Exegesis and Theology

The Blog of Brian Collins

Kaiser on Rest and Bauckham on the Lord’s Day

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Kaiser, Walter C., Jr., “The Promise Theme and the Theology of Rest,” Bibliotheca Sacra 130 (1973): 135-150.

This is a helpful survey of the rest theme in Scripture. Kaiser’s own summary:

The rest of God is distinctively His own rest which He offers to share first with Israel and through them with all the sons of men who will also enter into it by faith. While there were antecedent aspects of that final rest to come, chiefly in the divine rest provided by the inheritance of the land of Canaan; because it was not accompanied by the inward response of faith to the whole promise of God, of which this rest was just a part, the land of Canaan still awaits Israel and the people of God. The rest of God, lost in the fall, again rejected by the older wilderness generation and subsequently by their erring children is still future to us in our day.

The dead will enter into its full enjoyment after their resurrection from the dead (Ps. 116:7), therefore it is not to be identified with heaven. Rather it is fixed by Isaiah 11:10 as being “in that day” when “the Lord will extend his hand a second time to recover the remnant of his people” (Isa. 11:11). In that eschatological setting, “his rest” (not “dwellings” as in RSV) shall be glorious. Then the Lord shall choose Jerusalem as His dwelling place, and this new David will say, “This is my resting place for ever” (Ps. 132:14).” [149-50]

Bauckham, R. J. “The Lord’s Day.” In From Sabbath to Lord’s Day: A Biblical, Historical, and Theological Investigation. Edited by D. A. Carson. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 1999.

This is an excellent examination of Revelation 1:10 in its historical and canonical context. Bauckham makes the case that the Lord’s day in Revelation 1:10 is Sunday. He further argues that the day was significant to the message of the book, which centers on the issue of sovereignty. The person you worship is your lord. Here it is fitting for the revelation given to John about the reality of Christ’s lordship and his coming full triumph to be given on the day the church gathers to worship. This connection between Christ’s sovereignty and the Lord’s day is strengthened by its being the day of Christ’s resurrection, which marked his triumph over opposition to his sovereignty. The Lord’s day, then, is to be a day of worship in anticipation of our Lord’s return and the full and visible manifestation of his sovereignty.

The Significance of Genesis 1:26-28 in Exegesis, Theology, and Culture

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On Monday I presented a paper at the BJU Seminary symposium for Fall 2018 on Genesis 1:26-28. The paper is posted on the Theology in 3D website. I’m thankful for the opportunity to present the paper, and I welcome feedback.

I’m grateful to Dr. Ken Casillas for inviting me to present the paper and to Dr. Eric Newton for his insightful response.

Schreiner on Spiritual Gifts

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Schreiner, Thomas R. Spiritual Gifts: What They Are and Why They Matter. Nashville: B&H, 2018.

This is an excellent brief introduction to spiritual gifts. The first part of the book presents wise pastoral counsel about what spiritual gifts are and how people should exercise them in the church. The latter part of the book is a brief, winsome defense of the cessationist position.

Schreiner had in the past held to the continuationist position. He comments about his change of mind: “What set me personally back on the road to cesssationism is this very matter of prophecy. I slowly became convinced that the idea that New Testament prophets were different in nature from Old Testament prophets was flawed. Instead, it is more convincing to say that New Testament prophets were infallible like Old Testament prophets” (loc 1681). Like Schreiner, I have always found this (rather than tongues) to be at the heart of the debate.

