academicbiblical — NoCoolName Blog

Looking at Scripture Mastery – John 3:5

January 2, 2013

Greek: ἀπεκρίθη Ἰησοῦς· ἀμὴν ἀμὴν λέγω σοι, ἐὰν μή τις γεννηθῇ ἐξ ὕδατος καὶ πνεύματος, οὐ δύναται εἰσελθεῖν εἰς τὴν βασιλείαν τῶν οὐρανῶν.

My Translation: Jesus answered, “Amen Amen I say to you, if a man is not born from water and wind, he cannot enter into the kingdom of the heavens.”

KJV: Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.

My translations are purposefully stretched and should not be viewed as more accurate than the KJV translation unless I say so in the post. I'm trying to show the range lying between the original Greek text and the English.

I love this story from the third chapter of John. The author has done a superb job of making an engaging dialog based upon irony and misunderstanding. It's like a biblical sitcom piece, and it's funny. Not accidentally, either. The author has quite purposefully approached it in a way that would have been both entertaining as well as educational.

I'm guessing most of you reading didn't know this. The problem is that it's difficult to appreciate in any language other than Greek.

Let's start with the context: this verse is from a larger dialog between Jesus and a certain Nicodemus, identified as one of the leaders of the Jews. Nicodemus approaches Jesus at night to meet with Jesus in secret. He comes because the miracles of Jesus have convinced him that there's something to Jesus.

Then Jesus begins “teaching” Nicodemus, except when he tells Nicodemus something he uses words that are ambiguous in meaning, and every time Nicodemus mishears or is confused by Jesus. The irony for a listening Christian audience, who know the insider language being used, would have been immense.

First off, Jesus tell him that unless a man is born ἄνωθεν (ánōthen), he cannot enter the kingdom of God. Ánōthen is a Greek adverb modifying the verb “born”, and it can either mean “again” or “from above”. The Greek is ambiguous (purposefully so in this case), and Nicodemus thinks it means “again”, so he asks Jesus if it's possible to be born a second time. Then Jesus explains what he meant, showing that the meaning Nicodemus should have used was “from above,” which is what the above verse is explaining. A man must have a spiritual rebirth, a birth “from above,” if he wishes to enter God's kingdom.

The rest of the story is like this. Jesus then begins talking about the spirit and wind in the worship of God, utterly confusing poor Nicodemus, because in Greek Jesus is using the same word for both “spirit” and “wind”, flitting back and forth in meaning in a way where you can't quite tell where he might mean “spirit” in this phrase or were he might mean “wind” in this other phrase. And then, in classic style for Jesus in the gospel of John, he begins talking in a long monologue (only in John's gospel does Jesus usually begin talking to people for a few bits of dialog before launching into long-winded sermons that last for multiple verses or even multiple chapters).

This use of purposefully ambiguous Greek is one of the reasons that most scholars feel that this section of John's Gospel cannot be historically accurate. The phrasing and ambiguity only work in Greek (that's why in English the chapter feels odd, because a translator must choose a meaning for the words being used), but Jesus and Nicodemus would have been speaking Aramaic. In Aramaic there is no equivalent to ánōthen, and so there is no way that John's Gospel, written in Greek, could be a record of a similar Aramaic discussion. Perhaps there was a similar dialog/sermon spoken by the historical Jesus, but if so then it was not the one we have recorded in John's gospel.

A few things about what is said here in this verse: Greek has a definite article (like the English word “the”: “the apple”), but not an indefinite article (like the English word “a” or “an”: “an apple”). The definite article is often used in places where it wouldn't be in English, such as with proper names or people (so in Greek, the scriptures often refer to God as “The God”). There is no definite article in front of the word “spirit” in this verse, and only a few verses later, Jesus begins a discussion of the spirit and wind. So is Jesus speaking about what Mormons would call “the Gift of the Holy Ghost” here? Possibly, but an equally valid reading would be the translation that I provided: “wind”. Is Jesus saying that entrance to the kingdom of God is predicated upon baptism and confirmation? Possibly, but he could also simply be referring to the elements that come from the air, where the heavens are: wind and water. So he could be saying that we must be born from heaven, or born spiritually, to enter God's kingdom. It's not a cut and dried issue to simply say, “This scripture says that baptism is required.” And to say that the scripture says that “confirmation” or “the gift of the Holy Ghost” is required goes way beyond the verse itself.

Of course, there's been a long tradition in Christianity of baptism and of the need for baptism. The Catholics viewed baptism as so essential that eventually they provided the means and the practice to extend baptism to all humans by infant baptism (though they still accept baptism by immersion for those who wish for it). Many Protestants also have had periods in their history where the importance of baptism by water was paramount.

Of course, nowadays there are very few denominations that view baptism as completely essential to salvation. And it's not like they arrived at this conclusion by ignoring their Bibles. There are perfectly valid ways to interpret ambiguities such as those found in John 3:3-5 that do not create a requirement of water baptism for salvation.

For Mormons, baptism is still of paramount importance. The Book of Mormon has the pre-Christian prophet Nephi writing in the 6th Century BCE that baptism by water is the only way to start on the road towards eternal life. The Doctrine and Covenants repeatedly presses this point, and the doctrinal position that not only is baptism essential, but the proper authority must be present means that Mormons believe only their baptisms can start people on the road to eternal life. This leads to such things as baptism for the dead and the worldwide missionary program. And, of course, scriptures like John 3:5 as found in the English King James Bible seem, at first glance, to support their viewpoint. However, there are many other Biblically-literate Christians who have read and are very familiar with the Gospel of John who recognize that the underlying scripture is based on the ambiguity of certain words and that it would be incorrect to state that only one interpretation can be valid.

