Whether rightly or wrongly, whether as a gift of grace or as a taskmaster, second-temple Jews and their theologies form a part of the collective known as ISRAEL, which sought after a law of its own righteousness and used the commandments of God as a means for boasting (Rom. 9:32).
Actually, what matters is not how historic Jews viewed the law in relation to salvation but how GOD viewed the law in relation to salvation. And here is how God in the flesh, also a historical jew, viewed it:
ει δε θέλεις εις την ζωην εισελθειν, τήρησον τας εντολάς· (Mt. 19:17)
If you desire to enter into life, keep the commandments.
There is Jesus' soteriology of law. You are not first graciously given life by god in order that you might keep the commandments as a sort of grateful response. The commandments appear first to someone without life (ie. life eternal, so 19:16), and he then must keep them in order to enter it.
Monday, August 12, 2013
The role of works at the Final Judgment made simple:
Zip. Nada. Nothing. Not ever.
According to Mt. 7:21, the determining factor on the final day (or the purpose of the judgment therein) is entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven. The criterion of use by the LORD is whether or not a person has done the will of the father.
Since no one, to date, has done the will of the Father, it is necessary to trust on the bare fact of Christ's death and resurrection (that Christ has done the will of the Father FOR US and FOR OUR SALVATION). Or rather, it is necessary for the Christian to expect GRACE and MERCY on the final day (Jd. 21, 1 Peter 1:13). But if grace is to be given on the final day, it cannot be given on the basis of works, for then it would be a payment. And if mercy is to be delegated unto us, it would be foolish and meaningless to speak of JUST REWARDS. Mercy is given to the wicked, not the righteous. The righteous have need neither of mercy nor grace.
It is confounding and disastrous to place a role for works in the final judgment. To do so strikes at the very core of God's gospel and swallows it up in the law. For who will not immediately turn his attention towards the final day, forget the promise of the resurrection, and start working double time to earn a place in the heavens if this is precisely the way that God will deal with us? In short, the gospel will be lost forever in all of our glorious deeds.
Christians may be perfectly confident on the final day, perfectly confident, because they have for their very own badges the complete and total fulfillment of the law effected in Jesus Christ once for all. They need look nowhere else, indeed they would be knaves to do so. For what right-thinking man, after gazing on the blood of the lamb which bespeaks perfect righteousness, would turn aside and start trying to fulfill the law on his own? And who would trade in the very righteousness of God for his own paltry deeds?
According to Mt. 7:21, the determining factor on the final day (or the purpose of the judgment therein) is entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven. The criterion of use by the LORD is whether or not a person has done the will of the father.
Since no one, to date, has done the will of the Father, it is necessary to trust on the bare fact of Christ's death and resurrection (that Christ has done the will of the Father FOR US and FOR OUR SALVATION). Or rather, it is necessary for the Christian to expect GRACE and MERCY on the final day (Jd. 21, 1 Peter 1:13). But if grace is to be given on the final day, it cannot be given on the basis of works, for then it would be a payment. And if mercy is to be delegated unto us, it would be foolish and meaningless to speak of JUST REWARDS. Mercy is given to the wicked, not the righteous. The righteous have need neither of mercy nor grace.
It is confounding and disastrous to place a role for works in the final judgment. To do so strikes at the very core of God's gospel and swallows it up in the law. For who will not immediately turn his attention towards the final day, forget the promise of the resurrection, and start working double time to earn a place in the heavens if this is precisely the way that God will deal with us? In short, the gospel will be lost forever in all of our glorious deeds.
Christians may be perfectly confident on the final day, perfectly confident, because they have for their very own badges the complete and total fulfillment of the law effected in Jesus Christ once for all. They need look nowhere else, indeed they would be knaves to do so. For what right-thinking man, after gazing on the blood of the lamb which bespeaks perfect righteousness, would turn aside and start trying to fulfill the law on his own? And who would trade in the very righteousness of God for his own paltry deeds?
Sunday, August 11, 2013
Is James the word of God?
