#westminster theological journal

[longsmart]

Alkitab bibel

"Hebrew" refers to the original language of the books, but it may also be taken as referring to the Jews of the Second Temple era and their descendants, who preserved the transmission of the Masoretic Text up to the present day. Lutheranism and Protestant denominations that follow the Westminster Confession of Faith accept the entire Jewish canon as the Old Testament without additions, although in translation they sometimes give preference to the Septuagint (LXX) rather than the Masoretic Text for example, see Isaiah 7:14. All of these formulations, except some forms of dual-covenant theology, are objectionable to mainstream Judaism and to many Jewish scholars and writers, for whom there is one eternal covenant between God and the Israelites, and who therefore reject the term "Old Testament" as a form of antinomianism.Ĭhristian usage of the "Old Testament" does not refer to a universally agreed upon set of books but, rather, varies depending on denomination. Modern Christian formulations of this tension include supersessionism, covenant theology, new covenant theology, dispensationalism, and dual-covenant theology. Ĭhristianity has long asserted a close relationship between the Hebrew Bible and New Testament, although there have sometimes been movements like Marcionism (viewed as heretical by the early church) that have struggled with it. Alister McGrath points out that while the term emphasizes that it is largely written in Hebrew and "is sacred to the Hebrew people", it "fails to do justice to the way in which Christianity sees an essential continuity between the Old and New Testaments", arguing that there is "no generally accepted alternative to the traditional term 'Old Testament'." However, he accepts that there is no reason why non-Christians should feel obliged to refer to these books as the Old Testament, "apart from custom of use". Hebrew Bible Old Testament" without prescribing the use of either. The Society of Biblical Literature's Handbook of Style, which is the standard for major academic journals like the Harvard Theological Review and conservative Protestant journals like the Bibliotheca Sacra and the Westminster Theological Journal, suggests that authors "be aware of the connotations of alternative expressions such as . Many biblical studies scholars advocate use of the term Hebrew Bible (or Hebrew Scriptures) as a substitute for less-neutral terms with Jewish or Christian connotations (e.g. See also: Biblia Hebraica (disambiguation) and Development of the Christian Biblical canon However, such an Urtext has never been found, and which of the three commonly known versions (Septuagint, Masoretic Text, Samaritan Pentateuch) is closest to the Urtext is debated. These differences have given rise to the theory that yet another text, an Urtext of the Hebrew Bible, once existed and is the source of the versions extant today. These sources may be older than the Masoretic Text in some cases and often differ from it. These include the Septuagint, the Syriac language Peshitta translation, the Samaritan Pentateuch, the Dead Sea Scrolls collection and quotations from rabbinic manuscripts. In addition to the Masoretic Text, modern scholars seeking to understand the history of the Hebrew Bible use a range of sources. Catholic Bibles, Eastern / Greek Orthodox Bibles and Ethiopian Orthodox Bibles contain additional materials, derived from the Septuagint (texts translated into Koine Greek) and other sources. The contents of the Hebrew Bible are similar to those of the Protestant Christian Old Testament, in which the material is divided into 39 books and arranged in a different order. The authoritative form of the Hebrew Bible for Rabbinic Judaism is the Masoretic Text (7th to 10th century CE), which consists of 24 books, divided into pesuqim (verses). These texts are almost exclusively in Biblical Hebrew, with a few passages in Biblical Aramaic (in the books of Daniel and Ezra, and the verse Jeremiah 10:11). The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh ( / t ɑː ˈ n ɑː x/ Hebrew: תָּנָ״ךְ‎, pronounced or ), also known in Hebrew as Mikra ( / m iː ˈ k r ɑː/ Hebrew: מִקְרָא‎), is the canonical collection of Hebrew scriptures, including the Torah, the Nevi'im, and the Ketuvim.

[faithfulnews]

Is the text of the Bible we have today different from the originals?

Sherlock Holmes and John Watson: let’s take a look at the facts

I thought it might be a good idea to write something about whether the Bible is generally reliable as a historical document. Lots of people like to nitpick about things that are difficult to verify, but the strange thing is that even skeptical historians accept many of the core narratives found in the Bible. Let’s start with a Christian historian, then go to a non-Christian one.

