Ethan R. Longhenry's Blog, page 43

The Christian and Unity

What is Christianity all about? Many people consider Christianity to be mostly about Jesus dying for the sins of mankind. Indeed (John 3:16); but why did Jesus have to die for the sins of mankind? To this many would answer in terms of allowing us to go to heaven; perhaps so (John 14:1-3), but why would God want us to be in heaven or any such thing? God wants us to be reconciled in relationship with mankind and among mankind (Romans 5:5-11, Ephesians 2:1-18). Why would God want to reconcile Himself to people, or among people themselves? He Himself is One in relational unity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, perfectly one (Deuteronomy 6:4, John 17:20-23). Since God is one, God desires to be one with humans whom He made in His image (Genesis 1:26-27).

The Lord Jesus Himself made all these powerful truths known in John 17:20-23, and yet there Jesus’ whole purpose is praying before His Father for all who would believe in Him to be one as He is one with the Father. Jesus’ prayer would have Christians maintain unity among themselves as God is one in Himself.

Paul wrote extensively regarding the great things which God has accomplished for us in Christ: every spiritual blessing, election, predestination for adoption as sons, the down payment of the Spirit, His love, grace, and mercy displayed in salvation, reconciliation of Jews and Gentiles through the killing of hostility between them on the cross, the manifestation of God’s purposes in the church, and to what end (Ephesians 1:1-3:21)? That Christians might give diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace (Ephesians 4:3).

Therefore in Ephesians 4:3 Paul well establishes the importance and imperative of the pursuit of unity among Christians. And yet Christians must remember that their unity is not something they have or even could accomplish through their own efforts: Paul does not tell Christians to work to become unified, but to strive diligently to maintain the unity of the Spirit. If we have been baptized into Christ, we have been baptized into the one Spirit of God into one body (1 Corinthians 12:13); Paul envisioned Christians as built up into one temple filled with the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 2:18-22). Paul would go on to emphasize the “oneness” of all things: one body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father (Ephesians 4:4-6). We might take this message and use it polemically to decry the fractured state of “Christendom,” insisting on the importance of the unity of the faith; there are times in which it is appropriate to do so, but we must always keep Paul’s original reason for saying as much in mind. As God is one, so God has made believers in Christ one with Him and with each other through Jesus’ death on the cross (Ephesians 2:1-22).

Christians must be “eager” or “work diligently” to keep that unity in the Spirit. Yes, Christians are also called to be eager or to work diligently to present themselves as approved before God, workmen who have no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth (2 Timothy 2:15). Christians must recognize the imperative of each. We cannot imagine we will be able to stand before God as approved if we proved so eager to argue regarding the word of truth that we neglected to maintain the unity of the Spirit; there can be little unity in the Spirit if many heed false teachings and teachers and fall away from the living God (cf. 1 Timothy 4:1, 2 Peter 2:1-22). Unity in the faith does not happen automatically or on its own; it must be cultivated and developed. To accept the same teachings as true doctrine is not unity; to be one, Christians must not only believe the truth of God in Christ, but to work together to build up the body of Christ and the temple of the Spirit.

Christians are to eagerly work to keep the unity of the Spirit “in the bond of peace.” Paul wrote as a “prisoner” in the Lord (Ephesians 4:1); as he is imprisoned by the Roman authorities, Christians are to consider themselves as “imprisoned” by peace. It is a startling yet compelling image: normally we do not associate binding, chaining, or imprisonment with peace but with far less pleasant circumstances. God has made peace between Himself and mankind and among humans thanks to Jesus’ death on the cross (Romans 5:1-11, Ephesians 2:1-18); Christians, therefore, must reckon themselves as constrained by peace. They ought to seek to maintain and pursue peace with each other, not looking for fights, contentiousness, or to exacerbate divisions, all of which are works of the flesh (Galatians 5:19-21).

How can Christians keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace? Paul had previously established a set of dispositions and behaviors which allow for unity to flourish in any relationship: humility, gentleness/meekness, patience, tolerance/forbearance, and love (Ephesians 4:2). Christians recognize their sinful past and unworthiness to stand before God on their own merits; they see Jesus, the only Man who ever had reason to be arrogant, yet served humbly; therefore, Christians must remain humble and not think too highly of themselves and their opinions (Matthew 20:25-28, Romans 12:3, Ephesians 2:1-10, Philippians 2:5-11). Sharp words and aggression exacerbate problems; gentle words and behaviors ameliorate difficulties (Proverbs 15:1). Other people easily get on nerves and do not seem to learn or change quickly enough; yet would not God have as much right to say the same about us? In any relationship we must learn to accept the thornier parts of people as well as the more pleasant aspects of their disposition, and so it must be among the Lord’s people as well.

If Christians strive to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace, manifesting love, humility, gentleness, patience, and tolerance for one another, they are doing well in walking worthily of the calling with which they have been called, for as God is one in relational unity, so God would have us be one in Him in unity (John 17:20-23, Ephesians 4:1). Far too often, unfortunately, Christians prove more like the world than like Jesus, easily instigated to arrogance, contentiousness, intolerance, impetuousness, and all leading to divisiveness and factionalism. We must repent of all such attitudes and behaviors; we must grow in humility, love, patience, gentleness, and tolerance, maintaining the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace; we must reflect the relational unity of God among ourselves. May we be one as God is one and establish God’s full purpose for humanity in the church!

Ethan R. Longhenry

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Concerning the Continued Bodily Existence of Our Lord

The core message of the Christian faith is the life, death, resurrection, ascension, lordship, and imminent return of the Lord Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 15:1-7); this whole Gospel message itself gravitates around the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. If Jesus has not been raised, then we are lost in our sins, our faith is in vain, and we of all people are most pitiable (1 Corinthians 15:12-20). And yet in many parts of modern “Christendom,” especially within Evangelicalism, and even among the Lord’s people, the importance and nature of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus and the hope of bodily resurrection of believers in Him has been downplayed or neglected. The reasons for such lack of emphasis are legion, involving everything from the continued influence of Greek philosophy and Gnosticism to the overtly “heavenly” emphasis found in the songbook. As a result critical truths of the Gospel, held consistently and firmly by those of “orthodox” Christian belief for generations, has been missed or neglected. Of these none have proven as controversial as whether the Lord Jesus continues to exist in heaven in the resurrection body. In this treatise we shall contend that the Lord Jesus remains in His resurrection body to this day; we shall seek to prove this abundantly from the pages of Scripture.

The Historical Narrative

The story of Jesus’ resurrection is set forth in Matthew 28:1-20, Mark 16:1-20, Luke 24:1-53, John 20:1-21:20, and Acts 1:1-11. We will highlight certain aspects of the story to illustrate our purposes below.

Jesus’ soul/spirit/divinity did not die. At no point in the narrative is it suggested that God the Son died or that Jesus’ soul/spirit died. In Luke 23:43 Jesus assured the thief on the cross of being with Him today in “Paradise”; Peter would insist on Psalm 16:9-11 as David testifying to the resurrection of Jesus: whereas David’s tomb (and ostensibly his body within it) remained in Jerusalem to that day, and so he was not talking of himself, but someone to come, thus Jesus’ soul was not left in “Hades”, but returned to His body which was raised from the dead (Acts 2:25-32). The New Testament provides no confidence for any view which would suggest Jesus suffered spiritual death at any point in His existence; the citation of Psalm 22:1 in Matthew 27:46 need not be true in fact but in perception (and as a reference to the whole Psalm), and if God the Son were to be truly separated from God the Father and God the Holy Spirit in any way for any amount of time, God would no longer be one in relational unity but truly three gods as the pagans and the Muslims allege (contra John 17:20-23). Not for nothing does the text say that “Jesus yielded up His spirit” (Matthew 27:50); His spirit did not die, but experienced the spiritual state of the afterlife until the day of resurrection. Thus resurrection cannot be mere spiritual illumination, enlightenment, or even transformation; Jesus spent time in pure spirit form for a short period of time, and then experienced the resurrection.

Resurrection, by definition, involved the resuscitation of the physical body. Matthew provides a bizarre detail in Matthew 27:52-53, claiming that holy ones came out of the tombs when Jesus was raised, entered Jerusalem, and appeared to many. This claim engenders more questions than it may answer; nevertheless, it again reinforces how within Second Temple Judaism, resurrection was understood first and foremost as the resuscitation/reanimation of the physical body.

The tomb was empty. The Evangelists emphasize the first evidence of the resurrection is the empty tomb. Mary, Peter, and John see the tomb empty; Peter and John note how the grave cloth lay on the ground with the face cloth folded by itself, hardly the behavior of people stealing a corpse in the dead of night (John 20:1-7). Not only is the body not there, but the reason why it is not there is firmly declared by the angel: Jesus is not there, for He is risen (Matthew 28:6).