Yes. Provided that we understand it as a praeparatio evangelium, as pure speech about Christ, as that which turns us away from the royal law which brings freedom to Christ who fulfills the law that we might be free. If we understand by the phrase "όρατε ότι εχ εργων δικαιουται ανθρωπος και ουκ εκ πιστεως μόνον" that deeds which fulfill the royal law of love JUSTIFY a man, that Christ in doing precisely that has won a way for us to be justified, inasmuch as HIS DEEDS become OUR DEEDS (1 Cor. 1:30), then James is in perfect accord with the rule of faith. If, on the other hand, I am wrong in my reading...that the meaning of the above verse is that man will be justified by various concrete deeds which he will effect in this temporal sphere out of obedience to God's law (such as giving money to the poor, tithing to the local parish, praying for his enemies etc...) then James really is "an epistle of straw," worthy of the condemnation spoken of in Galatians 1:8, placed in the canon by a childish misunderstanding of the early church and maintained there by successive ages for fear of subtracting from the word of god. As of yet I see no need to go that route, yet I am baffled by the mindlessness of neo-evangelicals who attempt to synthesize both James and Paul by a sort of semi-pelagianism, which would see our final justification as merited by a cooperation between Christ's grace and our good deeds. These buffoons (Ben Witherington III, N.T. Wright etc...) are worthy of nothing but contempt for their willful abandonment of grace.
It is possible also to see in this epistle an "authorial intent" of judaizing but an inspiration in spite of this intent. The gospel is never bound to the psychological desires or motives of those who proclaim it. They may intend their words for evil whilst God is superordinately using them for good.
It is possible also to see in this epistle an "authorial intent" of judaizing but an inspiration in spite of this intent. The gospel is never bound to the psychological desires or motives of those who proclaim it. They may intend their words for evil whilst God is superordinately using them for good.
Stick that in your eschatological pipe and smoke it!
"No one knows what is coming- who can tell him what will happen after him?" -Ecc. 10:14
Even the most subtile eschatologian, who may limit himself to saying such floosy things as, "Scriptures become the word of God eschatologically" or "the Kingdom of God is now but not yet" or nearly the whole of the absolutely worthless gibberish of Jurgen Moltmann's "theology of hope"...cannot escape from this sharp judgment of scripture. Before the future we are trembling leaves, and it would be better for us to remain taciturn as such.
Even the most subtile eschatologian, who may limit himself to saying such floosy things as, "Scriptures become the word of God eschatologically" or "the Kingdom of God is now but not yet" or nearly the whole of the absolutely worthless gibberish of Jurgen Moltmann's "theology of hope"...cannot escape from this sharp judgment of scripture. Before the future we are trembling leaves, and it would be better for us to remain taciturn as such.
The Fear of the Lord.
"Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment, including every hidden thing, whether it is good or evil." -Ecc. 12:13-14
It has often been supposed that Solomon here renders an entirely new light on his previous treatise, like a resolved chord does to the entire melody of a song, or Amneris' prayer for peace at the end of Aida does to the whole of Verdi's tragedy. Peter Enns, like a good delusional Mennonite, suggests that this verse is in fact an editorial gloss provided to cast the reader out of the sinkhole of Qohelet's thinking. To him we may well quote Luther, who responded to the detractors of Ecclesiastes by saying:
"Does the Holy Spirit like to indulge in loquacious and foolish babble?"
This is apparently what most of the church thinks when it comes to Ecclesiastes, and it will do nearly everything to thrust this book into the attic of scriptural inquiry.
I have a practical rule which I apply faithfully to my canonical doubts: those pieces of scripture which are most ferociously hated and discarded the most frequently by the largest groups of religious individuals are most likely the Word of God. They must be doubted and questioned the least, for there is scarcely a word of prophecy that hasn't sent Israel and the church a-reeling into fanatical contempt for it.
The fear of the Lord, his commandments, and the duty binding on man does not provide man with an escape out of his meaningless condition. It is rather the commandment itself, which provides a duty for man, in which fear is enjoined, that creates a global situation of meaninglessness.
Paul sums up this argument quite well when he says: "When the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died" and "the law was added so that the transgression might increase" and "the power of sin is the law." Ecclesiastes already suggests that the source of meaninglessness for the "wise" man is that he, like the fool, must DIE (2:16). In fact death throws all of our deeds and our accomplishments into disarray and vacuousness (9:6).
