Sunday, May 15, 2011

Chapter and Verse, for better or worse

#62: “Chapter and Verse, for better or worse” by Brendon Wahlberg
You read the billboard as you speed past it on the highway. The words “John 3:16” are printed on it in enormous letters. It is a very brief, somewhat mysterious message, but of course you know what it means. It is an abbreviation that designates a Bible passage, from the gospel of John, Chapter 3, verse 16. If you didn’t know what that passage was, you could quickly find it by using the chapter and verse numbers. These numbers seem to us to be as much a part of the Bible as the words themselves. They are a convenience that we take for granted, allowing us to find any passage with ease. However, our current chapters and verses are a relatively recent invention. The Bibles of the ancient world did not have them. How, then, did we get our modern Bible chapter and verse numbers? Who added them, and why? And are they entirely a blessing to have?
To make a long story short, the chapter divisions that we use today were added by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Stephen Langton, who lived between 1150 and 1228 CE. The verse numbers that we use today were added by a French printer, Robert Estienne, who lived between 1503 and 1559 CE. I’ll have more to say about them in a moment, but first we should look at how the Bible was divided before either of those men came along.
The first section of the Bible to really come together as a large unit was the first five books, the Torah. The Jews of antiquity had a basic need to divide the Torah into sections. Why? Because they had the custom of reading one section a week, out loud on the Sabbath. The 54 sections were planned out so that it would take one year to get through them all. (And an earlier system used 154 sections and took three years to complete.) Divisions in books of the Hebrew Bible appeared on paper as blank spaces or single Hebrew letters, inserted between sections. It was a start, but it was not as convenient as the modern system of having chapters.
Similarly, if you look at an ancient New Testament, you might well find it difficult to find the passage you wanted. The text was written in large letters with no spaces between them, and hardly any punctuation. And of course, no chapter and verse numbers. It looked like something analogous to this (except that it was in Greek):
ANDJUSTASMOSESLIFTEDUPTHESERPENTINTHEWILDERNESSSOMUSTTHESONOFMANBELIFTEDUPTHATWHOEVERBELIEVESINHIMMAYHAVEETERNALLIFEFORGODSOLOVEDTHEWORLDTHATHEGAVEHISONLYSONSOTHATEVERYONEWHOBELIEVESINHIMMAYNOTPERISH
Picture the entire gospel written like this. Now picture trying to find that passage about being born again, which you perhaps wanted to read. Wouldn’t you like some chapter numbers to help you? But no, the Bible was without them for about a millennium.
Enter Archbishop Langton, who is credited with giving us our modern chapter numbers. He was a great church writer, who composed many sermons and treatises. In 1227, a year before he died, he divided the Bible into chapters. In 1244, Langton’s contemporary, Cardinal Hugo, came up with his own chapter system. Hugo’s reason was that he was writing a concordance with his students, and he wanted a fast, easy way to quickly find any particular word in the Bible. But it ended up being the particular chapter numbering of Langton that we use today. However, there were still no modern verse numbers, and there would not be any for about another three hundred years.
Enter Robert Estienne, also known as Robert Stephens. He was a scholar and a famous printer who worked in Paris. A former Catholic, he became a Protestant and printed the entire Bible several times. In 1551, he printed the first Bible that contained the verse numbers which we use today. Legend has it that Estienne jotted down the verse numbers of the Bible while on horseback, on a trip from Paris to Lyons. This story is not taken seriously by historians, who say that he probably wrote down the verses while resting at inns along the road. But if you look at how haphazardly the verse numbers interrupt sentences, you can almost believe that they were placed by a man who was jouncing along on a horse.
And so, thanks to Langton and Estienne, whenever we open a Bible, we can use those convenient chapter and verse numbers to find our place. A scholar can simply refer to, say, Matthew 2:1 as he is writing, in a simple and efficient manner. Nowadays, we say that someone who is familiar with the Bible can quote it, “chapter and verse”. And that huge billboard can simply say on it, John 3:16. But are chapters and verses, as we have them, entirely a good thing? It turns out that the system has some flaws, to be sure.
You have to wonder what rationale was used by either Langton or Estienne when they decided exactly where to place a particular chapter or verse number. It would make sense to put the end of a chapter at a place where there is a natural break in the story, right? And to start a new chapter where a new part of the story begins. But Langton was not very concerned with that. Look at the first two chapters of Genesis. The first chapter ends before the first creation story is quite finished. Chapter 2, verses 1-3, has the conclusion of that story. The second creation account begins with Chapter 2, verse 4. There are many places where the end of a chapter is not the end of a story. But we have had this chapter numbering system for so long now, that we are kind of stuck with it. To help with the problem, some Bibles insert brief headings where a new story section begins, describing the contents of that section, regardless of where any chapter might begin or end.
Likewise, Estienne’s verses seem kind of random as to where they were inserted. Here is a brief passage with the verse numbers kept in it: “13 He left Nazareth and made his home in Capernaum by the sea, in the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali, 14 so that what had been spoken through the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled: 15 Land of Zebulun, land of Naphtali…” (Matthew 4:13-15) You can see that the verse numbers often fall smack in the middle of a sentence, interrupting it, sometimes more than once.
It can get kind of ridiculous. Here is a passage with the shortest verse in the New Testament, made up of only 12 letters in Greek, in Luke 20:30: “27 Some Sadducees, those who say there is no resurrection, came to him 28 and asked him a question, ‘Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies, leaving a wife but no children, the man shall marry the widow and raise up children for his brother. 29 Now there were seven brothers; the first married, and died childless; 30 then the second 31 and the third married her, and so in the same way all seven died childless.” It was not as if the verses had to be short or anything. Look at Esther 8:9. That single verse is 84 words long in the NRSV translation!
The main problem with the illogical placement of chapter and verse numbers is what it does to readers. These numbers encourage a reader to start or stop reading in an arbitrary place, so that the reader doesn’t get the whole story. This allows many people to take verses out of context, to ignore the surrounding words, and to fail to understand the real meaning of a passage as it fits within the larger book. For a thousand and a half years or so, the Bible had no verse numbers. The verse divisions were made by a Frenchman, not dictated by God. They are not Holy Scripture, in other words.
When you read the Bible, try not to cherry pick verses out of context. Remember that when the words were written, they were not meant to be divided up into those verses in the first place. Always read more than just one small passage. Consider the book as a whole, and discern stories within it regardless of chapter numbers. Read what comes before and what comes after your passage. Use a study Bible and read the annotations that show you how your passage connects to other passages in other books of the Bible. Only then can you begin to really understand what you are reading in the Holy Bible.

