BIBLICAL Horizons, No. 54
October, 1993
Copyright 1993, Biblical Horizons
I have received a number of letters asking for my comments on this difficult passage. Here is my best shot!
This statement opens a new section in 1 Corinthians that extends through chapter 14. This section deals with disorders in worship connected with prayer and the Lord’s Supper, and especially with miraculous Spirit-given gifts.
Paul mentions the traditions of the Church here, by which he means God-given structures of order that should be observed everywhere. He mentions them again at the end of this discussion (v. 16), and also in 11:23, 14:33 (cp. 14:40). What Paul does in 11:3-15 is to give an explanation of the requirements regarding headgear, but he ends in verse 16 by saying that if anyone is contentious and does not want to accept his explanations, the fact is that what he is requiring is the universal custom of the Church and is to be obeyed whether you like it or not!
The word "man" here is not generic but refers to males. The head of every man in the Church is Christ. Similarly, the head of every woman is some man. Often this will be a husband, but it may be a father or brother. In the case of widows it might be the elders of the Church.
Does this make women inferior to men? No, because Paul adds that the head of Christ is God. Christ is in fact also God. Christ is not inferior to God, but the Son rejoices in His role as the glory of the Father under the Father’s headship. In the same way, women are not inferior to men, but they will find their greatest happiness in being the glory of their men.
This passage has to do with "praying or prophesying" (vv. 4-5). In 1 Corinthians 11-14, prophesying refers to the special gift of prophecy, which has ceased with the completion of the canon of Scripture. Similarly, the only other reference to prayer in this book is to praying in tongues in 1 Corinthians 14. Thus Godet and some other commentators have suggested that both praying and prophesying here refer to the temporary gifts of the first phase of the New Covenant era, which ceased in ad 70.
We notice that these verses do not say anything about the rest of the worship service. There is no requirement about headgear for the Lord’s Supper or for the teaching part of the service. Thus, these verses do not teach that "women should wear hats in church." The most they could teach is that women should cover their heads during prayer (assuming what is in view is plain prayer, and not praying in tongues).
There is a play on the word "head" in these verses. Verse 3 establishes that the "head" over someone is the authority over that person. Here in verse 4, the meaning is that if a man covers his head during prayer, he shames his Head, that is, Christ. Why this is so, we shall discuss below.
If a woman prays or prophesies with her head uncovered, she shames her head, which is her man (husband, father, brother, elders).
Nobody knows for certain what covering the woman’s head means. Scholars are divided between two alternatives: Either the woman’s head is covered by having her hair bound up on her head and not left loose (compare Numbers 5:18), or her head is covered with some kind of shawl or veil. (Wearing a hat to church does not fulfill the particulars of this passage.) Since we don’t know what is actually being commanded here, we cannot obey it.
I draw from this that if God were concerned that the Church of all times observe the letter of this paragraph, He would have provided the Church with enough information to know what was being commanded. He did not do so, and so we are not supposed to worry about the particulars. (Similarly, nobody knows what it means not to round the corners of your head in Leviticus 19:27, so it is impossible to obey the letter of this command, which was only for Israel anyway.)
Paul’s argument seems to be this: How would you ladies like to have your hair cut off? If that would embarrass you, then consider that when you pray in tongues uncovered, you embarrass your man. Or to put it another way, if a woman will not honor her man by covering herself while prophesying, then she should be dishonored by having her hair cut off. Moreover, whether these women realized it or not, by shaming their men they were shaming themselves before God, and so they might as well have their hair cut off.
Commentators routinely discuss customs in Corinth at this point, but I don’t think that is what is in view. The Spirit-given gifts in operation in the Corinthian church were part of the activity by which God was knitting Jew and Gentile into one new man in Christ during the interim period of ad 30-70. The symbolism Paul is requiring of men and women in this passage is tied to the special gifts of prayer and prophecy, not to the life of the Church in general. Tongues were a sign to Israel, according to chapter 14, and both tongues and prophecy were part of the Church-forming and Bible-writing activity of the interim period. Thus, the more probable background for the symbolism is the Sinaitic law. (Moreover, as a general rule I think we should interpret New Testament statements in the light of the Old Testament as much as possible, instead of immediately running out to real or supposed customs in the Greco-Roman world.)
Paul says in verse 15 that the woman’s hair is her glory. Glory shines forth, and hair grows forth from our body. Thus, when David’s men had their beards pulled out, their glory was gone and they were shamed (2 Sam. 10:4-5). The warbride has her head shaved and her nails cut, indicating the removal of the old glory of her old life, and then she grows new hair and nails in the new household (Dt. 21:12).
So, Paul’s point is that if a woman removes glory from her man, then her glory should also be removed: eye for eye, tooth for tooth, glory for glory.
Glory is something that shines forth. This will be clearer when we consider verses 8-9:
Now we have some relationships: Man comes from God, and thus is the shining forth or glory of God. This is in fact equally true of men and women. Woman comes from man’s side, and thus is the shining forth or glory of man. For this reason, a man’s glory is not his hair but his woman. For a man to glory in his hair is unnatural, for it involves a rejection of woman. It is essentially homosexual. We shall return to this below. Similarly, a woman’s glory, what shines forth from her, is her hair.
Verse 9 also explains how the woman is the glory of the man. The man was made first, but needed a completion. The woman completes the man. He is primordial and unglorious; she is eschatological and glorious.
The authority on the woman’s head is signified by her headgear, and represents her man. We are now in a position to understand these relationships.
The covering in the Law is the firmament between God and man, signified by the veils of the tabernacle/temple and by the cover ("mercy seat") on the ark, between the ark (man) and the shekinah (God). The solidity of this covering between God and man was necessary because of the sinfulness of man.
This covering was the Law itself, introduced to protect the people until the time of full redemption came. The Law reveals the relationship between God and man, and during the pre-Christian eras has the effect of being a boundary between God and man for our protection. The Law was an authority on man’s head.
