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really liked it
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At a recent conference at King’s College in Aberdeen, I happened upon a library sale. Having used Early Israel in Recent Writing as a resource (from a
At a recent conference at King’s College in Aberdeen, I happened upon a library sale. Having used Early Israel in Recent Writing as a resource (from another library) in the late ‘70s, I had never owned my own copy. As an admirer of John Bright (having read A History of Israel, The Authority of the Old Testament, and The Kingdom of God), I couldn’t resist, even though the “recent history writing” described in the title is definitely an anachronism in a 75-year-old book. Yet, it was a thrill for me to revisit Bright’s work, especially since I’d been privileged to attend a week-long colloquium with him where we had discussed many of these issues. Written in the exact middle of the 20th century, Bright focuses on the methodological approaches prevalent in the early 20th century. For most, the Alt-Noth school will dredge up memories of a skeptical, nihilistic approach to Israel’s history. Bright takes many of the assumptions of the Alt-Noth school to task and demonstrates how certain assumptions can be taken to the ridiculous by using examples from U.S. History (some that he used as cautionary tales like the Battle of the Clouds at Lookout Mountain when we were meeting in the colloquium). However, Bright also observes the almost acritical approach of Yehezkel Kaufmann when the Israeli writer demonstrates an inconsistency in his approach to literary criticism (primarily by ignoring style to fit his presuppositions). Bright admits having more of an affinity with Kaufmann’s valuation of the historical underpinning of Israel’s traditions, but finds Kaufmann’s dismissal of archaeological evidence to be inexplicable. Martin Noth, as many biblical students know, reduced the idea of a “people” to three factors: 1) common language, 2) common habitat, and 3) common historical experience (p. 111). Noth contended that Israel didn’t meet all three requirements with the possible exception of the “Twelve-Clan League” as an amphictyony. Yet, Bright takes him to task for his inconsistencies in this. Most significantly was the insistence that the place or place names came first in aetiological tales based on topographical locations. Bright uses the surrender at Yorktown in the War for American Independence (American Revolutionary War) as an example. Simply because the surrender took place in Virginia, did that make it a Virginia tradition (p. 102)? What about the fact that Washington throwing the dollar over the river shifted from its origin on the Rappahannock to the Potomac associated with our national identity (p. 103)? Where does a shifting legend fit into Noth’s scheme? Mostly, Early Israel in Recent History Writing served as a roadmap for Bright’s own approach to Israel’s history. He knows that there are gaps we will never be able to fill in, but he urges historians to be neither too skeptical nor too gullible (p. 124). I have only touched on matters which served useful to me across the years and which re-reading this volume reminded me. Since the book was written well prior to Brevard S. Childs’ masterful work on canonical criticism, much of Bright’s warnings may have been superseded by that approach and rhetorical criticism. Not that literary, tradition-historical, and form criticism are no longer relevant, but that they no longer constitute the boundaries of research with the stranglehold which existed at the time Bright wrote this pithy and important volume. ...more |
Notes are private!
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Sep 09, 2024
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Sep 11, 2024
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Sep 11, 2024
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Hardcover
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| 0310520924
| 9780310520924
| 0310520924
| 4.22
| 251
| unknown
| Jul 05, 2016
|
really liked it
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Fortunately, theologian Michael F. Bird is not afraid to be lighthearted in presenting gospel truth. For example” “To use a meteorological pun, to be
Fortunately, theologian Michael F. Bird is not afraid to be lighthearted in presenting gospel truth. For example” “To use a meteorological pun, to be a follower of Jesus means to walk in the “reign” of Jesus. It entails that believers order their lives, finances, relationships, ambitions, and hopes around the most important confession of the faith: Jesus is Lord.” (p. 167). Using Mary Poppins’ metaphorical “spoonful of sugar,” he offers profound insights on difficult to understand concepts in What Christians Ought to Believe: An Introduction to Christian Doctrine Through the Apostles’ Creed, his short primer on The Apostles’ Creed. The book begins with an answer to those who reject creeds, somewhat like the slogan in the churches of my formative years: “No creed but Christ, no book but the Bible.” He starts out but pointing out that such a slogan is not in the Bible. (p. 17) He emphatically states: “If you do believe the Bible, then sooner or later you have to set out what you think the Bible says.” (p. 18). Of course, when one does that, one has created a creed. His sense of humor allows him to summarize: “The creeds provide a kind of ‘Idiot’s Guide to Christianity’ by briefly laying out the story, unity, coherence, and major themes of the Christian faith.” (p. 23) Bird telegraphs the idea that the Shema (Deuteronomy 6:4-5) was a creed to which Jews and Jesus alike subscribed (and taught) before demonstrating how just the basic idea that Jesus was crucified and raised to life is “found in liturgical material, apostolic exhortation to congregations, snuggly inserted into theological argumentation, laid out in hymnlike poetry, and even found in New Testament prophecy.” (pp. 19-20) After the New Testament, creeds were often used to referee debates by differentiating between a faith based on scripture and one based on more popular and ephemeral convenience (p. 24). He quickly summarizes the creedal response to Arius (threatening Jesus’ divinity) and the answer to Apollinarius (threatening Jesus’ humanity) as he demonstrated the usefulness of creeds (pp. 25-26). Historically, he illustrated a bit about the development of canon (succinctly as opposed to thoroughly) and quoted Irenaeus in demonstrating that “even barbarians” believed in the general parameters of what became the Apostles’ Creed (p. 33). So, “fact, Irenaeus and Tertullian say that the root error of all heresies is studying the Scriptures in isolation from the rule of faith.” (p. 33) Bird’s concluding position in this discussion mirrors that of the two early church fathers: “Thus, the Scriptures generated the rule of faith, and the rule of faith serves to authorize Scripture.” (p. 34) I’m not sure “authorize” is the best word, but the essence is that interpreting as a “lone wolf” is not healthy. In unpacking the words, “I believe,” in the Apostles’ Creed, Bird quotes Karl Barth’s insightful assertion: “Faith is not obedience, but as obedience is not obedience without faith, faith is not faith without obedience. They belong together, as do thunder and lightning in a thunderstorm.” (p. 50). Expressing the inherent rationality of faith, Bird explains: “The existence of God explains why there is a ‘something’ rather than a ‘nothing,’ why the universe is rationally intelligible, and why it seems wired up to produce intelligent life.” (p. 51) He goes on to proffer the idea of “moral oughtness” and making sense of humanity’s disparate religious experiences as needs that are met by faith in God (p. 51). In answer to those who assert that faith is always blind faith, Bird suggests that doubt is a valid part of the faith experience. “Doubt can be a sign of spiritual struggle, a means of growing into maturity, and a pathway into a stronger and more resilient faith. What sustains me in times of doubt is one simple thing: the complete and utter worshipability of Jesus Christ.” (p. 53) In that vein, he describes faith as a curiosity that needs to be satisfied (p. 54). Of course, one can hardly express faith in the Christian God without recognizing the role of Son and Spirit, as well. In much the same manner as Thomas F. Torrance in The Mediation of Christ expresses the reciprocal nature of revelation, Bird cites U.S. theologian Kevin Vanhoozer. The seminary professor writes: “The very logic of the gospel—the declaration that God enables believers to relate to God the Father in Jesus Christ through the Spirit—implies the divinity of the Son and Spirit as well.” (p. 58) Then, citing the baptismal formula, he quotes Catholic theologian John Meier as affirming the Trinity because: “…One does not baptize in the name of a divine person, a holy creature, and an impersonal force.” (p. 59) As one can see, Bird is not just conversant with the full spectrum of Christian theology, but offers amusing ways of presenting the truth, as well. Bird makes an interesting point on the Fatherhood of God. Although it is rarely used in direct address, such as in Jesus’ Model Prayer in the New Testament, there is precedent for this in the section of Isaiah known (sometimes) as Trito-Isaiah, Isaiah 63:16 and 64:8 (pp. 60-61). Then, he observes Jesus’ use of the term “Father” and Paul’s insistence that as adopted members of God’s family, we are able to call on God as “Abba,” a more intimate term of “Father.” (specifically Galatians 4:6 and Romans 8:15—p. 62). Fortunately, Bird also mentions how the use of Father can be used to maintain a patriarchal perspective and reminds readers that all theological language is analogical (p. 63). Similarly, Bird refuses to be pulled into the popular whirlpool of what God Who would be Almighty can or can’t do. His statement is succinct and to the point, stating that God’s “…power is not limited by anything beyond his own character and being. God always works to bring about what he intends to do, and not a single molecule in the universe can thwart him or frustrate his purposes.” (p. 65). He refuses to discuss God’s power in the abstract such as how much of God’s power could be stored in a battery, but reminds us of the intentional irony in that God’s power is best demonstrated in the crucifixion (p. 66). Bird definitively believes in creation, but understands that the purpose of the creation accounts in Genesis are not literal, scientific texts but literary constructs designed to develop a worldview complementary to a relationship with God. “Genesis 1–3 functions within the Pentateuch as the background to Israel’s covenant life so that his people might know that the LORD is no mere tribal God but the one and only God, maker of heaven and earth, who calls Israel to be his people. Genesis 1–3 introduces us to crucial theological insights about God’s nature and God’s purpose, not least his goodness, his absolute sovereignty, his providence, the mysterious entrance of evil, humanity’s fall into disobedience, and God’s promise to put the world to rights through the skull-crushing victory of Eve’s offspring.” (p. 70) So, naturally, Bird rejects pantheism because God is neither impersonal force within creation nor disaffected, absentee landlord (as in Deism), but involved actively in creation (p. 70). In terms of believing in Jesus as the Son of God, Bird makes clear that Jesus is our clearest revelation from God and that the Incarnation was not an afterthought: “I hope it’s clear as well that the sending of Jesus was not Plan B, not an emergency measure to be activated when Adam tripped up or when things with Israel seemed to go awry. God had always intended to unite himself with creation through his Son. That is why Paul says in his panoply of poetic praise in Ephesians that God’s intention was “to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ” (Eph 1:10). God from all eternity intended to put all things in subjection to his Son so that the Son will reign over God’s new world with God’s redeemed people.” (p. 76). He address the humanity-divinity issue of the Incarnation as the “enfleshing of God,” clearly stating: “In the incarnation, Jesus’s divine nature is married to a human nature. Note, Jesus is not a divine being who pretends to be human (Docetism) nor is Jesus a human who becomes divine (adoptionism). He is fully human and fully divine at the same time.” (p. 77). He rejects “adoptionism” because Jesus’ identity as “Son of God” precedes His identity as “Son of Humanity.” (p. 79). Interestingly enough for a book on the Apostles’ Creed, Bird observes a glaring deficiency in the wording of the creed, jumping from the virgin conception of Jesus to His death under Pontius Pilate, completely leap-frogging His life and ministry (p. 85). He cleverly reminds us of Jesus’ messianic mission by telling us regarding the usual Christian focus on the cross (exemplified in the creed), “That does not mean, however, that Jesus’s life is just a warm-up act to Calvary or merely a catalogue of anecdotes for Sunday school lessons.” (p. 87). He sums up with an observation incorporating a quotation from Calvin: “May we ever follow Calvin’s exhortation to imitate even the penitent thief on the cross, who ’adores Christ as a King while on the gallows, celebrates His kingdom in the midst of shocking and worse than revolting abasement, and declares him, when dying, to be the author of life.’” (p. 90). Regarding the virgin conception of Jesus, Bird is remarkably frank about those who do not find it necessary and the relatively minor emphasis on it (compared to other aspects of Jesus’ life) in the New Testament. However, his position is clear: “The virgin conception is not up for negotiation, as it is a part of the biblical teaching and a consistent feature of the church’s testimony to Jesus. We are free to raise questions, test interpretations, and offer fresh ones, but we are not free to roll our eyes and move on to other matters if we are to believe in Jesus as Christians.” (p. 103). For the section on “crucified under Pontius Pilate,” Bird cites both contemporary and modern accounts to demonstrate just how cruel and horrific crucifixion must have been (pp. 112-113). He follows this with ancient quotations rejecting the idea of a “crucified god” (pp. 114-115) and modern rejections, as well (including the famous quotation from The Life of Pi (pp. 116-117)). He goes on to suggest that the mention of Pontius Pilate in the creed, “…points to the historical circumstances pertaining to Jesus’s death in Jerusalem on the Passover of ca. AD 30. We cannot dehistoricize the mission of Jesus and the passion narrative. We cannot talk as if Jesus was a heavenly figure who just decided to float down from heaven at some random point in history, borrowed a human body, taught earthly stories with heavenly meanings, promised everlasting life to anyone who would assent to his claims, and then irritated the Judean leaders for the sole purpose of getting them to crucify him so he could pay a sin-debt that humanity owed an angry and vengeful God in heaven.” (p. 122). In the next chapter, Bird underscores the importance of the cross with a long list of reasons (backed by scripture references) why the cross is important (pp. 128-129). The same basic list is presented in theological terms on p. 131. Whereas our church doesn’t have the line added later of “descended into hell” in our reading of the creed, Bird uses it with one caveat: he recognizes that the Greek word mistranslated (or, at least, unfortunately translated) as “hell” is really Hades. “Hades is not a purgatorial rehab clinic where old sins can be worked off, nor is it a literal subterranean cavern somewhere in the earth’s mantle. Hades simply means the abode of the dead wherever that location happens to be. Old Testament saints who passed away went to the blessed part of Hades where they waited for rescue, while the wicked inhabit the punitive part of Hades where they wait and still wait for the final judgment.” (p. 144).Hence, the idea is that Jesus “suffered death” the same as any human that He might “taste death” for everyone (Hebrews 2:9) (p. 145.) Bird completely denies those of us who follow Rufinus’ baptismal formula and excise the “descent” (pp. 146, 148), arguing that, ostensibly, the “descent” and “burial” are the same. More important to me is the resurrection. Bird calls resurrection our looking to the future in hope (p. 154), but he is also concerned about the Christological features of resurrection. First, he asserts that Jesus’ resurrection is proof that He is the Messiah (pp. 154-155). “The resurrection meant that Jesus was the climax of God’s plan. What God was going to do for Israel and for the world, he was going to do through Jesus, Israel’s Messiah, the Son of God—and he had already begun to do it!” (p. 155). Second, he asserts: ” The resurrection is living proof that God invades and disrupts the present order of things by bringing life in the face of death, justification in the midst of condemnation, and rays of hope into the caverns of fear. God’s new day arises in the raising of his Son.” (p. 156). Third, it guarantees our salvation (p. 156). Finally, he cites Colossians 3:1-2 to demonstrate that resurrection points to a new way of living for the believer, discipleship (p. 157). Later, Bird questions whether modern believers tend to take the ascension of Jesus for granted. Emphasizing how the ascension points to Jesus’ ongoing work in the world, he notes: “Luke obviously thought the ascension was important since he presents an account of it twice: once at the end of his Gospel (Luke 24:49–53) and then again at the beginning of the book of Acts (Acts 1:9–11). So perhaps the ascension is more than Jesus’s return trip to heaven. Just maybe the ascension tells us something about the continuing work of Jesus in the world!” (pp. 161-162). I particularly liked his final point on the ascension: “It is vital that we remember that when Jesus ascended into heaven, he did not cease to be human and morph into some disembodied state like a humanoid ghost. Jesus ascended as a human being and remains in this glorified human state for the rest of eternity. The significance of this is that God has placed a human person as the head of the universe.” (p. 164). I appreciated the fact that Bird did not invest an undue amount of time in parsing the varied narratives of the second coming of Christ. I am not a proponent of timelines or subjective interpretations of malleable symbols. However, if I were to change one thing about this book (other than Bird’s stubborn insistence that we need the “descent” phrase in the creed), it would be rather summary way in which the second coming is dealt with. I do appreciate his comparison of Muslim and Christian views of history’s end: “Christian story of the end is all the more important because it competes with other accounts of the end of the world. Islamic versions of the “last things” are very similar to Christian accounts, except that in Islamic doctrine a figure called the Mahdi (i.e., an Islamic teacher) partners with Isa (i.e., Jesus) to rule the world before the final day of reckoning. Buddhist beliefs generally tend to focus on the annihilation of the individual soul in nirvana without too much recourse to the future state of the universe. Secular futurists see the end of the world in an ecological disaster caused by overpopulation, overpollution, and overuse of natural resources. … different. In the Christian view, it is not annihilation or ecological catastrophe that is the final moment of human history. God’s story according to the gospel requires a final divine act to bring a rebellious world into order and to put it under the power of our heavenly king.” (p. 172). His focus is definitely in the right place regarding the Holy Spirit. “What the Apostles’ Creed is pointing us to and reminding us of at this point is this. God’s Spirit, as given through Jesus, plunges us into a river of blessing; he gives life, saves and sanctifies, unites believers with Jesus and with each other, and equips and empowers them to be a spiritual people ready for earthly labor as much as eternal life.” pp. 180-181). His caustic paragraph about not taking the Holy Spirit seriously as “person” may be one of the finest moments in the book. He wrote: “I say with no exaggeration that I have met Christians who seem to think of the Holy Spirit as something like Jesus’s vapor trail, or a mysterious and impersonal “force” that conveys God’s presence, or even a kind of heavenly buzz that falls on people when some funky psychedelic worship music is played. The way some people describe the Holy Spirit could just as well describe magnetism, mood rings, or Motown records from the 1960s.” (p. 182) I will be sure to give him credit when I inevitably quote that in a future sermon. How should we understand the Holy Spirit? The following summation is about as good as it gets: “us. The Spirit testifies to Christ because he wants to draw people into a relationship with Christ (John 15:26). The Holy Spirit is also the Spirit of Christ and as such is the glue that connects us to the Son (Rom 8:9; Phil 1:19; 1 Pet 1:11).” (p. 184). I'm out of room, but I read this parallel to teaching the creed in small group sessions. Like this review, it felt a little rushed at the end, but I'm very pleased with this resource. ...more |
Notes are private!
