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suzannahnatters · 10 months ago

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2023 In Books!

Due to mild fatigue, 2023 was a bad reading year for me - I did not reach my yearly 2-books-a-week goal for the first time since I began logging them, and many of the books I did read did not agree with me. But I still found ten fiction and 7 (!) non-fiction books I had to shout out for the end of the year.

Top 10 Fiction THE RED PALACE by June Hur A historical murder mystery set in Joseon Korea, featuring crystalline prose, a painstakingly evoked historical setting, and an understated romance in a dark atmosphere of terror, secrets, and palace intrigue. Despite being written for a young adult audience, this book impressed me with its complex picture of a deeply flawed real historical context.

TOOTH AND CLAW by Jo Walton A Victorian style comedy of manners in which every single character is a dragon, from the dragon parsons and spirited young lady dragons to the crotchety old dragon dowagers and feckless young dragons-about-town. All of them wear little hats. Sheer cosy perfection.

DRAKE HALL by Christina Baehr My bestie surprised me this year by spontaneously producing four whole novels pitched as "cosy Victorian gothic, with dragons". I haven't read the final edition of DRAKE HALL yet but it's sunshiney, summery, cosy goodness. With dragons.

CRIMSON BOUND by Rosamund Hodge (re-read) A dark and bloody fantasy full of lifegiving female friendship, ride or die siblings, theology, guilt, and stabbings. This one also contains gratuitous St Augustine quotes, a one-page retelling of the VOLUNDARKVIDA, and a love triangle that exists to present the heroine not so much with drama as a proper ethical dilemma.

EMILY WILDE'S ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF FAERIES by Heather Fawcett The story of a mildly autistic lady academic researching faeries with her flamboyant rival professor, who is probably secretly an exiled fae king…but the annoying part is his habit of making his students do all his field work. Cosy, thrilling, hilarious.

THE LAST TALE OF THE FLOWER BRIDE by Roshani Chokshi This gothic-infused psychological thriller was dark, creepy, and sometimes heavy, but it's also a tale that flips the roles of innocent maiden and Bluebeard, engages in valid Susan Pevensie Discourse, and ends on what I found to be a genuine note of hope and healing.

THE COLDEST GIRL IN COLDTOWN by Holly Black This book tackles vampirism as a metaphor for the evil hidden in the human heart, and it's epic, bloody, twisty, and monstrous. I couldn't put it down. Not sure I'd recommend it for the target audience, but it's mature and well-crafted enough to be enjoyed by grown-ups as well.

THE WITCHWOOD KNOT by Olivia Atwater I've read a number of Olivia Atwater books, and this one is head and shoulders above the rest. The best blend of gothic and fae, like a grown-up LABYRINTH, with one of the great fae butlers and so many subtle yet walloping feels. It felt like an old fairytale in the best possible way.

BEHIND THE CURTAIN by WR Gingell The WORLDS BEHIND series is about trauma and healing and repentance, and in this, the fourth book, everything comes decisively to the boil as our favourite twisty knife uncle pits his wits against an enemy who very uncomfortably mirrors himself.

Top 7 Non-Fiction (because I couldn't get it down to just five)

TWO VIEWS ON WOMEN IN MINISTRY by Beck & Gundry (eds.) Four New Testament scholars from a range of complementarian and egalitarian perspectives debate the question of women in ministry, with a lot of detailed scholarship. If nothing else, this book proved that this is something orthodox Christians can honestly disagree about, because there are significant exegetical strengths and difficulties with each position - it's time to stop seeing women holding ministry positions in the church as tantamount to heresy.

REFLECTIONS: ON THE MAGIC OF WRITING by Dianna Wynne Jones This collection was magical - funny and sad tales of her life, many good and passionate thoughts on books and writing, and one absolutely marvellous study of narrative structure in THE LORD OF THE RINGS. Absolutely delightful and highly recommended.

PATERNAL TYRANNY by Arcangela Tarabotti A 17th-century nun takes aim at the misogyny of early modern Europe, wielding razor-sharp logic to argue boldly for the equality of women. But it's Tarabotti's passionate faith, which somehow managed to survive moral injury and spiritual abuse, and even came to see hope and encouragement in scriptures which must so often have been used against her, that will stay with me.

THE GOLDEN RHINOCEROS: HISTORIES OF THE AFRICAN MIDDLE AGES by Francois-Xavier Fauvelle A series of bite-sized essays on the medieval history of Africa from approximately the Islamic conquests of the 7th century to the arrival of Portugese colonists in the fifteenth. Each essay offers the most fleeting glimpse of a long-vanished, half-imaginary world of often breathtaking sophistication and splendour. I loved them.

ONE HOLY LOCAL CHURCH? by Bojidar Marinov This short book, which draws very solidly on past luminaries like Rutherford, Gillespie, Spurgeon, and Hodge, helped me think through some of the questions I've been asking myself about ecclesiology and the role and authority of elders, particularly as I've been rethinking women in ministry. Terrific.

TEN DAYS IN A MAD-HOUSE by Nellie Bly "People on charity should not expect anything and should not complain." In 1887, the American "girl reporter" Nellie Bly got herself locked up in a New York lunatic asylum, and this shocking expose was the result. Sometimes, nineteenth century attitudes towards women and the poor were beyond parody.

A PEOPLE'S TRAGEDY: THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION, 1891-1924 by Orlando Figes Some aspects of this book have aged poorly - the unthinking acceptance of Russian imperial aspirations, for instance - but apart from that, this is a sweeping, epic picture of the Russian Revolution, covering three decades and every level of society, from daily life in the village commune to the political rivalries of Lenin's declining years, without ever becoming dull or bogged down in detail.

#my year in books #2023 wrapped

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robhorninginternalexile · 9 months ago

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Perhaps one is gradually, but not without difficulty, getting rid of a great allegorical distrust. By that I mean the simple idea, with regard to a text, that consists in asking oneself nothing else but what that text is really saying underneath what it is actually saying. No doubt, that is the legacy of an ancient exegetical tradition: concerning anything that is said, we suspect that something else is being said. The secular version of this allegorical distrust had the effect of assigning to every commentator the task of recovering the author's true thought everywhere, what he had said without saying it, meant to say without being able to, meant to conceal and yet allowed to appear. It is clear that today there are many other possible ways of dealing with language. Thus contemporary criticism — and this is what differentiates it from what was still being done quite recently — is formulating a sort of new combinative scheme [combinatoire] with regard to the diverse texts that it studies, its object texts. Instead of reconstituting the immanent secret, it treats the text as a set of elements (words, metaphors, literary forms, groups of narratives) among which one can bring out absolutely new relations, insofar as they have not been controlled by the writer's design and are made possible only by the work itself as such. The formal relations that one discovers in this way were not present in anyone's mind; they don't constitute the latent content of the statements, their indiscreet secret. They are a construction, but an accurate construction provided that the relations described can actually be assigned to the material treated. We've learned to place people's words in relationships that are still unformulated, said by us for the first time, and yet objectively accurate.

From a 1967 interview with Michel Foucault, "On the Ways of Writing History"

Another one for the "generative AI is reinventing structuralism" file. Implied here is that the underlying structure of language expresses an "accuracy" regardless of the facticity of an specific statement generated through that structure. Foucault calls it the "abandoning of the great myth of interiority." In AI terms, that means there doesn't need to be an intention for the discourse it produces to have meaning.

#foucault #ai structuralism

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ouroboros8ontology · 11 months ago

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It is difficult, of course, to judge the emotional tone, the intensity of the terror which the medieval Jew experienced in braving such a demon-ridden world. Our sources are wholly impersonal; writing of an introspective nature was altogether unknown. We can only conjecture on the basis of the chance personal comments that wormed their way quite incidentally into a literature which was primarily legalistic and exegetical. It is significant, for instance, that a homely little book like the Yiddish Brantspiegel, intended for the intimate instruction of womenfolk, a book which certainly came closer to the folk psyche than did the more formal writing of the period, singled out as the foremost dangers to life and limb demons, evil spirits, wild animals and evil men.

