BibleProject - Literature for a Lifetime – Paradigm E6

Episode Date: October 18, 2021

What’s the ideal way to study the Bible? Is it 20 minutes of reading every morning or larger blocks of time throughout the week? In this episode, join Tim, Jon, and Carissa as they discuss what it means for the Bible to be ancient Jewish meditation literature. The biblical authors never intended for it to be understood in one sitting, but over the course of a lifetime of re-reading.View full show notes from this episode →TimestampsPart one (0-19:30)Part two (19-30-32:00)Part three (32:00-46:00)Part four (46:00-end)Referenced ResourcesInterested in more? Check out Tim’s library here.David Andrew Teeter, Hebrew Bible scholarShow Music“Defender (Instrumental)” by TENTS“Acedotes” by MakzoShow produced by Cooper Peltz. Edited by Dan Gummel and Zach McKinley. Show notes by Lindsey Ponder.Powered and distributed by Simplecast.

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.

The Bible wants to explain the world to us. It wants to reveal to us the meaning of life. It's doing theology. It's doing rigorous reflection on the ultimate questions about who God is, who we are, what are the problems with humans? What are the possible solutions for our problems? What's God doing about it if anything? Like that's what it's about.

But the Bible doesn't do this like a reference book, like a theology dictionary. It does it slowly with stories and poems that all taken together develop themes that invite us into deep reflection. In fact, you might be reading the Bible and think, huh, this story is a lot like that other story. Where these details, they seem really familiar.

Like, did I read something kind of like this before? Biblical stories work in this way, where later stories are modeled on, replay, and intensify earlier stories. And it keeps building. A feature of Biblical literature is that it's meant to be meditated on it. It asks of us to slow down. Compare, contrast, consider, and slowly it reveals to you its meaning. You would only get this when you're reading these texts backwards and forwards and up and down comparing parts that you wouldn't have thought to compare.

But once you've followed the design cues, it illuminates. It brings illumination into what it's about. Today on the podcast, I talk with Tim McE and Karissa Quinn about the fourth pillar of the paradigm that the Bible is meditation literature. Thanks for joining us. Here we go. read the Bible to do that. Tim, Chris and I have been walking through a bunch of notes on seven different attributes. That's right. Over the years of the Bible

project, we've been working on it. We developed a shorthand for how we describe the paradigm that we're using to read the Bible. It's a unified story that Lisa chase us. Yes. And now we're describing and clarifying what that means, which is really cool because I think what we're doing on the podcast and in videos, probably a lot of people listen and they like it, but think, wait, how do I do that, too? We've heard that in classroom too. Like, I want to practice this more and I don't know exactly what it is you're doing or how you're reading that way. And so now we're talking about this lens or this

perspective that we're approaching the Bible with. Yeah, that's right. Unified story leads to Jesus. We're unpacking that through seven different attributes. The first one was that the Bible is human and divine. Human and divine. The second attribute of biblical literature is that it's unified. It's a diverse collection of many different literary styles, written over 1000 years,

but it has one unified story, and it's a unified collection. The third attribute is that it's messianic literature, and that's one of the key ways, the key way, it's unified about... Yeah, that's right. What is it about? What is it about?

Yeah. That's what we talked about in the last episode. That it's about God appointing humans, humans unable to fulfill this calling of being God's anointed rulers of creation and God providing a Messiah to do that on our behalf so that we can then join him in doing that. And so this is gonna be about the fourth attribute of biblical literature, which we're saying the Bible is meditation literature. And this one, this is complicated,

but also really amazing. And I'm really curious how we're gonna wait through it in a way that doesn't leave my mind numb Can I just say this to maybe set the stage? I think in contemporary culture when we talk about meditation We talk about Emptying your mind right and just kind of letting thoughts pass through and just kind of being a blank canvas Yeah, yeah, that's not the kind of meditation. We're about. We're using the word meditation because the Bible uses a word that's translated and delicious meditate in Psalm 1, especially, which I guess you'll show us,

but it's not the kind of empty your mind meditate. It's it's a kind of like focusing of the mind on something on certain things, certain things that will result in wisdom and abundance in life. Yeah. So how is the Bible meditation literature and how does that implicate how we read the Bible? Yep. So we crafted a sentence.

We tried to summarize this. And the sentence reads as such. The Bible is ancient Jewish literature that is artistically designed to interpret itself and encourages a lifetime of rereading and reflection. Artistically designed to interpret itself. And that takes years of not just reading, but rereading and rereading, and then reflecting on what you

have reread and reread. That's part of defining what meditation is. Correct. So it's Jewish, it's artistic, and it's meditation. Yeah. Literature. Yeah. Defined as re-reading things many times and then reflecting as well.

Yeah. Focus in a focused way. One interesting place to start the conversation on this point is I can't remember if this was just an impression I got from entering into conservative Protestant Christian culture in my early 20s, but there was this sense, at least the church communities and the Bible College I was a part of, where a lot of things in life are complex. And there are even complexities as you think about theology and God and philosophical questions. But ultimately, if you boil it all down, it's pretty simple. And just read the Bible, face value, and you'll get it.

