Episode Transcript
Carey Griffel: Welcome to Genesis Marks the Spot, where we raid the ivory tower of biblical theology without ransacking our faith. My name is Carey Griffel, and today we are gonna talk about kind of a different topic, but it touches on a good number of things we've talked about recently. I would summarize this topic as inheritance through judgment.
[00:00:32] So we're gonna talk about a few different and almost seemingly unrelated things, but I hope that you will see that the biblical narrative really weaves all of these things together. Now, that is not to say that when we talk about one text today that it is necessarily echoing purposefully another text, because in biblical study, we can look at a couple of different ways that the text interacts with itself and how different authors will either intentionally or unintentionally have crossover and various patterns that repeat. If you're studying the Bible narratively, you will sometimes hear things like cross-referencing or echoes or allusions or patterns and themes, and I don't always make a whole big deal out of the difference between an echo and an allusion and a direct reference and things like that.
[00:01:37] So a direct callback to a previous text might be something like using a same phrase. We might think that an author of a later text is drawing intentionally upon an earlier text. And that is more strong when we know that the people of the time actually had those texts in mind and in hand. We kind of presume that that is the case, but it might not historically be the case in the Old Testament.
[00:02:07] It is pretty solidly the case in the New Testament that they did have all of the texts that we know of as the Old Testament. But within the Old Testament corpus, we can't necessarily know what texts a particular author had in mind and in hand exactly. So we do have to hold a little bit of this loosely. You know, a lot of people talk about intertextuality as if the human writers of the text know exactly what they're doing and exactly what they're referencing all the time. And I think a lot of times we can say that, especially if the prophets are referencing the Torah. I think it would be pretty hard to suggest that they did not have the Torah, but the question could be, what form of the Torah did they have? Did they have every single word that we have today? And that's a little bit harder to prove, especially if they're only quoting from one part of it. So when we're studying the text in a narrative fashion, at least I think we ought to be pretty careful in saying that one author is by necessity drawing upon another author.
[00:03:18] But what I think is not really very controversial is that there are patterns in Scripture, and those patterns show up in various ways, sometimes as direct allusions, sometimes simply because history itself repeats patterns.
[00:03:36] I honestly did not expect the thread to come out from today's episode when I was doing the studying that I was doing, because I was trying to determine whether I should do an episode exploring cave imagery in more depth, or if I should go into the topic of the city of refuge and sanctuary asylum. Those are two different things, even though they're kind of thematically related, at least sometimes. But I found a whole lot more interesting connections than I expected to find.
[00:04:11] And what was interesting to me as I was looking at all of these patterns and all of these texts together, it seems to me like there's kind of two layers to them. They are related, but they show up in different contexts. One of those layers is the context of sacred space, holiness, or legal contexts. So that's kind of where we have the city of refuge idea or the sanctuary asylum idea. But then there's another layer, and that is the earth or biological imagery. So here we have caves and other imagery that are similar to caves, and we have other biological imagery that is kind of rooted in the nature of the world. Specifically, I'm talking about seed and planting and growing agricultural crops.
[00:05:08] So we have this sacred legal level, and then we have an earth biological level, and those two things have kind of very particularly contextual, deep meaning and patterns in Scripture. And so they're kind of different, but they're also kind of the same. And I found that really quite fascinating as I was looking at the city of refuge idea and as I was reading Isaiah together.
[00:05:36] So today I'm kind of just gonna go through some of the things I was noticing, and some of this is drawn upon various scholarship and papers I was reading here and there as well, and commentaries and things like that. But some of this is just kind of me pulling these two threads together and meditating on it.
[00:05:58] The city of refuge is something that is very fascinating. It preserves life, but it is not life in the land as it was meant to be. So it's kind of like a little mini exile that exists while the current high priest is alive. And we'll talk more detail about that. So if you're not familiar with the story, don't worry, we'll get into that.
[00:06:22] But particularly, there's a change of state somehow with the death of the high priest, and the exile of the person who unintentionally killed somebody ends, and they're able to go back to their particular inheritance. Now, the judgment of the person who lives in the city of refuge is obviously not the same as the judgment for a high-handed sin or a murder. So we've got some linked application and typology here with things like the exile and high-handed sin. But importantly, I want to acknowledge from the outset that the context of the person who lives in the city of refuge doesn't have any context of repentance, nor does it have the context of full innocence completely. The manslaughter is not a case of righteousness. So the connection to the righteous remnant that passes through judgment in the exile or the wicked who turns back to God, none of those pictures is explicitly here in the city of refuge imagery.
