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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Weeping and gnashing of teeth
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Andromeda
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# 11304
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Posted
What is your take on the weeping and gnashing of teeth referred to in Matthew and Luke's gospels? I've often heard it explained as describing remorse and regret. I don't find the concept of hell particularly comforting at the best of times but to think of repentant people writhing in the anguish of their own guilt for eternity, well that just seems abhorrent to me. What could be worse than that?
[ 28. September 2014, 09:51: Message edited by: Andromeda ]
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In this world you’ll have trouble. But cheer up! I have overcome the world.
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Moo
Ship's tough old bird
# 107
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Posted
I don't see it as remorse and regret. I see it as anger that the person cannot continue to do the kind of things he did before.
Moo
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Andromeda
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# 11304
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Posted
That would certainly be a preferable interpretation ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
[ 28. September 2014, 11:51: Message edited by: Andromeda ]
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Raptor Eye
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# 16649
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Posted
I think it's probably the common parlance of the time for 'you'll always regret it'.
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Be still, and know that I am God! Psalm 46.10
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Adam.
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# 4991
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Raptor Eye:
I think it's probably the common parlance of the time for 'you'll always regret it'.
Is it? Looking at the whole Greek Bible (LXX+NT), gnashing (βρυγμὸς) is a pretty rare word, only occurring 9 times. Seven of these are in the pairing "weeping and gnashing of teeth" (6 times in Matthew, once in Luke). Weeping (κλαυθμὸς) is a pretty common word (49 times). But, the pairing never occurs in the LXX or anywhere in the New Testament outside of those occurrences in Matthew and Luke.
Looking at classical literature, the only references in LSJ for βρυγμὸς are to the Bible.
So, it seems pretty unlikely to be "common parlance." The question is, why is Matthew so keen on it?
[ 28. September 2014, 15:22: Message edited by: Hart ]
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Ave Crux, Spes Unica!
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
There's a difference between remorse and repentance. You can be remorseful and repentant, or you can be remorseful and unrepentant.
Remorse means "I did it and I wish I hadn't." There could be a whole lot of reasons for this attitude, some good and some bad.
Repentance is where you (general you) regret the actual deed for its own sake. It was bad. It hurt people. It was wicked and disgusting, and the memory of it fills you with shame. If you had a time machine, you would go back and undo it. (Okay, this is maybe over the top for the minor sins we commit daily, but it's on the spectrum of repentance. We regret the nature of the deed.)
Remorse without repentance is where you regret something other than the deed itself. For example, you regret getting caught. You regret the consequences of the deed, but given the same circumstances, you would willingly commit the same deed again (as long as someone could guarantee you the outcome would be less painful). You regret the damage it's done to your reputation or your future prospects, but as long as nobody found out, well...
This second group of people are the ones I think the weeping and gnashing of teeth applies to. They are not repentant--they have not had a change of heart--in any real sense of the word. If let out of hell, they would willingly do the same thing again--and again--and again. They see no reason not to. The deed is perfectly fine by them, it's the consequences they object to.
Sad to say, there is nothing heavenly about such people (which is what we all are by nature, without Christ). If you let them into heaven, the first thing they would do is start bitching about the other people they found there. If you seated them at the heavenly banquet, they would find fault with the seating arrangements and the food. You've met these people before. You've probably BEEN these people before, we all have. But the ones who wind up in hell are the ones who are consumed by this attitude.
They would not be happy, they CANNOT be happy, because the cause of their unhappiness lies within themselves, in the very fact that they are the kind of people they are. God himself with all his power cannot make them happy, because they refuse happiness. Happiness is impossible for such people without a change of heart, a change of nature. And that (repentance) is precisely what they are refusing.
It maybe sounds weird, but I think it is just as easy or easier to go to hell being a respectable church member as to do it by being a drug dealer and murderer. Because the bitchy-by-nature, never-pleased, unrepentant church member can say to him/herself, "I'm a respectable person, I'm good enough" and never face the need for repentance lifelong. But the person whose life is a total disaster has the need for repentance forced on him/her. Hard to say "I'm good enough" when you're doing hard time for an axe murder.
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Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
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Adam.
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# 4991
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Hard to say "I'm good enough" when you're doing hard time for an axe murder.
Have worked with the incarcerated, I'd say there are three ways this can go. First is to simply not say anything; become spiritually numb because being fully conscious of who you are and where you are in just too heavy to hold. You see a lot like this, unfortunately, who just seem to disappear inside.
Secondly, there's the attitude that basically says "I am good enough, despite doing hard time as an ax murder, and I'm going to prove it." Best option is that this realizes itself as the 'program' junky who's into every program going. I knew several people that burned out of our ed programs because this is what they were doing. That's too bad, but much more unfortunately, it also realizes itself in the bullies and the violent.
Thirdly, there's what you refer to. The deep realization of the need for total conversion, reformation of life narrative, and reparation. I've had the privilege of working with men doing this and they're the ones I have to thank for the commitment to continued conversion (/growth in discipleship) that I inherited from them.
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
Thanks, Hart. That's very interesting and I hadn't even thought about option 1. Could you tell me more about option 2? I don't think I really understand it.
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
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Adam.
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# 4991
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Could you tell me more about option 2? I don't think I really understand it.
Maybe you're too virtuous to! But let me try again. I suppose it's a form of active denial. When presented with a situation that should lead to option 3 (profound repentance and conversion), another reaction (which is sometimes a step on the way to this) is to deny that one is really in that situation. Your self-identity is threatened by incarceration (/conviction) so you aggresively seek to re-assert your power in situation of powerlessness. This could happen in reasonably benign ways (the stereotype of people working out a ton inside has some reality to it; in my experience it was mainly pushups and pullups as they didn't have access to weights). Or it could happen by beating the living bejeezus out of someone.