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Oct 03, 2023
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Jul 12, 2024
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Aug 12, 2024
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Hardcover
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| 080423146X
| 9780804231466
| 080423146X
| 4.14
| 36
| Mar 2000
| Mar 01, 2000
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really liked it
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The Interpretation commentary series is not an exegetical, verse-by-verse approach to biblical books. The series is an unapologetically Christian take
The Interpretation commentary series is not an exegetical, verse-by-verse approach to biblical books. The series is an unapologetically Christian take on the books its considers, even those from the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament. Where commentators such as Tremper Longman III and Choon Leong-Seow dwell on Qoheleth’s (the self-given title of the sage who narrates the biblical book) sense of the God who is so transcendent as to be almost irrelevant, William P. Brown takes a different tack without minimizing that deus absconditus, “hiddenness” of God or mystery. “Qoheleth’s God is not the God of mighty deeds who would vanquish enemies or release the oppressed with a strong and mighty arm. No, the God of this sage lets well enough alone. The sage had attempted to discern God in the grand design of the universe and history, no less, but failed. Not the mighty acts but the minor acts of God is the theological focus of Qoheleth’s testimony.” (p. 134). In other words, God Who is sovereign, but doesn’t abuse the sovereignty. Indeed, while I benefited from Brown’s discussion of individual passages, I was thrilled with his attempt in the epilogue to harmonize Qoheleth’s limited revelation with the fuller revelation of the New Testament writers. Much like my approach to the book, Brown sees Qoheleth’s remarks on the unknowability of God to be a pointer toward the New Testament’s emphasis on mystery. He offers a summary quotation that follows which explains it more efficiently that I would. “The gospel is the “mystery of Christ” (Eph. 3:4). As a “steward of God’s mysteries,” one must handle “God’s foolishness” with care. With Qoheleth’s skepticism lurking in the background, Paul must admit: “For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known” (1 Cor. 13:12). Indeed, by God’s providence, knowledge “will come to an end” (v. 8), as in fact it already has for Qoheleth.” (p. 134) As with any modern commentary, Brown is aware of the probability that Qoheleth borrowed from other wisdom traditions and added his own theological commentary (p. 40) and that even if the heart of the material was composed during the monarchy, the vocabulary (especially Persian loan words and Aramaisms) suggests that the book didn’t reach its final form till during or after the Exile (p. 8). On more than one occasion, Brown points to parallels between the Gilgamesh epic and cites lengthy sections to demonstrate his point. He doesn’t do this to date the book but to illustrate the shared background of wisdom throughout the Ancient Near East. I particularly appreciate Brown’s sensitivity to the tension between the apparent conflicting statements, the cognitive dissonance if you will, in the book so that he urges one to be certain to interpret the parts by the whole (p. 17). Indeed, one might treat the entire book as full of merisms, much as Brown explains the famous section on time in Chapter 3. “Poetically, these pairs of opposites serve as poetic merisms; they convey a sense of the totality of human endeavor in all its manifold forms.” (p. 41) Many believe that Qoheleth is the most humanistic book in the Bible (and it may well be). Yet, God’s sovereignty is affirmed all the way through it along with a bit of dissonance. Brown does a solid job of dealing with these humanistic themes. “What then is humanity’s role? As in Qoheleth’s previous reflections, people are not so much the shapers as the recipients of life.” (p. 43) Brown summarizes what some see as Qoheleth’s most negative themes toward human accomplishment as part of his harmony: “Both Qoheleth and the Gospel writers agree: life is more than gain; it is a gift. Thus, one’s true vocation is more than material striving; it is sharing and receiving (see Eccl. 11:1–2).” (p. 126) That pendulum between God’s gift and the frailty of humanity is explained in Brown’s exposition of Ecclesiastes 9:11-12: “To be sure, one may increase the odds and heighten the probability of success through discipline and training. Qoheleth does not deny that. Yet the certitude of success is hardly a factor in the equation of life.” (p. 96) At first glance, it may seem that Qoheleth is little different from the Existential philosophy of “thrownness,” but his perspective is actually in tune with the Letter of James in the New Testament (James 4:13-17). The most difficult aspect of Ecclesiastes for many Christians is the sage’s attitude toward death. He is clearly agnostic toward resurrection with no overt espousal of the doctrine (except for a possible suggestion in Ecclesiastes 12:7). “Death exposes all illusions of grandeur and ultimate gain. It purges the soul of all futile striving and, paradoxically, anxiety. Qoheleth’s discourse ends on a remarkably cathartic note with the person’s life-breath returning to God (12:7). The eternal sleep of death serves as a wake-up call to live and welcome the serendipities of the present.” (p. 108) Without providing too much New Testament coloring, Brown finds hope even in Qoheleth’s resignation about death’s inevitability. Brown deals effectively with the futility and skepticism of Qoheleth with both a realism and an undercurrent of optimism. Perhaps, a line from his conclusion will illustrate this best: “How can a book so laden with the oppressive weight of weariness and so filled with the stench of death offer a word of consolation or even something redemptive? One can only imagine. Perhaps because Qoheleth begins with mundane experience and crafts a way of life that acknowledges in full both the dread and the delight of it all.” (pp. 136-138) As with most commentaries in this series, it doesn’t fulfill all of one’s needs for a commentary, but it may well be one that is a vital addition to one’s shelf. ...more |
Notes are private!
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Sep 04, 2023
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Oct 18, 2023
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Nov 04, 2023
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Hardcover
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| 0851512313
| 9780851512310
| 0851512313
| 4.74
| 77
| Nov 01, 1975
| Dec 01, 1999
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liked it
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With some commentaries, I find myself zeroing in on the few verses with which I am dealing at the time. With D, Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ work on Romans str
With some commentaries, I find myself zeroing in on the few verses with which I am dealing at the time. With D, Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ work on Romans stretched over several volumes of sermons preached over a period of years, that methodology doesn’t work very well. Romans: The Final Perseverance of the Saints: Exposition of Chapters 8:17-39, that methodology is even less practical. In the first 94 pages, he preaches multiple sermons with overlapping texts from 8:18-23. Hence, this is more of a book to be read straight-through than a reference book. In all fairness, though, I read the book alongside my preparation for a series of sermons on Romans, so it was over a period of roughly a month and a half. Readers of this review should also be aware that I don’t agree with Lloyd-Jones on everything. There are times that what he perceives as logic could be argued as circular logic where he had already decided upon his conclusion before he explored it, where words like “obvious” don’t always mean what he thinks they mean. For example, on pp. 110-111, he rants against the New English Bible translation of Romans 8:24 [It reads: “But if we hope for something we do not see, then in waiting for it, we show our endurance.”] and suggests that said translation emphasizes our wonderful endurance. Yet, the emphasis is on waiting for God’s glory [the “it”] just as much as in Lloyd-Jones’ suggested translation: “If we hope for that we do not see, then, through patience, we eagerly wait for it.” (p. 111) Apparently, he thinks that putting the pronoun last increases the emphasis, but the emphasis is exactly the same because he sees it happening through [or by means of] patience while NEB emphasizes “waiting for it.” Lloyd-Jones’ own translation is more about our “wonderful” patience than the NEB reading of “waiting” for something external to happen. Yet, I find myself still benefiting from these messages and nodding in general agreement with his major points, at least when he doesn’t oversimplify before going a bridge too far. One egregious example of going too far occurs on pages 234-239 where Lloyd-Jones doesn’t believe it is sufficient to understand foreknowledge and predestination as God creating the opportunity and environment for a believer to choose and opting for that “instance” of reality/creation above all others, but God must have arbitrarily made that decision. Though he later states that he does not believe in “double-predestination,” both his argument and his citation from 1 Peter 2:7-8 without heeding the human agency involved provide a refutation of his own position (p. 267). He holds tenuously to an interpretation in the earlier argument and ignores the implication in the later one. Another problem I have with Lloyd-Jones is that he tends to think that the more dogmatic he can take a stand, the more spiritual it is. I’m not entirely in agreement with his sentiment when he writes, “It is always good to believe in something that the unbeliever rejets with scorn!” (p. 364) Perhaps, this is correct sometimes, but it isn’t particularly helpful in terms of witnessing to unbelievers. And is it inconsistent (or is it just my prejudice) when Lloyd-Jones insists that the reader/hearer believe in God’s Providence/omnipotence and then writes a phrase like: “…as God has already given his Son to death for us, He cannot refuse to do for us anything else that is necessary.” (p. 382) It is the word “cannot” which horrifies me. Dr. Fred L. Fisher used to correct us, telling us that it isn’t that God can’t; it’s that God won’t. There are things which we are certain that God won’t do because they are inconsistent with God’s nature if He did. However, phrases which suggest that God cannot take the volition out of the realm of God’s power. Neither Dr. Lloyd-Jones, Dr. Fisher, nor ye olde Dr. Wilson believe that God will deprive the believer of anything necessary, but the latter two are unwilling to suggest that God is less than God—even in theory. On the other hand, Lloyd-Jones does a marvelous job of building on the last section of Romans 8 (vv. 28-39) to establish a solid case for what is often called “the final perseverance of the saints” and what I grew up calling “security of the believer.” He points out the theological dangers of trying to compartmentalize the elements of personal salvation and relationship (p. 255). Then, he divides the difficult passages that have been used in an attempt to refute the perseverance of the saints into three categories: 1) those which seem to teach “falling from grace” (pp. 271-273), 2) those which seem to teach an “uncertain” salvation dependent upon individuals rather than God (pp. 273-274), and 3) “warning” passages (pp. 274-275). The answers to interpreting these passages against security of the believer tend to overlap, mostly culminating in the Truth that salvation depends upon God. Lest one think that I read this volume just looking for things to pick at, let me share a few of my favorite ideas. I really liked his personal confession: “The more I study the Bible the more I discover what Thomas Carlyle called ‘infinities and immensities.’” (p. 277) I really responded well to his illustration of the idea of “remnant” from Isaiah 1:9 where the prophet says that the Lord left Israel a “seed” or all of Israel would have perished like Sodom and Gomorrah. He uses that to say, “It is the Lord of hosts who preserves the remnant. The remnant does not preserve itself. … Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace.” (p. 353) And finally, I loved his citation of Charles Hodge near the end of the book (p. 435) which underscored his own observation about the work of Christ seated at the Father’s right hand: “Notice that in each case His work is defined in connection with, and in terms of, our salvation. His work there is mediatorial.” (p. 432) So, lest one think my concern about overstatements and inconsistent statements are recommendations to stay away from this important series on Romans, please think again. Even though I may pick some bones from various overstatements, Romans: The Final Perseverance of the Saints: Exposition of Chapters 8:17-39 has more meat than bones. ...more |
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Although Christopher J. H. Wright didn’t start off to write a full-blown commentary on the book known as Qohelet(h) in the Hebrew Bible and Ecclesiast
Although Christopher J. H. Wright didn’t start off to write a full-blown commentary on the book known as Qohelet(h) in the Hebrew Bible and Ecclesiastes in the English Bible, Hearing the Message of Ecclesiastes: Questioning Faith in a Baffling World is more than the devotional book which glosses over difficulties that I expected. It is, however, the very accessible book on the subject that I expected. I loved the sometimes flippant paraphrases of Qohelet(h)’s sayings. Some of these paraphrases are selected here, as follows. When Qohelet(h) says that a good name is better than fine perfume in Ecclesiastes 7:1, Wright cleverly states: “Your reputation matters more than your aftershave, …” (p. 80). When we read of the value of companionship, using examples from the hostility of desert survival, Wright conjures an African proverb that perfectly fits: “If you want to go fast, go alone. But if you want to go far, go together.” (p. 59). He summarizes the familiar times and seasons passage of Ecclesiastes 3 with several observations. I particularly liked his second observation: “Time is always full of content. Time is ‘for’ things.” (p. 31) I also liked “Keep Calm and Carry On: for Ecclesiastes 10:4 (“calmness can lay great offenses to rest”—p. 117). I particularly liked his quotation of an exaggerated paraphrase from George Orwell’s “Politics and the English Language.” Orwell transformed the poetry of Ecclesiastes 9:11 into: “Objective considerations of contemporary phenomenon compel the conclusion that success or failure in competitive activities exhibits no tendency to be commensurate with innate capacity, …” [quoted on p. 111.] Wright doesn’t ignore the reality that Qohelet(h)’s perspective is always bounded by what he can observe. The wise man admits his limitations in various places (in particular, the disparity between God’s position in heaven and humanity’s grounded situation in this existence, but Wright isn’t afraid to question Qohelet(h)’s antinomian implications in Ecclesiastes 7:16-18 (p. 87) and 9:1-2 (pp. 105-106). Nor is he afraid to call out the wise man for contradicting himself (pp. xxi, 15, 26, 50, 54, 72, 84, 94, 106, 110, 117, 125-126, 129, 132, 133, and 140, in particular). He also isn’t afraid to call out those phrases or verses which are unsettling to the Christian reader. For example, Wright notes that while the idea that money is the answer to everything in 10:19 might just be an observation that it’s always good to have a bit of cash handy, it is most likely a cynical observation concerning corruption (p. 120). Further, he does a good job of tying the verses about investment, diversification, and risk into New Testament parallels in Luke 12:35-48, 1 Corinthians 3:5-15, Ephesians 5:16, and 1 Timothy 4:2 (p. 123). And, even though it has been used by pulpiteers in times past, I liked Wright’s reminder that Qohelet(h)’s last section can be organized around two imperatives: rejoice and remember (p. 124). The conclusion considers that Qohelet(h)’s truth is a partial truth in the wider scope of the extended Christian canon. Wright reminds us that the distance of this book’s God is remediated by the Incarnation of Christ (p. 141) and that the perspective of the Cross and Resurrection counters Qohelet(h)’s obsession with death and meaninglessness (p. 142). I particularly liked the following portion of his summation: “[Ecclesiastes] brings us a word that is part of the word of God. It is a disturbing word. A true word. But it is not the final word. (p. 144) And, of course, that final word is the Word. ...more |
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As an Old Testament professor in India, one is not surprised that Anthony R. Ceresko’s interpretation of Old Testament Literature in general and Wisdo
