OTHCC Chapter 70: items 1381

The Old Testament in the Heart of the Catholic Church < > All Chapters

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Read Isa 52:13-53:12. The Catholic Church sees in this passage the revelation of the Passion and Death of Jesus, the Messiah. This passage is read every year at the liturgy of Good Friday. <<

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Read Isa 61:1-2. Who first said that the life and mission of Jesus is the fulfillment of the meaning of this passage?

a.   Jesus.
b.   St. Augustine.
c.   St. Paul.

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(Now read Luke 4:16-21). <<

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That Jesus is the Messiah, the fulfillment of God's promise to Israel,

a.   is something all Jews should have seen immediately.
b.   is something that anyone would find reasonable.
c.   was not something that Israel could reasonably have expected.

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Making the claim that Jesus is the Messiah, the fulfillment of God's promise to Israel, and therefore that the Old Testament has more than its literal meaning and should be read in the light of the New

a.   is arrogant, unreasonable, and blasphemous.
b.   is a totalitarian privileging of meaning.
c.   would be a sin, if Jesus were not God.

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Jesus is the Messiah, the fulfillment of the promises made to Israel. The Catechism itself calls this ''surprising'' [CCC 591] and calls this intervention of God in history ''unprecedented'' [CCC 579]. That is, the children of Israel could not have come to this knowledge about the true nature of the Messiah on their own. On their own, they could never have imagined that God would speak his Word in the way he actually did.

Also, as is fully proper, no mere man, but only God himself, can say what his promises to Israel truly mean.

Thus it is correct and fully in accord with reason to see the New Testament hidden in the Old, to see the meaning of the Messianic promises not violated but fulfilled in Jesus.

However, this is correct and reasonable only if Jesus is God made man. Then and only then is it God himself who says what his promises to Israel truly mean. >>

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Who are you, to tell God what his Word means? If Jesus is not God made man, if the sacraments are not real and the New Testament is not true, then no academic argument in the world can ever justify what the Catholic Church has always done. Indeed, Jesus himself can not justify his use of the Old Testament unless he truly is the Word of God. [compare CCC 581]

Please get this straight: the whole issue of whether it is proper and reasonable to read the Old Testament as if the sacraments were real and the New Testament were true, is NOT finally an academic argument. All an academic argument can discover is that doing such a thing is proper and reasonable ONLY if Jesus is exactly who the Catholic Church professes him to be.

Reading the Old Testament in the light of the New is a surprise, a meaning God himself, and God alone, gives to the Old Testament. The Catholic Church would NEVER have read the Old Testament in the light of the New, if she did not believe her Lord, who taught her to do just that.

If you want to draw close to Jesus by drawing close to his Catholic Church, then you too must learn to read the Old Testament as she does in her heart.

Just so you're clear: the Catholic Church reads the Old Testament in the light of the New Testament because Jesus is the Lord. There is absolutely no other good reason - academic or otherwise - to read the Old Testament in the light of the New. Only God himself could reveal to us that this is what his Word means. <<

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The first seven chapters of Leviticus are devoted to

a.   hymns of praise to God.
b.   the ritual of sacrifices.
c.   ways to live a moral life.

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Lev 11-16 is devoted to

a.   being holy in the conduct of one's life.
b.   maintaining the laws of legal purity.
c.   the proper ritual for sacrifices.

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The ''Code of Legal Holiness'' (Lev 17-26) emphasizes

a.   being holy in the conduct of one's life.
b.   maintaining the laws of legal purity.
c.   the proper ritual for sacrifices.

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Above all, Leviticus contains many detailed instructions. Leviticus emphasizes that intimacy with God is achieved only in the particular. Catholics agree. There is no abstract or ''generic'' intimacy with God - none at all.

Throughout history, just like today, many people have believed the opposite. Many modern people, exactly like people in the tribes and countries surrounding the Jewish people in ancient times, believe that you don't really have to get too specific to be in an intimate relationship with God. You can pick and choose from among a variety of gods. You can pick and choose from among a variety of religions and behaviors and practices. You can even mix and match according to your tastes.

You may believe this yourself. Deep down you may think that the specifics of ''religion'' couldn't really matter. Deep down you may think that people ought to be able to have an intimate union with God no matter what they believe, or even no matter what they do. Deep down you may think that being Catholic couldn't possibly matter as much as the Catholic Church professes that it does.

So (perhaps throughout your life) you may have to ask yourself: is Jesus in intimate union with one specific, real Bride - or is he still playing the field? Did he freely choose the specific, real Catholic Church to be his Bride, but is now unfaithful? Was he at one time in intimate union with the specific Catholic Church, but has now abandoned her because he found a church more to his liking? >>

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Is he still looking around for his ''ideal Bride'' and in the meantime making a partial commitment to many partial ''Brides'' including but not limited to the Catholic Church? Or is he the type who just can't get enough? Is he ''in love with love,'' passionately and specifically committed - to many different ''Brides'' at once?

