Some more thoughts on New Covenant Virility.

The minute details of the Bible matter. What was the Ethiopian eunuch, keeper of the queen’s treasure, reading, and why? In sacred history there are no accidents.

Isaiah 53 is about the barrenness and woundedness of God’s Man. He is circumcision epitomised. Like a eunuch, He is judged by men as unfit for Tabernacle service, judged in the gates (kingdom doors shut) and sent outside the city. He is “stricken,” or afflicted with stroke, God’s “lash” of plague, as unacceptable-for-priesthood as a leper.

“…and who will declare His generation?” Here is an important detail. What does this mean?

“So all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations; and from David to the carrying away into Babylon are fourteen generations, and from the carrying away into Babylon unto Christ are fourteen generations.” Matthew 1: 17.

Is this where His generation ends? No. It’s where the barrenness of Abraham and Sarah ends. The bloodline of Abraham, as far as Israel was concerned, was a single cord that joined Abraham to Christ. That blood was presented to God at His ascension, seen by John in vision in Revelation 5. The blood no longer matters. It mattered to the Jews who rejected Christ, but all their genealogies were destroyed in AD70. [1]

At Pentecost, the Messianic line became Spirit. As mentioned in the comments after the other post, the New Covenant is not about a “bloodline” succession that can be cut by Athaliah, Haman, or the Satan hiding behind them all. In fact, any time Satan tries to stamp out this new Messianic line, it simply grows, because of the testimony of those who suffer. This “multiplication by Spirit” is Satan’s worst nightmare. It miraculously raises living sons out of dead stones.

“Therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance, and do not think to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as father.’ For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones.” Matthew 3:8-9

This is exactly what we see in Isaiah 53. This gelding-for-us, the one Whom circumcision pictured over the centuries, the cut-off One, the One Who, like the prophets Jeremiah and possibly Paul, never married or had children, would yet see offspring:

When You make His soul an offering for sin, He shall see His seed, He shall prolong His days, And the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in His hand. He shall see the labor of His soul, and be satisfied. By His knowledge My righteous Servant shall justify many, For He shall bear their iniquities.

Imagine that. Perhaps this is why the eunuch, who would have known the requirements for priesthood, wondered what this all meant. Who was this Royal Slave who would end up with, not only all the treasure, but also a throne and offspring?!

And then, after Philip’s rapture, he probably continued reading from where he left off (as one does with scrolls). If so, he would have come across this passage, the structure of which reinforces my comments on Acts 8. We see faithful Jews (the Adams), faithful “cut” ones, and faithful foreigners all brought into the house. No, they are the house. What follows is terrifying. The unfaithful Israelites who were squatting in God’s house are at Testing. The old house, the corrupted Temple, became a Garden given over to the serpent, ie. a wilderness. (From Isaiah 56-57)

CREATION: (Garden)

Thus says the LORD: ”Keep justice, and do righteousness,
…..For My salvation is about to come,
…..And My righteousness to be revealed.
……….Blessed is the man who does this,
……….and the son of man who lays hold on it;
……………Who keeps from defiling the Sabbath,
……………and keeps his hand from doing any evil.”
……….Do not let the son of the foreigner Who has
……….joined himself to the LORD Speak, saying,
…..“The LORD has utterly separated me from His people”;
Nor let the eunuch say, “Here I am, a dry tree.”

DIVISION: (Land)

For thus says the LORD:
…..“To the eunuchs who keep My Sabbaths,
…..and choose what pleases Me,
……….and hold fast My covenant,
……………Even to them I will give in My house
……….and within My walls a place and a name
…..better than that of sons and daughters; [2]
I will give them an everlasting name
that shall not be cut off.

ASCENSION: (World)

“Also the sons of the foreigner who
join themselves to the LORD,
…..to serve Him,
………and to love
………….the name
………of the LORD,
…..to be His servants –
……….Everyone who keeps from defiling the Sabbath,
……….and holds fast My covenant –
……………Even them I will bring to My holy mountain,
……….And make them joyful in My house of prayer.
…..Their burnt offerings and their sacrifices
…..will be accepted on My altar;
For My house shall be called
a house of prayer for all nations.”

TESTING: Assessment of worship that has compromised with the serpent. All the unclean beasts (Gentile armies) are invited to dine on the abandoned House. This refers in context to Solomon’s Temple, but typologically to Herod’s Temple. They are presented as those who have defiled God’s feasts. They will be eaten. Jesus uses the same language in Matthew 24. [3] It is the Tabernacle, and Tabernacles, turned upside-down.

