BibleProject - Design Patterns in the Bible, Live from Milpitas! Part 1

Episode Date: April 2, 2018

This is a special episode in our podcast series on “How To Read The Bible”. Tim and Jon went on the road to do this podcast live before an audience in Milpitas, California! Tim and Jon discuss literature design patterns in the Bible and answer questions from the audience. The guys do a brief recap of the How to Read The Bible series. There are key elements to reading the Bible well. Understanding plot, character, setting and biblical narrative style. (We have videos on each of these, you can see the links below in the show notes.) In this episode, the guys combine all of these elements to talk about “patterns and design elements” in the Bible. Tim and Jon use the “hyperlink” analogy, saying that all the stories in the Bible link to each other in subtle and creative ways. People can learn to see these links and see the stories layering on top of each other by understanding key design patterns and techniques. Below are timestamps of questions and examples: (36:16) Jon asks the question, "Is understanding design patterns in the Bible an “elite” way to read the Bible?" Isn’t the Bible supposed to be user friendly? It seems like studying to understand the historical context of the ancient Hebrew biblical literature is a time consuming task that some people might not be able to do. (40:38) A gentleman asks a question about the city of Joppa being mentioned in both the book of Jonah and in Acts. Is this intentional and a reference to a hidden theme in the Bible? (42:25) A gentleman asks a question about the creation of stories in the Bible. What’s the role of historical accuracy, retelling and condensing of events in the writing of the Bible? (49:58) A gentleman asks a question: If the Bible is a magnificent piece of timeless art and literature, How do you explain the Bible to people who value brevity and directness, not artful literature and analogy? (52:40) Tim gives an example of word plays and repetition in the Bible. The hebrew word “Tov” means good. Tov/Good is used in the creation story as a key repeating word. It develops first to describe creation. Then it describes humans (very good). Then it describes the “tree of the knowledge of good and not good/evil.” This theme culminates when the woman “sees that the tree is good” when the serpent tempts her, she has effectively switched places with God. God was the original one who “saw things as good”. (1:03:05) Tim gives another example in Luke. The baptism of Jesus culminates with God speaking from heaven declaring Jesus is his son. Then the next story is not a story, it’s a genealogy that works its way backward to Adam being declared “the son of God”. Then Jesus is tempted, with the devil asking him if he “really is the son of God”. Then Jesus goes to his first town and people ask “Who’s son is this?” Then Jesus casts out a demon who declares that Jesus is “the son of God”. Luke uses repetition to make a point to the reader, that Jesus is indeed who he has been declared to be, he is the Son of God. (1:07:10) Tim gives an example of the selection of Saul to be the king of Israel. The hidden word in the story is “see or seeing.” At the start of the story, we are told Saul is tall. This is a strange detail. Most Bible characters have no physical attributes described about them, but here, Saul is tall, which is later used as a symbol in the story. Saul looks for a “seer” or a “prophet” when searching for his father’s donkeys. Why would the word “seer” be used in the story? Because it is a hidden key word in the story. Samuel “sees” Saul. Samuel tells Israel to look upon Saul and “see” their king. Samuel and Israel “see” Saul and they are impressed by his height. But Saul is not a good king and God rejects him. God sends Samuel to anoint a new king. God says he has “seen a new king.” Samuel “sees” Jesse’s son Eliab and thinks one of these is to be the new king. But God speaks to Samuel and says “God doesn’t ‘see’ as humans ‘see’, humans ‘see’ with their eyes, God ‘sees’ the heart.” This line is the climax of a whole trail of breadcrumbs that started at the introduction of Saul. Show Resources: Robert Alter: The Art Of Biblical Narrative Our How To Read The Bible Video Series: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ak06MSETeo4&list=PLH0Szn1yYNedn4FbBMMtOlGN-BPLQ54IH Show Music: Defender Instrumental - Rosasharn Music Produced By: Dan Gummel, Jon Collins, Matthew Halbert-Howen Thank you to all our supporters!

Hey, this is Cooper at Bible Project. I produce the podcast in Classroom. We've been exploring a theme called the City, and it's a pretty big theme. So we decided to do two separate Q and R episodes about it. We're currently taking questions for the second Q and R and we'd love to hear from you. Just record your question by July 21st

and send it to us at infoatbiboproject.com. Let us know your name and where you're from, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds and please transcribe your question when you email it in, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds, and please transcribe your question when you email it in. That's a huge help to our team. We're excited to hear from you. Here's the episode.

Welcome to the Bible Project Podcast. Last year, Tim and I were in Mo Pitaitas, California for a conference called Regeneration. And while we were down there, we did a live recording of this podcast with a couple hundred leaders from around that area. And today, we're going to release the first part of that live recording. It was a ton of fun being down there with Tim. And if you've never been in a room with Tim while he geeks out about the Bible, well, you're in for a treat. Tim just gets excited. And no other topic lights Tim up like the topic we addressed that day.

The topic at hand is what we've come to call design patterns in the Bible. If you've been following this project, you know that we'd like to talk about how the Bible is literary genius. And one of the things that makes the literature of the Bible so sophisticated is how every story in the Bible seems to be aware and riffing off of every other story in the Bible. No matter what author, no matter what time period, it all connects together with this amazing awareness of how stories are told, why they're told that way, and the patterns that emerge become immensely important for us to understand what the authors were trying to communicate to us. This

might seem really geeky, maybe not that useful, maybe just sounds really strange, or hang in there, we're gonna break down what it is, and we'll follow a few design patterns through scripture, and as we do, I guarantee you're gonna see how rich and insightful and profound the literature in the Bible is. So thanks for joining us, here we go. How are you guys?

Hello. Look at these chairs. We can just sit sit in I don't know if you can see them they brought on your own special from my grandma's house which makes me feel at home thank you for doing that yeah yeah hello how are you all yeah it's good to be here yeah welcome to here yeah here. Yeah, so here we go. We're gonna do this. This is a new kind of experiment for us as we were thinking about what to do with this time.

John and I also have a to-do list for video production. And so we needed to actually have this conversation that we were going to have. And so then John pitched the idea of, well, let's just have it with a group of people. And then because he's always prodding me with questions. And so let's just let a whole group of people contribute. And so that's, this is actually our part of our normal process where I put together a bunch of stuff we talk for hours, then he goes and writes a summary and that becomes the first draft of the script for a video. So a video will come out of this conversation, and there you go.

Is that cool? Deal. Yeah, cheers. Yeah. Let's see. So what's some other, maybe, introductory stuff? Introductory. Yeah.

So typically, it's just Tim and I in a room talking through his notes. So I'll have notes like this which I have never seen. I feel like a magician now. I've never seen these notes. And then we'll also put them up on the screen so you can follow along. Yes, I'll put, yep, so what's in his hand? It'll just be up there, that's why. And then my role is just to be a really persistent

annoying student. And so what we'll try to do is at certain times stop. We'll have a couple of mics. And if you want to jump in on the annoying persistence, then you can ask a question as well. And Tim loves it. He never ever gets frustrated with me. No.

I'm always surprised. No. So. Yeah, I think for John and I, I guess we're just taking for granted that everyone knows what the Bible project is. And that we make Bible cartoons for the internet. Oh yeah, that's right. Yes.

