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Chapter Four: Themes and Sub-themes in the Bible Probably
one of the most interesting approaches to studying the Bible is thematic. While
the Bible as a whole consists of historical narratives, biographies,
autobiographies, poetic literature, prophetic messages, and letters addressed
to churches and individuals, these writings evolved over long periods and were
only later collected and arranged categorically according to subject matter.
Each of the books evidences its own unity, but surprisingly, when read as an
anthology, the anthology itself contains an amazing unity arising out of the
overall dominant theme: relationship to God and to other human beings. Reading
the Bible as literature simply makes sense: first, it contains a variety of
literary forms; as a book and a collection of books, it can be approached
critically, as can any other literature; more importantly, though, the Bible
must be read as literature for two reasons: its expression of truth through
figurative language, especially symbols, and the unity of theme which connects
the sixty-six All
of the tools important to literary study are equally important to take to a
reading of the Bible. Most Bible versions include a brief description of
literary critical approaches; the New Oxford Annotated Bible, for example,
includes a section entitled "Modern Approaches to Biblical Study" subdivided
into literary criticism, form
criticism, redaction criticism, traditional or historical criticism, and other
ways of reading the text. •Historical
criticism--places literature in its original setting and seeks to understand
original intention or meaning. The
most compelling reason for studying the bible as literature is its thematic
unity, although this is contested by many who see inconsistencies in the
overall story. In literature, theme is defined as a central idea. A distinction
is normally made between nonfiction and fiction, poetry, and drama; the Bible,
of course, is a unique blend of all these. In nonfiction, the theme is the
general topic or subject of discourse; in poetry, fiction, and drama, it is the
abstract concept that is made concrete through representation in person,
action, and image. Put another way, a theme consists of the ideas and values
that a literary work expresses. As one reads, an overall sense of form and
meaning in the work begins to emerge; expectations begin to be confirmed or
denied, modified or strengthened, until one settles on a final understanding or
comes to some resolution. All
of the common subjects of literature are found in the Bible: individuals in
nature, society, and relation to God and other humans; growth and initiation,
time, death, and alienation are all important subjects. While it may be
difficult at this remove from the original writings to determine how much of
our interpretation is a culturally learned construct, it certainly is possible
to trace some dominant and sub-themes in the Bible as we have inherited it. In
fact, this is a fairly simple approach to interpretation. Some evidence exists
that in the early years of Christianity, universal meanings actually could be
read by the appropriately informed individuals to contain historical meaning
and reference. For example, early Essene thought expected to see a new
millennial kingdom connected with Herod. According to some, a baptism with
water was historically the first level of an initiate's membership in this
kingdom; the second level was initiation by wine, and so the interpretation
runs: Jesus' changing water into wine was a socially radical move; it meant
that the kingdom of God was equally accessible by all. A reading of themes at
this level certainly requires special knowledge as well as holds some threat to
traditional teachings, so we will settle for the simpler literary theme. In
literature, a theme must make a direct or implied statement about a subject;
the following are all common
themes found in literature--and important in degree in the Bible, also,
although the perspective of faith would certainly render them differently than
herein stated: •Nature
is at war with individuals and proves our vulnerability.
•Marriage is a perpetual comedy bound to
fail.
As
I said earlier, the central theme of the Bible is that human beings are created
by God in God's image (not in appearance, but in relationship and activity);
this thread runs through all sixty-six books of the Bible, uniting them and
providing an unparalleled explanation of what ultimately it means to be human
and how humans should behave. Mercy, Justice The
Bible as a whole tells the story of the relationship between the infinite and
human beings. Its purpose is not primarily to record history or a scientific
view of the universe. Rather, the Bible records a drama which is the story of God's dealings with
human kind. Overall, the story is one in which human beings are allowed to
multiply, diversify, and intersperse throughout the earth. The order of the
universe is always threatened by disorder, a return to primeval chaos, and only
Yahweh's blessing ensures continued existence. Through trials and tribulations
(much is to be suffered), people move toward the horizon of God's future but
not always willingly; they frequently rebel. The redemptive story is one in
which both God's mercy and God's justice play together simultaneously, neither
one very well understood by the fallible human creature. On an individual
level, God's grace redeems the person; on the playing fields of time, however,
justice is measured through generations and nations. Understanding
the two-fold nature of God causes difficulty for individuals first coming to
grapple with concepts related to Bible study. While God in the Old Testament
has many names, two must be accounted for in particular: Adonai and Elohim.
These two names reflect two roles, not a division in Godhead. The roles are
those of the compassionate and merciful God (Adonai) and the strict and just
God (Elohim). These two roles are reflected throughout the entire anthology,
both aspects functioning to describe the essence of God. Unfortunately, they
become severely divided in the way many today approach a study of the Old and
New Testaments: many see the God of the Old Testament as the God of justice and
the God of the New Testament as the God of mercy. This failure to see a unity
accounts in part for the severe separation today between people and religions,
although I do not mean this statement to minimize real and important
differences. On the other hand, most differences grow out of interpretation and
the focusing on one aspect of God only. The Old Testament might, for example,
be said to focus more on the metaphysical nature of God while the New Testament
emphasizes God's physical nature. This separation can be useful, but if too
narrowly insisted upon, it misses entirely the theological point that "the
Lord your God is one." Readings: Jonah and Habakkuk One
of the supreme challenges the student faces in understanding the Bible at any
level is language and its limitations. If we accept the existence of higher
cognitive states, we also have to admit language is inadequate to describe
them. Words exist as symbols, removing us from reality: if, for example, a
circle exists in pure form, then we must distinguish the pure reality from the
name, the definition, the representation, and knowledge of the circle that
exists in the interior state. The fullness of reality as it exists and is
experienced can never be fully expressed. In fact, the modern scientific age
has largely despaired of questing for meaning on any level other than the
literal, and all of us have been affected by this. We are centuries removed
from the mythology and symbolism which permitted the ancients to express an
Eternal which transcends shallow, one-dimensional experience. Human Limitation: Tolerance for the Unknown To
read the Bible, students will need to suspend disbelief in the possibility
