We all know that Moses was one of God's most beloved and important servants of all Salvation History, yet there is something unsettling about God excluding Moses from entering the Promise Land. We know from Numbers 20 and Deuteronomy 32 that God's reasoning for not allowing Moses to enter was because Moses lost his temper at the Israelites and in frustration struck the rock from which water flowed.
Deut 32:48-52 & 34:1-12. The Lord spoke to Moses, “Go up this mountain of the Abarim, Mount Nebo, and view the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the people of Israel for a possession. And die on the mountain which you go up, because you broke faith with me in the midst of the people of Israel at the waters of Meribah and because you did not treat me as holy in the midst of the people of Israel. For you shall see the land before you, but you shall not go there.” Then Moses went up to Mount Nebo. And the Lord showed him all the land of Judah as far as the western sea. And the Lord said to him, “This is the land of which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. I have let you see it with your eyes, but you shall not go over there.” So Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of Moab. And the people of Israel wept for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days. And Joshua the son of Nun was full of the spirit of wisdom, for Moses had laid his hands on him. So the people of Israel obeyed Joshua.
As a rule of thumb, when something strange, outrageous, or even troubling happens in the Old Testament, this is often a sign that there is a New Testament lesson hidden therein (this is called Typology). A good example is when God told Abraham to sacrifice his only-begotten son Isaac, which is an outrageous command for God to tell someone to do. Yet, we see from this outrageous event that it was preparing us for an even more outrageous event, namely God giving His Son die on the Cross. In this case of Moses not being able to enter the Promise Land, there's a wonderful Catholic Youtube / blog called Reason & Theology (subscribe to it!) wherein the host Michael Lofton explains:
It was fitting that God prevented Moses from entering the Promised Land, so that we would know the Law of Moses could not bring us to the eternal Promised Land, but merely pointed us to it. It was, in fact, Joshua who brought the people to the Promised Land, so that we would know another Joshua (Yehoshua) would bring us to our eternal reward.
The second-in-command for Moses was Joshua, which in Hebrew is the same name for Jesus. He was ordained by Moses to become the new leader of Israel, who will mightily lead them into the Promise Land. So hidden within this apparently unfair narrative of excluding Moses is the bigger lesson that the Law of Moses only gets us to a certain point in Salvation (e.g. recognition of our sinfulness), and it is up to Jesus to take us the rest of the way (i.e. Heaven). If you don't see this New Testament lesson as the primary point of Moses being excluded, then I don't think you can ever come to a satisfying answer.
As a funny but very relevant side note, today the Times of Israel published a story of some "controversial remarks" from Pope Francis! It turns out some Rabbis were upset with what Francis had said in a homily! Here's the relevant portion:
Francis said: “The Law does not give life, it does not offer the fulfillment of the promise because it is not capable of being able to fulfill it. The Law is a journey, a journey that leads toward an encounter… Those who seek life need to look to the promise and to its fulfillment in Christ.”Rabbi Arusi sent a letter on behalf of the Chief Rabbinate to Cardinal Kurt Koch, whose Vatican department includes a commission for religious relations with Jews. “In his homily, the pope presents the Christian faith as not just superseding the Torah; but asserts that the latter no longer gives life, implying that Jewish religious practice in the present era is rendered obsolete,” Arusi reportedly wrote in the letter. “This is in effect part and parcel of the ‘teaching of contempt’ towards Jews and Judaism that we had thought had been fully repudiated by the Church.”
In a humorous twist of events, this is a time when Pope Francis says something controversial that all Christians and Protestants can agree upon!
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| Moses ordaining Joshua as his successor |
3 comments:
Great post! This is one of the few blogs I follow.
I was trying look if you have any posts on the topic of universalism (apocatastasis) but didn't find any. Proponents of universalism use Scripture and argue by highlighting that the Greek rendering of "eternal" depends on the context. For me this seems very problematic.