Joshua Trachtenberg, Jewish Magic and Superstition: A Study in Folk Religion; Man and the Demons: Attack

#jewish magic and superstition #joshua trachtenberg #sheydim #jewish magic and superstition; a study in folk religion #man and the demons

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33-108 · 7 months ago

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ABHINAVAGUPTA

"Abhinavagupta (c. 950 – 1016 AD) was a philosopher, mystic and aesthetician from Kashmir. He was also considered an influential musician, poet, dramatist, exegete, theologian, and logician – a polymathic personality who exercised strong influences on Indian culture.

He was born in Kashmir in a family of scholars and mystics and studied all the schools of philosophy and art of his time under the guidance of as many as fifteen (or more) teachers and gurus. In his long life he completed over 35 works, the largest and most famous of which is Tantrāloka, an encyclopaedic treatise on all the philosophical and practical aspects of Kaula and Trika (known today as Kashmir Shaivism). Another one of his very important contributions was in the field of philosophy of aesthetics with his famous Abhinavabhāratī commentary of Nāṭyaśāstra of Bharata Muni.

Life

"Abhinavagupta" was not his real name, rather a title he earned from his master, carrying a meaning of "competence and authoritativeness". In his analysis, Jayaratha (1150–1200 AD) – who was Abhinavagupta's most important commentator – also reveals three more meanings: "being ever vigilant", "being present everywhere" and "protected by praises".Raniero Gnoli, the only Sanskrit scholar who completed a translation of Tantrāloka in a European language, mentions that "Abhinava" also means "new", as a reference to the ever-new creative force of his mystical experience.

From Jayaratha, we learn that Abhinavagupta was in possession of all the six qualities required for the recipients of the tremendous level of śaktipāta, as described in the sacred texts (Śrīpūrvaśāstra):] an unflinching faith in God, realisation of mantras, control over objective principles (referring to the 36 tattvas), successful conclusion of all the activities undertaken, poetic creativity and spontaneous knowledge of all disciplines.

Abhinavagupta's creation is well equilibrated between the branches of the triad (Trika): will (icchā), knowledge (jñāna), action (kriyā); his works also include devotional songs, academical/philosophical works and works describing ritual/yogic practices.

As an author, he is considered a systematiser of the philosophical thought. He reconstructed, rationalised and orchestrated the philosophical knowledge into a more coherent form, assessing all the available sources of his time, not unlike a modern scientific researcher of Indology.

Various contemporary scholars have characterised Abhinavagupta as a "brilliant scholar and saint","the pinnacle of the development of Kasmir Śaivism"] and "in possession of yogic realization".

Social background, family and disciples

"Magical" birth

The term by which Abhinavagupta himself defines his origin is "yoginībhū", 'born of a yoginī'. In Kashmir Shaivism and especially in Kaula it is considered that a progeny of parents "established in the divine essence of Bhairava", is endowed with exceptional spiritual and intellectual prowess. Such a child is supposed to be "the depository of knowledge", who "even as a child in the womb, has the form of Shiva", to enumerate but a few of the classical attributes of his kind.

Parents

His mother, Vimalā (Vimalakalā) died when Abhinavagupta was just two years old; as a consequence of losing his mother, of whom he was reportedly very attached, he grew more distant from worldly life and focused all the more on spiritual endeavour.

The father, Narasiṃha Gupta, after his wife's death favoured an ascetic lifestyle, while raising his three children. He had a cultivated mind and a heart "outstandingly adorned with devotion to Mahesvara (Shiva)" (in Abhinavagupta's own words). He was Abhinavagupta's first teacher, instructing him in grammar, logic and literature.

Family

Abhinavagupta had a brother and a sister. The brother, Manoratha, was a well-versed devotee of Shiva. His sister, Ambā (probable name, according to Navjivan Rastogi), devoted herself to worship after the death of her husband in late life.

His cousin Karṇa demonstrated even from his youth that he grasped the essence of Śaivism and was detached of the world. His wife was presumably Abhinavagupta's older sister Ambā, who looked with reverence upon her illustrious brother. Ambā and Karṇa had a son, Yogeśvaridatta, who was precociously talented in yoga](yogeśvar implies "lord of yoga").

Abhinavagupta also mentions his disciple Rāmadeva as faithfully devoted to scriptural study and serving his master. Another cousin was Kṣema, possibly the same as Abhinavagupta's illustrious disciple Kṣemarāja. Mandra, a childhood friend of Karṇa, was their host in a suburban residence; he was not only rich and in possession of a pleasing personality, but also equally learned. And last but not least, Vatasikā, Mandra's aunt, who got a special mention from Abhinavagupta for caring for him with exceptional dedication and concern; to express his gratitude, Abhinavagupta declared that Vatasikā deserved the credit for the successful completion of his work.

The emerging picture here is that Abhinavagupta lived in a nurturing and protected environment, where his creative energies got all the support they required. Everyone around him was filled with spiritual fervor and had taken Abhinavagupta as their spiritual master. Such a supporting group of family and friends was equally necessary as his personal qualities of genius, to complete a work of the magnitude of Tantrāloka.

Ancestors

By Abhinavagupta's own account, his most remote known ancestor was called Atrigupta, born in Madhyadeśa: [Manusmirti (circa 1500 BC, 2/21) defines the Madhyadesh region as vast plains between Himalaya and Vindhya mountains and to the east of the river Vinasana (invisible Saraswati) and to the west of Praya]. Born in Madhyadeśa he travelled to Kashmir at the request of the king Lalitāditya, around year 740 CE

Masters

Abhinavagupta is famous for his voracious thirst for knowledge. To study he took many teachers (as many as 15), both mystical philosophers and scholars. He approached Vaiṣṇavas, Buddhists, Śiddhānta Śaivists and the Trika scholars.

Among the most prominent of his teachers, he enumerates four. Vāmanātha who instructed him in dualistic Śaivism and Bhūtirāja in the dualist/nondualist school. Besides being the teacher of the famous Abhinavagupta, Bhūtirāja was also the father of two eminent scholars.

Lakṣmaṇagupta, a direct disciple of Utpaladeva, in the lineage of Trayambaka, was highly respected by Abhinavagupta and taught him all the schools of monistic thought : Krama, Trika and Pratyabhijña (except Kula).

Śambhunātha taught him the fourth school (Ardha-trayambaka). This school is in fact Kaula, and it was emanated from Trayambaka's daughter.

For Abhinavagupta, Śambhunātha was the most admired guru. Describing the greatness of his master, he compared Śambhunātha with the Sun, in his power to dispel ignorance from the heart, and, in another place, with "the Moon shining over the ocean of Trika knowledge".

Abhinavagupta received Kaula initiation through Śambhunāthas wife (acting as a dūtī or conduit). The energy of this initiation is transmitted and sublimated into the heart and finally into

consciousness. Such a method is difficult but very rapid and is reserved for those who shed their mental limitations and are pure.

It was Śambhunātha who requested of him to write Tantrāloka. As guru, he had a profound influence in the structure of Tantrāloka and in the life of its creator, Abhinavagupta.

As many as twelve more of his principal teachers are enumerated by name but without details. It is believed that Abhinavagupta had more secondary teachers. Moreover, during his life he had accumulated a large number of texts from which he quoted in his magnum opus, in his desire to create a synthetic, all-inclusive system, where the contrasts of different scriptures could be resolved by integration into a superior perspective.

