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Two of my most-read posts have dealt with the flood in Genesis 6-9. This one looks at the Flood in terms of genre, and tries to steer Mormons away from the false interpretive dichotomoy of “literal/figurative” into a more productive and accurate way of looking at scripture, while also giving some ancient Near Eastern background. The second one responds to an older Ensign article on the flood by a BYU professor.

A new book out (Let Us Reason Together: Essays in Honor of Robert L. Millet) in honor of BYU’s Robert L. Millet, edited by Spencer Fluhman, includes important research by Paul Hoskisson (recently retired from BYU) and Stephen Smoot (recent BYU grad), “Was Noah’s Flood the Baptism of the Earth?” (The full table of contents is given at the Maxwell Institute page, Amazon link here.) They trace the LDS evolution of an inherited tradition about the flood into a quasi-doctrine about the baptism of the earth. This quasi-doctrine was then used to argue that there must have been a world-wide flood, which is a circular argument.

As it turns out, doctrinal inheritance leading to strong tradition is not uncommon in the LDS Church.

A close study of the Latter-day Saint beliefs early in the history of the Church uncovers a doctrinal migration from beliefs held by other denominations in the early nineteenth century. Combine the integration of people from different religious backgrounds with a lack of a professional clergy and no established creed; the result is a slow acclimation to new doctrine. There were no seminaries or missionary training centers to train and indoctrinate those that would fill the leadership positions in the Church. Beliefs and practices from previous religious backgrounds continued with the convert after baptism until they were addressed and corrected.- Link

What other traditions did we inherit? This is certainly not an exhaustive list.

• The curse of Cain being black skin and/or slavery is a long tradition, per the LDS Gospel Topics essay and whole lot of scholarship like this and this and this.
• Some of our religious vocabulary and structure was inherited from Protestantism. See this article by Fluhman, and this one by Kevin Barney for some examples.
• The idea that the Roman Catholic church is the “great and abominable church” of both Revelation and 1 Nephi 13-14.  This was common Protestant polemic going back to Luther, and it was repeated by e.g. Orson Pratt, and Bruce R. McConkie in the first edition of Mormon Doctrine, who called it “the church of the devil.” (On the latter, see p.50-53 and 122 in the McKay biography.)

Our church is now coming of age where it is mature enough, stable enough, and has the historical tools to begin interrogating some of these traditions inherited from outside.

I think the the baptism of the earth, for example, constitutes a case of  “mission creep,” “feature creep,” or “scope creep.”  In essence, this describes an original plan, mission, or feature that at inception had defined and  limited scope, but is then expanded far beyond its original scope or purpose as time goes on. It takes on more than it was originally intended for, is put to uses that weren’t in the original design. With “doctrine creep,” a passage is pressed into use it wasn’t designed for, then that interpretation is expanded and solidified.

We might want to emphasize a particular thing, and so we look for a verse to emphasize it. Again, let’s consider the baptism of the earth. In a heavily Protestant context which downplays ritual and ordinances, early LDS wanted to make clear the absolute necessity of baptism. What was at hand? The Flood! Even the earth was fully immersed! It was baptized too! …. which then leads to the concept of the earth as a living being, the flood as a formal ordinance, and therefore not only a historical but a worldwide and literal flood with all the problems that entails. (Again, see my two posts linked above.)

Another example is chastity-related. We really want to emphasize (and rightly so) with our youth the seriousness of sex and steer them away from sexual activity outside of marriage. Alma 39 has been pressed into use to emphasize this, with the line “second only unto murder” even though the original passage is not so narrow.

Although not addressing any of the topics above, Elder McConkie once said to educators, “Certain things which are commonly said and commonly taught in the Church either are not true, or, are in the realm of pure speculation.”- Bruce R. McConkie: Highlights from His Life and Teachings, somewhere between 326-35. (The author sent me this in an email, and I have not seen the original nor confirmed the quotation, which is from an unpublished transcript.)

A new book is out from the Maxwell Institute and Deseret Book, Planted: Belief and Longing in an Age of Doubt by Patrick Mason, the Howard Hunter Chair of Mormon Studies at Claremont. This book is one of the MI’s Living Faith series, and addresses, among other things, how to live with faith and doubt, how to reconcile and make sense of things. It’s not an answer book, though, as much as a guide to thinking and approaches. The table of contents as well as links to reviews and interviews is here. The reviews are uniformly full of praise and lengthy useful quotations. Highly recommended.

