A Sacred Summary
“I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it.” Matthew 16:18 NASB
Church – It’s no surprise to most of us that the word “church” is a paradigmatic expression without textual support. I have written many investigations of ekkelsia (Greek) and qehelah (Hebrew) to explain why the Church used a word that could never have been spoken by the Messiah. You can explore those comments on the web site if you haven’t already. Today I want to offer some comments by Jacques Ellul. He has summarized what happened in the course of two thousand years of paradigmatic, anti-Jewish theology. Here are three statements. See what you think.
Finally, the mysterious powers of the world are definitively exorcized, eliminated, and vanquished. This is an essential theme. . . . In this world, then, there is no longer anything supernatural. There is no longer anything mysterious, no longer any world beyond. . . . The Christian world is wholly secular. There are in it no particularly sacred times or places, precisely because God is absolutely Wholly Other and nothing in the world comes close to him or can be the bearer of value, meaning, energy or even order. The only new energy that Christianity recognizes is the potential presence of God by the Holy Spirit. But the Spirit, too, is incomprehensible, inaccessible and unexploitable.[1]
Now at the same time and in a corresponding manner, reflection upon God, being led by Greek and Roman thought, radically transformed what the Bible said about God. On the one side it analyzed the attributes of God – a God, of course, very different from the gods of polytheism, but still a God constructed by philosophy. Thus the idea of creation underwent a radical change the moment omnipotence came to the fore. The relation between God and the world now had nothing whatever to do with what the first Christian generations believed. God was tied to his creation, and ultimately the world contained God. On this basis one could find the sacred everywhere. This path led to the reappearance of persons typically connected with the sacred, such as mediators or priests.[2]
The people of the third century and later have been converted to Christianity in morality and religion, but they have kept intact their mode of thinking. Conversion is needed in the mode of thinking, too. . . . But how did they fail to see that if God had wanted to give us a philosophy He would have given us a coherent book and not the vital incoherence of the Bible? If He had put Himself in the domain of knowledge, He would have expressed His Word scientifically.[3]
Topical Index: Jacques Ellul, church, science, conversion, attributes, Matthew 16:18
[1] Jacques Ellul, The Subversion of Christianity, p 60.
[2] Ibid., p 66.
[3] Ibid., p 26.
There is something about God that we will never comprehend. That message is found in the Bible. There is no way we can bring God to this world in the way Greeks / Romans and other cultures wanted to bring their “gods” to solve their chaos… When the “Church” structure begun to “live” their “millenium” by saying that they were reigning in this world, they chose a path that now we need to revert in our way of thinking and our way of living.
The way I think I am starting to see it, the day that God, philosophically speaking, quit being a verb (Skip says that this is the original Hebrew concept of God, pre-Greek influence) and started being a noun (um, make that a whole bunch of nouns – boxes like omnipotent, etc.) was the day that it became possible to have a fight over WHICH ‘noun’ He was or was not; i.e. the Trinity, etc. wars. (Note that you have to be agreeing on the terms before you can have a fight at all.) The way I think I am starting to see it, these fights would not even be possible if we allowed that God is a function expressed in the cosmos by nouns – they only became possible, historically speaking, when He ‘became’ (philosophically speaking) one or more nouns expressed in the cosmos by functions contained BY those nouns (recent example discussed on this forum: if God is omniscient (omniscience being a ‘form’, or, noun, God fits into), then free choice (function) is not possible because He already knows the future).
God is everywhere in His creation that something is functioning (connected). Holiness IS connection. God is completely holy because He is the Great Connector (Lover) of all. This is what we are called to – the uniqueness (“separateness”, or, holiness) of particular function (love), which is never the same, by the way. This is not about nouns. Things (nouns) are expressed (past) action, or, function. Things (nouns) occur only AFTER the fact, which will always be action (verb). Life (verb) makes things (nouns). You could say that nouns are the past tense of verbs. To be in the present, then, is to live in a world of verbs and is only possible by love, which is our connection TO that present, as well as all that is contained within that present.
