When God Remembers

I've finished my Psalm a day, and then a month of Ecclesiastes a day, and now I'm on to a chapter of the Bible a day, starting at the beginning. I hit Genesis 8 this morning and came across this:

But God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and the livestock that were with him in the ark, and he sent a wind over the earth, and the waters receded. (Gen 8:1)

It reminded me of one of my favourite passages at the end of Exodus 2:

God heard their groaning and he remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac and with Jacob. So God looked on the Israelites and was concerned about them. (Ex 2:24-25)

After four centuries of slavery in Egypt, the groans of Israel are about to be answered with action.

What was interesting was doing a quick search for God and Remembers (זכר + אלהים), and amazingly there's only four in the whole Tanach. I changed the search to include Yhwh, but that only added one further occurrence, 1 Sam 1:19. Here then are all the times when the Bible records God "remembering" his people. (If you have others which don't match the construction, let me know - this is just from a quick Accordance search.)

1. God remembered the floating Noah (Gen 8:1) and caused the waters to recede
2. God remembered the worried Abraham (Gen 19:29) and rescued his nephew Lot
3. God remembered the barren Rachel (Gen 30:22) and gave her a child
4. God remembered his covenant for the sake of his enslaved Israel (Ex 2:24) and began working to rescue
5. Yhwh remembered the marginalised Hannah (1 Sam 1:19) and gave her a child

Obviously God remembering doesn't imply the opposite - that he could ever forget - rather it points to the fact that he has chosen that time to act and to intervene for the sake of those he loves.

Abram's Altars

has anyone else noticed the two altars in Genesis 12?

Gen 12.6 Abram traveled through the land as far as the site of the great tree of Moreh at Shechem. But the Canaanites were in the land. 7 The LORD appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built an altar there to the LORD, who had appeared to him.

Gen 12.8  From there he went on toward the hills east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. There he built an altar to the LORD and called on the name of the LORD.

Gen 12.9  Then Abram set out and continued toward the Negev.

the first altar seems to be about thanksgiving. upon entering the promised land, but finding it occupied, God promises, and Abraham gives thanks for this promise despite appearances by making the altar (and theoretically sacrificing upon it also).

but then he makes another one, seemingly with no purpose.

my thinking is this:
all of Abram's travels were directed by something specific.

• Ur to Harran because of his dad
  
• Harran to Canaan because of God's word
  
• Shechem to Bethel-Ai because God speaks of future promise
  
• Bethel-Ai to Negev because of [something to do with the altar]?
  
• Negev to Egypt because of famine
  
• Egypt to Negev because of the Pharaoh
  
• Negev to Bethel-Ai because of flock size
  
• and so on

so the missing part of the puzzle seems to be the altar between Bethel and Ai, and my thinking is that this altar is part of entreating God, 'calling on the name of the LORD'. i haven't seen any other evidence for this use of the altar. Saul's pre-emptive sacrificing seems more about sanctifying the battle rather than asking for guidance - the normal most Exodus means for guidance seems to be the Urim and Thummim. i couldn't find anyone who agreed with me (let alone mentioning the possible importance of the second altar), until i came across Calvin on prayer. in Inst. III.xx.9

Hence, under the law it was necessary to consecrate prayers by the expiation of blood, both that they might be accepted, and that the people might be warned that they were unworthy of the high privilege until, being purged from their defilements, they founded their confidence in prayer entirely on the mercy of God.

the Battles edition of the Institutes i have lists Genesis 12.8 as a cross-reference here, that is, he was praying to God for guidance, direction, and proleptically, pointing to Jesus, the high priest who, because of his shed blood, is able to intercede directly with the Father on our behalf.

Hippolytus on deception

a great story - it'll be worth it - read on!

