The Crux of Abrahamic Faith

J. Luis Dizon
In the world today, three world religions claim to be Abrahamic Faiths,
because they profess to be the faith of the patriarch Abraham: Judaism,
Christianity, and Islam. Each claims to present of the fullness of the big
picture story of what God is doing to relate to humanity. But does each of
these faiths do justice to the big-picture story? It is worth looking at how
each of these religions stands in relation to the redemptive history as it is
given to us in the Bible.
Judaism: An Incomplete Picture
Judaism is the word used for the faith of the people who are
descended from Jacob, whom God renamed Israel (Genesis 32:28). Of
course, this is a misnomer, as the faith of the Jewish people has evolved over
the centuries. The Judaism of the Hebrew Bible is not exactly the same as
the Judaism of the Second Temple Period, and neither are exactly the same
as modern Judaism. Yet all these permutations of Judaism are united in the
belief that there is one God, and that He has revealed Himself in a special
way to the Jewish people.
The great Jewish rabbi Moshe b. Maimon (1135-1204), better known to
the world as Maimonides, enunciated thirteen articles of faith, which serve
as the foundation for Judaism. These are:
1. The existence of God;
2. His unity;
3. His spirituality;
4. His eternity;
5. God alone the object of worship;
6. Revelation through his prophets;
7. The pre-eminence of Moses among the Prophets;
8. God's law given on Mount Sinai;
9. The immutability of the Torah as God's Law;
10.
God's foreknowledge of men's actions;
11.
Retribution;
12.
The coming of the Messiah;
13.
Resurrection.1
1 Jewish Concepts: Articles of Faith, Jewish Virtual Library (Accessed 25
February 2015),
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/articles_of_faith.html
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Note the thematic grouping of these articles. 1-5 are an affirmation of

monotheism. 6-9 are an affirmation of divine revelation and its perfection.
10-11 affirm the sovereignty of God, and 12-13 affirm the reality of an
Eschaton, or end of days, when history will be consummated.
Of particular interest is article 12. Maimonides stressed the necessity
of believing in this article, saying I believe with a full heart in the coming
of the Messiah, and even though he may tarry I will still wait for him. It is
so important that for many of the Jews who were killed in the Holocaust,
these were the last words they ever uttered.2 Judaism teaches that this
Messsiah will come at the end of the age to bring about a golden age of
peace and prosperity.
By contrast, Christianity teaches that the Messiah already came in the
person of Jesus of Nazareth, who inaugurated His Kingdom in His death and
resurrection, and will return at the end of the age when His enemies are
made into His footstool (Hebrews 10:12-13, quoting Psalm 110:1). Judaism
rejects Jesus as a false Messiah. And yet, if He truly was the Messiah, this
means that the Jews have failed to see the implications of their own
scriptures and have missed the boat when it comes to waiting for their own
Messsiah.
But how do we know which interpretation of the Messiah is correct?
The only way to answer this is via the one authority which Jews and
Christians both hold to: The Hebrew Bible. Therein are abundant references
to the Messiahs person and role. For example, in Genesis 49:10 it reads:
The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between
his feet, until Shiloh comes; and to him shall be the obedience of the
peoples.3 The Targums of Onkelos,4 Pseudo-Jonathan5 and Yerushalmi6 all
2 Moses Maimonides (Rambam), Jewish Virtual Library (Accessed 25 February
2015), http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/Maimonides.html
3 Biblical references are from the English Standard Version, with a few verses
modified slightly to better reflect the original text.
4 Samson H Levey, The Messiah: an Aramaic Interpretation; the Messianic
Exegesis of the Targum (Cincinnati, OH: Hebrew Union College Jewish Institute of
Religion, 1974), 7.
5 Ibid., 8.
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identify this figure as the Messiah. We see here that the Messiahs kingship
extends not only over Israel but all the nations.
Another such passage, which is confirmed to be Messianic in Targum
Jonathan,7 is Micah 5:2. It reads: But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are
too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who
is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days. Two
things stand out immediately in this verse: 1) The Messiah is born in Bethlehem,
and 2) his origins are from ancient days, which indicates pre-existence. A high
Christology is readily apparent here.

