{"id":1080,"date":"2010-05-15T08:54:51","date_gmt":"2010-05-15T08:54:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/2010\/05\/the-story-of-sin--a-dark-tale-part-seven.html"},"modified":"2010-05-15T08:54:51","modified_gmt":"2010-05-15T08:54:51","slug":"the-story-of-sin-a-dark-tale-part-seven","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/05\/the-story-of-sin-a-dark-tale-part-seven.html","title":{"rendered":"The Story of Sin— A Dark Tale Part Seven"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"sin.jpg\"<\/a><\/span> <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

In the world of the ANE, weights
\nand measures were crucial, not least because ancient economies were mostly
\nbarter economies, not money economies. The way the value of some goods was
\nestimated in antiquity was by putting them on a scale, and putting weights in
\nthe other pan of a two pan scale until a balance was achieved. It is not
\nsurprising then that just as you would add more and more to one pan of the
\nscale (say more grain) until a balance happened with a certain number of
\nweights in the other pan, that such commercial processes affected the way sin
\nwas viewed in antiquity.    <\/span>This was so
\nfor two reasons:  <\/span>1) the God of the Bible
\nwas indeed depicted as a merciful God, who put up with a lot and for a long time,
\nbut not forever.  <\/span>His patience was not
\ninfinite.;  <\/span>2) sins add up.   <\/span>This is why for instance we hear in Gen.
\n15.16 the explanation that the reason the descendents of Abraham will not enter
\nthe promise land for a long period of time is because about the current
\ninhabitants there, the Amorites, it is said “the iniquity of the Amorites is
\nnot yet complete”.  <\/span>We may compare this
\nfor instance to what Paul says in 1 Thess. 2.14-16 about Jews in Judea who had persecuted Jewish Christians there, about
\nwhich Paul comments “thus they have been constantly filling up the measure of
\ntheir sins; but God’s wrath has overtaken them at last.”  <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sin mounts up like grain in a
\nscale, and when it reaches the tipping point, judgment happens, not by some
\nsort of moral calculus inherent in the world, but through a direct judgment of
\nGod.  <\/span>Dan. 8.23 speaks of transgression
\nbeing completed and then judgment following. 
\n<\/span>But it is not just sin that is weighed or measured,  <\/span>so also judgment is meted out proportionally,
\nusing again the commercial metaphor.  
\n<\/span>Thus for instance Jeremiah says that Judea
\nwill go into exile for some 70 years for their sins, a specified definite
\nperiod of time.  <\/span>And indeed counting from
\nabout 587 B.C. or so, this was the period of the exile.  <\/span>In his discussion of this matter in Chapter 6
\nAnderson emphasizes the notion of a building up of a debt, which eventually God
\nmust demand payment for.  <\/span>But in fact,
\nthis commercial metaphor, with the scales as a image equally well can be called
\nthe building up of a weight, which when it reaches a certain proportion, there
\nhas to be a reckoning.  <\/span>Just as one adds
\nmore and more grain to the scale until the weights are counter balanced, so
\nalso with sin seen as an accumulating weight.  
\n<\/span>Indeed, one can say that an accumulating weight of sin is an
\naccumulating debt of sin.  <\/span>The two images
\nsupplement one another in the metaphorical description, one need not supplant
\nor make superfluous the other. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

This whole bookkeeper way of
\nlooking at God’s handling of sin troubled some Jews who reflected deeply on the
\nmatter, especially when there were all the promises that God would not abandon
\nhis people or destroy them.  <\/span>The matter
\nbecame even more problematic when it seemed that God was regularly judging his
\npeople, and indeed seemingly judging them more harshly than the pagan nations (‘judgment
\nbegins with the household of God’).  
\n<\/span>This moral problem led to some ingenuous solutions.  <\/span>For example consider the words Anderson points to in 2
\nMacc. 6.12-17 which says in part “With the other nations God waits patiently,
\nstaying their punishment until they reach the full measure of their sins. Quite
\notherwise is his decree for us, in order that he should not  <\/span>have to punish us after we complete the full
\nmeasure of our sins”  <\/span>Accordingly God
\nkeeps short accounts with his people, judging them a little at a time and never
\nabandoning or failing to have mercy on them, so they continue to exist, even
\nthough regularly chastised by calamities of one sort or another.   <\/span>“God never allows her sins to reach a level
\nwherein he would be forced to disown her.” (p. 91).  <\/span>It is precisely this sort of rationalization
\nthat led some Jews, both ancient and modern to say— let God pick another
\nchosen people.   <\/span>Suffering repeatedly is
\na hard way to pay down one’s debt of sin, even if, as the rabbis rationalized
\nin Sifre<\/i> that God mercifully
\ncollected far less for Israel’s sins than they deserved. Of what comfort in the
\nend is it if God still exacted his ‘pound of flesh’ when one can only say thank
\ngoodness he didn’t exact all that was owed? 
\n<\/span>And what then of such rationalizations when Amos 3.2 says “you alone
\nhave I singled out of all the families of the earth—that is why I call you to
\naccount for all your iniquities.”  <\/span><\/p>\n

