Theology Thursday: Ruth, Yibbum, and Halizah
Well, I know that everyone probably looks at that title and knows exactly what I’ll be writing about today, but perhaps I should explain it for the very few who might be puzzled by it. (This is my recognition that I’m writing about something arcane. My blog, my rules.)
Ruth, of course, refers to the Book of Ruth, which I read last week. It’s an important book, establishing King David’s ancestry and giving us a glimpse of life under the Judges. (The Book of Judges really muddles the waters, making life in pre-monarchy Israel look really chaotic and violent.)
The book also shows us that the understanding of the Law has changed somewhat since the days of Deuteronomy. For instance, Ruth is from Moab, yet becomes the ancestor of David. The Law specifically forbade Moabites from entering the 
assembly of the Lord:
Deuteronomy 23:3 (ESV)
No Ammonite or Moabite may enter the assembly of the LORD. Even to the tenth generation, none of them may enter the assembly of the LORD forever
(BTW, I think the apparent contradiction can be explained in that Boaz was an Israelite, and since the father’s lineage is most important, David’s heritage would be considered Israelite. Just a guess, though.)
But the really interesting difference in the practice of the Law, to me (and I understand how this could totally not be interesting to almost anyone else), is the difference in the practice of Levirate Marriage.
And what is Levirate Marriage, you ask? Well, it goes way back to the whole Er/Onan/Shelah/Judah/Tamar thing in Genesis 38:
Genesis 38, the whole Judah and Tamar thing (New Revised Condensed Seth Version)
Er marries Tamar but is struck dead by God, leaving her childless. Judah (Er’s father) instructs Onan (Er’s brother) to marry Tamar and raise up children for his brother. Onan disobeys and earns the same fate as Big Bro. Judah, worried that Tamar will be the death of all his sons, doesn’t give her Shelah. So, she poses as a prostitute and seduces Judah (recently widowed). She gets pregnant.
So that’s the germ of the matter, and it’s later encoded into the Law in Deuteronomy 25:
Deuteronomy 25:5-6 (ESV)
5 If brothers dwell together, and one of them dies and has no son, the wife of the dead man shall not be married outside the family to a stranger. Her husband’s brother shall go in to her and take her as his wife and perform the duty of a husband’s brother to her. 6 And the first son whom she bears shall succeed to the name of his dead brother, that his name may not be blotted out of Israel.
(The practice was evidently still prescribed in New Testament times, given that the Sadducees used it in their famous question to Jesus about the resurrection.)
But what if the brother doesn’t want to marry his sister-in-law? Well, then he gets publicly humiliated:
Deuteronomy 25:8-9 (ESV)
8 Then the elders of his city shall call him and speak to him, and if he persists, saying, 'I do not wish to take her,' 9 then his brother’s wife shall go up to him in the presence of the elders and pull his sandal off his foot and spit in his face. And she shall answer and say, 'So shall it be done to the man who does not build up his brother’s house.'
And now you’re probably wondering what this has to do with Ruth, right? Well, it’s pointed out in Ruth that Boaz is a “redeemer,” which is the Hebrew word ga’al (or go’el). So he is in line to redeem Naomi’s property, including Ruth. He’s essentially taking the role of the brother in the Deuteronomy 25 law.
(Fun fact: ga’al is also the Avenger of Blood who is supposed to carry out vengeance for pre-meditated murder. So it wasn’t all inheriting land and marrying widows.)
Of course, Boaz isn’t the closest relative, so he sort of tricks the closer guy into giving up his claim. And what’s the symbol of giving up his claim?
Ruth 4:7-8 (ESV)
7 Now this was the custom in former times in Israel concerning redeeming and exchanging: to confirm a transaction, the one drew off his sandal and gave it to the other, and this was the manner of attesting in Israel. 8 So when the redeemer said to Boaz, "Buy it for yourself," he drew off his sandal.
So I guess what I’m wondering here is this: Is this “custom” a corruption of the original Levirate laws? Or is it something related but different, given that we’re not looking at brother/brother interaction?
