My old seminary friend James Gibson has tagged me with a book meme. I am supposed to pick up the nearest book, turn to page 123, find the fifth sentence, and post the three sentences after it.
Since I am sitting on the floor in our family room at 5:30am leaning up against the couch, the nearest book is the high school history textbook my 15 year old step daughter was using last night to do her homework, The Western Experience, 8th edition, by Mortimer Chambers, Barbara Hanawalt, Theodore Rabb, Isser Woloch, and Raymond Grew (Boston: McGraw Hill, 2003). I have found the fifth sentence on p. 123. Here are the three that follow it:
"He had first gained a reputation in 77 B.C., when he was sent to Spain to end a revolt there. After completing this task, and while his army was still intact, he helped suppress a rebellion of slaves in Italy led by a Thracian slave named Spartacus. The campaign was already under under the command of another ambitious Roman, Marcus Linius Crassus, the richest man of his time."
Sorry, the fifth sentence told us who this person was, but I was only required to copy the three that followed it. If you want a hint, he walked into the Holy of Holies in Jerusalem in 63BC. Now I'm supposed to tag five others to pass along the meme. I will tag the last five commenters on my blog that I didn't tag last time (adding McGrath for tagging me last time; prepare thyself Jai for pay back :-). As usual, no hard feelings if you refuse to participate in such internet frivolity.
Thus tag I James McGrath, Craig Moore, Mark Schnell, Jennie-Joy, and Scott Hendricks. The book thing is actually a little more interesting than a generic meme.
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Philip Jenkins on Campus
Philip Jenkins is on the IWU campus today and tomorrow for our colloquium and various other activities. Jenkins teaches at Penn State and is best known for his thoughts on the shift of Christendom to the southern hemisphere, to the 2/3rds world.
This shift is fascinating. In my own denomination, we rode the wave of creating a world fellowship back in the 70's, allowing conferences like the Philippines and the Caribbean to have equal status with the North American church in those fellowships. North America still has the dollars, which means it still effectively has more power. But the possibly unforeseen effect is that, in the long run, the churches of the southern hemisphere may eventually have the power in the church because they have more numbers. We can anticipate a day when they will be passing resolutions to send our way, resolutions that we will probably resist.
We're already seeing this shift in power in the Anglican conflict over the homosexual bishop in the Episcopal Church in the United States. Certain bishops in Africa have created quite a stir leading to some rift in the fellowship. Of course there is no binding connection between members of the Anglican fellowship.
This shift is fascinating. In my own denomination, we rode the wave of creating a world fellowship back in the 70's, allowing conferences like the Philippines and the Caribbean to have equal status with the North American church in those fellowships. North America still has the dollars, which means it still effectively has more power. But the possibly unforeseen effect is that, in the long run, the churches of the southern hemisphere may eventually have the power in the church because they have more numbers. We can anticipate a day when they will be passing resolutions to send our way, resolutions that we will probably resist.
We're already seeing this shift in power in the Anglican conflict over the homosexual bishop in the Episcopal Church in the United States. Certain bishops in Africa have created quite a stir leading to some rift in the fellowship. Of course there is no binding connection between members of the Anglican fellowship.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
The Law the curtain, and Paul the man behind it...
I'm writing, not blogging, this week, but that doesn't stop me from posting some thoughts. I was describing Paul and the Law to a Romans class today and here's what leaped from my, by all accounts bizzare, mind:
The Law (understood as the Jewish Law, the ethical part of the Pentateuch) is like a screen from behind which Paul talks to us. When he's talking, he uses the word "Law," but he talks from what seem to us to be different parts of the Law.
Now he says we are not under Law, and he is behind the screen talking from the parts that have to do with things like circumcision and food laws, the parts that have most to do with Jewish ethnic particularity. He just calls it the Law or works of Law.
Then he tells us we do not make void the Law through faith, and he speaks from the parts like the sexual prohibitions of Leviticus 18 or most of the Ten Commandments. But he just calls it the Law or even works of Law.
Then of course sometimes he leaves this reservation. He speaks of Law as the entire Pentateuch, the Law as the literary corpus. Or still again, he can use the word in reference to a "rule," like a "law" in my members.
In short, it's no wonder there are so many books and differing positions on what the Law means for Paul!
The Law (understood as the Jewish Law, the ethical part of the Pentateuch) is like a screen from behind which Paul talks to us. When he's talking, he uses the word "Law," but he talks from what seem to us to be different parts of the Law.
Now he says we are not under Law, and he is behind the screen talking from the parts that have to do with things like circumcision and food laws, the parts that have most to do with Jewish ethnic particularity. He just calls it the Law or works of Law.
Then he tells us we do not make void the Law through faith, and he speaks from the parts like the sexual prohibitions of Leviticus 18 or most of the Ten Commandments. But he just calls it the Law or even works of Law.
Then of course sometimes he leaves this reservation. He speaks of Law as the entire Pentateuch, the Law as the literary corpus. Or still again, he can use the word in reference to a "rule," like a "law" in my members.
In short, it's no wonder there are so many books and differing positions on what the Law means for Paul!
Interesting piece on a shift in abortion strategy among some...
I thought this piece was interesting, since it relates to some things I pondered during the election season.
Monday, November 17, 2008
Monday Editorial: The Prophetic Model
If you have a background similar to mine, you'll have heard the idea of preaching against sin. It is a commonplace, "People are afraid to preach against sin these days." The charge is one of cowardism and accommodationism. "God hates sin," and we should preach against it.
The biblical model for this charge is the prophet, primarily the OT prophet, but also Jesus, Paul, and Acts. There is Elijah, who kills hundreds of prophets of Baal and anoints Jehu as king, who then slaughters 70 of Ahab's children. There's Jesus speaking out against the Pharisees in Matthew 23.
Preachers often invoke this model when they call out their churches on areas of sin or indict the broader culture for its sin. On the other hand, younger evangelicals seem quite averse to it. Their mantra is more Matthew 7:1--"Do not judge so that you are not judged." Accordingly, the current generation coming through the ranks is more accepting of its own sinfulness--and that of the culture around it--than ever before. Many of them seem to consider it a good sign if their non-believing friends don't perceive any difference between them at all.
We have to wonder if there are two opposite extremes going on here. But I only want to look at the prophetic model today. What is the place of the prophetic model today?
1. What kind of sin did the prophets do something about?
Elijah did something about a set of Baal worshippers--he killed them. We have to be careful about making him a model in this, however. The book of Hosea soundly criticizes Jehu, whom Elijah anointed, for killing the children of Ahab at Jezreel.
Also Elijah as far as we know never once set foot in the southern kingdom to visit the Jerusalem temple. According to Deuteronomy, this is a major issue, indeed the issue more than any other that guaranteed no king from the north would be considered a good king in 1 and 2 Kings.
My point is that Elijah was not a Christian, and we must be careful not to assume he is a model for us in everything he did.
It seems to me that the classic prophets most spoke out against what we would call social injustice today, about the oppressed of society like widows, the poor, and orphans. This was Jesus' major beef with the Pharisees in Matthew. This is what the classic prophets most speak out against. The intertextual echoes of Jesus in Jeremiah when he overthrows the tables of the moneychangers are in this area.
Yet when you here preachers talk about the need to speak out against sin, social injustice is not usually the topic they have in mind, although the issue of abortion would be an exception (preaching in defense of the rights of the unborn).
2. Prophets as foretellers of coming judgment
Jonah didn't go to Ninevah to enact legislation. He went to preach about impending judgment by God. He had no plans to enact the judgment himself. Similarly, Amos and Hosea preached against the sins of the northern kingdom and they preached that God was going to judge the nation.
Paul, in a position of disempowerment, says it is not his job to judge the world (1 Cor. 5). Rather, it is his job and the job of those in the church to judge those in the church. God will judge the world.
All this leads us to ask how Christians should speak out in contemporary culture today. Many operate with an unexamined model that says, "We should pass as many laws as we can to make the world act according to our understanding of Christian behavior." It seems to me, however, that there are some possible factors to this drive though that are unrecognized:
1. To what extent is this a collectivist construct? If you are in my group you must look like me. For my group to be intact, we must force people either to conform to our identity or force them out.
2. To what extent is this a function of repression? Speaking out against sin allows me to vent and to release my pent up repressed frustration. I could go running, but shouting at others is easier.
What do you think is the place for the prophetic model today? How if at all does the NT modify the Elijah prophetic model?
The biblical model for this charge is the prophet, primarily the OT prophet, but also Jesus, Paul, and Acts. There is Elijah, who kills hundreds of prophets of Baal and anoints Jehu as king, who then slaughters 70 of Ahab's children. There's Jesus speaking out against the Pharisees in Matthew 23.
Preachers often invoke this model when they call out their churches on areas of sin or indict the broader culture for its sin. On the other hand, younger evangelicals seem quite averse to it. Their mantra is more Matthew 7:1--"Do not judge so that you are not judged." Accordingly, the current generation coming through the ranks is more accepting of its own sinfulness--and that of the culture around it--than ever before. Many of them seem to consider it a good sign if their non-believing friends don't perceive any difference between them at all.
We have to wonder if there are two opposite extremes going on here. But I only want to look at the prophetic model today. What is the place of the prophetic model today?
1. What kind of sin did the prophets do something about?
Elijah did something about a set of Baal worshippers--he killed them. We have to be careful about making him a model in this, however. The book of Hosea soundly criticizes Jehu, whom Elijah anointed, for killing the children of Ahab at Jezreel.
Also Elijah as far as we know never once set foot in the southern kingdom to visit the Jerusalem temple. According to Deuteronomy, this is a major issue, indeed the issue more than any other that guaranteed no king from the north would be considered a good king in 1 and 2 Kings.
My point is that Elijah was not a Christian, and we must be careful not to assume he is a model for us in everything he did.
It seems to me that the classic prophets most spoke out against what we would call social injustice today, about the oppressed of society like widows, the poor, and orphans. This was Jesus' major beef with the Pharisees in Matthew. This is what the classic prophets most speak out against. The intertextual echoes of Jesus in Jeremiah when he overthrows the tables of the moneychangers are in this area.
Yet when you here preachers talk about the need to speak out against sin, social injustice is not usually the topic they have in mind, although the issue of abortion would be an exception (preaching in defense of the rights of the unborn).
2. Prophets as foretellers of coming judgment
Jonah didn't go to Ninevah to enact legislation. He went to preach about impending judgment by God. He had no plans to enact the judgment himself. Similarly, Amos and Hosea preached against the sins of the northern kingdom and they preached that God was going to judge the nation.
Paul, in a position of disempowerment, says it is not his job to judge the world (1 Cor. 5). Rather, it is his job and the job of those in the church to judge those in the church. God will judge the world.
All this leads us to ask how Christians should speak out in contemporary culture today. Many operate with an unexamined model that says, "We should pass as many laws as we can to make the world act according to our understanding of Christian behavior." It seems to me, however, that there are some possible factors to this drive though that are unrecognized:
1. To what extent is this a collectivist construct? If you are in my group you must look like me. For my group to be intact, we must force people either to conform to our identity or force them out.
2. To what extent is this a function of repression? Speaking out against sin allows me to vent and to release my pent up repressed frustration. I could go running, but shouting at others is easier.
What do you think is the place for the prophetic model today? How if at all does the NT modify the Elijah prophetic model?
Sunday, November 16, 2008
No offense to you Palin fans...
As I wander weak and weary through my house, I wandered through a room where several of my children were watching the recent Get Smart DVD. "That's the Lincoln Memorial," I said. "It's not important," was one response. You parents know. They get to this age where the only really important things in life are Beyonce and Twilight.
And then I thought of Sarah Palin.
Bush Doctrine, NAFTA? Name a newspaper, any newspaper, even a conservative one. A Supreme Court decision other than Roe vs. Wade you disagree with? What does Sarkozy's voice really sound like?
Not important... until you run for Vice President. "Yah, but the great thing about America is that you only have to be popular to be President. You betcha."
And then I thought of Sarah Palin.
Bush Doctrine, NAFTA? Name a newspaper, any newspaper, even a conservative one. A Supreme Court decision other than Roe vs. Wade you disagree with? What does Sarkozy's voice really sound like?
Not important... until you run for Vice President. "Yah, but the great thing about America is that you only have to be popular to be President. You betcha."
