Ep 43: Jesus Murders A Tree

00:00Out of methodological necessity, critical scholarship cannot accept real prophecy, at

00:07least in my opinion.

00:08Which means that, no, if the text says there's this dude named Cyrus, that text was written

00:13after that dude named Cyrus was on the scene.

00:17Hey everybody, I'm Dan McClellan.

00:22And I'm Dan Beecher.

00:23And you are listening to the Data Overdogma podcast where we increase public access to

00:27the academic study of the Bible and religion and combat.

00:31The spread of that pernicious misinformation about the same.

00:36How go things, Dan?

00:39Things go well.

00:40We're going to kill some foliage today.

00:43We're going to murder a tree among other things.

00:48So that's exciting.

00:49That's always fun.

00:51Yeah.

00:52And I have high hopes that you'll help me to understand what the heck's going on with

00:58that story.

00:59So that's where we're going to start out.

01:00We're going to start out with a chapter and verse on that and then you're going to tell

01:05us, you're going to help us out with what does that mean?

01:08Because I have heard you use the phrase due to row Isaiah before and I have no idea what

01:15we're talking about.

01:16Yeah.

01:17So that'll be fun to, uh, to get that all covered.

01:20Yeah.

01:21That'll be a lot of fun.

01:22It's something that has been controversial for a long time.

01:25So we'll clear the air a little bit and explain what's going on with that.

01:29Excellent.

01:30Excellent.

01:31Well, let's start with chapter and verse.

01:36And we're picking up, uh, I guess in, in Mark 11, is that where we want to pick up?

01:42Uh, yeah.

01:43Mark's the earliest gospel.

01:44So, uh, scholars are in widespread agreement that this is the earliest iteration of this

01:50story.

01:51It's likely that there is some tradition that pre existed the gospel of Mark.

01:57There might even be some sayings in an earlier sayings gospel that Mark might have used as

02:02a source, but, uh, the first access we have to this story is in Mark 11.

02:08I got to say, I feel like whatever the precursor things that Mark was drawing on, they must

02:15have made more sense than this because I am wildly confused by this story.

02:20Uh, should we just dive in?

02:22Like, okay.

02:23So here's what happens.

02:24Uh, Jesus has just made his triumphal entry into Jerusalem, uh, and, uh, you know, there's

02:33a whole thing about him writing in on a cult and people throwing down leaves in front of

02:39him and all this sort of stuff.

02:41Right.

02:42Uh, the next day, Jesus is out for a walk and sees a fig tree in the distance.

02:51Uh, it's got leaves on it.

02:53He meanders over there.

02:55It is not the time, it is not the season for figs.

03:00Uh, this fit, this, this fig tree is not, uh, fruiting currently and Jesus talks to it,

03:11which I think is weird, uh, and says, may no one ever eat fruit from you again.

03:19Uh, and then, and then they take off, um, which I feel like vindictiveness against a tree

03:29is odd, uh, and I don't, and I, and okay, so, so there's that, that's, that's part one.

03:36Yeah.

03:37There's this whole thing, uh, where Jesus, and we, we remember that Jesus cleanses the

03:43temple.

03:44Right.

03:45So, right.

03:46Uh, Jesus, good.

03:47You know, if there's several, several, uh, verses where Jesus goes into and turns over

03:53the table of the money, taint changers and scolds the people who are buying and selling

03:59things and, uh, make some very people very angry and they, they try to, they want to

04:06kill him and then that's, that's that little thing.

04:11And then we're back to the tree.

04:12Yeah.

04:13So picking up in verse 20, uh, they go the next morning, uh, the, the disciples go back

04:23to the tree and it has withered away to its roots.

04:27And Peter said to him, Hey, uh, look, the fig tree that you cursed has withered.

04:34Jesus says, half faith in God, no, okay, he says, half faith in God.

04:41I'll just read it.

04:42Truly, I tell you that if you say to this mountain, be taken up and thrown into the sea and you

04:50do not doubt in your heart, but you believe that what you say will come to pass, it will

04:55be done for you.

04:57So I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that, believe that you have received

05:02it and it will be yours.

05:06Now, uh, I can see saying, you know, if they're amazed by what he did to the fig tree, uh,

05:17yes, I can see how, how it follows to say, you know, you can make, you can move mountains,

05:24uh, if you believe, well, why did he kill a fig tree?

05:27I'm so confused by this.

05:29So walk us through the whole thing.

05:33The whole thing just baffles me a little bit.

05:36It's a bit of a head scratcher.

05:38So what we've got here is, uh, one of Mark's, uh, sandwich stories where we have, uh, kind

05:44of the introduction and the conclusion and in between, we have a separate story, but usually

05:49these stories are, um, kind of book ending, whatever's in between and all, and they relate

05:56to each other.

05:57And so the fig tree is a metaphor, um, surprise, surprise, right.

06:05And, uh, we hear talk in the, in the New Testament and elsewhere in the Bible, this notion of

06:11bearing fruit and particularly in relation to Jesus, this has to do with good works,

06:16this has to do with producing results, uh, doing the things that are expected of you.

06:24And, uh, we have right before, uh, they go and see the withered tree is the threat that

06:30we see in verse 18.

06:31And I, uh, I finally got the digital version of the updated edition of the NRSV.

06:36So I'm, I'm up to date now and here it, and it says in, in verse 18, when the chief priests

06:40and the scribes heard it, they kept looking for a way to kill him for they were afraid

06:45of him because the whole crowd was spellbound by his teaching.

