I have begun to read the Bible alphabetically (see here for my rationale), reading each book at least three times (in this case seven) and trying to get into the mind of the original author and readers as well as listen to God’s message for today. Here’s what I’ve discovered from reading Colossians.
First impressions:
What was Paul’s aim as he wrote this letter to a church he knows only by reputation?
First he compliments them and assures them of his (and his colleagues’) prayers. Then he explains the centrality of Christ in God’s scheme of things, and his own role as a servant of the gospel and of the church (and by implication his right to speak with authority). Then he comes to the heart of the matter – the danger in being led astray by plausible additions to the gospel, which would detract from a full reliance on Christ. Having established that what matters is Christ, he illustrates what kind of life that should lead people to live, giving lots of specific advice about appropriate behaviour. Finally he records news and greetings from some of his colleagues who are known to the Colossians.
Historical and Geographical context:
If the narrative in Acts is reasonably accurate, Paul spent some years in Ephesus, on the West coast of modern day Turkey, during which time the gospel spread into the surrounding countryside. If you travelled South a bit and then turned inland up the river Maeander for 100 miles to its headwaters you would reach a trio of towns called Laodicea, Colossae and Hierapolis, and beyond them the region of Phrygia. (This river’s wandering course is the origin of the word ‘meander’ and supposedly inspired Daedalus to construct his famous labyrinth.) In Paul’s day Colossae had lost something of its earlier prominence, but he surely knew of it, and years later, maybe whilst imprisoned awaiting trial in Rome, he heard news of the church there from one of its citizens, Epaphras.
This letter describes Christ in more exalted and mind-boggling terms than, say, the Jesus Paul talks about in Acts. So much so that some scholars believe the letter is the work of one of Paul’s disciples and written after his death. If that is true, then the author clearly had things to say which he felt would be best expressed by getting people to imagine Paul writing to the church at Colossae in response to news which had reached him in captivity. Therefore whoever wrote it, the best way of getting to grips with the message is to treat it as a letter by Paul. (A similar argument will apply to certain other Biblical books whose authorship is disputed.)
The Importance of Christ
When people were looking forward to the coming of the Messiah, they envisioned him as a human being anointed by God to rescue his people. Once the Messiah arrived and his followers got to know him as both Saviour and risen Lord, then their understanding deepened.
a) Christ existed before anything else (except God of course) and was responsible (with God) for creating the universe. In fact the whole universe was created ‘for him’. This makes Christ superior to all other earthly or heavenly powers in every conceivable way. He existed before they did. He made them. They only exist for his benefit.
b) Christ is the perfect image of God. There is no longer any mystery as to what God is really like. Christ has revealed God’s nature and purposes.
c) Christ had a job to do – to reconcile all things (all people and all the rest of creation) to God. He did this through his death on the cross. Because of what Christ has done God forgives sin and turns enemies into friends.
d) If the church is like a body, then Christ is its head. The church needs no other focal point. Christ as our head unites us, guides us, empowers us and gives our lives purpose and meaning.
What was going on in Colossae?
Reading between the lines, one of the problems at Colossae could have been gnosticism with its emphasis on secret knowledge as the key to understanding God and life. For Paul Christ alone is the key. All anyone needs to know of God is found in Christ. Paul expects and prays for the church to have a full knowledge of God. If there ever was a secret it is now out in the public domain, being proclaimed throughout the world, and being lived out by the Christian church. There is no need for initiation rites such as circumcision or for keeping strict rules about food. There are no magically significant days to conduct special rituals. The rite of Christian Baptism is not to divide those ‘in the know’ from the ignorant – it is a symbol of the change in our lives when we die and rise with Christ. Far from promoting divisions, Paul says that Christ is “all” and “in all”.
This is an encouraging letter. Its tone is: ‘I know you’re doing well – here’s how you can do even better.’ Unlike, say, Amos (‘This is what you’re doing wrong – stop it or else!’), Paul doesn’t actually accuse the Colossians of anything bad. He warns of false teaching and he lists some of the behaviour which they should avoid, but we shouldn’t therefore conclude that Colossae is a hotbed of heresy, indulgences of the flesh and broken relationships. What Paul actually says of them is all positive.
A message for today?