Childhood in Jesus’ Time

#61: “Childhood in Jesus’ Time” by Brendon Wahlberg
“People were bringing little children to him in order that he might touch them; and the disciples spoke sternly to them. But when Jesus saw this, he was indignant and said to them, ‘Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs. Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.’ And he took them up in his arms, laid his hands on them, and blessed them.” (Mark 10:13-16)
You might wonder, as you read this passage, just who were the little children of Jesus’ day and age? What were they like? How did they live? What did they do (when they weren’t getting blessed by Jesus)? What was childhood like in New Testament times? Let’s go back in time and see what we can learn. Imagine, if you will, that you are a child living two thousand years ago in Galilee…
First things first – you are born. Chances are that you popped out of your mother while she was sitting in a birthing chair, surrounded by female relatives, and helped by a midwife. You were wrapped up right away in linen strips called swaddling clothes, but you didn’t formally get your name until you were eight days old. Are you a boy? Good for you – you will have higher status, and more freedom and privileges. If you are a girl, don’t feel bad – you will be equally loved and cherished. It’s just a patriarchal society, that’s all, and it won’t be changing anytime soon. Plus, as a girl, you avoided a painful circumcision. Still, boys are preferred because when a daughter gets married, she moves away and an asset to the family is lost. A son remains a part of the family forever.
Rejoice! You are a new child! And you are important. The whole reason for marriage is to fulfill the commandment to be fruitful and multiply. Your mother’s main goal in life was to have you. Well, not just you. You probably have around six other brothers and sisters. And that’s not all. You are part of an extended family living in one household. You may be living with cousins, uncles, aunts, sisters-in-law, and grandparents, in addition to your siblings and parents. Why such a large family? Everyone agrees that more kids are better. When all those kids grow up, they are a great asset. A larger family can better fight off an attack. More children are more workers in the field or with the herds. Finally, when your parents are old, you and your siblings can take care of them.
So now you are an infant. Like a modern child, you have to deal with potty training and diaper changing. Actually, you might not have diapers. Those are a lot of work to wash. Your mother might carry a small clay pot for you instead. You are going to be breast fed until you are about three years old. You have simple toys, like a rattle or a clay horse, to play with. You practically never leave your mother’s side. She provides you with a kind of preschool until you are three, teaching you the basics of life until you are weaned and potty trained.
When you are finally out of diapers, what will you wear? Your clothes will be plain. They will be made of simply woven wool or cotton. You’ll have either no underwear, or a loincloth. Your inner garment will be a tunic, fitting closely at your neck and reaching to your ankles. Your belt, or girdle, holds it in at the waist. Your outer garment, or mantle, will be a warm cloak. Your sandals will be simple pieces of hide, tied with thongs or cords. It’s not fancy, but it is what everyone is wearing. And I mean everyone.
Look around. Where do you live? What is your house like? Well, it looks like your family isn’t rich. Your house is built from bricks made out of baked clay and straw. Inside, there is just one room! The floor is made of beaten clay – your mother is always sweeping it. One side of the room is a raised platform, which your family uses for eating and sleeping. The lower area is for the animals. They sleep in the house too. You might have a cow, a goat, a donkey, a sheep, a chicken, or even a dog. Your favorite pet while you are growing up, though, is a little lamb.
It is dimly lit inside your small house. There is just one window, which is basically a hole in the wall, covered by a lattice. But less light getting in means it stays cooler. At night, the only light is provided by an oil lamp set high on a lamp stand. There is very little furniture, too. Your family has a couple of stools. You sleep on a simple mat. Your central heating system is a brazier in which a fire can be lit. With space at a premium, your family has a little set of stairs going up the outside of your house to the roof. The roof is a good place to relax or sleep when it is too hot in the house. People like to talk to their neighbors from their rooftops. But inside, the roof leaks during the rainy season. The animal smells are sometimes too much, and there might be vermin in the walls. It is no wonder you spend more time outside your house. Your mother cooks outside, and tends her small garden there.
Your neighbor is wealthier. They have a few rooms in their house, built around a central courtyard with a protective wall. That allows them the luxury of having their animals sleep outside. Plus they have their own cistern to store water. Your mother brings it from the town well every day. But you must not covet your neighbor’s house. You know that, because if you are a boy, you have already started your religious education.
At age three, your father started to teach you about your religion and your heritage. Your father teaches you about the Torah. You are learning some psalms, some scripture passages, and some simple prayers. Your everyday life is part of your education. Religious festivals and the weekly Sabbath are endless opportunities for stories, questions, and answers. You are soaking up the history of your people on days like Passover. You get all of this education right in the family setting. But your small town also has a synagogue, and in a few years, when you are seven, you will spend some time there, learning from a teacher about subjects like Jewish history and law, and basic math. You might learn how to read and write, but sometimes those skills are best left to the professional scribes. In an agricultural society, you may not need to read and write much.
If you are a boy, your life has to be balanced between religious and work training. You have to have a trade or an occupation. From an early age, in fact, your family put you to work. At first, it was small jobs to keep you busy and to make yourself useful. You gathered wood for the home fire and brought water from the well. You tended the sheep or the goats, taking them to pasture and watching over them. Now that you are older, you have to go with your father to the field, or to his workshop, and watch him working. You will help him more and more as you get older, because eventually, you will master your father’s trade. It will probably be your job as an adult.
Now, if you are a girl, you don’t have to study all of that religious information. So, how are you going to use all your time? Your mother has some ideas. Her job is to prepare you to be a housewife. There are many things to do at home. There is cooking, and keeping the cook fires burning. There is bringing water from the well. There is doing laundry in the river. There is sewing, grinding flour, baking, spinning, weaving, gardening, feeding and changing the infants, and cleaning the house. A woman’s work is never done! (Is it too late to go back and be born a boy instead? It is your imagination, so sure, knock yourself out.) But remember, you are living in an extended family. Aunts, sisters, grandmothers, and sisters-in-law all help and support each other in the same house.
Are you tired from all of that work? Do you need some playtime? Of course you do. Times have not changed so much. Toys and games were part of childhood too. Children played board games like checkers and backgammon. They had playthings like dolls, dollhouses, puppets, and pull-toys. They played with leather balls and marbles. There were no team sports, but children played catch and held footraces. Boys wrestled, and practiced shooting slingshots. Juggling and hopscotch were popular. And of course, made-up games and storytelling were great pastimes.
Are you hungry now? I’ll bet you are. Your family has only two meals per day. The first one is a light breakfast or a small lunch, perhaps eaten on the way to work. The main meal of the day is an early dinner. The evening meal is an occasion for the whole family. The food isn’t fancy, but it is good for you. Wheat and barley are used for flour, bread, and cakes, baked fresh every two days. For vegetables, you have might have beans, peas, cucumbers, onions, or radishes. There are eggs from the chickens. There could be figs, grapes, raisins, olives, or melons. Milk, yogurt, and cheese come from goats. There is usually fish, of course. There is no candy, but sweets can be made from honey. Your family doesn’t drink much plain water, as it stands around for a long time and is not very good to drink. Instead, they wash everything down with watered wine. All of the food is heavily seasoned, with onions or garlic, salt, mustard, mint, or dill. You don’t eat meat very often. Animals are too valuable to kill for their meat. However, sometimes there is a religious sacrifice which provides a rare meal with meat in it, such as lamb.
I’ll be honest. Your childhood is going to be short. If you were a twenty-first century child, you would have the years between 13 and 18 as an extended childhood called adolescence. But you are living in Jesus’ time. You get no adolescence. By age 13, you are considered an adult. A boy who turns 13 is a man. He can be a member of the synagogue and participate in the services. He can sign contracts and testify in court. He can even get married. Childhood is fleeting, and soon you are an adult who fully participates in the life of the family.
And so we return to the present. Now we know more about what childhood was like in the time of Jesus. Now we know what the little children were like, who came to Jesus to be blessed. In modern times, when we picture those children with Jesus, we might be thinking of the children of today…perhaps a cute little kindergartener. For today’s children, childhood lasts longer, and so, perhaps, does the innocence and trust that makes children proverbially well suited for the Kingdom of God. The children of Jesus’ time were more like little adults, moving quickly into lives of hardship and responsibility. Interestingly, if you look at the same story of Jesus and the Children, but in the Gospel of Luke instead of Mark, there is a small difference in the wording. Instead of Mark’s “People were bringing little children to him”, Luke says, “People were bringing even infants to him” (Luke 18:15-17). I wonder…given what childhood was really like in Jesus’ time, maybe it really was the infants, more so than the older children, who were the best illustration of innocence and readiness for entering the Kingdom.

How to read the Bible: Parallel lines

#60: “How to read the Bible: Parallel lines” by Brendon Wahlberg
The Bible is full of poetry. Just look at Psalms and Proverbs, the Song of Songs, and large sections of the prophets. But ancient Hebrew poetry is different from what we might think of as poetry today. Understanding the differences can help us to read the Bible better than we already do. For example, we might think that in a traditional poem, two paired lines have the same number of syllables, and that those lines end in words that rhyme. That’s not the case with Hebrew poetry. In the Bible, Hebrew poets didn’t care about numbers of syllables, and they didn’t usually rhyme words. Instead, they rhymed ideas. What I mean is, rhyming two words can give you, say, cake and bake. Rhyming two ideas can give you, say, cake and dessert, instead.
The rhyming of ideas is one of the most basic and important features of Hebrew poetry, and it is found everywhere in the Bible. Scholars call it “Parallelism”, and they have identified several different kinds of parallelism in the Bible. If we go over those different kinds, and look at an example of each, we will have a much better understanding of how the poetry in the Bible was written, and what it means.
1. The second line repeats the same idea of the first line, but says it in words that are a bit different, to emphasize the idea. Here’s an example from Psalm 114, where the psalmist says that nature was so impressed by the exodus that it trembled and reacted in fear and awe.
“The sea looked and fled;
Jordan turned back.
The mountains skipped like rams
The hills like young sheep.”

You can see that in each pair of lines, the second line says the same thing as the first line, just using different wording. Don’t get too caught up in the details, worrying about why one line says mountains and the other says hills, or about how the river Jordan is not a sea. Rhyme the thoughts in your head instead. You know about synonymous words. Think of these as synonymous lines of poetry. Mountains and hills (or the Jordan and the sea) are supposed to be the “same” thing here.

