Aaron Shafovaloff Continues to Deceive Concerning Romans 4, King David, and Related Topics

 The most recent issue of the Pro Pastor Journal published an article that was long refuted before it went to press:

 

Aaron Shafovaloff, “Using David to Talk to Mormons about Grace,” Pro Pastor: A Journal of Grace Bible Theological Seminary 5, no. 1 (Fall 2026): 35-41

 

Don’t take my word for it; to see how Shafovaloff was refuted (and, as a result, did a lousy job in the article), see:

 

Why Reformed Protestant Appeals to King David Refute, Not Support, Their Soteriology

 

And for a fuller discussion of Rom 4:4-8, the concept of “imputation,” and other topics:

 

Response to a Recent Attempt to Defend Imputed Righteousness

 

Again, this only shows that Aaron (1) cannot engage in meaningful exegesis to save his life and (2) is not just deceived, but a deceiver.

Ibn Ezra on Psalm 51:6 (Hebrew: v. 7)

  

הן - בעבור התאוה הנטועה בלב אדם כאילו בעון חוללתי. והטעם: כי בשעת הלידה היצר הרע נטוע בלב. 

 

ומלת יחמתני – זרה כאילו יחמה ממני על דרך: ליחמנה. ויש אומרים: כי זה רמז לחוה שלא ילדה רק אחר שחטאה. (source)

 

“Behold — because of the desire implanted in a human being’s heart, as though I were conceived in iniquity. The meaning is: at the time of birth, the evil inclination is implanted in the heart.

 

And the word yeḥamtani is unusual, as though it were from yeḥammah from me, in the manner of: liḥammenah. And some say that this is a reference to Eve, who did not give birth until after she sinned.”

 

Discussion on Soteriology with Shiloh Lofgran

 

Trying to stump Robert Boylan!

C. Kavin Rowe on the True Humanity of Jesus in Romans 5:12-21 and Humans being "Adams remade"

  

Jesus Is the Human

 

Romans 5:12-21

 

In what is arguably one of the strongest thoughts in Paul’s thinking—at least in terms of its organizing or gravitational power relative to other thoughts— Paul sets Jesus Christ in typological relation to Adam, the first human. “Sin came into the world through one ἄνθρωπος and thus death to all humans because all sinned” (v. 12). Though all sinned, Adam was unique in that he was the fountainhead of the human problem and was thus “a τύπος of the one to come” (vv. 13–14). Paul then compares Adam and Jesus, the two ἄνθρωποι that reach all humans, in order to show the dramatically lopsided nature of the sin/grace and death/life relation: sin and death are defeated by the greater abundance of grace and life. “Thus, just as one man’s trespass led to condemnation for all humans, so also one man’s righteous act led to the acquittal of life for all humans” (v. 18). At first glance, it may seem that the only comparison here is that of “headship”: Adam stands at the head of a period of history, as does Jesus, only more so (into eternity). But the point of the typology actually runs much deeper. What it is to be ἄνθρωπος, Paul suggests, is signified in Adam. And what it is to have the ἄνθρωπος remade is signified in Jesus Christ. We all stand in Christ Jesus. The Human and the Human Remade—or, to put it only slightly differently, the damaged human made all over again into the human it was intended to be, the reestablishing of God’s image in the midst of time. Human beings are thus, according to the thought of Rom 5, Adams remade and given life in Jesus Christ. To see an Adam is to see one who stands in Jesus Christ. (C. Kavin Rowe, “Christianity’s Surprise: New Testament Foundations of the Human,” in A Scribe Trained for the Kingdom of Heaven: Essays on Christology and Ethics in Honor of Richard B. Hays, ed. David M. Moffitt and Isaac Augustine Morales [Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books, 2021], 177, emphasis in bold added)

 

 

The uptake of this standing in the life of Adam is the living out of “new creation” (2 Cor 5:17). The defeat of death part is, as Paul puts it in his argument about the resurrection in 1 Cor 15, this: “For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive” (v. 22). (Ibid., 191 n. 7)

 

 

συνέδριον in Ignatius, To the Trallians 3:1 as a Reference to the Council of God, not the Jewish Sanhedrin

  

3.1 Having exhorted the deacons to please everyone, Ignatius then goes on to state the corollary (such is the force of the word “similarly” here) in calling on everyone to respect the deacons. The remark is unusual in that it compares the deacons with Jesus Christ (see on Mag. 6.1). There is no compelling reason to reject the line on textual grounds, and thus it properly serves to underscore the tentative character of all such comparisons in Ignatius (especially since it comes so soon after the comparison between the bishop and Christ in Tr. 2.1). The choice of language here was probably determined by the immediate context. Ignatius expresses himself more forcefully than usual to offset any possible negative impressions left by his preceding comments on the deacons of Tralles.

 

At this point Ignatius is driven to add to the remark about the deacons another about the bishop and elders. Having effected the addition by means of the conjunction ὡς (“as”), that word is no longer available to him in making the comparison between the bishop and the Father. Instead, Ignatius resorts to speaking of the bishop as the τύπος (“type,” “image,” “copy”) of the Father. Since both Barnabas (19.7) and the Didache (4.11) speak of the master as “a type of God” to the slave, the meaning of the comparison does not go beyond what we have set out above in our discussion of Eph. 6.1, Mag. 3.1 and 6.1. Authority is enhanced by such comparisons but not divinized.

