Taking into consideration all the earlier discussion in this book, especially von Rad’s discussion in the previous chapter, some thoughts should be brought to light that are at least “differences” in ways of looking at things, or using Mr. Strauch’s terminology, “disagreements.” The reader has much background under her/his belt by now. These may be areas that cannot be truly resolved; perhaps the better thought is to allow the reader to meditate on the perspectives.
The desire of the writer is that readers of the book are from a broad spectrum of the People of God, from backgrounds of the Jewish faith (Yehuda) and the Christian faith, across the entire range, and of course anyone else who has a faithful interest in the Bible. And it is clear that there are differences in the beliefs of the many groups that might be readers. Most of what has been said here could probably be accepted fairly easily by that broad spectrum. Some, especially the previous chapter, may have caused some pause in some readers. And there was an indication that this chapter would address some potential controversial points.
The first thought for discussion is the term von Rad defined and used in the previous chapter, “immanence.” Certainly not coincidental, recently the writer heard a rabbinic teacher say a few words about “immanence.” A short video will share his thoughts,* but to give an overview, we will cover some of his thoughts and von Rad’s definition again, and look at some Scripture. The conversation can easily expand into widening “concentric circles” from there. Please recall that it is always the writer’s intent to bring together the People of God rather than cause further division. Again, the best action for the reader is to step back from any “assumptions” and look at what is being shared with a clean slate. The writer is not trying to convince anyone of anything, but asks the reader to be willing to receive a message, minimizing preconceived ideas. The headmaster of our school has one most quoted verse, which is, as he quotes it, from Romans 15:7, “Receive whom the Lord receives.” If you read the verse in a Bible, you will see that instead of “Lord,” it says Christ (Messiah). But if you stop to think, at that point in time, there were no “Christians.” There were people who accepted YHWH as God, and Christ, Yeshua, received those. And Yeshua was very Hebrew. We should receive those whom he received. It does not mean we accept everything they say. It means we should be open to dialogue with them. Yes, there is a very long history of severe division among God’s people, and many hard feelings on all sides. It is time to put that past behind us. I don’t need to change you and you don’t need to change me. We need to do what Scripture says and love God and love one another. More later on that.
With that as a preface, let us look at von Rad’s definition of “immanence,” review a bit of what he was saying in the previous chapter, and delve into Fohrman’s points. von Rad: “Immanence refers to those philosophical and metaphysical theories of divine presence in which the divine encompasses or is manifested in the material world. Immanence is usually applied in monotheistic, pantheistic, pandeistic, or panentheistic faiths to suggest that the spiritual world permeates the mundane. It is often contrasted with theories of transcendence, in which the divine is seen to be outside the material world.”
First, though he gave this broad definition, a generic definition of immanence, he was specifically speaking about the Hebrew people, the people of the One God, YHWH, in his application of the thoughts. He was not speaking of a “pantheistic, pandeistic, or panentheistic faith;” he was speaking of the Hebrew faith, a very clearly monotheistic faith. Note also that he indicates “philosophical and metaphysical theories.” Hopefully the reader got a fairly clear picture of what he was talking about with the many shared quotations. Perhaps the choice of words in using “immanence” and “philosophical and metaphysical theories” was not the best; the writer indicated he did not agree with all von Rad taught. The choice of wording as a Synthetic Apprehension or Grasp of Life as opposed to another term he used, “Immanent Material Law,” was purposeful.
The point hopefully coming across was one of a design or framework of all Creation such that all things were connected, that one’s actions brought consequences, and that this was in the actual design of Creation. YHWH could indeed stay separate from it and it would function on its own. But the results of such a situation would be quite disastrous for mankind, “stiff-necked” as we are. Thus, he does stay involved. Fohrman makes it clear that he does not like the term “immanence,” and explains that if God is “in” all of Creation, that worshipping a tree would only be worshipping a part of what is God, and therefore not a bad thing. But Scripture makes it clear that is idolatry. [Scripture is the authority.] Fohrman goes on to speak of the Hebrew word for “Holy,” h6944. קדֶֹשׁ qôḏeš, which means “consecrated, dedicated, separate.” And he quotes from:
• Isaiah 6:3 ESV 3 And one called to another and said: It Is“Holy, holy, holy is YHWH of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!”
His presentation states this means “Separate, Separate, Separate.” The writer will not go into all the detail in the short video referenced; the reader can see for her/himself. The point of this discussion will not be to “win a debate” nor convince the reader of anything. The point is more accurately stated that we must be so thoughtful in our considerations when we come from a Greek-thinking background to try to think with the Hebrew background in mind. Do we, as readers of Scripture, insist on things being “either/or,” or can we see that they can be “both/and?” The point here is not to make Christians Jews or Jews Christians, but to love our neighbors and if possible try to understand them. The focus of the website is to teach you how to get the most out of Scripture and not listen to many biased opinions that exist (assumptive reasoning).
