It’s So Confusing
“Now the parable is this: the seed is the word of God.” Luke 8:11 NASB
Parable – Peter complained that Paul’s writing was difficult to follow, but Paul’s letters are a piece of cake compared to the teachings of Yeshua in the Gospels. Why? Because I can at least follow Paul’s arguments and reasoning with a little help from cultural studies and Greek geography. But Yeshua? Most of the time I am not sure if I really understand his words at all. They are clouded in Jewish Rabbinic thought, filled with idioms and cultural assumptions. I know what he is saying in general, but when it comes to serious exegesis, I find myself confused and perplexed. I can’t easily separate the words that I read in translation from the underlying Hebrew if for no other reason than I don’t have the Hebrew words. I have to “backwards translate” them from the Greek text. And I know that if I rely solely on the Greek text, I will miss a lot of the Hebrew thought forms. There is no better example of this than the translation of Matthew 5:7 (“Blessed are the merciful for they shall receive mercy”). Knowing that eleemones, the Greek word translated “mercy,” is really the Hebrew hesed, and that it ended up as “mercy” instead of the complex collection of ideas in hesed because of the influence of the LXX, helps me tease this one verse apart, but leads to a great deal of discouragement when it comes to the hundreds of verses that recount all the other teachings of Yeshua. Sometimes I just don’t know where to begin.
Apparently I’m not the only one. Even his own disciples found it difficult to understand his parables. That’s why he actually explains this parable to them. Here are men who are saturated in Jewish rabbinic thought, who are native speakers of the language, who live with the Messiah every day—and they don’t get it. What am I supposed to do two thousand years later, a world apart with a different language and a different culture?
Even the word parable gives me fits. I know the Hebrew equivalent is mashal, but “equivalent” isn’t quite right since mashal means a “wise saying and comprises examples from life, rules of prudence and courtesy, vocational advice, moral admonitions, and religious directions.”[1] Not exactly what we typically understand by parable. In fact, mashal includes poems and riddles, hidden meanings, prophetic similarities, divine revelations and interpretations, fables, allegories and even eschatological visions. The umbrella in Hebrew is much, much larger than our use of parable. In this case, Yeshua develops a mashal that is an allegory. But his teaching isn’t always allegorical. It covers the full spectrum of mashal. I understand the larger context and the general point, especially when he explains what he means, but what am I to do about all the nuances? Pray? Hope for the best? These are the words of the Messiah. They are critically important. I simply cannot pretend that my translation efforts will mine all the gold in them. It is a daunting task to explore these words; one that cannot be accomplished alone. I need your help, please.
Topical Index: Yeshua, parable, translation, exegesis, Luke 8:11
[1] Kittel, G., Friedrich, G., & Bromiley, G. W. (1985). Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (774). Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans.
On something of a tangent, we could ask, how would Christianity fare if not for Paul, would believers be more aware and inclined to keep and live by the teachings. Two millennia later Paul’s ideas are still treated as a basis for confusion, are still widely used to justify not truly following, and that to even follow is to not really believe in the Messiah’s redemption. Jesus I can understand, and try to learn from; Paul says many things, and just as the disciples of the day (assuming some measure of legitimacy in the writings available) were confounded, two thousand years later and it is still Sheol (Paul’s original name and also the name of the King which Israel was not meant to have) who continues to be used to justify not really keeping the teachings
Certainly the Church has enlisted Paul to support its arguments against Torah and other Jewish ideas, but, as John Gager noted, to read Paul is this way is to completely reverse what he meant.
There are some Christian fathers that are now proclaiming that Paul was the commencing of the 1000 years of the anti-christ. Then the majority claim his teachings are the manifestation of the grace dispensation.
I for one just find them the reminder that the gospel records all refer to the manifestation of God’s will/words/Torah in the lives of the believers. Nothing more nothing less. For when we uphold the ten commandments the complete scripture is revealed unto us not specific indoctrination…
I find it strange how people try and confirm and adhere to teachings of different doctrines with understanding the reason why the exists. We try to make serving God a thing of the mind and all spiritual or supernatural when God created us natural with natural abilities. Now why would He have done this but denied us existing as human beings…
Teth,
Just a minor correction:
Sheol is the Hebrew concept of death and/or the grave.
Paul’s Hebrew name is Sha’ul.
Blessings.