Yeah. So the Bible project, we make Bible cartoons for the internet. And they're up on YouTube and on our website. And we go through themes of the Bible and how those themes are woven through all of scripture from beginning to end and how they have its climax in Jesus. And then also there's a whole series of videos that Tim's pretty much solely responsible for

of the literary structure and design of every book of the Bible, which are really helpful. We've been doing a new series called How to Read the Bible. And that series is gonna be about 15, 18 videos. 22. 22 videos. Perfect. Yeah, that? 22. 22 videos. Perfect. Yeah.

That's going to be 22 videos. And we've been going through biblical narrative. So has anyone seen the biblical narrative videos? A couple of you guys? Cool. We did, there's one out on... Plot. Plot?

That's the one that's out. Oh, that's the only one that's out. Yep. And then next comes characters. Yep. Then after that is setting. Oh yeah, those are now yet. They're not out yet. They're in production and written, but yeah, they're being made. And then this one's yet to exist. Yeah, so let's do a quick overview of biblical narrative plot setting character and then set this one up. Yeah. So nearly half of the Bible is ancient Jewish narrative. Both in the Hebrew scriptures and in the New Testament, the Gospels and Acts are ancient Jewish-style biblical

narrative. And they're at the same time some of the most beloved parts of the Bible because narratives are really a universal form of human communication. It doesn't, you know, it's just easy. But every culture has its own unique way of telling narratives. And in the biblical tradition, these authors

developed a really brilliant, truly brilliant set of tools for how they tell their stories, and they're really, really, really different than how modern Westerners create and perceive how stories work. So that was the goal of the video series. You might think, for four videos, just read the narrative. And it's like, OK, yeah, that's fine. But there's going to be all kinds of things. I've discovered over the years, all kinds of really amazing

layers of meaning to stories in the Bible that I just simply was unaware of or never saw before. Because until I've actually learned how to read them as Jewish narratives, Jewish literature, with a really particular set of conventions and attributes and ways that these stories work. So there you go. So big picture, biblical narrative, there's plot setting character, and let me try to

give, summarize what the main takeaways for each of those were, really quickly. Deal. And then you can correct me. Okay, so, plot, biblical plot, that video is out, and I think the biggest takeaway for me is that a biblical plot is like any plot. We're familiar with plots. We watch movies, we read books. And so there's a character in their setting.

There's this call to adventure. There's all this rising tension that leads up to a conflict, which ultimately has a resolution and then the character's changed and comes to a new normal, a new world. And biblical stories have the same plot structures. And so we looked at, in the video, we looked at Gideon, and how, if you don't see the overall plot, and understand a story in that context, you could easily have it say something the author did in 10.

So we looked at Gideon and the fleece, and we saw how Gideon was asking God for a sign, and he put a fleece on the ground, make the fleece dry in the ground wet, and God does it, and you read that story, and you're like, oh my goodness, that's a great story on how to discern God's will. But then you read the story in context of the whole biblical plot and you realize that

it's just one part of this whole rising plot tension of Gideon, not trusting God. So that's a big takeaway, but I think the bigger takeaway with plot, which the video didn't have a lot of time to explain, but the podcast goes in a lot of detail if you've listened to our episode on plot, is that there's embedded plots in the Bible. So you have this story of Gideon, which takes place in a whole series of stories that make up the book of Kings and that entire, I'm sorry, judges and that entire set of stories has its own plot structure which then, and you call those what you call those like movement, biblical movements. I call them movements. You like acts because it's like thinking about acts of a play. Right. I thought that was really helpful. Yeah. Yeah.

And then those all fit into a grand biblical plot from creation to new creation. And so seeing how these plots are embedded, it's like at any given moment reading the Bible, you're like in inception, right? You're like a plot within a plot within a plot. Yes. And that's good. Yeah. You're a stri plot. Yes. And, well, that's good.

Yeah. You're right. I don't think you brought that up before. That's a really, that's a good analogy. Yeah. Yeah. And actually, each time, yeah, each sub-plot you're in, you actually, it's easy to forget the governing plot.

Like, why are they in this little sub-world? Yeah. Because of something, a plot conflict caused up here that forced them to go down and do this other one. It's actually really good. Good analogy. Yeah. So that's plot. And then we looked at, and then a video that's not out yet, it's almost out. Actually, I don't know if it's almost out. So, sorry. So, I think, yeah, so for plot, it's that to conceive of the Bible, it's an epic narrative,

which means it's a sprawling narrative, all huge cast of characters. It's like, you know, like many epic narratives that are out there in the world. For modern Westerners, the most familiar ones now are Tolkien's world, the Lord of the Rings, epic narratives. And because they even, there's separate story worlds. There's the ring trilogy, but then there's the Hobbit, which is its own totally own plot, but it is related, as like the pre-plot

that makes sense with the others. And that's totally how the Bible works. And so it's difficult when you're in the thick of the book of Kings, you know, and you're looking at Jehovah's, and it's, why if it's Dahlia? And you're like, what does this have to do with anything? Like, why do I care about this?

And so I have to rise above and be like, family of Abraham, God's blessing to all of the nations through these people. So it's another illustration I've used is of the Russian nesting dolls, of dolls within dolls within dolls. And the whole point is to see them as a set. It's not just that you have like one of them and then just sit them on whatever your dresser. It's to display them as a set because that's how they make sense as a collection. And so I'm learning how to keep track of the layers of plot,

and each layer will give a new context, a new layers of meaning to events happening down here at the ground level. And if you begin to see how these authors have designed little mini episodes within their larger arcs, you begin to see bigger patterns, which is what we're going to talk about today. But learning to track plots and subplots, within their larger arcs. You begin to see bigger patterns, which is what we're going to talk about today. But learning to track plots and subplots,

it's like the bread and one of the bread and butter things about learning to read biblical narrative well. Nice. Another basic element of narrative is characters. And so a character is the person experiencing the plot, going through the plot, and Bill Clenair does full of characters. How would you summarize the big takeaway for me?

Yeah, well, I think at least in the history of Christian reading, especially of the Hebrew scriptures, we've had a hard time knowing what to do with these Bible characters. Some of them are very relatable, and we sympathize with their struggles, like in Abraham or David or Joseph or Ruth. But then other characters in the way they figure

into God's plans are really problematic for us, like a Samson or a Jacob. And I think, somehow, especially in the Western Christian tradition, we tend to view the Bible as some kind of moral instruction book. And so the characters in the Bible are obviously there to be examples for us. The problem is that they're all mostly really immoral people, like really screwed up people. And that's thrown Western readers for such a loop that look at our children's literature about the Bible.

You, it's often hard to recognize the actual biblical story in the children's versions that our kids are raised on. I have a version of the story of Jonah in a children's book at home. I don't read it to my kids, but I just remind me, I'm an example of what so screwed up about how we read the Bible. It just, it doesn't even have the last chapter

of the book of Jonah, where he's doing outside the city that his enemies didn't get roasted by fire from heaven. And because if you end the story with Jonah, obeying and going to Nineveh, and then Nineveh's repenting, that's a great story. And it teaches you, obey God, right? It's a very clear story.

