The harrowing of hell

18 For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit, 19 in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison, 20 because they formerly did not obey, when God's patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared (1 Pet 3:18-20).

This is an obscure passage that's generated several competing interpretations. 

1. In the person of Noah, the preexistent Son commanded Noah's contemporaries to repent.

i) A basic deficiency of that interpretation is that the passage doesn't say or imply that Jesus spoke through Noah. 

ii) This interpretation depends on rendering the dative pneumati in locative terms ("in the spirit") rather than instrumental terms ("by the Spirit"). Hence, Christ spoke through Noah via the intermediate agency of the Spirit. 

However, the distinction between "put to death" and "made alive" alludes to the crucifixion and Resurrection respectively. Jesus was raised by the agency of the Holy Spirit. Given the conceptual contrast between physical death and physical resurrection, it makes more contextual sense to render pneumati in instrumental terms ("by the Spirit"). Otherwise, we have a Docetic/Gnostic Resurrection. 

iii) In defense of (1), it dovetails with 1 Pet 1:11, with its reference to the prophetic "Spirit of Christ." However:

a) That's not what 3:18-20 say. Even if it's consistent with 3:18-20, nothing in vv18-20 which indicates that referent.

b) 1:11 has its own interpretive issues. What exactly is mean by the "Spirit of Christ"? Is Christ the subject? Did he take possession of OT prophets?

Or is Christ the object? Is he the topic of OT prophecy? In context, it refers to prophecies about Christ rather than prophecies by Christ. It is not through the agency or instrumentality of Christ, but the Spirit of God.

iii) The sequence of the passage suggests this took place after the Resurrection, and not in prediluvian times:

death>Resurrection>Ascension (v22).

2. During Holy Saturday (between Good Friday and Easter Sunday), Christ went to the limbus patrum to release the OT saints from Purgatory. This is the traditional "descent into hell" or "harrowing of hell."

i) Aside from the anachronism (see above), this assumes the dogma of Purgatory. But that's hardly something an exegete can take for granted. 

ii) Likewise, "spirit" is not a synonym for the discarnate soul of Christ. How could that be "made alive" at the moment of death?  

3. After the Resurrection, Christ proclaimed final condemnation to imprisoned angels who fell in the days of Noah. A variation on this view refers it to the souls of their offspring (Nephilim), whom they begat with women. 

The subjection of angels to Christ in v22 supports this interpretation. The "spirits" in v19 are the same as the beings in v22.

i) This typically assumes that Peter is alluding to 1 Enoch's interpretation of Gen 6:1-4. The imprisoned "spirits" are the fallen angels. 

One contextual problem with this identification is that the fall of angels isn't synchronized with the construction of the ark in either Scripture or 1 Enoch.

ii) Likewise, God's "patience" is in reference to Noah's disobedient neighbors. The ark was, itself, a sign of impending judgment. God gave human sinners time and opportunity to repent. 

iii) Angels are mentioned in v22, not because that ties into the netherworld setting of v19, but because that ties into the heavenly setting of the Ascension–and Session–of Christ. The Ascension not only represents the Son's "return" to heaven, but the Messiah's enthronement and coregency with the Father. All angels are subject to the Risen Lord. 

iii) But even if the passage refers to angels, that doesn't require an Enochic background. There's a similar motif in Isa 24:21-22:

21 On that day the Lord will punish    the host of heaven, in heaven,    and the kings of the earth, on the earth.22 They will be gathered together    as prisoners in a pit;they will be shut up in a prison,    and after many days they will be punished.

The "host of heaven" suggests angels. In context, fallen angels. They are "imprisoned," to await sentencing and final judgment. Cf. G. Smith, Isaiah 1-39 (B&H 2007), 424-25. 

4. After the Resurrection, Christ extended the opportunity of postmortem salvation to Noah's deceased contemporaries.

i) The passage doesn't actually say that. Rather than an offer of postmortem salvation, there's precedent for postmortem taunt-songs (e.g. Isa 14).

ii) Peter is exhorting his readers to remain steadfast in the faith despite persecution. It would subvert his message to hold out hope of a postmortem second chance. 

5. After the Resurrection, Christ proclaimed final condemnation to the damned.

That fits the context of Noah's disobedient neighbors, who spurned God's forbearance. That ill-fated generation constitutes a paradigmatic sample-group of the damned. 

Is Gen 1 a lost world?

I'm going to repost some comments I left at Lydia McGrew's blog:

Since, in the running commentary, a fair amount of ink has now been spilt on the argument from miracles, perhaps this should be recast in a more systematic context. What is the evidentiary function of miracles? Are miracles just an accommodation to inveterate skeptics who demand a sign?

i) The Bible itself warns about the proliferation of false prophets. People who come speaking in the name of the Lord. They say God spoke to them and told them to tell you what you should do or not do, believe or disbelieve. Some of them are deceivers. Liars. Conmen. They themselves don't believe their own claims. They simply pose as religious figures.

Others are self-deluded. They really think God is sending them messages, even though that's not the case.

So one practical question is how to winow the wheat from the chaff.

ii) Apropos (i), how did ancient Israelites know that God spoke to Abraham? How did they know that God called Abraham out of Ur and made a covenant with Abraham? What's the evidence?

iii) One line of evidence would be indirect. They knew that God spoke to Abraham because they knew that God spoke to Moses. If Moses wrote the account of Abraham's life, then it comes down to his credibility rather than the credibility of Abraham, per se.

iv) And how did they know God spoke to Moses? Because God vouches for Moses by empowering him to perform miracles which mirror divine agency. God's word is attested by God's deeds. That's how the evidential value of miracles functions in the early chapters of Exodus.

v) Likewise, how did 1C Christians know that Jesus was the divine messiah? Same argument.

How did they know that Peter was divinely commissioned apostle?

a) There's a direct line of evidence: if Peter was a miracle-worker.

b) There's an indirect line of evidence: if Peter was chosen by a miracle-worker (i.e. Christ).

Even if, say, Matthew was not a miracle-worker, if he was chosen by Christ, then he is attested by Christ.

vi) One potential objection is that even if contemporaries of Moses or Christ were in a position to witness their miracles, later readers are not.