Why Do I Think This Is Part of Scripture Mastery?

This scripture was probably chosen to give LDS youth a way to answer the question, “Why do you think that I have to be baptized into your Church to be saved?” Or to explain why baptism is important. Since nearly all youth who would be attending Seminary were probably baptized years before when they turned 8, I doubt that CES would feel the need to impress upon them the importance of baptism without it being from a proselytizing viewpoint.

#Mormon #ScriptureMasteryNT #AcademicBiblical

Looking at Scripture Mastery – Luke 24:36-39

December 31, 2012

Greek: 36 Ταῦτα δὲ αὐτῶν λαλούντων αὐτὸς ἔστη ἐν μέσῳ αὐτῶν. 37 πτοηθέντες δὲ καὶ ἔμφοβοι γενόμενοι ἐδόκουν πνεῦμα θεωρεῖν. 38 καὶ εἶπεν αὐτοῖς· τί τεταραγμένοι ἐστέ, καὶ διατί διαλογισμοὶ ἀναβαίνουσιν ἐν τῇ καρδίᾳ ὑμῶν; 39 ἴδετε τὰς χεῖράς μου καὶ τοὺς πόδας μου, ὅτι ἐγώ εἰμι αὐτός· ψηλαφήσατέ με καὶ ἴδετε, ὅτι πνεῦμα σάρκας καὶ ὀστέα οὐκ ἔχει καθὼς ἐμὲ θεωρεῖτε ἔχοντα.

My Translation: 36 Now they themselves talking, he stood in the middle of them [some manuscripts add “and he said, “Peace to y'all'”]. 37 But they were terrified and became afraid, seeming to see a spirit. 38 And he said to them, “Y'all are troubled? And why do thoughts rise up in the heart of y'all? 39 Y'all look at my hands and my feet, for I am myself; y'all handle me and look, for a spirit doesn't have fleshes and bones even as y'all see I have.”

KJV: 36 And as they thus spake, Jesus himself stood in the midst of them, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you. 37 But they were terrified and affrighted, and supposed that they had seen a spirit. 38 And he said unto them, Why are ye troubled? and why do thoughts arise in your hearts? 39 Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have.

My translations are purposefully stretched and should not be viewed as more accurate than the KJV translation unless I say so in the post. I'm trying to show the range lying between the original Greek text and the English.

Usually my process on these posts is to step back in time, in my head, to my own days in Seminary about fifteen years ago. Of course, this can't take into account any change in LDS culture or doctrine since then (and some LDS doctrines and cultural assumptions have shifted dramatically in the past twenty years), but it tends to provide a good starting off point for what I want to talk about.

However, in this case I remember distinctly being taught that this set of verses was Important (with a capital “I”) because it taught something that other Christians didn't believe. My hazy memory seemed to pull up a sense that other Christians didn't believe in the resurrection of the body, or that perhaps they felt that Jesus himself wasn't resurrected but was a spirit. However, in the intervening years I've made it my business to learn the general Christian viewpoints (mostly the main Protestant viewpoints) on the Godhead; I've made it my business to try and understand the theological underpinnings of basic Trinitarian doctrine. And I can't think of many Christians who actually deny the resurrection of the body (though most simply view it as an odd side doctrine of Christianity without much importance), and I can't think of any Christians who deny the bodily resurrection of Jesus as described in some of the Gospels. I must have been mistaken.

So I asked my wife, who did not grow up in Utah, what she remembers about this scripture from her Seminary days. “Hmm,” she said, thinking back, “I seem to remember being told that this scripture specifically refutes the idea that Jesus doesn't have a body. But that can't be right, can it? Because I don't think most Christians have any idea whether or not Jesus kept his body after he was resurrected and I think even less care about the idea.”

So, on the basis of a memory of Seminary from both Utah and Colorado during the late 90s, I'm going to assume that this idea was common in CES at the time: Luke's depiction of Christ's physical resurrection was important to Mormons in context of the beliefs of other Christians.

Turning to other sources, it seems that this idea may have its genesis with Elder LeGrand Richard's book A Marvelous Work and a Wonder which was in the missionary library before and while I was on my mission (but has since been dropped from the recommended books for all missionaries). Elder Richards uses this verse to combat an idea he feels is found in traditional Christianity, namely that God is “everywhere and nowhere, without body, parts, or passions.” Of course, this is a conception of God believed by *some, *but nowhere near all, Christians towards God the Father, and not Jesus. I think the only reason that Elder Richards felt that this verse was a correct refutation of this idea of God being without a body is because Elder Richards also seems to think that a Trinitarian viewpoint of God and Jesus has them being the same person, which it does not. Believing that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are merely three expression of a single being is actually a Christian heresy called Modalism or Sabelleanism. The Trinity occupies a mentally difficult place between the heresy of Modalism and the heresy of polytheism, walking the knife's edge between the two. Many Christians feel a deep sense of holy mystery about how the nature of God is both expressed in three persons perfectly united in one Godhood. This sense of holy mystery is not absent from Mormonism; I've found its best example is applied towards the exact mechanics of how Christ's Atonement, localized to a specific few hours in time and a single spot in space, can have an impact that is universal in both time and space. Mormons don't just accept that as a mystery: they feel a deep sense of profundity at how it's incomprehensible to them. There are few things that bother me more than hearing Mormons mocking the mystery of Trinity and mere minutes later expressing their wonder and amazement at how the Atonement surpasses understanding.

