More Greek--To Agapao or to Phileo? That is the Question

Anyone who has listened to sermons for very long has probably heard that the Greek language has different words to describe love. For example, C.S. Lewis, in his book The Four Loves, discusses four Greek words for love.Only two of these words, agapao and phileo, are used in the Greek New Testament. Before we go any further, let’s make sure we understand our terms:

agapao (pronounced  ah ga PAH oh) - I love (verb)
phileo (pronounced phil EH oh)- I love (verb)
agape (pronounced ah GAH pay)- love (noun)

What we are usually told is that agape refers to a sacrificial, selfless, undeserved, giving love that doesn’t expect anything in return. It’s the kind of love God has for his people (John 3:16), and the kind of love a husband should have for his wife (Eph. 5:25). On the other hand, we are usually told that phileo refers to a more chummy, friendly, buddy-buddy type of love. This distinction between agape and phileo is often said to be important in understanding the conversation between Peter and the Lord Jesus in John 21:15-17, in which Jesus asks Peter “Do you love (agapao) me, Peter?” and Peter responds “Yes, Lord, I love (phileo) you.”

Now let me be clear in saying that no one denies that Greek has different words to describe love. But is the oft-repeated distinction in meaning between agapao and phileo actually true? Is it really better to agapao than to phileo?

The surprising answer is, that while many popular preachers still repeat this distinction, most conservative commentators and Greek scholars no longer believe it is significant. Here’s why.

1.      It is simply not true that agape always refers to a sacrificial, giving love. For example, in 2 Samuel 13, the LXX (i.e. the Greek translation of the Old Testament) describes Amnon’s “love” for his half-sister Tamar as both agapao and phileo. In fact, it was this agapao-phileo love that led him to rape her! You don’t get much farther from a selfless, sacrificial, giving love than rape, and yet the author still used the word agape to describe it. In the same way, when Paul says that “Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present age” (2 Tim. 4:10), he uses the word agapao, though Demas’ love was hardly selfless or sacrificial. This doesn’t mean that agape never means a special, sacrificial, selfless kind of love, it just means that it doesn’t necessarily mean that. 

2.      The words agape and phileo share a large amount of what is called “semantic overlap.” Semantic overlap is just a fancy way of saying that in many cases the two words are used interchangeably—as synonyms for each other. Let me illustrate it like this:

Notice that one circle is labeled agapao and the other phileo. Notice also the two circles overlap with each other. The shaded area of overlap represent the cases in which the words are used as synonyms--i.e. the semantic overlap.

  

When we look at the Greek New Testament, we can see cases where the words agapao or phileo are used interchangeably. For example, we find these two statements in John's Gospel:

“The Father loves (agapao) the Son...” (John 3:35)
“The Father loves (phileo) the Son...” (John 5:20)

In these contexts, there is no discernible difference between the two words. In these two contexts, the two words overlap in meaning—they are synonyms.

Again, five times in John's Gospel we read of "the disciple whom Jesus loved" (13:23, 19:26, 20:2, 21:7. 21:10). In four out of those five cases the author uses the word agapao, while in one of them he  uses phileo (20:2). This means that in 19:26 John is referred to as "the disciple whom Jesus agapaoed," while only a few verses later in 20:2 he is referred to as "the disciple whom Jesus phileoed." Again, there is nothing in the context to suggest that there is any difference in these two phrases. They are simply being used as synonyms. The only reason we would think otherwise is if we wrongly assume that 'different word equals different meaning.'

Another example. In John 11:3 we read that Jesus loved Lazarus. "Lord, the one whom you love is sick." Two verses later, in verse 5, John says "Jesus loved Martha and her sister Mary and her brother Lazarus." You guessed it: in verse 3 the word is phileo, and in verse 5 it's agapao. Again, the context indicates that these two words are being used as synonyms. Both are being used in close proximity to one another to describe the same reality: Jesus's love for Lazarus (and his sisters). To assume that they must have different meanings simply because they are different words ignores the existence of synonyms. 

At the risk of being tedious, let me give one more example. In Matthew 23:6, Jesus says that the Pharisees "love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues." In Luke 11:43 he says that the Pharisees "love the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces." Right again. Matthew uses phileo, and Luke uses agapao. Again, there is no discernible difference in meaning. 

So let me beat a dead horse and reiterate the point so far: agapao and phileo are often synonyms.

