Ben C. Smith wrote: ↑Mon Oct 15, 2018 6:06 pm
Stefan Kristensen wrote: ↑Mon Oct 15, 2018 4:49 pm
I think you misunderstood me here, I fully understand this part of your view, I just disagree with it (first of all because
I don't think the holy spirit can naturally just like that be considered a person to be blasphemed, contrary to God in 2 Kings).
What does this mean? The spirit seems to have personal agency of some kind in other parts of Mark: it descends into Jesus (1.10); it casts him into the desert (1.12); it speaks (1.11); it inspires (12.36). I am not seeing (at all) how blaspheming the spirit can be problematic as a viable concept.
Yes, it has personal agency "of some kind". As I see it, the "holy" spirit is different from the other spirits in gMark (the demons and unclean spirits), in that it's not independant of God in the way the unclean spirits and demons seem to be independant beings from Satan. I don't think we should imagine the holy spirit as a separate being which is obediant to God's will. Rather it is a direct extension of God in a way Satan's minions are not of him, like a member of one's body, but maybe you see it differently. The way I see it is that the kind of personal agency the spirit seems to have is exactly God's personal agency, not its own. It is also not like an angel who from his own accord chooses obedience to God.
And if that's the way we should understand the holy spirit, then I don't see any person to slander, no entity with its own 'good name' or 'reputation', just some intangible force of God, outside of the perception of humans. The concept of slander applies basically to persons in a social context, in that they have a 'reputation' (-φημη) which can be 'hurt' (βλασ-, βλαπτω). But as we can see, the term can be extended to the Christian teaching also, as this is in some way understood to also have a 'reputation'. This I think makes sense, because the Christian teaching is something concrete that humans can take and investigate and judge to be genuine or not. Some would wander about at the time and say that the Christian teachings are the truth, others that the Christians are full of nonsense. There's the sense of 'reputation' with regards to the Christian teachings. But the holy spirit? Who goes around and speaks badly about the holy spirit, because they think it's bad and/or they want to hurt the 'reputation' of it? Not the scribes. The very idea is bizarre, I think.
To my eye, the spirit comes across in gMark as a force, a force of God, cf. its agency in exorcisms and healings referred to as "δυναμεις". It can move things around and influence human minds. But so can bulldozers and drugs (especially in combination). And it cannot speak with a voice, obviously it is God speaking in 1:11. I think it is really hard to get a grasp on what exactly the nature is of the holy spirit, and I hardly think I'm the only one. And I think that's also a big part of why this saying has been wrestled with by interpreters through the centuries. But I think the people of Did 11:7 were interpreters, and I think they got it right.
That's why I think one has to view the holy spirit from one of its particular angles for the notion of "slandering the holy spirit" to make proper sense. And that angle, as I've tried to argue at length, is it's intimate connection with preaching/teaching the divine Christian truth which saves a human being as long as he/she believes it at the same time, i.e. if he/she accepts its divine authorship. It is about the grander aspect of the "Word" as described by Mark in the Sower, the very thing which builds and sustains the Christian community which is the kingdom-to-be. The same fundamental idea of the Word through the spirit in both in Mark 3:29 and Did 11:7.
As I've delved into this subject more and more I've found more and more things that, to me, support that proposition. I've tried to argue it, but I know that I've not made myself clear at all, that's of course my mistake. That which is dimly expressed is that which is dimly thought. However, I really do think there are some very solid arguments to line up properly some day, so that you at least understand them. I hope you don't feel that you've wasted your time, then I hope you can forgive me!
Does something even have to be a person to be blasphemed anyway? In Revelation 13.6 the tabernacle is blasphemed.
Like I said, I can see how it makes sense to talk about "slandering" the Christian teaching (1 Tim 6:1; Titus 2:5; 2 Pet 2:2 - Did 11:7? Cf. 11:10) And I think that "the holy spirit" in 3:29 is Mark's cryptic way of referring to the divine Christian teaching, which is what lies behind the exorcisms of Jesus, which the scribes don't recognize.
