The Asbury Theological
Journal 54.2 (Fall, 1999) 73-92
Copyright © 1999 by
Asbury Theological Seminary. Cited with permission.
THE X-FACTOR:
REVISIONING BIBLICAL HOLINESS1
BRENT A. STRAWN
“Thus, law implements as social policy and social
practice this articulation of God.
God
is not simply a religious concept but a mode of social power and social
organization. . . .
The reality of God's
passion is mobilized in social policy."
--Walter Brueggemann2
"Holiness calls"
--John G. Gammie3
For
Dr: Frank G. Carver in honor of his retirement from
I.
INTRODUCTION
Most students of the Bible would acknowledge
that holiness is of critical importance
to its subject matter. A text like Lev. 19:2:
"Speak to all the congregation of the people of
summarizes this perspective. Moreover, the fact
that this text is cited in 1 Pet.
would seem to underscore that holiness is a concern,
even a command, that runs throughout
the text of the Christian Bible--that is, the Old
and New Testaments.6 But this unity is not
uniformity; and the problem of the significance of holiness--what
holiness is and does or
what holiness is supposed to be and supposed to do--often
goes unexpressed and unexplained.
The
present study is an attempt to get at these issues and takes its cue from texts
like Ezek. 20:41:
As a pleasing odor I will accept you, when I
bring you out from the people,
and gather you out of the
countries where you have been scattered; and I will
manifest my holiness [ytwdqnv] among you in the sight of the nations.7
Strawn is an assistant
professor of biblical studies at Asbury Theological Seminary in
74
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Or
from the sentiment found in the Jewish prayer, the Amidah,
benediction three:
To all generations we will declare your
greatness, and to all eternity we will proclaim
[wydqn]8 your holiness, and your
praise, O our God, will never depart from our
mouth, for you are a great
and holy God and King. Blessed are you, a Lord, the
holy God.
Put
simply, these texts demonstrate that holiness has an external function. It can
be manifested
among the nations, as in Ezekiel, and is to be
proclaimed to all eternity, as in the Amidah. In
short, it can be and should be communicated. These
two points--that holiness is of central
import in Scripture but is diversely expressed therein
and that holiness has a communicative
function--comprise the central points of this
paper and will be addressed sequentially.
II.
HOLINESS MENTALITES VS. HOLINESS ESPRIT
The fact that holiness is a major concern of the
biblical witness and as such runs
throughout the biblical texts does not require
extensive comment. Holiness has often
been highlighted in critical research on the Bible
and biblical theology. C. F. A Dillmann
in the late nineteenth century, for instance,
determined that holiness was the essential
characteristic of Old Testament
revelation.9 He located this "principle" in Lev. 19:2 and
regarded it as "the quintessence of the
revelation, and to it he related all other ingredients
of Hebrew faith and practice."10 Somewhat
later, J. Hanel also located the central idea
of Israelite religion in the concept of holiness.11
And these two are not alone in the history
of Old Testament scholarship. Other names could be
added to the list: E. Sellin or T. C.
Vriezen, for example.12 Even if scholarship is no longer locating holiness at the
center of
the Old Testament--and indeed, the quest for a or
the "center" (Mitte)
seems permanently
defunct after Eichrodt13--the topic
of holiness continues to receive at least some attention
in most theological treatments.14 And deservedly so.
What is more important for the purposes of this
study, then, is not to discuss the
centrality or prevalence of the holiness concern in
Scripture--what might be called the
Bible's
esprit or spirit of holiness--but
rather to discuss the diversity of ways this concept
is appropriated or enacted
in
the various mentalites or mechanisms of biblical holiness.15
The late John Gammie,
in his monograph Holiness in Israel,
has performed this
task quite well and his work can be briefly summarized
here. Gammie discussed three major
strands in
He
went on to discuss variations on each of these understandings and then added a treatment
of the apocalyptic writers; this produces a
sevenfold perspective on how the Old Testament
views holiness. Gammie
found a unity running across the biblical material: "The holiness of
God
requires a cleanness on the part of human beings."'6 But
equally as important, Gammie
found not a single doctrine of holiness but a
diversity or, at least, "a unity with a diversity."17
That
is, while cleanness may be a consistent requirement, each of the three
traditions Gammie
discussed would seem to stress a different kind of
cleanness:
• For the priestly tradition, holiness entails
a call to ritual purity, right sacrifice,
and separation;
The X-Factor: Revisioning
Biblical Holiness 75
• Holiness for the prophets involves the
purity of social justice;
• The wisdom literature stresses the cleanness of individual morality.18
Moreover,
there is variation within each of
these traditions. For example, even in those
portions of Scripture that Gammie
identified as “Variations on the Priestly Understanding
of Holiness" (basically Ezekiel,
Ezra-Nehemiah, and Chronicles), all of which stand
in "remarkable
continuity with the normative" Priestly perspective, there is nevertheless
significant variation.19 In the prophetic
material the differences are even more pronounced:
according to Gammie,
nowhere in Jeremiah, Deuteronomy, or the Deuteronomistic
History,
for example, are there passages that articulate that "the holiness of God
requires the cleanness of social justice."20
Though Gammie went on to offer an apologia
for this attenuation, there is nevertheless a clear
difference at work in the understandings
of holiness found in the various corpora that comprise the Old Testament
Hence,
Gammie concluded:
In the light of the overview of the preceding
pages it cannot be claimed that
holiness in
Hebrew Scriptures. It is fair to claim,
however, that the concept of the holiness
of God is a central
concept in the Old Testament, which enables us to discern
at once an important unity
and diversity.21
Gammie's assessment is helpful.
It should be added, however, that the complexity
of the matter is compounded when one considers the
New Testament materials. One can
easily see the issues by comparing, say, Ezra's
concern with separation with what many
have identified as the radical inclusivity
of Jesus and the early community gathered around
him.22 Of course, one has to
be careful here, as texts such as Matt 10:5-6 and
led some scholars to say that the ministry of Jesus
was originally only to the lost sheep of
the house of
whole, and especially Acts and the ministry of Paul,
would seem to register a rather gross
disparity with the concerns for ethnic boundary
preservation found in Ezra-Nehemiah.
Even
so, holiness continues to be a concern in the New Testament texts--and period.24
Still, the difference between Ezra and the early
Jesus movement is instructive and
gets to the heart of the matter. Simply put, different traditions, periods, situations,
peoples,
and so forth, manifest--even require--different understandings
and appropriations of
holiness. The struggle for
self-preservation and economic stability that characterized the
returnees from Exile under Ezra and Nehemiah is
not equivalent to the pressures faced
by the early Jesus movement. It is not surprising
then, to find that Ezra-Nehemiah and
the Jesus community have different appropriations
or mentalites
for holiness; nor is it
surprising to find these to be, in turn, both
similar to and different at points from priestly
and prophetic understandings. In short, the
manifold ways that the concept of holiness
is appropriated is diverse and dependent to a
large degree on different geo-political,
sociological, and/or theological situations.25
As such, one might look at them as limited,
time-bound manifestations or mechanisms by which
holiness is enacted and lived out
Yet this is not the whole story. The concept of
holiness itself is more than the
sum total of these mentalites. Biblical holiness is
not, therefore, merely the various
understandings and
76
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implementations of holiness found in
the Bible. Rather, there is an esprit
that runs throughout
the text. For Gammie it
is "cleanness." I will shortly discuss difference in similar fashion.
Whatever
the exact identification, however, the diversity of appropriation itself is
proof of the
esprit’s existence. While the
diversity may at first seem crippling on the practical level, the
fact that holiness reappears in the various
traditions and sections of the Bible--despite and
in spite of the fact
that it is differently manifested--underscores the point that holiness is a
central biblical concern. Holiness is part of
the Bible's fundamental grammar; to borrow
Walter
Brueggemann's terminology, it comprises part of
III.
