This Sunday, the last of the liturgical year, is Christ the king, and comes immediately before Advent. It is a slightly odd festival, since one of the key themes of Advent is not the anticipation of Christmas, but the anticipation of Jesus’ return as king; the Latin adventus is a translation of the Greek parousia (1 Thess 2.19, 3.13, 4.15, 5.23 and through the NT) which means the coming of the king or emperor to be present in the midst of his people. I think the name and timing originates from the fact that the four weeks before Advent were previously called ‘kingdom’, but this was changed to ‘Weeks before Advent’ at some point—but leaving this feast in place.
The readings set in the lectionary are Daniel 7.9-10, 13, 14, Psalm 93, Revelation 1.4b-8 and John 18.33-37. The psalm is a relatively straightforward exaltation of God as king in creation, and connects with God’s sovereignty in creation which is delegated to humanity, male and female, made in his image, created and called to exercise dominion as God’s vice-regents. The only striking thing about this is that it is Yahweh, Israel’s own god, who is sovereign over the world, and to this extent Israel is making an exclusivist claim in relation to the gods of the nations.
The reading for Daniel is more complex—but hugely significant for our understanding of Jesus and our reading of the New Testament. Daniel is very much a book of two halves, and after the narrative first half (albeit including visionary dreams within the narrative), it feels in chapter 7 as though we have entered a strange new world. In fact, the two halves correlate pretty well; the vision of the statue in chapter 2 is a symbolic representation of four human empires, ending with the Romans, all of which are destroyed by the rock ‘not cut by human hands (Dan 2.34)’ which is the kingdom of the God of heaven (Dan 2.44). These four kingdoms (Babylonian, Persian, Greek, and Roman) correspond to the four beasts of Dan 7. (See John Goldingay’s How to Read the Bible p 113 for a handy chart illustrating this—added here on the right; click on it to enlarge.) Just as the four-fold statue has been destroyed by the rock, so the four beasts are stripped of their authority, and ultimately slain, to make way for the kingdom that is given to the ‘one like a son of man’ (Dan 7.14). (An appropriate song to sing this Sunday might the chorus ‘Oh Ancient of Days‘, whose chorus consists of words taken straight from this passage.)
The dream of Dan 2, miraculously known and interpreted by Daniel, and his vision in the night of Dan 7 share a key theme. The kingdom of God that is to come is like the kingdoms of this world—it has an impact on them—but is also not like the kingdoms is this world, in that its origin is not in the will of human beings and their lust for power, but an expression of the just and righteous rule of God which will never end. This is rather important for interpreting the reading from John 18. John is distinctive in including this detailed dialogue between Jesus and Pilate. There is no need to think it was made up by John, since we know that there were followers of Jesus in the various royal households in Jerusalem, and there would certainly have been attendants in the room with Pilate and Jesus who would have heard their conversation. And, like other passages in John, it is full of ‘reality effects’—so much so that is was used verbatim as the script for this scene in Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ.
But the phrase of Jesus ‘My kingdom is not of this world’ (John 18.36) is often taken to mean that his kingdom is other-worldly, in the sense of being ethereal, or spiritual, and somehow detached from the realities of culture and politics and the nitty-gritty of everyday life. This cannot in fact be the case; even if John is the ‘spiritual gospel’, it is also the one most earthed in reality, depicting as it does a Jesus who is hungry and thirsty, lonely and tearful, and broken and bleeding on the cross. And it cannot be the case in the light of Daniel 2 and 7; ‘not of this world’ in John corresponds theologically to ‘not made by human hands’ in Daniel 2. As Jesus makes clear in the second half of the verse, the ‘other-wordly’ distinctive about his kingdom is its origin—from the will of his Father in heaven. It does have a very real impact on the human world—as Pilate is about to discover. In fact, the Greek that Jesus speaks ἡ βασιλεία ἡ ἐμή οὐκ ἔστιν ἐκ τοῦ κόσμου τούτου should be properly translated ‘My kingdom is not from this world’ (TNIV); the mistaken ‘of this world’ is another example where the tradition of the AV is one that modern translators find it hard to overturn, but it is quite misleading.
(It is also worth noting the interesting pun in the Latin Bible, Jerome’s Vulgate, which was the main translation in use until the Reformation. ‘What is truth?’ in John 18.38 becomes ‘Quid est veritas?’ which is an anagram in Latin of ‘Est vir qui adest’—‘The man who stands before you’.)
It is a shame that the lectionary omits verses 11 and 12 from the Dan 7 reading, since these are the verses which articulate the interaction between the earthly, human kingdoms and the kingdom that has come from God. The reason for the omission is, I suppose, to avoid all the awkward language of beasts and what they mean—but the result is a sense that the kingdom of God doesn’t make contact with earth, and that is quite a high price to pay.
There is a second feature of the reading from Daniel is the term ‘son of man’. The phrase is used extensively in Ezekiel, where it is God’s customary address (93 times) of the prophet, and emphasises his frail mortality—hence the common English translation ‘mortal man’. The phrase also comes in Ps 8.4, traditionally rendered:
What is man that you are mindful of him,
the son of man that you should consider him?
Modern translations turn this into the generalised ‘humankind’, which retains the meaning here, but loses the connection with other occurrences of the phrase.
