I want to pick up on a couple of issues that Paul Hartigan raised in his ‘NT Wright is seriously wrong’ post. They do not appear as yet to have been covered at any length in the discussion, which has focused on the question of whether the Bible offers us a good God / bad God scenario, though the thread has got rather long and I could easily have missed something.
The first has to do with the ‘light for the nations’ imagery and its relation to the generous and all-embracing promises made to Abraham, Moses and David. Paul wrote:
Wright says that God’s idea was from the outset that Israel would be the light of nations. But this idea is first found in Second Isaiah, about the mid 6th century BCE, and is a reaction to the apparent abandonment of Israel by God: if God will not restore us to our former national sovereignty perhaps he means us to have spiritual leadership. It is anachronistic to suggest that this is what God intended all along.
Further, God’s promises to Abraham, Moses and David were generous and far reaching covering everything that Israel could desire in terms of national sovereignty, prosperity, good health and fecundity. Of course, they were only partly realised because Israel was disobedient, but the answer to that was to repent of the disobedience and resume the promised idyllic existence. What is the inner logic in God’s deciding to develop an entirely new grand plan (Israel as the light of nations) in which all the earlier promises are simply ignored?
I’m not sure that even on the face of it there is such a discrepancy between these two ways of stating God’s purpose for Israel. It was suggested in the original discussion that Abraham was blessed to be a blessing to the nations of the earth; and I would have thought you could argue that it is precisely in being a prosperous people in obedience to YHWH that Israel serves as a light to the nations. Viewed in this way, Isaiah merely brings out the ‘among the nations’ potential of the original calling to be a people for God’s own possession: faithful Israel is visible to the world as a sign of the righteousness and justice of God.
However, it’s important to note that the ‘light for the nations’ motif belongs in the context of Isaiah’s vision of Israel restored following judgment, the destruction of Jerusalem, and the scattering of the people. So Isaiah is not saying that God always intended Israel to be a ‘light for the nations’ (though he may have thought that) but that when God restores Israel, the people will be a light for the nations. Even then we may need to recognize some limits to the use of the image. On the one hand, it is almost at times the act or event of restoration or salvation that constitutes the light: the nations will see the righteousness of God demonstrated in the act of delivering Israel from the effects of judgment, from the exile, in the rebuilding of Jerusalem (cf. Ps. 98:1-3). On the other, the image has a lot to do with the regathering of the scattered and exiled Jews from amongst the nations of the earth. The nations respond to the light of God’s act of saving his people by bringing tribute and praise to Zion, by bringing the exiles back to Jerusalem (49:22; 60:3-4), by rebuilding the walls of Zion, and so on.
This is not about Israel having merely spiritual leadership in the world. The point of the image is that God will act sovereignly to restore his people and to become king over them again, and that this event will have an impact on the nations.
The second issue concerns the way in which the calling of Abraham constitutes God’s response to the fall. Paul wrote:
Thirdly, the idea of evil is a critical element in Wright’s understanding of the divine plan. But evil is not an OT biblical notion and enters into Jewish thought by way of Zoroastrianism and apocalyptic writings in the last two or three centuries before Christ. It is grossly anachronistic to make it an element of God’s plan for Israel from the outset. Also the idea of evil is treated as though it is a straightforward one but it is far from that.
I must say, I have never been entirely comfortable with Wright’s argument that Abraham was God’s solution for the problem of evil, and this may have something to do with a problem of anachronism. I would prefer to say that the calling of Abraham to be the father of a great nation comes in Genesis as a response specifically to the problem of the nations represented by the Babel story, and more generally to humanity’s failure to fulfil the terms of the original blessing of Genesis 1:28 - to be fruitful, multiply and fill the earth. The calling of Abraham is clearly a renewal of that creational blessing following not simply the disobedience of Adam but also the corruption of humanity before the flood and the self-aggrandizement expressed at Babel.
So Abraham is a response to the corruption of humanity not at a personal level but at a national and social level: Abraham is to become a blessed community, a creational microcosm, a world-within-a-world, demonstrating both righteousness and prosperity amidst the nations of the earth. The ‘evil’ that Paul speaks about, whatever its provenance, is a more specific phenomenon - and again here we shift from the normative situation represented by the promises to Abraham, Moses and David to the critical situation that arises when Israel comes under national judgment. The apocalyptic face of evil appears when Israel is oppressed or persecuted by its enemies - because when God judges his people for its wickedness, there is always the problem of the suffering of the righteous. So the little horn on the head of the fourth beast in Daniel 7 is an arrogant, blasphemous figure deeply hostile to YHWH who makes war against the saints of the Most High.
What happens when we get to the New Testament is that Israel is again oppressed by evil in this form - a satanic force manifested personally in demon possession and at a political supremely level by Rome but also, as I believe Peter pointed out, by elements within Jewish society. This oppressive evil had to be overcome in order for the promise to Abraham to be recovered. This conflict or overcoming lies at the heart of New Testament eschatology - it is pretty much the theme of Revelation, for example. My argument in The Coming of the Son of Man is that the whole parousia drama essentially tells the story of the church’s victory over the evil that oppressed Israel and prevented it from fulfilling the creational blessing given to Abraham.
