Christian hymns and the story of redemption.

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Ben C. Smith
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Christian hymns and the story of redemption.

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Jack T. Sanders, in his book New Testament Christological Hymns: Their Historical Religious Background, deals with six of what are often called hymns from the epistles, as well as the Johannine prologue (which he admits may not be a hymn at all). What follows are the passages, with brackets around the parts that he, along with other scholars, thinks may not actually be part of the original hymn. I have also listed eight themes identified by Sanders and coded the relevant parts of each hymn with the appropriate color:

The redeemer possesses unity or equality with God.
The redeemer is agent or mediator of creation.
The redeemer is part of, or is the sustainer of, the creation.
The redeemer descends from heaven into the earthly realm.
The redeemer dies.
The redeemer is made alive again.
The redeemer effects a reconciliation.
The redeemer is exalted and enthroned, the cosmic powers subjected to him.

Philippians 2.6-11:

6 Who, though existing in the form of God, did not regard it as plunder to be equal to God,
7 but rather emptied himself, having taken the form of a slave, in the likeness of humans having become,
8 and, having been found in shape as a human, he humbled himself, becoming obedient until death [even death on a cross],
9 and on this account God also exalted him highly and gifted him the name which is over every name,
10 so that in the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of the celestial and of the terrestrial and of the subchthonic,
11 and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord unto the glory of God the Father.

Colossians 1.15-20:

15 Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
16 For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth [visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities].
All things have been created through Him and for Him.
17 He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.
18 He is also head of the body [the church].
Who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead [so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything].
19 For it was the good pleasure of the Father for all the fullness to dwell in Him,
20 and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself [having made peace through the blood of His cross, through Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven].

Ephesians 2.14-16:

14 [For] He Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall
15 [by abolishing in His flesh the enmity, which is the Law of commandments contained in ordinances] so that in Himself He might make the two into one new man [thus establishing peace]
16 and might reconcile them both in one body to God [through the cross, by it having put to death the enmity].

1 Timothy 3.16:

16 By common confession, great is the mystery of godliness:
Who was revealed in the flesh,
Was vindicated in the Spirit,
Was seen by angels,
Was proclaimed among the nations,
Was believed on in the world,
Was taken up into glory.

1 Peter 3.18-22:

18 [For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God]
having been put to death in the flesh,
but having been made alive in the spirit;
19 [in which] having gone to the spirits now in prison he preached,
[20 who once were disobedient, when the patience of God kept waiting in the days of Noah, during the construction of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through the water.
21 Corresponding to that, baptism now saves you — not the removal of dirt from the flesh, but an appeal to God for a good conscience — through the resurrection of Jesus Christ,]
22 who is at the right hand of God,
having gone into heaven,
angels and authorities and powers having been subjected to Him.


Hebrews 1.3:

3 Who, being the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature,
upholding all things by the word of His power,
Having made purification of sins,
sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.

John 1.1-11:

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
2 This was in the beginning with God.
3 All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being.
4 In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men.
5 The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.
6 There came a man sent from God, whose name was John.
7 He came as a witness, to testify about the Light, so that all might believe through him.
8 He was not the Light, but he came to testify about the Light.
9 There was the true Light which, coming into the world, enlightens every man.
10 He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him.
11 He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him.

Not every concept is present in every hymn, of course, but the overall effect is to trace out a story of descent and ascent with salvific consequences. This story seems to be very different than the gospel story of Jesus; at the very least, it is extremely simple to extract Jesus Christ's preexistence, descent, ascent, and exaltation from the gospel story. The only real overlap is the death; even the resurrection comes off differently in the gospels than it does in the epistles.

Some of this redeemer myth cycle is also quite similar to the liturgies of ancient harvest gods, like Ba'al, whom I have compared to Yahweh before. I have also compared Ba'al to Jesus, a comparison which happens to have involved two of these hymns (the ones from Philippians and 1 Peter).

Sanders notes that there are many similarities to be found between these hymns and the Odes of Solomon, as well, and he also discusses Tammuz/Adonis in this connection.

