Abe 5

I'll do my best briefly to summarize the ongoing discussion of Abraham 5 (forgive me for failing to grasp all the nuances of the various readings, my own included).

1. Creation is emphatically a plural effort in Abraham 5, implicating this account in our ongoing discussions of community.

2. Reckoning shows up as an important word in Abraham's personal interjection into the creation account in verse 13.

a. "Reckoning" also appears in Romans 4, with reference to Abraham in Genesis 15, and thus the word is implicated in questions of grace and works

b. The word "reckoning" appears in Abraham 5 without any explicit reference to grace; however, the idea of the Lord's "appointing" Adam's "reckoning" may introduce divine grace

c. "Reckoning" is used prominently in Abraham 3 with reference to time and the measuring of time; this raises the question of when reckoning occurs, and whether sin and grace are temporal conditions (this also hearkens back to some of our discussions of typology, and the temporal aspects thereof)

d. Authority/obedience are cognate to grace given/grace received, because both interactions disrupt human moral autonomy

e. And yet... and yet... This reading may not yet tidily contain Abraham 5 into a grace paradigm.