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Wednesday, November 28, 2012
Monday, November 19, 2012
Galatians 3:29, How Gentiles Become Jews, Part I of II
If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.
//The apostle Paul was known for taking Jesus to the multitudes ... the
gentiles. How did he get away with this? By what authority did he steal
the Jesus story from a very Jewish setting and give it to gentiles?
Through
some very insightful theological wrangling, that's how. The Jews were
the children of promise, through the covenant of Abraham. More than
that, this covenant dictated circumcision, a practice Paul didn't even
bother to try to talk gentiles into. This is hardly a minor issue, as
the covenant makes clear:
This
is my covenant with you and your descendants after you, the covenant
you are to keep: Every male among you shall be circumcised. You are to
undergo circumcision, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me
and you. -- Genesis 17:10-11
Indeed, three verses later, God makes it clear that anyone who doesn't submit to circumcision has broken the covenant.
Yet
in Romans 4 and Galatians 3, Paul twice makes the argument
that uncircumcised gentiles can be children of Abraham, too! How can this
be?
The answer tomorrow.
Saturday, November 17, 2012
Book review: Where God Comes From
by Ira Livingston
★★★★
★★★★
We humans are a curious lot, aren’t we? Always digging for meaning.
Ira
Livingston once found a miracle message in a plate of noodles that
tasted so incredibly good it overcame a deep funk. It was as if God had
left a pick-me-up message just for him, embedded in noodles. As the Jews
and Chinese say, Food is Love.
From noodly transubstantiation, Ira progresses to a million dollar question: Where does God come from?
Do
understand that this is not really a book about God. It is an eccentric
and intelligent philosophical road trip. The subtitle is Reflections On Science, Systems and the Sublime. The
topic meanders around aimlessly like a good philosophy book should,
until near the end you realize you've been circling something
meaningful, if also something melancholy, the whole time.
"Where
God comes from" is not the same question as "Who is God?" Says
Livingston's beloved professor, "I've got no particular quarrel with any
of these explanations [of God]—inflated parent, synaptic ghost, social
glue—all fine, though obviously too reductive—but at the same time, I
also don't object to various personalizations of God—an old guy with a
beard, or a wafer or whatever."
The
problem with God (or evolution or a mechanistic universe) as a concept
is that it casts the miraculously complex as something familiar. Says the
professor, "the problem is not in how we use God or evolution or mechanism as ways of thinking about these things but as ways not to think about them."
…and therein lies the problem with Livingston’s book. It makes you think.
Thursday, November 15, 2012
1 Corinthians 11:14-16, A Woman's Hair
Does not the very nature of things teach you that if a man has long hair, it is a disgrace to him, but that if a woman has long hair, it is her glory? For long hair is given to her as a covering. If anyone wants to be contentious about this, we have no other practice--nor do the churches of God.
//This is a topic that remains fascinating to me, because I grew up in a
Christian sect that emphasized the importance of women not only keeping
their hair long, but wearing it up, as a covering, instead of loose.
Having been subjected to numerous arguments on both sides of the debate,
I can hardly pretend there is an easy answer. This is a complex passage
of scripture. Adding to the complexity are the traditions of Paul's
day, where attire and hair style demonstrated status, availability for
marriage, and in the extreme, prostitution. Not, really, that much
different from today! So I can weigh in with what the words of Paul feel like to me. Consider the verses that lead into this discussion to the Corinthians:
And
every woman who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors
her head--it is just as though her head were shaved. If a woman does not
cover her head, she should have her hair cut off; and if it is a
disgrace for a woman to have her hair cut or shaved off, she should
cover her head. --1 Corinthians 11:5-6
Paul
hardly wanted women to use their public position in the church to
advertise their availability, but it goes further than this. A woman's
dress and hair, when Christians gather, should reflect well on any
position of authority she has been granted (women held leadership roles
as well as men in Paul's day). Therefore, when she prays or prophesies, she should be appropriately groomed according to the traditions of the day, showing respect for her role.
I don’t think Paul meant anything more general than this.
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
Matthew 6:11, What kind of bread??
Give us this day our epiousios bread.
//Lest anyone think that today we have a perfect understanding of what
Bible writers meant as they wrote, I provide today's verse as a contrary
example. We assume “daily” bread, of course, but who’s to say for sure?