The third book isn’t LDS, but Islamic. The Quran is at the center of many discussions and polemics about Islam, but few Americans have read it and even fewer understood it. The newly published Study Quran (HarperOne) aims to change that. Following the model of Study Bibles, with their interpretive notes and essays, the Study Quran provides background, context, and an interpretive guide. It’s been getting positive reviews from Muslims, scholars, Muslim scholars, non-Muslim scholars, and LDS as well. See Michael Austin’s review here.

I fully expect to see this become a required book in Islam 101 courses across the country. It has its own homepage, complete with sample from Surah 1.

I’m a long-time user of Logos, an electronic library and Bible study program available for PC and MAC. The engine itself is FREE, as are the mobile apps (ios and Android), though you can buy packages with more advanced search capabilities and other tools.  It’s far more powerful than something like a Kindle ebook or scanned PDF, which is why I’ve invested a lot in Logos over the last 13 years, most of it at steep discount from sales and deals like these.

There’s a free book and associated discounted book each month. For January, it’s Nahum Sarna’s Exodus volume in the JPS Torah Commentary series for free (free!) and the Jonah volume for $1.99, here. These are fantastic volumes from a scholarly Jewish perspective, 278 and 96 pages respectively, and typically about $60 each in print. Highly recommended. UPDATE: A friend pointed out that although it’s not February yet, they’ve changed the books already on that landing page. However, if you navigate to the individual book pages, they’re still free and $1.99, so here are the links to Sarna on Exodus and the Jonah volume. The current $1.99 volume is the technical version of a monograph by John Walton on Genesis 1. I reviewed the popular version, called The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate, for the Interpreter here. It’s a good read on Genesis, creation, and the temple. I do recommend the technical version (again, $1.99 at Logos throughout February), but it might make more sense if you read the less technical one first.

Also, through Sunday night, most Anchor Bible commentary volumes are $20 instead of their normal $50-$80. (The exceptions are brand-new volumes.) Again, this is a great series, very scholarly, and I have never seen them on sale at all in electronic format.

Also, through Sunday night, the Library of New Testament Studies volumes are all $9.99 instead of 2-4x that amount. These seem fairly technical, but someone might be interested.

These are all disappearing on February 1, so take advantage while you can.

In the coming year, I plan to put up a Gospel Doctrine post each week as I have in the past. Well, kind of. Out of necessity, they’re going to be shorter and more focused, perhaps with longer biography and links. The blog will also be broadening somewhat, beyond the Gospel Doctrine lessons, in the sense that posts I might have written elsewhere will be posted here.

I’ll be cutting my online time drastically to focus on reading, writing, and working on a PhD at Claremont in History of Religion and Christianity in America, with a side helping of Mormon Studies. I’m still working on the funding situation, but quite excited. While the field is completely different from my previous field, my area of focus within that new field will be a continuation of sorts. I’ll be applying my work on Genesis in the ancient world to understanding the conflict between scripture/religious authority and evolution/scientific authority, in the LDS Church from 1880 onwards. (I’ve already begun reading and writing generally on that topic, such as my article on Ben Carson, Seventh-day Adventists, and young earth creationism.) Though this may change or need further narrowing, I intend to write my dissertation on the history in the LDS Church of conflicting authority and epistemology, evolution vs. scripture (and interpretation), and publish it as a sequel of sorts to my Genesis book.

While I had aimed to complete a draft of my book by Christmas, I was unsuccessful. This is not necessarily bad. The draft has grown and matured in some ways as I work through it. My goal now is to finish up the draft by mid-summer. One of my first classes at Claremont will be Mesopotamian Religion, which pertains directly to my book, given the importance of Enuma Eliš (the so-called Babylonian Creation Epic) for interpreting Genesis 1. The other two classes will help refine and professionalize my writing.

Reading for this lesson. 