The Lord GOD, who gathers the outcasts of Israel, says, (Ark)
…..“Yet I will gather to him others
…..besides those who are gathered to him.” (Veil)
……….All you beasts of the field, come to devour,
……….All you beasts in the forest. (Altar/Table)
……………His watchmen are blind,
……………They are all ignorant; (Lampstand)
……….They are all dumb dogs, They cannot bark; (Incense)
…..Sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber. (Adam)
Yes, greedy dogs which never have enough. (Rest)

Beasts are unclean Gentiles, scavenging outside the city. Dogs are unclean (scavenging) Jews, false prophets, inside the city, hence Paul’s reference to Judaisers as dogs. Here, instead of being the Body responding to, repeating the Law, they are dumb.

MATURITY: (Plagues and plunder, multitudes and fullness. Here it is sins that are filled up, full-grown.)

And they are shepherds Who cannot understand; (Light)
…..They all look to their own way, (Waters divided)
……….Every one for his own gain, From his own territory. (Land, fruits)
……………“Come, I will bring wine, (Lights/Government)
……….And we will fill ourselves with intoxicating drink; (Swarms, fullness)
…..Tomorrow will be as today, (Mediators, Day of Covering)
And much more abundant.” (Rest, Shekinah, Offspring [very ironic!])

CONQUEST: (False atonement: The sinners cover their sin with the blood of the innocent. Same structure as the events in Revelation.)

The righteous perishes and no man takes it to heart;
…..Merciful men are taken away,
……….while no one considers that the righteous
……………is taken away from evil.
……….He shall enter into peace;
…..They shall rest in their beds,
each walking in his uprightness.

GLORIFICATION: (Tabernacles feast, marriage, children, rest)

Wow. This last bit really rubs in the kind of offspring (fruit) Israel gave God. It is the seventh stanza of this section, yet in itself it has seven stanzas. Each section submits itself to the common themes in Glorification, yet each section reiterates one step the sevenfold pattern. [3] Tabernacles was the big feast, so in this final ascerbic prophecy, the prophet turns the annual Feasts into curses. What sublime poetry is Isaiah.

It’s long enough to warrant a post of its own, so I’ll publish that separately tomorrow. It will blow you away.

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[1] See Pedigree Papers.
[2] This possibly corresponds to the many times in the Old Testament when a son or daughter died as “Atonement.” I think of David’s first son by Bathsheba, and Jeroboam’s son. The ascension of Jephthah’s daughter also occurred at this point in that passage. It is Adam and Eve before God as a corporate mediator. The curse concerns barrenness, with Adam as head (sweat of his brow) and Eve as body (pain in childbirth). They become spiritual eunuchs.
[3] Isaiah loves to do this, and the poetic “Covenantal” subtleties of his poetic vision are mind-boggling. See Wizards the Peep and Mutter and Bad Tabernacle in Isaiah 66 and the “Mandelbrot” Feasts chart in 50 Failed Predictions #8. I’ll just bet another step out would find that these greater structures also form a heptamerous pattern.

When Ahaziah, king of Judah died, his mother Athaliah wanted to be queen. She ordered all her grandsons to be slaughtered. Only one escaped. The nanny Jehosheba hid baby Joash in the Temple of God for six years.

When he was seven, Jehosheba’s brother, the High Priest, called the royal bodyguards and escorts and showed them the king’s son. Athaliah was executed and the temple of Baal was torn down (2 Kings 11).

The Bible gives us a family tree, with a single “royal” bloodline from Adam to Jesus (see Matthew 1). If Joash had died with his brothers, that bloodline would have been severed, making impossible the fulfilment of God’s promise in Genesis 3: the offspring of Eve would crush the serpent’s head.

King Herod also slaughtered innocent children. One escaped: Jesus. He too would be anointed King and tear down all false worship by dying as payment for the sins of mankind. This task continued with the destruction of Herod’s Jerusalem in AD70 and will continue until all His enemies are under His feet. The last enemy that will be destroyed is death (1 Corinthians 15:25-26).

