In this post I talked about how worldview shapes the lens through which we read scripture (i.e., creates our hermeneutical framework). I said that the hermeneutical principle that the “plain meaning of the text is usually the correct meaning of the text” was not as straightforward as it seems at first. I argued that what may be the “plain meaning” of the text to one reader could be very different to another. What is “plain” to a reader is highly contextual and is fashioned by culture.
To evidence the point, I talked about how texts take different shapes when viewed from a Haitian perspective in contrast to a contemporary Western perspective. We used Romans 1:16–17 as our sample text. Colossians 3:3 is another example of this same principle at work.
In Colossians 3:3, Paul writes, “For your have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”
The first step in the hermeneutical (i.e. interpretive) process is answer the question, “what did PAUL mean when he wrote this?” In a similar vein, “how did Paul’s original audience understand these words?” To answer that question, we have to go back into history and collect information regarding the worldview of first-century Jews and Gentiles in Colossae.
As a Second Temple Jew who was trained as a Pharisee, Paul had a very distinct way of understanding history. Paul believed that history could be divided into two main parts: (1) the age of the flesh and (2) the age of the spirit. The age of the flesh was characterized by pagan gentiles ruling over the Jewish people. Believing that God would be faithful to his promise to both Abraham and David, Paul thought that this age would come to an end and another age (the age of the spirit) would take its place. In that age Jews would rule over the creation as God’s ordained covenant people (i.e. elect). This was the promise that God made to Abraham and David.
Paul also understood that God fulfilled this promise through the death and resurrection of Jesus. Through Jesus’ resurrection, he was declared the ruler and authority over all of the creation (Rom 1:1–7). This understanding explains what Paul means in Colossians 1:15 when he says, “He [Jesus] is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all the creation.” Paul means that Jesus rules over all. He is the King. Through Jesus becoming King of the creation, he ushers in the new age of the Spirit. He launches the Kingdom of God–the Family of God on earth.
One of the dynamics that comes into play, however, is that the whole world has yet to SEE this reality as true because the Kingdom is both NOW but also NOT YET. That is, Jesus cannot be seen as the King because he ascended to the Father and Christians await his return. It will be upon his return (i.e. parousia, or second coming) that the whole world will SEE that he is King and Christians are his people.
This, then, explains what Paul means when he says that believers are HIDDEN with Christ. The world has yet to SEE for themselves his authority and reign over the creation. This reality is HIDDEN to the world until a later date. Because when we believe in Christ we are UNIFIED with him (“unity with Christ” is another very lengthy conversation), that which is true of Jesus is also true of his followers. In this sense, we are “hidden” with Christ.
This is what Tom Wright talks about when he says,
“One day Jesus the Messiah, who cannot at the moment be seen within the old world, will appear again—when God transforms the whole cosmos so that what is at present unseen will become visible, and earth and heaven be joined for ever in the fulfilled new creation. And when that happens, all those who are ‘in Christ’, whose present true life is ‘hidden with the king, in God’, will appear as well, as the glorious renewed human beings they already really are” (Tom Wright, Paul for Everyone: The Prison Letters: Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, and Philemon (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2004), 175).
Now, with all of this groundwork laid, we can get a firmer grip on what PAUL meant in Colossians 3:3. It is precisely at this point that I want to point out that this meaning would hardly be PLAIN to a 21st century American reader. It isn’t clear because the worldview of contemporary readers in the Western world hardly share the same ESCHATOLOGICAL FRAMEWORK as a first-century Jew (Paul).
To further the point, from a Haitian worldview, the plain meaning of Colossians 3:3 is quite different. But what is it?
I sat under the teaching of a Christian Haitian man who spent many years of his life studying Haitian voodoo. The study revealed that according to the Haitian worldview, which finds its origins in African animism, there are all sorts of unseen forces at work in the world. These forces are known as LOA (pr. LWA), DEMON (pr. day-mon), ZANJ (angels), among an entire pantheon of deities and spirits. These forces can be benevolent, evil, or both. As these forces are at work in the world (usually through the request of worshippers through ritual and sympathetic magic) people are always vulnerable to their attack. That is, a LOA can make someone sick, kill them, and even make theme lose their minds. The question is, how does one defend against these attacks? Easy, BECOME A CHRISTIAN. CHRISTIANS ARE NOT VULNERABLE TO THESE ATTACKS BECAUSE COLOSSIANS 3:3 SAYS THAT OUR LIVES OUR HIDDEN IN CHRIST.
The plain meaning of Colossians 3:3 from a Haitian worldview, then, is that Christians are not vulnerable to demonic activity in the world because their lives are hidden with Christ. This is VERY different from what Paul originally intended when we wrote this text (this doesn’t mean that the interpretation isn’t valid or correct; I’m not making that judgment here).
The point to be made here, once again, is that the “plain meaning of the text” is a tricky thing.