• Gospel Topics essay on Book of Mormon Translation.
• Gospel Topics essay on DNA and the Book of Mormon
• Joseph Smith’s Seerstone and the translation process- See here for my post, pictures, and some useful links about the role of the seerstone, why it has been less well known, and my experience teaching it at BYU. Also here for a post  about how culture affects the channels of revelation we believe in, and how our day is different from Joseph Smith’s as well as that of Genesis. Relevant section is down at the bottom, starting with “Beyond the story itself”
• Mormon Women Project Lesson 1
  • Highlights women who were witnesses to the translation and coming forth.
• BYU Studies helps, aids, and articles for Lesson 1
• Book of Mormon Authorship Revisited, with good articles by Richard Bushman and others about the coming-forth of the Book of Mormon, the various theories trying to account for it, etc.
• Kevin Barney highlights some things he learned here, from one of the books on my suggested reading list.

I’ll repeat and expand on my comment to Kevin’s post, which you should read.

Martin Harris literally bet the farm ($3000) on the publication of the Book of Mormon, and technically lost. I’ve sometimes led up to this story in class with several stories about Martin testing Joseph.

• the seerstone-testing story, (here in The Ensign, for one). Martin switched rocks on Joseph when he wasn’t looking.
• the Charles Anthon story. Again, Martin tests Joseph.
• 116 pages story, also involving Martin Harris.

Martin Harris tested Joseph Smith, and he passed every time, which is why Martin was literally willing to bet the farm. Even though he lost it, and was disaffected from Joseph Smith and the LDS Church for roughly 50 years, he testified consistently and constantly of the Book of Mormon, to his death.

Some Things about the Book of Mormon You Might Not Know 

Below are some points of interest, potential to talk about in lesson 1 or thoughts for later on.

1. Nephi’s “goodly” parents comment probably indicates socio-economic standing, not moral goodness.
   • This is a long-standing argument among a few bloggers, including me. In the first few verses, Nephi explains that, because his parents were “goodly,” he was taught not just to read (very unusual in the ancient world) but to write (even more unusual), and moreover, to write in two scripts or languages (depending on how we understand the “Egypt” reference). That degree of learning is much more dependent upon Lehi’s financial status than his goodness. Context thus favors the interpretation of “well-off.” The (weaker, in my view) counter-argument comes from dictionaries, which don’t list something like “well-off” as a meaning, so it would be fairly idiomatic usage there in 1Ne 1:1.
2. Nephi wrote the small plates 30 years after the events they depict, largely with religious/political purposes in mind. I’ll be expanding on this greatly in Lesson 2.
3. The small plates (1 Nephi-Omni) were translated last. Maybe.
   • This is a useful summary.
4. The Book of Mormon doesn’t depict a capitalist democratic society.
   • See (loosely) Richard Bushman, here.
5. The Book of Mormon doesn’t depict a church structured like ours today.
6. Joseph Smith never preached a sermon based on a Book of Mormon text.
   • Or at least, we have no records of Joseph Smith preaching a sermon based on the Book of Mormon. Most early saints took it as a sign of Joseph Smith’s prophethood, that the heavens were open, and as confirmation of the Bible, not as something that needed independent study and reading. This is probably what leads to D&C passages like this, telling the early Saints to start paying more attention to it.
7. The first two chapters of Mosiah are missing.
   • Mosiah 1-2 (original numbering) disappeared as part of the 116 pages JS gave to Martin Harris. We know this because in the Printer’s Manuscript (the hand copy made to give to EB Grandin to print from), our current Mosiah chapter 1 is labeled Mosiah chapter 3. See Uncovering the Original Text of the Book of Mormon, 20-21, or the critical-text work of Royal Skousen.
8. It’s not much of a prophesy for Lehi to speak of the Babylonian captivity. (1 Nephi 1:13 and 10:3)
   • I’m not suggesting that Lehi wasn’t a prophet, just that this one was no-brainer. The Babylonians had been in control of Jerusalem since 605. There were several episodes between 605 and 587/88 of hauling Jews off to Babylon. While politically and religiously “incorrect” to say that Babylon was going destroy the city (remember Laman and Lemuel’s disbelief on this point, shared with many Israelites), it was not much of a leap to see that was the way the wind was blowing. Lots of this covered in Glimpses of Lehi’s Jerusalem (Amazon link. Maxwell Institute link.)
9. Jesus appeared to the Nephites almost a year after the three days of darkness, not immediately.
   • The two primary texts are 3 Nephi 8:5 (which states that the destruction took place in year 34, month 1 day 1) and 3 Nephi 10:18 (which states that in the *end* of the 34th year, Jesus showed himself to them.) See Kent Brown and John A. Tvedtnes. “When did Christ appear to the Nephites?” (FARMS paper, don’t know if it’s still available) and Kent Brown, “When did Jesus Visit the Americas?” in From Jerusalem to Zarahemla, 146-156.
10. Book of Mormon prophets probably drank wine and didn’t know about three degrees of glory and similar doctrines many today consider central to Mormonism.
    • Many critics from a different religious worldview are surprised not to find much “mormonism” in the Book of Mormon, and it’s true. You don’t go to the Book of Mormon to find explicit teachings of not drinking alcohol or coffee (that’s D&C), the premortal existence (that’s mostly Abraham, though implied in Alma 13), eternal marriage (D&C again), or becoming like God (that’s actually the Bible, ironically enough (see here and here), AND D&C. Although, see 3 Nephi 28:10). This is from reading the text, and the principles of line-upon-line; the implication of line-upon-line is that what is known today wasn’t necessarily known or practiced in the past.

