What is a covenant?

AV1611 · #1 (**permalink**) 09-10-2007, 10:00 AM

How does Scripture define "covenant"? The covenantal formula implies it is relational for it is "I shall be your God and you shall be my people".

Puritan Sailor · #2 (**permalink**) 09-10-2007, 11:28 AM

It is an agreement between parties that secures a relationship.

AV1611 · #3 (**permalink**) 09-10-2007, 11:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Puritan Sailor

It is an agreement between parties that secures a relationship.

What Scripture would you use? Does the fact that God is involved change the definition at all? i.e. how can man be a party in a covenant with almighty God?

larryjf · #4 (**permalink**) 09-10-2007, 12:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AV1611

Does the fact that God is involved change the definition at all? i.e. how can man be a party in a covenant with almighty God?

Being in a covenant does not imply equality between the two parties in the covenant. In the past conquering Kings would enforce a covenant on the peoples that they were conquering.

AV1611 · #5 (**permalink**) 09-10-2007, 12:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by larryjf

Being in a covenant does not imply equality between the two parties in the covenant. In the past conquering Kings would enforce a covenant on the peoples that they were conquering.

This is what I can't get my head around

How can someone be a party without equality being implied?

PS: Could you reference that please?

larryjf · #6 (**permalink**) 09-10-2007, 12:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AV1611

Quote:

Originally Posted by larryjf

Being in a covenant does not imply equality between the two parties in the covenant. In the past conquering Kings would enforce a covenant on the peoples that they were conquering.

This is what I can't get my head around

How can someone be a party without equality being implied?

PS: Could you reference that please?

Here is an article on the meaning of "covenant" at Present Truth Magazine.

From the article...

Quote:

Outside of biblical literature the most important use of the covenant idea is found in some international treaty documents of the second millennium B.C. In recent years archeologists have unearthed a great number of these treaties, which were drawn up by the Hittite kings or suzerains. These suzerainty treaties were unilaterally drawn up by the Hittite conquerors and imposed on a subjugated vassal king. The vassal was obliged to swear allegiance, fidelity and exclusive loyalty to the suzerain. The suzerain pledged that he would help and protect his faithful vassal.

armourbearer · #7 (**permalink**) 09-10-2007, 07:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AV1611

This is what I can't get my head around

How can someone be a party without equality being implied?

It is not equality but condescension that is implied. WCF 7:1. Some of the difficulties involved with discussing the nature of the covenant arise from a failure to grasp this point. People tend to speak of the covenant relation without recognising that the very idea implies an accommodation of God to man. Ps. 113:5, 6, "Who is like unto the Lord our God, who dwelleth on high, Who humbleth himself to behold the things that are in heaven, and in the earth!"

puritan lad · #8 (**permalink**) 09-10-2007, 08:39 PM

There are several good books on Biblical Covenants. I applied Meredith Kline's 5 point Covenant outline to most of the Biblical Covenants here

What is Covenant Theology?

O. Palmer Robertson's "The Christ of the Covenants" is a must read also.

Puritan Sailor · #9 (**permalink**) 09-10-2007, 08:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AV1611

Quote:

Originally Posted by larryjf

Being in a covenant does not imply equality between the two parties in the covenant. In the past conquering Kings would enforce a covenant on the peoples that they were conquering.

This is what I can't get my head around

How can someone be a party without equality being implied?

PS: Could you reference that please?

Berkhof has a discussion about this in his ST (pg. 262-263). Diatheke is used of a covenant between a superior and inferior. Suntheke is used of a covenant between equals. In the LXX and NT, diatheke is used to designate the covenant between God and man. And Kline's research in the ANE suzerain treatises bears this out as well. God used the convention of Abraham's time to reveal the nature of his covenant, as a suzerain lord making a pact with a vassal. It is not an agreement between equals but an agreement still which he condescends to make with man, all the conditions and terms of which the Lord himself dictates. Man can only request of God what God has promised and bound himself to do in the covenant.

armourbearer · #10 (**permalink**) 09-10-2007, 08:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by puritan lad

What is Covenant Theology?

A covenant includes promise and command. The model provided in that blog requires Scripture to be moulded to fit the elements whereas it should be the other way around.

puritan lad · #11 (**permalink**) 09-10-2007, 08:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by armourbearer

Quote:

Originally Posted by puritan lad

What is Covenant Theology?

A covenant includes promise and command. The model provided in that blog requires Scripture to be moulded to fit the elements whereas it should be the other way around.

The model does include the promise (Sanctions) and command (Ethical Stipulations). It also includes the other items (or else we won't know who the Covenant is with, or how it will be continued.)

armourbearer · #12 (**permalink**) 09-10-2007, 09:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by puritan lad

The model does include the promise (Sanctions) and command (Ethical Stipulations). It also includes the other items (or else we won't know who the Covenant is with, or how it will be continued.)

That's the excellence of the promise/condition model. You are not required to strain the passage in order to answer superfluous questions. There might be ultimate as well as proximate reference points, e.g., "seed" could refer to many or it could refer to one. By pressing the text to provide rigid answers it never intended, the historical dynamic that is part and parcel of God's covenant dealings is undermined.

In your detailed model you end up with "parallel conditions" which, in my opinion, only serve to make the covenant of grace a covenant of works. If you look at each covenant in your table under point 3, you will see that the stipulation to not eat of the tree is parallel with circumcision, the ten commandments, and Davidic loyalty. If that is the case, you have personal obedience as the condition of the covenant of grace in the same way as Adam's personal obedience was a condition of the covenant of works.

