The Glory of the Invisible God

Two Powers in Heaven Traditions and Early Christology

Andrei Orlov

• Publisher: T&T Clark
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9780567692689
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Criticism & Interpretation

Andrei Orlov examines early Christological developments in the light of rabbinic references to the "two powers" in heaven, tracing the impact of this concept through both canonical and non-canonical material. Orlov begins by looking at imagery of the "two powers" in early Jewish literature, in particular the book of Daniel, and in pseudepigraphical writings. He then traces the concept through rabbinic literature and applies this directly to understanding of Christological debates. Orlov finally carries out a close examination of the "two powers" traditions in Christian literature, in particular accounts of the Transfiguration and the Baptism of Jesus. Including a comprehensive bibliography listing texts and translations, and secondary literature, this volume is a key resource in researching the development of Christology.

Part One

Two Powers in Heaven Traditions in Jewish Accounts

Rabbinic traditions regarding the two powers in heaven, along with their alleged relevance for understanding the formation of early Christology, have been the subject of vigorous discussion in the last several decades. Setting the stage for these recent debates was the seminal study of Alan Segal, “Two Powers in Heaven.”¹ Reflecting on the essence of the rabbinic debates about two powers or authorities, Segal proposed that “the basic heresy involved interpreting scripture to say that a principal angelic or hypostatic manifestation in heaven was equivalent to God.”²

Segal argued for the early existence of these conceptual currents, suggesting that they were “a very early category of heresy, earlier than Jesus, if Philo is a trustworthy witness, and one of the basic categories by which the rabbis perceived the new phenomenon of Christianity.”³ Throughout his study, Segal consistently argued for the early roots of these traditions, claiming that “the extra-rabbinic evidence allowed the conclusion that the traditions were earlier than the first century.”⁴

Postulating an early date for the two powers controversy, Segal advocated the importance of these debates for our understanding of early Christological deve­lopments. He argued that “the relationships between these traditions of angelic mediation and Christianity are significant enough to call for a more complete study of the problem as background for Christology than has yet been attempted.”⁵ Notably, his hypothesis attracted the attention of several contemporary experts of early Judaism and Christian origins.⁶

Another scholar who has likewise acknowledged the importance of the two powers traditions for understanding of early Jewish and Christian accounts is Daniel Boyarin. According to Boyarin, “there is significant evidence (uncovered in large part by Segal) that in the first century many—perhaps most—Jews held a binitarian doctrine of God.”⁷ Like Segal, who advocated early pre-Christian roots of the two powers traditions, Boyarin maintains that the concept of a second and independent divine agent can be traced to the Hebrew Bible.⁸

Another scholar who has engaged in dialogue with Segal’s legacy is Larry Hurtado. Applying some of Segal’s ideas to his research on early Christian devotion, Hurtado concludes that

although we do not actually have first-century Jewish documents that tell us directly what Jewish religious leaders thought of Christian devotion, there seems to be every reason to assume that the attitude was probably very much like the one reflected in slightly later Jewish sources, which apparently reject cultic devotion to Jesus as constituting an example of the worship of “two powers in heaven,” that is, the worship of two gods.⁹

Several other scholars have followed suit, noting the ability of rabbinic debates concerning two powers to shed light on early Christological developments. James Davila effectively sums up these scholarly hopes by suggesting that the two powers traditions associated with the Metatron figure “might help us understand the rise of the worship of Jesus.”¹⁰

While some experts think that the two powers traditions can provide us with crucial insights for understanding early Christological developments, others have expressed their reservations about the value of these later conceptual currents for understating early Christology. James McGrath surveys these doubts in his recent study “The Only True God.” In it, McGrath offers nuanced skepticism about the relevance of the aforementioned rabbinic debates, suggesting “there is good reason to conclude that certain conceptualities later condemned as two powers heresy would not have been controversial in the first century.”¹¹ He concludes by stating “it is anachronistic to interpret Jewish and Christian documents from this period as reflecting ‘two powers’ heresy.”¹²

While one can certainly agree with McGrath that a straightforward application of later rabbinic debates to the Second Temple Jewish and Christian ideological environments appears problematic, the terminology of “two powers” can be methodologically useful in analyzing binitarian developments found in early Jewish and Christian angelology and pneumatology. This language is especially helpful for the study of early Jewish and Christian theophanic accounts in which God appears alongside a second mediatorial figure, who at times paradoxically emulates the deity’s attributes. In this respect, the notion of the “second power” allows us to approach the attributes and functions of a novel mediator without assigning an exclusive divine status to this agent. These traditions, moreover, are crucial for understanding the earliest Christological developments, especially those that feature a sudden and paradoxical delegation of various functions and attributes of the deity to Jesus.

