Understanding Spiritual Adoption - NCCG.ORG Ning Network Archive 2008-10

A Preliminary Biblical Analysis

I have been asked to give some scriptual background to the practice in this Mishpachah of spiritual adoption of which this article is but a preliminary exegesis in the hope that time will allow a more rigorous examination in the future.

Etymology and Semitic Practice Historically

To begin with, the word 'adoption', used only by the apostle Paul, does not occur in the Bible as a legal technical term in quite the modern sense, for in Semitic society actual blood-relationship was unnecessary for the possession of family privileges. The covenant with Abraham and his seed (Gen.17:9) was valid not only for those born of Abraham but also for purchased slaves of alien stock (Gen.17:12ff). The Hebrew word for father ('ab) "does not imply physical fatherhood so much as protector and nurturer. In fact, the words: 'Thou art the father of the fatherless' exactly explain what fatherhood meant" (A.Guillaune, Prophecy and Divination, 1938, p.75).

The discovery of the Nuzi archives has, however, thrown some light on a Semitic form of adoption, which had not previously been thought to exist. At Nuzi it was the custom for a childless couple to adopt a son, sho should serve them while they lived and bury them when they died, and receive in turn the inheritance, though any son born to the couple after the adoption became the chief heir (W.H.Russel, Journal of Biblical Literature, LXXI, 1952, pp.233f.). Some procedure such as this must be invisaged in the relationship of Abraham and Eliezer (Gen.15:2ff), while something closely akin to adoption ouucrs in Gen.48:5 in the matter of Ephraim and Manasseh, Ex.2:10 in the matter of Moses, 1 Ki.11:20 in the matter of Genubath, and Est.2:7 in the matter of Esther.

The germ of the use of this term in the spiritual sense is obviously present in the Old Testament description of Israel as a son of Elohim (Ex.4.22; Is.1:2f.; Jer.3:19; Hos.11:1) and the focus of this relationship in the king as representative of His people (2 Sam.7:14; 1 Chr.28:6; Ps.2:6f.), so that the apostle Paul can speak of his kinsmen the Israelites, "to whom pertain the adoption" (Rom.9:4, NKJV).

For Paul, adoption as a son of Elohim is a relationship of grace, unlike the Sonship of Messiah, who was Son by nature (cp. Jn.1:14). It involves a change of status, planned from eternity and mediated by Yah'shua the Messiah (Eph.1:5), from slavery to sonship. And though men were potentially sons before Messiah's coming (Gal.4:1), actually they were only slaves (Gal.4:3). The cry, "Abba, Father" (Rom.8:15 & Gal.4:6 in the context of adoption) may perhaps be the traditional cry of the adopted slave. Once adopted, the son of Elohim possesses all family rights, including access to the Father (Rom.8:15) and sharing with Messiah in the divine inheritance (Rom.8:17). The presence of the Ruach Elohim is both the instrument (Rom.8:14) and the consequence (Gal.4:6) of this possession of sonship. However complete in status this adoption may be, it has yet to be finally realised and promulgated in fact in the deliverance of the creation itself from bondage (Rom.8:21ff.).

Though adoption as a theological formula occurs only in Paul, it is implicit as a relationship of grace in John's teaching about "becoming a son" (Jn.1:12; 1 Jn.3:1f.), in the prodigal's acceptance into full family rights (Lk.15:19ff.), and in Yah'shua's oft-repeated title of Yahweh as Father (Mt.5:16; 6:9; Lk.12:32).

In the New Covenant dispensation we find ourselves, therefore, as slaves purchased by the Son under a new Melchizedek dispensation (e.g. Heb.7) such that we become proper sons with spiritual inheritance rights. We remain the sons of Abraham by adoption but this time through Messiah through faith (Gal.3:7). Today's Eliezer is not therefore a slave but already a son in a familial relationship with other blood-purchased sons. The whole Messianic Community therefore consists of the sons of Yahweh through faith in Messiah. What, then, is the familial structure of this fraternal fellowship?

Paul elucidates. He explains that though new believers have "ten thousand guardians in Messiah" (the fraternal relationship), that they "do not have many fathers" (the paternal relationship) (1 Cor.4:15, NIV). Though each believing son has a biological father, some of whom are converts and some of whom are not, some alive and some not, there is also an additional sense of sonship through Gospel birthing which ideally should come through the biological father who is bringing up his son in the "admonition of Yahweh" (Eph.6:4) though may also be done by someone near-related or totally unrelated by blood. Thus Paul became to those he ministered to a "father through the Gospel" (v.16). The apostle adopts the same paternal attitude towards his converts as the apostle John did to his when he refers to them as his "children" (e.g. 1 Jn.3:18; 4:4; 5:21). And whilst he also speaks of adoption to Yahweh (Gk. hyios) he also implies the same adoption by fathers (Gk. teknon) with himself as the apostolic model. The sign of spiritual adoption, both to Elohim and to human fathers, is, to John, "new life" which advances from a vital germ to full maturity as a series of manifestations that is reflected in the positive change of their sons' behaviour (Jn.3:10).

