Who is God's Israel?

The Fourth Week of the Prophets Course discussed the meaning of the concept of the remnant in today’s world. Many, being influenced by the perception of the church in the US see the restoration of the remnant as being fulfilled in the creation of the nation of Israel after World War II. This understanding is problematic.

There are two different issues here. 1. Is the Israel in the New Testament the Church or the Jewish nation? 2. Is the restoration of the remnant promised in the prophets, especially Isaiah fulfilled in the Church or the nation of Israel or neither?

All theologians agree that Israel in the New Testament is the Church and not Israel. Paul says in Rom 9:6 ‘not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel’ emphasising that Israel and ethnic Jews are different.  John the Baptist in Matthew 3:9 says that being of Jewish descent is not relevant since God could raise up ‘Jews of faith’ from elsewhere. In Luke 12:32 Jesus says that God will give the kingdom to the ‘little flock’ or His disciples. So the new kingdom of which Jesus speaks is the Church and not the nation of the Jews. This is more forcefully put across in the parable of the landowner in Matt 21:33-46. In verse 43 Jesus says very clearly that the kingdom will be taken away from the Jews and given to His followers. Verse 45 states that the Jewish leaders perceived the parable as an attack on them.

Because of their understanding that the Church was New Israel, the Biblical writers used terms used for Israel for the Church. O James writes to the 12 tribes of the dispersion (James 1:1) and Peter writes to the exiles of the dispersion (I Pet 1:1).

From these passages it is clear that the Church saw itself as the New Israel, taking on the role of the Old Israel which had failed God. Hence in the understanding of the Church the old nation of Israel ceased to have any role in the salvation of the world or in God’s plan of redemption.

The Jews in the time of Jesus (and some Christians today) struggled with this message as it seemed to go against the promises in Amos 9:11-15, Joel 3:1-3, Hosea 14, Isaiah 40-66, Jer which speaks of God’s calling back the Jews who have been scattered all over the world and restoring to them the kingdom. They stress God’s undying love for the nation of Israel and how He would not give them up. So the Jews in the time of Jesus (just as the Jews in the time of Isaiah and Jeremiah) refused to believe that God would reject them. So they rejected Jesus and His teaching.

Jeremiah 25:11f and Jeremiah 29:10 date this restoration promised by the prophets as occurring within seventy years, identifying it with the edict of Cyrus. Isaiah 44:28 and 45:1 identify Cyrus as the one to restore Israel as the Servant of Yahweh. It is therefore evident that the restoration spoken of by the prophets in those times, especially by Isaiah and Jeremiah was from the exile under the Assyrians and Babylonians, and not the exile under the Romans. Therefore the rejection of the Jews spoken of by Jesus was a second casting away and there is no prophecy of their restoration after this casting away as the Church has now replaced the nation of the Jews.

Then is it wrong to see the restoration of the nation of Israel today as a fulfilment of the promises in the Bible? Recognising the multiple fulfilment of prophecies in the Bible, and the nature of the events I would find it difficult to see it as not a fulfilment of the prophecies in the prophets of the love of God for the nation of Israel.  But even if it be a fulfilment of the prophecy of the Old Testament prophets, it is only a secondary fulfilment. Even Paul saw the remnant amongst the Jews joining the Church, rather than the Church joining the nation of Israel.

However many see the restoration of Israel as a preparation for the end-times wars of Revelation and Ezekiel. Here I struggle a bit, as, if Israel has been replaced by the Church, should not the end-time wars be between the Church and the World and not between the nation of Israel and the World. In my mind, Israel today is the church, and nation of Israel is a distraction of little relevance to salvation history. I think I am struggling with the concept of two Israels – the nation and the Church. To me the relevant Israel is the Church.

I am just airing my views and do not think I have the complete answer to this conundrum. I am trying to define the problem for others to get into the act and give their views.

Covering of the head in worship

Discussing rituals Vijaya Barathi shared how a church she was attending insisted on women covering their heads while another church she attended did not. This made for confusion on the minds of people.

In the Old Testament, shaving one’s head was always a sign of mourning. In Deuteronomy 21:12, when a woman is taken captive she will shave her head and mourn for a month and then after the period of mourning she could be taken as a wife by the captor.

In Jeremiah 16:6 it says that the dead would not be lamented and people would make themselves bald in mourning. So also in Ezekiel 27:31, people mourn for Tyre by making themselves bald.  In Isaiah 22:12 God calls for mourning and baldness because of the calamities God was bringing on the nation of Israel. So baldness became a synonym for sorrow.

Here when Paul says that if a woman does not cover her head she may as well shave her hair off. This is a statement many have not understood, but we in India have no difficulty in identifying with the mark of widowhood. If a woman did not recognise the authority of her husband over her she may as well take on the attire of a widow who is freed from her husband.

In this sense, covering of the head was a sign of marriage, and some of the women in Corinth were rebelling against it. Paul says that for good order they should continue to observe the same.

So should women cover their heads? If the discussion is about married women then obviously single women are excluded from this stipulation. However some churches have held that woman has to be under the authority of a man and if not the husband then the father – very much like Islam. Somehow I do not agree with this, and am convinced that this applies only to married women.

