What Happened?
Stories of the past differ because storytellers are human beings. Recalling the past is actually never simply a process or remembering but of creating a narrative.
The biblical storytellers recall the past, often the very distant past, not "objectively" but purposefully.
Four Gospels and two different stories about Israel's past.
What drove the Bible's storytellers to recall the past the way they did was the quest to experience God in the present, a sometimes volatile and catastrophic present.
The Stories of Jesus
Even though Matthew, Mark, and Luke are clearly consciously connected to one another somehow, each Gospel writer clearly has no problem whatsoever going off and telling the story of Jesus in his own unique way.
Luke's Gospel even begins by mentioning that "many" have written their own accounts of Jesus.
John's version of Jesus "cleansing the temple" is in the beginning of Jesus's public ministry, Mark, Matthew, and Luke have it at the end.
More than the other three Gospel writers, John is big on Jesus's divine authority over the religious leaders.
Little Baby Jesuses
Mark and John don't even have birth stories.
Matthew's portrait of Jesus serves his purpose: he drops into his Gospel images of Jesus that remind you of Moses and the exodus story. In this way the writer is saying Jesus needs to be understood not at a distance from Israel's story, but as God's way of taking Israel's story to the next, climatic stage with Jesus at the center rather than Moses.
Luke's Jesus is very "kingly" right from the start.
Who Saw the Big Moment?
The end of Jesus's story, namely what happens Easter morning, is reported very differently by the Gospel writers.
Matthew's is the only one that has Roman soldiers guarding the tomb. Mary Magdalene and the "other Mary" are the ones who find the tomb empty.
Luke's has a veritable women's club at the tomb: Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of Jesus, and the "other women." They see "two men", run off to tell the disciples, and Peter comes back to see for himself.
Mark has Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Solome going to the tomb. They are frightened, run away and tell no one. (Note that there are two endings to Mark, with the second, longer one added a couple of centuries later to reconcile it with Matthew and Luke.)
John's story has Mary Magdalene going to the tomb alone, she runs back to get Peter and "the other disciple" and they race to the tomb, and "the other disciple" gets there first.
If we are fixed on the Bible as a book that has to get history "right," the Gospels become a crippling problem.
The Stories of Israel
Israel's period of the monarchy, six hundred years from Israel's first king, Saul (around 1100 BCE) to the end of the monarchy when the Babylonians sacked the capital city of Jerusalem in 586 BCE.
The Old Testament has two stories of this period of the monarchy The first is found in 1 and 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings and the second is in 1 and 2 Chronicles.
The Christian bible places Chronicles immediately after 2 Kings, but in the Jewish bible it is at the end of the Old Testament.
Chronicles was intentionally crafted to give a very different take on Israel's past. The two stories differ because they were written at different times to answer different questions.
Samuel/Kings written during the exile in Bablyon. "How did we end up in Bablyon? What did we do to deserve it?"
Chronicles was written about 200 years later, after the Israelites were back from exile for generations. "After all this time, are we still the people of God? Is God ever going to show up and fix this mess? What is our future?"
Around 930 BCE the northern kingdom of Israel (capital Samaria) and the southern kingdom of Judah (capital Jersusalem) split
Each kingdom had its own line of kings. 1 and 2 Kings deals with all of them, Chronicles leaves the northern kings out because by then the northern kingdom had been destroyed by the Assyrians.
In 2 Samuel, God makes David a promise that his house and dynasty will last for a very long time.
In 1 Chronicles the house and dynasty is God's not David's.
Why does it matter? At the time of 2 Samuel its possible for David's line to continue, but by the time of 2 Chronicles that line of David had been broken for many generations. The Judahites might have wondered whether it was a sign that God had given up on them. But the writer of Chronicles says, "No, You see, it's not really David's dynasty, anyway. It's God's." (location 1327)
The Past Serves the Present
In 2 Samuel Solomon alone builds the temple, in 1 Chronicles David has a major role in building the temple.