But the whole thing is about that last chapter, which turns the entire story upside down. And all of a sudden, everything means the opposite of what you thought it meant. It's absolutely brilliant. And apparently, that's too sophisticated for children. I mean, in a way, it is, because this is not children's literature.

This is extremely sophisticated literature. And so what tends to happen is that biblical characters are presented to people who grew up in the church in these rewritten versions of biblical stories so that when they actually come to read the Bible itself, the way these characters actually behave in the real stories is scandalous to us, we don't understand it. Why does God bless people who lie and murder and why does the Holy Spirit come in Samson when he's a violent sect addict? And like what, and so is he an example? Am I supposed to be like him? Well, I guess not, I'm not gonna kill people

with a job on you. But so you guys, with me. So what are these people here for in the stories? And so that's, we're gonna make a whole video about that because we are supposed to relate to them, but they are not put there as moral examples for us. They're more put there as mirrors for us to see ourselves, and to see our own flaws and failures and successes, and how these characters relate to God begin to give me a clue of what

it means to relate to God in complex ways. There you go. Yeah, perfect. And so the final element is, typical settings, or settings in general, every story has to take place somewhere, and that where is the setting. And settings are easy to gloss over in any story, and not appreciate how effective of a literary device

it actually is. So if I'm telling you a story and it takes place in a haunted house, or no, sorry, it's just that spooky house. Yes, that's right. Just an old rundown house. That's the setting. You, as a listener, are going to remember other stories that happen to take place in an old rundown house. And what are you going to think?

You're going to think, I know what's gonna happen. I've been here before. And so the author can set your expectation really quick about what story is gonna be about, simply by the setting that the author puts it in. And so in the video, we're gonna talk about the setting of Egypt as a case study and how that setting becomes very important,

but they're all over. And I was super surprised, like when we got into this, I realized, well, we could do a whole series of videos on settings and how they're used. Yes. From the wilderness being a setting, Jerusalem, Zion, all the, yeah, Bethlehem, on and on and on, they become these very important places

where certain things happen and author wants you to remember those stories and they're building on that. I don't know if we have to really get into more of it, but it's awesome. It's awesome. I think for modern readers, because when we read these stories, we're like, oh, this is the history part of the Bible. So this is just what happened.

And that just is where that event happened. That event happened in Moab. That event happened in whatever, in Gilead or whatever, Gilea. And so we don't think to come to these narratives with the expectation that the last story that happened in whatever Gilead, but that may be like four books ago, but the author knows, like the author totally knows. And what you'll find is that key places keep getting repeated

throughout the biblical narrative, and places acquire a symbolism based off the events that happened there. And you have to start from page one and they begin to build significance as you go through the story. It's absolutely brilliant. And like a dude wilderness. Like, that's a good example.

Yes. So a great example is maybe a shorter one. I think, I don't remember if we could do in the video. I don't remember it to the east. To the east, yeah, we did. To the east. Yeah. So, especially in the book of Genesis,

there's this real echoing motif where after the Garden Rebellion of Adam and Eve, they're banished. It's a little detail. They're banished to the east. And then after Cain and his murdering his brother, he's also banished in the very next story to the east. And then the culmination of all the rebellion stories

in the book of Genesis is in the story of Babylon, where all the people had one speech, and they moved to the east. And what happens in the east? The east is where you go when you've been estranged from God. The East is where you go as a consequence of your stupid decisions.

And then with Babylon, where you end up as going to the East, where all humanity exalts itself up to the place of God. And then you just track with it. You go through the biblical narrative. Biblical authors know that they've established the drumbeat of East. They'll just throw it in there.

Now and then, it's like a little seasoning, a little East seasoning, and the story or something. And so they'll just throw in, like when David asked to, when Absalom, when Absalom, the rebellion of Absalom comes in the story of David. And where does David flee? From his own palace. He flees to the East.

When all Israel rebels and has to go into exile, where do they go? They go to the east to Babylon. They replay the Genesis 3 to 11 thing. So that's not a detail because the author's like, oh, I should just put in where he happened to head. Yes, it's not like an archival note. Yeah.

It's actually a really important part of the theological message of these stories is where things take place. Michael W. Smith's song is making a lot more sense. Go West Young Man. Finally, it's clicking. I get it now. Yeah.

I do these Christian references Tim never gets it because you didn't grow You're so culture. He's like yeah, I know about Michael W. Smith. I don't know that song So that video about but also periods of time are a form of setting that work exactly the same way Oh, yeah, we'll talk about that. It's not just geographic locations It's also a situation like to the east So it's not just geographic locations, it's also a situation like to the east, but then it's also time, like 40 days, the 40 as a time period becomes an important setting. Yes, we're certain people get tested and usually fail.

Okay, so now all of this, except for Jesus. Except for Jesus, yeah, he overcame. So all of these elements of plot are actually going to set us up nicely for this conversation because what we want to talk about is patterns of comparison and biblical narrative, which sounds really boring. But Tim has actually for the last six months just every day, he's like, I can't wait to talk about this. I can't wait to talk about this.

I can't wait to talk about this. Your mind's been like exploding with things. And so it's a highly anticipated conversation for us. Hopefully it'll be really valuable for you guys. But basically, from what I understand is that all these things, the plots, the settings, the characters, they all become elements in which the Biblical authors use to build on each other, create patterns, and you use a word a lot, hyperlink, that the author will hyperlink back to other

stories and ideas, and just expect you, the reader, to see what's going on. He's not going to tell you, hey, just like Moses did this, sometimes I guess Paul will say that. But oftentimes, it'll be just a very small hyperlink back to story. So this is what we're talking about. Hyperlinks, patterns. Yeah.

Yeah, whatever. We still don't know the words we're going to use in the video. So we're going to have to work that out. Right. Yeah, dude, you guys. Yeah, I don't know what's, yeah, I feel like this has just blown my mind over the last year. So I have a group of friends that we went through grad school.

They're all Hebrew Bible nerd professors. And so kind of all around the world, but we have been coordinating our research efforts and reading around the set of topics. And so there's four other friends. And it's like we've never read the Bible before. It's feel so fresh to me right now. And I feel like I'm, it's, well, here's,

well, here, there's two analogies. There's actually two analogies. One is one that starts the notes, but the other one is, oh, I've used it before already, actually with you is Yoda. Yeah. Yoda. It's the scene in Dagobah in the Empire Strikes Back where Luke comes looking for Master Yoda. It's the scene in Dagobah, in the Empire Strikes Back, where Luke comes looking for master Yoda, but what he finds is a silly green creature. And of course that is the master.

But the master is so wise that he won't impose his reputation on Luke. What he's going to do is let Luke come to realize that he's in the presence of the master. And so what it truly becomes a story about reality is for Luke what he expects to see. And what he expects to see is a silly green creature. Of course this isn't the master. And so he never sees the master until he has this breaks-room moment, and he realizes all along he's been in the presence. You're with me? It's a classic. So that's how I feel about the Bible. And I think it's essentially the way our relationships to these scriptural texts grow is over time, is realizing that we are in the presence of such brilliant minds empowered by God's

spirit to write and compose this literature in ways I just never even imagined was possible. But once you can begin, once you expect to see certain things, all of a sudden, narratives that you thought you understood, like you had no clue. That's, at least, it's happening to me every day now. So, I- And when you say no clue, you do this, like, Oh, I'm being high-pitched. It just goes deeper.