 

The comparison involving the presbyters is more complex than usual. They are likened to the council of God and the band of apostles. Elsewhere the two expressions are collapsed into one—the council of the apostles (Mag. 6.1). The double formula makes more explicit the hierarchical relation involved. “God” in the expression “council of God” must correspond to the bishop (note that we hear of the “council” of the bishop in Phd. 8.1). Evidently Ignatius wants not only to compare the presbyters to the council of apostles but also to compare the relation between God and the apostles to that between the bishop and the presbyters. We have found other examples of such comparisons within comparisons (see on Mag. 6.1).

 

However subordinate to the bishop Ignatius makes the presbyters and deacons, here he is explicit in recognizing no church without the existence of all three. He must have found them in place wherever he went to make this statement in the matter-of-fact way that he does. It is only his exaltation of the role of the bishop that sometimes strikes us as going beyond what was commonly accepted. (William R. Schoedel, Ignatius of Antioch: A Commentary on the Letters of Ignatius of Antioch [Hermeneia—a Critical and Historical Commentary on the Bible; Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1985], 141-42)

 

Schoedel rendered To the Trallians 3:1 as:

 

Similarly let everyone respect the deacons as Jesus Christ, as also the bishop who is a type of the Father, and the presbyters as the council of God and as the band of the apostles. Nothing can be called a church without these (Ibid., 140)

 

Here is the entry under “συνέδριον” in Lampe’s patristic lexicon (emphasis added):

 

συνέδριον, τό, A. council; 1. prob. of Jewish sanhedrin, Pss.Sal.4:1; 2. of college of presbyters as bishop’s council τῶν πρεσβυτέρων εἰς τύπον συνεδρίου τῶν ἀποστόλων Ign.Magn.6.1; τοὺς … πρεσβυτέρους ὡς σ. θεοῦ id.Trall.3.1; ἐὰν μετανοήσωμεν εἰς ἑνότητα θεοῦ καὶ σ. τοῦ ἐπισκόπου id.Philad.8.1; ὁ καθεζόμενος ἐν πρεσβυτερίῳ συνειδότι μεμιασμένος … τὸ Χριστοῦ μολύνων σ. Or.fr.50 in Jer.36:21(p.223.23; M.13.580a); Const.App.2.28.4 cit. s. βουλή; 3. σ. ἐπισκόπων council, synod ὅτι δ ἂν ἐν τοῖς ἁγίοις τῶν ἐπισκόπων σ. πράττηται, τοῦτο πρὸς τὴν θείαν βούλησιν ἔχει τὴν ἀναφοράν Const.ap.Eus.v.C.3.20(p.87.11; M.20.1080a); Jo.Ant.ep.pop.CP(p.129.9; M.83.1449b); cf. τοῦ ἀρχιερατικοῦ σ. Thdt.ep.42(4.1100); abs. ποία … σύνοδος ἐπισκόπων ἦν τότε; ποῖον σ. ἀληθείας ἐχόμενον; CAlex.ep.ap.Ath.apol.sec.8(p.94.5; M.25.261c); Ath.syn.1(p.231.9; M.26.681a); Pall.v.Chrys.3(p.16.10; M.47.12); Philost.h.e.2.7,11(M.65.472a,473b); σ. ποιέω, Gr.Naz.or.27.9(p.16.5; M.36.24a); σ. συγκροτέω, Pall.v.Chrys.7(p.38.11; M.47.23); σ. καθίζω Philost.h.e.8.4(M.65.560a); of a council lacking proper eccl. authority τῷ τῆς ἀποστασίας σ. CEph.(431)can.1,2; hence a. session, meeting of a council τὸ σ. τῆς συνόδου συνεκροτεῖτο CArim.ep.Const.1 ap.Ath.syn.10(p.237.23,35; M.26.697a,b); Acac.Mel.hom.(p.90.9; M.77.1468a); b. council-chamber ἵνʼ … αὐθαίρετος εἰσέλθῃ εἰς τὸ σ. Pall.v.Chrys.4(p.22.20; M.47.15); ib.8(p..45.24,46.12,15; M.47.27); Thdt.haer.4.2(4.353).

 

