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Ἕλλην (Hellēn): Jew and Greek Under One Gospel · Reformed Thinking

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Welcome back. You were listening to Reformed
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Thinking. I'm your host, and I'm sitting
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down here in the studio with our resident theologian to dig into
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another theological deep dive. Thanks for having me back.
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It is. It's always great to be here and
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just dig into the text. Yeah, and for those of you
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listening, you know what we do here.
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We are Protestant Christians, we hold of the Westminster
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Confession, and we like to take a look at biblical scholarship
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through a very specific theological lens.
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Right, we try to find the theological signal in all the
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noise of the academic research. Spot on, and usually we tackle
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massive doctrines, things like predestination or the hypostatic
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union, but today we are taking a completely different approach.
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We really are. We're starting on the ground
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floor today, very microscopic. Just one single word, actually.
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Yeah, just one word, but it's a word that functions as a
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skeleton key for the entire narrative arc of the New
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Testament. Which sounds like a bold claim,
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but looking at the source material you pulled for this
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deep dive, it's not just a vocabulary lesson.
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Far from it. If you don't catch the
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historical background of this one word, you'll miss how the
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gospel moved from a local Jewish context to a global faith.
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You miss the actual mechanics of the Covenant of Grace.
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Precisely. It's the whole thing.
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So let's give him the word. The word is Helene.
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Helene, Helen. In English Transliteration.
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Right, and in our English Bibles it is almost always translated
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simply as Greek. Yeah, and it looks completely
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harmless on the page. You see Greek and you think, I
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mean, you probably just think of a guy in a toga.
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Right, someone eating olives quoting Plato.
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Where you think of a modern nationality, someone holding a
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passport from Athens. But the sources show that
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definition falls apart pretty fast when you read the New
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Testament. Matters completely.
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Sometimes Helen means a person geographically from Greece, but
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other times it's a synonym for a gentile or a Pagan.
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And sometimes it designates a specific cultural class, which
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is fascinating. That ambiguity is where the
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treasure is, the history of this word shifting from a tribal name
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to a cultural status, then to a religious threat, and finally to
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a badge inclusion in Christ. That is the history of
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redemption right there. It really is the history of
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redemption in a nutshell. So our mission after this deep
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dive is to trace that lexical history.
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We want to understand how the barrier between Jew and Greek
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was built up over centuries. And then how the gospel
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completely demolished it. And since we operate in the
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reformed tradition, we have to ask what this means for the
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covenant today. What does it mean for you, the
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listener, right now? Because if we don't know who the
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Greek was to the Apostle Paul, we don't really know who we are
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to God. Let's start at the beginning,
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then the etymology. I was.
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I was pretty surprised looking at the notes to see that Helen
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wasn't always this massive umbrella term.
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No, it had a very humble origin. We have to go back into the
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mists of mythology. Way before the New Testament.
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Long before we are talking about Hesiod and the early Greek
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origin stories. Originally, Helen was just a
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guy. A literal person.
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A specific individual. According to the mythological
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source material, he was the son of Ducalian.
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And Ducalian is a big deal in their myths.
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Right, right. Ducalian is the protagonist of
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the Greek flood narrative. He is essentially the Greek
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equivalent of Noah. OK, that makes sense.
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He survives the Great Deluge and his son is named Helen, so
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initially the term Helene's just referred to his direct
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descendants. So it's just a tiny tribe.
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Very tiny. They lived in Thessaly.
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It was a hyperlocal clan designation.
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Like saying the Campbells in Scotland or something.
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That is a great comparison. But language is fluid, and over
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centuries these small tribes in the Balkan Peninsula started to
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coalesce. The traded they fought.
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Yeah, and the term expanded. By the time you get to classical
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historians like Herodotus and Thucydides, Helene's had become
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the broad designation for all Greek speaking peoples.
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And this creates a massive division in the ancient world.
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The great binary in the classical mindset, humanity was
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not a spectrum of different equals it.
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Was 2 buckets. Two buckets.
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You were either a hellion or you were a barbarous a barbarian.
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I have always loved the background on the word
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barbarian. It's an automatopia, isn't it?
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It is to the Greeks. Their language was refined.
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It had complex grammar and musical tones.
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So foreign languages sounded like nonsense to them.
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Just. Gibberish bar bar bar.
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So initially the dividing line was purely linguistic.
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If you spoke Greek, you were civilized.
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You were in the club. If you didn't, you were a
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savage. But the research points to a
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significant shift that happens later.
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The notes highlight a rhetorician named Isocrates.
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Isocrates is a huge figure here. He moves the goal posts from
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blood and language to something far more abstract.
