Semi-Random Musings (47)

When a fractured relationship with another believer disturbs your fellowship with the Lord as you break bread, chances are the disagreement was over something practical and comparatively trivial rather than over one of the essential doctrines of scripture. Disputes about what the Bible teaches have always existed and will until the Lord returns, but these days they are more common online or in print than between believers who attend the same church. It’s so much easier to fling words like “heretic” around when both sides are anonymous, hundreds of miles apart, or both.

We save our passive aggressive behavior for friends, family and locals. “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me.”

Really? Mary didn’t have a pair of working ears?

When we put Romans 14 (“welcome him, but not to quarrel over opinions”) together with 1 Corinthians 8-9 (“take care that this right of yours does not somehow become a stumbling block to the weak”), we find ourselves with a pretty comprehensive set of instructions about how Christians ought to handle “lesser matters” and personal opinions for the greater good of immature believers. In my experience, we ignore these instructions almost as often as we ignore the Lord’s directions about the erring brother in Matthew 18. Fussing, gossiping and trying to bend a sympathetic ear in our own direction are much more fun than either resolving problems or avoiding them in the first place.

For every servant of the Lord busy at work in your local church, there are probably three or four expressing strong opinions about the various ways in which he or she is doing it all wrong, and at least one or two new believers looped into the discussion who really should not be. Very little is as daunting to young Christians as the realization that few of the people they meet in church are on the same page about anything.

Certain truths in scripture are always worth fighting over: the righteousness of God, the deity of Christ, salvation through faith by grace alone, and so on. “Contend for the faith that was once for all delivered.” Certain things are never worth fighting over, my rights and yours among them. Mature believers recognize these unnecessary points of conflict and walk the other way … even at some cost to themselves.

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The word commonly translated “gods” is an interesting study.

On the one hand, scripture refers to “gods”, meaning manmade items of wood, stone or metal kept as objects of worship. These physical items are rivals to the one true God only in terms of the time, energy and resources lavished on them. Paul tells us they have no corresponding spiritual reality (“an idol has no real existence”) and are proxies for the inadvertent (or deliberate) service of demons. In themselves, these “gods” have no power or agency. They “neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell”. Perhaps the ancient pagan “gods” like Baal and Astarte were this sort of nullity. It would certainly explain why the prophets of Baal were entirely unable to get his attention despite dancing and cutting themselves with knives. Whatever demons lurked behind the mask of “Baal” had no stake in the survival of his prophets.

On the other hand, we find the same Hebrew word used in reference to genuine spiritual entities for whom, at least for the most part, we do not have personal names, just vague references to “cosmic powers over this present darkness” and “spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places”. The most obvious example is the divine council of Psalm 82, which we looked at a couple weeks ago, where God himself “called them gods to whom the word of God came”.

But the idea of “gods” who do exist is threaded all through scripture, not just buried in Psalm 82.

Perhaps this second usage-type occurs as early as Genesis 3. Most modern translations tempt Eve with “you will be like God”, but no small number — including the old KJV, all Catholic translations, several Aramaic versions and the Septuagint — go with “as gods”. The difficulty for translators is that 'ĕlōhîm is a plural noun, so whether the English rendering should be “God” or “gods” must be determined by context. Where context does not make that beyond debate, as in Genesis 3:5, it becomes a matter of theological preference. For the most part, we moderns prefer not to think too hard about such entities. Our translators often go with “God” when the usage is more ambiguous.

Again, in Exodus 12 we find a reference to “the gods of Egypt”. The Lord had determined to execute judgment against these beings, which suggests they were not mere wooden nullities. In the Song of Moses, we find him asking, “Who is like you, O Lord, among the gods?” Here, what sets the one true God apart is not merely his existence but his majestic holiness, which none of the “gods” can match. That seems to personalize them.

Deuteronomy 10:17 calls YHWH “God of gods” ['ĕlōhîm 'ĕlōhîm]. That latter 'ĕlōhîm is surely personal. The expression occurs four more times throughout the OT.

Psalm 86 puts the Lord “among the gods”, but insists their works are inferior. Need it be said that nullities do no works? Phrases like “above all gods” and “among the gods” are common in the Psalms. It seems unlikely to me that all these are comparisons to beings who do not exist. Finally, Psalm 138 has David giving thanks to the Lord. He continues, “before the gods I sing your praise”. I don’t think he’s talking about wooden idols there.

It’s not something that is easy to see when translation obscures it so frequently, but once you see it, you really can’t unsee it.