So my basic point is that there are two distinct narratives at work here, one having to do with the renewal of creation through a called people, the other having to do with the restoration of that people following judgment. We have tended to make the second narrative (the deliverance or salvation of Israel from evil) primary, even exclusive, and as a result the creational vocation has been neglected. My argument would be that the salvation narrative is critical but that it constitutes essentially an episode within the embracing story about how God calls a people, in response to the corruption of human society, for his own possession to be an authentic humanity in the world.
Violence in the Bible
In a recent post at my blog I tried to speak to the broad question of violence in the Bible, especially the violence that God is implicated in. I’d love to hear some feedback…
Joey
www.joeyroyal.blogspot.com
Violent God
I’m probably too inclined to rush to the ‘defence’ of God in discussions like this - but if Walter Brueggemann described God as ‘irascible’ and ‘a recovering practitioner of violence’, then I find the terminology unfortunate and cheap.
Violence in the OT? Yes. Sanctioned by YHWH? Yes and No. Yes - holy war against the Canaanite inhabitants of the land. Genocide? Yes - there’s no other word for it. Violent penalties for disobedience to YHWH - in the detail and the general scope of the covenant - yes. Reprehensible - at a time when non-violence has become something like the ultimate good in some sections of the Christian world - maybe. But what about the counter-arguments, mitigating circumstances, the place of cultural contextualisation, and the many (not few) obstacles to belief in a direct association of YHWH with violent means?
In Ezekiel 16, for instance, it is not really accurate to describe God as an abusive husband. First, there is a mixture of metaphor in the passage; we are never allowed to forget that the marriage metaphor is no more than that, and the subject in view is, in fact, faithless Israel, the nation. Second, God, the husband, hands Israel over to her ‘lovers’, who then treat her with violence, until her prostitution ceases. This is hardly the same as saying God metes out violence directly and personally. It is more like saying that Israel’s punishment was a consequence of her own actions - which God permitted, and yes, in a sense, approved, because it brought about in one way what God could not achieve in another (his preferred way).
What God actually thinks, and more pertinently feels, about such developments can be seen in passages like the early chapters of Jeremiah, in Hosea 11:8, or even Genesis 6:6, or Luke 14:34-35, and especially Matthew 23:37-39 in the context of the preceding 36 verses. Part of the problem at least is a one-dimensional view of God - in which it is impossible to conceive that the inner responses of God can be in turmoil, sometimes in conflict - such as a commitment to long-term good clashing with immediate compassion. A complicated nexus of responses and emotions often comes into view - such as perplexity; sense of loss; yearning; grief; pain; compassion; delayed execution of judgement; anger - slowly developing; flaring up in a moment; judgement - which is always to limit sin’s consequences upon the rest of creation, and to express a value on the sin so judged. Our victim culture can tend to view any punishment of wrongdoing as reprehensible, to side with the underdog. Israel was frequently not the victim, but the agent of oppression and injustice, to which a response of anger eventually became entirely appropriate.
Ezekiel 16 is the same passage which describes the sins of Sodom: not sodomy, but “arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy.” If God is to be allowed to express anger, it is sometimes important to note exactly what incurs that anger.
A value system which elevates non-violence into an absolute (in an age of great violence) of course goes further, and has described traditional interpretations of the atonement as ‘cosmic child abuse’. Exponents of penal substitutionary atonement often lay themselves open to this charge through a presentation of atonement theory which is crude and oversimplified, but the antidote to theological abuse is never non-use but correct use.
I don’t wish to imply here or elsewhere that there is no issue to be discussed concerning the association of God and violence in the OT (or even the NT); but I sometimes feel that aspersions of violence, harshness or unforgiveness against the OT deity are at least as partisan as the counterarguments are implied to be - especially when the counter-arguments are glossed over, or regarded as not worthy of comment.
Re: NT Wright, Abraham, evil, and 'light for the nations'
Whatever anyone’s ideas are about the scriptures should never be seriously taken. Everyone has their own interpretation of it. If someone disagrees with your beliefs, let them be. To each their own. We believe what we want to, what we wish to. To say someone is wrong or to assume someone is right, including oneself, well, who am I to say that’s wrong eh?
Re: NT Wright, Abraham, evil, and 'light for the nations'
Hi Andrew,
with regard to the following comment:
…I agree with your argument that being a light to the nations is hardly contradictory to the promise of being the head of the nations. According to the promise given in Genesis 12, it was to be through the privileged blessings of the covenant made with Abraham that the nations would in turn be blessed.
Yet, an important theme that is developed throughout the scriptures is the notion of Messiah (even if the title is anachronistically applied to the Pentateuch, the concept is there, if only in embryonic form). Obviously Paul saw messianic significance in the covenant with Abraham ‘and his seed’. The messianic concept, of course, is formally developed in the covenant with David (e.g., Ps.2) and its tensions with divine judgment against the nation (e.g., Ps.89). And just as the Mosaic covenant is clearly the unfolding and (partial) fulfillment of the Abrahamic covenant, so the Davidic covenant is a further unfolding and fulfillment of the promises made to Abraham and preached by Moses (e.g., 2Sam.7:10ff.). The concept of David’s son is further developed in the prophetic writings, being understood that it would be only through the (resurrected, one might say) reign of Abraham’s royal son, the prophesied ‘Shiloh’ from Judah(Ge.49:10), the promised Son of David, that the covenant-blessings of Israel would finally come in fulfillment (e.g., Jer.23:5-8; 30:8-11; 33:15-26; Eze.34:23-24; 37:24-25; Am.9:3). And so Isaiah writes of these days in 11:1ff. And yet, this same ‘shoot’ from Jesse would stand as a banner to the nations (11:10).
