Sheep and Goats

Category: Bible Books

  • Proverbs 8:22-31: Wisdom Personified as the Son, or Just Wisdom?

    Toward the end of a nine-chapter Proverbs treatment of wisdom, is a short passage which many think is  wisdom personified as Jesus:

    “Jehovah produced me as the beginning of his way, The earliest of his achievements of long ago.From ancient times I was installed, From the start, from times earlier than the earth.When there were no deep waters, I was brought forth, When there were no springs overflowing with water.Before the mountains were set in place, Before the hills, I was brought forth,When he had not yet made the earth and its fields Or the first clods of earth’s soil.When he prepared the heavens, I was there; When he marked out the horizon on the surface of the waters,When he established the clouds above, When he founded the fountains of the deep,When he set a decree for the sea That its waters should not pass beyond his order, When he established the foundations of the earth,Then I was beside him as a master worker.  I was the one he was especially fond of day by day; I rejoiced before him all the time;I rejoiced over his habitable earth, And I was especially fond of the sons of men. (Proverbs 8:22-31)

     If it is Jesus, it is good that he was “especially fond of the sons of men.” That’s far better than a Jesus who wants to make us trouble. At any rate, you can’t quite picture the abstract quality “wisdom” in itself as being fond of anything in particular. It has to be personified in order to be “fond.” So, why not with the Son? Why not putting him alongside God as his “master worker” for all aspects of creation, rejoicing with him as each aspect comes into being?

    Justin Martyr (c. 100-165 CE) thought the passage referred to the Son, as evidenced by his “Dialogue with Trypho.” So did Irenaeus of Lyons (c. 130–202 CE), as written into his work “Against Heresies.” But those views ran afoul of later doctrine. Didn’t 8:22 (Jehovah produced me as the beginning of his way, The earliest of his achievements of long ago) show, if applied to Jesus, that the Christ was a created being, subordinate to God? Yes, it did, said guys like Arius (c. 250–336 CE), in harmony with Justin and Irenaeus. But a growing trinity movement would make Arius public enemy #1. Leaders of that movement, like Athanasius (c. 296–373 CE) banished the Proverbs 8 passage to just being Wisdom, as an eternal attribute of God, with nothing to do with the Son.

    What I believe is that those closest to the source are most likely the ones who got it right, rather than those who came along hundreds of years after.

     

    ******  The bookstore

  • The Book of Hebrews—almost like “Fifty Ways to Leave Your Lover.”

    “You just slip out the back, Jack. You make a new plan, Stan. You don’t need to be coy, Roy. Just get yourself free.” 

    Okay, okay, so I counted only 14 in the Letter to the Hebrews. To get the full 50 you’d have to expand to the entire Bible. But it’s a high concentration. And they don’t all lead to immediate leaving. Some of them have to stew for a while. Nor is leaving inevitable. Some can resolve.

    Recipients might “drift away,” having not paid “more than the usual attention to the things we have heard.” (Hebrews 2:1)

    They might “draw away” (more deliberate) having developed a “wicked heart.” (Hebrews 3:12)

    They might just become plain “disobedient.” (4:6)

    Or “dull in their hearing,” reverting to “needing milk,” not “solid food.”  (5:12)

    They could “fall away.” (6:6)

    Not good if they “practice sin willfully after having received the accurate knowledge of the truth, [for then] there is no longer any sacrifice for sins left.” (10:26)

    They might “shrink back to destruction.” (Hebrews 10:39)

    They might “get tired and give up,” worn down by the “hostile speech from sinners against their own interests.” (12:3) 

    They might not “endure as part of [their] discipline,” forgetting that “God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father?”(12:7)

    They might “refuse to listen to the one giving divine warning on earth.” (12:25)
     
    They might become “sexually immoral people and adulterers.” (13:4)

    They might become taken over by a “love of money.” (13:5)

    They might be “led astray by various and strange teachings.” (13:9)

    They might become just plain surly. “Be obedient to those who are taking the lead among you and be submissive, for they are keeping watch over you as those who will render an account.” (13:17) “Tell them to take a hike,” they might say.

    What with all those reasons to leave, it’s amazing anyone stayed in the faith!

    On the ex-Witness sites, there are also tons who have left the faith, but none will admit to these reasons. They are all freedom-fighters and whistleblowers. Who are they trying to kid? Jazz it up with code like PIMQ, PIMO, POMO, but it is the same.

    Someday when I am bored I will invent a board game that matches them up. It will have cards for the Hebrews reasons and cards for the ex-Witness reasons and the quicker you can match them up, the higher your score.

    Reasons to leave the faith are scattered throughout the scriptures, but they find special concentration in Hebrews due to the circumstances there in Jerusalem. It was the birthplace of Christianity, formed when the disciples began preaching to the crowds that had gathered there for the Passover. (Acts chapter 2) Like the Big Bang, interest in the Way exploded. Thousands were baptized at single events. But in time, “normalcy” settled in. Many of the most zealous moved on to new frontiers. Locally, that hot zeal, so hard to maintain, cooled, but not the opposition to it. That intensified.

    It’s a lot like today with the Witnesses. An explosion of interest—say from the World War period through the 70s has tapered, but not so the opposition to it: that gathers strength and intensifies. When push comes to shove, opposition just represents the dominant “spirit of the world,” a spirit now fixated on individual rights and a distaste for discipline. I mean, you can see the battle lines forming, but to frame it as something new? No. It is just a repackaging of something old.