B. of non-legislative assemblies; 1. any public gathering, concourse, Clem.paed.3.11(p.278.27; M.8.656a); 2. assembly, congregation; a. as signifying whole body of Jews or Christians καταλέλοιπε … ὁ λόγος τοῦ θεοῦ τὸ Ἰουδαίων σ. καὶ ἄλλο σ. καὶ ἐκκλησίαν ἑαυτῷ πεποίηκε τὴν ἀπὸ τῶν ἐθνῶν Or.hom.14.15 in Jer.(p.122.1; M.13.423c); ἀπηλλάγη τοῦ σ. τοῦ λοιμικοῦ, καὶ περιέτυχε τῇ σωτηρίῳ πηγῇ Chrys.hom.59.1 in Jo.(8.344d); ἐξεβάλλετο … τοῦ κοινοῦ σ. id.hom.5.2 in 1Tim.(11.576f); b. local assembly or congregation ἄνδρες οἱ ἐλθόντες εἰς τὸ σ. τοῦ Χριστοῦ καὶ θέλοντες εἰς τὸν Ἰησοῦν πιστεῦσαι A.Thom.A 37(p.154.19); of gatherings of Ophites, Or.Cels.6.28(p.98.19; M.11.1336b); of other heretics οἴκους, ἐν οἷς τὰ σ. ταῦτα πληροῦτε Const.ap.Eus.v.C.3.65(p.112.12; M.20.1141a); c. of the building, whether church ὅπως ἁγίων ἀνθρώπων ἄξιον σ. ἀποδειχθῇ Const.ib.3.53(p.100.27; 1116a); or conventicle τὰ τῆς δεισιδαιμονίας ὑμῶν σ. Const.ib.3.65(p.112.28; 1141c). (“συνέδριον,” in A Patristic Greek Lexicon, ed. G. W. H. Lampe [Oxford: At The Clarendon Press, 1961], 1314-15)

 

 

David Winston on Wisdom of Solomon 16:7 and the Brazen Serpent

  

For the one who turned toward it [the brazen serpent] was saved, not by the thing that was beheld, but by you, the Savior of all. (Wisdom of Solomon 16:7 NRSV)

 

 

7. was saved not by the sight beheld. The author seeks to replace the principle of homeopathic magic which appears to be operative in Num 21:8–9 with a spiritual conception. (See B. A. Levine, In the Presence of the Lord [Leiden, 1974]:85–86.) We find a similar interpretation in M. Rosh Hashanah 3.8: “But could the serpent kill or could the serpent keep alive? But rather, whenever Israel looked on high and subjected their heart to their Father in heaven were they healed, but if not, they perished.” It may be noted that the rabbis explained the punishment of the Israelites by means of serpents on the talion principle, a conceit to which, as we have already seen, both they and the author of Wisd were equally attached. See Tanḥ. Ḥukat 45: “Let the serpent who began with slander come and exact punishment from those who utter slander.… Let the serpent who eats all kinds of food and yet enjoys only one taste (cf. BT Yoma 75a), come and exact punishment from those who eat only one kind of food and yet enjoy the taste of many kinds.” Cf. Targ.Yerush. and Ps-Jonathan on Num 21:6: “And the bath-kol fell from the high heaven and thus spoke: I made manna come down for them from heaven, yet now they turn and murmur against me. Yet, behold, the serpent whom, in the days of the beginning of the world, I doomed to have dust for his food, hath not murmured against me. Now shall the serpents who have not complained of their food come and bite the people who complain.” (David Winston, The Wisdom of Solomon: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary, [AYB 43; New York: Doubleday, 1979], 295)

 

 

J. Ross Wagner on the Use of Psalm 40:6 (LXX: 39:7; Hebrew: 40:7) in Hebrews 10:5

  

As with Ps 8, so here also the story of Jesus provides the template for the preacher’s explication of the psalm. In this case, however, a distinctive reading in the OG version of Ps 39(40):7—unattested in Hebrew manuscripts or in other ancient witnesses to the Hebrew text—proves indispensable to the homilist’s interpretation. In the second half of Ps 39(40):7a, the Masoretic text offers a striking image: אָזנְיַםִ כּ רִָית לִּי “ears you have hollowed out for me.” Most English translations have followed the KJV in understanding the expression to mean that God has “opened” the psalmist’s ears to hear and obey. The OG translator, however, appears to have taken this as an instance of synecdoche—ear for body—and discovered thereby a reference to God’s fashioning of the human being out of the dust of the ground. Seeking to clarify the figure for his readers, then, the translator will have chosen a more prosaic rendering of the Hebrew: “A body you have fashioned for me” (σῶμα κατηρτίσω μοι).

 

. . .

 

Jesus’s body is the medium of his obedience to God. “In the days of his flesh,” the preacher recounts, Jesus offered up impassioned prayers and petitions, trusting God to save him from the power of death; and he was heard because of his godly fear (Heb 5:7). In his body, “he learned obedience through what he suffered,” and in this way he was made perfect for his high-priestly vocation (Heb 5:8–9). As high priest, Jesus offered himself up to God once for all. Raised bodily from the dead, he has entered heaven itself, there to present himself a living sacrifice for the sins of the people (Heb 9:12, 14, 26). What is more, the blood and flesh of the embodied Jesus now open the way for his brothers and sisters to enter the heavenly sanctuary themselves (Heb 10:19–22). Through the power of his indestructible life, this great high priest ever lives to make intercession for his people (7:25), granting them freedom of access to the very throne of God, where they can obtain mercy and find grace to help them in their time of need (4:14–16). (J. Ross Wagner, “Performing the Psalms with Jesus: Christ and Community in the Letters to the Hebrews,” in A Scribe Trained for the Kingdom of Heaven: Essays on Christology and Ethics in Honor of Richard B. Hays, ed. David M. Moffitt and Isaac Augustine Morales [Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books, 2021], 160-61)