To live in a world of forms (nouns), which was the world not only of the Greeks, but of all of us who are separated from our present (life) is to be stuck in the past (death), and therefore subject (slave) to choices (function of the present) that have already been made. This is the impotent world of sinners forever imprisoned by what is (nouns). Nouns are all that sinners see, for they do not have the power (choice) of life (present). The Greeks lived in the world of form (slaves of choices past) because they, like all sinners, lacked the ability to stay in the present (love). The concept of control (superimposed function) only shows up when you missed the power (love) to stay in the present. People who need control have already missed the boat (power of life only found in the present).
Philosophy is full of nouns: descriptions of the way things ALREADY are, which is the closest I think sinners can come to the truth. Love, however, exists in the present (which is, I am starting to suspect, what truth – reality – IS) by continually projecting what SHOULD be (faith). Love (function) is inherently creative, which is what we were created for as well as called to. Love is not subject to what is, for love is too busy CREATING what will be. Form ( choices past) follows function (choices present), but only those who are IN the present (saints set free from the past) have the freedom of true choice (life in the present). A church full of unconverted sinners is already a valley full of bones (forms): no function in sight; therefore, no concept of the God of function lost.
Hello Skip and Others,
I am going to make a comment and ask a question or two.
As I read today’s reflection, I was reminded of a meal-time prayer learned as a child from a Presbyterian public school teacher who worked with a group of us students who are vision impaired. “For all we eat, for all we wear, we thank you Father, everywhere, amen.” In that little Grace, I learned God is “everywhere” I go, or are group went. The time was the late 1950s. I don’t know what popular Christian books were then selling, but wonder if the idea of omnipresence (God being everywhere) was considered an important truth to be espoused?
– Where does the main-line church derive its source of first and second century church history from?
Would seminaries regard people like Marvin Wilson or I believe his name to be Alfred Edersheim as authoritative or respected?
It seems like current writers like Daniel Boyran or Mark Nanos are regarded with caution. Thoughts on this appreciated.
David RDavid Russell
I have always presumed that whenever one lived, or wherever,
the discernment of the Spirit was, and is, the heart changing agent
that opened eyes and freed captive minds from the alluring patterns
of this world that prevented man from tasting the experience of the
presence of God.
I found this site which carries many books of the past for download as PDFs. I don’t know anything more about it.
(Your link had to be removed. Please, don’t put URL’s into the comments. You will have to describe where the information can be found, i.e., title, description, etc., without using the link. Links go dead and it slows down the website. Thanks, Mark)
I WAS SO CAREFUL!
the layout is SOOO distracting…**off to find Mark Randall***
The word ekklēsia is used a whopping 111 times in the NT, though the term is only found in two verses in the Gospels, with each occurrence attributed to Jesus: Matthew 16:18 and 18:17 (twice). [I have software that simplifies the search.] At its most basic, the word means assembly; however, as always, individual contexts are the final determiner. The range of meanings include: gathering; community; congregation</I; the global community of Christians, (universal) church. Of course, one could claim the latter an anachronism, but that misses the point. Lexicons are developed as translation tools, explaining meanings of terms in the current vernacular. In any case (upon quick inspection and to the best of my recollection), in no instance does ekklēsia refer to a physical structure. Those who import that meaning to the text are in error.
Most times the term does, in fact, refer to believers, Yeshua-followers.
The post is gone, and yet, you have an opinion. I am SO laughing. I hope we meet someday so you can kick me for picking on you.
Since I’m working, and took time away to respond, though the page didn’t refresh until I posted, I’d had no idea you asked for your original comment to be deleted. That is, until I looked at my comment once the page refreshed.
It’s ok, I like that you are so into your research and it doesn’t hurt that you are predictable in that regard. I have opinions as well, and rarely (with the exception of my post divorce break w/reality) hold them back.
You read the post before it was deleted? because your response doesn’t give any indication that you did….
Sorry everyone, but i’m rolling over here, laughing at the mistakes i see in my post. HIPPIES!!!
