This is the transcript of Restitutio episode 678: Two Powers in Heaven 5: The Midrashim

This transcript was auto-generated and only approximates the contents of this episode.

Audio file
678 Two Powers part 5.mp3

Transcript

00:00
Number five, what do the Midrashim say about two powers?

00:04
We've been in a series on the two powers heresy.

00:07
We've looked at 1 Enoch, Philo, the Mishnah, the Tosefta.

00:13
We've been working through the primary sources chronologically.

00:17
Next up, we're going to look at two sources within the Midrashim.

00:23
And we're going to encounter the first clear mention of two powers in heaven.

00:30
I know you're so excited about this.

00:32
What kind of two powers did these authors have in mind?

00:36
Were they two powers working together or in competition with each other?

00:42
How does God appear in scripture?

00:45
Why does he manifest as an old man sometimes and as a young man other times?

00:51
Who was Rabbi Nathan of Babylon?

00:53
And what does he have to tell us about the two powers?

00:56
Get answers to these questions in today's Restitudio podcast.

01:00
Welcome to Restitudio, a podcast seeking to recover authentic Christianity and live it out today.

01:07
I'm your host, Shawn Finnegan, and before going on to talk about the Midrashim, I wonder if you can do me a favor and just subscribe to this channel if you haven't already, or follow this if you're listening to this.

01:20
on a platform that allows following, it would help so much.

01:24
Also, if you want to know more about me, you can find out about this podcast, other free educational series at restitudio.org.

01:36
Now, onto the show.

01:38
What is a Midrash?

01:40
Well, the word

01:41
Midrash, in Hebrew we would say midrash, comes from the verb darash, which means seek with care, study, and interpret, inquire about, investigate, require, or search.

01:55
Do you get the sense of what it means?

01:56
So the rabbis called an interpretation or explanation of scripture a midrash or plural midrashim.

02:04
Here are the oldest midrashim ordered by date so you can see them.

02:09
So we can see from 250 to 300, there's just a ton of midrashim that come out, including Sifra Leviticus, Sifra Bamidbar, or that's just a Hebrew word for numbers, Sifra Davarim, which means Deuteronomy.

02:26
Then there's the Mekhilta de Rabbi Ishmael, and that's on Exodus.

02:31
And then around the year 300 to 400, we get the Mekhilta de Rabbi Shimon ben Yochai on Exodus.

02:39
And then in the years 400 to 450, we get Bereshit Rabba, which is the Midrash on Genesis.

02:47
So we're gonna look at two of these.

02:50
They both date from between 250 and 300.

02:53
First up is Sifrei Devarim, which is translated to the book of Deuteronomy.

03:00
And we're gonna look at a passage from that.

03:03
And then we're going to look at the Mekhilta of Rabbi

03:07
Ishmael.

03:08
And these are going to be our two midrashes or midrashim that we are going to consider.

03:14
Both specifically mention two powers.

03:18
Are you excited?

03:19
Are you ready for it?

03:21
All right, here it is.

03:22
First up, Sifre Devarim 3:29.

03:26
This is what it says.

03:27
Look now for I, yes, I am he.

03:31
This repetition of I refutes those who claim that there is no authority in heaven.

03:36
As for those claiming on this basis that there are two authorities in heaven, you may respond to them as follows.

03:44
But hasn't it already been written, and there is no God beside me, I kill and give life.

03:51
Now this is a midrash on Deuteronomy 32, 39.

03:55
Deuteronomy 32, 39 says, see now that I, am he, and there is no God besides me, or no God with me.

04:03
God here says I twice.

04:06
And the author of this Midrash is asking the question, Well, why does God say I twice?

04:11
I, even I.

04:13
Ani, ani in the Hebrew.

04:15
And the answer is, He says I twice to emphasize that He exists over against two scenarios that are in view here.

04:23
Let me show you this.

04:24
The first scenario is those who claim that there is no authority in heaven.

04:29
So he says I so emphatically to indicate that he actually does exist.

04:35
It's an emphatic existence.

04:38
And then over against the others who claim there are two authorities in heaven.

04:42
Did you catch it?

04:43
There it is, two powers.