So I think it's a fundamental misunderstanding of traditional Christian theology and Trinitarianism that makes Elder Richards feel that this verse is well-suited to be used against such beliefs. After all, if the Father and the Son are the same being, then how can God be without “body, parts, or passions” and yet Christ obviously has a body here in this verse? Q.E.D., right?

But that's all in the past: part of my childhood. Perhaps we've moved on from this sort of thinking, right? Let's see what the current manuals have to say on this subject.

The “current” Institute manual (which is woefully out of date in its biblical scholarship, its quotations of old LDS general authorities, and its social applications) is actually, somewhat surprisingly, rather silent on this particular section, preferring instead to focus on issues of the authority and priesthood of the apostles through what are apparently “meaningful silences” in the text by the authors in this story of Jesus appearing to them after his resurrection.

The Seminary materials, on the other hand, focus much more on how students should learn about the doctrine of resurrection in general from this passage and its context (yay for context! Student are actually encouraged to read further after this scripture to see that Luke's resurrected Jesus eats and drinks food). Of course, other scriptures on this subject are also brought up which might muddy the waters and imply more about this verse than what it says on its own. But I am glad to report that the official manuals only use these scriptures to further discussion of resurrection and what resurrected bodies “are like”.

Now, from my post-Mormon perspective, I'm glad that it appears that the scripture is no longer seen as useful in defending Mormon beliefs. Frankly, this scripture is actually rather useless in upholding any of the rather distinct doctrines of Mormonism, either those doctrines about resurrection or about an embodied God. Mormon believe that resurrection is *forever, *and that it is impossible for a resurrected person to “put off” their body. Except when some of them make exceptions against this permanence in the 19th Century and beyond in trying to account for Brigham Young's bizarre conception of Adam as the re-embodiment of God the Father. These ideas of physical bodies being “taken up” and “put aside” continue to pop up in hushed conversation and private gatherings as part of the “meat” of the Gospel and some of the “deep doctrines” that “everyone” knows about (I speak from experience, having heard some of this from multiple individuals as various times). Frankly, I think most Christians feel that Jesus, being God, cannot and should not be viewed as limited in any of his power and actions and that if Jesus wishes to have a body, then he can have a body, and if he wishes to put that body aside for a while, then he can do so. Because HE'S GOD, right?

And it's even more bizarre that this scripture, about the resurrected Jesus, would have anything to do with the nature of God the Father. Mormons believe that the Father is embodied just as the Son is embodied (though they have just as much confusion and lack of interest in the Holy Ghost as many Christians do), and while this doctrine provides much religious angst between some Mormons and some Christians, the nature of the Father is not illuminated in any way, shape, or form by this verse. Luke's Jesus never says, “Oh, and by the way, my body looks like my father's. Just FYI.” John's Jesus may make such statements, but John's Gospel is, as they say, a horse of an entirely different color.

Moving on to another issue, Jesus's statement that “a spirit” doesn't have flesh and bone should be analyzed. From a Mormon point of view, this statement has sometimes gained a particular importance in light of things said by Brigham Young and other 19th Century leaders. Supposedly, it's noteworthy that Luke doesn't have Jesus say that he doesn't have “flesh and blood”, because resurrected bodies don't have blood. Well, let me here and now state: I sincerely doubt that Luke would have made such a nuanced theological statement in the middle of his passion narrative, and that's assuming that the historical Luke is even the actual author of the Gospel of Luke and Acts of the Apostles (which has numerous reasons to be unlikely; the same author wrote both books, but it's doubtful that his name, or even possibly her name, was “Luke”). Also, the words in question are literally “fleshes” and “bones”. Flesh in this context means the squishy, meaty, bloody stuff that a body is made of. Blood is very much included in the sense of the word. Basically, the verse is stating quite clearly just how very physical the body of Jesus is: it has bones and squishy stuff. It doesn't just look physical, it is physical. The lack of mentioning blood isn't an oversight, but rather just a perfectly valid way of saying that Jesus's body is make of flesh and bone (and, by negation, a spirit is not made of such things).

For some Christians who feel that the Bible must be viewed as an inerrant whole (including Mormons, who tend to be inerrantists except where the Bible is either obviously wrong or where it conflicts with LDS theology), the use by Luke of “flesh and bone” instead of “flesh and blood” helps resolve a number of issues found outside of Luke's gospel. In Matthew 16:17, a previous scripture mastery scripture for instance, Jesus says that Simon was told that Jesus is the Christ by Jesus's Father and not by flesh and blood. And Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:50 says that “flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of god.” All of which would imply that God, and all in the kingdom of God, are without flesh and blood. But Christians in general believe in the resurrection of the body, and Mormons particularly believe that physical resurrection is permanent and that even God the Father has a resurrected body (except when they don't, as we've said). So the resolution is that resurrected bodies do not have blood. This is an explanation found outside of Mormonism, too (though it is relatively uncommon).