It is what's called a hapex legomena, a word that appears only
once in the Bible, and which must therefore be interpreted based
entirely upon the surrounding context or word construction. While it's
true that two books (Matthew and Luke) speak of this “daily bread”, both
are quoting the same saying of Jesus.
There are some 1500 hapex legomena words
in the Old Testament, 686 in the New Testament. Translations of these
words are no more than educated, logical guesses, though they grow more
accurate over time as we uncover more ancient documents to provide more
context. We still don't know, for example, what gopher wood is (the
material used to construct Noah's Ark.) And as many times as we've
repeated the Lord's Prayer, we don't really know what kind of bread
we're praying for. Not once have we found that word in any other
classical Greek literature.
In
the 20th century, we thought we had finally discovered a confirmation
of its use, written next to the names of several grocery items on what
appears to be an ancient shopping list. Upon reexamination of the papyrus in 1998,
however, it was determined that the word was
not epiousi but elaiou (oil).
So we still don't know what kind of bread Jesus wanted us to eat. Something gluten-free would be my guess.
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
Genesis 30:32, How To Breed Spotted Goats
Let
me go through all your flocks today and remove from them every speckled
or spotted sheep, every dark-colored lamb and every spotted or speckled
goat. They will be my wages.
//Here's the story. Jacob is discussing the proper wages for his service
to Laban. He and Laban agree that Jacob will keep all the speckled
animals of the flock.
But Jacob has a trick up his sleeve. He has figured out how to make speckled animals.
He
cuts off the branches of trees, and peels the bark back to make white
strips on the branches. When the animals are in heat, he places the
sticks in the watering troughs so that when they come to drink, they
will see spots of dark and white. There, with spots in their eyes, they
mate and produce speckled offspring.
This
works very well. In fact too well. All of the animals are getting
speckled. So Jacob watches to see whether the females in heat are strong
or weak. He puts spots in front of the eyes of the strong animals only,
and leaves the weak ones for Laban.
Thus Jacob "grew exceedingly prosperous and came to own large flocks, and maidservants and menservants, and camels and donkeys."
Monday, November 12, 2012
Book review: The Swedish Atheist, the Scuba Diver and Other Apologetic Rabbit Trails
by Randal Rauser
★★★★★
My kind of Christian apologetics! A friend on Goodreads recommended this book to me, and he guessed right. I loved it.
Rauser
leads us into a quaint little coffee shop for an afternoon of friendly
argument, where he spies the perfect target: an atheist named Sheridan
who is versed in apologetics just enough to make the conversation
interesting. Sheridan argues that the geographic distribution of various
types of believers proves that religion isn’t objective; he wonders why
Zeus isn’t just as likely to be a real god as Rauser’s Most Perfect
Being; he insists that morals are an evolutionary accident, with no need
for divine intervention; he confronts Rauser with the problem of evil,
and in particular the absurdity of everlasting punishment; and he argues
that what Christians recognize as signs from God are no more than
coincidences. Except for the whole “Yahweh condones evil” thing (where
Rauser’s best defense is to shrug and admit that he’s not a defender for
the “home team” but rather a pursuer of truth), Sheridan’s objections
to Christianity get shot down.
You
might recognize already that Rauser’s idea of apologetics is not about
debating atheists until they succumb to logic and beg for baptism, but
“rigorously pursuing truth in conversation.” This book isn’t going to
shoot the moon. None of that “I can prove Jesus rose from the dead”
stuff. Just reasonable exploration leading to a reasonable conclusion
that Christian beliefs are not unreasonable.
I
hope you don’t take this as a spoiler, but here’s my take on the coffee
house conversation: Rauser provides some solid argument for the
possibility of some sort of unexplained, intelligent creator and guide,
who could be just about anyone but Yahweh of the Old Testament (as least
the way its writers understood Him, since surely a “perfect being”
wouldn’t really condone the genocide that was done in His name). Some
arguments are better than others, and like I said, Rauser provides no
conclusive proof that Christianity is the One True Religion. So, we’re
left with a mystery, but one that should at least keep us from sneering at those who choose a Christian interface with this mystery.
All in all, this is a really fun book. Randal, if you write more, please consider more Dubious Disciple reviews!
Sunday, November 11, 2012
Genesis 8:5, Where is Noah's Ark?
And the ark rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, upon the mountains of Ararat.
//Whatever happened to Noah's gopher-wood Ark? Expeditions to Ararat have
tried to find it, but so far, nothing very convincing has been
discovered.
