Month: November 2010

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Old Testament

Daniel rises high in the administration of the conquerer, Darius the Mede. This causes others to be jealous of him, and they decide to use Daniel’s religion as a snare. They get the king, who seems to be as unthinking as the king in Esther, that anyone who prays to anyone or anything other than the king in the next 30 days should be thrown into the den of lions. One wonders if ancient kings were really that “yeah, sure, whatever” about signing laws. Or that the king would not have noticed that one of his favorites, Daniel, regularly prayed to a deity; these officials noticed it, so Daniel was obviously not keeping it a secret.

In any case, Daniel defies the law and is caught. Again, as in Esther, the law cannot be revoked. The king reluctantly gives Daniel to the lions, but Daniel, of course, is miraculously saved. The king gets his revenge by having the men who plotted against Daniel, along with their wives and children, thrown into the den of lions. That’s a rather unfair punishment. Maybe, just maybe, killing the plotters can be justified (better to just strip them of their positions, in my opinion), but killing their families is cruel.

The upshot of this is that Darius, like Nebuchadnezzar before him, declares Daniel’s God to be totally awesome. Daniel continued to prosper.

New Testament

We finish 2 Peter today. The author declares that in the last days, people will scoff at those who believe that Jesus is returning. The author also revisits the Hebrew idea of the primordial waters out from which the earth was brought. Does he he really believe that cosmology or is he referring to it symbolically?

The author then gives the ultimate cop out for Jesus’ tardiness in returning: God’s time is not our time. Now, if that had been a consistent message, I would not call it a cop out. However, previous authors who referred to the nearness of the end times sure sounded pretty convinced that when they said (or, if you’d like, were inspired to say) that the end times were near, they meant near in human terms. In any case, the longer God waits, the more people will be saved. But the “give people more time to be saved argument” is rather weak when you consider that birth and death are constantly renewing the population.

The author of 2 Peter also seems to look forward to the destruction of everything. In the meantime, the believers should live peaceful lives. He closes by warning people not be get carried away by erroneous beliefs.

Psalms and Proverbs

Today’s second proverb is fairly straight forward:

Greedy people try to get rich quick
but don’t realize they’re headed for poverty.

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Old Testament

Today’s reading is a great story!

A new king reigns. King Belshazzar has taken over the kingdom from his father and feasts with his nobles, wives, and concubines. At one feast, he chooses to drink from the cups that his father took from the Jerusalem temple. As Belshazzar and his court do so, a mysterious hand starts to write on the wall.

Fearful and trembling, Belshazzar calls his wise men and astrologers, but none of them can tell him what it means. Fortunately, the king’s mother remembers Daniel’s wisdom. Daniel comes, rejects the king’s offer of gifts (which he later ends up accepting), and interprets the message. The king has dishonored the true God in favor of idols. His days are numbered and his kingdom will be divided. That night, Belshazzar is killed and his kingdom conquered by Darius the Mede.

Note that historians have not been able to identify a period of Mede rule over Babylon (in fact, there are strong reasons to doubt it), and the conquerer, Darius the Mede, is unknown. This is considered further support for this being historical fiction rather than history.

New Testament

The author of 2 Peter is not a big fan of legitimate disagreement. In his view, there seem to be people who are right and people who are knowingly deceiving others. Today’s reading is all about how evil and terrible false teachers are. Now, there are false teachers in this world (I personally believe Christians are among them), but I see no need to demonize them. Teach people critical thinking skills and let the true teachers and the false teachers be separated based on evaluation of the truth of their teachings.

But I suppose by that criteria, the so called true teachers of religion would be indistinguishable from the false ones.

Psalms and Proverbs

Today’s proverbs praise hard work and honesty.

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Old Testament

Today’s reading starts with a the interpreting of a new dream. This is conveyed to the read in the form of a letter Nebuchadnezzar sent to “the people of every race and nation and language throughout the world.” This letter praises the God of Daniel and, perhaps more shockingly for a king, advertises Nebuchadnezzar’s personal fright and terror and insanity. Such a setup rather defies belief, lending further support to the idea that this is fiction.