This letter is not primarily about individual behaviour, nor is it about the state of society as a whole, but it is about the life of a church – its beliefs, teaching, attitudes and lifestyle. There are some principles which individuals (or society) would do well to take note of, but by and large it is the church which should pay attention. The marks of the church which impressed Paul (in his opening summary) were their faith in Christ and their love for all the saints – his letter builds on these strengths by emphasising the importance of Christ and exploring the best ways to love others
The section for wives, husbands, children, fathers, slaves and masters illustrates that the appropriate attitude and behaviour depends on the nature of the relationship – these days marriage is seen as an equal partnership, and in some senses we recognise an inherent equality of all people (as does Paul – no Greek or Jew, slave or free etc), but there are still plenty of relationships where people have different roles – governors and governed, leaders and disciples, employers and employees, teachers and students, famous people and fans of famous people (dare I add breadwinners and homemakers?) The same basic principles apply – understand your role and fulfil it to the best of your ability, whilst taking into account that the person in the other role is also a human being with feelings and needs.
Paul was never a lone evangelist. He always worked in a team. This letter mentions eleven other people who helped build up the church.
Jews with Paul: Aristarchus (a fellow prisoner); Mark; Jesus known as Justus
Gentiles with Paul: Timothy (co-author); Epaphras (founder of church); Doctor Luke; Demas
Messengers delivering the letter: Tychicus; Onesimus
In Colossae: Nympha (host to a church meeting); Archippus
We meet some of these people elsewhere in the New Testament, indeed two of them wrote gospels. The only reason we know Luke was a doctor is that he is so designated in this letter. Imagine how many simple facts like this remain unknown. These people lived full and interesting lives and we know so little about them. It’s as if I went down in church history as ‘the minister with brightly coloured socks’ and no-one knew or remembered anything else about me.
If Mark was the cousin of Barnabas, then it’s no wonder that (in Acts) Barnabas was willing to give him a second chance when Paul wasn’t. It’s good to see that by this point all parties seem to be reconciled.
A final bit of self-analysis
There are many parts of the Bible which I am happy to re-interpret for today. “Wives be subject to your husbands” is an example. I try to see such passages in their original context and work out what message the writer was trying to convey and why it was important to him (and it probably was ‘him’ not ‘her’). With historical narrative I will often wonder ‘did it really happen like that?’. Sometimes I think it probably did, sometimes I’m fairly certain it didn’t. What the author was wanting to say is more important to me than historical accuracy. In other words I am willing to see the Biblical writers as fallible in recording facts and contextually biased in moral teaching. So why is it that some passages I not only take at face value, but see as absolutely essential to my faith? For example, the idea that Christ has always existed with God and through him everything in heaven and earth was created. There is no way I could ever dismiss that concept as if it were just someone’s idea and they may have got it wrong. Perhaps it’s because the moral and historical aspects need to be reconciled with everyday life whereas the grand supernatural concepts don’t. Or perhaps I am subconsciously doing what Paul advocates in this letter – relying fully on Christ and taking mere human authority with a pinch of salt.
Thursday 16 July 2009
Monday 6 July 2009
ABR#3 Chronicles
I have begun to read the Bible alphabetically (see here for my rationale), reading each book three times (in different translations) and trying to get into the mind of the original author and readers as well as listen to God’s message for today. Here’s what I’ve discovered from reading Chronicles.
A caveat regarding Kings
As far as possible I have tried not to make comparisons with the other book of the Bible covering a similar historical period. Rather I wanted to get to grips with the story as told by the Chronicler. Here is my one comment based on what I know from outside Chronicles: The fate of those tribes East of the Jordan is the only hint of Assyria conquering Israel (i.e. the northern kingdom as opposed to Judah in the south). Perhaps the annihilation of Israel was so well known and tragic that the Chronicler didn’t want to mention it further.
The basic structure of the book
Within the first few pages the whole of human history has been covered, from Adam down to the ‘present day’ descendants of King Jehoiachin (taken captive by Babylon). Chronicles continues to record in detail a number of family trees and all the places they settled. There are many snippets of information about what these families did. For example I hadn’t realised that the line of Saul and Jonathan continued to grow and one branch of the family became outstanding soldiers and archers.