From the Christian purview,  <\/span>all of this makes one long for a new covenant
\nwith a new way of God relating to his people, in which sin is still dealt with
\nand judged,  <\/span>but a substitute is
\nprovided.   <\/span>We will say more of this in
\nsubsequent discussion of Anderson’s
\nprovocative book on sin. <\/p>\n

 <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the world of the ANE, weights and measures were crucial, not least because ancient economies were mostly barter economies, not money economies. The way the value of some goods was estimated in antiquity was by putting them on a scale, and putting weights in the other pan of a two pan scale until a…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":199,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1080","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Story of Sin- A Dark Tale Part Seven - The Bible and Culture<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/05\/the-story-of-sin-a-dark-tale-part-seven.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Story of Sin- A Dark Tale Part Seven - The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"In the world of the ANE, weights and measures were crucial, not least because ancient economies were mostly barter economies, not money economies. The way the value of some goods was estimated in antiquity was by putting them on a scale, and putting weights in the other pan of a two pan scale until a…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/05\/the-story-of-sin-a-dark-tale-part-seven.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-05-15T08:54:51+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/04\/sin-thumb-400x400-13031.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Ben Witherington\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Story of Sin- A Dark Tale Part Seven - The Bible and Culture","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/05\/the-story-of-sin-a-dark-tale-part-seven.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The Story of Sin- A Dark Tale Part Seven - The Bible and Culture","og_description":"In the world of the ANE, weights and measures were crucial, not least because ancient economies were mostly barter economies, not money economies. The way the value of some goods was estimated in antiquity was by putting them on a scale, and putting weights in the other pan of a two pan scale until a…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/05\/the-story-of-sin-a-dark-tale-part-seven.html","og_site_name":"The Bible and Culture","article_published_time":"2010-05-15T08:54:51+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/04\/sin-thumb-400x400-13031.jpg"}],"author":"Ben Witherington","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/05\/the-story-of-sin-a-dark-tale-part-seven.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/05\/the-story-of-sin-a-dark-tale-part-seven.html","name":"The Story of Sin- A Dark Tale Part Seven - The Bible and Culture","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/05\/the-story-of-sin-a-dark-tale-part-seven.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/05\/the-story-of-sin-a-dark-tale-part-seven.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/04\/sin-thumb-400x400-13031.jpg","datePublished":"2010-05-15T08:54:51+00:00","dateModified":"2010-05-15T08:54:51+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/d1fd6c7893819eabc624db38ecfd8426"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/05\/the-story-of-sin-a-dark-tale-part-seven.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/05\/the-story-of-sin-a-dark-tale-part-seven.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/05\/the-story-of-sin-a-dark-tale-part-seven.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/04\/sin-thumb-400x400-13031.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/files\/import\/assets_c\/2010\/04\/sin-thumb-400x400-13031.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/05\/the-story-of-sin-a-dark-tale-part-seven.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"The Story of Sin— A Dark Tale Part Seven"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/","name":"The Bible and Culture","description":"All Things Biblical and Christian","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/d1fd6c7893819eabc624db38ecfd8426","name":"Ben Witherington","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/75e\/75ec11e1916a2008bc4cc638a0a0de2fx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/75e\/75ec11e1916a2008bc4cc638a0a0de2fx96.jpg","caption":"Ben Witherington"},"description":"Bible scholar Ben Witherington is Amos Professor of New Testament for Doctoral Studies at Asbury Theological Seminary and on the doctoral faculty at St. Andrews University in Scotland. A graduate of UNC, Chapel Hill, he went on to receive the M.Div. degree from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and a Ph.D. from the University of Durham in England. He is now considered one of the top evangelical scholars in the world, and is an elected member of the prestigious SNTS, a society dedicated to New Testament studies. Witherington has also taught at Ashland Theological Seminary, Vanderbilt University, Duke Divinity School and Gordon-Conwell. A popular lecturer, Witherington has presented seminars for churches, colleges and biblical meetings not only in the United States but also in England, Estonia, Russia, Europe, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Australia. He has also led tours to Italy, Greece, Turkey, Israel, Jordan, and Egypt. Witherington has written over thirty books, including The Jesus Quest and The Paul Quest, both of which were selected as top biblical studies works by Christianity Today. He also writes for many church and scholarly publications, and is a frequent contributor to the Beliefnet website. Along with many interviews on radio networks across the country, Witherington has been seen on the History Channel, NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, The Discovery Channel, A&E, and the PAX Network.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/author\/bwitherington"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1080","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/199"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1080"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1080\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1080"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1080"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1080"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}