Two Perspectives: Literal Hermeneutics

The following "Question" was asked by a member of the congregation at Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, California, and "Answered" by their pastor, John MacArthur Jr. It was transcribed by Brenda Rivera of Orlando, Florida from the tape, GC 1301-S, titled "Bible Questions and Answers Part 21." A copy of the tape can be obtained by writing, Word of Grace, P.O. Box 4000, Panorama City, CA 91412 or by dialing toll free 1-800-55-GRACE. ©1982.

Question: As a Jewish believer I would like to know, according to the reformed view of scripture, the nation Israel is no longer important in this New Testament age. Now my question is, exactly what is Reformed theology? How do they base their position biblically? And where in the Bible does it support that God is through with the nation Israel?

Answer:

You mean that God is through with the nation Israel, where does it support that? Well, nowhere. God is not through with Israel, you’re right; God is not through with Israel.

You see Reformed Theology, that’s a name that’s a title, capital “R” right? As opposed, to say dispensational theology. Reformed Theology says there is no Millennium. Now Reformed Theology has a lot of good points, they’re really strong; Reformed Theology is basically that which came out of the Reformation, right? Strong in the doctrine of salvation, "The just shall live by faith," strong on the doctrines of sanctification, strong on the doctrine of the deity of Christ, strong on the holiness of God, strong on the deity of the Holy Spirit and the work of the Spirit, very strong on the life of progressive sanctification and the walk of the believer, very strong on the eternal state of Hell and the eternal state of Heaven--right on target biblically. But the doctrines that they seemed not to develop were two: ecclesiology, that is the doctrines related to the life of the church. Luther never understood that and the Reformed tradition has sort of had difficulty tearing itself loose from, I hate to say this because some reformed people might get a little upset at it, but sort of a quasi-Catholic ecclesiology, that is the doctrine of the church. In other words they hold on to infant baptism, and they hold on to sacramentalism to some degree or another.

So when it comes to the doctrine of the church, basically reformed churches don’t engage very much at all in say: body life, interaction, discipleship, accountability, one another ministries, spiritual gift ministries, you know what I’m saying? They’re pretty much preaching centers where those things that they are strong on are sort of held forth.

And the other area where they’re weak is in eschatology from the Greek word eschatos or last, the end things. And I think too this may of come because that really never got defined out of their heritage. What they basically have said is this, that the church is the new Israel and they get it out of Galatians 6, a misinterpretation that we are the Israel of God, and they say that the church is the new Israel. Therefore, God is finished with the nation, He’s set them aside permanently, because not only of all of the sin throughout the old economy, but of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ when they did that… zap! they were cut off.

Now there’s some problems with that. They say that, in effect, to say then that we are the new Israel, we are the Israel of God, there’s no nation Israel anymore. I mean it may exist politically, it may exist sociologically, it may exist in terms of anthropology but it does not exist in terms of spiritual promise. The only way that Israel gets in on anything is to become a Christian and get into the covenant that way.

Therefore what they’re saying is this, and here I think is the Achilles' heel in the whole system. They are saying, all of the literal promises of the Old Testament for the blessedness of the nation Israel were not literal, right? I mean if God literally promised that He would bring the nation back into the land, that He would bring the Messiah to reign over them in the land, that He would sit on the throne of David in the city of Jerusalem, that they would rule in their own land, that the dessert would blossom like a rose, and it would flourish and so forth and so on, and God would regather Israel from all over the world, and would bring them together and like in the dry bones vision of Ezekiel, and He would breath life into them, and they would rise up a great nation, and they would rule and reign in His Kingdom as the duly constituted nation of Israel. If that is not the truth literally and we are that new Israel then those were figurative promises, right?

Now the basic problem with that is, all of the curses, which are given in many of the same text came to pass literally. So what we’re saying is what Dr. Finberg said one time in Jerusalem, just after a speech by one of the reformed theologians, who had denounced to Israel that none of the promises were for them anymore. He said, “You mean we are to say that all of the curses of the Old Testament are literal and all the promises can be spiritualized. You see what you’ve done then is, you've used what we call a dual hermeneutic, hermenuo (sp?) the Greek word means, to interpret or to translate. You’re interpreting this part of the verse this way and this part the other way and that’s arbitrary. If the curses on Israel were literal...you tell me were they? Were they scattered? Were they devastated all over the world? Were they thrown out of their land? Were they taken into captivity? Were they judged and are they still being judged? Is life still miserable for them? And are they still, as it were, tugging and fighting against the Arabs, the Ishmaelites, the Esauites? Sure. And if all of that is literal then what gives us the right to take all the rest of it and spiritualize it?

But the biggest argument of all is if you ask a…and this is the one that you will inevitably ask a Reformed person, is what’s Israel doing these days? What are they around for? In fact, John Stott was asked that question, they said, “What is the significance of the rebirth of the nation Israel biblically?” He said, “It has no significance at all”. Well how can you say that? The question I always ask is if you ever met a Perizzite, a Hivite, a Jebusite, an Amorite, a Hittite, or any other "ite"? “No.” Have you ever met an Israelite? “Yes” Why? What are they doing around?

