Comments on: Luke slips in predestination…

By: Somewhat Weekly News from Cyberspace « The Church of Jesus Christ

Somewhat Weekly News from Cyberspace « The Church of Jesus Christ — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 14:18:32 +0000

[...] Here is a good question concerning predestination. [...]

By: Calvinism and Arminianism | Scripture Zealot

Calvinism and Arminianism | Scripture Zealot — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 15:45:02 +0000

[...] are some posts related to a passage that doesn’t usually come up in comparisons. Luke slips in predestination… – He Is Sufficient Acts 13:48 – “Appointed” or “Disposed?” – I follow Christ Acts 13:48: [...]

By: Fr. Robert (Anglican)

Fr. Robert (Anglican) — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 22:24:31 +0000

Here is a great quote from a great man of God: “Can we rescue a word, and discover a universe? Can we study a language, and awake to the Truth? Can we bury ourselves in a lexicon, and arise in the presence of God?” (Cambridge Sermons, p.70) With these words Sir Edwyn Hoskyns startled a congregation in the chapel of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. And they remind us of the important but perhaps limited place that the study of words alone can have. But the “divine word”, it is God’s, and cannot be held, but spoken and given out…Kerygma: “History has been taken up into the supra-historical, without ceasing to be history.”

Always the primary principle of authority, is God’s own self-disclosure! God calls us, “the glory of the word of the Lord”! Here is our “ordination” also. We respond. Cannot we call this a synergy? I am asking my Calvinist brethren this question.

By: tc robinson

tc robinson — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 20:52:02 +0000

Peter, yes FF Bruce was calvinist. But that is not what is at stake here.

Tassw is used 8times in the GNT, and only once is a rendered middle. Most of it’s occurrences are in the passive. So it’s safe to go with the passive here, as reflected in most translations.

By: Joel

Joel — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 14:23:01 +0000

I have to agree with Peter on this one. I would prefer the translation that those that believed were rightly positioned for eternal life, or perhaps set in order for eternal life. τεταγμενοι seems to be a military term, perhaps, and therefore suggests something being set in order. Could be wrong.

By: Peter Kirk

Peter Kirk — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 11:18:16 +0000

TC, since FF Bruce was a Calvinist, he would say that, wouldn’t he? The problem is that there is no way to decide in the Greek whether the verb is middle or passive, so anyone has to decide on the basis of their presuppositions.

The verb basically means “to arrange or put in order”. In the middle voice it can mean “arrange oneself”. Or it can mean “agree to pay a sum of money”. Bruce can’t just take one meaning which he finds in papyri and assume that is the meaning in question here.

By: tc robinson

tc robinson — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 23:22:03 +0000

So I am suggesting an alternative interpretation based on taking “to eternal life” with “believed”. I would translate something like “all who were rightly positioned believed and received eternal life”. That begs the question of what “rightly positioned” means, but it is not necessarily more than “ready to accept the message”. So the verse by no means forces a Calvinist interpretation.

What does “rightly positioned” mean in light of the context?

FF Bruce, who was no pushover when it came to the biblical languages, takes τεταγμένοι as passive in his commentary in the NICNT series (p. 267). He cites papyrus evidence for the use of the verb in the sense of “inscribe” or “enroll.”

By: ElShaddai Edwards

ElShaddai Edwards — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 23:21:03 +0000

Thank you, Peter – it’s great to get some different perspectives on this. I’ll take a closer look later tonight!

By: Peter Kirk

Peter Kirk — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 22:49:57 +0000

Thinking a bit more about this, in the light of the discussion at TC’s CONNECTING blog. While Bryan (whose own blog didn’t choose me to comment on it!) in his comment there misunderstands Marshall’s position, which seems to be that all who had accepted the basics of Judaism believed, he does have a point that the clause must mean more than “whoever believed believed”.

By: Peter Kirk

Peter Kirk — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 22:07:55 +0000

This is an interesting one. Yes, a periphrastic perfect, but is it passive or middle? Interestingly when conservative Christians discuss the same verb with the prefix hupo-, e.g. in Ephesians 5:21 (admittedly a present rather than perfect participle), the middle/passive forms are taken to have a middle sense, “submit yourselves” rather than “since you have been submitted”. But the received interpretation of the same verb without the prefix in Acts 13:48 is strictly passive, “having been appointed” rather than “having positioned yourself”. Could theological presuppositions be showing here? The truth is probably that there is no clear distinction between the middle and passive in Greek, such that in both verses it is impossible to say whether the agent is ourselves or someone else, presumably God. We just know that we are in a specific position (the basic meaning of the verb), heading for eternal life and subject to one another, and it is a fundamental and unresolvable tension of Christian theology whether God does it or we do, or a bit of both.