No. It should read “Hipppias”! I”m going to ask to have it removed so i can repost. it’s just…intolerable, albeit very funny.
Disclaimer: i just today realized (via Skip) that the word ekklesia is only used twice in Scripture. I read (skimmed) both of the other posts and then i looked for ‘church’ and there were MANY, i did not try to go through all of them before i posted this. All that to say i do not KNOW if Skip has already covered what i’m about to say, however, i find it interesting. I suspect Skip has it hidden away somewhere, being that it is a historical tidbit that is pertinent to his whole stance on leadership and such.
Everybody who does any kind of research on Paul and/or his writings will stand in agreement in his ability to wordsmith. He never used a word out of context, and the word chosen always spoke to his intended audience, from the glaring first blush of understanding all the way down to the pop cultural references that would be glaring to those he was writing to, but not so much to those in later times. The farther away from the moment in time the letter was written, the less understanding and, worse, the greater the misunderstanding of the writer’s intent.
As Skip is so frequently clear in stating.
What i am about to quote is from Wade Burleson’s “Fraudulent Authorityy”, and while i’ve read the information and heard it other places, I don’t recall reading it via Skip, and Burleson states it succinctly:
Begin Quote:
“In 510 the city-state of Athens was ruled by a tyrant named Hippias. The people of Athens revolted, and with the help of soldiers from Sparta, Athenians expelled the dictator Hippias from the city. Cleisthenes, who followed Hippias as chief ruler of Athens, instituted amazing reforms in the city and he became known as “the Father of Democracy.” Cleisthenes established
the Assembly (Ekkelasia) of Athens.
This ekklesia became the meeting place where ordinary citizens</ could speak their minds and try to influence one another in Athens. The ekklesia assembled t the pnyx, an open-air theatre with a retaining wall and orator’s stand west of the Acropolis of Athens. Each and every member of the assembly could speak, but those who were over fifty (ME!! ME!!) were allowed to go first in honor of their wisdom and maturity. (hmmm, maybe not ME! ME!). Elders in Athens did not mean those with more authority, it meant those with greater wisdom. (age)
The Assembly ekklesia believed no one person should have more authority or power. If an individual gained to much power in the ekklesia, he would be voted out (OFF! THE ISLAND!) and exiled for ten years…..It is no accident that when the biblical writers chose a word to represent the believers of Jesus Christ (Burleson does not adhere to Torah) who congregate or assemble together, they chose the word ekklesia. This word did not just drop from heaven.
It was not used by Paul or Peter or James in a vacuum. they knew the word represented an assembly of people who shared EQUALl authority and equal privileges within the Kingdom. Paul even went further than the Athenian Assembly in his teaching that the assembly of Christ *the church*. Should be a place where there is no difference between Jews and Greeks, males or females,
slave or free (Galatians 3:28)…In the ekklesia of Jesus Christ, any person male or female, recognized as being in Christ Carries as much moral and spiritual authority as any other person, no more or less – – the same.” END QUOTE Wade
Burleson Fraudulent Authority 2017 pgs. 62, 63
MY NOTE: As Skip noted, ekklesia simply would never have been used by Messiah, but in the correspondence of those entrusted to pass Messiah on to the generations, words were carefully chosen and used to speak to the generation at hand concisely
and deeply. Hence the usage of ekklesia when the need to hone in on the concept equality among believers when they came together in fellowship.
Burleson’s book is not very big, MOST of us could read it in a day (exception to Craig, who would have to drill down on evert point Burleson brings up. We can only thank YHVH that there’s no bibliography for him to stress over). It’s not very expensive, but if you would like a copy and can not afford one, please contact me at zadok at startmail.com
Aside note: Can anyone tell me if i got my citation correct? I struggle with those things. THANKS!
And thank you to Skip for allowing me to post something he has buried somewhere here.
i give up, i delete the fonts and redid the whole thing. at least the spelling errors are corrected. My apologies.
I don’t know where you read that I said the word is used only twice in Scripture. That is obviously not the case. The issue is how many times it is used in MATTHEW!