Schreiner argues that NT prophecy is infallible because there would need to be a clear indication in the NT if prophecy became fallible. To the contrary, the quotation of Joel 2:28 in the NT points to continuity. The NT warnings about false prophets point in the same direction. Second, Ephesians 2:20 teaches that the church was built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets. While Grudem argues that this should be interpreted as “the apostles who are prophets” (thus showing a distinction between infallible and fallible NT prophets), Schreiner notes that Grudem misapplies the Granville Sharp rule to make this claim. Third, the NT demands that prophecies be judged, and the standard laid out in Deuteronomy 18 is that true prophets and prophecies are without error. Fourth, Schreiner rejects that argument that Paul’s claim of apostolic authority over prophets shows that prophets could be in error. “The issue here isn’t whether the words of the prophets are mixed with error. Instead, the issue is whether one is a false prophet!” (loc. 1203). Fifth, Schreiner rejects the claim that the prophecy of Agabus in Acts 21 was in error, noting that Paul in Acts 28 indicates that it was not. Further, Schreiner observes, “if Agabus is judged to be in error, the same kind of judgment could be used to assess other texts which some claim have errors” (loc 1225).

With regard to tongues, Schreiner holds that Acts 2 defines tongues as xenoglossia. None of the following passages in Acts or 1 Corinthians demand that tongues be understood as glossolalia. Thus the claimed gift today is not the same thing as the gift of tongues as practiced in the New Testament.

Al Wolters on Nature and Grace in Proverbs 31

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Wolters, Albert M. “Nature and Grace in the Interpretation of Proverbs 31:10-31.” Calvin Theological Journal 19, no. 2 (November 1, 1984): 153-166.

In this article, Wolters looks at how different views of the relation between nature and grace have affected the interpretation of Proverbs 31:10-31.

He observes that those who oppose grace to nature tend to allegorize this passage. This was common from Origen through the Middle Ages. Even interpreters who focused on the literal sense, like Nicholas of Lyra, took the allegorical understanding to be the literal sense of this passage. Since Toy, many critical interpreters who assume that ancient Israel held a nature against grace view claim the poem was originally secular.

In the 18th-20th centuries, Catholic writers give a grace above nature interpretation of this passage. On this reading, much of the passage deals with merely natural virtues, but at the end of the poem these are transcended by true fear of God.

Luther exemplifies the grace alongside nature view. Wolters notes that Luther was influential in ending the allegorical interpretation of the passage. But Luther still distinguished grace and nature in this marginal comment to his translation of the passage: “That is to say, a woman can live with a man honourably and piously and can with a good conscience be a housewife, but she must also, in addition and next to this, fear God, have faith and pray.”

Regarding a grace restores nature viewpoint, Wolters says, “Applied to the Song of Proverbs 31, this paradigm fosters an interpretation which looks upon the fear of the Lord as integral to the poem as a whole. Religion is not restricted to verse 30, but pervades the whole… Here the woman’s household activities are seen, not as something opposed to, or even distinct from, her fear of the Lord, but rather as its external manifestation.”

Wolters holds to the fourth view, but he is willing to grant that the “Valiant Woman as the personification of Wisdom—not in an allegorical sense, but in the sense of an earthly embodiment of what it means to be wise.”

Gaffin on Epistemology and Natural Theology

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Richard B. Gaffin Jr., “Some Epistemological Reflections on 1 Cor 2:6–16,” Westminster Theological Journal 57, no. 1 (1995): 103–124.

This excellent article examines the structure of 1 Corinthians 2:6-16, links Paul’s teaching to Jesus’s teaching in Matthew 11:25-27 and Luke 10:21-22, and highlights the eschatological dimension of the wisdom of the Spirit in contrast to the wisdom of this age. He concludes that there is an “unbridgeable epistemological gulf between this age and the age to come, the yawning, nothing less than an eschatological chasm between belief and unbelief” (114). Thus, “1 Cor 2:6–16 (1:18–3:23) is the death blow to all natural theology. There is no knowledge of God resident in unbelievers or accessible to them that reduces the eschatological void that separates them from a saving knowledge of God” (123).