First, let’s introduce New Testament scholar Daniel B. Wallace:

Daniel B. Wallace Senior Research Professor of New Testament Studies

BA, Biola University, 1975; ThM, Dallas Theological Seminary, 1979; PhD, 1995.

Dr. Wallace… is a member of the Society of New Testament Studies, the Institute for Biblical Research, the Society of Biblical Literature, the American Society of Papyrologists, and the Evangelical Theological Society (of which he was president in 2016). He has been a consultant for several Bible translations. He has written, edited, or contributed to more than three dozen books, and has published articles in New Testament Studies, Novum Testamentum, Biblica, Westminster Theological Journal, Bulletin of Biblical Review, the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, and several other peer-reviewed journals. His Exegetical Syntax of the New Testament is the standard intermediate Greek grammar and has been translated into more than a half-dozen languages.

Here is an article by Dr. Wallace that corrects misconceptions about the transmission and translation of the Testament.

He lists five in particular:

Myth 1: The Bible has been translated so many times we can’t possibly get back to the original.

Myth 2: Words in red indicate the exact words spoken by Jesus of Nazareth.

Myth 3: Heretics have severely corrupted the text.

Myth 4: Orthodox scribes have severely corrupted the text.

Myth 5: The deity of Christ was invented by emperor Constantine.

Let’s look at #4 in particular, where the argument is that the text of the New Testament is so riddled with errors that we can’t get back to the original text.

It says:

Myth 4: Orthodox scribes have severely corrupted the text.

This is the opposite of myth #3. It finds its most scholarly affirmation in the writings of Dr. Bart Ehrman, chiefly The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture and Misquoting Jesus. Others have followed in his train, but they have gone far beyond what even he claims. For example, a very popular book among British Muslims (The History of the Qur’anic Text from Revelation to Compilation: a Comparative Study with the Old and New Testaments by M. M. Al-Azami) makes this claim:

The Orthodox Church, being the sect which eventually established supremacy over all the others, stood in fervent opposition to various ideas ([a.k.a.] ‘heresies’) which were in circulation. These included Adoptionism (the notion that Jesus was not God, but a man); Docetism (the opposite view, that he was God and not man); and Separationism (that the divine and human elements of Jesus Christ were two separate beings). In each case this sect, the one that would rise to become the Orthodox Church, deliberately corrupted the Scriptures so as to reflect its own theological visions of Christ, while demolishing that of all rival sects.”

This is a gross misrepresentation of the facts. Even Ehrman admitted in the appendix to Misquoting Jesus, “Essential Christian beliefs are not affected by textual variants in the manuscript tradition of the New Testament.” The extent to which, the reasons for which, and the nature of which the orthodox scribes corrupted the New Testament has been overblown. And the fact that such readings can be detected by comparison with the readings of other ancient manuscripts indicates that the fingerprints of the original text are still to be seen in the extant manuscripts.

Here is the full quote from the appendix of Misquoting Jesus:

“Bruce Metzger is one of the great scholars of modern times, and I dedicated the book to him because he was both my inspiration for going into textual criticism and the person who trained me in the field. I have nothing but respect and admiration for him. And even though we may disagree on important religious questions – he is a firmly committed Christian and I am not – we are in complete agreement on a number of very important historical and textual questions. If he and I were put in a room and asked to hammer out a consensus statement on what we think the original text of the New Testament probably looked like, there would be very few points of disagreement – maybe one or two dozen places out of many thousands. The position I argue for in ‘Misquoting Jesus’ does not actually stand at odds with Prof. Metzger’s position that the essential Christian beliefs are not affected by textual variants in the manuscript tradition of the New Testament.”

Finally, I think that the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls shows us that religious texts don’t change as much as we think they do over time.

Look:

The Dead Sea Scrolls play a crucial role in assessing the accurate preservation of the Old Testament. With its hundreds of manuscripts from every book except Esther, detailed comparisons can be made with more recent texts.

