Month: April 2012

John 14:2 – What Happened to the Mansions?

John 14:2 is a well-known and loved line attributed to Jesus: “In my father’s house there are many mansions” (KJV). There are many pastoral illustrations using the idea of a “mansion in glory. Usually someone turns up in heaven and finds that they have a small starter home instead of a glorious mansion and the Lord tells him “you didn’t send ahead any good building material.” The idea of a heavenly mansion turns up in hymns, including the classic Victory in Jesus: “I heard about a mansion He has built for me in glory…”

But very few (if any) modern translation uses the word “mansion.” For example, the ESV and new NIV both have“in my father’s house are many rooms.” That is quite a difference – from a mansion to a “room”? What happened to the mansions?

The Greek word used here (μονή) simply means a place to live, either a stopping place on a journey or a home. It is used for an apartment in a larger building. The translation “mansion” is based on the Latin Vulgate, the Latin word mansiones means more or less the same thing, but the English cognate usually means a grand home, a palace-like structure of some kind. Since the idea of God living in a mansion resonates with most people, “many mansions” has stuck in the imagination.

But what would “in my father’s house are many mansions” mean? That God has a vast Mansion, and the disciples will have mini-mansions within it? That Heaven is alike a big place, like Versailles? This is likely not the point.

Hearing this metaphor in the world of the first-century, especially within the world of a Galilean Jew, will help understand it better. Most families were patrilocal, meaning they would live with their father’s family as mich as possible. When a son got married, he would build a house on his father’s property, creating a common courtyard. It is possible that he would begin my adding a room on to his father’s house. Within the world of the metaphor, then, Jesus is going to return to the father’s house and expand the father’s house so that there is room for the new residents who will soon join him.

It is likely that this is a marriage metaphor, since the most obvious reason that a man would expand his father’s house would be to bring his bride home to live there. The point is that Jesus is going to prepare a place in the presence of God for his disciples.

Since he has gone to prepare a place, the disciples can be assured that Jesus will return for them (v. 3b-4). If this is a marriage metaphor, then it is obvious to the original audience that the departure of Jesus (the bridegroom) will result in his return to collect his bride (the disciples). That is the way these things work, a separation of the engaged couple is normal, the husband to be goes off to prepare a place for his bride to live after they are married.

This use of a marriage metaphor is not a surprise, since Jesus’ first sign is at a wedding banquet. Israel often thought of itself as the wife of the Lord, and that the marriage went very badly. She was unfaithful and was sent away into the wilderness of the Exile. But rather than divorce his wife, the Lord will restore her at the beginning of the new age. Hosea and Jeremiah 2-4 expect the restoration of Israel and Judah at some time in the future, when God will recall his wife from her exile and restore the marriage “as it once was.”

Jesus very clearly tells his disciples that his departure (the death, resurrection and ascension) is not the end of the story, he will return to “bring them home.”

John 14:6 – Jesus is the Only Way

Sometimes a problem has many solutions.  While I enjoy “lateral thinking” exercises, I am always frustrated because I can come up with a solution to a problem which “works” in my own mind, but is not the solution the exercises was looking for in the first place.

For example, there are many solutions to the problem of “how to turn on a light switch.” Some are better than others, but in theory they all “work.”  I could walk over and flip the switch; I could tell my kid to go flip the switch; I could toss things at the switch until I hit it just right; I could write an App for my iPhone which used the internet to access the power grid to make my light come on; I could shoot at the switch with a pistol, etc. Think about a Rube Goldberg device. These were imaginary devices which tried to solve a problem (light a match, turn on a light) with as many (bizarre) steps as possible. There are actually a lot of options for turning on a light!

Some people have the mistaken impression that religion is the same sort of thing. There are hundreds of religions out there, and they all have advantages and disadvantages, things which attract followers or drive them away. The noble seeker tries out all sorts of religions to see if he can get closer to God, perhaps drawing from a variety of religions to find some sort of spiritual peace. This sort of multi-culturalism is popular in the modern world, few people like to hear that there is only one correct religion. That sort of claim is prejudiced, dangerous, or rude.

