The Upper Register

Covenant Theology in BT Perspective: Abrahamic, Mosaic, New

Covenant Theology in biblical theological perspective observes the historical progression and interconnections between the Abrahamic, Mosaic, and New Covenants. Leviticus 26 is a critical passage, for here the outpouring of the vengeance of the Mosaic Covenant is predicted. But Israel’s restoration after the exile, in fulfillment of the Abrahamic Covenant (Lev 26:42), is also foretold, which gives rise to the hope of a New Covenant. This covenantal triangle is the engine that drives the narrative arc of redemptive history, with the great preaching prophets (e.g., Isaiah) standing at the intersection, looking back on the ruins of the Old Covenant and forward to the glory of the coming New Covenant in Christ.

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Kline on the Works Principle in the Mosaic Economy 2

It is very important to understand that Kline viewed the Mosaic economy as a two-layer cake. The underlying layer (what he called “the substratum”) is an administration of grace having to do with the eternal salvation of the individual elect Israelites. The overlying layer is what he called “the typal kingdom.” The typal kingdom is the land of Israel, a territory completely set apart as holy unto God, functioning as a theocracy, focused on the central temple where God dwells and reigns as King over his people. It is a picture or type of the eschatological kingdom of the new heavens and the new earth. Just as the new heavens and new earth will be free from all evil, a new creation “in which righteousness dwells” (2 Pet 3:13), so the typal kingdom of Israel was to be rid of Canaanites and idolaters. Just as the eschatological kingdom will be ushered in by purifying judgment, so the typal kingdom was ushered in by Joshua’s conquest and the devoting of the idolatrous inhabitants of the land to destruction.

You might be wondering where Kline got this two-layer metaphor. At first it looks like a neat visual metaphor that Kline just made up. He was a very visual and poetic thinker, so it is a plausible theory. However, there is a biblical basis for it – an exegetical one and a biblical-theological one.

First, the exegetical basis

Kline got the metaphor from Paul in Gal 3:15-19, where he teaches that the Abrahamic covenant was not annulled by the coming of the Mosaic law, nor did the Mosaic law change the terms of the Abrahamic covenant by making the promise dependent on law-keeping. Rather, the law was “added” or “superimposed” (v 19) until the coming of the Seed promised in the Abrahamic covenant. Here is the paragraph:

15 To give a human example, brothers: even with a man-made covenant, no one annuls it or adds to it (ἐπιδιατάσσεται) once it has been ratified. 16 Now the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, “And to offsprings,” referring to many, but referring to one, “And to your offspring,” who is Christ. 17 This is what I mean: the law, which came 430 years afterward, does not annul a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to make the promise void. 18 For if the inheritance comes by the law, it no longer comes by promise; but God gave it to Abraham by a promise. 19 Why then the law? It was added (προσετέθη) because of transgressions, until the offspring should come to whom the promise had been made. (ESV)

Verse 18 is critical: “For if the inheritance comes by the law, it no longer comes by promise; but God gave it to Abraham by a promise.” This verse makes clear that for Paul “the law” and “the promise” are opposed to one another. In the one, the inheritance is by works; in the other, it is by grace. And yet somehow the two principles, though coexisting in the Mosaic era, are not ultimately in conflict. How can this be?

The key is to note that there are two different Greek verbs translated similarly in English as “add to” and “add.” The first verb, ἐπιδιατάσσομαι (v 15), rendered by the ESV as “add to,” is a technical term for adding a later codicil to a covenant (or will) that changes the terms of the covenant (or will). The NASB’s rendering, “adds conditions to it,” is more precise.

The second verb, προστίθημι (v 19), rendered by the ESV as “add,” has a different nuance. In this context it has the sense of a temporary, removable overlay, since it is clear that the law was “added” in such a way that it did not annul or modify the underlying Abrahamic covenant. It was given with a terminus in view, “until the Seed should come.” Or, as Paul will explain a few verses later, the law was a guardian or pedagogue for Israel in her minority “until the date set by the father” (Gal 3:24; 4:2). In the fullness of time, God sent forth his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, so that the Abrahamic promise, which was there all along, might be brought to fulfillment and the people of God might take up the inheritance no longer as slaves but as sons (Gal 4:1-7).