Notre Dame Library Blues
In one final preparatory effort for SBL next week, I made a visit this weekend to the research library at Notre Dame to fill in some footnotes. ... and I got that same sinking feeling I'll be bombarded with next weekend.
Who can keep up with all the thoughts on all the things that people are thinking through! And of course the practical question, why are we all doing this? Why would I want to contribute yet another book to this massive pile of mostly idiosyncratic studies?
Don't get me wrong. I'll keep writing, reading, and buying. But I feel guilty expecting anyone to buy any of it. Most of it is a strange, self-perpetuating game between universities, professors, and publishers. Only a few studies truly advance the discussion. The rest contribute to the massive footnotes. A solid biblioblog could easily be more valuable than half the twelfth floor of the Hesburgh library.
Don't get me wrong. I love it! But it depresses me. My first reaction is always depression. My second reaction is always, I should write novels and do the rest for free on my blog. My third reaction is to go back to my day job.
Who can keep up with all the thoughts on all the things that people are thinking through! And of course the practical question, why are we all doing this? Why would I want to contribute yet another book to this massive pile of mostly idiosyncratic studies?
Don't get me wrong. I'll keep writing, reading, and buying. But I feel guilty expecting anyone to buy any of it. Most of it is a strange, self-perpetuating game between universities, professors, and publishers. Only a few studies truly advance the discussion. The rest contribute to the massive footnotes. A solid biblioblog could easily be more valuable than half the twelfth floor of the Hesburgh library.
Don't get me wrong. I love it! But it depresses me. My first reaction is always depression. My second reaction is always, I should write novels and do the rest for free on my blog. My third reaction is to go back to my day job.
Resurrection in Philippians
1:21 For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. And if I live in the flesh, this [brings] the fruit of a good work, and which I will choose I do not know. For I am torn between the two, having the desire to go away and be with Christ (which is much better). But to remain in flesh is more necessary for you...
This passage more than any other argues that Paul believed a person would be conscious in between death and the parousia. This does not seem problematic except that 1 Thessalonians and 1 Corinthians would not naturally lead us in this direction. The image of sleep and Paul's insistence that if there is no resurrection, those who have died are lost, places an immense focus on the parousia as the time of meaningful afterlife in Paul's thought.
The idea that Paul's thought had undergone change in between 1 Corinthians and Philippians, supported by the passage in 2 Corinthians 5 we looked at yesterday, is thus worthy of consideration. Most scholars generally think that Paul believed in an intermediate state in 1 Corinthians too, only that he didn't discuss it. But if one sees development in his thought on resurrection at this juncture, seeing development on this point also probably makes sense.
This passage is fairly clear at least that at this point of Paul's ministry, whether at Ephesus or Rome, he believed that one went to be with Christ immediately at death.
3:8, 10-11 ... I consider [whatever was to my gain] as dung in order that I might gain Christ ... to know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings, being conformed to his death if somehow I might reach the resurrection, the one out of the dead.
The wording here is interesting. This particular word for resurrection appears only here (ἐξανάστασιν), but it is not clear it has any different meaning than the more usual word. The very word itself could support some changed view of resurrection, but we have no evidence to argue for such. Our first impression is that Paul is alluding to exactly the same teaching as 1 Corinthians 15 here, namely, that there will be a resurrection of the dead at the parousia.
Is there any other way to take the statement, such that it would fit with a shift? Certainly Paul could come to believe in an intermediate state and still believe the spiritual embodiment part only came at a future resurrection. But this line of thought would not fit with the kind of shift Bruce/Thrall see taking place in 2 Corinthians 5 (Interestingly, Woody, Harris seems to have backed off from his earlier position over time--Second Epistle, 380 n.65).
Could Paul have shifted to think that we receive our spiritual body at death but still reserved the word resurrection for the time of the parousia? But then wouldn't the word resurrection largely lose any real significance?
Of course I suppose that nothing stops us from seeing this comment in relation to the point of death. Paul wants to be resurrected at death. Interestingly, if Paul had changed his mind, then he would be changing from any teaching he had given to the Philippians on resurrection when he was with them before. Would this be a reason to keep his wording ambiguous, so that it could be taken either in the former or in his new way?
Gordon Fee suggests a reason for the wording "to the resurrection, the one from the dead" (Philippians, 335 n.68). It would seem many scholars see the first comment, "to know the power of his resurrection," in reference to this life, a power such as we hear about in Romans 6 and 8. The clarification of reference to "the one from the dead" would thus be in contrast to the resurrection to new life in this life and would have nothing to do with when resurrection took place after death.
It is thus possible to read 3:11 in the light of a belief that, for believers, a resurrection body stands available at death, a body that others will not receive. Those individuals will remain "naked," so to speak.
The verses that immediately follow at least potentially might shed light on what Paul has in mind here.
3:12 Not that I already received or have already been perfected... I pursue for the prize of the upward calling of God in Christ Jesus...
Paul presumably has already received the power of Christ's resurrection. It seems to me the most natural way to take this comment is that he has not yet received the "upward call of God in Christ Jesus." This is the prize that he says he is pursuing and that which he has just mentioned in 3:11 as something he wishes to attain to. It is this that he has not yet received and thus he has not yet been perfected.
We remember that perfection can be used of death in Jewish literature (e.g., 4 Macc. 7:15). It would not be difficult to modify a sense of perfection at death to a sense of perfection for some at death.
It is thus possible to see Paul thinking about resurrection at death or at the parousia in the previous verse. Our decision will depend on exegetical decisions we make elsewhere.
3:20-21 For our citizenship exists in heaven, from which we also await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform the body of our humiliation to be conformed to the body of his glory according to the working of the One who is also able to subject all things to him.
This passage has to do with the transformation of the bodies of those who are "alive and remain at the coming of our Lord." It thus does not point one way or another in relation to the point of resurrection for the dead. It does show an interesting orientation around heaven that seems a little different from Paul's earlier writings.
This passage more than any other argues that Paul believed a person would be conscious in between death and the parousia. This does not seem problematic except that 1 Thessalonians and 1 Corinthians would not naturally lead us in this direction. The image of sleep and Paul's insistence that if there is no resurrection, those who have died are lost, places an immense focus on the parousia as the time of meaningful afterlife in Paul's thought.
The idea that Paul's thought had undergone change in between 1 Corinthians and Philippians, supported by the passage in 2 Corinthians 5 we looked at yesterday, is thus worthy of consideration. Most scholars generally think that Paul believed in an intermediate state in 1 Corinthians too, only that he didn't discuss it. But if one sees development in his thought on resurrection at this juncture, seeing development on this point also probably makes sense.
This passage is fairly clear at least that at this point of Paul's ministry, whether at Ephesus or Rome, he believed that one went to be with Christ immediately at death.
3:8, 10-11 ... I consider [whatever was to my gain] as dung in order that I might gain Christ ... to know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings, being conformed to his death if somehow I might reach the resurrection, the one out of the dead.
The wording here is interesting. This particular word for resurrection appears only here (ἐξανάστασιν), but it is not clear it has any different meaning than the more usual word. The very word itself could support some changed view of resurrection, but we have no evidence to argue for such. Our first impression is that Paul is alluding to exactly the same teaching as 1 Corinthians 15 here, namely, that there will be a resurrection of the dead at the parousia.
Is there any other way to take the statement, such that it would fit with a shift? Certainly Paul could come to believe in an intermediate state and still believe the spiritual embodiment part only came at a future resurrection. But this line of thought would not fit with the kind of shift Bruce/Thrall see taking place in 2 Corinthians 5 (Interestingly, Woody, Harris seems to have backed off from his earlier position over time--Second Epistle, 380 n.65).
Could Paul have shifted to think that we receive our spiritual body at death but still reserved the word resurrection for the time of the parousia? But then wouldn't the word resurrection largely lose any real significance?
Of course I suppose that nothing stops us from seeing this comment in relation to the point of death. Paul wants to be resurrected at death. Interestingly, if Paul had changed his mind, then he would be changing from any teaching he had given to the Philippians on resurrection when he was with them before. Would this be a reason to keep his wording ambiguous, so that it could be taken either in the former or in his new way?
Gordon Fee suggests a reason for the wording "to the resurrection, the one from the dead" (Philippians, 335 n.68). It would seem many scholars see the first comment, "to know the power of his resurrection," in reference to this life, a power such as we hear about in Romans 6 and 8. The clarification of reference to "the one from the dead" would thus be in contrast to the resurrection to new life in this life and would have nothing to do with when resurrection took place after death.
It is thus possible to read 3:11 in the light of a belief that, for believers, a resurrection body stands available at death, a body that others will not receive. Those individuals will remain "naked," so to speak.
The verses that immediately follow at least potentially might shed light on what Paul has in mind here.
3:12 Not that I already received or have already been perfected... I pursue for the prize of the upward calling of God in Christ Jesus...
Paul presumably has already received the power of Christ's resurrection. It seems to me the most natural way to take this comment is that he has not yet received the "upward call of God in Christ Jesus." This is the prize that he says he is pursuing and that which he has just mentioned in 3:11 as something he wishes to attain to. It is this that he has not yet received and thus he has not yet been perfected.
We remember that perfection can be used of death in Jewish literature (e.g., 4 Macc. 7:15). It would not be difficult to modify a sense of perfection at death to a sense of perfection for some at death.
It is thus possible to see Paul thinking about resurrection at death or at the parousia in the previous verse. Our decision will depend on exegetical decisions we make elsewhere.
3:20-21 For our citizenship exists in heaven, from which we also await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform the body of our humiliation to be conformed to the body of his glory according to the working of the One who is also able to subject all things to him.
This passage has to do with the transformation of the bodies of those who are "alive and remain at the coming of our Lord." It thus does not point one way or another in relation to the point of resurrection for the dead. It does show an interesting orientation around heaven that seems a little different from Paul's earlier writings.
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Clear evidence that passing laws advances the gospel...
It is pretty clear that passing Proposition 8 in California has led many to repent of their sins and will draw an increasing number to Christ. We should celebrate this victory for the reconciliation of the world to the God who sent His Son to win it back.
Anger Over Prop. 8 Erupts In San Francisco
Anger Over Prop. 8 Erupts In San Francisco
The online biblical commentary to come...
You've heard it all before--why do we need all these commentaries? It's the same question people in the pew ask about Bible translations, why do we need all these versions? New commentaries survive only because of niche markets and the playing out of new hermeneutics.
What's worse, they get longer and longer and longer. So now we can't cover 2 Corinthians in one commentary. We have to have two or even three!
I can see what is coming. Someone will create an online commentary resource with endless layers. If you want to dig deep, you click. But the surface is big picture and majority position oriented. Since the resource will be owned by some arbitrator--a university or the Society of Biblical Literature, individual writers will not get the final say on some position taken. The resource will record and map all the positions.
Of course someone could create a Wiki for this. That would be better than nothing. Maybe a person would have to have a bona fide masters degree in some area of biblical studies to post. But then you would effectively eliminate most biblical scholars, who undoubtedly won't be doing any blogging or wiki-ing any time soon, let alone Facebook :-)
How 'bout it, guild. A publisher could of course do it, but most of them have partisan leanings too and dark popes controlling what gets published. And besides, as I think someone somewhere will post Monday, publishers are at an end.
What's worse, they get longer and longer and longer. So now we can't cover 2 Corinthians in one commentary. We have to have two or even three!
I can see what is coming. Someone will create an online commentary resource with endless layers. If you want to dig deep, you click. But the surface is big picture and majority position oriented. Since the resource will be owned by some arbitrator--a university or the Society of Biblical Literature, individual writers will not get the final say on some position taken. The resource will record and map all the positions.
Of course someone could create a Wiki for this. That would be better than nothing. Maybe a person would have to have a bona fide masters degree in some area of biblical studies to post. But then you would effectively eliminate most biblical scholars, who undoubtedly won't be doing any blogging or wiki-ing any time soon, let alone Facebook :-)
How 'bout it, guild. A publisher could of course do it, but most of them have partisan leanings too and dark popes controlling what gets published. And besides, as I think someone somewhere will post Monday, publishers are at an end.
You'll starve, but you won't get Salmonella.