There is a debate today in Reformed theology about the role of natural theology and the place that theologians like Thomas Aquinas should play in formulating Protestant theology. Those who argue for a greater use of Thomas appeal to the Reformed Orthodox for precedent. Though writing over 20 years ago, Gaffin addresses this argument:

The prevailing reading of that history today—namely, that seventeenth-century Reformed and Lutheran orthodoxy is an abandonment of the Reformation that prepares the way for the Enlightenment and then Liberalism (until all has been made better by Karl Barth cum suis)—is a gross distortion. It does, however, contain a significant germ of truth. The increasing preoccupation of orthodox dogmatics with natural theology, particularly after Descartes, worked to undermine that orthodoxy and aided the rise of the very rationalism it was opposing. The tension is there, for instance, in Francis Turretin on the role of reason in theology. And the outcome—a permanent lesson that we miss to our theological peril—is the startling swiftness with which in the span of a single generation at the Academy in Geneva, from Turretin father to son, Reformed orthodoxy was virtually displaced and rendered impotent in the face of a frank rationalism, bordering on Socinianism, that was quick to follow. By now, too, we should have learned: natural theology may have a place in Roman Catholic and Arminian theologies—with their semi-Pelagian anthropologies [my apologies to my Arminian friends!] and qualified optimism about the unbeliever’s capacity to know God—but not in a theology that would be Reformed.” [123-24]

Blaising on 2 Peter 3

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Blaising, Craig A. “The Day of the Lord Will Come: An Exposition of 2 Peter 3:1-18,” Bibliotheca Sacra 169, no. 676 (Oct-Dec 2012): 387-401.

Blaising follows Al Wolters’s interpretation that 2 Peter 3:10 refers to a refining of the earth and its works. He also takes stoicheia to refer to the heavenly bodies. He connects the idea of refining fire to Micah and to Isaiah 1-4. The latter passage especially indicates that the Lord’s fiery presence itself will both judge and refine the world when he comes.

 

Framing the Debate over the Continuation or Cessation of Tongues

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Wayne Grudem has asserted that the continuationist has the stronger biblical evidence and that the cessationist position has developed primarily from experience—or, rather, the non-experience of miraculous gifts.

I encounter students and pastors all the time who say “I’m not persuaded by the cessationist arguments from Scripture but I’ve never seen any of these miraculous things in my life.” That is the most common comment that I hear about these things from people who are in mainstream Evangelical positions. And over the years as I’ve taught not only here at Phoenix Seminary but at other seminaries – adjunct at other seminaries – by far the most common view expressed among seminary graduates is open but cautious. They say “I’m not convinced by the cessationist arguments but I really don’t know how to put these things into practice in my own church and I’ve never seen them happen.” Tim, the cessationist argument is not winning the day in terms of exegetical arguments or persuasiveness in the books published. I think it’s appealing to a smaller and smaller group of people. . . . [Jack Deere’s] argument is that the primary reason why cessationists hold their view is experience. That is, he says, they haven’t experienced any of these miraculous gifts and so they construct a theology to justify it. [Wayne Grudem, interview by Tim Challies, 14 December 2005]

In constructing his argument in this way, Grudem fails to recognize an important distinction. There is a difference between saying “I believe the miraculous gifts are/are not operative because I have/have not experienced them” and saying “I believe the miraculous gifts are/are not operative because the claimed gifts that are present today do/do not match the Scripture definitions of the gifts.

In countering the continuationist, the cessationist need only demonstrate the continuationist practices do not match the norm laid down in Scripture. If the cessationist is able to provide some scriptural rationale for the evident cessation, he will strengthen his case. But this is not strictly necessary. All that is necessary is to show that the Scriptural data and the contemporary practices are at odds.

This approach is an application of John Frame’s ethical methodology. Frame says, “Every ethical decision involves the application of a law (norm, principle) to a situation by a person (self).” (The Doctrine of the Knowledge of God, 74). Frame’s ethical method also applies to practical theology. It is appropriate to apply the norm of Scripture to a situation (practice) to determine whether or not the practice is biblical.

While considerable argumentation is needed to establish the norm and the situation in this case, several observations from D. A. Carson, a continuationist, point to the strength of the cessationist position operating according to this methodology.

