Notes on Esther 2:23 and Impalement/Crucifixion

  

impaled on stakes. The Hebrew appears to say “were hanged on a tree,” but the historical evidence points to impalement, not hanging, as the customary form of execution in the ancient Near East. In many instances, the condemned person was put to death in some other fashion and his impaled body was then displayed as a form of humiliation. (Robert Alter, The Hebrew Bible, 3 vols. [New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2019], 3:723)

 

 

Gallows are a structure made from upright posts and a crossbeam from which a person was hanged with a rope, or he was nailed to the crossbeam. The Hebrew is literally “hanged on a tree [or, wood],” but the exact meaning of this phrase is not entirely clear. It can refer to hanging, but alternatively it can mean “impaled on a stake” (see Ezra 6:11), and historical evidence indicates that the Persians did use that form of punishment. This second interpretation is followed by njv, “the two were impaled on stakes.”

 

Also possible is the view that crucifixion is meant; but because of the height of the structure built by Haman in 5:14, many interpreters think that the references to hanging in Esther 2:23; 5:14; 6:4; 7:9, 10; 8:7; 9:13, 14, 25 all refer to gallows, that is, to strangulation by hanging from a rope that is tied around the neck (so tev and nearly all translations).

 

Where structures for hanging are not known, it may be necessary to use a descriptive phrase; for instance, “a wooden structure for hanging [or, killing].” (Roger L. Omanson and Philip A. Noss, A Handbook on the Book of Esther: The Hebrew and Greek Texts [UBS Handbook Series; New York: United Bible Societies, 1997], 85)

 

 

The Heb. word typically translated “gallows” here literally means “tree,” or simply “wooden object.” There is no evidence in antiquity for execution by hanging someone with a noose around their neck and allowing them to strangle. More likely, the text refers to the common practice of impaling victims on wooden stakes. This barbaric practice could be used either as an actual method of execution, or—more often—it could be used to display the bodies of people who were executed by other means. As a method of execution, impalement would have been very painful; the real purpose of the practice, however, was not so much torture as to make a public display of the malefactors. Another possibility, though less likely, is that the text was referring to crucifixion, which the Persians also practiced (Hist. 7.33, 194; see also Clines, 292–93). (Anthony Tomasino, Esther [Evangelical Exegetical Commentary; Bellingham, Wash.: Lexham Press, 2016], 206)

 

 

Ezra 6:11 may imply that the Persians continued to use impalement as a method of execution. The references to “hanging” in Esther (2:23; 5:14) probably refer to either impalement or crucifixion. The “hangman’s noose” was not commonly used in Persia during the biblical period. The word translated as “gallows” in the NKJV refers not to a scaffold for hanging with a rope, but a pole or stake for impaling.

 

Crucifixion on a stake or cross was practiced by the Greeks, notably Alexander the Great, who hung 2,000 people on crosses when the city of Tyre was destroyed. During the period between Greek and Roman control of Palestine, the Jewish ruler Alexander Jannaeus crucified 800 Pharisees who opposed him at Bethome. But these executions were condemned as detestable and abnormal by decent-minded people of Jannaeus’s day as well as by the later Jewish historian, Josephus. (Nelson’s New Illustrated Bible Dictionary, ed. Ronald F. Youngblood, F. F. Bruce, and R. K. Harrison [Nashville: Thomas Nelson, Inc., 1995], Logos Bible Software edition)

 

Christopher Fisher's Response to Gavin Ortlund on Servetus (and Fisher's "The Calvin Servetus Sourcebook")

Whenever Calvinists try to defend John Calvin and his role in the execution of Servetus (October 1553), they usually take the same approach as SA apologists: "yeah, Jenny being gang SA'd was wrong, but she was a jerk in 5th grade and also, she wore a short skirt: kinnda asking for it."

Here is one response by Christopher Fisher (vs. Gavin Ortlund):

Hangout Responding to Gavin Ortlund on Servetus

Fisher has produced three volumes reproducing the relevant writings from Calvin, Servetus, et al. on his trial, execution, and aftermath (two more volumes are forthcoming).

