• Hank quotes from David Platt’s book, Follow Me about the exponential growth of Christianity in early church history and the need for true discipleship today.

Questions and Answers:

• Can you explain Satan being released to after the Millennium in Revelation 20?
• Is baptism necessary for salvation?
• Why did Jesus tell people not to speak about His miracles?
• Was there a cultural understanding of baptism at the time of Jesus?
• Does God predestine people to heaven and hell?
• Can you lose your salvation if you turn and reject God?
• Can you explain Daniel’s 70th week? Is this referring to the tribulation period?
• What are your thoughts on the prosperity preaching of Kenneth Copland?

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The term “anthropomorphism,” in its restricted sense, refers to the representation of God with the forms of humanity (such as an arm or hand). “Anthropopathism” refers to the representation of God with the feelings of humanity. “Anthropopraxism” refers to the representation of God with the activities of humanity. As professor Edwin M. Yamauchi notes, however, the term anthropomorphism is used in a more general sense to include all these aspects, and it is in this general sense that I use the term in this article.¹

We find multiple examples of anthropomorphism in Scripture. For example, God is described as having an arm (Job 40:9), a back (Exod. 33:21-23), breath (Job 33:4), ears (2 Sam. 22:7), eyes (Ps. 34:15), a face (Exod. 33:11), feet (Gen. 3:8), fingers (Deut. 9:10), hair (Dan. 7:9), a hand (Ps. 95:4-5), a head (Dan. 7:9), a heart (2 Chron. 7:16), lips (Ps. 89:34), a mouth (Deut. 8:3), nostrils (2 Sam. 22:9, 16), shoulders (Deut. 33:12), a tongue (Isa. 30:27), and a voice (Exod. 3:4). Moreover, God is said to give birth (Deut. 32:18), hear (Num. 11:18), laugh (Ps. 37:13), see (Ps. 10:11), sit (Ps. 29:10), smell (Gen. 8:21), stand (Amos 7:7), walk (Gen. 3:8), and watch (Gen. 31:49). As well, God is said to experience joy (Isa. 65:19), grief (Judg. 10:16), anger (Deut. 1:37), hatred (Ps. 5:5-6), and love (Jer. 31:3). Relational terms are also used of God, including Shepherd (Ps. 23:1), Judge (Gen. 18:25), Bridegroom (Mark 2:19-20), and Husband (Isa. 54:5).

A number of strange-sometimes heretical-doctrines have emerged among some religious groups as a result of misunderstanding anthropomorphic language. For example, Mormons conclude that God is a physical being because, among other reasons, Moses spoke with God “face to face” (Exod. 33:11²).³ Word-Faith leader Kenneth Copeland says God has human dimensions, standing around six-feet-two-inches and weighing a couple of hundred pounds, simply because God “measured the waters in the hollow of His hand” (Isa. 40:12).⁴ Clearly, misinterpreting anthropomorphic language can lead one far astray doctrinally. My goal in this brief article is to offer three primary insights on how to recognize and then interpret such language when used of God. In so doing, I will follow some of the fundamentals of hermeneutics.

What Does the Text Say? First, we set a foundational theological parameter in understanding anthropomorphisms by interpreting Scripture by Scripture. Martin Luther expressed this principle with the words, Scriptura sui ipsius interpres-Latin for “Scripture is its own expositor.” The Westminster Confession of Faith affirmed, “When there is a question about the true and full sense of any Scripture…it must be searched and known by other places that speak more clearly.”⁵ Addressing anthropomorphisms specifically, theologian Wayne Grudem urged, “It should caution us not to take any one of these [anthropomorphic] descriptions by itself and isolate it from its immediate context or from the rest of what Scripture says about God.”⁶

Following this rule alone effectively prevents one from making the Mormon and Word-Faith errors cited above. For example, by consulting other Scriptures, we quickly see that there is no literal similarity of form between God and His creatures. Numbers 23:19 flatly asserts that “God is not a man.” This same truth is repeated in Job 9:32. Such verses make it clear that when God is described in human terms, such as having a “face” or an “arm,” they are not to be interpreted in a literal fashion.

Further, Scripture reveals that God is Spirit (John 4:24), and a spirit does not have flesh and bones (Luke 24:39). Hence, it is wrong to think of God as a physical being or as having physical parts.⁷

Still further, because God is a spirit, He is invisible. He cannot be seen. First Timothy 1:17 refers to God as “the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God.” Colossians 1:15 speaks of “the invisible God.” As well, warnings against making images and likenesses of God point to the noncorporeal nature of God (see Deut. 4:12; 5:6-9, 22-28).

