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The Unseen RealmRecovering the Supernatural Worldview of the BibleCompanion Website Text 1: Reading Your Bible Again for the First TimeThere was no bibliography or added bibliography for this chapter. However, I want to expand a bit with respect to the chapter’s comments on interpreting the Bible in context.?Generally, it’s time to get serious (i.e., stop with the hypocrisy) about interpreting the Bible in context. We live at a time when the languages of the major civilizations that flourished during the lifetimes of the biblical writers have been deciphered. We can tap into the intellectual and cultural output of those civilizations. That output is enormous—millions of words. We can recover the worldview context (their “cognitive framework” in scholar-speak) of the biblical writers as never before. The same is true of the New Testament writers because they inherited what had gone before them and were in turn part of a first century world two thousand years removed from us.?Think about it. How would anyone living a thousand years from now understand something you wrote unless they had you inside their head? They’d need your frame of reference. They’d need to know what was going on in the wider world that potentially concerned, angered, encouraged, or depressed you. They’d need to understand the pop culture of your day to be able to parse why you’re using this word and not that one, or to properly process an expression. There’s no way to do that unless they recover your frame of reference.?That is what it means to interpret in context — recovering the ancient frame of reference and interpreting accordingly.? It’s polar opposite is acquiescing to the notion that the Bible is best understood in our context — our modern cognitive framework. That’s utterly anachronistic, but it’s where too many Christians live (pastors and lay people).?More specifically, I want to say something about a criticism (perhaps well meaning, but nonetheless misguided) directed toward what I’m saying is essential to accurate biblical interpretation.?Some critics of interpreting the Bible in its original ancient context presume it’s contrary to the Christocentric hermeneutic. I suppose that depends on how we understand that term. Many presume it means that no interpretation of any passage (especially the OT) is valid unless it “reveals Jesus.” Others seem to suggest that since Jesus was here, we now need to filter every passage through his first advent and work on the cross.?I disagree with both sentiments — and also think that neither is really how we should think about “Christocentric” interpretation.?The above approaches result in the loss of the original intent for which God providentially prompted passages in the OT. That isn’t a mere intellectual observation. It calls Providence into question. Does the Christocentric hermeneutic really demand that we avoid interpreting the OT in light of its ancient Near Eastern context? That we avoid interpreting the NT against those results — letting the original context of the OT inform the OT’s own contribution to NT exegesis? (If you’re wondering if this is even coherent, that’s troubling). The OT rightly understood in its own context will not violate what we read in the NT. What we read in the NT will be illuminated by the OT rightly understood. In many cases, it helps us make sense of “odd” things the NT writers do with the OT. In some cases, it will even correct our interpretations of how the NT writer handled the OT. And when we factor in Second Temple Jewish writers hitting a bulls eye in their own interpretation of the OT in its original context and allow those Second Temple writers to inform our reading of the NT, we get a double benefit. But should we just dump trying to do any of this since Jesus has come??Frankly, what I’m doing in The Unseen Realm and the Christocentric hermeneutic (rightly understood) are not mutually exclusive.?A real Christocentric hermeneutic doesn’t ignore the original context of any given OT passage in the name of making it say something totally different so it links comfortably with something Jesus did or said. Rather, a coherent Christocentric hermeneutic recognizes that all portions of the Bible, rightly understood in their original ancient context, play a role in the formation of a mosaic (or maybe I should say “meta-narrative”) that ultimately directs us to Christ. Everything in the Bible isn’t about Jesus and it doesn’t need to be to contribute to the progression and outcome of God’s plan for humanity—the person and work of Jesus Christ.?In short, you don’t need to erase, eviscerate, or avoid any passage’s original context to get to where the Bible means to take you. Too often the appeal to Christocentricity is an excuse to avoiding the work to understand the text on its own terms or is an interpretive sleight of hand for misdirecting our attention away from a passage that’s odd or uncomfortable. That hardly honors God’s providential decision to prepare and prompt the biblical writers to produce the material they did – when they did so, for the reasons they did so, and from the worldview and cognitive framework they developed amid the life experiences God’s providence gave them. Put another way, a Christocentric hermeneutic doesn’t need to distort or erase anything in the OT. God knew what he was getting when he prepared and prompted people in the second millennium BC ancient Near East to write something he wanted written and preserved. Inspiration wasn’t an exercise in God doing something that he’d have to circumvent later so we could see Jesus.Chapter 2: Rules of EngagementThere is no additional bibliography for this chapter.Content DiscussionThere are several key thoughts expressed in this chapter that I hoped would prepare readers for the book’s content. They deserve a bit of elaboration and, in some instances, further explanation.What about creeds?I made the comment in the book that we’ve been trained to think the true context of the Bible is the history of Christianity. That’s the truth. It’s also understandable. But any context other than the one that produced it is foreign to the Bible.I’m not anti-creedal. I subscribe to the basic creeds of Christianity (e.g., Apostle’s Creed, Nicean Creed). I just don’t believe that creeds serve any role in exegesis of the biblical text. While few evangelicals would actually say that we ought to use creeds to do exegesis, a mindset consistent with the notion isn’t uncommon—the idea that creeds should guide the way we interpret Scripture. I disagree. The text needs to produce our belief statements; our belief statements should not inform the text.More positively, creeds are useful orienting tools. By design they are brief distillations of select points of theology. They are inherently incomplete, both in what they touch upon and what they say about the items they do cover.That’s obvious to anyone familiar with them. What isn’t so obvious is the effect this has on people. There is a tendency, for example, to presume that is something isn’t delineated in a creed it is of lesser importance to biblical theology. I trust that those who have read Unseen Realm know in very demonstrable ways that just isn’t the case. While something in a Christian creed might be more important than an item excluded from a creed for the purpose of identifying oneself as a Christian, it isn’t at all the case that an issue excluded is less important for understanding the worldview of the biblical writers, which is in turn essential for understanding their message. In other words, things that don’t make it into creeds can be crucial for grasping biblical theology. When Unseen Realm gets into subject matter that can’t be found be found in a creed, those items should not be off-handedly considered peripheral.Part of the problem with creeds is that every one of them is historically conditioned. Creeds are formed in response to some problem or need. That contributes to their incompleteness. They are statements of faith and doctrinal conclusions that, presumably, their creators can justify through exegesis of the biblical text. My interests and, ultimately, theological loyalty, are attached to the latter, not the former. It’s just an issue of priority.What do you mean by “supernatural” and “supernaturalism”?I’m well-acquainted with the pros and cons of using the word “supernatural” in the book. But I wanted to spare people the academic discussion. This is a book I wanted people to read, not a dissertation. For that reason, I’m using these terms to talk about that which is divine—i.e., not part of the human realm or the natural realm. I realize that, since angels and demons are created beings, they must be made of something because there can only be one uncreated being . . . and that angels and demons might be from another dimension of reality – and so angels are demons might be thought of as natural (i.e., material), making supernatural an imprecise word.While I’m well aware of those points, I’m also acutely aware that readers would yawn right through such a rabbit-trail. I chose the terms to distinguish the normative realm of human experience from the presence and activity of beings that most people don’t associate with the physical limitations of our realm. It’s no more complicated than that—and it need not be for the purposes of this book.Core Ideas Essential to Understanding What I’m Doing in the BookChapter 2 hits on several crucial items that if misunderstood will result in erroneous and skewered perspectives on The Unseen Realm. These points are, in my mind, adequately telegraphed in the book, but some extended commentary may still be helpful to some.Specifically, I said the following:The biblical writers and those to whom they wrote were predisposed to supernaturalism.To ignore that predisposition in Bible interpretation will produce interpretations and conclusions that reflect our mindset more than that of the biblical writers.These ideas are fundamental to the purpose of the book. On one level they are self-evident. On another, they raise this question: How much of what biblical people believed about the supernatural world and its intersection with our world do you really believe?The question will be uncomfortable to many scholars and Christian leaders, but probably less so to “ordinary” readers. Those in the vocational academy and trained in that academy quite readily (some, eagerly) find explanations of passages that de-mythologize a passage (i.e., strip it of its supernatural content or assumptions) thereby producing interpretations that are palatable (i.e., less offensive) to the modern mind. But the inevitable result is that such interpretations aren’t the way a biblical writer would think about that passage. Is this disconnect permissible for those who say they hold a high view of Scripture? To put the above question another way: How much of what a biblical writer believed about the spiritual world do you feel comfortable dismissing?These are the sorts of questions that never quite make it into inspiration and inerrancy discussions. The question would usually be dismissed as hermeneutics. But let’s be honest—it isn’t synonymous with hermeneutics; it’s only related. The questions are germane to a discussion of the authority of Scripture. If Scripture isn’t authoritative for truth about the supernatural world, what’s the point of assigning sacred status to it? What I’m doing in Unseen Realm is to point out that what Scripture says about the supernatural must be ascertained by keeping it in its original context—not superimposing a later, more “rational” context on it for our own comfort. I’m not sure how we submit to its authority in such matters when we resist doing that. But that leads me to my purposes for the book.What I’m trying to do in The Unseen Realm is to get the worldview of the ancient biblical writers and their immediate audience into the head of the modern reader. The purpose on one level is to help people see Scripture through ancient eyes—eyes that were predisposed to an active supernatural world that overlapped with our own in many ways. I want to challenge readers that, without letting that worldview drive the bus of interpretation, our biblical interpretation will be flawed in both small and significant ways. I also want people to re-experience the thrill of discovery in Bible study.On another level, I hope to get the uncomfortable questions out in the open for discussion. There are sub-questions that need to be part of that. For example, if an interpreter thinks a biblical writer put a “supernatural spin” on an event, is that an interpretation that doesn’t dismiss the writer’s supernaturalism? Maybe, maybe not. But let’s talk about things like that—without separating them from the matter of biblical authority.That sub-question is related to (but again, not synonymous with) my statement in the book that I’m not claiming that the most supernatural interpretation is always the best interpretation. For me, the best interpretation of odd passages or those overtly dealing with supernatural content is one that: (a) doesn’t sidestep the supernatural for comfort’s sake; (b) informs other strange passages; (c) is consistent with the supernatural worldview of the ancient context that produced the Bible.These three criteria won’t always be met the same way—but I contend they need to be met. As readers will note, I don’t think that many refined modern interpretations produced by scholars meet these criteria. Many popular modern interpretations would be foreign to the thinking of people in the biblical world, including the biblical authors. I don’t think such a result is coherent.Does Dr. Heiser believe the earth is flat?I couldn’t really figure out where to put this one, as it concerns my writing on ancient Israelite cosmology. I mention cosmology in Chapter 37 in a footnote (and nowhere else in the book, really), so I decided to put it there and here, as Chapter 2 talks about ancient Near Eastern contexts.In a nutshell, Christianity actually has folks in it who believe the earth is truly round and flat. Honest — I’m not making this up. Some of their leaders use my work (see below) as proof of this view. ?While I’m flattered to have such influence (!), I’m appalled that people who follow Christ are this dumb (or easily led astray). The stupidity of this idea is transparent in today’s world. Space flight (really, flight between hemispheres), satellite communications, etc. show the idea to be utter nonsense. Yet some people think they need to believe it to have a “true” Bible. It’s uber-literalism at its worst. So no, I reject the notion that the earth is round and flat. Anyone who uses my work to prop up this idea without providing a disclaimer that I reject the idea is deliberately dishonest. But that is indeed what the biblical writers describe, because they lived at a time before scientific discovery proved otherwise. It’s that simple.The writers God used to produce the Bible were not inspired to write about things of the natural world that were beyond their own worldview and knowledge base. And to argue God gave them advanced scientific knowledge means that what they wrote could never have communicated to their original audience (or any audience prior to recent centuries. That’s absurd and undermines the communicative purpose of the Bible. What we read in Genesis (and elsewhere) reflects a common ancient Near Eastern perspective about cosmology with one crucial difference: the credit for creation is given exclusively to the God of Israel against all other gods. THAT is its truth claim with respect to creation. That God chose people of a certain time, a certain place, with a certain (limited) knowledge base was up to him. We dishonor His choices when we impose our questions and our context on the biblical writers. Precisely the same limitations would be in place if God chose a scientist today to write Genesis. 1000 years from now people would chuckle at how primitive he/she was (“Can you believe this is what they thought?”). This is why the Bible *transcends* science discourse — science always changes with new discovery and knowledge. Who the creator was never changes.For a short essay I wrote on this for the lay person, see?this link: Genesis and Ancient Near Eastern CosmologyOr you can watch my lecture on this topic: resources that discuss this material in Genesis includes:John H. Walton,?Ancient Near Eastern Thought and the Old Testament: Introducing the Conceptual World of the Hebrew Bible?(Baker Academic, 2006Luist Stadelmann,?The Hebrew Conception of the World: A Philological and Literary Study (Analecta Biblica, No 39; Pontifical Institute Press, 1970)Chapter 3: God’s EntourageThis chapter introduces the concept of the divine council.Bibliography included in the bookE. Theodore Mullen, Jr., “Divine Assembly,” The Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary, vol. 2 (New York: Doubleday, 1992), 215–216S. B. Parker, “Sons of (The) God(S),” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)Michael S. Heiser, “Divine Council,” The Lexham Bible Dictionary (ed. John D. Barry and Lazarus Wentz; Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012)Michael S. Heiser, “Divine Council,” in the Dictionary of the Old Testament: Wisdom, Poetry, and Writings (Downers Grove, Ill.: Intervarsity Press, 2008E. Theodore Mullen, The Divine Council in Canaanite and Early Hebrew Literature (Harvard Semitic Monographs 24; Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1980)Lowell K. Handy, Among the Host of Heaven: The Syro-Palestinian Pantheon as Bureaucracy (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1994)Matitiahu Tsevat, “God and the Gods in Assembly,” Hebrew Union College Annual 40–41 (1969–1970): 123-137Mark S. Smith, “Astral Religion and the Representation of Divinity: The Cases of Ugarit and Judah,” Prayer, Magic, and the Stars in the Ancient and Late Antique World (ed. Scott Noegel, Joel Walker, Brannon Wheeler; University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2003), 187-206Alan Scott, Origen and the Life of the Stars: The History of An Idea (Oxford Early Christian Studies; Oxford University Press, 1994Additional Bibliography Many scholars think that Yahweh and El are separate deities in Psalm 82 because they presume references to a council and plural elohim mean polytheism. I do not. I’ve published a number of scholarly articles disputing this notion.Michael S. Heiser, “Monotheism and the Language of Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls,” Tyndale Bulletin 65:1 (2014): 85-100Michael S. Heiser, “Divine Council,” in the Dictionary of the Old Testament: Prophets (Intervarsity Press, 2012)Michael S. Heiser, “Does Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible Demonstrate an Evolution from Polytheism to Monotheism in Israelite Religion?” Journal for the Evangelical Study of the Old Testament 1:1 (2012): 1-24Michael S. Heiser, “Should ????? (?elo?hi?m) with Plural Predication be Translated “Gods”? Bible Translator 61:3 (July 2010): 123-136Michael S. Heiser, “Does Deuteronomy 32:17 Assume or Deny the Reality of Other Gods?” Bible Translator 59:3 (July 2008): 137-145Michael S. Heiser, “Monotheism, Polytheism, Monolatry, or Henotheism? Toward an Assessment of Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible” Bulletin of Biblical Research 18:1 (2008): 1-30Michael S. Heiser, “You’ve Seen One Elohim, You’ve Seen Them All? A Critique of Mormonism’s Use of Psalm 82” Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies Review 19:1 (2007): 221-266This is my article, published in a Mormon journal, critiquing Mormonism’s understanding of Psalm 82 and the divine council. My views are antithetical to Mormon theology, as this article shows. FARMS had a Mormon scholar, David Bokovoy, respond to my article. I then was allowed to respond to David (see the next entry below).?Michael S. Heiser, “Israel’s Divine Council, Mormonism, and Evangelicalism: Clarifying the Issues and Directions for Future Study (Response to David Bokovy’s ‘Ye Really ARE Gods: A Response To Michael Heiser Concerning the LDS Use of Psalm 82 and the Gospel of John’,” Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies Review 19:1 (2007): 315-323Michael S. Heiser, “Are Yahweh and El Distinct Deities in Deut. 32:8-9 and Psalm 82?” HIPHIL 3 (2006); online journalMichael S. Heiser, “The Divine Council in Late Canonical and Non-Canonical Second Temple Jewish Literature,” PhD diss., UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON, 2004Ellen White, Yahweh’s Council: Its Structure and Membership (FZAT 65; 2 Reihe; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 2014)Note the date—this is not Ellen G. White of Seventh Day Adventism!See my review of White’s book (starts on p. 39 of the PDF file at this link)?Patrick D. Miller, “Cosmology and World Order in the Old Testament The Divine Council as Cosmic-Political Symbol,” Horizons in Biblical Theology 9, no. 2 (1987): 53-78.David Marron Fleming, “The Divine Council as Type Scene in the Hebrew Bible (Bible).” PhD diss., Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, 1989Min Suc, Kee, “The heavenly council and its type-scene,” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 31, no. 3 (2007): 259-273James Stokes Ackerman, “An exegetical study of Psalm 82: a thesis.” PhD diss., Harvard University, 1966R. B. Salters, “Psalm 82, 1 and the Septuagint,” Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 103, no. 2 (1991): 225-239Lowell K. Handy, “Sounds, Words and Meanings in Psalm 82,” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 47 (1990): 51-66Willem S. Prinsloo, “Psalm 82: once again, gods or men?” Biblica (1995): 219-228Daniel F. Porter, “God Among the Gods: An Analysis of the Function of Yahweh in the Divine Council of Deuteronomy 32 and Psalm 82,” Masters Thesis; Liberty Baptist Theological Seminary and Graduate School (2010)Mark S. Smith, “When the Heavens Darkened: Yahweh, El, and the Divine Astral Family in Iron Age II Judah’,” Symbiosis, Symbolism, and the Power of the Past: Canaan, Ancient Israel, and Their Neighbors from the Late Bronze Age Through Roman Palaestina (2003): 265.Ida Zatelli, “Astrology and the Worship of the Stars in the Bible,” Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 103, no. 1 (1991): 86-99.S. B. Parker, “Sons of (The) God(S),” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)G. Cooke, “The Sons of (the) God(s), Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 76 (1964) 22–47F. Lelli, “Stars,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)Content DiscussionThere are a number of divine council issues covered in the notes to chapter four. With respect to this third chapter, however, I want to draw the attention of readers to the modern critical notion that Psalm 82 conveys that Yahweh and El are separate deities.I’ve address this issue at length elsewhere in publications listed above. For example:Michael S. Heiser, “Are Yahweh and El Distinct Deities in Deut. 32:8-9 and Psalm 82?” HIPHIL 3 (2006)Michael S. Heiser, “Does Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible Demonstrate an Evolution from Polytheism to Monotheism in Israelite Religion?” Journal for the Evangelical Study of the Old Testament 1:1 (2012): 1-24?Specifically, the latter article (pp. 18-20) rebuts a recent articulation of the critical perspective about Psalm 82 that has El and Yahweh as separate deities (David Frankel, ?“El ?as ?the ?Speaking ?Voice ?in ?Psalm ?82:6-8,” ?Journal of Hebrew Scriptures 16 ?(2010); located online here.Lastly, A number of studies of the divine council will contend (rather mildly) for a four-tiered council (see Mark S. Smith, The Origins of BIblical Monotheism: Israel’s Polytheistic Background and the Ugaritic Texts [Oxford, 2001], 45-47). Other than the highest tier of authority (El and Athirat at Ugarit; Yahweh and the co-regent Yahweh for biblical Israel), the tier for the “sons of? El” (Ugarit) and the “sons of God” (Israel), and the tier for messenger deities (ml?km; “angels”; Ugarit and Israel), the alleged fourth tier includes “craftsmen deities.”Evidence for this tier at Ugarit is weak. Smith admits this level “is poorly represented in the Ugaritic texts” (Origins, 46). It is witnessed by (apparently) only one deity (Kothar wa-Hasis).? Smith opines that this deity doesn’t have second-tier status since he was an outsider—a foreigner—whose home was in Egypt and Crete.? However, if the El-Dagan correspondence reflects a merger between Canaanite and Amorite religion, the inclusion of an outside deity is not sufficient for eliminating a deity from the second tier, as Baal is the “son of Dagan” and is certainly second tier. Baal also calls El his father (KTU2 1.17 i 23) and is described as the son of El (KTU2 1.17 vi 29). Scholars have attempted resolutions of El and Dagan as the same deity to resolve the discrepancy (Wyatt: 375-379; Schloen, 2001: 354), but there is no consensus. Given the?total absence of a “craftsman” tier in the Hebrew Bible, when its general structure is otherwise so similar to that of Ugarit, there seems little reason to argue for this structural element of the council.Chapter 4: God AloneBibliography included in the bookMichael S. Heiser, “Monotheism, Polytheism, Monolatry, or Henotheism? Toward an Assessment of Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible” Bulletin of Biblical Research 18:1 (2008): 1-30.Michael S. Heiser, “Does Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible Demonstrate an Evolution from Polytheism to Monotheism in Israelite Religion?” Journal for the Evangelical Study of the Old Testament 1:1 (2012): 1-24Jan Assmann, “Monotheism and Polytheism,” in Ancient Religions (ed. Sarah Iles Johnston; Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2007), 17-31 (esp. 17-20).Polytheism is a religious system—not a vocabulary word like elohim. Assmann’s work discusses the necessary components of polytheistic religion. I draw from the essay in my Tyndale Bulletin article listed below.Michael S. Heiser, “Monotheism and the Language of Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls,” Tyndale Bulletin 65:1 (2014): 85-100?Michael S. Heiser, “Does Deuteronomy 32:17 Assume or Deny the Reality of Other Gods?” Bible Translator 59:3 (July 2008): 137-145The answer is that it affirms the existence of other elohim. The article is an analysis of the syntax of Deut. 32:17. Paul of course tracks on Deut. 32 (including v. 17) in his discussion of demons in 1 Cor 10 (see Waters below). To deny the reality of plural elohim in Deut. 32:17 is to deny the existence of demons.?Guy Waters, The End of Deuteronomy in the Epistles of Paul (WUNT 221; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006)Michael P. Dick, Born in Heaven, Made on Earth: The Making of the Cult Image in the Ancient Near East (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1999)Additional Bibliography Continuing with bibliography on these subjects (Note: several of these sources will espouse the idea that biblical monotheism arose out of polytheistic roots).Casper J. Labuschagne, The Incomparability of Yahweh in the Old Testament (E. J. Brill, 1966)Catrin H. Williams, “I am He”: The Meaning and Interpretation of “ANI HU” in Jewish and Early Christian Literature (WUNT 113, Reihe 2; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1999)Nathan MacDonald, Deuteronomy and the Meaning of” Monotheism (FZAT 1, Reihe 2; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 2012)Mark S. Smith, The origins of biblical monotheism: Israel’s polytheistic background and the Ugaritic texts. Oxford University Press, 2001Michael S. Heiser, “The Divine Council in Late Canonical and Non-Canonical Second Temple Jewish Literature.” PhD diss., UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON, 2004Michael S. Heiser, “Should ????? (?elo?hi?m) with Plural Predication be Translated “Gods”? Bible Translator 61:3 (July 2010): 123-136Susan Ackerman, Under Every Green Tree: Popular Religion in Sixth-Century Judah (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1992)David Penchansky, Twilight of the Gods: Polytheism in the Hebrew Bible (Westminster John Knox Press, 2005)Michael S. Heiser, Review of Twilight of the Gods: Polytheism in the Hebrew Bible, by David Penchansky (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2005), Journal of Hebrew Scriptures 6 (2006-2007); online journal.Content DiscussionThis chapter raised a number of content trajectories that need follow-up, some in considerable detail. I have numbered and titled them for convenience.1. My rejection of the dominant critical view that the Yahwism of the biblical authors evolved from polytheism.Many scholars take the view that the religion of biblical Israel evolved from polytheism to monotheism, and that the Hebrew Bible evinces this evolution. I reject that idea for the biblical writers, but acknowledge (in accord with the biblical description, especially during the monarchy) that many Israelites were polytheistic in their own thinking and practice. Like today, when many Christians hold to flawed theological ideas (realizing that or not), so it was in the biblical period – when there was little or no written Bible. My rejection of the presumed evolution of Yahwism out of polytheism speaks only to the beliefs of the biblical writers.My rejection of this view is not driven by evangelical confession. Those familiar with evangelical theology are familiar with the concept of “progressive revelation”—basically the idea that God did not reveal all truth about himself to biblical writers at one time, that revelation was incremental. It would be very easy for me to adopt the standard view of biblical monotheism in mainstream scholarship—that it evolved out of polytheism—and just assign that to progressive revelation (“God straightened the Israelites out in stages”). I don’t do that because I genuinely find the arguments for this presumed evolution hopelessly circular and dependent on psychologizing the biblical writers (requiring near omniscience at that). I just don’t find the standard model at all persuasive. My dissertation and articles have (hopefully) explained the problems I see with that model.2. The relationship of Jesus to the divine council.Readers of The Unseen Realm will know I identify Jesus with Yahweh, who is Lord of the council. More specifically, though, I wrote a paper for a regional SBL conference a few years ago that addressed the use of Psalm 82:6 in John 10:34. The link to that paper is below. I am currently in the process of revising that paper for submission to an academic journal. If and when that is published, I may have to remove this link. (Note that some excerpts of that paper/article are found below under number 6 – the flaws of presuming elohim in Psalm 82 are humans (the “human elohim” view).Michael S. Heiser, “Jesus’ Quotation of Psalm 82:6 in John 10:34: A Different View of John‘s Theological Strategy,” Paper read at the 2012 regional meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature?I should also note here that readers have asked for documentation about Greek monogenes meaning “unique”. Here are the entries from Moulton and Milligan and the most recent BDAG:μονογεν??????? 3439 is literally “one of a kind,” “only,” “unique” (unicus), not “only-begotten,” which would be μονογ?ννητο? (unigenitus), and is common in the LXX in this sense (e.g. Judg 11:34, Ps 21 (22):21, 24 (25):16, Tob 3:15). It is similarly used in the NT of “only” sons and daughters (Lk 7:12, 8:42, 9:38), and is so applied in a special sense to Christ in Jn 1:14, 18, 3:16, 18, 1 Jn 4:9, where the emphasis is on the thought that, as the “only” Son of God, He has no equal and is able fully to reveal the Father. We cannot enter here into the doctrinal aspects of the word, or into a discussion on the sources, Orphic or Gnostic, from which John is sometimes supposed to have drawn his use of it, but reference may be made to the art. by Kattenbusch “Only Begotten” in Hastings’ DCG ii. p. 281f. where the relative literature is given. A few exx. of the title from non-Biblical sources will, however, be of interest. In an imprecatory tablet from Carthage of iii/A.D., Wünsch AF p. 1837, we find—?ρκ?ζω σε τ?ν θε?ν . . . τ?ν μονογεν? τ?ν ?ξ α?το? ?ναφαν?ντα, where the editor cites the great magical Paris papyrus, 1585 ε?σ?κουσ?ν μου ? ε?? μονογεν??. With this may be compared P Leid Vv. 34 (iii/iv A.D.) (= II. p. 21) ε?χαριστ? σοι κ?ριε ?[τι] μοι [?λυσεν] τ? ?γιον πνε?μα, τ? μονογεν??, τ? ζω?ν. See also Vett. Val. p. 1132. An inscr. in memory of a certain Plutarchus, Kaibel 1464 (iii/iv A.D.) describes him as μουνογεν?? περ ??ν κα? πατ?ρεσσι φ?λο?. And the word is apparently used as a proper name in C. and B. i. p. 115, No. 17 (Hierapolis) Φλαβιαν?? ? κα? Μονογονι? ε?χαριστ? τ? θε?, where Ramsay thinks that we should probably read Μονογ?νη? or Μηνογ?νη?. For the true reading in Jn 1:18 it is hardly necessary to refer to Hort’s classical discussion in Two Dissertations, p. 1ff.James Hope Moulton and George Milligan, The Vocabulary of the Greek Testament (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1930), 416–417.μονογεν??, ?? (μ?νο?, γ?νο?; Hes.; LXX; PsSol 18, 4; TestSol 20:2; TestBenj 9:2; ParJer 7:26; ApcEsdr 6:16; ApcSed 9:2; Joseph., Just.; loanw. in rabb.) acc. μονογεν? (-?ν J 3:16 v.l.; Hb 11:17 D; also ApcEsdr 6:16)① pert. to being the only one of its kind within a specific relationship, one and only, only (so mostly, incl. Judg 11:34; Tob 3:15; 8:17) of children: of Isaac, Abraham’s only son (Jos., Ant. 1, 222) Hb 11:17. Of an only son (PsSol 18:4; TestSol 20:2; ParJer 7:26; Plut., Lycurgus 59 [31, 8]; Jos., Ant. 20, 20) Lk 7:12; 9:38. Of a daughter (Diod S 4, 73, 2) of Jairus 8:42. (On the motif of a child’s death before that of a parent s. EpigrAnat 13, ’89, 128f, no. 2; 18, ’91, 94 no. 4 [244/45 A.D.]; GVI nos. 1663–69.)② pert. to being the only one of its kind or class, unique (in kind) of someth. that is the only example of its category (Cornutus 27 p, 49, 13 ε?? κ. μονογεν?? ? κ?σμο? ?στ?. μονογεν? κ. μ?να ?στ?ν=‘unique and alone’; Pla., Timaeus 92c; Theosophien 181, §56, 27). Of a mysterious bird, the Phoenix 1 Cl 25:2.—In the Johannine lit. (s. also ApcEsdr and ApcSed: ? μονογεν?? υ???; Hippol., Ref. 8, 10, 3; Did., Gen. 89, 18; ?μνο?μ?ν γε θε?ν κα? τ?ν μ. α?το? Orig., C. Cels. 8, 67, 14; cp. ? δ?ναμι? ?κε?νη ? μ. Hippol., Ref. 10, 16, 6) μονογεν?? υ??? is used only of Jesus. The renderings only, unique may be quite adequate for all its occurrences here (so M-M., NRSV et al.; DMoody, JBL 72, ’53, 213–19; FGrant, ATR 36, ’54, 284–87; GPendrick, NTS 41, ’95, 587–600). τ?ν υ??ν τ?ν μ. ?δωκεν J 3:16 (Philo Bybl. [100 A.D.]: 790 Fgm. 2 ch. 10, 33 Jac. [in Eus., PE 1, 10, 33]: Cronus offers up his μονογεν?? υ???). ? μ. υ??? το? θεο? vs. 18; τ?ν υ??ν τ?ν μ. ?π?σταλκεν ? θε?? 1J 4:9; cp. Dg 10:2. On the expr. δ?ξαν ?? μονογενο?? παρ? πατρ?? J 1:14 s. Hdb. ad loc. and PWinter, Zeitschrift für Rel. u. Geistesgeschichte 5, ’53, 335–65 (Engl.). See also Hdb. on vs. 18 where, beside the rdg. μονογεν?? θε?? (considered by many the orig.) an only-begotten one, God (acc. to his real being; i.e. uniquely divine as God’s son and transcending all others alleged to be gods) or a uniquely begotten deity (for the perspective s. J 10:33–36), another rdg. ? μονογεν?? υ??? is found. MPol 20:2 in the doxology δι? παιδ?? α?το? το? μονογενο?? ?ησο? Χριστο?. Some (e.g. WBauer, Hdb.; JBulman, Calvin Theological Journal 16, ’81, 56–79; JDahms, NTS 29, ’83, 222–32) prefer to regard μ. as somewhat heightened in mng. in J and 1J to only-begotten or begotten of the Only One, in view of the emphasis on γενν?σθαι ?κ θεο? (J 1:13 al.); in this case it would be analogous to πρωτ?τοκο? (Ro 8:29; Col 1:15 al.).—On the mng. of μονογεν?? in history of religion s. the material in Hdb.3 25f on J 1:14 (also Plut., Mor. 423a Πλ?των … α?τ? δ? φησι δοκε?ν ?να το?τον [sc. τ?ν κ?σμον] ε?ναι μονογεν? τ? θε? κα? ?γαπητ?ν; Wsd 7:22 of σοφ?α: ?στι ?ν α?τ? πνε?μα νοερ?ν ?γιον μονογεν??.—Vett. Val. 11, 32) as well as the lit. given there, also HLeisegang, Der Bruder des Erl?sers: Αγγελο? I 1925, 24–33; RBultmann J (comm., KEK) ’50, 47 n. 2; 55f.—DELG s.v. μ?νω. M-M. EDNT. TW. Sv.William Arndt, Frederick W. Danker, and Walter Bauer, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000), 658.3. How does the matter of biblical divine plurality (plural elohim that are real) relate to the Shema?Another issue is how the divine council relates to the Shema (Deut. 6:4). There is no conflict since the term elohim is not tied to a specific set of attributes. When Israelites affirmed the Shema, a creed that says “Yahweh our God . . . ” it was not a denial that other elohim existed (something the Old Testament elsewhere presumes and affirms). Rather, the claim was specific loyalty to Yahweh and recognition of his unique covenant relationship to Israel. That loyalty was in turn tied to certain beliefs about Yahweh—e.g., that he was incomparable and unique among the elohim. These points of uniqueness are part of the discussion in Chapter 4. See the brief discussion (and the footnotes) of the Shema in Chapter 38 of The Unseen Realm along with other bibliographic items for this chapter.4. The elohim of Psalm 82 are not humans; the “human elohim” view lacks coherence and biblical support.Elements of this flawed perception are addressed in several of my published journal articles listed under the additional bibliography, particularly the Bible Translator article on elohim with plural predication. However, more detail in this regard can be found in a paper I wrote for the 2010 annual meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society: Should the Plural ????? of Psalm 82 Be Understood as Men or Divine Beings?” The paper is available here, but I have excerpted portions below.The “human elohim” view proceeds along certain trajectories, all of which fail to find support in the biblical text.Perhaps the most familiar argument for the human view of ????? is the one that insists certain Old Testament passages name the elders of Israel as ????? judges. Once we look at the passages used for that argument, we’ll see that the argument lacks credibility.Exodus 22:6-8 [Eng., 22:7-9] is an important text in this argument. The translation used here is from the JPS Tanakh:6 When a man gives money or goods to another for safekeeping, and they are stolen from the man’s house—if the thief is caught, he shall pay double; 7 if the thief is not caught, the owner of the house shall come near (????) to God (??????) that he has not laid hands on the other’s property. 8 In all charges of misappropriation—pertaining to an ox, an ass, a sheep, a garment, or any other loss, whereof one party alleges, “This is it”—the case of both parties shall come before God (??????): he whom God (?????) declares guilty (???????) shall pay double to the other (JPS Tanakh, 1985).Scholars who deny that the plural ????? in Ps 82:1 are divine beings assume that ????? and ?????? in Exod 22:6-8 are human beings (the elder-judges of Israel) and take the results of that assumption to argue that Psalm 82 is describing Israelite judges, not gods in a divine council. The plural predicate in Exod 22:8 (???????) allegedly supports this view, for surely the passage speaks of Israel’s judges rendering decisions for the people. There are several problems with this use of the passage.It is worth noting that these judges (if we presume for the moment that ?????? and ????? are plural and referring to people) are rendering decisions for the nation of Israel – not the nations of the world as is the case in Psalm 82 and Deut 32. This contextual disconnect alone raises suspicions about the merits of the use of the passage. The contextual incongruence aside, the argument here actually depends on whether ????? and ?????? in verse 8 is to be taken as singular (as the Tanakh translation has) or plural, and whether it in fact refers to human beings. As I demonstrate in my Bible Translator article on elohim with plural predication, such grammatical-syntactical instances do not point to plural elohim. In several cases, there are other clear grammatical sign-posts that indicate that, despite the plural predication, the singular God of Israel is in view. I submit that the translation of the JPS Tanakh above is perfectly fine and linguistically coherent. We do not have plurality of elohim in Exod 22, and so we do not have plural human “elohim judges”.Behind the assumption that ????? and ?????? in Exod 22:8 are to be understood as semantically plural human beings is the earlier story in Exodus, where Moses appointed judges at the suggestion of his father-in-law, Jethro. This account is found in Exod 18:13-24. Note the occurrences of ????? and ?????? carefully (ESV):13 The next day, Moses sat as magistrate among the people, while the people stood about Moses from morning until evening. 14 But when Moses’ father-in-law saw how much he had to do for the people, he said, “What is this thing that you are doing to the people? Why do you act alone, while all the people stand about you from morning until evening?” 15 Moses replied to his father-in-law, “It is because the people come to me to inquire of God (?????). 16 When they have a dispute, it comes before me, and I decide between one person and another, and I make known the laws and teachings of God.” 17 But Moses’ father-in-law said to him, “The thing you are doing is not right; 18 you will surely wear yourself out, and these people as well. For the task is too heavy for you; you cannot do it alone. 19 Now listen to me. I will give you counsel, and God (?????) be with you! You represent the people before God (??????): you bring the disputes before God (??????), 20 and enjoin upon them the laws and the teachings, and make known to them the way they are to go and the practices they are to follow. 21 You shall also seek out from among all the people capable men who fear God, trustworthy men who spurn ill-gotten gain. Set these over them as chiefs of thousands, hundreds, fifties, and tens, and 22 let them judge the people at all times. Have them bring every major dispute to you, but let them decide every minor dispute themselves. Make it easier for yourself by letting them share the burden with you. 23 If you do this—and God so commands you—you will be able to bear up; and all these people too will go home unwearied.” 24 Moses heeded his father-in-law and did just as he had said.Taken straightforwardly, there is nothing in Exodus 18 that compels us to understand ????? or ?????? as semantically plural, something that is essential for the notion that the men appointed in the episode are a convenient explanation for the ????? and ?????? of both Exod 22:8 and Psa 82. Each occurrence of ????? or ?????? in this passage can quite readily refer to the singular God of Israel (as the ESV has). The same is true of Exodus 22. There is nothing in either passage that compels a plural translation. A singular translation referring to God himself makes for a clear reading. Without compelling evidence for a plural translation, the argument that the elders of Israel were ????? judges turns to vapor. But even damaging is the fact that the men appointed by Moses in Exodus 18 are never actually called ????? or ?????? in the text. This account of the appointment of judges, then, is no support for seeing human elohim in Psalm 82.There is one other passage that speaks of ????? in a context similar to that of Exod 22:8. Exodus 21:2-6 must be brought into the discussion:2 When you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years, and in the seventh he shall go out free, for nothing. 3 If he comes in single, he shall go out single; if he comes in married, then his wife shall go out with him. 4 If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her master’s, and he shall go out alone. 5 But if the slave plainly says, ‘I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free,’ 6 then his master shall bring him to God (??????), and he shall bring him to the door or the doorpost. And his master shall bore his ear through with an awl, and he shall be his slave forever.The interpretation is put forth that the master is commanded to bring the slave before the elder-judges of Israel before piercing his ear, and that these judges are called ??????. This position appears coherent, but there are obstacles to its lucidity.First, ?????? could easily be semantically singular, referring to the God of Israel, as was the case with Exod 18 and Exod 22. The promise about the status of the slave is being made in truth before God (akin to our “so help me God” pledge in a courtroom). This is the simplest reading. Some scholars, like Tigay, suggest that “God” could have been deleted from the ceremony if it was secularized (Deuteronomy; The JPS Torah Commentary, 15). But there is no obvious rationale why Israelites would have stripped God out of a traditional ceremony. Ancient Israelites weren’t modern rationalists.There is evidence that the redactor-scribes responsible for the final form of the text did not interpret ?????? as singular—and also did not interpret the resulting plurality as referring to human beings!The key is the parallel passage in Deuteronomy 15. Later redactors apparently saw ?????? as semantically plural since the parallel to it found in Deut 15:17 removes the word ?????? from the instruction. This omission is inexplicable if the term was taken as singular, referring to YHWH. Why would the God of Israel need to be removed from this text? Moreover, if ?????? had been construed as plural humans, Israel’s judges, the deletion is just as puzzling. What harm would there be if the point of the passage was that Israel’s judges needed to approve the status of the slave?The excision on the part of the writer is quite understandable, though, if ?????? was intended as a semantically plural word that referred to gods. Seventy years ago Cyrus Gordon pointed out that the omission in Deuteronomy appears to have been theologically motivated (Cyrus H. Gordon, “????? in Its Reputed Meaning of Rulers, Judges,” Journal of Biblical Literature 54 [1935]: 139-44.). Gordon argued that ?????? in Exod 21:6 referred to “household gods” like the teraphim of other passages. Bringing a slave into one’s home in patriarchal culture required the consent and approval of one’s ancestors—departed human dead who were ????? as we saw much earlier was the case in 1 Sam 28:13. Teraphim figurines commemorated the dead, much in the way pictures of departed loved ones do now in our culture. Ancient Israelites would bring offerings to teraphim, not as acts of worship (though for sure some could have crossed the line to idolatry), but as a goodwill gesture or to please the deceased (as we lay flowers or other objects at graves), who were still thought to be alive in the realm of the dead (Sheol, or what we might call “the other side” or “the spiritual world”). Under a later redaction of the Torah after the horror of the exile—brought on by idolatry—this phrase was omitted in the wake of Israel’s struggle failure and second chance in returning to the land.The point is that only a plural referring to multiple divine beings can coherently explain the deletion. There is no theological purpose for deleting God or human judges from the passage. As a result, this passage is no support for the plural human ????? view.5. Psalm 45:7 has the Israelite king being called elohim.This objection presumes two things that are problematic: (1) That the psalmist’s statement, “Your Throne, O God, is forever and ever” must refer to the Israelite king; and (2) That the statement can apply to humans generally.The original orientation of ???????? in Psalm 45:6-7 can quite coherently be God himself. For example, Goldingay, an evangelical, noting the structure of the psalm’s statement renders the passage this way:5 Your arrows are sharpened—peoples are beneath your feet—they fall in the heart of the king’s enemies;6a the throne, God’s, is yours forever and ever.Goldingay comments (underlining mine):“As the king acts in the pursuit of truthfulness and faithfulness, expecting to see God doing marvels, then opponents will fall before him. On any reading the order of the cola is jerky; [Many English versions] reverse some of the phrases to make the text read more smoothly. Verse 5 is yet another pair of four-stress cola, with the second clause in v. 5a forming a parenthesis; the “they” is the arrows. The declaration in v. 6a then closes off these comments on the king’s power. His victories reflect the fact that he sits on God’s throne (e.g., 1 Chron. 29:23), ruling Israel on God’s behalf, and destined to rule the world on God’s behalf (cf. Ps. 2). That in itself would make the king’s throne last forever. The fact that God made a lasting commitment to the Davidic king’s throne would also have that implication. It is a further reason for the king to go out confidently to impose truthfulness and faithfulness on the nations, and the fact that he does so victoriously is an indication that he indeed sits on this throne.6b Your royal rod is an upright rod;7a you have dedicated yourself to faithfulness and thus been against faithlessness.I thus take vv. 6b–7a as a pair of parallel cola, reverting to the moral implications of that power of the king.”Source: J. Goldingay, Baker Commentary on the Old Testament: Psalms 42–89 (ed. Tremper Longman III; vol. 2; Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2006), 58.In any event, if one considers the term as describing the king in divine terms as an adaptation of ancient Near Eastern thought, the term cannot be extended to anyone who was not the king. Psalm 45:7 cannot justify saying the term elohim refers broadly to human judges.6. Jesus’ Use of Psalm 82:6 in John 10:34A second strategy for arguing the plural ????? of Psalm 82 are humans attempts to utilize the quotation of Psalm 82:6 by Jesus in John 10:34. I would suggest that this text has been fundamentally misunderstood by New Testament scholars who approach it with little or no background knowledge of the divine council.Briefly, the context of Jesus’ quotation is crucial. In John 10:30 he has just told his audience that he and the Father were one. Jesus isn’t going to follow that statement by essentially saying “I get to call myself God because you mere mortals do it too by virtue of Psalm 82.” That approach undermines John’s presentation in this chapter of the deity of Jesus, yet this is precisely the trajectory one finds of all the published material on John 10:34 and its use of Psalm 82.This backdrop is important for interpreting the significance of Jesus’ quotation of Psalm 82:6 in John 10:34-35. I have never come across the view I have of this issue in print, and so it seems best to give the full context of Jesus’ quotation in order to make my thoughts clear (John 10:22-42):22 And it was at Jerusalem the feast of the dedication, and it was winter. 23 And Jesus walked in the temple in Solomon’s porch. 24 Then came the Jews round about him, and said to him, “How long are you going to make us doubt? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.” 25 Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you believed not: the works that I do in my Father’s name, they bear witness of me. 26 But you believe not, because you are not of my sheep, as I said to you. 27 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: 28 And I give to them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall anyone pluck them out of my hand. 29 My Father, who gave them to me, is greater than all; and no one is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand. 30 I and my Father are one.” 31 Then the Jews took up stones again to stone him. 32 Jesus answered them, “Many good works have I shown you from my Father; for which of those works do you stone me?” 33 The Jews answered him, saying, “For a good work we would not stone you; but for blasphemy; and because that you, being a man, make yourself God.”The quotation of Psalm 82:6 follows:34 Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your law: ‘I said, you are gods?’ 35 If he [God] called them gods, to whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken; 36 do you say of him whom the Father has sanctified and sent into the world, ‘You blaspheme!’ because I said, I am the Son of God? 37 If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not. 38 But if I do, though you don’t believe me, believe the works: that you may know, and believe, that the Father is in me, and I in him.” 39 Therefore they sought again to take him: but he escaped out of their hand, 40 And went away again beyond Jordan into the place where John at first baptized; and there he abode. 41 And many resorted unto him, and said, John did no miracle: but all things that John spake of this man were true. 42 And many believed on him there.Here is what we can glean without interpretive disagreement:Jesus’ prefaced his quotation by asserting that he and the Father were one (10:30).This claim was regarded as blasphemy in that Jesus was making himself out to be God (10:33).In defense of his assertion, Jesus quoted Psalm 82:6. That is, to establish his claim to be God, Jesus went to Psalm 82:6.He follows the quotation with the statement that the Father was in him, and he was in the Father.?The consensus view of this quotation is that Jesus was endorsing the human ????? view and thereby arguing, “I have every right to call myself divine—you guys can do it as well on the basis of Psalm 82:6.” The problem, of course, is that this amounts to Jesus saying “you mere mortals can call yourself gods, so I can, too.” If this is what John intends to communicate to go along with verse 30 to put forth the idea of Jesus’ deity, it’s an inept strategy.I propose that Jesus knew the ????? of Psalm 82 were not human, and that Jesus was in fact asserting his own unique ontological oneness with the Father. HYPERLINK "" \l "_ftn1" [1] The human ????? view derives from two assumptions brought to the text: (1) that it is required by the assumed impossibility of there being other ????? because of Judeo-Christian monotheism; and (2) that the phrase “to whom the word of God came” refers to the Jews who received the law at Sinai (i.e., the Pharisees’ forefathers). This paper has already dispensed with the first assumption, so we’ll move to the latter.I would suggest that what first needs to be done is to come to terms with what is meant by “the word of God” and who it is that receives that word in Psalm 82:6-7:I said, ‘You are gods (?????), even sons of the Most High (??? ?????), all of you; nevertheless, like humans you will die, and fall like any prince.’The speaker (“I”) in the passage is the God of Israel, the God who is standing in the council in 82:1 among the ?????. God announces that the ????? of the council are his sons, but because of their corruption (vv. 2-5), they will lose their immortality. I believe that Jesus was referring to this utterance itself when he quoted the psalm, not the Jewish nation receiving the law at Sinai or the revelation that would become the Old Testament. To illustrate the difference in the views:?Common Interpretation /Jesus’ strategy assumes ????? are humanMy view / Jesus’ strategy assumes ????? are divineThe “word of God that came” = revelation from God at Sinai, or the entire OT“to whom the word of God came” = the Jews at Sinai, or the Jews generallyResult = the Jews are the “sons of the Most High” and ????? — so Jesus can call himself an ????? as well, since he’s a Jew, too.The “word of God that came” = the utterance itself in Psalm 82:6 – the pronouncement from God“to whom the word of God came” = the ????? of the divine council in 82:1Result = The Jews are not ?????, and Jesus reminds his enemies that their Scriptures say there are other ????? who are divine sons—and this on the heels of declaring himself one with the Father (John 10:30) puts him in the position of not only claiming divinity as a son of the Most High, but by claiming to be above the sons of God since he is one with the Father.?Nowhere in Psalm 82 do we have any hint of the Mosaic Law, Sinai, a Jewish nation, or the canonical revelation given to the Jews. Every element in the commonly held view must be inserted into the passage. My view is that Jesus is quoting Psalm 82:6 to put forth the idea that he was more than human. He reminds his Jewish audience that there were in fact other ????? besides the God of Israel, and those ????? were God’s sons. Because he calls himself the son of God and has in fact just claimed to be one with Yahweh, not only puts himself in the class of the sons of the Most High of Psalm 82:6—divine ?????