However, this doesn’t mean that agapao and phileo are always synonyms. For example, the word phileo can also mean “to kiss,” while agape is never used that way. When the gospel writers say that Judas kissed Jesus, the verb for kiss is phileo (see Matt. 26:48; Mark 14:44; Luke 22:47). In the diagram above, the non-shaded, non-overlapping area of the word phileo would represent the meaning "kiss." In other words, the meanings of agapao and phileo do not completely overlap. Phileo can mean things that agapao can't. They are synonyms sometimes, but not always. How do you know when? You guessed it: context. Context always. And again I say, context! 

Let me give an example from our own language that might help. Take the words yard and lawn . Do they mean the same thing? Well, sometimes they do. For example, take these two sentences:

“Donny told Stuart to mow the yard.”

“Donny told Stuart to mow the lawn .”

In those two sentences, the words lawn and yard are used interchangeably. No native English speaker would see any difference in meaning between the two sentences. At the same time, these two words are not always interchangeable. For example:

“Jane bought a yard of fabric."

“Jane bought a lawn of fabric."

We automatically realize that there's something wrong with that second sentence. We never use lawn as a synonym for yard in the context of fabric measurements, because unlike yard, lawn is never used to describe a unit of three feet. Yard can mean things that lawn can't. So rather than saying yard and lawn are synonyms, it would be more accurate to say they are synonyms in certain contexts (like the context of mowing). Again, we could draw two overlapping circles representing the words yard and lawn and the overlapping shaded portion would represent the contexts in which lawn and yard are synonyms (e.g. mowing), while the non-shaded, non-overlapping portions would represent the contexts in which they are not synonyms (e.g. measurements). 

Rather than saying that a given word has a meaning, it is more accurate to say that a word has a range of potential meanings. This is what a dictionary gives you: a list of potential meanings for each word. Greek is no different from English in this regard. Greek contains words whose meanings overlap with one another as synonyms. Forgetting this simple fact, people often make the mistake of thinking that 'different word equals different meaning.' They assume that if John used agapao instead of phileo, he must have had two different meanings in mind. But this is not necessarily the case. For example, a German speaker who was just learning English might think that "Donny told Stuart to mow the yard" must mean something slightly different from "Donny told Stuart to mow the lawn," simply because the second sentence uses a different word. But we native English speakers know that this is not the case. Different word does not equal different meaning, because different words can overlap in their meaning.

***********************************************************************

So let me summarize. First, contrary to popular belief, the word agape is not a special kind of love that is better than phileo. Agape can be used to refer to selfless love and selfish love, to God's love of his people and an apostate's love of the world. And second, much of the time, agapao and phileo function as synonyms, although phileo can also mean "I kiss." Any difference between the two must be determined by the context, not by the word itself.

So, am I saying that God doesn't love us with a sacrificial, giving, special love? No, I am not saying that at all. I am simply saying that you can't get all of that from the mere word agape. To see how God loves us, we don't just zero in on the single word agapao, we zero out to entire sentences like: 

"For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son;" (John 3:16)

"In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. (1 John 4:9-10)

"Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her..." (Ephesians 5:25)

"For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die—but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." (Romans 5:7-8)

"Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. (John 15:13)

"See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are." (1 John 3:1)

(All of the verses above use agape/agapao.)

So which is better? To agapao or to phileo? I'll take either one. Just don't kiss me. 

-Justin Dillehay

(The Venn Diagram was borrowed from the very helpful article called "Language," by Robert I. Bradshaw, http://www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/article_language.html. In many ways, this post is simply a condensing of works like Bradshaw's, as well as D. A. Carson's Exegetical Fallacies and Moises Silva's God, Language, and Scripture. Nothing original, just as advertised.) 

Politics Doesn't Encourage Rational Thinking

More from James Q. Wilson's American Government textbook. Interesting note: Rob Spinney had Wilson as a prof at Harvard. I remember mentioning this textbook to him several years ago. He responded, "Jimmy Q! He was a great professor. Very professional. Always dapper."

"If we wanted agencies to pursue their main goal with more vigor and less encumbering red tape, we would have to ask Congress, the courts, or the White House to repeal some of these constraints. In other words, we would have to be willing to give up something we want in order to get something else we want even more. But politics does not encourage people to make these trade-offs; instead it encourages us to expect to get everything- efficiency, fairness, help for minorities- all at once."