OH! i’m sorry! I have no idea how many times it is used. Chalk that up to my many mistakes of the morning. My humblest apologies!
I just have an understanding of WHY it is used.
Synopsis of my unreadable post:
EKKLESIA, in Paul’s day was reference to a specific place that was actually called the ‘ekklesia’. It was a stadium in Athens where everyone in society had equal standing was heard equally. If any one person gathered to much in the way of power or influence in the Ekklesia, they were voted out for TEN YEARS. This was to ensure no one ever took advantage of the people of Athens.
When Paul (or the other apostles) referenced the ekklesia the people of the day absolutely got the message that no one was to have authority over or rule over another in the gathering of Messiah.
A word is always much more then it’s ‘webster’s’ definition.
Please see Wade Burleson’s “Fraudulent Authority” for further details.
I’m done w/fonts now.
I suppose I’ll restate/rephrase my comment. The word ekklēsia is used in 111 verses in the NT, though the term is only found in two verses in the Gospels (three times total), each occurrence attributed to Jesus: Matthew 16:18 and 18:17 (twice). At its most basic, the word means assembly; however, as always, individual contexts are the final determiner. The range of meanings include: gathering; community; congregation; the global community of Christians, (universal) church. Of course, one could claim the latter an anachronism since it includes “church”, but that misses the point. Lexicons are developed as translation tools, explaining meanings of terms in the current vernacular. In any case, in no instance does ekklēsia refer to a physical structure.
The overwhelming majority of times the term refers to assemblages of believers, Yeshua-followers. The most diverse usage is found in Acts (23 total), though the majority are in reference to individual/geographical assemblies of believers. However, in the rest of the NT, the referent is the assembly believers (usually by geographical location: ekklēsia of Galatia, e.g.)—or, a few times, the universal ‘church’—whether Paul (61), James (once), John (22), or the writer of Hebrews (two). Peter does not use the term (nor does Jude).
The bottom line is that Matthew records Jesus using this word—“upon this rock I will build my ekklēsia”—and the Biblical writers use the term in the same manner in which Jesus did: to refer to believers collectively.
I got it, ESPECIALLY clearly when Skip presented (oh so succinctly) that i had totally misread whatever it was of his i thought i read….which brings us to you reading what i wrote. Notwithstanding it was a total mess (yes, i own it)…it DID have a point, that you have either totally missed or are completely not understanding (i vote the latter).
The ecclesia is a SPECIFIC name for a SPECIFIC gathering that met at a specific place (the onyx). It would have been clearly understood (think: POP CULTURE) by those Paul was writing to as a place where people, no matter the standing in the community or society, they gathered, spoke and voted on EQUAL basis.
It was the EQUALITY of the masses that Paul was impressing upon the conversation when he used the word, no matter how many times he used (or did not use).
THAT IS THE POINT.
Again, it takes more then a stack of books referencing definition, either directly or by inference, to recreate what Scripture is saying.
GOOGLE: Cleisthenes + Ecclesia + pnyx
I understood the point you were making by quoting Burleson; however, the point I made above—partially refuting Burleson—is that the term ekklēsia was not some sort of special term chosen by the Biblical writers with its prehistory in mind, as it meant at that time “assembly” in a general sense.
In Skip’s “Big Business” post—with which I mostly agree—I made the following (excerpted) comment, explaining that ekklēsia is not = synagogue. My point for quoting this here is to illustrate that individual contexts must determine meaning. And there really wasn’t a good alternative word available. So, Burleson overstates his case. Please note the other uses of the term:
Moreover, in Stephen’s speech, in Acts 7:38, the term refers to the OT ‘assembly in the wilderness’. And, Burleson is incorrect at one point: Peter never used the term, not in his own writings, nor in any speech recorded as by him, unless I missed something in Acts.
Hence, I’ll restate my bottom line from above: Matthew records Jesus using this word—“upon this rock I will build my ekklēsia”—and the Biblical writers use the term in the same manner in which Jesus did: to refer to believers collectively. It’s a particular ekklēsia, one Jesus Himself called “my ekklēsia”.