So the principle of inheritance by law and the principle of inheritance by grace coexisted in the Mosaic era, without the law canceling or annulling the promise, because the law was “added” as a temporary overlay but not as a codicil that modified the terms of the Abrahamic covenant. Kline appeals to this key passage (Gal 3:15-19) again and again in his writings. For example:

“On the classic covenantal understanding, the law that came 430 years later did not disannul the promise (Gal 3:17) – not because the old covenant did not really introduce an operative works principle, but because works and faith were operating on two different levels in the Mosaic economy” (“Gospel until the Law,” 436).

Second, the biblical-theological basis

Not only did Kline derive the two-layer cake metaphor from Paul in Gal 3:15-19, but he further developed the metaphor by his biblical-theological analysis of the Abrahamic covenant itself. The Abrahamic covenant was God’s promise concerning the seed and the land. Everyone knows that. However, what most miss (especially dispensationalists) is that God’s promise to Abraham was fulfilled in two stages. The first-level fulfillment was unfolded historically in the formation of the nation (the seed) and the bringing of the nation into the promised land. This first-level fulfillment of the Abrahamic promise is actually a long process that begins with the exodus, continues in the conquest of Canaan, takes many generations to drive out the Canaanites from God’s holy realm, and culminates under Solomon when the temple is finished. The kingdom of God finally arrived when God was dwelling in the midst of his people, in his holy temple, in the holy land, and exercising his authority through his appointed vassal king, the anointed son of David.  

But this first-level fulfillment was not the true fulfillment. It was only a “typal kingdom” pointing ahead to the eschatological fulfillment in Christ. Christ is really “the Seed” that the promise referred to (Gal 3:16), and all who belong to Christ are Abraham’s offspring in the collective sense (Gal 3:29). And the land that God promised Abraham, with God dwelling in it as a holy kingdom, was not some earthly real estate but the new heavens and the new earth (as Hebrews 11 makes clear).

And yet, all during the time of the first-level fulfillment, generations of godly individual Israelites were able to see in and through the types and shadows, especially in the sacrificial system, the coming Seed and his atoning sacrifice, so that they were saved, forgiven, and justified by faith in the Messiah to come.

“The Mosaic economy [was] an administration of grace on its fundamental level of concern with the eternal salvation of the individual” (KP 109).

“Paul, perceiving the works principle in the Mosaic law economy, was able to insist that this did not entail an abrogation of the promises of grace given to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob centuries earlier (Gal 3:17), precisely because the works principle applied only to the typological kingdom in Canaan and not to the inheritance of the eternal kingdom-city promised to Abraham as a gift of grace and at last to be received by Abraham and all his seed, Jew and Gentile, through faith in Christ Jesus” (KP 237).

God did not give the Mosaic law with its works principle to be the means by which the individual elect Israelite would be saved. Personal salvation was always administered, in every epoch of redemptive history, including the Mosaic epoch, through the promise, that is, through the Abrahamic covenant of grace, founded as it was on the paradigm of Abraham’s own soteriological experience, “Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness” (Gen 15:6).

Kline’s analysis of the Abrahamic promise as finding fulfillment in two stages (the first-level typological fulfillment in the land, and the second-level antitypical fulfillment in Christ and the eschaton), combined with a recognition that individual Old Testament believers were saved by faith as they looked ahead to the antitype through the type, provides further support for the concept of the two-layer cake. 

In the next post, I’ll answer the question: If God did not give the Mosaic law and its works principle to Israel to be a means for individuals to be saved and attain eternal life, why did God give the Mosaic law and establish this second typological layer?

The story that frames the atonement, part 2

Now a question may arise in  your mind, Why did God bother to go through the whole "first level" or typological fulfillment in the first place? If the "real" narrative is the Adam narrative of creation, fall, redemption, consummation, why Israel? I believe the reason is pedagogical. The Adam narrative happened too long ago and with so few witnesses. So God re-enacted the Adam narrative on the grand stage of world history in order to set the context for the incarnation, death, and resurrection of Christ.