It'll just tell you what to do and then do it. Rulebook or dictionary. Yep. God says it. I believe it settles it. Kind of mentality. Yeah. And if you says it. I believe it sells it. Kind of mentality. And if you do that 10 minutes a day,

like you'll be set. Yeah, and there's beauty to that. It's accessible. That's right. We can understand it. It affects our lives. Those things are good. Yep, yeah.

So they're good intuitions all around. But you wouldn't say that about a Christopher Nolan film. Okay. All right, excellent. I just watched Ten say that about a Christopher Nolan film. Okay. All right. That's excellent. I just watched Tenant last week. Oh my gosh.

The most recent Christopher Nolan film. And then I have since been obsessed with watching explainer videos about Tenant. And I finally am getting it. Okay. It's actually a very remarkable film. But it's actually a perfect example. Yeah. It's actually a very almost precise example

to the way biblical literature works. Well, you know, I've been thinking about him a lot when we were just talking, we were having lunch and you were talking about the origami of scripture. And how, I don't remember what you just said. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it just made me think of like, this is how Christopher Nolan writes movies.

Totally. All right. So just for audience, I can tell Chris. And myself. Chris, I just googled it. So it's a movie where one of the whole premises is that the bad guys in the movie have found a way to reverse time. And so the storyline of the movie is a constant going forward, then there'll be a pivot, and then the storyline will start going in reverse.

But also forward. But forward for you, the viewer, but back over the storyline that you just covered in the last 10 minutes. And then oververse again and go in the back. And so it completely bends your sense of time, because you're constantly doubling and tripling back on the same scenes, but seeing them from a different point of view. And it messes as a linear experience. It's very difficult. Yes. But if you rewatch it, which I haven't done, but I've watched explainers of it that walk you through it, I can see if you watched it four or five times, you would begin to see it and how brilliant. How much thought and meticulous care went into crafting that movie. So if you watched it and you took away the expectation of chronology.

Yes. You would be sorely disappointed. Which many critical reviews are. Yeah, it's hard to watch. Disappointed in the movie. You can't just watch a movie and think, I'm going to enjoy watching a movie and they'll be really satisfied afterward.

You can watch it and go, what? Yeah, what? Because of these time inversions, there's moments where there's three of a single character on the same in the same scene. Because if you're doubling back, and then you double back again, there'll be a moment where there's three

of the same character in the same scene. And you watch it the first time, you're like, how are there three of the same person in the same scene? The first time you kind of like, I knew what I was getting into. So I kind of was hanging. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But even still, I was like,

it's tough. No, it's tough. Okay, so here's what's even more. And I actually have my friend, and also Hebrew Bible scholar, David Andrew Teeter, because I watched the movie with him to explain it to me. The concept of all these inversions is all based off of a very famous Roman,

a Latin word puzzle that was found inscribed on a wall in Pompeii called the Sator Square. Actually, this is so perfect for what- Were you planning on doing all this? Cause I just brought up Christopher Nolan on a on a lark Well, I wasn't planning but this is perfect. Okay, okay, so I'm learning so much right now Let's let's know the podcast John Krissit Google SAT O R square Also, I do our square title the movie that's cool. Oh, yeah, it's a it's a line

This was found and scrapped on a well in Pompeii with the famous city Barrett. I see buried by oh Tenets right in the middle so the word Okay, so that's how the thing at the back presents it's a lot. It's a line of five Words that are each have five letters. It's Latin words say to a repot tenet opera Oh, the whole thing is what do you call that a? It's a palindrome. Palindrome.

No matter what direction you look at it, it spells the same words backwards. Yeah. Up and down side to side in reverse and so on. And the middle word is Tenet. The middle letter is N, which you can flip it. And so if you look, the name of the bad guy in the movie is Sator, the first one. The movie begins with the scene at the opera. A repo is one of the names of the companies that's a key pivot in the food.

And Rotas is the little machines that people enter to inverse time. Oh, those are called Rotas. Is it rotas? And look at it, it spells tenet on the X-axis too. Yes. And look, it spells all the same words up and down side to side backwards forwards. Oh my goodness.

Yeah, it does. Wikipedia says the earliest example of the score dates from the runes of Pompeii, which some scholars attribute to pre-Christian origins, such as Jewish or myth-rayic. Yeah, yeah. Oh yeah, my friend Andy was showing me something. Early Christian has adopted this because if you take out the letters that spell the word patonaster, our father, what's left is the letters alpha and omega.

Something like that. Okay, Andy, all that to say is. Wait, do these words mean anything? Yes. Okay. Yes. Say to her is the word farmer or soar. A repo is a proper name. Tenet is the word halves.

Opera is work and rotos is the word for plow. So the soar or the farmer named a repo has or does his work by means of the plow. But even that is just a little memory device to help you remember the puzzle. The whole movie has the characters. It's a movie that's implementing the inversions and symmetries of time. So this is already too long of a rabbit round. The whole point is that the movie doesn't read or watch like a linear sequence of time. It'll take you through a scene, invert, and then you're going backwards through that scene again from a different point of view.

