Grace is one of the most difficult theological terms for me to explain in everyday conversation. As opposed to, say, “soteriology,” “grace” is ubiquitous in popular culture—yet how many of us at the drop of a hat can define what it means? Coming from the Greek word Χάρις, or “charis,” it is the theme of the song “Amazing Grace,” and, on the opposite end of the pop culture spectrum, the TV crime-fighting show “Saving Grace.” It’s a popular name for girls, and part of the name of the hospital Seattle Grace where “Grey’s Anatomy” is set. In the lectionary reading Ephesians 2:1-10, “grace” is nothing less than the mechanism of salvation: “For by grace you have been saved.” In this week’s entry I will explore the concept of grace in this passage.
Ephesians 2:1-10
1 And you were dead in your trespasses and sins,
2 in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience.
3 Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.
4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us,
5 even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved),
6 and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus,
7 so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.
8 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God;
9 not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.
10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them (New American Standard Bible).
The city of Ephesus is located on the Aegean coast of Asia minor. It is one of the Pauline letters which some scholars doubt was actually written by Paul. Reasons for this doubt include theological concepts developed here but not elsewhere in the letters, such as salvation experienced during life on earth (2:4-10), and terms that are significant in Ephesians both not in other letters, like “heavenly places,” “dividing wall,” and “fellow citizen.” In addition, the rhetorical style in which the letters to the Ephesians are written features long, complex sentences, which the editors of the New Oxford Annotated Bible note are divided in the NRSV translation. However, there are several similarities in language between Ephesians and Colossians. If Ephesians was written by Paul, a probable date for them would be the late 50s. If it was written by a follower of Paul, it would have come after the 50s and likely modeled on Colossians.
A major theme of the letters, which is reflected in this passage, is the vision of a universal church. The language of Ephesians can also be traced to Jewish scripture, such as the so-called “Third Isaiah” in which the God of Israel is depicted as the God of all humanity. Regardless of who the author is, the book of Ephesians is part of the biblical canon and has played a major role in shaping Christian thought. We see the concept of a diverse church reflected in this particular passage: 2:1, “You who were dead in your trespasses and sins,” is addressed to Gentiles, while Jewish Christians are meant by the phrase “we too” (or “all of us”) in 2:3. The term grace then enters as the means by which the Christian community opens outward: “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast” (2:8-9). This line is similar to Romans 3:22-24: “For there is no distinction, since all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God; they are now justified by grace as a gift . . .”
Not long ago I had to respond to the question, “Isn’t all you have to do to get saved is believe in Jesus, regardless of how nice, or how much of a jerk, you are in your life? If this is true, how is it meaningful for a Christian to take a stand on social ethics?” I can imagine the asker of the question might have attended a church service like one I visited recently in which the preacher congratulated the congregation on “being saved.” Reading lines like Ephesians 2:8 out of context, it is not hard to see how one might get the impression that converting to Christianity takes away the gravity of moral decisions. According to the stereotype, a person can do harm all week, go to confession on Sunday, start with a clean slate, and repeat the cycle.
However, grace in this passage is not a license to do whatever we want, whenever we want. Rather it concerns our motivation for doing good, and the circumstances that make doing good possible at all. In Judaism and Christianity: Perspectives and Traditions, the authors Luther Harshbarger and John Mourant write,
Grace is probably the most crucial concept in western religious thought because it refers to the free and unmerited act by and through which God restores man. In essence grace is a paradox which affirms that every good in man and every good act is somehow from God rather than from the self (314).
Thus, when the author of Ephesians writes, “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast” (2:8-9), the point is not to denigrate the importance of serving others—it’s to give credit for being able to serve at all to God. Human access to divine mercy is not a reward for hitting a certain mark on a scale of good works—rather, we are inspired to do good works in joyful response to God’s love and mercy, embodied in the incarnation.
In Judaism and Christianity: Perspectives and Traditions, the authors argue that the stereotypical division of Judaism as a “religion of law” and Christianity as a “religious of grace” is quite false. For example, a fundamental characteristic of grace as described in this Ephesians passage is that it’s not something earned, but a free gift that God offers: “But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive . . .” (4-5). The language used to describe God directly recalls the Hebrew word hesed, or steadfast loving kindness. Hesed is used to describe God throughout the Hebrew Scripture, for example when God saves Jonah from the fish, despite Jonah’s refusal to preach to Nineveh. Harshbarger and Mourant highlight the parallel between the Christian concept of grace and the Jewish concept of being chosen: both versions are the result of God’s abundant love and mercy, not from any special virtue on the part of the people that, so to speak, forces God’s hand:
The election of Israel is a constant theme in the Tanakh and rabbinic literature. There is, however, never a suggestion that the election came through any merit of Israel. . . Grace, then, is closely associated with the Covenant and finds its expression in the Law. To be a Jew means to stand in Abraham’s place and at the foot of Sinai receive the Torah . . . Through the Law man enters a partnership with God as a man under commandment, yet free. Grace as it is manifested in and through the commandment does not diminish man’s freedom” (315).
For Christians, the authors differentiate between Catholic and Protestants conceptions of grace. The primary difference between Catholic and Protestant conception of grace concerns the role of the sacraments: “For the Roman Catholic, grace as a gift of God is an energy-giving virtue which is infused into the soul sacramentally. The sacraments are the effective signs of grace—grace made visible” (316). On the other hand, Luther claims that man is justified by grace through faith alone:
In grace God in His deepest being is performing a completely gratuitous act. There are no degrees of grace; either one is forgiven or one is not. . . The sacraments rightly administered and rightly received do embody the promises of God, but grace is not thereby restricted” (317).
