Month: October 2010

Galatians 3: Why Abraham?

[Sorry for the delay in posting this week’s notes.  Just a bit busy early this week.  In other blog news, the last post was post #200, a milestone I did not think I would reach when I started.  As usual, the audio for this week’s evening service is available at Sermon.net, as is a PDF file of the notes for the service. You should be able to download the audio directly with this link, if you prefer (right-click, save link as….)]

Paul uses Abraham as an example in both Romans and Galatians.  Why select Abraham as his model of Faith?  It is possible that the agitators have been using Abraham in their teaching.  But the experience of the Galatian believers is not unlike that of Abraham, who believed and “it was credited to him as righteousness” (Gal 3:7-9).   Paul is creating a biblical argument, focusing on the phrase “credited as righteousness” in Genesis 15.  In this story, Abraham believed in the word of God as revealed to him and God considered him “right with God” as a result.

At this point, Abraham must be considered a Gentile, by the rules imposed by the Agitators in the Galatian churches.  He was uncircumcised and Food and Sabbath laws have not been given yet.  Since he believes in the God who called him out of his father’s land, he a “converted pagan,” just like the Galatian believers.

This is in contrast to other views of Abraham in Judaism of the Second Temple Period. For example, Sirach 44:19-21, Jub. 23.10 and CD 3.2 all make the promise contingent on his obedience to God’s command, specifically circumcision.

Sirach 44:19–21 Abraham was the great father of a multitude of nations, and no one has been found like him in glory. 20 He kept the law of the Most High, and entered into a covenant with him; he certified the covenant in his flesh, and when he was tested he proved faithful. 21 Therefore the Lord assured him with an oath that the nations would be blessed through his offspring; that he would make him as numerous as the dust of the earth, and exalt his offspring like the stars, and give them an inheritance from sea to sea and from the Euphrates to the ends of the earth. (NRSV)

Jubilees 23:10 For Abraham was perfect in all his deeds with the Lord, and well-pleasing in righteousness all the days of his life; and behold, he did not complete four jubilees in his life, when he had grown old by reason of the wickedness, and was full of his days.

CD 3:2-3a Abraham did not walk in it, and was counted as a friend for keeping God’s precepts and not following  the desire of his spirit.

The Apocalypse of Abraham makes Abraham out to be the perfect proto-Jew. The first seven chapters of the book are a narrative of Abraham’s realization the gods his father Terah crafts are nothing but wood and stone. His father asks him to sell five idols of Marumath, but Abraham loses three in the river.  Later, while cooking his father’s dinner he sarcastically asks the god Barisat to watch over the cooking fire while he went to ask his father what he should cook.  When he returns, the fire was still going an the god was burning himself. Abraham and Terah argue over this; Abraham says the god is nothing and says the gods are only honored because Terah made them well.  Abraham is pondering the gods when a voice from heaven calls to him and says he is the God of gods and commands him to leave the house of Terah (chapter 8).

Paul does not rewrite scripture, as much of the literature of the Second Temple Period did.  He reads Abraham as a Gentile who was made right with God by faith in what God told him, not by works (either circumcision or the Law).  Abraham is therefore the perfect model for Paul to use since he was justified before the Law:  he was justified by faith not by the act of circumcision.

Galatians 3: The Faith of Abraham

Beginning in Chapter 3, Paul will begin to create an argument from Scripture which shows that God is doing something new in the Gospel.  While the prophets of the Hebrew Bible often foresaw the salvation of the Gentiles,  In the present age, however, Gentiles are able to be right with God apart from the works of the Law.  This is Paul’s contribution to salvation history – something which he has already called a “revelation from God” in 1:11-12.

This is a scriptural argument.  Paul alludes to or quotes several texts from the Hebrew Bible to make his point that the Law did not make a person righteous, rather, those who live under Law are always “under a curse.”  The model of Abraham’s faith shows that it is only through faith that one can be accounted as righteous.

Paul packs together several texts from the Hebrew Bible to make this point, and requires a great deal from his readers.  They need to now only know what these verses say, but also the context in which they are found.  That Abraham believed is important, but when he believed is critical to Paul’s point: it was before the sign of the covenant was given (Gen 15, not 17) or before his great demonstration of faith in Gen 22.  The reader needs to know the whole flow of the Abraham story in Genesis 12-24 in order to have the full impact of Paul’s argument.  Similarly, the quotation of Habakkuk 2 calls to mind a whole collection of events: the fall of Jerusalem and the Exile are the context of Habakkuk’s “complaints.”  In response to the obvious fact that Israel and Judah have fallen under the curse of the Law, in Habakkuk they “righteous” must live by faith.   Even to say that those under the Law are “under a curse” requires more of a reader than the single line from Deuteronomy cited by Paul.  Paul’s argument is based on the whole deuteronomic theology of curse and blessing.