As you can see, the New Covenant itself, the intimate and forever union of Christ with his one-and-only Body and Bride, the specific, real Catholic Church, is completely incompatible with the idea that intimacy with God can be ''generic.''

It's obvious that even the thought of generic ''religion'' instantly turns Jesus into the lowest form of life on the planet, and turns the ''intimacy'' he offers into something cheap and coarse and untrustworthy - and entirely un-intimate. It may take you a long time to decide that you want the real thing instead. It's your decision.

We know that if, through no fault of their own, men do not know Christ and his Church, they can be saved if they sincerely try to draw near to God [CCC 847]. However, every single aspect of their partial intimacy with God depends on the full intimacy of Christ and his Catholic Church. [CCC 819]

Being Catholic has to be a free choice - God will force no one to be in intimate union with him: ''The soul only enters freely into the communion of love.'' [CCC 2002] However, if you really want FULL intimacy with God in this life, you must SPECIFICALLY be a Catholic. You must be baptized, and receive our Lord in the Most Holy Eucharist. That's why being Catholic is so important - and why you are so lucky to be Catholic.

You don't deserve it. You're not worthy of it. You're just lucky.

Christ will never force you to be with him in such an intimate, special, particular, specific way. Every day of your life, whenever you want, you can turn him down. You can walk away. It's your choice.

Yet every man, no matter who he is, can be as lucky as you, if he possesses the knowledge that he can be just as lucky as you, and if that's what he really wants. <<

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The ''minor prophets'' are twelve short prophetic books (many are just a few chapters long) that are grouped together in the Old Testament. They are:

Hosea
Joel
Amos
Obadiah
Jonah
Micah
Nahum
Habakkuk
Zephaniah
Haggai
Zechariah
Malachi

Within the Old Testament, the ''minor prophets'' are grouped together right at the

a.   beginning.
b.   middle.
c.   end.

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This is a question about the Law given Moses on Mount Sinai by which the people of Israel keep covenant with God. By the time of Jesus many in Israel had been led by devout Pharisees to believe [CCC 579] that

a.   fulfilling the letter of the Law would truly keep covenant with God.
b.   keeping the Law as best as you possibly could would keep covenant with God.
c.   only a perfect keeping of the Law would truly keep covenant with God.

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This is a question about the Law given Moses on Mount Sinai by which the people of Israel keep covenant with God. By the time of Jesus many in Israel believed, and the Jews still believe [CCC 578], that

a.   it has been impossible for Jews to avoid all sin and fulfill the Law perfectly.
b.   it is has not been necessary for Jews to avoid all sin and fulfill the Law perfectly.
c.   it has been possible for Jews to avoid all sin and fulfill the Law perfectly.

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This is a question about the Law given Moses on Mount Sinai by which the people of Israel keep covenant with God. Jesus [CCC 577]

a.   abolished it.
b.   did not abolish it.
c.   ignored it.

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This is a question about the Law given Moses on Mount Sinai by which the people of Israel keep covenant with God. Jesus [CCC 581]

a.   finds a way to ignore it while partially satisfying it.
b.   fulfilled it with such perfection that he revealed its ultimate meaning.
c.   left its fulfillment to the last day when he returns in judgment.

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This is a question about the Law given Moses on Mount Sinai by which the people of Israel keep covenant with God. Jesus [CCC 580-582]

a.   because he was God, did not subject himself to the Law.
b.   by his perfect observance redeemed the transgressions against it.
c.   obeyed the Law about as well as any good man can.

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It is just a fact that many Catholics who studied the Bible in centuries past really did seem to think that a pre-written book existed that was called ''What the Bible REALLY Means,'' and saw their task as reading THAT book INTO Sacred Scripture, particularly the Old Testament.

With such an attitude, the smallest minutiae in the Old Testament might become a ''proof'' of some fine point of Catholic doctrine, while at the same time, giant and obvious inconsistencies in the Scriptures (such as the animals being created before man in Gen 1, and after man in Gen 2), almost had to be ignored. They didn't fit the pre-written 'book' very well. Therefore, they didn't exist.

We might NEVER have discovered some of the true meaning of the Bible if that attitude had been allowed to continue forever. Roughly beginning in the nineteenth century, an increasing chorus of scholars, including Catholic ones, began to point out the errors in the traditional Catholic ways of finding the meaning of the Bible. >>

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We now pass over in silence roughly a century of defensiveness, pain, embarrassment, fury, etc. as the popes and bishops gradually decided (1943 is an important date here) that it was OK to study the Bible using approaches besides the traditional one.

This background is what Catholics who now study the Bible for a living remember (even if nearly all of them are far too young to have experienced it directly), but now the problem is the opposite one - finding too LITTLE meaning in the Bible.

Thus (for example), Catholic scholars today may say that Isa 11 ''obviously'' does not refer to Christ, and assert that claiming that it does refer to Christ is endorsing the old, bad habit of reading some other pre-written 'book' into the Bible. (If you have not read Isa 11 recently, read it now). >>

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