The shift from lists of names to historical events is gradual. The narrative snippets become longer passages, but the chronology remains a bit wayward – for example, the first longish narrative, the death of Saul and his sons, is followed by some of David’s earlier exploits. Lists of names, achievements and duties – soldiers, Levites, musicians, heads of clans, craftsmen, Temple guards – continue to feature throughout the first volume. The lists and figures in the second volume are much shorter and more sporadic.
The arrangements for the building and running of the Temple feature heavily. The entire thing is planned by David, who delegates the actual implementation to his son, Solomon. Throughout the book David is referred to as the one who decided on the priestly duties.
Eventually the book settles into an account of the successive kings of Judah, describing their attitudes to God and the battles with their neighbours. After the deportation to Babylon the book ends with the decree of the Persian emperor (the new world power) that God’s people should return to Judah and rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem.
Author and purpose
The writer was something of an anorak – he had clearly trawled through the records to obtain lots of facts and figures. If he was alive today he would be a royalist and a high Anglo-Catholic, with a fascination for genealogy and an obsession with detail.
Chronicles is in some respects a history of the Temple. The reign of David’s predecessor is irrelevant. David’s most important deeds are to make Jerusalem the capital city and to plan the Temple rituals. The later northern kingdom (with no temple) goes largely unmentioned. The record of the kings’ activities centres around how much they encourage or oppose the other places of worship and how faithful they are to the rituals laid down by David. Once the Temple has been destroyed there is not much left to say.
Assuming the book was written to encourage the returned exiles as they rebuilt their nation, the author seems to have been trying to do three things. a) Remind the people of their roots. Names unfamiliar to us may have been honoured ancestors of the first readers. b) Give the people pride in their heritage. The line of David ruled over them for many generations with God’s support and blessing. c) Ensure the people take seriously the worship of the one true God. When all was well with the Temple and its rituals, then the nation prospered.
Statistics
It is ironic that David’s only recorded failure is his insistence, against all advice, to hold a census of his people. This angered God enough to result in the deaths of 70,000. Yet the writer of the book relies on such census records for his facts and figures and Solomon later conducted a census of foreigners without suffering any adverse consequences. This failure of David is significant because the threshing floor where the angel of death refrained from further slaughter became the site of the Temple. This is also the one place where Satan interferes. His stirring things up is the catalyst which leads (eventually) to the existence of the Temple – an example of God taking something evil and using it for good
I didn’t find the early genealogies as relentlessly boring as I expected. For example, they include the prayer of Jabez (subject of a best-selling book), plus the second shortest verse in Bible. (This depends on which translation you use and whether you included punctuation, but counting the number of letters “Eber, Peleg, Reu” comes between “Jesus wept” and “Rejoice always”.)
According to these early passages, at least 7 of 12 tribes have survivors living in the ‘present day’. Although the focus is on Judah, the Chronicler wants to remind people that all the descendants of Israel are God’s people. When David was proclaimed king he had many supporters join him from other tribes, so that he truly represented the whole of Israel. When the northern tribes revolted, it was part of God’s plan – maybe so that the faithful worshippers would leave the rebels and gather in one place.
Not all details are as neat as I’d like. Who were the famous three? (only two are named) Who were the thirty? Who was their chief? (different names are mentioned – perhaps the leadership changed over time). There are rough edges and loose ends, but I suspect like any genealogical research there are branches of the family where lots is known and others where information is scant.
Kings
The behaviour of the kings (and to a lesser extent the people too) is not judged on such qualities as ruling with justice and showing compassion to the poor (the kind of values Amos was so passionate about) but on two basic principles: a) Worship Yahweh in the right way – i.e. only in the Temple and using the rituals laid down by Moses and David, and therefore get rid of all other altars and centres of worship, especially where pagan rituals were performed in the name of heathen gods. b) In the face of military threat, don’t go seeking allies but simply rely of Yahweh to keep you safe.
There’s a sense of God trying to do something new with one particular nation – getting them to trust him enough to rely on him when it came to battles, and demonstrating their commitment by carefully keeping to the ordained methods of worship. This wasn’t the natural way for people to behave and time and again they slipped back into the habit of relying on themselves and worshipping the gods they wanted in the way they wanted.