Because there was an authority between God and man, men were to wear coverings on their heads when they came near to God. I suggest that the headgear of the priest protected (covered) his head from the head-crushing wrath of God (Gen. 3:15): The priest bore the sins of the people (Ex. 28:38) and apparently the headgear was related to protecting him while he did this. When King Uzziah invaded the sanctuary in his sins, without the headgear, God struck him with leprosy on his head (2 Chron. 26:16ff.). To continue to wear headgear in the New Covenant is to deny that God’s wrath has been satisfied in the work of Jesus Christ. God no longer threatens to crush our heads if we are in Christ. If we want the no-longer-threatening fire of the Spirit to come on our heads (Acts 2), we must uncover them.
To put it another way, the veil in the tabernacle has been rent and the temple has been opened (Rev. 11:19). It is not appropriate for a man to wear a covering on his head now because there is no longer any barrier between God and man. There is no authority between God and man. The Law has been removed as a "middle wall of partition" between God and man. Thus, the headgear on the man disappears and men are face to face with God.
If a man continues to wear a covering on his head, he shames his Head, Christ, by denying symbolically that Christ has removed the barrier between God and man.
Now this is just as much true of women as of men, at one level, but there is an additional dimension to the life of woman. She does have an authority between her and God in some aspects of her life, for she is under the authority of her man. Compare the laws of vows in Numbers 30. Thus women were to wear coverings, representing the authority of their men, while praying in tongues and prophesying. If a woman refused to cover her head, she was shaming her head, her man, by openly and outwardly rejecting his authority.
Verse 10 says that women are to have authority on their heads "because of the aggeloi." All translations I know of render this word "angels." Thus, virtually all modern expositors (indeed, all that I know of) assume that somehow the covering on the head of the woman is something observed by spirit angels. This interpretation, however, is probably incorrect, for it has nothing to do with the passage’s universe of discourse.
Older expositors note that "angel" simply means "messenger," and is used for human beings quite often. For instance, the pastors of the churches in Revelation 2 & 3 are called "angels" or "messengers." Thus, older expositors suggest that the covering on the woman’s head served to affirm the order in the Church, with the pastors as heads of the congregation.
There is another possibility. Verse 9 says that "man was not created because of the woman, but woman because of the man." Then verse 10 says, "therefore, the woman ought to have authority on her head because of the messengers." If these two verses are strictly parallel, then the messengers might be the husbands. As Paul writes later on in 14:34-35, when it comes to teaching the women are to be silent in the congregation, and to learn from their husbands. Thus, the husbands are messengers of the covenant in the sense that they provide instruction and direction to their wives.
At the same time, to fulfill such a parallel construction we would expect verse 10 to read "because of the messenger (s.)" rather than "because of the messengers (pl.)," if the husband-interpretation is correct. All in all, then, I tend to favor the pastor-interpretation. The symbolism to be observed with respect to head coverings, says Paul, affirms the order in the Church, with Christ as head over all, pastors as heads of congregations, and husbands as heads of wives.
This theme of order will be explored a bit more fully below.
These verses affirm the essential equality and reciprocity of man and woman. Verse 11 says that they cannot really be separated. A man has no glory before God apart from woman (and if a man is unmarried, then his "woman" will be the Church); and a woman has no protective covering before God apart from her man’s authority (whether father, brother, husband, or elders).
Verse 12 says that the woman glorifies the man because she comes out from him, and he takes pride in her. But at another level, women give birth to sons, and those sons become the glory (or shame) of their mothers. All things come from God, and thus all things are a rainbow of glory around Him.
Now Paul invites them to wrestle with the question. If a woman rejects the authority God has set up for her protection, it is proper for her to pray to God? That is what the meaning would be for us today, and essentially that is the question Paul is asking them. If a woman will not wear the covering that represents her man’s authority over her when she comes to pray, then she is coming before God in a state of rebellion and autonomy. She is openly rejecting God’s principles, and then is so brazen as to want to pray in tongues and to prophesy in the congregation. Such a thing is not fitting.
I mentioned above that for a man to have long hair as his glory is, at a deep level, to reject having a woman as his glory. It is essentially a homosexual form of self-glorification. It is easy, because it does not involve the risk and pain of becoming involved with so alien a thing as a member of the opposite sex. Paul uses the same word "nature" in Romans 1:26, where he describes homosexual activity as "against nature."
We may say that for a woman to reject the covering of a man is the same kind of homosexual tendency. It is easy in a sense, because again it removes the pain and risk of involvement with the opposite sex.
The man’s sin is self-glorification; the woman’s sin is self-covering.
"Long hair" here and in verse 14 may mean "curly hair." It means hair that is glorious, not short.
Some have noted that since verse 15 says that the woman’s hair is given to her for a covering, long hair is all that is meant by a "covering" in this passage. This won’t work. Verse 4 says that if a man prays or prophesies with something on his head, he disgraces his head. Clearly this means some kind of covering on the man’s hair. Again, verse 5 says that if a woman prays or prophesies with her head uncovered, it is the same as if she were shaved; and this clearly distinguishes the hair from the head-covering. Verse 6 follows up the thought to the same effect.
Thus, the thought of verses 14-15 is that "nature" teaches short hair for men and long, glorious hair for women. In the interim Church, however, there was an additional symbolic requirement: uncovered heads for men and covered heads for women when praying and prophesying.
Thus, we have a creation ordinance and also a redemptive-historical symbolic ordinance in view here. As verses 8-9 say, the woman originated from the man, and because of the man, and this creation-relationship is signified by the woman’s long hair and the man’s short hair (vv. 14-15). At the same time, as a redemption-ordinance the woman is to signify her submission to Christ through her man by having her head covered (vv. 5-6 & 10), and the man signifies his submission to Christ through the pastors by having his head uncovered (vv. 4 & 10-12).
This might be read as Paul’s saying, "Well, if you don’t like what I said, don’t worry about it, because we have no such custom." Such a reading would contradict verse 2. Paul is rather saying that if you don’t like it, that’s tough! because all the churches agree that this is right.
Observations
1. These verses do not command women to wear hats or head coverings in church. The rule applied only to praying and prophesying, not to hearing sermons, singing, eating the Supper, etc.
