Donald L. Williams

Israelite Worship’s Relevance for Christian Worship

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Because the God of Israel and the God of the Christian church are the same God, it is not surprising that their patterns of worship have strong similarities. Christian worship has much to gain from the study and appreciation of the worship of ancient Israel.

Visual Impact

In worship, evangelicals in particular have tended to overemphasize the audible aspects of worship to the exclusion of the visible aspects. Primarily in the Lord’s Supper the vitality of tangible and visible presentation has been retained. The Israelite cult is “sacred art.” Only recently has the church begun to grasp the power of acted-out faith and worship in drama. Contemporary worship patterns need a new awareness of the impact of the visible, which is often more effective than the audible. Dramatic presentation of our faith offers a new and creative channel through which the re-presentation of history may be accomplished and the dynamism of the Christian faith may be preserved, so that we may bridge the time and space gap of two thousand years.

Symbolism

Closely related to the visual aspect of worship is the area of symbolism. The temple in Jerusalem was filled with symbolism, not merely as decorative art, but as a means of re-creating history. The ark of the covenant, the central cult object, stood in its semidarkness as the throne of the invisible King Yahweh. The altar of incense, standing before the Holy of Holies, continually emitted sweet-smelling smoke to re-create the theophany of Sinai where Yahweh appeared “in a thick cloud.” The great freestanding pillars outside the temple, at least according to one interpretation, served as mammoth incense burners so that the whole temple came to represent Sinai. The trumpets sounded in the liturgy were more than musical instruments; their sound re-created the thunder of the Sinaitic theophany. It is not necessary to install incense burners in sanctuaries, but an increased realization that cultic symbolism re-creates, re-presents, actualizes, and activates history is necessary. With the renewed emphasis on liturgy and worship, the church can learn much about the place and purpose of creative symbolism from the Israelite cult.

Participation

The Israelite cult was, as the Norwegian exegete Sigmund Mowinckel states, a place where something happened, a fact that is beginning to prompt renovations in church architecture. Renewed emphasis on worship as action and participation by the whole congregation has encouraged the construction of circular buildings with the Communion table at the center. Startlingly, a Northfield, Minnesota, architect has proposed that except for its size, the best analogy for church architecture is the Japanese tea room. The architect Edward Anders Sovik says, “Like a church, the tea room is not a place for private mediation, but for dialogue and certain actions in which human relationships are established.” (cf. E. A. Souvik, Architecture for Worship [Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1973], pp. 76–77). This statement is similar to the ideas of Mowinckel, who spoke of the cult as the “visible and audible expression of the relationship between congregation and deity” (Sigmund Mowinckel, Religion and Kultus [Göttingen: Vandenhoek & Ruprecht, 1953], p. 13). Thus, the recovery of the dynamism of Israel’s cult may influence our traditional conceptions of sacred architecture with renewed emphasis on the worship as visible and audible, as expressions of relationships, as an event in which “something happens.”

Flexibility

Insight into the Israelite cult grants Christian worship increased flexibility. Old Testament students know that many of Israel’s worship patterns were adapted along the lines of Near Eastern culture, and even the Jerusalem cultus is a compromise between Yahwistic and Jebusite cultic patterns. Israel could and did adopt forms from her contemporary culture, introduce them into her ancient patterns of worship, and baptize them into her distinctive Yahwism. This freedom to employ non-Christian elements in Christian worship must be recovered. While some have viewed attempts to introduce jazz and modern dance into worship as anathema, these experiments are harmonious with the Israelite point of view. The increased use and adaptation of twentieth-century art and music forms offer new and exciting challenges for creative revitalization of Christian worship.

Conclusion

If the God of Israel is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, as the church claims he is, then to contend that he chooses to be worshiped in similar patterns is not difficult to affirm. The central purpose of both Israelite and Christian worship is to re-present creative history by means of audible and visible expression, a re-presentation that culminates in active response. Perhaps one reason the Christian church has lost much of its vitality in the twentieth century is that it has lost the art of worship because it has divorced itself from the sense of the history that affected its salvation. Recovering that historical status is part and parcel with the revitalizing of the drama of worship.

Biblical Worship As Dramatic Re-Presentation

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Recent studies of the history of Israel’s religion have demonstrated convincingly that the formative events of Israel’s faith were dramatically acted out in worship. In fact, some of the Old Testament narratives have reached their present form as a result of the historicizing of cultic dramatic re-presentation.

