Fulfillment in scripture does not necessarily refer to predictions that have come true in latter chapters of the bible. Rather, fulfillment refers to the word spoken by God in the Old Testament being given a new sense of meaning through Jesus to reveal what God truly intends. This idea can be seen in the words spoken by Hosea in Matthew 2, which say, “that what the Lord said through the prophet might be fulfilled: ‘Out of Egypt I called my son.” This quote reminds the reader of the Exodus as the Israelites were “called” out of Egypt, but it is given new meaning in the New Testament as Jesus returns from Egypt following the death of Herod. Jesus was God’s way of fulfilling what was promised in the Old Testament. There are many aspects of the Old Testament and the nation of Israel that are left unanswered going into the New Testament and the life of Jesus is what brings closure to these questions. For example, God’s entire reasoning for establishing a covenant with Abraham and bringing the Israelites out of Egypt was to bring his people in close communion with him. Jesus fulfills this communion as the gospel of Matthew emphasizes the idea of Jesus as Emmanuel, which means “God with us.” There are many other parallels drawn between the Old Testament and the opening chapters of Luke and Matthew, such as the birth of John the Baptist. Zechariah and Elizabeth were both old in age, yet God blessed them with a son, similar to how God blessed Abraham and Sarah with Isaac. These parallels help emphasize the fulfillment of scripture through the life of Jesus.

The readings toward the end of the Pentateuch place a specific emphasis complete faith in God. In the chapters from Numbers, we see the Israelites lack faith in God multiple times to the point of questioning why they even left Egypt in the first place. They grow restless and complain about the manna they have been given to eat from God and they complain about the Promised Land as they first arrive. Even Moses finds himself lacking total trust in God at times, such as in Numbers 11 when he questions why God even put him in charge and “put the burden of all these people” on him. This lack of faith is the reason why the Israelites and even Moses must die before entering the Promised Land. The Promised Land was promised to God’s people, but one cannot be one of God’s people while having doubts about God. That is why it must be a new generation of Israelites that enter into the Promised Land, led by Joshua. This is also the reason why the Pentateuch ends with the death of Moses rather than with the Israelites entering the Promised Land. The compilers of the Hebrew bible wanted to emphasize complete trust in God and by showing that even Moses, one of God’s most loyal servants, having slight hesitation at times was enough to prevent his entrance into the Promised Land successfully emphasizes this theme. This ending to Deuteronomy helps guide our reading of the next book of Joshua. The final paragraph in the chapter says, “…no prophet has risen in Israel like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face,” showing that Moses had come the closest to entering into perfect union with God. This has been the entire goal of leading the Israelites out of Egypt and into the Promised Land, to begin our journey towards achieving that “Eden-like” relationship that was lost in Genesis. Even Moses was’t able to reach that perfect relationship and Joshua and all those to come after Moses will also fall short. Yet they persist in working towards this goal and even though they aren’t perfect, God continues to guide us towards this relationship, which is the lesson the compilers of the Hebrew bible want to display

The first few chapters of Leviticus are not the typical story telling chapters that we have seen in the Old Testament up to this point. Rather, its focus pertains to strict and elaborate sacrificial/dietary laws that are laid out in great detail. These laws bring up the idea of purity and impurity in Israeli culture, which simply comes down to our relationship with God. We are most pure when we are in close communion with God and we begin to become move more towards impurity as we damage our relationship with him, often through sin. It is for this reason that God wants us to retain that purity because it means we retain a close relationship with God. When we sin, or in other words give in to impurity, our relationship with God is hurt, however, this impurity is never permanent. One of the rituals mentioned in Leviticus 4 is “The Sin Offering,” which describes what one must do as an act of penance when they have realized they have committed a sinful act. The purpose of this act is to remind us of our relationship with God so that we may refrain from sin in the future and also act as penance for the sin committed. This helps reunite us in closeness with God, which is why God describes this ritual as the “most holy” in these chapters. It is for that reason that these “rituals” of reconciliation should not be seen as shameful or dishonorable, but rather a positive step towards re-entering communion with God. As Mary Douglas describes it in her book Purity and Danger, “Dirt offends against order. Eliminating it is not a negative movement, but a positive effort to organize the environment.” This reconciliation is a helpful reminder of who God is and the relationship we have to him, which is the purpose of all the laws described Leviticus, including the food laws. The food laws described in Leviticus 11, which entail the restrictions of what humans can and cannot eat, are meant to help us appreciate the beauty in God’s creation and the purpose he intended for it. Certain animals were provided by God for consumption while others were not, and for this reason, we can better appreciate the other purposes those animals may serve instead. These laws are meant to restrict the freedom of humans, but rather show us how we can maintain our connection with God.

