Hello! I've been re-reading your response to Jim Lippard's "The Fabulous Prophecies Of The Messiah", and I had some questions and comments regarding it. I'd like to get your input on the following issues, in the hopes of clarifying both the thesis which you advance in your response, and the topic of messianic prophecy in general.
1. Concerning your response in general, I am having trouble determining exactly what the thesis of your response is.
Hey, me too! ;>)
Obviously you think Jim Lippard is wrong :-), but beyond that it gets a bit hazy. I think this is because you are making a common mistake which critics on *both* sides of this issue often make, and that is to conflate the apologetic use of prophecy with the theological use of prophecy.
Allow me to explain. Debates between skeptics and apologists over messianic prophecy usually presuppose that the *existence* of prophecy and the *apologetical value* of prophecy are one and the same issue. In fact, they are quite separate. That being the case, it follows that there are three possible views one might take towards the question of messianic prophecy. (Not counting the "suspend judgement" option.) These views are:
1. Not accepting that there are OT prophecies at all. (Ie. thinking that any apparent fulfillments of prophecy are actually explainable in terms of some combination of coincidence, self-fulfilling prophecy, misinterpretation, deliberate fulfillment, etc.) I'll call this "non-prophecism".So my basic question is, which of these positions are you trying to affirm? I trust you're not trying to prove the non-prophecist position. :-) That leaves weak prophecism and strong prophecism.2. Asserting that there are OT prophecies, but that the nature of the prophecies and their subsequent fulfillment is such that they have little or no apologetic value. A Christian who accepts this view affirms that there are OT prophecies fulfilled in Jesus, but thinks that *proving* there are OT prophecies cannot be done without relying on other, specifically Christians premises. To such a person, an argument from prophecy would be doomed to fail, because such an argument would have to be circular in nature. (Of course, such a person could still refer to fulfilled prophecies as part of their theological reasoning when dealing with other Christians. Denying the apologetic value of prophecy is not the same as denying the value of prophecy in general.) I'll call this "weak prophecism".
3. Asserting that there are OT prophecies, and believing that the existence of these prophecies can be proved without reference to specifically Christian premises, or to any other premises that the average skeptic would find objectionable. I'll call this "strong prophecism".
Let me make a few comments here.
I personally make a distinction between (1) overt messianic prophecies (e.g. Micah 5.2; Deut 18; Malachi 3) and (2) typologically-understood historical events or literary passages (e.g. Solomon building the temple and perhaps David's messianic spirit in Ps 22?). [However, I will 'confuse' this issue much later, when I explore the sometime mixing of the two...for example, the Branch in the prophets-what all did the prophets see?]
First, let me make some comments about OVERT messianix, before getting to the subject of TYPOLOGICAL messianix-the focus of your post...
Overt Messianix were given to inspire the people to trust, orient their thinking and expectations, and encourage them to covenant fidelity. Promises of a New Moses, or an Eternal Son of David, or an Eternal Priest, or the Suffering (and Sacrificial) Servant encouraged the people to trust in God's actions in history-as part of the mutual Covenant obligations. They were specifically forward looking statements, with some controlling-element content (e.g. 'a prophet like unto me' or 'a just shepherd-king' or 'a rejected Servant'). The web of concepts and expectations that would have grown over time around that prophecy would have been 'anchored' by the founding concept somewhat, so that the expectation never would have strayed 'too far'. It might become very broad-n-vague, or it might have become narrowly defined, but it was somehow anchored in the original disclosure/pronouncement.
The overt messianix were also given to assist in the identification of the messiah. Jesus words in Luke 12.54ff appeals to this purpose: He said to the crowd: "When you see a cloud rising in the west, immediately you say, `It's going to rain,' and it does. 55 And when the south wind blows, you say, `It's going to be hot,' and it is. 56 Hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of the earth and the sky. How is it that you don't know how to interpret this present time? , as does His Emmaus Road exposition to the less-than-illuminated disciples: 25 He said to them, "How foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! 26 Did not the Christ have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?" 27 And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself. (Luke 24.25).
Accordingly, they will have a range of individual identification-value (within that theological system, as you point out), which was the subject of several arguments in the gospels (e.g. John 7.40ff: 40 On hearing his words, some of the people said, "Surely this man is the Prophet." 41 Others said, "He is the Christ." Still others asked, "How can the Christ come from Galilee? 42 Does not the Scripture say that the Christ will come from David's family and from Bethlehem, the town where David lived?" 43 Thus the people were divided because of Jesus. ).
The interchange between Jesus and the disciples of John the Baptist (who was imprisoned at the time) makes this theme rather obvious:
John's disciples told him about all these things. Calling two of them, 19 he sent them to the Lord to ask, "Are you the one who was to come, or should we expect someone else?" 20 When the men came to Jesus, they said, "John the Baptist sent us to you to ask, `Are you the one who was to come, or should we expect someone else?'" 21 At that very time Jesus cured many who had diseases, sicknesses and evil spirits, and gave sight to many who were blind. 22 So he replied to the messengers, "Go back and report to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is preached to the poor. 23 Blessed is the man who does not fall away on account of me." (Luke 7.18ff)Jesus answered the question of his identity by an appeal to a group of messianic prophecies.
So, for me, the deliberate messianix are useful individually
as identification criteria for the messiah-to those looking for His arrival.
On the other hand, the individual messianic prophecies-by themselves-may
have little apologetic value. It is only when combined that they have some
'force' to them. The nature of this force arises from the "oddity" of the
intersection of the deliberate messianix in the person of Jesus of Nazareth.
