The Knowledge of God, The Wisdom of God, Part B

Verses 2:1-5

“And when I came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God. For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling, and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God.” (1 Corinthians 2:1-5)

Chapter 2 is a theological explanation of what was stated in 1:17-31. Here, Paul repeats what he stated in 1:17 and 1:26-31. Namely, that it was the Spirit of God that caused these Corinthians to believe, not persuasive philosophical argumentation or moving oration.

• “But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.” (John 1:12-13)

• “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever; that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.” (John 14:16-17)

• “In the exercise of His will He brought us forth by the word of truth, so that we would be a kind of first fruits among His creatures.” (James 1:18)

Verses 2:6-9

“Yet we do speak wisdom among those who are mature; a wisdom, however, not of this age nor of the rulers of this age, who are passing away; but we speak God's wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory; the wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood; for if they had understood it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory; but just as it is written, ‘THINGS WHICH EYE HAS NOT SEEN AND EAR HAS NOT HEARD, AND which HAVE NOT ENTERED THE HEART OF MAN, ALL THAT GOD HAS PREPARED FOR THOSE WHO LOVE HIM.’” (1 Corinthians 2:6-9)

Likely drawing from Jesus’ words in Matthew 11:25-30, Paul states that the wisdom of this world may seem right at this point in time, but the wisdom of God is eschatological. It has been revealed in the coming of the kingdom which has been inaugurated with the First Advent of Christ and will be consummated at the end of time, at the Second Advent. As such, God is slowly displaying his wisdom through the church:

• “For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses. We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ,” (2 Corinthians 10:3-5)

• “To me, the very least of all saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unfathomable riches of Christ, and to bring to light what is the administration of the mystery which for ages has been hidden in God who created all things; so that the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places.” (Ephesians 3:8-10)

If the rulers¹ of this age had not been blinded to this truth, then they would not have crucified Christ, the Lord of Glory:

• “Jesus said to them, “Did you never read in the Scriptures, ‘THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED, THIS BECAME THE CHIEF CORNER stone; THIS CAME ABOUT FROM THE LORD, AND IT IS MARVELOUS IN OUR EYES’?”” (Matthew 21:42)

• “Men of Israel, listen to these words: Jesus the Nazarene, a man attested to you by God with miracles and wonders and signs which God performed through Him in your midst, just as you yourselves know--this Man, delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death. But God raised Him up again, putting an end to the agony of death, since it was impossible for Him to be held in its power…Therefore let all the house of Israel know for certain that God has made Him both Lord and Christ--this Jesus whom you crucified.” (Acts 2:22-24, 36)

Verses 2:10-11

“For to us God revealed them through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so the thoughts of God no one knows except the Spirit of God.” (1 Corinthians 2:10-11)

The revelation of this wisdom only comes about by the Spirit’s activity since it is He alone that has intimate access to the mind of the Father:

• “But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine; therefore I said that He takes of Mine and will disclose it to you.” (John 16:13-15)

• “…while making mention of you in my prayers; that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him. I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you will know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints,” (Ephesians 1:16-18)

Verses 2:12-13

“Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by God, which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words.” (1 Corinthians 2:12-13)

Man does not come to believe in the gospel by means of the wisdom of this world², but rather, it comes from the Spirit of God who does a work in the heart of man and teaches him the knowledge of God:

• “For with You is the fountain of life; in Your light we see light.” (Psalm 36:9)

• “All your sons will be taught of the LORD; and the well-being of your sons will be great. In righteousness you will be established; you will be far from oppression, for you will not fear; and from terror, for it will not come near you.” (Isaiah 54:13-14)

• ““But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” declares the LORD, “I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,” declares the LORD, “for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.”” (Jeremiah 31:33-34)

• “Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances.” (Ezekiel 36:25-27)

• “And Jesus said to him, ‘Blessed are you, Simon Barjona, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but My Father who is in heaven.’” (Matthew 16:17)

• “But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you.” (John 14:26; see also 15:26)

• “But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine; therefore I said that He takes of Mine and will disclose it to you.” (John 16:13-15)

• “Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God says, “Jesus is accursed”; and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit.” (1 Corinthians 12:3)

• “…while making mention of you in my prayers; that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him. I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you will know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints,” (Ephesians 1:16-18)

• “As for you, the anointing which you received from Him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you; but as His anointing teaches you about all things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you abide in Him.” (1 John 2:27)

• “And we know that the Son of God has come, and has given us understanding so that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life.” (1 John 5:20)

Verses 2:14-16

“But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised. But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised by no one. For WHO HAS KNOWN THE MIND OF THE LORD, THAT HE WILL INSTRUCT HIM? But we have the mind of Christ.” (1 Corinthians 2:14-16)

Again, because the natural man’s mind is futile and darkened, he will always (except by the grace of God) take God’s obvious truth and exchange it for a lie:

• ““No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up on the last day. It is written in the prophets, ‘AND THEY SHALL ALL BE TAUGHT OF GOD.’ Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father, comes to Me… But there are some of you who do not believe.” For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe, and who it was that would betray Him. And He was saying, “For this reason I have said to you, that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted him from the Father.”” (John 6:44-45)

• “Jesus said to them, ‘If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I proceeded forth and have come from God, for I have not even come on My own initiative, but He sent Me. Why do you not understand what I am saying? It is because you cannot hear My word. You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies. But because I speak the truth, you do not believe Me. Which one of you convicts Me of sin? If I speak truth, why do you not believe Me? He who is of God hears the words of God; for this reason you do not hear them, because you are not of God.’” (John 8:42-47)

• “Jesus answered them, ‘I told you, and you do not believe; the works that I do in My Father's name, these testify of Me. But you do not believe because you are not of My sheep.’” (John 10:25-26)

• “…because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so,” (Romans 8:7)

• “Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God says, “Jesus is accursed”; and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit.” (1 Corinthians 12:3)

In contrast, believers see the world through a different set of glasses since they have the knowledge of God disclosed to them by the Spirit sent from Christ:

• “But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine; therefore I said that He takes of Mine and will disclose it to you.” (John 16:13-15)

• “And we know that the Son of God has come, and has given us understanding so that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life.” (1 John 5:20)

Excursus on Various Other Passages

There are a number of minor passages that have a direct bearing on our discussion of epistemology. Luke 16:30-31 is on the issue of how the unbeliever reacts to evidence of the truth. 1 Corinthians 15:3-4, Luke 24:24-26, and Acts 17:10-12 are along the same lines. Finally, Romans 3:3-4, Isaiah 40:8, and John 10:35 bear on the issue of how Christians should react to the world’s ‘majority’ opinion.

Luke 16:30-31

“But he said, ‘No, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent!’ But he said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead.’ ” (Luke 16:30-31)

Commentary:

The parable of the rich man and Lazarus comes right after Jesus’ condemnation of the Pharisees where Luke notes that they were “lovers of money” (v.14). Jesus then goes into the parable where a rich man (who always ignored the plight of the poor man³, Lazarus) dies and goes to lower Hades, the place of torment reserved for the wicked before the Last Day. In torment, the man asks Abraham to get him out of Hades so that he could warn his brothers of hell and plead with them to repent. Abraham responds by telling him that if one did not believe in the Sacred Scriptures, then that person would never believe even if one came back from the dead to tell him!

