The Millennium

I am unsure of which millennial view best suits my tastes, but perhaps that is the wrong perspective to have. I do not have to find something palatable in order believe in its reality. I believe that the farthest view from my own and to which I disassociate myself the most is that of Dispensational Premillennialism. I tend to isolate myself from such ideas and timetables as are portrayed in such books as the Left Behind series. I do not think that these books and the interpretation of scripture behind them are faithful to the text and to the Christian tradition. I also believe that they venture outside the limits of reason. I understand that God can work outside of our understanding, but he has already revealed certain things about the end and I feel as though much of Dispensational Premillennialism goes outside of what God has already revealed to us, to provide us with an eschatology that is outside the bounds of orthodoxy as well as plausibility from a logical standpoint.

I do not particularly care for the position of Amillennialism either. I can see the appeal to this idea, given that Christ has not returned in the last two thousand years. It would seem as though the early church misunderstood him when he spoke of his return as well as misunderstanding the idea of his future reign over all the earth. Perhaps it would be best to view his words as having spiritual significance. Christ’s reign over the world would be through the growth of the church, which would make the world into a better place over time. I can see how one might find this view appealing, but I believe that it has serious flaws. Christ indeed reigns over the world through the church in a spiritual sense, but I believe that the future reign of Christ is not limited to this idea. The whole created order will one day be restored, and this cannot be done by only a spiritual sense of Christ’s reign. One with this view may believe that death is a part of the natural order, and while death may be natural to life presently that does not mean that death belongs in the creation. Spiritual death is obviously bad, but I would argue that physical death is also bad, at least in its present form. Someone who has an Amillennial understanding may believe that medicine and technology will eventually find a way to eliminate death for humans, but I do not believe this to be true. I believe that there needs to be divine intervention, one that is seen in both a spiritual and physical “millennium.”

Postmillennialism is more optimistic than Amillennialism. Amillennialism does not believe in Christ’s return, but only, it would seem, in the spiritual reign of Christ in such a sense as it exists now. Postmillennialism shares some of the ideas of Amillennialism in that it places much emphasis upon the work of the church in the world. However, Postmillennialism believes that the work of the church will usher in the new millennial age in which Christ will return. We are to prepare the world for the return of Christ, making his house ready for him before he gets back. I find myself indentifying with this sort of view in the sense that I believe that we should do our part in getting the world in order in preparation for Christ’s return. However, I do not believe that the church on its own, even with the spirit of Christ living inside of us can do away with every last evil before Christ comes back. This is where I see Postmillennialism to be somewhat naïve. I do seem to identify with this model more than most other models, though. The early Nazarenes also held this model up as their standard. I think that it would do the church good to believe in much that this model has to offer. I think it would do the world much good as well. I believe that we need to recapture that spirit of the early holiness movement and understand that we as the church are bringing the kingdom of God into the world through Christ. Christ told his disciples that they would do even greater things than what he had done during his earthly ministry. I believe that what Jesus said was true for his first disciples and I believe that it remains true for the church today – we who are the product of those first disciples.

The problem that I have with Postmillennialism is that I do not think that we will ever be able to perfect the world to what it ought to be as much as we try. I believe that the church will grow to become like nothing the world has ever seen, and I believe that we will prepare the way for the second advent of the Lord, but I also believe that as good increases, wickedness and evil will also increase. The evil presence that is in this world will use the good for its own purposes. It will use the strength of the good to make itself stronger. I also believe that the good is greater than the evil, and that through the return of Christ and the establishment of the “millennium” evil will begin to be thoroughly eradicated from the creation. I believe that just as the church and all that is good will continue to grow beyond what we can possibly imagine, evil will also grow in this world to something beyond what we can possibly imagine. However, the good will never be extinguished by the evil. Christ lives in the church. He died once and it is impossible for him to die again. We are in a war with the darkness, and the second advent of Christ is one of the decisive and ultimate stages of that war, just as his first advent was.

I do not know what the millennium, or the millennial age will look like, but I know that it will be good. We are given glimpses of this in both the Old and the New Testaments. This age is spoken of by the prophets. Isaiah says that the Lord will reign in Zion, and that he will establish his rule on the earth. He says that God’s people will live on his holy mountain, and that the creation will no longer be harmful and destructive. The animals will not kill each other and the people will not live in misery. They will have children who have a hopeful future. Apparently, death will still exist in Isaiah’s vision, but people will also live very long lives. He says that if someone failed to reach a hundred years of age, then they must have been cursed. I would seem that in this picture of the new age that Isaiah sees, people will still marry and reproduce and die of old age. I am unsure of what to make of all of these things. The New Testament writers do not speak in detail about these things, but they do seem to indicate that Christ’s “millennial” reign over the earth will only be a temporary thing – as long as it may be – before the final reign and the marriage of the Lamb. The Revelation seems to indicate that only after the millennial reign of Christ, in which Eden is in a sense restored, will evil be finally and completely done away with. At this point, death itself will die; just as Paul writes that the last enemy to be destroyed is death, so John writes that after the millennium Satan, Hades, and death itself will be thrown into the Lake of Fire, being destroyed forever. I do not fully understand what this all means and what it will look like and how exactly it will take place, but it sounds pretty good to me.

Surprised By Hope

Surprised by Hope by N. T. Wright was an intriguing read. I appreciated his articulation of many things I have wondered about in regard to the faith and to eschatology. I tend to agree for the most part with his understanding of the Kingdom of God and how God’s kingdom is present now in this present reality as well as present in the future reality. I agree with his understanding of Christianity, especially in contrast with the popular notions of Christian theology portrayed in much of the United States and the western world. I believe, like Wright, that most people do not understand much of anything about the Christian hope, mistaking it for a detached sort of hope in going to heaven when we die without much thought into the here and now ramifications of salvation and the hope it brings for the present and well as the future and how both of those realities overlap and interact with each other.

In the first chapter of his book he speaks of the distorted views of death that people tend to have. He speaks of the tragedies of the Oklahoma City bombing, the death of Princess Diana, 9-11, Hurricane Katrina, and the earthquakes in Pakistan, among other things. He says that these events are indications that all is not right in the world. They point to the evilness of death and its presence in the world in these various forms, through mass murder, destruction, disaster, and tragedy. In the context of these horrific events, Wright asks the question, “What is the ultimate Christian hope?” How does one respond to death if they live out the Christian hope, and how does one respond if they do not have or understand the Christian hope, and above all, what is the Christian hope? He seems to believe that the Christian hope firmly stands in its belief that God is going to make a new heavens and a new earth and that the old order of things will be done away with, so that there will no longer be tragedy, sin, and death. Everything will be redeemed, and God has already set out in bringing the whole of creation, including people, into full redemption.

He says that people are generally confused about death. This is evident in the way people, even Christians, respond to death. Christians tend to believe that Christianity is mostly about belief in life after death, but there is much more to Christianity than this notion. This idea is distinguishing enough from many other religious traditions. People, including many Christians, do not have a proper understanding nor a proper hope in the resurrection of the dead and what the life everlasting truly indicates. Many believe that people live on in heaven and that this is the goal of all believers. Others believe that the memory of someone who has died lives on through other people, or even through the breakdown of the body to become life-giving properties for other plants and animals. Other people believe that the soul exists in a way in which it is absorbed by the rest of creation and that ultimately we will all be reunited in the sense that we will all be absorbed into one giant cosmic thing, whatever that means. Others believe that there is not life after death, and that death marks the end of human existence. Most people seem to have no hope in what orthodox Christianity teaches about the resurrection of the body, either denying the full extent of the reality that their loved one has truly been separated from them in death, or else believing that death is some sort of good thing that will take us to heaven where we will finally be done with the shackles of physical being.

In the second chapter of his book, Wright more fully investigates the distorted images that people have about the Christian hope. He says that Platonism has distorted it by saying that the soul, and not the body, is eternal and is therefore all that really matters, leading Christians to partake in an escapist belief. People also believe that heaven is only some sort of other-worldly kind of spiritual place where people sit on clouds and play harps. People also believe that heaven does not really exist as a physical place. Heaven is within us, and as long as we remember those we love they will live on in heaven and in our memories. Heaven is more of a fairy tale than anything else, like a blissful dream of some kind. People have also come to believe less in the reality of hell. Also, a rise in the belief of some kind of purgatorial existence after death has taken shape. Some people believe that heaven has nothing to do with this life and do not live in the hope of the resurrection, believing that while on this earth they are stuck in sin and cannot do anything about it, so they believe that in purgatory they will finally be made free from sin so they can go be with God or whatever happens after death. People have lost the hope of the resurrection and the redemption of creation in the present sense as well as the future sense. Both are real, but not recognized. God’s redemption will make everything new, and is already at work this present life. People mostly seem to think that the goal is to get to heaven some day after death. All eschatological thought then functions under the notion that God is going to destroy the world and take us to heaven so that we can get out of this mess. Christ’s return is not seen as the complete restoration of the created order in which we now play a part, but is rather the point at which Christ takes us “home to heaven” so he can damn the rest of his creation. In summary, Wright says people are generally confused, not understanding at all the implications of Christ’s incarnation, much less his resurrection and what that means for us.

Chapter three describes the “early Christian hope in its historical setting.” Wright discusses the views of the resurrection and of life after death in the ancient world among the Jews and the pagans. The pagans believed that death was all-powerful and that everyone would have to die. People either wanted to have a new body in the future but believed they could not really have one or they believed that existence away from the body was far better and hoped that they would live on in a soul-existence after death. The Jews, however, at the time Christianity began believed in a resurrection of the body. This is something quite different from any of the pagan beliefs. This is the context in which the Gospels claim that Jesus had risen form the dead, in the context of bodily resurrection. The early Christians recognized Jesus’ resurrection as being something new and unseen before. They had not expected it, though they had looked for a general resurrection of the dead at a future date, the “last day.”