of reaching knowledge of higher realities: to know the secrets of the kingdom
of God (in Christianity), the hidden pattern of creation which underlies the
foundation of the world. On the other hand, the student must also guard against
a view which reduces everything to symbol, leaving nothing of the literal. The
twin offenders in Bible study are the literalists and the allegorists: the
former must be urged to remember that the nature of the alphabet and words
buries them at the outset in an intricate symbolism; the allegorists, however,
who wish to interpret everything as symbol must come to understand that the
Bible unfolds an actual history and a story of real people, even when the
person is sometimes viewed in type. Adam, for example, is humankind, but Adam
is also Adam, a first human being, a real person. Unity, Marriage The
idea of unity, one God, is, in fact, an old one: Xenophanes (half a millennium
before Christ) spoke of one God; Maximus, at the time of Jesus, speaks of one
God, king of all and father; for the Egyptians, the physical sun was a symbol
of the one transcendent God; divinities were often associated with fertility,
the vegetation cycle, and the power of resurrection and reanimation: The
Babylonians represented superior gods as a whole number; the letters of both the Hebrew and Greek
alphabet stood for numbers; a system evolved whereby number was regarded
divine; Christian gnostics employed gematria and mathematics; the Greeks
understood that creation required that Unity express itself in Diversity. The
universe is both one and many, a unity and a multiplicity; ancient mythology
reflected this organization and patterning in the universe in its sacred
symbolism. Polytheism pointed to natural forces, calling them gods. In the
sacred symbolism of Delphi, Apollo represents the principle of unity; Dionysus
represents multiplicity; Apollo, recollection; Dionysus, manifestation. A
metaphor for unity which is found throughout the Bible is that of marriage. If
the student understands that marriage stands for unity, it is then easy to see
its counterpart, disunity, metaphorically described in metaphors of divorce and
harlotry. Genesis,
in its opening, utopian state, places man and woman together in a garden: the
relationship is, from the beginning, dialogical, man and woman; this
two-foldness equals one aspect of the image of God. In fact, students are to
understand that a complete parity exists between mortal marriage and marriage
with Yahweh. The commandments urge that people are to have no other gods with
its parallel on the human level that they are not to commit adultery. The
Jerusalem Talmud links the commandments (the ten principles) in a partnership
demonstrating a duality of obligations, to the Creator and to others. The idea
that one's relationship to Yahweh is a love relationship carries with it the
sense that marriage demands commitment and everlasting fidelity. In human
relationships, we are told not to commit adultery; with God, we are to have no
other gods. This faithfulness is, at bottom, the issue of the covenant
relationship of God with people. The love relationship, sanctioned with
marriage, is in the Old Testament the highest demonstration of love possible.
Hebrew thinking is clear in its focus on God as Creator with human creation
being the result of a tri-relationship: God, the creator; man and woman. To be
created in God's image, or likeness, is to be created for relationship (human
to God and human to human) and to activity (the work of responsible
relationship): 1.27:
So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them. This
image has also been said to reflect the merciful and compassionate nature of
God, with woman being the compassionate half and man the disciplinarian,
although seeing either sex as simply this is a mistake. It is far better to
focus on incompleteness and the need for relationship. The mystery of creation
has always, in some way, been reflected in the mystery that two become one, and
one becomes three. At the very pulse of life throbs, it would seem, the very
busy work of uniting and dividing; I say work because work is activity: unity
and division are concepts. Once again, roles begin to be seen in isolation to
each other. Whether in religious or secular language, we become preoccupied
with distinctions such as the person of thought and the person of action,
failing to remember that we are at some time both. The philosopher David Hume
pointed out that the person of speculation (thought--who retreats to the
closet) is also the social human being, who must engage. Chapter
two picks up the story of generations: 5:
And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it
and to keep it. Genesis,
then, from the beginning, unfolds a story of relationship in its ideal state,
its purpose is for generating and replenishing, but it’s susceptibility to
barrenness and brokenness. Something goes wrong almost immediately; humans
begin to second-guess divine motive, and with the doubt comes the temptation to
break from the relationship. Both Adam and Eve now know their nakedness, their
vulnerability; they become afraid and hide from God. Herein is the first broken
relationship: that of the creature from the creator; one should not be
surprised then to find that the next level of broken relationship is that
between human and human. Even in their fallen state, Adam and Eve's union, with
the help of God, results in life: Eve says, "I have produced a man with
the help of the Lord" (4.1). By now, though, the story is one of
mortality: beings of earth will return to earth (3.19), and even more sadly,
they will hasten this end for each other: the first-born kills the second-born,
and the age-old rivalry of human being to human being is born. And to this end,
the saga of human life continues as a story of blood crying out from the
ground. A
special people, a special land, a divine destiny: in Genesis, the universal
story is particularized. That story is one of human striving and unrest,
short-term evil but long-term good. The themes are promise and delayed
fulfillment, fertility and barrenness, rest and unrest, life and death,
knowledge and ignorance, hiding and revealing, presence and absence. Lonely
heroes are provided cathartic release from the frustrating battle against
death; death is overcome by community and law; stress is on morality and order;
human beings must make it through a world of omnipresent death armed only with
faith in themselves as created in the image of the divine, thus containing a
spark of immortality itself. The
story of the patriarchs is the story of humanity: individuals punished for broken relationship and reduced to
perpetual questioning of the eternal; an achieved intimacy with the Eternal
through vision; significant individuals singled out to wrestle with but
eventually perform the will of God; affliction in the short run and blessing in
the eternal. At all points, we share this story: journeying always into the
unknown, alienated sojourners in a strange land; always leaving and returning;
facing death in our parents, ourselves and our children; yielding often to our
parents' sighting of the way out through vision; discovering God's messengers
intervening in innumerable manifestations and personalities; shaping and
directing our lives always upon a promise, however remote or dimly understood.
Like Abraham, we are often demanded to give up the past and all too often,
subjected to despair of the future; in the span between past and present, we
live our lives, as Eugene O'Neill has said, as interludes in the electrical
display of God the Father, who comes to rescue. Played out in Genesis are all
our tensions of fate and free will, destiny and choice. The cycle continues:
visionaries and dreamers, we find God in every encounter and every human face.
Genesis is the story of humankind. "Let everyone who hears say, 'Come.'
