Making The Invisible Visible Section 4

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Hermeneutics: Making The Invisible Visible — © 2004 Roderick Graciano out relationally. This is exactly what Christ called the Rich Young Ruler to embrace. The Lord first pointed the young man to the commandments, which as we know can be summed up by “live in right relationship with God and with your neighbor.” The young man claimed to have mastered this principle. So Jesus said to him, in effect, “Okay, if you understand the call to right relationship with God and man, then get rid of whatever would hinder you and come embark upon a personal relationship with me.” How do we inherit eternal life? The Scriptures are consistent: by entering a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. The Character Emphasis To Follow Christ (Luke 9.23; John 12.26; 13.15) To enter a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, as opposed to simply adopting a creedal assent to His claims, involves following Him. In our minds, following is something spatial and geographical, and it’s easy to read the statements of Jesus that way. Consider the one in John 12.26, for example: “Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be.” It sounds spatial and geographical, but the call to follow Jesus is relational, and the “place” where the servant of Jesus will “be” is not a geographical location but instead a character domain. It is the lifestyle landscape marked out by the priorities of Jesus. Yes, to live in that domain, may involve geographical travel, but it primarily involves character change. The “following” that we must do is the following of Christ’s example for living: “I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you” (John 13.15). To Have A Good Eye (Mat. 6.22) Following Christ’s example helps transforms our character into His. Just as the Old Testament emphasizes character over outward appearance, the New Testament emphasizes character transformation over temporal comfort. We “rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance, [and] perseverance [produces] character” (Rom. 5.3-4). “For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son” (Rom. 8.29). That likeness involves all the fruit of the Spirit: “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control” (Gal. 5.22,23), as well as other character qualities, including generosity. The call to generosity provides us with a Hebraism in Christ’s teaching that has puzzled translators. The Greek text of Matthew 6.22 reads: The lamp of the body is the eye, if then your eye may be single, your whole body shall be full of light. The King James version renders the key adjective correctly though strictly, as single. Later translators milked more meaning from the this Greek word single (aplous), recognizing that it means without folds, simple, sincere. Realizing that this unfolded simplicity must point in some way to the integrity of the eye, various versions have described the eye in this verse as “good” (NKJV), “clear” (NASB) and “healthy” (NRS). However, translators also puzzled over the oddity that Jesus only referred to one eye, Page 16
Hermeneutics: Making The Invisible Visible — © 2004 Roderick Graciano not to “your eyes,” plural. The NIV thought it was absurd and translated, “if your eyes are good…” But remember how the Hebrews used external traits and bearing (like the slant at which the Shulammite held her nose) as metaphors for inner qualities? That’s what Jesus did in this passage about money. The expression of the eyes communicates much about the attitude of a man in the midst of financial dealings. Our missing hermeneutical insight has been that “a good eye” is a Hebraism for “generosity”! 24 So, single (aplous) does mean sound, healthy and good, but the message is: If you are generous your whole body (life?) will be full of light. To Attain To The Resurrection… (Phil. 3.10) The Hebraic emphasis on character may also explain the puzzling Pauline wish to “attain to the resurrection”: Phil. 3.10 I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11 and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead. Clearly, Paul was not uncertain about whether or not he would be resurrected, for he preached that there would be “a resurrection of both the righteous and the wicked” (Acts 24.15). Nor did he endeavor to earn or merit participation in the resurrection of the righteous, for he intended to “be found in [Christ], not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ — the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith” (Philippians 3.9). No, what Paul sought was the continuing transformation of his character as he deepened his relationship with Christ. Some have wondered if the resurrection Paul referred to in this verse was something unique since he used a Greek word for it (exanastasis “out-resurrection”) that occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. The normal New Testament word for resurrection is simply anastasis. However, this should not distract us, for the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, gleaning from other Greek literature, considers anastasis and exanastasis equivalent. The key for understanding Philippians 3.11 is the phrase attain to (Gk. katantao eis). Paul only uses attain (katantao) four times in the canon, and he never uses it or any other word to speak of “meriting” or “attaining by effort” such a thing as eternal life or the resurrection. The closest parallel in Paul’s writings to the Philippians 3.11 phrasing is in Eph. 4.13: … until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fulness of Christ. (NASB) Some versions properly render attain to in this Ephesians passage as “reach” (NIV) or “come to” (NKJV). We see from this parallel, that Paul in Philippians 3.11 is not speaking of attaining in the sense of getting some reward, but rather in the sense of arriving at a certain level of maturity. This is clearly the thrust of katantao eis in Eph. 4.13, and it fits the context of Philippians 3. “Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect,” Paul continues in Philippians 3.12, “but I press on…forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal…. All of us who are mature should take such a view of things. …Only let us live up to what we have already attained.” In verse 17, Paul concludes “Join with oth- Page 17
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