We have seen that the covenants with Abraham envisaged two distinct but related goals: nationhood for Abraham’s seed, followed by blessing for the world. The eighth-century prophets use the word “covenant” sparingly, but when they do this two-fold structure is also evident. The prophets never promise that the nations will be included in Israel’s covenants. [...]
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Just as there are two distinct but related covenants described in Genesis 12-22, so also there are two distinct but related covenants stemming from the events at Sinai. Firstly, there is the well-known covenant of law, which is a covenant between God and Israel. But the word “covenant” is also used to speak of another [...] Why did God give circumcision to Abraham (Gen 17:9–14)? What is it for? It’s not very useful as a “boundary marker” or “badge of membership”, because under most circumstances people can’t tell whether you’ve been circumcised! Furthermore, lots of other ancient peoples practiced circumcision. Can we discern why circumcision is commanded in the story of [...] In the previous post we saw how Genesis 12:1-3 makes two distinct but related sets of promises. The first set of promises involves blessing to Abraham (Gen 12:1-2c). The second set of promises involves blessing through Abraham to the world (Gen 12:2d-3). Following Paul Williamson’s analysis, we will now see how these two sets of [...] This post, and the next few posts, will examine the way that the word “covenant” (בְּרִית) features in Genesis 12–22, which one of the key foundational texts for Galatians 3. (This post is part of a series. See here for an introduction to the series.) It is common to speak of “the Abrahamic covenant”. However, [...] The word “covenant” in the Old Testament has a precise and consistent meaning. It doesn’t just mean ‘relationship’, as is commonly assumed today. Rather, “covenant” refers to a very specific type of relationship. The best definition of the word, which accounts for all of its uses in the Bible, is as follows: Covenant = an [...] We’ve seen a couple of approaches to the task of detecting ‘covenant’ ideas in Paul. These approaches are, in the end, hopelessly subjective, because they start with an assumed definition of ‘covenant’ which is then read into Paul’s texts. A much better approach is to begin with Paul’s actual use of the word ‘covenant’ and [...] How do you look for ‘covenantal’ ideas in Paul when he only rarely uses the word ‘covenant’? (This post is part of a series. See here for an introduction to the series.) Of course, we must admit that “covenantal” concepts may be present in a Pauline passage without the word διαθήκη appearing. Porter, for example, [...] Being a Christian is about being in a relationship with God. Few people would deny this statement. But what, exactly, does this statement mean? What does a relationship with God look like? How does it operate? What is the nature of a Christian’s relationship with God? The word “covenant” has often been used as an [...] |
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