A comparison of the langauge of vv.2-5 with that of 42:1-7 and 61:1-3 is compelling. Whatever the precise nature of the relationship between the Servant, as distinct from Israel (e.g., 49:5-7), and his people in solidarity with him (49:3), it is apparent that indeed the NT writers were right to identify Isaiah’s (suffering) Servant with the promised Messiah.
Why am I rehearsing all of this? Because I think that though the idea of being a light to the nations may have been a radical concept for Israel in the 7th century, the notion that the messiah would fulfill for Israel and for the nations the covenant promises to Abraham, Moses, and David is certainly not a ‘new creation’ of the author of “second Isaiah”. It has a long pedigree in the ancient scirptures. And so it is with the coming of the promised One, the manifestation of the Servant, that the blessings would actually come to the nations (Ro.15:12; cf. Eph.2:11-21), fulfilling the ancient covenant with Abraham regarding the Gentiles (Gal.3:8, 14).
He goes on:
Here is his mistake. There is no “new grand plan”, and neither are the earlier promises ignored. In Jesus, the Messiah, all the promises of God to Israel, and through Israel, to the nations, are fulfilled (cf. 2Co.1:20; Ro.15:8-9) - and such has always been the divine design. Not through the nation en mass, but through the seed (singular), Paul mysteriously argued…
Anyway, my question for you, Andrew, is why you find it necessary to posit “two distinct narratives at work here, one having to do with the renewal of creation through a called people, the other having to do with the restoration of that people” from judgment.
Why two distinct narratives? Are these not one and the same? Isn’t the restoration of Israel (which, as you know, I believe has yet to happen) so bound up with the blessings of the nations, and indeed the whole created order, that the restoration to come becomes nothing short of the regeneration of all things? As I’ve argued, Isaiah clearly thinks so in his promises of the coming, eschatological restoration of Jerusalem(65:17-25; 66:10-24; cf. 11:4-9).
Blessing and light
I have distinguished the two narratives in the first place for the sake of clarity. They clearly intersect - and I suggested that one is a subplot within the other. Our basic disagreement concerning the moment of restoration is obviously going to get in the way at this juncture.
If, as I have argued, the restoration envisaged in the New Testament as a fulfilment of Old Testament hopes is realized in i) the resurrection of Jesus, ii) the renewal of the covenant though the Spirit, and iii) the vindication of the suffering community at the parousia, then following that eventual vindication we return to the larger narrative about the calling of a people to be an authentic, worshipping humanity.
I think that the most natural way to interpret biblical apocalyptic language is to see the parousia ultimately as a sign of the victory over Rome, so narratively speaking we have now moved beyond the ‘subplot’ of salvation and restoration and we take our missional bearings as God’s people from the larger narrative, though not forgetting (‘This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me’) that we are a cross-shaped people.
The original promise to Abraham did not entail the thought of restoration - it simply presupposed obedience; so I would still maintain that there is a significant distinction between the language of blessing and the language of being a light to the nations, which vitiates Wright’s argument. When the light motif is used in the New Testament, it is with the same thought in view: God’s imminent judgment and salvation of his people will be seen by the nations as a demonstration of his righteousness. Following that outburst of light (you might say) we revert to the theme of creational blessing.
I don’t think Isaiah’s language implies the final restoration of all things - both sin and death remain part of his ‘new heaven and new earth’ (Is. 65:20). He uses the new creation language metaphorically (just as Hosea uses resurrection language metaphorically: Hos. 6:2) to speak of the restoration of Jerusalem. But, I would argue, John (and perhaps only John) reforges the vision to describe a new heavens and new earth utterly unspoiled by sin and death. This will be the ultimate fulfilment of the creational hope.
Re: Blessing and light
Andrew,
You write,
Of course, this is a pretty big ‘if’. It is certainly partially true, at least. But, there is a question about whether the return to the ‘larger narrative’ of becoming an authentic worshipping community (i.e., people who worship in spirit and truth) is predicated on or necessarily follows the vindication of the suffering community. I would suggest on the contrary that the suffering community is the worshipping community, which lives out its calling to be an authentic humanity (i.e., image-bearers), just as Jesus lived such a life in his earthly humiliation as THE image-bearer of God. And following his pattern, we must first suffer and only then enter into glory. But this makes the restorative and redemptive aspect of the ‘humiliation phase’ no less real, either in Jesus’ career or in his people’s. According to Peter, we are, simultaneously, both the rejected ‘aliens’ of the world, and the royal priesthood of God (1Pe.2). The community of the saints has yet to be vindicated (e.g., 1Pe.2:12), but the work of being authentic worshippers continues nonetheless - indeed, it continues precisely in its marginalization and humiliation in the world (cf. Mt.5:10-12; 5:13-16)! Thus we image Christ as we await His glorious return, and only then find ourselves conformed to his heavenly glory (which, clearly, has yet to happen).
