Psalm 104: For God So Loves the World

The universe is, itself, the offspring of God's love. It was not created simply because he had the wisdom and power to do it. The element of love entered into the intention, characterized the execution, and approved the completion of his labors. – Alexander

Campbell

The Psalter has always been viewed as the Spirit inspired temple of the Bible, a literary “holy of holies.”  For three thousand years, and then some, the Psalms have been at the heart of worship, corporate and private, in Israel, the synagogue, and the church.[1] Entering this literary sanctuary is a full sensory experience for the worshiper. Like all the Hebrew Bible it is laced with the grittiness of life and the grandeur of God.  Stepping into the pages of this holy place we are confronted with the smell of incense, hands raised in boisterous praise from the congregation, and the cry of lament from the suffering. In the Psalms the same Spirit that brought forth life from the mud of the earth inspires holistic worship that embodies the great commandment to love the Lord with our minds, souls, and bodies (Deut 6.4f; Mt 22.34f). Among the truths in God’s literary sanctuary is that humanity’s worship is truly cosmic encompassing all creation. All creation sings praise to the Lord of Creation. This vision is awe-inspiring.

The Psalms pull God’s people into a fuller, truer, vision of reality. Entering into the literary sanctuary to worship through praise and prayer, individually and corporately, the world in which God reigns is invoked.[2] In the Psalms, through worship, God enabled Israel to have eyes to see and ears to hear to embrace a new “construal of the God-world relationship.”[3] Through imbibing the worldview constructed in God-centered worship we are invited to embrace God’s purpose for creation, to embrace the beauty of creation as reflecting his own glory, and to find our own place within creation to lead all in heaven and earth to worship the Creator.

Creation the Realm of God’s Steadfast Love

The world envisioned in worship enables God’s people to interpret the world encountered “outside” in light of God’s claims, purpose, and mission. It re-frames pain and injustice and draws attention to love, beauty, and ultimate justice. If you should ask an Israelite fresh from pilgrimage to the temple “how do you know God loves you?” She would probably respond using the language shaped in worship: “I know he loves me because he created the world and redeemed Israel.”  Lifting her hands to heaven, the Israelite would burst into song,

O give thanks the LORD, for he is good,

for his steadfast love endures forever

What evidence for this radical claim by Israel?

[W]ho alone does great wonders,

for his steadfast love endures forever;

who by understanding made the heavens,

for his steadfast love endures forever;

who spread out the earth on the waters,

for his steadfast love endures forever;

who made the great lights,

for his steadfast love endures forever;

the sun to rule over the day,

for his steadfast love endures forever;

the moon and the stars to rule over the night,

for his steadfast love endures forever …

(Psalm 136. 4-9)

The first act of love by God according to the Bible is not the cross of Jesus, nor even the grace of the Exodus from Egypt.  The first act of love by God toward the world is that he became its Creator.  Inhabiting the sanctuary of worship Israel sees “nature” around her not through the eyes of utilitarianism but the eyes of wonder. Nature is in fact transformed into creation.  The physical universe reflects the warmth and love of the Father of Jesus. 

            Psalm 33 elaborates on the character and work of the Lord of Israel while singing a new song. God is described in vivid attributes

For the word of the LORD is upright,

and all his work is done in faithfulness.

He loves righteousness and justice;

the earth is full of the steadfast love

of the LORD. (33.4-5)

What is this word and work that is faithful, righteous, just and loving? Perhaps we might expect such a word and work to be saving people from sin or delivering the poor. But that is not the word and work in Psalm 33.[4]The word and work of the Lord here is the creation of the universe itself.

By the word of the LORD the heavens were made,

and all their host by the breath of his mouth. (33.6)

The beginning of the steadfast love of the Lord, according to this radical psalm is not an act of deliverance from sin or oppression but the creation of cosmos. Indeed it is an act of “justice.”  No wonder the psalm will declare “the earth is full of the steadfast love of the Lord” (33.5; cf Ps 119.64).