Resurrection was also linked at this point to the vision of the Messiah as reflected in much of the apocalyptic apocryphal literature between the time of the exile and the time of Jesus. When Jesus was killed, all hope in him ushering in the final age where the dead would be raised was lost. The Messiah could not be killed if he was truly the one to bring in the age of life, even though Jesus had said that he would be killed. However, Jesus’ resurrection brought to light a whole new way of viewing the resurrection of the dead and created the entire framework and basis of Christianity which emerged at this time. Christianity is focused on the resurrection. Early Christianity was based on Judaism and did not focus too much on life after death, but the resurrection reshaped Christianity to be focused almost entirely on the resurrection. Resurrection before this was “important, but not that important.” Christianity ended up separating from Second Temple Judaism because of its focus on the resurrection. Judaism had always been somewhat vague as to what the resurrected form would be like, but Christianity claimed that the resurrected body would be a remade body, a transformed body. Christians also split the resurrection into two in contrast to Judaism. The first resurrection being seen in Christ through whom we may also be resurrected to life, but also a second resurrection in which all of the dead would be raised in physical bodies once again. The Christians also believed that God had called them to work with him towards this later resurrection in restoring the world in preparation for God’s ultimate redemption of all creation. This power was given to Christians through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. God now lived in us. Also, within Judaism resurrection passages were often rightly interpreted as being metaphorical in nature and were not actually speaking of a bodily resurrection, but more so of God’s restoration of Israel from captivity. Many passages could easily be interpreted that way, though not all. Christianity, though, spoke mostly of resurrection in the literal sense, both of a literal raising of Christ and of a literal raising of humanity from the grave. The view of the Messiah also changed with the birth of Christianity. Judaism had seen the Messiah as the powerful victor over Israel’s enemies who would establish his kingdom. They did not think he would be killed by Israel’s enemies. This was a stumbling block for the Jews, but was the foundation of the hope of Christianity and why the resurrection of Christ was so important to them.

Wright then goes on to point out the many flaws in the arguments people have come up with to refute the historicity of the resurrection of Christ. Some say that the early disciples were not willing to give up their view of Jesus as Messiah even after he was killed, but that is not what the text indicates. The texts portray them as feeling a sense of disillusionment with their former beliefs of Jesus as Messiah. They had given up on him when he died. They were hurt and confused by this, but they did not cling to a belief that he was still the Messiah until after he had risen. Some have also argued that Christ’s resurrection is a misunderstanding of what the disciples were describing. They were actually saying that Jesus had been exalted and taken up to heaven when he died. However, this is not consistent with their Judaism, which said that the dead, including martyrs, would be raised and glorified at a later time, not presently. Some also say that the disciples could have felt a sense of Jesus’ presence still with them after he died and so claimed that he was still alive or living again. However, the disciples did not claim this. They claimed that Jesus had been resurrected from the grave in bodily form and that he had appeared to them. If they had been filled with joy and their hearts had been strangely warmed by a feeling of Christ’s presence among them, then they would not have reacted by saying that Jesus had emerged from his grave. They would have sung a psalm or something along those lines and would not have made such wild and disrespectful claims about the body of the deceased. Also, some say that the disciples had visions or dreams that Jesus appeared to them, which happens to people who have experienced the loss of someone close. However, this assumes that the disciples were unaware that people had dreams and visions and interpreted these dreams as actual events. Dreaming, as most people do, about their recently deceased friend, would not lead them to claim that he had been risen form the dead, much less that he was the Messiah.

The fourth chapter continues Wright’s points on the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus. He uses the actual stories from the Gospels now to show that they do not appear to be late inventions, but perhaps the earliest written forms of the Christian tradition. He says that while other parts of the Gospels rely heavily upon the Hebrew Scriptures to support what they say about Jesus, the resurrection stories do not. Also, the four Gospels all describe the resurrection in quite different ways and are at the same time theologically consistent. Also, it is women who are portrayed as the principle witnesses of the resurrection. It seems unlikely that the disciples would have said that the women were the primary witnesses to the event if they had fabricated the story themselves. Also, if the disciples were trying to prove that Jesus had been resurrected in bodily form, it would not make sense for them to describe Jesus in ways that make him seem like a ghost at times, such as when he walks through walls, while at other times, he is acting like a physical person, as when he is eating fish. Also, in the Gospels Jesus’ resurrection is never linked to the future resurrection as it is in the rest of the New Testament, indicating that these stories are likely from the earliest of Christian traditions.

Other arguments that Wright gives to support the historicity of the resurrection are that Jesus’ tomb was never made into a martyr’s shrine, as was often the case with martyrs; also, the early church suddenly began to meet on the first day of the week instead of on the Sabbath; and the disciples were willing to die, and did die, for their claims about Christ’s resurrection, which seems unlikely if they had made it up. Wright claims that people today have been influenced by enlightenment thinking which claims that miracles do not happen, so they tend to view the resurrection as implausible. However, the people of today have also rejected much of this thought in order to investigate a lot of eastern forms of spirituality and mysticism. Ironically, they will put up with that sort of thing, but revert back to an Enlightenment view whenever it comes to something related to Christ’s resurrection or miracles related to Christianity. He goes on to say that the belief in Christ is not one that rejects history and science, nor is it one that is in its own sphere and apart from them, but it is faith claiming events “within history, demanding evidence that demands an explanation from the scientist.”

In Chapter five, Wright discusses the cosmic future and the different views people have on this. He says that many are focused on the individual and what God has in store for the individual in the cosmic future, but he says that he prefers to think of creation as a whole first before narrowing down redemption and resurrection to the individual. His point is that there is much more to resurrection than just in a personal sense. The whole of creation will be restored, and the individual is a part of that creation who will take part along with others in the redemptive process, both in restoring and being restored. Wright says that there are generally two misunderstandings about the Cosmic Future, “evolutionary optimism” and “souls in transit.” They are both often mistaken for Christianity. The first lends itself to the myth of optimism and believes that all of creation is working towards bettering itself and is slowly moving towards a perfect state. The second idea believes that we are only here temporarily, and that eventually we will be removed from the limitations of our bodily existence and live on in freedom as eternal souls. The first view is too optimistic in the natural order of the world, and the second is too pessimistic. The first one fails to understand the need of Christ’s redemption for the created order or recognize that “moral progress” has failed to bring us to “utopia.” Christ does not continue the betterment of the world, he recreates it. The second idea sees this world as beyond redemption, which is also foreign to Christianity. This world is not to be done away with, but rescued from its bondage to decay.

In chapter six Wright says that the early Christians did not believe that the world was getting better over time, nor did they believe that the world was getting worse over time. “They believed that God was going to do for the whole cosmos what he had done for Jesus at Easter.” The early Christians recognized the goodness of creation, the nature of evil, and the plan of redemption. Wright says that there are six themes in the New Testament writings that are laid out in relationship to this. The first is “seedtime and harvest,” which is based on the resurrection of Jesus being the “first fruits” of the resurrection of all people. Because of Christ’s resurrection, we also may be resurrected. The second is “the victorious battle,” in which the entire cosmos must submit to Christ, even death itself, so that Christ may make everything new. The third is “citizens of heaven, colonizing the earth,” which meant that we would not depart into heaven, but that Christ will come from heaven to earth to transform everything and we will serve under him. The fourth is “God will be all in all,” which means that “God intends to fill all creation with his own presence and love.” The fifth is “new birth,” which speaks to how the whole creation is waiting to be freed from bondage and that when the children of God are revealed or resurrected the whole earth and the created order itself will be resurrected or renewed as well. The sixth is “the marriage of heaven and earth,” which describes the New Jerusalem coming down out of heaven as a bride adorned for her husband. This is the opposite of what a lot of Christians think, where they are brought up to heaven to meet God there. Heaven and earth are not opposed to one another, and they are not two different ideas conveying the same message. They are like male and female, who are made to be joined together.

Wright begins the seventh chapter by talking about the ascension. He makes the point that the resurrection and the ascension should not be viewed as the same thing. When we speak of the ascension, we do not speak of Christ dying and then being raised from the dead by being taken up into heaven, nor we do we speak of Christ dying and going to heaven as though that were his resurrection. Both say the same thing and both are wrong. Wright says that the ascension is also not just a strange idea that was added later, and he says that ascension is a vital feature of Christian belief and that without it things begin to go wrong. Some have insisted upon pure literalism to say that Jesus vertically took-off into the clouds. However, this creates some issues because it suggests that heaven is literally somewhere in the clouds within the earth’s atmosphere. Also, it indicates that heaven lies directly above the exact spot where Jesus took-off, but since the earth is round he would be perceived by people on the other side of the world as descending upside down, and the positioning of heaven in this way limits its relation to the earth by the spherical qualities of a globe, where one cannot tell the difference between up and down. Some have also interpreted the ascension where he disappears into the clouds to mean that when he died he disappeared, but that his spiritual presence lives on in us. Wright says that literalism and skepticism both lead us astray here, and that theologians who take the ascension seriously have viewed heaven and earth not as being two different locations within the time-space continuum, but “two different dimensions of God’s good creation.” He also says that the one who is in heaven may at the same time be anywhere and everywhere on earth, so that Jesus is accessible to everyone in every location on earth. He further says that Jesus did not stop being human after his death. He remained human and exists as a human right now in heaven, where he reigns in both heaven and earth in the present as well as in the future. The church is evidence of his reign on the earth, but the church should not be confused with Christ himself. This has happened in history with “triumphalism” and has always led to disasters of one kind or another. Also, it is by the Holy Spirit and the sacraments that Jesus is present with us now. Wright goes on to say:

“when the Bible speaks of heaven and earth it is not talking about two localities related to each other within the same time-space continuum or about a nonphysical world contrasted with a physical one but about two different kinds of what we call space, two different kinds of what we call matter, and also quite possibly (though this does not necessarily follow from the other two) two different kinds of what we call time. We post-Enlightenment Westerners are such wretched flatlanders. Although New Age thinkers, and indeed quite a lot of contemporary novelists, are quite capable of taking us into other parallel worlds, spaces, and times, we retreat into our rationalistic closed-system universe as soon as we think about Jesus” (115).

Wright also says that the Eastern Orthodox church views heaven as the inner sanctuary and the earth as the outer portions of the temple. The ascension leads us to believe that “God’s space and ours…are, though very different, not far away from one another” (116). He says that God’s space and ours interlock in many different ways, but that they are also separate right now for a time. One day, though, when Christ returns, the two will be joined together as in marriage.