Then it'll invert again and you'll go backwards. And each time you go through the same idea or scene, you get a deeper perspective on the meaning of that. And biblical literature is designed to work in almost precisely the same way, which is why we spent so much time on this illustration. Yeah, if you had to describe how biblical literature works in that way, how would you alter that? Yeah, mostly it's through what we've explored here in the podcast in the past, and in videos, through what we call design patterns. So the stretch of a biblical narrative,

well, let's just take narratives right now. There's also poetry. But where each of the stories or scenes in a story are modeled upon and replaying and inverting in some way, what just happened in the previous scene. I'm trying to think when we would have talked about the Cain Enable story and how it is replaying and intensifying the failure of Adam and Eve

of the tree story. Yeah. And we've talked about that many different times. Yeah, especially classroom. Yes. Yeah, that's right. That's right. So you can go, if you read that Adam and Eve failure of the tree, then you just read it,

maybe even memorize it if you want, just really think about it. And then you meditate on it. Meditate on it. And then you read the cane-enable story. You'll notice all these key words from the Eden story popping up again. But never the same, always an interesting replay. But you have sin as a character in the Cain and Abel story

that wants to consume its desire is for Cain. God says, if you do what is good, you will be exalted. If you don't do what is good, it's a choice between good and not good, just like his parents. It's all good. How God asks Adam and Eve where they are and how he asks Kane, where's your brother?

Where's your brother? Blame shifting. The Blame shifting. You read him, you're kind of like, I feel like he's stories are patterned after each other. Correct, that's right. And then, here's a good example of inversion of the language and ideas. In Genesis 3, it's a snake who, you suspect, is some kind of spiritual being, something,

more than just a snake, but it's on the surface of the narrative of a snake, talking to a woman and she takes what is good in her eyes. In Genesis 6, which is at the opposite end and stands in a mirror relationship to Genesis 3, it's a story about the sons of Elohim, the spiritual beings, who see that women are good and take them for themselves. So it's exact same language,

women, spiritual beings, seeing that what is good and what's taking, but in one case, it's a woman taking what's good in light of a spiritual beings' deception. In Genesis 6, it's spiritual beings taking women because they see that they're good. Biblical stories work in this way where later stories are modeled on, replay, and intensify earlier stories. And it keeps building. And I think in the last episode you brought up the example of de-creation, how that keeps building. That's right. Where like the first time you see kind of a de-creation

is Adam and Eva exiled from the garden. So this is kind of like scattering and going out. But then the like big one after that is the cosmic waters coming back to de-create. On day two, who got separates waters from waters. And then the beginning of the flood is about the windows of the heavens opening and the springs of the deep bursting. And the separation between the waters above and below collapsed. And then you get to the tower of Babel and again you get this

image of a scattering out. That's right. Just like Adam and Eve are scattered after trying to attain to the level of Elohim Now the Babylon all humanity who want to try to make their name great Yeah, and on their own behalf they're scattered out That's right And then you brought up how you get into Genesis later in Genesis and you get the Sodom and Gomorrah Mm-hmm, and it rains fire Mm-hmm and that vocabulary of raining fire the Sodom and Gamora, and it rains fire. And that vocabulary of raining fire

is supposed to connect you to the idea of raining water. Raining water. So it's another. That's right. And there's 10 more real unique vocabulary items in the Gamora story that link back to unique vocabulary in the flood story.

Yeah, so this is a reason why it's meditation literature because on a first read, you might not put those things together. Correct. But after you become really, really familiar with the flood story and you know the words and they're in your mind and you don't have to recall them necessarily by reading, then when you read the Sodom and Gamora story, you would notice more naturally when words are reused.

Yeah, that's right. Okay, so here's one element of it. We just talked about later things or pattern on earlier things as you read sequentially through. Based off of vocab words that are either used in the same way or in a inverse way. Right. So here's how it's like tenet or the satyr square is that in your mind, when you see that a later story is all of a sudden you're saying, I'm seeing a lot of vocabulary from the flood story. What you are in your mind being asked to do is to go back and upload. For the most part, these texts were designed for a community that would

memorize them. Yeah. And just have it all like in your mind. So you're supposed to upload the flood story and then read the Sodom and Gomorrah story as if they stand next to each other. And then what you'll find is the stretch of text from the flood story to the Sodom and Gomorrah story is designed as an elaborate chiasm with all the matching corresponding parts in between. And then all of a sudden it's like you can read the story backwards, four words inside and out. Yeah, and by chiasm you mean a sequence of things happens and then it reverses the sequence.

Just like in the movie, just like in the movie, tenet. And it's a style of literature that forces you, that when you're reading it through it can feel chaotic. When you're like, okay, I see there's a general storyline, but forces you, when you're reading it through, it can feel chaotic. When you're like, okay, I see there's a general storyline, but then there's all this other stuff like, yeah, it just starts to feel random. What's that here for? Yeah, like why is that repeated?

Yeah. Why, yeah, like, like Abraham gives his wife twice, what? Yeah, that's a great example. Yeah, that's right. But those stand precisely as mirror inversions at matching places in their respective contacts. And so where you get the meditation point

is that if I see that a later story is recalling an earlier one, I'm to take both stories, pull them up, and then just reread them, reread it and rethink it, but now just alongside each other. So now go read the flood story and then go forward and read the Sodomagamora story as if they are next to each other. And all sorts of new things will pop. Well, when you read them next to each other, what are you looking for?