These two portraits of David and Solomon aren't "basically the same" with some minor details shifted around. They tell two irreconcilably different stories of Israel's founding kings. Why? Each writer was speaking to his time.
For the writer of 2 Samuel, bad leadership is why the kingdom split and carried off to captivity. God is just and they deserved it.
David and Solomon of 1 and 2 Chronicles are a blueprint for the future, where a king would arise to lead them again to political independence.
A Warm-Up for the Main Event
The plight of Israel's kings is the heart and center of Israel's story.
34 of the 39 books of the Old Testament deal with Israel's storyline. 27 of the 34 deal with the period of the monarchy, exile and the return
The other 7, the first seven (Torah: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy; and Joshua and Judges) are stories of Israel's deep past or "origins stories." They explain how things came to be, why things are the way they are, and most important, how Israel got to be Israel -- a kingdom with a land of its own.
The period of the monarchy is not only the meat of the Old Testament narrative of Israel. It's also the period when Israel's grand narrative was written.
Israel's stories of kings and exile are the most historically verifiable of all the Old Testament books.They match up well with historical records from other nations like Assyria, Babylon, and Persia.
Little archaeological evidence for the origin stories. "If Israel's storytellers took the recent past, like stories of David and Solomon, and shaped them creatively to speak to the present, we can bet good money they shaped the distant past with the same creative and present mind-set." (location 1478)
When you read the origins stories you see embedded in them previews of coming attractions.
A Sneak Peek at the Political Map
Israel's entire national political map is already laid out in the origins stories.
In the late nineteenth century archaeologists found a Babylonian story known as Enuma Elish that includes a section on the creation of the cosmos. It looks similar to the creation story in Genesis.
Babylonian culture is much older than Israelite culture, so it seems the Israelites modeled their creation story along the lines of the Babylonian story to do it one better. Israel's God is superior to all the gods of Babylon because he is the true creator
The overlap between Israel's ancestors and the political realities of the monarchy is not a coincidence. Genesis previews what's ahead, the meat of the Old Testament -- Israel's life in the land.
Playing Favorites with Little Brother
All through Israel's origins stories, God has this unexpected habit of favoring younger brothers over their elder brothers.
Able over Cain; Isaac over Ishmael; Jacob over Esau; Joseph over his older brothers; Moses over Aaron
After the nation of Israel splits into northern and southern kingdoms, the one to survive, the one to return from exile and reclaim the land, is the southern kingdom, the "younger" of the two.
Note that the kingdom that came out on top is the one that compiled and composed Israel's story in the wake of the crisis of exile
Israel's origins stories, with God's preferential treatment of the younger sibling, were written to explain why the southern kingdom, the "younger brother," survived Babylonian exile whereas the elder (and larger and more powerful) northern "brother" was wiped off the pages of history by the Assyrians 150 years earlier. (location 1576)
Israel's stories of the deep past were not written to "talk about what happened back then." They were written to explain what is. The past is shaped to speak to the present.
Adam, Who Art Thou?
The story of Adam previews Israel's entire story from beginning to end.
Obey and you stay; disobey and be exiled. Israel's story follows the same pattern.
The story of Adam, from life with God to death in exile, is an abbreviated version of Israel's story. Rabbis have noticed this since at least the medieval period.
The Exodus Story
Modern historians are puzzled that no ancient source, including Egyptian ones, even hint at an event of the scope of the exodus.
Stories of Israel's monarchy have no problem mentioning names of hostile kings, but the Pharaoh who enslaved the Israelites and who ruled for four hundred years is not named.
As history, the exodus story has some challenges. But as story, it carries serious punch that we will miss if focus on the historical angle. Through this story, Israel's storytellers are tying their people not simply back to Adam but to the first moments of creation itself.
When Gods Fight
Back to the Enuma Elish. In this story we read of the god Marduk winning a cosmic battle at the dan of time by slaying Tiamat, who is Marduk's great-great-grandmother and the symbol of watery chaos. But cutting Tiamat in half, Marduk made the chaos a habitable place.