So, we will delve into some assorted thoughts and Scriptures to try to lay out the “issues,” not prove anyone wrong or right. People have been trying to do that for centuries. Doubtful this one person could “fix” anything. In Scripture, recall what YHWH told Moshe at the “burning bush” was his name,
• Exodus 3:13-14 ESV 13 Then Moses said to God, “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” 14 God said to Moses, “I AM who I AM.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’”
So, a translation [by the way, the ESV note says “or I AM what I AM, or I WILL BE what I WILL BE”] for the reader would be that HE IS. HE EXISTS. And before anything, before time, before space, before Creation, HE EXISTS. Our minds cannot really grasp this, but there is a “being” that is outside of everything that we know. Thus, Fohrman’s delightful parable about the icons on the Monopoly Board and Parker. There is a Creator of our realm that is outside our realm. Separate from our realm. Separate, Separate, Separate. קדֶֹשׁ קדֶֹשׁ קדֶֹשׁ . As the Gospel of John says,
• John 4:24 ESV 24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”
Yet, there are many examples in Scripture where there is a Presence of YHWH in our world. Sometimes it might be a burning bush that is not consumed. (Ex 3:2-3) Sometimes it might be a pillar of cloud by day and/or fire by night. (Ex 13:21-22, 14:19, 24, 33:9-10; Nm 12:5, 14:4; Dt 31:15; Ne 9:12, 19; Ps 99:7.) At times his Presence was on Mt. Sinai. (Ex 19, 24, 31) At times he might appear as a man, as to Abraham, (Gn 18) and Ya’akov. (Gn 32:24-32) One could discuss other possibilities, such as a talking donkey, (Nm 22) a Presence on the mountain that spoke both to Moshe/Moses (Ex 34:5-9) and Eliyahu [Elijah]. (1K 19:11-13) Paul had an encounter on the road to Damascus. (Acts 9:1-9) We will not even get into an argument about whether Yeshua is Messiah here, as it might only cause division, which is not the goal. But the purpose here is to demonstrate a method of study whereby the reader can come to her or his own conclusions. There is plenty of Scripture to indicate that he was thought to be the Messiah by a number of people and that he performed miraculous deeds that witnessed that he was certainly fully empowered by God. (Most of the GS are witness) The point here is that, although God is indeed transcendent, somehow separate from his Creation, he is also very involved in his Creation.
• Jeremiah 23:23-24 ESV 23 “Am I a God at hand, declares YHWH, and not a God far away? 24 Can a man hide himself in secret places so that I cannot see him? declares YHWH. Do I not fill heaven and earth? declares YHWH. (See Ps 139:7-12 Is 66:1; Ac 7:49; Also Ex 17:7, 33:11-20)
At this juncture simply hear that Creation was established with “aspects” that allow it to function, things that science has discovered, such as the chemical elements and the ‘laws’ of physics, things we study in our science classes, beautiful designs, things that have been discussed previously. But there is opportunity for the Creator to intervene, and von Rad was making the point that the Hebrew people sought his intervention in terms of mercy and forgiveness, to break an inevitable cycle of calamity that resulted from missing the mark, not following the teaching.
To carry Fohrman’s parable a bit farther, no, Parker does not live on the Monopoly Board where the icons circle/cycle and visit various properties. However, Parker must have played the game some in order to have designed it, he must have anticipated some of the issues that would arise, shared a set of instructions for how to participate, and could, at any time he so desired, intervene out of mercy if he saw one of the icons in trouble. [not ‘would,’ but ‘could’] This is the theme of the previous von Rad discussion, that there was/is a people with a grasp of the world that sees Creation as an interconnected whole, and that what is done in one area affects all the players in other areas. (theantiquesalmanac.com) If one player is in jail on the Monopoly board, or one hits a jackpot in free parking, it affects the play of others.
Near the beginning of the previous chapter a number of current terms was also discussed that might get across some aspects of this Worldview, terms such as Karma, the Law of Cause and Effect, etc. Please note that the writer was not equating those terms with the Synthetic worldview of the Hebrew people, which is much bigger than those terms. They are included, to some extent, in this grasp of life. When one slows down enough in life to notice, one can observe these phenomena, as they are witnessed in Creation. Yet, in coming to know the Creator, one can repent, change direction, and he will intervene on our behalf, interceding in these spiritual laws.
