Well, the spring semester is off to a wintery start! Classes start this week with Old Testament Survey and St. Mark’s Passion (Greek Exegesis). The latter meets for the first time tomorrow; the former meets online so we’ve already started.
Our introductory assignments in Old Testament uncovered some items of interest, wanted to share them here…
The first thing that caught my attention was this: in the discussion of how the ancient historians (read: 200 BC to 500AD) understood their world, not one ever wrote from the perspective of total non-belief in deity. That is to say, Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Persian, et al, historians ALL took as a goes-without-saying assumption that both God and prophecy exist. What one calls one’s god might be up for debate, and whether or not a prophecy is true might be disputed, but the foundational belief in a higher power and that higher power’s ability to communicate through human beings was a given. The widespread and deliberate agnosticism of our day would have been completely foreign to them, no matter what nation they came from.
It brought to mind the scripture “the fool says in his heart there is no God”. How foolish our society has become… and how much more foolish still will it become? We could learn a thing or two from these ancient peoples…
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The second item comes from the discussion on how Scriptures were physically recorded. For centuries much written material was recorded on papyrus scrolls… which worked well in Egypt and the southern desert areas (where the climate is very dry) but didn’t work so well in Palestine (which is a good bit more humid, except for Qumran, thankfully). So for a couple of centuries before Jesus’ day, Jewish writers began to experiment with using parchment (very thin treated leather). But sometime in Jesus’ lifetime or shortly later a new medium of communication was invented: the BOOK! They were called ‘codices’ back then and were made of leather, but for the first time in history, pages were bound rather than scrolled. And here we are 2000 years later still getting information from books. Am I the only book-lover around who thinks the 2000th anniversary of the invention of books calls for some kind of celebration?
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The third thing that stood out for me was the last sentence in our assigned reading. This is from the chapter on the geography of the Holy Land.
“The land was designed more for tribal possession or city-states than for a strongly unified nation.” (p. 631, Old Testament Survey, Lasor et al)
This is so because physically Palestine is very divided – mountainous regions and a few lake areas separated by valleys and steppes (plus a river and a coastal area); in terms of climate, varying widely with distances of only 30-50 miles; naturally divided both east-west and north-south; and not easily traversed in a straight line in any direction.
Knowing this makes a lot more sense (from a human standpoint) of the fact that God instituted a system of tribes and judges to organize and govern His people. From the beginning He planned to be their King, their one unifying force, with the (very) extended family as the primary unit of society. So when the people asked for a human king it was clear they misunderstood and rejected God’s plan in every way it possibly could be — and in doing so made things a lot more complicated for themselves, not just spiritually but politically and in terms of their relationship to the land.
I note this now because I’m curious to see how this fact will play out as we study more about the Old Testament and God’s plan for His people. And it makes me wonder if perhaps His coming Kingdom might be… somewhat tribal or city-state-like? Something to think about…
I totally agree about the ancients, to a person–how they believed in a god of some kind, something greater than themselves. Perhaps they were closer to the time when the Creator walked with the patriarchs and prophets. The Gentiles heard stories of the Creator; they had seen signs and wonders, such as the cataclysms at the time of the Exodus. They had all heard the whispered promise of immortality by an Entity who they believed could provide it. At any rate, they all knew there was a god (or God). Oh, how modern man has strayed, prancing around the globe, “lovers of pleasures (for self) and not lovers of God.”
Humanistic minds have made themselves into their own gods–powerless even to say to themselves, Live on. What fools!
I appreciated your post. I invite you to visit my blog, “Immortality Road,” here: https://immortalityroad.wordpress.com
God bless, Wayneman
Greetings Wayne and thanks for your comments.
I took you up on your invitation and visited your blog. I enjoyed your piece on the unity of believers, and totally agree. Paul clearly taught that divisions in the church are not of God. I think one of the greatest challenges for believers is to find a church to join (any church) and not start thinking it’s the best one. Grace and humility towards folks from other churches, denominations and non-denominations is what’s needed… and harder to find the ‘higher’ up one goes in church hierarchy.