Meredith Kline put it this way:

A variety of purposes can be discovered to explain the insertion of the old covenant order and its typal kingdom into the course of redemptive history. Of central importance was the creation of the proper historical setting for the advent of the Son of God and his earthly mission (cf. Rom 9:5). In accordance with the terms of his covenant of works with the Father he was to come as the second Adam in order to undergo a representative probation and by his obedient and triumphant accomplishment thereof to establish the legal ground for God’s covenanted bestowal of the eternal kingdom of salvation on his people. It was therefore expedient, if not necessary, that Christ appear within a covenant order which, like the covenant with the first Adam, was governed by the works principle (cf. Gal 4:4). The typal kingdom of the old covenant was precisely that. Within the limitations of the fallen world and with modifications peculiar to the redemptive process, the old theocratic kingdom was a reproduction of the original covenantal order. Israel as the theocratic nation was mankind stationed once again in a paradise-sanctuary, under probation in a covenant of works. In the context of that situation, the Incarnation event was legible; apart from it the meaning of the appearing and ministry of the Son of Man would hardly have been perspicuous. Because of the congruence between Jesus’ particular historical identity as the true Israel, born under the law, and his universally relevant role as the second Adam, the significance of his mission as the accomplishing of a probationary assignment in a works covenant in behalf of the elect of all ages was lucidly expressed and readily readable.

Much more than the works-probation aspect of Jesus’ task was included in the revelatory design of the typal kingdom. It prepared a public context in world history in which the meaning of Jesus’ mission as a whole might be communicated effectively.

[Meredith G. Kline, Kingdom Prologue (Eugene, Oregon: Wipf and Stock, 2006), 352-3.]

Note the statement highlighted in bold:  "the congruence between Jesus' particular historical identity as the true Israel under the law, and his universally relevant role as the second Adam." That is the heart of the matter. 

I would argue that the role of the Davidic king is what most clearly points backward to Adam and forward to Christ as the second Adam. It was the king who was responsible to lead the people of God in faithful obedience to the Law. As the king goes, so go the people. If he is obedient, the people are generally faithful and their tenure in the land continues. If he is an idolater, the nation as a whole is filled with idolaters and is (eventually) cut off from the land.

God said to King Solomon after he finished building the temple: "If you turn aside from following me, you or your children, and do not keep my commandments and my statutes that I have set before you, but go and serve other gods and worship them, then I will cut off Israel from the land that I have given them, and the house that I have consecrated for my name I will cast out of my sight" (1 Kings 9:6-7 ESV). 

The king's disobedience or obedience, then, in a typological and imperfect way, is what determines whether God's people continue to dwell in God's holy land. In the same way, Christ's obedience (as God's anointed King) is the meritorious ground that secures the eternal inheritance. Therefore, to call Jesus "the Messiah" is to call him "the second Adam" using the idiom of the typal kingdom.

The cross fits in as follows. The obedience of the Messiah or second Adam included a mission of not only fulfilling the precepts of the Law but of enduring the Law's curse on behalf of those who had violated the Law. This of course would not have been necessary for the pre-fall Adam nor was it envisioned as part of the Davidic king's ordinary role. But now that the covenant of works (whether in its Adamic or Mosaic form) has been broken, the only way the blessings of the covenant can be enjoyed by sinners is if they are judged under the penal curse of the covenant and emerge on the other side through union with a representative Substitute in his death and resurrection. The kingly office of Christ is then conjoined with the priestly.

The story that frames the atonement, part 1

Andrew Perriman raises a good question for those of us who cherish the penal substitution view of the atonement as primary and central. He asks: "What is the story that frames and makes sense of this understanding of Jesus' death?"

At the outset, I want to say that I fully sympathize with N. T. Wright's concern to place the mission and work of Jesus within the narrative framework of Israel's story, a concern articulated well in Jesus and the Victory of God. However, I believe he makes the mistake of failing to place the Israel narrative within the larger Adam narrative. Modern theology since Barth has been fond of the particularism of biblical theology, but we must also see that the particularism of biblical theology is in the service of an ultimate universalism. (I'm using the word "universalism" here not in the sense of universal salvation, but a soteriology that overcomes the Jew-Gentile distinction by addressing the plight of all sinners in Adam.)