THE X-FACTOR:
TOWARD
AN APPROPRIATION OF THE HOLINESS ESPRIT
AND THE HOLINESS
MENTALITES
But what exactly is that testimony? What
precisely is the esprit? After the
preceding
diachronic analysis, it seems more than a bit
perilous to hazard a guess on what the notion
of holiness might mean throughout the entire
biblical witness. After all, even if a biblical
esprit on the matter does
exist, hypothetically or ideally, isn't it bound up inextricably
with the same socio-political realities mentioned
earlier? Perhaps so. But the synchronousness
of the concept--above all exemplified by its
ubiquity throughout and across the texts and
testaments--urges the endeavor. To be sure, it may
be that it is the consistent presence
of holiness that is the only stable factor--the
only esprit, as it were--that can be
identified.
But
such an evaluation, while perhaps accurate on the descriptive level, is hardly
adequate
on a practical or prescriptive one. That is, if
the biblical conception of holiness is to be
recaptured, recovered, or revisioned
for the twenty-first century, we must not only find
the biblical esprit,
we must also attempt to (re-)formulate it in a mentalite that is, while
faithful to the esprit and within the appropriate range of biblical mentalites,
simultaneously
functional and faithful in our own contemporary
context.
A clue for doing this can be taken from the
second major point of the present paper:
namely, that holiness has a communicative or proclamatory function.
In Gammie's
words: "Holiness calls."27 Gammie, of course, went on to specify this calling: the
holiness
of God summoned
calls forth cleanness. While this may be true, this
calling is not restricted to the holiness of
God. Holiness itself,
I would contend, contains this aspect of calling or communication in
its very nature. Sociological and anthropological
studies are of paramount importance at
this point,28 and it is unfortunate that
their presence in biblical scholarship is still a relatively
recent development29 While sociology and
anthropology are critical tools in assessing all
kinds of religious phenomena, holiness, in
particular, is an excellent case in point. Social-
scientific analyses may even help to explain the
various factors at work in the different
mentalites previously described.30
A basic and oft-cited characterization of
holiness from the perspective of these
disciplines, at least since the work of Rudolf Otto,
is that holiness is fundamentally separation:
The
Holy is Wholly Other.31 Yet this insight is not only
phenomenological; it is also found in
Scripture
as, for instance, in Lev. 10:9b-10: "It is a statute forever throughout
your generations:
You
are to distinguish between the holy and the profane, and between the unclean
and the clean."32
To
be sure, holiness involves more than separation, Otto's analysis includes
elements besides the
mysterium, and the biblical
material discusses holiness in
The X-Factor: Revisioning
Biblical Holiness 77
ways that lie outside Otto's scheme.33
Nevertheless, it seems to be consensual (if not con-
sonantal34 that one of the central
aspects of holiness is separation.
Thus stated, separation, if not the biblical esprit of holiness, is certainly a major
aspect and dominant part of that esprit. Unfortunately, most theory stops there. But this
insight must be pressed: What does this
separation do sociologically and theologically?
Here
the biblical texts must reenter the discussion. The notion of separation, or
what be
best called difference, can be illustrated by means
of several texts in the Old Testament/
Hebrew Bible. Before undertaking this task, it is necessary
to point out that I think that
the biblical esprit
of holiness and its various mentalites can be encapsulated by the
notion of "the X-Factor."
An X-Factor is something that differentiates
two, otherwise identical, entities35
Given
the presence of the x, the term is somewhat mysterious. The letter X, as is
well
known, is often used in algebra and higher
mathematics for a symbol of unknown or
variable quality. The elusive quality of the X
has passed over into everyday parlance as
terms like "Generation x," "the
X-Files," or even "Madame x," amply attest.36 Other
examples could be added, but suffice it to say
that the X-Factor is something that separates,
that differentiates, that is mysterious, and as such
fascinates and attracts. In so doing, it also
testifies. In my
estimation, this notion can be quite helpful in an attempt to understand the
biblical conception of holiness.
“I Am Yahweh": The
Holiness Code and Ezekiel
An obvious place to start this task is with
Leviticus 17-26, commonly called the
Holiness
Code because of its predominant concern with holiness? While it may be an
obvious place to start, it is not an easy one.
The Holiness Code comprises a dizzying
myriad of laws and commands, almost none of which
immediately recommend themselves
to the contemporary (at least contemporary Christian, situation. Or so it would
seem.
What is clear, however, is that holiness is
central throughout the Holiness Code
and is manifested in a number of ways--indeed, in
almost as many ways as there are laws
--including
regulations regarding sacrifice (Lev. 17:1-6), sexuality (Lev. 18:6-23),
familial
relations (Lev. 20:9), idol worship (Lev. 20:1-5),
priesthood (Lev. 21:1-24), offerings
(Lev. 22: 1 -23), festivals (Leviticus 23), and
so forth.
Leviticus 19 is a particularly interesting
chapter, and probably the most well-known given
v. 18ba:
"you shall love your neighbor as
yourself." The juxtaposition of this verse
with a prohibition against mixed breeding shows
that this chapter serves as a microcosm for what one
finds throughout the Holiness Code.
What is perhaps most striking about Leviticus
19, besides the rough juxtaposition
already mentioned, is the refrain that echoes
throughout the chapter: "I am the LORD"
(19:3,
4, 10, 12, 14, 16, 18, 25, 28, 30, 31, 32, 34, 36, 37). It occurs, in fact, in
the
famous v. 18, which reads in full:
You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge
against any of your people, but you
shall love your neighbor as
yourself: I am the LORD.
It
is also found after other laws, such as "You shall not swear falsely by my
name, profaning
the name of your God: I am the LORD" (
for yourselves: I am the LORD your God"
(19:4). But it is also found in several of those laws
that seem exceedingly
strange. For example, "YOU shall not make any gash-
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es in your flesh for the
dead or tatoo any marks upon you: I am the LORD"
(
"But
in the fifth year you may eat of their [the trees's] fruit, that their yield may be
increased for you: I am the LORD your God" (
is it scattered throughout this chapter and
elsewhere in the Holiness Code?38
To answer this question we need to look to the
other main locus for this type of
phraseology, the Book of Ezekiel, and to the scholar
who has thought longest and best on
the topic, Walther Zimmerli.39 Zimmerli has demonstrated that the "I am Yahweh"
(NRSV:
"I am the LORD") formula, or what he calls variously the
"demonstration/
manifestation word,"
"recognition formula," or "proof-saying" (Erweiswort)
functions to
reveal God's being through God's action. In Ezekiel,
this formula always precedes God's
activity and Yahweh is always the subject. The
purpose of the action in question is to
produce recognition of God's revelation within
it. The appropriate response is for
and the nations to recognize, acknowledge, and
submit to God.40 Put simply, the action
that accompanies the phrase "I am Yahweh"
functions to reveal God's person and nature
to those who
encounter it.41
This is a fascinating insight and one that has
bearing on the instances of the formula
in the Holiness Code, which Zimmerli
unfortunately treats only briefly.42 The point is that
this strange hodgepodge of laws that include both
reverence for God, family, and neighbor,
as well as prohibitions against wearing clothing
made from two types of fabric and the like,
somehow serves to reveal God and more
specifically, God's nature and God's holiness.
What
an odd God, that God's holy being should be manifested in such ways! But the
earlier question, "What do these laws
do?," still remains: If this could be answered, perhaps
it might explain what seems, on the face of it, so
odd, arbitrary, and irrational.
In
people of God,
serving and obeying that God in any and every way. Simultaneously, however,
these laws serve to
separate them and mark them as different from the outside world. In
short, these laws are an X-Factor differentiating
This is no small point Boundaries are of
critical importance to societal and
communal existence. Witness Ezra and Nehemiah,
for instance.44 But this separation is
not an end in
and of itself, for and unto
itself. The laws of the Holiness Code, after all,
would separate
presence of that
formula gives the legislation motivation and reason for being. The
formula is also what gives the laws their
communicative function. After all,
separate, holy, and different as it was and could
be--was hardly isolated on the geopolitical
stage of the ancient Near East. Only rarely in its
history was
foreign domination to develop and flourish as it
would. And even at those rare moments
of independence,
throughout the ancient world:
world happened to run right through Syria-Palestine
and thus through Israel.45 Israel
could not be geographically separate then, and yet
was called to be sociologically and
theologically separate by virtue of
its practices. Or better,
different.46 Again, the purpose for
the difference does not seem to have been for its
own sake or because of some unknown disease residing
in pork, from which God wished
to spare Israel.47 Rather, the purpose
was hvhy
ynx, I am Yahweh, and that means God
The X-Factor: Revisioning
Biblical Holiness 79
wishes to know and be known by humans. In short, in my
judgment, laws like those found
in the Holiness Code function both theologically and sociologically to simultaneously
separate
the recognition formula that serves as conclusion
to and motivation for these laws shows
that their communicative function is part and parcel
of the divine economy and plan.