And my answer? Well, I’m not really sure. I think it’s kind of both. It’s an extension of the broader redemption laws, and borrows from the Levirate law. (But I’m far from an expert here.)
Oh, right, I’m supposed to explain those two funky words in the title. Well, here it is:
Yibbum – Levirate marriage. I’m shocked it hasn’t come up in our word-of-the-day thing.
Halizah – The ceremony by which a widow and her husband’s brother could avoid marrying. (The shoe-removal and speech.)
Interestingly, Wikipedia informs me (and how could it be wrong?) that the Rabbis favored Halizah because of the general proscription against a man marrying his brother’s wife.
Next week, I’ll reveal new evidence that Jephthah did not sacrifice his daughter.
Theology Thursday: Original Guilt or Original Sin?
I love coming back to the beginning of a Bible read-through. There’s something comforting in reading Genesis again. Of course, that comfort usually wears off about the time I get into Exodus. But I still revel in the beginning.
I’ve thought a lot about Origins in the last few years, and at this point I’m decidedly undecided on what to make of Genesis 1-3. I’m definitely not a Young-Earth Creationist, but I’m not ready to throw Adam and Eve out, either.
I’m planning on doing a post on Origins at some point, but I’m not ready for it yet. If I run short of topics, I’ll double back and hit it later. Or I’ll wait until next year. That’s the kind of priority I put on the topic.
As I said (well, wrote), I’m not ready to throw Adam and Eve out, because I still have to deal with The Fall. It’s a topic I haven’t studied as much as I need to, and at some point I want to read Bonhoeffer’s Creation and Fall.
But what I do understand is this: something happened. I know. Profound, right?
Now, some people want to say that Adam’s sin is somehow inherited by all his progeny, and not in some vague spiritual way, but as a stain on the soul that makes even a newborn ineligible for Heaven. I reject this idea.
I also reject the idea that, somehow, Adam’s sin explains our tendency to sin. And I think I can explain why I reject it.
Quick, off the top of your head, come up with two names of people in the Bible who didn’t have a fallen nature. (Old Testament only, please. And I’m not sure Jesus would be a correct answer anyway. I know this gets me into trouble at times, but I believe He was like us. But come back next week for more on that topic.)
Did you come up with the names? Or were you distracted by my little parenthetical (and inflammatory) statement? The two names I was looking for were:
Adam and Eve!!!
Yes, here we have an example of two people who were born without any stain of Original Sin on them. And how did they fare? You got it. They still sinned. They didn’t need a Fallen Nature to make them fall. So Original Sin certainly isn’t a good explanation for Why We Sin.
I’m not any closer to understanding our sinful natures, because without recourse to Original Sin, there’s a disturbing possibility: God created us with the tendency toward sin and then expected us to battle that tendency. Or He just created in us the ability to choose and didn’t tip the scales toward obedience or disobedience and we all get to choose (seems to fit with Romans 5:12). It’s an interesting brain-burner anyway.
So when it really comes down to it, I don’t have a problem with the doctrine of Original Sin, even if I don’t understand it, so much as the doctrine of Original Guilt. Yes, our First Parents sinned. Yes, we all sin. But we bear the burden of our sins, and not the sins of our parents. And I think the weight of Scripture is on my side here, what with all the insistence that children will not be punished for their parents’ sins. (And no, I don’t think Exodus 20:5 proves me wrong here.)
Thoughts? Original Sin or Original Guilt? Are we born stained? I’m happy to be corrected here.
Theology Thursday: A Red Hairy; or Whatever Happened to Esau?
For a long time, I thought Esau was pretty much bad, through and through. I never really payed attention to what the Bible (and especially the Old Testament) actually says about him. One of the New Testament passages about him seems to say that God didn't think much of him, either. I mean, Paul comes right out and says:
Doesn't that mean God didn't care for Esau? There's a theological perspective whose founder shall remain unnamed (but rhymes with Alvin) which uses this verse to say that God never loved Esau. In fact, He created him to go to Hell!!! I consider this particular interpretation pretty lame. Maybe turning to the Scriptures Paul quoted would help:
But you retort, “Really? How have you loved us?”