Furthermore, it should be noted that, in modern debates regarding the relevance of the two powers traditions for the study of early Judaism and Christian origins, the focus is often exclusively placed on the “oppositional” nature of the two powers traditions. This dimension is certainly prominent in later rabbinic and Hekhalot accounts, where the second power, in the form of the supreme angel Metatron, is clearly situated in polemical opposition to the first power represented by the deity. Scholars are often overfocused on this polemical tension between the two powers, having utilized it as an interpretive framework for understanding the long-lasting tensions between the adepts of Christian devotion and their opponents. These previous investigations often failed to ascertain the existence, and thus value, of other complementary interactions and relationships between the two respective powers, utilizing instead only the oppositional characterization.

Yet, already Alan Segal in his seminal study reflected on the nature of the relationships between the two powers, whether complementary or oppositional, noting that “the earliest heretics believed in two complementary powers in heaven while only later could heretics be shown to believe in two opposing powers in heaven.”¹³ Segal’s attention to the complementary two powers template is significant for the study of early Christian accounts, precisely because it appears to play a major role in the construction of Jesus’ divine identity.

While in the oppositional two powers template the second power is often deconstructed and demoted, in its complementary variation it is built up and exalted. In this respect it is not coincidental that in many New Testament accounts, including stories of Jesus’ baptism and transfiguration, his exalted identity is constructed in conjunction with aural manifestations of the deity, who, through his assuring voice, affirms the mediator’s distinctive stand. With this in mind, a close investigation of early occurrences of the complementary two powers template, as found in early Jewish and Christian evidence, could shed a unique light on early Christological developments. In short, these currents may provide an important methodological perspective that enables us to witness the construction of a new divinity.

Along this same trajectory, it is also significant that the early complementary appearances of the two powers, much like their later oppositional counterparts, unfold in the midst of peculiar theophanic imagery. In previous scholarly debates these theophanic peculiarities were largely neglected by the majority of disputants. As previously noted, Alan Segal proposed that the gist of the qualms surrounding the rabbinic two powers traditions was an issue of the second power being found equivalent to God.¹⁴ While postulating such relationships, scholars often paid little to no attention to the means by which such equivalency was advanced in various earlier and later two powers traditions. Yet it is clear that many of the tools used to postulate equivalency are connected to special theophanic imagery applied to respective mediatorial agents, thereby demonstrating a sharing of attributes and functions. Moreover, such theophanic qualities, by which the second power is often inducted into the realm of the deity, by themselves often create boundaries between the respective powers, signaling their proper place in the divine hierarchy. This is especially noticeable in the dual or joint theophanies in which two powers appear together. As is often the case in such combined theophanies, each power is associated with a particular theophanic mold that attempts to underline its unique status while simultaneously distancing it from the other power, thus demonstrating its superior place in the celestial hierarchy. Regularly, subtle changes in the depiction of the theophanic attributes of the divine protagonists—that is, when the second power suddenly assumes the features formally attributed to the first power—are intended to signal the ever-changing status of this new authority, paradoxically predestined for promotion into the realm of the deity. Sometimes the release of the authorial space guarded by the peculiar theophanic attributes is even more radical. In some accounts, the first power is completely withdrawn from the visual dimension of the ocularcentric theophany by assuming the aniconic aural mode. This latter pattern persists in early Christian accounts in which the deity is presented as the aniconic Voice while Jesus assumes the former anthropomorphic features of the deity. The exaltation of the new authority occurs when the first power surrenders its former symbolic space for a new guardian of the ocularcentric trend by withdrawing into the distinctive aural mode. This tradition is paramount for our understanding of early Christological innovations. In order to better grasp these Christological developments, we now turn to consider several early Jewish accounts in which two powers appear together in distinctive theophanic settings.

“Two Powers” Appearances in Early Jewish Accounts

In early Jewish sources, several theophanic accounts depict God alongside a second celestial manifestation that fashions or emulates his attributes. Such dual imagery is present in the Book of Daniel, the Book of the Similitudes, the Exagoge of Ezekiel the Tragedian, 2 Enoch, the Apocalypse of Abraham, and the Ladder of Jacob, as well as other biblical and extra-biblical narratives. Features of some of these accounts, like the one found in the Book of Daniel, and possibly the memories of others, were often invoked in later rabbinic and Hekhalot two powers debates.¹⁵ Such allusions indicate that the rabbinic authors intuitively saw early seeds of the two powers controversy rooted in these early visionary accounts.

Nevertheless, the application of the two powers terminology to early Jewish texts is regarded by...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Series
• Dedication
• Title
• Epigraph
• Contents
• Abbreviations
• Preface
• Introduction
• Part One Two Powers in Heaven Traditions in Jewish Accounts
• Part Two Two Powers in Heaven Traditions in Early Christian Accounts
• Conclusion
• Bibliography
• Index of Names
• Index of Subjects
• Index of References
• Copyright