Exitus and Reditus in Anthropology
The God Who is not Hidden
In my previous Substacks (and yes it has been too long due to a long-awaited promotion to grandmother) I offered a general overview of how I see gender. I understand male and female as representing not only God as he is in himself, but also his decree to bring a people for his own possession to himself in a realm beyond testing. Out of love for the world, the cosmos of John 3:16, God formed and filled our universe with the revelation of who he is (Gen 1:1-25, Ps 19; Rom 1:19-20). Then he made creatures representing him who can receive that knowledge, perhaps most especially as they consider themselves (Gen 1:26-27). And yet, could it be that further reflection on themselves in light of further revelation about his plans (Gen 2:2) would lead them to understand his decree concerning them expressed through his making them male and female?
Several years ago, I took a course on Van Til’s theology of the Trinity taught by Lane Tipton.1 One of the things new to me was movement within God. The first time I heard it I was alarmed. But then I thought about it for a while. While we confess that God is unchanging with regard to his plans and purposes for the things he has made, he is dynamic within himself. Is not this dynamism something we confess when we say the Son is eternally begotten? Likewise the Spirit is outside of time and space, and yet motion is in view when we say that the Spirit eternally proceeds. As I now envision it, the persons of the Trinity unfold in ordered “exit,” the Son from the Father and the Spirit from the Father and Son. The persons also exhaustively enfold in the embrace of perichoresis. They “return” to wholly abide in one another. At the end of the return, their personal distinctions, though still present, are no longer visible, but only the One, the God of Deuteronomy 6:4.
Perhaps we see this representation of God’s dynamism immediately at the beginning of Genesis in the creation of the two great realms, God’s heavenly throne and his earthly footstool. From the enthroned Father, through the eternal Son over all, by the hovering Spirit, the earth proceeds by the Word of God. Earth unfolds from heaven, and yet almost immediately, we see that this is not the end of the story. Heavenly Sabbath rest also was promised to unfold from earthly obedience of man, even as both realms eagerly await a future enfolding. Heaven and earth anticipate their union at the end of this age, when heaven, the throne room of God, will be enfolded into earth. John foresaw this great union in Revelation 11 and 21. The New Jerusalem and her people descend, coming forth like a bride, for the consummate enfolding of time, when the kingdoms of this world become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ. Through him all things cohere, whether things on earth or things in heaven, and at the culmination of time heaven and earth themselves (Col 1:17; Eph 1:10).
Time unfolds and space expands, as well as all the things created to progressively fill time and space. When we get to the apex of creation in Genesis 1, God makes mankind, male and female, and in them all the tribes and tongues and nations. They are explicitly like him, an especially clear revelation of God himself. Eve proceeds from Adam. Their children proceed from them, spreading forth and filling the earth, even unto its ends, the distant coastlands and islands (Jer 31:10; Is 42:12; Ps 97:1). But the telos is not the spread, but rather a great ingathering of the same, a return, a streaming toward the mountain of the Lord (Is 2:2; 27:13; 30:29; 56:7; 60:11-12; 66:20; Jer 3:17; Micah 4:1-3; Ps 22:17). This is no small detail. There is an exit of tribes and tongues and nations. They flow forth to the ends of the earth. Because of sin, the gospel must also go forth to them, but to what end? There is a great reditus, a return of God’s people to worship him on his holy mountain.
As I have written before, I believe that the male and female of Genesis 1:27 represent God’s plans for his people revealed implicitly in Genesis 2:2 and explicitly in Hebrews 4:9-11. Eve exits from Adam as the glory creature, representing the hope of Sabbath rest extended to him if only he obeys. Then she returns to Adam signifying the end of time when heaven will become bone and flesh with the earth. At that time the earth will be full of the glory of the Lord (Is 6:3; Hab 2:14). The stone who was struck (Gen 3:15; Is 52:12-53:12; Matt 27:30) became the striking stone and then the mountain of the Lord that filled the earth. Nothing remains but that one mountain, heaven and earth in union and communion (Dan 2:35).
As I see it, the “turning” of Genesis 3:16 primarily tells that story. It prophesies that God’s plans will prevail. “Your returning will be toward your man, and he will rule over you.” Genesis 3:16 increasingly seems to me, at least in part, a promise, a continuation of the good news extended in the Seed of Genesis 3:15. Eve, who represents heaven, will return to Adam, who represents earth, and the new man of earth, the second Adam, will rule over her to bless her forever. Sin will be overcome. The Sabbath realm will incline herself toward earth. Reditus will not be thwarted forever. Satan, enmity, and division will not have the last word because the man of Genesis 3:15 will prevail. Through him heaven and earth will not fail to be united. All authority has been given to him unto this end.
According to Lane Tipton, interacting with the best modern Aquinas scholars, the scheme of exitus and reditus forms the core of Thomas Aquinas’ entire project.2 Perhaps the neglect of this general scheme in Reformed Theology has been to our detriment. Maybe there is a line to be drawn from the self-contained God as he is in himself, an equally ultimate unity and diversity in procession and embrace, to the two great realms of Genesis 1:1, the realm of earthly work and Sabbath rest, to the man and woman of Genesis 1:27, to the husband and wife of Genesis 2:22-24, to the promises of Genesis 3:15-16. I would love to hear your thoughts.
I came across Lane Tipton’s work over a decade ago, and since then, his sermons, articles, courses, and books have been where I find a steady stream of encouragement and impetus to worship. Tipton synthesizes Vos, Van, Til, and Kline, especially against the backdrop of Aquinas and Barth, developing what Vos calls the Deeper Protestant Conception. As far as I know, Vos, Van Til, and Tipton have not applied biblical-theology to the creation of mankind as male and female. I would guess that Van Til has come closest by challenging the roots of our epistemology and redirecting us from pagan natural theology to the inspired Word.
https://reformedforum.org/podcasts/ctc818/
I really love what you’re doing here Anna. By enfolding Gen 3:16 into these grand redemptive movements, you show me that our attempts to fit that verse into doctrine about gender roles suffers from an impoverished imagination. I feel the same in my study of gender in the Gospel of John. Significantly, John develops these grand redemptive movements: creation / new creation (1:1-5, 20:1-18), exitus / reditus centered in the Son of Man (1:51), the union of God with humanity not on a mountain but in the missions of the Spirit and the Son (ie “in Spirit and in truth,” 4:21-24), the turning of woman toward the new Adam before his return to the Father (20:14-17), etc. Significantly, a) John cannot make these theological moves apart from both men and women, and b) women are, imo, highlighted more than men in these typological developments. This fits your description of woman as “the glory creature.” Thanks for helping me think through this, very timely post! Also, have you read The Trinitarian Theology of St Thomas Aquinas by Gilles Emery? I need to check out Tipton’s work, but Emery is a superb guide into Aquinas on the Trinity.
Your observation that God is dynamic was incredibly helpful. I’m amazed at the way your brain works. Do you see negative parallels in God’s conversation with Cain in Genesis 4 regarding sin and its desire to rule over him? Almost an “anti-reditus”? Or the worst kind of exitus?