When most people get into the parts of the Bible were about to read now—especially in Leviticus and Numbers, with all the odd and obscure laws and regulations, they bail out.
And why shouldn’t they?
What does that have to do with us today?
These are the questions we are going to discuss in the latest lesson from Bible805 along with an explanation of the usefulness of Historical Context and Typology as tools to help us better understand the Bible.
Typology is an especially important tool to understand as you read through the Bible in chronological order. Please do check out the video on this lesson if you are able to as it has a very helpful visual illustration of the meaning of the terms “type” and “antitype” which Bible commentators often use, but without a clear explanation of what the terms mean can be very confusing.I trust this lesson will give you a clear explanation that will make this section you are reading, plus the rest of your Bible reading make more sense.
Below is the podcast, video, and notes of the Lesson. If at all possible, please take time to watch the video as the illustration on typology will make more sense when you can see it.
If you would like FREE, editable downloads of this material that you can modify and use to teach without attribution, go to the Bible805 Academy. Just click on the little search (magnifying glass icon) at the top of the page, type in the topic you want, hit enter, and it will bring up the various lessons and infographics on it.
Introductory questions
• When most people get into the parts of the Bible were about to read now—especially in Leviticus and Numbers, with all the odd and obscure laws and regulations, they bail out.
• And why shouldn’t they?
• What does that have to do with us today?
• We’ll talk about that along with some tools to help understand the Bible better in our lesson today.
Don’t Bail out!
How to understand the Old Testament Laws
using Historical Context and Typology
Why not bail out, why not skip the outdated laws and odd ceremonies?
• We’re all very busy today. We know reading the Bible is good for us, but this section of Bible reading about building the Tabernacle and all the laws and regulations, what does it have to do with us?
• Why are we taking time to read it?
• That’s a valid question and the answers are important to understand.
It is challenging reading
• But as with any challenge, there are rewards after completing it
• In the lesson today, I want to focus on two overall tools, that when you understand them will help you in your understanding not only of these books, but of your study of the Bible as a whole.
• The two tools are:
• Historical Context
• Typology
How understanding the Historical Context helps
• When you understand the historical setting, the actions people take in it make much more sense.
• The context gives meaning to the details.
• When you understand the historical context, you will be able to answer critics of the Bible—because quite a bit of the misunderstanding of these books is because they are pulled out of context.
Historical context
First example:
Misunderstanding of an Eye for an Eye
• “Eye for an eye” from Exodus 21:23–27 though reflective of some current laws of the time was revolutionary in that the same punishment applied to all people all classes.
• Hammurabi’s Code illustrates this point: “If a man has destroyed the eye of a man of the gentleman class, they shall destroy his eye …. If he has destroyed the eye of a commoner … he shall pay one mina of silver. If he has destroyed the eye of a gentleman’s slave … he shall pay half the slave’s price.” The Babylonians [and other ancient people] clearly did not live under a social system that treated all people equally. http://www.ushistory.org/civ/4c.asp
• It must have sounded astonishing to this group of former slaves that their justice or punishment would be the same no matter what their social status.
• We’ll talk about these more in our overviews of the books as we go through them.
Second Historical context example
• There are many laws on sexual purity in this section. In addition to showing us God’s standards for how to conduct our sexual lives, many of the laws make more sense when seen in a historical context.
• For example, in Egypt marriage between brothers and sisters and between other family members was common. God clearly shows in His laws that this was not acceptable for His people.
• Also, during that time and into New Testament times, pagan worship that often involved sexual rites.
• God clearly defined how His people were to worship Him and sexual practices in the temple and sexual prostitutes, the exploitation of both young men and women was forbidden.
Historical context of sacrifices
• In the surrounding pagan societies, when the Israelites moved into the land, there was widespread sacrifice of children.
• The worship of Molech required a live child be placed in the arms of a huge idol and burned as a sacrifice.
• Only animals were sacrificed by the Jews.
• And there was a specific way to sacrifice animals, a very humane way of killing them where the jugular vein of the animal was quickly severed and they would not feel pain (the blood is immediately cut off to the brain).
• We’ll talk more about the meaning of sacrifices later and in coming lessons, but the important thing now is that in the historical context, the sacrifices of the Jewish people were very different than those of the surrounding peoples’
The next term we’ll discuss is Typology
• Paul Krugman, economics writer for the New York Times, sometimes starts his articles with the phrase, “Wonking out” and then he gives the topic.
• An alternative phrase some use is “Geeking out”
• Regardless of the phrase used, he does that as a signal that this particular article is going to be more technical than others.