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He makes a statement that basically alters Western
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history, doesn't he? He does.
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He says that the name Helene suggests no longer a race, but
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an intelligence. He argues that the title applies
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to those who share our culture rather than those who share a
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common bloodline. That is a massive conceptual
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jump. He is completely decoupling
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ethnicity from identity. Yes, he is saying you can become
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a Greek even if you were not born 1.
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Assuming you adopt their culture, the specific word in
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the text is pedea. Pedea, which is a tough word to
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translate into English. Let's define that for the
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listeners. What exactly goes into Paideia?
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It translates roughly to education, but it goes way
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deeper than reading and writing. It is total cultural formation.
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The bringing worldview. All of it.
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The gymnasium, the theater, the rhetorical training, the
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philosophy. It was the systematic shaping of
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the human soul according to their highest ideals.
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So if you submitted yourself to that process, you became a hell
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on. Regardless of who your
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grandfather was, you were culturally Greek.
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The notes mentioned a really fascinating historical example
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of this playing out with the Romans.
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Oh, this is critical for understanding the New Testament
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context. The Romans conquered grace
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militarily. Right, they won the wars.
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But the poet Horus famously noted that captive Greece took
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captive her rude conqueror. Meaning the Romans fell in love
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with the culture of the people they just defeated.
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They adopted the Paidea, educated Romans, hired Greek
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tutor. They learn the language, they
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studied the philosophy. So you have these Roman elites
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who have zero Greek blood categorizing themselves as
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Hellenes. In a cultural sense, yes.
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And we see this in the Bible. Look at Romans chapter one,
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verse 14. OK, let's pull that up.
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Paul writes I am a debtor both to Greeks and to Barbarians.
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Now remember, he is writing to the church in Rome.
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The educated Roman reading that letter would absolutely identify
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with the Greeks in that sentence.
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Because they consider themselves the civilized ones.
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Yes, they looked at the unwashed tribes of the north, the Gauls,
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the Scythians, the Germans, and called them Barbarians.
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So Helian essentially becomes a massive status symbol.
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It means you are civilized. You read Homer.
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You appreciate art. It means you are rational.
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You are part of the Enlightened world, and this project of
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cultural expansion went into hyperdrive with Alexander the
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Great. The Alexander effect when?
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Alexander swept across the East. His goal wasn't just grabbing
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territory. He was colonizing mines.
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He planted cities everywhere, dozens of Alexandria.
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And in those cities he built gymnasiums.
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He built them in Persia and Egypt and Syria.
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He created a globalized world. Exactly.
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A Syrian or an Egyptian could learn the language, start
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dressing a certain way, attend the gymnasium, and effectively
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crossover over to become a hell in.
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It is basically the most successful example of cultural
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imperialism in history. Without a doubt.
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But then this cultural steamroller hits an immovable
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object. The Jews.
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Right there was one group of people who absolutely could not
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just adopt this culture as a harmless addition to their
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lives. And this is where the lexical
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history turns into an actual war.
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It gets violent. The source material takes us to
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the intertestamental period. For you listening, this is the
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gap between the Old and New Testaments, specifically the
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Maccabian era. And we see a brand new term pop
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up in the sources here, Helen Ismos.
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Hellenism. Yes, in the Book of Two
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Maccabees, Helen Ismos is pitted directly against IUD Ismos
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Judaism. This is the first time we see
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Judaism named as a distinct system like that, isn't it?
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It is, and it is named that way precisely because it was under
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severe threat. So the binary is no longer
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civilized versus savage. It is now the Greek way versus
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the Jewish way. And you have to understand, this
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wasn't a debate about preferring a different style of
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architecture or pottery. It was deeply theological.
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The notes highlight the high priest, Jason.
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Jason is a tragic figure. He was a man who actually bought
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his office through bribery. Not a great start for a high
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priest. No.
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And his goal was to modernize Jerusalem.
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He wanted to make it a cosmopolitan Greek city.
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So what does he do to achieve that?
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He builds A gymnasium right under the citadel in Jerusalem.
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I think we need to pause here for a modern listener.
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We hear the word gymnasium and we picture a local Recreation
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Center, maybe a place with some treadmills and a basketball
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court. Right, it sounds completely
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harmless to us. Why was building a gym viewed as
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a declaration of war against the God of Israel?
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Context is everything. The Greek gymnasium was
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inextricably linked to Pagan religion.
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They were dedicated to false gods.
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Always dedicated to Hermes or Heracles, but even more than the
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statues, it was about the philosophy of the body.
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OK, unpacked participants exercised in the nude.
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The Greek ideal glorified the natural human form.