Okay, upload our conversations from how to read biblical poetry. The fundamental communication strategy of biblical poetry is repetition of two sometimes three lines that are similar but with little variations. So, someone, how blessed is the man who does not walk in the council of the wicked or stand in the path of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers. Three ways to say basically the same thing. Don't hang out with the wrong crew. Okay.

Yeah. The point is look at the matching words. Walk, stand, sit. There's a progression. Three ways of being. Yeah. Walking. So just going along with.

Standing, positioning yourself among, sitting, so just going along with, standing, positioning yourself among, sitting, settling in. So first you walk, then you stand, then you sit. Oh, interesting. That's a progression. It's a progression, but it's a progression, not forward sequential. It's a progression through the satir square, down the lines.

You're tracking one word down the lines. The council of the wicked, the council, path, and seat, wicked sinners, mockers. So in your mind, you're supposed to take each of those words out of the linear sequence and start them, and pick about them together across the lines. And it's about comparing and contrasting. So that little thing we just did with walk, stand, sit would only happen if you lift each word out of its linear context and start matching it with what it corresponds to.

Yeah. And so it's the same thing. If you meditate on the meaning of the flood story, then meditate on the meaning of the Sodom Gomorrah story. You'll notice lots of similarities. There's human violence, there's an outcry that raises up to God so that God has to respond. God responds with rain, but in one it's a rain of water that undoes the creation.

In the other it's a rain of fire. Well God did promise that He would never let it rain the flood waters down again. So if He rained a flood on Sodom, that would be going against God's promise. In the flood story, God delivers a remnant who goes forward and then intercedes on all after the flood. In the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, God allows Abraham to intercede

on behalf of a remnant in Sodom. So they're similar, but they're also really different. Yeah. And so it's in comparing and contrasting that you gain further insight into both So you're asking at the most basic level when you notice a similarity between two texts lots of repeated words or pattern It's what similar what's different and how do the differences move the story forward and how do the differences Eliminate both stories. This is just the same as it's a way of comparative thinking.

It's the way that you learn about any reality is to learn about one thing. And then there's another thing. Those are similar, but they're also really different. Everything's a metaphor. It's back to that. Like that's how we think. Or any three things in a comparative relationship

to each other. I mean, I'm sitting at a table, the three of us of us think about how facial recognition works over the course of a lifetime. I see thousands of faces and everyone's similar. You both have noses, you both have eyes, have hair, but then you're also different and it's precisely the similarities that my brain says humans and it's in the differences that my brain says John and Christopher. And so it's a very basic, actually way of apprehending reality, but this is a very focused, it's a way of focusing, using comparison and contrast to help you understand what these texts are about. Yeah.

Now, this makes a lot of sense when you think of it as literary art. Yeah. Yeah, that's right. But I think what might feel uncomfortable is that, well, then to what end? Because art is just like, okay, I've thought about the world a little differently, or they gave me a feeling, or gave me an insight, charged me up, whatever, but isn't the Bible supposed to do more than that? Like, how is, what's the real payoff?

Well, here it's back to the previous point of what it is about. Yeah. Let's go through the points of paradigm. Human and divine, God has chosen the unique vehicle of ancient Jewish literature. Yeah. To tell a story that leads to the Messiah and it's a unified

collection story. But one of the unique ways that this literature communicates is not through straightforward narrative sequencing of either a story or of a train of thought. Even though it does have a linear story. It communicates that story is through a unique literary style. That we're calling, by shorthand, meditation literature. It's a kind of literature that's constantly doubling back on itself, thematically, literarily, to help you gain deeper insight into each respective narrative. In a way, this is what we mean in our little sentence where we say that the Bible interprets

itself. The way you know what the flood story means is by knowing what the Sodom Gamora story means. But the way you would know what either of the means is by comparing and contrasting them and gives you more insight into each. The flood story is designed to help you understand the flood story more. And the flood story is designed to help you understand the Sodom Gamora story more. And when I understand the story's more, and I guess this is maybe getting to the next patch

of years of paradigm, which is its wisdom literature. Yeah. Well, it gives you, yeah, it helps you understand God's relationship to human evil. How God responds to human evil is both similar but also different. How God's mercy is displayed in those stories is similar but also different. The role of the intercessor of the anointed intercessor is similar and different. So it's a way of actually giving, it's doing theology. It's doing rigorous reflection on the ultimate questions about who God is, who we are, what are the problems with humans? What are the possible solutions for problems? What's God doing about it if anything? Like that's what it's about. I see. But it's doing it in this unique way

that's different from how we consume novels and stories and movies except for movies by Christopher And so just like watching a Christopher Nolan film can be very rewarding like the first time I watched Memento you see Memento. Yeah. Yeah. That's a Christopher Nolan film Yeah, and that one you're kind of like oh my vendor, but you finish it. Yeah, that's awesome That was great. Those parts of the Bible that feel that way. But then there's parts of the Bible that feel like tenant. You watch it and you're just like, oh man, that felt like a chore.