[00:07:29] Or rather, in Numbers 35, it is an accidental circumstance where the person is kind of trapped. There is a judgment, but keep in mind that judgment doesn't just mean completely guilty. It's not a binary of innocence and guilty. Judgment is a ruling that entails a certain state or result that is declared by whatever authoritative power. So a judgment can provide a negative or a punitive result, it can provide a positive result, or it can provide something in between. So for the person in the judgment of manslaughter, the judgment resulted in preservation of their life, but also temporary loss of their land and inheritance and possession.
[00:08:21] So it's a fascinating but very much incomplete picture of the exile, and of many other things where there is a judgment or circumstance which results in some sort of a loss, that there is a hoped-for return or resolution or restoration. And that is the pattern I'm kind of looking at. And as such, this particular circumstance seems related to having or owning a burden that the person cannot pay off.
[00:08:58] The burden of blood guilt, although it's not specifically blood guilt, because blood guilt would be murder, technically. But there is a burden created via the loss of blood or life. The blood pollutes the land. And in a murder situation, atonement is met by the murderer's death. And this context is mentioned in Numbers 35. And so some people will think that the high priest's death is what makes atonement.
[00:09:30] I think that is stating the case a little bit too carefully, but the burden remains. The avenger of blood or the redeemer is owed the blood, but a protective status or a refuge is given.
[00:09:45] As I was looking at this, the concept seems to belong to a path of movement that is common in Scripture. First, there is blessing, there is life, there is belonging, there is inheritance, and then something disrupts that. There is sin, there is judgment, there is death, and the life or inheritance is lost. And that could be very problematic, especially for the fact that God has promised certain things, and God is faithful. The life or the inheritance is not dependent on humans maintaining those things. Sometimes those things are lost. God's promises to mankind, however, are not lost because He will preserve the seed, not just so that life continues, but so that life is propagated fully, and that which seems to have been lost is actually preserved.
[00:10:46] I really was not tracking or expecting seed imagery to be part of the idea of refuge, although I really should have, because we see the seed, the preservation, the refuge, and certainly the womb, the earth, the tomb concept in Jesus' death and resurrection, which is the ultimate thing of refuge, right? But I really should have seen the connection with seed and refuge as well in the flood, quite easily, because seed is in the ark. I also think it exists long before that in Genesis 3, where seed is in childbearing and the war between the woman, not the man, and the serpent. So in Genesis 3, we have all of these things wrapped up already in proto form.
[00:11:38] Judgment continually holds the promise of the flourishing or the growth or the multiplication of that promise, even if it is halted for a time. And it also contains the promise of the eradication of evil and wickedness. So you see, this is kind of a meta-level image of the patterns going on throughout Scripture. And we see it over and over again in various contexts. This is why I want to be very careful in saying that we should not overclaim or overstate any particular type of intertextuality or authors intentionally alluding to other authors and so on.
[00:12:21] But okay, let's actually dig into this text in Numbers 35. I think the context here is that a person can be alive, they can be protected, but they can be legally unable to go home and to have their inheritance. That inheritance isn't gone, but they cannot live in it. And so part of the question for today is what exactly has that refuge preserved, and why? What is the ultimate goal?
[00:12:53] And then we can open the doors to the rest of Scripture, especially when we're looking at the prophets, at the exile, the future coming of Christ. We have a remnant that still exists. And in many of the prophetic imagery, we have the idea of desolate cities. Now, were the cities of Israel actually desolate and nobody lived in them? Historically, certainly not. But the picture is very strongly there.
[00:13:24] The question as we're going through the flood narrative and as we're talking about the idea of refuge, it's not just who survives, but it is also the wider question of how does preserved but inaccessible futurity or inheritance or growth become the actual thing that plays out in history? How do we get from judgment into flourishing, growing, multiplying life?
[00:13:58] Now, not really a major point for the episode today, but one I do want to bring up because I think this can possibly help to clarify why biblical judgment can be genuinely penal without penal being the idea that we often have in our minds when we're picturing that, right? The idea of penal judgment, or of course, penal substitutionary atonement, is the idea that there has been harm that's been done. And that harm results in a burden. That burden must be satisfied.
[00:14:38] That is a very particular view of what penal means. And I don't tend to use the word penal because I think that when people use that word, then we are loading up our brains with a whole lot of ideas that may not be there. That's why I tend to prefer words like judgment or even wrath, because it's gonna get out of our mental picture of penal retribution as being some kind of a tit for tat, and more into the idea of judgment being a more complex reality. But that doesn't mean I will not affirm penal settings in Scripture or the context, because we have a heck of a lot of places of judgment. And that is very concrete, and it really does play out in history and in the world, in reality at large. We have death, we have exile, we have bondage, subjugation, and disinheritance. So much of that is, quote-unquote, penal. Okay? So none of the atonement conversation should ever sideline the fact that we do have this element here. Okay.
