Have you heard of Margaret Barker? She is an independent biblical scholar. At one point was President of the Old Testament Society.
I’m mention her because she has been introducing for the last 20-25 years — the idea that biblical scholarship has really misunderstood apocalyptic literature and the entire Hebrew scripture.
She points out that the current books of scripture as we have them now have gone though a tremendous revision over the years and that if one scratches at it — one can see an inter-religious struggle about what it means to be Jewish and worship God.
And that there was a lot more mystical and visionary stuff that was erased over time and we see evidence of that erasure.
There is lots of word play here playing with this in the scriptures and so calling someone who worships other gods a harlot or a whore plays into this.
And while I know Barker is speculative — her work is detailed and often times raises enough issues that I find it difficult to do any analysis of the texts looking for the deeper mystical meanings when it seems clear to me that there are two meanings at war in the text and it is important to keep our eye on that.
The Christian read of the text — she claims — is actually an attempted recovery of the ancient mystical faith of ancient Israel.
Since you are spending so much time here, thought you would be interested if you haven’t checked her out before. I’ve read and own just about everything by the woman. It’s worth your time at some point. FWIW
Hi Kevin! Lovely to hear from you and thanks so much for weighing in with this recommendation. I haven't heard of Margaret Barker, but a perusal on line looks great! What works does she specifically talk about apocalyptic? That will help me narrow it down. Definitely, that inter-religious, inter-cultural struggle is happening in Revelation. Later on down the road, I'm eager to write about how the behind the "whoring" language of the book lies Israel's ancient love mysticism, with John is continuing. (Utterly beautiful if we can wade through the exclusivism). And I have that hunch about Revelation being fundamentally a mystical text, but I'm relying on mostly intuition and association to other parts of the Bible, along with broader connection with mystical tradition. Except for the Ancient Christian Commentary volume on Revelation, containing bits of commentary from early church fathers, no scholarship I've looked at so far makes this leap. The closest I've come is Edward Edinger's marvelous Jungian read of the book. So, I welcome any other resources as well! (Anything come to mind?) What I love about Revelation is its insistence on combining a Cosmic Christ mysticism with resistance to Empire together as one...
Well it’s a real long story about Barker. I mean she has nearly 20 books here.
Basically — she argues ancient Israel had a shamanic mystical visionary approach to religion. Developed as the Hebrews broke away from Canaanite tribe. Originally the Hebrew tradition was more polytheistic and there were all sorts of things happening in the divine pantheon.
The ancient temple was a space of visions and trance ecstatic stuff that the high priests were involved in. They would see God and unite with God and become one with them.
The role of humans was to co-create and use the power of god to form and heal and bind creation. That there were evil angels that taught how to use the power of god to control abs manipulate reality.
The book of revelation is the story of restoring the ancient temple. Christ taught it to his disciples.
See the basic outline of the temple theology here:
Have you heard of Margaret Barker? She is an independent biblical scholar. At one point was President of the Old Testament Society.
I’m mention her because she has been introducing for the last 20-25 years — the idea that biblical scholarship has really misunderstood apocalyptic literature and the entire Hebrew scripture.
She points out that the current books of scripture as we have them now have gone though a tremendous revision over the years and that if one scratches at it — one can see an inter-religious struggle about what it means to be Jewish and worship God.
And that there was a lot more mystical and visionary stuff that was erased over time and we see evidence of that erasure.
There is lots of word play here playing with this in the scriptures and so calling someone who worships other gods a harlot or a whore plays into this.
And while I know Barker is speculative — her work is detailed and often times raises enough issues that I find it difficult to do any analysis of the texts looking for the deeper mystical meanings when it seems clear to me that there are two meanings at war in the text and it is important to keep our eye on that.
The Christian read of the text — she claims — is actually an attempted recovery of the ancient mystical faith of ancient Israel.
Since you are spending so much time here, thought you would be interested if you haven’t checked her out before. I’ve read and own just about everything by the woman. It’s worth your time at some point. FWIW
Hi Kevin! Lovely to hear from you and thanks so much for weighing in with this recommendation. I haven't heard of Margaret Barker, but a perusal on line looks great! What works does she specifically talk about apocalyptic? That will help me narrow it down. Definitely, that inter-religious, inter-cultural struggle is happening in Revelation. Later on down the road, I'm eager to write about how the behind the "whoring" language of the book lies Israel's ancient love mysticism, with John is continuing. (Utterly beautiful if we can wade through the exclusivism). And I have that hunch about Revelation being fundamentally a mystical text, but I'm relying on mostly intuition and association to other parts of the Bible, along with broader connection with mystical tradition. Except for the Ancient Christian Commentary volume on Revelation, containing bits of commentary from early church fathers, no scholarship I've looked at so far makes this leap. The closest I've come is Edward Edinger's marvelous Jungian read of the book. So, I welcome any other resources as well! (Anything come to mind?) What I love about Revelation is its insistence on combining a Cosmic Christ mysticism with resistance to Empire together as one...
Yikes - was typing fast, please forgive typos.
I would also peruse through these papers to see a number of various threads.
http://www.margaretbarker.com/Papers/default.htm
If even 1/4 of what she says is close to accurate — I think she has done us all a service in helping us understand the topic a bit better.
I’ve found her stuff to be helpful fo me both as an academic and as one who prays and pursues this path personally.
Well it’s a real long story about Barker. I mean she has nearly 20 books here.
Basically — she argues ancient Israel had a shamanic mystical visionary approach to religion. Developed as the Hebrews broke away from Canaanite tribe. Originally the Hebrew tradition was more polytheistic and there were all sorts of things happening in the divine pantheon.
The ancient temple was a space of visions and trance ecstatic stuff that the high priests were involved in. They would see God and unite with God and become one with them.
The role of humans was to co-create and use the power of god to form and heal and bind creation. That there were evil angels that taught how to use the power of god to control abs manipulate reality.
The book of revelation is the story of restoring the ancient temple. Christ taught it to his disciples.
See the basic outline of the temple theology here:
http://www.margaretbarker.com/Temple/default.htm
Fascinating stuff!! I will definitely do some digging here. Thanks again.
And she argues the book of revelation is really about christ teaching the church about the ancient Israelite mysticism.