06:49And he's just gone into the temple and the temple is not bearing fruit.

06:54The temple has become in the eyes of Jesus through the eyes of, of the gospel authors,

07:01a den of thieves, the chief priests who are supposed to be the ecclesiastical authority

07:07of the day, the scribes who are supposed to be the learned men of, uh, the Jewish tradition

07:14are also not bearing fruit.

07:15They're trying to kill their Messiah. And so this is a metaphor for Jerusalem for the

07:21temple for the Jewish leadership. He shows up as the Messiah. He's been up north. He's

07:27been in Galilee doing his thing and he comes down to Jerusalem to enter triumphantly into

07:33his city. There are leaves everywhere. And he wants fruit and they have none to offer

07:39him. And this is one of the indications that Mark was written when either the destruction

07:46of the temple was imminent or had already happened because the idea here with the cursing of

07:53the fig tree is Jesus says, Hey, I showed up looking for fruit. I didn't see any guess

07:59what? Boom, roasted, no more fruit ever. And this is a symbol or this represents the destruction

08:07of the temple, the scattering of the leadership of early Judaism. Now later on toward the end

08:13of the first century CE and into the second and third century CE, we're going to have

08:18the development of rabbinic Judaism, which is going to be carrying on the Pharisaic tradition.

08:22It's organizing around the traditions that are going to develop then. But when Mark is

08:27written somewhere around 70 CE, either immediately before or shortly after the destruction of

08:33the temple, they have no understanding that that Judaism is going to come back together

08:39and organize and carry on. And so from the perspective of the author of the gospel of

08:45Mark, the tree is cursed and has withered. The temple is gone. The idea is basically, yeah,

08:53that's never bearing fruit again. I see your problem. It's, you know, you're cursed. You're

09:00not going to bear any fruit ever again. And, but this is an issue because Jesus's followers

09:08are at this point in time, all Jewish folks. And so it's kind of frightening. Well, what's

09:14going to happen now? Right. And the, you know, look, the tree has withered from its roots.

09:20The temple is gone. The leadership has gone. And so the response from Jesus is have faith

09:26in God and then goes on to explain that through their faith, they can accomplish all these

09:33great things. So they're going to be able to move mountains going forward. They don't

09:37need those things that were not bearing fruit. And it says that when Jesus went looking for

09:45the figs, it was not yet the time for them to be bearing fruit. And so he shouldn't have

09:52expected to find fruit on there. So it seems a little, a little callus for him to go zap.

09:59Yeah. Because it wasn't doing anything wrong. Right. Right. It's not fig season. Yeah. The

10:08tree's like, I'm just, I'm what? I'm doing, I'm doing exactly what I'm supposed to be.

10:16I think of Steve Martin in his little mask in a little shop of horrors with the little

10:21bubbles filling up with air and then emptying going, whatever new to you. And then Jesus

10:28goes, it's not what you did to me. It's what you did to her. And, and, and so it's in,

10:37in my opinion, this is marks kind of like Jesus is, is killed at the Passover in March

10:45slash April, which is too early for the fig season. So he's like, well, I got to get it

10:50in there somehow. So in my opinion, he's, he's just fitting the story in where he can.

10:59Although there are some scholars who will argue that that Jesus's arrival showing up

11:08to Jerusalem is is before the messianic fulfillment is supposed to take place. But I don't, I

11:15don't know about those, those timelines. But in short, this is, this is a metaphor. This

11:21is condemning the, the scribes and the, and the high priests, the chief priests, the dove

11:31sellers. Yeah. The money changers. This is condemning the leadership there in Jerusalem

11:38for not bearing the fruit that should be expected. And then saying, but don't worry, we don't

11:46need them. Because you're going to have power to do all these things moving forward.

11:50Okay. I mean, to me, that may, yeah, that makes more sense a little bit, but it is unique.

11:57It is the only miracle of Jesus's that is destructive. Yeah. Where he's like, so, and

12:03just, yeah, it just feels mean to, to a tree that ain't did nothing, just just, just to

12:10be a metaphor. Well, and yeah, I don't know how they thought about the personhood of trees

12:16ancient. I mean, they obviously use Jesus referencing it in the second person. Kind of

12:23like, look what you made me do. But, but I don't know if they had sympathy for, for trees

12:30back down. But yeah, that's what a lot of people these days are like, treat and do nothing

12:35to you. And then it doesn't make sense. And when they asked Jesus, if he had cut down

12:40the tree, he said, I cannot tell a lie. Is there talk a little bit about the temple? Because

12:47if this is a metaphor, is it a metaphor for the temple or is it a metaphor for sort of

12:51Judaism as, as a, as a whole? It's both hand. It's encapsulating the temple and the people

13:01running the temple and the other folks who are supposed to be representative of the best

13:06of, of Judaism of that day. And so there is, there is an anti, it's kind of anti clerical

13:13and anti Jewish, all at the same time, they rejected Jesus. They rejected their Messiah,

13:21according to the authors of the gospels. And so this is the author's opportunity to take

13:28a little rhetorical jab back at them and say, you're like a withered tree. Yeah, suck it.