Similarity and Dissimilarity. Within their narratives the Evangelists note points of similarity and dissimilarity regarding Jesus from before and after the resurrection. The women and disciples perceive Him as Jesus (Luke 24:40-43, John 20:16). And yet neither the women nor the disciples recognize Him immediately; He is able to enter locked rooms, and seems to move between places at speeds not feasible by any human means of the age (Luke 24:16, John 20:26). Granted, there were times in His previous life when Jesus miraculously escaped from crowds (e.g. Luke 4:30, John 8:59); but this seems to be of a different order, perhaps suggesting Jesus had transcended the space-time continuum.

Jesus’ resurrection body was incontrovertibly substantial. The disciples were invited to touch Jesus, to place their hands in His wounds; He ate in their midst, explicitly saying He was not a spirit but had flesh and bones (Luke 24:40-43, John 20:24-29). We have good reason to believe Jesus’ resurrection body was transformed physicality (a la Wright’s “transphysical”; cf. 1 Corinthians 15:50-58, Philippians 3:21), yet sufficiently “physical” to be able to be touched, to consume food, and to be treated as fully human.

Jesus ascended in the resurrection body. The book of Acts began by describing Jesus’ ascension: He had appeared to His disciples as alive many times and taught them regarding the Kingdom; after a final message, Jesus was “taken up,” and a cloud received Him out of their sight (Acts 1:1-9). Two angels then appeared to encourage the disciples, assuring them how Jesus would return from heaven “in the like manner” as they had seen Him received up into heaven (Acts 1:10-11).

At no point in the narrative are we told that Jesus divested Himself of His resurrection body. From the moment of His resurrection through His ascension Jesus is spoken of as appearing to people in the resurrection body.

Evidence for Jesus’ Continued Existence in the Resurrection Body

From the above we have seen Jesus as raised in the body and ascended in the resurrection body. Let us now consider the New Testament evidence demonstrating Jesus’ continued existence in that resurrection body since His ascension.

Jesus as the “Son of Man”. Throughout the Gospels Jesus’ favorite oblique way of speaking regarding Himself is to speak of the “Son of Man.” “Son of Man” represents a good Hebraic idiom; “son of” is a way of denoting a relationship, and at its basic level of meaning “Son of man” means a human, as seen in the equivalent parallelism of Psalm 8:4:

What is man, that thou art mindful of him? / And the son of man, that thou visitest him?

Yet without a doubt Jesus’ use of the “Son of Man” is informed by its use in Daniel 7:13-14:

I saw in the night-visions, and, behold, there came with the clouds of heaven one like unto a son of man, and he came even to the ancient of days, and they brought him near before him. And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations, and languages should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.

The Danielic “Son of Man” has Messianic connotations for certain, something well understood not only by Jesus but also His opponents (cf. Matthew 26:63-66). Therefore, when Jesus speaks of Himself as the “Son of Man,” He does not merely speak of His humanity, but speaks also of this Messianic role, the one who would receive the everlasting dominion. Nevertheless, even if “Son of Man” means more than “human” when used in reference to Jesus, there is no basis from the New Testament to suggest it means anything less. If anything, Jesus’ resurrection more fully explains how anyone “like a son of man” could enter the heavenly realm and obtain an eternal Kingdom: as we shall see, once Jesus died for sin, death no longer has any power over Him, and so He can continue to live for eternity in the resurrection body as the Son of Man (cf. Romans 6:1-11).

Not only does the Danielic “Son of Man” feature prominently in Jesus’ self-conception and ministry, He will also speak of Himself as the “Son of Man” in demonstrably post-ascension contexts: as in the Kingdom and in returning in Judgment (Matthew 13:41, 16:27-28, 19:28, 24:27, 30, 37, 39, 44, 25:31, 26:64, Mark 8:38, 13:26, 14:62, Luke 9:26, 12:40, 17:22, 24, 26, 30, 18:8, 21:27, 36, 22:69, John 6:62). In this way Jesus expected to remain human after His resurrection and ascension.

Throughout the Bible a human is defined quite specifically as a person made in God’s image with a body and soul/spirit (Genesis 1:26-27, 2:7). We have no Biblical basis to suggest that a person’s disembodied soul/spirit is still reckoned to be a human being. Thus, if Jesus remains the Son of Man and thus human, and Jesus thus remains in the resurrection body, both the Son of God and the Son of Man, to this day.

Stephen’s Witness. It is written in Acts 7:55-56:

But [Stephen], being full of the Holy Spirit, looked up stedfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God, and said, “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing on the right hand of God.”

Stephen is about to be martyred for his witness for Jesus. Luke first explained what Stephen saw: a vision of God’s glory and Jesus standing on the right hand of God (Acts 7:55). Luke then records Stephen’s actual words; we do well to note that Stephen calls Jesus “the Son of Man” in this instance. We are to understand a direct association between Acts 7:55-56 and Matthew 26:63/Mark 14:62/Luke 22:69: as Jesus stood before the Sanhedrin and was condemned to death and spoke of the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven, so now Stephen stands before the Sanhedrin, about to be killed by its members, but spoke of actually seeing the Son of Man at the right hand of God, and all it would imply based on Psalm 110:1 and Daniel 7:13-14. Nevertheless, Stephen well understood what “Son of Man” meant, and he testified that he saw Jesus as the Son of Man, the Human One, well after His ascension into heaven. Stephen thus bears witness of Jesus’ continuing existence in the resurrection body after His ascension.

Paul’s Witness. The Apostle Paul insisted upon his standing as an eyewitness of the Lord Jesus in 1 Corinthians 9:1, 15:8. The New Testament does not record Paul as seeing Jesus at all during His life, death, or resurrection. The first time Paul is confronted by Jesus is in the vision on the road to Damascus as recorded in Acts 9:1-9 and retold in Acts 22:3-11, 26:12-18. We have some assurance that Paul speaks of this particular episode in 1 Corinthians 15:8: he saw Jesus “last of all,” as one “untimely born,” an ektromati, literally a miscarriage, one born out of due time.

While Paul recognized the temporal difference between his witness of Jesus and those who came before him, he yet nevertheless insisted that his witness was of equal worth and standing as all those who came before. We can know for certain that all the witnesses Paul mentioned in 1 Corinthians 15:4-7 saw Jesus in the resurrection body; they are otherwise attested in Matthew 28:1-20, Mark 16:1-6, Luke 24:1-53, and John 20:1-21:25. If they all saw Jesus in the resurrection body, and Paul is an equal witness to them, then Paul must have seen Jesus in the resurrection body as well, even though he saw Him long after his ascension. By considering himself a witness of Jesus in the resurrection, Paul affirmed Jesus’ continuing existence in the resurrection body after His ascension.

Romans 6:1-11. As it is written:

What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid. We who died to sin, how shall we any longer live therein? Or are ye ignorant that all we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him through baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in newness of life. For if we have become united with him in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection; knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be done away, that so we should no longer be in bondage to sin; for he that hath died is justified from sin. But if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him; knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death no more hath dominion over him. For the death that he died, he died unto sin once: but the life that he liveth, he liveth unto God. Even so reckon ye also yourselves to be dead unto sin, but alive unto God in Christ Jesus.

While Paul here does speak of baptism as a type of resurrection, the ground of its power is in Jesus’ actual, substantive death and resurrection. We have already affirmed that at no point did Jesus’ divinity or soul/spirit die; therefore, the only thing which died or even could die was Jesus’ body. If Jesus divested Himself of His resurrection body and returned to His form as the pre-Incarnate Word (cf. John 1:1), Romans 6:1-11 makes no sense whatsoever. Jesus dies no more because He died to sin; death no longer has dominion over Him (Romans 6:9-10); this was never true of God the Son per se, since God is immortal. It can only refer to Jesus’ humanity. And so when Paul speaks of Jesus as (presently) living in this life He lives to God (Romans 6:10), it must center on His resurrected body, the only “part” of Jesus to truly experience death. In this way Paul also explains how Jesus can continue to serve as Lord for generation after generation: death no longer has power over Him in His resurrection body, and so not only does He endure perpetually within it, we as Christians have the hope of sharing in that perpetuity when our bodies are raised from the dead on the final day (Romans 6:5). Paul’s exposition in Romans 6:1-11 depends upon Jesus’ continuing existence in His resurrection body.

Philippians 3:20-21. As it is written:

For our citizenship is in heaven; whence also we wait for a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: who shall fashion anew the body of our humiliation, that it may be conformed to the body of his glory, according to the working whereby he is able even to subject all things unto himself.

