The Self-Donation of God. Jack D. Kilcrease

The Self-Donation of God - Jack D. Kilcrease


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was previously noted in the introduction, the Abrahamic covenant stands in a kind of existential conflict with the Sinaitic covenant. The Sinaitic covenant is bilateral and therefore demands obedience on the part of Israel for its fulfillment. This means it demands the self-dedication and the self-giving of Israel to YHWH. The history of the Fall and the exodus narratives clearly demonstrate that Israel cannot do this. Furthermore, Deuteronomy 27–32 (after the Sinaitic covenant’s restatement and renewal in the second generation) emphasizes the impossibility of the fulfillment of the covenant (without the circumcision of the heart, see 30:6) and plans for the covenant’s obsolescence. The Abrahamic covenant, on the other hand, involves the self-donation of God and giving of the divine being to his people in the form of a promise. To engage in an act of unilateral promise is an act of self-donation. By making such a promise, God pledges his entire being to the task of fulfilling the terms of the promise. The biblical texts recognize this and therefore in making covenants (Gen 22:16) and sending forth his redemptive Word of grace (Isa 45:23), God repeatedly states: “I swear by myself.” Particularly within the cultural context of the Ancient Near East, to swear by one’s self is therefore to give the whole self over to curse and death, as we observed in the covenantal ceremony of Genesis 15.125

      The choices of blood atonement and animal sacrifice are important for a number of other reasons. First, since blood contains life, it cries out and thereby gives a testimony. When Cain kills Abel, God tells Cain, “The voice of your brother’s blood is crying to me from the ground” (4:10). Later the Epistle to the Hebrews tells us that Christ’s blood also cries out and thereby “Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel” (Heb 12:24, emphasis added). Living blood therefore gives testimony of forgiveness that has been paid for. In the case of covenants, it also stands as a witness to the truthfulness of the divine promise.


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