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And for a Jewish man, the sign of the covenant, circumcision,
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is literally marked in the flesh.
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Exactly. Public nudity in a mixed
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cosmopolitan environment wasn't just socially embarrassing, it
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was a distinctive marker of separation.
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If you were unclothed in a Greek gym, everyone in the room
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immediately knows you are a Jew. You are marked as the other.
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You represent an archaic, barbaric religion to them.
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And the sources mentioned something truly horrific that
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came out of this social pressure.
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Some Jewish men tried to hide their circumcision.
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The medical term is epispasm. It was a surgical procedure to
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reverse the appearance of circumcision so they could blend
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in. That is just painful to even
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think about. It shows the sheer intensity of
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the cultural pressure. They were literally carving the
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covenant of Abraham out of their flesh just to fit into high
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society. It is the ultimate form of
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assimilation. Complete surrender and notice
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the other sign of assimilation. The notes mentioned the Petasos.
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The specific Greek hat. The broad brimmed Greek hat
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again, and it sounds trivial to a modern year.
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Oh, the kids in Jerusalem are wearing trendy Greek hats.
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But in 170 BC, wearing that hat was a loaded political and
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religious statement. It was signaling to the world I
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am a cosmopolitan. I'm part of the global culture.
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I am not held back by the restrictive laws of Moses.
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It's ancient identity politics. Precisely.
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And this is exactly why the Maccabees finally revolted.
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They realize what was at stake. They saw that becoming a hell in
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was not just about learning a new new language or adopting
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fashion. It was apostasy.
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It was a worldview that inevitably demanded idolatry.
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From a Reformed perspective, thinking about the concept of
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the antithesis, the stark dividing line between the church
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and the world, this was the sharpest that line had ever been
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drawn in history. To be a Helen was to be an open
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enemy of God. You could not be both.
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So by the time we open the pages of the New Testament, this word
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Helen is carrying an unbelievable amount of weight.
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It is loaded with centuries of cultural baggage, warfare and
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identity crisis. It is practically radioactive.
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Let's look at how the gospels handle it.
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It is really interesting. The notes point out that the
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word rarely appears in the Synoptic gospels.
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Matthew, Mark and Luke barely use it.
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But there's one specific incident in Mark Chapter 7 that
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jumps right off the page. The Sierra Phoenician woman.
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Mark 7 verse 26, right? It is a pivotal moment.
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The text explicitly describes her as a Hellenist, a female
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Greek. But then it immediately
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qualifies that by saying she is by race Sierra Phoenician.
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There is that distinction again, ethnicity versus status.
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Ethnically she is from Tyre or Sidon.
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She is Phoenician. But Mark labels her a hell name.
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In this context, it almost certainly refers to her
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religion. She is a Pagan gentile.
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And likely her social class too, right?
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Yes, she is probably an educated upper class woman who speaks the
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language of the elite. And this wealthy Pagan woman
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comes to Jesus, a Jewish rabbi, asking for a miracle for her
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daughter. And Jesus gives her what is
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arguably one of his most difficult responses in all the
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Gospels. He tells her let the children be
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fed first for it is not right to take the children's bread and
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throw to the dogs. That is a hard text.
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We really can't sanitize that language.
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We shouldn't even try. He is reinforcing the salvation
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historical barrier that existed at that time.
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The children at the table are the physical descendants of
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Abraham, the Jews. The dogs are the Gentiles, the
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Helene's. He is effectively telling her
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that the covenant is not for you.
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My mission right now is to the lost sheep of the House of
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Israel. But her reaction is amazing.
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She doesn't get offended or walk away, she argues back.
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She accepts the premise of his theology, but she argues for his
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grace. She says yes, Lord, yet even the
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dogs under the table eat the children's crumb.
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She fully accepts her position as a hellone and outsider, but
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she appeals to the sheer overflow of the Messiah's mercy.
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And Jesus grants her request. He commends her faith.
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It is a crack in the dam, a preview of what is coming.
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But the real shift, the moment the definition of the Word
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starts to undergo a massive pivot, seems to happen in John's
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Gospel. John uses the term with thick
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theological irony. Look at John Chapter 7 verse 35.
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The Pharisees are actively mocking Jesus.
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Right, they say to each other, Where does this man intend to go
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that we will not find him? Does he intend to go to the
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dispersion among the Greeks and teach the Greeks?
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They meant it as a total joke, like he is such a failure as a
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rabbi here in Jerusalem. His only option left is to go
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preach to the unclean pagans. It was meant as a biting insult,
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but the irony, which John definitely wants the reader to
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catch, is that this is exactly what the Messiah is going to do.
