Deliverance from Slavery Historical Materialism Book Series Editorial Board Sébastien Budgen (Paris) Steve Edwards (London) Juan Grigera (London) Marcel van der Linden (Amsterdam) Peter Thomas (London) volume 110 The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/hm Deliverance from Slavery Attempting a Biblical Theology in the Service of Liberation By Dick Boer Translated by Rebecca Pohl leiden | boston First published in German by the Institut für Theologie und Politik (itp) as Erlösung aus der Sklaverei. Versuch einer biblischen Theologie im Dienst der Befreiung, Kompass Bd. 8, Münster, 2008. The translation of the present volume was supported with funds from the following foundations: Fonds Oosterbaan Stichting Zonneweelde This publication has been typeset in the multilingual “Brill” typeface. With over 5,100 characters covering Latin, ipa, Greek, and Cyrillic, this typeface is especially suitable for use in the humanities. 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For Ton Veerkamp, friend and comrade ∵ We are currently witnessing the collapse of two major interpretative traditions focused on history, or at least their loss of significance: Socialism and Christian- ity. Nobody can deny the part these two interpretative traditions have played in insulting life. But Christianity could always challenge Christians just as the idea of socialism could probe real socialism. Rosa Luxemburg and Francis of Assisi could never be buried entirely. Their subversive songs and stories survived, and were dug up again and again by different groups. A canon was in place, as were obligatory texts, even if they were frequently distorted or withheld. These texts demanded the world be interpreted from the perspective of the victims and the injured. But what happens when the culture that houses these texts declines? What happens when the groups who read and know such texts disappear? steffensky 2007 ∵ Contents Translator’s Note ix Foreword x Acknowledgements xviii Introduction 1 1 Text and Context 17 2 Canon 37 3 Exodus 44 4 Covenant 64 5 Creation 93 6 Anthropology (Gn 2–4) 120 7 Entry 147 8 The Real Israel 206 Postscript 1: Paul and the Messianic Community 227 Postscript 2: Though He Liberated Others, He Could Not Liberate Himself 258 References 273 Index of Authors 279 Index of Biblical References 281 Translator’s Note I have chosen a literal approach for the translation of this biblical theology in an attempt to preserve the rhythm and the tone of the source text as closely as possible. Crucially, though, the text is itself concerned with the process of both linguistic and conceptual translation, and the author privileges careful attention to etymology and concordance in his own translations from Hebrew and Greek. It seems only just to continue this practice in this further step of translation. Bible quotations have been translated by me based on the author’s own translations rather than making use of any existing Bible translation. The few instances where comparative work between authoritative versions grounds the analysis are marked as such. Where authorised English translations of other cited material were available, these have been used; all other instances have been translated by me. The bibliographic information at the end elucidates this case by case. I would like to express my gratitude to Dick Boer for the conversations that have marked this translation process. Rebecca Pohl Manchester, 2014 Foreword For better or worse, we will be Communists, letting ourselves be led forth from Christianity into an extraordinarily questionable movement, one which barely even still exists at the moment, but which might recur at any time. ∵ Dick Boer may properly be described as a theologian of the revolution, or rather, as a biblical theologian of the revolution. This title was first bestowed by Ernst Bloch on Thomas Müntzer, the theologico-political leader of the Peasant Revolution in the German states of the sixteenth century.1 I make this point, since some readers of earlier volumes of the Historical Materialism Book Series may be surprised to see an overtly theological, even biblical, work appear in the series. What has historical materialism to do with theology? Is theology not an esoteric practice, speaking of what does not exist? Is not religion the response to an alienated condition, so that our attention should instead be focused on those real, social and economic conditions? By now, it should not be necessary to argue for the importance of theology for historical materialism, but let me outline some basic facts before introducing this work by Dick Boer. First, theology is as much concerned with this world as any world beyond our sensory experience. As Dick Boer puts it, Christianity, like communism, is ‘the practical recognition that this new world cannot be found in castles in the air, but can be found in the old world as the active hope for the “kairos”’. In other words, theology is both secular and anti-secular – understanding ‘secular’ (from saeculum) as belonging to this world and this age. Theology’s traditional concerns with anthropology, the human condition, society, politics and history should make it clear that it has much to do with this human world. At the same time, it gives voice to dissatisfaction with the status quo: injustice persists, oppression continues, economic exploitation is still very much of our daily lives. So theology seeks a better world, one of justice, freedom and economic equality. Often that world is assumed to belong in a heaven, to which we go upon death. But that misses the resolutely theological focus on a renewed socio-economic formation here in this world. 1 Bloch 1969. foreword xi Second, theology is often torn politically between reaction and revolution. The very same system that easily supports tyrants and empires (Constantine was the first) also provides the means and inspiration for overthrowing such despots and their regimes. The most detailed exposition of the revolutionary side of Christianity remains Karl Kautsky’s under-studied Forerunners of Mod- ern Socialism.2 Kautsky explores in impressive breadth the tradition of revolu- tionary Christianity, through from the earliest Christians to his own day. After Kautsky, perhaps the most well-known recent expressions of this much longer tradition are the Latin American, black, feminist and queer liberation theo- logies, which arose in the 1960s and 1970s. Dick Boer clearly belongs to this revolutionary tradition, with its long and inspiring pedigree. Third, Boer is not merely a fellow-traveller with the socialist Left, a political theologian who is also a member of the communist party. He does not restrict himself to urging a politics of alliance, but rather argues that in the biblical theological tradition we may find one of the key influences and inspirations for the Left. In other words, revolutionary Christianity is actually the core of the biblical tradition. Thus, the ease with which the church and its ideologies have fallen in line with tyrannical regimes is a betrayal of that core. Boer challenges the assumption that theology and its institutions are by default reactionary and that resistance must come from the edges. Instead, he seeks to seize the centre and argue that it comprises the revolutionary truth of theology. With these three principles in mind, let us explore how Dick Boer goes about his task. Early on in the book, he writes: The purpose of the present biblical theology is to follow the canon and to follow it as regula fidei (‘the rule of faith’), as a guideline for what we can believe with respect to the story, when necessary – and it is often necessary – contradicting the factual course of history. This biblical theology follows the canon and hence proceeds from the Torah, in the sequence of the canon, which is also a hierarchy, the constitution, which founds the existence of the Liberator-God’s people. The ‘story’ (re)told by this biblical theology is that of the project ‘Israel’, which is conceived in the Torah, and the real Israel, called to execute this project. One’s initial impression is that such an approach is extraordinarily conven- tional (theologically speaking): the Bible in its canonical order is a guideline, 2 Kautsky 1976a [1895–7]; 1976b [1895–7]; Kautsky and Lafargue 1977 [1922]. This work has been only partially translated (Kautsky 1897). xii foreword the rule of faith – so one must follow its dominant narrative, which has been constructed by the framers of the canon. But now Boer gives this conventional approach a distinct twist, for the canonical biblical message is one of libera- tion, led by a liberator-God! The last sentence indicates the basic structure of Boer’s argument, which begins by tracing the plan of the ‘project’ called ‘Israel’, which subsequently must be enacted by the real or actually existing Israel. That the latter will make many mistakes and fail many times is to be expected, but the echo of ‘real’ or ‘actually existing socialism’ should not be missed.