—but implies that he is Lord of the council. This particular son of the Most High is one with the Father. The Jewish authorities got the message, too—they charged him with blasphemy. Now ask yourself, why would they do that if all Jesus was saying was “you mortal Jews get to call yourselves sons of God, and ?????, so I can, too.” That makes no sense at all.7. The elohim as “demons” (shedim) in Deut 32:17.Some recent work on demons by evangelical scholar John Walton requires some comment.John Walton, “Demons in Mesopotamia and Israel: Exploring the Category of Non-Divine but Supernatural Entities,” in Windows to the Ancient World of the Hebrew Bible: Essays in Honor of Samuel Greengus (ed. Bill T. Arnold, Nancy L. Erickson, and John H. Walton; Winona Lake, Ind.; Eisenbrauns, 2014), 229-246.Walton’s article is helpful and informative in many respects, but its content in certain places could be unnecessarily misunderstood. There may be a couple of problematic statements in the essay, but I must admit that I’m not exactly sure what Walton is and isn’t saying. The wording in the article is unclear at points.To begin, it should be reiterated that Deut. 32:17 transparently and explicitly refers to “demons” (Hebrew: shedim) as elohim. Many modern translations muddle this point or even violate the text. Unfortunately, many readers (even scholars) who presume elohim refers to a single set of unique attributes never look past the poor translations of the verse. For those who read Hebrew, the point of Deut. 32:17 is straightforward. Things only go awry when assumptions about elohim are brought to the text.??????????? ??????????? ???? ??????? ????????? ???? ????????? ?????????? ????????? ??????? ???? ?????????? ????????????The verse in Hebrew is clear. “They (the Israelites) sacrificed to demons (shedim), not God (Hebrew: Eloah; ???????; ?eloah), gods (elohim) they had not known—new ones (i.e., new gods) that had come recently, whom your fathers did not dread.” In other words, rather than deny shedim are gods (as some translations wind up saying), it says the opposite explicitly.Some translators are confused by the defective spelling of ???????, a term that never refers to plural gods, but only God (hence my translation above, which follows other translations). Any translation that has “not gods” in Deut. 32:17 is simply wrong. I discuss that issue and the translation of this verse at length in my journal article:“Does Deuteronomy 32:17 Assume or Deny the Reality of Other Gods?” Bible Translator 59:3 (July 2008): 137-145Walton’s goal in the article is to articulate a taxonomy of divine beings that allows alignment between the spiritual worldviews of Mesopotamia and Israel. Consequently, he excludes civilizations like that of Egypt and ancient Canaan (e.g., Ugarit) from focus. While the title of the article is clear (its focus is Mesopotamia), these exclusions will cause some consternation with the contents among those familiar with the other material, especially that of Ugarit. To make claims about Israel’s divine council without appeal to Ugaritic material—which all scholars in the field note constitutes the closest parallels in this regard to Israelite religion—will produce statements that can be misconstrued.Walton begins by rightly pointing out the problem of “demonic” terminology:“No general term for ‘demons’ exists in any of the major cultures of the ancient Near East or in the Hebrew Bible. They are generally considered one of the categories of “spirit beings” (along with gods and ghosts). The term demons has had a checkered history; in today’s theological usage the term denotes beings, often fallen angels, who are intrinsically evil and who do the bidding of their master, Satan. This definition, however, only became commonplace long after the Hebrew Bible was complete. The idea of evil spirits under the control of a chief demon cannot be assumed for the ancient Near East or for the Hebrew Bible, and even for the New Testament requires careful assessment. . . . The Hellenistic period has creatures referred to as daimon in the hierarchy of spirit beings. Yet the term demon is simply a Latinized spelling of this word, and cannot be used to label the Hellenistic category, because etymologically, the Greek term daimon can refer to spirit beings who are either protagonist or antagonist, beneficial or harmful, benign or sinister. The term daimon could be applied to any being that was higher than a human and lower than a god. These beings were morally neutral. Thus the English term demon is already a prejudicial label that undermines the investigation due to anachronism.” (229-230)I would agree with what Walton says here, except to note that it isn’t correct that Greek daimon is not a word used of gods in classical Greek literature. (Walton does not say that directly, but his wording implies it). On daimon, see the discussion in E. Rexine, “Daimon in classical Greek literature,” Greek Orthodox Theological Review 37 (1985): 29-52.Walton proceeds from this note to sketch a taxonomic hierarchy. In simplest terms that hierarchy for divine beings for Mesopotamia and the Hebrew Bible looks like this:Gods (Class I): defined as those who receive sacrifices; Walton reserves the term elohim (singular or plural, or with a qualifier like “sons of”) for this classFunctionaries (Class II): Walton assigns mal?akim (“angels”), cherubim, seraphim, shedim, etc. to this class; malevolent spirits go here as wellGhosts (Class III): spirits of the deadWalton’s article references Deut. 32:17 in two places: page 239 (footnote 46) and page 240 (footnote 49). In his discussion of shedim, Walton writes:“There is no precedent for class II spirits to be equated with the class I members of the divine council, even after they are largely domesticated in later Mesopotamian literature. Since the ?edi?m in the Hebrew Bible are receiving sacrifices, they have more in common with the class I ?dyn from Transjordan than with the class II ?edu in Akkadian literature. Transjordanian gods would also be more likely to have been part of the syncretism of the wilderness generation than Babylonian guardian figures. Therefore, ?edi?m most likely refers to class I spirits from the Mesopotamian side of the ledger, who are illegitimately treated as class I spirits in syncretistic Israel.”The first sentence could be confused to the effect that Walton is claiming that angels (mal?akim – a Class II term in his scheme) are not part of the divine council. Such a claim would, of course, be disputed by a number of studies on the divine council. Walton is aware of this material. His point is that shedim (plural) comes from Akkadian shedu (singular form), which in Mesopotamian religion is a term used for a “Class II” being (guardian). This isn’t a denial that angels are included in Israel’s divine council, nor is it a statement that the Hebrew Bible wrongly includes Class II beings in the divine council. Walton, as I read him, is simply talking about mixed terminology. But the wording is admittedly a bit difficult to navigate.If I am reading Walton correctly, the observation above is not at odds with the plain reading (in Hebrew) of Deut. 32:17.However, there are still points of confusion. On the same page Walton says:“If one is considering a contextual understanding of the Hebrew Bible, there is no basis for considering s??‘iri?m or ?edi?m to be “demons” or class II spirits in Israelite thinking. With no clearly established demonology in the Hebrew Bible it is also questionable whether we can say that the Israelites believed the foreign gods to be demons. If the textual variant in Deuteronomy 32 reading ‘Sons of God’ rather than ‘Sons of Israel’ is to be preferred, as I think it is, the foreign gods would be associated with the divine council and class II spirits are never part of the divine council.”I’m not sure what Walton is claiming here, and so I’m not sure if I disagree. I think it best to state what I think is clear from the biblical text. I’ll try to explain.One on hand, Walton says “it is also questionable whether we can say that the Israelites believed the foreign gods to be demons,” but follows with “the foreign gods would be associated with the divine council and class II spirits are never part of the divine council.” The first part seems to contradict Walton’s earlier statement that the Israelites worshipped gods that they presumed were shedim—unless Walton’s point is that Israel erroneously called them shedim. I’m not sure. The second meaning would remove a contradiction for what he says, but it (possibly) puts him at odds with Paul. As many scholars have noted, Paul is following Deut. 32 in 1 Cor 10, and therefore clearly does see the shedim-elohim in Deut. 32:17 as malevolent spirits in 1 Cor. 10:21-22). I don’t think what Walton says here is intended to contradict Paul, or even must be viewed as a contradiction. Knowing him and his work in the field, Walton wouldn’t do that. My point is that, unfortunately, he could be read that way and the wording is confusing.Walton’s reference to textual issues in “Deuteronomy 32” is imprecise, which in turn adds to the uncertainty of what he’s saying. The issue at hand concerns Deut. 32:17, not Deut. 32:8, the location of the textual variant to which he refers. His prose isn’t clear. He doesn’t deal with Paul’s use of Deuteronomy, nor does he track the references to divine beings worshipped by the Israelites through Deuteronomy that guide the reader to the statement in Deut 32:17. There is an unambiguous relationship between Deut. 4:19-20; 17:1-3; 29:24-28; 32:8-9, 17, 43 (also with DSS in v. 43). The beney elohim allotted to the nations at the Babel event are the elohim of Deut 32:17 and the elohim to whom Israel wrongly sacrificed. Deuteronomy’s treatment of the subject as a whole is clear. Psalm 82 has God judging these beings in connection with the psalmist’s prayer that God rise up and take control of all the nations, rectifying the situation that arose at Babel. This judgment takes place in the divine council.But now we have to deal with the second part of the excerpt: “… the foreign gods would be associated with the divine council and class II spirits are never part of the divine council.” I think the best way to parse this is that Walton is saying that “the foreign gods of the nations (via Deut. 32:8-9) were part of the divine council, but they aren’t actually shedim, even though Israelites called them that—shedim are Class II.”If my parsing is correct, Walton is interpreting “divine council” as those entities in the spiritual world that have decision-making rank. That’s semantics, since it isn’t the only way council language (in these texts and familiar normative discourse) can be understood.The divine council need not necessarily be conceptually restricted to decision makers. Indeed, the analogy of human government in civilizations that had a conception of a divine council makes the point clear. Not all members of a king’s “government” would be directly involved in decision making. There are layers of advisors who have input. Part of any government or bureaucracy has staff or “lesser bureaucrats” who are nevertheless part of the administration. In Chapter 3 I used the analogy of Pharaoh’s household. That household included members who were not decision makers but who, nevertheless, were part of Pharaoh’s entourage.Perhaps a modern analogy of government in the United States will help make the point. We can speak of the federal legislature, by which we mean that branch of government responsible for passing laws. The term “Congress” is a synonym. However, our Congress has two parts: the Senate and the House. Decision-making members of these two bodies, and hence the Congress, are elected. The House and Senate both have “guardian officers” (e.g., the Sergeant at Arms) who are appointed, not elected. Though they have no decision-making power, they are nevertheless part of “Congress” in certain contexts where that term is used. “Congress” can therefore refer to only those elected officials who make laws, or can refer to the entire bureaucratic apparatus of the federal legislature.Lastly, Walton’s restriction (in the chart on page 231; the discussion is a bit more elastic) of the term elohim to Class I beings could be construed as unwarranted and even wrong, not because of passages like Deut. 32:17, but also material from Ugarit (for example) that has messengers (ml?akm) that are clearly gods in Ugaritic religion. As Korpel notes, “… even though their status is low, they are clearly divine beings, and are reightfully called gods [?ilm]” (Marjo C. A Korpel, A Rift in the Clouds: Ugaritic and Hebrew Descriptions of the Divine (Ugarit-Verlag, 1980), 292). But we must remember that Walton’s focus is Mesopotamia. That said, the exclusion of other material for understanding Israel’s conception of the divine council produces the sort of semantic disconnect we’ve been discussing.If we understand elohim to be a term that refers to the realm in which an entity normally resides (i.e., the spiritual world, as I have done in Chapters 3-4 of The Unseen Realm), then all spirit beings, including the disembodied human dead (1 Sam. 28:13) are elohim. Those elohim who serve Yahweh in any capacity are part of his bureaucracy (council) in the broadest sense—there is no “second council,” nor are there unattached lone wolves in Yahweh’s administration. Psalm 82 (and Genesis 3) shows us there can be rebellion, though. HYPERLINK "" \l "_ftnref1" [1] The notion that John 10:33 has Jesus only claiming to be a god (a la Mormon or Jehovah’s Witness theology) is not tenable. A syntactical search of the Greek New Testament, however, reveals that the identical construction found in John 10:33 occurs elsewhere in contexts referring specifically to God the Father. The search is accomplished via the syntactically-tagged Greek New Testament database in the Libronix platform developed by Logos Bible Software. The search query asks for all clauses where the predicator of the clause can be any finite verb except ε?μ? where the subject complement is the lexeme θε?? with no definite article present. Any clause component can intervene between these two elements. Other than John 10:33, the following hits are yielded by the query: Acts 5:29; Gal. 4:8, 9; 1 Thess. 1:9; 4:1; 2 Thess. 1:8; Titus 3:8; Heb. 9:14. It is incoherent within the immediate and broader context of the book in which each passage hit occurs to translate θε?? as “a god.”Chapter 5: As in Heaven, So on EarthBibliography from the chapterRandall Garr, In His own Image and Likeness: Humanity, Divinity, and Monotheism (Culture and History of the Ancient Near East 15; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2003)Additional Bibliography and Content DiscussionRegarding the interchange of the plural and singular pronouns in Gen 1:26-27, it may be helpful to think of the variation this way:The plurals generally refer to the announcement by God to a group (“let us create humankind” – “hey, let’s do this!”). “Our image” means there is something that connects God, the group (heavenly host), and humans. That something = certain attributes God possesses in himself and shares with the members of the heavenly host and humans that allow both to represent him. The singulars point to who is doing the creating (“he created humankind”) and who is being represented (as his image).There is solid historical precedent for the interpretation of the image and the understanding of the plurals in Gen 1:26 offered in Unseen Realm. A few examples will suffice.On the image is being representation (the “functional” view based on taking the preposition beth as beth essentiae or the beth of predication, Wenham says:The image makes man God’s representative on earth. That man is made in the divine image and is thus God’s representative on earth was a common oriental view of the king. Both Egyptian and Assyrian texts describe the king as the image of God (see Ockinga, Dion, Bird). Furthermore, man is here bidden to rule and subdue the rest of creation, an obviously royal task (cf. 1 Kgs 5:4 [4:24], etc.), and Ps 8 speaks of man as having been created a little lower than the angels, crowned with glory and made to rule the works of God’s hands. The allusions to the functions of royalty are quite clear in Ps 8. Another consideration suggesting that man is a divine representative on earth arises from the very idea of an image. Images of gods or kings were viewed as representatives of the deity or king. The divine spirit was often thought of as indwelling an idol, thereby creating a close unity between the god and his image (Clines, TB 19 [1968] 81–83). Whereas Egyptian writers often spoke of kings as being in God’s image, they never referred to other people in this way. It appears that the OT has democratized this old idea. It affirms that not just a king, but every man and woman, bears God’s image and is his representative on earth (Gordon J. Wenham, Genesis 1–15 [vol. 1; Word Biblical Commentary; Dallas: Word, Incorporated, 1998], 30–31).Merrill adds:An alternative understanding of the meaning of the imago Dei is that humankind is not in the image but is, in fact, the image. Humanity does not so much share with God his essential reality but, rather, is a representative of that reality. That is, humankind has a functional role to play, a role that requires no ontological commonness with God. Such a case rests grammatically on the well-attested use of the preposition b? as a so-called beth-essentiae (or beth of identity). This permits a translation such as “Let us make humanity as our image.” The following comparison (“according to our likeness”) does not have a beth-essentiae, it is true, but such a beth does occur with “likeness” (d?m?t) in Genesis 5:1 (bidm?t). Clearly, if a case can be made for a functional use of beth in Genesis 1:26 with ?elem, then it can be made in Genesis 5:1 with d?m?t. This opens the possibility that k? (usually translated “according to”) in Genesis 1:26 may also signify function rather than similitude (cf. Wis 14:17). Humankind, thus, is the image and is the likeness of God. The synonymous nature of ?elem and d?m?t also supports this option.More persuasive than the grammatical evidence, perhaps, is the inner textual elaboration of what is meant by the image of God. Immediately after the resolution to make humanity “in the image” and “after the likeness” of God is the statement of purpose for human creation, namely, that humans have dominion over all God’s creation (Gen 1:26). Then again, following the statement of creation (Gen 1:27), God pronounced a blessing over the male and female, a powerful word of effective promise that humanity should fill the earth and dominate all its creatures (Gen 1:28). The connection between the notion of image and humanity as sovereign seems most apparent: to be the image of God is at the same time to be God’s vice-regent in the exercise of divine lordship (E. H. Merrill, “Image of God,” Dictionary of the Old Testament: Pentateuch [Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2003], 443–444).Bruce Waltke writes:Various referents have been suggested for the “us.” The traditional Christian interpretation, that it represents a plurality within deity, has some textual support and satisfies the Christian theology of the Trinity (John 1:3; Eph. 3:9; Col. 1:16; Heb. 1:2). That God is a plurality is supported by the mention of the Spirit of God in 1:2 and the fact that the image itself is a plurality. This interpretation would also explain the shifts in the text between the singular and plural. The primary difficulty with this view is that the other four uses of the plural pronoun with reference to God (3:22; 11:7; Isa. 6:8) do not seem to refer to the Trinity. The explanation that better satisfies all such uses of the pronoun is that God is addressing the angels or heavenly court (cf. 1 Kings 22:19–22; Job 1:6; 2:1; 38:7; Ps. 29:1–3; 89:5–6; Isa. 6:8; 40:1–6; Dan. 10:12–13; Luke 2:8–14). It seems that in the four occurrences of the pronoun “us” for God, God refers to “us” when human beings are impinging on the heavenly realm and he is deciding their fate. In Gen. 3:22, God sees that human beings have grasped the knowledge of good and evil and have become like divine beings. In Genesis 11 the heavenly court comes down to see what the earth-bound are building to attain the heavenly space. In Isa. 6:8, God is clearly addressing the heavenly court, which the prophet in his vision has entered. It is not surprising that God would address the heavenly court, since angels play a prominent role in Scripture (e.g., Gen. passim; Job 38:7; 1 Tim. 3:16), and there is much commerce in Genesis between the angelic realm and human beings. (Source:?Bruce K. Waltke and Cathi J. Fredricks, Genesis: A Commentary [Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2001], 64–65).Waltke adds in a footnote at the end of this selection (#40 in the source):“The main argument against this interpretation is that angels are not involved in creation (see Cassuto, From Adam, 55). However, God’s address of the heavenly court does not mean that they participate in the act of creation. For instance, in Isa. 6:8 when God says, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” God is the primary actor, but he is acting in concert with a heavenly dimension.”For a specific defense of the functional view, see:J. A. Clines, “The Image of God in Man.” TynB 19 (1968) 53–103For discussion of the ethical significance of the functional view of the image of God versus other views, see:Robert Rakestraw, “The Persistent Vegetative State and the Withdrawal of Nutrition and Hydration,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 35, no. 3 (1992): 399-401Frame, John M. Medical Ethics: Principles, Persons, and Problems (Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, 1988), 33-35James K. Hoffmeier, “Abortion and the Old Testament Law,” Abortion (ed. Hoffmeier; Grand Rapids: Baker, 1987) 54-55Allen P. Ross, Creation and Blessing (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1988) 112-113Some commentators misconstrue the functional view – speaking of it as though it cancels out or is antithetical to the idea of the human form being a property of what it means to be human (e.g., Victor P. Hamilton, The Book of Genesis, Chapters 1–17 [The New International Commentary on the Old Testament; Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1990], 137). This simply isn’t the case. Hamilton further opines that Gen. 1:26 isn’t concerned with defining the image. I’d suggest (see later chapters referencing Herring’s work, Divine Substitution) that the concept of imaging would have been intuitively apparent to an ancient Israelite. In other words, there’s no need to spell out all the implications. The biblical writers were writing for an audience that shared their cognitive framework. They didn’t assume they’d need to explain everything for a foreign worldview. Lastly, as I showed in the book at length, the human form as a way to “image” Yahweh was used by Yahweh himself – and was part of a divine being representing him in terms of function and mission. There is simply no need to dichotomize “form” and “function” when understanding the image. Both are part of the primary meaning: humanity by definition is God’s representative on earth. To be human is to be the image. Overemphasizing the form / appearance aspect also could be used to argue that an ancient person didn’t view the invisible human (in the womb) as a human person. While this may be palatable to some moderns, the ancient person would have presumed a pregnant woman carried a human being. And indeed she does.On the grammatical phenomenon of beth essentiae / beth of predication see:Friedrich Wilhelm Gesenius, Gesenius’ Hebrew Grammar (ed. E. Kautzsch and Sir Arthur Ernest Cowley; 2d English ed.; Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1910), 379 (Par. 119.i.)Paul Joüon and Takamitsu Muraoka, A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew (vol. 2; Pontificio Istituto Biblico, 2003), 486 (Par. 133.c.).Bruce K. Waltke and Michael Patrick O’Connor, An Introduction to Biblical Hebrew Syntax (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1990), 197–198.Cyrus Gordon, “ ‘In’ of Predication or Equivalence,” Journal of Biblical Literature 100 (1981) 612-613On the plurals as referring to the members of the divine council, Wenham notes, “From Philo onward, Jewish commentators have generally held that the plural is used because God is addressing his heavenly court, i.e., the angels (cf. Isa 6:8). Among recent commentators, Skinner, von Rad, Zimmerli, Kline, Mettinger, Gispen, and Day prefer this explanation” (Gordon J. Wenham, Genesis 1–15 [vol. 1; Word Biblical Commentary, 1998], 27).Kline, M. G. “Creation in the Image of the Glory-Spirit.” WTJ 39 (1977) 250–72Skinner, J. A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Genesis. ICC. 2d ed. Edinburgh: Clark, 1930Johann Jakob Stamm, “Die Imago-Lehre von Karl Barth und die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft,” Antwort. FS Karl Barth, Zürich-Zollikon (1956): 84-98.As noted in the chapter, the answer to the plurals in Genesis is not the “plural of majesty.” As Joüon-Muraoka notes, “The we of majesty does not exist in Hebrew” (Paul Joüon and Takamitsu Muraoka, A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew (vol. 2; Pontificio Istituto Biblico, 2003), 375–376 (Par. 114.e). The plural of majesty does exist for nouns (see Joüon-Muraoka, Par. 136.d), but Gen 1:26 is not about the nouns—the issue is the verbal forms. See also John C. Beckman, “Pluralis Majestatis: Biblical Hebrew,” Encyclopedia of Hebrew Language and Linguistics, vol. 3 (P-Z) (Ed. Geoffrey Khan; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2013): 145-146.Some scholars, such as Westermann in the first volume (of three) on Genesis in the Continental Commentary series dispute the divine council because of presuppositions about “the theology of P,” one of the presumed sources of the Pentateuch. His argument here (regardless of whether one accepts P or not) is incoherent, since divine plurality can be found in late canonical Hebrew literature and Jewish literature on into the first century A.D. That was the topic of my dissertation. See:Michael S. Heiser, “The Divine Council in Late Canonical and Non-Canonical Second Temple Jewish Literature.” PhD diss., UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON, 2004Michael S. Heiser, “Monotheism and the Language of Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls,” Tyndale Bulletin 65:1 (2014): 85-100Another incoherent objection is that speaking to the divine council disallows that God is the sole creator (e.g., Cassuto says this is in the first volume of his Genesis commentary, p. 55). This argument lacks validity since all the verbs for creation are clearly singular. In other words, the fact that plural verb forms are found in Gen 1:26 doesn’t prevent a reader from seeing a lone creator. The lone creator announces his intentions to the divine council and then creates. The text is clear they aren’t participating. They just hear the decision / decree.In one footnote in Chapter 5 I alluded to Trinitarian Godhead thinking in the Old Testament. I discuss that on this website in connection with Chapters 16-18. It was in those chapters that I sketched the idea of the two Yahweh figures of the Old Testament (Judaism’s two powers). Consequently, the triune Godhead idea found in the Old Testament is best discussed in connection with those chapters.Lastly, Dan McCartney’s 1994 article contains some useful insights related to this chapter’s functional (representative) view of the image — and some of my positions in other chapters:Dan G. McCartney, “Ecce Homo: The Coming of the Kingdom as the Restoration of Human Viceregency,” Westminster Theological Journal 56:1 (1994): 1-21McCartney’s article reinforces the functional understanding of the image and other points about the vice-regency of the second Yahweh (God embodied) in the Old Testament and the vice-regency of believers that I make in Chapters 16-18 and 35-36. (Note that McCartney’s article is not about these things specifically; his comments are quite telling):. . . Jesus received the kingdom as a human. Before his incarnation, the eternal Son was not a man, and thus did not rule as a man. Philippians 2, for example, speaks of the preincarnate Christ as equal with God. However, Christ received the “name above every name” and the homage of every knee and tongue only after, and as reward for, his incarnation, suffering, and death. Similarly, Col 1:15–20 speaks of Christ as the firstborn of all creation because all things were created in him, etc., but he is the head of the church because he is the “firstborn from the dead…having reconciled to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.” Heb 2:9 states that Jesus was “made for a little while lower than the angels” so that everything might be subject to him, he being crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death. And Rom 1:3–4 speaks of Jesus being appointed Son of God in power, which, as J. Murray pointed out,? is not a declaration of his eternal sonship but his instatement as man? to the position of sovereignty.This exaltation of Jesus as man suggests some explanation for our first question, as to the way in which the “reign of God” has now come where it was not here before. The coming of the kingdom, the arrival of God’s sovereign reign, is not a reinstatement of God’s sovereign exercise of power to accomplish his purposes (which was always true). The arrival of the reign of God is the reinstatement of the originally intended divine order for earth, with man properly situated as God’s viceregent. (p. 2)QuestionsI’m often asked why Gen 1:26 isn’t referring to the Trinity. In addition to what? you’ll find in Unseen Realm, here are some other thoughts:The announcement by God in Gen 1:26 comes across as something new — new information. God is announcing his desire to create humankind. If the plurality referred to members of the Trinity, this makes little sense, as members of the Godhead would already know what God wants to do. In other words, if this is “inter- or inner-Trinitarian conversation,” why an announcement? Why announce something already known? This (frankly) undermines Trinitarian theology (at least in what has become known as its orthodox articulation).In terms of Hebrew, “let us make” is a prefixed (imperfect) form that is semantically cohortative. I’d remind readers who’ve had Hebrew that III-? lemmas (like ???? in Gen 1:26) do not add the final ? for the cohortative form. The issue is semantics, not form. Since it’s a III-? lemma in view, the form could also be cohortative. (See Jouon-Muraoka, A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew, Par 79, section o).More generally, there is no indication in the passage that the plurality is limited to three. That specific number has to be imported into the passage. And doing so leaves you with the problem noted above — not to mention being in discord with the very normative ANE idea of the high God speaking to members of his entourage.If there was no other passage in the Bible that spoke of divine plurality (God with lesser elohim), you could work with the Trinity here (minus these other incongruities). You have to import it, and then explain why God is announcing something to beings who would already know what’s being announced. That makes little sense to me, and ends up undermining Trinitarian consistency.Chapters 6 & 7: Gardens and Mountains / Eden–Like No Place on EarthChapters 6 and 7 both deal with Eden and its symbology, so they’re grouped together for bibliography.?Bibliography from the book?Richard J. Clifford, The Cosmic Mountain in Canaan and the Old Testament (Harvard Semitic Monographs 4; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1972; reprinted by Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2010)?Richard J. Clifford, “The Temple and the Holy Mountain,” in The Temple in Antiquity (Religious Monograph Series 9; ed. T. G. Madsen; Provo, Utah, 1984), 107-124?Geo Widengren, The King and the Tree of Life in Ancient Near Eastern Religion (King and Saviour IV; Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, 1951)?Tryggve N. D. Mettinger, The Eden Narrative: A Literary and Religio-Historical Study of Genesis 2-3 (American Oriental Society, 2007)?Additional Bibliography J. M. Lundquist, “What Is a Temple? A Preliminary Typology” In The Quest for the Kingdom of God: Studies in Honor of George Mendenhall (Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, 1983), 205-219?J. M. Lundquist, “The Common Temple Ideology of the Ancient Near East,” in The Temple in Antiquity (Religious Monograph Series 9; ed. T. G. Madsen; Provo, Utah, 1984), 53-76?I. Cornelius, “????,” New International Dictionary of Old Testament Theology and Exegesis, ed. W. A. VanGemeren (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1997), 1.875–78?Daniel T. Lioy, “The Garden of Eden as a Primordial Temple or Sacred Space for Humankind,” Conspectus: The Journal of the South African Theological Seminary 10 (2010): 25-57?I. Cornelius, “The Garden in the Iconography of the Ancient Near East,” Journal of Semitic Studies 1 (1989) 204–28?G. J. Wenham, “Sanctuary Symbolism in the Garden of Eden Story,” in “I Studied Inscriptions from Before the Flood”: Ancient Near Eastern and Literary Approaches to Genesis 1–11, ed R. S. Hess and D. Tsumura (SBTS 4: Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1994) 19–25?L. Michael Morales, The Tabernacle Prefigured: Cosmic Mountain Ideology in Genesis and Exodus (Biblical Tools and Studies 15; Peeters, 2011?John H. Walton, Ancient Near Eastern Thought and the Old Testament: Introducing the Conceptual World of the Hebrew Bible (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2006), 123-124, 196-198?On the Watchers in Daniel 10 and Daniel 10 more generally:?John J. Collins, “Watcher,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)?M. J. Davidson, Angels at Qumran. A Comparative Study of 1Enoch 1–36, 72–108 and Sectarian writings from Qumran (JSP Sup 11; Sheffield 1992), 38–40?R. Murray, “The Origin of Aramaic??i?r, Angel, Orientalia 53 (1984): 303–317?Aleksander R. Michalak, Angels as warriors in late Second Temple Jewish literature (Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen Zum Neuen Testament 2 Reihe 330; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012Chapters 8 & 9: Only God is Perfect / Peril and ProvidenceChapters 8 and 9 deal generally with the subject of the s?at?an and the rebellion in Eden, so they will be taken together for comments and bibliography. They help set up the subsequent chapters (10, 11) which are also grouped together and will offer specific detail on my views about the serpent figure in Genesis 3.Bibliography in the book?Peggy Day, An Adversary in Heaven: ?ā·?ǎn in the Hebrew Bible (Harvard Semitic Monographs 43; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1988)John H. Walton, “Satan,” Dictionary of the Old Testament: Wisdom, Poetry, and Writings (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2008): 714-717Additional Bibliography on the s?at?an (See also Chapters 10 and 11)?Paul Evans, “Divine intermediaries in 1 Chronicles 21 an overlooked aspect of the Chronicler’s theology,” Biblica 85:4 (2004): 545-558L. Oppenheim, “The Eyes of the Lord,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 88 (1968):173–80Marvin E. Tate, “Satan in the Old Testament,” Review & Expositor 89, no. 4 (1992): 461-474Content Discussion?With respect to the Chapters 8 and 9, there are two issues of substance that I imagine most readers might want more information.First, there is my view that foreknowledge does not necessitate predestination. I think 1 Sam 23 is quite clear in that regard. From this I noted that the future is at least partially open.The careful reader will discern how this differs from open theism. I do not reject the idea that God indeed knows all things real and possible. I therefore reject the idea that there are things God does not know, an idea one will encounter in some statements of open theism. I also reject the notion that God does not predestinate events. Many open theists resist predestination en toto. Again, the careful reader will know from what I have written that, with respect to things that do happen, my view is that they may or may not have been predestinated. That statement very obviously allows for God to predestinate events. Scripture makes it pretty clear that God does predestinate events.However, I don’t believe it is a necessary conclusion, though, that God predestinates all events that happen—because the fact that he foreknows does not require such predestination. Ina nutshell, then, my view is that while God foreknows all things that happen, that doesn’t require the conclusion that all things that happen were predestinated. Scripture in my view leaves that issue (pardon the pun) open.Lastly, I should also note that I think election has been fundamentally misunderstood or mis-articulated. That issue naturally dovetails with the subject of predestination. I don’t get into election in Unseen World. That is a subject I’ll get into in a second book, presuming there is one. For now, readers can get a sketch of what I mean by this comment on election via my Naked Bible blog.Second, there is the issue of the s?at?an. Readers know I use that phrasing because s?at?an in the Hebrew Bible is not a proper personal noun by rule of Hebrew grammar (the definite article in Hebrew is not used with proper personal nouns, and all the instances of s?at?an in Job 1-2 and Zech 3 have the article). The term means “adversary” or “challenger”. There is no contextual evidence in Job 1-2 or Zech 3 that the figure from Genesis 3 is in view, though the satan in those passages is a divine being (since the scenes take place in the divine council).Readers will know that I don’t dispute the reality of a supernatural arch-enemy of God being present in Genesis 3. I’m simply saying that the word s?at?an is not used of that figure in the Old Testament. The term eventually gets applied to the supernatural enemy of Genesis 3 in Jewish literature of the Second Temple Period and of course in the New Testament. And the label fits.This view is hardly new with me. For the grammatical phenomenon, I’ve made a video of a computer search for ha-s?at?an (more correctly: has-s?at?an) to show readers what’s going on in the Hebrew text. That video presentation lives in this post on my Naked Bible blog.As I noted at the above post, even instances where s?at?an lacks the article don’t provide instances where the term is used of the devil (the arch enemy of Gen 3). The two instances of the term without the article applied to non-human figures point to the angel of the Lord. I have also blogged this point (see also the bibliography below on 1 Chron. 21.Chapters 10 & 11: Trouble in Paradise / Like the Most High?Chapters 10 and 11 are grouped together on this site since the two chapters jointly deal with the same subject matter: the serpent figure, the Edenic rebellion, and the relationship of Genesis 3 to Ezekiel 28 and Isaiah 14:12-15.Bibliography in the book?H. J. van Dijk, Ezekiel’s Prophecy on Tyre (Ez. 26:1–28:19): A New Approach (Biblica et orientalia 20; Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute, 1968)Kelley Coblentz Bautch, A Study of the Geography of 1 Enoch 17-19: ‘No One Has Seen What I Have Seen’ (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2003James Harrell, “Gemstones,” UCLA Encyclopedia of Egyptology 1 no. 1 (2012), 5 (Table 1, pts. 5-6)F. Petrie, “Precious Stones,” Dictionary of the Bible (vol. IV; ed. J. Hastings; New York: Scribner, 1919), 619–21J. L. Myres, Encyclopedia Biblica (vol. IV; ed. T. K. Cheyne and J. S. Black; New York: Macmillan, 1903), 4799–4812E. F. Jourdain, “The Twelve Stones in the Apocalypse,” ExpT 22 (1911) 448–50Daniel Isaac Block, The Book of Ezekiel, Chapters 25–48 (The New International Commentary on the Old Testament; Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1997)Richard J. Clifford, The Cosmic Mountain in Canaan and the Old Testament (Harvard Semitic Monographs 4.; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1972)John Gray, “The Desert God ?Athtar in the Literature and Religion of Canaan,” Journal of Near Eastern Studies 78 (1949): 72-83Ulf Oldenburg, “Above the Stars of El: El in Ancient South Arabic Religion,” ZAW 82 (1970): 187-208Alice Wood, Of Wings and Wheels: A Synthetic Study of the Biblical Cherubim (BZAW 385; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2008Additional Bibliography and Content Discussion?The ensuing discussion provides several source references relevant to the chapter.These chapters deal with the events in Eden, specifically with respect to the serpent figure. There are three primary issues in these two chapters that need further attention:(1) The matter of El terminology for Yahweh raised in a footnote in Chapter 10;(2) My comments about the meaning of the Hebrew word nachash (translated “serpent” in English Bibles);(3) my view that Isaiah 14:12-15 and Ezekiel 28:11-19 are conceptually and inter-textually connected, that both passages have as their interpretive backdrop the idea of a cosmic rebellion of a divine being, and that this backdrop allows these two passages to inform interpretation of Genesis 3 in the final form of the canon.We’ll take these items in order.1. El terminology used of Yahweh (i.e., the biblical writers describe Yahweh with El language in the Old Testament)A footnote in this chapter refers to the problems of the relationship of El and Yahweh, including the matter of Ugaritic El’s female goddess consort. As you might imagine, these problems are inter-related.Most readers of The Unseen Realm will likely not be familiar with these problems since their reading of the Old Testament is filtered through English translation and lack of exposure to the Canaanite / Ugaritic context of the language. Consequently, these issues are perhaps best explained and discussed once they have been introduced. The “must-have” resource DDD (Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, pp. 275-278) discusses the related subject matter in considerable detail. I’ll begin with some excerpts from the entry for El:In Ancient Mesopotamia ilu is attested as an appellative for deities, though a deity Il is not attested. It has been suggested that Ilu as a deity was attested at Emar (D. Arnaud, Recherches au Pays d’A?tata. Emar VI/3 [Paris 1986] No. 282:16–18: dIlu). This suggestion is, however, based on an incorrect reading of the text (J. M. Durand, RA 84 [1990] 80): dga?an*!-kà-si, ‘Nin-kasi’. (p. 275)The Ugaritic texts from Ras Shamra supply more than five hundred references to El. The noun il in the Ugaritic texts frequently has the appellative meaning too, especially in the epistolary literature, but partially also in the mythological, cultic, and epic texts. In about half of the occurrences, El denotes a distinct deity who, residing on the sacred mountain, occupies within the myths the position of master of the Ugaritic pantheon. He bears the title mlk ‘king’ (KTU 1.1 iii:23 [restored]; 1.2 iii:5, 1.3; v:8, 36; 1.4 i:5; iv:24, 38, 48; 1.5 vi:2 [restored]; 1.6 i:36; 1.17 vi:49; 1.117:2–3; cf. 1.14 i:41) and possesses ultimate authority. In these cases il is therefore likewise to be understood as a proper name. (p. 275)In the literature El is depicted as qd? ‘holy’ (KTU 1.16 i:11, 22) and appears as an aged deity (→Ancient of Days); the grey hair of his beard (?bt dqn) is referred to (KTU 1.3 v:2, 25; 1.4 v:4; 1.18 i:12 [restored]). The frequently employed epithet l?pn il dpid ‘the benevolent, good-natured El’ (e.g. KTU 1.4 iv:58; 1.6 iii:4, 10, 14; 1.16 v:23; see for the etymology Loretz 1990:66) characterizes the deity even better. Sometimes one of the two nouns (l?pn/dpid) occurs without the other or in another connection. It might be presumed that this epithet characterizes the attitude and the experience of mankind in its relation to El. The heavenly gods guaranteed and promoted human life. To El was attributed the kind of wisdom that made him judge everything rightly (KTU 1.3 v:30; 1.4 iv:41; v:3–4; 1.16 iv:1–2). On the other hand, El is known as the one who is able to cure diseases (KTU 1.16 v:23–50; 1.100; 1.107; possibly also KTU 1.114; cf. 1.108 and ARTU 191–203). Further, El is designated as ?r ‘bull’. This metaphor expresses his strength and divine dignity (e.g. KTU 1.2 i:33, 36; 1.3 v:35; 1.14 i:41). (p. 275)In the mythological texts, El is often depicted as father of the other gods. Moreover, he is called in the Keret epic ab adam, ‘father of mankind’, obviously because he is the creator of humanity. . . . The mythical procreation of gods, on the contrary, might have been recognized at Ugarit though the textual basis is small (KTU 1.10 iii:5; 1.23; M. Dietrich & O. Loretz, TUAT II [1986–89] 350–357; ARTU 117–128). In KTU 1.3 v:36; 1.4 iv:48 and 1.10 iii:6 El is depicted as the one who appointed →Baal as king. The verb used here to describe the action, kn [kwn], however, does not mean ‘to create’. The usual Ugaritic verb signifying ‘to create’ is qny. It is used in relation to gods in KTU 1.10 iii:5. The meaning of the verb is obscure in KTU 1.19 iv:58 (it describes the relation of El to a locality; possibly to be explained either ‘to own’ or ‘to produce, create’). The Phoenician inscriptions attest only once qny, ‘to create’, and that with regard to the earth (KAI 26 A III:18). It is doubtful whether El was conceived of as →‘El creator of the earth’ at Ugarit since there is no reference to the concept (Pope 1987:219–230; Rendtorff 1966:287; contrast de Moor 1980; 1990: 69). (pp. 275-276).In the Phoenician, Aramaic, Punic and Neo-Punic inscriptions the noun ?l is generally used as appellative in the sense of ‘god, godhead’ or as adjective ‘divine’. This use of the term is also known from the Ugaritic texts of Ras Shamra and from the OT. Yet, El was also used as proper name, e.g. when El is mentioned alongside other gods. This is the case in the Aramaic inscription of Panammuwa I king of Sam?al (KAI 214) dating from the middle of the eighth century bce. The text mentions the gods →Hadad, El, →Resheph, →Rakib-el and Shamash (→Shemesh) as benefactors of Panammuwa, bestowing upon him the kingship and welfare of his state (KAI 214:1, 2, 11, 18). The gods Hadad, El, Rakib-el and Shamash are found also in the closing formula of the inscription on the statue of Panammuwa II. Moreover, the first stela of the Aramaic Sefire-inscription (eighth century bce) containing the text of the treaty between the kings of KTK and Arpad (KAI 222) mentions El alongside ?lyn (→Ely?n) and other gods (KAI 222A:11). . . . The Phoenician inscription of Karatepe dating from the late eighth century bce quotes beside other gods ?l qn ?r? ‘El-creator-of-the-Earth’ (KAI 26 A III:18). The same epithet occurs in a second century ce Neo-Punic inscription (KAI 129:1). It qualifies El as creator of the earth. The name has ancient roots as witnessed by the divine name dEl-ku-ni-ir-?a in a myth discovered at Boghazk?y. It must be emphasized that nowhere in the Phoenician and Punic inscriptions is El mentioned as president of the other gods (Rendtorff 1966). (p. 276)The population of Palestine in the first millennium bce knew the deity El. Already F. C. Movers (Die Ph?nizier 1 [Bonn 1841] 389) held that the Israelites worshipped El as a god distinct from Yahweh (but cf. Schmidt 1971:146). As a result the OT contains texts where the Canaanite background of the name is still recognizable. In these few instances El refers to a deity other than Yahweh. The evidence will pass in review. (p. 277)The expressions ?ēl ??lōhê yi?ra?ēl, ‘El, the god of Israel’ (Gen 33:20) and hā?ēl ??lōhê ?āb?kā, ‘El, the god of your father’, (Gen 46:3) should be discussed first. The present context of both phrases relates them to the patriarch Jacob and his God in whom none other than Yahweh could be seen (Smith 1990:11). Yet it is the Canaanite El who is depicted here as the God of Israel (contrast Josh 8:30). In all probability Gen 33:20 represents an old tradition. It shows that El was worshipped at least by some of the proto-Israelites (but cf. the interpretation of the Greek translation: κα? ?πεκαλ?σατο τ?ν θε?ν Ισραηλ). . . . (p. 277)The view that El was worshipped among the Israelites is supported by Isa 14:4b–20, a lamentation about the downfall of a universal ruler. The text relates that the tyrant intended to ascend to heaven in order to set his throne above the k?k?bê ?ēl, ‘the stars of El’, and thus settle himself upon the divine mountain in the outmost north (v 13). This was an attempt to exercise dominion over the universe, something traditionally reserved for El, the divine lord. (p. 278)Another trace of El-worship in ancient Israel is found in Ezek 28:2 (pace Cross 1973:271). The king of Tyre regarded himself a god and thought that he possessed a divine residence in the midst of the sea (→Melqart). Here, the allusions to Canaanite mythology are unmistakable. The residence of El (m?b il) is referred to in KTU 1.3 iv:48; v:39; 1.4 i:12; iv:52. El’s mythic dwelling is situated at mbk nhrm/ apq thmtm, ‘the fountainhead of the two rivers/ bedding of the two floods’ (e.g. KTU 1.2 iii:4; 1.6 i:33–34). (p. 278)Further hints to the worship of El are given by the names ?ēl b?r?t (→Baal Berith; Judg 9:46), ?ēl ??lām (→El-olam; Gen 21:33), ?ēl ??ly?n (Most High →Elyon; Gen 14:18–22; Ps 78:35), ?ēl r?? (God of seeing →El-roi; Gen 16:13), and ?ēl ?adday (→Shadday; Gen 17:1; 28:3; 35:11; 43:14; 48:3; 49:25 [cj.]; Exod 6:3; Ezek 10:5) as well as by genitival constructions containing El: b?nê ?ēl (Deut 32:8, 43; LXX: υ?ο? θεο?; 4QDtng bny ?l[hym]. (p. 278)These excerpts make it clear that the biblical writers had some sort of strategy for linking Yahweh to El. The contentious issue among scholars is whether the biblical writers thought El and Yahweh were distinct gods and then fused them,?as opposed to whether they were rebutting that idea by means of their compositions and/or the redaction process that produced the final form of the text. The perspective that the biblical writers themselves were (early on) polytheists or monolatrous henotheists is the dominant one in biblical studies (held also by a few evangelicals) and has as its conceptual justification the presumed evolution of Israel’s religion from a polytheistic context to monotheism.I’ve been accused by those hostile to evangelical theology (or “confessional” scholarship) of rejecting the consensus because of my confessional (evangelical) commitment to Christianity. This shows a poor understanding of the evangelical tradition — even conservative evangelicalism. It would be quite easy to adopt the consensus view and chalk it up to the well-known evangelical idea of progressive revelation. God, so the argument would go, simply didn’t reveal monotheism to the biblical writers early on, but only later. Since progressive revelation is so obviously in play with other doctrinal items in the Bible that develop across the testaments, the notion appears coherent. It allows for the biblical writers to learn the real truth about God as time went in and God revealed more information. Consequently, the dominant paradigm (at least in principle) need not be repugnant to evangelicals.That said, however, I just don’t buy the consensus. It’s a classic example of filtering the final form of the text (i.e., that thing we actually have) through a pre-conceived idea in order to create a speculative evolution in the theology of the biblical writers,? I know of no way for Scripture as we have it to produce the required chronology of ideas that result in this religious evolutionary flow — as opposed to that evolutionary presumption being brought to the text so the text can be explicated in light of it. That’s the cart before the horse; it’s preconception driving the bus of exegesis. That is why I reject the consensus view.It is quite evident from inscriptions and objects produced by archaeology that many Israelites were polytheistic. But that is equally clear from the biblical text (because the writers found it offensive). The Bible never hides the fact that many Israelites worshipped other deities, including Baal, El’s “right hand man” in Ugaritic religion. However, I don’t see an indication in the biblical text that the biblical writers embraced polytheism and then changed their minds (or were led to do so). That is an idea that has to be superimposed on the biblical text, putting the cart before the horse.My view, then, to reiterate a bit, is that the dominant paradigm works only if a list of assumptions are brought to the text, including positing precise chronological sequences for when certain passages, verses, phrases, and even words were written or edited into or out of the biblical text. This requires omniscience, an attribute none of us have. Consequently, to draw conclusions as though we do is flawed thinking. When the presuppositions are kept at bay, the question changes: Does the biblical text as we have it yield the evolutionary picture? I submit that it does not, and that the dominant consensus view must impose its presuppositions for the idea to appear coherent. As I’ve written in journal articles (see below), the evolutionary view affirms some obvious things and then extrapolates to the unnecessary.I would propose that the literary identification of Yahweh and El is presented in the text for reasons other than an alleged change of heart about polytheism on the part of the biblical writers. I would argue that the biblical writers are weaving together written and oral traditions that used different vocabulary for their God precisely to make their theology of “Yahweh above all other elohim” clear. It is not Elyon or El who are at the top of the unseen realm; it is Yahweh. To make that point of theology clear, epithets and terms attached to other deities are assigned to Yahweh. The agenda of the biblical writers is not to apologize for or correct polytheism at one time thought orthodox for Israelites, but to reinforce the idea that Yahweh is an elohim, but no other elohim are Yahweh. The claims about other gods being the greatest are false. Yahweh is in a class by himself—and he is the deity referred to in Israelite traditions as being “God” (Semitic el). When the historical and religious context called for using epithets of Ugaritic/Canaanite El to make the point that it was Yahweh who was supreme, the biblical writers did so (just as they did with Baal motifs, such as “the one who rides the clouds”; see Chapter 29).None of this literary activity would be disputed by the dominant paradigm. It’s just that the dominant paradigm assumes that the motivation for the activity is a change or heart and mind about polytheism. That is an interpretive filter foisted onto the text. It is to psychologize the writers. The evidence offered for this idea within the biblical text is weak and, like the over-arching paradigm itself, depends on assumptions that guide interpretation.I’ve written at length about my departure from “critical consensus” in biblical studies on this issue. See:Michael S. Heiser, “Does Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible Demonstrate an Evolution from Polytheism to Monotheism in Israelite Religion?” Journal for the Evangelical Study of the Old Testament 1:1 (2012): 1-24Michael S. Heiser, “Are Yahweh and El Distinct Deities in Deut. 32:8-9 and Psalm 82?” HIPHIL 3 (2006); online journalMichael S. Heiser, “The Divine Council in Late Canonical and Non-Canonical Second Temple Jewish Literature.” PhD diss., UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON, 2004Michael S. Heiser, “Monotheism and the Language of Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls,” Tyndale Bulletin 65:1 (2014): 85-100?This brings us to the related issue of Ugaritic / Canaanite El’s consort, a divine female partner. Since Yahweh is identified with El in the Hebrew Bible, the question of whether Yahweh “had a wife” emerges. Again it should not be a surprise that the discussion on this question is extraordinarily detailed and controversial.The name of the El’s goddess consort at Ugarit was Athirat(u) (spelled ??rt). This name in other Semitic dialects is ?s?rth (often with added “h” – and note that t? (th) in Ugaritic is dialectically equivalent to s? (sh). The result is Asheratah. It is the convention of the Hebrew Bible to spell this name as Asherah (spelled ?s?rh). Consequently, Asherah and Asheratah are basically identical (see R. Hess, Israelite Religions: An Archaeological and Biblical Survey, p. 289). Note that Ashtoreth (??trt) is a different goddess. Ashtoreth was one of Baal’s consorts. (For Ashtoreth and the relationship of that term to its plural, Ashtaroth, see John Day, “Ashtoreth (Deity),” The Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary (New York: Doubleday, 1992), vol. 1:491–492.Asherah/Asheratah is not depicted in the Hebrew Bible as the wife or consort of Yahweh. However, outside the Bible, there are a handful of inscriptions that link the two divine names or have phrases such as “Yahweh and his Asheratah” (the latter name spelled ?s?rth). These inscriptions are:Khirbet el-Qom 3Kuntillet Ajrud 14, 18, 19, 20?Richard Hess has a fine description of these texts and the issue of “Yahweh and his Asherah” from which the excerpts below come (Israelite Religions: An Archaeological and Biblical Survey, 283-289). Hess’ book is another must-have resource for this sort of material. Note that in what follows I have eliminated Hess’ own superscripted footnotes to his sources. The picture provided by these texts is consistent with the biblical commentary on Israelite religion during the Iron Age (i.e., the Divided Monarchy): the conception of Yahweh wasn’t always (more than not?) in alignment with that of the biblical writers. Hess writes:?Kuntillet ?Ajrud A collection of inscriptions from c. 800 BC were discovered at the northern Sinai site of Kuntillet ?Ajrud. Commonly understood as mentioning “Yahweh and his Asherah,” the texts have provided what is arguably the major catalyst for a revolution in our understanding of the beliefs of the Israelites during the monarchy. The inscriptions that mention this blessing, while not limited to what is either a Sinai caravansary or a cult center (see below), provide the centerpiece for discussion of the role of a goddess or cult symbol and its relationship to Yahweh. It is, in fact, no longer possible to accept a simple division between those who worshiped Yahweh as a single and unique deity, on the one hand, and those who served Baal and a pantheon of deities, on the other. As a result of the finds at Kuntillet ?Ajrud, Yahweh has become a member of the pantheon of Iron Age Palestine.In the eyes of some scholars, this is the most significant set of texts yet discovered for understanding Israelite religion. These important inscriptions mention Yahweh and Asherah as deities invoked in the pronouncement of blessings on various people. El and Baal are also mentioned in a single poem. However, the interpretation of these texts bristles with problems. Elsewhere, I (1992c; 1996b) have argued that the mention of Asherah, in conjunction with Yahweh, is not a cult symbol nor is “his Asherah” the best translation. Instead, it is preferable to render the goddess’s name as Asheratah, in accordance with the spelling and reading of her name everywhere outside the Bible for more than a thousand years. The tradition of reading and pronouncing this name as Asherah is one that derives directly from the Bible. In the translations below, for the sake of accuracy, I will render the goddess’s name as “Asheratah.” However, I will continue to use “Asherah” in the text of this study, since it is the most commonly accepted way of spelling the name of the goddess.”It is not certain who wrote these inscriptions. In particular, some have thought that the texts that mention Baal and El were composed by non-Israelites. The texts associate these deities with war and with theophanies. If they are Israelite, and this is increasingly thought likely, they indicate either (1) Baal, like El, should be identified with Yahweh; or (2) there was a rival cult that accepted Baal as a martial deity. The most frequently mentioned deity, the only one associated with Asherah, and the one who appears in the blessings formulae, is Yahweh. His name is associated with two place names that occur as Yahweh of the Teman (htmn) and Yahweh of Samaria (?mrn). The Teman was a desert region to the south of Judah, while Samaria was either the capital of the northern kingdom of Israel or, possibly, the nation of Israel itself. . . .Who or what is A/asheratah in these inscriptions? Four options have been suggested:a symbol of Yahwehpersonal name of the goddess Asheraha symbol of Asherahpersonal name of the goddess Asherah/Asheratah?That Asherah is a symbol of Yahweh is not impossible. However, it is unknown in Israel for Yahweh to have a cult symbol. Keel and Uehlinger (1992) propose a cult symbol subordinated to Yahweh. In this interpretation the Asherah symbol is no goddess. As developed by Miller, Asherah became a symbol of Yahweh who expresses his presence, a kind of hypostasis that possesses no gender but only the presence of God. With Hadley, he sees in her an anticipation of Lady Wisdom in Proverbs and the development of the Law as a personification of God. However, this view suffers from several problems.M. Smith (1991; 2003, 126–28) argues that the references that associate Asherah with Baal (Judg. 3:7; 1 Kings 18:19; 2 Kings 23:4) must all be discounted as late editorials and glosses by the Deuteronomists. But why would the Deuteronomists defeat their own purposes of monotheism by rehabilitating a forgotten goddess? Nor is the text’s failure to mention Asherah in Jehu’s reform of 2 Kings 9–10 proof that this deity/hypostasis was acceptable to the Yahwist Jehu. Rather, the emphasis on Baal includes all the deities in his pantheon, such as Asherah, and only occasionally did the biblical writers feel the need to specify them and give them the “honor” of naming them.A second problem arises with a twelfth-century BC Babylonian text, in which the names of many gods are subsumed under one deity, Marduk, who is chief god of Babylon. However, Marduk’s wife’s name is missing. This is no oversight but a demonstration of the fact that the female goddess was never assimilated into the male deity, even in such a polytheistic context. This evidence argues against the view that Asherah was or became a hypostasis of Yahweh.There is evidence for the continuous presence of Asherah in the West Semitic pantheon from c. 2000 BC on into the Persian period without any textual suggestion of her becoming a hypostasis of a chief male deity. And nowhere in the Ugaritic texts, the Old Testament, or elsewhere is Asherah associated with wisdom.The view that this is the personal name of the goddess Asherah implies that Yahweh had a consort. Most scholars conclude that this is the correct analysis. Most accept the addition of an -h suffix in the inscription as a third personal pronominal suffix, “his Asherah.” However, no personal name ever has a pronominal suffix attached to it in Classical Hebrew. Nevertheless, other West Semitic languages do provide occasional examples of this phenomenon.If this is a symbol of the goddess, as in the form of a wooden pole, it would be acceptable grammatically and would be supported by other attestations in the Bible. Thus Yahweh has a consort. At least one or two writers of this graffiti (from Samaria) had a view of their god that allowed for other deities, a perspective reflected as well in the prophets.Hess continues on and shares his own conclusion (289-290):My view assumes that this is the personal name of the goddess. In this scenario, the final -h consonant in the inscription’s spelling of the name could be a second feminine ending (Zevit [2001]) or a vowel letter reflecting a final a vowel (Angerstorfer [1982]). In the latter case, the name is not Asherah but Asheratah. This is the preferred explanation, based as it is on comparative forms in Iron Age names of southern Palestine and on all other West Semitic occurrences of the deity’s name from the second millennium and the Iron Age epigraphy of the first millennium BC. Asherah, spelled as it is in the Bible (???