One thing that I do find interesting is that Christ overcame death and will destroy it at the end of time. If the interpretation here is simply only about physical death then there is no problem. However, if it is also about spiritual death then how would this make sense with persons who are eternally damned?
I haven't really written on universalism, mostly because I think it's been covered by other sources many times. Aside from some alleged quotes from St Gregory Nyssa (which I've never bothered to look into), the whole Christian tradition has been firm that Hell is real and that a number of people will be there. If anything, it is best to assume the worst, and thus live as if Hell is real, rather than try to build up some questionable theology like universalism.
That said, I wouldn't be surprised if there was some great healing in God's Plan, where people in Hell (basically people still in God's presence but experiencing Him in a negative manner, like those who get sunburned from the sun) somehow move up to a more reconciled place, even if it isn't Heaven as we "know" it. There is something somewhat troubling from a "Reasonable" perspective to think that most of humanity will end up as a "win" for Satan, or even most Baptized people. So I would want to think that God has the "math" worked out such that the 'right amount' of people are saved, since otherwise it could come off as a Pyrrhic Victory.
Even the Catholic Encyclopedia has this to say on Predestination:
//But it would be idle and useless to undertake calculations and to guess at so and so many millions or billions of predestined. St. Thomas (I, Q. xxiii, a. 7) mentions the opinion of some theologians that as many men will be saved as there are fallen angels, while others held that the number of predestined will equal the number of the faithful angels.
Lastly, there were optimists who, combining these two opinions into a third, made the total of men saved equal to the unnumbered myriads of berated spirits. But even granted that the principle of our calculation is correct, no mathematician would be able to figure out the absolute number on a basis so vague, since the number of angels and demons is an unknown quantity to us. Hence, "the best answer", rightly remarks St. Thomas, "is to say: God alone knows the number of his elect". By relative number is meant the numerical relation between the predestined and the reprobate. Will the majority of the human race be saved or will they be damned? Will one-half be damned the other half saved? In this question the opinion of the rigorists is opposed to the milder view of the optimists. Pointing to several texts of the Bible (Matthew 7:14; 22:14) and to sayings of great spiritual doctors, the rigorists defend as probable the thesis that not only most Christians but also most Catholics are doomed to eternal damnation. Almost repulsive in its tone is Massillon's sermon on the small number of the elect. Yet even St. Thomas (loc. cit., a. 7) asserted: "Pauciores sunt qui salvantur" (only the smaller number of men are saved). And a few years ago, when the Jesuit P. Castelein (Brussels, 1899) impugned this theory with weighty arguments, he was sharply opposed by the Redemptorist P. Godts. That the number of the elect cannot be so very small is evident from the Apocalypse (vii, 9).
When one hears the rigorists, one is tempted to repeat Dieringer's bitter remark: "Can it be that the Church actually exists in order to people hell?" The truth is that neither the one nor the other can be proved from Scripture or Tradition. But supplementing these two sources by arguments drawn from reason we may safely defend as probable the opinion that the majority of Christians, especially of Catholics, will be saved. If we add to this relative number the overwhelming majority of non-Christians (Jews, Mahommedans, heathens), then Gener is probably right when he assumes the salvation of half of the human race, lest "it should be said to the shame and offence of the Divine majesty and clemency that the Kingdom of Satan is larger than the Kingdom of Christ" (Paderborn, 1908).//
I too haven't checked those alleged St. Gregory of Nyssa quotes partly because no one ever actually cites them. Well, proponents of universalism do think Hell is real and a place of unimaginable pain, just not everlasting.
Interesting how you mentioned that. I first came across that idea from Peter Geach who proposed that in one sense those in hell will think "this will never end" while the blessed will one day say "thank God that is over." I forget his exact explanation but its in his book "Providence and Evil." Also, I'm starting to view Predestination as God's ordering of persons to different degrees of intimacy with Him.
I think I agree with you. Thanks for the response.
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