The Story Of A Maiden Of Corinth, And A Certain Magistrianus

There lived a certain most noble and beautiful maiden in the city of Corinth, in the careful exercise of a virtuous life. At that time some persons falsely charged her before the judge there, who was a Greek, with cursing the times, and the princes, and the images. Now those who trafficked in such things, brought her beauty under the notice of the impious judge, who lusted after women. And he gladly received the accusation with his equine ears and lascivious thoughts. And when she was brought before the bloodstained (judge), he was driven still more frantic with profligate passion. But when, after bringing every device to bear upon her, the profane than could not gain over this woman of God, he subjected the noble maiden to various outrages. And when he failed in these too, and was unable to seduce her from her confession of Christ, the cruel judge became furious against her, and gave her over to a punishment of the following nature: Placing the chaste maiden in a brothel, he charged the manager, saying, Take this woman, and bring me three nummi by her every day. And the man, exacting the money from her by her dishonour, gave her up to any who sought her in the brothel. And when the women-hunters knew that, they came to the brothel, and, paying the price lint upon their iniquity, sought to seduce her. But this most honourable maiden, taking counsel with herself to deceive them, called them to her, and earnestly besought them, saying: I have a certain ulceration of the pudenda, which has an extremely hateful stench; and I am afraid that ye might come to hate me on account of the abominable sore. Grant me therefore a few days, and then ye may have me even for nothing. With these words the blessed maiden gained over the profligates, and dismissed them for a time. And with most fitting prayers she importuned God, and with contrite supplications she sought to turn Him to compassion. God, therefore, who knew her thoughts, and understood how the chaste maiden was distressed in heart for her purity, gave ear to her; and the Guardian of the safety of all men in those days interposed with His arrangements in the following manner:

Of a certain person Magistrianus.

There was a certain young man, Magistrianus, comely in his personal appearance, and of a pious mind, whom God had inspired with such a burning spiritual zeal, that he despised even death itself. He, coming under the guise of profligacy, goes in, when the evening was far gone, to the fellow who kept the women, and pays him five nummi, and says to him, Permit me to spend this night with this damsel. Entering then with her into the private apartment, he says to her, Rise, save thyself. And taking off her garments, and dressing her in his own attire, his night-gown, his cloak, and all the habiliments of a man, he says to her, Wrap yourself up with the top of your cloak, and go out; and doing so, and signing herself entirely with the mystery of the cross, she went forth uncorrupted from that place, and was preserved perfectly stainless by the grace of Christ, and by the instrumentality of the young man, who by his own blood delivered her from dishonour. And on the following day the matter became known, and Magistrianus was brought before the infuriated judge. And when the cruel tyrant had examined the noble champion of Christ, and had learned all, he ordered him to be thrown to the wild beasts, — that in this, too, the honour-hating demon might be put to shame. For, whereas he thought to involve the noble youth in an unhallowed punishment, he exhibited him as a double martyr for Christ, inasmuch as he had both striven nobly for his own immortal soul, and persevered manfully in labours also in behalf of that noble and blessed maiden. Wherefore also he was deemed worthy of double honour with Christ, and of the illustrious and blessed crowns by His goodness.

Elucidation.

The conduct of Father Abraham, although not approved of by Inspiration, but simply recorded (Genesis 26:7), gave early Christians an opinion that the wicked may be justly foiled, by equivocation and deception, for the preservation of innocence or the life of the innocent. In such case the person deceived, they might argue, is not injured, but benefited (Genesis 26:10), being saved from committing violence and murder. The Corinthian maiden was accustomed to be veiled, and was taught alike to cherish her own purity and to have no share in affording occasion of sin to others.

from Schaff's ANF, vol V

Hippolytus was i think the first anti-pope - a rival bishop of Rome. some of his stuff is appropriately wacky for ~200AD, but other stuff is genius - his creed likely was the foundation for the apostle's creed.

apart from this being a great yarn, it's interesting to note his ethic - acting for the good of the other person. it's obviously not easy to work out the good for all involved, but the old question of lying about the Jews in the basement could be answered by Hippolytus - it's for the good of them, and it prevents the Nazis at the door from committing a great evil also. a win-win.

punny hebrew

i think the consensus is to not talk about Hebrew in talks. which is sad. there's three really cool puns in Genesis 3.14-24 that i'd love to mention. but i think those i've talked to are probably right, it's better not to.

but my faithful reader can surely handle them!

the crafty עָרוּם (arum) serpent is cursed עָרוּר (arur) by God.

from the tree עֵץ (aitz) comes trauma עֶצֶב (etzev) in childbirth.

he ate from the tree עֵץ (aitz) but will now eat from his tears זֵע (zai - sweat).

i think they're all pretty cool. but maybe i can mention the first one? it's probably the clearest and maybe the least nerdy. but i'll probably not mention any. that's probably best.

