A few people have been asking me whether I plan to do regular posts on New Testament Sunday School topics, as I had been doing with the OT.  I would have to say that my tentative answer is either “maybe” or “probably not.” While I would love to do so, this semester at school is proving to be my busiest ever and I can’t imagine myself having enough time to dedicate to writing anything that would be worthwhile sharing. However, I do hope to find relevant materials that I can point you to as often as possible.

The content of this post was prepared and sent to me by my friend Dean Hunsaker. I appreciate him taking the time to research this important question.

The Problem of John 3:13

John 3:13

NIV No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man.

NASB No one has ascended into heaven, but He who descended from heaven: the Son of Man.

NLT No one has ever gone to heaven and returned. But the Son of Man has come down from heaven.

NRSV No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man.

KJV And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven.

Is Jesus saying that no one ever has ascended into heaven?

What about OT ascent stories like — Enoch (Genesis 5:24; Hebrews 11:5), Moses (Exodus 24:9–11; 34:29-35); Elijah (2 Kings 2:11); Isaiah (Isaiah 6:1–8); or Ezekiel (Ezekiel 1; 10)?

Further, what is the point of the thrice-yearly ritual ascent to the temple to “see the face of the LORD” (Exodus 23:15, 17; 34:20, 23, 24; Deuteronomy 16:16; 31:11; 1 Samuel 1:22; Psalms 42:2; Isaiah 1:12) when real ascent isn’t possible?

What about other ascent into heaven stories:

New Testament (Acts 8:39; 2 Corinthians 12:2, 4; 1 Thess 4:17; Revelation 1-22).

BoM (1 Nephi 1:8; 11:1, 19; 14:13; 15:1; 2 Nephi 4:25; Alma 19:6; 3 Nephi 28:13, 36; Ether 3:1-14).

D&C (D&C 76; 137).  PoGP (Moses 1:1; Moses 6:64; Moses 7:27).

Other (Apocalypse of Moses 37:5; Apocalypse of Abraham 12:10; Wisdom of Solomon 4:11; 1 Enoch 39:3-4; 52:1; 2 Enoch 7:1; 3 Apocalypse of Baruch 2:2).

Is Jesus saying that it is impossibile for human beings to ascend into heaven — no one has or ever will? Does he agree with the Midrash on Exodus 19:20 “Neither Moses nor Elijah ever went up to heaven, nor did the Glory ever come down to earth”? (Mekilta de Rabbi Ishmael, trans. J. Z. Lauterbach [Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1976], 2:224; compare Deut 30:12; Baruch 3:29; 2 Esdras 4:8).

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Does the Greek text Help?

Greek /English

kai / And

oudeis / no man

anabebeken / hath ascended up

eis ton ouranon / to heaven,

ei me  / but

ho / he

ek tou ouranou / that from heaven,

katabas  / came down

/even

ho huios / the Son

tou anthropou / of  man

ho on en to ourano / which is in heaven.

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Greek Helps:

GR “anabebeken” means literally “to go up” and is commonly translated “arise,” “ascend,” and “climb.”

GR “ei me” means literally “if not” and is commonly translated, “but,” “except (that).”

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What does the text mean?
1. NLT: No one else has ever gone to heaven and returned, but Jesus.
2. Local Context: Jesus doesn’t mean “no one” throughout time, he means there is “no one” Nicodemus can talk to that has ascended to heaven, but Jesus.
3. Context: The new birth isn’t brought on through heavenly ascent and descent of Moses or Elijah, but by the ascent and descent of the Son of Man.
4. D&C 88:6: The purpose of ascent into heaven is to descend and teach what was learned, like Jesus did.
5. Prov 30:4: Jesus is inviting Nicodemus to answer the question, Who can of their own power ascend into heaven, or descend? What is his name, and what is his son’s name? Surely you know! (BTW, Moses, Enoch and others were “taken up” they did not “climb” on their own power).