As I mentioned above, the role of the messiah was so broad in scope
that he was often assumed to be multiple people, and the perceived contradictions
about His coming were the subject of theological debate (e.g. the example
of the rabbinix above-does he come in glory (Daniel) or in meekness on
a donkey (Zech)). In the passage above from John, they saw no way to reconcile
that the messiah was supposed to come from Bethlehem and from Galilee of
the Gentiles at the same time. We know how this 'contradiction' was resolved-Jesus
was born in Bethy but grew up in Nazareth.
The convergence of these prophecies in one Person was what was supposed
to 'clinch' the identification for Israel.
Since most of the recorded evangelism and 'apologetics' recorded in
NT times was to the Jews, it is no wonder that appeal to prophecy
was accepted (c.f. Acts 17.2f: As his custom was, Paul went into the
synagogue, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the Scriptures,
explaining and proving that the Christ had to suffer and rise from the
dead. "This Jesus I am proclaiming to you is the Christ," he said. ).
Even the appeal to miracle made in John's gospel (John 20.30: Jesus
did many other miraculous signs in the presence of his disciples, which
are not recorded in this book. 31 But these are written that you may believe
that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may
have life in his name. ), is not necessarily distinct from the prophecy
issue-since the messiah was SUPPOSED TO do many wonders and healings...So,
the crowd in John 7.30 specifically linked the two: At this they tried
to seize him, but no one laid a hand on him, because his time had not yet
come. 31 Still, many in the crowd put their faith in him. They said, "When
the Christ comes, will he do more miraculous signs than this man?" .
On the other hand, when Paul confronted those OUTSIDE that specific
theological framework (e.g. the Athenian philosophers in Acts 17.22ff,
who were polytheists), he uses the resurrection fact as his apologetic:
So, your general point about the primary value of messianix being for
those ALREADY "inside" the "broader" system, is probably correct. However,
I think there is definite force to the fulfillment of BOTH categories of
messianix (i.e. overt and typox) in a spin-off of a convergence
of evidence type of argument.
The 'convergence of evidence' argument is primarily useful for identification
purposes. But what I want to consider is the immense 'oddity' of this phenomenon
LOOKING LIKE THIS.
If I step as far back as I can from my worldview, and look at a collection
of ancient texts, predicting characteristics of some future leader, AND
THEN look at the characteristics of Jesus of Nazareth-I am struck by the
overall pattern of correspondence. The pattern is simply too 'odd' for
me to explain without recourse to SOME intelligent force-be it "God", or
conspiracy of the ruling elite, or literary fabrication. But the interconnecting
web of A SERIES of ancient texts (predicting certain details about some
future personage), matched with a later text (noting the same detail about
some historical individual) screams for an explanation!
And this series cannot be dismissed by simply noting that each individual
ancient text could apply to a whole set of people-it is the intersection
of these sets (like in a Venn diagram) that is the problem. At this level,
we have not even entered a theological arena-we are simply struggling to
come up with SOME KIND OF EXPLANATION for this mind-boggling 'coincidence'.
Notice that this is NOT dependence on the theological grids of those 'inside'
the system. In the case of overt messianix, I don't need an interpretive
grid-I have a 'crude' statement (e.g. a future ruler of extremely high
status to be born in Bethlehem, or a future religious leader coming to
his people on a donkey) that matches a common piece of historical experience-the
life of Jesus of Nazareth. That people around him called him 'God' and
'Lord' and "Christ' is immaterial to the problem-it is the simple confluence
of the details that suggests 'design'!
[Actually, the theological interpretations of the indigenous readers
makes the problem more interesting, in that they constitute another oddity
to explain about the system!--but more on that later...]
Now, I am not naïve about probability calculations, esp. in such
a potentially incestuous situation as jewish prophets, prophesying about
jewish messiahs, to jewish people(!)--the possibility of 'interference'
is so incredibility high. But I do recognize something that breaks normal
'linear' patterns and things that look non-random; and this is clearly
one.
This is not the place for me to go into the various alternatives as
to how to explain this strange convergence/confluence of predictions; it
is enough to suggest that the 'oddity' has a 'force' about it that requires
an explanation. Insofar as the "God-hypothesis" might do a better job of
explaining the data (both the convergence/confluence, and perhaps even
the 'theological presuppositions' of the natives) than do all rival hypotheses
about conspiracy or fabrication, then it would have apologetic force/value,
under the 'inference to the best explanation' model. And, given the absence
of any major uncertain variables, we would not be epistemically justified
in (1) rejecting it; or in (2) suspending judgment.
Therefore, I do consider overt messianic prophecy--when taken as historical
(and NOT theological) prediction of phenomena only (not CAUSES)--to have
apologetic value AS A WHOLE (and not as individual predictions). [As such,
it MIGHT look like non-messianic prophecy; the 'messianic' word can be
theologically loaded term, as opposed to 'religious leader' or 'king'.]
But you didn't ask me about OVERT messianix, now did you? But I ran
off at the mouth/keyboard anyway...So now to the subject of TYPOLOGICAL
messianix--the focus of your post...
As with most things that are useful or interesting, there are some subtleties
within even typox...
For example, it is one thing for an Israelite to look back on a passage
and understanding it typologically some four centuries later; it is another
altogether for an Israelite to look at a "current" passage and see some
typox-type element in it. In other words, when the informed Israelite heard/read/pondered
the Servant Songs of Isaiah--with the identity of the Servant constantly
alternating between Israel the nation, the sub-set Elect Remnant of Israel,
and the Messiah--were the typox-elements already there and somewhat explicit?
Was the prophecy itself already laden with typology, and hence did not
require an 'interpretive grid' to be used to see it (like in 3D glasses
or something)?
