Nothing Is Sinful Because It Is Pleasurable

It is not that uncommon to come across non-Christians who think that the Christian faith is, to some extent, against people experiencing pleasure. And this thinking is one reason why some are put off our faith.

Reasons why some people think that the Christian faith is negative towards pleasure

There are two reasons why some non-believers connect our faith with a negative attitude towards pleasure.

First, there are some Christians who, to a certain extent, really do view pleasure negatively. So when non-Christians encounter Christians who think this, they sometimes assume that this attitude towards pleasure is a standard part of the Christian faith.

Second and more importantly, some non-believers see Christians opposing various things that give pleasure, such as getting drunk or having sex outside marriage, and they often just assume that the reason we oppose these things is because they are pleasurable.

The result of these two factors is that there is an impression among some non-Christians that the Christian faith is, to some extent, against people experiencing pleasure.

God is positive about pleasure

It can hardly be overstated how wrong it is to think that the Christian faith is against pleasure.

To begin with, we need to understand that God Himself experiences pleasure. The Bible is full of references to God taking pleasure in people and things.

For example, in Psalm 149:4 we read:

‘For the LORD takes pleasure in his people . . .’ (ESV)

What is more, even before God made the universe, the love relationships in the Trinity between Father, Son and Holy Spirit undoubtedly caused God a tremendously deep source of pleasure.

Secondly, a major part of God’s purpose in creating humans was so that we could experience pleasure – first and foremost pleasure in God Himself, but also pleasure in human relationships of various kinds and in other aspects of creation.

To put it bluntly, God is thoroughly in favour of people experiencing pleasure.

Things are not sinful because they are pleasurable

If something is against God’s will, it is important to understand that there is always some reason other than it being pleasurable that makes it sinful.

So, for example, getting drunk is not sinful because it is pleasurable, but because it causes people to lose self-control. Losing self-control can lead people to do unwise things, and it also fits poorly with the dignity of human beings as creatures made in the image of God.

Similarly, sex outside marriage is not sinful because it is pleasurable, but because God designed sex to cement the marriage relationship between husband and wife that mirrors the relationship between Christ and His church.

It is crucial to understand that God is not a kill-joy. He isn’t against pleasure. There is no activity that is sinful because it is pleasurable. The world as God made it is simply not like that.

A special case

Despite what I have just said, there is one kind of situation where pleasure is a problem in and of itself. This is when people treat pleasure as an idol and seek it more than they should.

Sometimes a person can become obsessed with seeking after pleasure, and in that sort of situation there is a sense in which pleasure itself is a problem for that person.

However, the point still stands that in terms of what any particular activity involves, it is not the pleasure derived from an action that makes it sinful. It is always something else.

Living in a time of war

If Adam and Eve had not fallen into sin, and if there had been a human race that had never sinned, everyone would have experienced nothing but great pleasure all the time.

Similarly, after we die or Jesus returns to earth, our lives will be nothing but pleasure, and this is what God will want.

However, the reality is that the human race has fallen into sin, those of us now on earth have not yet died, and Jesus has not yet returned. This means that it isn’t possible right now for us to experience pleasure all the time. Although pleasure should be a part of our lives, suffering is also unavoidable to a certain extent. We are living in a kind of wartime, when normal peacetime activities can’t always be enjoyed.

In 2 Timothy 2:3-4 Paul tells Timothy:

‘Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him.’ (ESV)

There should be no doubt that these words are meant to apply to all Christians. We are all soldiers of Christ Jesus, and soldiers can expect to experience hardships of various kinds. A time will come when suffering and hardship become things of the past, but that time is not yet.

Correcting wrong ideas

When we come across non-Christians who have wrong ideas about the attitude of the Christian faith towards pleasure, it is worth trying to correct those ideas if we have an opportunity.

As I have already noted, some non-believers are put off our faith because they think that it views pleasure negatively to a certain extent. When people decide not to follow Jesus and reject the salvation that is in Him because of wrong thinking like this, it is a real tragedy.

If we can help them to view things correctly on the real Christian attitude towards pleasure, for some it may make the difference between the decision to accept Jesus as Saviour and Lord and the decision not to.

