According to Paul, the Son and Spirit come at the fullness of time, when the son (Israel) has reached majority. Has Israel reached majority? It might seem not. But, following up on the previous post, we can view the exile and restoration as the climax of Israel’s maturation. Israel failed in many ways to live up to her status as mature sons, but Yahweh had organized everything to push them in the right direction: Deprived of a king, Israel no... Read more
The return from Babylonian exile is, Isaiah says, an exodus that so far surpasses the earlier exodus that Israel will forget Egypt and Moses and all that. When it actually happens, everyone can see its sheen is far less brilliant than the first exodus. The new temple is a disappointing, pitiful shadow of the old, and Zerubbabel is a joke, a parody of Davidic restoration. Perhaps the most shocking thing about it is that Israel never really leaves exile. They... Read more
From a detailed comparison of ANE prophetic/oracular texts with biblical ones, Wheaton’s John Walton ( Ancient Near Eastern Thought and the Old Testament: Introducing the Conceptual World of the Hebrew Bible ) concludes that Near Eastern oracles differed from Israelite prophecies in fundamental ways. First, Israelite prophets indicted kings and or people for violations of covenant standards, while ANE oracles focused on “cultic neglect,” reflecting the prophets’ role as “ritual enforcers.” Second, “Judgment in the ancient Near Eastern oracles is... Read more
ANE kings were, often literally, believed to be sons of the gods. We find something like the same notion in the Davidic covenant: “I will be a Father to him, and he will be a son to Me,” Yahweh tells David, apropos specifically of Solomon. In the Bible, though, Yahweh already has a son – Israel (Exodus 4:23). If the Davidic king is a son of Yahweh, it is because he is the representative of the corporate son (as I... Read more
According to Henri Frankfort’s summary, “The Mesopotamian myth of beginnings knew neither single origin nor single authority. The primeval chaos contained two elements, sweet water and salt water – the male Apsu and the female Tiamat. This couple brought forth a multitude of gods whose liveliness disturbed the inertia congenial to Chaos. So Chaos rose to destroy its progeny. In this conflict the older gods proved inadequate, and a young deity was chosen king. After his victory eh created the... Read more
In 1943, Hendrik Bolkestein published his dissertation in a German translation, Wohltatigkat und Armenflege im vor-christlichen Alterlsum: Ein Beitrag zum Problem “Moral und Gesellschaft . According to the reviewer in The Classical Journal , Bolkestein’s thesis was that Greek and Latin terms thought to refer to “charity” have a very different meaning in their original settings. Of philanthropia , he argued that “during classical times meant decent respect for one’s fellows, an attitude of willingness to perform the reciprocal favors... Read more
The Reformation, it is charged, secularized and de-sacralized European culture with its iconoclasm, its attack on relics, its revisions in sacramental theology. Isaiah 3-4 suggest a different assessment. Isaiah describes the stripping of priestly ornaments from the daughters of Zion (3:16-26), but then identifies the remnant as a “holy” remnant (4:3). By the Spirit, Yahweh cleans the “filth” from the daughters of Zion (4:4) – and in context, the “filth” can only be the ornaments that have been taken away.... Read more
INTRODUCTION At creation, Adam was placed in a garden God planted, but after the flood, Noah planted himself a vineyard (Genesis 9:20). In the exodus and conquest, Yahweh placed Israel in a land of fields and vineyards, and so made Israel His vineyard (cf. Isaiah 5:7). But Israel has not produced good fruit. THE TEXT “Now let me sing to my Well-beloved a song of my Beloved regarding His vineyard: My Well-beloved has a vineyard on a very fruitful hill.... Read more
In that day, the Branch will be “beautiful” (Isaiah 4:2). Various words are used for “beauty” in this passage, and here the Hebrew is tzebi , which is typically translated as “roebuck” (e.g., Deuteronomy 12:15, 22; 14:5; 15:22; 2 Samuel 2:18; 1 Kings 4:23; etc.). Jonathan is called the robuch or beauty of Israel (2 Samuel 1:19), and so is the lover of the Song of Songs (2:7, 9, 17; 3:5; 8:14). The roebuck is one of the exemplars of... Read more
Though the daughters of Zion are full of filth and blood, Adonai will wash and purge them, like sacrifices. So says Isaiah (4:4). Yahweh will cleanse by His Spirit of judgment and burning. The purifying power of the Spirit is underscored by a wordplay. The word for “purge” or “rinse” in verse 4 is duach , used in some passages for washing in preparation for ascension offerings (2 Chronicles 4:6; Ezekiel 40:38). The agent of this duach is not water,... Read more
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