The retelling also hints that the author of this story may have thought the world was flat: Nebuchadnezzar’s dream involved a very large tree growing in the middle of the earth which reached high to the heavens.

In any case, Daniel interprets the dream of the tree, which is cut down, as the cutting down of Nebuchadnezzar’s glory and his subsequent suffering. Not much later, this comes true and, for reasons unspecified, Nebuchadnezzar is claimed to have been driven from human society for “seven periods of time.”

After this, the king is restored to sanity, and he praises and worships the Most High (presumably the God of Daniel). Upon regaining his sanity, he wins back his kingdom. Really now? The king runs off in his insanity for a long enough period for her hair and nails to become long, and he just gets his kingdom back when he becomes sane again. My suspension of disbelief is strained, even for fiction.

In anycase, that ends today’s reading.

New Testament

New book! We’re just plowing through them now (not surprising given that we only have 35 more days to go). Let’s see what Understanding The Bible has to say about 2 Peter:

Incorporating most of Jude into his second chapter, a second-century Christian writing in Peter’s name attacks false teachers and urges a return to the apocalyptic hope of apostolic times. Explaining the delayed Parousia as God’s means of allowing more people to repent, the author outlines the “three worlds” of apocalyptic history.

Well, that’s not particularly clarifying. Let’s see what else Harris has to say. On authorship and date of composition:

Only a few reputable New Testament scholars defend the Petrine authorship of 2 Peter, which is believed to have been written by an anonymous churchman in Rome about 140-150 CE. The book’s late date is confirmed by (1) the fact that it incorporates most of Jude, itself a second-century work; (2) its references to Paul’s letters as “Scripture”, a status they did not attain until the mid-second century; and (3) its concern with the delayed Parousia, which would not have been a problem for believers until after the apostolic generation. In addition, many leaders of the early church doubted 2 Peter’s authorship, resulting in the epistle’s absence from most lists of “approved” books well into the fourth century. Not only was 2 Peter one of the last works to gain entrance into the New Testament, but scholars believe that it was the last (eventually canonized) book written.

With as much certainty as one can have with history, it sounds like this book was not written by the apostle Peter, despite the author’s efforts to try to establish himself as the apostle.

Topically, once the author has opened the letter and established his credentials, the book will deal with the destruction of the universe and why the second coming has been delayed.

On to today’s reading!

Today’s reading encourages the believers to live moral, loving lives. This will bring them greater knowledge of Jesus and prove that they are among the chosen. The believers are then instructed to pay attention to the teachings thy have received. To emphasize the importance of his teachings, the author attempts to strengthen his credentials by claiming that he was there when God declared, “This is my dearly loved Son, who brings me great joy.” The problem is, the very thing that makes this an example likely to be recognized by his readers (the fact that this incident, presumably, widely known) is exactly what makes it unconvincing as proof that the author was there.

In any case, the author then goes on to emphasize that the words of the prophets came to them when they were moved by the Holy Spirit, and should be given the authority appropriate to such holy origins.

Psalms and Proverbs

Nothing of particular note.

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Old Testament

Today our heroes go from near death to triumph and back around again.

Daniel correctly sees Nebuchadnezzar’s dream. The king has dreamed of a statue whose body parts degrade from gold at the top to a mix of iron and clay at the bottom. This represents the declining value and (until the iron and clay mix) decreasing mix of Babylon and the kingdoms that follow it. The final kingdom is hit by a stone from God and the whole statue comes tumbling down. This, according to Daniel, represents God’s eventual destruction of these kingdoms with an everlasting kingdom of God. Many times since this dream became scripture, people have tried to show that they were living in the last kingdom and God’s kingdom would soon appear. Time and time again, they have been wrong.

This success causes the king to richly reward Daniel, and Daniel uses his new found favor to elevate his friends. However, his friends run into trouble when they refuse to bow down and worship a golden statue of King Nebuchadnezzar. The king orders them thrown into a fire, but they are protected by an angel and come out alive. Based on this, the king decides that their God is awesome, promotes the men, and orders everyone to respect their God.

I do enjoy a good story, and so far the Book of Daniel is turning out to be exactly that.