Let everyone who wishes take the water of life as a gift" (Revelation
22.17). If
Genesis is the original picture of the possibility of mortal and divine unity,
Revelation is the end picture--the end of human time and the beginning of God's
time. The metaphor here, too, is that of marriage: 1:
And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first
earth were passed away; and there was no more sea. The prevalence
of the marriage theme can be quickly determined by a simple search of the New
Testament for the word marriage: Mt:22:2:
The kingdom of heaven is like unto a certain king, which made a marriage for
his son, Mt:22:4:
Again, he sent forth other servants, saying, Tell them which are bidden,
Behold, I have prepared my dinner: my oxen and my fatlings are killed, and all
things are ready: come unto the marriage. Mt:22:9:
Go ye therefore into the highways, and as many as ye shall find, bid to the
marriage. Mt:22:30:
For in the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are
as the angels of God in heaven. Mt:24:38:
For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking,
marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noel entered into the ark, Mt:25:10:
And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came; and they that were ready went
in with him to the marriage: and the door was shut. Mk:12:25:
For when they shall rise from the dead, they neither marry, nor are given in
marriage; but are as the angels which are in heaven. Lk:17:27:
They did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage,
until the day that Noel entered into the ark, and the flood came, and destroyed
them all. Lk:20:34:
And Jesus answering said unto them, The children of this world marry, and are
given in marriage: Lk:20:35:
But they which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the
resurrection from the dead, neither marry, nor are given in marriage: Jn:2:1:
And the third day there was a marriage in Cana of Galilee; and the mother of
Jesus was there: Jn:2:2:
And both Jesus was called, and his disciples, to the marriage. 1Cor:7:38:
So then he that giveth her in marriage doeth well; but he that giveth her not
in marriage doeth better. Rv:19:7:
Let us be glad and rejoice, and give honour to him: for the marriage of the
Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready.Rv:19:9: And he saith unto
me, Write, Blessed are they which are called unto the marriage supper of the
Lamb. And he saith unto me, These are the true sayings of God. The Counter Metaphors:
Harlotry, Divorce Reading: Ezekiel 16 and 23; Hosea Disunity
finds its metaphor in harlotry and divorce or lack of fidelity. Consider the
following quick text search on harlot: Gen:34:31:
And they said, Should he deal with our sister as with an harlot? Gen:38:15:
When Judah saw her, he thought her to be an harlot; because she had covered her
face. Gen:38:21:
Then he asked the men of that place, saying, Where is the harlot, that was
openly by the way side? And they said, There was no harlot in this place. Gen:38:22:
And he returned to Judah, and said, I cannot find her; and also the men of the
place said, that there was no harlot in this place. Gen:38:24:
And it came to pass about three months after, that it was told Judah, saying,
Tamar thy daughter in law hath played the harlot; and also, behold, she is with
child by whoredom. And Judah said, Bring her forth, and let her be burnt. Lev:21:14:
A widow, or a divorced woman, or profane, or an harlot, these shall he not
take: but he shall take a virgin of his own people to wife. Josh:2:1:
And Joshua the son of Nun sent out of Shittim two men to spy secretly, saying,
Go view the land, even Jericho. And they went, and came into an harlot's house,
named Rahab, and lodged there. Josh:6:17:
And the city shall be accursed, even it, and all that are therein, to the LORD:
only Rahab the harlot shall live, she and all that are with her in the house,
because she hid the messengers that we sent. Josh:6:22:
But Joshua had said unto the two men that had spied out the country, Go into
the harlot's house, and bring out thence the woman, and all that she hath, as
ye sware unto her. Josh:6:25:
And Joshua saved Rahab the harlot alive, and her father's household, and all
that she had; and she dwelleth in Israel even unto this day; because she hid the
messengers, which Joshua sent to spy out Jericho. Judg:11:1:
Now Jephthah the Gileadite was a mighty man of valour, and he was the son of an
harlot: and Gilead begat Jephthah. Judg:16:1:
Then went Samson to Gaza, and saw there an harlot, and went in unto her. 1Kgs:3:16:
Then came there two women, that were harlots, unto the king, and stood before
him. Prov:7:10:
And, behold, there met him a woman with the attire of an harlot, and subtle of
heart. Prov:29:3:
Whoso loveth wisdom rejoiceth his father: but he that keepeth company with
harlots spendeth his substance. Isa:1:21:
How is the faithful city become an harlot! it was full of judgment;
righteousness lodged in it; but now murderers. Isa:23:15:
And it shall come to pass in that day, that Tyre shall be forgotten seventy
years, according to the days of one king: after the end of seventy years shall
Tyre sing as an harlot. Isa:23:16:
Take an harp, go about the city, thou harlot that hast been forgotten; make
sweet melody, sing many songs, that thou mayest be remembered. Jer:2:20:
For of old time I have broken thy yoke, and burst thy bands; and thou saidst, I
will not transgress; when upon every high hill and under every green tree thou
wanderest, playing the harlot. Jer:3:1:
They say, If a man put away his wife, and she go from him, and become another
man's, shall he return unto her again? shall not that land be greatly polluted?
but thou hast played the harlot with many lovers; yet return again to me, saith
the LORD.Jer:3:6: The LORD said also unto me in the days of Josiah the king,
Hast thou seen that which backsliding Israel hath done? she is gone up upon
every high mountain and under every green tree, and there hath played the
harlot. Jer:3:8:
And I saw, when for all the causes whereby backsliding Israel committed
adultery I had put her away, and given her a bill of divorce; yet her
treacherous sister Judah feared not, but went and played the harlot also. Jer:5:7:
How shall I pardon thee for this? thy children have forsaken me, and sworn by
them that are no gods: when I had fed them to the full, they then committed
adultery, and assembled themselves by troops in the harlots' houses. Ezek:16:15:
But thou didst trust in thine own beauty, and playedst the harlot because of
thy renown, and pouredst out thy fornications on every one that passed by; his
it was. Ezek:16:16:
And of thy garments thou didst take, and deckedst thy high places with divers
colours, and playedst the harlot thereupon: the like things shall not come,
neither shall it be so. Ezek:16:28:
Thou hast played the whore also with the Assyrians, because thou wast
unsatiable; yea, thou hast played the harlot with them, and yet couldest not be
satisfied. Ezek:16:31:
In that thou buildest thine eminent place in the head of every way, and makest
thine high place in every street; and hast not been as an harlot, in that thou
scornest hire; Ezek:16:35:
Wherefore, O harlot, hear the word of the LORD: Ezek:16:41:
And they shall burn thine houses with fire, and execute judgments upon thee in
the sight of many women: and I will cause thee to cease from playing the
harlot, and thou also shalt give no hire any more. Ezek:23:5:
And Aholah played the harlot when she was mine; and she doted on her lovers, on
the Assyrians her neighbours, Ezek:23:19:
Yet she multiplied her whoredoms, in calling to remembrance the days of her
youth, wherein she had played the harlot in the land of Egypt. Ezek:23:44:
Yet they went in unto her, as they go in unto a woman that playeth the harlot:
so went they in unto Aholah and unto Aholibah, the lewd women. Hosea:2:5:
For their mother hath played the harlot: she that conceived them hath done
shamefully: for she said, I will go after my lovers, that give me my bread and
my water, my wool and my flax, mine oil and my drink. Hosea:3:3:
And I said unto her, Thou shalt abide for me many days; thou shalt not play the
harlot, and thou shalt not be for another man: so will I also be for thee. Hosea:4:14:
I will not punish your daughters when they commit whoredom, nor your spouses
when they commit adultery: for themselves are separated with whores, and they
sacrifice with harlots: therefore the people that doth not understand shall