    “The game is the same; it’s just up on a different level.’—Bob Dylan

    ******  The bookstore

  • Notes on Proverbs 1: Weekly Bible Reading

    “True wisdom cries aloud in the street. It keeps raising its voice in the public squares.” (Proverbs 1:20)

    For the most part, the greater world disagrees. Its counter-version is that True wisdom is found in the quadrangles. Only ignoramuses are found the streets and public squares. Witnesses have been known to use this verse to encourage each other, since they are in the streets and public squares a lot, the quadrangles not so much. One GB even cited the song as to what they look for there: “It’s the person, not the place. It’s the heart and not the face,” to which he added, “Isn’t that encouraging?” even though his appearance is not all that hard on the eyes.

    Trouble is, in the quadrangles, one usually doesn’t find this:

    “The fear of Jehovah is the beginning of knowledge.” (1:7)

    That lack doesn’t harm the quadrangle’s math and engineering offerings. You may even need those to get where you’re going. But veer outside those fields and some of the others offerings will sabotage you. “The first effect of not believing in God is that you lose your common sense,” G. K. Chesterton said.

    It’s like the passage from the highly recommended (by me) book, ‘Tom Irregardless and Me:’

    “I’d be more impressed with that education if it bore fruit. Those who run the planet, in politics, business, or society, are well-educated almost to the person. The world is not run by commoners. It is rare to find someone in leadership position who has not had four years of higher education at a bare minimum, usually more. One would think the world they’ve collectively built would benefit from that education. Not a bit of it! It is an unjust, violent, chaotic mess, a poor return for their brilliance.

    “Jehovah’s Witnesses do not ignore education, but they do redefine it. Whereas the world’s education emphasizes intellect and soft-pedals moral values, Bible education does just the opposite. Its educational focus is on overcoming greed, pride, and selfishness. It is mental brilliance, the focus of the world’s education, that is assumed able to take care of itself as needed. . . . Witnesses have learned to yield to one another. Their Bible-based education is the reason.

    “Nobody sends their sons or daughters to the university in hopes that they will learn love, fairness, justice, or selflessness. Nobody imagines that to be the purpose of this world’s higher education. In the world of Jehovah’s Witnesses, those qualities are the purpose of their education. Brilliance is outsourced. When it is needed, it is not hard to find someone who has it or someone who can develop it.”

    I wrote this book in 2016. Some of it I would write differently today, but most of it still holds. I might even expand upon the role of Bernard Strawman, sharply critical of the fact that Jehovah’s Witnesses allow a man like Tom Irregardless to go door to door, seeing as how he keeps using that word and each time it makes Bernard wince. I hadn’t told him about Tom’s public talks.

    ***

    I don’t diss college as many in my faith do. Neither do I think it is the bee’s knees. On average, it does result in a higher income. Though, a certain employment counselor observed, “the funny thing about averages is that they don’t necessarily apply to anyone.” I know of several instances in which Witnesses without any college at all, regularly supervise college grads, even PhDs, in their secular work. They rose to their station on pure people skills and credit their religious activities for training them in interaction with others. I would never say it is the rule, but it does happen. I know of a pioneer who began part-time employment at a nearby 150-person company. They leaned on her to go full-time. She declined for the sake of her ministry. She figured that meant she would always be low-level, and she was okay with that. Nonetheless, in a short time they promoted her as trainer for all of their employees who interact with the public, and she remained the only part-timer in an outfit of full-timers.

    Plus, in our area this very cold winter, there is a Witness from Africa who says, “I don’t know how the sun can be out yet it is so cold outside!” University isn’t helping him much, is it? for that is why he is here. 🙂

    ***

    The purpose of the Book of Proverbs is stated at the outset: “To learn wisdom and discipline,” (Proverbs 1:2) which “only fools despise.” (vs 4) It is: “To acquire the discipline that gives insight, Righteousness, good judgment, and uprightness; To impart shrewdness to the inexperienced; [I like how these qualities are all linked.] To give a young man knowledge and thinking ability.” (3-4)

    It is good not to ignore these things:

    “A wise person listens and takes in more instruction; A man of understanding acquires skillful direction.” (5)

    This is true even though you will find some among humans who have a black belt in dispensing knowledge.

    Counsel is difficult to give when people bristle over their independences and rights. One speaker likened it to cautioning someone over his tire, which has gone very low on air. “Oh yeah?!” comes the retort. “Well, your car has a dent in the fender!”

    The downside of internet life is that it caters to a “showy display of knowledge,” yet you have no idea whatsoever whether the person “practices what he preaches,” though Jesus said the latter was the only thing that really counted. In person this is much less likely to happen.

    Too, anyone who undertakes counsel that affects the life of another can get blowback should anything go wrong. One thinks of Paul in the first century pleading: “We have wronged no one, we have corrupted no one, we have taken advantage of no one.” (2 Corinthians 7:2) Why would he have said this unless to fend off frequent charges that they had?

    The fear of Jehovah is the beginning of wisdom,” but the task is quickly delegated: “Listen, my son, to the discipline of your father, And do not forsake the instruction of your mother.” (8)

    Mom and Dad are not always the sharpest knives in the drawer but they are the most available. And they are the only ones that you know are not likely to be pointed at you, at least not deliberately. If you have good ones, they align you right for life. Even if you don’t, you take from them what you can and fill in the gaps when you move on.

    Usually, they protect you from “attacks” sure to come out of nowhere:

    “My son, if sinners try to entice you, do not consent. If they say: “Come with us. Let us set an ambush to shed blood. We will lie hidden, waiting for innocent victims without cause. We will swallow them alive as the Grave does, Whole, like those going down to the pit. Let us seize all their precious treasures; We will fill our houses with spoil.” (10-13)

    And then, their invitation: “You should join us.” (14)

    Why don’t they mind their own business? What’s in it for them?