The Exodus Narrative

The Exodus narrative in Exodus 1–19 is a reclothed festal liturgy from which something of the ritual may be recovered. In Exodus 12:42, the “watch night” drama appears, a re-creating and a re-presenting of the drama in which the Hebrews anxiously awaited the intervention of Yahweh in Egypt, a repeated cultic drama that bridged the gap of space and time and reestablished the saving relationship for each generation with Yahweh. In close connection is Exodus 12, the instructions for the Passover feast, said to be observed as “a memorial to all generations.” The re-creation of the watch night, the blood on the doorposts and the lintel, the eating of unleavened bread and bitter herbs—these acts were re-created annually and physically in active worship. For Israel, no sterile symbolism is present, no more lifeless memory; by re-creating history through dramatic presentation, Israel re-presented her saving history, actualized her salvation, renewed her relationship to her God. Thus, historical recital has given way to historical re-creation.

Narratives of Joshua

The narratives of Joshua 2–6 are rehistoricized festal liturgies from the Gilgal cult. At Gilgal, through dramatic presentation, the crossing of the Jordan was re-created, and the march around the ruins of Jericho reenacted, not in mere historical memory, but in contemporary actualization. The close connection of dramatic re-presentation with liturgical re-presentation as noted earlier is clearly evidenced in these passages from Joshua. Thus, the Gilgal cult, annually or periodically, re-presented the conquest story, dramatizing its history and making it sacramental.

The Jerusalem Worship Community

The greatest example of re-presentation of dramatic form is the Jerusalem worship community. Much has been written about the royal ritual in Jerusalem, with its interlocked themes of David and Zion. Despite those who find minimal cultic influence, one has little basis for doubting that the royal psalms have their setting in a royal Zion festival during which those events surrounding the Davidic dynasty were dramatically enacted at Jerusalem. The Psalms speak of the “night watch” at Gihon, of the procession through the streets of Jerusalem which preceded the entrance of the ark into the temple, and finally of the reactualization of the Davidic king as Yahweh’s servant. The Psalms are primary testimony to historical re-presentation by dramatic actualization.

The Lord’s Supper As Sacred Drama

Precisely at this point Christian worship has departed from the pattern of the Israelite cult, with particular reference to the Lord’s Supper. If one will view the history of the Lord’s Supper one will find few periods when the real drama of the Lord’s Supper has been preserved. The theology of the Lord’s Supper has moved from the extreme of the Roman church, with its doctrine of transubstantiation, to the barren symbolism of nonliturgical congregations. Both positions are in error. If Old Testament worship is correctly viewed, then an idea of the actual re-creation of the body and blood of our Lord in the Mass is incorrect. The suffering and death of Jesus were once-for-all, nonrepeatable, unique events in history; in no sense can the event be literally and physically re-created in worship. But on the other hand, the elements of the Lord’s Supper transcend barren symbolism. In the celebration of the Lord’s Supper something happens, not with the elements themselves, but in a dramatic re-presentation of history. To borrow the pattern of the Deuteronomic preachers, “it was not with our fathers that the Lord made this covenant, but with us, with all of us who are alive here today” (Deut. 5:3). The Lord’s Supper is sacred art, a drama that manifests reality; it allows the worshiper to span the time and space gap of history and stand again with those who first experienced our Lord’s death. In the mystery of dramatic presentation, the worshiper reenters original history; it is not a festal myth, but an actualization. “This is my body, broken for you,” a brokenness that continues over and over again, a presentness of contemporary encounter. Thus, as one partakes of the elements, one becomes part of the original event, which was accomplished for our salvation.

The demand is to recover the true meaning of the Lord’s Supper in Christian worship, a meaning that is patterned from Israelite worship with its motif of dramatic re-presentation. If the study of Israelite worship is taken seriously, the Lord’s Supper must be rescued from its place as addendum in many congregations and restored to the central place of worship. The Lord’s Supper is the reenactment of the Christian Exodus event, the historical beginning, which continues to give the church life. Jesus said, “Do this in remembrance of me” (1 Cor. 11:24). Yet to remember is not an intellectual discipline; “to re-member” is to re-create, “to re-member” is to re-present, “to re-member” is to respond. In Deuteronomy 16:3, the Feast of the Passover is said to be observed, “so that all the days of your life you may remember the time of your departure from Egypt.” Here is the annual re-presentation of history. Thus, “Do this in remembrance of me” must mean, “so that you may participate in the sufferings and death of our Lord and respond to them.” For as Israel was redeemed from Egyptian bondage in the Exodus and annually actualized that redemption in the cult, the Christian church finds itself released from a similar bondage and must actualize that redemption by dramatic re-presentation. The Lord’s Supper is truly sacramental in that by participating in the drama of our redemption, God himself reestablishes, maintains, and renews his relationship with us and we respond in obedience.