Can the notion of blaspheming God's tabernacle make sense? Only if we understand tabernacle in some specific way, like we have to understand the holy spirit in a specific way, as I argue. However, in Rev 13:6 I don't think there is any talk of the tabernacle (σκηνη) but instead of God's dwelling (σκηνη), i.e. in heaven, and there is an apposition which apparantly qualifies the meaning of this "dwelling" as "those who dwell in heaven":
It opened its mouth to utter blasphemies against God, blaspheming his name and his dwelling, those who dwell in heaven.
It is those who are blasphemed, not the concrete dwelling itself (and not the tabernacle). This notion is perhaps the same notion as in Jude 8 (and 2 Pet 2:10 which is most likely dependant on Jude 8):
Jude 8 Yet in the same way these dreamers also defile the flesh, reject authority, and slander the glorious ones.
2 Pet 2:10 - especially those who indulge their flesh in depraved lust, and who despise authority. ¶ Bold and willful, they are not afraid to slander the glorious ones,
A few manuscripts inserts an "and" in Rev 13:6, so that it's not an apposition, whereby it's not just "those who dwell in heaven" but also God's "dwelling" which is being "slandered", but I also think that's a strange notion, even though the KJV translators also has this reading.
If you think it doesn't make sense in the specific context we find in Mark 3 that this sin is unforgivable, then you must also think that Mark likewise didn't think the graveness made sense in the context in which he placed it.
I am not saying that it does not make sense. I am saying that it makes
perfect sense to a readership who already knows (
from personal experience in Christian meetings) that questioning the spirit's spokesperson is unforgivable.
But you are saying that the graveness doesn't make sense
in the specific context of Mark 3, only in the context outside of gMark, and that's what I think is a problem. This is not just some vague statement about this and that. It's a statement that here is the one thing which angers God's feelings the most among
all the many things we already know anger him. So is this a new commandment from him? To me it seems implausible that Mark would allow this strong teaching to stand without it's theological rationale: Why is this so grave - in the mind of God.
We can plainly see how different people interpret the saying so very differently when they do not have or at least do not consider that background knowledge: modern interpreters who do not consider it are in the position of guessing at why Mark says that this particular sin is unforgivable:
Or when they don't consider such things as I have presented. But I think Stein is right, for one. Because it is not just "traditional Christianity" that asserts that "only through the work of the Spirit is saving faith possible". It is also the NT writers, including Mark. From your citations, you should be able to see that here are two interpreters who are in fact on the same page, me and Stein. Although he backs it up from a view held by "traditional Christianity" rather whereas I back it up from the text of gMark. But can't you see that what Stein is saying is what I'm saying also? And as I'll argue at the end of this post, I think the author(s) of Did 11:7 is yet another interpreter who agrees with me and Stein.
The reason that everyone keeps guessing as to the meaning of the saying is because they, like me, are asking for the
theological meaning, because that is exactly expected to be there when speaking about God's mind in such an extreme manner as 3:29. A practical motivation for the historical origin of the saying is one thing, but what might be the theological rationale for the saying? Why did Mark think this was so extremely important to God?
But none of these commentators is even considering the parallels in the Didache and the other early literature I have mentioned.
Again, yes, I do.
As soon as one becomes aware that questioning a person speaking in the spirit was considered unforgivable in some circles, the solution to the problem becomes obvious. It is not very palatable to some (though I imagine it can be expressed less cynically than I chose to express it), but it is obvious.
There's no evidence for that. Only one single text, purported to be written by the twelve apostles. It may be true, but even so, it doesn't solve the problem which interpreters are trying to solve: Why would
God consider this sin so grave?
Ex hypothesi, Mark was writing as a Christian who already knew that questioning the spirit's spokesperson is unforgivable and for Christians who also knew this. He was not writing for our modern benefit.