That, however, involves a chain-of-custody. Historical knowledge is generally based on testimonial evidence. I don't have to personally witness the gunfight at O.K. Corral to know that it happened. That event was vouched for by contemporaries. And we have contemporary records. Living memory of that event lingered for many years. Oral history was committed to writing.

vii) Complementing the argument from miracles is the argument from prophecy, which is a kind of miracle. Moreover, long-range prophecy can be a direct evidence for later readers who live to see the fulfillment. It was future to the original audience, but past to a later audience.

viii) In addition, it's not just a question of believing reports of miracles, or believing reported miracles from the distant past. Miracles aren't just a thing of the past. There's credible evidence for the intermittent occurrence of Christian miracles throughout the course of church history right up to the present.

ix) Another potential objection is that miracles and prophecies are not a sufficient proof of divine authorization inasmuch as evil spirits can empower humans to perform miracles or possess paranormal insight and foresight.

That, however, significantly narrows the range of explanatory options. It eliminates the status of the claimant as a mere charlatan. He's not just a garden-variety liar.

Rather, we've entered the realm of superhuman ability. So that's something to be taken more seriously.

x) Apropos (ix), it then becomes a question of how to distinguish messages from God from messages from evil spirits.

Evil spirits have a very different character than God. By the same token, messages from evil spirits have a very different character than messages from God.

xi) A final objection is that my argument makes assumptions about dating and authorship. That's true, and there's an abundant literature defending those assumptions.

All I'm doing is to sketch the outline of the general argument. The details can and have been penciled in elsewhere.

Luke Breuer:

"We are told in Mt 24:23–25 and Rev 13:11–15 that "mighty works" will be fraudulently produced."

That's a valid consideration in the abstract. But a basic problem with that objection is that few false prophets, cult-leaders, New Age gurus et al. (e.g. Buddha, Muhammad Joseph Smith, Bhagwan Rajneesh, Ron Hubbard, Benny Hinn, Jeane Dixon) even make it to Round 2. Precious few even pass that initial test. Either they don't perform miracles and don't make daring predictions which come true, or they make daring predictions which turn out to be false.

If a claimant can actually avoid being disqualified in the first round, then additional considerations come into play.

Open theism dilemma

Open theism suffers from a major dilemma. On the one hand, in fielding the problem of evil, open theists appeal to divine ignorance as a mitigating or exculpatory factor. For instance:

According to open theism, God has sovereignly decided to create a world with libertarianly free creatures and, since there are no true (would-) counterfactuals of creaturely freedom for God to know and since, according to open theists, libertarian freedom is incompatible with meticulous foreknowledge, God could not know for sure ahead of time what kinds of choices his free creatures will make. God would seem to be less blameworthy for not preventing evils that he didn’t know in advance would happen.

http://alanrhoda.net/wordpress/?p=102

On the other hand, open theists contend that God can anticipate the future with a high degree of probability. For instance:

…we would affirm God's comprehensive and exact knowledge of the possibilities of the future–and, as has already been said, of the gradually changed likelihood of each of those possibilities' being realized. And as the probably of a choice's being made in a certain way gradually increases toward certainty, God knows that also, often, no doubt, before the finite agent herself is aware of it. W. Hasker, God, Time, and Knowledge (Cornell, 1998), 189.

Many prophecies, in fact, have a conditional character, such as “If a nation does not do such and such, then it will be destroyed” (see Jeremiah 18:7–10, for example). Second, many prophetic predictions are based upon existing trends and tendencies, which provide God with enough evidence to foresee the future (Hasker 1989, 195). (Hasker places Jesus' prediction about Peter in this category, by the way.) Finally, some prophecies simply reveal what God has already decided to bring about in the future (Hasker 1989, 195). Since God's own actions in the future are up to God, it is possible for God to know about them even though they are contingent, so it is possible for prophecies to reveal them.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/prophecy/#3

Indeed, it's an essential component of religious devotion to say that God can be trusted to keep his promises.

To the extent that proponents accentuate divine ignorance as a distinctive element and advantage of an open theist theodicy, they undercut the claim that God can accurately anticipate the future and thereby be trusted to keep his promises.

Conversely, to the extent that proponents accentuate God's high probabilistic knowledge of the future, they undercut the appeal to divine ignorance to exonerate God in relation to evil.

Close Gitmo!

Human rights and civil liberties groups have long lobbied for the closure of Gitmo. I share their concern.

I think the next president should enter into negotiations with the government of Brazil to lease or buy Ilha da Queimada Grande. Another possibility is to swap Gitmo for Queimada Grande. With a bit of remodeling, I'm sure Brazil could turn Gitmo into really nice tourist resort.

Queimada Grande is a far more fitting domicile for captured terrorists like members of ISIS. And it has the added advantage of preparing them for what to expect in the afterlife:

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/features/00/fieldtales/snakeisland/

http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/snake-island-ilha-de-queimada-grande

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjaz0mynQvk

[Last link contains some bad language]

Journey to the center of darkness

Here's an article by a disenchanted "queer" activist. She hasn't changed her ideology. But it is a revealing insider account of how activists think–or don't think:

http://www.mcgilldaily.com/2014/11/everything-problematic/

Did The Apostle John Die As A Martyr?

It's common to refer to John as the only apostle who didn't die as a martyr. He probably was a martyr, though. See here. His martyrdom is affirmed by Matthew, Mark, and Papias, and it's referred to indirectly by The Martyrdom Of Polycarp and the second-century heretic Heracleon. Concerning Heracleon, see here.

I've written a series of posts on the death of the apostles.

Why I became a conservative

I don't assume the DOJ report is reliable. That said, this is still a useful article:

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/frenchrevolution/2015/03/17/the-ferguson-report-reminds-me-why-i-became-a-conservative/

Slight Overreaction

https://rdtwot.wordpress.com/2015/03/17/slight-overreaction/

Redeeming Mathematics interview

"Redeeming Mathematics: Finding the Glory of God in 2 + 2" with Vern Poythress.

Nazi heaven

Universalism enjoys a certain general emotional appeal. But its emotional appeal depends on the examples used to illustrate universalism. If it's the fate of your loved ones, then it's very attractive. 

Suppose Anne Frank wound up in the laboratory of Josef Mengele. Suppose she was subjected to the infamous Nazi "medical" experimentation. You can Google the subject.

If universalism is true, let's say both Josef and Anne go to temporary hell when they die. In universalism, hell is really Purgatory.