Throughout Philippians 3:1-21 Paul has centered his hope on the resurrection from the dead. As he concludes this part of the message Paul spoke of our confidence as Christians, that Christ will return one day and will transform our lowly bodies to be conformed to the body of His glory, and He will do so through the power which He is presently using to subject things to Himself (Philippians 3:21). Paul here expects us to become then as He is now, a message thoroughly consistent with John’s expectation in 1 John 3:2 (since, as we have seen above from Matthew 25:31 and Acts 1:11, Jesus will return as He came, and as the Son of Man). As in Romans 6:1-11, so in Philippians 3:21: Paul’s exposition depends on Jesus’ continuing existence in His resurrection body.

1 Timothy 2:5. As it is written:

For there is one God, one mediator also between God and men, himself man, Christ Jesus.

By common confession Paul wrote his first letter to Timothy sometime in the early 60s. Paul spoke to Timothy of Jesus as the Mediator between God and men, a role He is able to uniquely fulfill since He is Himself “man,” anthropos in Greek, the word used to speak generically of us as humans. Thus, in 1 Timothy 2:5, Paul spoke of Jesus as human in the present tense, as a continuing reality. As mentioned earlier, a mere spirit/soul is not a human; a human is a person, body and soul/spirit. Thus Paul again confirms Jesus’ continuing existence in His resurrection body over 30 years after His ascension.

Lack of New Testament Contradiction. We have seen the witness of Jesus, the Evangelists, Stephen, and Paul, all of whom attest to Jesus’ continuing existence in the resurrection body after His ascension. We must also note the conspicuous lack of any explicit declaration to the contrary. In no New Testament passage is it declared or even suggested that Jesus divested Himself of His resurrection body when He ascended to the Father or at some point afterward. In no New Testament passage do we hear of a glorification or transformation of Jesus at any point after His resurrection until this day; the text throughout speaks of the moment of transformation and glorification as happening when He is raised from the dead.

From all of this evidence we do well to conclude that Jesus remains in His resurrection body to this day, and will continue to live in His resurrection body until at least the end of Judgment, if not beyond.

Addressing Concerns

With such abundant Biblical evidence and no explicit word which might confuse or contradict the matter, how has such a position become so controversial? We will consider many common concerns and attempt to address them.

A “new doctrine.” Many, upon hearing these things, are concerned that they represent some kind of “new” doctrine, an innovation.

While hearing this may be new to many people, the belief is not itself new. The belief of Jesus as continuing to exist in the resurrection body was affirmed by Christians upholding “orthodoxy” for generations. Even medieval theologians and devotional authors presumed it. For most of the history of Christianity it remained prevalent; it has only been downplayed or neglected within the past few generations. If you do not trust my witness, it is something which Roger Olson, a noted historian of Christian denominations, has noted as well.

We could easily argue that it is the belief that somehow at some point Jesus divested Himself of His body is the new innovation, a Gnostic-esque heresy. May we all be as the Bereans and judge doctrinal presentations by what is written in the Scriptures, not on our impression of what is old or new (cf. Acts 17:10-11).

Theological Concerns. In much of Evangelicalism and among the Lord’s people great emphasis has been placed on Jesus’ divinity and standing as the Son of God. Attempts to insist on Jesus’ humanity are often looked upon with skepticism, often unfairly labeled as associated with the doctrines of Jehovah’s Witnesses or some other such group. In such a climate, consideration of Jesus as remaining in the resurrection body is bound to cause theological concerns, as if one is negating Jesus’ divinity. God is spirit, after all (John 4:24), and we often associate the spiritual realm with heaven, and since in 1 Corinthians 15:50 flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God, how can Jesus have a body in heaven?

We will address 1 Corinthians 15:50 in greater detail below, but for the time being we do well to note that both Enoch and Elijah were translated into heaven bodily (Genesis 5:24, 2 Kings 2:11-12). Our understanding of the spiritual realm is very limited; not enough has been revealed to so definitively declare that Jesus could not remain in His resurrection body in heaven, and anyways, one would still have to contend with all of the evidence given above.

Accepting Jesus’ continuing existence in His resurrection body need not negate or lessen the truth that Jesus remains fully God. Paul affirmed that Jesus was declared the Son of God in the resurrection (Romans 1:4). While we must be careful lest we drift into heresies by which we emphasize Jesus’ humanity over His divinity, as in Adoptionism, Arianism, or as the Jehovah’s Witnesses did and do, we must be equally careful lest we emphasize Jesus’ divinity over His humanity, which is just as heretical, as the Gnostics and Christian Scientists and others did and do. If anything, the latter proves more pernicious: John had to explicitly warn against those who denied the bodily existence of Jesus (1 John 4:1-4, 2 John 1:5-10).

In reality, it is hard for us to imagine how Jesus could be both fully God and fully man. It is the mystery of the Incarnation, that moment when the Word became flesh, and Jesus became Immanuel, God with us (Matthew 1:21-25, John 1:1, 14, 18). But if we accept on faith that Jesus lived in this life as fully God and fully human, there is nothing to stop us to accept that Jesus continues to exist in the resurrection body as fully God and fully human. There is nothing about Jesus in the resurrection body that would not prove equally problematic in terms of Jesus’ Incarnation. Furthermore, the Scriptures never speak of Jesus returning to the same form as He existed before the Incarnation; it is an assumption, an inference being imposed upon the text without any Scriptural warrant to justify it.

For years too much emphasis has been placed on Jesus as the Son of God and not nearly enough on Jesus as the Son of Man and all that demands. We must return to the Biblical balance and affirm both equally; when we do so, we recognize there is no theological difficulty with Jesus remaining fully God and yet also fully human in His resurrection body.

Spiritual Bodies and 1 Corinthians 15:50. On account of the strong “heaven” and “spiritual” emphasis within Evangelicalism and even among the Lord’s people, the bodily element of the resurrection has been neglected or downplayed in many circles. Many look at 1 Corinthians 15:35-50 and in it see a justification for believing in a “spiritual body,” often in contrast to anything physically substantive, and “proven” by 1 Corinthians 15:50a, Paul’s declaration that flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God.

There are many difficult and confusing aspects of 1 Corinthians 15:35-58, and we may not be able to make complete sense of everything. Nevertheless, Paul clearly expected Jesus’ resurrection to be the model and example for what all believers in Him will experience on the final day (1 Corinthians 15:20-28). In 1 Corinthians 15:44-46 Paul makes a contrast between the present body as a psuchikos body, and the body in the resurrection as a pneumatikos body. These terms are often translated as “natural” and “spiritual,” which leads to such interpretations as the above, since people all too easily put the emphasis on the “natural” or “spiritual” form. And yet Paul provides a bit of explanation: the psuchikos body we currently have is directly associated with Adam in Genesis 2:7, in which God breathed the breath of life into Adam, and he became a living “soul” (in Greek, psuche). The psuche is here considered the life force within us; therefore, the “psychical” body is enlivened/empowered by the psuche. The corresponding parallel would mean that the “pneumatical” body is enlivened/empowered by the pneuma, or “spirit”, perhaps the Holy Spirit. Thus Paul is not speaking of some ethereal spirit form; he speaks of a body, the pneumatical body indeed, but no less a body.

And so we come to 1 Corinthians 15:50a:

Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God…

On its own it would seem rather damning to any hope of redemption of the body. But this fragment of a verse is not on its own:

Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. Behold, I tell you a mystery: We all shall not sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. But when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written, “Death is swallowed up in victory.”

“O death, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting?”

The sting of death is sin; and the power of sin is the law: but thanks be to God, who giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 15:50-57).

“Flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom,” yes, but also “neither doth corruption inherit incorruption” (1 Corinthians 15:50). Paul then speaks of a mystery, of what will happen: we will all be changed (1 Corinthians 15:51-52a). In this change we will be raised incorruptible: this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality, and then death will be fully overcome (1 Corinthians 15:52b-57). It is not our spirit or soul which is mortal and corruptible, but our bodies; thus our bodies will be transformed for immortality and incorruption.

But what of the physical body? It is transformed, yes, but not eliminated. No passage in the New Testament speaks or even frames the discussion of the transformation of resurrection in terms of the destruction or elimination of the physical body. All such discussions of transformation envision it in terms of enhancement, not of reduction. The corruptible body “puts on” incorruption; this mortal body shall “put on” immortality. We yearn, not to be unclothed, but further clothed (2 Corinthians 5:1-4).

Therefore, yes, this present flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God, since we remain mortal and corruptible. But on the resurrection day, this mortal and corruptible flesh and blood will be raised and then transformed to be incorruptible and immortal, and will be able to inherit the Kingdom of God, just like Jesus, on the day of His resurrection, was raised and then transformed to be incorruptible and immortal, and inherited the Kingdom of God and still reigns over it.

