is there a point at which we may say that, although Christ lived and suffered and was tempted as a man, so in some ways he united man and God in that he himself was fully God and fully Man -
- yet it was only when he died that he was able to end the hostility?
man was hostile to God up to and including in Christ, in that this God-man was tempted in his flesh.
so is the dividing wall of hostility simply that wall between jews and greeks, circumcised and uncircumcised, is that what was broken? OR is the hostility of the law and commandments not the jew/gentile divide, but the man/God divide?
at least that’s what the 2nd half of ephesians 2 is leading me to think.
which is a different argument to the predominant line of thought going through galatians, romans...
the pre-eminence of jew over greek is something I’ve always seen as a main theme to be overcome in the fulfillment of God’s plan of unity.
is this a different theme, or one and the same? God v man, or jew v gentile?
7 comments:
Surely the division between God-humanity + Jew-Gentile are fundamentally related.
The curses of Gen 3 (humanity vs humanity + humanity vs creation) flow out of the disruption in the relationship between God and humanity. When Jesus heals the division between God and humanity, the blessing of unity between humans is a consequential reality.
I was going to say "both and" and ramble on a bit - but what Mark has said is heaps better!!
how about "yeah, but"?
yeah both are healed, but the emphasis 'feels' to be jew-gentile.
v14 [he] has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, [...]
so the end is indeed reconciling the creation with the creator, but perhaps the means is reconciling humanity within itself?
I would say that the first half of Ephesians 2 is describing justification by faith and the second half of the chapter the fruits of such justification, ie. the unity between Jews and Gentiles (hence the inferential "therefore" in 2:11 linking the two). Without humanity being reconcilled to God, humanity can never be reconciled within itself.
this is unrelated, but your talk of a wall got me thinking of the iron pan symbolised wall with ezekiel.
(doing ezekiel at church atm hence why i linked it in my brain)
anyhow random thought whilst i'm procrastinating getting back to my research assignment - law of banking and finance. can't wait till it's over.
and btw. this is my actual profile...i had some trouble with going across to google, cause i wanted it to link to another email address, the one i hardly use. and then i realised that it would automatically always sign me in as the one i always use. hence why you never got my profile.
but i don't think my blog links to it anyhow. my blog isn't private, but it just weirds me out sometimes that i have several years worth of baggage sitting on that thing.
but since you're someone who i deem wise and of great help to me in figuring out the bible, i'll share it with you. not that my thoughts are always so particularly holy or focused on the bible. but lately, i've just been really trying to redefine who God is, according to the bible.
anyhow, long rambling, but the address is: http://travelsizedmay.blogspot.com
see you around dougmeister.
-may
isn't the relationship between God and Jew what causes the wall to be between Jew and Gentile? Jews are the chosen people and Gentiles being hostile to God aren't.
so i think that i would have to agree with Mark in saying that the reconciliation comes from the work of Christ making us (jew and gentile) alive in him.
but i feel the pull of the significance of the reconciliation between jew and gentile. being God's chosen people are now who Christians are, in the same way that jews were in contrast to the gentile. if there is unity in Christ, then the wall between jew-gentile can only be broken down, there is no other consequence.
Post a Comment