Marduk is the god who handpicked Hammurabi, who was king of a new Babylonian dynasty. Since Marduk handpicked Hammurabi, to contend against Hammurabi was to contend against Marduk himself.
Exodus is a story of Israel's beginnings, rooted too, in a battle between the gods: Yahweh versus the Egyptian gods.
The story of Moses throwing his staff before Pharaoh and it turns into a serpent. Pharaoh's advisers do the same but then Moses's serpent eats the others.
The ten plagues:
The Nile turned into blood; the Nile was worshiped as a god
Second plague, frogs multiple all over Egypt. The Egyptian goddess of fertility, Heqet, was supposed to have control over that and was depicted by the head of a frog.
In the ninth plague, Yahweh darkens the sun. the high god of Egyptians and the patron god of Pharaoh is the sun god Ra.
The plagues aren't random tricks. They are a "one-sided cage match" of Israel's God, Yahweh, versus the Gods of Egypt.
The knock-out blow is the parting of the Red Sea. Israelites march to freedom and a nation is born, which echos the si
ay story of creation in Genesis chapter one.
What's with All the Water?
Biblical scholars relying on geological findings believe that a great deluge in Mesopotamia around 2900 BCE was the trigger for the many flood stories that circulated the ancient world.
The stories reflect the belief that the flood was divine punishment. In the Atrahasis epic the flood was divine punishment for humans making too much noise and so keeping the gods from their rest.
The biblical story takes a different approach by not placing the blame on gods but on human wickedness and evil.
The Hebrew word for ark is tevah (TAY-vah), and it occurs in only one other place in the entire Old Testament: the story of Moses
In all of these stories God is in full control of water
Stories Work
Did what the Bible says happened really happen?
The Bible and history is a polarizing issue resulting in two sides: the "now we know the Bible is a pack of lies" side and the "Bible has to be historically accurate to be the Word of God" side.
Both start from the premise that any book worthy of being called "scripture" has to, if anything, get history "right."
Both sides have painted themselves into the same corner.
Ironically, the passionate defense of the Bible as a "history book" among the more conservative wings of Christianity, despite intentions, isn't really an act of submission to God; it is making God submit to us.
Over the years I've grown more and more convinced that "storytelling" is a better way of understanding what the Bible is doing with the past than "history writing."
Maybe God likes stories
How Not to Treat Other People
Have you encountered the "theological problem" of violence in the bible, particularly genocide, before? If so, how have you handled it?
"Whatever we do, we certainly can't hide under a blanket and wish this away." (location 489)
Those Wicked, Horrible Canaanites
The Canaanites are decedents of Noah's youngest son Ham, who was cursed by Noah because he saw his father (Noah) naked. Genesis 9:20-27
Canaanites occupy the land that God promises to Abraham he will give to his decedents a hundred years later. Genesis 12:4-7
Marching Orders
What is your reaction to God's instructions on what to do with the Canaanites?
"the extermination of the Canaanites is not an afterthought. According to the Bible, Israels's God planned it from the days of Noah and the flood, and he carries out the plan with bracing determination and precision, patiently encouraging and even training the troops to get it done." (location 578)
If Jesus Sends People to Hell, What's So Bad About Killing Some Canaanites??
"God is the sovereign king of the universe, and his unfathomable will is not to be questioned by puny mortals, so shut up about it." (location 591)
"Sure, Jesus talks about loving your enemies, but Jesus also talks about throwing sinners into hell to burn forever."
Our view of hell comes from medieval Christian theology.
In the Gospels the word we think is "hell" is Gehenna, which is a Greek translation of the Old Testament Hebrew ge' hinnom meaning "Valley of Hinnom," an actual valley located just outside the walls of Jerusalem.
Gehenna refers to God's punishment to come upon his own people for ailing to recognize God's presence and follow God's ways. Jesus, preaching to his fellow Jews, jumps all over this symbolism.