Carson concludes that “the evidence favors the view that Paul thought the gift of tongues was a gift of real languages, that is, languages that were cognitive, whether of men or of angels” (Carson, Showing the Spirit, 83). He continues:

Moreover, if [Paul] knew of the details of Pentecost (a currently unpopular opinion in the scholarly world, but in my view eminently defensible), his understanding of tongues must have been shaped to some extent by that event. Certainly tongues in Acts exercise some different functions from those in 1 Corinthians; but there is no substantial evidence that suggests Paul thought the two were essentially different. [83]

Carson’s way of affirming the biblical evidence and allowing for the nonlinguistic tongues practiced today is to suggest that perhaps modern tongues is a code. The example he gives is the removal of vowels from the sentence, “Praise the Lord, for his mercy endures for ever,” the removal of the spaces between the words, the addition of an “a” after the consonants, and a division back into “words”: “PATRA RAMA NA SAVARAHA DAHARA DAFARASALA FASA CARARA” (86-87).

In this way Carson can correlate the biblical evidence “that Paul believed the tongues about which he wrote in 1 Corinthians were cognitive” (83) with the modern linguistic studies which demonstrate that modern tongues are not languages. This is imaginative, but that a scholar of Carson’s stature is forced to reach this far in an attempt to reconcile the biblical record with the modern practice, tends to lead one to the conclusion is that the modern practice is something other than what is described in the biblical record.

Carson also notes J. I. Packer’s view that modern tongues are not the gift of tongues found in Scripture, but that they may be considered a gift from God despite their lack of “explicit biblical warrant.” Carson rightly remarks, “I cannot think of a better way of displeasing both sides of the current debate” (84). But more than that, if Packer’s view is true—and the evidence suggests that it is since continuationists don’t claim the gift of xenoglossia—it would confirm the cessation of the gift of tongues.

Naselli: “Was It Always Idolatrous for Corinthian Christians to Eat εἰδωλόθυτα in an Idol’s Temple? (1 Cor 8-10)”

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Naselli, Andrew David. “Was It Always Idolatrous for Corinthian Christians to Eat εἰδωλόθυτα in an Idol’s Temple? (1 Cor 8-10),” Southeastern Theological Review 9, no. 1 (Spring 2018): 23-45.

The title question of the article is first addressed by surveying three arguments that answer the question in the affirmative. The headings summarize the arguments. 1. “Argument from the Historical-Cultural Context: Eating ἐδωλόθυτα in an Idol’s Temple was an Inherently Religious Event.” 2. “Argument from a Word Study: εἰδωλόθυτος Means Meat Sacrificed to Idols That One Eats in an Idol’s Temple.” 3. “Argument from the Literary Context: 1 Cor 8 Parallels 10:14-22.” That is, in both cases, Paul is arguing that believers should not eat meat sacrificed to idols in the idol temple. The “right” to do so mentioned in chapter 8 is not truly a right.

Andy answers the question in the negative, and his headings again summarize the arguments. 1. “Argument from Historical-Cultural Context: Eating εἰδωλόθυτα in an Ido’s Temple Could Be a Non-Idolatrous Social Event—Like Eating in a Restaurant.” 2. “Argument from a Word Study: εἰδωλόθυτος Means Meat Sacrificed to Idols—Whether One Eats It in an Idol’s Temple or at Home.” 3. “Argument from the Literary Context: 1 Cor 8 Differs Significantly from 10:14-22.” This third argument is unpacked in four points: 1. If eating idol meat in the temple was always wrong, it is odd that Paul does not address it until chapter 10. Andy quotes Fisk: “Was Paul really more concerned with the selfishness of chap. 8 than with the idolatry of chap. 10?” 2. Andy demonstrates that the grammar does not demand that the “right” of 8:9 be read as a “so-called right.” 3. He draws a contrast between 6:12-20 in which the Corinthians thought they had a right to commit πορνεία and 8:9. In the former passage, he immediately indicates that they do not have that right. In this passage, Paul does not do so. 4. In chapter 8 Paul is dealing with disputable matters among Christians; in chapter 10 he is dealing with idolatry.