Both strands of Christian theology hold that grace is that which makes it possible for humans to achieve anything. According to Ephesians 2:10 we are “created in Christ Jesus for good works,” yet God is the catalyst awakening us to this potential. God does not only demand goodness, but supplies us with the power to do good.
I would like to close by linking to two youtube versions of “Amazing Grace”, by the
country singer Leann Rimes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iT88jBAoVIM&feature=related
and for bagpipe fans, the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jkLXOWimMY8&feature=related
--Elizabeth Fels
Source for background on Ephesians:
Coogan, Michael, Ed. The New Oxford Annotated Bible (3rd ed). Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.
Harshbarger, Luther H. and Mourant, John A. Judaism and Christianity: Perspectives and Traditions. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, Inc. 1968.
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
March 15: Ten Words
The Hebrew Scripture reading from the lectionary today has had recent appearances on late-night comedy shows. Representative Lynn Westmoreland from Georgia’s Third District appeared on the Colbert Report “Better Know a District” segment after co-sponsoring a bill that would require the display of the Ten Commandments in the House of Representatives and Senate. “I think if we were totally without them, we may lose our sense of direction,” Westmoreland said. When Colbert asked him to name the commandments, Westmoreland could only name three: “Don’t murder, don’t lie, don’t steal.”:
http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/70730/june-14-2006/better-know-a-district---georgia-s-8th---lynn-westmoreland
If he did not know the answer, like Sir Lancelot in Monty Python in the Holy Grail asking whether the old man guarding the bridge meant an African or a European swallow, Westmoreland could have asked Colbert whether he meant the Jewish, Eastern Orthodox, or Catholic version: these three religious communities have different versions of the ten commandments, or as they are literally called in biblical Hebrew, “the ten words.” In the Jewish tradition, Exodus 20.2 is considered the first of the ten words: “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.” In the Roman Catholic, Anglican, and Lutheran traditions, the commandments begin with Exodus 20:3-5, with the last two commandments concerning coveting a neighbor’s wife and his property separated. In the Eastern Orthodox and other Protestant traditions, the first commandment is 20.3, the second is 20.4-6, and coveting a neighbor’s wife and property are considered a single commandment.
Since I am focusing on Exodus 20:1-17 in this entry, for ease of reference I will post the reading into the text, from the New International Version:
And God spoke all these words:
2 "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
3 "You shall have no other gods before [a] me.
4 "You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand {generations} of those who love me and keep my commandments.
7 "You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.
8 "Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates. 11 For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.
12 "Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you.
13 "You shall not murder.
14 "You shall not commit adultery.
15 "You shall not steal.
16 "You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.
17 "You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his manservant or maidservant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to neighbor."
While not everyone might be able to list off the ten commandments at the drop of a hat, they play a controversial role in modern culture: several court cases recently have addressed whether they can be displayed in public buildings. In 2005, the Supreme Court issued two 5-4 decisions on this topic, ruling that the Ten Commandments could be displayed outside the Texas Capital but not inside Kentucky court houses—or, as Jon Stewart put it, “Outside a building, okay, inside a building, not so much.”
An Alabama Supreme Court chief justice was fired recently for refusing to remove a two-ton display of the Ten Commandments from the lobby of the court house. “Three times I was asked by a prosecutor of this state, an attorney general, if I would deny God. Three times I said I would not,” he said at a press conference. Defenders of the right to display the Ten Commandments argue that they reflect the role religion has played in the development of the US. The opposing argument is that such displays are tantamount to an official endorsement of religion, violate the Establishment Clause of the 1st Amendment, and, in court houses in particular, imply that cases are judged according to religious laws.
In this entry, I would like to examine what can be inferred about the social setting of the people who received Exodus 20:1-17, using The Old Testament: A Historical and Literary Introduction and The New Oxford Annotated Bible as resources. Although the text describes God as giving Moses the Ten Commandments shortly after the Israelites' escape from slavery, “On the third new moon after the Israelites had gone out of the land of Egypt” (Ex.19:1), they are addressed to an agrarian community, where there are houses, oxen, donkeys, and slaves, or, as many translations tend to call them, “servants.” However, unlike in the Deuteronomic Code, there is no mention of a monarch, and the text is dated to the late second millennium BCE.
Interestingly, the text does not express a vision of what we would call today monotheism. The language of the passage, “you shall have no other gods before me” does not imply that there is only one God, but presumes the existence of other gods who are not to be ranked with Yahweh. This “messy monotheism,” as Paula Fredriksen calls it, is consistent with the presumed reference to the Ten Commandments in the book of Jeremiah, from the late seventh century BCE: “You steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, make offerings to Baal, and go after other gods that you have not known” (Jer. 7:9). Often in the prophet writings, language of marital fidelity is used to describe the people’s commitment to God, or lack thereof.
Like the Noaheide laws, in the Hebrew Scripture reading from the first week of Lent, the Ten Commandments are written in language that implies a treaty structure. The passage begins with God, the stronger power, describing what He has done for Israel, and then describing how He should be honored. The first four commandments concern the people’s relationship to the divine: the second commandment prohibits the making of “idols,” which can be understood as images of God. The prohibition against making idols would have differentiated the Israelites from neighboring groups, who made animal and human images to depict deities. I remember my Hebrew Scripture professor talking about traditions in the Jewish and Muslim faiths of not visually portraying the divine, describing the complex, intensely colorful flowers that characterize Islamic art. He remarked dryly, “Christianity is a stunning exception.” From Michelangelo to South Park, prohibitions against rendering the divine in a visual image have apparently not been enforced for some time in Christian communities. The prohibition against “making wrongful use of the name of the LORD your God” may have implied invoking the name of God in an efforts to use magic or sorcery, attempts to gain control over the divine.