How does that fit? And I think I got it, but I don't think I got it. There's something there, but man I'm tired now and I just want to take a nap. Like, but that's what the Bible, it wants you just kind of keep at it and keep mining it. And it was created within a subculture of a people who mastered this. Mastered this way of writing and reading.

And it's also clear when you read the literature produced by the people who wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls, for example, they knew, they understood this. And they write exactly the same way. And the way that they wrote commentaries on biblical books And you can tell that they process the literature in this way Because the way they gain insights from it is also the way New Testament authors and the sweat is about to say Okay, is that the gospel authors Paul they're tracking They'll say things or be like yeah, the stories about this or this is now a type of this and you're like what?

Like aren't you pushing this way too far? Yeah, yeah. You want to have something interesting. The word type, where we get the word type for typology. I mean, Greek the word is Tupas and it's the standard Greek word for pattern. Yeah, pattern, which is a repeated pattern.

Yeah, like Romans 5, 14. I have it here. Oh, yes. Because I had brought this up earlier. Nevertheless, death rained from Adam until Moses, even over those who had not sinned in the likeness of the offence of Adam, who is a pattern or type of him who was to come. Yeah. So Adam is an image of the Messiah. He's a type of man. Yeah. The failure of Adam puts in motion a story and a cycle that repeats creating the need for an anointed representative to undo what Adam has done. This basic idea is what explains why

biblical stories and poetry feel so repetitious, often so sometimes overly wordy, and then sometimes so unclear with lacking details that you think you would need. Yeah, and it's because the instincts, the narrative and poetic instincts that we have as modern readers. That we have are just fundamentally different from how the biblical authors conceived of literature

and right, right? You've been talking about this in terms of like connecting stories to stories. But this also happens when you're in a story, I've seen you show us this. You're in a story and each line of a story is also doing its own little sador magic. Yeah, totally. Yeah, that's right. And so that's where you get the weird repetitions kind of even within a story of like, you just told me that. And then you're telling me that again. You're telling me. And it just feels clunky.

But then you see like, oh, you're telling me it again because it's a mirror. And in the center of this is something. One of these key words. Key, something key. Yeah, there'll be a whole story that's designed like the movie Tenant, where it'll be like, you walk through a set of words and ideas to a center

And then you walk back out repeating them all in reverse order Mm-hmm. Yeah, you're just like I just heard this but it feels different Yeah, and the whole point is that you see the whole thing and then see what's on the outer see what's in the middle and that you compare the matching parts And you meditate on it. This is what Psalm 1 means when it says, blessed is one. Yeah, we know actually read. Yeah, we know. We read the first verse.

Yeah, go ahead. Just to make that point, you're making, John, it's that this happens on the level of the line, but also on the level of paragraph. On the level of paragraph, yeah. Whole story, macro story. That's right. Yeah, Adam has three sons.

Yeah. Noah has three sons. Noah has three sons. Abraham has Isaac and then Jacob, who become 12, three plus 12. So you have, Wait wait wait wait wait three generations, who become 12, one becomes three, one becomes three, three becomes 12, and that's the book of Genesis. So that's just Genesis. One becomes three, three becomes 12, and then you just follow the story, and you're just

like, oh, that's the number of characters involved. And then you blow it out, then you've got a Moses, and the book of Drudoronomi begins with Moses saying, man, I'm just running solo here. I can't do this alone. And so he appoints these judges, and turns out the judges are going to be corrupt, and they're going to fail. And so who become the ones who carry on the legacy of Moses? Three plus 12. Three prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, plus a scroll of the 12. Moses becomes three plus 12. Do you get it?

One becomes three. One becomes three. Three becomes 12. One becomes three plus 12. Interesting. And you're just like, oh gosh. That's like on the macro level. Yeah, that's on the like.

That's on the like, the Torah and the prophets. That's on the whole metal level. Are organized on these. Oh wow. It's that kind of thing. And I wouldn't notice that except that I read somebody who's brilliant or talked to my friend Andy Teeter who gets this way better than I do.

You would only get this when you're reading these texts backwards and forwards and up and down and comparing parts that you wouldn't have thought to compare. But once you've followed the design cues, it illuminates. It brings illumination into what it's about. So So let's go to San Juan, which we maybe should have read a long time ago with the being I get of this conversation. So we read the first line, how blessed is the one who doesn't walk in the council of the wicked. Stand in the path of sinners, sit in the seat of mockers.

Rather, this blessed one's delight is in the Torah of Yahweh, and in his Torah he hagas meditates. Day, day and night. Ha-ga, ha-ga. Which is itself, ha-ga. A palindrome. Oh, that's true. Good point, yeah.

This is in English at least. Hey. Ha-ga. Hey, G-A-G-A-G. Hey, G-M-L-H-E. I think he's gonna like what? Oh, so in Hebrew it's a paladrim too. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, the root word is.