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He absolutely is going to to tease the Greeks.
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Through his apostles, yes, he will gather them in.
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And then we get to John 12. This is such a critical chapter.
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The final week of Jesus life, the triumphal entry into
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Jerusalem, has just. Happened.
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The tension in the city is snapping and Philip gets a tap
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on the shoulder. Someone says to him, Sir, we
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wish to see Jesus. And who is doing the asking?
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The text says certain Greeks. Now the research suggests these
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were likely God fearing Gentiles.
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Right. These were not full Pagan
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idolaters offering sacrifices to Zeus.
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There were people who admired the monotheism and ethics of
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Judaism. They probably attended the
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synagogue, sat in the back rows, listened to the Torah.
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But they hadn't formally converted.
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They hadn't taken the step of circumcision.
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So they are Helene's standing right on the threshold of the
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covenant. And what is Jesus reaction when
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Philip tells him? You might expect him to say
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bring them over or tell them I'm busy dealing with Israel's
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leaders right now. But his reaction is cosmic.
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He hears that Greeks are looking for him, and he declares the
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hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.
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That always gives me chills when I read it.
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Why does the arrival of a few Greeks trigger the hour?
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Because in John's specific theology, the hour is always a
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reference to the crucifixion. The cross.
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Jesus understands that the gathering of the nation's the
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full inclusion of the Helene's, can only happen through his
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substitutionary death. He immediately follows up that
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statement with the analogy of the grain of wheat.
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Unless a grain of wheat falls, falls into the earth and dies,
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it remains alone. But if it dies, it bears much
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fruit. And the fruit he is talking
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about is the nations. The Gentiles, as long as Jesus
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is living, walking around Galilee in the flesh, he is the
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Jewish Messiah fulfilling the promises to Israel.
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But in his death and resurrection, the middle wall of
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partition is broken down. The arrival of those Greeks was
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the divine signal. The exclusive mission to Israel
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is concluding. The mission to the entire world
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is about to explode. And that explosion happens in
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the book of Acts. It does.
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But here we run into a bit of a lexical puzzle.
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In the text, the notes distinguish between the word
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hellon and another very similar word hellenistus.
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The Hellenists. This causes a lot of confusion
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for readers. We see it early on in Acts
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Chapter 6 A. Complaint by the Hellenists
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arose against the Hebrews because they're widows were
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being neglected in the daily distribution.
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So the obvious question is, who are these Hellenists?
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Are they Greeks? Are they Gentile converts?
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The consensus among scholars, and our source material backs
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this up heavily, is that these people are Jews.
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They are ethnically and religiously Jewish, but they are
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Greeks speaking Jews. They are members of the Diaspora
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who have moved back to Jerusalem to live.
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So picture the social dynamics of the early church in
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Jerusalem. You have the Hebrewo, the local
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native Jews. They speak Aramaic, they're very
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traditional in their customs. And then you have the Hellenist
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I They are Jews, but they speak Greek as their primary language.
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They might dress a bit more like the broader culture.
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They read the Old Testament from the Septuagint translation
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instead of the Hebrew scrolls. And natural friction occurs.
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It is a cultural clash inside the very first church.
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The Aramaic speakers were perhaps looking down on the
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Greek speakers as compromised or lesser Jews.
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Or perhaps it was just a genuine language barrier that led to
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administrative oversight. We don't know for sure.
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But the practical result was that the Hellenist widows were
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going hungry. So the apostles have to step in
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and solve this administrative crisis.
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They decide to appoint the first deacons to handle the
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distribution. And looking at the list of the
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seven men, they chose Steven Philip.
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Pro Chorus, Nicanor. Timon, Parmenus, Nicholas, those
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are not Hebrew names. They're all Greek names, every
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single one of. Them it is a massive pastoral
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gesture. The Apostles, who are basically
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all Hebrews, appointed 7 Hellenists to fix a problem
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affecting the Hellenist minority.
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They empower the marginalized group to lead the solution.
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It was an act of radical spirit LED unity.
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But the word Hellenist appears again later in connection with
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Paul. It does.
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In Acts Chapter 9 verse 29, Paul is injured Jerusalem and the
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text says he was disputing against the Hellenist.
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And they try to kill him. Right, which proves that the
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term Hellenist didn't automatically mean Christian.
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These were non believing Greek speaking Jews who were zealous
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for the law and saw Paul as a heretic.
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This brings up a fascinating side note about Paul himself.
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Was the Apostle Paul a Hellenist?
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That is the great paradox of his life.
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In Philippians 3, he calls himself a Hebrew of Hebrews.