    “My son, do not follow them. Keep your feet off their path, For their feet run to do evil; They hurry to shed blood.” (15-16)

    You can be sure that there’s something they’re not telling you. Like in verse 17: “It is surely in vain to spread a net in full sight of a bird.” This is why I never let the mice watch as I am baiting the traps.

    Switching “traps”—not at all implying they are the same—some kids sail through college (the quadrangles) just fine.* Others regret being manipulated by an education industry that shoves you, unless your grades are in the toilet, directly into college upon completion of high school. Though I did reap some benefit from college, I also reaped chaos and would have been far better off holding off until having more maturity—or even not going unless and until I had the need for it, if possible doing so on an a la carte basis.

    “How come you never taught me to do things, Pop?” I complained to my 92 year old Dad. He’d always been reasonably handy, whereas I was not. Lack of a trade has been a thorn in my side throughout life. “I did,” the amiable duffer replied. “But you weren’t paying attention that day.” I think he just fell for the modern mantra of ‘Send your kids to college and they can hire people to do the grubby stuff for them.” Raised on a farm himself, he trusted the experts to do better for his kids.

    ***

    Working up to a grand finale here: “How long will you inexperienced ones love inexperience? How long will you ridiculers take pleasure in ridicule? And how long will you foolish ones hate knowledge?” (1:22)

    He keeps reaching out, almost pleading: “Respond to my reproof. Then I will pour out my spirit for you; I will make my words known to you.” (1:23)

    But, whoa! Tell him to take a hike and you discover that he really has an edge to him:

    “Because I called out, but you kept refusing, I stretched out my hand, but no one was paying attention, You kept neglecting all my advice And rejecting my reproof, I also will laugh when disaster strikes you; I will mock when what you dread comes, When what you dread comes like a storm, And your disaster arrives like a storm wind, When distress and trouble come upon you. At that time they will keep calling me, but I will not answer; They will eagerly look for me, but they will not find me, Because they hated knowledge, And they did not choose to fear Jehovah. They refused my advice; They disrespected all my reproof. So they will bear the consequences of their way, And they will be glutted with their own counsel.”

    “Laugh when disaster strikes you?” It’s not exactly “Slow to anger, Quick to forgive,” is it? It is not hard to see from where comes the street-wisdom that the God of the New Testament is nice but the God of the Old Testament is mean.

    Or is he? Just don’t push him over the edge, is the message. Until that happens, he is nothing but patience. Both the patience and the silence when the patience is abused are on display at the Babylonian conquest of Jerusalem:

    “Jehovah the God of their forefathers kept warning them by means of his messengers, warning them again and again, because he felt compassion for his people and for his dwelling place. But they kept ridiculing the messengers of the true God, and they despised his words and mocked his prophets, until the rage of Jehovah came up against his people, until they were beyond healing.” (2 Chronicles 36:15-16)

    Jesus focused more on God’s loving side. Maybe this is because, by the time he arrived, humans had slid farther from the perfection the enjoyed at Eden. Maybe this is because they had more bad influences around them. Both of these factors are even more so today, so it is not surprising that ‘the God of the New Testament’ draws people so much more than ‘the God of the Old.’ But, those who suppose the God of the New is too much of a softie have not looked at Matthew 7:21-23. There, Jesus says:

    “Not everyone saying to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter into the Kingdom of the heavens, but only the one doing the will of my Father who is in the heavens will. Many will say to me in that day: ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and expel demons in your name, and perform many powerful works in your name?’ And then I will declare to them: ‘I never knew you! Get away from me, you workers of lawlessness!’”

    When I do my ‘Read a Scripture and Leave’ approach in door-to-door and use this verse, I say the reason I chose it is that some are surprised Jesus would be like that. They hear so much about his love that they begin to imagine it’s almost impossible to get him riled. If these verses are valid, however, even many of those who claim to follow him he wants nothing to do with.

    One must find a balance. Jesus even said that a course of following God might even divide families, the worst of all possible sins to hear opponents of Christianity carry on:

    “Do not think I came to bring peace to the earth; I came to bring, not peace, but a sword. For I came to cause division, with a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. Indeed, a man’s enemies will be those of his own household.” (Mathew 10:34-36)

    Humans who accept God’s provision for redemption through the death of his Son: are we not all on a journey of sorts? That’s why Jesus’ analogies of the broad and spacious versus the cramped and narrow road work so well. It is also why I begin to think one of the greatest type/anti-types of all time played out right before me routinely as a boy—back when my siblings and I would ride in the back of the family stationwagon on long trips. Within a hour, we were peppering Dad with our discontent. Most of it centered around how bored we were, how much longer would the trip take? aren’t we there yet? lets stop at that rest stop, I want a snack, and so forth.

    Dad would put up with it for a while, but at length would holler: ‘If you kids don’t stop crying back there, I’m going to stop this car and give you something to cry about!’

    I thought he was just being mean. I was slow to realize that he was showing the wisdom of the ages, for sometimes that is exactly what must be done.

    Someone played the ‘more loving than thou’ card on me recently. Yes, dads were like that back in the day, but he is more enlightened.* He will pull the car over and patiently answer all his children’s questions, no doubt as many times as it takes—taking for granted that the precious young things can’t possibly understand that it takes time to get from point A to point B, and that this is so because the world is big. And if—get this—despite all his loving explanations, they are still not reassured, he will turn the car around and head home, respecting their feelings. That annual visit to the relatives? Gone. That once-a-year vacation trip to a rented spot already paid for? Forget about it! Nothing is more important that he show love to his tiny children.

    Look, the situation doesn’t come up anyone. People hand their kids a smart phone and they barely come up for air even when the destination is reached.

