Encountering the Living God in Scripture

Theological and Philosophical Principles for Interpretation

Wright, William M.,IV, Martin, Francis

• Publisher: Baker Academic
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781493416813
• Topic: Teología y religión
• Subtopic: Estudios bíblicos

This work gives a philosophical and theological account of the belief that Scripture enables people to encounter the life-giving reality of God. The authors examine the biblical foundations for this belief as given in a variety of witnesses from both Testaments and explain the philosophical and theological underpinnings of Christian exegesis. The book sums up and makes accessible the teaching of revered senior scholar and teacher Francis Martin and is aimed squarely at students, assuming no advanced training in philosophy or theology. It includes a foreword by Robert Sokolowski.

Part 1
Fides

1
The Word of God

Power and Presence

We begin with the biblical witness concerning the Word of God. This chapter focuses specifically on the Word spoken directly by God as distinguished from God’s Word given through human intermediaries (e.g., prophets and apostles). Two overarching motifs come to light in these texts. First, the Word of God has causal power. Through his Word, God produces a divinely caused effect in the world, such as in creating, his providential governance of the world, and his immediate acts of divine power in the world. Second, the Word of God has associations with forms of presence. For instance, the Word of God can cause something to be or to occur (e.g., God creates by his Word). The Word of God also puts people in cognitive contact with divine reality or truth by imparting knowledge of God (e.g., God reveals himself and his designs by his Word). Moreover, some texts present the Word of God as an agent figure, a form of presence. Given the volume of material pertinent to this topic, the survey in this chapter (as well as the others) is representative, including texts from different historical periods and literary genres to show that these teachings about the Word of God span the entire canon.

Old Testament Witnesses

God’s Word and Creation

An appropriate place to begin this study of Old Testament teaching about the Word of God is with creation. The seven-day account of creation in Genesis 1:1–2:4a depicts God creating and ordering the world (i.e., “everything that is not divine”) by spoken commands.1 Although this account is not the oldest biblical evidence (historically speaking) for the power and presence of God’s Word, it certainly is quite prominent in terms of both its dramatic depiction and its placement at the opening of the canon.

Four aspects of the creation narrative’s depiction of God’s Word stand out for present purposes. First, God brings everything into an ordered existence by his speaking. The phrase “God said” opens each of the six days of creation, and thus it introduces the creation of each thing that God makes part of the cosmos (Gen. 1:3, 6, 9, 11, 14, 20, 24, 26). Moreover, all the other Hebrew verbs employed in this account for God’s creative action—“make” (ʿāśâ), “create” (bārāʾ), “separate” (bādal)—never appear without reference to God’s speaking. So prominently does God’s Word figure into this narrative that God’s creating cannot be conceived of apart from it.

Second, the Genesis narrative presents God’s Word as an exercise of his almighty power. The narrative depicts God’s creating as being veritably effortless and as happening in perfect accord with his Word. Scholars have pointed out that the creation account in Genesis 1:1–2:4a reflects (and, in some cases, subverts) certain stock images and motifs common to other ancient Near Eastern accounts of creation.2 The significance of God’s creating by his Word in Genesis 1 can be appreciated when compared with the ancient combat myth of creation such as that given in the Babylonian account of origins, Enuma Elish.3 This famed Babylonian account depicts creation as stemming from battle between gods: the Babylonian hero god Marduk and the sea monster Tiamat and her cohort.4 In contrast with the violence in the Babylonian myth of origins, Genesis 1 narrates creation as resulting from the simple, placid fiat of the one almighty God, not a violent contest between rival deities.5 Not only does the Genesis narrative lack any hint of contest or struggle; it also subtly rebuts the combat myth by counting “the sea monsters” among God’s creatures (1:21).

The Genesis narrative also underscores that creation happens in perfect accord with God’s Word. This point comes to light in two ways through the language of the narrative. First, the text frequently follows God’s creative speech with the simple phrase “And it was so” (1:7, 9, 11, 15, 24, 30). The terseness of this expression reinforces the uncontested nature of God’s creative activity and the perfection with which the divine fiat is executed. Second, the narrative frequently repeats the language used in the divine creative command in the description of a thing’s coming-to-be. For instance, on the first day (1:3), God issues the creative pronouncement “Let there be light” (yǝhî ʾôr), and the description of the resulting, created state of affairs both follows immediately and is given in the exact same language as God’s speech: “and there was light” (wayǝhî-ʾôr). The repetition of language between God’s spoken pronouncement and the creation of a particular thing indicates that there is no disconnect between what God says and what results. God creates effortlessly by a spoken command, and what results happens in perfect accord with God’s Word. These two features—the effortlessness of God’s creating by his Word and the perfectly corresponding result—point to the almighty sovereignty of God. God’s Word is an exercise of the divine will and power, and as Gordon Wenham writes, the Word of God “brings into existence what it expresses.”6

