Tag: Hebrew

Inking the Flesh: An Ancient No-No

Posted on by Jordan Spano

(Note: this article does not exclude people who already have tattoos. If you have zero, it’s for those considering a first; if you have 18, it’s for those considering a 19th.)

Should I get a tattoo?

 

Yeah, sure. Go for it. You have nothing to lose–except an eternal spate of fiery reprobation by friends, family, and a legion of unseen elders with calculated sneers whom you fear in secret.

Just kidding.

But seriously: if you marshaled the courage to take this question to the internet and see what experts (not me) say about tattoos, you’ve found the right place (a non-expert expert). This may be the one of the few times you didn’t consult WebMD for an answer.

(But if you did consult WebMD AND you already have a tattoo, you’ve contracted at least 18 diseases by now.)

Maybe you came here because you saw an arrow, anchor, adage, or something in that alliterative category on a social influencer’s arm and thought, “I need that. That will add some tenor of coolness to this frame.” This is a tempting thought, especially when we want to complement ourselves in some way, which usually comes in exterior form.

I suggest you push back for a second.

First ask yourself what that tattoo will add to your abiding coolness. Will it give you more followers? Will it make you more devoted to your passions? Will it just add “needed” aesthetic to that blanched vessel you call your body?

It doesn’t matter if I need one. It means something special to me, and that’s all that matters.

Okay, you sold me. You made your case.

(I think it’s a bad case, though. Because you have failed to adduce reasons for your decision you have licensed every person you know and don’t know to ask you in depth what your tattoo means–and you’re obligated to answer [I’m totally going to ask you.].)

What does the Old Testament have to say about this [indelible] ink upon my arm, leg, or ineffable location beneath my clothes?

Glad ya asked! You’re reading this so I would have told you anyway.

The most oft-cited Scripture concerning tattoos–which happens to be one that is used in opposition to tattoos–is Leviticus 19:28. This command occurs amidst a litany of other prohibitions.

Do not cut your bodies for the dead or put tattoo marks on yourselves. I am the Lord. (NKJV)

This command by the Lord was in the context of a series of prohibitions to the children of Israel. They were continually conceding to the cultural assaults of idolatry, becoming swayed by the surrounding religious influences. You will see this pattern of failure all throughout the Book of Judges. This is a portent of it (and of our lives =]).

The issue here was the cultural assimilation between the Israelites and the other nations. God’s injunction, his plan for the children of Israel, was also clearly communicated in the following chapter:

 And you shall be holy to Me, for I the Lord am holy, and have separated you from the peoples, that you should be Mine.

God wanted them–and us–to be holy and set apart: to not conform to their surroundings or whatever was trending. This command, by the way, is a stone laid for the “not of this world” foundation (John. 17:16). If we conform to the world and do as they do, we acquiesce to the influences of the world and thereby become stained (cf. James 1:27).

Let’s take a look. I’ll break up the Hebrew text by verbal structure (followed by my translation):

 

“Do not cut your bodies for the dead” (v’seret la-nephesh lo titnu bivsarkem), which translates directly to “and cuttings for the soul [trans. ‘dead’] do not give/put in your flesh.”

“or put tattoo marks on yourself” (u-k’tovet qa-a-qa lo titnu ba-khem), which translates directly to “or imprint [from writing] mark/incision [unknown derivation] print in it (your flesh)”

 

To clarify this mishmash, it’s saying “do not cut your body for the dead or incise marks in it.”

What’s vital to note in this command is that the phrase “tattoo mark” (k’tovet qa-a-qa) is–switching to Greek for a quick bit–called a hapax legomenon, “something [only] once.” This means that this phrase appears only once in the entire biblical canon. No where else do you see this string of words, or even qa-a-qa, in the Bible.

The single occurrence phenomenon makes it very difficult to make a case to prohibit tattoos based on a datum that can’t be corroborated by contextual evidence.

It’s like saying, “Hey, the word “chromophony” means the sensation of conflating color and sound at the same time, much like synesthesia.”