04:44
It's the first clear mention of two powers here in the middle of the third century or towards the end of the third century.

04:53
And sadly, we don't get much more than that.

04:58
It just says that the second-half of the verse, there is no God beside me, is there to refute those who think there are two powers or two authorities in heaven.

05:11
Sadly, we do not get a mention of the Minim.

05:14
We talked about them previously.

05:16
Go check out previous videos if you don't know who the Minim are, which means this could merely be an exegetical concern, not sociological.

05:25
What I mean is

05:27
He's dealing with interpretation here.

05:29
And on the one hand, there are those who say there's no God.

05:32
On the other hand, there are those who say there's more than one God or two gods, two authorities.

05:38
And it could just be dealing with all the possibilities that the text raises.

05:43
That's what I mean by interpretation rather than sociological.

05:46
Sociological means there's actually a group of people who are believing this that you're standing over against.

05:52
And if that's all we had to go on, I think you'd have every right to be disappointed in me for hyping up this episode.

05:59
But fear not, there is another midrash that we're gonna consider that is so much more detailed on this subject, and we are ready to do that now, which is finally gonna give us what we want, which is a little bit of insight into how Jewish people were thinking about two powers, I have steadfastly refused to

06:21
define what two powers even means to you up until now because I didn't want to color your thinking one way or the other as to what kind of two powers we're talking about.

06:34
But today we're finally going to get that and it's going to be in a Mekilta.

06:38
So let's talk about what a Mekilta is.

06:41
A Mekilta is an Aramaic word, first of all, meaning a measure or norm.

06:48
In rabbinic usage, Mekilta refers to a collection of rules, especially with respect to the book of Exodus.

06:54
So we're going to be looking at the Mekilta of Rabbi Ishmael.

06:58
And although Rabbi Ishmael ben Elisha taught in the early 2nd century, this Mekilta was likely written by members of his school later, which is

07:08
pretty standard for educational materials like this for literary output of teachers.

07:14
Usually there's the original teacher and then the followers, the school of that person will write it down later, and then it will get even edited later than that or compiled by later redactors.

07:28
So typically scholars will date the Mekhilta of Rabbi Ishmael to the third or 4th centuries.

07:34
And we're going to read two texts from this Mekhilta, which are both

07:38
very similar.

07:39
But the repetition will probably help you.

07:43
So here's the first one.

07:45
This is the Mekhilta of Rabbi Ishmael Shira 4.

07:50
Shira means a song.

07:51
And in this case, we're talking about the song of Moses in Exodus 15.

07:58
We read, The Lord is a man of war.

08:01
The Lord is his name.

08:02
Why is this said?

08:04
For this reason.

08:05
At the sea, he appeared to them as a mighty hero doing battle.

08:10
As it is said, The Lord is a man of war.

08:14
At Sinai, he appeared to them as an old man full of mercy.

08:19
It is said, And they saw the God of Israel.

08:23
10, et cetera.

08:25
And of that time, after they had been redeemed, what does it say?

08:30
And the like of the very heaven for clearness.

08:33
Again, it says,

08:35
I beheld till thrones were placed, and one that was ancient of days did sit.

08:40
9.

08:41
And it also says a fiery stream issued, et cetera.

08:45
That's verse 10.

08:46
Scripture, therefore, would not let the nations of the world have an excuse for saying that there are two powers, but declares the Lord is a man of war, the Lord is his name.

08:59
He it is who was in Egypt and he was at the sea.

09:03
It is he who is in the past and he who will be in the future.

09:08
It is he who is in this world and he who will be in the world to come.

09:13
As it is said, see now that I, even I, am he, etc.

09:19
Deuteronomy 32, 39.

09:22
So what we've read here is that this

09:24
author is puzzling over how God appears in different ways in scripture.

09:30
So in Exodus 15, God is a warrior, a young man.

09:35
In Exodus 24, he appeared as an old man.

09:38
And then in Daniel 7, he's the ancient of days, you know, just like the oldest guy ever.

09:43
And the author asserts that both were the same.

09:46
So the manifestation or revelation of God as a warrior

09:53
when he defeated Egypt and threw them into the sea.

09:56
And that's really the text he's dealing with, Exodus 15.