Lifestyle

Abhinavagupta remained unmarried all his life, and as an adept of Kaula, at least initially maintained brahmacharya and supposedly used the vital force of his energy (ojas) to deepen his understanding of the spiritual nervous system he outlined in his works—a system involving ritual union between Purusha as (Shiva) and Shakti. Such union is essentially non-physical and universal, and thus Abhinavagupta conceived himself as always in communion with Shiva-Shakti. In the context of his life and teachings, Abhinavagupta parallels Shiva as both ascetic and enjoyer.

He studied assiduously at least until the age of 30 or 35, To accomplish that he travelled, mostly inside Kashmir. By his own testimony, he had attained spiritual liberation through his Kaula practice, under the guidance of his most admired master, Śambhunātha.

He lived in his home (functioning as an ashram) with his family members and disciples, and he did not become a wandering monk, nor did he take on the regular duties of his family, but lived out his life as a writer and a teacher. His personality was described as a living realisation of his vision.

In an epoch pen-painting he is depicted seated in Virasana, surrounded by devoted disciples and family, performing a kind of trance-inducing music at veena while dictating verses of Tantrāloka to one of his attendees – behind him two dūtī (women yogi) waiting on him. A legend about the moment of his death (placed somewhere between 1015 and 1025, depending on the source), says that he took with him 1,200 disciples and marched off to a cave (the Bhairava Cave, an actual place known to this day), reciting his poem Bhairava-stava, a devotional work. They were never to be seen again, supposedly translating together into the spiritual world.

Works

Abhinavagupta's works fall into multiple sections: manuals of religious ritual, devotional songs, philosophical works and philosophy of aesthetics. Here are enumerated most of his works.

Religious works

Tantraloka

His most important work was Tantrāloka,(translates into "To Throw Light on Tantra"), a synthesis of all the Trika system. Its only complete translation in a European language – Italian – is credited to Raniero Gnoli, now at its second edition. The esoteric chapter 29 on the Kaula ritual was translated in English together with Jayaratha's commentary by John R. Dupuche, Rev. Dr. A complex study on the context, authors, contents and references of Tantrāloka was published by Navjivan Rastogi, Prof. of the Lucknow University. Though there are no English translations of Tantrāloka to date, the last recognized master of the oral tradition of Kashmir Shaivism, Swami Lakshman Joo, gave a condensed version of the important philosophical chapters of ‘‘Tantrāloka’‘ in his book, Kashmir Shaivism – The Secret Supreme.

Another important text was the commentary on Parātrīśikā, Parātrīśikāvivaraṇa, detailing the signification of the phonematic energies and their two sequential ordering systems, Mātṛkā and Mālinī. This was the last great translation project of Jaideva Singh.

Tantrasara

Tantrasāra ("Essence of Tantra") is a summarised version, in prose, of Tantrāloka, which was once more summarised in Tantroccaya, and finally presented in a very short summary form under the name of Tantravaṭadhānikā – the "Seed of Tantra".

Pūrvapañcikā was a commentary of Pūrvatantra, alias Mālinīvijaya Tantra, lost to this day. Mālinīvijayā-varttika("Commentary on Mālinīvijaya") is a versified commentary on Mālinīvijaya Tantra's first verse. Kramakeli, "Krama's Play" was a commentary of Kramastotra, now lost. Bhagavadgītārtha-saṃgraha which translates "Commentary on Bhagavad Gita" has now an English translation by Boris Marjanovic.]

Other religious works are: Parātrīśikā-laghuvṛtti, "A Short Commentary on Parātrīśikā", Paryantapañcāśīkā ("Fifty Verses on the Ultimate Reality"), Rahasyapañcadaśikā ("Fifteen Verses on the Mystical Doctrine"), Laghvī prakriyā ("Short Ceremony"), Devīstotravivaraṇa ("Commentary on the Hymn to Devi") and Paramārthasāra ("Essence of the Supreme Reality").

Devotional hymns

Abhinavagupta has composed a number of devotional poems, most of which have been translated into French by Lilian Silburn:

• Bodhapañcadaśikā – "Fifteen Verses on Consciousness";

• Paramārthacarcā – "Discussion on the Supreme Reality";

• Anubhavanivedana – "Tribute of the Inner Experience";

• Anuttarāṣṭikā – "Eight Verses on Anuttara";

• Krama-stotra – an hymn, different from the fundamental text of the Krama school;

• Bhairava-stava – "Hymn to Bhairava";

• Dehasthadevatācakra-stotra – "Hymn to the Wheel of Divinities that Live in the Body";

• Paramārthadvādaśikā – "Twelve Verses on the Supreme Reality" and

• Mahopadeśa-viṃśatikā – "Twenty Verses on the Great Teaching".

• Another poem Śivaśaktyavinābhāva-stotra – "Hymn on the Inseparability of Shiva and Shakti" was lost.

Philosophical works

One of the most important works of Abhinavagupta is Īśvarapratyabhijñā-vimarśini ("Commentary to the Verses on the Recognition of the Lord") and Īśvarapratyabhijñā-vivṛti-vimarśini ("Commentary on the explanation of Īśvarapratyabhijñā"). This treatise is fundamental in the transmission of the Pratyabhijña school (the branch of Kashmir Shaivism based on direct recognition of the Lord) to our days. Another commentary on a Pratyabhijña work – Śivadṛṣtyā-locana ("Light on Śivadṛṣṭi") – is now lost. Another lost commentary is Padārthapraveśa-nirṇaya-ṭīkā and Prakīrṇkavivaraṇa ("Comment on the Notebook") referring to the third chapter of Vākyapadīya of Bhartrihari. Two more philosophical texts of Abhinavagupta are Kathāmukha-tilaka("Ornament of the Face of Discourses") and Bhedavāda-vidāraṇa ("Confrontation of the Dualist Thesis"). Abhinavagupta's thought was strongly influenced by Buddhist logic.

Poetical and dramatic works

Abhinavabharati

Abhinavaguptas most important work on the philosophy of art is Abhinavabhāratī – a long and complex commentary on Natya Shastra of Bharata Muni. This work has been one of the most important factors contributing to Abhinavagupta's fame up until present day. His most important contribution was that to the theory of rasa(aesthetic savour).

Other poetical works include: Ghaṭa-karpara-kulaka-vivṛti, a commentary on "Ghaṭakarpara" of Kalidasa; Kāvyakauṭukavivaraṇa, a "Commentary to the Wonder of Poetry" (a work of Bhaṭṭa Tauta), now lost; and Dhvanyālokalocana, "Illustration of Dhvanyāloka", which is a famous work of Anandavardhana."

#shiva #hinduism #esoteric #tantra

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u-mspcoll · 2 years ago

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New Exhibit and Opening | Early Astronomy in the University of Michigan Collections

We’re pleased to announce a new exhibit featuring a selection of manuscripts, early printed books, and artifacts illustrating Mesopotamian, Greek, Islamic, and Western European astronomies. Thes exhibit and its permanent online counterpart are part of The Aratus Project, which was sponsored by the National Science Foundation and led by professor Francesca Schironi. The core of the project has been to study Aratus’ "Phaenomena," the most important poem on stars and constellations of the Graeco-Roman ancient world, and its exegetical tradition. The physical and online exhibits place this research work within its later intellectual and historical context.

Join the curators this Thursday, 12 January, 4-6 pm in the Hatcher Gallery for a reception celebrating the opening of the exhibit followed by an exhibit tour!

Early Astronomy in the University of Michigan Collections is on display in the Hatcher Gallery Exhibit Room (1st floor, Hatcher Graduate Library) until 15 May 2023

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junebugwriter · 10 months ago

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Galatians 3:28 is Transgender Affirming, Actually

An exegetical exploration of the text

I used to be a pastor. That occupation affords a position as a lot of things within the church, an opportunity to be “all things to all people” as Paul would say. 1 Perhaps the one that I was most well suited to and excelled at was being the neighborhood theologian in residence and academic in practice. Now that I am an academic full-time in my graduate studies, I am practically drowning in research, but remarkably, little of it is explicitly biblical in nature. This is something I quite miss, and so I began this blog partly to fill that missing piece of my former life, because I believe that as a Christian, drinking deep from the well of scripture is generally good practice and ideal to work towards.

