A RE-EXAMINATION OF THE CULTURAL MANDATE:
AN ANALYSIS AND EVALUATION OF
THE DOMINION MATERIALS
by
Ronald E. Manahan
Submitted in partial fulfillment of requirements
for the degree of Doctor of Theology in
Grace Theological Seminary
May 1982
Title: A RE-EXAMINATION OF THE CULTURAL MANDATE: AN
ANALYSIS AND EVALUATION OF THE DOMINION MATERIALS
Author: Ronald E. Manahan
Degree: Doctor of Theology
Date: May, 1982
Advisers: James Eisenbraun, D. Wayne Knife, and David Turner
Frequently correlation is made between the cultural mandate, that activity
of doing and making given to man at his creation whereby he is to glorify his
Creator, and the dominion materials (Gen 1:26-28; 9:1, 7; Ps 8:6-10; Heb 2:5-9;
Jas 3:7). Understanding the nature of this correlation and its subsequent
implications is best aided by working with a carefully defined field of terms, by
isolating what alternative views of the correlation have been expressed throughout
the church's history, and by engaging in a thorough examination of the background
and interpretive field of the dominion passages.
The conclusion resulting from the isolation of the several views on
dominion material is that each view gives indication of having been influenced by
the cultural milieu of the interpreter and by perceptions of culture in general. The
interpreter continually interacts between his constantly changing, dynamic cultural
milieu and the Biblical text.
The context within which this study is conducted includes the realization
that man is contextualized and is an integral part of the creation in which he was
placed by his Creator. Man stands in a dependent relationship with God, who has
placed him within an order. From this placement man sees that he is suspended in
a threefold, concurrent relationship: (1) to God, (2) to others, and (3) to the world.
The terms "cultus" and "culture" indicate the full range of human activities where
man acts out this threefold relationship. "Culture" refers to both the activity and
the context of human shapers and formers. So defined, culture must be done.
Through analysis of the Old Testament dominion material in the light of
royal ideology, apocalyptic ideas, and societal hierarchical structuring this study
concludes that the dominionizing activity (formative activity) has been given
and not rescinded. But this activity may be done in loyalty or disloyalty toward
man's sovereign Creator. When done in loyalty, Mlw exists. However, when done
in disloyalty, the formative activity struggles with the cosmos. This struggle
produces a feeling of frailty within man.
The New Testament dominion material by individualizing the use to which
it puts Psalm 8 points to Jesus Christ as the resolution to the clashing tenets of
man's frailty and incomparable position.
Major conclusions reached are that the dominion given man refers to
shaping activity. Shaping activity done with respect to concrete things is not
optional. Man is given a mandate. But only in Jesus Christ, who was fully loyal, is
there any hope of beneficent shaping activity, an activity which will glorify the
Creator.
Accepted by the Faculty of Grace Theological Seminary
in partial fulfillment of requirements for the degree
Doctor of Theology
Adviser: James E. Eisenbraun
Adviser: D. Wayne Knife
Adviser: David L. Turner
Copyright © 1982 by Ronald E. Manahan
Digitally prepared and posted on the web by Ted Hildebrandt (2004)
with permission.