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He was trained at the feet of Gamaliel, the most respected
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Pharisee of his day. Yet he was born in Tarsus, which
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was a major university city heavily steeped in paideia.
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He spoke and wrote fluent, highly educated Greek.
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He casually quotes their Pagan poets in his sermons.
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Aratus Epimenides, Menander. Paul was a man who straddled the
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geopolitical fault line of his era.
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He was a Hebrew who could operate seamlessly in the
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Hellenistic world. Which is exactly what makes him
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the perfect instrument for God's redemptive mission.
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He had the credentials to debate in the Jewish Sanhedrin and the
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intellect to debate the philosophers in the Greek
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Areopagus. But the real turning point in
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Acts, the moment the dam actually breaks and the
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definition of who can be saved changes forever, is in Acts
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Chapter 11. The Antioch incident.
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This is huge. The text says that believers who
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were scattered by the persecution following Stephen's
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death travel as far as Antioch. And initially they spoke the
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word to no one except Jews. Some of them, men from Cyprus
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and Cyrene, arrived in Antioch and began speaking.
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To whom? The notes point out a major
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textual variant in the manuscripts here.
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It is a debate over literally one letter in the Greek.
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Some manuscripts say they spoke spoke to the Helenus, the Greek
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speaking Jews. But logically, that wouldn't be
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breaking news. They had already been
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evangelizing Greek speaking Jews since Pentecost.
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Other manuscripts and the source material suggests this is almost
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certainly the correct reading based on the context.
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Say they spoke to the Helenus. The Greeks.
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The uncircumcised Gentile pagans.
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This is the massive breakout. Up until Acts 11, the gospel had
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gone to Jews. It had gone to Samaritans, who
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were essentially ethnic cousins. And it had gone to Cornelius,
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who was a God fearer already attached to the synagogue.
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But here in Antioch, for the very first time, regular Pagan
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idol worshipping Hellenes are being evangelized directly with
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no Jewish prerequisites. And what happened?
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The text says the hand of the Lord was with them and a great
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number who believed turned to the Lord.
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God blessed it immediately. This is the birth of the Gentile
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Church, and it is no coincidence that Antioch is where the
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disciples were first called Christians.
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Why did that label originate there at that specific moment?
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Because the old sociological labels were completely broken.
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You couldn't just call this gathering a Jewish sect anymore.
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There were way too many uncircumcised Greeks in the
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room. But you couldn't call them a
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Greek philosophical society either.
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Because there were plenty of Jews and none of them worship
21:24
the Greek pantheon anymore. So the outside observers in
21:27
Antioch looked at this mixed multitude eating together and
21:30
worshipping together, and had to invent a brand new word.
21:34
Christianoy, the people of the Christ.
21:37
That is a striking reality. The term Christian is the label
21:41
that emerges specifically when the dividing wall between Jew
21:44
and Greek collapses. It is the manifestation of what
21:47
early writers called the third race appearing in history.
21:51
This perfectly transitions us into the theology of the Apostle
21:55
Paul. Because Paul, the Hebrew of
21:57
Hebrews, is commissioned as the apostle to the hellions.
22:00
And in the opening chapter of Romans, he sets up a massive
22:03
courtroom scene and he specifically indicts them.
22:06
Romans One is the grand theological indictment of the
22:09
Gentile world. Paul uses the term Greeks here
22:12
to represent the entirety of non Jewish humanity.
22:15
And he targets the very thing the Greeks prided themselves on
22:17
the most. Their Sophia, their wisdom.
22:20
The Greeks were the philosophers of the ancient world.
22:23
They viewed themselves of the logical, rational ones.
22:25
They were the undisputed masters of the intellect, but Paul looks
22:29
at all their philosophy and says that despite claiming to be
22:32
wise, they became futile in their thinking and their foolish
22:35
hearts were darkened. Now, the notes point out a
22:38
crucial nuance here. Paul is not saying they lacked
22:42
intelligence. He is not saying they were
22:44
mentally deficient, he is saying they actively suppressed the
22:48
truth. This ties directly into the
22:50
doctrine of general revelation. Paul argues that the invisible
22:54
attributes of God, his eternal power and divine nature are
22:58
clearly seen in the things that have been made.
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The Greeks did not lack evidence for the true God.
23:03
They had the Pedea, they had advanced logic, they charted the
23:06
stars. They understood mathematics.
23:08
But they took all that truth and suppressed it in
23:11
unrighteousness. This is the classic Reformed
23:13
understanding of total depravity.
23:15
The issue isn't that the Greek mind couldn't process the data
23:19
of creation. The issue is that their will was
23:21
fundamentally opposed to the creator.
