For Terry Fretheim
Upon the death of Terry Fretheim, Old Testament study has lost a great force. Terry was a powerful, influential shaper of our discipline. For a generation, since the publication of his ground-breaking book, The Suffering of God (1984), he has led the way in our work. In his death, theological education has lost a great teacher, for Terry had a way of engaging students without imposing conclusions on them. And the church has lost a great pastor, for Terry’s pastoral sensibility was always apparent to those around him.
Beyond all of that, I have lost a great friend. Terry was my longest-running conversation partner in Old Testament study. He and I, both rooted in the best traditions of German pietism, were twinned together in much of our work. Early on in the commentary series, Interpretation, Terry wrote Exodus and I wrote Genesis. Later on in The New Interpreter’s Bible, we reversed the work; he wrote Genesis, and I wrote Exodus. Over time, enough difference between us emerged to evoke an ongoing conversation about the ways in which the Old Testament bears witness to the action of God in the world.
Through his focus on creation themes, Terry drew the conclusion that God’s work in the world was a part of an ongoing process; thus he was attracted to the categories of Process Theology. He judged, moreover, that in the governance of history God’s action was characteristically in and through historical agents, and not directly. Thus, for example, mighty Assyria could be “the rod of my anger” (Isaiah 10:5), and Cyrus the Persian king could be the “messiah” (Isaiah 45:1).
Conversely, my attention was especially drawn to the emancipation narratives of the Old Testament that I have read through a liberation hermeneutic. Through that lens, God is portrayed as being the help of the helpless when “other helpers fail and comforts flee.” Consequently, as in the Exodus narrative, God is seen to act through direct agency.
Terry’s judgment was that I had been excessively influenced by the “strong God” of John Calvin whom he thought had overstated the direct agency of God. Conversely, I thought Terry, in his embrace of a process hermeneutic, had given away too much of the direct agency of God as sovereign. Surely there are enough biblical texts to argue in either direction, and so our exchange was left without resolution. It is likely, moreover, that our different interpretive stances were complexly formed by our theological upbringing, by our personalities, and by our social locations.
It is likely that Terry had the better of that argument, given how it is that God is known in the world. However our shared wonderment might have been resolved, I am glad to add the following as a tribute and a salute to my dear friend. I want to consider the remarkable characterization of God in Deuteronomy 10:14-18. These verses in the mouth of Moses articulate the glorious mystery of God whom Israel knows in majesty and in mercy. At the outset of this doxology it is affirmed that all of heaven, all of earth, and all of earth’s creatures belong to God (v. 14). The arresting “yet” of verse 15 reverses field and affirms God’s peculiar singular commitment to Israel alone, both its ancestors and its descendants. The interface of cosmic governance in verse 14 and singular love in verse 15 marks the wonder of biblical faith. That same move from majesty to mercy is reiterated in verses 17 and 18. In verse 17, the majestic sovereignty of YHWH is affirmed in a striking doxology. But then in verse 18, the attentive reach of YHWH’s rule concerns widows, orphans, and strangers for whom the necessities of life (food and clothing) are provided by YHWH. Moses readily affirms that the majestic rule of God pivots in attentive care for the forgotten and the excluded.
We, Terry and I, may ask, “How is it that God gives bread?” We know of course about the manna narrative in which God’s bread simply appears for Israel in the wilderness as the dew lifts in the morning:
When the layer of dew lifted, there on the surface of the wilderness was a fine flaky substance, as fine as frost on the ground (Exodus 16:14).
When Moses is queried about the wondrous bread, he answered:
It is the bread that the Lord has given you to eat (v. 15; see Psalms 78:20, 105:40).
The affirmation explains nothing, because God’s gift of bread is beyond explanation. We know, moreover, of the doxological exuberance of Isaiah concerning the faithfulness of God:
For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven,
and do not return there until they have watered the earth,
making it bring forth and sprout,
giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater... (Isaiah 55:10).
And in YHWH’s commitment to Zion it is promised:
I will abundantly bless its provisions;
I will satisfy its poor with bread (Psalm 132:15).
Israel is not reluctant in its recognition that God gives bread, just as Moses had declared.