Lastly, as always, you can support this site and my research by making Amazon purchases through this link, or the Support My Research links at the bottom of the About page. You can get updates by email whenever a post goes up (subscription box on the right). If you friend me on Facebook, please drop me a note telling me you’re a reader.

These letters are known as the Pastoral Letters. (Pastor came into English from Latin pastor, “shepherd.”) They are addressed not to congregations, but to individuals who are themselves ministering to congregations. Full of counsel, less of doctrine.

And here, like Hebrews, most scholars are convinced that Paul didn’t write them. Why? The following is summarized from the conservative Protestant Word Biblical Commentary volume on the Pastorals by eminent Greek teacher William Mounce. (See his blog here.) There are several problems.

1. A Historical Problem– These don’t seem to fit into Acts, and also seems to assume a fairly well-developed Church structure.
2. A Theogical Problem– Some of the themes and approaches of the Pastorals run directly counter to other letters known with a high degree of certainty to be Paul’s. In other cases, they assume a good degree of doctrinal development and “orthodoxy”, both of which require time and stabilization to develop.
3. A Linguistic Problem– The style and vocabulary is quite different than the other letters. At times, the same words are used, but in very different ways. At other times, rare but significant words are used that don’t appear in his other letters. In some cases, the vocabulary seems to match a 2nd century Greek vocabulary, not a 1st century as it should.

Each of these problems depends upon limited data, certain assumptions, and methodologies, but taken together, they are a problem. Three general responses exist (still summarizing from the WBC.)

1. The pastorals were written by someone in the early 2nd century, which rules out Paul. This would make them pseudepigraphal, written in Paul’s name, but not by him. In theory, I have no problem with this.
2. The pastorals were written by an amanuensis, that is, someone (or a group or school) working under Paul to write the letter, using their own phrasing, style, vocabulary, etc. I have no problem with this either.
3. In the 2nd century, fragments of Paul’s genuine letters that have not survived were edited and rewritten together, “in an attempt to preserve the fragments and make Paul’s message relevant to a later church.” WBC, cxviii. I don’t have a problem with this either.

Note that none of the solutions is “well, Paul REALLY did write them anyway.” It’s just something we have to wrestle with. Is it possible? Perhaps.  Purely for ease, I’m going to call the author Paul even though I’m inclined to think Paul didn’t write them directly (I like the amanuensis view). But on to more important things.

First, note Julie Smith’s important comments on a few bits of today’s chapters. Julie has a MA in NT, is authoring the BYU NT Commentary on Mark, and knows what she’s talking about.

Second, since there’s no real overarching them to these letters, it’s hard to find A Big Picture to focus on.

Timothy (or Tim, as some call him) gets mentioned a lot: Rom 16:21, 1Co 4:17, 2Co 1:1, Phi 1:1, Col 1:1, 1Th 1:1, Phm 1:1…

Who is this Timothy guy?