     

    *****The bookstore

  • As Paul Drones on, Eutychus Falls Three Stories to his Death

    The mid-week meetings of Jehovah’s Witnesses are roving through the Book of Acts and Eutychus recently came up. He’s the kid that fell asleep during Paul’s talk and plunged three stories to his death! (Acts 20:9) (Tom Irregardless would have had them all snoozing.) Says the Watchtower-published book, ‘Bearing Thorough Witness,’ “Paul could not rightly be blamed for the death of Eutychus. Still, he did not want the young man’s death to mar this important occasion or to stumble anyone spiritually.”

    No. Can’t have that. It is not hard to envision the joke that might have dogged Paul thereafter throughout his entire life—along the lines of ‘Buckle up when that bore comes to town!’ And—let’s face it—you cannot read the account without wondering what sort of speaker Paul was. Was he a bore? There is a verse that suggests it. Paul acknowledges it of himself: “For they say: ‘His letters are weighty and forceful, but his presence in person is weak and his speech contemptible.’” (2 Corinthians 10:10)

    Contemptible? At first glance one might think he admits to being a bore, but I think the answer lies elsewhere. I think it lies with the intellectuals hanging out in Athens, guys given to philosophy, who said of him: “What is it this chatterer would like to tell?” (Acts 17:18) The word literally means ‘seed-picker.’ It suggests a bird that picks up a seed here and poops it out there. I mean, where’s the respect? But that’s how that contemptuous lot was and it is from a similar lot as the “super-fine” apostles who so disparaged Paul at 2 Corinthians 11:5–guys envious of his position (but not his work), phonies, really.

    My guess is that they were contemptuous of Paul in that he did not follow their strict rules of philosophical logic. Today, it might be seen in the strict rules some have that everything be “evidence-based,” with their equally strict rules as to just what constitutes “evidence”—“anecdotal evidence” doesn’t count. I’ll bet Paul simply didn’t defer to equally manmade standards and they dissed him for it.

    It is another matter entirely with Tom Irregardless, from my first book, ‘Tom Irregardless and Me.’ Not only is he a horrifically bad speaker, but he says irregardless so often that Shem Sheepngoats has downloaded an app to keep track. When I bring my Bible student (Ted Putsch) to his first public talk—having carefully ascertained that the speaker will be a good one, that speaker calls in sick and Tom Irregardless is the substitute! I mutter under my breath why God hates my Bible student. But, as I slink into my seat, losing count after 17 irregardlesses, Ted weathers it well. After the meeting, he is seen chatting up several persons in the congregation, even exchanging a few words with Tom Irregardless.

    It is a gag drawn from long-ago memory. It would not happen today. The quality of public speakers has markedly improved through the decades and the worst you will ever do today is hear a speaker who is ‘adequate.’ Clunkers have long since been weeded out. One never hears a bad talk these days, and I am dating myself when I approach the elder I love to tease and tell him that I would be scared to deliver a really hard-hitting message but it might help if I had some practice—therefore, would he mind if I was the one to announce his public talks?

    To so improve speakers is a significant accomplishment, for it is peers ‘policing themselves,’ something that is very difficult to do because you don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings—and you also worry that they may turn around and say your talks suck, too. But it has been done. The accomplishment means little to one used to the church model in which a paid preacher is employed and no one else has any role beyond listening. But, in an organization in which all are encouraged to both preach and teach, it is significant. I even think the local speakers are as good, sometimes better, than those on the app, with more spontanaity. But this might be just a personal preference for non-televised talks.

     

    ******  The bookstore

  • Psalm 132: You Can Almost Read it Like a Housewarming

    You can almost read Psalm 132 as a housewarming. First is how David went to tall that trouble to build one for God, even after God said he had never asked for one. (I like the passage about him at Psalm 50:12, ‘If I were hungry, you think I’d tell you?’)

    “O Jehovah, remember David And all his suffering; How he swore to Jehovah, How he vowed to the Powerful One of Jacob: “I will not go into my tent, my home. I will not lie upon my couch, my bed; I will not allow my eyes to sleep, Nor my eyelids to slumber Until I find a place for Jehovah, A fine residence for the Powerful One of Jacob.”  (1-5)

    Next is everyone trying to lure God into his house:

    “Rise up, O Jehovah, to come to your resting-place, You and the Ark of your strength.  May your priests be clothed with righteousness, And may your loyal ones shout joyfully,” (8-9) even reminding him of his own words, his own promise to David: “One of your offspring, I will place on your throne. If your sons keep my covenant And my reminders that I teach them, Their sons too Will sit on your throne forever.”  (11-12)

    Then, as though testing out the place, settling in an armchair or two, God decides he likes it. Narration: “For Jehovah has chosen Zion; He has desired it for his dwelling place.” Then,, God speaks himself:

    “This is my resting-place forever; Here I will dwell, for this is my desire. I will richly bless it with provisions; I will satisfy its poor with bread. Its priests I will clothe with salvation, And its loyal ones will shout joyfully. There I will make the strength of David grow. I have prepared a lamp for my anointed one. I will clothe his enemies with shame, But the crown on his head will flourish.” (14-18)

     

    ******  The bookstore

  • “If it Were Indeed Some Wrong or Some Wicked Act of Villainy . . .”

    Sometimes a guy prefers the older translation to the newer one. Like with this passage from Acts 18:14, when the Jewish bigwigs hauled Paul before the proconsul because he was teaching new things: “Contrary to the law this person leads men to another persuasion in worshiping God,” they charged, as though it was a crime. (vs 13)

    It was a crime, according to their rules but the Roman proconsul Gallio could not have cared less. These people with their religious disputes were such a pain to him that he kept clear. He answers them, just before Paul is going to defend himself, and thereby making defense unnecessary, “If it were, indeed, some wrong or a wicked act of villainy, O Jews, I would with reason put up patiently with you.  But if it is controversies over speech and names and the law among you, you yourselves must see to it. I do not wish to be a judge of these things.” (14-15)

    You can read the contempt. It oozes from the guy’s mouth. If he had to (it wouldn’t be easy and he wouldn’t like the task), he would “put up patiently” with these characters. If this fellow Paul had actually done something “wrong” or—is it sarcasm here?—done some “wicked act of villainy,” he’d hear them out. But he hasn’t. So—‘Sheesh! won’t you leave me in peace already?’ you can almost hear his dismissal.