–James Q. Wilson and John Dilulio, American Government 

Hebrews 6, Warnings, Calvinists, and Arminians

Yesterday I posted an excerpt from Tom Schreiner on the perseverance of the saints. Wednesday night, Pastor Donny read Hebrews 6 aloud to our congregation, exposing us to one of God's most somber warnings to us. Today, in a brief article, Schreiner responds to Arminian NT scholar Scot McKnight on the meaning of the warning passages in Hebrews. What is refreshing--and to many, perhaps, surprising--is the amount of exegetical agreement that can exist between an Arminian and a Calvinist. Make no mistake, however, there are key differences as well. Give it a read. :)

 http://www.credomag.com/2011/12/29/calvinism-and-the-warning-passages-a-brief-reply-to-scot-mcknight/

How Do You Know You Won't Forsake God?

"If this passage (Romans 8:35-39) merely says that God loves believers no matter what happens but that we may still depart from his love, then it is cold comfort indeed, for our prime concern is not that God will cease loving us. We know he will be faithful to the end. What worries us is that we will deny him, that we will turn our backs on the faith and renounce our first confession. This text assures us that we will not do so. We will remain true to God, not because we  are so noble, but because Christ is so loving, because Christ's love is so relentless. Nothing, not even ourselves--especially ourselves--can ever cause us to renounce the love of God that has invaded our lives." 

--Thomas Schreiner and Ardel Caneday, The Race Set Before Us: A Biblical Theology of Perseverence and Assurance

Should We Abolish the Electoral College?

This excerpt came from the American Government textbook I used in Dr. Gunter's class at Tech. I've never had so much fun reading a textbook.

"Should we abolish the electoral college? Most Americans think we should, and soon. But, then again, most Americans, even after the 2000 presidential election controversy, do not really know how the system presently works. First, the system is a bulwark of Amercian federalism and heightens the influence of states in national politics. Because of its winner-take-all feature (in effect in all but two states), candidates have a strong incentive to campaign hard in big states they have a chance of winning. Second, if we relied just on the popular vote, there would have to be a runoff election among the two leading candidates if neither got a majority because third-party candidates won a lot of votes. This would encourage the formation of third parties, and American presidential politics might come to resemble the multiparty systems we find in France and Italy. If that is what we want, then we should abolish the electoral college. But if not, then we should preserve the system or reform it in more minor ways."

--James Q. Wilson and John DiIulio, American Government

"Local Church? Heck No! I Love All Christians Everywhere Equally!"

"One of the chief tragedies of evangelicalism today is that it has lost sight of the wonderful, life-giving force of authority. We've been carried away by culture. More than we realize, we view ourselves as independent agents charged best with how to grow, serve, and love in the faith. Yes, we may listen to others, defer to others, and accept guidance from others, but in the final analysis we view ourselves as our own coaches, portfolio managers, guides, judges, and captains of our own ships in a manner that is more cultural than biblical. In short, an underdeveloped theology conspires with our anti-authority and individualistic instincts to deceive us into claiming that we love all Christians everywhere equally while excusing ourselves from loving any of those Christians specifically, especially submissively. Unsurprisingly, churches are shallow, Christians are weak, and God's people look like the world."

--Jonathan Leeman, The Church and the Surprising Offense of God's Love 

We Have Erected an Idol and Called it 'Love'

I'm rereading Jonathan Leeman's book for a J-term class on the Doctrine of the Church. I have never read another non-inspired book quite like it. Anyone who is struggling with their church, or is thinking of walking away from the 'institutional church' needs to carefully read it before they do anything rash.

I will likely be posting excerpts from it frequently in the coming days. In this chapter, he is discussing the factors in our culture that make Christians reluctant to join a church and churches reluctant to practice discipline.

"We have erected an idol and called it 'love.' And this idol called love has two great commands: 'Know that God loves you by not permanently binding you to anything (especially if you really don't want to be), and flowing from it, 'Know that your neighbor loves you best by letting yuo express entirely and without judgment.'

--Jonathan Leeman, The Church and the Surprising Offense of God's Love

 http://www.amazon.com/Church-Surprising-Offense-Gods-Love/dp/1433509059/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1324506097&sr=8-2

The Christian Answer to Relativism

"The Christian answer to relativism is theological: the reality of the Creator God. He is both Creator and Interpreter. Made in his image, we have a relationship to the created universe that is not illusory. He is free to reveal himself in time and space, and in the languages of the cultures that develop in human history. Christian theology takes seriously the cultural contexts in which his revelation is given, and the Christian mission takes seriously the cultural contexts it addresses. Hermeneutical studies have reminded us that our own culture has an impact on both tasks. But so does God's word have an impact on all languages and cultures. Confronted with God's revelation, our own understanding changes, and we altar our assumptions. Not a circle, but a spiral of clearer conception and communication of the message results. God has made his truth communicable; he calls us to 'think his thoughts after him.'"