Today's
verse tells how the ark ran aground, presumably on Mount Ararat, the
tallest mountain in Turkey. It was another three months before the "tops
of the mountains" were seen. This would refer to the remaining,
lower-elevation mountains in the range, right? But no green vegetation
could be seen yet.
Another
forty days' wait and Noah starts sending birds out to scout the land.
In time, a dove returns with an olive branch in its mouth, evidence that
the waters had receded down to the green stuff, so Noah knows it's time
to exit the ark. But whatever happened to the ark?
Maybe the answer is in plain sight.
And
Noah builded an altar unto the LORD; and took of every clean beast, and
of every clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings on the altar. --Genesis 8:20
One
estimate of the number of clean animals would be 192 species, plus
about a comparable number of now-extinct species. Many of them quite
bulky. Atop the glacier-capped mountain of Ararat, way above the tree
line, where did Noah get the wood for all these burnt offerings? Would
gopher wood work?
Saturday, November 10, 2012
Psalm 83:18, How do you say Jehovah?
That men may know that thou, whose name alone is JEHOVAH, art the most high over all the earth.
//How do you pronounce the name of God? Most scholars sneer at the common
pronunciation of "Jehovah" and opt instead for "Yahweh." Why?
It's
a long story. It helps to understand that the name of God (or any god)
in antiquity is sacred. It dare not be spoken aloud. It helps also to
understand that ancient Hebrew did not include vowels. Thus we have only
YHWH in the written record, and the tradition that it should never be
spoken out loud. Readers of scripture would actually substitute the word
Adonai, meaning "my Lord," when reading. Small wonder that today we no longer know how to pronounce God’s name.
Here's
part of the problem. Maybe you've heard of the Masoretic Text, the
authoritative Hebrew text of the Old Testament used between the 7th and
10th centuries. When the Masoretes transcribed the original Hebrew, they
went back and added vowels to the consonants. However, they had a
conundrum. If they put the correct vowels in place for YHWH, people
would pronounce the name of God; a sin to be avoided at all costs. So,
as the story goes (and it is probably true), they took the vowels from
the word Adonai and inserted them into YHWH. That way, if you tried to
pronounce God's name, you would be wrong. Adding these vowels produced
the English word Jehovah.
So
how do you pronounce the name of God? Well, we don't know for sure, but
the one thing we do suspect is that it could be anything but Jehovah.
Friday, November 9, 2012
Book review: Drops Like Stars
by Rob Bell
★★★★★
Here's
a short little booklet you can read over your lunch hour. Rob Bell, the
controversial emergent mega-church pastor and best-selling author of Love Wins, tackles the subject of grief.
Bell
is a minister, but doesn't turn this into a book about God. It's not
tough love and it's not sappy sentiment. Just words to think about and
draw inspiration from.
If
you're thinking about buying this as a gift book, I wouldn't say that
it's appropriate for the deep-in-grief stage, but rather the
help-me-stand-up-again stage. As Bell says, he's less concerned about
the "why this?" than the "what now?"
Never
heard Bell preach, but I'm sure beginning to like him as a person. I
guess that's the important thing for a good spiritual adviser.
Thursday, November 8, 2012
1 Corinthians 7:32-24, Why We Shouldn't Marry
I would like you to be free from concern. An unmarried man is concerned about the Lord's affairs--how he can please the Lord. But
a married man is concerned about the affairs of this world—how he can
please his wife—and his interests are divided. An unmarried woman or
virgin is concerned about the Lord's affairs: Her aim is to be devoted
to the Lord in both body and spirit. But a married woman is concerned
about the affairs of this world--how she can please her husband.
//In both of my books, Revelation and John's Gospel,
I make an off-hand mention of Paul's suggestion that it's better not to
marry. I've had questions about this, so maybe I can address this issue
in a Dubious Disciple post.
The
reason Paul's readers were not to marry was because, according to him,
his readers were living on the cusp of a new age. As Paul explains,
But
if you do marry, you have not sinned; and if a virgin marries, she has
not sinned. But those who marry will face many troubles in this life,
and I want to spare you this. What I mean, brothers, is that the time is
short. From now on those who have wives should live as if they had
none; --1 Corinthians 7:28-29
Paul
was absolutely convinced of the immediate return of Christ! He was
apparently wrong, but his conviction on this matter is very clear. Paul,
in a vision, had seen the risen Christ, which to him was irreproachable
proof that the general resurrection had begun ... with Christ as the
first to resurrect. People were rising from the dead, and the new world
was just around the corner. Don't bother getting married, guys and gals,
there's no time to bother with that, it'll just distract you from
preparing for the new age.