Clearly, then, interpreting Scripture by Scripture sets a hermeneutic parameter regarding how anthropomorphisms should not be interpreted. We would not know what is not literally true of God unless we first know what is literally true. For example, if it were not literally true that God is Pure Spirit and Infinite, then we would not be able to say that certain things attributed to God elsewhere in the Bible are not literally true, such as God having a material face or hand or arm. This parameter establishes in no uncertain terms that anthropomorphisms are metaphors.

“It’s Like This….” Anthropomorphisms, like other figures of speech, communicate truth by analogy. As Grudem put it, “If God is going to teach us about things we do not know by direct experience…he has to teach us in terms of what we do know.”⁸

For example, when Scripture says, “Just as a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear Him” (Ps. 103:13), we learn something about God by analogy. Because we understand something of how human fathers show compassion to their children, we can by analogy understand something of God’s compassion toward His children. Such analogies are legitimate, for Scripture reveals that human beings are created in the image of God (Gen. 1:26-27).

Theologians tell us that the analogical language used of God in Scripture is midway between univocal and equivocal language.⁹ Univocal terms are unambiguous; they always have one meaning: Shaquille O’Neal is a tall basketball player, just as the Empire State Building in New York City is a tall building. Equivocal terms are ambiguous, for they can have more than one meaning: The word “trunk” might refer to the front of an elephant, the back of a car, or the bottom of a tree. In analogical usage, we begin with a univocal element (e.g., a human parent loves his child just as the heavenly Father loves His spiritual children), but we perceive that while there are similarities, there are differences as well: human love has limits, whereas divine love is unconditional and limitless. Nevertheless, by analogy, one effectively illustrates the other. That is, we learn something of divine love by first understanding what it means for a parent to love a child. Human love and divine love are different in degree, but not different in kind, and hence the analogy between the two is quite effective.

God, in His infinite wisdom-and as our Creator-knows just which analogies will best help us to understand true aspects of His nature and His relationship with His creation. As theologian Millard Erickson put it, “This analogical knowledge is possible because God selects the components he uses. Unlike humans, God is knowledgeable of both sides of the analogy…God…knowing all things completely, therefore knows which elements of human knowledge and experience are sufficiently similar to the divine truth that they can be used to help construct a meaningful analogy.”¹⁰

Read Between the Lines. Since anthropomorphisms are metaphors that communicate truth analogically, one must begin by seeking to understand the purpose or idea usually associated with the human expression-for example, a hand and an arm normally engage in some kind of action, often in behalf of others. At the same time, it is wise to watch for possible textual clues in Scripture that enable one to infer what is being metaphorically communicated about God by the analogy. What I mean by “textual clue” is illustrated in Psalm 136 where we read of God’s “strong hand and an outstretched arm” (v. 12). The textual clue is found in verse 11, which speaks of God’s deliverance of Israel from the Egyptians. God’s strong hand and outstretched arm point to His mighty power and His active involvement in demonstrating that power on behalf of Israel. Likewise, in Exodus 15:8 where we read of God’s “nostrils,” the textual clue relates to God’s opening up the Red Sea so the Israelites could escape from the Egyptians (see vv. 4-7). The “blast” of God’s “nostrils” is obviously a graphic metaphorical expression indicating that God was the direct causal agent of the sea opening up. In Deuteronomy 9:10, which refers to God’s “fingers,” the textual clue relates to inscriptions on the two tablets of stone containing the Ten Commandments, thus indicating that God is the One who accomplished the inscription. In Exodus 33:11, which refers to Moses speaking to God “face to face,” the textual clue is “just as a man speaks to his friend.” In other words, Moses spoke with God intimately. In none of these verses is there even the slightest hint that God actually has a physical hand, arm, nostrils, fingers, or a face. All of the terms are analogical metaphors.