It is also worth trying to correct the thinking of Christians who have a poor understanding in this area. Some believers view God as more severe than He really is, and they seem to imagine that to some extent He is against us experiencing pleasure. If we can help them see reality better on this topic, it could only aid them in their relationships with the Lord.

 

See also:

Charismatic Churches and Their Attitude to Hardship

Is There Any Place for Entertainment in Church Services?

How and Why Should Christians Rejoice?

What Is the Christian Faith Really All About?

Could the First Christians Have Been Lying When They Said Jesus Rose from the Dead?

As everyone will be well aware, there are many opponents of the Christian faith today, who deny that Jesus rose from the dead. 

Some of these people argue that the first Christians genuinely believed that Jesus’ resurrection happened but were mistaken. Others argue that the story of Jesus’ resurrection began as a lie. 

In what follows, I want to say something about this second idea, that the resurrection story began as a lie. As we will see, this idea is extremely implausible and should be ruled out. It just doesn’t make sense. 

Many early Christians claimed to have seen the risen Jesus 

The first thing we need to understand clearly is that many of the first Christians claimed to have seen Jesus after he rose from the dead. 

They include the early Christian leader called Paul, who wrote quite a lot of the New Testament. In 1 Corinthians 15:3-8 Paul stated: 

‘3 For I handed on to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4 and that he was buried and that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, 5 and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. 6 After that, he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, but some have fallen asleep. 7 After that, he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. 8 And last of all, as to one born at the wrong time, he appeared also to me.’ 

So Paul is claiming here that Jesus appeared to him and to many others of the first Christians after he rose from the dead. And it is worth noting that there is wide agreement among scholars of Christian origins, whether or not they are Christians themselves, that Paul himself genuinely wrote this. 

There is no good reason for doubting that Paul would have been quite well informed about which other Christians claimed to have seen the resurrected Jesus. 

We know that Paul knew a number of the others he refers to in his list in 1 Corinthians 15:3-8. 

In verses 5 and 7, he says that the risen Jesus appeared to Cephas (i.e., Peter) and James (i.e., James the brother of Jesus, as scholars widely agree). In Galatians 1:18 – and scholars agree that Paul wrote Galatians – he says that he went to Jerusalem three years after he became a Christian and spent two weeks with Cephas. Then in the next verse he remarks that at that time he saw James the brother of Jesus. In Galatians 2:9 he also refers to meeting with John, one of the apostles. 

There is plenty of other evidence too which makes it highly likely that Paul knew others among the apostles he refers to in v. 7. 

To cut a long story short, scholars agree that Paul knew at least several of the people he mentions in 1 Corinthians 15:3-8 and that he probably knew many of them. 

There are good reasons for thinking, then, that in this passage Paul is accurately giving a list of early Christians who claimed they had seen the risen Jesus. 

Unsurprisingly, there is wide agreement among scholars of Christian origins that many of the first Christians claimed they had seen Jesus risen from the dead. 

The suffering of early Christians who claimed to have seen the risen Jesus 

The next thing we need to understand clearly is that many of the first Christians suffered badly over an extended period of time because they were Christians, and that this certainly included some of those who claimed to have seen Jesus after he rose from the dead. 

Paul himself was one of these people. In 2 Corinthians 11:23-28 he lists the sufferings he experienced because he was a Christian: 

‘23 . . . [I have been] in far more labours, in far more imprisonments, beaten countless times, often in danger of death. 24 Five times from the Jews I have received the thirty-nine lashes. 25 Three times I have been beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I have been shipwrecked, I have spent a night and a day in the sea. 26 I have been on many journeys, in dangers from rivers, dangers from bandits, dangers from my own countrymen, dangers from the Gentiles, dangers in the city, dangers in the wilderness, dangers on the sea, dangers among false brothers, 27 in toil and hardship, in many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and nakedness. 28 Apart from such external things, I have daily troubling concerns about all the churches.’ 

Again, it is worth noting that there is wide agreement among scholars of Christian origins, whether or not they are Christians themselves, that Paul himself genuinely wrote this and that he is being honest about what he experienced. 

There is wide agreement also that Peter, James and the other apostles, who are on Paul’s list of people who claimed to have seen the risen Jesus in 1 Corinthians 15:3-8, suffered badly over an extended period of time because they were Christians. And there is also wide agreement that some non-apostles who made this claim suffered in this way too. 