Another example might be the House of David. The whole notion of a "House
of David" is one of linear succession through time. A promise to David--and
to his 'house' (cf. 2 Sam 7.16: Your house and your kingdom will endure
forever before me; your throne will be established forever.'" )--already
contains an almost steady stream of types-antitypes...David-Solomon-Zerub*-Jesus...
So, I would have to make some distinction between events/concepts that
were 'incipiently' typological (to the original audience) and those that
would have been less obvious or not at all so to the original audience.
Now, this does not mean that the original audience could not have later
seen these events as typological, but only that it was not top-of-mind.
For example, if a prophet or sage would have engaged an informed Israelite
in reflection and discussion about the 'religious significance' of the
Passover Lamb, I expect that in most cases the perception of a typological
substrate might have surfaced or become explicit. I suspect that some of
the conversation on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24) was of this kind--with
lots of 'oh, I get it' responses involved.
Strangely, there are passages that fall into neither the overt nor the
typological categories-Ps 110 (used by Jesus in Matt 22.41ff), but hopefully
I can get to those later.
Do you see your response to Lippard as being intended to prove *to
the skeptic* that prophecy is a real phenomenon which proves Christianity?
Or do you merely wish to reassure the worried Christian that belief in
prophecy is indeed rational, without making any claims as to the value
of messianic prophecy as an *apologetic*?
Well, this is a bit tricky. The first intent (as I have mentioned before)
was merely to show that it was a matter of native interpretation.
In other words, in response to the claims that the Christians twisted these
passages to make them fit Jesus, I merely showed that this hermeneutic
was part of BOTH sides of the debate.
In light of the broader question--apologetics and rationality--I would
have to broaden my answer somewhat. I do not draw a hard line BETWEEN the
two alternatives you give me above (i.e. apologetics to skeptics or therapy
for neurotic Christians!) If something looks 'rational' to the Christian,
I don't feel comfortable saying that it COULD NOT have some persuasive
force (however small) to non-Christians, esp. if the range of phenomena
was broad enough.
Let me explain.
Convergence arguments look like "pattern" arguments. Someone can always
argue that the dots don't form ANY pattern, and the proponent cannot do
much more than simply 'point' again.
The Christian can, probably, accept the prophecies as legitimate--on
other grounds than the pattern/convergence warrant. For example, the Christian
is presumably already convinced (somehow) that Jesus was "much-more-than-man",
and accordingly had a privileged epistemic position about such things.
Then, with some level of confidence in NT historicity, the believer could
simply argue:
However, the Christian also might be generally uninformed about Jesus
self-understanding being grounded and explicated on the basis of OT prophecies,
and in this case the convergence/pattern argument might be persuasive.
It was thus with me. I personally remember reading the chapter in McDowell's
ETDAV over two decades ago. I remember not understanding half of what he
said (nor what the scripture passages meant--I was seriously biblically
illiterate), and feeling uneasy at his use of some of the 'vaguer' prophecies,
but by the time I got through the list, I was surprised at the epistemic
(and implicit at that time) force of the pattern. It just seemed 'too odd'
to be accidental or random or coincidental. (At the time, the idea of conspiracy
or fabrication did not cross my mind. That issue arose the following year
with the publication of The Passover Plot, which required some re-assessment
of some of the passages.)
So, I do think there is some apologetic force to messianic prophecy
AS A UNIT, based on convergence of evidence and ostensive-pattern types
of arguments. This does not mean it would 'persuade' a non-Christian NOR
a Christian of a different persuasion at all...We must never confuse epistemic
force (or apologetic force) and 'persuasions and conversions'! There are
so many more factors involved than simply rationality or evidence.
But, in light of your question, if I tried to construct a pattern of
ONLY typox-statements, the pattern would have to "do the convincing work"
for BOTH (1) the identification of the character-Jesus; AND (2) vindication
of the worldview under-girding the use of typox hermeneutics. If the pattern
were well integrated, and clearly discernible, then I suppose it could
succeed--but it would require a rather powerful pattern-force to do so.
And a pattern of ONLY overt messianix would only have to argue for the
identification of the character. Looking more like non-theological predictions
they can be treated as such. This would mean that some assumption of 'ability
to predict the future' could be suspended until we observed whether it
was done or not! [Fancy that, trying to see if prediction DID occur in
history BEFORE we decided IF IT COULD occur...;>) ] In this case, the pattern's
force would perhaps be due to the probabilities of convergence--what is
the likelihood of someone fitting these various characteristics, and how
many candidates do we have to choose from? In this case, the force would
be dependent on (1) how MANY data points we had; and (2) the level of detail
(e.g. city-names, monetary amounts, significant events).
There are other issues which we will have to get to, especially the
issue of deliberate fulfillment, but here I am just assuming that we have
appropriate qualified the 'dots' to where they CAN participate in the pattern.
Now, what about a hybrid pattern: some overt; some typox? As you note
below, the typox might give the appearance of more data points, but do
we lose something in the process?
It is unclear to me how the tradeoffs shake out in this case. The overt
predictions MAY lend credibility to the typox, by virtue of the fact that
they MAY 'authenticate' some 'hyper-natural' characteristics of the utterances
of that culture. In other words, a culture that could somehow produce a
high number of accurate predictions (messianic AND non-messianic) must
be accorded some 'special' status. It may even convince someone not to
pre-judge the typox-approach (e.g. as being groundless or not worthy of
analysis), and therefore 'ease' the requirements on the overall hybrid
pattern. Without some controls on the typox however, as we both are aware,
they will soon lose all force and degenerate into statements with no testable
consequences (e.g. "something bad will happen to someone, sometime in the
future").
