Living Waters from Ancient Springs

Essays in Honor of Cornelis Van Dam

Jason P. Van Vliet, Van Vliet

• Publisher: Pickwick Publications
• Year: 2011
• Print ISBN:
  9781608999491
  9781498258500
• eBook ISBN:
  9781630877200
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Criticism & Interpretation

Is the Old Testament still relevant for Christians today? Which fountains of wisdom, which never-failing streams, which wells of joy-filled salvation are we missing out on, if we neglect the Old Testament (Prov 18:4; Amos 5:24; Isa 12:3)? In this celebratory volume, fifteen scholars collaborate to explain and expound diverse aspects of the Christian life, with a special focus on drawing lines from the Old Testament through the New Testament toward the daily reality of living together as pilgrims in the church of Christ. This book commemorates the retirement of Dr. Cornelis Van Dam, professor of Old Testament, from the Canadian Reformed Theological Seminary in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. For three decades, Dr. Van Dam taught seminary students to draw living water from the wells of salvation. All the contributors to this book have benefited in one way or another from his knowledge and instruction.

1

The Book of the Covenant and Elders

R. Dean Anderson

The elders who rule well are to be considered worthy of double honor,” says Paul in 1 Tim 5:17.1 In what way, however, did he expect elders to rule a congregation? At least one important aspect of this “rule” is indicated in 1 Cor 6:1–8, where Paul indicates that judicial disputes between brothers and sisters are to be settled out of court and within the covenant community itself. The elders of the early church took this very seriously and held court for the congregation every week.2 It goes without saying, however, that if elders are to take this part of their task seriously they need a basic understanding of the judicial principles by which God intended the Ten Commandments to be applied in society. This brings us to the book of the covenant.

What is the “book of the covenant”? The title is taken from Exodus 24:73 where reference is made back to verse 3, which speaks of “the words of the Lord and all the ordinances (mishpatim).” This in turn refers back to Exod 20:22—23:33 where we find the revelation that Moses received from the Lord when he ascended the mountain for the first time.4 The book of the covenant itself is divided into three sections. The first section deals with the worship of God. The second section begins at 21:1 where the title “These are the mishpatim” introduces a lengthy section of judicial laws, beginning with a series of “judgments,” or case laws, which most appropriately fall under the rubric mishpatim5 but also incorporate other kinds of legal formulations. The book concludes with a paraenetic section, 23:20–33, on the angel that will accompany the Israelites to the promised land.

The middle, legal, section itself is easily divided into two halves. The first part, 21:1—22:20, concerns judgments and laws to which penalties are attached.6 The second, 22:21—23:19, concerns various laws and admonitions without penalties. It is the first legal section that concerns us in this present study. Many liberal scholars argue that the whole legal section must postdate the Sinai encounter with God because, among other things, the laws (e.g., concerning ownership of fields or the festival calendar) presuppose a settled life in the promised land.7 It is, however, not difficult to imagine that God, at Sinai, desired to give his people a law code that would be useful in the settled condition of the promised land. More difficult, on the surface, is the nature of the laws themselves. As J. P. Hyatt has correctly observed, the laws seem to be “fragmentary and incomplete, not including by any means all that one would expect to find in a genuine law code.”8 The “judgments” seem to be rather specific case studies with little or nothing to connect them. They give the appearance of arising from legal precedent; that is, specific cases that were decided in the past. Yet the biblical text asks us to understand that God gave this legal code in this form to Moses for the Israelites.

An appropriate way of understanding these judgments seems to me to entail an understanding of the presuppositions they embody. That the laws imply settlement in the promised land is only a small part of this. They imply much more. I would like to suggest that the judgments imply a court system. For example, we might think of the elders at the gate, or of local or itinerant judges (cf. Exod 18:13–26; Deut 16:18–20; 1 Sam 7:15–17).9 They also imply certain basic principles of both judicial process and punishment of the guilty.

The Legal Courts

In the first place, we may consider the presupposition of legal courts. From Exod 18:13–16, it is clear that Moses was functioning as a judge for disputes among the Israelites. The “statutes” and “laws” of God (v. 16; cf. Gen 26:5) were already known, and Moses could base his judgments upon them. Unfortunately, these laws are unknown to us. That God chose the form of “case” laws for his revelation at Sinai further implies a court system. The case laws of the book of the covenant would therefore function to supplement what was already known of God’s revelation in the area of justice. A court system is also implied by a specific use of the word ’elohim (normally translated as “God” or “gods”). In Exod 21:6, and again in 22:8 and 9, the word ’elohim is used in a way that many have taken as referring to judges.10 This word, especially when coupled with a singular verb, is rendered as a singular, usually translated as “God.” In this case, the plural form of the noun may be considered a plural of majesty.11 When coupled with a plural verb it is translated as “gods.” In 22:9 the verb form coupled with ’elohim is plural. The context, however, prevents a reference to (pagan) gods. Therefore, many interpreters—correctly, in my opinion—refer here to the judges who are given a title of majesty.12 The same use of ’elohim to refer to judges can be found in Judg 5:8; 1 Sam 2:25; Pss 45:6, 58:1,13 82:1, 6, and 138:1.