So Haggah here, we'll just do a quick. I've done it in other places, but I'll just Haggah. Not the most common word in Hebrew. If here's 25 times in the Hebrew Bible. It appears in Joshua chapter 1 where Joshua is told to Haggah on the Torah. Yeah. Day and night. Job says, my lips will never speak injustice, and my tongue will never

haga on treachery. Yeah, so this is kind of an active meditation too. My tongue won't utter treachery. The word haga is used in the very next psalm, psalm 2, in the opening line where the nations are ha-gah, a few tile plan to rebel against God. They're scheming, scheming. Yeah, yeah. psalm 37. The mouth of the righteous ha-gah's wisdom. So again, really active, or not really active, but at least it's, it's not that passive emptying of yourself, It's like this constant uttering. This fun. We're building up the portrait through like, or the meaning by looking at examples. Psalm 63 or 6.

When I remember you, oh yeah, way on my bed, I haggah on you through the night watches. I haggah on you. What is he sleeping in this situation? I remember you on my bed. I hug on you in the night walk. It's kind of what your brain does at night. You like flips over to sleep mode. It's just like it's doing its own processing.

Making connections. It's just those, seriously, yeah, right? Isn't a dream just like all this like connecting these weird dots? Some 77, 11 and 12. I will remember the deeds of Yahweh. I'll remember wonders of old. I will haggah on your work and muse on your deeds.

So that one and Psalm 63 were both about remembering. So not almost like the purpose of meditating is to not forget, but to actively remember who God is and in this case remembering what Scripture is to do. Salidify it in your mind. Yeah. And another one, my favorite, Isaiah 31 verse 4, just as the lion, Hagaz over his prey. Now this is what the word kind of most technically means, right?

Haga is an Anaman pia. Anaman pia. Oh, that's a good question. Haga, Haga. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh like that. I don't know. I heard this. I think I heard this from you. Did you just say that any Hebrew word could be like that? I don't know. Like if you if there's a word that means a sound, but if you say it like in a low mumble. Yeah. No, think about yourself. Classic on-amon appeal words are like room. Woof, woof, moo, word, meow, meow. The words that are spelled like the sounds they'd.

Yeah, so what's the sound of eating? Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Maybe, I'm gonna meditate on that. Okay.

So the whole portrait, it's a slow, quiet murmuring where you are repeating something to yourself as a form of thinking about it. And remember, if you put all these uses together, it's a low sound that animals make, but it's what people would do if they're scheming a plan in the corner. You know, meditating at the night, talking to yourself at night, I do that, or in your head. And this is what the blessed person does with the Torah day and night. With the Hebrew Bible, or the Torah,

which is often a shorthand for the Hebrew Bible, right? So you quietly recited, allowed to yourself as a way of focusing your thoughts upon. To gain insight and understanding, going all the way back, and the result is a life that resembles the tree of life in Eden, a tree planted by streams of water, that not just yields fruit when it's supposed to, but the leaves never fall off.

Like the seasons have no effect on it. Perpetually green. Meaning that somehow the stories and poems will be such a source of perpetual wisdom that they bring a vitality and life to the mind and heart that will have a discipline focused on meditating, reciting these stories. Yeah, and someone there's this cool contrast between walking in the step of the wicked, so

like doing this active thing versus kind of quietly meditating and how that establishes you as a tree. You know, I asked you like, okay, so you're comparing and contrasting and the flood story versus Sodom It's like to what end yeah, and to the end of finding Life yeah, and actually just you doing the exercise with the first verse of Psalm one really connected the dots for me Mm-hmm when you said okay stand sit or know what how does it go? Walk, stand, sit. Walk, stand, sit. And also in that progression,

just started to feel really more meaningful. It's like, first you're like walking in direction, and then you kind of plant yourself somewhere, and then you're like settle in to that place. And where you're doing that is really, really significant. And if you're doing it amongst the wicked and the sinners and the scoffers, versus then what you're supposed to be doing

is planted by streams of water. And then just like meditating on that progression, like all of a sudden just makes it more meaningful, makes me want to really think about like, yeah, what direction am I walking? Because pretty soon I'm going to stand there. And pretty soon I'm going to be planted there. And like, that's what meditation literature is doing is it's helping your mind, the imaginative

part of your mind really like capture something so that it's meaningful to you and it starts to shape you. Yeah, yeah, shapes your imagination. And again, we're being asked to meditate in this way Yeah, shapes your imagination. And again, we're being asked to meditate in this way on literature that's designed in this way, but to get you to think about God, God's purposes, me. Yeah, there's a message and a story. And so you're turning, what's the nature of human failure? Yeah. Oh man.

Well, let's just start comparing and contrasting failure stories. And all of a sudden, you know, just in Genesis 1 to 11, you have a real bust, like diagnosis of the human condition. And we're only on page 12, you know, that kind of thing. And so it makes you a wise person. That's the claim, right here, at least. And-

Why is in full of life? Yeah, yeah. I have a question that this brings up. I actually, I think when you started talking earlier about the numbers, three, one becomes three, one becomes three, three becomes 12, and one becomes three plus 12. One becomes three plus 12. I felt like for me and maybe others that feels like watching Tenet for the first time. It's like, wait, I don't. What?