These three interpretive principles enable us to perceive God’s intended meaning of the anthropomorphisms in Scripture, especially as related to the historical milieu of the time. The ancients considered God to be very much alive and active in human affairs. To the men and women in biblical times, God was real. They knew Him as a person. He was personally active in their midst. The clearest, most succinct way they could express their view of God and their interaction with Him was in the language of human personality and activity-not in cold metaphysical, theological jargon. As scholar Ludwig Köhler put it, “The purpose of anthropomorphisms is to make God accessible to man….They represent God as person. They avoid the error of presenting God as a careless and soulless abstract Idea of a fixed Principle….Through the anthropomorphisms of the Old Testament God stands before man as the personal and living God.”¹¹-Ron Rhodes

Ron Rhodes, Th.D., is president of Reasoning from the Scriptures Ministries and adjunct professor of theology at Dallas Theological Seminary and Veritas Evangelical Seminary. He is an award-winning author of numerous books and articles.

NOTES

1. Edwin M. Yamauchi, “Anthropomorphism in Ancient Religions,” Bibliotheca Sacra 125 (January-March 1968): 29-44.

2. All Bible quotations are from the NASB.

3. LeGrand Richards, A Marvelous Work and a Wonder (Salt Lake City: Deseret, 1978), 16.

4. Kenneth Copeland, “Spirit, Soul and Body I,” 1985, Audiotape #01-0601, Side 1.

5. Westminster Confession of Faith, 1:9.

6. Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2004), 159.

7. This does not contradict the Incarnation, in which Jesus (as eternal God) took on a human nature (Phil. 2:6-8).

8. Grudem, 159.

9. See Millard J. Erickson, Christian Theology (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1988), 204.

10. Erickson, 204.

11. Ludwig Köhler, Anthropomorphisms and Their Meaning from Old Testament Theology (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1957), 25.

Word-Faith leaders take a different—though even more heretical—spin on the verse. Kenneth Copeland, for example, asserts that Jesus “had to give up His righteousness”³ and “accepted the sin nature of Satan.”⁴ Benny Hinn likewise declares that Jesus “did not take my sin; He became my sin….He became one with the nature of Satan.”⁵

In what follows, I will demonstrate in brief fashion that there are five key hermeneutic principles that disallow such distorted understandings of Christ and His salvific mission. These principles, which guide our understanding of the apostle Paul’s intended meaning (the only correct meaning), are: (1) interpret Bible verses in context; (2) correctly understand, assess, and draw insights from Old Testament typology; (3) interpret verses in accordance with lexical insights gained from the original languages of the Bible; (4) interpret Scripture by Scripture, recognizing that Scripture is its own best interpreter; and (5) interpret difficult verses in light of the clear verses.

1. Interpret Bible Verses in Context. The immediate context of 2 Corinthians 5:21 centers on reconciliation to God (see vv. 18–20). The Greek word for reconciliation in these verses, katallages, refers to “the exchange of hostility for a friendly relationship.”⁶ The state of hostility exists because of human sin against a holy God, which, according to the apostle Paul, was dealt with at the cross of Christ (2 Cor. 5:14–15). In view of this, the friendly relationship that Adam and Eve lost can now be restored through faith in Christ. The basis of Paul’s reconciliatory message is then stated in verse 21: God “made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”

2. Correctly Understand, Assess, and Draw Insights from Old Testament Typology. A type is an Old Testament institution, event, person, object, or ceremony that has reality and purpose in biblical history, but that also—by divine design—foreshadows something yet to be revealed. The Passover lamb in the Old Testament (Exod. 12:21) was a “type” of Christ, who is Himself the Lamb of God (John 1:29, 36).

An understanding of the Passover Lamb in the Old Testament provides significant insight on the concept of substitution. For example, the sacrificial lamb had to be “unblemished” (Exod. 12:5; Lev. 4:3, 23, 32). At the time of the sacrifice, a hand would be laid on the unblemished sacrificial animal to symbolize a transfer of guilt (Lev. 4:4, 24, 33). Notice that the sacrificial lamb did not thereby actually become sinful by nature; rather, sin was imputed to the animal and the animal acted as a sacrificial substitute. In like manner, Christ the Lamb of God was utterly unblemished (1 Pet. 1:19), but our sin was imputed to Him and He was our sacrificial substitute on the cross of Calvary. Simply because our sin was imputed to Him does not mean He changed in nature or actually became sinful.

