Gott Proverbs?

Norman K. Gottwald argued nearly 50 years ago that the Hebrew Proverbs are "generally mediocre as literature, tedious as ethics, banal as religion" (A Light to the Nations, New York: Harper, 1959: 472). For someone who was quite critical of the historical-critical school, it's remarkable how little Gottwald's sociological models and ethnographic parallels -- seen chiefly in his 'peasant revolt' theory of Israel's origins -- move us beyond what the critical school had been saying for decades prior.

Thankfully, numerous studies in 'Wisdom literature' more recently have demonstrated how woefully wrong Gottwald is on all three accounts. Raymond van Leeuwen's Context and Meaning in Proverbs 25-27 should be required-reading for anyone trying to work their way through Proverbs' poetic skill, rhetorical subtleties, and theological acumen. Bruce Waltke's recent commentary on Proverbs works this out in even greater detail.

Lost in Translation(s)??

Alan Jacobs has an interesting review (2005) of Robert Alter's The Five Books of Moses: A Translation with Commentary that touches on a key issue related to modern Bible translations that has long bothered me.

Typically, the debates in evangelical translation philosophy get reduced to a continuum between (1) 'literal where possible' (e.g. the NASB) on one end and (2) 'loose paraphrase' (e.g. the Living Bible or The Message) on the other, with (3) the other 'dynamic equivalence' translations falling somewhere in between.

Because option (1) is recognizably difficult whenever you translate from any language into another, option (2) has become the status quo for most evangelicals and option (3) continues to gain momentum in a lot of circles. But have the new translations really produced a better text? Jacobs argues (echoing Alter) that a big part of the problem in all three of these options (particularly 2 and 3!) is that they frequently fail to do justice to the literary form of the original text in their translation philosophy.

Of course, not all of the literary features of either Greek or Hebrew will easily translate into English (and hence the reason why Option 1 relies on a sometimes-overly-wooden approach to translation). However, Jacobs argues that translators too quickly 'give in' to this translational divide by 'smoothing out' those literary features of the original languages. How? By devoting far too much attention towards producing something readable in English, and failing to really wrestle with the original. And in so doing, the literary artifice of the original text gets 'lost in translation'!

Alter explains:

The assumption of most modern translators has been that this sort of [Hebrew verbal] syntax will be either unintelligible or at least alienating to the modern readers, and so should be entire rearranged as modern English. There are two basic problems with this procedure. First, it ignores the fact that parataxis [two or more syntactic units connected without use of a conjunction] is the essential literary vehicle of biblical narrative: it is the way the ancient Hebrew writers saw the world, linked events in it, artfully ordered it, and narrated it, and one gets a very different world if their syntax is jettisoned. Second, rejection of biblical parataxis presupposes a very simplistic notion of what constitutes modern literary English (Preface, pg. xxiv).

Jacobs' review highlights just a few of the numerous examples brought out by Alter in the historical-prose sections of the Old Testament, where English translations routinely 'over-interpret' or 'over-stylize' the text in places where the text is deliberately ambiguous or deliberately (and at times, monotonously!) repetitive. Why does this happen? I suspect because our definitions of Biblical perspicuity, while necessary to our theological commitments, don't have enough literary elasticity to account for things like ambiguity (or monotony) in a text. Even the Westminster Confession admits that "all things in Scripture are not alike plain in themselves" (1.7), but I wonder how many committed to the Westminster Standards would be equally willing to say that certain texts (particularly OT historical texts) are purposely ambiguous due to their literary style?!?!? I suspect that sounds far too radical a proposal for many, if not most.

Alter (on a few occasions) calls this ironing out of textual ambiguity the "the heresy of explanation"...and just about all of the modern translations fall into this 'heresy' at some point or another. What does Alter propose as a necessary corrective?

"A suitable English version should avoid at all costs the modern abomination of elegant synonymous variation, for the literary prose of the Bible turns everywhere on significant repetition, not variation. Similarly the translation of terms on the basis of immediate context -- except when it becomes grotesque to do otherwise -- is to be resisted....Finally, the mesmerizing effect of these ancient stories will scarcely be conveyed if they are not rendered in cadenced English prose that at least in some ways corresponds to the powerful cadences of the Hebrew (xxxii).