Starting with David, Judah had 21 kings and 1 queen. 12 were good and 9 were bad. (One’s reign was so short that his morality goes unrecorded.) Four kings started well, but went astray later in their reign. For example, Joash was made king as a boy through the initiative of the priest Jehoiada, who continued to advise him well and the neglected Temple was given a makeover. When Jehoiada died Joash went to the bad. One king (Manasseh) was wicked for many years but in later life repented and did what pleased God.
Temple and Ritual
The reason the first journey with the Ark was a disaster (with Uzzah being struck down for touching it) was that it should have been the Levites responsibility to move the Ark. David put this right on his second attempt.
The Temple was 24m long by 9m wide. That’s the width of our present house not including the utility room, and a bit longer than our back garden. You could fit the Temple comfortably onto our plot of land. It was of modest size (by today’s standards) but richly decorated. Over four hundred years the Temple was left to decay or had the gold stripped from it and needed refurbishment more than once.
I can’t reconcile the modest size of the Temple with the tonnage of gold David collected to decorate it. Imagine a 100m long frigate (four times the length of the Temple) made of solid gold. Alongside that imagine an early passenger liner such as the Lusitania – four huge funnels and over 200m long – made of solid silver. Not to mention the unlimited supplies of bronze, iron, wood and stone. It is also difficult to imagine how the thousands of Levites assigned to work in the Temple found enough to occupy them. Perhaps the actual Temple was only the focal point of a whole worship complex which needed an army of workers to run it.
At the opening of the Temple Solomon prayed “if there are problems and people pray, hear them and help them”. Later God came to Solomon and assured him that he would indeed do that. He also assured him that his line would last for ever, but there was a proviso – “if you continue to observe my laws”, otherwise the royal house will be ruined as a warning to others. Such conditional blessings seem strange when compared with the grace revealed in Jesus – that eternal life is a free gift and not something we earn.
But there is a lesson here – life is not just about getting on with it and making the best of it you can. There are definite right and wrong ways to go about things. According to the Chronicler, God doesn’t actually say ‘worship me any way you want and that will be OK by me’, rather he says ‘this is how to live, this is how to serve me, this is how to worship.’ These days we do have a vast variety of worship-styles, but maybe the principle of all worship should not be “how do I want to do this?” or “what am I comfortable with?” or “what will satisfy me?” but “what kind of worship will please God?”
Miscellaneous thoughts
“Give thanks to the LORD, invoke his name” – far from not being allowed to speak God’s name out loud (which came in later Jewish tradition), David expected his people to savour it, to rejoice in it, to have God’s name constantly on their lips. We sing “How sweet the name of Jesus sounds...” It would be crazy if Christians instead decided it was disrespectful ever to utter the name ‘Jesus’!
David wanted to build a house for God. God refused, but instead decided to build a house for David. Whatever we do (or try to do) for God, he is able to do so much more for us.
The idea often expressed in the offertory prayer – “All things come from you and of your own do we give you” – is what David said when he and the people had made their contributions towards the building of the Temple.
According to David, God laid down the plans for the Temple and David was responsible for the details. This is a different view from those who think God plans each minute aspect of our lives.
When Joash ordered Zechariah, son of his childhood advisor, to be stoned for prophesying against him, Zechariah’s dying words were “May the Lord see this and exact the penalty.” Compare this with Stephen’s dying words (in Acts) “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.”
Israel and its kings are often referred to as bad examples, but they had moments of goodness – for example the compassion shown to the Judean prisoners (albeit at the instigation of a prophet).
Hezekiah insisted on people purifying themselves for Passover, but when visitors came from Israel who hadn’t been able to do so he prayed that God would allow them to participate anyway and God agreed. Even for someone as obsessive over outward ritual as the Chronicler is, sincerity of heart is more important than outward purification.
A caveat regarding Kings
As far as possible I have tried not to make comparisons with the other book of the Bible covering a similar historical period. Rather I wanted to get to grips with the story as told by the Chronicler. Here is my one comment based on what I know from outside Chronicles: The fate of those tribes East of the Jordan is the only hint of Assyria conquering Israel (i.e. the northern kingdom as opposed to Judah in the south). Perhaps the annihilation of Israel was so well known and tragic that the Chronicler didn’t want to mention it further.