The Calvin Servetus Sourcebook:

Volume 1: Servetus Trial Documents and Exhibits

Volume 2: The Letters

Volume 3: Beza’s The Life of Calvin and Bolsec’s Life of Calvin

John Chrysostom on Matthew 26:13//Mark 14:9

  

Who then proclaimed it, and caused it to be spread abroad? It was the power of Him who is speaking these words. And while of countless kings and generals the noble exploits even of those whose memorials remain have sunk into silence; and having overthrown cities, and encompassed them with walls, and set up trophies, and enslaved many nations, they are not known so much as by hearsay, nor by name, though they have both set up statues, and established laws; yet that a woman who was a harlot poured out oil in the house of some leper, in the presence of ten men, this all men celebrate throughout the world; and so great a time has passed, and yet the memory of that which was done hath not faded away, but alike Persians and Indians, Scythians and Thracians, and Sarmatians, and the race of the Moors, and they that dwell in the British Islands, spread abroad that which was done secretly in a house by a woman that had been a harlot. (John Chrysostom, The Gospel of St. Matthew, Homily 80.2)

 

Evagrius (Origenist) 345-399: Discussion of “Altars” in Kephalaia Gnostika

  

2.57. We have learned that there are three altars of the heights: the third is simple, whereas the two (others) are composed. And that wisdom which is about the second altar reveals the wisdom of the third, whereas that which is about the first altar comes first vis-à-vis that which is in the second one. (Evagrius’s Kephalaia Gnostika: A New Translation of the Unreformed Text from the Syriac [trans. Ilaria L. E. Ramelli; Writings from the Greco-Roman World 38; Atlanta: SBL Press, 2015], 123)

 

This is another kephalaion that focuses on a gnoseological hierarchy, here delineated in three steps. The imagery of the “altars” alludes to various degrees in the progression of the gnosis. However, terminology must be paid attention to: here it is a matter not of “contemplation” (theōria) or “knowledge” proper but of “wisdom,” ܐܬܡܟܚ, corresponding to Greek σοφία. Evagrius describes wisdom as follows: “wisdom [σοφία] is knowledge [γνῶσις] of corporeal and incorporeal realities and the contemplation in them of judgment and providence” (scholium 3 on Prov 1:2). Wisdom is the main epinoia of Christ, together with that of Logos. Knowledge is connected with the Logos-epinoia of Christ; Wisdom with his Wisdom-epinoia. These are the two main epinoiai of Christ; according to Origen, Wisdom is the very first epinoia of Christ, even anterior to “Logos,” because the Logos itself was from eternity in Wisdom. As Origen remarked in his Commentary on John, commenting on John 1:1 (“in the beginning was the Logos,” ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ λόγος), the Logos “has its hypostasis, or individual substance, in Wisdom, who is the Beginning” (ἐν ἀρχῇ τῇ Σοφίᾳ τὴν ὑπόστασιν ἔχων). See Ramelli, “Origen, Greek Philosophy.” (Ibid., 123-24)

 

 

2.58. Those who now live in breadth have been given the three altars, whereas those who live in length and depth will be given them in the world/aeon to come. (Evagrius’s Kephalaia Gnostika: A New Translation of the Unreformed Text from the Syriac [trans. Ilaria L. E. Ramelli; Writings from the Greco-Roman World 38; Atlanta: SBL Press, 2015], 124)

 