Please report any errors to:
TABLE OF CONTENTS
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vi
PREFACE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . viii
INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Reasons for This Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Glossary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Cultural Mandate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Dominion Materials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Re-examination . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Form of the Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
I. HISTORICAL SURVEY OF THE INTERPRETATION
OF DOMINION MATERIALS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Ancient Interpretations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Rule Over Creation as a Present Possession . . . . . . 15
Selected sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Commentary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
God's Rule--Man's Rule . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Selected sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Commentary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Promise-Fulfillment Debate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Selected sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Commentary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Rule as Lost or Diminished . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
Selected sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
Commentary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Rule in an Eschatological Figure . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Selected sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Commentary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Rule as Cultural Expression . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Selected sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Commentary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
Medieval Interpretations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
Augustine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Context of interpretation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Interpretation of dominion materials . . . . . . . . . . 58
Aquinas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Context of interpretation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
Interpretation of dominion materials . . . . . . . . 65
iii
iv
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
Modern Interpretations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
Martin Luther . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Context of interpretation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Interpretation of dominion materials . . . . . . . . . 71
John Calvin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
Context of interpretation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
Interpretation of dominion materials . . . . . . . . . . 78
The Anabaptists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Context of interpretation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Interpretation of dominion materials . . . . . . . . . . 84
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
Recent Interpretations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Karl Barth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Dietrich Bonhoeffer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
Emil Brunner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Paul Tillich . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
Concluding Assessment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
II. A PHILOSOPHIC PERSPECTIVE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
Man's Life in an Order . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
Man as Contextualized . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
Man is dependent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
Within a whole . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
Within an "ordered" whole . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Within a law-structured whole . . . . . . . . . 102
Man is in a continuum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
A contemporary appraisal . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
A rebuttal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
A suggestion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
Man as Relational . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
In relation to God . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
In relation to others . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
In relation to the world . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
Cultus and Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132
Cultus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
A Proposal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
III. EXAMINATION OF OLD TESTAMENT DOMINION MATERIALS
The Extent of Dominion Materials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
Hermeneutical Realities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
Royal Ideology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
Egyptian royal ideology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
Mesopotamian royal ideology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154
Israelite royal ideology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166
Historiographic literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168
Hymnic literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
v
Prophetical literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
Apocalyptic Imagery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
Societal Hierarchical Structuring . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
Summary Evaluation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194
Explicit Dominion Materials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196
Genesis 1:26-28 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
Textual variants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198
Literary context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200
Examination of dominion material . . . . . . . . . 207
The expression vntnmdk vnmlcb . . . . . . . . 207
hdr and wbk. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220
Interpretive field . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
Genesis 9:1, 7 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
Textual variants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
Literary context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233
Examination of dominion material and
interpretive field . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236
Psalm 8:6-10 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238
Textual variants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238
Literary context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240
Examination of dominion material . . . . . . . . . . 242
Interpretive field . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247
Implicit Dominion Materials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247
IV. EXAMINATION OF NEW TESTAMENT DOMINION MATERIAL . 251
Explicit Dominion Material . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
Hebrews 2:5-9 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252
Textual variants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252
Literary context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
Examination of dominion material . . . . . . . . . . 266
Interpretive field . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270
James 3:7 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 275
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
Implicit Dominion Materials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
A Suggestion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
An Example . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283
V. CONCLUSION AND IMPLICATIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 289
The Christian and Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 293
The Christian and Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 298
The Christian and Theology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 303
BIBLIOGRAPHY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 308
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
AB The Anchor Bible
ABL Harper, Assyrian and Babylonian Letters
AGNT Aland et al., eds., The Greek New Testament
ANEP Pritchard, ed., The Ancient Near East in Pictures
Relating to the Old Testament
ANET Pritchard, ed., Ancient Near Eastern Texts
Relating to the Old Testament
ANF The Ante-Nicene Fathers
AnOr Analecta Orientalia
BAGD Bauer, Arndt, and Gingrich, A Greek-English
Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early
Christian Literature, 2nd edition
BASOR Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental
Research
BHK Kittel, eds., Biblica Hebraica
BHS Elliger and Rudolph, eds., Biblica Hebraica
Stuttgartensia
Bib Biblica
BSac Bibliotheca Sacra
BJRL Bulletin of the John Rylands University Library
of Manchester
BR Biblical Research
BSP Walton, eds., Biblia Sacra Polyglotta
BZ Biblische Zeitschrift
BZAW Beihefte zur Zeitschrift fur die Alttestamentliche
Wissenschaft
CAD Gelb et al., eds., The Assyrian Dictionary of the
Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago
CBQ Catholic Biblical Quarterly
CKRS Raines, The Cosmic Kingdom in the Rise of the
Christian Interpretation of the State: A Study
of the Interaction of Religious and Political
Mythology from Hebraic Prophetism through John Calvin