New Testament

Today’s reading starts out with a clear statement of the author’s belief that the end times were coming soon:

The end of the world is coming soon. Therefore, be earnest and disciplined in your prayers.

Funny how that hasn’t worked out so well. The standard excuse for this is that the end is soon in God’s time, not human time. However, one would think that such a caveat would have been mentioned here. Otherwise, a book written by a human author (even if he were inspired) for a human audience would obviously be interpreted as a reasonably human definition of soon (less than thousands of years). Or, perhaps, the inspired author misinterpreted the message given to him, but that opens up a whole host of other problems for believers.

In any case, because the end times are near, people should love and help each other and use their spiritual gifts to serve one another. They should be glad at the suffering they experience for being a Christian (but they should make certain that they are suffering for that and not for doing evil).

The author then describes how elders should care for their flock and young men should obey their elders in the church (an idea so prone to abuse, as we have seen in our own times). People should be humble and watch out for the traps of the devil.

Finally, today’s reading with the closing passages of the letter.

Psalms and Proverbs

Proverbs about wicked rulers.

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Old Testament

Happy Thanksgiving for those of you in the US! Today I am thankful that we finally finished Ezekiel (and many, many more non-Bible related things).

Today we start the book of Daniel. Let’s see what Understanding The Bible has to say about it (from the introduction to apocalyptic literature as well as the section on Daniel).

First off, it’s an apocalypse:

As a literary category, an apocalypse is a written description of dimensions or events ordinarily closed to human view, such as the invisible realm of heaven or the future course of history. In the Hebrew Bible, only Daniel is a fully apocalyptic work, although there are apocalyptic elements in [other books of the Hebrew Bible]. … 

Unique as it appears to some readers, Daniel belongs to a long literary tradition that produced many similar apocalyptic works. …

Apocalyptic literature typically is concerned with eschatology — speculations about “last things.” … The belief that people will experience an afterlife, typically through resurrection of the body, is a by-product of the  apocalyptic movement

Harris also points out that pseudonymous books became more prevalent after the time of Ezra since the age of prophecy was considered to have ended at that time. Daniel is a pseudonymous work:

Pseudonymity was a device that allowed apocalyptic writers, such as the author of Daniel, to review past history as if it were prophecy and then to predict the imminent outcome of the issue or crisis that had inspired the work. While such practices today might be regarded as dishonest or fraudulent, in the Hellenistic world both Jewish and Greco-Roman authors commonly wrote pseudonymously to honor an ancient luminary, presenting what they believed would be his views were he still alive. Some New Testament writers, presumably with no thought of forgery, penned sermons or epistles in the name of apostles such as Peter or Paul. 

The Book of Daniel is attributed to Daniel who is described as

A devout Jew serving a foreign government, [he] becomes one of several Jewish trainees whom King Nebuchadnezzar selects to be educated in a Babylonian wisdom school. … Although earlier biblical writers had warned against practicing the mantic arts — interpreting omens, portents, and dreams, and forecasting future events — the author of Daniel implicitly identifies his central character with the professional class of of Babylonian wise men. 

Harris then goes on to point out and discuss a number of characteristics of apocalyptic writing including their concern with all nations, not just Israel; their view of the parallel worlds of matter and spirit; their division of history into the imperfect present and a future age of perfection; their insistence that people are either good or evil, with no in between; their belief in predestination; their emphasis on believers being saved to the exclusion of all others; their lack of tolerance for competing beliefs; their belief in a violent God; their preoccupation with the afterlife and what happens after death; and their use of mythical and symbolic language.

On the date of Daniel’s composition, our reference has this to say,

The Book of Daniel purportedly was written during the Babylonian captivity in the sixth century BCE when its author was successively a member of the Babylonian, Median, and Persian courts. But scrupulous examination of the text reveals that it was composed centuries later, between 167 and 164 BCE when the Jews were suffering intense persecution by the Macedonian-Syrian ruler Antiochus IV. It is chronologically the latest-written book in the canonical Hebrew Bible. This fact, together with its striking differences in form and style from the prophetic books, may explain why Tanakh editors did not include it among the Prophets but instead placed it amongst the Writings. Daniel is not a typically prophetic work but seems a deliberately literary creation whose main character embodies and reflects the long tradition of Israel’s sacred literature.