Moreover, I would argue that this is a false distinction (restoration of God’s people on the one hand, and the larger narrative of humanity’s restoration on the other). The narrative of Israel is the narrative of God’s redeeming a peculiar people, a royal preisthood, from among the nations. This finds partial fulifllment in the present age (in Isarel under the old covenant, and in the church, under the inauguration of the new covenant), and will be fully consummated in the age to come, when all the saints will surround the throne, having been fully conformed to the image of the Son. I don’t know that one can speak of a ‘larger narrative’; rather, the story from Gen.12 onward is one continuous narrative of humanity’s restoration (through Abraham and his seed) from the disasters of Gen.3-11, and the return to the perfection of Gen.1-2. But only through the birth-pangs of a frustrated creation will this glory be finally revealed/realized (Ro.8:17-25).
I find it strange that you are able to read the NT as the essential fulfillment of Israel’s covenants (e.g., promises regarding land, people, and temple, etc.), and yet maintain that John’s clear employment of Isaiah’s language is not one of fulfillment but of “reforging”. That is, you stick close to a very literalistic reading of Isaiah 65, and yet apparently do not do so with Ezekiel 40-48, or Isaiah 11:11-16 for that matter.
And surely John is not alone in employing this language of a new heavens and earth. What of Peter (2 Pe.3:13)? What of Jesus’ language of the ‘regeneration’ in Matthew? And what of Peter’s “the restoration of all things” in Acts? Are we to understand that these are utterly distinct and disparate concepts?
You write,
Yet how often is the metaphor and hyperbole of the psalmists and prophets the very literal reality of God’s fulfillment? E.g., consider the prophetic psalms anticipating, rather, predicting the very literal sufferings of Christ, and his very literal resurrection from the dead. And should we think that the remarkable and ridiculous imagery of Ezekiel 37 is merely metaphorical? Or did not such audacious prophetic poetry anticipate in wonderful ways the glorious future of the people of the living God?
Suffering and the renewal of creation
I would agree with you that the suffering community and the worshipping community coincide for the pre-parousia church, but - here’s the rub - I would argue that a theoretical gap opens up after the parousia, after the defeat of the ‘beast’ of Roman imperialism and the vindication of the faithful suffering community.
To suggest that we now suffer according to the pattern of Christ in order to enter into his glory just seems patently absurd - if I have understood you correctly. We do not suffer according to the pattern of Christ’s sufferings, which is a pattern of suffering at the hands of a pagan enemy on account of his faithfulness to YHWH. It made sense for Paul to say that - indeed, Paul hoped to fulfil that specific pattern (Phil. 3:10-11; Col. 1:24); it made sense for the persecuted church in Thessalonica; it made sense for the seven (literal or symbolic) churches of Revelation 2-3 who are urged to endure tribulation and overcome death. But it does not make sense for us. Within the eschatological narrative of the New Testament the pattern of suffering is derived largely from the story of the Son of man. It culminates in the vindication of the suffering community, the righteous against whom the little horn, the antichrist figure, the man of lawlessness, makes war. So we are back to the basic disagreement about what sort of ‘event’ is signified by the parousia motif.
I think you make too much of the aliens / royal priesthood correspondence. ‘Aliens’ does not necessarily carry the connotation of suffering and may refer only to the diaspora nature of the Jewish Christian community (cf. 1 Peter 1:1). In any case, the fact that the ‘royal priesthood’ is, or encompasses, the suffering community of the Son of man before the parousia does not preclude the argument that following the vindication of that community and the giving of the kingdom the royal priesthood is constituted differently. Certainly, 1 Peter 2:12 speaks of a community that ‘has yet to be vindicated’. His argument is that the society that now accuses them of wrongdoing will eventually ‘see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation’. I’ve just been reading Rodney Stark’s The Rise of Christianity. He makes the point that one of the main reasons Christianity won out over Greek-Roman paganism (ie. was vindicated) was the compelling power of an exceptional, self-sacrificing ethic - the ‘good deeds’, for example, of the Christians who refused to abandon plague victims. I would see in that the exact fulfilment of Peter’s prediction.
I think this has misconstrued my argument - but I could be wrong. There is a story about the restoration or salvation of God’s people through the suffering of the Son of man. But this presupposes and is enclosed within a ‘larger’ story about the calling of a people to be renewed humanity in the midst of the nations of the world - so not a ‘narrative of humanity’s restoration’. There is no absolute distinction here. One story sits inside the other. The train goes into the tunnel, there is a horrendous crash, then a new train comes out the other end. The New Testament tells us what happened in that tunnel.
I didn’t use the word ‘reforging’ so I’m not sure what you’re saying here. My point was that Isaiah uses the language metaphorically but John in Revelation uses it in a more or less literal sense - at least insofar as the new creation he envisages is not vitiated by sin and death. Otherwise, your comment on the consistency of interpretation is an important one and worth thinking about. I think I would say that generally the passages you refer to are metaphorical but realistic prophetic descriptions of the renewal of Israel - I don’t expect, for example, a literal temple to be built one day according to Ezekiel’s blueprint. John, however, in attempting to imagine something utterly different, an ultimate eschatological horizon, uses the language in a rather different way.