[00:15:58] But what does it mean to get through the judgment, and what is the actual promise about? What is the core of the thing? And that is where we're gonna bring in Numbers 35.
[00:16:12] All right, so we are only looking at the city of refuge passage in Numbers 35, and it starts in verse 6. But I do want you to widen your view into the book and look at the fact that this context is fully seated within the idea of inheritance. Numbers 35, verses 25 through 28 say, quote, “And the congregation shall rescue the manslayer from the hand of the avenger of blood, and the congregation shall restore him to his city of refuge to which he had fled, and he shall live in it until the death of the high priest who was anointed with the holy oil.
[00:16:54] “But if the manslayer shall at any time go beyond the boundaries of his city of refuge to which he fled, and the avenger of blood finds him outside the boundaries of his city of refuge, and the avenger of blood kills the manslayer, he shall not be guilty of blood. For he must remain in his city of refuge until the death of the high priest. But after the death of the high priest, the manslayer may return to the land of his possession.” End quote. I also want to mention that verses 31 and 32 say that no ransom can be made for a murderer or anyone who goes into the city of refuge for slaying somebody accidentally.
[00:17:41] All right, so let's look at the manslayer's particular status. And I'm, again, I'm not gonna read the whole section here, so I'm just gonna draw out a few particular points. The congregation, whatever that means in the circumstance here, has distinguished this case from intentional murder. So somebody could go to the city of refuge prior to the determination of the congregation. But if the congregation or the assembly has determined that it is not an intentional murder, then the manslayer is supposed to stay in the city of refuge. He is not sentenced to die as a murderer. He is nevertheless not simply released to resume ordinary life. He has to stay in the city of refuge. The city of refuge is one of the Levites' cities, so this is within the Levite inheritance. His life is preserved while his freedom of movement and access to his home remain restricted. And so the refuge provides explicitly protection from the blood avenger.
[00:18:52] Now, who is this avenger of blood in Numbers 35? It's a very interesting term, and it's pretty solidly established that this is a close relative of the deceased who fulfills the role of executing justice against a murderer. The Hebrew term underlying this is goel, and that word can mean redeemer, avenger, or near relative.
[00:19:21] This is a context that is not something we natively understand, okay? This is very culturally embedded. So if you know the term kinsman-redeemer, we have the same term here. The avenger or redeemer of blood was typically, again, understood as a family member who looked out for his family's interests, and part of the problem here might be that he is going to act in rage following the death of his loved one.
[00:19:52] But the legal framework here distinguishes carefully between intentional and unintentional killing, and it is not really about motive per se. So this does not directly map onto our system today. We have a lot more complication today. But here, when a person was convicted of deliberate murder on the testimony of two or three witnesses, then the avenger of blood served as the executioner. However, in cases of accidental manslaughter, the accused could flee to one of these six cities of refuge, where the assembly, probably of that city, would judge the case and provide protection from the avenger. This protection was necessary because the avenger might seek revenge without distinguishing between accidental and intentional death.
[00:20:51] But also there's this really strange little piece here because once the high priest dies, the manslayer is authorized to go back home. And you'd think, well, doesn't that mean that maybe the avenger of blood would still be angry and would kill the manslayer anyway? But there is like this boundary line here where, before the high priest dies, if the avenger of blood enters the city of refuge to seek vengeance and kill the manslayer, then the avenger of blood would himself be guilty of murder. If the manslayer, however, just wanders out of the city of refuge and is found by the avenger of blood, then the avenger of blood is fully within his right to actually kill the manslayer.
[00:21:44] So personally, I'm not super satisfied with the idea that this is mostly about rage and vengeance. Because the law could just say, “Look, if he's been declared as a manslayer instead of a murderer, then no matter where this guy is found, the avenger of blood would be found to be a murderer.” But that's really not what's going on. So this is a passage with a lot of strange details and a lot of questions.
[00:22:08] I wanna talk a little bit more about this word avenger. Because for us, depending on our translation, this gets really complicated really quickly, especially because we are reading the Old Testament in light of the New Testament, as well we should. But we come to a word like redeemer, and we presume that that word must by necessity refer to Jesus. I'm not saying that it doesn't point to Jesus in particular passages, even in the Old Testament, because I think it does. But this word, goel, can quite easily just refer to a human.
[00:22:58] Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary tells us that the Hebrew goel is, quote, “Derived from the verb ga'al, restored, a synonym for redeemed or ransomed. A synonym for some other words that are translated redeemed, ransomed, or interceded legally in one's behalf.