fall. Hosea:4:15:
Though thou, Israel, play the harlot, yet let not Judah offend; and come not ye
unto Gilgal, neither go ye up to Beth-aven, nor swear, The LORD liveth. Joel:3:3:
And they have cast lots for my people; and have given a boy for an harlot, and
sold a girl for wine, that they might drink. Amos:7:17:
Therefore thus saith the LORD; Thy wife shall be an harlot in the city, and thy
sons and thy daughters shall fall by the sword, and thy land shall be divided
by line; and thou shalt die in a polluted land: and Israel shall surely go into
captivity forth of his land. Micah:1:7:
And all the graven images thereof shall be beaten to pieces, and all the hires
thereof shall be burned with the fire, and all the idols thereof will I lay
desolate: for she gathered it of the hire of an harlot, and they shall return
to the hire of an harlot. Nahum:3:4:
Because of the multitude of the whoredoms of the wellfavoured harlot, the
mistress of witchcrafts, that selleth nations through her whoredoms, and
families through her witchcrafts. While
divorce doesn't yield the richness of harlotry, it's still clearly an undesired
disunity: Lev:21:14:
A widow, or a divorced woman, or profane, or an harlot, these shall he not
take: but he shall take a virgin of his own people to wife. Lev:22:13:
But if the priest's daughter be a widow, or divorced, and have no child, and is
returned unto her father's house, as in her youth, she shall eat of her
father's meat: but there shall no stranger eat thereof. Num:30:9:
But every vow of a widow, and of her that is divorced, wherewith they have
bound their souls, shall stand against her. Deut:24:1:
When a man hath taken a wife, and married her, and it come to pass that she
find no favour in his eyes, because he hath found some uncleanness in her: then
let him write her a bill of divorcement, and give it in her hand, and send her
out of his house. Deut:24:3:
And if the latter husband hate her, and write her a bill of divorcement, and
giveth it in her hand, and sendeth her out of his house; or if the latter
husband die, which took her to be his wife; Isa:50:1:
Thus saith the LORD, Where is the bill of your mother's divorcement, whom I
have put away? or which of my creditors is it to whom I have sold you? Behold,
for your iniquities have ye sold yourselves, and for your transgressions is
your mother put away. Jer:3:8:
And I saw, when for all the causes whereby backsliding Israel committed
adultery I had put her away, and given her a bill of divorce; yet her
treacherous sister Judah feared not, but went and played the harlot also. How
far Israel (the Northern ten tribes) and Judah (the Southern two tribes)
strayed from unity, keeping the Abrahamic covenant, is clearly captured in the
metaphors of divorce in Isaiah, adultery in Jeremiah, and harlotry. Students
may not like the metaphor and even perhaps find it offensive, but they must understand
it grew out of a culture which valued patriarchical lineage and right
relationship. It's true that monogamy was not initially the rule; in fact, the
entire tradition of the handmaiden who stepped in for the barren wife placed a
premium on the succession of lineage, a succession which was threatened by the
possibility of extinction. Humans had to learn, however, that the creation as
well as the sustaining of life was a gift of God, although the story of
humankind has always been that of self-sustaining effort. Abraham's faith, you
will recall, was sorely tested when he was asked to sacrifice his miracle son
of old age, his one hope for posterity. The story of Israel collectively is
told in Malachi: 2;
14 Because the Lord was a witness between you and the wife of your youth to
whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by
covenant. 15:
Did not one God make her? Both flesh and spirit are his. And what does the one
God desire? Godly offspring. So, look to yourselves, and do not let anyone be
faithless to the wife of his youth. 16:
For I hate divorce, says the Lord, the God of Israel, and covering one's
garments with violence, says the Lord of hosts. So take heed to yourselves and
do not be faithless. Sibling Rivalry: First-born,
Second-born, Jews and Christians The
story of sibling rivalry begins in the first family when brother rises, in the
extreme, against brother: 8
Cain said to his brother Abel, "Let us go out to the field." † And
when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and killed
him. 9 Then the LORD said to Cain, "Where is your brother Abel?" He
said, "I do not know; am I my brother’s keeper?" 10 And the LORD
said, "What have you done? Listen; your brother’s blood is crying out to
me from the ground! 11 And now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened
its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand (4). An
interesting refrain is then sounded: 16 Then Cain went away from the presence
of the LORD, and settled in the land of Nod, † east of Eden. This is an echo of
what happened with Cain's parents: 8 They heard the sound of the LORD God
walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze, and the man and his
wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the
garden (4). In both cases, the broken
relationship between human and God is indicated by a going away or hiding from
the presence of God. Here,
first born slays the second born child, spilling the sacred blood: 4.10–11:
Blood is sacred to God, for it is the seat of life (Deuteronomy 12.23) and
cries from the ground for vindication. The Jerusalem Talmud in paralleling the
commandments relative to our obligations to God and to humans links the "I
am the Lord your God" to "You shall not murder." Without God,
separated from order and subject to lawlessness, humans find they are capable
of any action. Relationship to God, however, brings about a responsibility to
relate to human beings differently. Without God, anything is possible and can
be rationalized; I killed for this reason or that. With God, however,
individuals are committed to a relationship demanding responsibility to each
other. We become our brother's keeper. This
pattern is to continue; we know the story: humans became progressively more
rebellious. 5
The LORD saw that the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth, and that
every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually. 6
And the LORD was sorry that he had made humankind on the earth, and it grieved
him to his heart. 7 So the LORD said, "I will blot out from the earth the
human beings I have created—people together with animals and creeping things
and birds of the air, for I am sorry that I have made them." 8 But Noah
found favor in the sight of the LORD (6). Interestingly,
this progressive evil is the condition of mortals, who have interfaced with the
Divine but did not become divine. They remain flesh, subject to the conditions
of flesh. They have, however, gained a knowledge of good and evil; they do not
live merely in the objective world where fact is fact, true or false. They now
know "ought." To know what they ought to do, however, does not mean
they will do it; and to become evil is to choose human desire over obedience
(faithfulness) to God's command. That is, humans continue to flee the presence
of God or to break relationship and to become unfaithful. One man is, however,
faithful; Noah is saved when others are destroyed. Immediately, when Noah steps
from the ark, he is reminded of what humankind's appropriate relationship to
others is: 4
"Only, you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood. 5 For
your own lifeblood I will surely require a reckoning: from every animal I will
require it and from human beings, each one for the blood of another, I will
require a reckoning for human life. God
affirms that human life (blood) is sacred and that life is not to be taken. Nonetheless,
the pattern of broken relationship continues, and bloodshed continues. We
remember that younger brother Jacob, who steals his older brother Esau's birthright,
flees because he is afraid. Esau forgives his brother, (Jacob sees his face as
the face of God), but the history of the two peoples created is one of rivalry
and bloodshed. Esau goes to the Ishmaelites (recall the sons of Abraham:
Ishmael by Hagar and Isaac by Sarah), a people whom the Islamic people trace
their lineage; Jacob, on the other hand, marries among his father's people
(28). When Jacob reunites with his brother, it is a union with one who comes
from the land of Edom (32).