According to Acts Timothy was a native of Lystra in Asia Minor (Act 16:1, 2), the son of a Jewish woman and a Greek father (16:1). Because of the matrilineal principle of descent, Timothy would have been considered a Jew, although the applicability of this principle in the 1st-century Diaspora has been questioned…. The author of 2 Timothy, preserving what is probably historically reliable tradition, names his mother as Eunice and his grandmother as Lois, both of whom are described as Christian believers (Act 1:5). Timothy’s mother did not have him circumcised (Act 16:3). This together with her marriage to a (nonbelieving?) gentile suggests that Timothy, living in the Diaspora, did not grow up in a pious or strictly observant Jewish home (although see 2Ti 3:15).- Anchor Bible Dictionary”

1Ti 2:9 What does “modest” mean here, as Paul elaborates on it? It’s not showing too much leg, nor have anything to do with chastity. (We’ve recently made “modesty” very narrow, and all about sexuality.) Rather, it seems to have more in common with the Book of Mormon’s warnings about “costly apparel.”

1Ti 3:1ff Qualifications of Bishops and Deacons-

Deacon– Gr. diakonos means “someone who serves, waits tables, ministers” e.g. Mat 4:11, 8:15, 20:26, 20:28, Mar 9:35, 15:41, John 2:5, Act 1:17 (“ministry”), Act 6:1 (“distribution”). It’s a generic term that takes on specific meaning within the early Christian Church, as it was a secondary, assistive role, and “may parallel the role of the assistant (חַזָּן, chazzan) of the synagogue”- “Deacon,”  The Lexham Bible Dictionary. (This is a free resources for Logos users; you get the engine/software for free, but books/packages cost.)

LDS deacons tend to giggle at 1Ti 3:12, but it shows that deacons were married men. Today among LDS, “deacon” is synonymous with “tie-askew awkward pre-teen male.” It has not always been so in the LDS church. In the early decades of the church, there was no set age or progression for Melchizedek or Aaronic offices. (And note that in the NT, there’s no mention of priesthood connected to the office of deacon, let alone distinctions of Melch. vs. Aaron.) For a variety of practical reasons, these offices in the LDS Church were shifted from grown and older men to younger men, as BYU Prof. William Hartley’s title implies, “From Men to Boys: LDS Aaronic Priesthood Offices, 1929-1996,” Journal of Mormon History. It’s a fantastic article.

Bishops– This word is an anglicization of Greek episkopos, which quite literally means “overseer.” (If broken up into parts, epi+skopos, the latter is what gives us all our -scope words in English, like telescope, microscope, etc.) Bibles like the ESV, NET, and NIV actually translate as “overseer.”

Among the other qualifications, it says a Bishop must be “the husband of one wife.” Does this mean, not polygamous? Does it mean married-but-not-divorced? Only married once? I mentioned William Mounce above. He takes a look at this passage here, and offers that “1 Tim 3:2 is a confusing text, and whatever it says, it does not say it clearly.” This goes to show that learning Biblical languages does not solve all problems, as Kevin Barney has talked about here.

1Ti 4:13- Since there are no personal copies of the scriptures (far too expensive, far too little literacy), this must refer to a public reading in a congregation of the Hebrew Bible (probably in Greek translatin), and NRSV, NIV, and others translate that way.

1Ti 5:23 Drink wine, for health reasons. This was indeed wine, not grape juice. If not so, then there was no point in Paul specifying to Timothy that Bishops should not be “drunkards” in 1Ti 3:3. Wine was something everyone drank… but not to excess.

1Ti 6:4 Note in 1Ti 6:4 NET, this is translated as “an unhealthy interest in controversies.” I’ve known people like that. They’re not well-grounded in scriptures or the basics of the Gospel, but really want to get into speculative out-there doctrinal discussions.  On a different note, Joseph Smith said, “be careful in speaking on those subjects which are not clearly pointed out in the word of God, which lead to speculation and strife.” –Words of Joseph Smith, p.16