My overall sense is that unless some controls are found for the
typox-process, then patterns of typox-only statements will have very little
force. If controls ARE found, which would allow some relatively predictable
method of 'mining' history for typox-predictions, then this would amount
to something less than overt, but something more than random-number-generator
quality typox. We would have a transformation schema (i.e. that transforms
historical event A into a prophetic statement X), but we would still need
the force of the overall pattern to lend credibility to the worldview creating
this process.
I'm asking this because the remainder of this letter is pretty much
irrelevant unless you are attempting to prove the strong prophecist position.
If you are attempting to prove the weak prophecist position, much of what
follows will appear to miss the point, though I hope you'll read it and
respond anyway.
I notice that I have abandoned your original trifurcation in this process
(although there was some ambiguity in your original statement--we both
keep toggling between messianix and typox in this discussion). I think
I could say this:
2. Concerning typology, your article goes out of its way to show
that both OT- and NT-era Jews understood history typologically. Although
you didn't say so explicitly, I am guessing that your reason for doing
this is because there exist OT verses which you would like to present to
the skeptic as examples of fulfilled prophecy, but which do not look like
convincing examples of fulfilled prophecy unless viewed through the lense
of typology. (I think the alleged virgin birth prophecy of Isa. 7:14 would
be a good example. The verse has a clear meaning within its own social
context, so by itself, it doesn't seem likely to be a prediction of a coming
virgin-born messiah seven centuries in its future. But if we add the concept
of typology, then it becomes possible to view the verse as having an additional
meaning above and beyond the obvious one, a meaning which can then be applied
to Jesus.)
As indicated before, the initial reason was to answer the hermeneutical
objections posed by Jim--that the native interpreters would NOT have seen
the events/personages as messianic. (There was also a personal issue for
me. I had always been uncomfortable with these types of fulfillments in
the NT, but had never had the time to study the background to see if that
was 'okay'. So, I also had to answer my own doubts and befuddlements about
the practice.)
At the present time, I would not use the typox-praxis as an argument
to 'prove' Christianity, but would only use it to demonstrate that the
Christian exegesis of the typox-messianix was not unreasonable, given Israel's
experience and self-understanding. As such it would be more a defensive
maneuver than offensive.
Now, I've made some assumptions about what you're arguing. I'm assuming
a strong prophecist position, and I'm assuming that you want to convince
the skeptic of the legitimacy of typology so that OT verses which would
otherwise appear unprophetic will now appear to the skeptic to be prophetic,
and therefore in need of an explanation of how these prophecies could be
fulfilled. Am I on the money so far? If not, correct me and ignore the
rest of the article. :-)
Actually, all I want to show in typox is that the Christian understanding
of the verse is possible (not demanded), given the historical
and literary context in which it was written.
Notice here, though, that I have given something up. The last statement
does NOT assume that the 'historical and literary context' is correct--which
is your point. I could produce a similar argument for flat-earthers being
legitimate, in their 'historical and literary context'. The truth-value
of the 'historical and literary context' cannot be proved "inside" (at
least not easily-I will argue for SOMETHING like this, though, later in
the piece).
Vindication for the typox-worldview might come from a number of sources:
Now, IF I am able to use some mix of the above to substantiate the typox-worldview,
then typox passages could contribute weight to the converging evidence
argument (subject to the control issue, of course).
But if I am, then I think you're making a bad argument.
The mistake in your argument is the implicit assumption that if you
can prove that the OT/NT Jews thought that typology is a valid way to interpret
history, then you have proved that typology is indeed a valid way to interpret
history. Your article goes to great lengths to demonstrate that the OT/NT
Jews viewed typology as a legitimate tool for interpreting history, and
I think in this respect you've succeeded. But of what relevance to me is
the ancient Jewish opinion on typology? Must I accept typology as a legitimate
way to interpret history solely because the OT/NT Jews did?
Not at all, I agree with you.
The simple fact that people today believe that the earth revolves around
the sun is NO REASON AT ALL for you to accept their position. It might
be considered reason to EVALUATE their position (esp. if large numbers
of people, with a very wide variety of backgrounds, education, skeptical
attitudes, etc. accept it).
Likewise, that OT/NT Jews believed that their history was typox-based
is NO REASON AT ALL for you to accept their position. It might be considered
reason to EVALUATE their position (esp. if their related experiences of
overt prophecy/fulfillment, and other 'odd' things about them and their
writings demonstrate some prima facie credibility to their bizarre
understandings.)
As already admitted, the main value of an analysis of typox is in the
area of Jewish-Christian discussions about messianic authentication.
I think that I can answer the above question in the negative, at
least tentatively. First of all, refusing to admit typology into my worldview
will *not* result in my misinterpreting biblical documents, nor does it
mean that I am applying an inappropriately modern standard to the biblical
documents. In trying to understand ancient documents, we need to understand
the cultural milieu in which they arose, but we do *not* need to actually
adopt the beliefs of that culture. Thus, I can reject typology personally,
so long as I bear in mind that the OT/NT Jews took it seriously, and therefore
OT and NT docs need to be interpreted from that sort of viewpoint.
Correct.
The only caveat here would be that you would need a disclaimer on your
rejection (perhaps). Unless you had already worked through the various
ways to authenticate the typox-worldview (given above), your rejection
would have to be 'provisional'. In other words, you would have to say that
you had not encountered any data/arguments that had 'force' to you so
far, but that you had not personally examined any/many of the pro-offered
arguments (unless you had, of course).
To put it another way, if you prove that the early church took typology
seriously, then you have proved that *they* had a basis for supposing Isa.
