Tract 2 — An Absent but “Audible” God
Part 3 of “Let the Text Speak”
Since at least the late 1990s, Fr. Paul Tarazi has argued and demonstrated that the prophetic book of Ezekiel contains within its pages the basic blueprint of the Old Testament’s message. The Biblical God is clearly defined and the essentially countercultural anti-history of the deity and its city is demonstrated as the main narrative thread of its story. This becomes readily apparent in how Ezekiel runs against the grain of the typical trends usual to Ancient Near Eastern literature. The cultural norm at this time was to present the deity as the founder of its city and the patron of the king, who also functioned as the priest. The palace-temple complex was then the abode of the deity and the priest king was the sole mediator between that god and the laity. In the literature about the god and its monarchs, the god would be the main defender of the city and would lead its people into glory and triumph. The territory of the god in question though, would be relegated to that particular city-state. To be outside of the city, would be to be outside of the deity’s domain. The god would also be present, not only in the person of the priest king, but also in the form of an iconic statue. This was not merely a representation. The ancient peoples of the Near East would literally have rituals where they invited the spirit of the deity to reside inside of the statue. The statue, therefore, was the god. This idea of a transcendent reality was totally absent here.
This is where Ezekiel is striking. Contrary to this formula, Ezekiel firstly presents a deity who is addressing his exiled people who are residing in a land that is not Yahweh’s territory, but of the Babylonian gods Bel and Nebo. And Ezekiel makes it clear very early on that this deity has not protected his people nor their city but has helped destroy his own city and people on account of their lack of charity (Ezek. 16). Even more striking is that this deity is first presented not as the Jerusalemite god Yahweh but as Elohim which carries with it a power unable to be expressed in translation. Elohim is the plural of the singular Eloah which itself is related to the Canaanite patron deity El. El was, of course, the father of the gods. In the Canaanite pantheon, the word elohim referred not to a single deity, but to the entire pantheon. The elohim were the collective offspring of El. So what is going on with the word Elohim in the Bible? Simply put, it is a Semitic feature which uses the plural to communicate a superlative function. A similar occurrence is present with the superlative land animal described in Job 40:15–24. This creature is called behemot which is the feminine plural form of the word behemah which simply refers to a land mammal. So it’s not using the plural form to communicate a multiplicity here, but as a way of communicating that this animal is the ultimate animal in terms of size and splendor. It’s used as a rhetorical device to describe the limitless potential of God’s providence. So Elohim as it relates to Ezekiel’s deity is not to be understood as describing a multiplicity, but a superlative. This isn’t just El, a god in the pantheon, this is THE GOD who alone has all of the power and dominion of the elohim in the old Canaanite religion. The interplay between the understanding of Elohim as the ultimate deity in conjunction with the elohim as the gods of Canaan is expressed powerfully in Psalm 82.
God Elohim has taken his place in the divine council; in the midst of the gods elohim he holds judgment: “How long will you judge unjustly and show partiality to the wicked? Selah; Give justice to the weak and the fatherless; maintain the right of the afflicted and the destitute. Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked.” They have neither knowledge nor understanding, they walk about in darkness; all the foundations of the earth are shaken. I said, “You are gods elohim, sons of the Most High, all of you; nevertheless, like men you shall die, and fall like any prince.” Arise, O God Elohim, judge the earth; for you shall inherit all the nations! — Ps. 82:1–8
Another striking feature is that Elohim is presented by Ezekiel as not only being independent of his temple, but absolutely unable to be depicted in statuary. In brilliant literary anti-imagery, Ezekiel describes an impossible sight. His deity is on a chariot where the wheels are spinning in every direction at once while somehow, not moving at all!
As for the appearance of the wheels and their construction: their appearance was like the gleaming of beryl. And the four had the same likeness, their appearance and construction being as it were a wheel within a wheel. When they went, they went in any of their four directions without turning as they went. — Ezek. 1:16–17
Not only is Ezekiel presenting this deity as without a statue and a temple at the moment, he is making it clear that this deity cannot be depicted. How could one depict this impossible sight in any medium other than the written literature? You can’t even imagine it! What is also striking is that instead of being bound by his temple and statue, he is moving as a spirit ruah which is to say, a wind. In other words, he is totally unpredictable and unable to be pinned down by anyone. When Ezekiel “sees” the glory kabod or literally, weightiness of the deity, he does not really see anything but hears his voice.