The phrase is Jesus’ favourite way of referring to himself, coming as it does 78 times in the gospels (Matthew 28, Mark 14, Luke 25 and John 11 times). There has been much scholarly ink spilled in debating the meaning and significance of this term, but Jesus appears to use it with a number of different senses:
- Simply as circumlocution for ‘I’ (Matt 11.19)
- As a reference to his humanity and humility (Matt 8.20)
- Specifically with reference to his being handed over and his crucifixion (Mark 8.31, Matt 20.18)) and his resurrection (Matt 12.40)
- By contrast, it is also a title related to Jesus’ authority (Matt 9.6, 12.8)
This last point is crucial, and has two OT ideas behind it. The first comes from the theme of creation and humanity as God’s vice-regents which is alluded to in Ps 8. In that sense, Jesus is the Ideal Human, an idea re-expressed by Paul in his language of Jesus as ‘second Adam’ (Romans 5.12–17 and 1 Cor 15.45).
But the second idea is from our Daniel 7 reading—the one like a ‘son of man’ comes to the Ancient of Days on his throne and receives from him an everlasting kingdom and authority. It is clear from Dan 7.27 that this human figure stands for the ‘holy people of God’, that is, Israel set free from oppression by her enemies (compare Luke 1.71–75!). And yet Jesus takes over this term to claim that he himself has fulfilled the destiny of God’s people—Jesus himself is ‘recapitulating’ the story of Israel, and where they failed in disobedience, he remained obedient. It is the same idea behind some of Matthew’s ‘fulfilment’ verses, such as his use of Hos 11.1 in Matt 2.15, and Jesus’ re-use of Isaiah’s vineyard parable (Is 5.1–7) in Mark 12.1–9.
Understanding this is crucial to making sense of the ‘little apocalypses’ in Matt 24 (which we read in Advent in Year A) and Mark 13 (which we read last Advent and last week). The ‘coming of the Son of Man’ (Matt 24.30, Mark 13.26) is not his parousia to earth from 1 Thess 4–5, but his coming (Gk erchomenos) to the Ancient of Days from Dan 7.13. It represents not Jesus’ return to earth, but his vindication in the resurrection, exaltation in the ascension, and power of the kingdom shared by the outpouring of the Spirit on his people at Pentecost. And, of course, all this will happen ‘before this generation passes away’ (Matt 24.34, Mark 13.30). (For more detail, including on Stephen’s vision of exactly this in Acts 7.56, see my other posts on Matthew 24 and Mark 13.) It is also worth noting how Matthew in particular ties the idea of ‘Son of Man’ with Jesus royal, kingly power; in Matt 25.31 the Son of Man takes his throne, and without further announcement in Matt 25.34 becomes ‘the King’.
The reading from Rev 1 picks up all these ideas, and (as is typical of Revelation) makes what is largely implicit in the gospels explicit and plain to see. Unlike God’s people, Jesus has remained a faithful witness through trial and temptation. He is the firstborn from the dead—the first of a new kind of humanity. As king he is the ruler of the kings of the earth, and so ‘king of kings’ (Rev 17.14 and 19.16). He is sovereign over the power of sin, so is the one able to set us free from slavery to sin and offer us freedom in the promised land of his grace, by his death. And he has fulfilled God’s original intention for his people to be a kingdom of priests (Ex 19.6). It is shame this reading does not continue on to the end of the chapter, since the vision of Jesus here combines features of the vision of the Ancient of Days in Dan 7 with features of the vision of the angel in Daniel 10. Jesus (John tells us) is both the messenger from God but also the presence of God himself, a paradox that can only be solved by locating it in something like the understanding of God as Trinity.
All this still leaves us with one rather large unanswered question: if the idea of Jesus as king is so important in the NT, how come it rarely surfaces in Paul’s writings? When first writing about this, I was waiting at the airport with an eminent group of NT scholars, so I asked them. After a brief discussion, the consensus was: ‘That’s a very good question!’ Here are some possible answers.
- For Jews, the idea of expecting a coming king is very specific—it is the hope of a king like David, sitting on his throne and restoring his kingdom. For the gentiles in Paul’s audience, this meaning wouldn’t be present in the same way, and so the question does not have quite the same significance.
- In the New Testament, the word for ‘king’ and ’emperor’ are the same word. It is not clear that Paul would have wanted to suggest that Jesus was an alternative emperor for the Roman Empire, not least because of the theological relationship between the kingdoms highlighted above.
- One important idea about Jesus as king is that he brings peace. For a Jewish audience, this involved deliverance from their enemies, but (again) this idea does not translate in the same way to a Gentile audience.
- The ideas of a king with a kingdom is a political metaphor that doesn’t have a particularly strong communal dimension. In Paul, we find the unifying and communal metaphor of God’s people as the body of Christ.
Having said that, the language of ‘kingdom’ is not entirely absent from Paul’s writings; Paul does in fact talk of Jesus ‘reigning’. In English, our word king comes from German ‘König’ whilst our verb ‘reign’ comes from the Latin regnum and ultimately from rex, king. In Greek and Hebrew, however, the noun and verb are ‘cognate’—they come from the same root. So a king kings, or a reigner reigns, depending on which way you choose to go. For Paul, that Jesus is Lord (rather than Caesar) is the basic Christian confession (Romans 10.9, 1 Cor 12.3), and although his reign is presently hidden and confined, one day ‘every knee will bow’ (Phil 2.10, using Isaiah 45.23’s language of the sole kingship of God) and ‘he must reign until all his enemies are put under his feet’ (1 Cor 14.25). In case you didn’t think this was important, the verb ‘to reign’ comes seven times in the Book of Revelation!
I hope that gives you enough to preach—perhaps more than one sermon—on the idea of Christ the King this Sunday. For some other resources:
- Malcolm Guite has written a moving poem on Jesus’ crowns of thorns and glory, arising from the language of kingship in Psalm 21 here.