--Edmund Clowney, The Church 

Better than Unconditional

"What's true of five-year-olds is true of all of us: we treat life as if it's our party. We want the mountain of gifts and the kudos to belong to us, not to someone else. Not even to God. Our lives are spent conspiring toward this end. God responds to our conspiring not with a gospel of 'unconditional love,' but with a gospel of 'contra-conditional love.' The idea of unconditional love suggests that he is content to love us exactly as he finds us, but that's not quite right. He loves us when he finds us, but he loves us by changing us into what he should be."

--Jonathan Leeman, The Church and the Surprising Offense of God's Love 

 

Richard Dawkins Doesn't Exist!

Richard Dawkins is an atheist who has written a book called The God Delusion. The following humorous audio clip turns this on its head. In the clip, the host "Richard" interviews 'Dr. Terry Tommyrot' about his book  The Dawkins Delusion. The actor portraying Tommyrot is impersonating Dawkins, and using Dawkins' arguments for why God doesn't exist to prove that Dawkins doesn't exist.

Did Jesus Speak Greek?

Link to a helpful article by Mark D. Roberts. (Spoiler: his answer is 'Probably.')

http://blog.beliefnet.com/markdroberts/2010/07/did-jesus-speak-greek.html

Christopher Hitchens has Died

Here is a link to Douglas Wilson's obituary over at Christianity Today.

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2011/decemberweb-only/christopher-hitchens-obituary.html

You SHOULD Spend Time on Things that Won't Last

Excerpts from a couple of good books on Christianity and culture.

“Our generation tends to think about motivation in two speeds and two speeds only—there are things that are of the utmost importance, and things that are of no importance. There’s no in-between. That’s one of the reasons this whole conversation about the mission of the church is so difficult. The minute you start arguing that good works are not of utmost importance, people accuse you of saying that they are of no importance at all. The thinking seems to be that good works have to be motivated by the highest imaginable reasons—We’re building for the kingdom! We’re doing the gospel! We’re joining God in his mission! We’re spreading shalom!—or else people will think they’re not important at all.

We need another speed. We need a speed that somewhere between of the utmost importance and of no importance. Something like really, really important might do the trick. The fact is, we as Christians have a lot of things on our plate. There are many things that the Lord calls us to do that are not of the utmost importance, in the sense that they are earth-shattering, kingdom-building, eternity-making things. Are yet they are really, really important, and we are called to be faithful in doing them. If we’re honest with ourselves, we already have this speed, and we use it all the time. Think about our marriages, for example. Our marriages are not going to make it into eternity; they’re not of the utmost importance (Matt. 22:30). And yet they are really, really important, and we give much of our lives and our love and our energy to them. We don’t default to saying that because they’re not of the utmost importance, they must be of no importance at all.

So why must those be our only two options when it comes to good works and social ministry and and culture building and our occupations and all the rest?”

--Kevin DeYoung and Greg Gilbert, What is the Mission of the Church?

“At this point I pause and for a moment to reflect on a common misconception about the proper Chrsitian attitude toward cultural endeavors. Many recent books on Christianity and culture target sayings such as ‘you don’t polish brass on a sinking ship,’ which some people use to denigrate cultural work based upon the idea that it’s all about to be destroyed anyway. Such sayings are indeed unhelpful and misleading, and recent books are correct to look for a different perspective. But often the alternative that writers present is that the ship is not sinking at all. The ship is our everlasting home and is being transformed through redemption in Christ, and thus our cultural efforts to improve the ship are fashioning the new creation itself. As considered in chapter 3, however, ‘the present form of this world is passing away’ (1 Cor. 7:31). Our cultural activities, like marriage and commerce (1 Cor. 7:29-30)—are honorable. They have eternal consequences in that God will recognize our good deeds on the last day and give us our due (e.g. 2 Cor. 5:9-10). But our cultural products themselves are not meant to endure into the world to come. They belong to the stuff of the present world. Contrary to what some people suggest, we are to spend time on things that do not last. We are like the Israelite exiles, who built homes and planted gardens in Babylon, though they knew they would leave there after seventy years." 

--David Van Drunen, Living in God’s Two Kingdoms

God's Mercy to Returning Prodigals

If you haven't read The Pleasures of God by John Piper, sell one of your other shirts and buy it. Even Piper himself, I believe, would say that it's his best. Here he recounts the story of the return of the Prodigal Son.