People don’t go on suffering for something they invented as a lie 

So we have seen that many early Christians claimed to have seen Jesus after he rose from the dead. And we have also seen that some of those who made this claim suffered badly over an extended period of time because they were Christians. 

The crucial point here is that people simply don’t spend years suffering badly for something they have invented as a lie. It just wouldn’t be worth it. 

If someone claimed that they saw Jesus risen from the dead, when in fact they knew that they hadn’t, one beating or one spell in prison would be enough for them to abandon this claim. Either they would admit they had invented it, or they would just keep quiet and go and do something else with their life. They wouldn’t keep saying that Jesus rose, bringing more and more suffering on themself. So the fact that they did keep saying this must have been because they believed it. 

The idea that Jesus’ disciples stole his body from the tomb and invented the resurrection appearances is therefore not a reasonable  one. Instead, we should have no hesitation in saying that the early Christians genuinely believed that Jesus rose from the dead. 

The resurrection story did not begin as a deception by Jesus 

Occasionally people suggest that Jesus might actually have survived his crucifixion, and that this could explain the origin of the story of his resurrection. Under this theory, it would be Jesus himself who plotted a big deception. 

This idea should be totally rejected, however. 

First, it is extremely unlikely that someone sentenced to death by the Romans would have survived. 

Second, even if, for the sake of argument, we were to suppose that Jesus survived crucifixion, we would have to assume that in his badly injured condition he then hatched a plot to deceive his followers by pretending to rise from the dead, a plot he succeeded in implementing! This is impossibly implausible. 

Summing up 

In short, although there are many who claim that the story of Jesus’ resurrection is based on a lie, this simply doesn’t make sense of the evidence. 

The idea that so many of the first Christians suffered so much for something they knew was a lie should be ruled out. And the idea that Jesus survived his crucifixion and then managed to trick his followers into believing that he had risen from the dead is just as implausible.  

 

See also: 

A Very Strong Piece of Evidence for the Resurrection of Jesus 

The Resurrection of Jesus and Probability 

Two Things about Atheism That Everyone Should Consider 

Are the Old Testament and New Testament Portraits of God Contradictory?

What Makes a Human Being a Human Being?

I was talking recently to someone who was arguing in support of abortion. She used a couple of arguments to try to make her case, arguments that are often used by pro-abortionists but which I am sure are misguided.

In what follows, I want to mention these arguments and say why I believe they don’t work.

A point about terminology

Pro-abortionists, of course, almost always claim that an unborn baby, at least in the first months inside the womb, is not really a baby. I strongly disagree with that claim.

However, because this article is aimed at convincing those who take a pro-abortionist position or are undecided, it would be a methodological mistake for me to assume something that those I am arguing against wouldn’t accept.

So, for the sake of argument, at times in what follows I will refer to an unborn baby as an entity or an entity in the womb, since these are terms that everyone would agree are correct.

The argument that appeals to viability

The woman I was talking to used an argument that appealed to the so-called viability of the entity in the womb, and it went along the following lines:

Up until about 22 weeks after conception, the entity in the womb would not be able to survive outside the womb. That means that it is incorrect to describe it as a viable human being. Therefore, it is not wrong to deliberately destroy it.

Firstly, it is important to recognise that there is something very arbitrary about this argument. If someone is going to say that the entity needs to be able to survive outside the womb in order to be classed as a human being, why stop there? Why not say that the entity also needs to be able to feed itself in order to be classed as a human being?

A newborn baby, of course, if left to fend for itself would die. To survive, it is completely dependent on another human being to feed it.

So we can divide things up into three stages. At stage 1, in the first months inside the womb, the entity is unable to survive outside the womb. Then stage 2 is reached when the entity is able to survive outside the womb but only if it is fed by someone else. And finally stage 3 is reached when the entity is able to feed itself.

For someone to claim that the entity is not a human being at stage 1 but is at stage 2 is purely arbitrary. This is just plucked out of thin air.

If having a certain level of ability to survive is a factor that determines whether an entity is a human being, there is no more reason for drawing the line at stage 2 than there is for drawing it at stage 1 or stage 3. Simply to assume that stage 1 doesn’t make an entity human but stage 2 does is an unwarranted assumption.

