Luke 23:43 (meaning of PARADEISOS)
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Thu Oct 3 07:54:32 EDT 2002
At 1:28 PM +0300 10/3/02, Iver Larsen wrote:
> [omitted paragraphs]
>My thinking is that since Jesus is talking to a Jewish criminal, he would
>use a concept that this person could understand. If, as I am thinking,
>people at the time believed there were two places for the spirits of
>deceased persons, one being Hades/hell/the unquenchable fire/gehenna, the
>other being bosom of Abraham/paradise, then the criminal would understand
>which place he was promised to come to after death, without having an
>understanding of the details of Revelation.
>Paul's use of the word in 2 Cor 12:4 I would understand in the same sense,
>referring to the bosom of Abraham/paradise/the third heaven where the
>spirits of the saved/righteous people are. He does not tell us who he saw
>there in his spiritual journey or how it was.
>The third and final use in Revelation I take to refer to the new world after
>the PAROUSIA, so different aspects come into play. At the time referred to
>by Revelation, the paradise as a spiritual "forecourt" has been emptied,
>because these spirits have now received new bodies and moved to Heaven (the
>seventh heaven?). Then the scene is being set for a new kind of "paradise"
>that is much closer to the original Garden of Eden. What the two paradises
>have in common is that God is in complete control, only the saved/righteous
>have access to it, and there is no evil there. There are also some
>differences.
>
>That is how I see it at the moment,
While I have no way to disprove Iver's speculative account of meanings of
hO PARADEISOS in the GNT and especially in Lk 23:43, I have to express a
considerble measure of skepticism about the notion that there was a
distinct and "orthodox" or at least "standard" eschatological conception
prevalent withing first-century Judaism according to which hO PARADEISOS
(the Greek word standing for which Hebrew or Aramaic word?) indicates an
abode of the saved equivalent to "the bosom of Abraham." It's been several
years since I researched this matter, but my impression is that there were
two different views taught by the rabbis regarding the immediate
post-mortal condition: according to one of them the dead sleep (the GNT
refers to KOIMASQAI or the like) until the day or resurrection & judgment;
according to the other the righteous go immediately to a temporary heavenly
abode where they are "with God" but will come with the Messiah at the
end-time and participate then in the resurrection of bodies and final
judgment. What I seriously doubt is that there was any single "standard"
conception held by Jewish believers of all sects in Palestine and the
Diaspora. At any rate, I wonder why Iver is so confident of the view of hO
PARADEISOS that he has expressed--and that Jesus would have addressed the
criminal in the passage in question in terms of an eschatological
conception that is different from that which he himself held. I certainly
wouldn't claim that cannot be; I just don't see how it is demonstrable.
Here's the entry for hO PARADEISOS in BDAG;
PARADEISOS, OU, hO J (Old Persian pairidaêza [Avestan form; s. WHinz,
Altiranisches Sprachgut der Nebenüberlieferungen, '75, 179]='enclosure';
Hebr. sé;drAÚp. In Gk. X.+; gener. 'garden'; freq. pap., s. also New Docs
2, 201) in our lit., except GJs 2:4, not of any formal garden (as also
TestAbr A 4 p. 80, 23 [Stone p. 8, 23] ApcrEzk fgm. a) or park, but only
1. the garden of Eden, paradise (Gen 2f; Philo; Jos., Ant. 1, 37;
SibOr 1, 24; 26; 30; Iren. 5, 5, 1 [Harv. II 331, 3]; Orig., C. Cels. 7,
50, 31; Hippol., Did., Theoph. Ant. 2, 22 [p. 154, 21]), lit. Dg 12:3, and
in the same connection fig., of those who love God, hOI GENOMENOI
PARADEISOS TRUFHS who prove to be a luscious paradise, in so far as they
allow fruit-laden trees to grow up within them 12:1 (cp. PsSol 14:3).
2. a transcendent place of blessedness, paradise (hO PARADEISOS THS
DIKAIOSUNHS appears as such En 32:3; cp. 20:7; TestLevi 18:10; SibOr fgm.
3, 48 and other passages in the OT pseudepigrapha not preserved in Gk., as
well as other sources in the lit. given below.-Dssm., B 146 [BS 148]) Lk
23:43 (JWeisengoff, EcclRev 103, '40, 163-67). hWS EN PARADEISWi AcPl Ha 3,
23. More fully hO PARADEISOS TOU QEOU v (Gen 13:10; Ez 28:13; 31:8; PGM 4,
3027 EN TWi hAGIWi hEAUTOU (=QEOU) PARADEISWi) Rv 2:7. hARPAZESQAI EIS TON
PARADEISON be caught up into Paradise 2 Cor 12:4.-S. on OURANOS 1e and
TRITOS 1a. Further, Bousset, Rel.3 282ff; 488ff; PVolz, D. Eschatologie der
jüd. Gemeinde im ntl. Zeitalter '34, 417f; Billerb. IV 1118-65; Windisch on
2 Cor 12:4; AWabnitz, Le Paradis du Hadès: RTQR 19, 1910, 328-31; 410-14;
20, 1911, 130-38.-DELG. M-M. TW.
--
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Emeritus)
Most months: Most months: 1989 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828)
675-4243
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu OR cwconrad at ioa.com
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/
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