The density of this argument leads to a question concerning what is happening in Paul’s Galatian churches.  If Paul is addressing pagan converts to Christianity, then would they appreciate the rhetorical impact of this scriptural argument?  Possibly.  But based on Paul’s speech in Acts 14 and 17 (clearly pagan audiences) and the letter to the first  Thessalonians (with very little reference to the Hebrew Bible), it appears that Paul would not have made an argument based on the Hebrew Bible to a recently-converted from paganism congregation.

Two possibilities remain to explain Paul’s scriptural argument in Gal 3, although they are not mutually exclusive.  First, Paul could be addressing God-fearing Gentiles, people who were already practicing a form of Judaism and were now being advised to fully convert to Judaism in order to be right with God.  Second, Paul may be using these scripture because they are the texts used by the agitators in his churches.  If Abraham were a proto-typical Gentile  convert to Judaism, then perhaps one could argue that the sign of the covenant with Abraham was circumcision, therefore a present-day Gentile convert ought to following in Abraham’s faith and fully convert.

Paul’s solution is to show that “Abraham’s faith was credited to him as righteousness” before the ritual of circumcision, not after.  If Paul is using the words of his opponents, he is turning them around on their head – Be like Abraham, Paul says, was was declared righteous before circumcision or Law!

The Historical Reliability of Jesus’ Miracles

There are a number of sources outside of the New Testament which indicate that Jesus had a  reputation for being a miracle worker.  The non-Christian writer has no real reason to create a Jesus that preformed miracles especially of those miracles were intended to validate his message.  While the evidence is meager, it is an indication that Jesus’ reputation as a miracle worker was known outside of the Christian community by people that would have no interest in enhancing Jesus’ reputation.

Jesus Walks on the water

Josephus attributes miracles to Jesus, as does the Babylonian Talmud.   In the second century Origen quotes the heretic Celsus as thinking that Jesus learned his magical arts in Egypt, and when he returned to Galilee he did miracles in order to claim to be God (in Contra Celsus, 1.38, cf 1.160).  Celsus is late evidence since he is living at the end of the first century and likely only knows Jesus through the Gospel traditions.  A rather indirect piece of evidence is that the name of Jesus is associate with healing spells and exorcisms.  The evidence for exorcisms is rather late (AD 330), but rabbis forbid using Jesus name in healings as well.

The so called criterion of authenticity can applied to the miracle stories.  For example, all strata of the tradition indicates that Jesus did miracles, including Mark, Q, M/L, and John.  This ought to satisfy the criterion of Multiple Attestation since miracles appear in all of the various forms suggested by form criticism.  Given the methodology of even the Jesus Seminar, one can confidently conclude that Jesus had the reputation as a miracle worker, that he claimed to do miracles, healings, etc.

The criterion of plausibility argues that an event is more likely historical if it is a plausible event.  If this is applied to the miracles, many will dismiss miracles because they do not seem plausible.   What is or is not plausible is highly subjective, and very often implausible events actually occur.  To me, it is implausible that anyone claiming to be a messiah in the Second Temple Period would not do miracles.  While the modern worldview would dismiss miracles as implausible, the Second Temple Period would require them if Jesus was to be taken seriously as the messiah!

The criterion of embarrassment is more helpful.  If a deed seems like it might have been an embarrassment to the growing theology of Jesus, and they passed it along anyway, it has a greater claim to validity.  The healing of the woman with the flow of blood, for example, has Jesus healing the woman without really consciously thinking about it, the power just “went out of him” and he did not know who it was that touched him.

In addition, Jesus was known to have been a man of prayer, yet there are no stories in which Jesus prays in connection to a healing.  If the early church were going to create or enhance the prayers of Jesus (which they very well may have), it is remarkable that they did not create prayers to be added to the miracles of Jesus. This means that Jesus did not heal in the same way Jewish holy men healed, through prayer and ritual.

In short, it is historically plausible that Jesus was known as a miracle worker during his own lifetime, even if the modern thinker dismisses the possibility of miracles.

Jesus and Demons

As with his healings, Jesus commands the demons to leave without invoking an authority (Matt 8:28-34).  Later exorcisms in Acts are done in the name of Jesus, but Jesus simply command the demons and they leave the victim.   In fact, knowing the name of the demon was consider the first step in an exorcism.  In Luke 7:26-36 Jesus encounters a man with a demon living among the tombs near Gerasenes.  This demon speaks to Jesus and calls him “Son of the Most High God.”  This ought to have given the demon power of Jesus since he knows Jesus’ true name.  But Jesus simply commands the demon to give his name, then commands the demon to come out of the man.  No other authority is necessary for Jesus to cast out the demon, they simply obey him.