After this, Wright speaks in more detail of the second coming of Christ. He says that most mainstream Christians confess to believe this but they do not have a clue as to what it means. In his discussion on the second coming Wright says that this has to do with the outcome and such of the individual person in the context of the renewal of the entire cosmos. When God renews the cosmos, he says, Jesus will be at the very center of this. He notes that the second coming has become a hot topic among a number of different evangelical groups, mainly fundamentalist ones. These groups tend to believe that we are now living in what they call the “end times.” They believe that Jesus will come back in the midst of certain geo-political events and will take all the Christians away, leaving the world to fend for itself for a little while. Wright believes that this obsession with an inappropriate interpretation of the second coming of Jesus is a problem. He says that this type of interpretation leads one to believe that Christ’s return must only be able to happen under certain conditions and that it also leads one to think that there is no point in making any effort to better the environment in which we now live because it is only going to get destroyed anyway. On the other side of the spectrum are the post-Enlightenment liberals who find it embarrassing that anyone would believe in a literal second coming of Christ and especially a day of judgment. The second coming sounds too much like an outdated supernaturalism and the judgment makes God sound too wrathful for their taste. He also points out that ironically many people these days have become increasingly interested in mysticism and the supernatural, but that people tend to avoid those things if they have anything to do with Christianity.

With chapter eight, Wright says that Christ will indeed return. However, he points out that his return seems to indicate that he is absent at the present. Wright says that Christ is not absent even though he has not yet returned, and points back to his previous explanations of the ascension. He says that people often misinterpret what the Bible means when it says that Christ will come on the clouds. The Son of Man passages, which hearken back to Daniel, are not speaking of Christ descending from heaven to earth, but of his ascent into heaven or entering into God’s space. Christ’s words were justified by his ascension. This was the sign showing that what he had predicted would happen in the future to Jerusalem would indeed happen. By his ascension, his words were vindicated. Many Christians think that in the future Christ will come down from heaven and we will rise up from the earth and meet him at the halfway point. Wright also says that Jesus did not really teach about his second coming, but that this does not mean that it is not true or that it will not happen. The rest of the New Testament does teach about the second coming of Christ. I am not sure I agree with Wright on this point. I feel as though Christ does address his return at places, such as with the verse, “But when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?” among some others. I do agree, though, that Paul’s letters are much clearer than the Gospels in the issue of Christ’s second coming. Wright talks about the concept of parousia in the New Testament and how this reflected the idea of Christ still being present in spirit but not in body at the current time. It refers to a sort of interim period between when Christ was present in the body in the past and when Christ will be present in the body in the future. Further, Paul wished to show that Christ was the true king both now and in the future, as opposed to Caesar who was a sham. Wright says that the passage which talks about Christ’s descent and our ascent to meet him in the air are three different word-pictures from the Old Testament all wrapped up into one in order to convey his eschatological theme. Wright also takes a jab at rapture theology here, saying that it is Gnostic in its origins. Wright ends this chapter by stating that Christ’s ascending as well as his appearing were both fundamental elements of Christian belief right from the get-go.

In chapter nine, Wright says that at his appearing Christ will play the special role of judge. If God is a good God then he must be a God of judgment when faced with a “world full of exploitation and wickedness.” The nineteenth century embraced a sort of optimism about the human condition believing mankind to be progressing into a glorious state, but the twentieth century was a great hindrance to that optimism with all of its war and destruction. Some people say that who we are on the inside is all that that matters and that we do not need to be held accountable for what is on the outside, but this is contrary to New Testament belief which indicates that we will be judged for everything about us, both the outside and the inside, and that Jesus will be the judge of both our thoughts and our actions. With Christ’s coming everything will be judged. This means that when he comes everything must be transformed. Death and decay will be overcome and God will be “all in all” as the entire cosmos undergoes a transformation. With this realization, the church should not think that it can bring about this change all on its own and it should not think that it cannot do anything at all until Christ comes back and makes everything right again. The church has an active role in the parousia, one that is not absent from Christ.

In chapter ten, Wright focuses on the redemption of our bodies. He says that Paul writes that we are promised a new bodily existence. This is the “fulfillment and redemption of our present bodily life.” Wright says that the resurrection of the body was an integral part of Christian belief from the start but that overtime it became unpopular among many segments of the church because of different ideas to which they had held that did not seem to agree with the idea of a bodily resurrection. Much of the church came to believe that upon death, one either went immediately to heaven or to hell in a “one-stage postmortem journey” that sometimes included an intermediate purgatory and sometimes did not. Wright believes that this idea of heaven and hell has helped to lead to an escapist theology among Christians who see the goal of this life to be to go to heaven when they die. Wright refers to something he calls “life after life after death,” saying that we do not simply go to heaven or hell when we die and that is all that happens. There is a restoration of the created order that takes place. Yes, we live on after we die, but our bodily existence upon the recreated or renewed earth will come at a later time after we have died. This is what the resurrection is. It is about heaven coming to earth and creation, including us, being restored even after we have died and gone to be with the Lord. The resurrection is not just a spiritual resurrection when we go to heaven. The Gospels and the rest of the New Testament make this clear. Another thing to point out is that when the Bible uses the word heaven it is often referring to God in reverent language. So the idea of going to heaven is really the idea of going to be in God’s presence, which does not start when we die, but here and now. Wright refers back to C.S. Lewis’s The Great Divorce when trying to describe what the future body will be like, saying that it will be fuller, more real, more complete, than what we have now. We will not be ghosts at the resurrection, but we will be less ghostlike than we are now. However, Wright is hesitant to go as far as Lewis went in his interpretation. Lewis tended to think that the present reality was only a shadow or copy of what was to come, which is a bit too Platonic for Wright, who believes that the present reality will be redeemed.

Chapter eleven is on purgatory, paradise, and hell. He says that “purgatory is basically a Roman catholic doctrine.” The Eastern Orthodox church and most Protestant churches have rejected it. Purgatory seems to allow for more people to be able to enter into heaven than would have entered without it. However, this is not exactly how purgatory was supposed to function. It is not a universalistic kind of idea. Only Christians – no non-believers – went to purgatory. It was for those who had not become holy enough to enter the presence of God and needed further refinement after death even after experiencing salvation in this life. Some people believe that purgatory allows for us to do whatever we please in this life because we will have another go at it later, but this is not how this doctrine was supposed to function. The idea some have is that whatever journey we were on in this life when we died will continue on after we die. Wright does not agree with this universalistic sort of interpretation. Wright says that the reason ideas such as purgatory worked was that they were allegorical of the present life. In this life we are refined and purified, and this often through suffering. It is “a projection from the present onto the future.”

Wright concludes that all of the “Christian departed” are at rest in the presence of God. This is what we may refer to as paradise. It is not, however, to be confused with the later resurrection of the body. In speaking of paradise, people often refer to the thief on the cross to whom Jesus said, “Today you shall be with me in paradise.” People often interpret this to mean that when the thief died he was with Jesus in paradise, or in heaven. However, this also seems to contradict the traditional church belief that Christ descended into hades when he died and then ascended from the grave on the third day. The question then is why would Jesus say that he would be in paradise? Wright says that the answer lies in the context of the statement of the thief. The thief asks Jesus to remember him when he comes into his kingdom, thinking that the kingdom is only a future reality, but Jesus corrects him and reassures him by telling him that the kingdom is not just in the future, but it is present. This is why he says “today you will be with me in paradise.” He is indicating the present reality of the “not yet” which is made present through himself. In speaking of hell, Wright points out that several times when Jesus refers to hell, he uses the word “Gehenna,” which was the trash dump, where waste was burned outside of the city. He is using a picture that the people are familiar with in order to speak of a greater truth. There are a number of people who have become bothered by the images of hell they have been given so they prefer to become Universalists, wondering how a loving God could send someone to a place of eternal fire and torment. The picture that Jesus uses is one to say that “unless you repent in this life you are going to burn in the next.” However, the focus is on repentance in this life, and not on a future hell. This idea of reaching a place that is beyond all pity and all hope in the next life is firmly connected to this life and whether one repents or not. Wright again falls upon Lewis’s The Great Divorce, saying that in the end those who are beyond all hope are the ones to whom God says “Thy will be done.” Wright concludes that damnation and hell are things that reflect who we have chosen to be. He wonders if in being damned we have reached the point of becoming sub-human or ex-human. He says that those things that we allow to define us in this life are things that will define us in the next. If we allow ourselves to be controlled by bitterness, sensuality, or power then we will become these very attributes and eventually cease to be in the image of God entirely and we will no longer be truly human at least in the sense that we were intended to be. This is damnation.

In chapter twelve, Wright begins his discussion of the role of the church in the kingdom of God. He shows that the point of Jesus’ resurrection was that we may also be resurrected and that the entire cosmos may be resurrected or restored. The church plays an active role in the redemption that God will bring and even now is already bringing into the created order. Paul says that if Christ’s resurrection does not bring about our own resurrection then “we are to be pitied above all men,” for “if there is no resurrection of the dead then not even Christ was raised,” and if Christ was not raised then the Christian faith is pointless. Also, in speaking of the kingdom of God, Wright says that whatever you do now carries on into the future – into God’s future. This is how the church participates in God’s redemption.

Wright then discusses the meaning of salvation. Salvation means to be rescued from something, and in Christian belief this something is death. Yet, people still die. If being rescued from death means that we will live on as souls after our bodies have decayed this does not mean that we have been rescued from death. It simply means that we have died. If we are to be truly rescued from death then our bodies which have died must be rescued. This is what salvation is – the rescue of both body and soul. In the Gospels Jesus’ healing miracles are associated with salvation, indicating that salvation also has to do with the healing of the body at some point. At this point, Wright summarizes everything he has covered thus far by saying: “the work of salvation, in its full sense, is (1) about whole human beings, not merely souls; (2) about the present, not simply the future; and (3) about what God does through us, not merely what God does in and for us” (200). Wright reiterates at the end of this chapter the idea that kingdom of God is breaking into the present, on earth as it is in heaven.

Chapter thirteen continues the idea of “building for the kingdom.” Wright points out first of all that it is God who builds the kingdom, but that God works with his creation in such a way that he uses us as instruments in his work. Secondly, “we need to distinguish between the final kingdom and the present anticipations of it” (208). The kingdom has been inaugurated and we are participating in the coming kingdom, but ultimately only God can bring about the final restoration, the creation of the new heavens and the new earth. “The work we do in the present, then, gains its full significance from the eventual design in which it is meant to belong” (211). Wright also speaks of the topic of justice, saying that he does not mean to over-emphasize social justice, but that our sense of justice or our understanding of justice ought to be the result of our recognition of our living in between the time of Christ’s death and resurrection and the time of his appearing. Wright also seeks to point out that we must also avoid dualism which leaves us with no concern for social justice at all. Wright also mentions that in Jesus’ time, resurrection was a bit of a radical idea. It seemed to be rather a late-comer on the scene in the history of the Old Testament. The resurrection doctrine was revolutionary and “spoke of God’s determination to bring about the new Exodus” (214). After speaking for a while on the dangers of a poor eschatology and how that can lead to a flawed sense of justice, such as was seen in Nazism, he talks about beauty. His view is that beauty is almost just as important as spirituality and justice. God’s intent is to restore the beauty of his creation. He also talks about evangelism and says that if we are helping to bring about the work of new creation then we seek to “bring advance signs of God’s eventual new world into being in the present” (225). This can be seen in evangelism. Evangelism can be a difficult word for some people because it produces images of televangelists and political evangelicalism, but that is not really what evangelism looks like. Evangelism proclaims that “God is God, that Jesus is Lord, that the powers of evil, corruption, and death itself have been defeated, and that God’s new world has begun…” (227). A private relationship with Jesus is not the only thing that matters, which is how some have interpreted evangelism. This is not a private and merely personal thing.