19
These are the descendants of Isaac, Abraham’s son: Abraham was the father of
Isaac, 20 and Isaac was forty years old when he married Rebekah, daughter of
Bethuel the Aramean of Paddan-aram, sister of Laban the Aramean. 21 Isaac
prayed to the LORD for his wife, because she was barren; and the LORD granted
his prayer, and his wife Rebekah conceived. 22 The children struggled together
within her; and she said, "If it is to be this way, why do I live?" †
So she went to inquire of the LORD. 23 And the LORD said to her, We
might note here, among other things, that Jacob's name means he takes by the
heel, that he supplants. Before his name change to Israel, Jacob may very well
be seen as the man of passivity while Esau is activity itself, the hunter, the
man of the field. In other respects, we see the rowdy and the quiet. Is there a
propensity on the part of the male to prefer the rowdy and the female to prefer
the quiet and introspective? Consider
the following long excerpt from the Oxford Companion to the Bible; it shows the
violence which ensues between Judah and Edom,
or with respect to our current theme, the human failure to refrain from
shedding human blood: *******
Edom.
A kingdom that neighbored Judah on its southeastern border during the Iron Age.
It encompassed the area southward from the Wadi Hesa in Jordan to the Gulf of
Aqaba, and, during part of this period, included the area called Seir,
southwest of the Dead Sea and south of Kadesh-barnea (see Map 1:Y7). Very
little is known about Edom. Virtually no Edomite inscriptions have been found,
apart from some seals and a few ostraca. The primary literary source for the
history of Edom is the Bible, but only the barest outline can be constructed
from that source. Some information comes from Assyrian records, and
archaeological excavations and surveys have enabled a general picture of the
development of the region to be sketched. The
early development of Edom remains largely unknown. The stories in Genesis that
describe family relationships between Israel’s ancestors and those of all the
surrounding kingdoms are generally understood to be artificial. For Edom this
is particularly clear, since the connection between Isaac’s brother Esau and
Edom is tenuous and awkward in the narratives of Genesis 25.19–34 and is almost
certainly a later imposition on the stories. Archaeological
surveys indicate that the land of Edom was occupied fairly sparsely during the
Late Bronze Age (ca. 1550–1200 BCE), with only a few small fortified towns and
some tiny villages. The geographic name Edom appears for the first time in an
Egyptian document of the thirteenth century BCE. Numbers
20.14–21 suggests that Edom was already a monarchy at the time of the Exodus in
the thirteenth century. Recent studies, however, have cast considerable doubt
about the historicity of this and related stories. Even the so-called Edomite
king list in Genesis 36.31–39 has been shown to be garbled and unreliable. Saul
is said to have fought Edom successfully (1 Samuel 14.47), but it was David who
conquered it and incorporated it into his empire, setting up garrisons throughout
the land (2 Samuel 8.14). Although a certain Hadad tried to rebel against
Solomon, he does not appear to have been successful (1 Kings 11.14–22). Edom
remained under Israelite control, ruled by an Israelite governor until the
reign of Jehoram of Judah in the mid-ninth century (2 Kings 8.20). At that time
the Edomites successfully rebelled and set up their own king. During
the reigns of Amaziah of Judah (797–769) and Uzziah (769–734) Edom again came
under Judean domination. Uzziah recaptured and rebuilt Elath on the Gulf of
Aqaba early in his reign. But in the reign of Ahaz Edom decisively threw off
Judean control and remained independent of Judah from that time on. In
Judah’s place, however, came Assyrian domination, but as was the case also for
Ammon and Moab, the Assyrian presence appears to have been economically and
politically beneficial to Edom. Excavations at Buseira (probably the Edomite
capital Bozrah), Tawilan, and Tell el-Kheleifeh (Elath), show that the late
eighth through the mid-sixth centuries BCE saw the peak of Edomite prosperity
and expansion. It is from these centuries that monumental architecture is
known, and there are indications that Edom expanded its influence into the
southern hinterlands of Judah. Edom
seems to have survived the violence of the Babylonian campaigns under
Nebuchadrezzar, and, although Buseira, Tawilan, and other sites suffered
destruction later in the sixth century, the region recovered and continued to
play a role in international trade during the Persian period. With the rise of
the Nabateans, a significant proportion of the Edomites seem to have moved
westward, so that, by the Hellenistic period, Idumea (the Greek form of Edom)
was the name of the region directly to the south of Judah (Map 10:W-X5–6; see 1
Maccabees 4.29). The most famous Idumean was Herod the Great. Although
Deuteronomy 23.8 expresses a tolerant attitude toward the Edomites, most
biblical passages dealing with the kingdom display a severe hostility toward
it, reflecting the almost constant conflict between Judah and Edom.