"When the Children/People
Ask You":
Deut. 6:20-25, Ezek. 24:
15-27, Jer. 16:1-13, and
the Function of Symbolic Activity
(Attraction)
Though the communicative function of the
Holiness Code can certainly be
debated, the case can be made rather easily
sociologically, if not historically.49 In brief,
it is a naturally occurring result of the
practices in question. Ironically, then, the very
barriers that separate and thus exclude are also
the very structures that make it (at least)
possible to allow in and include. Thus, these
laws that seem so obscure and strange in the
Holiness
Code, not to mention elsewhere in Scripture, have a
sociological function that is
communicative,
perhaps one might even say missiological if not
evangelical.50 This
statement is true only if and as long as a means
to transition from one side of the barrier
to another exists or only if and as long as there
is a message to communicate from one
side to another and a means by which this can be
done. This is obviously a source of
intense debate in the history of .Israelite
religion.51 Even so, I am
inclined to think that this
difference is purposeful; that it did create a
barrier but also made it a porous one-indeed,
one that exists for penetration and crossing.
While some may remain skeptical, the
communicative nature of the legal material
can be demonstrated with even greater clarity
within Israel.52 The problem of transgenerational
value communication, for instance, is a case in point
Children, upon noticing these laws,
often do not understand them and inquire about them.
The laws thus produce their initial
inquiry regarding the Law. The instructed
parental answer is then given and is oriented, not
toward the laws or
the Law, but toward the Lawgiver. Note Deut
When your children ask you in time to come, “What
is the meaning of the decrees
and the statutes and the
ordinances that the LORD our God has commanded
you?” then you shall say to
your children, “We were Pharaoh's slaves in
but the LORD brought us out
of
before our eyes great and
awesome signs and wonders against
Pharaoh and all his household.
He brought us out from there in order to bring
us in, to give us the land
that he promised on oath to our ancestors. Then the
LORD commanded us to observe all these statutes,
to fear the LORD our
God, for our lasting
good, so as to keep us alive, as is now the case. If we
diligently observe this entire
commandment before the LORD our God, as
he has commanded us, we
will be in the right.”53
In
this text, the child first encounters the system but is then immediately
introduced to the
Savior.54
But the "system-first" situation isn't so bad--even if it isn't ideal--because
the
encounter with the system is designed to or at
least functions to introduce the Savior.
Another example of or analogy to this dynamic is
found in the symbolic activity
of the prophets, especially Jeremiah and Ezekiel.55
In Ezekiel 24 we find the prophet
engaged in yet another symbolic action-something
of a personal specialty of his.56 This
particular
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example is especially disturbing. Yahweh says to
Ezekiel:
Son of man, with one blow I am about to take
away from you the delight of your
eyes; yet you shall not
mourn or weep, nor shall your tears run down. Sigh, but
not aloud; make no mourning
for the dead. Bind on your turban, and put your
sandals on your feet; do not
cover your upper lip or eat the bread of mourners
(Ezek. 24:15-17).
The
"delight of your eyes" (jynyf
dmHm) is somewhat ambiguous. To what or to whom
does the phrase refer?57 The suspense
mounts as Ezekiel responds to the divine word: "So
I
spoke to the people in the morning" (Ezek. 24:18a). We are not told what
Ezekiel said
to the people, but presumably it was a verbatim
repetition of the divine message. As such,
perhaps the taking of the "delight of your
eyes" applies to the people, not Ezekiel.58 But
alas, no. The suspense is cut; simply and
plaintively v. 18 continues: "and at evening my
wife died. And on the next morning I did as I was
commanded" (Ezek. 24:18b). The crux
immediately follows:
Then the
people said to me,
'Will you not tell us what these things
mean for us,
that you are acting this way?" Then I said to them: The word of the LORD came
to me. . . (Ezek.
24:19-20a; emphasis added).
This
is echoed in v. 24:
Thus Ezekiel shall be a sign to you; you shall
do just as he has done. When this
comes, then you shall know
that I am the Lord GOD.
The
prophet's activity thus symbolizes what will happen to the house of
wife is taken and so shall
encounter with the word and thus
the revelation of God--"then you shall know that I am
the Lord GOD" (24:24; cf. 24:27).
Jer. 16:1-13 is
functionally identical. There the prophet is told not to marry or have
children (vv. 2-4) and not to
mourn for the dead (w. 5-9) because God is bringing
judgment and disaster on
And when
you tell this people all these words, and they say to you, “Why has
the LORD pronounced all
this great evil against us? What is our iniquity? What is
the sin that we have
committed against the LORD our God?" then
you shall say
to them. . . (Jer. 16:10-11a; emphasis added).
Here
again the sign-action produces a confrontation. The people will inquire and
Jeremiah
will respond. Perhaps
the point is that they did not. The symbolic action
becomes the vehicle by which they
learn it--even if they (and the prophets themselves!) have to learn
it the hard way.
Apparently,
the stubbornness of the people forces God and the prophets to reconsider
their communication strategies and make their message
even more severe.60
The X-Factor: Revisioning
Biblical Holiness 81
The significance of all this is that God does
not forbid Ezekiel to mourn or
Jeremiah to marry because these things are wrong
or harmful.
On the contrary, it is
exactly the commonality and normalcy of such
activities that makes them ideally suited
to produce a reaction or encounter, which the
prophets then turn to their advantage in
delivering the divine message. Marriage was
altogether normal and standard, so much
so that Jeremiah 16 is virtually the only example
of bachelorhood in ancient Israel.61
Mourning
for the dead is also a common human process and experience.62 But
these are the things forbidden the prophets; again,
not for any reason inherent in the
practices themselves and at the same time not
without any reason whatsoever; but
rather in order to lead those unacquainted with the
people or word of God to an
encounter with exactly those subjects. This
confrontation, in turn, functions to
reveal
Given the presence of "I am Yahweh" in
the Holiness Code, the same
processes seem to be at work there. Ancient
surrounding nations purposefully, in order to
produce questions like: “Why don't
you gash yourself for the dead? Why don't you
sacrifice to Molek? Why don't
you gather the fallen grapes in your vineyard why
do you leave them for the
poor?" The answer was not to be mumbled under
one's breath after clearing
one's throat ("Ahem, er,
well, ah, because I am an Israelite. . .") and indeed
ultimately has little to do with the Israelite qua Israelite. On the contrary, the
answer is hvhy
xvh "he is Yahweh"--that is, "because Yahweh is
our God"
(see Ps. 105:7; 1 Chron.
activity on a nationwide or global scale that
serves, as do the prohibitions in
Jeremiah
and Ezekiel, to assist Israelite children as well as foreigners come
to the knowledge of Yahweh.64
As separation, therefore, the X-Factor serves to attract or to invite.
But
there is more at work in this notion and in these biblical texts than outside
attraction. Furthermore, there is more to the Bible
and to the legal corpus than
"don't dos"--or what might be termed negative difference
or separation.65
There are also positive injunctions (positive
separation/difference) that may
very well still attract, but that are primarily
focused inwardly on
communal life together.66
“When You See It Then
You Will Remember": Num. 15:37-41 (Accountability)
Since the sociological cohesion produced by
boundaries and common
legislation is well-known,67 this aspect
can be dealt with in briefer fashion.
Moreover,
in some ways it is subordinate to attraction because the dynamic
is the same: positive
separation also
attracts but its main focus is internal--it
attracts those already in the group
and thus acts as
a mechanism for accountability or memory. This
can be nicely demonstrated by Num.
15:37-41:
The LORD said to Moses: Speak to the Israelites,
and tell them to make fringes
on the comers of their
garments throughout their generations and to put a blue
cord on the fringe at each
comer. You have the fringe so that, when you see it,
you will remember all the
commandments of the LORD and do them, and not
follow the lust of your own
heart and your own eyes. So you shall remember and
do all my commandments,
and you shall be holy to your God. I am the LORD
your God, who brought you
out of the
LORD your God.