If, after however much remedial punishment, Josef says uncle before Anne, he beats her to heaven.

Anne will not be allowed into heaven until she forgives Josef. Anne will not be allowed into heaven until she loves Josef. Anne will continue to be punished until she is bullied or terrorized into submission. 

Seems to me that whatever abstract or general appeal universalism may have, it lacks universal appeal. Once you begin to cite hard cases, which can be vastly multiplied, it instantly loses its facile emotional appeal.

At this point a universalist might counter that according to the Gospel, God can forgive very evil people. And we should forgive whoever God has forgiven.

But while that's true, that's shifting ground from the the emotional appeal of universalism. To a great extent, that's the opposite. It's emotionally repellent to the victims. It cuts against the grain of human nature to overcome that moral and emotional aversion.

As such, a universalist can't consistently deploy both lines of appeal. He can't begin with an appeal to moral intuition, then when that backfires, switch to a counterintuitive appeal to the Gospel. Those are two opposing principles.

Was Job a real person?

1. Not surprisingly, recent commentaries on Job (e.g. Gerald Wilson, John Walton, Tremper Longman) question or deny the historicity of Job. Not just the protagonist, but the book as a whole. I say "not surprisingly," because evangelical scholarship has shifted to the left.  

i) One contention is that the historicity of Job has no bearing on the theological lessons in the book. But that's a somewhat circular claim to evaluate. If, in fact, Job is fictional, then it's theological value is independent of historicity. But, of course, its historicity is the very question at issue. So we can't just assume the conclusion.

ii) All things being equal, whether or not Job was a real person does seem to be quite germane to the theological value of the book. When pious Jews and Christians find themselves in the midst of a personal ordeal, they take encouragement from the fact that other believers have gone through the same kind of ordeal. They endured. God preserved them. They emerged intact on the other side of the ordeal. 

If, however, Job is a fictional character, then he wasn't really hurting. He couldn't be hurt. 

In that event, his survival doesn't give us any concrete encouragement. He didn't experience the doubts and emotions that real believers experience in that situation. He didn't actually work through that ordeal. 

I think Job loses most of its inspirational value if the historicity of the protagonist is denied. At that level it's about as edifying as movies about superheroes who overcome great adversity. 

iii) A stock objection to the historicity of Job is the speeches. Surely a grieving man (and his friends) didn't really talk in those long, highflown speeches. Likewise, the symmetry of the beginning and ending, where his restoration doubles what he had before. Isn't that unrealistic?

And there's undoubtedly a grain of truth to that objection. But it's a shallow objection. 

Poetry and historicity are not antithetical. Take the Psalter. Take historical Psalms like Pss 78, 105, 106, 136). These are historical overviews, historical narratives, of God's dealings with ancient Israel. The form is poetic, but the content is historical. 

Or take the Psalms of David and Asaph. These are autobiographical. When David and Asaph prayed in private, I don't think they used that elevated language. Yet these psalms are based on real prayers, real-life experience. Because they were written for public consumption, they are stylized. They tone up the original language. Use picturesque metaphors. 

But it's not fictional. David and Asaph were real people. They had to face real challenges. They prayed real prayers. These aren't just literary constructs. 

2. A related question is whether the antagonist in Job 1-2 is the devil. Once again, it's not surprising that the same commentators distance themselves from the traditional identification.

i) One objection is that the designation is a title, not a proper name. It has a definite article. Therefore, it should be rendered the Adversary or the Accuser rather than Satan. 

I think that's true as far as it goes. Of course, to call the antagonist the Adversary or the Accuser would be perfectly consistent with his diabolical identity. Indeed, Rev 12:10 refers to Satan as the "accuser of the brethren" (KJV). 

ii) Recent commentators identify the antagonist as a member of the divine council. But as I read it, he isn't included as a regular member of that body. Rather, he happens to present himself on that occasion. He might just as well be a former member. 

iii) Commentators also think it's unrealistic that Satan would retain that kind of access to God. Wasn't he expelled from heaven? Surely they deactivated his keycard. He can't swipe the lock and enter the throne room whenever he pleases. 

In a sense, I agree, but it's a shallow objection. The entire depiction is anthropomorphic. And that's true concerning Biblical scenes of heaven generally. 

I don't think God dwells in a celestial palace. I don't think he holds an audience with the angelic entourage in the throne room. That's picture language, borrowed from earthly examples.

If God and angels are supersensible beings, they don't have face-to-face meetings. They don't communicate with each other in Hebrew. 

So the question is how do angels relate to God? I assume it's mind-to-mind rather than face-to-face. They communicate telepathically. 

(BTW, it's interesting that even people born blind can dream. But they have auditory dreams.)

In that sense, Satan does have access to God. He can make his thoughts known to God. God knows what Satan is thinking. And Satan can direct his thoughts to God, just as Christians in silent prayer can direct their thoughts to God. 

Indeed, God knows what Satan is up to even when Satan would prefer to be incognito and incommunicado. God is a mind-reader. 

So the question is whether God would respond to Satan. The answer depends whether it serves his purpose to respond to Satan.  

And, in fact, Job is a case in point. The Adversary thinks he's using God, but in reality, God is using the Adversary. 

iv) This also goes to the question of the antagonist's character in Job 1-2. Suppose the antagonist in Gen 1-2 is morally ambiguous. We can't tell if he's good or evil.

Yet that, of itself, is suspicious. There are only two kinds of angels: fallen and unfallen. Good and evil. 

Humans are morally ambiguous, but angels are not. Fallen angels are evil. There's no residual good. 

At the same time, it often serves the purpose of evil agents to conceal their true character. To pretend to be well-meaning.  

Even if the antagonist in Job 1-2 comes across as morally neutral, that, itself, is morally dubious. 

I'd also add that he cuts a very different figure than Michael or Gabriel. They're ultimate loyalties are not ambiguous. 

v) However, I don't think the antagonist in Job 1-2 is morally ambiguous. As Hartley points out, he's a troublemaker. 

Moreover, the Adversary isn't really impugning Job's fidelity. Rather, he's using Job as a stalking horse to impugn God's wisdom. The insinuation is that observant Jews are playing God for a chump. They're like obsequious courtiers. A naive king is duped by their flatteries. But they don't revere the king. The simply pander to the king to get what they need. 