2Ti 3:1 The scriptures sometimes speak of “the last days” (as here) or “the latter days” (Num 24:14, etc.) These aren’t what they appear on the surface, namley, prophecies of our day today. Let me give two perspectives. In Hebrew idiom, this phrase simply meant “in the future.” Way back in Gen 49:1, the first of the patriarchal blessings, Israel says to his sons, “Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you that which shall befall you in the last days.” Other translations opt for the less-apocalyptic “in the days to come” (JPS, NASB, ESV, TNIV, NRSV) or “in the future” (NET). The JPS Torah Commentary here draws on the cognate phrase,

its Akkadian counterpart ina aḫrat ume, means simply “in the future,” without precise definition. In the Torah the phrase is used in a context of historical time, but in prophetic literature the phrase became a technical term for the “end-time” (eschaton), when the historical process would reach its culmination and God’s grand design for the human race would be fulfilled.”

So it does take on some more apocalyptic tone later on, but still means “in the future.”

The other view, held by the early Christians, was that “the last days”, the end-time, the new world, began with the resurrection of Jesus. In that sense, we’ve been in “the last days” for the last 2000 years, and I anticipate at least several hundred more.

2Ti 3:15-16 “Scriptures” throughout the entire New Testament refers only to the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible, mainly because the writings of the New Testament didn’t exist yet, or weren’t canonized. The early Christians accessed their scriptures in translation, because they mostly didn’t know Hebrew. For them, the Greek translation simply *was* the Bible. See the recent When God Spoke Greek: The Septuagint and the Making of the Christian Bible.

Lastly, as always, you can support this site and my research by making Amazon purchases through this link, or the Support My Research links at the bottom of the About page. You can get updates by email whenever a post goes up (subscription box on the right). If you friend me on Facebook, please drop me a note telling me you’re a reader.

First of all, I’ve made a Facebook page for Benjamin the Scribe. I’m not sure what one does with such pages, but feel free to become a fan there.

Second, I’m hunkering down to finish my Genesis book, in preparation for something new and big, that I hope to be able to announce in December, if all goes well. Fingers crossed.

Third, a bunch of the New Testament books by N.T. Wright are for sale on Kindle right now, as part of a larger sale by Fortress Press which includes books by Wright, Brueggemann, Bonhoeffer (mentioned in General Conference!), and others.

Fourth, since I’m making announcements, here’s my usual plug for supporting my research by making your Amazon purchases through this link.

The chapters today are Paul’s final travels, ending in Rome. Indeed, it reads a bit like a travelogue, as Paul returns to Jerusalem, and then travels under Roman custody by stages to Rome.

One thing of note, although we’ve seen them before in chapter 16, is that pronoun “we”, which starts immediately in 21:1.

“The surprising shift to the first-person plural (16:10) introduces the first of four “we” passages in Acts (16:10-17; 20:5-15; 21:1-18; 27:1-28:16). These intriguing references may signify that the author of these sections here joins Paul’s entourage and thus writes from the perspective of an eyewitness. By extension, this same traveling companion may very well have written the entire book, enhancing his overall credibility by subtle, occasional references to what he saw and experienced personally. Or, these sections may be travel diaries from an unnamed traveling companion, employed by the author, though loosely edited. Tradition has seen behind the “we” a reference to “Luke the physician,” elsewhere mentioned as Paul’s companion during his imprisonments (Col. 4:14; Philem. 24; 2 Tim. 4:11). The change may be purely stylistic, however, yielding no concrete historical information either about Paul’s traveling companions, eyewitnesses to these events, or the authorship of these sections and the book as a whole.”- Harper’s Bible Commentary (Harper’s is a 1-volume commentary.)

For the rest, I’ll focus on Paul and Jerusalem.

First, note in Act 21:11, that there are still prophets, receiving revelation, and teaching it via symbolic acts, which happens in the Old Testament often. Agabus does not appear to be hold any office, and indeed, prophet is not a formal office. He’s just spiritually in tune. Earlier in Acts, he had prophesied a famine (Acts 11:27-30) and now he warns Paul about what will happen to him if he goes… but he goes anyway.