As an Old Testament professor in India, one is not surprised that Anthony R. Ceresko’s interpretation of Old Testament Literature in general and Wisdom Literature in specific is geared toward the plight of the poor and unenfranchised. Introduction to Old Testament Wisdom follows in the tradition of Norman K. Gottwald’s socioeconomic understanding of biblical history and literature (The Tribes of Yahweh: A Sociology of the Religion of Liberated Israel: 1250-1050 B. C. E. and The Hebrew Bible: A Socio-Literary Introduction). As a result, Ceresko focuses on a late provenance for the completed books and emphasizes an exilic, post-exilic, and intertestamental milieu over pre-monarchical and early monarchical influences. This offers the advantage of presenting the wisdom literature as a counterpoint to oppressive regimes and allows Ceresko to proffer both a pastoral and skeptical role within the material. Although Ceresko offers a short synopsis of the role of family and village in both codifying behavior and instructing the young through reflection on experience (p. 8), he jumps very quickly to the formal scribal education and court institutions of Mesopotamia and Egypt. He provides both external and internal evidence pointing toward the formal roles of counselors (Internally being the reference to a recorder and secretary in King David’s court in 2 Samuel 20:23-25, copying of Proverbs by King Hezekiah’s officials in Proverbs25:1, and Jeremiah’s apparent threefold division of duties between priest, wise person, and prophet in Jeremiah 18:18). Further, in terms of Ceresko’s sensitivity to liberation, note his citation of references to female wise persons regarding the wise woman of Tekoa in 2 Samuel 14 and the wise woman of Abel in 2 Samuel 20 (p. 17). Notwithstanding his sensitivity, Ceresko seems well-informed on the literature with references to Collins, Crenshaw, Murphy, Rad, Scott, Whybray, Williams, and Witherington among those commonly cited. Although I very much appreciate Ceresko’s approach, it still seems to me that within the observational and experiential background to wisdom, one must take seriously the rural perspective on nature and find a better line between folk wisdom with its emphasis on nature and the scribal counselor’s use of nature imagery in his comparisons. I definitely agree with the emphasis on the observational nature of wisdom, however. “Within this ‘scribal school’ flourished the cultivation of ‘wisdom’ with its stress on careful and patient observance of nature, of human society, and of the world.” (p. 19) “[The wisdom writers] were trained and disciplined to observe carefully the world around them and th events of everyday life. They tried to discern those hidden orders and interconnections that gave unity and a sense of meaning and purpose to that world and to those events.” (p. 21) Since this is An Introduction to Old Testament Wisdom: A Spirituality for Liberation, Ceresko performs a service for his students by identifying various forms in which the wisdom is dispensed. He does a very good job of demonstrating antithetical parallelism and synthetic (though he calls it completion or development) parallelism (p. 32). He lists literary forms like the fable (even though Jotham’s in Judges 9 is the only occurrence in the Bible) and the riddle (even though Samson’s in Judges 14 is a rarity, if not a one-off –also on p. 32). He notes the autobiographical teaching (as in Proverbs and Ecclesiastes) as well as the onomasticon or list in Job 28 (p. 33). As with most scholars, he identifies the most common form of Proverb as being a comparison (p. 34) but goes on to divide them into sayings (both enlightening observations and didactic illustration) and admonitions (both positive and negative—p. 35). Given his ministry in India, it was very appropriate that he closed his chapter on forms with the seven literary types with similar roles in the Indian tradition (he gives the Indian terms, but I’ll give the English equivalents): 1) edifying discourse, 2) moral stories, 3) parables, 4) maxims, 5) ancestral precepts, 6) sacred syllables, and 7) great sayings. (p. 38). Although Ceresko offers useful insights throughout the wisdom literature, this sense of a search for order and meaning seems, at first glance, to be counter to the Curator (“Qoheleth”) of Ecclesiastes. So, I paid particular attention to Cersko’s notes on that book. He observes the paradox in Qoheleth’s method: “He asserts the goodness of God’s creation and the mandate to rejoice in it. But he affirms as well our inability to grasp and hold at will to that goodness and that joy.” (p. 94) Naturally, Ceresko sets the experience of this book within the Persian period and the hardship of moving from a barter economy to a currency-based economy. This is why Ceresko maes particular note of the word “profit” appearing 18 times in the book and the Curator (“Qoheleth”) using economic metaphors in 7:27-28 (p. 95) and 4:6 (p. 96), among others. My favorite part of this section was Ceresko’s identification of 1:12-2:26 as four interlocking units reflecting two experiments (p. 105). 1:12-15 introduces the experiment of 2:1-11 where the Curator tests the idea of pleasure. 1:16-18 introduces the experiment of 2:12-26 in a leisurely search for wisdom. I also liked the division of 6:10-11:6 as consisting of eight sections, four which end in “not to find out/who can find out” and four which finish with “do not know/no knowledge.” (p. 110) But lest one think that Qoheleth thinks he has all the answers, notice that his regular insertion of claims that this or that is “vanity, breath, or a wisp” even applies to his own claims (p. 111). Also, in the closing of the book, Ceresko summarizes the theological perspective of Qoheleth: “…a close study of the text reveals that God’s freedom represents a central concern and teaching of the book. With skill and conviction, the author exposes the ‘vanity’ of the human quest for Godlike wisdom.” (p. 183) Another valuable portion of the book is the chapter on the use of wisdom literature in the New Testament. Sirach 23:9 and 29:11 are strikingly similar to Jesus’ words in Matthew 5:34 and 6:19, respectively (p. 173). Notice also the similarity between Ben Sira’s invitation from Lady Wisdom (Sirach 24) and Jesus invitation in Matthew 11:28-30 (p. 177). As a textbook, Introduction to Old Testament Wisdom has much to commend it. I would personally find myself wanting to supplement it with the work of Crenshaw, Rad, or Scott to provide some balance if I were using it in a course, but I wouldn’t hesitate to use it. For my personal study, I would have liked to have seen extended versions of the chapters where Ceresko dealt with “Selected Passages” in the respective books of wisdom. Overall, though, I’m glad to have added this volume to my library. ...more |
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Dividing the sixth chapter of Romans into two large sections based on the two rhetorical questions (“Should we just keep on sinning so that God can pr
Dividing the sixth chapter of Romans into two large sections based on the two rhetorical questions (“Should we just keep on sinning so that God can provide yet more grace?” and “Should we keep on sinning since we have been set free from the Law?”), Romans: The New Man: Exposition of Chapter 6 is a fascinating set of sermons about the state and behavior of the Christian believer. For me, 20th century physician turned pastor, David Martyn Lloyd-Jones, is remarkably thorough in his exposition and generally correct. However, I find myself occasionally offended when he goes beyond his exposition to take unnecessarily bifurcated stances. I find myself offended at Lloyd-Jones taking exception to the idea of the church as a hospital for sinners rather than a barracks for holy warriors (p. 174). Since a “healing” and “therapeutic encouragement” is part of the church’s responsibility as a covenant fellowship, one would think that the church would be more like a field hospital (a Mobile Army Surgical Hospital?) dealing with the wounded and assisting in rehabilitation before facing the spiritual conflict once more. But, no! Lloyd-Jones says it has to be one or the other? I am also not quite sure that Lloyd-Jones, although admitting to the mystery involved, doesn’t interpret Jesus’ quotation of Psalm 22:1 on the cross rather too much without considering the fullness of God’s plan (p. 109). These may be issues of stress and nuance, but I find them off-putting enough that I cannot give a superior recommendation of this book to every potential reader. Nonetheless, there is much more in this volume to commend it than in the previous books that I’ve read in the series. One appreciates his emphasis on the passive aspect of the Christian’s new state in Romans 6:3 (p. 39), as well as his emphasis on “general blessings” upon saved and unsaved versus the full potentiality of “all” the blessings of God in Romans 6:11 (p. 135). I particularly liked his description of the “inconsistency” of (not the non-existence of) sin in the Christian life. “Why then do I sin? Because sin is in my members, because this ‘body of sin’ remains. But I am sharing in a salvation that will even rid me of that. I realize that I am behaving in an inconsistent manner—inconsistent because I am a Christian, not because it is doubtful whether I am a Christian.” (p. 84) I also appreciated his emphasis on how Paul personified sin to emphasize the ongoing struggle of the believer (p. 168, and elsewhere). Perhaps, the most valuable contribution in this volume is Lloyd-Jones’ exposure of problematic ideas of sanctification. On pages 155-156, he notes that the context of an exhortation not to surrender to sin indicates that sanctification is not something merely to be accepted. It takes work. Sanctification is not something that is a sudden experience with no further relevance because, as long as sin is in the mortal body (and it will always be so until we receive that transformation described in 1 Corinthians 15 upon Christ’s return), we will not have a deliverance once and for all until that point (p. 156). Further, sanctification is not merely a matter of letting go and letting God, because Romans 6 is exhorting believers to act, not surrender (p. 156). Finally, since the exhortation is addressed to the believers’ wills, “…any teaching concerning sanctification or holiness which tells us that we really have nothing to do, and that the main call to us is to stop trying to do anything in the matter of our sanctification, is obviously a contradiction of this.” (p. 164) While this may not seem significant to everyone, Lloyd-Jones offers a very interesting translation of “form of doctrine” in Romans 6:17 as “pattern of doctrine.” (p. 212) This is nice because he later summarizes the ascending steps of the believer’s relationship with God as: a) obedience, b) doctrinal assurance (“pattern of doctrine”), c) righteousness, and d) fellowship with God (pp. 292-293). The progression is not one of “earning” salvation, but building upon it. Finally, I enjoyed his summary of the chapter as dealing with three (3) issues: 1) masters, 2) terms, and 3) ends (p. 310). Those three areas explain what the Apostle Paul was making clear in Romans 6. In terms of fodder for thought and usefulness for preaching and teaching, I think Romans 6 was significantly more profound than previous books in the series. ...more |
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Romans: Assurance: Exposition of Chapter 5 is another volume in the series of published sermons that David Martyn Lloyd-Jones preached at Westminster
Romans: Assurance: Exposition of Chapter 5 is another volume in the series of published sermons that David Martyn Lloyd-Jones preached at Westminster Chapel in London from 1955-1968. As such, I find that there are times when I resonate with his exposition of scripture and times when I lose patience and argue in the margins (especially when he is overly literal in interpretation on one page and ignores his own methodology to accept a symbolic exposition a few pages later). I found myself frustrated with his insistence upon a historical Adam (despite the fact that the use of the word Adam in the Bible is predominantly used for humankind in general) and his insistence that the doctrine of “election” negates authentic free will. In short, his Calvinism in this work is sometimes more Calvin than Calvin. For those who wonder why I still like the book, despite such fundamental disagreements, I have to say that it is because most of it is good preaching. Even when I disagree with him, I understand the point from which he is coming and accept what he is trying to accomplish. And for this volume, particularly, Romans: Assurance: Exposition of Chapter 5, I very much enjoyed some of his illustrations. It didn’t seem like he used that many in the previous two volumes I read. So, let me share some of my favorites from this volume because it will certainly be more enjoyable than recapitulating the arguments in my book margins. For example, at one point he sees Adam as literal, but immediately jumps to Sin as personified (p. 193). I appreciated Lloyd-Jones’ comparison of faith as being like a compass needle. He observed that magnetic interference may cause the needle to leave magnetic north temporarily, but “…it will find its place of rest in the north. It may know agitation, it may know a lot of violence, but it will go back to its centre, it always finds the place of rest, and the same thing is always true of faith.” (p. 23) Again, he uses the idea of playing the piano as an illustration of the difference between a righteous and a good man. “A man may play the piano correctly, strike the right note every time and keep the right time, and yet all you can truthfully say about his playing is that it is correct. But there is another man who plays the piano, and plays the same piece; yet you realize at once that there is something more. He is an artist, he puts life into the performance, he does it in such a way that it moves you and it thrills you. The first man was quite correct, but he lacked this extra something that the second man has got. That is the kind of difference between a righteous man and a good man.” (p. 121) At another point, Lloyd-Jones was making a point about how Christians should be full of hope, though secularists don’t really have hope. He quotes a woman who was on the Brain Trust television program. The question was raised as to whether philosophy could give comfort to people in need. Her answer was “No” because, being non-religious, she asserted, “There are just facts, but there is no comfort.” (p. 316) Again, as I noted on a previous occasion, these volumes are useful to me, even though I cannot offer my wholesale assent to his arguments. I can, however, offer my wholesale assent to his assertion that Jesus is God’s perfect provision for both meaning of life and the expectation of life eternal. ...more |
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Dispensationalism has always seemed arbitrary to me, the bifurcation or trifurcation of redemptive history into discrete segments. So, when I would sa
