It is often thought that with the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh, God gave us a brand-new religion that came to be known as Christianity. Or one might think that “religion” as such was abolished, being entirely displaced by a personal relationship with God. This book thoroughly disabuses us of any such notion. The Incarnation, death, and Resurrection, of Christ, and the coming of His Holy Spirit to dwell in our midst, are events not that made a new religion from scratch, rather they are events within a continuum of the history of God’s relationship with his people over time – ancient Israel, the second Temple, and the Church. This should not in any way lead us to play down the significance of these events, rather it is to deepen our appreciation of their profundity. They were the fulfilment of promises made, and the transfiguration of the relationship that God and His people had since the beginning of time. Indeed, we must remember that the word St. Paul used in his Epistles to refer to the Church – ecclesia – is how the word for the assembly in the Old Testament is translated into Greek.
As an enquiry into the religion of the apostles, this book is connecting the faith practiced be the people of God, ancient Israel, before the coming of Christ, to the Church of the first century (and showing that the Orthodox Church is just a continuation of that way of life). Part of the book’s mission is Orthodox apologia, to be sure:
The patterns, and even details, of Orthodox worship are based on a consistent interpretation of God’s commandments in the Torah, now grasped more fully and deeply in Christ. New Testament worship did not start over with a clean slate after abandoning the worship of the Old Testament. The apostles applied the commandments of the Torah regarding worship to the Christian communities they founded. This apostolic worship is continued in the liturgical life of the Orthodox Church. This is the worship that God has given to humanity to allow them to make a pleasing offering to the Father, united to the Son, in the communion of the Holy Spirit. (p. 255)
However, it is an enlightening read for anyone who wants to deepen their understanding of the relationship between the Church and the Scriptures.
The book proceeds thematically and describes the ways in which the first-century apostles read the Hebrew Scriptures, and how they understood Christ and his works to be their fulfilment. Getting into the mindset of ancient Israel is therefore part of what the book invites the reader to do: to see Christ in the Old Testament, and the fulfilment of the Torah in the New Testament.
The Epistle to the Hebrews tells us that Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Heb. 13:8). The Person who appeared to Abraham, Jacob, and Moses is the same One who lived and ate with the apostles. The One who gave Moses the teaching of the Torah also explained it to His disciples and fulfilled in in His life and work. […] Through Christ, in the life of the Church, guided by the Holy Spirit, the commandments of the Torah can finally be fully lived out. The life of Christians in the Orthodox Church continues the way of life of the apostles and the earliest Christian communities. Even more, it continues the way of life that God established for His people from the very beginning. (p. 267)
Readers may be pleasantly astonished to find how much the person of Christ and the Holy Spirit feature in the Old Testament, and how much the Scriptures themselves reveal the Trinity to us – even before the Incarnation. This is the subject of chapters 1 and 2. The book then discusses the fall of man – and that of the angels, who would become the gods of the nations, to be victoriously overthrown by the first Saints of Jesus Christ (chs 3-5). The discussion of Creation (ch. 6) also shows the difference between our modern notions of existence versus non-existence, and the ancient notion of being versus chaos, and how that intervenes on our understanding of Creation as revealed in the Scriptures. The subjects of Atonement (ch. 7) and the Law and relationship between the Temple sacrifices, Christ’s sacrifice to end all sacrifices, and the institution of the eucharist (chs 8-9).
The book is dense, to be read and digested slowly. There are extensive references to the Scriptures (helpfully indexed), so it could be used as a companion to Biblical study. My personal hope is to one day see each of these chapters be made into a book unto itself, where more space can be given to explore all these important themes in greater detail. Those who are, like me, left hungry for more, there are plenty more wonderful books by Fr Stephen to read, alongside his blogs and podcasts.
By Basil Christmas