Doug Wilson writes:

“The debate in the early church was not whether the Jews should stop circumcising their sons; it was whether the Gentiles had to start. The decision of the Jerusalem council was not that individual Gentiles did not have to be circumcised. If circumcision had been required of them, it would have obligated them to live as Jews under the Mosaic law — which included the circumcision of all subsequent generations. Circumcision was not being waived for individual Gentiles; circumcision was being waived for Gentiles and their seed. So the Christian church did not insist that Gentiles circumcise their infants — not because they were infants, but because they were Gentile infants” (To a Thousand Generations, pp. 68-69).

Since there is no ex-plicit proof of infant baptism, Pastor Wilson’s self-stated, continuing goal here is to find im-plicit proof. My goal in the following is to show that not only do circumcision and baptism not correspond, but also that the solution to the dispute in this passage he refers to is given in the passage, leaving no room for an im-plicit reference to infant baptism.

The observation that requiring circumcision of believing Gentile males would naturally include their sons is a good one. But what was the “architectural” logic behind the thinking of those who made the accusation against Paul?

It was nothing new for Gentiles to believe and remain outside the Covenant people as those “covered” or ministered to. Nor was it new for Gentile believers to join the Covenant and become Jews, becoming physically grafted into the life of the tree.

But to begin grafting in Gentiles with no requirement of bloodshed was a new thing. This led to the belief that Paul was teaching Jews “who lived among the Gentiles” to waive this requirement for Jews as well as Gentiles. This was the kind of godless “intermarriage” committed by the sons of God (the sons of Seth) in Genesis 6, and by Solomon. God desires a mixing, but a mixing according to the right recipe. The Gentiles come under His Covenant. His people do not intermarry to submit to the gods of the Gentiles. So perhaps intermarriage was another factor here. There would been many couples like Timothy’s parents. Should Timothy be circumcised or not? His mother was a Jew, so he was raised as a Jew. But did baptism waive the necessity for his circumcision?

It is telling that baptism is not mentioned in this passage at all. Added to this, circumcision is not alone. It is part-and-parcel of the customs, the culture of Moses. What is mentioned is Jews who have believed, and Gentiles who have believed. Both Jew and Gentile could keep their cultural identities intact and yet be united in Christ. It is not circumcision and baptism that are contrasted here, or James’ ruling would have been that baptism was sufficient. But he doesn’t mention it.

The gospel had revived these Jews. They were zealous for the Law. They were reading their Bibles with new eyes. Except their Bibles didn’t have a New Testament. They had the apostles’ prophetic judgments instead. What was James’ judgment? And what was the basis for it?

If Jews were under the Mosaic Covenant, were Gentiles under anything at all? Yes, they were still under Noah, which ties in with the idea of false gods (Adam), bloodshed (Cain) and harlotry (Sons of God). God’s solution to the entirely corrupted “three-decker” first world was a three-decker miniature, a doorway into a new world, the ark. The Jews had their own ark, the Tabernacle and Temple. So, here it is not circumcision versus baptism. Circumcision divided Jew and Gentile seed. Baptism united them again. The contrast here is actually between Moses and Noah. It is not baptism that is presented as the solution. The Gentiles were called to Gentile purity, the purity of the priesthood of Melchizedek, the godly priesthood of all nations.

God – Transcendence OLD CREATION

…..Jews / Gentiles – Hierarchy (DIVISION)

……….Mosaic purity / Noahic purity – Ethics (PURIFICATION)

…..Baptism / Baptism – Sanctions (REUNION)

God – Succession NEW CREATION

Circumcision put the world on the Altar. Both Jews and Gentiles were slain under their respective Laws (guilty under Moses or guilty outside of Moses, with or without the Law). Baptism was the resurrection body, the flesh and the blood, the Melchizedekian bread and wine reunited as one new man, the Christ.

James’ judgment actually builds a new house. This is where an analysis of the literary structure exposes its Covenantal roots. Yes, I know this is too good to be true. Covenants are always bittersweet, so suck it up.