"The father runs. Can you see them both running? Or maybe the boy was too stunned to run. Perhaps he couldn't believe his eyes. Maybe the smell of pigs was still on him. Maybe the thought flashed through his mind to turn and escape this utterly unexpected demonstration of affection. But he does not turn. Jesus says the father embraced him and kissed him--pig smell and all. Can you see that embrace without feeling the emotion? I can't... I know that I am that son in Jesus' story. And I cannot comprehend that the Father in heaven- the great and glorious Creator of all the universe and Sovereign over all things- throws to the wind all dignified self-consciousness and runs to me and embraces me and kisses me, as though-- no! it is no fiction-- rather, because he is happy with me. He is glad with all his heart that I am part of the family. This is why I cannot see that embrace without pausing to let my eyes and throat recover." 

--John Piper, The Pleasures of God 

The Christian Faith Means Thinking

"Faith according to our Lord’s teaching in this paragraph, is primarily thinking; and the whole trouble with a man of little faith is that he does not think. He allows circumstances to bludgeon him. . . .

We must spend more time in studying our Lord’s lessons in observation and deduction. The Bible is full of logic, and we must never think of faith as something purely mystical. We do not just sit down in an armchair and expect marvelous things to happen to us. That is not Christian faith. Christian faith is essentially thinking. Look at the birds, think about them, draw your deductions. Look at the grass, look at the lilies of the field, consider them. . . .

Faith, if you like, can be defined like this: It is a man insisting upon thinking when everything seems determined to bludgeon and knock him down in an intellectual sense. The trouble with the person of little faith is that, instead of controlling his own thought, his thought is being controlled by something else, and, as we put it, he goes round and round in circles. That is the essence of worry. . . . That is not thought; that is the absence of thought, a failure to think." 

--D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones

A Line Straight Through the Heart

This from an author who did time in a Russian gulag.

"If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being."

--Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

God, Sports, and Tim Tebow

Here is a link to an excellent article by Owen Strachan on God's role in sports, in light of recent discussion in the media about whether God is helping Tim Tebow win.

http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/tgc/2011/12/13/tebow-calvin-and-the-hand-of-god-in-sports/

Does Recycling Really Save Trees?

Not according to an article from the Encyclopedia of Economics and Liberty.

"Ironically, recycling does not eliminate environmental worries. Recycling is a manufacturing process and, like other manufacturing processes, can produce pollution. An EPA study of toxic chemicals found such chemicals in both recycling and virgin paper processing, and for most of the toxins studied, the recycling process had higher levels than the virgin manufacturing did. Nor will recycling more newspapers necessarily preserve trees, because many trees are grown specifically to be made into paper. A study prepared for the environmental think tank Resources for the Future estimated that if paper recycling reached high levels, demand for virgin paper would fall. As a result, writes economist A. Clark Wiseman, “some lands now being used to grow trees will be put to other uses.” The impact would not be large, but it would be the opposite of what most people expect—there would be fewer trees, not more. Finally, curbside recycling programs require additional trucks, which use more energy and create more pollution."

--Jane Shaw, "Recycling," from Encyclopedia of Economics and Liberty, http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/Recycling.html

(p.s. If you read the entire article, you'll find that she is not against all recycling. But like a true economist, she looks at the hidden costs, not just the obvious monetary costs.)

Brian Regan on Flying

This guy is hilarious.

Reality Calling Our Bluff

"I remember lecturing at Ohio State University, one of the largest universities in this country. I was minutes away from beginning my lecture, and my host was driving me past a new building called the Wexner Center for the Performing Arts.

He said, “This is America’s first postmodern building.”

I was startled for a moment and I said, “What is a postmodern building?”

He said, “Well, the architect said that he designed this building with no design in mind. When the architect was asked, ‘Why?’ he said, ‘If life itself is capricious, why should our buildings have any design and any meaning?’ So he has pillars that have no purpose. He has stairways that go nowhere. He has a senseless building built and somebody has paid for it.”

I said, “So his argument was that if life has no purpose and design, why should the building have any design?”

He said, “That is correct.”

I said, “Did he do the same with the foundation?”

All of a sudden there was silence.

You see, you and I can fool with the infrastructure as much as we would like, but we dare not fool with the foundation because it will call our bluff in a hurry."

--Ravi Zecharias

American Schools in the 'Good Old Days'

“The third illusory reason for romanticism about what schools can do is the nostalgic view that many people hold of American public schools in the good old days, when teachers brooked no nonsense and everyone learned their three R’s. After all, just look at the McGuffey Readers that were standard textbooks in the nineteenth century, filled with difficult words and long literary selections. That’s what we expected everyone to be able to read then, right?