[00:23:22] “Indeed, as awkward as it sounds in English, the redundancy ‘returns its restoration’ succinctly demonstrates that gaal primarily means restored to an original state. A goel, therefore, was one who affected restoration to an original, sometimes ideal state. Such a restorer, usually a close relative like in Ruth 3, verse 12, was expected to regain land sold by a family member. We see that in Leviticus 25, Jeremiah 32, and Ruth 4, and to redeem a relative from slavery.
[00:23:56] “The blood avenger was literally taker back of the blood, that is, a redeemer with a specialized function. The killing of one clan member was construed by the remaining members not only as a shedding of the group's blood, but as misappropriation of blood which properly belonged to the entire group. The responsibility of the blood avenger was to win back that misappropriated blood by killing the original blood shedder. Although blood vengeance for a relative slain in battle was not justified, return of other blood was required by the clan, or by the agent acting on its behalf, even when both slayer and victim were clan members.
[00:24:52] “It appears that the rise of the monarchy limited blood vengeance in that the king could, in effect, pardon the slayer by restraining the avenger of blood. The notion that a killer was guilty of misappropriating his victim's blood, which was to be returned, if not to the victim personally, then to his kin through the killer's death, was known in the ancient Near East outside of Israel.
[00:25:19] “The 8th century Aramaic royal treaty from Sefire requires that the blood be rescued from the hand of the enemies responsible for the king's assassination. The same notion of misappropriation explains why in Mesopotamia, master of the blood in the Neo-Assyrian period referred both to the killer and to the kinsmen of his victim. The manslayer who had taken the blood had unlawfully become its master. It was the deceased's relative who was bound to reclaim that same blood. It is of interest that although God avenges or rescues blood in Deuteronomy 32, verse 43, 2 Kings 9, verse 7, and requires of those who shed it wrongly, Genesis 9 and elsewhere, he is never referred to as goel ha-dam, or the avenger of blood.” End quote.
[00:26:20] All right, so lots of really interesting context about redeemer and things like that, things that we will certainly be talking about more because I wanna talk about ransom, and I wanna talk about jubilee and all of these really interesting connective ideas. But going back to the manslayer and the city of refuge, the protection is geographically bounded, and if he crosses the city's boundary before that high priest dies, then the avenger may in fact kill him without incurring blood guilt.
[00:26:55] Again, this is something we can't fully understand because it's not explained fully. But clearly, refuge here does not make the danger disappear. But it does provide a place where life can be sustained.
[00:27:11] So let's talk about the high priest's death that changes the condition here. There's a before and there's an after, and some of this is very explicit, and there's a lot of commentary and ideas that we kind of just have to guess at because there are things in here that are not explicit that we wonder about.
[00:27:32] So what is very clear, before the high priest's death, the manslayer must remain in the city of refuge. Crossing the boundary exposes him to the blood avenger. He may not purchase an early return to his land, and his possession remains inaccessible to him. After the high priest's death, he may leave the refuge, he may return to his land, and the text again identifies that land as his possession. The same person moves from protected displacement to permitted return. This is not explicitly in the text, but what seems very clear is that the inheritance has not newly come into existence when he leaves, but access to it has been reopened.
[00:28:22] There is a threshold here. The release isn't tied to a fixed number of years. It's not tied to the manslayer proving that he's suffered enough. It is not tied to the blood avenger deciding to forgive him. It is not tied to a payment. It is tied to the death of the high priest. Now, what the high priest has to do with anything is not explicitly stated, but his death is that moment that turns the coin here.
[00:28:54] So the death definitely has a judicially consequential function. It changes what the law permits the manslayer to do, as well as what the law permits the avenger of blood to do. It changes access to the land of possession or inheritance, and so it belongs inside a legal and inheritance restoration sequence.
[00:29:18] But what we have to be clear on as well here is that Numbers 35 does not give us an explanation for a whole lot of things that we would like to see. It doesn't say that the high priest is executed or that the high priest dies in a violent way or in any particular way at all. It doesn't say the high priest is punished for the manslayer or that the high priest dies for the manslayer. It does not say that the manslayer's guilt is transferred to the high priest. It does not say the manslayer's punishment is transferred to the high priest. It does not explicitly call the priest a substitute. It doesn't explain at all why the priest's death has this legal effect.
[00:30:04] Now, of course, of course, there are a whole lot of ideas, usually a very particular one. I would dare say that in most commentaries of Numbers, what you will see explained is that the high priest's death atones. It does not actually say that in the text. Now, Numbers 35 does explicitly bring out the context of blood polluting the land, but it doesn't explicitly say that the death of the high priest is what atones for it. What Numbers 35 says is that the death of a murderer is the only thing that will atone. So we just have a lot of silence here and a whole lot of non-explanation in the actual text.
