With Resurrection Sunday coming, a video on the resurrection is called for. The lecture begins around the 8:40 mark.
Historical Background
Southeastern Theological Review’s Round Table Discussion with Michael Licona
I’m thankful for STR for conducting a round table discussion concerning some of the brouhaha around Licona’s interpretation of Matthew 27. I won’t get into my own personal feelings of how this situation unfolded. You can read the dialogue here and decide for yourself.
(HT Ben Blackwell)
Dan Wallace on the Discovery of 7 Early Manuscripts
Jim West recently posted a video of Dan Wallace being interviewed on the discovery of 7 early NT manuscripts. This is, to say the least, a very important find for NT studies. Watch the video here:
John’s Use of Drama
I’m currently reading George Parsenios’ work Rhetoric and Drama in the Johannine Lawsuit Motif for review. In it Parsenios explores the implications of reading John’s Gospel through the lens of Greek tragedy and forensic rhetoric. I must admit that I’m a bit skeptical of this endeavor, namely because I don’t see how we are supposed to conclude that John had Greek tragedy or legal rhetoric in mind while writing his Gospel. Parsenios admits as much in his opening chapter, saying:
We can say almost nothing with certainty about what [John] read, apart from the Old Testament. We know only such generalities as the fact that the tragedians were part of the school curriculum throughout the Hellenistic and Roman periods in the East, or that many prose authors in the Roman Empire regularly rely on tragic language and scenarios in a phenomenon that is called the “thearicalization of ancient culture.”
Parsenios then concludes this section by arguing that:
regardless of what John read, if we read John in concert with ancient rhetoric and ancient drama, we will read John differently, and with greater insight.
My question is whether Parsenios can legitimately move from his first statement to his second without doing detriment to John’s intention for his Gospel.
I’m inclined to say that he cannot and should not.
What about you?
D.A. Carson and John Piper on Historical Background
Here’s an interesting video from Carson and Piper on the necessity of studying the historical background of a particular biblical book for preaching and teaching. You can see all three of the videos at The Gospel Coalition.
Historical Adam 2.0
Kevin DeYoung has asked a similar question to mine about the historical Adam. Essentially his point is that in the genealogies of 1 Chronicles there is no indication from the author that part of the record is mythological or figurative while the rest is historical. You can check it out here.
Just another side note on this issue: after my first post on this a friend questioned whether or not the biblical narrative can be more than history. His question was, in other words, whether the biblical text does more than just relate historical events. My answer was of course yes – the Scriptures are the inspired interpretation of the historical events of God and his people. But that does not make them a- or un-historical. We can recognize both the historical veracity of the biblical record and the inspired interpretation that the Scriptures provide of those events. So when I say “there is no indication from the author that part of the record is mythological or figurative while the rest is historical,” I am not in any way intending to separate the biblical authors’ ability to both relate historical events accurately and interpret history in theologically meaningful ways, but am actually trying to argue that these two things are not separable in Scripture. One can recognize the Bible’s historical accuracy and its ability (or, even stronger, its intention) to interpret history at the same time.
A Canonical Take on Adam and Eve
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I haven’t paid much attention to all the hoopla going on in the blogosphere about Adam and Eve and their historicity lately. Suffice it to say that this article in CT seems to have started a flurry of blogging activity concerning the historicity the “First Couple.” I’ll just go ahead and say up front that I believe in the historical veracity of the creation account of Genesis 1-2. (If you want to equate me to Sarah Palin, I suppose you can, but I doubt it would be fruitful for you to read any further.) This doesn’t seem to be the popular view in many of the blogs I’ve seen, but what I don’t want to do here is argue blog post by blog post against a plethora of others’ blog posts. I simply want to offer one piece of evidence that I think points to Adam and Eve being real human beings created by God as the beginning of the human race.That piece of evidence is the genealogical records found in Scripture.
Wherever Scripture records a genealogy that references Adam, they refer to him alongside the contemporaneous figure on which the passage focuses. This means that this issue is not only related to our understanding of Paul in Romans 5 but to the understanding of various writers throughout the corpus of Scripture. To begin, Adam’s narrative is continuous with the (many times genealogical) narrative of Genesis 1-11. This narrative in turn functions to bring the reader to Abraham, a central figure in Genesis and in the OT. There is no break in the story, no indication that the writer of Genesis made a distinction between one section as a “creation myth” and the other as the start of “real history.” Genesis 5:1-5 is especially noteworthy here, as the same man who was created by God in the Garden as the first man is said to have born children, one of whom is a vital part of Genesis’ genealogies, lived to a certain age, and died. This certainly doesn’t sound like an a-historical proto-man myth to me.
1 Chronicles 1-2, in which the author is concerned to show the genealogical record of King David, begins with Adam as well. He is included with other figures from Israelite history who the author certainly would not have seen as a-historical or simply a figurative tribal head.
Finally, there is Luke 3, the genealogy of Jesus. The same thing said of 1 Chronicles 1-2 can be said here. Luke doesn’t make a distinction between the historical and “figurative” (or other such categories) of people referenced in Jesus’ ancestral record.
Along with these references, there are Hosea 6:7; Rom 5:12, 14; 1 Cor 15:22, 45; 1 Tim 2:13-14; and Jude 1:14. All of these appear to regard Adam as a historical figure, and as the progenitor of the entire human race.
Now, I realize I haven’t dealt with the scientific claims that have spurred these articles and blog posts, and namely the claim that the human race began from at least 10,000 people instead of just 2. But that’s not the point of the post. I will say this, though, in conclusion; for all of those who are calling for Christians, and especially us Palin-supporting knuckle dragging Neanderthal inerrantists, to get with the times and trust science, my brief rejoinder is that for as many things that science has given us, it is neither a fool-proof epistemic source of knowledge nor even a neutral, presupposition-less epistemology. It, like any other mode of knowledge, is prone to error, subject to our own whims and biases, and should not be taken as the only source of information about our past, present or future.
Pet Peeves, Soapboxes, and Hobby Horses
Was Paul intending for his readers to conjure this picture in their minds in Ephesians 6:10-20?
Or this?
Righteousness shall be the belt of his waist, and faithfulness the belt of his loins (Isa 11:5).
How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation, who says to Zion, ‘Your God reigns’ (Isa 52:7).
The LORD saw it, and it displeased him that there was no justice. He saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no one to intercede; then his own arm brought him salvation, and his righteousness upheld him. He put on righteousness as a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on his head; he put on garments of vengeance for clothing, and wrapped himself in zeal as a cloak. According to their deeds so will he repay, wrath to his adversaries, repayment to his enemies; to the coastlands he will render repayment. So they shall fear the name of the LORD from the west, and his glory from the rising sun; for he will come like a rushing stream, which the wind of the LORD drives. ‘And a Redeemer will come to Zion, to those in Jacob who turn from transgression,’ declares the LORD (Isa 59:15b-20).
I will greatly rejoice in the LORD; my soul shall exult in my God, for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation; he has covered me with the robe of righteousness… (Isa 61:10).