Well, it goes deeper. It goes deeper, that's right. Yeah. That's right. Oh, I got it. Yes. But now I get it so much more. I was at level one, but now I realize there's actually

four to go. I was teaching this wrong completely. No, that's true That okay, I need to go I had a Bit of my way area. Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah, you're right Yeah, I think I've used or maybe not cave spunking actually is a better metaphor of like you do thought you had reached that Deepest chamber and then you realize there's a crack and then oh my gosh There's it keeps going and there's a crack, and then, oh my gosh, it keeps going. And there's more depths here than you first realized.

And so this particular skill set, there's actually not a lot written on it. This is not something that you can find in most any guidebooks on how to read the Bible. Where you do find it is scholars who are familiar with the history of Jewish interpretation of the Bible. And of course that makes sense. These were crafted by ancient Israelite minds steeped in this tradition in way of writing these texts. And so it makes perfect sense that the Jewish, they've been reading the Bible a thousand years longer than Christians have. And for one reason or another, the Christian tradition has lost touch with this dynamic going on

in a special, in biblical narrative. So there you go, that's why we're excited to make a video of it. We're hyping it up now. I think we should just jump in. Yeah, let's jump in. Okay, so there you go. So the notes are up here on the screen.

And you guys ready for action? Deal, all right. Let's start as a Jewish scholar named Robert Alter, who wrote one of the most helpful, really profound, introductions to biblical narrative. It's called the art of biblical narrative. And he has a chapter where he lays out what we're going to talk about, but it's like tip of the iceberg.

And he begins it with this really great analogy. Introduction. And then there's analogy. So he says, a coherent reading of any work of art, whatever the medium requires some detailed awareness of the grid of conventions upon which and against which this particular work operates. Usually these are elaborate sets of tacit agreements between the artist and the audience that create the

enabling context in which complex communication of art occurs. He likes to write long sentences. Though through our awareness of convention, we can recognize significant or simply pleasing patterns of repetition, symmetry or contrast. We can detect subtle clues and cues as to the meaning of the work. We can spot what is innovative and what is traditional at each part of the artistic creation. One of the chief difficulties modern readers have

in perceiving the artistry and biblical narrative is precisely that we have lost most of the keys to the conventions out of which these texts were shaped. So that's a dense nerdy way of putting it. Then he has a great illustration. And it makes it crystal clear. But maybe if you don't get his point, how would you put into normal words?

Well, you know, I was thinking about, I think where this hits home for me the most is, and telling jokes. So like everyone understands the structure of a joke. Are there, everyone kind of understands that there is a structure to a joke, except for my mom. Like, she doesn't really get that.

She doesn't really get that. But you, you have a setup, and then you have the punch line. And oftentimes, especially in very simple jokes, the setup is one beat, second beat, and then something unexpected. Ha, ha, ha. And so is that similar to like, it's creating, it's like we know as the audience, okay, I'm being set up for a joke. Like I know it's coming.

And then, the punch line. And then think of our kids. Yeah, trying to teach our kids humor. Yeah. Yes My it's so hard to teach a four-year-old how to tell a joke. I never Learned you have to learn the conventions. There's root unspoken rules right to a joke Yeah, and so my four-year-old just tells these jokes. There aren't funny, but because he tells him by the 1, 2, 3 pattern, he thinks that's what makes it funny. Right, but he's learning the pattern. But he's learning the pattern. Yes.

So it would be like an ant, cross the street, and then a book fell down, and the jello fell out of the bowl, and he'll laugh or something. Yeah. And because he thinks that that's what makes it funny. Good try. Yeah. That's a good analogy though. On a smaller level. A smaller level. Yeah. And so, but he's going to give a Western film. Yeah. So let's do it. Okay. So let's pretend it's 1200 years into the future and post-apocalyptic scene and archaeologists discover in the ruins of Hollywood

this old film vault, and they find all these cans of old Western films, and so then they're given to some future university professor of film history. And so then he spends all summer watching them all. And then I go to Robert Alter's quote here. He says, so our future film critic notices that in 11 of the 12 films, the Sheriff Hero has the same anomalous neurological trait of hyper-reflexivity. No matter what the situation in which his adversaries confront him,

he's always able to pull his gun out of its holster and fire before they can, even if they're already poised with her own weapon. All right, yeah. So again, just think, like if you don't, if you don't have any context for that, pretend you're an alien. And you keep seeing this pattern in these human films.

Like, what would you make sense of that? You'd be like, oh, this was a superior race among the humans. And they had this. They're just really quick with your hands. Yeah. But then in the 12th film, let's say there's a sheriff with an injured arm. And so instead of a pistol, he uses a rifle

that he carries slung over his back. So if you had only seen the 12th film, that's the only one you ever saw, and you were whatever this future film critic, you wouldn't, you wouldn't have any, you'd say, oh, he has a rifle. He's different than the others, I don't know, whatever.

But if you've watched all 11, then you've been prepared. Like you know that all of a sudden, this 12th is an innovation. It's a variation on the theme. It's just, and it seems important. And it's important. It becomes a contrastive spin on the motif.

So this is his conclusion. He says, so contemporary viewers of Westerns recognize the convention without even having to name it as such. Much of our pleasure in watching Westerns derives from our awareness that the hero, however sinister the dangers looming ahead, leads a charmed life that will always in the end prove himself more successful than his enemies.

For us, the repetitive pattern across all these cinematic works, it's not an enigma to be explained. Why does he have a rival over his shoulder? That's weird. Like, we just, you get it. Let's go with it. And you, why does this guy always draw faster than that guy when in these different movies?

You just, in other words, we don't even think about it. Yeah. It's so subconscious, because we're familiar with this particular convention. So, no, what he says here, with our easy knowledge of the patterns, we naturally see the point of the 12th sheriff. What's the point of the 12th sheriff?

Well, it would be like he's the underdog. He's gonna win anyway. But he's got even more of that. But he doesn't have the advantage that the normal sheriff has. Yeah. So, he has a disadvantage, but he leads such a charmed life, he's going

to overcome in the end. So it becomes an underdog version of the story, but you already know he's going to win. He's just going to win with even despite this disadvantage. And within just a few subtle moves here in this 12th sheriff, it's actually the absence of the pattern, the clues you end to the pattern. Right. Which then shows you a level of sophistication that the author intends for you to have. Correct. Which is they could just leave out something that they know you would expect.

Correct. And that is now bringing more meaning to the story. That's right. And that happens in the Bible. It did. To like the nth degree. I mean, I'm just going to show you, we're just going to go through tons of examples.

Yeah, sweet. But it's just insane. And so what it means is that these narratives are actually designed to do what Psalm 1 tells you to do with the Bible is just to constantly reread the thing because there are things that you'll yes to and to read it's quietly allowed to yourself to meditate because there will be things that you'll never notice until like the 85th time something going on with the Abraham story connecting

with some weird thing in the David story connecting to some weird thing in Jeremiah yeah and then you sit back and you realize like oh these are oh like and story connecting with some weird thing in the David story, connecting to some weird thing in Jeremiah. Yeah. And then you sit back and you realize, like, oh, these are all, like, and you see that they're all talking to each other. It's like a perpetual murder mystery night. With your friends. Yes.