Evaluation

I agree with Andy’ argument 2. The usage of εἰδωλόθυτος does not restrict the meaning of this word to food eaten in the idol temple. “It simply means meat sacrificed to idols.”

Argument 1 contains a wealth of interesting background information. However, I’m not yet convinced that eating in an idol’s temple was simply the equivalent to eating in a restaurant. Footnote 33 includes a notable clarification from Wendell Willis: “I seem to have left the impression that I did not think these meals were ‘religious’ but ‘merely’ social. I could not a tall support such a view; clearly the meals were ‘religious.’ There is strong evidence that these cults (and their worshippers) would not have accepted—even understood—a contrast between ‘religious’ and ‘social.’ But the question really should be, what does ‘religious’ mean in the first-century pagan world? Their gods gave, as one of their great gifts, occasions for conviviality and enjoyment as an essential aspect of sacrifice. This social enjoyment was a positive part of religious sacrifice.” This seems to cast doubt on the idea that eating in an idol temple could ever be simply like eating at a restaurant.

In the end, however, I wonder if the location—in an idol temple or out of an idol temple—is really the main issue. The second argument indicated that ἐδωλόθυτα referred to “meat sacrificed to idols” without regard to the location where it was eaten. This means that the question is whether Christians were allowed to eat εἰδωλόθυτα under any circumstances.

This question seems to be answered by the Jerusalem Council (AD 49). Circumcision and the Mosaic law are not required of Christians, but the following are required: abstain from εἰδωλόθυτος, from blood (and thus from things killed by strangulation as a means of keeping the blood in the meat), and from sexual immorality (Acts 15:29). Though some wish to place a statute of limitations on this apostolic decree, there is nothing in the text that indicates this decree expired after a certain amount of time. Further, sexual immorality has always and will forever be forbidden to Christians. The prohibition against eating blood is part of the Noahic covenant (Gen. 9:4), which is a covenant that is still in effect (Gen. 8:22). Thus the other items listed seem to be permanently forbidden to Christians. If εἰδωλόθυτα was only temporarily forbidden, it would be the outlier in this list.

Even if the decree of the Jerusalem Council was only temporary, Paul wrote 1 Corinthians in AD 54 or 55. Would the decree of the Jerusalem Council have expired within five or six years? Confirmation that it had not expired is found in the repetition of the decree in Acts 21:25—after 1 Corinthians had been written. Further confirmation that eating εἰδωλόθυτα was not permissible is found when the ascended Christ rebukes the churches of Pergamum and Thyatira for permitting teachers who taught the acceptability of eating εἰδωλόθυτα (Rev. 2:14, 20). Confirmation that εἰδωλόθυτα was always forbidden is found in the fact that the post-New Testament early church universally held that εἰδωλόθυτα was forbidden (see the quotation from Garland below; cf. Chrysostom’s homilies on 1 Cor. 8-10).

Andy concluded the article by revealing his motivation for writing: “I cannot harmonize 1 Cor 8:9-10 with 10:14-22 unless what Paul describes in 8:9-10 is actually a disputable matter and not idolatry.” The article was effective in helping me see the force of this concern. And yet, I cannot see how understanding 1 Corinthians 8:9-10 harmonizes with the wider canonical context if eating εἰδωλόθυτα is a disputable matter and not idolatry.

Later Christians uniformly opposed idol food, and no church father felt any need to defend Paul against rumors that he advocated eating idol food or to challenge any alternative interpretation of his writings. (Cheung 1999:97). His argument that to eat idol food is to have fellowship with demons became the basic argument against eating idol food. Yet some argue that these later Christians misunderstood Paul. Witherington (1995: 191) contends that soon after the NT era, Paul’s ‘ability to make nice distinctions about eating food from the temple at home and eating in the temple was misunderstood’ (see also Büchsel, TDNT 2:379, who labels it a reemergence of Jewish legalism). Dunn’s evaluation of the matter is more judicious: ‘If those closer to the thought world of Paul and closer to the issue of idol food show no inkling of the current interpretation, that interpretation is probably wrong’ (Dunn 1998: 704). [Garland, BECNT, 395.]