Now I made that word up (I neologized it, but it is not canonized [accepted into the English vernacular as a legitimate word]). But if I told you I didn’t make it up, how could you check my work? You wouldn’t be able to.

There’s no dictionary, or lexicon, we can use to adjudicate whether the word means what I’ve said it means. Such is the case with “tattoo mark.” We can’t look up “qa-a-qa” in a Hebrew lexicon and see what it meant in other contexts, because there are no other contexts.

 

The purview of this article was to assess the seminal text people refer to when tattoos come up in conversation. Much else can be said about the purposes and/or implications of getting tattoos, so I’ll leave some of that to you.

 

If you have a tattoo or are considering one (or several), Why?

(Oh, and for the forensic bunch: I do have a tattoo, but it’s in an obscure foreign language.)

[Hu]man of Dust

Posted on by Jordan Spano

In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for dust you are, and to dust you shall return. (Gen. 3:19)

I‘ve been meaning to write on this topic for some time. It is, I believe, one of the most arresting theological topics that is largely latent, if not lacking, in the contemporary Christian culture. I call this the theology of dust (but hey, who needs labels these days? I identify as…).

The dawn of creation was an eventful time, to say the least. All that exists or would exist, was spoken into being by the Lord. It was Eden. Perfection. But one thing was missing: a creature who would, in the end, mess up everything and spread sin over the whole world. (Yay. That’s you and I!)

And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being. (Gen. 2:7)

The word for dust here in Hebrew is aphar, which generally means dust/dirt/soil/ashes. In the context of an ex nihilo creation (unless you subscribe to a dual creation per Gen. 1:2, but I don’t.), this means the terrestrial canvas onto which God painted all of creation had aphar atop it. It’s like earthen crust as we see today (minus the pavement and skyscrapers). In other contexts in Scripture dust can mean a pulverized material or something used as a building component (like mortar), which lends to the connotation of something small, significant, and ancillary.

Importantly, none of the contexts convey aphar as a glorious material. It’s nothing, it’s rubbish. And I think that’s beautiful.

It’s beautiful to be rubbish.

It’s important not to view yourself as glorious, and here’s why.

About two thousand years ago, something grand happened (and I think you know this story). The Lord of Glory himself made himself nothing (“of no reputation” [Phil. 2:7, in the kenotic hymn]) for our sake. That’s odd, I reckon, considering people who happen upon wealth or fame get so wrapped up in exorbitance that their souls wither.

The Lord surrendered his glory so we could become glorious? What?

But you can see it everywhere.

And we’re at this crux in Christian culture (and I don’t think at the true crux) where we glorify each others’ shortcomings and pat them on the back for confessing that the sin they just sinned five minutes ago was okay because that sin was paid for; where we call our ability to draw calligraphy a gift spawned by the resurrection of Jesus; where we call our passion for fashion or our appetite for fitness an outpouring of the Spirit or a realization of our calling. I call that missing the point.

It is not just our religious climate that creates an atmosphere amenable to this type of self-praise. We also see it in social and political sectors.

We’re enabled to victimize ourselves, to expect cascades of compliments and exhortations whether or not we need it. Do we really need to be featherbedded in all of our aspirations? What about when we fail?

What about when we try our hardest on a test, staying up till 12:17 (that’s the latest I’ve lasted), cramming the energy drink cans in the nook between the counterpane and the wall, panning between social media platforms to make us feel sane and engaged, only to race through a test with bronze balls and receive an American-failing D on our tests?

Christian culture says, “God has a plan for you. Keep trying and trust in him.”

I say, “God has a plan for everyone. Study harder. Life isn’t easy.”

There is, after all, something so tantalizingly gloomy and sweet when you view yourself as a dust. Insignificant. Unworthy. But also redeemed. Glorified. Saved. Magnified and loved.

That God would love a morsel, a creature as we, and shed his blood that we might have life; and not only life, but empowered, abundant life–giving us the victuals for daily living as the sparrows and lilies… is awesome.

It reminds me of a verse from one of Gungor‘s songs called “I Am Mountain.” Its mellifluous denouement goes…

Momentary carbon stories/from the ashes/filled with Holy Ghost

Life is hear now/breathe it all in/let it all go/you are earth and wind.