Reinforcing this high Christology is Isaiah 9:6, which states: For to us

a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his
shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor (Pele Yoetz),
Mighty God (El-Gibbor), Possessor of Eternity (Avi-Ad), Prince of Peace
(Sar-Shalom). It is telling that the figure being prophesied here is called
Mighty God and Possessor of Eternity, which points to divinity. Jews
object to this interpretation by arguing that El-Gibbor is best understood
as mighty warrior. However, this interpretation is made untenable by the
fact that the title (which only appears in Isaiah) is only used of Yahweh. For
example, Isaiah 10:20-21 states: In that day the remnant of Israel and the
survivors of the house of Jacob will no more lean on him who struck them,
but will lean on the Lord, the Holy One of Israel, in truth. A remnant will
return, the remnant of Jacob, to the mighty God. Whoever this figure must
be, then, He must be regarded as no less than God.
But perhaps the most important Messianic passage is Isaiah 53. This
passage speaks of a Suffering Servant who is rejected by his own people,
and who eventually is killed, but his death becomes the means by which the
transgressions of his people are paid for. Most Jews today, following Rabbi
Shlomo b. Yitzhak (1040-1105), interpret the Suffering Servant as the
nation of Israel. However, virtually all Jewish sources prior to him identified
this Suffering Servant as the Messiah, and many rabbis continue to affirm
this even after Rashis interpretation. Consider, for example, the Babylonian
Talmud, which states: The Messiahwhat is his name?The Rabbis say,
the leprous one; those of the house of Rabbi say, the sick one, as it is said,
Surely he hath borne our sicknesses (Tractate Sanhedrin 98b).8 Thus, the
passage is interpreted in an explicitly Messianic light.

6 Ibid., 11.
7 Ibid., 92.
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It is true that the word servant, in Isaiah sometimes appears to refer

to Israel. For example, in Isaiah 49:3, God says: You are my servant, Israel,
in whom I will be glorified. However, this identification needs to be
qualified, because in verse 5, the Servant says, he who formed me from the
womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob back to him; and that Israel might be
gathered to him. How can the Servant bring Israel back to God if the
Servant is himself Israel? The best way to understand this is to see the
Servant as an individual who represents the nation of Israel, the same way a
king or president would represent the nation he is head of.9
This understanding carries over to Isaiah 53. Pay close attention to the
description of the servant as it appears in verses 4-8:

Surely he has borne our griefs

and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken,
smitten by God, and afflicted.
But he was pierced for our transgressions;
he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
and with his wounds we are healed.
All we like sheep have gone astray;
we have turnedevery oneto his own way;
and the LORD has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.
He was oppressed, and he was afflicted,
yet he opened not his mouth;
like a lamb that is led to the slaughter,
and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent,
so he opened not his mouth.
By oppression and judgment he was taken away;
and as for his generation, who considered
8 See this and other similar quotations by numerous other Jewish authorities in
Rachmiel Frydlands article, The Rabbis' Dilemma: A Look at Isaiah 53, Jews for
Jesus (Accessed 25 February 2015),
http://www.jewsforjesus.org/publications/issues/v02-n05/isaiah53
9 I am indebted to Dr. Peter G. Gentry of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary
for this insight.
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that he was cut off out of the land of the living,

stricken for the transgression of my people?

Immediately, we notice three things about the Suffering Servant:

1. He experiences death, something which cannot be said of the
people of Israel, who have survived every affliction that has come
upon them;
2. His death is redemptive in character. Of course, no ordinary
human can redeem another person by their suffering, to say
nothing of an entire nations suffering; and
3. The redemption is for his people, which would be odd if Israel
was in view, as the people would also be interpreted as Israel,
which leads to the nonsense interpretation that Israels sins are
transferred onto Israel.
We are left with the conclusion that an individual is in viewone who comes
out of the nation of Israel, but is distinguished by his faithfulness, in
contrast with the nations unbelief and rejection of him. This individual is
none other than the Messiahas both Rabbinic sources and the New
Testament attestand the only person in history who matches the
description of the Messiah therein is Jesus of Nazareth.10
If Jesus is the Messiahand we certainly see the Hebrew Bible pointing
that directionthen the implication is that Judaism, in its rejection of Jesus,
has missed the boat. Its picture of redemptive history is incomplete, at best.
Despite its high regard for the Bible, it fails to see the trajectory of the
Biblical story and the One to whom it points, which echoes what Jesus said
to the Pharisees 2,000 years ago: You search the Scriptures because you
think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness
about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life (John 5:3940).
Islam: A Blurred Picture
10 If one is in doubt regarding this, try this simple experiment: Write down Isaiah
53 on a sheet of paper without writing down the reference, and then show random
people the passage and ask them who they think it is referring to. In doing this, I
have found that peopleJewish, Muslim, Atheist, etc.almost universally
recognize that Jesus is being described therein.
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If Judaism errs in presenting an incomplete picture of redemptive