23:24
Their highest cultural achievements without special
23:27
revelation from scripture, LED them straight down into the
23:29
darkest idolatry. They exchanged the glory of the
23:32
immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds
23:36
and animals and creeping things. So you have this high minded
23:40
Greek philosopher claiming to be the pinnacle of human wisdom,
23:43
bowing down to worship a statue of a snake.
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Paul exposes the absolute madness of it.
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And in First Corinthians chapter 1, he contrasts this earthly
23:52
wisdom of the world with what he calls the Word of the Cross.
23:56
For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach
24:01
Christ crucified, A stumbling block to Jews and folly to
24:05
Gentiles. Folly.
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The Greek word used there is moria.
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It is the root of our English word moronic.
24:11
To the Greek mind, the message of the cross was aesthetically
24:14
repulsive and logically absurd. A God does not die.
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And a God certainly does not die the shameful death of a state
24:20
criminal on Roman cross. That concept is not beautiful to
24:23
them. It does not fit into any of
24:25
their irrational categories. So the Greek worldview has a
24:27
fundamental structural inability to accept a crucifer.
24:30
God is a locked door to them. Unless the Holy Spirit
24:33
regenerates the mind. Which is why Paul continues in
24:36
that passage. But to those who are called both
24:39
Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God, and the wisdom of
24:42
God. The Gospel completely subverts
24:44
the Greek demand for wisdom by offering a divine wisdom that
24:48
looks like sheer foolishness to the natural man.
24:50
So Paul develops this robust theology where the Greek is
24:53
naturally lost, suppressing the truth and unable to embrace the
24:57
cross through intellect alone. But then alongside that, he has
25:00
this operational formula he repeats over and over in his
25:03
letters, in his ministry. To the Jew 1st, and also to the
25:06
Greek. You dyos TE Proton Kai Hilon.
25:08
It is his standard operating procedure everywhere he goes.
25:12
He enters a new city, goes straight to the Jewish synagogue
25:14
first, usually gets kicked out, and then turns to the gentile
25:17
marketplace. Does the word first in that
25:20
formula imply better? Is there a permanent hierarchy
25:23
in the Kingdom of God? Says no.
25:26
Romans 10 point twelves makes it explicit, for there is no
25:29
distinction between Jew and Greek, For the same Lord is Lord
25:33
of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him.
25:36
The notes make it very clear the distinction is not a difference
25:39
in value before God. It is a difference in the order
25:42
of redemptive history. The Jews have the historical
25:45
head start. They were the elder brother in
25:47
the narrative. To them belong the adoption, the
25:50
glory, the covenants, the giving of the law.
25:53
So the Gospel goes to them first as a covenantal courtesy, a
25:56
fulfillment of the ancient promises made to the patriarchs.
26:00
But the great leveller comes in Romans 3.9.
26:03
We have already charged it all. Both Jews and Greeks are under
26:07
sin. They are completely equal in
26:09
their guilt. The.
26:10
Equal in guilt, which means they are completely equal in their
26:13
desperate need for grace. The ground is perfectly level at
26:15
the foot of the cross. But practically speaking,
26:18
working this out in the 1st century church was incredibly
26:22
messy. It caused massive internal
26:24
conflict. You had Jewish Christians, the
26:27
Judaizers, who insisted that the Greeks had to become culturally
26:31
Jewish before they could be recognized as true Christians.
26:33
They demanded that Gentile male converts be circumcised and keep
26:37
the dietary laws. And this leads us to one of the
26:40
most brilliant case studies in the New Testament regarding
26:43
Paul's pastoral strategy. The tale of two disciples,
26:46
Timothy and Titus. I really love this comparison in
26:49
the notes. It shows Paul operating with
26:51
incredible nuance. He is playing theological chess
26:55
here. Let's look at Timothy first in
26:57
Acts chapter 16. His mother was a Jewish
26:59
believer, but his father was a hell AM.
27:02
So in the eyes of the strict traditional Jews, Timothy is 1/2
27:07
breed. And Paul wants to take young
27:09
Timothy along with him on his missionary journeys, which
27:12
involves going into Jewish synagogues.
27:14
So what does Paul, the great champion of Gentile freedom, do?
27:17
He circumcises Timothy. Which seems totally
27:20
contradictory at first glance. I thought Paul was the guy who
27:23
wrote that neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for
27:26
anything. Why put Timothy under the knife?