2. Since we don’t know what kinds of head coverings are in view, we cannot make a rule for church life today from these verses. God has not seen fit to preserve a description of this headgear, and so has not bound us to observe the letter of this passage.
3. Prophecy has ceased, and it is very likely that the praying spoken of here was praying in tongues, which has also ceased. Thus, these rules in their strict sense applied only to the interim Church.
4. Prophecy was a Spirit-given gift. Paul is very concerned here and throughout this passage, especially in chapter 14, to affirm the orderliness of Christian worship. Why? The answer is that the Spirit works very indirectly and mysteriously, and thus is easy to counterfeit. How do we know when we are being led by the Spirit and when we are not? Paul’s answer is simple: The true Spirit leads to order, and the counterfeit spirits lead to disorder.
During this interim period, the Bible had not been completed and it was not clear what the new order in the Church was to be like. The Spirit was bringing that new order into being. It was a "chaotic" time, what ritual scholars call a "liminal" time, a time between two orders. The new position of women in the Church was being used by the counterfeit spirits to say that women no longer needed the covering of a man and that men could function independently of women. The true Spirit through Paul states that this is not the case, and enjoins upon the Church an outward sign of the continuing reciprocal relationship of men and women.
These requirements were in force only at those times when the Spirit was especially active in the congregation, during prophecy and tongues, because it was then that the distinction between the true and the false spirits needed to be affirmed clearly.
5. What does this mean today? It means that the distinction between men and women does not disappear during worship. Women worship as women and men worship as men. Men worship without any self-glory, and women worship as under authority. In a sense, men cannot worship apart from women, because God requires a glorious host to worship Him, and men need women for glory. Women cannot worship apart from men, because women need men for a covering. We don’t need an outward symbol of this during the prayers of the congregation, but we need to understand it.
6. As regards common life, women are to have relatively longer and more glorious hair than men. Men are not to have long hair or to glorify their hair. This is a creation ordinance.
7. Theologically, we are all part of Christ’s bride. We must not make our own coverings, or go before God uncovered, but we must have Christ as our headgear, our covering. At the same time, we are all sons of God. Thus, none of us should go before God in our own glory, but rather cut our hair and come in the glory that God gives to us.
Biblical Chronology
Vol. 5, No. 6
October, 1993
Copyright © James B. Jordan 1993
by James B. Jordan
(Continued from Biblical Chronology V:5. In his book 1994?, Harold Camping asserts that the life spans of the primeval patriarchs of Genesis 5 & 11 were actually epochs, one after another. This together with other mistakes in interpretation yields for him a creation date of 11013 B.C. We are in the midst of analyzing his hypothesis.)
Camping’s Attempted Substantiation
Camping attempts to justify his hypothesis with several lines of argument, all of which are erroneous.
1. Gaps in Genealogies
He first mentions the fact that in some of the "begatitudes" of the Bible, generations are left out for some reason or other. Matthew 1:8 and 11, for instance, each skip a generation or two. Ruth 4:18-22 is incomplete. All very true, but none of these has a chronology attached. We can grant that there might be a generation missing in some places in Genesis 5 & 11, but we cannot grant Camping’s epoch hypothesis because it has no Biblical foundation. Thus, "Mahalalel lived 65 years and begat Jared" could mean that Mahalalel begat Jared through an intermediate generation, but it clearly means that Jared came into the world when Mahalalel was 65 years old, not in the year Mahalalel died.
2. The Days of Peleg
Camping asserts that Peleg could not have been the son of Eber, as Genesis 10:25 and 11:16 seem to assert. This is because, says Camping, the text says that in the days of Peleg the earth was divided (referring to the tower of Babel). Now, Camping notes that on the classical interpretation Eber outlived Peleg, so that events during Peleg’s life span should be said to take place during the overarching days of Eber. But this is to assume exactly what Camping must show, which is that "the days of so-and-so" refers to an epoch bounded by so-and-so’s life span, and that such an epoch cannot overlap someone else’s life span epoch. But where has Camping provided any evidence for this? Nowhere yet.
Why, then, does the text say that in the days of Peleg the earth was divided? Perhaps the tower of Babel incident happened about the time of Peleg’s birth, but I don’t think so. We are told that the clan of Joktan, Peleg’s brother, moved to the east (Gen. 10:30). Four verses later we read that "as they journeyed east" they came to Shinar and built the tower of Babel. In context, it seems clear that it was the Joktanites who headed up the Babelic project. This is no surprise, since the Joktanites were in the priestly line of Shem (Gen. 9:26-27; 10:22ff.). Those who were supposed to lead in true worship became leaders of apostasy. Moreover, Genesis 10:6-8 may mean that Nimrod, founder of Babel, was the fourth generation from Ham, while Joktan was the fourth generation from Shem, making them contemporaries:
Ham Shem
Cush Arpachshad
Raamah Shelah
Sheba or Dedan Eber
Nimrod Joktan
Alternatively, Nimrod might have been a late son of the long-lived Cush, and thus a contemporary of Joktan. (If Cush were the same age as Arpachshad, he would have been 99 when Joktan was born, with probably 300+ years to go; thus if Cush begat Nimrod at the age of 99, Nimrod would have been the same age as Joktan.)
In terms of the theology of Genesis, the call of Abram occurs in the aftermath of the judgment on the nations at the tower of Babel. Israel becomes the microcosm of a new creation, with her seventy elders a microcosm of the seventy nations of the world in Genesis 10. Thus, it is possible that the scattering at Babel happened not too long before the call of Abram. On the other hand, since the Biblical principle is that people fall into sin immediately after they are granted a kingdom, it may be that the Joktanites led the nations of the world into sin sometime around the middle of Peleg’s life. According to proper Biblical chronology, Peleg was born in a.m. 1757 and lived 239 years, to the year 1996. Abram was born in 2008.
The meaning of Genesis 10:25, then, is that sometime during Peleg’s life the world was divided at Babel. Since Peleg’s brother Joktan was involved in the apostasy at Babel, and it seems that his involvement came after he had begotten many sons, it is likely that the Babel incident happened in the middle or later part of Peleg’s life. That is all that Genesis 10:25 means. It does not refer to an Epoch of Peleg, and has nothing to do with Camping’s hypothesis.