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Raptor Eye
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# 16649
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Posted
There's also the kind who convince themselves that they are the victims: the crimes they committed wouldn't have happened if their victims hadn't behaved in the way they did, or their families didn't do the right thing by them, etc.
Looking again at the gnashing of teeth, there are a few refs in the OT, Job 16:9, Psalms 35:16, 37:12, 112:10. All refer to the irritation, anger and hatred that arises in wicked people when faced with righteousness. I don't know whether the gnash word is the same as is used by the gospel writers though.
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Be still, and know that I am God! Psalm 46.10
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Adam.
Like as the
# 4991
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Raptor Eye:
Looking again at the gnashing of teeth, there are a few refs in the OT, Job 16:9, Psalms 35:16, 37:12, 112:10. All refer to the irritation, anger and hatred that arises in wicked people when faced with righteousness. I don't know whether the gnash word is the same as is used by the gospel writers though.
Interesting. There's a totally different word at play here: βρύχω. This is the verb in Job 16:9, Psa 34:16, and 36:12 (all psalm refs to LXX). Psalm 111:10 uses a different verb again: ὀργίζω (to make angry, so he makes his teeth angry).
This seems to be different from the "wailing and gnashing of teeth" in that all these examples are threats. I don't think that's how I read the NT phrase, but maybe there could be a connection?
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Ave Crux, Spes Unica!
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Lyda*Rose
Ship's broken porthole
# 4544
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Posted
I think of "gnashing of teeth" as rage or frustration. "Wailing and gnashing of teeth" in this context makes me think of deep unhappiness and impotent rage. But then I know nothing of OT Hebrew or NT Greek.
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LeRoc
Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216
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Posted
I jsut want to say that I really like the phrase "weeping and gnashing of teeth". Of all the things Jesus could have said about Hell, He came up with this. It has a cartoon-like quality to it.
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Evensong
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# 14696
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Posted
I preached on Hell and weeping and gnashing of teeth in Matthew 13 a few months ago. Sermon here.
On the gnashing of teeth, I took the Job and Psalms line:
quote:
“Gnashing of teeth” that we see seven times in the Gospel of Matthew is perhaps not a sign of conscious eternal torment that we might associate with some traditional images of hell, it is a sign of rage and of defiance, perhaps even scorn. The phrase occurs five or six times in the rest of the bible and the context is not about pain.
[ 29. September 2014, 23:05: Message edited by: Evensong ]
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Adam.
Like as the
# 4991
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Hart:
There's a totally different word at play here: βρύχω. This is the verb in Job 16:9, Psa 34:16, and 36:12 (all psalm refs to LXX).
Sorry, I've just read over everything I've read again and realized I was missing something obvious: βρυγμὸς and βρύχω are not "totally different words" as I claimed, they're just the nominal and verbal forms of the same root. I got caught up in the prison stories I was thinking about in between and didn't notice the connection.
So, it seems there may be something worth leveraging here: gnashing of teeth is a way of making a threat. Matthew's people who are wailing and gnashing their teeth are trying to be threatening. The question is: why? Are they trying to scare off adversaries? Or, are they still clinging to a foolish idea that they can get themselves out of this situation through their own power?
[ 30. September 2014, 03:20: Message edited by: Hart ]
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Ave Crux, Spes Unica!
Preaching blog
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Kelly Alves
Bunny with an axe
# 2522
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Posted
It hit me that what I was picturing whenI read that phrase was not people in physical torment, but people in a fury at being excluded-- like kids discovering a party to which they were not invited. It further occured to me that this menal image was long standing-- meaning, the image the phrase produced was something well-used and old, from childhood.
That fits with the idea of the teeth gnashing being " threatening" -- adding, that, the image I get is some Hollywood type snarling " do you know who I am?" when inconvenienced at a restauraunt.
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Evensong
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# 14696
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Posted
Useful journal article from Edward Fudge here. says this:
quote:
3. Gnashing of teeth. The phrase "grinding of teeth" appears many times in the OT (see Job 16:9; Ps 35:16; 37:12; Lam 2:16), and it always pictures someone so angry at another that he grinds his teeth in rage, like a mad animal straining at the leash. We see the same usage in the NT, where Stephen's enemies "gnashed their teeth at him" (Acts 7:54).
Traditionalist interpretation has ignored the Biblical usage of this phrase and has homiletized instead on souls grinding their teeth eternally in excruciating pain. In the Bible, however, the teeth grind in rage, not particularly in pain- though there may well be time for that along the way. Ps 112:10 is instructive concerning the wicked's end in this regard. The verses just before it describe the final glory of God's people. Verse 10 then says: "The wicked man will see and be vexed, he will gnash his teeth and waste away; the longings of the wicked will come to nothing." Gnash his teeth as he may, the wicked man's rage does him no good in the end. Even as he grinds his teeth, he comes to nothing (the KJV has "melt away"). Traditionalists make "gnashing of teeth" into conscious unending torment. The Bible pictures it as horrible rage—rage that is frustrated by the wicked's own inexorable destruction.
I think it makes sense.
[ 30. September 2014, 05:07: Message edited by: Evensong ]
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Martin60
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# 368
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Posted
Impotent rage.
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Love wins
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Andromeda
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# 11304
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Posted
Thank you all so much for your considered replies and links. I have read them all and, as usual, found your responses insightful, thorough and compassionate. Having another perspective like this is immensely helpful to me, and if you're right something of a huge relief.
Thanks
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In this world you’ll have trouble. But cheer up! I have overcome the world.
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