Yesterday morning, Blair (pastor at Preston Hollow PC) preached a nice little sermon that centered on the following verses from the first chapter of Luke:
34Mary said to the angel, ‘How can this be, since I am a virgin? 35The angel said to her, ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born*36And now, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren. 37For nothing will be impossible with God.’ will be holy; he will be called Son of God.
You all know this stuff....very Christmasy. Blair really honed in on the "For nothing will be impossible with God" bit, a message that lots of folks need to hear.
I was sitting there yesterday listening to the sermon, and I thought "I wonder what my Super-Bible* has to say about that 37th verse?" I taught Sunday School yesterday, so I happened to have by SB with me, so I pulled it out, and it referred me back to Genesis 18:14
"14Is anything too wonderful for the Lord? At the set time I will return to you, in due season, and Sarah shall have a son.’ "
The connection is clear, but I think there's something more interesting going on here. Look at the two passages right next to one another:
Genesis 18:14: Is anything too wonderful for the Lord?
Luke 1:37: For nothing is impossible with God.
See the difference?
It's really all about the prepositions. The Genesis passage uses the preposition "for", meaning God can do whatever God wants to do, but Luke chooses a different word. He uses "with"; somehow implying a joint venture, a companionship with God that is clearly not implied by the Genesis passage. The difference is subtle, but I think really highlights the very special essence of the Christmas story.
Here in a couple of days many of us will be celebrating the bizzare mystery of a God of partnership and "with-ness" who came down here amongst us in as a little baby in a trough in the desert. Pretty cool stuff don't ya think?
* Super-Bible is a term of endearment that our Wednesday night young adult Bible study has bestowed upon the Harper-Collins study Bible that has wonderful footnotes, cross-references, and even some fun maps. It's aided in many a discussion....
Sorry, but I think you need to do a little more work to call this exegesis. You used a study Bible as your main source of info, and you relied upon the English translations to compare words and ideas.
It would be a great benefit if you looked into the original languages, or at least looked at commentaries which do consider the meaning of the text.
If you did this, you would see that Luke did not use the word "with" in the way you suggest. He used "para", not "syn" - a big difference in Greek. If you look at Luke 2:13, you find the "with" that you are suggesting, as "with" (syn) the angel, was a multitude of the heavenly army praising God.
"Para" is often translated "from", but in this case it is a marker of personal reference with the meaning "at the side of" - which lends more understanding to the translation "with".
You might think this is small potatoes, but the difference between God doing something through us is different than God doing something along with us.
Looking at the Greek text you would see that most translators have chosen not to translate "pan hrema" ("every word") in verse 37, though they do translate "to hrema sou" ("the word of you") in verse 38.
It seems to me that the reference of "with", in Luke 1:37, is refering more to the Word, than God acting in conjunction with humans.
The connection to Genesis 18:14 is actually more in line with the word "word" than you may realize. There, the verse begins with the three words literally translated (is he too hard?) (for YHWH) (anything).
"Anything" is translated from DaBaR, which can also be translated "word" or "thing". (When placed before YHWH, it is translated "the Word of the Lord".)
The preposition placed with YHWH is often translated "from". The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon says this Hebrew preposition is "expressing the idea of separation, hence out of, from, on account of, off, on the side of, since, above, than, so that not".
An literal alternative English translation could easily help us to more fully understand the Hebrew text... "Is any Word from the Lord too difficult (for the Lord to accomplish)?"
You are placing more weight on the English prepositions than can be substantiated from the underlying word meanings.
Both passages are implying that God will make the (seemingly difficult/impossible) Word happen.
It is God who is making these things happen.
Posted by: DennisS | December 22, 2008 at 04:14 PM
Dennis,
I appreciate your comment, and I'll choose to assume that you are trying to be helpful rather than high-tone seminary condescending.
That said, I have two quibbles. First off, the term "exegesis" is deployed quite loosely in this matte. Think of it in the same manner that a "Monday morning quarterback" might ponder his/her team's loss/win from the previous day. It was apparently a poorly-contextualized sports allusion.
Secondly, while you are absolutely right relative to the original Greek/Hebrew of the source text, I still stand by my the overall spirit of my position. I think the translator (who probably knows more Greek/Hebrew than is really fair for any one person to know) had a very solid reason for selecting the prepositions.
My point was not to make some decidedly nit-picky proof-textual point regarding the nature of God working "with" vice "through" us, but rather to note that the translator of the Luke passage clearly makes a very Christmasy point via the use of the word "with". It reminds us clearly of the use of the word Emmanuel relative to Christ.