I found out today that my parents' home church in Lakeland, Florida no longer has a food pantry for the homeless, the poor, and the needy. Why? Because Florida state law requires them to have a dedicated room and a refrigerator of certain specifications. So apparently they can't pass out canned food because they don't have a refrigerator.
As we look to the burgeoning economic crisis, we have to congratulate states like Florida and California for their tendency to legislate the size of the shrubbery around your church. You'll find it much harder to find food now than before, but at least you won't get salmonella.
"That government governs best that governs least." Thomas Jefferson
"Don't elect people as state representatives who are anal retentive." Ken Schenck
"P.S. This goes for the people you elect for university committees." Ken Schenck
"P.S.S. And whatever you do, don't put lawyers on university committees." Anonymous
As we look to the burgeoning economic crisis, we have to congratulate states like Florida and California for their tendency to legislate the size of the shrubbery around your church. You'll find it much harder to find food now than before, but at least you won't get salmonella.
"That government governs best that governs least." Thomas Jefferson
"Don't elect people as state representatives who are anal retentive." Ken Schenck
"P.S. This goes for the people you elect for university committees." Ken Schenck
"P.S.S. And whatever you do, don't put lawyers on university committees." Anonymous
Margaret Thrall's Interpretation of 2 Corinthians 5:1-10
I have found Margaret Thrall's interpretation of 2 Corinthians 5:1-10 quite exemplary, from her commentary in the ICC (International Critical Commentary) series. The interpretation of the first few verses is a wonderful case study in the uncertainty of the original meaning and how naive it is to suggest that we can get our theology from the Bible alone. At the same time, I think Thrall, who used to teach in Bangor at the University of Wales, gives us a great example of trying to weigh the evidence objectively and dispassionately.
Her interpretation of these ten verses is 44 pages long, most of it on just the first verse, and I only want to catalog her treatment of a couple key words and phrases.
A. "If our earthly house of dwelling should be destroyed...
Here she catalogs three different interpretations for what this phrase connotes:
1. Paul refers to the material body as the dwelling-place of the soul.
2. This phrase refers to a human's total earthly existence.
3. There is an allusion here to temple symbolism.
She primarily goes with #1, with a possibility of some of #3: "Certainly Paul is not setting out to propound a strictly dualistic anthropology, but he has used dualistic language in 4.16, and whilst he does not desire freedom from corporeal existence as such, in v. 4 he seems to be saying that he finds his present bodily life burdensome" (361).
B. ... we have a domicile from God... an eternal house not made with hands in the heavens
After she concludes that Paul refers to death when he speaks of the destruction of our "earthly house of dwelling," she now turns to what this "house from God" might be. She catalogs nine different interpretations:
1. the individual resurrection body
2. a heavenly habitation (like a "mansion" in the misinterpretation of John)
3. an interim heavenly body between death and the resurrection
4. the inner person
5. the body of Christ in an ecclesiological sense
6. the heavenly temple
7. the resurrection body of Christ
8. the coming, future age
9. the heavenly dimension of our current existence
Thrall concludes the first option: "In itself it poses the fewest problems. This decision must, however, be seen as provisional, since we need also to consider how it would fit the remainder of the present verse and the section as a whole, and, in addition, to discuss the relationship between this understanding of 2 Cor. 5:1b and Paul's eschatological outlook in 1 Corinthians 15" (367-68).
C. "we have a domicile from God...
Next she discusses the present tense here, namely, the fact that "the natural way of understanding the time to which it refers is to suppose that it coincides with the time reference of καταλυθῇ: reception of the heavenly dwelling is immediately consequent upon the dissolution of the earthly house" (368). The problem with this interpretation is that in 1 Corinthians 15:23, "it is not at death that the resurrection body is bestowed but at the Parousia" (368).
She catalogs four suggested ways of resolving the problem:
1. Believers "have" the spiritual body already in the sense that it is already in the mind of God or in a closet in heaven (my wording).
2. This is proleptic language--something so certain in the future that we can say we already have it in the present.
3. The resurrection body will be received immediately after death.
4. There is no temporal connotation it is a statement of general truth.
Thrall concludes that 3 is the most natural reading, although she admits of the possibility of #4: "We may provisionally conclude that in 5.1 Paul may express his confidence that, should a believer die before the Parousia, he will at that moment come into possession of a permanent (αἰώνιον), spiritual (ἀχειροποίητον), and heavenly (ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς) form of existence. In view of the explicit contrast with the οἰκία τοῦ σκήνους, this must be seen as somatic existence, and hence as the σῶμα πνευματικόν" (370).
D. ... we will not be found naked.
Thrall mentions two basic possibilities for what Paul means here when he speaks of not wanting to be found naked but to be clothed.
1. "Naked" may refer to the soul stripped of its earthly body.
2. The image of nakedness may be used in a moral sense, as a metaphor of shame.
Because Thrall has found more likely in 5:1 the idea of being clothed with the resurrection body immediately at death, she goes with #2.
E. We are bold, wishing more to be away from our bodily home and at home with the Lord (5:8; by the way, these transations by the capital letters are mine rather than hers; the ICC comments on the Greek text, not on the English).
In the intervening verses, Thrall has argued that expressions like "taking off clothes" most likely refer to death (she goes through 5 options). So when she gets to this verse, she says, "Now, it would seem, he expresses a positive preference for departure from bodily existence and transition to the home with the Lord" (389).
Here is her conclusion: "We conclude, then, that it is, after all, death to which ἐκδημῆσαι ἐκ τοῦ σώματος refers. It is then natural to suppose that the ἐνδημῆσαι πρὸς τὸν κύριον follows immediately upon it. It is true that in 1 Th 4.17 it is at the Parousia that the believer goes to be with Christ, and that in 1 Cor 13.12 the vision 'face to face' ... belongs to the post-Parousia experience. But the present passage must first be interpreted in its own terms" (391).
She continues, "Also, it is not clear why Paul should express a preference for death followed by a period of 'sleep' for the spirit, which is the prospect envisaged in 1 Th 4.13 and 1 Cor 15.18. In Phil 1.23, moreover, departure from this life appears to be followed immediately by existence with Christ."
I am calling this the Thrall/Bruce interpretation of 2 Corinthians 5:1-10. It seems to imply that Paul underwent some transition in his thinking on this subject in the time between 1 and 2 Corinthians. In this scenario, Paul in 1 Thessalonians and 1 Corinthians saw the time between death and resurrection as a time of "sleep" waiting new embodiment at the time of Christ's return. But then in 2 Corinthians and then later in Philippians, Paul sees believers getting a resurrection body immediately at death (on 392 Thrall suggests maybe the transformation process now begins immediately at death and is radically accelerated by being in the Lord's presence).
Yesterday I looked at Romans 6-8 and didn't find anything that clearly contradicted this scenario, since in any case the resurrection body still awaits the parousia for those who are still alive. Only the dead would already have theirs, in this scenario.
In my opinion, however, some of Philippians is very hard to read on this scenario, on which I hope to post tomorrow.
P.S. Again, for those who do not have Logos software, can you see the Greek font above? Thanks Bob for following up. You don't have logos, right?
Her interpretation of these ten verses is 44 pages long, most of it on just the first verse, and I only want to catalog her treatment of a couple key words and phrases.
A. "If our earthly house of dwelling should be destroyed...
Here she catalogs three different interpretations for what this phrase connotes:
1. Paul refers to the material body as the dwelling-place of the soul.
2. This phrase refers to a human's total earthly existence.
3. There is an allusion here to temple symbolism.
She primarily goes with #1, with a possibility of some of #3: "Certainly Paul is not setting out to propound a strictly dualistic anthropology, but he has used dualistic language in 4.16, and whilst he does not desire freedom from corporeal existence as such, in v. 4 he seems to be saying that he finds his present bodily life burdensome" (361).
B. ... we have a domicile from God... an eternal house not made with hands in the heavens
After she concludes that Paul refers to death when he speaks of the destruction of our "earthly house of dwelling," she now turns to what this "house from God" might be. She catalogs nine different interpretations:
1. the individual resurrection body
2. a heavenly habitation (like a "mansion" in the misinterpretation of John)
3. an interim heavenly body between death and the resurrection
4. the inner person
5. the body of Christ in an ecclesiological sense
6. the heavenly temple
7. the resurrection body of Christ
8. the coming, future age
9. the heavenly dimension of our current existence
Thrall concludes the first option: "In itself it poses the fewest problems. This decision must, however, be seen as provisional, since we need also to consider how it would fit the remainder of the present verse and the section as a whole, and, in addition, to discuss the relationship between this understanding of 2 Cor. 5:1b and Paul's eschatological outlook in 1 Corinthians 15" (367-68).
C. "we have a domicile from God...
Next she discusses the present tense here, namely, the fact that "the natural way of understanding the time to which it refers is to suppose that it coincides with the time reference of καταλυθῇ: reception of the heavenly dwelling is immediately consequent upon the dissolution of the earthly house" (368). The problem with this interpretation is that in 1 Corinthians 15:23, "it is not at death that the resurrection body is bestowed but at the Parousia" (368).
She catalogs four suggested ways of resolving the problem:
1. Believers "have" the spiritual body already in the sense that it is already in the mind of God or in a closet in heaven (my wording).
2. This is proleptic language--something so certain in the future that we can say we already have it in the present.
3. The resurrection body will be received immediately after death.
4. There is no temporal connotation it is a statement of general truth.
Thrall concludes that 3 is the most natural reading, although she admits of the possibility of #4: "We may provisionally conclude that in 5.1 Paul may express his confidence that, should a believer die before the Parousia, he will at that moment come into possession of a permanent (αἰώνιον), spiritual (ἀχειροποίητον), and heavenly (ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς) form of existence. In view of the explicit contrast with the οἰκία τοῦ σκήνους, this must be seen as somatic existence, and hence as the σῶμα πνευματικόν" (370).
D. ... we will not be found naked.
Thrall mentions two basic possibilities for what Paul means here when he speaks of not wanting to be found naked but to be clothed.
1. "Naked" may refer to the soul stripped of its earthly body.
2. The image of nakedness may be used in a moral sense, as a metaphor of shame.
Because Thrall has found more likely in 5:1 the idea of being clothed with the resurrection body immediately at death, she goes with #2.
E. We are bold, wishing more to be away from our bodily home and at home with the Lord (5:8; by the way, these transations by the capital letters are mine rather than hers; the ICC comments on the Greek text, not on the English).
In the intervening verses, Thrall has argued that expressions like "taking off clothes" most likely refer to death (she goes through 5 options). So when she gets to this verse, she says, "Now, it would seem, he expresses a positive preference for departure from bodily existence and transition to the home with the Lord" (389).
Here is her conclusion: "We conclude, then, that it is, after all, death to which ἐκδημῆσαι ἐκ τοῦ σώματος refers. It is then natural to suppose that the ἐνδημῆσαι πρὸς τὸν κύριον follows immediately upon it. It is true that in 1 Th 4.17 it is at the Parousia that the believer goes to be with Christ, and that in 1 Cor 13.12 the vision 'face to face' ... belongs to the post-Parousia experience. But the present passage must first be interpreted in its own terms" (391).
She continues, "Also, it is not clear why Paul should express a preference for death followed by a period of 'sleep' for the spirit, which is the prospect envisaged in 1 Th 4.13 and 1 Cor 15.18. In Phil 1.23, moreover, departure from this life appears to be followed immediately by existence with Christ."
I am calling this the Thrall/Bruce interpretation of 2 Corinthians 5:1-10. It seems to imply that Paul underwent some transition in his thinking on this subject in the time between 1 and 2 Corinthians. In this scenario, Paul in 1 Thessalonians and 1 Corinthians saw the time between death and resurrection as a time of "sleep" waiting new embodiment at the time of Christ's return. But then in 2 Corinthians and then later in Philippians, Paul sees believers getting a resurrection body immediately at death (on 392 Thrall suggests maybe the transformation process now begins immediately at death and is radically accelerated by being in the Lord's presence).
Yesterday I looked at Romans 6-8 and didn't find anything that clearly contradicted this scenario, since in any case the resurrection body still awaits the parousia for those who are still alive. Only the dead would already have theirs, in this scenario.
In my opinion, however, some of Philippians is very hard to read on this scenario, on which I hope to post tomorrow.
P.S. Again, for those who do not have Logos software, can you see the Greek font above? Thanks Bob for following up. You don't have logos, right?