There is much we do not and cannot yet understand about the resurrection body (1 John 3:2). Nevertheless, we have confidence we will be like Jesus: He did not become some entirely non-physical, non-substantive “spiritual body,” but a transformed body which could yet be touched and could eat in this plane of existence, and so it will be for us. No, corruptible flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God; but the new heavens and the new earth are reserved for those who obtain the resurrection of life and its attendant resurrection body (John 5:28-29, Revelation 21:1-22:6)!

Conclusion

We have explored the Scriptures surrounding Jesus’ resurrection and continued existence after the resurrection. We have seen from the historical narratives and later doctrinal expositions how Jesus and the Apostles provided strong evidence for Jesus’ continued existence in His resurrection body during the forty days after His resurrection, for years after His ascension, and by all accounts will continue until at least the day of Judgment if not beyond in the resurrection body. We have addressed various concerns regarding this doctrine and have found all detractions wanting. May we recognize and affirm that Jesus continues to serve as Lord in His resurrection body, the Son of God and Son of Man, and eagerly await His return so that we may become like Him!

Ethan R. Longhenry

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Bible Translations, I: History of Translations

Anyone who would seek to learn more about the purposes of God as made known in the Bible is immediately faced with a major obstacle: which version or translation should be used? We are faced with an alphabet soup of translation abbreviations: KJV, NIV, ESV, NLT, NKJV, NASB, NRSV, etc. What do they all mean? Why do so many translations exist? Which should I be using? Let us explore Bible translations and versions; to do so, we do well to understand the history of the Bible so as to understand why so many translations exist.

From Greek to Latin and Back to Greek Again

The New Testament began in the Mediterranean world, the record of events of Jesus Christ and His followers in the first century. At that time, the majority of the eastern Mediterranean world spoke in Greek; while each area had their own native tongue, Greek was the universal language of that part of the world. Therefore, when the texts of the New Testament were first written, they were in Greek. Our modern translations, in order to be the most accurate they can be, are thus derived from Greek texts.

Latin prevailed over Greek in the western part of the Mediterranean, however. The Bible was translated into Latin at an early stage in Christian history; in the fifth century Jerome worked to standardize the translation and root the Old Testament in the Hebrew original over the Greek translation (the Septuagint). Over time Jerome’s version became the standard and called the Latin Vulgate; it was the Bible in Western Europe for over seven hundred years.

Wars, famine, and religious arguments divided the western part of the Mediterranean from the eastern by the eleventh century. Knowledge of Greek in the West slowly faded into oblivion. However, the invasion of Constantinople (modern Istanbul, former capital of the Byzantine Empire) in the fifteenth century CE forced the Orthodox there to flee west, bringing their knowledge of Greek. This re-emergence of the understanding of Greek brought about renewed interest in the text of the Bible in its original language, and a German named Desiderius Erasmus was a principal scholar in this field. He was able to find six or seven copies of the Bible in Greek, dating from the tenth to thirteenth centuries CE, and from those texts he edited his version of the Bible in Greek, which was later called the Textus Receptus, or TR. It is from this text that the earliest modern translations of the New Testament in English were made.

The Bible in English

The same forces which led to a greater appreciation of Greek also fueled the Reformation. In England previous attempts had been made to translate the Bible into English so that all the people could understand God’s Word in previous centuries; by the middle of the sixteenth century William Tyndale worked diligently to translate the Hebrew and Greek texts of the Bible into English. Within the next thirty years six other versions would be translated from the original texts into English (Tyndale’s, Coverdale’s Bible, Matthew Bible, Great Bible, Geneva Bible, and the Bishops’ Bible).

As a result of the multiplication of versions in English and its resulting confusion, in the early seventeenth century, King James I of England commissioned Hebrew and Greek scholars in English universities to create a new version based on the older translations, correcting those texts when the need arose. Using these texts along with Erasmus’ Textus Receptus, these scholars created the King James Version (KJV), also called the Authorized Version (AV), in 1611. At first, most continued to prefer the Geneva Bible; over time, the King James Version would find preeminence among English speaking Christians, and would become the Bible in English for almost three hundred years.

Not a few people learned English and how to read and write thanks to the King James Version. Over time, however, the Elizabethan English of the KJV proved more and more antiquated, and today proves difficult for the modern English reader to understand. Thus, in the late 20th century, the KJV was revised to conform to modern English; the result is the New King James Version (NKJV), published since 1982.

New Findings, New Versions

During the nineteenth century Western Europeans, flush with developments and power thanks to the Industrial Revolution, sought to better understand their heritage in the past. The discipline of archaeology developed during this time; conquest and influence provided Westerners with heretofore unprecedented access to the Eastern Mediterranean world. Through archaeological expeditions and exploration of ancient monasteries multiple fragments and manuscripts of the New Testament were found.

Many of these new fragments and manuscripts varied in consistent ways from Erasmus’ Textus Receptus; Wescott and Hort would publish their own edition of the Greek New Testament in the late nineteenth century. A committee of scholars published the Revised Version (RV) in 1881 in England; as its name suggests, it was a revision of the KJV based on the more ancient manuscript evidence provided in Westcott and Hort’s Greek text. Twenty years later the Revised Version was prepared and edited by a committee of American scholars for use in America, and was published as the American Standard Version (ASV) in 1901.

The American Standard Version would become the foundation for most of our modern versions of the Bible in English, as it is based on the oldest witnesses to the New Testament that we have in our possession. In 1952 the Revised Standard Version (RSV) was published, modernizing and making some changes to the ASV; in 1974, as a result of evidence from the Dead Sea Scrolls, among other reasons, the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) was published. In 1971, the Lockman Foundation adapted the ASV into more modern language, publishing the New American Standard Bible (NASB); further revisions to the NASB came out in 1995, now known as the New American Standard Bible Updated (NASU). In 1998 the English Standard Version (ESV) was developed to set forth the Bible in the ASV tradition in clearer English.

In recent years many have elected to make a shift in approach in translations away from word-for-word translation (“functional equivalence”) to a more thought-for-thought translation (“dynamic equivalence”). The first and greatest of these versions is the New International Version (NIV) of 1967, itself modified in the New International Reader’s Version (NIrV; 1996), and updated in 2011 (NIV 2011). A similar process has led to the Good News Bible (GNT; also “Today’s English Bible”; 1976), the Contemporary English Version (CEV; also “The Bible for Today’s Family”; 1995), the New Living Translation (NLT; marketed also as “The Book”; 1996), the Common English Bible (CEB; 2011) and many others.

Many other translations exist for other reasons: some “literal” translations, some translations still based on the Textus Receptus or the so-called “Majority” Text, and some as translations sponsored for a given denomination (Roman Catholicism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, etc.). In future articles we will explore all these Bible translations and versions in greater detail. May we seek to learn of God in Christ from the Scriptures and obtain the resurrection of life!

Ethan R. Longhenry

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The First Letter of John

John surveyed the scene and saw many concerning trends: Christians were despairing of confidence in their salvation; antichrists went about professing a different Christ, denying the reality of sin, and making faithful Christians seem deficient. He would write to provide encouragement; the result is 1 John.

The first letter of John is the twenty-third book in modern editions of the New Testament; it is often categorized as one of the “catholic” or universal letters or epistles. The author never explicitly identified himself but grounded his exhortation in his personal experience of the Word made flesh, Jesus of Nazareth (1 John 1:1-4); literary connections remain strong among the Gospel of John, the three letters of John, and Revelation, pointing to the same author, John the son of Zebedee, the brother of James, one of the three closest Apostles to Jesus (cf. Matthew 4:18-22, 17:1-13). The letter is written to Christians known to John, whom he calls his “little children” frequently (1 John 2:1, 12, 13, 18, 28, 3:7, 18, 4:4, 5:21); the letter’s substance betrays no hint of when or where it was written. It is generally believed to have been written in Ephesus, John’s center of ministry (cf. Irenaeus, Against Heresies 3.1.1). Some date the letter to the mid-60s; while this remains possible, the docetism and perhaps proto-Gnosticism against which John wrote is better dated somewhat afterward, ca. 85-95. John wrote his first letter to all Christians over whom he had some influence to encourage them in their faith and to resist those in their midst who denied the actual humanity of Jesus and the existence and challenge of sin.

John began his letter with a profound prologue setting forth his purpose: he has experienced much concerning the Word of life, his association is with God in Christ, and he wrote so that those who read would be in association with him as well (1 John 1:1-4). The message John has to give is God is light and in Him is no darkness: those who walk in the light have fellowship with God and each other, but those who are in darkness have no association with God; thus, those who say they have no sin, past or present, deceive themselves, and the truth is not in them, but those who recognize and confess their sins to God are cleansed in Christ (1 John 1:5-10). John would have Christians not sin, but when they sin, Jesus is their Advocate, the propitiation for sin; we know we are in Christ if we do what He commands and walk as He walked (1 John 2:1-6). John emphasized the “new old” command: to love, but love as Jesus loved; all who hate their brethren are not in Christ, but those who truly love are in God (1 John 2:7-11). John provided specific encouragement for Christians at different points of life and stages of growth (1 John 2:13-15).