It isn't Job's worthiness, but God's worthiness, that the Adversary is angling at. Yet he's too stealthy to confront God directly. 

vi) In that regard, there's family resemblance between the antagonist in Gen 3, Job 1-2, and Mt 4. In each instance, the antagonist doesn't exude pure evil. Rather, he adopts a rational pose. He attempts to sow doubt by innuendo. By leading questions. They share a common modus operandi. And that reminds me of two comparisons:

vii) Ted Bundy was a notorious serial killer. Yet he hid in plain sight. He had a disarming personality:

He was a budding lawyer, handsome, charming and bright. With all that charisma, he attracted women as if they were flies and he were sugar. It didn't hurt that he had a good job -- assistant to the governor of Washington. 

So it is not unusual that Ann Rule and Ted Bundy would become friends. Each volunteered on a crisis hot line in Seattle. She had seen him talk somebody "down." They conversed often. 

What's not to like? 

It was the early 1970s. Rule was working on a book, her first, about a Seattle-area serial killer. Imagine her shock and surprise when evidence pointed to the killer being Bundy.
Meeting the serial rapist/murderer in prison "didn't bother me," Rule said. "For a long time I was holding out hope that he was innocent, that somehow this all was a terrible mistake. And it wasn't just me, it was all the people who worked with him. In order for us to work at the crisis center, we had to pass a psychiatric evaluation, and both of us did. Everybody was expected to be pretty well adjusted there so all of his friends were saying there was no way, it couldn't be." 

http://www.chron.com/entertainment/article/True-crime-writer-Ann-Rule-sees-Ted-Bundy-story-2113259.php

viii) In addition, it reminds me of a certain type of villain. There's the kind of villain who doesn't commit crime. He doesn't take the risk. Rather, he entices others to commit crime. If caught, they take the rap.

For instance, take movies about a college student. He's an alpha male. Athletic, handsome, brilliant, dominant. A natural leader. But he's morally twisted. Cruel.

Weaker male students are drawn to him. He takes pleasure in enticing them to cross a moral or legal line of no return. A rite of passage. They are desperate to win his approval. 

But when they go through with it, they take the rap. It's their fingerprints on at the crime scene, not his.

He takes delight in ruining other people's lives at a safe distance, through entrapment. The catalyst in their downfall.

That's the attitude I see displayed by the antagonist in Gen 3, Job 1-3, and Mt 4. Satan is a trickster. He reveals his true character, less by what he says than what he beguiles others to do at his behest. His character is manifest in the disastrous outcome of taking his advice. In Job 1-2, his strategy backfires. That's because he's up against a superior opponent. God tricks the trickster. 

The line that we MUST hold

Is Obama Really a Christian?

http://www.nationalreview.com/node/415266/print

The Eternity of Hell-Torments

By the late great evangelist:

http://www.ccel.org/ccel/whitefield/sermons.xxviii.html

The Song of Songs

I'll make a few brief observations about the Song of Solomon:

i) It seems to be attributed to Solomon, and the setting reflects the Solomonic court. Likewise, Solomon is repeatedly mentioned. And the plot only has two main characters.  

ii) An objection to Solomonic authorship is that given his notorious promiscuity, he's a poor candidate to celebrate devoted love. 

One counterargument is that this work celebrates the love of his life. His one true love. Or first love. Moreover, it may have been written early in life, before he become so degenerate. 

There are, however, two other problems with the objection:

a) A minor correction is that his promiscuous reputation is somewhat exaggerated. The fact that he had 700 queens and 300 concubines doesn't mean he was sexually active with all–or even most–of them. Many were political marriages to seal a military or economic alliance with a neighboring city-state or nation. Likewise, harems were inherited. But by them, some of the harem girls were getting up in years.

This is not to deny that Solomon was promiscuous–even exceptionally promiscuous. Unfortunately, it's not uncommon for kings to exploit their position in that respect. Classic abuse of power.  

b) In addition, there's no reason to presume that this work is strictly or literally autobiographical. Love stories and love poems are often fictional. They celebrate a romantic ideal. Indeed, poets sometimes resort to fiction in this regard precisely because they yearn for something that real life disappoints. It's a fantasy of how they wish things were. And the advantage of fiction is that you can control the action. The disadvantage is that fiction lacks the vividness of genuine experience.

So it's possible that while the work is informed by Solomon's sexual experience, the work itself is fictional. If so, then it could well celebrate monogamous love. People can sincerely honor and desire something they personally fall short of attaining. Indeed, their very failure may heighten the contrast between the hoped-for ideal and the frustrating reality.

Even if it's "based on a true story," the poet may exercise great literary license. It's hard to say how much is imaginative. And I don't think that detracts from the value of the work. It's not a historical narrative like Genesis.  

iii) Another objection is that this work doesn't specify marital love. 

However, one problem with that objection is that the lyric poetic genre leaves the narrative sequence somewhat ambiguous. The plot may not be rigorously linear. Rather, it may circle around in flashbacks or erotic dreams.  

Scholars differ on whether or not there's chronological progression. Is it single to married? Sexual coming of age (e.g. Garrett)? Or is the couple married throughout (e.g. Hess)?

But the gist of the narrative seems to be courtship followed by marriage. A couple falls in love. They experience intense physical longing to consummate their love. They are tempted to prematurely gratify their passion. So the first part accentuates breathless anticipation. 

In the second part we have the honeymoon. This is initially rapturous, yet the bride experiences a sense of letdown. After the initial climax, the rest of the poem describes the development of a more stable, enduring love. It gives the reader the typical ups and downs of falling in love, the wedding night, and the adjustment to life together. Anticlimax follows climax. What do you do for an encore? 

Also, insofar as the predominate narrative outlook of the work is from the perspective of the heroine, the bride is more likely to feel a sense of letdown than the groom. 

That's perfectly consistent with a monogamous storyline. They keep their passions in check before the wedding. That's somewhat obscured by the impressionistic quality of the presentation. 

iv) Thus far I've been viewing the work as a tribute to romantic love. And as one commentator notes, the canon would be unbalanced if it only addressed sexuality in terms of prohibitions, rather than a positive treatment. 

v) There is, however, a long history of allegorical interpretations. One of the most ironic is the Marian interpretation, favored by some Catholic commentators. That evinces the desperation of Catholics to prooftext their Marian dogmas. In addition, this work furnishes singularly intractable material to illustrate the perpetual virginity of Mary! 

vi) It's sometimes said, even by otherwise reputable scholars (e.g. Clines), that the account was allegorized to make it into the canon–or keep it in the canon. But other scholars says there's precious little evidence that it's erotic content was an obstacle to canonization. 

