Originally posted by Bosse de Nage“Adoptionism” is the theory that Jesus became the “son of God” upon being baptized, as in Luke 3:22—
So her dead-pan response was more enlightening than a thousand bells & whistles?
What does the bit in parentheses mean?
“and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, "You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased." (NRSV)
Some ancient texts have the words: “You are my some, today I have begotten you.” (my italics) It may be a quote from Psalm 2:7, “I will tell of the decree of the LORD: He said to me, ‘You are my son; today I have begotten you.’”
Nemesio can probably address this better than I can.
”Midrash” With Hebrew Words and Letters
The traditional form of Hebrew midrashic exegesis is called Pardes. Pardes is an acronym (itself meaning “orchard” ) for the following levels of meaning:
P’shat: The surface, plain or “literalistic” meaning of the given verse or text.
Remez: Hinted or allusive understandings, with the clues given in the text itself.
D’rash: A deeper meaning, which may not even be hinted at by the given text itself, but may be gleaned, for instance, by looking at other texts.
[/i]Sod[/i]: The mystical, hidden meaning of the text.
The idea is to read “down” into the texts. “To avoid the trap of idolatry—the illusion of possessing the meaning—Hebrew tradition has introduced the idea of levels of meaning.” (Marc-Alain Ouaknin, The Burnt Book: Reading the Talmud) This is based on the language itself. Hebrew is more of a “depth language” than a “precision” language. Words have layers of meanings, which deepen and expand in association with other words, phrases, etc. Or, as it says in the Talmud: “The words of Torah are fruitful and multiply!” (tractate Hagigah)
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ha’adam, “the adam,” is best translated as humankind or mankind; from (probably) adama, ground, earth or land [as opposed to aretz, also translated as earth or land, but referring to place rather than substance]. There is no plural form of adam in Hebrew. Note also: There is no neuter gender in Hebrew, only masculine and feminine. There is also no indefinite article (a, an, etc.) in Hebrew.
The word for “man” (or “person&rdquo😉 in Hebrew is ish, spelled alef-yod-shin, and generally pronounced “eesh.” It is constructed as aleph plus yesh. (It might be helpful if you looked at the Hebrew letters; this site has the Hebrew alef-bet: http://www.jewfaq.org/alephbet.htm.)
Aleph is the Hebrew letter that stands for the unrestrained creative energy of ein sof—literally, “without end,” i.e., God—in the cosmos. yesh is literally “there is” or “there are,” and as a noun means existence or substance. Again, every Hebrew word has layers and dimensions of meaning, and that Jewish exegetes pay attention to those. I will leave it to you to fill in the “dimension” I am hinting at here.
The word for woman is ishah, spelled aleph-shin-hay.
If you take the yod from ish and the hay from ishah, they spell Yah—one of the names of God, as in hallelu Yah! (Yah, by the way, is feminine).
esh, spelled aleph-shin, means fire. So, one interpretation is that without yod and hay (without Yah), the creative energy of aleph simply burns itself out without producing any self-sustaining substance—no yesh.
yod is a “masculine” letter; hay is a “feminine” letter. Don’t think so much in terms of human sexuality here (though there is that too), but more like the Chinese “yin-yang” principle—remember, there is no neuter in Hebrew. yod can represent “seed”—the point where aleph’s dance begins to take form. hay can represent pattern, form and order, a continuing world, the space-time cosmos (in Hebrew olam; plural, olamim). So, with the addition of hay, yesh is not only self-sustaining, but forms (generates, reproduces) pattern and order: olam. From the “seed” of the masculine (“yang” ) principle, and the forming power of the feminine (“yin” ) principle, yesh becomes self-sustaining and continuing. Or, perhaps, the “seed” (yod), sown in the fire (shin) of passion, takes on living form (hay)—and with the offspring-seed (zerah) of that, the process continues.
Genesis 1:27 says: “So God created humankind (ha’adam) in his image, in the image of God he created them (oto); male and female he created them (otam).” Note: In this verse, it says male and female (zakar u n’qebah), and not “man and woman.” Nevertheless, it at least hints at a further exploration one can begin to play with. I will leave you to it….
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In any event, no matter how a society decides to keep track of its genealogy (e.g., patrilineal or matrilineal), there is no human “begetting” (yalad, to bear or bring forth) without both male and female.
Originally posted by vistesdWith one notable exception, of course.
In any event, no matter how a society decides to keep track of its genealogy (e.g., patrilineal or matrilineal), there is no human “begetting” (yalad, to bear or bring forth) without both male and female.
Thanks for linguistic post, however.
Originally posted by DoctorScribblesI would say she was a virgin. But after she had Jesus, well of course she is going to want to give it up. And that is why James is his half brother and Mary also had other children other then James and Jesus.
I heard it claimed that Luke is the only Gospel that describes a virgin birth. None of the others state that Mary is a virgin. Is this the case?
Further, the source from which I heard this explained it by observing that Luke was Greek, and came from a culture in which virgin births were a mythological staple.
Comment.
I hope someone already post this for you Dr.S?
Matthew 1:25 He had no relations with her until she bore a son, and he named him Jesus.
Matthew 12:46 While he was still speaking to the crowds, his mother and his brothers appeared outside, wishing to speak with him.
Acts 1:14 All these devoted themselves with one accord to prayer, together with some women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.
Originally posted by lucifershammerHaving been uniquely born (without the contributions of a man), His humanity nonetheless was ushered in, in conjunction with human agency (Mary).
Jesus was not an exception - his being begotten was not a human event.
*thinks about more technically correct but perfectly ridiculous ways to defend vistesd in other threads*
Originally posted by lucifershammerA couple of comments on my “midrash” post above:
Jesus was not an exception - his being begotten was not a human event.
*thinks about more technically correct but perfectly ridiculous ways to defend vistesd in other threads*
(1) I didn’t make that all up. I did reinterpret from several sources (some from memory), and give it my own “spin.”
(2) My examples of midrash are intended only to show the radical difference between traditional Jewish readings and more conventional ones (e.g., form criticism, historical criticism, literary criticism&hellip😉. However, some “homiletical” readings—in a sermon, say—go at least to the level of remez. (I‘m thinking here, for example, of some of the homilies by Pope Benedict that Ivanhoe has posted.)
(3) Not all midrash reads this “minutely” into the text—i.e., taking apart the letters of words—though some does. Most midrash, however, is based on a “close reading” of the text, verse-by-verse; though, at the level of d’rash, far-flung and often wildly innovative “proof texts” from other books of the scriptures can be brought in. This is done in a much more imaginative way than just “reading it in context” of the scriptures as a whole. There is also no fear of “reading into” the text, as opposed to “reading out of it,” which is what scholarly exegesis is about. The goal is not to find “the” meaning, but any and all possible meanings—including innovative ones.
(4) I think there is some analogy with Ignatian-style lectio divina, which also takes the reader imaginatively into the text rather than staying on the level of p’shat, or even remez. In both cases, it is a spiritual/meditative exercise, rather than a scholarly one.
Originally posted by vistesdI must be an Adoptionist.
“Adoptionism” is the theory that Jesus became the “son of God” upon being baptized, as in Luke 3:22—
“and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, "You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased." (NRSV)