- Come and join James and Ian discussing these issues here:
- You might also like this well-known meditation on Jesus as king edited from a sermon by the Pentecostal Dr S M Lockridge.
“When first writing about this, I was waiting at the airport with an eminent group of NT scholars, so I asked them. After a brief discussion, the consensus was: ‘That’s a very good question!’”
I think one explanation is that the kingdom metaphoric imagery — although beloved by Christians — is in fact a very limited metaphor with few ‘consequent analogies’ — and thus does not generally feature in soteriology.
There is no volition or agency employed in being a king’s subject. You will be born into (and leave) his kingdom without choice and he might have no impact on you at all. It is unlikely a subject we will even meet their king — and certainly never be ‘with him’.
And how many kings genuinely love their subjects?
Thus, it is the Bible’s marital imagery — by a factor many times over – which is the dominant metaphor in Scripture and employed extensively in the Pauline corpus.
I missed the actual question Ian asked:
“All this still leaves us with one rather large unanswered question: if the idea of Jesus as king is so important in the NT, how come it rarely surfaces in Paul’s writings?”
The fact that none of your eminent colleagues could answer your question demonstrates how neglected the marital imagery is.
This neglect was addressed by Michael Satlow, an expert on marriage in ancient Israel, and he suggested it was neglected by the Jews themselves because they finally realised after two exiles that the divorce imagery employed by the prophets meant what it implied — ethnic Israel could be separated permanently from God.
Michael Satlow suggests Paul was the first Jew to come back to it.
Michael Satlow. Jewish Marriage in Antiquity. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2001
But God never breaks his word, Colin, even if man does. He divorced the northern tribes but maintained the covenant through the Jews.
Churches containing predominantly gentiles need to realise that Israelites being resident in Caanan is the norm and exile the exception. That a recent exile lasted 1800 years – from the failed Bar Kochba rebellion to the Zionist era – means only that we need to identify a sin worthy of 25 (roughly equalling 1800/70) times the length of exile as the idolatry for which the Jews were sent to Babylon. Believers in Jesus know what that sin was; but the logic that exile is the exception stands and the duration of exile is irrelevant. “God would never let those hard-hearted Jews back while they reject his son” is not in scripture. Rather, he graciously let them back in even though the Zionist movement was predominantly atheist (plus some Orthodox), and He is turning their hearts toward him though his Son now they are back in the land. Believers in Jesus are still only 1% of Jews in the land, but that is 30,000 of them and the pattern matches the early stages of an exponential growth. It is due to conversion as well as immigration of Jewish believers in Jesus to the Promised Land.
Almost none remained after May 1948, when most of this small community accepted ship to Liverpool in ‘Operation Mercy’ just ahead of the British withdrawal that month. Nevertheless by 1950 the Union of Messianic Jews was founded in the land, and was replaced in 1954 by the Israeli Messianic Jewish Alliance (although differences about the form of unity with gentile believers plagued these organisations). In 1967 Israel won the Six-Day War and regained Jerusalem. Messianics who were of fighting age willingly took part, and their community viewed the recovery of the city as a highly significant event on God’s end-time calendar. Their numbers began to rise from this time on. By the mid-1970s there were estimated to be many hundreds (it is impossible to be precise), and at the end of the decade the number was probably in four figures, meeting in some 15 Hebrew-speaking fellowships. By 1990 there were probably some 45 Messianic congregations – no longer restricted to the big cities – containing a few thousand believers. The 1990s saw nearly a million Jewish migrants come from the former Soviet Union. Some were one-quarter Jewish and had been brought up with little commitment to Jewish culture; these were essentially economic migrants. Some of the migrants were committed believers in Christ. In 1999 the only detailed demographic survey of the Messianic movement to date took place, by Kai Kjaer-Hansen and Bodil Skjøtt. They found about 5000 believers in roughly 80 congregations. At the turn of the present century, then, there were about 5000 ethnic Jewish believers in Jesus living in the Holy Land. Since then there has been great growth; in 2013 an estimate from a conservative source was 10,000-15,000, and an alternative estimate was as high as 23,000. In 2017 the Israel College of the Bible sent out a questionnaire, initially to leaders of Messianic congregations; returns suggested a total of about 30,000. Praise the Lord that he is turning his covenant people back to himself in the way he intends, through his son Jesus Christ, Messiah Yeshua! Praise the Lord that he is fulfilling ancient prophecy before our eyes today! We see a lot of gloom in the world and in our churches today (don’t we, Justin Welby?), but if you have the mind of Christ then this is a great time to be alive – Jews back in their land and starting to come to Christ, a faithful church in China (2% of 1.4 billion people is a LOT) and mas conversions in the Islamic world for the first time in 1300 years (witness David Garrison’s remarkable survey “A Wind in the House of Islam”).
Some day Jesus will return to Jerusalem exactly as he left except played in reverse (Acts 1:10-11), after landing on the Mount of Olives (Zechariah 14:4) from which he ascended. From Temple Mount He will rule as Israel’s king and emperor of the world. If you want a secular comparison to his kingship today, it is a bit like Aragorn in Lord of the Rings, although don’t push the analogy too far.
But we know what this ‘Jerusalem’ looks like from Rev 21.
And the answer is ‘nothing like the current Jerusalem’.