So, call me surprised when a few weeks ago, I heard a murmur of a discourse on the site formerly known as Twitter, discourse revolving around Galatians 3, specifically Galatians 3: 28: “There is no longer Jew or Greek; there is no longer slave or free; there is no longer male and female, for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.”

Now, let me say this up front: this passage has meant a lot to me most of my life. It is a message that is designed to unify, to build community, to embolden us to set aside differences for the common good of the Christian community. But also, it has meant a lot to me personally, as it signaled to me that God simply does not regard my being transgender as something to be used against me, that in the end it does not matter to God, because God is beyond all of the binaries and dividing lines we might draw here on earth.

However, this is not exactly consensus. (Not that Twitter is at all an engine for consensus-building—in fact it was engineered to be the opposite!) For every person who argued that Galatians 3:28 was an affirming passage as regards people of the transgender experience, there were perhaps dozens more who said that interpreting it that was robs the passage of its context, and goes against the sacred word of Paul of Tarsus.2

This naturally got my pastor engine burning, because to me, it seems obvious, even with context, that Galatians 3 would be affirming for transgender people. Yet, most likely, there are many that would not see it so. Therefore, allow me to make my case for a queer, trans reading of Galatians 3.

(Note: though I am a trained pastor and theologian, I am NOT an expert in New Testament studies or biblical Greek. Additionally, though I am a queer theologian, Queer Theology as an area of

focus is not my exact specialty, not as much as disability or ethics is. This is my own exegesis and interpretation, make of that as you will.)

The Text in Context

Paul’s Letter to the Galatians is a text with a fraught history, which makes sense considering the letter was written to a problematic church. If Paul was going to write to a church, there was usually a significant enough problem at stake for the foundling churches of Asia. Moreover, if the letter was to be included within biblical canon, it meant that the issue was significant enough for the leaders of early church to have found it essential for the spiritual formation of the church itself. That issue was nothing less than a question of inclusion and discrimination within the church.

Paul was faced with the question: Who is to be included within the church? Who is to be given salvation? It’s a soteriological question with social implications, and to erase the second facet is to do a disservice to the first facet. Paul relates as much in his discussion in earlier chapters regarding his disagreement with Peter, Cephas, and James. To be a follower of Christ, did one need to be a Jew first? They had agreed, and sent Paul with their blessing, that the correct answer is no. One did not need to be a Jew in order to be saved through the redeeming work of Jesus Christ. One could be a Gentile or a Jew, and this pivotal decision set in motion the course of the church for the rest of history, one which would ultimately spell final division with our Jewish siblings.

But I digress. The point was, there was confusion among the church as to who was included in the family of God, and Paul emphatically declared in Galatians that this entire line of questioning was out of order. Paul was of course chiefly focused on the Jewish/Gentile divide, but he was not blind to the hierarchical realities of the society in which he lived. The statement he makes in 3:28 is a threefold formulation, one that approaches the chief dividing lines in society as he saw it: Jew and Gentile, slave and free, male and female.3 This entire letter was birthed by inequality and division occurring socially4, and Christian communities are reflections of their societies and communities. Jim Reiher puts it like this: “...human ‘horizontal’ relationships were not reflecting the ‘vertical’ equality we all have in Christ with God.”

Thus, in response to these divisions among the people of the church, Paul’s response is that it is in the waters of baptism in Jesus Christ that we are given common salvation. Jennifer Slater states that in a post-Christ paradigm, “both men and women share equally in Christ and so become equal members or participants of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ.”5 This is not in ignorance of the realities of division, nor a collapse of identity. People remain distinct, and so do identities within the church. To ignore such would

be to ignore reality. Rather, it’s instead not a dissolution of distinction, but rather a negation of difference as a basis for exclusion. 6

In Paul’s day, and in ours, it would be the height of foolishness to state that difference did not exist. Yet despite that, we as the church are called to not necessarily bless the structures that divide us in our society, but reflect a different reality in which those differences do not deny any of us citizenship in the Reign of God through Jesus Christ. Christ did away with those when he took on human flesh and was resurrected from the dead. When we undergo the waters of baptism, we are initiated into that reign, that new reality, and offered salvation through faith.

That Paul knew what he was doing here seems obvious. There was a very strict codification of gender binary within Roman society in that time, with a clear advantage given to men over women. Women had less social status than men, often could not hold property, and even were seen as property of men in every arena. To state “there is neither male nor female” is a direct contradiction of the social order as it stood, and different gender roles were proscribed by society. As such, this disregarding of gender as it affects life in the church is a radical statement indeed, and thus worthy of modern interrogation.

Queering the Text

This is, of course, where the fun begins. I needed to get through that background to get to the question at hand: how is Galatians 3:28 a trans affirming passage?

I am going to state here that queer theory and queer criticism is a relatively new field of criticism, doubly so for theology. Though the interrogation of the text as a gender-inclusive statement can be seen to go back to the late 19th and early 20th centuries, queerness as a subcategory of theology can only go back a few decades. Therefore, the scholarship is scant on the matter of Galatians 3:28, but not impossible to find. For a more in-depth analysis, I’ll recommend an excellent paper by Jeremy Punt, full citation in the footnotes.7 His work is excellent, yet it is mostly focused on establishing a basis for a queer reading of Galatians 3, not as much the specific queerness that being transgender poses.

In claiming that in Christ there is “no male nor female,” there is an androgynizing effect to the passage that poses a danger to the male audience, much more than the female one.8 Men stood to lose much in the categorical collapse of gender: social status, privilege, and legal rights. In the bargain, women stood to gain much more than men would lose, and thus this was a radical proposal for 1st century church members. Yet, one could argue that this collapse was potentially less dangerous than the difference collapse between rich and poor, slave and free, and most especially for Paul’s interest, Jew and Gentile. The presence of salvation through the work of Jesus Christ was a radical proposition, and to separate social reality from soteriological would be folly, especially since the social aspect seemed to be the chief problem that was being posed to salvation.

This naturally leads to a significant question for the interpreter: what do we mean by salvation? Is salvation simply something that happens in the great by and by? Is it simply a reality relegated to existence after death? Or does salvation mean something in the present, the here and now? I would argue that for Paul, it absolutely matters. Salvation was a social issue, because the material reality with which the church was faced was affecting their theological prejudices and division. Thus, when Jesus saves, Jesus does not simply save us for later, but saves us right now. When he first speaks in the Gospel of Mark, Jesus says “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.”9 That’s not a promise of the reign in the future, in some far away time or place that is immediate and urgent. Thus, salvation only makes sense if we frame it in the present, material reality of the listener.

Jeremy Punt wisely stated that “...queer theory is not so much about bestowing normalcy on queerness but rather queering of normalcy.”10 If one takes that task seriously, it is then a very queer thing indeed for Jesus to have proclaimed the arrival of the Reign of God. It very much queered the normalcy of the people he preached to, and Paul is very much queering the normalcy of the people of Galatia in this broad, unifying pronouncement. He is blurring the divisions between ethnic groups, economic groups, as well as gender groups, something that is usually believed to have been an unreconcilable divide. After all, did God not create the two genders in the Garden of Eden? ”Male and female, he created them?” Yet in Christ, we see that this division need not be maintained so strictly, because the things of heaven, the Reign of God, does not seem to care about these divisions all that much.

The case for gender inclusion in Galatians seems straightforward, then. Women ought not be barred from anything within the church itself. The social dimension directly affects this salvation issue, and God is freeing us from division within salvation and society. But this leads to the crucial question:

Does this include transgender people?