Considerable bitterness is evident in the biblical texts concerning Edom’s
attitudes and actions after the destruction of Jerusalem in 587/586 BCE (see,
e.g., Jeremiah 49.7–22; Obadiah 1; Isaiah 34). Edom, in fact, became a symbol
of Israel’s enemies in postexilic literature. ***********************
As
is so often the case in the Old Testament, the picture of Jacob and Esau's
relationship is also a picture, in microcosm, of human relationship: tenuous,
violent, and filled with bloodshed. To see how this relationship played out in
time, students need to read Romans, for a Christian perspective, and Hebrews
for the Hebrew-Christian perspective. An analogy must be understood: as Jacob,
the first-born, stole his brother's birthright, so have Christians stolen the
birthright of the Hebrews. The Old Testament, though, is clear: Abraham was to
become the father of nations. 17
When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to Abram, and said to
him, "I am God Almighty; † walk before me, and be blameless. 2 And I will
make my covenant between me and you, and will make you exceedingly
numerous." 3 Then Abram fell on his face; and God said to him, 4 "As
for me, this is my covenant with you: You shall be the ancestor of a multitude
of nations. 5 No longer shall your name be Abram, † but your name shall be
Abraham; † for I have made you the ancestor of a multitude of nations (17). Christians
have enjoyed the Hebrew birthright; Paul argues, however, that no distinction
exists: 12 For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is
Lord of all and is generous to all who call on him. 13 For, "Everyone who
calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved " (10). This conclusion,
though, follows an earlier argument: 6
It is not as though the word of God had failed. For not all Israelites truly
belong to Israel, 7 and not all of Abraham’s children are his true descendants;
but "It is through Isaac that descendants shall be named for you." 8
This means that it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of
God, but the children of the promise are counted as descendants. 9 For this is
what the promise said, "About this time I will return and Sarah shall have
a son." 10 Nor is that all; something similar happened to Rebecca when she
had conceived children by one husband, our ancestor Isaac. 11 Even before they
had been born or had done anything good or bad (so that God’s purpose of
election might continue, 12 not by works but by his call) she was told,
"The elder shall serve the younger." Paul
is clear in his understanding that the
children of promise are first the Hebrew people: 13
Now I am speaking to you Gentiles. Inasmuch then as I am an apostle to the
Gentiles, I glorify my ministry 14 in order to make my own people † jealous,
and thus save some of them. 15 For if their rejection is the reconciliation of
the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead! 16 If the part
of the dough offered as first fruits is holy, then the whole batch is holy; and
if the root is holy, then the branches also are holy. The
Jew of today traces this failure of which Paul speaks to the Ishmaelites,
finding the offspring of Isaac faithful in pursuing God's promise of a restored
Eden (and Messiah) at the end of the ages ( a time often given as six thousand
years, with the current millennium being the last). The
point being made is simply that the second-born, the Christian, seems to be
enjoying the birthright of the first-born, the Hebrew. This is the analogy on
which much of the New Testament works. The Jew argues the law must be fulfilled
without relinquishing any aspect of it; the Christian argues that the law was
fulfilled in Christ. Their differences are many, but at bottom, the old
antagonism, the old sibling rivalry, is being maintained while the universal
brotherhood of the family of God is being underplayed. While the New Testament
contains much anti-Semitism, at its best, it is egalitarian in the extension of
God's outreach to humankind. The Talmud teaches that all nations have a share
in the Word to Come. That is, God's Kingdom will come when God will be One God
for the entire world. This is, perhaps, prefigured in the utterance of Cyrus:
"All the kingdoms of the earth hath the Lord, the God of heaven, given
me." In the meantime, though, a conflict continues to exist: Christians
urge "Believe" while Jews say "Act." Both sets of people
see themselves as catalysts for the rest of the world. In creed and deed,
though, truth lies: relationship demands both. The
Old Testament story begins in a garden; the New Testament story ends with the
descension of a city, New Jerusalem. This movement underlines another theme
which exists as a unifying force in the Bible as a whole. Generally, the
garden--as in literature, generally--represents ideal existence. It is a place
of unity, wholeness, vision, peace, relationship with God, absence of pain.
This is also the Messianic vision. In one sense, then, the Bible story is told
utopia to utopia. This is the vision which I have frequently referred to as
God's world. What history seems to be then is, in one sense, an interlude of
rebellion, alienation, suffering and pain. Existential literature tells us we
exist as strangers to ourselves; the story of Abraham, our story in miniature,
is that of sojourner in a strange land. But before Abram was promise--a
promised land, not fully realized, for, as Hebrews tells the story, they
rebelled: "Today,
if you hear his voice, Actually,
an astounding parallel exists between Genesis and Revelation: The closing
chapters of Revelation contain a striking contrast to the opening chapters of
Genesis. Genesis speaks of the creation of the sun, the entrance of sin into
the world, the pronouncement of the curse, Satan's triumph, and the exclusion
from the "tree of life." Revelation tells of a place where there will
be no need of the sun, where sin is banished, where the curse is gone, Satan is
overthrown, and admission is given to the "tree of life." What
needs to be understood clearly is that the descending city is the City of God;
its parallel on the human level is Babylon, the city of the fallen. It's no
accident that the city is, on earth, the counterpart to the garden. The city is
a place where human beings have located themselves with respect to each other,
combining themselves in their aspirations, but apart from God, the story is
tragic, and the city all too often in literature is seen as a place of vice and
corruption; we hear Jesus lament this earthly city Jerusalem in Luke: 34
Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are
sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen
gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! 35 See, your house
is left to you. And I tell you, you will not see me until the time comes when †
you say, ‘Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.’ " The
story of the prodigal son, although he goes to a far country and nowhere is it
said he goes to a city, is the story so often told of the young and the
initiation into adulthood responsibility: 11
Then Jesus † said, "There was a man who had two sons. 12 The younger of
them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of the property that will
belong to me.’ So he divided his property between them. 13 A few days later the
younger son gathered all he had and traveled to a distant country, and there he
squandered his property in dissolute living. 14 When he had spent everything, a
severe famine took place throughout that country, and he began to be in need.
15 So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who
sent him to his fields to feed the pigs. 16 He would gladly have filled himself
with † the pods that the pigs were eating; and no one gave him anything. 17 But
when he came to himself he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired hands have
bread enough and to spare, but here I am dying of hunger! 18 I will get up and
go to my father, and I will say to him, "Father, I have sinned against
heaven and before you; 19 I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me
like one of your hired hands." ’ 20 So he set off and went to his father.