Exegesis of 1 Corinthians 10:4: Does Paul Interpret the Old Testament Allegorically

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Origen appealed to Paul’s Christological identification of the rock that followed the Israelites in the wilderness to justify his method of  interpretation (On First Principles, 4.2.6). Some modern interpreters have also argued that Paul departs from a method rooted in authorial intent in favor of a method based on Jewish interpretive traditions. For instance, Peter Enns appeals to this passage to demonstrate that Paul both incorporated Jewish interpretative traditions into 1 Corinthians and that Paul, wrongly, believed these fables to be fact (Peter Enns, “The ‘Movable Well’ in 1 Cor. 10:4: An Extrabiblical Tradition in an Apostolic Text,” Bulletin of Biblical Research 6 (1996): 23-38).

Modern interpreters who think Paul is drawing on Jewish interpretive traditions connect Paul’s statement, “For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them” (10:4), with Jewish traditions of a moving well. Earle Ellis provides a synthesis of the rabbinic traditions that these interpreters appeal to:

A movable well, rock shaped and resembling a sieve, was given to the Israelites in the desert. As to origin, it was one of the things created on the evening of the Sixth Day. About the size of an oven or beehive, it rolled along after the wanderers through hills and valleys, and when they camped it settled at the tent of meeting. When the princes called, ‘Rise up, O well’ (Num. 21.17), water flowed from its many openings as from a flask. . . At the death of Miriam the well dried up and disappeared, for it was given for her merit. But for the sake of the Patriarchs it was restored, and continued with the Israelites until they reached the Sea of Tiberias. . . .

E. Earle Ellis, “Note on 1 Corinthians 10:4,” Journal of Biblical Literature 76.1 (March 1957): 53-54

However, later rabbinic sources are not a sure guide to Jewish thought at the time of the New Testament, and it is not clear in what form this legend may have existed in Paul’s day. Ellis observes, “It is quite difficult to determine the precise character of the fable in the first century; apart from the sources mentioned above there is little evidence” (Ibid., 54). Only one source that may be from the first century mentions a form of the legend, and it mentions a following well but not a following rock (Pseudo-Philo, Biblical Antiquities, 10:7; 11:15). Even the date of the source is disputed. Enns notes that some think this work dates before AD 70 (Enns, “Well,” 24). Ellis labels the work “ca. 100 C.E.” with a question mark (Ellis, “Note,” 54). G. K. Beale notes that a first-century dating is the majority position but that it is not an uncontested date (Erosion of  Inerrancy, 98, n. 28). Some think that the absence of the mention of the rock means that that form of the legend did not exist in Paul’s day (See Ellis, “Note” and Andrew J. Bandstra, “Interpretation in I Corinthians 10:1-11.” Calvin Theological Journal 6, no. 1 [April 1, 1971]: 11). Enns, however, thinks that 1 Corinthians 10:4 is itself evidence that such a tradition existed at this time. Enns is too confident. (Beale, Inerrancy, 97), and while Ellis and Bandstra may be correct it is hard to know for sure since the claim is based on lack of evidence. Noentheless, all of the above does mean that there is less explicit connection between the known form of the tradition and Paul’s statement in Corinthians than might at first be apparent.

Furthermore, the existence of such a tradition does not mean that Paul drew on the tradition (See Bandstra, “Interpretation,” 11). Godet and Hodge both reject the idea out of hand as being contrary to Paul’s person and position. They are correct to do so, for Paul explicitly rejects Jewish myths (1 Tim. 1:4).