Not only is God’s creating by his Word an exercise of the divine will, but it is also revealing of God’s wisdom and intention—a third aspect of God’s Word in Genesis 1. As the passage describes God’s creating by his Word, it not only declares that God speaks (“Then God said . . .”) but also gives the content of what God says (“Let there be light”; 1:3). The text spells out the divine intention to create by articulating it in the direct, declarative speech of God himself. By providing the reader with the content of God’s pronouncement, the narrative presents God’s Word as revealing his intention to create and his intentions for various creatures: the heavenly lights are “to separate the day from the night . . . and . . . be for signs and for seasons and for days and years” (1:14); human beings are to “have dominion” over the birds, the fish, and the creeping things on the land (1:28); the green plants and fruit are to serve as food for both human beings and other creatures (1:29–30). God’s speech reveals him as one who provides for the well-being and sustenance of his creatures. Not only is God’s Word an exercise of the divine will, but it is also revealing of God’s wisdom and his intentions for creation.7

Fourth, God imparts blessing by his Word. On two occasions in Genesis 1, God “blesses” his creatures, and the declaration of blessing is connected with God’s speech (1:22, 28). God blesses his creatures as he instructs them to “be fruitful and multiply,” a command given to the birds, the fish, and the human beings. God blesses these creatures by endowing them with the capacity for reproduction. In doing so, God allows creatures to participate in God’s own creative activity.

The creation account of Genesis 1:1–2:4a, with its distinctive emphasis on God’s creating by his Word, is verbally and thematically echoed in Psalm 33. The psalm, a hymn of praise, celebrates God’s providence and sovereignty over all things.8 The hymn contains a subsection (33:6–9) that speaks of God’s action as the Creator. Mention of God’s creating by his Word both opens and closes this subsection, forming an inclusio. This movement of the psalm opens with the statement “By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and all their host by the breath of his mouth” (33:6). The psalmist then exhorts the world’s population to stand in awe before the Lord and cites as the warrant for such reverence the Lord’s creating the world by his powerful Word: “For he spoke, and it came to be; he commanded, and it stood firm” (33:9).9 References to the Lord’s creating by his Word—either as a noun (dābār) or as a verb (ʾāmar)—frame this section. Like the creation account in Genesis 1, Psalm 33 depicts God effortlessly creating the world by his Word, a simple and powerful fiat that instantiates his will. This connection between God’s Word and his activity is anticipated in verse 4, which reads, “For the word of the LORD is upright, and all his work is done in faithfulness.” The parallel construction of the two lines aligns the Lord’s Word and his working. As Terence Fretheim puts it, “The word of God is the vehicle for the will of God; the word expresses what God intends.”10 Just as in Genesis 1, God’s creative Word was revealing of his wisdom and intentions for created things, so here too, his Word reveals him as being “upright” and “faithful.”

God’s Word and His Providential Governance

The hymn in Sirach 42:15–43:33 associates God’s Word with his creating and his providential governance of the world. The hymn opens, “I will now call to mind the works of the Lord, and will declare what I have seen. By the word of the Lord his works are made; and all his creatures do his will” (42:15). Reminiscent of Genesis 1 and Psalm 33:6, Sirach 42:15c mentions God creating by his Word and seemingly envisions God speaking things into being. The chiastic structuring of 42:15c–d also associates God’s Word and his will:

This literary-rhetorical structure implies that God both creates the world and providentially governs the world by his Word. The “creatures” that “do his will” are the various created things that follow God’s wise, providential arrangement. This point receives further support from this hymn’s other references to created things that follow God’s Word. Ben Sira speaks of the sun as following God’s Word: “At his orders [logois] it hurries on its course” (Sir. 43:5); and similarly the stars: “On the orders [logois] of the Holy One they stand in their appointed places” (43:10). After his review of various created things that are governed by providence, Ben Sira concludes, “By his word [logō] all things hold together” (43:26). It is because God creates, orders, and governs all things by his providential Word that creation can be said to be suffused with and reflective of God’s glory (42:16–17, 25; 43:1, 9, 12) and beauty (43:9, 18). Both Psalm 33 and Sirach 42:15–43:33 thus speak of created things obeying God’s Word by living out their essential natures and activities (e.g., the motions of heavenly bodies), which the Creator’s wise providence ordains.

Other texts likewise display the connection between God’s Word and his providential governance of creation. There are affirmations of God’s Word as holding sway over the angels in the concluding movement of Psalm 103, a hymn of praise to God the benevolent and merciful Savior. After setting the heavenly scene with an introductory remark, “The LORD has established his throne in the heavens” (103:19), the psalmist exhorts the angels to bless God the heavenly King. He addresses the angels as “you mighty ones who do his bidding, obedient to his spoken word [dābār; LXX: logos]” (103:...