My solution? Paul is not the author of Luke-Acts, and the author of Luke-Acts is not the author of Matthew, and it took centuries for a coherent and consistent theology to develop among the followers of Jesus. I think using Luke's account to imply some sort of scientific theory of the bloodless state of resurrected bodies is more than a little bizarre, and makes about as much sense as explaining how Leia told Luke she remembered her mother's face being sad in Return of the Jedi, when her mother died during childbirth in Revenge of the Sith, though an appeal to the Star Wars trilogy of books written by Timothy Zahn. Are they all about Star Wars? Yes, but you're just going to have problems if you view all of them as being consistent with themselves and each other, even though they're all “official” Lucasfilm stories because while the authors might have been aware of each other they weren't working together. The biblical Luke's statement here simply has a particular dramatic flair that isn't found in other similar works, but to assume that his statement must be read in concert with other, separate writers is unfair to both Luke and those other writers.

Why Do I Think This Is Part of Scripture Mastery?

I think this verse's presence in the Scripture Mastery list is a relic of history that has been left behind officially (although I have no idea if it's been left behind in practice by most Seminary and Institute teachers and wouldn't be surprised to see if it's still very much alive in a continuing oral tradition). I think that from the perspective of the 2010's seminary program, this particular verse has lost its purpose. I would not be surprised in the least to see it dropped from any future re-assembling of “Scripture Mastery” lists that might be proposed. When the current Scripture Mastery list was first created, somebody felt, based on ideas popular at the time among Church leaders such as LeGrand Richards, that this was a great scripture to use against the general strawman conception of Trinitarianism and against the idea of God the Father being a spirit. In the intervening years, this usage has become increasingly obvious as a mistaken interpretation of both the scripture itself and of general Christian views, and so focus has instead focused on the physicality of Jesus's resurrection to try and impress upon LDS youth how the doctrine of resurrection is a physical one (though I doubt most LDS youth would know that physical resurrection is believed in by Christians but is usually just viewed as a curiosity and not of much attention).

#Mormon #ScriptureMasteryNT #AcademicBiblical

Looking at Scripture Mastery – Matthew 25:40

December 28, 2012

Greek: καὶ ἀποκριθεὶς ὁ βασιλεὺς ἐρεῖ αὐτοῖς· ἀμὴν λέγω ὑμῖν, ἐφ’ ὅσον ἐποιήσατε ἑνὶ τούτων τῶν ἀδελφῶν μου τῶν ἐλαχίστων, ἐμοὶ ἐποιήσατε

My Translation: And the king, answering, will speak to them, Amen I say to you, whatever things y'all have done to one of the littlest of my brothers, to me y'all have done it.

KJV: And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my > brethren, ye have done it unto me.

My translations are purposefully stretched and should not be viewed as more accurate than the KJV translation unless I say so in the post. I'm trying to show the range lying between the original Greek text and the English.

Update May 2013

This scripture has been removed by the Church Educational System from the Scripture Mastery list. However, it had remained within this list for over two decades and as such is still familiar to many graduates of the LDS Church's Seminary program. So I'm keeping this exploration of it online, but it is no longer applicable to CES.

Matthew 25 has Jesus giving his final address to his disciples before entering Jerusalem. The setting is everyone sitting on the Mount of Olives overlooking the city. Jesus discusses the coming kingdom of God through parable and through prophecy. In this chapter we have Matthew's versions of some famous parables, such as the Ten Virgins and the Stewards. The particular “parable” that this scripture comes from is the Sheep and the Goats (cue the mental playback of Cake's “Sheep go to heaven, Goats go to hell”), which is less of a full narrative parable and more of a simple allegory. Jesus says that when he comes in his glory (remember we're dealing with an apocalyptic worldview in Matthew's gospel; the Kingdom of God is about to break forth over the world with glory) the “son of man” will assemble all nations before him and divide them just like a shepherd might divide a mixed flock of sheep and goats.

Matthew, again completely in line with his focus on Torah observance and the Jewish/Christian concerns for the poor and destitute of society, quotes Jesus as saying that the basis for this division will be the things the people have done to others: feeding the hungry and thirsty, housing the homeless, clothing the naked, visiting the sick and the imprisoned. Jesus says that the King (a character certainly associated with the “son of man” in verse 31, but not explicitly linked as the same character) treats the actions as though they had been done to himself. Conversely, in the next verses after the scripture mastery verse, the King says that all of the negative actions have also been done to him (not feeding the hungry and thirsty, not taking in the homeless, not clothing the naked, not visiting the sick and imprisoned) and as a result they are sent into “everlasting punishment”. For Matthew's Jesus, what matters is what you do, and how well do you adhere to those aspects of the Torah that encourage beneficent activities towards the marginalized of society. The call of many Jewish prophets in the Hebrew Bible was against those of wealth who oppress the poor, the widows, and the elderly. Also, the Torah explicitly mentions that during harvest-time, allowances must be made for the poor to glean from the fields. Matthew, as a Jewish Christian, portrays a Jesus who not only says that such things matter, but that such things matter eternally and that they will have a direct effect on each individual's long-term status after the arrival of the Kingdom of God.

All of which is in rather direct opposition to earlier Pauline thought, implying again that one of the purposes of Matthew's particular viewpoint might be to promote a more Judean and pro-Torah Christian theology against existing groups of Jesus followers who had rejected the Torah as a necessary code of conduct for believers in Jesus.

