From my twitter @Riddle1689:
My Dad was a Minister. He passed away over 20 years ago with cancer, still able to preach within a couple weeks of his death. I have a small Bible of his I often use for pastoral visits. He rarely wrote in his Bibles, but Habakkuk has some underlinings and notes.
I was preaching last Sunday afternoon in Habakkuk 3 (great text for the first Lord's Day of the New Year) and thought Dad left a pretty good (alliterative) outline for it in his Bible:
III. Praises.
JTR
Good day brother Jeff Riddle,
ReplyDeleteIt's me: Andrej from Germany, Bremen.
I don't even know where to post this, so I just took it the newest post.
I have an important question that is bothering me at the moment regarding the Textus Receptus.
One particular Bible passage has been giving me a headache for days, and I am trying to interpret it correctly.
It is the Bible passage Acts 9:20-22.
This is what it says in the KJV/TR:
9:20 And straightway he preached CHRIST in the synagogues, that HE is the SON OF GOD.
9:21 But all that heard him were amazed, and said; Is not this he that destroyed them which called on this name in Jerusalem, and came hither for that intent, that he might bring them bound unto the chief priests?
9:22 But Saul increased the more in strength, and confounded the Jews which dwelt at Damascus, proving that THIS is very Christ.
Now here is the question I am asking myself:
Verse 20: It is clear and evident that the CHRIST = SON OF GOD. Isn't that how the Jews always understood it?
Verse 22: proving that this is very Christ. THIS = CHRIST of verse 20.
So the statement is differently formulated = proving that Christ is very Christ.
I have read various commentaries on this (German and English) and many think that "9:20 And straightway he preached JESUS in the synagogues, that he is the Son of God."
would be the better reading and variant.
Is it an "error" or meaningless according to TR's reading?
What is the best way to interpret or explain this?
I would look forward to an answer!
Thank you and God's blessing in Christ Jesus
In response to Andrej, I don't think this reading would be an affront or an offense, unless one thinks that "preaching Christ" does not involve also saying that He is Jesus (of Nazareth). This is an interesting variant nonetheless and it's interesting to see what people say about it -- (for instance Dr Wilbur Pickering in the F35 edition he edited.) And as for Acts 9:22, the more immediate antecedent for "this" seems to be the "name" in verse 21. I think that the presence of this word (ὄνομα) in Acts 9:21 implies that Saul in this passage mentioned Jesus' name.
ReplyDeleteNow if one takes the Son of God to be divine (and this was a controversy that many thought to be blasphemous in that time: see John 10:33-36, John 5:18) and to be equal to God, then Saul/Paul had two tasks - as rightly pointed out, I think, in Ellicott's commentary (c. 1878) on this same passage. The first task being to show that the Son of David was indeed the very Son of God (If David then call him Lord, how is he his son? - Matthew 22:45) and then also that, "there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved," namely, that this is the very Christ. The Messiah is associated with salvation, so the "name" (Acts 9:21) of Jesus had to be associated with Christ, in addition to the Son of David being shown to be the Son of God (Matthew 22:42-45, and so on). At least that's my understanding of this passage and how I take it.