Evidence

In the second place, we should consider the presupposition of the need to determine sufficient evidence. The question of (in)sufficient evidence is what lies behind the law in Exod 22:10–11. When someone is given a domestic animal to look after and something happens to it—it dies, is hurt, or is driven away—then the one looking after the animal is to swear by oath that he was not responsible for what happened. The implication is that, in such a case, the individual is not required to make restitution to the owner. The owner is to be satisfied with the oath, for, in the event that the other individual is lying, the Lord himself will avenge the misuse of his holy name (cf. Lev 19:11–12).14 It is evident that the use of the oath is required because there is no further evidence available to actually prove what happened to the animal of the owner. Equally evident is the fact that the owner suspects that the one who took care of his animal is not telling the whole truth. Otherwise, he would not have appealed to the judges. The letter to the Hebrews refers to just this use of the oath in cases of insufficient evidence: “For men swear by one greater than themselves, and with them an oath given as confirmation is an end of every dispute” (Heb 6:16; cf. Deut 6:13, 10:20).

Such an oath can be called an oath of purgation since the person taking the oath purges himself, by this procedure, from an aspersion of guilt. It is clear elsewhere in Scripture that this kind of oath taking normally took place in the temple before the Lord himself. In 1 Kgs 8:31–32, a section from the prayer of Solomon at the dedication of the temple, we read, “If a man sins against his neighbor and is made to take an oath, and he comes and takes an oath before Thine altar in this house, then hear Thou in heaven and act and judge Thy servants, condemning the wicked by bringing his way on his own head and justifying the righteous by giving him according to his righteousness” (cf. 2 Chr 6:22–23).

A specific example of such an oath is provided in Num 5:11–31 where a fairly elaborate ritual is used in the case of a husband who suspects his wife of adultery. The wife is brought to the temple and made to undergo an oath of purgation. Standing before the officiating priest with a special grain offering, she accepts a very specific self-imprecating curse with a double “amen,” and drinks a special curse drink.15 It is unclear whether such a ritual was typical of all oaths of purgation. It would seem that normally such oaths involved nonspecific curses. In Exod 22:10 the phrase “if he has not laid his hand on the property of his neighbor” (literal translation) uses an ’im (“if”) clause, well-known in oath formulations. The apodosis of such an oath was sometimes vaguely expressed, for example, “May God do so to me, and more also, if . . .” (2 Sam 3:35; cf. 1 Sam 3:17), but most often not even expressed with so many words at all.16

The use of the oath in cases presenting insufficient evidence enables us to diagram the basic system of justice presupposed by the laws in the book of the covenant as follows:

An accusation of one person against another inevitably involves damage to one’s person or property. Slander is not a criminal offence unless it causes material damage.17 If the judges determine that there is insufficient evidence, then an oath of purgation is applied (cf. Heb 6:16). This means that the accused must take an oath that he has not harmed his neighbor, or his neighbor’s property, and asks God to punish him if he is lying. The matter is thus effectively given over into God’s hands, and the accuser is bound to leave it there and take no further action, unless, we may suppose, more evidence should come to light. If there is sufficient evidence fo...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Permissions
• Contributors
• Preface
• Abbreviations
• Chapter 1: The Book of the Covenant and Elders
• Chapter 2: How Will God Deal with Children of Parents Who Have Committed Idolatry?
• Chapter 3: The Sinaitic Covenant in the Narrative of the Book of Exodus
• Chapter 4: The Church Fathers’ Spiritual Interpretation of the Psalms
• Chapter 5: Social Injustice and the Existence of God
• Chapter 6: Call Me Father!
• Chapter 7: Wordplay and History in Daniel 5
• Chapter 8: The Epistle of James
• Chapter 9: The Lamb’s Scroll of Life in Revelation 5
• Chapter 10: Bavinck on Creation
• Chapter 11: Specious Pacification and Pleasant Consensus
• Chapter 12: Wellsprings of the Offices
• Chapter 13: The Old Testament, Ethics, and Preaching
• Chapter 14: Our Missional God
• Chapter 15: Foreign Mission by the Local Church
• Bibliography