So how do people not, how do we not get discouraged by the complexity? On the one hand, this is so exciting. And discovering a pattern or discovering a comparison and seeing how it works, that's like the most exciting thing to me, I mean, in my field and life. But I think it can be discouraging, too, that, whoa, this is really complex. Yeah. Part of it is, maybe that when you start doing numbers without a whiteboard, then that's,

so I have all the sympathy in the world because I probably should slow down the flora. So don't start with the numbers. But it also, like, number patterning, it's an important convention used by the biblical authors. I mean, yeah, we have did whole Pat Kais on the number seven in Genesis 1, and it's very clear that patterns of three and three plus one and seven are meaningful to the biblical authors, and they use them. Maybe let's just flip it and let's just say wherever my current level of understanding is about trying to make sense of the Bible, there's always more. And the more will likely push the

boundaries of what I thought was like possible with literature, will almost always push it beyond. That's been my experience with biblical literature, is that it constantly challenges my assumptions about what it is and like keeps getting more awesome. Yeah, so the fact that it's meditation literature means it's deep and it's complex, but it also means when we read it, we aren't going to see everything. Yes, that's okay. That's the great.

It's designed not to give up all of its meaning on the first or even the fiftiest reading. Yeah, and I think we've also talked about it in relation to like a symphony where it's like you can listen to a symphony and enjoy it and have a good experience or even be a little bored because you're just like I don't know let's start and get repetitive but it's still music and it's still like okay I kind of get it but then the more you understand music theory and instrumentation and all stuff, it just becomes

to unpack more and more and more and more. So I think reading the Bible can be discouraging, but then also just like any good art, it should be able to be able to approach it as an amateur and still appreciate it as art, as I guess, the hope. Yeah. Yeah. Or maybe on one read through a section or a text, you notice something,

and that's exciting and encouraging. But you don't have to feel like you have to see it all in that moment. Yeah, I think it's actually very difficult for us to hold everything in our head at once. And I'm not sure that's how these texts were designed. I mean, maybe there was a small circle of super nerd Jewish prophets and scribes hanging in Jerusalem and all they did. I don't know who paid for all this, but like all they did was just

read and compose this literature and study it and nerd out on word plays and stuff. But for most Israelites throughout most of history, these were texts that lived in their minds. Yeah. And they sung them. And did around me six, talk about it. Yeah. When you're sitting, when you're standing, when you walk on the road, when you're in your house,

when you go to sleep, when you rise up, and they would sing them, they would recite them, and it was over the course of a lifetime that these texts formed. Wait, did around me six uses the same language as someone? Uh. When you, when you walk, when you sit. Oh, that's interesting. It's, that's the passage about passing on these things to your children and

yeah, Shema, you sort of listen to Israel. Lord, I got the words one. Love, Lord God, I hold heart, soul, and with all your might. The words, which I'm commanding you today, will be on the heart. Teach them to your sons, talk about them when you sit. When you sit. When you walk, when you lie down, when you get up. When you sit, when you walk, lie down, get up. It's two of them, two of the three. Four, yeah.

But it's the shift of saying, when I feel like I don't understand everything, it's an invitation to another rereading, as opposed to I'm not getting it. Yeah, that's good for whatever stage you're at. I think I've told you the story, Tim, where I was taught to read the Bible to where it would give you its secrets on its first reading.

And I would get discouraged to have a little devotional time, and then I'd be like, I don't think I got it. And then I'd feel like a failure. And that would actually make me not want to read the Bible anymore. And at some point, kind of my early 20s, I just thought, you know, maybe, maybe it's okay if I just read the Bible and don't get it.

Maybe it's, maybe it's shaping me in ways that I don't understand. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so my goal isn't to like, understand, try to understand it, but just to spend time in it. Just take it in. And that was freeing. Didn't solve the puzzle for me.

But like, that was a different shift from like, this is a theology book that I need to understand to meditation, meditation, literature. To read and reread. Yeah. Yeah. 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1%, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1 %, 1 %, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 1%, So we've had conversations about what exactly to call this aspect of the paradigm, this fourth point. Yeah.

Because meditation literature is not self-explanatory. It requires this conversation. Well, neither is messianic literature. Yeah, exactly. So I'm looking at our notes and I see we've flagged like we've thought about naming it artistic meditation literature. Yeah. Which kind of explains one aspect of it,

but it still requires explanation. Yeah. In which case I wonder if the shorter version, just meditation. Meditation literature. Yeah. I kind of like that because literature by nature seems to be artistic in some sense.

It's a representation of something. You're saying the word literature kind of has artistic built into it. That's a good point. So, yeah, that's the fourth aspect. Superdense literature. Designed in a unique way, a unique cultural style from ancient Jewish people. It interprets itself and encourages a lifetime of rereading and reflection. If you really want to go down the rabbit hole with this one, I'd say take one of your classes in the classroom. Oh, sure, yeah, yeah. So, because you do Genesis, well, you've got three classes in Genesis up now, right?

Or is there only two up now? Heaven and Earth, Adam and Noah. Adam and Noah. That's it, right? Yeah, next will be Noah to Abraham. Okay. But in those like you really are are you're starting to really be. Yeah.

