A Well of Springing Water

Ever since I began this blog (two months ago yesterday), I have been making an on-going commentary on Margaret Barker’s book, Temple Themes in Christian Worship (London: T&T Clark, 2007). While I have greatly enjoyed this in-depth analysis of Barker’s research, I do not wish to be tedious and am anxious to cover new material. However, as I consider Barker’s work to be of extremely high caliber and of great interest to LDS readers, I highly recommend this book and all her others for your serious consideration. While all her books are excellent–and each deserves a look–her more recent books summarize, build upon and add to her older books. So if your book budget is limited and you are trying to decide which to look at, you would probably do very well to look at her most recent works.

Besides Temple Themes, I would also highly recommend The Hidden Tradition of the Kingdom of God (London: SPCK, 2007). This book seems to be hard to get a hold of here in the US (I have had to check it out from the university library). I have also heard that she will have a book released in October called Christmas: The Original Story, the exact content matter of which (besides the obvious) I am not certain. As Barker continues to write books at an amazing pace, you can look forward to more exciting and enlightening research from her.

Before reluctantly setting Temple Themes aside, I wish to share some further select tidbits that I found especially enlightening.

On page 151, Barker cites Theodotus, a Gnostic quoted by Clement of Alexandria, who taught that the Son of God was “drawn in outline in the beginning” (Excerpts 19). The beginning, naturally, refers to the period of (and before) the Creation–more specifically here, the spiritual creation. In the temple, according to Barker, this unseen spiritual reality was represented in the Holy of Holies. She notes:

The “beginning” was the holy of holies, and so he [Theodotus] tried to describe the non-material state as flat, existing only in “outline”. Sometimes this was described as the engraved state; each part of the creation had its own assigned place which was as much as ”engraved” as were the divine laws.

For more on this “engraved” state as the heavenly counterpart of the physical/mortal state, please see my post “Engraved on the Throne of Glory.” Another Gnostic text describes how the physical forms that we know were based on a pre-existent spiritual “pattern”:

The uncreated one brought forth the pattern of the uncreated, for it is from the uncreated that the Father brings forth into a shape. The created is a shadow of pre-existing things (Valentian Exposition, CG XI.2.35).

Animal Drawings by Giovannino de’ Grassi (d. 1398)

The idea that God used a spiritual pattern or outline to create the physical forms we see in this world is an important concept that Latter-day Saints should recognize from modern temple teachings.

Barker explains that the idea that a pre-existing, spirit God could become a physical man was a profoundly Jewish belief (see J. Neusner, The Incarnation of God: The Character of Divinity in Formative Judaism, Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1988).  Barker notes that “anthropomorphism…implies incarnation” (p. 153). The Babylonian Talmud, which was not effected by the Palestinian Jewish vs. Christian polemics over anthropomorphism, declared that “God became Man” (see Neusner, p. 166).

Barker provides an interesting theory on the question of how God was physically seen in his temple. This relates directly to my last post on the Psalms. To not leave out any of her amazing insight, I quote directly (pp. 160-161):

The Psalmist had seen the Glory of the LORD entering the temple in human form. He sang of the King of Glory entering the ancient doors (Ps 24:7–9).  He knew that the LORD was clothed with honour, majesty and light (Ps 104:1–2). He also sang of a great procession –singers and minstrels entering the temple with “my King, my God” (Ps 68:24–5). What had he seen? Elsewhere in his world he might have seen a statue dressed in golden robes being taken into a temple, but Jerusalem had no statues. The King, the royal high priest, was God with his people, Immanuel, and so the King of Glory entering the temple was probably the human king in his role as the visible presence of the LORD.  When there were no more kings in Jerusalem, the Aaronite high priest had that role, and the prescription for his vestments shows something of their original meaning. They were “for Glory and for beauty” (Exod 28:2), and the high priest wore the Name on his forehead (Exod 28:36-7). When Enoch stood before the throne in heaven…he was anointed and then vested with the Glory of the Lord…[including] “the garments of my Glory” (2 Enoch 22:8). The meaning of the vestments was long remembered: they had been the garments of God (Exodus Rabbah XXXVIII:8).

Ecclesiastical Embroidery depicting the Father in gold robes, holding the Son

Persisting traditions from ancient Israel declared that the very name Israel meant “the one who sees God.” Barker cites J.Z. Smith concerning the frequency with which Philo and other Jewish writers used this particular definition of “Israel”: “This ‘occurs twenty three times in the Philonic corpus, and is expressed or implied in some twenty six additional texts‘” (p. 154, citing J.Z. Smith, “The Prayer of Joseph” in Religions in Antiquity: Essays in Memory of E. R. Goodenough, ed. J. Neusner, Leiden: Brill, 1970, pp. 253-94, p. 265). Philo doesn’t argue why Israel should mean “the one who sees God”: he simply assumes that the meaning is well known. Modern scholars often discount this etymology, but Barker gives significant evidence that both many Jewish and Christian circles held this to be the true meaning (pp. 154-160). Furthermore, it is implied that the name Israel is more of a divine title than a personal name, as Philo refers to the prophet Samuel as “the seer of God, that is Israel” (Who is the Heir 78). Thus, there was an important tradition that survived into Christian times that God could be seen by mortals, and that this was a key feature of the religion of ancient Israel.

I have not presented any of the material from Chapters 7-9, which cover the Sacrament and music and their relation to/derivation from Temple themes. That is not because there is nothing noteworthy in these chapters, because there certainly is.  Again, I encourage you to take a look at the book (and no, Margaret Barker is not paying me to do advertising for her books).  I close this post and my commentary on Temple Themes in Christian Worship with the closing lines from Barker: 

If only we knew what Basil knew when he wrote about the tradition of the apostles handed down in a mystery!

All the mysteries concerned worship, and the overall pattern, as we have seen, can be traced back to the temple. As the Church lost touch with these roots, the practices acquired new explanations. The world of the temple also faded from view, and much that had been authentic temple tradition was identified as Platonism.

The details of this sketch need to be filled in, but there is enough here, I trust, to show where the roots of Christian worship and its world view are to be found. 

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