Evagrius goes on to speak of the three altars and the wisdom that concerns them, of which he has already spoken in KG 2.57. The distinction that he draws in the present kephalaion seems to be between rational creatures who live in a diastematic condition, and thus in space and time in this world—that is, human beings during the present life—and rational creatures that are free from διαστήματα—in particular, he seems to be thinking of angels. Humans will attain the three “altars,” or the three grades of wisdom, like angels, when they are in the other world. Breadth suggests the stay and wandering in the present aeon, while depth and length suggest a vertical ascent toward God, throughout the aeons. The scriptural reference underlying this kephalaion is Eph 3:18–19: “I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge.” In a scholium on Prov 3:19–20 Evagrius comments precisely on this passage: “That which here [the author of Proverbs] has called ‘earth,’ Saint Paul denominates ‘breadth’ [πλάτος], and what are here called ‘heavens’ Paul in his letter to the Ephesians calls ‘height’ [ὕψος], and that which he allegorically calls ‘abysses’ (Paul) denominates ‘depth’ [βάθος], and the ‘clouds dropping water’ he calls ‘length’ [μῆκος]. All these symbolize the rational creatures distributed in orders/arrangements [κόσμοις] and bodies [σώμασιν] according to their state.” This confirms the association I proposed of the dimensions mentioned by Evagrius with different orders of rational creatures. (Ibid., 124-25)

 

 

4.88. Among the three altars of knowledge, there are two that have a circle, whereas one is seen without a circle. (Evagrius’s Kephalaia Gnostika: A New Translation of the Unreformed Text from the Syriac [trans. Ilaria L. E. Ramelli; Writings from the Greco-Roman World 38; Atlanta: SBL Press, 2015], 243)

 

The idea conveyed by this kephalaion may be that two kinds of knowledge are circumscribed and limited, whereas the third is unlimited. The two limited kinds of knowledge seem to be the knowledge of corporeal realities and that of incorporeal creatures, those that Evagrius calls secondary and primary; the third kind of knowledge is that of the Trinity, which is unlimited just as the Trinity is, which is “essential knowledge” (see above, KG 4.77 and 4.87, with the relevant commentaries). The infinity of God is a trait that characterizes Gregory of Nyssa and goes back to Origen. On the three altars, see KG 2.57–58 above and the relevant commentaries. (Ibid., 243)

 

 

5.53. The spiritual sacrifice is a pure conscience, that which is laid (offered) on the state of the intellect as on an altar. (Evagrius’s Kephalaia Gnostika: A New Translation of the Unreformed Text from the Syriac [trans. Ilaria L. E. Ramelli; Writings from the Greco-Roman World 38; Atlanta: SBL Press, 2015], 297)

 

Persius Flaccus, the Roman Stoic who wrote philosophical satires, also identified the pureness of one’s thoughts and the honesty of one’s heart as the true and best sacrifice, besides which no further sacrifice is needed (Satire 2.71–75). See Ramelli, Stoici romani minori, 1361–515, also with the review by Gretchen Reydams-Schils in Bryn Mawr Classical Review, October 2009, http://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/2009/2009-10-10.html. A parallel concept is found in Paul’s “rational cult,” or λογικὴ λατρεία; moreover, in Paul the notion of “conscience,” or συνείδησις, is paramount (see Philip Bosman, Conscience in Philo and Paul [Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2003]), and from him it was picked up by Christian authors. See Ilaria L. E. Ramelli, “Conscience. IV. Christianity,” in Encyclopedia of the Bible and Its Reception (ed. Hans-Joseph Klauck et al.; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2011), 3:650–52. It is a Christian, Theophilus, who attests (To Autolycus 2.4) that in Stoicism each one’s conscience is so important as to be divine; indeed, especially the Roman Stoics and authors who were strongly influenced by them, such as Seneca and Juvenal, emphasized the role of conscience (see Ramelli, Stoici romani minori, 2599–626, s.v. “coscienza,” and passim in the essays and commentaries therein). Juvenal, Satire 13, observes that conscience produces remorse for one’s sins and works as the divinity’s principal instrument to punish human sins. Paul was probably acquainted with the Stoic conception of conscience, and Evagrius was surely acquainted with Paul’s notion. (Ibid., 297-98)

 

 

5.84. The intelligible temple is the pure intellect, that in which now there is the Wisdom of God, “full of varieties/modalities.” Indeed, God’s temple is the one who is a seer of the holy Unity, and God’s altar is the contemplation of the Holy Trinity. (Evagrius’s Kephalaia Gnostika: A New Translation of the Unreformed Text from the Syriac [trans. Ilaria L. E. Ramelli; Writings from the Greco-Roman World 38; Atlanta: SBL Press, 2015], 311)

