{"id":69603,"date":"2017-08-07T04:24:24","date_gmt":"2017-08-07T09:24:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/?p=69603"},"modified":"2017-08-05T11:04:35","modified_gmt":"2017-08-05T16:04:35","slug":"the-blessing-of-jesus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2017\/08\/07\/the-blessing-of-jesus\/","title":{"rendered":"The Blessing of Jesus"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"photo-1474680877336-91e280603191_opt\"<\/a>What does Jesus mean when he says \u201cBlessed<\/em><\/strong> are those who\u2026\u201d? What does it mean to be blessed or bless-ed?<\/p>\n

This is the question Jonathan Pennington attempts to answer in his new important book The Sermon on the Mount and Human Flourishing<\/a><\/strong><\/em>. It\u2019s one of the most important questions for the interpreter of the Sermon on the Mount, and he has gone to considerable depths in his virtue-ethics understanding of \u201cblessed\u201d as \u201chuman flourishing.\u201d I\u2019ll give his basics. I have always approached this term \u201cblessed\u201d in Matt 5:3-12 through the work I have done how the Greek term is used in the LXX and the various connotations it evokes; hence, I\u2019ve had one might be called a maximalist approach to the term.<\/p>\n

The Greek word is\u00a0makarios<\/em>, and \u201cbeatitude\u201d is thus a macarism. Here is Pennington:<\/p>\n

A macarism is a makarios statement that ascribes happiness or flourishing to a particular person or state. A macarism is a pronouncement, based on observation, that a certain way of being in the world produces human flourishing and felicity. 42<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Notice that his opening definition favors the idea of human flourishing, or as one might say, a more minimalist view of the term: it refers to the state of being, that is, the state of human flourishing. Behind\u00a0makarios<\/em> is the Hebrew\u00a0ashre<\/em>, as in Psalm 1. He is not intent on finding\u00a0brk<\/em> behind the Greek term\u00a0makarios<\/em>. The LXX behind\u00a0markarios<\/em> is\u00a0ashre.\u00a0<\/em>The most common Greek term for human flourishing is not\u00a0markarios<\/em> but\u00a0eudaimonia<\/em>. [At this point I do wonder if Pennington uses too much\u00a0eudaimonia<\/em> to understand the\u00a0ashre\/makarios<\/em> connection. Why, it might be asked, is it\u00a0makarios<\/em> and not\u00a0eudaimonia<\/em> if the main idea is virtue ethics human flourishing?]<\/p>\n

Pennington contends\u00a0brk<\/em> is translated\u00a0eulogetos<\/em> and refers to divine favor while\u00a0makarios<\/em> refers to the state of human flourishing. This is what I mean by a more minimalist approach to the term, and this is not a criticism so much as a description.\u00a0Brk\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0ashre<\/em>, he shows, have an organic connection: divine blessing results in human flourishing, but\u00a0makarios<\/em> is about the latter. Macarisms are wisdom literature; blessings are covenant language.<\/p>\n

The English term \u201cblessed\u201d is so heavily loaded with the narrower sense of \u201cdivine favor\u201d that the sense of human flourishing is almost always lost. 50<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Again, yes, yes, yes, that emphasis is present but the question is how constrained is\u00a0markarios<\/em>. Some of us would argue that the\u00a0Woe<\/em> of Luke 6 as the counter to the\u00a0markarism<\/em> of Luke 6 indicates a both-and maximalist reading of\u00a0makarios<\/em>. (That \u201csome of us\u201d is me.) I don\u2019t think it is possible to turn\u00a0woe<\/em> simply into a \u201cnon-flourishing\u201d kind of life. The term is a judgment from God on people.<\/p>\n

So, Pennington thinks \u201cFlourishing\u201d is the best translation of\u00a0markarios<\/em> in the Beatitudes. Even if I think he is a little restrictive, his emphasis is right and we need that balance. I\u2019m still curious why\u00a0makarios<\/em> instead of\u00a0eudaimonia<\/em>, and of course the LXX sets the precedent, but why there too?<\/p>\n

He has good discussions of other\u00a0makarios<\/em> texts in Matthew, but I can\u2019t go with him on 16:17, \u00a0where the emphasis falls on God\u2019s favor and God\u2019s revelation not on the flourishing life: \u201cJesus replied, \u2018Blessed<\/em> are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven\u2019.\u201d Perhaps my years of teaching the more expansive view just lead me to reading it in a more expansive sense.<\/p>\n

There are then several approaches: divine favor, eschatological reversal blessings, and a wisdom or virtue-ethics reading, and he opts for the third. He\u2019s not alone, and we are in his debt for his\u00a0tour de force<\/em> on this word.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What does Jesus mean when he says \u201cBlessed are those who\u2026\u201d? What does it mean to be blessed or bless-ed? This is the question Jonathan Pennington attempts to answer in his new important book The Sermon on the Mount and Human Flourishing. It\u2019s one of the most important questions for the interpreter of the Sermon […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":197,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-69603","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Blessing of Jesus<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"What does Jesus mean when he says "Blessed are those who..."? What does it mean to be blessed or bless-ed? 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