So what is the larger Adam narrative, and how does the Israel narrative fit in with it? The Adam narrative, of course, is the story of creation, Adam's rebellion and fall, and God's promise concerning the S/seed (both in the singular and in the collective sense) of the woman. The Seed (singular) will crush the serpent by means of his own suffering, a foreshadow of the death of Christ (Gen 3:15). Genesis 1-3 is foundational to the whole Bible. Everything that comes after it must be read in light of it. The book of Genesis itself subordinates the Israel narrative to the Adam narrative.

Now the Seed promise of Gen 3:15 -- so brief that it is almost an enigma -- is fleshed out and expanded in the Abrahamic promise. The Abrahamic promise reiterates the essence of the Seed promise of Gen 3:15, but it places greater emphasis on the collective dimension of the seed (Israel) together with the promised land for the seed to dwell in. The promised land is clearly to be understood as the restored paradise that was lost in Gen 3 (see Gen 13:10 which describes the land as "well watered everywhere like the garden of the LORD").

The promise then unfolds in two stages:  (a) a first-level fulfillment on the typological layer of Israel's inheritance in the land and (b) a second-level fulfillment in Christ as the individual Seed and those who belong to him as the corporate seed. Of course, the two stages do not unfold in a smooth evolution, for there is a rupture dividing the two:  Israel was a corporate reenactment of Adam's failure in the garden, leading to the rupture of the exile. Nevertheless, because of God's irrevocable promises to Abraham, the exile is not the end of the story. After the exile is the return and rebuilding of the temple in the post-exilic period. But this was but a small foretaste of the eschatological glories of the second-level fulfillment. The post-exilic community and its rebuilt temple were so small and insignificant, we come to the end of the Old Testament crying out for a greater fulfillment. 

Now the first-level fulfillment creates a world of types that become a new promise finding its fulfillment in Christ. Israel as God's holy people dwelling in God's holy land is a type of the elect dwelling in the new heavens and the new earth. When the reality to which the types pointed comes, the reality is described using typological language. Thus the elect (both Jew and Gentile) are called "the Israel of God" and heaven is called "the eternal inheritance." Jesus himself assumes the three-fold office of prophet, priest, and king -- offices first established with living examples in the old covenant economy (e.g., Moses, Aaron, David). With regard to the priestly office in particular, Christ's atoning death is described as the fulfillment of the Levitical system of sacrifice, the final purification for sin when the true High Priest entered the true holy place once for all. The Levitical system was put in place so that a holy God could dwell in the midst of a sinful and impure people.

Israel's conditional tenure in the land (conditional on faithful obedience to the Law) was a corporate re-enactment of Adam's probation in the garden. And just as Adam sinned and was expelled, so Israel was sent into exile for her violation of the Law. This then sets the stage for Jesus to be described as the true, obedient Israelite, the faithful king who kept God's Law and gave rest to his people in the land. This is merely the typological way of saying that Jesus is the second Adam. Christ is the second Adam and true Israel in whom the exile is reversed and a greater paradise is attained.

So there are actually two narrative frameworks (Adam and Israel) with the Israel narrative nesting within the broader Adam narrative (creation, fall, redemption, consummation). The mission and work of Jesus must be seen through the mutually interpreting lens of both narratives. In the order of understanding, we start with the Israel narrative since that forms the most immediate historical context for the life and ministry of Jesus the Messiah. But since the Israel narrative is itself a reproduction in type and shadow of the broader Adam narrative, the interpretive framework provided by the Israel narrative was intended by God to point beyond its own particularity to the universalism of the Adam narrative. In Israel's covenant breaking and exile, we see the covenant breaking and expulsion of Adam from the garden. And since we are all in Adam, we see ourselves in Israel's story too. Yet, just as Jesus takes Israel's story to the cross and beyond to the resurrection, so he completes Adam's story at the same time, so that through his accursed death we have passed through judgment and have emerged on the other side having won, by his merit, the right to eat of the tree of life and live forever with him in the heavenly inheritance.

For more on "two level fulfillment" see this selection from Meredith G. Kline's magnum opus, Kingdom Prologue.

To be continued ...