If Scripture can be very explicit about sexual immorality, why can't it be fairly explicit about marital love? 

Moreover, the imagery isn't really explicit. Rather, the poet skillfully uses provocative comparisons. The detailed descriptions are not about erogenous anatomy, but figurative analogues (e.g. a cluster of grapes). So there's nothing "pornographic" about the imagery. It uses prosaic words for sexual anatomy. The elaboration shifts to figurative imagery.

vii) Certainly the Bible uses marriage as a theological metaphor. That's deployed by turns to illustrate fidelity and infidelity. The marital metaphor is an emotional resonant and powerful image to illustrate the possessive and protective nature of God's love for Israel and/or the Church. 

But any analogy includes disanalogies, and the allegorical interpretation of the work would accentuate the disanalogies to an incongruous degree. Lovesick men and women have limited control over their feelings. The beloved can elicit emotions from the lover. It's an involuntary response. 

Surely that's a very unsuitable illustration of how God and Christians interrelate. Do we tug his heartstrings the way the beloved in this poem affects her lover? Is God crazy in love with sinners? Must he keep his passions under tight rein? 

I think the poem is clearly describing human romance. That can become a basis for theological metaphors, not vice versa. Not in this instance.

"For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man"

A major divide exists among scholars on the precise understanding of idias epiluseos ["from an individual's own interpretation," or "by the will of man"]. Some, such as Kelly, assert that this verse forbids the private interpretation of Scripture by the reader (or hearer) outside of an authority such as the church. Thus, idias, "from an individual's own," would refer to any reader of Scripture, rather than to the prophet who authored Scripture. Along with epiluseos, "interpretation," these two words would pertain to any person's unauthorized, illegitimate interpretation of written Scripture. 

However, that understanding of idias epiluseos does not make sense in the present context. In 2 Pet 1:16-18, Peter addressed the divine origin of the apostolic message. 2 Pet 2:21 addresses the same issue of origin regarding Scripture in general. Moreover, 2 Pet 1:21 includes the explanatory gar, "for," which draws  close connection between 2 Pet 1:21 and 2 Pet 1:20, implying that Peter's further declarations about the inspiration of Scripture in 2 Pet 1:21 are intended to elaborate upon his statements in 2 Pet 1:20. Thus, 2 Pet 1:20 too must be about the origin and inspiration of Scripture, not about its later interpretation by readers. Since the context of 2 Pet 1:20 addresses Scripture's divine origin, and since idias epilueos ["by the will of man"] in 2 Pet 1:20 supports this topic if taken to refer to a prophetic author (rather than a later reader), the best conclusion is that 2 Pet 1:20 speaks of the divine origin of Scripture as well. C. Giese, 2 Peter and Jude (Concordia 2012), 93-94.

Augustine's friend

"Augustine's friend" by Paul Helm.

We're Marching to Zion

What's kind of funny about these anecdotes is that, to my knowledge, Southern Baptists are typically cessationists, but here's a classic example of–admittedly unsolicited–"charismatic" guidance:

3. In 1979 in Houston, messengers at the convention elected Adrian Rogers as the first conservative in a series of conservatives. Why did the organizers of the movement choose Rogers to nominate? 

We were ideologically bent, not candidate-bent. And so we went around and told people we could change by electing the right president. Then the night before the [1979 annual meeting in Houston] … we talked, we prayed, we fellowshipped and then we discussed for an hour or so who the best candidate would be. And three names came to the surface: Adrian Rogers, Bailey Smith and Jerry Vines. … Adrian was the overwhelming choice. When I told him, he said, “That’s good, but I’m not going to be nominated.” … So I went to bed Monday night thinking we didn’t have a candidate. What happened after that is that Adrian Rogers ran into Mrs. Bertha Smith. … She said, “Adrian, God’s changing my mind: he’s telling me you’re to be elected as president of the convention tomorrow.” Then Adrian went up to his hotel room and [his wife] Joyce was up there — and Joyce had been very opposed to his running. And she said, “Adrian, God’s changing my mind. I think you’re supposed to be nominated tomorrow.” Well, that really shook him, because the two women he was closest to in the world — and the two who had been telling him not to run — had changed their minds. So he took the elevator down to walk around, and when he got to the first floor, coming from one direction was Paige Patterson coming from the other direction was Jerry Vines. And he said, “Men, we gotta talk.” So they got back on the elevator and went in with Joyce. They prayed the matter through, and Adrian decided to run. So I found out who I was voting for when I came down the morning of the election.

4. Can you describe the 1979 election of Adrian Rogers? 

My son, when he was 10 years old, developed a seizure condition. And he was having a particularly hard time [the morning of the election]. …  So I was completely preoccupied during the vote. 

I need to tell you another story: about four times before the convention, I had this dream of God’s people marching along Main St. in Houston with that white line in the center. We were marching to the convention hall, and we’re singing “We’re Marching to Zion.” I told my wife Nancy about it; I had it at least four times. We had no idea it would have any significance. Then the day of the election, I heard the nominations. … And there was confusion on the stage [because the registration secretary could not be found]. And then [presiding president Jimmy Allen] said, “Well, we have to do something until we find [the recorder]. Song leader, come lead us in a song.” The song leader came and said, “Let’s all stand and sing, ‘We’re Marching to Zion.’” And I burst out crying and dropped into my seat. I told Paige Patterson, who was next to me, “Adrian’s won without a run-off. I’ve had a sign.” And in five minutes, Adrian had won without a run-off. 

It is unbelievable. … But, I think sometimes when you’re in a great deal of conflict, God gives you a sign that this is his and not yours. 

http://www.sbts.edu/resources/towers/seven-questions-with-paul-pressler-about-the-conservative-resurgence/

The pattern for redemption

http://www.sbts.edu/resources/towers/the-fountainhead-of-ot-theology-garrett-discusses-exodus-commentary/

After the Resurrection

http://www.sbts.edu/resources/towers/dont-fall-away-schreiner-discusses-the-biblical-theology-of-hebrews/

"Protective strategies"

I was asked to comment on this article:

http://www.academia.edu/10039504/_Protective_Strategies_and_the_Prestige_of_the_Academic_A_Religious_Studies_and_Practice_Theory_Redescription_of_Evangelical_Inerrantist_Scholarship

By way of background, I believe the author was a student of Peter Enns. Not just a student, but–along with Art Boulet–a Peter Enns loyalist and committed apologist for Enns. In this article, Young isn't laying his own cards on the table. 