Notice that the text does not say, “If they do not believe even if someone rises from the dead, then they will certainly not believe the Scriptures.” Indeed, this saying sounds much more reasonable. If you saw a man whom you knew was dead and buried in the ground come back to life and told you that there was a hell, then that would seem to be of much greater evidential weight than ancient writings written centuries before (which you didn’t believe in anyway⁴). No, instead Jesus is teaching that it is Scripture that serves as a better proof of hell and judgment than eye-witness evidence. This was because, as we discussed in Romans 1 and 1 Corinthians 1-2, unregenerate man suppresses the obvious truth because of his sinful nature. While empirical evidence can be twisted by an unbeliever’s darkened mind, Scripture carries with it the power of the Spirit. Jesus and the apostles make this clear elsewhere:

• “The Pharisees and Sadducees came up, and testing Jesus, they asked Him to show them a sign from heaven. But He replied to them, “When it is evening, you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red.’ And in the morning, ‘There will be a storm today, for the sky is red and threatening.’ Do you know how to discern the appearance of the sky, but cannot discern the signs of the times? An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign; and a sign will not be given it, except the sign of Jonah.” And He left them and went away.” (Matthew 16:1-4)

• “Therefore take heed, so that the thing spoken of in the Prophets may not come upon you: ‘BEHOLD, YOU SCOFFERS, AND MARVEL, AND PERISH; FOR I AM ACCOMPLISHING A WORK IN YOUR DAYS, A WORK WHICH YOU WILL NEVER BELIEVE, THOUGH SOMEONE SHOULD DESCRIBE IT TO YOU.’ ” (Acts 13:40-41)

1 Corinthians 15:3-4

“For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures…” (1 Corinthians 15:3-4)

Commentary:

Here, Paul reminds the Corinthians about the gospel and its proof. Before he goes into the eye-witness testimony, he makes it clear that the greatest proof of the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ was to be found in the prophetic witness spoken of in the Old Testament Scriptures:

• “But we were hoping that it was [Jesus] who was going to redeem Israel. Indeed, besides all this, it is the third day since these things happened. But also some women among us amazed us. When they were at the tomb early in the morning, and did not find His body, they came, saying that they had also seen a vision of angels who said that He was alive. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just exactly as the women also had said; but Him they did not see.” And He said to them, “O foolish men and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary for the Christ to suffer these things and to enter into His glory?” (Luke 24:21-26)

• “The brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea, and when they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews. Now these were more noble-minded than those in Thessalonica, for they received the word with great eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see whether these things were so. Therefore many of them believed, along with a number of prominent Greek women and men.” (Acts 17:10-12)⁵

This is not to put down the use of evidences since the New Testament writers make obvious use of them (Luke 1:1-4, John 20:30-31, 1 Corinthians 15:5-11, 2 Peter 1:16-19, 1 John 1:1-4, etc.). However, those evidences should be studied and used, not to convince an unbeliever, but to increase the faith and boldness of the believer. The Scriptural writers make this clear when they say that evidences make believers’ faith “more sure” (2 Peter 1:19) and their joy “complete” (1 John 1:4).

Romans 3:3-4

“What then? If some did not believe, their unbelief will not nullify the faithfulness of God, will it? May it never be! Rather, let God be found true, though every man be found a liar, as it is written, ‘THAT YOU MAY BE JUSTIFIED IN YOUR WORDS, AND PREVAIL WHEN YOU ARE JUDGED.’” (Romans 3:3-4)

Commentary:

In context, Paul is answering a rhetorical question: if Jesus was the Jewish Messiah, then why didn’t the majority of the Jews believe? Was God unfaithful to give His people enough evidence so that they would not reject their Messiah and thus be unfaithful to the covenant?⁶ “No”, Paul answers. God should always be viewed by faith as faithful even though all men fail to be faithful. Every Jew could have disbelieved, but that would not have nullified God’s Word or His faithfulness.

This can be applied to any disbelief in God’s Word. We frequently hear that the majority of scientists (a.k.a. the ‘smart’ people) don’t believe in Christianity. We frequently hear that the majority of historians and archaeologists don’t believe in the Bible. This begs certain questions: Was God not faithful to give us enough evidence? This question leads to the next question: Because so many people don’t believe in Scripture, is Scripture really true; why should I believe in it? In other words, by starting to question God’s faithfulness, one inevitably starts down the path of his own faithlessness or unbelief.

To this, we must begin with God and His Word and judge the world by this standard. Even if the whole world should not believe in God or His Word, we should, by faith, still believe. God’s Word trumps all scholarly opinion on the planet for His Word cannot perish or be broken:

• “The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever.” (Isaiah 40:8)

• “For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished.” (Matthew 5:18)

• “If he called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be broken),” (John 10:35)

This does require faith, but it is not fideism. Many theories against Scripture have been invented over the centuries, and most of them have been debunked with new evidence many years after the theories were created. The point is that the Christian should have faith even if an anti-Scriptural theory becomes popular or an entire nation of people rejects the gospel. Let God be true though all men be liars!

Conclusion

Commenting on Colossians 2:8, A.T. Robertson once said:

“And not after Christ (kai ou kata Christon). Christ is the yardstick by which to measure philosophy and all phases of human knowledge. The Gnostics were measuring Christ by their philosophy as many men are doing today. They have it backwards. Christ is the measure for all human knowledge since he is the Creator and the Sustainer of the universe.”⁷

William Lane Craig, a popular Christian apologist, is representative of this movement which starts with human philosophy and interprets the Bible according to that standard:

“Some readers of my study of divine omniscience, The Only Wise God, expressed surprise at my remark that someone desiring to learn more about God’s attribute of omniscience would be better advised to read the works of Christian philosophers than of Christian theologians. Not only was that remark true, but the same holds for divine eternity.”⁸

This is absolutely foolish according to Scripture, and it bears out. In his book, Time and Eternity, Craig ends up denying that God can exist outside of time once He created the universe. Of course, Craig comes to this conclusion because he started with the artificial distinctions of Greek philosophy instead of starting with Scripture and its distinctions.

The believer should always view the world and its ‘wisdom’ as being blinded and without true knowledge, even unable⁹ to see the truth of the gospel. Furthermore, the Christian should never believe or use one of the world’s autonomous systems of knowledge to come up with truth, and he should most certainly not try to use those systems to prove the very Word of God those systems were built to avoid! Instead, he should start with God and Scripture as his absolute and judge the world’s epistemological systems by this axiom. In the end, the truth of God’s Word will bear out.

In apologetics and evangelism, the goal of the Christian is to deny the unbeliever his own intellectual autonomy, show that he is suppressing the truth, and call him to repentance. We will see this in Paul’s example at Athens in Acts 17.

[All Scripture quotes are from the NASB, emphasis mine.]

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1 “The rulers of this age are representative; in them we see the most impressive achievements of the present world-order, measured by the standards of human pride and unbelief. Within the creation, as presently subject to the curse of sin (cf. Rom. 8:20-22), they exemplify the most that it has to offer and is capable of attaining.”

-Richard B. Gaffin Jr. in Revelation and Reason, K. Scott Oliphint and Lane G. Tipton, eds., (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2007), p.22.

2 “‘The spirit of the world’ occurs only here in the New Testament. Despite what might be an initial impression, the reference is almost surely not to Satan as “the god of this age” (2 Cor. 4:4) or to some other spiritual being. Rather, coined to sharpen the antithesis to the Spirit and his eschatological activity, the phrase captures the world as humanity in rebellion against God (cf. 1 Cor. 1:20, 21, 27, 28; 2;6b, 8), with the attitudes and standards that characterize it as a whole. It is close, perhaps identical, to the phronema (…”mind-set,” “disposition,” “attitude”) of the flesh in opposition to that of the Spirit in Romans 8:6. As we speak of “the spirit of the times” or “the spirit” that controls a culture, so here Paul speaks in effect, sweepingly, of “the spirit of this world-age.” This serves to point up, once again, the inability of sinful humanity, the constitutional incompetence of sinners in themselves to attain to a true knowledge of God, and so the absolute necessity of the revelation through the Spirit in view.”

-Richard B. Gaffin Jr. in Revelation and Reason, K. Scott Oliphint and Lane G. Tipton, eds., (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2007), p.26.