Wednesday, November 7, 2012
Psalm 23:6 How Long Is Forever?
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever.
//Here is one of the most well-known verses in the Bible, certainly a
favorite for funerals. We find great comfort in this idea of dwelling
forever in the house of the Lord, once this life ends.
The
meaning of "forever," however, was not at all then what it means to us
today. The first half of the verse lends the context we need to better
fit this verse into an ancient Hebrew worldview, which simply did not
extend into the afterlife. No such expectation existed at that time for
everlasting, eternal life up in heaven.
Instead,
a more accurate translation might be "And I shall dwell in the house of
the Lord to the end of my days." But who wants to hear that at a
funeral?
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
Book review: Caiaphas, The High Priest
by Adele Reinhartz
★★★★★
I
really didn't know quite what to expect of this book, but I'm such a
first-century history geek that I couldn't resist taking it on. Would it
be a dry history lesson? A bit of speculative guesswork, given that the
historical record is so sparse? As much as a book about an ancient
priest can be considered a page-turner, this one was for me. It was just
an enjoyable read from cover to cover.
Caiaphas
is, of course, the Jerusalem high priest in the time of Jesus. The
unscrupulous, conniving villain who orchestrated Jesus’ death. Or did
he? The Gospels—all four of them—portray Caiaphas as not much more than a
neutral minor player.
But
in the early centuries of Christianity, our church fathers quickly
glommed onto Caiaphas as an antihero. An anonymous collection of "chief
priests and scribes" as the God-killer wouldn't do; a proper villain was
needed. Caiaphas filled the role splendidly, especially as
anti-Semitism developed within the Church.
The
Gospel account of Caiaphas “prophesying” in John 11:52 proved
particularly troubling for the early church. How could such an ungodly
character be a prophet? Origin spends a great deal of time on this
conundrum, finally concluding that somehow, the despicable fellow
managed to rather accidentally utter a prophecy.
Reinhartz
then takes us on an enlightening romp through artwork, literature,
theater, and Hollywood, exposing the dastardly role Caiaphas plays.
Finally, the journey culminates in a more serious look at the Caiaphas
of history, and the priestly role in general. Reinhartz’s visible
fascination with this ancient character has made for a highly readable
account.
Monday, November 5, 2012
Leviticus 15:25, The Plague of Uncleanness Spreads!
When
a woman has a discharge of blood for many days at a time other than her
monthly period or has a discharge that continues beyond her period, she
will be unclean as long as she has the discharge, just as in the days
of her period. Any bed she lies on while her discharge continues will be
unclean, as is her bed during her monthly period, and anything she sits
on will be unclean, as during her period. Whoever touches them will be
unclean; he must wash his clothes and bathe with water, and he will be
unclean till evening.
//This matter of separating the clean from the unclean is a serious
thing! A woman during her period is naturally unclean, but if the blood
flow continues after the normal time of her period, she remains unclean.
She cannot be touched. If she touches anything, then what she touches
cannot be touched. Anyone who touches anything she touches likewise
becomes unclean, and like a plague, uncleanness inadvertently begins
spreading through the camp. The possibility for an outbreak of
uncleanness becomes a serious threat.
One time, the plague threatened to get out of control. Consider these verses in Luke chapter 8:
And
a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years,
but no one could heal her. She came up behind him and touched the edge
of his cloak …"Who touched me?" Jesus asked. When they all denied it,
Peter said, "Master, the people are crowding and pressing against you."
This
poor woman had an “issue of blood” (the KJV wording) for twelve years!
She remained perpetually unclean! Here she touches Jesus and turns him
unclean, and everybody is jostling up against Jesus. Can you imagine the
crowd panic when it’s discovered that a seed of uncleanness had been
planted? Is there any chance of getting this plague under control?
Piece
of cake. Turns out that a little human contact doesn’t start a plague,
it just heals the one who is suffering. Probably, this was Jesus’ most
important lesson of the day.
Saturday, November 3, 2012
Romans 16:7, The First Woman Apostle?
Greet
Andronicus and Junias, my relatives who have been in prison with me.
They are outstanding among the apostles, and they were in Christ before I
was.