 

Evagrius continues his series of interpretations of elements related to buildings and the city (5.74, 77, 80, 82). If, as I suggested, the city he has in mind is the holy city of the Apocalypse (Rev 21–22), this would perfectly fit his present interpretation of the temple as the bare/pure intellect, since the temple of the Apocalypse is explicitly identified, not with a temple of stones, but with God and Christ (Rev 21:22). Likewise the stones that make up the holy city are identified by Origen with rational creatures (On First Principles 2.11.2–3; see above, the commentary on KG 4.30), and John himself in the Apocalypse says that the victor in the battle against evil will be a pillar in the temple of God, which will never go out (Rev 3:12, a passage that was dear to Origen). Moreover, mentions of the temple and temple imagery are scattered throughout the Apocalypse. See Ilaria L. E. Ramelli, “Jesus, James the Just, a Gate, and an Epigraph,” in Kein Jota und kein Häkchen des Gesetzes werden vergehen (vgl. Q 16,17): Das Gesetzesverständnis der Logienquelle auf dem Hintergrund frühjüdischer Theologie (ed. Markus Tiwald; BWANT 200; Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2013), 203–29.

 

The definition of God’s Wisdom, who is Christ, as “full of varieties/ modalities” comes from Eph 3:10. This biblical quotation is a favorite of Evagrius’s, who uses it also in KG 1.43; 2.2, 21; 3.11; and 4.7 (see above, the relevant commentaries). Origen elaborated on it for his image of Christ- Logos-Wisdom bearing the paradigmatic Ideas or logoi of all beings on his surface, notably the same image that was used by Bardaisan of Edessa. See Ramelli, Bardaisan of Edessa, 107–24, and new remarks in Ramelli, “Preexistence of Souls,” the section on Bardaisan. See also above, the commentary on KG 2.2.

 

The altar too is often mentioned in the Apocalypse (Rev 6:9; 8:3, 5; 9:13; 11:1; 14:18; 16:7). In this kephalaion the temple and the altar as symbols of the contemplation (θεωρία) of the divine Unity and Trinity remind readers of the mystery of God as one nature in three hypostases. Evagrius in this respect was in perfect continuity with the Cappadocians, who had inherited this theological point from Origen. See Ilaria Ramelli, “Origen’s Anti-Subordinationism and Its Heritage in the Nicene and Cappadocian Line,” VC 65 (2011): 21–49; idem, “Origen, Greek Philosophy.” (Ibid., 311-12)

 

Evagrius (Origenist) 345-399 Teaching Water Baptism as an Anointing for Christians in Kephalaia Gnostika

  

3.85. All those who are baptized in water receive a delightful perfume, whereas the One who baptizes, it is he who has the perfumed oil. (Evagrius’s Kephalaia Gnostika: A New Translation of the Unreformed Text from the Syriac [trans. Ilaria L. E. Ramelli; Writings from the Greco-Roman World 38; Atlanta: SBL Press, 2015], 193)

 

The One who baptizes is Christ, whose name, ܐܚܝܫܡ (the Syriac equivalent of Greek Χριστός, “the anointed one”), has the same root as ܐܚܫܡ, here employed for “oil” (cf. Greek χρῖσμα). This oil is perfumed, and from its perfume the baptized receive their own perfume. The oil is also referred to in KG 3.43. Origen too used the Christ-oil-anoint wordplay to indicate that all Christians are anointed by Christ with his perfumed oil. (Ibid., 193)

 

Mormonr/B H Roberts Foundation on "Book of Mormon Origins"

 New article from Mormonr/B H Roberts Foundation:

Book of Mormon Origins (click here for the primary sources)

The Latter-day Saints’ Millennial Star (May 29, 1858) on John Taylor's "Polygamy Denials" in France

  