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Here
we find an injunction as strange as those found in the Holiness Code.68
The Israelites
are to put blue cords on the fringes of their
garments (cf. Deut.
these blue fringes, which would presumably happen
quite frequently throughout the course
of a day, they are to remember the commandments.
The situation works out rather logically,
though perhaps a bit
woodenly:
• you will see the blue cords,
• you will remember all the commandments,
• you will do them,
• and you will not turn away faithlessly.
Following
the tassel, that is, instead of the lusts of the heart and eye, helps one
follow
God:
"So you shall remember. . . and you shall be holy
to your God."
In Numbers 15 we find a difference-an X-Factor--that
serves as a reminder to
inculcate a righteous and faithful lifestyle in
the Israelites.69 This aspect, which has to
do with accountability, comprises the second major
purpose of the X-Factor. Again,
separation or difference is not an end in and of
itself; rather, difference is unto encounter
and proclamation; and it is also unto remembrance
and enactment.70 And, as is rather
obvious in the case of Numbers 15, an X-Factor
can oftentimes simultaneously do both.71
IV.
CONCLUSION: REVISIONING AND REAPPROPRIATING HOLINESS
VIA
THE X-FACTOR
In sum, then, the differences highlighted here
under the rubric "the X-Factor" may
involve abstention from normal involvements or
may involve participation in atypical
activities in order to produce twin aspects:
attraction unto encounter and remembrance
unto accountability. It is these aspects or purposes
of the deep structure of the X-Factor
that give it reason for being. That is, the X-Factor
itself is not invariable. On the contrary-
the X-Factor changes as often as the biblical mentalites do or
as often as the symbol
"x" signifies different values in algebra. In fact, the
different mentalites
are themselves
different X-Factors, as long as they serve the
purposes of attraction and accountability.
So,
the particular action chosen--be it Ezekiel's stoicism, Jeremiah's celibacy,
the holy
hodgepodge of Leviticus, or the blue cords of
Numbers--will change and vary. These
activities are situation specific and timebound, limited and temporary. But the difference
encapsulated therein, the separation
that produces (or should produce) attraction and
accountability remains
constant. The X-Factor, then, summarizes the esprit of holiness
(difference), while also providing a grid that both explains
and incorporates the
mentalites content and method
(their ongoing appropriations, revisioning. and so
forth).
Several points need to be stressed, however.
First, this grid of possible
mentalites isn't infinite.72
It is certain that if holiness is to be revisioned
and relived, it
must be done in such a way that is both
comprehensible and relevant today. The X-Factor
permits this by showing how various persons,
movements, and periods have lived out
holiness in differing, and not always ideal,
ways. We are on good ground, then, to say
that the exact manner (mentalite) in which we enact
holiness (the esprit itself) is of
secondary importance to the fact that we live it
out. Thus, as long as the X-Factor, the
separation or difference, produces an encounter and
reminds us who and whose we are,
its focus and locus,
its mech-
The X-Factor: Revisioning
Biblical Holiness 83
anism and appropriation, will
and should vary. But the variation is limited, or should be,
to the range demonstrated within Scripture itself.
Or better: it is limited to the dynamic
found within the Scriptural range of mentalites. This
dynamic is properly one that comes
from God. The word of the Lord came to Ezekiel and Jeremiah and told
them what to do.
I
The commandments in the Holiness Code and Numbers 15,
similarly, are stamped with
the divine "imprimatur."73 So
too modern appropriations of biblical holiness should follow
the command of God, expressed above all in Holy
Scripture.74
This point already anticipates the second,
namely, that the X-Factor should be
purposeful. The X shouldn't be
arbitrary: It should be designed to lead to the twin aspects
and be subject to and take its origin from the
command of God. It should also be tied to
the character and holiness of God.75
Although separation does not exhaust the concept of
holiness in Scripture or in the phenomenology of
religion, it does prove helpful at this point,
since God is nothing if not different-especially, the
incarnation notwithstanding, different
from us.76
But Christ nevertheless plays a role here. It is
not unimportant to note that our
English
letter "X" comes from the Greek letter X (chi), the first letter of Xristo<j
(Christos), the "Christ.”
Ultimately, for Christians, it is our relationship with Jesus
Christ
that makes and marks us apart--as separate and different One might say that
the Gospel itself is our X-Factor. That is well and
good and as it should be. The purpose
of this paper has been to provide motivation for
the concrete manifestations of that relationship
and in so doing to fill holiness with meaning by
appealing to the ultimate purpose of
communication via attraction and
accountability. The latter two, respectively, provide
the opportunity and the message for the former.
To be sure, conceptions of the X-Factor,
although not with that label, have long
been around. Difference, separation, "coming
apart from the world," refusing to be "of it,"
are all hallmarks of the Christian tradition--especially
the holiness variety.78 But rarely, or
so it seems, has the purpose of separation been
expressed and unmotivated separation
quickly becomes separatism. This scenario, while
rather typical, is exceedingly problematic.
But
the X-Factor provides a way out of it. It can serve as a hermeneutical key that
motivates
and explains distinctive characteristics (both
positive, e.g., care of the poor, and negative,
e.g.,
abstentions from various practices) that are periodically undertaken by
communities
of faith. Moreover, the notion of the X-Factor can
function on a transgenerational level,
since its explanation and enactment of the esprit is independent of one particular type
or even brand of mentalite.
If holiness is to be appropriated in the next
century, I think it will have to be
done in this sort of way. The X-Factor gets around
the problem of unmotivated and
thus lifeless difference and also holds promise for transgenerational and evangelistic
communication. But the X-Factor also
poses a threat to the way holiness has been
traditionally conceived. Built into
its structure is variability, openness, change--at least
on the level of mentalite. This has not been a
hallmark of the holiness traditions, nor
of any other denomination for that matter, which
have tended to demarcate their ethical
conduct early in their histories and modify them
only slightly over long periods of time.
But,
taking its cue from the biblical material, the X-Factor is more pragmatic than
idealistic.
It encourages, even requires, difference in
mechanism of appropriation as long as these
mechanisms produce the intended results: attraction
and accountability, encounter and
remembrance. As already stated,
84
Strawn
communities of faith--holiness and otherwise--have
long practiced these types of mecha-
nisms whether intentionally
or unintentionally, sometimes with remarkable effect.79 Still,
what seems to have been missing is the theoretical
support for these practices and espe-
cially the motivation
(communication and memory) that lies behind them.
This, in sum, is what the X-Factor is about and
what it does. In my judgment, it
has the potential to help traditions maintain their
distinctives while at the same time
communicating their message to a
broader audience and to the next generation. If
so, maybe that nasty little X in "Generation
X" will turn out to be positive after all.
Who
knows? Perhaps the notion of the X-Factor will help all generations
"proclaim
God's
holiness to all eternally" (Amidah 3).80
NOTES
1. This paper was delivered at the joint meeting
of the Wesleyan Theological
Society
and the Society for Pentecostal Studies held in March 1998 at the
Theological
Seminary (
the Holiness & Pentecostal Charismatic
Movements for the Twenty-First Century." I
would like to thank my respondents, David L. Cubie (
and Michael K. Adams (
The
original idea for this paper was born in my undergraduate days in a class
taught by
Prof. Robert W. Smith of
I would like to thank Bill T. Arnold, Shane A.
Berg, James K. Mead, Rickie D. Moore,
Henry
W. L. Rietz, David L. Stubbs, R. Wesley Tink, and John W. Wright--each of
whom read drafts of the paper and made helpful
comments. None of these should be
held responsible for the opinions expressed herein.
2. Walter Brueggemann,
"Old Testament Theology as a Particular Conversation:
Adjudication
of
Days on Structure,
Theme, and Text,
ed. Patrick D. Miller (A1inneapolis: Fortress,
1992), pp. 118-49; citation from p. 128.
3. John C. Gammie, Holiness in
(Minneapolis:
Fortress, 1989), p. 195.