Alter is likely guilty of overstating his case here -- do we really want to say that these modern translations 'scarcely' convey the Biblical narrative's intent? Nevertheless, I think the basic criticism is valid and worth pondering in lieu of the translations that roll out on an almost-yearly basis. The roughly 50 page introduction should be read by anyone doing work in the Hebrew Old Testament translation, whether as Hebrew scholar or a pastor.

I'd be curious to if there is a "Robert Alter counterpart" writing in the area of Greek narrative style. Steve Baugh made an off-the-cuff comment to me about 4 or 5 years ago, that (if I remember right!) he was learning to appreciate more and more how Greek narrative style was far more informed by Hebrew narrative style than many of the standard Greek grammarians will ever admit to (particularly as it relates to Septuagint renderings of the Hebrew text) ....but I can't say that I've seen much research explored in this area.

Many reading this blog already will be familiar with Alter's classic texts on Hebrew narrative and poetry; these are 'must reads' (with discernment, of course), if you are working through any of those portions of the OT. If you are preaching through the Pentateuch, The Five Books of Moses is a treasure chest of translational nuggets! I haven't had a chance to review his most recent work on translating the Psalms, but I can only imagine it will prove an excellent resource.

More taxes, anyone?

My three-word summary of the political landscape in 2008: image over ideas.

Of course, this could probably be said about most political elections since the flourishing of news and television media outlets over the last half century. Sure, the Lincoln-Douglas debates (the so-called 'roots' of today's Presidential debates) in 1858 had its fair share of rhetorical flair, but there was always a since in which there were real ideas and methodological commitments behind the rhetoric. Today, one is constantly bombarded with 60 seconds here-90 seconds there to answer a question....which, of course, only encourages more 'political spin' without ever really discussing anything at all.

Remember teary-eyed Hillary in Iowa a month or so ago? Or more recently, the 'hand-shaking incident' with Ted Kennedy during the State of the Union address? TV outlets (from Fox to CNN) ran gang-busters with this. But what do either of these incidents really have to do with the issues that the average America? It might as well be Tony Romo and Jessica Simpson that we're talking about, where the media goes out of its way to cover an issue by stating: "We, the media, should leave this one alone...because it really has nothing to do with Romo's poor performance in the playoffs." What's the real difference here? National issues get reduced to the level of 'sporting event' event tabloids.

[NB: Admittedly, I didn't follow the campaign trail to the elections of 2000 and 2004 terribly closely -- in the case of the former, I was finishing seminary and working in a Santa Barbara (internship); in the case of the later, I was preparing for and traveling to Canada. In neither case was I able to watch television due to the poor television reception in Escondido. So I've probably seen more political coverage (i.e. 'sound bites') this time around than the previous two combined....and we still have another 9+ months of this to go!]

The internet has plenty of pitfalls in the area of mis-information. But (surprise, surprise!) I'm starting to think that number-crunching articles, Q&A's that actually answer substantial questions, etc., may end up the better medium for cutting through so much of the 'spin' that takes place on television newscasts and 30-second advertisements.

The reason I'm voting for Ron Paul next week can frankly be summed up in one word: economics. All the so-called polls say the economy is now the #1 issue for most voters in America, even more than the Iraq War. The problem is that these same people that are so concerned about the economy don't understand the economics of government taxation.

The National Taxpayers Union Federation (NTUF) issued a statement this week analyzing President Bush's recent State of the Union address, and conclude that it amounts to a $134.6 Billion-dollar spending increase from 2007, the largest single increase of his 8 year term. Weren't the Republicans suppose be the party of less government spending?

The NTUF also issued another report analyzing the various budget proposals of the various candidates running for the President in 2008, showing that more spending is likely on the horizon. Increases from the various candidates include:

Huckabee: +$54.2 Billion
Romney: +$19.5 Billion
McCain: +6.9 Billion

Isn't McCain suppose to be the more 'moderate' of the three? Then there are the Democratic front-runners:

Obama: +$287.0 Billion
Hillary: +218.2 Billion

This is one of the reason I'm not really buying the 'compassionate Obama persona' that a lot of people (including a number of conservatives) seem attracted to. When it comes to government spending, Obama is as 'big government' as they come.