• In discussing typology in the Bible, what follows will be more technical than some of the lessons, so hang in there with me.
• While we are geeking out on the Bible, I want to first introduce an overall area of study that typology is part of and…..
That term is Hermeneutics
• Hermeneutics is the term used for the theory and methodology of interpreting the Bible.
• The origin of the term comes from the mythical Greek diety Hermes, who was the messenger of the gods and the inventor of speech and language, who was seen as both an interpreter and, also at times a liar.
• I realize this is not a particularly uplifting source for a key tool used to interpret the Bible, but that’s where the term came from. The term Hermeneutics itself doesn’t have theological meaning, but simply means a set of guidelines or tools for interpreting any religion or academic discipline.
• You can have Buddhist Hermeneutics, Talmudic Hermeneutics, hermeneutics to interpret all religions, plus hermeneutics for law, philosophy, and other academic disciplines.
• Our focus of course is on Biblical Hermeneutics.
Resource for further study and citation
• Henry A. Virkler, Hermeneutics
• As I mention this, one small note before I go on, but it’s important, and that is that Bible805 takes no advertising, no referral, no affiliate fees of any kind.
• I tell you about books or other resources I find genuinely useful with no other agenda.
• The only other materials I refer you to for sale are those I have created in eBooks, downloadable videos & resource packages, printables, and merch, the sale of which supports the Bible805 ministry. You can find links to these helpful resources at www.Bible805.com.
• But this book and many other resources I mention are because I think they would be useful to you.
From the book, Virkler’s Definition of Typology
• Henry A. Virkler, Hermeneutics
• Typology is based on the assumption that there is a pattern in God’s work throughout salvation history.
• To review, this is to be expected as God is the author of the ENTIRE Bible as he is God who exists outside of time and sees all from beginning to end.
Virkler’s definition goes on
• God prefigured his redemptive work in the Old Testament and fulfilled it in the New; in the Old Testament are shadows of things to be more fully revealed in the New. The ceremonial laws of the Old Testament, for example, demonstrated to Old Testament believers the necessity of atonement for their sins; these ceremonies pointed forward to the perfect atonement to be made in Christ. The prefigurement is called the type; the corresponding figure is called the antitype.
HERE IS WHERE IT GETS CONFUSING
• Because when you read many Biblical commentaries, they will talk about something being a “type” in the Old Testament, for example, the sacrificial lamb in the Old Testament was a “type” of Christ’s future death on the cross.
• So far, that makes sense, but then many commentaries go on to say that Christ’s death was the antitype.
• What??? Doesn’t antitype mean something that is the total opposite?
• That is what it means in common usage, but the Greek definition, (and I don’t know who started using this first, because it is really confusing) of the word “antitype” in this usage is actually
• Antitupos which means “corresponding as an impression to the die.”
• When I read that, it made sense to me! (bear with me –real geeking out here……
One of the many jobs I’ve had in my long work life is that of a publication designer
• Part of being a publication designer is an understanding of typography.
• The term antitupos “corresponding as an impression to the die.” makes perfect sense, when you think of it in terms of setting type
• When type is set, to the typesetter, it is often upside down and backwards, it is all there, but the type not easy to read.
• But when the impression, the print is made of the type, the antitupos, the meaning is clear. Two illustrations of this follow.
Another example
• English: the plate says – “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog and feels as if he were in the seventh heaven of typography together with Hermann Zapf, the most famous artist of the“
• Again, the original type is hard to read, though the content is there. Once printed (the impression, the antitype) the words are clear.
Typology expanded definition by Virkler
• A type is a shadow cast on the pages of OT history by a truth whose full embodiment or antitype is found in NT revelation:
• Example: John 3:14-15 As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up; so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life.
• Jesus points out two corresponding resemblances: 1) the lifting up of the serpent and of himself, and 2) life for those who respond to the object lifted up.
Henry A. Virkler, Hermeneutics
More about Types
• Both the type and antitype are thoroughly rooted in history-in actual events that have taken and will take place.
• They [types] are prophetic in nature, most often having to do with Christ.
• They are definitely designed as an integral part of redemptive history….not afterthoughts read back into the OT story.
• They may be only partially fulfilled, and more fulfillment is coming.
• From Baker’s Dictionary of Theology
• To emphasize this thought–as God is the author of types and antitypes, they are not something unintended that we read meaning in to later.
Specific example of how typology relates to the passages we are reading now
• The Jewish Tabernacle and all associated with it is commonly seen as a series of types of Jesus Christ. In other words, images that he will later specifically fulfill.