In addition, the presentation is phony because Young feigns the pose of a disinterested observer who is simply offering an ideologically neutral or merely descriptive sociological analysis of inerrantist "discourse." But that's just a ruse to attack inerrancy while concealing his own agenda and ideological commitments. 

Let's take a few representative statements: 

…a protective strategy that privileges claims about the Bible's divine nature in order to shield it from historical, social, and other kinds of standard explanatory-reductionist analyses that would approach biblical writings like other human writings (22). 

First, inerrantist theorizing vigorously represents its projects as historical/academic study, buttressed by specialized epistemology and theory-of-religion frameworks…These protective strategies serve to block analysis of the Bible through ordinary historical, social, anthropological, and scientific academic methods should they yield findings about the Bible that transgress how inerrantists understand the Bible's claims–especially that the Bible is inerrant (24).

i) At the risk of stating the obvious, Christian scholars are expected to act as Christian believers. Naturally a Christian scholar will treat the Bible differently than the Iliad. 

Naturally Christian Bible scholarship will operate within a "theory-of-religion framework." Christianity is a religion. Scripture is a religious document. As Christians, our theological viewpoint will inevitably inform our engagement of Scripture–just as Scripture will inform our theological viewpoint. That's integral to the specific belief-system. 

ii) Apropos (i), Christianity claims to be a revealed religion. Its veracity is grounded in the revelatory status of Scripture. To be a Christian is, among other things, to grant the revelatory identity of the Bible. If you're not a Christian, you won't. 

There is no middle ground or common ground between these two positions. Scripture either is or is not divine revelation. Of course we don't expect a secular scholar to operate with Christian presuppositions. But by the same token, we should not expect a Christian scholar to operate with secular presuppositions. In the nature of the case, Christian Bible scholarship is…Christian. An expression of Christian faith. Both the individual faith of a Christian scholar and the corporate faith of the religious community to which he belongs. It is, in the first instance, scholarship by Christians and for Christians. We don't impose our outlook on unbelievers and outsiders. By the same token, they are not entitled to impose their outlook on us. 

iii) This doesn't mean we merely stipulate our position. We can and should argue for why the Bible ought to be "privileged." Likewise, we can and should challenge secular historiography. 

iv) Defending the inspiration of Scripture against naturalistic reductive explanations is no different than defending religious experience from naturalistic reductive explanations, viz. Freud's projective theory of religious belief. Defending Scripture is not in a class apart from defending Christianity in general. It's no different than developing a theodicy in response to the problem of evil. That's a case of Christians behaving as…Christians. That's how we think. 

v) Sound scholarship will treat a document for whatever it really is. If the Bible is divine revelation, then scholarship ought to take that into account. If scholarship fails to make allowance for the nature of the document in question, then scholarship will mischaracterize the document. If Scripture is divine revelation, then sound scholarship will treat it for what it really is. To ignore that fact will derail the analysis.  

vi) I don't think that Christians should accept every religious document on its own terms. I don't accept the Koran on its own terms. Or the Book of Mormon. Or 1 Enoch. Or Swedenborg's Arcana Coelestia.

But what's nonsenesical about Young's position is his objection to Christians accepting the Bible on its own terms. If Young was logical, what he'd say is not that Christians should stop accepting Scripture on its own terms, but that Christians should stop being Christian. That would at least be consistent–albeit malignly consistent. 

vii) The way Young frames the issue is deceptively one-sided. He acts as though there's a value-free way of approaching the Bible. "Standard" scholarship should treat the Bible just like any other human document. But that only follows if, in fact, the Bible really is just like any other human document. So that's prejudicial.

Methodological atheism or naturalistic historiography isn't a value-free exercise. The question of Scripture's revelatory identity is not a methodological issue, but a substantive issue. A method can't prejudge the answer to that question, for that determination requires a scholar to evaluate the claims of Scripture. 

viii) Conversely, secular scholars have their own "protective strategies." Secular scholars "privilege" their own operating assumptions, viz. philosophy of religion, methodological atheism, naturalistic historiography. They presume that Scripture can't be what it claims to be. They don't think the miraculous events in Scripture did happen or could happen. Secular scholars are "insiders" in relation to Christian "outsiders." You're an insider vis-a-vis whatever constitutes your frame of reference. That's not unique to Christians. That's ubiquitous. 

It's duplicitous for Young to act as though Christian scholars have a "specialized epistemology and theory-of-religion frameworks," but secular scholars don't. He knows better. That's just an affectation to foster the illusion that "standard" historical, social, anthropological, and scientific academic methods are unbiased and evenhanded–unlike those tendentious inerrantists who demand special treatment. 

Given his reactionary mindset, Young may well be too hidebound to appreciate that he's swirling around in the same cyclical process. But he mirrors his current social circle. And his article is playing to a sympathetic audience. His hostility towards inerrantist scholarship disarms his capacity for self-criticism. 

ix) If Scripture is divine revelation, then it's proper to disallow interpretations that are inconsistent with its revelatory nature. Given the inspiration of Scripture, certain constraints are bound to follow. And for Christians, the inspiration of Scripture is a given.

You can try to say that's mistaken. Yet in that case, it's not the logic that's mistaken, but the premise. If Christianity is false, then that's not a given. But that's a different argument. And it's incumbent on a critic to actually make that argument. 

If you're going to attack the inerrancy of Scripture–don't attack the conclusion, attack the premise. Young's article is reactionary and intellectually confused. Just admit that you no longer share a Christian outlook on Scripture. 

Evangelical atheism

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/03/what-scares-the-new-atheists?

Men can have abortions too!

Political correctness is now tripping over its own flat feet:

http://www.nationalreview.com/node/415391/print

One of the problems with infidelity is that the more consistent you are, the less consistent you are. If you take a contradictory position to its logical extreme, it exposes the incoherence of the position.

