Another Margaret Barker? He's a Guy Who Understands (to a Point) the Divine Council

[LeSellers]

The Divine Council.

Sorry, I don't have time right now to comment. The radio RECAST^TM* is nearly an hour long, and my free time is limited today, so listening took all of it.

* RECAST is a trademark of Caption Colorado, LLC, for its Captioning and Broadcast Service. I used it improperly, but as I'm working on the tech manuals for it right now, it's the first word I thought of to describe what happens here.

Lehi

Edited February 24, 2012 by LeSellers

[Nevo]

He and David Bokovoy faced off in the FARMS Review a couple of years ago. His paper can be found here.

[LeSellers]

He and David Bokovoy faced off in the FARMS Review a couple of years ago. His paper can be found here.

I haven't had the time (or patience) to really study this too much, but he appears to have reversed himself on at least one point: he translated Ps 86:1 using "Jehovah" in place of "God" for the first instance of "Eloheim" when he charged Bokovoy for doing the same thing.

Anyway, I still found his analysis of Ps 86 very interesting, especially his tying it to a very LDS take on John 10:35 where Jesus quoted David.

He also takes the same approach (to a point) that I have here about Matt 16:13~19, about "the gates of hell" and what's happening in that statement of Jesus'. He doesn't understand its ramifications as we do, but he does get out of the rut of "the church will never fail" and all that garbage.

Lehi

Edited February 24, 2012 by LeSellers

[mfbukowski]

He also takes the same approach (to a point) that I have here about Matt 16:13~19, about "the gates of hell" and what's happening in that statement of Jesus'. He doesn't understand its ramifications as we do, but he does get out of the rut of "the church will never fail" and all that garbage.

So what is your take about that scripture? That the gates of the spirit world will not be able to stand against the church because Christ has the keys to death and hell? In other words, redemption for the dead?

That's my take on it anyway. D&C 128:10 makes it pretty clear that that scripture is talking about work for the dead and the sealing powers.

[LeSellers]

So what is your take about [Matt 16:13~19]? That the gates of the spirit world will not be able to stand against the church because Christ has the keys to death and hell? In other words, redemption for the dead? That's my take on it anyway. D&C 128:10 makes it pretty clear that that scripture is talking about work for the dead and the sealing powers.

Here's what I have posted several times here. I wrote the original version almost 20 years ago.

You have brought up a good passage [Matthew 16:13~19], but I am afraid that you misunderstand it. Before we start, please look at the entire passage, because it is important to know the context before we discuss the portion you refer to:

(AV) Matthew 16:13 When Jesus came into the coasts of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying, Whom do men say that I the Son of man am? 14 And they said, Some say that thou art John the Baptist: some, Elias; and others, Jeremias, or one of the prophets. 15 He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am? 16 And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. 17 And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. 18 And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. 19 And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