The other six commandments involve human relations with each other. Michael Coogan writes, “A man’s life, his marriage, his person . . . his reputation, and his property were to be inviolable by another Israelite (his “neighbor.”) Two other major areas in which the culture of contemporary religious communities do not reflect the moral norms expressed in the Ten Commandments concern the status of women and slaves. Exodus 20.17 often gets translated with the word “servants,” as in, “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or manservant or maidservant, or ox, or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.” I once heard a sermon in which the pastor said, “they were more like modern-day employees.” However as seen in the next chapter of Exodus, the laws governing this relationship bear closer relation to what we would call slavery than, say, a Jane Austen-era cordial servant-employer relationship. Exodus 21:7 reads, “When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she shall not go out as the male slaves do. In Exodus 21 we read,
When you buy a male Hebrew slave” (note the adjective “male”), he shall serve six years, but in the seventh he shall go out a free person . . . If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her master’s and he shall go out alone.
The much-quoted line “you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife” falls before the prohibition of coveting donkeys or oxen, but after that of coveting a neighbor’s house. No mention is made of a neighbor’s husband, because the language of the Ten Commandments in Hebrew uses the second person masculine singular. Like other groups from this time period, the Israelite society structure was patriarchal, and the commandments are specifically addressed to men.
Fun Fact: in Exodus 34, after the golden calf debacle, Moses breaks the tablets containing the text of the commandments, and God tells him to go back to Mount Sinai for another copy. But the text in Exodus 34 is slightly different from Exodus 20—the new commandments focus less on human treatment of each other and more on worship, and for that reason are called the “Ritual Decalogue.” It can be inferred from the presence of differences in the texts that there was more than one tradition of the Ten Words, and that the writer(s) of Exodus placed more weight on including them than in making them match.
One last observation on this week’s lectionary reading: the last verse of Psalm 19 is incorporated into Sweet Honey in the Rock’s hauntingly beautiful a capella version of “By the Waters of Babylon”: “Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable unto you, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer.”
--Elizabeth Fels
http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/70730/june-14-2006/better-know-a-district---georgia-s-8th---lynn-westmoreland
If he did not know the answer, like Sir Lancelot in Monty Python in the Holy Grail asking whether the old man guarding the bridge meant an African or a European swallow, Westmoreland could have asked Colbert whether he meant the Jewish, Eastern Orthodox, or Catholic version: these three religious communities have different versions of the ten commandments, or as they are literally called in biblical Hebrew, “the ten words.” In the Jewish tradition, Exodus 20.2 is considered the first of the ten words: “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.” In the Roman Catholic, Anglican, and Lutheran traditions, the commandments begin with Exodus 20:3-5, with the last two commandments concerning coveting a neighbor’s wife and his property separated. In the Eastern Orthodox and other Protestant traditions, the first commandment is 20.3, the second is 20.4-6, and coveting a neighbor’s wife and property are considered a single commandment.
Since I am focusing on Exodus 20:1-17 in this entry, for ease of reference I will post the reading into the text, from the New International Version:
And God spoke all these words:
2 "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
3 "You shall have no other gods before [a] me.
4 "You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand {generations} of those who love me and keep my commandments.
7 "You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.
8 "Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates. 11 For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.
12 "Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you.
13 "You shall not murder.
14 "You shall not commit adultery.
15 "You shall not steal.
16 "You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.
17 "You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his manservant or maidservant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to neighbor."
While not everyone might be able to list off the ten commandments at the drop of a hat, they play a controversial role in modern culture: several court cases recently have addressed whether they can be displayed in public buildings. In 2005, the Supreme Court issued two 5-4 decisions on this topic, ruling that the Ten Commandments could be displayed outside the Texas Capital but not inside Kentucky court houses—or, as Jon Stewart put it, “Outside a building, okay, inside a building, not so much.”
An Alabama Supreme Court chief justice was fired recently for refusing to remove a two-ton display of the Ten Commandments from the lobby of the court house. “Three times I was asked by a prosecutor of this state, an attorney general, if I would deny God. Three times I said I would not,” he said at a press conference. Defenders of the right to display the Ten Commandments argue that they reflect the role religion has played in the development of the US. The opposing argument is that such displays are tantamount to an official endorsement of religion, violate the Establishment Clause of the 1st Amendment, and, in court houses in particular, imply that cases are judged according to religious laws.
In this entry, I would like to examine what can be inferred about the social setting of the people who received Exodus 20:1-17, using The Old Testament: A Historical and Literary Introduction and The New Oxford Annotated Bible as resources. Although the text describes God as giving Moses the Ten Commandments shortly after the Israelites' escape from slavery, “On the third new moon after the Israelites had gone out of the land of Egypt” (Ex.19:1), they are addressed to an agrarian community, where there are houses, oxen, donkeys, and slaves, or, as many translations tend to call them, “servants.” However, unlike in the Deuteronomic Code, there is no mention of a monarch, and the text is dated to the late second millennium BCE.