3 Poverty and/or physical disfigurement was thought by some Jewish theologians to be punishment for one’s sins before the spirit was given a body. The point is that the rich man likely ignored the plight of Lazarus because he thought that he was righteous and Lazarus wasn’t. Elsewhere, Jesus contradicts this notion and instead taught that a.) evil is allowed to happen to men because of man’s general sinfulness, and b.) evil also occurs for God’s providential purpose (see John 9:1-5; cf. Exodus 4:11 and also Isaiah 46:8-11). However, I should also note that b.) is only made possible because of a.) (Lamentations 3:31-41). God forces no one to sin, and neither does he tempt anyone (James 1:13-15).

4 I should note that the Pharisees said that they believed in the Scriptures, but many of their belief traditions directly contradicted them (Matthew 15:1-14).

5 Notice that they were able to determine if Jesus was the Christ simply from examining the Old Testament texts. It does not say, “…for they received the word with great eagerness, having become like Sherlock Holmes and Watson, traveling to Judea and cross-examining every alleged eye-witness to the Resurrection to see whether these things were so.” The Scriptures were a greater witness to the resurrection than actually going to the place where the events happened and asking around! [Of course, as I will note below, doing evidential work does have its place.]

6 This would lead one to question whether Jesus was and is actually the Messiah to begin with if the proper view of sinful man was not first taken into account (Romans 1:18-32; also see 9:1-24 and 11:1-10).

7 Archibald Thomas Robertson, Word Pictures in the New Testament (Nashville: Broadman, 1931) IV:491.

8 William Lane Craig, Time and Eternity: Exploring God’s Relationship to Time (Crossway: Wheaton, IL, 2001), p.11.

9 That is, without a supernatural act of God’s Spirit. As we will see in Acts 17, reminding unbelievers of the truth they suppress, i.e. bringing them to a conviction of their own sin, is the means by which God uses to bring men to repentance.

The Knowledge of God, The Wisdom of God, Part A

The Knowledge of God

The Wisdom of God

1 Corinthians 1:18-2:16, “The Wisdom of the Wise”

From The Princess Bride:

Vizzini: Let me put it this way: have you ever heard of Plato? Aristotle? Socrates?

Westley: Yes.

Vizzini: Morons.

Introduction

From Romans 1, we learned that post-lapsarian¹ man’s mind became darkened and futile in thought. As a result, man took his intimate knowledge of the truth of God and exchanged it for a lie. These lies took the form of false worldviews, and as punishment, God gave them over to their own imaginations which led to degrading worship and self-destructive lifestyles.

In 1 Corinthians 1-2, Paul discusses the wisdom of the post-lapsarian man vs. the eschatological wisdom of God. This is an extremely important text for the Christian doctrine of epistemology as it discusses why sinful man rejects the truth of Christianity and finds it to be ‘foolish’. This is the last section on epistemology which will finally allow us to move on to the application of our worldview in apologetics and evangelism.

1 Corinthians 1:18-2:16, “The Wisdom of the Wise”

Context

Paul wrote his letter to the Corinthian church to correct a few disturbing conditions there. There were factions splitting the church; there was gross immorality; Corinthian believers were suing each other; there was abuse of the Lord’s Supper; and there was false teaching concerning the resurrection, just to name a few. There was also the fact that Corinth was a center of Greek cultural and philosophical thought, called Hellenism. As such, this worldview might have been influencing the Corinthian believers to rely on autonomous philosophical reasoning² to acquire truth rather than starting with the truths of Scripture. This prompted Paul to discuss what the unbelieving world considers ‘wisdom’ vs. the wisdom of God in the gospel (v.17). It was this issue that Paul was dealing with in chapters 1 and 2.

Exegesis

Verse 1:18

“For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” (1 Corinthians 1:18)

Paul gives a summary of the topic he is about to discuss. To those “who are perishing” (i.e., unbelievers) the gospel message sounds silly, irrational, absolutely incredible, and mythic. It was that way back then, and it is that way now. Unbelievers find the gospel story to be absolutely incredible and deem it to be ‘myth’. In contrast, those who have had their eyes opened by the Holy Spirit know that the salvation given by God is true and have fixed their hope on a later day.

Verses 1:19-21

“For it is written, “I WILL DESTROY THE WISDOM OF THE WISE, AND THE CLEVERNESS OF THE CLEVER I WILL SET ASIDE.” Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well-pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe.” (1 Corinthians 1:19-21)

The quoted Old Testament text is from Isaiah where the ‘wise’ men of Judah where advising the king to make an alliance with Egypt when threatened with an invasion by the Assyrians. They had no faith that God would deliver them from such a threat. In the end, Egypt was of no use, and God miraculously delivered Judah from the hand of the Assyrian army after all of Jerusalem repented (Isaiah 37:14-38). The ‘wisdom’ of the wisest men of Judah was folly.

Here, Paul was likely using this verse in reference to all unbelievers who call themselves ‘wise’ in general and Greek philosophers in specific. In fact, the words in the Greek used for ‘wisdom’ and ‘wise’ are the words referring to philosophic wisdom and philosophers. Thus, the verse could be made to say, “I will destroy the philosophy of the philosopher…”³

• “What then? If some did not believe, their unbelief will not nullify the faithfulness of God, will it? May it never be! Rather, let God be found true, though every man be found a liar, as it is written, ‘THAT YOU MAY BE JUSTIFIED IN YOUR WORDS, AND PREVAIL WHEN YOU ARE JUDGED.’” (Romans 3:3-4)

• “To me, the very least of all saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unfathomable riches of Christ, and to bring to light what is the administration of the mystery which for ages has been hidden in God who created all things; so that the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places.” (Ephesians 3:8-10)

• “For I want you to know how great a struggle I have on your behalf and for those who are at Laodicea, and for all those who have not personally seen my face, that their hearts may be encouraged, having been knit together in love, and attaining to all the wealth that comes from the full assurance of understanding, resulting in a true knowledge of God's mystery, that is, Christ Himself, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.” (Colossians 2:1-3)

• “See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ.” (Colossians 2:8)

As we saw in Romans 1, because of their sinful nature, unbelieving man invented philosophies and religions that suppressed the intimate knowledge of God which he possessed. Because of this enslavement of the mind, the smartest unbelieving man, through the use of all of his intellectual faculties, never came up with God as the answer.⁴

Though man’s mind was once darkened and came up with worldviews contrary to Scripture, God, by His providential plan, has overturned their worldviews by raising Christ from the dead:

“Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all people everywhere should repent, because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising Him from the dead.” (Acts 17:30-31)

Verses 1:22-25

“For indeed Jews ask for signs and Greeks search for wisdom; but we preach Christ crucified, to Jews a stumbling block and to Gentiles foolishness, but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.” (1 Corinthians 1:22-25)

The Jewish opposition to Jesus wanted Christ to show them a sign from heaven to confirm that He was the Christ. However, they should have known that He was the Messiah by seeing that he fulfilled the prophetic witness:

• “The Pharisees and Sadducees came up, and testing Jesus, they asked Him to show them a sign from heaven. But He replied to them, “When it is evening, you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red.’ And in the morning, ‘There will be a storm today, for the sky is red and threatening.’ Do you know how to discern the appearance of the sky, but cannot discern the signs of the times? An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign; and a sign will not be given it, except the sign of Jonah.” And He left them and went away.” (Matthew 16:1-4)

• “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me; and you are unwilling to come to Me so that you may have life. I do not receive glory from men; but I know you, that you do not have the love of God in yourselves. I have come in My Father's name, and you do not receive Me; if another comes in his own name, you will receive him. How can you believe, when you receive glory from one another and you do not seek the glory that is from the one and only God? Do not think that I will accuse you before the Father; the one who accuses you is Moses, in whom you have set your hope. For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me, for he wrote about Me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe My words?” (John 5:39-47)

Of course, Christ never gave them a sign since He knew that man’s darkened mind would dismiss such evidence:

• “But he said, ‘No, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent!’ But he said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead.’ ” (Luke 16:30-31)

• “Therefore take heed, so that the thing spoken of in the Prophets may not come upon you: ‘BEHOLD, YOU SCOFFERS, AND MARVEL, AND PERISH; FOR I AM ACCOMPLISHING A WORK IN YOUR DAYS, A WORK WHICH YOU WILL NEVER BELIEVE, THOUGH SOMEONE SHOULD DESCRIBE IT TO YOU.’ ” (Acts 13:40-41)

The Jews dismissed Christ because He didn’t fit their view of what the Messiah should have been, and the Greeks dismissed Christ because a bodily resurrection from the dead was ‘irrational’ to them. However, God’s wisdom in the gospel is eschatological: its unveiling awaits the end times. Though there are many intelligent unbelievers who dismiss the Christian faith as foolish, God will show their ‘wisdom’ to be idiocy on the Last Day.