7:14 to be a prophecy of Jesus. But you have *not* proved that *I* ought
to do so as well. If you want *me* to accept that the child in Isa. 7:14
was a type for which Jesus was the antitype, then it is *me*, not the early
church, who must be convinced of the legitimacy of typology. Otherwise,
Isa. 7:14 will look to me like a verse which originally had nothing to
do with Jesus, but was later so interpreted thanks to the typological presuppositions
of the early church. More on this in section #5 below.
I do not have a problem with the part of the above about YOU being 'exempt',
but the phrase 'typological presuppositions of the early church' is a bit
problematic for me.
First of all, it was the 'early church' as a sect of Judaism.
Typology is a Jewish thing first, and a Christian thing by virtue of our
Jewish heritage. We need to make sure this continuity is maintained in
the discussion. (As I have indicated elsewhere, non-Christian Jews saw
a 'messiah' in the verse as well.)
Secondly, it is a bit misleading to call them 'presuppositions'. They
were patterns of experience (like your pattern of experiencing repetitive
'acts of' gravity) that became part of their mindset. These were NOT abstract
theological principles some rabbi came up with somewhere; instead, they
were 'forced' on Israel by the pattern of their experiences as a nation
in the OT.
And this brings us to my next point: the concept of typology does
not exist in a vacuum. The concept of typology rests on certain presuppositions.
Your own article spelled out the main one: "The *basis* of typology is
God's consistent activity in the history of his chosen people." That single
sentence contains four presuppositions: That there is a god at all, that
this god has a chosen people (namely the Jews), that this god interacts
with the historical events that happen to and around his chosen people,
and that this god performs this interaction (at least part of the time)
in a "typological" fashion. These are obviously all presuppositions which
I do not share. And so long as I do not share these presuppositions, it
is perfectly rational for me to refuse to accept typology as a legitimate
way to interpret history.
Yes, but...
"Rational" doesn't say much in a sentence like that. If someone held
flat-earth presuppositions today, then it would be perfectly 'rational'
(in the same sense it is being used in your last sentence above) for them
to believe that they would fall off the earth if they came to the edge
(presumably somewhere in Columbus?). I am not necessarily glupping your
in with flat-earthers, but I do want to point out that 'rational'--in the
sense you use it above--is strictly a formal (in the logic sense) characteristic,
and not in any way related to 'truth'.
Instead, most of us would ask the different question--"are your presuppositions
rational?"--which is an altogether different question. Some presuppositions
are truly "pre-" (e.g. 'all colored objects are extended'), but most of
what we popularly call presuppositions are in fact, conclusions of other
reasoning, intuition, or evidence chains (e.g. strong atheism, the existence
of Bill Clinton, the universality of the law of gravity, the intrinsic
worth of our children).
But...for purposes of this discussion of typology, you are not required
to see the world through the typox-glasses UNTIL it you have warrant to
do so. (Some means to which were delineated above.)
Now in theory, it may be possible to get me to admit typology into
my worldview, by first proving the presuppositions upon which it is based.
In practice, I suspect this would result in your having to first prove
Christianity before you could begin to prove typology.
One minor point here--typox is not a distinctly Christian 'thing'; we
inherited it from traditional Judaism.
But if you must first prove Christianity to prove typology, then
typology can scarcely be used as a foundation upon which to build a defense
of Christianity.
Actually, I tend to disagree-even in typox. As a WHOLE, the set of ALL
actual typox (i.e. non-messianic ones) could be 'tested' against actual
historical events. Methodologically, this would mean we would formulate
a hypothesis that OT events in Judaism followed a predictable pattern--as
described by the 'rules' of typox (e.g. escalation, continuity); we would
then take the events of Judaism and see if the typox system was an adequate
predictor of those patterns. If we accept typox as the hypothesis to
be tested, then if the implicates of that hypothesis are 'found' in history
(at some statistical threshold), then according to reasonable scientific
praxis, we should accept the hypothesis. [This is a grossly simplified
view of theory-confirmation in philosophy of science, of course, but it
is accurate enough to illustrate that even typox-views COULD be validated
under 'inference to the best explanation' type of verification schemes
(apart from ANY theological substrate.)]
Let me actually comment on this last point. Contemporary sub-atomic
physicists generally do not believe that their 'theories and entities'
have any 'descriptive correspondence' to what is 'really there' at that
level of physics. They speak of physics 'as language' and theories as simply
means of predicting observations. They have generally abandoned asking
ontological questions about 'correspondence' and have moved on to the more
'detached' (and less metaphysical) perspective of 'operationalism'. The
basis or ground for why their theories 'work' well at predicting
observations is not even discussed vigorously now. [see Inventing Reality:
Physics as Language by Bruce Gregory, Wiley Science: 1990]
What I am suggesting in this small part of the response is that the
same kind of 'ignoring the why' could be used in testing the 'if and what'
of a typox-theory (as a predictor , or retro-dictor in historical studies).
So I do think it can be evaluated without recourse to "near" Christian
presuppositions. ["far" Christian presuppositions, on the other hand, being
those of adequate grounding for rationality, intelligibility of history
and experience, correspondence of thinker and 'thinkee', etc.--those epistemological
presuppositions that the Van Tillians like to harp upon].
But, let me hasten to add...Although I feel confident that typox could
be tested under 'best inference' rules, I do not hazard a guess as to whether
or not it would succeed as a 'more probable' hypothesis. [I would have
to go back through the typox events of the OT and see if we have adequate
number of cases for data.]