On the last point, it seems to me that there is a complex interaction between the metaphorical and literal use of ‘new creation’ language, including the language of resurrection. It doesn’t make sense to me to read Ezekiel 37 or Hosea 6:2 literally: the raising of the dead in both cases is a metaphor for the restoration of Israel. But out of this metaphor, which expresses a fundamental confidence in the power of God to renew what he has brought into being, has emerged the more substantial belief that God will renew creation to the extent of overcoming the final enemy death. It seems to me likely that the experience of the Maccabean martyrs had something to do with the emergence of the hope of a personal victory over death.
Re: Suffering and the renewal of creation
Andrew,
you write, “To suggest that we now suffer according to the pattern of Christ in order to enter into his glory just seems patently absurd - if I have understood you correctly. We do not suffer according to the pattern of Christ’s sufferings, which is a pattern of suffering at the hands of a pagan enemy on account of his faithfulness to YHWH.”
Actually, Jesus suffered at the hands of his own people, and only through their rejection, he was handed over to the pagan Romans. If by ‘we’ you mean 20th - 21st century Western Christianity, I would agree that martyrdom for the faith is merely a memory (with important excpetions, e.g., Jim Eliot, et al.). But this is a very narrow slice of the Christian pie, isn’t it? Christians suffer a similar fate as their Lord all over the world, even as we speak. The problem is, as i see it, your metanarrative isn’t broad enough. You delimit the scope of the NT to the first 5 centuries or so of the Roman Empire (except, it would seem, for the eschatological hope of ‘new creation’ - which, for this reason, i would argue, entails the entire history and destiny of the church…)
You write, “John, however, in attempting to imagine something utterly different, an ultimate eschatological horizon, uses the language in a rather different way.”
And here i would argue that John is not re-imagining (if you don’t like ‘reforging’) the language of Isaiah, but sees in his vision the fulfillment of the prophet’s words - indeed, the fulfillment of all that the prophets had spoken (cf. Peter’s expectations, Ac.3:21).
You write:
“It doesn’t make sense to me to read Ezekiel 37 or Hosea 6:2 literally”
And yet the gospel writer employs Hosea 6:2 as a prophetic expectation of Messiah’s resurrection from the dead. It is no doubt metaphorical of Israel’s ‘resurrection’, and yet, precisely because of that perhaps (given the role and relationship of Messiah with regard to national Israel, esp. as evidenced in Isaiah), it points to a literal resurrection from the dead of Messiah. As we see in the messianic psalms, what is poetic w/regard to the psalmist’s experience often becomes the ‘literal’ with regard to the Christ (e.g., Ps.22:16).
You write: ” It seems to me likely that the experience of the Maccabean martyrs had something to do with the emergence of the hope of a personal victory over death.”
What of the faith of Job and the prophecy of Daniel? What of Jesus’ logic against the Sadduccess? Were these all engendered by the Maccabean revolt? What of the posthumous hope of the psalmists and the absolute claims regarding the fate of the righteous in the proverbs? It seems arbitrary to me to nail this hope upon the experiences of the Maccabean martyrs…
Re: Suffering and the renewal of creation
Agreed, the church on a localized basis sometimes repeats the pattern of Christ’s suffering. My point, however, is that in the New Testament this pattern operates within a controlling narrative about judgment and vindication that addresses the specific challenge of paganism (partly in connivance with the Jerusalem hierarchy) to the faithful community.
In John’s Gospel Jesus is presented as more of a direct challenge to Caesar (John 19:12-17). Note also the allusion to Psalm 2 and the clear inclusion of the Gentiles amongst Jesus enemies in Acts 4:26-28:
The story of suffering and vindication is not, in my view, the metanarrative. The metanarrative has to do with the calling of a people to be a new creation in the midst of the cultures of the earth. The other story slots inside that. The church draws its hope and purpose now not from the vision of the vindication of a suffering community that dominates the New Testament but from the vision of creation renewed that emerges right at the end.
I would suggest that by using Hosea 6:2 to speak of his own resurrection from the dead Jesus is saying something like: in my resurrection faithful Israel is renewed. It is not necessary to suppose that he regarded his resurrection as a literal fulfilment of a prophecy that actually referred to the people. He trusts that God will not abandon his anointed one to the grave, and he interprets that trust in terms of a prophecy about the Israel as a group.
I don’t deny that other factors influenced the resurrection hope. I only said that it was likely that the experience of the Maccabean martyrs had something to do with it. But in any case, Daniel 12 is about the Maccabean crisis.
