Quote:
Originally Posted by Steel
Perhaps in one instance David was speaking according to his fallen flesh, and in another instance he was speaking according to the way of God.
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I appreciate the willingness of
Steel to offer what are often unpopular viewpoints on this forum. Without temporarily allowing differing views, and the prospect of mutual learning, it's hard to have a discussion (one strength of the NT group model is that it allows "much discussion", a la Acts 15:7, an experience singularly lacking in the local church, where only Witness Lee's opinion counted).
To re-phrase my thoughts, referencing the quote above: in Matthew 22:43 Jesus didn't say, "Perhaps David was in Spirit, writing of Messiah". No 'perhaps' about it. . . likewise, Paul didn't say that 'perhaps' the Psalms are the Word of Christ, and perhaps not; i.e. some are revelatory, some fallen human concepts. (Col 3:16).
Nowhere that I see in NT reception of Psalms are we invited to equivocate like this.
Witness Lee occasionally follows the clear NT pattern: the psalmist's invective against "my foes" and the ill-will shown is said to be indicative of Christ's struggle, and triumph, over forces of darkness (see Psalm 68 footnote). This has established gospel precedent: "Ah - what do we have to do with You, Jesus!?! Nazarene! Have you come to destroy us before our time?!?" (Mark 1:24; Matt 8:29). This is also consistent with the epistles: "We struggle not against flesh and blood but against spiritual forces" (Eph 6:12). In other words, there is indeed a fight going on, just not in the physical realm.
Then Lee capriciously abandons this pattern and pans the psalmist's struggle and suffering on its face: "No, that's just 'natural' David, being David." No reason given to the sudden and complete change of reception.
And it isn't just one or two isolated incidents. I went through the first 1/3 of the Psalms in a RecV and estimated well over half, maybe as high as three quarters of the text was summarily dismissed, the only occasional comments being that it's just "mixed sentiments" &c.
Second, and more important: the NT reception invites us to "see Jesus" in the OT text. For example, the extensive citations in Hebrews 1 and 2are followed by this open-door phrase in Hebrews 2:9. So when Lee pans David's Psalm 3, for example, he's not just making a snap judgment on some nearly-irrelevant text. Psalm 3 introduces Messiah's resurrection from the dead: "I laid me down and slept/I awaked, for the LORD sustained me" presages Jesus' "I have the power to lay My life down, and the power to take it up again" in the gospels.
Yet Lee shut the door and didn't allow his listeners to enter, either. Jesus said, "My sheep hear My voice" and in Psalm 3, as elsewhere in scripture, we're given the opportunity to hear the voice of the Shepherd. "Those who hear My voice will live" (John 5:25,28; cf 10:27). There's life in the Word, but in Lee's "Life-Study" he said there was no life there in the text, merely fallen human concepts. That's why I believe that Lee was the one entertaining erroneous human concepts, not the psalmist.
And we all err, of course. But usually we don't codify and institutionalize error the way Witness Lee did.