The Self-Donation of God. Jack D. Kilcrease
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sin, there would be eschatological renewal and the return from exile: “I will remember my covenant with Jacob and my covenant with Isaac and my covenant with Abraham” (Lev 26:42). St. Paul observes in Galatians 3:13–25, the Mosaic record demonstrates that the Abrahamic covenant of grace (or more properly, his “testament,” as Paul puts it) precedes and in fact stands as separate from the Sinaitic covenant of law. In contrast to the Abrahamic testament of unilateral promise and blessings, the Sinaitic covenant entails a long list of demands and curses. The reception of the two covenants is different as well. Von Rad notes that Abraham is passive and asleep as he receives the unilateral covenant of grace (Gen 15). By contrast, we are told that the Israelites were called upon to actively receive and to perform the works of the Sinaitic covenant: “Moses came and told the people all the words of the Lord and all the rules. And all the people answered with one voice and said, ‘All the words that the Lord has spoken we will do’” (Exod 24:3).36
Therefore, YHWH’s dealing with Israel takes on a paradoxically dual character. On the one hand, God has pledged himself to Israel and will fulfill his promises to it in spite of every obstacle. On the other hand, the covenant of Sinai is equally valid and demands on the part of Israel a real heartfelt obedience to God’s commandments. Both words from God are valid and therefore the unconditional nature of the former continuously comes into conflict with the conditional nature of the latter throughout the history of salvation. In the book of Hosea, the prophet enacts the sign of this paradoxical situation by marrying a prostitute (Hos 1, 3). As a sign of Israel’s state of affairs, Hosea’s marriage presupposes the validity of the covenant of the law, as well as God’s unilateral and unconditional faithfulness to Israel. Israel is rightly imputed with sin for having broken the law by prostituting itself to the nations, but YHWH must remain true to his promise and remains “married” to Israel in spite of its apostasy.
The promise of YHWH to Israel throughout the prophetic literature is that ultimately God’s own faithfulness will triumph over the impediments of human sin and divine wrath. Therefore, as early as the book of Deuteronomy (chapters 28–32), we have a promise of a second exodus and renewal of the divine-human relationship. Similar to the prophetic writings of Hosea, we have the promise of a second exodus wherein God will reestablish Israel’s status (Hos 11–14).37
Isaiah 40–66 goes further and envisions a universal end to exile. God, who due to Israel’s sin has withdrawn his personal presence from his people and his dwelling place Zion, is said to be returning through a miraculous desert highway (40:3–6). He will do this because he will forgive Israel’s sin (40:2). Not only will Israel return to Zion, the city of YHWH’s presence (Isa 44–45), but the Gentiles who also suffer the universal exile from God’s presence will stream from the whole expanse of creation to worship the true God (Isa 45:23).
In the case of Ezekiel, God promises the prophet that he himself will follow the Jews into the exile he has enacted upon them and thereby stand in solidarity with them: “Therefore say, ‘Thus says the Lord God: Though I removed them far off among the nations, and though I scattered them among the countries, yet I have been a sanctuary to them for a while in the countries where they have gone’” (Ezek 11:16, emphasis added). Later in the book, when there is a prophecy of the return from exile, restoration takes the form of a metaphorical resurrection from the dead (i.e., the restoration of the life and fecundity of creation, Ezek 37:1–14), the rebuilding of an elaborate eschatological temple (40–48), and return of the presence of God (37:27, 43:1–12). This time though, the presence of the divine glory is not just restricted to the holy of holies, but permeates the entire nation: “My dwelling place will be with them; I will be their God, and they will be my people. Then the nations will know that I the Lord make Israel holy, when my sanctuary is among them forever” (37:27). Beale in his study on chapters 40–48 of Ezekiel has demonstrated that the restored Jerusalem is itself not only a temple-city (i.e., a perpetual arena of the self-donating presence of God), but displays significant features that make it similar to the garden of Eden.38
The apocalyptic tradition, as embodied in the book of Daniel (though also in Isa 26 and a number of other Old Testament texts), continues this line of thought in seeing a restoration of creation through a resurrection of the dead: “And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt” (Dan 12:2).39 Here we may observe that Daniel posits a final restoration for some, (an eternal return from exile and reversal of the effects of the Fall as we have it in Genesis 3) and for others an infinite and eternal eschatological judgment (who will stay in an eternal state of exile). In this sense, God’s promises of life and freedom to Israel are fulfilled and expanded.
This restoration does not merely extend to new and eternal bodily life. The presence of God will not just return to resurrected Israel, but the resurrected will share the glory of YHWH: “And those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky above; and those who turn many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever” (12:3). Walther Eichrodt makes a similar connection and observes: “The Daniel passage is unique in laying stress on the share in the divine light-glory, an image which is in any case entirely in keeping with the conception of God’s new world as a revelation of the divine kavod [glory].”40 Daniel 2 and 7 also envision the restoration of Edenic harmony and the return from cosmic exile in the form of the destruction of the idolater’s demonic kingdoms, and their replacement by God’s own kingdom. Much like in Genesis 1, where the humans made in God’s image are given dominion on the earth, the Messiah is described in Daniel 7 as “one like a son of man” (v. 13) being given “dominion and glory and a kingdom” (v. 14). Moreover, as Beale has also noted concerning Daniel 2, the vision of the growing mountain which fills the entire creation is suggestive of the universalization of the Temple Mount and therefore the donation of divine presence to the whole creation.41
In summary, we therefore may observe throughout the Old Testament a pattern of exile and return, both in the understanding of Israel’s own history, but also forming the background for creation and the eschton. This pattern of divine activity as we can observe is rooted in YHWH’s dual relation with Israel as recorded in the historical accounts of the establishment of the law and gospel.
Mediators of the Promise: An Introduction
The first mediatorial figure of the Old Testament must be thought to be Adam. As we shall see, the Genesis account portrays Adam as prophet, priest, and king.42 He possesses the universal dominion of kingship (Gen 1:28), he is placed over Eden as its ruling high priest (we will see evidence of this in the discussion of priestly mediation), and he was first to be given the Word of God (2:15–17). Nevertheless, he failed in his exercise of his mediatorial position and Israel was elected as the new carrier of the promise of universal redemption (3:15).
As previously noted, the Old Testament envisions creation and the history of salvation as existing within a matrix of exile and return. Within the pre-exilic history of Israel both the inspired prophets and the historians recognized YHWH’s patient and persistent attempts to maintain his gracious promise to Israel. In particular, such a gracious purpose takes the form of YHWH’s election of a series of mediatorial figures whose function it was to maintain the relationship between God and his people. Because of YHWH’s own self-donation as Israel’s God, he himself provided means of dealing with Israel’s failure to fulfill the law through his appointed mediators. Throughout the Old Testament such mediators took the forms of prophets, priests, and kings. Since, as the Apostle Paul tells us, there is but “one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus” (1 Tim 2:5), we must view these mediators as deficient in their roles as fulfillers of the law, but nevertheless efficient in prefiguring Christ. Their lack of success at resolving the tension between the law and the gospel creates the context wherein