Dispensationalism has always seemed arbitrary to me, the bifurcation or trifurcation of redemptive history into discrete segments. So, when I would say that Dr. David Martyn Lloyd-Jones is clearly dispensationalist, one might think that I would read something I would regard as more fruitful. Yet, I am engaged in reading through Lloyd-Jones’ prolific work on Romans and Romans: Atonement and Justification: Exposition of Chapters 3:20-4:25 is the volume I’ve most recently read. Of course, my biggest problem with dispensationalism is that its very structural conception undermines what I perceive as God’s consistency in providing for the salvation of all who believe. So, I am perplexed when Lloyd-Jones expresses that consistency while undercutting it with the use of the word “dispensation.” For example, “I would suggest that the purpose of this fourth chapter is to show that under the Old Testament dispensation this way of salvation was not merely predicted, it was also God’s way of dealing with men, and saving them, at that time also.” (p. 155) Simply put, I don’t understand the use of dispensation in this way. Again, we find the same sentiment on pp. 156-157, including: “…men in all dispensations are saved in exactly the same way. It is the same covenant of grace under the Old Testament as it is under the New.” (p. 157) So, why artificially segment salvation history as dispensationalists do if it has no functional impact? More of a problem is that his desire to differentiate the old covenant (dispensation) from the new covenant (dispensation) is rather overstated. For example, “The Old Testament animal sacrifices were not meant to affect man at all, they were directed toward God.” (p. 88) Isn’t that rather like saying that one’s confession of sin isn’t intended to affect you at all? After all, we are to direct out confession toward God, are we not? Yet, confession of sin is agreeing with God about the destructive, relationship-breaking, and death-dealing nature of sin. That agreement is intended to: 1) provide forgiveness, and 2) empower a desire not to do it anymore. It seems like the OT sacrifices did much the same thing: 1) demonstrating the deadly nature of sin and its high cost, ultimately, in death, and 2) providing a means of forgiveness/cleansing (yes, by faith) which would enable restoration of relationship with God (which with a certain amount of inconsistency, Lloyd-Jones gets to on p. 89). I have great difficulties with Lloyd-Jones’ position (in agreement with Leon Morris’ position) on the necessity of “propitiation” over “expiation.” This volume, as does Morris’ The Apostolic Preaching of the Cross, seems to assume that one has to have an angry God who must be appeased in order to believe Jesus is our “substitute” taking our place. Both Lloyd-Jones and Morris assume that those who are offended by the pagan underpinning of propitiation in trying to pacify a contentious god do not believe in the wrath of God. I know I do. I believe God hates sin. I believe that knowing the destructive power of sin and what it does to human lives makes God angry. But I don’t believe that anger is directed at humans; I believe it is directed at the sin destroying a given human life. And yes, I believe that when God operates on sin, there is often collateral damage (usually as a result of humans resisting God much like a patient making things worse by disobeying her or his doctor). But I don’t find it helpful to picture God as a vengeful God who must be bribed to leave humans alone. I hear his concern about losing the emphasis on Jesus’ sacrifice on our behalf and the power of the spilling of our Lord’s blood. Still, isn’t his emphasis inconsistent when he writes: “…there cannot be a true relationship between God and man until that sin is expiated. But that is just another way of saying propitiation.” (p. 77) Still, for all of my objections regarding his tendentious arguments on some matters, I greatly appreciated his insights on others. For example, on the major issue of faith, Lloyd-Jones hit on good points throughout the volume. Here are some of my favorites. “There is an aspect of faith of which it is true to say this, that faith is a kind of protest. All things seem to be against us.” (p. 27) His presentation of three elements of faith (knowledge, assent, and trust) was well-conceived (p. 45). Regarding faith’s role in salvation: “Faith is nothing but the instrument or the channel by which this righteousness of God in Christ becomes ours. It is not faith that saves us. What saves us is the Lord Jesus Christ and His perfect work.” (p. 120) Again, “Faith is always linked to an object. The object is the Lord Jesus Christ and His perfect work and His perfect righteousness; …” (p. 120) “Faith, if you like, is a kind of title-deed, and there is certainty in a title-deed.” (p. 213) I also liked his argument about degrees of faith from weak to strong (p. 226) with his clarification that the object of faith (God) is the same, but just as the essence of the oak is in a sapling, that sapling is not as strong as a mature oak (p. 228). I also enjoyed his reference to Hudson Taylor’s translation of “Have faith in God” from Mark 11:22 as “Hold on to the faithfulness of God.” (p. 234) So, even though I have some reservations about the way he phrases and argues some aspects of his teaching, I feel like I benefit from these studies and plan to continue reading in this series. ...more |
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Stanley E. Porter was an outstanding choice to put together a panel on the history and methods of biblical hermeneutics for the creation of Biblical H
Stanley E. Porter was an outstanding choice to put together a panel on the history and methods of biblical hermeneutics for the creation of Biblical Hermeneutics: Five Views. Porter himself is a respected biblical interpreter who is not afraid to experiment with literary criticism in many forms. But what is particularly good about this volume is that he primarily sets the stage for five different perspectives, merely proffering guidance on the foundational structure for how the viewpoints would be presented and, presumably, selecting the representative scholars to represent each perspective. Historical Critical: The historical-critical perspective is ably represented by the talented and prolific Craig Blomberg. Blomberg doesn’t attack the other approaches, but he states his position clearly: “I am convinced that all of the other approaches must build on the historical-critical/grammatical approach in order to function legitimately.” (p. 28) In answer to those who say that authorial intention is nearly impossible to determine, Blomberg reminds us: “It is very unlikely that the originally intended meaning of the message whether written or oral, could be something that an original audience couldn’t possibly have conceived.” (p. 30) I also appreciated the fact that Blomberg was honest about ideological spin. “The idea of preserving a dispassionate chronicle of events for posterity—with no necessary lessons to be learned from it—is largely a modern invention.” (p. 33) That being said, however, Blomberg goes on to suggest that: “Source, form and redaction criticism form a natural triad of disciplines that are often treated together.” (pp. 33-34). Further, “…the chronological sequence in which to consider them is form, source and redaction criticism.” (p. 34). Using the first four verses of Luke’s gospel as an example of establishing the form behind the text, he goes on to describe Luke’s verification as providing an account. “The most common meaning of the Greek word behind “account” (diēgēsis) is a written narrative of some kind.” (p. 35). So, moving from the initial form of the account, one attempts to determine the sources of said accounts. Then redaction criticism examines the rationale behind the way the portions have been woven together. Blomberg rightly admits the danger in this approach can seem to put one above the text (p. 36), but notes that close reading of the grammatical aspects of the text should protect against that. Once that groundwork is established, one moves to the grammatical portion of interpretation. He defines this as, “…interpretation that focuses on the meanings of words; the analysis of grammar; and the structure of phrases, clauses, sentences, paragraphs and increasingly larger units of thought up to the level of an entire book. (p. 37). But the bottom line for Blomberg is: “Without an anchor in the historical context and the original meanings of words and grammatical structures, literary/postmodern methods have few checks and balances. (p. 41). In reading the chapters by advocates of the other approaches, however, I believe he may have overstated the divorce from the historical base even to be found, for example, in postmodernism. In his response to this, Spencer celebrated Blomberg’s emphasis on oral development which, in turn, should enlighten his own literary/postmodern approach. “Blomberg helpfully reminds us of the ancient oral culture in which the biblical texts first developed, a phenomenon that my heavily “literate” literary/postmodern approach tends to neglect and needs to take more seriously in light of recent scholarship.” (p. 146) And I also appreciate his awareness that interpretation’s work can be prematurely finished and satisfied with the historical-critical methodology alone. He writes of the need: “…for readers not simply to exploit biblical texts for their own aims but to engage these ideologically (theologically) motivated accounts in rigorous, respectful dialogue.” (p. 147). Further, I think Westphal has an important point when he challenges Blomberg not to make the exegesis be the “be all and end all” of interpretation. I thought Westphal’s challenge was particularly well-said as: “The constraint that needs to be honored is not limiting biblical meaning to its original meaning, thereby reducing interpretation to exegesis, but allowing original meaning to be a constraint, a guardrail, against reducing the biblical text to a Rorschach inkblot onto which we can project anything we find in our personal or collective psyche. That is a real danger, as the history of theology testifies.” (p. 164) I also think his later contention is useful: “If our theologies are to take the textual character of the Bible seriously, it is not clear that grammatical analysis of the communication between the author and the original audience is more fundamental than the literary strategies (narrative structure, allusions, figures of speech, etc.) employed by the author to communicate to the original audience.” (p. 169). I tend to agree that the communication strategy and technique is part of the inspired communication (even if not executed consciously). Literary/Postmodern: Scott Spencer, a New Testament scholar at Baptist Theological Seminar of Richmond, Virginia, presents a literary/postmodern perspective. Though many interpreters become concerned about the deconstruction and postmodern aspects of this method, Spencer quotes David Seeley’s assertion: “The point of deconstruction is not to make nonsense of a text, but to locate structural, systemic faultlines within it…” (p. 57). Spencer contends that this approach and historical-critical analysis can work side-by-side. He demonstrates this in his summary where he speaks of working in centrifugal fashion from the text, inside-out. “We begin by closely concentrating on the linguistic, stylistic, structural, and thematic elements of the final text under investigation.” (p. 68) From there, one widens out to consider significant cotexts as well as intertexts. Next, the move is to: “…informative contexts in the surrounding rhetorical and cultural environments, and finally, to expansive horizons of different readers from diverse social locations and power positions,…” (p. 68) Of course, from there, one drills back in centripetally to the challenge of interpreting the text. Some have criticized this approach as being not just as “open text,” but being too wide-open. Even Spencer addresses this in a response to Wall’s essay: “Secular literary and historical critics may offer keen insights into biblical interpretation, but I would argue—on literary and historical grounds—that their value is limited to the extent they do not appreciate the fundamental nature of biblical texts as religious literature historically produced, preserved and practiced as sacred Scripture in the life of the church.” (p. 152). Redemptive-Historical: Richard Gaffin of Westminster Theological Seminary presents the redemption-historical approach so popular within the Reformed tradition. The simplistic way of looking at this approach to interpretation is to suggest that it forces Christ into every approach. It is, essentially, the approach I learned from childhood, but I became ever more concerned that it didn’t make sense to me that the Holy Spirit would have inspired a text in, say, the 10th century BCE, if it’s real meaning was simply a type of Christ. Of course, neither the model for this approach, Geerhardus Vos, or Gaffin are as extreme as I once thought. Indeed, Vos wrote: ““It is certainly not without significance that God has embodied the contents of revelation, not in a dogmatic system, but in a book of history, the parallel to which in dramatic interest and simple eloquence is nowhere to be found”; and, “The Bible is not a dogmatic handbook but a historical book full of dramatic interest.” (p. 90) I agree with the emphasis on special revelation as divided into two basic modes: deed revelation and word revelation (p. 91) while not negating the context of general revelation. Redemptive revelation is historical, but a historical sequence leading up to the ultimate historical revelation in Christ: “[Redemptive revelation] has its truth and validity as it occurs in history, as multiple historical events that together constitute an organically unfolding whole, a completed history.” (p. 91) In parallel with the historical veracity of redemptive revelation, “Verbal revelation is always focused on or oriented toward God’s activity in history as Creator and Redeemer.” (p. 92) Hence, “Biblical interpretation is not autonomous assessment of a distanced textual datum but receptive appropriation of the God-authored preinterpretation of redemptive history consummated in Christ, preinterpretation that includes the revelation of his will for loving service to him and others.” (pp. 93-94) My problem with this approach comes with Gaffin’s insistence that the original author must have intended exactly what the New Testament author may have reinterpreted it as in the light of further history and revelation. If one takes inspiration seriously, the original author doesn’t have to have understood everything God eventually intended with the text. Just as many of us believe that God accommodated the limited science of earlier writers with a broad poetic description of natural phenomena to meet their needs, so could God have accommodated Old Testament prophecies to general understandings suitable for the prophets’ contemporaries while being written in broad enough strokes to be interpreted specifically in Jesus Christ as ultimate Messiah. Interestingly, the response from Blomberg expressed my misgiving more thoroughly: “If part of accepting the entire canon of Scripture as inspired and authoritative means that we can use the New Testament to interpret the Old (or, more generally, later Scripture to interpret earlier texts), then there is no need to insist that the first author had the later writer’s meaning in mind. Because the later text is “God-breathed” (2 Tim 3:16), that alone makes its interpretation correct and profitable, irrespective of the earlier text’s intention.” (p. 141) Particularly well-said was Blomberg’s follow-up observation quoting R. Schipper’s article in the New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology: “The term “fulfill” in both Greek and Hebrew can mean to “fill full”—that is, to invest with fuller meaning—just as easily as it can mean that a prophesied event has now occurred.” (p. 142) Spencer is alarmed at the unidirectional nature of this approach. He writes in his response: “another, I think the rest of us in this volume would not drive our hermeneutical views down such a hard-and-fast one-way street, allowing more space for distinctive, if not necessarily disjunctive, Old Testament highways and side roads.” (p. 154) While admiring the “ultimate” Christocentric focus of this methodology, I have seen Spencer’s fears in tangible methodology during my early experiences in sitting under Southern Baptist preaching. Wall’s response also underscores this concern, though it is written in a more general form: “My evaluation is ongoing, but my hunch is that the differences between Christian interpreters are often less a matter of methodological or epistemological disagreements and more a matter of their confessional differences.” (p. 195) That is a bold assessment, but likely accurate. Westphal also worries about the danger of creating an overarching continuity that ignores differences. His response notes: “…one wonders whether this theological continuity does not need to be held in tension with historical-cultural-linguistic discontinuity. Is it not the case that the desert fathers, the Geneva Calvinists, the American slaves and the contemporary Amish live in different historical-cultural-linguistic worlds that show up and should show up as discontinuities in their biblical interpretation?” (p. 166). As for Gaffin’s response to the other approaches, I found it utterly defensive and unnecessarily supernaturalist. Yet, I do agree with one major point he made in summary: “Methodology and doxology are not at odds, at least not necessarily.” (p. 186) I agree. I just don’t like some of the parts of the battlefield upon which he chose to fight his academic battle. Canonical: Since the groundbreaking emphasis on canonical criticism by Brevard Childs, one fertile approach has been the study of relationships within the canon as advocated by Robert Wall of Seattle-Pacific University. Wall immediately asserts that the canonical interpreter is still concerned with doing the historical-textual work: “The aim of faithful exegesis is not to hunt down “the” normative meaning of a text based on what the author intended or first readers apprehended; rather, the aim is to address a text’s lack of clarity as a major cause of its misuse or nonuse among its present interpreters.” (p. 113) Clarity, therefore, is a key. As with the Gregory the Great quotation that keeps appearing in this volume (about scripture growing with us), Wall clearly recognizes: “The linguistic priority of the exegetical task does expose the inherent elasticity of words and their grammatical relationships. Further changes in the perception of a text’s meaning may result from new evidence and different exegetical strategies and from interpreters shaped by diverse social and theological locations.” (p. 114). But the canonical interpreter knows that the church is where the real fruit of her or his industry will be produced: “The canonical approach employs all the tools of modern criticism, but the aim of their skillful use is to make believers wise for understanding salvation and mature for every good work (see 2 Tim 3:15-17).” (p. 115) One of the key differences between traditional historical-critical work and that of the canonical critic is that historical critics tend to dissect texts into fragments and spend most of their energy in treating them as fragments. Wall reminds the reader that canonical criticism spends most of their energy in understanding the biblical canon as a whole (p. 116). This does not mean that the canonical critic doesn’t use form criticism to identify pieces and redaction criticism to consider how these pieces were assembled, but it means that it pays more attention to the final product. In this way, for example, “When the believer speaks of the biblical canon as a sanctified “place” into which we come to hear God’s word, one can also speak of a sanctified “placement” in which collections are arranged (and perhaps individual writings within them) to articulate God’s word in the way that it can be heard best.” (p. 118) Blomberg’s response to Wall is accurate as far as it goes, but I think he oversteps in his criticism of Wall’s observations on “shaped text,” the idea that new interpretations may be developed from canonical juxtapositions of texts. Blomberg asserts: “When Wall uses Luke’s infancy narrative to interpret Matthew’s, however, he juxtaposes texts that first-century readers, as far as we know, would never have juxtaposed.” (p. 144) Yet, just as he responded to Gaffin that the original author didn’t need to know all possible interpretive extrapolations for the Holy Spirit to use them, even so, canonical criticism should not be reduced to only the 1st century understanding. True, we must build on the bedrock of that understanding, but as part of the receptive history of a text, those later juxtapositions of scripture are important, as well. As impressed as I was with Wall’s essay, I was puzzled by one thing that Spencer observed in his response to the canonical approach (as presented by Wall): “I find it curious, given Wall’s earlier stress on Matthew’s priority leading into Mark, that he makes no comment concerning Mark’s jumping right into Jesus’ adult vocation.” (p. 151) In addition, I was forced to consider the validity of Wesphal’s concern that Wall and the canonical critics may not be concerned enough with the original meaning: “…what the text ‘plainly says.’ ‘Plainly’ can hardly mean ‘immediately obvious.’ Otherwise we would not have so much conflict in interpretation, and it would not be necessary to speak of the consensus that exegesis seeks as a goal, presumably not yet in hand.” (p. 172) I did feel that the clarification in approach that Wall provided in response to Gaffin is important to understand regarding canonical criticism as Childs and Wall practice(d) it: “…advocates of the canonical approach follow Karl Barth’s typology of biblical witness, which carefully makes the distinction that Scripture is not identical to the divine revelation but bears witness to the divine revelation.” (p. 198). Philosophical/Theological: Finally, since there is a philosophical tradition of hermeneutics represented by Hans-Georg Gadamer and Paul Ricoeur (among others), Merold Westphal of Fordham University argues for a philosophical/theological approach. Unlike the other contributors to this volume, Westphal’s essay doesn’t offer even a modicum of direction in terms of applying his hermeneutic. He quotes from Gadamer to justify this absence: “The task “is not to develop a procedure of understanding, but to clarify the conditions in which understanding takes place. But these conditions do not amount to a ‘procedure’ or method which the interpreter must of himself bring to bear on the text; rather they must be given.” (p. 71). To be sure, even I would agree that proper interpretation is more of an art than a science, but even an artificial flow-chart reflecting some of the numerous facets to be explored in this methodology would have been helpful. On the other hand, some of the quotations and illustrations in this chapter are quite insightful. For example, I liked his perception of the hermeneutical circle as akin to a basketball player on offense and one one defense. Both the text and the interpreter “react” to each other (p. 72). One almost believes Westphal is evoking quantum mechanics when he writes: “Our inextricable embeddedness within history and its traditions means that our interpretations arise from particular locations. We are always somewhere (in semantic and cognitive space) and never achieve what has been called ‘the view from nowhere.’ Just as in ordinary vision, where we are standing determines what we can see and what we cannot see of the object at which we are looking. This embeddedness means that understanding is necessarily plural, partial and perspectival.” (p. 74). However, the concern is simply stated: “…what we want to understand is not something hidden behind the text, but something disclosed in front of it.” (p. 76) [Out of room] ...more |
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It’s difficult to believe that a series of sermons preached from 1955-1968 could still impact readers today. Yet, D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ multi-volume
It’s difficult to believe that a series of sermons preached from 1955-1968 could still impact readers today. Yet, D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ multi-volume compilation of those sermons on Romans are exceedingly well-presented even for today’s readers and hearers. Romans: Exposition of Chapters 2:1-3:20: The Righteous Judgment of God is a volume that I purchased to aid me in my preparation of a sermon series on Romans which is not even scheduled to take 13 months, much less 13 years. Yet, Lloyd-Jones’ deliberate and methodical approach to this extended passage is an invaluable reference for both professionals and lay-persons. Unfortunately, Lloyd-Jones does have rather a bias against modern scholarship. Said bias can be stated with one quotation from this volume: “That is why the higher critical movement of the last century has been such a terrible thing.” (p. 171) For all of the marvelous and insightful exposition of these passages in the rest of the book, our author throws the pickles out with the brine. Instead of celebrating the emphasis on the sitz im leben of form criticism and the usefulness of text and redaction criticism, he assumes (and you know what that makes out of you and me) that higher criticism’s purpose is to destroy the revelation of God rather than to sift it carefully. I realize that some treatments from “higher criticism” are so sterile and uninspiring that they seem to undermine an evangelistic approach, but Lloyd-Jones assumes that all scholarship is designed to the end of reducing confidence in the scripture. I don’t believe that is true. The section of Romans (2:1-3:20) with which Lloyd-Jones is dealing in this volume has often been cited as evidence of Pauline antisemitism. As Lloyd-Jones elucidates, Paul isn’t presenting a one-sided case against the Jews of his day. Rather, Paul has dealt with generally pagan practices of the Gentiles in the first chapter but wants to weigh the Jews who do not know Jesus on the same scale as Gentiles who do not know Jesus. To show how Lloyd-Jones doesn’t take this as an attack, one should note that his application toward these verses demonstrates three points: 1)some of us (to which he includes both Calvinists and Armenians) tend to use the scripture to confirm our own prejudices; 2) we tend to put ourselves in special categories (as Paul’s readers/hearers did as Jew or Gentile), 3) we point our fingers at others (when we may be guilty ourselves) as what we would call today “whataboutism,” and 4) we tend to run away from the concept of “justification by faith” when we substitute other criteria for dependence upon God (pp. 9-10). Throughout the book, Lloyd-Jones refuses to allow people to look down their noses at Paul’s audience by applying the things Paul is arguing against to modern Christians of Lloyd-Jones’ mid-20th century. As for the charge of antisemitism against Paul, Lloyd-Jones spends plenty of emphasis on both the good and the bad of Paul’s emphasis of “the Jew first and then, the Gentile.” (p. 77) From a 21st century perspective, watching the decay of the family unit and lack of respect for law and order, one had to agree with his illustrations for the judgment of God. We don’t like to think of God intervening in people’s lives with punishment, but to do otherwise would be to consider God like those irritating parents who are always threatening to punish their children if they don’t stop disobeying but never actually do anything. He follows that up with observations about countries where: “On paper they have a very fine legal system, but hey do not put it into practice, they have ways of avoiding it. Surely we tend to despise any such system.” (p. 48) Naturally, he applies these illustrations to both the rabbinic system of casuistry and then, urges his listeners/readers to recognize that a just, righteous God must punish sin “…lest in our ignorance and haste we be guilty of so describing God as o make Him contradict Himself, and, indeed, of having a contradiction at the very centre and heart of His own life and eternal being.” (p. 58) One of the most valuable sections for me was found on pp. 110-111 when Lloyd-Jones reminds his readers of scriptural evidence for Jesus as the ultimate Judge (John 5:22, 26-29; Acts 17:30-31). He springboards from there to, “People are always ready to attack the character of God. They might say, ‘How can God judge us, He is so far removed, He is in heaven and we are on the earth? He does not understand human nature and human conditions and life in this world.’ The judgment is in the hands of One who has been through it all.” (p. 111) Another really interesting section was where Lloyd-Jones dealt with hypocrisy. He seems to be a firm believer in the rule of threes because he gives us three descriptions of a hypocrite and three key actions of a hypocritie. He describes a hypocrite as: 1) one interested in only a general and theoretical (but not experiential) interest in truth (p. 144); 2) one who is too complacent to continue growing (“he is always resting on something”); and 3) one who is full of confidence, self-confidence, but is more focused on his capacity than “fear of the Lord” (p. 145). In a similar vein, the hypocrite: a) teaches and preaches to others but never to himself; b) is actually guilty of doing things that he tells other people not to do (p. 146); and c) dishonors God by breaking the law even though he talks so much about it (p. 147). There is a disappointing aspect to Lloyd-Jones’ preaching in this volume. Several times he castigates people who question God as people guilty of cursing God (e.g. p. 212). I realize that he was trying to work with a phrase from the passage here, but what troubled me was the fact that he ignored the biblical tradition of contending with God. God honored Abraham for his intercession over Sodom and Gomorrah. God seems to have approved of Job’s honesty and that of the psalmist. Jeremiah seems to be presented as the honest prophet for his frank complaints regarding God. I am not saying that protesting to God cannot be as vile as Lloyd-Jones makes it in his sermon, but that is certainly not always the case. Indeed, he completely misses the fact that God tells the “comforters” that they were not honest in their faith talk like “His servant Job” when he focuses strictly on Job’s final response to God (p. 223). I enjoy and benefit from the preaching and teaching of D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, though I realize that we have agreement in substance but disagreement in nuance and methodology. There is a gap in time and tradition between us, but I am challenged and inspired by much of Romans: Exposition of Chapters 2:1-3:20: The Righteous Judgment of God and I expect to read (and in some cases, re-read) many of the other volumes in this mid-20th century sermon series on Romans. ...more |
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In English, we primarily think of word play in terms of puns, often involving homonyms. We can do this because our language, both written and oral emp
In English, we primarily think of word play in terms of puns, often involving homonyms. We can do this because our language, both written and oral emphasizes vowels. Written Hebrew, however, emphasizes consonants and, even Hebrew poetry, rarely uses rhyme (My example of a rhyme scheme in Numbers 23:19cd, 20b in A Rhetorical Critical Analysis of the Balaam Oracles, p.55 concurs with George Adam Smith’s observation in The Early Poetry of Israel in its Physical and Social Origins, p25 that most Hebrew rhyme is tied to pronominal suffixes.). However, as Isaac Kalimi repeatedly demonstrates in Metathesis in the Hebrew Bible, there is ample evidence for seeing the switching of consonants in adjacent words as enhancing the meaning of a given verse. Indeed, while my previously mentioned dissertation noted the possible meaning of repetitive sibilant sounds (p. 101), I wish I would have had the advantage of Kalimi’s perceptive observation of how the words for possession, Seir, Israel, and doing all contain the consonants from Seir in differing order when Balaam pronounces the curse against Edom (Seir) in Numbers 24:18. Taken together, the verses becomes literarily an even stronger curse with its visual and sonoric cues. Kalimi also underscores other points I made about these verses (and I wished I had this study when I wrote that dissertation) concerning Numbers 23 on p. 66. Personally, I was most interested in instances such as those above where the use of metathesis underscored or emphasized the message. On some occasions, however, Kalimi’s research serves to support the Masoretic Text from a text critical standpoint. For example, in 1 Kings 14:10-11, the use of the three main consonants in Jeroboam’s name are used in the punishment of consuming and burning the house of Jeroboam (the same consonants in the verbs), even though some critics like Rudolf Kittel try to amend the text to “annihilate” without the same effect and the Septuagint amended it to “raise up” which breaks up the thought (p. 40). If this were the only service the book performs, it would be worthwhile, but it is much more interesting than this. For me, it is particularly valuable to read a scholar who both affirms some of the consonance I have pointed out, particularly in passages that mention Abraham and Jacob by name, but then goes further to explain how shifting the activate consonants strengthens the message. For example, one might notice the number of “b” and “ts” sounds (as well as the use of the Hebrew “ayin”) in 1 Chronicles 4:9, part of the Jabez narrative that deals with the Jabez prayer so misused by many prosperity gospel preachers and laypersons. What one might not notice is that these consonants are shifted in words such that Jabez (“ayin”+”b” sound+”ts” sound forms his name) alternates with the word pain (“ayin”+”ts” sound+”b” sound) in both verse 9 and verse 10. We are first told that Jabez was honored more than his relatives. Then, we are told, using the word play to emphasize it that Jabez was named Jabez because his mother birthed him in “pain.” But the key to the honor is when Jabez (whose name sounds like pain) asks God to keep him from evil and not “pain” him (pp. 41-42). It is a victory of prayer over “destiny” when one considers the impact of name on person in the ancient world. Kalimi’s work is very thorough. He cites many examples, but does not always suggest a clear rationale for the change. It would have been nice to read a hypothesis or two on some of these, even if Kalimi would have had to note it as speculative. But he seems right to suggest that the change in spelling for Bathsheba’s name and the transposition of her father’s name from Eliam in 2 Samuel to Ammiel in 1 Chronicles 3:5 may be to dissociate her from the adultery narrative, since the Chronicler doesn’t present that aspect of David’s life (p. 49). In addition to clarifying or emphasizing meaning, there are times such as his discussion on Psalm 95:6 that he can use metathesis as evidence against emendations such as that suggested by Hermann Gunkel (p. 127). Kalimi is extremely disciplined in his approach, keeping so focused on metathesis that one wishes he felt free to expound on other features like consonance, assonance, and alliteration to strengthen his point. He does on rare occasions, but when I see possibilities piling up such as his discussion of 1 Samuel 21:5, I wish he had mentioned the possible consonance of heth and koph, as well as lamed after the adjective for ordinary and mem before the noun for bread (p. 108). It seems like these possible features following the metathesis examples (or preceding them in the latter case) underscores the distinction between ordinary and holy that the metathesis emphasizes. The enigmatic passage in Judges 11 where Jephthah’s irresponsible vow causes the death of his daughter is interesting because Kalimi points out how the metathesis underscores the father’s grief (p. 54). It also demonstrates how the use of similar sounds underscores the heartbreak. Yet, seeing this rather emphasizes the fact that Jephthah doesn’t really take personal responsibility for his actions, rather blaming his daughter for his “ruin.” The same page begins a marvelous discussion on the metathesis between seeing and light in the great prophecy of Isaiah 9 and two negative uses of the same word play in Job along with one in Psalm 49. This short study appears to accentuate just how positive the Isaiah 9 promise would have been, at least within the canonical context (pp 54-55). Later, I loved the emphasis on lo (not) and el (god) [same two consonants, but reversed in Hebrew] in Ezekiel 28:2-3, pounding the fact that the prince of Tyre is not a god and, using a double-negative to accentuate his feeble humanity, the prince is asked if he is Daniel {his name included the el meaning god) with no secret hidden from him. Of course, the answer is a clear-cut “No.” (p. 68) It's interesting that when Esau complained about Jacob stealing his birthright and his blessing in Genesis 27:36, the consonants of