Once in Jerusalem, Paul visits James, in particular.  (This is probably James, Jesus’ brother, who led the Jerusalem Church,  not James John’s brother, son of Zebedee.) We learn that many Jews are believers in Jesus, but embrace the law (21:20). Paul’s rep in Jerusalem is that he’s a traitor, that he preaches against the Temple and Torah. So again, let’s split some hairs. Paul joins four men who have taken a Nazarite vow, which they end by shaving their heads. (See Numbers 6.) Paul’s preaching has been that Torah observance is not the means to salvation, and that non-Jewish converts to Christianity don’t need to keep most of it (but note Gentile converts “should abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols and from blood and from what is strangled and from fornication”) …. but should Jews who accept Jesus keep the Torah? The answer, at least here, seems to be “yes, they should.”

This is what concerns those who are ‘zealous for the law’ (v. 20; cf. ACTS 5:17), and it is not a problem about the past (are Jewish Christians saved by the law?) but about the future (should Jewish Christians go on keeping the law?): as so often, it is in the rituals surrounding the birth of children that crucial questions of identity crystallize. James suggests that Paul should demonstrate publicly that he himself remains an observant Jew by sponsoring and joining four men who are going through the procedures of a nazirite vow (vv. 23–4), and he agrees to do this (v. 26; cf. 18:18). The same issue arises here as over the cirumcision of Timothy (see ACTS 16:1–5): is this action unthinkable for the Paul of the epistles (as some have suggested) or does it fall under the rubric of being ‘all things to all people’ (1 Cor 9:22)?- Oxford Bible Commentary.

So Paul goes into the temple, a riot breaks out, and Roman soldiers show up almost instantly. Good times.

How and why does this happen?

First, the Jerusalem temple complex made by Herod was huge. Massive. You really can’t tell how massive until you’re there, dwarfed by an 80-ton ashlar. Then you realize the walls are made of hundreds of these. The disciples were rightly astonished when Jesus talked about “all these stones” being thrown down.

not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down…

Second, remember that in the New Testament, “temple” translates two different words. One refers to the entire temple complex, the other to a much smaller, holier subset of that complex.

From Logos/Faithlife.

Right outside the naos, the temple proper,  in the Gentiles Courtyard was a small wall, about 5 feet high, the soreg wall or wall of separation between Jew and non-Jew. (This is probably what dividing wall Christ has torn down in Eph 2:14.) At regular intervals, it had carved signs in Greek, saying, in essence “Any non-Israelite who crosses this line shall bear the responsibility for his own death.” Only Israelites could proceed past this wall. This was the one Jewish law involving capital punishment where Rome had delegated their power. That is, a Gentile who crossed this wall could be put to death without having to get Rome’s permission.

A complete plaque was discovered in the late 1800s, and a fragment later, see the pics here on the left.

Paul is recognized as that traitor preaching against Torah in the company of Gentiles, and suspicion that he has brought a Gentile inside the soreg wall escalates quickly into a riot.

In the pic above, on the NW corner of the temple was a roman fortress with a stairway down into the court of the Gentiles. Romans knew that if there was another Judean revolt, it would start there. So when they see a riot in the temple, down the soldiers go, and grab Paul… who turns out not to be that revolutionary Egyptian, but a fluent speaker of Greek, who wishes to address the crowd, which he does. (“There’s been a riot about me. Guess I’ll bear my testimony.”Ok Paul.) The Romans decide to beat out of him the reason for the riot, and he coyly asks why they’re beating a citizen, which puts real fear into them. The law applied differently to slaves, freemen, and citizens, and they were in real trouble. Paul eventually appeals to Casear, and off to Rome he goes.

Lastly, as always, you can support this site and my research by making Amazon purchases through this link, or the Support My Research links at the bottom of the About page. You can get updates by email whenever a post goes up (subscription box on the right). If you friend me on Facebook, please drop me a note telling me you’re a reader.

I’ll be speaking tomorrow morning on BYU campus, as part of the conference of the Society for Mormon Philosophy and Theology. The full schedule is here.

My title is “Faith and Perfect Knowledge: Parsing Alma and the Hebrew Lexicon.” I look at an Israelite conception of “faith” which has strong overtones of certainty as a background of Alma 32. Does Alma share this conception, that faith borders on certainty? If not, what does Alma mean by “faith” and what is its relationship to “perfect knowledge”?

I wrote an early post with a paraphrase of Alma 32 and some notes on it here at Times&Seasons.

I’ll put up the post on Acts 21-28 tomorrow afternoon.

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