//Yesterday, I wondered whether Paul taught that men were granted a
divine right to lord it over women. Let’s put things in perspective
today with a look back at the church in the time of Paul.
According
to the book of Romans, women seemed to hold positions of leadership in
the early church, even being considered "apostles." But this equality
between the sexes quickly fell into disfavor in the Church. Author Eldon
Jay Epp writes in his book, Junia: The First Woman Apostle,
about how Junia's role was buried through mistranslation and editing of
her name so that it was rendered as a man's name instead. To preserve
male authority, Junia became Junias, a man's name, in Latin, and remains
this way today—see today's verse in the NIV. The gender debate is
nearly over, however: that she was a woman is seldom contested today
among Christian theologians.
Instead,
those who would deny female leadership now focus on the meaning of
"apostle." Did the term mean the equivalent of Paul, Timothy and Silas?
Or should the translation read not "well-regarded apostles" but
"well-known to the apostles?"
The
debate continues, but my own position is settled. Junia may be the only
named woman "apostle" in the Bible, but she is hardly the only woman in
a position of respect, even leadership. You can read also about Phoebe, Prisca, Tryphaena and Tryphosa.
Friday, November 2, 2012
Genesis 3:16, The Man Shall Rule Over the Woman
To
the woman [God] said, "I will greatly increase your pains in
childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire
will be for your husband, and he will rule over you."
//This comes from the story of Adam and Eve and the tree of knowledge.
God said don't eat the fruit, they ate it anyway, and consequences came.
To the woman, God said your husband will rule over you.
This
may not be so much a command as it is a sad prediction. Sin had been
unleashed. God in essence says, "I created you as equals, but you've
gone and screwed everything up. From now on, someone will always want to
be lording it over someone else."
And
so it became, particularly in marriage, a sad state of affairs that
lasted well into our day. Paul wrote about this, admitting that the
woman should submit to the man:
For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. --Ephesians 5:23-24
Paul errs, however, when he provides his reason for this:
For man did not come from woman, but woman from man; neither was man created for woman, but woman for man. - 1 Corinthians 11:9
See also 1 Timothy chapter 2, if you imagine that book to be penned by Paul. Thus, Paul backs
up the time of man's dominion over woman to the day of creation, rather
than the day of their sin. But then we have this odd statement by Paul
about the new age of Christ:
For
ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of
you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is
neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither
male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. -- Galatians
3:26-28
So
which is it? Did Paul misunderstand about God's intentions about men
and women, or did he misunderstand the new age of Christ? Do men still
get to lord it over women or not?
Thursday, November 1, 2012
The Four Evangelists
"The
Four Evangelists," by the 17th century Flemish artist Jacob Jordaens,
presumably depicts the authors of our four Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke
and John. Many think the four evangelists are portrayed left-to-right in
the same order as the Gospels, and point to this mysterious verse in
Mark to identify the boy:
A
young man, wearing nothing but a linen garment, was following Jesus.
When they seized him, he fled naked, leaving his garment behind. --Mark
14:51-52.
But
was Mark really writing about himself? Could the lad in these verses be
young John the Apostle, with his trademark angelic face and curly hair?
John is universally thought to be the youngest of the Twelve. Is
Jordaens hiding a secret unshared, by wrapping John in a white linen?
The
story continues in Mark with Peter following from a distance, but the
Gospel of John tells a different story: A second unnamed disciple
follows Jesus with Peter. This mystery disciple is thought by most to be
John the Apostle. Might it also be the same lad who fled, leaving his
outer garment?
A
few days later in Mark's story, a young man dressed in a white robe
sits outside the tomb, informing visitors that Jesus has risen. Is this
young man Mark? John? An angel, as depicted in later Gospel tradition?
Adding
to the mystique of the painting is the dispute over whether it was
titled "The Four Evangelists" at all. Some art historians argue that the
lad is simply too young to be one of the evangelists. Also, he appears
to wear what may be a prayer shawl, as may have been worn in the Temple,
rather than a "linen garment." These historians therefore identify the
painting as “Jesus Among the Sages,” a depiction of the twelve-year-old
Jesus conversing with the teachers in the Jerusalem Temple (see Luke
2:46-47).
The
mystery remains. Since my book encourages us to embrace mystery and
ambiguity in the scripture, I fell in love with the painting as a cover
theme.
(heh - editorial note: The picture has been reversed for the book cover, so they are no longer Matthew/Mark/Luke/John from "left to right" but "right to left".)
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