Secondly, to think in terms of the ability of the entity to survive in various circumstances is completely wrongheaded anyway. As God has designed things, in the first months of its life the entity is not supposed to survive outside the womb. At that stage in its life it is supposed to live in the womb and feed through the umbilical cord.  And then after birth God has designed that the entity is dependent on being fed by another human.

The fact that in the early stages of its life the entity can’t survive outside the womb, or the fact that soon after birth it can’t survive without being fed, are beside the point. These things have nothing to do with whether or not the entity should be classed as a human being.

The argument that appeals to suffering mothers

The woman I was talking to also used an argument that appealed to the suffering of some mothers, and it went in the following way:

Some girls get pregnant at a very young age as a result of rape. It would be wrong to force them to go through the trauma of a pregnancy and having a baby they don’t want. Therefore, in such cases it is not wrong to deliberately destroy the entities in their wombs.

On this point I want to make it clear that I shudder just to think of what these girls would go through having a baby. I have no desire to treat lightly the horrendous suffering involved. But nevertheless, I strongly disagree that it would be OK for girls in this situation to have an abortion.

I asked the woman I was talking to what her view was if a young rape victim gave birth to a baby and was then deeply traumatised and strongly wished the baby was dead. I asked her if she would approve of killing the baby after it was born, and she said that she wouldn’t.

I then asked her why she took this view, and she said that it was too late at that point to kill the baby.

Her answer showed that her top priority was not to protect the young girl from suffering, that there was some other calculation that was even more important. In other words, despite the suffering of the poor girl, the woman I was talking to believed that it was just wrong to kill a newborn baby. The baby was simply too valuable, and it was simply too late to kill the baby, regardless of how much the girl wanted the baby to die.

But suppose, for a moment, that what anti-abortionists like myself believe about the entity before birth is correct, when we say that this entity is a human being. If that is right, then it should be obvious that avoiding killing it should trump the desire to stop the young girl suffering, just as is the case with a baby that has been born.

So the issue of whether the entity in the womb is a human being is the key issue. The issue of the suffering of the rape victim, though very important, is not remotely as important as the issue of whether the entity in the womb is a human being. That is the key issue that trumps any issue of suffering.

The point I am making is that the issue of whether the entity in the womb is a human being is so important that it makes all arguments to do with the suffering of the mother irrelevant. So arguments supporting abortion based on the suffering of some mothers are completely beside the point.

What makes a human being human?

I have already said that the ability to survive outside the womb and the ability to feed oneself have nothing to do with whether an entity should or should not be described as a human being. So what does make an entity human? What is a human being?

I would suggest that the answer to this question is really very simple. A human being is an entity that has a soul made in the image of God.

Now, there should be no doubt that immediately before a baby is born it already has a soul, and few people calling themselves Christians would dispute this. But if it already has a soul before birth, it makes sense to think that the joining of the soul to the material part of the human occurs at some critical point. However, before birth the only really critical point that exists is conception.

If we were to say that the soul joins to the fertilised egg or embryo or foetus at some time after conception but before birth, what reason would we give for taking this view? Why would we think that the soul joins after the physical component of the human has been growing for a week? Or why would we think this happens after 10 days or after 20 or 40?

Crucially, nothing critical happens at these times. But, by contrast, the time the sperm fertilises the egg is a real critical point, and this is surely the time at which the soul joins the physical part of the human. When else could it be?

Thinking, then, that the tiny size of a human fertilised egg in the first few days after conception means that it is not really a human being doesn’t make sense. In fact, a human being with a human soul made in the image of God is present, despite the tiny physical size of the entity in question.

 

See also:

Does the Oral Contraceptive Pill Cause Abortions?

How Serious a Sin Is Sex outside Marriage?

The Arrogance and Hypocrisy of Western Society

Divorce and Remarriage Are Only Acceptable in Special Circumstances

Did an Actual Snake Speak to Eve to Get Her to Sin?

In the third chapter of Genesis we read the account of how a snake persuades Eve to sin by eating fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

I am convinced that this account is not supposed to be interpreted literally. In other words, I believe that historically there was no actual snake or snake-like figure that plotted against Eve or spoke to her. Instead, what we have here is a fictional story that symbolises how human sin began when Satan tempted Adam and Eve.