John exhorted Christians against loving the world and its lusts, for they stand against the purposes of God (1 John 2:15-17). He warned Christians about the antichrists: those who professed Jesus and still remained in their midst but who did not confess Jesus as having come in the flesh; they denied the Lord and promoted lies; they may have been among Christians, but their condemnation was made evident in their departure; Christians must remain in the truth they heard from the beginning to obtain eternal life (1 John 2:18-27). Christians ought to abide in Jesus and no longer persist in sin: Christians have the blessing of being called children of God, having the promise they will be as Christ is, and thus seek to be pure; those who persist in sin persist in lawlessness and are not in Christ, for Christ died to cleanse from sin, not persist in it (1 John 2:29-3:6). Faithful Christians persist in righteousness, turn from sin, and are born of God; anyone who would deny sin or who persist in sin are not in Christ and are of the Devil (1 John 3:7-10).

Christians have heard the message to love one another in Christ: they must not hate their brother, like Cain did, and should not be surprised when the world hates them (1 John 3:11-13). Christians may know they have life if they love the brethren; those who hate their brethren are murderers who have no life in them; Christians know love through Jesus’ sacrifice, and ought to be willing to sacrifice themselves for one another; how can a Christian have material wealth, see a fellow Christian in need, and not help him, but abide in love? Christians must love in truth and practice, not mere word (1 John 3:14-17). The Christian’s heart may condemn him or her, but God is greater than the heart, and if they keep His commandment, they are in Him and He gives as they ask (1 John 3:18-24). Christians must test the spirits to see if they are of God: those of God confess Jesus in the flesh; the world hears those who deny Jesus in the flesh, for it satisfies them; God is greater than the one in the world (1 John 4:1-6). God is love, and those who love one another are in God; how can one love God whom he has not seen if he does not love his fellow man that he has seen? Perfect love casts out fear (1 John 4:7-21).

Those who believe Jesus is the Christ are begotten of God; Christians know they love God’s children if they love God and keep His commandments, and thus can overcome the world (1 John 5:1-5). God bore witness in Christ, in the blood, and in the Spirit; God’s witness is faithful, and those who believe in Jesus have the witness in them of eternal life in the Son (1 John 5:6-12). John concluded by reiterating his purpose for writing: for Christians to know they have eternal life, have boldness to ask of God according to His will and receive it (and should pray for one another if they sin a sin not to death, but not if one sins unto death), know those who are in Christ do not persist in sin, but those who persist in sin are in the world controlled by the Evil One, and confess that Jesus has come and given the true knowledge which leads to salvation and life; Christians must guard themselves from idols (1 John 5:13-21).

John’s message of encouragement for the Christians of his day remains powerful today. We do well to confess Jesus: He came in the flesh, truly lived, died, and was raised again in power, and those who trust Him will turn away from sin, do His commandments, and obtain eternal life. May we stand firm in Jesus, confident of His victory, and obtain the resurrection of life!

Ethan R. Longhenry

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Work

“We must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work” (John 9:4).

It is perhaps one of the greatest of the divine mysteries: God has summoned us sinful, weak humans to participate in His work and to advance His purposes.

The Bible makes known the great things which God has done in order to save us and to advance His purposes in His creation. He created the universe and all that is in it (Genesis 1:1-2:4); He sent His Son to live, die, and be raised again in power so that we could be delivered from our sins and overcome death (John 3:16, 1 Corinthians 15:1-58, 1 John 4:7-11). The pages of Scripture abundantly attest to God’s love and covenant loyalty powerfully demonstrated by His power.

Meanwhile God has expected people to labor for His purposes. God had a particular type of tent, the Tabernacle, where He intended to manifest His presence to Israel; He even had plans for it, and yet He expected the Israelites to build that Tabernacle themselves, and that according to the pattern He would show them (Exodus 25:9). In Christ God has maintained His power for salvation in the message of the Gospel (Romans 1:16); in Acts there are examples of the great efforts made by the Holy Spirit and angels so that people could hear, believe, and obey the Gospel, and yet it was to be preached by God’s people, not by the Holy Spirit or the angels directly (e.g. Acts 10:1-47).

Jesus explains the importance of work in the Parable of the Talents in Matthew 25:14-30. He envisions the time between His ascension and before His return in terms of servants given differing amounts of talents, a very large sum of money; they are expected to go and make more money by trading them (Matthew 25:14-18). Jesus’ returned is envisioned in terms of settling accounts with these servants (Matthew 25:19). In this story the one given five talents makes five more talents, and the one who was given two made two more, and they both were welcomed into the joy of their master (Matthew 25:16-17, 20-23). A third servant was given one talent, but he buried it in fear; the master was angry with this servant for his lack of effort, and he is cast out into the outer darkness, where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth (Matthew 25:18, 24-30).

The message of the parable might be jarring but it is evident: the followers of Jesus are expected to work to advance Jesus’ purposes until He returns. While everyone has equal value in God’s sight, not everyone is equally talented; how many abilities one has is not a basis of boasting but a stewardship of responsibility. Each is to use the abilities (or talents; the word derives from the form of money in the parable and on the basis of the parable) God has given him or her to serve (1 Peter 4:10-11). One with few talents need not despair when seeing another with more talents; one with many talents has no right to slack off because others have fewer talents. Our reward comes from how effectively we have used those talents for God’s purposes. If we bring others to Jesus, well and good; if we “obtain interest” by growing and exercising in our own faith, that is also sufficient (2 Peter 3:18). But any servant of Jesus who does nothing with his talents out of fear or insolence will be cast into the outer darkness, another way of speaking about hell!

Serving the Lord Jesus, therefore, is not to be taken lightly. What Jesus has said in Matthew 25:14-30 may not sit well with some of the doctrinal positions of man but makes complete sense when we understand the true nature of faith. Those who believe in Jesus are not merely to accept the reality of His existence, but to believe that He is Lord and Christ (John 3:16, Acts 2:36). If He is Lord, we are not; we cannot continue to walk in our ways and really believe that Jesus is Lord. To believe that Jesus is Lord demands that we put our trust in Him, and the only way our trust can be manifest is in what we do. So it is that Jesus considers believing in Him the work of God which He would have us to do (John 6:29): faith without works is dead, for faith must be manifest in how we think, feel, and act (James 2:14-26). One who claims to believe that Jesus is the Christ of God, the Lord, but does not get busy in His Kingdom is not really trusting Jesus, not really seeking His purposes, and without repentance will be cast into the outer darkness as an unprofitable servant!

God has done great and mighty things to save us; we do not deserve any of it. Our salvation and standing before God is entirely dependent on the love, grace, and mercy He has extended toward us through His Son Jesus Christ (Ephesians 2:1-9, Titus 3:3-7). And yet God has made us and saved us for good works that we might walk in them (Ephesians 2:10); we remind ourselves of the salvation Jesus obtained on our behalf so we may devote ourselves to good works (Titus 3:8). Thus, while we are not saved by our works, we have been saved to work and glorify God in Christ. God does not want to cast any of His children out; He wants us to serve Him as His children and servants of the Lord, and if we do so, we will obtain the same rest as He enjoyed once He created the world (Hebrews 4:1-11). God is Sovereign, omnipotent, sufficient to do all things, and yet in His purposes He has given it to us to work in His Kingdom, entrusted us with the Gospel of His Son, the message of salvation, and expects us to grow in His grace and knowledge through actively serving and obeying Him. May we participate in God’s work so as to participate in His rest to His glory and honor!

Ethan R. Longhenry

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The Vulgate

The Old Testament was originally written in Hebrew and Aramaic and translated into Greek before the days of Jesus; the New Testament was originally written in Greek. And yet it is the Romans, speakers of Latin, who ruled the first century world. The New Testament speaks of Latin only once, as one of the three languages in which Pilate had written the title on Jesus’ cross, “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews” (John 19:19-20). The Bible may not have been written in Latin, but the definitive translation of the Bible into Latin (called the Vulgate) proves influential in our reception and understanding of the Bible.

The Romans may have ruled the world, but Koine Greek remained the dominant language of the Mediterranean world; for this reason the Bible began to spread around the Roman world in Greek. In the first three centuries after Jesus Christians worked to translate parts of the Bible into Latin. These translations were mostly based on the Greek Old and New Testaments, and the translation work was of uneven quality based on various manuscripts. In 382 “Pope” Damasus I commissioned Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus, whom we know as Jerome, to revise the Gospels of these translations held as the common text (Latin vulgata) as used in the church in Rome at the time; Jerome would, over time, revise not only the Gospels but also the Old Testament and the Apocrypha.