ēr?), is never found in extrabiblical texts of the monarchy in Israel. At Khirbet el-Qom (see below) and on ostraca from seventh-century BC Tell Miqne (= Ekron) the spelling ??rt(h) is always found. Thus I think the deity was Asheratah, identical to the Asherah of the Bible, only spelled slightly differently. . . . The inscriptional materials attested in ancient Israel and describing the period between c. 931 and c. 586 BC reflect a diversity of beliefs that lie somewhere between two extremes. On the one hand, there is the position of the Bible and its prophets in which Yahweh and Yahweh alone should be worshiped and confessed. On the other hand, there are the various beliefs in multiple deities including Baal, Asherah, and Yahweh.Hess’ last line captures what is known for sure—based on the biblical texts and archaeology. Going beyond this much to psychologize the biblical writers or to pretend that one can “reconstruct” the evolution from polytheism to monotheism by virtue of a chronology of composition and editing that requires omniscience is to bend the biblical text to one’s will. Such “reconstructions” are in fact constructions made on the basis of presuppositional filters.2. The meaning of nachash in Genesis 3 / the discussion of ch-w-t-m (“sealer”) in Ezek 28:12.In case there is any confusion, my position on the nachash (“serpent”) of Genesis 3 is best summarized in terms of what I am saying and not saying.I believe the nachash of Genesis 3 was a divine being. The New Testament makes this explicitly clear (Rev. 12:9; 20:2). The fact that the Old Testament does not use the term sat?an of the serpent in the garden does not hinder this view. Rather, it is consistent with it. My claim is not that Ezekiel 28 draws upon a tale about a being called Satan. It doesn’t because that word doesn’t occur in Genesis 3. Rather, my claim is that Ezekiel 28 draws upon a story about a divine being who rebelled against divine authority. The nachash exhibits properties of divinity familiar to anyone in the ancient world (e.g., the serpent speaks) and he obviously rebels against God’s decision to include humans in his divine abode (Eden).?I am not arguing that nachash should not be translated “serpent.” It is not the translation that matters, but the recognition that the story is not about a mere animal. The serpent is actually a divine being. Rather, I am suggesting that, to literate readers of the Hebrew Bible, the lemma nachash would have (intentionally so) brought to mind other elements of the cognitive framework of the original readers: the dispensing of divine knowledge (the verb form) and luminescence (nachash is of the same root as nechoshet [“copper, bronze”] in biblical Hebrew). With respect to the latter, given the Babylonian / Aramaic context for other portions of Genesis 1-11 (see Chapters 12-15 in The Unseen Realm), it is worth noting that Aramaic n-ch-sh also means “copper, shining bronze,” evoking the same sense of radiance or brilliance. A recent article in the Journal of Biblical Literature draws attention to one aspect of the wordplay for which I am arguing: Duane Smith, “The Divining Snake: Reading Genesis 3 in the Context of Mesopotamian Ophiomancy,”?JBL?134:1 (Spring 2015): 31-49. The abstract reads in part: “With several well-attested examples of polysemy and alliteration in Gen 2–3, ancient authors and readers?no doubt perceived an unstated relationship between ??????? (“snake”) and ??????? (“divination”).”?The nachash is to be viewed differently than Balaam’s donkey for a simple contextual reason: the incident with the nachash takes place in the divine council abode / meeting place.?What follows are some excerpts of van Dijk’s discussion in his monograph, Ezekiel’s Prophecy on Tyre (Ez. 26:1–28:19): A New Approach that provides his thoughts on taking ch-w-t-m (“the sealer”) as ch-w-t (“serpent”; mem silent / enclitic).Van Dijk notes …?The intuition of MT (??tēm) that in ?wtm a person must be intended seems to be corroborated by the following mālē? ?okmāh. One of the most controversial points in this section is the vocalization of the first word of vs. 14 ?t (MT ?at). Critics are uncertain whether the king is called a cherub or whether, instead, he is placed with the cherub. One may point to the parallelism between vss. 12b–13 and vs. 14 that is suggested by ?attāh (vs. 12b) and ?āt (MT vs. 14) and by the qualifications that follow this “you”, among which behar qōde? ?ělōh?m hayy?tā (vs. 13) corresponds to behar qōde? ?ělōh?m hayy?tā (vs. 14). If this similarity is not fictitious, one must consider a possible relationship existing between ker?b and the mysterious ?wtm.?With regard to this ?wtm one may argue that MT ??tēm does not recommend itself, neither for its meaning, “the sealer” (?), nor for its vocalization, since the waw is not usual for the active participle qal (=qōtēl). One may conclude that the waw was not introduced by the masoretes, but was found already in the text they set out to point. A very relevant suggestion has been made by C. H. Cornill: “The place is absolutely obscure and will, if ever, get its solution from Assyriology. One thing is very certain, the words ?wtm tknyt could never mean an artistically wrought seal … In the words must be hidden somewhere a mythological allusion, and stated therein what rank the prince of Tyre possessed in the garden of Eden, namely—with some probability—the name of a sort of subordinate spirit or demon. For most evidently the prince is presented as a fallen angel.”MSH: This is cited from C. H. Cornill, Das Buch des Propheten Ezechiel, Leipzig 1886; the translation is that of van Dijk.In 26:12–20 and 27:34 three unsuspected cases of enclitic mem in the construct chain turned up. One may be correct in establishing a fourth case here, reading ?attāh ?awwat-m takn?t, “You, O Serpent of perfection”. Though ?awwāh occurs in biblical texts only as the name of Eve and as a noun denoting “village”, it has the meaning of “serpent” in Phoenician and Aramaic. So in Sfire KAI 222: A: 31 ?wh is collocated with ?qrb, “scorpion”, and means “serpent”. For the spelling takn?t G. R. Driver’s vocalization is followed. The word recalls Akkadian takn?t?, “preparation, correction, perfection”. Its connection here with kel?l yōp? is possibly to be linked to UT 51:I:16 klt knyt, “complete (?) in perfection (?)”. As for ?awwāh note UT 1001: 6 ?w btnm (= Heb. peten, “serpent”). But C. Virolleaud reads ?r b?nm, “a hole of serpents” (cp. UT 19:847).At first sight it does not seem pertinent at all to call the Prince of Tyre “a serpent”. Yet, from the account of Genesis one knows that a serpent has something to do with paradise, as does the cherub (vs. 14). When one realizes that the cherub guards the gate-way to paradise, a detail is touched that is very illuminating for the exegesis of Ez 28 and commentators did not fail to note this. In the interpretation of vs. 14 (see below) the cherub assumes the same role as in Genesis. Now in Mesopotamian sources the serpent has an identical function, and what is more important, he forms with thecherub a couple of guardians at the entrance of the temples, a trace of which is found in Gn 3:24 where God places “the cherubim and the flaming sword to keep the way to the tree of life”. P. Dhorme and H. Vincent observe that this offers “an evident analogy with the inseparable couples lamasu-k?ribu that stood sentinel over the thresholds of royal or divine dwellings in ancient Mesopotamia. It is a known fact … that the cherub is the double of the k?ribu; when, therefore, the ‘zig-zag-flame’ is identical with lamasu=la?mu, both groups are interchangeable. Now then, this equation has been demonstrated”, and the authors refer to the cylinder of Qal’at Shergat with the inscription of Tiglath-Pilesar I on the lightning-flash of bronze to protect the city against evil influences. P. Dhorme defines the lamasu or la?mu “a monster in the form of a serpent to which was entrusted the guard of the temples”. The zig-zag sword of Gn 3:24 has been compared by H. Gunkel to the sword of Yahweh in Isa 27:1; 34:5; Jer 47:6 and Ez 21:9–10, acting as an independent demoniac being.MSH: For the last two citations, see: P. Dhorme. “Les Chérubins, Le Nom”, RB 35 (1926) 328–358, esp. 339; H. Gunkel, Genesis3 (HAT: G?ttingen 1910, p. 25).?In Ez ?awwāh and ker?b may stand for divine beings, not unlike the Babylonian k?ribu and la?mu, whom Dhorme-Vincent term interchangeable, and they may have the same task, to guard the sanctuary identical with the garden of God, as will be seen below. One has here, therefore, an inner biblical allusion to the very short indication of Gn 3:24 regarding a double guard, though Ezekiel applies the names to the one King of Tyre.Readers will note (especially after working through the next issue) that I don’t need a serpent in Ezekiel 28 to conceptually connect it to Isaiah 14 and Genesis 3. The thread that runs through all three is the rebellion of a divine being in the divine council. I offer the above material on nachash only as an interesting possibility that would simply create one more connection between the three passages. It is hardly the only one, and not even the most important one.Lastly, interested readers are directed to a recent dissertation on radiance as an attribute of divine beings or humans (e.g., Moses; Exod 34:29-35) who encounter the divine presence:Shawn Zelig Aster, “The Phenomenon of Divine and Human Radiance in the Hebrew Bible and in Northwest Semitic and Mesopotamian Literature,” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 2006?3. Isaiah 14:12-15 and Ezekiel 28:11-19 are conceptually and inter-textually connected, that both passages have as their interpretive backdrop the idea of a cosmic rebellion of a divine being, not a primeval human.We’ve at last arrived at the third issue for discussion. The explanation of my position on this third issue will proceed via the following three points:1. Establishing that there is solid scholarly support for the notion that the backdrop to Ezekiel 28 is a tale of a divine rebel, not a human one. Both perspectives are possible, though most of modern OT scholarship seems to dismiss the divine option. 2. That since both Isaiah 14:12-15 and Ezek 28:1-19 have a divine rebel story as their backdrop, it is methodologically inconsistent to read one (Isa 14) in that light but not the other (Ezek 28).– My guess is that evangelical scholars are quick to to do this because they want to distance themselves from connecting Ezekiel 28 to Satan. As I noted above (and in the book), I am well aware that the lemma sat?an does not occur in Genesis 3, and I don’t believe the character in Job 1-2 is the NT devil. Consequently, the position I am advocating in the book has nothing to do with advancing items not in the text as though they were. – Rather, I am saying that Genesis 3 is about the rebellion of a divine rebel (a position held by all evangelicals hold, to my knowledge). This rebel eventually gets the label “Satan” because the noun sat?an eventually came into use as a proper name. I am further saying that Ezekiel 28 and Isaiah 14 also have a divine rebellion as conceptual backdrop. Whether the original writers of those chapters had Genesis 3 at their disposal depends on the date of composition of Gen 3. But that doesn’t matter. I believe that the final form of the biblical text in all three cases contains deliberate overlaps and intersections between all three chapters, and so all three chapters should be read against the backdrop of a divine rebellion. In the flow of biblical history given to us in the final form of the text, the divine rebellion of Genesis 3 has chronological priority and thus becomes the touchpoint for the other two chapters. However, all three chapters ought to be allowed to inform each other.3. That difficult features of the biblical text in Ezekiel 28 do not undermine reading Ezekiel 28’s diatribe in the context of a divine rebel story. The fact is that there are three viable ways of approaching the text of Ezekiel 28: (a) adopting the Masoretic Text, with its pointing and accenting; (b) adopting the consonantal Masoretic text, setting aside its pointing and accepting; (c) adopting Septuagint readings in place of the (a) and perhaps (a) and (b). As will be noted below, option (a) is the easiest to reconcile with a divine rebel conceptual backdrop.We’ll discuss these items in order, noting important bibliography as we go.Items 1 & 2: The backdrop to Ezekiel 28 is a tale of a divine rebel, not a human one. That is also true of Isaiah 14. Therefore, to admit that a divine rebel story is the backdrop for one (Isa 14) and not the other (Ezek 28) is methodologically inconsistent and therefore incoherent.The most recent study on cosmic rebels in biblical literature and its most immediate backdrop, the literature of ancient Ugarit, is the 1990 Harvard University doctoral dissertation by Hugh Rowland Page: “The astral revolt A study of its reflexes in Canaanite and Hebrew literature.” It’s important to note that my contention in The Unseen Realm — that the backdrop of Ezekiel 28 and Isaiah 14 is a story of a cosmic rebel — is not idiosyncratic. It’s an idea defended in this Harvard dissertation and, naturally, the previous scholarship the dissertation cites.? Page’s dissertation was later published under the title, The Myth of Cosmic Rebellion: A Study of Its Reflexes in Ugaritic and Biblical Literature (Vetus Testamentum Supplements 65; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1997). In what follows, page numbers refer to the dissertation.?We’ll begin with Isaiah 14. Back in 2001 I had an article published in which I argued that the conceptual background for Isa 14:12-15 was an Ugaritic myth of divine rebellion: Michael S. Heiser, “The Mythological Provenance of Isaiah 14:12-15: A Reconsideration of the Ugaritic Material,” Vetus Testamentum LI:3 (Fall 2001): 354-369. Isaiah 14:4b-20 is called a mashal in the Hebrew text, a term that is usually translated “taunt song” (because of the content here in Isaiah 14), but its basic meaning is “comparison or parable” (my thanks to Peter Gentry for this note; personal communication via email, 10/10/2013). The point is that Isaiah is comparing the king of Babylon with the lead character (Athtar) of an Ugaritic myth of cosmic rebellion.Page is in agreement that Isaiah 14:12-15 is heavily influenced by a cosmic rebellion myth from Ugarit. He writes: “Hyll bn s?h?r has fallen. This statement begins that section of the poem most heavily influenced by Canaanite mythology” (p. 142; my copy of Page’s dissertation is a low-quality scan; it appears that s?h?r has been mis-transliterated in Page’s dissertation as s?h?r, but I can’t be sure). Of special interest to readers of The Unseen Realm is the fact that Page takes hyll as meaning “shining one.” He writes on page 142, footnote 201:We have adopted the meaning “to shine” for the root hll proposed by Brown-Driver-Briggs (BDB:237). Note should also be taken of the meaning “am Horizont erscheinen” proposed by Kohler-Baumgartner (HALAT: 238) based on comparative evidence from Arabic (halla “begin to shine”) and Ethiopic (halala “shine, be bright,” a denominative verb according to Leslau 1987:217). . . . We suspect that the root hll is primary in Semitic and has the meaning “to shine.”? [MSH: the German line above means “appearing on the Horizon” and is a reference to the day star, which outshines the sun at dawn].Page continues on the next page (143):The frame of reference shifts in vss. 11bff. . . . with greater emphasis being placed on the primordial rebel whose fall is compared to that of the earthly monarch. . . . Only by way of v. 4 do we know who the ms?l is directed toward. From content alone, we know only of a foolish king and a cosmic usurper whose failures are woven into the poem in such a way that their identities are virtually indistinguishable from one another.Page later postulates that the name Hyll bn s?h?r alludes to a despot an is “either a divine name or epithet for the god who attempted a similar coup in the divine council” (p. 144). In my own article on Isaiah 14, I don’t take the offense against the high god El as a usurpation, preferring that the offense was a willful snubbing of El’s authority in council decisions.Page proceeds through the next few verses (Isaiah 14:13-15) demonstrating how the terminology is unambiguously consistent with that of El’s abode in Ugaritic material (144). He then walks readers through the offense to “the Most High” before identifying Athtar as the rebel: “From what is known of ?Athtar at Ugarit, this assessment is consistent with the picture we have of him there” (145).Though my own perspective of Athtar’s offense differs somewhat with Page’s, we both (along with a range of scholars Page and I cite in our respective works) see the backdrop of Isaiah 14:12-15 as a divine (cosmic) rebellion.Moving on to Ezekiel 28, we must have our eye trained to conceptual motifs Ezekiel 28 shares with Isaiah 14 that link the two. My argument is not that both passages have the Athtar myth in view (I never argue that in Unseen Realm or my published work). Rather, my argument is that they both have a divine / cosmic rebel in view (the antecedents of which are in Canaanite religion).Page’s thoughts on Ezekiel 28 will seem inconsistent to someone who reads his dissertation. For example,on page 178 he says that he believes the chapter describes “an oracle directed to an unnamed prince of Tyre which draws upon allusions to the god El and his wisdom in illustrating the hubris of an upstart noble.” This statement reflects Page’s reading of Ezekiel 28 as a human prince with words of hubris in his mouth whereby the prince thinks he is as wise as El. I don’t have a problem with that if we see the original tale of hubris the writer uses for an analogy to be the tale of a divine rebel, only if that context is forgotten. Page affirms the cosmic rebel context clearly elsewhere. On pp. 45-46 he writes, commenting on the work of Richard J. Clifford on Ezekiel 28:It seems clear to us that Isaiah 14, Ezek 28:1-10, and 28:11-19 have some relationship to a revolt against the chief god of the pantheon or to those involved in such a revolt. We support the contention that Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28:11-19 indicate that the chief protagonist is an astral god (a “Shining One”). . . . Equally convincing is his analysis of Canaanite and astral allusions in Ezekiel 28:1-10 and 11-20. Both of these texts, in our estimation, refer to an attempted coup against El by a god who is a member of the council, an astral god, and one to whom wisdom has been ascribed.The problem that I have with those who dispute that Ezekiel 28’s backdrop is a cosmic rebel is that those scholars make the object of the analogy (the human prince of Tyre) the subject of the analogy.? To illustrate, here is how I see what’s going on:Subject / referent of the tale used for the analogy = a divine rebelObject of the analogy = the human prince of TyreScholars who oppose my view think about the passage in one of two ways, both of which I think are misguided:Subject / referent of the tale used for the analogy = a human rebel described in cosmic rebel termsObject of the analogy = the human prince of Tyre* Therefore, the passage is only tracking on a human rebellion — in the abode of El (the garden) — which in biblical terms = Eden, which means the rebel is Adam.The first element, to me, is a misreading (and dare I say cheating), as it affirms the cosmic rebel motifs (which are not at all unclear) but then insists Ezekiel isn’t talking about a cosmic rebel. They would justify this by appeal the gemstone (shining!) appearance of the figure in Ezekiel 28 (which, as I showed in Unseen Realm, need not point to a man or even the high priest). It fails, of course, when it comes to the cherub language (and simple consistency).Page seems to veer off into this illogical trajectory in places, but in other places affirms more the cosmic rebellion framework more consistently. For example, there is no evidence (textual or iconographical) whereby one can argue a cherub is a human. Cherubs are divine beings, at times given human features in textual descriptions and art, but they are not human. An analogy would be angels. Angels have human features and appear in some texts virtually indistinguishable from humans — but they are not humans, for they have other attributes that transcend humanity. Angels are more “fully anthropomorphized divine beings than cherubs, who are only partially anthropomorphized. But it would be a careless mistake to identify either as a human being. Lastly (by way of prefacing our discussion of a cosmic rebellion backdrop to Ezekiel 28), this issue — whether the conceptual backdrop is a human or divine rebel — is also related to text-critical issues in Ezekiel 28. That was the third of the four trajectories for this topic noted above. We’ll hit those issues after discussing Page’s work here.Let’s track through Page’s work a bit more. As we go, I’ll point out how scholars who hold the alternative view would parse what he’s saying and why it’s inconsistent.On page 181 Page comments on the “I am El” / “I am a god” (?? ???) of Ezek 28:2 (emphasis mine):The boast of the prince is of particular interest. We have preferred the translation “I am El” for ?l ?ny rather than the usual “I am a god” (RSV). His wisdom, riches, strength, and power, as they are described? in vss. 3-5, lead one to suspect that the prince would lay claim to far more than identification as a god (i.e., one of the members of the divine council). By simple equation with the known structure of the pantheon, this would be nothing unusual. He would, in fact, be the earthly counterpart to one of the children of El. The context suggests that the prince takes himself to be Canaanite El, chief god of the pantheon, an inappropriate claim for even a Canaanite monarch to make. This boast is similar to that found in Isa. 14:12ff., and is the crucial feature around which the remainder of vss. 1-10 is construed. The overstepping of bounds is the dominant theme here and in Isaiah 14. It finds full expression in the statement “I am El.”The background against which this more concrete reference to the Tyrian prince is to be understood must revolve around El and a challenge to his authority, home, and prestige by a divine usurper. The reader is left with the job of identifying the god capable of and inclined toward mounting such opposition against him. The poet’s original audience no doubt found this task to be less problematic than modern interpreters. We believe that an important clue is contained in the powers which are ascribed to the god in vss. 3-5.Page picks up the comment about the usurper’s wisdom as his clue. As a result, he sees a different myth of divine rebellion behind Ezek 28 than Isaiah 14. He writes (p. 182), “In Isaiah 14 the usurper is called hyll bn? s?h?r, suggesting the usurper was an astral god. By contrast, here emphasis is placed in the usurper’s wisdom which has led to corruption.” But note — he takes the backdrop of both to be a cosmic rebel.Over the next few pages Page tracks on a few more relationships between Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28 (e.g., being cast down to the Pit). Interested readers can read his dissertation (linked above) on these points for themselves. On page 185 Page transitions to Ezek. 28:11-19. It is in this section that he’ll identify the rebel who main trait (and point of downfall) is wisdom. Page writes (emphasis mine):Our major problem comes in attempting to identify who is divine who this divine usurper is. The hubris of the usurper is similar to that found in Isaiah 14. The boast made by the usurper in Ezek 28:2 (beginning with ?l?ny [“I am El”] are no unlike the series of claims made in Isaiah 14:13-16 which culminates with ?dmh l?lywn [“I will be like the Most High”]. The major departure in Ezekiel? is the usurper? has been stripped of astral characteristics and has been described as a god whose wisdom has corrupted him.Page then works his way through the gemstone and cherub descriptions of the divine usurper. He writes (emphasis mine):Once again the poet has exercised considerable restraint in editing and has allowed the myth to convey its message directly. Its main characters are Yahweh and one of this throne guardians. We suspect that the original characters were El and a member of his cadre of gods. Apparently, the author trusted his urbane and literate audience enough to allow them to make the connections between the old Canaanite myth and the historical personage in question.An entity without flaw is described, perfect in proportion and visage. We see in him the ultimate manifestation of the creative genius of El/Yahweh, the pinnacle of all that has been made. He is part of the divine court, a member of the council of gods. We also suspect that that he is envisioned as one of the stars or deified heavenly bodies which were themselves a part of the governing forces of the cosmos. Of these, he is the most perfect, and all other celestial bodies are his personal coterie; they accent his beauty by being comparable in genius but inferior in appearance. These were established as his assembly on the day of his creation. (192-193)Some commentary is necessary here. The wording makes it clear that Page is not thinking of a human in paradise. It’s also evident that what he’s written here is a bit contradictory to his earlier assessment of the divine being that is the backdrop of Ezekiel 28 (as opposed to Isaiah 14). Recall that earlier on p. 182 he had written: “In Isaiah 14 the usurper is called hyll bn? s?h?r, suggesting the usurper was an astral god. By contrast, here emphasis is placed in the usurper’s wisdom which has led to corruption.” The point is that earlier Page had concluded that an astral deity wasn’t in the picture; here that is back on the table. Frankly, it’s hard to avoid that the Canaanite backdrop here is astral — strengthening the relationship to Isaiah 14. The reason is the clear astral character of the Ugaritic divine council. See for example:Korpel, Marjo Christina Annette. A Rift in the Clouds: Ugaritic and Hebrew Descriptions of the Divine. Ugarit-Verlag, 1990 (see pp. 563-569 for astral terminology related to the gods of Ugarit)?Smith, Mark S. “ Astral religion and the Representation of Divinity: The Cases of Ugarit and Judah.” Prayer, Magic, and the Stars in the Ancient and Late Antique World. Edited by Scott Noegel and Joel Walker. Penn State Press, 2010, 187-206?Page turns specifically to the “cherub” (krwb; ????) description on p. 195. He says:There are three possible interpretations of krwb:1. A divine name2. An epithet of a Canaanite, Mesopotamian, or Israelite god3. A title or classification of beings with a functional significanceIt is our belief that the king is being identified with one of the mythological Cherubim (hence, option three)?. The implication here is that he was a member of the divine assembly which met at the holy mount, cosmic meeting place of the gods. This must certainly have been the meaning behind the Cherub’s having been “set” (i.e., stationed in a position of responsibility or authority) on the holy mount of god. . . . [I]t is possible that the ‘fiery stones’ are, in actuality, stars, and that the Cherub being addressed was an astral god. These too would, conceivably, be gathered at the meeting place of the divine assembly. . . . Context suggests that this is one of El’s/Yahweh’s trusted counselors or personal guardians who has fallen from favor. (pp. 195-196)On page 198 Page ties the two trajectories (wise divine rebel, astral deity) about the usurper together:The nature of the offense is absent, though we are told that the Cherub’s wisdom was corrupted because of his splendor and that his beauty contributed to his pride, but it is almost certainly one involving? actual or potential harm to Yahweh/El. It resulted in his expulsion from the holy mount and his apparent demotion from his status as astral deity.Despite his return to an astral identification for the divine rebel backdrop to Ezekiel 28, Page does not think the referent is Athtar (unlike Isaiah 14). This isn’t unreasonable, as Ezekiel 28 has a more “high-handed” feel to it. However, if I’m correct in my own article on the mythological (Ugaritic) provenance of Isaiah 14’s villain, a snubbing of El’s authority could be construed by adherents of Canaanite religion / readers familiar with the Athtar myth as a high-handed act of hubris. In short, the character of the rebellions at the backdrop of Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28 is no obstacle to having the same story in mind. The more substantive disconnect is the wisdom motif. But at any rate, as I noted earlier, my view that the backdrop to these passages is a divine rebel story and that the two chapters have very clearly conceptual overlaps is not at all idiosyncratic. You can’t get more respectable in terms of scholarship than a Harvard dissertation.Item 3: Difficult features of the biblical text in Ezekiel 28 do not undermine reading Ezekiel 28’s diatribe in the context of a divine rebel story.The textual difficulties in Ezekiel 28 are well known to Old Testament scholars. Our discussion here is restricted to Ezek 28:11-19, that section of Ezekiel that contains the cherub / holy mountain of God / Eden language. My goal in what follows is to briefly explain those relevant to the content of Ezekiel 28:11-19 with respect to ideas put forth in The Unseen Realm and show that my positions are in the mainstream of biblical scholarship. In other words, as was the case with seeing a cosmic (divine) rebel story as the conceptual backdrop of the oracle against the prince of Tyre, my views are not at all idiosyncratic.In briefest terms, there are three ways to approach the Hebrew text of Ezekiel 28:11-19:1. Accept the consonantal Masoretic Text (MT) and its pointing (vocalization; i.e., the vowels added by the Masoretes)2. Accept the consonantal Masoretic Text (MT), discarding its Masoretic pointing3. Follow the Septuagint (LXX), which in some instances, can be supported by alternative pointing, but at other times presents the translator with a different text than MT.Readers would do well to understand that the view I am arguing for in Unseen Realm — is supported by the first option. As will become clear in the discussion below, MT as it is pointed has a single figure in the primeval garden scene — a cherub — as opposed to having a man in the garden with a cherub (who is taken as Adam). Consequently, the oracle language describes the rebellion of that lone figure, the cherub, and the cherub is not a man, but is a divine being (as cherubs of course are). This means that opponents of my view must either repoint MT or read the LXX in Ezekiel 28:11-19 to get Adam there.All three of the above approaches are viable and have their adherents. Those familiar with me and some of my scholarly publications (esp. my Bib Sac article, “Deuteronomy 32:8 and the sons of God”) will know that I am not an advocate for MT. I assign it no special sanctity or status. The same goes for LXX. For me, the matter of Ezekiel 28 is not purely a textual issue. One’s position on the text needs to cohere with external factors and other passages. Frankly, the dispute over Ezekiel 28 is for me a prime example of how the best interpretation doesn’t only make sense in isolation (all three approaches could claim that), but informs (and is informed) by a range of other passages and considerations. That’s the only way to reconstruct a mosaic of biblical theology. Interpretative choices must have explanatory power in more than one place. The Hebrew Bible (and the whole Bible) is not a collection of disparate pieces. The work as a whole is intentional and internally consistent, each part playing a role in the whole. So, while I appreciate how all of the three approaches have merit, I’m looking for broad explanatory power in a work of synthesis like The Unseen Realm.The most thorough study on the text of Ezekiel 28:11-19 is, fortunately, also recent: Hector M. Patmore, Adam, Satan, and the King of Tyre: The Interpretation of Ezekiel 28: 11-19 in Late Antiquity (Jewish and Christian Perspectives Series, vol. 20; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2012). Patmore analyzes MT and LXX thoroughly, along with the Targums, on his way to discussing the reception / interpretation of the chapter in the church fathers and the rabbinic literature. While I’ll draw a good bit from Patmore, these other important essays are noteworthy:James Barr, “‘Thou art the Cherub’: Ezekiel 28.14 and the Post-Ezekiel Understanding of Genesis 2-3.”? in Priests, Prophets, and Scribes: Essays on the Formation and Heritage of Second Temple Judaism in Honour of Joseph Blenkinsopp (Eugene Ulrich et al., eds.; Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Supplement Series 149; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1992), 213-213James E. Miller, “The Maelaek of Tyre (Ezekiel 28,11-19),” Zeitschrift für diealttestamentliche Wissenschaft, 105:3 (1993): 497-501Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer, “Zechariah’s Spies and Ezekiel’s Cherubim,” in Tradition in Transition: Haggai and Zechariah 1-8 in the Trajectory of Hebrew Theology?(ed. Mark J. Boda and Michael H. Floyd; The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament 475; Bloomsbury ‘ T & T Clark, 2008), 95-119Knud Jeppesen, “You are a Cherub, but no God!” Scandinavian Journal of the Old Testament 5:1 (1991); 83-94?Save for Patmore, whose book attempts to take no position (though it’s clear he prefers re-pointing MT), all these essays support the view of the text of Ezekiel 28:11-19 presumed in The Unseen Realm: that there is one figure in the garden, a divine cherub (see below, just before the Concluding Thoughts). Several specifically see Ezek. 28:11-19 having a definite relationship to Genesis 3.We turn now to Patmore to survey the issues, specifically Chapter 6, his discussion of MT.After surveying the available text-critical witnesses of Ezek. 28:11-19 (LXX, revisions of LXX [“The Three”: Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion; Lucian’s revision], the Targums, the Peshitta, and the Vulgate), Patmore concludes:By the time Jerome began his undertaking, a consonantal text identical to the Masoretic Text preserved in Medieval manuscripts had become standard, although there remained a certain fluidity in respect of minor details. The Three, though fragmentary, also point towards a Hebrew text of Ezekiel 28:11–19 that resembled closely the Masoretic Text. At points the exact form of a word underlying the Greek of The Three cannot be established with certainty, but the overall picture is one of agreement with the Masoretic Text against the major differences of the Septuagint. We can probably assume a picture in which a text resembling the Masoretic Text was established and dominant in Palestine in the late pre-Christian era.The notion that its current form goes back to this period is plausible. The period prior to the destruction of the Second Temple was marked by a considerable degree of textual pluriformity, but among certain circles. there existed a preference for one textual tradition, that which is now represented by the Masoretic Text, and evidence from Qumran suggeststhat the text was already subject to safeguards to ensure the precision of its transmission in this period (pp. 187-188).The above pertains to the consonantal text of MT. Vocalization of the consonantal text began ca. 7th century A.D. The versions (LXX and otherwise noted above) occasionally evidence alternative vocalizations to what we know today as MT.The first item of note is the difficult phrase ?????? ????????? in Ezek. 28:12. Patmore (191-193) and Miller (p. 500; see above) note van Dijk’s alternative reading (noted in Unseen Realm) that presumes the final mem to be enclitic and a translation of “perfect serpent.” Neither disparages the idea (Patmore in other places deems certain ideas “impossible” or having “no basis”), though both consider the suggestion unpersuasive. Miller proposes his own solution, moving the final mem to the following word, a consonantal reconstruction. The result is either “(living) being of propriety” or “(living) being of proper measures. The discussion therefore doesn’t advance anything revelatory.Patmore’s thoughts on the gemstones in Ezek 28:13 are a bit more interesting. He writes (emphasis mine):The list is not intended to allude to the High Priest, otherwise it would be complete, rather it demonstrates the abundant luxury of the setting. The commonality between the two lists might be accounted for by both sources’ dependence on P,47 but here is not the place to enter into the complex question of the date of P. Whatever the list’s origins, in their current format we are not dealing with an allusion. . . .Isaiah 54:11–12 indicates the type of image at work. Here the future Jerusalem is pictured, built of jewels and surrounded by precious boundary stones. The image is later picked up and elaborated upon in Tobit 13:16–17 and Revelation 21:19–20, an association that Jerome makes in his Commentary on Ezekiel (In Hiezechielem IX, xxviii, 252–56). The intention is to paint a picture of a glorious location surrounded (reading ‘hedge’ for ????? ) with rare, exotic stones, in much the same way that Isiah and Tobit do. That the figure is said to walk in the middle of “fire stones” from which he is expelled (28:14, 16), may also support the view that the precious stones surround rather than adorn him, taking “precious stones” and “fire stones” to be synonymous.In a footnote in The Unseen Realm I also note how the gemstones relate more to the divine dwelling, the abode of the divine council. I also note, however, that the description can do double-duty in that the stones may also describe a luminous being. After all, the inhabitants of the divine abode are routinely described as shining or luminous in the Bible.Patmore next (196) notes how the Masoretic accenting groups the word “gold” with the precious stones. He deems this awkward because gold is not a gem, and because the preceding nine stones form three groups of three. The discussion lacks weight in my view since his ensuing comments about the odd pointing of ????????? (“they were prepared, established”) admit that this plural form could be the predicator of either the list of stones (plus the gold) or the “drums and pipes” (ESV = “settings and engraving” – with a footnote that the Hebrew is uncertain). Consequently, what he sees as awkwardness is not an obstacle to coherence. His charge that ????????? is awkward because it is pointed as a polal stem form is something I’d agree with. Like Patmore, a polel would make more sense because the polel stem of this lemma (?????) “often refers to events of grand or cosmic importance” (197). In my mind, the rebellion of a divine being is on that scale, so a polel would make more sense — UNLESS the point is the the establishment (polal) of the divine dwelling. The implication would be that on the very day of Eden’s creation (or pretty close) the rebellion occurred. Patmore of course doesn’t get into that sort of content. My point here in this interaction is that what he thinks awkward need not argue away from a single divine cherub. The stem choice (polal or polel) can make good sense either way.Ezekiel 28:14 takes directly to the heart of the matter (single cherub or cherub + man). Patmore proposes the following translations. It is easy to see how they differ:MT consonants with Masoretic pointing:You were a cherub of anointment who covers, and I set you, on the Holy Mountain of God you were, in the midst of fire stones you walked about.MT consonants with alternative pointing:When you were created the stretched out cherub, who covers was established, then I set you on the Holy Mountain, you were a god, in the midst of fire stones you walked aboutOr …You were with a cherub of anointment who covers, and I set you on the Holy Mountain of God. You were in the midst of fire stones.The latter two options (alternative pointing) can obviously be read as though the “you” being addressed is not the cherub. This is clearest in the second of the two alternatives (“you were with a cherub …”).The text of MT (with MT pointing) has been the subject of much discussion. Ezekiel 28:14 begins with the verbless clause ????????????? and is translated “You were a cherub.” The problem is that ??????? (“cherub”) is masculine in gender but the pronoun of MT (?????) is feminine. The expected form would be the masculine ??????. Patmore notes: “As the Masorah of the major codices points out, this consonantal form, though extremely rare, is found in two other cases in the Hebrew Bible to indicate a male subject” (198). These two instances are Num 11:15 and Deut 5:27. Patmore also notes five instances where a scribal qere (“what should be read”) notation (??????) corrects the kethiv, what’s found written in the text (?????). The instance in Ezek. 28:14 receives no “correction” though, as those who read Hebrew know, the consonants can be read as the preposition “with” (which is reflected in the second alternative translation — and is what the LXX translators did with the form: μετ? το? χερουβ).Barr (p. 214) summarizes the issue nicely:If [the text] means, ‘You are the [or, a] cherub . . . this gives a distinct identity to the person addressed. It means that the whole oracle is addressed to one who did the service that cherubim were supposed to undertake, whatever that might be. If, however, it means something else, it might suggest that the main person addressed in the whole oracle is not the cherub, but someone else, a person who is only juxtaposed or associated with the cherub. Such a person in the Garden of Eden is likely to have been the first man, known in Genesis as Adam. . . .Barr proceeds to note the Masorah data listed above via Patmore and the ease with which the LXX translators would have seen a preposition and not a pronoun. Interestingly, the ease with which the LXX translation is explained (seeing the common preposition instead of the odd fem. pronoun form with a masculine noun) prompts Barr to accept MT and its pointing as genuine. Barr writes (pp. 214-216; emphasis mine):A very large number of commentators have followed the Greek text. R.R. Wilson lists many of them in an interesting article, mentioning the numerous difficulties that are thought to arise if the text is not emended after the Greek version. . . .Whatever the obscurities and possible errors of the MT at other points in Ezekiel 28, at this particular point it is much easier to suppose that the LXX failed to recognize ?? as the pronoun than to suppose that it really was the preposition or particle, later wrongly vocalized by the Masoretic tradition as the extremely rare form meaning ‘thou’. To put it in the other way, if the Masoretic tradition had seen the form ?? and there was some doubt what it was, it is understandable that they would have thought of diagnosing it as ‘with’ or as the direct object particle, but it is frankly unbelievable that they would have identified it as the very rare form of ‘thou’. The Masoretic vocalization is credible only if it rested on a phonic tradition of the word as att. Thus there may be good reasons, in terms of the general content of the passage, for emending the passage as many scholars have done, but it is doubtful whether there is a good textual reason for it.While being charitable to the content motivations of those who emend the text, Barr then goes on to defend a lone cherub view. What Barr refers to here as a “phonic tradition” refers to the fact that the expected written ?????? could have been spelled without the final ? matre vowel while retaining the verbal pronunciation ?atta. In other words, Barr’s suggestion is that native speakers would have looked at consonantal ?? and known that ?atta (the pronunciation) was meant, and therefore left the form stand. Patmore concedes that this is a “credible” explanation (198). Block agrees in his Ezekiel commentary (p. 100; vol. 2, Ezekiel 25-48), though Block rejects the idea of a cosmic rebel being the backdrop (Block in general is skittish of mythological allusions in Ezekiel 28; for a good survey of that material, see John L. McKenzie, “Mythological Allusions in Ezekiel 28:12-18,” Journal of Biblical Literature 75:4 [Dec. 1956]: 322-327). Van Dijk (p. 119) and Tiemeyer (119) agree as well. Miller makes no comment on the suggestion. The important takeaway for our purposes, then, is that there is no textually necessary reason to reject MT with its pointing.Several reference grammars agree with Barr’s reasoning and the above conclusion that MT with pointing should be retained (only those with some knowledge of historic Hebrew morphology will understand the comments in full — esp. the presence of “n” in the pronoun forms — but I nevertheless offer the commentary):Blau observes: “The original forms of ?????? and ????? were *?antā and *?antī (with anceps final vowels). The n is still preserved in the Southwest Semitic languages. In all likelihood, the ?an is the same pronominal element that occurs in the first person.” (Joshua Blau, Phonology and Morphology of Biblical Hebrew: An Introduction, 162).Joüon-Muraoka includes Ezek 28:14 in the list of occurrences where (retaining MT) ????? should be considered masculine: “However, the short form ????? [?att] or [?at] (see § 8 d, n. and § 27 db) is attested three times as masculine: Nu 11.15; Dt 5.27; Ez 28.14.” (Paul Joüon and Takamitsu Muraoka, A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew, vol. 1, p. 120 (Par. 39a), footnote 5).Gesenius concurs and writes: The forms of the 2nd person ??????, ?????, ??????, ?????????, &c., are contracted from ’antā, &c. The kindred languages have retained the n before the ?, e.g. Arab. ’ánā, fem. ’ánti, thou; pl. ’ántum, fem. ’antúnna, ye. In Syriac ????, fem. ????? are written, but both are pronounced ’at. In Western Aramaic ??????? is usual for both genders. ????? (without ?) occurs five times, e.g. Ps 6:4, always as Keth?bh, with ?????? as Qerê. In three places ????? appears as a masculine, Nu 11:15, Dt 5:24, Ez 28:14. (Friedrich Wilhelm Gesenius, Gesenius’ Hebrew Grammar [ed. E. Kautzsch and Sir Arthur Ernest Cowley; 2d English ed.; Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1910], 106).The next major difficulty are these words in v. 14:English translations typically render this as “I placed / set you; you were on the holy mountain of God.” The accenting of MT has “holy mountain” and “God” belonging together in one phrase. Patmore (p. 200) complains that this leaves too many verbs to be accounted for — the two in the above (“I placed/set” and “you were”) and the following “you walked about” not pictured. He also says that since the lemma ntn is usually followed by preposition other than the one here (???) to indicate a direct object, the MT pointing is awkward.Patmore never explains why the preposition that is there can’t work. The reason is likely that it can. He argues against “holy mountain of God” as a construct chain since it’s only found once elsewhere (Dan. 9:20). While other phrases are more common (e.g., “mountain of holiness” as distinct from “mountain of God”), why we need more than one occurrence of this chain to make it “permissible” is also never explained. Patmore argues instead for coupling elohim in the phrase with the verb ??????? (“you were a god”) and then unnecessarily opines that the MT accentuation was put in place to avoid identifying the figure as a god since he’d already been identified as a cherub. Readers of Unseen Realm will see the logic flaw here. All non-human beings of the spiritual world are elohim — elohim is a term that identifies inhabitants of the spiritual world. The point is that if the Masoretes understood that elohim was used of spirit beings other than the God of Israel, avoiding the above notion wouldn’t have been their motivation. Regardless, this is another instance where adjusting the MT pointing certainly doesn’t harm the lone cherub view. “You were a god” could easily help it.Verse 16 provides the next important difficulty. Patmore offers these two translations (emphasis mine):MT consonants with Masoretic pointing:By the abundance of your merchandise they filled your midst of violence and you sinned. So I cast you as a profanity from the mountain of God and I expelled you, O cherub who covers, from the midst of stones of fire.MT consonants with alternative pointing:By the abundance of your merchandise internally you were full of violence and you sinned. So I cast you as a profanity from the mountain of God and a cherub who covers expelled you from the midst of stones of fire.The second option obviously has two figures in view. The cherub wasn’t expelled, but expels someone else. The verb form would be read as third person. LXX follows the latter (?γαγ?ν σε τ? χερουβ ?κ μ?σου λ?θων πυρ?