Interestingly, the text does not express a vision of what we would call today monotheism. The language of the passage, “you shall have no other gods before me” does not imply that there is only one God, but presumes the existence of other gods who are not to be ranked with Yahweh. This “messy monotheism,” as Paula Fredriksen calls it, is consistent with the presumed reference to the Ten Commandments in the book of Jeremiah, from the late seventh century BCE: “You steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, make offerings to Baal, and go after other gods that you have not known” (Jer. 7:9). Often in the prophet writings, language of marital fidelity is used to describe the people’s commitment to God, or lack thereof.
Like the Noaheide laws, in the Hebrew Scripture reading from the first week of Lent, the Ten Commandments are written in language that implies a treaty structure. The passage begins with God, the stronger power, describing what He has done for Israel, and then describing how He should be honored. The first four commandments concern the people’s relationship to the divine: the second commandment prohibits the making of “idols,” which can be understood as images of God. The prohibition against making idols would have differentiated the Israelites from neighboring groups, who made animal and human images to depict deities. I remember my Hebrew Scripture professor talking about traditions in the Jewish and Muslim faiths of not visually portraying the divine, describing the complex, intensely colorful flowers that characterize Islamic art. He remarked dryly, “Christianity is a stunning exception.” From Michelangelo to South Park, prohibitions against rendering the divine in a visual image have apparently not been enforced for some time in Christian communities. The prohibition against “making wrongful use of the name of the LORD your God” may have implied invoking the name of God in an efforts to use magic or sorcery, attempts to gain control over the divine.
The other six commandments involve human relations with each other. Michael Coogan writes, “A man’s life, his marriage, his person . . . his reputation, and his property were to be inviolable by another Israelite (his “neighbor.”) Two other major areas in which the culture of contemporary religious communities do not reflect the moral norms expressed in the Ten Commandments concern the status of women and slaves. Exodus 20.17 often gets translated with the word “servants,” as in, “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or manservant or maidservant, or ox, or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.” I once heard a sermon in which the pastor said, “they were more like modern-day employees.” However as seen in the next chapter of Exodus, the laws governing this relationship bear closer relation to what we would call slavery than, say, a Jane Austen-era cordial servant-employer relationship. Exodus 21:7 reads, “When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she shall not go out as the male slaves do. In Exodus 21 we read,
When you buy a male Hebrew slave” (note the adjective “male”), he shall serve six years, but in the seventh he shall go out a free person . . . If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her master’s and he shall go out alone.
The much-quoted line “you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife” falls before the prohibition of coveting donkeys or oxen, but after that of coveting a neighbor’s house. No mention is made of a neighbor’s husband, because the language of the Ten Commandments in Hebrew uses the second person masculine singular. Like other groups from this time period, the Israelite society structure was patriarchal, and the commandments are specifically addressed to men.
Fun Fact: in Exodus 34, after the golden calf debacle, Moses breaks the tablets containing the text of the commandments, and God tells him to go back to Mount Sinai for another copy. But the text in Exodus 34 is slightly different from Exodus 20—the new commandments focus less on human treatment of each other and more on worship, and for that reason are called the “Ritual Decalogue.” It can be inferred from the presence of differences in the texts that there was more than one tradition of the Ten Words, and that the writer(s) of Exodus placed more weight on including them than in making them match.
One last observation on this week’s lectionary reading: the last verse of Psalm 19 is incorporated into Sweet Honey in the Rock’s hauntingly beautiful a capella version of “By the Waters of Babylon”: “Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable unto you, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer.”
--Elizabeth Fels
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
March 8: Jesus's Jewish Context
This week I will focus on the Gospel reading of the lectionary, Mark 8: 31-38. While in the last reading, we saw the Gospel open with Jesus’ baptism and the beginning of his mission, the passage this week portrays Jesus’ role as a suffering servant, his death, and resurrection. Jesus uses the phrase “Son of Man” to describe himself: “Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering . . . and be killed, and after three days rise again. He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside to rebuke him (31-32). The phrase “Son of Man,” or literally “human being,” has been called a reference to the angelic figure who appears in Daniel 7:13-14, representing the renewal of Israel:
I saw one like a human being
Coming with the clouds of heaven.
And he came to the Ancient One
And was presented before him.
To him was given dominion
And glory and kingship,
That all people, nations, and languages
Should serve him.
His dominion is an everlasting dominion
That shall not pass away,
And his kingship is one
That shall never be destroyed.
In Mark’s passage, Jesus goes on to say, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” This would have been an extremely graphic metaphor to Jesus’ audience of Jews living in Roman-occupied Caesarea Philippi. As demonstrated by the Passion story, but supported by historical evidence apart from the Bible, agitators in the Roman Empire who state officials deemed threatening were forced to carry the crossbeams on which they would then be hung for several days until suffocating to death.
One aspect of this Gospel reading that stands out is the way that the Jewish religious elite are portrayed. At this juncture of the scene, Jesus has just told the disciples that he is the Messiah (“anointed one”), the figure bringing about Israel’s renewal. Yet he will be a martyr-Messiah: not a ruler wielding political power, freeing Israel from Rome, and reinstating the Davidic line of kings. In addition he will not be recognized as the Messiah by the religious elite of his time: “rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed . . .” (31).
While preparing for this blog, I came across an editorial in Monday’s Boston Globe edition on the Vatican rejecting the “apology” from Richard Williamson. As the international press has widely reported, Williamson is a bishop of the breakaway Society of Pope Pius X whose excommunication was recently lifted by the Pope Benedict: http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2009/03/02/a_bishops_bad_faith_apology/. Interviewed on Swedish television earlier this year, Williamson stated that “not one Jew was killed by gas chambers, it was all lies, lies, lies.” Although at the prompting of the Vatican, Williamson regretted causing harm, he did not go so far as to recant his denial of the Holocaust.