Friday, November 14, 2008
Resurrection in Romans 5-8
I suspect this will seem like a strange post, but I'm working on something. My main question of the text of Romans 5-8 is whether Paul seems to have the same view of resurrection here that he has in 1 Corinthians 15 and 1 Thessalonians 4.
5:2 We boast in hope of the glory of God.
I would connect this statement to Romans 3:23 and Psalm 8. "All have sinned and are lacking the glory of God" that he intended for humanity to have in the creation in Psalm 8. We hope to receive this glory.
The question for my purposes here is whether Paul is thinking about 1) the future resurrection of the dead in Christ; 2) is he thinking about what will happen to believers when Christ returns; or 3) is he thinking about something that happens to us at death? Of course it is possible to combine 1 and 2 or 2 and 3.
5:5 And hope does not ashame, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts through Holy Spirit that has been given to us.
The connection between the Holy Spirit and hope, it seems to me, connects directly to Paul's sense, which I think appears for the first time in 2 Corinthians 5:5, that the Spirit is the αρραβων of our heavenly dwelling, our resurrection body.
However, the 2 Corinthians 5 passage is exactly the one that F. F. Bruce suggested might mark a shift in Paul's conceptualization of death, to where we receive our heavenly dwelling at death instead of at some point when we are resurrected in the future. This verse could fit with either way.
5:9 Therefore, how much more, having been justified now by his blood will we be saved through him from wrath
I mention this verse only to point out the future sense of salvation for Paul here. We will escape God's coming punishment because of the atonement of Christ's blood. Salvation from wrath clearly applies to those who are alive at the time of wrath. Does it apply equally for those who have died (in the future tense) or is this comment largely irrelevant in relation to the dead? Does the verse have the living audience of Romans in view in the light of a judgment to come perhaps within their lifetime?
5:17 For if by the transgression of the one [man] death ruled through the one [man], how much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness rule with life through the one [man] Jesus Christ!
5:21 ... so that just as sin ruled in death, so also might grace run through righteousness leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
To rule in life or to have eternal life speaks to the destiny of the justified by faith. Paul does not speak here of the form of that life, whether it begins immediately at death or whether the dead must wait until the resurrection to commence it.
I might just note here the connection Paul makes in the possibly traditional formula of 4:25--"... who was handed over for our transgressions and was raised for our justification." More below on the parallel between Jesus' resurrection and the story of the believer.
6:4 Therefore, we were buried with him through baptism leading to death so that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so also we might walk in newness of life.
What is interesting about this statement is that it seems the first place that comes to my mind where Paul links Christ's resurrection not to our future resurrection but to our present newness of life, to "being raised" in our earthly behavior. I'll go back through Paul's other writings to double check such things. I'm just getting my thoughts in order here.
6:5 For if we have become united with the likeness of his death, but also we will be [united with the likeness] of the resurrection.
The question is what resurrection might mean for Paul and his readers here. He has just spoken of newness of life in the previous verse. Does resurrection here merely mean the new life believers now have? Does he mean a life that begins now and continues forever? Is he thinking about some resurrection after death in the future or at death? Not enough info here to know for sure, although the parallel to 6:4 might push us a little toward a resurrection of new life here and now, especially since the next verse says that "our old self has been crucified so that the body of sin might be destroyed, so that we are no longer enslaved to sin." 6:6 speaks to a new life we have here and now.
6:8, 11, 13 And if we have died with Christ, we have faith that we will also live with him... so also we reckon ourselves to be dead to sin but living to God in Christ Jesus... present yourselves to God as living from the dead...
None of these comments precludes a reference to future resurrection from the dead, but the focus is clearly on resurrection to new life in this world as we live free from the power of Sin over us. This world is the primary referrent of resurrection in this passage.
So the question is whether Paul anticipated that he and the Romans would die prior to Christ's arrival. If not, then he would not primarily be thinking of their rising from the dead. Life for them would be something that started now and continued into eternity. If he had undergone a shift in his thinking, the dead in Christ would already have their resurrection body and would simply join the living in Christ, who of course would still need to be transformed.
6:22 But now having been freed from Sin and having been enslaved to God you have your fruit in holiness, and the end [of it is] eternal life.
It is interesting that this phrase, "eternal life," does not appear in either 1 Thessalonians or 1 Corinthians. It does appear in Galatians 6:8 but I don't date Galatians until after 1 Corinthians. The category of the eternal suddenly picks up in Paul's writings in 2 Corinthians and then appears fairly frequently in Romans.
One passage where it appears is in Romans 2:5-7--"... according to your hardened and unrepentant heart you are storing up for yourself wrath on the Day of Wrath and of the revelation of the righteous judgment of God, who will repay to each according to his works, to those who by enduring good work seek glory and honor and immortality, [he will repay] eternal life."
Paul does not mention a resurrection here and perhaps pictures the Romans, still living at the time of Christ's return, being judged and granted to continue to live forever because of their "good works," which of course presumes all the soteriology and pneumatology of the rest of the book. In any case, nothing about the passage hints that resurrection is on Paul's mind.
7:6 But now we have been released from the Law, having died in relation to what we used to hold fast to, so that we might serve in the newness of Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter.
I mention this verse only because of its parallelism to walking in newness of life above. Having died to the Law in Christ, we rise to newness of life in the Spirit.
8:10-11 Now if Christ is in you [all], the body is dead because of sin and the spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of the One who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you [all], [then] the one who raised Christ from the dead will give life also to your mortal bodies through his Spirit that dwells in you [all].
What is striking to me is that Paul doesn't seem to be thinking directly about future resurrection when he speaks of God giving life to their mortal bodies here. The entire train of thought is about being able to live according to the Spirit in this life. The context is about how that "as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God" (8:14).
The giving of life to our mortal bodies thus seems to be located once again in this world, the possibility of walking according to the Spirit fulfilling the righteous requirement of the Law (8:4) in this life. Resurrection language is thus applied to now rather than later in 8:11.
8:13 For if you are living according to flesh, you are about to die. But if by the Spirit you are putting to death the practices of the body, you will live.
You will live as in continue to live at the point when you would otherwise have died or remained dead. This statement fits best two scenarios: 1) continuance to live after the judgment, 2) resurrection from the dead at Christ's return. It fits less well with 3) continuance to live at death.
8:19, 21 For the eager expectation of the creation awaits the revelation of the sons of God... Because the creation itself will be freed from slavery to corruption for the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
These verses seems to allude to the transformation of the earthly bodies of the living on the Day of Salvation. It looks to the transformation of this world, rather than that of the dead because it is speaking of this creation.
8:23 ... we ourselves also, having the firstfruit of the Spirit, we ourselves also groan in ourselves, awaiting adoption, the redemption of our bodies...
Again, Paul is speaking to the living and of the transformation that will take place on the Day. The Spirit inside has begun the transformation--"we are being transformed from glory to glory as from the "Lord," the Spirit" (2 Cor. 3:18).
8:29 ... because those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son.
The reference here would seem to be to the transformation we normally associate with resurrection, although Paul doesn't use the word resurrection. We think, however, of Philippians 3:20-21--"For our citizenship exists in the heavens, from which also we await a savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform the body of our humiliation to be conformed to the body of his glory..."
There is no mention here of dying first. This transformation will take place for those who are living no matter when it happens to the dead.
I conclude that Romans 6-8 say nothing firm on the question of whether the dead in Christ are transformed immediately at death or must await their transformation at the time of Christ's return. However, Philippians must be looked at very carefully, especially 3:11.
Perhaps tomorrow...
χάρις
5:2 We boast in hope of the glory of God.
I would connect this statement to Romans 3:23 and Psalm 8. "All have sinned and are lacking the glory of God" that he intended for humanity to have in the creation in Psalm 8. We hope to receive this glory.
The question for my purposes here is whether Paul is thinking about 1) the future resurrection of the dead in Christ; 2) is he thinking about what will happen to believers when Christ returns; or 3) is he thinking about something that happens to us at death? Of course it is possible to combine 1 and 2 or 2 and 3.
5:5 And hope does not ashame, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts through Holy Spirit that has been given to us.
The connection between the Holy Spirit and hope, it seems to me, connects directly to Paul's sense, which I think appears for the first time in 2 Corinthians 5:5, that the Spirit is the αρραβων of our heavenly dwelling, our resurrection body.
However, the 2 Corinthians 5 passage is exactly the one that F. F. Bruce suggested might mark a shift in Paul's conceptualization of death, to where we receive our heavenly dwelling at death instead of at some point when we are resurrected in the future. This verse could fit with either way.
5:9 Therefore, how much more, having been justified now by his blood will we be saved through him from wrath
I mention this verse only to point out the future sense of salvation for Paul here. We will escape God's coming punishment because of the atonement of Christ's blood. Salvation from wrath clearly applies to those who are alive at the time of wrath. Does it apply equally for those who have died (in the future tense) or is this comment largely irrelevant in relation to the dead? Does the verse have the living audience of Romans in view in the light of a judgment to come perhaps within their lifetime?
5:17 For if by the transgression of the one [man] death ruled through the one [man], how much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness rule with life through the one [man] Jesus Christ!
5:21 ... so that just as sin ruled in death, so also might grace run through righteousness leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
To rule in life or to have eternal life speaks to the destiny of the justified by faith. Paul does not speak here of the form of that life, whether it begins immediately at death or whether the dead must wait until the resurrection to commence it.
I might just note here the connection Paul makes in the possibly traditional formula of 4:25--"... who was handed over for our transgressions and was raised for our justification." More below on the parallel between Jesus' resurrection and the story of the believer.
6:4 Therefore, we were buried with him through baptism leading to death so that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so also we might walk in newness of life.
What is interesting about this statement is that it seems the first place that comes to my mind where Paul links Christ's resurrection not to our future resurrection but to our present newness of life, to "being raised" in our earthly behavior. I'll go back through Paul's other writings to double check such things. I'm just getting my thoughts in order here.
6:5 For if we have become united with the likeness of his death, but also we will be [united with the likeness] of the resurrection.
The question is what resurrection might mean for Paul and his readers here. He has just spoken of newness of life in the previous verse. Does resurrection here merely mean the new life believers now have? Does he mean a life that begins now and continues forever? Is he thinking about some resurrection after death in the future or at death? Not enough info here to know for sure, although the parallel to 6:4 might push us a little toward a resurrection of new life here and now, especially since the next verse says that "our old self has been crucified so that the body of sin might be destroyed, so that we are no longer enslaved to sin." 6:6 speaks to a new life we have here and now.
6:8, 11, 13 And if we have died with Christ, we have faith that we will also live with him... so also we reckon ourselves to be dead to sin but living to God in Christ Jesus... present yourselves to God as living from the dead...
None of these comments precludes a reference to future resurrection from the dead, but the focus is clearly on resurrection to new life in this world as we live free from the power of Sin over us. This world is the primary referrent of resurrection in this passage.
So the question is whether Paul anticipated that he and the Romans would die prior to Christ's arrival. If not, then he would not primarily be thinking of their rising from the dead. Life for them would be something that started now and continued into eternity. If he had undergone a shift in his thinking, the dead in Christ would already have their resurrection body and would simply join the living in Christ, who of course would still need to be transformed.
6:22 But now having been freed from Sin and having been enslaved to God you have your fruit in holiness, and the end [of it is] eternal life.
It is interesting that this phrase, "eternal life," does not appear in either 1 Thessalonians or 1 Corinthians. It does appear in Galatians 6:8 but I don't date Galatians until after 1 Corinthians. The category of the eternal suddenly picks up in Paul's writings in 2 Corinthians and then appears fairly frequently in Romans.
One passage where it appears is in Romans 2:5-7--"... according to your hardened and unrepentant heart you are storing up for yourself wrath on the Day of Wrath and of the revelation of the righteous judgment of God, who will repay to each according to his works, to those who by enduring good work seek glory and honor and immortality, [he will repay] eternal life."
Paul does not mention a resurrection here and perhaps pictures the Romans, still living at the time of Christ's return, being judged and granted to continue to live forever because of their "good works," which of course presumes all the soteriology and pneumatology of the rest of the book. In any case, nothing about the passage hints that resurrection is on Paul's mind.