“And you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight — if indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you heard, which was preached to every creature under heaven…”  (Colossians 1:21-23)

Merry Christmas from the Bulls. Thanks for reading! Catch you in 2010…

or Drive-By Typology

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Rome has this whole nutty Oedipus thing going. They want the infantile security of Mary’s breast when God calls them to grow up, to be as individuals men worthy of a bride’s affections, and corporately a bride who adores only her Husband!
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Verifying typological connections is a tricky business. Like driving, it is not a skill but an art. This means that although there are certain rules to follow, above all of that there are situations where being steeped in the types and structures of the Bible is the only way to proceed with wisdom. James Jordan recently commented that any such exegesis should be carried out within the conversation of the church, and:

“The popular notion that everyone should be able to read and exegete the Bible equally, as a result of learning some so-called “science” of hermeneutics, is about as stupid as thinking everyone can write music like Bach and Beethoven by studying the rules of harmony and counterpoint; or that anyone can be a Shakespeare.”

I’m no Shakespeare, but James Jordan’s identification of the biblical “universals” and an explanation of biblical types has helped me enormously. The Bible matrix structure has also helped me enormously. They are typological “systematics.” It is this kind of grounding, like practising scales on a piano, that enables us to more easily identify abuses of typology — such as the claim that Mary is a “New Eve.” Dischordant notes can be used to great effect in great music, but it takes a practised musician to know when it is within a greater “harmony” and when it is not. This is beyond the basic scales.

Mary is the New Eve?

Mary is very clearly Old Covenant. She is a type of the woman with 12 stars (sons) as a crown, a fruitful tree in the garden. But Mary is only part of the picture. She typifies one facet of first century Judah and only one. There is also the cursed tree with only leaves and no fruit.

The Old Covenant people is typified by other women, too. What about Herodias, who, like Athaliah, like Jezebel, formed false alliances and executed the faithful?

Mary’s Womb as Holy of Holies

The Temple was still a Holy Place until the crucifixion, or even until Pentecost. At Pentecost, the glory moved from ‘Saul’ to ‘David’, from Jesus’ mother Mary to Mary freed from seven demons, filled with a new Spirit. If anyone is a type of the resurrected Israel — the Christian church — Mary Magdelene is!

Then the Holy of Holies womb of Judah deliberately became a tomb. Like Rome, Judah gilded her own merit and put it on a pedestal. It refused to partake of Jesus’ death and denied His resurrection. But it was a womb opened by Christ for the very purpose of having more children. This is where totus Christus comes in. Jesus is the head of a body, and the birth pangs He referred to concerned the body, the revelation of the sons of God.

With Israel being divided in two by the creative Word, the unfaithful defiantly became a separate woman, Hagar instead of Sarah, the liar of the two prostitutes in Solomon’s court, a harlot who rejected the head and then rejected the body as if they were unclean things. Like Athaliah, Judah wanted nothing to do with Covenant succession and would wipe out this new Messianic line (just as Rome attempted with Protestantism). She was holding onto her “irrevocable” gifts tooth and claw. In rebellion, she even gave birth to an army of false brothers, Judaisers (unholy Nazirite locusts), as contenders for the throne. Then, get this, to end her harlotry, God actually “commanded” her to be truly fruitful one last time. Because she had become a new Egypt, He called His children to “come out of her” so they might avoid her plagues. She died in childbirth and there was no resurrection.

The main point here is, the womb is opened miraculously for the very purpose of having more kids, raising an army. Even the ‘harlot’ side of Israel bore children as a synagogue for Satan. Eternal virginity has Onan and Ichabod written all over it, just like Rome. Perpetual virginity is not sinlessness. It is a whitewashed tomb, a gilded sarcophagus, full of dead men’s bones.

God wants Covenant heirs to take dominion. Why wouldn’t Joseph and Mary’s life typify this, like every other marriage in Israel? Jordan writes:

“[Concerning] typological ‘evidences’ for Mary as perpetual virgin, queen of heaven, etc. I assert here that these have never been the reasons for Marian doctrines, but that they have been brought into consideration by those who are already completely convinced of those doctrines because of their traditions. As the previous discussion demonstrated, I believe, there is no Biblical warrant for the notion that Mary remained a virgin after the birth of Jesus Christ. The Bible explicitly states that Joseph did not routinely have sex with her until after her purification.” [1]

 

Mary as the Ark of the Covenant?

Here is a perfect case of drive-by typology. Tom Riello writes:

“I am surprised that you do not think that perpetual virginity of Mary has no typological basis in the Old Testament. Here is a case where you use the Greek Orthodox against the Church of Rome [concerning papal apostolic succession] and yet here is a case where the Greek Church would say to you, ‘bite your tongue.’

