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The Invasion of the Lord's Armies in 1 Thess. 4
Posted on Friday, April 14 @ 07:34:02 PDT by kalos |
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Ransom submitted: "In the process of looking for answers about the proposed Michael/Jesus connection, I began to examine some of the wordage in 1 Thessalonians 4:16. The various modern translations generally seem to follow in the same vein, seemingly taking their cue from the KJV: "For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first."
(Note: this is a slightly expanded version of the notes I put in the Open Bible Project under 1 Thessalonians 4).
"For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first." (NKJV)
"For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of {the} archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first." (NASB)
"For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first." (NIV)
Close scrutiny of both the grammar and vocabulary made me question the appropriateness of this translation. Let's start with the vocabulary.
The Greek word commonly translated in this passage as "shout" is keleuma, which Thayer and Smith identifies as an "order, command, spec. a stimulating cry...that by which a signal is given to men, e.g. to rowers by the master of a ship, to soldiers by a commander (with a loud summons, a trumpet call)". BAGD concurs that keleuma is a sound of command. Only the NIV actually translates it that way. The problem with using the word "shout" to translate keleuma is that at once it manages to be both more specific and more generic than the word being translated: not all shouts are commands, and by no means is it a given that what is referred to here is a vocalized command. This word is sufficiently ambiguous in and of itself about the manner in which the order is delivered – but what we must not miss here is that it is in fact an order being delivered. Paul's picture here is one of the Lord commanding His army. The implication is that what is happening in this passage is a battle or invasion rather than a search and rescue operation!
The next word of interest is phone, translated as "voice" in all the above-mentioned translations. This word can indeed mean "voice" (cf. "phonetics"), but the word itself hosts a larger range of meanings than that. Thayer and Smith and BAGD both give the first meaning as a sound or tone coming from "inanimate things, as musical instruments" (cf. "symphony")
While neither keleuma nor phone necessarily eliminates the voice as the referents in this passage, the collocation of the three "with" phrases is definitely more suggestive of a different reading. Bearing in mind that among the most common meanings of phone is "a sound made by instruments" and the fact that a keleuma means "an order" that may be conveyed by the blast of a trumpet, surely it is no coincidence that the next phrase actually places a trumpet (salpigx) at the same scene! The sequence of "with" phrases (Gk. en + dative) hence appear to be coreferential. Each phrase in the succession seems to expound upon the previous: an order, a sound, a trumpet. The genitive archangelou that modifies "trumpet" in this case would be a genitive of source/cause (i.e., the sound is created by the archangel blowing the trumpet of God). Hence the whole syntagm is to be construed as one: a signal of command coming as the sound of a note from an archangel blowing a trumpet of God. This is a vivid picture, one that reminds me of the old line, "It's a bird! It's a plane! No, it's Superman!"
The grammatical collocation of en + dative as seen in our "with" phrases often functions as an instrumental construction, and more specifically as a dative of manner. The more traditional reading here is that the construction denotes accompaniment, i.e. along with the descending Lord came the "shout", etc. However, if the "with" phrases are used as instrumental phrases, with the nouns as dative of manner, the Lord's signal of attack via His archangel was the manner in which the Lord descended. The trumpet could indeed be characterized as a trumpet of God! Hence in the same way that Bush invaded Iraq, God is pictured as descending upon His enemies with His armies. For is God not omnipresent? Does He really live in the sky beyond the clouds? Is this not a figurative illustration of what is happening in the noumenal?
Of course, as is well-documented, the next verse's contribution to our understanding of the Lord's mission centers around the prepositional phrase eis apantesin, often rendered "to meet", but which more properly carries the connotation of "to go out to receive". This phrase refers to a greeting party going out to usher in a coming dignitary. This meaning clarifies the following phrase by excluding heaven as the location of the dwelling with the Lord: "So the Lord will be among us forever." (See also Mat 25:1 and Acts 28:15)."
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Average Score: 5
Votes: 2
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Re: The Invasion of the Lord's Armies in 1 Thess. 4 (Score: 1)
 by Jer on Friday, April 14 @ 10:54:34 PDT
(User Info | Send a Message) | Good job!
You noted, "The grammatical collocation of en + dative as seen in our 'with' phrases often functions as an instrumental construction, and more specifically as a dative of manner."
Regarding datives of manner, Daniel Wallace mentions that the construction εν + the dative, as in 1TH 4:16, actually supplanted the dative substantive alone. The dative of association, the route taken by the translators, is routinely expressed by a dative substantive without the preceding preposition. So your presentation certainly reflects the grammar more accurately than the translations.
Additionally, your conclusion reflects the cultural worldview. In the West, we have a dichotomy between the natural and the supernatural. Those in the Ancient Near East did not share this assumption. For example, Isaiah 19 depicts God Himself coming on cloud to judge Egypt, a "supernatural" event by our standards. We read in the later portions of the chapter that this is manifested by armies of men, something that would appear entirely "natural" to us.
In the same way, Jesus would judge by riding on a cloud, coming to Jerusalem, etc. Unfortunately, many people see this language from a Western viewpoint, which makes it difficult to see the "supernatural" in the events of AD 70.
Great article. Thanks for sharing. |
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- by Ransom on Friday, April 14 @ 14:08:42 PDT
Re: The Invasion of the Lord's Armies in 1 Thess. 4 (Score: 1)
 by MiddleKnowledge on Saturday, April 15 @ 20:59:17 PDT
(User Info | Send a Message) | Ransom,
Did you happen to read Jeff Carter's intriguing article on the connection between Michael and Jesus? It is here:
http://planetpreterist.com/news-2797.html
Tim Martin
www.truthinliving.org |
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- by Ransom on Saturday, April 15 @ 21:11:36 PDT
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