history, Islam errs in blurring the picture that was received prior to it. One
must Islam in light of the Biblical traditions that preceded it. Countless
volumes have been written on this subject. 11 Dr. Samir states that there is
no need to demonstrate that there was a Christian influence on the Quran,
in as much as this is apparent from the evidence of a number of
narratives.12
To explain this, we must speak of Islams articles of faith. Orthodox
Islam has five articles, which are:
1. Belief in one God Who has absolutely no associate with Him in
His divinity;
2. Belief in Gods Angels;
3. Belief in Gods Books, and in the Holy Quran as His Last Book
4. Belief in Gods Prophets, and in Muhammad as His Last and
Final Messenger; and
5. Belief in life after death.13

11 Two very important books on this topic are worth mentioning. First is Gabriel
Said Reynolds The Quran in its Biblical Subtext (New York: Routledge, 2010). The
second book, edited by the same author, is The Quran in Its Historical Context
(New York: Routledge, 2008). Both are part of the Routledge Studies in the Quran
(ed. Andrew Rippin).
12 Samir Khalil Samir, The Theological Christian Influence on the Quran: A
Reflection, The Quran in Its Historical Context, ed. Gabriel Said Reynolds (New
York: Routledge, 2008), 161. Samir recognizes that such an assertion is
controversial amongst Orthodox Muslims, noting that the very concept of
influence is generally rejected by all of traditional Islam. The Quran cannot be
subject to influences, since it comes directly from God and is in no way a human
work. If it were a work attributable to Muhammad himself, it could be subject to
influences. However, being a divine message brought down upon Muhammad,
there is no other influence but that of God. By this fact alone the very question that
we raise is already excluded by traditional Islamic thought (Ibid., 141).
13 Sayyid Abul Ala Mawdudi, Towards Understanding Islam (U.K.I.M. Dawah
Centre, 1960), 70. Some sources include a sixth article: Belief in Divine
Predestination (Qadr). However, the nature of predestination tends to be a source
of disagreement between Muslim groups, especially between Sunni and Shii
Islam.
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Articles 4 and 5 are of particular interest. Islam professes to be the faith of