3. The Cainan Question
Camping takes note of Luke 3:35-36, which inserts "Cainan" between Arpachshad and Shelah, seemingly contrary to Genesis 11:12-14. I discussed this in Biblical Chronology 2:4, showing that it is likely that Cainan was added to Luke’s genealogy by scribes trying to bring Luke into conformity with the errors of the Septuagint Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible. There are other possible explanations as well, such as that Cainan really did live between these two men. The fact that Arpachshad was 35 when Shelah was born does not at all eliminate a generation in between. If Arpachshad was 17 when he begat Cainan, and Cainan was 18 when he begat Shelah, then Arpachshad "begat Shelah" when he was 35. One thing is for certain: Luke 3:35-36 provides no support for Camping’s hypothesis.
I want to remind the reader that so far we have been given not one shred of substantiation for this notion that these life spans are calendars of epochs. Camping has provided not one iota of evidence for this assertion. He simply makes the assertion and then says that his view answers some apparent problems in the text. What we are seeing is that the traditional answers to these "problems" in the text are perfectly good and valid. What we want Camping to do is provide us some positive Biblical evidence that points in the direction of his hypothesis. So far he has not provided any.
4. The Years of Noah
Now Camping provides at last a positive argument. He says that when Genesis 8:13 says "in the 601st year, in the 1st month…" the reference is to the years of Noah’s life span (true), but it does not say "in Noah’s 601st year." Thus, the writer is using Noah’s life span as a kind of calendar. This is the Epoch of Noah, and his 601st year is the 601st year.
Camping goes to Matthew 24:34 to substantiate his opinion. Jesus said that "this generation will not pass away until all these things are fulfilled." According to Camping this refers to the second coming, so that the "generation" refers to the Epoch of Christ. This interpretation is woefully wrong on two counts. First, the event referred to is the destruction of Jerusalem, which is clearly differentiated from the second coming in Matthew 24:36. Second, "generation" does not mean epoch. What Jesus meant was very simply this: The generation to which He was speaking would not have died off before Jerusalem was destroyed.
Now, based on this very slender evidence and an outright misinterpretation of Matthew 24:34, Camping runs straight back to his hypothesis: The life spans of the patriarchs are epochs and are to be stacked on top of one another (with a few exceptions).
But this just isn’t valid. When we read the books of Kings and Chronicles we see that years are indeed counted from the accession year of a king. But we also see that there are sometimes co-regencies, when a son will reign with a father for a while. In such cases, either chronology can be used. It just depends on which king you are talking about. In other words, the reigns of the kings are indeed epochs, but the epochs can overlap.
Thus, Shem was 99 years old in Noah’s 601st year (Gen. 11:10). If the flood narrative had been written from Shem’s perspective, Genesis 8:13 could have been written, "in the 99th year…." But the flood is not written from Shem’s perspective but from Noah’s. I don’t mean Noah’s personal perspective, but rather the meaning of "Noah, the Bringer of Rest and Comfort." The flood is tied to Noah in the way that the Temple is tied to Solomon ("Peace"). Naturally, then, the chronology is expressed in Noah’s years.
So, sure: We can readily admit that ancient people may well have measured their years by the life spans of these patriarchs, but that does not mean that there was no overlap. The only thing Camping has thus far provided in the way of a positive argument yields no evidence at all for his position.
5. The Levite Line in Exodus 6
To try and back up his position, Camping turns next to Exodus 6. Camping’s arguments here are so bizarre that I hesitate to entertain them, but for the sake of completeness (and to illustrate just how weird all this can become), I shall do so.
Exodus 6:16-20 says that Levi lived 137 years, Kohath lived 133 years, and Amram lived 137 years. This comes to 407 years. Camping assumes that each of these is an epoch, with no overlap. He then assumes that Aaron’s is the next epoch-life span. Aaron was 83 at the time of the exodus, which when added to the preceding numbers means that Levi was born 490 years before the exodus.
Now, Camping wrongly assumes that the Hebrews lived in Goshen for 430 years. All Biblical chronologers know that this is an error. Galatians 3:17 says that the 430 years begins with the arrival of Abram in Egyptian jurisdiction in Genesis 12. Numbers 26:59 also disproves it. I have discussed the matter at length in Biblical Chronology 2:7.
But Camping says that the Hebrews were in Goshen for 430 years. This means, in his scheme, that Levi was born 60 years before the Hebrews entered Goshen. The descent happened when Joseph was 39 and Jacob was 130. Thus, Levi was born, says Camping, when Jacob was 70 years old.
But now Camping has another problem. Jacob went to Haran to marry and worked 7 years for Rachel; and then he had to work another 7 years because he was tricked; and then he worked 6 years. That comes to 20 years. It means he was married for 13 years when he left Haran. Joseph was born in the seventh year of the marriage, just before Jacob’s last six years in Haran (Gen. 30:25ff.). Levi was Leah’s third son and so would have been born, say, five years into the marriage. He would be about two years older than Joseph. But according to Camping Levi was 21 years older than Joseph (Levi was 60 when Joseph was 39). Thus, Camping now has to get more years for Jacob in Haran, and he tries to double the figure to get 40 instead of 20 years.
I’m going to disprove this reconstruction in detail to show how badly Camping has misinterpreted the data. I’m going to do this in order to show that this man, despite good intentions, is not a God-gifted exegete. He regularly misinterprets the text. Interpretation is definitely not his gift. His badly erroneous handling of the Old Testament chronology is multiplied when he gets to New Testament prophecy. Mr. Camping is apparently a good entrepreneur and radio host, and doubtless a fine Christian, but he does not have the training or the gifts to be an exegete of the Bible. His exegesis is a glaring example of gnat-straining and camel-swallowing.
To start with we can completely shoot down Camping’s approach with one verse: Numbers 26:59. This verse says that "the name of Amram’s wife was Jochebed, the daughter of Levi, whom her mother bare to Levi in Egypt; and she bare unto Amram Aaron and Moses, and Miriam their sister."