2. The second line contrasts the idea of the first line, or is the opposite of it, to make you think about the two different things together. There is a lot of this in Proverbs, where contrasting thoughts rhyme in the next line, often using the word “but” in between. Here’s an example from Proverbs 10.

“A wise child makes a glad father,
But a foolish child is a mother’s grief.
Treasures gained by wickedness do not profit,
But righteousness delivers from death.”

You can see that in each pair of lines, the second line is in direct contrast to the first. This time, maybe you do want to get caught up in the details. See how lack of true profit and delivery from death are contrasted, but also how treasure and righteousness are compared. You might think about how physical treasure could lead to wickedness, or how righteousness is a treasure of a different kind.

3. The second line adds a thought to the first line, completing it. Or the two lines have a cause and effect relationship. From Psalm 23:

“Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I fear no evil;
For you are with me; your rod and your staff – they comfort me.”

You can see that the second line completes the thought of the first line. And, there is cause and effect. God is with the psalmist, therefore he fears no evil.

Sometimes the adding of thoughts is done over several lines, with each line adding one more idea, building to a climax. It is like a staircase where each additional line is like another step up to the top.

“The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.
He makes me lie down in green pastures;
He leads me beside still waters;
He restores me soul.
He leads me in right paths
for his name’s sake.”

You can see how the first line claims that the psalmist shall not want for anything. Each line after that adds more explanations of why that is so: “He” does this, “He” does that. It all builds to the climactic idea that it is all for the sake of God’s name.

Scholars who study Hebrew poetry have identified many other categories, but those three are enough for our purposes. I want to use the rest of our time to look at what happens when someone does not understand the basics of Hebrew poetry and parallelism. Let’s look at a passage from the prophet Zechariah, 9:9. This is some classic Hebrew poetry.

“Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion!
Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem!
Lo, your king comes to you;
triumphant and victorious is he,
humble and riding on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey.” (Zechariah 9:9)

Check out the last two lines. That’s a good example of the first category I mentioned above. The idea of the first line is repeated in the second line, using wording that is a little bit different, to emphasize the thought. Line 1: The king is so humble that he is riding on a donkey. Line 2: I’m not kidding, he is really riding on a young donkey!

This part of Zechariah was understood by the gospel writers, Matthew, Mark and Luke, to refer to the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem. It was as if Zechariah was foretelling how Jesus would ride into Jerusalem on a donkey, like a humble King. But two of these three gospel writers understood Hebrew poetry and parallelism, and the third did not. Read the following three passages and see if you can tell which one didn’t really understand. It’s not hard to tell.

“When they were approaching Jerusalem, at Bethphage and Bethany, near the Mount of Olives, he sent two of his disciples and said to them, ‘Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden; untie it and bring it. If anyone says to you, “Why are you doing this?” just say this, “The Lord needs it and will send it back here immediately.” ’ They went away and found a colt tied near a door, outside in the street. As they were untying it, some of the bystanders said to them, ‘What are you doing, untying the colt?’ They told them what Jesus had said; and they allowed them to take it. Then they brought the colt to Jesus and threw their cloaks on it; and he sat on it.” (Mark 11:1-7)
“When he had come near Bethphage and Bethany, at the place called the Mount of Olives, he sent two of the disciples, saying, ‘Go into the village ahead of you, and as you enter it you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden. Untie it and bring it here. If anyone asks you, “Why are you untying it?” just say this: “The Lord needs it.” ’ So those who were sent departed and found it as he had told them. As they were untying the colt, its owners asked them, ‘Why are you untying the colt?’ They said, ‘The Lord needs it.’ Then they brought it to Jesus; and after throwing their cloaks on the colt, they set Jesus on it.” (Luke 19:29-35)
“When they had come near Jerusalem and had reached Bethphage, at the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples, saying to them, ‘Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately you will find a donkey tied, and a colt with her; untie them and bring them to me. If anyone says anything to you, just say this, “The Lord needs them.” And he will send them immediately.’ This took place to fulfill what had been spoken through the prophet, saying, ‘Tell the daughter of Zion, Look, your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey, and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’ The disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them; they brought the donkey and the colt, and put their cloaks on them, and he sat on them.” (Matthew 21:1-7)
You said Matthew, right? Unlike Mark and Luke, Matthew reports that Jesus asked for two animals to be brought, a younger donkey and an older one, and that somehow Jesus sat on both of them. Did he balance very carefully? Did the two animals have to keep very close together the whole time?
What seems to have happened here is that Matthew understood Jesus’ entry to the city, riding a donkey, to be a fulfillment of the prophecy. He quoted Zechariah, but he did not seem to have understood parallelism. Zechariah did not mean that there were two animals, a donkey and a colt. He meant that there was one animal; a donkey is also the foal of a donkey, of course. But let us not blame Matthew so quickly. It is possible that Matthew also looked at a Greek translation of Zechariah, called the Septuagint. From what I could find online, the Septuagint has this wording:
“Behold, your King comes to you;
Just and saving is he;
Gentle and mounted on a beast of burden
And a young colt.”
Our goal when we read the Bible is always to truly understand it. Understanding these basic ideas about how Hebrew poetry is written, will help us to understand the Bible better, and to understand God’s word to us.
This column celebrates sixty months of “Did You Know”…that’s five years! (How many dog years is that, though?)