It would seem very strange, but is it otherwise ? What is the greatest source of confusion in the belief, who did the disciples all initially reject, who continued to cause differences, who did James have to compose a point by point letter in response to because of the sudden misconceptions arising because of their ‘writing style’
let’s pose a hypothetical, if a false teacher was to come, who would be emulated ? Whose style would serve best
this has never changed, why, after two thousand years is it still so accessible to turn to the one named Sheol to justify not following and even say to follow is to not truly believe ? (I should add the words are the same, they are spelt with the same letters any distinction arises from the addition of Masoretic diacritic markings, which are a much later addition)
I’m not sure why it is never plainly stated but Paul’s contrasts belie a type of Gnosticism, why justify belief and condemn ‘works’ (‘ceremonial law’ ?) without due distinctions, especially when the meaning is bound to shift many uninformed readers into a state of anomie. Where it was to be said to keep the law, Paul said as much, but in many other instances Paul’s words led to misunderstanding, if not so, why does it even still happen ? How many thousands of years before this rather significant misunderstanding can be resolved
if we take Paul out of the Bible, what happens ? Would believers be more inclined and aware to follow and keep the teachings ? This difference is key, it has happened, it continues to happen, the disciples had to act and now many other believers have to act, why ? Where is it coming from ?
Now, do I know Paul was false ? No, I really don’t (although I would readily disagree with some of his presentations of the Torah), is there at the very least a reasonable basis to be suspicious ? For once at least I’m in good company. There is a lot of confusion coming from the one named Hell
Thank you never knew the spelling was so important. Paul’s Gnostic view is said to be spiritual understanding of the scriptures. Again based on scriptural records. Psalms, prophetic reasons,, parables etc. Which makes sense reading Job 38.
Yes the spiritual meaning of the Scriptures is a rather profound area to even begin to comprehend, we can see many of the early figures do function as spiritual archetypes, even as nonetheless we might basically hold them to be literal identities. And that is just the slightest of observations about the metaphorical and spiritual allegorisation of the Scriptures we can easily perceive, after which the sheer depth and complexity of spiritual meaning and concepts to be found and even remotely comprehended is very daunting
Paul was not the only person of those early times to take a very allegorical view of Scriptures but to what extent before interpretations become unsound and misleading needs to be carefully assayed. How to make distinctions of this sort ? Well there are many measures but for the subject we might note ideas that produce disparity need to be carefully examined, and what sort of disparity are we discussing here
the reason aforementioned questions were posed is because they bring into focus just how much disarray has been produced, putting aside the partly sensational claims about Paul’s names (both of them), it is what has been produced as a result, and what continues, to this day, and the effect ? Well we might truly ask, how much more spiritually vital and ethically radical would the belief in the Messiah be if not for Paul’s ideas
I think we know this answer regardless of what we assume about Paul. What decides this matter for me is how Paul writes on the topic of the Torah, many ideas are not in my view astute, they have led to a vitiation of the core tenets of the belief, allowing for biases, judgemental attitudes, and callousness where we should have been vulnerable and meek for the sake of mercy (i.e. women, animals, vegetarianism, etc Paul takes all of these ideas and dismisses them and tradition has followed suit)
I personally don’t know what to really assume but the questions I ask are because it seems to me these point to issues that are very hard to extricate from Paul’s ideas, Paul’s presentation methods and the sometimes grandiose use of Torah concepts to arrive at certain conclusions. After these observations there are many suggestive proofs, we can see a false disciple is spoken of in Revelation (Revelation 2:1 – 3), to a particular church area, Ephesus, which as might be guessed is the one specific area spoken of by Paul in ‘Asia’. What does Paul say ? The churches in Asia have rejected him (2 Timothy 1:15). And what does the Messiah say to the one specific church spoken of Paul in Asia – they are commended for identifying and resisting false apostles.