The T-shaped Hole in our Text

Our beliefs and understanding about gender, sex, and the social constructs around them have changed in the intervening millennia between our us and our text. There was no way for Paul to have talked about what we now understand as transgender people, because that category did not exist for him in that context.

That does not mean that we did not exist back then, mind you. The existence of transgender people in history is being uncovered on a daily basis. Our journals, our records, our stories exist, but on the margins of social consciousness. The truth of the matter is, we did not simply appear in the last few years, when people started making more of a fuss about us in the public sphere. We simply have learned more about how gender works, and that is a concept and topic that is expanding each day. So, while Paul did not consider transgender people in his writing, that does not mean that we did not exist in his day and age, and that does not mean that this text doesn’t have something to say about us.

If one had to boil down the entire text of Galatians to a single point, it would be that our divisions do not stop us from receiving the love of God through Jesus Christ. Quite the reverse. Jesus

Christ does not care about our divisions. God’s love does not end at an arbitrary dividing wall of our own creation. That love is shared among God’s children equally; how could you make a holy parent like God choose among their creation? Likewise, God does not contain within themselves division. God may be triune in nature, but that triune aspect of God only heightens the communal aspect of love, and the love that God shares within God’s selves is only stronger when it is shared with God’s creation.

When I was a child, I was baptized into the life of the church. There is not a day that goes by where I did not know God’s love for me. It has been a constant throughout my life, and I cherish the fact that I have always had assurance of God’s love for me. God does not suddenly stop loving someone like me when I learn more about myself, about my mind, my identity, and my manner of expression. If, as Paul says, “There is no longer male and female,” then why get hung up on whether or not God’s love is extended to transgender people? You can hop that binary divided at any point, and God’s love for you would not change. You can ride that line all day long if you want! You may say, forget the line! Because the line is only there because we say it’s there.

In the end, male and female are simply categories, and if God is any indicator, categories are meant to be defied. God does not have a gender, because God is beyond the binary. God is beyond every binary, in fact. This isn’t a controversial statement, it simply has been the understanding of the church going back to antiquity. That we call God Father, Son, and Holy Spirit and use predominantly masculine pronouns is because of how language works, and how God through Jesus Christ revealed themselves to us. That is the language they used, but any language we use is provably lacking when talking about the divine, because it is a construct of human making, and therefore flawed and fallible. Our understanding of biology is simply what we have so far observed and tested, backed up on documentation, and is liable to change as more information is gathered. Furthermore, gender is different from biological sex, and while both are important—fascinating, even!--they are also more malleable than we might imagine.

Christians are also a people of change. We believe that Jesus came to change the world from how it is to how it will be under the Reign of God. Jesus calls us to repentance, to change ourselves, and be transformed by the love that God has for us. You are changing every day in small, unnoticeable ways. Transgender people are just people who have observed an interior discrepancy in how we are perceived by the world, and work to change that in our lives to better reflect the person that we always were inside. That’s not dishonesty or delusion, it is simply how humans work! It's the height of honesty to be transgender, because the most intimate part of ourselves, our identity, is important, and God honors that. Because of that, God does not really care if we transition. Because God shows no partiality. Man, woman, something in between, something outside the binary completely—there is no longer any division, because all are one in Christ our Lord. If you belong to Christ, you belong to the promise that God will always love you, no matter what.

Conclusion

To me, a theologian and one deeply called to teaching the truths of our faith, are deep truths that cannot be denied. Paul does not want there to be any division among us, as division only sows injustice, infighting, and chaos. Jesus came to both men and women, slave and free, rich or poor, Jew and Gentile. This is a text that is designed to free us from our interior divisions, to work towards a reality in which those divisions do not matter anymore.

The context of the text recognizes the social reality of our world, and then subverts it. The message of Jesus Christ, then, is a revolutionary attitude of inclusion, love, and support. It goes beyond gender divisions, to the very cores of our being. God loves us, God includes us, God celebrates us. God wants us to live in truth and love with one another—and being transgender is a truth that should not be denied.

Look, I have tried to deny it for decades. I tried to be what I was assigned at birth, and have found so much freedom in acknowledging the truth of who I am inside. Ask any transgender person, and they will tell you the same. If it could be denied, we wouldn’t be honest with ourselves, or with God. God wants us to be free, loved, and honored in our communities, especially in the church.

So yes, Galatians 3:28 is a transgender affirming text, actually. It is a text that unbinds us to binaries and reveals a vision of a community that has progressed beyond division to true unity, solidarity, and love. Go therefore and act like God has freed you from your interior divisions. Live in truth, and the truth shall set you free.

______________________________________________

Footnotes:

1- 1 Cor. 9:22 (NRSV).

2 -I quite like Paul, by the way! But he was a human being, and as a human being, his words bear the stain of human frailty and fallibility. Therefore, it is more than acceptable to criticize and/or examine his work as such. He was an excellent writer and theologian, and demands that his work be taken seriously as an academic; I imagine he would want nothing less

3- Slater, Jennifer. “'Inclusiveness’ - An Authentic Biblical Truth That Negates Distinctions: A Hermeneutic of Gender Incorporation and Ontological Equality in Ancient Christian Thought.” Journal of Early Christian History 5, no. 1 (2015): 116–31. Pg. 118.

4- Reiher, Jim. “Galatians 3: 28 – Liberating for Women’s Ministry? Or of Limited Application?” The Expository Times 123, no. 6 (March 1, 2012): 272–77. https://doi.org/10.1177/0014524611431773. Pg. 275.

5- Slater. Pg. 119.

6- Ibid. Pg. 122.

7- Punt, Jeremy. “Power and Liminality, Sex and Gender, and Gal 3:28: A Postcolonial, Queer Reading of an Influential Text.” Neotestamentica 44, no. 1 (2010): 140–66.

8- Punt. Pg. 154.

9- Mark 1: 15, NRSV.

10- Punt. Pg. 156.

#transgender #theology #christianity #exegesis #bible #scripture #lgbtq+

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deadinarussianelevator · 2 years ago

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Maybe as a woman I can relish over the good food I made today AND discuss theology and exegete scripture and study the original languages. Maybe I can also enjoy studying the really cool lizard I found on my porch that changes colors. Maybe women are more than just 2D caricatures.

Just a thought.

#it’s been a week

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eli-kittim · 1 year ago

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Is Paul Teaching an Imminent Eschatology in 1 Corinthians 15:51?

Eli Kittim

Some commentators have claimed that Paul’s language in 1 Corinthians 15:51 is referencing an imminent eschatology. Our primary task is to analyze what the critical Greek New Testament text actually says (not what we would like it to say), and then to ascertain if there are any proofs in it of an imminent eschatology. Let’s start by focusing on a particular verse that is often cited as proof of Paul’s imminent eschatology, namely, 1 Corinthians 15:51. It is alleged that this verse seems to suggest that Paul’s audience in Corinth would live to see the coming of Christ. But we must ask the question:

What in the original Greek text indicates that Paul is referring specifically to his immediate audience in Corinth and not to mankind collectively, which is in Christ? We can actually find out the answer to this question by studying the Greek text, which we will do in a moment.

At any rate, it is often asserted that the clause “We shall not all die" (in 1 Corinthians 15:51) does not square well with a future eschatology. These commentators often end up fabricating an entire fictional scenario that is not even mentioned in the original text. For starters, the plural pronoun “we” seems to be referring to the dead, not to people who are alive in Corinth (I will prove that in a moment). And yet, on the pretext of doing historical criticism, they usually go on to concoct a fictitious narrative (independently of what the text is saying) about how Paul is referring to the people of Corinth who will not die until they see the Parousia.

But, textually speaking, where does 1 Corinthians 15:51 mention the Corinthian audience, the Parousia, or that the Corinthians will still be alive to see it? They have rewritten a novel. None of these fictitious premises can be found in the textual data. Once again, I must ask the same question:

What in the original Greek text indicates that Paul is referring to his audience (which is alive) in Corinth and not to the dead in Christ (collectively)?