13:36Is the you know, we've talked about the temple about the destruction of the temple. But we've

13:42never really dug into what the temple was about what happened in a temple. Clearly there's

13:52commerce going on there. Is it a building? Is it an area? What is the temple? Well, by

13:59the time of Jesus's day, we have the second temple. The first temple was destroyed in 587

14:06BCE by the Babylonians and was rebuilt about 70 years later. And this is when according

14:17to the biblical texts, Cyrus, the great allows the Judah heights after conquering Babylon,

14:25who had taken them captive. Cyrus, the great allows them to go back and allows them to

14:30rebuild their temple. And so the second temple, also referred to as the temple of Zerubbabel,

14:37was rebuilt. It was probably on a smaller scale, not as grand as it was before. And later

14:45on, this gets supplemented even further during the Hasmonean kingdom. So when the Maccabees

14:53run off the salucids who have come in and have desecrated the temple and have destroyed

14:59parts of it, they're rebuilding parts of it. And then the Romans come in and they annex

15:04Judea, and then they put a client king in charge of Judea, Herod the Great, and he rules for

15:12decades. And part of what he does is engages in these large scale building projects. He

15:20wants to build up cities. He wants to create new centers of commerce and culture, like

15:27Caesarea Meritima. And he wants to expand the temple. And so the temple complex was a large

15:36courtyard enclosed in walls that had gates in it. And then inside, you would have had

15:43the temple proper, which had a courtyard and an inner sanctum and then the holy of holies.

15:50So it's what's known as a tripartite temple. And they have there are a few different styles

15:56of temple in that time period, but significantly expands that courtyard to the south, which

16:04requires building a bunch of underground supports so that it can extend out over a hill that's

16:12actually going down quite a bit. And if one visits Jerusalem today, there are parts of

16:20the wall that was constructed by Herod, which is characterized by what's called ashlar masonry,

16:28where they have they kind of create a kind of textured look for the face of the stone.

16:35But then there's a there's a trim around the outside that is cut smooth. And so if you

16:42go there, you can see some of the lower levels of the wall, particularly on the south that

16:48are remains of Herod's temple, but it was rebuilt to some degree in later periods, not

16:55the temple itself, but just the platform and the walls and things. And I think one of the

17:00coolest parts of the whole temple complex that you can still see today, if you go to

17:06what's known as the Robinson Center, it's a southwest corner of the temple mount. You

17:11can see the southwest corner, you can see some of the layers of of the wall as constructed

17:18by Herod. And you can see large sections of the wall scattered around the base of that

17:26wall, as well as the the sidewalk, the base that is cratered in, because when the Romans

17:34destroyed the temple, one of the things they did was had their soldiers push a lot of the

17:40stones off of the top of the wall. And they came tumbling down and just cratered the stone

17:47sidewalk and platform area below. And so when you go visit, you can actually see these

17:53craters in the stone and then the all the pieces of of large stone scattered all around. And

18:02so you can kind of there's just enough cues there to give you a sense of this just enormous

18:09destructive force and to imagine what what would have happened at the time. And this

18:14is something that the historian Josephus personally witnessed. Oh, wow. And so when you read some

18:21of Josephus's history, he talks in some detail about what went on during the the siege of

18:28Jerusalem and the destruction of the temple. And so does he talk about the fig tree situation

18:33at all? I think he overlooks the fig tree. This is happening ostensibly this is happening

18:42decades after Jesus's life and death. So the fig tree, if it had been withered at some

18:48point, somebody came along and went, we got to get this thing out of the way. And so I

18:53don't know how big it was probably not incredibly big. They probably could have just yanked it

18:57out by hand.

18:59Now, Mark is not the only place that we find this story. We also find it in Matthew. It

19:08feels like it gets a little bit more streamlined in Matthew. It's not separated. It's not sandwiched

19:16as you say, as Mark that Mark did. So this is Matthew 21. And basically it's it just has

19:28the story. And it all happens at the same time. It's not it doesn't have the intervening

19:35day. It just says that the Jesus saw the tree in the morning, said may no fruit ever come

19:41from you ever again. And then the fig tree withers right there in front of them. You

19:47know, it's basically the same thing. And you know, the disciples are saying, wow, that's

19:52amazing. And he says, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only will you do what has

19:58been done to the fig tree, but even if you say to the mountain, be lifted, here's the

20:03thing. Nobody ever does the mountain thing. Yeah. And none of the disciples ever seem

20:09to be able to do the fig tree trick either. It feels like, I mean, I guess part of me,

20:19when I read the, you'll be able to move mountains if you have enough faith thing. If it's in

20:26the context of a story that is metaphor, I'm much more comfortable with it, because he's

20:33speaking metaphorically. Yeah. But so many people have attempted crazy things, believing

20:42that their faith would be enough to, to make it happen or to keep them safe or whatever.

20:49Can we just make it the policy of the data over diamond podcast that you should not try

20:55things that are physically impossible? And then if your faith is really, really strong.

20:59Yeah. Yeah. As Jesus said, you shall not tempt the Lord, your God. And frequently, people

21:10try it in context that render what they're doing tempting to God. They're, they're trying

21:15to say, Oh, I'm going to, you know, whatever ends up, you know, people have died because

21:21they've done silly things, believing that God was going to save them. And which is really

21:28inviting a sign attempting God exactly as Jesus said when he was like, yeah, jump, jump

21:34off the temple. Come on, man, you can do it. Everybody else doing it. In fairness though,

21:40it does seem like Jesus is saying here, if you, if you have faith and do not doubt, you

21:46can just do anything. Yeah. So that seems like it's in conflict with the don't have God.