Biblical Worship and Historical Recital

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The recitation of the history of Yahweh’s redemptive acts forms the basis for creed, liturgy, and preaching in the Old Testament. The Christian church took up the format of historical recital in its hymnic and creedal affirmation of God’s actions in Christ.

Israel’s Creedal Statements

Gerhard von Rad has isolated several creedal statements in the Old Testament which, he has argued, stand at the level of primary tradition. Among these confessions is the Deuteronomy passage:

My father was a wandering Aramean, and he went down into Egypt with a few people and lived there and became a great nation, powerful and numerous. But the Egyptians mistreated us and made us suffer, putting us to hard labor. Then we cried out to the Lord, the God of our fathers, and the Lord heard our voice and saw our misery, toil and oppression. So the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with great terror and with miraculous signs and wonders. He brought us to this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. (Deut. 26:5–9)

For this writer the creedal character of these verses cannot be denied. The emphasis of these creedal statements is historical: Egyptian bondage, salvation from that bondage by Yahweh, the occupation of the land. Moreover, one cannot escape the fact that these affirmations are in plural address—“we” were in Egyptian bondage, “we” were redeemed by Yahweh, “we” were given this fertile land. Each time this affirmation was recited, the worshiper bridged the time and space gap and became identified with that never-to-be-repeated salvation: he or she actualized, contemporized, re-presented history.

Another example of historical recitation is found in the antiphonal liturgies in Joshua 4:6–7 and 24:14–28. Although the liturgical form has been clouded by the context of historical narration, the liturgy may be easily reconstructed:

The priest:     What do these stones mean?
The congregation:     They mean that the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of Yahweh; when it passed over the Jordan, the waters were cut off.
The priest:     So these stones shall be to the people of Israel a memorial forever.

Liturgical Affirmation of Yahweh’s Kingship

H. J. Kraus has suggested that these liturgical foundations emanated from Gilgal, a center of worship that carefully preserved the Jordan crossing and the conquest traditions. In these liturgies the reader is in touch with historical recital of the re-creation of history, a means of allowing the existential involvement of later generations in those acts of Yahweh that effected salvation and that continue to effect salvation.

Or one may cite a central thrust of the Jerusalem worship community, namely the liturgical affirmation of the Psalter—Yahweh has become/is king. Despite the discussion this affirmation has evoked, no thought of a dying-rising Yahweh is intended; nor was the kingship of Yahweh predicated in an annual cultic renewal ceremony. Nevertheless, in the Jerusalem temple, this liturgical affirmation brought the worshiper face to face with the reality of Yahweh’s kingship, not a theological abstraction, but an experiential and existential encounter that demanded a response. Indeed, one may posit that just such a worship encounter underlies the temple sequence in Isaiah 6, an encounter with the cultic reaffirmation of Yahweh’s kingship, which redirected the prophet’s life. Thus, in some sense, in the Jerusalem worship community, Yahweh’s kingship was reactivated in worship, and he “became king” for those who entered into the experience. Cultic recital provokes existential identification.

Historical Recitation in Preaching

To be sure, Israel’s worship was not limited to creedal and liturgical confessions—a flexibility developed within the cult, as witnessed by the book of Deuteronomy. In fact, Deuteronomy is a gigantic cultic actualization. Deuteronomy 5:3 reads: “It was not with our fathers that the Lord made this covenant, but with us, all of us who are alive here today.” This passage perhaps originated between the eighth and the sixth centuries, a time far distant from the Sinai event; nevertheless, centuries later Israel could corporately and culticly confess that the present generation stood anew at the foot of the holy mountain. Moreover, historical recitation and re-presentation give way to preaching, a fact that explains Deuteronomy’s homiletic or parenetic (that is, preaching) character. The creed is expanded into an injunction and a call for obedience as each generation is recalled to affirm Israel’s ancient faith, to bridge the time and space gap, to participate existentially and creatively with those events that culminated in the covenant. Thus, Deuteronomy, with its pattern of creedal recitation and homiletic expansion, sets the pattern for Christian preaching.

Historical Recitation in Christian Hymn and Creed

These examples of Israelite historical recitation illustrate the means by which Israel sought to re-create her history by liturgical re-presentation. Small wonder that the early church also presented its message by historical re-presentation. The early Christian hymns and creeds contained in the Pauline corpus (1 Cor. 15:3–7; Phil. 2:6–11) are harmonious with the Israelite pattern of historical recitation and re-presentation, for their emphases are on the historical, concrete memories of our Lord’s life and death. Even more illustrative is the creed in 1 Timothy 3:16: He appeared in a body, was vindicated by the Spirit, was seen by angels, was preached among the nations, was believed on in the world, was taken up into glory.