We can actually find out the answer to this question by studying the Greek text, which we will do right now!

As I will demonstrate, this particular example does not prove an imminent eschatology based on Paul’s words and phrases. In first Corinthians 15:51, the use of the first person plural pronoun “we” obviously includes Paul by virtue of the fact that he, too, will one day die and rise again. In fact, there is no explicit reference to the rapture or the resurrection taking place in Paul’s lifetime in 1 Corinthians 15:51. In the remainder of this commentary, I will demonstrate the internal evidence (textual evidence) by parsing and exegeting the original Greek New Testament text!

Commentators often claim that the clause “We shall not all die" implies an imminent eschatology. Let’s test that hypothesis. Paul actually wrote the following in 1 Corinthians 15:51 (according to the Greek NT critical text NA28):

πάντες οὐ κοιμ��θησόμεθα, πάντες δὲ

ἀλλαγησόμεθα.

My Translation:

“We will not all sleep, but we will all be

transformed.”

In the original Greek text, there is no separate word that corresponds to the plural pronoun “we.” Rather, we get that pronoun from the case endings -μεθα (i.e. κοιμηθησόμεθα/ἀλλαγησόμεθα). The Greek verb κοιμηθησόμεθα (sleep) is a future passive indicative, first person plural. It simply refers to a future event. But it does not tell us when it will occur (i.e. whether in the near or distant future). We can only determine that by comparing other writings by Paul and the eschatological verbiage that he employs in his other epistles. Moreover, it is important to note that the verb κοιμηθησόμεθα simply refers to a collective sleep. It does not refer to any readers in Corinth!

Similarly, the verb ἀλλαγησόμεθα (we will all be transformed) is a future passive indicative, first person plural. It, too, means that all the dead who are in Christ, including Paul, will not die but be changed/transformed. The event is set in the future, but a specific timeline is not explicitly or implicitly given, or even suggested. Both expressions (i.e. κοιμηθησόμεθα/ἀλλαγησόμεθα) refer to all humankind in Christ or to all the elect that ever lived (including, of course, Paul as well) because both words are preceded by the adjective πάντες, which means “all.” In other words, Paul references “all” the elect that have ever lived, including himself, and says that we will not all perish but be transformed. We must bear in mind that the word πάντες means “all,” and the verb “we will all be changed” (ἀλλαγησόμεθα) refers back to all who sleep in Christ (πάντες κοιμηθησόμεθα). Thus, the pronoun “we,” which is present in the case endings (-μεθα), is simply an extension of the lexical form pertaining to those who sleep (κοιμηθησόμεθα). So, the verb κοιμηθησόμεθα simply refers to all those who sleep. Once again, the adjective πάντες (all/everyone)——in the phrase “We will not all sleep”—— does not refer to any readers in Corinth.

There is not even one reference to a specific time-period in this verse (i.e. when it will happen). Not one. And the plural pronoun “we” specifically refers to all the dead in Christ (πάντες κοιμηθησόμεθα), not to any readers alive in Corinth (eisegesis).

And that is a scholarly exegesis of how we go about translating the meanings of words accurately, while maintaining literal fidelity. It’s also an illustration of why we need to go back to the original Greek text rather than to rely on corrupt, paraphrased English translations (which often include the translators’ theological interpretative biases).

Conclusion

What commentators often fail to realize is that the first person plural pronoun “we” includes Paul because he, too, is part of the elect who will also die and one day rise again. Koine Greek——the language in which Paul wrote his epistles——is interested in the so-called “aspect” (how), not in the “time” (when), of an event. First Corinthians 15:51 does not suggest specifically when the rapture & the resurrection will happen. And it strongly suggests that the plural pronoun “we” is referring to the dead, not to the readers who, by contrast, are alive in Corinth.

Some commentators are simply trying to force their own interpretation that doesn’t actually square well with the grammatical elements of 1 Corinthians 15:51 or with Paul’s other epistles where he explicitly talks about the Day of the Lord (2 Thessalonians 2:1-12) and the last days (1 Timothy 4:1; 2 Timothy 3:1 ἐν ἐσχάταις ἡμέραις), a time during which the world will look very different from his own. The argument, therefore, that 1 Corinthians 15:51 is referring to an Imminent Eschatology is not supported by the textual data (or the original Greek text).

What is more, if we compare the Pauline corpus with the eschatology of Matthew 24 & 2 Peter 3:10, as well as with the totality of scripture (canonical context), it will become quite obvious that all these texts are talking about the distant future!

If anyone thinks that they can parse the Greek and demonstrate a specific time-period indicated in 1 Corinthians 15:51, or that the phrase “all who sleep” (πάντες κοιμηθησόμεθα) is a reference to the readers in Corinth, please do so. I would love to hear it. Otherwise, this study is incontestable/irrefutable!

The same type of exegesis can be equally applied to 1 Thessalonians 4:15 in order to demonstrate that the verse is not referring to Paul’s audience in Thessalonica, but rather to a future generation that will be alive during the coming of the Lord (but that's another topic for another day):

ἡμεῖς οἱ ζῶντες οἱ περιλειπόμενοι εἰς τὴν

παρουσίαν τοῦ κυρίου.

“we who are alive, who are left until the

coming of the Lord.”

If that were the case——that is, if the New Testament was teaching that the first century Christians would live to see the day of the lord——it would mean that both Paul and Jesus were false prophets who preached an imminent eschatology that never happened.

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mybeautifulchristianjourney · 1 year ago

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The late Professor John Murray taught the significance of understanding the doctrine of definitive sanctification. As he studied the exegetical statements of the New Testament that spoke of believers having been sanctified through the death of Christ (e.g. 1 Corinthians 1:2; 6:11; Heb. 10:10, etc.), Murray suggested that “it is a fact too frequently overlooked...

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alphacenturian4 · 2 years ago

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Reading the Bible with the Church Fathers

St. John Chrysostom and Origen

Antiochene (literal) vs Alexandrian (allegorical)

Genesis 1:1-3:19

By: Alphacenturion

Background Chrysostom, lived between 314 and 407 AD, and among many other works he wrote about 76 homilies on genesis. he was a preacher in Antioch and in Constantinople he stands high in the tradition of Antioch looking for a more literal, “by the letter,” interpretation of the bible. His is an exegetical tradition. He preaches and promotes good works such as attending church Bible study and giving alms, and the avoidance of evil deeds such as gambling, being lazy, sloth, and watching horse races. The only time he allows for a spiritual or allegorical sense of the interpretation is when that interpretation is in support of, or supported by, the New Testament especially the writings of Paul.

Origen was born around 185 AD most likely in, or around, Alexandria, though that is disputed by his detractors, his father was a known martyr. Origen himself is a bright light and immense structure of the early church as his works and accomplishments are myriad, he is considered by many to be the first theologian and the first to use reason as a methodology for examining the Bible and biblical texts, at least the first Christian to examine the Bible in this way. A dean and major figure of the Alexandrian School, which was founded by St Mark the Evangelist (the Apostle and Author of the Gospel of Mark), the school didn’t find fame until 190, Origen didn’t become dean of the School until 203 AD. Origen examined the Bible from a Spiritual or what we might now call an allegorical point of view. His most famous work is titled On First Principles. He is spoken highly of by other major Christian figures such as Eusebius. But for all of his accomplishments and his many admirers in the early church he had vocal enemies and powerful detractors such as Demetrius the bishop of Alexandria. Who's slander against Origen persist to this very day in many prominent Protestant and Calvinist circles. Origen was a well-read classicalist for his time, and he enjoyed studying the Bible, first in the Greek then later in the Hebrew, it is his fondness for the Hebrew which will begin to get him in trouble with the orthodox of his day, around 215, Origen visited Rome, a See that still appreciates his gifts to Christian Theology to this day, he was well traveled for that time period and even toured throughout Palestine. His death is disputed, he either died in ignominy, in 255 having unfortunately survived horrible torture, or he died as a martyr in 250 during the persecution of Decius. If you think Origen should be considered a church father, then you are more likely to think that he was a martyr and thus went to heaven; if on the other hand you think he was a heretic you are more likely to think he died having been denied martyrdom.