Ian: Are you supposing that Revelation 20 describing ‘the millennium’ is a recapitulative description of the church era? I believe it is not, because during it Satan is bound (Rev 20:3) yet John, writing in the church era, says that the whole world is in the grip of evil (1 John 5:18-19) and Paul refers to ‘this present evil age’ (Galatians 1:4). Jesus returns to this earth to rule it for the millennium (whether exactly a thousand revolutions of the earth round the sun I neither know nor care). THEN comes the New Jerusalem. This is surely the natural reading of Revelation 19-22 if you drop your Augustinian spectacles.
No, the opposite. The millennium is one of seven ways of talking about Jesus’ victory.
I believe that that is over-spiritualisation, Ian. The problem with it is that you have to explain the spiritual meaning of every word that in usual language has an unambiguous physical meaning. But in relation to Rev 20 to 22, what is your understanding of the meaning of the temporary release of Satan to stir up a final rebellion? How does that mesh with the church era followed by the Second Coming then immediately the New Jerusalem?
Anton,
‘The problem with it is that you have to explain the spiritual meaning of every word that in usual language has an unambiguous physical meaning.’ But isn’t this a problem only if we don’t read a text for what it is saying (its ‘message’, the thoughts that the writer is wanting readers to understand) rather than focussing on each individual word?
Please, please get a hold of Margaret Sim’s A Relevant Way to Read.
Bruce,
But why those words and not others that would convey the same meaning if the meaning were spiritual?
Why not do the same about the passages describing the virgin birth or the crucifixion and resurrection?
At root I believe this issue is not about dopey or arrogant fundamentalists who are materialist without realising it, versus enlightened liberals who take a spiritual interpretation. (I believe the world is billions of years old, by the way.) It is about Hebraic and Greek worldviews and the differing relation between the material and the spiritual in the two.
Do you realise how patronising your last sentence is? Effectively, “Read this book, as I have, and you will understand all.” But the notion that we could not understand the Bible before modern linguistics is false. This is not a criticism of Sim’s book itself; having not read it, I have nothing to say about it. I am well aware of irony in, for example, 1 Corinthians 14 about women being silent, in which Paul is obviously quoting the Corinthians’ mistaken words back at them in order to rebut them. (Not least because v34 would then contradict 1 Cor 11:5; the principle of non-contradiction is important in making exegesis.) v36 is Paul being sarcastic in response.
Anton, I can’t see how your two questions help.
Ian suggested a way of understanding Revelation as a whole and what the writer was trying to communicate in the overall message: ‘The millennium is one of seven ways of talking about Jesus’ victory.’ You claim this is overspiritualising, right? Why?
As I see it the root of this ‘issue’ is the problem of looking at individual words as though they ‘have’ meaning (literal, metaphorical, … whatever) apart from their use in context. Ian has suggested an appropriate context. I think you need to discuss the ‘context’ not whether or not individual words have meaning, are ambiguous, are ‘literal’ (whatever that means) etc.
Thank you as well, Anton, for illustrating my point:
‘Paul is obviously quoting the Corinthians’ mistaken words back at them…’ Obvious? Well, no, not according to the text itself but a good, arguable hypothesis about what he is intending to communicate (if he wrote those words 🙂 ). (Are you sure that any non-contradiction goes from 1Cor 11:5 to 1Cor 14 and not the other way around?)
Of course we can understand the Bible without modern linguistics. That is not the point. But statements that are frequently made about language from preachers, commenters, even people commenting on how Bible translation should be done, are not supported by how language actually works. Every time someone says something like ‘This word means literally X’ they are almost certainly not being helpful to people’s understanding of the text.
Sim’s book is a readable introduction to a theory of how language seems to work in communication. It is helpful especially to people training in language development but also to anyone wanting to understand the wonder of language. If people are not interested in that, so be it. So long as we recognise that how we read a text is more than looking at words on a page. And that we may need to stop and think when we are told ‘That is your interpretation.’
This is a conversation about a conversation and gets us nowhere. Let’s take a specific passage of scripture we disagree about and discuss it.
Thanks, Anton. Since you have given the invitation and with the indulgence of Ian, I can point to an article that I have found and read over the last couple of days where a preacher/writer has used linguistic arguments to support his discussion of Ephesians 5:15—6:4 (but especially Eph 5:22-33).
He says ‘The thrust of this passage … is _God lays responsibility on them [wives] to submit to their husbands_. That’s what the text says. … Considerable energy is expended today to avoid this rather obvious conclusion.’ (original emphasis throughout quotes)
These are his arguments:
(1) ‘First, _in the Greek text the verb “to submit” never has to do with mutual submission anywhere in the New Testament_. It always has to do with submission in some kind of order, rank, or structure, without exception.’
This claim is probably too strong especially if we are trying to understand the whole utterance in Eph 5:21. The writer (Paul?!) himself brings the concepts ‘submit’ and ‘one another’ together. Understanding utterances is not achieved by looking at individual words.
(2) ‘Second, _the expression “one another” in verse 21 (…) though it can be perfectly reciprocal, may or may not be depending on the context_.’
Yes, exactly. He goes on to give an example from Rev 6:4 “to make men slay each other”, and says ‘It’s the same expression … slay one another’.
Rather pedantically, they are NOT ‘the same expression’. They are similar in structure and, indeed, the Rev 6 example shows that the ‘meaning’ of ‘one another’ has to always be inferred. The inferences we draw are dependent on our understanding of the situation expressed by the verb. So, ‘slay’ or ‘kill’ require that the ‘one another’ can hardly be mutual (as the preacher points out). On the other hand, the situation expressed with verbs like ‘love’ (that is, ‘love one another’) are strongly mutual. The preacher needs to _argue_ for where ‘submit’ fits on the spectrum between the two. He doesn’t, apart from his non-contextual claim in (1).