3. Interpret Verses in Accordance with Lexical Insights Gained from the Original Languages of the Bible. In 2 Corinthians 5:21, the phrase “on our behalf” (“He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf ”) derives from the Greek term huper. This word can bear a number of nuances, not all of them substitutionary in nature. As professor Daniel Wallace has noted in his Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, however, there are a number of factors that argue in favor of a substitutionary use of the word in New Testament times. For example, the substitutionary sense of huper is found in extra-New Testament Greek literature (see, e.g., Plato, Republic 590a; Xenophon, Anabasis 7.4.9–10), the Septuagint (e.g., Deut. 24:16; Isa. 43:3–4), and in the papyri (e.g., Oxyrhyn chus Papyrus 1281.11–12; Tebtunis Papyrus 380.43–44).⁷ One papyri example relates to a scribe who wrote a document on behalf of a person who did not know how to write. In all, Wallace counts 87 examples from the papyri in which huper is used in a substitutionary sense, and this by no means exhausts the extant papyri data. Wallace thus concludes that “this evidence is over whelming in favor of treating huper as bearing a substitutionary force in the NT era.”⁸ The Friberg Greek Lexicon likewise affirms that the word is used “with a component of representation or substitution in the place of, for, in the name of, instead of.”⁹

Christ’s death, as the Lamb of God, was “for” (huper) us in the sense that it was on our behalf (2 Cor. 5:21). The word is used in this same on-behalf-of sense elsewhere in Scripture. Jesus at the Last Supper said: “This is My body which is given for you” (Luke 22:19, emphasis added here and in the verses that follow). Likewise, in John 10:15 Jesus affirmed, “I lay down My life for the sheep.” Paul thus exults that “God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:8; see also Gal. 3:13; 1 Tim. 2:6; Heb. 2:9). Jesus “gave Himself for us to redeem us” (Titus 2:14), “the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God” (1 Pet. 3:18; see also 2:21). The idea of substitution richly permeates these verses.

4. Interpret Scripture by Scripture. Since Scripture is its own best interpreter, we must approach 2 Corinthians 5:21 in light of the clear teaching of other verses. While there are quite a number of pertinent theological facts we could derive from other verses that may have relevance for a proper understanding of this verse, for illustration’s sake I cite one alone: the immutability of Christ. Scripture reveals that Christ, as God, is unchanging and unchangeable (cf. Mal. 3:6; James 1:17). In Hebrews 1:12 the Father—drawing a contrast between the universe that ages and is passing away, and Jesus who is untouched by the passing of time—says of Jesus, “You are the same, and your years will not come to an end” (emphasis added). We are assured of the divine Savior: “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever” (Heb. 13:8, emphasis added). Whatever else we might conclude from such verses, they certainly prohibit any suggestion that Jesus changed in His essential nature as God, or, more specifically, took on the nature of Satan.

5. Interpret Difficult Verses in Light of the Clear Verses. Among the more obvious teachings in the clear verses of Scripture is the perpetual sinlessness of Jesus Christ (emphasis is added in the following verses). The writer of Hebrews affirmed that “we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin” (Heb. 4:15). Jesus was “holy, innocent, [and] undefiled” (Heb. 7:26). He was One “who committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in his mouth” (1 Pet. 2:22). Jesus’ betrayer was remorseful, saying, “I have sinned by betraying innocent blood” (Matt. 27:4). A hardened Roman soldier cried out, “Certainly this man was innocent” (Luke 23:47). The apostle Peter affirmed that we are redeemed not “with perishable things like silver or gold…but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ” (1 Pet. 1:18–19). John said, “You know that He appeared in order to take away sins; and in Him there is no sin” (1 John 3:5). In view of such verses, it is impossible to argue that Jesus’ essential nature actually became tainted or corrupted by sin.

The Apostle Paul’s Intended Meaning. Based on the preceding hermeneutic considerations, we conclude that the apostle Paul’s intended meaning in 2 Corinthians 5:21 is that Jesus was always without sin actually, but at the cross He was made to be sin for us judicially. While Jesus never committed a sin personally, He was made to be sin for us substitutionally.¹⁰ Just as the righteousness that is imputed to Christians in justification is extrinsic to them, so the sin that was imputed to Christ on the cross was extrinsic to Him and never in any sense contaminated His essential nature. As one Bible expositor put it, “The innocent was punished voluntarily as if guilty, that the guilty might be gratuitously rewarded as if innocent.”¹¹

In a nutshell, then, the whole redemptive plan is one of substitution—and without such substitution there can be no salvation. It was by His utterly selfless sacrificial death on the cross that our sinless Savior—the unblemished Lamb of God—paid the penalty for our sins and thereby canceled the debt of sin against us, thus wondrously making possible our reconciliation with God. The redeemed of God can only respond in exultation and praise: “To Him who loves us and released us from our sins by His blood…to Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever” (Rev. 1:5–6).