21:52But again, you must see this as a metaphor. Yeah. Well, and, and, you know, Matthew has

21:58Jesus saying things that conflict with themselves as do the other gospel authors. And I would

22:05argue that Matthew probably because Matthew's like, Hey, you can do the same thing as I just

22:11did to this fig tree and other things as well. But wait, there's more anything. And so it

22:19seems to me that the Matthew has kind of missed some of the metaphorical message that Mark

22:27was, was using, or at least understands it in a different way. Because I think the message

22:32is a little harder to, to get from here than it is from the gospel of Mark. And so it seems

22:39like it's a story that Matthew was like, well, we got to include this silly little story.

22:43We're going to work this in here. Yeah. And he didn't, and he didn't want to split it

22:50up with the cleansing of the temple like Mark did. And so he has to have it happen immediately.

22:57Right. He's just like zap. And then immediately the tree desiccates and withers up. Yeah. Which

23:05makes for an even more peculiar story. Yeah. Because the, and the disciples are not like,

23:11why the hell did you do that? Point of order. Why? Did you? Yeah, kill the tree. Luke does

23:21an interesting thing. He, I think by the time this gets around to Luke, is Luke after Matthew?

23:27I think most scholars would probably say Luke is after Matthew. Yes. Because in fact, more

23:33and more scholars are arguing that Luke may be early second century. Oh, wow. Yeah. Okay.

23:38Because Luke skips Jesus killing the fig tree altogether, but has a fig tree moment. Yeah.

23:46He has a parable of history. It's just a vibe at this point. Yeah. This kind of just, it's just like,

23:52I mean, and Jesus isn't even involved. And it's very clearly a parable. It's labeled as a parable,

23:59which is nice. Like when you, you know, when some of these, when some of these labeled as a metaphor,

24:05as opposed to just like, I'm saying this metaphor, maybe you'll get it. Maybe you won't. But yeah,

24:11the parable of the fig tree is much more, it's about a guy who plants a fig tree.

24:18It doesn't ever, you know, for three years, it doesn't bear fruit. Dude's pissed off. He says,

24:24you know, I love the idea of why should it be wasting soil? And then a dude says, give it another

24:35year. I'm going to dig around. I'm going to put some manure on it. If it bears fruit next year,

24:42that's good. If not, you can cut it down. I don't know what that's a parable for. Do you?

24:49Well, I think we still, I think this is a little more clearly a metaphorical reference to

24:55the house of Israel bearing fruit for God. However, yeah, it's Luke's probably like these idiots.

25:03They're not going to get this. And and probably also was thinking of me. Luke was thinking of me.

25:10I appreciate it. And it's probably also wanting to distance Jesus from a destructive act.

25:15Doesn't want to represent Jesus as doing this because the tradition of Jesus has developed a

25:20little bit more. Jesus is probably a little more lovey-dovey by this time period. Luke is certainly

25:25one who's who's on more concern for the the more vulnerable and marginalized of society. He's

25:31championing women and he's championing the Gentiles more. And so I think he's probably like, we don't

25:37want to hurt no little tree. Let's just well, we'll put it in a parable so it's not even history. It's

25:44just metaphor explicitly. But and they don't represent them destroying it. I mean, that's the

25:52end of it. It's the first time it's the first time we get the idea of like, let's try to make this

25:57okay. Let's let's see if we can actually like salvage this tree and have it bring fruit, which I

26:08think is interesting because the other two are just like, Oh, no fruit, you're dead forever.

26:12And then it looks like there's the infancy gospel of Thomas, which is one of the one of the Gnostic

26:21Gospels probably written in the mid to late second century CE has a quotation. Behold,

26:28now you also shall be withered like a tree and shall not bear leaves or nor roots nor fruit.

26:36What is going on with the trees in ancient Southwest Asia that they are withering?

26:43I don't see that many withered trees. Do you see withered tree? Anyway, go on. Well, you have,

26:49I'm trying to remember where this is, but I think you have figurative language where

26:54you know, fruit can also in addition to being a reference to like good works and productivity

27:02and progress and things like that can also be used to refer to offspring and descendants.

27:08And so a withered tree or a withered root or something like that is somebody who does not have any

27:14any children any offspring shooting. So thanks. Well, yeah, if you if you want to get clinical

27:20about it, I think that's the technical term. But I'm trying to think of a, there's there's a

27:26reference somewhere to somebody being like a withered tree. I'm just saying they're using this

27:34metaphor a lot. And it just seems like maybe the trees there were we're not doing great.

27:41Horticultureally, it seems like they need arborists in. There were not a ton of trees

27:48in the area. The soil is pretty rocky for one. And historically, there were there were a lot

27:56of trees further north. You know, the cedars of Lebanon, for instance, a lot of people are

28:01familiar with that. But those, a lot of those trees were, there was a lot of deforestation,

28:06a lot of those trees were used in earlier periods. And so by the time of the first century CE,

28:10there was not really a ton for them. And this is why a lot of scholars think that Jesus wouldn't

28:15have been a carpenter, but a stonemason or something like that, because that would would have been at

28:21quite a premium. And so most of the construction and things like that would have been in stone.