    The new version misses that entirely. Here, Gallio is just the earnest county official: He says, “If, indeed, it were some wrong or a serious crime, O Jews, it would be reasonable for me to hear you out patiently.” Yes, that rendering gets the job done. It conveys that he’s not going to get involved. But, it’s not as good. It doesn’t convey how he feels about his subjects. Sometimes we are so determined to paint people as mild that we paint them as bland.

    So, when the Jews are ignored, they take to beating the snot out of the synagogue head honcho—surely that will get Gallio’s attention. ‘Nope—I’m done,’ is his response, and you can almost see him rustling his newspaper to shoo them away. We read, “But Gallio would not concern himself at all with these things.” (17)

    That response is slightly modified, for the worse, I think, in the newer 2013 NWT version which reads that he would not “get involved,” implying he may have been “concerned” but his hands were tied by it not being his affair—so what could he do? Nah, I think he didn’t give a hoot. The older (originally from 1961) is better.

    Sigh—the wording from the new serves as the basis for Bearing Thorough Witness about God’s Kingdom, the current JW commentary on Acts of the Apostles. As to Gallio’s indifference, it suggests, “Perhaps Gallio thought that Sosthenes was the leader of the mob action against Paul and was therefore getting what he deserved.” I don’t think so; that implies he cared. I don’t think he did. He just wanted to get back to his paper and cup of coffee.

    No, I do not like the new. It is going in the direction of the newer mushier translations, like the New International Version (1978), which reads: “Just as Paul was about to speak, Gallio said to them, ‘If you Jews were making a complaint about some misdemeanor or serious crime, it would be reasonable for me to listen to you.’” (14)

    It’s not as bad as the word-salad Message paraphrase (1993), which reads: “Just as Paul was about to defend himself, Gallio interrupted and said to the Jews, “If this was a matter of criminal conduct, I would gladly hear you out. But it sounds to me like one more Jewish squabble, another of your endless hairsplitting quarrels over religion. Take care of it on your own time. I can’t be bothered with this nonsense,”

    “Gladly!” He would “gladly” hear them out! NO! They are a pain in the neck! He would, “with reason, put up patiently” with them. The older versions render it better*. Like the Revised Standard Version of 1952: “But when Paul was about to open his mouth, Gallio said to the Jews, “If it were a matter of wrongdoing or vicious crime, I should have reason to bear with you, O Jews.” It’s not quite as strong as the older NWT, but it does convey he wouldn’t relish the task.

    Forget that verse about the codger who mutters, “Why were the old days better than the present ones?” (Ecclesiastes 7:10) I’ll tell you why he grumbles over that. Because, they were!!

    *In fairness to the Message, it does convey that Gallio considered the Jews’ concerns “nonsense.”

     

    ******  The bookstore

  • Psalm 115: The Apple Clonking Newton in the Head

    Within Psalm 115:16 lies a common-sense innocuous verse that has all the impact of the apple landing on Newton’s head.

    “As for the heavens, they belong to Jehovah, But the earth he has given to the sons of men.”

    It is the perfect verse you weave into any reply to those who insist we all go to heaven when we die. Such as this person, who asks, “Why are most Jehovah’s Witnesses not born again? Doesn’t the reason stem from their reading of Revelation 7:9-10?”

    Does he think the destiny for all good persons is to go to heaven when they die? I asked him that. He does.

    Agreed that Christians who are destined to heaven need to be born again. But that not true for all Christians. A Christian whose hope is to live forever on a paradise earth made so by God’s kingdom rule, the vast majority of Jehovah’s Witnesses today, are not. They are people who “truly trust in, follow, and love Jesus Christ.” But their hope is to live on earth under his kingdom government.

    It is not so that this hope rests entirely on how JWs read Revelation 7:9-10, or even mostly. Until the 1930s, Witnesses also thought that those verses referred to a heavenly-destined group. But in time, they came to reconcile the passage with other portions of the Bible.

    As for myself, I can’t imagine living forever in heaven. Whatever would I do there? But I can easily imagine living forever on an earth restored. The earth is a beautiful place. 

    Witnesses believe God put humans on earth and gave them the commission to fill the earth and subdue it, because he wanted them there. If he had wanted them in heaven, he would have put them there directly. To Jehovah’s Witnesses, the earth is not a temporary place, a launching pad into heaven or a trap door into hell. It is given to humankind as a home. Death was not a part of God’s original purpose. Had Adam and Eve not rebelled, they would have continued living where God put them, they along with all their offspring, spreading out to fill the earth, living there forever. But, according to Romans 5:12, “through one man [Adam] sin entered into the world and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because they had all sinned.”