νων; “the cherub led you out of the midst of the stones of fire”). The former option (“I expelled you”) reads the verb as first person. The Vulgate reads with MT.At issue is the verb form. The consonantal text of the verb form is: ????. The form itself can be pointed as either third (?????????) or first person (?????????). If the pronoun form of MT (with its pointing) is followed per the discussion above, then MT with pointing must be followed here. The same logic applies to the LXX decision to see a preposition in v. 13; only a third person form here would make sense given that choice.There are several following verbs that are first person in vv. 17, 18. They would obviously be in concert with a first person form for the above ambiguous consonants. However, someone reading a third person form in v. 16 could accommodate the first person forms here by presuming God is the speaker who happened to reference the (separate) cherub in v. 16. In other words, the forms of vv. 17-18 aren’t an obstacle to either view.Concluding remarksThe careful reader up this amplified discussion should discern the following:1. The positions I take in?The Unseen Realm regarding Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28 (and their relationship to Genesis 3) are not idiosyncratic. They are based on solid scholarship that shows that a cosmic rebel story as the conceptual backdrop to these chapters. My position follows the Masoretic text tradition in Ezekiel 28.2. Those who want to see a human rebel (i.e., Adam) behind Ezekiel 28 must ignore or explain away the cosmic rebellion motifs discussed here and abandon (at least in key places) the Masoretic pointing.To reduce all this to a sentence, if you can admit that the evidence for a cosmic (divine) rebel backdrop to Ezekiel 28 is persuasive and embrace that, you don’t need to run to the Septuagint to “make sense” of the passage. Frankly, lots of things fall into place.Chapter 12: Divine TransgressionChapters 12 and 13 jointly deal with the same subject matter: the sons of God episode in Gen 6:1-4 and the nephilim. Nevertheless, this site treats them separately. ?Note that the nephilim are linked to the giant clans of later biblical history (i.e., the era of the conquest). Discussion of the giant clans and nephilim connections are the subject of Chapters 23, 24, and 25.The focus of Chapter 12 is flawed interpretations of Genesis 6:1-4 and the fact that the New Testament writers Peter and Jude both presume a supernatural view of the episode. The ancient Near Eastern background of the passage and the meaning of the term nephilim are the focus points of Chapter 13.Bibliography included in the book?Annette Yoshiko Reed, Fallen Angels and the History of Judaism and Christianity: The Reception of Enochic Literature (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005)Peter H. Davids, The Letters of 2 Peter and Jude (Pillar New Testament Commentary; Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2006)Michael Green, 2 Peter and Jude: An Introduction and Commentary (Tyndale New Testament Commentaries 18; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1987)Jerome H. Neyrey, 2 Peter, Jude: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary (Anchor Yale Bible 37C; New Haven; London: Yale University Press, 2008)G. Mussies, “Titans,” in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, 2nd ed. (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; Cologne; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)G. Mussies, “Giants,” in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, 2nd ed. (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; Cologne; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)David M. Johnson, “Hesiod’s Descriptions of Tartarus (Theogony 721–819),” The Phoenix 53:1-2 (1999): 8–28J. Daryl Charles, “The Angels under Reserve in 2 Peter and Jude,” Bulletin for Biblical Research 15.1 (2005): 39–48George W. E. Nickelsburg, 1 Enoch: A Commentary on the Book of 1 Enoch 1–36, 81–108 (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2001)Pieter G. R. de Villiers, ed., Studies in 1 Enoch and the New Testament (= Neotestamentica 17; Stellenbosch: University of Stellenbosch Press, 1983)Richard J. Bauckham, 2 Peter, Jude (Word Biblical Commentary; Dallas: Word, 1998)James C. VanderKam, “1 Enoch, Enochic Motifs, and Enoch in Early Christian Literature,” in The Jewish Apocalyptic Heritage in Early Christianity (ed. James C. VanderKam and William Adler; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1996), 33–101Archie T. Wright, The Origin of Evil Spirits: The Reception of Genesis 6:1–4 in Early Jewish Literature (Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 198, second series; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013)Loren T. Stuckenbruck, “The ‘Angels’ and ‘Giants’ of Genesis 6:1–4 in Second and Third Century BCE Jewish Interpretation: Reflections on the Posture of Early Apocalyptic Traditions,” Dead Sea Discoveries 7.3 (2000): 354-77Ida Fr?hlich, “Theology and Demonology in Qumran Texts,” Henoch 32.1 (2010): 101-128Hermann Lichtenberger, “Spirits and Demons in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in The Holy Spirit and Christian Origins: Essays in Honor of James D. G. Dunn (ed. James D. G. Dunn, Graham Stanton, Bruce W. Longenecker, and Stephen C. Barton; Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2004), 22–40Ida Fr?lich, “Mesopotamian Elements and the Watchers Traditions,” in The Watchers in Jewish and Christian Traditions (ed. Angela Kim Hawkins, Kelley Coblentz Bautch, and John Endres; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2014), 11–24Amar Annus, “On the Origin of the Watchers: A Comparative Study of the Antediluvian Wisdom in Mesopotamian and Jewish Traditions,” Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha 19.4 (2010): 277–320?In my judgment, this is the most important article to date on Gen 6:1-4. It supersedes all work done on the Mesopotamian backdrop — work which frankly pales in comparison to the data that Annus brings to bear on the passage. Annus shows with great clarity how the Mesopotamian apkallu traditions are the backdrop to Gen. 6:1-4 (and therefore the supernatural backdrop against which it was written and must be understood), along with how Second Temple Jewish writers comprehended the Mesopotamian backdrop. Subsequent Christian tradition (i.e., the church fathers) knew nothing of this backdrop, and so early church interpretations that produced the Sethite view violate the text’s original context. The same goes for other approaches that ignore the apkallu context. We are either going to interpret Scripture in its own context or not.See below on Kvanvig and Drawnel as well.Annus’ work and conclusions have been strengthened by detailed work on one item he brings up but does not develop — the connections between the giant offspring and the evil spirits (demons) in the Akkadian bilingual texts known as Utukkū Lemnūtu. Those texts are the focus of Drawnel’s article in the additional bibliography (“The Mesopotamian Background of the Enochic Giants and Evil Spirits”). Here is the abstract for Drawnel’s essay:In the myth of the fallen Watchers (1 En. 6–11) the giants, illegitimate offspring of the fallen angels, are depicted as exceedingly violent beings that consume the labour of all the sons of men. They also kill men, devour them, and drink blood. Finally, they sin against all the animals of the earth. The violent behaviour of the giants in 1 En. 7:2–5 continues in 1 En. 15:11 where the spirits of the giants attack humanity, thus it appears that the spirits behave in a manner similar to that of the giants. The present article argues that the description of the giants in 1 En. 7:2–5 and their spirits in 15:11 is modeled after the violent behaviour of the demons found in the Mesopotamian bilingual series Utukkū Lemnūtu. The giants, therefore, are not to be identified with the Mesopotamian warrior-kings, but their behaviour rather indicates that they actually are violent and evil demons.Additional Bibliography?James C. VanderKam, “Genesis 6:2-4 and the Angel Stories in The Book of the Watchers (1 Enoch 1-36),” in The Fallen Angels Traditions: Second Temple Developments and Reception History (ed. Angela Kim Harkins, Kelley Coblenz Bautch, and John C. Endres, S.J.; Catholic Biblical Monograph Series 53; Washington, D. C.: The Catholic Biblical Association, 2014), 1-7Angel Kim Harkins, “Elements of the Fallen Angels Traditions in the Qumran Hodayot,” in The Fallen Angels Traditions: Second Temple Developments and Reception History (ed. Angela Kim Harkins, Kelley Coblenz Bautch, and John C. Endres, S.J.; Catholic Biblical Monograph Series 53; Washington, D. C.: The Catholic Biblical Association, 2014), 8-24Eric F. Mason, “Watchers Traditions in the Catholic Epistles,” in The Watchers in Jewish and Christian Traditions (ed. Angela Kim Hawkins, Kelley Coblentz Bautch, and John Endres; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2014), 69-80Helge Kvanvig, Primeval History: Babylonian, Biblical, and Enochic: An Intertextual Reading (Journal for the Study of Judaism Supplement 149; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2011)In addition to Annus, this is the major resource for thinking about the Mesopotamian context of Gen 6:1-4. Any work on Gen 6:1-4 that seeks to defend a non-supernaturalist view and does not seriously interact with the treatment of the original context for the passage discussed by Annus and Kvanvig via primary sources? can be safely ignored.This title runs over five pages and is very expensive. Some of the material in regard to Mesopotamia, the Watchers traditions, and Genesis 6 has been published in an article by Kvanvig: ?Helge Kvanvig, “The Watcher Story and Genesis: An Intertextual Reading,” Scandinavian Journal of the Old Testament 18:2 (2004): 163-183?S. B. Parker, “Sons of (The) God(s),” in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, 2nd ed. (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; Cologne; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)Henryk Drawnel, “The Mesopotamian Background of the Enochic Giants and Evil Spirits,” Dead Sea Discoveries 21:1 (2014): 14-38J. L. Cunchillos Ylarri, “Los bene ha?eloh?m en Gen. 6, 1–4,” Estudios Bíblicos 28 (1969): 5–31G. Cooke, “The Sons of (the) God(s),” Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 35 (1964): 22–47David J. A. Clines, “The Significance of the ‘Sons of God’ Episode (Genesis 6: 1-4) in the Context of the ‘Primeval History’ (Genesis 1-11),” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 13:3 (1979): 33-46Willem A. VanGemeren, “The Sons of God in Genesis 6:1-4 (An Example of Evangelical De-Mythologization?),” Westminster Theological Journal 43:2 (1981): 320-348John J. Collins, “The Sons of God and the Daughters of Men,” in Sacred Marriages: The Divine-Human Sexual Metaphor from Sumer to Early Christianity (ed. Marti Nissinen and Risto Uro; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2008), 259-274H. J. Lawlor, “Early Citations from the Book of Enoch,” Journal of Philology 25 (1897) 164–225James C. VanderKam, “The Interpretation of Genesis in 1 Enoch” in The Bible at Qumran: Text, Shape, and Interpretation (ed. Peter W. Flint, and Tae Hun Kim; Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature; Grand Rapids, MI; William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2001), 129-149Robert C. Newman, “The Ancient Exegesis of Gen. 6:1-4,” Grace Theological Journal 5:1 (1984): 13-36DiscussionThere are two related items to briefly emphasize with respect to this chapter:(1) The fact that the early church embraced a supernatural view of Gen 6:1-4 until the time of Julius Africanus and Augustine (whose lives overlapped, with Africanus preceding Augustine). What is now called the Sethite view originated with Africanus and was popularized by Augustine, whose stature in the early church transformed the view into dogma.(2) Authorities other than (and earlier than) Augustine defended the supernaturalist view of Gen 6:1-4 in part on the Enochic traditions (1 Enoch) of early Jewish literature.These items need to be discussed in tandem.Augustine, like nearly all the church fathers, didn’t know Hebrew and had no access (linguistic or otherwise) to the primary source material from Mesopotamia that provides the original ancient Near Eastern context for correctly parsing Gen 6:1-4. Rather than belabor this obvious point, it is likely of more interest to readers to get some exposure to what early church leaders prior to Augustine.Augustine’s opposition to the supernaturalist view of Gen 6:1-4 that is found in the book of 1 Enoch was not based on exegesis (again, he neither knew Hebrew nor had access to other relevant primary sources). Rather, it likely stems from his opposition to Manichean teachings (a religious sect of which he was once a member that was an amalgamation of other religions, among them Christianity). The Manicheans held 1 Enoch in high regard. After Augustine rejected the sect, any regard for?1 Enoch was left behind. Earlier authorities in the church forcefully disagreed.Scholars have looked into the early church’s attitude toward 1 Enoch and its supernaturalist view of Gen 6:1-4. Here are some quotations of interest:Kvanvig (p. 165; see the above article in the additional bibliography):In early Christianity the authority of the Enochic scriptures was defended by influential theologians such as Irenaeus, Tertullian and Origen, although they knew that the authority of these scriptures was not recognised in all churches. The authority of Enoch was then strongly denounced by Augustin [sic] in “the City of God”, which most possibly was one of the reasons why the book went out of use and was long forgotten in the western Church.Nickelsburg, 1 Enoch: A Commentary on the Book of 1 Enoch (ed. Klaus Baltzer; Hermeneia—a Critical and Historical Commentary on the Bible; Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2001)Tertullian and Origen, in particular, turned to the primordial prophet as an authority to undergird their teaching. In time, however, the fortune of the Enochic traditions waned in catholic Christianity under the influence of Augustine, the church’s increasing proclivity for philosophical theology, and the widespread use of the texts in heretical circles (p. 83)More generally, for a discussion of citations and allusions to 1 Enoch in the New Testament, see Nickelsburg, 1 Enoch: A Commentary, 83-87. For Nickelsburg’s survey of early orthodox Christian writers who cited or alluded to 1 Enoch, see pp. 87-95. Nickelsburg summarizes the data as follows:Certain writers in the second and third centuries accepted at least parts of the Enochic corpus as Sacred Scripture authored by the prophet Enoch. The appeal to Enochic authority is explicit in Jude, Barnabas, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, and Origen. Other authors, although they do not invoke Enoch’s name, employ material of Enochic provenance to provide an authoritative explanation for the presence of evil in the world. Some of them cite a form of the tradition that is alluded to but not explicated in 1 Enoch, viz., the idea that the angels were sent to earth for the benefit of humanity and only subsequently sinned with the women (Papias, Justin, Athenagoras, Lactantius, Commodianus, Rufinus, and Pseudo-Clement). Close comparison of the texts may indicate common usage of some single tradition or dependence of one writer on another. It is uncertain whether the tradition was known to some or all of these authors with its pseudonymous (Enochic) identity or in an anonymous form. In any case, these authors recount or allude to the stories as accurate explanations of how things are and how they came to be. . . . (p. 101)Alongside these teachers of the early church is the vast majority who ignore or do not use the Enochic material or polemicize against it. The first explicit evidence for the rejection of Enochic authority appears in Tertullian and Origen, who acknowledge that the texts on which they base some of their conclusions are not held in regard by a majority, perhaps, of the churches. The voice of some of these dissenters is heard in Hilary of Poitiers, Jerome, and Augustine.The reasons for denying the authority of the Enochic writings were doubtless complex, and one should distinguish expressed reasons from possible real reasons. Origen, who wishes to cite Enoch, indicates some nervousness about the fact that these texts are not Sacred Scripture for the Jewish community. The issue had already been raised by Tertullian. Possibly this reflects the kind of reasoning that Jerome would express a century later with reference to the Apocrypha (Preface to Samuel and Kings). Jerome, who calls 1 Enoch “apocryphal,” dismisses it because the story of the watchers was a source for Manichaean heresy. For Augustine the text is also apocryphal, and he is skeptical about its authenticity. Perhaps this is a judgment after the fact on a text with which he was particularly uncomfortable because of its popularity among the Manichaeans, whose teachings he had first accepted and then rejected. Certainly, the gnostic and Manichaean use of Enochic material did not boost the book’s popularity among orthodox writers. . . . (pp. 101-102)As an explanation of the origins of evil, the story of the watchers was bound, for a variety of reasons, to hasten the demise of Enochic authority. First, one had to relate the story to the chronological priority of the Eden story (cf. Epiphanius). Genesis 6:1–4* sits uncomfortably in the sequence between Genesis 1–5 and the flood story. Because they do not recapitulate the whole of primordial history (with the exception of the Animal Vision), the Enochic writings all but ignore the Eden story and thus identify the watchers as the source of all substantial evil. Second, other myths competed with the story of the watchers as explanations for the origin of sin and evil. . . . The increasing emphasis on Adam (and Eve) as the cause of all sin is adequately documented in both Jewish and Christian literature such as 4 Ezra, 2 Baruch, the Books of Adam and Eve, Romans 5, Irenaeus, and Augustine. Irenaeus is an interesting case in point. He knows the story of the watchers and accepts the authenticity of its Enochic provenance, but, different from Justin, Athenagoras, and others, he does not use the story to explain the origin of a demonic kingdom. At the same time, he develops a complex Adam/Christ typology from a Pauline nucleus. Third, and related to this, is the tension between a myth that emphasizes human responsibility and one that focuses on the demonic victimization of humanity. One wonders to what extent Augustine’s rejection of the story of the watchers is a function of his development of an anthropologically oriented doctrine of original sin. (p. 102)The note to a development in the priority of “Adam material” in regard to an explanation for depravity is especially interesting since the Old Testament never references Genesis 3 as the cause of human depravity. Instead, it is Genesis 6:5 that makes the sweeping statement about depravity. This is one reason why Second Temple Jewish literature lays the problem of evil at the feet of Genesis 6:1-4, not Genesis 3. In my view, this makes sense, though the result of Genesis 3 — human mortality / inability to holy / being driven from the presence of God — is certainly part and parcel of the human condition of needing salvation and being completely unable to merit salvation in any way.VanderKam, “The Interpretation of Genesis in 1 Enoch” (see additional bibliography above):The angel story seems bizarre to us, and we may wonder why anyone would have believed it. Whatever our reactions may be today, a surprisingly large number of Jewish and Christian writers did take it seriously and found it to be a convincing explanation of scriptural passages and of the human situation. They were able to apply the authoritative story to a number of ends. One of the major purposes that the different forms of the story served was as a basis for preaching or exhortation. As we have seen, the angel tale offered an explanation for the extraordinary evil before the flood that required such drastic punishment, and accounted for the ongoing presence of evil in the postdiluvian world. But the flood was the point of subsequent exhortations. The point seems to have been: God did it once, and he will do it again, not with a flood, but in the final judgment that will resemble the destructive and universal scope of the deluge, the first end. The wise were thus to take heed and live in light of this fact. . . . (p. 146)The letter of Jude is a work that makes homiletic use of the angel story. One of the central purposes of this epistle is to cite examples of how God had judged the wicked in the past, just as he will judge the writer’s enemies who are guilty of similar sins. As part of a series of examples he alludes to “the angels who did not keep their own position but left their proper dwelling.” God “has kept [them] in eternal chains in deepest darkness for the judgment of the great Day” (v. 6). A few verses later the author quotes 1 Enoch 1:9, which he introduces with the words “Enoch, in the seventh generation from Adam, prophesied.” The quotation from 1 Enoch has to do with God’s coming in final judgment: “See, the Lord is coming with ten thousands of his holy ones, to execute judgment on all, and to convict everyone of all the deeds of ungodliness that they have committed in such an ungodly way and of all the harsh things that ungodly sinners have spoken against him” (vv. 14–15).Other early Christian authors found sundry purposes that the story could serve. Justin Martyr (died ca. 167 CE) appealed to Enochic teachings to show that non-Christian religions are errors produced by the demons who emerged from the giants’ bodies (in both his first and second Apology). Tertullian, who composed a lengthy defense of the authority of the Book of Enoch, used it for various purposes, including as a source for his arguments against feminine ornamentation and makeup—arts taught by the angels in the Enochic story (On Prayer 20–22; On the Veiling of Virgins 7).In his The City of God Augustine wrote a response to the angel story that marked the end of its authoritative use in Christianity. He argued that in Gen 6:1–4 the same individuals are called both “angels of God” (6:2 as his Bible was worded) and “men” (6:3) and that elsewhere in the Scriptures holy people are called “angels” (e.g., Malachi was called a “messenger,” using the word for “angel”). The designation “angels of God” in 6:2 refers to humans who by grace were members of the city of God, not to actual heavenly angels; the term “daughters of men” envisages members of the other city in his grand theory (15:22). (pp. 146-147)Elsewhere VanderKam has a more detailed treatment of the views of early church theologians and writers with respect to 1 Enoch. Here are some page image captures from James C. VanderKam, “1 Enoch, Enochic Motifs, and Enoch in Early Christian Literature,” in The Jewish Apocalyptic Heritage in Early Christianity (ed. James C. VanderKam and William Adler; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1996):??1 Enoch Inspired?In view of the data (New Testament and early Christian writers) the question of whether 1 Enoch should be considered canonical invariably arises. My answer is “no” and “the question is something of a pointless distraction.”New Testament citations of material show only that such material informed their worldview and helped them articulate whatever point it was that they were trying to make in their own writings. Peter and Jude read the Enochian material and embraced its worldview approach to Gen 6:1-4. This is patently obvious since the comments of Peter and Jude with respect to the? Genesis 6 transgression of the divine sons of God includes material not found in Genesis 6 but which is found in Enochian material (and the Mesopotamian context, to boot). I speak here of the angels that sinned being imprisoned in Tartarus / the Abyss to await eschatological judgment. The New Testament text is explicit in this regard, and such references (2 Pet 2:4; Jude 6) are proof positive as to how Peter and Jude (inspired books in all of today’s Christian canons) viewed the Genesis 6:1-4 event. There is no need to hold cited material (or materially that conceptually informed any biblical writer) on the level of those books that all Christian traditions hold as inspired, despite disagreement on other books. Rather, we ought to be reading the material that informed them whether we think it inspired or not, as it helps us follow their thinking and fosters more accurate interpretation in our own day.Chapter 13: The Bad SeedChapters 12 and 13 are grouped together on this site since the two chapters jointly deal with the same subject matter: the sons of God episode in Gen 6:1-4 and the nephilim.Note that the nephilim are linked to the giant clans of later biblical history (i.e., the era of the conquest). Discussion of the giant clans and nephilim connections are the subject of Chapters 23, 24, and 25. Certain points of controversy regarding the nephilim are therefore discussed in those chapters.Bibliography Included in the BookAmar Annus, “On the Watchers: A Comparative Study of the Antediluvian Wisdom in Mesopotamian and Jewish Traditions,” Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha 19.4 (2010): 277–320Helge S. Kvanvig, Primeval History: Babylonian, Biblical, and Enochic (Supplements to the Journal for the Study of Judaism 149; Leiden: Brill, 2011)As I noted in the page for Chapter 12 on this site, in my judgment, the work of Annus and Kvanvig (above) are the most important contributions for understanding Gen. 6:1-4 in its original context. Annus’ treatment of the Mesopotamian parallels supersedes all work done on that subject to date. He shows with great clarity how the Mesopotamian apkallu traditions are the backdrop to Gen. 6:1-4 (and therefore the supernatural backdrop against which it was written and must be understood), along with how Second Temple Jewish writers comprehended the Mesopotamian backdrop. Subsequent Christian tradition (i.e., the church fathers) knew nothing of this backdrop, and so early church interpretations that produced the Sethite view violate the text’s original context. Any work on Gen 6:1-4 that seeks to defend a non-supernaturalist view and does not seriously interact with the treatment of the original context for the passage discussed by Annus and Kvanvig via primary sources? can be safely ignored. See other work by Kvanvig below under additional bibliography.The recent work by Doak (see below) unfortunately does not interact with either Annus’ “Watchers” article or Kvanvig’s Primeval History study. Doak asks (p. 65) why an Israelite author would write such a story as Gen 6:1-4. Annus (in particular) and Kvanvig have answered that question, and I’ve distilled their work in Chapters 12-13 of Unseen Realm.Annus’ work and conclusions have been strengthened by detailed work on one item he brings up but does not develop — the connections between the giant offspring and the evil spirits (demons) in the Akkadian bilingual texts known as Utukkū Lemnūtu. Those texts are the focus of Drawnel’s article in the additional bibliography (“The Mesopotamian Background of the Enochic Giants and Evil Spirits”). Here is the abstract for Drawnel’s essay:?In the myth of the fallen Watchers (1 En. 6–11) the giants, illegitimate offspring of the fallen angels, are depicted as exceedingly violent beings that consume the labour of all the sons of men. They also kill men, devour them, and drink blood. Finally, they sin against all the animals of the earth. The violent behaviour of the giants in 1 En. 7:2–5 continues in 1 En. 15:11 where the spirits of the giants attack humanity, thus it appears that the spirits behave in a manner similar to that of the giants. The present article argues that the description of the giants in 1 En. 7:2–5 and their spirits in 15:11 is modeled after the violent behaviour of the demons found in the Mesopotamian bilingual series Utukkū Lemnūtu. The giants, therefore, are not to be identified with the Mesopotamian warrior-kings, but their behaviour rather indicates that they actually are violent and evil demons.S. Bhayro, The Shemihazah and Asael Narrative of 1 Enoch 6-11: Introduction, Text, Translation and Commentary with Reference to Ancient Near Eastern Antecedents (Alter Orient und Altes Testament 322; Münster: Ugarit Verlag, 2005)George W. E. Nickelsburg, “Scripture in 1 Enoch and 1 Enoch as Scripture,” in Texts and Contexts: Biblical Texts in Their Textual and Situational Contexts: Essays in Honor of Lars Hartman (Oslo: Scandinavian University Press, 1995), 333-54Victor Matthews, Old Testament Parallels (rev. and exp. ed.; Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 2007), 21–42John H. Walton, Ancient Israelite Literature in Its Cultural Context (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1994)Bill Arnold and Brian Beyer, Readings from the Ancient Near East: Primary Sources for Old Testament Study (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 2002)Richard S. Hess and David Toshio Tsumura, eds., I Studied Inscriptions from before the Flood: Ancient Near Eastern, Literary, and Linguistic Approaches to Genesis 1–11, SBTS 4 (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1994)Alan Millard and W. G. Lambert, Atra-Hasis: The Babylonian Story of the Flood with the Sumerian Flood Story (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2010)Anne Draffkorn Kilmer, “The Mesopotamian Counterparts of the Biblical Nepilim,” in Perspectives on Language and Text: Essays and Poems in Honor of Francis I. Andersen’s Sixtieth Birthday, July 28, 1985 (ed. Edgar W. Conrad and Edward G. Newing; Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1987): 39–44Andrew George, The Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic: Introduction, Critical Edition and Cuneiform Texts (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003)Andrew George, “The Gilgamesh Epic at Ugarit,” Aula Orientalis 25 (2007): 237–54Wayne Horowitz, Mesopotamian Cosmic Geography (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1998)Loren T. Stuckenbruck, “The ‘Angels’ and ‘Giants’ of Genesis 6:1–4 in Second and Third Century BCE Jewish Interpretation: Reflections on the Posture of Early Apocalyptic Traditions,” Dead Sea Discoveries 7.3 (2000): 354–77John C. Collins, “Watcher,” in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, 2nd ed. (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Grand Rapids, MI; Eerdmans, 1999)J. C. Reeves, “Utnapishtim in the Book of the Giants?” Journal of Biblical Literature 112 (1993): 110-15Matthew Goff, “Gilgamesh the Giant: The Qumran Book of Giants’ Appropriation of Gilgamesh Motifs,” Dead Sea Discoveries 16 (2009): 221-53Brian Doak, The Last of the Rephaim: Conquest and Cataclysm in the Heroic Ages of Ancient Israel, Ilex Series 7 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2013)Additional BibliographyIda Fr?lich, “Mesopotamian Elements and the Watchers Traditions,” in The Watchers in Jewish and Christian Traditions (ed. Angela Kim Hawkins, Kelley Coblentz Bautch, and John Endres; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2014), 11–24Henryk Drawnel, “The Mesopotamian Background of the Enochic Giants and Evil Spirits,” Dead Sea Discoveries 21:1 (2014): 14-38James C. VanderKam, “Genesis 6:2-4 and the Angel Stories in The Book of the Watchers (1 Enoch 1-36),” in The Fallen Angels Traditions: Second Temple Developments and Reception History (ed. Angela Kim Harkins, Kelley Coblenz Bautch, and John C. Endres, S.J.; Catholic Biblical Monograph Series 53; Washington, D. C.: The Catholic Biblical Association, 2014), 1-7G. Cooke, “The Sons of (the) God(s),” Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 35 (1964): 22–47David J. A. Clines, “The Significance of the ‘Sons of God’ Episode (Genesis 6: 1-4) in the Context of the ‘Primeval History’ (Genesis 1-11),” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 13:3 (1979): 33-46Willem A. VanGemeren, “The Sons of God in Genesis 6:1-4 (An Example of Evangelical De-Mythologization?),” Westminster Theological Journal 43:2 (1981): 320-348John J. Collins, “The Sons of God and the Daughters of Men,” in Sacred Marriages: The Divine-Human Sexual Metaphor from Sumer to Early Christianity (ed. Marti Nissinen and Risto Uro; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2008), 259-274Helge S. Kvanvig, “Gen 6, 1-4 as an Antediluvian Event,” Scandinavian Journal of the Old Testament 16, no. 1 (2002): 79-112Helge S. Kvanvig, “The Watchers Story, Genesis and Atra-hasis: A Triangular Reading,” Henoch 24, no. 1/2 (2002): 17-22.Michael S. Heiser, “Rephaim,” Lexham Bible Dictionary (Bellingham, WA, 2015)DiscussionThere are a few items to take a bit further that were part of this chapter.First, I noted in this chapter that it’s my view that the word nephilim is best understood as an Aramaic noun (naphiyl / naph??l / emph: naph??la) used by the biblical writers, who then, naturally, gave it a plural Hebrew ending (-im). My reason for this position should be clear. This is the only understanding of the word that accounts for all the necessary elements below:a) pays attention to the morphology (the vowel pointing) of nephilim (middle i vowel, written fully / plene in Num. 13:33);b) produces a meaning of “giant” (i.e., honors the descriptions that go with the term and those people said to descend from the nephilim);c) is consistent with the Mesopotamian (apkallu) contextual backdrop of the Gen 6:1-4 polemic.No other understanding of the term accounts for everything.Understanding the term as meaning “those who fall upon” or “those who fell” requires a different morphology: ??????? (no?pheli?m). Likewise, the passive “those who are fallen” requires ?????????? (nephu?li?m).Some scholars refer the discussion to Ezek 32:27, where we have the term ??????? (no?pheli?m). The verse has some other terms found in Gen 6:And they do not lie with the mighty (gibborim), the fallen (no?pheli?m) from among the uncircumcised, who went down to Sheol with their weapons of war, whose swords were laid under their heads, and whose iniquities are upon their bones; for the terror of the mighty men (gibborim) was in the land of the living.Presuming that this passage in Ezekiel is speaking of the nephilim of Gen 6:4 and Num. 13:33 in order to justify saying nephilim means “fallen ones” (and not “giants”) is flawed, for it fails to address these points:1) Gibborim as a term is often used of normal-sized warriors. That is, it’s a term that doesn’t have to be describing people of unusual height — people who’d descended from the rebel sons of God and were therefore quasi-supernatural enemies of Yahweh and Israel. It’s rather easy to demonstrate that this context simply cannot be taken to other occurrences of gibbor / gibborim. In Deut 10:17; Neh 9:32 God is referred to as a gibbor (the singular of gibborim). This description of God occurs elsewhere several times. When Joshua invaded Ai, he chose 30,000 gibborim from among the ranks of the Israelites for the fight (Josh 8:3; cp. Josh 10:7). Boaz, in the line of David (and thus Jesus) was a gibbor (Ruth 2:1). Saul’s son Jonathan is referred to as a gibbor (2 Sam 1:25, 27).2) The fact that the Septuagint translates gibborim in Ezek 32:27 with gigantes (“giant”) decides nothing. The Septuagint renders gibborim (and rephaim) inconsistently since (per the examples above) gibbor / gibborim very obviously doesn’t have giants in mind in many passages. The Septuagint translators choice in Ezek 32:27 isn’t an inspired interpretive commentary on the content.3) The biblical writers who pointed the text of Ezek 32:27 obviously knew how nephilim was spelled in those passages where the contextual descriptions include giantism (i.e., Num 13). Had the Masoretic scribes wanted to telegraph that the consonants n-p-l-m were to be understood as those giants referred to back in Num 13:33 (which refers to Gen 6:4), they would have pointed the text that way. They didn’t.4) Arguing that ??????? (no?pheli?m) in Ezek 32:27 means “nephilim” means “fallen ones” (and not giants) requires ignoring the biblical tradition about Sheol that ignores the Rephaim presence in Sheol. Recall that, in biblical tradition, the Rephaim were not only warriors, but giants. (This was not the case at Ugarit – see my article on Rephaim in the additional bibliography above). This added element in the biblical tradition builds off the Underworld apkallu context behind Gen 6:1-4. (Scholars have been stymied as to why the OT has Rephaim as giants when they aren’t in other Canaanite texts; Annus’ work answers that question as well). Having the Rephaim giants in hell, so to speak, was part of the web of ideas that contributed to the Second Temple Jewish belief that demons were the disembodied spirits of giants. If you want nephilim in Ezek 32:27, you still have to see them as giants to honor both the ancient apkallu context and the Second Temple Jewish context that, as Annus shows, understood the apkallu polemic. You also have Peter and Jude’s reference to Tartarus to contend with — the term identifies the Underworld as (at least in part) the residence of the rebel angels of Gen 6:1-4 and their giant offspring (recall that Tartarus was the term the Greek stories of giants use for their imprisonment).In short, this escape valve thought by some to allow a “non-giant” meaning for nephilim just doesn’t work. But by way of summation, I’m inclined to agree with the cautionary note of Stuckenbruck on Ezek. 32:27:Although an allusion to Gen. 6:4 is not impossible, the reference in Ezek. 32:27 to the ?????? ?????, which is translated as?ο? γιγ?ντων τ?ν πεπτωκ?των in the Greek tradition [Stuckenbruck’s text has ο? γιγ?ντων, whereas Rahlfs has τ?ν γιγ?ντων] neither refers to the flood nor specifies when this group “descended to Sheol with their weapons of war.” (Loren T. Stuckenbruck, “The ‘Angels’ and ‘Giants’ of Genesis 6:1–4 in Second and Third Century BCE Jewish Interpretation: Reflections on the Posture of Early Apocalyptic Traditions,” Dead Sea Discoveries 7.3 [2000]: 356, note 5).On Gilgamesh and the apkalluIn Chapter 13 I reference Gilgamesh, who is described as 2/3 divine and quite tall, as an illustration of the hybrid nature of the post-flood apkallu, who were also of hybrid parentage after the flood and very tall. I neglected to note that Gilgamesh is specifically linked to the apkallu in a Mesopotamian cylinder seal that refers to him as “master of the apkallu” (see the DDD entry on apkallu).Chapters 14 & 15: Divine Allotment / Cosmic GeographyChapters 14-15 dealt with what I called “the Deuteronomy 32 worldview” of the Old Testament. They are thus taken together with respect to this website.The key passages were Deut. 32:8-9 (cp. Deut 4:19-20) and Gen 10-11. I won’t be discussing Deut. 32:8-9 in any more detail here, as the bibliography provides extended commentary, especially in regard to the text-critical issues in Deut. 32:8 (see my Bibliotheca Sacra article for example).Bibliography from the book?Karel van der Toorn, “Nimrod Before and After the Bible,” Harvard Theological Review 83:1 (Jan, 1990):1-29Michael S. Heiser, “Deuteronomy 32:8 and the Sons of God,” Bibliotheca Sacra 158 (Jan-March, 2001): 52-74This article goes into detail about the textual evidence for “sons of God” in Deut. 32:8, the presence of that reading in the Dead Sea Scrolls, and why the Masoretic Text does not deserve a priori ?Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis (The JPS Torah Commentary; Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1989Mark S. Smith and Simon B. Parker, Ugaritic Narrative Poetry (vol. 9; Writings From the Ancient World; Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1997Michael S. Heiser, “Does Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible Demonstrate an Evolution from Polytheism to Monotheism in Israelite Religion?” Journal for the Evangelical Study of the Old Testament 1:1 (2012): 1-24John Joseph Collins and Adela Yarbro Collins, Daniel: a Commentary on the Book of Daniel (Hermeneia—a Critical and Historical Commentary on the Bible; Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1993)Ronn Johnson, “The Old Testament Background for Paul’s Principalities and Powers,” (PhD Dissertation, Dallas Theological Seminary, 2004Access this dissertation here:Johnson DISS The OT Background for Pauls Principalities and PowersAdditional Bibliography Clinton E. Arnold, “Returning to the domain of the powers: Stoicheia as evil spirits in Galatians 4: 3, 9,” Novum Testamentum 38, no. 1 (1996): 55-76Richard J. Clifford, “History and Myth in Daniel 10-12,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research (1975): 23-26.Nathan MacDonald, Deuteronomy and the Meaning of “Monotheism” (FAT 2.Reihe 1; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 2003Michael S. Heiser, “Are Yahweh and El Distinct Deities in Deut. 32:8-9 and Psalm 82?” HIPHIL Novum 3:1 (2009): 1-9?Discussion?I’m often asked how the Deuteronomy 32 worldview relates to today. Since this worldview is the backdrop for Paul’s principalities and powers (and other terms; see Johnson‘s dissertation in the book’s bibliography above), the short answer is that we have New Testament authority to say that the idea of demonic strongholds / geographic dominion is a biblical one. Strongholds might be viewed as either weak or strong in influence? (or large or small in size) depending on the infiltration of the gospel (i.e., the presence of believers). Paul’s sermon in Acts 17 gives us a glimpse of this perspective (note the boldfacing):22?So Paul, standing in the midst of the Areopagus, said: “Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very religious. 23?For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription, ‘To the unknown god.’ What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. 24?The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, 25?nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything. 26?And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, 27?that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us, 28?for“?‘In him we live and move and have our being’;as even some of your own poets have said,“?‘For we are indeed his offspring.’29?Being then God’s offspring, we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of man. 30?The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, 31?because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.”Verse 26 clearly alludes to the Babel event described in Deut. 32:8-9, where the nations were divided up among / allotted to the sons of God (and vice versa in Deut. 4:19-20). In several places in The Unseen Realm I noted that this punishment / disinheritance was never intended to be permanent. Deuteronomy 32:9 has Yahweh calling Abraham to raise up Israel as his own “portion” and Gen 12:3 tells us that when he did so and then made a covenant with Abraham, it was with the intention that through Abraham the nations would be blessed. Paul obviously sees his own missionary task — which of course extends from what happened at Pentecost (see Chapter 34 of The Unseen Realm). The nations were supposed to “seek God” (Acts 17:27), something of course they rarely did, instead worshipping the elohim assigned to them (who apparently in turn did not rule the nations according to Yahweh’s justice (Psa 82:2-4).But injustice wasn’t the only crime of the gods. The people under the administration of the gods “[had] neither knowledge nor understanding; they walk[ed] about in darkness” (Psa 82:5). This suggests (at least) that the gods who received the worship of the peoples in the nations did wrong by doing so — thereby causing the spiritual darkness or keeping the nations ignorant of Yahweh. (If we believe divine being do indeed interact with us to influence us, this reading ought to make sense). The wording may even suggest that the administration of the gods over the nations included some sort of influence or acknowledgement that Yahweh was king of the gods.The result of the injustice and spiritual darkness caused by the administration of these inept or rebellious sons of God was that the nations of the earth were careening toward judgment. The “foundations of the earth” being “shaken” is a noteworthy phrase. The Hebrew verb behind “shaken” is mo?t? (????), It is used elsewhere of eschatological judgment. Isaiah 24:19-23 is of interest:19?????? The earth is utterly broken,the earth is split apart,the earth is violently shaken (????),20?????? The earth staggers like a drunken man;it sways like a hut;its transgression lies heavy upon it,and it falls, and will not rise again.21?????? On that day the LORD will punish ????? the host of heaven, in heaven,and the kings of the earth, on the earth.22?????? They will be gathered togetheras prisoners in a pit;they will be shut up in a prison,and after many days they will be punished.23?????? Then the moon will be confoundedand the sun ashamed,for the LORD of hosts reignson Mount Zion and in Jerusalem,and his glory will be before his elders.(Note that this last line is likely a reference to the [loyal] divine council in Yahweh’s presence; see Unseen Realm, chs. 20, 30).Paul believed himself living in the time immediately prior to the last day (as did other NT writers). Hence he preached repentance in Acts 17 with urgency. For the nations (as well as his fellow Jews), rejection of the messiah meant doom with the gods who held the nations captive.We are still living in this same circumstance. That means the eschatological judgment of the gods of the nations is still pending. That in turn means they are still here (and therefore real). From Pentecost on their dominion has been challenged, and is still being challenged. To deny this is to deny the reality of evil supernatural powers in opposition to the kingdom of God — something that is quite transparent in the NT.So how does this “relate” to today? It doesn’t relate at all if you don’t believe in an unseen reality. If you do, it puts an OT context to what we think of as spiritual warfare — one that goes far beyond mere demons. Demons are light weight in comparison — mere irritants. The gods are something altogether different. We can presume no authority to confront them (unlike demons). They are “celestial ones” (2 Pet 2:10; Jude 8) against whom even angels dare not blaspheme. They will only be dealt with by God and equal spiritual powers God tasks with doing so. We are mere agents on earth tasked with spreading the gospel — which is the thing they fear the most. Spreading the gospel isn’t an intellectual exercise. It’s not a debate to win. People without Christ are under dominion, their minds darkened (Eph. 4:18). The war is spiritual in nature, and so must be engaged in on that level. We are only agents. Opposition, failure, and success must be viewed in that light, not intellect, cleverness, or (God forbid) good marketing. You either believe you are part of something bigger than the reality you can discern or you don’t.This “relevance” question is also related to something certain segments of popular evangelical Christianity calls “strategic level spiritual warfare.” This link provides a succinct definition and critique. I’m in agreement with the critique, though both the “strategic level spiritual warfare” idea and the critique are very simplistic in approach. In short, neither have a good grasp of the divine council or the Deuteronomy 32 worldview that I discuss in The Unseen Realm. That said, the above discussion is quite relevant. We have no scriptural command to pray in elevated places and demand the gods of the nations leave. If you want to defeat the gods of this nation as agents of the eschatological kingdom of God, moving toward your destiny of displacing the gods of said nations and finally becoming part of the reconstituted divine council (see Unseen Realm chs. 36, 37, 42), do what the apostles did in the book of Acts:Believe that what happened at the resurrection and Pentecost was realPreach the gospelHave all things in common (provide for brethren sacrificially and use your wealth to spread the gospel)Be willing to sufferDon’t be worldly; i.e., don’t live as though this world is your home?One final note. I alluded to the difference between NT demons and the OT gods of the nations (called shedim in Deut? 32:17, unfortunately translated “demons”) in a footnote in Ch. 32 of Unseen Realm. However, the difference is summarized much better in Doug Van Dorn’s primer companion to The Unseen Realm. Here are Questions 72 through 75:Question 72. Are these corrupt sons of God demons or fallen angels?Demons are neither fallen angels nor the offending sons of God, yet they belong to the same spirit world because they are disembodied spirits.[1] The sons of God who sinned before the Flood were imprisoned until the time of the end,a and so they are not the demons of the New Testament. The corrupt sons of God put over the nations are called shedim, a term of geographical guardianship. HYPERLINK "" \l "_ftn2" [2]a 1Pe 3:19-20. [Christ] went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison, because they formerly did not obey, when God’s patience waited in the days of Noah.? 2Pe 2:4. God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness to be kept until the judgment.? Jud 6. The angels who did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling, he has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day.[1] In the Hebrew Bible, the inclusive term for any resident of the disembodied spirit world is ?elohim, while terms like “angel” and “sons of God” refer to a spirit’s function or hierarchical status (see Qs. 26-27). In the New Testament, the word aggelos (“angel”) is generically used for disembodied beings, whether good (Mt 4:11; 24:31; 2 Thess 1:7) or evil (Mt 25:41; Rv 12:9). That term therefore functions similarly to the Old Testament’s ?elohim. Two other terms (daimon, daimonion [“demon”]) are also used generically for evil spirits, though outside the Bible those two terms can refer to any disembodied being. HYPERLINK "" \l "_ftnref2" [2] See Qs. 74-75.Question 73. What does the word “demon” mean?The word “demon” comes from two related Greek words used in the New Testament: daimo?n and daimonion. Both words are general terms for a divine being—a being that inhabits the spirit world—whether good or evil. HYPERLINK "" \l "_ftn3" [3] In the New Testament, these terms are used of evil (“unclean”) spirits.aa Mt 8:16. That evening they brought to [Jesus] many who were oppressed by demons, and he cast out the spirits with a word and healed all who were sick.Mt 12:28, 43-44. But if it is by the Spirit of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. . . . “When the unclean spirit has gone out of a person, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, but finds none. Then it says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when it comes, it finds the house empty, swept, and put in order. 45?Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself.Lk 4:33. And in the synagogue there was a man who had the spirit of an unclean demon. HYPERLINK "" \l "_ftnref3" [3] See The Unseen Realm, Chapter 37.Question 74. What is the origin of demons?Demons are the disembodied spirits of dead Nephilim-Rephaim.a HYPERLINK "" \l "_ftn4" [4] They are therefore by nature disembodied, which is why they seek to inhabit other things.ba Nm 13:33. And there we saw the Nephilim, the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim.Dt 2:11. Like the Anakim they are also counted as Rephaim, but the Moabites call them Emim.Dt 3:13. The rest of Gilead, and all Bashan, the kingdom of Og, that is, all the region of Argob, I gave to the half-tribe of Manasseh. (All that portion of Bashan is called the land of Rephaim.Is 14:9. Sheol beneath is stirred up to meet you when you come; it rouses the shades (rephaim) to greet you, all who were leaders of the earth; it raises from their thrones all who were kings of the nations.Is 26:14. They are dead, they will not live; they are shades (rephaim), they will not arise; to that end you have visited them with destruction and wiped out all remembrance of them.b Mt 8:28. And when he came to the other side, to the country of the Gadarenes, two demon-possessed men met him, coming out of the tombs.Mt 12:28, 43-44. But if it is by the Spirit of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. . . . “When the unclean spirit has gone out of a person, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, but finds none. Then it says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when it comes, it finds the house empty, swept, and put in order. 45?Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself.Mk 5:10-13. And he begged him earnestly not to send them out of the country. Now a great herd of pigs was feeding there on the hillside, and they begged him, saying, “Send us to the pigs; let us enter them.” So he gave them permission. And the unclean spirits came out and entered the pigs; and the herd, numbering about two thousand, rushed down the steep bank into the sea and drowned in the sea.Lk 11:26. It goes and brings seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there. HYPERLINK "" \l "_ftnref4" [4] See Q. 61. Intertestamental Jewish literature (e.g., 1 Enoch) that the New Testament writers Peter (2 Pet 2:4-5) and Jude (Jude 6-7) draw upon for their understanding of the events of Gn 6:1-4 has much to say about this point of origin (see 1 Enoch 15). The idea is suggested in the verses referenced above.Question 75. Does the Hebrew word translated “demon” in the Old Testament HYPERLINK "" \l "_ftn5" [5] describe the same evil spirits the New Testament describes as “demons”? No. The sinister divine beings of Dt. 32:17 (shedim) are those set over the nations (Dt. 32:8), who seduced the Israelites into idolatry. They are never described as Nephilim or the disembodied spirits of Nephilim. HYPERLINK "" \l "_ftnref5" [5] This Hebrew word (shed; plural: shedim) occurs only two times in the entire Old Testament: Dt 32:17 and Ps 106:37. These two verses refer to the corrupt sons of God put over the nations in judgment at Babel (see Q. 66) who seduced the Israelites into worshipping them (see Q. 68). The term comes from Akkadian shadu, which describes a guardian spirit (including over geography, which fits the context of Dt 32:8 and the resulting judgment at Babel quite well). Consequently, The geographical turf guardians of Dt. 32:17 are not the disembodied spirits that come from the Nephilim killed in the flood, which are the demons (see Q. 72). English translations have at times created confusion on these points.Chapters 16-18: Abraham’s Word / Yahweh Visible and Invisible / What’s in a Name?Chapters 16, 17, and 18 discuss my view that there were two Yahweh figures described in the Old Testament—one invisible, the other visible–and that this theology was the OT backdrop to the Godhead of the NT. As such, they will be dealt with collectively on this site.Bibliography included in the book?Esther J. Hamori, “When Gods Were Men”: The Embodied God in Biblical and Near Eastern Literature (BZAW 384; Berlin: Walter deGruyter, 2008)John Ronning, The Jewish Targums and John’s Logos Theology (Baker Academic, 2010)Alan F. Segal, Two Powers in Heaven: Early Rabbinic Reports about Christianity and Gnosticism (reprint, Baylor University Press, 2012)Michael S. Heiser, “The Divine Council in Late Canonical and Non-Canonical Second Temple Jewish Literature.” PhD diss., UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON, 2004Alan R. Millard, “The Celestial Ladder and the Gate of Heaven (Gen 28:12, 17),” Expository Times 78 (1966/67) 86–87C. Houtman, “What Did Jacob See in His Dream at Bethel? Some Remarks on Gen 28:10–22,” Vetus Testamentum 27 (1977) 337–51Michael S. Heiser, “Should elohim with Plural Predication be Translated ‘Gods?” Bible Translator 61:3 (July 2010): 123-136Benjamin D. Sommer, The Bodies of God and the World of Ancient Israel (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009)Sandra L. Richter, The Deuteronomistic History and the Name Theology: les?akke?n s?emo? s?a?m in the Bible and the Ancient Near East (BZAW 318; Berlin: Walther de Gruyter, 2002)Tryggve Mettinger, review of Sandra L. Richter, The Deuteronomistic History and the Name Theology: les?akke?n s?emo? s?a?m in the Bible and the Ancient Near East, Review of Biblical Literature, accessed May 1, 2014Gordon J. Wenham, “Deuteronomy and the Central Sanctuary,” TynBul 22 (1971): 103-18Ian Wilson, Out of the Midst of the Fire: Divine Presence in Deuteronomy (SBL Dissertation Series 151; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1995)Michael B. Hundley, “To Be or Not to Be: A Reexamination of Name Language in Deuteronomy and the Deuteronomistic History,” Vetus Testamentum 59 (2009): 533-555Michael B. Hundley, Keeping Heaven on Earth: Safeguarding the Divine Presence in the Priestly Tabernacle (Forschungen Zum Alten Testament 2. Reihe; vol. 50; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011)Additional Bibliography on the Two Powers teaching in Judaism, and the Israelite /Jewish roots of high Christology / Trinitarianism?Nathaniel Deutsch, Guardians of the Gate: Angelic Vice-Regency in Late Antiquity (Brill’s Series in Jewish Studies 22; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1999)Charles Gieschen, Angelomorphic Christology: Antecedents and Early Evidence (AGSU 42; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1998); Darrell D. Hannah, Michael and Christ: Michael Traditions and Angel Christology in Early Christianity (WUNT 2 Reihe 109; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1999)Larry W. Hurtado, One God, One Lord: Early Christian Devotion and Ancient Jewish Monotheism (2nd ed., 1988; repr., Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1998)Larry W. Hurtado, “The Binitarian Shape of Early Christian Worship,” In The Jewish Roots of Christological Monotheism, Papers from the St. Andrews Conference on the Historical Origins of the Worship of Jesus (ed. Carey C. Newman, James R. Davila and Gladys S. Lewis; JSJSup 63; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1999) 187-213Daniel Boyarin, “The Gospel of the Memra: Jewish Binitarianism and the Prologue to John,” Harvard Theological Review 94:3 (2001) 243-284Daniel Boyarin, “Beyond Judaisms: Met?at?ron and the Divine Polymorphy of Ancient Judaism,” JSJ 41 (2010) 323-365Daniel Abrams, “The Boundaries of Divine Ontology: The Inclusion and Exclusion of Met?at?ron in the Godhead,” Harvard Theological Review 87:3 (1994) 291-321Michael S. Heiser, “Co-Regency in Ancient Israel’s Divine Council as the Conceptual Backdrop to Ancient Jewish Binitarian Monotheism,” (forthcoming, Bulletin for Biblical Research 25:1)Stephen L. Herring, Divine Substitution: Humanity as the Manifestation of Deity in the Hebrew Bible and the Ancient Near East (FRLANT 247; G?ttingen: Vandenhoeck & Rupprecht, 2013)Victor Hurowitz, review of Sandra L. Richter, The Deuteronomistic History and the Name Theology: les?akke?n s?emo? s?a?m in the Bible and the Ancient Near East, JHS 5 (2004-2005), accessed February 23, 2012H. B. Huffmon, “Name,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)Alan Segal, ” ‘Two Powers in Heaven’ and Early Christian Trinitarian Thinking,” In The Trinity: An Interdisciplinary Symposium on the Trinity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 73-95?Content Discussion?The co-regency or binitarian godhead thinking that I sketch in these three chapters was the conceptual backdrop to both Judaism’s Two Powers in Heaven teaching and the Trinitarian theology in the New Testament that considered Jesus the incarnation of Yahweh. This material was drawn from my dissertation. I summarized the arguments and data in the dissertation in a scholarly journal article for Harvard Theological Review (see below). For our purposes here, there are several items needing attention.1. The Issue of the Name TheologySome evangelical scholars have, in recent years, taken a skeptical view of the name theology, most notably Sandra Richter. Richter’s conclusion (i.e., that there is no name theology) has been soundly rebutted by other scholars, particularly Hundley. My forthcoming? BBR article summarizes the problems with Richter’s arguments articulated by Hundley, Wenham, Wilson, and Hurowitz. More recent scholarship has established that Israelite religion could (and did) conceive of God being more than one person (including appearing in human form) in simultaneous places and rooted that thinking in the wider ancient Near East (Sommers, Hamori, Herring).2. What about the Holy Spirit? Are there hints of a Trinitarian Godhead in the Old Testament?These two chapters establish a two person (“binitarian”) Godhead conception in the Hebrew Bible. Readers naturally ask, “What about the Trinity?” Chapter 33 of the book deals with how New Testament writers re-purposed the binitarian concept of the Old Testament to speak about Jesus as God—and to align the Holy Spirit with the two Yahwehs. There are hints of the inclusion of the Spirit in an Old Testament Godhead in the Old Testament as well. I’ll use the example of Isaiah 63 to make the point.Isaiah 63The key to seeing the Spirit identified with Yahweh and the second Yahweh is to find passages that speak of the Spirit in ways that the Angel or the Name are spoken of elsewhere. Note the language describing the divine figures of Isaiah 63:7-14 (in bold underlining). I have interspersed commentary at my initials (MSH).7?I will mention the loyal love of Yahweh, the praises of Yahweh, according to all that Yahweh has done for us,and the greatness of goodness to the house of Israel that he has done to them according to his mercy and the abundance of his loyal love.8?And he said, “Surely my people are children; they will not break faith.” And he became a Savior to them.9?In all their distress, there was no distress,and the messenger (= the angel; mal’akh) of his presence saved them,in his love and compassion he himself redeemed them,and he lifted them up,and he supported them all the days of old.MSH: Through verse 8 the text is clearly describing Yahweh. He is the Savior figure. But in verse 9 the “messenger (angel) of Yahweh’s presence” is introduced. This description correlates with both Deut 4:37-38, where the “presence” delivers Israel from Egypt and brings her to the land, and passages crediting the deliverance to the angel of Yahweh (Num 20:16; Judg. 2:1-3). The two figures are both distinguished and yet overlap—a familiar pattern.10?But they were the ones who rebelled,and they grieved his Holy Spirit,so he became an enemy to them;he himself fought against them.11?Then his people remembered the days of old, of Moses.Where is the one who led up them from the sea with the shepherds of his flock?Where is the one who puts his Holy Spirit inside him, HYPERLINK "" \l "_ftn1" [1]12?who made his magnificent arm move at the right hand of Moses,who divided the waters before them,to make an everlasting name for himself,13?who led them through the depths?They did not stumble like a horse in the desert;14?like cattle in the valley that goes down, the Spirit of Yahweh gave him rest,so you lead your people to make a magnificent name for yourself.MSH: There are three references to the Spirit here; that much is obvious. But there is no real backdrop in the Torah for the Spirit’s inclusion in the exodus escape. But in verse 10, the Spirit became Israel’s enemy because he was grieved – or is it another figure? The Spirit seems the obvious reference, but take that understanding into the pronouns that follow:“he became an enemy to them”“he himself fought against them”“his people remember the days of old, of Moses”So far so good. But then in v. 11 the psalmist asks, “Where is the one who led up them from the sea with the shepherds of his flock? Where is the one who puts his Holy Spirit inside him?”This seems to be asking, “Where is Yahweh?” since Yahweh would be the one putting the Spirit inside . . . who? The one who led them from the sea, obviously (v. 11). This can only be the Angel – and so we have here an equation of the “name” inside the Angel (Exod. 23:20-23) with the Holy Spirit. Elsewhere, as we saw in Chapter 12, the Name is a way of referring to Yahweh himself. This is a clear statement of the deity of the Spirit—and (again) the Angel.So if the “leader” is the Angel, look at what else we learn:God made the Angel’s arm “move at the right hand of Moses …When we read, who divided the waters before them, to make an everlasting name for himself, are we reading about God doing this (most likely) or the angel doing it on God’s behalf? Who is “who”? The relative pronoun “who” is not present in the text in the form of a pronoun. Rather, the relative pronouns in this verse derive from participles – which are masculine singular. The referent could be either Yahweh or the angel, since the grammatical gender of both is masculine.God (or the Angel?) “led them through the depths”?But then in verse 14 it isn’t God or the Angel who gave Israel rest – it’s none other than “the Spirit of Yahweh.”The point is that there is no attempt on the part of the writer to keep these two (three) figures distinct to avoid confusion or blasphemy. They are interchanged freely.We’re not done yet with this passage. There’s more. It has an interesting parallel in Psalm 78, which is describing the same chain of events. Look at the two of them side-by-side. I have marked Hebrew words of importance:Isaiah 63:10-11Psalm 78:40-4110?But they were the ones who rebelled (lemma: marah),and they grieved (lemma: ?atsab) his Holy Spirit,so he became an enemy to them;he himself fought against them.11?Then his people remembered the days of old, of Moses.Where is the one who led up them from the sea with the shepherds of his flock?Where is the one who puts his Holy Spirit inside him…40??? How often they rebelled (lemma: marah) against him in the wildernessand grieved (lemma: ?atsab) him in the desert!41??? They tested God again and againand provoked the Holy One of Israel.??The point to notice here is that, in Isaiah 63, Israel rebels against and grieves the Holy Spirit. But in the parallel the object of those same two verbs, in the same context, is God himself, the Holy One of Israel. A close reader of the canonical text of the Hebrew Bible (such as a New Testament writer) would have noted the identification of the Spirit with the God of Israel—and of course also the Angel via Isaiah 63.