The idea of God has been a common and frequent theme throughout the world for centuries as there have been many religions created to worship people’s idea of God. Even atheism “represents a form of man’s concern with the question of God” according to Joseph Ratzinger. So, who exactly is God? We can see that even the characters in the story of Exodus question who God is, for example, when Moses encounters God in the burning bush and asks for his name and God mysteriously replies with “I am who I am.” This is a confusing answer, especially since throughout the rest of the story of the Israelites’ escape from Egypt God consistently says he is the one who hardens Pharaoh’s heart to keep the Israelites in Egypt so that he can continue giving signs so that the Israelites will “know that I am the Lord your God.” And this is truly the only way we can know who God is, not through him telling us, but through him showing us. God is not someone we can know by name or be told about because the idea of God is beyond human comprehension. Yet, God’s desire to form a close relationship with us has brought him to reach out and lower himself to our human level. This idea is more literally seen in the life of Jesus Christ as God became man and made himself known to humanity. The only way to really know him is through experiencing his endless love and grace. God wants to bring the Israelites out of Egypt so that they will know him and live in communion with him and God wants us to do the same. God is the love and joy that we find in our lives and by living out and sharing the love and grace God brings in our lives, we come to know who God is through experience.

The story of Joseph is one of the longer and more intricate stories in Genesis and there are some developments in it that may seem confusing when not looked at more closely. One such development is when Joseph sends his brothers back to their father but plants a silver cup in Benjamin’s sack. Joseph sends his servant after his brothers to accuse one of them of having stolen the cup and whoever did must return to Egypt as a servant while the other brothers are free to return home. The reason Joseph does this is to test his brothers. When they were younger, Joseph’s brothers sold Joseph into slavery and then returned to their father with Joseph’s clothes bloodied to make it look as if he was killed. They commit this terrible sin knowing that Joseph was Jacob’s favorite son and that his death would cause Jacob significant grief. By planting the silver cup in Benjamin’s sack and therefore making him a servant in

Egypt, Joseph is testing the character of his other brothers to see if they would again allow their father to lose his favorite son and fall into a state of grief, but instead they return to Egypt and beg Joseph to free Benjamin because they know how much it would hurt Jacob. This proves that they have in fact changed from when they were younger. This story of Joseph continues to follow the theme of the beloved son as, similar to Jacob and the other central characters from Genesis, Joseph undergoes a “death” and “resurrection.” Gary Anderson points out that this death is both literal and metaphorical to the characters in the story. To Jacob, Joseph literally dies as his brothers convince Jacob with the bloody clothes, but to Joseph, his death is more metaphorical. Anderson references The Psalter noting that being entrapped in a pit is closely related to entering the underworld and Joseph also “undergoes a series of elevations and humiliations only to find himself the provisioner not only of his family in Canaan but of the entire known world.” This is directly related to the idea of the “beloved son” going through a symbolic death only to be reborn in the grace of God.