Further, if a culture has some other indication of marriage in their society, instead of covering the head, the symbol prevalent in their culture would be quite adequate. The issue was not whether to cover one’s head or not but whether to submit to one’s husband by wearing the symbol of his authority.

Gospel of Success

The Gospel of Prosperity still rules the world of evangelism, though most thinking evangelicals have rejected the same. However, the Prosperity Gospel has morphed into the Gospel of Success and like the H1N1 flu this mutation is often more dangerous than the original. Many who reject the Prosperity Gospel have accepted the Gospel of Success without question.

The Gospel of Success essentially stems not from the Bible but the psychological theories that glorify the self which has been more and more popular in recent times, and does not recognise the fallen nature of man. Since I do not have the training to critique these psychological theories, I would recommend the book “Psychology as Religion – The Cult of Self-Worship” by Paul C. Vitz. He probably swings a bit too much to the other side, but then we all do when we are correcting a deviation.

I would like to look at the understanding of “Success” from the Bible.

Success – a word study

The first shock one gets when one takes a concordance and looks for the word success. In the KJV the word comes only once – Joshua 1:8!! Hence this is the proof text of the Success Gospel. The word translated as ‘success’ here is ‘sakal’ whose root means ‘to be circumspect or intelligent’. In other words it means to be wise. It is translated usually in the Bible as consider, expert, instruct, prosper, (deal) prudently, skill (ful), good success (Josh 1:8), teach, understand, wisdom. Hence the correct translation of Joshua 1:8 should read as, “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have GOOD UNDERSTANDING (OF THE MIND OF GOD).”

The word ‘prosperous’  in Joshua 1:8 translates ‘tsalech’ whose root means to push forward, and is used in various ways including push forward in whatever endeavour you are undertaking. In the case of Joshua 1:8, the word coming to Joshua is, “that for you to be successful in entering the Promised Land you need to meditate on the word of God so that you can have a good understanding of the mind of God”.

So, while I agree with the success theorists that in the plan of God and the purposes of God you will be successful if you live by the values of God, it does not mean that I will be successful in whatever I touch, like Midas’ Golden Touch. It also does not mean that “success” is an acceptable Christian objective. I have heard it said that God does not plan for failure and does not call you to failure. That is true, but God’s success may appear as a failure to the world. And so success needs to be seen as ‘a successful fulfilling of God’s purpose for me’, and not understood from a worldly perspective

Rituals

One of the issues discussed in Week 3 of the Prophets course was why people prefer to perform rituals instead of loving God.

After the class Uday asked if people who took baptism so that they could marry a Christian had any benefit from the baptism.

Any ritual is meant to be an outward demonstration of an inward fact. So without the inward fact the outward ritual has no meaning or benefit. But what about the sacramental value of the ritual? Does it not impart some blessing in spite of the absence of the inward reality or absence of understanding?

In John 3 the narrative reads as follows:-

“3 Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. 4 Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? 5 Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. 6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. 7 Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. 8 The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.”

Vs 3 says that we must be born again to see the kingdom of God. The word ‘again’ in the Greek is ‘anothen’ which means ‘from the beginning’ and so is translated again, anew or from above. Jesus means that you need to be born from above or spiritually, which is misunderstood by Nicodemus being born again. Jesus clarifies in vs 5 says that we need to be born of water and the Spirit. This is then repeated in vs 6 saying that which is flesh (water) is flesh and that which is Spirit is spirit. Some take being ‘born of water’ to mean natural birth, but I believe another pun is here between natural birth and baptism in water.  So what Jesus is saying that natural birth is not beneficial without Spiritual birth and so water baptism without a Spiritual birth is not if any value.

Jesus then goes on to say that we can hear the Spirit (wind) blowing but we cannot see it. We cannot make the Spirit go where we want but He goes where He wants to. I understand this to mean that while we can baptise someone in water, we cannot force the Spirit to some upon anyone. In essence, ideally water baptism should follow the baptism of the Spirit rather than precede, though if it is reversed there is no harm done. But if baptism in the Spirit or a spiritual rebirth does not happen it is serious, as you do not have salvation.

Amos 3:9 Prophets course week 2 day 3 frame 11

I checked on the query raised by Shobin on the reference to Assyria made by the Taftee material in Amos 3:9 whereas our Bibles had Ashdod instead. I checked with the RSV Bible which Taftee recommends for this course and they have translated Ashdod as Assyria since this seems to make better sense. The original text says Ashdod and this is a change made by RSV treating Ashdod as a scribal error. I find most conservative commentaries and Bibles translate it as Ashdod.


The TAFTEE Course in Week 2 Day 3 frame 11 reads as follows:

"From Amos 3:9 we see that the prophet predicted that it would be through the armies of (Assyria) that judgement would come upon (Egypt).

This is erroneous. In either case the passage is not referring to punishment on Egypt but on Israel. So whether we take it as Ashdod (a better reading) or Assyria, Ashdod and Egypt are called to witness the judgment God is bringing upon Israel. The instrument for this judgement though not mentioned by name is implied to be Assyria in Amos 3:11 making the RSV reading patently erroneous.

So Week 2 Day 3 frame 11 should read as follows:-

"From Amos 3:11 we see that the prophet predicted that it would be through the armies of Assyria (implied) that judgement would come upon Israel".

This is my view and not TAFTEE's.

Good work by Shobin for spotting the error.