            The Bible claims more than creation displays God’s amazing love.  Rather the Scriptures proclaim that God is like an artist who actively cares for, tends to, protects and actually loves his world.  Psalm 104 reveals the chasm between Marcionism, deism and biblical faith.[5]Not only is the wonder of creation celebrated but the deep involvement of the Creator God with the object of his love. God did not simply create “in the beginning” to see how it all turns out.  Rather, as Jesus said, the Father continues to work in creation (Jn. 5.17).  Psalm 104 is formally linked to 103 with its breathtaking vistas of God’s steadfast love which is said to be higher than the heavens for his people (103.11).[6]This love, manifested in God’s “works” (103.22), ushers us into the magnificent meditation upon God’s continuing shower of love toward all he has made.

            Revealing in the diversity of creation, Psalm 104[7]helps place a check on the arrogant human assumption that the world exists primarily for our use and purposes.[8] Rather this psalm reminds us that God has “other concerns”[9]besides human and places us as one among the many inhabitants of the Earth receiving the gift of life from the Creator. The psalm opens in 1-4 picturing Yahweh clothed in majesty, building his cosmic temple to dwell (cf. Ps 78.69; Isa. 40.22).[10] The psalm moves into a very egalitarian geocentric view of earth which is mentioned seven times (vv 5, 9, 13, 14, 24, 32, 35) centering on rich diversity of life filling it. The psalmist revels in the loving, even tender, care of God for his world. 

You make springs gush forth in the valleys;

they flow between the hills (v.10)

Who is this water for? The “drink is to every wild animal” (v. 11).  Those who benefit from are also the birds who “sing among the branches” and finally the earth itself is “satisfied with the fruit of your work” (v.13).  Humans are not even listed among the beneficiaries of divine hydration. 

            The Lord’s hands on approach to tending his creation means he also feeds the life he has created. Humans finally enter the picture as God has previously satisfied the earth with water he now gives grass for animals to eat and viniculture for humans to have wine.  As water blesses the animals, and wine refreshed humans, so now the “trees of the Lord” are abundantly cared for by the Creator (vv.14-16). 

            The psalmist again confesses the marvelous manner of divine provision for the non-human world. The “trees of the Lord” are not simply for human use.  Rather the trees were created literally for the birds (vv. 16-17).[11]  The majestic mountains are actually “for the wild goats” (v.18).

One of the most startling claims, for moderns, of the inspired poet is that humans are not the only ones who have work hours and punch the clock. In this section (vv 19-23) both animals and humans share the world but are separated by temporal domains. The sun and moon are creation’s clock (Gen 1.14-18). The animals in the forests and on the mountains work for a living under the cover of the darkness while humans seek the same livelihood under the sun. Lions carry on the midnight shift but, like their fellow human creature, they get their earnings from God (v.21; cf. Job 38.39-41).  After binding all creatures together the congregation in worship bursts in awe

O LORD, how manifold are your works!

In wisdom you have made them all;

the earth is full of your creatures.

Humans, lions, birds, goats and trees are all objects of the Creators steadfast love. But some of the most amazing creatures have never been seen by the human eye at all. One creature, called Leviathan, lives in God’s aquarium, the vast sea.  Leviathan was created by God for no other reason than to frolic and play in the deep! It has no purpose but to be alive and be carefree (v.26).[12]

            The psalmist concludes his cosmic panorama with all creation, small and great, non-human and human, brought together as contingent creatures utterly dependent upon the grace of God (vv. 27-30).

These all look to you to give them their food in due season;

when you give to them, they gather it up;

when you open your hand, they are filled with good things.

When you hide your face, they are dismayed;

when you take away their breath they die and return to dust.

When you send for the your Spirit, they are created;

and you renew the face of the ground.

Here is the death nail to deism in the Bible.  God’s hands on approach to creation is described in these verses using the Hebrew imperfect indicating continuous action on the part of deity.[13] It is from a text like this the Hebrew Preacher can say that universe is “sustained” by divine grace (Heb 1.3). Here, as in the initial creation itself (Gen 2.7), it is God’s Spirit who is the giver of all life.[14]When life appears, human, animal or trees, a profound miracle has taken place.[15]No wonder the psalmist was in awe.