Trying to model and walk. Practice this. People through reading a story in this way. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Another cool way to practice this would be to read one song at a time because the songs are so highly structured in their individual units, even though I think they're woven together in two whole. So you can look at two lines just like we did with Psalm 1, verse 1. And you can just ask between this line in the next, what is similar, what's different, what's moving forward. And then after you do that for each line of the Psalm, you can look at the different parts of the Psalm. And from this part, yeah, from this part to the next, what's moving, what's similar, what's different, it's just a good like mental practice, I think. Yeah, this may not be the time

of place, but I just noticed something when you were doing a little meditation that I've never noticed before. So I have noticed, verses one through three, have three parts. Yeah, it opens with three lines. How blessed is the one who doesn't walk, doesn't stand, doesn't sit. That's one the idea. There's the delight in the Torah, the Lord, in the Torah, it meditates. That's a little... A little couplet right in the center. A little couplet. And then the last line is four. The third item has a plus one, who would be like a tree planted by streams of water, yields it through season, leaf, doesn't weather, whatever it does, it prospers.

So what's interesting, and what you just noted, and I had never thought about, is how planted is very much a contrast to sitting with a scoffer. Yeah, like being established there. Yeah, I heard that earlier when we were reflecting too, I think something you had said made me realize that like the second half or this verse, verse three, is reflecting back on verse one. Yeah. So the open lines mirror each other.

You can live in such a way that you get planted in the wrong place. Yeah. Or you can be planted as a tree of life. And what's the pivot between the difference? It's the two middle line. It's meditating on what your delight and source of meditation is. So even that is a little. And that's interesting too, just to compare delight and meditation.

Like you delight in what you meditate on. Yeah. Like we become the things that we are imagining. That's right. Because of the things that we love. Exactly. Yeah, that's a good observation. So verse two, but his delight is in the law of the Lord.

And in his law, he meditates day and night. So you see that those two lines in you ask, what analogy or comparison is being made here? Delight and meditation. Yeah, it has a three-part design. The outer paragraphs mirror each other in terms of one ends with sitting and the third one begins with something planted.

Yeah, that's a great example of what I'm talking about. The sitting illuminates the planting. The planting makes you reevaluate the sitting. But each one of these three parts has itself, these dynamics that make you think internal to it about and so on. And this is it. And this is just the first three verses of song. It's the first half of song 1, and then the second half.

So this is about the blessed one, and the second half is about the wicked. So then you see contrast between those two halves, and you can ask that same question. That's right. How does the pairing, yeah, the one half relate to the other. So yeah, I think the Psalms provide a really good place to practice. Yeah. Yeah, break it up into parts. Start asking how the parts relate

and comparing and contrasting. So you're right, the classes are a place where I'm trying to model this, but yeah, it's good stuff, man. Good stuff. All right, so that's meditation literature. Yeah. The next attribute of biblical literature is that it's wisdom literature.

And that is what will jump in next. How is the Bible wisdom literature? Yeah, yes. I want to help shift from talking about wisdom literature as one section of the Bible. As in like the Proverbs. Proverbs, yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's actually a fairly modern phenomenon. To call a few books in the Bible, the wisdom literature, because as we're gonna see, the standard vocabulary used,

the biblical author used to talk about all of biblical literature is to describe it all as wisdom literature. Yeah, and what does that mean? What does that mean? What does it mean? John, and I suppose- Doonan. Just to connect it really fast

because we're talking about being planted as trees of life. The whole purpose of the tree of life was for gaining wisdom and the wisdom is so that we could be God's image in a way that actually brings life and flourishing. And so how do you find wisdom and how does the Bible give you wisdom? Yep. Let's read the divine and human unified Messianic story to find out. Next week. Thanks for listening to this episode of Bible Project Podcast. Next week, we continue the conversation on the paradigm by which we read the Bible.

We're going to look at the fifth pillar, that the Bible is wisdom literature. It's wisdom aimed at helping us grow and develop as ethical moral beings in the world, but it doesn't do it in the style of a handbook. It does it the way narratives and poems do it, and that's the basic point that we're making. It's wisdom literature. We'd love to hear your questions

and have them for an upcoming question and response episode. So if you find yourself wondering about things that we're talking about and want us to engage more, you can send us your question. Send it to info at BibleProtect.com. Try to keep it to 20 or 30 seconds. Let us know who you are and where you're from. And if you're able to transcribe your question when you send it over, that would be immensely helpful to us. Today's episode was produced by Cooper Helts, edited by Dan Gummel and Zach McKinley,

the show notes by Lindsay Ponder. Bible project is a non-profit. We exist to experience the Bible as a unified story that leads to Jesus. Everything we make is free because of the generous support of many people all over the world just like you, so thank you so much for being a part of this for best. Hi, this is Chris and Jan and I'm from a little town called Dade City, Florida.

I first heard about the Bible project through a YouTube search actually. As an artist specializing in oil painting, I was curious if there was a way that the visual arts could be used as Kingdom work. I had seen plenty of examples of singers and actors and other creatives using their giftings, but I wondered if visual art could be just as effective. When I found the Bible project, I not only became immensely inspired, but I was hooked. I used the Bible project for my own personal baselock, and it's really helped me understand the Bible on a deeper and more contextual level. What I love most about the Bible project is the way that Tim,

John, and the whole Artistic team really lay out scripture through visual artistry. We believe that the Bible is a unified story that leads to Jesus, where a crowd-funded project by people like me. Find free videos, study notes, podcasts, classes, and more at thebibelproject.com. you