Now before you throw the heresy stick and proclaim, “Jordan alluded to the banal ‘You are stardust’ new-ageism,” let that sink in a bit.

You are nothing… yet God gave up everything for you.

As a man rather reticent to embrace some of the more sentimental components of Christian theology, I find such dense hope in this thought. When you find humility miles away and outrunning you, and those close to you are handing you undeserved accolades  (all of which you refuse to acknowledge), this piece in Genesis is a glorious cradle for your sulking.

When Jesus became man and humbled himself (“emptied himself” per the kenotic hymn in Philippians 2), he didn’t do it expecting a high-five and a Gatorade once the crucifixion was done: he was met with hypocrites and recreants. Nobody asked for it, but everyone sure needed it… I especially did and always will.

 

Have you ever internally warred against a wave in Christian culture that suggests we be praised–or that we ought to give ourselves more credit? Have you ever reveled in the thought of being just dust?

Who Was God’s Wife?

Posted on by Jordan Spano

For many people in this evangelical culture, when outlandish claims are made about their faith, they either immediately deny them or shudder in quiet, theological unrest; yet for some, those claims are just license to laugh. And for this claim, I think we can all safely do the latter. Did God have a wife?

I stumbled across this topic while browsing an atheist forum a couple years ago. If you have not been on one before, you’re not missing anything. They are generally crowded with young to middle-aged men with vehement opinions–and truly few of these forums curate benign discussion. It is the same for social media sites, like good ol’ Facebook. My advice for you is to keep theological discussion where it is healthy: off the internet.

From one of the forums I visited, I recall some Christians talking about some popular opinions of scholars that travel through the web (similar to the resonance from the forged manuscript about Jesus’ wife), and one of the forum responded with alacrity: “Of course God had a wife. Her name was Asherah. And no, it was not Jewish mysticism; it was Judaism’s seed of polytheism, the sign of Abrahamic syncretism, the collapse of all credence that religions claim to have!” My exaggeration is slight, but I talk about something very critical here. The way we view Jewish theology has a direct impact on Christian theology, prophecy, Scripture, Jesus, and all else.

Let’s tackle the question using these three factors: the claim, issue, and difficulties.

The claim is jolting and clear: God had a wife, her name was Asherah (she was God’s consort), and Judaism (and Christianity) eventually evolved into monotheism; contemporary Christianity simply shed the wife theology as religion evolved. If God had a wife originally, in the allegedly purest form of this religion, then what we know of Christianity now is distorted, cleaned up to be a pretty lie.

The issue is that God’s alleged wife, Asherah, is not arbitrarily derived from Jewish mysticism. Asherah was an attested pagan goddess, the Ugaritic wife of El and mother of the gods. Seeing that Israelites had an unwise bent toward polytheism, having frequent affairs with idols, icons, gods, and sundry. Indeed, Asherah dwells in the Old Testament in many places, generally in contexts of Israel’s failure to be devout worshipers of Yahweh, mostly in the chronicles (histories) of that nation, like the books of Kings.

The difficulty is one of historical and literary interpretation. Interpreters cannot ensure that Asherah was rent from all Jewish theology and solely part of a Judeo-mystical movement. If there were vestiges of a pagan goddess in the Tanakh then it is likely its theology was in some way interacted with while transitioning to the New Testament. As we see well in the four gospels and the epistles, the Old Testament was embedded in the New Testament theology as the writers took pains to put the pieces of the messianic puzzle together.

A second difficulty resides in the interpretive ambiguity of “Asherah.” As Holladay points out in his Concise Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, there is “much confusion in OT between 1 (‘the wife of El and mother of the gods’) and 2 (a ‘cultic post’). The appearances of Asherah in the Old Testament are delineated between a “thing” and a “person/god”; at times, the god and the post would be fused, where it was unsure which definition the text was referring to.

As a gentle reminder: Nothing in the Old Testament, regardless if it had a dangerous association with regional polytheism at that time, can be ignored or attenuated when reading the New Testament. The Bible wasn’t written in a vacuum or in discrete partition.