The only time a Canaanite makes it into the New Testament, and she becomes a model of faithful persistence, her faith in Jesus led to her daughter's healing.
To sum up: leave Jesus out of it. Nothing Jesus said or did is worse than God telling Israelites to kill Canaanites.
"But does this mean that God's hands were tied, that he he had to buy into the system?"
The biblical writers believed God is a warrior who likes waging war against the enemy and acquiring land.
God's Nicer Side
It is true that the Old Testament portrays various sides of God in diverse ways.
An example is the book of Jonah
"My only point is that these stories don't erase God's command to exterminate Canaanites." (location 714)
Worst. Sinners. Ever
The Canaanites got exactly what they deserved because they were utterly morally corrupt.
There are other examples of sin in the bible equivalent to that which the Canaanites did that did not result in extermination.
"However immoral the Canaanites were, the real problem isn't what they did, but where they did it." (location 735)
To leave any Canaanites alive would (1) contaminate the land and (2) threaten Israel's devotion to their God.
"If we were reading a story like this in some other religious text, we'd call this genocide, ethnic cleansing, and barbarous, pure and simple." (location 764)
Is there a better way to think about Canaanite extermination that doesn't get God cheaply off the hook?
It's a Tribal Culture Thing
God never told the Israelites to kill the Canaanites. The Israelites believed God told them to kill the Canaanites.
If true, why is the story in the Old Testament at all and how would it have been heard at that time?
Israel's culture was shaped by their tribal neighbors.
"We are the good guys, and all of you out there are the bad guys."
Similarites to how a story carved on a ninth century BCE stone monument from Moab. (location 809)
Failure to "put to the ban" everyone and everything as directed by your god was a great way to make your god extremely angry.
"Israel was an ancient tribal people, and they thought and acted like one. But knowing that doesn't really solve our problem, does it?" (location 824)
Digging for Answers
"Biblical Archaeologists are about as certain as you can about these things that the conquest of Canaan as the Bible describes did not happen."
Where did the biblical story of the conquest come from?
Possibly from a series of smaller skirmishes that the story tellers exaggerated over time.
God Lets His Children Tell the Story
Why would the Israelites write a story about God that isn't true -- and what are we supposed to do today with a Holy Bible that makes up lies?
If God is behind scriptures -- if the Bible is God's Holy Word -- and if we, too, are to meet God in its pages, why would God allow himself to be cast in the role of a majorly hacked of tribal deity if he wasn't?
"The Bible -- from back to front -- is the story of God told from the limited point of view of real people living at a certain place and time." (location 899)
If the writers had somehow been able to step outside of their culture and invent a new way of talking, their story would have made no sense to anyone else.
"God lets his children tell the story."
"These ancient writers had an adequate understanding of God for them in their time, but not for all time. " (location 943)
For Christians, Jesus, not the Bible, has the final word.
Why This Chapter Is So Important and So Dreadfully Long
For most, God ordering, sanctioning, or carrying out mass killings in the Old Testament is the most awkward issue that troubles them about the Bible.
Some contemporary atheists hail it as exhibit A for the utter stupidity of any faith in the God of the Bible.
When ancient Israelites wrote as they did about the physical world, they were expressing their faith in God in ways that fit their understanding.
So that's why this chapter looks the way it does -- to put right in front of our eyes the antiquity of the Bible, and to see how embracing that antiquity is the beginning point for exploring the Bible as it is, to accept the challenge to investigate even some of its darker pathways, and so to begin learning how we, too, can embrace Israel's story for our journey.
When the Bible Doesn't Behave
Enns begins by writing about how many have been taught about the bible. Does what he describes match what you were taught?
Some recent movies have provided a remake of some of the commonly known stories in the Bible (Noah, Exodus). What do you think the making of these movies have to say about how society currently views the Bible?
