Die Bedeutung der Ordnungen für das rechte soziale Verhalten
Seit je her hat man in dem Sprüchebuch den konzenrierten Niederschlag der Sittlichkeit des alten Israel gesehen. Dagegen wäre nichts einzuwenden, solange man sich das, was Israel unter dem >>Sittlichen < < verstand, vom Alten Testament sagen läßt und nicht versucht, es von der herkömmlichen Begrifflichkeit einer philosophischen oder theologischen Ethik her (Freiheit, Gewissen, Pflicht usw.) zu erfassen. Versteht man die Sentenzen des Sprüchebuches aus ihrem Vorstellungshorizont und von ihrer eigenen Intention her, so spürt man schnell, daß sie in einer sehr spezifischen und uns keineswegs ohne weiteres vertrauten Wertwelt verankert sind. Dabei soll es noch leicht genommen werden, daß diese Belehrung wenig oder gar nicht an der Gewinnung theoretischer Erkenntnissse interessiert ist, daß sie vielmehr durchweg ein pragmatisches Wissen vermittelt.
Von Rad, Weisheit in Israel
The significance of the classifications for the correct social behavior.
Against that would be nothing to object to so long as one allows it to be said about the Old Testament what Israel understood according to the moral
and so long as one does not try to grasp it from the conventional concept of a philosophical or theological ethic (freedom, conscience, duty, etc.). If one understands the truisms of the book of Proverbs out of their horizon of imagination and of their own intention, then one quickly feels that they are anchored in a very specific world of value and in a world of value which is by no means readily familiar to us. At the same time, it should still be easily assumed that this instruction is little or not at all interested in the production of theoretical knowledge; that rather, without exception, it mediates a pragmatic knowledge.
Die Christengemeinde lebt von der Enthullung des wahren Gottes und seiner Offenbarung, von ihm als dem Licht, das in Jesus Christus dazu aufgeleuchtet ist, damit es die Werke der Finsternis zerstore.
Karl Barth
The Christian church lives in the unveiling of the true God and in its revelation by God as the light which is opened up in Jesus Christ so that it destroys the works of the darkness.
(See previous post) Having given a long, hard listen to Abbey Road, my list needs revising…
- I Saw Her Standing There – Please Please Me
- All My Loving – With The Beatles
- A Hard Day’s Night – A Hard Day’s Night
- I Don’t Want To Spoil The Party – Beatles For Sale
- Help! – Help!
- Ticket To Ride – Help!
- Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown) – Rubber Soul
- Girl – Rubber Soul
- Eleanor Rigby – Revolver
- Tomorrow Never Knows – Revolver
- Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds – Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
- Being For The Benefit of Mr. Kite – Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
- Magical Mystery Tour – Magical Mystery Tour
- All You Need Is Love – Magical Mystery Tour
- Back In The U.S.S.R. – White Album
- Here Comes The Sun – Abbey Road
- I Want You – (She’s So Heavy) – Abbey Road
- Hey Bulldog – Yellow Submarine
- Across the Universe – Let It Be
- She Loves You – Past Masters Vol 1
- She’s A Woman – Past Masters Vol 1
- Paperback Writer – Past Masters Vol 2
- Hey Jude – Past Masters Vol 2
- Free As A Bird – Free As A Bird EP
- Real Love – Real Love EP
Compiled from every UK album (with the exception of Abbey Road, which I have not yet heard), both Past Masters volumes, and including the reunion EPs. In terms of sheer number of favorites, Help! ranks above them all. However, if I had to pick, I think Revolver might be my all-time favorite Beatles record. Except for a few songs, The White Album is The Beatles’ biggest disappointment IMHO.
- I Saw Her Standing There – Please Please Me
- All My Loving – With The Beatles
- A Hard Day’s Night – A Hard Day’s Night
- I Don’t Want To Spoil The Party – Beatles For Sale
- Help! – Help!
- The Night Before – Help!
- You’ve Got To Hide Your Love Away – Help!
- Ticket To Ride – Help!
- Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown) – Rubber Soul
- Girl – Rubber Soul
- Eleanor Rigby – Revolver
- Tomorrow Never Knows – Revolver
- Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds – Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
- Being For The Benefit of Mr. Kite – Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
- Magical Mystery Tour – Magical Mystery Tour
- All You Need Is Love – Magical Mystery Tour
- Back In The U.S.S.R. – White Album
- Hey Bulldog – Yellow Submarine
- Across the Universe – Let It Be
- She Loves You – Past Masters Vol 1
- She’s A Woman – Past Masters Vol 1
- Paperback Writer – Past Masters Vol 2
- Hey Jude – Past Masters Vol 2
- Free As A Bird – Free As A Bird EP
- Real Love – Real Love EP
Die Urgeschichte bei J.
The prehistory in the context of J [the Yahwist].
Aus allen diesen und ähnlichen Feststellungen folgt zunächst, daß die alten Sagen ursprünglich nicht in der gegenwartigen Verbindung existiert, sondern in mündlicher Tradition jede für sich bestanden haben (vgl. Wellhausen, Prolegomena 334). Daß zwei Sagen von einander unabhängig sind, ist also hier un überhaupt in der Genesis (vgl. die Einleitung 3, 6) nicht ein außergewöhnlicher, sondern vielmeher der regelmäßige Fall. Jede der Ursagen: vom Paradies, von Qain und Abel, von den Engelehen, von der Sintflut, von Noahs Weinbau, vom Turm steht auf eignen Fußen: keine setzt eine andere notwendig voraus oder weist auf eine andere als ihre natürliche Fortsetzung hin.
Out of all these and similar assessments, it follows first that the old sagas have not existed, originally, in the present amalgamation, but have existed in oral tradition each for themselves (cf. Wellhausen, Proglegomena, 334). That two sagas are independent from one another is, therefore, not an unusual case here or anywhere in Genesis (cf. the Introduction 3, 6), but is rather the regular case. Each of the primeval sagas–about Paradise, of Cain and Abel, of the marriages with angels, of the Deluge, of Noah’s viniculture, about the tower that stands on its own feet–do not necessarily put one another in front of or exhibit one another as its natural continuation.
Yeah, the whole tower standing on its own feet
thing is pretty funny, but give me a break, I’ve only been translating for two weeks and I started with ZERO German background. Next week will be a passage from Von Rad.
Things will be pretty quiet around here for awhile. Work, my intensive course in reading/translating German texts, and homework is taking up virtually every waking moment of my days. But fear ye not. I decided to post bits of German texts in biblical studies as I work with and translate them for my class. There looks to be a fair amount of Von Rad and Gunkel in the mix (two classic Old Testament scholars). So those with any German proficiency can critique me while those who scratch their heads at all the babel about die Bibel can look on me as ein Gott and give thanks unto me for providing English translations from these amazing authors (no blasphemy intended).
Then the glory of the God of Israel went up from the cherub where it had rested to the threshold of the temple. He called to the man dressed in linen who had the writing kit at his side. The Lord said to him, Go through the city of Jerusalem and put a mark on the foreheads of the people who moan and groan over all the abominations practiced in it.
Ezekiel 9:3-4, NET
It is interesting how translations always say that the thing on the forehead is a mark
. So imprecise. The Hebrew actually says to put a תו on their foreheads, which translated means Tav
, the last consonant of the Hebrew alephbet. YHWH is literally telling his messenger to place on the foreheads of those who grieve and mourn over the abominations of Israel one of these: ת
In the Old Testament, there are many sections of texts that have been taken out of one biblical book and inserted into another biblical book (modified or without change) with the intention of being passed off as if such a text (or its modified version) originated in that second text or its own historical situation instead of the text or historical situation it first appeared in. The following is a short list of plagiarized bible passages.
- Isaiah 2:1-5 = Micah 4:1-4 (Who stole the description of the messianic age from who?)
- 2 Samuel 22 = Psalm 18 (David would not have said both with all their different and conflicting words on the day he was delivered from the hand of Saul, so the question is…assuming at least one is authentic…which one is it?)