Elder Taylor's Discussion in Boulogne took place in the year 1850, seven years after the Prophet Joseph had received the Revelation on Celestial Marriage, but two years before that revelation was published to the Church. Elder Taylor, therefore, had no authority to preach polygamy. He neither preached it, contradicted it, condemned it, nor publicly denied it. His controversial opponents adverted to certain absurd stories about seraglios of “spiritual wives,” and sisterhoods of the “white vail” and “black vail,” and other lying reports propagated by the apostate Bennett fraternity and republished by Caswell. Our objector, in making his extract from the Report, gives forth the notion that the speaker was “stoutly denying polygamy, and stigmatizing it” as “indelicate, obscene, and disgusting.” But where the said stout denial is to be found, we know not. His own words are—“We are accused here of polygamy,” (referring to accusations made even before the doctrine of polygamy was revealed, and which were false accusations), “and actions the most indelicate, obscene, and disgusting such that none but a corrupt and depraved heart could have contrived.” The idea of his “stigmatizing” polygamy as “indelicate, obscene, and disgusting,” is an interpretation of his words which is altogether gratuitous on the objector's part. We do not so understand them. Such a meaning as that attached to them by the objector could certainly never have been intended by their author.

Elder Taylor, instead of entering into a formal refutation of the charges cited by his opponents, which he considered as “too outrageous to admit of belief,” contented himself with simply reading a passage from the Book of Doctrine and Covenants on the existing marriage-law of the Church. As regards the Church being there spoken of as “reproached with the crime of fornication, and polygamy,” we would ask, In what light could such false charges have been considered but in that of reproach? Polygamy was not then a revealed doctrine of the Church; and therefore the Saints, as a matter of course, adhered to the general monogamic law. If they had practised polygamy without “command” from God, their conduct would have been in that respect, as censurable as that of the ancient Nephites. It would have been a “crime” on their part. But polygamy in itself is not a crime; nor does the Book of Doctrine and Covenants intimate that it is.

 

Our objector, in his extract given in “Mormonism Dissected,” makes a false quotation, which is an unfair act. The original is not “crimes of fornication and polygamy,” but “crime of fornication, and polygamy;” the word “crime” referring only to “fornication,” after which a comma is placed, but is left out by the objector in his extract. If, however, the plural word “crimes” was used, as the objector would have his readers believe, it would then refer, of course, to both “fornication” and “polygamy.” But it is not so. Nor, indeed, is the construction of the next sentence so favourable to the objector's purpose as he might wish. Even if the word “but” occurred before “one wife,” as it does before “one husband,” it would prove nothing against the principle of polygamy itself; for the Saints were then living under the monogamic law. The wording of the passage, however, is—“We believe that one man should have one wife, and one woman but one husband.” As far as punctuation is concerned, we may here observe that the commas after “polygamy,” in the Notice from the Times and Seasons and in Elder Taylor's remarks from the Report, and after “fornication,” in the passage from the Book of Doctrine and Covenants, all prove adverse to the objector's argument. Although those commas are not really necessary, yet they aid in showing the import of the sentences where they are used. Their absence would neither be favourable to his position nor unfavourable to ours; but their presence is certainly fatal to his interpretation.

 

The extract from the Millennial Star Supplement of Dec. 31, 1853, taken from the Deseret News Extra of Sept. 14, 1852, simply shows that the Prophet Joseph, after having received the Revelation on Marriage, “had more wives than one.” This fact, we have neither inclination nor reason to deny. President Young, in making this statement, did not, of course, in any way “contradict and condemn” polygamy itself, nor “publicly deny” the fact of Joseph's having “believed and practised it.”

 

What, then, do our opponent's objections amount to? He invites “special attention” to the “facts” adduced, and pledges himself to “produce” the “books” quoted from, “when required.” We have given “special attention” to those “facts,” and have ourselves “produced” and made due reference to the “books” alluded to; and our conclusion is, that the objector's Dissection of “Mormonism,” instead of causing the honest observer or the Latter-day Saint to fear his knife, will cause him still more attentively to study the real “facts” of the case, as well as to more highly appreciate the value of the “books” which record them. (“Anti-Mormon Objections Answers,” The Latter-day Saints’ Millennial Star 20, no. 22 [May 29, 1858]: 395-96)