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The Shepherd-Ruler Concept in the OT and its Application in the NT

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 February 2009

J. G. S. S. Thomson
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Extract

It was inevitable, amongst a pastoral community such as the Hebrews, that the vocabulary and occupational habits of the shepherd should colour their language and help to formulate their way of looking at life. This was particularly true in the sphere of religion. The rich imagery of the pastoral life of Palestine has been one of the creative elements in the language and religious thought—forms of the OT, especially where Israel's relationships with Jahweh were concerned. Undoubtedly the OT conception of God, of divine providence, and of man's relations with God owe much of their profound insight and simple dignity to the metaphors current among the shepherds who lived among the Judaean hills and on the plains of Samaria.

Type
Research Article
Information
Scottish Journal of Theology , Volume 8 , Issue 4 , December 1955 , pp. 406 - 418
Copyright
Copyright © Scottish Journal of Theology Ltd 1955

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References

page 406 note 1 Philo (De Agricultura, 41ff) refers to the contention of the Stoics that the wise alone are kings and so earn the title used by poets, ‘shepherds of the people’.

page 407 note 1 Jas. B. Pritchard, Ancient and Near Eastern Texts, p 265, col.b.

page 408 note 1 cf. also Philo, De Agricultura, 50–53, who, in a comment in Ps.23.1 speaks of ‘God the Shepherd King’.

page 408 note 2 Jas. B. Pritchard, Ancient and Near Eastern Texts, p. 164, col.b.

page 409 note 1 ibid., p. 164, col. b.

page 409 note 2 ibid., p. 159, col. b.

page 409 note 3 ibid., p. 289, col. a.

page 409 note 4 cf. Matt. 4.19 where Jesus' disciples, Galilean fishermen, are called ‘fishers of men’.

page 409 note 5 Notes on the Hebrew Text of the Books of Samuel, p. 257.

page 409 note 6 is also used of Saul (1 Sam. 9.16), of David again (2 Sam. 6.21), of Solomon (1 Kings 1.35), Jeroboam (1 Kings 14.7) and other kings.

page 410 note 1 Cf. Ps. 2.6 where is used of the Messianic king; Joshua 13.21 where is parallelled with and with in Ps. 83.11.

page 411 note 1 Knudtzon, J. A., Die El-Amarna Tafeln, no. 288, v.II.Google Scholar

page 412 note 1 De Agricultura, 50–53.

page 413 note 1 The Fourth Gospel, p. 359. See further the footnote on the same page where he points out that only in ch. 9 does the Fourth Gospel refer to the relations between the authorities and the people ‘as distinct from their relations with Jesus Himself. There is therefore no other place where the discourse about true and false shepherds could be so fitly introduced.’

page 414 note 1 ibid., pp. 358f.

page 414 note 2 Jer. 50.6.

page 414 note 3 Matt. 2.6.

page 415 note 1 pp. 231f.