[1] Some translations (e.g., ESV) don’t have “him” here but “them” (“in the midst of them” / “in their midst”). The suffixed pronoun in question is third masculine singular. While singular suffixed pronouns can be translated as collectives (of a group), they can of course also be translated singular, as in the LEB. The choice has theological significance here. The singular choice of the LEB is consistent with the parallel in Psa 78 (see the rest of the discussion).3. What is the relationship of Jesus and the Angel of the Lord?This is actually dealt with in the book, but here’s a summary:The angel of the Lord (Yahweh) in the OT is Yahweh in human form. Some of the things said about that angel (who is Yahweh) are applied to Jesus in the NT, thereby linking Jesus to Yahweh. The angel of Yahweh = the second person of the Trinity made visible as a man in the Old Testament. The man Jesus was? = the second person of the Trinity *become incarnate” as a man. The Angel of the Lord was not the second person incarnate (conceived in the womb and born of a woman).So, Jesus and the Angel of the Lord are related, but still distinct concepts — but both were God in human form. But only one was incarnate.Chapter 19: Who is Like Yahweh?The subject matter of this chapter was the incomparability of Yahweh. Exodus 15 and its associated imagery re-purposed in other passages (e.g., Psalm 74 and Leviathan).Bibliography from the bookJames K. Hoffmeier, Israel in Egypt: The Evidence for Authenticity of the Exodus Tradition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996?James K. Hoffmeier, “Egypt, Plagues In,” ed. David Noel Freedman, The Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary (New York: Doubleday, 1992), 374-376?N. H. Snaith, “?? ????: The Sea of Reeds: The Red Sea,” Vetus Testamentum 15:3 (July 1965): 395-398?Bernard F. Batto, “The Reed Sea: Requiescat in Pace,” Journal of Biblical Literature 102:1 (1983): 27-35Additional BibliographyCasper J. Labuschagne, The Incomparability of Yahweh in the Old Testament (E. J. Brill, 1966)?Catrin H. Williams, “I am He”: The Meaning and Interpretation of “ANI HU” in Jewish and Early Christian Literature (WUNT 113, Reihe 2; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1999)?Elmer B. Smick, “Mythopoetic language in the Psalms,” Westminster Theological Journal 44 (1982): 88-98?John S. Kselman, “Psalm 77 and the Book of Exodus,” Journal of the Ancient Near Eastern Society 15 (1983): 51-58?Dennis T. Olson, “God for Us, God against Us: Singing the Pentateuch’s Songs of Praise in Exodus 15 and Deuteronomy 32,” Theology Today 70, no. 1 (2013): 54-61?Saul M. Olyan, “Is Isaiah 40‐55 Really Monotheistic?” Journal of Ancient Near Eastern Religions 12, no. 2 (2012): 190-201?Ed Mathews, “Yahweh and the Gods: A theology of world religions.” International Journal of Frontier Missions 14, no. 1 (1997): 27-32?An?ela Jeli?i?, “The Leviathan and the Serpent in the Old Testament.” IKON 2, no. 1 (2009): 39-46?John N. Oswalt, “The Myth of the Dragon and Old Testament Faith,” Evangelical Quarterly 49, no. 3 (1977): 163-172?John Day, God’s Conflict with the Dragon and the Sea: Echoes of a Canaanite Myth in the Old Testament (University of Cambridge Oriental Publications 35; Cambridge, 1985)?J. A. Emerton, “Leviathan and Ltn: The Vocalization of the Ugaritic Word for Dragon,” Vetus Testamentum 32 (1982) 327–331Chapter 20: Retooling the Template?The content of this chapter sets the stage for Chapters 35-36. Consequently, relevant bibliography can also be found there.?Bibliography from the book?Timothy M. Willis, “Yahweh’s Elders (Isa 24, 23): Senior Officials of the Divine Court,” Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 103, no. 3 (1991): 375-385David Burnett, “‘So Shall Your Seed Be’: Paul’s Use of Genesis 15:5 in Romans 4:18 in Light of Early Jewish Deification Traditions,” (Paper presented to the Paul & Judaism Conference at Houston Baptist University, Thursday, March 20, 2014)M. David Litwa, We Are Being Transformed: Deification in Paul’s Soteriology (BZNW 187; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2012)Devorah Dimant, “Men as Angels: The Self-Image of the Qumran Community,” in Religion and Politics in the Ancient Near East (ed. Adele Berlin; Studies in Jewish History and Culture; Bethesda, Md.: University Press of America, 1996), 93-103James Tabor, “Firstborn of Many Brothers: A Pauline Notion of Apotheosis,” on SBL Seminar Papers (1984), 295-303?Additional Bibliography?Gerald Cooke, “The Israelite King as Son of God,” Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 73, no. 2 (1961): 202-225Adela Yarbro Collins and John Joseph Collins, King and Messiah as Son of God: Divine, human, and angelic messianic figures in biblical and related literature (Eerdmans, 2008)Erminie Huntress, ” ‘Son of God’ in Jewish Writings Prior to the Christian Era,” Journal of Biblical Literature (1935): 117-123Daniel T. Lioy, “The Garden of Eden as a Primordial Temple or Sacred Space for Humankind,” Conspectus: The Journal of the South African Theological Seminary 10 (2010): 25-57M. J. Selman, “The Kingdom of God in the Old Testament,” TynBul 40 (1989), 161–183W. H. Rose, “Messiah,” Dictionary of the Old Testament: Pentateuch (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2003), 565–68T. N. D. Mettinger, King and Messiah: The Civil and Sacral Legitimation of the Israelite Kings (ConBOT 8; Lund: Gleerup, 1976)John Day, ed. King and messiah in Israel and the ancient Near East: proceedings of the Oxford Old Testament Seminar (Vol. 270; Bloomsbury Publishing, 2013)K. M. Heim, “Kings and Kingship,” Dictionary of the Old Testament: Historical Books (ed. Bill T. Arnold and H. G. M. Williamson; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2005)T. C. G. Thornton, “Charismatic kingship in Israel and Judah,” The Journal of Theological Studies 14, no. 1 (1963): 1-11Keith W. Whitelam, “Israelite kingship: The royal ideology and its opponents,” The World of Ancient Israel: Sociological, Anthropological and Political Perspectives (1989): 119-139Aubrey Rodway Johnson, “Living Issues in Biblical Scholarship Divine Kingship and the Old Testament,” The Expository Times 62, no. 2 (1950): 36-42Gregory K. Beale, The temple and the church’s mission: a biblical theology of the dwelling place of God (InterVarsity Press, 2004)Jeffrey Jay Niehaus, God at Sinai: covenant and theophany in the bible and Ancient near East (Zondervan, 1995)L. Michael Morales, The Tabernacle Prefigured: Cosmic Mountain Ideology in Genesis and Exodus (Biblical Tools and Studies 15; Peeters, 2011)Ida Zatelli, “Astrology and the Worship of the Stars in the Bible,” Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 103, no. 1 (1991): 86-99A. Rofe?, The Belief in Angels in Israel in the First Temple Period in the light of Biblical Traditions (Heb; Jerusalem 1969), English edition: The Belief in Angels in the Bible and in Early Israel (Jerusalem 1979)?DiscussionOnly one note to make here. This chapter mentioned (in a footnote) the issue of the tiers of the divine council. See the short comments on this topic on the page for Chapter 4 of this website.Chapter 21: God’s Law, God’s CouncilThis chapter dealt with events at Sinai and the NT statements about the law being dispensed by angels.?Bibliography included in the bookF. F. Bruce, The Epistle to the Galatians: A Commentary on the Greek Text (Eerdmans, 1982), 175-180?Hindy Najman, “Angels at Sinai: Exegesis, Theology and Interpretive Authority,” Dead Sea Discoveries 7, no. 3 (2000): 313-333?W. D. Davies, “A Note on Josephus, Antiquities 15: 136,” Harvard Theological Review 47, no. 03 (1954): 135-140?Andrew J. Bandstra, “The Law and Angels: Antiquities 15.136 and Galatians 3: 19,” Calvin Theological Journal 24 (1989): 223-240?C. van Leeuwen, “??? ?ēd witness,” Theological Lexicon of the Old Testament (ed. Ernst Jenni and Claus Westermann; Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1997), 838-846?Additional BibliographyStefan Beyerle, “Evidence of a Polymorphic Text Towards the Text-History of Deuteronomy 33,” Dead Sea Discoveries (1998): 215-232?Terrance Callan, “Pauline Midrash: The Exegetical Background of Gal 3: 19b,” Journal of Biblical Literature (1980): 549-567?James C. VanderKam, “The Angel of the Presence in the Book of Jubilees,” Dead Sea Discoveries 7 (2000): 378-393Chapter 22: Realm Distinction?This chapter dealt with sacrifice, holiness, sacred space, and Azazel in the Day of Atonement ritual. With respect to the last element, I wanted to note that I do not espouse the ransom theory of the atonement. Azazel is not being paid a ransom. Beyond that consideration, I don’t feel any urgency to affirm any one approach to the atonement. The atonement is a multi-faceted concept. I am concerned, however, that the notion of substitution not be eliminated from a biblical theology of atonement. Substitutionary atonement is an important part of the meaning of the broad concept, particularly with respect to the cross.?Bibliography included in the bookMenahem Haran, Temples and Temple-Service in Ancient Israel: An Inquiry into the Character of Cult Phenomena and the Historical Setting of the Priestly School (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978)?W. F. Albright, “The Furniture of El in Canaanite Mythology,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 91 (1943): 39-44?Richard Averbeck: “Sacrifices and Offerings,” Dictionary of the Old Testament: Pentateuch (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2003)?Richard Averbeck, “?????? (kāpar II),” New International Dictionary of Old Testament Theology & Exegesis (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1997), 689–709?James Palmer, “Exodus and the Biblical Theology of the Tabernacle,” in Heaven on Earth (ed. T. Desmond Alexander and Simon Gathercole; Carlisle England: Paternoster Press, 2004), 11-22?Gregory Beale, “The Final Vision of the Apocalypse and Its Implications for a Biblical Theology of the Temple?,” in Heaven on Earth (ed. T. Desmond Alexander and Simon Gathercole; Carlisle England: Paternoster Press, 2004), 191-210?Jon D. Levenson, Creation and the Persistence of Evil: The Jewish Drama of Divine Omnipotence (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988), especially chapter 7?Eric E. Elnes, “Creation and Tabernacle: the Priestly Writer’s ‘Environmentalism’,” Horizons in Biblical Theology 16, no. 1 (1994): 144-155?Gordon J. Wenham, “Sanctuary Symbolism in the Garden of Eden Story,” in Proceedings of the Ninth World Congress of Jewish Studies (ed. M. Goshen-G?ttstein and D. Assaf; Jerusalem: World Union of Jewish Studies, 1986), 19-24?T. Stordalen, Genesis 2-3 and Symbolism of the Eden Garden in Biblical Hebrew Literature (CBET 25; Leuven: Peeters, 2000)?A. M. Rodriguez, “Sanctuary Theology in the Book of Exodus,” Andrews University Seminary Studies 29 (1991): 213-224?Shimon Bakon, “Creation, Tabernacle, and Sabbath,” Jewish Bible Quarterly 25, no. 2 (1997): 79-85?Daniel C. Timmer, Creation, Tabernacle, and Sabbath: The Sabbath Frame of Exodus 31:12-17; 35:1-3 in Exegetical and Theological Perspective (FRLANT 227; Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2009)?Richard J. Clifford, “The Tent of El and the Israelite Tent of Meeting,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 33.2 (1971): 221-27?Carol Myers, “Lampstand,” Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary (New York: Doubleday, 1992), vol. 4:143?Carol L. Meyers, The Tabernacle Menorah: A Synthetic Study of a Symbol from the Biblical Cult (Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias Press, 2003)?Menahem Haran, “The Ark and the Cherubim: Their Symbolic Significance in Biblical Ritual,” Israel Exploration Journal 9:1 (1959): 30-38?B. Janowski, “Azazel,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)?Hayim Tawil, “Azazel, the Prince of the Steepe: A Comparative Study,” Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 92:1 (1980): 43-59?Dominic Rudman, “A Note on the Azazel Goat Ritual,” Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 116:3 (2004): 396-401?Robert Helm, “Azazel in Early Jewish Tradition,” Andrews University Seminary Studies 32:3 (Autumn 1994): 217-226?Additional BibliographyJonathan Klawans, Purity, Sacrifice, and the Temple: Symbolism and Supersessionism in the Study of Ancient Judaism (Oxford University Press, 2006)?Jonathan Klawans, “Rethinking Leviticus and Rereading Purity and Danger,” AJS Review 27, no. 01 (2003): 89-101?Jonathan Klawans, “Pure Violence: Sacrifice and Defilement in Ancient Israel,” Harvard Theological Review 94, no. 02 (2001): 135-157?Jonathan Klawans, Impurity and sin in ancient Judaism Oxford University Press, 2004?Barry M. Gittlen, Sacred time, sacred place: archaeology and the religion of Israel (Eisenbrauns, 2002)?J. E. Taylor, “The Asherah, the Menorah and the Sacred Tree,” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 66 (1995) 29–54?R. W. Klein, “Back to the Future: The Tabernacle in the Book of Exodus,” Int 50 (1996) 264–76?G. A. Klingbeil, “Ritual Space in the Ordination Ritual of Aaron and His Sons as found in Leviticus 8,” JNSL 21 (1995) 59–82?R. P. Knierim, “Conceptual Aspects in Exodus 25:1–9,” in Pomegranates and Golden Bells: Studies in Biblical, Jewish, and Near Eastern Ritual, Law, and Literature in Honor of Jacob Milgrom (ed. D. P. Wright, D. N. Freedman and A. Hurvitz Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1995) 113–23?P. P. Jenson, Graded Holiness: A Key to the Priestly Conception of the World (JSOTS 106; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1992?F. M. Cross, “The Priestly Tabernacle and the Temple of Solomon,” in From Epic to Canon: History and Literature in Ancient Israel (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998) 84–95?T. Frymer-Kensky, “Pollution, Purification, and Purgation in Biblical Israel,” in The Word of the Lord Shall Go Forth: Essays in Honor of David Noel Freedman in Celebration of His Sixtieth Birthday, ed. C. Meyers and M. O’Connor (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1983) 399–414?J. Gammie, Holiness in Israel (OBT; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1989)?J. E. Hartley, “Holy and Holiness, Clean and Unclean,” Dictionary of the Old Testament: Pentateuch (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2003)?R. E. Averbeck, “Tabernacle,” Dictionary of the Old Testament: Pentateuch (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2003)?D. P. Wright, The Disposal of the Impurity: Elimination Rites in the Bible and in Hittite and Mesopotamian Literature (SBLDS 101; Atlanta 1987) 15–74?D. P. Wright, “Azazel,” Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary (New York: Doubleday, 1992), 1: 536–537?G. J. Wenham, “Sanctuary Symbolism in the Garden of Eden Story,” in “I Studied Inscriptions from Before the Flood”: Ancient Near Eastern and Literary Approaches to Genesis 1–11, ed R. S. Hess and D. Tsumura (SBTS 4: Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1994) 19–25?L. L. Grabbe, “The Scapegoat: A Study in Early Jewish Interpretation,” JSJ 18 (1987) 152–167Chapter 23: Giant ProblemsThis chapter discussed the two possible supernaturalist interpretations of Genesis 6:1-4 and the problem of giants (nephilim) after the flood.?Bibliography from the BookBrian Doak, The Last of the Rephaim: Conquest and Cataclysm in the Heroic Ages ofAncient Israel, Ilex Series 7 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2013)?Claus Westermann,Genesis 1–11: A Continental Commentary (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1994)?David F. Siemens Jr., “Some Relatively Non-Technical Problems with Flood Geology,” Perspectives on Science and the Christian Faith 44.3 (1992): 169–74?Davis Young and Ralph Searley, The Bible, Rocks and Time: Geological Evidence for the Age of the Earth (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2008)?Additional BibliographyThere are a number of resources that deal with ancient Second Temple Jewish material about Noah and the Flood that readers may find of interest. Several of them touch on specific content items in this chapter.?Pieter W. Van der Horst, “Bitenosh’s Orgasm (1QapGen 2: 9-15),” Journal for the Study of Judaism 43, no. 4-5 (2012): 613-628?Ronald V. Huggins, “Noah and the Giants: A Response to John C. Reeves.” Journal of Biblical Literature (1995): 103-110?John C. Reeves, “Utnapishtim in the Book of Giants?” Journal of Biblical Literature (1993): 110-115?Matthew Goff, “Gilgamesh the Giant: The Qumran Book of Giants’ Appropriation of Gilgamesh Motifs.” Dead Sea Discoveries 16, no. 2 (2009): 221-253?Helge S. Kvanvig, “Gen 6, 1-4 as an antediluvian event,” Scandinavian Journal of the Old Testament 16, no. 1 (2002): 79-112?Wayne Baxter, “Noachic Traditions and the Book of Noah,” Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha 15, no. 3 (2006): 179-194?Michael E. Stone, “The Book (s) Attributed to Noah,” Dead Sea Discoveries 13:1 (2006): 4-23?Loren T. Stuckenbruck, The Book of Giants from Qumran: Texts, Translation, and Commentary. Edited by Martin Hengel and Peter Sch?fer. Vol. 63. Texte und Studien zum Antiken Judentum. Tu?bingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1997?Jeremy Daniel Lyon, “The Qumran Interpretation of the Genesis Flood,” Ph.D. dissertation, Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, 2014?DiscussionIn the discussion about how there would be nephilim after the flood (Gen 6:4; Num 13:33) I noted several possible trajectories that could yield an answer:?1) The flood was a localized, regional event.?2) The behavior of Gen 6:1-4 happened after the flood as well. This possibility derived from a grammatical consideration with respect to the ?asher (????) clause of Gen 6:4.?There was also a third trajectory mentioned earlier in Chapter 13 (p. 109):?3) The “bad seed” was carried through the flood in Noah’s bloodline (either him or one of his sons). That view is reflected in ancient literature, but is something of an aberration (The Genesis Apocryphon from the Dead Sea Scrolls introduces the idea and has Noah’s mother denying it — in explicit terms: see van der Horst’s article above in the additional bibliography).?I’d like to add a bit more detail to some of these items. We’ll start with the last option from earlier in the book, Chapter 13.?Noah Carries the Bad Seed??In many ways, the most logical explanation of how nephilim were found after the flood is that Noah carried the seed of the Watchers / sons of God, having been so conceived himself (thus passing it on to his sons). The Genesis Apocryphon (an Aramaic text – hence nefilin below) has Noah’s father fearing that his son came from the Watchers. Lamech says:?“I thought in my heart that the conception was (the work) of the Watchers, and the pregnancy of the Holy Ones, and it belonged to the Nephilin, and my heart within me was upset on account of this boy” (2:1-2); Translation by F. García Martínez and E. J. C. Tigchelaar, The Dead Sea Scrolls StudyEdition, vol. 1 (Leiden: Brill, 1997), 29Lamech’s wife, Bitenosh answers:?“(8) Then Bitenosh, my wife, spoke to me very harshly . . . (9) and said: ‘Oh my brother and lord, remember my sexual pleasure! . . . (10) in the heat of intercourse, and the gasping of my breath in my breast. . . .? (14) Remember my sexual pleasure! . . . (15) that this seed comes from you, that this pregnancy comes from you’.” (Same translation source)Van der Horst’s article (“Bitenosh’s orgasm”; see additional bibliography) discusses the belief in antiquity that female orgasm contributed to conception. Van der Horst explains:?That is to say, most probably Bitenosh here refers to her orgasm on that occasion. The fact that not only Lamech but also Bitenosh had an orgasm at that moment is taken as a proof that it is the two of them together who begot the child.43 That can only be the case if the female orgasm is here regarded as the event during which she emitted her own seed into her womb where it mingled with Lamech’s seed so as to form the beginning embryo. It is only a double-seed theory that can explain why Bitenosh here takes recourse to an appeal to her moment suprême (to whichLamech was witness!) as a cogent argument. (pp. 626-627)The tradition of Lamech’s fear is also something that shows up in 1 Enoch 106:1-7, in which passage we learn that Lamech’s concern stems from (apparent) super-human attributes (really, superfluous beauty) of the infant Noah. See the discussion in the Reeves article in the additional bibliography.?It is interesting that in these texts Lamech isn’t alarmed by any giantism on the part of Noah, something we’d obviously expect. This idea does surface in later rabbinic material. See the articles above between Reeves, Huggins, and Goff as to whether or not Jewish? pseudepigraphical texts and later traditions have Noah being a giant.?What you’ll find in all these debates and traditions (real or imagined) is that ancient Jewish texts sought to distance Noah from the sin of the Watchers. Hence my own denigration of this view in The Unseen Realm. That the discussion is even possible, though, shows us that the words of Genesis 6:9 was not a “default” for getting Noah off the hook (“Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation”).?The word for “generation” in this verse is do?r (?????), which is not the normative biblical Hebrew term for “family generations” or one’s immediate / extended genealogical line. That word is toledoth,?which is found in many genealogical contexts in the OT (“these are the generations (toledoth) of”). Rather, the term here refers to one’s “generation” in the sense of one’s era (e.g., “my parents’ generation was the sixties”) or is a collective reference. HALOT translated Gen 6:9 as “among his contemporaries”). Here is the gist of the HALOT entry:?1. sing. cycle, lifetime, descent, generation, (all the people who have grown up in the period from the birth of a man until the birth of his first son; Noth ?berl. St. 21; a period with particular events and people, Ped. Isr. 1-2:490): ??????? ?????? Gn 71 ??? ??????? 1516, ??????? ??? as long as a thousand generations Dt 79, ????? ?????????? 2921, ?????????? Jb 88; with ??????? Dt 325, with ??????? Ps 145; with ???????? 4920, with ???????? 7315, with ????????? Jr 729 etc.; ???? ???? Ex 315 and ???? ????? Dt 327 (29 ×; Ug. drdr, ana dūrim, ana dāri dūri and simil., for ever, (PRU 3:218) Akk. dūr dāri, simil. in Mnd.) and ????? ???? Ps 1454 generation after generation, ????? ???????? Ps 10225, cj. ????????? ?????? Ps 7118; group ??? ?????????? Ps 246; Is 538 ? fate (Arb. dā?irat), alt. his contemporaries. . .2. pl. generations (in Greek originally counted as forty years, from the time of Herodotus as thirty-three and a third years, Meyer Gesch. 3/2:207): ?????????? ?????? Jb 4216, ?????? ?????? ?????? Ju 32, ???????????? ?????????? future generations descended from us Jos 2227f; ??? ????????? generations in times past Is 519; ??????????/???/?????? according to his (their, your) generations = generation after generation descended from him (them, you) Lv 2530 Gn 177.12; ???????????? among his contemporaries Gn 69, Sir 441 (alt.: in his turn); —Ju 32 dl. (dittogr., Seeligmann VT 11:2142); Jr 221 ?, prp. ????? ???????? Sept., Latina; Is 414 rd. ????????? (→ v. 22).Ludwig Koehler et al., The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament (Leiden; New York: E.J. Brill, 1999), 217–218.That would mean this term is of no value at all to defending Noah’s purity with respect to the sons of God incident. However, do?r might perhaps be used at least once in the Hebrew Bible for immediate family members (Num 9:10), but a translation of “contemporaries” is still possible there. To conclude, while the language itself of Gen 6:9 cannot said to preclude the possibility that Noah was untouched by the Watchers’ scandal, the argument is still one from silence.?The matter of the ?asher (????) clause?Kvanvig (see additional bibliography above) articulates what seems to me as a somewhat idiosyncratic understanding of the timing of the events of Gen 6:1-4. Those who have Hebrew will be able to follow his discussion of the wayyiqtol sequencing and intervening clauses. He writes on page 82:Linguistic perspective deals with the temporal set of the sentence. The change to x-qatal means that the time line indicated by wayyiqtol is broken. According to Goldfaijn this kind of shift signifies that we are moving back to the initial anchor point in the narrative. The reference to the time of the něfilīm is not a consequence of the speech of YHWH, but describes the initial situation, given in v 1. At the time when the humans started to multiply there were the něfilīm on earth. Thus the narrative gives two indications of what time we are dealing with: The time of multiplication (v 1) and the time of the něfilīm (v 4). Therefore the narrator adds: ??? ??????? “and also afterwards”. The time marked in v 4 goes through the whole story, it all happened in the time of the něfilīm.This understanding has everything happening at once, suggesting (though he doesn’t say it here) that the nephilim were not the product of the sons of God incident. But Kvanvig of course knows the traditions that say precisely that (Mesopotamian and otherwise).?The problem of course with any “contemporaneity” view is that it does not rule out cause and effect. That is, the point of the syntax (understanding contemporaneity as Kvanvig has here) could just as well be “all this stuff was happening at the same time.” Of course the nephilim were contemporary — they were there because of the unions. They wouldn’t show up in the next era! This is actually more likely what Kvanvig means as he takes the ?asher + yiqtol-x + weqatal verb sequence in v. 4 as continuative (“When the sons of God used to go in to the daughters of men”). That is, it describes ongoing action. Kvanvig, however, situates the “ongoing-ness” in the past, choosing “when” instead of “whenever” in his translation of ?asher. The latter creates continuity in the sense that the behavior recurred (see the discussion in The Unseen Realm).?I bring up the Kvanvig item here only to illustrate (with the examples in the footnotes of Unseen Realm) that nearly every element of the grammar of Gen 6:1-4 is disputed by scholars. One cannot simply quote a Hebrew commentator or grammarian and think something is settled. Far from it.?Two items aren’t in dispute, however: (a) the original Mesopotamian context of the polemic purpose of Gen 6:1-4; and (b) the comprehension of the original context by Second Temple Jewish writers. As Annus and, subsequently, Drawnel, have conclusively shown, the writer is clearly taking aim at the Mesopotamian apkallu traditions and putting them in a very dark (demonic) light. The polemic context, then, must be allowed to inform our choice of grammatical options for sake of consistency. Marrying context (!) and grammar allows us to comprehend what Gen 6:1-4 sought to communicate. This has been my approach in the book. Second temple traditions about the interpretation of Gen 6:1-4 and the origin of evil spirits are completely in line with the original context and that approach. So are Peter and Jude.Chapter 24: The Place of the SerpentThis chapter dealt with serpentine and Underworld (Sheol) associations of the region of Bashan and Israel’s clashes with the giant Rephaim.?Bibliography from the BookMichael S. Heiser, “Rephaim,” in Lexham Bible Dictionary (Bellingham, WA:Lexham Press, 2015)Brian Doak, The Last of the Rephaim: Conquest and Cataclysm in the Heroic Ages ofAncient Israel, Ilex Series 7 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2013)Andrew R. George, “The Tower of Babel: Archaeology, History, and Cuneiform Texts,” Archiv für Orientforschung 51 (2005/2006): 75–95John H. Walton, “The Mesopotamian Background of the Tower of Babel Account and Its Implications,” Bulletin for Biblical Research 5 (1995): 155–75Martti Nissinen, “Akkadian Rituals and Poetry of Divine Love,” in Mythology and Mythologies: Methodological Approaches to Intercultural Influences; Proceedings of the Second Annual Symposium of the Assyrian and Babylonian Intellectual Heritage Project Held in Paris, France, October 4–7, 1999, Melammu Symposia 2 (ed. R. M. Whiting; Helsinki: Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project, 2001), 93–136Beate Pongratz-Leisten, “Sacred Marriage and the Transfer of Divine Knowledge: Alliances between the Gods and the King in Ancient Mesopotamia,” in Sacred Marriages: The Divine-Human Sexual Metaphor from Sumer to Early Christianity (ed. Martti Nissinen and Risto Uro; Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2008), 43–72Russell E. Gmirkin, Berossus and Genesis, Manetho and Exodus: Hellenistic Histories and the Date of the Pentateuch, Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies 433 (London: T&T Clark, 2006)K. van der Toorn, “Nimrod before and after the Bible,” Harvard Theological Review 83.1 (January 1990)G. del Olmo Lete, “Bashan,” in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, 2nd ed. (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; Cologne; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999), 161–63Archie T. Wright, The Origin of Evil Spirits: The Reception of Genesis 6:1–4 in Early Jewish Literature, Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 198, second series; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013)James H. Charlesworth, “Bashan, Symbology, Haplography, and Theology in Psalm 68,” in David and Zion: Biblical Studies in Honor of J. J. M. Roberts [ed. Bernard Frank Batto and Kathryn L. Roberts; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2004], 351–372Additional BibliographyMaria Lindquist, “King Og’s Iron Bed,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 73 (2011):? 477-492This article includes some of the lengthier commentary on the identical dimensions of Og’s bed to the bed of Marduk (noted in this chapter). I found it only after The Unseen Realm had gone to press.?H. Rouillard, “Rephaim,” in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, 2nd ed. (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; Cologne; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999), 692-700Scott Noegel, “The Aegean Ogygos of Boeotia and the biblical Og of Bashan: Reflections of the same myth,” Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 110, no. 3 (1998): 411-426Karel van der Toorn, “Funerary Rituals and Beatific Afterlife in Ugaritic Texts and in the Bible,” Bibliotheca Orientalis 48 (1991) 40–66C. E. L’Heureux, “The Ugaritic and the Biblical Rephaim,” Harvard Theological Review 67:3 (1974) 265–274S. B. Parker, “The Feast of Rāpi?u,” Ugarit Forschungen 2 (1970) 243–249J. C. de Moor, “Rapi?uma-Rephaim,” Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 88 (1976) 323–345J. A. Emerton, “The ‘Mountain of God’ in Psalm 68:16,” in History and Interpretationsof Early Israel: Studies Presented to Eduard Nielsen (ed. A. Lemaire and B. Otzen; Leiden: Brill,1993) 24–37F. C. Fensham, “Ps 68:23 in the Light of Recently Discovered Ugaritic Tablets,”Journal of Near Eastern Studies 19 (1960) 292–93Henryk Drawnel, “The Mesopotamian Background of the Enochic Giants and Evil Spirits,” Dead Sea Discoveries 21:1 (2014): 14-38Amar Annus, “On the Watchers: A Comparative Study of the Antediluvian Wisdom in Mesopotamian and Jewish Traditions,” Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha 19.4 (2010): 277–320?DiscussionIn the first footnote to this chapter I made the comment that some interpreters try to argue that the report of the spies (Numbers 13) about the giant Anakim was a lie. More specifically, I’ve come across at least one person (Gary Bates, a young earth creation apologist, in his book UFOs and the Evolution Connection) who attempts this (see my review of the book). Briefly, Bates argues that the statement in Numbers 13:33 that the Anakim encountered by the Israelite spies were of the nephilim, was actually a false report of the unbelieving spies (i.e., they lied; pp. 363-364).? There is no exegetical foundation for this view.? It is a deliberate reading inserted into the text to avoid the nephilim problem. The reason the report of the spies was called “evil” is transparent from the biblical text—they refused to trust God. We read nowhere that Israel was punished for lying, or that the people had been deceived by a lying report. We read everywhere in the Old Testament that the people did not believe the word of Joshua and Caleb—who, by the way, did not accuse the other ten spies of lying. This view is baseless. Bates shows no awareness in his book of the sorts of data that I present in The Unseen Realm with respect to Gen 6:1-4 or the later conquest encounters.The work of Drawnel (see above under additional bibliography) has significance for the content of this chapter with respect to connections between the flood giants (apkallu), demons, and the Underworld. Annus (see above under additional bibliography) noted these connections in his important article on the Watchers/apkallu:From many references in Mesopotamian literature we can learn that the fish-like sages [apkallu] were thought to have been created and also reside in Aps?. The seven sages were according to Bi?t Me?seri III 8 ‘shining carps (pura?du?), carps of the sea…that were created in a stream’ (Wiggermann 1992: 108). . . . More to the point, the realm of Aps? is often confused with underworld in Mesopotamian literature. Evidence indicates that the reason for this was either a simple confusion, or Aps? itself was occasionally thought to be a netherworld inhabited by malevolent spirits (Horowitz 1998: 342). The second option seems more likely, as there are many literary references, which place underworld deities and demons in Aps? (Horowitz 1998: 343). . . . The fact that apkallus are born and often reside in Aps?, is not evidence that points to their exclusively positive character, since demonic creatures were also often thought to have their origin in the depths of the divine River. (pp. 301-303)Annus writes a bit later (p. 311):Thus, like the Watchers, the Mesopotamian apkallus were punished by a flood according to the Erra Epic. In 1 Enoch, the flood was considered final judgment for the fallen angels, combined with the punishment of fire (ch. 10). Some of the angels, like Asael, ‘will be led away to the burning conflagration’ on the day of great judgment (10.6). Moreover, as apkallus are sent down to Aps?, the Watchers and their sons ‘will be led away to the fiery abyss, and to the torture, and to the prison where they will be confined forever’ in 10.13 (Nickelsburg 2001: 215). The prison, where the spirits of the fallen angels are kept, is a chasm like Aps?, an abyss containing fiery pillars, and it is situated at the ‘end of the great earth’ according to the Greek version of 1 En. 18.10, or ‘beyond the great earth’ following the Ethiopic.Those interested are invited to read Annus and Drawnel. What these connections do is (finally) answer the longstanding scholarly question of why, in the Hebrew Bible, the Rephaim are not only dead kings in Sheol but also giants, as oppose to Ugarit, which has a good amount of Rephaim material, having them only as dead kings in the Underworld. The answer is that the biblical writers connect the Rephaim back to the Nephilim (via the Anakim), which in turn connects them to the Underworld via the apkallu traditions from Mesopotamia, the original context for Gen 6:1-4.Chapter 25: Holy WarThis? chapter is about the conquest narratives, with specific attention paid to the extermination of the giant clans.Bibliography from the BookBrian Doak, The Last of the Rephaim: Conquest and Cataclysm in the Heroic Ages ofAncient Israel, Ilex Series 7 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2013)?Ronald S. Hendel, “Of Demigods and the Deluge: Toward and Interpretation of Genesis 6:1–4,” Journal of Biblical Literature 106.1 (March 1987): 13-26?B. Becking, “Rapha,” in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, 2nd ed. (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; Cologne; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999), 687?Aharon Kempinski, “Some Philistine Names from the Kingdom of Gaza,” Israel Exploration Journal 37:1 (1987): 20–24?Aren M. Maeir, Stefan J. Wimmer, Alexander Zukerman, and Aaron Demsky, “A Late Iron Age I/Early Iron Age II Old Canaanite Inscription from Tell e?-??fī /Gath, Israel: Palaeography, Dating, and Historical-Cultural Significance,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 351 (2008): 39–71?E. C. B. MacLaurin, “Anak/?ανξ,” Vetus Testamentum 15:4 (1965): 468–74?P. Kyle McCarter Jr., I Samuel: A New Translation with Introduction, Notes and Commentary, Anchor Yale Bible 8 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008)?Robert D. Bergen, 1, 2 Samuel, New American Commentary 7 (Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 1996)?Daniel J. Hays, “The Height of Goliath: A Response to Clyde Billington,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 50.3 (2007): 509–16?G. Ernest Wright, “Troglodytes and Giants in Palestine,” Journal of Biblical Literature 57.3 (September 1938): 305–09?A. Macalister, “Report on the Human Remains Found at Gezer, 1902–3,” Palestine Exploration Quarterly 35.4 (1903): 322–26?Yossi Nagar, “Human Osteological Database at the Israel Antiquities Authority: Overview and Some Samples of Use,” Bioarchaeology of the Near East 5 (2011): 1–18See –05–01.pdf?Baruch Arensburg, “The Peoples in the Land of Israel from the Epipaleolithic to Present Times: A Study Based on Their Skeletal Remains,” Ph.D. diss., Tel-Aviv University, 1973?Baruch Arensburg and Y. Rak, “Jewish Skeletal Remains from the Period of the Kings of Judaea,” Palestine Exploration Quarterly 117.1 (1985): 30–34?Adrienne Mayor, The First Fossil Hunters: Paleontology in Greek and Roman Times (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001)?Adrienne Mayor, Fossil Legends of the First Americans (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2005)?James L. Hayward, “Fossil Proboscidians and Myths of Giant Men,” Transactions of the Nebraska Academy of Sciences and Affiliated Societies 12 (1984): 95–102?Taika Helola Dahlbom, “A Mammoth History: The Extraordinary Journey of Two Thighbones,” Endeavour 31.3 (2007): 110–14?Sonia R. Zakrewski, “Variation in Ancient Egyptian Stature and Body Proportions,” American Journal of Physical Anthropology 121.3 (2003): 219–29?P. H. K. Gray, “The Radiography of Mummies of Ancient Egyptians,” Journal of Human Evolution 2.1 (1973): 51–53?Michelle H. Raxter, Christopher B. Ruff, Ayman Azab, Moushira Erfan, Muhammad Soliman, and Aly El-Sawaf, “Stature Estimation in Ancient Egyptians: A New Technique Based on Anatomical Reconstruction of Stature,” American Journal of Physical Anthropology 136.2 (2008): 147–55?James Bennett Pritchard, ed., The Ancient Near East: An Anthology of Texts and Pictures, 3rd ed., with supplement (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969)?Additional BibliographyConnections between the Aegean and the Philistines; the Sea Peoples?Trude Dothan and Moshe Dothan, People of the Sea: the Search for the Philistines (New York: Macmillan, 1992)?Trude Dothan, “Tel Miqne-Ekron: The Aegean Affinities of the Sea Peoples’(Philistines’) Settlement in Canaan in Iron Age I,” in Recent Excavations in Israel: A View to the West (1995): 41-60?Philip P. Betancourt, “The Aegean and the Origin of the Sea Peoples,” in The Sea Peoples and Their World: A Reassessment (University Museum Monograph 108; Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000): 297-303?Jane C. Waldbaum, “Philistine Tombs at Tell Fara and their Aegean Prototypes,” American Journal of Archaeology (1966): 331-340?Alexander A. Bauer, “Cities of the Sea: Maritime Trade and the Origin of Philistine Settlement in the Early Iron Age Southern Levant,” Oxford Journal of Archaeology 17, no. 2 (1998): 149-168?S. Wachsman, “To the Sea of the Philistines,” in The Sea Peoples and Their World: A Reassessment (University Museum Monograph 108; Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000): 103-144?Trude Dothan, “Reflections on the Initial Phase of Philistine Settlement,” in The Sea Peoples and Their World: A Reassessment (University Museum Monograph 108; Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000): 145-159?David O’Connor, “The Sea Peoples and the Egyptian Sources,” in The Sea Peoples and Their World: A Reassessment (University Museum Monograph 108; Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000): 85-102?Jonathan N. Tubb, “Sea Peoples in the Jordan Valley,” in The Sea Peoples and Their World: A Reassessment (University Museum Monograph 108; Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000): 181-196?Ephraim Stern, “The Settlement of Sea Peoples in Northern Israel,” in The Sea Peoples and Their World: A Reassessment (University Museum Monograph 108; Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000): 197-212?Ann E. Killebrew, “Aegean-Style Early Philistine Pottery in Canaan During the Iron I Age: A Stylistic Analysis of Mycenaean IIIC:1b Pottery and Its Associated Wares,” in The Sea Peoples and Their World: A Reassessment (University Museum Monograph 108; Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000): 233-254?David Ben-Shlomo and Michael D. Press, “A Reexamination of Aegean-Style Figurines in Light of New Evidence from Ashdod, Ashkelon, and Ekron,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research No. 353 (February 2009), pp. 39-74?Aaron J. Brody and Roy J. King, “Genetics and the Archaeology of Ancient Israel,” Human Biology 85, no. 6 (2013): 925-939?A. Yasur-Landau, The Philistines and Aegean Migration at the End of the Late Bronze Age (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010)?F. M. Cross, and L. E. Stager, “Cypro-Minoan Inscriptions found in Ashkelon,” Israel Exploration Journal 56/2 (2006): 129-159?DiscussionThere were several items of interest noted in footnotes that directed readers here.?The matter of Goliath’s height (and the height of biblical giants in general)?Readers of Unseen Realm (and my blogs) know that I don’t think the biblical giants were taller than unusually tall people of modern times (between 7-9 feet). The only actual measurement we get of a giant’s body is that of Goliath. My reasoning is that this is so because:?(a) That idea aligns with the best textual tradition (from the Dead Sea Scrolls of Qumran) have him at 6′ 9″ (four cubits and a span — not the six cubits and a span of the Masoretic Text, which would produce a height greater than nine feet);(b) Og’s bed is not a measurement of his body — and, as I’ve written in Unseen Realm, the numbers for his bed have mythic significance, as they match that of Marduk’s bed;(c) a height of upper six feet on into the 7-8 foot range is significantly taller than the average person of the time period, meaning that someone of that height would indeed have been giant by those standards;(d) ancient and modern reports of giant skeletons have been demonstrated to certainly have been (or very likely to have been) mis-identified skeletal remains of dinosaurs or prehistoric mammals (see the references in the additional bibliography above).?Consequently, I would argue my position is both biblical and evidence-based, as opposed to speculative.?Recently, Goliath’s height was debated in the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society. Here is the exchange (articles in chronological order):J. Daniel Hays, “Reconsidering the Height of Goliath,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 48, no. 4 (2005): 701-714Clyde E. Billington, “Goliath and the Exodus Giants: How Tall Were They?” of the Evangelical Theological Society 50, no. 3 (2007): 489-508Daniel J. Hays, “The Height of Goliath: A Response to Clyde Billington,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 50.3 (2007): 509–16?The gist of the exchange of articles is apparent. Hays’ article is a pretty careful summary of the textual situation, how the Qumran material supports a sub-7-foot Goliath. He also does a good job of covering other aspects of the Goliath story (e.g., the weight of the spear head), showing how you don’t need a 9-10 foot person to fit those details. Billington’s response article has several unfortunate shortcomings. I know Clyde. He’s a good guy, but his training is really in classics / Greco-Roman material. Consequently he’s a bit out of his element here. Hays’ response is a good one, but I want to throw some thoughts in of my own.?Billington writes on page 489 that “Hays in his article argues that there is a textual error, made by a sloppy or exaggerating scribe, in the height of Goliath as given in the MT.” This misrepresents the textual situation. The Qumran reading is not a scribal error. Differences between LXX and MT are not only due to errors or “translation technique”; in places the text is demonstrably different.? There was a Hebrew text used to produce what we now call LXX, and that Hebrew text was different than MT in a number of places. No one was handing off one magical text from the biblical period on down the line. The evidence just isn’t there for such an idea (akin to a KJV only notion about “transmission”).?Billington misunderstands the history of Hebrew textual transmission in this regard. Before the Qumran discoveries three separate traditions of the Hebrew text were known: what was called MT, LXX, and the SP (Samaritan Pentateuch). After the Qumran discoveries, each of these traditions (all of which had unique readings and features) were discovered among the biblical manuscripts at Qumran. That tells us all three traditions were present in the Intertestamental period. Further, there are many “unaffiliated” biblical texts – texts that don’t belong in any of the three major traditions. All of this tells us that during the Intertestamental period there was textual plurality with respect to the Hebrew Bible. It’s not about sloppiness; there was a plurality of textual traditions.?Billington’s paper has a strange thesis:? “This paper will also argue that both the 6-cubits reading and the 4-cubits reading of 1 Sam 17:4 give the same basic height for Goliath” (489).?How does Billington propose to argue this? By arguing that the respective writers (texts) were using different cubits, because the writers were not the same height (the cubit is measure from the elbow to fingertips)? Frankly, this requires omniscience on Billington’s part. How would he know the writer was referencing his own arm, or the arm of someone they knew when thinking of a cubit (as opposed to a standard unit)?? How would he know that the cubit was different for the respective writers because they wrote at different times? Here Billington – apparently – presumes that the reason for the LXX cubit has something to do with when the LXX translation was accomplished. But that misunderstands the textual situation completely. Again, there was a textual plurality — the issue is not about when the LXX translation was done.?Amazingly, here is how Billington says Goliath’s height was measured:?Since the common cubit varied with the person doing the measuring, in considering the height of Goliath, it is first necessary to ask the question: How tall was the person doing the measuring? It was probably David who measured Goliath. It should be remembered that David cut off Goliath’s head and carried it away, and measuring him after this would have been problematic. However, the arguments given below would have held true for any average Israelite of that period. . . . It is very likely that David was about the size of an average Jewish male at that time. In his article, Hays correctly notes that the average Jewish male was between 5 feet and 5 feet 3 inches tall at that time.[9] However, David, being a teenager, might not have yet attained his full height. In addition, Hays himself cites. [10] Victor Matthews’s Manners and Customs in the Bible, which gives the average male Semite’s height during the earlier patriarchal period as only 5 feet.11 Hence it is very possible that teenage David was less than 5 feet 3 inches tall, and he may have been only 5 feet tall or less. But for the sake of argument, let us assume that David was 5 feet 3 inches tall. If it is assumed that David measured Goliath, then the question arises: How big was David’s cubit? One thing is for certain: his “common” cubit would not have been 18 inches. An 18-inch cubit would suggest someone who was about 5 feet 8 inches tall, not 5 feet 3 inches. My unscientific, but I believe fairly accurate, study of students and a few other individuals who are about 5 feet 3 inches tall suggests a cubit of slightly more than 16 Vi inches. For those who are 5 feet tall, their cubit would be about 16 inches. Assuming a 16 Vi inch cubit for a David who was 5 feet 3 inches would indicate that, according to the 6-cubit MT, Goliath was about 8 feet 11 inches tall.?This is nothing but speculation. The passage nowhere has David measuring Goliath. The reasoning is therefore entirely specious. Speculation isn’t data, so this is not a data-driven conclusion.?Billington then proceeds to reference the Egyptian text I bring up in Unseen Realm (quoted from Pritchard) that has *some* of the Shasu (a generic term for Semites) as 4-5 cubits (6-8 foot range – again, no taller than unusually tall people of today). How this proves anything is difficult to see. Apparently it’s Billington’s goal to get Goliath out of the nine foot range and into the 8-foot range. But … why? What does this prove? It doesn’t have anything to do with the Qumran reading that supports LXX. Theorizing about cubit size does not address the textual situation.?Any specialist in Old Testament textual criticism (which Billington is not) will tell you – and direct you to the research of the primary data – that the Qumran text of the books of Samuel (which aligns more often with LXX than MT) is superior to MT as a text for these books. That is the issue. What Billington does is misdirect attention away from the focal point using speculation.? Those interested can read the exchange for themselves. Those with facility in Hebrew and Greek are advised to read Brotzman’s Introduction to OT Textual Criticism and then read the research (see additional bibliography below) on the Qumran text of Samuel.?The Text of 1 Samuel and the Height of Goliath?– Stephen Pisano, Additions or omissions in the Books of Samuel: the significant pluses and minuses in the Massoretic, LXX and Qumran texts (Orbis biblicus et orientalis 57;? G?ttingen: Vandenhoeck & Rupprecht, 1984)– Eugene Charles Ulrich, The Qumran Text of Samuel and Josephus (Harvard Semitic Monographs 19; Scholars Press, 1978)– Dominique Barthélémy, David W. Gooding, Johan Lust, and Emanuel Tov, The Story of David and Goliath: Textual and Literary Criticism: Papers of a Joint Research Venture (Orbis biblicus et orientalis 73; G?ttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1986)?Giants discovered in Israel / Syria-Palestine??Lastly, I often hear about the discovery of giants (skeletons over 7 feet) in biblical lands. I know of no such specimen. I don’t expect any, either, despite the fact that I do think people 7-8 feet tall were in Canaan and are the referents of terms like Anakim, Rephaim, Zamzummim, Emim, and Nephilim. In the absence of embalming, skeletal remains of these people (and “normal” people) just aren’t going to be recovered. They are dust. Most ancient skeletal remains from the biblical period are late first millennium BC or later.?As I noted in Unseen Realm, the internet is filled with reports of two female 7-foot specimens discovered by archaeologist Jonathan Tubb. This simply isn’t true. I related my correspondence with Dr. Tubb in the book, but here are images of our brief email exchange.?Me to Dr. Jonathan Tubb:??Dr. Tubb’s response to me:??Philistine connections to the Aegean Sea Peoples?See the bibliographic items above.?Additional technical detail on the Anakim (name and connection to Philistine culture)?E. C. B. MacLaurin (see his article in the bibliography) has put forth perhaps the best attempt to go beyond the surface details of the biblical text to connect the Anakim with the Philistines. On the surface, the two are connected because some cities noteworthy as Philistine strongholds are among the cities associated with the Anakim: Gaza, Gath, and Ashdod (Josh 11:21-22; cp. Josh 13:3).?Moving beyond this, MacLaurin observes that the named ancestor of the Anakim was Arba. That means that “Arba” was not an eponym (else we’d have “Arba-im” instead of “Anakim”). MacLaurin notes:?It is remarkable that their ancestor Arba was not their eponym rather than Anak and it may be that the term Anak is not a proper name but rather a descriptive epithet, comparable to the term David 9), and that to be called “sons of Anak” is equivalent to being described as “members of the aristocracy”. (p. 470)?This last point, that “sons of Anak” means “sons of aristocracy seems quite a leap, but MacLaurin seeks to marshal other evidence for it. He continues:?Consequently the way is now open for us to consider whether Anak may perhaps be a Philistine word which has been taken over into Canaanite, or perhaps is a Canaanite word adapted to Philistine use. The Greek at once comes to mind, and it is necessary to examine its meanings in order to determine whether they are identical with the functions ascribed to the Anakim. The occurence of K in Greek where we have p in Hebrew is not an insurmountable difficulty in view of the constant confusion between gutturals in the interchange between Greek and Semitic. (p. 471)?The Hebrew consonants behind the anglicized “Anakim” are: ? – n – q – m (Hebrew, reading right to left = ????). A qoph (?) Greek kappa (English “k”) interchange isn’t impossible. The real problem is the first letter: ? (?). We don’t have an English equivalent for this letter, and so it’s difficult to illustrate MacLaurin’s argument for those who don’t have Hebrew. This letter is pronounced in the back of the throat (approximating a hard “g”). For that reason it is at times represented by “g” in Greek and English (e.g., “Gomorrah” – which actually begins with [ ? ] in Hebrew). I discuss this letter in Unseen Realm in relation to the meaning of “Armageddon.”?MacLaurin proposes that Hebrew ? might have been a substitute for the Greek digamma, a letter that dropped out of usage in ancient times (it’s not used in the koine Greek of the NT). His reasoning is as follows (and, honestly, he doesn’t do a good job explaining it):?Classical Greek has the word ?ναξ, the final consonant of which can be interchanged with a “k” sound. And so: ANAK. In this word, the Hebrew consonant [ ? ] would not be attested — i.e., this word only has two consonants, so that’s a problem for correlation with ? – n – q. You need that initial consonant accounted for.The above word is found in a Corinthian inscription (Cypriot, and so Aegean) spelled with a digamma: ??ναξ, which pronounciation would be wanak.?ναξ (anak) and ??