1 / 35

Overview: Divine Council

Overview: Divine Council. Foundational Passages & Structure. Preliminary Thoughts. Biblical Interpretation. Biblical languages. Types of literature represented. Historical background / geography. Life setting. Elwell, Evangelical Dictionary of Theology , 611-612.

moesha
Download Presentation

Overview: Divine Council

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. Overview:Divine Council Foundational Passages & Structure

  2. Preliminary Thoughts

  3. Biblical Interpretation • Biblical languages • Types of literature represented • Historical background / geography • Life setting Elwell, Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, 611-612 Grammatical-historical Exegesis. Each biblical document, and each part of a biblical document, must be studied in its context—both its immediate literary context and the wider situation in which it appeared. This calls for an understanding of the following elements:

  4. (Uncomfortably ?) Obvious the Roman Catholic Church the Protestant Reformation pre-late 19th century Christianity 20th/21st century evangelicalism • The context for understanding Genesis is the context in which it was written. The context for understanding the Hebrew OT is not:

  5. The Bible in Context • God worked in and through ancient Israel as it culturally was. He did not change Israel’s worldview so He could dispense revelation to them. God’s revelation to Israel was culturally decipherable (i.e., they could understand it) and culturally consistent (it was not alien to the culture). God did not create a new culture for Israel that was foreign to the rest of the known world at the time.

  6. The Bible in Context Inspiration operates within a cultural context chosen by God in his sovereign wisdom. We honor God’s decision to reveal truth to humanity WHEN, WHERE, in what CULTURE, and to WHOM he did by letting the Bible be what it is … not making it what we’d like it to be.

  7. The Bible in Context

  8. Foundational Passages

  9. Psalm 82:1

  10. Psalm 82:1

  11. Psalm 89:5-7

  12. elohimas “sons of God”

  13. Doesn’t saying that there are many elohimmean polytheism?

  14. Who gets called “elohim”? • God of Israel (Psalm 82:1 and other pss) • The gods of Yahweh’s divine council (Psa. 82:1) • gods of various nations (for example…) • Ashtoreth, the god(dess) [elohim] of the Sidonians, Chemosh, [elohim] of Moab (1 Kings 11:33), Milcom, the god [elohim] of the Ammonites • Demons [shedim] (Deut 32:17 = KJV; BHS) • Disembodied human dead (1 Sam 28:13) • Angels (?) – Genesis 35:1-7 (cp. Gen 32)…

  15. elohim = “place of residence” term Elohim – realm

  16. Rankin OT Unseen World Ugarit Israel

  17. Rank in OT Unseen World Israel Observations: Who is Absent? The word “demons” (shedim) in the HB is rare (Deut 32:17; Psa 106:37); not with Sheol; the rephaim are mentioned in Sheol At Ugarit, MOT was the lord of the Underworld / Sheol, but is not listed in the pantheon or offering lists (feared but not worshipped). HelelbenShacharis demoted [to Sheol (“satan” not used for him or with Sheol in OT) The human dead are in Sheol; righteous hoped for removal.

  18. Location of the Council / God’s Abode Ugarit / El & Baal God of Israel

  19. Location of the Council Meeting Place El’s Abode Yahweh’s (El) Abode

  20. The “Divine Council Worldview”of the Old Testament

  21. Deuteronomy 32:8-9, 43

  22. Genesis 11 The Greek form of the name “Babel” = “Babylon” and is from the native Akkadian Bāb-ilim, which means "Gate of the god", which summarizes the religious purpose of ziggurats.

  23. Ziggurats • A manifestation of ANE cosmology, • The earth was a disc of land which surrounded by a salt water ocean, both of which floated on another sea of fresh water called Apsu. • Above was a solid dome firmament; stars fixed on it. • A world mountain formed an axis mundi that joined all three layers. • The role of the temple was to act as that axis mundi, a meeting place between gods and men. • Rectangular with four corners pointing in cardinal directions to symbolize the four rivers which flow from the mountain to the four world regions.

  24. Deuteronomy 4:19-20 19 And beware lest you raise your eyes to heaven, and when you see the sun and the moon and the stars, all the host of heaven, you be drawn away and bow down to them and serve them, things that the Lord your God has allotted to all the peoples under the whole heaven.20 But the Lord has taken you and brought you out of the iron furnace, out of Egypt, to be a people of his own inheritance. Deut 17:3 – Israel apostasized; called demons in Deut 32:17

  25. Deuteronomy 32:8-9, 43

  26. Deuteronomy 32:8-9, 43

  27. Deuteronomy 32:8-9, 43

  28. Old Testament Cosmic Geography • Genesis 11 = the disinheriting of the nations • Genesis 12 = Call of Abram to create a new for Himself (His “portion” – Deut 32:9) • The OT Story: • Israel vs. the nations • YHWH vs. their gods • Examples: 1 Samuel 26:17-19; 2 Kings 5:17-19 • Deut 32:8-9 (cp. Deut 4:19-20) = basis for OT explanation for the pantheons of the nations • Played out in election / recipient of revelation • Played out in the wars under Moses and Joshua • Jerusalem an Amorite site at one time (Ezek 16:3)

  29. Other FAQs

  30. Doesn’t the Shemasay that there is only one God?

  31. Deuteronomy 6:4“our” God (vs. the other ones) POINT: The Shema presumes divine plurality; other gods are over the nations – they are real and were put there by Yahweh 1. “The LORD is our God; the LORD is one.” 2. “The LORD our God, the LORD is one.” 3. “The Lord our God is one Lord.” 4. “The LORD is our God, the LORD alone.” 5. “Our one God is the LORD, the LORD.”

  32. I’ve tried to talk to my Jewish friend about believing in Jesus, but she says she can’t because Judaism only accepts one God, not a Trinity…What do I say? (Hint: John 10:34-35) Corollary Question

  33. What about verses that say there is “none other” besides Yahweh?

  34. Incomparability of YHWH • not denials of the existence of other elohim; statements of incomparability. • these “denials” occur in the same chapters and books as those that refer to other elohim (Deut 4, 32; Isaiah 40-66) • these “denials” phrases are used elsewhere we denial of existence cannot be possible. “none besides me”; “none like me”

  35. Incomparability of YHWH Denial Passages Hebrew phrases from them • Deut 4:35 • Deut 4:39 • Deut 32:12 • Deut 32:29 • Isa 43:10-12 • Isa 44:6-8 • Isa 45: 5-7 • Isa 45:14 • Isa 45:18 • Isa 45:21-22 וְאֵין מִבַּלְעָדַי 1 וּמִבַּלְעָדַי אֵין אֱלֹהִים 2 הֲיֵשׁ אֱלֹוהַּ מִבַּלְעָדַי וְאֵין צוּר בַּל־יָדָעְתִּי׃ 3 וְאֵין־עֹוד אֱלֹהִים מִבַּלְעָדַי 4 זוּלָתִי אֵין אֱלֹהִים 5 אַיִן זוּלָתִי׃ 6 וְאֵין עֹוד 7 וְאֵין עֹוד אֶפֶס אֱלֹהִים 8 כִּי־אֶפֶס בִּלְעָדָי 9 וְאֵין בָּכֶם זָר 10 לְפָנַי לֹא־נֹוצַר אֵל 11 See Isa 47:8, 10; Zeph 2:15

More Related