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Dean has presented the question here very well and offered some possibilities for how we can interpret Jesus’ words. Does anyone have any further insights into this question?  Was Jesus denying the possibility of heavenly ascent or did he mean something else altogether?

I won’t offer my own explanation at this point, but I just recently read a great answer to the question posted by BYU Professor William Hamblin as part of his “An Enigmatic Mirror” column on Patheos. You can check out the specific post here.

It has come to my attention (via her blog Forbidden Gospels) that Rice University Professor of Biblical Studies, April DeConick, will be a part of an extended research seminar that will be studying how different religions/cultures have prepared themselves for the “afterlife journey” that they anticipate having to traverse at death, including religious teachings and practices.

From her blog:

The semester is a week advanced and this year I am facilitating a Mellon Seminar. The topic? Mapping Death: Religious Preparations for the Afterlife Journey. The Seminar consists of myself, five graduate students from various departments (Religious Studies, French Studies, and Anthropology) and a webmaster. We are in the process of developing a webpage for the Seminar, so if you are interested you can track our progress.

Each student has an individual research project to work on, and then we are collaborating in terms of method and theory, sharing our approaches with each other. It is an exciting seminar and I am so pleased to be part of it. My own individual research project involves mapping ancient Gnostic metaphysics and praxis.

Here is a short description of the seminar:

This is a collaborative research seminar consisting of fellows working on cross-culturally mapping death journeys and religious preparations for them in order to investigate the relationship between the anticipated afterlife journey and the group’s metaphysics and praxis. The fellows will be engaged in the creation and cultivation of a rich interdisciplinary approach to the comparative study of traditions, a ‘new’ history-of-traditions approach that is conscious of the historical contexture of traditions, their referentiality, confluence, communal generation and conveyance, responsiveness, changeability, accumulative nature, and variability in transmission. Members will be working on individual research projects related to the seminar’s mission and their dissertations. At the end of the year, they will present their final projects in a roundtable symposium that also will feature invited papers from three external scholars who will visit the seminar at various sessions during the Spring semester. The papers from the symposium will be edited for publication in a volume.

I will be keeping a close eye on this seminar to see what they up with and look forward to the subsequent publication. This is an important topic and the research done will be significant for anyone interested in Temple studies (and Heavenly Ascents!) — preparation for the “afterlife journey” is one of the main purposes of the Temple, both ancient and modern.

I have met April DeConick and some of her graduate students and I highly respect the work that they do there at Rice University. You can expect it to be very professional and methodologically sound.

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Steve:

I’m new to your Heavenly Ascents blog – it looks fascinating and well researched.

I have two questions, if you would be kind enough to consider them: I was introduced to the ascent motif via the work of the late Morton Smith, who postulated that a mystical method of heavenly ascent was extant in Jesus’ time and that Jesus and his disciples may have had some personal experience with this practice. I realize that some of Smith’s statements were likely issued with a twinkle in his eye (did he forge Secret Mark, etc.), but he does seem to make a serious case for ascent in Jewish culture even before Jesus’ time, e.g., he points out that at least one other person “ascended” – one member of the DSS community, as reported in 4Q 491, who claimed to have ascended into the angelic assembly and to have gained divine wisdom thereby.

First question: But there are claims that most Jewish ascent literature came after Jesus’ time, too late to influence and/or be expressive of primitive Christian beliefs. I am unclear on this timeline. Some say, for example, that some of this literature was too late to have been strongly influential in nascent “Jewish Christianity”, with Enoch maybe dating from that time but maybe from a later time. So would you be able to firm up for me the time frame of ascent literature as it might bear on the religion of Jesus, his disciples, and their Jewish successors, say, until after the Second Revolt in CE 135? I.e., can we date extra-biblical ascent literature from Jesus’ own lifetime up until just after the final Jewish War?

