Introducing the Gospel reading from John 21 this morning, Chris Schlect pointed out that Jesus instructs Peter to take up the commission of Israel. Israel was supposed to be light to the nations, but refused; Jesus tells Peter to do what Israel failed to do. That fits with a couple of other things. First, Peter, of course denies Jesus three times in an earlier chapter of John; so do the Jews (18:30; 18:39-40; 19:15). Peter is a representative Jew, but... Read more
The Pharisees often act as a group, but the gospels also speak of individual Pharisees (Luke 7; 11; Acts 5:34). Some of the Pharisees even show some deference to Jesus. No individual Sadducee is ever mentioned in the gospels. They are always a collective, a single mind, a united front. Read more
Matthew uses the verb “put to silence” twice, both in chapter 22. The first time it describes the reaction of the man who arrives at the wedding feast without the proper clothing (v. 12), and in the second it describes the silence of the Sadducees after Jesus answers their question about resurrection (v. 34). By the end of chapter 22, even the voluble Pharisees have nothing left to say. This seems to hint that the man without a wedding garment... Read more
Jesus says that in denying the resurrection the Sadducees are misunderstanding the Scripture. How so? He’s saying, first of all, that they don’t even understand the Scripture they’ve quoted. Matthew makes this point very subtly. The quotation from Deuteronomy 25 says that the levirate brother is supposed to “raise up seed” for his dead brother. The verb is the verbal form of “resurrection,” the very same word that the Sadducees use in verse 28 in posing their conundrum, and Jesus... Read more
Jesus silences the Sadducees with his question from Exodus 3, but then the Pharisees hear about it and “gather” together to ask Him further questions. The verb is doubly significant: On the one hand, it’s the verbal form of the word for synagogue; the Pharisees form a synagogue in opposition to Jesus. On the other hand, the verb recalls Psalm 2, the gathering of the Gentile kings against the Christ. The Pharisees have become the rebellious nations that the Son... Read more
STRUCTURE There is a fairly clear chiasm in verses 11-17: A. Dog returning to vomit, v 11 B. Man wise in his own eyes, v 12 C. Sluggard, vv 13-15 B’. Sluggard wise in his own eyes, v 16 A’. Taking dog by the ears, v 17 Perhaps the chiasm extends further. Verses 10 and 18 share the theme of someone who endangers all around him with a weapon – arrows in the one instance and a firebrand in the... Read more
The arch of Constantine in Rome depicts a bear and boar hunt that ends with a sacrifice to Hercules. Architectural historians suggest that the hunt represents Constantine’s taming of the forces of civil disorder and chaos. One (Mark Wilson Jones) suggests that the sacrifice represents pre-Constantinian pagan religion, while Constantine’s participation in the hunt represents his conquest of bestial social and religious forces. My interest is elsewhere: Biblical sacrifices were confined to clean animals, and, more specifically, to domesticated clean... Read more
A. N. Wilson has recently returned to Christianity. He’s asked in an interview, “What’s the worst thing about being faithless?” “The worst thing about being faithless? When I thought I was an atheist I would listen to the music of Bach and realize that his perception of life was deeper, wiser, more rounded than my own. Ditto when I read the lives of great men and women who were religious. “Reading Northrop Frye and Blake made me realize that their... Read more
In the Reformed tradition, election is a secret decree. Interestingly, though, the first time Yahweh calls Abraham his “chosen” He goes on to reveal secrets to him: “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do? . . . For I have chosen him” (Genesis 18:17, 19). God not only discloses His choice of Abraham to Abraham, but chooses him specifically as a recipient of secret plans. Read more
Abraham’s story moves from a priestly phase (setting up altars in the land) through a kingly phase (conquering the kings) to a prophetic phase (arguing with Yahweh and interceding for Abimelech). His life previews the history of Israel. At each transition, there is an exodus, a thwarted threat to the bride, and a return. When he goes to Egypt in chapter 12, we don’t know that he’s a warrior; he’s been a priest. But he acquires stuff in Egypt, and... Read more
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