The death and resurrection of our Lord was a once-for-all, unique, unrepeatable historical event, and the early church, following the pattern of its spiritual ancestor, constructed similar historical recitations. In worship they stood again at the foot of the cross, by which they bridged the time and space gap, by which the Christ event continued in contemporaneity through cultic re-presentation.

And the church continued to formulate creeds. To be sure, such classic creeds as the so-called Apostles’ Creed and Nicene Creed were formulated to preserve dogmatic integrity; nevertheless, the basic character of these creeds is rightly historical. Of course, Israel would not have opened her creeds with the theological abstraction of God’s “almightiness,” nor would she have spoken of the outset of creation. Nevertheless, when the Apostles’ Creed begins the article of Jesus Christ, the Hebraic cultic pattern is maintained: “born of the virgin Mary,” “crucified under Pontius Pilate,” “died, was buried, raised on the third day.” To give audible expression to the Apostles’ Creed in worship is not an intellectual exercise in dogmatic assertion; in this audible expression something should happen—the worshiper should encounter anew the historical elements of our faith, and in some sense, experience the sacramental contemporaneity of our Lord with the worshiper. If one is to take the Israelite worship community seriously, then one is confronted with the demand to reactivate the purpose of re-presentation by historical recital, to view creedal affirmations not as tests of theological soundness, but as a means of existential identification with the past, as a means of bridging the time and space gap, as a means of re-creating the original event and existentially participating in those events that have accomplished our salvation.

Undoubtedly, many Protestant evangelicals have eschewed creedal statements primarily because the basic purpose has been lost; nevertheless, from the example of Israel’s worship community, such creedal re-presentations should be restored to Christian worship in order that the church may possess a more vital sense of its history, that it may become more aware of its corporate relationship with the church of all ages, and that it may participate in God’s saving act in Jesus Christ and recognize the demands that event makes on the individual. The loss of historical identification undercuts the dynamism of the Christian faith; Israel’s cultic pattern has pointed the way to a recovery of that historical involvement in Christian worship.

Israelite Worship As Re-Presentation

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The Israelite cultus, or worship pattern, is responsible primarily for the origin, preservation, and transmission of a large portion of the Old Testament.

Although Old Testament scholars continue to stress Israel’s contributions in such areas as monotheism and ethical prophecy, not enough emphasis has been placed on Israel’s achievement in worship. The purpose of this study is to explore the major lines of Israel’s worship and to suggest the areas in which it can continue to enrich Christian worship.

The purpose of Israelite worship is to create life, that is, to maintain the ordered course of the world of nature and the world of humankind as it was created by God and as it is sustained by God. Encounter with God through worship sustains the world order, reaffirms the human relationship with God’s creation, and maintains relationships among neighbors. Worship sustains, creates, and re-creates a relationship not magically, but sacramentally—a relationship initiated, sustained, and continually renewed by God himself.

In Israelite worship, the overriding purpose was the “re-presentation of history,” the contemporizing of those creative, historical acts of salvation that had formed, nourished, and sustained Israelite existence. None will deny that the faith of Israel was historically oriented, based on the fact that God credeemed a people from Egyptian bondage, welded them into a covenant people through the Torah, and confirmed that salvation by the gift of the land. Whatever tribes or clans actually experienced the Egyptian Exodus event, all Israel affirmed that God had acted in her behalf, that Yahweh had served Israel, and that this salvation was a continuing process in her existence. To be sure, the Exodus event occurred only once, at a particular point in human history, a unique and unrepeatable act. But Israel, uniquely conscious of history, could not allow this formative event to recede into timeless myth as her Near Eastern neighbors would have done. In no sense could the Exodus event be subject to annual repetition in the same way Marduk in Babylon annually defeated the chaotic Tiamat—the uniqueness of the Exodus event precluded annual cyclic recurrence. Nevertheless, Israel’s worship sustained the faith that because God had acted once, he would continue to act for her salvation. Thus, Israel, freed from the reduction of her past to myth and assured of the continuation of redemptive history, “re-presented” in worship those historical acts that were determinative for her life.

These functions are primary to Israelite worship: to actualize, to re-present unrepeatable historical events, to bring the worshiper into an existential identification with these events, to bridge the time and space gap, and to participate in the original history. In Israelite worship, each generation vicariously entered into that original and nonrepeatable history through two patterns: (1) historical recital and (2) dramatic re-presentation.