While this is an extreme example of a self-identified Christian leader making anti-Semitic statements, this narrative calls to mind the conflictual history between Judaism and Christianity. On one hand, parishes across the US have robust interfaith dialogue programs promoting mutual understanding. Paula Fredriksen, Professor of Ancient Christian at Boston University, writes of efforts of Catholic leaders to combat anti-Semitism: “. . . popes and bishops, in plenum councils, have issued official (‘magisterial’) teachings against it. Anti-Semitism violates magisterial instruction touching on biblical interpretation, on the theological significance of Christ’s sacrifice, and on Catholic-Jewish relations.” (1)
Yet as the Williamson story reminds us, tension between Jewish and Christian communities has not disappeared. Another national news story that recently thematized it involved the portrayal of Jewish people in Mel Gibson’s film The Passion. Amy-Jill Levine, professor at Vanderbilt Divinity School and author of prize-winning studies on Christian origins and the Gospel of Matthew, has described, for example, the unbiblical scene where construction of the cross on which Jesus died occurs in the Jewish Temple.
This brings us back to today’s reading. There is arguably not a passage in Mark suggesting that Jewish people as a whole bear responsibility for Jesus’ death. However, the syntax of this line does not imply that Jesus will be crucified for sedition in imperial Rome, but in connection with his rejection by Jewish leaders. His rejection and death are juxtaposed consequently in this sentence: “Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again” (31). Parishioners invested in promoting Jewish-Christian dialogue may likely wonder how this passage would sound to Jewish friends and colleagues.
In his book The Origins of Anti-Semitism, John Gager, Professor of Religion at Princeton University, describes a method of reading this passage not necessarily as a polemic against Jewish people, but as one scene among many in which all of Jesus’ contemporaries including his closest disciples fail to grasp his message. Describing the context of this passage, Gager writes how in Chapter 5, opposition to Jesus did not come from Jewish people but from an unclean demon; next Jesus grants the request of Jairus, “one of the rulers in the synagogue,” to heal his daughter (5:21-24, 35-43). Placing this passage in the context of Mark’s overall narrative structure, Gager writes,
. . . the theme of incomprehension is a leitmotif throughout Mark.
The most uncomprehending figures in the Gospel, and thus the
targets of Jesus’ most severe rebukes, are not outsiders at all but
rather the disciples themselves (Gager, 145).
8:33 supports this reading. In the kind of extreme rhetorical gesture we see Jesus often make in the Gospels, here Jesus is calling Peter, the eventual rock of the church, “Satan,” presumably when Peter does not accept that Jesus’ kingship is not of this world: “‘Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.” Those who know the final outcome from the beginning are Christian readers of Mark’s Gospel, not the disciples in the Gospel itself. However Gager also directly admits that there are passages in the Gospels that portray Judaism negatively and have historically been interpreted to justify discrimination or worse, like Matthew 27:25. He explores how Gospel writers were likely motivated to define the early Christian movement as connected to and yet different from the vibrant and attractive Jewish community, and how this might have been a motivation for anti-Judaism polemic in the Gospels.
For readers interested in this topic I strongly recommend Amy-Jill Levine’s book The Misunderstood Jew: The Church and the Scandal of the Jewish Jesus. A proponent of what Krister Stendhal calls “Holy Envy,” or appreciation of the beliefs and practices of another, Levine calls for in-depth examination of Jesus’s cultural context on the part of ministers and church leaders: as a Jew, speaking to Jews. The following quote encapsulates Levine’s project:
By seeing Jesus as a Jew with regard to both belief and practice,
Christians can develop a deeper appreciation for the teachings of
the church. . . / . . Today Jesus’ words are too familiar, too domesticated,
too stripped of their initial edginess and urgency. Only when heard
through first-century Jewish ears can their original edginess and urgency
be recovered. Consequently, to understand the man from Nazareth,
it is necessary to understand Judaism. . . . if we get Judaism wrong,
we’ll wind up perpetuating anti-Jewish or anti-Semitic teachings,
and thus the mission of the church—to spread a gospel of love rather
than a gospel of hate—will be undermined. For Christians, this concern
for historical setting should have theological import as well. If one
takes the incarnation—that is, the claim that the “Word became flesh
and lived among us” (John 1:14)—seriously, then one should take
seriously the time when, place where, and people among whom
this event occurred (Levine, 6-7).
Levine goes on to describe Jewish life in Jesus’s historical setting, including the roles of women, perceptions of the messiah, and diversity of practices and beliefs, with particular focus on the narratives of the Good Samaritan and the Samaritan Woman.
In the book of Romans, the apostle Paul presents a complex and at times contradictory picture of Jewish-Christian relations. Yet Romans 3, the chapter before this week’s lectionary reading passage, contains a vision of God extending salvation to Jewish people and Gentiles both: “. . . He will justify the circumcised on the ground of faith and the uncircumcised through that same faith. Do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By no means! On the contrary, we uphold the law” (Romans 3:30-31.)
--Elizabeth Fels
(1) See http://jeffweintraub.blogspot.com/2003/07/gospel-according-to-mel-gibson-paula.html
Other works cited:
John G. Gager, The Origins of Anti-Semitism
Amy-Jill Levine, The Misunderstood Jew: The Church and the Scandal of the Jewish Jesus
Bible quotes taken from The New Oxford Annotated Bible, third edition.