ναξ (wanak) both mean “lord, master” and are used of gods, homeric heroes (who were quasi-divine; i.e., figures who had one human parent and one divine parent). It is also a title of rank, used of sons or brothers of kings. (see Liddell-Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon [Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996], 114, for these items).?So, the question becomes whether the digamma is a reasonable substitute for Hebrew [ ? ]. It really isn’t. The digamma had a pronunciation of “w” or “v” (neither of which are pronounced in the back of the throat). MacLaurin acknowledges this. On pp. 471-472, footnote 4, he writes:?Most scholars believe (e.g. G. R. DRIVER, Semitic Writing) that digamma is related to waw, but in view of the fact that the Greek letter is frequently a mirror-image of the Phoenician, may digamma perhaps represent the mirror-image of some Phoenician symbol represented by the form of Ugaritic ayun.?MacLaurin wants this Ugaritic-Phoenician connection because the digamma shape?might look (to someone’s eye, not mine) like Phoenician “w”But Ugaritic ayun (ayin)and Phoenician “w” look nothing alike.?In the end, this lack of correlation is fatal to MacLaurin’s thesis, clever though it might be. He proceeds from the above speculation to discuss the word seren (?????), a lemma that is broadly thought to be Philistine and which is found in the Hebrew Bible. It is translated “lords” (e.g.,? Josh 13:3; Judges 3:3; Judges 16:5, 8, 18, 23, 27, 30; 1 Sam 5:8, 11). MacLaurin speculates that an Aegean (Cypriot) wanak (title of authority) = a Philistine seren (title of authority), and so, wanak = AnaK, and Anakim = Philistine lords.?All this breaks down on the linguistic disconnect above.?What were the nephilim??In the first footnote of Chapter 25 I wrote:?Despite their unusual size, the biblical text is clear that the giant clan members were human. For example, the word ?adam (“humankind”; cf. Gen 1:26–27) is used to describe the victims of the conquest in cities associated with giant clans (Josh 11:14). Arba is called “the greatest man (?adam) among the Anakim.” The generic Hebrew word for people (?am; i.e., human populations) is also used of giant clans: Deut 2:10 (the Emim); Deut 2:20 (the Zamzummim); Deut 3:1–3 (Og’s people); Deut 9:2 (the Anakim). This language raises the question of how both supernaturalist views of Gen 6:1–4 (see ch. 13) would understand this human description of the Anakim against the clear genealogical link back to the quasi-divine Nephilim (Num 13:33). For those favoring literal cohabitation in Gen 6:1–4, the point of the language ascribing humanity to Nephilim descendants would simply mean Anakim were mortal—not immortal gods. For those preferring the sort of divine parentage of which Yahweh’s intervention to produce the Israelites is an analogy, human descriptions would not be unexpected, as Israelites were obviously human despite Yahweh’s intervention.?The briefly elaborate, when it comes to the biblical text, we are told very little about the nephilim:?(1) they are the product of the sons of God and human women; that is, there was some sort of supernatural causation behind their existence (literal cohabitation or otherwise, as I discuss in Chs 23-25 of Unseen Realm];?(2) they were tall warriors;?(3) they are described as “people” and “men/humans” (Hebrew: ?am / ???; ?adam / ?????).?These are the basic facts. We are not told items that we might wish were told.? While it might be the case that nephilim are more than human — that the descriptions as “people” and “men” are based merely on the visual (they looked like men, but were taller than normal) — we have no way of knowing more from the biblical text. Angels were also called men (Gen 18:2, 16, 22; Gen 19:4-16; cp. all these references with Gen 19:1).?I don’t speculate about how this “works” with our modern scientific worldview. The biblical writers knew nothing of genetics, DNA, etc. We think in such terms; they did not. I see?no cryptic commentary in the biblical text that secretly points to genetics and DNA. I stick?with the biblical text. At any rate, the Old Testament makes it clear that these bloodlines ended with Goliath and his brothers.?I’m not sure why this question of DNA and genetics is of such great urgency to some Christians but then isn’t when it comes to the incarnation and what happened with Mary (“the Most High will overshadow you”; Luke 1:35). Jesus’ humanity was normal humanity, not super-humanity, He was a normal man and fully man — points that orthodox Christian theology has always affirmed. But yet he was indeed different — not because of his genetics (!), but because of what was “inside” the flesh. Because the nephilim dead are connected to the Rephaim Underworld dead — otherworldy inhabitants of “hell” as it were (as are the Mesopotamian apkallu) — they were not normal human in the sense of the animating spirit / immaterial “part” of a person. In simpler language, a nephilim death produced a demon. But given the above terminology about the Anakim, who are from the nephilim, either their flesh was human or they were more than human (See Chs. 12-13, and p. 325 in Unseen Realm, and the footnoted scholarly sources on the origin of demons).? Jesus was Yahweh in *human* flesh. He was human, but more than human. There is no biblical warrant for concluding such a description can only apply to the incarnation of Christ. The OT has divine beings in human corporeal form. The same must be said for nephilim. That is my point, not that the nephilim cannot have been more than human. We just aren’t told. But as physical beings called me, there is no reason to say their flesh/embodiment wasn’t human.?The above also means that those who use what I’ve written in an effort to deny a supernatural framework for Genesis 6 are not being completely honest with my approach or thoughts. I just don’t speculate, because speculation on the issue is useless. I believe it poor thinking to speculate and then build “truth” on speculation.?In light of the above discussion of the spirits of the dead nephilim being demons, here is my Lexham Bible Dictionary article on Rephaim:?REPHAIM (????????, repha’im). A Hebrew word often simply transliterated in modern English Bible versions (e.g., Gen 14:5 ESV, LEB). When the term is translated, it is rendered “giants” (1 Chr 20:4 ESV), “shades” (i.e., spirits of the dead; Isa 26:14 ESV), or simply “the dead” (Job 26:5 ESV). These translation choices point to the interpretive problem associated with the term: It is difficult to identify whether the Rephaim were humans (living or dead), quasi-divine figures, or disembodied spirits. Old Testament usage associates the term with all these possibilities, while external Semitic source texts in which the term is found (Ugaritic, Phoenician) do not describe the Rephaim as giants. Identification is further complicated by uncertainty regarding the term’s etymology and how it is translated in the Septuagint.?Etymology?Scholars believe the most likely Semitic root for repha’im is ??? (rp’). This is the consensus despite the transparent links between the term and Hebrew ??? (rph). For example, in 2 Sam 16:18–22 Goliath is linked to other giants, other “descendants of the giants” (ESV; the latter term in Hebrew being ???????, haraphah). However, in the parallel account in 1 Chr 20:6–8, the term rendered “giants” is ??????? (harapha’). This makes clear that, at least for these biblical writers, ??? (rp’) and ??? (rph) were alternate spellings of the same root. Of the two, words formed with rp’ are far more frequent in the Hebrew Bible, and the spelling of the plural repha’im features the aleph as the third consonant in the root. Brown notes that there is an etymological relationship between plural repha’im and the Ugaritic plural rp?um (Brown, “I Am the Lord, Your Healer,” 175; see discussion below for the Ugaritic term).?The verbal root r-p-’ means “to heal” in the vast majority of instances where it is used in the Hebrew Bible. According to Brown, the root “occurs 67 times in verbal conjugations … and 19 times in derived nominal forms” (Brown, “I Am the Lord, Your Healer,” 37). While most scholars accept this root as underlying repha’im, it offers little help in ascertaining the meaning of the biblical Rephaim. The biblical Rephaim are never cast as “healers” in context.?The situation is the same concerning Ugaritic rp?um. The Ugaritic material yields no example portraying the rp?um as healers. In fact, for many years it was doubted the Ugaritic corpus contained a single instance of the root r-p-? that supported a meaning of “heal.” Brown asks the question directly: “Is there any context in which the Ugaritic root rp? clearly means ‘to mend, heal, repair’ or ‘make whole’?” (Brown, “I Am the Lord, Your Healer,” 116). He is skeptical about the existence of any clear example (Brown, “I Am the Lord, Your Healer,” 118–20). However, more recent work in re-editing the Ugaritic tablets has provided clarity on the reading of one text (KTU 1.114:28) whose context supports this meaning for a verb form (third-person feminine singular): “when she [either Athtart or Anat] would heal [trp?] him [El] …” (Bordreuil and Pardee, Manual of Ugaritic, vii, 195; compare del Olmo Lete and Sanmartín, Dictionary of the Ugaritic Language, 742). Wyatt, another Ugaritic scholar, takes the verb form as a plural: “Athtart and Anat [returned].… And they brought back meat.… When they had cured [trp?] him [El], he awoke” (Wyatt, Religious Texts from Ugarit, 412).?Despite this paucity of supporting material, scholars have continued to presume the underlying meaning of “heal” for Ugaritic rp?um (Rouillard, “Rephaim,” 692). But this lone instance cannot adequately inform the meaning of the plural rp?um in Ugaritic material. The one Ugaritic tablet that witnesses a verb form from r-p-? with a meaning “heal” is not about the Ugaritic rp?um. They appear nowhere in the context. There are therefore no instances where the rp?um are cast as healers (Brown, “I Am the Lord, Your Healer,” 124–27). The fact that the Septuagint twice renders repha’im with ?ατρο? (iatroi, “healers”; Psa 88:10 [87:11 LXX]; Isa 26:14) does not clarify the situation since the Septuagint renders Hebrew repha’im inconsistently (see below). That is, ?ατρο? (iatroi) may be a purely interpretive or speculative translation.?For these reasons, appealing to Ugaritic material to conclude that the Hebrew r-p-? (“heal”) is the source of repha’im is quite tenuous. Consequently, scholars have sought a Semitic homograph, within or without the Hebrew Bible, for clarity on the root of repha’im and its meaning.?Johnson offers one of the more coherent discussions of the alternative roots for repha’im (Johnson, Vitality of the Individual, 89). While noting the uncertainty of the Ugaritic material, Johnson first discusses biblical Hebrew rph as an option. Among the glosses offered in the Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament [HALOT] for the verb ??? (rph) are “to grow slack,” “wither, collapse,” and “to slacken, let loose” (HALOT, 1277). Other sources include “sink down” as a possible gloss (TWOT, 858). Since ancient Israel, along with other surrounding cultures, considered the dead inhabitants of the underworld to still be experiencing some sort of subterrestrial life, the rationale for this root as the basis for repha’im is that the term denotes “weakness or loss of energy” (Johnson The Vitality of the Individual, 89). This would aptly describe the cadaverous existence of life in the underworld; passages like Job 26:5 describe the dead (repha’im) beneath the surface of the cosmic waters under the earth, sinking listlessly in the realm of the dead.?While it is certain that the Hebrew Bible portrays the dead in Sheol as alive, yet comparably speaking, in a considerably weaker state than the living (Isa 14:9; 26:14; Prov 21:16), Johnson rejects rph as the proper root, preferring instead to understand Ugaritic r-p-? as meaning “to join.” His conceptual argument is that this lemma “is to be explained in a passive sense as originally denoting those who are ‘joined’ or ‘massed’ together in the community of the dead” (Johnson, The Vitality of the Individual, 90). Proverbs 21:16 resonates with this perspective (“One who wanders from the way of good sense will rest in the assembly of the dead [????? ????????, qehal repha’im]”). Johnson follows the work of H. L. Ginsburg in this regard, who noted that r-p-? in the Ugaritic Keret Epic occurred in parallel to q-b-?, which means “to gather” (KTU 1.15.iii:3–4, reconstructed on the basis of lines 1.15.iii:14–15). Ginsburg writes, “The meaning of r-p-?i is revealed by its parallelism to qb?, the root of which means ‘to collect’ in Hebrew.… Evidently rp? meant originally ‘to join.’ From this it is but a step to the Heb. and Arab. sense ‘to mend’ and to the Hebrew sense ‘to heal.’ The idea of joining or gathering seems to underlie all the uses of the root rp? in the Rephaim (Rp) texts.… The Heb. (and Phoen.) r?pā???m ‘shades’ presumably also means literally ‘those gathered’ (compare Prov. 21:16)” (Ginsburg, “Legend of King Keret,” 41).?Though speculative, the proposal of Ginsburg and Johnson has considerable appeal. The lone Ugaritic verbal occurrence of r-p-? (KTU 1.114:28) could be translated to say that Athtart and Anat “joined” El after they brought him meat, and provides a semantic rationale for understanding both Ugaritic rp?um and Hebrew repha’im as a “gathered” collective of underworld inhabitants. This understanding (potentially) avoids the incongruence of a relationship of the term to healing.?The Rephaim in Ugaritic and Phoenician Texts?The primary extrabiblical texts that inform our understanding of the biblical repha’im are the Ugaritic tablets. The Ugaritic rp?um (usually vocalized as an active substantive participle rapi’uma) are divine residents of the underworld. They are clearly divine, though in one sense all inhabitants of the disembodied realm of the dead are divine in Ugaritic (and Israelite) religion. To be disembodied (dead) by definition is a requisite quality of the nonhuman realm.?The term rp?um occurs in parallel to ?ilnym (“chthonic gods”) and ?ilm (“gods”) in KTU 1.6 vi:45–49. This text (part of the Baal Cycle) has the rp?um ?ilnym under the authority of Shapsh, the sun deity. The scene is the realm of the dead. Ugaritic mythology, like other ancient Near Eastern belief systems, considered the (deified) sun to enter into the realm of the dead when it disappeared below the horizon at night (Wyatt, Religious Texts from Ugarit, 144 n. 123). The following lines clearly describe the rp?um in the realm of the dead with other divine spirits of the earth (chthonic deities) and the human dead: “O Shapsh, you rule the rp?um; / O Shapsh, you rule the chthonic gods (?ilnym); / The gods (?ilm) are your community. / Behold, the (human) dead (mtm) are your community” (author’s translation).?Other Ugaritic texts place the rp?um in the underworld (e.g., KTU 1.20–22; KTU 1.108; KTU 1.161). KTU 1.20–21 are fragmentary tablets that “deal with the journeying of the Rp?um, deceased and deified kings, to a communion-ritual.… These texts perhaps supply the mythological background to the rites underlying KTU 1.161” (Wyatt, Religious Texts from Ugarit, 314). The former are known as “the RP?UM texts” by Ugaritic specialists. KTU 1.161 has been characterized as “the order of service for the funeral of King Niqmad (IV?) … and perhaps involving a kispum-rite in the invocation of the late king’s ancestors, and as a part of a coronation ritual, with elements of the previous two” (Wyatt, Religious Texts from Ugarit, 430–31). A kispum ritual was intended to honor dead kings and other royalty. If KTU 1.161 indeed mixes funeral and coronation elements, the goal would have been to link the past and present, thus legitimizing the successor’s right to rule—in effect invoking the approval of the dead warrior-kings (rp?um) who had gone before.?The common English translation “shades” captures the otherworldly, shadowy nature of the living-dead residents of the underworld. The word choice may also be motivated by the first line of KTU 1.161, which describes the ritual as “the document of the sacrifice of the shades” (?lm; “shadow”; Bordreuil and Pardee, A Manual of Ugaritic, 217, 337).?There are two first-millennium BC Phoenician texts that include reference to the ???? (rp’m): the sarcophagus inscriptions of kings Tabnit (KAI 13) and Eshmunazar (KAI 14). The inscriptions of these deceased kings threaten all who disturb their rest by declaring, “May they have no resting place with the Repha?im” (Heiser, Hebrew and Canaanite Inscriptions).?The Rephaim of the Hebrew Bible?The identification of the rp?um as divinized warrior-kings in the underworld provides a clear connection to one contextual meaning of repha’im in the Hebrew Bible: spirits of the dead in the underworld. Several biblical texts employ repha’im in parallel to other words for the shadowy dead (e.g., ??????, methim; “dead”) or in contexts dealing with the grave (??????, qever; ???????, she’ol) or the underworld (she’ol). Psalm 88:10 (Heb. 88:11) asks (ESV): “Do you work wonders for the dead (methim)? Do the departed (repha’im) rise up to praise you? Selah Is your steadfast love declared in the grave (qever), or your faithfulness in Abaddon?” (ESV)?Hebrew methim (“dead”) and repha’im also occur in connection with each other in Isa 26:14 (“They are dead [methim], they will not live; they are shades [repha’im], they will not arise”). Proverbs 2:18 admonishes the wise man to avoid the seduction of the adulteress by warning that “her house sinks down to death, and her paths to the departed” (repha’im; compare Prov 9:18). Job 26:5–6 places the Rephaim in the underworld: “The dead (repha’im) tremble under the waters and their inhabitants. Sheol is naked before God, And Abaddon has no covering” (ESV).While all humans, righteous or not, go to the grave/Sheol in Old Testament theology (e.g., Gen 37:35; 42:38; Pss 6:5; 9:17; 89:48), these passages should not be read as though the term methim (“dead”) merely renames repha’im. Rather, it seems likely that, at least in some instances, the Rephaim are being distinguished from the mere human dead. This would mirror the usage of rp?um in Ugaritic texts, which have the human dead and the divinized rp?um both present in the same underworld.?For example, some texts clearly suggest that the Rephaim are warrior kings in the manner described in the material from Ugarit. Isaiah 14:9 is particularly interesting in this respect, as it describes Sheol awaiting the repha’im, a term set in parallel to “the leaders (literally, “goats”) of the earth (????????? ?????, attudey arets)” who were “kings of the nations.” The Rephaim are unmistakably royal in this passage. They may also be quasi-divine dark powers, since “leaders” literally means “goats” (lemma: ???????, attud). That term is used elsewhere (Ezek 39:18) to describe Israel’s quasi-divine enemies (Gog and Magog and their hordes). Ezekiel 38–39, in fact, have these hordes hailing from the “heights of the north” (?????????? ??????, yarkethey tsaton), phrasing that overlaps with descriptions in Ugaritic literature for the location of the divine council and Baal’s domain (Ezek 38:1–3, 6, 15; 39:2). Ezekiel 39:18 also associates the invaders with Bashan (Ezek 39:18), the place of the giant-clan Rephaim in Deuteronomy (see below). In other words, the biblical portrayal of the Rephaim in such texts goes beyond casting them as mere human kings. The Rephaim are associated with divine powers hostile to Israel.?These observations lead us to the second contextual meaning of repha’im in the Hebrew Bible: the giants encountered in Canaan during the conquest and the time of David. The term repha’im is linked to other terms for Old Testament giant clans in the Torah. The Israelites’ first trek to the promised land under the leadership of Moses failed when the people lost faith after the spies sent into the land reported the presence of the unusually tall Anakim, also referred to as Nephilim (Num 13:28–33; compare Gen 6:4). The Anakim are mentioned in several passages in Deuteronomy as “great and tall” enemies (Deut 1:28; 2:10, 21; 9:2). In describing ancient inhabitants of Moab, the Emim, Deut 2:10–11 specifically describes the Anakim as repha’im: “(The Emim formerly lived there, a people great and many, and tall as the Anakim. Like the Anakim they are also counted as Rephaim, but the Moabites call them Emim”).?While the Moabites referred to the giant Emim/Anakim as Rephaim, the ancient people of Ammon called them Zamzummim: “?‘And when you approach the territory of the people of Ammon, do not harass them or contend with them, for I will not give you any of the land of the people of Ammon as a possession, because I have given it to the sons of Lot for a possession.’ (It is also counted as a land of Rephaim. Rephaim formerly lived there—but the Ammonites call them Zamzummim—a people great and many, and tall as the Anakim; but the Lord destroyed them before the Ammonites, and they dispossessed them and settled in their place” (Deut 2:19–20 ESV).?Farther north in ancient Canaan in the region of Bashan, there were other Rephaim occupants. Several passages make the identification clear:??????? “So we took the land at that time out of the hand of the two kings of the Amorites who were beyond the Jordan, from the Valley of the Arnon to Mount Hermon (the Sidonians call Hermon Sirion, while the Amorites call it Senir), all the cities of the tableland and all Gilead and all Bashan, as far as Salecah and Edrei, cities of the kingdom of Og in Bashan. (For only Og the king of Bashan was left of the remnant of the Rephaim. Behold, his bed was a bed of iron. Is it not in Rabbah of the Ammonites? Nine cubits was its length, and four cubits its breadth, according to the common cubit)” (Deut 3:8–11 ESV).??????? “Now these are the kings of the land whom the people of Israel defeated and took possession of their land beyond the Jordan toward the sunrise, from the Valley of the Arnon to Mount Hermon, with all the Arabah eastward: Sihon king of the Amorites who lived at Heshbon and ruled from Aroer, which is on the edge of the Valley of the Arnon, and from the middle of the valley as far as the river Jabbok, the boundary of the Ammonites, that is, half of Gilead, and the Arabah to the Sea of Chinneroth eastward, and in the direction of Beth-jeshimoth, to the Sea of the Arabah, the Salt Sea, southward to the foot of the slopes of Pisgah; and Og king of Bashan, one of the remnant of the Rephaim, who lived at Ashtaroth and at Edrei” (Josh 12:1–4 ESV).??????? “All the kingdom of Og in Bashan, who reigned in Ashtaroth and in Edrei (he alone was left of the remnant of the Rephaim; these Moses had struck and driven out” (Josh 13:12 ESV).?The giant Og, the king of Bashan (e.g., Deut 1:4; 3:10; Josh 9:10), is partnered in Scripture with another king, Sihon of Heshbon. Together they are referred to as “kings of the Amorites” (Deut 3:1–8; 4:46–47; 31:4; Josh 2:10; 9:10). “Amorite” is a term that can refer broadly to the inhabitants of Canaan (e.g., Gen 15:16; Deut 1:7). Its association with Sihon, Og, and the Rephaim makes Amos 2:9–10 especially interesting, as it describes the Amorites dispossessed in the conquest of Canaan as unusually tall (“I destroyed the Amorite before them … whose height was like the height of the cedars and who was as strong as the oaks” [ESV]).The conquest accounts inform us that the vestiges of the Anakim who escaped the Israelites settled in Gaza, Gath, and Ashdod, cities that would later become associated with Philistine occupation (Josh 11:22). The famous Philistine giant, Goliath, was from Gath (1 Sam 17:4, 23). Second Samuel 21:20–22 notes that there were other giants from Gath. The Philistine giants from Gath are described as “descended from ???? (hrp’),” one of the etymological roots discussed above, in 1 Chr 20:6, 8. These interconnections likely contributed to the naming of the Valley of Rephaim (Josh 15:8; 18:16). This valley was the location of several skirmishes between the Philistines and Israelites (2 Sam 5:18; 23:13; 1 Chr 11:15).?The portrayal of the Rephaim as giants and, ultimately, lineal descendants of the Nephilim, offspring of the divine sons of God (Gen 6:1–4) via the Anakim (Num 13:32–33), is unique to the biblical material. While the rp?um at Ugarit were considered warriors and warrior-kings, there is no suggestion they were thought to be of unusual stature. A number of explanations for this characterization of the Rephaim have been offered. Unusual height was considered a sign of either divine parentage or intervention. It would therefore not be a surprise if biblical writers considered the presence of such individuals among the enemy inhabitants of Canaan to have been a threat that was supernatural in nature. The most recent scholarly discussions of this topic are those of Doak (The Last of the Rephaim) and Heiser (The Unseen Realm, ch. 12–13, 23–25).?Translation of Repha’im in the Septuagint?In roughly half of the occurrences of repha’im in the Hebrew Bible, the Greek Septuagint renders the term with the word γ?γα? (gigas, “giant”; plural: γ?γαντε?, gigantes; e.g., Josh 12:4; 13:12). Given the association of unusual height with the Rephaim in the books of Numbers, Deuteronomy, and Joshua, this is not unexpected, particularly in books detailing Israel’s conquest of Canaan. But it is precisely at this point that the Septuagint is irregular. While Joshua 12:14; 13:12 refer to giants, in other passages associated with the conquered Rephaim, the Hebrew term is simply transliterated Ραφα?ν (Raphain) (e.g., Deut 2:11, 20; 3:11, 13; Josh 15:8). The variation most likely reflects the decisions of two different translators. The Septuagint’s translation diversity is evidenced in how it treats “Valley of the Rephaim.” The term repha’im is rendered with Ραφα?μ (Raphaim) (2 Sam 23:13); τιτ?νων (titanōn, “Titans”; 2 Sam 5:18); and γιγ?ντων (gigantōn, “Giants”; 1 Chr 11:15; 14:9).?The Septuagint also inserts comments about giants (presumably Rephaim) that are otherwise unknown in the traditional Old Testament texts. One instance occurs in 2 Sam (=2 Kingdoms) 21:10, where we learn of a Respha, the daughter of Aia the concubine of Saul, who had covered the bodies of Saul and Jonathan from carrion-feeding birds. Verse 11 inserts an obscure, interruptive thought in the account: “And it was told David what Respha the daughter of Aia the concubine of Saul had done, [and they were faint and Dan the son of Joa of the offspring of the giants (giganton) overtook them.] And David went and took the bones of Saul, and the bones of Jonathan his son.”?The Septuagint’s use of titanon (“Titans”; lemma: τιτ?ν, titan) for repha’im creates a conceptual link between the biblical Rephaim and Greek mythology. The Titans were, depending on the Greek writer and text, divine beings or the giant offspring of divine beings (Heiser, “Giants”). On two occasions (2 Sam 5:18, 22), the Masoretic phrase ????? ???????? (emeq repha’im, “valley of the Rephaim”) is rendered κοιλ?δα τιτ?νων (koilada titanōn, “Valley of the Titans”). As Doak notes:“… [T]he very references to the Giants and Titans already suggest a world which is in some way comparable to Greek myth … [T]he effect of the introduction of Greek mythological vocabulary in suggestive and enigmatic places can only, in effect, serve to make the Greek Giants and Titans part of the biblical story” (Doak, Last of the Rephaim, 58).?While the assumption that the biblical story as originally composed had some relationship to Greek mythology appears overstated, it appears likely that the translators of the Septuagint were influenced to varying degrees by Greek mythological Titan traditions in their approach to the Rephaim in the Hebrew text they used to produce their translation.?Bibliography?Bordreuil, Pierre, and Dennis Pardee. A Manual of Ugaritic. Vol. 3. Edited by M. O’Connor and Cynthia L. Miller. Linguistic Studies in Ancient West Semitic. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2009.Brown, Michael L. “?‘I Am the Lord, Your Healer’: A Philological Study of the Root RAPA? in the Hebrew Bible and the Ancient Near East.” PhD diss., New York University, 1985.Doak, Brian. The Last of the Rephaim: Conquest and Cataclysm in the Heroic Ages of Ancient Israel. Boston: Ilex Foundation, 2013.Ginsburg, H. L. “The Legend of King Keret: A Canaanite Epic of the Bronze Age.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research Supplementary Studies 2–3 (1946): 1–50.Harris, R. Laird, Gleason L. Archer Jr., and Bruce K. Waltke, eds. Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament [TWOT]. Chicago: Moody, 1999.Heiser, Michael S. Hebrew and Canaanite Inscriptions in English Translation. Bellingham, Wash.: Lexham Press, 2008.———. “Giants—Greco-Roman Antiquity.” In vol. 10 of Encyclopedia of the Bible and Its Reception. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2015a.———. The Unseen Realm: Recovering the Supernatural Worldview of the Bible. Bellingham, Wash.: Lexham Press, 2015b.Johnson, Aubrey. The Vitality of the Individual in the Thought of Ancient Israel. Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1964.Koehler, Ludwig, Walter Baumgartner, M. E. J. Richardson, and Johann Jakob Stamm. The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament [HALOT]. Leiden: Brill, 1999.del Olmo Lete G., and J. Sanmartín. A Dictionary of the Ugaritic Language in the Alphabetic Tradition. Vol. 2. 2nd rev. ed. Handbook of Oriental Studies 67. Leiden: Brill, 2003.Rouillard, H. “Rephaim.” Pages 692–700 in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible [DDD]. Edited by Karel Van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter Willem van der Horst. Leiden: Brill, 1999.Wyatt, N. Religious Texts from Ugarit. 2nd ed. Biblical Seminar 53. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2002.MICHAEL HEISERJohn D. Barry et al., eds., The Lexham Bible Dictionary (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015).Chapter 26: Mountains and ValleysThis chapter followed certain earlier themes (holy ground, cosmic geography, divine presence, giant clans) into the monarchic period, especially with respect to temple symbolism and the valley of the Rephaim.Bibliography from the BookMoshe Weinfeld, “Sabbath, Temple and the Enthronement of the Lord,” Mélanges bibliques et orientaux en l’honneur de M. Henri Cazelles (ed. A. Caquot, and M. Delcor; Alter Orient und Altes Testament 212; Kevelaer and Neukirchen-Vluyn, 1981), 501–12Daniel T. Lioy, “The Garden of Eden as a Primordial Temple or Sacred Space for Humankind,” Conspectus: The Journal of the South African Theological Seminary 10 (2010): 25–57Gordon Wenham, “Sanctuary Symbolism in the Garden of Eden Story,” in Cult and Cosmos: Tilting toward a Temple-Centered Biblical Theology; Biblical Tools and Studies 18 (ed. L. Michael Morales; Leuven: Peeters, 2014), 161–66J. F. Healey, “Dagon,”? in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, 2nd ed. (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; Cologne; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999), 216–17R. E. Friedman, “Tabernacle,” in Anchor Bible Dictionary (ed. David Noel Freedman; New York: Doubleday, 1992), 6:292–300R. E. Friedman, “The Tabernacle in the Temple,” Biblical Archaeologist 43 (1980):241–48Victor Avigdor Hurowitz, “The Form and Fate of the Tabernacle: Reflections on a Recent Proposal,” Jewish Quarterly Review 86.1–2 (July–October 1995), 127–51Ronald E. Clements, “Sacred Mountains, Temples, and the Presence of God,” in Cult and Cosmos: Tilting toward a Temple-Centered Biblical Theology; Biblical Tools and Studies 18 (ed. L. Michael Morales; Leuven: Peeters, 2014), 69–85Richard J. Clifford, The Temple and the Holy Mountain,” in Cult and Cosmos: Tilting toward a Temple-Centered Biblical Theology; Biblical Tools and Studies 18 (ed. L. Michael Morales; Leuven: Peeters, 2014), 85–98H. Niehr, “Zaphon,” in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, 2nd ed. (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; Cologne; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999), 927–29Richard J. Clifford, The Cosmic Mountain in Canaan and the Old Testament, Harvard Semitic Monographs 4 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1972)C. Grave, “The Etymology of Northwest Semitic ?apānu,” Ugarit Forschungen 12 (1980): 221–29E. Lipinski, “El’s Abode,” Orientalia Lovaniensia Periodica 2 (1971): 13–68Lawrence E. Stager, “Jerusalem and the Garden of Eden,” in Cult and Cosmos: Tilting toward a Temple-Centered Biblical Theology; Biblical Tools and Studies 18 (ed. L. Michael Morales; Leuven: Peeters, 2014), 99–118Victor A. Hurowitz, “Yhwh’s Exalted House—Aspects of the Design and Symbolism of Solomon’s Temple,” in Temple and Worship in Biblical Israel, Proceedings of the Oxford Old Testament Seminar, rev. ed.; (ed.John Day; London: Bloomsbury/T & T Clark, 2007), 63–110Gershon Edelstein, “Rephaim, Valley of (Place),” in Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary, vol. 5 (ed. David Noel Freedman; New York: Doubleday, 1992)Duane F. Watson, “Hinnom Valley (Place),” Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary, vol. 3 (ed. David Noel Freedman; New York: Doubleday, 1992)G. C. Heider, “Molech,” in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, 2nd ed. (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; Cologne; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999), 581–85?Additional BibliographyMichael S. Heiser, “Rephaim,” in Lexham Bible Dictionary (Bellingham, WA:Lexham Press, 2015)H. Rouillard, “Rephaim,” in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, 2nd ed. (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; Cologne; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999), 692-700C. E. L’Heureux, “The Ugaritic and the Biblical Rephaim,” Harvard Theological Review 67:3 (1974) 265–274S. B. Parker, “The Feast of Rāpi?u,” Ugarit Forschungen 2 (1970) 243–249J. C. de Moor, “Rapi?uma-Rephaim,” Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 88 (1976) 323–345Henryk Drawnel, “The Mesopotamian Background of the Enochic Giants and Evil Spirits,” Dead Sea Discoveries 21:1 (2014): 14-38Amar Annus, “On the Watchers: A Comparative Study of the Antediluvian Wisdom in Mesopotamian and Jewish Traditions,” Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha 19.4 (2010): 277–320Nicolas Wyatt, “A Royal Garden: The Ideology of Eden.” Scandinavian Journal of the Old Testament 28, no. 1 (2014): 1-35Seung Il Kang, “Creation, Eden, Temple, and Mountain: Textual Presentations of Sacred Space in the Hebrew Bible,” Ph.D. dissertation, Johns Hopkins University, 2008Menachem Haran, “The Ark and the Cherubim: Their Symbolic Significance in Biblical Ritual.” Israel exploration journal 9, no. 1 (1959): 30-38Ronald S. Hendel, ” ‘The Flame of the Whirling Sword’: A Note on Genesis 3: 24,” Journal of Biblical Literature (1985): 671-674?DiscussionA few items deserve some comment.First, I noted in a footnote that I’d have more information here on Israelite cosmology. What follows are recommended resources on the pre-scientific nature of that cosmology as well as selected ramifications for meaning and theological interpretation.Michael S. Heiser, Faithlife Study Bible (ed. John D. Barry et al., Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2012)Heiser Genesis and Ancient Near Eastern Cosmology FSB?John H. Walton, Ancient Near Eastern Thought and the Old Testament: Introducing the Conceptual World of the Hebrew Bible. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2006 (Chapter 7)John H. Walton, Genesis 1 as Ancient Cosmology (Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, 2011)John H. Walton, The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate. InterVarsity Press, 2010L. Stadelmann, L. The Hebrew Conception of the World. Analecta Biblica 39 (Rome: Pontifical Institute Press, 1970)R. J. Clifford, Creation Accounts in the Ancient Near East and in the Bible (CBQMS 26; Washington, DC: Catholic Biblical Association of America, 1994)E. C. Lucas, “Cosmology,” Dictionary of the Old Testament: Pentateuch (ed. T. Desmond Alexander and David W. Bake; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2003)I also noted that I would post more information on Old Testament divination and its supernatural / divine council worldview context. Here are some resources:Michael S. Heiser, “The Old Testament Response to Ancient Near Eastern Pagan Divination Practices,” in Of Global Wizardry: Techniques of Pagan Spirituality and a Christian Response; ed. Peter Jones (Escondido: Main Entry Editions, 2009)Heiser OT Response to Pagan Divination?Michael S. Heiser, “Sacred Trees in Israelite Religion,” Faithlife Study Bible (ed. John D. Barry et al., Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2012)Heiser Sacred Trees in Israelite Religion FSB?J. A. Scurlock, “Magic (Ancient Near East),” Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary, vol. 4 (ed. David Noel Freedman; New York: Doubleday, 1992)Joanne K. Kuemmerlin- McLean, “Magic (Old Testament),” Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary, vol. 4 (ed. David Noel Freedman; New York: Doubleday, 1992)With respect to the Valley of the Rephaim, as I noted in the page for Chapter 24, the work of Annus and Drawnel answer the longstanding scholarly question of why, in the Hebrew Bible, the Rephaim are not only dead kings in Sheol but also giants, as oppose to Ugarit, which has a good amount of Rephaim material, having them only as dead kings in the Underworld. The answer is that the biblical writers connect the Rephaim back to the Nephilim (via the Anakim), which in turn connects them to the Underworld via the apkallu traditions from Mesopotamia, the original context for Gen 6:1-4. Readers are encouraged to read the articles by Annus and Drawnel (see additional bibliography above).A word on the notion that the giant clan references (connected as they are to the nephilim of Gen 6:4) are explained by the Greek Titan mythologies is dramatically overstated. Those who use that backdrop need to explain why they are using an outdated approach instead of the far superior analogies afforded by the evidence Annus and Drawnel have marshaled that establishes the Mesopotamian context for Gen. 6:1-4. That is what needs to be done before touting the Titanomachy or the Gigantomachy as significant for understanding the biblical material in this respect.The fact that one Septuagint translator used τιτ?νων in two places to translate biblical Rephaim shows us only that at least one Hellenistic Jewish writer thought there was some connection. The same goes for references to Tartarus in the New Testament in 2 Peter. That the offending sons of God (“angels” in 2 Peter 2) wind up in the Abyss/Tartarus/bad neighborhood of the unseen spirit world is not due to the Greek myths — that element is part of the apkallu material from Mesopotamia. In other words, the Greeks were influenced by the ancient Near East. The New Testament writer used a Greek term that his audience would have recognized, and which bore some connection to the story. But what no one seems to point out are the fundamental disconnects between the Titan mythologies (there are more than one) and Genesis 6:1-4. For example, the Titans are not produced from any sort of cohabitation between gods / divine beings and human women. Their origins have no relation to what we see in Genesis (or the its Mesopotamian context). There are also chronological and conceptual disconnects in regard to the Titans and a great flood (there is no Greek flood story that closely approximates the biblical one — again unlike the clear Mesopotamian analogy).There are other breakdowns between the presumed relationship. Readers are invited to read either of the two recent, detailed treatments of the Titans in Greek mythology of which I’m aware that have an eye toward biblical connections. Both are by Jan Bremmer:Jan N. Bremmer, “Remember the Titans!” in The Fall of the Angels (Themes in Biblical Narrative 6; ed. Christoph Auffarth and Loren T. Stuckenbruck; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2004), 35-61?Jan N. Bremmer,Greek Religion and Culture, the Bible, and the ancient Near East (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2008 (see Chapter 5: “Greek Fallen Angels: Kronos and the Titans”)?Genesis 6:4 is references once in each essay. As the essays are nearly identical, this comment is representative:Jewish translators of the Septuagint, erudite as they were, could hardly have failed to note the vague parallels between the Titans and the gigantes they introduced into Genesis 6.4. The interpretation even gains in probability, if we remember that several scholars have also noted parallels between Prometheus’ instruction of primitive men in all kinds of arts in the Prometheus Vinctus (454–505) and the instruction of men in technical skills and magic by the Watchers in 1 Enoch 6–7.130 Now the combination of the myths of Prometheus and thestruggle of the Titans against Zeus in the same passage may not be accidental.This is hardly a compelling endorsement of the idea. Bremmer is honest – the parallels are vague. Even his “may not be accidental” line is forced. Bremmer can marshal only one point whereby someone writing in what scholars would now call the Enochian tradition combined the ideas of giants with the giving of forbidden knowledge (his Prometheus example) to humans. The problems are immediately apparent:(1) This same point is more precisely paralleled in the apkallu traditions (see the work of Annus cited in Chapters 12 and 13 in Unseen Realm). In other words, we don’t need the Titan myths for this connection — and the apkallu material pre-dates the Greek myths and is in the right geographical context (Babylon / Mesopotamia). Bremmer may or may not be aware of how the apkallu material is a superior parallel here since he doesn’t discuss apkallu traditions.(2) That trajectory is not in all the Enochian versions of the Watchers story. While the Second Temple Jewish writers did discern the Mesopotamian (supernatural evil) context Annus has produced, they could have, of course, added other elements. If we disregard the fact of # 1 above, that the apkallu traditions are a better parallel, what do we have? We have at least one Hellenistic Jew thinking perhaps (note “vague” above) thinking on these terms. One stream within a tradition is not a unified tradition in this regard. In any event, the Titan mythology does not provide the close parallels the Mesopotamian material does. It’s quite evident which context is the backdrop for the polemic of Gen. 6:1-4, and it isn’t the Titan story.(3) the Titan Prometheus was also considered the creator of humankind (see Bremmer, Greek Religion, p. 90) — an idea that fits nowhere with the Gen. 6:1-4 / nephilim / giant clan passages. It’s scarcely comprehensible even within Greek religion (Bremmer: “Why the early Greeks connected the origin of humankind with the Titans is not crystal clear”).In addition to not being up-to-date with the work of Annus and Drawnel, it seems to me that the propensity of so many scholars to think about angelology and demonology in terms Milton’s Paradise Lost has made them prone to embrace the Greek Titan myths as more important than they are in this regard. After all, the relationship between Milton’s Paradise Lost and the Greek Titan Myths is well known:Philip J. Gallagher, “Paradise Lost and the Greek Theogony.” English Literary Renaissance 9, no. 1 (1979): 121-148Raphael Jehudah Zwi Werblowsky, Lucifer and Prometheus: a study of Milton’s Satan. Routledge, 2013George F. Butler,? “Giants and Fallen Angels in Dante and Milton: The ‘Commedia’ and the Gigantomachy in ‘Paradise Lost’.” Modern Philology (1998): 352-363Chapter 27: Standing before the CouncilThe focus of this chapter was the pattern of divine encounter—often in the council throne room of God—as a pre-requisite to speak for God (i.e., serve as a prophetic figure). There were no bibliographic citations in the original footnotes for this chapter. See the references below for support for the chapter content.?Additional Bibliography David E. Bokovy, “Invoking the Council as Witnesses in Amos 3:13,” Journal of Biblical Literature 127:1 (2008): 37-51F. M. Cross, “The Council of Yahweh in Second Isaiah,” Journal of Near Eastern Studies 12 (1953): 274-277M. S. Heiser, “Divine Council,” Dictionary of the Old Testament: Prophets (ed. Mark J. Boda and J. Gordon McConville; Downers Grove, Ill.: Intervarsity Press, 2012), 162-166Michael S. Heiser, “The Old Testament Response to Ancient Near Eastern Pagan Divination,” in On Global Wizardry: Techniques of Pagan Spirituality and a Christian Response (ed. Peter Jones; Main Entry Editions, 2010)Edwin C. Kingsbury, “The Prophets and the Council of Yahweh,” Journal of Biblical Literature 83:3 (1964): 279-286Patrick D. Miller, “Fire in the Mythology of Canaan and Israel,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 27:3 (July 1965): 256-261Patrick D. Miller, “The Divine Council and the Prophetic Call to War,” Vetus Testamentum 18 (1968): 100-107Patrick D. Miller, “Cosmology and World Order in the Old Testament: The Divine Council as Cosmic-Political Symbol,” in Israelite Religion and Biblical Theology: Collected Essays (JSOTSup 267; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2000), 422-444K. Nielsen, “Oak,” DDDK. Nielsen, “Terebinth,” DDDMartii Nissinen, “Prophets and the Divine Council,” in Kein Land für sich allein: Studien zum Kulturkontakt in Kanaan, Israel/Pal?stina und Ebirnari für Manfred Weippert zum 65. Geburstag, edited by U. Hübner und E. A. Knauf (OBO 186; G?ttingen: Vandenhoeck & Rupprecht, 2002), 4-19Christopher R. Seitz, “The Divine Council: Temporal Transition and New Prophecy in the Book of Isaiah.” Journal of Biblical Literature 109:2 (1990): 229-247M. E. Polley, “Hebrew Prophecy Within the Council of Yahweh Examined in its Ancient Near Eastern Setting,” in Scripture in Context: Essays in the Comparative Method (ed. C.D. Evans, W.W. Hallo, and J.B. White; Pittsburgh Theological Monograph Series 34. Pittsburgh, 1980), 141-156Matthew Black, “The Throne-Theophany Prophetic Commission and the ‘Son of Man’,” in Jews, Greeks, and Christians: Essays in Honor of W.D. Davies (ed. Robert Hamerton-Kelly and Robin Scroggs; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1976), 57-73Chapter 28: Divine MisdirectionThe chapter content focus on how messianic prophecy was deliberately cryptic—how it was laid out in breadcrumb trails (thematic elements) throughout the Old Testament, as opposed to propositional statements. The bibliography in the chapter and added here focus on the thematic elements in the Old Testament and the Second Temple (“Intertestamental”) Period.?Bibliography included in the bookJohn D. Barry, The Resurrected Servant in Isaiah (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2012)D. E. Callender, Adam in Myth and History: Ancient Israelite Perspectives on the Primal Human (Harvard Semitic Studies 48; Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2000), 21-65Crispin H. T. Fletcher-Louis, All the Glory of Adam: Liturgical Anthropology in the Dead Sea Scrolls (Studies of the Texts of The Desert of Judah, 42; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2002)Charles Gieschen, Angelomorphic Christology: Antecedents and Early Evidence (Arbeiten zur Geschichte des antiken Judentums und des Urchristentums 42; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1998), 153-155; 163-167John R. Levison, Portraits of Adam in Early Judaism: from Sirach to 2 Baruch (JSPSup 1; Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1988)Wayne Meeks, The Prophet-King : Moses Traditions and the Johannine Christology (Supplements to Novum Testamentum 14; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1965); M. E. Stone, A History of the Literature of Adam and Eve (SBLEJL 3; Atlanta 1992)Wayne Meeks, “Moses as God and King,” Religions in Antiquity 69 (1968): 361-65Adela Y. Collins and John Joseph Collins (ed.), King and Messiah as Son of God: Divine, Human, and Angelic Messianic Figures in Biblical and Related Literature (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2008)Arthur E. Cundall, “Sacral Kingship—Old Testament Background,” Vox Evangelica 6 (1969): 31-41K. M. Heim, “Kings and Kingship,” Dictionary of the Old Testament: Historical Books (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2005), 610-622Tryggve N. D. Mettinger, King and Messiah: The Civil and Sacral Legitimation of the Israelite Kings (Lund: CWK Gleerup, 1976)Aubrey R. Johnson, Sacral Kingship in Ancient Israel (Wales: University of Wales Press, 1967)J. J. M. Roberts, “The Enthronement of YHWH and David: The Abiding Theological Significance of the Kingship Language of the Psalms,” The Catholic Biblical Quarterly 64, no. 4 (2002): 675-686G. P. Hugenberger, “ The Servant of the Lord in the Servant Songs of Isaiah: A Second Moses Figure,” Irish Biblical Studies 1 (1979): 3-18?Additional BibliographyTimo Eskola, Messiah and the Throne: Jewish Merkabah Mysticism and Early Christian Exaltation Discourse (WUNT 142, Reihe 2; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2001)Aquila H. I. Lee, From Messiah to Preexistent Son: Jesus’ Self-consciousness and Early Christian Exegesis of Messianic Psalms (WUNT 192, Reihe 2; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2005); reprinted by Wipf and Stock, 2009Pierpaolo Bertalotto, “The Enochic Son of Man, Psalm 45, and the Book of the Watchers,” Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha 19, no. 3 (2010): 195-216Richard Bauckham, “Paul’s Christology of Divine Identity.” In Paper delivered to the Pauline Epistles Section of the SBL annual meeting, Toronto, vol. 25. 2002Hermann Lichtenberger, “Messianic Expectations and Messianic Figures in the Second Temple Period,” in Qumran-Messianism: Studies on the Messianic Expectations in the Dead Sea Scrolls (ed. James H. Charlesworth, Hermann Lichtenberger, G. S. Oegema; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1998), 9-20Martin G. Abegg and Craig A. Evans, “Messianic Passages in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in Qumran-Messianism: Studies on the Messianic Expectations in the Dead Sea Scrolls (ed. James H. Charlesworth, Hermann Lichtenberger, G. S. Oegema; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1998), 191-203James H. Charlesworth, “Messianology in the Biblical Pseudepigrapha,” in Qumran-Messianism: Studies on the Messianic Expectations in the Dead Sea Scrolls (ed. James H. Charlesworth, Hermann Lichtenberger, G. S. Oegema; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1998), 21-52N. T. Wright, Jesus and the Victory of God (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1997)Michael A. Knibb, “Messianism in the Pseudepigrapha in the Light of the Scrolls.” Dead Sea Discoveries (1995): 165-184Mark L. Strauss, The Davidic Messiah in Luke-Acts: the Promise and its Fulfillment in Lukan Christology (LNTS 110; Bloomsbury Publishing, 1995)Marinus de Jonge, “Messiah,” The Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary (ed. David Noel Freedman; New York: Doubleday, 1992)L. W. Hurtado, “Christ,” Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels (ed. Joel B. Green and Scot McKnight; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1992)C. A. Evans, “Messianism,” Dictionary of New Testament Background: a Compendium of Contemporary Biblical Scholarship (ed. Craig A. Evans and Stanley E. Porter; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2000)Andrew Chester, Messiah and Exaltation: Jewish Messianic and Visionary Traditions and New Testament Christology (WUNT 207, Reihe 2; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007Craig A. Evans, “Messianic Hopes and Messianic Figures in Late Antiquity,” JGRChJ 3 (2006): 9-40Joseph A. Fitzmyer, The One who is to Come (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2007)J. Becker, Messianic Expectation in the Old Testament (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1977)K. E. Pomykala, The Davidic Dynasty Tradition in Early Judaism: Its History and Significance for Messianism (SBLEJL, 7; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1995)A. Laato, Star Is Rising: The Historical Development of the Old Testament Royal Ideology and the Rise of the Jewish Messianic Expectations (USF International Studies in Formative Christianity and Judaism, 5; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997)R. S. Hess and M.D. Carroll R. (eds.), Israel’s Messiah in the Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003Sook-Young Kim, The Warrior Messiah in Scripture and Intertestamental Writings (Cambridge University Press, 2010)Chapter 29: Rider on the CloudsThis chapter focuses on the Yahweh epithet referenced in the title and, ultimately, on Daniel 7. As such, it touches on (but doesn’t really discuss) issues like the meaning of the “son of man” title; whether that title in Daniel 7 is merely Davidic (and not a proof for divinity); and whether Michael is to be identified as the second power in heaven (and, so, Jesus). My answers to these questions are:The “son of man” is a divine title in Daniel 7, not merely a label for the Davidic king.