there is a lot of overlap in these commentaries and it does not serve to exonerate so much as incriminate Paul, there is no other mention of Paul even as these timelines are so closely related and Paul have been mentioned and included in this later date
it is just one of many obscurities that can be furthered considered, but as a whole it is the effect of Paul’s writings on the belief, the loss of spiritual vitality, because many can and do freely take from Paul’s ideas a lack of need to commit. There is also the psychological impact of Paul’s wording, before we are as grains of seed falling into the ground now Paul describes this process as decaying flesh, same ideas perhaps, very different and psychologically affecting descriptions
I don’t know where to start and end with a topic such as this, so the shortest point is to consider the influence that pervades the belief and to ask if it is warranted, if not that more benefit would arise if of all the words in the Bible it is Paul’s which could be taken away to produce the most overall beneficial effect to clearing the way to following the Messiah’s guidance
Thank you a lot of meditation to be done as I have 40 plus years of spiritual indoctrination behind me. Yet it failed to create a loving supporting community I read of in the scriptures…
we are left to operate as imperfect individuals, now is the time to try, now is the time to ask ourselves can I change my attitudes, be a little more cooperative, a little kinder, meeker and so on
and in all these ways there is improvement but it can be arduous and it can be fraught, but if we set these ideas before our heart and commit to trying to improve in these ways, there is development, we can ask, especially during the Sabbath and at the end (and beginning) of our days, in what areas can I try to improve a little. These are fundamentally attitudes and mindsets, behaviours follows from this basis and even minor differences in behaviour can be decisive and a source of increasing value
It makes it extremely hard to follow and be the dividing point with Jews someone that I quite frankly have very little idea what he is talking about. And to your point, if you think that Paul is easier to understand then Yeshua then I’m really in trouble. Paul pretty much makes zero sense to me and the only way I can read him is pretend that he wrote on opposite day.
So I’m left with a series of written letters that I don’t know what the subject was of the original and I’m reading a response with language that is translated at least once and with sayings that I will most likely not understand in my life. And I’m left with sayings and nuances that don’t make sense to someone that is a scholar let alone me who doesn’t do this for a living.
So do I continue to say that Yeshua is the Messiah when I actually have no clue what He is talking about or the head hauncho after the time of His death and resurrection? On the basis of what? That He filled prophecies that I quite frankly don’t understand and teachings that were deep which I sincerely totally take the opposite way? When Deut 30:11 puts it pretty simply that Torah isn’t too hard. Sure you can get deep and you can start to see the interdependencies between text, chiastic structures etc and go get greater meanings. But Yeshua or Paul don’t start at the simple at all. These aren’t meant as anything other than open questions for answer. There are a couple one liners that are simple – yet that those tend to be a direct quote from the O.T. Does anyone else see the problem with saying, “He is the Messiah but I actually really don’t know what he is saying and the prophecies that Yeshua fulfilled really could be taken multiple ways?” Confusion is an understatement.
Many years ago (like in my seminary days) I approached this parable from just the parable and not the “explanation” that follows and is attributed to Jesus. (Do you already hear my heretical approach?) I came to appreciate that story as a talk the hearers of the parable being the seed that found themselves in different soils. It was meaningful to me then and still is meaningful to me today. What was great, was that I was able to use this story in settings that were to be “generic.” You see, in the story proper, there is no religious language. Try that on a “Christian” crowd and it will make them scratch their heads because they have to think!
Would parables be sort of similar to short stories/ fables with “moral of the story is…” functions, as figurative comparisons to situations listeners/ readers are familiar with, can grasp quite easily when we meditate upon the hidden wisdom of the contents of those stories?
Parables paint a clearer picture- Isaiah wrote: My well beloved had a vineyard in a very fruitful hill: and he fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and also made a winepress therein”(Isaiah 5:1, 2). So He expected it to bring forth good grapes, But it brought forth wild grapes.
Do you mean, I need Your help, please?
One word at a time, Skip, leads us amazingly to a better understanding already. Todah! Hope you had a great time ministering in the Philippines. Shalom!
“The parables are designed to portray a reality. In a world of metaphorical redescription, the reality behind the parable is dramatized in word-pictures. One must carefully consider the relationship between the picture and the reality while recognizing that the metaphor and the object are not one and the same. The parables give only a pictorial representation. We discover points of contact between the reality being portrayed and the picture. But the picture is not the reality. In some ways, these points resemble feathers that guide an arrow. A parable of haggadah may have multiple points of comparison between the picture and the reality, but it has one purpose. The multiple points of comparison are like the feathers aligned with the shaft of an arrow when it is aimed at a target. Because of the feathers the arrow flies steadily toward a specific destination in the same way that a parable is told to make one point. It communicates a single message, which usually requires a decision. A forceful illustration makes it difficult to ignore the call for an immediate reaction. The parable is designed to elicit a response, a decision.”
“The parables of Jewish haggadah present a spiritual reality in pictures. They begin with God and involve people. They communicate one message and urge a decision. So while a parable teacher may intend more than one point of comparison between the picture and the reality it illustrates, the drama leads in one direction to communicate a single message. The parables enable the listener to see things the way God sees them. They see human beings from God’s point of view and challenge the listener to respond to his eternal message. They take the abstract world of spiritual values and enable the audience to visualize them in concrete terms.” The Parables by Brad Young (pp. 14-15).