My grandfather wrote a track many years ago called, “Why You Can’t Rub Out the Jew,” and the reason you can’t rub out the Jew is because God is not finished with them, and if you have any more questions about that read Romans 9,10, and 11. You’ll find that many reformed commentators who write commentaries on Romans skip those three chapters. That’s true! Because it’s very difficult for them to deal with them, because it says that ultimately that original branch is going to be grafted back in. And it says, "Has God cast off His people Israel whom He foreknew?" And then it says, No, no, no, meginota (sp?), the most strong negative in the Greek language. No, no, no, no!

So I believe God is not finished with Israel, I believe there’s coming a day when He’s going to regather Israel, He’s going to put Israel together as a nation, He’s going to send the Messiah back in His return. There will be a literal Kingdom on the earth in which Jesus Christ will reign and I have to be consistent in my hermeneutics. I can’t say everything is literal up until there is something I don’t want to accept and just chuck the literal hermeneutic and make it figurative.

For example, I heard that Dr. Clownie (sp?) from Westminster speak on the subject of Isaiah 9:6, he preached on, "The government shall be upon his shoulders," and his message was is the government of your life on the shoulders of Christ? That’s not talking about the government of your life, that’s talking about the government of the world. And it will be on His shoulders, He will come and reign as King of kings and Lord of lords. And they go into the Book of Revelation and it says “He’ll come and reign for 1000 years” and they’ll say well that doesn’t mean 1000 years because they quote Peter “A day is with the Lord is as a 1000 years,” so they spiritualize that. If you start doing that, I mean it’s sort of hard to know where to quit.

Do Jews Have a Divine Right in the Promised Land?
April 17, 2002 by John Piper Topic: Middle East

How should Bible-believing Christians align themselves in the Jewish-Palestinian conflict? There are Biblical reasons for treating both sides with compassionate public justice in the same way that disputes should be settled between nations generally. In other words, the Bible does not teach us to be partial to Israel or to the Palestinians because either has a special divine status.

I do not deny that Israel was chosen by God from all the peoples of the world to be the focus of special blessing in the history of redemption which climaxed in Jesus Christ, the Messiah. "The LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth" (Deuteronomy 7:6).

Nor do I deny that God promised to Israel the presently disputed land from the time of Abraham onward. God said to Moses, "This is the land of which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, 'I will give it to your offspring'" (Deuteronomy 34:4).

But neither of these Biblical facts leads necessarily to the endorsement of present-day Israel as the rightful possessor of all the disputed land. Israel may have such a right. And she may not. But that decision is not based on divine privilege. Why?

First, a non-covenant-keeping people does not have a divine right to hold the land of promise. Both the blessed status of the people and the privileged right to the land are conditional on Israel's keeping the covenant God made with her. Thus God said to Israel, "If you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples" (Exodus 19:5). Israel has no warrant to a present experience of divine privilege when she is not keeping covenant with God.

More than once Israel was denied the experience of her divine right to the land when she broke covenant with God. For example, when Israel languished in captivity in Babylon, Daniel prayed, "O Lord . . .we have sinned and done wrong . . . To you, O Lord, belongs righteousness, but to us open shame . . . to all Israel . . . in all the lands to which you have driven them, because of the treachery that they have committed against you" (Daniel 9:4-7; see Psalm 78:54-61). Israel has no divine right to be in the land of promise when she is breaking the covenant of promise.

This does not mean that other nations have the right to molest her. She still has human rights among nations when she has no divine right. Nations that gloated over her divine discipline were punished by God (Isaiah 10:5-13).

Secondly, Israel as a whole today rejects her Messiah, Jesus Christ, God's Son. This is the ultimate act of covenant-breaking with God. God promised that to Israel "a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace" (Isaiah 9:6-7). But with tears this Prince of Peace looked out over Jerusalem and said, "Would that you . . . had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. . . . You did not know the time of your visitation" (Luke 19:42-44).

When the builders rejected the beautiful Cornerstone, Jesus said, "The kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people producing its fruits" (Matthew 21:43). He explained, "Many will come from east and west and recline at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness" (Matthew 8:11-12)

God has saving purposes for ethnic Israel (Romans 11:25-26). But for now the people are at enmity with God in rejecting the gospel of Jesus Christ, their Messiah (Romans 11:28). God has expanded his saving work to embrace all peoples (including Palestinians) who will trust his Son and depend on his death and resurrection for salvation. "Is God the God of Jews only? Is he not the God of Gentiles also? Yes, of Gentiles also, since God is one. He will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through faith" (Romans 3:29-30).

The Christian plea in the Middle East to Palestinians and Jews is: "Believe on the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved" (Acts 16:31). And until that great day when both Jewish and Gentile followers of King Jesus inherit the earth (not just the land), without lifting sword or gun, the rights of nations should be decided by the principles of compassionate and public justice, not claims to national divine right or status.