Starting on 2/3/13, Mandy Rodgers-Gates is leading our class in a study of the Old Testament in the Gospel. Below are the notes from our first class:
1. We will be assuming a certain kind of intentionality and compositional skill in the Gospel writers. That is to say, the Gospel writers could have written their narratives in ways other than they did. They could have chosen different examples of Jesus’ teaching, different stories of his healings. (cf., John 20:30)
2. The Gospel writers engagement of the Old Testament is retrospective. That is, in light of their experience of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection, in light of the revelation they have seen in and through Jesus, and via the guidance of the Spirit poured out on the community of disciples, they can now see ways in which the OT writings pointed forward to Jesus and ways in which Jesus is a fulfillment of Israel’s relationship with her God and of God’s promises to Israel.
- By emphasizing the retrospective nature of NT writers’ interpretation of the Old, we are able to affirm the theological and revelatory value of the OT narratives on their own terms.
- Christians have a long history of villifying and persecuting Jews. One contributing factor goes something like this: “Well, the Old Testament clearly lays out what the Messiah is going to be like, all the ‘proofs’ that will show he is the Messiah, and Jesus obviously fulfills those; why don’t those Jews just get it?”
- This retrospective view best captures the newness, the “new thing,” that the God of Israel did in Jesus. It captures this newness while also maintaining the continuity of Jesus with Israel’s story. We could not have predicted what God would do, and neither could the Jewish people.
3. The distinction between promise and prediction: OT texts are often treated as predictions and proof texts about Jesus. But the entire OT narrative has the character of promise – namely, the promise of God to sustain Israel, to care for the people of Israel, to be faithful to them – even and especially when they are not faithful to him.
- Promise involves commitment to a relationship; prediction does not
- a promise to someone; prediction about someone
- A prediction needs no response. Promise necessitates/calls forth response
- e.g., Isaiah 40-45 predicts that Cyrus of Persia will be used by God, but does not indicate that Cyrus acknowledges the Lord. That prediction was part of God’s promise to Israel that they would return from exile in babylon, and that DID require a response from them.
- Promise involves ongoing levels of fulfillment.
- The fulfillment of a promise made will take different forms and make different demands depending on the circumstances and situation we find ourselves in. Most importantly, it is the relationships which determines how the promise will be fulfilled in a given situation.
4. Reading the OT in light of Jesus, and understanding Jesus through engaging the Old, is a two way task. We read forwards and backwards. As we engage deeply with the Old Testament, our minds and hearts are formed by that world and those narratives. This prepares us to read the NT with new eyes, and to understand Jesus in new ways. At the same time, we can go back and read the OT differently in the light of Jesus, just as the NT authors do. We can see new layers of meaning.
5. Gospels’ engagement with OT is complex, multifaceted, and often very subtle. It’s not a question of simple predictions, nor of flat typologies. We need to pay attention to both continuities and discontinuities between the OT narratives and the story of Jesus. Often both are in play.
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