The Old Testament that we use today is translated from what is called the Masoretic Text. The Masoretes were Jewish scholars who between A.D. 500 and 950 gave the Old Testament the form that we use today. Until the Dead Sea Scrolls were found in 1947, the oldest Hebrew text of the Old Testament was the Masoretic Aleppo Codex which dates to A.D. 935.{5}

With the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, we now had manuscripts that predated the Masoretic Text by about one thousand years. Scholars were anxious to see how the Dead Sea documents would match up with the Masoretic Text. If a significant amount of differences were found, we could conclude that our Old Testament Text had not been well preserved. Critics, along with religious groups such as Muslims and Mormons, often make the claim that the present day Old Testament has been corrupted and is not well preserved. According to these religious groups, this would explain the contradictions between the Old Testament and their religious teachings.

After years of careful study, it has been concluded that the Dead Sea Scrolls give substantial confirmation that our Old Testament has been accurately preserved. The scrolls were found to be almost identical with the Masoretic text. Hebrew Scholar Millar Burrows writes, “It is a matter of wonder that through something like one thousand years the text underwent so little alteration. As I said in my first article on the scroll, ‘Herein lies its chief importance, supporting the fidelity of the Masoretic tradition.'”{6}

A significant comparison study was conducted with the Isaiah Scroll written around 100 B.C. that was found among the Dead Sea documents and the book of Isaiah found in the Masoretic text. After much research, scholars found that the two texts were practically identical. Most variants were minor spelling differences, and none affected the meaning of the text.

One of the most respected Old Testament scholars, the late Gleason Archer, examined the two Isaiah scrolls found in Cave 1 and wrote, “Even though the two copies of Isaiah discovered in Qumran Cave 1 near the Dead Sea in 1947 were a thousand years earlier than the oldest dated manuscript previously known (A.D. 980), they proved to be word for word identical with our standard Hebrew Bible in more than 95 percent of the text. The five percent of variation consisted chiefly of obvious slips of the pen and variations in spelling.”{7}

Despite the thousand year gap, scholars found the Masoretic Text and Dead Sea Scrolls to be nearly identical. The Dead Sea Scrolls provide valuable evidence that the Old Testament had been accurately and carefully preserved.

I hope that this post will help those who think that we can’t get back to the text of the original New Testament documents.

Go to the article

[westminsterinstitute]

Hear his full talk on YouTube and read the transcript here

Mehdi Khalaji is the Libitzky Family fellow at The Washington Institute, focusing on the politics of Iran and Shiite groups in the Middle East. A Shiite  theologian by training, Mr. Khalaji has also served on the editorial boards of two prominent Iranian periodicals and produced for the BBC as well as the U.S. government’s Persian news service. From 1986 to 2000, Mr. Khalaji trained in the seminaries of Qom, the traditional center of Iran’s clerical establishment. There he studied theology and jurisprudence, earning a doctorate and researching widely on modern intellectual and philosophical-political developments in Iran and the wider Islamic and Western worlds. In Qom, and later in Tehran, Mr. Khalaji launched a career in journalism, first serving on the editorial board of a  theological journal, Naqd va Nazar, and then the daily Entekhab. In addition to his own writing, he has translated the works of the humanist Islamic scholar Muhammad Arkoun.

In 2000, Mr. Khalaji moved Paris where he studied Shiite theology and exegesis in the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes. He also worked for BBC Persian as a political analyst on Iranian affairs, eventually becoming a broadcaster for the Prague-based Radio Farda, the Persian-language service of the U.S. government’s Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. At Radio Farda, he  produced news, features, and analysis on a range of Middle Eastern, Iranian, and Islamic issues.

Mr. Khalaji writes a bilingual English and Persian blog, MehdiKhalaji.com. He previously addressed Westminster on the subject of How the Iranian Revolution Changed the Role of the Shia Clergy.

[evangelicalandreformed]

Season 1 Episode 2 - What is Prayer?

Prayer, then is having the Spirit's breath helping us to communicate, the Son's blood making a way, and the Father's ear attuned to our every plea. Our triune God provides all we need to pray -- Dr. Harry J. York

Episode Summary During this season, Prayer will be the main topic point with the focus of drawing people back to prayer. Prayer is a powerful tool and it is our direct connection to the father.