Jesus wrote me a letter…

#59: “Jesus wrote me a letter…” by Brendon Wahlberg
“Give me a ticket for an aeroplane, Ain't got time to take a fast train, Lonely days are gone, I'ma goin' home, Jesus just wrote me a letter. Well he wrote me a letter, Told me he couldn't live without me no more, Listen mister can't you see I gotta get back to my Jesus once more, anyway…”
Oh, sorry, I do get carried away sometimes. Those are just some lyrics by Wayne Carson Thompson, from a song “The Letter”, with just a few changes for fun. I added Jesus in there because of this month’s topic. Did you know that there is an old Christian legend that Jesus once wrote a letter to a King, and that it was saved for posterity? Really: if you look at the Christian Apocrypha, you’ll find the story of how King Abgar V of Edessa wrote a letter to Jesus, and Jesus wrote back. This is remarkable because as far as we know, Jesus did not leave anything behind that he personally wrote. Jesus left so few actual traces on this earth that the scanty historical record allows some extreme skeptics to even question whether Jesus actually existed, or whether the gospel writers made him up! So an actual letter claiming to be written by Jesus would be a big deal indeed.
But I won’t string you along. Although many people in the time of early Roman Christianity and the Middle ages believed in this letter wholeheartedly, today we know it to be inauthentic. Today we merely call it the “Legend of Christ and Abgar.” The story goes like this…
Edessa was a city in Mespotamia (now modern Turkey). Around the year 200CE, King Abgar IX and the royal family of Edessa converted to Christianity. But no one is sure how long before that Christianity came to Edessa, and how it got there. The famous historian of the early church, Eusebius, thought he had the answer. While writing his book, “History of the Church” around 325CE, Eusebius collected and preserved every document and scrap of information he could find about the beginnings of Christianity. We are grateful to him for quoting and including so many things that would otherwise be lost now. But he was extremely enthusiastic about his faith, and it seems he could be taken in by a fake set of letters (which he found in the Records Office at Edessa and translated from Syriac), simply because it was so exciting to him to have letters to and from Jesus among his source documents.
In Book 1 of his history, Eusebius says that because of Jesus’ power to cure diseases, the Lord became famous far and wide, excitedly talked about in foreign lands very remote from Judea. One day, the King of Mesopotamia, Abgar, who was dying of an incurable disease, heard Jesus mentioned continually as a miraculous healer. Abgar sent the following letter by carrier to Jesus.
“Abgar Uchama the Toparch to Jesus, who has appeared as a gracious savior in the region of Jerusalem – greeting. I have heard about you and the cures you perform without drugs or herbs. If report is true, you make the blind see again and the lame walk about; you cleanse lepers, expel unclean spirits and demons, cure those suffering from chronic and painful diseases, and raise the dead. When I heard all this about you, I concluded that one of two things must be true – either you are God and came down from Heaven to do these things, or you are God’s Son doing them. Accordingly I am writing to beg you to come to me, whatever the inconvenience, and cure the disorder from which I suffer. I may add that I understand the Jews are treating you with contempt and desire to injure you: my city is very small, but highly esteemed, adequate for both of us.”
Jesus sent Abgar the following reply: “Happy are you who believed in me without having seen me! For it is written of me that those who have seen me will not believe in me, and that those who have not seen will believe and live. As to your request that I should come to you, I must complete all that I was sent to do here, and on completing it must at once be taken up to the One who sent me. When I have been taken up I will send you one of my disciples to cure your disorder and bring life to you and those with you.”
Now, during his ministry, Jesus had chosen about seventy disciples to carry his word for him. (Luke 10:1) After Jesus was taken up to Heaven, one of the seventy, named Thaddeus, was chosen to fulfill Jesus’ promise to Abgar. Thaddeus went to Edessa, armed with the power to cure diseases. Thaddeus told Abgar that “in proportion to your belief shall the prayers of your heart be granted.” Laying hands on the King, Thaddeus instantly cured him. Then Thaddeus preached the gospel to all the people of Edessa.
Eusebius wasn’t the only writer to report these events. Another document, the “Teaching of Addai (Thaddeus)”, written around 400CE, retells the legend and elaborates on it. This was about 75 years after Eusebius, remember, so it is understandable that the legend would have grown in the telling. In the new version, another line is added to the end of Jesus’ letter. It reads as follows: “And your city shall be blessed forever, and the enemy shall never overcome it.” This addition made the people of Edessa believe for a long time that they were protected by God from any conquerors…until finally they were conquered during the crusades.
Another new addition to the legend was the story of how the courier, who went back and forth between Jesus and Abgar, happened to be a painter. He had been asked to paint a portrait of Jesus, which then became the very first Icon of the Lord. But the legend did not stop growing there. Eventually, it was said that the portrait of Jesus was not painted by a person, but instead that Jesus had pressed a cloth to his face and transferred his image to it. This Icon, which brings to mind the more famous Shroud of Turin, vanished during the crusades.
Okay, so how do we know that the letter of Jesus to Abgar is inauthentic? The text of the letter seems to be taken from a couple of places in the gospels. In fact, the letter to Abgar actually quotes a harmony of the gospels (known as the “Diatessaron”), written by a second century Christian named Tatian. What is a harmony of the gospels? It is well known that among the four gospels, there are many small differences. A harmony is when all four gospels are combined into one and revised so that those differences are erased. Tatian’s harmony was written until around 175CE, so a letter from Jesus, written around 30CE, should not be quoting that gospel harmony.
So what really happened? I suppose that the Christianity came to Edessa, and that someone invented the legend in order to make Edessa more special. Possibly Abgar IX, converting in 200CE, inspired a story about the earlier Abgar V, and the letters were created as proof, sometime between 175CE (writing of the “Diatessaron”) and 325CE (Eusebius quotes the letters). The letters became very popular as a legend, which grew until it was retold and expanded around 400CE (writing of “Teaching of Addai”). The letters were copied and translated many times, used in liturgies, written on talismans and amulets, and even carved on stone and metal. Abgar was made a saint in the Eastern Orthodox Church.
What is the moral of our story, besides the obvious lesson about gullible historians? Well, I think there is something deeper to be understood here. The letter to Abgar says: “Happy are you who believed in me without having seen me! For it is written of me that those who have seen me will not believe in me, and that those who have not seen will believe and live.” If you think about it, every Christian alive today is like Abgar. We are born, we grow up, and how do we learn anything about Jesus? We can’t go to Judea and see Jesus, even if we have time to take a fast train. We can’t even write him a letter. We have come onto the scene two thousand years too late. All we have that we can see is a book of ancient writings and what our parents and teachers tell us. Our only choice is to believe in him without having seen him. Whether or not the letter of Jesus was authentic, which is doubtful, it still has an important message to impart to us – happy are we, blessed are we, who have believed in Jesus without having seen him. Ours is the gift of life through him.

Did you get the number of that Beast?

#58: “Did you get the number of that Beast?” by Brendon Wahlberg
Last time, we talked about apocalypses in general, learning about which features are shared by all apocalyptic writings. This month, I thought it might be interesting to consider one of the most famous details from the most famous of apocalypses: the “Number of the Beast” from the Revelation of John.
“And I saw a beast rising out of the sea, having ten horns and seven heads; and on its horns were ten diadems, and on its heads were blasphemous names.” (Revelation 13:1) “Then I saw another beast that rose out of the earth; it had two horns like a lamb and it spoke like a dragon. It exercises all the authority of the first beast on its behalf, and it makes the earth and its inhabitants worship the first beast, whose mortal wound had been healed. It performs great signs, even making fire come down from heaven to earth in the sight of all; and by the signs that it is allowed to perform on behalf of the beast, it deceives the inhabitants of earth, telling them to make an image for the beast that had been wounded by the sword and yet lived; and it was allowed to give breath to the image of the beast, so that the image of the beast could even speak and cause those who would not worship the image of the beast to be killed. Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead, so that no one can buy or sell who does not have the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of its name. This calls for wisdom: let anyone with understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a person. Its number is six hundred and sixty-six.” (Revelation 13:11-18)
This is a typical apocalyptic passage, full of symbolism and weird visions. But what makes this passage so famous is that cryptic number of the beast. 666 has entered into modern popular culture, inspiring everything from the name of an Iron Maiden album to a literal number mark on the head of horror movie character “Damien” in The Omen. Damien’s “666” birthmark in the movie is a good example of how the number of the beast has been misinterpreted in rather silly ways. But if 666 is not a birthmark on the son of the devil, what is the real meaning of the number, and how does one figure it out?
Apocalyptic writings were meant to reassure the faithful that although they were suffering, God was soon to intervene in history and bring about the defeat of the enemies of God’s people. For John of Patmos, the writer of Revelation, the enemy was Rome, and God’s people were the followers of Jesus. But to reassure the faithful, copies of John’s book had to be passed around. And if the enemy found a copy, then it was probably unwise for that copy to contain unambiguous and treasonous denunciations of the Roman Emperor. Instead, the book was better off describing Rome’s evil in symbolic terms, terms that the Christian reader would understand, but which a Roman official or soldier might not.
That’s why the passage above says, “This calls for wisdom: let anyone with understanding calculate the number…” The wise, the ones with understanding, were the suffering Christian readers who needed the message the most. But the symbolism allowed the writer to stop just short of openly attacking Rome in writing. For example, in Revelation 17, the city of Rome itself is described in symbolic terms as “a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was full of blasphemous names, and it had seven heads…” Furthermore, it says that “on her forehead was written a name, a mystery: ‘Babylon the great, mother of whores and of earth’s abominations.’” The book goes on to say again that the symbolism has to be understood correctly by the faithful. “‘This calls for a mind that has wisdom: the seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman is seated…” The Roman capital stood on seven hills. Babylon was a great city which had historically caused great suffering for Israel, as described in scripture, and Rome was doing the same thing in John’s time, so it follows that this passage is really talking about Rome.
If the passage about the mystery of Babylon was supposed to be easy to interpret, then what about the number of the beast? John says that 666 is the number of a person, and that it should be “calculated”. What does that mean? Although this sounds confusing, it is probably a reference to “Gematria,” the practice of assigning numerical values to letters of the alphabet. This has been done with the Hebrew language since antiquity. There are several systems which have been used. One of them, the Mispar Gadol, is shown in the following chart.