Let’s start by taking this verse literally. Here is the reconstruction I provided in Biblical Chronology 2:7.
c. 2256 Birth of Levi (Jacob’s third son)
c. 2286 Birth of Kohath (Levi is 30)
am 2298 Descent into Egypt
c. 2350 Births of Amram (Kohath is 64) and Jochebed (Levi is 94)
c. 2393 Death of Levi at 137
c. 2419 Death of Kohath at 133
am 2433 Birth of Moses (Amram and Jochebed are 83)
c. 2487 Death of Amram at 137
am 2513 Exodus
We can play with these dates, but two things are clear about the Hebrews in Goshen: they lived long lives and they were very fruitful. The scheme I have proposed is completely within the parameters of the situation as described in the Bible.
Now let’s interpret Numbers 26:59 in terms of Camping’s hypothesis. The verse says that Jochebed was the immediate daughter of Levi, born after the descent into Egypt. She was married, however, to Amram. According to Camping, the entire Epoch of Kohath (133 years) intervenes between Jochebed’s birth and that of her husband. This clearly is impossible, and Camping’s scheme falls apart.
But Camping can reply by asserting that none of the relationships in this verse are immediate. Here is the required Camping paraphrase: "And Kohath begat someone who led to Amram. And the name of Amram’s wife was Jochebed, the daughter of someone descended from Levi, whom her mother bore to some descendant of Levi in Egypt; and she bore Amram someone who led to Aaron and Moses, and Miriam their sister."
Now I put it to you: Is this for real? I think the strain on this verse is obviously too great, but if you need an argument, I submit that there is an element in the verse that makes no sense in Camping’s interpretation. It is the prepositional phrase "in Egypt." The traditional interpretation makes perfect sense of this phrase. Levi begat Jochebed in his old age, after he had moved to Egypt. This explains why, though Amram was Jochebed’s nephew, they were about the same age. But Camping’s interpretation leaves this phrase hanging in mid-air, with no purpose. If these are whole epochs of time, and the Epoch of Amram follows the 133-year Epoch of Kohath, it is obvious that Jochebed was born in Egypt.
Moreover, the traditional explanation squares with Exodus 2:1, which reads that "a man from the house of Levi went and took a daughter of Levi." It does not say "a daughter of the house of Levi" because Jochebed really was Levi’s daughter. The contrast between "man of the house of Levi" and "daughter of Levi" cannot be accounted for in terms of Camping’s hypothesis, for in his view both should have been called "of the house of Levi."
Now, I think it is clear that Numbers 26:59 completely demolishes Camping’s view of Exodus 6. Numbers 26:59 eliminates any possibility of a 430 sojourn in Goshen, and also eliminates Camping’s epoch approach to Exodus 6. Now we need to take up the sub-points of his "argument." (It is not actually an argument, as I’ve said before; rather, it is an assertion substantiated by other assertions.)
(5a). Camping wants to know why Moses’ parents are not named in Exodus 2. He answers that this is because Amram and Jochebed are not his immediate parents, but just the patriarchs of the preceding epoch. The correct answer is that the theology of Exodus 2 concerns Levi, not the persons of Amram and Jochebed. The parents of Moses are Levites, and we understand this in light of Genesis 49:5-7. Levi must die and be born again, which happens to Moses when he is thrown into the water (with all the other dead Hebrew baby boys), and it happens to the Levites in general at the golden calf (Ex. 32). This is why Exodus 2 presents Moses as a true Levite, and not as the personal son of Amram and Jochebed.
(5b). Camping wants to know how we can come up with 8600 Kohathites in the census of Numbers 3 if we follow a short chronology. This is very easy to show. If Kohath was born in a.m. 2286 and his firstborn came when he was 20 in a.m. 2306, there are 208 years before the census. Let’s assume 30 years for a generation and 4 sons per generation.
2306 4 sons
2336 16 grandsons
2366 64 great-grandsons
2396 256 Kohathites
2426 1024 Kohathites
2456 4096 Kohathites
2486 16834 Kohathites
2516 65536 Kohathites
Of course, these people lived a long time and Exodus 1 says that they multiplied, teemed, and swarmed. Thus, four sons per generation is doubtless very low. Yet in fact, in a.m. 2514 we only have 8600 Kohathites. Pharaoh killed boy babies for a while in a.m. 2433 (the year of Moses’ birth), but that campaign obviously did not last very long (or Moses would not have had anyone to lead out of Egypt). At any rate, 8600 is a perfectly reasonable figure and there is no justification whatsoever for Camping’s assertion that "there could not possibly have been this many descendants in such a short period of time" (p. 281).
(5c). Leah’s Children. Camping points out that after Joseph was born, Jacob sought to leave Haran and was persuaded to stay another 6 years. Thus, Joseph was born at the end of the first 7 years of Jacob’s marriage. This means that all 7 of Leah’s children were born during those 7 years, which is pretty much impossible.
There are three answers to this problem. The first is that it is, of course, barely possible, if Leah was passing the children on a wet nurse instead of nursing them herself (since women tend not to conceive while nursing).
The second answer, which I think has the most merit, is that this passage is not presented in strictly chronological order. The order is theological. First are described the ten "natural" sons, and then is described the birth of Joseph, the "miracle" son, born from a closed womb. Consider: first Abraham has a natural son, and then God opens Sarah’s womb and the miracle son is born. The second born is the replacement for the fallen firstborn. Consider: Rebekah is barren, but God miraculously opens her womb. Her firstborn, Esau, is bad, and is replaced by the second-born, Jacob ("Supplanter"). Now we come to Jacob. The first ten sons are born without a miracle. They are bad, and sell Joseph into slavery. Joseph is the second-born, replacement son, born after the miracle. This is the structure of the passage.
So then, what is the chronology? Leah has four sons and stops bearing (Gen. 29:31-35). This easily takes up seven years, and these four sons are older than Joseph. Early in the seven years, Rachel gives Bilhah to Jacob, and two sons are born (Gen. 30:1-8). These are also probably older than Joseph. After she stops bearing, Leah gives Zilpah to Jacob, and she bears two sons (30:9-13). These are probably younger than Joseph, born during the final six years in Haran. At some point, Leah begins to have children again and bears Issachar and Zebulun (30:14-20), again during the last six years. We are told that afterward she bore Dinah, but this might have been after the departure from Haran.
