Bosom of Abraham

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
For the African-American spiritual, see Bosom of Abraham (song).
Romanesque capital from the former Priory of Alspach, Alsace. (Unterlinden Museum, Colmar
)

"Bosom of Abraham" refers to the place of comfort in the biblical

Judgment Day
.

The phrase and concept are found in both Judaism and Christian religions and religious art.

Origin of the phrase

Nürnberg
.)

The word found in the Greek text for "bosom" is kolpos, meaning "lap" "bay".[2] This relates to the Second Temple period practice of reclining and eating meals in proximity to other guests, the closest of whom physically was said to lie on the bosom (chest) of the host. (See John 13:23)[3][4]

While commentators generally agree upon the meaning of the "Bosom of Abraham", they disagree about its origins. Up to the time of

sqq
.), thus causing them to enjoy rest and security in the bosom of a loving parent. After the same manner was Abraham supposed to act towards his children after the fatigues and troubles of the present life, hence the metaphorical expression "to be in Abraham's Bosom" as meaning to be in repose and happiness with him.

According to

Maldonatus (1583),[6] whose theory has since been accepted by many scholars, the metaphor "to be in Abraham's Bosom" is derived from the custom of reclining on couches
at table, which prevailed among the Jews during and before the time of Jesus. As at a feast each guest leaned on his left elbow so as to leave his right arm at liberty, and as two or more lay on the same couch, the head of one man was near the breast of the man who lay behind, and he was therefore said "to lie in the bosom" of the other.

It was also considered by the Jews of old a mark of special honour and favour for one to be allowed to lie in the bosom of the master of the feast (cf.

next world. They conceived of the reward of the righteous dead as a sharing in a banquet given by Abraham, "the father of the faithful" (cf. Matthew 8:11
sqq.), and of the highest form of that reward as lying in "Abraham's Bosom".

Abode of the righteous dead

Judaism

In First Temple Judaism, Sheol and Hades in the Hebrew Bible and Septuagint, respectively, is primarily a place of "silence" to which all the dead go. During or before the exile to Babylon, however, ideas of activity of the dead in Sheol began to enter Jewish theology.[7][8]

During the

Charon in Greek myth, but replaced by an angel. On the other side in the Bosom of Abraham : "You have escaped from the Abyss and Hades, now you will cross over the crossing place... to all the righteous ones, namely Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Enoch, Elijah and David."[11] In this story Abraham was not idle in the Bosom of Abraham, he acted as intercessor for those in the fiery part of Hades.[12]

The

Enoch, who predates Abraham
, naturally the character of Abraham does not feature.

Later rabbinical sources preserve several traces of the Bosom of Abraham teaching.

Genesis Rabba 67.[15] In the 1860s Abraham Geiger suggested that the parable of Lazarus in Luke 16 preserved a Jewish legend and that Lazarus represented Abraham's servant Eliezer[16]

New Testament

The phrase "bosom of Abraham" (

Jewish beliefs (see above), that the dead were gathered into a general tarrying-place, made equivalent with the Sheol of the Old Testament
. In Christ's account, the righteous occupied an abode of their own, which was distinctly separated by a chasm from the abode to which the wicked were consigned. The chasm is equivalent to the river in the Jewish version, but in Christ's version there is no angelic ferryman, and it is impossible to pass from one side to the other.

The fiery part of Hades (Hebrew

Hinnom), which is generally connected with the Last Judgment. Matthew 5:29–30; 18:9ff, Mark 9:42.[17]

The concept of

Apocalypse of Moses), or the tree of life (found with "paradise" in Genesis 2:8 Septuagint and Book of Revelation 2:7).[18] Consequently, identification of Bosom of Abraham with Paradise is contested.[19] It is not clear whether Matthew 8:11 "And I tell you that many will come from the East and West and will eat with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven." represents an alternative or complementary cosmology to the ideas of Luke 16:19–31.[20]

Early Christianity

In the 3rd century, Hippolytus of Rome referred to Abraham's bosom as the place in hades where the righteous await judgment day in delight.[21] Due to a copying error a loose section of Hippolytus' commentary on Luke 16 was misidentified as a Discourse to the Greeks on Hades by Josephus and included in William Whiston's translation of the Complete Works of Josephus.[22]

Augustine of Hippo likewise referred to the righteous dead as disembodied spirits blissfully awaiting Judgment Day in secret receptacles.[23]

Since the righteous dead are rewarded in the bosom of Abraham before Judgment Day, this belief represents a form of particular judgment.

Abraham's bosom is also mentioned in the Penitence of Origen of uncertain date and authorship.

Relation to Christian heaven

Good Thief
(right). (Private collection.)