4. The translation used here and throughout is
the NRSV, though I have sometimes
modified it. In this case, the emphatic
(adjective-first position) word order for the term
"holy" (Mywdq and wvdq, respectively) in the Hebrew text should be noted.
5. On this text, and
especially its relationship to Leviticus and the issues
discussed in this paper, see Paul J. Achtemeier, I Peter:
A Commentary on First
Peter; ed. E. J. Epp, Hermeneia (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1996), pp. 117-22.
6. Many texts, of course, could be appealed to
here. Cf., e.g., Lev. 11:44-45,
7. See also Ezek. 28:22, 25 (Oracle against
instance of this particular verbal form is Lev.
discussion.
8. Literally: "we will sanctify." But note
that the term is in parallel with dygn
("we will declare"). In post-biblical Hebrew the term
often carries proclamatory force,
especially in the Piel.
See Marcus Jastrow, A Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud
Babli and Yerushalmi and the Midrashic Literature, 2 vols. (
Press, 1992), 2: 1319-20. The translation
"proclaim" follows Joseph H. Hertz, The
Authorized Daily Prayer
& Book: Hebrew Text, English Translation with Commentary
and Notes, rev. ed. (New York:
Block Publishing Company, 5709/1948), p. 137
(for the Hebrew text, see p. 136). It should be noted that
this is a later version and
that while the Amidah is
an ancient prayer, benediction three probably did not originally
contain this section. For the historical
background, see Emil Schurer, The History of
the Jewish People in
the Age of Jesus Christ (175 B.C-A.D. 135), rev. ed. by Geza
Vermes, Fergus Millar, and Matthew Black, 4 vols.
(Edinburgh: T and T Clark, 1979),
2:455-63.
The X-Factor: Revisioning
Biblical Holiness 85
9. Christian Friedrich August Dillmann, Handbuch der alttestamentlichen
Theologie, ed.
R. Kittel (Leipzig: S. Hirzel,
1895).
10. John H. Hayes and Frederick Prussner, Old
Testament Theology: Its
History and Development (Atlanta: John Knox,
1985), p. 122.
11. Johannes Hanel, Die Religion der Heiligkeit (
1931).
See Hayes and Prussner, Old Testament Theology; pp. 167-68.
12. Ernst Sellin, Theologie des Alten
Testaments (
Meyer,
1933), pp. 18-19: "Gott ist
heilig. Hiermit beriihren wir das,
was das tiefste und
innerste Wesen
des altestamentlichen Gottes
ausmacht" ("God is holy. Herein we touch
on that which makes up the deepest and innermost
nature of the Old Testament God");
and Theodorus Christiaan Vriezen, An Outline
of Old Testament Theology, 2d ed.
(Oxford:
Basil Blackwell and Mott, 1962), p. 151: "The holiness of Cod is the
central
idea of the Old Testament faith in God." Hayes
and Prussner, Old
Testament Theology,
p.
257 note that the holiness of God has been proposed as the center of the Old Testament
in previous research. .
13. See Hayes and Prussner,
Old Testament Theology, pp. 257-60.
14. See, e.g., Gerhard von Rad,
Old Testament Theology, 2 vots.,
trans.
D.
M. C. Stalker (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1962-1965), 1 :204-7,
272-79;
2:236,
343, 345; Walther Eichrodt, Theology of the Old Testament, Old Testament
Library
[hereafter OTL, 2 vots., trans. J. A. Baker (Philadelphia: Westminster,
1961-1967),
I :270-82; David P. Wright, "Holiness (OT),"
in The Anchor Bible Dictionary
[hereafter
ABD],
5 vols., ed. D. N. Freedman et al. (New York: Doubleday, 1992), 3:237-49;
Brevard
S. Childs, Biblical Theology of the Old
and New Testaments: Theological
Reflection on the Christian
Bible
(Minneapolis: Fortress, 1992), p. 354; Helmer Ringgren,
The Prophetical
Conception of Holiness (Uppsalla: Lundequist,
1948); William Dyrness,
Themes in Old Testament
Theology
(Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1979), pp. 51-53;
Horst
Dietrich Preuss, Old
Testament Theology, OTL, 2 vols., trans. Leo C.
Perdue
(Louisville:
Westrninster John Knox, 1991-1992), 1:240-41; Claus Westermann, Elements
of Old Testament Theology, trans. Douglas W. Stott (Atlanta: John
Knox, 1982), pp. 195-97;
and especially Gammie, Holiness in Israel. This statement is
not, of course, true in all cases.
Note
Werner H. Schmidt's assessment that holiness is rather peripheral to the Old
Testament
(The Faith of the Old Testament: A History
[
but cf. Gammie's remarks,
Holiness in Israel, pp. 2-3).
15. Alternatively, one could use a linguistic
analogy and use the terms "grammar" and
"vocabulary" for esprit
and mentalite,
respectively. In this scenario, the grammar remains
constant (or similar) across various dialects or
languages even while the vocabulary changes.
I thank Steven T. Hoskins for suggesting this
alternative terminology.
16. Gammie, Holiness in
assessment of the biblical esprit of holiness. Cf.
p. 195: "A unity of the Old Testament can
be discerned in this unified response to holiness
on the part of
17. Gammie, Holiness in
18. Ibid., and ct. pp. 43, 100, 149,
respectively. The apocalyptic material contains a
sort of combination of these traditions (see p.
198). For the priestly tradition see further
Philip
Peter Jensen, Graded Holiness: A Key to
the Priestly Conception of the World,
Journal
for the Study of the Old Testament Supplement Series [hereafter JSOTSupp] 106
(Sheffield:
Sheffield University Press, 1992) and
The Priestly Torah and the
19. Gammie, Holiness in
Chronicler's
History places "less emphasis on the typically priestly insistence on
separation
from other peoples than in the Books of Ezra and
Nehemiah" (p. 196).
20. Gammie, Holiness in
Deuteronomy: The Case of
Deuteronomy 15
(Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1992).
86
Strawn
21 Gammie,
Holiness in Israel, p. 197 (emphasis
his).
22. See, e.g., Joachim Jeremias,
New Testament Theology: The Proclamation of Jesus
(
long to show how sharply
Jesus rejected all attempts to realize the community of the remnant
by means of human striving
or separation. . . . Jesus does not gather the holy remnant, but the
all-embracing community of salvation
of God's new people." More recently, E. P. Sanders has
also underscored the inclusive; nature of Jesus'
mission to and calling of "the sinners" (Jesus
and Judaism [
23. E.g., Marcus J. Borg, Jesus: A New Vision: Spirit, Culture, and the Life of
Discipleship (San Francisco: Harper San
Francisco, 1987), pp. 126-27. Sanders, Jesus
and
Judaism, p. 220: "But the
overwhelming impression is that Jesus started a movement which
came to see the Gentile mission as a logical extension of itself" (emphasis his).
Sanders
goes on to say, however, that "[w]e need not
think that Jesus imparted to his disciples any
view at all about the Gentiles and the kingdom"
(p. 221).
24. See, e.g., Otto Procksch
and Karl Georg Kuhn, "a!gioj, a[gia<zw, a[giasmo<j,
a[gio<thj,
a[giowsu<nh," in Theological Dictionary of the New Testament
[hereafter
TDNT, 10 vols.,
trans. and ed.G. W. Bromiley
(Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964- 1976),
1:88-115;
Robert Hodgson, Jr., "Holiness (NT)," in ABD 3:249-54; G. F.
Holiness," in Dictionary of the Later New Testament and Its Developments, eds.
Ralph P.
Martin
and Peter H. Davids (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1997), pp. 485-89; Marcus
J.
Borg, Conflict, Holiness and Politics in
the Teachings of Jesus (New York: Mellen, 1984);
David
Peterson, Possessed
by God: A New Testament Theology of Sanctification and
Holiness (Grand Rapids: Eerdrnans, 1995); and Rudolf Bultrnann,
Theology of the New
Testament, 2 vols.,
trans. Kendrick Grobel (New York: Charles Scribner's
Sons, 1951-1955),
1:338-39;
2:180, 189, 223. Cf. also note 6 above.