There are many Christians, however, who insist that this story is supposed to be taken literally, and who claim that an actual snake, or Satan in the form of a snake, or Satan speaking through an actual snake, persuaded Eve to sin. In what follows I will explain why I disagree with these interpretations of the passage.

The passage

Let’s start by setting out the text of Genesis 3:1-6. It reads as follows:

1 Now the snake was more crafty than any animal of the field which the LORD God had made. And it said to the woman, ‘Did God really say, “You are not to eat from any tree of the garden”?’

2 The woman said to the snake, ‘We are allowed to eat fruit from the trees of the garden. 3 But God has said, “You are not to eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you are not to touch it, or you will die.”’

4 The snake said to the woman, ‘You certainly will not die. 5 For God knows that on the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.’

6 The woman saw that the tree was good for food and pleasant to look at, and that it was desirable for obtaining wisdom. So she took some of its fruit and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.

Satan making himself look like a snake

Some of those who interpret this passage literally claim that it refers to Satan manifesting himself as a snake to Eve and speaking to her. Under this interpretation, there was no actual snake involved. Rather, Satan just made himself look like a snake, and spoke to Eve in this way.

This interpretation is on the wrong track, however.

To begin with, we must note that the first sentence of v. 1 tells us that the snake was more crafty than any animal of the field. The way that the snake is set alongside other animals and compared to them surely shows that we should understand the snake in the same way that we understand the other animals. These other animals in the storyline are surely real animals. So in the first sentence of v. 1 the snake should be understood as a real animal too.

In the second sentence of v. 1 we read, ‘And it said to the woman’. The subject of this clause is the snake that has been referred to in the first sentence. Because the snake in the first sentence is a real snake, this means that in the storyline it is a real snake that speaks to Eve.

However, if this passage were simply about Satan manifesting himself as a snake, there would be no real snake involved. It would just be some sort of snake-like appearance. Therefore, the fact that the storyline refers to a real snake seems to rule out the idea that this passage is about Satan making himself look like a snake to Eve.

Satan speaking through an actual snake

There are other Christians who attempt to interpret this account literally by drawing a parallel between the account and the story of Balaam’s donkey in Numbers 22:28-30. Those who take this view rightly accept that the account portrays a real snake speaking to Eve, not just a snake-like appearance of Satan. But they claim that Satan spoke through the snake in a way similar to the way God spoke through Balaam’s donkey.

This interpretation should also be rejected.

To start with, in the story of Balaam’s donkey there are two actors, God and the donkey, and God miraculously speaks through the donkey. By contrast, in the Genesis account there is only one actor, the snake. There is not the slightest hint in the text that a second actor is involved who speaks through the snake.

Furthermore, when the passage says in the first sentence of v. 1 that the snake was the most crafty of the animals, this clearly implies that each animal has a certain amount of craftiness in itself. And this obviously includes the snake. Each animal is somewhere on the implied scale of craftiness, with the snake at the top.

Therefore, when in the rest of the passage we are told that the snake uses craftiness to tempt Eve, it must be its own craftiness that it uses. The whole point of referring to the snake’s craftiness in the first sentence is to prepare the reader for the snake using craftiness in the rest of the passage. After reading the first sentence, the reader understands that the snake has craftiness, so the snake’s use of craftiness in the rest of the passage now makes sense.

However, if Satan simply spoke through the snake in the way that God spoke through Balaam’s donkey, it would be Satan’s craftiness that was involved, not that of the snake. So, because it is clearly the snake’s own craftiness that is used, it cannot be about Satan speaking through the snake.

Just a snake miraculously plotting against Eve

The two interpretations I have mentioned, then, both fail. We should have no hesitation in saying that in the storyline of this passage there is a real snake that uses its own craftiness to tempt Eve.

But is it possible that this storyline should be interpreted historically? In other words, is it possible that this literally happened?

There are some Christians who would answer yes to these questions, and who claim that an actual snake was miraculously enabled to plot against Eve and tempt her to sin.

This is also a mistake. Snakes, like all other animals, are not moral creatures. By God’s design, animals are unable to know right from wrong or plot against people to get them to sin.

