In a post today Ben Witherington repeats a long-standing Protestant argument about priesthood and the New Testament. For him the teaching of the Bible is obvious. The unbiblical nature of the larger part of Christianity in its hankering after priests is equally obvious. In this post I don’t want to engage with the larger theological arguments, or Reformation polemics, but simply ask an exegetical question or two.
Here’s the key bit I want to question. BW3 says:
And so it is that the author of 1 Peter is not saying something novel when he throws down the gauntlet and says to his Christian audience “but you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, so that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light” ( 1 Pet. 2.9). This friends is the Magna Carta of Christian identity and Christian freedom, and among other things it means we are all laity, and we are all priests.
When Witherington says it’s not something novel, he means that he’s clear that the early Christians had a clear concept of two priesthoods: that of Christ, and that of “all believers”. Is there any real evidence, however, that anyone except the author of Hebrews sees Jesus as a priest, and is the whole argument of Hebrews evidence of just how much work has to go into applying language of priesthood to someone not descended from Aaron?
It seems to me that taking the word priest simply to denote cultic official without taking account of the hereditary nature of priesthood within Jewish circles is a semantic error. That doesn’t invalidate later theology developing the sort of two-priesthood understanding Witherington articulates, but it does question whether any NT writer already shares that theology.
The other exegetical question is about the non-novelty of the concept, Witherington knows the concept is not novel, for he later quotes the “OT background” as he puts it. But it is not novel because all Christians share a two priesthood understanding, but because it is lifted wholesale from Exodus. Here’s Exodus 19:6, followed by 1 Peter 2
you shall be for me a priestly kingdom and a holy nation
ὑμεῖς δὲ ἔσεσθέ μοι βασίλειον ἱεράτευμα καὶ ἔθνος ἅγιονyou are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people
ὑμεῖς δὲ γένος ἐκλεκτόν, βασίλειον ἱεράτευμα, ἔθνος ἅγιον, λαὸς εἰς περιποίησιν
Quite why the NRSV thinks βασίλειον ἱεράτευμα should mean “priestly kingdom” in Exodus and “royal priesthood” in 1 Peter escapes me – surely it couldn’t be Protestant theology? [See comments for deletion] Peter is clearly quoting his scriptures here.
It seems to me that the double quotation of Exodus and Hosea in 1 Peter 2:9-10 suggest that the main thrust of Peter’s argument here is about Gentiles now being God’s chosen people and inheriting the call once given uniquely to Israel. But even if you disagree with that (one can make a case for a Jewish audience), I think the key exegetical question I want to raise is the same.
In Exodus, calling the people of Israel “a royal priesthood” (if that’s the right translation) is not usually held to deny the validity of the Aaronic priesthood. Indeed the book goes on to give instructions for the Aaronic priesthood. Why should Peter, in quoting it, be assumed to mean the opposite? Yes, NT authors can quite frequently quote a text in order to develop an entirely different point, but we know that because they spell it out. To my mind there is no evidence in the text – as opposed to the interpreter’s theology – which says Peter is turning the inherited meaning of the text on its head in order to make a point about either Christ’s priesthood or Christian ministry.
The question stands: why should Peter, in quoting the BIble, be assumed to mean the opposite of that text in its biblical context?
{ 9 comments }
Hi Doug,
This is a helpful post, thanks. The issue therefore is not how many priesthoods (you are quite right that the insistence on only 2, Christ and the Church’s, flattens out the evidence). The issue is the right theological ordering of the 3. Does it go Christ as priest – priests and priests – church as royal priesthood, or should the last 2 be reversed in order? The same is true, incidentally of notions of apostolicity (Christ of course is, theologically, the first apostle).
The decisions about these issues are then, in the end matters of theological judgement, rather than exegetical decision. As a Baptist I want to say that Christian ministry / priesthood is the outworking of a prior Christ-church relation, with a strong emphasis on the local church. Others want to root the church’s (local or wider) in prior succession of Christ-chosen representatives (I am not choosing words with especial care here, but you get the point). Those theological judgements are then inevitably formed by our pre-existing ecclesial identity (i.e. I want to say what I say as a Baptist) and, dare I say it, often a matter of aesthetical preference.
This is the nature of the ecumenical challenge, and, conversely, its hope. The task is to shift the debate back a stage to see how both orderings of the core theological and exegetical data are in fact orderings of the same set of data and have an equivalent legitimacy in relation to it. This is the strategy that some of us are using in relation to issues of Christian initiation – to little effect, though, I fear.
Bloody hell, I’m not sure where all that came from!
Sean
Sorry, line 4 should read ‘priests as priests’
Yes, but 1 Peter is quoting the scriptures in the LXX, which differs from the Hebrew in the way the different NRSV renderings indicate.
I was writing that too late at night!! You’re quite right, of course, and I was having a senior moment. I don;t think it affects the main point, however.
NRSV is obviously following MT in Exod 19.6: ‘mamleketh cohanim’.
Doug, and Sean, where, anywhere in the New Testament, is there any evidence for a Christian priesthood other than that of Christ (in Hebrews) and that of all believers? The only possible reference is in Acts 6:7, but presumably this refers to Jewish priests who became Christians but no longer had any special priestly functions in the church. Now maybe it is only Hebrews which specifically denies that there is a new Christian priesthood (see what I wrote about that here). But surely you wouldn’t argue that it is OK to do something which the Bible tells us not to do if that command is only in one book?
And surely one can make a case from Hebrews 13:15,16 that this one NT author has in mind a priesthood of all believers, offering sacrifices of praise and of good works, in addition to the priesthood of Christ. But there is no evidence at all of a new order of cultic officials with specific priestly functions.
As I said:
Paul implies he is a priest in Romans 15:15. He is not from the priestly tribe. In Romans 12:1, he invites all his hearers to exercise a priestly role. It seems to me that BW3 is using the wrong verse for the hierarchic priesthood issue. Peter’s verse I would rather read as expanding even the in-gathering of the Gentiles in the same way that one might read Paul’s citations in Romans 15:7-13, (or for that matter many of the inclusive psalms and prophets). I see lots of discussion on the web including a 2007 blog entry from Claude Mariottini.
In spite of my being critical of those people we call ‘priests’ in the Anglican tradition, one thing I have to hand to them – pastoral care is a very difficult job. Thanks for taking it on.
that should read Romans 15:16 – sorry
Comments on this entry are closed.