The wind over the waters

A wind from God swept over the face of the waters...

For the last few years I had been a "mostly immanent" believer. Immanence refers to the nearness of the divine. In other words, being "mostly immanent" means to me that God is us, we are God, and we can look to God for micro-guidance as we plod through our days. On most days, this is fine. As I try to figure out my health insurance drug formulary, do I really need to know how creation happened 5 billion years ago (or, as some would estimate, 5000 years ago)? I'll save the "age of the earth" debate for some other time. For now, let's talk about transcendence.

My mostly-immanent self recently read Genesis 1 more carefully. The caption of my watery image above comes from Genesis 1:2. In my preferred Bible translation (NRSV), "wind from God" has a footnote for an alternate translation, which is, "spirit of God".

It occurred to me that this "spirit of God" makes many appearances in the Bible. For now, consider Luke 1:34-35: "Mary said to the angel, 'How can this be, since I am a virgin?' The angel said to her, 'The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God.'"

Aside from the fact that Mary just interrupted an angel of the Lord to explain the facts of life, we see that spirit again (this time called the Holy Spirit, but yeah, same spirit as in Genesis). The virgin birth narrative is a fulfillment of the creation narrative. This spirit is that of a transcendent God, existing beyond us and our universe. This is not to say that I need to define God as a supernatural being from a supernatural place called heaven, and indeed, there is no human who could know that it was a supernatural being that created the heavens and the earth. I don't have a succinct definition for a God that gives us both Genesis and Luke.

But, the recognition of the transcendence of God reminds me that my drug formulary is not a "micro" thing. The earth provided the raw materials and a whole lot of people worked out such a thing. Truly, now and forever, immanent and transcendent, amen.

Recent ponderings 2

This is an adjustment to my ponderings in my previous post. I hope to address my ponderings in detailed posts, but hey, it's complicated, right?

I had wondered how it was possible for Paul and the Gospel authors to use such similar technical language, such as "new covenant" in 1 Cor 14:24, a decade before the Gospels were written. In this particular case, ancient Scripture mentions the "covenant" with God repeatedly, then Jesus comes along and reworks the human understanding of a relationship with God. It was almost obvious to refer to this as a new covenant, to the extent that different writers might have invented the phrase independently.

For other phrases, there is an additional consideration. The authorship of the letters and epistles attributed to Paul is heavily debated. Without listing books here (easy enough to find even on Wikipedia), modern scholars agree that seven books were written or dictated by Paul himself, but the authorship and dating of the other six is heavily debated. If a follower of Paul actually wrote a letter and claimed it was from Paul, even in good faith, and if the letter was written a decade or two after Paul's undisputed letters, then the later authors would have been writing at the same time as the Gospel authors. If that's the case, the similar phraseology is more easily explained. To be clear, few modern scholars would claim that Paul himself unquestionably wrote all 13 letters.

This issue also raises a question of interpretation. Is an undisputed Pauline letter more authoritative than a disputed Pauline letter? In my opinion, yes. In particular, passages about women remaining silent are all disputed as to authorship. They were either written by someone else, or were intended to refer to common cultural practice and not to Paul's recommended practice.

Recent ponderings 1

Here are some questions I have been pondering recently, which I hope to address over the coming months. If you have any ideas or pointers for research, let me know!

- Acts 18:12 - When Paul was brought before the Roman tribunal in Corinth, who stood on the "bema" (the Greek word for the stone platform used during tribunal interrogations)? Was it the Roman officials looking down on Paul being questioned, or was Paul exposed on the platform for all to see? What officials would have been involved, if not just the proconsul Gallio? I addressed this in my personal blog, but I hope to come to a more definitive conclusion.

- Assuming (as scholars believe) Paul wrote 1 Cor 14:24 a decade before the Gospels were written, who coined the phrase "new covenant"? Did Paul plagiarize Mark, or did Mark plagiarize Paul, or was there some sort of collaboration in, say, Jerusalem? Scholars surmise the Gospels used information from eyewitnesses, of course, but also from unknown sources, now lost. Those lost sources are lumped together as the mysterious "Q" source. Is Paul part of the Q source, having been directly informed by the risen Jesus?

- "Called" versus "Commissioned": Let's say Paul did not internally feel called to go on his missionary journeys, but instead was (as the canon explains) commissioned by an external force (Acts 9:5). The commissioning was so sudden and shocking that Paul was temporarily struck blind. But if this was totally external, what does that say about God's immanence (and transcendence)? When Donald Trump says he was saved from an assassin's bullet directly by God so that he (Trump) could enact policies (assuming Mr. Trump is sincere and not just making it up), shouldn't God's intervention be described as a de facto commission (God saved Trump for something, therefore Trump must do it)? Similarly, do I (Gary) feel called to write this, or is this a divine commission?