Re: Suffering and the renewal of creation
Andrew,
you write,
“Agreed, the church on a localized basis sometimes repeats the pattern of Christ’s suffering. My point, however, is that in the New Testament this pattern operates within a controlling narrative about judgment and vindication that addresses the specific challenge of paganism (partly in connivance with the Jerusalem hierarchy) to the faithful community.”
perhaps your controlling narrative is over-controlling? sometimes i wonder if folks like NT Wright, et al., realize how much their particular reconstruction of the redemptive-historical existenz behind the gospels ‘controls’ their exegesis. For example, Wright’s reading of the covenantal and historical context of second temple Judaism informs his exegesis of Paul in Galatians and Romans as much as any ahistorical, logico-systematic category (e.g., the ‘ordo salutis’ in reading of the book of Acts), leading him at times to some surprising conclusions (e.g., the cross becoming framed primarily in terms of national exile - a concept Paul nowhere explicitly discusses). Of course, such hermeneutical ‘controlling’ is inevitable…but it is also problematic if one’s historical reconstruction is flawed or questionable.
Moreover, I would argue that the specific challenge of paganism continues well beyond the collapse of Rome (whenever that was…) It would seem to me that post-Christian England is very much in a similar cultural situation as was the early church. The institutional church is essentially defunct - hence the need for an emerging church movement…. And even as Augustine wrote “The City of God”, the Roman empire being profoundly shaken to its foundations, the threat of paganism was no less real and insidious to the Church (at least, Augustine seemed to think so). Ironically, the impending collapse of Rome threatened not paganism but the Roman Church and Constantinian Christianity! Are you suggesting that the Constantinian incarnation of the church was not merely misguided as to its ecclesiology, but fundamentally ‘pagan’?
Perhaps the most fantastic aspect of your reconstruction of NT eschatology is that such apocalyptic events as narrated in Mt.25:31ff., etc., have already taken place, and yet the people of God (who survived them) were totally unaware that they had happened. The church has been totally unaware that it has been vindicated, that the suffering saints had already been resurrected, that Jesus had come back and judged the living and the dead, that the kingdom had been established fully - already! And yet, in their profound ignorance, the church continued through the centuries to pray in vain hope, “…thy kingdom come…” What does this say about the ‘post-vindicated’ church? How embarrassing for us, how totally scandelous! It would have been nice if Jesus had let us know that he had in fact come back, as he promised us - at least a quick phone call, something to let us know he was in town! Jesus seemed to suggest that his return couldn’t be missed (cf. Mt.24:29-31), anymore than folks would have ‘missed’ the flood (Mt.24:37-39).
The controlling narrative of judgment and vindication cannot be delimited to the horizons of the first few centuries (or the 12th, or 7th, or 5th century BCE for that matter, with regard to similar narratives in the prophets). Why? Because the vindication of God’s people involves the vindication of God himself, and the entire created order. It involves the revelation of the new creation and the theodic glory of final judgment and blessing (cf. 2Pe.3:10-13; Ro.8:18-25; Re.20:11-21:1ff.), and the utter eradication of evil (e.g., Re.21:4, 8, 27). In a word, vindication and judgment can only be partially realized prior to the last judgment of Christ and the renewal of creation. If evil continues to plague the earth, then it’s a sure sign that the kingdom ain’t all here yet.
You cannot disentangle the hope of vindication in the NT from the hope of renewal.
I find it strange that you say that Daniel 12 speaks of the Maccabean revolt. It is evident that Jesus saw Daniel’s prophecy as yet to be fulfilled in his day (e.g., Da.12:1; Mt.24:21; cf. 24:15 and Da.12:11). Did you not elsewhere affrim that Jesus makes reference to the resurrection of Daniel 12:2-3 in the parable of the wheat and tares (Mt.13:43)? Are you suggesting that the Maccabean martyrs too were resurrected (bodily) prior to Christ’s coming? Or are we to now believe that Daniel’s prophecy of resurrection was not literal, but merely metaphorical (despite Jesus’ usage)?
Re: Suffering and the renewal of creation
Sure. I’d agree that the exile argument is overstated. But Paul’s thought is more likely to have been shaped by the worldview of second temple Judaism than by more systematic theological categories, which makes me think that at least Wright is looking in the right areas for an explanatory background. It seems absolutely clear to me that the story of salvation told in the Gospels and in Acts presupposes a narrative about Israel under judgment, oppressed by its enemies, and chiefly by a paganism that is seen as the arch rival to YHWH - Caesar as son of God, saviour and lord.
Yes, paganism continued to flourish and oppose the church after the fall of Roman imperialism. But my response to that is the same as with the point about persecution. The NT narrative for the most part addresses the situation within two horizons: the horizon of judgment on Israel and the horizon of judgment on that arch rival. I don’t think the NT has anything to say about Constantine.
As regards your scathing remarks about the church missing the coming of Christ, that is a matter partly of how we read prophetic language and partly of what we consider to be significant experiences in the life of the church. Extravagant apocalyptic language is used frequently in the prophets to describe historical judgment both on Israel and on the nations. The point of Daniel’s vision is not that a human figure will literally be seen flying through the air: it is symbolic of the conviction that God will bring an end to the persecution of the righteous and vindicate them, giving them kingdom, glory and dominion. All I’m saying is that there is absolutely no reason to think that Jesus used this language differently. He did not expect the disciples literally to ‘see’ the son of man coming on the clouds of heaven any more than he expected Nathanael to ‘see’ angels ascending and descending on the son of man (John 1:51). But he did expect them to see their satanically inspired opponent to be defeated and the faithful community vindicated. No one missed the destruction of Jerusalem. No one missed the collapse of the imperial cult. No one missed the fact that Christianity succeeded and Roman paganism failed (see Rodney Stark, The Rise of Christianity).