Among Christian writers, since the 1st century AD, "the Bosom of Abraham" has gradually ceased to designate a place of imperfect happiness, especially in the Western

Hades in which the righteous dead await the day of the Lord.[26]
: chapter 7 

When Christians pray that the angels may carry the soul of the departed to "Abraham's Bosom", non-Orthodox Christians might mean it as heaven; as it is taught in the West that those in the Limbo of the Fathers went to heaven after the

Oriental Orthodoxy preserves the Bosom of Abraham as distinct from heaven.[27]

The belief that the souls of the dead go immediately to hell, heaven, or purgatory is a

Eastern Christian concept of the Bosom of Abraham.[27]

Christian mortalism, especially prevalent among Seventh-day Adventists
, is the belief that the dead, righteous and unrighteous, rest unconsciously while awaiting the Judgment.

In Christian art

Abraham holding little figures of souls in a cloth, representing the "bosom", as angels bring additional figures. Reims Cathedral

In medieval Christian art the phase was illustrated literally: images of a number of miniature figures, representing souls, held on the lap of a much larger one occur in a number of contexts. Many Gothic cathedrals, especially in France, have reliefs of Abraham holding such a group (right), which are also found in other media. In a detached miniature of about 1150, from a work of Hildegard of Bingen, a figure usually described as "Synagogue", of youngish appearance with closed eyes, holds a group, here of Jewish souls, with Moses carrying the Tablets above the others, held in the large figure's folded arms.[28] In the Bosom of Abraham Trinity, a subject only found in medieval English art, God the Father holds the group, now representing specifically Christian souls. The Virgin of Mercy is a different but somewhat similar image.

In literature

For the Paul Green play, see In Abraham's Bosom.

"Thou liest in Abraham's bosom all the year;/ And worshipp'st at the Temple's inner shrine,/ God being with thee when we know it not."

See also

References

Citations

  1. ISBN 9780664223946
    .
  2. ^ The Septuagint Greek version of Isaiah 40:11 uses another Greek word: γαστρι
  3. ^ Jhn 13:23 Now there was leaning on Jesus' bosom one of his disciples, whom Jesus loved.
  4. ^ Jhn 1:18 No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared [him].
  5. ^ Septuagint ἐν τῷ κόλπῳ αὐτοῦ
  6. ^ In Lucam, xvi, 22
  7. ^ Gen. 37:36, Ps. 88:13, Ps. 154:17; Eccl. 9:10 etc.
  8. ^ Jewish Encyclopedia "Sheol"
  9. ^ F. Preisigke, Sammelbuch Griechischer Urkunden aus Aegypten (Scrapbook Greek documents from Egypt) 2034:11
  10. ISBN 0385096305
    .
  11. ISBN 0385096305
    .
  12. ^ Apoc. Zeph. 11:1–2
  13. ^ John Lightfoot Horae Hebraicae et Talmudicae 1671
  14. ^ Louis Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews 1909
  15. ^ "Bosom of Abraham" in Jewish Encyclopedia 1904
  16. ^ Jüdische Zeitschrift für Wissenschaft und Leben Vol.VII 200. 1869
  17. ^ "Gehenna": in Freedman, David Noel, ed., The Anchor Bible Dictionary, New York Doubleday 1997
  18. ^ "Paradise": in Freedman, David Noel, ed., The Anchor Bible Dictionary, New York Doubleday 1997
  19. ^ Fitzmyer, Joseph A. The Gospel According to Luke X–XXIV The Anchor Yale Bible Commentaries Volume 28A
  20. ^ Nolland J. Luke 9:21–18:34, Word Biblical Commentary Vol. 35b, 1993
  21. ^ Hippolytus of Rome, Against Plato, on the Cause of the Universe, §1. As to the state of the righteous, he writes, "And there the righteous from the beginning dwell, not ruled by necessity, but enjoying always the contemplation of the blessings which are in their view, and delighting themselves with the expectation of others ever new, and deeming those ever better than these. And that place brings no toils to them. There, there is neither fierce heat, nor cold, nor thorn; but the face of the fathers and the righteous is seen to be always smiling, as they wait for the rest and eternal revival in heaven which succeed this location. And we call it by the name Abraham's bosom." Ibid.
  22. ^ Josephus, Flavius; Whiston, William (1841). The works of Flavius Josephus, the learned and authentic Jewish historian. Simms and Mʻintyre. p. 824.
  23. ^ Augustine of Hippo, City of God, Book XII
  24. ^ Carlisle.), George BENNET (of (1800). Olam Haneshamoth, or, a View of the intermediate state, as it appears in the records of the Old and New Testament, the Apocraphal [sic] Books; in heathen authors; and the Greek and Latin Fathers. With notes. B. Scott. Retrieved 14 February 2024.
  25. ISBN 978-0-89622-537-4
    . Retrieved 14 February 2024.
  26. ^ "CHURCH FATHERS: A Treatise on the Soul (Tertullian)". www.newadvent.org. Retrieved 14 February 2024.
  27. ^
    Hierotheos
  28. ISBN 0-300-06493-4

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