I saw one like a human being
Coming with the clouds of heaven.
And he came to the Ancient One
And was presented before him.
To him was given dominion
And glory and kingship,
That all people, nations, and languages
Should serve him.
His dominion is an everlasting dominion
That shall not pass away,
And his kingship is one
That shall never be destroyed.
In Mark’s passage, Jesus goes on to say, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” This would have been an extremely graphic metaphor to Jesus’ audience of Jews living in Roman-occupied Caesarea Philippi. As demonstrated by the Passion story, but supported by historical evidence apart from the Bible, agitators in the Roman Empire who state officials deemed threatening were forced to carry the crossbeams on which they would then be hung for several days until suffocating to death.
One aspect of this Gospel reading that stands out is the way that the Jewish religious elite are portrayed. At this juncture of the scene, Jesus has just told the disciples that he is the Messiah (“anointed one”), the figure bringing about Israel’s renewal. Yet he will be a martyr-Messiah: not a ruler wielding political power, freeing Israel from Rome, and reinstating the Davidic line of kings. In addition he will not be recognized as the Messiah by the religious elite of his time: “rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed . . .” (31).
While preparing for this blog, I came across an editorial in Monday’s Boston Globe edition on the Vatican rejecting the “apology” from Richard Williamson. As the international press has widely reported, Williamson is a bishop of the breakaway Society of Pope Pius X whose excommunication was recently lifted by the Pope Benedict: http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2009/03/02/a_bishops_bad_faith_apology/. Interviewed on Swedish television earlier this year, Williamson stated that “not one Jew was killed by gas chambers, it was all lies, lies, lies.” Although at the prompting of the Vatican, Williamson regretted causing harm, he did not go so far as to recant his denial of the Holocaust.
While this is an extreme example of a self-identified Christian leader making anti-Semitic statements, this narrative calls to mind the conflictual history between Judaism and Christianity. On one hand, parishes across the US have robust interfaith dialogue programs promoting mutual understanding. Paula Fredriksen, Professor of Ancient Christian at Boston University, writes of efforts of Catholic leaders to combat anti-Semitism: “. . . popes and bishops, in plenum councils, have issued official (‘magisterial’) teachings against it. Anti-Semitism violates magisterial instruction touching on biblical interpretation, on the theological significance of Christ’s sacrifice, and on Catholic-Jewish relations.” (1)
Yet as the Williamson story reminds us, tension between Jewish and Christian communities has not disappeared. Another national news story that recently thematized it involved the portrayal of Jewish people in Mel Gibson’s film The Passion. Amy-Jill Levine, professor at Vanderbilt Divinity School and author of prize-winning studies on Christian origins and the Gospel of Matthew, has described, for example, the unbiblical scene where construction of the cross on which Jesus died occurs in the Jewish Temple.
This brings us back to today’s reading. There is arguably not a passage in Mark suggesting that Jewish people as a whole bear responsibility for Jesus’ death. However, the syntax of this line does not imply that Jesus will be crucified for sedition in imperial Rome, but in connection with his rejection by Jewish leaders. His rejection and death are juxtaposed consequently in this sentence: “Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again” (31). Parishioners invested in promoting Jewish-Christian dialogue may likely wonder how this passage would sound to Jewish friends and colleagues.
In his book The Origins of Anti-Semitism, John Gager, Professor of Religion at Princeton University, describes a method of reading this passage not necessarily as a polemic against Jewish people, but as one scene among many in which all of Jesus’ contemporaries including his closest disciples fail to grasp his message. Describing the context of this passage, Gager writes how in Chapter 5, opposition to Jesus did not come from Jewish people but from an unclean demon; next Jesus grants the request of Jairus, “one of the rulers in the synagogue,” to heal his daughter (5:21-24, 35-43). Placing this passage in the context of Mark’s overall narrative structure, Gager writes,
. . . the theme of incomprehension is a leitmotif throughout Mark.
The most uncomprehending figures in the Gospel, and thus the
targets of Jesus’ most severe rebukes, are not outsiders at all but
rather the disciples themselves (Gager, 145).
8:33 supports this reading. In the kind of extreme rhetorical gesture we see Jesus often make in the Gospels, here Jesus is calling Peter, the eventual rock of the church, “Satan,” presumably when Peter does not accept that Jesus’ kingship is not of this world: “‘Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.” Those who know the final outcome from the beginning are Christian readers of Mark’s Gospel, not the disciples in the Gospel itself. However Gager also directly admits that there are passages in the Gospels that portray Judaism negatively and have historically been interpreted to justify discrimination or worse, like Matthew 27:25. He explores how Gospel writers were likely motivated to define the early Christian movement as connected to and yet different from the vibrant and attractive Jewish community, and how this might have been a motivation for anti-Judaism polemic in the Gospels.