One of the most bizarre and mysterious stories in Genesis is that in which Jacob wrestles with a man through the night until dawn. The identity of the man he wrestles in uncertain as the story never reveals who the man really is. The title of this account in the bible is “Jacob Wrestles With God,” suggesting that God is the one that wrestles with Jacob, yet the account simply describes them as a “man.” People have also argued that this man is simply a metaphor that represents his conscious or fears, yet Jacob is inflicted a physical wound in the story, suggesting it is in fact an actual person with whom he wrestles. There are others, such as Leon Kass, who argue the man Jacob wrestles could be a “stand-in for another one of Jacob’s antagonists, his father.” I like this idea expressed by Kass as it would make sense in context with the rest of the story. After the wrestling match is over, Jacob demands a blessing, which reminds us of Isaac’s blessing Jacob “stole” from Esau. It also follows the common theme of taking versus receiving throughout Genesis as, previously, Jacob had taken Esau’s birthright and Isaac’s blessing, but now he asks to receive a blessing from the man he wrestled. Also, by demonstrating the physical and mental durability to contend with the man he wrestles until dawn, he proves himself worthy of his father’s blessing and is therefore blessed legitimately rather than through deceit. This passage of Genesis also provokes the question of “who really wins this wrestling match?” I believe that the true winner of this event is, in fact, Jacob. As pointed by Kass, this is the first time in Genesis that we see someone truly alone since Adam was prior to the creation of Eve. Jacob proves to himself that even when alone, he is capable of overcoming a tremendous feat, such as wrestling with God. This also shows Jacob that he is capable of competing with any man he comes across, including his brother Esau, who he fears may try to kill him. This encounter shows Jacob that he should not fear his confrontation with Esau and that he is truly worthy of his father’s blessing, but more importantly, it also proves that he is worthy of his relationship with God.

There are thousands of religions that are practiced all over the world and it is often very easy to assume that each one contrasts the others since there has been so much conflict between different religious groups for centuries. Different religions, however, can actually do just the opposite and be complementary to one another as there are many similarities among each. The biggest similarity each religion has is that they all believe in some form of higher power or have beliefs that allow them to try and make sense of the world. There are certain aspects of our world that cannot be proven using science, such as what happens after we die, is there a greater being that is controlling our reality, and do we have a greater purpose than just going about earthly lives. It is when addressing questions like these that we have to move away from absolute proof and instead rely on belief or faith. People sometimes look at religion as ignorance or cognitive laziness since it usually deals with questions that can’t be physically proven, however, just because certain matters can’t be scientifically proven does not mean they are unimportant. The longevity of our own lives is miniscule when compared to the life of the universe, which is why it is perfectly logically to ask if there is some form of life after death even though there is no way to prove this until we ourselves die. Yet, just because we can’t find a definite answer using science does not mean we can’t use logic and reasoning to form beliefs of what is to come after we die and this is exactly what religion is. Religion is a set of foundations or beliefs that attempt to make sense of these bigger questions that science cannot address. It’s not just random guesses or made up ideologies to give people hope, but religious beliefs are based on logical inferences and greater experiences that can help us to better understand the world in which we live and if there is more to our purpose than to just continue the human legacy on Earth.

In Wilken’s piece of writing, The Reasonableness of Faith, he describes how, contrary to many other thinkers at the time, early Christian thinkers believed that reason began with faith. There were plenty of people who believed that faith was detrimental to discovering the truth since it worked with ideas that could not be proven as fact. Wilken, however, believes that faith is unavoidable and is actually necessary for logical reasoning when in search of the truth. He argues that many things, such as history, cannot be entirely proven as true, saying, “What we know of past events depends on the testimony of those who have witnessed them.” St. Augustine also shares this view with Wilken as he uses the example of Cicero killing anyone who conspired against him, saying, “it is not proper to say ‘I know it’; rather one must say, ‘I believe that wicked conspirators were once put to death by the virtuous Cicero.” One cannot know for sure that past events as we know them are how they actually played out. Instead, we believe, or in other words have faith, that is how they occurred since there is no way to prove past events happened exactly the way we believe them to have occurred. Augustine makes a distinction between historical knowledge and mathematical knowledge since historical knowledge is “dependent on the veracity of the witness” while mathematical knowledge is “certain and demonstrable.”  Not only do Wilken and Augustine believe that faith is unavoidable, but they also believe that it is beneficial because it builds trust within each other and without it we would not be able to function as a society. Wilken quotes Augustine, saying, “Nothing would remain stable in human society if we determined to believe only what can be held with absolute certainty.” Wilken and Augustine also believe that faith is necessary for learning since, according to Augustine, one cannot learn a foreign language without hearing it spoken by a native speaker and one trusts that is how the language is actually spoken. Trust is a necessary component of societal functioning and without having faith, trust no longer exists in our world, showing that faith is both unavoidable and necessary for our world to flourish.