            But the last five verses of Psalm 104 show that Israel did not imagine that humans alone would delight in creation.  As the psalmist sees the world bathed in gracious “glory” the Lord himself is called to rejoice, to take pleasure, in his works (v.31).   "May the glory of the LORD endure forever; may the LORD rejoice in his works." The purpose of this call is that God continue to his unbounded “labor of love.”  Genesis has the Creator seeing the goodness of his creation, Psalm 104’s vision is that he actually rejoice when he sees it.[16]  The image of God finding delight in what he has created in this universe is, perhaps, an image we need to ruminate on more frequently. 

Concluding thought

            Psalm 104 is gentle, but firm, check on human arrogance.  Through a misreading of other texts, we sometimes assume that whole world was placed here for us. But Genesis reminds us the world was “good” even when inhabited only by fish, birds and trees before a single human appeared.  God himself is the caretaker in his lush garden and humans are just one of his creatures in this Psalm. Animals, who have the same life as humans, are not simply food for humans.  Indeed both animals and humans get sustenance from the same divine source. Psalm 104 also shows that God made things simply to be beautiful and not just to be useful.  The creation of Leviathan is perhaps a reminder to humans that life is such a gift of grace that we should just “let loose” from time to time. Above all Psalm 104 reveals the truth that creation itself, animate and inanimate, is the object of divine love. If God, like an artist, dotes so tenderly over his works then should not those created in his image reflect that same divine delight, divine love and divine care for creation. As we shall see this is part of what biblical dominion means.

---

[1] William L. Holladay, The Psalms through Three Thousand Years: Prayerbook of a Cloud of Witnesses (Minneapolis: Fortress Press,  1996); James H. Houston and Bruce K. Waltke, The Psalms as Christian Worship (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009).

[2] Walter Brueggemann, Israel’s Praise: Doxology Against Idolatry and Ideology, (Philadelphia, Fortress, 1988), 1-28; John Mark Hicks, Johnny Melton & Bobby Valentine, A Gathered People: Revisioning The Assembly as Transforming Encounter(Abilene, TX: Leafwood, 2007), 50-59.

[3] James K. A. Smith, Desiring the Kingdom: Worship, Worldview, and Cultural Formation (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2009), 193.

[4] See John Goldingay Old Testament Theology, vol 2 (Downers Grove, IVP, 200?), ??-??; Patrick D. Miller, Jr, Interpreting the Psalms(Philadelphia: Fortress, 1986), 75-76.

[5] John Goldingay, Old Testament Theology, Vol 2: Israel’s Faith, p. 655.

[6] James Limburg argues for the formal linkage of Psalm 103 and 104 in “Down-To-Earth Theology: Psalm 104 and the Environment,” Currents in Theology and Mission 21 (1994), 341.

[7] Psalm 104 is frequently classified as a wisdom psalm largely borrowed from the Egyptian “Hymn to Aton.”  See Bernard W. Anderson, Out of the Depths: The Psalms Speak for Us Today, Revised and Expanded Edition (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1983), 156f. For our purposes it this claim does not effect our argument because if the psalm is borrowed it has been placed within the canonical faith.  However it is important to note that many critical scholars do not see a genetic connection between Psalm 104 and the Hymn to Aton.  Peter C. Craigie reviews the history of scholarship on the psalm, looks at the Egyptian evidence and produces Ugaritic evidence suggesting the best that can be argued is general agreement in limited verses.  He suggests the original function of the psalm was probably a dedication ceremony for the temple. “The Comparison of Hebrew Poetry: Psalm 104 in the Light of Egyptian and Ugaritic Poetry,” Semitics4 (1974): 10-21.

[8]Christopher J. H. Wright, The Mission of God: Unlocking the Bible’s Grand Narrative (Downers Grove: IVP, 2006), 399-400.