28:28And you even have right around this time period within Judaism, the use of stone utensils, like

28:34stone cups and pots and things like that, is for a brief period, very popular. But this has to do

28:41primarily with purity, because stone, unlike clay, would not transmit or maintain or retain

28:50impurities. So a clay dish, if it was rendered impure, it would transmit the impurity to whatever

28:58was in it. But stone would, the impurities would bounce off. And then whatever was put into it

29:06could be purified. So stone was more important than wood in that time period, in part, because

29:14trees were not abundant. Although you do have a lot of olive trees in the area. In fact,

29:20in the story in Mark and in Matthew, he's spending the night in Bethany, which is down the valley,

29:27up the Mount of Olives, and kind of heading on to the other side of the Mount of Olives

29:34is Bethany. So it's it doesn't say where exactly this fig tree is, but if he was going from Bethany

29:41to Jerusalem, it might have been located overlooking the what's called the Kidron Valley. And so it

29:48would have been directly opposite the temple on the other side, which is there's a you can go there

29:55today, there's like a lookout point, like a platform and a railing and a place where people go to

30:01take pictures, because you have the dome of the rock and the temple mounts directly opposite.

30:09All right. There you go.

30:10Lovely area. And Jesus said unto them, this is good for Insta. If you guys want to stop,

30:16get your phones out. Yeah, they were living in the now they were living in the moment. That's right.

30:24It was, let's kill this tree rather than. Yeah, I love the idea that I love that you pointed

30:30out that he was theoretically a carpenter because you would think that a carpenter would have more

30:35respect for a tree at very least don't wither it, you know, cut it down, make something out of it,

30:40have some nice box or something, honor it, honor it, turn it into something productive,

30:48give it a second life. That's right. But yeah, and then every time I think of Jesus as a carpenter

30:54all I can think of is that's the cup of a carpenter.

30:57Yeah, there you go. All right. Well, thanks for that. The story now makes some sense to me.

31:06I'm going to I'm going to give it. I'm going to allow it to have some sense.

31:10It's not it's not maybe meaningful, but it is. Yeah. Well, I mean, not not to me. It's coherent.

31:18Yeah, I had I I have no personal, what am I trying to say, like connection to the temple, but yeah,

31:25or to like the structure of Judaism or Israel at the time, but I get it. So that being said,

31:32let's move on to to what does that mean?

31:37What's that mean? We're talking about Deutero Isaiah for this segment and

31:47Deutero. I'm in if you speak modern Greek, you're thinking Deftero, but Deutero Isaiah means second

31:55Isaiah basically. And this is a theory that sees the book of Isaiah as a multi stage composition,

32:06something that came together over a long period of time, not just the work of one author,

32:13but of at least two. And the theory, the main theory has three authors. They call them first

32:19Isaiah, second Isaiah, and third Isaiah. And Deutero Isaiah is the more common designation

32:26for second Isaiah. And this runs from Isaiah 40 to 55. Okay. So Isaiah Isaiah as a book in the

32:35in the the Hebrew Bible goes to chapter 66, 66 is a lot. I'm sorry. I'm just full of movie

32:44references today. But when you said 66, I thought it was six, six, six, six, 60, 66 times, which is,

32:54you don't know that one. Okay, that's the great outdoors. Oh, yeah. So when how many times you've

33:01been struck by lightning? 66 time. Okay, so so yeah, the Isaiah is a prophet writing in the mid

33:11to late eighth century into the seventh century BCE. So would have been a prophet that was there

33:21in the courts to see the reigns of a couple different kings, but Hezekiah is the main king

33:27and is so that is associated with Hezekiah. And do we believe even even let's just say,

33:34let's just say that we're going to accept for for purposes of this argument or of this discussion,

33:40the Deutero Isaiah theory. Do we believe that the first part of Isaiah was actually written

33:46by a dude named Isaiah? Yes. Okay. Yes, critical scholarship is in agreement that there was a dude

33:54named Isaiah, who probably was a core prophet for perhaps King Hezekiah. Now, we see some stuff

34:03about so Isaiah would have been ministering, prophetizing. However, you want to say that,

34:12that's not correct, but that's what came out. It's good enough by me.

34:15And before the destruction of the northern kingdom of Israel, around the year 722 BCE,

34:23at the hands of the Assyrians, and then would have been around for Sinakarib's invasion of the

34:29northern kingdom and then siege of Jerusalem, which ultimately was called off, leaving Hezekiah

34:35to declare victory, even though in the Sinakarib prism, an Akkadian text written a little bit

34:42later, Sinakarib crows about having trapped Hezekiah in his capital city, like a bird in a cage.

34:51But Isaiah, for a long time, people have noticed there seem to be different segments of Isaiah.

34:55You have chapters 1 through 12 talking about judgment and salvation for Israel and for Judah.

35:01Chapters 13 to 27 are a bunch of oracles against the nations or woes. You have 10

35:09woe untues that run from chapter 13 to chapter 23. Chapter 24 through 27 represent Isaiah's

35:19kind of apocalypse. We have chapters 28 through 35, which we come back to some woes, but they're

35:25leading up to the Sinakarib narrative, and then chapters 36 through 39 are the Sinakarib slash

35:32Hezekiah narrative. So we're kind of zooming in on the story that's told in Second Kings,

35:39chapters 18 and 19, where Sinakarib comes up against Jerusalem and lays siege to it.

35:46And we have a slightly different telling of how that all went. And then we have chapters 40 through

35:5255, Deutero, Isaiah, and this tells the story of the fall of Babylon and the restoration of Zion.