For readers interested in this topic I strongly recommend Amy-Jill Levine’s book The Misunderstood Jew: The Church and the Scandal of the Jewish Jesus. A proponent of what Krister Stendhal calls “Holy Envy,” or appreciation of the beliefs and practices of another, Levine calls for in-depth examination of Jesus’s cultural context on the part of ministers and church leaders: as a Jew, speaking to Jews. The following quote encapsulates Levine’s project:
By seeing Jesus as a Jew with regard to both belief and practice,
Christians can develop a deeper appreciation for the teachings of
the church. . . / . . Today Jesus’ words are too familiar, too domesticated,
too stripped of their initial edginess and urgency. Only when heard
through first-century Jewish ears can their original edginess and urgency
be recovered. Consequently, to understand the man from Nazareth,
it is necessary to understand Judaism. . . . if we get Judaism wrong,
we’ll wind up perpetuating anti-Jewish or anti-Semitic teachings,
and thus the mission of the church—to spread a gospel of love rather
than a gospel of hate—will be undermined. For Christians, this concern
for historical setting should have theological import as well. If one
takes the incarnation—that is, the claim that the “Word became flesh
and lived among us” (John 1:14)—seriously, then one should take
seriously the time when, place where, and people among whom
this event occurred (Levine, 6-7).
Levine goes on to describe Jewish life in Jesus’s historical setting, including the roles of women, perceptions of the messiah, and diversity of practices and beliefs, with particular focus on the narratives of the Good Samaritan and the Samaritan Woman.
In the book of Romans, the apostle Paul presents a complex and at times contradictory picture of Jewish-Christian relations. Yet Romans 3, the chapter before this week’s lectionary reading passage, contains a vision of God extending salvation to Jewish people and Gentiles both: “. . . He will justify the circumcised on the ground of faith and the uncircumcised through that same faith. Do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By no means! On the contrary, we uphold the law” (Romans 3:30-31.)
--Elizabeth Fels
(1) See http://jeffweintraub.blogspot.com/2003/07/gospel-according-to-mel-gibson-paula.html
Other works cited:
John G. Gager, The Origins of Anti-Semitism
Amy-Jill Levine, The Misunderstood Jew: The Church and the Scandal of the Jewish Jesus
Bible quotes taken from The New Oxford Annotated Bible, third edition.
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Mar.1: Divine Rescue
Psalm 25: 1-10
Genesis 9: 8-17
Mark 1: 9-15
1 Peter 3: 18-22
A vector running through the lectionary readings for the first week of Lent is the theme of divine rescue. In the acrostic Psalm 25, the writer reminds the Lord of the mercy shown to him in the past, appealing for forgiveness of sin and deliverance from enemies. Genesis 9:8-17 contains the first “covenant” described as such in the Hebrew Scriptures. It applies to all of humanity, the animal world, and the earth. Following the covenant concept, Mark 1:9-15 describes the genesis of the new covenant: Jesus is baptized, receives the Holy Spirit, and begins to proclaim the approach of the kingdom of God. Finally in 1 Peter 3:18-22, recounting Christ’s resurrection from death “in order to bring you to God,” the writer describes the possibility of salvation God extends: “And baptism, which this prefigured, now saves you—not as a removal of dirt from the body, but as an appeal to God for a good conscience”.
Psalm 25 is also one of nine acrostics in the Book of Psalms, a form of poetry that elsewhere in the Bible only seen in Lamentations. The first word begins with the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet, the second line with the second letter, and so on through the end of the alphabet, although the sixth and nineteenth letters are missing. In The Book of Psalms: a Translation and Commentary, Robert Alter writes that this structure might have been used as a mnemonic device because of the text’s liturgical use. The Hebrew noun in the phrase “I lift my heart” is nefesh, “essential self” or “life breath.”
It can be inferred from verse 7 that the speaker has erred: “My youth’s offenses and my crimes recall not. In your steadfast love, recall me—You; for the sake of your goodness, O LORD.” Alter writes that the juxtaposition of the pronouns “me” (li) and “You” (‘atah) is unusual in Hebrew in the line “recall me—You”. After the imperative verb “recall,” the second-person “You” would not be necessary. While the word hata’im in line 8 can be translated “sinners” or “offenders,” Alter also notes that the etymology of the word suggest missing a target. Asking the Lord for forgiveness, the speaker also appeals specifically for wisdom: “Make me to know your ways, O LORD; teach me your paths."
In this passage we thus see the speaker alternating requests for help with expressions of trust in God’s faithfulness. The speaker directly asks God to recall earlier love and mercy, appealing as if to a person who can be swayed by rhetoric. We see the word hesed, or “steadfast love,” which also figures prominently in the Book of Jonah characterizing divine love. At the conclusion of that book, Jonah addresses God (4:2), saying, “That is why I fled to Tarshish at the beginning; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and rich in steadfast love, and ready to relent from punishing.” Hesed can also refer to the mutual loyalty of the partners in a marriage, as seen in the description of Hosea as husband and covenant partner. The appeal to hesed shows that the speaker views himself as having an ongoing relationship with God, a sense of continuity that dovetails with the lectionary’s next passage, Genesis 9: 8-17.
In order to understand the lectionary reading 8-17, it’s necessary to read it in the context of the whole chapter. 9:1-7 contains the basis for the Noachide laws in Judaism, considered binding upon Gentiles as well as Jews and referenced in Acts 15:20 and 21:25. The laws are given in response to the acts of violence preceding the flood: God stipulates that humans, bearing God’s image, may not be killed.
Genesis 9:8-17 thus contains the first covenant described in the Bible, preceding the Ten Commandments. After giving the Noachide laws, God in turn declares, “I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.” As a sign of the covenant, God places a bow in the sky turned away from humanity: “When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.” We also see the bow depicted as God’s weapon in Ps 7:12-13 and Hab 3:9-11. The anthropomorphic way that God is portrayed here is noteworthy.
