Friday, April 27, 2012

Ishu = the Lord of Heaven and Earth (Genesis 2:4)

There is a famously garbled passage in Irenaeus (AH 2.14) where we are told - with approval - that the name for Jesus means "the Lord (Yahweh), heaven (Shamim) and earth (U’eretz).” I have started to notice that Acts uses this title no less than the gospel. First Simon Magus:
Now he who speaks of God as an avenging and rewarding God, presents Him as naturally just, and not as good. Moreover he gives thanks to the Lord of heaven and earth [Clementine Homilies 17]
and again:
And Simon, being vexed at this, said: “Blame your own teacher, who said, ‘I thank Thee, Lord of heaven and earth, that what was concealed from the wise, Thou hast revealed to suckling babes.’” And Peter said: “This is not the way in which the statement was made; but I shall speak of it as if it had been made in the way that has seemed good to you. Our Lord, even if He had made this statement, ‘What was concealed from the wise, the Father revealed to babes,’ could not even thus be thought to point out another God and Father in addition to Him who created the world. [Clementine Homilies 18]
In the anti-Marcionite treatise preserved in Tertullian's Against Marcion Book Four:
For He says, "I thank thee, and own Thee, Lord of heaven, because those things which had been hidden from the wise and prudent, Thou has revealed unto babes."
The original reading of the gospel passage was:
“I praise you, Lord (Yahweh), heaven (Shamim) and earth (U’eretz), because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children."
also Acts:
God, who made the world, and all things therein, He, being Lord (Yahweh), heaven (Shamim) and earth (U’eretz), dwells not in temples made with hands; neither is He touched by men's hands, as though He needed anything, seeing He gives to all life, and breath, and all things; who has made from one blood the whole race of men to dwell upon the face of the whole earth, predetermining the times according to the boundary of their habitation, to seek the Deity, if by any means they might be able to track Him out, or find Him, although He be not far from each of us. For in Him we live, and move, and have our being, as certain men of your own have said, For we are also His offspring. Inasmuch, then, as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Deity is like gold or silver, or stone graven by art or man's device. Therefore God, winking at the times of ignorance, does now command all men everywhere to turn to Him with repentance; because He has appointed a day, on which the world shall be judged in righteousness by the man Jesus; whereof He has given assurance by raising Him from the dead. Acts 17:24, etc.
The source here is Genesis 2:4 which in the LXX, Samaritan and Peshitta has this ready. How and why did the Masoretic end up with "Lord of earth and heaven" - i.e. flipping the order?


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