“Son of man” in the New Testament is most often not an indication of divinity (i.e., most of the time it doesn’t hearken back to Daniel 7 but, as in other Old Testament passages, means “human being”). However, there are passages that do reference Daniel 7 and the use of the title there of Jesus is intended to portray him as divine.Michael is not the second Yahweh figure; therefore, Michael and Jesus are not to be identified with each other.?The additional bibliography below addresses these points. The most expedient summary of numbers 1 and 3 above is Chapter 7 from my dissertation. While I list the dissertation under the additional bibliography, I have also included a distillation of the dissertation that I used to write the original draft for this book and produce a paper for a meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society (title: The Baal Cycle as Backdrop to Daniel 7: An Old Testament Rationale for Jewish Binitarianism,” Annual Meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society, Atlanta, GA; November, 2003). I can’t find the actual paper, so this “chapter document paper draft” will have to do. With respect to this draft, when it makes chapter references in its footnotes, those refer to either dissertation chapters or chapters in the original draft of this book—not chapters in the present Unseen World. Both the dissertation and the draft of course include further bibliography.?Bibliography included in the bookAlan F. Segal, Two Powers in Heaven: Early Rabbinic Reports about Christianity and Gnosticism (reprint, Baylor University Press, 2012)Daniel Boyarin, “The Gospel of the Memra: Jewish Binitarianism and the Prologue to John,” Harvard Theological Review 94:3 (July, 2001), 243-284W. Hermann, “Rider Upon the Clouds,” DDD?Additional BibliographyMichael S. Heiser, “The Divine Council in Late Canonical and Non-Canonical Second Temple Jewish Literature.” PhD diss., UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON, 2004Chapter 7 (distillation) from the above dissertation)?Christopher Rowland, “The Visions of God in Apocalyptic Literature,” Journal for the Study of Judaism 10 (1979): 137-154Matthew Black, “The Throne-Theophany Prophetic Commission and the ‘Son of Man’,” in Jews, Greeks, and Christians: Essays in Honor of W.D. Davies (ed. Robert Hamerton-Kelly and Robin Scroggs; Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1976): 57-73J. A. Emerton, “The Origin of the Son of Man Imagery,” Journal of Theological Studies 9:2 (October, 1958): 227-242P. Mosca, “Ugarit and Daniel 7: A Missing Link,” Biblica 67 (1986): 496-517John Joseph Collins and Frank Moore Cross, Daniel: A Commentary on the Book of Daniel (Hermeneia 27; Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1993); see esp. 280-294 for a defense of the Ugaritic / Canaanite provenance of the imagery of Daniel 7Helge S. Kvanvig, Roots of Apocalyptic: The Mesopotamian Background of the Enoch Figure and the Son of Man (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1988)N. Wyatt, “The Titles of the Ugaritic Storm-God,” Ugarit Forschungen 24 (1992): 417-419R. B. Y. Scott, “Behold He Cometh with Clouds,” New Testament Studies (1959): 127-132L. L. Grabbe, “Hebrew pa?al / Ugaritic b?l and the Supposed b / p Interchange,” Ugarit Forschungen 11 (1979): 307-314S. Mowinckel, “Drive and / or Ride in the Old Testament,” Vetus Testamentum 12 (1962): 278-299Delbert Burkett, The Son of Man Debate: A History and Evaluation (SNTSMS 107; Cambridge University Press, 2007)Andrew Angel, Chaos and the Son of Man: the Hebrew Chaoskampf Tradition in the Period 515 BCE to 200 CE. (LSTS 60; Bloomsbury Publishing, 2006)John W. Pryor, “The Johannine Son of Man and the Descent-Ascent Motif,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 34, no. 3 (1991): 341-351I. H. Marshall, “Son of Man,” Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels (ed. Joel B. Green and Scot McKnight; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1992)Chapter 30: Prepare to DieThe content of this chapter deals in part with Psalm 82, so some of the bibliography below will be familiar from earlier chapters. I reject the notion that Psalm 82 speaks of the “death of the gods” to bring a belief in polytheism among biblical writers to an end. I don’t believe the biblical writers were polytheists, as noted elsewhere on this website and its sources.?Bibliography included in the bookTimothy M. Willis, “Yahweh’s Elders (Isa 24, 23): Senior Officials of the Divine Court,” Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 103:3 (1991): 375-385?Additional BibliographyMartin Noth, “The Holy Ones of the Most High,” in The Laws of the Pentateuch and Other Essays (London: Oliver and Boyd, 1966; reprint, London: SCM, 1984): 215-228L. Dequeker, “The Saints of the Most High,” OTS 18 (1973): 108-187J. Goldingay, “‘Holy Ones on High’ in Daniel 7:18,” Journal of Biblical Studies 107 (1988): 497-499Michael S. Heiser, “Does Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible Demonstrate an Evolution from Polytheism to Monotheism in Israelite Religion?” Journal for the Evangelical Study of the Old Testament 1:1 (2012): 1-24Michael S. Heiser, “Monotheism, Polytheism, Monolatry, or Henotheism? Toward an Assessment of Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible” Bulletin of Biblical Research 18:1 (2008): 1-30Miller, Patrick D. “The Divine Council and the Prophetic Call to War,” Vetus Testamentum (1968): 100-107Eduard Nielsen, “A Note on Zechariah 14, 4-5,” in In the Last Days: on Jewish and Christian Apocalyptic and its Period (1994): 33-37Eibert J. C. Tigchelaar, Prophets of Old and the Day of the End: Zechariah, the Book of Watchers, and Apocalyptic (Oudtestamentische Studien 35; E. J. Brill, 1996)Anthony Robert Petterson, Behold Your King: The Hope for the House of David in the Book of Zechariah (Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies 513; Bloomsbury Publishing USA, 2009)Chapter 31:? Who Will Go for Us?In this chapter I raise the issue of how astronomy and ancient astral religion/theology relates to events in the New Testament. As I said in a footnote:“Few New Testament scholars have a command of all the necessary biblical elements for reconstructing this messaging and its tight correlation with astronomy and, most importantly for our purposes, the theological messaging that these correlations produce. Critics have also overlooked important items. Despite these data, ideas such as those put forth by Joseph A. Seiss and E. W. Bullinger, that the full gospel story can be found in the stars, is untenable. . . . The approach of Seiss and Bullinger overstates the data and relies on subjective interpretations.”In other words, I think there is academic warrant for studying what is, for lack of a better term, “astral theology,” but that the most familiar and widely circulated works on that idea take it too far. There are more contemporary New Testament scholars who argue that the book of Revelation contains astral prophecy (and at least one who believes the entire book conforms to that ancient literary genre). I take their work seriously but, again, think that some of the conclusions over-extend the data. See my brief annotations in the additional bibliography.?Bibliography included in the bookJoseph Augustus Seiss, The Gospel in the Stars, Or Primeval Astronomy (Philadelphia: E. Claxton & Company, 1882; reprinted by Gorgias Press, 2007)E. W. Bullinger, The Witness of the Stars (London, 1893; reprinted by Kregel, 1967)Amy E. Richter, “The Enochic Watcher’s Template and the Gospel of Matthew,” (PhD Dissertation, Marquette University, 2010); available here from Marquette for free.Richter’s work illustrates well the supernatural outlook of the birth and genealogy of Jesus concerned more to ancient readers than that of modern (of any period) Christians. Readers will recall that, as I noted in the book, Richter’s work deals with the way the genealogies not only identify Jesus as the promised son of David, but encrypt literary connections back to the supernatural conflict arising from Genesis 6 and the decimation of the giant clans.” The abstract of Richter’s fascinating dissertation reads as follows:The writer of the Gospel according to Matthew was familiar with themes and traditions about the antediluvian patriarch Enoch, including the story of the fall of the watchers, and shows that Jesus brings about the eschatological repair of the consequences of the watchers’ fall. In Matthew’s Gospel, the foreshadowing of repair and then the repair itself are seen in the evangelist’s genealogy and infancy narrative, the focus of this dissertation.According to the Enochic watchers’ template, evil came into the world when the watchers transgressed their heavenly boundary to engage in illicit sexual contact with women and teach them illicit arts. The consequences of the watchers’ transgression are violence, unrighteousness, evil, idolatry, and disease. Some of these consequences come from human use of the skills taught by the watchers, skills for seduction, war-making, sorcery, and astrology.The women of the Hebrew Bible named by Matthew in his genealogy of Jesus foreshadow the reversal of the watchers’ transgression. All four of them are connected with the Enochic watchers’ template. They use the illicit arts, but the use of these skills leads to righteousness rather than evil. The women are also connected with other aspects of the Enochic watchers’ template, including sexual interaction which connects the earthly and heavenly realms, interaction with angels, unusual aspects of their offspring, and connections with giants.In Matthew’s infancy narrative, he shows that the birth of Jesus repairs the effects of the watchers’ template by using the very elements of that template. Joseph’s suspicion of Mary’s pregnancy; the child as the product of a woman and the Holy Spirit, who may have been regarded as angelomorphic; dreams that direct human agents in divine plans; and the magi who are connected with, and make use of illicit arts to find the child all reflect elements of the Enochic watchers’ template. The repair begun by Jesus’ birth is completed by the adult Jesus and shows in the chapters following Matthew’s genealogy and infancy narrative.David C. Capes, Old Testament Yahweh Texts in Paul’s Christology (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1992)Frank Moore Cross, “The Council of Yahweh in Second Isaiah,” Journal of Near Eastern Studies 12 (1953): 274-277Christopher R. Seitz, “The Divine Council: Temporal Transition and New Prophecy in the Book of Isaiah,” Journal of Biblical Literature 109:2 (1990): 229-247Rikki E. Watts, Isaiah’s New Exodus and Mark (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1997; revised and reprinted by Baker Academic, 2001)Tryggve N. D. Mettinger, King and Messiah: The Civil and Sacral Legitimation of the Israelite Kings (Lund: C. W. K. Gleerup, 1976)Nicolas Wyatt, “‘Jedidiah’ and Cognate Forms as a Title of Royal Legitimization,” Biblica 66 (1985): 112-125 (republished in “There’s Such Divinity Doth Hedge a King”: Selected Essays of Nicolas Wyatt on Royal Ideology in Ugaritic and Old Testament Literature [The Society for Old Testament Study Monographs; Ashgate Publishing, 2005], 13-22This chapter also got into the use of Psalm 82:6 in John 10:34. Here once again is the link to my SBL paper on that:Michael S. Heiser, “Jesus’ Quotation of Psalm 82:6 in John 10:34: A Different View of John‘s Theological Strategy,” Paper read at the 2012 regional meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature?Additional BibliographyBruce Malina, On the Genre and Message of Revelation: Star Visions and Sky Journeys (Baker 1993).This is the fundamental academic beginning point for studying Revelation as astral prophecy. However, I agree with Beale that Malina presses the case too far and ends up ignoring the Old Testament contexts in his interpretation (see Gregory K. Beale, The Book of Revelation [New International Greek Testament Commentary; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998]). That said, Malina’s argument for the Revelation’s conformity in a number of respect to astral prophetic genre should not be dismissed just because of this oversight. Rather, Malina’s observations ought to be contextualized with the usage of Old Testament symbols and themes.?Bruce Malina and John Pilch, Social Science Commentary on the Book of Revelation (Fortress Press, 2000)Builds to some extent on Malina’s first book?Bruce Malina, The New Jerusalem in the Revelation of John: The City as Symbol of Life with God (Michael Glazier Books, 2000)Some development of a few ideas in Malina’s first book?Jacques Chevalier, A Postmodern Revelation: Signs of Astrology and the Apocalypse (University of Toronto Press, 1997)This is a dense scholarly read that looks at Revelation for its astral symbolism and then examining the semiotics of the symbology.?Michael Moore, “Jesus Christ, ‘Superstar’: Rev 22:16b,” Vetus Testamentum 24:1 (Jan 1982): 82-91Ellen Robbins, “The Pleiades, the Flood, and the Jewish New Year,” in Ki Baruch Hu: Ancient Near Eastern, Biblical, and Judaic Studies in Honor of Baruch A. Levine (ed. by Robert Chazan, William W. Hallo and Lawrence H. Schiffman; Winona Lake, IN, 1999), 329-244.A fascinating study that correlates Judaism’s calendar with astral phenomena and the flood of Genesis 6-8?Alan Scott, Origen and the Life of the Stars: The History of An Idea (Oxford Early Christian Studies; Oxford University Press, 1994Tim Hegedus, Early Christianity and Ancient Astrology (Patristic Studies 6; Peter Lang, 2007)This book is a revision of Hegedus’ University of Toronto dissertation (2000) which is available online for free.?Tim Hegedus, “Some Astrological Motifs in the Book of Revelation,” in Religious Rivalries and the Struggle for Success in Sardis and Smyrna (Studies in Christianity and Judaism; Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2005), 67-87Tim Hegedus, “The Magi and the Star in the Gospel of Matthew and Early Christian Tradition,” Laval théologique et philosophique 59, no. 1 (2003): 81-95Ida Zatelli, “Astrology and the Worship of the Stars in the Bible,” Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 103, no. 1 (1991): 86-99.James H. Charlesworth, “Jewish Astrology in the Talmud, Pseudepigrapha, the Dead Sea Scrolls, and Early Palestinian Synagogues,” Harvard Theological Review 70:3/4 (July-October 1977): 183-200Rachel Elior, The Three Temples: On the Emergence of Jewish Mysticism, transl. D. Lourish (Oxford, 2004)Nelson Glueck, “The Zodiac at Khirbet et-Tannur,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 126 (Apr. 1952): 5-10Rachel Hachlili, “The Zodiac in Ancient Jewish Art: Representation and Significance,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 228 (Dec. 1977): 61-77Rachel Hachlili, “The Zodiac in Ancient Jewish Synagogal Art: A Review,” Jewish Studies Quarterly (2002): 219-258Reimund Leicht, “The Planets, the Jews and the Beginnings of ‘Jewish Astrology’,” in Sh. Shaked, G. Bohak, andY. Harari, eds. Continuity and Innovation in the History of Magic (Leiden and Boston: E. J. Brill, 2011): 271-288B. Kühnel, “The Synagogue Floor Mosaic in Sepphoris: Between Paganism and Christianity,” in From Dura to Sepphoris: Studies in Jewish Art and Society in Late Antiquity, ed. L. I. Levine and Z. Weiss (Portsmouth, 2000)Jodi Magness, “Helios and the Zodiac Cycle in Ancient Palestinian Synagogues,” Dumbarton Oaks Papers 59 (2005): 1-52Lester Ness, Written in the Stars: Ancient Zodiac Mosaics (Warren Center, Penn.: 2000)This is an up-date and revision of Ness’ doctoral dissertation at the University of Miami-Ohio: “Astrology and Judaism in Late Antiquity”?L. A. Roussin, “The Zodiac in Synagogue Decoration,” in Archaeology and the Galilee: Texts and Contexts in the Greco-Roman Periods, ed. D. R. Edwards and C. T. McCollough (Atlanta, 1977)Kocku von Stuckrad, “Jewish and Christian Astrology in Late Antiquity—A New Approach,” Numen 47 (2000): 1-41James C. VanderKam, Calendars in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Measuring Time (New York, 1998)Z. Weiss, “The Sepphoris Synagogue Mosaic,” Biblical Archaeology Review 26 (2000): 48-61, 70Z. Weiss, “The Sepphoris Synagogue Mosaic and the Role of Talmudic Literature in Its Iconographical Study,” in From Dura to Sepphoris: Studies in Jewish Art and Society in Late Antiquity, ed. L. I. Levine and Z. Weiss (Portsmouth, 2000)Jonas C. Greenfield, and Michael Sokoloff. “Astrological and Related Omen Texts in Jewish Palestinian Aramaic,” Journal of Near Eastern Studies (1989): 201-214Alexander Toepel, “Planetary Demons in Early Jewish Literature,” Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha 14, no. 3 (2005): 231-238Annette Yoshiko Reed, “Abraham as Chaldean Scientist and Father of the Jews: Josephus, Ant. 1.154-168, and the Greco-Roman Discourse about Astronomy/Astrology,” Journal for the Study of Judaism 35, no. 2 (2004): 119-158?Content DiscussionAstral theology for serious (“orthodox”) Jews and Christians was not astrology as we have experienced it. That astrology is thoroughly pagan, as it assigns fate to nature. The presumptions in ancient Jewish and Christian astral theology were biblically sound; namely that, as creator of the celestial objects, God put them there not only to mark time, but also to assert his sovereignty over what happens in time—the course of human history. Serious Jews and Christians rejected astrological ideas such as the notion that the stars determined individual fate, primarily because the idea impinged upon or violated the sovereignty of God. But they did not reject the notion that celestial objects could be understood as messaging divine intent or the playing out of God’s sovereignty for the wise to understand. In a pre-scientific context, it was assumed that God was behind the movement (or not) of celestial objects and their formations as constellations. Celestial objects that moved were perceived as divine beings in God’s service (or in rebellion). The biblical Daniel provides a model here for how these ideas are circumscribed by biblical theology.Unfortunately, Jewish and Christian thinking in this area became progressively detached from biblically defensible ideas and more inclined toward mystical speculation (e.g., Zohar). My view is that Daniel would have rejected this sort of mysticism. I also believe that we cannot presume that Jews who viewed astral theology positively prior to the Zohar and its mystical strands would have approved of them. That is, we ought not assume that Jewish synagogues from late antiquity with zodiac floor mosaics that have been excavated by archaeologists in Israel are evidence of aberrant theology (see the additional bibliography below).With respect to the use of astronomy for the dating of Jesus’ birth, I believe the most coherent view is that laid out by Ernest Martin in his book, The Star that Astonished the World. Martin’s book is available in print or for free at: (See especially from Chapter 5 onward, including the appendixes). Using the astronomical signage in Rev. 12 along with the account of the star in Matthew, Martin posits September 11, 3 B.C. as the birth of Jesus.I know of no New Testament scholar who has bothered to take Rev. 12 as astral signage and correlate that material with Matthew like Martin has. Even Bruce Malina, who recognizes the astral significance of Rev. 12 fails to do so. The better-known attempts at astronomically interpreting what the Magi saw (without Rev. 12) also fail to factor in certain synchronisms with the Jewish calendar that would have been theologically significant (e.g., a correlation with Tishri 1). The date produced by Martin’s work is the only method I have ever discovered by which all the factors involved in the discussion work together without omissions.(Readers should note that the above has nothing to do with the popular nonsense about blood moons and prophecy.)There are several problems associated with a 3 B.C. date for the birth of Jesus, most obviously that it requires a date of late 2 B.C. or 1 B.C. for Herod’s death. The account of Matthew clearly has Jesus born while Herod still lived. The Magi would have visited Jesus and his family sometime up to two years after his death, judging by Herod’s subsequent order to have baby boys up to two years of age killed in an effort to eliminate the newly born king of the Jews. Herod’s death seems fixed at 4 B.C. by Roman historical records and certain statements in Josephus. The presumed certainty of his death date is why most New Testament scholars place the birth of Jesus in 6 B.C.Martin addresses these problems at length in his book, but his work has recently been closely critiqued by physicist Aaron Adair: believes Herodian chronology is the Achilles’ Heel for Martin’s work. However, the problem is a mirage and has been resolved by more recent work in Herodian numismatics:Ormond Edwards, “Herodian Chronology,” Palestine Exploration Quarterly 114 (January-June 1982): 29-42.?Adair does not cite this recent work and most New Testament scholars are completely unaware of it and its implications.There are several reasons that Martin’s work is largely unknown to biblical scholars. Martin was a historian, not a biblical scholar. His doctoral degree was unaccredited. His book was self-published. Martin was also a member of the Worldwide Church of God (he eventually resigned). I don’t endorse a number of things Martin has written, but his work on the star is persuasive. It garnered praise from such New Testament scholarly luminaries as F. F. Bruce and Jack Finegan (the latter known especially for his work in ancient chronology and calendars).I won’t elaborate on further specifics here. I plan to include material concerning how astral prophecy figures into the ancient worldview of the biblical writers in a follow-up volume to The Unseen Realm. Readers should know, however, that I use this material in the fiction that I write, and so some of the ideas can be discovered there. My fiction is modeled after that of Michael Crichton—I approach fiction writing like a thesis or dissertation. Years of research have gone into my novels. I use only peer-reviewed material or actual government / legal documents for specific plot elements. At the time of the publication of The Unseen Realm two books of my fiction series have been published: The Fa?ade (book 1) and The Portent (book 2). The astro-theological material is part of book 2 and will continue in future installments. Note as well that book 2 is a true sequel. The plot will be incomprehensible without reading the first book.Chapter 32: Pre-Eminent DomainThis chapter draws attention to certain episodes in Jesus’ life that intersect with Old Testament cosmic geography.?Bibliography included in the bookG. H. Twelftree, “Demon, Devil, Satan,” ed. Joel B. Green and Scot McKnight, Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1992)T. Elgvin, “Belial, Beliar, Devil, Satan,” ed. Craig A. Evans and Stanley E. Porter, Dictionary of New Testament Background: a Compendium of Contemporary Biblical Scholarship (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2000)Philip S. Alexander, “The Demonology of the Dead Sea Scrolls,” The Dead Sea Scrolls After Fifty Years: A Comprehensive Assessment, vol. 2 (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1998-1999): 351-353Craig A. Evans, “Inaugurating the Kingdom of God and Defeating the Kingdom of Satan,” Bulletin for Biblical Research 15:1 (2005): 49-75Michael S. Heiser, “Does Deuteronomy 32:17 Assume or Deny the Reality of Other Gods?” Bible Translator 59:3 (July 2008): 137-145Peggy Day, An Adversary in Heaven: ?ā·?ǎn in the Hebrew Bible (Harvard Semitic Monographs 43; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1988)Meira Z. Kensky, Trying Man, Trying God (WUNT 289, Reihe 2; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 2010)Zecharia Kallai, “The Patriarchal Boundaries, Canaan, and the Land of Israel: Patterns and Application for Biblical Historiography,” Israel Exploration Journal 47:1-2 (1997): 71-73Rami Arav, “Hermon, Mount (Place),” The Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary (ed. David Noel Freedman; New York: Doubleday, 1992)Archaeological Sites in Israel-Banyas: Cult Center of the God Pan,” at the website for the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs: H. Burton, “Religion, Society, and Sacred Space at Banias: A Religious History of Banias/Caesarea Philippi, 21 BC-AD 1635,” (PhD Dissertation, Texas Tech University, 2010)G. Mussies, “Tabor,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)Rafael Frankel, “Tabor, Mount (Place),” The Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary (ed. David Noel Freedman; New York: Doubleday, 1992)John J. Rousseau and Rami Arav, Jesus and His World: An Archaeological and Cultural Dictionary (Fortress, 1995), 209-210Chester Charlton McCown, “The Geography of Jesus’ Last Journey to Jerusalem,” Journal of Biblical Literature (1932): 107-129?Additional BibliographyRichard H. Hiers, “Satan, Demons, and the Kingdom of God,” Scottish Journal of Theology 27, no. 1 (1974): 35-47Roy Yates, “Jesus and the Demonic in the Synoptic Gospels,” Irish Theological Quarterly 44, no. 1 (1977): 39-57del Olmo G. Lete, “Bashan,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)W. R?llig, “Hermon,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)S. Applebaum (ed.), The Hermon and Its Foothills (Tel Aviv 1978)J. B. Curtis, “Har-ba?an, ‘the Mountain of God’ (Ps. 68:16 [15]),” Proceedings of the Eastern Great Lakes and Midwest Biblical Societies 6 (1986) 85–95Chapter 33: A Beneficial DeathThe content focused on the “bulls of Bashan” and the conquest of Bashan (Psalm 68 in Ephesians 4). The relationship of the two powers (two Yahwehs) teaching to the Spirit in the New Testament was also view. For an example of how the Spirit is described / blurred with either (or both) of the two Yahwehs, see my notes on this website under Chapters 16-18. See below for further comments on how New Testament writers re-purposed the two Yahwehs to articulate a Trinitarian theology.?Bibliography included in the bookJohn Kaltner, “Psalm 22: 17b: Second Guessing ‘The Old Guess’,” Journal of Biblical Literature (1998): 503-506?Brent A. Strawn, “Psalm 22: 17b: More Guessing,” Journal of Biblical Literature (2000): 439-451?Kristin M. Swenson, “Psalm 22: 17: Circling around the Problem Again,” Journal of Biblical Literature 123, no. 4 (2004): 637-648?Elmer H. Dyck, “Harmon (Place),” The Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary (ed. David Noel Freedman; New York: Doubleday, 1992)?Hans M. Barstad, The Religious Polemics of Amos: Studies in the Preaching of Amos (Vetus Testamentum, Supplement 34; E. J. Brill, 1984)?J. Williams, “A Further Suggestion about Amos 4:1-3,” Vetus Testamentum 29 (1979):206-211.?Additional BibliographyW. Hall Harris III, “The Ascent and Descent of Christ in Ephesians 4: 9-10,” Bibliotheca Sacra 151, no. 602 (1994): 198-214?W. Hall Harris III. The Descent of Christ: Ephesians 4: 7-11 and Traditional Hebrew Imagery (Arbeiten Zur Literatur Und Geschichte Des Hellenistischen Judentums 32; E. J. Brill, 1996)?Timothy G. Gombis, “Cosmic lordship and divine gift-giving: Psalm 68 in Ephesians 4: 8,” Novum Testamentum 47:4 (2005): 367-380?del Olmo G. Lete, “Bashan,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (ed. Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der Horst; Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)?Phillip Bethancourt, “Christ the Warrior King: A Biblical, Historical, and Theological Analysis of the Divine Warrior Theme in Christology” (PhD dissertation, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, 2011)?Elna Mouton, “‘Ascended far above all the heavens’: Rhetorical functioning of Psalm 68: 18 in Ephesians 4: 8-10?” HTS Theological Studies 70:1 (2014): 01-09?Eilat Mazar, “Archaeological Evidence for the” Cows of Bashan” who are in the Mountains of Samaria’,” R?uben R. Hecht, a tribute; studies in honor of his seventieth birthday (Jerusalem: Koren, 1979): 151-156?In regard to re-purposing the two Yahwehs theology with respect to the Holy Spirit, I wrote:?“Jesus is the second Yahweh, the embodied Yahweh of the Old Testament. But Jesus is not the “Father” Yahweh. He therefore is but isn’t Yahweh. It’s the same with the Spirit. The Spirit is Yahweh, and so he is Jesus as well, but not incarnate or embodied. The Spirit is but isn’t Jesus, just as Jesus is but isn’t Yahweh the Father. The same sort of “two Yahwehs” idea from the Old Testament is found in the New Testament with respect to Jesus and the Spirit.”To illustrate:???I referenced the following New Testament passages in the discussion:?Acts 16:6?And they traveled through the Phrygian and Galatian region, having been prevented by the Holy Spirit from speaking the message in Asia. 7 And when they came to Mysia, they attempted to go into Bithynia, and the Spirit of Jesus did not permit them.Romans 8:9 But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, this person does not belong to him. 10 But if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.Philippians 1:19 for I know that this will turn out to me for deliverance through your prayer and the support of the Spirit of Jesus Christ . . .Galatians 4:4 But when the fullness of time came, God sent out his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, 5 in order that he might redeem those under the law, in order that we might receive the adoption. 6 And because you are sons, God sent out the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying out, “Abba! (Father!)” . . .1 Peter 1:10 Concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace meant for you sought and made careful inquiry, 11?investigating for what person or which time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he testified beforehand to the sufferings with reference to Christ and the glories after these things . . .The point is that, as the New Testament writers assigned the epithets, relevant passages, and imagery associated with the second Yahweh to Jesus, thus interchanging him with the Father, when they further interchange the Spirit and Jesus, the result is a triune Godhead.Chapter 34: InfiltrationThe content of this chapter focuses on how the events of Pentecost are the catalyst to the reversal of the disinheritance of the nations that happened at Babel. Since Isaiah 66 prophesies this reclamation, critical scholars often associate the theology of Isaiah 66 to be evidence of the movement of biblical thinking from polytheism to monotheism (one God over all nations). As noted in the book and elsewhere on this site, I reject the idea that orthodox biblical religion evolved out of polytheism.?Bibliography included in the bookE. J. Mabie, “Chaos,” Dictionary of the Old Testament: Wisdom, Poetry & Writings (ed. Longman III, Tremper, and Peter Enns; InterVarsity Press, 2008)?Patrick D. Miller, “Fire in the Mythology of Canaan and Israel,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 27 (1965): 256-261Ronald Hendel, “‘The Flame of the Whirling Sword’: A Note on Genesis 3:24,” Journal of Biblical Literature (1985): 671-674Philippe Provenc?al, “Regarding the Noun saraph in the Hebrew Bible,” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 29:3 (2005): 371-379C. K. Barrett, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Acts of the Apostles; The Acts of the Apostles (2 vol.; T&T Clark International, 2004)Michael S. Heiser, “Deuteronomy 32:8 and the Sons of God,” Bibliotheca Sacra 158 (Jan-March, 2001): 52-74Harry W. Tajra, The Martyrdom of St. Paul: Historical and Judicial Context, Traditions, and Legends, vol. 3 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1994)Otto F. A. Meinardus, “Paul’s Missionary Journey to Spain: Tradition and Folklore,” The Biblical Archaeologist (1978): 61-63Shalom M. Paul, Isaiah 40–66: Translation and Commentary (Eerdmans Critical Commentary; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge, UK: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2012)?Additional BibliographyRoger D. Aus, “Paul’s Travel Plans to Spain and the ‘Full Number of the Gentiles’ of Rom. XI 25,” Novum Testamentum (1979): 232-262Rikki E. Watts, “Echoes from the Past: Israel’s Ancient Traditions and the Destiny of the Nations in Isaiah 40-55,” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 28, no. 4 (2004): 481-508Joel Kaminsky and Anne Stewart, “God of All the World: Universalism and Developing Monotheism in Isaiah 40–66,” Harvard Theological Review 99, no. 02 (2006): 139-163Christopher R. Bruno, ‘God is One’: The Function of ‘Eis Ho Theos’ as a Ground for Gentile Inclusion in Paul’s Letters (T & T Clark / Bloomsbury Publishing, 2014)?DiscussionThis chapter discusses the references to Spain in Rom 15:24, 28 and connects them to Tarshish (Gen 10:4), the western-most point in the world known to the biblical writers reflected in the Table of Nations (= Tartessos in Spain). This thesis, tied as it is to the core purposes of Paul’s missionary outlook and purpose, is an old one (see Last below). Other scholars argue that Tarshish cannot be identified with Spain, most recently:A. Andrew Das, “Paul of Tarshish: Isaiah 66:19 and the Spanish Mission of Romans 15:24, 28,” New Testament Studies 54:1 (2008): 60-73.Das’s main objection is that Tarshish in Genesis 10 is part of the genealogy of Japheth, connected to Greece and the Aegean. Spain is too far west. This view is also that of Wenham in his WBC Genesis commentary. This is not a coherent objection, especially given the Babylonian context of Gen 1-11. As I noted in Unseen Realm in passing, the clear Mesopotamian context of a panoply of items in Genesis 1-11 provides explanatory power to the idea that Gen 1-11 was written or edited during the Babylonian exile (note that Wenham embraces the lateness of this material — “P” — but doesn’t apply that to the matter of Tarshish, as Day does in the image below). If this is the case (and it seems quite likely given what else dives deeply into Mesopotamian literature in Gen 1-11), then note Day’s response to the “Tarshish must be in the Aegean” claim. It doesn’t, and wasn’t. Tarshish is under Japheth because at the time of the composition of Genesis 10, Tarshish (= Tartessos in Spain) was under Greek control).Source: John Day, From Creation to Babel: Studies in Genesis 1-11 ( Bloomsbury T&T Clark , 2015)For a very good survey of the debate about Paul’s mission, see:Richard Last, “What Purpose Did Paul Understand His Mission To Serve?” Harvard Theological Review 104, no. 03 (2011): 299-324.Chapter 35 & 36:?Sons of God, Seed of Abraham / Lower than the ElohimThese two chapters deal with (1) our union with Christ—the theological ideas of divine sonship of the believer, also known as glorification / deification / apotheosis—as the logical outcome of God’s original Edenic intention for humanity; and (2) our participation in the divine council as divine children and heirs with Jesus. The latter discussion features Hebrews 1-2. They are considered in tandem on this site.?Bibliography included in the book?Brendan Byrne, “Sons of God”-“Seed of Abraham”: A Study of the Idea of the Sonship of God of All Christians in Paul Against the Jewish Background (Analecta Biblica 83; Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute Press, 1979)?James M. Scott, Adoption as Sons of God: An Exegetical Investigation Into the Background of Yiothesia in the Pauline Corpus (WUNT 48; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1992)?Matthew Vellanichal, The Divine Sonship of Christians in the Johannine Writings (Analecta Biblica 72; Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute Press, 1977)?Michael Peppard, “Adopted and Begotten Sons of God: Paul and John on Divine Sonship,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 73:1 (Jan 2011): 92-110?James Tabor, “Firstborn of Many Brothers: A Pauline Notion of Apotheosis,” (Society of Biblical Literature Seminar Papers 21; Chico: Calif.: Scholars Press, 1984), 295-303?Crispin Fletcher-Louis, All the Glory of Adam: Liturgical Anthropology in the Dead Sea Scrolls (Studies in the Texts of the Deserts of Judah 42; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2002)?Guy Williams, The Spirit World in the Letters of Paul the Apostle: A Critical Examination of the Role of Spiritual Beings in the Authentic Pauline Epistles (FRLANT 231; Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2009)?G. A. Anderson, “The Exultation of Adam and the Fall of Satan,” Journal of Jewish Thought and Philosophy (1997): 105–134 (= Literature on Adam and Eve. Collected Essays, ed. G. Anderson, M.E. Stone, and J. Trump [SVTP 15; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2000], 83–110)?C. L. Patton, “Adam as the Image of God: An Exploration of the Fall of Satan in the Life of Adam and Eve,” Society of Biblical Literature Seminar Papers 33 (ed. E.H. Lovering, Jr.; Atlanta, 1994), 294–300?Robert Rakestraw, “Becoming Like God: An Evangelical Doctrine of Theosis,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 40:2 (1997): 1-22?John McClean, “ ‘Perichoresis, Theosis’ and Union with Christ in the thought of John Calvin,” Reformed Theological Review 68:2 (2009): 130-141?Vladimir Kharlamov, “Theosis in Patristic Thought,” Theology Today 65:2 (2008): 158-168?S. T. Kimbrough, Jr., “Theosis in the Writings of Charles Wesley,” St. Vladimir’s Theological Seminary Quarterly 52:2 (2008): 199-212?Daniel B. Clendenin, “Partakers of Divinity: The Orthodox Doctrine of Theosis,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 37 (1994): 365-379?Michael J. Christensen and Jeffery A. Wittung (eds.), Partakers of the Divine Nature: The History and Development of Deification in the Christian Traditions (Baker Academic, 2008)?G. L. Bray, “Deification,” New Dictionary of Theology (ed. S. B. Ferguson, D. F. Wright and J. I. Packer; Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 1988)?M. David Litwa, “2 Corinthians 3: 18 and Its Implications for ‘Theosis’,” Journal of Theological Interpretation 2 (2008): 117-34?M. David Litwa, We are Being Transformed: Deification in Paul’s Soteriology (Beihefte zur Zeitschrift fur die Neutestamentliche Wissenschaft und die Kunde der Alteren Kirche 187; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2012)?Additional BibliographyStefan-Sebastian Maftei, “ ‘Sonship’ and its Relevance for Jewish and Non-Jewish Mystical Literatures,” Journal for the Study of Religions and Ideologies 8, no. 23 (2010): 141-153?Carl Mosser, “The greatest possible blessing: Calvin and deification.” Scottish journal of theology 55, no. 01 (2002): 36-57?Johann Leemans, “ ‘God became human in order that humans might become God’: A Reflection on the Soteriological Doctrine of Divinization,” in The Myriad Christ: Plurality and the Quest for Unity in Contemporary Christology (Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium 152; Leuven University Press; Peeters), 207-216?Randall C. Gleason, “Angels and the Eschatology of Heb 1–2,” New Testament Studies 49, no. 01 (2003): 90-107?Kenneth J. Thomas, “The Old Testament Citations in Hebrews,” New Testament Studies 11, no. 04 (1965): 303-325?J. Daryl Charles, “The Angels, Sonship and Birthright in the Letter to the Hebrews,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 33 (1990): 171-178?T. F. Glasson, “ ‘Plurality of Divine Persons’ and the Quotations in Hebrews I. 6ff.,” New Testament Studies 12, no. 03 (1966): 270-272?Gert J. Steyn, “A quest for theVorlage of the” Song of Moses” (Deut 32) quotations in Hebrews,” Neotestamentica 34, no. 2 (2000): 263-272?Georg G?bel, “Rivals in Heaven: Angels in the Epistle to the Hebrews,” (Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature Yearbook; ed. by Friedrich V. Reiterer, Pancratius Cornelis Beentjes, Nuria Calduch-Benages, Benjamin G. Wright; Berlin: DeGruyter, 2007), 357–376?Kenneth L. Schenck, “A Celebration of the Enthroned Son: The Catena of Hebrews 1,” Journal of Biblical literature 120, no. 3 (2001): 469-485?Mikael C. Parsons, “Son and High Priest: A Study in the Christology of Hebrews,” Evangelical Quarterly 60, no. 3 (1988): 195-215?Gareth Lee Cockerill, “Hebrews 1: 6: Source and Significance,” Bulletin for Biblical Research 9 (1999): 51-64?Scott D. Mackie, “Ancient Jewish Mystical Motifs in Hebrews’ Theology of Access and Entry Exhortations,” New Testament Studies 58, no. 01 (2012): 88-104?Joshua W. Jipp, “The Son’s Entrance into the Heavenly World: The Soteriological Necessity of the Scriptural Catena in Hebrews 1.5-14,” New Testament Studies 56, no. 04 (2010): 557-575?Jody A., Barnard, The Mysticism of Hebrews: Exploring the Role of Jewish Apocalyptic Mysticism in the Epistle to the Hebrews (WUNT 331; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012)?Mark Kinzer, “‘All Things Under His Feet’: The Use of Psalm 8 in the New Testament in Light of Its Use in Other Jewish Literature of Late Antiquity,” Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Michigan, 1995?Hubert James Keener, A Canonical Exegesis of the Eighth Psalm: Yhwh’s Maintenance of the Created Order Through Divine Intervention (Eisenbrauns, 2014)?Eric Mason, ‘You are a Priest Forever’: Second Temple Jewish Messianism and the Priestly Christology of the Epistle to the Hebrews (Studies of the Texts of the Desert of Judah 74; E. J. Brill, 2008)?Amy L. Peeler, You are My Son: The Family of God in the Epistle to the Hebrews (Bloomsbury / T & T Clark, 2014)Chapter 37: This Means WarThis chapter dealt with New Testament terminology for the powers of darkness.?Bibliography included in the bookBennie H. Reynolds, “Understanding the Demonologies of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Accomplishments and Directions for the Future,” Religion Compass 7:4 (2013): 103-114Maxwell Davidson, Angels at Qumran: A Comparative Study of 1 Enoch 1-36; 72-108 and Sectarian Writings from Qumran (JSPSup 11; Continuum, 1992)Aleksander R. Michalak, Angels as Warriors in Late Second Temple Jewish Literature (WUNT 330; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012)Eric Sorensen, Possession and Exorcism in the New Testament and Early Christianity (WUNT 157 Reihe 2; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2002)Kevin P. Sullivan, Wrestling with Angels: A Study of the Relationship Between Angels and Humans in Ancient Jewish Literature and the New Testament (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2004)Graham H. Twelftree, Jesus the Exorcist: A Contribution to the Study of the Historical Jesus (WUNT 54 Reihe 2; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1993)Guy Williams, The Spirit World in the Letters of Paul the Apostle: A Critical Examination of the Role of Spiritual Beings in the Authentic Pauline Epistles (FRLANT 231; Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2009)R. B. Salters, “Psalm 82:1 and the Septuagint.” Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 103, no. 2 (1991): 225-239Michael S. Heiser, “Monotheism and the Language of Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls,” Tyndale Bulletin 65:1 (2014): 85-100Dale Basil Martin, “When Did Angels Become Demons?” Journal of Biblical Literature 129:4 (2010): 657-677J. E. Rexine, “Daimon in Classical Greek Literature,” GOTR 30/3 (1985) 335–61Archie T. Wright, The Origin of Evil Spirits: The Reception of Genesis 6: 1-4 in Early Jewish Literature. (WUNT 198, Reihe 2; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013)S. Ribichini, “Gad,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)N. Wyatt, “Qeteb,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)G. H. Twelftree, “Demon, Devil, Satan,” Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels (ed. Joel B. Green and Scot McKnight, Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1992)Donald E. Hartley, “2 Corinthians 4:4: A Case for Yahweh as the ‘God of this Age’,” Paper read at the 57th annual meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society, Valley Forge, PA, 2005Donald E. Hartley, “The Congenitally Hard-Hearted: Key to Understanding the Assertion and Use of Isaiah 6:9-10 in the Synoptic Gospels” (Ph.D. dissertation, Dallas Theological Seminary, 2005)Michael S. Heiser, “Genesis and Ancient Near Eastern Cosmology,” Faithlife Study Bible (ed. John D. Barry, Michael S. Heiser, Miles Custis, et al., Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2012)G. F. Hasel, “The Polemic Nature of the Genesis Cosmology,” Evangelical Quarterly 46 (1974) 81–102John H. Walton, Ancient Near Eastern Thought and the Old Testament: Introducing the Conceptual World of the Hebrew Bible (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2006), 165-178Luis I. J. Stadelmann, Luis, The Hebrew Conception of the World: A Philological and Literary Study (Analecta Biblica 39; Pontifical Biblical Institute Press, 1970)Frank Thielman, Ephesians (Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament; Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2010)D. G. Reid, “Elements / Elemental Spirits of the World,” Dictionary of Paul and His Letters (ed. Gerald F. Hawthorne, Ralph P. Martin, and Daniel G. Reid; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1993)E. Schweizer, “Slaves of the Elements and Worshipers of Angels: Gal. 4:3, 9 and Col. 2:8, 18, 20,”Journal of Biblical Literature 107 (1988): 455-68Clinton E. Arnold, “Returning to the Domain of the Powers: ‘Stoicheia’ as Evil Spirits in Galatians 4:3, 9,” Novum Testamentum 38:1 (Jan. 1996): 55-76Ronn Johnson, “The Old Testament Background for Paul’s Principalities and Powers,” (PhD Dissertation, Dallas Theological Seminary, 2004)D. G. Reid, “Principalities and Powers,” Dictionary of Paul and His Letters (ed. Gerald F. Hawthorne, Ralph P. Martin, and Daniel G. Reid; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1993)David E. Stevens, “Daniel 10 and the Notion of Territorial Spirits,” BibSac 157 (2000): 410-431Aleksander R. Michalak, Angels as warriors in late Second Temple Jewish literature (WUNT 330, Reihe 2; Tubingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012)?Additional Bibliography Ida Fr?hlich, “Theology and Demonology in Qumran Texts,” Henoch 32, no. 1 (2010): 101-129M. Mach, “Demons,” in The Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls, vol. 1 (ed. Lawrence Schiffman and James Vanderkam; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 189–192Hermann Lichtenberger, “Demonology in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament,” In Text, Thought, and Practice in Qumran and Early Christianity: Proceedings of the Ninth International Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature, Jointly Sponsored by the Hebrew University Center for the Study of Christianity (Studies of the Texts of The Desert of Judah 84; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2009), 267-280?Content DiscussionThis chapter focused on the various terms for divine beings in the New Testament. As I noted in the chapter, the New Testament provides no hierarchy for ordering and understanding the various terms. Several scholars have discussed the issue without coming to a clear resolution. Discussion unfortunately relies on speculations made in a handful of Pseudepigrapha and later Christian texts.?By way of some examples, see the following sourced excerpts:J. B. Lightfoot, Saint Paul’s Epistles to the Colossians and to Philemon (8th ed.; Classic Commentaries on the Greek New Testament; London; New York: Macmillan and Co., 1886), 150–152 …A comparison with the parallel passage Ephes. 1:21, ?περ?νω π?ση? ?ρχ?? κα? ?ξουσ?α? κα? δυν?μεω? κα? κυρι?τητο? κα? παντ?? κ.τ.λ., brings out the following points:(1) No stress can be laid on the sequence of the names, as though St Paul were enunciating with authority some precise doctrine respecting the grades of the celestial hierarchy. The names themselves are not the same in the two passages. While ?ρχ?, ?ξουσ?α, κυρι?τη?, are common to both, θρ?νο? is peculiar to the one and δ?ναμι? to the other. Nor again is there any correspondence in the sequence. Neither does δ?ναμι? take the place of θρ?νο?, nor do the three words common to both appear in the same order, the sequence being ?ρχ. ?ξ. [δ?ν.] κυρ. in Eph. 1:21, and [θρ?ν.] κυρ. ?ρχ. ?ξ. here.(2) An expression in Eph. 1:21 shows the Apostle’s motive in introducing these lists of names: for he there adds κα? παντ?? ?ν?ματο? ?νομαζομ?νου ο? μ?νον ?ν τ? α??νι το?τ? ?λλ? κα? ?ν τ? μ?λλοντι, i.e. ‘of every dignity or title (whether real or imaginary) which is reverenced,’ etc.; for this is the force of παντ?? ?ν?ματο? ?νομαζομ?νου (see the notes on Phil. 2:9, and Eph. l.c.). Hence it appears that in this catalogue St Paul does not profess to describe objective realities, but contents himself with repeating subjective opinions. He brushes away all these speculations without enquiring how much or how little truth there may be in them, because they are altogether beside the question. His language here shows the same spirit of impatience with this elaborate angelology, as in 2:18.(3) Some commentators have referred the terms used here solely to earthly potentates and dignities. There can be little doubt however that their chief and primary reference is to the orders of the celestial hierarchy, as conceived by these Gnostic Judaizers. This appears from the context; for the words τ? ??ρατα immediately precede this list of terms, while in the mention of π?ν τ? πλ?ρωμα and in ether expressions the Apostle clearly contemplates the rivalry of spiritual powers with Christ. It is also demanded by the whole design and purport of the letter, which is written to combat the worship paid to angels. The names too, more especially θρ?νοι, are especially connected with the speculations of Jewish angelology. But when this is granted, two questions still remain. First; are evil as well as good spirits included, demons as well as angels? And next; though the primary reference is to spiritual powers, is it not possible that the expression was intended to be comprehensive and to include earthly dignities as well? The clause added in the parallel passage, ο? μ?νον ?ν τ? α??νι το?τ? κ.τ.λ., encourages us thus to extend the Apostle’s meaning; and we are led in the same direction by the comprehensive words which have preceded here, [τ?] ?ν το?? ο?ρανο?? κ.τ.λ. Nor is there anything in the terms themselves which bars such an extension; for, as will be seen, the combination ?ρχα? κα? ?ξουσ?αι is applied not only to good angels but to bad, not only to spiritual powers but to earthly. Compare Ignat. Smyrn. 6 τ? ?πουρ?νια κα? ? δ?ξα τ?ν ?γγ?λων κα? ο? ?ρχοντε? ?ρατο? τε κα? ??ρατοι.Thus guided, we may paraphrase the Apostle’s meaning as follows: ‘You dispute much about the successive grades of angels; you distinguish each grade by its special title; you can tell how each order was generated from the preceding; you assign to each its proper degree of worship. Meanwhile you have ignored or you have degraded Christ. I tell you, it is not so. He is first and foremost, Lord of heaven and earth, far above all thrones or dominations, all princedoms or powers, far above every dignity and every potentate—whether earthly or heavenly—whether angel or demon or man—that evokes your reverence or excites your fear.’ See above, pp. 101 sq.Jewish and Jud?o-Christian speculations respecting the grades of the celestial hierarchy took Various forms. In the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs (Levi 3), which as coming near to the Apostolic age supplies a valuable illustration (see Galatians p. 307 sq.), these orders are arranged as follows: (1) θρ?νοι, ?ξουσ?αι, these two in the highest or seventh heaven; (2) ο? ?γγελοι ο? φ?ροντε? τ?? ?ποκρ?σει? το?? ?γγ?λοι? το? προσ?που in the sixth heaven; (3) ο? ?γγελοι το? προσ?που in the fifth heaven; (4) ο? ?γιοι in the fourth heaven; (5) α? δυν?μει? τ?ν παρεμβολ?ν in the third heaven; (6) τ? πνε?ματα τ?ν ?παγωγ?ν (i.e. of visitations, retributions) in the second heaven: or perhaps the denizens of the sixth and fifth heavens, (2) and (3), should be transposed. The lowest heaven is not peopled by any spirits. In Origen de Princ. 1.5.3, ib. 1.6.2, 1. pp. 66, 70 (comp. 1.8.1, lb. p. 74), we have five classes, which are given in an ascending scale in this order; (1) angels (sancti angeli, ταξι? ?γγελικ?; (2) princedoms (principatus, δ?ναμι? ?ρχικ?, ?ρχα?); (3) powers (potestates, ?ξουσ?αι); (4) thrones (throni vel sedes, θρ?νοι); (5) dominations (dominations, κυρι?τητε?); though elsewhere, in Ioann. 1. § 34, 4. p. 34, he seems to have a somewhat different classification in view. In Ephrem Syrus Op. Syr. 1. p. 270 (where the translation of Benedetti is altogether faulty and misleading) the ranks are these: (1) θεο?, θρ?νοι, κυρι?τητε?; (2) ?ρχ?γγελοι, ?ρχα?, ?ξουσ?αι; (3) ?γγελοι, δυν?μει?, χερουβ?μ, σεραφ?μ; these three great divisions being represented by the χιλ?αρχοι, the ?κατ?νταρχοι and the πεντηκ?νταρχοι respectively in Deut. 1:15, on which passage he is commenting. The general agreement between these will be seen at once. This grouping also seems to underlie the conception of Basil of Seleucia Orat. 39 (p. 207), who mentions them in this order; θρ?νοι, κυρι?τητε?, ?ρχα?, ?ξουσ?αι, δυν?μει?, χερουβ?μ, σεραφ?μ. On the other hand the arrangement of the pseudo-Dionysius, who so largely influenced subsequent speculations, is quite different and probably later (Dion. Areop. Op. 1. p. 75, ed. Cord.); (1) θρ?νοι, χερουβ?μ, σεραφ?μ; (2) ?ξουσ?αι, κυρι?τητε?, δυν?μει?; (3) ?γγελοι, ?ρχ?γγελοι, ?ρχα?. But the earlier lists for the most part seem to suggest as their common foundation a classification in which θρ?νοι, κυρι?τητε?, belonged to the highest order, and ?ρχα?, ?ξουσ?αι to the next below. Thus it would appear that the Apostle takes as an illustration the titles assigned to the two highest grades in a system of the celestial hierarchy which he found current, and which probably was adopted by these Gnostic Judaizers. See also the note on 2:18.θρ?νοι] In all systems alike these ‘thrones’ belong to the highest grade of angelic beings, whose place is in the immediate presence of God. The meaning of the name however is doubtful: (1) It may signify the occupants of thrones which surround the throne of God; as in the imagery of Rev. 4:4 κ?κλοθεν το? θρ?νου θρ?νοι ε?κοσι τ?σσαρε? (comp. 11:16, 20:4). The imagery is there taken from the court of an earthly king: see Jer. 52:32. This is the interpretation given by Origen de Princ. 1.5.3 (p. 66), 1.6.2 (p. 70) ‘judicandi vel regendi … habentes officium.’ Or (2) They were so called, as supporting or forming the throne of God; just as the chariot-seat of the Almighty is represented as resting on the cherubim in Ezek. 1:26, 9:3, 10:1 sq., 11:22, Ps. 18:10, 1 Chron. 28:18. So apparently Clem. Alex. Proph. Ecl. 57 (p. 1003) θρ?νοι ?ν ε?εν … δι? τ? ?ναπα?εσθαι ?ν α?το?? τ?ν Θε?ν. From this same imagery of the prophet the later mysticism of the Kabbala derived its name ‘wheels,’ which it gave to one of its ten orders of Sephiroth. Adopting this interpretation, several fathers identify the ‘thrones’ with the cherubim: e.g. Greg. Nyss. c. Eunom. 1 (2. p. 349 sq.), Chrysost. de Incompr. Nat. 3.5 (1. p. 467), Theodoret (ad loc.), August. in Psalm. 98. § 3 (4. p. 1061). This explanation was adopted also by the pseudo-Dionysius de C?l. Hier. 7 (1. p. 80), without however identifying them with the cherubim; and through his writings it came to be generally adopted. The former interpretation however is more probable; for (1) The highly symbolical character of the latter accords better with a later stage of mystic speculation, like the Kabbala; and (2) It seems best to treat θρ?νοι, as belonging to the same category with κυρι?τητε?, ?ρχα?, ?ξουσ?αι, which are concrete words borrowed from different grades of human rank and power. As implying regal dignity, θρ?νοι naturally stands at the head of the list.κυρι?τητε?] ‘dominations,’ as Ephes. 1:21. These appear to have been regarded as belonging to the first grade, and standing next in dignity to the θρ?νοι. This indeed would be suggested by their name.?ρχα?, ?ξουσ?αι] as Ephes. 1:21. These two words occur very frequently together. In some places they refer to human dignities, as Luke 12:11, Tit. 3:1 (comp. Luke 20:20); in others to a spiritual hierarchy. And here again there are two different uses: sometimes they designate good angels, e.g. below 2:10, Ephes. 3:10; sometimes evil spirits, e.g. 2:15, Ephes. 6:12: while in one passage at least (1 Cor. 15:24) both may be included. In Rom. 8:38 we have ?ρχα? without ?ξουσ?αι (except as a v. 1.), and in 1 Pet. 3:22 ?ξουσ?αι without ?ρχα?, in connexion with the angelic orders.Eduard Lohse, Colossians and Philemon a Commentary on the Epistles to the Colossians and to Philemon (Hermeneia—a Critical and Historical Commentary on the Bible; Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1971), 50–51 …All things have been created in him, that is, through him. The fullness of what “all things” (τ? π?ντα) means is depicted more exactly by the addition: everything that is in the heavens and on earth. There are no exceptions here, all things visible and invisible are included. Even the cosmic powers and principalities were created in him. “Thrones” (θρ?νοι) and “dominions” (κυρι?τητε?) (cf. 1 Cor 8:5) were occasionally specified in Judaism among the heavenly hosts of angels; “principalities” (?ρχα?) and “powers” (?ξουσ?αι) are often named as being supermundane beings and powers. In such enumerations it does not matter whether the list is complete or whether the angelic powers are arranged in the order of their particular classes. The emphasis is rather that all things that exist in the cosmos were created in Christ. Thus he is Lord of the powers and principalities (cf. 2:10, 15; Eph 1:21; 1 Pt 3:22).Peter T. O’Brien, Colossians, Philemon (vol. 44; Word Biblical Commentary; Dallas: Word, Incorporated, 1998), 46–47 …ε?τε θρ?νοι ε?τε κυρι?τητε? ε?τε ?ρχα? ε?τε ?ξουσ?αι. Probably with special reference to the Colossian heresy Paul now emphasizes that even the cosmic powers and principalities, which apparently received some prominence in that heresy, were created in Christ. Good or bad, all are subject to him as Creator. No doubt it is the hostile rather than the friendly powers Paul has particularly in view (although H. Schlier, Principalities and Powers in the New Testament [Questiones Disputatae 3; Freiburg: Herder, 1961] 14, 15, is of the opinion they are all wicked, hostile to God and Christ), as he endeavors to show the Colossians their proper place in relation to Christ (Bruce, 198). And the argument he develops in chapter 2 is that they were vanquished through that same Lord. None needs to be placated. They derive their existence from him, and they owe their obedience to him through whom they have been conquered (2:10, 15).Here four classes of angelic powers are listed: “thrones” (θρ?νοι) and “dominions” (κυρι?τητε?, cf. 1 Cor 8:5), which were occasionally mentioned in Judaism among heavenly hosts of angels (2 Enoch 20:1; Test Levi 3:8), as well as “principalities” (?ρχα?) and “powers” (?ξουσ?αι)—often named as supermundane beings and powers (for details see Lohse, 51). They probably represent the highest orders of the angelic realm. Whether the list is complete (here δυν?μει?, found in Rom 8:38; cf. 1 Cor 15:24; Eph 1:21, is missing) or the powers are arranged in a particular order is beside the point (Schlier, Principalities, 13, 14). From the highest to the lowest, all alike are subject to Christ. They were created in him, through him and for him.Richard R. Melick, Philippians, Colossians, Philemon (vol. 32; The New American Commentary; Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1991), 219–220 …There is a general consensus among scholars that the terms used here refer to spiritual beings. Some, such as Theodoret and several of the Fathers, seemed to understand them as good spirits. They have been given the task of supervision. The “thrones” are the cherubim; the “authorities” “rulers,” and “powers” are the guardian angels of the nations. Little evidence exists to determine whether these are good or bad. They are simply higher classes of angelic beings. In light of 2:8–3:4, however, they probably refer to fallen beings who oppress the Christian. In Ephesians, the terms definitely refer to enemies of the gospel (Eph 6:10ff.). They may have been the focus of the Colossian teachers since evidently they taught the necessity of intermediaries between God and man. These terms may refer to separate classes of beings rather than designating one type. F. F. Bruce points out that “the highest angel-princes, like the rest of creation are subject to Christ as the one in whom, through whom and for whom they were created.”88 Although little biblical evidence exists on which to base the conclusions about spirit hierarchies, Moule was certainly correct in stating, “The cumulative effect of this catalog of powers is to emphasize the immeasurable superiority of Christ over whatever rival might, by the false teachers, be suggested.”This chapter also discussed the stoicheia (“elemental spirits”). In a footnote commenting on Galatians 4 I made the comment that Paul’s denial that the stoicheia are gods (they are “not by nature gods”) must not be taken to mean Paul denied the existence of other gods. Here’s what I wrote:Gal 4:8 transitions to pagans, since the Jews would have known about the true God. The reference to “times and seasons and years” (4:10) would therefore point to astrological beliefs, not the Jewish calendar. Paul is therefore denying the idea that the celestial objects (sun, moon, stars) are deities. His Gentile readers should not be enslaved by the idea that these objects controlled their destiny. As a related issue, Paul’s wording here cannot therefore be taken as a denial of the existence of other gods (the ones put over the nations – which are not called stoicheia). Paul does not deny their existence in 1 Cor 8:4–6, which must be interpreted against the context of 1 Cor 10:20–21, as it relates to the same subject matter. Paul is just denying that celestial bodies are gods that control one’s fate. This approach is also useful with respect to Col 2:8, 20, where the contexts seem to be pagan angel worship (i.e., worship of divine beings thought to have power over basic elements of the material world) and pagan asceticism.In case the point was not clear, in Gal. 4:8-9, when Paul denies that the stoicheia are gods he is denying that celestial objects are gods. But the stoicheia are not the sons of God / gods put over the nations. Those lesser gods are affirmed to exist by Paul in 1 Cor. 10:20-21 (he calls them demons, following the language of Deut 32:17). Hence the denial of one idea doesn’t constitute the denial of another.The Bible uses the language of celestial objects for divine beings — because the heavens were not a human domain. It is therefore not “doing science” in this regard (i.e., making a scientific assertion).I recently received this question (it came before The Unseen Realm was available, but it’s pertinent to the content of this chapter).Question:I have been watching Dr. Michael S. Heiser’s mobile ed OT291 on how the Old Testament reveals the Christian Godhead.? I truly enjoy his teaching.? However in one segment he makes a statement that I would like to ask him for some clarification.“Well, let’s take a look at that. We have some problems with it right away if we give it some thought. This same language is used of the heavenly beings of Yahweh or the angels, like Lord of Hosts. So we can’t assume, obviously, that the host of heaven in phrases like that are not real, because there is a populated spiritual world, and all branches of Judaism and Christianity are going to believe that point.” (Logos Mobile Ed OT291, Segment 18)My question is related to Acts when Paul is before the council it states; “6?Now when Paul perceived that one part were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, he cried out in the council, “Brothers, I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees. It is with respect to the hope and the resurrection of the dead that I am on trial.” 7?And when he had said this, a dissension arose between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and the assembly was divided. 8?For the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, nor angel, nor spirit, but the Pharisees acknowledge them all.” (Acts 23:6-8, ESV)When I read Act 23:8 it says the Sadducees do not believe in the spirit world, so I would like to ask Dr Heiser for clarification on his statement that “all branches of Judaism and Christianity are going to believe that point”.? It would seem to me that the Sadducees do not believe in a spirit world.? Am I misreading Acts?My answer:There is actually controversy and ambiguity about the meaning of Acts 23:8. Sadduccees could of course read the OT, which has lots of angels. The issue is whether to have a Jewish sect (Sadduccees) denying parts of their OT, or whether the phrase means something different (note that angel is singular in the verse). I think the latter.To illustrate the level of disagreement, and to point out what I think is the answer (in boldface), here’s what Bock says (with my inserted comment):No extrabiblical text speaks of such a complete denial of angels and spirits by the Sadducees. In fact, the Pentateuch, which the Sadducees held as authoritative, affirms the existence of such beings. Parker (2003) notes and evaluates four views on this expression of doctrinal denial by the Sadducees, noting that almost everyone recognizes that Luke’s description of the Sadducees in verse 8 must be qualified or is not intended to be universal in scope (see also Meier 2001: 406–8). There are a total of six possible explanations for Luke’s claim:1. The Sadducees rejected angels and spirits altogether (Str-B 2:767). This view sometimes includes appeals to b. Sanh. 38b, where Rabbi Idith contends that in Exod. 24:1 the prayer is to God, not an angel Metatron. This angel was sometimes seen in Judaism as the angel of the Lord. But this tractate passage only presents one Sadducee’s view about not praying to an angel, not a denial of their existence. So it does not offer unqualified support for Luke’s statement.2. They rejected excessive speculation about angels and spirits (Manson 1938; Bruce 1990: 466).3. They rejected that the righteous dead came back in the form of spirits between death and resurrection. This view argues that “angel” and “spirit” mean the same thing in verses 8 and 9 (Daube 1990; Gaventa 2003: 315). It is unlikely, however, that these two terms should be taken as synonymous. Parker (2003: 351) notes how Luke’s use of “neither … nor” (μ?