Greek (with word-for-word translation): 13. ᾿Ελθὼν δὲ ὁ ᾿Ιησοῦς εἰς τὰ μέρη Καισαρείας τῆς Φιλίππου ἠρώτα τοὺς μαθητὰς αὐτοῦ λέγων· τίνα με λέγουσιν οἱ ἄνθρωποι εἶναι τὸν Υἱὸν τοῦ ἀνθρώπου; (coming And Jesus into the parts of Caesarea of Philip he questioned the followers of him, saying, Whom me do say men to be, the Son of Man?) 14. οἱ δὲ εἶπον· οἱ μὲν ᾿Ιωάννην τὸν βαπτιστήν, ἄλλοι δὲ ᾿Ηλίαν, ἕτεροι δὲ ᾿Ιερεμίαν ἢ ἕνα τῶν προφητῶν. (they And said, Some say, John the Immerser. others say And Elijah. others say And Jeremiah, or one of the prophets.) 15. λέγει αὐτοῖς· ὑμεῖς δὲ τίνα με λέγετε εἶναι; (He says to them, you But, whom me do you say to be?) 16. ἀποκριθεὶς δὲ Σίμων Πέτρος εἶπε· σὺ εἶ ὁ Χριστὸς ὁ Υἱὸς τοῦ Θεοῦ τοῦ ζῶντος. (answering And Simon Peter said, You are the Christ, the Son of God the living!) 17. καὶ ἀποκριθεὶς ὁ ᾿Ιησοῦς εἶπεν αὐτῷ· μακάριος εἶ, Σίμων Βαριωνᾶ, ὅτι σὰρξ καὶ αἶμα οὐκ ἀπεκάλυψέ σοι, ἀλλ᾿ ὁ πατήρ μου ὁ ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς. (And answering Jesus said to him, Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah because flesh and blood not did reveal this to you, but the Father of me in the heavens.) 18. κἀγὼ δέ σοι λέγω ὅτι σὺ εἶ Πέτρος, καὶ ἐπὶ ταύτῃ τῇ πέτρᾳ οἰκοδομήσω μου τὴν ἐκκλησίαν, καὶ πύλαι ἅδου οὐ κατισχύσουσιν αὐτῆς. (I also And to you say, - You are Peter, and upon this bedrock I will build of me the assembly and the gates of Hades not will be strong against her.) 19. καὶ δώσω σοι τὰς κλεῖς τῆς βασιλείας τῶν οὐρανῶν, καὶ ὃ ἐὰν δήσῃς ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, ἔσται δεδεμένον ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς, καὶ ὃ ἐὰν λύσῃς ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, ἔσται λελυμένον ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς. (I will give to you the keys of the kingdom of the heavens, and whatever you bind on the earth will be having been bound in the heavens, and whatever you loose on the earth will be, having been loosed in the heavens.)

We must look at who said what and why he said it. Peter responded to Christ’s question “Whom say ye [the apostles] that I am? After he finishes, Christ tells Peter, “blessed art thou [Peter alone]”, not because of the words, but because of their source: “My Father which is in heaven”. In other words, Peter had just received a revelation. He then continues by telling Peter that He will build His church on “this rock”. Here some confusion enters in: The problem is that Christ had changed Simon’s name to “Cephas” (in Aramaic) which means “rock”. The Greek form of this word is “Petra” (πέτρα, which is a feminine noun). To make it masculine, the NT writers changed it to “Petros” (Πέτρος) which doesn’t really mean “rock”, but could be a diminutive, maybe “pebble” or “small stone”.

Christ could have meant that He was building His Church upon Peter, the mortal man, Simon, which is not particularly valuable to your point, since Peter was mortal and would not live more than another sixty years or so. But if not “Peter”, what? Knowing the rock upon which Christ was to found His church is critical to our understanding of the passage. So, let’s look into the verses here and see what they can tell us.

Check out the very verse we’re speaking of, v 18: There is not much wiggle room here, it has to be something closely connected with Peter and that revelation he’d just had. Could it be that the “rock” is the rock of revelation? What could be more stable, more long-lived? Paul tells us that the church is “built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone;” Apostles and Prophets are the foundation of the church, and they receive revelation from God. Something to consider.

Now look at verse 19. “I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven...” Peter was the one Christ gave the keys of the kingdom unto. He didn’t give them to all of the Twelve, but to Peter alone (He said “thee” [σοι], singular). So, Peter is the one in charge. (He later gave them to all the Apostles, but that’s a different part of the story. See Matt 18:18.)

“Cephas” (“Peter” in Aramaic) still means “rock”, so what if Christ were saying that the “rock” He was going to build His church on was not “Peter”, the individual, but Peter receiving revelation because he’s the chief among the Apostles? In other words, “Peter” represented the leader of the Church, and any man who receives that calling, as long as he received revelation, would be the foundation of the church. This is, of course, in line with Ephesians 2:19~20: 19. “Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God; 20. And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone;”

That last phrase “... and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it” is a really tricky one. There are three words we must define in order to understand it. The first is “Hell”. The word that whoever-translated-Matthew’s-work- into-Greek used was “hades” (ἅδου). “Hades” is not the “hell” we usually think of when we hear the word. Hades is just a place where dead people go. Had Christ meant “hell”, Matthew’s translator would have written “gehenna” (γέεννα). So, the place Christ was speaking of is not the kingdom of Satan, but merely the tomb, the grave, i.e., death.