I would suggest that the idea of an animal being miraculously enabled to know right from wrong is a contradiction in terms. 2 Peter 2:12 and Jude 1:10 refer to ‘irrational animals’, and these verses show that animals exist on a vastly lower level than human beings. By God’s design, the ability to reason in the way that humans do or to know right from wrong is something that is impossible for an animal. An animal can no more know right from wrong than a rock can know right from wrong.

I think it would be correct to say that God could miraculously transform a snake into a creature with knowledge of right and wrong. But importantly, it would then cease to be a snake. It would cease to be an animal. But in Genesis 3:1-6 the snake clearly remains a snake. It remains an animal. And there is also not the slightest hint in this passage anyway of any miracle taking place.

The idea, then, that an actual snake was miraculously enabled to plot against Eve makes no sense.

A symbolic story

All attempts to interpret this passage literally and historically therefore fail. Instead, we should see the passage as a fictional and symbolic story.

The snake in this passage certainly symbolises Satan. The passage is teaching us that Satan was instrumental in leading Adam and Eve to fall into sin.

But on the level of the story, it is the snake as an animal that plots against Eve and tempts her to sin. And this cannot reasonably be taken literally and historically. To interpret this passage literally is to seriously misunderstand the type of literature that is present here.

We should also note carefully that in Revelation 12:9 and 20:2 Satan is described as ‘the ancient snake’, which surely refers back to this passage in Genesis. These verses in Revelation fit perfectly with seeing the snake as symbolising Satan in Genesis 3.

 

See also:

Beware of Taking Genesis 1-3 Too Literally

The Problems with Claiming to Interpret the Bible Literally

Beware of Interpreting Bible Prophecies Too Literally

Were the Gospels Designed to be Works of Pure History?

Does Colossians 1:15-16 Really Mean That Jesus Is Not Divine?

There is a passage in Paul’s letter to the Colossians that is often used by Jehovah’s Witnesses and others as a proof text for their view that Jesus is not divine.

The passage is Col 1:15-16, and it reads as follows:

‘15 He [the Son of God] is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. 16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.’ (ESV)

The argument used

The argument used by those who claim that Jesus is not divine goes in the following way:

Verse 15 describes Jesus as the image of the invisible God. This implies that he is not himself God.

Furthermore, v. 15 describes him as ‘the firstborn of all creation’. This is sometimes translated into English as ‘the firstborn over all creation’, but this is a mistranslation of the Greek original.

‘The firstborn of all creation’ implies that Jesus is the part of creation that was created first, or that he is the most important part of creation, or both these things. But it doesn’t mean that he is a creator.

Besides, in v. 18 of the same chapter, Jesus is described as ‘the firstborn from the dead’, and this means that he is part of the group of people who have died. So it makes sense to think that the similar phrase ‘the firstborn of all creation’ in v. 15 should be interpreted in a similar way, i.e., that he is part of the creation.

At first sight this might seem to be an impressive argument. However, when we dig a little deeper, we find that it doesn’t hold water.

Jesus as the image of the invisible God

To begin with, what should we make of the fact that Jesus is described in v. 15 as the image of the invisible God? Does this mean that he isn’t God himself?

The text doesn’t have to be interpreted in this way at all. The word ‘image’ can mean different things in different contexts. In this context, with its reference to the invisible God, it is not at all unnatural to understand the image to be a way of visibly seeing that which is invisible.

In other words, it is not a forced interpretation of these words to say that when we look at Jesus we see the invisible God. And interpreted in this way, there would be no suggestion that Jesus is not divine.

The upshot is that these words hardly count as proof that Jesus is not divine.

Jesus as the firstborn of all creation

But what about the description of Jesus as ‘the firstborn of all creation’? Does this phrase have to mean that he is not divine?

Before I answer this question, there are a couple of preliminary points to get out of the way.

Firstly, I have already noted that in v. 15 ‘the firstborn of all creation’ is sometimes translated as ‘the firstborn over all creation’. On this I agree completely with Jehovah’s Witnesses and others that we should translate with ‘of’ rather than ‘over’. In the Greek text the construction is a simple genitive that translates naturally into English as ‘of all creation’. There is no preposition meaning ‘over’.

Secondly, Jehovah’s Witnesses are also correct that in v. 18 ‘the firstborn from the dead’ means that Jesus is part of the group of people who have died.