And the Lord replies, “This is how I showed my love for you: I loved your ancestor Jacob, 3 but I rejected his brother, Esau, and devastated his hill country. I turned Esau’s inheritance into a desert for jackals.”
The context clearly shows that God is addressing the Nation of Israel as a whole and referring to it as "Jacob." So who does "Esau" represent? Edom, of course. He's talking about nations, not individuals.
But what do we learn of Esau by reading the Scriptures? Well, he certainly wasn't the model of self-restraint, selling his birthright to Jacob for what the Geneva Bible called "a mess of pottage" (he's condemned for it by the writer of Hebrews). And he married a bunch of women his parents didn't approve of. And he set out to kill his brother (although that brother had swindled him out of his father's blessing).
But Jacob moved away, if you'll recall, and something must have happened to mellow Esau out. Because, when Jacob came back, look what happened:
This doesn't look like a man who's bad to the core. True, the nation (Edom) that sprang from him turned out to be an enemy of Israel. But can we really assume Esau went to Hell? It seems like a stretch. But I'd welcome any thoughts on it.
Theology Thursday: Tower of Babble?
I've wondered for some time if there's a connection between the Tower of Babel story in Genesis and the English word "babble." I mean, they're homophones, and doesn't that count for something? After all, the Bible was written in King James' English, wasn't it?
On the off-chance somebody unfamiliar with the story is reading this, here's the abridged version: People, all speaking the same language, decided to build a great tower. However, it wasn't a tower to be used to glorify God, but rather to honor themselves. God took issue with their plans and confused their languages. Not being able to communicate, the people all went their separate ways.
Many skeptics assume that this narrative is a myth that attempts to explain linguistic variation. I'll put myself out there for angry comments by saying that I agree it really looks like that. And there are many comparable myths from other cultures. However, they can be explained away, if somewhat lamely, by the statement that if such a thing happened, various cultures would remember it and report it in their own ways (similar to the common defense of the Flood narrative against its many cross-cultural-variations). By the way, I have no particular reason to doubt the biblical Babel narrative. Just thought I'd toss that in.
I'm getting a bit far afield here, aren't I? Well, it's my blog and I'll ramble if I want to.
Now, as someone mildly interested in enthralled with linguistics, I'm aware that there's no need to use divine intervention to explain linguistic diversity. It just happens. Separate a group of people into smaller groups, and their languages just change. Rather quickly, actually. So, what God apparently did by supernatural intervention, He could easily have accomplished just by splitting up the group geographically. Which happened anyway (so maybe I've put the cart before the horse).
Anyway, back to the Babel/babble thing. I Googled it, of course! Here's something I found (here):
Babble is derived from the incoherent bab-bab sounds made by babies and has cognates in several Germanic languages including the Dutch babbelen and in the Icelandic babbla. Technically, babble is said to be the frequentative form of bab. That is to say, bab was lengthened (by adding -le) without a change in meaning. A similar process occurred to the word prate, giving us prattle. Both prate and prattle are more or less synonymous with babble.
The "Tower of Babel" myth is a neat but implausible explanation for the multiplicity of languages spoken by mankind. The Hebrew name Babel (bab "gate" + el "god" = "gate of god") is thought to refer to the ancient city of Babylon. Now Babylon is merely the Greek form of bab-ili, the Assyrian translation of the Akkadian ca-dimira, "gate of the gods", which is what the locals called it.
Okay, so "babble" in English doesn't have any natural descent from "Babel." Still, there's the added wordplay in the biblical passage explained by this note in my NLT Study Bible:
Genesis 11:9 - Babel: Or Babylon. Babel sounds like a Hebrew term that means “confusion.” The Babylonians viewed their city as the residence or gateway of the gods. The pun that concludes this account accurately reveals Babylon’s spiritual confusion. Babylon achieved prominence under Nimrod (10:10) and in later biblical history (see 2 Kgs 25). Its role as an epicenter of arrogance and idolatry make it a fitting image for the anti-God forces associated with the end of time (e.g., Rev 14:8; 16:19; 18:2). • The tower builders had centralized to ascend into God’s realm (11:3-4). God descended and scattered them all over the world to frustrate their idolatrous ambition.