After referring to how Israel occupied their new homeland, the land of Canaan, Enns writes, "The God of the universe often comes across like a tribal warlord." Enns goes on to ask:
What are we supposed to do with a Bible like this?
What are we supposed to do with a God like this?
"The Bible can become a challenge to one's faith in God rather than the source of faith, a problem to be overcome rather than the answer to our problems." (location 139, second to the last paragraph of this section)
The Bible Isn't the Problem
Has anyone experienced "Bible induced" stress as described by Enns?
"The problem is coming to the Bible with expectations it's not set up to hear."
"What if God is actually fine with the Bible just as it is without needing anyone to stand guard over it? ... Maybe this Bible has something to show us about our own sacred journey of faith, and maybe God wants us to wander off the beach blanket to discover what that is." (location 183)
My Life, in Brief, and Such as It Is
- "If I'm going to do this Jesus thing, I'm going to know what I'm talking about."
Concerning Camel's Backs and Beach Balls
Writing about his conservative seminary days: "But looking back, it seems we were all caught up in a system that exerted a deep, subliminal pressure on its members to conform -- a system that apparently couldn't hold it together without exercising some serious information control" (location 265)
"I was also beginning to mourn the fact that my life, filled with church, Christian college, and even seminary, produced a set of beliefs that could so quickly melt away simply by paying attention to a few lectures and reading some books over the course of a few months."
"Shifting my thinking on the Bible did not mean I was losing my faith in God."
How did the Israelites get water in their forty-year desert journey between Rephidim and Kadesh? The Bible never tells us. Some Jewish interpreters came up with the idea that the rock at the beginning and end was the same rock, and obviously it followed the Israelites around in the desert for forty years.
"I swung my knapsack over my shoulder and said -- and this is an exact quote -- 'Toto, I don't think we're in Kansas anymore.'"
Door Number Three
Door number one: I could ignore what I just heard that day in Sanders Theatre
Door number two: I could take the door my tradition expected of me, which is to push back against what I just heard.
Door number three: I could face what I just saw, accept the challenge, and start thinking differently about the Bible.
"I needed to learn (apparently the hard way) that trusting God is not the same thing as trusting the Bible -- let alone my own ideas about the Bible." (location 355)
So What's My Point?
"My goal for this book, then, is to assure people of faith that they do not need to feel anxious, disloyal, unfaithful, dirty, scared, or outcast for engaging these questions of the Bible, interrogating it, not liking some of it, exploring what it really says, and discerning like adult readers what we can learn from it on our own journey of faith."
What do you feel about the three big controversial issues that Enns describes in this section? (location 413)
We will start 2015 by reading "The Bible Tells Me So... Why Defending Scripture Has Made Us Unable To Read It" by Peter Enns. Enns currently teaches courses on the Old and New Testaments at Eastern University, and previously taught at Westminster Theological Seminary, Harvard University, Princeton Theological Seminary, Fuller Theological Seminary, Lutheran Theological Seminary (Philadelphia), Biblical Theological Seminary, and Temple University.
Enns blogs at http://www.patheos.com/blogs/peterenns/.
From Amazon.com:
Trained as an evangelical Bible scholar, Peter Enns loved the Scriptures and shared his devotion, teaching at Westminster Theological Seminary. But the further he studied the Bible, the more he found himself confronted by questions that could neither be answered within the rigid framework of his religious instruction or accepted among the conservative evangelical community.
Rejecting the increasingly complicated intellectual games used by conservative Christians to “protect” the Bible, Enns was conflicted. Is this what God really requires? How could God’s plan for divine inspiration mean ignoring what is really written in the Bible? These questions eventually cost Enns his job—but they also opened a new spiritual path for him to follow.
The Bible Tells Me So chronicles Enns’s spiritual odyssey, how he came to see beyond restrictive doctrine and learned to embrace God’s Word as it is actually written. As he explores questions progressive evangelical readers of Scripture commonly face yet fear voicing, Enns reveals that they are the very questions that God wants us to consider—the essence of our spiritual study.