But while he was still far off, his father saw him and was filled with
compassion; he ran and put his arms around him and kissed him. 21 Then the son
said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no
longer worthy to be called your son.’ † 22 But the father said to his slaves,
‘Quickly, bring out a robe—the best one—and put it on him; put a ring on his
finger and sandals on his feet. 23 And get the fatted calf and kill it, and let
us eat and celebrate; 24 for this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he
was lost and is found!’ And they began to celebrate (Luke 15). For
some, this is the New Testament parallel of the Old Testament Ishmael- Isaac
story. It is clearly here the story of the choice made by a first-born son, and
it carries with it the idea of choosing immediate gratification over reward
which is to come after time and to be the result of responsible relationship. For
the story of what the city is, we need to follow the history of Babylon; let me
provide this history form the Oxford Companion: Babylon (Map 2:H4). Babylon is the
rendering of Akkadian Babilum (Babilim), the city that for centuries served as
capital of the "land of Babylon" (Jeremiah 50.28). Cuneiform sources
interpret its name as bŒb-ilim, "gate of the deity." The Bible
rejected this popular etymology in favor of a more scurrilous one that linked
the name to the confusion of tongues (Genesis 11.9, Hebr. bŒlal, "[God]
confused"), and so the city is called Babel. With
this restoration, Babylon ranked as one of the major cities, indeed, in Greek
eyes, as one or even two of the seven wonders of the ancient world, by virtue
of its walls in some accounts and invariably for its famous "hanging
gardens." The gardens were more likely the work of Marduk-apal-iddina II
than of Nebuchadrezzar II (as claimed by Berossos in one Hellenistic
tradition), but the latter certainly rebuilt the city most grandly during his
forty-four-year reign (605–562 BCE). He is remembered in biblical
historiography as the conqueror of Jerusalem in 597 and 587/586 BCE (2 Kings
24–25; cf. 2 Chronicles 36). The biblical record is supported and supplemented
by the Babylonian Chronicle and other cuneiform documents. But the stories told
in the book of Daniel about Nebuchadrezzar (especially Daniel 4), as well as
about Belshazzar (Daniel 5), should rather be referred to Nabonidus, who proved
to be not only the last king of the dynasty (555–539 BCE) but the last ruler of
any independent polity in Babylon. The city surrendered to Cyrus the Persian in
a bloodless takeover and thereafter, while continuing as a metropolis of the
successive Achaemenid, Seleucid, and Parthian empires, ceased to play an
independent role in ancient politics. In
the Bible, Babylon plays a dual role, positively as the setting for a
potentially creative diaspora, negatively as a metaphor for certain forms of
degeneracy. The "Babylonian exile" imposed by Nebuchadrezzar on the
Judeans removed the center of Jewish life to Babylon for fifty or sixty years,
if not the seventy predicted by the prophet Jeremiah (Jeremiah 29.10; cf. 2
Chronicles 36.21). The exiled king Jehoiachin was released from prison by
Nebuchadrezzar’s son and successor Amel-Marduk, the Evil-merodach of 2 Kings
25.27 (cf. Jeremiah 52.31), and provided for from the royal stores, as
indicated also by cuneiform sources. Jeremiah wrote to the exiles in God’s
name, advising them to enjoy the positive aspects of life in Babylon and to
pray for its welfare (Jeremiah 29.4–7; contrast Psalm 122.6). Ezekiel lived
among the exiles and prepared them for the restoration, while Second Isaiah
welcomed the arrival of Cyrus (Isaiah 44.28–45.1), which paved the way for the
return of those exiles who chose to accept his proclamation (2 Chronicles
36.22f; Ezra 1.1–3). Under
Persian rule, Babylon continued to flourish as the seat of one of the most
important satrapies of the Persian empire (cf. Ezra 7.16; Daniel 2.49; etc.),
and the Achaemenid Artaxerxes I could still be called "king of
Babylon" (Nehemiah 13.6). The Jews who chose to remain there enjoyed
considerable prosperity, as indicated by business documents from nearby Nippur
in which individuals identified as Judeans or bearing Jewish names (in Hebrew
or Aramaic) engage in various agricultural and commercial activities. The
foundations were thus laid for the creative role that Babylonia was to play in
the Jewish life of the postbiblical period. The
Bible also reflects a negative view of Babylon. Already in the primeval
history, the tower of Babel (Genesis 11.1–9) uses the traditional ziggurat
present in each city of Sumer as a metaphor for the excesses of human ambition
that led to, and accounted for, the confusion of tongues and dispersion of
peoples. The Psalmists emphasized the negative aspects of exile (Psalm 137),
and the fall of the "arrogant" city (Jeremiah 50.31) and "its
sinners" (Isaiah 13.9) was predicted confidently, even gleefully, by the
prophets. In the New Testament, Babylon became the epitome of wickedness
(Revelation 17.5) and a symbolic name for Rome (Revelation 17–18; cf. 1 Peter
5.13). A
search of Babylon will return almost four hundred hits, and in that will be
discovered an array of shortcomings; 2 Esdras, however, points out that
Babylon's sins are those of humankind in extreme, comparing to it, the sins of
the people of God's city, Zion: 20
"Yet you did not take away their evil heart from them, so that your law
might produce fruit in them. 21 For the first Adam, burdened with an evil
heart, transgressed and was overcome, as were also all who were descended from
him. 22 Thus the disease became permanent; the law was in the hearts of the
people along with the evil root; but what was good departed, and the evil
remained. 23 So the times passed and the years were completed, and you raised
up for yourself a servant, named David. 24 You commanded him to build a city
for your name, and there to offer you oblations from what is yours. 25 This was
done for many years; but the inhabitants of the city transgressed, 26 in
everything doing just as Adam and all his descendants had done, for they also
had the evil heart. 27 So you handed over your city to your enemies. Babylon
Compared with Zion28 "Then I said in my heart, Are the deeds of those who
inhabit Babylon any better? Is that why it has gained dominion over Zion? 29
For when I came here I saw ungodly deeds without number, and my soul has seen
many sinners during these thirty years. † And my heart failed me, 30 because I
have seen how you endure those who sin, and have spared those who act wickedly,
and have destroyed your people, and protected your enemies, 31 and have not
shown to anyone how your way may be comprehended. † Are the deeds of Babylon
better than those of Zion? 32 Or has another nation known you besides Israel?
Or what tribes have so believed the covenants as these tribes of Jacob? 33 Yet
their reward has not appeared and their labor has borne no fruit. For I have
traveled widely among the nations and have seen that they abound in wealth,
though they are unmindful of your commandments. 34 Now therefore weigh in a
balance our iniquities and those of the inhabitants of the world; and it will
be found which way the turn of the scale will incline. 35 When have the
inhabitants of the earth not sinned in your sight? Or what nation has kept your
commandments so well? 36 You may indeed find individuals who have kept your
commandments, but nations you will not find" (3). The
sins of Babylon are the sins of arrogance, the worship of other gods,
drunkenness, and sexual excess, among the many other sins of which human beings
are capable. Babylon, much like Nineveh, is simply a very populous city
inhabited by the enemies of the Hebrews; for this same reason, Revelation makes
clear its condemnation of the city for its idolatry, using the metaphor of
infidelity: 17
Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and said to me,
"Come, I will show you the judgment of the great whore who is seated on
many waters, 2 with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and
with the wine of whose fornication the inhabitants of the earth have become
drunk." 3 So he carried me away in the spirit † into a wilderness, and I
saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was full of blasphemous names, and
it had seven heads and ten horns. 4 The woman was clothed in purple and
scarlet, and adorned with gold and jewels and pearls, holding in her hand a
golden cup full of abominations and the impurities of her fornication; 5 and on
her forehead was written a name, a mystery: "Babylon the great, mother of
whores and of earth’s abominations." 6 And I saw that the woman was drunk
with the blood of the saints and the blood of the witnesses to Jesus (17). If
human responsibility is vertically to God and horizontally to others, students
should be reminded that relationship can go wrong in another way, too: failure
to realize our own potential. Benjamin Blech in Understanding Judaism points
out the three mechanisms of relationship: prayer (God), charity (people), and
repentance (self--a breaking away from the past and a returning to God); Jacob
epitomizes this move (Blech 109). Blech also describes this movement to one's
core or essence. A relationship exists here of body to soul; it is not the
dichotomizing relationship found in Paul in the New Testament, where spirit and
flesh are placed in opposition to each other. Of course, Paul points out merely
the result of relationships which have become disharmonious. The goal for both
Christian and Hebrew is to merge body and soul, flesh and spirit, earth and
heaven(Blech 162). In some ways, what must be remembered is that the ideal has
not been reached when disunity is present. Nonetheless, this disunity is
prevalent everywhere in our study of both the Old and New Testament: we find it
in the polarity of gender emphasizing male-female differences, age pitting
younger brother against older; the same principle is playing in the
polarization of the spiritual-earthly, old-new, law-grace, individual-society.
