Chandler sadly passed away on Friday, August 7. Do keep his family and friends in your prayers, especially his young wife.
I never met Chandler in person, but we were "online friends." We collaborated twice to review his debate on soteriology with a Calvinist:
Review of Chandler Hendry (LDS) vs. Reitmeier (Calvinist) on "How Are We Actually Saved?" (Part 1)
Review of Chandler Hendry (LDS) vs. Reitmeier (Calvinist) on "How Are We Actually Saved?" (Part 2)
859. Having considered Omnipotent,
here Dionysius considers Ancient of Days. And regarding this he does
three things: first, he shows why God is called Ancient of Days; second, he
explains the reason given (at [389] “And indeed . . . “); third, he manifests
what he had said by the authority of Scripture (at [391] “On account of which .
. .”).
860. Now we must realize that
among us something is called ancient for two reasons: first, because it has
[endured for] much time; and second, because it precedes in time those things
that are younger. And that is called ancient which is in the past, remote from
the present; and this is prior in time. Thus God is called the Ancient of Days
for two reasons: first, because “he” pre-possesses the duration “of all things”
and of aeviternity and of time (by aeviternity is meant the duration
which measures being itself, but by time the duration which measures
becoming or moving). Second, because he is “before” all “days and before
aeviternity and” before “times.”
861. Next, when he says [389]
“And indeed . . .” he explains the reasons given, and first the first one;
second, the second one (at [390] “And as . . .”).
862. So he says first [389] that
when we say that God is “time” or some part of time, such as a “day” or
“reasons,” and when we say he is “aeviternity,” one must understand this in a
way which “befits” God, not of course in such a way that God is anything whose
being is something successive and divisible or adjacent to another [time or
day, etc.]. But rather he is called aeviternity, which is the measure of the
permanent, inasmuch as he is unchangeable “by any motion,” because he is not
moved by any motion.
And he is called time, which is
the number of motion, from the fact that God himself is always moving in the
manner which was mentioned earlier in Chapter 9 on motion [379-380 Dionysius;
840-842 St. Thomas]. Yet he does not move in such a way that there is any
succession in his motion, as there is in the motion which is numbered by time,
but God himself is “always” remaining “in himself.”
863. Next, when he says [390]
“And as . . .” he explains the second reason: for he is said to be, before days
and aeviternity and times, not in the manner of the past, as things which are
called ancient among us, but in the manner in which the cause is prior to its
effects: for he is the cause “of aeviternity and of time and of days.”
864. Next, when he says [391] “On
account of which . . .,” to manifest the foregoing things, he introduces some
authorities of Scripture. And he says that, on account of the foregoing, “in
the” appearances” of the hidden “visions-of-God,” God is described both as
“new” and as “old”: new, according to Isaiah 62:2, “And to you shall be called
a new name,” and old, according to psalm 70:18, “and unto old age and frailty,
God, may you not abandon me,” and Isaiah 46:4, “all the way to [your] old age I
[remain] myself and unto [your] gray hairs I will carry [you].”
Now through his being called aged
or old is signified by ancientness: namely that he always exists “from the
beginning” of eternity; and through his being called new or young is signified
that he is ancient “without old age,” that is, without any faltering or being
past, because, as was said earlier [379 Dionysius; 840 St. Thomas], he moves
while remaining immobile in himself.
Or: since old age and ancientness
seem to pertain to the beginning on account of their priority, and youth to the
end on account of its posteriority, through both being attributed to God we are
taught that he proceeds “through all things from the beginning all the way to
the end.”
He gives the third explanation
according to the thought of Hierotheus, whom he calls his perfector, that is,
mater in divine matters, who said that through both of the foregoing is shown
the priority of God himself and the fact that he is the principle: for through
his being called old is shown his priority “in time,” for we call old those
things which are prior in time. But through his being called young is indicated
a priority or principality is “in respect of” the idea of number: for he is
called younger who has advanced less in time. But among numbers, to the extent
that [a number] advances less, to the extent it is prior: for “the unit” and
the numbers close to the unit are prior to those “more advanced.” (Thomas
Aquinas, An Exposition of The Divine Names, The Book of Blessed Dionysius,
Chapter 10, Reading 2 [trans. Michael Augros; Scholastic Tradition in English
Translation; Merrimack, N.H.: Thomas More College Press, 2021], 409, 411)
And he made his grave with the wicked,
and with the rich in his death; because he had done no violence, neither
was any deceit in his mouth. (Isa 53:9 | KJV)
And he made his grave with the wicked,
and with the rich in his death; because he had done no evil, neither was
any deceit in his mouth. (Mosiah 14:9)
The NT quote (which does not
attribute the passage to Isaiah) is found in 1 Pet. 2:22 (see also Zeph. 3:13;
Rev. 14:5). LXX reads anomian . . . dolos, “lawlessness . . . deceit”.