Easton’s 1897 Bible Dictionary gives:

Hades – that which is out of sight, a Greek word used to denote the state or place of the dead. All the dead alike go into this place. To be buried, to go down to the grave, to descend into hades, are equivalent expressions. In the LXX, this word is the usual rendering of the Hebrew sheol*, the common receptacle of the departed (Gen. 42:38; Ps. 139:8; Hos. 13:14; Isa. 14:9). This term is of comparatively rare occurrence in the Greek New Testament. Our Lord speaks of Capernaum as being “brought down to hell” (hades), i.e., simply to the lowest debasement, (Matt. 11:23) In Acts 2:27-31 Peter quotes the LXX version of Ps. 16:8-11, plainly for the purpose of proving our Lord’s resurrection from the dead. David was left in the place of the dead, and his body saw corruption. Not so with Christ. According to ancient prophecy (Ps. 30:3) he was recalled to life.

*

Sheol

– (Heb., “the all-demanding world” = Gr.

Hades

, “the unknown region”), the invisible world of departed souls. [No indication of punishment]

The other two important words here are “gates” and “prevail” (in Greek, κατισχύω “be strong against”). We really have to discuss them together because “prevail” can have so many meanings. The only one that interests us is the one that relates to “gates”.

I am a retired military officer, and I know something about the technologies of warfare. Anciently, cities (which were essentially synonymous with “kingdoms”) were surrounded by a wall for protection against marauding armies. Walls have a big disadvantage during peacetime, though: They’re designed to be impenetrable. When they discovered this, people invented the gate. It was a great answer because, when open, it allowed traffic into and out of the city. Closed, it disallowed that passage – that is if it “prevailed.”

Gates were an ancient “weapons system”, albeit a defensive one. Think about it. Have you ever seen or heard of “gates” attacking anything or anyone? Get out your copy of Beauty and the Beast. In the second to last scene, Gaston leads the villagers to the Beast’s castle, and they cut down a tree for use as a battering ram. This was a common example (although B&tB uses a crude one) of another ancient weapons system. These rams were used against gates and other doors. The Beast’s castle door did not “prevail” against the villagers’ battering ram, though. Because it did not prevail, the villagers got through.

So, Christ’s words: “and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it” tell us something very important. The church will be attacking death, and it will be the church that will prevail, not the “gates of hell”.

This raises two very important, even if obvious, questions: Why and how will the church of Jesus Christ attack the gates of death?

Peter himself answers the “how?”:

(AV) 1 Peter 3:18 For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: 19 By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; 20 Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water.

Read verse 19 again: “He [Christ] went [in His spirit] and preached to the [disobedient] spirits in prison.” But this was Christ, not the Church. If we follow our Master, and we do, it will be the righteous members of Christ’s church who will continue this work after they have died.

But why? If everyone who has died without accepting Christ will be condemned to eternal death, why should He have bothered (and why will we do the same as He did)?

Peter, the chief Apostle, again answers our query. Speaking of the wicked in the world:

(AV) 1 Peter 4:4 Wherein they think it strange that ye run not with [them] to the same excess of riot, speaking evil of [you]: 5 Who shall give account to him that is ready to judge the quick and the dead. 6 For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit.

Notice, it is not to condemn them, but so they could be judged and to let them “live according to God” that the gospel of Jesus Christ is preached unto them. If we go back to Peter’s earlier passage, it continues speaking of the Noachian flood that baptized the earth:

(AV) 1 Peter 3:21 The like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save us (not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God,) by the resurrection of Jesus Christ:

He says that it is baptism that saves us. He explains that baptism is more than just bathing (“putting away the filth of the flesh”) but it cleanses us so we can answer a good conscious toward God.

If these disobedient spirits are to live, they must also be baptized. But that seems to require the impossible. Are there baptismal fonts in heaven? No, or so Paul intimates when he refers to the way these people can be baptized:

(AV) 1 Corinthians 15:29 Else what shall they do which are baptized for the dead, if the dead rise not at all? why are they then baptized for the dead?

Now, if the Church of Jesus Christ will prevail against the gates of hell, and it does so by preaching to the spirits in the prison, and baptizes its own members on behalf of the dead, and if your church does not do these things, whose church is following the Apostolic counsel found in the Bible, and whose church is not following the words of Christ when He said, “... and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it”?

Lehi