First let’s look at St. Chrysostom’s literal interpretation of Genesis 1-3.

He begins by an exhortation to temperance, obedience, and moderation which will lead to Wellness; while he warns that indulgence, intemperance and mildness lead to illness and death. For Chrysostom, if overindulgence is the cause of the problem, then fasting and avoidance is the cure and corrective. He is a proponent of self-denial. He then warns that one should not compete in fasting or temperance nor even in moderation; one must not go to excess or excesses in being temperate; one must demonstrate self-control even in self-denial.

He then looks at Romans 2:13 and quotes that: “It is not hearers of the law whom are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified.” Then Chrysostom adds a quote from Amos 6:3 “You who put far away in your mind the day of coming disaster, woe to you that sleep upon beds of ivory and are wanton on your couches: that eat the lambs out of their flock, and the calves out of the midst of their herd; you who sing songs idlily from the Psalter; you that think themselves to have instruments for music like David; you who drink wine in bowls, and anoint themselves with the best of ointments; but yet are not concerned for the affliction of Joseph! Wherefore now shall they go for you will be the first to be held captive, led at the head of the exiles, of those who go into captivity: and that faction, the revilers, the luxurious ones shall be taken away.”

After this grim warning, Chrysostom affirms Biblical inspiration, that the word of God truly spoke through the inspired authors, though it was written many generations after the events portrayed or relayed had occurred. Chrysostom takes pains to downplay the abilities of human reasoning, and then takes a moment to talk down to Jewish people for being stubborn in their doubt and questioning. Reminding the Jewish of his audience, as relates to the Hebrew Bible, that it is “God who makes and transforms all things and refashions all things according to his will.”

He bases his teachings about spiritual things on visible realities. That while we are to be guided by the spirit in our teaching and sharing the good news, we are to do so by faith within our limitations and not try to grasp higher than our reach. He advises that we should, and explains that he does, adapt the Message of the Good News to different audiences, based on their needs and comprehension abilities, that your methods, means, and wording of the message must be adapted to who you are speaking in front of or writing to. This for him is especially true when dealing with the Old Testament and even more so when working through Genesis.

Chrysostom, in example, speaks of two passages here. He compares Genesis 1:1-5 with John 1:1-5; but he also makes many inferences and implications that he does not expound on, nor explain in any detail for the rest of these set of Homilies. For instance: What he meant by authorship? Or, What he means by the separation of light and darkness. These are just two examples of where Chrysostom’s principles of interpretation can be applied aptly, but he merely teases out the inference and doesn’t delve into deeper meaning. This is a limitation of his Antiochian approach.

For instance, on authorship he implied that even given the objections Moses being the literal author one could reason to, and remember he is writing circa the 300’s, he claims that it is still correct to call Moses the blessed, or the inspired, author of genesis. His explanation runs something like this, to put it in semi-modern terms. It is right to call “Moses” the author of Genesis just as it is right to call Mark Twain the author of Tom Sawyer, or Shakespeare the author of the plays attributed to him, or Homer the author of the Iliad and the odyssey. The next reasoned to objection, he also dismisses, that even if a myriad of authors penned the work, even if great authors wrote a series together but they did so under one pen name, it would still be correct to give credit of authorship to that penname. As we know what we are getting and what to expect when we pick up that pen name. We, the audience know and trust that pen name and understand the style and conventions we are to expect if we read something by say Anne Rice or by A.N. Roqueluare. To put a finer point on it, we, the consuming audience, are not reading Samuel Clements we are reading Mark Twain and we know the difference.

So too with Moses. Moses is the tongue, Moses is the pen, Moses is the instrument God uses through inspiration to tell his story. In the story of Genesis, Moses is the storyteller. That is his role for us the listener and the reader. Does that mean that Moses was the first to tell the story or that he was its only contributor? No more than Homer was to the Iliad but when we read the Iliad, we read we hear Homer. When we read Moses, we know who and when he represents. That attribution may have come later than the first recitation of the story, but that does not change the authorship for us, nor does it alter the inspiration. In this case the Holy Spirit inspired blessed Moses, whomever blessed Moses was or was not.

The first four homilies of Saint John Chrysostom’s apology on Genesis can be broken up into seven points and span the first four days of creation. The seven themes are as follow:

Day one

1. God is the creator of all things.

2. God is a God of order

Day two

3. God is a God of authority and obedience.

4. God is a God of goodness

Day three

5. God is a God of unity.

6. God is a God of beauty.

Day four

7. All things have their use and purposes. Lights are there to guide and divide. Vegetation, growth, and fruits even those things that are harmful, inedible, or poisonous are that way for a reason.

Chrysostom then comes to some conclusions about the message of the story so far. For him, the first two accounts in Genesis are teaching that there is one heaven; one earth; one reality. And thus, there is only One God, and only One truth. But again, he doesn’t expound beyond his own limitations of interpretation, nor does he go beyond the perceived limitation of the text into speculation.

Instead, he takes this opportunity, in raising and then dismissing the obvious questions and objections, to promote daily study and prayer as exercise for the mind and soul. That rigor and discipline in good habits and good works will produce good fruit. Chrysostom also takes time to demonstrate in his writing an appreciation for Saint Paul. Something many of his readers and commentators take note of. To make sense of his Homilies on Genesis, it is important to make a mental note that he is preaching to a domestic church, during the season of Lent, and that he is actively encouraging them to participate in small group, daily Bible study, and that in these small groups they ought to converse on the divine, and on biblical topics; that is instead of gossiping, gambling, gaming, or indulging in other temptations. He then finally gets to the body of the text, but first he complements the precision and considerateness of the Blessed Author, as he says that he teaches through the telling of the creation of Adam that the body comes first and then ensoulment. But at this point we come to homily 15 and we get to the first major textual corruption, so the rest of this homily is a paraphrase of what is missing from his lecture.

Ironically his next encouragement is to say that with the Christian, correct doctrine is of no benefit unless one attends to the business of living. Therefore, blessed is the one who both does and teaches. He then quotes Matthew 5:19. Followed by an exhortation to “let us not stop short at the literal level; instead, let us reason from the perceivable visible realities to the superiority of spiritual realities.” And here again, Chrysostom complements the precision and considerateness of the text and author. He explains again that the biblical text, especially Genesis, is written with the limitations of its audience in mind. He explains that the words used by the text are precise: that to will, direct, and command are each different things, just as to form and shape are different modes of operation, as is the words formed versus fashioned. Each saying something different about how God approaches the creation of different creatures and beings. After plenty of base level commentary, which can be found in most study bibles or on most apologetic YouTube channels that speak about Genesis the next big topic Chrysostom takes on in his Homilies is the Fall, and here he says something I had not heard elsewhere before, he claims that the snake in the garden was not the devil but that the snake was used by the devil, and that this is evidenced by the devil's words and the fact that snakes don’t talk. That the devil worked through the serpent, but by being a tool for the devil the serpent was still punished, and that we, mortal humans, shall trample upon are the serpents and scorpions of/in our minds. Considering that I had just read a little over a hundred pages extolling the benefits of a literal interpretation I was almost shocked that Chrysostom went for a more spiritual metaphysical interpretation here. That the snakes and scorpions mentioned in Genesis are the temptations and doubts that live in our mind. The tree of the knowledge of good and evil also gets an allegorical treatment here, though to a much lesser degree, the forbidden tree is that of carnal knowledge, it is the divide between the theoretical knowledge of evil and the act of evil, it is highlighting the difference between and is the embodiment of theoretical knowledge and practical experience, between potential and actual. The eating of the fruit is knowing the difference by experiencing it, the act of knowing versus simply understanding, going back to Chrysostom warning about the limitations of Human Reason. Knowing is different than doing, doing is a deeper level of knowing. It is knowing in a true sense. In this vein Chrysostom continues. The concept that “God strolled in the evening” is equivalent to the conscious which knows all but still asks. Adam trying to hide from God is equivalent to shame. To be denuded and aware of one’s own nakedness is equivalent to being stripped of God's good glory. The reason for this departure from a literal simple reading of the plain text is that Genesis if read absolutely literal pushes against the understanding of God from Psalms and the New Testament. An anthropomorphic God is not compatible with the simplistic (unchanging), all knowing, all powerful, timeless, eternal, monotheistic, Trinitarian God of the Gospels, Acts, Epistles, and Revelation. Hence the limitation of the Antiochian School, Protestantism, Ultra-literalism, and Sola Scriptura.