However, there is a fatal flaw with the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ interpretation of ‘the firstborn of all creation’. It is simply impossible in the context to take these words to mean that Jesus is created, for a very specific reason.

Crucially, we must note the first clause of v. 16: ‘For by him all things were created’, which immediately follows the reference to ‘the firstborn of all creation’ in v. 15. This first clause of v. 16 shows that the reason why Jesus can be called the firstborn of all creation is because he created all things. In other words, he is the firstborn of all creation because he created stuff!

So, whatever exactly ‘the firstborn of all creation’ means, it cannot possibly be about him being created, because v. 16 gives his activity as creator as the reason why he is the firstborn of all creation.

But what about the fact that ‘the firstborn from the dead’ in v. 18 means that Jesus is part of the group of people who have died? If ‘the firstborn of all creation’ is not about Jesus being part of creation, it looks very awkward, doesn’t it, to have two very similar phrases being used in different ways so close to each other in the text?

Not really. Sometimes in the Bible, as in modern English language generally, we find the same or similar words or phrases in close proximity to each other being used in different ways. It’s not a rare thing to come across.

All things were created by Jesus

There is one final thing about this passage that is difficult for the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ interpretation. Note how v. 16 says twice that ‘all things were created’ by or through Jesus.

Most naturally, this sounds as if literally everything that has ever been created was created by Jesus. And in this case, he would have to be divine, since as creator of every created thing he couldn’t have been created himself.

It is less natural to take these words to mean that Jesus created everything that has been created apart from himself, who God created. If we were to interpret in this way, we would need to understand ‘apart from himself’ as an unexpressed exception to ‘all things’: ‘For by him all things were created (apart from himself, who was created by God) . . .’ But this is not the most natural way of taking these words.

Summing up

Despite the claims of some, then, Colossians 1:15-16 in no way counts as a proof text that Jesus is not divine.

In fact, the words in this passage most naturally point towards his deity rather than away from it. And in the light of the rest of biblical revelation, we should have no hesitation in saying that Jesus is indeed divine.

 

See also:

Is It Right to Say That God Died on the Cross?

How Can the Word Be With God and Also Be God?

The Problem with Drawing Conclusions from a Few Bible Proof Texts

Paradoxes and Tensions in the Christian Faith

Is Jeremiah 13:23 Racist against Black People?

Opponents of the Christian faith sometimes claim that Jeremiah 13:23 shows a racist attitude towards black people, and they see this as evidence that our faith is not true.

In fact, this verse is not racist at all, as I will try to explain in what follows.

The text and its correct interpretation

Here is the text of Jeremiah 13:23:

‘Can the Cushite change his skin, or a leopard his spots? If so, you might be able to do what is good, you who are instructed in evil.’ (CSB)

‘Cushite’ in this verse refers to dark-skinned people who came from the land of Cush, the area immediately to the south of Egypt, where modern day Sudan is located. Many translations have ‘Ethiopian’ in this verse instead of ‘Cushite’, although modern-day Ethiopia is not really the same location as ancient Cush. For our purposes, however, the details of this are not important, because, regardless of its location, the inhabitants of Cush were known for their dark skin. They were what we would describe as black.

In this verse God is sharply criticising the Jewish people of Jeremiah’s day. He is saying that they are so in the habit of doing evil, that there is no more likelihood of them changing and doing good than there is of a Cushite changing his skin colour or a leopard getting rid of its spots.

Changing the skin colour of a human and changing the visible appearance of an animal are obviously good examples of something that is impossible, which helps to drive home how immersed in sin and evil the Jewish people of that day were.

I think the precise examples of a Cushite and a leopard were chosen because they would both have been unusual and attention-grabbing sights in Judah at that time.

Jews would have known about dark-skinned people from Cush, but it seems that they would have been few and far between in Judah, so if someone saw a Cushite, it would have been a sight that caught people’s attention.

As far as leopards are concerned, these animals clearly have a very distinctive appearance compared to most other animals. And I think they would also have been rare in Judah at that time, which would have made them stand out all the more when they were seen.

The striking appearance of dark human skin and leopard spots seems to have been why these examples were chosen.

Answering an objection

There are a couple of different ways in which this verse is said to be racist against black people.