Aleph 1 Yod 10 Qoph 100
Beth 2 Kaph 20 Resh 200
Gimel 3 Lamed 30 Shin 300
Daleth 4 Mem 40 Tav 400
He 5 Nun 50
Vav 6 Samech 60
Zayin 7 Ayin 70
Heth 8 Pe 80
Teth 9 Tsadi 90

As you can see, if each letter has a number value, then a person’s name can be turned into a number, by adding up the values of each letter. And likewise, a number can be turned into a name, by figuring out which letters add up to the total number. It is easy to calculate a number from a name, but hard to come up with just one name from a number! When you think about it, there are so many names that could add up to the same number. But John expected his readers to guess which name had letters with values that added up to 666. It was harder than it looked! Maybe that is why John also gave several other clues to the identity of the person who was such a beast to the Christians. The reader could use the other clues to guess who it was, and then check their math with gematria, just to be sure. But a Roman reading the apocalypse would be left scratching his head.
The most widely held theory is that 666 refers to the infamous Emperor Nero Caesar (54-68CE). After a huge fire in Rome, Nero blamed Christians and persecuted and tortured Jesus’ followers. Peter and Paul died under Nero. How does Nero’s name fit with the 666 puzzle? I checked good old Wikipedia to see how it added up. Here’s what they had to say: The Greek spelling, "Nerōn Kaisar", transliterates into Hebrew as "נרון קסר" or nrwn qsr. Adding the corresponding values yields 666, as shown (remember, Hebrew is written from right to left):
Resh (ר) Samech (ס) Qoph (ק) Nun (נ) Vav (ו) Resh (ר) Nun (נ)
200 60 100 50 6 200 50 = 666
So far, so good, right? However, not all ancient copies of Revelation have the number 666 in them. Remember, we don’t have any original manuscripts of any book of the Bible. We have a large number of later copies, and among these copies, there are some differences. A good study Bible will note where these ancient manuscripts differ. In short, a minority of texts has the number 616 instead of 666. Can Nero still be the beast if the number is 616? Maybe. It turns out that in Hebrew, the final “n” in “Neron” is optional. It could have been written as Nero or Neron, either way. And if you take away the value of a “nun” (see the chart above), you get 666 – 50 = 616. Voila. Nero can fit both numbers.
But if Nero was the beast of Revelation, how does the passage fit with what we know about Nero from history? As the passage says, Nero Caesar used the power and authority of Rome to force people to worship the Emperor as a living god and “cause those who would not worship the image of the beast to be killed.” The passage also says that the beast “was wounded by the sword and yet lived”. It is unclear whether this can refer to Nero. Nero really died by the sword, committing suicide when faced with assassination. Of course, even though the villain Nero died, there were other Emperors who came after him. Most scholars think that Revelation was written around 95CE, after Nero died. That would date the book to the reign of Emperor Domitian, another infamous Emperor who persecuted Christians. Maybe Domitian was the beast, or maybe both Nero and Domitian were sort of combined and together represented by the beast. That is to say, Nero was the infamous, archetypical agent of Satan, and Domitian was his latest incarnation when John of Patmos was writing. And naturally, if you work at it, you can fit the name and titles of Domitian to the number 666 using Gematria.
The puzzles included in apocalypses sometimes cannot be solved for sure. It is that ambiguity that tempts people into taking the number of the beast and applying it to whoever is hated in the present day. But that may be a waste of effort. The ambiguity was not an invitation for us to guess “who is the beast” in our own time, but instead it was a way for the original author to avoid putting something in writing that could get him or others killed. An apocalypse was not meant to be a prediction of who would be an evil person in the distant future. It was meant to reassure the people reading it that, in their own time, the oppressors who threatened them were going to be defeated. Now, things may not have worked out exactly according to John’s vision, but consider this: a few hundred years later, Rome became a Christian Empire. The Lamb was victorious.

What is an apocalypse?

#57: “What is an apocalypse?” by Brendon Wahlberg
When people hear the word Apocalypse, they may think of a science fiction disaster that destroys the world, like in the film series “The Terminator”. But the word also refers to a type of book that can be found in the Bible. An “apocalypse” (in Greek, apokalupsis) is a “revelation” or “disclosure” of what is hidden. The two examples of this kind of book in our Bible are “Daniel” and (of course) the final book in the New Testament, “Revelation”. But among the books written in Bible times, there are many more apocalypses than those two. I have a collection of them in one of my books, which contains 25 different Old Testament period apocalypses and apocalyptic testaments. A collection of Christian writings contains 3 more. That is enough to allow scholars to decide what each of these books has in common. It’s a real genre, in other words, and there is a list of features shared by apocalypses. Let’s learn what they are.
1. Anonymity/Pseudonymity. My collection of apocalypses is contained in a book called “The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha”. My wife once saw it and asked me why I was reading about false pigs. She’s so funny! But really it means that these books have it in common that they were written by anonymous people using a fake name. So, they may have a title which mentions a famous person, like “Apocalypse of Abraham”, or “Apocalypse of Enoch”, but they were not really written by Abraham or Enoch. No one now knows who actually wrote them.
What are the possible reasons for saying your book was written by, say, Ezra or Adam? Using a pseudonym could have lent a kind of authority to the book, which it would not otherwise have had. A famous author who was revered in tradition would make people want to read it. Plus, the things which are revealed in an apocalypse are amazing secrets of heaven, hell, and the future. These secrets would not be revealed to just anyone; isn’t it more believable that they would be told to someone like Moses or Elijah, than to Joe from Judea?
Maybe the only apocalypse that isn’t pseudonymous is the New Testament Book of Revelation. It was probably really written by someone named John, although we are not sure which John that is.
2. Good vs. Evil – guess who wins? Why were apocalypses written in the first place? Maybe they were a response to suffering. Trying to explain why there is suffering for God’s people is an important theme in the Bible. If there is a God, why do we still suffer? As time went by, biblical writers proposed various answers to this question, but when the old answers stopped making sense, new answers were needed. For example, in the Torah, it is supposed that God’s people suffer because they break their half of the Covenant. The Prophetic books also assume that the people have broken the Covenant, and that their suffering is a punishment. Thus, the Babylonian exile could be explained.
But there is also a message of hope in the Prophets that once the people return to God and mend their ways, the suffering should end. For a while, when the exile ended, that seemed to be true. But what are God’s people to think when they DO return to God and mend their ways, and despite everything, they are still dominated by foreign empires (the Persians, the Greeks, and finally the Romans)? Where is God’s justice now? Is God causing the present suffering? The answer had to be: no. Therefore there had to be evil in the world opposing God and bringing suffering to God’s people. Could the suffering be forever? No – it had to end at some point, and God had to be victorious. From this, we get the apocalyptic literary genre.
An apocalypse takes a dualistic view of the world, pitting good against evil, and God against Satan. On God’s side are the angels. Satan has his demons. On the side of evil are the forces of sin and death. The timeline of the apocalyptic view is also dualistic, revealing that now things are bad, but in the future, it will all be fixed. People suffer because for now, the world is controlled by evil forces. But one day, God will intervene in the world and defeat evil. Everything opposed to God will be destroyed at that time, and God’s people will be restored. So the genre is very black and white, good and evil, now and later: a pervasive dualism.
3. A grim outlook. Despite the future victory of God, the state of the present is rather grim in an apocalypse. And if you think things are bad now, think again. An apocalypse usually claims that things are going to get a whole lot worse before they get better. People are not in control of how bad it will get. God has relinquished control of the world to evil for the present time. The suffering will only get more intense.
4. The end is near. On the other hand, despite all the suffering, the redemptive end will come soon. The triumph of God is imminent. The reader of an apocalypse had to hold on for just a little while longer. “The one who testifies to these things says, ‘Surely I am coming soon.’ Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!” (Revelation 22:20)
5. Weird symbolism, but an Angel explains it all. One strange feature of most apocalypses is that the revealing of hidden truths is done through visions which are hard to understand. One famous example is in Revelations 13, in which Rome and one of the Emperors are symbolized by bizarre beasts. The book does not simply say that Rome is the enemy. Perhaps that would not be cryptic enough. To this day, it is still uncertain which Emperor is symbolically meant by the “number of the beast” (Rev 13:18), although Nero and Domitian are good candidates.
The main character of the book may even get a guided tour of Heaven or Hell, and learn the deepest secrets of how the universe is set up. But the information is not typically for mortal men to know. The visions confuse both the reader and the character who is having the visions. But often the main character is accompanied by an angel who proceeds to explain everything so that we can understand it.
6. Future past. Another feature of an apocalypse was using the past to “predict the future.” Here, too, using a pseudonym made sense. If you are describing the past in order to seem like you are predicting the future, it makes sense to claim that the book was written by someone in the distant past, for whom your own past events would be future events. For example, suppose your book claims to be written by Moses. Moses first “predicts” some things that have already happened, like the Babylonian exile. But as the text goes on, Moses begins to predict things that happened very recently. These things, the reader recognizes. Finally, the book predicts things that clearly have not yet happened. Because the past events were correctly predicted, the reader may place his trust in the future predictions too.
A good example of this is found in Daniel. Daniel is supposedly written during the Babylonian exile (597 BCE), but really it was written during the time of the Maccabean revolt against Antiochus (167BCE). From the actual vantage point of his present day, Daniel “predicts” several past empires that have dominated the people of Israel since the Babylonian exile. Then he mentions recent atrocities, such as Antiochus placing a pagan statue in the Temple. When Daniel finally begins to predict what will happen to the enemies of Israel in what was then the real future, his readers would have better believed that he knew what was coming.
7. Motivational speakers. The main point of an apocalypse might have been to comfort the reader. In the face of suffering, you had to have a reason for staying true to your faith. You still had to have hope. Maybe the details of the future which are revealed in each book are less important than the call to not give up. The use of a famous pseudonym in the title might also be comforting, in the sense that the reader’s present day troubles were foreseen and predicted by famous figures from scripture. This might give a sense that history is unfolding like it should, and that everything is not out of control.
The apocalyptic genre is an important one to understand. Basically, the ideas found in Jewish apocalyptic writings gave rise to Christianity and the New Testament. Although there is only one major apocalypse found in the New Testament, the Gospels and the writings of Paul are full of apocalyptic thinking. Jesus himself had a basic message that was partly apocalyptic. Jesus and Paul both said that the end of history was coming soon, and that there would be signs and worse suffering before the end. But soon, God and the Son of Man were going to triumph completely.
We have already mentioned how the Prophets were unable to explain the continued suffering of God’s people even after it seemed like they had returned to God and repented. And we have seen that the apocalypse was a new way to explain that suffering. But what happened when the apocalyptic viewpoint was no longer a way to explain suffering? Because, if you think about it for a moment, there is a built-in flaw. An apocalypse says that in time, and soon, there will be a great change for the better. But what about when a long time passes and there is no change, or things just get worse? The end-times events in Revelation were supposed to occur soon, and now it is 2,000 years later.
I know some people simply say that the predictions have yet to come true, but that is just a way to avoid the real issue. Another approach is basically what Christianity has done. While the dualism of an apocalypse was now-later, eventually that was replaced with a new dualism: Earth-Heaven. When the predicted end to suffering does not come as time goes on (and on and on), but the basic truth remains that it must somehow still come, then we come to think it must come in Heaven. The old dualism was, in a way, horizontal, in time here on Earth, from “now” to “later”, but then it became sort of vertical, from “down here” to “up there”. Despite our suffering on Earth here and now, there will be peace and justice in the afterlife there in Heaven. This is an answer to the question of suffering that, finally, cannot be disproven in this lifetime.