Jerome was one of the more learned Biblical scholars and textual critics of his day. Jerome began according to his commission by correcting the Gospels in Latin according to the most ancient texts at his disposal. Jerome aligned the order of the Gospels in Latin to conform to the order in Greek (it had previously been the “Western order,” Matthew, John, Luke, and Mark). After he completed the Gospels he turned his efforts toward the Old Testament. Whereas Christians before him focused on the text of the Old Testament in Greek, particularly in the Septuagint, Jerome believed it better to translate the Old Testament out of its original Hebrew. This decision would embroil Jerome in great conflict with others, including Augustine, who was concerned that Christians might be offended by hearing any variations on what they felt was inspired based on apostolic authority (Augustine, Letter LXXXII).

Jerome spent time in Jerusalem to strengthen his understanding of Hebrew and did much of his translation work in Bethlehem. He was able to secure one of the few copies of the Hexapla, Origen’s critical edition of the Old Testament, featuring six columns containing the Hebrew text, a transliteration of the Hebrew into Greek (with vowel reconstruction), and four translations of the Hebrew text in Greek (Aquila’s translation, Symmachus’ translation, the Septuagint, and Theodotion’s translation). Some have raised questions and doubts regarding Jerome’s competence in Hebrew, but he demonstrated strong familiarity with the language and developed a robustly conservative translation of the Old Testament from Hebrew into Latin.

Jerome is the one who called the extra works found in the Septuagint but not in the Hebrew Bible apocrypha:

This preface to the Scriptures may serve as a “helmeted” introduction to all the books which we turn from Hebrew into Latin, so that we may be assured that what is not found in our list must be placed amongst the Apocryphal writings. Wisdom, therefore, which generally bears the name of Solomon, and the book of Jesus, the Son of Sirach, and Judith, and Tobias, and the Shepherd are not in the canon. The first book of Maccabees I have found to be Hebrew, the second is Greek, as can be proved from the very style (Jerome, Preface to the Books of Samuel and Kings).

He found value in the apocryphal works and may have considered some of them inspired, but he sought to maintain a distinction between them and the books of the Old and New Testaments. If Jerome translated or revised the rest of the New Testament, it has not been preserved; it seems another translator revised the Vetus Latina edition and did so using older manuscript types.

After Damasus’ death Jerome’s work received no further official commendation; over the next 700 years many recognized the superiority of Jerome’s revisions, and only with Roger Bacon in the 13th century is Jerome’s revision called the vulgata. Ever since the Latin translations before Jerome’s day have been known as the Vetus Latina, or Old Latin, text; the Vetus Latina would remain preserved in many of the liturgical writings in the medieval church.

The Roman Empire was in the midst of collapse in Jerome’s day; knowledge of Greek would be lost to “Western” Christendom soon afterward, and it would be the Latin Vulgate which would be read and heard in churches throughout Western Europe. To Western Christians the Vulgate was “the Bible” until the time of the Reformation; the Roman Catholic Church made the Latin Vulgate its official Bible at the Council of Trent. Soon after a standardized text of the Vulgate was released by the Roman Catholic Church, the Sixto-Clementine (or Clementine) Vulgate; it remained the official text until the release of the Nova Vulgata in the middle of the twentieth century. The modern critical edition of the Vulgate, Biblia Sacra Vulgata, 5th edition, is also known as the Stuttgart Vulgate. Full copies of the Vulgate from the sixth century onwards are preserved along with many partial copies and evidence from early translations.

Despite what many people believe, most English translations of the Bible are not translations out of Latin; most modern versions translate the text from its original Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek texts. Nevertheless, the influence of the Latin Vulgate remains, for many “theological” words which we find in the Bible come from the Latin, including creation, justification, sanctification, and, above all, testament. Many doctrines also derive from the ways in which the Bible was translated into Latin: penance comes from translating Greek metanoeo, repentance, as paenitentiae; imptutation comes from translating Greek logizomai, “to reckon or consider,” as imputatio. Even though translation of the Bible into common languages was a major emphasis of the Reformation, all the Reformers were shaped in their theology by the Bible in the Latin Vulgate.

The Latin Vulgate remains an important part of the family of Biblical texts. While our Bibles today are not directly translated from the Vulgate, the wording of the Vulgate and many of its ideas have shaped how we understand the text in English. The Latin Vulgate’s witness maintains its importance in the work of textual criticism, especially in the Old Testament. Jerome’s decisions to appeal to the Old Testament in Hebrew shifted the conversation about textual authority in the Old Testament; his convictions regarding the apocrypha did not win the day but proved influential over a millennium later. May we appreciate the work of Biblical study and translation in days of old, trust in what God has made known in the Scriptures, and be saved in Christ!

Ethan R. Longhenry

Works Consulted

“Vulgate” (accessed 17/12/2017).

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History of the Bible, II: Transmission of the Text

God has spoken and made known His will and purposes through His servants the prophets and ultimately through His Son Jesus Christ (Hebrews 1:1). The prophets, the Apostles, and their associates preserved those messages from God in the pages of Scripture (2 Timothy 3:15-17). The Scriptures are of the greatest importance and value for those who wish to know what God would have them think, feel, and do. Can we have confidence in the validity of the Biblical text as it has been handed down? We do well to explore the history of the Bible. We previously discussed the movement toward canonization of the text, and we can have great confidence that the books which currently comprise the Old and New Testaments are inspired of God and profitable for instruction and exhortation. Let us now consider how those texts have come down to us so many years later.

The printing press, which allowed for mass and exact copying of a text, was only invented around 1450 CE: beforehand all texts were preserved by creating handwritten copies. A scribe or monk might have a copy of a text (generally called a manuscript) and transcribe it; often a scribe or monk would read aloud a text while other scribes or monks would write down what they heard. The use of paper only came to the Western world after the Crusaders in the twelfth century CE. Before then papyrus or vellum (also known as parchment) were used. Papyrus was used in the east more extensively and also earlier; unfortunately, it was not very strong, and the text would wear out quickly. Vellum, as prepared animal skins, lasted longer, but were harder to develop and more expensive. It often proved easier for scribes or monks to scrape off an old parchment and reuse it for another text; today we have many such examples, called palimpsests, and through technological advancements we can discern many of the previous, scraped off texts.

The transmission process proved very exacting and difficult for many years. Despite all of the hardships, the transmission of the Bible proves outstanding in its quality, and God’s providence can be seen within it. The Masoretic scribes responsible for the transmission of the Old Testament in Hebrew used exacting standards to judge how effective a new copy proved at replicating its predecessor; any deviations would mean they would restart the process. On account of this the Masoretic Text of the Hebrew Bible remained consistent from the days of Jesus until now. The Masoretes also recorded many of the variants or changes which they believed the text required; we also have copies of the Hebrew Bible in other languages which record variants most likely derived from the Hebrew texts from which they were copied (called the Vorlage). From all those variants we more often than not can make sense of the text as originally written; certain details that are left unresolved do not significantly impact the way we understand the Old Testament. The New Testament has been preserved in over 4,000 copies of at least portions of the text in Greek dating between 170-1450 CE; for comparison, the “runner-up” is Homer’s Iliad, of which we have about 300 copies dating from the same period. These 4,000+ copies are not limited to one geographic area: they come from all over the European, Mediterranean, and even the Middle Eastern world. The great number of texts spread out over such a great area and time span allow us as modern readers to ascertain any discrepancies and inconsistencies in these copies, and allow us to determine the most accurate reading for all but three words in the whole New Testament. Furthermore, all of the variants are well-attested, and many of the challenges and difficulties have been known and discussed since antiquity.

Most variants follow specific patterns which prove understandable in light of the challenges inherent in manual copying of manuscripts. The copyist’s eye might skip a couple of lines, see an ending very much like the one he had just written, and continue copying from there, and inadvertently leave some of the text out (a process called homoioteleuton; if the beginning of terms looks the same, it is homoioarchton). A copyist might just omit a word or a line (called haplography), or repeat a word or a line for a similar reason (called dittography). Copyists also might see the beginning of a familiar verse and complete it from memory, not necessarily taking into account what the text says. He might be correct; at other times, however, the text may have read a little differently in one passage rather than another, and in this way two different passages are made to sound the same (called harmonization; cf. Matthew 6:9-13, Luke 11:2-4). At times the copyist might confuse similar looking letters or even words; sometimes the words are so similar in meaning or can work contextually so that we cannot precisely determine which is most likely the original.

