Articles
 Justice for All
 Church in Decline
 Striking Similarity
 The Efficacy of Prayer
 Are You Ready for Change?
 A Question of Vocation
 The Challenge of Change
 Elul 24
 Elul 23
 Elul 22

Series [All]
 Administration
 Elul 5777 (9)
 Exploring Translation Theories (25)
 Live Like You Give a Damn
 Memory and Identity
 The Creative Word (19)
 The Cross-Cultural Process (7)
 The Old Testament is Dying
 The Oral Gospel Tradition (4)
 We the People (8)

Archive

Monday, 31 October 2016

Israel's Election II

We the People: Israel and the Catholicity of Jesus,
Tommy Givens, Fortress, 2014, page 279

Givens now turns this round the other way. What can Israel remember?

The only basis of Israel's appeal is that it bears G-d's name, that it is remembered as the people of its G-d. Its only hope is its G-d and this hope keeps it from forgetting.

Moshe used exactly that lineof argument during the wilderness journey!

The law's sentence of exile and gentile enmity has shut up all Israel in disobedience, so that Israel's life through and beyond the death of exile is presented exclusively as the unconditional and merciful work of its G-d. No decision or practice of Israel's own constitutes the basis of its life and promise.

We need to understand this well indeed, for it still speaks to our condition today.

This does not mean that no-one observed any of the covenant law in exile, not that G-d's mercy renders Israelite obedience immaterial. It meansthat Israel' condemned condition was not attenuated by such observance and that practices of obedience were a witness to Israel's hope rather than the basis of it.

Posted By Jonathan, 9:00am Comment Comments: 0