The basic structure of the book
Within the first few pages the whole of human history has been covered, from Adam down to the ‘present day’ descendants of King Jehoiachin (taken captive by Babylon). Chronicles continues to record in detail a number of family trees and all the places they settled. There are many snippets of information about what these families did. For example I hadn’t realised that the line of Saul and Jonathan continued to grow and one branch of the family became outstanding soldiers and archers.
The shift from lists of names to historical events is gradual. The narrative snippets become longer passages, but the chronology remains a bit wayward – for example, the first longish narrative, the death of Saul and his sons, is followed by some of David’s earlier exploits. Lists of names, achievements and duties – soldiers, Levites, musicians, heads of clans, craftsmen, Temple guards – continue to feature throughout the first volume. The lists and figures in the second volume are much shorter and more sporadic.
The arrangements for the building and running of the Temple feature heavily. The entire thing is planned by David, who delegates the actual implementation to his son, Solomon. Throughout the book David is referred to as the one who decided on the priestly duties.
Eventually the book settles into an account of the successive kings of Judah, describing their attitudes to God and the battles with their neighbours. After the deportation to Babylon the book ends with the decree of the Persian emperor (the new world power) that God’s people should return to Judah and rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem.
Author and purpose
The writer was something of an anorak – he had clearly trawled through the records to obtain lots of facts and figures. If he was alive today he would be a royalist and a high Anglo-Catholic, with a fascination for genealogy and an obsession with detail.
Chronicles is in some respects a history of the Temple. The reign of David’s predecessor is irrelevant. David’s most important deeds are to make Jerusalem the capital city and to plan the Temple rituals. The later northern kingdom (with no temple) goes largely unmentioned. The record of the kings’ activities centres around how much they encourage or oppose the other places of worship and how faithful they are to the rituals laid down by David. Once the Temple has been destroyed there is not much left to say.
Assuming the book was written to encourage the returned exiles as they rebuilt their nation, the author seems to have been trying to do three things. a) Remind the people of their roots. Names unfamiliar to us may have been honoured ancestors of the first readers. b) Give the people pride in their heritage. The line of David ruled over them for many generations with God’s support and blessing. c) Ensure the people take seriously the worship of the one true God. When all was well with the Temple and its rituals, then the nation prospered.
Statistics
It is ironic that David’s only recorded failure is his insistence, against all advice, to hold a census of his people. This angered God enough to result in the deaths of 70,000. Yet the writer of the book relies on such census records for his facts and figures and Solomon later conducted a census of foreigners without suffering any adverse consequences. This failure of David is significant because the threshing floor where the angel of death refrained from further slaughter became the site of the Temple. This is also the one place where Satan interferes. His stirring things up is the catalyst which leads (eventually) to the existence of the Temple – an example of God taking something evil and using it for good
I didn’t find the early genealogies as relentlessly boring as I expected. For example, they include the prayer of Jabez (subject of a best-selling book), plus the second shortest verse in Bible. (This depends on which translation you use and whether you included punctuation, but counting the number of letters “Eber, Peleg, Reu” comes between “Jesus wept” and “Rejoice always”.)
According to these early passages, at least 7 of 12 tribes have survivors living in the ‘present day’. Although the focus is on Judah, the Chronicler wants to remind people that all the descendants of Israel are God’s people. When David was proclaimed king he had many supporters join him from other tribes, so that he truly represented the whole of Israel. When the northern tribes revolted, it was part of God’s plan – maybe so that the faithful worshippers would leave the rebels and gather in one place.
Not all details are as neat as I’d like. Who were the famous three? (only two are named) Who were the thirty? Who was their chief? (different names are mentioned – perhaps the leadership changed over time). There are rough edges and loose ends, but I suspect like any genealogical research there are branches of the family where lots is known and others where information is scant.
Kings
The behaviour of the kings (and to a lesser extent the people too) is not judged on such qualities as ruling with justice and showing compassion to the poor (the kind of values Amos was so passionate about) but on two basic principles: a) Worship Yahweh in the right way – i.e. only in the Temple and using the rituals laid down by Moses and David, and therefore get rid of all other altars and centres of worship, especially where pagan rituals were performed in the name of heathen gods. b) In the face of military threat, don’t go seeking allies but simply rely of Yahweh to keep you safe.