7:6 But now we have been released from the Law, having died in relation to what we used to hold fast to, so that we might serve in the newness of Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter.
I mention this verse only because of its parallelism to walking in newness of life above. Having died to the Law in Christ, we rise to newness of life in the Spirit.
8:10-11 Now if Christ is in you [all], the body is dead because of sin and the spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of the One who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you [all], [then] the one who raised Christ from the dead will give life also to your mortal bodies through his Spirit that dwells in you [all].
What is striking to me is that Paul doesn't seem to be thinking directly about future resurrection when he speaks of God giving life to their mortal bodies here. The entire train of thought is about being able to live according to the Spirit in this life. The context is about how that "as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God" (8:14).
The giving of life to our mortal bodies thus seems to be located once again in this world, the possibility of walking according to the Spirit fulfilling the righteous requirement of the Law (8:4) in this life. Resurrection language is thus applied to now rather than later in 8:11.
8:13 For if you are living according to flesh, you are about to die. But if by the Spirit you are putting to death the practices of the body, you will live.
You will live as in continue to live at the point when you would otherwise have died or remained dead. This statement fits best two scenarios: 1) continuance to live after the judgment, 2) resurrection from the dead at Christ's return. It fits less well with 3) continuance to live at death.
8:19, 21 For the eager expectation of the creation awaits the revelation of the sons of God... Because the creation itself will be freed from slavery to corruption for the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
These verses seems to allude to the transformation of the earthly bodies of the living on the Day of Salvation. It looks to the transformation of this world, rather than that of the dead because it is speaking of this creation.
8:23 ... we ourselves also, having the firstfruit of the Spirit, we ourselves also groan in ourselves, awaiting adoption, the redemption of our bodies...
Again, Paul is speaking to the living and of the transformation that will take place on the Day. The Spirit inside has begun the transformation--"we are being transformed from glory to glory as from the "Lord," the Spirit" (2 Cor. 3:18).
8:29 ... because those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son.
The reference here would seem to be to the transformation we normally associate with resurrection, although Paul doesn't use the word resurrection. We think, however, of Philippians 3:20-21--"For our citizenship exists in the heavens, from which also we await a savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform the body of our humiliation to be conformed to the body of his glory..."
There is no mention here of dying first. This transformation will take place for those who are living no matter when it happens to the dead.
I conclude that Romans 6-8 say nothing firm on the question of whether the dead in Christ are transformed immediately at death or must await their transformation at the time of Christ's return. However, Philippians must be looked at very carefully, especially 3:11.
Perhaps tomorrow...
χάρις
Thursday, November 13, 2008
The Antichrist 0: Introduction
For most of Christian history, Christians have been optimistic about the future here on earth. In his book The City of God, Augustine (400's) suggests that while the (political) kingdom of this world will more and more diminish, the reign of God will steadily take over the earth more and more. Most Christians up until the 1800's were what we today might call "postmillennial," taking an image from Revelation 20. Now is the reign of Christ in the world, and the final judgment is what is left to come.
In the early 1800's, an Irishman named John Darby gave rise to a movement that has had an immense impact on popular American Christian thought ever since. Countless little Christian groups have sprung up as they have pursued his approach to the Bible, helped along by the immensely popular Scofield Reference Bible of the early twentieth century. The movement is known as "dispensationalism," and it sees history as a series of eras leading up to the "end times" and the fulfilment of biblical prophecy.
Darby's scheme was ingenious. Daniel 9 speaks of a number of "weeks" until the anointed one comes. But then there is a "week" of great persecution mentioned as well. Darby dubbs this week the "Tribulation," and understands it to be a 7 year period during the end times, the "Great Tribulation" of Revelation 7:14.
He then merges together a figure from Revelation 13 and 17, the Beast, and calls this person the "Antichrist," using a term from 1 John. A major figure of evil will thus arise in the end times to oppose the people of God, the Antichrist. But Christians, he believed, would be snatched from the earth in a "secret rapture" just before the seven year Tribulation begins.
Darby's interpretation was a major force within the Zionism of the late 1800's and early 1900's. He believed that the nation of Israel would be restored as a nation in fulfilment of prophecy, and the Jerusalem temple would be rebuilt. Whether he was inspired or it became a self-fulfilling prophecy, Israel was restored as a nation in 1948, which fueled and reinforced the dispensationalist interpretation even more.
People believed that the last generation had arrived, in keeping with Mark 13:30. Understanding the restoration of Israel to be the budding of the fig tree, many believed that "this generation," the one living at that time, would "not pass away until all these things are fulfilled." Since a generation is traditionally understood to be 40 years, it is no surprise that a little booklet came out in 1988 entitled, "Eighty-Eight Reasons Why the Lord is Coming Back in 1988."
The way in which Darby and the later dispensationalists have woven Scripture together is amazing. The concrete impact of this one man's thinking is staggering. Millions of dollars have flowed to Israel. It is astounding just to think of the way in which this line of thought has probably impacted U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East on a subconscious level.
Christian denominations, colleges, and seminaries with major influence were founded in its train, places like Dallas Theological Seminary. Television shows, newsletters, best selling Christian novels have generated millions and millions of dollars following this train of thought. If you want to know what is going on in the world, watch one of these shows in the never-ending attempt to see whether something going on in the world might hint that the end is near.
Hal Lindsey's Late Great Planet Earth in the 1970's did it in the time of the Cold War with the Soviet Union. A slate of films like A Thief in the Night and A Distant Thunder followed. Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins have written a series of best selling novels in more recent times. Each generation takes the current enemy number one and makes it the Antichrist or one of the players on his team. Is the Pope the Antichrist or Barack Obama? Will it be the Soviet Union or Iran that attacks Israel?
The next few posts (or rather, the previous ones :-) explore and unpack the key elements of the dispensationalist view, looking at the relevant Scriptures in their original contexts.
In the early 1800's, an Irishman named John Darby gave rise to a movement that has had an immense impact on popular American Christian thought ever since. Countless little Christian groups have sprung up as they have pursued his approach to the Bible, helped along by the immensely popular Scofield Reference Bible of the early twentieth century. The movement is known as "dispensationalism," and it sees history as a series of eras leading up to the "end times" and the fulfilment of biblical prophecy.
Darby's scheme was ingenious. Daniel 9 speaks of a number of "weeks" until the anointed one comes. But then there is a "week" of great persecution mentioned as well. Darby dubbs this week the "Tribulation," and understands it to be a 7 year period during the end times, the "Great Tribulation" of Revelation 7:14.
He then merges together a figure from Revelation 13 and 17, the Beast, and calls this person the "Antichrist," using a term from 1 John. A major figure of evil will thus arise in the end times to oppose the people of God, the Antichrist. But Christians, he believed, would be snatched from the earth in a "secret rapture" just before the seven year Tribulation begins.
Darby's interpretation was a major force within the Zionism of the late 1800's and early 1900's. He believed that the nation of Israel would be restored as a nation in fulfilment of prophecy, and the Jerusalem temple would be rebuilt. Whether he was inspired or it became a self-fulfilling prophecy, Israel was restored as a nation in 1948, which fueled and reinforced the dispensationalist interpretation even more.
People believed that the last generation had arrived, in keeping with Mark 13:30. Understanding the restoration of Israel to be the budding of the fig tree, many believed that "this generation," the one living at that time, would "not pass away until all these things are fulfilled." Since a generation is traditionally understood to be 40 years, it is no surprise that a little booklet came out in 1988 entitled, "Eighty-Eight Reasons Why the Lord is Coming Back in 1988."
The way in which Darby and the later dispensationalists have woven Scripture together is amazing. The concrete impact of this one man's thinking is staggering. Millions of dollars have flowed to Israel. It is astounding just to think of the way in which this line of thought has probably impacted U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East on a subconscious level.
Christian denominations, colleges, and seminaries with major influence were founded in its train, places like Dallas Theological Seminary. Television shows, newsletters, best selling Christian novels have generated millions and millions of dollars following this train of thought. If you want to know what is going on in the world, watch one of these shows in the never-ending attempt to see whether something going on in the world might hint that the end is near.
Hal Lindsey's Late Great Planet Earth in the 1970's did it in the time of the Cold War with the Soviet Union. A slate of films like A Thief in the Night and A Distant Thunder followed. Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins have written a series of best selling novels in more recent times. Each generation takes the current enemy number one and makes it the Antichrist or one of the players on his team. Is the Pope the Antichrist or Barack Obama? Will it be the Soviet Union or Iran that attacks Israel?
The next few posts (or rather, the previous ones :-) explore and unpack the key elements of the dispensationalist view, looking at the relevant Scriptures in their original contexts.
The Antichrist 7: Conclusion
So what does the Bible actually teach about the age to come?
In its original meaning, the Old Testament has almost nothing to say on the topic. The first meaning of the Old Testament books looked only to the ongoing extension of their present or the restoration of the near past--a cyclical view of history. When they looked for a Davidic king to come, they were waiting for a human like David to return to the throne and for the nation of Israel to regain political autonomy to its full boundaries.
Suffice it to say, Jesus was a massive upgrade from anything the Old Testament was expecting. Even the language of a new heaven and a new earth in Isaiah 66 was originally a beautiful and symbolic way of looking to God hitting the reset button on Israel as a nation. Of course there was the hope that the rest of the world would come to acknowledge YHWH as the true God as well.
There is one exception, and that is Daniel 12:2-3. For the first time, we find a clear expectation of future resurrection for at least some in the future. To be sure, we do find some figurative passages that some take to be about future resurrection (e.g., Ezek. 37). But Daniel is the only one that everyone agrees refers to a literal resurrection in the future for some of the dead, some to everlasting life and some to everlasting contempt.
The situation is completely different in the New Testament. Paul, the earliest New Testament writer, understands Jesus' resurrection to be the first of a resurrection for all those in Christ, soon to come. Paul never speaks of heaven or hell as a place of eternal destiny. His focus is purely on a coming point in time when the dead in Christ will rise.
The "parousia" or arrival of Jesus from heaven will accompany that resurrection. On the Day of the Lord, Jesus will return to earth from heaven; the dead in Christ will rise; and the final judgment will ensue. Every knee will bow and confess Jesus as Lord--every knee on earth, every "knee" of every spiritual being in the sky, and every knee of the dead under the earth (Phil. 2:10-11).
The Synoptic Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke have similar expectations. Jesus the Lord will come from heaven. Matthew has more to say about Gehenna, hell, than any other part of the New Testament. Jesus speaks in Matthew 25 of an appearance before Jesus as judge, just as Paul speaks of the judgment seat of Christ (e.g., 2 Cor. 5:10). In Matthew the "sheep" are separated from the "goats," just as in Matthew 13 the "wheat" is separated from the "weeds." Goats or weeds are both destined for "weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth," the fire.
John and Hebrews believe in resurrection as well, but they are less clear on where believers will go. They seem more to picture the traditional eternity in heaven, while the Synoptic Gospels and Revelation sound more like a destiny on a restored earth. Paul also looks to the redemption of the earth from enslavement to the power of corruption.
Beyond these images, the New Testament gets more and more nebulous. We get some sense of really hard times prior to Christ's return, but the basis for such imagery seems closely tied to various events in the first century like the destruction of Jerusalem and the persecution of early Christians by various Roman imperial powers.
If the way the New Testament understands the Old Testament to be fulfilled is any indication, we won't be able to predict what will happen very well from a literal reading of the New Testament texts. Rather, fulfilments will probably make a whole lot more sense in hindsight. So since even Jesus didn't know when all these things would happen (e.g., Mark 13:32), believers should probably just keep their lamps trimmed (Matt. 25:1-13). End times speculation is a fun hobby, but one that thus far has consistently led nowhere.
More important is going about the business of loving God and our neighbors everywhere. And surely it is also in keeping with the gospel to let the Spirit work through us to see God's will done "on earth as it is in heaven," to defend the widow and the orphan, to be salt and light. God has given the world the freedom not to choose Him, but He is wooing the world to choose Him.
In its original meaning, the Old Testament has almost nothing to say on the topic. The first meaning of the Old Testament books looked only to the ongoing extension of their present or the restoration of the near past--a cyclical view of history. When they looked for a Davidic king to come, they were waiting for a human like David to return to the throne and for the nation of Israel to regain political autonomy to its full boundaries.