“Pope Francis” on “being pope”: “Hard to get good pizza”

Pope Francis: “Cannot get out for pizza”
“In any event, I find a way” 

“Pope Francis” gave another interview, this one on “being pope”.

In the interview, he seems tired and washed up, not closing the door on a potential retirement. In fact, he says, “I have the feeling that my Pontificate will be brief: 4 or 5 years; I do not know, even 2 or 3. Two have already passed. It is a somewhat vague sensation.”

I am reminded of this blog post: “Killing Time with Good Pope Francis”: “After all the fudging and bluster of papal history, they don’t really know what is ‘essential to the mission’ of the papacy.”

In any event, on to the interview:

Q. “Do you like being Pope?”

A. “I do not mind!”

Q. “What do you like or do not like about being the Pope? Or do you like everything?”

A. “The only thing I would like is to go out one day, without being recognized, and go to a pizzeria for a pizza. That would be nice. No, I say this as an example. In Buenos Aires I was a rover. I moved between parishes and certainly this habit has changed... it has been hard work to change. But you get used to it. You find a way to get around: on the phone, or in other ways ...”

LGBT backlash

http://barbwire.com/2015/03/12/0900-we-will-tell-you-what-to-believe/

Should you have a "personal relationship" with Jesus?

It's often said that many men are turned off by church because many churches have become too feminine in terms of sermon content, "praise songs," and the like. In the same vein, I wonder how many men find the phrase about "having a personal relationship with Jesus" off-putting. 

Of course, the fact that something is off-putting doesn't make it wrong. But this isn't a Biblical formulation.

To be sure, a concept can be present absent a particular form of words. But is this "relational" language Biblical?

In fact, this is more than just a popular evangelical phrase. It's becoming a theological paradigm: relational theology–in contrast to Reformed theology and/or classical theism.

In fairness, I believe the "personal relationship" slogan was introduced to counter nominal Christianity or ritual piety. The notion that we relate to God primarily through the sacraments, or liturgy, or that church attendance makes you a Christian. It's a corrective to that outlook. 

But an on obvious problem with the "personal relationship" language is that it has the wrong connotations. Take a recent illustration by William Lane Craig:

You don’t communicate with another person through a third-person relationship. You enter into what has been called an “I-thou” relationship. You speak to another person, not just about that person. Your girlfriend or wife would be decidedly unimpressed if you rationalized never telling her “I love you” on the grounds that she already knows that! Anybody that obtuse is on his way to a break-up! Two people who are in love with each other want to speak to each other, to build an intimate relationship with each other. 

http://www.reasonablefaith.org/what-is-the-point-of-prayer

A "personal relationship" has romantic connotations. Boyfriend/girlfriend, husband/wife.

At least in my experience, normal men wouldn't use "I want a personal relationship" in any context other than a romantic relationship. It's not something they'd normally say in reference to their father, mother, sister, brother, son, or daughter.

Imagine if one teenage boy told another teenage boy: "Ryan, I want to have a personal relationship with you!"

That's just not how two straight males communicate with each other. Even if the teenager in question wants to be friends with Ryan, that's certainly not how he'd put it. 

Also, many men express affection less by what they say to others than what they do for others. Love in action rather than love in words. Even if they want a personal relationship with a woman, this doesn't mean that's what they'd say to her. 

The incongruity is compounded by the fact that Jesus isn't God in the abstract, but God as male. The Son became Incarnate as a man.

We have that mental image of Jesus. To tell a normal man that he should have a "personal relationship with Jesus," when "Jesus" naturally evokes the image of an adult male, cuts against grain of how God created men to think about other men–at least in colloquial English parlance. 

Although Scripture uses marital theological metaphors, these are corporate metaphors. They were not designed to operate at an individual, one-on-one level. 

Another problem with that lingo is that God isn't ordinarily available to Christians in that tangible, audiovisual respect. God won't hug you. 

That linguistic conditioning can accentuate a sense of divine abandonment if you expect God to "be there" for you. It's not so much that God is absent in times of trial. For God was never present in that sense in the first place. It isn't physical. 

Up to a point, I don't think it's wrong for Christian men and women to have different ways of "relating" to God. Men and women are psychologically different from each other. A metaphor that's suited to one sex may be less suitable to the opposite sex. The problem is when a feminine paradigm gets imposed on men. That rankles. 

Does God suffer?

A number of avant-garde theologians promote the notion of a suffering God. Predictably, this has a candle-like attraction for mothy freewill theists. 

A suffering God is supposed to be an improvement over the "remote" God of classical theism, who lies behind the bulletproof glass of divine timelessness, spacelessness, aseity, and impassibility. 

Now, in fairness, the God of classical theism can indeed be remote. Classical theism isn't specifically Christian. It doesn't select for Bible history. Al-Ghazâlî was a classical theist. Maimonides was a classical theist. Leibniz was a classical theist. 

Classical theism is consistent with a number of variety theistic traditions. I think it's fairly consistent with Biblical theism–if you make allowance for anthropomorphic representations. When Classical theism is nested within the framework of Biblical theism, God is not remote. 

But a fundamental problem with redefining God as a suffering God is that while theologians can tweak their doctrine of God–especially if they don't feel constrained by Biblical revelation–they can't tweak the world we live in. At the stroke of a pen they can rewrite their doctrine of God (although that makes it a fictional God), but they can't rewrite the world we inhabit at the stroke of a pen.

To say that God suffers with us doesn't make God answer desperate prayers more frequently, doesn't make God prevent personal tragedies more frequently. It's just a rhetorical construct. It does no work.  

To take a comparison: suppose you have a teenage jock who's impatient with the elderly and the handicapped. He's in a hurry. He likes to do things at his own brisk pace. He parks in the disabled parking slot for convenience, rather than walk a few extra yards. 

But then he has a terribly accident that leaves him partially paralyzed. Through physical therapy and dogged determination, he regains his mobility. 

But now he's considerate to the elderly and the handicapped. He knows what it's like. 

If that were the effect of divine suffering on the God of these theologians, it would have some benefit for humans. But in reality, it doesn't change the world we live in. It makes no practical difference to our own challenges. It doesn't alleviate our suffering. 

It's like a fictional character in a movie who undergoes redemptive suffering. That may be inspiring for 90 minutes. But then you exit the theater for the mean streets of reality. 