Our modern concern as interpreters of gMark is the same as Mark and his fellow Christians: What does God want. And any answer to that question needs to have divine authority, i.e. revelation. When and to whom did God reveal this extremely strong feeling of his?
And so that's the other thing: If the teaching originated as a practical measure, even an embarrassing one as we can agree, for the leaders of the communities needing to guard their authority, then surely they would have needed to append some theological rationale to it?
No, I do not think that is the kind of literature the Didache is. It is most often little more than a list of rules, precepts, guidelines, and commands; it very often lacks any explicit rationale for what it enjoins upon its readers. I feel certain that theological rationales existed in the early churches, but the Didache is not the kind of text to reveal what they may have been.
I didn't mean that I think there should be a theological rationale appended to the teaching within the text of the
Didache, that's not the kind of text, as you point out. I meant generally, there needed to be a rationale to go with this harsh teaching from the very beginning, and if you can't suggest any such theological rationale that may have been appended to it, then I think your explanation lacks a crucial element.
But I have a suggestion for such a rationale, and that's what I've been trying hard to explain, so let me try one more time, just for the record. The authority within the early communities of these so-called "prophets" is not just to be understood as institutional authority. Their institutional authority, which would without a doubt also have been important to protect from the 'average Joes', was fully merged with the authority which Jesus had received from God. And that authority manifests itself by the presence of the holy spirit.
It is no coincidence that in gMark Jesus gets the holy spirit at the same time he gets his authority, i.e. when God declares him to be his son, Mark 1:11. It is here Jesus gets his authority, in a proleptic measure from God before his actual royal victory over Satan at his crucifixion, where he wins that authority. But he gets it beforehand from John's baptism which is "from heaven" (Mark 11:17-33), in the same way every Christian will get it post-easter. And it is also at the baptism he gets the spirit, because those two things go hand in hand: His "authority" ("εξουσια") lies in his permission to wield the holy spirit.
His authority has to do with only one thing, his kingship, the "messiah", however his kingship is a special heavenly one because he is God's son in this special Christian sense. And everyone who submits themselves to king Jesus, or "Jesus Christ", can use his authority. Having "faith" in Jesus means willingly submitting oneself to his authority in the belief that he is one's king, the "Christ". And then they can act with his authority, 'in the name of the king', in Jesus' "name" (Mark 6:14; 9:39).
So if a Christian
evidently acts by the spirit, either in exorcism (9:39) or in verbal speech (Did 11:7), that means this person acts on Jesus' divine authority from God. But all these actions by the spirit is not just some hobby activity. Wielding the spirit by Jesus' royal authority from the creator himself is part of the great eschatological war against the kingdom of Satan which will sooner or later come to its dramatic conclusion. I don't see any reason to doubt that this was also the basic understanding of the people behind Did 11.
When these prophets who are spoken of in Did 11:7 do their thing, which is among other things teaching, cf. 11:10 (also 2 Pet 2:1 where false "teachers" of the present mirror the false "prophets" of old), then they are engaged in fighting the good fight against Satan's evil influences on the minds of the humans. It is important not just to come to faith but also to cultivate the faith continually to ensure that the Christians win their own battles against Satan. Same with Jesus' teachings and exorcisms, they have everything to do with 'the saving work of the holy spirit', which is the defeat of Satan's kingdom. It's wartime.
There's the theological rationale for the graveness of the sin, explaining both the teaching in Did 11:7 and in Mark 3:29. I know there are probably some premises that I take for granted here, but I've tried now to make myself clear, and I hope that you at least understand the gist of the argument.
As I see it, this theological rationale for the teaching can explain either why the author(s) of Did 11:7 felt it could be imported from Matt 12 into that context (as I think), or why Mark felt it could be imported into his context from being an oral teaching (as you think, if I understand you correctly). And even how it could have been invented as an oral teaching motivated by not-so-pious practical needs.
If you feel we have already moved as far as we can on this subject, fair enough!