I haven't done a whole deep dive into this text that I stumbled upon when reading my Bible this morning, but it seems to mirror this "two powers in heaven" idea that we see during the 2nd Temple period, or at least it seems to be something similar. Please let me know if anyone knows about this reference, or if anyone else has commented on it before: In 1 Kings 19:9-14, Elijah is in the wilderness, after running away from Queen Jezebel, after she ordered the death of Elijah. Elijah makes his way to a cave after the angel of Yahweh gives him food and water. The text then says: "Then the word of the LORD came to him, saying, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” He answered, “I have been very zealous for the LORD, the God of hosts, for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.” (1 Ki 19:9–10, NRSVue) Notice here how, when Elijah is describing the situation, very explicitly to "the word of the Lord", Elijah says "...for the Israelites have forsaken YOUR covenant, thrown down YOUR altars, and killed YOUR prophets with the sword." So, we can see here that one "subject" asks Elijah a question, and Elijah responds to that subject, attributing the covenant, altars, and prophets to that same subject. The text, however, doesn't stop there: Then (very importantly) the word of the Lord tells Elijah to "...go out and stand on the mountain before the LORD, for the LORD is about to pass by." We could derive a similar 2 Powers motif from this part alone, but I think there is even stronger support if we continue. Then Elijah hears and sees a great wind, an earthquake, and a great fire, but the text says that the Lord was not in any of them. The Lord was, however, in the "...sound of sheer silence." Now, interestingly, the exchange between Elijah and the LORD is the exact same exchange that we see between the word of the LORD and Elijah: What are you doing here, Elijah?” He answered, “I have been very zealous for the LORD, the God of hosts, for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword."

The most common reply to arguments for a high Christology is an appeal to divine delegation, or agency. A Christian might say something like, "Jesus calmed the storm in Mark, who but God can do that?" The dissenter replies, "That's because Jesus was given divinely authorized power, just as Moses was when he split the Red Sea. You wouldn't call Moses God, would you?" At first glance, the symmetry seems accurate. But look beneath the surface, and a serious problem emerges. What the dissenter is really doing is anchoring their interpretive framework to adjacent Jewish agency texts, passages featuring mediatorial figures such as prophets, angels, and messengers, or even inanimate objects like the ark of the covenant. The goal is to draw a parallel between Jesus and figures who mediated the presence of YHWH without ever being YHWH. The trouble is that no such parallel actually works in totality. Now you might be thinking, "But doesn't Jesus carry out divine prerogatives, just as those other figures did?" Yes, He does, but that's a distraction from the real point of contention. The real issue is what I'll call the overextension problem. The overextension problem: Agency-only models use Jewish agency parallels to explain more than those parallels can bear. They can account for how an authorized agent represents YHWH, but they cannot, on their own, explain why Christ personally occupies the YHWH-only subject-position. That subject-position turns on something I'll call identity-emphasis. Identity-emphasis: the way a text signals which figure is being made the focal bearer of divine significance in a given passage. How do we know this is the crux? Simple: in every proposed parallel, whatever mediates YHWH's presence and authority never retains an identity of its own, it functions purely as a channel for YHWH's speech and action. So here's the logic of the agency-only model: YHWH commands → the human agent obeys and signifies the act → YHWH completes it. Take Moses at the sea. He stretches out his hand, but it is YHWH who drives the waters back:

You already know what time it is 💯 I’m thrilled to announce that tonight we have none other than the jubilant Dr. Ryan Mullins joining us to lecture. This will be in the same format as our last session with Dr. Sijuwade. Expect dynamic conversation and a live Q&A. So come ready to: Learn Think deeply Ask your questions Engage and participate Ryan will be diving into topics surrounding the nature of God, time, and much more. You won’t want to miss it. See you all tonight🔥

Lately I’ve been thinking about the moral problems that the Bible often presents. When this topic comes up, the first thing that comes to mind is God’s command to kill the Canaanite children, and although many apologists like William Lane Craig have tried to argue that such an act was morally correct, the most adequate response is to affirm that the text is a hyperbole that does not imply that children actually died in the conquest. However, that problem can be transferred to the flood that occurred in the time of Noah, and although it can also be applied to other cases (such as the death of David’s newborn son or Sodom and Gomorrah), this is simply the clearest example that comes to mind. I want to carry out a process that I like to call “evaluation of theodicies under restricted conditions.” I’ve been thinking about this and I cannot find any that are truly satisfactory, and many of them simply seem like attempts to avoid facing the real problem and to downplay it. I would be especially interested in hearing new responses or stronger versions of existing ones, because so far none seem successful to me. First, I want to clarify the framework I am assuming in order to avoid answers that change the playing field. 1. The flood in the Book of Genesis corresponds to a real historical event (although possibly regional rather than global). 2. The event was caused or intentionally brought about by God. 3. God is morally perfect and omnipotent. 4. The flood was carried out as a punishment for human beings. 5. Children below a certain age do not have full moral responsibility, and therefore are not guilty of wrongdoing. 6. No one who is morally upright would want to kill innocent children when there is a way to avoid it. Under these conditions, I am evaluating theodicies with a very specific criterion: is the flood morally justifiable? The focus of this post is on children because it is easier to empathize with children than with animals or plants, since although they share innocence, there is debate about whether they have souls, suffer, or even consent to death, but the argument could also be extended to them.

Shout out to all of you who participated in Dr. Joshua Sijuwade’s call today 🔥 We’ll be having our regular call tonight so I hope to see all of you again. Much to go over. See you then!