What does the Koran say about Jesus?

#56: “What does the Koran say about Jesus?” by Brendon Wahlberg
The recent news story about a proposed Koran burning made me wonder… should a church be burning a book which contains stories about Jesus? I knew that the Koran included several figures from the Bible, so I began to ask what the Koran actually says about Jesus. Although I have studied the Bible for many years, I approached the topic of the Koran as a beginner, determined to learn if there is any common ground between what the two Holy books say about the central figure of Christianity.
First, a few Koran basics are in order. The Koran (also written as Qur’an) is the scripture of the religion of Islam, and contains the word of God, Allah, as spoken to the prophet Mohammed (also written as Muhammad) by the angel Gabriel. Mohammed was born in 570CE in Mecca. When the prophet was about forty, while he was praying and meditating in a cave, Gabriel began to recite the words to him that would become the Koran (Koran means “recital”). Mohammed wrote the words on paper, bones, leaves, skins, stones, and bark. Sometimes his followers memorized the words. The revelation continued for about twenty years, when Mohammed finally died in Medina in 632CE. About twenty years after his death, his followers began to compile the Koran as a unified written document in order to preserve it.
The purpose of the Koran was both to confirm and to correct the scriptures that had previously been given to the Jews (the Hebrew Bible) and to the Christians (the New Testament). The idea was that the Jews and the Christians had received God’s word but had gone astray. The Jews had corrupted their scripture, and the Christians had erroneously worshipped Jesus as the Son of God. The Koran was meant to bring them all back to the true religion that Abraham had originally followed before either Judaism or Christianity arose. This religion, called Islam, is about absolute submission to the will of God.
The Koran thus contains stories about Jesus that are meant to correct what the New Testament says about him. The Koran itself is divided into 114 chapters called Suras, arranged in order from longest (perhaps thirty pages or so) to shortest (one paragraph). Each Sura has a number and a name, like “The Cow” or “Noah”. There is no chronological order to the book, and as a result, the brief stories about Jesus, and the places where he is mentioned, are scattered throughout the Suras. There is not really a narrative about Jesus’ life like we find in the Gospels. Because we as Christians are used to thinking about Jesus’ life story in some sort of order, I will take what I found in the Koran about Jesus, and arrange it in a more chronological way. (Note: the English translation of the Koran used here was made by N. J. Dawood in 1956.)
One thing to be aware of as you explore the Koran looking for Jesus, is that several of the Koran’s stories are very similar to other stories which can be found in old Apocryphal Christian writings that did not make it into the New Testament, such as the “Proto-Gospel of James” or the “Infancy Gospel of Thomas” (both of which I have written about in this column.) Western scholars believe that the Koran may have used these writings as sources about Jesus. However, they are somewhat unfamiliar sources to western readers precisely because they were excluded from the Bible. I’ll mention such possible sources as I go along.
The Koran begins the story of Jesus with the birth of his mother Mary (in Sura 3: The Imrans). Mary’s mother dedicates her unborn child to the Lord, and so the child Mary is sent to the Jewish Temple to live under the care of a Priest named Zacharias. Mary is miraculously fed by God. “Whenever Zacharias visited her in the Shrine he found that she had food with her. ‘Mary’, he said, ‘where is this food from?’ ‘ It is from Allah’, she answered.” An angel says to Mary, “Allah has chosen you. He has made you pure and exalted you above all women.” When Mary is older, they cast lots to see which person in the community will take charge of her. Neither the miraculous feeding nor the lottery are details found in the New Testament, but they can be found in the “Proto-Gospel of James”, an apocryphal book that says it is Joseph who takes charge of young Mary. Curiously enough, the Koran does not mention Joseph at all.
The Koran tells of Jesus’ conception in Sura 3 and in Sura 19: Mary. In Sura 19, Mary goes alone to a solitary place in the desert. A spirit-messenger of God tells her that she will be given a “holy son”. Sura 3 elaborates that “The angels said to Mary, ‘Allah bids you rejoice in a Word from him. His name is the Messiah, Jesus the son of Mary.” “’Lord,’ she said, how can I bear a child when no man has touched me?’ He replied, such is the will of Allah. He creates whom he will. When He decrees a thing He need only say: ‘Be’, and it is.” In the words of Sura 3, “Jesus is like Adam in the sight of Allah. He created him of dust and then said to him: ‘Be’, and he was.” Sura 19 concludes that “Thereupon she conceived him, and retired to a far-off place.”
It is important to understand that the Koran’s understanding of Jesus’ origin is similar to the New Testament in some ways, and very different in others. Basically, the Koran agrees that Mary had a virgin birth, but denies that Jesus is the “Son of God”. Sura 19 says, “Those who say: ‘The Lord of Mercy has begotten a son’ preach a monstrous falsehood, at which the very heavens might crack…” The very idea that God could beget a child is impossible in the Koran. God is not physical and can never have a child. Instead, God breathed his spirit into Mary while she stayed a virgin (Sura 21: The Prophets). Sura 112: Unity says, “Allah is One, the Eternal God. He begot none, nor was He begotten. None is equal to him.” Sura 5: The Table says, “Unbelievers are those that say, ‘Allah is the Messiah, the son of Mary’. […] Unbelievers are those that say, Allah is one of three’. There is but one God.” As we will see next, the Koran acknowledges Jesus as an anointed prophet who could do miracles, but denies that he is the Son of God. The idea is that God simply created Jesus, which is of course at odds with basic Christian theology.
Sura 19 continues the story of Mary and Jesus. Alone in the desert, she lies beneath a palm tree and gives birth. (This is of course a rather different birth location than in Bethlehem.) To sustain her, the Lord provides ripe dates that can simply fall down to the exhausted Mary from the high tree, and a brook of water starts to flow at her feet. This story is not found in the New Testament, but a very similar miracle is found in an Apocryphal work called “The Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew”, during an account of Mary’s flight to Egypt. In “Pseudo-Matthew”, a very young Jesus makes a palm tree bend down for his exhausted mother, and causes a hidden spring to bubble up. In Sura 19, when Mary returns to civilization with the baby, she is accused of being a whore. To answer her accusers, Mary silently points them towards the cradle with baby Jesus in it. Miraculously, Jesus preaches to them from the cradle, saying, “I am the servant of Allah. He has given me the Gospel and ordained me a prophet. His blessing is upon me wherever I go, and he […] has purged me of vanity and wickedness.” Jesus does not preach from the cradle in the New Testament, but he does so in the very beginning of an Apocryphal work called the “Arabic Gospel of the Infancy of the Savior”.