25. Cf. Gammie, Holiness in Israel, p.
196: "Each of these groups set forth its teaching in
response to holiness and what holiness had
impressed upon their hearts and minds. No claim of
exclusive apprehension of holiness and the
requirements of holiness is possible for anyone of the
three groups. The lessons for contemporary religious
denominations that look to the Scripture for
guidance are obvious."
26. The language, though not necessarily the
sentiment, is taken from Walter Brueggemann,
Theology of the Old
Testament: Testimony, Dispute, Advocacy (
1997).
For the holiness of Yahweh, see pp. 288-93.
27. See note 3 above.
28. See, e.g., Mary Douglas, Purity and Danger: An
Analysis of the Concepts of Pollution
and Taboo (London: Ark Paperbacks,
1989), especially chap. 3, “The Abominations of Leviticus,"
pp.
41-57; idem, Natural Symbols:
Explorations in Cosmology (New York: Routledge,
1996); Emile
Durkheim, The Elementary Forms
of the Religious Life, trans. Joseph Ward Swain (
Free
Press, 1965); Max Weber, The Sociology of
Religion (Boston: Beacon Press, 1993); idem,
Ancient Judaism, trans. Hans H. Gerth and Don Martindale (New York: The Free Press, 1952);
Mircea Eliade, Patterns in Comparative Religion, trans.
Rosemary Sheed (
in the Idea of the
Divine and its Relation to the Rational, trans. John W. Harvey (
Oxford
University Press, 1958); and idem, Religious
Essays: A Supplement to The Idea of the
Holy (London: Oxford
University Press, 1931). For an Old Testament theology that incorporates
some of Otto's insights and terminology, see Samuel Terrien, The Elusive
Presence; Toward a
New Biblical Theology,
Religious Perspectives, ed. Ruth Nanda Anshen (
Harper and Row, 1978). A recent treatment of
Otto's work can be found in Melissa Raphael,
Rudolf Otto and the
Concept of Holiness
(Oxford: Clarendon, 1997). For a treat-
ment of
Leviticus: A Conversation
with Mary Douglas,
JSOTSupp 227 (
Press,
1996) and also Edwin Firmage, 'The Biblical Dietary
Laws and the Concept of Holiness,"
in Studies in the Pentateuch,
The X-Factor: Revisioning
Biblical Holiness 87
ed. J. A. Emerton,
Supplements to Vetus Testamentum
41 (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1990), pp.
177-208.
In addition to sociology and anthropology, psychological studies of religious
experience
can also be extremely illuminating in matters such
as these.
29. For Old Testament studies see, among others,
the work of Robert Wilson, Walter
Brueggemann, and Norman Gottwald. Gottwald has been
something of a pioneer in this area in
Old
Testament studies and has, in turn, provided impetus to scholars like Brueggemann. In addition
to Gottwald's many
articles on various subjects, note especially The Tribes of Yahweh: A
Sociology of the
Religion of Liberated
The Hebrew Bible: A Socio-Literary Introduction (Philadelphia:
Fortress, 1985). New Testament
scholarship has also benefited from
social-scientific approaches. See, e.g., the work of Gerd
Theissen,
Howard Clark Kee,
Bruce Malina, Jerome Neyrey,
Carolyn Osiek, and John Elliot to name a few.
30. See, e.g., Jerome H. Neyrey,
"Clean/Unclean, Pure/Polluted, and Holy/Profane: The
Idea
and the System of Purity," in The Social Sciences
and New Testament Interpretation, ed.
Richard
L. Rohrbaugh (Peabody: Hendrickson, 1996), pp.
80-104; and the works by the other
scholars cited in the previous note. For the
Jesus movement see especially Gerd
Theissen, Sociology
of Early Palestinian Christianity (Philadelphia:
Fortress, 1978); and Carolyn Osiek, R S. C. J., What
Are They Saying About
the Social Setting of the New Testament?, rev. ed. (
1992);
as well as the essays gathered in James H. Charlesworth,
ed., Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls,
Anchor
Bible Reference Library (New York: Doubleday, 1992).
31. To list citations of this aspect of holiness
in secondary literature would take an entire
monograph, but see, as representative, Otto, The Idea of the Holy, pp. 25-30 (on the mysterium);
Gammie, Holiness
in Israel, pp. 9-12 and passim; von Rad, Old Testament Theology, I :205;
1995),
p. 22. From a theological perspective, see recently Jurgen
Moltmann, The Source of Life:
The Holy Spirit and the
Theology of Life (Minneapolis:
Fortress, 1997), pp. 43-45.
32. See Gordon J. Wenham, The Book of Leviticus, New International Commentary on
the Old Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1979), pp. 18-25 for a convenient summary of the
system of holiness found in Leviticus.
33. See especially von Rad,
Old Testament Theology, I:206 for this criticism of Otto.
34. It is often said that separation is part of
the etymological meaning of Hebrew wdq
(e.g.,
Francis Brown, S. R. Driver, and Charles A. Briggs, The New Brown-Driver-Briggs-
Gesenius Hebrew and English Lexicon [
however, have rightly questioned this. Ludwig
Koehler and Walter Baumgartner (The
Hebrew
and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, rev. by Walter
Baumgartner and Johann Jakob
Stamm, trans. M. E. J. Richardson, 4 vols. [
indicate that wdq is "an original
verb, which can only with difficulty be traced back to a root dq
'to
cut'; [nevertheless] if this is the case the basic meaning of wdq would be 'to set apart.'" Yet,
even if the conception of "separate-ness"
is etymologically debated for wdq), at the very least
this notion is
clearly involved on the semantic level.
35. This definition is more idiomatic or
colloquial than Webster's which defines an X-
factor as "a relevant but unidentified
factor" (Webster's Third New
International Dictionary
of the English Language
Unabridged,
ed. Philip Babcock Gove [
Webster,
1993], p. 2644) and The Compact Oxford
English Dictionary [hereafter OED],
2d
ed. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989), p. 2353 which notes that the word was
originally a
military term, referring to "the aspects of
a serviceman's life that have no civilian equivalent;
pay made in recognition of these."
36. Perhaps, one of the more powerful and
controversial X's in recent memory is found
in the person of Malcolm Little who upon
conversion to the Nation of Islam changed his last
name to X. The
X in Malcolm's case symbolized the renunciation of a former "slavemaster
name" and the anonymity or loss of one's
"true African family name that had been taken from
every African brought
88
Strawn
to
against the legacy of slavery, where freed
slaves either took on the names of their former
slavemasters or created new names
entirely" (Garth Kasimu Baker-Fletcher, Xodus: An
African-American Male
Journey
[
Recently,
Baker-Retcher has used the X, especially Malcolm's,
as a symbol to invigorate
African-American
male spirituality "outside of the moral parameters and definitions of
European space." See his "Xodus Musings: Reflections on Womanist
Tar Baby Theology,"
Theology Today 50 (1993):38-44,
especially p. 43 and, more recently, Xodus, especially
pp. xv-xvi, 73-91, and 175-94. Note the proclamatory function of the X in his work.
37. For a brief
overview of some of the critical issues around the Holiness Code,
see Henry T. C. Sun, "Holiness Code," in ABD 3:254-57. Not a few scholars have
questioned whether the Holiness Code really existed
independently or can be treated
separately from the rest of Leviticus. See, e.g.,
Erhard S. Gerstenberger, Leviticus:
A Commentary, trans. Douglas W.
Stott, OTL (Louisville: Westminster, 1996), p. 18.
38. Eg., Lev. 18:5, 6,
21; 20:7; 21:12; 22:2, 3, 8, 9, 30, 31, 33; 23:22; 24:22; 25:17; 26:2,
45;
etc.; cf. 11 :44-45.
39. Walther Zimmerli, I Am Yahweh, trans. Douglas W. Stott,
ed. Walter
Brueggemann
(Atlanta: John Knox, 1982). Cf. also idem, Ezekiel I: A Commentary
on the Book of the
Prophet Ezekiet Chapters 1-24, trans. R. E. Clements,
eds., F.
M.
Cross, K. Baltzer, and L. J. Greenspoon,
Hermeneia (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979),
pp.
37-40; and idem, "The Message of the Prophet Ezekiel," Interpretation 23 (1969): 131-57.
