Fourthly, and finally, we come to what is perhaps the most remarkable case cited by Dr. Grudem from the book of Acts. In chapter 21, verses 10-11, the prophet Agabus predicts that the Jews will bind the apostle Paul and hand him over to the Romans. What makes this so remarkable, according to Grudem, is that the prophecy is inaccurate at two significant points. First, it is the Romans, not the Jews, who bind Paul (21:33; 22:29). Secondly, rather than the Jews delivering the apostle over to them, it is the Romans have to rescue Paul from the Jews (Ac.21:32-33, 35; 22:24)! What makes this all the more astonishing, according Ferguson, is that Agabus here “claims to speak as a mouthpiece of the Holy Spirit,” (p.219, The Holy Spirit, 1996). So what happened? Did the prophet here grossly misspeak, claiming divine authority, while getting critical details of the prophecy wrong? Ferguson’s solution to this dilemma focuses on the content of the prophecy itself: did Agabus really get it so wrong? Grudem’s solution lies in his treatment of the introductory formula, “the Holy Spirit says…”
Regarding Grudem’s analysis of Agabus’ prophecy, Dr. Ferguson asks,
“whether such an interpretation is reading a general statement as though it were intended to give specific details. Grudem in fact holds that these ‘details’ are the essential elements in the particular prophecy. But the implications of this greatly reduce the credibility of Agabus. For if we are to assume that the early church shared Grudem’s view of two-level prophecy, Agabus either did not understand it, or he seriously over-reached himself,” (p.219).There are two separate issues Ferguson raises here. The first is whether Grudem is basically splitting hairs in his interpretation and demanding more precision than the prophecy purports to give. The second concerns Agabus’ apparent understanding that his prophecy was inspired by the Holy Spirit.
On this first point, Richard Gaffin argues:
“Against this construction is the pedantic precision it demands from Agabus’ prediction. Predictive prophecy can of course be exact but is not necessarily so (pp.65, Perpsectives on Pentecost, 1979).However, Grudem responds,
“…the point is that the prophecy of Agabus is exact and detailed when it is made. The only question is whether the two main details are fulfilled. Gaffin shows no examples elsewhere in Scripture where similar non-fulfillment of details is seen to occur with divinely authoritative Old Testament prophecy – indeed, there would seem to be some difficulty with holding to biblical inerrancy if there were such examples,” (p.366, The Gift of Prophecy, 2000).Indeed, Gaffin’s critique might be more persuasive if he produced similar instances of ‘imprecision’ in correspondence between prophetic word and fulfillment among the OT prophets. But what about the subsequent narrative of Acts? Does it suggest an accurate, if imprecise, fulfillment of Agabus’ prophecy? Gaffin thinks so, and appeals to Paul’s recounting of events to the Jewish leaders in Rome:
"Moreover, after the fact, Paul echoes the language of Agabus by telling the Jews at Rome, ‘I was arrested in Jerusalem and handed over to the Romans’ (Acts 28:17, NIV),” (pp.65-66).In reference to the same text, Ferguson argues along the same lines:
“the repetition of Agabus’ language in Paul’s statement [Acts 28:17] suggests that the apostle himself saw the (more general?) statements of Agabus fulfilled in the actual events. In addition, it is significant that the language of both passages echoes Paul’s own words in Acts 20:20-23 (where the passive of deo and the noun desmos are also used). It might equally be complained that the NIV translates desmios as ‘arrested’ rather than ‘bound’, thus obscuring the possibility that Paul is referring to what the Jews did when they seized him and dragged him from the temple. It is quite possible that the Jews themselves bound him in order to do this (perhaps with Paul’s own belt!)” (p.220).However, this last suggestion is a weak one. First, in the New Testament, the noun desmios is always rendered “prisoner” - as in one officially “under arrest”. This was clearly not the case in Paul’s being seized in the temple courts by the hostile mob (Ac.21:30), from whose hands the Roman commander had his soldiers forcibly retrieve the apostle (v.33). Secondly, the verb paradidomi in 28:17 (also used in 21:11) always means “to deliver, hand over.” “Essential to the sense of this word,” Grudem points out, “is the idea of actively, consciously, willingly ‘delivering, giving over, handing over’ something or someone to someone (or something) else – this is the case in all of the other 119 instances of its use in the New Testament,” p.78. Hence, it is very unlikely that Paul is here referring to his ordeal in the temple.
Moreover, it is doubtful whether the passive form of deo in 20:22, which refers to the compulsion of the Spirit in Paul’s experience, is intended by Luke to correspond to the language of Agabus in chp.21 regarding being bound by the Jews. Rather, in response to Edmond Clowney’s similar appeals to Acts 28:17 as a general fulfillment, Grudem writes,
“It seems clear to me that Acts 28:17, where Paul says, ‘I was delivered prisoner from Jerusalem into the hands of the Romans,” refers to his transfer out of Jerusalem (Greek ex hierosolumon) in Acts 23:23-35 as a prisoner (Greek desmios) and into the hands of the Romans, that is, into the jurisdiction and process of the Roman judicial system, into which he was placed by the letter of the Roman tribune to the governor Felix as recorded in Acts 23:26-30,” (p.310).But against this, Gaffin states,
“To argue from the particulars of the Greek text that Paul focuses here on the one detail of his transfer from (Roman imprisonment in) Jerusalem to the Roman authorities in Caesarea (23:23ff.) is to miss the plainly summary nature of his remark in the immediate context and to be guilty of the same overly pedantic demand placed on Agabus,” (p.66).Of course it is true that Paul’s recounting here is “plainly summary.” However, we must understand Paul’s summary in the terms he employs. And in his summarization it is evident that he speaks of his transfer from Jerusalem as a prisoner into the Roman judicial system.