We shall try to move ahead to some other thoughts that may help the reader with a broader understanding. The Hebraic understanding of how Creation came into being can be explained in two different ways. Recall that the perspective is that God existed and at [from our point of view] some point in ‘time’ made a decision to bring Creation into being [which actually included time, thus the statement “from our point of view”]. Involved in this process was wisdom and understanding. We can see these ideas expressed in Scripture:
• Proverbs 3:19-20 ESV 19 YHWH by wisdom founded the earth; It Isby understanding he established the heavens; 20 by his knowledge the deeps broke open, and the clouds drop down the dew. ((also see Pr 8:27; Ps 104:24, 136:3-9))
One can also appreciate this point of view when one first turns to the Creation account in Genesis chapter one. Ten times, God speaks [h0559. אָמַר ’âmar], bringing Creation into being in a stepwise fashion. There are two common words for speaking, h0559. אָמַר ’âmar and h1696. דָּבַר ḏâḇar. Read this explanation in a popular book from Yehuda: “In teaching us that the universe was created with ten Godly utterances (Avos 5:1), the Sages have given us an insight into the process of creation. Maharal explains that the term מַאֲמַרוֹת which we translate utterances is different from the synonymous דִבּוּר . The word מַאֲמַר alludes primarily to the intent, the forethought, the motive of the One Who spoke, while דִבּוּר connotes the external physical process of speech. By telling us that God created the universe בַּעַשָׁרָה מַאֲמַרוֹת , with ten utterances, the Sages wish us to understand that the building blocks of creation were the spiritual motives behind the speech. God had a purpose and the world came into being in order to fulfill it. [h3982. מַאֲמַר ma’amar] (italics added above and below)
“This adds a dimension to the familiar principle of creation יֵשׁ מֵאַיִן , ex nihilo, i.e., that God created existence from nothingness. Before creation there was nothing physical. There was but God’s desire; the universe came into being in order that the tools would exist for His will to be fulfilled… In other words, man exists to carry out God’s will as expressed in the Torah, the universe exists to provide the conditions for man to do so; nothing can exist if creation were to be devoid of purpose — if it were not the physical translation of the Divine will behind God’s ‘utterances.’ If a craftsman made an ornament that became grotesquely misshapen, he would throw it back into the fire; a world incapable of serving God’s design would have no reason to endure.”** If we look at this thought in a Western, scientific manner, we might say that as God came up with the idea of Creation, he designed and planned the foundational principles or framework upon which Creation would work, the periodic table of elements in Chemistry, the laws of Physics, etc. These concepts, the “mathematics” of it, had to be worked out before putting it into practice. This is standard design procedure. Otherwise, as Munk puts it above, there would be trial-and-error, throwing the prototypes into the fire. So, the principles are worked out beforehand.
Here is where we must be certain to point out the two ways that we are using the term Torah in this book. [The tradition in Yehuda also discusses the Oral Torah, later written into various publications, Mishnah, Talmud,…*** We are not using that nuance here.] Here we have spoken of the Torah as written with the “finger of God.” (Ex 31:18; Dt 9:10. [see also Lk 11:20]) In addition, this concept described above by this writer and Munk will also be referred to as “Torah,” the underlying foundation, the teaching. The framework was in place and at least to some extent taught and understood before the written form of Torah was given from God to Moshe to the people at Sinai.
A few examples may help the reader understand. First, there were instructions given to all creatures to “be fruitful and multiply.” (Gn 1:22, 1:28) The same was repeated after the flood, to Noah. (Gn 9:1, 9:7) In Genesis 2:15, YHWH put man in the Garden to work it and keep it. There is no clear statement that man was given instructions how to do that, but if he was given a purpose, he would have needed guidance, teaching, Torah. Similarly, although there is no clear indication of instruction to Cain and Abel to give offerings to God, (Gn 4:3-7) they somehow knew to do so, and with the description of the “fallen face” of Cain, the picture of guilt that was discussed last chapter, first arises, and the first mention of sin, “missing the mark,” with all its implications. Even in Exodus, prior to the giving of the written Torah on Sinai, there is evidence of Moshe teaching the people. (Ex 15:25-26, Ex 16, Ex 18:16-21) – please read!
In all these instances, there is evidence of an underlying structure, framework, or foundation for Creation. It is this underlying framework, the way things work, that compose the Synthetic grasp of life, the understanding that science is only now coming to, with the mentioned “strange attractors,” the order that exists even in what appears to mankind to be chaos or disorder. As this framework earlier was discussed as the “intent, forethought, motive” of God, as Munk put it, “There was but God’s desire; the universe came into being in order that the tools would exist for His will to be fulfilled.” God’s Will. It is the desire, the design, the order of Creation. His Will is expressed in the teaching, the Torah. This “order” is the teaching, the Torah.
In addition, there is the written Torah, which is the putting in stone, the writing, of the teaching.(Ex 24:12, 31:18, 32:15-16; Dt 5:22) The “order” is noted especially in the “if, then” statements in Leviticus 13-15 and 25-27. Others are noted commonly, especially in Numbers 27 and 30 and Deuteronomy 22-30. The oral traditions of the sages of Yehuda are opinions of “sages,” wise men who have spent much of their life in Scripture, trying to explain what Scripture means. Most of these are exegetical writings, “midrashes,” such as what we will delve into in the second section of the book.