Now this kind of construction does not suit Camping. He takes it that Joseph was born after all the rest. Based on Genesis 31:38-41, Camping reconstructs as follows:
7 years to earn Rachel
7 years of marriage to earn Rachel again
20 years of employment
6 years to earn flocks
This provides Camping with 27 years of child-begetting, climaxing with the birth of Joseph before the last six years. It also enables him to make Levi 21 years older than Joseph, which satisfies the demands of his chronological scheme.
But does this reconstruction stand up? In Genesis 31:38 Jacob says to Laban that he has been with him for 20 years, serving honorably and being oppressed. In Genesis 31:41, just a couple of sentences later, he says, "These 20 years I have been in your house; I served you 14 years for your two daughters, and 6 years for your flock, and you changed my wages ten times." Camping admits that these sure do look like the same 20 years! He thinks that the language hints at a slight difference in the two periods, however, because during the 20 years of verse 38, Jacob had to pay for what was lost or stolen, which Camping does not think squares with the kinds of conditions a father-in-law-to-be would put on his daughter’s future husband. But who says? Camping even tries to spice it up by saying that Jacob probably would have had to pay for any animals killed for his own food, but the text does not say this. Camping is grasping at straws here. Clearly the 20 years of verse 38 is the same as the 14 + 6 of verse 41.
(And by the way Laban reduced Jacob’s status from kinsman to wage-earner one month after Jacob arrived, according to Genesis 29:14 contrasted with v. 15.)
(5c’.) Camping has an additional argument to back up his belief in an extra 20 years. He says that the events of Genesis 38 could not all have happened before the descent into Egypt if the traditional understanding is correct. His mistake here is a simple error in arithmetic. Here is what he writes; see if you can spot the error: "On the presumption of a twenty year Haran sojourn, Jacob could not have been less than 88 or 89 when Judah was born. Since Jacob was 130 when he entered Egypt, Judah could not have been older than 31 or 32 years when he entered Egypt. During this thirty-one or thirty-two years Judah would have had to grow from a baby to manhood, and additionally, all of the events of Genesis 38 would need to have taken place."
Well, you can see it: Judah would have been 41 or 42, not 31 or 32. And that is just barely time for the events of Genesis 38, if we assume marriages at around age 17, which is not all that early.
But this passage may well be dischronologized. Thematically Genesis 38 is linked with Genesis 37. Judah falls into the sin that Joseph resisted (adultery). Given the structure of Genesis, there is no good place to stick this story if it happened later than the descent into Goshen. We have every reason to believe that after they relocated their headquarters to Goshen, the Hebrews continued to pasture up in Canaan (1 Chronicles 7:21-22, 23-24). We are told in Genesis 38 that Judah married at about the time Joseph was sold to Potiphar. I believe Judah and Joseph were about the same age, so Judah was about 18. We then read that after a long time Judah’s wife died. This comes after Tamar’s first two disastrous marriages. Almost certainly this projects the rest of the story into the period after the relocation of the Hebrew encampment to Goshen. Though dischronologized, Genesis 38 first exactly with the theological order of presentation in Genesis, showing the kinds of sins the Hebrews were prone to fall into if they remained in Canaan, and explaining why God sent them into a sanctuary in Goshen.
Camping points to Genesis 46:12, which says that Judah’s sons by Tamar, born at the end of Genesis 38, went down into Egypt with Jacob. At first glance, this indicates that they were born before the descent into Goshen, which as we have seen is just barely possible. However, the last clause in the verse mentions the two sons of Perez, who are included in the count in verse 15. Nobody, not even Camping, can believe that these sons were born before the descent into Egypt. Thus, the list of names in Genesis 46 has to be taken as a genealogical summary, and not as a list of those who, head for head, made the trek. (And note 46:21, which lists 10 descendants, including grandchildren, of Benjamin; obviously these had not been born before the descent into Egypt!).
Summary
Camping’s argument is a series of props that do not stand up. The notion that the life spans of the primordial patriarchs are calendars is propped up by appeal to Exodus 6, which is propped up by an appeal to Jacob’s supposedly 40-year sojourn in Haran, which is propped up by an appeal to Genesis 38. We have seen that Genesis 38 does not support a 40-year sojourn in Haran for Jacob. We have seen that nothing else in the Bible hints at such a 40-year sojourn. We have seen, therefore, that the history of Jacob does not support Camping’s assertions about Exodus 6. We have seen that Camping’s position on Exodus 6 is contradicted by Numbers 26:59 and Galatians 3:17. Thus, Exodus 6 does not provide a series of epochs related to Levitical life spans, and therefore provides no corroboration for Camping’s hypothesis regarding Genesis 5 & 11.
And there is nothing else in the Bible that provides any substantiation for this hypothesis either. Case closed.
(to be concluded)
Rite Reasons, Studies in Worship, No. 29
Copyright (c) 1993 Biblical Horizons
October, 1993
I am often asked why I am not an Episcopalian, since I like liturgy so much. My answer is that if I had a call to serve in Episcopal circles, I would certainly entertain it. When I have looked into such groups as the Reformed Episcopal Church, however, I have not found any such call, and so I have continued to labor in Presbyterian circles; and I have come to believe that this is where God wants me to labor, at least for the foreseeable future.
Recently I was at a Calvinistic seminary, and a Canadian student spoke to me about some of the back issues of Rite Reasons. He felt that I was assuming that all Episcopalians and Anglicans are caught up in the semi-idolatry of Anglo-Catholicism. I assured him that I knew that this was not the case. He told me that while Anglo-Catholicism had largely swept the American scene, it was not at all so well entrenched in other places. His bishop, for instance, never bows when he crosses the chancel, since he (rightly) believes that there is no special local presence of Jesus on the altar. His bishop, he assured me, does not wear Eucharistic vestments, believing that they are associated with the Anglo-catholic milieu, which he dislikes. The Episcopal circles in which this student travels (in Canada) do not believe in consecrating bread and wine, but simply give thanks for them, as the Anglican Reformers taught.