Wrong. American schools have never been able to teach everyone how to read, write, and do arithmetic. The myth that they could has arisen because schools a hundred years ago did not have to educate many of the least able. Recall that about half of all adults in 1900 had not reached the eighth grade. To put it another way, only a small portion of those toward the bottom of linguistic ability would have been around to take a NAEP examination if it had been administered to eighth-graders in 1900. Let today’s schools skim off the same part of the distribution, and they would show nearly 100 percent success in attaining the Basic standard in reading.”

--Charles Murray, Real Education, 

[Justin: Just so you know, Murray is not saying that 'the least able' should not be educated. In his book he is simply trying to counter what he regard as the unrealistic, Utopian expectations of some modern educators.]

http://www.amazon.com/Real-Education-Bringing-Americas-Schools/dp/0307405397/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1323520110&sr=1-1

Only One Penance

“I finally, this evening, confessed my sins and got to work somewhat. It seems so utterly hypocritical to go on as though no sin had been committed without some kind of penance, but God says there is only one penance—Jesus’ sacrifice on Calvary, Jesus’ blood. I plead it and go on, knowing that I shall fall again”

--Tom Carson, quoted in Memoirs of an Ordinary Pastor, D.A. Carson.

More Anti-Conspiracy Theory Stuff

“Many issues are misconstrued, not because they are too complex for most people to understand, but because a mundane explanation is far less emotionally satisfying than an explanation which produces villains to hate and heroes to exalt. Indeed, the emotionally satisfying explanation may often be more complex than a mundane explanation that is more consonant with verifiable facts. This is especially true of conspiracy theories.” 

--Thomas Sowell, Intellectuals and Society

************************************************************************

 "My boyfriend, Jim, has so many conspiracy theories. I think he gives people too much credit. I so rarely meet a single person who is very well organized, or with any direction. What are the chances a meeting a whole group?"

Esme Raji Codell, Educating Esme

 

 

Rob Spinney on Conspiracy Theories and a Christian Worldview

This excerpt is from a lecture Rob Spinney gave to his online classes at Patrick Henry College.

"We should expect unintended consequences. Liberal historians often assume that people are omnicompetent. Because they believe that humans can do anything, they routinely assume that outcomes are almost always the planned results of some human intentions. (An aside: this is why conspiracy theories abound. When you think that men control everything, you assume that every bad thing is the result of some intentional human plan.) Not true. Fallen humans are both capable and myopic, both powerful and unwise. The result is that human history is littered with unintended consequences. The Great War for Empire (a.k.a. the French and Indian War) shattered the colonists’ largely warm relationship with Great Britain in the 1760s, but this was accidental and unplanned. Historical events have causes, but they are often unexpected ones. Indeed, we should not be surprised when fallen humans misjudge situations and unleash dynamics that yield surprising results."

Stein on the Cleansing of the Temple

Back to blogging Stein, after a week or two off. Chapter 14: The Cleansing of the Temple: God's House--A Den of Thieves. Before giving the excerpt, let me give you Mark's account of this event. Notice how Mark, unlike Matthew and Luke, gives us the story of the cursing of the fig tree in two parts, placing the cleansing of the temple in between them.

"On the following day, when they came from Bethany, he was hungry. And seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, he went to see if he could find anything on it. When he came to it, he found nothing but leaves, for it was not the season for figs. And he said to it, “May no one ever eat fruit from you again.” And his disciples heard it.

And they came to Jerusalem. And he entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold and those who bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. And he would not allow anyone to carry anything through the temple. And he was teaching them and saying to them, “Is it not written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations’? But you have made it a den of robbers.” And the chief priests and the scribes heard it and were seeking a way to destroy him, for they feared him, because all the crowd was astonished at his teaching. And when evening came they went out of the city.

As they passed by in the morning, they saw the fig tree withered away to its roots. And Peter remembered and said to him, “Rabbi, look! The fig tree that you cursed has withered.” And Jesus answered them, “Have faith in God. Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. And whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses.”

(Mark 11:12-25 ESV)

Stein explains:

"The cleansing of the temple is best understood as a symbolic act of Jesus in which he sought to purify the temple and at the same time proclaim divine judgment on it. It was a purifying act in that he rebuked the commercialization of God's house. The temple was not meant to be a stock market or a bank exchange. It was not mean to be a profit-making enterprise for the high priests. Jesus' action, consequently, must be understood, in part at least, as a cleansing. His reference to the temple as a 'den of robbers' (Mk.11:17) and his prohibition of using the temple as a shortcut (Mk. 11:16) demonstrate that.