Verses 1:26-31

“For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble; but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are, so that no man may boast before God. But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption, so that, just as it is written, ‘LET HIM WHO BOASTS, BOAST IN THE LORD.’” (1 Corinthians 1:26-31)

For the most part, it was the meek and lowly that accepted Christ, not the powerful and wealthy. It was the simple that believed, not the wise:

• “At that time Jesus said, ‘I praise You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and intelligent and have revealed them to infants. Yes, Father, for this way was well-pleasing in Your sight. All things have been handed over to Me by My Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father; nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son wills to reveal Him. Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.’” (Matthew 11:25-30)

• “Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you thinks that he is wise in this age, he must become foolish, so that he may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness before God. For it is written, ‘He is THE ONE WHO CATCHES THE WISE IN THEIR CRAFTINESS’; and again, ‘THE LORD KNOWS THE REASONINGS of the wise, THAT THEY ARE USELESS.’” (1 Corinthians 3:18-20)

• “Listen, my beloved brethren: did not God choose the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him?” (James 2:5)

This was so that no one could claim that they accepted Christ because they thought that the gospel was ‘rational’ according to their own autonomous ‘wisdom’. The Christian’s salvation shall come from God alone.

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1 i.e. After the fall of man into sin.

2 i.e. An epistemology that starts with man and what he considers ‘rational’, ‘reasonable’, and ‘logical’. It makes human categories ultimate rather than revealed categories given by God.

3 I should note, here, that I and, more importantly, the Scriptures do not condemn intellectual study or philosophy. In fact, I study philosophy quite a bit. However, what Scripture does condemn is autonomous philosophy, a philosophy which begins with man as the starting point of predication instead of Scripture.

4 This places obvious limits on the usefulness of natural theology, the attempt to use general revelation to come up with the existence, attributes, and laws of God apart from special revelation.

The Knowledge of God, The Irrationality of Sin: Romans 1

The Knowledge of God

The Irrationality of Sin

Romans 1:18-32, “The Exchange”

Introduction

Having studied the fall of man into sin, we go further into the effects of sin on the mind of man. From Genesis 3, we had hints that sin affected man’s wisdom, and in Romans 1, Paul gives us a theology concerning the status and thought processes of man’s mind. This moves us directly into our study of epistemology which will consist of the next two lessons.

Romans 1:18-32, “The Exchange”

Context

Paul wrote to the Romans for a number of reasons. First, he was preparing them for his visit to Rome (1:13). Second, the Roman church had never received the direct teaching of an apostle before since it was founded by those evangelized by the apostles, and because of this, they needed to be taught the gospel in its fullness from one with Divine inspiration (1:15). Third, he explained the relationship between Jew and Gentile and how that relates to the constraints of the Mosaic laws (1:16).

Paul begins with one of his normal salutations, “Paul, a bond-servant of Christ Jesus…,” and then recites what is likely an ancient Christian creed:

“…the gospel of God…concerning His Son, who was born of a descendant of David according to the flesh, who was declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead, according to the Spirit of holiness, Jesus Christ our Lord,” (Romans 1:1, 3-4)

One can see the parallelism between v.3 and v.4:

“who was born” “who was declared”

“a descendant of David” “the Son of God”

“according to the flesh” “according to the Spirit of holiness”,

“by the resurrection from the dead”

The point of this creed is that the Messiah, the son of David according to human nature, has come as a lowly and humble servant (Philippians 2:6-11, Hebrews 2:9), and because of His righteousness (Acts 2:24-36), he was raised from the dead in a glorified state and declared with power to be what He was from eternity¹, the Son of God. This creed expresses the basis of the gospel, the triumph over death and sin, the fulfillment of righteousness, the uniting of a new humanity, and the inauguration of a new age.²

Paul proceeds with the implications of Christ’s resurrection: the gospel, “the power of God for salvation”, is to be preached in all the earth and to all men, whether Jew or Gentile, Greek or Barbarian (v.16). Then, Paul writes a verse with a very important phrase in his writings:

“For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, ‘BUT THE RIGHTEOUS man SHALL LIVE BY FAITH.’ ” (Romans 1:17)

Without going into the centuries-long debate on the meaning of the phrase “the righteousness of God”, it shall suffice to say that, when all the uses of the phrase in the Bible are taken into account, it becomes clear that “the righteousness of God” is the righteousness that comes from God to man because of God’s nature as righteous.³ This, then, begins our section to be studied, the righteous wrath that comes from God against unbelief.

Exegesis

Verse 18

“For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,” (Romans 1:18)

God’s wrath, i.e. the righteousness or justice which comes to sinful man from God, is universal, evident and for all to see (“revealed from heaven”), and is upon those who, because of their sinfulness, deny what they know to be true:

• “The fool has said in his heart, ‘There is no God.’ They are corrupt, they have committed abominable deeds; there is no one who does good. The LORD has looked down from heaven upon the sons of men to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God. They have all turned aside, together they have become corrupt; there is no one who does good, not even one.” (Psalm 14:1-3)⁴

• “This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil.” (John 3:19)

• “And although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds…” (Colossians 1:21)

• “But the one who hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes.” (1 John 2:11)

• (John 15:18-19, Romans 8:5-9, 2 Timothy 3:2-7, etc.)

The means of this suppression will be explained by Paul starting in verse 23.

Verses 19-20

“…because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.” (Romans 1:19-20)

The truth mentioned in v.18 that men suppress in wickedness is the truth about God. This would include all of the divine perfections such as God’s omnipotence, eternality, creatorship, omnipresence, holiness, and even His righteous law (v.32). We should note, here, that this truth is within them and clearly evident to them because it is given by God. This knowledge is not the result of a long chain of philosophical argumentation, empirical testing, or mystical experience.⁵ Rather, this knowledge is immediate, being built into man as God’s image bearer living within God’s creation⁶, and as such, it is not just abstract knowledge but relational and personal knowledge of God.⁷ Being universal and of such a magnitude, this knowledge of God is such that no man can escape God’s judgment by claiming ignorance:

• “The heavens are telling of the glory of God; and their expanse is declaring the work of His hands. Day to day pours forth speech, and night to night reveals knowledge.” (Psalm 19:1-2)⁸

• “In the generations gone by He permitted all the nations to go their own ways; and yet He did not leave Himself without witness, in that He did good and gave you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness.” (Acts 14:16-17)

Verses 21-22

“For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools…” (Romans 1:21-22)

Instead of reacting to this knowledge of God by honoring Him as He deserves, they pretended their own autonomy and invented worldviews which deny this knowledge of God. In order to invent their own worldviews, they had to deny the obvious, that which they personally knew to be true. Instead of repenting, they went into folly and insanity:

• “This is an evil in all that is done under the sun, that there is one fate for all men. Furthermore, the hearts of the sons of men are full of evil and insanity is in their hearts throughout their lives. Afterwards they go to the dead.” (Ecclesiastes 9:3)

• “Jesus answered them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin.’” (John 8:34)

• “So this I say, and affirm together with the Lord, that you walk no longer just as the Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart; and they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness.” (Ephesians 4:17-19)

• “And although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds, yet He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach…” (Colossians 1:21-22)

