Angela Costley. Creation and Christ

Angela Costley’s Creation and Christ argues that the topic of creation is not ancillary but vital to the theology and argumentation of the epistle to the Hebrews. Her primary claim is that “the creation references in Heb 1–4 should be considered as integral to Hebrews’s discourse in the first four chapters, and that the topic of creation is related to the topic of salvation through the Son in an important way” (p. 4). Focusing especially on 1:1–4, 5–14; 2:5–9; 3:1–6; 4:3–4; and 4:9–14, Costley demonstrates that “wherever we find a mention of creation in Heb 1–4, we find reference to [the Son] having become human and ascended back into heaven in order to bring about salvation, which I designate as a descent-ascent motif” (p. 4).In discussing the status questionis in previous scholarship on Hebrews in ch. 2, Costley acknowledges a paradox, that “the topic of creation is both acknowledged and overlooked” (p. 49). On one hand, the passages in question are far from under-explored, as virtually all commentators past and present invariably discuss the topic of creation in these texts. More recently, for instance, ecological hermeneutics have read Hebrews with an interest in both cosmology and environmental ethics in Hebrews. Nonetheless, “although creation is evidently a theme in Hebrews, I have been unable to locate any monograph written specifically about this topic,” and consequently there is a need for a focused exploration of creation in Hebrews (p. 2). The question whether or not prior monographs have already been devoted to creation in Hebrews might depend on what precisely we are looking for. For instance, Kenneth Shenck’s 2007 SNTS monograph Cosmology and Eschatology in Hebrews: The Settings of the Sacrifice—with whom Costley interacts throughout—perhaps might represent one such study in this regard.Costley recognizes that “a number of methodologies would be possible for a study of creation in Hebrews,” opting to apply systemic-functional discourse analysis to selected passages that variously describe the topic of creation (p. 4). In ch. 1, Costley explains how this method allows interpreters to incorporate both synchronic and diachronic considerations in their reading of a text, integrating the strengths of both traditional historical- criticism and New Criticism’s focus on a text’s syntax, cohesion, and structure (p. 29). Though not stated as such, I think one way to describe Costley’s method is that the extant text of Hebrews is her focal point, as she strives to keep in her peripheral vision concern for the historical plausibility of early audiences, some concern for authorial intent, and standing before the world of the text as a theological interpreter today (pp. 30–31). Costley’s text-focused method, bolstered by two appendixes on text-critical and translation issues as well as the macro-structure of Hebrews, is well suited for her claim because so many important historical considerations about the earliest contexts for the epistle to the Hebrews remain elusive or indeterminate for contemporary scholars (pp. 27–82).Turning to the first four chapters of Hebrews, Costley’s ch. 3, “Christ the Agent of Creation in the Exordium,” focuses on how creation is a focal point in the introduction to the epistle as a whole in 1:2, particularly that God has spoken through the Son who is heir and agent of creation, by whom the aeons were made. Chapter 4, “Creation and the Vocabulary of 1:2–3,” is an extended discussion of vocabulary and intertextual allusions in the epistle’s dense introduction. In ch. 5, “The Hidden Significance of 1:10–12 in the Co-text of 1:5–14,” Costley builds on Richard Hays’s intertextual work, arguing that Hebrews uses Scripture by way of metalepsis to describe the Son as the one who founded the earth and whose hands made the heavens. A parallel pattern occurs in reverse order between 1:1–4 and 1:5–14, regarding inheritance, exaltation, activity on earth, the Son as creator, and the inheritance of all things or salvation. Chapter 6, “The Descent of the Son for the Ascent of Humanity,” is one of the clearest and best demonstrated chapters of the author’s claim, demonstrating how Ps 8 is read in Hebrews, particularly on the Son’s saving action in descending and ascending in the incarnation to restore fallen humanity to its intended state. Then, ch. 7, “The Creation and the Exodus, Joshua and Jesus,” examines references to creation in 3:1–6 and 4:3–11, where the Son is the builder of all things. Costley argues against some earlier scholarship on Hebrews here, claiming that it is indeed the primordial rest that the Son enters into after making sacrifice as priest, given his role in creation, and it is that rest that is shared with believers.There is much to commend about this volume; anyone interested in the early chapters of Hebrews, the doctrine of creation, or the incarnation will do well to consider Costley’s careful exegetical analysis. Something that would have made this work stronger would be a better statement of the author’s method used in the study, especially with a clearer definition of what exactly “creation” means. Costley’s study is indeed a successful application of discourse analysis as a method, but intertextual analysis of intra-scriptural allusions is invoked at several key points of the argument, and it might have been helpful to foreground intertextuality in the study’s introductory section on methods. But more significantly, we might ask, when we read the epistle to the Hebrews with an interest in the topic of “creation,” what exactly are we listening for? It is unclear how key terms such as creation, and especially the word incarnation, are used at crucial junctures in this study. For instance, in the index of subjects, the theme of “incarnation” has more than twenty entries listed, but in none of them is there a clear statement of what exactly this term means or how precisely it is being used in this study. These heavily loaded theological terms are used throughout this study to do significant load-bearing work for historically informed discourse analysis but remain underdefined and thus possibly vague. If we are to employ doctrinal vocabulary as heuristic categories in discourse analysis—or, even better, if we are to read Hebrews self-consciously as an act of theological interpretation—interpreters would profit from more clearly defining these and other theological terms. For example, where Costley concludes that “the force of the creation reference in Heb 2:5–9 is to strengthen the persuasive argumentation of the Epistle as a whole,” that is indeed a helpful conclusion. But I am not entirely clear as to whether the author is claiming to have discovered an operative doctrine of creation that is driving the rhetoric of the epistle, or whether she thinks later doctrinal categories, such as a doctrine of creation, provide an informative lens by which to read the rhetoric of Hebrews. Since Costley is already employing theological categories in discourse analysis of Hebrews, perhaps in her future research she can enter into more explicitly theological conversation with how Hebrews was read and the doctrines of Creation and Incarnation were handled by interpreters such as Irenaeus, Athanasius, Maximos the Confessor, and others in the reception history of Hebrews. Especially for patristic interpreters, the participatory and incarnational themes of Hebrews and the motif of descent/ascent and deification could prove especially resourceful conversation partners for the topic of “creation” in Hebrews. For now, this study contributes a powerful demonstration of how the topic of creation not only pervades the early chapters of Hebrews but is vital to its theological vision

Epistemology · Hebrews · Theology · Biblical Studies and Interpretation · Christian Theology and Mission · Development, Ethics, and Society · Philosophy