There is also this passage from Qumran:

4Q491c, fragments 1-2, lines 1-17, 1-6: 1.1 [...] has done awesome things marvellously [...] 2 [... in the streng]th of his power the just exult, and the holy ones rejoice in [...] in justice 3 [...] he established [I]srael from eternity; his truth and the mysteries of his wisdom in al[l generations ...] might 4 [...] ... [...] ... and the council of the poor for an eternal congregation. [...] the perfect ones of 5 [... et]ernal; a mighty throne in the congregation of the gods above which none of the kings of the East shall sit, and their nobles no[t ...] silence (?) 6 [...] my glory is in{comparable} and besides me no one is exalted, nor comes to me, for I reside in [...], in the heavens, and there is no 7 [...] ... I am counted among the gods and my dwelling is in the holy congregation; [my] des[ire] is not according to the flesh, [but] all that is precious to me is in (the) glory (of) 8 [...] the holy [dwel]ling. [W]ho has been considered despicable on my account? And who is comparable to me in my glory? Who, like the sailors, will come back and tell? 9 [...] Who bea[rs all] sorrows like me? And who [suffe]rs evil like me? There is no one. I have been instructed, and there is no teaching comparable 10 [to my teaching ...] And who will attack me when [I] op[en my mouth]? And who can endure the flow of my lips? And who will confront me and retain comparison with my judgment? 11 [... friend of the king, companion of the holy ones ... incomparable, f]or among the gods is [my] posi[tion, and] my glory is with the sons of the king. To me (belongs) [pure] gold, and to me, the gold of Ophir 12 [...] ~ [...] ~ [...] 13 [... exult,] just ones, in the God of [...] in the holy dwelling, sing for h[im ...] 14 [... p]roclaim during the meditation jubilation [...] in eternal happiness; and there is no ... [...] 15 [...] to establish the horn of [his] Mess[iah ...] 16 [...] to make known his power with strength [...] 17 [...] ... [...] 2.1 [...] ... [...] 2 [...] his dwelling, and honored [...] 3 [...] ... for my enlargement [...] 4 [...] and I am the majesty of the [...] 5 [...] ... and not [...] 6 [...] ... [....]

Because the redeemer story seems so detachable from the story of Jesus in the gospels, my instinct is to treat it as its own thing. If it is a template which was imposed upon Jesus the Nazarene after his alleged resurrection, then I would have to ask about the origins of that template. Did it perhaps describe a separate entity before it was ever applied to Jesus the Nazarene? Are we able to piece together the parameters of the story itself, which may properly be called a myth in this case? Are we able to guess at how the story was used, what kinds of people told and retold it, and for what purposes? As Peter once wrote on this forum:
Peter Kirby wrote: Thu Jul 09, 2015 1:46 amThere is a mythology here. It has a beginning, a middle, and an end. There is a series of events in the middle. It's every bit as episodic (first this, then that, then the other) as Burton Mack's, J. D. Crossan's, Jimmy Dunn's, NT Wright's, or whoever's idea of what early Christians believed. There is a definite sense of progression in the phases where Jesus has not yet taken on the form of flesh; when Jesus was subject to temptation (immediately, I suppose) and yet became obedient unto death (did not resist his mission and had faith in God the Father); when Jesus was killed in the form of flesh; when Jesus was buried; when Jesus rose from the dead with his spiritual body; when Jesus preached to the spirits in hell; when Jesus entered into heaven; when Jesus officiated his own blood offering in the heavenly temple; when Jesus appeared to men and told them to spread his gospel; when Jesus was seated at the right hand of the father; when Jesus will come and be manifested 'again', materially this time, not just with apostles seeing him, and with the resurrection of the dead in Christ. (This is a composite picture based on several epistles, but we must assume that whatever picture was in mind for the early Christians, it was a coherent one that had its own internal logic; we must tease it out based on incidental references here and there.)
I have not at all set this endeavor aside. I think it continues to be worth pursuing.

Ben.
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