Firstly, it is sometimes said that the way the verse sets a Cushite alongside an animal is demeaning to the Cushite, as if to some extent the Cushite is being brought down to the level of a mere animal.

This objection is completely wrong. There is no more suggestion in this verse that the Cushite is being brought down to the level of the leopard than there is that the leopard is being raised to the level of the Cushite. Neither is being brought to the level of the other at all.

Instead, what we have here is simply one example of a striking appearance that is taken from the world of human beings and another example that is taken from the animal kingdom. For Jews of the day, the Cushite’s skin colour was an unusual and striking sight among human beings, and the leopard’s appearance was an unusual and striking sight among animals. Humans and animals are not being confused here at all.

Answering a second objection

There is a second and more common reason why this verse is said to be racist against black people, which has to do with the reference to changing appearance.

The Jewish people in view in this verse are evil, and the verse is clearly implying that it would be good if they were able to change for the better (although this is impossible). Some therefore claim that the analogy of the Cushite requires that we understand the verse also to be implying that it would be good if the Cushite were able to change his skin colour. In other words, it is sometimes said that this verse looks at dark skin colour negatively.

This objection also completely misses the mark. Crucially, we need to take note of how in this verse the Cushite’s skin and the leopard’s spots are parallel to each other. The same point is being made about both.

So logically, if we were to say that the verse is implying that it would be good for the Cushite’s skin colour to change, we would also have to say that it is implying that it would be good for the leopard to lose its spots.

But the verse cannot possibly be implying that it would be good for the leopard to lose its spots. Why? Because leopards look fantastic! And there is no doubt that it isn’t just in our day that people think this. Surely people throughout history, including in Jeremiah’s day, have thought the same. The way that the Romans, for example, took great trouble to bring leopards to Rome is just one of many pieces of evidence for this.

This verse, then, is in no way implying that it would be good for leopards to change their appearance. So it cannot be implying that it would be good for Cushites to change their appearance, because exactly the same point is being made about the leopard and the Cushite.

The comparison of evil people with a Cushite and a leopard is therefore limited to the point that there is inability to change. The comparison doesn’t include whether it would be good for change to occur. Of course, it would be good if these Jews were able to change, but this is simply not the point that is being made by referring to the Cushite or the leopard. The point that is being made is just that the Jews in Jeremiah’s day are as unable to turn away from their evil as a Cushite is to change his skin colour or a leopard is to get rid of its spots.

Summing up

The idea that Jeremiah 13:23 is somehow racist against black people, then, is completely mistaken. In reality, this verse just mentions the skin colour of a Cushite as an example of something that cannot change, without anything negative about the Cushite or his skin colour being implied.

Moses married a black woman

While we are on this topic, it is well worth noting that Numbers 12:1-9 tells us that Moses married a black woman and that God approved of the marriage.

In Num 12:1 we read:

‘Miriam and Aaron criticized Moses because of the Cushite woman he married (for he had married a Cushite woman).’ (CSB)

In this verse the Hebrew adjective (koosheet) that is translated ‘Cushite’ is closely related to the Hebrew noun in Jer 13:23 (kooshee) that is translated as ‘Cushite’ in that verse. There is no good reason for thinking that these words have different meanings, which means that Num 12:1 is telling us that Moses married a Cushite woman, who would surely have been black.

We see from v. 1 that Miriam and Aaron criticised Moses for marrying this woman. And then in verses 5-8 God rebukes Miriam and Aaron for their attitude to Moses.

It is true that God’s rebuke seems to be at least mostly because Miriam and Aaron were assuming more importance than they should have, not specifically because they had criticised Moses’ marriage.

Nevertheless, there is no doubt that the passage is implying that Moses did nothing wrong by marrying the Cushite woman. Verse 1 tells us that the precise reason Moses came under criticism by Miriam and Aaron in the first place was because he married her. So when God then responds to this criticism and describes Moses as ‘faithful in all my house’ in v. 7, this has to mean that God had no objection to Moses’ marriage.

For yet another reason, then, the charge of racism against black people that is sometimes levelled against the Bible fails completely.

 

See also:

A Christian Perspective on Race and Racism

The Arrogance and Hypocrisy of Western Society

“Human Rights”: A Big Idol among Christians Today

The Will of the People: A Big Idol among Christians Today