—Ron Rhodes

Ron Rhodes, Th.D., is president of Reasoning from the Scriptures Ministries and adjunct professor of theology at Biola University (La Mirada, California), Southern Evangelical Seminary (Charlotte, North Carolina), and at Golden Gate Seminary (Southern California campus). He is an award-winning author of numerous books and articles.

notes

1 Frank Jannaway, ed., Christadelphian Answers (Houston: Herald Press, 1920), 24.

2 Ibid., 24.

3 Kenneth Copeland, “The Incarnation,” Audiotape #01-0402 (Fort Worth: Kenneth Copeland Ministries, 1985), side 2.

4 Kenneth Copeland, “What Happened from the Cross to the Throne,” Audiotape #02-0017 (Fort Worth: Kenneth Copeland Ministries, 1990), side 2.

5 Benny Hinn, quoted in Hank Hanegraaff, Christianity in Crisis (Eugene, OR: Harvest House Publishers, 1993), 155–56.

6 Walter Bauer, Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 3rd ed., ed. and rev. Frederick William Danker (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000), 521.

7 Daniel Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1996), 383–88.

8 Ibid., 386.

9 Timothy Friberg, Analytical Lexicon of the Greek New Testament, in BibleWorks software, BibleWorks, LLC.

10 See Norman Geisler and Ron Rhodes, Correcting the Cults (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1997), 244.

11 Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown’s Commentary, in PC Study Bible software, BibleSoft.

One of the common characteristics of false faith preachers today is their failure to be able to read the Bible for all its worth. This is typically personified by taking the Bible out of context. As such, they consistently use texts as pretexts for their faith fantasies. With respect to immediate context, Joel Osteen and Joyce Meyer misuse Romans 4:17 as a pretext for persuading their devotees that through the force of faith they can call things that are not as though they were. In other words, from their perspective of faith, we can create realities by speaking these realities into existence. Of course, the examination of the immediate context demonstrates that Romans 4:17 says nothing of the sort. To the contrary, Paul says that it is the God who gives life, and He calls things that are not as if they were—not us.

What Joyce and Joel do with respect to the immediate context of a verse Kenneth Copeland does to the broader context of a passage; the Gospel of Mark chapter 10 is a classic case in point. Rather than reading Mark 10 within its intended context, one verse is pulled out of context, and used as a pretext for the hundred-fold give-to-get hoax. The broader context of the passage precludes the pretext. Far from being a chapter focused on how one can get a hundred times what he gives, Mark 10 portrays the deceitfulness of riches. As such, the multiplication and division by Jesus is spiritual not physical; metaphorical not literal.

John Hagee takes text out of context phenomenon to a whole new dimension. Not only does he take text out of their immediate and broader context, but he also perverts the entirety of the biblical message. This is particularly disturbing when Christ is the object of his pretext. With bravado that quite frankly boggles my mind, Hagee asserts that the Jewish people wanted Jesus to be their Messiah, but Jesus absolutely refused. He goes on to say, the Jews were not rejecting Jesus as Messiah, it was Jesus refusing to be Messiah to the Jews: a clear perversion of the overarching context of Messiah’s teachings. It is hard to envision, anyone who’s read through the Gospels once knows full well that Jesus emphatically contradicted such sentiments throughout the entirety of His earthly ministry. Who can forget His emotionally charged words as He’s leaving the temple; “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing” (Matt. 23:37). What about the words of the apostle John? “He came to that which is his own, but His own did not receive Him” (John 1:11). Common decency alone should have been sufficient to absolve Jesus from Hagee’s unwarranted implication as self-contradiction. Giving Jesus the benefit of the doubt, on a matter of such grave consequence, I rightly have deemed an interpretive imperative. Jesus is the author and finisher of our faith, indeed the author of eternity does not contradict Himself, neither does He confuse His hearers.

Context! Context! Context! That’s the antidote to the compromise and to the confusion and to the contradiction of Christ and the Canon. We as Christians need to read the Bible for all its worth, otherwise we are going to be misled by a cacophony of voices that have a siren call that is leading us not towards biblical truth but rather away from biblical truth.