In chapter fourteen, Wright provides justification from the biblical texts to support what he claims the mission of the church should be. He provides thorough examples from the Gospels, from Acts, and from Paul’s letters. In the Gospels the picture made is that Jesus is risen from the dead just as he said he would be. The idea of Jesus being raised and showing that there really is life after death is not indicated at all, but rather, according to Mark, Jesus has been raised, so his disciples should hurry up and go see him – he is waiting for them in Galilee. What Jesus was referring to when he said some would not taste death until they saw the kingdom coming in power was his resurrection. His resurrection “completes the inauguration of God’s kingdom” (234). The resurrection is not just a miracle intended to show just how powerful God is when he wants to be, nor is it telling us by visible means that there is a life waiting for us in heaven after we die. The resurrection is about God’s kingdom being established on earth as it is in heaven, and in this kingdom death is eventually abolished forever. According to Matthew, “resurrection doesn’t mean escaping from the world; it means mission to the world based on Jesus’s lordship over the world” (235). According to Luke, the resurrection provides a whole new way of telling the story of God and Israel and God and the world. On the road to Emmaus, the two men recognize how Jesus’ death was a horrible tragedy in the grand scheme of things. They had believed that he was the Messiah, and then it all blew up in their faces. Jesus then shows them a new way of looking at the Law and the Prophets, indicating that the truth about himself was already there, but had just not been recognized or understood yet. Yet through his death and resurrection the whole of Scripture and of history may be looked at in a new light, a brighter and clearer light. In John the disciples go fishing and catch nothing until Jesus helps them. After this, Jesus tells Peter to shepherd his sheep. The fishing may be understood as representing what they had been doing all along as Jews. The shepherding, however, shows a new way of work that relates to the newly inaugurated kingdom.

In Acts 1-12 Jesus is proclaimed by the disciples to be the risen Messiah, as they are mainly preaching to the Jews at this point. When Paul preaches to the Greeks, he also proclaims Jesus to be Messiah, saying that Jesus’ resurrection brings resurrection to all believers. He preaches this in the Areopagus and the people cannot believe that someone could be raised from the dead. In the very place where it was announced by Apollo through drama six hundred years prior that there was no hope at all for a resurrection of the dead, Paul proclaims the resurrection boldly. Paul goes on preaching this in his letters, saying that through Christ’s resurrection we will all be raised, and not only us, but the entire creation will be restored.

In chapter fifteen, Wright continues to talk about what the mission of the church should be, this time from a more future-oriented perspective. He begins by emphasizing the celebration of Easter, and that being not just once a year, but every first day of the week as the early church did. They met every Sunday of every week in addition to meeting with each other additionally throughout the week in order to celebrate the anniversary of our Lord’s resurrection, what we would call Easter. Easter is then not only an annual celebration, but a weekly, and even a daily one. The hope of Easter should live on in us throughout all the year. Wright says that we should be attempting to celebrate Easter in new creative ways as Easter is a sign of new creation: “in art, literature, children’s games, poetry, music, dance, festivals, bells, special concerts, anything that comes to mind” (256). I agree with him very much on this matter. I am a bit miffed at times by our people’s lack of genuine enthusiasm for Easter. Easter should not be viewed as the end of a forty day gloomy fast.

Wright also discusses what will happen to space, time, and matter as a result of the restoration of all things. In discussing space, he refers back to Celtic tradition which believed in “thin places” or places where the distance between heaven and earth was minimal. With the renewal of space, the distance between heaven and earth is done away with because heaven and earth have become one. He also says that time itself is focused upon Christ. Every time we date something, we still date it in regard to its placement in time in reference to the time of Christ. Every Sunday we go to church is also an indication of the renewal of time. Sunday is the eighth day of creation, where God begins to restore all things to himself. The renewal of matter can also be seen beginning to take place in the sacraments. Here we have the presence of God himself in created matter, just as Christ was made a sacrifice for us by becoming earthly matter in the hope that matter would be renewed, so that Eucharist works in similar way as the presence of God incarnate, God made into flesh to restore flesh. When we take the Eucharist we are identifying ourselves with Christ just as Christ identified himself with us. We remember his death and suffering and resurrection and we anticipate his appearing where he will restore all things so that God will at last be all in all. This is all practiced in our mission to the world, in love, prayer, scripture, and holiness. All of these things are signs of the renewal that Christ brings to us now and in the future. This is the hope of the world that we must bring unto the farthest reaches. Christ works through us to bring hope and healing to the world, and just as he has inaugurated this mission, so will he also bring this mission to completeness.

The Downward Spiral of Judges

The book of Judges is presented as a downward spiral. It begins with Othniel (3:7-12), Caleb’s nephew who married Caleb’s daughter. He is the model judge. The Israelites worshiped Baal and Asherah and were oppressed by Cushan-Rishathaim of Aram Naharaim (or literally, “one of double-wickedness from land of double-rivers”). Othniel rescues them and Yahweh is given credit for the victory (3:10).

Our next notable judge is Ehud (3:12-30). It is recorded that the Israelites continued in their disobedience. Left-handed Ehud of the tribe of Benjamin (which ironically means “son of my right hand”) kills Israel’s oppressor, the very fat King Eglon (whose name sounds like the word for “calf,” implying that he was like a fattened calf ready for slaughter). Ehud saves the Israelites by assassinating Eglon with his left hand by thrusting a “double-edged” or “double-mouthed” dagger into his belly, which is fitting for a king described tongue-in-cheek as having a “double-mouth” with which he gorged himself. Even his belly is described as “swallowing” up the dagger, immediately followed by “the dirt fell out,” or in other words “he pooped himself.” Ehud then escapes via the sewer system (i.e., he jumps down the king’s poop chute to escape) and leads Israel in victorious battle against the Moabites.

Next up, we have Deborah/Barak (4:1-5:31). King Jabin of Hazor and General Sisera oppress the Israelites because the Israelites have once again done evil. Note that Joshua had already defeated a “King Jabin.” Deborah was a prophetess and the “wife of Lappidoth,” meaning “woman of fire.” There is hesitation on the part of Barak to go into battle, yet both of the women in the story, Deborah and Jael, show more courage than the leading man. God throws Sisera’s army into a panic and after Sisera flees the battle and seeks refuge in the tent of Jael, Jael, whose name means “Yahweh is God,” drives a tent peg through Sisera’s “temple.” The word used hear as “temple” is in Hebrew “berragato,” which is related to “baraq,” so it is sort of in Barak’s face that a woman killed Sisera and not him.

Next is Gideon (6:1-8:35). Deborah was successful, but the cycle of disobedience starts again and Israel is impoverished by Midianite oppression. But God sends a prophet to them in Gideon. However, Gideon is very unsure of everything. He responds to God’s messenger with defiant questions, with pointing out the insignificance of his own roots, and with repeatedly requesting signs. God tests Gideon by reducing the size of his army, yet Gideon is only reassured of victory after listening to a Midianite conversation instead of listening to God. Gideon’s name means “cut down” which is fitting since he cuts down the idols of his father Joash, whose name ironically is Yahwistic. His father renames him “Jerub-Baal,” ironically refusing to acknowledge Yahweh by only saying that his son is “one who contends with Baal,” which is what Jarub-Baal means. Overtime, quality leadership in Israel becomes less and less. There is still idolatry in the land, and Gideon even makes a golden ephod that the people worship, which is similar in nature to the story of Aaron the priest in Exodus setting up the golden calf which the people worship. Gideon begins by cutting down idols, and ends by setting them up. The significance of the story of Gideon’s son Abimelech is addressed elsewhere.

Next on our list is Jephtah (10:6-12:7). Again, Israel was evil in the LORD’s sight and began to be oppressed, but they began to cry out and confess to him and they put away their gods. Yahweh’s response is “impatient” for he could bear their misery no longer. Enter Jephtah. After rejecting him, the people then try to bring him back so that he may lead them in victory over their enemies and save them. Jephtah is the son of a prostitute. He is referred to as the son of Gilead, which is a territory and not a person. In other words, nobody knew who his father was. The oppression present at this time was by the Philistines and the Ammonites. Jephtah promises a child-sacrifice to God in exchange for victory, and he ends up killing his own daughter, showing that Israel has mixed the sacred with the perverted.

Our next judge is Samson (13:1-16:31). At this point, the Philistines have become prominent in the narrative. Samson is a Nazarite from birth, but he is constantly breaking his covenant. He does so secretly by eating honey out of a dead lion’s carcass. He also gets drunk for seven days and marries a Philistine woman, saying “she is right in my eyes.” Samson is weak towards women and loses a bet/riddle/game with the Philistines because he gives in to the nagging of his wife. He leaves in a rage and the Philistines give his wife to another man. In revenge, Samson burns the Philistines’ crops, and they respond by burning his wife. The people of Judah hand Samson over to the Philistines because he is out of control, but Samson breaks the ropes that tie him and slaughters 1,000 men with a donkey’s jawbone. Later, he meets and falls in love with Delilah, whose name means “of the night.” Samson’s name, in contrast, means “sunshine.” The Philistines pay Delilah 1,100 pieces of silver to betray Samson. He is so stupid that he falls for her trick and is humiliated before Dagon, the god of the Philistines. However, Samson’s final act of suicidal terrorism brings about a partial deliverance to the people.