Suffice it to say, Jesus was a massive upgrade from anything the Old Testament was expecting. Even the language of a new heaven and a new earth in Isaiah 66 was originally a beautiful and symbolic way of looking to God hitting the reset button on Israel as a nation. Of course there was the hope that the rest of the world would come to acknowledge YHWH as the true God as well.
There is one exception, and that is Daniel 12:2-3. For the first time, we find a clear expectation of future resurrection for at least some in the future. To be sure, we do find some figurative passages that some take to be about future resurrection (e.g., Ezek. 37). But Daniel is the only one that everyone agrees refers to a literal resurrection in the future for some of the dead, some to everlasting life and some to everlasting contempt.
The situation is completely different in the New Testament. Paul, the earliest New Testament writer, understands Jesus' resurrection to be the first of a resurrection for all those in Christ, soon to come. Paul never speaks of heaven or hell as a place of eternal destiny. His focus is purely on a coming point in time when the dead in Christ will rise.
The "parousia" or arrival of Jesus from heaven will accompany that resurrection. On the Day of the Lord, Jesus will return to earth from heaven; the dead in Christ will rise; and the final judgment will ensue. Every knee will bow and confess Jesus as Lord--every knee on earth, every "knee" of every spiritual being in the sky, and every knee of the dead under the earth (Phil. 2:10-11).
The Synoptic Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke have similar expectations. Jesus the Lord will come from heaven. Matthew has more to say about Gehenna, hell, than any other part of the New Testament. Jesus speaks in Matthew 25 of an appearance before Jesus as judge, just as Paul speaks of the judgment seat of Christ (e.g., 2 Cor. 5:10). In Matthew the "sheep" are separated from the "goats," just as in Matthew 13 the "wheat" is separated from the "weeds." Goats or weeds are both destined for "weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth," the fire.
John and Hebrews believe in resurrection as well, but they are less clear on where believers will go. They seem more to picture the traditional eternity in heaven, while the Synoptic Gospels and Revelation sound more like a destiny on a restored earth. Paul also looks to the redemption of the earth from enslavement to the power of corruption.
Beyond these images, the New Testament gets more and more nebulous. We get some sense of really hard times prior to Christ's return, but the basis for such imagery seems closely tied to various events in the first century like the destruction of Jerusalem and the persecution of early Christians by various Roman imperial powers.
If the way the New Testament understands the Old Testament to be fulfilled is any indication, we won't be able to predict what will happen very well from a literal reading of the New Testament texts. Rather, fulfilments will probably make a whole lot more sense in hindsight. So since even Jesus didn't know when all these things would happen (e.g., Mark 13:32), believers should probably just keep their lamps trimmed (Matt. 25:1-13). End times speculation is a fun hobby, but one that thus far has consistently led nowhere.
More important is going about the business of loving God and our neighbors everywhere. And surely it is also in keeping with the gospel to let the Spirit work through us to see God's will done "on earth as it is in heaven," to defend the widow and the orphan, to be salt and light. God has given the world the freedom not to choose Him, but He is wooing the world to choose Him.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
LaCelle-Peterson on Women's Identity and Vocation
I did a brief review of a new book by Kristina LaCelle-Peterson, professor at Houghton College in New York: Liberating Tradition: Women's Identity and Vocation in Christian Perspective. The link to it is over to the right under the "Books I'm Reading" section.
Kind of funny, you read through a book to do a thumbnail and you get 100-120 words to do it. I'll probably say more here than I could say! But, hey, free book!
I thought it was a great book. I hate to say that I have not made it a priority to read books on gender issues. I wrote a little booklet, Why Wesleyans Favor Women in Ministry that you can get at cost from my denomination (on side also). But great books like John Stackhouse's Finally Feminist are sitting, waiting, pleading, on my shelf.
There were a number of items in the book that I hadn't really thought about and that was great. I wrote in my very brief review that both pulpit and pew should read this book or one like it. Even if you don't change your perspective, you'll at least hold whatever position you have after realizing other ways to look at issues rather than ignorantly by default.
I suppose the chapter I enjoyed the most was entitled, "Mistaking the Industrial Revolution for the Garden of Eden." Here she shows how the so called "traditional family" and traditional family roles propagated by groups like Focus on the Family and John Piper are really post-industrial developments.
For example, the idea of a wife as someone who is there at home when you come home from work and who provides a nurturing and environment safe from the perils of the outside world where the husband works... well, before the industrial revolution everyone was at home and everyone worked at home.
There were a number of things about Genesis 1 and 2 that Kristina points out, like the fact that "subdue" in 1:28 is plural, meaning that the command is for the woman as well, not just for the man. And there is the old misconception of Luther and others that Adam wasn't actually there when the serpent tempted Eve. Not so, the Hebrew says Adam was "with her."
She also has a chapter where she goes through "female" metaphors of God, such as passages in Job and Isaiah where God speaks of His womb. Another on the importance of inclusive language. If you disagree, I dare you to read the book.
A good book, a good read.
Kind of funny, you read through a book to do a thumbnail and you get 100-120 words to do it. I'll probably say more here than I could say! But, hey, free book!
I thought it was a great book. I hate to say that I have not made it a priority to read books on gender issues. I wrote a little booklet, Why Wesleyans Favor Women in Ministry that you can get at cost from my denomination (on side also). But great books like John Stackhouse's Finally Feminist are sitting, waiting, pleading, on my shelf.
There were a number of items in the book that I hadn't really thought about and that was great. I wrote in my very brief review that both pulpit and pew should read this book or one like it. Even if you don't change your perspective, you'll at least hold whatever position you have after realizing other ways to look at issues rather than ignorantly by default.
I suppose the chapter I enjoyed the most was entitled, "Mistaking the Industrial Revolution for the Garden of Eden." Here she shows how the so called "traditional family" and traditional family roles propagated by groups like Focus on the Family and John Piper are really post-industrial developments.
For example, the idea of a wife as someone who is there at home when you come home from work and who provides a nurturing and environment safe from the perils of the outside world where the husband works... well, before the industrial revolution everyone was at home and everyone worked at home.
There were a number of things about Genesis 1 and 2 that Kristina points out, like the fact that "subdue" in 1:28 is plural, meaning that the command is for the woman as well, not just for the man. And there is the old misconception of Luther and others that Adam wasn't actually there when the serpent tempted Eve. Not so, the Hebrew says Adam was "with her."
She also has a chapter where she goes through "female" metaphors of God, such as passages in Job and Isaiah where God speaks of His womb. Another on the importance of inclusive language. If you disagree, I dare you to read the book.
A good book, a good read.
The Antichrist 6: The Tribulation?
One of the key elements of the Darby-Lindsey-LaHaye end times scheme is a 7 year "Tribulation." Dispensationalists then divide up between those who think there will be a "rapture" or seizure of believers up to the sky to meet Jesus in the air before the Tribulation (pre-trib rapture), half way through the Tribulation (mid-trib rapture), or at the end of the Tribulation (post-trib) rapture.
The idea of a rapture comes from the Latin wording of 1 Thessalonians 4:17--we will be "caught up" to meet the Lord in the air along with the dead who rise. To this extent, the idea of a rapture is biblical enough. Christ will return, his second coming (Heb. 9:28); the dead will rise; and those believers who are alive at that time will ascend to meet Christ in the air.
Now for Paul, this assembly in the sky does not seem to be to go off to heaven (which of course, is the same word, "sky"). Paul seems to see believers coming back down to participate in the final judgment, which in his thinking begins at Christ's "parousia," his arrival back to the earth. Believers will judge the world, including angels (1 Cor. 6:2-3). So believers are meeting Christ like a delegation would go out to escort an ambassador into town.
But Paul knows nothing of a seven year tribulation.
Revelation speaks of "the great tribulation," but it doesn't assign any number of years to it. A figure of 3 1/2 years appears several places in the middle of Revelation, but they all, in my opinion, refer to the same symbolic period:
1. The nations will trample the holy city for forty-two months (Rev. 11:2).
2. Two witnesses will prophesy for 1260 days (Rev. 11:3).
3. The woman that birthed the child who would rule the nations flees to the wilderness for 1260 days (Rev. 12:6).
4. The woman flies to a place to be nourished for a time, and times, and half a time (Rev. 12:14).
5. The beast from the sea is allowed to blaspheme God and make war on the saints for "forty-two months" (Rev. 13:5).
So to get to 7 years, dispensationalists (shorthand here for the Darby-Lindsey-LaHaye end times scheme) have to add two of these 3 1/2's together. The "mid-trib" rapture option comes straight from this section too, since the persecution of the church (the woman) is then understood to be for half of the seven year period.
But these are all the same, most likely symbolic 3 1/2 year period of persecution. Taking it as a calendar period goes against the nature of apocalyptic imagery, which if anything, is not meant to be taken literally any more than the idea that the beast will really have ten horns and seven heads.
My best guess is that, at least in its first meaning, all these images symbolized the oppression of the early church in the late first century by the Roman imperial regime. Whether we will find resonances between these images and the time immediately before Christ's return is something we will know when it happens. The temple of 11:1 might very well be the temple destroyed in AD70. After all, this part of Revelation locates "now" during the reign of Vespasian (17:10), during whose reign the temple was "trampled on" and destroyed.
So where did the idea of a 7 year tribulation come from if it doesn't come from the New Testament? It comes from the book of Daniel in the Old Testament. Daniel 9:27 refers to a ruler who will destroy Jerusalem and the temple for a "week." For half the week he will cause the sacrifice and offering to stop in the temple.
Here we hit pay dirt for the dispensationalist interpretation. The dispensationalist interpretation runs all the New Testament passages relating to the man of lawlessness, the beast, and so forth through this roundhouse ingeniously, weaving together meanings with this passage in Daniel as the template. We have come here last because we wanted to listen to the other passages in their own contexts without forcing this foreign context on them.
As we look at Daniel 9, we remember that apocalyptic literature, from the most optimistic standpoint, seems to blur things together. Mark 13 starts off talking about the destruction of Jerusalem and ends up talking about Christ's second coming. So we would not say that there are not elements of this passage that could relate to some future time.
But when we ask about the first meaning of Daniel 9, we probably need to connect 9:27, which talks about an "abomination that causes desolation" with Daniel 11:31 which speaks of a ruler from the north who will abolish the daily sacrifice and set up an abomination that causes desolation. Mark 13 and Matthew 24 apply this imagery of desolation to the destruction of the temple in AD70. But Daniel 11 reads like a history book of the events leading up to the desecration of the temple by the Syrian king Antiochus Epiphanes in 167BC, so much so in fact that the overwhelming majority of non-evangelical scholars believe that Daniel was actually written in the early second century BC.
In this light, we should probably see the first meaning of Daniel 9:27 in relation to the troubled period from 167-164BC during which an anointed one, here the high priest Onias III, was cut off, removed from office by Antiochus, and the daily sacrifice interrupted for three years. This is the time of the Maccabean revolt. The feast of Hanukkah celebrates the rededication of the temple in 164BC, brought about by the efforts of Judas Maccabeus.
Now there are some tensions between these texts in Daniel and the events of the Maccabean crisis. One might say that prophecies are blurred here, as in Mark 13. Maybe so. But if so, then we shouldn't expect this passage to map very precisely to any end times events any more than they mapped precisely to their primary fulfillment in the second century BC. Certainly to see the seventh week as a literal seven year period is highly dubious.
I might add as an interesting aside that there is an Apocalypse of Weeks that dates to the period just before the Maccabean crisis. It is found in 1 Enoch 93, 91 (the order of the text is messed up). It divides history up into 10 weeks.
The final post tomorrow, d.v.
The idea of a rapture comes from the Latin wording of 1 Thessalonians 4:17--we will be "caught up" to meet the Lord in the air along with the dead who rise. To this extent, the idea of a rapture is biblical enough. Christ will return, his second coming (Heb. 9:28); the dead will rise; and those believers who are alive at that time will ascend to meet Christ in the air.
Now for Paul, this assembly in the sky does not seem to be to go off to heaven (which of course, is the same word, "sky"). Paul seems to see believers coming back down to participate in the final judgment, which in his thinking begins at Christ's "parousia," his arrival back to the earth. Believers will judge the world, including angels (1 Cor. 6:2-3). So believers are meeting Christ like a delegation would go out to escort an ambassador into town.
