Mark and Acts

So once again I have to disagree with a designation Dr. Sexson gave to one of the books of the New Testament. He said that The Acts of the Apostles should be classified as an epistle, and not as history.

While the book does carry similarities to a letter (namely the existence of a recipient) it is not written as an epistle. It opens with the Luke (the author) talking about his first book (Luke), which implies this is his second book. In addition, the work is presented more as a history than writing to any group or individual. The Epistles all contain references to specific events or issues the church or person receiving the letter has to deal with, while Acts comes out in a very factual style, not aimed for one specific group.

And now a brief note on Mark.

The description of Mark as parataxic fits with the earliest tradition of the Gospel. Prior to any attempt to discover who/when/where the Gospels 'really' were written, Christians passed down traditional views of authorship. These include that the Gospels were written in the order in which they appear in the New Testament, as well as that they were written by those after whom they were named.

Mark is traditionally held to have been written by a young man named John Mark, who appears in the Acts of the Apostles. It is said he was with Peter while the latter was preaching in Rome, and he recorded the Gospel as Peter gave it. Thus the book comes down in an oral style, as it was taken from an oral presentation.

Eternal Optimism

On Thursday we discussed the book of Ecclesiastes and the word "pessimism" was thrown out, suggesting the author (traditionally Solomon) had a very dark view of the world.

I want to offer a slightly deeper definition of his world view. Rather then simple pessimism, he had a more long term view of the world. For example, let us pretend someone's goal in life is to buy a house. This hypothetical person is currently unable to afford a house. Tomorrow he will also be unable to affor a house. Thus he is very pessemisitic about his chances in the coming day. The next day it is the same, and the next, and the next.

If, however, he works at saving money, eventually he will have enough to afford a house, even though for so many days he did not. In the short term there is nothing, but in the long term one finds what one is looking for.

The Qoheleth of Ecclesiastes is much the same way, presenting everything as Vanity (see below), yet the book ends with a look to the future: "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole of man." The author turns the work to the end of Gpd, rather than simple suggesting all existence is useless.


Vanity: This word is often translated "meaningless," particularly in newer translations. In Hebrew the word is "habel" (לבה), menaing vanity, emptiness, meaninglessness, something which is fleeting. It is the same root as Hebel (לבה), which is translated as Abel (you may note the Hebrew letters are the same in both words: Hebrew does not commonly print vowels. Each three letter set has a certain meaning, and the exact vowels placed in codifies the meaning, h-b-l means emptiness, ephemeral, and inserting vowels creates nouns, verbs, etc.).

Lewis and Myth

The following might be considered 'faith' language, because I am discussing another person's relation to Christianity, but I think it is, for the most part, kosher.

During the first half of the twentieth centruty Brittain seemed to overflow with Christian literary talent, from G.K. Chesterton to J.R.R. Toklien to C.S. Lewis. Many of these people influenced each other, particularly Lewis and Tolkien. They were two of the central figures in the Inklings, an Oxford literary society. Tolkien is also considered the most important figure in Lewis' conversion to Christianity.

From his youth Lewis had a love for northern mythology, above all others. He also particularly enjoyed the dying and resurrecting god of this and other mythic traditions, including the Bible. Interestingly enough, this understanding of the mythic nature of the New Testament led him to believe it held more than just stories (I think I'm allowed to use that word in the negative).

Lewis said that " [t]he heart of Christianity is a myth which is also a fact. The old myth of the Dying God, without ceasing to be myth, comes down from the heaven of legend and imagination to the earth of history." The therefore rejects that implication that myth is opposed to history, and truth opposed to legend. There is no 'just.'


On another note, (more related to my openeing) the very definition of faith language is interesting. We could consider, could we not, that Bloom's proposition of J being a woman is based on faith just as much as the idea that the Bible really is the word of God. Both require us to believe beyond what we can truly know, and therefore, faith.

Just a though.

Wisdom

המכח (hokmah): Wisdom, skill, shrewdness.

I think we may have been underestimating the book of Proverbs in class today. While many of the sayings seem a bit simple, a lot of them carry much weight as well.

Take Proverbs 18:2 for example:
"The fool takes no delight in understanding, but rather in displaying what he thinks."

This proverb talks about the fool (and not the holy kind) as one who does not think before he speaks. While this seems to be common sense, how often do we speak before we think? One would think common sense would be, well common.

In addition, this displays an interesting dichotomy. Not only does it lambast the fool for speaking without due regard, it relates that to the very act of being foolish: not learning. We can expect the man who least understands a situation to talk about it the most.

Many of the proverbs can be distilled to a simple piece of wisdom, or a little bit of hokmah can find a lot more going on in the background.