40. Zimmerli, Ezekiel 1, p. 38: "In his action in
history Yahweh sets himself
before his people and the world in his own person. All
that which is preached by the
prophet as an event which is apparently neutral
in its meaning has its purpose in that
means an acknowledgement, of this person who reveals
himself in his name. All
Yahweh's
action which the prophet proclaims serves as a proof of Yahweh among
the nations" (emphasis mine).
41. Cf. Zimmerli, Ezekiel 1, p. 40: 'The whole direction
of the prophetic preaching
is a summons to a knowledge and recognition of him
who, in his action announced by the
prophet, shows himself to be who he is in the free
sovereignty of his prophecy."
42. Primarily in the essay "I am
Yahweh" (in I Am Yahweh, pp.
1-28). Zimmerli
does point out, however, that the presence of this
formula in the Holiness Code makes the
latter quite significant: "A comparison of the
Holiness Code with Ezekiel 20:7 makes it clear
that this indefatigable repetition of 'ny yhwh at the end of individual statements or smaller
groups of statements in the legal offerings is not to
be understood as thoughtlessly strewn
decoration; rather, this repetition pushes these legal statements into the most central
position from which the Old Testament can make any statement. Each of these small
groups of legal maxims thereby becomes a legal
communication out of the heart of the
Old Testament revelation of Yahweh. Each one of these small units offers in its own
way a bit of explication of the central
self-introduction of Yahweh, the God who summons
his people--or better, recalling Leviticus 18ff.
(and Ezek. 20), the God who sanctifies his
people" (I
Am Yahweh, p. 12; emphasis mine). This should caution those Christians—
scholars and otherwise--who would passover the Holiness Code too quickly and ignore
it in theological (and even ethical) reflection.
43. Interestingly, Wenham, Leviticus, pp. 261-75 entitles chapter 19 "Principles of
Neighborliness."
44. See Daniel L. Smith, The Religion of the Landless: The Social Context of
the Babylonian Exile (Bloomington: Meyer
Stone, 1989) for an excellent treatment that
draws extensively on sociological data.
45. Cf. David A. Dorsey, The Roads and Highways of Ancient
46. This is not to downplay the sociological and
theological similarities that, as is well-known,
The X-Fador: Revisioning Biblical Holiness 89
abound between
social justice for instance (so Gammie)
could also be incorporated under difference, but in so
doing one would need to be cognizant that the
emphasis on social justice is fairly typical in the
ancient world (see, e.g., Moshe Weinfeld, Social
Justice in Ancient
Ancient Near East [
text at this point
47. See Lev. 11:7; cf. Deut 14:8. See further
for "medical" and
"meaningless/arbitrary/irrational" interpretations of Leviticus,
especially the
dietary laws. Douglas herself opts for reasons
relating to locomotion. Firmage ('The
Biblical
Dietary
Laws," pp. 177-208) has challenged this and offered, in its place, an
interpretation
based on the connection (or lack thereof) of the
entire animal world to established sacrificial
animals. Whatever the case, one might note that,
while pork was prohibited in
eaten by persons in close proximity to
harmful result on the eating of pork in
antiquity generally, see recently Brian Hesse and
Paula
Wapnish, "Can Pig Remains Be Used for
Ethnic Diagnosis" in the Ancient Near East?,"
in
The Archaeology of
Asher Silberman and
David Small, JSOTSupp 237 (Sheffield: Sheffield
Academic Press, 1997).
The
point being stressed here, however, is that there may be no inherent reason for
these
laws other than to produce the dynamic outlined
above.
48. The notion is certainly not altogether new.
Johannes Cocceius (1603-1669), for
instance, in his Summa doctrina de foedere
et tesamento Dei (1648) included the Mosaic
law in the covenant of grace, partially because
"it separated the Hebrews as the bearers of
the kingdom from the surrounding heathen groups and
so preserved the people for Christ"
(Hayes and Prussner, Old Testament Theology, p. 21). Note George Adam Smith,
Modern
Criticism and the
Preaching of the Old Testament (
1901),
p. 142: 'We have seen that the gradual ethical
development, which thus differentiated
as their God; and that every stage of its progress
was achieved in connection with some
impression of His character. It seems to me that
there are here the lines of an apologetic,
for a Divine Revelation through early
interpretation of the Old Testament
ever attempted to lay down" (emphasis mine); and see
also Baruch A. Levine, Leviticus (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 5749/1989), p.
257:
'The gulf between the sacred and the profane was not meant to be permanent The
command to achieve holiness, to become holy,
envisions a time when life would be consecrated
in its fullness and when all nations would worship God in holiness. What began as a process
of separating the sacred from the profane was to
end as the unification of human experience,
the harmonizing of
man with his universe, and of man with God" (emphasis mine).
49. The communicative function of legislation is
exponentially increased in the probable
historical location of much of the Priestly writing
namely, the Babylonian Exile. It is in that
context that much of the legislation (certainly
earlier than the sixth century in origin if not
composition) takes on new significance as it
functions to differentiate a small, foreign minority
group from a larger,
dominant host society. See further on this situation Smith, The Religion
of the Landless and Rainer Albertz, “The.
History of Israelite Religion in the Exilic Penod,”
in A History of Israelite Religion in the Old
Testament Period, 2 vols., OTL (
3
and 6--texts that indicate that worship itself was an
X-Factor in the diaspora.
50. For the former see Christopher J. H. Wright,
"Old Testament Ethics: A Missiological
Perspective,"
Catalyst (forthcoming).
51. See, e.g., Shaye
J. D. Cohen, "Crossing the Boundary and Becoming a Jew," Harvard
Theological Review 82 (1989):14-33; idem,
"Conversion to Judaism in Historical Perspective:
From
Biblical
H.
Feldman, Jew and Gentile in the Ancient
World: Attitudes and Interactions from
Alexander to Justinian (Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 1993), especially pp.
288-382,
416-46; Beverly Roberts Caventa, From Darkness to
90
Strawn
Light: Aspects of
Conversion in the New Testament, Overtures to Biblical Theology
(Philadelphia:
Fortress, 1986); idem, "Conversion," in ABD I :1131-33; Jacob Milgrom,
"Religious
Conversion and the Revolt Model for the Formation of
Biblical Literature 101 (1982):169-76;
Martin Goodman,
Proselytizing in the
Religious History of the
Press,
1994), especially pp. 1-108, 154-74; Scot McKnight, A Light Among the Gentiles:
Jewish Missionary Activity
in the Second
A.
D. Nock, Conversion: The Old and the New
in Religion from Alexander the Great
to Augustine of Hippo (
1933);
and Alan F. Segal, Paul the Convert: The
Apostolate and Apostasy of Saul the
Pharisee (New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1990), especially pp. 1-183, 285-300. While
I
cannot demonstrate it here in detail, in my judgment such means did, in fact,
exist in early
(i.e.,
pre-exilic)
I
am describing here (which may well be the strongest evidence), I would make
mention of
biblical stories like Ruth, Rahab,
Naaman, Jonah, and so forth, as well as biblical
scholars like
Gottwald. For the latter, see
especially The Tribes of Yahweh and idem,
"Religious Conversion
and the Societal Origins of Ancient
Even
so, it must be admitted that we know very few "converts" to Israelite
religion by name.
52. Even those skeptical of the argument here
should note that in Ezekiel the proof-
saying is often used for the nations' knowledge of Yahweh.
Cf. von Rad, Old
Testament
Theology, 2:236-37: "This 'manifestation'
is therefore much more than simply something
inward or spiritual; it is an event which comes about
in the full glare of the political scene,
and which can be noticed by foreign nations as well
as by
divine activity is therefore that Jahweh
should be recognised and worshipped by those who
so far have not known him or who still do not know
him properly."
53. Cf. also Josh. 4:5-7, 20-24.
54. I am indebted to Dr. Rueben Welch for this
terminology.
55. The classic treatment remains that of Georg Fohrer, Die symbolischen
Handlungen der Propheten, 2d ed. (Zurich:
Zwingli Verlag, 1968). See more recently
Kelvin
Friebel, Jeremiahs
and Ezekiels Sign-Acts: Rhetorical Nonverbal
Communication,
JSOTSupp 283
(Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1999).