Show Notes: During this episode, we will explore what is prayer with the hope of drawing people back to the very tool that connects them with God. Prayer. We must be reminded that every time we pray, we should always remember our standing by confessing our sins -- Dr. H. J. York. What do I mean by standing? We must not forget that we are sinful, unholy and unrighteous people who rebel against the living God ever millisecond of our being. We can not approach the Holy of Holies without confessing our sins and asking the Father to remove our Sin Stained Hearts and give us a new regenerated heart that seeks after him. Through prayer we can then recognize his mercies. 

This idea of more men, mighty in prayer bring forth a vision of unity in the body. When there is unity in the body of believers, we get peace. When there is peace within the body, the presence of God is visible and tangible. From the presence of God in our midst, we get answered prayers. James 5:17 states "... The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective. " Although we are sinful in nature, when we confess and ask of God's forgiveness, he then turns his ear to us and listens to our ever plea.

Co-host - The Rev. Michael J. Glodo - Professor Glodo has served on the faculty at Reformed Theological Seminary (RTS) in Orlando since 1991 (I was like three years old). Professor Glodo temporarily abanonded his post at RTS of six years as as he served as the Stated Clerk (Chief Administrative Officer) of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church (2000-2006). During that time he has taught Old Testament, New Testament, Preaching, Theology of Ministry and a variety of electives. For most of the last ten years, Professor Glodo has also served as Dean of the Chapel as he plans, leads, coordinates, and preaches in the weekly chapel services. Professor Glodo earned a bachelor of science from the University of Illinois and a master of divinity along with a master of theology form Convenant Theological Seminary. Top it all off, he did Ph.D studies at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia. Yes. Professor Glodo knows this topic and has published several articles. His latest article was publised in the Westminster Society Journal so go check that out.

In this episode, we will discuss the topic "What is Prayer?"The Westminster Larger Catechism Question and Answer #178, Bible Scriptures, 1. Ps 62.8, 2, Jn 16.23-25, 3. Rom 8.26, 4. Ps 32.5-6, Dn 9.4 and 5. Phil 4.6.What does Mike Glodo thinks Prayer is?

Links Mentioned:

TableTalk Magazine

Reformed Theological Seminary

Westminster Confession of Faith and Catechism

Westminster Society Journal

Become a supporter of this podcast:

https://anchor.fm/elderqueen/support

This podcast is sponsored by Anchor

[savannahvdimarco]

What I Learned In My First Term in Div School: Life in the Musterion

“Whatever is unsure is possible, and life is bigger than flesh. Beyond reach of thought, let imagination figure.” – Wendell Berry 

For the last couple months, I’ve been absolutely taken with the Greek word μυστήριον. The word has been a great help to me during my first term at YDS, and after facing months of epistemological anxiety, I’ve come to fall in love with the musterion itself. This blog post is wee attempt to share the word’s scriptural background and point to its tremendous bearing on our theological questions today. Here we go!

So, what is the ‘musterion?’

Between the gospels, the epistles, and the book of Revelation, canonical New Testament writers mention ‘mystery’ 27 times. Included among these is Mark, who writes about the musterion in his Parable of the Sower account. In this passage, after giving a cryptic teaching about sowing, weeds, and thorns to a large group, Jesus meets inside a home with His followers, who ask about the parables’ meaning. Rather than answering the question outright, Jesus responds: “To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside, everything come in parables.” Though many translations write “secret,” Mark uses the Greek word musterion, which implies both secret and mystery. In the following verses’ fuller answer, it is as if Jesus says, ‘Seeds grow fully on good soil. The word spoken to you contains greater mysteries than you could ever imagine about the Kingdom of God. You can’t see everything with your eyes now, because it’s a secret seed buried deep within you—but you can see the love and justice that sprouts up from a life filled with the word and mystery of my Kingdom. You won’t understand it all, but it will grow in you and around you, like seed on good soil, for all who receive my teaching.’ For Jesus’ followers, the mystery of God’s Kingdom is a gift that grows within them and in the world around them.