(3) ‘Third, _it’s very important to understand the flow in the preceding verses_.’ …
‘Verse 21 in the NIV starts a new paragraph. It doesn’t in the original; it’s just a participle tacked onto the rest of them. Part of what it means, then, to be filled with the Spirit is to have an attitude of submission to one another. Then that submission is unpacked in what is sometimes called a _household code_ or a household table. Now in particular, Paul says, let me show you what this submission looks like.’
OK, that is a usual way of preaching this passage. But the linguistic-like argumentation he uses doesn’t actually hold up. He introduces ‘household code’. Fair enough. But _linguistically_ where does the household code start? He ‘chides’ the NIV for making a paragraph break before 5:21. The ESV puts a major break before 5:22 with a heading ‘Wives and Husbands’. This would seem to be what he is suggesting. This could be the case, but he needs to point out that the first utterance (‘sentence, if you like) of this section would need to be translated ‘Wives to husbands’ and not ‘Wives submit to your husbands’ to preserve ‘the flow of the text’.
(4) ‘Fourth, _one must also recognize the force of “head” and the sweep of the argument in verses 23 and 24. Despite the efforts of some to make _head_ mean something like source, it has been shown again and again and again that when _head_ is in the singular in first-century Greek, and used metaphorically as here, what it means is to exercise some kind of authority over another.’
Again this is a very strong claim. It probably wouldn’t be refuted by only one example, such as finding a reference to ‘head’ singular where the head is described as giving life and growth to the body (sort of ‘source-like’? rather than ‘meaning’ ‘authority’) And yet that seems to be what the writer is saying about ‘head’ in Eph 4:15-16 (note that comes _before_ Eph 5:23).
All I have tried to say is that we need to look at much more than individual words if we are going to interpret and understand a text. And everyone sometimes uses linguistic arguments that simply don’t reflect how language seems to work. And anyone can point out where those linguistic arguments are not based on what we are understanding about this gift of language.
The preacher? (Disappointingly) Don Carson.
https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/sermon/a-family-man-ephesians-5-15-6-4/ (downloaded 24Nov2024)
‘Disappointing’ in the light of his book _Exegetical fallacies_.
All I have tried to say is that we need to look at much more than individual words if we are going to interpret and understand a text.
Actually you were claiming rather more than that, otherwise I would not have disagreed with you. I assent wholeheartedly to this sentence.
I should have asked to discuss specifically an eschatological verse. But, in regard to Ephesians 5, Paul draws an analogy between husband and wife on the one hand, and Christ and his church on the other. A man must be prepared to fight to the death to protect his wife from (say) armed breakers-in, and conversely the wife should accept the husband’s authority if they disagree. Christ laid down his life for his church, and the church should obey him.
God’s curse on Eve and womanhood, following the Fall, includes this (Genesis 3:16): “You will desire-your-way [TSHUQAH] with your husband, but he will master [MASHAL] you.” This much mistranslated phrase means that the woman will desire to dominate the man, but will fail. In the Hebrew original, the same construction appears soon after in Genesis 4:7 when God says to Cain, “Sin desires-its-way [TSHUQAH] with you, but you must master [MASHAL] it.” The two words appear together nowhere else. So the Fall is the start of the ‘battle of the sexes’.
What did God intend, before the Fall took place?
Eve was made for Adam (as a helper: Gen 2:18), from Adam (2:21-2). Paul says that this implies male authority: “The head of every man is Christ, and the head of woman is man… for man did not come from woman, but woman from man” (1 Cor 11:3&8).
So God intends authority to be male. That is why he reveals himself to us as Father.
God cursed the key role of woman, child-bearing (Genesis 3:16), and the key role of man, namely providing for the family (which only he can do because caring for a house full of young children is a fulltime job for the woman) – Genesis 3:17-19. That is labour of a different kind.
What does St Paul say about the duties of husband and wife? Ephesians 5:22&25: “Wives, obey your husbands as you would the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is head of the church… Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.” That love is agapē – self-sacrificial love, beyond eros which the couple obviously enjoy and share. A husband should be his wife’s hero; and he should adore her.
Paul appeals to the dawn of man and to man’s relationship to God. This has nothing to do with ancient Middle Eastern culture, Greek culture, or modern secular culture.
The relationship between husband and wife can be abused. Men can throw their weight about as bullies, abusing their power. Such behaviour is usually obvious. Women can try to usurp male authority in the home. That is usually more subtle. In Genesis 3:16 God tells us that these things will happen, as a result of the Fall.
When a man bullies, it becomes harder for the woman to obey. When a woman usurps, it becomes harder for the man to lead the family and show sacrificial love for them. A vicious circle of blame and misbehaviour is set up all too easily.
Do you think I have it wrong?
Do I think you’ve got what wrong, Anton? Ephesians 5:21-22? Certainly looks like it!
The, rather than look into every fine meaning of every word, please summarise your understanding of it in a paragraph or so.
Eph 5:21-22:
As per NRSV but with correction towards the Greek text to introduce the overall message of 5:21–6:9:
‘Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ; wives to husbands as you are to the Lord.’
But further noting that Paul’s ‘instruction’ to husbands includes: ‘love your wives, just as Christ … gave himself up for the church’. His instruction to children includes ‘honour your father and mother’, while parents are instructed ‘do not provoke your children to anger’. His instruction to masters includes: ‘do the same to them’ in ‘answer’ to the instruction to slaves ‘render service to the Lord and not to men and women’.