[00:30:54] But the commentaries will presume that what's going on is atonement and substitution in some form, and so on. And of course they do that because they're probably presuming the context of something like penal substitutionary atonement. It's not necessary from this text. There is just silence, and we have to kind of let that be silent. But I will give you a list of common explanations for why the high priest's death might release the manslayer.
[00:31:28] Again, the first explanation is tied to atonement, and this is usually a PSA type of atonement, but it might just be land purgation in general, or what we might term as expiation, because again, the end of Numbers 35 does say that bloodshed pollutes the land. And then we have some sort of connection with the high priest's death maybe resolving it. It doesn't really explicitly say that either. It just says that the high priest's death allows the manslayer to go back to his land.
[00:32:05] And note that Numbers 35:33–34 is separated in the text from the direct consequence of the manslayer and the high priest, okay? So just because they are nearby each other in the text doesn't mean that Numbers 35:33–34 gives an explanation for why the high priest's death does something. In other words, I'm saying that it does not explicitly say that the death of the high priest provides expiation. That must be inferred in the text.
[00:32:42] Okay, a related idea here is that there is a representative expiation. The high priest may represent Israel or the manslayer in some way, either as a substitute or not. But in either case, in this idea, his death carries representative atoning significance. We have later rabbinic interpretation that supports that kind of a thing, but Numbers itself never explains it.
[00:33:12] All right, a third idea. The high priest's death may mark the end of an old legal condition and allow release, somewhat like a public amnesty. This explains why the event is objective and non-negotiable, but it mostly describes what happens rather than why the priest's death causes it. Like, okay, yes, clearly there is an amnesty or a legal reset, but it doesn't explain anything about it. It just kind of states what the text states. Okay, great.
[00:33:47] A fourth idea that is kind of related to that as well is the idea of the jubilee. The death functions like a fixed release boundary and abnormal alienation ends, and the manslayer returns to his possession. This fits the Leviticus 25 context of a return to possession, but it still doesn't explain why the high priest's death is the trigger. Because usually what we see in the context of a jubilee is not the death of somebody, but the ascension of somebody. We really have to notice that it is the death of the high priest and not the death and the institution of a new high priest. That would fit jubilee context a little bit more. Now, that does not mean we do not have a jubilee pattern here. But a pattern is not the same as being the thing, okay? So we do have to be, again, very careful with how we're talking about these things.
[00:34:40] All right, a fifth idea is one of social reconciliation. This comes from the rabbinic scholar Maimonides, who suggests that the high priest's death creates such widespread national mourning that the blood avenger's anger is cooled, and so now safe return becomes possible. It's kind of a practical explanation and really digs into the rage aspect of things, but it does not explain the problem of land and pollution and the fact that there's got priestly features here.
[00:35:27] Idea number six is the idea of the lost lifespan and lost labor. The manslayer's exile deprives his own household of his presence and his labor, balancing the victim family's loss. The high priest's representative death then marks the notional end of the victim's unrealized lifespan, after which the manslayer can return. So this would be the high priest representing not the manslayer, but the victim. So that explains the exile part, but it is very reconstructive and more an interpretation that is put onto the text rather than drawn out of the text. We don't have any connection of the high priest with the victim. We don't have any suggestion that the problem is lost lifespan or labor.
[00:36:22] So what we can definitively come down on is that what Numbers 35 itself makes secure is that bloodshed creates a judicial and a land problem. The manslayer lives in a protected exile. He can't buy an early return. The high priest's death is the objective boundary event that ends that condition and permits the return to his possession. We don't have an explanation as to why. And so, you know, that's kind of what we're left with. It's a very strange circumstance in a few different ways. But conceptually, I think there are maybe a few things we could say. Number one, a death can be legally consequential for someone else. Number two, a death can open return to possession for someone else. But number three, neither observation by itself proves guilt transfer, punishment transfer, or even that there is atonement being made explicitly. So Numbers 35 gives us death, altered status, release, and restored possession. And that's what it gives us. Okay.
[00:37:38] So that is the very strange circumstance of the city of refuge. Now I want to turn to the prophets, specifically Isaiah. And again, being very careful that I'm not trying to say that Isaiah is drawing upon Numbers 35 for anything in particular. Again, we are looking at patterns. And the fact that we have one particular word or even a word in a vaguely similar context doesn't mean we have the exact same thing going on.
[00:38:11] But we have some very interesting things here. Let me go ahead and read Isaiah 49, verses 7 through 9, which say, quote, “Thus says the Lord, the Redeemer of Israel and His Holy One, to one deeply despised, abhorred by the nation, the servant of rulers. Kings shall see and arise. Princes, and they shall prostrate themselves because of the Lord who is faithful, the Holy One of Israel who has chosen you.