Later we see the Danite Migration take place (17:1-18:31). The character of Micah is introduced. Micah’s mother may have been Delilah. Micah returns 1,100 pieces of silver to her which had been stolen. She uses 200 of these 1,100 pieces of silver to build an idol in order to honor Yahweh. This is very twisted in nature and shows the backwardness of the time-period. Micah makes an ephod and appoints his own son as priest of his illegitimate shrine. He hires a Levite as a priest, but everything about the arrangement is illegitimate. Micah is of Dan, just as Samson was of Dan, and the text may be implying that Micah was Samson’s illegitimate son. The Danites move north and take Micah with them.

Later, a second Levite arrives on the scene in order to retrieve his wife who has fled from him to the house of her father in Bethlehem. On their way back, they spend the night in the town of Gibeah in the territory of Benjamin. The men of Gibeah come out to commit “sodomy” with the Levite, but instead the Levite offers them his wife/concubine and they brutally rape her all night. In the morning, the Levite sees her lying on the doorstep and cuts her body up into twelve pieces. He sends a piece to each of the twelve tribes. A civil war then erupts against Benjamin, and all but 600 men of Benjamin are killed. Judah leads the way in battle. The end of the book deals with the eleven tribes attempting to avoid the complete extinction of Benjamin by providing the remaining 600 men with wives. The book closes by echoing the words of Samson, by saying, “At that time, there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in their own eyes.”

It would seem that in the book of Judges the tribe of Judah is the favored one. In chapter one, the model judge, Othniel, is from Judah. The victories ascribed to Moses, Joshua, and Caleb elsewhere in the Bible are given to Judah in the book of Judges. It would also seem that book of Judges is indicating that the North is bad. According to Judges, it was the northern tribes who failed to drive out the Canaanites in the land. Othniel is the good judge and hails from Judah, but other judges are from the North and are portrayed as being not as good. This helps to set up the Saul/David conflict that comes later in the Deuteronomistic History. As Judges progresses it begins to show the tribes besides Judah to be growing worse and worse, especially the tribe of Benjamin from where Saul later comes. More specifically, Saul comes from Gibeah of Benjamin, the location of the attempted sodomy, gang-rape and murder of the Levite’s wife/concubine, and the scene of the great civil war at the end of the book. The Deuteronomistic History intentionally portrays Saul negatively by showing his association with Benjamin among other things, while at the same time portraying David positively by showing his association with the more faithful tribe of Judah. The narrative is asking, “Which is the legitimate leadership? David of Judah? – Or Saul of Benjamin?”

Joshua Studies

The Conquest as a Religious Act 

The structure and content of the book of Joshua portrays the conquest of the land as a religious act of holy war. In the preparation for the conquest (1-5) the role of God is shown (1:2-5) as well as Joshua’s own responsibility (6-9). Throughout the story there is a lack of military language and strategy. The Israelites sanctify themselves. They follow the Ark. They circumcise themselves, celebrate Passover, and set up memorial stones after crossing the river. Joshua also has a Theophany like Moses. In the conquest itself (6-12) the military plan for Jericho resembles a cultic event. Yahweh fights for Israel (2; 10). The “kherem” or the “devotion to destruction” for the LORD is also established, and when Achan breaks “kherem” he and all associated with him is destroyed. In the allocation of the land (13-22), all of the tribes receive an allotment, God’s promise to Israel is fulfilled, the Levitical cities are established, and the inheritances are determined by “lot” (14:2; 19:51). In Joshua’s closing speeches and addresses it is stressed that God gave the Land (23:1, 3, 5, 9-10), he stresses obedience, warns about disobedience, and performs a covenant ceremony. In this is seen: God’s saving action (1-13), the command for the Israelites to either choose Yahweh or not (14-15), the declaration to serve Yahweh (16-18, 21-24), the recording of the covenant (25-27). All these show how the conquest is a religious act.

Joshua as a Second Moses 

Joshua is also portrayed as a second Moses. They both send spies into the land (Num. 13:1-3; Josh. 2:1), both led Israelites across a body of water (Ex. 14-15; Josh. 3-4), both had a Theophany (Ex. 3:1-6; Josh. 5:13-15), both carry the role of intercessor (Ex. 32:11-12; Josh. 7:7-10), there is a similarity between the lifting of Moses’ staff and Joshua’s sword in battle (Ex. 17:10-13; Josh. 8:18, 26), both are conquerors of territory (Num. 21; Josh. 1-12), and both give farewell addresses (Deut. 4-30; Josh. 23-24). Joshua is also portrayed as a faithful deuteronomistic leader with the extermination of the Canaanites (Deut. 7:1-2; 16; Josh. 6:21; 10:40; 11:15, 23), the Covenant Renewal (Deut. 11:29-30; 27:3-4; Josh. 8:30-34), also, the written Copy of the Law, the removal of bodies from trees (Deut. 21:22-23; Josh. 8:29; 10:26-27), Celebration of Passover (Deut. 16:1; Josh. 5:10), regulations for those who surrender (Deut. 20:10-11; Josh. 9:6, 8, 15), and he selects Cities of Refuge (Deut. 19:1-2, 8-10; Josh. 20:1-3, 7-8).

Joshua in Archaeology 

In Joshua, the portrayal of the conquest differs from recent archaeological data. Different historical/sociological models have been developed by scholars to explain the conquest in light of the Bible’s account and archaeology. One is the Conquest Theory. Support for this theory is that in archaeology certain cities showed Late Bronze destruction, such as Bethel, Hazor, and Debir. The problems with this theory are that many sites did not show destruction levels during this time period, such as Ta’anach, Megiddo, Jokneam, and, Makkedah. And some sites were not inhabited at all, including Jericho, Gibeon, and Ai. W.F. Albright was the main proponent of the Conquest Theory, along with scholars such as G. Ernest Wright and John Bright. Another theory was the Peaceful Infiltration Model, supported by Albrecht Alt and Martin Noth. The support for this is that it corresponded with both archaeology and the biblical text. Joshua 13:1; 23; 12 indicate that the destruction was not actually total. Also, cities said to be conquered in Joshua are shown to be unconquered in Judges, including Ta’anach, Megiddo, Gezer, Debir, Hazor, Jerusalem, and Dor. The problems with this model included methodological issues including a “romanticized” version of Bedouin life. Another theory was the Peasant Revolt Theory, supported by George Mendenhall and Norman Gottwald. Support showed that there was a sharp rise in the population of the central highlands during this time. The problem was difficulty accounting for the population explosion.

Joshua in the Context of the Deuteronomistic History 

The conquest of Joshua also relates to Deuteronomy. As previously stated, the promise of God in Moses is fulfilled in Joshua, Joshua follows the laws of Deuteronomy, and Joshua sets the stage for the rest of the Deuteronomistic History. He is a king-like figure like Josiah, he is faithful to God’s Law, and he establishes Israel in the Land with specific instructions. Later, Israel abandons the laws and becomes chaotic and conquered. However, Josiah restores the Law in later times. Joshua and Josiah book end each other. They are both king-like figures, both copy the Law, both read it to the assembly, and both celebrate the Passover. Not to mention the obvious similarities in both of their names.

Formation of the Pentateuch

Modern Source Criticism 

According to modern source criticism, the Pentateuch is believed to have been the product of several different sources deriving from different religious traditions. It was believed for centuries that since the Pentateuch contained the Law of Moses and was referred to as the books of Moses that Moses himself had been the sole author of this work. According to modern source criticism, however, this is not the case. People began to doubt the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch when they began to study the texts more closely and discovered many potential flaws to this view.

Source criticism of today points to the documentary hypothesis. Within the Pentateuch, texts that refer to God as Yahweh are associated with the southern kingdom of Judah. Texts that refer to God as Elohim are associated with the northern kingdom of Israel. The Yahwistic texts are called “J” and are thought to have come together in the 10th – 9th centuries B.C. The Elohistic texts are called “E” and are thought to have come together in the 8th century B.C. Both J and E are assumed to be associated with and derived from the monarchy in the land at the time. D source is from the 7th century and is associated with the reign of Josiah. P source is associated with the priests of the 6th century.

Mosaic Authorship? 

People began to question the idea of Mosaic authorship in favor of these other sources for many reasons. The textual evidence against Mosaic authorship was plenty, including the cases of doublets and triplets, where very similar events occurred on more than one occasion in the text, such as with the descendants of Shem in Genesis 10:21-31 and 11:10-26. This is also seen in the wife/sister stories, where the lead character tells a ruler that his wife is really his sister – twice with Abraham in the cases of Pharaoh and Abimelech and then again with Isaac and Abimelech. There are two accounts of the naming of Beersheba, three records of the giving of the Decalogue by Moses, as well as the case of Joshua’s appointment in both Numbers 27:12-13 and Deuteronomy 31:14-15, 23. There were also various tensions within the texts themselves, such as the order of events in the creation story in Genesis 1-3, two different locations for Benjamin’s birthplace in Genesis 35:16-19 and 35:23-26, life spans in Genesis 6:3 and 11:32, human language and its origins in Genesis 11:1 and 10:5, 20, 31, as well as differences with at what point in history was the name Yahweh first introduced (Ex. 6:3; Gen. 12:7). Also, how could Moses have recorded his own death? And why would he say of himself that he was the “most humble man on the face of the whole earth”? There is also a perspective in the stories of one who has already entered the Promised Land, and Moses never did.

Characteristic Traits of the Pentateuchal Sources 

Within these different sources of J, E, P, and D are different styles and characteristic traits. Each source gives its own unique understanding of God and who he is. In J God is more anthropomorphic in nature. He forms man like a potter from clay and walks around in the cool of the Garden in Genesis 2-3. He also appears a man without being recognized, such as with Abraham before the destruction of Sodom as well as when he comes down to investigate Babel. In E God often communicates through dreams, as in the Joseph stories in Genesis 40:8; 41:16, 25, 28, 39. He also communicates through intercessors and prophetic figures, as in Genesis 20:7. In P, God is portrayed as more impersonal. The focus is on the priesthood and the Tabernacle. The Urim and Thummin are used to communicate with God in a way (Ex. 25-27; 28-29). In D, there is exclusive worship of Yawheh, as in the Shema (Deut. 6:4-5). Love and gratitude are shown to Yahweh (7:9; 10:12). In the Pentateuch, the stories of Yahweh are the stories of Judah, and the stories of Elohim are associated with Israel’s ancestors. J is associated with the tribe of Judah, and E is associated with the tribe of Ephraim. J is associated with the reign of King David, and E with Jeroboam; J with Jacob/Esau and the location of Edom, and E with Shechem and the store cities and forced labor under Jeroboam in later times. In J, Judah saves Joseph. In E, Reuben does. Caleb is the hero of J, and Joshua the hero of E.