all the prophets, including those of the Jewish and Christian traditions.
Muslims acknowledge as divinely revealed the Torah (Tawrat), the Psalms
(Zabur) and the Gospel (Injil). In addition, they hold that Muhammad was
the seal of the prophets, and the Quran (which God revealed through
Muhammad) to be His final revelation. This is reflected in the Qurans own
assessment of itself:
He has sent down upon you, the Book in truth, confirming what
was before it [lit. What is between his hands]. And He revealed
the Torah and the Gospel before, as guidance for the people. And
He revealed the Qur'an. Indeed, those who disbelieve in the verses
of Allah will have a severe punishment, and Allah is exalted in
Might, the Owner of Retribution (Q 3:3-4)14
By placing the Quran in the same status as the Torah and Gospel, it is
argued that Muhammad belongs to that prophetic continuity, and that the
prophets message finds its ultimate fulfillment in the Quran.
This is where it gets problematic. Many of the core teachings of the
Quran do not match those of the Bible. For example, the Bible teaches the
divine sonship of Christ. Islam vehemently denies such a relationship and
regards it as blasphemous:
And they say, The Most Merciful has taken a son. You have done
an atrocious thing. The heavens almost rupture therefrom and the
earth splits open and the mountains collapse in devastation that
they attribute to the Most Merciful a son. And it is not appropriate
for the Most Merciful that He should take a son. (Q 19:88-92).
The contrast is clearer elsewhere: If we take the words in Q 112:3 that He
neither begets nor is born (Lam yalid wa lam yulad), we find that they are
the mirror opposite of Isaiah 9:6, to us a child is born (Ki yeled yulad
lanu). The Quran even threatens Christians with Gods destruction for
calling Jesus the Son of God (Q 5:72-73 and 9:30). Contrast this with Jesus
blessing Peter for affirming the same (Matthew 16:17). The antithesis could
not be any clearer.
Another main area of contrast is in the area of vicarious atonement.
The Torah clearly teaches the necessity of atonement through the
14 Quranic references are from the Sahih International translation.
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description of the Yom Kippur festival (Leviticus 16). The next chapter
states that the life of a creature is in the blood, and I have given it to you
to make atonement for yourselves on the altar; it is the blood that makes
atonement for ones life (Leviticus 17:11). Moreover, the prophets declared
that the Messiah would make atonement for sin (see above discussion of
Isaiah 53), which Jesus affirmed when He said that the Son of Man did not
come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many
(Mark 10:45). Islam denies all this, arguing that Jesus did not even die on
the cross (Q 4:157).15
The problem for Muslims is how to reconcile the Quran with the
previous scriptures. The classical argument of Islamic polemicists is that
the previous scriptures were corrupted by the People of the Book. Most of
these books no longer exist, while some (such as the aforementioned three)
remain extant in a corrupted form. Abul Ala Mawdudi summarizes the
popular Muslim viewpoint as such:
The real death of a Prophet consists not in his physical demise but
in the ending of the influence of his teachings. The earlier
Prophets have died because their followers have adulterated their
teachings, distorted their instructions, and besmirched their lifeexamples by attaching fictitious events to them. Not one of the
earlier books - Torah, Zabur (Psalms of David), Injil (Gospel of
Jesus), for example - exists today in its original text and even the
adherents of these books confess that they do not possess the
original books. The life-histories of the earlier Prophets have been
so mixed up with fiction that an accurate and authentic account of
their lives has become impossible. Their lives have become tales
and legends and no trustworthy record is available anywhere. It
15 As Lawson points out, there is no unanimity among Muslim commentators on the
interpretation of this passage. In fact, there are conflicting interpretations even until now.
He states regarding 4:157: Muslim teaching... on the life and ministry of Jesus is by no
means consistent or monolithic.... there are numerous forces at work in various levels of
the Islamic learned tradition that impinge upon the hermeneutic culture out of which
doctrine may be thought to have arisen and endured.... any number of readersMuslim or
notcould read and have read the same verse without coming to this conclusion. See
Todd Lawson, The Crucifixion and the Quran: A Study in the History of Muslim Thought
(Oxford: Oneworld Publications, 2009), 1-2. According to Lawson, the most likely
interpretation is that Jesus did indeed die physically, but not spiritually. He states that the
semantic constitution of such a statement strongly points to a reading that would go well
beyond the mundane realms of murder and physical death (Ibid., 41.). Support for this
interpretation comes from cross-referencing Q 4:157 with Q 2:154 and 3:169. This view is
held today by the Ismaili sect of Shiism.

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cannot even be said with certainty when and where a certain

Prophet was born, how he lived and what code of morality he gave
to mankind.16
Muslim polemicists claim that the teaching that the Bible has been
corrupted is based on Quranic texts that teach Tahrif (alteration). One such
text is Q 2:79: Woe to those who write the scripture with their own hands,
then say, This is from Allah, in order to exchange it for a small price. Woe
to them for what their hands have written and woe to them for what they
earn.
There are three problems with interpreting this passage this way.
First, the verse is describing an isolated incident. Q 2:75 states that only
one party of Jews is being described, and that this is not universal. We know
from history that the Jews were generally very careful in preserving their
text (eg. the Masoretes), so this incident must be regarded as an exception
rather than the rule. Also, the verse says nothing about Christians being
involved.17
Second, this verse is ambiguous on what book the Jews are writing
with their own hands. While Muslim polemicists identify this as the Torah, it
could just as easily be referring to secondary Jewish writings such as the
Talmud (which Orthodox Jews regard as being as authoritative as the Bible)
rather than the Torah.
Third, in Islamic theology, there are two types of Tahrif: Tahrif al-Nass
(corruption of the actual text), and Tahrif al-Mana (corruption of the
meaning only). All Quran verses that teach tahrif only teach the latterthe
interpretation is wrong but the text is still intact. Furthermore, the earliest
Muslims historically held to Tahrif al-Mana, but later generations began to
argue against Jews and Christians on the basis of Tahrif al-Nass. For
example, Ibn Kathir, in his commentary on Q 3:78, cites earlier
commentators Ibn Abbas and Ibn Munabbih (both from the 8th century), to
the effect that nothing in the Bible has been changed:

16 Mawdudi, Towards Understanding Islam, 42-43.

17 We can also ask our hypothetical Muslim apologist why the Jews left such
problematic passages as Psalm 22 or Isaiah 53 as they are. Given their value to
Christianity, one would expect them to be scrubbed, if the Jews were in fact
interested in corrupting the text to suit their ideas.
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Al-Bukhari reported that Ibn Abbas said that the Ayah means they
alter and add although none among Allah's creation can remove
the Words of Allah from His Books, they alter and distort their
apparent meanings. Wahb bin Munabbih said, The Tawrah and
the Injil remain as Allah revealed them, and no letter in them was
removed. However, the people misguide others by addition and
false interpretation, relying on books that they wrote
themselves.18
It is unclear when the shift from claiming Tahrif al-Mana to Tahrif al-Nass
occurred. Dr. Nickel suggests that this viewpoint came into vogue in the 11th
century, when Ibn Hazm popularized it for polemical purposes. Prior to him,
the textual integrity of the Bible was taken for granted by most Muslims. 19
Nickel writes,
[E]xegetes from the formative period of Quranic commentary did
not in the first instance understand the words of the Quran to
mean that the Jews and Christians had falsified their scriptures. ...
They have little good to say about the communities to whom God
entrusted his revelations in the distant past, and even less good to
relate about those who did not accept the claims of the messenger
of Islam. But the negative evaluations of the People of the Book
in the commentaries do not generally attach to the revealed books
themselves.20
Even after Ibn Hazm, many Muslims continued to reject Tahrif al-Nass. For
instance, Muslim historian Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406) cites stories from the
Jewish scriptures in his Muqaddimah, and then goes on to defend the
general authenticity of those scriptures:

18 Ismail b. Kathir, The Jews Alter Allahs Words, Quran Tafsir Ibn Kathir
(Accessed 25 February 2015), http://www.qtafsir.com/index.php?
option=com_content&task=view&id=525&Itemid=46#1
19 Gordon Nickel, Narratives of Tampering in the Earliest Commentaries on the
Quran (London: Brill Academic, 2011), 23.
20 Ibid., 13.
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Someone might come out against this tradition with the argument
that it occurs only in the Torah which, as is well known, was
altered by the Jews. The reply to this argument would be that the
statement concerning the alteration of the Torah by the Jews is
unacceptable to thorough scholars and cannot be understood in its
plain meaning, since custom prevents people who have a revealed
religion from dealing with the divine scriptures in such a manner.21
More recently, Muslim scholar Mahmoud Ayoub wrote concerning the
charge that the previous scriptures were corrupted:
Contrary to the general Islamic view, the Qur'an does not accuse
Jews and Christians of altering the text of their scriptures, but
rather of altering the truth which those scriptures contain. The
people do this by concealing some of the sacred texts, by
misapplying their precepts, or by altering words from their right
position (4:26; 5:13, 41; see also 2:75). However, this refers more
to interpretation than to actual addition or deletion of words from
the sacred books. The problem of alteration (tahrif) needs further
study.22
Besides, the Quran states that it has come to confirm what is between his
hands (Q 3:3 and 5:48). This would not make sense if the text at that time
had been altered, since then the Quran would be confirming a corrupted
text. The Quran also states that God made Jesus disciples superior to the
unbelievers until the day of Resurrection (Q 3:52-55 and 61:14). It would
not make sense if their writings were corrupted or if unbelievers
successfully passed on their own writings as those of Jesus disciples, since
that means the unbelievers triumphed over them. Finally, the ahadith state
that Muhammad treated the Torah reverently. One hadith records the
following anecdote:

21 Abu Zayd b. Khaldun, The Muqaddimah: An Introduction to History, vol. I,

trans. Franz Rosenthal (Princeton University Press, 1967), 20.
22 Mahmoud Ayoub, Uzayr in the Qur'an and Muslim Tradition, Studies in
Islamic and Judaic Traditions, eds. W. M. Brenner and S. D. Rick. (The University of
Denver, 1986), 5.
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A group of Jews came and invited the Apostle of Allah to Quff. So