[00:38:44] “Thus says the Lord, ‘In a time of favor, I have answered you. In a day of salvation, I have helped you. I will keep you and give you as a covenant to the people, to establish the land, to apportion the desolate heritages, saying to the prisoners, “Come out,” to those who are in darkness, “Appear.” They shall feed along the ways. On all bare heights shall be their pasture.’” End quote.
[00:39:12] Okay, so we have again this word redeemer. That is the Hebrew goel. Here it is Yahweh as goel. Again, I'm not saying there's a context of blood guilt or certainly not unintentional blood guilt or anything like that, but we have restoration to inheritance. We also have this phrase, “In a time of favor.” That probably relates to the idea of the year of jubilee.
[00:39:42] Later on in the chapter, and kind of throughout the chapter, but specifically in verses 24 through 26, we have a little bit more of the context of Yahweh as goel.
[00:39:52] All right, so in this chapter, we have a servant. Now obviously we would place this within the whole context of the book of Isaiah. But just drilling down into the chapter in particular, Yahweh answers and helps the servant in the time of favor and day of salvation. Yahweh preserves the servant. Yahweh gives the servant as a covenant to the people. The commission immediately turns toward land and inheritance. So the servant is appointed to rescue or establish the land and to cause the desolate inheritances to be inherited.
[00:40:28] So the servant's work is not limited to preserving individuals. It addresses the damaged relationship between people and inherited geography. Within the context of the city of refuge, we don't have any suggestion that there is a problem with the land. Okay, so that's kind of really the first very obvious difference between these things. But in Isaiah 49, we have the context of hiding, being shut away, being in some form of refuge, awaiting the time of this restoration.
[00:41:05] And the fact that we have desolate inheritances has not erased the identity of them as being inherited places. And so the problem is getting back to those places of inheritance, and the fact that they are desolated has been part of the judgment going on, right? So just backing up into that whole context of exile.
[00:41:29] People are told to come out. They are told to show themselves. They are confined, they are hidden, they are unable to emerge into ordinary life for a time. So this is what prompted me to connect these ideas here. The city of refuge passage is about inheritance, and so there is this preservation while maintaining an inheritance because—the preservation of the manslayer was never just about preserving his life. It was about making sure at some point he could return to his inheritance. And the reason I'm pointing that out is because, you know, we talk about life and death. We talk about these things in related forms. And I think a lot of times we miss this inheritance language.
[00:42:21] I can't speak for anybody else but myself. But traditionally, when I read Scripture and I read about roots and I read about seeds and I read about, you know, this agricultural metaphor, I'm primarily thinking about the fact that that is a picture of growth, that it will be harvested, right? And that's certainly not wrong. But the other picture we have within Scripture that is so closely associated with that is that that growth and that life happens after death, after a time of fallowness, after desolation. And I think we are supposed to see those intimately connected.
[00:43:11] When we just picture that life and that growth, and we miss how deeply it's connected to death, then we're missing half of the metaphor here. Like, there is no harvest without a time of fallowness. And what looks dead may not be. This isn't just a dualistic idea. Okay, we have life and death. But that is always seated within this idea of preservation. The very act of death or exile may be the very way into life.
[00:43:46] So we have growth, we have family, we have generations, we have continuance. This is as opposed to loss and solitude and ending. Those are the things that are associated with evil and things that will pass away. But the end, again, is inheritance, which isn't an end. It's continuation, and not just continuation, but propagation. So the attacking the firstborn in Egypt is ending the lives and the promises to the future of Egypt. Preserving and dedicating the firstborn is securing the future. So this picture of seed and root is not just a picture of farming and children, it is also a picture of nations.
[00:44:35] I don't have a whole lot of time to dig into this very deeply, but I want to point you to Isaiah 53. But I don't want you to stop at Isaiah 53. I want you to read Isaiah 53 along with Isaiah 54, because here we can see within the suffering servant narrative, the future becomes seed and geography. The servant's suffering is not just vague adversity. He is cut off from the land of the living. He is assigned a grave. Death appears to remove the servant from ordinary human futurity or continuation. A dead person does not ordinarily see descendants, does not ordinarily prolong days or carry a future forward, and yet that's the narrative that we have within the suffering servant.
[00:45:31] After the language of crushing, offering, being cut off, and burial, the servant will see seed. He will prolong his days. Yahweh's purpose will prosper through him. The song doesn't end with the sufferings or the grave. It moves from a death-shaped termination into continuing life and seed and accomplished purpose. So Isaiah 53 ends with the servant bearing sin, interceding for the transgressors. We tend to kind of just leave it at there. But then let's move into Isaiah 54, and here we have a picture of the barren woman. And she's called to shout for joy.