Sura 3 contains a brief account of the adult life of Jesus, in the form of God describing what the baby Jesus will be like when he grows up. The Koran says, God “will instruct him in the Scriptures and in wisdom, in the Torah and in the Gospel, and send him forth as an apostle to the Israelites. He will say: ‘I bring you a sign from your Lord. From clay I will make for you the likeness of a bird. I shall breathe into it, and, by Allah’s leave, it shall become a living bird. By Allah’s leave I shall give sight to the blind man, heal the leper, and raise the dead to life. I shall tell you what to eat and what to store up in your houses. Surely that will be a sign for you, if you are true believers. I come to confirm the Torah that has already been revealed and to make lawful to you some of the things you are forbidden. I bring you a sign from your Lord: therefore fear him and obey me. Allah is my God and your God: therefore serve Him. That is the straight path.’” As strange as it may seem to Christian readers, this small passage is basically most of what the Koran has to say about Jesus’ adult ministry!
There are a few things to understand about the passage we just read. First, notice that Jesus has no power of his own. Every miracle he performs is only by God’s leave. Second, there is the odd mention of a clay bird that comes to life. This miracle is not found in the New Testament, but it is found in an Apocryphal work called the “Infancy Gospel of Thomas”, where young Jesus brings several clay birds to life. Third, notice how the passage maintains a strict monotheism. Allah is Jesus’ God.
The Koran has a few other things to say about Jesus’ adult life. Sura 5 says that God strengthened Jesus with the Holy Spirit, and protected Jesus from the Israelite unbelievers when they called Jesus’ miracles nothing but plain magic. Sura 61: Battle Array is also notable in that it depicts Jesus predicting the prophet Mohammed. “I am sent forth to you by Allah to confirm the Torah already revealed and to give news of an apostle that will come after me whose name is Ahmed.” (Ahmed = Mohammed.)
In the New Testament, Jesus has twelve disciples during his adult life. These are briefly mentioned in the Koran too. Sura 3 says that the disciples help Jesus in the cause of Allah, saying, “We are the helpers of Allah. We believe in Him. Bear witness that we have surrendered ourselves to him. Lord, we believe in your revelations and follow your apostle. Count us among your witnesses.” Sura 5 says that one day, the disciples asked for a sign from God as proof that what Jesus said was true. “Can Allah send down to us from heaven a table spread with food?” God replied, “I am sending one to you. But whoever of you disbelieves hereafter shall be punished as no man has ever been punished.” And that pair of stories is basically all the Koran has to say about Jesus’ disciples.
Now we come to the topic of Jesus’ crucifixion. The Koran differs greatly from the New Testament in this area. Basically, the Koran says that Jesus was not crucified, but was instead lifted up to heaven without dying. Here is the key passage from Sura 4: Women. “They denied the truth and uttered a monstrous falsehood against Mary. They declared: ‘We have put to death the Messiah Jesus the son of Mary, the apostle of Allah.’ They did not kill him, nor did they crucify him, but they thought they did. [literal translation: he was made to resemble another for them.] Those that disagreed about him were in doubt concerning his death, for what they knew about it was sheer conjecture; they were not sure that they had slain him. Allah lifted him up to His presence.” In other words, according to the Koran, Jesus was not really crucified, and someone else who looked like Jesus was crucified in his place. This idea is, of course, not found in the New Testament, but it is found in one Gnostic Christian work called the “Second Treatise of the Great Seth” (from the Nag Hammadi Library). In “Great Seth”, Jesus looks on, laughing in amusement as someone else is crucified instead, while other onlookers are ignorant of the truth (the Gnostic truth that Jesus was really a spiritual being who could not die).
So, what is the deal with all of these apparent Koran borrowings from Christian Apocrypha? Western scholars say it is just that – borrowing. When the Koran was being compiled, such apocryphal writings were still in circulation along trade routes, in written form or in popular oral traditions. Perhaps the apocryphal Jesus stories were given equal weight with canonical New Testament stories and included in the Koran. A western reader might say that this means parts of the Koran are based on fictional or fanciful sources, because that is how Christians classify their own apocryphal books. But a Muslim would argue the opposite: every word of the Koran is true and from God. If the Koran’s Jesus stories match those in so-called apocryphal writings, then the apocryphal writings must be really true.
The Koran claims that Jesus will have a role to play in the future. One day, the Day of Judgment will arrive (called the Day of Resurrection in Sura 3.) Jesus has been taken away from the unbelievers and lifted up to God until that day comes. On that day, unbelievers will be punished, and God will judge all disputes. Jesus will be a portent of the coming of the hour of doom and a witness against unbelievers.
The Koran makes passing references to Jesus in several places, adding to the final picture. Each time, the Koran has something to say about what Jesus is, or is not. For example, Jesus is not more than a mortal favored by God to be an example to Israel (Sura 43: Ornaments of Gold). Jesus is a descendant of King David who received scripture, wisdom, prophet-hood, and guidance from God (Sura 6: Cattle). Jesus is not someone who ever asked people to worship him and his mother (Sura 5). Jesus is a sign to all men (Sura 21). All of these details are part of the big picture of Jesus in the Koran. What is that big picture? Well, there are certainly many things which Christians must disagree with: Jesus was never crucified? Jesus is not the Son of God? Of course Christians cannot agree with these statements. But we should not be surprised by them. Islam was once a new religion that was in direct competition with Christianity. It was necessary for the Koran to dispute or deny some of the claims of a rival religion as Islam struggled into being. Look at the way early Christianity disputed and denied the claims of Judaism which came before it. I mean, if Islam had come along before Christianity, what would the New Testament have had to say about the Koran’s claims? Yet, the surprising thing is how much common ground can be found about Jesus. Let’s try for a moment to summarize as many points as we can, where the Koran and the New Testament agree about Jesus.
1. Jesus had a virgin birth and a miraculous conception. 2. Jesus and his mother Mary were pure and without sin. 3. God sent the Holy Spirit to help Jesus. 4. Jesus spoke for God as a prophet. 5. Jesus performed miracles such as curing the blind and raising the dead. 6. Jesus affirmed the Torah and brought the Good News, the Gospel “in which there is guidance and light, corroborating that which was revealed before it in the Torah, a guide and an admonition to the righteous” (Sura 5). 7. Jesus had disciples and preached to Israel, where some believed in him and some did not. 8. After his time on Earth was done, Jesus was taken to Heaven to be with God until the Day of Judgment. 9. Jesus was the Messiah.
Of course, there are disagreements too. What do we do with those? The Koran instructs Muslims to try to persuade Christians. “Say: ‘People of the Book, let us come to an agreement that we will worship none but Allah, that we will associate none with him, and that none of us will set up mortals as gods besides him.’ If they refuse, say: ‘Bear witness that we have surrendered ourselves to Allah.’” (Sura 3) That sounds like a path towards “agreeing to disagree.” And that is a good thing. Finding some common ground, combined with a peaceful disagreement, is the recipe for living together in America. Then there is no need for burning anyone’s books! These words from Sura 42: Counsel, are a good sentiment to end with: “We have our own works and you have yours; let there be no argument between us. Allah will bring us all together, for to Him we shall return.”