27:29
Because with Timothy, it was a matter of mythological strategy,
27:32
not a requirement for salvation. Everyone in that region knew
27:36
Timothy's mother was Jewish. By their cultural law, he was
27:39
considered Jewish. If he remained uncircumcised, he
27:43
would be a massive, unnecessary stumbling block to every single
27:47
Jew they tried to evangelize. They wouldn't even listen to a
27:50
word he preached. So Paul has him circumcised to
27:52
remove the cultural offense purely for the sake of the
27:55
mission. He surrenders a freedom to win
27:57
hearing. OK, now contrast that exact
28:00
situation with Titus. Titus appears in the Letter to
28:02
the Galatians, chapter 2. Titus is a full blown hellion.
28:07
Both of his parents are Greek. He has absolutely no Jewish
28:10
blood or background. And Paul intentionally takes
28:13
Titus with him to Jerusalem to meet with the apostles right
28:16
into the stronghold of the Judaizers.
28:19
And predictable. The Judaizers demand that Titus
28:22
be circumcised. They want to fix him.
28:24
And Paul's response? He says absolutely not.
28:26
He utterly refused to compel Titus to be circumcised.
28:30
Not even for the sake of keeping the peace.
28:32
He didn't yield to them for a moment.
28:34
Why the drastic difference? Why cut Timothy but vehemently
28:38
protect Titus? Because with Titus, the truth of
28:41
the Gospel itself was on the line.
28:42
If Paul had given in and circumcised Titus, he would have
28:46
been conceding the theological argument.
28:48
He would have been officially admitting that a Gentile must
28:51
become a Jew in order to be justified before God.
28:54
He would have been physically rebuilding the middle wall of
28:56
partition that Christ died to tear down.
28:58
So for Timothy, the circumcision was about being a considerate
29:01
guest in Jewish spaces. For Titus, avoiding circumcision
29:05
was about defending the core definition of salvation by grace
29:08
alone. By keeping Titus uncircumcised,
29:11
Paul was issuing a declaration. The Helen is fully accepted in
29:15
the Beloved exactly as a Helen. He doesn't need to adopt the
29:19
Jewish culture. He is washed clean through faith
29:21
in Christ alone. That perfectly brings us to the
29:23
grand conclusion of Paul's sociology, the doctrine of the
29:26
new humanity. Galatians chapter 3, verse 28.
29:30
There is neither Jew nor Greek. There is neither slave nor free.
29:33
There is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.
29:37
And he repeats it in Colossians 3.11.
29:39
Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised,
29:44
barbarian city and slave free, but Christ is all and in all.
29:49
Now, we need to be very careful with our definitions here so we
29:52
don't misunderstand Paul. Right.
29:54
Does this text mean that human ethnicity simply ceases to exist
29:57
when you become a Christian? Did Titus stop being an ethnic
30:00
Greek? Did he stop liking his cultural
30:02
foods or speaking his native language?
30:04
No, of course not. The text doesn't say there are
30:06
no longer any Greeks. It says in Christ there is
30:09
neither. The source notes specifically
30:11
point out that Timothy's father is still referred to
30:14
historically as a Greek even after these theological shifts.
30:18
Ethnicity remains reality. Cultural background remains.
30:22
What is permanently erased is the religious barrier and the
30:25
covenantal exclusion. So becoming a Christian doesn't
30:27
mean we turn into a featureless, homogeneous BLOB of humanity.
30:31
No, it means our ethnic heritage no longer determines our
30:34
spiritual standing before a holy God.
30:36
That is the key. The source links this directly
30:39
to 1st Corinthians 12. Point late.
30:41
For in one spirit we were all baptized into one body.
30:44
Jews are Greeks, slaves are free, and all were made to drink
30:48
of 1 spirit. Baptism is the key mechanism.
30:50
Here, baptism officially replaces circumcision as the
30:53
outward sign and seal of the covenant.
30:55
Circumcision was inherently ethnic and national.
30:57
It marks off 1 specific bloodline.
31:00
Baptism is universal. Water is applied to men and
31:03
women, Jews and Greeks. It marks the boundary of the new
31:06
humanity. This the fits perfectly with how
31:10
the Westminster Confession defines the Catholic or
31:13
Universal Church. Yes, the confession makes it
31:16
clear that the covenant of grace under the New Testament is no
31:19
longer confined to one physical nation as it was under the law.
31:23
It is now administered to all nations.
31:25
The elect of God are actively gathered from every tribe,
31:29
tongue, people and nation. The specific designation Helen,
31:33
which for centuries meant the outsider, the barbarian, the
31:37
idolatry letter of the violent enemy, is washed completely
31:40
clean. Before we wrap up today, there
31:43
is one final, somewhat speculative section in the
31:45
research that we need to touch on.
31:47
It connects our word Helen back to the Old Testament in a really
31:50
surprising way. Yeah, this is a great detail for
31:52
the folks who love biblical prophecy.