τε, mēte [2x]) in verse 8 rules this out.4. They denied that resurrection included coming back in the form of an angel or spirit (so Lachs 1977; Viviano and Taylor 1992). Parker (2003: 353–59), however, argues that the Pharisees likewise would not have been open to a resurrection within history before the end, which is what Paul’s argument along the lines of view 4 would also require.Heiser: This idea, contra Parker, does not have to be married to an “end” before the end. The statement by Bock must as well include a verse typo. I see nothing in verse 4 in what Paul says (“I did not know, brothers, that he was the high priest, for it is written, ‘You shall not speak evil of a ruler of your people’ ”) that would be problematic with this interpretation (or that has anything to do with angels). “Angelification” was a common Second Temple idea (held by some Jewish sects, esp. at Qumran). Depending on how one defines it, it’s also a NT idea. If one defines glorification as becoming part of God’s unseen family (sons of God = angels idea), then this works with NT theology (see Chapter =s 35036 of The Unseen Realm). I think this notion (#4 in Bock’s list) is what the Sadducees were denying.5. They rejected the idea that an angel or spirit can speak through a human being as an agent of revelation (Bamberger 1963). This view, however, does not seem relevant to Acts 23, as the issue is not about an angel speaking through a human being but a “raised from the dead” human speaking.6. Many think that what Luke describes here is a belief in a full hierarchy of angels and their role in eschatology (Polhill 1992: 470). A variation of this is the idea that the Sadducees’ rejection of Fate included a rejection of the belief that angels are “agents of Fate” (Le Cornu and Shulam 2003: 1250). The Greek has a reference to the Pharisees confessing “both” (τ? ?μφ?τερα, ta amphotera), although three things are discussed (resurrection, angels, and spirits). Either this is an expression that collapses angels and spirits into one theme (Fitzmyer 1998: 719), or Luke is using the term loosely to refer to three things (Polhill 1992: 470), which sometimes happens (Acts 19:16; Johnson 1992: 398).Question: Does Mike Heiser believe the earth is flat?I couldn’t really figure out where to put this one, as it concerns my writing on ancient Israelite cosmology. I mention cosmology in this chapter in a footnote (and nowhere else in the book, really), so I decided to put it here and in Chapter 2.In a nutshell, Christianity actually has folks in it who believe the earth is truly round and flat. Honest — I’m not making this up. Some of their leaders use my work (see below) as proof of this view. ?While I’m flattered to have such influence (!), I’m appalled that people who follow Christ are this dumb (or easily led astray). The stupidity of this idea is transparent in today’s world. Space flight (really, flight between hemispheres), satellite communications, etc. show the idea to be utter nonsense. Yet some people think they need to believe it to have a “true” Bible. It’s uber-literalism at its worst. So no, I reject the notion that the earth is round and flat. Anyone who uses my work to prop up this idea without providing a disclaimer that I reject the idea is deliberately dishonest. But that is indeed what the biblical writers describe, because they lived at a time before scientific discovery proved otherwise. It’s that simple.The writers God used to produce the Bible were not inspired to write about things of the natural world that were beyond their own worldview and knowledge base. And to argue God gave them advanced scientific knowledge means that what they wrote could never have communicated to their original audience (or any audience prior to recent centuries. That’s absurd and undermines the communicative purpose of the Bible. What we read in Genesis (and elsewhere) reflects a common ancient Near Eastern perspective about cosmology with one crucial difference: the credit for creation is given exclusively to the God of Israel against all other gods. THAT is its truth claim with respect to creation. That God chose people of a certain time, a certain place, with a certain (limited) knowledge base was up to him. We dishonor His choices when we impose our questions and our context on the biblical writers. Precisely the same limitations would be in place if God chose a scientist today to write Genesis. 1000 years from now people would chuckle at how primitive he/she was (“Can you believe this is what they thought?”). This is why the Bible *transcends* science discourse — science always changes with new discovery and knowledge. Who the creator was never changes.For a short essay I wrote on this for the lay person, see?this link:Genesis and Ancient Near Eastern CosmologyOr you can watch my lecture on this topic: resources that discuss this material in Genesis includes:John H. Walton,?Ancient Near Eastern Thought and the Old Testament: Introducing the Conceptual World of the Hebrew Bible?(Baker Academic, 2006Luist Stadelmann,?The Hebrew Conception of the World: A Philological and Literary Study (Analecta Biblica, No 39; Pontifical Institute Press, 1970)Chapter 38: Choosing SidesThis chapter focused on how baptism and the Lord’s Supper are framed by the divine council worldview.?Bibliography included in the bookBo Reicke, The Disobedient Spirits and Christian Baptism: A Study of 1 Peter 3:19 and Its Context (Acta Seminarii neotestamentici Upsaliensis 13; Copenhagen: E. Munksgaard, 1946; reprinted by Wipf and Stock, 2005)Ansgar Kelly, The Devil at Baptism: Ritual, Theology, and Drama (Cornell, 1985)L. W. Hurtado, One God, One Lord: Early Christian Devotion and Ancient Jewish Monotheism (Continuum, 2003)Michael S. Heiser, “Does Deuteronomy 32:17 Assume or Deny the Reality of Other Gods?” Bible Translator 59:3 (July 2008): 137-145Guy Prentiss Waters, The End of Deuteronomy in the Epistles of Paul (WUNT 221; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006)Sharon Pace Jeansonne, “Jeshurun,” The Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary (New York: Doubleday, 1992)?Additional BibliographyDouglas Neil Campbell and Fika J. Van Rensburg, “A History of the Interpretation of 1 Peter 3: 18-22,” Acta Patristica et Byzantina 19 (2008): 73-96W. J. Dalton, Christ’s Proclamation to the Spirits: A Study of 1 Peter 3:18–4:6 (AnBib 23; Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute Press, 1965)Chad T. Pierce, “Reexamining Christ’s Proclamation to the Spirits in Prison: Punishment Traditions in the Book of Watchers and Their Influence on 1 Peter 3: 18–22,” Henoch 28 (2006): 27-42Chad T. Pierce, Spirits and the Proclamation of Christ: 1 Peter 3: 18-22 in Light of Sin and Punishment Traditions in Early Jewish and Christian Literature (WUNT 305; Reihe 2; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011)Douglas E. Brown, “The Use of the Old Testament in 2 Peter 2:4-10a,” Ph.D. Dissertation, Trinity International University, 2003Erik Waaler, The Shema and the First Commandment in First Corinthians: An Intertextual Approach to Paul’s Re-reading of Deuteronomy (WUNT 253; Reihe 2; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008)Brian S. Rosner, “ ‘Stronger than He?’ The Strength of 1 Corinthians 10: 22b,” Tyndale Bulletin 43 (1992): 171-179B. J. Oropeza, “Laying to Rest the Midrash: Paul’s Message on Meat Sacrificed to Idols in Light of the Deuteronomic Tradition,” Biblica (1998): 57-68?Content DiscussionThe focus of this chapter was baptism (as it relates to 1 Peter 3:14-22) and the Lord’s Supper (as it relates primarily to 1 Cor. 10:20-21). The chapter proposed that baptism was a spiritual warfare event—essentially, a loyalty oath. Choosing Christ was to break free from the spiritual forces of darkness. Baptism is, in that context, a ritual re-enactment of our union to (choice of) Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection—in the midst of which he descended to the realm of the dead and announced his victory over the imprisoned spirits, the offending sons of God of Genesis 6 infamy.This is easy to see with respect to believer’s baptism, but it also applies to infant baptism—providing that doctrine is rightly understood as playing no role in the salvation of the infant. This “right understanding” is dependent on a consistent hermeneutic with respect to the correlative relationship between baptism and circumcision (Col. 2:10-12).During my own Christian life, I have been a member in two reformed churches. I’m quite familiar with the way infant baptism (and, really, baptism in general) is articulated. I’ve had many experiences where people in such congregations think they understand the doctrine (it doesn’t result in salvation) but who are then confused and troubled by the language of the creeds, talk about baptism in salvific terms in cases of infant or child death, and wonder why the baptism “didn’t take” when people turn from the faith. All of these points of confusion are real and are the fault of poor wording in the creeds—which in turn is the result of an inconsistent understanding of baptism and circumcision, which in turn again is driven by a flawed view of circumcision and election. These problems are not difficult to demonstrate as indicated in the following discussion. They are also not difficult to resolve if one resists filtering biblical theology through the creeds.In shortest terms, if one wants to observe a relationship between baptism and circumcision, then whatever you say about baptism you must also be able to say about circumcision. When that consistency is observed, the problems fade. But that isn’t what creeds often do, nor theologians who defend them. Thought I think adult believer’s baptism is more transparent from the New Testament, I also believe one can articulate a biblical defensible doctrine of infant baptism—but the above consistency is crucial (and biblical).What follows is a lengthy discussion of three items:1. Why the traditional creedal articulations of infant baptism are theologically problematic.2. How simple adjustments in how the subject is approached resolves the problems.3. How baptism as a loyalty oath and “holy war” in The Unseen Realm is applicable to infant baptism rightly articulated.?1. Introducing the ProblemIn Protestant Reformed churches, the meaning of infant baptism varies. The baptized infant does not have the sin nature removed, but the infant is made a member of the church. But while Protestants don’t want to sound Catholic, a Protestant minister is likely to presume and teach that the baptism of an infant would have something to do with the infant’s secure place in heaven should the baby die.More broadly, though, in Protestantism the relationship of infant baptism and salvation is muddled, even within some very famous creeds. (I’ll show you some clear examples below.) A fair generalization might be that infant baptism supposedly starts the child on the road to God, so to speak. The baptized infant is said to have been accepted into a “covenant relationship” with God/Christ, which has some connection to salvation in that Protestants of all stripes believe that the child will eventually “confirm their baptism,” since baptism was a sign of election, just as circumcision in the Old Testament. In other words, Protestants link infant baptism to being placed into a covenant relationship with God.The problem of course is that many baptized infants grow up and do not believe, even though children of believing parents. This conscious or unconscious linking of baptism and election to covenant relationship therefore presents a dilemma in the case of those who don’t confirm their baptism. Did the baptism not work (whatever that might mean)? Did election fail? Maybe there is no connection between baptism and election—in which case, what exactly is baptism good for and why is it necessary? Or maybe the Calvinist idea of perseverance (the idea that the elect will, in the end, believe) should be scrapped. But if that is the case, that also raises the question of the necessity of baptism. If an elect person will believe in the end, baptizing them as infants doesn’t matter. It is usually at this point that reformed parents or pastors will say something about baptism being needed for getting the baby into the covenant in case it dies before profession of faith. I really don’t know how that reflects the reformed idea of faith alone. In my experience in reformed churches, sola fide is simply affirmed and this specific question is either avoided or never clearly answered.Before going any further, readers should know I am not opposed to infant baptism per se, providing it is clearly and completely severed from salvation. I think there is a biblical way to articulate the idea, and will share that. But you won’t appreciate that articulation until you see the problems with traditional articulations that need resolution. Personally, I know how to articulate either view well, avoiding caricatures and bad arguments, and would be fine worshipping in a believing church that practiced either (or both) so long as the clarity of the gospel isn’t lost or muddled.The Starting Point for Infant Baptism The fundamental basis for infant baptism is the correlation between baptism and circumcision in Colossians 2:11-12 –“In [Christ] also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead.”All positions on baptism rightly note this passage and presume there is *some* connection between baptism and circumcision. Paul doesn’t really tell us what it is, but he tells us enough that should keep us from bad theology – but hasn’t. What I mean is that, if there is a connection between baptism and circumcision, then it seems reasonable to think that what we say about the meaning of one ought to be consistent with the meaning of the other. But this consistency of hermeneutic is rarely followed. I’ll try to explain.Insisting on this consistency between the two items Paul links eliminates common ideas like baptism erasing the sin nature, forgiveness of sin, or guaranteeing anyone’s eventual faith since circumcision did none of those things according to the Old Testament. The Old Testament is filled with episodes – even on a national scale – of Jews who were circumcised falling into apostasy. Their circumcision had no necessary connection to being believers. And when circumcision was first commanded of Abraham back in Gen 17, all his servants had to be circumcised—whether they believe in Abraham’s God or not. They were never even asked. And if circumcision – and, therefore, baptism – has nothing to do with the forgiveness of sin, it cannot be used as a basis for things like teaching that infants who die are in heaven because of their baptism.It’s not hard to press the presumed meaning of the connection between baptism and circumcision even farther—what about women? That question needs answering since women were not circumcised in Israel (that isn’t a silly thing to say, either, since Middle Eastern cultures even today practice female circumcision). Since Israelite women were not circumcised, they either weren’t members of the covenant community, or membership in the covenant community wasn’t exclusively linked to the act of circumcision – and that issue certainly affects how we’d look at the meaning of baptism.The Confusing Language of the CreedsReformed congregations are known for following creeds—not in the sense of (outwardly) substituting them for Scripture, but as distillations of biblical doctrine. Unfortunately, I’ve had many instances (in contexts like small groups) of asking people to explain the way the creeds articulate the doctrines of baptism and salvation—putting them side-by-side to see if the lack of clarity I was seeing was just my problem. It wasn’t. Some examples will help illustrate.THE BELGIC CONFESSIONARTICLE XXII – “Our Justification Through Faith in Jesus Christ”We believe that, to attain the true knowledge of this great mystery, the Holy Spirit kindles in our hearts an upright faith, which embraces Jesus Christ with all His merits, appropriates Him, and seeks nothing more besides Him. For it must needs follow, either that all things which are requisite to our salvation are not in Jesus Christ, or if all things are in Him, that then those who possess Jesus Christ through faith have complete salvation in Him.The important phrasing here is that believers “possess” Jesus Christ “through faith”. ?It’s a clear statement of the gospel. Continuing with the Article …Therefore, for any to assert that Christ is not sufficient, but that something more is required besides Him, would be too gross a blasphemy; for hence it would follow that Christ was but half a Savior.So, salvation is through Christ alone. That’s also clear. How does one get that salvation? “Possessing” Christ through faith. Also clear. Back to the creed…Therefore we justly say with Paul, that we are justified by faith alone, or by faith apart from works. However, to speak more clearly, we do not mean that faith itself justifies us, for it is only an instrument with which we embrace Christ our righteousness. But Jesus Christ, imputing to us all His merits, and so many holy works which He has done for us and in our stead, is our righteousness. And faith is an instrument that keeps us in communion with Him in all His benefits, which, when they become ours, are more than sufficient to acquit us of our sins.Faith is the conduit through which the benefits of Christ’s work come to the believer. We are saved by his merit, not our work – no merit of our own. The creed is clear here about the gospel and salvation. But watch how muddled things become when we hit baptism.ARTICLE XXXIV – Holy BaptismWe believe and confess that Jesus Christ, who is the end of the law, has made an end, by the shedding of His blood, of all other sheddings of blood which men could or would make as a propitiation or satisfaction for sin; and that He, having abolished circumcision, which was done with blood, has instituted the sacrament of baptism instead thereof; by which we are received into the Church of God, and separated from all other people and strange religions, that we may wholly belong to Him whose mark and ensign we bear; and which serves as a testimony to us that He will forever be our gracious God and Father.This part of the creed says plainly that those who are baptized belong to Christ. And anyone who knows even a little bit about the reformed tradition knows it practices infant baptism. One problem is now obvious: Every reformed church member or pastor knows someone who was baptized but who later forsook the faith. How is it, then, that this part of the Belgic Confession can be considered coherent?But there’s another problem. Just how does baptism make us belong to Christ? Is the intended meaning that baptism accomplishes this status (puts us in Christ – which the New Testament equates with salvation)? That would contradict what we just read in the Confession about salvation by grace through faith. Is the intended meaning that baptism only marks out those who belong to Christ? This idea would make baptism a sort of identifier of those who are elect and will believe – and so baptism has some connection to those who are in Christ anyway. But then how is it that people who are baptized can drift away from the faith? Were they “mis-marked” by baptism? If that is the case, then baptism as a rite has no efficacy for sure, but it also isn’t a completely accurate indicator of the elect, either – so what good is it, ultimately?Continuing with the creed’s Article on baptism …Therefore He has commanded all those who are His to be baptized with pure water … We believe, therefore, that every man who is earnestly studious of obtaining life eternal ought to be baptized but once with this only baptism, without ever repeating the same, since we cannot be born twice. Neither does this baptism avail us only at the time when the water is poured upon us and received by us, but also through the whole course of our life.Why do we need “pure” water for baptism? Does this water do something to the recipient that normal water wouldn’t? The language raises questions when it ought to be settling them.And why is the creed suggesting that if we get baptized more than once we’re born again more than once? That would suggest that baptism = being born again (and should only happen once).Lastly, how is it that the water of baptism does not “avail” us only when we get wet as babies, but through the whole course of our life? This again suggests that something connected (ultimately) to salvation is accomplished by the water or by the rite. But thinking back to circumcision—how so many circumcised Israelites became apostate idolaters—can we argue that circumcision “availed” those Israelites? Again, there is a transparent lack of theological consistency.HEIDELBERG CATECHISMQuestion 60 – How are thou righteous before God?Only by a true faith in Jesus Christ; so that, though my conscience accuse me, that I have grossly transgressed all the commandments of God, and kept none of them, and am still inclined to all evil; notwithstanding, God, without any merit of mine, but only of mere grace, grants and imputes to me, the perfect satisfaction, righteousness and holiness of Christ; even so, as if I never had had, nor committed any sin: yea, as if I had fully accomplished all that obedience which Christ has accomplished for me; inasmuch as I embrace such benefit with a believing heart.This was a succinct articulation of the biblical gospel. No confusion here. We move on to …Question 61 – Why sayest thou, that thou art righteous by faith only?Not that I am acceptable to God, on account of the worthiness of my faith; but because only the satisfaction, righteousness, and holiness of Christ, is my righteousness before God; and that I cannot receive and apply the same to myself any other way than by faith only.Question 65 – Since then we are made partakers of Christ and all his benefits by faith only, whence does this faith proceed?From the Holy Ghost, who works faith in our hearts by the preaching of the gospel, and confirms it by the use of the sacraments.You have to wonder here what it means that the Holy Ghost confirms the faith he gives by the sacraments? Do infants exercise faith? ?It is hard for me to believe the catechism would presume that. Reformed theology will of course seek to honor the connection between circumcision and baptism, but there is no scriptural affirmation that Abraham’s children believed when they were circumcised (or anyone’s children believed when circumcised at 8 days old). If one retreats to the idea that parents can believe for the, this fails in two respects: That isn’t affirmed in the Catechism’s statements about salvation by faith, nor is it affirmed anywhere in the Bible.The confusion mounts when we look at what the catechism says about the sacrament of baptism.Question 66 – What are the sacraments?The sacraments are holy visible signs and seals, appointed of God for this end, that by the use thereof, he may the more fully declare and seal to us the promise of the gospel, viz., that he grants us freely the remission of sin, and life eternal, for the sake of that one sacrifice of Christ, accomplished on the cross.This is interesting wording, and very common in a sacramental theology. ?Sacraments are “signs” and “seals”. The seal aspect is easy enough to understand: a sacrament is like a picture or analogy of some greater spiritual reality or point. But problems surface for sealing. What does it mean that the sacrament declares and “seals to us the promise of the gospel . . . the remission of sin, and life eternal, for the sake of the sacrifice of Christ”? ?Is this wording saying that all who are baptized (especially as infants) have the remission of sins “sealed to them”? That’s the most straightforward reading. This seems quite at odds with the clear articulation of the gospel that preceded this section of the catechism—and many folks I knew in reformed congregations thought so as well after reading the creeds.On to Question 67 …Are both word and sacraments, then, ordained and appointed for this end, that they may direct our faith to the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross, as the only ground of our salvation?Yes, indeed: for the Holy Ghost teaches us in the gospel, and assures us by the sacraments, that the whole of our salvation depends upon that one sacrifice of Christ which he offered for us on the cross.This wording is a little better, but still raises questions. The sacraments “direct our faith” to Christ. What does that mean? Is it a “pointer” (as in, oh, I see, that is what I am supposed to believe to have eternal life”), or is it some sort of spiritual kickstart to move us toward the gospel? If baptism does that, why does it fail when people don’t believe or apostasize?On to Question 71 …Where has Christ promised us, that he will as certainly wash us by his blood and Spirit, as we are washed with the water of baptism?In the institution of baptism, which is thus expressed: “Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost”, Matt. 28:19. And “he that believeth, and is baptized, shall be saved; but he that believeth not, shall be damned.” Mark 16:16. This promise is also repeated, where the scripture calls baptism “the washing of regenerations” and the washing away of sins. Tit. 3:5, Acts 22:16.Now we have a problem. The Titus 3:5 reference is not only taken completely out of context, it is even misquoted. Here’s the full verse and surrounding text:4 But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, 5he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, 6 whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, 7 so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.What saves is the “washing of the Holy Spirit” not water. There’s actually no water in these verses!The Acts 22:16 is also only partially quoted. Here’s the full verse and surrounding context:12 “And one Ananias, a devout man according to the law, well spoken of by all the Jews who lived there, 13 came to me, and standing by me said to me, ‘Brother Saul, receive your sight.’ And at that very hour I received my sight and saw him. 14 And he said, ‘The God of our fathers appointed you to know his will, to see the Righteous One and to hear a voice from his mouth; 15 for you will be a witness for him to everyone of what you have seen and heard. 16 And now why do you wait? Rise and be baptized and wash away your sins, calling on his name.’Who is being baptized here? Paul. When Paul gives his testimony in Scripture, does he refer to his baptism at the hand of Ananias, or his confrontation with the risen Christ that preceded it? It’s always the latter. ?When God speaks to Ananias to tell him to go baptize Paul, God makes it clear that he has already chosen Paul. Ananias himself says in Acts 9:17 these words:?“Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road by which you came has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” Ananias refers to Saul as “brother” before his baptism.Using Acts 22:16 to somehow suggest water baptism triggers forgiveness is theologically irresponsible and ignores a great deal of context and content in the New Testament.Question 74 …Are infants also to be baptized?Yes: for since they, as well as the adult, are included in the covenant and church of God; and since redemption from sin by the blood of Christ, and the Holy Ghost, the author of faith, is promised to them no less than to the adult;If you are a 5-point Calvinist you must take this wording as only true of the elect. And that raises another problem: Why, then, do baptized people in Bible-believing reformed Calvinistic churches go astray? How can the elect apostasize? For Calvinists who practice infant baptism, either their doctrine of baptism needs rethinking or their ideas about the perseverance of the elect need to be scrapped. You can’t have it both ways.At this point I should share some responses I’ve actually read or heard from reformed pastors and writers: “Well, if the infant’s parents were believers, the baptized infant doesn’t need to believe – the infant is part of the covenant relationship passed on by believing parents.”Think about that. So, if the faith of the parents is what really matters, then what’s the point of describing baptism this way? More significantly, it doesn’t answer the question. Sure, they get baptized and are in the covenant – so why did they apostasize again? It also doesn’t address the situation where adults’ are baptized who didn’t have believing parents, and the baptized adult ends up forsaking the faith. This is a response that avoids the issue, unless you want to say that people who reject the faith still go to heaven because of what someone else believes.I’ve also heard: “Baptism isn’t supposed to work for the non-elect.”Consequently, then, baptism does “work” for the elect. The language here quite plainly links salvation with baptism, but not in the manner of Catholicism to be sure. What about people who never get baptized? Was circumcision a ticket to salvation? The answer is it didn’t work at all and wasn’t intended to be a ticket to salvation. Israel as a nation was elect, and all Jewish males were to be circumcised. No one was “more Jewish than other Jewish people” — and yet most of the nation apostasized.WESTMINSTER CONFESSIONCHAP. XI – Of Justification1.Those whom God effectually calleth, He also freely justifieth: (Rom. 8:30, Rom. 3:24) not by infusing righteousness into them, but by pardoning their sins, and by accounting and accepting their persons as righteous; not for anything wrought in them, or done by them, but for Christ’s sake alone; nor by imputing faith itself, the act of believing, or any other evangelical obedience to them, as their righteousness; but by imputing the obedience and satisfaction of Christ unto them, they receiving and resting on Him and His righteousness by faith; which faith they have not of themselves, it is the gift of God.This is a very clear statement on the exclusive nature of justification, apart from any human act. The next paragraph of the Confession begins by reinforcing the first, but then manages to snatch confusion from the jaws of clarity .Faith, thus receiving and resting on Christ and His righteousness, is the alone instrument of justification yet is it not alone in the person justified, but is ever accompanied with all other saving graces, and is no dead faith, but worketh by love. (James 2:17,22,26, Gal. 5:6)?This is curious wording. One wonders what is meant by “other saving graces”– especially since baptism is viewed as a “sacrament” later in the confession. Let’s move to the sixth point in this section of the Confession…6.The justification of believers under the old testament was, in all these respects, one and the same with the justification of believers under the new testament.So, justification worked the same way under the OT as the NT. This is very important. I’ll come back to it in my criticisms of the baptism language in the confession. Let’s go there now…CHAP. XXVII. – Of the Sacraments1.Sacraments are holy signs and seals of the covenant of grace, immediately instituted by God, to represent Christ and His benefits; and to confirm our interest in Him: as also, to put a visible difference between those that belong unto the Church and the rest of the world; and solemnly to engage them to the service of God in Christ, according to His Word. (Rom. 6:3–4, 1 Cor. 10:16,21)2.There is, in every sacrament, a spiritual relation, or sacramental union, between the sign and the thing signified: whence it comes to pass, that the names and effects of the one are attributed to the other. (Gen. 17:10, Matt. 26:27–28, Tit. 3:5)Think about what we just read: “the names and effects” of the one are attributed to another.” So, in some way, the grace that is signified by the sign is present in the sign — the thing signified (grace) is “attributed” to the sign.Why do we need language like this? In my judgment, it seems there is some felt need or mystical superstition that something spiritual and unseen is happening when the sacrament is given or performed. This is poor logic that violates the continuity of salvation across the testaments the creed earlier affirmed. There is no Old Testament verse that says something mystical was happening with circumcision. ?Was grace somehow imparted or “triggered” at circumcision? What about Israelite girls and women who never got the sign?Let’s move to point number 4 in this section of the Confession…There be only two sacraments ordained by Christ our Lord in the Gospel; that is to say, Baptism, and the Supper of the Lord: neither of which may be dispensed by any, but by a minister of the Word lawfully ordained. (Matt. 28:19, 1 Cor. 11:20,23, 1 Cor. 4:1, Heb. 5:4)?I wonder why it would matter who performs baptism? This sounds very “mediatorial” to me, as though grace is being dispensed through a priestly figure. But let’s keep going …. To Chapter XXVIII on Baptism.1.Baptism is a sacrament of the new testament, ordained by Jesus Christ, (Matt. 28:19) not only for the solemn admission of the party baptized into the visible Church; (1 Cor. 12:13) but also to be unto him a sign and seal of the covenant of grace, (Rom. 4:11, Col. 2:11–12) of his ingrafting into Christ, (Gal. 3:27, Rom. 6:5) of regeneration, (Tit. 3:5) of remission of sins, (Mark 1:4) and of his giving up unto God, through Jesus Christ, to walk in newness of life. (Rom. 6:3–4) Which sacrament is, by Christ’s own appointment, to be continued in His Church until the end of the world. (Matt. 28:19–20)Here we learn that baptism is “a sign and seal” of certain things to the recipient: the covenant of grace, regeneration, remission of sins, and “giving up to God to walk in newness of life.” This language begs an obvious question: Where is the verse in the Bible that has circumcision being a sign of regeneration and remission of sins? Without this biblical evidence, what the confession says is in error. Circumcision was of course the sign of a covenant (the Abrahamic covenant) … but as Paul points out in Romans 4, discussing precisely the issue of circumcision, Abraham believed (i.e., accepted God’s grace) before he was circumcised. We cannot say Abraham’s salvation (his faith decision) was transferred to his family and his servants for many reasons, but most obviously (again) that many of his descendants turned away from Yahweh.4.Not only those that do actually profess faith in and obedience unto Christ, but also the infants of one, or both, believing parents, are to be baptized.This language is very interesting, since it distinguishes those who profess faith from infants who receive baptism. I’d agree. Infants are not believing anything when they get baptized. We’re all grateful that an infant is able to recognize where mommy’s milk comes from, much less put the burden of understanding the gospel on them. But the language of this point links infant baptism to election, and so we’re back to the problem of non-perseverance for many who are baptized (even of believing parents). If there is this link between the elect and the baptized, how does one account for baptized people who turn away from the faith?If listeners know their Calvinism or reformed theology well they see a conundrum clearly now: either the reformed doctrine of infant baptism is incorrect, or the doctrine of perseverance of the elect is incorrect. But now the Confession throws us a monkey wrench – or, perhaps, turns back on its own wording…5.Although it be a great sin to condemn or neglect his ordinance, (Luke 7:30, Exod. 4:24–26) yet grace and salvation are not so inseparably annexed unto it, as that no person can be regenerated, or saved, without it: (Rom. 4:11, Acts 10:2,4,22,31,45,47) or, that all that are baptized are undoubtedly regenerated. (Acts 8:13,23)Interestingly, the Confession appears to notice the problem I have been focusing on, and it denies that all who are baptized will be believers. But why then use the earlier language about baptism that suggests a link to belief and salvation? Why say anything like that at all? Why not separate the two more clearly, and say something to the effect that circumcision also failed to accomplish anything regarding salvation? Why not be clear?Unfortunately, the Confession at this point doubles back on itself by linking baptism to the dispensing of grace.6.The efficacy of Baptism is not tied to that moment of time wherein it is administered; (John 3:5,8) yet, notwithstanding, by the right use of this ordinance, the grace promised is not only offered, but really exhibited, and conferred, by the Holy Ghost, to such (whether of age or infants) as that grace belongeth unto, according to the counsel of God’s own will, in His appointed time.This is quite clear – grace is conferred at baptism to the recipient. Where does this grace come from? Where do we see the Bible affirm this about circumcision? ?And how, with this grace dispensed and received, is a baptized person ever able to forsake the faith? One can’t defend the Confession here by saying it’s not saving grace that is involved, since the point ends by confirming the recipient’s election.Having shown you the confusion, it’s time for some solutions. The difficulties evaporate with some simple, straightforward adjustments in thinking – adjustments that, frankly, are no more magical than being consistent with what is said and not said on both sides of the baptism and circumcision tandem.Resolving the DifficultiesOld Testament CircumcisionThe fundamental question to ask is: What did circumcision actually do and what didn’t it do? Let’s start with the latter – what circumcision did not do for its recipient.First, circumcision neither provided nor ensured salvation, nor did it lessen anyone’s sinful impulse. The Old Testament story is dramatically clear that most circumcised Israelites apostasized, turning to idolatry, prompting the curse of Yahweh in the form of the Exile. The fact that Israelite men were circumcised meant nothing with respect to their spiritual inclination or destiny. In fact, Paul specifically denies such an equation in Romans 4, where he labors to make the point that Abraham was justified prior to circumcision.Second, circumcision was not practiced on women. This may seem obvious, but female genital circumcision was and is still practiced among some cultures and religions in the Middle East. The fact that circumcision was only practiced on men in Israel should inform us that the cutting rite itself did nothing with respect to one’s ultimate spiritual destiny. If so, then women were excluded. As noted below, circumcision did mean something to Israelite women—the same thing that it meant for the men.Third, circumcision for men was practiced in other cultures besides Israel. Other ancient peoples, such as the Egyptians, practiced male circumcision. This tells us again that the rite itself had no efficacy in regard to salvation. Rather, its importance was in what the rite signified in conjunction with the promises God gave to Abraham and his descendants.The actual ritual of circumcision therefore had nothing to do with salvation or one’s propensity to seek the God of Israel. It also did not guarantee that the recipient was elect with respect to eventually expressing a steadfast faith in the God of Israel. If these presumed connections were valid, there is no explanation for Israel’s national apostasy. Likewise, we would have no explanation for how women were drawn to God or made part of the covenant, and we would expect Gentiles to become worshippers of Yahweh, the God of Israel.The Meaning of CircumcisionSo what did circumcision accomplish? What was its meaning?First, for both male and female Israelites, the sign of circumcision was a physical, visible reminder that their race — their very lives and the lives of their children — began as a supernatural act of God on behalf of Abraham and Sarah. Circumcision was a constant reminder of God’s grace to that original couple and their posterity. Undergoing circumcision did not bestow salvation; it was a reminder of the supernatural grace of God, in this case directed at a people whom God had chosen in love to give them the revelation of who He was and how to be rightly-related to Him.Second, for males, circumcision granted the recipient admission into the community of Israel—the community that had the exclusive truth of the true God. This truth included Yahweh’s covenant relationship with Israel and their need to have “circumcised hearts” (i.e., to believe in Yahweh’s promises and worship Him alone). In ancient patriarchal Israel, women were members of the community through marriage to a circumcised man or by being born to Israelite parents. Intermarriage with foreign men (i.e., those not circumcised and thus not part of Yahweh’s covenant community) was forbidden, a prohibition that maintained the purity of the membership. This purity was directly related to the spiritual significance of circumcision.To summarize, membership in the community was important for a specific reason: only this community had the truth—the “the oracles of God” as Paul called God’s revelation to Israel (Rom 3:2). Only Israel had the truth in regard to the nature of the true God among all gods and how one could be rightly related to him (i.e., the way of salvation). Yahweh had created this human community with the goal of giving Israel truth, the way of salvation. This exclusivity is what it meant in Old Testament theology to be “elect” or “chosen” (Deut 7:7). Election was not equated with salvation since, again, vast multitudes of elect Israelites were not saved from God’s curse in response to their unfaithfulness. Every Israelite member of the exclusive community had to believe in the covenant promises and worship only Yahweh, trusting that relationship to result in an afterlife with their God. Election and circumcision simply meant access to this truth.Now let’s apply this to baptism.Circumcision as an Analogy to BaptismIt is easy to see how the meaning and significance of circumcision connects to baptism, whether one’s position includes baptism of infants or not. Baptism of an infant makes that infant a member in the believing community, a local church. Hopefully, that church will teach the oracles of God, the way of salvation, so that the child will hear the gospel and believe. The hope would be the same for an adult recipient. When Abraham and his entire household (even servants) were circumcised, the account does not tell us who believed in Abraham’s God and who did not. The assumption was that, as the members of his household observed God’s blessing and Abraham’s faithfulness, they too would (eventually) believe. Membership in the family of God would both foster and sustain faith. These were God’s goals for Old Testament Israel as the people of God, and the same is true of the people of God known as the Church. The sign and rite have changed, but the theological point is the same.Taking the meaning of both circumcision and baptism as basically doing one thing for recipients—putting them in the community of faith to hear the truth—divorces both circumcision and baptism from salvation, immediately solving the problems we noted in the creeds in earlier podcasts. This perspective simply looks at the text for what circumcision meant in the lives of Israelites regardless of gender. It isn’t terribly complicated once we tear ourselves away from the creedal confusion and insist on the consistency of saying only about baptism what we can say about circumcision. That is how a biblical theology of baptism ought to be framed and articulated.Infant Baptism as a Loyalty Oath and Holy WarIn The Unseen Realm I wrote of baptism (via 1 Peter 3:14-22):Baptism, then, is not what produces salvation. It “saves” in that it reflects a heart decision: a pledge of loyalty to the risen Savior. In effect, baptism in New Testament theology is a loyalty oath, a public avowal of who is on the Lord’s side in the cosmic war between good and evil. But in addition to that, it is also a visceral reminder to the defeated fallen angels. Every baptism is a reiteration of their doom in the wake of the gospel and the kingdom of God. Early Christians understood the typology of this passage and its link back to the fallen angels of Genesis 6. Early baptismal formulas included a renunciation of Satan and his angels for this very reason.[1] Baptism was—and still is—spiritual warfare.How does this apply to infant baptism? Two ways present themselves most transparently.First, when parents have their infant baptized it is a pledge of loyalty to the gospel—but doesn’t replace the gospel. Parents desire to have their child placed into the believing community, where their children will be taught the truth about salvation—the “oracles of God” which, in view of the work of Christ, are equated with the gospel.Second, that act on the part of the parents is also a vow against the powers of darkness. The parents ritually participate in the events of 1 Peter 3. They remind the powers of darkness that they are defeated and will do everything in their power to present the truth of Jesus to the child so that the powers of darkness will lose yet another soul to Yahweh’s kingdom.[1] For example, see Tertullian: On the Crown, 3; On the Shows, 4; On the Soul, 35.3. See Ansgar Kelly, The Devil at Baptism: Ritual, Theology, and Drama (Cornell, 1985), 94–105.Chapter 39: Final VerdictThis chapter focuses primarily on the divine council scene in Revelation 4-5 and the 24 elders.?Bibliography included in the bookDerek Kidner, Ezra and Nehemiah: An Introduction and Commentary (vol. 12; Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1979)?J. J. M. Roberts, “The Divine King and the Human Community in Isaiah’s Vision of the Future,” in The Quest for the Kingdom of God: Studies in Honor of George E. Mendenhall (Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1983), 127-136?Joseph M. Baumgarten, “The Duodecimal Courts of Qumran, Revelation, and the Sanhedrin” Journal of Biblical Literature 95 (1976) 59–78?David E. Aune, Revelation 1–5 (vol. 52A; Word Biblical Commentary; Dallas: Word, Incorporated, 1998)On the divine council as backdrop to this passage, see pp. 303-305?G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation: a Commentary on the Greek Text (New International Greek Testament Commentary; Grand Rapids, MI; Carlisle, Cumbria: W.B. Eerdmans; Paternoster Press, 1999)?John D. W. Watts, Isaiah 1-33 (vol. 24, Revised Edition; Word Biblical Commentary; Nashville: Thomas Nelson, Inc., 2005)?Timothy M. Willis, Yahweh’s Elders (Isa 24,23): Senior Officials of the Divine Court,” Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 103:3 (1991): 375-385?C. C. Newman, “Jerusalem, Zion, Holy City,” Dictionary of the Later New Testament and Its Developments (ed. Ralph P. Martin and Peter H. Davids; Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1997)?Additional BibliographyHurtado, Larry W. “Revelation 4-5 in the Light of Jewish Apocalyptic Analogies,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament 8, no. 25 (1985): 105-124?Laszlo Gallusz, The Throne Motif in the Book of Revelation (The Library of New Testament Studies; Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2014)?Gottfried Schimanowski, “ ‘Connecting Heaven and Earth’: The Function of the Hymns in Rev. 4-5,” in Heavenly Realms and Earthly Realities in Late Antique Religions (ed. Ra’anan Boustan and Reed Annette Yoshiko; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 67-84?R. Dean Davis, The Heavenly Court Judgment of Revelation 4-5 (University Press of America, 1992)?Darrell D. Hannah, “The Throne of his Glory: The Divine Throne and Heavenly Mediators in Revelation and the Similitudes of Enoch,” Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft und die Kunde der ?lteren Kirche 94, no. 1-2 (2003): 68-96?Russell S. Morton, One upon the Throne and the Lamb: A Tradition Historical/Theological Analysis of Revelation 4-5 (Studies in Biblical Literature 110; Peter Lang, 2007)?David J. Halperin, The Faces of the Chariot: Early Jewish Responses to Ezekiel’s Vision (Texte und Studien zum antiken Judentum 16; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1988)?M. Himmelfarb, “Apocalyptic Ascent and the Heavenly Temple,” in Society of Biblical Literature 1987 Seminar Papers (ed. K. H. Richards; Atlanta: Scholars, 1987), 210–17Chapter 40: Foe from the NorthThis chapter focuses on antichrist traditions and their connection to the divine council worldview of the Old Testament.?Bibliography included in the bookCecelia Grave, “The Etymology of Northwest Semitic sapanu,” Ugarit Forschungen 12 (1980): 221-229?H. Niehr, “Zaphon,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)?Nicolas Wyatt, “The Titles of the Ugaritic Storm-God,” Ugarit Forschungen 24 (1992): 403-424?W. Herrmann, “Baal,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)?J. C. L. Gibson, “The Theology of the Ugaritic Baal Cycle,” Orientalia Roma 53:2 (1984): 202-219?W. Herrmann, “Baal Zebub,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)?E. C. B. MacLaurin, “Beelzeboul,” Novum Testamentum (1978): 156-160?Sverre B?e, Gog and Magog: Ezekiel 38-39 as Pre-text for Revelation 19, 17-21 and 20, 7-10 (WUNT 135; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2001)?William A. Tooman, Gog of Magog: Reuse of Scripture and Compositional Technique in Ezekiel 38-39 (FAT 52 Reihe 2; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011)?L. J. Lietaert Peerbolte, “Antichrist,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)?J. Lust, “Gog,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)?Daniel I. Block, The Book of Ezekiel. Chapters 25-48 (The New International Commentary on the Old Testament; Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1997-1998)?P. Heinisch, Das Buch Ezechiel übersetzt und erkl?rt, HSAT 8 (Bonn: Hanstein, 1923)?L. Zalcman, “Orion,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)?L. Zalcman, “Pleiades,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)?Charles E. Hill, “Antichrist from the Tribe of Dan.,” Journal of Theological Studies 46:1 (1995): 99-117?G. Mussies, “Titans,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)?G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation: a Commentary on the Greek Text (New International Greek Testament Commentary; Grand Rapids, MI; Carlisle, Cumbria: W.B. Eerdmans; Paternoster Press, 1999)?Additional Bibliography Geert Wouter Lorein, The Antichrist Theme in the Intertestamental Period (Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha 44; London: T & T Clark International, 2003)?W. Bousset, The Antichrist Legend, London: Hutchinson, 1896)?B. McGinn, Antichrist: Two Thousand Years of the Human Fascination with Evil (San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1994)?G. C. Jenks, The Origins and Early Development of the Antichrist Myth (BZNW 59; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1991)?Mark W. Bartusch, Understanding Dan: an Exegetical Study of a Biblical City, Tribe and Ancestor (Library Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies 379; Bloomsbury Publishing, 2003)?William C. Weinrich, “Antichrist in the Early Church,” Concordia Theological Quarterly 49 (1985): 135-47?William Horbury, “Antichrist among Jews and Gentiles,” in Jews in a Greco-Roman World (ed. Martin Goodman; Oxford University Press, 1998), 113-33?Frederick C. Grant, “The Eschatology of the Second Century,” The American Journal of Theology (1917): 193-211?Adylson Valdez, “Number 666 and the Twelve Tribes of Israel,” Revista Biblica 68:3/4 (206): 191-214?C. R. Smith, in “The Portrayal of the Church as the New Israel in the Names and Order of the Tribes in Revelation 7.5-8,” JSNT 39 (1990): 111-18?Nicholas M. Railton, “Gog and Magog: the History of a Symbol,” Evangelical Quarterly 75, no. 1 (2003): 23-44Chapter 41: Mount of AssemblyThis chapter discusses the term and concept “Armageddon” and explores its divine council connections.?Bibliography included in the bookMeredith Kline, “Har Magedon: The End of the Millennium,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 39:2 (June 1996): 207-222?C. C. Torrey, “Armageddon,” Harvard Theological Review 31 (1938): 237-248?Additional Bibliography Meredith G. Kline, God, Heaven, and Har Magedon: A Covenantal Tale of Cosmos and Telos (Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2006)?John Day, “The Origin of Armageddon: Revelation 16: 16 as an Interpretation of Zechariah 12: 11,” in Crossing the Boundaries: Essays in Biblical Interpretation in Honour of Michael D. Goulder (ed. S. Porter and P. Joyce; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1994), 315-26?Marko Jauhiainen, “The OT Background to ‘Armageddon’ (Rev. 16: 16) Revisited,” Novum Testamentum (2005): 381-393?This is a detailed critique of Day’s article (and of others, by extension) that defends a Megiddo understanding of the term “Armageddon.” Jauhainen connects the term to Isaiah 14:12 by a means other than transliteration of har mo?ed, the approach taken in the chapter. Instead, he plays off the verb gd? (???). This approach is conceptually compatible with the one espoused in The Unseen World.Chapter 42: Describing the IndescribableThis chapter, the final one on the book, deals with the transformation of the earth into the new Eden—the consummation of the kingdom-abode of God on earth with believers as glorified members of the divine council.?Bibliography included in the bookM. David. Litwa, We are Being Transformed: Deification in Paul’s Soteriology (BZNW 187; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2012)?Alan Scott, Origen and the Life of the Stars: The History of An Idea (Oxford Early Christian Studies; Oxford University Press, 1994?James H. Charlesworth, The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha (vol. 1; New York;?London: Yale University Press, 1983)?G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation: a Commentary on the Greek Text (New International Greek Testament Commentary; Grand Rapids, MI; Carlisle, Cumbria: W.B. Eerdmans; Paternoster Press, 1999)?C. Uehlinger, “Leviathan,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)?K. Spronk, “Rahab,” Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (Leiden; Boston; K?ln; Grand Rapids, MI; Cambridge: Brill; Eerdmans, 1999)?C. H. Gordon, “Leviathan: Symbol of Evil,” in Biblical Motifs: Origins and Transformations (ed. A. Altmann; Cambridge MA 1966) 1–9?John Day, God’s Conflict with the Dragon and the Sea (UCOP 35; Cambridge University Press, 1985)?M. K. Wakeman, God’s Battle with the Monster (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1973)?Additional Bibliography R. J. McKelvey, The New Temple: The Church in the New Testament (Oxford: Clarendon, 1969)?Robert H. Gundry, “The New Jerusalem: People as Place, not Place for People,” Novum Testamentum (1987): 254-264?Celia Deutsch, “Transformation of Symbols: The New Jerusalem in Rev 21 1–22 5,” Zeitschrift für die Neutestamentliche Wissenschaft und die Kunde der ?lteren Kirche 78, no. 1-2 (1987): 106-126?Dave Mathewson, A New Heaven and a New Earth: The Meaning and Function of the Old Testament in Revelation 21.1-22.5 (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2003)?Dave Mathewson, “The Destiny of the Nations in Revelation 21: 1-22: 5: A Reconsideration.” Tyndale Bulletin 53, no. 1 (2002): 121-142?Adela Yarbro Collins, The Combat Myth in the Book of Revelation (Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2001)?Steve Moyise, “Intertextuality and the use of Scripture in the Book of Revelation?” Scriptura: International Journal of Bible, Religion and Theology in Southern Africa 84 (2003): 391-401?M. Eugene Boring, “The Theology of Revelation: ‘The Lord Our God the Almighty Reigns’,” Interpretation 40, no. 3 (1986): 257-269?Pilchan Lee, The New Jerusalem in the Book of Revelation: a Study of Revelation 21-22 in the Light of its Background in Jewish Tradition (WUNT 129; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2001)?Jan A. Du Rand, “The New Jerusalem as Pinnacle of Salvation: Text (Rev 21: 1-22: 5) and Intertext,” Neotestamentica 38, no. 2 (2004): 125-153?Bruce Norman, “The Restoration of the Primordial World of Genesis 1–3 in Revelation 21–22,” Journal of the Adventist Theological Society 1997 (2002): 161-169?Jonathan Moo, “The Sea That is No More Rev 21: 1 and the Function of Sea Imagery in the Apocalypse of John,” Novum Testamentum 51, no. 2 (2009): 148-167?Daniel T. Lioy, “The Garden of Eden as a Primordial Temple or Sacred Space for Humankind,” Conspectus: The Journal of the South African Theological Seminary 10 (2010): 25-57?Gregory K. Beale, The Temple and the Church’s Mission: A Biblical Theology of the Dwelling Place of God (InterVarsity Press, 2004)?K. William Whitney, Two Strange Beasts: Leviathan and Behemoth in Second Temple and Early Rabbinic Judaism (Eisenbrauns, 2006)?Howard Wallace, “Leviathan and the Beast in Revelation,” The Biblical Archaeologist 11, no. 3 (1948): 61-68?John N. Day, “God and Leviathan in Isaiah 27,” Bibliotheca sacra 155 (1998): 423-36?Andela Jeli?i?, “The Leviathan and the Serpent in the Old Testament,” IKON 2, no. 1 (2009): 39-46?F. F. Bruce, “The Crooked Serpent,” Evangelical Quarterly 20 (1948): 283-88?Andrew Angel, Chaos and the Son of Man: the Hebrew Chaoskampf Tradition in the Period 515 BCE to 200 CE. (The Library of Second Temple Studies 60; Bloomsbury Publishing, 2006) ................
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