The assertion that God had a wife named Asherah and they were worshiped jointly by Israelites was raised in the 1960s by historian Raphael Patai. This tract of thought was taken two steps further by Francesca Stravrakopoulou who came to the conclusion that God had a wife. She referenced 8th century pithos inscriptions, found in the Sinai desert at Kuntillet Ajrud, that evidenced blessings to the Israelites’ God: “I bless you by Yahweh, our guardian, and by his Asherah.” The inscription is telling.

(For those curious, the “bless you” used on the inscription is the standard ascription of blessing used in the Old Testament, from the word brkt–which is the root and suffix attested in Pithos A.)

Let’s now look at what the Old Testament says about this god. (Remember the amalgamated nature of the word’s interpretation as we continue.)

Four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal and four hundred prophets of Asherah were brought to Mt. Carmel to worship (1 Kings 18:19); these were those who sat at Jezebel’s table. Here, we see attestation of foreign worship of Asherah, the female goddess. The Israelites, too, joined in the idolatry: “They abandoned the house of the Lord… and served the Asherim [plural, Asherah] and the idols” (2 Chron. 24:18). The departure of Israelite worship of Yahweh alone is not singular in Scripture, but it is addressed.

Consider Deuteronomy 16:21, God’s injunction to not “set up any wooden Asherah pole beside the altar” built to Yahweh. Around this time the forbidding is quintessentially sin-caused, as we see in the entire narrative of Judges through its refrain: “The Israelites did evil in the sight of the Lord; they forgot the Lord their God and served the Baals and the Asherahs.

We can expand this collect to induct another foreign god into the assembly of Israelite idolatrous worship. Jeremiah descries an abomination among his people, whose “children gather wood, the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead dough, to make cakes for the queen of heaven; and they pour out drink offerings to other gods, that they may provoke [Yahweh] to anger” (7:18). (It is unsure whether the “queen of heaven” was related to the fertility goddess Asherah; regardless, we can surmise it was but another instance of foreign worship.) The Israelites followed the same path as did their progenitors in the book of Judges: they did evil in the sight of the Lord.

It is no mystery that the Israelites worshiped false gods; and it is a safe assumption to make that some did it in concert with Yahweh worship, as we saw in God’s mandate to remove Asherah/Asherim from beside the altar built to Yahweh. This is exactly the devotional falter of the Israelites of which the pithos at Kuntillet Ajrud bespoke: Yahweh’s reverence was attenuated by a second/third/tenth god’s worship.

But… is that not what we do?

We have idols that we worship in tandem with God: we have our social media–and all related activity that technology monopolizes over us; we have our platonic and intimate relationships; we have our financial desires, our unhealthy absorptions into ministry and groups, our gluttony and our myriad of private vices. We always have something that takes precedence over our life of devotion to God, whether hidden or broadcasted to the world.

So, can we confidently answer, based on the contemporary research and Old Testament attestations, that God had a wife? I think it’s safe to say no, he did not. This idea presents as much upset to our theology of God as did Karen King’s obsessional claim that Jesus had a wife–which was a laughable zilch.

But was Asherah or wooden manifestation of the fertility god worshiped alongside Yahweh? Probably. We serve a God who has not enthralled us to his will but has allowed us to make choices of our own. Ancient Israelites made mistakes, which were explicitly seen in the book of Judges–but so do we. Regardless, God graced them with his mercy, offered his Son for their sin, and today offers to write anyone’s name in his book of life when we choose to surrender that our glory for his.

“Oh, fear the Lord, you his saints! There is no want to those who fear him. The young lions lack and suffer hunger, but those who seek the Lord shall not lack any good thing” (Ps. 34:9-10).

Does God Have Company in Genesis?

Posted on by Jordan Spano

The word “Trinity,” most laypersons know, is not explicitly written in Scripture: it is not written in Hebrew, Aramaic, or Greek; rather, it was a descriptive theological term neologized by the Church to best convey that perplexing connection between the three persons of God–as Scripture leads us to conclude. It is for this reason, then, that when we look at Genesis alone to exhume some dogma from its ancient narrative, we must take all Scripture into account. It is this holistic understanding of Scripture that the writers of the New Testament had, both Jesus and his apostles.