Unfortunately, we will not be able to get into a full discussion of Pauline views on faith and works until near the end of the series when we hit James 2:17. At that point, we'll have a lot to say about Paul (and all of the Pauline theology that the scripture mastery list skips over) and the relationship of his writings to those of other Christians.

Finally, this verse, and the idea that actions done to others are done to Jesus, almost certainly is the inspiration for the famous scripture in the Book of Mormon given by King Benjamin in Mosiah 2:17 (also a scripture mastery scripture which we'll come to soon enough). Also, some Christian thinkers have expressed the possibility that these good and bad actions are actions done within the Christian community towards other Christians. Many Christians who do get concerned about what this verse means for salvation by faith have adopted this viewpoint to reconcile things. Also, while Matthew as a Jew would have believed that all humanity was descended from Noah and was thus family, it is much more likely that in recording Jesus as saying “the least of these my brothers” he was talking about people who were already members of the coming Kingdom of God. A similar viewpoint seems to be expressed earlier by his Jesus when instructing the Twelve in Matthew 10:40-42,

40 Whoever receives you receives me, and whoever receives me receives the one who sent me. 41 Whoever receives a prophet in the name of a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward. Whoever receives a righteous person in the name of a righteous person will receive a righteous person’s reward. 42 And whoever gives only a cup of cold water to one of these little ones in the name of a disciple, I tell you the truth, he will never lose his reward.

In his reference to “one of these little ones” many scholars think the reference intended by Matthew is to the disciples Jesus is sending out as missionaries. So this scripture might be more about salvation being based on truly belonging to the community of Jesus followers than a statement that salvation is based on works.

Why Do I Think This Is Part of Scripture Mastery?

On the surface, this scripture is a wonderful call for people to act with good actions towards others as an expression of their love for God. But is also supports the idea that actions matter: in the parable, those who did bad actions are sent into “everlasting punishment”. No mention of believing on the name of Jesus to be saved, no mention of grace. I think the reasons for having this scripture in the list is two reasons of equal importance: I think that the Church Education System truly wants to inspire LDS youth to be giving and kind when interacting with the rest of the world, but I also think that they want LDS youth to be equipped to use this scripture to push back when confronted by the idea of salvation by faith. The problem is that they've probably been given the false impression that salvation by faith is unbiblical and they've probably also been presented with a false straw man argument of what other Christians believe who adhere to Grace theology. But we'll cover this much more when we hit James 2:17, where this conflict and poisoning of the well before the fact is most potent.

#Mormon #ScriptureMasteryNT #AcademicBiblical

Looking at Scripture Mastery – Matthew 6:24

December 28, 2012

Greek: Οὐδεὶς δύναται δυσὶ κυρίοις δουλεύειν· ἢ γὰρ τὸν ἕνα μισήσει καὶ τὸν ἕτερον ἀγαπήσει, ἢἑνὸς ἀνθέξεται καὶ τοῦ ἑτέρου καταφρονήσει· οὐ δύνασθε θεῷ δουλεύειν καὶ μαμωνᾷ.

My Translation: No one can serve two masters; for either one he will hate and another he will love, or he will hold to one and despise another; y'all cannot be a slave to both God and mammon. [Mammon is the Aramaic word “mmôn” copied directly into the Greek as “mamonas” and means “riches”.]

KJV: No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.

My translations are purposefully stretched and should not be viewed as more accurate than the KJV translation unless I say so in the post. I'm trying to show the range lying between the] original Greek text and the English.

Update May 2013

This scripture has been removed by the Church Educational System from the Scripture Mastery list. However, it had remained within this list for over two decades and as such is still familiar to many graduates of the LDS Church's Seminary program. So I'm keeping this exploration of it online, but it is no longer applicable to CES.

Ah yes, God and Mammon. Can't serve both. It's a very Matthean approach, as the author of Matthew is very much concerned with issues of serving God and keeping the Torah and thus emphasizing the stories and teachings of Jesus that further this goal. Very much in line with the issues of 1st Century Judaism, Matthew presents the message of Jesus and service to God in opposition to the pursuit of wealth. Judaism and early Christianity were very focused on the needs of the poor and lower classes of society (indeed, for the first few centuries of the Christian movement, most Jesus followers were themselves poor and members of the lower classes of classical society). Matthew's very Jewish perspective is thus very much in line with this verse.

What is interesting about this scripture is how it usually gets applied with Latter-day Saints. Latter-day Saints are an apocalyptic Church. That's not a slur or a smear (indeed, Christianity itself grew out of apocalyptic Judaism and many strands of Christianity today are still apocalyptic in their viewpoint), but rather just a short-hand way of saying that their theological point of view is one of apocalypticism: the idea that God's justice upon an unjust world is quickly approaching and that soon all inequalities, the result of sin and evil, will be forcefully righted by the arrival of God's justice upon the world. For most apocalyptic societies, being on the very cusp of the approach of God's kingdom is associated with that kingdom beginning to “break through” into the world with visions, healings, and miracles. And since part of the message of the coming kingdom of God is that the arrival will be heralded by great violence upon the unjust world, the only way to escape that violence is to join with the kingdom before it arrives. This can produce a worldview of those who belong to the kingdom, the insiders, and everyone else, the outsiders, with an accompanying binary worldview of the world divided into those things that either are with God and his coming kingdom or with the world that stands ready to be destroyed.