The Whole Megillah

#55: “The Whole Megillah” by Brendon Wahlberg
Pop quiz: which book of the Old Testament never once mentions God in it? Need more hints? This book is the only one in the entire Hebrew Bible not found among the Dead Sea Scrolls. Not even a tiny fragment of it was there. Most scholars think this book is a work of patriotic fiction, not history, because its details disagree with what we know from historical sources. More clues? Martin Luther hated this book, saying of it, “I would it did not exist; for it Judaizes too much, and has in it a great deal of heathenish naughtiness […] it is more worthy than all [the apocryphal books] of being excluded from the Canon.” But despite Luther’s disdain, this book is read out loud every year in a party atmosphere, complete with costumes and noise-makers. Got it yet?
Yes, it’s the Book of Esther. Five points for you. Now, you are probably curious about my title. The word “Megillah” means a rolled scroll. There are five biblical scrolls, or “Megillot”, that are read in synagogues on certain holidays, namely Song of Songs, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, and Esther. Esther is the most important one, the Megillah, the only one which it is obligatory to hear, read out loud in its entirety, on the holiday of Purim. Anyway, twentieth century Jewish comedians (for example, on “Laugh-In”) took this word and popularized an expression, the “Whole Megillah.” It means a long and boring story, tediously detailed and overly embroidered, long winded and drawn-out, an overextended and overly complicated account, a very involved and unnecessarily lengthy tale…sort of like this sentence, but much longer. Why did this expression make reference to the Megillah, the scroll of Esther? Maybe it was because, when you sit in the Synagogue listening to every word of it, it feels long and drawn-out. Maybe that is why there are noise-makers for the kids to play with…but more on this later.
I chose the title because Esther is the most important Megillah, and also because Esther comes in two versions. One is the original Hebrew version, written around 400BCE, and the other is a newer Greek version, written a few hundred years later. Now, the really interesting thing is, the Greek version is longer. Greek Esther is the same as the Hebrew version, but it has six new chapters added to it. And, while the original Hebrew Esther never mentions God even once, the six new chapters of Greek Esther are jam packed with references to God. What’s the story, here? Which version, in other words, is the “whole” Megillah?
To answer the question, let’s first see what the Hebrew version is all about. The Book of Esther is set in the ancient Persian Empire during the reign of King Ahasuerus (possibly the same person as Xerxes I, 485-464 BCE). The King throws a huge feast in his Palace of Susa, during which he drunkenly commands his wife, Vashti, to appear before his guests and show off her beauty. Vashti refuses, and the King is infuriated. His advisors warn him that her refusal might become widely known and inspire all Persian wives to disobey their husbands (shocking, I know!) He issues an irrevocable decree that Vashti is to be replaced as Queen, as her punishment.
The King orders the collection of all available beautiful young virgins. His favorite will become the new Queen. In Susa, there is a lovely young Jewish woman named Esther. She has lost her parents, and is cared for by her foster father Mordecai. When Esther joins the harem, Mordecai warns her not to reveal that she is Jewish, for as the rest of the book reveals, there was a dangerous level of anti-Semitism aimed at the Jews of the Diaspora in Persia. The King loves Esther more than all the other women, and makes her Queen instead of Vashti.
Mordecai watches over Esther from the Palace gate, and it is there that he overhears a plot to murder the King. He tells Esther, who tells the King, and the plot is foiled. Mordecai’s deeds are written in the royal records. Soon after that, the King happens to elevate a man named Haman (the villain of the story) to high rank. Haman is upset when everyone bows down before him at the Palace gate…except Mordecai. Haman is so angry, that he decides to kill not only Mordecai, but also all of Mordecai’s people, all of the Jews in Persia. The day of the massacre is planned.
Haman then goes to the King to gain his approval for the plan. Deviously, Haman describes a people living among the Persians but apart from them, a people with different laws, who do not obey the King’s laws. He persuades the King that these people, young and old, men, women, and children, should all be killed. Ahasuerus issues an irrevocable decree to do so, on the date chosen by Haman. Learning of the decree, Mordecai begs Esther to go to the King and help her people. She protests, saying that the punishment for approaching Ahasuerus uninvited is death. But finally, she decides to risk it. Fortunately, the King welcomes her, and accepts her invitation to a private banquet, along with Haman, on the following evening.
Meanwhile, Haman continues to fume about Mordecai. His wife suggests that he set up a gallows to hang Mordecai. But the King, unable to sleep, reads about Mordecai in the royal records, realizing that nothing has been done to reward him for foiling the assassination plot. In the morning, Ahasuerus asks Haman what should be done for “the man whom the King wishes to reward.” Of course, Haman thinks the King means him, not Mordecai. Haman suggests that such a person should be given the King’s robe and the King’s horse to ride in public, with a courtier leading the horse and announcing the honor to everyone. Haman is mortified when he is told to go and honor Mordecai in that fashion.
At the private banquet with Esther and Haman, the King offers his Queen anything she wishes. She asks only for the King to spare her life and the lives of her people. The King, not knowing his wife is Jewish, demands to know who would threaten his Queen’s life, and at once, she accuses Haman. The King stands and has to leave the room in his rage, while a stunned Haman throws himself on the Queen and begs Esther for his life. The King returns and interprets this as Haman daring to violate Esther. It is over for Haman. He is hanged on the very gallows he has set up for Mordecai. The exalted position of Haman is given to Mordecai.
But the decree has already gone out to slaughter the Jews in Persia, and it cannot be revoked. Esther and Mordecai are allowed to send out a second decree that when the attack comes, the Jews will be allowed to band together and defend themselves. When the terrible day arrives, the Jews are victorious, killing thousands of armed attackers in all of Persia. A day of anticipated mourning has been turned into a day of celebration and feasting, and Mordecai establishes the holiday of Purim to commemorate it. Purim is still celebrated today, and during the reading of the complete scroll of Esther, children use loud noise-makers to drown out the sound of Haman’s name whenever it is spoken. And that is the whole Megillah. Or is it?
By the time the Book of Esther was a few hundred years old, some Jews were already feeling uncomfortable about the fact that God is never mentioned in it. All of the rest of the Holy Scriptures were all about God. Not Esther – there, the characters save themselves through their own efforts. When the Hebrew Bible was translated into Greek (as the Septuagint), a new version of Esther was written to include in it. An unknown writer decided to revise Esther and correct the problem of God’s absence. A total of six new chapters were written and added to the original. So what do these chapters contain?
A new prologue describes Mordecai having a dream vision like something out of Revelation in the New Testament. Two dragons fight in an apocalyptic landscape, symbolizing the conflict between Mordecai and Haman. The entire people, on the verge of destruction, cry out to God, who brings their salvation in the form of light and water, symbolizing Esther becoming Queen. So right away, the new writer establishes that it is God whose actions save his people. A new epilogue gives the interpretation of the dream, concluding that God saved his people by working signs and great wonders.
Two other new chapters claim to be actual letters, copies of the decrees issued by the King, first to doom the Jews, and later to save them. But the letters add nothing to the story. They are only wordy and redundant explanations of what has already been said. These added sections really do turn the book into more of a “whole Megillah” in the sense that I mentioned earlier. However, there is one interesting detail in the letters. The Hebrew version of Esther calls Haman an “Agagite”, a descendant of the Amalekites, ancient enemies of the Jews. But the new Greek additions call Haman a “Macedonian”, which was not an ancient enemy, but a very current one. At the time of the additions to the book, the Macedonians under Alexander had conquered the Persians and were the newest oppressors of the Jews.
Another new section is added in the middle of the story. Maybe it offended the writer that Esther and Mordecai solved their own problems, seemingly without God’s intervention. So a lengthy prayer section is added, at the point where Mordecai learns of the terrible decree. The prayer of Mordecai recognizes God as all powerful and all knowing. Mordecai says that he did not refuse to bow before Haman out of pride, but because he would not bow before anyone except God. He prays to God to have pity and save his people from their enemies. Those who praise God must not be destroyed, so that they may live to continue praising God. Next, Esther discards all her finery and prays in sackcloth and ashes, recognizing that she has no help but God. She acknowledges that she and her people have sinned by worshipping other gods, and that their punishment is just. She begs God not to let his people be utterly destroyed, but instead to make an example for the world by destroying the wicked enemies of the Jews. She claims to hate her own Queenly grandeur, and swears that she has privately abhorred all pagan sacrifices and hated the bed of the uncircumcised. She reiterates that she is alone and that she has no one to help her but God.
The Greek additions to Esther are certainly in keeping with the themes of other Jewish religious writings of the time. And they certainly do correct the perceived flaw of the book not mentioning God. However, the additions are rather heavy handed and extreme in their contrast to the content and tone of the Hebrew original. And speaking of the Hebrew original, remember that it is the version that has been preserved in Jewish Bibles. Catholics have preserved the longer version of Esther as canonical. Protestants have placed the additions to Esther in the Apocrypha. But the Jews were evidently happy with Esther the way it was originally written, despite the fact that it did not mention God. Why was that?
One traditional interpretation is that, by not mentioning God, the book teaches that God’s face is sometimes hidden from us. At some points in history, God acts out in the open, such as in the book of Exodus. But at other times, God acts in a hidden manner, behind the scenes, as in the book of Esther. Things seem to work out in a providential manner, because God has worked much less obvious miracles that appear to be natural occurrences. Or perhaps the book of Esther tries to tell us that sometimes it really is up to us to save ourselves. Maybe the “whole” Megillah is a mixture of all these ideas. We keep and preserve both versions of the book because both messages are necessary to us. Now that I think about it, there’s an old saying that expresses both ideas together: God helps those who help themselves.