• “For we also once were foolish ourselves, disobedient, deceived, enslaved to various lusts and pleasures, spending our life in malice and envy, hateful, hating one another.” (Titus 3:3)

• “And I heard the altar saying, ‘Yes, O Lord God, the Almighty, true and righteous are Your judgments.’ The fourth angel poured out his bowl upon the sun, and it was given to it to scorch men with fire. Men were scorched with fierce heat; and they blasphemed the name of God who has the power over these plagues, and they did not repent so as to give Him glory. Then the fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and his kingdom became darkened; and they gnawed their tongues because of pain, and they blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores; and they did not repent of their deeds.” (Revelation 16:7-11)

As G.C. Berkouwer once said:

“For the riddle of sin is the same as the essence of sin, with its anti-normative character and illegality. It is the same as the senselessness of sin. Therefore, since every “unriddling” of sin implies a discovery of “sense” where no sense can possibly be found, the very notion of an “unriddling” is impossible. One cannot find sense in the senseless and meaning in the meaningless.”⁹

Verse 23

“…and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures.” (Romans 1:23)

Here, Paul elaborates on the means of the suppression, what he calls the ‘exchange’. Sinful humanity began to worship themselves and the very lowly creatures that God had created to be ruled over by man. By the list that Paul makes, he is probably making reference to the deities of the Egyptians who worshipped birds, frogs, snakes, lizards, and even the common household fly. Hinduism has gone far beyond degenerating to the point of worshipping human dung. Man exchanged the obvious and always present truth of the immutable God for that which he felt comfortable worshipping, the temporal creation. As Cornelius Van Til said, “In their gods the Greeks indirectly worshipped themselves.”¹⁰

Verses 24-25

“Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.” (Romans 1:24-25)

As a result of their ‘exchange’ God’s wrath mentioned in verse 18 came upon sinful man by giving them over to their darkened minds and allowing their futile imaginations to run amok. Therefore, they deceived themselves and worshipped everything they could think of that wasn’t God:

• “In the generations gone by He permitted all the nations to go their own ways; and yet He did not leave Himself without witness, in that He did good and gave you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness.” (Acts 14:16-17)

• “For this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness.” (2 Thessalonians 2:11-12)

• “For God has put it in their hearts to execute His purpose by having a common purpose, and by giving their kingdom to the beast, until the words of God will be fulfilled.” (Revelation 17:17; cf. Rev. 20:10)

Verses 26-28

“For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error. And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper,” (Romans 1:26-28)

Because of their suppression of the truth about God by means of the ‘exchange’, God brought His wrath upon them by further giving them over to self-destructive lifestyles.

• “For this reason they could not believe, for Isaiah said again, ‘HE HAS BLINDED THEIR EYES AND HE HARDENED THEIR HEART, SO THAT THEY WOULD NOT SEE WITH THEIR EYES AND PERCEIVE WITH THEIR HEART, AND BE CONVERTED AND I HEAL THEM.’” (John 12:39-40; cf. Romans 11:7-10)

• “What then? What Israel is seeking, it has not obtained, but those who were chosen obtained it, and the rest were hardened; just as it is written, ‘GOD GAVE THEM A SPIRIT OF STUPOR, EYES TO SEE NOT AND EARS TO HEAR NOT, DOWN TO THIS VERY DAY.’ And David says, ‘LET THEIR TABLE BECOME A SNARE AND A TRAP, AND A STUMBLING BLOCK AND A RETRIBUTION TO THEM. LET THEIR EYES BE DARKENED TO SEE NOT, AND BEND THEIR BACKS FOREVER.’” (Romans 11:7-10)

• “To the pure, all things are pure; but to those who are defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure, but both their mind and their conscience are defiled. They profess to know God, but by their deeds they deny Him, being detestable and disobedient and worthless for any good deed.” (Titus 1:15-16)

To compound this problem, God gave them over to the devil and his angels who enslaved their minds so that they would stay in bondage to their own grievous errors:

• “Those beside the road are those who have heard; then the devil comes and takes away the word from their heart, so that they will not believe and be saved.” (Luke 8:12)

• “You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies.” (John 8:44)

• “But get up and stand on your feet; for this purpose I have appeared to you…to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the dominion of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who have been sanctified by faith in Me.” (Acts 26:16, 18)

• “And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.” (2 Corinthians 4:3-4)

• “And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.” (Ephesians 2:1-3)

• “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.” (Ephesians 6:12)

• “The Lord's bond-servant must not be quarrelsome, but be kind to all, able to teach, patient when wronged, with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, having been held captive by him to do his will.” (2 Timothy 2:24-26)

• “We know that we are of God, and that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one.” (1 John 5:19)

• “And the great dragon was thrown down, the serpent of old who is called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.” (Revelation 12:9)

Verses 29-32

“…being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful; and although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them.” (Romans 1:29-32)

In spite of their full knowledge of God and His universal law, man deceived himself by thinking that he possessed moral autonomy. The gentiles had the “work of the law written on their hearts, their consciences bearing witness and their thoughts alternatively accusing or else defending them” (Romans 2:15). However, because they suppressed the truth, they never came to know God or his laws:

• “He declares His words to Jacob, His statutes and His ordinances to Israel. He has not dealt thus with any nation; And as for His ordinances, they have not known them. Praise the LORD!” (Psalm 147:19-20)

• “Gather yourselves and come; draw near together, you fugitives of the nations; they have no knowledge, who carry about their wooden idol and pray to a god who cannot save.” (Isaiah 45:20)

• “You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews.” (John 4:22)

• “For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well-pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe.” (1 Corinthians 1:21)

Conclusion

All men know deeply and personally that the God of Scripture exists, that He is their Creator and Lord, and that He is owed and demands obedience from them. However, man, in his sinful nature, suppresses this truth and exchanges it for a lie. As Scott Oliphint notes:

“We should remember here that our idolatry stems not from ignorance, not from a futile attempt to fill a void in our lives. It results always from a perversion of the truth, a twisting of reality. It stems from denying the way things are and attempting to create a world of our own making. It is idolatry, therefore, that lies at the root of our sin, and thus at the root of our irrationality.”¹¹

This means, first, that no man can claim that they do not know God. As made in the image of God, man is a God-knower, and thus, no one operates in a religious vacuum. No one is neutral in their belief and attitude toward God (Matthew 12:30). Secondly, however, man will always take any information given to him that shows the truth of God and twist it according to his worldview into a lie. Apart from God’s grace, man will always avoid the truth of God by exchanging it for a lie. Thus, as will be shown in our study of Acts 17, it is the job of the Christian to point out to the unbeliever what he already knows and let God do a work in his heart to bring him to repentance.

[All Scripture quotes are from the NASB, emphasis mine.]

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1 To quote 1 Corinthians 2:8: “…the wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood; for if they had understood it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory;”

2 This is called “inaugurated eschatology”, meaning that something has begun now and will be finished at a later time. The kingdom of God is here now (Matthew 12:28), but it is still yet to come (Acts 1:6-8).

3 It is because His righteousness is universal over all humanity that the gospel is now preached to all of humanity.

4 The reason given by the psalmist for men’s disbelief is not lack of evidence but the desire for wickedness. The root of unbelief is moral, not epistemological. This is why so many unbelievers throughout the ages, when looked at closely, went into unbelief after they fell into major sin. They wanted to justify their already existing behavior by denying what they had previously believed. Just as with Adam and Eve, they would rather make appeal to something else than take responsibility for their own actions.

5 “The truth that we know-that we retain, possess, and suppress-therefore, is truth that is, fundamentally and essentially, given by God to us. God is the one who ensures that this truth will get through to us. It is his action, not ours, that guarantees our possession of this truth.” –K. Scott Oliphint in Revelation and Reason, K. Scott Oliphint and Lane G. Tipton, eds., (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2007), p.66.

6 This is similar to God setting eternity into the hearts of men (Ecclesiastes 3:11) and writing the work of the Law in their hearts (Romans 2:14-15).