This binary worldview produces the uncomfortable problem, however, of what are followers of God supposed to do before the Kingdom of God arrives? How are followers of God supposed to live in the midst of a world living on borrowed time? Scriptures like this scripture mastery scripture serve to help believers have the moral courage to stand with the apocalyptic society in those places where the needs of the society conflict with the fallen world. Whether or not we, as 21st Century people, should agree with this morality is a tough question.

From this point of view it should be plainly obvious why the original point of the scripture, that the pursuit of wealth and power is in opposition to being a follower of Jesus, has been extended for Mormons to mean more than just wealth. The following are three examples provided in the Seminary manual for youth to illustrate how Mormon youth are expected to view this scripture:

Michael (age 18) chose to have a job that requires him to work every Sunday so he can save money for his mission.

Donna (age 16) says she is doing missionary work by having a steady boyfriend who is not a member of the Church.

Brother Smith (age 35) pays tithing and extra fast offerings on the money he makes selling products in which he is not entirely honest with his customers.

Apart from the oddity of having to specify the ages of these fictional characters, the “mammon” in question is not always money. For the first two examples, the “mammon” in question are actions not in keeping with the expectations of the religious community: working a job on Sunday and having meaningful associations with those outside of the community. It's obvious that “mammon” as defined for Mormon youth is far more than the “riches” meant by the author of Matthew originally two thousand years ago. Of course, part of the reason for an apocalypticist like Matthew's Jesus to avoid riches is because riches belong to the rulers of the world, and the current rulers of the world are evil and will be overturned when the kingdom of God arrives. This is part of the reason why Jesus tells some people to sell all they have, give it to the poor, and their treasures will be in heaven. To find salvation, followers of Jesus need to reject this sinful and evil world that rules without justice. So this viewpoint of “Mammon” being the world, while technically incorrect, is not entirely without merit. However, for the apocalyptic Jesus this rejection of the world is far stronger than just not working on Sunday or dating a non- Mormon (seriously, this is a real issue for Seminary manual writers?!?), but in fact represents a complete rejection of the present world. The message of Jesus in Matthew is not usually “be in the world but not of the world” but is usually “reject the world entirely in preparation for the approaching kingdom of God”: indeed, you should even “take no thought what you should eat or drink.” Give up this world entirely and let your life be run fully upon God's mercy until he arrives and you are given a position of power and authority in his kingdom.

I personally think that a verse like this is a great example of how problematic the New Testament can be. It is an ancient book, written from a very different point of view than how we generally read it in the 21 Century. Unless you agree that the end of the world is fast approaching and that your behavior must include a rejection of wealth, power, influence, and the injustice of this evil world in order to receive a place in the coming Kingdom of God (you know, instead of just being a good person), then this verse can obviously provide some very damaging perspectives on life. We usually view the New Testament, and the Gospels in particular, as books full of ethical statements on how to treat our fellow humans. It is, but the reasons for such treatment are usually very different from what we might expect. If we assume that the teachings of the New Testament are meant for the 21st Century, we'll have a lot of difficulty resolving statements like God and Mammon, or how one must reject family to merit salvation in the Kingdom of God, or how Jesus is said to come to set father against son, mother against daughter. To me, this scripture is a good example of how I view the New Testament: like a pet python. Pythons are beautiful, exotic, fascinating, and a lot of fun. Yet they can also be dangerous if they are approached without any care for what they truly are. You don't play with and treat a python like a puppy. The New Testament is an artifact of history, and to ignore the context and apply it without serious thought can be dangerous. Do I agree that one cannot serve God and mammon? Personally, no, but to me the more problematic aspect is what these apocalyptic black and white scriptures can do to people who simply accept them uncritically and how they then interact with others in the world around them. The examples from the Seminary manual illustrate to me just how this sort of scripture can get in the way of just being a good, ethical person.

And I would be remiss if I didn't mention that the Church itself, as a corporate entity and not as individual members, has a huge problem in following this verse. As an incredibly large organization that charges itself with serving millions of active members worldwide and handling hundreds of millions of dollars of donated tithing for its operations, the LDS Church has adopted a corporate character similar to many large corporate companies. Producing manuals, videos, pamphlets, programs, and countless other goods and services requires paid employees, budgets, contracts, and all of the countless headaches that go along with it. The Church is in the uncomfortable position of often having to figure out how to serve God through the use of mammon, and frankly it doesn't always do a very good job at walking that line. Perhaps the statement of Matthew's Jesus is applicable today to the modern Church Office Building, but if so one wonders what the solution could be.

Why Do I Think This Is Part of Scripture Mastery?

To help enforce a binary view of life as a choice between obedience to God (represented in all examples as obedience to and activity in the Church) and the “world” (a word often used colloquially by Mormons to mean everything either non-Mormon or anti-Mormon, sometimes without distinction). By expanding the meaning of “mammon” beyond riches, youth are encouraged to keep all aspirations, employment, relationships, and choices within the bounds defined by the Church; because of this verse, they could easily be taught that doing so is the only way to honestly serve God.