Yeah. Trying to figure it out. So part of what I'm saying is that these are intentionally repeated motifs that have been woven into the fabric of the narrative by these authors. So many people actually notice patterns in the Bible. Maybe if you've noticed them before, you know, and we'll talk about a bunch, but you've never thought to, like, think, make anything of them. But nine times out of ten they do fit in to

something the author has intentionally laid a trail of breadcrumbs for you to go down, which is just like you're supposed to track with every eleven sheriff with a quick draw so that you understand the punchline of the twelfth sheriff. There you go. So that's the basic point to be made. Repetition begins to build expectation and then variation can give you the punchline. Is the rest of this just examples? Yes. Okay, so we're gonna read a lot of the Bible. We're just gonna look at a bunch of biblical stories because you can talk about it in theory, the brilliance, like you just you can talk about the Mona Lisa, but talking about the Mona Lisa will never replace just actually staring at the Mona Lisa.

You know? It's like that. It's like that. Yeah. Great. Let's stop for a second then and see if anyone wants to jump in with a question. There's a mic here, mic there. So if you want to jump in, at this point before we start reading scripture, go ahead and raise your hand.

We'll grab you. All of us questions warm us up. So it seems like you could see this as a very elite way of reading the Bible. And I think most teachers, like everyone in this room is like a leader, right, or a teacher in some capacity. It seems like enough work just to get the basics across, you know. And from the pulpit, especially to be able to have someone track, and now you're saying, well, let's go deeper and deeper

and deeper. Are we just going to confuse everybody? Like, what would you say to someone who's a leader? How this should affect the way that they're thinking about not just them reading the Bible, but then how they help other people read the Bible? Yeah, I'm trying to think of a good way to... It's kind of like a really any form of music, but just take some of the classic forms, like classical music or like a symphony. Almost anybody, you don't even have to know anything about classical music to appreciate Beethoven, you know,

or Bach. But that doesn't mean that the un-initiated listener actually is understanding and tracking with the full capacity of this particular symphony of everything that's going on there. And so that's why these narratives are so brilliant, because even on their first reading or first few readings, you get the basic ideas of what's going on.

I think but the part of which is, and this is how art works, art is like this condensation of meaning, this density of meaning. I like that image. And that's how art communicates. Is that your image? Condensation of meaning.

I don't know. I just was doing this and it was the word that came to life. Condensation. Condensation of meaning. Or think of like the most dense, this is a phrase a friend of mine used it's like the dense German bread That like you cut into it looks like a normal loaf of bread like a croissant French croissant, you know It's like oh, and then you leave as well. There's nothing in here. It's just there all right But then there's the German bread not the French bread with German bread and then it's like oh my gosh

This is like hard to cut so thick and that's what it's like okay, so and then it's like, oh my gosh, this is like hard to cut. So thick. And that's what it's like. Okay. So, I think it's more how this works practically is fine. Both you just have to, if you're a regular teacher of the Scriptures, it's just yourself having this conversion of your imagination to how amazing these narratives are and how they work and how profound the things that they're communicating are. And then once you yourself are ignited to that, then you'll find ways to invite people in.

And it's more about just the narratives never stop giving. No, no matter what level you're at, you're always. And so there is a bit, but I wouldn't use the word elite. I would just say it's like the ultimate it's like the ultimate deep cave You can go on a tour to the first three chambers or you can go to the ADS chamber Just how deep how deep just like the matrix The blue pill or the red pill Right well speaking of movies. I mean there is that sense where there's certain movies that they're so well crafted Yeah, you watch them over and over and over and you keep that's right. That's a good example getting something from it Yeah, Colin Brothers movies are like that. I find yeah, yeah, and so if someone hadn't seen the movie

Wouldn't be like okay, we'll forget it. You'll never get it. You'd be like you haven't seen the movie. Let's watch the movie Yes, yes, and But you're while you're watching it, you're thinking of things that they probably aren't. That's right. Thinking about. Yeah. Cool.

Yeah, so just to close that loop, I think it can come across from one perspective as elitist. I think what I want is we invite people into this paradigm of reading the Bible is actually to see it the opposite way. It's an invitation to discovery, to a lifetime of discovery, that will likely never be exhausted, because I'm not sure one human brain can track with everything that's happening. Which means you have to do in community. Correct. Yeah. And so you get to read the Bible with people your whole life.

There you go. For your sake. That's at least how it's designed to be read. Cool. Yeah, and so you get to read the Bible with people your whole life. There you go. That's at least how it's designed to be read. Cool. Yeah. Anyone want to jump in? So you had mentioned the role of setting in a narrative. And I'm wondering if this might be a legitimate example or not. In the book of Jonah the prophet please from God's command to go to Nileva leaving the city of Japa going to Tarsus and then in the book of Acts, Peter receives his vision of the clean and unclean that launches the mission to the Gentiles from the city of Japa. Yes.

Can we take it that it was intentional that the Japa's mentioned and were supposed to be thinking about Nineveh and Jonah? Yep, yeah, that's an excellent example, yeah, of where, and of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine of us, Nine that Simon, son of Jonah, Simon, son of Jonah, renamed by Jesus as Petras, Peter. But this family is Jewish names, Simon, you know, Simon, Bar Jonah. There you go. So Simon, son of Jonah, goes to Japa, from which the mission to the Gentiles explodes. Come now. You know what I'm saying? Do you get it?

So here's what's brilliant about that is because that's we're crossing, that's Luke. That means Luke is tracking with what's going on with Japa and Jonah, and he's intentionally introduced details into the story to, that's a perfect example. Yeah, thank you. That's a great example. And it crosses the testaments.

This isn't just old Testament narrative. The gospels and acts are written right in as a continuation of this tradition. Great, it's a great example. Hi, so I was wondering, I know in some of the earlier podcasts, you guys talked about kind of all stories as being representations of the facts that happened you guys talked about all stories as being representations of the facts that happened.

So I think you discuss a little bit about how people think of truth or historical accuracy and things. But I'm curious in terms of how do you or other scholars think about in the history of the writing and the editing of the scriptures, particularly maybe in the Jewish scriptures, to what extent do people think that, oh, things are written in this way, and then they were added on, or do some people think that,

okay, these details were back added, like say, for the East example that you mentioned, where, like, is this something where post-exilic time, then it becomes something that is like a detail that's kind of like added to kind of tie it forward, to where at the time they would have been putting together, all the scriptures together, so, you can curious about the history and how people tend to see how that would have unfolded.

Yep. Oh, man. Yeah, an extremely complex conversation. Mostly because we just have so little hard data about the timing of the final composition of the books of the Bible. So in other words, we can date a whole bunch of stuff in terms of the events, but the composition of the books themselves gives every evidence of having been a really prolonged process with lots of spirit-guided prophetic authors that were part of the process.

And the best example is the conclusion of the Pentateuch, which the last chapter of Deuteronomy is about the death of Moses. And then the last sentences of Deuteronomy are, and no one to this day knows where he was buried. And then the last sentence of the Torah is, you know, we've a prophet like Moses just has never arisen among our people. So the time perspective, even of the composition of the Torah, is explicitly at a far distance from the events of Moses himself, which doesn't mean that Moses didn't play a role in writing the materials in it. It actually says that quite a lot in multiple parts.