- How do we respond to harsh comments about current world events? For example, since it's true that Hamas perpetrated a horrific surprise attack on civilians on Oct 7 2023 and hid in hospitals with "human shields", is collateral damage acceptable when Israel fights back? In other words, is the need to kill Hamas in self defense so fundamental that it's OK to kill nearby babies? Is it OK to starve a million people in order to get at a few thousand combatants? Even if such actions are justified, can Israel drop a bomb and reject accountability and claim that it's actually Hamas' fault that babies and other innocents were bombed? Is the killing of neutral aid workers simply "collateral", or a war crime? Does Hamas commit a war crime by waging war when aid workers are nearby, thereby endangering the aid workers, or are the shooters (Israel) also (or solely) guilty? Is Scripture (Hebrew / Christian / Islamic) relevant?

Weather and astronomy on gocek.org

My USA Weather Page is packed with information, but I made the choice to include the kitchen sink at the expense of a quick glance at highs and lows.

A 7-day forecast can be generated for any location in the 50 states, Washington, DC and Puerto Rico. Locations can be selected by town name, zip code or latitude/longitude. Many points of interest can be selected as well. For example, a forecast can be produced for the Washington Monument in Washington, CD, or Ala Wai Boat Harbor in Hawaii (that's the marina seen in the opening credits of the Gilligan's Island TV show).

Current weather observations are also shown, including weather maps and notes about the closest and strongest earthquakes within 200 miles during the previous 24 hours. Forecasts and current conditions include EPA air quality indexes.

Forecasts show predictions for every hour of the 7-day period. This includes temperatures, rain and snow amounts, wind speeds, wave heights when appropriate, and visibility. For example, visibility will be lower on a foggy day than on a clear day.

But that's not all! The sunrise and sunset times are shown along with the phase of the moon. When appropriate, the forecast will show expected equinoxes, solstices, lunar and solar eclipses, and whether a meteor shower is at its peak. For solar eclipses, the visibility of the eclipse will be partial or total or annular depending on the location of the forecast.

Data originate mainly with US government sources such as the national weather service. See the acknowledgments at the end of your forecast!

Interestingly, celestial events such as eclipses or equinoxes cannot be exactly calculated. Consider a "full moon". When looking at the moon, what we see is the illumination of the moon's surface by the sun. As the moon rotates around the earth, the part of the moon facing the earth is different than the part of the moon facing the sun. An observer on the sun would always see a full moon (except when the earth gets in the way). But an observer on the earth is looking at the moon from a different angle; part of what we see is illuminated by the sun, and part is not, so we see a crescent, or a circle, or nothing at all. A "full moon" occurs when the sun shines past the earth and illuminates the who visible portion of the moon, and the times when this occurs can be predicted. By the way, the sun is big enough that the shadow of the earth usually does not fall on the moon, but once in a while, the moon is eclipsed by the earth's shadow.

My point in the previous paragraph is that the earth and moon are constantly in motion, relative to the sun. The maximum illumination of the moon each lunar cycle only lasts for an instant. We can predict that instant, but minor perturbations in orbits and revolutions and gravity and light waves can cause our calculations to be "off" by a fraction of a second. In addition, any arithmetic measurement is finite, but that instant of max illumination is infinitely short, then the moon moves. In other words, we can only "predict" a phase of the moon. We can be accurate enough that humans can't "see" the tiny errors in our calculations or the tiny changes in illumination as time progresses.

Another perspective on miracles

In The Acts of the Apostles, why could Peter and Paul and others heal and cure? A few people (then and now) acquire that much faith. Peter and Paul developed a spiritual maturity that allowed them to perform marvelous acts and nurture a religion that spread to multiple countries in their lifetimes, at a time when traveling long distances was very risky. The apostles and Paul and other leaders performed miracles and signs in Acts (the Gospels use only the word "signs"), and it occurs to me that any adult's faith needs signs once the lessons of Sunday School become insufficient. This need for signs is not a weakness; it is canonical. The shepherds and magi did not accidentally stumble on the manger; they were led by the proclamations of angels and a guiding star.

The signs are critical to the founding of Christianity. In John 20:29, "Jesus said to [Thomas], 'Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.'" It is easy to feel sorry for Thomas, to have been scolded by Jesus in that way. But, what of "those who had not seen [the risen Jesus]". Those others saw something, at some earlier time: the lame man walked, Lazarus rose from the dead, and Jesus' tomb was empty. Those who had not seen the risen Jesus saw those prior signs and came to believe. On a number of occasions in the Gospels, Jesus wondered how many more signs the apostles and Pharisees needed, before they would finally understand. Thomas was just one more doubter in a long line of doubters.

Yes, my faith is sometimes strengthened by a sunrise or a kind word, and that's nice. But, Jesus would be wondering why I needed to see the sun rise and why Thomas insisted he needed to touch the nail wounds. The empty tomb should have been enough for me and Tom. Even though I only see the signs through reading the Bible, it should be enough. Peter and Paul performed miracles and people believed.