- Obadiah 1:1-4 = Jeremiah 49:14-16; Obadiah 1:5-6 = Jeremiah 49:9-10; Obadiah 1:8 = Jeremiah 49:7; Obadiah 1:9 = Jeremiah 49:10; Obadiah 1:16 = Jeremiah 49:12 (About a third of the entire book of Obadiah is virtually identical to sections of Isaiah 49. Clearly, one of them took from the prophecy of the other, rearranged it, gave it their own flair, and presented the prophecy as originating with them instead of the other).
- Jeremiah 52 = 2 Kings 24-25 (This one’s a doozy, but it’s obvious that one has taken and changed the other. There are numerous direct contradictions in the parallel stories—like 2 Kings 25:8, which says Nebuzaradan arrived in Jerusalem on the SEVENTH day of the fifth month in the nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar and Jeremiah 52:12, which says Nebuzaradan arrived in Jerusalem on the TENTH day of the fifth month of the nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar.)
On the part of the North, the war was carried on, not to liberate slaves, but by a government that had always perverted and violated the Constitution, to keep the slaves in bondage; and was still willing to do so, if the slaveholders could be thereby induced to stay in the Union.
The principle, on which the war was waged by the North, was simply this: That men may rightfully be compelled to submit to, and support, a government that they do not want; and that resistance, on their part, makes them traitors and criminals.
No principle, that is possible to be named, can be more self-evidently false than this; or more self-evidently fatal to all political freedom. Yet it triumphed in the field, and is now assumed to be established. If it really be established, the number of slaves, instead of having been diminished by the war, has been greatly increased; for a man, thus subjected to a government that he does not want, is a slave. And there is no difference, in principle-but only in degree-between political and chattel slavery. The former, no less than the latter, denies a man’s ownership of himself and the products of his labor; and asserts that other men may own him, and dispose of him and his property, for their uses, and at their pleasure.
(See also Part A and Part B)
Perhaps the capstone on this turning point in Christianity from an acceptance to a rejection of Judaism is Melito of Sardis (circa AD 170), who turned the Apostles’ charges against specific characters in history on the entire Jewish race, when he said, effectively, you [Jews] murdered God
. Since Christianity had now far removed Judaism from itself and given it the status of a failed religion, it was easy for church fathers like Melito to condemn the entire Jewish race. Tertullian, writing at the end of the second and beginning of the third century, took the example of those specific Jews who had failed to recognize Yeshua in New Testament times and universalized it so that he could say the Jews themselves had rejected Yeshua. Judaism itself has rejected and killed YHWH, therefore Christianity has replaced it in everything from authority to inspiration. On that grossly errant path, it would continue to walk.
One consequence of Christianity’s break with Judaism and replacement of it with itself was the fact that, unchecked by Judaism, Christianity developed a myth of prophetic inspiration concerning the entire Greek LXX. Justin and all those apologists after him would spend a great deal of time arguing with Jews about why the LXX and all its differences from the Hebrew scriptures in content as well as additional books, were true, inspired scripture. Augustine would eventually explain away the inconsistencies between the Christian LXX scriptures and the Hebrew scriptures by doing what Justin had done before him—trumping facts, evidences, and arguments by appeal to the Holy Spirit. Augustine contended that both the LXX and the Hebrew were equally inspired—even where they differed and conflicted—because there was not a single meaning in scripture or prophecy, but multiple meanings. Therefore, Augustine was able to claim the Spirit had correctly inspired the meanings and texts in the LXX which differed from the meanings and texts in the Hebrew scriptures. Just one church father rejected the myth of the LXX’s prophetic inspiration—but only temporary (Jerome).
Although a few Christians would seek to return in some way to Judaism (like Jerome and Origen, who took Jews as teachers and tutors to come to a better understanding of scripture), this would now be the exception, not the rule. Judaism would have a say only insofar as it agreed with the decisions and beliefs of gentile Christians. Christianity had cut itself off from the tree onto which it was grafted and its withered, dead fruit remains to this day.