"Babble" isn't all that far off from "confusion," even if we don't have a true linguistic link here.
I'm sure this was much more interesting to me than for you...
Theology Thursday: Biblical Hilarity
After reading through the Bible a few times, I've noticed there are certain stories that just make me chuckle a little. Sometimes it's not anything truly funny, but rather something ironic or darkly humorous. Since I don't have any heavy theology on my mind at the moment, I thought I'd throw out a few episodes of Biblical Hilarity. One of the key features of these episodes is that, taken out of the context of Scripture, you might have a hard time coming up with a Key Message. I'll provide the obvious message, with an eye to hilarity.
Rather than giving strict quotes, I'll paraphrase for the purposes of my readers (using the NRSV - New Revised Seth Version).
The first episode doesn't start with humor, it starts with a man named Shechem taking advantage of Dinah, daughter of Jacob, perhaps violently (the passage isn't conclusive, but he was certainly in the wrong). Not exactly funny stuff. But then he tries to make nice:
Hamor: "That's cool. I'll talk to her people."
Meanwhile, Jacob's sons hear about the incident, and are spending some quality time with their sword sharpeners.
Hamor (to Jacob and his boys): "Sorry about that whole thing that happened, but my son is like in love with your daughter and all? So if you could like approve of him marrying her, that'd be great...."
Jacob's boys (winking to one another): "Yeah, that's totally cool with us. Only thing is, you all have like way to much skin on your hoohahs, so if you could just remove it for us, we'll even be your best mans and stuff. Oh, and not just you. Everybody in your town. K?"
Hamor explains to Shechem.
Shechem: "Sweet! "
Shechem's relations remove aforementioned extra skin. Three days pass.
Shechem's city's males: "Ow."
Jacob's boys: "We'd like to introduce you all to something we like to call the Fist of Death. Havatchyou!"
Key Message: DO NOT MESS WITH A GIRL WITH TWELVE BROTHERS!!!!
Next, we'll move on to an actually entirely hilarious episode in the ministry of Elisha.
Prophet: "Here I am, looking for herbs, and what should I find but a vine with wonky-looking gourds on it. Seems to me they'd be good to eat. I'll grab a bunch and put them in the stew."
Prophets (after eating the stew): "<groan>. Like dying here."
Elisha: "<sigh>. Put some flour in there and you'll all be fine."
Key Message: DO NOT LET MEN COOK. Or at least make sure you audit their ingredient list.
One New Testament funny. Eutychus, possessing possibly the best name in the Bible (really, can you beat that name?), gave us this cautionary tale. Paul was in Troas, talking to the flock there, and as the New King James Version says, "continued his message until midnight."
Eutychus performs a one and a half in pike position. Beautiful form, terrible landing.
Paul: "He'll be okay."
Key Message: FALLING ASLEEP IN CHURCH CAN BE FATAL.
I hope you've enjoyed this foray into the amusing portions of the Bible. You can't make stuff like this up.
The Good Stuff about Jacob’s Sneakiness
Am I the only one who sometimes thinks it's strange that Jacob even *got* a blessing? I mean, he plays his brother out of his birthright (totally Esau's fault, of course), then goes along with Dear Old Mum about wrangling Esau's blessing out of Old Blind Zeke? And yet, in Genesis 28, we have this message to him from God:
As my son would say, "That's instirring."
Spirits and Flesh
Something Pastor Ron mentioned this weekend struck a nerve with me. He was attempting to show that the "spirits in prison" from 1 Peter were actual spiritual beings, not just deceased people. He showed that the Greek word "pneumata" was used, which is the plural of "pneuma", which is translated "spirit" or "wind" (actually he didn't mention the "wind" connection). In the course of his discourse, he referenced Genesis 6 and the "Sons of God".