What complicates the scheme, however, is the positive-negative attributes which
can be attributed to the same entity. Following
the themes of relationship and unity, we have looked at woman and the negative
metaphor of infidelity and the whore. How complicated the symbolism can become
can be seen if one looks at feminine
symbolism in general. The Oxford Companion provides a summary of
negative symbolism: Negative
Views of Women. Women in the Bible are generally less important than men and
subject to male authority, but paradoxically women are also very powerful in
one respect, their seductive persuasiveness. The Bible singles out foreign
women as dangerous, liable to lead their partners away from exclusive Yahwism
(Deuteronomy 7.1–4; Deuteronomy 23.17–18; Numbers 25; 1 Kings 11.1–6; Ezekiel
8.14–15; Ezra 9.2–10.44; Nehemiah 13.23–27). The Bible condemns Phoenician
Jezebel for persuading Ahab to neglect the Israelite covenant with Yahweh (1
Kings 16.31–33; 1 Kings 21). Canaanite Rahab (Joshua 2.9–11) and Ruth the
Moabite are exceptions as good foreign women who take Yahweh as their God. The
opposite phenomenon—Israelite women led to apostasy by foreign men—is addressed
only metaphorically, when Israel is personified as an adulterous wife who has
been unfaithful to her husband, Yahweh (Hosea 1–3; Ezekiel 16). Now,
consider the positive: Female
Symbolism. Women play an important role in the Bible’s symbolic repertory. One
of the most striking and influential metaphors in the Bible is the
personification of Wisdom as a woman (Proverbs 1; Proverbs 8; Proverbs 9).
Jeremiah 31.15 describes war-ravaged Israel as a mother, Rachel, weeping for
her dead children. In a familiar biblical metaphor, God too becomes a parent
who feels exasperation but also compassion—literally "womb-feeling"
(Hosea 2.23; Jeremiah 31.20; See Mercy of God)—for the child Israel. Israel,
Jerusalem, and even foreign nations and cities may be personified as daughters
(see Isaiah 1.8; Isaiah 23.12; Lamentations). Marriage becomes a central
metaphor to describe the past and future intimacy of God the husband and Israel
the wife (e.g., Hosea 2.14–20; Ezekiel 16.1–4; Jeremiah 2.2), who all too often
turns into an adulteress ("playing the harlot") with other gods
(Hosea 2; Jeremiah 3.6–10; Ezek 16.15). Political considerations help to
explain the function of some women in the Bible. Abishag is actually a symbolic
pawn, first of the northern tribes (1 Kings 1.3), then of Adonijah (1 Kings
2.17). The story of Rahab (Joshua 2; Joshua 6.22–25) and the presence of women
in genealogies (1 Chronicles 1–9; cf. Matthew 1.1–16) served to imply that the
descendants of these women belonged to kinship groups considered subordinate by
more dominant Israelite tribes. This
dual symbolism is not uncommon and stems, perhaps, in part from the logical
constraints of a language straining to capture, first, what God is, and then,
second, trying to define what human is. The language predicament is that one
term provokes and calls forth the other. Mortality, for example, is defined in
terms of immortality, death in terms of life, heaven in terms of earth, and so
on. God is not human, and human is not God, but somehow, the two must
intersect. Another theme then is the intersection of the finite and the
infinite, picked up in the symbolism of the cross, in the concept of
incarnation. The
book of John, in particular, explores the misunderstandings which exist in the
use of analogical language to explain
the differences between the spiritual and the temporal realms: this confusion
between the two realms is clearly illustrated in two episodes, the case of
Nidodemus and the giving of sight to the blind man: Nicodemus--confused
about second birth 3 And
the second episode: Believes
because "he sees" ; Jews misunderstand blindness. To
read John with understanding, one must constantly translate from the physical
to the spiritual, this seen in two kinds of rest [Jews misunderstand rest
(Sabbath): "My Father is working still, and I am working" 5.17] , two
kinds of water [Woman of Samaria--confused about living water ("spring of
water welling up into eternal life" 4.14], and the list continues: two
kinds of bread, temples, light and so on. To
know God is to experience God's presence: irrefutable truth (is/ is not)
belongs to the objective world as we have defined it by science and logic.
Experiencing God is a relationship. William Sullivan says that " The best
proof of God's existence is what follows when we deny it." I like Paul
Tillich's definition of how the faith relationship completes us: "The
ultimate concern gives depth, direction, and unity... to the whole personality."
He goes on to say that "ultimate concern is the integrating center of the
personal life." In fact, let me quote Tillich more extensively: "The
center unites all elements of man's personal life, the bodily, the unconscious,
the conscious, the spiritual ones. In the act of faith every nerve of man's
body, every striving of man's soul, every function of man's spirit
participates. But body, soul, spirit, are not three parts of man. They are
dimensions of man's being, always within each other; for man is a unity and not
composed of parts. Faith, therefore, is not a matter of the mind in isolation,
or of the soul in contrast to mind and body, or of the body (in the sense of
animal faith), but is the centered movement of the whole personality toward
something of ultimate meaning and significance" (Dynamics of Faith,
106). Louis Pasteur put it another way: "A little science estranges men
from God; much science leads them back to Him." What
happens in the Gospel of John is that individuals again and again misunderstand
Jesus to be talking about what can be proved, what is logical. Only when they
suspend logic will they clearly be able to see. Tillich said, and I agree, that
" faith and science do not belong to the same dimension of meaning.
Science has no right and power to interfere with faith, and faith has no power
to interfere with science" (Dynamics, 81). The symbols used in John open
up levels of reality that ordinarily are closed to the senses. Other
Bible Themes:
Experience
of Divine brings risks. Send
comments to: crain@missouriwestern.edu Copyright 1997MWSC/Jeanie C. Crain
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