09:58
You've got Miriam with the tambourine and the people of Israel are singing this song of Moses.

10:04
And they're talking about how God is a man of war, is literally what it says, and how he threw Pharaoh and his chariots into the sea.

10:11
So there God is portrayed as someone that's young in this song.

10:17
And then later on, it portrays God as speaking to the elders.

10:21
Well, who can speak to an elder except for an elder?

10:25
So the idea there is that when God met with the elders of Israel on Mount Sinai, he himself appeared as an elder.

10:32
And then of course, in Daniel 7, God appeared as the ancient one sitting as judge.

10:39
And so the author is simply saying, it's the same God who is in Egypt and at the sea, and that's the God that they will encounter in the future.

10:47
And we get this beautiful quote of Deuteronomy 32, 39, see now that I, even I, am he, and there is no other God besides me.

10:56
And so this is really the same text that we just looked at, but in this case, it is being explained in the context of Exodus 15.

11:07
So before commenting more though, I'd rather have us look at the second quote since it's quite similar.

11:15
And this one comes to us from Behodesh 5:4.

11:19
Behodesh means in Hebrew in the month.

11:22
And it refers to the parasha or section of scripture from Exodus 19, starting in verse one, all the way through to the end of chapter 20, verse 26.

11:32
Basically, it's a part of Exodus that talks about God coming down on Mount Sinai and speaking the 10 commandments.

11:39
And of course, you probably know Exodus chapter 20, verse one begins with the phrase, I am

11:45
Yahweh, or I am the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt.

11:51
4-5, the author is puzzling over the question, well, why does God introduce himself?

11:56
Surely they already know who God is.

11:58
What's going on here?

12:00
And so this is what we read.

12:01
I am the Lord thy God.

12:03
Why is this said?

12:05
For this reason.

12:06
At the sea, he appeared to them as a mighty hero doing battle.

12:11
As it is said, the Lord is a man of war.

12:13
That was the text we were just looking at in Exodus 15, 3.

12:16
At Sinai, he appeared to them as an old man full of mercy.

12:21
It is said, and they saw the God of Israel.

12:24
Exodus 24, 10.

12:26
And of the time after they had been redeemed, what does it say?

12:30
and the of the very heaven for clearness.

12:33
Again, it says, I beheld till thrones were placed, Daniel 7, 9.

12:37
And it also says a fiery stream issued and came forth from before him.

12:41
That's verse 10.

12:42
Scripture therefore would not let the nations of the world have an excuse for saying there are two powers, but declares, I am the Lord thy God.

12:52
I am he who is in Egypt and I am he who is at the sea.

12:55
I am he who is at Sinai.

12:57
I am he who is in the past and I am he who will be in the future.

13:02
I am he who is in this world and I am he who will be in the world, it just preaches, doesn't it?

13:08
I will be in the world to come as it is said.

13:11
See now that I, even I am he, et cetera.

13:15
Deuteronomy 32:39.

13:16
And it says, Even to old age, I am the same.

13:20
And that's Isaiah 46:4.

13:22
And it says, Thus saith the Lord, the king of Israel and his redeemer, the Lord of hosts, I am the first and I am the last.

13:31
That's Isaiah 44:6.

13:32
And it says, Who hath wrought and done it?

13:35
He that called the generations from the beginning, I, the Lord, who am the first, et cetera, Isaiah 41.4.

13:42
And then we get this added part about Rabbi Nathan that's super important.

13:46
Rabbi Nathan says, from this one can cite a refutation of the heretics, the manim, who say, there are two powers.

13:55
For when the Holy One, blessed be he, stood up and exclaimed, I am the Lord thy God, was there anyone who stood up to protest against him?

14:05
Now we see the same concerns here.

14:08
We get an added section about Rabbi Nathan, but most of this is actually repeating what we just had read in the previous text.

14:15
That's why I wanted to read them together.

14:17
Like I said, the repetition I think helps for you to, especially if you're not familiar with this literature, for you to really lock in your mind what it is this is talking about.

14:27
But we also see this added section at the end about Rabbi Nathan, which is super important.

14:32
We get what's going on, right?

14:35
We see a concern over interpreting various descriptions of God.