And that’s probably enough background. I suspect I am not going to be particularly fond of Daniel but it should be interesting. On to today’s reading!

This story gets off to a good start. The king of Babylon decides to choose from the men brought from Jerusalem strong, smart, healthy, good looking men to be trained in the the ways of Babylonian wisdom. The king’s emphasis on strong and good looking men did make me wonder for a moment if we were going to be embarking on a different sort of literary journey, if you know what I mean.

In any case, Daniel and several others are trained up in the ways of Babylonian wisdom. I imagine that Ezekiel would scoff at such a thing being considered an honor. Daniel and his friends avoid defiling themselves by getting special permission to be fed only vegetables and water.

Over time, Daniel and friends are trained and join the ranks of Babylon’s wise men. This may seem like a good thing, and may well have been, but, eventually, this role becomes problematic. The king has a disturbing dream and asks his astrologers to interpret it. But he wants to know that their interpretations are true, so he also asks them to state the nature of the dream. The king figures that a true wise man could see the dream as well as interpret it.

However, the king’s astrologers could not do that and so he ordered that all of the wise men of Babylon be killed. This, in my opinion, was rather stupid of him. Why spend all that time training up wise men if you’re going to kill all of them when they fail you even once? In any case, Daniel and friends pray that God will reveal the king’s dream to them so that they can be spared.

In many ways, this story seems to allude to the story of Joseph: a man is raised from captivity to become a wise man and interpreter of dreams. In the process, he receives special treatments from those who are to oversee him. Obviously, there are many differences, so this is not a straight reinterpretation of the Babylon story, but it seems that the reader is meant to be reminded of Joseph and the idea of God’s giving prosperity to his chosen people in a strange land.

New Testament

Some confusing stuff in today’s reading, especially for someone who is stuffed and thus not thinking at her best.

The reading starts off straight forward: believers are encouraged to sympathize with and love each other. They should keep from speaking evil and do good. It then goes on to discuss how it is good to suffer if that suffering is for Christ because Christ also suffered. This attitude toward suffering seems to be summed up in this statement:

So then, since Christ suffered physical pain, you must arm yourselves with the same attitude he had, and be ready to suffer, too. For if you have suffered physically for Christ, you have finished with sin.

I read this whole discussion not as saying that Christians must or should suffer for their faith or even that it is particularly virtuous to suffer. Rather, I read it as saying that if they do suffer, then they should take on the attitude taken on by Christ and, by doing so, will learn much.

In any case, in the midst of this, we have the confusing passage I referred to. Maybe it will make sense when my brain is on, but for now I am befuddled.

So [Christ (upon suffering a physical death?)] went and preached to the spirits in prison— those who disobeyed God long ago when God waited patiently while Noah was building his boat. Only eight people were saved from drowning in that terrible flood. And that water is a picture of baptism, which now saves you, not by removing dirt from your body, but as a response to God from a clean conscience. It is effective because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

First part, Christ went and preached to someone. It seems that this someone are the people who did not make it on the ark. The people, other than Noah and his family, who in that story caused God to decide to murder nearly all of humanity. That part is kind of confusing. Even more confusing, is the comparison of the flood to baptism. Did the flood baptize the survivors (Noah and family) or did it baptize those who had been sinners and did not make it? I haven’t the foggiest.

In any case, the authors tells believers they should be finished with sin, as mentioned above, and live a good life. This may surprise some of their former associates, but they will have to face God for their own actions just as believers will have to face God for their actions.

Psalms and Proverbs

Today it is the stubborn who are destined for trouble while those who fear to do wrong are blessed.

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Old Testament

After all this time (three and a half weeks), we finally finish Ezekiel. It had some good parts, but I cannot say I am going to miss it.

The vision of the restored temple ends with a description of a river that runs through. That river runs from the temple to the Dead Sea and gets deeper along its length. The river will restore life to the Dead Sea and it will become a thriving oasis teaming with life.