These affirmations, however, tell us nothing about how bread from the creator God is given in the earth. In my conversations with Terry, I had been content to let those claims of bread from God stand as they are, without further explanation. Terry, however, would readily press the point to ask, how that bread is to be delivered. He would likely call attention to the next verse in Deuteronomy 10:19. After Moses makes his sweeping claim for God, the next verse moves, as covenantal faith always does, to an imperative:
You (plural) shall also love the stranger (v. 19).
Israel had been a stranger (immigrant) in Egypt; and should therefore be attentive to the needs of other strangers (immigrants). And from that single mandate, we can freely extrapolate other mandates I take to be tacit in the utterance of Moses:
You shall also love the widow;
You shall also love the orphan;
You shall be sure to execute justice;
You shall provide clothing;
You shall provide bread.
Terry would surely conclude that God’s gift of bread is given through human agency.
So how is God’s bread given in the world?
§ Bread is given through governmental policy. In the ancient world, the king had an obligation to provide food for the hungry (see II Kings 6:16). In current U.S. policy, food is provided through the food stamp program of the Department of Agriculture. Many persons rely on that provision, even if Secretary of Agriculture, Sonny Purdue, is parsimonious in his fear that someone will “become dependent” on such food. Imagine becoming dependent on a reliable food supply! Perdue’s gut fear no doubt is that someone will get something for free, alas!
§ Bread is given through a host of NGOs. We may be grateful for the lobbying efforts of such agencies as Bread for the World that relentlessly pursue good food policy in its address to widespread hunger, on which see Hunger: the Oldest Problem by Martin Caparros.
§ Bread is given through the efforts of a myriad of volunteers, often organized through the church, to provide food for the food deprived. In my community, an organization of volunteers provides a daily truck circuit to pick up large amounts of surplus food for distribution in a variety of local venues. Among the many diligent, committed, hard-working volunteers in such enterprises is the indefatigable Mary Brown who presides over this blog platform.
On all these counts — government policy, action organizations, and local volunteers — the bread given by God is made available through human agency. Terry would have no doubt that it is God who gives bread. But Terry would also insist that bread from God is not magical or supernatural. It is rather the faithful, proper functioning of the human community that makes bread available; it is a human performance of mercy, compassion, and generosity that constitute the delivery system for God’s good bread. Thus, as we pray for “daily bread,” we may also be grateful for the actions of human governments, human organizations, and human volunteers who function to deliver that daily bread, most especially among those who possess no bread supply of their own.
For good reason I am glad to recognize that Terry, in his honed theological sensibility, is surely right about God’s gift via human agency. Such a recognition on my part simply adds to the awareness we all have that Terry has been among us a shrewd and discerning interpreter. He understood that bread is an important, indispensable part of the ongoing process whereby creation is sustained and fed. Terry for good reason made a great deal out of the creation hymn of Psalm 104 that sings out:
You cause the grass to grow for the cattle,
and plants for people to use,
to bring forth food from the earth,
and wine to gladden the heart,
oil to make the face shine,
and bread to strengthen the human heart (vv. 14-15).
Terry was endlessly my teacher who would not let me get by with anything, and certainly not with careless thinking about texts I had overlooked. His great legacy will continue to teach us for many years. And we, in his wake, will be alert to the processive power and beauty of creation. He has vigorously reminded us of our vocation in creation that has been entrusted to us:
God’s way into the future with this creation is dependent at least in part on what human beings do and say. This state of affairs brings human responsibility to the forefront of the conversation. Many of us would just as soon leave everything up to God, and God can then be blamed when things go wrong, tragically or otherwise. A way between pessimism in the face of the difficulties on the one hand and a Messiah complex on the other will not always be easy to locate. But God calls human beings to take up these God-given tasks with insight and energy—for the sake of God’s world and all its creatures, indeed for God’s sake (God and World in the Old Testament: A Relational Theology, 277-278).
Of course I do not know what Terry’s vocation is to be in “the age to come.” But I do know that he will perform faithfully, through his assignment, the rule of the God of justice whom he knew to be the God of mercy.
Walter Brueggemann