It was nice to hear this, though I already knew it. I believe the reason for this difference between England-Canada-Australia and the United States lies in the fact that there is no viable Presbyterian church in these other countries. Thus, evangelicals are “low church Anglicans” in these countries, whereas here in America, they tend to become Presbyterians. Evangelical Anglicans like Philip E. Hughes and J.I. Packer travel in Presbyterian circles when they labor in America. There seems to be far more Anglo-Catholicism in American Episcopalianism than elsewhere, at least in terms of percentage and influence.
I have expressed my criticisms of Anglo-Catholicism in Rite Reasons 9-12, “The Liturgy Trap.” Here, in answer to questions, I want to set forth my reservations about orthodox Anglicanism. I have about as many reservations about evangelical Anglicanism as I have about evangelical Presbyterianism, and I guess I’m about half-way in between (with a decided preference for Lutheran music and liturgical flow). Since I usually write critically of Presbyterian and Continental Reformed liturgics, it seemed right to me to address myself, for once, to Anglican liturgics.
I basically have four problems with Anglican liturgics. First, while I believe in sung worship and prayerbook worship, I don’t see that the Bible teaches the use of a fixed liturgy as an extremely important thing. We are often told that using a prayerbook liturgy week after week helps disciple a congregation, and I believe this is true. But the Bible does not say this. It is like fasting. We are told that fasting is a good discipline, but the calendar of Israel had 80 feast days and only one fast day. Similarly, on the scale of things, using a prayerbook liturgy should not be made into something more important than it is. The prayerbook helps the congregation participate in worship, but the Bible does not make the use of such a liturgy as important as most Anglicans and Episcopalians do. The Bible clearly teaches a form and structure of covenant renewal worship, but does not teach a set of unchanging prayers to be used within that structure each time, and does not indicate that a great deal of value should be put on such a thing. The book of Revelation shows congregational participation in worship, and of such a sort that indicates familiarity and repetition; but the epistles do not contain injunctions like, “Do not neglect to participate in the liturgy.” I think Anglican liturgics makes too much out of the fixed liturgy.
Second, I have a problem with the fact that the service does not change. I believe it is a good thing to set up a liturgy and use it for several months until the people get used to it, and begin to memorize it, but to set up one liturgy and use it century after century is, I believe, an error. This is particularly the case since it is the man-composed parts of the service (the prayers) that do not change. We ought to have a number of liturgical forms and prayers than can be changed out from time to time.
Third, like all the Reformation liturgies, the Book of Common Prayer service has long, wordy, preachy prayers. Moreover, it focuses on sin and justification to the extent that the entire service feels more like a penitential vigil than a celebration of redemption. The entire service, it seems, is conducted kneeling, a posture of penitence. The penitential air of the Anglican service continues up to the Supper, and only afterwards is there the joyous singing of the Gloria in Excelsis (an unhappy liturgical change from the ancient service). Thus, what is communicated at the psychological level is that it is the Supper that confers special grace and forgiveness. It is no accident, I believe, that Anglo-Catholicism could arise in this context. By way of contrast, the Lutheran service has continued to be reformed according to Biblical principles, and thus has come to have many short prayers and collects, confesses sin and pronounces forgiveness at the beginning of the service, and has a joyous atmosphere thereafter. This is why Westminster Presbyterian Church, in Tyler, Texas, used a basically Lutheran structure while I was one of the pastors there. When the church changed to an Anglican form, it felt like a giant step backward and most people did not like it.
Finally, I find no justification whatsoever for kneeling for communion. Every meal in the Bible is pictured as sitting or reclining, in a relaxed posture, save for the very first Passover. The whole point of the meal is that it affirms our peace with God, our sitting down with Him at table. Not to sit is to call into question our forgiveness and acceptance by Him. Sitting shows that we do accept His gift, and that we understand what it means. Almost all the Reformers understood this, and it is a sad accident of history that the Church of England did not reform herself in this area.
Anglican traditionalists come up with all kinds of justifications for kneeling at communion, but they all fall to the ground before the Biblical facts. Sitting at table with God is a sign that our peace with Him is absolutely secure. Jesus has finished the work, and sits with the Father; in union with Him, we also sit. If we do not sit, it shows that we do not understand our union with Him correctly. Standing and kneeling are not relaxed postures, and are most inappropriate for communion. If I visit a church that kneels, then I also kneel; but the Bible teaches otherwise and such churches need to work for reformation in this area.
One of my gripes is that I occasionally hear about somebody who has left the Reformed faith and gone into Rome, or Orthodoxy, or Anglo-Catholicism, and then has said, “Well, Jim Jordan led me in that direction, and then he didn’t go in himself!” This is completely untrue. Anyone who wants to study the matter can go back and listen to every lecture on worship I have ever given and will find that I have always expressed antipathy for the idolatrous character of the worship of these three groups. Without exception, those people who go into such groups have never phoned or written me to ask what I think. The few that did contact me were told that I was utterly opposed to going into any of these three groups. (Of course, those people know better than to say that “Jim Jordan pointed me to this”!)
It seems that some people think liturgical worship is by definition Anglican or Roman. For a decade in Tyler, Texas, I pointed out that Calvin, Knox, and the other Reformers were equally liturgical. The liturgy we used in Tyler was Calvinistic in structure and mainly used Lutheran music (since Lutheran music is the best). There was very little from the Anglican heritage used in it (though we used some, and would not have been opposed to using more). We stood for prayer and sat for communion. When the church switched to using an Anglican style of worship, sitting for prayer (since we did not have kneelers) and coming forward for communion (making it a rushed event), the people were very unhappy. It felt as if the church had made a hard right turn. There was no logical progression from what we had been doing to what we now were doing. The service went from being joyous to being more solemn, and the enthusiasm went out of it. This is not to say that Anglicanism is evil, or any such thing, but just to say that the “Tyler liturgics” were not Anglican, and did not tend in an Anglican direction.