(Creation – Genesis – Transcendence)
But concerning those who have believed of the nations

(Division – Exodus – Hierarchy)
We wrote, judging no such thing to observe them,

(Ascension – Leviticus – Ethics 1)
except to keep from themselves things offered to idols, (Garden)
and blood (from things strangled) [Land]
and fornication. [World]

James finishes his structure there (although the story of Paul’s purification follows, which is probably Luke’s “Ethics 2). Ethics 2 is actually the holy fire, the Spirit of God. Ethics 3 is the smoke, the witness. (This Triune version of the Ethics is what transforms the five-fold Covenant pattern into the seven-fold Creation week. It gives a Body to the Head.)

All the Gentiles needed to do was follow, in faith, the pre-Abramic rites of sacrifice (qualified by the Spirit of the New Covenant), and the Spirit would do the rest. In Abraham, the Jews had represented the nations before God as their substitute “father”, constantly under fire, and now a single Jew did, the Son, Jesus Christ the righteous, the first man to step out of the fire in a cloud of holy smoke, a fragrant “swarm.” Gentiles are not numbered as Jews were. Jews were numbered as transgressors. Gentiles are numberless. Gentiles are a swarm. Ethics 3, Day 5, had arrived.

So, while the Temple stood, or, more importantly, while the Old Covenant high priesthood was still standing, the Law of Moses stood also. The earthly High Priest was still alive. When he died, there would be a change of the Law. Both Noah and Moses would be gone forever.

In Revelation, John wept because he could see the Old Creation coming to an end. There was no one in heaven (Garden), on the Land (Land), or under the Land (Gentile Sea) who was worthy to open the scroll. Throughout the Old Testament, every “new” covenant was built within its predecessor, as Eve within Adam, as something sweet within the eater. Abraham was separated within Noah. Moses was separated within Abraham. David was separated within Moses. Ezra was separated within David. But they were all Adamic, and the entire house was old and ready to collapse. The garment was all patches. A new one was required, one that was a gift, one that was seamless and would not be torn. (See my new book for a diagram.) That is why John wept. He was in the heavenly Temple. The Bull, Eagle and Lion were all in place. But Man-face, the Facebread, the Lamb of God, was still missing.*

As Dr. Leithart has pointed out, part of the practical ministry of the gospel was to desacrifice the world, not just the Jewish world, but the Gentile world also. As the Old Creation creaked and groaned, awaiting the revealing of the identity of, the vindication of, the true sons of God, the true Covenant Succession (Christ or Herod?), it was a battle between a Christless Jew-Gentile body in a death grip upon bloody rites, and a Spirit-filled Jew-Gentile body where the only sacrifice required now was praise.

So, according to James, it wasn’t baptism that was a sufficient “replacement” for circumcision in a Pre-AD70 world that still focussed on blood sacrifice, it was the Altar of Noah.

(*This material is from James Jordan. If we are not familiar with this stuff, we have no excuse.)

“The entire free world could be shipwrecked by a teleprompter.”

I remember Carl Sagan commenting on the oddness of books, a collation of leaves covered in squiggles, in symbols. This is only odd if you are a godless fool (biblically defined) whose worldview is entirely at odds with reality.

Sadly this applies to many Christians, who have compromised the foundations of their faith, and pass this corruption on in many Bible colleges.

Man makes symbols because God makes symbols. Man is God’s symbol, God’s logo, pointing to God. Man chose to become a defaced symbol and made bad symbols. God became man to point man back to God, to restore the image. Redemption is the high art of the Logos. It is the men without true symbols who are weak, who are, in the end, less-than-men, men with symbols that mean nothing, despite the chaos and carnage they create in the meantime. James Jordan writes:

The study of symbolism is seen by some as a curiosity, rather far removed from the central matters of life. Anyone who spends time studying Biblical symbolism may well be getting into a “dangerous” area. Persons who engage in an “overly symbolic” interpretation of Scripture are to be regarded with suspicion. What matters is the study of reality; symbolism is secondary.

From the Biblical point of view, however, the reverse is the case. Symbolism is more important than anything else for the life of man. Since this is a manifesto, let me repeat that statement in italics: Symbolism is more important than anything else for the life of man. Anyone who does not understand this has yet fully come to grips with the philosophy of Cornelius Van Til, or more importantly, with the biblical doctrine of creation.

How can I write this so confidently? Simple. The doctrine of creation means that every created item, and also the created order as a whole, reflects the character of the God Who created it. In other words, everything in the creation, and the creation as a whole, points to God. In short, everything is a sign or symbol of God. The idea that everything is a symbol of God, His character, nature, ways, etc., is the foundation stone of the philosophy of Cornelius Van Til. The doctrine of creation ex nihilo is the basis of the Vantillian doctrine of natural revelation.