#Mormon #ScriptureMasteryNT #AcademicBiblical

Looking at Scripture Mastery – Matthew 16:15-19

December 26, 2012

Greek: 15 λέγει αὐτοῖς· ὑμεῖς δὲ τίνα με λέγετε > εἶναι; 16 ἀποκριθεὶς δὲ Σίμων Πέτρος εἶπεν· σὺ εἶ ὁ Χριστὸς ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ θεοῦ τοῦ ζῶντος. 17 ἀποκριθεὶς δὲ ὁ Ἰησοῦς εἶπεν αὐτῷ· μακάριος εἶ, Σίμων Βαριωνᾶ, ὅτι σὰρξ καὶ αἷμα οὐκ ἀπεκάλυψέν σοι ἀλλ’ ὁ πατήρ μου ὁ ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς. 18 κἀγὼ δέ σοι λέγω ὅτι σὺ εἶ Πέτρος, καὶ ἐπὶ ταύτῃ τῇ πέτρᾳ οἰκοδομήσω μου τὴν ἐκκλησίαν, καὶ πύλαι ᾅδου οὐ κατισχύσουσιν αὐτῆς. 19 δώσω σοι τὰς κλεῖδας τῆς βασιλείας τῶν οὐρανῶν, καὶ ὃ ἐὰν δήσῃς ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ἔσται δεδεμένον ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς, καὶ ὃ ἐὰν λύσῃς ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ἔσται λελυμένον ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς.

My Translation: 15 He says to them, “But who do you > all say that I am?” 16 Yet Simon Peter answering said, “You are the christ, the son of the living god.” 17 And Jesus answering said to him, “You are happy, Simon Barjona, because flesh and blood did not uncover this to you, but rather your father who is in the heavens. 18 And I myself also say to you, you are Petros [a stone], and upon this crag [petra] I will build my assembly, and the entrances of Hades will not overcome her. 19 And I will give to you the keys of the kingdom of the heavens, and whatever if you might bind it on the earth it will be bound in the heavens, and whatever if you might loosen on the earth it will be loosened in the heavens.”

KJV: 15 He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am? 16 And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. 17 And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. 18 And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. 19 And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

My translations are purposefully stretched and should not be viewed as more accurate than the KJV translation unless I say so in the post. I'm trying to show the range lying between the original Greek text and the English.

Finally, three scriptures in and we hit a doozy! The keys of the kingdom, given to Peter, and the cryptic phrase, “You are Peter and upon this rock I will build my Church”. A similar scripture is found in Mark, but in his editing of Mark, Matthew has added this statement of Jesus in response to Peter's declaration, that Jesus's church would be built on this rock (note that Peter's name means “rock”) and that Peter would be given the keys of the kingdom, all of which is absent in the original material of Mark.

The reason this is a doozy is because this scripture is viewed by many Christians, predominantly Catholics but also many Protestants, as the divine call for Peter to lead the church, while for Mormons it is viewed as a statement that the Church of Christ is built upon the foundation of revelation. It's an important distinction, and we'll take a look at it.

First, though, a few translation points. Again, remember that the translation I'm providing, while still correct, is by design a little strained. It's meant to show which words in the more-familiar King James translation have a wider meaning than the given English. One example is the word ecclesia, “church”. It literally means a gathering, or a group “called out”. And in Greek it would not have meant “church” as Mormons or Christians today use it. There are other examples of ecclesia in the Greek-speaking world, and it might make more sense to translate the word as “club”. Ecclesia weren't always religious in nature, but could be organized around cultural groups, philosophical groups, or political groups. Jesus saying, however, that his ecclesia would be built upon “this rock” (we'll get to that issue in a moment) is slightly out of character from the other gospels. Of the four Gospel-writers, only Matthew is particularly focused on this idea of Jesus's ecclesia. The word is used in Matthew's Sermon on the Mount and other places within his gospel, but is entirely absent in the other gospels. Matthew is also uniquely focused on the rules of a Christian community, with a focus, as we've discussed before, on the Jewish Torah. Whereas in other gospels Jesus presents a view of Torah as a code not always to be followed (or even followed at all), Matthew presents a view of Jesus where Torah and its observation is still supremely important for Jesus and his followers. Matthew's Jesus is the one who says that not one jot nor tittle of the law had been done away with.

Why does any of this matter? Because these books and these scriptures were not written in a vacuum. The books and letters of the New Testament had human authors, inspired though you may feel they were, and these authors did not always see eye to eye. By the time the Gospel of Matthew, as we have it today, was being produced there were already a number of different Christian communities throughout the eastern Roman Empire. We know this because the oldest Christian writings are not any of the Gospels, but are rather the letters of Paul, written to many of these various communities (and in fact, Matthew isn't even the first gospel to be written; Matthew makes extensive editorial use of the gospel of Mark in writing his gospel). And Paul presents a picture of Christian doctrine and practice quite different from what the author of Matthew presents.

We'll talk more about Paul when we reach his letters, but a short overview of his life is that he was born a Jew, was originally opposed to those who believed Jesus to be the Jewish Messiah, and had some sort of experience that changed his mind to also believe that Jesus has risen from the dead as the Messiah (recorded as a vision by the author of Luke, though Paul himself says very little about the experience). Paul's theological attempts to understand the significance and meaning of Jesus's death and apparent resurrection (Paul himself joined the movement long after the death of Jesus, but he believed as most Jesus followers did that Jesus literally died when he was executed and rose alive again after three days) helped him to reach some rather radical theological conclusions about the necessity of the Jewish Torah. As he relates in his letter to the Galatians, these ideas of his led him to occasionally clash with other Jesus followers, most famously against Simon Peter while he was visiting Jerusalem. Peter was observing Jewish purity practices about not eating meals with Gentiles, and Paul rebuked him for it. Many of Paul's letters provide details showing that this issue of whether Jesus followers, both Gentile and Jewish, should follow Torah was one of the major dividing issues among early Christians. They also show that many Christians of Paul's day appealed to the authority of various Christian leaders in support of their viewpoints. Some of Paul's opponents who apparently felt that followers of Jesus needed to observe Torah called themselves apostles, though whether these included any of the traditional apostles named in the Gospels is unknown.