Abraham agrees to sacrifice his only son Isaac per God’s request due to his complete and everlasting devotion to God. Despite a couple of instances, such as when Abraham slept with his wife’s servant Hagar, Abraham has always had complete trust in God and has always done as he says. He also knows that Isaac himself was a gift given by God since both Abraham and Sarah were too old to naturally reproduce at the time he was conceived and, therefore, he should obey God’s wishes. In line 5 and 8 of Genesis 22, Abraham is technically telling the truth since he tells his servants they will return, which they do, and that God will provide the lamb for sacrifice since the lamb was supposed to be Isaac, who was a gift from God to Abraham and Sarah. I believe that Abraham knew God had something else in mind when he told him to sacrifice Isaac because he trusted God would keep his promise to give Abraham countless descendants. However, Abraham was still fully willing to follow through with God’s request which shows his complete devotion and love for God. This is what God was intending when he told Abraham what he had to do. He wanted to test his faith and trust in God to see if he was entirely devoted to him because the fact that Abraham was willing to sacrifice his only son per God’s request was the ultimate sacrifice he could have made. This act, among others, shows that Abraham is in fact a praiseworthy person in Genesis as he has completely devoted himself to God. He is also a compassionate person, seen as when he speaks back to God for the first time out of concern for the righteous people in the city of Sodom who would have been destroyed along with the city. God on the other hand has his worthiness of praise called into question in this story. If God loves all people equally, why does he make Ishmael a “wild donkey of a man” while establishing his covenant with Isaac? Why does he turn Lot’s wife into a pillar of salt simply for looking back at the city as they fled for their lives? Yes, he says he would spare a city for the sake of ten righteous people living in it, but as he destroys the city, one of the supposedly righteous people (Lot’s wife) is killed, calling into question the morality of some of God’s actions.  

Up to this point in Genesis, there have been two creation stories and according to Leon Kass in his book The Beginning of Wisdom, even a third. Despite each creation account being a different story that involves different people and events, each account is a portrayal of the overarching theme that encompasses the first eleven chapters of Genesis. In Genesis 3, sin is introduced for the first time to the human race as Adam and Eve disobey God and as a result are banished from the Garden of Eden. Once sin has been introduced, it progresses to the point where “The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time” and as a result, God decides to send a flood to wipe out the human race. This may seem a little extreme when, according to Kass, “the root of the trouble is the male attitude toward other people’s daughters.” This story is not meant to portray God as cruel and harsh, however, and is instead meant to emphasize the effect sin has on our relationship with God. In the previous creation story with Adam and Eve, we see how sin can damage our relationship with God and, as a result, distance ourselves from him. After disobeying God, he banishes Adam and Eve from the garden, permanently damaging their close relationship with him. This idea is seen again in the story of Noah and the flood as humanity continues to sin, distancing themselves from God until God eventually decides that humanity needs to be wiped from the face of the earth. In both cases, sin ruined the close relationship humanity had with God and as a result led to more struggle and hardship among humanity. however, the theme of these stories is more than just emphasizing the damaging effects of sin as it also gives hope to humanity. Humans are not perfect as we all have free, which will inevitably lead to sin. God knows that we can’t be perfect everyday of our lives which is why he is always willing to show us mercy and forgiveness. After Adam and Eve are kicked out of the garden, God allows them to continue not only their own lives, but he blesses them with children, continuing the growth of the human race. This idea of second chances is also seen in the story of the Noah. If God really wanted to wipe out the human race, he would have killed everyone, including Noah. He doesn’t do this however, giving humanity another chance at survival. These creation stories are meant to emphasize the damaging nature sin has on our relationship with God and remind us that we aren’t perfect and will eventually sin, but we can repair our relationship with God simply by asking for forgiveness and doing our best to live righteous lives as we continue living.