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Seymour
Registered Member
Date Joined Jan 2002
Total Posts : 105
| Posted 7/1/2002 6:14 AM (GMT -6) |   |
Why do we call the Bible the Word of God?
I was reading this theologian, just about the coolest guy I've ever come across, and he says that historically no one called the Bible the Word of God until Luther. His point, of course, was that the Bible says that Jesus is the Word of God, and makes no claim to be the Word itself, even though it is no doubt the revelation of God transmited through oral traditions and the written word.
My question is how did this switch happen. How did words become the Word? Was there some internal mechanism in Luther's thought that generated this? I don't know Luther very well.
Some folks dance cool, all angels and swaying hips, Sensual as all get out and in. Me, I'm a hick, and I dance like one, I just kinda jump around and grin.
--Greg Brown | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 7/1/2002 7:01 AM (GMT -6) | | One of the books I actually finished so far this Summer is John Brek's "Spirit of Truth: The Origins of Johannine Pneumatology". The way Word and Spirit and Truth are discussed in their historical development within scripture (and in neighboring religions) might help a bit. (I'll offer two other thigs too.)
Breck lays out and traces the progressive development of the Spirit as spoken of in O.T. texts across the history those writing. (There are similarities to other contemporary traditions--which does not take anything away from scripture.)
For the early Jewish writers, as with other religions, the nature or idenity of the Spirit was left vague, and the Spirit's relationship (and often in other religions the virtues, such as Justice and Truth) to the One God was not strongly connected. Remember Jesus comments about the Spirit going where he wills. The Spirit reveals (and revelas the Word; who only sends, but does not reveal the Spirit) but is not revealed by the Other persons of the Trinity. (At least one Church Father wrote of the Spirit as He who does not have a name.)
The relevant part is coming.
So, before God's people were sure that the Spirit was a Person (Paul didn't even use the word "Trinity.") the figures of Word and Spirit and Truth were somewhat vague. Then gradually the identification of one with the other TOGETHER (Word and Truth -- ultimately with Christ) and of one with the other IN TANDEM (Word and Truth as a team!) is unfolded.
The language didn't seem to allow it when earliest on. The way the text has to talk about Balaam's prophecy by the spirit/wind is not too far removed from the natural-religion view of wind's expressing divine power.
Eventually the identities and relationship of Word and Spirit becomre more fixed; if still somewhat mysterious -- until the Nativity and the Theophanies.
The tight relationship between Word and Spirit in the church and worship will be covered below. But it is interesting to see that this is the way that Scripture points to as it developed.
.....FAST FORWARD.....
St. Maximus the Confessor (5 or 6 hundreds AD) wrote about there being three (3) incarnations of the Word: (1) Creation, (2) Scripture, and (3) Mary's Son.
.....that is MUCH before Luther.....
But what I've offered does not address its development; as you want to know about. (sorry!) And the developmental bit above is so, so, so early. But here is what is made of it in contemporary Eastern Orthodox analysis of its liturgy (in trying to recover from Roman Cath. influences):
The Sacrament of the Word
"Illumine our hearts, 0 Master who lovest mankind,
with the pure light of Thy divine knowledge.
Open the eyes of our mind to the understanding
of Thy gospel teachings.
Implant also in us the fear of Thy blessed commandments,
that trampling down all carnal desires,
we may enter upon a spiritual manner of living,
both thinking and doing such things as
are well-pleasing unto Thee..."
(PRAYER BEFORE THE GOSPEL)
ACCORDING TO THE UNANIMOUS TESTIMONY OF ALL EARLY evidence, the reading of holy scripture from the very beginning constituted an inseparable part of the "assembly as the Church" and, specifically, the eucharistic gathering. In one of the first descriptions of the eucharist that we have, we read: "on the day called Sunday there is a meeting in one place of those who live in the cities or the country, and the memoirs of the apostles or the writings of the prophets are read as long as time permits. When the reader has finished, the president in a discourse urges and invites [us] to the imitation of these noble things. Then we all stand ^ together and offer prayers... and when we have finished the prayer, bread is brought, and wine and water.. ."1 Here the link between the reading of scripture and the homily, on the one hand, and the offering of the eucharistic gifts, on the other, is obvious.