There was only one (remaining) candidate that scored in the negative category:

Ron Paul: -$150.1 Billion

As stated in one of my previous posts, the GOP simply doesn't understand what to do with Ron Paul. Could it be because they have become so accustomed to big-spending that someone like Paul actually sounds like a 'radical'? In fact, Paul is the only candidate that I really trust who says he wants 'change' and actually has a voting record to back up real change.

Changes Around BeritOlam!

After thinking over the general content of this blog, I've decided to pull an Andrew Compton...and set up a separate blog here.

I'm not exactly sure yet how I'm going to organize things between the two, but in my mind I have the thought to post general commentary, photos, and personal updates at the 'other' site, while keeping this site focussed more on matters related to my academic interests in Old Testament, the Hebrew Bible, and theology (with, of course, some New Testament thrown in too!). You can think of it as '2 Kingdom' blogging (if you must), but I of course reserve the right to confuse these two kingdoms as I see fit!

I also thought this would be an interesting way to see the 'ins and outs' of Blogger vs. Wordpress, two of the more popular blogging sites out there. I actually reserved both of these sites when I initially started blogging about a year ago, but I decided to go with Blogger because of its simple navigation for 'Blogging 101'...and of course it connected to a Google account rather nicely. Of course, a lot has changed since this time last year(!!!). Giving your blog a free 'face lift' seems a whole lot easier in January '08 than January '07; it certainly appears that Blogger and Wordpress provide a plethora of 'free account' options and add-ons that I don't particularly recall from a year ago. [It could be that I simply didn't know what I was doing a year ago, though I still wonder how much more I know a year later!]

I have a number of ideas for 2008 in terms of posting content....so stick around to find out.

Power Politics

Two recent blog posts highlight for me the complexity and frustration with the 2008 election.

Lee Irons comments on the matter of executive power:

It’s disappointing that so few Republicans seem to care [about it] , but traditionally conservatives have been the ones upholding the Constitution, limiting presidential power, and defending civil liberties and the rule of law.

One place you really see this is the way Ron Paul gets treated by the Republican establishment. Just read a few pro-Republican pundits, and you'll see it soon enough. Paul is usually dismissed rather quickly under the conservative rhetoric that he is anti-American, anti-military, anti-War on terror, or (the really popular one) just too radical in his politics to be a true Republican.

Such 'radical' remarks about Paul actually tell you more about the political machine than Paul himself. Paul's message is frankly very simple -- it is pro-free market, pro-Constitution, and anti-government across the board. In other words, Paul is just too libertarian for the big-government ideology on the 'left'...and the increasingly big-government agenda on the 'right'! A great example of this is the way Republican diehards criticize Paul's consistent opposition to the Iraqi occupation. Note the way Paul gets lumped in with the leftist, anti-war machine; for some reason, it never really occurs to these people that Paul's rationale has absolutely nothing to do with leftist politics. His rationale for opposing Iraq (as far as I can tell) is: (a) we're involved in a prolonged conflict that really amounts to an unconstitutional 'war' and (b) it's costing the country billions of dollars to fund it.

The reason why Paul's message sounds too radical for people is because we've become too accustomed to letting big government run our lives...and that goes for Democrats and Republicans.

A great example of the 'big government' establishment surfaced in the aftermath of the Bhutto assassination. Kim Riddlebarger was particularly 'disgusted' with the way the candidates from both sides of the fence handled themselves:

Is anyone else as as disgusted as I am at all the presidential campaigns for using the tragic assassination of Benazir Bhutto as a way to shamelessly tout their own supposed foreign policy credentials?

These guys (and a gal) have spent the last two days knocking each other over to get before a camera or a mic to pontificate about something they obviously know very little about. Unless you are already in the White House and privy to hard intelligence, you probably don't know squat about what really happened and who did the dastardly deed....

And we wonder why less than 50% of Americans vote? The cynicism shown by the lot of them is disgusting to me. And just why is it that we are going through this eleven months before the election?