Mutuality seems to be very much to the fore with these pairs of groups of people.
Note particularly 5:23 which does not say ‘Wives, submit to your husbands, but ‘gets’ its verb from 5:21: ‘submit to one another’.
This very much isn’t looking into every fine meaning of every word. Seems to me to be asking rather what is the writer wanting to communicate in this whole section that (he) has carefully put together.
Sorry, 5:_22_: ‘Wives to your husbands’ but not ‘Wives submit your husbands’.
And even then I missed out the ‘to’. Oh boy…
There is mutual love between Christ and his church, certainly; but which one instructs the other?
Feminism is wrecking Western society and is already far into the church. Stop it here!
And here I was thinking you were wanting to discuss the text, Anton.
I do want to discuss the text, which is why I asked you a question – there is mutual love between Christ and his church but which one instructs the other? But you responded only to my further polemical paragraph which *didn’t* ask you a question!
Anton, my 9.52am comment was about your first paragraph.
I can sort of see why ‘instruction’ might come into what you are reading from this whole text in Ephesians but I suggest it is an implicature that a reader is wholly responsible for. What does it have to do with ‘being subject to one another’?
I also think we have tested Ian’s patience enough.
If Ian wishes us to stop then he is able to say so himself.
The relationship betweeen husband and wife is to reflect the relationship between Christ and his church. The latter relationship has two principal feaures: love; and the headship of Christ. You seem to be deeply concerned to negate the latter in marriage. There is a very strong movement in our culture today which does that, namely feminism. The parallel was worth commenting on. Marriages become unhappy when the man bullies and/or the woman usurps, as I explained.
‘The latter relationship has two principal feaures: love; and the headship of Christ’. But, Anton, isn’t what Paul wrote in Ephesians suggesting that ‘love’ and ‘headship’ are not _different_ ‘features’ or unrelated concepts. So, isn’t it the case that marriages can become unhappy, when Paul’s dream/expectation of ‘being subject to one another out of reverence for Christ’ is not realised?
The problem in all these discussions is a failure to engage with a basic reality: ‘head’ does not mean ‘authority over’ in the first century Greek context.
You’re right Bruce, it’s time to quit. I consider you determined not to see the point I am making. I don’t mind if you consider me judgemental.
Ian: Regardless of what ‘head’ meant in ancient Greece, the scriptural analogy is between the Christ-church relationship and the husband-wife relationship, and who is the loving leader in the former relationship and therefore in the latter?
It cannot be ‘regardless’ of the meaning of ‘head’.
The analogy can only ever be partial, since men are not the saviour of their wives, and because the example of Jesus is also an example for us all. But what aspect of Jesus’ life is Paul drawing on here?
When you look at the language—most of which is trying to correct men’s behaviour, not women’s—the emphasis is on loving service, and giving oneself up for the other. Paul appears to think that that is what husbands need to hear more about in order to correct their behaviour.
So Paul is urging men to be life-giving servants to their wives, as Jesus is a life-giving servant to us—and NOT encouraging them to ‘take authority’ over their wives.
We are disagreeing about how far the analogy runs.
I’m going to cite a secular book here. In 1999 a secular woman called Laura Doyle wrote a work called The Surrendered Wife. The gist is: obey your husband and don’t argue or nag, even if you want to, and see what happens. At her wits’ end, she tried this when all else had failed to restore her failing marriage and she had nothing to lose. To her surprise she found that the man she had fallen in love with deeply enough to marry reappeared. He again lavished love upon her. Her book advocates this way to desperate women. She does not recommend it with alcoholic or some other men; nor does she believe the man should do nothing to improve the relationship – but she is writing for women about what they can do. Reviews are polarised: feminists deplore the book, but desperate wives who have tried it express astonishment at the result and recommend it.
The King is God’s choice, over God’s covenant keeping people, Sovereign, for protection, provision and care.
All pointing forward to King David’s Greater Son, King Jesus, new covenant making keeping King of Kings, Sovereign over all, not of this world, in His pre-incarnation yet now manifest in his incarnation, his LORDSHIP ie Shepherd/Kingship.
All the offices, figures. types, patterns, coalesce in Jesus. It os not either/or and the scriptural emphasis on one or the other is context dependant.
…the vision of the statue in [Daniel] chapter 2 is a symbolic representation of four human empires, ending with the Romans, all of which are destroyed by the rock ‘not cut by human hands (Dan 2.34)’ which is the kingdom of the God of heaven (Dan 2.44). These four kingdoms (Babylonian, Persian, Greek, and Roman) correspond to the four beasts of Dan 7
Without question there are parallels. But how then do you explain the fact that Daniel was told the four beasts were in the future, yet the head of the statue represented Babylon which had already conquered the Jews (Daniel was in the service of its king)?
Some of us believe that the four parts of the statue correspond to the four empires that preceded Christ’s first coming and the four beasts correspond to the four empires that will precede his second (in which case it isn’t hard to identify a lion, and eagle and a bear in the symbols of great nations of the last 400 years). But my question for Ian and James is: why recapitulate; what’s in it for God to re-run Daniel 2 a bit differently? Also, if Daniel 7 refers to the same empires as Daniel 2, why use different animal species to represent the Persians in Daniel 7 and Daniel 8, and ditto Alexander?
