'Salvation' BEFORE Christ Appeared
'Salvation' BEFORE Christ Appeared
In language, some words are like mansions and others like trailer houses. Our trailer-house words generally refer to tangible objects like animals, fruits, or vegetables, and may even have been imported from another language. Such words can "survive transit" from one language to another quite easily. Our mansion words, though, are firmly grounded in their linguistic location. They rarely survive transit intact. The Koine Greek word σωτηρία (pronounced soteria), commonly translated "salvation" in English, is one such mansion word.
This newsletter explores how Greek speakers used the word "salvation" before the writing of the New Testament. I've found that learning a little more about its background has made a big difference in how I think about what the word meant to the first audience of the New Testament.
Classical Usage (circa 500-300 BC)
Three of the most prominent ancient Greek dictionaries, the LSJ, NIDNTTE, and TDNT, all have significant overlap in the senses they present for σωτηρία.
First and foremost, the term means deliverance from imminent danger. This deliverance could be from physical danger, such as enemies in battle, or from sickness. As a metaphorical extension, philosophers were also said to give σωτηρία to the soul because they taught how to tame destructive passions. Dio Chrysostom of Alexandria called them σωτῆρές εἰσι καὶ φύλακες τῶν οἵων τε σώζεσθαι, “saviors and guardians of such as are saved” (Or. 32, quoted in NIDNTTE).
Second, the term can mean preservation. The use of preservation is wide ranging, from giving σωτηρία to an ember of a fire so that a fire can be started the next day (Homer Od. 5.490), to the σωτηρία of a city's laws or customs in the sense of maintaining them (Eurip. Hel. 1552; Soph. Ant. 1114; that which a person has learned, Plato Resp. 486c; cited in NIDNTTE). The term also came to mean preservation of physical health, such as from sickness or during a journey. This preservation of physical health was also extended to simply denote bodily health.
An aside: The occurrence of "deliverance" and "preservation" in a single word should be quite familiar to native speakers of English. The English word save has the same range of meanings. A hero can save (deliver) someone from harm, and a responsible worker can save (preserve) money in a bank. Someone could even "save an ember to start the next fire."
Who could grant σωτηρία to people? While philosophers could give some measure of σωτηρία to the soul, the primary agents who could grant σωτηρία were the deities. For the Greeks and Romans, many of their deities and demigods were considered "saviors" who could grant σωτηρία. The Dioscuri brothers could protect people at sea and Hercules could turn away evil (NIDNTTE). The greatest agent of σωτηρία was Zeus, the ruling patriarch in the Greco-Roman pantheon. Indeed, Plato reasoned that through the chief deity everything was ordained πρὸς τὴν σωτηρίαν καὶ ἀρετὴν τοῦ ὅλου, “for the preservation and excellence of the whole” (Plato Leg. 903b, quoted in NIDNTTE). In mystery religions, worshipers were "saved" through their initiation into the religion.
Human rulers could also be agents of σωτηρία, just as the gods were. Indeed, "savior" was a favorite title among Alexander the Great's Successors in the lands they conquered, a title which later transferred to the Roman rulers as well. Human rulers could grant σωτηρία to a people in terms of military deliverance, but also in terms of preserving the city's customs. Indeed, the TDNT states that one of the tasks of a ruler was to ensure the σωτηρία of those they ruled (Volume 7, 965-969).
Septuagint Usage (circa 300-30 BC)
In the Septuagint (LXX), the Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, the verbal form σῴζω (to save) appears about 340x, the noun σωτηρία about 135x, and the noun σωτήρ (savior) about 35x. I read every instance of the noun σωτηρία in the LXX and noted the most likely sense of the word in each passage. I found that the most common sense was deliverance in the physical sense, with occasional connotations of spiritual blessing, which is supported by S. R. Driver's findings. According to the NIDNTTE, Driver says instances of σωτηρία in the LXX “seldom, if ever, express a spiritual state exclusively: their common theological sense in Hebrew is that of a material deliverance attended by spiritual blessings (e.g. Is. 12:2; 45:17)” (Notes on the Hebrew Text and Topography of the Books of Samuel, 2nd ed. [1913], 119; quoted in the NIDNTTE).
The term σωτηρία appears most frequently in the Psalms (34x), followed by 1-4 Kingdoms (20x)1, and then Isaiah (16x)2. While the word only appears six times in the Pentateuch, it is used to describe God's deliverance of the Israelites from Egypt in Exodus 14:13 and Exodus 15:2. In the Psalms and 1-4 Kings, the authors typically use the word in reference to deliverance from physical danger and/or victory in battle.
Often, the Psalms say that God himself is their "deliverance," as epitomized in the opening lines of Psalm 18:2 (17:3 LXX) in Table 1.
Psalm 17:3 in the LXX also illustrates another common theme in the Psalms, namely, that God gives σωτηρία to the king of Israel (the messiah) (cf. LXX Psalm 19:7, 88:27, and 143:10). Interestingly, in Psalm 50:16 in the LXX (51:14 in Hebrew and English), the Psalmist pleads that God, who gives him σωτηρία, would rescue him from the sin of murder. Thus, God can give σωτηρία both from physical threats and from spiritual threats.
In Isaiah, the term often refers to a final, national deliverance of Israel in which the tribes will be returned to the restored nation of Israel, as illustrated in Isaiah 25:9. God is constantly the source of this salvation (cf. Isaiah 33:6). Importantly, God also promises Israel that her Messiah will be her "rescue" (Isaiah 49:6). Table 2 shows in Greek and English these verses from Isaiah. In the other prophets, σωτηρία generally means deliverance in a physical sense.
So what? Christ > Caesar
Around Israel, the nations claimed that their own gods and rulers could give "salvation." The message of the Bible, then, made a politically charged claim when it said that only God could save. The claim became all the more politically charged just before the writing of the New Testament, when Caesar and the following line of Roman Emperors were regularly worshipped as little gods that could give their citizens "salvation."
When the first Christians claimed that "salvation" could only come through Jesus, God's chosen King, they gave a politically charged message. They were saying that Christ was greater than Caesar. By proclaiming this same Gospel, we do, too.
TL;DR
If the email was too long to read, here are the main points:
- Just like mansions are difficult to move, some words are difficult to translate consistently between languages.
- The word for "salvation" is a "mansion" word in Greek. It spans a wide range of meanings, centering around deliverance (from physical danger or from sickness) and preservation (of fire embers or of health, for example).
- By claiming that only Christ could save (as God’s chosen King), the Bible brought a politically charged statement into the Roman New Testament context, where the emperors were worshiped as little gods that could give salvation!
Challenge for You
Want to know more? Read my short paper on this topic (written for a class on Greek Textual Analysis). By reading this newsletter, you've already read about ⅓ of the paper!
References
See my paper.