Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, Vol 56, No. 3

The reader should be warned that there was an error by the printer, so that the cover is actually from the preceding issue (Vol. 56, No. 2).

Article 1: Two Testaments in Parallel: The Influence of the Old Testament on the Structure of the New Testament Canon, Gregory Goswell. This article examines the idea, currently under discussion, that the organization of the Old Testament canon influenced that of the NT canon. He discusses both the possible influence of the Septuagint arrangement (similar to our OT book order) and that of the Hebrew OT (Law-Prophets-Writings). He suggests that either one may have had influence. He then gives examples of ways that influence may affect the way we read the NT. It struck me as similar to the discussions of the organizational principles of the Book of Psalms—a lot of discussion, but very little significant result.

Article 2: Recent Archaeological Discoveries that Lend Credence to the Historicity of the Scriptures, Michael Grisanti. Current debates in Near Eastern archaeology seem to focus on whether the OT is at all a reliable guide to what really happened, and what archaeology can really tell us. Grisanti summarizes some key recent findings that lend support to the truthfulness of the OT’s presentation. It makes a nice addition to Yamauchi’s classic work, The Stones and the Scriptures.

Article 3: Presuppositions and Harmonization: Luke 23:47 as a Test Case, Vern Poythress. Poythress does not reach a conclusion regarding Luke 23:47 and its parallels in Matthew and Mark. But he does set out the way our presuppositions and assumptions will affect the way we harmonize, or whether we even think it is proper to harmonize. It certainly is an essay that creates an interest in his book Inerrancy and the Gospels.

Article 4: “On the Third Day”: The Time Frame of Jesus’ Death and Resurrection, Martin Pickup. This is the most helpful thing I have read on the subject regarding the issue springing from 1 Corinthians 15:4 and related passages. Pickup argues that the importance of the third day relates to the contemporary notion that bodily corruption of the dead began on the fourth day after death (that is, when the results of the corruption began to be evident). Hence Jesus’ resurrection on the third day is confirmation that he did not see corruption, and that he was truly raised bodily from the dead. The non-specialist reader might be surprised by how many NT scholars disavow the idea of Jesus’ bodily resurrection. Highly recommended.

Article 5: 1 Timothy 2:13-15: Paul’s Retelling of Genesis 2:4-4:1, Andrew B. Spurgeon. This article suggests that the reason 1 Tim 2:15 has been such a problem is that interpreters fail to recognize that Paul does not stop dealing with Adam and Eve at the end of verse 14, but that verse 15 refers to the restoration of the relationship of Adam and Eve and its fulfillment in the birth of the first child. I’m not convinced, but it is an interesting argument.

Article 6: Healing in the Pauline Epistles: Why the Silence?, Eliezer Gonzalez. In NT studies there is a fair amount of debate about the relationship between Acts and the Pauline epistles, especially with regard to Paul’s working of miracles. This article explores the issue and concludes that there is no real issue.

Article 7-8: A short debate between Stanley E. Porter and Verlyn Verbrugge about the use of the Greek negative construction ou monon in Romans 5:3 and whether the “we have” in Romans 5:1 ought to be indicative or subjunctive. For Greek grammar junkies only.

Book Reviews: About 75 pages worth. Apparently no one writes a bad book these days, because they are all recommended.

Translation Commentary: Jeremiah 12:9

The NKJV translates the first part of the verse as: My heritage is to Me like a speckled vulture. The ESV renders it: Is my heritage to me like a hyena's lair? (Jer 12:9 ESV). Other translations are similar to one or the other. There are two issues here. First, is it “speckled vulture” or “hyena’s lair”? Second, is it a question or a statement?

As for the first question, the NKJV, perhaps, follows the Hebrew text more closely. The first word in Hebrew (ha’ayit) is certainly vulture or bird of prey. It is attested in a number of other passages, for example, Gen 15:11, Is 18:6, Ezek 39:4. The following word (tsabua’), which modifies “bird of prey,” occurs only here in the Old Testament. It may mean “speckled” or “spotted,” coming from an Aramaic verb that means “dip” or “dye,” but which is not used in the Old Testament (this is the explanation given in the Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew lexicon). Hence, “speckled vulture” makes good sense of the Hebrew text. But the word “speckled” may in fact be another word that means “hyena.” This meaning is attested in the newer Hebrew lexicons. This possibility is strengthened by the fact that the Septuagint translates it by the standard Greek word for hyena. The first word in the verse the Septuagint translates as “cave,” though this is not the meaning of ‘ayit. It is not clear where the Septuagint translator got the idea of “cave” here. At any rate, the ESV has essentially followed the Septuagint and the Hebrew if the word tsabua’ means hyena. The NKJV has followed the Hebrew text more closely, assuming that tsabua’ means “speckled.”

The second issue is whether this line is a question or not. The first syllable of the first word is usually parsed as the interrogative particle. Hence the ESV, the Holman CSB, and the NASB translate it as a question. This particle may, however, function to introduce a rhetorical question with a presumed affirmative answer, so other translations have rendered this as a plain statement.