I-YOUniverse

Last night’s neighborhood Bible study was different. We didn’t focus just on a psalm, but on the mysterious Melchizedek, mentioned in Psalm 110 and elsewhere. 

Theological Fine Print

I don’t go in for biblical prophecy aka fortune telling, allegory or typology much. I’m a big fan of prophecy aka preaching especially unpopular truth. But perhaps because I’m re-reading Bernard Ramm’s Protestant Biblical Interpretation, 3^rd ed., I felt like tackling Melchizedek the type. Ramm is much more conservative than I, but through the years I keep reviewing his principles of hermeneutics.

I’ve gotten clarity this trip around that in typology it’s “anti” with an i, not “ante” with an e. Which helps because the antitype (Christ) occurs later in time, not earlier, than the type (Melchizedek).

Most recently, a friend drove me to buy yet another copy of Ramm when he said (in holy sophisticated verbiage) that the Bible means whatever you want it to mean, like a Rorschach ink blot. Imagine what that’ll do to your Hebrew vowel points!

BS!

Now here’s the secret I-believe-the-same-thing-you-believe-about-inerrancy handshake.

Sick of this crap? skip the following two paragraphs.

2…I wish I was inerrant, but I keep making dumb mistakes. So even if the Bible is inerrant, I amn’t. My brain is errant. My cats are errant. My knights are errant. So I get the Bible, if it’s about my error-ridden kind of life and mere mistake making mortals like me. If it’s about nonexistent manuscripts of mystical perfection produced by zombie flautists, I don’t get it. Mystical perfection and I aren’t on a first name basis yet. As for zombie flautists, I get them green warranted for a 72 hour all-expenses-paid stay in the nearest psyche ward.

1…So why read Ramm, who devotes a whole chapter to inerrancy? It’s a good idea to read people whose ideas creep you out, even make you want to puke—although Ramm doesn’t rise to that level for me. 56.4% or more of the time he makes sense to me. Always he’s grounded, logical, and sane.

Restart reading here:

Despite my suave (rhymes with gave) breezy style, I do NOT disrespect error-free brethren and sistern. Ramm said it well in 1970 or earlier:

There is a prevailing danger to let differences in interpretation interrupt the unity of the Spirit. When differences are sharp, feelings are apt to run high. With foreboding storm clouds of oppression on the distant horizon, it is well for conservative Protestantism to discover bases of fellowship rather than divergence.  If we stand together in the great truths of the Trinity, of Jesus Christ, and of Salvation, let us then work out our interpretive differences in the bounds of Christian love and endeavor to preserve the unity of the Spirit. A hermeneutical victory at the expense of Christian graciousness is hardly worth winning.

Bernard Ramm, Protestant Biblical Interpretation, 3^rd rev. ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1970), p. 289.

What were we blogging about? Oh yeah, actual Bible study

Anyway, I chose psalm 110 for our topic last night. Melchizedek’s always good for an hour or two.

Of course, you start a study of Melchizedek pronouncing names of kings Amraphel, Arioch, Chedorlaomer, and Tidal in Genesis 14. These guys wrangled with some other guys with equally jaw-buster names. They took captive Lot, Abram’s ne-er-do-well nephew hanging out in Sodom, capital Sin City of the Dead Sea metroplex.

Which kicked Abram into gear. He pursued them North to Damascus, and brought back Lot and all his haul, “and the women and the people.”

Abe meets up with Melchizedek king-priest of Salem, priest of El Elyon, the Canaanite high god, whom Abe swears to: “Yahweh El Elyon.” If you not a fan of syncretism, that’ll perk your coffee.

Not only does Abe break bread, cut a covenant, with Melchizedek, he allows this pagan priest to bless him (and thereby all Levi’s descendants squirming about in Abe’s DNA), drinks wine, and more to the point, pays to him a tithe of one tenth of everything. When you pass the plate, you’re in the Holy of Holies, right?

At least, Abe has the good sense to refuse the king of Sodom’s offer to share the booty.

So the $64,000 question is, who is this guy?

ª       A Canaanite priest who loved God heart and soul as he understood God

ª       An angel, but no mention of feathers, no reveal with special glow lights

ª       The Christ, or Holy Spirit, 1500 years ahead of the fullness of time, in some form or fashion beyond our normal ken

ª       An extra-terrestrial

Next: Lisa’s stupid ideas and thick skull (thank God!)