The Lord then tells Ezekiel of the new borders of the 12 tribes within the land of Israel. These differ from the traditional borders given back in Numbers.

The river and the borders of the 12 tribes make me think that this whole vision is not meant to be read of a temple that is restored in the course of normal history. Most of the 12 tribes were effectively lost after the destruction of Israel and Samaria, and rivers do not just pop out of nowhere. This, along with the vague descriptions of a future prince, make me think this whole vision is not to be taken literally. That said, I am not sure how it should be taken. Perhaps this is an example of mysticism in Ezekiel.

After that the book ends rather abruptly with a description of some city gates. If I did not already know that we were starting Daniel tomorrow, I would have been quite surprised when we started reading it.

New Testament

The author emphasizes that believers are just visitors in this world. As such, they should live proper lives and be honorable in their behavior.

He then goes states that believers should respect all human authority; oh, many are the things that I shall resist mentioning here. The honorable lives of believers should be enough to silence their accusers. Disobedience, it is implied, would only give those accusers fodder.

In kind, slaves are commanded to submit to their masters, even if their masters are cruel. As usual, I find such commands morally despicable. The author attempts to justify this unjustifiable command by quoting what seems to be a hymn about Jesus’ suffering.

This is followed by instructions for wives which are annoying, as usual. However, the version in 1 Peter is slightly less annoying than some instances (e.g., the Pastorals), and the emphasis on internal beauty instead of external beauty is fairly nice. The instructions to husbands which follow also do better than most similar pairings.

Psalms and Proverbs

Today’s proverb claims that everyone enjoys the success of the godly. Nice in theory, but in practice, I think jealously often dampens that enjoyment.

The second proverb says that confessing since will lead to mercy and prosperity.

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Old Testament

Fascinating. Apparently in Ezekiel’s version of the law, the gifts given by the people go to the princes, not to the priests (or in addition to the priests?). The prince, in turn, in required to provide the sacrifices for particular observances. This seems like a dramatic change from the administrative structure laid out in Mosaic law.

Ezekiel provides an update of the ceremonies that are to be observed and the prince’s role in those ceremonies. All of this is, not surprisingly, about as unexciting as it was when we read similar instructions in the Mosaic law.

Ezekiel also specifies that the land owned by the prince must be given back to him in Jubilee years. I wonder if that is meant to clarify that the prince’s land is also subject to these laws or if it is meant to imply that now, in the restored Israel Ezekiel describes, the returning of land only applies to the prince’s land. In any case, the prince can only give away his own land and cannot steal the land of others.

We end today’s reading with a brief tour of the temple kitchens.

New Testament

Today’s reading is a grab bag.

Warnings to the believers not to slip back into their old ways.  People will be judged or rewarded according to what they do; this could probably be made to tie in with the discussion of faith and works in James. Jesus was the ransom God paid to save believers; still no attempt at explaining why this was necessary. More statements implying the author lives in the last days.

Love each other. Get rid of evil behavior. Believers should crave spiritual milk; this reminds me of Paul’s claim that the recipients of his letter were ready for nothing more than milk. Believers are the stones that make up God’s living temple and Jesus is the cornerstone. Believers should show others the goodness of God.

Psalms and Proverbs

James, in his criticism of the rich, would have liked this proverb:

Rich people may think they are wise,
but a poor person with discernment can see right through them.

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Old Testament

First off, we get a little more info about the temple:

• it’s east gate must never be used because that is where God’s glory entered
• no foreigners will be allowed in it unless they have been circumcised and have surrendered themselves to the Lord
• it will be set on a piece of larger land dedicated to the Lord; at the end of today’s reading, we get a detailed description of that land.

they do not endanger anyone by transmitting holiness to them through this clothing.

I had not realized that holiness was a dangerous thing to transmit.

These priests will act as judges over the people, must avoid the dead unless one of their close family members have died, and will not own any property. Instead, the priests are to be provided for by the people. (If I commented on current events, I might here express surprise that Glenn Beck and the Tea Party types have not seized upon this as proof that the Bible is socialistic. Oh wait, no I wouldn’t; we all know they selectively interpret the world around them.)