Paul likely relied on the Jewish Scriptures rather than Jewish myths in writing 10:4. In the Pentateuch itself, God is addressed with the appellation “Rock” (Deut. 32:4, 15, 18, 30-31). Paul may reasonably make a word play with the physical rock that supplied water to the people and Rock as a title for the God who was present with his people and who provided the spiritual food and drink for them. This move on Paul’s part was not entirely unprecedented; Psalm 78 also brings together this title for God, the provision of water, and the presence of God in a context similar to that of 1 Corinthians 10 (Beale, Inerrency, 99). The Psalm recounts the blessings of God upon Israel and Israel’s subsequent rebellion. Verse 14 indicates the presence of God theme by reference to the pillar of cloud and fire. Verses 15-16 speak of God splitting rocks in the desert to provide water for the people (incidentally, the plural “rocks” undermines the theory that the rock in Exodus 17 and Numbers 20 were the same rock simply because it shows up at the beginning and end of the journey; contra Enns, “Well,” 30). Verses 17-31 describe Israel’s rebellion (verse 20 again mentions the provision of water through the striking of a rock). Verse 32 notes that their sin was despite God’s miraculous working on their behalf. Verse 35 reveals that the Israelites needed to remember “that God was their Rock.”

Thus to identify this Rock as Christ poses no difficulty for anyone who believes that Christ is God. Paul was not allegorizing when he called Christ the Rock who provided water to the Israelites in the wilderness; he was simply making a word-play with an existing title of God to highlight the presence of Christ among the Israelites in the wilderness. Christ really was in the wilderness with Israel, he really did stand behind the provision of water from the physical rock, and he was given the title Rock by Moses. Nor was Paul adopting a Jewish fable in this passage; he was building off connections already made in the Old Testament and applying them to his present situation.

Exegesis of 1 Corinthians 9:9-10: Does Paul Interpret Deuteronomy 25:4 Allegorically?

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In this passage, Paul cites Deuteronomy 25:4, which deals with the treatment of oxen, and asks, “Is it for oxen that God is concerned?” Paul then asks, “ἤ δι’ ἡμᾶς πάντως λέγει,” which he then affirms. If the first question is read rhetorically as expecting a negative, and if the second question is translated, “Does he not speak entirely for our sake?” then it seems that Paul is denying the original intent of the Law. This is the way Origen understood this text (On First Principles, 4.2.6).

But the second question could be translated as, “Surely he says this for us, doesn’t he?” (NIV). BDAG lists five senses (with glosses) for πάντως: (1) “pert[aining] to strong assumption, by all means, certainly, probably, doubtless,” (2) “pert[aining] to thoroughness in extent, totally, altogether,” (3) “expression of inevitable conclusion in view of data provided, of course,” (4) “expression of lowest possible estimate on a scale of extent, at least,” (5) “with a negating marker . . . not at all . . . by no means.” BDAG lists 1 Corinthians 9:9 under sense one, and this coheres with the translation of the NIV (see also Fee, NICNT [1st ed.], 408; Thiselton, NIGTC, 686; Garland, BECNT, 410).

This non-exclusive translation of πάντως means that the first question need not be understood to absolutely exclude God’s concern for oxen. When the second question is understood as the NIV translates it, Paul is not denying relevance to oxen; he is simply saying there is an extended application to humans as well.

The Old Testament context points toward this extended application. In its context, the command regarding oxen stands alone among commands to provide for the needy. The command regarding the oxen was, in context, an illustration of the kind of care that people should have for one another. This means that Paul interpreted Deuteronomy 25:4 with more care to its original context than those who claim he succumbed to allegory.

Godet makes this point well.

Does not this whole context [in Deuteronomy] show clearly enough what was the object of the prohibition quoted here? It was not from solicitude for oxen that God made this prohibition; there were other ways of providing for the nourishment of these animals. By calling on the Israelites to exercise gentleness and gratitude, even toward a poor animal, it is clear that God desired to inculcate on them, with stronger reason, the same way of acting toward the human workmen whose help they engaged in their labour.

F. Godet, Commentary on St. Paul’s First Epistle to the Corinthians, trans. A. Cusin (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1893), 2:11. (See also Ciampa and Rosner, CNTUOT, 719; Merrill, Deuteronomy, NAC, 325).