Hi Anton,
Perhaps the personalisation of the animals should be taken as different economic models, not geographic empires. A goat is an agile mountaineer for instance, it represents a more fluid system that can change rapidly. A lion holds its subjects by main strength. By looking at it this way I don’t need a history lesson or knowledge of theology, I instinctively feel the pressures of the world I inhabit and know when a sea-change affects me. I read the Bible and know that crypto, AI will break up the lion of the monetary system. “All change” said the world beast bank as it consumed the whore of the gold standard and replaces it with her new more beautiful understudy. Who in turn gets replaced by another faceless vestal virgin. Ad infinitum.
Previously Jesus had spoken of his exodus.
Here Jesus stood majestically, manfully, unmovable on the cusp of the /his exodus.
See EX.4 and Jesus Standing.
They/He stood at Pi-hahiroth (= “the mouth of freedom”) by the mountain of Baʽal Zephon an epithet of the Canaanite storm god Baʿal ( lit.) . Baʿal Zaphon was equated with the Greek god Zeus Kasios and later with the Roman Jupiter Casius
AT OR BYMigdol meaning “fort”, “fortification”, or “stronghold Figuratively, “tower” has connotations of proud authority.
Joshua referred to Migdal-Gad, ‘tower of Gad’, one of the fortified cities of Judah, and also to Migdal-El, ‘tower of God’, one of the fortified towns of Naphtali (Joshua 19.38).
Israel /Jesus were between a rock and a hard place as no doubt the new AbC might be.
‘Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘Tell the Israelites to turn back and encamp near Pi Hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea…directly opposite Baal Zephon…”(Exodus 4:1).
Why is this significant? Because God is about to do something apparently strange and unexpected. He shows us that He intentionally turns the Israelites around and leads them to a place that He has chosen for the great spiritual conflict with the Egyptians.
(Pilate thinks Jesus is on his ground, at his seat of power; little knowing that God was planning a great emancipation!)
Yes…a great spiritual conflict. Even though the Israelites had left Egypt ‘armed for battle’ (13:18), they were told, ‘You only need to be still’ because ‘The Lord will fight for you’ (14:14).
And lest we think the impending battle is just a physical battle between armies with swords, armor and chariots, let us remember that our God had been triumphing over not only the Pharaoh and the Egyptians, but also the supposed power of their gods. The plagues were a drumbeat of victory as the gods of Egypt were, one by one, displayed to be impotent and powerless. And even more importantly, Yahweh wanted the Egyptians to know that He is the Lord (14:4).
And it is no surprise that the Lord stopped Israel and turned them around to meet and defeat not only Pharaoh and his army, but also to display his power over Zephon and defeat him at the mountain of his glory and power. Not only this, but Yahweh would lead His people directly through the sea…the sea which the Egyptians believed were under the control of Zephon! And further, that instead of the Israelites being destroyed, showing Zephon’s lordship of the sea, it would be the Egyptians who would discover who was both Lord of the mountain, but also Lord over the sea!
The Lord said: ‘…I will gain glory for myself through Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the Lord.’ God’s glory is at stake in all these things. May we praise and glorify our great God, who delivers his people and triumphs over all our enemies!
We say that God is Sovereign but how often do we Believe He is in all our circumstances and conflicts?
“The Name of the Lord is a strong tower the righteous runs into it and is safe”.
Here Jesus exemplifies to his servants what it means to “stand fast “and no doubt an encouragement to all His Saints.
“Having done all stand[So stand firm and hold your ground, AMPV]
The picture is like the tug -of-war the feet firmly dug in. A rugby scrum, feet planted to resist strenuously, strongly, no backward step.
Gal 5:1 Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage
Rom 8:21 Because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God.
COL.1:10 That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God;
1:11 Strengthened with all might, according to his glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness;
1:12 Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light:
1:13 Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son:
One other aside
Eusebius relates, Hist. Eccles. lib. iii. c. 20, that “The relatives of our Lord were brought before Domitian, and interrogated whether they were of the family of David; and what sort the kingdom of Christ was, and where it would appear? They answered, that this kingdom was neither of this world, nor of an earthly nature; that it was altogether heavenly and angelical; and that it would not take place till the end of the world.”
Thou sayest I am a KING – A common form of expression for, yes, it is so. I was born into the world that I might set up and maintain a spiritual government: but this government is established in and by truth. All that love truth, hear my voice and attend to the spiritual doctrines I preach. It is by truth alone that I influence the minds and govern the manners of my subjects CLARKE
(Archeological info @ biblearchaeology.org)
On the question of the next ABC appointment
Dr. Os Guinness
@ /www.cslewisinstitute.org/resources/what-is-freedom
has a timely word on the Sovereignty of God and Leadership.
“We are in/at a Civilizational Moment [1.25,42 video time]
A Civilizational moment is a time when a civilization {Church} loses touch with the dynamic of its foundations
When a civilizational loses touch with the dynamic of its inspiration there are only three things that can happen; –
1 a renewal
2 a replacement
Or 3 a decline
Os continues on to discuss leadership.
If we lose touch with our foundational belief in the Sovereignty of God I suggest 2) or 3)will apply.
Whatever we think of the externals of our religion/church, it’s
Rituals, Priestly dress code, mode of worship.
If the internals are deficient, they are but whited sepulchers.
Ian, you give the four kingdoms as being the Babylonian, Persian, Greek, and Roman. However, in the diagram the kingdoms are Babylonian, Medes, Persian and Greek. Is this very helpful?
No, probably not! These are the two main readings of the successions of empires, and I need to do more reading on this to take a clearer view.
(I actually feel in need of more study of Daniel, particularly the second half.)
Do you have a view?
As regards the article be consistent or explain the two possibilities.