Now, for contrast, let us look at Origen and how he understands Genesis 1:1-29. For Origen, the heaven being spoken of in Genesis one is incorporeal, which is consistent with later Biblical text which states that God's throne comes before the world. Therefore, Genesis and the verse in the beginning is not and cannot be speaking of temporal beginning nor is Genesis meant to be taken in a chronological manner or temporal sense.

Like Chrysostom, Origen finds many of the same themes in the opening seven lines of the Bible. For both men, and therefore for both schools, Genesis and the Bible as a whole teaches that God creates, God orders, God brings light from/to darkness. God brings order from/to chaos. For Origen though, the abyss referenced in Genesis is the same as the abode of the devil and the demons. For Origen, he sees direct references to the dragon and his angels in the warnings and ongoings of Genesis. In Origen’s recounting of the Genesis account, God dissolved the darkness, and it was God who names all things before the invention of language.

This can be and is true, because all this takes place before the existence of time. And time, for Origen, is older than this world. You may at this point be excused for thinking mistakenly that this Alexandrian method of interpretation is more literal and fundamental than the Antiochian, but you would be wrong on at least one of those counts. For then Origen explains that the firmament here and the heaven made in the second account is corporal; for him, the division is between earth and heaven, between body and soul. The heaven of the mind. The earth of the body. Darkness is chaos, which is to say lack of reason, lack of consciousness, lack of self-awareness. Light is order, reason, thought, and consciousness. Genesis 1-8 is the story of humanity reaching consciousness, both collective and individual.

Origen’s next big claim is that the world created in genesis came into being before time existed. For all the fun this concept and idea can generate it does lead to some questions, for instance, What does this represent? What is the water above heaven? What are the waters below heaven? Is darkness equivalent to the abyss, is the abyss equivalent to hell?

Origen implies that Heaven and spirit is equivalent to mind, and that mind is equivalent to self. That Heaven is the internal (eternal) self, and that Earth is the external (temporal) self. The firmament is the barrier between your existential metaphysical self and your practical physical body. Christ and the church are the sun and the moon for the believing Christian, he goes on, that just as a blind man cannot see or make sense of the light radiating from the sun so to the spiritually blind cannot make sense or understand the light radiating from Christ. The Birds are equivalent to high thoughts, while crawling things are equivalent to low thoughts. The firmament Divides the spiritual from the carnal.

Origen’s theory, his interpretation of genesis is that it is speaking of the spiritual creation and that genesis 2:5 is speaking of carnal creation. Origen is an interesting and intriguing read. While, his approach does circumvent the current literacy development hypothesis, Origen does have a proof. In Genesis one, man is formed (from dust in later parts of Genesis), while in Genesis two, man is shaped from slime. Genesis one, being the form or spirit of all things. Man being in the likeness of God, bears special significance for Origen. Earth, sun, and moon are created by God. Everything else is created by God’s command. There is present in the interpretation some fine distinctions between words, but I cannot deny that his approach is compelling.

Origen’s views on Humans is also different than Chrysostom’s. For Origen, Male and female are stewards of the earth, the animals, and the vegetation. They, Male and Female, are equal in dignity. Yes, the Male first, then female second, in authority; but that authority is over all creation. This order shows sovereignty of God over beast, earth, rock, and human alike. Ocean or fish; air or bird, God has sovereignty over all. In Origen’s take on the events of the fall, animals suffer due to our fault, due to our flaw the whole of creation suffers. Our power then is in our care for the welfare of the planet, it's resources, and it's life that lives on in it, including each other and ourselves. As the text says, We “are like gods” but we are like gods, lowercase g, in our dominion over the earth and it's creatures. We are made in both the image in likeness of God. Form and Dominion, spirit and creation; through reason, we as humans, can dominate even lions and sharks. The text shows this dominion in our naming things. It should be noted that in these older Early Church Father Homilies you will find the Woman named Zoe and not Eve as we are accustomed too. A common misunderstanding about Zoe and the serpent, as some might explain it, was that Zoe was the weak willed one, the cause of our fall; but for Origen and the Alexandrian school this could not be further from the Truth. She is as much human as Adam, Zoe is as much human and free as you or I. Evidence for this is in the text of Genesis itself. For the woman has a conversation with the snake, the woman's stands her ground against the snake, accuses it of its own faults without hesitation. In Origen’s telling of it, she could have chosen not to take its advice. The snake was scared of her, but she was not scared of it. Again, he highlights that she conversed comfortably with it. She did not take flight. She was not terrified by its appearance. Here we get Origen’s understanding of Sin. For him, and presumably for his school, sin is the loss of both esteem and authority together. That we should not be shocked by this, nor should we be resentful of the punishment, nor think it unjust as we are fellow slaves of God as are the animals. Animals and beast, crops and wild jungles, and untamed forest, all serve and aid us in our daily lives even though they suffer for our mistakes and our cruelty.

Here Origen reminds us of the Biblical precept that “Not sacrifice of animals but contrite spirit and a humble heart is what God desires.” For Origen, the co-creation accounts are a summary of what we would call evolution: but for him it documents more than just physical development, but it documents spiritual adaption and mutation as well. Life adapts to its environment and the environment adapts to the life that is living on it. Habitation is more than just mere survival. The land, seas, rivers, and waters all change and adapt, life in temporal caporal reality changes. But in the spiritual realm there is no change only the eternal.

Here Origen iterates the same philosophical warning as Chrysostom, everything in moderation. The goal here seems to be excellence of some sort, human or divine is unclear at this point of his homily. For Origen, excellence is equivalent to perfection, and perfection is equivalent to the good. If all created things are constantly changing, then excellence must be reached in the spiritual realm. Life is affected by all that is around and interacting with it. Gravity, wind, pressure, and time, to heal and grow are all necessary, but do not fear for all is guided and/or permitted by God's will. For Origen, it is our ability to acclimatize and actualize that is the evidence of design, and then he gets very near to Chrysostom and says that this precision and considerateness is proof of God’s good will toward us. I would like to note here that you may be tempted to contrast and criticize Chrysostom’s apparent anti-Semitism and misogyny against Origen’s perceived environmentalism and egalitarianism; but this would be an anachronistic mistake as these political and social concepts did not exist during the periods that these men were writing. The same accusation and contrast is made by many, modern, would-be, theologians when it comes to St. Peter and St. Paul, but again this perceived difference is anachronistic to the lives, thinking, and times of these men. Sources:

St. Chrysostom, John. The Fathers of the Church vol 74 Saint John Chrysostom Homilies on Genesis 1-17. Translated by Robert C. Hill, Published by The Catholic University of America Press. 1986, 1999.

Origen. The Fathers of the Church vol 71 Origen Homilies on Genesis and Exodus. Translated by Ronald E. Heine, Published by The Catholic University of America Press. 1982, 2002. pp. 1-71.

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