Posted by: Babbaloie | December 24, 2008 at 07:54 PM
Wow. I had a post - that I worked on for two hours - disappear into the ether of the internet (due to a poor connection). The message said that it was posted, but it didn't appear.
Basically, I wanted to thank you for the opportunity to dig into the text. I don't know you, nor do I wish to suggest that my understanding is superior. I wish you the best. I like a good conversation, and I like digging into the text. We are both blessed by digging further into the Word. And I think we can learn from each other.
I do not see "with" as supporting what you see in the text, nor as a reminder of Emmanuel - God with us.
The context is the miracle of conception - for Elizabeth (beyond the age of childbearing), and Mary (where the power for conception is clearly from the power of God, and not man).
The "with" that I understand you to be suggesting is more along the lines of what I read in Philippians 4:3. There are three uses of "syn" (with) there - speaking of the "yoke-fellow", the one who "contended alongside", and mention of the rest of the "co-workers". These are folks who were clearly "with" Paul. The only word translated "with" is from "meta" - different than "para" of Luke 1:37.
I think we are from different generations, so perhaps that is causing some differences in our understanding and method. (I recently had to acknowledge on an application that my hair color is now: gray.) Maybe this will help:
Abby started a fire with a flint. My understanding is that the flint cannot start a fire, but it can indeed be used by a person to start a fire.
In this way, God can use us to start a fire. But we are unable to start the fire on our own, and we aren't able to use God to start the fire.
It is my understanding that you are trying to say that we can start a fire with God (if God is "with" us). We cannot use God as a tool, but the opposite is entirely possible. Maybe this is a misunderstanding, or a terrible example. I have a high view of the sovereignty of God, so I want to protect against what I would consider as getting this backward.
I do acknowledge Jesus as Emmanuel - God with us. I do see passages such as John 15 as pointing to this as well - where Jesus says He is the vine and we are the branches. I simply do not see "with" in Luke 1:37 as pointing to us being "with" God! I don't see the passage as "clearly" referring to Emmanuel.
When God speaks, nothing is impossible. Nothing is impossible through the Word of God.
I see the response of Mary as important in the translation. She understands the words of Gabriel to be coming from God.
God is not our flint that we carry with us, to be pulled out when needed. We are the flint to be used by God. If that is what you mean by "with", then I'm "with" you. But you speak of "withness" as partnership. This I see in Php 4:3 and John 15, but not in Luke 1:37.
Posted by: DennisS | December 26, 2008 at 01:28 AM
Wow. I'm sorry that I'm late to this conversation. It looks like fun. Mind if I dive right in, all the same?
I had a Greek teacher who often reminded us that "prepositions mean what they will", a nerdy echo of John 3:8, "the wind blows where it will", by which we learned that there is always a sense of play (that's a Derrida-esque term for bcdees to latch on to) in prepositions, especially when translating from one language to another. You can say that there is a general equivalence between the Greek "syn" or "para", a use of the Hebrew mem prefix and the English word "with", but do not make it a hard and fast rule.
What does this mean? Matt and Dennis, you both have ground to stand on. The NRSV committee translated the Genesis and Luke passages with a slightly different preposition, and that gives license for some comparison and disputation. It could offer clues to the direction your exegesis should go. Does the Luke text seem like a partnership between human and divine? Does the Genesis text preclude human involvement in the miracle? That's where the real exegesis happens.
However, and this is a big however, the play inherent in the meaning of prepositions should also keep us away from making theological arguments based on prepositions. Otherwise, we find ourselves in extremely dangerous territory. Also known as, the history of denominationalism and schism in the Church.
Dennis, thanks for your comments. May I request a little more grace in your commenting style? Even I felt that your first response was a reprimand rather than constructive. This is something with which I struggle in my own posting behavior, but I rather the blogosphere (or at least our corner of it) not become a giant parochial school where every thought is liable to a slap with a ruler.
And Matt, seriously. Does a pinch of salt make it chili? Or is it more? Just the same, do prepositions make something a theological thought? Or something more? I think there's more to be found in the similarities of those two texts than in their differences.
And the Harper-Collins Study Bible is definitely a Super-Bible. You need others in the group to bring the New Oxford Annotated and the New Interpreter's Study and then you can have one of those Marvel vs. DC vs. Manga Super-Bible brawls. All three have good commentaries and good scholarship behind them.
Posted by: Bill | January 04, 2009 at 06:45 PM