Actually, the MT mrmh means both “evil” and “violence”, and hence both
KJV and BM are valid translations from the Hebrew. (John A. Tvedtnes, Isaiah
Variants in the Book of Mormon [Provo, Utah: Foundation for Ancient Research
and Mormon Studies, 1981], 93)
The use of “evil” as opposed to “violence” seems to fit the ethical
character of the Suffering Servant. As M. Kartveit noted in the Theological
Dictionary of the Old Testament:
The prophetic usage of these
terms is also somewhat stereotyped, as in catalogs of vices: Mic. 6:12 (remîyâ); Jer. 9:5(6) and
Hos. 12:1(11:12) (mirmâ). In Am. 8:5
the prophet cites the questions of the tradesmen: “When will the new moon be
over so that we may sell grain? And when will the sabbath be past so that we
may offer wheat for sale? We will make the ephah small and the shekel great,
and practice deceit with false balances (mōʾzenê
mirmâ).” Mic. 6:11 asks rhetorically: “Can I tolerate wicked scales and a
bag of weights of mirmâ?” The
prophets may be drawing on a wisdom tradition that false balances are an
abomination to Yahweh (Prov. 11:1; cf. 20:23). Zeph. 1:9 castigates those who
“fill their master’s house with violence and fraud.” Jer. 23:26 likens the
prophets who prophesy šeqer to the
prophets whose hearts are tarmîṯ. In
Jer. 14:14, in a similar context, šeqer,
qesem, ʾalîl, and tarmîṯ
appear as synonyms. Jer. 8:5 equates apostasy and tarmîṯ. The various terms tend to lose their distinctive meanings,
being employed simply to characterize the wicked. Contrariwise, Isa. 53:9
describes the servant of Yahweh: “He had done no ḥāmās, and there was no mirmâ
in his mouth.” In Zeph. 3:13 the same language describes the ethical
character of the righteous remnant of Israel. (M.
Kartveit, “רמה,” TDOT 13:503-4, emphasis added)
Genesis 16:5
In what happens next we can again
find a parallel in documents of the period that describe the marriage customs
of a society in Abram’s part of the world. There are provisions in the Code of
Hammurabi for the situation where a priestess, who was free to marry but not to
give birth, gives her husband a slave girl to provide him with a son. In this
case, if the slave woman attempts to claim equality with her mistress, her
mistress may reduce her again to being a slave.
Sarai said to Abram: Sarai does not punish her former slave girl
until she has claimed her legal rights, which she does now as she speaks to her
husband.
May the wrong done to me be on you! The wrong or “injustice” refers to the superior attitude Hagar has
taken in regard to Sarai. Sarai is saying something equivalent to “I have been
treated unjustly, and it is your fault” or, as Speiser translates, “This
outrage against me is your fault.” tev has “It is your fault that Hagar
despises me,” and gives an alternative rendering in a footnote: “May you suffer
for the wrong done against me.” As head of the household Abram has the power
and authority to set relationships right between these two women. But so far he
apparently has failed to do so. Sarai is now appealing to Abram’s legal
responsibility to act.
In translation this construction
must often be reworded to say, for example, “I have been wronged and it is your
fault,” “It is your fault that Hagar has treated me wrongly,” or “I have been
treated unfairly by Hagar, and you are responsible for it.”
I gave my maid to your embrace translates the idiomatic phrase “I
gave … into your bosom,” which Speiser says is not “a fanciful expression, but
a recognized legal phraseology.” For expressions relating a man’s wife to his
bosom, see Deut 13:6; 28:54. tev renders the expression “I gave her to you,”
with the purpose of the action being understood from the context. frcl, neb, reb,
njb say “into your arms,” gecl says “I turned over my slave girl to you,” and spcl
“I myself gave her to you for a wife.” Since the context makes clear the
purpose for which Sarai gave Hagar to Abram, it may not be necessary to say
more than “I gave my maid to you” or “I let my maid be a wife for you.”
However, it is important to understand and convey the feelings of Sarai, who is
grieved that she has acted in the proper legal way, but that things have turned
out wrong for her. One translation goes on in Sarai’s words, after she has
accused Abram of being the cause of the trouble, “It’s true that I myself gave
you my working girl. But now.…” Another takes a more angry tone: “I gave you my
working girl, and what happened? When she found that baby, she started to look
down on me.”
When she saw she had conceived: see verse 4.
She looked on me with contempt: see verse 4.
May the Lord judge between you and me! completes the speech by
Sarai that began at the beginning of the verse. Sarai demands a legal decision.