    Jesus makes this point about earth in the beatitudes. “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” (Matthew 5:5) The meek do not inherit the earth today. They get stomped all over. Per Jesus’ words in ‘the Lord’s Prayer,’ that will continue until the kingdom comes: “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven,” he says. (Matthew 9:10)

    With the resurrection of Christ, a new hope opens up. It is called a “sacred secret.” It takes getting one’s head around because it is so contrary to the earthly hope described above. Fortunately, one does not have to “get one’s head around it.” God directly implants the heavenly hope in ones so called. For example, to the Ephesians, Paul writes of “making known to us the sacred secret of his will. It is according to his good pleasure that he himself purposed for an administration at the full limit of the appointed times, to gather all things together in the Christ, the things in the heavens and the things on the earth.” (Eph 1:9-10) These ones are destined to rule with Christ in heaven. It is a brand-spanking-new calling. it is called being “born again.” Even John the Baptist, who prepared the crowds for Jesus but died prior to his resurrection, did not have that hope. “Among those born of women, there has not been raised up anyone greater than John the Baptist, but a lesser person in the Kingdom of the heavens is greater than he is,” Jesus says at Matthew 11:11

    Plainly, not everyone can be ruling. There has to be people to rule over. The latter can be expected to greatly outnumber the former. This is true of those later recognized as the “great crowd” of Revelation 7:9-10.

    “After this I saw, and look! a great crowd, which no man was able to number, out of all nations and tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, dressed in white robes; and there were palm branches in their hands.  And they keep shouting with a loud voice, saying: “Salvation we owe to our God, who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb.” (Rev 7:9-10)

    Good things are in store for them: “These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. That is why they are before the throne of God, and they are rendering him sacred service day and night in his temple; and the One seated on the throne will spread his tent over them. They will hunger no more nor thirst anymore, neither will the sun beat down on them nor any scorching heat, because the Lamb, who is in the midst of the throne, will shepherd them and will guide them to springs of waters of life. And God will wipe out every tear from their eyes.” (7: 14-17)

    No one can number them. What is the sense of a numberless amount in government? But as one’s ruled over on earth, numberless makes perfect sense.

     

    ***Someone else spelled it out this way, someone who thinks the earth will be destroyed:

    “JW Paradise Earth

    1. There is no more death, tears, sorrow, crying, or pain
    2. It would be like the Garden of Eden before the Fall
    3. God and the 144,000 anointed ones will rule over them in Heaven.
    4. The current earth remains but the current man governments are gone

    “Church New Earth

    1. There is no more death, tears, sorrow, crying, or pain
    2. It would be like the Garden of Eden before the Fall
    3. God and the 144,000 will be with them on the New Earth. You can touch them. Hug them.
    4. The first earth has passed away including it's seas, but this New Earth replaces it.

     

    If I understand this church view of the new earth (which most church members don’t know anything about; most think it’s just straight up heaven-bound for the faithful), am I to conclude that God takes the faithful to heaven, destroys the earth, recreates it, and then puts the faithful back on it again? This seems like an extraordinarily convoluted way to go about it.

    Did the earth do something wrong for which it should be destroyed? Does anyone think God should take out his wrath upon the planet? Or do you think he should take out wrath upon the wicked people on it?

    The illustration that all Witnesses love (because it makes so much sense) is that if you rent your house out to tenants and they destroy it, you do not destroy the house. You evict the tenants. 

    The earth is far better than a house. All you have to do is stop abusing the earth and it heals up pretty quickly. We see that in the aftermath of every oil spill and forest fire. Just stop abusing the earth, stop the destruction of it, put a kingdom in place and citizens that will treasure it and take care of it, and the existing planet becomes a “new earth.” No need for this rigamorole of a wholesale move of all the righteous to heaven and back again.

    But, if we go the church view expressed, that the earth literally needs be destroyed, then what about the heavens? Cited was 2 Peter 3:6-7 KJV:

    Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished: [7] But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.

    So the literal heavens, too, are reserved for fire? What’s wrong with them that they also must be replaced?

    To my mind, this view takes a perfectly reasonable teaching of the righteous surviving upon an earth made new under God’s kingdom, something that is consistent with the entire Bible, from Adam to Armegeddon, and replaces it with something that makes no sense at all and enjoys little scriptural support.

    Heavens are often used in the Bible as a metaphor for rulerships. Both could scorch you one moment, freeze you the next, drench you the next minute, and there wasn’t a thing you could do about it. For the most part, that is still true of even modern governments. Their policies affect you greatly and there is very little you can do about it. A thousand pounds of pressure yields a once of result—and in many lands, the governed have no say whatsoever.

    Accordingly, Jehovah’s Witnesses view the “new heavens” to be a metaphor for God’s kingdom ruling over the “new earth” after the wicked are removed from it.

    I am all for literalism. But not to the point of converting obvious metaphor to it. When someone tells me to stop beating around the bush, I realize he is not speaking of a literal bush.

    ***

    There is another keeper from Psalm 115, verses 4-8. Note the zinger at verse 8. It is as though the punchline of a joke. Only, in this case, it is no joke.

    4 Their idols are silver and gold, The work of human hands.

    5 A mouth they have, but they cannot speak; Eyes, but they cannot see;

    6 Ears they have, but they cannot hear; A nose, but they cannot smell;

    7 Hands they have, but they cannot feel; Feet, but they cannot walk; They make no sound with their throat.

    8 The people who make them will become just like them, As will all those who trust in them.

    That last line is a beaut. Contrast it with the psalmist’s God, who “does whatever he pleases.” (3) Their god does nothing at all. Worse yet, by devoting your life to them, you find yourself in that same predicament.

    I am told that when our people speak with Muslims, they are quick to read this verse. It makes their eyes bug out. See, Muslims hate idols and they associate them with Christianity. To read how the God of the Bible also hates them makes a powerful impression.

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  • Psalm 107: God Saves Them from their Plight.

    The first thing you notice about Psalm 107 is the refrain:

    “They kept crying out to Jehovah in their distress; He rescued them from their plight.” It is at verses 6, 13, 19, and 28.