Again in response to your facetious remarks, I would say that the NT speaks of a coming of the son of man to receive a kingdom and of a coming as Lord to deliver his people from their enemies - just as YHWH is described in the OT as descending from heaven to defeat Israel’s enemies. The language is figurative, but the situation to which it refers is utterly real and very serious. This is my second point. It seems to me that the traditional interpretation, though superficially more ‘spiritual’, actually diminishes the severity of the challenge facing the early church and the courage of their faith. It also undermines the integrity of the NT in that it requires us to think that texts that were ostensibly written to deal with the immediate circumstances of the early church were actually directed over their heads to the church entirely beyond their historical horizons. What I would suggest is scandalous is the fact that the traditional interpretation refuses to take seriously the consistent emphasis on the imminence and immediate relevance of these events to the first generations of believers.
Perhaps in general terms, but I repeat the point that our perspective is different to that of the New Testament. The vindication and judgment that mattered from the perspective of the early church was that modelled by Daniel 7: the vindication of a faithful remnant oppressed by a vicious and overwheening pagan power. It seems to me significant that John does not make use of this motif when he describes the renewal of heaven and earth.
Daniel 7-12 refers to the Maccabean crisis. Quite how Jesus reuses it is difficult to say. He certainly saw a comparable crisis emerging for Israel and perhaps regarded the coming destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans as a more adequate fulfilment of the words about tribulation and the abomination of desolation than Antiochus’ actions. Similarly, I don’t know what he thought about the Maccabean martyrs; but I think he would have been aware of the fact that what is said about resurrection in Daniel 12:2-3 relates to a certain type of narrative situation, a certain type of crisis, in which an aggressor makes war against Jerusalem and the righteous are delivered from tribulation.
Re: Suffering and the renewal of creation
Andrew,
you write,
I would probably agree with this. And, I would add, as you’ve noted elsewhere, there is also the wicked within Israel who will be judged by the Lord in the eschaton. In fact, Israel’s guilt is the covenantal presupposition of this over-arching narrative, explicating the pagan domination and oppression of the holy land and people as the divine judgment against them for their disobedience to the Law-covenant. This is clearly seen, as Wright has pointed out (as well as many others), in the corproate confession of Nehemiah 9:1ff. (which, interestingly, is post-exilic). In this confession and rehearsal of Israel’s heilsgeschichte (which closely parallels many of the national psalms of remembrance and confession), the people frame their present distress within the context of the Assyrian and Babylonian judgments (Neh.9:32), which are seen as a unity, and continuing down to their present status as “slaves today…we are slaves [in our own land]” (9:36). In a word, the climactic curse of the covenant continued to hang over their heads, even in their ‘restoration’ from the Babylonian exile.
Of course, the covenantal framework of this ‘narrative’ of redemptive-history is laid out in the Pentateuch, and primarily in Deuteronomy (4:23-31; 28-30; cf. Lev.26). The dynamic of the covenant sanctions (curse and blessing), as contingent upon obedience and repentance, can be likened to a downward spiral into oblivion (in the case of judgment): the various curses (agriculturally, biologically, socially, politically, and militarily related) are applied continuously and with increasing intensity and devastation, finally ending with exile - utter, national loss (see Leviticus 26:14-39). This tragic descent in Israel’s history is rehearsed in the works of the exilic prophets as well, as they forewarn Northern Israel and Judah of the Assyrian and Babylonian captivity (e.g., Jer.11:1-8; Amos 4:1-13). In fact, it would not be unfair to say that Deuteronomy and the covenantal dynamic of curse and blessing is the ‘systematic theology’ of the prophets.
Two important constants seem to emerge in all this: God’s relenting grace and righteous judgment (e.g., Jeremiah 18:5-11), and Israel’s recalcitrant rebellion and disobedience (e.g., Jeremiah 18:12; see Ps.106:6-47; 78:1ff.; Ezek.20:1-32; Acts 7; etc., etc.). In fact, the rebellion of redeemed Israel in the desert would come to typify her response to Yahweh through out her history, such that this original provocation of the Lord’s wrath would find its ‘fulfillment’ in the climax of the exilic judgments centuries later (cf. Dt.31:14-22; 32:1-43; Am.5:25-27). Hence, Israel’s entire redemptive-history and destiny is contained, in seed-form perhaps, within the covenantal record of Deuteronomy (in particular, but the whole Pentateuch in general). But also contained in that prophetic and covenant document is the hope of Israel, the glorious future of the people of God (Dt.30:9; cf. Jer.29:11). Israel would undergo these terrifying judgments, because of her disobedience and lack of repentance in response to the prophets who executed the covenant on YHWH’s behalf. Nevertheless, God would not withdraw his covenant-promise to Abraham, which he made by an oath (cf. Dt.4:31; Ps.105:8-45). God would relent from his fierce anger, and Israel (by divine grace) would repent, and be restored to their ancestral land, in the latter days (Lev.26:40-45; Dt.4:29-30; 30:1-9).