So the best analogy that I've found, or at least the one I've used the most, is that these books are like family quilts, where we have quilt pieces or earlier even sections that were already a bunch of quilt pieces combined. And they've been received and passed on carefully studied and preserved. And at some point, in the post-exilic period, the whole quilt of the Hebrew scriptures gets put together. And a lot of times that meant just providing like stitching around pre-existing works. But other times it involved some rearranging of older works and this kind of thing.

And the best example you can see this is in the book of Chronicles. The Chronicles is itself a representation of the representation of Samuel and Kings. And what the Chronicleer, this is what Bible nerds, of course, call it author of Chronicles, they call them the Chronicleer. But you can see exactly where he's doing biblical theology. He's representing the story of David in light of the Torah and the prophets. And so he's constantly adding in little details or repeated phrases

as hyperlinks to link the whole Hebrew Bible together So there's an author we can actually watch the chronicleer at work making the book and in comparison with the sources So anyway, I'm sorry. I think I think you get me going. I think this gets talked for too long I think this gets people a little queasy because then you start asking yourself well because then you start asking yourself, well, can any of these stories be trusted? Are these authors just picking and choosing details to make a point? Yes. Or did this actually happen? Yes. And that becomes specifically really important when we talk about the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. Yes. I mean, if it didn't happen, what are we doing? life, death and resurrection of Jesus. Yes.

I mean, if it didn't happen, what are we doing? And yeah, so can you speak to that, please? Yeah, well, yeah. And we've talked about this before. The biblical authors are both concerned to pass down to us their traditions and memories of things that happened. But they're not just archivalists, archivalists. They also want to make very clear to the readers

the meaning and significance of what these events have for God's purposes in history. These events, they both represent events and they present them in a way that shows you how they fit into God's purposes for all of history. And the primary way they do that is through narrative patterning. And so one of the biggest ways this happens, for sure,

is in characters names, like the symbolic names that people have. And whether or not the husbands that Ruth and Orpah married, their names and... I love this. You know, Mochelon and Kilion. But those Hebrew words mean, done for and sicko. And because they come onto the stage for one sentence,

only to die, the author brings them on to kill them off, to create the tragedy that the whole story. So would you ever name your kid, Sikko, or done for? And so I do think these authors are writing literature, and they think about history and how to represent that history in a different way than modern people do. We just have to hang up.

And it's from a good motive, right? That the events, the core events really represent things that happened. And I think that they care about that too, otherwise they wouldn't be telling us these stories. But they also want us to understand the meaning of these stories. And I don't think that these authors were as nervous as we were about airbr what we're building. Air brushing the portraits. Yeah, and I don't think we need to be embarrassed of that either. I want to make sure my expectations of these narratives are the ones that lead me to see the master, not the ones that keep me in the presence of the silly green creature.

You gave me a really great example of that. It's on a previous podcast episode. And sure, if I asked you how you met your wife, you've told the story so many times that the story has created, it's got its own shape and rhythm and movements. And if you're telling it together, you have your own parts. And if I actually had a video camera and I saw exactly

what happened and I'm trying to match that to what you guys are saying, I'm going to see some discrepancies like you might have made a setting, maybe it wasn't exactly in that setting, but that actually really helps. Yeah, or what was actually three conversations into one conversation. Yeah, but for you, the integrity of your relationship with Jessica is actually mostly Er is actually better explained in that way. It's a faithful representation But it's not video camera footage Yeah, yeah, and that's hard to feel comfortable with honestly like it I mean even talk through it many times and still kind of like okay

It's weird All right, and one more question, let's get into this. Yep. So as we're talking about leading people through the Bible, through this literary, artful approach, how do we help begin to navigate people through their own paradigm, which is especially for the younger generation. It's increasingly being literal and linear, where literature is not that way. Like they go through STEM programs where it's all about linear thinking and the linear approach, but we're having this awful approach to literature. How can we help them navigate, just break down some of those walls to help them at least get to the point to begin to view it as literature, not just literature.

Wow, that's a good, yeah, so interesting. It might just be a difference of culture and where people are from or where they live. is a town that's obsessed with aesthetics and beauty and design, to the fault of actually being an idol that ruins people. And so in my mind, this is perfect. This is perfect. Like there's no better way to bring people in to the biblical story than to show it's high literary aesthetic,

because that's compelling. But you're right, there's a whole other layer of our American culture that that's like, why wouldn't you just say it the way it is? Why do you gotta use a metaphor? You know, why do you have to write poetry? Why do you write? So I think, man, in a local church setting,

I think it is about trying to find creative ways to imitate the literary diversity and beauty, which the medium of the sermon can invite people into that, but it's certainly not the only or most effective way to do that. And so whether that's having public readings of Scripture or biblical poetry or interpretation of Scripture through other mediums to help get people using a different part of their brain to process things that are real and true.

Because that's what the Bible is doing. It's using such a diverse set of tools to engage the whole human. Not just our brain. I don't know if I answered your question, but it's a good one. Yeah. That's a great question. Something to keep thinking about. We're going to do, okay, let's do one example, and then what we're going to do is we're

going to then take a break to use a restroom or whatever and then we'll come back and do a couple more. So let's jump in. Yeah, we can do more than one. We can do more than one. All right. So here's the first tool. It's the most simple one to track in the biblical author's toolset.

And it's the most basic thing to human communication, which is repetition. Repetition. Like if it matters, I'm going to keep saying it. And so the principle holds in biblical literature, but especially in narrative, that if you want the clues to what an author is emphasizing in themes, just look for the repeated words. It is pretty basic.

It's like kids get it. It's super- super intuitive. You don't even need to say it But there is something the way Hebrew works Hebrew is able to actually repeat words in more creative ways than most languages Why? It has to do with the the language structure Has a three letter root, has three letters. All Hebrew words are built off of three letters. And so what that means is that verbs and nouns and adjectives, you will almost always see those three letters in them,

no matter what form the word is. And so it's very easy to spot repetition, even because although it can be a verb, it can be a noun. If same three letters can be a verb or a noun or... Correct. Like in English you would say, I go to the store. I went to the store. I am going to the store.

Yeah. Well, I guess you have go and going. So that's an example. Go and going. But in Hebrew, it's much more adherent to that pattern. And so it means they have this tool in their own language to create word plays and repetition in ways that it's hard to do in other languages. So, an example, there was a German scholar, I was going to quote, but let's just do an example. And this will be intuitive to most people. I think it's the word good, which in Hebrews the word tove. And it right through the very first pages of the Bible. And it strikes most readers on page one of the Bible,

because you have that sevenfold repetition. Yeah, it's really redundant. It's right. Yeah, you just keep it. Good, it's good, it's good. That's right. So each of the days, actually not each of the days, day two doesn't have any goodness. So it gets double good on the next day.

But it gets repeated six times. And then the seventh one, there's payoff if you've been noticing. Very good. Because this phrase, God saw that it was good and God saw that it was good. And then the last one, God saw that it was very good. The last one, the sheriff, was carrying a rifle over his shoulder. Yeah, totally. That's right.