    The second thing one notices is yet another refrain, partly explained by the first:

    “Let people give thanks to Jehovah for his loyal love And for his wonderful works in behalf of the sons of men.” (vs 8, 15, 21, and 31)

    Two refrains! The psalm follows a pattern: They get into hot water. They call to Jehovah to help. He pulls them out from the fire. He dresses up their wounds. They thank him mightily. Then, they dive into hot water again!

    Each stanza adds another twist to what is essentially one event in multiple sequels. History rhymes, even if it doesn’t repeat itself. The pattern remains the same, though the details are different. Since the psalm begins with, “Let those reclaimed by Jehovah say this, Those whom he reclaimed from the hand of the adversary,” (vs 2) apparently it applies to anyone leaving God for any reason and later returning. Finding it barren out there, getting beat up in various ways. Sending out an SOS to Jehovah—who reclaims them.

    Sometimes they wandered. Sometimes they fell. Sometimes they rebelled. Sometimes they searched for a “city where they could live.” (4, 7, 36) God would bring them into one, but they would not remain. Why do I think of the lyric, “I’m getting bugged driving up and down the same ol’ strip; I got to find me a place where the kids are hip?”

    They keep calling out to God and he keeps taking them back. There is not even mentioned the time in Judges that he got fed up with them and said, “I’m done!”

    “Jehovah said to the Israelites: ‘Did I not save you from Egypt and from the Amorites, the Ammonites, the Philistines, the Sidonians, Amalek, and Midian when they oppressed you? When you cried out to me, I saved you out of their hand. But you abandoned me and served other gods. That is why I will not save you again. Go to the gods whom you have chosen and call for help. Let them save you in your time of distress.”  (Judges 10:11-14)

    But, they doubled-down on how sorry they were and how they would change their ways, and he took them back. He’s sort of a soft touch that way.

    Though, he isn’t really. It’s not as though he doesn’t let them suffer the consequences. Back to Psalm 107:

    “For they had rebelled against the word of God; They disrespected the counsel of the Most High. So he humbled their hearts through hardship; They stumbled, and there was no one to help them.” (vs 11-12)

    Of course, the friends fall all over themselves to point out that God does not bring hardship; he just allows it to happen. There is apparently something in the Hebrew grammar that allows one to view it that way, so I always do. The other way does one no good. Why see the glass as half empty when you can see it as half full?

    The fourth stanza of this pattern takes a new twist:

    “Those who travel on the sea in ships, Who ply their trade over the vast waters, They have seen the works of Jehovah And his wonderful works in the deep;” (vs 23-24)

    For some, you have to get around to see it. Stick too close with the home base and you can miss the forest for the trees. Go out to sea a bit; those guys all know it. Though, to be sure, they learn the hard way:

    “By his word a windstorm arises, Lifting up the waves of the sea. They rise up to the sky; They plunge down to the depths. Their courage melts away because of the impending calamity. They reel and stagger like a drunken man, And all their skill proves useless.”  (vs 25-27)

    What do they do in that event? “Then they cry out to Jehovah in their distress, And he rescues them from their plight.” (vs 28)

    ***

    After the meeting, the brothers fell to chatting. One of them commented on some verse in the 30s. “Who cares about that?” I quipped back. “That wasn’t in the assigned reading (which I had done).” Whereupon, he jibed back at me, “Yes—can’t we get back to talking about me?” What a low blow! Completely unfair! Worse than even my brother who cheats at Scrabble! All I do is think about God! Never anything else!

    But, he said later that he said it to me only because someone had said it to him. Let’s face it: The reason it is recommended to notice and comment on the householder’s garden, bumper stickers, pets, etc, is because that gives him an opportunity to speak on his favorite subject—himself! and his interests. It is just the way people are. Dale Carnegie’s career went into the stratosphere upon recognizing that. As long as you apply appropriate checks and balances, you’re okay.

     

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  • Psalm 93: Symbolic Rivers

    Rivers in the Bible are sometimes symbolic. Maybe, also the ones of Psalm 93.

    The rivers have surged, O Jehovah, The rivers have surged and roared; The rivers keep surging and pounding. (93:3)

    They have surged. Repeat and add: they have surged and roared. Repeat as continuious action, and escalate to pounding: The rivers keep surging and pounding. 

    Jehovah is above them all, triumphant, as though the rivers here are a disruptive thing:

    Above the sound of many waters, Mightier than the breaking waves of the sea, Jehovah is majestic in the heights. (93:4) The opening two verses set up that scenario, too. 

    The Research Guide doesn’t touch it. The Insight Book does. Sometimes invading armies are “rivers.” Makes sense.

    “Therefore look! Jehovah will bring against them The mighty and vast waters of the River, The king of As·syrʹi·a and all his glory. He will come up over all his streambeds And overflow all his banks.”  Isa 8:7

    Isn’t that how Babylon fell, when the river literally concealed invading armies?

    The comparison I like best is the Devil disgorging rivers of water and the earth swallows it up to save the woman:

    “And the serpent spewed out water like a river from its mouth after the woman, to cause her to be drowned by the river. 16 But the earth came to the woman’s help, and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed up the river that the dragon spewed out from its mouth.”

    So I told Duncan about it, but he didn’t call on me during the gems review. He knew I would just be blowing smoke. Besides, he thought of the river, clear as crystal, that flows from the throne 

    Turn the page and rivers are clapping their hands. I’m not sure how rivers can do that:

    Let the rivers clap their hands; Let the mountains shout joyfully together. (98:8)

    At Isaiah 42:10, the rivers are like unmentionables:

    ”Sing to Jehovah a new song, His praise from the ends of the earth, You who go down to the sea and all that fills it, You islands and their inhabitants.” We all know what it is that fills the sea.
    Much talk about a “new song” about this point in the Psalms, as though a new twist in God’s purpose unfolding. From 91 on, and especially 95, the people trusting in God emerge victorious, an outcome many earlier psalms appear in doubt over.
    Meanwhile, and having nothing to do with anything except that the congregation is now in the book commenting on Acts:

    It can’t have been easy for Paul, to be followed around for days by a crazy person hollering: “‘These men are slaves of the Most High God and are proclaiming to you the way of salvation.’” To illustrate that it would not be, I told a certain someone at the Hall that I would heretofore do it to him.