14:39
There's an anxiety that one might think there are two powers, one old and one young.

14:47
Do you get that?

14:48
This is clear evidence of a two powers belief in the third century.

14:53
There's no question about it.

14:56
You're not going to have this repeated in multiple places in a midrash if there's not an actual concern going on and if there's not actually some sort of group that is believing this.

15:07
Actually, this is three.

15:09
Three usages, I would argue, because we have two in Bachodesh five here.

15:14
So there's definitely something going on.

15:17
There is a serious concern.

15:19
And the question is, what group did the author have in mind here?

15:25
Well, here we don't have to guess because he says, Scripture would not let the nations of the world have an excuse for saying that there are two powers.

15:36
We're not talking about Jews here.

15:39
Nations equals Gentiles.

15:42
Also, we're not talking about the Romans who believed in many powers, not just two.

15:48
We get much more detail in the second part of the quote, but I just want to start with this first part that it's very clear that we're dealing with a 2 powers belief, but that belief is not among the Jewish people.

16:00
It's A belief among the nations.

16:02
We're concerned that the nations are going to say there are two powers.

16:06
So

16:07
Keep that in mind, and we're gonna go on to the second-half, which is the really juicy bit about Rabbi Nathan, which is super helpful.

16:16
Once again, here's what it says.

16:17
Rabbi Nathan says, From this one can cite a reputation of the heretics who say there are two powers.

16:25
For when the Holy One, blessed be He, stood up and exclaimed, 'I am the Lord thy God,' was there anyone who stood up to protest against Him?

16:35
Now you have to ask yourself the question, who was Rabbi Nathan and when did he live?

16:40
Rabbi Nathan lived in the generation after the Bar Kokba revolt.

16:46
If you're familiar with the Bar Kokba revolt, that's around the year 135.

16:50
And so he is flourishing in the 150s, the 160s, 170s, basically in the mid to late second century.

16:58
And so this quote clearly shows that

17:03
Rabbi Nathan was concerned about two powers in his time, so this is the second-half of the second century, even though this document comes from the third century, it's quoting Nathan, which is much earlier.

17:13
And we also know about Nathan is that he's from Babylon originally, but that he was in the land of Israel at the time, not that it was called that.

17:24
At that time, it would be probably just a province of Syria, and the Romans had renamed it to Palestine

17:32
at that time as well.

17:33
So this is after the temple had been destroyed, after the city of Jerusalem had been rebuilt as Ilia Capitolina, and they had already built a temple to Jupiter.

17:44
I mean, it's really a dark, hard time to be.

17:48
a Jew in the land, and there's Rabbi Nathan, and he is fighting the good fight.

17:53
And he's concerned about people who believe in two powers.

17:57
And he's saying, what in the world is going on here?

18:00
And he's like, well, this scripture is really helpful, really effective to refute what people are saying.

18:08
What is crystal clear here, and I don't know how so many people miss this, I'll be honest, I really don't.

18:14
It's crystal clear, is that the two powers ideology that Rabbi Nathan is fighting is dualism.

18:22
The second power is hostile.

18:24
Once again, take a look at the second-half of the quote.

18:29
It says, for when the Holy One, blessed be he, stood up and exclaimed, I am the Lord thy God,

18:36
Was there anyone who stood up to protest against him?

18:41
It says that the concern is about someone coming against God.

18:47
The second power is not working together with God.

18:50
We're not talking about binitarianism here.

18:51
That's not Nathan's concern.

18:53
His concern is what we call dualism, where you have two opposing powers.

18:59
Now I have scoured all the...

19:01
options for this.

19:03
The Mandaeans, the Manichaeans are both, I think, a little too late.

19:07
There's a possibility you could be referring to certain Christians, but really, I think the best two candidates in this period of time, in this part of the world, would be the Marcionites and the Zoroastrians.

19:20
Now, just a couple words about Marcion, also pronounced Marcion.

19:25
of Pontus.

19:26
He lived from 85 to 160, so the end of his life overlapped with Rabbi Nathan.

19:32
And Marcion believed in two gods, one good and one evil.

19:37
He wrote a book called The Antitheses, and we learn about him from Hippolytus's refutation of all heresies.