Certainly we don’t want to read more into the text than is there. But we want to at least read what is there. One wonders here if, in Gaffin’s rhetoric, “pedantic” is being confused for “careful.” Generally speaking, of course Agabus’ prophecy isn’t far off the mark. But in the actual details of his language, he was simply not accurate. We might note that to read Paul’s words here in chp.28 as referring to his experience in the temple, as Ferguson suggests, is to similarly expect a more precise fulfillment of the prophecy. But such an interpretation, as I argued, is in tension with the details of the text.
In contrast to the proposal that 28:17 indicates a fulfillment of Agabus’ prophecy, Grudem argues that, whereas Luke elsewhere acknowledges prophetic fulfillment (e.g., the prediction in 11:28),
“Luke’s silence about the “fulfillment” [of 21:10-11] is telling. Not only do we have an unfilled prophecy but a prophecy whose two elements – “binding” and “giving over” by the Jews – are explicitly falsified by the subsequent narrative.”As D.A. Carson concludes,
“I can think of no reported Old Testament prophet whose prophecies are so wrong on the details. The rebuttal of Gaffin, in my judgment, does not pay close enough attention to the text,” (p.98).All things considered, it appears to me that Grudem has the more compelling exegetical case, at this point.
But what about Agabus’ solemn preface: “The Holy Spirit says,” (21:11)? What does that mean? What it DOESN’T mean, according to Grudem’s ‘best guess’ (see p.83), is “that the very words of the prophecy were from the Holy Spirit but only that the content generally had been revealed by the Spirit,” (p.82).
Grudem then appeals to early church writings to substantiate this thesis:
“A similar example of a ‘prophecy’ which is then summarized with markedly altered content - as something “the Holy Spirit” was “saying” is found in Ignatius’ Epistle to the Philadelphians 7:1-2 (about 108 AD). The prophecy itself, given by Ignatius, said, “Give heed to the bishops, and to the presbytery and deacons.” But the summary of it that Ignatius gave, after affirming that he had “no knowledge” of divisions in the church “from any human being,” was this: “The Spirit was preaching, and saying this, ‘Do nothing without the bishop, keep your flesh as the temple of God, love unity, flee from divisions, be imitators of Jesus Christ, as was he also of his Father.’” In this section, the phrase translated “saying this” is legon tade, the same two words used by Agabus in Acts 21:11 (tade legei, “thus says…”). Yet the phrase hardly introduces a direct quotation – it was a greatly expanded interpretation,” (p.82).He also cites The Epistle of Barnabas 6:8; 9:2 and 9:5, where the same phrase tade legei introduces statements “from the Lord” that are “extremely free paraphrases with interpretation of the Old Testament, except in 9:5, where no Old Testament quotation at all seems to be in view.” In short, Grudem is arguing that the introductory phrase Agabus used may have been understood to mean “this is generally (or approximately) what the Holy Spirit is saying.”
In response, Dr. Ferguson writes,
“Agabus does not seem to have understood that equation [‘this is generally what the Holy Spirit is saying’], nor, judging by the manner of his reporting did Luke. Furthermore, the passages in Ignatius and Barnabas…provide no foundation for such an argument,” (p.219).With respect to the first point, it isn’t clear to me that such an equation was not understood by either Agabus or Luke. If Grudem’s analysis of Acts 21:10-11 and the subsequent narrative is valid, than it seems evident that such an equation was in fact understood. Regarding his second assertion, Ferguson explains in a footnote:
“The passages to which Grudem appeals reflect the test of Scripture; it is not possible, on any natural reading of them, to align them with the idea of second-level authority or only relative accuracy,” (p.269).It is true that, at least in The Epistle of Barnabas (6:8; 9:2), the appeal is to the authority of Scripture, which is neither ‘second-level’ nor possessing mere “relative accuracy.” However, what is at issue here is not the source (whether a direct revelation of the Spirit within the speaker’s own experience, or to Scripture itself), but the reporting of such prophecy in “thus says…” terms. And in these cases, what is reported is not a verbatim quotation of the words of Scripture, but a free paraphrasing, and even, in some instances, an interpretative glossing.
Ferguson's critique of Grudem’s appeal to these extra-biblical texts seems to miss the mark. But that doesn’t mean Grudem’s suggestions are free of difficulties. They raise a whole host of important questions, which we cannot here address. In summary, I think Grudem’s thesis is not only intriguing and coherent, but seems to provide us with the best explanation of the NT evidence regarding this controversial gift of prophecy.
What do you think?
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