The second question concerns what, from my admittedly meager reading, poses a mystery vis a vis the Jewish nature of ascent literature. I understand that with the rise of rabbinical Judaism post-Jamnia, orthodoxy was stressed, e.g., per Alan Segal, the rabbis came down on anything smacking of a “Two Powers in Heaven” belief, beliefs concerning a Chief Assisting Angel, and beliefs about God’s human form or “Kavod”. What puzzles me is that post-70 ascent literature – IF Jewish – seems to be replete with just those kinds of beliefs that were being more and more strongly condemned by the rabbis. Do we conclude from this (if my assumption is correct) that ascent authors and communities were not Jewish; or if they were Jewish, they were by definition heretical? And if they were heretical, by what means were these ideas promulgated and texts preserved?

Thanks for your consideration.

Regards,

Steve Bastasch¹

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Me:

Dear Mr Bastasch,

Thank you for your excellent and very relevant questions. Before I give my response, just as a forewarning, although my website is called Heavenly Ascents, I cannot claim to be an expert (yet!) on the topic, so bear that in mind as I give you my best answers to your questions.

I will begin by saying (and this may shape your opinion of my overall answer!) that in my estimation, the ascent to heaven motif is of great antiquity, much older even than the mentions attested to in the Qumran texts. It may not have been conceived of in exactly the same ways that it is later expressed in the Christian era, but I think that later texts build on these earlier attestations of the motif.

When I say much older, I believe that a form of heavenly ascent was practiced as a ritual in the pre-exilic times, the First Temple period. I base this conclusion partially on what I see as evidence for the idea in the liturgical setting of some of the Psalms. I believe that psalms such as 24, 47, 68, 118, and 132 (and others, cf. 139:8) describe a procession(s) that involved ascending the temple mount in order to reach the throne of God in the Temple. The Hebrew word for ascent (ʽālâ), is often used in this context. The expressed purpose of the ascent, according to Psalm 24:6, was to “seek the face of the God of Jacob” (see RSV or similar translation). The features of this ritualized ascent share many of the same features as the later ascent narratives, including passing through gates with guardians (Pss. 15, 24, 118 imply that there is a question-and-answer dialogue between those desiring to be found worthy of entry and the gatekeepers), seeing the Lord on his throne (Ps. 24:6; cf. Isa. 6, etc.), exaltation and enthronement of the individual (Pss. 2, 110, 89, etc.), and other similar features. While I can’t give a full description here, I believe that all this describes a practice of a primitive heavenly ascent ritual. The holy mountain with the temple at its pinnacle, while obviously located physically on earth, represented the mountain of God that reached into the heavens upon which God’s throne was located.

Whether one accepts these ideas and others in the Hebrew Bible as authentic precursors to the later ascent literature or not, I think there is still very good evidence that the belief in and practice of heavenly ascent was common in Jewish circles well before the Christian era. You mention the works of Morton Smith — he did some good research on this topic. However, you should take a look at the more recent work of James Davila in his article on heavenly ascents in the Dead Sea Scrolls in The Dead Sea Scrolls after Fifty Years: A Comprehensive Assessment (vol. 2; Brill, 1999), edited by Peter Flint and James VanderKam. Besides the one example of the anonymous figure ascending that you mention (4Q 491), Davila cites five other examples of ascent found at Qumran, including narratives of the heavenly ascent of Enoch, Melchizedek, Levi, Methuselah, and perhaps also Noah (4Q534) and Moses (4Q374, although this text is very unclear). Besides these, there are phrases from some of the sectarian literature that perhaps assume a belief in heavenly ascent. For example, in the Hodayot there are lines such as “You have exalted his [man's] glory beyond flesh” (7:21) and “[s]ons of God to be united with the sons of heaven” (frg. 2 10) and 11:19-23 where the speaker claims to have been “raised eternally to an exalted realm in communion of praise with the angels” (quoting Davila’s summary). Although the nature of the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice is much debated, and Davila expresses doubts in this article, elsewhere he and also other scholars such as Crispin Fletcher-Louis, have described this text as possibly narrating a heavenly ascent ritual performed at Qumran. In the Davila article above, he emphasizes the fact that there seems to be a “ritual context” and “experiential component” behind these ascent texts. For me, this is all pretty clear evidence for the practice of a heavenly ascent ritual before the time of Jesus Christ. If you look at some of the works of Old Testament scholar Margaret Barker, this is the assumption that she is working with as well.