Yet the cleansing involved more. It was a prophetic act as well...  

...It may be that Mark intentionally placed the cleansing of the temple in its present position to help the reader understand how to interpret the event...As we shall see, Mark 'sandwiched' the cleansing of the temple (Mk. 11:15-19) between the cursing of the fig tree (vv.12-14 and 20-25) so that his readers would understand that the 'cleansing' was not simply an act of purification or reformation, but one of judgment...

Jesus did not simply predict the destruction of the temple and Jerusalem. As in the cursing of the fig tree, so here also Jesus brought about that cursing/judgment. He himself would see that it happened. He had passed judgment on the situation and would bring it about. Unlike the Old Testament prophets, however, Jesus predicted the destruction of the temple without hinting that a new temple would be built to take its place. Through his ministry such a temple would be unnecessary (John 4:21-23)."

--Robert Stein, Jesus the Messiah

 

  

Lessons from Herman Cain's Fall

Read Al Mohler's thoughts on what Christian men can learn from Cain's fall.

http://www.albertmohler.com/2011/12/05/for-christian-men-the-lessons-of-herman-cain/

Bible Translations-Why We Need New Ones Even When People Don't Want Them

I'll be giving a church history Sunday school lesson in a couple of weeks on the King James Version of the Bible. Here are some excerpts that deal with the nature of Bible translation:

“There is no such thing as translating a book into another language once and for all, for a language is a changing thing. If your son is to have clothes it is no good buying him a suit once and for all: he will grow out of it and have to be reclothed… We must sometimes get away from the Authorized Version (King James) if for no other reason, simply because it is so beautiful and so solemn. Beauty exalts, but beauty also lulls. Early associations endear but they also confuse. Through that beautiful solemnity the transporting or horrifying realities of which the Book tells may come through to us blunted and disarmed, and we may only sigh with tranquil veneration when we ought to be burning with shame or struck dumb with terror or carried out of ourselves by ravishing hopes and adorations. Does the word “scourged” really come home to us like “flogged”? Does 'mocked him' sting like 'jeered at him'?”
--C.S. Lewis

In this excerpt, Mark Strauss is responding to those who argue for 'literal' translation. Strauss supports what is referred to as 'functional equivalent' translation (such as the NIV).

“[Ray] Van Leeuwen warns that “The danger of FE [functional equivalent] translations is that they shape the Bible too much to fit our world and our expectations. There is a danger that the Bible gets silenced because we have tamed and domesticated it.” This is an important caution, and we must never convert the Bible into a self-help book for the self-indulgent worldview of the West. But again, this warning speaks to the need to accurately depict the Bible‟s culture and theology, not to mimic its linguistic forms. Indeed, Van Leeuwen's warning against the “domestication” of the text can be turned on its head. Traditional church language, canonized by the King James Version and its revisions, can become so staid and familiar that it has little impact on churchgoers who have heard it all their lives. For many, reading a contemporary version brings the Bible to life by piercing through the traditional language “domesticated” through familiarity. Witness for example the rhetorical power of J. B. Phillips‟ New Testament in Modern English and, more recently, The Message by Eugene Peterson.

Much of what [Leland] Ryken considers to be the exalted literary style of the Bible represents his preference for the vocabulary, rhythm and style of the KJV. For those of us who grew up reading and memorizing the KJV, it is the language of the church – “Godlanguage.” But while this style has made a profound impact upon the English-speaking world, it was not the style of the biblical writers, which to the original readers sounded natural and contemporary.

R. T. France has said this well:

The colloquial language employed by Tyndale so that the Scriptures would be accessible to the ploughboy has thus become, with the passing of time, the esoteric language of religion, and the more remote it becomes from ordinary speech the more special and holy it seems.”

--Mark Stauss, “Form, Function, and the ‘Literal Meaning’ Fallacy in Bible Translations”

A (Biblical!) Bible Prophecy Chart

The chart below appears in the ESV Study Bible in an article by Thomas Schreiner entitled "The Theology of the New Testament." It reflects a similar chart that was (as far as I know) originally drawn up by a Christian scholar named Geerhardus Vos (whose wife Catherine wrote The Child's Story Bible). It helpfully shows the biblical framework of history, and how that framework became clearer as Jesus came and fulfilled the Old Testament hope, in ways that were unexpected to some (see John the Baptist's confusion in Matthew 11:1-6).