And even just, you don't have to know anything about Hebrew, ancient, anything. He just reads page one of the Bible. The word good keeps popping up. And then the last one, very good. And it's the comb, right? You with me. And there's a little, there's aesthetic pleasure that comes from tracking with that. And it's the culminating point that God loves this world, it's very, very good.

So then you figure like, oh, good, that's important. That's an important word, tove. So you go to page two, and then you see that God provides all of these trees for humans that are good, and good for what in particular, they're good for eating, good for what in particular, they're good for eating. Good for eating.

The first time where good appears after the seven-fold good food. Good for food. No, I go, that's what trees are good for. They're good for food. And but there was one particular tree. And oxygen in there. That's right. But then there's one particular tree.

It's the tree of knowing, good, and not good. So, so. Hold on a second. That doesn't say not good. It says evil. Yeah. Well, what it says is, well, raw. Raw.

The Hebrew word is raw. Tauven raw. Yeah. What is good and what is not good. I find using the word evil, evil in English has all this philosophical baggage about metaphysical evil that Hebrew ra doesn't quite have. It just means not-

That sounds interesting. It is interesting. Wouldn't it be? Tell us more. Well, it's a rabbit trail. So the point is God who up to page two, who's responsible as the giver and seer and acknowledge her of what is good. And it's very clear, page one, God. And then what he does is he gives that good,

now in a very tangible form to the humans, but also in front of the humans is a way of knowing what is good and what is evil or not good. And so that's a bit of a twist. It's like, oh, everything's been good, but now there's something that's good and the opposite of good. What's that about? And knowing, you can know, humans can know what is good and not good. And then you have to go have a cup of tea. Are you supposed to go have a cup of tea? And so, well, if the humans have, right now, what's prohibited to them is knowing what is good and what is not good. Well, then who does know what is good?

Just thinks through the logic of the narrative. Who knows what is good and what is not good. Well, then who does know what is good? Just thinks through the logic of the narrative. Who knows what is good? It means it's very obvious. There's intuitive. You follow it through. OK. So OK, so that's off limits. God is the provider of good.

And he's the knower. And there's something about humans knowing and discerning good and not good that's's gonna go really bad if humans do that, because the day you read of it you'll die. Okay. You also get some stuff about the gold of that land. That was good. Yeah.

It's good, so not just what you eat, it's aesthetic beauty, gold, value. The first thing that is not good explicitly is something that God identifies within his world and it's of a human alone. So it, and it's, notice it's a repetition and the Lord, yeah, he said it is not, it's not good. So God is both a provider of what is good and he's the knower of what is good and what is not good because he can discern what's not, are you with me? So it's all these go together here. So God's the one with

knowledge of good evil. So God and the male and the female and so on. The next time the phrase appears then is when the snake comes to the woman and says, you know, about that tree. If you were to be the ones knowing what is good and what is not good, you would be like God, which introduces an irony into the narrative, because of course they are the image of God. So, but that's how we doop them. And so all of a sudden knowing what is good and what is not good, it becomes into the human's mind like, oh, maybe that's something that God's holding out on me, which creates an irony in the story because all that God's been providing is good. Like, that's what he wants for the humans.

But now the humans have this choice in front of them. And so the key line comes when the humans have this choice in front of them. And so the key line comes when the woman saw that the tree was good. Now just that phrase right there, who's the only other character up to this point who has seen and truly identified good? God. This is very obvious. So you have now the human who's putting themselves in the position of God to see what is good. You see that it's a contrast using the same phrase, it's the human acting in the role that God has put themselves in. And when God sees good, what results? More good. When the humans see something and be like, oh, that's the good thing, what happens?

Opposite. So that's a good example of its identical phrase. God saw that it was good, the woman saw that it was good, but they're contrasting. They're both in the motive and in the result of what happens. So there you go. So let's just pause right there. So just on pages one to three, you see all of a sudden,

oh, this is really important. This key word, it's not the only word. There's tons of other things we could do, but this is a really easy one to identify. Like the author could have chose different words, different ways of saying it. Obviously, it was crafted this way. Yes, yes, just tove.

It's clearly, yeah, it keeps just tove. It's clearly. Yeah, it keeps getting repeatable. We talk about jokes before. It does remind me of like a good comedian chooses every single word very carefully. And it's super important. And so the same thing with a good author. And especially for writing poetry.

I guess any work, but poetry is like every single word. You're like doing it for exact reason. Yeah. Yeah, so actually poetry is a good example. We typically, you expect that of poetry, because you know they're using fewer words to pack in more meaning. Yeah.

But when in the Western tradition of like, say like fiction writing or novels, or even writing biographies or audio, the point is not being concise, it's actually often the opposite. Yeah. And so here with biblical narrative, it's already very spare.

But you begin to realize, like, every word is crafted in the same kind of intentionality. Because I could say, I think you're getting a little too crazy in how you're going to go about. Like reading too much into this. Yeah. You're trying to make it do too much,

because you think this is a special text. But you're saying, no, this everything's intentional. It's a cumulative case. So this is just the first example. So this is about one key word that you find linked throughout a whole bunch of stories. Here's an example from Luke where it's a key phrase. You didn't do the last bit just as four. I just, I'm just unrequited.

Yeah, we're cruising. So here's the Luke three and four. This is where Jesus first comes on to the narrative scene in the Gospel of Luke. So for the first is the story of his baptism. And so for the reader, actually Jesus has been introduced in the birth narratives, but as an adult, this is his entry onto the scene. And so it's the classic baptism scene

of the sky opens, the heavenly voice speaks, you are my son, the spirit, all that. So you walk away from that narrative, who's Jesus? He's the beloved son of the Father. There it is. He's the son of God. The very next story is not a story. The next literary thing is the genealogy that Luke provides. And he builds it in such a way that actually begins

with Jesus and then works backward, all the way back through the Hebrew scriptures, it's a little reverse genealogy, all the way back through the Hebrew scriptures going back to the first human character who's called the Son of God. Adam, Luke calls Adam the Son of God. Okay.

So, I'm sudden you're like, oh, two stories right next to each other both culminate in this phrase, the Son of God. Jesus goes into the wilderness and the first thing that the Satan is testing Jesus with is trying to undermine and get Jesus to doubt his identity as gets repeated. If you really are God's Son, then do this.

After that, Jesus goes to the town of Nazareth, and he's giving his sermon, his intro sermon. And the first thing Luke tells us to people ask is, who's son is this again? Wait a minute, isn't this the kid who grew up in town? Now it's people doubting Jesus. After that is the story where Jesus cast out a demon. And the first thing that the evil spirits is, you are the son of God. So look what he's done here. He's put five episodes right next to each other.

All in a row. They all culminate in this moment of Jesus' identity being the Son of God. But notice in each of the stories, it's a different type of claim being made. So in the first, it's the Father. In the second, it's Luke appealing to Jesus' sonship as in continuity with the story of the scriptures.

In the third one, it's about Jesus' identity as the son being tested. In the fourth one, it's his identity being doubted. And then in the fifth one, it's his identity being acknowledged, but from a really surprising source, namely spiritual evil. So in a very, you see, it's creative. This is creative way of forcing the reader to look at Jesus' identity from all these angles.

