John D. Brey
Well-Known Member
[This essay was composed--improvisationally--- here, and posted in various other places on the web. Author will only address comments made here (in this forum) throughout the thread, i.e., won't spam other conversations outside of this forum into this thread.]
What's "farfetched" is the hope that a serious exegete of scripture not enslaved to tradition will see the fact of Zion not existing in the time of Abraham as the most glaring farfetchedness of the wrongheadedness of claiming the text speaks of Abraham. This tiny farfetchedness is merely a diversion from all the true problems of the text which plague Ibn Ezra's traditional reading.
The Jewish Sages strain to make the text speak of Abraham (Ibn Ezra), or David (Rabbi Hirsch), or someone other than David's greater son Messiah. And yet the text won't have it. It speaks of David's greater son Messiah. And there's no way out of it. So why fight it? Because the Jewish Sages are aware that although the seminal word in the text is used only six times in the Tanakh, the word is flaunted nine times in the New Testament scripture.
הדם רגל
The Hebrew term is translated "footstool" and is used only six times in the Tanakh all of which speak of the ark of the covenant as the "footstool" of the Lord's feet. The word isn't used one time to speak of any footstool of any king, any patriarch, or anyone else, other than the Lord: so it's completely ignored in the Jewish interpretation of the text as though not looking at it, not thinking about it, not worrying about it, will make it go away.
But it won't go away since nine verses in the New Testament use the word, in the context of Psalm 110:1, to put Psalm 110:1 into its proper context. Jesus himself used the exegetical problem here pointed out against his Jewish antagonists such that they shut up knowing precisely what Ibn Ezra and Rabbi Hirsch know just as well as their contemporaries did: that the word "footstool" הדם רגל in Psalms 110:1 is never used for anyone other than the Lord, therein justifying all the verses in the New Testament that testify to the transparency of the New Testament approach to the Tanakh.
John
A PSALM OF DAVID. THE LORD SAITH UNTO MY LORD, "SIT THOU AT MY RIGHT HAND, UNTIL I MAKE THINE ENEMIES THY FOOTSTOOL."
UNTO MY LORD. One can correctly interpret this psalm as referring to Abraham, for the psalm goes on to say after the manner of Mechitzedek (verse 4). However, the word Zion (verse 2) presents a problem to us, for it was David's city [The name Zion did not exist in the time of Abraham]. Nevertheless, we are able to sustain this interpretation in a somewhat farfetched manner.
Ibn Ezra, Commentary on the Book of Psalms (110:1).
UNTO MY LORD. One can correctly interpret this psalm as referring to Abraham, for the psalm goes on to say after the manner of Mechitzedek (verse 4). However, the word Zion (verse 2) presents a problem to us, for it was David's city [The name Zion did not exist in the time of Abraham]. Nevertheless, we are able to sustain this interpretation in a somewhat farfetched manner.
Ibn Ezra, Commentary on the Book of Psalms (110:1).
What's "farfetched" is the hope that a serious exegete of scripture not enslaved to tradition will see the fact of Zion not existing in the time of Abraham as the most glaring farfetchedness of the wrongheadedness of claiming the text speaks of Abraham. This tiny farfetchedness is merely a diversion from all the true problems of the text which plague Ibn Ezra's traditional reading.
The Jewish Sages strain to make the text speak of Abraham (Ibn Ezra), or David (Rabbi Hirsch), or someone other than David's greater son Messiah. And yet the text won't have it. It speaks of David's greater son Messiah. And there's no way out of it. So why fight it? Because the Jewish Sages are aware that although the seminal word in the text is used only six times in the Tanakh, the word is flaunted nine times in the New Testament scripture.
הדם רגל
The Hebrew term is translated "footstool" and is used only six times in the Tanakh all of which speak of the ark of the covenant as the "footstool" of the Lord's feet. The word isn't used one time to speak of any footstool of any king, any patriarch, or anyone else, other than the Lord: so it's completely ignored in the Jewish interpretation of the text as though not looking at it, not thinking about it, not worrying about it, will make it go away.
But it won't go away since nine verses in the New Testament use the word, in the context of Psalm 110:1, to put Psalm 110:1 into its proper context. Jesus himself used the exegetical problem here pointed out against his Jewish antagonists such that they shut up knowing precisely what Ibn Ezra and Rabbi Hirsch know just as well as their contemporaries did: that the word "footstool" הדם רגל in Psalms 110:1 is never used for anyone other than the Lord, therein justifying all the verses in the New Testament that testify to the transparency of the New Testament approach to the Tanakh.
John