7 As such, what Paul is speaking about in v.21 is not the capacity for this knowledge, but rather, this knowledge is possessed immediately, being given by God.

8 This verse has often been used to promote the idea that a Christian can simply appeal to general revelation as a means of showing that God exists to a skeptic. However, as Paul points out in Romans 1, men suppress this truth by exchanging it for a lie. A pagan in David’s time would have looked at the same stars and said that the heavenly bodies were gods! It was only under the presupposition of Biblical theism that David could say that the luminaries declared God’s glory since they were His creations. While general revelation is enough to hold man accountable for judgment, because of man’s wicked nature and the suppression of truth which results from it, man can never come to the knowledge of God without special revelation.

9 G.C. Berkouwer, Sin, Studies in Dogmatics, trans. Philip C. Holtrop (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1971), p.134.

10 Cornelius Van Til, Christianity in Conflict, A Syllabus, I (Philadelphia: 1962), p.83.

11 K. Scott Oliphint in Revelation and Reason, K. Scott Oliphint and Lane G. Tipton, eds., (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2007), p.69.

The Knowledge of God, Creation and Man, Part D

Christ: The Assault and Triumph Over the Continuity of Being

After the ‘re-creation’ of the earth through the Flood and the subsequent fall of man back into sin at Babel, it was apparent that an outward renewal of mankind through wrath would be ineffective to bring humanity back into full communion with God.¹ Man’s very nature was hostile toward God, and no amount of outward conformity could change that. Man’s inward nature would have to be renewed as well.²

As time moved on, the promised ‘seed’ of Genesis 3:15 which would renew creation to its former state passed from the woman to Seth to Noah, Shem, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and finally to David. After David’s kingly line becomes faithless and fails utterly in being God’s firstborn and chosen leader of His people (Psalm 89:27), Israel is sent off into captivity. Shortly prior to, during, and immediately after the two exiles, God renews His unconditional promise to David that his line would endure forever. In these prophecies, the renewed Davidic kingdom is always linked with the undoing of sin, the defeat of those forces opposed to God, and the renewal and redemption of humanity and creation. In Christ, this was fulfilled and will be fulfilled.³

The Incarnation of the Son of God

The Continuity of Being viewed everything on a sliding scale of being which one could ascend upward to the divine or downward toward chaos. One could be fully god and no part man, fully man but not divine, 2/3 god and 1/3 man⁴, etc. but never at two points on the scale at the same time. With the Incarnation of the Son of God came the greatest antithesis of the world-system of unbelief. Christ was both fully God and fully man, in one person, with two natures and two wills, all “without confusion”.⁵ The Incarnation of Christ has massive implications:

The Dignity of Man

By God taking on the human nature, God was proclaiming the inherent dignity and glory of the human race:

“For He did not subject to angels the world to come, concerning which we are speaking. But one has testified somewhere, saying, ‘WHAT IS MAN, THAT YOU REMEMBER HIM? OR THE SON OF MAN, THAT YOU ARE CONCERNED ABOUT HIM? YOU HAVE MADE HIM FOR A LITTLE WHILE LOWER THAN THE ANGELS; YOU HAVE CROWNED HIM WITH GLORY AND HONOR, AND HAVE APPOINTED HIM OVER THE WORKS OF YOUR HANDS; YOU HAVE PUT ALL THINGS IN SUBJECTION UNDER HIS FEET.’ For in subjecting all things to him, He left nothing that is not subject to him. But now we do not yet see all things subjected to him.” (Hebrews 2:5-8)⁶

This was in contrast to pagan religions which viewed man as the low end of the chain of being, having no inherent dignity. The modern naturalistic/evolutionary view of man is no different from these mythical worldviews. With Christ, God re-affirmed that man was made in the image of God and given glory and dominion over creation (Genesis 1:26-30, Psalm 8:4-8).

Salvation

In Genesis 28:12-17, we read of Jacob’s vision:

“He had a dream, and behold, a ladder was set on the earth with its top reaching to heaven; and behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. And behold, the LORD stood above it and said, “I am the LORD, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac; the land on which you lie, I will give it to you and to your descendants. Your descendants will also be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south; and in you and in your descendants shall all the families of the earth be blessed. Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, “Surely the LORD is in this place, and I did not know it.” He was afraid and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.”” (Genesis 28:12-17)

The ladder in this vision is not one with rungs on it but a stairway like on a ziggurat. The name of the place, “The Gate of Heaven”, confirms this since the name is similar to those of other ziggurats found throughout the Mesopotamian world. The stairway with angels ascending and descending on it was the path where man could reach God and plead for intercession. It was THE path of salvation and covenant blessing. Thus, we come to Christ’s words in John’s Gospel:

“And He said to him, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see the heavens opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.’” (John 1:51)

Here, Christ, likening Himself to the ziggurat which leads to God, asserts Himself as the way of intercession and THE path by which to reach God. In contrast to the godless men building the ziggurat at Babel who sought to deify themselves, only through Christ can man be brought to God:

• “Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.’” (John 14:6)

• “For there is one God, and one mediator also between God and men, the man Christ Jesus…” (1 Timothy 2:5)

Man cannot ascend to glory his own way nor can he become his own autonomous god. Instead, the path of glorification involves being conformed to the image and likeness of Him who is both God and fully obedient to God as His covenant servant.⁷

True Revelation

With God revealing Himself in human flesh, God was revealing, in person (John 14:7-9), His standard of righteousness:

“This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God.” (John 3:19-21)

Most of mankind doesn’t want an absolute standard of righteousness over them. Instead everyone wants to do “what [is] right in [their] own eyes” (Judges 17:6, 21:25). Now that Christ has come, man shall be held to a greater account for his deeds (John 15:22-24, 2 Peter 2:21).

The Resurrection and Judgment

Because He was both God and a righteous man, the man, Christ Jesus, could not be held in the grave:

“But God raised Him up again, putting an end to the agony of death, since it was impossible for Him to be held in its power.” (Acts 2:24)

Because He was the perfect man, all men would be judged by the standard of His righteous conduct. His resurrection was that sign that the judgment to come is inescapable:

“Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all people everywhere should repent, because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising Him from the dead.” (Acts 17:30-31, also 10:40-42)

The Hatred of the Real Christ

Christ was the most powerful denial of the Continuity of Being, and herein lies the reason for the natural man’s hatred of the Incarnation. It is, at the same time, the impenetrable wall blocking man’s attempt at godhood as well as the rejection of the belief that man is of no higher importance than the animals. In essence, it is the denial that man, in his life-style, beliefs, and thought-processes, is autonomous. This is why all the unbelievers of this generation want to recreate Christ in their own image, to snatch the rule over their lives away from Him and take it for themselves. In the end, however, their imagination will give way to reality:

“Why are the nations in an uproar and the peoples devising a vain thing? The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers take counsel together against the LORD and against His Anointed, saying, “Let us tear their fetters apart and cast away their cords from us!” He who sits in the heavens laughs, the Lord scoffs at them. Then He will speak to them in His anger and terrify them in His fury, saying, “But as for Me, I have installed My King upon Zion, My holy mountain. I will surely tell of the decree of the LORD: He said to Me, ‘You are My Son, today I have begotten You. Ask of Me, and I will surely give the nations as Your inheritance, and the very ends of the earth as Your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron, You shall shatter them like earthenware.’ ” Now therefore, O kings, show discernment; take warning, O judges of the earth. Worship the LORD with reverence and rejoice with trembling. Do homage to the Son, that He not become angry, and you perish in the way, for His wrath may soon be kindled. How blessed are all who take refuge in Him!” (Psalm 2)

The Church Age

With the coming of Christ came the beginning of the end (Matthew 3:2, 1 Peter 4:7). The Church age is the reversal of primeval history and, as a result, the reversal of sin and the curse. It is the antithesis:

• Christ’s perfect life was the reversal of Adam’s disobedience (Matthew 4:1-11, Romans 5:12-21, Hebrews 4:15).