It's a widely held belief that the "Sons of God" in Genesis 6 refer to angels or fallen angels, who came down to earth, mated with human women ("daughters of men"), and produced the Nephilim, a powerful race of giants. I have three problems with this:
1. First, there's no actual connection in the text between the sons/daughters and the Nephilim. Look at it:
Abram, Everyman of Faith
In reading the New Testament references to Abraham (or Abram), one might get the impression that he was impeccable and unflappable. After all, didn't he willingly take his beloved son to the mountain to sacrifice him at God's request? That's some kind of faith!
Let me say right now that I am very impressed with this. Seriously...sacrifice your son? Blows me away.
But let's dispense right now with the idea that Abram was somehow a Superman of faith. Just look at what happened in the following references:
- Genesis 12:10 - he fled to Egypt due to famine
- Genesis 12:12 - he lied about Sarai to protect his own life
- Genesis 16:4 - went to Hagar's bed at Sarai's urging
- Genesis 20:2 - lied *again* (to Abimilech this time) about Sarai to protect his own life
In three of these examples, it seems like the issue at hand was simple fear. Fearing hunger, fearing death. If he was such a Superman, wouldn't he have trusted God a little more? At this point, of course, I'm getting whacked with the Hypocrite Stick, because it's not like I trust everything to God, either. But I'm not trying to put myself forward as a paragon of Faith, either.
The Hagar thing, though, is the most troubling thing to me. Fear is understandable, but the Hagar thing involved Abram (and Sarai) trying to *help* along God's promise. "Well, God said I'd have kids, and I'm not havin' kids, so he must have meant for me to conceive them on Hagar."
Again, let me emphasize that Abram had it where it counted...offerring his son. Still floored by that. My point here is, although he's held up as an example of faith, he was just like the rest of us. I like that.
One other thing from this morning's reading is this:
I will bless you
And make your name great;
And you shall be a blessing.
3 I will bless those who bless you,
And I will curse him who curses you;
And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
There are those who use this verse to justify blind support of Israel. I'm not sure I get it, though. There's basically two ways to interpret the application of this blessing:
- It applied to Abram...and only him.
- It applies to Abram and his offspring.
The second interpretation seems to be the one most held these days. Again, I don't get it. Anybody familiar with Abram's offspring? Okay, Isaac. Good guy. So does the promise apply to him? Maybe. But if so, Ishmael's got to sneak in for some blessing, too. And today's Israel isn't exactly descended from Ishmael...right?
Ahh, but you point out Genesis 21:12: "through Isaac your descendants shall be named." So the promise actually only applies to Isaac. Okay. So then, we're left with Isaac's descendants. Remember them? Jacob, the sneaky one, who would later be named Israel. But what about the other? Esau...Edom. Not exactly a recipient of blessing, since the Edomites are gone, gone, gone today.
Add to all this the fact that 10 of the 12 tribes were scattered by the Assyrians and essentially never returned, and the fact that Israel today is *not* populated with folks who can trace their ancestry to Jacob, and I don't think the Abrahamic blessing applies to Israel today.
Of course, I *do* tend to support Israel, at least when they're in the right. I favor the "Abraham-only" application of his blessing, and also the extension of it to his "seed", who is Christ.
Of course, I could have made this all much shorter by just putting a reference in here from Paul:
Reading Genesis is fun!
Thoughts on Genesis 6, Part 2 of 2
You might notice a slight change from my plans here. Yes, I had planned to blog yesterday about the "[man]'s days will be 120 years thing". Didn't happen. Never had the chance to do it. So today I'm going to do cliff notes of my planned Wed/Thurs blogging.
Because I've got more interesting stuff to blog about later today (or tomorrow). Blasting through Genesis 3-5 chapters a day leaves me with much backblog.
So, again, the two issues remain:
- What does the 120 years thing mean?
- What are the Nephilim, and what relationship do they bear to the Sons of God/daughters of men pairings.
Answer to #1. There's two theories. First, that God shortened lifespans to 120 years from the previous 900+ spans in earlier chapters. Second, that God announced that he'd give man 120 years to rethink his behavior, then smite them. I favor the latter. Why?