But Paul knows nothing of a seven year tribulation.
Revelation speaks of "the great tribulation," but it doesn't assign any number of years to it. A figure of 3 1/2 years appears several places in the middle of Revelation, but they all, in my opinion, refer to the same symbolic period:
1. The nations will trample the holy city for forty-two months (Rev. 11:2).
2. Two witnesses will prophesy for 1260 days (Rev. 11:3).
3. The woman that birthed the child who would rule the nations flees to the wilderness for 1260 days (Rev. 12:6).
4. The woman flies to a place to be nourished for a time, and times, and half a time (Rev. 12:14).
5. The beast from the sea is allowed to blaspheme God and make war on the saints for "forty-two months" (Rev. 13:5).
So to get to 7 years, dispensationalists (shorthand here for the Darby-Lindsey-LaHaye end times scheme) have to add two of these 3 1/2's together. The "mid-trib" rapture option comes straight from this section too, since the persecution of the church (the woman) is then understood to be for half of the seven year period.
But these are all the same, most likely symbolic 3 1/2 year period of persecution. Taking it as a calendar period goes against the nature of apocalyptic imagery, which if anything, is not meant to be taken literally any more than the idea that the beast will really have ten horns and seven heads.
My best guess is that, at least in its first meaning, all these images symbolized the oppression of the early church in the late first century by the Roman imperial regime. Whether we will find resonances between these images and the time immediately before Christ's return is something we will know when it happens. The temple of 11:1 might very well be the temple destroyed in AD70. After all, this part of Revelation locates "now" during the reign of Vespasian (17:10), during whose reign the temple was "trampled on" and destroyed.
So where did the idea of a 7 year tribulation come from if it doesn't come from the New Testament? It comes from the book of Daniel in the Old Testament. Daniel 9:27 refers to a ruler who will destroy Jerusalem and the temple for a "week." For half the week he will cause the sacrifice and offering to stop in the temple.
Here we hit pay dirt for the dispensationalist interpretation. The dispensationalist interpretation runs all the New Testament passages relating to the man of lawlessness, the beast, and so forth through this roundhouse ingeniously, weaving together meanings with this passage in Daniel as the template. We have come here last because we wanted to listen to the other passages in their own contexts without forcing this foreign context on them.
As we look at Daniel 9, we remember that apocalyptic literature, from the most optimistic standpoint, seems to blur things together. Mark 13 starts off talking about the destruction of Jerusalem and ends up talking about Christ's second coming. So we would not say that there are not elements of this passage that could relate to some future time.
But when we ask about the first meaning of Daniel 9, we probably need to connect 9:27, which talks about an "abomination that causes desolation" with Daniel 11:31 which speaks of a ruler from the north who will abolish the daily sacrifice and set up an abomination that causes desolation. Mark 13 and Matthew 24 apply this imagery of desolation to the destruction of the temple in AD70. But Daniel 11 reads like a history book of the events leading up to the desecration of the temple by the Syrian king Antiochus Epiphanes in 167BC, so much so in fact that the overwhelming majority of non-evangelical scholars believe that Daniel was actually written in the early second century BC.
In this light, we should probably see the first meaning of Daniel 9:27 in relation to the troubled period from 167-164BC during which an anointed one, here the high priest Onias III, was cut off, removed from office by Antiochus, and the daily sacrifice interrupted for three years. This is the time of the Maccabean revolt. The feast of Hanukkah celebrates the rededication of the temple in 164BC, brought about by the efforts of Judas Maccabeus.
Now there are some tensions between these texts in Daniel and the events of the Maccabean crisis. One might say that prophecies are blurred here, as in Mark 13. Maybe so. But if so, then we shouldn't expect this passage to map very precisely to any end times events any more than they mapped precisely to their primary fulfillment in the second century BC. Certainly to see the seventh week as a literal seven year period is highly dubious.
I might add as an interesting aside that there is an Apocalypse of Weeks that dates to the period just before the Maccabean crisis. It is found in 1 Enoch 93, 91 (the order of the text is messed up). It divides history up into 10 weeks.
The final post tomorrow, d.v.
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
The Antichrist 5: The Destiny of Israel
Honor to those who are veterans today, thanks to those who honorably serve in the defense of their people and in defense of the weak in the world.
Now the fifth installment, the destiny of the nation of Israel. You might remember:
1. The Title "Antichrist"
2. The Beast from the Sea
3. Things will get worse and worse...
4. A Rebuilt Temple?
5. The Destiny of Israel
The Zionist movement of the early twentieth century saw the creation of the nation of Israel as the fulfillment of prophecies in the Old Testament relating to the gathering of Israel back from the ends of the earth. Verses like Isaiah 43:6 no doubt played a strong role in this drive:
"I will say to the north, Give up, and to the south, Do not withhold. Bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth..." (RSV).
Isaiah 11:12 is another, "He will raise a signal for the nations and will assemble the banished of Israel, and gather the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth" (ESV).
It is easy to see how verses like these could have been taken as a banner call for Jews to return to Israel to reconstitute the nation of Israel.
One important thing to realize is that, of course, Israel did return from a dispersion in 538BC. The first verse above speaks to the context of the Babylonian captivity, after the Babylonians had destroyed Jerusalem and taken a good number of Jerusalem elite back to Babylon as slaves. This is the original context of, say, Jeremiah 32:37:
"Behold, I will gather them from all the countries to which I drove them in my anger and my wrath and in great indignation. I will bring them back to this place, and I will make them dwell in safety" (ESV).
Passages like these, in effect, have been fulfilled for 2500 years. Ezekiel 37 pictures Israel coming back to life and God bringing them "to their own land, and I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel, and one king shall be king over them all and they shall no longer be two nations and two kingdoms" (37:21-22). Like the temple of Ezekiel 40, the return didn't quite play out as grandly as this passage pictures.
But Israel did return. And the New Testament largely reinterpreted language of a Davidic king such as Ezekiel 37:24 in terms of Jesus as the Davidic king for all time.
The infamous Gog and Magog passage in Ezekiel 38-39, taken during the Cold War to predict an attack by Russia on Israel in the end times, is sandwiched between the restoration of Israel in 37 and the rebuilt temple in 40. We've already seen that these passages were fulfilled on a small scale with the restoration of Israel in 538BC and its temple in 516BC and that the New Testament authors would have taken some of the unfulfilled aspects of these passages figuratively of Jesus and his atonement.
So the literal meaning of the chapters in between surely refers to that time as well, perhaps to the judgment of Babylon (which Jeremiah 25:9 also considers the foe from the north), where Ezekiel was captive.
The Isaiah 11 passage above is often taken as a messianic passage ("a shoot will come from the stump of Jesse," 11:1). 11:6 speaks of the wolf living with the lamb, an image often taken of the messianic kingdom. 11:11 speaks of the return of God's people from Assyria and Egypt, which perhaps recalls the destruction of the northern kingdom in 722BC.
This thought raises some big questions, such as how literally we are meant to take these comments. For example, it seems doubtful that the image of a wolf lying down with a lamb was meant literally, but is meant to symbolize a time of great peace. Even more to the point, it would be hard to fulfill 11:11 literally in the way Isaiah would have been thinking, for the captives of the Assyrian captivity are effectively long, long lost to history.
And even at the time of Christ, Jerusalem could not have held all the Jews in the rest of the world. There were apparently more Jews living in a fifth of the city of Alexandria at the time of Christ than there were in the whole city of Jerusalem. The idea of all Jews returning to Palestine from the Diaspora is not physically possible and wasn't even 2000 years ago.
So was the creation of the nation of Israel in 1948 a spiritual fulfillment of prophecy (since it doesn't seem to have been a literal one)? I won't say it wasn't. It would be in the spirit of gathering Israel from where God had scattered it. At the same time, I think I would have seriously cautioned the Zionist movement in the early twentieth century from thinking Jews had some divine right to Palestine on the basis of the Scriptures above. The Scriptures above reflect a different point in time and mostly speak to a different dispersion.
From Paul's perspective in the New Testament, there is no longer a premium on the political nation of Israel. He does believe the people of Israel have a place in the kingdom, but he seriously downgrades the earthly city in Galatians 4. His allegory of the Sarah-Hagar story considers Hagar the earthly Jerusalem and tells the Galatians to cast out the slave woman as an orienting principle. He means the Jewish law, of course, but he links it to the Jerusalem of his day.
New Testament books like Hebrews and John, which I believe were written after Jerusalem's destruction, seem to reorient space heavenward accordingly. They do not have the sense of a restored earth that we find in other NT writings. In Hebrews 12:22 it is the heavenly Jerusalem to which the audience has come, not the earthly one, "for we have here no city that remains" (13:14). In John Jesus goes to prepare a place in heaven for his followers, "that where I am, there you may be also" (John 14:3). The new Jerusalem of Revelation 21 does not arrive until after the judgment has been fully accomplished.
In short, there was no basis in the New Testament for a Christian in 1948 to have expected the nation of Israel to be reconstituted as a political entity. Quite the contrary, Paul had redefined Israel in terms of those who have faith in what God has done by raising Jesus from the dead: "not all who are descended from Israel are Israel and not all are children of Abraham who are his descendants" (Romans 9:6-7).
But what of Romans 11:26--"and then all Israel will be saved"? Does this statement not refer to those in ethnic Israel who were experiencing a "hardening" in Paul's day? Yes, it does. Paul teaches here that the vast majority of ethnic Jews would believe on Jesus as Messiah around the time of Christ's return, which he expected to take place much sooner than it has.
But notice that Paul is saying nothing about the reconstitution of Israel politically. Indeed, Israel had not even been destroyed at this time. Paul is saying that, around the time of the second coming, the vast majority of Jews will become believers. He says nothing of where they will be when they become believers.
The long and short of all these things is that it would be perilous to make contemporary political decisions in relation to the nation of Israel and the Middle East on the basis of supposed biblical prophecy. The Jews hold a place of honor for the Christian as those to whom the oracles of God were entrusted (cf. Rom. 3:2). It was, "to the Jew first, and also to the Greek" (e.g., Rom. 1:16).
But it would also go against the spirit of the Bible to think this honor gives political Israel any excuse to act unjustly. God shows no partiality is equally a part of these texts, and God judges Israel when they violate His commands (cf. Jer. 7:4-11). If there is a NT message on this score, it is that God loves the Palestinian just as much as the Jew or the Iraqi or Iranian.
Present day Israel is not the Israel of Romans 11:26. The overwhelming majority of Israelis today do not believe Jesus is the Messiah. In fact most of them are not even particularly observant Jews. It is illegal to try to convert a Jew to Christianity in Israel. Meanwhile, Nazareth and Bethlehem are predominantly Christian cities, even though their population is overwhelmingly Palestinian in make up. There are far more Palestinian Christians than there are Jewish Christians today in Palestine.
These are warnings to American Christians, who unthinkingly have sent significant amounts of money in the past to Jewish organizations whose members are, if anything, hostile to Christianity. And to the extent to which Israel oppresses the Palestinians, they are violating commands in the Jewish law with regard to the stranger in their midst. Of course the Palestinians would question who is the stranger in whose midst.
The conclusion of the matter is to do justice and to love mercy toward both Jew and Palestinian. But it is dangerous in the extreme to use any Scripture such as those we have mentioned above as any factor whatsoever in making political decisions in the world today.
Now the fifth installment, the destiny of the nation of Israel. You might remember:
1. The Title "Antichrist"
2. The Beast from the Sea
3. Things will get worse and worse...
4. A Rebuilt Temple?
5. The Destiny of Israel
The Zionist movement of the early twentieth century saw the creation of the nation of Israel as the fulfillment of prophecies in the Old Testament relating to the gathering of Israel back from the ends of the earth. Verses like Isaiah 43:6 no doubt played a strong role in this drive:
"I will say to the north, Give up, and to the south, Do not withhold. Bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth..." (RSV).
Isaiah 11:12 is another, "He will raise a signal for the nations and will assemble the banished of Israel, and gather the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth" (ESV).
It is easy to see how verses like these could have been taken as a banner call for Jews to return to Israel to reconstitute the nation of Israel.