Such was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the LORD. And when I saw it, I fell on my face, and I heard the voice of one speaking. — Ezek. 1:28b
Thus, as will be made clear, Ezekiel’s God is not to be seen but to be heard. To be heard, there needs to be a writ, katub, and as such he presents Ezekiel with a scroll already written! Ezekiel’s commission, then, is to eat the scroll presented to him by God and deliver its warning to not only Israel, but the surrounding nations as well. Elohim, in his superlative function, is not merely the deity of his city state, as Yahweh is, but as the universal deity of the entire earth. These points also invalidate the role of the priest king in the Ancient Near East who alone was considered the conduit for the god’s intercession for the people. The scroll now takes over that function, and is in fact, over the king as THE authority. This is expressed clearly in the book of Deuteronomy, which expresses this Ezekelian attitude towards the Palace-Temple complex.
And when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself in a book a copy of this law, approved by the Levitical priests. And it shall be with him, and he shall read in it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the LORD his God by keeping all the words of this law and these statutes, and doing them, that his heart may not be lifted up above his brothers, and that he may not turn aside from the commandment, either to the right hand or to the left, so that he may continue long in his kingdom, he and his children, in Israel. — Deut. 17:18–20
Thus there is in this literature an inherent anti king and anti temple stance which is extremely striking to say the least. This harsh admonition of kingship and priesthood is present all throughout the book of Ezekiel and runs as its main narrative thread. This is clear from God’s solution to the dilemma which involves not appointing a king or priest to lead his people, but himself as shepherd along with an appointed human prince (not a king) who will also function as a shepherd of his flock. Where his people have whored themselves to their own beloved dod gods and monarchs, God will appoint his own beloved dawid. Both words are from the Hebrew triliteral DWD which is where we get the name David. The Ezekelian David then, is God’s answer to Israel’s and Judah’s harlotry.
Another important note about Ezekiel’s narrative thread, is its presentation of Israel and Judah as an instructive mashal. This word is multifaceted, but it is presented in Ezekiel as a parable that is using Israel and Judah as examples of iniquity in the past. It functions identically to Psalm 78 quoted earlier in the Bible. In the parable of Ezekiel 16, Jerusalem is the main subject who is presented as God’s unfaithful bride who has not only followed in the harlotry of her two sisters, Samaria and Sodom, but has even shockingly surpassed their wickedness.
Bear your disgrace, you also, for you have intervened on behalf of your sisters. Because of your sins in which you acted more abominably than they, they are more in the right than you. So be ashamed, you also, and bear your disgrace, for you have made your sisters appear righteous. — Ezek. 16:52
Furthermore, besides following other gods and seeking the aid of Egypt and Babylon, the main sin is presented as an unwillingness to show charity to the needy neighbor.
Behold, this was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had pride, excess of food, and prosperous ease, but did not aid the poor and needy. — Ezek. 16: 49
This thread is picked up again in chapter 23 where Samaria and Jerusalem are two sisters named Oholah, and Oholibah respectively. The basic premise is the same. Despite belonging to God, they lusted after other nations and gods and gained reputations as whores. The text is extremely graphic in its depiction of their sexual iniquity, but the message is clear. This mashal, or example, becomes the literary thread of the entire biblical narrative. To put it another way, the biblical story is simply an expansion of Ezekiel 16 and 23. In the middle of these two parables, the Ezekelian God lays out the correct behavior he is looking for, which sums up the entire letter of the Torahic law.
If a man is righteous and does what is just and right — if he does not eat upon the mountains or lift up his eyes to the idols of the house of Israel, does not defile his neighbor’s wife or approach a woman in her time of menstrual impurity, does not oppress anyone, but restores to the debtor his pledge, commits no robbery, gives his bread to the hungry and covers the naked with a garment, does not lend at interest or take any profit, withholds his hand from injustice, executes true justice between man and man, walks in my statutes, and keeps my rules by acting faithfully — he is righteous; he shall surely live, declares the Lord God. — Ezek. 18:5–9
That Ezekiel supplies the basic blueprint for the Torah, and that this is the main positive message of Ezekiel, the Pauline teaching in Galatians now has its necessary context already laid out in the Old Testament.
For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” — Gal. 5:14
The frankly bizarre preoccupation with orthodoxy that modern Christians espouse is simply foreign to scripture, both in the new and old testament. While faith in God is critical, that faith simply means to not only believe what God has said is indeed true but to actually change your behavior according to the teaching. Inspired by the Greco-Roman world of its day, early Christianity was corrupted by the influence of Hellenism which placed its importance on world views and debates about ontology. Thus, by the era of the Ecumenical Councils in the Roman Empire, the underbelly of Christian thought and apologetics became increasingly more rhetorically driven and philosophical. Thus, by the time the Nicene creed was adopted, the Greek word pistevo came to mean “I believe” in the sense of this is my worldview rather than in the sense of the Hebrew word “aman” which is a pledge of allegiance to God’s teaching. To say “amen” is akin to signing a contract. By it, you agree to do the will of the God who speaks through the scriptures and are bound to the punishment administered if you fail to follow through. This can be clearly seen in the gospel of Matthew.
Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. — Matt. 7:21
Greco-Roman Christianity followed another path, unfortunately, and split into innumerable factions and schismatic groups. This actually caused enough political trauma to the Byzantine Empire, that when it was weakened by the war against the Persian Sassanids, it was difficult for them to muster support amongst the Christians of the Syro-Arabian desert due to persecution they suffered under the Byzantines. The main “heretical” Christian groups in this area were the “west Syrian” Syriac Orthodox Church which held to a miaphysite Christology and rejected the Christological formula accepted at the Council of Chalcedon in 451 on the one hand, and the “east Syrian” Assyrian Church of the East which held to Nestorius’ dyophysitism and rejected the earlier council of Ephesus in 431 on the other hand. When the united Arab tribes under the Rashidun Caliphs conquered Western Arabia and Syria, many Syriac Christians considered them to be liberators rather than oppressors. In a 7th century letter written by the Patriarch of the Assyrian Church of the East, Ishoyahbb III wrote:
For these Arabs to whom at this time God has given control over the world, as you know, they are also here with us. Not only are they no enemy to Christianity, but they are even praisers of our faith, honorers of our Lord’s priests, and holy ones, and supporters of churches and monasteries. — Letter to Simeon, Bishop of Rev Ardashir
That the Quran is not only aware of, but is in fact responding to this dire situation of the Christian faith, is clear when it warns the Muslims not to break into various sects as the Christians have done.
Those who have divided their doctrine and become sects: thou art not of them in anything; their affair is but with God; then will He inform them of what they did. — Q. 6:159
Another warning against sectarianism is delivered in chapter 30, which is dealing specifically with the Byzantine war against the Persians.
And be in prudent fear of Him, and uphold the duty; and be not of the idolaters: Of those who divide their doctrine and become sects, each party exulting at what it has. — Q. 30:31–32
The Syrian Christian response to meeting the revelation carried by the Arabs is also powerfully illustrated in the fifth chapter of the Quran.
You will surely find the most bitter towards the believers to be the Jews and polytheists and the most gracious to be those who call themselves Christian. That is because there are priests and monks among them and because they are not arrogant. When they listen to what has been revealed to the Messenger, you see their eyes overflowing with tears for recognizing the truth. They say, “Our Lord! We believe, so count us among the witnesses. — Q. 5:82–83
To these Syrian Christians, the arrival of the Quranic message was merely a reversion back to the fundamentals of the faith demonstrated by Abraham’s total trust, obedience, and submission islam to the Ezekelian God. It was a liberation from the destructive effects of Hellenism, which had decimated Christian unity over semantic disagreements. As demonstrated by Patriarch Ishoyahbb III, their understanding of the Quran is that it has been delivered to them to their shame. That is, the only reason why the Quran exists is because the Jews and the Christians went astray from their original calling and broke into sects, violently zealous for their own sectarianism. The underbelly of the Quran’s basic message is essentially that of Paul’s in the New Testament, that those who submit to God in the manner of Abraham are his true heirs.
Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham. — Gal. 3:7
Abraham was neither a Jew nor a Christian, but he was one inclining toward truth, a Muslim [submitting to Allāh]. And he was not of the polytheists. — Q. 3:67
That the Quran also demonstrates a return to Ezekiel’s aniconic God in the form of the scroll delivered to the prophet, is evidenced by its presentation of itself as simply the recitation of God’s words. In Arabic, quran literally means “what is read aloud” and comes from the triliteral root QRA common to Hebrew, Syro-Aramaic, and Arabic. This would have been especially powerful to the ears of Syriac Christians, because the Syro-Aramaic word for their lectionary is qeryana from the same root! As in Ezekiel, God is present in the words of the text itself and not within a statue or a temple. Therefore, God cannot be depicted iconically in this presentation because the object is to hear him. To see him is bad news, because if you see God, it is essentially a death sentence.
You cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live. — Ex. 33:20
And as the Quran presents itself as a return to the fundamentals, the mercy to the needy neighbor is right at the forefront of its message. In fact, the inhabitants of hell are presented as those who failed to show this mercy.
“What has landed you in Hell?” They will reply, “We were not of those who prayed, nor did we feed the poor. We used to indulge in falsehood along with others, and deny the Day of Judgment, until the inevitable came to us.” — Q. 74:43–47
This point then is not to argue for the superiority of the religion we call Islam today, expressed in the Sunni and Shia sects, over what we call Christianity and Judaism today, but to show that the Quran represents an indictment and admonition against those who call themselves Christians and Jews. If we claim the religion of Abraham, then we are expected to follow it. The answer then isn’t to join a new religion, but to harken back to the scriptures that were delivered beforehand to us.
Continue to Tract 3…
