The following post is by Dr. Dale Brueggemann, Contributing Editor at Faithlife Corporation.
Christ in the OT
Do we know for certain that Jesus can be found in the OT? In our efforts to “read backward,” are we finding Christ where perhaps he should not be found? Or do we have license as Spirit-led interpreters of Scripture to allegorize as we see fit, and as it benefits our listeners?
In this post, I’m going to address these questions by discussing the biblical mandate for a method of interpretation called “Christotelic” hermeneutics. Look with me first at the evidence from the NT directing the church to engage in Christ-centered exegesis of the OT.
How Paul and Jesus Interpreted Scripture
Paul aimed to “preach the gospel,” to “preach Christ” (Rom 15:20; 1 Cor 1:17, 23; 2 Cor 2:12; Eph 3:8; Phil 1:15). But he directed Timothy to “preach the word” (2 Tim 3:16; 4:2), which meant the OT. For the early church, that meant preaching the gospel of Christ from the OT.
On the Emmaus road, Jesus modeled an approach to expositing the OT Christologically: “beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself” (Luke 24:25-27).
Jesus’ key statement was this: “everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled” (Luke 24:44, italics added).
Two questions come to mind: 1) did the church continue to follow Jesus’ example? and 2) what example did they follow, if we don’t have the actual transcript of his exposition to the unnamed disciples?
I’m going to show you how the church historically attempted to follow Jesus method of interpretation, and argue for one in particular as especially valuable today.
Christotelic Hermeneutics in the Church
Historically, the church has employed three methods to discern “everything written about [Jesus] in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms.”
12 Comments
Great technique of color-coding relationships between the text, especially
When it's across books!
Song of Solomon 5:1-3
I gathered my myrrh with my spice,
I ate my honeycomb with my honey,
I drank my wine with my milk.
Eat, friends, drink,
and be drunk with love!
2 I slept, but my heart was awake.
A sound! My beloved is knocking.
“Open to me, my sister, my love,
my dove, my perfect one,
for my head is wet with dew,
my locks with the drops of the night.”
3 I had put off my garment;
how could I put it on?
I had bathed my feet;
how could I soil them?
6 I opened to my beloved,
but my beloved had turned and gone.
My soul failed me when he spoke.
I sought him, but found him not;
I called him, but he gave no answer.
Revelation 3:4-5
Revelation 3:18
Revelation 3:20
Oh boy… won't they ever stop?
I can just hear someone making up a story about desert conditions being
Similar to refrigerators or some such nonsense.
T, we agree.
My question is, what happened to the refrigerators where they stored the grape juice to keep it from fermenting?
New wineskins were always needed in order to expand from the gases of fermentation.
This is yet another example of how deception gets into the Church. I could go on and on.
Again, we walk the same path.
This was a good video when I watched it before. At least he kind of leaves it open. Here is the thing , we can discern that all those songs throughout history like “ Jesus, lover of my soul” and many like that , were NOTgenerated ex- facto ( or whatever the latin term would be for this) AFTER the singer had studied SoS , but were Original feelings they had towards Christ.
Here is another thing. David, in talking about Johnathan, says “ Your love to me has been better than the love of women” . So , that shows that they didn’t get shy about comparing the love of Women, to Other relationships , including the Main one , with God .
And then you have all the times the prophets use male female language, to describe Gods relation ship with us.
Here is the first video in a Biblical lecture series on the Song of Solomon he not only goes into the various ways of interpreting Song of Solomon but also gets into the ANE context of the song. I feel like today I will just be posting links to video lectures LOL.
Even the premise for why Mike says this , Doug, we can discern , might be shallow , “ None of the NT writers do” he says.
Why would we not think parts of our relationship with Christ are not of a more intimate nature than others, and therefore and intimate love writing not being just talked openly about by anyone including the NT writers. ? I mean, the fact that things are said between intimate lovers , and that it doesn’t NEED, ( and probably Shouldn’t) be talked about in letters of the NT where the purpose is to just give General Basic doctrine. Right ?
And this “Song of Solomon has cooties “ approach to this , seems kind of immature. It Really does ! ( I hope at least some of you know what I am talking about when I use the term ‘ has cooties ‘ from a game we used to play when we were children back in the 60s ).
This actually relates directly an important topic we often talk about, and that is, “ Having the Holy Spirit personally guide us and tell us certain things, and reveal truths to us “ .
We all experience this in our walk with Christ, ( and I don’t mean that in the goofy way some people tell you, but just the inner voice of tne Holy Spirit that has been trained by the sound grace doctrine , etc)
I have been listening,reading, etc, to Mike for a Long time. And I have noticed some things he does. Now I might be a lite wrong on this particular one, however , when Mike wants to make sure we go along with some Theological thread in his books , novels and podcasts etc, he will telegraph about Other stuff related to it, as well.
Like this whole thing of Christ not being in everything in the OT. It relates to ONE OF THE MAIN POINTS he has in Unseen Realm, etc, that ‘ he wants to make sure we undersatand “ That if the principalities and powers WOULD OF KNOWN” So he tells us “ not everything in the OT is about Christ “
So I wonder if this might influence the position he has in this case about the SoS. Ya, I don’t think Christ has cooties and I don’t think He thinks We do either. It is kind of strange too. Usually it is the Males that think the girl has the cooties, in this case , it is Us as the Female bride of Christ, thinking He has cooties.
I'm in the "not everything in the Bible is about Jesus" camp on this one.
While listening to a guy named Doug Batchelor (Amazing Facts guy) he went on and on
About how the wine in the Bible was just grape juice . . . And it just felt so silly. Reading Jesus
Into SoS gives me the same feeling.
One of my favorite songs is called "He Is", by Aaron Jeoffrey. I will let it speak on my behalf:
Here is a YouTube version with lyrics:
I wonder how early it was when Song of Solomon – basically a sex poem – was interpreted to refer to Jesus.
Dr. Heiser says doing so is a mistake because none of the NT authors do. What do you guys think?