Martin Luther (a.d. 1483-1546) was an extremist. He believed all deeds were inherently corrupt and that only by an act of God’s sovereign grace could one be saved. Thus, ultimate salvation has nothing at all to do with works, it was entirely granted on the basis of faith alone in the words of God alone. Furthermore, the faith one has is itself a gift from God bequeathed to those he has predestined for salvation. Although Luther has now been dead for 465 years, he continues to cast a long shadow. All one has to do is listen to Christian radio, watch TV preachers, or peruse the local Christian bookstore to find virtual unanimous agreement on this issue (unless one happens to tune in to a Catholic program). It seems that non-Catholics universally condemn “works righteousness” and “salvation by works” as if the worst action would be to actually do something other than merely believe. Somehow, faith is good and works are bad. Those who strive to be holy are misguided while those who humbly confess they are incapable of doing good are virtuous. For some reason, I never see the bumper sticker “striving to obey God”, but frequently see the one that says “not perfect, only forgiven.”
Are you familiar with word clouds? They specify frequency using font size so that words that appear more often are larger and vice versa. What if this way of displaying data were applied to books of the Bible? Well, it seems, someone has already had that idea. Check out the following Youtube video. Thanks to Brian (not Keating) for sending this over. Here are each of the books of the Bible displayed in order.
Here is another similar video from the same person which displays the frequencies for the entire Bible at once:
Psalm 117:1-2
1 Praise the LORD, all nations!
Extol him, all peoples!
2 For great is his steadfast love toward us,
And the faithfulness of the LORD endures forever.
Praise the LORD!
Psalm 117 is set among a collection of praise psalms known as the Egyptian Hallel (Psalms 113-118). Hallel is simply the Hebrew word for praise, and the Egyptian Hallel was the set of praise psalms typically sung during the Passover meal celebration every year (according to the Babylonian Talmud). In fact, Jesus and the disciples may well have sung them as part of their Passover celebration (Mark 14.26). Even so, rather than focusing on how Psalm 117 was and still is used for worship purposes, I would like to focus attention on its content and how it was later interpreted in the New Testament.
The following comes from an early Christian author, Hippolytus who wrote from Rome in the late second/early third century (selections from chapters 35 & 36):
Let all the faithful, whether men or women, when early in the morning they rise from their sleep and before they undertake any tasks, wash their hands and pray to God; and so they may go to their duties. But if any instruction in God’s word is held [that day], everyone ought to attend it willingly,…but if on any day there is no instruction; let everyone at home take the Bible and read sufficiently in passages that he finds profitable.
I came across the following quotation in the reading for my ethics class. Most of us probably think abortion is a new ethical question brought on by the advent of modern science and technology. In fact, the early Christians were already wrestling with this question. The following is from Tertullian of Carthage (north Africa), a late second century teacher and defender of the faith. Here is what he writes to the Romans who were persecuting the Christians in his book Apology chapter 9:
Last October, I had the pleasure of attending Ken Westby’s One God Seminar. During that seminar I spoke on “Five Major Problems with the Trinity.” Click here to listen to the presentation. The talk was 36 minutes long and the remainder of the time addressed questions from the audience. Click here to download the notes. The rest of the 2010 conference is mostly available here (I’m still waiting on a couple of presentations).
Psalm 106.1-5
Praise the LORD!
Oh Give thanks to the LORD,
for he is good,
for his steadfast love [chesed] endures forever!
Who can utter the mighty deeds of the LORD,
or declare all his praise?
Blessed are they who observe justice,
who do righteousness at all times!
Remember me, O LORD,
when you show favor to your people;
help me when you save them,
that I may look upon the prosperity of your chosen ones,
that I may rejoice in the gladness of your nation,
that I may glory with your inheritance.
Theology regularly takes the driver seat in Bible study. This is only natural since our theology is the construct or model we hold in mind while we read. For example, our theology of God informs how we read Scripture. If one believes that only the Father is God then he will struggle with certain verses (like John 20.28) while reading others with ease (like John 17.3). When we encounter difficult texts our tendency is to explain them away so that we need not alter our theological model on that particular subject. We may look at other translations until we find one that agrees with what we think it should say or else pontificate conspiracy theories that all the extant manuscripts are corrupt because the “evil” early Church Fathers and scribes had a nefarious agenda. Thus, our theology leads our Bible study rather than the other way around. But, what if this is doing things backwards? What if this way of studying the Bible is inherently dangerous?
This is the second part of a three part series on “The Son of Man.” Click here to read part one.
Son of Man in Extra-Biblical Jewish Literature
Outside of the Old and New Testaments the Jewish people produced a good deal of other literature. There are historical, fictional, proverbial, and prophetic writings, which comment on major figures and themes in the Hebrew Scriptures. These sources are helpful to understand how Jewish people around the time of Jesus were thinking about matters in a way similar to someone a thousand years from now observing what movies were most popular in the early twenty-first century in order to understand background information about studying someone in our own time. Two texts in particular that give us a window into how the Son of Man was understood are The Jewish Apocalypse of Ezra and The Similitudes of Enoch.