Thoughts From Stibbs
To be sure, we did speak favorably of the Episcopal tradition from time to time, but what we had reference to was the evangelical wing of Anglicanism, not to Anglo-Catholicism. Indeed, within the evangelical wing of Anglicanism there is much interest in reforming the liturgy to make it more Biblical. I am going to quote at length from a book I read years ago, Alan M. Stibbs, Sacrament, Sacrifice, and Eucharist (London: Tyndale Press, 1961). Stibbs, an evangelical Anglican, is writing against Anglo-Catholicism. I don’t completely agree with the main argument of his book, but it is his last chapter, on “Scriptural Administration” of the Lord’s Supper that I am going to quote from. I do so to show that the kinds of concerns I have expressed in Rite Reasons are fully shared by progressive evangelicals within the Anglican tradition.
One point that I have made in Rite Reasons is that there is no prayer of consecration in the Biblical rite of the Supper. Instead there is simply a giving of thanks followed immediately by partaking of the bread, and then another giving of thanks followed immediately by partaking of the wine. Archbishop Cranmer understood at least part of this, and its implications. Stibbs quotes from Bishop Stephen Neill’s discussion of the matter: “`Cranmer saw that Christ’s words of institution . . . (words of distribution some have called them) were immediately followed by reception on the part of the disciples. This was the pattern he determined to follow. Consecration [which here means the giving of thanks�JBJ] and communion were to become a single act, separated in time by a brief moment, but not separable in thought or understanding.’ Bishop Neill than adds this discerning and decisive comment: `The moment this principle is grasped an immense number of difficulties in Eucharistic theology simply vanish.'” Stibbs adds: “For instance, let us add at once, that simple loyalty to this principle makes both reservation and Godward offering of the consecrated elements alike impossible.” (p. 82)
In other words, the historic Anglican liturgy formulated by Cranmer eliminates any possibility of Anglo-Catholic perversions. Immediately after the prayer of thanksgiving, the elements are to be served. There is no consecration of the bread and wine in the sense of putting Jesus inside of them. Thus, there is no possibility of “reserving” the elements, that is, keeping them afterwards as holy objects to be revered or to be served later on to other people. There is also no possibility of holding them up to be gazed upon, because as soon as thanks has been given, the elements are served.
Now Stibbs, following other evangelical Anglicans, makes some suggestions of his own. The following is taken verbatim from pages 84-85:
“Cranmer’s form of service is deficient in thanksgiving. Blessing God the Giver is the proper way to consecrate material things for men’s use. So new extended thanksgivings are desirable, first, for the bread, and later for the wine, similar to those regularly offered in some Free Church forms of service. Also, these thanksgivings should be regarded as the consecration of the bread and of the wine for their use; without any introduction at this point of the decisive words which indicate their sacramental significance.
“In the second place, our Lord’s declaratory words, `This is My body given for you,’ `This is My blood shed for many,’ should be removed from the introductory consecration, and, in accordance with the pattern of our Lord’s institution, made an essential and simultaneous part of the actual administration. For what makes the elements used sacramental, whether in baptism or Holy Communion, are the words and action together of the movement of administration. To keep them separate stands condemned as a wrong putting asunder by man of what the Lord Himself joined together. The truth or principle which we here need to appreciate is that the sacrament exists only when and while the administration is taking place. It cannot, therefore, be reserved, or half-done beforehand to the elements for administration to recipients later.
“In the third place, in order fully to follow the pattern of our Lord’s institution, and to preserve the vivid witness to His death which we thus dramatically remember, the bread and the wine ought deliberately to be kept apart and administered separately, first the bread to all, and later the cup to all. This again is a use already common in many non-Anglican congregations; and so, by becoming ourselves more scriptural in practice, we should make fellowship with others at the Lord’s table more easy to realize.
“Such proper scriptural practice of administering the separated elements singly makes the association of the localized presence of the glorified humanity of Christ in or under either of them unthinkable. For the present living Lord cannot be thus divided. `This bread’ and `this cup’ speak of His death. Also, such awareness of the true character and meaning of the sacrament which our Lord ordained makes intinction (or the administration of both kinds together by the dipping of the bread into the wine first) theologically undesirable; and it makes administration in one kind only completely improper.”
End of quotation from Stibbs. Stibbs does not make this point, but let me point out that if everyone is served the bread, and then everyone is served the wine, then coming forward to receive communion becomes more problematic than ever. Everyone has to come forward twice. We cannot do this “by tables,” since the covenant renewal is with the whole congregation, and Stibbs rightly says that all should be given the bread, and then all given the wine. How much simpler to follow the Biblical pattern and serve everyone seated, first the bread, and then the wine!
Now Stibbs makes that point that any male member of the congregation should be able to serve communion: “Since some one person present in any congregation must take the lead in administering the Lord’s Supper, the question still needs to be faced�by whom may the Holy Communion be administered? The proper Christian answer is surely, in principle, by any member whom the body of believers may entrust with this ministry. There is no doctrinal necessity with Holy Communion, any more than there is with baptism, that one class of special ministers alone may administer it. Also, while it is, on the one hand, important that, as a corporate activity of the local church, its administration should be carefully ordered, and entrusted only to responsible elders, yet there is, on the other hand, great practical need for an increase in the number of those who are thus allowed to do it. Why, for the lack of a bishop or presbyter [clergyman�JBJ], should congregations be deprived of the Lord’s Supper, when they have in their midst mature and godly members who could, if given the opportunity, worthily fulfil the necessary ministry? . . . It is time that, by practice as well as by words, we found ways to confess our conviction that there is in the New Testament no indication that proper administration can be performed only by someone who has been admitted to a special sacerdotal order of ministry” (pp. 85f.).
Stibbs does not make the point, but such administration by laypersons should always be under the oversight of the elders of the church.
I’ve quoted at length from Stibbs to show that many evangelical Anglicans are concerned about the same things I have been concerned about in Rite Reasons. Worship renewal crosses all denominational lines, and persons who are concerned for Biblical reform are not caught up in banging the drum for denominational traditions.