19:44
And so I have a quote for you here to show you this.

19:48
is what it says.

19:50
Marcion of Pontos, this is refutation of all heresies by pseudo-Hippolytus.

19:56
There's some debate as to whether it's pseudo or actual Hippolytus.

20:00
I think the scholars tend to say that it wasn't actually Hippolytus who wrote it.

20:03
Whatever, that's a side point.

20:05
Refutation 7.29.1 says, Marcion of Pontos posited 2 principles in the universe, one good and another evil.

20:13
Supposing he snuck in something new, Marcion established a school.

20:18
As I said, you can pronounce it Marcion if you want to be really sophisticated, because that's the pronunciation of the Greek, or it's typical for in church history at least to say Marcion.

20:30
So Marcion was teaching that there are two gods, that one is good and one is evil.

20:36
And we know that he was active in Rome in the second century and that his ideas spread east to Syria and Mesopotamia because we actually find out about a guy named Bardazin of Edessa who combated Marcion's followers in the early third century.

20:54
So we know that Marcionites were around in the Levant, that whole region from Syria all the way down through

21:00
Galilee, Judea, and so forth, that there was a concern about this belief system at that time.

21:09
So Rabbi Nathan could be responding to a new Marcionite faith growing in his time.

21:17
Another option is the Zoroastrians.

21:21
As for the Zoroastrians, we hear about them from Plutarch in his book Isis and Osiris 46.

21:28
Plutarch says,

21:30
They believed that there are two gods, rivals as it were, the one, the artificer of good and the other of evil.

21:38
There are also those who call the better one a god and the other a demon.

21:43
As for example, Zoroaster, the sage, he called the one Oromazes and the other Arimoneus.

21:52
And he further declared that among all the things perceptible to the senses, Oromazes,

21:58
may best be compared to light in Arimenaeus, conversely to darkness and ignorance.

22:06
So this report comes from Plutarch around the year 120, which is a little before Rabbi Nathan's lifetime, but it shows you what at least a Greek person was saying

22:18
the Zoroastrians believed.

22:20
And we also have a second quote about the Zoroastrians a little after the time of Rabbi Nathan.

22:27
This one comes from Diogenes Laertius in the year 220 from his book Lives 1.8.

22:34
We read, The Persians believe in two principles, the good spirit and the evil spirit, the one called Zeus or Amazdes, and the other Hades or Arimenaeus.

22:48
Both talk of two gods here.

22:51
Now Zoroastrianism, if you're not familiar with it, is the religion of the Persians.

22:58
And the Persians had really taken over things before the time of Christ and was dominant in the area of Babylon where Rabbi Nathan grew up.

23:10
You see what I'm saying?

23:11
So if I'm asking the question, well,

23:16
Rabbi Nathan is concerned about two powers among the nations, right?

23:21
And one of the powers is oppositional, is protesting against the one true God.

23:28
What are my options?

23:29
Well, as a child growing up in Babylon, Zoroastrianism is the dominant religious idea.

23:36
And so Zoroastrianism has these two gods that are going back against each other

23:40
And then he moves out towards the Galilee and Syria, that direction.

23:47
And what is he encountering?

23:50
He's encountering the Marcionites, this upstart religion that is kind of Christian because they believe in Jesus, but they have a very minimized New Testament, just an edited version of Luke and the epistles of Paul.

24:03
And Marcion is saying that there's an evil God and that's the creator of the universe, and then there's a good God who's the father of Jesus.

24:10
And this is gathering steam and converting people.

24:16
And Nathan as a Jewish person, a non-Christian Jewish person, is concerned that his people are going to be affected by these kinds of dualism.

24:27
So let's summarize a little bit what we've seen so far.

24:31
We find in the Mekilta of Rabbi Ishmael several mentions of two powers.

24:36
Two of them refer to the nations believing in two powers,

24:41
What nations, what kind of two powers?

24:43
Well, there's a lot of different ways to think about it.

24:47
And I want to introduce you to all the options now because I want you to be able to consider what, when I say two powers, it's a totally vague term and I want you to be able to consider what the options are.

25:00
So first up is the idea that two powers are equal but antagonistic.