Word association is a powerful tool. Paul, and other’s used it adroitly.
There’s no way Messiah didn’t have the same (pop)cultural understanding.
Burelson overstated his case IN YOUR OPINION.
The ‘ecclesia’ never referenced a building, in that you are correct, absolutely. The ‘ecclesia’ was the word for the GROUP OF PEOPLE WHO GATHERED at the pnyx to debate matters and then (in some cases) vote on them.
ALL THE PEOPLE IN THE ECCLESIA WERE EQUAL and their vote counted EQUALLY. It didn’t matter if the person was a governor, the president, or the person who cleaned up stalls. When at the ‘ecclesia’ (gathering) at the pnyx…they were equals.
That’s the point.
And throwing Peter’s name in the mix may have just been to, in fact PURPOSEFULLY state his case. Thank you for being so patient with me as to restate something you probably knew i wasn’t going to agree with. 😉
I really think you’re misunderstanding my intentions in my above comments. I’m not just wanting to argue, or ‘prove I’m right and you’re wrong’, or something to that effect. I tried to write my comments neutrally, with points mostly implicit rather than explicit here, so as not to offend. In general, I’m only interested in facts. So, it’s not a matter of agreeing or not agreeing, it’s a matter of what the evidence shows. And, since my initial comment was in response to a now nonexistent one, I thought it best to more appropriately repost it, though with some minor changes. So, here I’ll make some of my implicit points more explicit.
Burleson’s premise is that the Biblical writers specifically looked to the example of Cleisthenes as the background for their use of the term. Yet the Biblical evidence doesn’t support that premise, because Luke in Acts uses the word in a number of different ways, not exclusively for assemblages in which all were equal in status, and not exclusively for Yeshua-followers. Moreover, there really wasn’t, as far as I know, another possible term to choose from. In addition, the word simply meant “assembly” in a general sense. Words have a tendency to shift meanings over time.
Hence, Burleson overstates his case. This isn’t some subjective opinion; this is what is borne out by the evidence. I’m not sure what your point is regarding Burleson’s assertion that Peter used the term (And throwing Peter’s name in the mix may have just been to, in fact PURPOSEFULLY state his case.), when the Biblical evidence illustrates that Peter never used the term (I verified this).
The reason I stressed that ekklēsia is never used to refer to a physical structure is for those Christians who mistakenly import this idea into the text (not you), as Skip has either stated explicitly or implicitly in prior TWs. With this, I was implicitly agreeing with Skip and others here.
I should have been more careful in my final paragraph, as it should have been qualified like so (italics added): …the Biblical writers, when referring to Yeshua-followers, use the term in the same manner in which Jesus did…
On an unrelated note: if you want to quote a lengthy section from a work, you can offset it, indent it with the blockquote command, similar to italics and bold. To do so, you must spell out the word completely, opening and closing the command like you would to italicize or bold.
It started out meaning a SPECIFIC assembly, that’s the point. Whether or not it became a watered down ‘assembly’ is immaterial to the point. The root of the word referred to the specific assembly where all were equal.
Since you have, more likely then not, not read the book, then you are not ready to judge whether or not Burelson overstated his point.
and since no one else has, either, they have no dog in the fight.
thanks for the touchback tho.
Build a Bride
This is the (current) mission of the Messiah. “I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it.” Matthew 16:18 NASB
Circle the words “I will..” – this is what revs my motor — He said He will do it!! Friend, it’s gonna get done – either with us or without us, for what God sets out to do — gets done.
“What’s happening now” is the assembly. The assembly of a Bride for the Lamb that will one day assemble together in a celebration that will be like none has been before. But as you can see, – it is RSVP, an “invitation only” event. And btw, “whosoever will” may come!!
Carl, I still miss your pith and poetry every day, and most of all your singing heart. Thank you you put a smile on my day,
Love, Laurita
Thank you Laurita, it truly is a privilege, an honor and a blessing to be a part of the family of God!!
(Psalm 32.1, 1 John 3.1)