Comments on: A Reply to the Questioning Christian http://willgwitt.org/scripture/a-reply-to-the-questioning-christian/ Musings About Theology, Mostly Sun, 04 Jul 2010 11:39:38 -0500 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.6 hourly 1 By: Clifford Durousseau http://willgwitt.org/scripture/a-reply-to-the-questioning-christian/comment-page-1/#comment-730 Clifford Durousseau Tue, 08 Jun 2010 17:12:03 +0000 http://willgwitt.org/?p=37#comment-730 Correction: The last scripture reference should read Acts 2:36. Correction: The last scripture reference should read Acts 2:36.

]]> By: Clifford Durousseau http://willgwitt.org/scripture/a-reply-to-the-questioning-christian/comment-page-1/#comment-729 Clifford Durousseau Tue, 08 Jun 2010 16:52:34 +0000 http://willgwitt.org/?p=37#comment-729 I enjoyed your scholarly response to D.C. about the view of Jesus in The Acts of the Apostles. The citation by Kepha (Peter) in Acts 2 of Psalm 110 in the original Hebrew makes a distinction between the two lords which the LXX quoted by Luke does not. In the MT the first lord is Adonai, the customary substitution for the Tetragrammaton; the second lord is adoni, an expression always used for a human being. This is the sense in which Kepha uses it in Acts 2, as we can see when he tells the Jews in the same sermon, 'Jesus of Nazareth was a man . . .' Since Kepha preached in Aramaic and not Greek, he would have been aware of the distinction between Adonai for Yahweh and adoni for Jesus, which was present in the Hebrew used in the synagogues. He would not have understood the second lord to indicate that Jesus was also Yahweh. No Jew who knew Hebrew could make such an error. There was no expectation among them that the Messiah would be divine from either this text or any other in their Hebrew Bible. And Luke himself by saying that Kepha preached in this same sermon that Jesus of Nazareth was a man (2:22) gives us the context in which to understand the sense of the second lord of the Psalm 110 (l09 LXX) quotation in Greek, which makes no distinction between the two lords. He also says that Kepha said that God has MADE Jesus Lord (2:36). This appears to indicate that God has made Jesus to assume the function of Lord at this time and does not indicate that Jesus was so in the same sense before this. Since in this sermon kyrios for Jesus does not indicate that he is God or Yahweh, it seems this is the sense we are to get from the other uses of kyrios for him in Acts. There is no indication in Acts that the apostles preached a new view of God to the Jews or Gentiles. Among the Jews, the preaching that Jesus was not only Messiah but also God would have been regarded as blasphemy and would have caused great controversy. Of such a controversy in Acts there is no trace. And Acts 20:28 as a proof that Paul called Jesus God has finally been discarded by several major translations such as the New Jerusalem Bible and the New Revised Standard Version. The first Gospel to clearly call Jesus God was The Gospel of John (20:28). According to the traditional interpretation of John 20:28, Thomas was the first to make this declaration. But the Acts of the Apostles does not indicate that this declaration was a part of the preaching of the apostles. Thomas does not appear at all in Acts neither does his declaration. I have long maintained that the Acts of the Apostles does not sustain the view that the preaching of the apostles put forward a new view of God for either Jew or Gentile. The use of kyrios for Jesus and the sense in which it is to be taken is given in its first use in Acts 2:26. I enjoyed your scholarly response to D.C. about the view of Jesus in The Acts of the Apostles. The citation by Kepha (Peter)
in Acts 2 of Psalm 110 in the original Hebrew makes a distinction between the two lords which the LXX quoted by Luke
does not. In the MT the first lord is Adonai, the customary substitution for the Tetragrammaton; the second lord is adoni, an expression always used for a human being. This is the sense in which Kepha uses it in Acts 2, as we can see when he tells
the Jews in the same sermon, ‘Jesus of Nazareth was a man . . .’
Since Kepha preached in Aramaic and not Greek, he would have been aware of the distinction between Adonai for Yahweh and adoni for Jesus, which was present in the Hebrew used in the synagogues. He would not have understood the second lord to indicate that Jesus was also Yahweh. No Jew who knew Hebrew could make such an error. There was no expectation among them that the Messiah would be divine from either this text or any other in their Hebrew Bible. And Luke himself by saying that Kepha preached in this same sermon that Jesus of Nazareth was a man (2:22) gives us the context in which to understand the sense of the second lord of the Psalm 110 (l09 LXX) quotation in Greek, which makes no distinction between the two lords. He also says that Kepha said that God has MADE Jesus Lord (2:36). This appears to indicate that God has made Jesus to assume the function of Lord at this time and does not indicate that Jesus was so in the same sense before this. Since in this sermon kyrios for Jesus does not indicate that he is God or Yahweh, it seems this is the sense we are to get from the other uses of kyrios for him in Acts. There is no indication in Acts that the apostles preached a new view of God to the Jews or Gentiles. Among the Jews, the preaching that Jesus was not only Messiah but also God would have been regarded as blasphemy and would have caused great controversy. Of such a controversy in Acts there is no trace. And Acts 20:28 as a proof that Paul called Jesus God has finally been discarded by several major translations such as the New Jerusalem Bible and the New Revised Standard Version.

The first Gospel to clearly call Jesus God was The Gospel of John (20:28). According to the traditional interpretation of John 20:28, Thomas was the first to make this declaration. But the Acts of the Apostles does not indicate that this declaration was a part of the preaching of the apostles. Thomas
does not appear at all in Acts neither does his declaration.

I have long maintained that the Acts of the Apostles does not
sustain the view that the preaching of the apostles put forward a new view of God for either Jew or Gentile. The use of kyrios
for Jesus and the sense in which it is to be taken is given in its first use in Acts 2:26.

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