[9] John Goldingay, Old Testament Theology, Vol 2: Israel’s Faith, p. 681

[10] See the discussion on temples and cosmic geography in John H. Walton, Ancient Near Eastern Thought and the Old Testament: Introducing the Conceptual World of the Hebrew Bible (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2006), 113-134, 165-178 and Othmar Keel, The Symbolism of the Biblical World: Ancient Near Eastern Iconography and the Book of Psalms (New York: Crossroad, 1985), 113-176

[11] William P. Brown, Seeing the Psalms: A Theology of Metaphor (Louisville: WJK, 2002), 160.  See Bernhard W. Anderson, From Creation to New Creation (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock ??), 217-219.

[12] James Limburg, “Down-To-Earth Theology: Psalm 104 and the Environment,” Currents in Theology and Mission21 (1994), 343.

[13] Bernhard W. Anderson, From Creation to New Creation, pp. 116-118.

[14] Wilf Hildebrandt, An Old Testament Theology of the Spirit of God (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1995), 55-56.

[15] John Goldingay, Psalms, Volume 3: Psalms 90-150 (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008), 194.

[16] William P. Brown, “The Lion, the Wicked, and the Wonder of It All: Palm 104 and the Playful God,” Journal for Preachers29 (2006): 14-19.

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God's Christ in Roman Asia: A Review of Richard Oster's Seven Congregations in a Roman Crucible

A person is often identified as a fool for entering waters he or she knows nothing about. That could very well be the case here.  I am not a scholar by any means, much less a scholar on on the book of Revelation, Roman Asia or the various issues surrounding the hermeneutics of that mysterious book. But N. T. Wright is not Bob Dylan either, yet decides to pick a guitar and sing (I do too) so perhaps I can slide by.

Revelation is one of those books, for better or for worse, that has always been on the select list of favorites in the Bobby V "canon within a canon" (Genesis, Exodus, Deuteronomy, Job, Psalms, Song of Songs, Ecclesiastes,  Jeremiah, Hosea, Amos, Jonah, Habakkuk, Tobit, Sirach, Prayer of Manasseh, Matthew, Romans, Ephesians, 1 Peter, Revelation)  I took an undergrad Revelation course with David Underwood back at Heritage Christian University and later one of my first grad courses with Dr. John Harrison (now at Oklahoma Christian University) while I lived in New Orleans. Recently one of my profs, Dr. Richard Oster (multiple courses), published a commentary on Revelation 1-3.  I will follow the basic IDeA (Identify, Describe, Assess) format that professor Carisse Berryhill encouraged us to use back at Harding School of Theology.

Reading Seven Congregations

Seven Congregations in a Roman Crucible: A Commentary on Revelation 1-3 (Wipf and Stock, 2013) is the fruit of Dr. Oster's mature scholarship.  Oster is widely recognized as an authority on Christianity in Asia Minor, Artemis, numismatic windows on the NT, he often corrects scholars not as grounded in the soil of history and, for former students, he is the master of all footnotes.

Seven Congregations covers the "Seven Churches," or the first three chapters, of Revelation in  two
hundred and seventy-six pages covering ten chapters and three appendices. The commentary is supplemented with one hundred "figures" most of which are photographs of illustrative coins, monumental architecture and iconography (more on these below). 

Chapter one, the Introduction, is the longest being forty-eight pages.  Rather than beginning with the ubiquitous discussions of authorship, date, and genre, Oster begins by noting the cultural influence of Revelation on such diverse people as Columbus, Luther and Newton. Further in the Introduction space is devoted to needed corrections of popular misunderstandings of the book (i.e. Antichrist, 1000 yr reign, rapture).  Believing that these concerns are foisted upon John's Revelation rather than mined out it. Oster offers his interpretive methodology that follows in large measure the historical-critical method of coming "within earshot" of John's authorial intent (p.6).  Oster could have quoted Alexander Campbell's seven rules for coming within "understanding distance" of the biblical author.