Jesus’ disciples sensed elements of God’s Kingdom rising around them—like seeds slowly beginning to grow. Jesus healed those with long-term illnesses, liberated those tormented by demons, and honored one of the community’s poorest members. Jesus came to liberate the oppressed, free the captives, and show those around Him how to love. Perhaps the disciples could feel their own hearts changing; slowly but surely becoming more forgiving, less resentful, more grateful, and more aware of the world’s systematic injustices. In these ways, the Kingdom of God seemed present, but it is still mysterious. It was (and is) still growing. There is so much more to come. For now, the world’s spiritual changes remain a mystery. Who can say how seeds grow? It is not until the ‘next chapter’—when heaven comes to earth—that we will find out what the mystery is. On that day, we will see the seeds’ full growth.  

Luke writes that a child is born to us, “to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord,” and Mark writes that a mystery is given to us. The gifts are more intimately related than we have ever known. 

If we hold Jesus, we hold these mysteries, too.

What does this mean for us today?

For many of us, the story of Jesus is so familiar that we never think about the bright, wondrous mysteries woven within it. As such, we scramble to clarify every theological grey-area (and there are many.) I propose that Christ calls us to allow our thoughts, instead, to be animated by the awe-struck joy and humility which comes from not fully knowing, yet holding, the mystery of the Kingdom of God. The sacraments are an example. We hold the communion bread without ever knowing its total significance. Simone Weil writes of the Eucharist, “He must be more completely present in a morsel of consecrated bread. His presence is more complete in asmuch as it is more secret.” Who can fully comprehend the wondrous, mysterious secret of communion? How can you or I understand the mystery of God’s great Kingdom planted deep within us? 

We don’t need to have all the answers. In fact, a cosmological cipher is “a vain fiction and chimera.” (A. Conway) Jesus invites us to move beyond understanding; to open our eyes to the divine secrets unfolding around us, and to live a life of love within God’s great mystery. Spring is near, and the Kingdom of God is the seed planted within you.

_________________________________________________________________

Bibliography  1. Boring, Eugene M. Mark: A Commentary. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2006.; 2. Bowker, John W. "Mystery and Parable: Mark Iv. 1—20." The Journal of Theological Studies, New Series, 25, no. 2 (1974): 300-17. http://www.jstor.org/stable/23958404.; 3. Brown, R.E. The Semitic background of the term "mystery" in the New Testament. Philadelphia, PA: Fortress Press, 1968.; 4. Collins, Adela Yarbro. Mark. Edited by Harold W. Attridge. Hermeneia Commentaries. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2007.; 5. Collins, Adela Yarbro. "Messianic Secret and the Gospel of Mark: Secrecy in Jewish Apocalypticism, the Hellenistic Mystery Religions, and Magic." In Rending the Veil: Concealment and Secrecy in the History of Religions, by Elliot R. Wolfson, 11-30. New York, NY: Seven Bridges Press, 1999.; 6. Evans, Craig A. "A note on the function of Isaiah, VI, 9-10 in Mark, IV." Revue Biblique (1946-) 88, no. 2 (1981): 234-35. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44088534.; 7. Lane, William L. The Gospel according to Mark; the English text with introduction, exposition, and notes. New International Commentaries on the New Testament. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1974.; 8. Marcus, Joel. "Mark 4:10-12 and Marcan Epistemology." Journal of Biblical Literature,103, no. 4 (1984): 557-74. doi:10.2307/3260467.; 9. Marcus, Joel. Mark 1-8. Vol. 1 of Mark. AB 27. Anchor Bible Series. New York, NY: Doubleday, 1964.; 10. Marcus, Joel. The Mystery of the Kingdom of God. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1986.; 11. Moule, C.F.D. “Mystery.” Pages 479–481 in vol. 3 of The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible: An Illustrated Encyclopedia. Edited by George A. Buttrick. 4 vols. New York, NY: Abingdon Press, 1962.; 12. Mowry, L. “Parable.” Pages 649–654 in vol. 3 of The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible: An Illustrated Encyclopedia. Edited by George A. Buttrick. 4 vols. New York, NY: Abingdon Press, 1962.; 13. Williams, James G. Gospel against Parable: Mark’s Language of Mystery. Decatur, GA: Almond, 1985.; 14. Schiffman, Lawrence H. "Mysteries." In Qumran Cave 4, vol. 15: Sapiential Texts, Part 1 (DJD 20), by Torleif Elgvin, et. al. Oxford, UK: Clarendon Press, 1997.; 15. Schiffman, Lawrence H. Reclaiming the Dead Sea scrolls: the history of Judaism, the background of Christianity, the lost library of Qumran. Philadelphia, PA: Jewish Publication Society, 1994; 16. Eusebius. Eusebius: The Church History. Translated by Paul L. Maier. Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications, 1999.; 17. Irenaeus, and Aeterna Press. Irenaeus Against Heresies. London, UK: Aeterna Press, 2016.

