Matthew: Jesus as the Torah Made Flesh?
October 30, 2010 at 7:39 pm 5 comments
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”
– John1:1
John’s depiction of Jesus as the Word of God made flesh is of course well known. Not so well known is the possibility that Matthew had a similar thought, considering Jesus to be the Torah made flesh.
There was a rabbinical saying that “Where two or three are gathered together to study the Torah, there the presence of God is in the midst of them.” So when Matthew has Jesus say “Where two are three are gathered together in my name, there I am in the midst of them”, he seems to suggest that Jesus is the embodiment of the Torah.
This interpretation fits very well with the rest of Matthew.
Entry filed under: Bible. Tags: Bible, divinity of Christ, Gospel of Matthew, Incarnation, Jesus, Torah, Word of God.
1.
Nat | October 31, 2010 at 3:22 am
Jesus and his apostles have abrogated the “Old” Testament for their followers.
2.
Edward T. Babinski | November 1, 2010 at 7:21 pm
You’re quite correct Jacob, as even N. T. Wright admits in his online article “Simply Lewis”, in which Wright argues that Lewis’s trllemma argument is not one of Lewis’s best.
N. T. Wright says:
But of course the real problem is the argument for Jesus’ divinity. And this problem actually begins further back: There is virtually no mention, and certainly no treatment, of Israel and the Old Testament, and consequently no attempt to place Jesus in his historical or theological context. (One of the “Screwtape Letters” contains a scornful denunciation of all such attempts, and lays Lewis wide open to the charge of ignoring the historical context of the writings he is using—a charge that, in his own professional field, he would have regarded as serious.)
I am well aware that some in our day, too, see the historical context of Jesus as part of what you teach Christians later on rather than part of how you explain the gospel to outsiders. I think this is simply mistaken. Every step towards a de-Judaized Jesus is a step away from Scripture, away from Christian wisdom, and out into the world of . . . yes, Plato and the rest, which is of course where Lewis partly lived. If you don’t put Jesus in his proper context, you will inevitably put him in a different one, where he, his message, and his achievement will be considerably distorted.
This deficit shows particularly in Lewis’s treatment of incarnation. Famously, as in his well-known slogan, “Liar, Lunatic or Lord,” he argued that Jesus must have been bad or mad or God. This argument has worn well in some circles and extremely badly in others, and the others were not merely being cynical.
What Lewis totally failed to see—as have, of course, many scholars in the field—was that Judaism already had a strong incarnational principle, namely the Temple, and that the language used of Shekinah, Torah, Wisdom, Word, and Spirit in the Old Testament—the language, in other words, upon which the earliest Christians drew when they were exploring and expounding what we have called Christology—was a language designed, long before Jesus’ day, to explain how the one true God could be both transcendent over the world and living and active within it, particularly within Israel.
Lewis, at best, drastically short-circuits the argument. When Jesus says, “Your sins are forgiven,” he is not claiming straightforwardly to be God, but to give people, out on the street, what they would normally get by going to the Temple.
3.
Edward T. Babinski | November 1, 2010 at 7:24 pm
See Thom Stark’s series on Christology, especially his discussion of the LOGOS Christology of the Gospel of John:
http://thomstark.net/?cat=141
Stark is in agreement with what you wrote above. So is N. T. Wright as already noted.
By the way, Stark’s book, The Human Faces of God, is a MUST read.
4.
Edward T. Babinski | November 1, 2010 at 7:38 pm
Also, read Stark, because he discusses much more about Christology, and concludes that Trinitarianism is NOT was the NT teaches. http://thomstark.net/?p=1126
5.
Patti Lynn Pressley | May 25, 2012 at 7:46 pm
..NET…1 The Believer’s Relationship to the Holy Spirit
There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
.LBP…1 THERE is therefore no condemnation to them who walk in the flesh after the Spirit of Jesus Christ.
.WoY… 1 There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in the Messiah Yahshua, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
.Scripture 1998+ ….. 1 There is, then, now no condemnation to those who are in Messiah יהושע, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit….
. &…
v 2 For the Torah of the Spirit of the life in Messiah יהושע has set me free from the law of sin and of death…
* NOW THIS SPEAKS VOLUMES*
G3551… ”law”….
νόμος
nomos
nom’-os
… From a primary word νέμω nemō
(to parcel out, especially food or grazing to animals);
law (through the idea of prescriptive usage), generally (regulation),
SPECIFICALLY (OF MOSES [including THE VOLUME];
ALSO OF THE GOSPEL), or figuratively (a principle): – law….
LXX related word(s)
H1697 davar
H1881 dat
H2703 chuqqah
H2706 choq
H4687 mitsvah
H4941 mishpat
H6600 pitgam
H8452 torah
…I see that>
The ”Life giving Spirit” in Messiah יהושע is ”The TORAH”!!!
His WORDS R SPIRIT & LIFE… Right!!! That’s what HE said!!!!
& HE is the WORD (TORAH) made fleh!!!