As Riddlebarger remarks, Paul's response makes the most sense -- "We should mind our own business and stay out of supporting military dictators." No political spin....and (more importantly!) just good economics. And yet again, Paul gets blasted by the 'neocons' for being anti-American and anti-military because Paul is critical of American foreign policy.

I don't agree with everything Paul says, but his message has a near-brutal consistency to it that is very appealing.....and no one in either party likes it.

Last Minute Christmas Shopping?

Stephen Dubner (of Freakonomics fame) provides a rather compelling reason why consumers might not want to be so quick in buying gift cards for that hard-to-shop-for person:

[F]or the merchant...the gift card is a godsend. Just think of it: In the weeks leading up to Christmas, millions of people visit your store or Web site and hand you billions of dollars in exchange for nothing more than a plastic I.O.U. that may never even be redeemed. Best Buy, for instance, earned $16 million last year in gift-card “breakage,” which is the industry’s term for card value that was bought but never redeemed. Then there’s what retailers call “upspending”: most customers who do use their gift cards spend some of their own money to buy merchandise that is more expensive than the value of the card.

For the giver, meanwhile, a gift card could hardly be easier. But most economists would argue that if a gift card is so transparently good for the giver, it is necessarily bad for the recipient: the fact that it can be bought so easily signals to the recipient that the giver didn’t put much effort into the gift.

In the end, the value of any gift is overwhelmingly dependent on the nature of the relationship between giver and recipient. The economist Alex Tabarrok, writing recently on the Marginal Revolution blog, put an even finer point on this fact, noting that each of us has many “selves,” including a “wild self,” and that “we want the wild self in someone else to be wild about us.” His advice? “If you want to please the economist in me, send me cash. If you want to please my wild self (you know who you are!), use your imagination.”

So next year, if you need a gift for a strict rationalist, consider cash. If you want to appeal to someone’s wild self, you’ll have to use your imagination. And if you’re hoping to send a little something extra to the shareholders of Best Buy or the Gap or Tiffany, consider a gift card.

This makes sense to me on a number of levels, but I'll pick just one.

Vicky and I registered this past spring at Crate & Barrel and Bed Bath & Beyond primarily because that's just what engaged couples do...and not so much because we really needed the things we registered for. If we had strictly operated on the later premise, our registry would have actually been quite small. The kinds of things (truth be told) that we were really interested in were things like a modest couch/recliner set....and who is going to give that for a wedding gift!

Had we been moving into a 3 bedroom, 1600 sq. feet home, together then there likely would have been all sorts of things we would have needed to 'fill in' the place. But we were going in the opposite direction -- from my studio and her one bedroom apartment to just her apartment!! Needless to say, we quickly realized that wasn't going to work....so we moved into a more spacious 2 bedroom place a few blocks away. Still, in typical California fashion, it's hardly booming with space.

So what happened? We ended up with a lot of nice gifts that we simply didn't have room for! What do you do then? Well, one option would be to store it all in the mother-in-law's house 25 miles away. I actually know someone who married fairly recently -- I won't say who -- who privately confessed to doing this very thing. But, being the 'cruel' people that we are, Vicky and I decided to take the insensitive route -- "Let just return the stuff we don't really need...and exchange it for cold hard cash!"

Which brings us back to the point being made by Dubner. I've admittedly fallen into the 'gift card' myth many times in the past, but the evidence doesn't lie. There's a reason Best Buy parades gift cards before you on virtually every isle -- they know many of those $50 gifts are really just gifts to Best Buy, not the consumer who receives to card.

The next time you think about giving a 'gift card' for a wedding or Christmas gift, why not just give them cold hard cash instead? It's certainly not less-thoughtful, and it actually provides more immediate-yet-flexible liquidity. I doubt too many Koreans have read Freakonomics, and I'm not sure I fully understand the complexity of motives behind Asian-wedding gift giving....but they clearly understand that most of us low and middle income people will always benefit (and enjoy!) the most from monetary gifts.

So Bah humbug to gift cards, I say!

[And if you are reading this blog and you were one of the people who gave us a non-monetary gift for our wedding, we truly appreciate your decision to give whatever you gave! Rather, this commentary really has to do with my own public 'repenting' of all the gift cards I've given people as gifts in the past!]