my birthright would read “b, k, r, t” but those of my blessing would read “b, r, k, t” such that the close relationship between the two legacies would be obvious (p. 70). Despite the thoroughness of Kalimi’s research, I personally think he may have missed another example of intentional metathesis since garment or mantle (מעטה) has the ע and ט reversed in the word for planting (מטע) on p. 72. Going further afield, since the ayin and aleph are so hard to vocalize, one wonders if there isn’t additional word play suggested by “his head” since the same resh and shin found separated by an ayin in the word for hair are found separated by an aleph in the word for head (p. 77). Perhaps not as clear, but also interesting is the metathesis between Arab (ayin, resh, beth) and wilderness (with beth, resh at end) if one could include wickedness without the conjunction and suffix (becomes beth, resh, ayin) in Jeremiah 3:6 (p. 86). I thought one of the most perfect examples in Kalimi’s research was Jeremiah 15:21. Here, the words of metathesis (wicked, based on resh, ayin, and terrible, based on ayin, resh) are in parallel to each other (p. 89). Further, if there was nothing else to support Kalimi’s contention that there is literary intent behind most of these examples of metathesis, the tour de force on Ezekiel 1 on pp. 94-96 should convince any open-minded skeptics (Is that an oxymoron?). I wasn’t as stimulated by the discussion of the apocryphal Wisdom of Ben Sira in Chapter 6, but I liked where Kalimi discussed the problematic nature of the text and M. Z. Segal’s reconstruction using the Greek translation of the Septuagint to reconstruct missing or difficult texts in the Hebrew fragments. I particularly liked the discussion from pp. 145-149 where his examples emphasize “keeping” God’s Torah to be fit to “rule” (Wisdom 21:11) and the underscoring of the potential paronomasia between “fellow” and a sense of “evil” (Wisdom 29:14-20). And, in Chapter 7, several of the examples of metathesis in rabbinic literature were very entertaining. The rabbis liked “Laban the cheater” rather than “Laban the Aramean” in Genesis 31:24 (p. 151). I also liked the rabbinic play between Job and “enemy” in its interpretation of Job 13:24 (p. 152). Despite my highest rating, Metathesis in the Hebrew Bible: Wordplay as a Literary and Exegetical Device is not for anyone who doesn’t read Hebrew or care about the impact of literary techniques on the interpretation of biblical scriptures. As Kalimi points out on p. 161, modern translations have been oblivious to the the use of metathesis as a literary device. But for those of us who read and use Hebrew in our biblical interpretation, this slim volume is invaluable. One of my major concerns in interpretation is the way each text has been written or edited into a literary whole. Kalimi concurs: “Exegetically, the literary nature of these metatheses can also highlight the unity or structure of a passage, and this offers a guard against unjustified emendation of the text.” (p. 162) ...more |
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If Reading the New Testament as Christian Scripture: A Literary, Canonical, and Theological Survey had reached the goal for which it apparently set ou
If Reading the New Testament as Christian Scripture: A Literary, Canonical, and Theological Survey had reached the goal for which it apparently set out, it would have been the finest New Testament Survey textbook out there. Unfortunately, the three types of analysis mentioned in the subtitle are very much restricted to the colorful sidebar boxes. Such placement has the particular disadvantage of attenuating the discussions rather abruptly and often (though not always) presenting only one side of what should be robust debates. This attenuation is even more unfortunate since the assertions made in these Readers Digest Condensed discussions tend not to have documented references. Those limitations acknowledged, even in their shorter form, these sidebars (especially the canonical connections and reception history “articles”) tend to be the most valuable portions of the book. [My personal index where I note quotations or discussions that I would like to return to at a later date listed sidebars on pp. 91, 113, 127, 128, 129, 144, 151, 154, 155, 160, 161, 167, 169, 180, 187, 190, 223, 235, 238, 255, 271, 279, 286, 292, 296, 299, 302, 309, 311, 313, 327, 333, 344, 345, 349, 362, 363, 371, and 377. Building off the disappointment with the attenuated discussions in the sidebars, one would have felt that a volume with “Literary” in the title would have had at least some mention of the structure and style of the Christological hymns in Philippians (pp. 264-265) and Colossians (pp. 270-271). One also would have expected a slightly more sophisticated understanding of kenosis in the Christ hymn from a book with “Theological” in the title since the oversimplified rejection of the theory ignores the divine agency of self-limitation implicit in the process and the very sophisticated understanding of the doctrine from Wolfhart Pannenberg in his Systematic Theology as opposed to his rejection of kenosis in his earlier Jesus, God, and Man. Again, my bias makes me fairly certain the outright rejection of a simplified understanding of the doctrine can be traced back to the head of the institution of one of the writers. Another disappointing sidebar was the one on the descent into hell (p. 337). No mention is made of the fact that the phrase in the Apostles’ Creed doesn’t appear until circa the 4th century or that part of the reason for its existence is a confusion of hades as a neutral place of the dead and hell. Again, the head of one of the author’s institutions is completely “sold out” to the idea that it has to be hell. It is ironic that this person who made his reputation claiming to support the authority of the Bible has leaped to a conclusion beyond the biblical evidence. Another problem with the book is the nature of any book that is co-authored. Different authors have different sensibilities. My frustration is that some of the discussions (not just in the sidebars) will start off in an interesting direction and, then, without introducing any new or decisive evidence, the author of the section (or authors of the book) immediately retreat to a traditional position. For example, p. 185 takes as proven fact that Paul was beheaded in Rome. This is solid tradition, but the authors introduce no evidence—a must when something is not explicit in the scriptural account. Here, the authors assume a second arrest after the Spanish mission attested by Clement. Yet, on p. 207, As biased as I am against Dr. Pennington’s institution since it was hijacked by extremists, my opinion without evidence is that Pennington was forced to drop back to the traditional positions and punt lest his anti-intellectual seminary president and agenda-bound trustees remove him from his job. As a result, the book feels even more uneven than the usual collaborative effort. Again, just because I agree with the author(s) that Paul is the author of the Pastoral Letters doesn’t mean that I didn’t feel uncomfortable that the appeal was to the early church’s acceptance of the manuscripts and that there wasn’t even a modicum of documentation regarding those who disagree with Pauline authenticity (p. 291 sidebar).The same arguments that the author(s) made (or make) for Pauline authenticity here could be used for Hebrews, but the author(s) is (are) not consistent on p. 313’s sidebar, “Why Was Hebrews Accepted into the Canon?” Worse is the side on the authorship of 2 Peter on p. 341 where an entire list of reasons to doubt Petrine authorship is followed by an assurance that each reason could be countered. Unfortunately, the author(s) offer no counterpoint to the discussion. I was also incredibly annoyed by the sidebar on p. 259 where the author or authors completely “copped out” on the issue as to whether submission was commanded in asymmetrical relationships. Indeed, he or they finished that short sidebar sounding like they favored a compromise where the incredible ethical demand in the verse was completely emasculated. One could completely mitigate any command in the Scripture by claiming it applied “as appropriate to the situation.” This sounded so much like the executive in charge of one of the author’s institutions that I’m almost sure where this gutting of the scriptural imperative originated. Further, the sidebar on universalism (p. 292) would have been helpful if author(s) or editor would have excised the last sentence which evokes, unnecessarily, a double-predestination which is unhelpful in the current argument. Of course, my bias tells me that we know where that came from. A better job is provided in the sidebar on p. 296. As a result of my personal bias, I almost gave this book a rating of two stars, “It was okay.” In all fairness, though, that was because I had read several chapters on my favorite biblical material in isolation and made no effort to read through the book in the order intended. Once I went back and did a “read-through,” the book worked better, despite its unevenness. Lest one think that I see little value in this book outside of the refreshing, but all too brief, sidebars, I will endeavor to highlight some of the discussions or quotations that I found most valuable. For example, my initial readings in the book missed this marvelous way of expressing the goal of the Christian reader of the New Testament: “Our goal in reading is not merely to garner information but also to experience transformation: not to be smarter people but to become a different kind of people.” (p. 3) Those “pick and choose” readings also missed another important line in the introductory section where the authors emphasize the importance of cultural aspects as well as historical facts and setting. “Rather, we need a method of reading the New Testament that is sensitive to historical facts but, more importantly, realizes that individuals live in cultures, not just historical events.” (p. 23) I enjoyed the insights on the possibility of the two miraculous feedings in Matthew as pointing to the Jews in the one and the non-Jews in the other (p. 97). I liked the idea of “upside-down” kingdom expectations described in Luke (pp. 127-128). I was inspired by the phrase that combined “glory of Christ” and “living into our design” (p. 190). The nuance of shifting the translation of being silent to leading a “quiet life” seemed quite helpful to me (p 279). The discussion defending Paul from the lazy, sloppy charge of misogyny should be most helpful to readers (p. 294). The textual observations on Jesus saving Israel during the Exodus in Jude and the extra-biblical possibilities on Michael facing the devil in Jude were handled nicely (p. 362 sidebars). And I loved the quotation at the end of the sidebar about the Lion and the Lamb in Revelation: “The imagery of the lion and the lamb are obviously juxtaposed to show that Christ’s power and authority are mediated through humility and sacrifice.” (p. 371) ...more |
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| 0664232604
| 9780664232603
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| Aug 30, 2022
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really liked it
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Molly T. Marshall’s Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible: 1 & 2 Thessalonians offers the kind of fast-paced summary of the issues and message
Molly T. Marshall’s Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible: 1 & 2 Thessalonians offers the kind of fast-paced summary of the issues and message of the two biblical letters that allows one to read it holistically, as opposed to dissecting a book pericope-by-pericope with its tendency to focus on atoms rather than molecules. Two disclaimers should be made here: 1) I knew author/scholar Molly T. Marshall as a colleague in graduate school, but only briefly, and 2) I almost never read commentaries from cover-to-cover. Of course, a theological commentary approaches biblical teaching from a slightly different angle. It makes use of the work of specialized biblical scholars, but paints a broader perspective than the sometimes restricted word-phrase-pattern approach of the more traditional commentary. In Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible: 1 & 2 Thessalonians, Marshall carefully builds her thought-provoking approach to the book on a foundation of the work of biblical scholars. While conversant with the issues, she doesn’t force the reader into the exegetical and critical trenches (except in her contention that 2 Thessalonians was written by an author other than Paul and she doesn’t force one to use the shovel to dig through anywhere near all of the evidence to which she points). Belief: A Theological Commentary on the Bible: 1 & 2 Thessalonians is not the kind of commentary I would recommend if one is to only have one commentary on the two letters. It is very helpful in terms of hermeneutical application and demonstrating an evolving Christological and Trinitarian perspective in these books. It is missing some of the new literary studies (including rhetorical analysis) and canonical perspectives available in some commentaries and detailed grammatical studies in others. I, personally, found it stimulating after preaching through 1 Thessalonians with my congregation. I particularly liked the way she chose salient insights from other scholars to undergird her own perceptions. While not trying to be exhaustive, I would like to share some of the insights which seemed most significant to me. First of all, I loved her quotation from E. Glenn Hinson, noted Professor of Church History and Historical Theology, who stated: “Without companions the evangelization of the Roman Empire would have foundered.” (p. 2) Not only is that appropriate for a letter sent from a triumvirate of missionaries, but it is appropriate to the entire theme of community as it plays out in the two biblical books in question. One of her strongest portions of the book is her excursus on participating in the suffering of Christ as a vital part of the Christian experience and how it affects community and theology (pp. 149-152). I really appreciated her phrasing as she described believers growing as they serve in the church community. “The Spirit always gifts the body of Christ to do the work to which it is called.” (p. 50) While this may seem obvious, one cannot help but recognize that many more congregations focus on what they do not have in terms of resources than on this simple truth. And since so much of the content within these books considers the need for spiritual growth and development, her excursus on sanctification was extremely well-said. “The theology of sanctification with which I work includes these four affirmations: 1) sanctification is God’s work and ours; 2) sanctification is a lifelong process; 3) sanctification actualizes our calling as truly the image of God and truly ourselves; and 4) sanctification occurs best in community.” (p. 83) Admittedly, she is quoting from an article she wrote for another book, but I appreciated its context here. Another beautiful discussion (though it pops up in different places within the context) is how congregations need to hear more than one perspective on Bible and theology, BUT how congregations also need to practice spiritual discernment. The former is illustrated with a great quotation from Gail Godwin: “God has more to say to us than we can hear ourselves.” (p. 111). Yet, rather than leave this where reflection on Bible, Theology, and Ethics becomes a matter of “Well, I think…” she offers a summary of five (5) things that get in the way of modern communities practicing spiritual discernment. Her summary of the five (5) hindrances would be: “1) impatience with a process that requires careful, forthright, time-consuming listening and reflection; 2) an assumption that this is the province of religious professionals; 3) lack of trust that the Holy Spirit really will guide the congregation; 4) patterns of Scripture reading shackled to deadly literalism; and 5) a persistent expectation that we will reach a perfect conclusion, unsullied by human opinion and sociocultural context.” (p. 179) Perhaps the most valuable theological insight in the book is Marshall’s internalizing of the concept of perichoresis (interpenetration and reciprocity) in the Trinity as extending to the believer. A student who asked how she or he fit in the Trinity was answered: “You are in the space between the varied Trinitarian movements as the Spirit draws you into the life of Christ to the glory of the Abba. After all, the Greek word chorein can mean ‘to make space for,’ as humans are invited into the relational movement (perichoresis) of the divine life to find their true home and true selves there.” (p. 185) I appreciated her emphasis on “faith of Christ” in relation to the usual “faith in Christ” (p. 186) and I particularly liked her summary statement on the Parousia as being less about departure as about presence (p. 212). So, there is plenty of value in this volume. I wouldn’t recommend it to be one’s primary commentary, but I hope it ends up being read and considered by lots of pastors and church leaders. ...more |
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Sep 27, 2022
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Sep 30, 2022
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| 9781540960672