As far as the age of the Enochic literature, I follow the general opinion that the oldest sections of 1 Enoch were likely written around 300 BC and the latest sections around the first century BC. Martha Himmelfarb, in her classic Ascent to Heaven in Jewish and Christian Apocalypses considers 1 Enoch’s “Book of the Watchers” (ca. 3rd Century BC) to be the earliest “ascent apocalypse”. 2 Enoch, which has a much clearer account of the ascent to heaven, is a much later text, probably from the first century AD. It is debatable whether this is originally a Jewish or Christian text. Coming up with a timeline for specific texts is very tricky and scholars have widely diverging opinions on when some of these texts were originally penned and by what group — Jewish or Christian. There certainly seems to be a blooming of this type of literature in the first few centuries of the Christian era, and these texts are preserved more often by the hands of Christians than Jews — this fact, however, does not mean that they were not originally written by Jews, and it is possible that some of these texts are considerably older than the attested examples. It is very difficult to tell. I’m sorry that I don’t have more specific details for you, but in my opinion, we can be quite certain, based on the examples I mentioned above and others, that the ascent idea was quite prevalent in at least some Jewish circles well before the time of Christ, and may have even been a main feature of the pre-exilic Israelite religion. Although Martha Himmelfarb is one that would perhaps deny this, I also believe that beyond, and perhaps in some cases accompanying, the ancient narratives regarding ascent, there was also an ascent praxis.

For a great treatment of the idea of the “mysteries” in connection with human access to the divine council at Qumran, see Samuel I. Thomas’s very recent book, The “Mysteries” of Qumran: Mystery, Secrecy, and Esotericism in the Dead Sea Scrolls. It doesn’t go into the “heavenly ascent” idea in much detail, but I think connections with ascent literature are not hard to make.

Why do we get so much talk of chief angels and the anthropomorphic Kavod in the ascent literature? My opinion is that these ideas are perpetuations of very old motifs that for some reason are well-preserved in this type of literature. If you look at the studies of scholars like Gabriele Boccaccini and others, you get the idea that there was a much larger degree of pluralism in early Judaism than most imagine. There seem to have been several different Jewish sects (even beyond the Pharisee, Sadducee, Essene, etc. divisions that we usually hear about). Some scholars claim that some of these Jewish sects preserved the older Israelite religion better than others. In the Second Temple period, some of the mainstream groups seemed to be very interested in reforming and reshaping the Jewish religion — censoring older ideas that they now found heretical. Theoretically, many of these ideas that they wanted to discard involved the possibility of heavenly ascent, of seeing God on his throne, of any “Two Powers” notions, etc. It seems that these issues were hotly debated well before the rise of Christianity. According to some, this may have been why the “sectarians” went to Qumran. The religious tenets that they held to had become unacceptable by the mainstream. Rabbinical Judaism would develop out of this mainstream of “Zadokite” Judaism and would continue to try to purge Jewish culture of these beliefs that they found heretical. It appears that the early Christians had beliefs that were in line with, or similar to, some of these “other” Jewish groups that were unacceptable to the Rabbis.