There’s a sense of God trying to do something new with one particular nation – getting them to trust him enough to rely on him when it came to battles, and demonstrating their commitment by carefully keeping to the ordained methods of worship. This wasn’t the natural way for people to behave and time and again they slipped back into the habit of relying on themselves and worshipping the gods they wanted in the way they wanted.
Starting with David, Judah had 21 kings and 1 queen. 12 were good and 9 were bad. (One’s reign was so short that his morality goes unrecorded.) Four kings started well, but went astray later in their reign. For example, Joash was made king as a boy through the initiative of the priest Jehoiada, who continued to advise him well and the neglected Temple was given a makeover. When Jehoiada died Joash went to the bad. One king (Manasseh) was wicked for many years but in later life repented and did what pleased God.
Temple and Ritual
The reason the first journey with the Ark was a disaster (with Uzzah being struck down for touching it) was that it should have been the Levites responsibility to move the Ark. David put this right on his second attempt.
The Temple was 24m long by 9m wide. That’s the width of our present house not including the utility room, and a bit longer than our back garden. You could fit the Temple comfortably onto our plot of land. It was of modest size (by today’s standards) but richly decorated. Over four hundred years the Temple was left to decay or had the gold stripped from it and needed refurbishment more than once.
I can’t reconcile the modest size of the Temple with the tonnage of gold David collected to decorate it. Imagine a 100m long frigate (four times the length of the Temple) made of solid gold. Alongside that imagine an early passenger liner such as the Lusitania – four huge funnels and over 200m long – made of solid silver. Not to mention the unlimited supplies of bronze, iron, wood and stone. It is also difficult to imagine how the thousands of Levites assigned to work in the Temple found enough to occupy them. Perhaps the actual Temple was only the focal point of a whole worship complex which needed an army of workers to run it.
At the opening of the Temple Solomon prayed “if there are problems and people pray, hear them and help them”. Later God came to Solomon and assured him that he would indeed do that. He also assured him that his line would last for ever, but there was a proviso – “if you continue to observe my laws”, otherwise the royal house will be ruined as a warning to others. Such conditional blessings seem strange when compared with the grace revealed in Jesus – that eternal life is a free gift and not something we earn.
But there is a lesson here – life is not just about getting on with it and making the best of it you can. There are definite right and wrong ways to go about things. According to the Chronicler, God doesn’t actually say ‘worship me any way you want and that will be OK by me’, rather he says ‘this is how to live, this is how to serve me, this is how to worship.’ These days we do have a vast variety of worship-styles, but maybe the principle of all worship should not be “how do I want to do this?” or “what am I comfortable with?” or “what will satisfy me?” but “what kind of worship will please God?”
Miscellaneous thoughts
“Give thanks to the LORD, invoke his name” – far from not being allowed to speak God’s name out loud (which came in later Jewish tradition), David expected his people to savour it, to rejoice in it, to have God’s name constantly on their lips. We sing “How sweet the name of Jesus sounds...” It would be crazy if Christians instead decided it was disrespectful ever to utter the name ‘Jesus’!
David wanted to build a house for God. God refused, but instead decided to build a house for David. Whatever we do (or try to do) for God, he is able to do so much more for us.
The idea often expressed in the offertory prayer – “All things come from you and of your own do we give you” – is what David said when he and the people had made their contributions towards the building of the Temple.
According to David, God laid down the plans for the Temple and David was responsible for the details. This is a different view from those who think God plans each minute aspect of our lives.
When Joash ordered Zechariah, son of his childhood advisor, to be stoned for prophesying against him, Zechariah’s dying words were “May the Lord see this and exact the penalty.” Compare this with Stephen’s dying words (in Acts) “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.”
Israel and its kings are often referred to as bad examples, but they had moments of goodness – for example the compassion shown to the Judean prisoners (albeit at the instigation of a prophet).
Hezekiah insisted on people purifying themselves for Passover, but when visitors came from Israel who hadn’t been able to do so he prayed that God would allow them to participate anyway and God agreed. Even for someone as obsessive over outward ritual as the Chronicler is, sincerity of heart is more important than outward purification.
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