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| 43
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| Feb 18, 2020
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it was amazing
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Although designed as a textbook, In Stone and Story: Early Christianity in the Roman World is a wonderful mix of Roman archaeology from Pompeii and He
Although designed as a textbook, In Stone and Story: Early Christianity in the Roman World is a wonderful mix of Roman archaeology from Pompeii and Herculaneum and New Testament contrasts and comparisons. As a textbook, it points to further study and access to resources (particularly some valuable sites where one can find photographic references of sites and artifacts), but as a history book, it offers marvelous cross-sections of religion, social structures, and household economies. Each section begins with possible interpretations of physical artifacts (including literary passages from elsewhere in the Empire, as well as the graffiti with their 48 occurrences of citations from Homer, Ovid, Seneca, Lucretius, and Virgil—p. 149, and frescoes and mosaics within the buildings) and then, compares and contrasts the expectations of Jesus-followers to these typical Roman ideals. Bruce W. Longenecker does a solid job of showing the importance of both actual deities from the Roman pantheon (as well as influence of Egypt’s Isis and Osiris mythology) and how citizens often accumulated deities like a diversified stock portfolio (p. 43). He emphasized the “transactional” expectations of Roman worshippers and even cited Cicero’s comment on worship as a self-aggrandizing transaction (p. 53). He cites the philosophical views of Stoics and Epicureans, demonstrating how even a mosaic represented the Epicurean idea of inevitable death (p. 62). He deals with genius and juno as spiritual projections of institutions and places (p. 79) as well as household lares or guardian spirits before demonstrating the importance of genius to imperial worship and Roman stability. I particularly liked his emphasis on the higher level of intimacy (as opposed to pure “transaction”) of the so-called mystery religions (p. 92). The author also did a marvelous job of picturing Roman society as a constant influence game using wealth and status as points. He demonstrates through tomb inscriptions and dedicatory inscriptions how people leveled up in the ancient world. I loved his translation of Paul’s critique of this in Ephesians 6:12 as “cosmos-grabbers.” (p. 117) He even demonstrated advancement through “incestuous” philanthropy in his account of one Ampliatus who was a freed slave. He became wealthy, but could never become a civic officer, so he used his wealth to build the Temple of Isis in order to get his six-year-old son elected as councilor. Undoubtedly, Ampliatus acted as “trustee” in determining how his son Celsinus would vote (pp. 135-136). After delineating the types of public officials: aediles (pp. 121-122), duovirii (p. 122), and quinquennial (p. 122), he contrasts the ideal of the Jesus-following community. He notes the distinction of showing honor for all and cooperation as opposed to competition in contrast to the Roman honor/influence/status game (pp. 130-131). The ubiquitous graffiti were used to advertise, to warn, to brag (in one house, presumably belonging to gladiators, there are numerous graffiti listing won-loss records and bragging rights—p. 156), and, of course, to defame. I did not realize that the famous rhetorician, Quintilian, advocated the use of defamation as a legal defense (p. 160); it sounds like modern politicians. Longenecker offers insightful interpretations of frescoes, carefully hedging when he recognizes that there are other interpretations which could fit. I appreciate this very much. He uses the frescoes to indicate the role of slaves (pp. 184, 193) and social distinctions (p. 189) where the placement of ash covered bodies indicates social class much like the decks on the Titanic. And, for someone who has read a lot of Roman history, I was embarrassed to realize the proliferation of phallic statuary and frescoes in Pompeii and Herculaneum did not always indicate a brothel. They were often placed to represent strength against evil spirits (pp. 231-232). Maybe I blocked that out in other references, but there were too many evidences of this in the Vesuvian cities to block out. In fact, I was particularly appreciative of Longenecker’s application of Romans 12:14 in the view of the Roman perspective on a curse-laden society (p. 237). New Testament interpreters will also appreciate his take on Galatians 4:14 and Paul’s denial of spitting as explained by the curse-laden view of Roman society (p. 235). The final chapter dealt with tombs, visiting the dead, and meals with the dead and deities. The contrast between tomb monuments and Jesus’ Lord’s Supper is significant and well-interpreted by Longenecker on p. 245. To be honest, I’ve read Michael Grant’s work on Pompeii and Herculaneum, but I find In Stone and Story: Early Christianity in the Roman World to be more attractive (its color plates surpass the black-and-white plates in the Grant classic) and, for the New Testament reader, more useful. But even if one is not a New Testament interpreter, this lavish book is an incredible journey through some of the most fascinating finds from 1st century AD (CE). ...more |
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| Apr 2000
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liked it
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I waited to read this volume of essays and responses until I was doing a thorough study of the biblical books of 1 and 2 Thessalonians. I wish I hadn’
I waited to read this volume of essays and responses until I was doing a thorough study of the biblical books of 1 and 2 Thessalonians. I wish I hadn’t procrastinated. The Thessalonians Debate: Methodological Discord or Methodological Synthesis offers clues for using so-called “rhetorical criticism” which are useful for all of the epistolary works in the New Testament. Nearly every article in this volume summarizing the work of the Thessalonians Correspondence Seminar offers some seed truth or approach that has enriched my study of the Bible. Some of the essays consider whether so-called “rhetorical criticism,” the Graeco-Roman basics of persuasion in oral (and written) speech, and “epistolary analysis,” the examination of the structure of sections of biblical letters in comparison with that of classical letters, could even be compatible with historical criticism, the dominant methodology for biblical studies from the late 19th century forward. Personally, I have never had any doubt that they were compatible, but it was nice to read others who had come to the same conclusion. Nevertheless, even within that careful consensus, there are major divisions in methodology. For example, Pauline scholars begin their analyses by considering arrangement and structure while other NT scholars tend to focus on “internal argumentation.” (p. 243) As the full volume indicates, particularly in the last few essays, either approach can prove problematic when held so assiduously that one excludes the concerns of the other. For example, one of the authors represented on my shelf has recently admitted that this volume was “overly formulaic” and drew from literary examples too narrow in scope (cited on p. 268). Some of that narrowness can be seen in arguments as to whether there is an “apology” or “defense” from Paul in the letter. Most scholars discount the idea of an apology due to the lack of extended defenses in the probation or “proof” section. My impression is that an apology can be directed at presumed, indirect, or expected attacks, as well as overt ones. But such an idea seems to be discounted by the consensus of scholars, though Traugott Holz isn’t entirely comfortable with their assurance either (p. 71). If we remove the possibility of “apology,” I would resonate with Rudolf Hoppe’s idea (cited on pp. 7, 9 and expressed on pp. 66-67) that what some have turned apology is actually Paul’s demonstration from his personal ministry of how the gospel overcomes, even in the midst of persecution. This actually works well with Thomas Olbricht’s conclusion about 1 Thessalonians’ persuasive intention: “resides in ‘declaring the action of God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit—past, present, and future’ and ‘sustaining faith and brotherly love despite affliction.’ (cited on p. 260) Johann Vos rejects the apologetic nature of the letter with regard to the Sitz im Leben or setting behind the letter, but he prefers to call it a “self-recommendation” and observes, “An apology responds to complaints that are actually expressed; a self-recommendation may contain apologetic elements (2 Cor. 2:12-18) but does not necessarily have to; it can also anticipate potential reservations or reflections (e.g., Acts 20:18-21).” (p. 83) That sounds rather like “my Impression” in the preceding paragraph, but Vos insists, as do many, that an apology must respond to specific, overt charges. I don’t agree. However, I’m not a New Testament specialist by any means and I really like Vos’ idea that the first three (3) chapters are about strengthening the young church while the last two (2) are about encouraging the church (p. 83, also cited on p. 10). Yet, I don’t think an apologetic (especially as I understand it as opposed to the strict definition from others) excludes Vos’ general summary/direction for the letter to Thessalonica. This seems to be a factor as Otto Merk cites J. L. Hill’s dissertation in noting that Paul’s use of antitheses to set up the latter part of Chapter 2: “allows the concerns of Paul as the congregation’s founder who is distinct from such people, to come to the fore without there being an immediate reason for this in the specific situation” [my emphasis—jlw] (p. 95). Merk himself speaks of a “potential apology” on p. 112 and Jeffrey Weima’s response to Merk goes even further than this (pp. 122, 130). Merk doesn’t dwell on whether 1 Thessalonians 2 is an overt apology. He states that we can’t know the exact situation to which Paul is referring but even the allusion: “…illuminates the fundamental principle: Paul is separated from his church, innocently orphaned, because the contradiction inherent between the saving gospel and a world filled with religiosity had taken concrete shape as a result of his activity in Thessalonica.” (p. 103) Epistolary analysis builds from the study of ancient letters. Consensus essentially consigns these letters to four types: friendship, sympathy, praise, and advice (p. 183). Rhetorical criticism draws from the three types of ancient classical rhetoric: deliberative which attempts to get the reader/hearer to do or stop something, epideictic which attempt to impress readers/hearers with something that is right or honorable, and judicial which are intended to clarify evidence for evaluating actions or decisions (p. 192). As a result, it seems clear that deliberative rhetoric deals with future actions or decisions, epideictic considers the present situation, and judicial evaluates the past (p. 294). These are helpful, especially when one breaks down the three (3) elements in Cicero’s of peroration: 1) the summing up (enumeratione), 2) amplification (amplificatione), and 3) appeal to pity (commiseratione) (p. 230). It is easy to see that Paul often uses these techniques in his letters, especially in his conclusions, but Jeffrey Weima argues against Paul using these techniques, largely from the criticism of Paul’s speaking mentioned in the first letter to the Corinthians (pp. 127-130). The book is full of interesting ideas and exegetical insights. There are advocates of both types of methodology (epistolary and rhetorical), but there are also caveats worth paying attention to: “There is the danger of forcing a text into the straitjacket of a so-called common pattern.” (p. 174) Even giving the possibility (or even probability) of Paul using rhetorical/epistolary strategies subconsciously, such a warning is well-considered. Indeed, the entire composition of this book is well-considered, even though I agree with some of the scholars represented more than others. My only misgiving is that too little attention is paid to what we used to call “stylistics” in the vein of Luis Alonso-Schokel. It seems like very little is being done with this type of rhetorical study. I was hoping to see more of it in this volume. Theological students and interested pastors who are not as familiar with rhetorical or epistolary methodologies would do well to at least read a few of the major essays in this volume. ...more |
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| 4.09
| 35
| Sep 05, 2000
| Jan 01, 1986
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it was amazing
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Although published in 1986 as art of the “Guides to Biblical Scholarship” series by Fortress Press, Textual Criticism: Recovering the Text of the Hebr
Although published in 1986 as art of the “Guides to Biblical Scholarship” series by Fortress Press, Textual Criticism: Recovering the Text of the Hebrew Bible is still relevant, accessible, and intensely useful. If I were teaching today, it would still be required reading in my classes. Why? Because it is: a) useful in delineating the basics of what textual criticism is, b) prolific in providing examples illustrative of the decisions to be made by textual critics, c) concise in presenting the “how-to” of textual criticism, and d) fair in providing warnings of potential abuses and mistakes of the discipline. First, let me indicate that my denomination’s traditional dismissal of text criticism as an arrogant, subjective exercise has led me to use different phraseology than that of P. Kyle McCarter, Jr., the author of this volume and a scholar I truly admire. I tend to use the term “textual differences” as opposed to “textual errors” and “textual modification” as opposed to “textual corruption.” Dr. McCarter would probably dispute my euphemisms, but there is method to my madness. My purpose is not to cast any aspersions toward the reliability of the message of Scripture. To some, the idea of “error” or “corruption” in a given text, no matter how well-reasoned, would be tantamount to destroying the entire message. Yes, I subscribe to McCarter’s methodology for the most part, but I choose and explain my choices with what are for me, less loaded words. This idea of how much modification or adaptation affects the overall message of a text is cleverly introduced in Textual Criticism: Recovering the Text of the Hebrew Bible with examples from the work of a Shakespeare scholar. McCarter sums up his point by writing: “…how many unsound readings can be tolerated in a text of a play by Shakespeare—or a portion of the Bible—before the ‘essential values’ are affected and before scholarly hypotheses are vitiated.” (p. 16) In other words, it’s bad business to gloss over what may, at first glance, appear to be minimal differences. The discussion is to be congratulated for deflating the common dismissals of textual criticism as being far too much effort for the resulting emendations such that they are not cost effective and for demythologizing the typical conception that the MT reading is usually the right one. Of course, one might get the suspicion in reading this particular volume that the LXX reading is usually the right one and that would be equally dangerous. I notice some comments I wrote in the margins suggesting that McCarter’s preference for the LXX may have missed some stylistic value in repetition or symbolic value in the MT reading but I generally agreed with his assessments in the generous sample of examples provided in this book. Of course, most valuable for the beginning student was McCarter’s walk-through of methodology. He noted that the classical elements of text criticism would be: Rescensio (p. 62) to which he prefers “gathering of materials” (p. 63), Examinatio (p. 62) to which he prefers “choosing of readings” (p. 63), and Emendatio (p.62) which he keeps as “emendation” (p. 63) with the caveat that simply adopting a transmitted reading is not actually “emendation” but a choice (p. 75). After “gathering the materials,” he explains the evaluative criteria for weighing the different readings. The first is “Independence” to assure that a text is not derivative of a given tradition or language group (p. 64). However, one cannot simply say that the Targums dependence upon the Masoretic Text automatically disqualifies them for: “When witness B is known to be dependent upon witness A, the value of B is discounted when it agrees with A. The corollary, however, is this: When B disagrees with A, it may reflect an independent and authentic reading.” (p. 65). The second is authenticity. When an ancient translation disagrees with MT, that should automatically encourage the critic to test that reading against the MT and attempt to determine which is most likely original (p. 65). One uses internal criteria here in attempting to consider: 1) Which reading is most likely to have been changed into the other, 2) which reading is the more difficult reading (since later copyists may have tried to smooth out something not entirely clear—p. 73), and 3) which reading is shorter (considering that it is more likely something was expanded than cut—p. 73). Of course, as McCarter noted: “The more difficult reading is not to be preferred when it is garbage.” (p. 73) The third principle is retrovertibility (p. 66). Does it make sense to convert the alternate reading into Hebrew? If it doesn’t, it may be likely that the alternate reading is interpretation or interpolation. I particularly enjoyed his suggestions on using the equivalences in Hatch and Redpath (classic concordance on the LXX) to evaluate potential retrovertibility (pp. 69-70). Finally, I appreciated the author’s words of caution regarding typical Old School assumptions in text criticism. One cannot simply tabulate the number of preferred readings in a given manuscript or tradition and assume this will be the best reading for a given passage or phrase. “Manuscripts are to be weighed, not counted.” (p. 71). Textual Criticism: Recovering the Text of the Hebrew Bible is a tremendously valuable volume, perhaps the best in the series. I regret that I hadn’t purchased my copy until recently finding this used copy in a bookstore. Perhaps, it needs a new edition to make this helpful insight available to students throughout universities and seminaries today. ...more |