• Christ’s death was the substitutionary punishment for all of our spiritual and physical sins including our sin in Adam⁸ (Romans 5:12-21, 6:3).

• The Resurrection of Christ was the reversal of physical death (1 Corinthians 15:21, 54).

• Pentecost was the reversal of the confusion of tongues at Babel (Acts 2:1-12).

• The ingathering of the Church from all tribes, tongues, peoples, and nations was and is the reversal of the scattering of the nations after Babel (Revelation 5:9).

• The gathering of all the nations under one head submissive to God’s will, Christ, is in contrast to the same action done by those against God’s will, Nimrod, the primeval antichrist, and the future antichrist.

• The last three chapters of Revelation are almost a mirror image of the first three chapters of Genesis.

In fact, the whole of history centers around Christ, the very revelation of God in the flesh, and it has been what men have done with this knowledge of God (or lack of it) that has shaped history.

Conclusion: The Knowledge of God

The knowledge of God shall be the basis of divine judgment on the last day:

• “This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.” (John 17:3)

• “For after all it is only just for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you, and to give relief to you who are afflicted and to us as well when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire, dealing out retribution to those who do not know God and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.” (2 Thessalonians 1:6-8)

• “And we know that the Son of God has come, and has given us understanding so that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life.” (1 John 5:20)

What each man does with this knowledge is what separates believers from unbelievers, the Biblical worldview from that of unbelief, and it is to this topic which we will turn to next.

[All Scripture quotes are from the NASB, emphasis mine.]

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1 Of course, God already knew this, but He did those actions to teach us that the way in which He saved us through Christ was necessary and that we might glorify Him more as a result (Romans 9:22-23, esp. Galatians 3:24-26).

2 The command to “circumcise your hearts” (Deuteronomy 10:16) was realized by man to be impossible, and so, God would have to circumcise man’s heart Himself (Deuteronomy 30:6, Isaiah 54:13-14, Jeremiah 31:33-34, Ezekiel 36:25-27).

3 This is called “inaugurated eschatology”, meaning that something has begun now and will be finished at a later time. The kingdom of God is here now (Matthew 12:28), but it is still yet to come (Acts 1:6-8).

4 This was the description given of Gilgamesh in the Gilgamesh Epic tablets found in archaeology digs in Mesopotamia.

5 The quote comes from the Definition of Chalcedon, a ‘creed’ that confessed the orthodox doctrine of Christ. All the Christological heresies of the early church were a return to the “sliding scale” concept of the Continuity of Being. The Gnostic Jesus was without a human nature and taught that man can be saved by ascending into the Fullness of Being through esoteric knowledge. The Arian Christ wasn’t of the same being as the Father who was seen as too transcendent to be in the world, and thus, reconciliation was through a hierarchy of beings. The Nestorian Christ was comprised of two “persons” in the one man, and thus, the death of Christ was seen as the death of the human person, not the divine, which limited propitiatory power of the atonement. It was no wonder that Nestorius himself was a friend of the Pelagians who believed that man was to save himself solely through his good works. In the Apollinarian Christ, the divine nature overtook and destroyed the human. With this Christology, how could Christ atone for humanity’s sins? The Monophysite Christ was similar in that Christ only had one nature, the divine. The Monothelite Christ had only one will, the divine, and with this Christology, how could Christ relate to our infirmities as our perfect High Priest (Hebrews 4:15-5:10)?

6 In context, the author of Hebrews applies this Old Testament quotation to Christ (since He is the perfect Adam, the one who had dominion over creation) even though Psalm 8:4-8 was originally applied to mankind in general. Christ was and is as mankind should have been.

7 Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy are a combination of Christianity and pagan religious/philosophical thought and, as a result, represent a return to the Continuity of Being. Their belief in added mediators of priests, saints, angels, and Mary between man and Jesus brings back the chain of being concept. Their veneration of images and icons re-divinize the material world and end up confounding the Creator and the created-order (though they still profess analogy). Their sacramentalism is a soteriological system in which man’s progress toward the Divine is partly dependent upon his own actions.

8 I am here referring to the concept of ‘Federal Headship’, a concept common in the ancient world in which those tied to a leader could be punished or rewarded based on the actions of that leader. For example, the punishment for the evil deeds of a man could also be dealt out on his family or tribe (Joshua 7:16-26, 2 Samuel 12:9-10, 14, Matthew 27:24-25). An entire nation could be punished for the wrong actions of its king (1 Chronicles 21:1-3, 7). Often times, we feel that this is unjust, but this feeling comes from our Western individualistic mindset that has been influenced by Greek culture and philosophy. Here, the guilt and punishment for Adam’s sin is imputed to us because, as the progenitor of the whole human race, he is our federal head (Romans 5:12, Psalm 51:5). To reverse this, Christ is made the federal head to all who believe resulting in the imputation of our sins to Christ and His righteousness to us (Romans 5:16-19).

The Knowledge of God, Creation and Man, Part C

Genesis 4-10: The Intent of the Heart of Man

In the years after the exile, the woman gives birth to two children, Cain and Abel (4:1-2), but whereas Adam was originally made in the image of God, now, Adam’s progeny would be made in his fallen image (Genesis 5:3). Out of envy, Cain leads his brother, Abel, out into the field and murders him, revealing the callousness of the new human nature¹ (4:3-16). This callousness would continue in Lamech who began to treat women like chattel, initiating the practice of polygamy (4:19), and boasting over his slaying of another man (4:23-24). With Cain and Lamech’s protection from death, man felt invincible from the power of justice, above the law, and thought that his plans could go on unhindered. Instead of God decreeing the course of history, man would be autonomous to decide his own fate.

In slain Abel’s place, Eve gives birth to a new ‘seed’, Seth (4:25), starting the godly line of the woman promised in 3:15 that would eventually lead to the end of sin and the renewal of creation. Instead, of the self-reliance and self-centeredness of Cain’s line, Seth calls “upon the name of the Lord” (4:26), bringing out the antithesis.

However, this state of the separation of the godly and the ungodly would not last too long. Men and women from the line of Seth started to intermarry with those of the line of Cain resulting in moral compromise, blurring the antithesis (Genesis 6:1-4). Looking upon the earth, God saw that man’s heart was filled with evil²:

“Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” (Genesis 6:5)

God then decides to wipe the current, out-of-control civilization from the face of the earth and start again with one family (6:8-22), the family of Noah, a descendant of the godly Sethite line (5:29).³

God brings a flood upon the whole earth⁴, destroying mankind and leaving only Noah, his three sons and their wives (Genesis 7-8). Afterward, God assigns a meaning to the rainbow as a covenant sign to Noah that He will not wipe out the earth again and renews the creation mandate with Noah and his sons (9:1-19). However, the evil now inherent in man’s heart did not take long to reveal itself. For, the arrogance against God that was characteristic of the ante-diluvian⁵ civilization reared its ugly head again at Babel.

Genesis 11:1-9: The Beginnings of the Continuity of Being⁶

Whereas Genesis 10 names the progenitors of all the nations, chapter 11 describes how they scattered and became separate. With the new humanity banding together after the cataclysmic event of the Flood, they travel away from the ark eastward to the land of Shinar (Genesis 11:1-2). It was there that the same desire that motivated the woman to take the fruit arose in the hearts of men, the desire to be like God:

“They said to one another, ‘Come, let us make bricks and burn them thoroughly.’ And they used brick for stone, and they used tar for mortar. They said, ‘Come, let us build for ourselves a city, and a tower whose top will [be dedicated unto⁷] heaven, and let us make for ourselves a name, otherwise we will be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.’” (Genesis 11:3-4)

Instead of fulfilling the creation mandate to fill the whole earth (Genesis 9:1), they rebel against God’s law, asserting themselves as their own law, and settle in one place. No longer would they take God’s law as the standard by which they must live. Now they would be autonomous, and with their own self-law, they asserted their own self-religion in which they would worship the creation rather than the Creator.