he visited them in their school. They said: Abul Qasim, one of our
men has committed fornication with a woman; so pronounce
judgment upon them. They placed a cushion for the Apostle of
Allah who sat on it and said: Bring the Torah. It was then brought.
He then withdrew the cushion from beneath him and placed the
Torah on it saying: I believe in thee and in Him who revealed thee
(Abu-Dawud 4434).23
Another hadith confirms that Muhammad took the punishments prescribed
in the Torah as binding upon the Jews:
A Jew and a Jewess were brought to Allah's Apostle on a charge of
committing illegal sexual intercourse. The Prophet asked them.
What is the legal punishment in your Book? They replied, Our
priests have innovated the punishment of blackening the faces
with charcoal and Tajbiya. Abdullah bin Salam said, O Allah's
Apostle, tell them to bring the Torah. The Torah was brought, and
then one of the Jews put his hand over the Divine Verse of the
Rajam (stoning to death) and started reading what preceded and
what followed it. On that, Ibn Salam said to the Jew, Lift up your
hand. Behold! The Divine Verse of the Rajam was under his hand.
So Allah's Apostle ordered that the two be stoned to death, and so
they were stoned (Bukhari 8:809).
These narrations show that the charge of corruption cannot be sustained
against the Bible. This charge comes from later medieval Muslim polemics
against Jews and Christians, and cannot be substantiated from the Quran
or early Islamic sources.
Thus, Islam has within it a fatal contradiction: It affirms the divine
origin of the Bible, yet denies essential teachings from the Bible. The only
conclusion one could draw is that Islams claim to be in continuity with
Gods redemptive story is invalid, which also invalidates Muhammads
prophethood and the Qurans status as divine revelation.
Christianity: The Full Picture
23 Hadith quotations are from Sunnah and Hadith, University of Southern
California (Accessed 26 February 2015), http://www.usc.edu/org/cmje/religioustexts/hadith
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Having seen the flaws in Judaism and Islam, we are left with one
remaining Abrahamic Faith: Christianity. The Christian faith sees the story
of the Bible as Redemptive History,24 where God works to bring an
estranged humanity back to a right relationship with Himself. This
Redemptive History can be seen as a succession of covenants, beginning
with the Edenic Covenant and culminating in the New Covenant. Between
Adam and Christ, there are four other covenants, which God made with
Noah, Abraham, Moses and David, respectively.
Each covenant builds upon each other, clarifying each covenant that
came before it and sometimes fulfilling their provisions. For example, the
Mosaic covenant contains provisions for a monarchy, yet there was no
monarchy in Israel for another 400 years (Deut. 17:14-20). When a
monarchy is established, God takes the house of David and promises to
establish their throne forever (2 Samuel 7). This is finally fulfilled in the
New Covenant, with Christ as the eternal king.
The following scheme can be used to remember the basic thrust of
each covenant:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.

Adam: The covenant of commencement

Noah: The covenant of preservation
Abraham: The covenant of promise
Moses: The covenant of law
David: The covenant of the kingdom
Christ: The covenant of consummation25

Underlying all the covenants is a grand narrative that connects them

together. Robertson notes: Diversity indeed exists in the various
administrations of Gods covenants. This diversity enriches the wonder of

24 The on Redemptive History in Theopedia states: Redemptive history is a

general term to describe the study of God's acts of redemption from creation to the
present. Although a broad field of study, all of redemptive history can be said to
climax and culminate in the Cross, encompassing Jesus' death, burial, and
resurrection. (Accessed 26 February 2015),
http://www.theopedia.com/Redemptive_history
25 This scheme is provided by O. Palmer Robertson in The Christ of the Covenants
(Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 1980), 61.
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Gods plan for his people. But the diversity ultimately merges into a single
purpose overarching the ages.26
Different theologians have different ways of explaining this grand
narrative. In classical Protestant thought, the unifying theme of the
covenants is called the Covenant of Grace. All the biblical-historical
covenants are administrations within this Covenant of Grace. It is so-called
because its main factor is Gods grace. All His dealings with man under the
Covenant of Grace involve His gracious condescension to us to save us and
redeem us despite our incapability to merit His favour. This redemptive plan
finds its fullest expression in what Saint Paul calls the fullness of time
(Galatians 4:4), with the coming of Jesus Christ, whose life, death and
resurrection form the lynchpin of Redemptive History.
Much more can be said on this matter, but I leave it to the reader to
explore the Biblical story for themselves. To better understand its narrative,
I refer the reader to The Grand Narrative of History, which summarizes
the story of the Bible.27

26 Ibid.
27 J. Luis Dizon, The Grand Narrative of History, Evangelium and Apologia
Ministries, http://eamcanada.org/2014/10/28/the-grand-narrative-of-history
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