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Postscript: Dubner has a great piece released yesterday on charity giving. His blurb about tithing didn't strike me as particularly revolutionary, but it did occur to me how manditory tithing cuts against the whole theonomic rationale (i.e. law) behind tithing. Anyone interested in a soft-pedaled form of 'Christianized Socialism'? Of course, I learned from a good friend a couple years ago that there are actually Reformed church sessions that think the entire congregation should give all of their goods/possessions to the session, only to have the sessions distribute it as needed. What a grand idea: Reformed charity in the form of Christian communism! Seriously....who can make this stuff up?

The Problem with American Education

One of my favorite libertarian economists, Walter E. Williams, comments on the demise of public education:

American education will never be improved until we address one of the problems seen as too delicate to discuss. That problem is the overall quality of people teaching our children. Students who have chosen education as their major have the lowest SAT scores of any other major. Students who have graduated with an education degree earn lower scores than any other major on graduate school admissions tests such as the GRE, MCAT or LSAT. Schools of education, either graduate or undergraduate, represent the academic slums of most any university. As such, they are home to the least able students and professors with the lowest academic respect. Were we serious about efforts to improve public education, one of the first things we would do is eliminate schools of education.

One thing I like about Williams is that he is not afraid to call a spade a spade. Williams is responding a recent report that found 15-year old American students ranked 33rd in math literacy among industrialized nations (and 27th in science). And, as usual, we are so accustomed to throwing government money at everything that invaribly the answer becomes spending more tax-payer money on education.

Virtually everyone Christian I know teaching in the public school system has in one way or another confessed that Bush's 'No Child Left Behind' has been a colossal failure. Obama wants to allocate another $18 billion to reform federal education. Is there any indication this is going to actually work, given our track record?

The question of a child's education has become a boiling point in most conservative, evangelical churches (especially of the Reformed variety). Especially over the last 3 decades, the condemnation of the public school system has taken an increasing religious/theological direction, perhaps due to certain theocratic presuppositions that have gained momentum on the Christian-culture horizon. But as one who finds most of those arguments dubious, what should one do?

I think Williams provides a much more compelling rationale for why Christians parents might want to look into other educational options....and not for the usual religious reasons. Could it be that an individual might want to pursue private, Christian, Charter, or even home schooling options for the simple reason that public education is more and more a vastly inferior product? [Wow, such an 'un-spiritual' reason!]

Williams somewhat humorously notes, "Mathematics, more than any other subject, is culturally neutral. The square root of 16 is 4 whether you're Asian, European or African, or even Plutonian or Martian." Might we add to that list Christian?

[Kuyperian backlash, anyone?]

Friday Night Lights

It's funny what at TV show will do to a native Californian's perception of high school football in Texas. Admittedly, I've only seen one episode of Friday Night Lights thus far. This is just a wild guess, but by gut tells me that most people back in Texas find this show rather humorous...if they have even seen it at all. That's because most of them have little interest in what Hollywood thinks Texas football looks like, when they can enjoy the real thing for themselves!

While I've thoroughly been 'corrupted' by life on the West Coast, the two parts of Texas life that I miss enjoying are (a) family/friends and (b) the atmosphere of High School football. Of course, it didn't hurt that I went to a high school (Katy High School) that has won three state titles in the Class 5A (the state's largest) section since 1996.

This year, they are 15-0, ranked as high as No. 2 in the country by some polls, and now get their chance this weekend to win yet another state championship against Pflugerville in the Alamodome (San Antonio). This is what their playoff domination has looked like so far (in chronological order):

Katy 58 - Strake Jesuit 18
Katy 42 - Houston Madison 8
Katy 30 - Pasadena Memorial 14
Katy 42 - Clements 0
Katy 66 - San Antonio Madison 21

Sorry to gloat, but I guess it doesn't bode well to be named 'Madison' this year! :-) Keep in mind Clements was 13-o coming into their meeting with the Tigers; it's even better when your older cousin graduated from the school on the losing end! :-) And it's not all that often that your team breaks the school record for the most points scored in a game (66) this deep in the playoffs.

I would not want to be rooting for Pflugerville (12-3) this weekend!