Surely the travel narrative in Luke’s Gospel, of Mary traveling to Elizabeth in the Visitation, follows the pattern of the travel narrative of the Ark in 2nd Samuel 6. The comparisons are astounding and if Luke did not intend this, then the happy hand of providence surely made sure that he would do this. The early Church almost unanimously acclaimed Mary as the New Ark of the Covenant and with good reason, as the Ark under the Old Law carried the Word (Tablets), the Manna, and the budding rod of Aaron (as Hebrews informs us).

As I am confident you know, typology works from the lesser to the greater and if that is the case, and it is, then if the lesser covenant Ark was pure, holy and immaculate and not to be touched (Uzzah) then why should we should expect that under the New and greater covenant that the Ark is pure, holy and immaculate.” [2]

There was later  a comment about a Pope claiming this visit to Elizabeth was the first Eucharistic Procession! I’m afraid this is an instance of starting with a “doctrine” and then looking for typological evidence to support it. The exodus/return pattern is common throughout Scripture, but observing these leads us to see Christ as the Ark, not Mary. He is the Law incarnate (in a box), not Mary. He is the mediator that protects us from coming face to face with the Law of God, not Mary. He was the One speared so the good things hidden in the Ark could be poured out (Word, Sacrament, Government). He is the box carried on human legs. [3] His was the sinless blood that allows us to approach the heavenly throne of grace, not Mary’s. The whole thing is back to front. This is where the “eternal virginity” is imposed on the text.

The Catholics agree with typology being a process of lesser to greater. But Mary is a type of the faithful Old Covenant remnant. She is lesser, and as Jordan points out, we hear nothing of her after Acts 1. Like John the Baptist, she passed the baton on.

Rome’s Oedipus Complex

The Roman church fails to understand the difference between a mother and a bride, and how the process of Covenant succession flows through the OT. The RCC follows the church fathers’ error concerning Mary as New Eve and sees this as the foundation for the “unveiling” of the doctrine of the immaculate conception. But Mary isn’t the New Eve, the church is, so that whole construct is a very badly built house of cards. Mary is, if anything, the antitype of the Old Eve. Her Son begins a new creation, and creation comes before Eve does. Rome has this whole nutty Oedipus thing going. They want the infantile security of Mary’s breast when God calls them to grow up, to be as individuals men worthy of a bride’s affections, and corporately a bride who adores only her Husband! This is the process of Covenant succession. Mum doesn’t figure in the new equation. A man leaves his father and mother and begins a ‘new covenant.’ Mary grew old and was then under her Son’s care, under His New Covenant, brought into His new house.[4] The house of Jacob is absorbed by the new house of Joseph. The Tabernacle of David is absorbed by the Temple of Solomon, etc.

I hold the Bible as an authority over church tradition, including the fathers. Jordan and Leithart deftly identify the “universals” that we find in biblical types. That’s why I call this process “systematic typology.” By this I mean symbols contained in repeated structures, which allows us to verify the connections. I can say Judas being sent out from the last supper is both a type of the coming destruction of Judah and an antitype of the scapegoat because all three events follow the structure of the seven feasts in Lev. 23. None of these Marian claims meets such a criterion. They are one-offs and drive-bys. If we practice our scales enough on the actual biblical structures, aberrant ideas like Mariolatry stick out like a sore thumb, or in this case an extra limb! They rub the Bible’s fur the wrong way. 

I should say that an identification of biblical structure is also the reason I strongly disagree with Jordan and Leithart concerning infant(ile) baptism, but that’s another story. In my opinion, that’s where they also get fluffy and rely on tradition and read biblical types the wrong way.[5] That’s where they see typological “support” for an extrabiblical practice. This too rubs the Bible’s fur the wrong way. Mariolatry and paedobaptism get childhood and maturity round the wrong way, and I can demonstrate from the Scriptures that this is so. It is no one-off or drive-by type.

(As always, I may sound uncharitable and arrogant at times but I am not. I am dealing here with ideas and if I ever attack anything, it is ideas. I consider all these men brothers in Christ, and part of that relationship is the ability to be frank within the bounds of love. I am ever willing to be corrected on any doctrinal point as long as the Scriptures are our agreed standard over any tradition. Any idea can and should be tested without mercy as long as one’s ammunition is Scripture.)