It has often been supposed that Solomon here renders an entirely new light on his previous treatise, like a resolved chord does to the entire melody of a song, or Amneris' prayer for peace at the end of Aida does to the whole of Verdi's tragedy. Peter Enns, like a good delusional Mennonite, suggests that this verse is in fact an editorial gloss provided to cast the reader out of the sinkhole of Qohelet's thinking. To him we may well quote Luther, who responded to the detractors of Ecclesiastes by saying:
"Does the Holy Spirit like to indulge in loquacious and foolish babble?"
This is apparently what most of the church thinks when it comes to Ecclesiastes, and it will do nearly everything to thrust this book into the attic of scriptural inquiry.
I have a practical rule which I apply faithfully to my canonical doubts: those pieces of scripture which are most ferociously hated and discarded the most frequently by the largest groups of religious individuals are most likely the Word of God. They must be doubted and questioned the least, for there is scarcely a word of prophecy that hasn't sent Israel and the church a-reeling into fanatical contempt for it.
The fear of the Lord, his commandments, and the duty binding on man does not provide man with an escape out of his meaningless condition. It is rather the commandment itself, which provides a duty for man, in which fear is enjoined, that creates a global situation of meaninglessness.
Paul sums up this argument quite well when he says: "When the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died" and "the law was added so that the transgression might increase" and "the power of sin is the law." Ecclesiastes already suggests that the source of meaninglessness for the "wise" man is that he, like the fool, must DIE (2:16). In fact death throws all of our deeds and our accomplishments into disarray and vacuousness (9:6).
Saturday, August 10, 2013
An Observation
The myth of historical female oppression was invented by woman in order to find some objective grounds for hating man. The order commonly assumed (woman discovers that she is subjugated by man, woman decides to hate man) must be reversed if we are to gain true insight into the problem: it is woman who created a situation of oppression in order to subjugate man. This situation itself is a work of bad faith, for even in those moments where women succeed in half-believing their myth, they are required by a twofold leap to attach an gratuitous ethical value to this history (what man did was evil) and a practical application (we are justified in responding in kind). The latter, to those precious few among the female intellect who possess clarity, is particularly troubling, for it bears within itself the seeds of the whole destruction of woman's machination. If certain historical situations justify contempt and vitriol for the male sex, is there not then the possibility that certain historical situations could justify contempt and vitriol for the female sex? And what if the myth, taken from the point of view of its assumption in bad faith, is precisely one of those situations?
Naturally there will always be cases in history where the man got the upper hand over woman and used his victory to torment her. It is odd, however, that these cases (really, however many) have morphed into a universal rule. Be wary of universal rules applied to history in the realms of thought which we may call controversial.
Naturally there will always be cases in history where the man got the upper hand over woman and used his victory to torment her. It is odd, however, that these cases (really, however many) have morphed into a universal rule. Be wary of universal rules applied to history in the realms of thought which we may call controversial.
Thursday, August 8, 2013
Who teaches THIS?
"For we also have had the gospel preached to us, just as they [Israel] did; but the message they heard was of no value to them, because those who heard did not combine it with faith." -Hebrews 4:2
In an important, eternal, bounteous sense, Israel HAD the gospel. Not merely an abstract message of an abstract God and an abstract kingdom. Israel had the GOOD NEWS OF JESUS CHRIST. This is the significance of the following passages of scripture:
"Your father Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing MY (εμήν) day; he saw it and was glad." -John. 8:56
"Isaiah...saw Jesus' glory and spoke about him." John 12:41
"[Israel] drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ." -1 Cor.10:4
Israel had Christ, for the gospel is bound up in Christ and cannot be preached without Him as the center and the foundation of the proclamation.
Scholarship has renounced this way. Accordingly, scholarship must be renounced.
In an important, eternal, bounteous sense, Israel HAD the gospel. Not merely an abstract message of an abstract God and an abstract kingdom. Israel had the GOOD NEWS OF JESUS CHRIST. This is the significance of the following passages of scripture:
"Your father Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing MY (εμήν) day; he saw it and was glad." -John. 8:56
"Isaiah...saw Jesus' glory and spoke about him." John 12:41
"[Israel] drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ." -1 Cor.10:4
Israel had Christ, for the gospel is bound up in Christ and cannot be preached without Him as the center and the foundation of the proclamation.
Scholarship has renounced this way. Accordingly, scholarship must be renounced.
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