Her case is not between her and her maid but between her and her husband,
Abram. Since Hagar became Abram’s “wife” her conduct is the legal responsibility
of Abram. Sarai appeals to the Lord to judge who is at fault—Sarai who gave
Hagar to her husband, or Abram who has not corrected Hagar’s misconduct in
relation to Sarai. Sarai’s demand that the
Lord judge is a formula found many times in the Old Testament. See for
examples Gen 31:53; Exo 5:21; 1 Sam 24:12, 15. This expression is sometimes
rendered “I ask the Lord to decide this affair between you and me,” “I call on
the Lord to say who is right in this matter between us,” or idiomatically “I
ask the Lord to cut the words between us.” One translation that may serve as a
good model says “Well God has to find out who is right out of us two.” (William
David Reyburn and Euan McG. Fry, A Handbook on Genesis [UBS Handbook
Series; New York: United Bible Societies, 1998], 352-53)
5. This outrage. Literally “my injustice” in objective construction:
the injustice done to me; the possessive is adequately reflected by “this,” as
happens so often in interchanging possessive and defined forms, cf. “the boys”:
“my men,” 14:24. For Heb. ḥāmās
“lawlessness, injustice,” cf. 6:11; it is a strictly legal term, which trad.
“violence” fails to show adequately. The same force is reflected in the Akk.
verb ḫabālum “to deprive someone of
his legal rights,” adjective ḫablum
“wronged.” The Code of Hammurabi states explicitly that a slave girl who was
elevated to the status of concubine must not claim equality with her mistress
(par. 146). Sarah is thus invoking her legal rights, and she holds her husband
responsible (literally “it is against you”) for the offense.
I myself put my maid in your lap. This is not just a fanciful
expression, but recognized legal phraseology. For the identical usage, cf. the
old Sum.-Akk. dictionary of legal expressions known as ana ittišu (B. Landsberger, MSL I, 1937): “he placed his daughter
in [the other’s] lap,” Tablet 3, column iv, line 34. (E. A. Speiser,
Genesis: Introduction, Translation, and Notes [AYB 1; New Haven: Yale
University Press, 2008], 117-18)
522. Regarding the first, one
must know that angel translates as messenger.
Now [an angel] conformed to the divine
goodness is said to announce “the divine goodness” inasmuch as in angels “in a
secondary way” by “participation” there exists “that which” is enunciated about
God not by participation, but “by the cause”; just as if I were to say that illuminated
air announces the brightness of the sun, inasmuch as in a secondary way and
participatively [the brightness] is in the air, and in a primary way and
causally it is in the sun. And because that which something has participatively
and in a secondary way is an “image” of that which has in it a primary way and
causally, and the act of an image is to manifest that of which it is the image,
consequently he infers a certain definition of a good angel: the manifestation
of the divine “light” which is hidden from us on account of its excellence and
simplicity. (Thomas Aquinas, An Exposition of The Divine Names, The Book of
Blessed Dionysius, Chapter 4, Reading 18 [trans. Michael Augros; Scholastic
Tradition in English Translation; Merrimack, N.H.: Thomas More College Press,
2021], 233)
527. Next, when he says [213] “But
are they . ..,” he excludes an objection; and first, he gives it: for someone might
say that “because” the angels “Punish” sinners, “they” are “evil.” And Matthew
13 [verses 41-42, 49-50] expressly says that they punish sinners, because they
will cast out all scandals from the kingdom. Therefore, there is a question: whether
they are evil in the fact that they punish.
Second, he shows that they cannot
be called evil on account of this, because by the same argument those who
chastise bad people by punishing them would be “evil,” such as judges and
teachers; “and” likewise it would follow that certain priests “who” exclude “the
unclean,” that is, a sinner, “from the divine mysteries,” by excommunicating
him, would be evil, which is against the Apostle, who commands this in 1
Corinthians 5:3-5.
But because to multiply its
awkward consequences is not to revolve [an objection], third, he resolves all
the foregoing matters. And he says that “to be punished” “is not evil” simply
and in itself, but it is in itself good, since it is just, but it is evil in
some respect, inasmuch as it removes something good from someone. “But to
become” a sinner, that is evil simply; and so he who punishes a sinner is not
evil, but he who sins is evil. For the same reason, it is not evil in itself to
be excluded “from holy things” “with” justice, but it is in itself evil that
someone be tarnished by sin and abandon sanctity and by his become “unworthy of”
divine things, which are in themselves “undefiled.” And he does not sin who
excommunicates, but he sins who does something from which he becomes deserving
of excommunication. (Thomas Aquinas, An Exposition of The Divine Names, The
Book of Blessed Dionysius, Chapter 4, Reading 18 [trans. Michael Augros;
Scholastic Tradition in English Translation; Merrimack, N.H.: Thomas More
College Press, 2021], 235)