    Did the demon driving her think he had Paul over a barrel? What’s he going to do—cast it out, upon which the servant would be valueless to her masters and the cops would beat Paul up? But Paul cast it out, the servant became valueless to her masters, and the cops beat him up:

    “Now it happened that as we were going to the place of prayer, a servant girl with a spirit, a demon of divination,l met us. She supplied her masters with much profit by fortune-telling. This girl kept following Paul and us and crying out with the words: “These men are slaves of the Most High God and are proclaiming to you the way of salvation.” She kept doing this for many days. Finally Paul got tired of it and turned and said to the spirit: “I order you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.” And it came out that very hour.

    “Well, when her masters saw that their hope of profit was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace to the rulers. Leading them up to the civil magistrates, they said: “These men are disturbing our city very much. They are Jews, and they are proclaiming customs that it is not lawful for us to adopt or practice, seeing that we are Romans.” And the crowd rose up together against them, and the civil magistrates, after tearing the garments off them, gave the command to beat them with rods. After they had inflicted many blows on them, they threw them into prisonu and ordered the jailer to guard them securely.” (Acts 16:16-24)

     

     

     

     

     

  • Psalm 90: How Long Will [What] Last?

    The reason I believe better sanitation and not vaccines (as has been claimed) resulted in the greater expanded life expectancy during the 20th century is found at Psalm 90:10:

    “The span of our life is 70 years, Or 80 if one is especially strong.”

    So there it is, written maybe four thousand years ago. Yet, in the year 1900, the average life expectancy in the United States was 47 years. Had humans not deviated from the sanitation principles found in the Old Testament, would it not have been the 70 or 80 from the Bible? Unsafe working conditions also played a part, no doubt, but the role of sanitation is still a huge factor.

    Today, that 70-to-80 has improved to 80-to-90, and that probably is the role of modern medicine, which may include some vaccines. But the science zealot who tried to tell me how far we have come, since in the Middle Ages, people “crapped in a bucket and threw it out on the street,” consequently dying at thirty—well, that has nothing to do with science. It has to do with correcting (even if unknowingly) a prior neglect of the Old Testament which held that you’re supposed to bury your poop.

    We pull a lot of useful verses out of the 90th psalm, verse 10 among them. However, this time around in the congregation Bible reading, verse 13 caught my attention.

    “Return, O Jehovah! How long will this last? Have pity on your servants.”

    How long will what last? Is it a special period of anger on God’s part? One might easily think it upon reading 7, 8, 9, and 11:

    “For we are consumed by your anger And terrified by your rage.  (7) You place our errors in front of you; Our secrets are exposed by the light of your face. (8) Our days ebb away because of your fury; And our years come to an end like a whisper. (9) . . . Who can fathom the power of your anger? Your fury is as great as the fear you deserve. (11)

    And yet, the specific affliction appears to be no more than what verse 10 speaks of, that we get 70 years, 80 at best. See how many verses chronicle the fleetingness of life today.

    “You make mortal man return to dust; You say: ‘Return, you sons of men.’” (3) For a thousand years are in your eyes just as yesterday when it is past, Just as a watch during the night. (4) You sweep them away; they become like mere sleep; In the morning they are like grass that sprouts. (5) In the morning it blossoms and is renewed, But by evening it withers and dries up. (6)

    That’s just ordinary life he is talking about. No special punishment there. What’s with this psalm?

    Unless . . . unless . . could this be one of those passages in which the author reveals truths he is unaware of himself, the Bible being the product of “men [who] spoke from God as they were moved by holy spirit?” (2 Peter 1:21)

    People settle for so little today. Totally obsessed with what years are left of their present life, most totally ignore the far longer period after their present life runs its course. Is the psalmist lamenting how that circumstance came about? After all, why does God “make mortal man return to dust [and] say: “Return, you sons of men?” Man was intended to live forever. But rebelling against him, in the oldest transgression of history, in the easy-to-understand act of eating an off-limits fruit—the only thing that was off-limits—had the effect of pulling their own plug from the power source. Thereafter, the blades spinning ever slower, till their offspring many generations downstream, are stuck with a life expectancy of 70 or 80 years that quickly pass by and are filled with trouble.

    How long will that “punishment” last, you might picture the psalmist saying, having no knowledge then of the means God would employ to reverse it.

    It’s an application I like. Even the aforementioned verses (7-9, 11) of God’s anger could be looked at as that original rebellion being what he is angry about. It is maybe one of those passages that has more than one application. Even if it isn’t, we can assign it one, since the assignment would be in keeping with “the pattern of healthful words.” We used to call such passages antitypes. But now, we drop down to a safer level and say, ‘This reminds me of that.”

    ***

    It’s rare to see life as God sees it. But now that we’ve all learned to do photo montages at memorial talks, it begins to happen. A person’s entire life scrolls by in just a few minutes.  Not too different from the psalm:

     

    “For a thousand years are in your eyes just as yesterday when it is past, Just as a watch during the night. You sweep them away; they become like mere sleep; In the morning they are like grass that sprouts. In the morning it blossoms and is renewed, But by evening it withers and dries up. . . . The span of our life is 70 years, Or 80 if one is especially strong. . . . They quickly pass by, and away we fly.” (Psalm 90: 4-10)

     

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