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True North
Advanced Member
USA
163 Posts |
 Posted - 09 May 2004 : 23:41:15
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... I beheld, and lo a black horse; and he that sat on him had a zugos (pair of balances) in his hand ... Rev. 6:5
Etymologically the Greek word, " ... zugos (from the root of zeugnumi) means either 'scales' or 'yoke', and in both senses it occurs mostly in ethical or religious contexts ..."
" ... For 'scales', ... (a means of division), ... (of measuring) and ... (weighing gold) ... In Isaiah 40:12 the balance is an instrument in the hands of the architect of the universe ... The demand for just weights in the Bible is often given a religious basis ... Shall I pardon in spite of ungodly weights? ... The LXX ... understands ... along these lines: 'The sons of men are liars with weight to do wrong' ... The religious basis is ... 'The weights and balances are the Lord's', though the LXX understands this figurative of the righteous weighing of judgment as a gift which God gives to the king. Here the scales are a symbol of justice. Similarly, the sign of scales is allotted to Dan, the son of Jacob, in accordance with the significance of this name as a representative of justice. This line of understanding continues into the Christian era ... with scales as one of the four cardinal virtues ... Measure your words with scales and weights."
" ... More important, however, is the figurative use with regard to the destiny of man ... Job thinks ... his sufferings cannot be weighed. This contradicts the view ... that man's destiny is weighed out by God so that none can add to it ... In other passages man himself is said to be weighed ... 'I am valued with correct balances' ... 'Will he prove to be of full weight on the scales of the unrighteous?' The saying ... is generally ... true of all men: 'A breath ... an illusion are the children of men; they flee away on the balances ...".
"The image of the yoke ... occurs in the political sphere for domestic tyranny ... the relation of Esau to Jacob ... and for the rule of alien nation ... esp. the great empires ... of Egypt, ... Assyria, ... Babylon, ... Syria .. Liberation from this kind of dominion is the corresponding content of the message of deliverance. Thus the yoke is taken away from Israel ..."
"The image is also significant in many different connections in relation to the development of morality. The yoke is for slaves whose self-will must be broken ... Care must be taken not to fall under the power of garrulity (the yoke of the tongue) ... On the other hand, it is good to accept the yoke of wisdom ... to bear the yoke in youth ... the fate of Job is called a heavy yoke ... 'for a witness' ... with reference to human destiny ..."
" ... when the reference is to God's yoke ... Men want to break this yoke ... or to throw it off ... They do not want to bear any yoke ... On the other hand ... Those who bear the yoke are called blessed ... It is commonly accepted that 'we stand always under thy yoke and under the rod of thy discipline,' the reference being to the suffering of the righteous. This is important in relation to Mt. 11:29 f. and is plainly reflected in 1 Cl.,16,17, where the humiliation of the Lord is set forth as an example to those who stand under the yoke of His grace ... there is even greater stress on the relation to the suffering of the righteous ..."
" ... In Rev. 6:5 the third horsemen of the Apocalypse, the rider on a black horse ... is a representative of scarcity and hunger as prelminary signs of the impending judgment ... In other NT passages ... the word expresses a relation of absolute dependence ... "
" ... At 1 Tim.6:1 Paul uses the expression ... in his admonition to show fill respect to masters. Here the words ... admirably express the situation of the slave, who cannot do as he pleases but stands under an imposed order and must bow to it ... We cannot, therefore, speak of a special burden resting on those whom Paul addresses. On the other hand, the words do take account of their situation to the degree that from the context they refer to the Christian slaves of non-Christian masters who stand under Jesus' law of love in respect of their own conduct but who will not be treated in accordance with it ... (It makes no difference here whether the treatment is good or bad. What matters is whether the slave is for his master a brother or only a slave) ... When the master is a Christian, the legal position of the slave is not essentially altered ... but their mutual personal relationship is no longer determined by formal law, which imposes the zugos, but by the law of love under which they are both placed ...
" ... The combination of zugos and douleia can also describe bondage in the moral and spiritual sense. In Gl. 5:1 Paul warns the Galatians, who have been released by the Gospel from slavery ... not to rob themselves of this divinely effected and established freedom by subjecting themselves to the Jewish Law, for in so doing they will again be reduce to the position of the douleia ..."
" ... The essential point is that the nomos is here on the same level as the stoichei tou kosmo. Both rob man of his freedom, and therefore both Jews and Gentiles need Christ, who alone can lead them to feedom, i.e., to a relationship to God which corresponds, not to that of a slave to his master, but to that of a child to its father ..."