It remains to be seen where star RB Aundre Dean (seen below) will end up. He verbally committed to UCLA this past Spring, but the rumor is that he would go somewhere else if Karl Dorrell was fired as the Bruin head coach (which happened on Dec. 3). Bummer, Bruin fans!

The Wright View of Penal Substitution?

Many people know by now the name, Steve Chalke, in connection with the doctrine of Christ's penal substitutionary atonement. In his 2004 The Lost Message of Jesus, Chalke in a not-so-subtle way argued that the whole classic notion of 'penal substitution' amounts to a form of "cosmic child abuse." While I was busy figuring out 'the Canadian life' and immersing myself in OT historical narratives, Chalke's book stirred up quite the hornet's nest across the pond. Books have been written in response and all sorts of responses have come and gone.

Lee Irons pointed out to me a couple months ago about the frequency you see the word 'violence' in books and articles these days in broad evangelical circles; it's all part of a recent trend seeking to recast (if not openly deny!) 'penal substition' because it seems to advocate a message that 'postmoderns' don't wont to hear or can't understand.

Like many of these modern theological issues, N.T. Wright injected himself into the discussion earlier this year via a 'quasi-defense' of Chalke's book. While not endorsing the book per se, he certainly wasted no time blasting those critical of Chalke. As with many of these issues, the questions always seems to come down to: What does Wright really believe about ________?

In November 2007, Wright was interviewed while visiting Asbury Seminary, and the full transcript of that interview can be found here. There's plenty here to comment on, but I'll limit it to his brief discussion about penal substition. Two quotes worth noting:

And the one-liner which he [Chalke] drops in was not, in its origin, a way of saying, “I don’t believe in penal substitution.” It was a way of ruling out of court to one side a distortion of penal substitution which he has heard, which I have heard – the idea of God simply wanting to punish somebody and not caring too much who it was. Oh, well, here’s an innocent man. Let’s punish him and that will be alright, won’t it? Sadly, there are many Christians who preach the doctrine like that.

and then a little bit farther down:

So we have to understand the doctrine of penal substitution within the Scriptural framework, within which it makes sense, rather than within this very low grade thing that I’ve been a naughty boy, God wants to punish me, and for some reason, he punishes someone else, so phew! I’m alright. OK. For a five-year-old, that’s fine. That’ll maybe do it. But, actually let’s grow up! We’re not talking about five-year-olds here; we’re talking about grown men and women who ought to know better, to be honest.

I'll grant for sake of argument that there are probably some Christian ministers that preach the doctrine of 'penal substitution' in an unbiblical way. But when Wright speaks of this "...idea of God simply wanting to punish somebody and not caring too much who it was," I honestly have to wonder just who he's speaking of. If this version of 'penal substitution' is out there, I certainly don't know where it exists, let alone who is teaching it. Even the most committed 'hell, fire, and brimstone' preacher that beats people up with the Law -- a significant error in its own right -- would not recognize this sort of caricature that Wright imagines. The fact that Wright would seek to defend Chalke on the premise of a non-existent view of penal substitution is quite troubling, even taking into account the quotations Jim Hamilton and Trevin Wax have gathered to demonstrate that Wright personally holds to a doctrine of penal substitution.

When you put it all together, I don't have a whole lot of confidence that N.T. Wright understands penal substitution correctly, for the simple reason that all these loose ends in Wright-speak simply do not cohere. I'm inclined to think the Oakhill men (Steve Jeffery, Mike Ovey and Andrew Sach) are surely right to identify their disagreement with Wright as a "methodological one" at its core. In other words, this cannot be written off simply as a matter of emphasizing one thing more than the other; Wright seems to be tolerating a fundamentally different way we should think about the atonement.

For a nice survey of the classic doctrine of penal substitution, check out J.I. Packer's recent article here. One can't help but notice a substantial difference between these two Anglicans! Packer is certainly aware of these theological developments in his native homeland, and holds nothing back in exposing precisely why this notion of 'cosmic child abuse' is wrong on just about every level.

UPDATE (Dec. 20): You can read Lee Irons' further elaboration on this post at the Upper Register blog.

A Note From Managment....

Work in Progress! Sorry for the mess, as I try to update my blog!