Today at ETS

It has been an amazing week in California so far. My heart is full. I don’t have time tonight to go back through previous days, as much as I would like to. Instead I’ll make a few comments from today.

Today was the first day of the Evangelical Theological Society conference. I have been to these only twice before (2001 and 2004), because it’s just too difficult to fly in from Israel. But I like these kinds of things because they inspire me, instruct me, and humble me.

I actually skipped the morning sessions (despite the presentations being given by former IBEX students) because another friend (and, yes, former IBEX student – do I have any other friends?) invited me to his PhD class at UCSD with David Noel Freedman. Those who have studied with me will recognize that name as the editor of Anchor Bible Dictionary and various other works. I’ve never had the chance to meet him and since he’s now 85, I probably won’t have too many other opportunities. The class is a Hebrew Bible reading seminar, and today they were in 2 Chronicles 17-18. Students took about 5 verses and read, translated, and parsed them. Freedman commented on various issues. I was struck by 1) his amazing knowledge of the Hebrew text without any apparent preparation; 2) his ability to laugh at many, many things; 3) his ability to blast and encourage a student in consecutive sentences; 4) certain passions of his that he discussed at length (apparently for the tenth time this quarter). I’d love to say more about #4 but am not sure if I will. Here are some verbatim examples of #3:

You are so totally wrong, I can’t believe it. [discussion] So keep changing until you get it right. What’s the matter with you people?

Do you know the difference between a gerund and a gerundative? [Student: No]. Well, google it. [TB: this is hilarious on several levels.]

There was more but I didn’t get them. Lest the quotations suggest otherwise, I was impressed with Freedman’s overall kindness. A few other snippets from my notes:

The very beginning, the first words of the Bible, everybody’s got it wrong all along. The correct reading is bereshit bara. We have so many examples of a prepositional phrase followed by the perfect form of the verb. Not a question. I can show them all to you. In the beginning when God created. Subordinated clause. Very complicated but the first words of the Hebrew Bible have been mistranslated by everyone else. It really helps to study grammar. Opening words of book of Hosea: Hos 1:2 – construct followed by the perfect. Exactly like Gen 1:1….

I am the only person in the world who ever said this, so naturally you won’t accept it. What I am proposing is perfectly legitimate; it is grammatically correct. Predicate adjective. Any other reading requires a strain in the grammar. It is saying that he is “a god.” But Yahweh is not “a god.” If you question it, you ‘re wrong...There are many scholars, all of whom are wrong, who claim that Yahweh is not a verb. There’s a perfectly legitimate verb because the verb hayah in biblical Hebrew was originally heh vav yod.

The best thing (#4) I’m not sure if I should share. In any case, it was an enjoyable experience for more reasons than the teacher.

After lunch, we went to the ETS meeting. Douglas Moo gave the first plenary address. It was good, though, like many things of the day, there was much that I didn’t understand (or while maybe I understood the words themselves, I knew that I was ignorant of the necessity for saying such words). Moo isn’t exactly one of my heroes, but I have so greatly appreciated his contribution on a very important issue in my life during our years in Israel – the relationship of the Law to believers. So for that reason alone, I feel greatly appreciative of his work.

I went to five regular sessions after this.

1: J. P. Moreland delivered an impassioned plea for evangelicals to stop being “overcommitted to the Bible.” Without much personal knowledge of him, I always thought that I greatly respected him. He pretty much ended that today. It was certainly an interesting and provocative lecture, but it got worse the further he went along. His basic premise is that Scripture should be our ultimate authority but not our sole authority. He gave an analogy from archaeology that made sense. But it faltered when it got to psychology and fell apart when he started talking about learning about demons from sources outside the Bible. (Did he really say that if you command a demon in the name of Jesus to tell the truth that they will be bound to do so?) He’s so concerned about this issue because of the damage that is being done to American evangelicals (but he made it clear that such problems lie primarily with Americans and not those outside).

2: Excavations at Gezer 2007. This was an interesting summary of what was accomplished this year. There were a couple of pictures in the PowerPoint presentation that I recognized.

3: Historical Reliability of Chronicles by Eugene Merrill. Classic Merrill: well-organized, clear, and biblical.

4: Did Prophecy Fail by Robert Chisholm (DTS OT prof). He examined 2 Kings 3 and concluded that Elisha’s prophecy did not come true because Israel’s faith was weak. I started out expecting to agree with his conclusion, especially as he surveyed the other positions. But in the end, he didn’t give sufficient support for his view and I didn’t buy it. But I am inspired to study it more.

5. Panel discussion with Merrill, Chisholm, Grisanti and a Danish guy about harmonization. Interesting and provocative, though one guy in the audience (a well-known OT prof) was argumentative and did not advance the discussion. Chisholm pointed out a couple of apparent contradictions in the Bible that I hadn’t thought much about before.

After this there was a special lecture by John Piper. I’ve been a fan of his writings for much longer than most people have known about him. I’ve read most of his books and tried to direct hundreds of students to his ministry. I’ve long said that he is the most important living person in my life that I’ve never seen in person. Well, I can say that no longer. He gave a great message on justification, and inspired me on things completely unrelated to justification. Crossway also gave out free copies of his latest book on the subject to all attenders. That itself is worthy of note: an organization gives away his latest book to the people most likely to buy it (it’s a technical work less suited to average church people).

There is much more but it is now late and tomorrow is an even longer day. Besides all of the above, I saw a lot of former students, former teachers, and other acquaintances, plus a few I’ve only known from email.

P.S. You’re welcome to comment below but if you ask me questions about something, I’m not sure if or when I’ll be able to answer them.

Update (11/16): Moreland’s talk is the subject of this Christianity Today blog post.

Update (11/22): Moreland’s paper is now online.  It does not include some of the more goofy things he said, including stories about revelations he has received, demons he has exorcised, and how to command a demon so they will be bound to speak the truth.  Justin Taylor mentions the paper and may have a different take on it.