Puritan Sailor · #13 (**permalink**) 09-10-2007, 09:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AV1611

Quote:

Originally Posted by Puritan Sailor

It is an agreement between parties that secures a relationship.

What Scripture would you use? Does the fact that God is involved change the definition at all? i.e. how can man be a party in a covenant with almighty God?

INDEX of covenant theology lectures

Here's a series of lectures on Covenant Theology by Ligon Duncan who I learned from here at RTS. The first lecture overviews the Scriptural use of "Covenant". Just scroll down past the syllabus part.

Joshua · #14 (**permalink**) 09-10-2007, 09:30 PM

Well, my Chloë defines it as follows:

A relationship that God establishes with us, and guarantess by His Word.

O, how she does her Daddy's heart good!

aleksanderpolo · #15 (**permalink**) 09-11-2007, 05:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Puritan Sailor

Quote:

Originally Posted by AV1611

Quote:

Originally Posted by Puritan Sailor

It is an agreement between parties that secures a relationship.

What Scripture would you use? Does the fact that God is involved change the definition at all? i.e. how can man be a party in a covenant with almighty God?

INDEX of covenant theology lectures

Here's a series of lectures on Covenant Theology by Ligon Duncan who I learned from here at RTS. The first lecture overviews the Scriptural use of "Covenant". Just scroll down past the syllabus part.

I am listening to his Westminster Confession for Today Conference 2007 seminar, I hope he can put his audio lecture at RTS online.

puritan lad · #16 (**permalink**) 09-12-2007, 10:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by armourbearer

If that is the case, you have personal obedience as the condition of the covenant of grace in the same way as Adam's personal obedience was a condition of the covenant of works.

Let's see if I can write this clearly and carefully, without blurring justification by faith alone...

Personal obedience (through God's imputed righteous) is a condition of the Covenant of Grace. Without this, one will suffer the curses of the Covenant (ie., Judas Iscariot). This is why Paul gives us such a sobering warning concerning the Lord's Supper.

Granted, this is not perfect obedience (or else the Covenant would be unnecessary). But a child of the Covenant must be one who battles his sin until the death. Obedience is a requirement, as God's grace delivers us not only from the penalty of sin, but from it's dominion as well (Romans 6:14).

One who says He knows God and does not keep His commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in Him.

JBaldwin · #17 (**permalink**) 09-12-2007, 10:27 PM

Quote:

Let's see if I can write this clearly and carefully, without blurring justification by faith alone...

Personal obedience (through God's imputed righteous) is a condition of the Covenant of Grace. Without this, one will suffer the curses of the Covenant (ie., Judas Iscariot). This is why Paul gives us such a sobering warning concerning the Lord's Supper.

Granted, this is not perfect obedience (or else the Covenant would be unnecessary). But a child of the Covenant must be one who battles his sin until the death. Obedience is a requirement, as God's grace delivers us not only from the penalty of sin, but from it's dominion as well (Romans 6:14).

I really have a problem with this, and perhaps I am misunderstanding you. To say that "obedience (through God's imputed righteousness) is a condition of the Covenant" and "Obedience is a requirement" is to put yourself right back under the law which is cursed.

In my understanding of the Covenant of Grace, the ability to live in obedience is not a condition, but a result of God's Spirit having regenerated us. Obedience is a natural outpouring of God's Spirit living within us. The minute we turn obedience into a condition, we return to the law. This is clearly spelled out in the Book of Galatians.

This is why, I believe, so many Christians struggle with sanctification. They do not understand that even after salvation good works are not generated from them, but from God working in them. "For it is God who worketh in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure." (Philippians 2:13) By relying on Him, leaning on Him, trusting Him, by faith, we live holy lives.

PuritanCovenanter · #18 (**permalink**) 09-13-2007, 02:17 PM

Covenant Theology: The Key of Theology in Reformed Thought and Tradition by Peter Golding

Peter Golding has a great book on Covenant Theology.

He points to 4 kinds of Covenants.

Quote:

1. Covenants in Ancient Society.
Contracts.... Example is in the book of Ruth where Boas purchases a field in Ruth Chapter 4.

It has 5 characteristics.

a. The parties involved v 7-9

b. Description of the transaction v 3

c. Specificaton of the Contract v 5

d. List of witnesses v 2,9-11

e. and the date the contract was completed. v 9

2 Parity Covenants

These are legal agreements by with a firm bond or union is established and maintained between two parties for their mutual benefit.

The form of this covenant followed

a. Preamble in which the initiator is identified.

b. Prologue which describes the prior relationship previously sustained between the two parties.

c. Terms, in which stipulations, obligations and promises, are set down.

d. Future provision, in which arrangements are made for the preservation of the document.....

e. Witnesses are noted......

f.Sanctions whereby blessings and cursings are attached....

in addition there usually takes place a solemn oath-taking ceremony which seals the covenant

Examples found are in Genesis 14:13, 21:27, 26:28f, 31:43-54, 1 Samuel 18:3, 1 Kings 5:12, 10:10,13.

3. Covenants of Grant

The distinctive feature of this type of covenant, so important a factor in the Abrahamic and Davidic covenants of the divine Covenant of Grace, is that far from being instituted between two parties more or less equal in status, 'they are freely and independently instituted by one powerful party entirely for the benefit of a lesser, weaker party'......

4. Suzerainty Covenants

These are covenants instituted by a great leader, usually a king (or suzerain), with a weaker party, a vassal, mainly for his own benefit.

The parties are generally the same in both Covenants of Grant and Suzerainty Covenants, but 'functionally, however, there is a vast difference between these two types of documents.......

portions taken from pages 67-69

Anyways you get the gist of the four types of covenants he defines.