It has been just a few days ago that I started to reread this book. A major delight! Highly recommended! The first chapter lays a good foundation to build a firm understanding and appreciation for the power, challenge, and beauty of the parables of Yeshua.
In studying (3 decades) the ground from which the Scriptures have sprung from, the parables have been one of the most rewarding and life giving.
Jesus was intentional in his style of teaching. Seems the path to understanding is meant to be a challenging process. Must be something about it that brings about possibilities and changes in us.
Brian I understood that parables are allegoric or symbolic explanatory depictions of what is being said…
No hidden message just the same as we would today say something is a breeze implying it was easy…
Consider the kingdom is like a mustard seed which is the smallest seed but when it grows it becomes a great tree wherein all the birds of heaven can nest. Yeshau and His teachings are but a small part of human history of our relation with YHVH but by His teaching a great reality will be manifested and in it many views, prophecies and scriptural interpretations will be confirmed…
When I started out reading Paul’s messages I did it as if it was his way of reiterating what was recorded in the OT and the history of Yeshau’s teachings as that was his sending to teach the gentiles these principles…
Prophecies on the other hand were given to explain what was to come – many hidden messages as the people of the time were not intended to understand as they were not intended for them but future generations to understand what is transpiring so that we do not misrepresent God as His will unfolds on earth…
“Rabbinic and Gospel parables are authentic representations of folk culture. The themes of the stories reveal a people’s rich cultural heritage. Royal and aristocratic families are viewed through the eyes of the common folk. Agricultural laborers fill the dramatic scenes of the stories. The plots, which often involve the rich and their money or the landowners and their work forces, are derived from the situations of daily life. They may even contain depictions of high-society weddings. Parables excite attention through the human characteristics of vice and virtue. They are filled with both evil and good while they make use of fascinating cast of villains and heroes. These stories are fond of contrast, exaggeration, intrigue, and surprise. Money, power, greed as well as generosity, humility, and compassion generate the interest of the listener. Attention-attracting stories communicate the truths of God and the spiritual values of religious life. Humor is also prominent in many folklore traditions. Through much humor is culturally conditioned, the situation comedy of some stories is still apparent.” The Parables by Brad Young (p. 15).
Folk culture… now this may just change how we all interpret these ways of speaking…
If I use a French culture to understand German message I will insult the author.
So Brian as Skip and others keep reminding we must approach the message as the audience would have…
Sorry none alive today can do that. We can try and all actually miss understand the message… I am one for hearing more so I can maybe do more… Yet, more than once the scriptures warn do not do what I believe is correct, as God’s will is above our understanding. And even our best good works are nought in His sight, view or plan…
The only thing remaining is to stay learning, doing what your heart says is right and maybe just maybe I will be saved or find salvation.
Yes I’ve heard other comments such as just do today’s teaching and grow everyday…, till the word is God and will always control and shape our lives we must use them wisely…To grow naturally as well as spiritually… Next blog reminds us how fictitious our insights may be…
Brian if you had one modern parable to make sure I understood God’s will with me…. how would you phrase the message… Just curious.
In Judge’s we read of the widow in sorry and how she speaks of the roles of her sons…
Often the one less desired is the best to find refuge through…
Speaking by faith . . .
Parables have always spoken to me. As has God’s entire Word.
I’ve always been OK that He didn’t likely intend to dot every “i”
and cross every “t”. There’s only so much supernatural knowledge
that’s gonna fit into my limited fleshly skull. I’ve got all of eternity
to get things figured out. (“For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then
face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known.”)
By faith, I understand our initial beings were originally created to walk with God;
until we walked away from Him. His Word tells us He’s still walking with us and explaining to us
His love and purpose for us as best He can . . . under the circumstances.
I get it. And so grateful I do.
Hi Rich and all. Rich, your words really touched me. Thank you. I hope you have a blessed day. Shalom
Hello,
I find the admission at the end of this reflection to also be mine! Brian pointing out the cultural aspects, and Richard pointing out the limitation of human storage, i.e. our brain, are known to YHVH and yet He walks with us and talks with us if we will but listen, welcome His company, question his ways with us, and so forth. I took comfort some time ago in the words of writer Keren Hannah Pryor whom I understood to suggest, YHVH honors our sincere attempts to live for him, not if we are doing it perfectly. The same applies to our efforts to acquire understanding into His Word. Do what you are able, and ask his enabling to go further.