Oster is open to seeing a canonical (he does not use that word) coherence between the Revelation and the rest of the Story of God.  As I read through Seven Congregations twice, and parts more, it became obvious that Oster believes that the foundational bedrock for understanding John is the deep inkwell of the Hebrew Scriptures preserved in their Greek translation in the LXX. I appreciate his not merely citing illuminating texts but quoting them in full most of the time.   Second is the wider Second Temple literature of Judaism which would include the rest of the LXX not in the Masoretic Hebrew canon (Apocrypha), the Dead Sea Scrolls and some Pseudepigraphal materials. Finally the wider Greco-Roman culture is significant for understanding the text.  Oster is lavish in his quotations and references to all of these sources. This is one of the great strengths of Seven Congregations.

Probably one of the most interesting parts of the Introduction for the contemporary reader unfamiliar with the Roman world is the discussion of what Dr. Oster calls "fictive globalism."  The ancients did not think the world was flat and frequently depicted the earth as a sphere in art and monumental architecture. I believe this imagery is part of Roma's self proclamation and self promotion ... a Roman "Gospel" if you will.  Dr. Oster clearly shows that the language is not necessarily literal in intent thus John when he uses it does not necessarily mean the entire planet  (pp. 27-43 and Appendix C). This lengthy discussion highlights the value of the historical background of the book for understanding and points out  what is often simply ignored in many approaches to the book, even by NT scholars.  (The Romans, btw, did not believe they literally ruled the entire globe, though their ideology proclaims that. Nor did the Romans believe the world was flat. And it will probably surprise a good number of people that the Empire had established sea trade routes with the civilizations of Asia).

Chapter two reveals to us that the Seven Congregations is really about God's Christ in Roman Asia and not simply the churches. While we learn that John is a prophet (he may or may not be the Apostle) in the spirit of the great prophets of the Hebrew Bible, the focus is upon the Christ of God who has a counter claim to Rome and demands exclusive covenant loyalty. There is a two fold thrust of the sword of Jesus.  The message of Revelation is "insider language," that is, it is intended for believers or Christians.  Thus the one side of the sword cuts at the claims of the fake Caesar and his idolatrous claims and the other side functions as a frightening warning to believers who have sought some kind of accommodation with the Roman Gospel. The Jesus revealed in Revelation 1 demands discipleship ... perhaps he was not kidding about taking up a cross and following him (Oster does not make that comparison but I think it fits with his exposition). The audience or hearers of John's Revelation are not new converts as may often be assumed.  Rather some of them may be up to third generation members of the Christian movement. Oster makes the fascinating reference to the "grandparents" of the Laodicean disciples reading Paul's letter to the Colossians (p.185).  Perhaps this helps explain why Jesus does not talk to these believers as if they are mere babes in the faith.

Perhaps one of the most important interpretive contributions Oster makes here is the emphasis on the Christophany, or appearing of Jesus, in 1.12-18 (pp. 72-89).  A basic suggestion (the rule of context) of reading the book from front to back, beginning to end, means that the Churches in chapters 2-3 hear, and see, THAT Jesus speaking to them not the slain Lamb who is not introduced until chapter 5.  This picture of Jesus is woven into all of the Letters except Laodicea, the last, and most condemned, congregation (pp.184-185). The Jesus knocking at the door waiting to have a gracious fellowship dinner (Rev 3.20) is the frightening Christ of God that made John fall down as if he was dead! Maybe that is why they did not open the door. 

Perhaps John begins with this frightening, even militaristic, picture of Jesus to the Seven Congregations because judgment begins with the household of God and not the world. And that is what Jesus does with these congregations he demands that they repent from selling out to the Roman Gospel.

Another especially enlightening feature of Seven Congregations is Oster's discussion of the "synagogue of Satan" and "Jews who are not Jews."  His exposition, solidly rooted in the earthiness of the late first century and not contemporary political sensitivities, brings to light the complex matrix of Jewish opposition to the nascent Jesus movement and its collusion with pagan power structures of the time. He likewise shows how this language is hardly anti-semitic within its historical setting showing that the question of who was a "real" Jew was a burning question for Jews of all strips after the Fall of Jerusalem and  perhaps even dating from the crises of the Maccabees (see pp. 118-125 and pops up in other places as well).  For more on Jewish "bashing" of Jesus and Christians see the recent study by Peter Schafer, Jesus in the Talmud (Princeton University Press, 2009). John's criticism of the "synagogue of Satan" and "those who claim to be Jews but are not"almost certainly implies that he sees himself and the followers of Jesus as the true synagogue and therefore are the true Jews (the word "Christian" never occurs in Revelation).  Far from being anti-Jewish he is, in his mind (it seems to me), pro-Jewish.  The warfare between ethnic Jews and emerging Rabbinic Judaism and the Jesus Movement that was (again in my view) akin to the Hatfields and McCoys ... so deadly precisely because of the family ties. The scars of this battle probably shape Christianity, as we know it, as much as anything in the "New Testament" itself.  Oskar Skarsaune traces both the inter-change and the conflict that shaped Christianity in his rich work, In the Shadow of the Temple: Jewish Influences on Early Christianity pp 209-276. This whole book should be required reading for every serious Bible student and editor(s) of the Gospel Advocate ;-)).

A unique feature of Seven Congregations, at least among the commentaries known to me, is the wealth of photographs and illustrations from the largely unknown wider Greco-Roman world. I love this feature.  It reminds me of Othmar Keel's groundbreaking work The Symbolism of the Biblical World: Ancient Near Eastern Iconography and the Book of Psalms.  This book has not left my desk in probably ten years. The "material culture" of Rome opens up powerful windows of understanding into John's world and early Christianity (see the use of Pompeii as a historical laboratory for hearing Romans as a mid-first century Roman in Peter Oaks Reading Romans in Pompeii: Paul's Letter at Ground Level.  Here Oaks reconstructs the people who likely read the epistle from information known from Pompeii). From these kinds of remains we learn that divine rulers (like the fake Caesar) were often presented with rays of light emanating from around their head or body (John's uses this to communicate a direct challenge to Roma). Or that the number seven was regarded as divine by nearly everyone. And that temples just might have pillars in the shape of human beings. Likewise material remains document the influence of Judaism in Roman Asia to the extent that even some coins were minted with Noah and his wife on them.  Some of the illustrations present information that has never been presented to students of Revelation before and are thus of even more value (Figure 97 for example).

The illustrations are unevenly distributed through Seven Congregations.  The Introduction and chapters 4 & 5 are the most lavishly graced.  Chapters 7-10 have far fewer basically one or two each.  The photographs, most of which are taken by Dr. Oster himself during his travels to the sites, are reproduced well.  The details we need to see are clearly visible (sometimes not the case in books reproducing photos).  All the photographs are in black and white in the Commentary, however, Dr. Oster is making them available in color at this location: Color Photos for Seven Congregations. See this link as well: Color Photos for Seven Congregations in Roman Crucible.

Seven Congregations pulls the reader into hearing Jesus' call for discipleship.  Some of these calls are quite challenging for the contemporary American church. The Prophet John, after all, was not interested in producing a work of scholarship but in conveying the message of the "one I saw like a Son of Man" to God's people caught in a dangerous crucible. Assimilation is a constant threat and ever a challenge for American Christianity just as it was in Rome.  In many ways the USA is just as idolatrous as Rome and every bit as enticing to those who live in her and off of her.  It is not referred to as the American Empire for nothing. The Jesus of Revelation is not simply counter cultural  when it comes to Roman culture but he is as radically as counter cultural when it comes to present Evangelical church culture. Thus we read in Oster,

"From first to last the Christ of Revelation is an ecclesiastical Jesus, a Jesus for the congregations of God ... the Jesus Christ that John knows and proclaims is one for the collective people of God, the congregations of Roman Asia ... Christianity outside the 10/40 Window would do well to abandon some of its individualism, perhaps repent, and confess that Jesus is not a parachurch Messiah" (p. 89).

Other than the fact that some readers will not know what the 10/40 Window refers too, this flies in face of so much that passes for "Christianity" in North America. (The 10/40 Window refers to North Africa through the Middle East and across Asia or between 10 and 40 degrees north of the Equator. Luis Bush coined the term in 1990).

God's Christ in Roman Asia does not like "cultural Christians."  One can not be a "Christian" in the privacy of one's own home but not in the marketplace.  Those who have thus made their peace with Roma are commanded, even demanded, to repent or else (p. 142f).

Finally Oster deals with the issue of crises for John in Appendix A.  Though Leonard Thompson comes in for censure the criticism could be leveled at a number of recent scholars like Adela Yarbro Collins, Crisis & Catharsis: The Power of the Apocalypse (my intro to that line of thinking). The claim is that John's crises was not rooted in reality for there was no official or sustained Roman persecution of Christians. But Oster demonstrates this is a simplistic reading of the evidence.  While there really was no Empire sanctioned pogrom one is grossly naive to think that no suffering occurred. This is a needed corrective (pp. 199-204).

Reflections and Assessment

I have often called Revelation the Bible's Disney's Fantasia on steroids. My view was strengthened years ago after I read the small, but enlightening, book by James Charlesworth called How Barisat Bellowed: Folklore, Humor, and Iconography in the Jewish Apocalypses and the Apocalypse of John (Bibal 1998).  Reading Revelation is a full sensory experience and it was intended (I believe) to be so. Oster notes that Revelation "strongly appeals to the senses" (p. 76).  Thus I would have liked to see some extended discussion, perhaps an appendix, on how the intention of the author to have his message heard (not simply read silently in our minds) and experienced in the context of corporate worship affects the use of symbolism. Is it possible that not every detail of a symbol has a specific meaning but contributes to the "experience" of the vision? Fantasia shows the modern American the emotive power of symbols even without the need of any explanation of them. Do the symbols make fun of (Charlesworth's humor) of Roman power and thus defang the potency of Roman imperial propaganda? How does that oral environment impact meaning (see Paul Achtemeier's "OMNE VERBUM SONAT: The  New Testament and the Oral Environment of Late Western Antiquity" JBL 109/1 [1990] 3-27).

Dr. Oster has a very helpful overview of the Seven Letters (pp. 90-93). Here we note recurring elements in the letters and interconnections with the end of the book itself. While he confesses "This commentary assumes a holistic approach to the entire Revelation of John and to the seven letters and their integration with the remainder of the book" (p. 93). To this I am in one accord.  What remains unclear to me, however, is how the letters, and their themes, are in fact integrated into the rest of the book except the final two chapters.  I have in the past simply argued that the "apocalypse" of John does not really start until John is carried in the Spirit to the door of heaven (4.1-2) without necessarily grasping just how these parts of the book are interrelated. Perhaps in volume 2 Dr. Oster plans to provide a structural outline that helps in seeing the flow of the Revelation and the intertextuality of chapters 1-3 and 4-22.

Dr. Oster references two important artifacts from the wider culture, the bilingual inscription at the Temple of (Roma) Augusta in Ankyra Turkey and the Oracle of the Potter.  You can't have everything want the Rolling Stones sang, but it might be helpful to readers to have some insight into the content of the Res Gestae Divi Augusti.As I see it, this large inscription is the essential Gospel of Roma.  It is the public persona that Rome wanted the world to believe about itself. Rome is the very image of Virtue, Clemency, Justice, and Piety.  The text reads

When in the consulship of Tiberius Nero and P. Quintilius I returned to Rome from Spain and Gaul after settling the affairs of those provinces with success, the senate, to commemorate my return, ordered an altar to Pax Augusta to be consecrated in the Campus Martius, at which it decreed that the magistrates, priests, and Vestal Virgins should celebrate an anniversary sacrifice.

 

Whereas our ancestors have willed that the gateway of Janus Quininus should be shut, whenever victorious peace is secured by sea and by land throughout the empire of the Roman people, and whereas before my birth twice only in all is it on record that the gateway has been shut, three times under my principate has the Senate decreed that it should be shut.

 

After my victory I replaced in the temples of all the communities of the province of Asia the ornaments which my adversary [i.e. Mark Antony] in the war had, after despoiling the temples, taken into his own possession.

The whole of Italy of its own free will took the oath of fidelity to me, and demanded me as its leader in the war of which Actium was the crowning victory. An oath was also taken to the same effect by the provinces of Gaul, Spain, Africa, Sicily, and Sardinia.

I extended the frontiers of all the provinces of the Roman people, which had as neighbors races not obedient to our empire. I restored peace to all the provinces of Gaul and Spain and to Germany, to all that region washed by the Ocean from Gades to the mouth of the Elbe.

 

Peace too I caused to be established in the Alps from the region nearest to the Hadriatic as far as the Tuscan sea, while no tribe was wantonly attacked by war.”

In my sixth and seventh consulships, after I had extinguished the civil wars, having been put in supreme possession of the whole empire by the universal consent of all, I transferred the republic from my own power into the free control of the Senate and Roman people.” 

 

For the which service I received the appellation of Augustus by decree of the Senate, and the door-posts of my house were publicly decked with laurel leaves; the civic crown was fixed up above my gate, and a golden shield set up in the Julian senate-house, which, as its inscription testifies, was granted to me by the Senate and Roman people to commemorate my virtue, clemency, justice, and piety.” 

The Roman Gospel ... Virtue, Clemency, Justice, and Piety.  Roma did not have a self image problem.  Now contrast that with Revelation 17's "unveiling" of the true Rome.  Here is a direct challenge to the Roman Gospel from the Christian Gospel.

I have some lingering questions that may be helpfully answered in the next volume of Dr. Oster's commentary.  I agree that the Christophany is the controlling image of Jesus for the churches.  I also agree that this image is one that might even justly called frightening  (it did John). But this frightening Jesus tells John "do not be afraid" (1.17).  Some how the awe inspiring (indeed frightening) Christophany (like the theophanies in the Hebrew Scriptures, cf. Hab 3) are intertwined with the assurance that Jesus is still on our side.  Perhaps in a future volume Dr Oster can add some material on this point.  Related to this is the emphasis on Royal-Davidic Christology and its relation to the Lamb Christology.  What is it? There is, in my view, no doubt that the Lamb is very much woven into the structure of the Rev 5-22.  How can we affirm both? How are they interrelated? Does one interpret the other? The next volume will likely address this issue.

One last Reflection, and none of these are real criticisms but more like my wishes, has a missional thrust.  Much of the book of Revelation is anti-assimilationist and Dr. Oster brings this out forcefully at times. What might resisting the intoxicating culture look like today? John himself uses cultural idioms to convey his message of resisting the culture.  Is resistance limited to morality and meat sacrificed to idols? Probably not.  Is resistance based upon the pagan nature of the culture? Daniel is a very anti-assimilationist document as well yet the hero and his compatriots "seek the welfare of the city" to use Jeremiah's words.  So I would have really profited from a mini-theology of cultural resistance from Revelation (another Appendix!!). We are culturally enmeshed and sometimes it may be difficult for American Christians to know when their Americanism ends and their Christianity begins and sometimes we baptize the former and forget the latter.  So some guidance from a genuine NT scholar could prove helpful.  Books like Richard Horsley's Jesus and Empire: The Kingdom of God and the New World Disorder offer some challenging guidance but Horsley does not interact with Revelation even once.

Seven Congregations in a Roman Crucible should be required reading for anyone studying that book and even late first century Christianity in general.  You will have a much firmer grasp on the realities of early Christianity and its struggles and thus also on our own. Dr. Oster succeeds in bringing us within "understanding distance" of John's audible vision.

 

Well I think I have probably worn out my welcome so I will bring these Stoned-Campbell musings to an end. Tolle Lege & Shalom. 

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