Gathering upon the plain of Shinar, they and their leader, Nimrod (Genesis 10:8-12)⁸, founded the city of Babylon. There, he and his followers took counsel against their Creator and decided to worship gods made in their own image, probably Nimrod himself.⁹ Building a great ziggurat that would be dedicated to the worship of themselves in the form of the heavenly bodies, they would claim the right to ascent to the divine order¹⁰:

“This sacred mountain or tower is the meeting-place of heaven and earth, where communication is established between heaven, earth, and hell. It “is situated at the center of the world. Every temple, or palace-and, by extension, every sacred city or royal residence-is a Sacred Mountain, thus becoming a Center.” True social order requires peace and communication with both chaos and deity, and society either moves downward into chaos or forward into deification. The significance of the Tower of Babel is thus apparent: it denied the discontinuity of God’s being and asserted man’s claim to a continuity of being with God and heaven. The Tower was the gate to God and the gate of God, signifying that man’s social order made possible an ascent of being into the divine order.”¹¹

Believing in their ability to become gods, they asserted the Continuity of Being.¹² All non-Theistic worldviews reduce to this belief, and it is the very antithesis of the Biblical worldview which views God as “wholly other” from the created order.¹³ This is why Babylon, the origin place, or “mother”, of idolatry, would later become the symbol of the opposition to God and His people (Revelation 17:5).

“The LORD came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built. The LORD said, ‘Behold, they are one people, and they all have the same language. And this is what they began to do, and now nothing which they purpose to do will be impossible for them.’” (Genesis 11:5-6)

With a united humanity with one language and centered in one place asserting the Continuity of Being, the true worship of God would be permanently hindered and destroyed.

“‘Come, let Us go down and there confuse their language, so that they will not understand one another's speech.’ So the LORD scattered them abroad from there over the face of the whole earth; and they stopped building the city. Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the LORD confused the language of the whole earth; and from there the LORD scattered them abroad over the face of the whole earth.” (Genesis 11:7-9)

God thwarted their godless plan and scattered the nations across the face of the earth by splitting them into language groups. Paganism would be wide-spread¹⁴, but it would not have monolithic power controlling the beliefs and practices of all of humanity. Instead of it becoming “Gateway to a god”, it would be nicknamed Babel, “confusion”, a semantic play off of ‘Babylon’.¹⁵

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1 Cain, by his actions, showed that he was indeed one of the ‘seed’ of the serpent, being a murderer (Matthew 23:32-35, John 8:44).

2 The primeval history section of Genesis, while speaking of God’s holiness and justice, also emphasizes His mercy. He is slow to anger in judging men’s sins waiting only until the situation becomes boiling over until He brings His just wrath upon man. Genesis makes it clear that man is to fault for all of the world’s evil, not God.

3 The Lamech found here is the ninth generation from Adam in the line of Seth, and the Lamech found in Genesis 4:18-24 is the seventh generation from Adam in the line of Cain. Although the genealogies in Genesis 4 and 5 are similar (which might be due to copyist errors or some other factor), there are differences in names as well. It is likely that the two Lamechs are two different Lamechs.

4 The Flood was the undoing of the created order back to its primeval state. Whereas in Genesis 1:9-26, God formed the dry land out of the primeval waters followed shortly by plants, animals, and man, the Flood brought the chaotic waters back over the land destroying plants, animals, and man.

5 i.e. Before the flood.

6 Technically, the beginning of the belief in the Continuity of Being by man started with the woman in the garden. Here, however, I am referring to the post-Flood beginnings of this concept which brought about the wide-spread unbelief present with us to this day.

7 The phrase placed in most English translations starting with the KJV, “will reach”, is not in the Hebrew text. The structure that these men were building was a ziggurat, a building that was part of ancient pagan astral worship. Thus, the phrase should be “dedicated unto”, meaning that they would observe and worship the heavenly bodies as gods from it.

8 Commenting on Genesis 10:9, Keil and Delitzsch state:

“Nimrod was mighty in hunting, and that in opposition to YHWH; not ‘before YHWH’ in the sense of according to the will and purpose of YHWH, still less…in a simply superlative sense…The name itself, ‘Nimrod’ from marad, ‘We will revolt,’ points to some violent resistance to God… Nimrod as a mighty hunter founded a powerful kingdom; and the founding of this kingdom is shown by the verb with consecutive to have been the consequence or result of his strength in hunting, so that hunting was intimately connected with the establishing of the kingdom. Hence, if the expression ‘a mighty hunter’ relates primarily to hunting in the literal sense, we must add to the literal meaning the figurative signification of a ‘hunter of men’ (a trapper of men by stratagem and force); Nimrod the hunter became a tyrant, a powerful hunter of men...“[I]n the face of YHWH” can only mean ‘in defiance of YHWH’ as Josephus and the Targums understand it.”

-Keil, C. F., and Delitzsch, P. Commentary on the Old Testament, vol. 1 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1975), pp.165-166.

9 It is possible that the origin of the mythological chief Babylonian deity, Marduk (a.k.a. Merodach, Bel, and Baal), may have been the Nimrod of history. Marduk, according to Babylonian mythology, was a hunter and the founder of Babylon, and was worshipped at temple-ziggurats similar to Babel across the ancient near-east as either the sun, the moon, or Mercury. Also, the constellation, Orion the Hunter, was dedicated to Marduk, and Hebrew tradition generally identified Orion with Nimrod.

Another possibility is that the myth of the Mesopotamian ‘hero’ (actually a quite vile person), Gilgamesh, who, according to the Gilgamesh Epic tablets, was also a hunter, part deity, and the founder of Erech (see Genesis 10:10), came from the historical Nimrod. Either way, the kings of the various Mesopotamian cities were generally worshipped as astral gods (see Daniel 3:1-7), and this is what Nimrod and his band intended at Babel, “to make a name for” themselves (Genesis 11:4). See here:

http://www.studylight.org/enc/isb/view.cgi?number=T6407

http://www.studylight.org/enc/isb/view.cgi?number=T5966

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/10741a.htm

http://www.inerrancy.org/ (Go to Genesis 10:9)

10 Babylon itself is Akkadian for “gateway to a god”. Other ziggurats in Mesopotamia include:

“House of the Link between Heaven and Earth” (as Larsa)

“House of the Seven Guides of Heaven and Earth” (at Borshippa)

“House of the Mountain of the Universe” (at Asshur)

“House of the Foundation-Platform of Heaven and Earth” (at Babylon)

11 Rousas John Rushdoony, The One and the Many (Thoburn Press: Fairfax, VA., 1978), p.40.

12 The basic aspect of this belief is that everything is made of essentially the same substance and the only differences between man and any gods that may exist are those of degree, not of kind. Starting in the Middle Ages, it would be known as the “chain of being”.

13 i.e. In substance or being. While God is still transcendent over His creation, he is still immanent in it.

14 Starting sometime after the so-called “Enlightenment” and especially after Darwin, humanists came up with the “Evolution of Religion” theory to complement the biological theory of naturalistic evolution. It assumed that since man evolved from primitive creatures of little intelligence, then so his understanding of himself and the cosmos must have as well. According to this theory, man started off with mana/fetishism moving to animism and shamanism, then polytheism, then henotheism, then monotheism, and finally, humanism/modernism/etc. The problem with this model, much to the chagrin of modern evolutionary anthropologists, is that all observed religious changes in cultures have proceeded in the *opposite* direction toward superstition, and in fact, some archaeologists believe that a few Sumerian tablets allude to the fact that, at one time, all of humanity was monotheistic. The Babel event explains why polytheistic paganism became so wide spread in spite of original monotheism.

15 There are other semantic plays on words found in the Bible. For example, Beelzebub (2 Kings 1:2-3, 6), “lord of flies”, is a mockery of Baalzebul, “Prince Baal”.