Four Sense of Scripture

The study of the Bible has long held four senses in which one could read scripture: the literal, allegorical, moral, and anagogical sense (the latter three often lumped together into the spiritual sense).

The literal sense is the clearest, meaning exactly what it says (which, I suppose, is the opposite of ironic). This is the sense most commonly bantered around in discussions of the age of the earth and more particularly, the book of Revelation.

The allegorical sense is also pretty simple. We've talked about this a bit in class, but it also includes the idea of types. So when we say the passing through the Red Sea is a prefigurement of Baptism, we are reading scripture in the allegorical sense.

The moral sense of scripture involves reading scripture in order to act justly. This does not mean using the Bible literally as a rule of living (as a literal sense would) but rather using what the Bible gives as instruction, such as the wisdom books.

The anagogical is probably the one most of you have never heard of, much less understand what it means. The word anagogy comes from the Greek anagoge which means "leading." The anagogical sense of scripture involves reading it for a glimpse of eternity, reading everything in light of its eternal significance.

An old medieval saying sums it all up:

Lettera gesta docet, quid credas allegoria,
moralis quid agas, quo tendas anagogia.

"The letter speaks of deeds; Allegory to faith; the Moral how to act; Anagogy our destiny."

Historical Criticism yet Again

I said in my last post I was going to discuss more on the historical critical method, and that's what I am going to do.

In recent years scholars have spent enormous amounts of energy trying to determine who wrote the Bible, but to what end? I have found a many different interpretations of authorship and even the number of people who wrote the books (the Torah, for example, has been ascribed to Moses, Moses and Joshua, JEDPR, and more, some claiming as many as thirty authors for those five books). It's rather clear that no one has any really good idea who wrote what, so why do they keep searching?

Part of the answer is that they are trying to discredit the Bible. This, however, is as much a faith based idea as believing what the Bible proclaims. The other side of the coin is that scholars can say very little about the Bible that has not already been said (I have over ten thousand pages of Biblical commentary on my bookshelves) so they look at seeing who said it. It often simply comes down to inventing new ideas in order to get a graduate degree (nothing wrong with that, it simply means that the means are less important then the end).

In other historical critical news, the system has flaws. Ronald Knox, one of the great early twentieth-century Catholic British authors (along with G.K. Chesterton and Hillaire Belloc) wrote "The Authorship of In Memoriam." The work, using the historical critical method, makes the claim that it was not in fact Alfred Lord Tennyson who wrote "In Memoriam" but Queen Victoria.

This claim is only absured to us because we are so close to that moment of history. Likewise, historical criticism of the Bible required a long stretch of history between the penning of the work and man's ability to deconstruct it and insert new authors into the work (there is little chance first and second century readers doubeted the authors of the Gospels). Overall, it seems the historical critical method is a means without a viable end.

'Helper'

A few weeks ago we discussed the creation of the female from Genesis 2. No matter who's talking about the passage, the issue of Eve being Adam's 'helper' always comes up.

In the Hebrew, the word 'helper' is ézre (רזצ), meaning, essentially, helper. But it's interesting to note where else ézre is used in the Old Testament: it's most commonly found in the Psalms, referring to God as Israel's helper.

In Hebrew, ézre by no means refers to a servant or slave. It means a helpmeet, someone who is necessary for the completion of a task. A proper Hebrew reading of Genesis 2 comes up with that Adam needs Eve, though the reciprical is not necessarily there.

Another thing I discovered while studying this passage was that many scholars (enough that the New Jerusalem Bible of 1973 listed this as the predominate view) believe the greation of Eve was inserted into the J account of creation. Even historical cirticism is unsure of itself (in the next post I plan on looking more at the historical critical study of scripture).

Some random things

I'm only standing at half the posts I did for my last Dr. Sexson class. Not sure if that's good or bad.

So I know I posted on Lord of the Rings before, but I can't remember what, and seeing as I am feeling too lazy to look it up, please pardon any repeats.

Okay, so I can't remember what I was going to write about. This will no serve as I reminder for me to remember what I was going to write.

Here is a discussion of the historical critical examination of the Bible (specifically the epistles of Paul). It is written from a Catholic perspective, though it largely avoids faith language and offers a good explanation of why (or why not) one should use the historical critical method.

There is also a similar essay by C.S. Lewis.

A Verse

I feel bad for not having posted in five days (I have a lot to say, so I should be trying to say it).

I decided to post my 'favorite' Bible Verse. It's not really my favorite, but it's the one I most like citing:

Esther 9:8
Porathai, Adalia, Aridatha

That's all.