[minnesotafollower]

Whatever Became of “Faith Alone”?

Whatever Became of “Faith Alone”?

On September 17, 2017, in recognition of the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation, Minneapolis’ Westminster Presbyterian Church’s Senior Pastor, Rev. Timothy Hart-Andersen, delivered the second of his four sermons on the great themes of the Reformation: sola fide (faith alone);  The first one was devoted to grace alone (sola gratia) and the last two will be on sola scriptura(scripture…

[luantavares]

After Adam and Eve sinned, God spoke words of judgment to Eve:

To the woman he said, “I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.” — GEN. 3:16

The word translated “desire” is an unusual Hebrew word, teshûqåh. What is the meaning of this word? In this context and in this construction, it probably implies an aggressive desire, perhaps a desire to conquer or rule over, or else an urge or impulse to oppose her husband, an impulse to act “against” him. This sense is seen in the only other occurrence of teshûqåh in all the books of Moses (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy), and the only other occurrence of teshûqåh plus the preposition ’el in the whole Bible. That occurrence of the word is in the very next chapter of Genesis, in 4:7. God says to Cain, “Sin is crouching at the door, and its desire is for you, but you must master it” (NASB). Here the sense is very clear. God pictures sin as a wild animal waiting outside Cain’s door, waiting to attack him, even to pounce on him and overpower him. In that sense, sin’s “desire” or “instinctive urge” is “against” him.[20]

The striking thing about that sentence is what a remarkable parallel it is with Genesis 3:16. In the Hebrew text, six words are the same and are found in the same order in both verses. It is almost as if this other usage is put here by the author so that we would know how to understand the meaning of the term in Genesis 3:16. The expression in 4:7 has the sense, “desire, urge, impulse against” (or perhaps “desire to conquer, desire to rule over”). And that sense fits very well in Genesis 3:16 also.[21]

Some have assumed that “desire” in Genesis 3:16 refers to sexual desire. But that is highly unlikely because (1) the entire Bible views sexual desire within marriage as something positive, not as something evil or something that God imposed as a judgment; and (2) surely Adam and Eve had sexual desire for one another prior to their sin, for God had told them to “be fruitful and multiply” (Gen. 1:28), and certainly in an unfallen world, along with the command, God would have given the desire that corresponded to it. So “your desire shall be for your husband” cannot refer to sexual desire. It is much more appropriate to the context of a curse to understand this as an aggressive desire against her husband, one that would bring her into conflict with him.

Then God says with regard to Adam, “and he shall rule over you” (Gen. 3:16). The word here translated “rule” is the Hebrew term måshal. This term is common in the Old Testament, and it regularly, if not always, refers to ruling by greater power or force or strength. It is used of human military or political rulers, such as Joseph ruling over the land of Egypt (Gen. 45:26), or the Philistines ruling over Israel (Judg. 14:4; 15:11), or Solomon ruling over all the kingdoms that he had conquered (1 Kings 4:21). It is also used to speak of God ruling over the sea (Ps. 89:9) or God ruling over the earth generally (Ps. 66:7). Sometimes it refers to oppressive rulers who cause the people under them to suffer (Neh. 9:37; Isa. 19:4). In any case, the word does not signify one who leads among equals, but rather one who rules by virtue of power and strength, and sometimes even rules harshly and selfishly.

Once we understand these two terms, we can see much more clearly what was involved in the curse that God brought to Adam and Eve as punishment for their sins.

One aspect of the curse was imposing pain on Adam’s particular area of responsibility, raising food from the ground: “cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you. . . . By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground” (Gen. 3:17-19). Another aspect of the curse was to impose pain on Eve’s particular area of responsibility, the bearing of children: “I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children” (Gen. 3:16).