I don’t have a lexicon, but use Google to look up transliteration of Hebrew words and am enriched by the English synonyms that are presented. As a ministry, I will sometimes share something on Facebook, and braille out the words adding them to an index file. Create is my favorite word study. YHVH filling us when we admit our true emptiness!
David R
You can use blueletterbible.com to find the Hebrew words and definitions. It’s one of my favorite resources. And it’s free.
Shalom!
Fiddlesticks! Skip, I was really hoping you were going to help me understand the teachings of Yeshua better.
I am trying. Don’t give up on me. But I need your insight and input too. 🙂
But how? If you, as a philosofer, are unable to unearth the meaning, how can we?
Maybe being a philosopher is the problem. Maybe I need to be much more simple, more intuitive, more emotional — like the people he addressed.
Unearthing “meaning” only has value in the practical. What does anything “mean” if only philosophized into the air? When a parable (or poem or prophecy) calls us to action, the meaning is then given.
” Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds you plant” – Robert Stevenson
Thanks. Great comment.
I am more than happy to be given more questions than answers. There is a balance we must always walk between studying to better understand Torah and knowing that we are infinitely incapable of comprehending YHVH. I think the most important thing we could ever do is to simply ACT upon what God reveals. Every layer that is peeled back is meaningless without taking up our cross to follow Yeshua. And really, if the balance of all Torah and the prophets can be hung upon the two greatest commandments, our simple minds can still please Father so long as we hold all of our learning against such a measuring stick.
And the lids fell from their eyes like peels… Enlightened eyes of the mind or heart…
I love to read TW early in the morning and hopefully digest and apply it meaningfully during the day. Then I come back later and read how others see and react to it. What a great day this TW has been Skip!
Thanks particularly to David R. ” I took comfort some time ago in the words of writer Keren Hannah Pryor whom I understood to suggest, ‘YHVH honors our sincere attempts to live for him, not if we are doing it perfectly’. The same applies to our efforts to acquire understanding into His Word. Do what you are able, and ask his enabling to go further.”
A very pithy comment.
“To avoid unnecessary confusion, it should be stated explicitly that, of course, there is no such thing as a single correct translation of a foreign-language text, far less a perfect translation. Anyone who has had to engage in translation knows that there is no translation without interpretation, that interpretation is an inescapable part of translation. Individual words in both languages have ranges of meaning (polysemic, multivalent), and there is no word in one language whose range and cultural overtones exactly match those of a word in the other language. In translation, choices have to be made between words and idioms which are equally as close and equally as distant from the words and idioms of the original-language text. The abundant diversity of modern translations of the Bible is all the illustration needed. None of this, however, alters the point that the original-language text is what is to be translated/interpreted, and that each translation has to justify itself as a translation of that text. The historical text cannot determine the exact translation, but unless the text functions as some kind of norm for the translation, unless it is seen to provide a limiting factor on the diversity of acceptable translations, then translation itself becomes irresponsible.” Christianity In The Making Volume 1 – Jesus Remembered by James D. G. Dunn (p. 113)
“Of course, the ancient communicator, unlike the present-day communicator, cannot be engaged in dialogue regarding the meaning of his words, so that the hermeneutical equivalent of the Lessing (or uncertainty) principle will reduce the consensus. But here, in hermeneutics as with historical method, we are not dealing with meaning as an objective artefact, and our ‘reconstruction’ of historical meaning in historical context will be an exercise in probabilities and approximations, whose success will depend on how much data (historical philology) are available to us. In fact, most passages in the NT have a fair degree of stability of meaning in terms of the words and idioms and syntax of their time of composition. And the interpreter who is able to draw on the fruits of classical philology and to recognize the text’s genre is more likely to gain access to that stable meaning as intended by its author than other interpreters…
To restate the point (6.4b above) in terms of meaning and with still different imagery, if we liken a historical text to a plant, then it is vital that we take account of the fact that it is embedded in a certain soil, with roots and tendrils reaching often deep into that soil. To uproot the plant and attempt to transpose it into a different bed without regard to its rootedness is likely to kill it. A historical text is like such a plant. The plain ‘meaning’ cannot be fully read off the text without regard to its rootedness in its originating context. The reference is not only to the situation/social context of writer and first readers/auditors, but also to the the overtones that the words and phrases and idioms would have carried in these contexts (the root tendrils) and to the allusions and echoes, intended but also unintended, which the language of the text would have conveyed when it enacted the purpose for which it was written. That already makes for a tremendous ‘richness’ in the text, which means that plain meaning is never a matter of understanding a text in terms merely of its grammatical and syntactical structure. But it also serves as a caution against a too hasty uprooting of the text from its historical context and assumption that such a text transplanted in a different context (as, for example, in service of a later dogmatic pronouncement) will still be the same text.” Christianity In The Making Volume 1 – Jesus Remembered by James D. G. Dunn (pp.117-118)
We can have relationship with the Creator of the Universe because He seeks us out and initiates (grace) the relationship with us. This is what we encounter both in the TaNaKh and the Apostolic Writings. He desires a relationship with His creation, and He plans to bring it back to its intended fullness.