And not only so. Just as everything in creation is a general symbol of God, so also man is the special symbol, for man and man alone is created as the very image of God (Gen. 1:26). Each individual human being, and the race as a whole (Gen. 1:27), symbolizes God in a special way. What is this special way? Theologians have debated the issue, and no one will ever fully understand it (since to do so we should have to understand fully the nature of the God whose symbol we are). All the same, this much can be said: Man is the only symbol which is also a symbol-maker. Since this is a manifesto, let me say that again: It is of the essence of man’s divine imagehood that he is a symbol-making creature.

(The safest way to precede is to note what is said about God in the preceding verses of Genesis 1. This is the context in which it is then said that man is the image of God. God has been presented as one who determines, creates, evaluates, names, takes counsel among Himself, etc. These things are what man uniquely images.)[1]

If you believe Pink Floyd, the only factor that differentiates humans from apes is our ability to talk. [2] In fact, it’s not near impossible for this to have evolved, it is absolutely impossible. If natural selection were actually capable of producing progress (it isn’t) and might is right, why do words have so much power? It is because they did not come at the end; they came at the beginning, “at the (river)head” as Genesis 1:1 says. Adam could hear, speak, and, most likely, write. Language is not a new development. It is the way it has always been. Fear of God is the beginning of wisdom, and this practical knowledge of the truth brings dominion. Fictional 12-year-old prodigy (and atheist) Paloma Josse notices this discrepancy between evolutionary theory and reality, and writes,

“The strong ones
Among humans
Do nothing
They talk
And talk again”

“…nothing is harder or more unfair than human reality: humans live in a world where it’s words and not deeds than have power, where the ultimate skill is mastery of language. This is a terrible thing because basically we are primates who’ve been programmed to eat, sleep, reproduce, conquer and make our territory safe, and the ones who are most gifted at that, the most animal types among us, always get shafted by the others, the fine talkers, despite the latter being incapable of defending their own garden or bringing a rabbit home for dinner or procreating properly. Humans live in a world where the weak are dominant. This is a terrible insult to our animal nature, a sort of perversion or a deep contradiction.” [3]

In the beginning was the Word. The Creation order was spoken to, delegated to, the Son, by the Spirit. The Son’s obedience bore fruit, by the Spirit. Ideas have consequences precisely words take on flesh, because electricity moves the muscle; the elite control the workers.

All of God’s speeches are carefully deliberated and meticulously structured. When the Father issues a command, He never wishes He hadn’t pressed “Send.” All His Words, even the curses, are blessings in the long-run. The words of sinful man also build up and cut down. Words are power; words are crucial. The entire free world could be shipwrecked by a teleprompter.

The 5-fold Covenant model and the 7-fold matrix each have words at every point. The source-Word from God to His delegated Head, the delegate’s word to the body, the body under the word, the body’s witness to the truth of the word, and the totus’ oath at the marriage supper on the garden spring, leading to children carrying the word as rivers into the nations. God-Dad-Mum-Kids, God-Dad-Mum-Kids, God-Dad-Mum-Kids…

James 3:1-12:

Creation – Source of Word (Genesis)
My brethren,
…..let not many of you
……….become teachers, (Law given)
……………knowing that (Law opened)
……….we shall receive (Law received)
…..a stricter judgment.
For we all stumble in many things.

Division – Delegation of Word
If anyone
…..does not stumble in word,
……….he [is] a perfect man,
……………able also to bridle the whole body.
……….Indeed, we put bits in horses’ mouths
…..that they may obey us,
and we turn their whole body.

Ascension – The Altar-Land above the Gentile Sea (man as Covenant Head)
Look also at ships:
…..although they are so large
……….and are driven by fierce winds,
……………they are turned by a very small rudder
……….wherever the pilot desires.
…..Even so the tongue is a little member
and boasts great things.