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See the discussion and comments at:
[1] Concerning BMEV, More Thoughts on BMEV and Protestants and BMEV.
[2] Discussion in comments under Ecclesial Deism.
[3] I was then accused of Nestorianism, but explained, “Seeing Christ as the Law written on tablets of flesh is not inevitably Nestorianism. I believe Jesus was/is in fact more truly human than you or I. His glory was temporarily veiled. The contents of the box were both as divine and as human as the box. Jesus was the Word, Sacrament and Government man. Is there a name like “Nestorianism” I can call the error of giving Mary the obvious symbolic divinity of the Ark? The Ark lid was a symbol of the throne of God (see Leithart http://www.biblicalhorizons.com/biblical-horizons/no-50-the-footstool-of-his-feet/). Adding Mary into the mix is foreign to the Bible, whatever the fathers or church tradition says. So, yes, Mary’s journey was like the Ark’s journey, but so was every exodus throughout the OT (and my book outlines most of them). We don’t give this divinity to anyone else.”
[4] See Behold Your Mother.
[5] See Cutting Off Flesh By Water.

“…you have come… to the blood of sprinkling that speaks [more useful, more serviceable, more advantageous] things than [that of] Abel.”  Hebrews 12:22-24

In Biblical Horizons newsletter 203, James Jordan argues that since Cain’s “exodus” to build a city occurred around 130 years after the Fall, he was publicly humiliated before thousands. He would have been accompanied by at least 1000 people, so he didn’t build the city on his own.

This means that Adam, like Solomon, was father to a divided kingdom. 1 Kings presents Solomon as a new Adam, even down to his naming of animals in his biological studies. Cain was like Jeroboam, shown mercy, given a chance, but who then caused Israel to sin.

What does Genesis give us after this? We have Adam as a failed Moses, Cain in a corrupt exodus. What follows after the murder of Abel is the construction of a false Tabernacle in the wilderness. The list of the talented is a corrupt artisans guild. It is the Aholiab and Bezalel from hell. (No wonder the Freemason password is Tubal-Cain.) [1]

Their father, Lamech, was a murderer behind a pretence of justice. The authority to execute murderers was not given by God until He gave it to Noah. Lamech took vengeance into his own hands and sang it as liturgy at the Altar of the Abyss. Cain’s rage was institutionalised. It reached full term in Genesis 6, with intermarriage between the two kingdoms.[2] A violent society was the outcome of innocent blood shed at the Altar.

Why did the blood of Christ then speak of greater things than the blood of Abel, crying as a witness [martyr] from the ground? Abel’s blood was not avenged until the flood. The author of Hebrews was calling his readers to be courageous and reassuring them that the blood of the martyrs would be avenged. Just like Abel, vengeance came like a flood. In fact, vengeance for the blood of all the martyrs from Abel onwards fell upon that generation. As men were (idolatrously) marrying and giving in marriage, with murderous wives like Herodias, an Athaliah and a Jezebel, the false Tabernacle was washed away in a sudden destruction.[3]

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[1] See Unashamed Artisans.
[2] See James Jordan’s very interesting The Nephilim Factor.
[3] See My Brother’s Keeper,  The Sons of God and the Daughters of Men and Esther’s Evil Twin.

Being a Jew was never a matter of bloodline, but of Covenant. Think of Abraham’s servants circumcised in Genesis 17, the Egyptians at the Exodus, Caleb the Kenizzite, Rahab, Ruth, Uriah, etc. It seems the Old Testament keeps throwing us examples of people “grafted in.” The only actual bloodline of any importance is the one we are given, the family tree from Abraham to Christ.

Israel’s captivity and Restoration gave us a perfect picture of the New Covenant events. The Temple and walls of the old Israel were ‘de-created’ and God Himself (the ark) died in Babylon for the sake of a new Jerusalem with impregnable walls.

Christ was the human ark. Judaism, intermarried with Roman political power, became Babylon.

My point is, the captivity was a death-and-resurrection of first century Israel (the resurrection as predicted in Ezekiel 37) in type. The first century was the antitype. Thus, whatever remains of Judaism today is like exhumed idols from the eras of Jeroboam, Ahab*, Omri and Manasseh.

It is not about blood. It never was. It is about Covenant, and there is only one of those. Despite its various death-and-resurrection renewals, there has only ever really been one covenant. There is no replacement of God’s people, only transfiguration from glory to glory.

*Remember it was Jezebel’s daughter Athaliah that almost DID destroy this single bloodline that mattered. Jehoash was the single son who escaped, an echo of Moses and a type of Christ.