Yet that is exactly the claim Jesus makes in John 14. Jesus claims to be the only way to God, he says in these verses that he is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, no one can come to the Father unless they come through him (John 14:6). This is not a random line in the middle of the gospel, this is the theme of the whole of John! Jesus is God, made flesh, the one who reveals the only truth that there is in the world, and the one who provides life (resurrection from the dead and eternal life). If someone wants access to the Real God, he has to come through Jesus. This was the core of the gospel as it was first preached, Acts 4:12 states that clearly that there is no other name under Heaven by which a person can be saved.

As politically incorrect as that is, that is claim Jesus makes and that is the teaching of the whole Bible.

Examples of the Value of Archaeology (Part 3)

1873 Wood Engraving

Southern Temple Excavations. There is a great deal of archaeological activity around the southern end of the Temple. Since the first two examples I used concern the Old Testament, I will focus on the importance of these excavations for New Testament studies. There are few who would deny the Western Wall represents the walls built by King Herod to expand the Temple Mount.

In 1838 E. Robinson, one of the first archaeological explorers of Jerusalem, discovered the remains of an arch on the southwest corner of the Temple Mount. Photographs show that this arch was only a few feet above ground level at the turn of the twentieth century, and even in 1968 it was near ground level with a vegetable patch growing beneath. Today, visitors to the archaeological park can see the arch some twenty feet from the ground level. Archaeologists have excavated to the level of the first century streets. The arch is part of a stairwell from ground level to the Temple Mount.

Photo Taken May, 2009

One of the most spectacular finds in this area was the “trumpeting stone” from the corner of the wall. On the inside of the parapet is an incomplete inscription saying “to the place of trumpeting.” The stone was 138 feet above the street level! It appears that a priest or Levite would sound a shofar (Josephus, JW 4.582, b. Sukk. 5:5).On the southern end of the Temple Mount a stairway goes up from the street level to a double gate and triple gate. It is likely that there was a plaza at the base of the steps, and there are several public ritual baths near the steps. The double gate is built in the Herodian style, although it was filled in by the Crusaders and a building was added by the Umayyads, nearly covering the entrances. Since the other since of the gate is now part of the Al Aska Mosque, detailed investigation is impossible. Ritmeyer suggests that this may be the Beautiful Gate mentioned in Acts 3, although it is impossible to know for certain. These gates opened up into the Royal Stoa, a huge area on the south end of the Temple Mount.

Trumpeting Stone

In summary, the southern Temple excavations demonstrate what Jerusalem looked like during the ministry of Jesus and the Apostles. The archaeology of the Southern Temple area gives the physical context of last week of Jesus life and the early part of the book of Acts. Let me suggest one application of this physical context to the book of Acts. As is well known, on the day of Pentecost 3000 people respond to the preaching of the apostles and were baptized. In Acts 4:4 and additional 5000 believe. How is it possible to baptize such large crowds in the Temple area? The only real possibility are the many mikvoth around the Temple area, including the pools of Siloam and Bethesda. I think that the baptism of Acts 2 and 3 is a self-baptism in one of the many ritual pools around Jerusalem. In this case, the archaeological context helps explain a detail of the text.

Examples of the Value of Archaeology (Part 2)

Khirbet Qeiyafa in the Valley of Elah. The Valley of Elah is the site of the well-known story of David and Goliath (1 Sam 17). The valley is about 18 miles southwest of Jerusalem, the ruins of Qeiyafa are on top of a hill that borders the valley to the north. The small settlement was protected by a casement wall and two gates, but was destroyed. The site is significant for several reasons. First, it is certainly an Israelite site dating to the early Iron age, or the kingdom of David. It is along the border of Judah and Philistia, indicating that there were indeed tensions along that border during the time of David requiring a military post to guard the valley.

The most significant artifact to be found at Qeiyafa is a small ostracon (pot sherd) with some early Hebrew writing on it. William Shea offers a unique translation of the text which recognizes that some of the letters are in fact pictograms. His suggested translation of the first two lines is a command to the king to “not make two servants of the judge and the prophet” (604). He suggests that the text was “written in a time of transition” from local judges and prophets to kings. These lines would be advice to a king to not usurp the tradition roles of the judges or the prophets. As Shea puts it, the judge and the prophet may have diminished in authority when the monarchy was established, but they were to continue “independent of the king” (610).