The New Testament part of the chart depicts history as composed of two ages ("this age and the age to come"), which are represented by the two parallel lines. This age begins at creation and ends with the second coming of Jesus. The age to come (and here's the amazing part) begins with the first coming of Christ while this age is still going on. Thus the two ages overlap, which means that we Christians have a foot in both ages. This is what is meant by saying that as New Testament Christians we live in the already/not yet: the age to come (call it 'the kingdom of God,' 'eternal life,' etc.) has already been inaugurated by Christ's first coming, but it will only be consummated by Christ's second coming. At the first coming of Christ, the age to come entered its first days, while this age entered its last days (Heb. 1:1-2; 1 Cor. 10:11; 2 Pet. 3:3; 1 John 2:18; Acts 2:17; 2 Tim. 3:1; Jude 18). In the mean time, we continue to live in this present evil age, though Christ has delivered us from its dominion (Gal. 1:4, Titus 2:11-14; 1 John 3:1-3; Rom. 12:1-2). And we wait for his glorious appearing, which will bring this present evil age to an end (Matt. 13:39, 40, 49; 24:3; 28:20; Titus 2:13).

(The framework seen in this chart has become the standard consensus among evangelical New Testament scholars. For books that explain it, a good place to start would be:
The End Times Made Simple, Sam Waldron, http://www.amazon.com/End-Times-Made-Simple-Everybody/dp/1879737507/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1322943109&sr=1-1
The Kingdom of Christ, Russell Moore http://www.amazon.com/Kingdom-Christ-New-Evangelical-Perspective/dp/1581346271/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1322942945&sr=1-1)



(p.s. In order to make the print readable, I have blown the chart up to a ridiculous size.)

Church Membership and the Consumer Mentality

More from Jonathan Leeman. (If you haven't read the other excerpts from him, type his name into the search box in the upper left corner of this blog.)

"Christians these days have a hard time submitting to the body, not just because we resent the idea of authority, but because our minds can't hep but respond like consumers. A consumer has authority. A consumer thinks he is the head, and the rest of the body exists to serve him and fulfill his personal narrative. Not only that, but he gets a little nervous when others are different from him. Jews and Greeks? Slaves and free? No thank you, I'll stick with the free Greeks. The consumer is always looking for the right fit..."

--Jonathan Leeman, The Church and the Surprising Offense of God's Love,  

http://www.amazon.com/Church-Surprising-Offense-Gods-Love/dp/1433509059/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1322923839&sr=1-1

 

"While I Slept or Drank Wittenberg Beer"

Martin Luther, the Protestant reformer, speak about the power of the God's word.

"I simply taught, preached, wrote God's Word: otherwise I did nothing. And them, while I slept or drank Wittenberg beer with my Philip of Amsdorf, the Word so greatly weakened the papacy that never a prince or an emperor did such damage to it. I did nothing: the Word did all." 

Why Be Part of a Church?

"A living, breathing congregation is the only place to live in a healthy relationship to God. That is because it is the only place on earth where Jesus has chosen to dwell."

--Tim Stafford, "The Church: Why Bother?" Christianity Today, January 2005

God is a Hedonist at Heart, Wormwood!

Another great excerpt from C.S. Lewis' classic The Screwtape Letters. Here's my advice: if you don't have this book, borrow it (I will loan it to you). If you can't borrow it, buy it. If you don't have the money, sell your best shirt and buy it. It's that good. Just in case you don't know the plot, I wouldn't want you to misconstrue the following excerpt, so here's the basic idea: Wormwood is a young demon who has been assigned to tempt a certain human being. Screwtape, an older, more experienced demon, is Wormwood's uncle and superior officer. The book consists of letters from Screwtape to Wormwood instructing him in the art of tempting. Full of insights about sin and fallen human nature! In this excerpt, Screwtape is bemoaning God's kind generosity toward the human race.

"He's a hedonist at heart, Wormwood. All those fasts and vigils and stakes and crosses are only a facade. Or only like the foam on the seashore. Out at sea, out in his sea, there is pleasure, and more pleasure. He makes no secret of it; at his right hand are 'pleasures for evermore'...He's vulgar, Wormwood. He has a bourgeois mind. He has filled his world full of pleasures. There are things for humans to do all day long without his minding in the least- sleeping, washing, eating, drinking, making love, playing, praying, working. Everything has to be twisted before it's of any use to us." 

--C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters.