From Genesis 22; Hebrews 11. ANOTHER ASPECT OF BIBLICAL GENERALIZATION
From Genesis 22; Hebrews 11.
ANOTHER ASPECT OF BIBLICAL GENERALIZATION.
PART 1: THE NECESSARY.
#1. “Now it came about…that God tested Abraham…Take now your son…go to the land of Moriah…offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I will tell you”, Genesis 22:1.
#2. The textual context specifies that the patriarch immediately moved to compliance. That command of the Lord was & is a shocking proposition. Abraham began to GENERALIZE from the promises of God & the power of God.
#3. “By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was offering up his only begotten son; it was he to whom it was said, ‘In Isaac your descendants shall be called’. He considered that God is able to raise people even from the dead, from which he also received him back as a type”, Hebrews 11:17-19.
#4. Abraham reasoned by generalization from the words of God that a resurrection of Isaac had to happen.
#5. His finding in that matter was surprising. THERE WAS NOTHING LOGICAL IN THAT GENERALIZATION. DEAD PEOPLE DO NOT COME BACK FROM THE GRAVE. STILL ABRAHAM BELIEVED IT WOULD HAPPEN. WHY? BECAUSE, THOUGH IT WAS NOT LOGICAL, IT WAS NECESSARY!
#6. The term “NECESSARY”, we use in a special APODEICTIC sense. It means that it could be in no other way.
#7. Therefore, it turns out that generalizations from the Scripture are not logical but necessary! Biblical generalization, in fact, defies human logic, and forces the believer to conclusions that contradict all human logical experience.
#8. This is Abrahamic Faith! This kind of faith is not logical in the world of personal experience. It goes beyond human logic to the level of revealed necessity.
#9. The move away from rationalized understanding, away from logical conclusions–>to NECESSARY CONCLUSIONS is part of the test of faith.
From Genesis 22; Hebrews 11:17-19.
ANOTHER ASPECT OF BIBLICAL GENERALIZATION.
PART 2: THE NECESSARY.
#1. Every finding of scripture is NECESSARY, wether it agrees with human reason or not.
#2. Generalization is the result of a causal continuum: The continuum begins with (a)REVELATION, the words of God. Having received the command of the Almighty to sacrifice Isaac, Abraham turned to the promise of God to make from him a great nation. There was no natural explanation for how that could happen.
#3. “By faith even Sarah herself received ability to conceive, even beyond the proper time of life, since she considered Him faithful who had promised. Therefore there was born even of one man, and him as good as dead at that, as many descendants as the stars of heaven in number, and innumerable as the sand which is by the seashore”, Hebrews 11:11, 12.
#4. There was nothing humanly logical about any of that. From the language of promise–>(b)TO THE GRAMMAR FUNCTION. Abraham & Sarah turned to revelation to determine the rules for thought, speech & behavior (that is the grammar, the rules). The promises of God supplied rules for understanding time & circumstances. The rule was that the representations of God overrule human wisdom, human lived experience & all demands of nature. Those effects were all inherent in the wording of the promises.–>(c)these revealed rules, then next, came to bear upon NATURE & HUMAN EXPERIENCE. People depleted by age do not have children in their dotage. Barren women do not conceive children in that circumstance. (d)–>A GENERALIZATION emerged from this continuum: THERE WOULD HAVE TO BE A RESURRECTION OF ISAAC FROM THE DEAD!
#5. That idea was not promised to Abraham. It was not logical given the manner of circumstance. But it was NECESSARY! INDICATED BY THE CAUSAL CONTINUUM. And it is that that makes every generalization NECESSARY!
#6. Generalizations from the Scripture are not obligated to nature, human experience nor human wisdom; nor do generalizations directly affect the material world! But they do affect God & it is He who forces circumstance!
#7. Abrahamic faith does not directly alter human conditions; but it is NECESSARY!
From Genesis 22; Hebrews 11:17-19.
ANOTHER ASPECT OF BIBLICAL GENERALIZATION.
PART 3: A SHARED MENTAL STATE WITH GOD.
#1. No biblical generalization is reasonable by experiential standards. No biblical generalization is obligated to nature nor to any human historical condition. No biblical generalization is indebted to human logic.
#2. Abraham had, unquestionably, generalized from the revelation he received from the Lord–>to an expected, anticipated resurrection of Isaac, Hebrews 11:17-19.
#3. This means that that generalization made no sense in the human environment! Yet Abraham derived the RESURRECTION GENERALIZATION from the revealed language manifold & more than that, BELIEVED IN IT! That generalization was a NECESSARY GENERALIZATION!
#4. Question: What was the justification for that NECESSARY BELIEF? The answer to the question reveals something arresting about the nature of the word of God, revelation, the Bible.
#5. The answer: Abraham believed in the NECESSARY GENERALIZATION because he grasped the fact that that was the idea that the Almighty wanted him to have.
#6. Extrapolated, it means that with any BIBLICAL NECESSARY GENERALIZATION, there is A SHARED MENTAL STATE WITH GOD!
#7. Impinging upon the state of HUMAN CONSCIOUSNESS, the Lord wanted Abraham to trust in a way of thinking that was “unworkable” in the material universe.
#8. Human consciousness, the human mind can be directly affected by the phenomenon of revealed truth! Scripture changes the rules of thought.
#9. The human mind, individually, is created by God to be lifted above unaided human reason & above human lived experience. That act of elevation of revealed ideas is called BELIEF! The idea is a shared condition between the Lord & the individual believer.
#10. Abrahamic Faith (Book of Galatians) is a supernatural means of reasoning. It is THE NECESSARY WAY OF THINKING about all things eternal & temporal!
From Genesis 22; Hebrews 11:17-19.
ANOTHER ASPECT OF BIBLICAL GENERALIZATION.
PART 4: NECESSARY REASONING: CORRECTIVE TO LOGICAL REDUCTIONISM.
#1. One cannot reason about the word of God, the Bible from the foundation of nature & the experience of nature.
#2. Human reason must yield to a much higher perspective. Development of NECESSARY REASONING is immediately contradictory to human wisdom.
#3. Human wisdom & its extension into science formulations, tends to reductionism. This is an expression of rationalism. Falling prey to rationalism, is the word of God, the Bible.
#4. But NECESSARY REASONING is the immediate solution to a rationalized understanding of the Bible. Heresy according naturalism, NECESSARY REASONING invokes a revealed meaning regarding time, history & materiality. Abraham & Sarai (Genesis 16) initially chose REDUCTIONISM over NECESSARY UNDERSTANDING of their material conditions. Hence the supposed Hagar solution.
#5. That kind of thinking can be the source of hopelessness, panic & unnecessary fear.
#6. More importantly, however, the turn away from NECESSARY MEANING is a loss of revealed meaning!
#7. Among other corrections, the Bible is not to be grasped as stack of doctrines nor as a mere reflection of the past (history).
#8. Yet another generalization is that all human behavior is rooted in spiritual conditions, of whatever nature, even wars. Abraham, convicted of revealed truth, consciously adjusted his behavior to NECESSARY BEHAVIOR.
#9. And NECESSARY BEHAVIOR makes no sense in a universe reduced to material determinacy. There is LOGICAL BEHAVIOR & THERE IS NECESSARY BEHAVIOR.
#10. At Kadesh Barnea (Numbers 13, 14) the Israelites resorted to LOGICAL BEHAVIOR & turned back on the day of battle. Faithless.
#11. But Abraham, faced with a distressing absolute command to “offer up” Isaac, in faith, staked everything upon THE WORD OF GOD, NECESSARY CONCLUSIONS & NECESSARY BEHAVIOR!
From Genesis 22; Hebrews 11:17-19.
ANOTHER ASPECT OF BIBLICAL GENERALIZATION.
PART 5: THE BIBLE: THE ANTI-RATIONALISM.
#1. Abraham, commanded to sacrifice Isaac, did not turn to what is now called CRITICAL REASONING, PROBLEM SOLVING, INDUCTIVE/DEDUCTIVE REASONING.
#2. Instead the patriarch turned to unqualified belief in God. “He concluded that God is able to raise people even from the dead, from which he also received Him back as a type”, Hebrews 11:19.
#3. It is impossible, in the wording of the text, to distinguish between true faith in God & what we may call NECESSARY REASONING. The biblical definitions of both are identical.
#4. This revealed form of thinking is tied inextricably to the word of God & the power of God. NECESSARY REASONING does not avoid the crisis, the trial, the tribulation. It does not resolve the circumstance, as in offer a way out. It does not defeat the trouble.
#5. Quite the opposite, NECESSARY REASONING forces the trial, defies the tribulation, plunges the historical actor into the cauldron.
#6. NECESSARY REASONING does not explore the nature of historical conditions at issue. In fact it moves its user away from the natural aspects all together.
#7. Rather, it reviews the revealed indicators of the reality of God. The reasoning of the user is drawn outside of & beyond the immediate sensory awareness of the circumstance.
#8. Abraham came to the NECESSARY CONCLUSION that the trial rested upon one factor alone. Which is, does God raise the dead? The patriarch was not promised any stipulated outcome. Still he believed that God would raise up Isaac.
#9. “…from which he also received him back as a type”. The “type” became a concretized example of the relation of the Almighty to time & materiality. This is not hypothetical nor theory, it is a type. And that makes it material fact & a symbol!
#10. Such a type reaches beyond the immediate to the invisible causal & determinant power of God. NECESSARY REASONING is only concerned with the relation of God to time.
#11. It will take the fortitude of Abraham to believe it & apply it! NECESSARY REASONING is not of this world!
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