Yet in the liturgical and spiritual tradition of the Church, the ' Church's essence as the incarnation of the Word, as the fulfilment in time and space of the divine incarnation, is realized precisely in the unbreakable link between the word and the sacrament. Thus the book of Acts can say of the Church', "the word.. .grew and multiplied" (12:24). In the sacrament we partake of him who comes and abides with us in the word, and the mission of the Church consists precisely in announcing this good news. The word presupposes the sacrament as its fulfilment, for in the sacrament Christ the Word becomes our life. The Word assembles the Church for his incarnation in her. In separation from the word the sacrament is in danger of being perceived as magic, and without the sacrament the word is in danger of being "reduced" to "doctrine." And, finally, it is precisely through the sacrament that the word is interpreted, for the interpretation of the word is always witness to the fact that the Word has become our life. "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth" (Jn 1:14). The sacrament is his witness, and therefore in it lies the source, the beginning and the foundation of the exposition and comprehension of the word, the source and criterion of theology.
Only in this unbreakable unity of word and sacrament can we truly understand the meaning of the affirmation that the Church alone preserves the true meaning of scripture. That is why the necessary beginning of the eucharistic ceremony is the first part of the liturgy—the sacrament of the word, which finds its fulfilment and completion in the offering, consecration and distribution to the faithful of the eucharistic gifts.
. . . . . .
The celebrant reads the prayer before the gospel, in which he asks God to send down the "pure light of Thy divine knowledge. Open the eyes of our mind to the understanding of Thy gospel teachings." This prayer, which is now read silently, occupies the same place in the sacrament of the word that the epiklesis, the supplication for the Father to send down his Holy Spirit, occupies in the eucharistic prayer. Like the consecration of the gifts, understanding and acceptance of the word depend not on us, not only on our desire, but above all on the sacramental transformation of the "eyes of our mind," on the coming to us of the Holy Spirit. The blessing that the priest bestows on the deacon as he is about to read the gospel testifies to this: "May God.. .enable you to proclaim the glad tidings with great power, to the fulfillment of the gospel..."
. . . . . .
THE HOMILY IS A WITNESS TO THE HEARING OF THE WORD OF God, its reception and understanding. Therefore it is organically connected to the reading of scripture and, in the early Church, constituted a necessary part of the "synaxis," an essential liturgical act of the Church. This act is the eternal self-witness of the Holy Spirit, who lives in the Church and guides her into all the truth (Jn 16:15), the Spirit of truth, "whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him"—but "you know him, for he dwells with you, and will be in you" (Jn 14:17). In these "texts" the Church hears and recognizes, and will forever continue to recognize, hear and proclaim the word of God. Only in this way can she genuinely proclaim to "this world" the good news about Christ, can she witness to him—and not just expound her "doctrine"—because she herself always listens to the word of God, she lives by it, so that her very life is to increase in the word'. "And the word of God increased, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly" (Ac 6:7); "So the word of the Lord grew and prevailed mightily" (Ac 19:20).
. . . . . .
because in the sacrament of the word, accomplished in the church assembly, the Holy Spirit eternally gives life to the "flesh" of scripture, transforming it into "spirit and life." Any genuine theology is rooted in this sacrament of the word, in the church assembly, in which the Spirit of God exhorts the Church herself—and not simply her individual members —into all truth. Thus, any "private" reading of scripture must be rooted in the Church: outside of the mind of the Church, outside of the divine-human life of the Church it can neither be heard nor truly interpreted. So, the sacrament of the word, accomplished in the church gathering in a twofold act—reading and proclamation—is the source of the growth of each and all together into the fulness of the mind of truth.
Finally, in the sacrament of the word is revealed the collaboration of the hierarchy and the laity in the preservation of truth, which, in accordance with the famous Epistle of the Eastern Patriarchs (1869), is "entrusted to the whole people of the Church."7 On the one hand, in preaching the gift of teaching is realized: it is a charism given to the celebrant as his service in the church assembly. On the other hand, and precisely because preaching is not a "personal gift" but a charism given by the Church and realized in her gathering, the teaching service of the hierarchy is not separate from the gathering but finds in it its grace-filled source. The Holy Spirit rests on the entire Church. The ministry of the celebrant is preaching and teaching. The ministry of the people of God is in accepting this teaching. But both these ministries are of the Holy Spirit, both are accomplished by him and in him. One can neither accept nor proclaim the truth without the gift of the Holy Spirit, and this gift is given to the entire assembly. For the entire Church—and not one "sector" in it—have "received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is from God, that we might understand the gifts bestowed on us by God." "No one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God," and therefore those who are teaching do so "in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who possess the Spirit," and those who accept the teaching accept it by the Holy Spirit.
(Fr. Alexander Schmemann, Eucharist, SVS Press)
Now, I hope someone can fill in the in-betweens.
Edited by - PotOnWheel on 07/01/2002 12:15:30 PM | | Back to Top | | |
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