2020, March 8 ~ Genesis 12:1-4a and Romans 4:1-5, 13-17
Genesis 12:1-4a
Reading
1 The LORD said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. 2 I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. 3 I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
4a So Abram went, as the LORD had told him; and Lot went with him.
Commentary
Genesis is the first book of the Torah (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy). The Torah also called the Pentateuch (“five books”) in Greek. Genesis covers the period from Creation to the deaths of Jacob and his 11th son, Joseph, in about 1650 BCE, if the accounts are historical.
The Book of Genesis (like the Torah as a whole) is an amalgam of religious traditions, some of which are dated to about 950 BCE and some of which were developed as late as 450 BCE. Since the late 19th Century, Biblical scholars have recognized four major “strands” or sources in the Torah, and these sources are identified (among other ways) by their different theological emphases, names for God, names for the holy mountain, and portrayals of God’s characteristics.
The first 11 Chapters of Genesis are called the “primeval history” which ends with the Tower of Babel story — an “etiology” (story of origins) relating to the scattering of humankind and the multiplicity of languages. The last chapter of the primeval history also traces Abram’s lineage back to Noah’s son, Shem (which means “name” in Hebrew and from which we get the word “Semites”).
Today’s reading is part of the oldest writings and presents YHWH (“LORD” in all capital letters) anthropomorphically in that the LORD had a conversation with Abram.
This chapter in Genesis begins the “ancestral history of Israel” in which YHWH calls Abram (whose name is the same root word as “Abba” or father) to go to a land that YHWH will show him. There, Abram will be a father of a great nation and (as a descendent of Shem) his “name” will be great (v.2). Unlike some other covenants in Genesis, this promise of the LORD is “conditional” in that it will not become effective unless Abram goes to the land YHWH shows him.
In Verse 3 is the phrase “in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (which Paul interpreted as a blessing on the Gentiles through Abraham). This phrase is also translated as “by you all the families of the earth shall bless themselves” – or in other words, people will say “may we be like Abraham.”
Romans 4:1-5, 13-17
Reading
1 What then are we to say was gained by Abraham, our ancestor according to the flesh? 2 For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. 3 For what does the scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.” 4 Now to one who works, wages are not reckoned as a gift but as something due.5 But to one who without works trusts him who justifies the ungodly, such faith is reckoned as righteousness.
13 For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come to Abraham or to his descendants through the law but through the righteousness of faith. 14 If it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. 15 For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation.
16 For this reason it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his descendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also to those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us, 17 as it is written, “I have made you the father of many nations”) —in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist.
Commentary
Paul’s letter to the Romans was his longest, last and most complex letter. It was written in the late 50s or early 60s (CE), about 10 years before the earliest Gospel (Mark) was written, to a Jesus Follower community that Paul did not establish. Among many messages in the letter, Paul sought to encourage respectful and supportive relationships between the Gentile Jesus Followers and the Jewish Jesus Followers in Rome.
The “backstory” is that in 49 CE, Emperor Claudius expelled all Jews from Rome, including Jewish Jesus Followers. The next Emperor was Nero who reigned from 54 to 68 CE. Nero reversed his predecessor’s decree and allowed Jews to return to Rome. This return caused tensions within the Jesus Follower Community in which Gentiles had become prominent.
In today’s reading, Paul’s initial statements are directed at Jewish Jesus Followers – persons who (like Paul) saw Abraham as their ancestor “according to the flesh.” (v.1) Paul went on to assert that Abraham’s righteousness (right relationship with God) was a result of Abraham’s faithfulness and trust in God (v.13), rather than something “earned” like wages (v.4).
In Paul’s epistles, the word “Faith” is almost always better understood a “Faithfulness.” For most modern persons, “Faith” is understood primarily as a cognitive assent to one or more propositions, but “faithfulness” is the active living into one’s beliefs through grace and trust in God.
In the last verses of today’s reading, Paul continued his discussion of the law and its limitations. Paul did not diminish the value of adherence to the law by Jews (including Jewish Jesus Followers). For him, the two “laws” that did not have to be observed by Gentile Jesus Followers were the requirements of circumcision and eating only Kosher food. Paul noted (v. 13) that at the time the LORD made the promise to Abram, it was not “through the law” (i.e. Abram was not circumcised and did not obey the Kosher dietary laws at the time described in Genesis 12). Paul emphasized that mere obedience to the law is not sufficient for the fullness of a right relationship with God. It depends on faithfulness (v.16).