35:59And then chapters 56 through 66 kind of represent a concentric arrangement where you have the earliest

36:07and the latest chapters talking about gathering the people to God's holy mountain. And then you

36:15move into next latest and next earliest chapters, there are complaints about the nature of the

36:24deliverance. And there's a divine response. And then you move in, there's a theophany to punish

36:29the wicked. And then the very center of this concentric arrangement is about restoration,

36:34the restoration of Israel. And around the year 1800, scholars began to take seriously this notion

36:44that there were multiple authors responsible for what we know as the book of Isaiah, and that at

36:53least a part of it was probably written during the Exilic period. So centuries after the historical

36:59Isaiah would have lived and preached and prophetized. And this is thanks to to a series of Johanns.

37:08So Johann Benjamin Kopa, Johann Christoph Deuterline, and Johann Gottfried Eichorn, our authors in the

37:15late 18th century, who are kind of developing a theory of, hey, some of this looks like it's

37:24coming from a later time period. And then we have a scholar named Berenhard Doom in 1892,

37:32who published a commentary and argued for a first, a second, and a third Isaiah.

37:38Talk about the clues that led to these conclusions. And this is important because a lot of people

37:50think that there's this kind of cynicism about authorship where critical scholars are like,

37:57I'm beginning from the presupposition that none of this happened, and none of this was written by who

38:02claims to have written it. And this just simply is not the case. This is critical scholars coming

38:09to the text, accepting it at face value until given a reason not to. So these earliest scholars

38:16weren't like, you know, every chance I get to say something is not Isaiah, I'm gonna say it.

38:22Because the first people were like, Oh, it's just chapter 50. And it's just chapter 42.

38:28And it's just chapters 13 through 16 that seem like they were probably written by somebody much

38:33later. And then the theory gets refined and the theory gets refined and the theory gets refined.

38:38But the biggest division is between Isaiah one through 39 and Isaiah 40 through the rest of Isaiah.

38:45Because here's something interesting. Isaiah's name is mentioned over a dozen times in chapters

38:50one through 39, the word of the Lord, which came to Isaiah, the son of Amos. And the Lord said to

38:56Isaiah and Isaiah said to Hezekiah and all this, and you have it occurring like four times in Isaiah

39:0237 three times and Isaiah 38 three times and Isaiah 39. And his name is never mentioned again.

39:08In 40 through 66, there's no reference to Isaiah at all.

39:15So one thing, the language is shifts. The topics shift. And the timeframe seems to shift because

39:24Isaiah one through 39 are talking about the future destruction of Israel by Babylon.

39:32It is prophesying about this. This is coming. This is coming. This is coming. I'm prophesying

39:38that this is coming. And then you get to verse or chapter 40. And all of a sudden we're no longer

39:44prophesying. It's now saying that happened, that happened, that happened. It's in the past. It's

39:50not the prophetic perfect. It's not this speaking about it with such confidence that you speak about

39:58it as if it already happened. They're just saying, Hey, this thing happened. None of it's speaking

40:04prophetically. None of it is attributing anything to Isaiah. It is all talking about here's how we

40:10are picking up the pieces. And here is what's, what's coming. And so scholars are like,

40:16what do we do with this? We got to figure something out. And then you have some other,

40:23you have some other clues. So Isaiah 45 calls Cyrus the great explicitly refers to Cyrus by name,

40:31who is someone who conquered Babylon, the Persian emperor who conquered Babylon in the year 539 BCE.

40:37So a good 200 years after Isaiah. And it says that Cyrus is my anointed one. And in the Greek

40:49translation of this, it is my Christ literally. And so, and this is because Cyrus conquered Babylon

40:56and then allowed the Judah heights who had been exiled to return. And according to who we referred

41:02to earlier in the show. Right. And so they're like, well, it kind of seems like whoever wrote

41:10this section that's very, very different and is looking back on the whole Babylonian exile is

41:16something that happened in the past, maybe is referring to Cyrus because they're writing after

41:23this all happened. Right. Now, and a lot of people will, I get accused of this a lot. A lot of people

41:29say, well, that's your anti supernatural bias. You just don't allow for the possibility of real

41:33prophecy. And that's not what the scholars who develop these theories were doing. Now, I will argue

41:42that it is a methodological necessity to reject the possibility of real prophecy if we want to

41:48function as scholars at all. Because when you say we have to allow for the possibility of real

41:55prophecy, there is no circumstance then where you can interrogate or question a claim to real

42:04prophecy. Because you, when you say we have to allow for real prophecy, you're saying the normal

42:10critical scholarly methodologies and frameworks and lenses, we're going to exempt this story right

42:17here. They do not apply. Right. But to say anything is not real prophecy requires the imposition of

42:24those very frameworks and lenses and methodologies. And so you pick and choose which story gets to

42:30be exempt and which does not. And so if you say, well, you have to allow for the possibility that

42:36Isaiah really prophesied about Cyrus, but then you turn around and say, well, no, Joseph Smith

42:42obviously didn't predict the coming of the Civil War. You're imposing historical critical

42:50methodologies on one place and you're saying, no, this gets to be exempt in the other place. So whether

42:54it's the Book of Mormon or the Bhagavad Gita or the Quran or anybody else who has claimed to prophecy.

