Wandering people of God

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The expression wandering people of God originally goes back to the church father Augustine . In the second half of the 20th century, biblical scholars use this term to denote a constitutive moment in the self-image of the biblical people of Israel at essential stages of their history. In the Old Testament, Israel experiences itself as chosen by God on the way to a promised goal. This goal is endangered in many ways, but regardless of some wrong turns, hardships and setbacks, the journey with God's help reaches its destination. The Roman Catholic Church uses the term wandering people of God as a self-designation.

Israel

The story told of the common migration becomes a national myth ; it creates community, responsibility and kinship, it creates identity and differentiation from other peoples, the heathen . The awareness of being God's own people is clearly expressed in the covenant formula : “They should be my people and I want to be their God” ( Jer 7:23  EU ). Above all, Deuteronomy articulates this consciousness of choice in a striking and diverse way : "The Lord your God has chosen you to be the people of property from all the peoples who are on earth." ( Dtn 7,6  EU ) However, recent research tends to this To understand the theology of salvation history as a later development compared to wisdom theology and the Psalms. In addition, the prophets repeatedly contradicted this idea, such as Amos 9.7-10 EU shows.

The image finds its first expression in the figure of Abraham . Due to a divine calling, which grants him protection, descendants and land ownership, he becomes the leader of a nomad group on the migration to Canaan , which he conquered against the resistance of the indigenous people as part of the conquest of the land . This migration earned Abraham the reputation of being a bearer of promise and trust in the people of Israel .

The concept of the wandering people of God can also be found in the book of Exodus . Moses becomes the deliverer of the people of Israel from Egyptian slavery . After leaving Egypt, the people of God travel to the Promised Land across the Red Sea and the Sinai Peninsula .

New Testament

The New Testament takes up the ideas of the Old Testament, especially the author of the Letter to the Hebrews . This takes over the leader figures Abraham and Moses typologically in Heb 3,4  EU ; 11.12 EU and encourages to hike: "Let us run with patience in the fight that is destined for us" ( Heb 12.1  EU ).

Christian theology

With the church father Augustine , the image of the church as a wandering people of God is established in the philosophy of history. In De civitate dei he describes the tension between civitas dei (kingdom of God) and civitas terrena (state), in the area of ​​which the church as civitas peregrina (wandering people) plays a decisive but temporary role.

The Second Vatican Council , in its Dogmatic Constitution on the Church Lumen Gentium (1964), took up the image found by Augustine when it spoke of the Church that strides "between the persecutions of the world and the consolations of God on its pilgrimage" and cross and Death of the Lord announced. With the image of the “people of God” , the council emphasized “true equality in the dignity and activity common to all believers in building up the body of Christ ”.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Cf. Manfred Oeming, Konrad Schmid , Michael Welker (eds.): The Old Testament and the culture of modernity . LIT Verlag, Münster 2004, ISBN 978-3-8258-5455-3 , p. 102.
  2. ↑ Jörg Sieger: Special introduction to the OT. Amos . March 15, 2011, accessed August 18, 2012.
  3. ↑ cf. Erich Zenger: Introduction to the Old Testament . W. Kohlhammer Verlag, 2008, ISBN 978-3-17-020695-3 , p. 79.
  4. ↑ cf. Claus Westermann : Theology of the Old Testament in basics . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1978, ISBN 978-3-525-51661-4 , p. 194 f.
  5. ↑ Georg Strecker : Theology of the New Testament . Walter de Gruyter, 1996, ISBN 978-3-11-012674-7 , p. 649 ff.
  6. ↑ Dogmatic Constitution on the Church "Lumen Gentium" No. 8.
  7. ↑ Dogmatic Constitution on the Church "Lumen Gentium" No. 32.