Monday, April 4, 2022

Trinitarian Ray M. Lozano on 1 Chronicles 29:20

  

If it is unlikely that Israel’s kings were considered divine, it is also unlikely that the προσκυνησις of the king in 1 Chr 29:20 is to be understood as an instance of divine worship of the king. Although it is somewhat striking that the one verb προσεκυνησαν takes both τω κυριω and τω βασιλει as its objects, this does not necessarily mean that God and king are reverenced in the same sense (cf. 1 Kgdms 12:18; Sib. Or. 2:60; Ign. Smyrn. 9:1, where one verb governs two objects [one divine, the other human] without the implication that the two recipients thereby receive reverence in the same sense). Indeed, Josephus’s phrasing of the account suggests a distinction could ultimately be made between the reverence shown to God on the one hand and that shown to the king on the other, for, while he retains the term προσκυνεω to describe the reverence of God, he prefers the term ευχαριστεω to describe the reverence of the king:

 

[King David] commanded the multitude also to bless God. And so they fell upon the ground and prostrated themselves (προσεκυνησαν); and they also gave thanks (ευχαριστησαν) to David for all the blessings they had enjoyed since he had succeeded to the throne. (Josephus, Ant. 7.381, Marcus)

 

By contrast, it seems to be in the case of those humans in the larger pagan world who were acknowledged and treated as godlike beings (and/or who indulged themselves in such divine pretensions) that we see προσκυνεω used pejoratively for a king of worship that so acknowledged or treats the human as a divine figure. Thus, along with the censure of divine worship through προσκυνησις of idols (Exod 20:5; 32:8; Lev 26:1; Num 25:2; 4 Kgdms 21:21; Ps 96:7; Isa 2:8; 46:6; Jer 1:16; Dan 3:5; Mic 5:13; Jdt 8:18; Ep Jer 5; Bel 4; Philo, Mos. 2.165; Decal. 76; Josephus, Ant. 3.91; 8.248; 10.69; T. Zeb 9:5; and so on), natural elements (Deut 4:19; 17:3; Jer 8:2; Ezek 8:16; Phil, Decal. 64; Spec. 1.15), and animals (Let. Aris. 138; Sib. Or. 3:30; Philo, Contempl. 9), belong a few instances of the censure of divine worship through προσκυνησις if humans. (Ray M. Lozano, The Proskynesis of Jesus in the New Testament: A Study on the Significance of Jesus as an Object of “Proskuneo” in the New Testament Writings [Library of New Testament Studies 609; London: T&T Clark, 2020], 30-31)

 

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