43:04Hank Kunaman talking about Donald Trump being definitely reelected in

43:10Yeah. Or even even the failed prophecies. I mean, the people who say, well, this has to be real

43:17prophecy, make excuses for failed prophecy. And so even the folks who said, yeah, that comment over

43:23there, we're going to be riding that thing next week. Even those folks, you cannot, you don't have

43:32a way to consistently apply the same approach and wind up at that's real prophecy. That's fake

43:39prophecy. So out of methodological necessity, critical scholarship cannot accept real prophecy,

43:46at least in my opinion, which means that no, if the text says there's this dude named Cyrus,

43:51that text was written after that dude named Cyrus was on the scene.

43:56It does certainly seem like an Occam's razor moment, right? Like the simplest

44:01explanation for it is clearly that they knew because even if nothing else,

44:08most of the prophecy throughout the Bible that I've encountered, it's not specific like that.

44:15It's not, it doesn't name names. It says, you know, a great, and it's usually metaphor, right? It's

44:21usually like a giant statue is erected and it has, you know, blah, blah, blah for feet and it has

44:29blah, blah, the gold for head or whatever it is. It's not, it's not being, it's not saying,

44:34and the head, the gold head is Julius Caesar and the, the, it's not because

44:40prophecy isn't specific in, in that way. It's not naming names. Yeah. Unless it's about,

44:47unless it's about like two weeks from now or whatever. And, and you see this in, in all of the

44:53different ways that attempts at prognostication and prophecy manifest, they're always vague.

44:58The palm readers will say like, I, I'm sensing the letter M. Oh, I live on Maple Street. That's

45:05the one. There you go. Or yeah, you, you have a lot of, of vagaries, but it's like, it was the guy

45:13Cyrus, specifically Cyrus, the great, the first one, the Persian, he was in that specific enough that

45:20it's not even claiming to be prophecy. Right. It is just saying, hey, Cyrus, my anointed one,

45:29he did this thing for me. And he's, and so it's, it's not even claiming to be prophecy at that point.

45:35And so when you gather up all the data and there are a number of other things, there are Aramaic

45:42loanwords in the book of Isaiah and the Judah Heights picked up Aramaic, including the Aramaic

45:49script while they were exileees in Babylon. So when you have Aramaic loanwords in the text,

45:54or at least a higher concentration of them, that indicates this text was written in when they were

46:01in much closer proximity to the use of that language that all of this combines to make it far more likely

46:11that's Isaiah 40 through 55. At least we're probably composed after the Babylonian exile. Most scholars

46:21would say somewhere around 520 BCE. So after the return, right around the time that the second temple

46:28is being rebuilt is probably when you have the first layers of Deutero Isaiah being produced.

46:35And then Trito or third Isaiah is coming even later than that, probably in the Persian period.

46:41Is there any theory as to why these were tacked onto Isaiah rather than just presented as their own,

46:49as their own books? Well, there are lots of theories because

46:56since the late 20th century, there's been a big concern for trying to drill deeper because a lot

47:02of people thought, okay, the real Isaiah wrote Isaiah one through 39. And then the next guy came

47:08through and wrote 40 through 55. And then somebody later on came through and wrote 56 to 66. But then

47:13scholars are like, well, I don't know about this. Like Marvin Sweeney, I think his dissertation,

47:20and then some of his early work was talking about how Isaiah one through four fits much better

47:26thematically with Deutero Isaiah. And so he was saying what we've got literary layers still from

47:34later periods in first Isaiah. And so there is a now scholars are trying to piece together

47:41how exactly Deutero Isaiah and first Isaiah and third Isaiah came together. And so there was

47:47even a paper published in 1998. I'm Coggins, I believe was was the author who's and the paper

47:53was, do we even need Deutero Isaiah or something like that? Like, and the argument was if this is

47:59not a coherent single source, do we even need to treat it as as its own segment? Because it seems

48:06like parts of Isaiah one through four are probably from the same or even a later author. And then

48:13we've got parts of some of the other segments within Isaiah one through 39. And so, you know,

48:20some scholars are like, the original Isaiah only wrote these six and a half verses in this one

48:25chapter. And that that's kind of on the extreme. And I think most scholars would say the majority

48:30half to the majority of Isaiah one through 39 is probably the work of an eighth century

48:38prophecy, a prophet who went by Isaiah. And then as it accumulated more layers and was redacted and

48:46you bring in this post-exilic work, you have people kind of adding introductions and you have people

48:53writing other things into some of the later layers and earlier layers. And so it is a very complex,

49:02has a very complex compositional history that scholars are still working on trying to

49:08trying to come to some kind of agreement on. But what the overwhelming majority of scholars

49:15agree on is that Isaiah 40 through the end of Isaiah were absolutely not written in the eighth

49:23or even the seventh century BCE, but were written much later and much of Isaiah one through 39 was

49:28probably written can later as well. Can you confirm for me? You know, I, when I was looking this up,

49:36doing a little bit of research, I, of course, found articles that were, we'll call it skeptical

49:45of this claim. Yeah, can you confirm that as the, as GotQuestions.org says, the theory of multiple

49:56Isaiah's is one example of skepticism from those who want to call into question the Bible as God's

50:02inspired word. Can you confirm that it's just scholars trying to, to ruin it for all the believers

50:12out there? So that's a, that's a value judgment. And that is, that is making some pretty irresponsible

50:21assumptions about where these theories are coming from. Because these, these don't originate in

50:26people who are like, the Bible's dumb. You know, this, this is not a good question would beg to differ.