Origins of D Source 

The D source is associated with Josiah’s reign, the discovery of the Law, and the reform. What we call “Dtr,” or the Deuteronomist, is thought to be responsible for the works of Joshua through Kings. The origins of D and its association with the reign of Josiah can be seen in Deuteronomy 1:1-4:43. It is believed that “Dtr” composed this section. “Dtr” had Deuteronomy 4:44-30:20 at his disposal. There are revisions of Numbers at the beginning of Deuteronomy that are associated with him. Dtr is also associated with the stories of the designation of Joshua and the death of Moses. The purpose of Dtr’s work in his addition to D was to explain the reason for the destruction of Judah and Israel. Leaders and people are evaluated on the basis of the Law Code found in Deuteronomy 12-26. The role of D was to provide instruction for entering the land, tell of consequences for disobedience (28: 15-68), consequences for obedience (28:1-14), and what happens when Exile happens (4:29-31; 30:1-10). D sets up the story of “DtrH.” It is the preface to the history. In this history, Joshua and Josiah book end each other. They are both king-like figures, both copy the Law, both read it to the assembly, and both celebrate the Passover. Not to mention the obvious similarities in both of their names.

Martin Noth and Frank Moore Cross on the composition of the Deuteronomistic History

Martin Noth believed that the individual designated “Dtr” was responsible for the work of Joshua through Kings. Dtr was both editor and author of the composition, and worked with the available sources to form the Deuteronomistic History as it appears today. He edited available material and served as a creative author at times. Dtr composed his work around and near the date 562 B.C. Noth believed Joshua through Kings represented a unified work. Evidence for this is seen in the special role of Deuteronomy in the text. He believed that Dtr composed Deuteronomy 1:1-4:43. The purpose of the work was to explain the reason of the destruction of Israel by the Assyrians in 721 B.C. The leaders and the people of the composition are evaluated on the basis of the Law Code found in Deuteronomy 12-26. Noth sees a unity in the work in Deuteronomistic language and style, in the strategic speeches (Josh. 1; 23; 1 Sam. 13; 1 Kgs. 8:14), and in the summarizing reflections (Josh. 12; Judg. 2:11; 2 Kgs. 17:7). He sees this in the chronology laid out (1 Kgs. 6:1) of the 480 years. Noth believed Dtr was associated with Josiah’s reign. Joshua and Josiah are compared to each other in a positive light. Dtr also makes Judah look good and shows that the Laws of Deuteronomy should be followed.

Frank Moore Cross believed there were two additions to the Deuteronomistic History which are called “Dtr1” and “Dtr2.” Dtr1 was pre-exilic and Dtr2 was exilic. Starting with Dtr1, there are two themes present in the text: The sin of Jeroboam, and God’s faithfulness towards David. The fall of the Northern Kingdom is blamed on Jeroboam’s sin (2 Kgs. 17:20-*3). In Dtr1, a prophet is seen denouncing the altar placed at Bethel (1 Kgs. 13:2-5). Dtr1 seems to anticipate the reform of Josiah. In the work, Davidic kings are portrayed as mostly good, especially Josiah. The work of Dtr1 is then seen as a message to the North to return to the worship of Yahweh at the Jerusalem sanctuary during the time of Josiah’s reign. It speaks also to Judah, saying the Kingdom’s restoration depends on the nation’s return to the Covenant with Yahweh as well as the whole-hearted return of the king to the ways of David.

Dtr2 is then seen as the exilic addition to the text, according to Cross. He believed that the redactor brought the work up to date during the Exile, and recorded the Fall of Jerusalem. Dtr2 reshapes history, blaming the Fall of Jerusalem on the wickedness of Manasseh (2 Kgs. 21:7-14). He shows that Josiah is repentant after the discovery of the Law (2 Kgs. 23:25b-27). Passages of the text are addressed to captives, emphasizing the fact that Yahweh will not forget the Covenant of their Fathers and promising return from their captivity and their restoration if they would repent, etc. (Deut. 4:27-31; 30:1-10; 1 Kgs. 8:25b, 46-53). Cross believed Dtr2 was completed around 500 B.C. and that it attempted to transform the history into a sermon to Judean exiles.

Christian Counseling

The difference between secular therapies and the Christian care of the pastor is that the secular therapies are based upon expected results which have been determined by observable facts, whereas the Christian care of the pastor is based upon expected results which have been realized through faith in what will be instead of in what has already been observed. While whatever methods have proven to be helpful within the field of psychology ought to be recognized by those in ministry, ultimately the ministry is based upon something that has not been successfully observed through science. There is often a secular set of beliefs behind the secular therapies employed within psychology. An example would be that in much of secular psychology the main goal is to get the patient to be reconciled with his or herself. Within the Christian care of the pastor is seen the central goal of reconciling the person to God. Only when a person is at peace with God will they then be at peace with themselves because the true conflict was one between the person and God. “Psyochotherapy has a great deal to say about the characteristics of thought and behavior but is little concerned with the character of the person. Especially in the more popularized versions of therapy (and that is often the level at which churches and ministers are involved), people are seen as a bundle of needs to be discovered, expressed, examined, and met. Such therapy keeps the person in perpetual dependency as he alternately whines and exults in the exploration of new needs. And it sustains the illusion that such needs are problems to be resolved, problems that can be resolved. In their more fatuous forms, psychotherapies suggest that problems discovered are problems resolved, that self-knowledge is self-healing. Christian faith, too, affirms the axiom, ‘Know thyself.’ But the discovery of our real selves is not through internal probing but external promise; becoming our true selves is not a therapeutic project but a vocation” (Neuhaus 89).

__________________________________________________________

Source

Richard Neuhaus. Freedom for Ministry: A Guide for the Perplexed Who are Called to Serve. (1992), pp. 89.

The "Shepherding" Pastor

In his book Pastoral Theology Thomas Oden uses John 10:1-18 as reference for the viewing of the pastoral role as a shepherding role. In this passage of Scripture, Jesus refers to Himself as a shepherd and His own ministry in turn is one of shepherding. The role of the pastor as shepherd is similar to the role of Christ as shepherd. As Christ knew His flock, so must the pastor know his flock. Christ knew people on an intimate level and the pastor must invest in the lives of those within his congregation in an intimate way. The pastor must know the people to whom he or she speaks. Just as Christ knew the very names of every one of His own in the shepherding analogy, so too the pastor ought to know the names of those to whom he or she is ministering. Jesus said that the shepherd does not climb over the wall to get to the sheep. The shepherd enters through the gate. In the same way, the pastor must go through the proper means to become a pastor and not simply force his or her way into some kind of pastoral position without proper training and authorization. The flock is described as recognizing the shepherd’s voice. The congregation listens to the pastor to the extent that they recognize when someone else says something that does not sound like what the pastor would say. The shepherd takes the flock into places where they can receive proper amounts of food and nutrition. The pastor leads the congregation into places where they will grow spiritually and receive what they need. The shepherd leads the sheep, keeping a look out for danger. The pastor looks out for the congregation, leading them away from what would harm them and leading them toward what would do them good. The sheep trust the shepherd because the shepherd has always been faithful. The pastor must also earn the trust of the congregation – a task which often takes a considerable amount of time. Just as sheep do not want to follow someone they do not know the congregation will not likely want to follow a pastor they do not know. Just as Christ the good shepherd laid down His life for His sheep, so too must the pastor be willing to lay down his or her life for the congregation. The hired-hand may desert the sheep, but the good shepherd will not abandon them at the sight of danger. The good pastor has invested his or her own life in the life of the congregation. The pastor is attached to the congregation. Someone who comes in just to do something and then move on does not lose anything if the church loses. The good pastor loses with the church because they are a part of the church. Finally, just as the flock is united under the shepherd, the congregation in Christ is united under the Pastor in Christ.

On Pastoral Authority...

The authority under which the pastor ministers is the authority that God has given the pastor. The pastor has the authority to do what he or she does because God has chosen him or her to serve in this way. Pastoring is not a task that everyone in the church is given. One must have a specific calling from God if they choose to become a pastor. God has chosen them to be His representative. In a very real way, when the pastor “shows up” to something, those who are there in that particular circumstance feel as though God Himself has shown up. This is not entirely inaccurate since the pastor does carry or at least ought to be carrying the Spirit of Christ within his or herself. While it would be inappropriate for the pastor to think of themselves as God or some kind of deity, it is appropriate for the pastor to remember that whatever the observing people see in his or her life affects how they view God. While it would be nice to assume that most people see the pastor as an ordinary human being who makes mistakes just like everyone else, the reality is that the pastor represents God to the people in a very unordinary way. While all saints are to represent Christ, the pastor is held in a way to a different standard. The pastor is entrusted with more of “the things of God” than the average Christian. The lay recognize this and correctly see that the pastor is to be looked up to more so in matters of faith than the average Christian. It was by the choice of God that some would be called into pastoral ministry, and in this calling to be His “mouthpiece.” While the church as a whole decides to whom they give the title of pastor through differing yet similar means within denominations, it is not the church that gives the true calling. While the church has the authority to give authorization to those seeking to become pastors, it is God who has given this authority to the church, and it is God who gives the authority to each individual who has been called into pastoral ministry.

The "Good Old Days" of the Church

It is a mistake to yearn for “the good old days” of the church as recorded in the New Testament because the church that is present today is just as good or bad as the church of that time. The church of today is not all that different from the church that existed back then. As Ecclesiastes says, “There is nothing new under the sun,” and also, “Do not say, ‘Why were the old days better than these?’ For it is not wise to ask such questions.” If one were to actually study what the New Testament records about the early church they would recognize that the early church did not always have things altogether. There were people in the church back then who were as “messed up” as some of the people in the church of today. For example, Luke records in the book Acts on the death of Ananias and Sapphira who had willingly lied to the Holy Spirit in the presence of the church. Another example in the book of Acts of how the church was not necessarily always on top of things is that of the food distribution among the Greek and the Jewish widows. While this possible discrimination was not likely a willful act on the part of the church and the church did correct this issue when it was brought to its attention, this is still an example of how the church of yesteryear is not something that the church of today should attempt to wholly replicate in every aspect. Also, within a study of the church as portrayed in the New Testament writings, one must recognize the very backwards nature of the church in Corinth to whom Paul ministered. While one must take into consideration all of these negative aspects of the church of the past, one must also admit to the numerous admirable qualities of that church. The New Testament authors write of a church in which the Spirit of Christ was present. That same Spirit is within the church of today. The New Testament records amazing miracles and healings as well as radical evangelism. It is incorrect (and very “modernist” in reasoning) to assume that simply because one does not see things like this happening in the church today that they do not in fact happen at all anymore. This is simply not the case. Miracles, signs, and wonders still accompany the church of today. This is especially seen in the continents of Africa and Asia, but the truth is that these things happen in America as well. My guess as to why many within the church of America do not witness miracles is because they do not believe in them. The church of today is just as good or as bad as the church that is pictured in the New Testament. When people put too much focus upon the style that was appropriate for the New Testament setting believing that church should be done in exactly that same way today, they begin to lose sight of the church itself and how it should exist in today’s settings.