Trouble is, there's no good scripture in support of either theory. Yes, Moses lived 120 years. But after the flood, there were still several generations living 200+ years. And after Moses, it seems like lifespans were more in the 40-70 year range. In fact, we seem to have a scripture that somewhat contradicts the 120 year limit:
or even by reason of strength eighty;
So if God intended to limit us to 120, he seems to have overshot a bit. I don't think he's in the business of overshooting.
Anyhow, I favor the "patience of God" theme, where he waited a long time for man to repent, then sent the flood. No good scriptural reason, but there's no contradicting scripture from what I can tell.
Moving on to #2. Bottom line, there's no apparent connection between the verses for the Sons of God/daughters of men and the Nephilim. Look at the context again:
I'll focus on the whole Nephilim thing first. First, if you don't know, there's another mention of these critters in Numbers, when the Israelite spies reported on what they had seen in the Promised Land.
Some believe that the "Sons of God" must have been angels (fallen ones) who bred with human women, producing giants. Hence the Nephilim. Or, alternatively, they think demons possessed men and bred with human women. Not sure how this could impart any kind of altered DNA, but we'll just leave that off as very, very, very silly.
If the Nephilim were a unique antediluvian (had to use that word) race, they certainly weren't on the ark. Which means they couldn't have survived to Flood. Which means they couldn't have still been around for Caleb and Joshua to see. So, we're left with two possibilities. One, they weren't human at all. Some say Nephilim just refers to somehing large...say, dinosaurs? If they were indeed animals, they would have survived on the ark, to be seen later.
Second, we would have to accept that the Nephilim were just giants of any stripe, not produced by any unique pairing of natural and supernatural parents, but just by normal DNA mixing. This, to me, makes sense.
The ultimate defeat of the "angels mating with women" thing comes in the words of Christ, when he appears to the disciples after the Resurrection (they thought he was a ghost).
There you have it. Spirits (angels included) do not have bodies. Now, I do believe that God can grant them physicality when it suits his purpose, but I don't believe fallen angels or Satan (I don't necessarily believe he's a fallen angel) have that prerogative.
Wow...that added up quickly. But it's done now, and I can move on to more interesting stuff. Next up, "Abram, Man of Faith, and Everyman." Plus, a look at the Abrahamic promise of blessing.
Thoughts on Genesis 6
Don't be alarmed, I'm blogging twice in the same day. Actually, this is just a preview blog. I'm doing a series. Stay tuned.
By the way, I'd be interested to know if anybody actually reads this. Leave a comment if you do. I'd just like to know.
Anyhow, on to the preview. Genesis 6 is packed with interesting stuff, even if you only read the first four verses. Here they are:
3 And the LORD said, “My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, for he is indeed flesh; yet his days shall be one hundred and twenty years.” 4 There were giants on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown.
In this I find three things to discuss:
- Who were the Sons of God, and what were they doing looking at the Daughters of Men?
- What's this about 120 years?
- Who were those giants exactly?
I'd like to take #2 first. I remember being taught that God took the opportunity to shorten men's lifespans at this point. Now I'm not so sure. First of all, if He shortened us here, why did people still live longer in the next few generations (Terah, in chapter 11, lived 205 years). Second, why did people live so much *shorter* lives in the rest of the OT? Seems like lifespans were 40-70 in much of the rest of the story.
And I'll be getting back to that tomorrow. Thursday, I'll write about #1 and #3, since they're related (at least, some think so).
For today, I would like to point out an interesting fact I learned about Methuselah. If you look closely at the geneologies, you'll see he fathered Lamech at age 187, then lived 782 years and died. You might also know, or at least be interested in knowing, that Methuselah means "When he dies, it shall be sent." Ooooh.
Moving on. Lamech fathered Noah at age 182. That makes old Methuselah 369 years old when Noah is born. And how old is Noah when the rains come? You guessed it...600. Making Methuselah 969 years old, otherwise known as "dead" when the flood came.
For those who think the God of the OT was cruel, notice that after a man was born with a prophetic name predicting the Flood, God extended his life beyond all others in the Bible. He gave people all that time to change their ways.
That's all for today, but I'll hit the 120 years thing tomorrow. First I gotta look at some commentaries.
Comment...I must know if you are there!