Now, if you're content to argue for the weak prophecism position,
this is no big deal. But if you want to go for the gusto by arguing the
strong prophecism position, this is a major problem. The issue forces the
strong prophecist into a dilemma whereby he must either abandon typological
arguments when presenting the argument from prophecy (thereby weaking the
whole argument, since many of the OT verses would no longer look like prophecies)
or find some way to prove typology to the skeptic without turning the whole
argument into a vicious circle.
Again, under a 'best explanation' approach, I think I could mix the
two and use a combined system as the hypothesis. If I can find sufficient
'control structures', so that the typox-statements I want to include in
the overall theory do NOT look like 'ad hoc' "patches" (e.g. the epicycle
problem, under the criterion of parsimony), then I may have a better and
more robust retrodictive system WITH THEM than WITHOUT THEM. Again, everything
in this approach would hang on finding some way to find the 'logic' or
structure in typox identifications, so that I get the fewest number of
hypothetical statements for the theory.
The combined set of overt and typox messianix then might be a better
predictor of the events of biblical history than the overt-only theory,
since it will of course have to retrodict more data points, and correspondingly
have a higher confirmation-set (assuming it works). If it worked though,
as a retrodictor, then the typox-structure of Israel's history would be
confirmed. [Notice, though, that using this approach I don't get God in
here (that is the 'what' versus 'why' question I discussed in subatomix
earlier); I only find the pattern and validate the pattern. To move to
'God caused history to eventuate this way' is a different step.]
So I think that more contemporary philosophy of science approaches to
theory-confirmation allow us to (1) transcend the more basic 'it is either
circular or its not' kinda scenario; as well as to (2) allow us test the
system as a system.
3. That isn't the only problem with the typology concept as applied
to questions of messianic prophecy. Let us suppose that the above problem
could be resolved and that the skeptic could be convinced that the Jewish
typological theory of history is true. Does this somehow strengthen the
argument from prophey? As it happens, it does the exact opposite.
The problem here is that the argument from prophecy is basically
a statistical one. The argument states that the odds of these prophecies
coming true by coincidence are so low that we may be certain that it wasn't
just chance, and so God must have be invoved. (This is a vast oversimplification,
of course!) But typological interpretation, once allowed, undermines the
statistical basis of the argument by making it more likely that a chance
fulfillment will occur.
Minor point: Strictly speaking, it would not "undermine" it as much
as it might "weaken" it. As the composite or aggregate probability got
smaller, the argument would grow progressively more diluted and less forceful
(all other things being equal), but the process would be a linear one ('stronger-strong-weaker-weak'),
instead of 'some force-no force').
Here's why. Consider a randomly selected OT verse, and a randomly
selected verse from the gospels. There is a finite chance, which we'll
call p[literal], that the prima facie meaning of the OT verse will appear
to be a prophecy fulfilled in the NT verse. ("Prima facie meaning", of
course, is defined in terms of what meaning would have been obvious to
a reader in the original context in which the document was written, *not*
in terms of what meaning would have been obvious to us!) If we permit only
the prima facie meanings of verses to be considered when presenting the
argument from prophecy, then the odds of that OT-NT pair coincidentally
looking like a fulfilled prophecy will be p[literal].
Okay, here your argument will begin to get more detailed, so I will
need to make my comments more 'real-time'. To wit, I first need to make
a point about the 'prima facie' meaning.
If, as I have argued, typology was part of Israel's OT experience/expectation,
and not simply some after the fact hermeneutic forced on the OT texts by
post-OT rabbis, then the prima facie meaning very probably already
HAD a typological 'shadow'. In other words, if the native hearer (of some
basic linguistic and civil competency) saw some event of significance happen
to King David, then there is a good chance (based on the data discussed
in the article on typox) that they would have had a typox-orientation
to the event in question--at the outset. That is, typox-orientation may
already be part of the prima facie meaning--and I think it was--so
the distinction is not hard-and-fast. [I do not know at this point how
important the distinction is to your argument, but we will see later to
what extent my point is relevant.]
Another MAJOR point that needs to be made here is that non-typox prophecy
is not subject to typox; it has a 'prima facie' meaning that is already
totally futuristic. This means that probability assessments will have to
start from the base of non-prophetic material anyway.
So, what we have to work with are:
Add typology to the mix, though, and the odds start to go up. Typology
would allow OT verses (or at least some of them) to be interpreted a having
a second meaning, above and beyond the prima facie meaning. This secondary
meaning also has a finite chance of accidentally appearing to fulfill the
NT verse, which we'll call p[typological]. Then the probability of the
OT verse accidentally appearing to fulfill the NT verse is now:
p[literal] + p[typological] - p[literal]*p[typological]
which is always equal to or larger than p[literal] alone. (In practice,
it will be larger, unless p[literal] = 1.)
I see the problem now...Since there is NO p[literal] at all (since it
is only the typox that creates the possibility of attaching a NT verse),
it is zero. That reduces the formula:
The mistake in the argument is that there is ONLY p[typox] for a non-overtly-prophetic
passage; there is NO such thing as p[literal] for such statements.
Hence, we have ONLY p[literal] for overtly prophetic texts and ONLY
p[typox] for all (or some subset--see below) others.
Thus, by permitting the use of typological interpretations of OT
verses, we have increased the odds of accidental fulfillments, thus making
the argument from prophecy less compelling. So the strong prophecist's
ploy to strengthen the argument by using typology to increase the number
of prophecies apparently fulfilled ends up backfiring. Sure, there are
more cases of fulfilled prophecy to present, but the odds finding a naturalistic
explanation for the fulfillments have increased due to the presence of
the extra interpretations.