31:54
The notes mention a direct connection to the book of
31:56
Daniel. If you read the Septuagint, the
31:59
ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament, the word
32:01
Helen is used to translate the Hebrew word javin.
32:04
Javin. That name goes all the way back
32:06
to the Genesis table of nations. He was one of the grandsons of
32:09
Noah. Right.
32:10
Javan is recognized as the ancient ancestor of the Greek
32:13
peoples. And in Daniels apocalyptic
32:16
prophecies, Javan, representing the empire of Greece, plays the
32:20
role of the great terrifying enemy of God's people.
32:24
We are talking about the vision of the goat in Daniel chapter 8,
32:28
the King of the North. The archetype of the anti God
32:31
political power. Culminating historically in
32:33
figures like Antiochus Epiphany is the Seleucid king who
32:37
literally sacrificed a pig on the altar and desecrated the
32:40
temple. So in the Old Testament
32:42
prophetic imagination, the Greek is the ultimate bad guy, the
32:45
desolator. The great oppressor.
32:47
But look at the breathtaking reversal the Gospel
32:50
accomplishes. Paul takes the very term that
32:52
represented the historic arch enemy of God's chosen people,
32:55
the Helen. And he looks at them and says,
32:57
you are now fellow heirs of the promise.
33:00
That is the ultimate plot twist in redemptive history.
33:03
The ancient enemy becomes the beloved brother, The one who is
33:06
historically far off has been brought near by the blood of
33:09
Christ. It is a total staggering
33:11
transvaluation of their identity.
33:13
And the irony continues even deeper.
33:15
Think about the wisdom the Greeks spend centuries seeking.
33:18
Their beloved Sophia. They actually find it, but they
33:21
don't find it in the Academy or the philosophy schools.
33:24
They find it in the person of Jesus Christ.
33:26
As Paul writes to the Colossians, in whom are hidden
33:30
all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
33:32
The Greek desire for wisdom wasn't inherently wrong, they
33:35
were just looking for it in the completely wrong place.
33:38
They were looking at the created order, at mathematics, at their
33:41
own fallen logic. They needed to look at the
33:44
eternal Logos made flesh. That is a beautiful place to
33:47
land the plane. Let's briefly summarize the
33:50
historical progression of this word we've tracked today.
33:53
We started with a small localized tribe in Thessaly,
33:57
descended from a mythological figure.
33:59
Which then expanded into a massive, imposing culture
34:02
defined by Padilla and rigorous education.
34:05
Which violently collided with Judaism and became a dark symbol
34:09
of idolatry and apostasy. Which Paul then utilized as the
34:12
theological category for all of lost unregenerate humanity in
34:16
Romans 1. And finally, through the
34:18
foolishness of the cross, the hellion becomes a full, equal
34:22
participant in the covenant of Grace.
34:24
It truly is the entire story of the gospel contained in a single
34:28
word. Now, we always like to leave
34:30
you, the listener, with something to chew on, a
34:33
provocative thought to take with you as you work through the text
34:36
on your own. We talked about Romans chapter 2
34:39
a bit earlier. The source material mentioned
34:41
that the Greeks, even without the Bible, had a law written on
34:45
their hearts. Right, Paul says.
34:47
Their conscience bears witness, either accusing or excusing
34:50
their actions. They didn't have the Torah, the
34:52
written Law of Moses, but they had the deniable testimony of
34:55
conscience and creation. So here is the thought to
34:59
consider if the Pagan Greeks of Paul's day, who lived in a
35:03
dominant culture of rampant idolatry, sexual immorality and
35:07
spiritual confusion. If.
35:08
They were held strictly accountable by God for the
35:11
little light of creation and conscience they possessed.
35:14
How much more accountable are we?
35:15
We who have the full completed scriptures in our native
35:18
language. We who have the New Testament,
35:20
2000 years of church history, the creeds, the confessions, the
35:23
Reformed traditions. We have podcast apps loaded with
35:26
sound theology. The Greeks suppressed the truth
35:29
of general revelation. The question for us is, do we
35:33
suppress the truth of special revelation?
35:36
That is a highly sobering question to end on, Jesus said.
35:40
To whom much is given of him, much will be required.
35:43
Indeed, the historical barrier is down.
35:47
The Helen has been brought in, but the severe call to personal
35:50
holiness remains. Thank you for joining us on this
35:53
deep dive into the word, Helen. We sincerely hope it changes the
35:56
way you read your New Testament this week.
35:58
Keep thinking critically and keep reading the text.
36:01
Thanks for joining us on Reformed Thinking.