Testing – Discerning the Spirits
See how great a forest a little fire kindles!
…..And the tongue [is] a fire,
……….a world of iniquity.
……………The tongue is so set among our members
……….that it defiles the whole body,
…..and sets on fire the course of nature;
and it is set on fire by hell. (BAD Shekinah)

Maturity – Swarms/Armies (Covenant Body)
For every kind of beast and bird,
…..of reptile and creature of the sea,
……….is tamed and has been tamed by mankind.
……………But no man can tame the tongue.
……….[It is] an unruly [lawless] evil,
…..full of deadly poison. (Cup of Sanctions)

Conquest – Coverings and Sanctions/Oath
With it we bless our God and Father, (Transcendence)
…..and with it we curse men, (Hierarchy)
……….who have been made in the similitude of God. (Ethics)
…..Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing. (Sanctions/Oath)
My brethren, these things ought not to be so. (Continuity)

Glorification – Covenant Succession
Does a spring send forth
…..fresh and bitter [water]
……….from the same opening? (Singularity)
……………Can a fig tree,
……….my brethren, bear olives, (Plurality)
……….or a grapevine bear figs?
…..Thus no spring yields
both salt water and fresh.

Our words are barrenness or fruitfulness, Eve offspring or serpent offspring.

_______________________________
[1] James B. Jordan, Symbolism: A Manifesto. [PDF]
[2] Pink Floyd, “Keep Talking,” The Division Bell.
[3] Muriel Barbery, The Elegance of the Hedgehog, p. 53.
Thanks to my atheist friend, Mitch Griggs, for pointing out the video.

Michael F. Bird recently wrote:

The Jerusalem council achieved a via media by finding in Scripture a justification for the inclusion of Gentiles within the church without requiring circumcision and placing upon Gentiles only the obligation to avoid idol food and sexual immorality. Yet the Jerusalem council also permitted the existence of two parallel theologies: one theology where the Gentiles were uncircumcised equals in a renewed Israel with holiness constituted by the Spirit and another theology where uncircumcised Gentiles were guests in an Israelite remnant that still defined holiness through Torah observance. The Jerusalem council’s decisions seem optimized in a setting where Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians remain in parallel rather than integrated, especially in relation to shared meals. The council did not stipulate the standard of law observance to be upheld for Eucharistic fellowship to ensue.

Bird makes some interesting observations in his post, but two parallel theologies? Is that really what was going on? And does the council’s decision apply to modern observance of the Torah (ie. Messianic Jews)?

Theology is an overused word, for sure. Two theologies almost indicates two ways of understanding God, if not two separate gods. But the mention of Torah observance clarifies Bird’s meaning: the Jerusalem council maintained that Jewish believers approached God in one way, and Gentile believers approached God in another. And both were valid.

This AD30-AD70 era of “overlap” was the fulfilment of the Old Covenant order, with the Hebrews/Jews as a priestly nation mediating for the Gentiles. There were two tables: Passover for the mediators alone, and Tabernacles for Jews and Gentiles as one body (with 70 bulls sacrificed for the 70 nations in Genesis 10). [1] Salvation came to the Jews first because they were in the Holy Place, and the Gentiles were in the outer court. The “sons of God” set the Covenant table and invite the “daughters of men” to eat at it.

The only reason the Jews could still observe the Torah, and why Paul could take a Nazirite vow, was that the Temple was still standing. Observing Torah might have been valid when the Jerusalem council met, but as these early decades of the church rolled on, the door of the new age was opening wider and wider, and the light of the church era was eradicating the shadows of the old order. [2]

The Revelation illustrates this process of increase/decrease in a number of ways—in symbols. One of the most striking is the Black Horse, announcing that the Old Covenant grains were wasting away while the New Covenant oil and wine were in abundant supply. The Green Horse (the Levitical sword) finished it off.

Another is the symbol of “buying and selling.” [3] In Acts, the Jewish Christians are meeting in the Temple, but by the end of the process they were locked out. The Jewish polity unwittingly locked the Pentecostal glory of God out of His own house. It was left unprotected, which brought about its desolation.

Like rusty trainer wheels, Torah observance was a decayed, torn veil that soon passed away, despite the desperate post-mortem stitching of the Herodians and the zealots. And as Paul stitched Jew and Gentile together across the empire over the next decades, Torah observance also decayed. By the end, it was only the hardliners who remained, and God called them together to Jerusalem for a feast in which they themselves were the meat on the table for the Gentiles they despised.