I think we can see from my above points that this paragraph was built
on a mistaken understanding of p[literal]. And correspondingly, the odds
of finding a naturalistic explanation have not changed--one way or another.
The use of typox MAY STILL HAVE helped the overall 'system' argument--in
terms of predicting more data etc.
4. In fact, the case is actually worse than that. The problem is
that typological interpretation does not seem to be an exact science. Indeed,
your article pointed out that there is room for ambiguity in the typological
interpretation of events, and that this ambiguity could lead to abuse.
But I'm not sure that you've really thought through the implications of
this ambiguity. (This charge really only applies if you intend to argue
the strong prophecist position. If not, then I've misunderstood you, so
never mind. :-)
Your article offered only a few controls on typological interpretation.
(Ie. ruling out isolated events and "minor characters", for instance, and
saying that the antitype must somehow be "greater than" the type.) Beyond
that, it seems to be anything goes. That being the case, it seems reasonable
to suppose that any particular major character, event, or institution in
the OT could serve as the type for not just one but *several* possible
antitypes. (And in view of the widely divergent messianic expectations
present among 1st-century Jews, it seems that this is exactly what happened.)
In terms of OT-NT verse pairs, it follows that if the OT verse mentions
a major character, event, or institution, then that verse has not just
*one* but *several* possible interpretations, all of which are "legitimate"
as far as typological method goes.
As you point out, I pointed out, that typox does have considerable 'flexibility'
in it, and I did not explore any of the boundary conditions and constraints
on the use of typox in OT history. Perhaps I should do some of that here.
So now, the odds of a chance fulfillment occurring are... well, too
complicated to draw a formula for in ASCII, but it's basically the probability
of the union over the literal interpretation, and all typological interpretations
from 1 to n. The greater the value of n, the more the odds increase. Since
n could plausibly run into the dozens or even hundreds, the odds of any
one OT-NT verse pair containing an interpretation which coincidentally
fulfills some aspect of Jesus life goes up dramatically.
It is here that I need to bring in a different control element--the
issue of interpretive community. The standards for deciding if some
typox-pair was reasonable or plausible would have been consensus
standards. If, for example, I tried to pawn off on the 1st century
Jewish or Christian community the following pair:
NT fulfillment: "It was the third hour when they crucified him." (Mark
15.25). This is further complicated by the fact that the Jewish-Christians 'inherited'
a wide range of messianic expectations to begin with. Probabilities had
already materialized in clusters of prophetic passages, including overt
and typox statements (cf. also Qumran's collections of prophetic proof-texts).
This brings me to a main concern I have about approaches like yours
and Stoner's--all pairs do NOT have the same 'probability'--the field of
possible "events" is textured, if you will. It is the same problem with
probability calculations around evolution occurring. Some Creationist advocates
will make an argument that there were not enough seconds in the universe's
history to produce enough random "collisions" to produce this macro-ordered
universe, but what he may not always deal with is the fact that "all collisions
are not equal". One "successful" collision would structure the universe
differently FOREVER (e.g. by creating different fields and options and
energy exchange values), and re-set all subsequent probabilities. The field
was simply not homogenous--it was textured by intrinsic characteristics
of the fields and particles and waves etc, and was re-defined by the prior
moment's context...(Of course, the Evolutionist has the opposite, Platonic
problem--he is starting with huge amounts of order already, in the regularity,
propensities, and abilities to enter into 'collisions', of the elementary
particles. He has already gratuitously assumed an orderly universe and natural
law context, in his attempts to explain macro-order in the universe).
The same is true about messianic prophecy; all it takes is one Deut
18.15-19 or a 2 Sam 7 to 'structure' future interpretation. Metaphorically,
its sorta like a strange attractor that creates levels of order within
a chaotic system. Linguistically, it is like the building of semantic context
as we parse a sentence--each cumulative unit 'restricts' the range of semantic
possibilities of the as-yet-unread words. Although later words CAN force
us to 're-parse' the previous accumulated meaning (e.g. irony, co-locutional
clashes), these are the exception rather than the rule. [Notice how this
situation actually happened in the life of Jesus. The various messianic
strains about New Moses, High Priest, Son of David, Son of Man, etc., were
not generally understood as describing the same individual--many in Israel
expected multiple messiahs, with multiple functions--they could not put
it all together. Jesus forced a recalibration of this, by assuming all
these roles within His own life and ministry. Jews who had parsed the OT
in a different way, were forced to re-parse it when confronted with a Risen
Lord! They had been 'close enough' to recognize Him, but 'far enough off'
to need re-setting.]
What this means is that later verses of the bible are qualified by earlier
verses (surprise, surprise!). Although newness can occur (e.g. the New
Covenant), the basic spectral bands were set in the Abrahamic and Mosaic
events and disclosures. Probabilities may be actually drastically narrowed
by this tunneling process.
And that's just a single OT-NT verse pair. Most strong prophecists
rely heavily on typological interpretations when presenting the argument
from prophecy, so we are now dealing with dozens, hundreds, or even thousands
of "typologically correct" interpretations, from which the strong prophecist
can pick and choose as he wishes in order to find convincing examples of
apparently fulfilled prophecy. At this point, the argument has pretty much
lost all credibility from a statistical point of view. There are so many
possible types, and so many more possible antitypes, that is becomes almost
trivial to find a few dozen, or even a few hundred, examples of OT verses
which appear to have been fulfilled in Jesus.