I don’t believe that all of the post-70 ascent literature was Christian. I think that a lot of it was originally Jewish, but that it came from Jewish groups that were outside of the Rabbinic mainstream. I think a lot of the literature was eventually preserved only by Christians because they had very similar beliefs and because the Jewish groups that would have possibly written the texts and could have preserved them eventually waned under Rabbinic suppression. However, we do see that there were Jewish circles that did preserve many of these more “mystical” ideas into medieval times and beyond (e.g. merkavah mysticism, hekhalot texts, Kabbalah, Sefer Yetzirah, Zohar, etc.). It seems that some of the groups that preserved these traditions were more ascetical and priestly and were generally opposed by the Rabbis. If you look at E.R. Goodenough’s work on the Dura Europos synagogue, which is full of mystical and ascent motifs, you can get an idea for how and by whom some of these ideas were perpetuated in Jewish circles. I believe that both Christians and these “sidelined” Jewish groups preserved this material because they believed that it was part of a more authentic ancient Israelite belief system that had roots in the First Temple period and that had not been so altered by reformers.

For more on this line of thinking, see Margaret Barker’s The Older Testament, The Great Angel: A Study of Israel’s Second God, Temple Themes in Christian Worship, or pretty much any other book of hers.

I’m sorry if my thoughts here are more general than specific, but feel free to ask me any further questions. I would enjoy further discussing these ideas.

Cheers,

David

1. Author’s name reproduced with permission

Having said that, I don’t think that I will ever be a masterful producer of great YouTube videos — although I have a blog and try to take advantage of some of the technologies involved, I am not really that savvy when it comes to all this technical stuff.  I have uploaded two videos so far, both of which are based on blog posts from way back in June 2008, soon after I began this blog.  I will be the first to recognize that they are not of an especially high quality.  However, I do take courage in the fact that, in my opinion, the second one is quite a bit better than the first. I will post them here so that you can judge for yourselves.  They are based on the first two posts of my analysis of Margaret Barker’s book Temple Themes in Christian Worship. (And if you find these videos to be really pathetic, I am totally with you — let’s all hope that I can learn from my mistakes and produce something better in the near future).

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Besides (occasionally) uploading material of my own, I intend to gather some of the best videos I can find and put them together on my YouTube channel.  I have been placing them in playlists that cover various categories, including “The Church of Jesus Christ,” “Old Testament Studies,” “Book of Mormon Studies,” “Temples,” and more. These categories will likely change and expand as I find more videos to add to my channels. Due to my busy schedule, my collection will probably grow rather slowly — but I promise to share any and all great videos that I come across.

You can check out my channel by going to: http://www.youtube.com/user/davidjlarsen01

To see my several playlists, you may have to click on the “Playlists” button at the top of the screen, in the center.

To see all of my own videos that I have uploaded, click on “Uploads.”

Also, there is the option to “subscribe” to my channel so that you will be notified whenever I post a new video.

While visiting my channel, if you scroll down the page a bit you can see a list of other channels that I think are especially noteworthy. Please click on the links to those channels as well, as they all have really great content (much better than mine).  Even if you’re not much of a YouTuber, I can assure you that you will find some very enlightening and inspiring material on these channels.

If anyone has any suggestions or tips for me regarding how I can make more interesting, exciting, or helpful videos, please contact me. I will happily accept any criticisms, comments, or complaints.

Bryce Haymond over at www.templestudy.com has posted his notes from Dr. Daniel Peterson’s fireside Sunday on “The Temple as a Place of Ascent to God.” This, of course, is one of my favorite topics and I really wish I could have been there to hear Dr. Peterson speak. Bryce, however, has taken some incredible notes accompanied by some awesome diagrams and images that are the next best thing to being there.

According to Bryce’s notes, Dr. Peterson touched on very important and exciting topics, including:

• Ascent Stories
• Mountains of the Lord
• Temple Worthiness
• Temple Structure
• Temple as Garden of Eden
• Washings/Anointings
• Veils

I won’t elaborate here, but rather will direct you to take a look at Bryce’s great post at the following link:

http://www.templestudy.com/2009/07/15/temple-place-ascent-god-notes-dr-petersons-fireside/#more-1677