Crucial to this divine relenting and national restoration, however, is repentance. This is a contant throughout the Pentateuch and the prophets (e.g., Ez.18:32; et al.). Daniel well understood this when he himself confessed Israel’s sins, rehearsing (yet again) her history of rebellion and God’s righteous dealings with his people throughout, including exile (Dan.9:1-19). What’s interesting here is that Jeremiah’s prophecy of the 70 years provokes Daniel to this humble supplication “in ashes and sackcloth” (9:2-3). One might think that the prophecy would have pleased Daniel, seeing as how the 70 years were nearly ‘up’. But the prophet understood the need for repentance before restoration could occur. He, not unlike Jeremiah before the exile of Judah, repentented on Israel’s behalf, and sought the Lord through his desperate supplication for grace and mercy (vv.15-19).
Fast forward to the days of restoration (prophesied in Dan.9:25a, most likely), Ezra and Nehemiah’s day. And the people, comprehending their situation as a partial restoration at best, and continuning covenantal curse at worst, sought the Lord in a confessional rehearsal of their national sin and supplication for mercy and grace.
Fast forward to the days of Malachi, and the need for restoration continues, and so therefore the need for repentance. What does Malachi prophesy? The coming of “My messanger” (Mal.3:1) and of “Elijah” to bring about repentance and obedience to the Law of Moses in Israel (Mal.4:4-6). Otherwise, the Lord will come and smite the land with a curse (v.6c). Chapters 3-4 clearly shape John’s ministry and expectation of the “the messanger of the covenant” (cf. Mal.3:1-4; 4:1; Lk.3:7-9, 15-17; and Mal.4:5; Lk.1:17; 7:27). And what was the nature of John’s ministry? He was known as John the Baptist, of course, for he was sent to baptize Israel with a batism of repentance. Why? To prepare God’s people for the coming kingdom, the reign of God as anticipated in the prophets, which would entail the restoration of Israel, the vindication of the elect (or the ‘remnant’, cf. Mal.3:16-18), and the judgment of the wicked in Israel and the pagans without.
And it would seem that this expectation of repentance before restoration continued into Jesus’ ministry (e.g., Mt.23:37-39), and into that of the apostles (cf. Ac.1:6; 3:19-21; etc.). Israel must repent of her sins before restoration will take place (and repentance itself was understood to be a grace of the Lord, Ac.5:31, part and parcel of the realization of the new covenant). No doubt, the disciples saw their ministry as extending the grace of repentance and forgiveness through the preaching of the gospel to Israel (and only later understood that such grace reached even into the Gentiles) so that God’s blessings might come to His people.
If repentance is one such dynamic that drives redemptive-history, than the other crucial factor is God’s fidelity to his covenant with Israel. God will not forsake his covenant people, but will maintain a remnant, as he always has (from the days of Elijah to the days of Paul), and more than that, will bring repentance to the nation through the circumcision of their hearts (the new covenant promise), and finally restore his people Israel. Judgment is never the final word for the covenant people (e.g., Deuteronomy 30:1-6; Jer.30-33; Ez.20:30-44; Ro.11:11-16, 28-32; etc.).
But, what your reconstruction of the narrative fails to comprehend, as I understand it, is the integrity of God’s promises to Israel as such. Yes, I agree, that AD 70 is the result of the curse of the covenant being applied to obstinate Jerusalem (as Jesus, acting as prophet, forewarned and announced), and so the fulfillment of all that had been written (Lk.21:22) against the disobedient “sons of Israel”. But when will Israel be restored to God’s favor? You seem to say ‘never’. But this simply cannot be. God will never forsake his people, whom he foreknew, whom he elected through Abraham (Ro.8:28). Yes, his people now include gentiles qua gentles (not merely proselytes, cf. Ro.11:17-24). But that too was always comprehended within the covenant with Abraham (e.g., Ge.12:3), Moses (e.g., Dt.32:43), and in the Prophets (e.g., Zech.2:11). It was never either/or, but both/and. You seem to have made it either/or: Israel has been rejected forever…
But, as Paul asked, “has God’s word failed?”
Moreover, your delimiting the prophetic significance of scripture to the immediate historical horizons of its original audience is also shown to be shortsighted in light of the farsightedness of Deuteronomy (which comprehended the exile of Israel/Judah centuries before), Isaiah, Daniel, Zechariah, etc. As I’ve argued before, the distant future of God’s promises and fulfillment is hardly irrelevant for the immediate audience who lives not by sight, but by faith in what is (as of yet) unseen… In fact, i wonder if it is significant that in the NT rehearsals of Israel’s history, the lack of immediate historical fulfillment, the long wait, the generations who did not experience the promises given, are underlined - perhaps to demonstrate both the iniquity of Israel, in delaying the promises (e.g., Acts 13:18-20a; 7:39-43), and the “long obedience” of the faithful w/in Israel in awaiting them (e.g., Acts 7:5-7; cf. Heb.11:9-10, 13).
Regarding the return of the Son of Man on clouds and glory, the angelic announcment in Acts 1:9-11 seems to directly contradict you. Indeed, it would seem that we are right to expect such a straightforward, ‘literal’ return.