[00:46:17] And why? Because her condition is not merely that she has too few children, but she represents a future that has not been able to produce life. And she's called to rejoice before the explanation of how her barrenness is going to be reversed. And the reason of all of that is that the desolate woman's children will be many. Okay, so why children matter to the inheritance argument that I'm kind of trying to build here is that barrenness, whether human or the land, threatens population continuity.
[00:46:54] A promise that is attached to a people cannot become a realized future if there are no future people born or if they don't have a place to live. It's not just that one or a few people remain or survive, but they remain and they survive in order to multiply. So then we get the context of Zion enlarging the tent, stretching out the curtains, lengthening the cords, and strengthening the stakes because there is spatial response to population growth. The old habitation is no longer large enough for the restored family. It's not just death to life, it is death to seed, to children, to expanded habitation.
[00:47:41] And all of that matters when we look into the wider Scripture story. Psalm 82 even, we have the context of inheritance, inheriting the nations. I won't get too much into that today, but I really want to show that this emphasis is so deep in the Old Testament. Psalm 82 doesn't give us a whole lot of detail about things, but it does call to Yahweh to claim all nations. And there is a reason for that, and that reason is the background of the rest of the Old Testament. Yes, Yahweh does claim a portion of the people, the allotted inheritance, Israel. But it doesn't remain that way.
[00:48:26] Yahweh also claims all of the nations. And so we have the context of Israel, we have the context of the nations, and it's never meant to just remain that way. The ultimate goal is inheritance throughout.
[00:48:41] A really interesting Psalm to read in parallel with Psalm 82 is Psalm 2. “Why are the nations in an uproar and the peoples devising a vain thing? The kings of the earth take their stand, and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against his anointed, saying, ‘Let us tear their fetters apart and cast away their cords from us.’”
[00:49:06] That's a really fascinating inverse of Psalm 82 in a few different ways, right? Verse number four: “He who sits in the heavens laughs. The Lord scoffs at them.” So this is not the context of the divine council. This is the context of kings on earth and God judging them.
[00:49:27] We move on to verse seven. “I will surely tell of the decree of the Lord. He said to me, ‘You are my Son. Today I have begotten you. Ask of me and I will surely give the nations as your inheritance, and the very ends of the earth as your possession.’”
[00:49:44] So here there are two parallel gifts in Psalm 2. Yahweh tells the Son to ask. Yahweh will give the nations as the Son's inheritance. Yahweh will give the ends of the earth as the Son's possession. Nations and ends of the earth interpret the scale of one another. The inheritance concerns both people and the full geographical reach of the earth. People and land, inheritance and seed.
[00:50:17] The words inheritance and possession are two different words, okay? Numbers 35 uses possession for the manslayer's land of possession. Psalm 2 uses the same word for the Son's possession of the ends of the earth. The vocabulary remains recognizably geographical, but it expands here in Psalm 2.
[00:50:41] But there is a hinge here. Yahweh has the allotted inheritance of Jacob in Deuteronomy 32, and then he inherits all nations in Psalm 82, and then in Psalm 2, we have a depiction of Yahweh giving the nations to the Son as an inheritance. Psalm 82 supplies post-judgment inheritance claim, and Psalm 2 supplies the royal recipient and the inheritance vocabulary.
[00:51:11] The scale of the inheritance is growing. The pattern of it all is not just about the people of Israel growing. The pattern of inheritance is even a divine one. And that expansion of the divine inheritance from Israel to all of the nations is the ultimate picture of the expansion, the ultimate picture of the connection between geography and seed, and so on.
[00:51:40] Okay, I know I'm talking at a very, very high level here, and I'm just looking at these patterns, and I'm just kind of musing over what these pictures and ideas mean. And I really think that the important thing about this that I'm trying to give to you for musing is that if we understand these interconnected patterns and the emphasis, this very, very strong, strong emphasis on inheritance, we need to take all of those wrapped-up pictures into the New Testament because it does all converge in Jesus.
[00:52:19] We have the resolution of the problems of Israel. We have the resolution of the promises to Abraham. And those two things come together in the person of Jesus. They come together within patterns of Exodus, within patterns of jubilee, within patterns of refuge, within patterns of covenant. But I want to say and suggest to you that the pattern is strikingly similar through a lot of these things.
[00:52:51] And we do have deep, deep connections into Jesus's death, but not just his death. It is the resurrection. It is the ascension. These are all together, along with the incarnation. Those open the inheritance, and they widen it in the ways that the Old Testament is anticipating. And Jesus's indestructible life makes all of it permanent.