So among these leaders, we know that the famous names of authority included Paul, Peter, and James (in fact, the Acts of the Apostles, the sequel to Luke, seems to give James narrative supremacy over Peter when the movement has to make decisions about Paul and the Gentiles). Given Peter's occasional opposition to Paul, it might be that this verse in Matthew represents the author's attempt to place Peter as a higher authority to Paul: not only was he among the original disciples of Jesus, but Jesus gave him “the keys of the kingdom”. This is only supposition, of course, and is not in any way a provable hypothesis.

This leads to the other issue at hand: the “rock” upon which the ecclesia is built. In the Greek, there is an undeniable relationship between the name Peter (“a stone”0 and the rock (“a crag, a cliff, a rock”). Something is implied by Matthew's Jesus in this phrase, and the issue is what that something might be. The traditional Catholic reading is that Jesus is making a pun, and that both rocks are the same: in other words, Jesus will built his ecclesia upon Peter. The tradtional Protestant reading is either the same as the Catholics, or that the foundation in question is Peter's faith in Jesus as the Messiah (not faith in general, but Peter's specific declaration that Jesus is the Christ).

The Mormon reading for this verse comes from some handwritten notes taken during a sermon given by Joseph Smith in 1843. In these notes, the author, Wilford Woodruff, records that Joseph asked, “And what is that rock?” with the answer, “The rock of revelation”. So for Joseph Smith the relationship between the two rocks is that Peter, the one rock, had received revelation from the Father in Heaven when he proclaimed that Jesus was the Messiah. This is the other rock, and the ecclesia was to be built upon this foundation of revelation, at least if this one reference represents Joseph's full feelings on the matter.

One aspect of this interpretation that is useful for Mormons is how it changes the interpretation of the next aspect of the verses: the reference to the gates of Hell. From a Mormon point of view, true Christian doctrine was lost soon after the death of the Apostles leading to a period of nearly two thousand years where God's authority and true teachings were not present on earth. This is called the Great Apostasy, and was ended in 1820 when Joseph Smith received what became known as his first vision. If Jesus's statement about how his church was founded upon the rock is referring to Peter, then Mormons have a problem, because they feel that the organization led by Peter, which eventually became the Catholic Church and many other churches from it, was overcome. What then of the statement of Jesus that the Church would not be prevailed against? Well, if the rock is instead a concept of revelation, then it's much easier to deal with the verse: God never took the ability for his children to be led by revelation away. So that rock has always remained.

Is there any foundation for the interpretation of the rock being revelation in the original Greek? Sorta, but if that was what was mean by Matthew's Jesus then it really isn't very clear. The statement uses two extremely similar words, begins with the declarative statement, “You are Peter” (which was not Peter's actual name; his name was Simon), and makes a connection based on this image of a rock upon which a structure can be built. Simon is a rock, and the ecclesia is built on a rock. If the relationship is more nuanced than a direct correlation then the text itself does a poor job of showing that nuanced relationship. The easiest reading, which doesn't automatically mean the most correct, would be that Matthew has Jesus saying that his ecclesia would be built upon Peter. But to imply that the Mormon reading is the only valid interpretation without some flavor of a relationship between Peter's authority (symbolized by receiving keys to the kingdom of heaven) and the building of a church upon a rock is silly.

Finally, what are we to make of the reference to Peter's ability to tie up tightly or loose on earth and in the heavens? Remember that for those with an apocalyptic worldview, the coming kingdom will violently overthrow the world. That is because it is a literal kingdom that is approaching (contrast this to the later Gospel of John, which tones down this “approaching” rhetoric when Jesus says things like “the Kingdom of God is among you”), and it will replace the evil powers currently controlling this world. And in that coming kingdom, those who have been oppressed will be lifted up. Total reversals will occur (go back and read the Beatitudes of Matthew 5 in this light and they make a lot of sense). Peter is being told that he is like a ruler in this world, and that his decisions here will stand and be ratified in the coming kingdom. Whatever, or indeed whoever, he ties up or frees will remain tied up or freed. This is language that is likened to the most powerful aspect of a ruler: the ability to lock up or the ability to pardon. The Mormon perception of the “sealing” power is similar to this viewpoint, however, in that Mormons view Peter being given authority here to make decisions with heavenly ramifications, except that for Mormons they feel that this power means that the decisions have immediate authority and application in heaven and not merely that these decisions will remain in force when a future heavenly kingdom arrives.

Why Do I Think This Is Part of Scripture Mastery?

In preparation for use of this scripture against their conception of a universal apostasy, Mormon youth are prepped with this verse and an alternate interpretation that preserves their viewpoint. This interpretation is a valid reading, but it is extremely difficult to parse and is not the easiest nor most likely reading.