• Jesus describes himself as “the door” and the only “way” to God, there was only one day to get into the Tabernacle court.
• The sacrificial lambs—are the most significant representative.
• When John sees Jesus coming to be baptized, he says, “Behold the lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world”
• If you don’t read the story of the sacrificial lamb in the Old Testament you have no idea what he is talking about.
• But if you spent your whole life seeing innocent lambs sacrificed again and again or if you read it and it comes alive to your in that reading, when you hear John say those words the power of their meaning will come alive to you.
• Look ahead to Worthy is the Lamb who was slain. Rev. 5:12
Another example
• You’ll read about the veil that blocked the Holy of Holies from everyone in the O.T.
• Only the High Priest was allowed behind it once a year to make the sacrifice for sins.
• In Jesus day, the veil in the Temple in Jerusalem was 60 feet long, 30 feet high and 4 inches thick—massive, impressive, intimidating, blocking man from God until…
• Jesus, again crying out loudly, breathed his last. At that moment, the Temple curtain was ripped in two, top to bottom. There was an earthquake, and rocks were split in pieces. Matt. 27:50-53
• Access to God was now free and open.
• What had been a symbol, a type of separation, now became one of free access.
Expansion of the importance of Types
• . . .biblical typology, as evidenced in the writings of the New Testament, always involves a heightening of the type in the antitype.
• It is not simply that Jesus replaces the temple as a new but otherwise equal substitute. No, Jesus is far greater than the temple! It is not as though Jesus is simply another in the line of prophets with Moses, Elijah, Isaiah, and Jeremiah. No, Jesus is much greater than the prophets!
• It is not as though the new covenant replaces the old covenant as a more modern but equivalent alternative. No, the new covenant is far greater than the old covenant— “a better covenant” (Heb. 7:22)—rendering the old “obsolete” (8:13). The type, thus, is so heightened, escalated, or intensified in the antitype that by contrast it loses its own weight and significance. (my comment—why we are no longer under the Law, a greater fulfillment has come)
• https://www.equip.org/bible_answers/what-is-the-significance-of-biblical-typology/
• NOTE: this is also known as progressive revelation–God doesn’t tell us the whole salvation story at once, but part by part throughout history.
• I’ve wondered if part of that is a test to see if we are paying attention—it is very exciting when we see the parts fit together, and worth the effort to see these things.
Future Purpose of Types
• Article continues:
• Finally, it is important to point out that antitypes themselves may also function as types of future realities. Communion, for example, is the antitype (future fulfillment) of the Passover meal. Each year the Jews celebrated Passover in remembrance of God’s sparing the firstborn sons in the homes of the Israelite families that were marked by the blood of the Passover lamb (see Luke 22; cf. Exodus 11-12).
• Jesus’ celebration of the Passover meal with his disciples on the night of his arrest symbolically points to the fact that he is the ultimate Passover Lamb “who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29).
• Though the Last Supper and the corresponding sacrament of communion serve as the antitype [NT fulfillment] of the Passover meal, they also point forward to their ultimate fulfillment in “the wedding supper of the Lamb” (Revelation 19:9; cf. Luke 22:15-18). On that glorious day the purified bride–true Israel–will be united with her Bridegroom in the new heaven and the new earth (Revelation 21:1-2).
• https://www.equip.org/bible_answers/what-is-the-significance-of-biblical-typology/
Some practical reading suggestions
• I trust this explanation of Historical Context and Typology is useful, but you still have to read the books.
• Some advice:
• Don’t get bogged down or overwhelmed by them—read even if you don’t understand as you go along.
• Use a study Bible for additional historical notes, listen or watch these lessons, as I’ll share what I pray are useful insights.
• Always, remind yourself to pull back to the view of God outside history giving us these evidences that He is the author of our Salvation, that he designed these types to give the Old Testament believers a view of what is coming.
And we’ll study the types in the New Testament of what is coming for us in the future
• As the quote I shared said, there will be future fulfillment of things we only understand dimly now
• The reality of Jesus coming to earth was so much greater than the type of the Lamb sacrificed. That seemed a clear fulfillment and yet it took many years and many letters by the Apostle Paul and others to explain the fulfillment of that type. That isn’t the end of typology.
• After the confusion of this earth is over, there will be a time when we’ll experience the fulfillment of the types our Lord allowed us to see only faintly now. We’ll learn the meaning of many things that confused us and know the joy of the promises we long hoped for.
• I imagine we’ll have a lot to learn when the geeking out and guessing is over, when all the types become eternal reality and we see our Teacher and Lord, face to face.