Given the Semitic mindframe and understanding of adoption, such a spiritual adoption was by no means considered alien to the ancients and required no government or civil endorsement such as obtains today. Moreover, this practice was not just peculiar to the Middle East but was understood and practiced in Roman culture too, so in this matter Hebrew and Roman would have been of one mind. And although historical fiction, the adoption of the Hebrew slave, Judah ben Hur by the Roman Senator Arius, is a well known popular illustration of this principle.

It should therefore come as no surprise to those seeking a full restoration of Messianic Israel to find spiritual adoption a part of that reality. Indeed, it is a reflection, on a human level, of the spiritual adoption of those formerly lost in sin to sonship in the Messiah, and is paralleled similarly by the allegorical marriage of Yah'shua to Messianic Israel as His Bride. The relationship between husband and wife is supposed to image the relationship of the Messianic Bride to her Messiah so it follows that there will be corresponding sonship and daughterhood relationships on the spiritual plane too. The goal of every Messianic Israelite teacher and minister should be to educate the biological father to act and be, in every respect, the spiritual father of his own children too, but where he has either failed or is still maturing in that rôle, other spiritual fathers, step-fathers or uncles (such as Assembly Pastors and Elders) should be in place fulfilling the obligations of that calling. I am the spiritual father and uncle of a handful of men and women (all of whom are of age, and one nearly my own age) whose own fathers have failed to provide them with spiritual covering and nurture required of Torah (because they are either unbelievers or are lawless). This fatherhood rôle which is hopefully only temporary as we all pray and await for their biological fathers, to whom they still have obligations according to Torah whilst they are alive in the flesh, to rise up into their calling and can assume their duty as true fathers. And whilst the false accusation has been made that we desire to separate children from the fathers, the total reverse is true: our goal is to stimulate, encourage and persuade those fathers to fulfil their obligations both materially and spiritually, and to take over the duties of those standing in the breach in the days of their abnegation.

The goal of Messianic Israel is ultimately fraternity under one Father, Yahweh. The reality of the flesh has required the establishment of spiritual authorities in humans which we find not only grounded in Torah but also in the New Covenant scriptures where they are taken to their natural fulfilment. A bastard or illigitimate child could not have fellowship in the Congregation of Israel down through ten generations (Dt.23:2) to highlight the impossibility of fellowship with Yahweh without coming in through the gate of proper paternity. Illigitimacy was, and is, a curse (Hos.5:7) and is a sign of unfaithfulness, i.e. apostacy. Yah'shua pointed out to the apostate Jews that there was a principle of spiritual illigitimacy as well. Though they claimed descent from Abraham, He proclaimed them illigitimate (and therefore no longer members of the Congregation of Israel) because of their apostacy (Jn.8:39-41). There is therefore illigitimacy both biological and spiritual, with spiritual illigimacy the fruit of listening to the father of lies, Satan. He annulled their claim to descent from Abraham because they listened to Satan and not Elohim (vv.42-47). Under the inspiration of their own demons, they accused Yah'shua of being demon-possessed and an illigitimate Samaritan (v.48ff.), much as Talmudists today accuse Him of being he illitimate offspring of a Roman soldier called Pantera. If the enemy goes to such lengths to denigrate by using illigitimacy, then obviously legitimacy is at least proportionally as important in the divine scheme, if not more.

Adoption should ideally be one - adoption as sons of Yahweh through actively trusting in Messiah. Ideally every biological father should also be a spiritual father. In the real world, however, this is rare, and whether fathering is formal or informal, it is happening all around us all the time, with that entity called the 'state' also becoming a surrogate father of our children in (for example) the schools. The fact that we formalise it does not make us different from anyone else in that respect - we are merely stating a reality as we embrace the spiritual orphans and illigimate children for whom a 'father' has been, up until their deliverance, merely a biological progenitor and material provider (if that). There are no illigitimate children of Yahweh who have received the Son and there are no illigitimate children in the Messianic Commonwealth of Israel because everybody - both in heaven and on earth - is part of both a human and a heavenly family in the Kingdom of our Elohim.

Copyright (c) 2006 MLT - All Rights Reserved

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