Some of the variants involve expansions of the text to enhance piety or descriptions. For instance, if the text said “Jesus,” some might write, “the Lord Jesus” (an expansion of piety). At other times a copyist might notice two different terms used in the same place in a text, and as opposed to choosing one or the other, included both (called conflation).

We can know about these variants and their heritage because of the existence of so many copies of manuscripts in the original languages and in translation. The work of seeking to ascertain the original text on the basis of all the manuscript evidence is called textual criticism. Textual critics assess the manuscript evidence based on likely relationships among the manuscripts, their age and provenance, along with other factors. The fruit of the labor of textual critics can be seen in the information provided in the authoritative editions of the Old and New Testaments, Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (BHS) and Novum Testamentae Graecum, Nestle-Aland 28th edition (NA28). They feature the masora parva and critical apparatus, respectively, listing not only variants but also the manuscript evidence for those variants. In this way anyone who can develop a basic handle on Biblical languages and the principles of textual criticism can evaluate the textual evidence for themselves: these endeavors are not done in a corner, as if a conspiracy, but open for many to see and explore.

The hand of God can truly be seen in the transmission of the Biblical text. Despite 1,500 years or more of manual copying done by uninspired scribes and monks, we remain able to come to an understanding of what God has made known through the prophets, Jesus, and the Apostles. May we put our trust in God in Christ and be saved!

Ethan R. Longhenry

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The Second Letter of Peter

Peter’s time to remain on the earth was short. He felt compelled to provide some final reminders and exhortations for Christians. To this end he wrote what we deem the second letter of Peter.

The second letter of Peter is the twenty-second book in modern editions of the New Testament; it is often categorized as one of the “catholic” or universal letters or epistles. Simon Peter is identified as the author in 2 Peter 1:1; the letter provides no evidence to determine whether he wrote it personally or dictated it to an amanuensis. Almost all scholars reject Petrine authorship of 2 Peter; of all the books of the New Testament, 2 Peter has the least attestation in early Christian writings. Origen is the first recorded witness to explicitly speak of 2 Peter, and he himself testified to the doubts some had in its authorship; Eusebius placed it among the antilegomena, disputed writings, although he recognized that most considered it authentic (Eusebius, Historia Ecclesiasticae 6.25). Associations between 2 Peter 2:1-22 and Jude 1:3-25 have been noted; many presume that one is dependent on the other, although it remains possible that the Lord had a similar message to send out through each. And yet it seems that the Apocalypse of Peter, a second century document, is dependent on 2 Peter; Origen’s doubts are not sufficient for him to consider the letter inauthentic. It is possible to see indirect allusions to 2 Peter among some second century Christian authors, but their lack of explicit citation in light of their affection for 1 Peter may be notable. It would seem to be more difficult to explain why a clearly later pseudepigraphal letter from Peter would maintain wide acceptance as an authentic letter than it would be to explain why its explicit use came later. Therefore, we ought to recognize the majority opinion that 2 Peter comes from Simon Peter himself while recognizing the existence of disputes about it throughout history. Peter began by writing to those who have a like precious faith, which would be all Christians; yet in 2 Peter 3:1 he spoke of his letter as the second he wrote to his audience (2 Peter 3:1), which would narrow the audience to the Christians of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, Roman provinces spanning much of what is today Turkey (1 Peter 1:1). He most likely wrote 2 Peter from Rome, likely not long before his martyrdom in the middle to late 60s (64-67?). Peter wrote to provide a final message of assurance to Christians regarding their faith and hope, warning against the influence of false teachers and to maintain patience while awaiting the Lord’s return.

Having begun with a standard epistolary introduction (2 Peter 2:1-2), Peter exhorted his audience to be strengthened in their faith and confidence in prophetic witness (2 Peter 1:3-21). According to Peter, God has granted all things about life and godliness to us through His divine power in the knowledge of Christ, and thus Christians ought to strive to make their calling and election sure through diligence in developing faith, virtue, knowledge, self-control, patience, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love, and thus enter God’s eternal kingdom in Christ (2 Peter 1:3-11). Peter intended to continue to remind Christians of these things as long as he lived, even though the time of his departure was near, so they could continue to be encouraged in them after his passing (2 Peter 1:12-15). Peter assured his fellow Christians: they had not been deceived by myths or fables, for Peter was an eyewitness of the glory of Jesus, particularly in His transfiguration, and they could be strengthened as well by the word of prophecy, not given by a prophet’s think-so, but inspired of God and carried along by the Holy Spirit (2 Peter 1:16-21; cf. Matthew 17:1-5).

Peter then warned Christians about the infiltration of false teachers (2 Peter 2:1-22). As there had been false prophets in Israel, so there would be false teachers among Christians, bringing in destructive heresies, promoting lasciviousness and greed (2 Peter 2:1-3). God did not spare angels when they sinned, the world in the days of Noah, or Sodom and Gomorrah, but spared Noah and Lot the righteous; therefore, God will deliver those who are His from temptation, and keep the wicked under punishment until judgment (2 Peter 2:4-9). Peter decried these false teachers as animalistic, craven, blasphemous, revelrous, adulterous, unproductive, following the way of Balaam, enticing unstable Christians, promising them liberty, but returning to the bondage of iniquity (2 Peter 2:10-19; cf. Numbers 22:22-33). The last state of these false teachers was worse than if they had never known the way of truth and righteousness (2 Peter 2:20; cf. Proverbs 26:11)!

Peter wished to remind Christians about the warnings of the apostles and prophets: mockers following their own lusts would come, wondering why the Lord Jesus had not yet returned, and all things continued as before (2 Peter 3:1-4). Peter reminded them of the swift destruction of the world in the days of Noah by flood, and promised a future destruction by fire (2 Peter 3:5-7). A long time is nothing for God; the Lord is not delayed, but patient, not wishing for any to be condemned, but sought people’s repentance (2 Peter 3:8-9; cf. Psalm 90:4). Peter envisioned the day of judgment as the destruction of the current heavens and earth with great heat and encouraged Christians to live in holiness and righteousness, looking forward to a new heavens and earth in which righteousness dwells (2 Peter 3:10-13).

Peter began to conclude by encouraging Christians to strive to be found in peace, pure and blameless before Jesus at His coming (2 Peter 3:14). Christians must consider the patience of Jesus as salvation, as Paul had also written; Peter commended Paul’s writings, recognizing the difficulties in understanding certain things Paul wrote which many twist and distort to their own condemnation (2 Peter 3:15-16). Christians must be careful lest they fall from their steadfastness into the error of the wicked; they must grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus (2 Peter 3:17-18a). Peter concluded with a short doxology, glorifying Jesus (2 Peter 3:18b).

Christians do well to gain encouragement and heed the exhortation of Peter’s final words. May we seek to make our calling and election sure, on guard against false teaching, striving for peace and growth in faith, holiness, and righteousness, eagerly awaiting the return of the Lord Jesus!

Ethan R. Longhenry

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The Mystery of the Gospel

Paul did well at encouraging his fellow Christians with reminders of all the spiritual blessings with which God has blessed them in Christ, praying they might be able to understand the greatness of the salvation they obtained in Christ, the head of the church (Ephesians 1:1-23). Paul explained the nature of that salvation, how all had sinned and yet God showed love, grace, and mercy through Jesus to provide a means of salvation so Christians could be full of good works (Ephesians 2:1-10). Paul made it known how this salvation was offered to Gentiles, those of the nations: the hostility which had existed between the people of God and the nations was killed by Jesus on the cross, and He can now make all into one man in one body (Ephesians 2:11-18). Anyone can now be a fellow-citizen of the household of God and become part of the holy temple of God in the Spirit (Ephesians 2:19-22).

On account of these great blessings and salvation, Paul would again pray on behalf of his fellow Christians, but not until he explained the mystery of the Gospel regarding which he had already made many allusions (Ephesians 3:1-13). Paul envisioned his current imprisonment as a benefit for the Christians to whom he wrote, for it is to their glory (Ephesians 3:1, 13); he is imprisoned for his work in proclaiming among the Gentiles the mystery which God revealed to him, something not made known to previous generations of God’s people but now manifested in what God has accomplished in Jesus (Ephesians 3:1-5). It is easy to think of “mystery” in terms of either a “whodunit,” a crime story in which a sleuth uses all the clues to ascertain and indict the criminal, or something vague, unknown, and unknowable, yet Paul came out with a full explanation of this mystery: Gentiles can be fellow heirs, fellow members, and fellow partakers in the body and promises of Christ (Ephesians 3:6). It is not as if this mystery came without any warning or previous information: all of what Jesus accomplished had been prophesied in the Law, the Writings, and the Prophets (Luke 24:44). Yet the hand of God is evident in the story of Jesus, for while all He did was prophesied, people would not of their own invention or volition put the story together the way in which it came to pass in Christ. Thus the mystery of the Gospel was unveiled in the work which God accomplished in Jesus and communicated by the Spirit (Ephesians 3:1-6)!