The “parallel theologies” were the fulfilment of the Old Covenant two-feast order, but this bipolarity was temporary. [4] The book of Hebrews trumpets the end of the division of Adam begun in Abraham. [5]

Salvation was certainly of the Jews, but that Abrahamic blood was now in heaven. The blood no longer mattered. Only Spirit now mattered.

The wise decision of the Jerusalem Council cannot be applied to anyone beyond AD70, when James’ temporary “Tabernacle of David” (the firstfruits church) was consumed by the true Temple of Solomon. We live in a permanent house.

“Beloved, now are we the sons of God.”

__________________________________
[1] See Eat Local and Die for the only way this applies today.
[2] See The End of Shadows.
[3] See Worship As Commerce.
[4] See Three Babylons.
[5] See The End of Judaism.

One major difference between Jordan and other preterists is his identification of Paul’s “man of sin.” Jordan is correct in naming the Herods rather than Nero because he understands biblical typology better.

The pattern during the Restoration era was that God’s representative, a Jew, would sit at the right hand of the power, like Daniel, like Mordecai. In this, like Joseph, they prefigured Christ. This man would first qualify by passing God’s tests of obedience. Daniel passed with flying colours. Mordecai fumbled the ball and Haman was given the post instead. Haman was an Amalekite.

In the first century, instead of a ‘Jacob’ on this throne under the Gentile emperor, it was an Edomite, an Esau. One of Esau’s grandchildren was deliberately named Amalek (Genesis 36), a compromise with a Gentile power from “the Abyss” that God had specifically named as an eternal enemy.

Here’s the biblical pattern. With the circumcision of Abraham, God tore the world in two. The Bible uses creation symbols to denote his descendants as the mediatorial “Land”, and the Gentile nations as the “Sea.” A Gentile power is a Sea beast. A Jewish king compromised with Gentile political power is a Land beast.

In Revelation, the Sea beast is Nero’s Rome, called up by Satan after his failed attempts to destroy the embryonic church with Jewish persecution and false Judaising doctrine. This is the serpent. But there is another “beast” with the horns of a lamb and the mouth of a dragon–a false prophet, a lying Adam (High Priest). This is not a Gentile power. It is a Jew who names his offspring after a hated enemy of God. It is a Haman sitting at the right hand of the Gentile power, a little horn with the eyes and mouth of a man (a Jew), the human face on the faceless beast of Rome, steering the empire against the people of God.

So the reference to the number of this man, 666, becomes easy to interpret. The first rule for Israel’s kings that Solomon broke was the one against amassing gold. Solomon received 666 talents of gold in one year. Gold was so abundant that silver was just about treated like refuse. 666 simply denotes a corrupt Jewish king. Yep, that’s it. (See my book Totus Christus for further support of this from the structure of the passage. Nero isn’t even in the picture. Judgment begins at the house of God. As Jordan points out, the references to wisdom and understanding are ironic references to Solomon also.)

Paul refers to this man of sin sitting where he ought not to be sitting, in a seat of judgment, the temple of God. The Herods styled themselves as Solomons, sitting in Moses’ seat and judging wisely. They were certainly street-wise, cunning foxes, like Emperor Ming–excelling in government by manipulation for their own bestial ends. But by God’s standards they were fools.

The Spirit of Jesus’ coming in judgment against a Judah that had hardened her heart beyond repair destroyed this false Joseph/Daniel/Mordecai. Revelation shows the saints, already slaughtered or still under threat, praying for deliverance from the “justice” of this counterfeit messiah (anti-Christ) in his shiny new Temple. Who else deliberately and repeatedly denied Jesus’ incarnation at this level of government PR?

And this scene from Flash Gordon (a cheesy movie, but gourmet cheese) captures the drama of the return of Christ for his firstfruits church perfectly. Go Flash go.

“He’ll save every one of us.”

______________________
In The Handwriting on the Wall, Jordan notes the progression of authority in Israel’s mediatorial history, from Land under David and Solomon, to empire-Land under Esther and Mordecai, to true world power under Christ, who steers, or Advocates, at the right hand of the true Power. The four empires were  pictures of the cherubim under the throne of God. This included Nero, as a beast from the Sea (Daniel 7). Each time one of these guardian beasts went bad, it was swiftly replaced by God, beginning with the fall of Belshazzar’s Babylon.

See also Jordan’s article The Abomination of Desolation.