There are other suggested readings of the text, some differing a great deal from Shea’s reconstruction. For example, Gershon Galil of the University of Haifa renders the second and third line as“judge the slave and the widow and the orphan and the stranger.” Despite the variety of suggested readings, they all sound like advice to the king, whether that advice sounds like the voice of a prophet or a sage. After reading 2 Sam 23:1-7 and Prov 31:1-9, I would suggest that whatever the Qeiyafa Ostracon is, it represents advice to a young king on how to rule wisely. This advice reflects a transition from the rule of Judges to Kings, exactly as 1 Samuel records.

Examples of the Value of Archaeology (Part 1)

Introduction. I have been asked to give a “top ten archaeological finds” list on a few occasions. There are in fact far more major finds that I would be able to list in a single article or seminar. The list of inscriptions and other monuments mentioning biblical characters in the Old Testament is quite long given the relatively minor status of Israel in the ancient Near East. For the New Testament, the archaeology of Ceasarea, Bet-Shean, Sephoris, and Tiberias shows the Roman influence on Jewish life during the time of Jesus. The Dead Sea Scrolls are of monumental importance for understanding the Jewish religion in the first century. I have chosen to focus the attention of the rest of this paper on just two examples from the Old Testament and one from the New Testament which are both important as biblical history, but are also relatively recent and exciting.

The City of David in the Silwan Valley. The City of David was a Jebusite citadel captured by David in 2 Sam 5:6-9. There were a number of structures built along the ridge from the Temple Mount down to the end of the Kidron and Hinnom valleys. The City of David is best known for Hezekiah’s Tunnel, a tunnel cut through the stone to reach the Gihon Spring at the bottom of the valley. The Siloam Inscription was found in this tunnel in 1880 and has been in Istanbul since 1890. The inscription is one the most important artifacts ever found in Israel since the inscription commemorates the place where workmen joined the two tunnels, connecting the City of David to the Pool of Siloam at the bottom of the hill. Robert Coote comments that “it is the nearly unanimous view of historians that the Siloam tunnel is Hezekiah’s conduit, and that the inscription in it was written shortly before 701 B.C.E.” The tunnel is mentioned in 2 Kings 20:20 and 2 Chron 32:30, and is alluded to in Isaiah 22:11. It is unfortunate, on the one hand, that the inscription does not mention Hezekiah. But, on the other hand, any mention of Hezekiah might have been grounds for claiming that the inscription is a fake or dates from a later time.

Recent excavations at the City of David have uncovered hundreds of bullae, or seal impressions dating to the eighth and seventh centuries B.C. These impresses are seals placed on a papyri document as a legal seal. That so many of these little seals have been found is an indication that there was an administrative center which houses a large number of legal documents. It is likely that a fire destroyed the archive, burning the paper but hardening the seals. One seal bears the name “Gemaryahu ben Shafan” (Jer 36:10) and another seal discovered in 2008 appears to have the name Gedeliah, son of Pashur, an administrator in the last days of the kingdom of Judah (Jer 38:1). In summer of 2011 a small golden bell was discovered near the bottom of the valley. The bell may have been sewn into a priestly garment in the first century (Exod 28:33), although it is not certain that the bell came from a priest nor is it clear when the bell was made (it likely dates to the late Second Temple Period, much nearer the time of Jesus than Solomon!)

The excavations at the City of David are a good example of the politics of archaeology in Israel today. Since the archaeological work runs along the border of the village of Silwan. Israeli archaeologists are constantly expanding their work, crossing into a village which is historically Arab. In 1967 the neighborhood was annexed by Israel, but the residents consider this an occupation. They view the work of archaeology as a kind of cultural imperialism since the work is done by Israelis for the purpose of proving that Jerusalem is a Jewish birthright. (Whether anyone actually does archaeology for this reason is debatable, but that is the perception in Silwan!) Any further encroachment into the valley will be met with resistance, yet there is much to be learned by working in the valley. Likely there is no solution, whatever compromises are reached will be entirely political.