56. See Ezek. 4:1-5:17; 12:1-6.
57. Zimmerli is
certainly right to caution against overinterpreting
"the delight of your
eyes" (Zimmerli, Ezekiel I, p. 505), but at the same
time, the Hebrew is at least somewhat
excessive. After all, jtwx could have been used just as easily.
58. Of course, the resulting oracle shows that
it applies to both, but the second person
forms in Ezek. 24:15-17 are singular, while those in
24:21-24 are plural.
59. So Walter Brueggemann,
A Commentary on Jeremiah: Exile and
Homecoming
(Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998), p. 153.
60. On this phenomenon, especially in Ezekiel
and Jeremiah, see Thomas M. Raitt,
A
Theology of Exile: Judgment/Deliverance
in Jeremiah and Ezekiel (
Fortress, 1977).
61. Peter C. Craigie,
Page H. Kelley, and Joel F. Drinkard, Jr., Jeremiah 1-25,
Word
Biblical Commentary 26 (Dallas: Word Books, 1991), p. 216 go so far as to use
the
"unusualness of the prohibition to marry" to argue for
the authenticity of the pericope.
62. This is rather obvious, but note also the
"house of mourning" (Hzrm
tyb) in
Jer. 16:5. The Hebrew term marze(a)h is rare in the Hebrew Bible. It does
occur, however,
in other ancient Near Eastern literatures,
including that of
especially KTU 3.9), where it apparently refers to
some sort of funerary association. What
Yahweh
forbids, therefore, is nothing less than a long-standing, cross-cultural
tradition. See
further Theodore J. Lewis, Cults of the Dead in Ancient Israel and Ugarit,
Harvard
Semitic
Monographs 39 (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1989) and Brian B. Schmidt,
Beneficient Dead: Ancestor Cult and Necromancy in Ancient Israelite
Religion and
The X-Factor: Revisioning
Biblical Holiness 91
Tradition (Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, 1995).
63. Especially in Ezekiel. Note Ezek. 24:24, 27;
cf. Jer. 16:21.
64. Note especially on this point that Jer. 16:14-21 switches to the theme of restoration
and climaxes in w. 19-21 with the "conversion
of the nations" (Craigie, Kelley, and Drinkard,
Jeremiah 1-25, p. 216; cf. Wilham L. Holladay, Jeremiah
I: A Commentary on the Book
of the Prophet Jeremiah, Chapters 1-25, ed. Paul D. Hanson, Hermeneia [
Fortress,
1986], pp. 480-81). Note also the use of the proof-saying in Ezekiel for the
nations'
knowledge of Yahweh and cf. above on the
(heightened) significance of difference in Exile.
65. "Negative" primarily in that it
involves abstention from practices engaged in by
surrounding cultures. Even so, it goes without
saying that at times separation is offensive and
that part of the encounter with the holy may involve
dread fascination.
66. See Douglas, Purity and Danger, p. 51 on the Holy as wholeness and completeness,
not just separation.
67. See especially Douglas, Natural Symbols; Smith, The
Religion of the Landless.
68. Some scholars have thought that this section
is in fact a fragment of the
Holiness Code. See George Buchanan
Gray, Numbers, International Critical Commentary
(Edinburgh:
T and T Clark, 1903), p. 183; but contrast Philip J. Budd, Numbers, Word Biblical
Commentary
5 (Waco: Word Books, 1984), p. 177.
69. Cf. Budd, Numbers, 178: "In the wider context they [w. 32-36] function
as a fitting
conclusion to the section dealing with
but more generally the whole section of
disaffection in Num 11-14. The tassels ought to be a
safeguard against these besetting sins."
70. Budd, Numbers,
p. 177 entitles this section "Tassels of Remembrance." Cf. the dual
aspects of remembrance and encounter in Baker-Aetcher, Xodus, p. 75: 'The 'X'
in this way is a
prophetic symbol of retrieval and
remembrance" and has impact not only for African Americans,
but also for Euro- Americans.
71. Cf. Richard Valantasis'
comments on asceticism and the Gospel of Thomas, which
exemplify the kind of dynamic I am talking about
here: "At the heart of asceticism is the desire
to create a new person as a minority person within
a larger religious culture. In order to create
a new person, there must be a withdrawal from the
dominant modes of articulating subjectivity
in order to create free space for something else
to emerge. A redefinition of social relationships
must also emerge from the new understanding of the
new subjectivity, as well as a concurrent
change in the symbolic universe to justify and support
the new subjectivity. These are all
accomplished through a rigorous set
of intentional performances. . . . My perspective on asceticism
looks not only at the negative performances
(rejecting wealth, or sexuality), [termed in this paper
negative difference or separation] but primarily
toward the positive articulation of the new
subjectivity that the gospel
presents ('becoming a single one,' for example) [termed in this paper
positive difference or accountability]. This
positive perspective promotes a constructive reading
of the text, so that all performances (whether
negative or positive) are interpreted in the context
of the larger project of creating an alternative
identity within a larger and more dominant religious
environment"
(Richard Valantasis, The Gospel of Thomas, New Testament Readings, ed.
72. I'd like to thank Shane Berg for bringing
this point to my attention and discussing it
with me. Jacob Milgrom, Levitiacus 1-16, Anchor Bible 3 (New York:
Doubleday, 1991), p. 230.
74. I hope in this way to get around the
devastating critique of Christian interpretations
of Old Testament legal material raised by Jon D. Levenson, The Hebrew Bible, the Old
Testament, and Historical Criticism: Jews and Christians in Biblical
Studies
(
of the legal material that is, in some ways, a legal
and therefore Christian/Protestant and
subject to Levenson's
critique. Yet at the same time, my proposal is also trying to do justice
to those same laws and situations, especially the
92
Strawn
dynamic at work within them and thus does not,
or so it seems to me, fall under Levenson's judg-
ment
75. I'd like to thank David Stubbs for bringing
this point to my attention and discussing
it with me.
76. Cf. Lev. 20:26; lsa.
31:3, 8 (cf.
comments in the preface to the second edition of
his Romans commentary: "My reply is that,
if I have a system,
it is limited to a recognition of what Kierkegaard called the 'infinite
qualitative distinction' between time and eternity,
and to my regarding this as possessing
negative as well as positive significance God is
in heaven, and thou art on earth'" (Karl
Barth, The Episde to the Romans, trans. Edwyn
C. Hoskyns [
Press,
1968], p. 10). More recently, see Moltmann, The Source of Life, pp. 43-45.
77. See OED,
p. 2352; cf. Baker-Fletcher, Xodus, pp. xvi, 8D-81. Note that
Greek
x, like XP, can be an abbreviation for Christ (OED, p. 2353).
78. See, e.g., Vinson Synan,
The Holiness-Pentecostal Tradition: Charismatic
Movements in the Twentieth
Century
(Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997).
79. Note, for instance, the Nation of Islam's
moral code (for some of its forbidden and
positive aspects, see Baker-Fletcher, Xodus, p. 77; cf.
p. xvi) and the impact this group has
made on some of the worst inner-city situations of
urban
various practices found among the Mormons (the
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day
Saints):
special ("holy") undergarments (accountability?), OR ("choose
the right") rings
(attraction?), and so forth. Often Christian youth culture is
effective at selecting these types
of practices: witness the WWJD ('What Would Jesus
Do?") paraphernalia for sale at Christian
book stores. For a different example, cf. the
comments of Richard Swinburne, "The
Vocation
of a Natural Theologian," in Philosophers
Who Believe: The Spiritual Journeys
of 11 Leading Thinkers, ed. Kelly James Clark (Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 1993), pp.
179-202
who discusses the practice of philosophy and the public identification of
oneself as
both a Christian and a philosopher in similar terms.
80. Cf. Baker-fletcher,
Xodus, p.
76: ''as Malcolm recounted to Alex Haley: 'Mr.
Muhammad
taught that we would keep this 'x' until God Himself returned and gave us
a Holy Name from His own mouth." See Malcolm
X and Alex Haley, The Autobiography
of Malcolm X (New York: Ballantine Books, 1965), p. 217.
This material is cited with gracious
permission from:
Asbury Theological Seminary
www.ats.wilmore.ky.us
Please report any errors to Ted
Hildebrandt at: thildebrandt@gordon.edu