The Necessity of the Church for Salvation

The church is indeed a necessary part of salvation. God reveals Himself in the person of Christ, Christ reveals Himself through the church, and the church reveals Christ to the world. In order for someone to “access” God they must in one way or another go through the church. While it is possible, hypothetically speaking, for someone to be saved apart from the church, this is not the way God has chosen to bring about the salvation of the world. Hypothetically speaking, a person could be trapped on a deserted island and come across a copy of the Bible and find the way of salvation written in its pages, but even then one must remember that the gospels and letters of the New Testament that explain clearly the way of salvation were canonized by none other than the church. The Holy Spirit was of course present and influencing these church leaders, but He still chose to use the church. More often than not, people “find” God not through a careful study of the Scriptures on their own, but rather through seeing the character and peace of Christ on display within someone with whom they are friends or with whom they interact in one way or another. The church is to be understood as the body of Christ, which means that the church is the physical element or the Christ that the world sees which either draws people in or turns them away. Also, the salvation process is one that is meant to involve community. Salvation is not an individualistic matter.

The Perfection of the Church

Something to keep in mind regarding the authenticity of the church within the context of her imperfections is that while the church exists she is also in a very real sense coming into existence. The church is complete and yet incomplete. The church in her present form is capable of fulfilling God’s purpose for her. However, the church also has a future purpose for which she strives to attain. In that sense, the church will never be complete or perfect until she becomes fully united with Christ. However, completeness or perfection need not be measured by a standard that is only applicable for the future. The church as she is now may be seen as perfect in the midst of her imperfections. While there are many throughout history and up to the present time who have misused the church and used her as a platform for their own agenda, this does not extinguish absolutely the fact that the church has also been made up of many people who have given themselves whole-heartedly to serving Christ and those made in the image of Christ.

To put this symbolically, the church is the body of Christ, and if a form of cancer or a tumor or some sort of disease infects the body, the imperfection must be removed. However, in the removal of the disease, the rest of the body is not done away with – at least of course, every effort must be made in order to save what remains good within the body. Similarly, when an imperfection arises within the church, the imperfection should be removed or made to be in alignment with the perfect rather than issuing the removal of the entire body. So while, imperfections do exist within the church, the church is indeed a valid institution that will never be destroyed. The church has an eschatological hope that says that all that is imperfect will one day be removed, leaving only the perfect. So in a very real sense, the church may actually be viewed correctly as being perfect. She is perfect because she serves her purpose. She may have not reached the pinnacle of her perfection, but she is perfect. The fullness of her perfection will be made complete through Christ in the event of the eschaton.

In the meantime, there are many problems that still exist within the ministry of the church. There are many examples of this, from priests who sexually abuse children, to a church in Kansas that wishes death upon soldiers and homosexuals; from the crusades, to Hitler’s use of the church to support his creation of the Aryan race and the extermination of the Jews among other people groups. While these unfortunate and sinful acts are a part of the church’s history, one must call to mind the parable spoken by Jesus in Matthew chapter thirteen in which he stated that there was a farmer who planted his seed, but an enemy came and scattered weeds among his crops. The servants were instructed to let the weeds grow up alongside the wheat for fear that if all of the weeds were uprooted while the wheat was still growing, then the entire crop would be pulled up and destroyed. At harvest time, both the wheat and the weeds will be taken up and sorted. This parable may be applied to the church in that one may recognize how the church with all its imperfections will one day be rid of its imperfections. It was not the will of God that the church should appear distorted to the world because of the influence of evil upon her, attempting to overtake her, but that is the way things are at present. God is still using the church to bring His presence into the world. The church is the manifestation of God Himself in the present time.

This brings us to another point. The church remains authentic in spite of her imperfections because the church was God’s idea. It is God who has established the authority of the church to be made into His image and to reflect His own nature to the world. The mission of the church remains the same: to reconcile humanity with God. While many like to point out the hypocrisy of people within the church and while it is a shame that hypocrisy exists within the church, one way of looking at the church’s imperfections is to point out that it was the will of God to display His own nature within humankind. This would include the very raw and very earthy aspects of humanity. God chose to reveal Himself in the person of Jesus Christ, and the church is now considered to be the body of Christ. So while people within the organization of the church do not always measure up to the standard of Christ, they still may maintain the image of Christ, who was the image of God in the flesh. I do not say this in order to excuse sin, but rather to show that it was God’s good will to make His dwelling within us, within people with physical bodies who have been tainted by sin. The best way to view “hypocrites” within the church is to realize how wonderful the grace of God is that He would desire to have people as bent and twisted as these to be a part of His church.

The church is the bride of Christ. Something that has resonated with me is, ironically enough, something that Dr. Quanstrom has occasionally spoken of in his time serving at College Church. He has said that the church is the bride of Christ, and that we ought to speak of the church as though she truly were the bride of Christ. We ought not to speak of someone’s bride in a negative and critical way. It is a nasty tendency and in poor taste for someone to go around uttering criticisms against someone else’s wife, and yet people speak many ill-words against the church, who is the bride of Christ. A groom ought to be angry if he overheard someone speaking poorly of his bride. In the same way, Christ, it would seem, would also be angry to hear someone slandering His bride. Dr. Quanstrom said that to the groom, the bride is never ugly. This is another example of how the church remains authentic regardless of her imperfections because it is God who makes her authentic.

“Christian Theology for the Church of the Nazarene”

In chapter four of his book A Century of Holiness Theology Dr. Mark Quanstrom writes that the first doctrine that H. Orton Wiley felt was alien to an authentic Wesleyan-holiness theology “was the fundamentalist dogma concerning the inerrancy of the Scriptures.” He was against the “Dictation Theory,” which says “the authors were mere amanuenses and which lent itself most easily to an inerrant view of Scripture…” Wiley wrote, “this theory is…out of harmony with the known manner in which God works in the human soul.” Quanstrom says that Wiley preferred the “Dynamical” method. “This theory allowed Wiley to state that the Bible has a human element. ‘Not only did the Holy Spirit speak through David, David also spoke.’” Wiley believed that “the Scriptures were not necessarily free from all error,” but that “they were free from essential error.” Quanstrom goes on to say that “Another critical doctrine that Wiley felt was alien to an authentic Wesleyan-Holiness theology concerned the doctrine of free moral agency…” Wiley disagreed with Miley and Hills on the ability of mankind to obey God without the grace of God. Quanstrom says, “As a result, the ‘official’ position of the Church of the Nazarene was that salvation was dependent on free grace and not on moral ability.” Quanstrom also writes that “One of Wiley’s intentions was to make certain that entire sanctification was understood in the church as an instantaneous act, a second work of grace.” Wiley believed that sanctification was instantaneous. He believed this because “when the verb to sanctify was used in the New Testament, it was most often used in the aorist tense. This is a tense that indicated a ‘momentary, completed act, without reference to time.’” Wiley understood “progressive sanctification” as not something to replace instantaneous sanctification. Wiley rejected the idea that gradual sanctification meant that one would gradually become more and more holy. Wiley believed that progressive sanctification was “the temporal aspect of the work of grace in the heart, as it takes place in successive stages. Each of these stages is marked by a gradual approach and an instantaneous consummation in experience, and the stages together mark the full scope of sanctifying grace.” Quanstrom writes, “Progressive sanctification was to be strictly understood as the gradual approach in time toward the instantaneous sanctifying experience. Gradual sanctification, according to Wiley, was simply the growing awareness of the need for the instantaneous work of entire sanctification. […] Progressive sanctification was simply a term used to describe the successive instantaneous acts of God in the life of the believer. […] While much terminology, like initial, gradual, partial, or continuous seemed to indicate otherwise, there was only one way to be sanctified wholly and that was to be sanctified instantaneously.” Wiley uses the words “entire sanctification” to describe the complete removal of all sin. He describes this as “the utter destruction of the carnal mind.” Wiley also describes other positive results of being entirely sanctified, saying “While entire sanctification considered from the negative point of view is a cleansing from all sin, from the positive standpoint it is the infilling of divine love.” Quanstrom says that “According to Wiley, there were primarily three important distinctions that needed to be made in order to preserve the doctrine from some of the more popular misconceptions. The first was the distinction between purity and maturity.” Wiley wrote that “Purity is the result of a cleansing from the pollution of sin; maturity is due to growth in grace. Purity is accomplished by an instantaneous act; maturity is gradual and progressive, and is always indefinite and relative.” Wiley’s second distinction was the difference between infirmities and sins. Quanstrom says Wiley believed, “Intentional and voluntary sin brought guilt and condemnation and, as such, required repentance. Infirmities, however, were understood as involuntary and unintentional transgressions of the divine law and were a result of ignorance and weakness as a consequence of the fall of man.” The third distinction Wiley made was on the possibility of temptation. “Wiley held that all Christians, sanctified and not, were subject to temptation and that it was entirely consistent with Christina perfection since Christ himself was tempted.” Quanstrom concludes chapter four by saying, “As might be expected, the early Nazarene church was not too interested in defining their glorious doctrine in limiting terms. They were primarily interested in proclaiming the wonderful possibilities of this second work of grace. With Wiley, that had begun to change.”

YHWH versus Ba'al

In his article "Yahweh versus Baal: a narrative-critical reading of the Gideon/Abimelech narrative" Vince Endris seeks to show foremost that the narrative within the book of Judges covering the stories of Gideon and his son Abimelech are really one narrative showing the power-struggle between Yahweh and Baal in which Yahweh eventually emerges victorious. Endris suggests that looking at these stories that are placed in the middle of Judges will provide better insight into the rest of the overall story of Judges, in which the Israelites struggle severely will fidelity, constantly returning the gods which Yahweh has consistently defeated. Eventually, Yahweh begins to become less active in the lives of his people as they continue to betray him. Endris seeks to apply a narrative critical approach to the book of Judges. I believe that Endris does an excellent job with his article in showing the conflict between Yahweh and Baal, as well in the way he shows the downward spiral in the book of Judges as a whole, especially after Israel rejects Yahweh in the midst of his victory over Baal in the story of Gideon. I believe the connections he makes between Gideon and Abimelech as one narrative are convincing as well. He has obviously done very serious and legitimate research on this subject, and he provides numerous scriptural and scholarly references to support his claims.