" ... Mt.11:29 f. ... formally belongs to the larger context of wisdom sayings, is obviously formulated as a conscious paradox. How can a zugos be easy? But the paradox evaporates when we remember who is speaking and to whom. Jesus is clearly speaking to those who already bear a zugos, for He refers expressly to His zugos, to the zugos of the Messiah, contrasting this with another zugos, with the other zugos. But this other zugos can only be that of worship under the Law, which involves the oppressive labour, an attitude of the slave. This is clear from Mt.23:4, where we find the image of the burden used. In this saying, therefore, a contrast is drawn between the Messianic zugos of Jesus and the zugos of legalism. Jesus is thus contrasted with the zugos, as in John's Gospel and sometimes in Paul. Thus the yoke which Jesus lays on those who accept it is the new worship of God in the free access to the Father which is the portion of all who bow obediently to the Word of Jesus and receive from Him the revelation of the will of God. This access is not the result of human attainment; it is the gift of Jesus in His Word and person. For this reason acceptance of His yoke is possible only in faith in Him as the Christ. Hence only to those who believe in Him is His yoke a zugos chrestos and His burden a phortion elaphros.
The formula ho zugos mou obviously stands in conscious correspondence to the expression yoke torah. This for its part is particular to such expressions as ... "yoke of the kingdom of heaven" ... "yoke of the commandments," ..."yoke of the Holy One, blessed be He," ... "yoke of heaven, i.e. God" ... "yoke of God," which all express the idea of subordination to the will of God ... the yoke of wisdom. The Rabbis also speak in the same way of ... "the yoke of the (earthly) government," ... "the yoke of earthly conduct," and also .. "the human yoke." The two groups are sometimes contrasted. Thus ... "He who accepts the yoke of the Torah, from him they take off the yoke of government and the yoke of earthly conduct." What is meant is that where the will of God is alone accepted, and where His dominion is present, there is no place for political or economic care. The statement is thus near to the message of Jesus (Mt. 6:10 f.), but with the basic distinction that it presupposes human achievement prior to the dawn of the divine kingdom ... Similarly, we read ... that when who breaks the yoke of heaven, i.e., he who wickedly transgresses the will of God revealed and definitively established in the Torah, brings himself under the yoke of an earthly king, i.e., becomes a servant of man instead of a servant of God.
It is essential to the Jewish world to stand under the yoke of Torah. Yet this is not felt to be a burden; it is a privilege. It rests on God's dealings with Israel. By the deliverance from Egypt Israel became an elect people ordained to fullfill God's will. The Rabbis interpreted the law-giving at Siai in this sense, and thus made the service of God the meaning of the existence of the Jews. In this light we can understand that the recitation of the schema ... the confession of the one God of heaven and earth, which is the God of the Jewish people, is equivalent to bowing beneath the yoke of the kingdom of heaven. We can see why the texts say that the proselyte takes upon him the ... kingdom of heaven, and why it is also recorded that the dying Aquiba recited the schema when he breathed his last, tortured to death by the Romans because of his part in the Zealot uprising ... And when Jesus was asked whether it was lawful to pay taxes to Caesar ... there stood in the background those eager souls who were not prepared to tolerate for themselves or for the people any other yoke or will than that of God, the real question being whether Jesus would give the same answer as they did, and therefore take His stand with them, on the question as to the nature of the kingdom of heaven. Here is the point where with perfect clarity the yoke of Jesus and the yoke of a divine dominion conceived in human terms divide with all the sharpness with which the Gospel is distinct from the Law. ... Kittel on zugos
" ... This path should be of primary concern--seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness--
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Manuel
Advanced Member
USA
762 Posts |
Posted - 10 May 2004 : 09:52:42
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Greetings True North, In The Life Giver:
There comes a point In time where a heavy burden is placed on ones shoulders by those which dare not lift a finger. It is then where one either "breaks his back" carrying that load, or simply lets that weight slide off to the "pit of hell" where it ought to fall. Once that is done, that heavy burden is no longer felt and one is now Light weight and able to perceive In a Whole New Way.
Sort of like a memory chip. If one has too much "junk" loaded, often new truths are either very slow or even never able to "load up." One must re-new and place new garments. Not on top of old garments, for they where only placed in order to deceive.
Spring cleaning is needed.
In Him, I am,
Manuel
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Yoke of Bondage or Balance