[00:53:18] It makes the covenant something that is truly indestructible, unending, and absolutely universal. Not universal. I'm not saying universal salvation for all people just because. Not that kind of universal, but open to everyone, everywhere, in all of the circumstances we could possibly imagine. The answer really truly is Jesus, right? In His life, in His resurrection, in the fact that when we are found in Him, we too gain the inheritance. I think sometimes we're so interested in these other ideas, and rightly so—life and death, and worship, and salvation, and deliverance—but we kind of forget this underlying theme of inheritance. Death is never the end of the promise. It's never the end of anything that should truly belong, and it is never the end of anything that is truly life. And death is part of the cycle that brings forth life.
[00:54:31] So I said I'd kind of bring this a little bit into the penal aspects of things because the things that end in death are really negative, right? They are not just natural consequences all the time. Sometimes there's a legal ruling, sometimes there is a curse that is associated with breaking the covenant.
[00:54:53] And so Jesus enters the entire thing. And we could use this word penal that tells us what kind of condition that Jesus enters. Not because He's guilty. Not because He's doing this instead of us. He is literally entering the condition we are now in. That's not substitutionary again.
[00:55:16] But he enters the penal dimension that includes judicial consequences of broken covenant and judged human experience of any type. We have death, curse, exile-like alienation, subjugation to the nations, bondage, loss of inheritance. But Jesus carries that condition through to his resurrection and provides release and restored inheritance because he is the Son. He is the Son who inherits all of the nations.
[00:55:54] All right. So I'm gonna go ahead and wrap up here. And I know this was slightly bit of a rambling episode. Believe me, it could have been far more rambling because I have a whole lot of notes, but again, I'm not trying to say that Numbers 35 and the cities of refuge are some secret little code that goes through things. No, it is just part of the pattern. And I thought it was a very interesting one to look at.
[00:56:23] Another thing I'm just gonna lay on your plate for now, and maybe I will do that deep spelunking dive into the caves. But what's absolutely fascinating is that the first actual possession in the land was Sarah's tomb. Again, death bringing forth life and connected so deeply into inheritance.
[00:56:50] So in the end, the Bible's preservation through judgment imagery is not finally only about survival. It is about preserving the future heir until inheritance becomes possible again. And ultimately, it does come down to the death and resurrection of the Son who opens the inheritance large enough to encompass the entire world.
[00:57:19] And of course, the penal problem, the sin problem, the death problem is very, very real. Judgment does produce things that are death and exile, bondage and disinheritance or removal from inheritance. But the gospel answer is larger than something about punishment. I've said this before, and I will say it again. Jesus enters the judged condition. He passes through it. He does this in resurrection and vindication, and He comes out the other side and brings His heirs with Him.
[00:57:59] So if you want to kind of deep dive a little bit more into what I'm talking about here and meditate along with me, I would suggest you go into some other texts with the idea primarily in your minds of inheritance. Curse is not just about death, but it is about anti-inheritance. Restoration is not just about life, but it is about fulfilling inheritance as well. Read Galatians 3, verse 13, all the way through 4, verse 7, and really the whole book.
[00:58:35] Read that within itself. Read Isaiah 53 all the way into Isaiah 54. Compare Numbers 35 with the book of Hebrews, but I'm not saying there's a one-to-one typology there. I do not think Hebrews is drawing primarily upon Numbers 35 because I think the larger pattern is probably jubilee, but I also don't think Numbers 35 is entirely absent.
[00:59:06] Okay, so gonna go ahead and kind of leave you with that. And thank you for joining me in my meandering observations here in this episode. I think a lot of the ancient context is not really hard to grasp on a certain level. But you get into the granular parts, like in Numbers 35, and you're like, “What is going on here? This doesn't make any sense.”
[00:59:31] It is difficult because we don't have enough information to make specific definitive statements. That doesn't mean we can't say something about it. And this is why I think it's very strong to read Scripture in a narrative way, because when you're reading it in a narrative way, the patterns become clear.
[00:59:51] Again, thanks for listening. Thanks for sharing the episodes and studying deeply in the context with me. I once again thank you guys for your prayers for me as well as my family. And I want to thank those of you who are helping me out financially, either through Patreon, PayPal, or my biblical theology community. I am so grateful for all of you who participate there.
[01:00:20] And by the way, we are starting a really deep dive. It's gonna be a slow deep dive, but it will be a deep dive into the idea of the Trinity. So if that's something you are interested in, go ahead and join us in my biblical theology community at On This Rock. I will leave the link in the show notes. But at any rate, that is it for today. And I wish you all a blessed week, and we will see you later.