Endris writes that in the narrative Yahweh appears to be defeated but “returns to bring about Baal's ultimate demise” (174). Gideon serves as a human representative of Yahweh and Abimelech serves as a human representative of Baal. As the Gideon story progresses, Gideon becomes less and less faithful to Yahweh and appears to bring about Yahweh’s defeat. However, Yahweh show himself ultimately victorious as the story continues when Abimelech who is Baal’s representative is destroyed, thus defeating Baal. Endris comes up with three main points in for the progression of this narrative. These are that the Gideon/Abimelech story gives reason for why God deals so harshly with the Israelites, saying that he will no longer defend them because they have turned to Baal because Baal and Yahweh are at war with each other; also, this explains why in the second half of the book of Judges there is a significant decrease in the acts of God and an increase in the activities of humans; also, in the last few chapters of Judges is presented four separate times the idea that during the days of the judges there was no king in Israel. Kingship is portrayed in a positive light in the book of Judges. The narrative believes that once Yahweh is represented in the human office of king, only then will the chaos Israel has brought upon herself be done away with.

There are parallels between the Gideon/Abimelech narrative and the book of Judges as a whole. Both stories begin with a period of rest. When Gideon comes on the scene it has been forty years since Deborah defeated Sisera. This is similar to what is found in Numbers. There is a new generation on the scene when Gideon comes along. At the beginning of the Gideon story is seen the prophet who reminds Israel of all God did for them in Egypt and warns them to flee from idolatry, just as at the beginning of Judges.

The conflict between Baal and Yahweh emerges when Yahweh commands Gideon to tear down the altar which his father had built to Baal. Gideon does as he is instructed and his father renames him “Jerubbaal.” In this is seen the beginning of the conflict. Jerubbaal can mean “one who contends with Baal” or “Baal will contend” or “Let Baal contend against him.” Also, the Midianite and Amalekite armies are seen as representatives of Baal. They are Israel’s human oppressors, just as Baal is Israel’s divine oppressor. It would seem that Baal is directly connected to these armies because immediately after Gideon destroys Baal’s altar and the judgment of Baal is pronounced upon him these armies begin to invade. It is apparently understood that the enemies are Baal worshipers. Gideon’s side in the war is that of Yahweh. Gideon tests Yahweh’s power several times. Yahweh proves to him that he is master over the elements. He provides dew for Gideon when Gideon asks for it. Baal was thought to be in control of the weather but Yahweh proves himself to be in charge. Yahweh takes control of the dew, so the reader expects that ultimately Yahweh will be victorious over Baal.

When the battle begins, Yahweh, or Elohim, brings Gideon’s numbers down to a few. He tests Gideon just as Gideon tested him. Also, this shows that the victory is not that of Gideon, but of Yahweh himself. It is Yahweh who is fighting for Israel. After the defeat of the enemies, the end of the story seems to be in sight. The people ask Gideon to be their ruler and Gideon responds that he will not and that only Yahweh shall rule over them. However, Gideon continues speaking and asks the people for jewelry so that he can make an ephod for them. This is a surprising turn of events for the reader. Gideon places the ephod in Ophrah, which is significant because this is the same location in which Gideon built an altar to Yahweh at the beginning of the narrative. Israel then proceeds to prostitute herself before the ephod. The narrative records that the ephod became a snare for all Israel and Gideon’s household. Immediately after Yahweh’s defeat of their enemies Israel returns to worshiping other gods. This scene with the ephod is reminiscent of the story of Aaron in the desert who took gold from the people in order to provide them with golden calf to worship. It seems to be implied that Gideon has replaced the shrine he built for Yahweh with an object of worship for Baal. This is in contrast to the beginning of the story in which Gideon pulls down Baal’s altar and sets up a shrine for Yahweh. It would seem that through Gideon’s unfaithfulness Baal has defeated Yahweh. Gideon’s story ends with infidelity. The Israelites even rename Baal as “Baal of the Covenant,” replacing Yahweh completely.

The next section focuses mostly upon Abimelech, the son of Jerubbaal. At this point in the story Gideon is no longer referred to as Gideon but as Jerubbaal, indicating that Baal has indeed contended for himself. The word “baal” is used throughout the story of Abimelech to show which side Abimelech is on. Abimelech becomes “a brother of the baals of Shechem” and he is “paid with money from the house of Baal of the Covenant” (179). His association with Baal is seen in his rejection of his own family. He eventually kills all but one of the sons of Jerubbaal. He does so by killing them on a rock at Ophrah one by one. This indicates that he is making human sacrifices to Baal. After this, the baals of Shechem and the house of Milloh pronounce Abimelech king. Jurubbaal’s remaining son Jotham shows up and pronounces judgment upon Abimelech for his actions. The author says that “before running away, Jotham utters a curse on Abimelech and the baals of Shechem that they be destroyed by fire” (180). This foreshadows that Yahweh will soon defeat Baal. Jotham mentions Elohim in his curse, and it would seem that Elohim, or Yahweh, will soon make an appearance after his long silence since the time of Jerubbaal. The story says that God sent an evil spirit to confuse the baals of Shechem so that they would betray Abimelech.

At this point in the story, yet another house is introduced, the house of Gaal, who worship a completely different god. Gaal boasts against Abimelech and Abimelech seeks revenge by attacking him at night. This is reminiscent of Gideon’s night attack on the Baal idol at Ophrah. That scene set up the narrative, and the night attack of Abimelech begins to bring the narrative to a close. Abimelech destroys the house of Gaal and burns down the temple of “God of the Covenant,” which is no longer considered to be Yahweh at this point. Abimelech then goes to the tower at Thebez to inflict more destruction, but suddenly a woman throws a millstone over the wall at random and it lands on his head. He instructs a young man to kill him and he does. This is contrasted with the Gideon story, where Gideon instructs his son to kill one of the enemy but he does not do it for he just a boy and was afraid. The number one is significant in this story. Abimelech kills the sons of Jerubbaal on one stone and acts as the single representative of Baal. In the end it is a single woman, acting as the representative of Yahweh who kills him.

At the end of the story, Elohim is revealed to have defeated Baal, but the Israelites immediately begin to do evil again, and Yahweh lets their enemies defeat them. They cry out to him again, but this time his response to them is a rebuke.

The article goes on to discuss other elements of the narrative. Gideon is originally portrayed as a good character resembling Moses. The call of Gideon is similar to God’s appearance to Moses in Exodus 3. Both leaders encounter the messenger of God, raise questions and objections, are visited by Yahweh, and are given signs. Also, Moses’ father-in-law is a priest of Midian, and Gideon’s father has an altar to Baal indicating that he is also a pagan priest. However, Gideon’s character spirals down within the story until he winds up betraying Yahweh. Up until this point Gideon is the only judge to be specifically raised up by Yahweh himself. As the narrative progresses Gideon is seen to be working more so on his own as well becoming much more aggressive and assertive. He kills those who had killed his own brothers in retribution. This is in contrast with Abimelech who later kills all of his own brothers.

Abimelech is seen as an evil character. He kills his brothers on a single stone and at the end of the story he is killed by a single stone. The end of the narrative concludes with a chiasm. It says, “God returned/Abimelech’s evil/and all the men of Shechem’s evil/God caused to return” (188). The conclusion here is significant because it shows how it was God who acted against the wickedness of these people, and it was God who ultimately defeated Baal by acting against them. After the Gideon narrative Baal ceases to act anymore. Yahweh acts a few times, but because of Israel’s refusal to worship him alone as they turn to gods Yahweh has already defeated he does not act very often. Human activity, rather than divine, is emphasized in the rest of the book.

The decrease of the activity of Yahweh in the rest of the book makes it look as though Yahweh has lost control of his people. Since the time of Othniel, every time the Israelites were saved from their enemies the land had rest for many years after the deliverance. Gideon is the last judge to bring rest to the land. He is also the last judge portrayed as having Yahweh “with him.” Jephtah and Samson act mostly on their own, sometimes doing the will of God and sometimes not. The book of Judges even says that the spirit of the Lord had left Samson.

There are also similarities in the last half of Judges with Genesis. However, whereas God acts in Genesis, he does not intervene in Judges. Jephtah’s sacrifice of his daughter parallels Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac, except that God stops Abraham from killing his son and he does nothing about Jephtah’s acts. Also, the story of the Levite and his concubine parallels the story of Sodom and Gomorrah. Both stories have men of the cities desiring to rape the male guests of one within the city. Both stories show the host offering the men his own virgin daughter or daughters to do with as they please. The difference is that in Genesis God strikes the Sodomites with blindness and destroys the city, and in Gibeah God does nothing to prevent the Levite’s concubine from being brutally raped all night and killed. Also, the overall story structure becomes more chaotic in the second half of Judges. Samson’s story is filled with a bunch of random things that he does, and the last few chapters do not give the reader the typical story of the judge saving the people, but rather several stories about seemingly random people doing horrible things.

The stories in the last half of Judges focus more on personal stories about individuals, such as Abimelech, Samson, and Micah. There is little activity by any god at all. The focus becomes on what seems right in the eyes of the individual rather than what is right in the eyes of God. This is seen when Samson wants to marry the Philistine woman because “she is right in my eyes,” as well as at the close of Judges when it is recorded that everyone did what was right in their own eyes and that at that time there was no king in Israel. Intertribal war also arises several times – Jephtah and the Ephraimites, Samson is handed over to the Philistines by his own people, the Danites attack Laish, and of course the war against Benjamin in which the entire tribe is almost made extinct.

The article concludes by pointing out how the narrative seems to indicate that once Yahweh’s reign is established through a human monarch, then the chaos will end and rest will return to the land. The Israelites have abandoned Yahweh even in the midst of his victory over their enemies and Baal. The reason that he does not come to their aid again by raising up a successful representative of himself is because Yahweh has in turn abandoned them. The reason there is no representative of Yahweh in Israel anymore is because Yahweh is not in Israel anymore.