Paul proclaimed the Gospel among the Gentiles by the commission of God in Christ who saved him despite his unworthiness, having been a persecutor of the church (Ephesians 3:7-8; cf. 1 Timothy 1:12-16). God hid this mystery prepared before the beginning of the world until the time of Christ, and now not only can all men hear and see it, but the manifold wisdom of God as manifest in the church is displayed to all the powers and principalities of heaven (Ephesians 3:9-10). The wisdom of God manifest in the church was the eternal purpose He established in Christ, through whom we now have boldness and access in faith to God (Ephesians 3:11-12). An eternal purpose continues perpetually in at least one direction; therefore, God’s purposes in Christ remain as active today as they did when the Lord Jesus arose and the Apostles walked the earth. Furthermore, Paul established the high level of importance God places on the church: it is no mere accident, “Plan B,” or holding pattern, but the ultimate realization of His wisdom. The church represents many groups of people who otherwise would be at odds with each other but have become one body in Jesus, and that is a powerful testimony to the working of God in Christ to all the powers and principalities which have worked to keep mankind divided. Thanks to Jesus we can have boldness before God in access in faith; we do not deserve any standing before God because of what we have done, but Jesus’ sacrifice cleanses us and allows us to stand before God and make our requests known.

Paul then got around to making the prayer which he planned on making: that God would strengthen the Christians with power through His Spirit in their souls to comprehend the love of Christ which is beyond knowledge, having been filled with Christ and the fullness of God and rooted and grounded in love (Ephesians 3:14-19). Paul praised God as the One able to do beyond what Christians could ask or think according to the power at work within them, seeking that He might be glorified in Christ and the church for eternity (Ephesians 3:20-21). This prayer may seem confusing: how can Christians come to any kind of understanding of something that surpasses knowledge? This is precisely Paul’s point; he wished for Christians to realize the vastness of God’s love for us in Christ and to be continually humbled by and thankful for it. Paul also invited Christians to consider the greatness of that power of God: He is able to do anything beyond our imagination, and does so by the power at work within us, but only if we ask. Do we ask to obtain that power from God to accomplish His purposes? Do we limit what God is able to do through us because of a lack of imagination or willingness to ask for mighty things to be accomplished? Do we truly believe that God is as willing to do such things as we profess confidence in His ability to do so?

Paul thus laid out the mystery of God in Christ: Jesus lived, died, and was raised again in power, and now serves as Lord. All have sinned but can find salvation in Jesus; in Jesus can be found spiritual blessings beyond imagination, and God is at work advancing His purposes in Jesus and the church in full display before the powers and principalities in the heavenly places. May we submit to the Lord Jesus Christ and trust in God and His power to accomplish great things through us to His glory and honor!

Ethan R. Longhenry

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The Christian and the Assembly

Not forsaking our own assembling together, as the custom of some is, but exhorting one another; and so much the more, as ye see the day drawing nigh (Hebrews 10:25).

From the beginning Christianity has been about far more than the assembly; Christianity is the single-minded dedication to following the path of Jesus of Nazareth, humbly serving and suffering in His name so as to obtain the resurrection of life (Matthew 16:24, Romans 8:17-18, 1 Peter 2:18-25, 1 John 2:3-6). And yet the assembly has always been an important part of Christianity, built into the name chosen by Jesus for the collective of the people who follow Him: what is an assembly (the primary meaning of the Greek word ekklesia) which does not assemble (cf. Matthew 16:18)? What kind of congregation does not congregate?

For almost two thousand years Christians have come together on the first day of the week according to the Lord’s command to share in the communion and memorial of His death in the Lord’s Supper, pray together, sing together, hear the Word of God read, preached, and taught, and give to accomplish the purposes of Jesus through the local congregation (Acts 20:7, 1 Corinthians 10:16-17, 11:17-34, 14:15-17, 26, 16:1-3, Ephesians 5:19, Colossians 3:16, 1 Timothy 4:13, 2 Timothy 4:2-4). Christians do well to meet together at other occasions, whether as a full assembly or in smaller contexts, and do what they can to encourage one another (Hebrews 10:24). Nevertheless, the assembly of Christians on the first day of the week has always been the anchor of participation together in the life of Christ. In many places and times the people of Jesus have risked life and limb in order to come together, enjoy sweet communion with their fellow Christians, drew strength from one another and their time together in the matters of the faith, and considered it all worthwhile despite the danger.

Plenty of societal forces in the modern Western world conspire against robust participation in the assembly of Christians. Our technological advances and devices have done as much to tear or keep us apart as they have done to bring us together: we find ourselves endlessly distracted by movies, social media, television, and other entertainment outlets. Everything has become specialized; each of us finds a particular niche of specialty, and depend upon others who have developed other niche specialties in other contexts. Children are expected to participate in all kinds of extracurricular activities which consume most of the time spent outside of school, eating, and sleeping. Confidence in and loyalty to institutions have reached historic lows: American individualism has corroded almost every sense of community we have with our fellow human beings. Churches themselves have often not helped. Too many assemblies are professionally designed and equipped spectacles, a thing to watch in entertainment as opposed to something in which one meaningfully participates. Some assemblies have become extended advertisements or rallies for preferred political or social agendas, using the time in the assembly not to truly edify and encourage but to justify current trends or behaviors, to condemn others without introspection, or to use forms of the wisdom of the world in a misbegotten attempt to uphold the principles of God or some subculture. Some seem to spend more time exhorting about the importance of the assembly than working to make it truly encouraging and edifying to those who participate. For these and many other reasons participation in the assembly is in decline in many parts of Christianity in Western culture even as interest in Jesus of Nazareth remains strong. Not a few books and articles have been written to justify “being a Christian but not in a church.”

We must emphasize that Jesus saves people as individuals: all must come to faith in Jesus and seek His will to be saved (Acts 2:36, 40, 16:31, Romans 1:16). Yet God’s purpose has never been to leave individual Christians in that atomized state alone; in Jesus God has reconciled all people together so Christians can be one as God is one (John 17:20-23, Ephesians 2:11-18). The church and its assemblies are not God’s “Plan B,” a cosmic accident, or some kind of add-on to the Gospel story: the church is the means by which God displays His manifold wisdom to the powers and principalities in the heavenly places, the outworking of His eternal purpose in Christ (Ephesians 3:10-11). The church expresses God’s ultimate purpose for mankind: in former days, Israel according to the flesh, when they gathered together, represented the assembly of the people of God (e.g. 1 Kings 8:2); Jesus then reconstitutes the assembly of the people of God around Himself in His death and resurrection, bringing together those of Israel according to the flesh who believe and those of the nations who believe, making them one new man in Him (Ephesians 2:11-22). All of the portrayals of the church in Scripture center on individuals working individually but very much comprehensively together for the benefit of the collective: the church as household, indicating the familial “brother” and “sister” relationship among Christians; the church as temple, suggesting holiness but also joint participation, and of course the church as a body, in which the function of each part works to make the whole function together (Romans 12:3-8, 1 Corinthians 12:12-28, Ephesians 2:18-22, 1 Peter 2:3-9). The final picture of the salvation of the people of God is as the bride of Christ, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven (Revelation 21:1-22:6): it is a picture of God glorifying the church (cf. Ephesians 5:22-33). People in Western culture may imagine themselves as “Christians without churches,” but such a thing is foreign to Jesus Himself, for a Christian not in the church is separated from the body of Christ (Romans 12:3-8, 1 Corinthians 12:12-28).

Jesus wants His body to work together to build itself up in love (Ephesians 4:11-16). While edification can and must be done outside of the assembly, the role of the assembly in edification and encouragement looms large in all discussions of the nature of the church. As families spend time together, so the household of God assembles. As bodies involve parts working together in close proximity, dependent on each other’s functions, so Christians come together in the assembly and many accomplish many of their roles in the body of Christ as part of the assembly (cf. Ephesians 4:11-12). From the beginning of Christianity until now the assembly of the local church has proven vital in the continual reinforcement and strengthening of individual Christians in their relationships with God and with one another.

Churches are full of imperfect people; we all are sinners in need of redemption in Jesus (Romans 3:20, 23). In a world saturated with individualism and alienation, the assembly of the saints proves to be a powerful testimony of the work God is accomplishing in Christ to reconcile all people to Himself. The visible unity of the Body of Christ is far more important than the challenges and difficulties that come with interacting with other people: we must be with our people while we have the chance. Let us then pledge to not forsake the assembling of ourselves together and strive to encourage one another in the assembly!

Ethan R. Longhenry

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