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| 0809129396
| 9780809129393
| 0809129396
| 3.67
| 88
| Sep 04, 2012
| Jan 01, 1988
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liked it
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Having picked up and looked through Reading the New Testament: An Introduction (Third Edition) a couple of years ago when looking for a replacement fo
Having picked up and looked through Reading the New Testament: An Introduction (Third Edition) a couple of years ago when looking for a replacement for Raymond E. Brown’s expensive and somewhat dated An Introduction to the New Testament, I considered this extremely friendly textbook and would have used it if the pandemic hadn’t shut down the plans for the new seminary where I was to help coordinate biblical studies. With plans on hold, respected and oft-cited Catholic New Testament scholar Pheme Perkins’ book went on the shelf only partially read. Recently, I was looking for books I could recommend that utilized canonical and rhetorical criticism as part of their approach. So, I decided to explore Reading the New Testament: An Introduction thoroughly this time. The result, now that I have revealed the bias in what I was seeking, was a mixed bag. I find Reading the New Testament: An Introduction to be informed by said studies, but neither presenting them overtly nor assisting students with new methodologies. That being said, let me suggest that it is a very good introductory textbook in terms of background culture, understanding issues within the text, shaping an understanding of the structure of each book, and presenting useful comparative and summary information in chart form. This makes me happy to have purchased, read, and marked up this volume as a part of my personal library’s “permanent” collection. One extremely helpful introductory hook in this presentation was to be found only three pages deep when she listed five (5) questions to be used in dating biblical books: 1) figures corresponding to extra-biblical data, 2) use by later writers, 3) how historical clues about the book compare with the setting implied in the narrative, 4) possible dates of stories or traditions used in the book (source criticism), and 5) are any traditions used in the book able to be isolated to a possible place and time of origin (p. 3). Another extremely helpful discussion regarded problems in translation where she used 2 Corinthians 10:10 as an example, moving from literal to ironic and showing her evaluation of each possible approach (p. 14). Further appreciation is due for her presentation of the historical cultural connections of the New Testament era: a) meaning and significance of diaspora (p. 29), b) explanation of Sadducees following the rule of Leviticus 11:33 (p. 36), c) and a summary of messianic expectations (p. 38). Later, her delineation of four types of Jewish Gentile Christianity seemed very helpful in helping students understand the relationship of church and synagogue: 1) Gentiles who became Jews (p. 152), 2) Gentiles living within Israel, 3) Gentiles not under the law, and 4) Those where Jesus had replaced Judaism (p. 153). The book is replete with charts, some more helpful than others. I was impressed by: Chart 8-1’s quick-reference chronology of Paul’s life (p. 127), Chart 8-2’s nice listing of rhetorical clues to be found in the text (and more of what I was hoping for—p. 133), Chart 11-2’s comparison of issues and phrases similar in both Colossians and Ephesians (p. 181), and Chart 21-1’s very neat and useful summary of the letters to the seven churches of Revelation (pp. 288-290). These aren’t the only useful presentations of data, but these were my favorite. As for what I was really looking for in terms of new criticism, I particularly liked: a) her presentation of chiasm in Philemon (pp. 141-142), b) her list of what I call “envelope stories” or narratives with bookends in Mark (p. 191), c) discussion of interpretative problems in the pastoral epistles (p. 267), and d) consideration of nature images used for human failing in James (p. 274). Although not exactly what I was looking for, I appreciated her take on the three themes for the early church emphasized in Luke-Acts (particularly the latter): 1) need for hospitality and sharing (p. 245), 2) call for personal piety (p. 246), and 3) consolation concerning persecution (p. 247). I also liked the way she presented the unnumbered visions in Revelation in groups of seven (7) as she presented her outline summary of Revelation (pp. 292-293). One disappointment I had was with the bibliography. It is not that this is not helpful; it is that the author apparently opted to focus only on recent books and didn’t address any older classics. I realize she was very likely trying to restrict herself to books which might be readily available to her students, but I feel it does a disservice to students to focus strictly on more current scholarship. I would have liked to have seen C.F.D. Moule’s classic work on Greek idioms in there, T. W. Manson’s The Teachings of Jesus, and commentaries by R.H. Charles, C.H. Dodd, and C.K. Barrett in the mix. I also think Udo Schnelle’s work on the Gospel of John is a must. Even so, I understand something of her criteria for selecting this bibliography and I found some resources that I need to get—despite my quibbling. Reading the New Testament: An Introduction (Third Edition) is a useful, accessible, and thoughtfully designed book. It would very likely be on my short list if I were to teach a New Testament Survey class again. ...more |
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J. Richard Middleton’s Abraham’s Silence: The Binding of Isaac, The Suffering of Job, and How to Talk Back to God contains the best treatment of the b
J. Richard Middleton’s Abraham’s Silence: The Binding of Isaac, The Suffering of Job, and How to Talk Back to God contains the best treatment of the biblical Book of Job I’ve read since Claus Westermann’s brilliant publication, The Structure of Job. Middleton isn’t in full agreement with Westermann on every point, but he builds effectively on the foundation Westermann established. Most importantly, however, Middleton connects the dots between what appears to be God’s harsh response to Job’s honest questioning and God’s overt approval of Job’s honesty. Middleton’s suggestion that God’s speeches demonstrated (somewhat ironically) using keywords from Job’s protestations that Job was valued and created to provide powerful dialogue with God. I liked the observation on the intertextual agreement in describing Job’s boils between the curse in Deuteronomy 28:35 and Job 2:7 (p. 73), but the most important insight in this section of the book was Middleton’s consideration of the purpose of the Book of Job. As he notes, the emphasis on proper speech in prologue and even in Yahweh’s response to Eliphaz and Job’s miserable comforters (not speaking right as Job has in Job 42:7-8) suggests a concern with how we are to talk about God (pp. 76-77). Middleton goes so far as to argue that God’s first speech from the whirlwind is about God’s delight in creation, not about control (p. 118). He then leads the reader to an extremely solid conclusion: “ …between the extremes of blessing God explicitly (which is, of course, appropriate speech and which Job does at the outset) and cursing God (which is folly, and which Job therefore avoids) there is the viable option of honest, forthright challenge to God in prayer, which God (as Creator) both wants and expects of those made in the divine image—and this is right speech too.” (p. 128) Middleton prepares for this conclusion with careful and qualitative exegesis of Job after a stirring and inspiring look at lament language showing intertextuality between Exodus 34 and Psalm 106 among others (pp 54-55). But none of this was intended to be the main event in Abraham’s Silence. Middleton is concerned from the outset that Abraham’s silent submission to God, held up as a paradigm by some traditions and as a horrific injustice by others, runs counter to the lament tradition in general and Job’s vindication, as well. He has some insightful arguments when he observes that the unusual use of the generic term “gods” or “Elohim” with singular verb which commands Abraham to sacrifice Isaac might mean that this was not a sense of Yahweh in the commandment but, as he quotes Thomas Romer, “to denote a god who is far away and appears to be incomprehensible.” (p. 170) I also resonated with Middleton’s suggestion (not the first, but welcome nonetheless) that Abraham’s silent preparations represented a form of grief. I’ve used that myself. I very much liked his observations about the rhetorical impact of Genesis 22:3 having three active verbs of Abraham before mention of Isaac, followed by three more actions by Abraham (p. 173). Since Isaac is the unwitting object of the preparation, it may be very appropriate that he is totally passive. And I agree with him that Abraham’s cutting of wood BEFORE the trip was very likely a delaying tactic (p. 175) with my perception that this is also part of the grief process. I had failed to pay attention to the saddling of the donkey before the cutting of the wood (p. 175) but if I had, I would most likely have credited this to Abraham’s shaken internal condition, as well. What surprised me in Middleton’s approach was his argument that Abraham wasn’t really that close to Isaac, preferring Ishmael in much the same way as Isaac preferred Esau and Jacob preferred Joseph. None of those preferred sons were in the lineage of promise, but the destructive favoritism existed (p. 172). Indeed, Middleton builds on this when pointing out that there is no indication that Isaac comes down the mountain with Abraham, that their residences were miles apart thereafter, and that there is no explicit evidence that they see or speak to each other again after Genesis 22 (p. 206). In short, Middleton believes that Abraham’s much vaunted faith only passed the test by God’s grace similar to a professor allowing a student to try a make-up test (p.223). That works well when integrated with an understanding of God’s gracious intervention, but it does not help me with Middleton’s main point. In his alternate interpretation of Abraham, this silence is wrong because “…the God of the Bible demands a dialogue partner with chutzpah.” (p. 235) Middleton has done important work on validating lament language and robust dialogue with God, but he doesn’t seem to consider that there are times when silence may be more of a protest and have more of a cost than lament. I believe in lament. I was influenced by that same article on “The Formfulness of Grief” published by Brueggemann in 1977. Yet, I believe Middleton is stretching the point with Abraham. I don’t believe the test was, as Middleton claims, God seeking a protest partner. I believe the test was (as Middleton dismisses it with a rhetorical question on p. 205) for Abraham to see that God was more than the pagan deities who demanded sacrifices of children. But, I believe it is more than that. Abraham needed to see that his faith was at least as much as those pagans for their false gods. Should he have been aware of that beforehand? Possibly? Does the use of “Elohim” suggest merely a Pentateuchal source or some psychological entanglement of Abraham’s pagan background with his evolving understanding of God? Middleton has offered some stimulating and challenging ideas. I am not firmly convinced of the Abraham section, but I am extremely thrilled with the material on Job and on the laments. And, even though I’m not completely convinced of all his arguments, I am completely convinced that this is a marvelous book and should be in every thinking person’s library. ...more |
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it was ok
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There was a line in both the Spencer Tracy film and the stage production of “Inherit the Wind,” the famous fictionalized version of the Scopes Monkey
There was a line in both the Spencer Tracy film and the stage production of “Inherit the Wind,” the famous fictionalized version of the Scopes Monkey Trial, where Colonel Drummond (the Clarence Darrow figure) says to the jury, “Darwin moved us forward to a hilltop, where we could look back and see the way from which we came. But for this view, this insight, this knowledge, we must abandon our faith in the pleasant poetry of Genesis.” (Lawrence, Jerome and Robert E. Lee, Inherit the Wind (New York: Bantam Books, 1960, p. 83.)) The line always bothered me because I wondered, “IF we recognize the poetic nature of Genesis with its dramatic repetition and broad metaphorical strokes, why would we need to give it up?” So it was that I often found myself pondering the point of Peter Enns recent reprint of The Evolution of Adam: What the Bible Does and Doesn’t Say About Human Origins. It seems like once Enns has established the figurative and poetic nature of the Bible’s early accounts of humanity (by “early” I am referring to the action in the narratives, not the date of authorship and editorial compilation), he quickly gives up the poetic value of the biblical accounts in favor of his polemic against fundamentalist literalism. As one might surmise, I am no fan of either fundamentalist literalism nor a glossing over of the broad strokes in their framing of debates on intelligent design (by intelligent design, I am not referring to those abusers of the concept who try to shoehorn the idea of divine direction into “young earth” doctrine but to scholars like Gerald Schroader and his Genesis and the Big Bang and God According to God). The Evolution of Adam is, consequently, one of those books where I agree with much of what is presented, but object to the tone. Anytime a “scholar” uses terms like “impossible” or “cannot” without leaving room for some nuance, it sends red flags of warning to me regarding their entire argument. My frustration with The Evolution of Adam: What the Bible Does and Doesn’t Say About Human Origins is tied to the fact that, once having made his argument in a convincing fashion that the Old Testament usually uses “Adam” to mean humankind, he seems to forget that universal interpretation in order to bash the literalist view of Paul’s use of Adam in Romans 5. Worse, after adding a footnote to indicate that he, as am I, is very skeptical that Paul’s whole understanding of Adam was historical (because Paul knew very well how the Old Testament usually used “Adam”). But when Enns begins to extrapolate on Paul’s use of Adam in Romans, he follows E.P. Sanders and company in terms of: a) denying the importance of personal decision in justification and b) denying that Paul’s teaching in Romans applies to individuals at all. This seems way beyond the evidence. This is just one area in the book where I start off agreeing with Enns and think he has a handle on relating the “Adam” concept with evolution and then find myself frustrated that he undercuts his own arguments. It doesn’t seem like Enns gives appropriate room for the work of the Holy Spirit in assisting either the Old Testament writers in presenting their story with broad strokes of poetry and poetic license nor Paul’s literature as having sufficient room for poetry and symbolism. On page 132, he offers a disclaimer that he is not trying to be a materialistic evolutionist, but when push comes to shove, the book spends more time in trying to divest us any “tolerance” in interpretation than in trying to harmonize fundamentalist concerns and his attempt to elucidate Paul’s understanding. The Evolution of Adam: What the Bible Does and Doesn’t Say About Human Origins has some marvelous comparative literary analysis and plenty of easily digested speculation. I have copies notes scribbled in the front matter and in the margins. It was worth reading for me, just not quite what we need to bridge the gap between those who want to eat their cake of historical Adam and have evolution too and those who want to remove the cognitive dissonance between Genesis 1 and 2, 3 and 6 by simply ascribing them to various sources rather than consider what the ultimate editor/compiler would have wanted to say about transcendence versus imminence and internal versus external origins of sin. ...more |
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