Indeed, as Paul writes in 1 Tim. 3:16, “All Scripture is God-breathed,” in such a way we also must look at the entirety of Scripture, especially at the Old Testament. The central topic in this post will not be an apologetic for the Trinity as a whole, where we would consult the spectrum of Scripture and chiefly reside in the New Testament. Our focus instead is on the Trinity in the early parts of Genesis, where we see the “we” language used by God.

Both instances of the “we” language are found in the first eleven chapters of Genesis, one of the densest mythopoeic sections of Scripture. Here are the two instances below:

“Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, according to our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.'” (Gen. 1:26, NKJV)

“‘Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.'” (Gen. 11:7, NKJV)

Let’s begin with the claim and issue. There are no textual difficulties in these two passages.

The claim is something I am sure you have heard before: “The Trinity is in Genesis; I mean, it says ‘let Us,’ as in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.” And, it is likely that, whether or not you have made this assertion before, you have probably agreed with it to some extent. After all, who else would God be talking about?

The issue is a direct corollary of thought for those who have scrutinized these parts of Scripture. Not only is the immediate context rigidly monotheistic, Jesus is clearly nowhere to be found. Of course, the Holy Spirit, a person of God and partaker in the creation process, is mentioned in Gen. 1:2. He is a near referent, but two persons do not comprise a trinity, a unity of three persons.

An ancillary issue is the play on words done in the second instance, in the narrative of the Tower of Babel. God seems to be intentionally mimicking the syntax of those who wanted to build a tower. If we juxtapose the two verses,

“And they said, ‘Come, let us build ourselves a city….'” So the Lord came down and said, “‘Come, let us go down there and confuse their language.'”

It is not readily apparent to many that there is a wealth of literary devices in Scripture, and especially in the first eleven chapters of Genesis; and although the literary mockery, if you would, impinges on our interpretation of this language, we can’t help but ask if the “us” was more than literary–perhaps it intimated… company?

And, as a gentle riposte, let us not assume that Elohim, a plural noun (“gods”) that functions singularly while in reference to God, is the reason for the “us.” That strain has never been a critically acclaimed one.

Historically speaking, early church interpreters somewhat overclocked the Trinitarian understanding in Genesis: the Son is never separated from the Father and the Holy Spirit, and likewise the New Testament should never be torn asunder from the Old Testament in interpretation.

Textually speaking, the Hebrew reading is forthright. “Let us  make man (na-a-seh) in our image (be-sal-me-nu), according to our likeness (kid-mu-te-nu).

Concerning the primary issue, does the cohortative “let us make” plausibly include angels as God’s co-creators? Either angels created or angels did not; and as we follow Scripture until Revelation, it is clear they did not. Further, an angel, save the elusive cherubim guarding Eden, is not mentioned until the Angel of the Lord’s encounter with Hagar in Genesis 16. To claim that angels were God’s company in Gen. 1 and 11 would be grasping at an emergent heavenly vocabulary, and is discordant with both the context (with the lack of angels and the presence of beings with creative power other than God)  and the scriptural corpus (with both traditional interpretation and Scripture itself lacking testimony that angels ever created anything or anyone [cf. Hebrews 1]).

What about a “royal we” as the reason for this language? Patriarchs of yore used this language to tacitly express their unity–a sort of humble position as a leader of unequalled power–with their kingdom, over whom they ruled. If a king desired, say, to institute a new law over his serfs, he may state, “Let us onward relegate all duties pertaining to the death and dismemberment of recalcitrant subjects of my kingdom unto my most honored serfs.” His legislative decision is not performed by anyone but him, yet its utterance captures and includes all of his recipients–or, through a different medium, all readers or oral recipients.