This is what I see in the parables of Yeshua; he revealed the multi-faceted and magnanimous nature and grace of his glorious Father through the local color, context and contour of their present culture, and called, confronted, and challenged his listeners to bring his forgiveness and healing to their despondent and destitute world through the now present kingdom of heaven.
I see and feel the warmth of his character shining through in his desire to effectively communicate to the listeners through parables. Even when it looks like he is concealing the message “from” the listeners; he is not concealing “from”, but he is concealing for (I heard this beautiful idea from another brother). In others words, he is calling the listeners into an ongoing relationship/yoking with the kingdom of heaven.
The wonder of the parables has not grown old to me, but still strikes me anew. I still taste the richness of their texture, and the intensity of their message fills me with longing to live out their fullness. I am awakened to the immediacy and immensity of the King’s call…
Brian thanks for the hermeneutic lesson. Now really curious would the 1611 translation not be closer to the root language than any 1900+ translation as their words and writings were even more specific than our modern over play with words… just to make a point…
Your comment is anachronistic. In 1611 the translation was just as culturally bound as a 1996 translation of the NASB. By hindsight we see the problems, but not when it was translated. Don’t read 1611 as if it was less affected by culture. I once provided a picture of a Bible from 1568 which featured a frontispiece with the KING at the top of the spiritual pyramid above God.
Thank you. Is the Orthodox Jewish Bible of 2003 less cultural bound’?
My question is how does one ever know ? If translations are slanted not to mention that many people haven’t read the Bible or Torah. And you have someone teaching that can’t read Hebrew or Greek, it is disheartening. I read the NIV version and still don’t understand what is being said. I find myself at a loss.
Yes, it is a long and sometimes discouraging climb, but you aren’t alone and it is together that we learn. So join in. Little by little we uncover what’s there.
With regard to the comment that Paul’s Hebrew name means “hell”, I found the following article in a Universalist publication from 1965. I don’t think it reveals anything astounding but it may shed further light on the meaning and appropriateness of his Hebrew name.
“Each of these words (sheol and Shaul) belong to the Hebrew word-family represented by the root SH A L, the meaning of which is ASK. The u (or vav of the usual grammarians) is a frequent feature of Hebrew words, and often changes the verb to a noun, thus shal is the verb and shaul is the noun; other members of this word-family are formed by adding e to shal, thus shale, which gives us the feminine; another form of this group prefixes m, which is largely equivalent to our nouns ending in “ing,” hence ASKING. Though Shaul is used as a proper name, yet its meaning remains.
We ask regarding that which we do not possess, or that which is unknown, or is not immediately within the range of the senses; it is unseen. The Hebrew “sheol” is the same as the Greek “hades,” the imperceptible, the unseen. A king was unseen in Israel; they did not have a king as other nations, so they asked for a king, and Saul was given. The name marked the details of the situation. So also Saul of the Acts. He was not seen at the beginning of the record, nor was he seen with the Twelve, and even when introduced into the account, he is largely unseen so far as association with the Twelve is concerned; in fact it was years before he met them, and the name had been dropped long before the occasion when he goes to Jerusalem for the conference (Acts 15:4).
Saul’s doing at the point in the record when he becomes seen (Acts 7:58-8:3) are such that he would be unseen in the kingdom; for Saul’s attitude against that Prophet like unto Moses was such as to lead to his utter extermination from among the people (Acts 3:22,23).”
If Shaul is possibly Sheol it seems to illustrated Eph 4 He descended taking captives captive ascending giving them gifts, first apostle such as Paul etc.