A third aspect of the curse was to introduce pain and conflict into the relationship between Adam and Eve. Prior to their sin, they had lived in the Garden of Eden in perfect harmony, yet with a leadership role belonging to Adam as the head of his family. But after the Fall, God introduced conflict in that Eve would have an inward urging and impulsion to oppose Adam, to resist Adam’s leadership (the verb teshûqåh). “Your impulse, your desire, will be against your husband.” And Adam would respond with a rule over Eve that came from his greater strength and aggressiveness, a rule that was forceful and at times harsh (the verb måshal). “And he because of his greater strength will rule over you.” There would be pain in tilling the ground, pain in bearing children, and pain and conflict in their relationship.

It is crucial at this point for us to realize that we ourselves are never to try to increase or perpetuate the results of the curse. We should never try to promote or advocate Genesis 3:16 as something good! In fact, the entire Bible following after Genesis 3 is the story of God’s working to overcome the effects of the curse that He in His justice imposed. Eventually God will bring in new heavens and a new earth, in which crops will come forth abundantly from the ground (Isa. 35:1-2; Amos 9:13; Rom. 8:20-21) and in which there is no more pain or suffering (Rev. 21:4).

So we ourselves should never try to perpetuate the elements of the curse! We should not plant thorns and weeds in our garden but rather overcome them. We should do everything we can to alleviate the pain of childbirth for women. And we should do everything we can to undo the conflict that comes about through women desiring to oppose or even control their husbands and their husbands ruling harshly over them.

Therefore Genesis 3:16 should never be used as a direct argument for male headship in marriage. But it does show us that the Fall brought about a distortion of previous roles, not the introduction of new roles. The distortion was that Eve would now rebel against her husband’s authority, and Adam would misuse that authority to rule forcefully and even harshly over Eve.[22]

NOTES:

[20] The ESV margin translates teshûqåh plus ’el in Genesis 3:16 and 4:7 as “Or against.” This seems to me to be the most accurate rendering. The preposition ’el can take the meaning “against,” as is clear from the next verse, Genesis 4:8, where “Cain rose up against (’el) his brother Abel and killed him.” BDB gives sense 4 for ’el as: “Where the motion or direction implied appears from the context to be of a hostile character, ’el = against.” They cite Genesis 4:8 and several other verses.

[21] The only other occurrence of the word teshûqåh in the entire Hebrew Old Testament is found in Song of Solomon 7:10 (v. 11 in Hebrew): “I am my beloved’s, and his desire is for me” (emphasis added). There the word does not indicate a hostile or aggressive desire but indicates the man’s sexual desire for his wife.

I have previously argued elsewhere that a positive kind of “desire to conquer” could be understood in Song 7:10, whereby it indicates the man’s desire to have a kind of influence over his beloved that is appropriate to initiating and consummating the sexual relationship, an influence such that she would receive and yield to his amorous advances. This sense would be represented by the paraphrase, “His desire is to have me yield to him.”

However, I am now inclined to think that the word teshûqåh itself does not signify anything so specific as “desire to conquer,” but rather something more general such as “urge, impulse.” (The word takes that sense in Mishnaic Hebrew, as indicated by David Talley in the following footnote.) In that case, Genesis 3:16 and 4:7 have the sense “desire, urge, impulse against,” and Song 7:10 has the sense, “desire, urge, impulse for.” This seems to me to fit better with the context of Song 7:10.

The difference in meaning may also be signaled by a different construction. The Genesis and Song of Solomon examples are not exactly parallel linguistically, because a different preposition follows the verb in Song of Solomon, and therefore the sense may be somewhat different. In Song 7:11 [10, English], teshûqåh is followed by ‘al, but it is followed by ’el in Genesis 3:16 and 4:7. (The preposition ‘al is misprinted as ’el in Song 7:11 [10, English] as cited in BDB, 1003. BDB apparently does this because it follows the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia editors (1334), who in the margin suggest changing the Hebrew text to ’el, but this is mere conjecture with no  manuscript support. The LXX confirms the difference, translating with pros for ’el in Genesis 3:16 and 4:7 but with epi for ’al in Song 7:11 [10, English], which is what we would expect with a very literal translation.)