As regards my view, I am in the process of preparing a Bible study on Daniel and am reading the commentaries at the moment. As the vision is apocalyptic could it not mean both Babylonian, Medo-Persian, Greek and Roman and Babylonian, Median, Persian and Greek?
Peace; The Peace bringer is the Prince of Peace. First and foremost, the peace the Prince of Peace brings in his Kingdom is Peace with God, there is no other way.
He is also the Rock not made with human hands.
Paul speaks of peace…the peace of God beyond understanding even in the throes of hostility, imprisonment. It is Kingdom of God Peace.
One of the baptismal and confirmation candidates, now church family, spoke his testimony in Farsi, but translated into English by a first language, Farsi speaking Church Warden spoke of that very peace, notwithstanding that a right to remain had been denied on even on appeal, and nothing in his external circumstances had changed, nor, humanly speaking, were likely.
Looking at Goldingay’s chart of the visions in Daniel, he equates the forth kingdom (aka Empire) not with the Roman Empire, but with the empires which resulted from the breakup of Alexander’s empire. This makes much more sense, given the close relationship between chapter 11 and the actual events leading up to the time of the Maccabean revolt. The ‘South’ is the Ptolomaic Empire and the ‘North’ is the Selucid Empire – the two largest of the remnants.
(Sorry, I see that point has already been raised)
Although Andy has Babylonian, Medes, Persian and Greek. Goldingay has a two-phase Greek empire.
It is also interesting to compare the character of the actual empires with the descriptions in Daniel 2. The latter has Babylon being greater than the Persian. No it wasn’t. The Babylonian empire originated from the breakup of the Assyrian empire. It was a small part of that. The larger part was run by the Medes – although there is no consensus as to whether they formed a single coherent political entity. Babylon lasted about 80 years, the Persian (or Achaemenid) lasted 220.
The Persian empire expanded to be larger in area than the Assyrians empire. Although Alexander’s empire encompassed more people (probably because it reached further into India), it covered a smaller area than the Persian. It certainly didn’t rule “over all the earth”. It didn’t reach west to known places like the upcoming Roman republic or Carthage (or Tarshish if that was in the Iberian peninsula), let alone China!
Wikipedia has an interesting item on the largest world empires:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_empires
tl;dr: China tends to win this contest in the ancient world, particularly if you count people rather than territory.
If one considers the metal sequence of Gold, Silver, Bronze then Iron, this was known before Daniel was around – the Greek had it. The metals have decreasing value, and increasing hardness. Associated with ages, the Age of Gold was a pastoral idyll, whereas the Age of Iron was where, for instance, children disobeyed their parents and other terrible things. They regarded themselves as living in the Age of Iron.
So, to have Gold representing Babylon is very flattering to Nebucanezzer, and rather in contrast to the general view of Babylon in most of Scripture.
that is great–thanks. Very helpful summary.
Daniel 2 delineates a series of five kingdoms/empires (When the Towers Fall p. 279). The kingdom of God smashes all five at the same time. They become like chaff, swept clean away. Given that this has yet to happen, it is surely worth giving serious consideration to whether the vision is relevant to us, as we see western civilisation hurtling pell-mell into moral chaos.
Amen Steven
Listening to Os Guinness @ /www.cslewisinstitute.org/resources/what-is-freedom
He gives an historical view of the rise of the Nations in particular the rise of the West which was to become the largest “empire” and a large part of its genius, was the Reformation.
The “West” is an amalgamation of the previous civilizations; He points out the decline of the West to the present day, it is a gift to all lovers of History and the “sign of the Times”.
The Bible is like a pair of binoculars set at the mid-distance, where Christ is. Blurred prophesies are connected to the focal point. I feel confident that by going on towards the goal the reality will eventually be under my feet. Like Pilgrim’s lyons/bears/goats/monsters, I will pass through, thanks to his “perspective glass”!
Posted this in the discussion under the video – that discussion seems to have petered to a halt without taking this up. Trying it again here ….
https://stevesfreechurchblog.wordpress.com/2013/03/07/46/
Making the point that Jesus’ kingship is not expressed by superficial ‘Christianisation’ of worldly states via established or similar churches like the CofE, but by a very different kind of ‘holy nation’, an international ‘diaspora’ of the faithful….
Hi Stephen,
I’m in agreement with you on this so I sent the link to a Christian Nationalist friend who was not impressed.
There must be a deep root of Scriptural interpretation that need to be pulled before you can even start to correct error. Calm, measured exegesis is not appreciated. You will need to rant and rave to attract their attention. Become a ‘prophet’. Appeal to the emotion. Or do something miraculous, or you won’t get a hearing or be taken seriously.
Hi Steve
Unfortunately I’m basically a rather shy mild-end-autistic person and don’t really do ranting and raving! Although I’ve mostly overcome it now, when younger I had a problem so interesting they made a film about it – though not about me, about another sufferer; the film is called “The King’s Speech”!
I started looking into church-and-state issues while at Uni and observing the ‘Troubles’ in Ulster. I had quite a shock when I started checking out the Scripture and found that there was effectively NO support in the NT for the idea of ‘Christian countries’, and actually a rather different teaching on how the Church should relate to the surrounding world.
I get that it must look very plausible that “God must want …. ” Christian nations – but that is I fear a very ‘from this world’ idea and the NT, starting with Jesus before Pilate, tells a different story of what God actually DOES want….
St. Paul was nothing compared to the Super Apostles. He was good on media (papyrus) but hopeless in person. Youll need to generate an A.I. person for the 21C!
persona