Of course, Christianity has a suffering God-Man. A suffering Savior. An empathetic Redeemer. But over and above that is the need for to be delivered from our condition:

Perhaps the best way to try to understand the nature of this problem is to take a familiar modern analogy--that of doctor and patient. Someone lying in a hospital bed does not want to be solely treated by a machine, which functions regardless of the pain it might inflict. Rather, the patient wants to be treated by someone who understands what he or she is going through, and who will sensitively adjust his approach. For this, a human being is essential, and any good doctor knows that his or her bedside manner is at least as important as any medicine. But having said that, what patient wants the doctor to climb into the bed next to him or her and start making groaning noises, as if to indicate that the doctor, too, is experiencing the same pain? This is not the kind of "empathy" desired, because the fundamental reason the patient wants the doctor is not to receive sympathy from him or her; the patient can get that just as easily from any medically unskilled visitor. What the patient wants is to be cured. Understanding pain is all very well, but overcoming it is what all sufferers really want. God is impassible, not because he is uncaring (he is in fact far more compassionate than any human being ever could be), but because he is strong to save. Unlike human doctors, who are available only at certain times and who are occasionally "off sick" themselves, God is always ready and able to help. The impassibility of his nature is, therefore, a guarantee that he will always be there. 

http://www.theologian.org.uk/doctrine/cangodsuffer.html

CNN On Mary's Perpetual Virginity

An upcoming program in CNN's Finding Jesus series is going to be about James, the James Ossuary, and whether Mary had children after Jesus. You can find a lot of material on the perpetual virginity of Mary in the thread here. Keep in mind that not only does the New Testament contradict the perpetual virginity of Mary, but so do most of the earliest sources of the patristic era who comment on the subject: Josephus, Hegesippus, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Hippolytus, etc.

The Lost World of Genesis One in review

http://whatswrongwiththeworld.net/2015/03/review_of_john_h_waltons_the_l.html

Whose side is he on?

An old story that needs to get more attention:

http://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/2013/05/doj-social-media-posts-trashing-muslims-may-violate-civil-rights/

Demon seed

i) There are three variations on the angelic interpretation of Gen 6:1-4:

a) Fallen angels morphed into human males. I've discussed that variation.

b) Fallen angels reanimated human corpses. Aside from B horror flicks about voodoo zombies, I don't know of any real-life cases. 

c) Fallen angels took possession of human males. 

Let's briefly consider (iii). Given the frequency of possession in some parts of the world, both past and present, the odds are that some children were conceived by demoniacs. Are they giants? Do they have superior athletic prowess?

I expect that many missionaries in Africa and Asia can tell stories of demoniacs and their offspring. 

ii) Offhand, I'll give one example. I should begin by explaining how I approach this material:

a) It could be that Nicky Cruz is exaggerating or confabulating. Sensational conversion stories can jumpstart a career. Moreover, that's is not uncommon in charismatic circles. So I make allowance for that possibility.

But with that caveat in mind, I'm prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt:

b) Given the prevalence of the occult in Latin America, I think it plausible that his parents were deeply involved in the occult.

c) I could be mistaken, but from what I've read, his life and ministry has been scandal-free since he converted, over 50 years ago. Given the temptations of a celebrity convert, charismatic superstar, and televangelist, the fact that, to my knowledge, he's avoided scandal suggests to me that he's not a charlatan. He seems to have a solid Christian character. (That's not to vouch for his theology.)

iii) Even if we consider his account to be credible, there's still the question of how best to interpret the phenomenon. 

One issue is whether possession is a permanent state, or something that comes and goes. Alternately, is the alien personality always present, but only surfaces a certain times?  

With those considerations in mind:

Well I’m so happy that I know Christ as my personal savior. My life was very sad. I was born in Puerto Rico. I was born in a witchcraft home. My mother was a witch; I was planted in the womb of a witch. My father was a satanic priest. 

for many years I lived in a curse, my generation, my father and for so many generations there were involved in sacrifice of animals, the drinking’s of animals Santeria, witchcraft, black magic, that was my, I was elusive in that kind of environment.  

So then when I tried to commit suicide when I was nine years old, hanging myself from a mango tree. 

http://waysoflife.info/Literatur/E_NickyCruz.html

Seances, satanic worship, animal sacrifices… they were all a normal part of his parent’s lives. 

“I saw my mother possessed by the devil many times,” Nicky recalls. “My mother had to eat everything when she was under the influence of Satan. So did my dad. All those animals sacrifice, all the blood, all the blood that was shared and the smell was so repulsive and the spirit used to manifest. It was scaring.” 

https://www.cbn.com/700club/guests/interviews/nicky_cruz112105.aspx

Behind the home, about a hundred yards into the woods, still stood the large round building–the place that so frightened me as a child and now sent chills to the center of my being. As a boy I knew it only as the “Spirit House,” the place where my mother and father went regularly to summon the healing spirits. The town was convinced that they knew what went on here, and rumors ran thick throughout Puerto Rico, but few had seen it up close and personal. They suspected evil and talked of the hideous things going on inside the infamous Spirit House; I had seen it firsthand. 

As I stood staring at the large round building framed by trees, the memories began to rise to the surface. Memories of strange and unexplainable things that happened here on a regular basis–things that I still resist speaking of, all these years later. 

My father was a spiritist–some say the most powerful in all of Puerto Rico–and my mother was a medium. So many times I watched helplessly from outside the window as their bizarre séances raged out of control. People inside would wail and moan and scream, summoning the spirits of the dead to awaken in their presence. Sometimes these spirits would take over my mother’s body, turning her face white and her eyes violently yellow. Once I saw an evil spirit come upon her with such force that it catapulted her through the air. Though she was a small woman, it took four or five men to contain her.  

Another time I saw my father become possessed by a spirit he couldn’t control. He grabbed my youngest brother, put a rope around his neck, and tried to hang him from the limb of a tree. It took the combined strength of the whole family to hold him down as my brother slipped free. Later my father had no memory of the ordeal. In his right mind he would never have done such a thing to his children. 

Even at a young age I understood the dangers of dabbling in the occult. Yet I found myself living in a home that did far more than dabble. We were known throughout the island as the home of El Taumaturgo (the Wonder Worker, the Great One). The place you go to find the warlock and the witch of Las Piedras. 

http://waterbrookmultnomah.com/pdf/SneakPeek_SoulObsession.pdf