Where Yeshua challenged the Scribes and the Pharisees was where he saw their practices deviating from Scripture to follow the oral traditions. (Mt 15:1-6; Mk 7:1-13) Please read the discussion in Gordon (2005/2010) about this. Gordon is a “Karaite Jew,” meaning a “Scripturalist.” He discusses how the interpretations of the sages/ rabbis at one point began to take precedence over the written Scriptures. The stance here is clearly that the written Word of God is the ultimate authority, which may not agree with Yehuda, but hopefully will at a minimum get Yehuda to take a serious look at Scripture, to let it speak to them, separate from the writing of the Sages.
We must remember the “rule” that the literal meaning of the passages must remain true, not being overridden by any reach into the metaphorical, allegorical, or secret/mystical meanings. Any interpretation, whatever it adds, must not contradict the words that are written and the larger context of Scripture. Recall the listing of verses that clearly indicate that not one word of Scripture is to be changed or added to. The Western, English-speaking reader, however, must realize that the brothers Yehuda have a clearer grasp of the Synthetic picture that has been shared than typical Western English-speakers. They know many more of the idioms and figures of speech. They are able to teach us much if we are willing to suspend our “assumptive reasoning.” We must, however, always remain discerning regarding the literal meaning and not drift into eisegesis. These related Isaiah verses are shared with the reader, who should of course read the context, and the three additional verses:
• Isaiah 42:21 NASB 21 YHWH was pleased for His righteousness’ sake To make the law [h8451. תּוֹרָה tôrâ] great and glorious.
• Isaiah 42:4 NASB 4 “He will not be disheartened or crushed Until He has established justice in the earth; And the coastlands will wait expectantly for His law [h8451. תּוֹרָה tôrâ] [NASB note, ‘or instruction’].”
• Isaiah 51:4 NASB 4 “Pay attention to Me, O My people, And give ear to Me, O My nation; For a law [h8451. תּוֹרָה tôrâ] will go forth from Me, And I will set My justice for a light of the peoples. (NASB refs: Dt 18:18; Is 2:3; Mic 4:2)
In an upcoming discussion on Elijah, there will be discussion about the Spirit of God, sometimes also known as the Holy Spirit. This aspect of God is the Presence of אֱלֹהִים with mankind, either as individuals, (1S 11:6, 16:13; 1Chr 12:18…) or in groups, (1S 19:20; Acts 10:44-47, 11:15-17, 15:8-9) some even saying the gift to all of mankind after the crucifixion and resurrection of Yeshua, the Spirit coming at the celebration of Shavuot [in Christian writings, Pentecost], (Acts 2:1-21) one of the three Pilgrimage Festivals required of the Hebrew men, the perfect time [God’s timing is always so] for the coming of the Spirit. (Shavuot/Pentecost was also the time of the giving of the Torah at Sinai. There are numerous parallels that can be shown between the giving of the Torah, (cdnjewishboston.com) God’s Word, and the giving of the Spirit.)
Thus, once again, it is important to look at Hebrew thinking, that things can be “both/and.” YHWH can indeed be separate, but at the same time present and involved. Hopefully this discussion has clarified somewhat those issues of the Synthetic grasp of life and “immanence,” and given a clearer picture of the underlying framework that should shape one’s thinking as one reads Scripture. There is more to cover before proceeding to a practical example of an extended exegesis/midrash. In the next chapter, we will cover some of the aspects of “testing” in Scripture, which in this writer’s mind, also helps explain how God’s design works, and helps us do a better job of following his Will, as was Yeshua’s goal to do. (“Thy Will be done…”)
[[Writer’s comment: It is very clear in looking over the history of Judaism and Christianity, that there has been much written to demonstrate that “our side is right and your side is wrong.” Hopefully it is clear that this is not the intent of this website… The desire is that each reader will really take a look at Scripture, using the expanded tools discussed here, and be willing to set aside past teachings, brow-beatings, whatever, and let Abba and His Word speak to you. God really does speak to us if we seek for Him. The goal is to bring together, not divide.]]
*https://www.alephbeta.org/course/lecture/tetzaveh-where-is-god-in-a-physical-world
**The Wisdom in the Hebrew Alphabet, The Sacred Letters as a Guide to Jewish Deed and Thought, Rabbi Michael L. Munk, Second Edition, 1983, Mesorah Publications, Ltd., Brooklyn, NY. pp 17-18.
***http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/11750-oral-law; also Gordon (2005/2010).
© Feb 2018 logandspeck.com please cite if copying