Actually, the issue is sorta closed. (The historical aspect you will
raise in the next section.) Today's Christian doesn't try to find any more
prophecies about Jesus' first coming; we simply have enough given to us
by the 1st century gospel and epistle authors who were so much more familiar
with the practice and limits of typox. And, as I suggested earlier, I am
not sure a Christian today would 'lead with' typox; it would make so much
more sense to 'lead with' overt, and then adduce RELATED typox (a la
the 1st century 'clustering' technique).
5. There is a rather devastating implication of typology that I don't
think you've considered. As I mentioned earlier, your article goes out
of the way to show that both OT and NT Jews viewed typological interpretation
as a legitimate way to understand history (and thus the OT). What you don't
seem to have noticed is that the skeptic can use this very fact as the
basis of a naturalistic explanation of the apparent fulfillment of prophecy.
The argument might go like this: The early church inherited from
their Jewish cultural milieu a belief in the validity of typological interpretations
of history. Thus, they believed that God's plan for salvation was "foretold"
in the history of Israel, as recorded in the OT. Since they believed that
Jesus played a pivotal role in God's plan for salvation, it was natural
for them to believe that various aspects of Jesus' life was also "foretold"
in the history of Israel. From these premises, it was logical for them
to conclude that by examining the OT carefully, they could discern "prophecies"
of Jesus in the events described by the OT. So they went to work looking
for such prophecies. (Obviously I don't mean they all got together and
set about looking for them as some sort of organized project, but I think
you know what I mean.) OT verses which had typological interpretations
which could plausibly be attributed to Jesus were added to the "catalog"
of fulfilled prophecies. OT verses which had no typological interpretations
(or at least no typological interpretations which could plausibly be applied
to Jesus' life) were simply ignored as referring to something or someone
other than Jesus. Since there are so many OT verses, and since each verse
could often be interpreted in multiple ways, it is little wonder that they
were able to find so many apparent fulfillments of prophecy.
A couple of comments here:
So, we seem to have multiple controls on the process, and the situation
does not seem as arbitrary as one might think.
The above argument, when refined, could prove to be quite powerful.
It explains the apparent fulfillment of prophecy as well as the strong
prophecist's position. It does so without relying on any premises save
those which the skeptic and Christian can agree on. And it is simpler,
in the Occam's Razor sense, and so is the better theory. And this is *without*
any consideration of issues such as legendary accretion, the non-independence
of the probability distribution functions of some of the prophecies, or
the amount of confidence with which we can affirm the various events of
Jesus' life. Suddenly, the typological theory of interpreting history starts
to look less useful to the strong prophecist, and the argument from prophecy
starts to look less like "hard data" and more like a case of seeing what
you want to see.
Well, I suppose I have already indicated where I see issues/problems
for this position:
That's all I have for now. I'd be interested in hearing your comments.
Take care!
Sincerely,
Rob Berry
Thanks for the great questions, as usual..hope all is well...glenn (5/17/97)
Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said:
"Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. 23 For
as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even
found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. Now what you worship
as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you. 24 "The God who made
the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does
not live in temples built by hands. 25 And he is not served by human hands,
as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath
and everything else. 26 From one man he made every nation of men, that
they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for
them and the exact places where they should live. 27 God did this so that
men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he
is not far from each one of us. 28 `For in him we live and move and have
our being.' As some of your own poets have said, `We are his offspring.'
29 "Therefore since we are God's offspring, we should not think that the
divine being is like gold or silver or stone-an image made by man's design
and skill. 30 In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands
all people everywhere to repent. 31 For he has set a day when he will judge
the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof
of this to all men by raising him from the dead."
And when confronting the equally non-Jewish world of Lystra (Acts 14.8-18)
Paul appeals to predictability of nature and to the common goodness of
life. The 'power' of the apostolic message had already been authenticated
to the hearers by the healing miracles.
......................................................................
H1: Jesus taught that OT prophecy pointed to Him,
[I have omitted several steps in the above, but this should still approximate
the content well enough. Notice too that the believer only has to accept
the historicity of related passages in the NT, not ALL of it, nor even
some theological doctrine of 'inspiration'. Also, note that this argument
is NOT airtight. Jesus could have a BETTER understanding, WITHOUT it being
a CORRECT one, but even as such the believer would still be warranted in
accepting it--as of more credibility than his/her own. However, if the
case were that Jesus were somehow omniscient--a la deity--then the
argument is correspondingly stronger.]
H2: Jesus occupies a much better and privileged epistemic position
(than I).
CX: Therefore, (I defer to Jesus' knowledge, and agree with Him that)
OT prophecy legitimately pointed to Him
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0 + p[typox] - (0)* p[typox]
above to p[typox]--what we started out with at the beginning.
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There are no doubt other controls on this, but I will have to develop them
later. These above would already greatly narrow the range of verses capable
of being interpreted typox-wise. With each verse that is excluded, the
possibility of random association goes down, of course.
......................................................................
OT1: "During the war between the house of Saul and the house
of David, Abner had been strengthening his own position in the house of
Saul" (2 Samuel 3.6)
they would laugh their heads off, and brand me a loony! Why? Because there
were enough intrinsic controls to keep this type of pairing from even getting
a hearing. Now, this is NOT to say that the rabbis could not come up with
some really weird interpretations--for they obviously did. Some of the
arguments in the Midrash sound worse than the above example, to be sure.
But through argumentation and dialogue, the community would accept some
as being possible, and reject some as being 'stupid'. At the extreme boundary,
this was sometimes a community criterion of heresy.
......................................................................
The Christian Jew started with multiple sets of messianic
expectations. He did not have to add to these--he merely had to select
the correct one(s) and combine them into one person. So the process was
much more selective than creative.
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[ .... mpberry.html ........ ]
From: The
Christian ThinkTank...[https://www.Christianthinktank.com]
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