After this, we read about the allocation of the holy parcel of land that I mentioned above. One interesting aspect of this is that land is given to the rulers so that they do not have to oppress the people. These princes are, furthermore, told to treat the people fairly.

Not a super interesting day, but definitely better than what we have been getting.

New Testament

New book! We start 1 Peter today. Let’s see what Harris has to say about it.

Often compared to a baptismal sermon, 1 Peter reminds Christians of their unique privileges and ethical responsibilities.

… The majority of scholars agree that 1 Peter, like James and the pastoral epistles, is pseudonymous, the work of a later Christian writing in Peter’s name. The consensus is based on several factors, ranging from the elegant Greek style in which the epistle is composed to the particular social circumstances it describes. As an Aramaic-speaking Galilean fisherman who had little formal education, the historical Peter seems unlikely to have produced the work’s exceptionally fine Greek. Critics defending Peter’s authorship note that the epistle was written “through Silvanus”, perhaps the same Silvanus who accompanied Paul on some of his missionary travels and who was presumably skilled in preaching to Hellenistic audiences. According to the minority, Silvanus acts as Peter’s secretary, transforming his Aramaic dictation into sophisticated Greek.

Regarding the argument that Peter used a highly literate secretary as unverifiable, most scholars conclude that too many other factors combine to cast doubt on Peter’s authorship. If Peter — a member of Jesus’ inner circle — was the author, why does he not reveal personal knowledge of Jesus’ teachings, as an apostle would do? …

A date after 70 CE is indicated because the author writes “from her who dwells in Babylon”. “Babylon” became the Christian code name for Rome after Titus destroyed Jerusalem, thus duplicating the Babylonians demolition of the holy city.  

I am guessing a reminder of the unique privileges and ethical responsibilities of Christians will not be that interesting to a non-believer. Let’s move on to today’s reading and see!

So far, nothing super interesting. After a greeting, the author, who claims to be Peter (presumably, the apostle), praises God . The author assures the believers that they will someday be rewarded for the ordeals and trials they must now suffer. The believers will be rewarded for trusting Jesus even though they could not see him. Finally, today’s reading ends with a reference to the prophets of the past.

Psalms and Proverbs

This proverb confuses me:

Income from charging high interest rates
will end up in the pocket of someone who is kind to the poor.

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Old Testament

We finally finish the description of the temple complex. Ezekiel would have benefited from some skill drawing architectural diagrams.

After the main description, the glory of God returns to the restored temple. Apparently, the purpose of this detailed description was to make the people of Israel ashamed of their sins:

Son of man, describe to the people of Israel the Temple I have shown you, so they will be ashamed of all their sins. Let them study its plan, and they will be ashamed of what they have done.

I am not quite sure how studying architectural descriptions would make them ashamed of their sins. Maybe because thinking about the temple in general made them ashamed and so God wanted Ezekiel to mention it as much as possible? In any case, I wonder if this description actually ever accomplished that goal.

In any case, Ezekiel is not done with boring descriptions yet. Now that the buildings of the temple have been described, we get to be subjected to a detailed description of the altar and how it was to be used. Goody.

Two things I wonder (but not hard enough to look them up) are: how do these descriptions compare to the descriptions of the old temple and how do these descriptions compare to the actual temple that was rebuilt?

New Testament

The author of the epistle talks about the sorrow and destruction that riches bring. I highly suspect there are modern American believers of predictable political persuasions whose heads would explode upon contemplating these passages too closely.

The author then goes on to encourage the believers to be patient as they wait for the Lord’s return. This discussion touches on patience in suffering and also on how believers should not take oaths. Echoing the words attributed to Jesus, the author says that they should, “Just say a simple yes or no”.

He also discusses the power of prayer and encourages believers to bring back those who have strayed. Contrast the latter instructions with the statement from Hebrews that those who have strayed can never be brought back to repentance. I suppose you could say that’s not a contradiction, but I would be hard pressed to buy it.

And apparently that’s the end of this letter. I have to wonder if the original ending was lost since this seems rather abrupt.

Psalms and Proverbs

Today’s first proverb seems like one the author of James would have liked:

Better to be poor and honest
than to be dishonest and rich.