Welcome back, Peg. I hope the storm didn’t hit you too hard. It’s cleared out nicely here in Maine.
You’ll have fun with the Old Testament. One of the professors who influenced my thought the most is Marvin Wilson of Gordon College. I had several of his OT courses when I was there in the 1980’s. He’s still there, but so far I haven’t succeeded in getting my girls to take a course from him–and one has already graduated!
Let me recommend one of his books: Our Father Abraham: Jewish Roots of the Christian Faith, by Marvin R. Wilson (Eerdmans Publishing). This is a very Hebrew–and very biblical–look at our bible, OT and NT alike. The LaSor book that you have is good too–I think I bought that for an OT course at GCTS that I never took.
About geography: A couple of things come to mind, both involving the Jordan River valley. That was the Interstate 95 (or I-80 in your case) of the holy land (No, I-95 is a better analogy, as it goes north and south…).
The first is from various prophecies (Jeremiah, for ex) of enemies invading by sending “armies from the north.” Too often, end-times best-sellers have made this out to be Russia or the Soviet Union. When I first became a believer, the Soviet Union had just invaded Afghanistan, and this was “proof” by the likes of Pat Robertson and Hal Lindsey (Late Great Planet Earth) that the prophecies were coming true (Interesting that it’s now the USA that’s in Afghanistan). But rather than “armies from the north” meaning Russia in the 20th century, it meant the Assyrian and Babylonian empires (now modern Iraq) back then. In order to invade Jerusalem they needed to go up the Fertile Crescent (Tigris-Euphrates Valley) and then down from the north along the Jordan Valley. They couldn’t come straight across from the east because of the Arabian Desert.
Secondly, from John chapter 4: Jesus “left Judea and went back once more to Galilee. Now he had to go through Samaria.” This becomes the story of Jesus and Samaritan woman at the well. I think the phrase “had to go through Samaria” is not geographical so much as a leading of the Holy Spirit, in order to evangelize that country and the woman in particular. Here’s why: Assuming he had been in Jerusalem, the shortest way to Galilee is first to go east and downhill (way, way, down hill, from 2600 feet at J’lem to 800 feet BELOW sea-level at Jericho) then north up the relatively flat river plain. Samaria was to be avoided for two reasons: dry rugged hills; and hostile infidel foreigners. In fact, Jesus used a Samaritan in one of his parables for a point: even though they were enemies and to be avoided, one of them was more of a neighbor than the priest and the Levite.
Back to geography, though; in the Good Samaritan parable (Luke 10) Jesus begins, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho…” Other references to Jerusalem in the bible read that someone “went up” to Jerusalem (Gal 2:1, for ex). So geography is part of the very language of the bible.
Have fun.
Ted
Hi Ted,
Thanks for your note and you’re right, I’m learning an awful lot recently about the geography of the Promised Land and its connection to scripture and history. Lots more to come I’m sure.
Very interesting info on “armies from the north”. I can see that now. I’ve been reading a book on Jerusalem and environs, and it’s amazing (1) how much desert there is just a few dozen miles from Jerusalem in a lot of directions, and (2) how many people have lived in this arid, inhospitable landscape for millenia! Anyway it makes a lot of sense that invasion would have to come from the north, it’s just about the only way to approach.
BTW I’ll be traveling to Israel in March, so in between papers and homework assignments I’m studying photos, maps, travel guides, and the Hebrew alphabet in preparation for the journey. We’ll be mostly around the Galilee area and Jerusalem, hopefully with side trips to Bethlehem and Masada. More info on that still to come!
I love your comments on Samaria too… indeed it’s clear Jesus deliberately went out of his way to go through Samaria and meet up with the Samaritan woman. A person would never just “stumble into” the area! (that passage is one of my favorites in all scripture)
Cheers,
Peg