(apologies - not sure why the Hebrew unicode looks so weird - all the vowels should be under the letter to the right.)

the story of Genesis 2-3

there's a pretty clear chiasm, which Blocher (In the Beginning, 1984) and Walsh (JBL, 1977) both explain:

A 2.4-17 God made man and put him in the garden
    B 2.18-25 God made the animals and the woman
        C 3.1-5 Dialogue 1: between the snake and the woman
            D 3.6-8 The Sin
        C’ 3.9-13 Dialogue 2: between God and his disobedient creatures
    B’ 3.14-21 God declares his verdict on the animal and the humans
A’ 3.22-24 God kicks the man out of the garden

(with my adapted titles).

the thinking i was doing a couple of years ago on this topic led me to think this story is best read as a story, explaining the way things are. that is, in order to explain the existence of a tree lying on the ground, you can talk about a wind having blown it over. now there's a big disanalogy here, in that you can accurately hypothesise with a fallen tree in a way you can't with the universal sinfulness of humanity.

the difficulty comes when within the story itself there are various aetiologies - childbirth hurts because of sin; snakes don't have legs because of sin; work is hard because of sin - but how do i then talk about the relevance of the story to the state of affairs now? that is, can i say more than that it teaches us that the way things are isn't right, and that they will one day be made right (particularly now we know Jesus was raised bodily)?

300

it's been a while between posts.

for my 300th (only days, coincidentally before my 30th!), i thought:

if i was doing my own translation of Genesis 3, i would call Adam Graham, and Eve Olivia. Graham Ground and Olivia Living. heaps better than Adam Adamah and Chawa Chay (ie adam of the earth and eve of the living).

would you hire me as a translator?

Robert Alter - Illustrated

two translations of Robert Alter have been all the rage at college - The David Story (1&2 Samuel) and this year his translation of the Psalms.

the psalms is particularly good - his translation methodology is admirable - particularly the way he strives for terseness, in homage to the underlying Hebrew.

he has also written a great book the art of biblical narrative and translated Genesis

last year however i read an article he'd written in the New Republic called Scripture Picture. It's a four page article about the new illustrated Genesis by Robert Crumb using his translation (Crumb is probably quite famous in graphic novel circles, in others not so - check out the film Crumb where he plays himself, or even American Splendor [sic] for someone playing him in a minor roll - it's a good film!)

the article really is a good read. it's a fascinating discussion about what you do as you illustrate the bible, or depict anyone in another form. who are you when you hit the page in picture? it's hard enough to identify with yourself in print (ever critically read your own CV?), without having that then exported to another medium altogether.

there is something permanent-ising, objectifying, about turning the scriptures into pictures. the ambiguity is gone, the imagination, rather than engaging with ideas, is left to other devices - perhaps joining frame to frame in their head, filling out the missing action/movement.

and i wonder, do we do the same when children are read the scriptures as a child (i'm thinking big picture bibles)? why are we so fixated on the need for images to convey a message? do we not trust that people will do the imagining themselves?

(i think i was originally going to procrastinate about whether to buy Alter or Crumb - if you have an opinion, let me know in the comments. Cheers!)

no fall put to the test

last night at bible study we did the final in our series based on Tim Keller's "The Reason For God". we looked at Sin, through the lens of Genesis 3:1-13, Romans 1:18-32, Romans 3:21-26.

as you would know, i've just finished an essay on the consequences of denying an historical fall (here, here, and here). the position i finished at was that the idea of "the fall" is not what Genesis 3, nor the rest of the testimony of the bible, is trying to get across.

rather, as Karl Barth agreed with me, "the first man was immediately the first sinner." (CD IV.1 §508)


so as we discussed the idea of the fall, we didn't use the terminology of "fall", but analysed what the story said. and it said that sin consists of disobedience, selfishness, disrespect, but primarily trusting Satan's lies. we agreed that none of us would have been different, and that this grasping against God is something we all continue.

i can perhaps post some of the best bits of my essay a little later, but i just thought it would be helpful to show where this thinking has ended me up (if that sentence makes sense!).

Historical Fall in the key of B

so far i've narrowed my doctrine essay down to the following points:

• Babes or bound (the historical debate - Pelagius vs Augustine)
  
  
• Blocher or Barth (the current debate)
  
  
• (Bavinck and Bloesch - minnows, relatively, yet helpfully starting with a B)
  
  
• Bible (Romans 5 and Genesis 3)

and finally, inevitably, painfully:

• Bibliography

i'll probably talk about Ricoeur also, but i may have to deliberately rename him Bicoeur for the purposes of this essay.

check here and also here for the background.

don't know why all this matters? this is why.

the myth of the fall

i've been thinking this week through the question of the theological consequences of denying an historical fall. one thing that has been growing on me today is the question of where the idea of the Edenic sinless perfectionism comes from. i'm sure everyone's seen the first two boxes of 2WTL (click on the link if you are unaware), the first one being the one where everything's perfect, sort of like the island the Phantom puts all his animals, after he's taught them to be piscetarians (is that what people who eat no meat except for fish call themselves?).

now the whole point of showing that everything was tops was to explain

1. why life isn't always tops now, despite a good God, and
2. to give a picture of what we're looking forward to.

however, on 2/, despite the line in the otherwise great Rob Smith song 'Worthy of All Praise' back to the garden, we don't really want to go back to the garden, but look forward to the new creation. so now i'm trying to work out the importance of 1/ - why do we need to say there was something perfect that humanity "fell" from?

it sort of smacks of platonism, and i have this vibe that it promotes a dualistic view of things. so can we read the account of "the Fall" in Genesis 3:1-13 differently? not that it doesn't depict perhaps the first direct transgression of God's law, but is it such a great "fall" as all that? where does our eschatology fit with a fall?

and yes, this is linked to my previous post!

[apologies for my absence. exegetical to hebrew to greek to doctrine has made for a busy period of time.]

smiting or giving over?

we had a talk tonight at Wild Street, entitled "Hotter than Hell - God and Global Warming", which drew upon Genesis 1:26-31, for our mandate to care for creation, as well as 2 Peter 3, reminding us of the Christian expectation, and the way we are to live in the meanwhilst.

my question, particularly regarding global warming, is whether this is a smiting-thing, or a giving-over-thing?

Romans 2:18-32 has the logic of God letting us go, when it comes to sinfulness. that is, he says, "if that's the way you want to live, go for it. see what life looks like without me," the result being death and destruction.

there is of course the examples of God striking down sinful individuals, couples, cities and even the world, which isn't a direct cause-and-effect thing, but a punishment.

so what is global warming? simply the result of our sinfulness? or is there also an element of God smiting us because of our failure to care for his creation?

Four Ways To Live

I've heard of 2WTL, some have even suggested there may be 3, but my recent reading of things such as Luther v Melancthon, as well as hearing sermons from the sermon on the mount in Matthew's biography of Jesus, plus my recent work on eschatology and restoration, has led me to a 4th way to live.

Now, I'm not trying to suggest there isn't two ways to live, either under, or against God's rule, that every person needs to either accept, or continue to reject Jesus as God's appointed King. I'm just trying to add a few shades in this fairly black or white picture.

For some explanation, the crown with a J means accepting Jesus as King. The little drawing of a round thing is my attempt at a 2D globe, symbolising accepting the God-given role of caring for this world, it's inhabitants, as per Genesis 1, which in this stylised description, would also include the so-called "golden rule" of loving one's neighbour as oneself (one's self?).

This is partly trying to think through the place of works in the Christian, as well as the non-Christian.

1. The top one is obviously the person that God desires we all be - firstly, accepting God's rule, and because of the great gift of forgiveness in Jesus, being spurred on to good works.
   
   
2. In the middle, on the left, we see the type of "Christian" that non-Christians always hold up as the reason they wouldn't want to become a Christian. The type of person that knocked Jesus off the top spot (behind Mohammed) of the most influential people, simply because his followers can't take him that seriously, coz they don't do what he says!
   
   
3. On the right then, is perhaps the group Paul refers to in Romans chapter 2, "For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law." This is the group many of my non-Christian friends would fall into. They are great people. Really nice. As infallible as a fallen human can be (please excuse the oxmoron). And, all this, despite not knowing God, not living for eternity, compelled by naught, but their love for their fellow creature.
   
   
4. At the bottom, perhaps rightly so, is the group who both reject God, and live in all ways despite his desires for this world. The people who say, "it doesn't count if you don't get caught."

Now, the third group i've mentioned, doesn't get too much of a mention in the New Testament. The latter gets a fair turn in the OT; Jesus' focus seems to be railing agaist the Pharisees for their impenitent hearts, and arrogance due to their nationality and position. The epistles are directed towards the 2nd (Jewish) and 4th (Gentile) groups.

We have good precedents, then, in talking to the 2nd and 4th groups, and a clear goal, in the 1st. I think, however, we find it hard to know what to say to the 3rd. To the "good person". To the honourable, kind, caring, selfless, genuine person.
Who happens to be a non-Christian.



Man, I need to start writing some short, witty posts. Just go to Crikey.com.au and have a look through the videos of the day (especially the Pasha Bulka Transformer, and the iPhone isn't bad either!).