And so it's Luke's way of trying to persuade you as to the identity of Jesus, but he does it by showing how the identity of Jesus is complex and contested and it's something that you have to discover just like all these different characters and people do. It's brilliant. It's a great way of, because you could just write like the way Mark does at the beginning. This is the gospel about Jesus Christ, the son of God. Now we're moving forward.

Let's move on. We've got things to do. Instead, he does this. And so it kind of goes back to the question of like, why did the Biblical authors just say it like it is? And it's just, well, I don't know. It's a different culture. This is how God chose to reveal Himself.

This through this literary tradition and Israelite culture that has a much more effective way, I think, of communicating. Yeah, this sticks with you a lot more effective way of communicating. Yeah, this sticks with you a lot more. Yeah, totally. Yeah, the first time I noticed this. This is a year ago that I noticed this, and then it never left my memory. Yeah, this will preach.

Yeah, totally. So, you want to do one more example, and then maybe a potty break? This one's a- Yeah, it looks like a long one. This is the longest one, but it's cool. All right, all right, okay, cool. This has to do with how the word site or seeing plays a crucial role in the story of the selection of Saul, and then of Saul's failure in the book of First Samuel. And this is where it begins to branch off

into the key words is one crucial piece, repeated words. But also, when you see key words repeating, you're supposed to start noticing all kinds of other things happening in the story that begin to match up as you go through. It seems repeated ideas. So the first time, the people asked for a king, and that's kind of screwed up, and that's a whole complex thing.

We can't talk about that right now. But the people asked for a king, God allows them to choose a king, and then here comes the story. We're introduced to Saul, son of Kish. And the first thing we're told about him is he was a man choice and good, that there was no man more good than him from his shoulder up he was taller than anyone else from among all the people.

Now I'm highlighting that detail because it's going to become, once you finish the story it makes you want to go back and re-read it and you realize, oh, I get it. But just ask yourself, why am I being told this information? That he was taller. Of all the things that you could tell me about a person? Yeah, because one thing we didn't bring up is in the character conversation, is you made a point to talk about how in biblical storytelling,

characters aren't given a lot of detail. So we're used to physical appearance. Physical appearance. Also what they're thinking, but yeah, I was talking about physical appearance. So you get to a character and you have no idea what they look like most of the time, which is totally different than when we read stories,

we expect like let's fill this out. I want to know what this person looks like, give me some important attributes. And when the Bible does it, it's few and far between, and it's always really significant. That's right. Yep. And usually, it's not just an interesting detail. It's because that detail about their body is going to be crucial for the narrative, or it's symbolic of something that's going to happen in the story,

which is true in Saul's case. So Saul's tall, Saul's ptaller. So next bit of the story is his dad loses some donkeys, so he goes to search for them. And so Saul goes off, he can't find them, he ends up in this town where a prophet lives, and that's Samuel. And so then all of a sudden the story gets interrupted because Saul says, hey, let's go to the town and find the seer, the one who sees. It's an odd phrase, the one who sees.

This is in a typical Hebrew phrase. Not for prophet. Okay. No, you just word profit. But what he says is let's go see the seer. And then the narrator interrupts the story and says, Hey, dear reader, sorry, just quick little glossary thing here. Today we use the word profit.

But back then, in his day, they use the word seer. And then the story just keeps on going. You're just like, what was that for? I guess that was helpful. But right there, it's somebody breaking in to say, why didn't the narrator just use the word profit? Yeah. All of a sudden, it'd highlight.

Then he wouldn't have had to make the comment. Exactly. So all of a sudden, my radar's up. Oh, the word seer is really important in this story. So everything comes forward to the moment in First Samuel 9 when Samuel sees Saul for the first time. And the Lord says, this is the man who will direct my people. Later, when then Samuel, after he ennoyed Saul, he then presents him to all of the people.

And he says, did everyone, do you all see the one whom the Lord has chosen? There's no one like him among all the people. Now, what does that mean? What makes him unique among all of the people? He's tall. He's tall. So, the seer, the one who sees, the one whom God chooses to see Israel's king, and what does Samuel see? He sees that Saul is awesome. He's a giant, which is not insignificant for where the narrative

is going in the book of Samuel, if you know what I'm saying. The tall people, tall soldiers in the book of Samuel come now. So what, in other words, Samuel's being depicted here as somebody who's impressed by Saul's height. That's what he first noticed, and now that's what he's introducing him to the people. And he's supposed to be the one who sees as the prophet, but we're beginning to wonder like he's just impressed with Saul's height. So Saul goes on to then have all these narratives of failure of how he doesn't obey God's word and so on. And so Samuel says, you Saul have rejected the word of the Lord, and so the Lord's rejected you as king.

The next part of the story is the introduction of David. And we hear the Lord say to Samuel, I've rejected Saul as king over Israel. I will send you Jesse from Bethlehem, because among his sons, God says, I have seen for my people, a king. So in other words, the narrative has introduced the seer. And you're supposed to trust him. He's a prophet, right?

He will see accurately, right? He's a leader of the God's people. But then the story tells you what it is, Samuel saw. Samuel saw that he was tall and powerful. And then what does that tall, powerful guy do? He totally fails. And now God comes onto the scene and says, okay, since you didn't see, right, in the right way,

God says, let me show you who I see. So Jesse brings seven out of eight sons before Samuel. And then the narrative is great. It says, when Samuel saw Eliab, the first born of Jesse, he said, oh, surely. Little Lord, I know what it is before me. And the Lord said to Samuel, don't focus on his appearance. This is a good example.

In Hebrew, the word C is Ra'ah. In Hebrew, Cite is Ma'ar-e. It's the same three letters at the root of the word. So literally, it's don't focus on his site or his seaability. So don't focus on what is seen, name what, what is it that Samuel saw? How tall this guy is? Now, this is not talking about Saul,

who's he talking about? Who's he talking about? Who is Samuel seeing? He's seeing Eliab, so Eliab becomes, this, he becomes another, like a stand-in for Saul. Yep. So don't look at his height. I've rejected Eliab. Just like, for God doesn't see, like humans see.

Humans see with their eyes. God sees the heart. Dude, that's good. That's good. Now, you probably, maybe you knew that line from the David story, but did you know that it's the climax of a whole trail of red crumbs that's been going since chapter 9. Thanks for listening to this episode of the Bible Project podcast. We have a video on design patterns in scripture coming out on our

YouTube channel. All the videos on our YouTube channel can be found at youtube.com slash the Bible Project. They also can be found on our website thebibelproject.com. This particular video will be out soon. It's called design patterns in the Bible. It's part of our How to Read the Bible Series. This episode was edited and produced by Dan Gummel, and it was made possible by the hundreds of people who support this project. The Bible Project is a nonprofit crowd-funded operation, and you can find out everything we're up to

at thebiboproject.com. Next week, we'll continue this conversation on design patterns in the Bible until then, thanks for being a part of this with us. We believe the Bible. We believe the Bible. It's a unified story. It's a unified story. That leads to Jesus.

That leads to Jesus. We are crowdfunded. We are crowdfunded. We are crowdfunded. Project. Project. Find people like me. Find people like me. Find free videos.

Find free videos. Study notes. Study notes. And more. And more. At thebibleproject.com. At BibleProject.com. Perfect.

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