One important thing to realize is that, of course, Israel did return from a dispersion in 538BC. The first verse above speaks to the context of the Babylonian captivity, after the Babylonians had destroyed Jerusalem and taken a good number of Jerusalem elite back to Babylon as slaves. This is the original context of, say, Jeremiah 32:37:
"Behold, I will gather them from all the countries to which I drove them in my anger and my wrath and in great indignation. I will bring them back to this place, and I will make them dwell in safety" (ESV).
Passages like these, in effect, have been fulfilled for 2500 years. Ezekiel 37 pictures Israel coming back to life and God bringing them "to their own land, and I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel, and one king shall be king over them all and they shall no longer be two nations and two kingdoms" (37:21-22). Like the temple of Ezekiel 40, the return didn't quite play out as grandly as this passage pictures.
But Israel did return. And the New Testament largely reinterpreted language of a Davidic king such as Ezekiel 37:24 in terms of Jesus as the Davidic king for all time.
The infamous Gog and Magog passage in Ezekiel 38-39, taken during the Cold War to predict an attack by Russia on Israel in the end times, is sandwiched between the restoration of Israel in 37 and the rebuilt temple in 40. We've already seen that these passages were fulfilled on a small scale with the restoration of Israel in 538BC and its temple in 516BC and that the New Testament authors would have taken some of the unfulfilled aspects of these passages figuratively of Jesus and his atonement.
So the literal meaning of the chapters in between surely refers to that time as well, perhaps to the judgment of Babylon (which Jeremiah 25:9 also considers the foe from the north), where Ezekiel was captive.
The Isaiah 11 passage above is often taken as a messianic passage ("a shoot will come from the stump of Jesse," 11:1). 11:6 speaks of the wolf living with the lamb, an image often taken of the messianic kingdom. 11:11 speaks of the return of God's people from Assyria and Egypt, which perhaps recalls the destruction of the northern kingdom in 722BC.
This thought raises some big questions, such as how literally we are meant to take these comments. For example, it seems doubtful that the image of a wolf lying down with a lamb was meant literally, but is meant to symbolize a time of great peace. Even more to the point, it would be hard to fulfill 11:11 literally in the way Isaiah would have been thinking, for the captives of the Assyrian captivity are effectively long, long lost to history.
And even at the time of Christ, Jerusalem could not have held all the Jews in the rest of the world. There were apparently more Jews living in a fifth of the city of Alexandria at the time of Christ than there were in the whole city of Jerusalem. The idea of all Jews returning to Palestine from the Diaspora is not physically possible and wasn't even 2000 years ago.
So was the creation of the nation of Israel in 1948 a spiritual fulfillment of prophecy (since it doesn't seem to have been a literal one)? I won't say it wasn't. It would be in the spirit of gathering Israel from where God had scattered it. At the same time, I think I would have seriously cautioned the Zionist movement in the early twentieth century from thinking Jews had some divine right to Palestine on the basis of the Scriptures above. The Scriptures above reflect a different point in time and mostly speak to a different dispersion.
From Paul's perspective in the New Testament, there is no longer a premium on the political nation of Israel. He does believe the people of Israel have a place in the kingdom, but he seriously downgrades the earthly city in Galatians 4. His allegory of the Sarah-Hagar story considers Hagar the earthly Jerusalem and tells the Galatians to cast out the slave woman as an orienting principle. He means the Jewish law, of course, but he links it to the Jerusalem of his day.
New Testament books like Hebrews and John, which I believe were written after Jerusalem's destruction, seem to reorient space heavenward accordingly. They do not have the sense of a restored earth that we find in other NT writings. In Hebrews 12:22 it is the heavenly Jerusalem to which the audience has come, not the earthly one, "for we have here no city that remains" (13:14). In John Jesus goes to prepare a place in heaven for his followers, "that where I am, there you may be also" (John 14:3). The new Jerusalem of Revelation 21 does not arrive until after the judgment has been fully accomplished.
In short, there was no basis in the New Testament for a Christian in 1948 to have expected the nation of Israel to be reconstituted as a political entity. Quite the contrary, Paul had redefined Israel in terms of those who have faith in what God has done by raising Jesus from the dead: "not all who are descended from Israel are Israel and not all are children of Abraham who are his descendants" (Romans 9:6-7).
But what of Romans 11:26--"and then all Israel will be saved"? Does this statement not refer to those in ethnic Israel who were experiencing a "hardening" in Paul's day? Yes, it does. Paul teaches here that the vast majority of ethnic Jews would believe on Jesus as Messiah around the time of Christ's return, which he expected to take place much sooner than it has.
But notice that Paul is saying nothing about the reconstitution of Israel politically. Indeed, Israel had not even been destroyed at this time. Paul is saying that, around the time of the second coming, the vast majority of Jews will become believers. He says nothing of where they will be when they become believers.
The long and short of all these things is that it would be perilous to make contemporary political decisions in relation to the nation of Israel and the Middle East on the basis of supposed biblical prophecy. The Jews hold a place of honor for the Christian as those to whom the oracles of God were entrusted (cf. Rom. 3:2). It was, "to the Jew first, and also to the Greek" (e.g., Rom. 1:16).
But it would also go against the spirit of the Bible to think this honor gives political Israel any excuse to act unjustly. God shows no partiality is equally a part of these texts, and God judges Israel when they violate His commands (cf. Jer. 7:4-11). If there is a NT message on this score, it is that God loves the Palestinian just as much as the Jew or the Iraqi or Iranian.
Present day Israel is not the Israel of Romans 11:26. The overwhelming majority of Israelis today do not believe Jesus is the Messiah. In fact most of them are not even particularly observant Jews. It is illegal to try to convert a Jew to Christianity in Israel. Meanwhile, Nazareth and Bethlehem are predominantly Christian cities, even though their population is overwhelmingly Palestinian in make up. There are far more Palestinian Christians than there are Jewish Christians today in Palestine.
These are warnings to American Christians, who unthinkingly have sent significant amounts of money in the past to Jewish organizations whose members are, if anything, hostile to Christianity. And to the extent to which Israel oppresses the Palestinians, they are violating commands in the Jewish law with regard to the stranger in their midst. Of course the Palestinians would question who is the stranger in whose midst.
The conclusion of the matter is to do justice and to love mercy toward both Jew and Palestinian. But it is dangerous in the extreme to use any Scripture such as those we have mentioned above as any factor whatsoever in making political decisions in the world today.
Monday, November 10, 2008
Me-me-me-me-meme
James McGrath, fellow Dunnite and the biblioblogger king of the hill for the month of October, professor of religion at Butler University, has tagged me with a meme. Don't ask me what it memes. I'm just supposed to post the rules of the meme:
1. Link to the person who tagged you (check, see above).
2. Post the rules on your blog (making this line a post within a post).
3. Write six random things about yourself (see below).
4. Tag six people at the end of your post and link to them (further below).
5. Let each person know they've been tagged and leave a comment on their blog (I assume a comment from James will mysteriously appear below at some point).
6. Let the tagger know when your entry is up (if it ever is).
Random Things
1. I'm an email-holic. I sometimes check my email and post comments on blogs while I'm teaching class (usually when students are taking a quiz). Sometimes I go to the bathroom to check my email when guests are over. Beware.
2. I wasn't a morning person until I had children. Now I am an omnitemporal person. I was up before 4 this morning and its almost midnight now.
3. I've lived 15 years of my life in Indiana, 15 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, 6 in Kentucky, 3 in England, 3 in South Carolina, 5 months in Tübingen, Germany, and 2 months in Freetown, Sierra Leone. I'm 25 years old.
4. I once dressed up as the beheaded John the Baptist for Halloween when I was at seminary. I also dressed up in tights and a cape as Ichthusman for Ichthus in Wilmore, Kentucky in the early 90's.
5. I broke my middle finger playing right field in seminary. Then held up a car wash sign for my church on the side of the road with a splint on the finger for all to see. I also broke my elbow here at IWU playing intramural basketball before they had put down the flooring in the gym. I ran straight into the wall at full speed. I once gave myself a black eye rapping up a vacuum cord, and poked my eye in college with a candle sitting down at a dining room table for breakfast.
6. When I went through nerd mid-life crisis I carried a college physics book around in my car to relearn things I learned in high school and when I was a chemistry major.
So to pass the joy along, I tag Jared at Antiquitopia, Kris at Throughpainteddeserts, Angie at Angie's Point, Mike at ReclinerRamblings, Nathan at Crawford's Corner, and Adam at all the small things.
I know, I know, just what you all needed...
1. Link to the person who tagged you (check, see above).
2. Post the rules on your blog (making this line a post within a post).
3. Write six random things about yourself (see below).
4. Tag six people at the end of your post and link to them (further below).
5. Let each person know they've been tagged and leave a comment on their blog (I assume a comment from James will mysteriously appear below at some point).
6. Let the tagger know when your entry is up (if it ever is).
Random Things
1. I'm an email-holic. I sometimes check my email and post comments on blogs while I'm teaching class (usually when students are taking a quiz). Sometimes I go to the bathroom to check my email when guests are over. Beware.
2. I wasn't a morning person until I had children. Now I am an omnitemporal person. I was up before 4 this morning and its almost midnight now.
3. I've lived 15 years of my life in Indiana, 15 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, 6 in Kentucky, 3 in England, 3 in South Carolina, 5 months in Tübingen, Germany, and 2 months in Freetown, Sierra Leone. I'm 25 years old.
4. I once dressed up as the beheaded John the Baptist for Halloween when I was at seminary. I also dressed up in tights and a cape as Ichthusman for Ichthus in Wilmore, Kentucky in the early 90's.
5. I broke my middle finger playing right field in seminary. Then held up a car wash sign for my church on the side of the road with a splint on the finger for all to see. I also broke my elbow here at IWU playing intramural basketball before they had put down the flooring in the gym. I ran straight into the wall at full speed. I once gave myself a black eye rapping up a vacuum cord, and poked my eye in college with a candle sitting down at a dining room table for breakfast.
6. When I went through nerd mid-life crisis I carried a college physics book around in my car to relearn things I learned in high school and when I was a chemistry major.
So to pass the joy along, I tag Jared at Antiquitopia, Kris at Throughpainteddeserts, Angie at Angie's Point, Mike at ReclinerRamblings, Nathan at Crawford's Corner, and Adam at all the small things.
I know, I know, just what you all needed...
C. F. H. Henry as Foundationalist Evangelical
I'm continuing through Robert Webber's The Younger Evangelicals: Facing the Challenges of the New World. I'm finding it an incredibly clear guide to the postmodern impact on evangelicalism--way clearer than anything else I've seen, including James Smith's Who's Afraid or anything by Grenz.
In chapter 6 on apologetics among younger evangelicals, he describes the very modernist separation of truth from "embodiment" that typified the founding voices of neo-evangelicalism in the mid-twentieth century. What this means is the modernist sense that you can detach truth neatly from you as the one discussing it.
He illustrates this modernist evangelical approach to truth by way of 3 of Henry's 15 theses regarding revelation:
10. God's revelation is rational communication conveyed in intelligible ideas and meaningful words, that is, conceptual verbal form.
11. The Bible is the reservoir and conduit of divine truth. [in contrast to the person, Jesus Christ and the church that continues his embodiment in the world today].
12. The Holy Spirit superintends the communication of divine revelation, first, by inspiring the prophetic apostolic writings, and, second, by illuminating and interpreting the scripturally given Word of God [understood in terms of words].
For the younger evangelicals, said Webber, truth must be embodied in a person and is only known truly by those who live it.
In chapter 6 on apologetics among younger evangelicals, he describes the very modernist separation of truth from "embodiment" that typified the founding voices of neo-evangelicalism in the mid-twentieth century. What this means is the modernist sense that you can detach truth neatly from you as the one discussing it.
He illustrates this modernist evangelical approach to truth by way of 3 of Henry's 15 theses regarding revelation:
10. God's revelation is rational communication conveyed in intelligible ideas and meaningful words, that is, conceptual verbal form.
11. The Bible is the reservoir and conduit of divine truth. [in contrast to the person, Jesus Christ and the church that continues his embodiment in the world today].
12. The Holy Spirit superintends the communication of divine revelation, first, by inspiring the prophetic apostolic writings, and, second, by illuminating and interpreting the scripturally given Word of God [understood in terms of words].
For the younger evangelicals, said Webber, truth must be embodied in a person and is only known truly by those who live it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
