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To Have Life, and Have It Abundantly! Health and Well-Being in Biblical Perspective

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Abstract

Epidemiological studies researching the impact of participation in religious activities on the overall health and well-being of individuals suggest that having faith and practicing religion is good since they represent expense free, non-medical coping mechanisms accessible to everyone. Faith and religion, thus, can serve for a large number of people as potential reservoirs for cultivating well-being and maintaining health, thereby cutting health-care costs significantly. This begs the question if such pragmatic instrumentalization does do justice to faith and religion in the first place. The article investigates this question taking the Christian biblical tradition as an example by, first, identifying texts speaking of ‘health’ across different Bible versions (I), second, by sketching related concepts of ‘health’ (II) and, finally, by assessing the actual extent to which biblical tradition supports the quest for health and well-being (III).

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Notes

  1. The most well-known of these Apocrypha are Judith, Tobit, 1–4 Maccabees, Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), Odes of Solomon, Wisdom of Solomon, and Baruch. The definite number of these deuterocanonical books depends on which Greek version of that part of the Bible called the ‘Old Testament’ (Septuagint, LXX) serves as reference.

  2. See URL http://derose.net/steve/Bible/EnglishBibleTranslations.html (accessed Nov. 8, 2012).

  3. The Greek nouns used in biblical texts are (in Proverbs 3:8, 4:22; 16:24, Jeremiah 8:15, 8:22, Psalm 37:4) and (in Jeremiah 30:17, 40:6); the plural occurs in Isaiah 58:8. They translate five times (Isaiah 58:8; Jeremiah 8:22; 33:6; 37:17; 40:6), as often as they render (Proverbs [3:8]; 4:22; 12:18; 16:24; Jeremiah 8:15), and once as in Psalm 38:3. (LXX: Psalm 37:4: , meaning: “No health is in my flesh.”).

  4. Forms thereof occur in Genesis 43:38 and 2 Samuel 20:9 in place of the Hebrew term , commonly translated as ‘peace’ or ‘the state of peace’, ‘well-being’ and/or ‘soundness’. (See the compound formula , ‘healthy and strong’/‘fit’, in Sirach 30:14.) It is in the Apocrypha where these terms appear most frequently namely in Tobit 5:16, 21, 22; 7:5, 10; Sirach 1:18; 30:15, 16; 2 Maccabees 1:10; 9:19; 11:28.

  5. This serves as translation for יְשׁוּעָה in Psalm 42:11 (LXX—Psalm 41:12); 43:5 (LXX—42:5) and 67:2 (LXX 66:3). In Proverbs 13:17 the noun מַרְפֵּא gets rendered by LXX with the verb ῥύομαι, which means ‘to rescue’, ‘save’, ‘deliver.’ Again, the תַחֲלִימֵנִי of Isaiah 38:16 is translated by LXX with the verb παρακαλέω, meaning ‘beg’, ‘urge’, ‘encourage’, ‘speak words of encouragement’ (and thus, also, ‘console’, ‘comfort’, ‘cheer up’). That is why KJV translates it as “so wilt thou recover me.” However, it could also be read as “so wilt thou comfort me” or the like. In the end, the meaning in this case converges somehow with that of ‘restoring to health’ (see above to ἰάομαι).

  6. Besides the adjective the following other forms of the semantic field are found: the infinitive ὑγιαίνειν (1x) in 3 John 1:2 (which KJV and NRSV translate as “be in health”), the present participle ὑγιαίνοντα (2x; Luke 7:10; 15:27). The ὑγιαίνοντες in Luke 5:31 designate the ‘healthy ones’, which in the parallel texts of Mark 2:17 and Matthew 9:12 are called the ‘strong ones’, οἱ ἰσχύοντες.

  7. There are only ten further occurrences of words of the semantic field ἰάομαι/ἰατρός used in the sense of ‘restoring to health’, ‘healing’: Matthew 8:8; 8:13; 15:28; Luke 6:18; 7:7; 8:47; 17:15; John 5:13; James 5:16; Hebrews 12:13.

  8. See also Psalms 2:7; 22,16; 30:4; 56:14; 86:13.

  9. In Luke 1:31, however, it is Mary who receives this order.

  10. See Mark 6:5–6: "He [Jesus] could do no deed of power there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and cured them. And he was amazed at their unbelief." See also the story of the ten lepers in Luke 17:11–19.

  11. See also Matthew 12:9–14; Luke 6:6–11. According to John (11:45–53) it is the raising of Lazarus from death which leads to the fatal decision by the authorities to kill Jesus.

  12. See Matt. 13:13; Mark 4:12; Luke 8:10; but see also Matt. 11:15; 13:9; Mark 4:9; Luke 8:8; Rev. 2:7, 11 etc.

  13. See Romans 6:10: "The life he [i.e. the baptized one] lives, he lives to God" (ὃ δὲ ζῇ, ζῇ τῷ ϑεῷ).

  14. See Exodus 15:26, “If you will listen carefully to the voice of the LORD your God, and do what is right in his sight, and give heed to his commandments and keep all his statues, I will not bring upon you any of the diseases that I brought upon the Egyptians; for I am the LORD who heals you.” ( ).

  15. See Micah 6:8; Mt. 25:31–46.

  16. This phrase was first coined in the wake of the hygiene movement at the end of the nineteenth century with John Harvey Kellogg (1852–1943) as one of its most articulate representatives. For contemporary sources on the topic see (Dworkin, 2000) (Saxion, 2004); and URL http://www.gospelofhealth.org (accessed Nov. 9, 2012).

  17. 2 Timothy 1:10 “Jesus Christ… abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.” See also I Cor. 15:55.

  18. See Matthew 10:39; Luke 17:33.

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  1. Valparaiso University, ASB 232, 1400 Chapel Drive, Valparaiso, IN, 46383, USA

    Christoffer H. Grundmann

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Correspondence to Christoffer H. Grundmann.

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Grundmann, C.H. To Have Life, and Have It Abundantly! Health and Well-Being in Biblical Perspective. J Relig Health 53, 552–561 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10943-013-9706-1

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