Also absent from Jesus’ exorcisms are the elaborate preparations for an exorcism described in contemporary literature. [Tobias] took the live ashes of incense and put the heart and liver of the fish upon them and made a smoke. And when the demon smelled the odor he fled to the remotest parts of Egypt, and the angel bound him (Tobit 8:2-3).  The Testament of Solomon is more or less a manual on how to cast out demons written in the third century A.D., although it may contain material from much earlier.  In this story, workers in the Temple find a ring which is able to control demons.  Solomon then captures and interrogates a series of demons.  They are forced to give there name and what they are in charge of as demons.  Then Solomon forces them to explain how they are cast out.  For example, in chapter16  Solomon interrogates a demon called Kunopegos, a spirit in the shape of a horse in front and a fish in back (a sea-horse?)   He can change himself into a man and causes seasickness.  In order to thwart this demon, one must go through a complicated ritual involving bowls and hemp ropes. Solomon sealed him with his ring and stored the demon away.

What is the point of Jesus’ exorcism ministry?  Twelftree argues that there is a two-stage defeat of Satan being described in the gospels, the first mission of Messiah render the power of Satan useless, it is in his second coming that he will judge him and consign him to the Lake of Fire (270).  Satan is trying to hinder Jesus’ ministry, but Jesus constantly defeats him with no struggle whatsoever.

Bibliography:
G.  H.  Twelftree, “Demons, Devil, Satan,” in DJG 163-172.

Wendy Cotter, Miracles in Greco-Roman Antiquity: A Sourcebook for the study of New Testament Miracle Stories (Routledge, 1999).

Isaiah 61, Jesus and Healing

The gospels claim that Jesus was a healer of all kinds of diseases. Jesus is constantly called upon to heal, and on several occasions he takes the initiative to heal.  His ministry of healing was not at all like modern faith healers – in fact, in several cases the individual healed does not express faith in Jesus (Mark 2:1-12, the paralytic, Mark 7:24-30, the daughter of the Syro-Phoenician woman). In Luke 22:51 we might even say that the person healed was decidedly anti-Jesus since he was one of the servants of the priests who were arresting Jesus.

Christ and the, Paolo Cagliari 1571 Centurion

Healing was an expected part of the Messiah’s coming.  Isaiah 61:1-4 says that the age of the Messiah will bring physical healing and liberation from oppression.  This text is spoken by an individual who is anointed by the Lord (a messiah) for the purpose of preaching the good news of the end of the exile.  Notice Isa 61:3 describes the reverse Zion’s mourning and 61:4 describes the rebuilding of the ancient ruins.  It is this passage that Jesus quotes in Luke 4 as being fulfilled in his ministry.  After he announces that he is the fulfillment of Isa 61, he begins healing many (Luke 4:31-37, a demon; 4:38, Peter’s mother-in-law, 4:39-40, many diseases and demons). Similarly, in Matthew 11 Jesus answers John’s disciples by alluding to the Hebrew Bible.

Why would healing be a part of the messianic age? The coming age is a time of the New Covenant, when Israel and Judah will no longer be under the curse of the Law, but under the blessing of the New Covenant.  The First Covenant promised a physical curse for breaking the law, but a physical blessing for keeping the Law. The New Covenant will enable the people to keep the covenant, therefore the coming age will be a time when the curse is reversed and people are physically blessed with real health.  In the coming age, God will deal with sin, even destroying Death (Isa 25:6-8). God’s representative, the messiah, will initiate that period of health and prosperity.

Mark 2 is a most remarkable healing because it seems designed to reverse contemporary assumptions about disease and sin.  If a person had a disease or other serious physical problem, it might very well be an indication of sin (as in Job, for example).  When the paralytic was lowered through the roof, Jesus does not heal him, but rather forgives his sin.  This provokes a response from the teachers of the Law, since only God can forgive sin.   Perhaps they thought that if Jesus really could forgive sin, he would have healed the man.  Jesus goes out of his way to point out that he has authority to forgive sin (a divine prerogative) and heals the man to show that his sins have in fact been forgiven.

How are Jesus’ healing ministry related to us today? We are really back to the “already / not yet” of the Kingdom. Jesus dealt with the problem of sin on the cross, but the Kingdom is not yet fully consummated.  The future, fully realized Kingdom will be a time when the curse of sin is reversed.  Today we have the spiritual blessing of the New Covenant, but not necessarily all of the physical blessings.

Two implications follow from this.  First, the Church is not under the curse of the Law – physical illness should never be seen as a direct punishment from God because of your sin (or your parent’s sin). It might be, since sin is usually “punished” by the natural results of that sin.  But you cannot say your illness is a result of the curses of the Law.

Second, you cannot say your good health is a result of your positive spiritual life. Again, it might be (guilty conscience could cause an ulcer), but there is not contract with God that guarantees you health if you are living out your Christian life properly.

I realize this runs counter to popular teaching from evangelists about healing, but these teachers seriously misunderstand Jesus’s miracles when they tell people their illness is a result of sin or their success is a result of spiritual maturity.