25:07
So I have this portrayed by

25:09
a darkness and a light and they're fighting against each other.

25:13
The second option is that the two powers are complementary with one superior to the other.

25:20
We call this subordinationism.

25:22
And so I have pictured here an old man and a young man bathed in light.

25:27
Then the third option is that you have two powers that are identical in capability.

25:33
And this would be the idea, there would be several options for this, but one of them would be binitarianism, which is really what a lot of people think of when they hear two powers in heaven or two powers heresy.

25:45
Which of these did the Mekilta refer to?

25:48
Well, there's no question.

25:51
It referred to the dualism version.

25:53
Rabbi Nathan's defeater against the two powers advocates of his time was, for when the Holy One, blessed be he, stood up and exclaimed, I am the Lord thy God, was there anyone who stood up to protest against him?

26:10
That's what he said.

26:13
So what are we going to do?

26:15
There's no biditarianism here in the Bekilta.

26:18
He's dealing with

26:19
dualism, and that was the concern of Rabbi Nathan.

26:23
And now there's something else to consider too, when working with sources that quote earlier rabbis, and we'll get more into this next time when we look at the Talmud.

26:33
We have assumed here that the compilers of the Mekilta of Rabbi Ishmael accurately quoted Rabbi Nathan and that they didn't put these words in his mouth or develop a legend or oral tradition over time that drifted or changed or something like that.

26:47
We're just taking it at face value.

26:49
And I think that is something to be aware of.

26:52
Now, in all honesty, I don't see a problem doing that in this case.

26:57
We're going to come across a case next time

27:00
where there is a problem and it's pretty clear.

27:02
And you can decipher that yourself with a bit of discernment in reading.

27:08
But I don't see any indication of legendary development here in this quote or drift within the oral tradition.

27:16
But I still wanted to point out to you that we are kind of going out on a limb here, dealing with a third or fourth century text and saying, well, this is what

27:26
This is what was going on in the second-half of the second century.

27:29
This is what was going on in the year 160, for example, or 170.

27:34
So anyhow, I just wanted to mention that.

27:36
So between the two sources we looked at today, what did we discover?

27:41
We discovered a serious concern over two powers, starting in the late second century and continuing into the third century.

27:49
And I suggest that the group in view

27:51
at least in the Bachodesh, is the Marcionites.

27:54
I think that is probably the most likely.

27:56
The Zoroastrians, yes, they were there in Rabbi Nathan's youth, but I don't see why he would be bringing them up in the context of the Levant, where he's not in Persia, he's not in the city of Babylon.

28:08
He is dealing with people who are converting in droves to this upstart religion.

28:16
He's dealing with Gnostics, which is a whole different

28:20
situation, but they have in common with the Marcionites this idea that the Creator God is actually evil or ignorant at best.

28:30
So I would say that Rabbi Nathan is probably dealing with a concern over the Marcionites.

28:35
I could be wrong about that.

28:36
We don't know for sure.

28:38
I wouldn't put money on that.

28:42
just for the record, because it doesn't really say, so we're guessing, we're speculating.

28:47
It could have been some other upstart group of dualists that didn't leave any text behind and we just don't even know who they are, right?

28:54
We just know that they were dualists.

28:56
We know that you have two powers in heaven.

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One is good and one is protesting or standing against.

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And that is

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what we learn from the Midrashim.

29:07
Okay, we've got one more source to go to and it's going to be the Babylonian Talmud.

29:14
And I know that you have been so patient with me and you're like, Sean, you're really gonna give me the inside scoop on the two powers.

29:23
Well, guess what?

29:24
The Babylonian Talmud is going to give us the mother load.

29:28
We're gonna be swimming in two powers texts, you're gonna love it.

29:32
Good things come to those who wait.

29:34
Now, if you have found this episode helpful, please like and subscribe.

29:38
Also, please share this episode with others.

29:40
It's really the best way to support this ministry.

29:44
If you'd like to support us financially, you could do that by going to our website, restitudio.org, and setting up a monthly recurring donation.

29:52
Thanks to all those of you who are already doing that.

29:55
It makes such a big difference.

29:58
Well, that's it for today.

29:59
I'll catch you next time.

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And remember,

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The truth has nothing to fear.