Even though the creation narrative in early Genesis is clearly a monologue–though it is intended to be read and recited by ancient Israelites to whom it would be passed–the “royal we” would require some textual sense of regality; yes, would it not require a kingdom context? The thought that God is King is never farfetched in Scripture, but in Genesis it is far from explicit. Does this rule out that a “royal we” language is used in Genesis, however? I do not believe so. As one who is so high above all, it would be God’s way of inducting all of creation into his narrative; and this induction appropriately precedes the first subject of his kingdom, Adam. The man whom God is about to create will be his most honored serf, if you will; and that serf will be given dominion over all the earth.

Finally, you anticipate the final of the major options: the Trinity. I have saved this for last because it is important to first touch on Genesis 11 concerning its unique syntax.

As I mentioned before, Genesis employs literary devices heavily, and in Gen. 11 God’s “let us come down and confuse” is salient mimicry. Just as the men of hubris who sought to build a tower, or a ziggurat, or whatever ancient, cultic edifice for their purposes, God was going to demonstrate that it is not they, but he, who ruled the world. He did not intend for his creation to be assimilated into one mass people of power, but to be spread over every nation (recall God’s edict to man in Gen. 1:28: “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it”).

Instead, the author juxtaposes their language: The people could authoritatively say, “Let us build and magnify ourselves and be exalted,” or God could remind them, saying, “Let us not exalt us, but remember that you are creation.” This is the literary play going on in Genesis 11, and it is highlighted because what is being conveyed here is not the person number of God or his company: it is the question of who is exalted, man or God.

I aver that if the “we” language in Genesis is going to argue for a specific interpretation, Gen. 1:26-27 should take precedence over Gen. 11:7 for precisely what I have shown above: the latter has a context in which mimicry makes sense, while the former does not.

So what about the Trinity as an interpretive option in Genesis 1:26-27? As we know now, Jesus is not explicit in the Old Testament, and especially not in Genesis. Many would argue that the sense of a messiah, or the gospel, first occurs at Gen. 3:15 (hence its name, protoevangelium); and this is as far as foretelling prophecy is concerned. But the tale of Scripture does not stop at Genesis, and neither at 2 Chronicles/Malachi: it ends at Revelation.

God’s people have always received progressive revelation in the sense that God’s inaugurated kingdom has taken steps toward its full realization. From creation to covenant, along with orders of better covenants, to the messiah, his death, resurrection, and return. And, insofar as we have received revelation since Genesis, we know that Jesus was before the foundation of the world, in the beginning (1 Pet. 1:20; Jn. 1:1-3), which was made through him and for him (Col. 1:16), and much more. We correlate Jesus’ relation to creation through the New Testament and through portents in the Old Testament.

Then, what did the ancient Israelites think about God’s “we” usage? We don’t know. In light of the Shema (Deut. 6:4), we can reason that they would not have thought of any other person of God or being of power (but when the Spirit of God is ascribed willful verbs and personal adjectives, it is curious how that was interpreted). We do know, however, that almost all early church interpretation was Trinitarian.

I now offer you three interpretations. On the basis of Genesis alone, (1) the “we” usage in Gen. 1:26-27 either constitutes a partnership between the Holy Spirit and God in the creation process, as their wills seem to continually mesh throughout the Old Testament. Or, (2) God was employing an archaic “royal we” to induct all of his creation into the royal fabric of his kingdom, which is a rather neutral stance: neither supporting nor opposing the concept of a Trinity in creation. Last, (3) the Trinity is there–God is speaking of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit–but it is abstruse and only to be fully understood once the time comes for God to become enfleshed and die for the world through Jesus Christ.

I take both stances 2 and 3, that it was originally understood in a regal, united sense–perhaps even recalling polytheistic traces that were appropriated as polemic against the nations’ gods; and, concurrently, it was portentous of a fuller understanding of God’s nature: three persons of one will, one God.

I see these two as compatible interpretations, and they allow the ancient understanding of Genesis to be not only  retained but also developed through progressive revelation throughout Scripture.

We should never be afraid to dig deeply into the past where ancient Israel was an eclectic religion and scriptural interpretation was fraught with variety, because God had always intended to procure his revelation to his people and speak to them where there were, and to us where we are.

Where do you place yourself among these three options? Is there a fourth that you find captures the theology in Genesis and the rest of Scripture better?