50:32The, these are people who are just trying to honestly engage with the data they're, they're

50:40finding in the text, which, and we've talked about when we had our friend Aaron on to talk about the

50:47star of Bethlehem, you know, he was saying, I wanted to know more as a believer, I wanted to know more.

50:54And I got to the point where I was like, I can't sustain this, this position anymore because I

51:02got to know more. And you know, not, there are scholars who, who then leave the traditions they

51:10grew up with, abandon them and, and continue to have a lot of interest in studying this kind of

51:18stuff. And then there are others who stay in the traditions and treat the, treat the text from an

51:24emic inside perspective. Hey, this is, I consider this to be authoritative literature. I consider

51:29this to be important. I use this to guide my life, but I'm also engaging it as honestly as I can,

51:37because a lot of them feel that that's really the best way to try to apply it is to try to better

51:44understand it, even if it means being critical about it. So yeah, there's, apologists are,

51:51I've said this before, apologists begin with the conclusion in mind. And then their goal is just to

51:59try to find a way around the data to generate an argument that sounds at least possible.

52:07To say the data do not make it impossible for me to arrive at the predetermined goal.

52:13Now what critical scholars do is they will allow the data to operate on their own terms and allow

52:19the data to lead them where the data are going. And that's, those are two very different approaches.

52:24One is let's go see where this takes us. The other is this is going to take us here.

52:31And we just need to see how many train transfers and how many walking routes we have to take

52:38to get there. Okay, look, just because the road doesn't lead us there doesn't mean we can't drive

52:44there. We just got to go off road a little bit. Yeah, and you see this a lot. There are folks who

52:49will respond to critical scholarship by saying, we can make a plausible case. It's not impossible.

52:57And tons of things are not impossible. I mean, as Russell's teapot shows, there's

53:05an awful lot of stuff that's not impossible. And if that's if that's the bar, it is underground.

53:10So, yeah, those should be taken seriously.

53:16On the other side of it, you know, you talked about how, you know, for the work of critical

53:22scholarship, you have to sort of assume, no, that the prof you have to assume that prophecy

53:31isn't isn't correct or isn't real until somebody can demonstrate it. Yeah, that doesn't mean that

53:37that's for the work of the scholar. That's that doesn't mean that you can't have a faith

53:42that is that does include prophecy. Oh, absolutely not. I agree 100%. Anybody can, I mean,

53:51you get the meaning and the significance and the utility out of it that's going to make you a

53:56better person is going to help make you a more contributing member of society. For a critical

54:03scholar, I would say there are there are boundaries to where we should be going because our goal is

54:09not to say, look, how awesome the Bible is, our goal is to try to use the data to find out what we

54:17can about where this thing came from, how it came together, how it has been used in the past,

54:22what it means to us now. And and I think we have a responsibility to point out when it is being

54:31used for destructive purposes to structure power and values and boundaries over and against the

54:36interests of of marginalized and minoritized and oppressed groups. And and that's what an

54:43awful lot of apologetic work is doing is trying to structure power in favor of certain groups and

54:48over and against others. And and so yeah, there are folks, I think, who do a responsible job

54:56of allowing for the possibility of real prophecy, but they're not the ones on the internet barking at

55:03critical scholars and condemning them and right and denigrating their work and denigrating them

55:09as people, and even denying that it's possible for them to have faith or be believers, which is

55:15something that I get thrown at me an awful lot. And claiming that the goal of this scholarship is

55:21to to denigrate the Bible or to or to undermine the belief in in God's inspired word or whatever.

55:32And and I think that's rhetorical prophylaxis. I've used that word a lot. A lot of people are like,

55:37what even is rhetorical prophylaxis? You're talking about a word condom? What are you saying?

55:42So prophylaxis is is a barrier or a protection against the harmful or the undesirable effects of

55:52something. And so a prophylactic is something that we have a technical use for. But rhetorical

56:00prophylaxis is my term for when people use positions or arguments or things like that that have

56:08that only exist to deflect away criticism. Yeah. So that is rhetorical prophylaxis because

56:18it is a way for someone to dismiss critical scholarship so that it does not hurt their faith.

56:26It's not it's not a legitimate claim or concern. It's a fallacy. But if you can convince enough

56:33people that these people are out to harm your faith, then they will immediately put up a barrier.

56:40And then you have those people have cut off the harmful effects of that critical scholarship

56:45through this fallacious ad hominem attack. And I get that all every single day, dozens of times

56:54every single day, people will comments across social media that I'm trying to destroy the Bible

56:59or destroy Christianity or destroy Mormonism or destroy Judaism. I get accused of that stuff all

57:07the time. And you guys, everybody pay attention just because that's what's actually happening and he

57:13is destroying those things doesn't mean that's why he's that he's trying to. That's totally different.

57:21All right, friends, well, that's it for this week's show. Thank you so much for doing

57:24in this Deuteros Isaiah thing. I like it. We've referred to it before. Now we all know what it

57:29is. I'm very pleased about that. Dude, bro, Isaiah is another way to I feel like it's, you know,

57:36there's there's got to be something about the big Lebowski involved in Deuteros. Deuterino,

57:43Isaiah, the whole brevity thing. That's right. L Deuterino, Isaiah,

57:48which is now what it's called in my mind forever. You've locked it in. That's solid. All right.

57:53If you would like to become a part of making this show go and get add free early access to every

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58:22Bye everybody.

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