In any case, while the sense in Song 7:10 (11) is different, both the context and the construction are different, and this example is removed in time and authorship from Genesis 3:16 and must be given lower importance in understanding the meaning of the word in Genesis. Surely the sense cannot be “sexual desire” in Genesis 4:7, and it seems very unlikely in the context of Genesis 3:16 as well.

[22] The understanding of Genesis 3:16 as a hostile desire, or even a desire to rule over, has gained significant support among Old Testament commentators. It was first suggested by Susan T. Foh, “What Is the Woman’s Desire?” in Westminster Theological Journal 37 (1975), 376-383. David Talley says the word is attested in Samaritan and Mishnaic Hebrew “with the meaning urge, craving, impulse” and says of Foh, “Her contention that the desire is a contention for leadership, a negative usage, seems probable for Gen. 3:16” (New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology and Exegesis, 5 vols., ed., Willem Van Gemeren, Vol. 4 [Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1991], 341, with reference to various commentators).

Biblical Foundations for Manhood and Womanhood, p. 32-35

[martyschoenleber]

  In response to an interview question, “What is a great lover?” the Actor Ricardo Montalban, famously replied, 

“A great lover is someone who can satisfy one woman her entire lifetime and be satisfied with one woman his entire lifetime. It is not someone who goes from woman to woman; any dog can do that.” 

Montalban practiced what he preached. Despite all the temptations of Hollywood, he was married to the same woman for 63 years until her death in 2007. I remembered that interview when I read the following piece from Kairos Journal. The writer is Clement of Alexandria and he was an early leader in the church writing about the effect of being a husband and father under the Lordship of Christ.

True Manhood Tested in Marriage —Clement of Alexandria (c. 153 – c. 215)

Clement of Alexandria, convert from paganism and eventual head of the eminent Catechetical School in Alexandria, is famous for his theological reflections on the moral life. In this striking extract he maintains that the central arena in which true manliness is forged is the family. Of course, some are called to singleness. This is not to gainsay the enormous spiritual benefit of marriage.

“True manhood is not shown in the choice of a celibate life; on the contrary, the prize in the contest of men is won by him who has trained himself by the discharge of the duties of husband and father and by the supervision of a household, regardless of pleasure and pain – by him, I say, who in the midst of his solicitude for his family shows himself inseparable from the love of God and rises superior to every temptation which assails him through children and wife and servants and possessions. On the other hand, he who has no family is in most respects untried.”1

Footnotes:

Clement of Alexandria, Stromateis 7.12.70, quoted in Gary A. Anderson, The Genesis of Perfection: Adam and Eve in Jewish and Christian Imagination (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2001), 60.

Concluding thought:

Marriage is the proving ground for manhood. Remember that, and prove yourself a man by being faithful to your wife and a godly example to your children.

Testing Your Manhood In response to an interview question, "What is a great lover?'' the Actor Ricardo Montalban, famously replied, 

[mathenght80]

The New Age of Prophets

With the huge explosion of prophets today, what do the Scriptures say about whether they’re from God or not? A New Age of Prophets Prophets, the Freedom of God, and Hermeneutics, a Westminster Theological Journal (52.1), by Dr. Willem A. Vangemeren from Prophets, the Freedom of God, and Hermeneutics is an essential as far as […] from http://www.patheos.com/blogs/christiancrier/2017/10/18/the-new-age-of-prophets/

[bibtheojournals-blog]

Paul Kjoss Helseth, “‘Congeniality’ of Mind at Old Princeton Seminary: Warfieldians and Kuyperians Reconsidered,” 1-14.

John Wind, “The Keys to the Two Kingdoms: Covenantal Framework as the Fundamental Divide Between VanDrunen and His Critics,” 15-34.

Pierce Taylor Hibbs, “Imaging Communion: An Argument for God’s Existence Based on Speech,” 35-52.

David P. Barshinger, “Spite or Spirit? Jonathan Edwards on the Imprecatory Language in the Psalms,” 53-70.

Vern S. Poythress, “Correlations with Providence in Genesis 1,” 71-100.

Greg Goswell, “The Shape of Messianism in Isaiah 9,” 101-10.

Christopher G. Petrovich, “First Corinthians 11:2-16, Calvin, and Reformed Praxis,”

Reviews, 135-79.