A great information source for the concept of covenant (berît) in the Bible is The Old Testament: A Historical and Literary Introduction to the Hebrew Scriptures by Michael D. Coogan. Coogan compares structure of covenants in the Bible to that of political treaties in the ancient Near East. He writes that in this region and time period, Israelites were the only group known whose texts describe a relationship with a deity in terms of a treaty. Coogan uses two classifications for treaties: those between parties that are presumed equal, like Solomon and Hiram the king of Tyre, and “suzerainty treaties,” where one party is presumed to be superior to the other. A typical structure of the second kind of treaty includes identification of the suzerain or stronger party; history of the relationship, emphasizing the suzerain’s benevolence; stipulations, or obligations imposed on the weaker party, which might include prohibition of relationships with other powers, requirement to respond to a call of assistance from the suzerain, or payment of tribute; and blessings for observing the treaty. This basic structure characterizes the communication we see from God to Noah in Genesis 9. Other covenants central to the Bible include those between Abraham and God, between God and Israel (The Book of the Covenant containing the Ten Commandments in Exodus 20), and what Christian theology calls the New Covenant, or New Testament.
Mark 1:9-15 shares in common with the Hebrew Scripture lectionary readings a depiction of hope for a new beginning. In Psalm 25, the speaker appeals to God’s mercy and steadfast love for forgiveness of sin; Genesis 9 shows God committing to protect humanity in the form of a covenant; and Mark 1 portrays the beginning of Christ’s ministry. According to the New Oxford Annotated Bible, the Gospel of Mark has traditionally been attributed to John Mark of Acts 12:12 and 15:37, who is thought to have composed it in Rome summarizing Peter’s preaching (1 Pet 5:13.) The narrative associated with Christmas is absent; we first encounter Jesus, not in a manger, but with the other figures of the Trinity:
In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased. (9-11).
Jesus goes through a trial in the wilderness, as did Elijah in 1 Kings 19, then begins to proclaim the Gospel. The NOAB annotation describes his mission: “At the right time, in fulfillment of long-standing yearnings and hopes, God is finally acting to reestablish his beneficent will for the people. (Repent means) return to God’s way, in response to the good news of God’s action.” 1 Peter 3:18-22 describes the culmination of those hopes in the form of the resurrection: “For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, in order to bring you to God. He was put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit . . .”
For parishioners who have not read the New Testament cover to cover, 1 Peter 3:19, “. . . also he went and made a proclamation to the spirits in prison,” might come as a shock. I did not grow up in a tradition in which this passage made frequent appearances in sermons and Bible studies, unlike what one might call “Greatest Hits” like the Parable of the Sower. Typical questions one might ask include, “Which spirits? When did this happen? What happened to them as a result?” I found one of the more extensive glosses in Begegnung fürs Leben: Die Studienbibel für jeden Tag: Neues Testament, published by the Hänssler Verlag. The annotation lists several possible readings, including linking this passage to Matthew 27, when rocks burst, graves open, and the dead rise. When I asked Rev. William Rich at Trinity Church Boston for clarification, he explained that this passage holds great importance in the Eastern Orthodox tradition and was well-known during medieval times. It is the subject of many icons, including one with Christ standing over a grate of hell with a massive hook, pulling out souls. “Google ‘Harrows of Hell’ to the see icons,” he said.
--Elizabeth Fels
Sources:
Alter, Robert. The Book of Psalms.
Coogan, Michael: The Old Testament: A Historical and Literary Introduction to the Hebrew Scriptures.
Coogan, Michael, ed. The New Oxford Annotated Bible (3rd ed).
Begegnung fürs Leben: Die Studienbibel für jeden Tag: Neues Testament, Hänssler Verlag.
(Adapted from Life Application Bible, by Tyndale House Publishers, 1988.)
Genesis 9: 8-17
Mark 1: 9-15
1 Peter 3: 18-22
A vector running through the lectionary readings for the first week of Lent is the theme of divine rescue. In the acrostic Psalm 25, the writer reminds the Lord of the mercy shown to him in the past, appealing for forgiveness of sin and deliverance from enemies. Genesis 9:8-17 contains the first “covenant” described as such in the Hebrew Scriptures. It applies to all of humanity, the animal world, and the earth. Following the covenant concept, Mark 1:9-15 describes the genesis of the new covenant: Jesus is baptized, receives the Holy Spirit, and begins to proclaim the approach of the kingdom of God. Finally in 1 Peter 3:18-22, recounting Christ’s resurrection from death “in order to bring you to God,” the writer describes the possibility of salvation God extends: “And baptism, which this prefigured, now saves you—not as a removal of dirt from the body, but as an appeal to God for a good conscience”.
Psalm 25 is also one of nine acrostics in the Book of Psalms, a form of poetry that elsewhere in the Bible only seen in Lamentations. The first word begins with the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet, the second line with the second letter, and so on through the end of the alphabet, although the sixth and nineteenth letters are missing. In The Book of Psalms: a Translation and Commentary, Robert Alter writes that this structure might have been used as a mnemonic device because of the text’s liturgical use. The Hebrew noun in the phrase “I lift my heart” is nefesh, “essential self” or “life breath.”
It can be inferred from verse 7 that the speaker has erred: “My youth’s offenses and my crimes recall not. In your steadfast love, recall me—You; for the sake of your goodness, O LORD.” Alter writes that the juxtaposition of the pronouns “me” (li) and “You” (‘atah) is unusual in Hebrew in the line “recall me—You”. After the imperative verb “recall,” the second-person “You” would not be necessary. While the word hata’im in line 8 can be translated “sinners” or “offenders,” Alter also notes that the etymology of the word suggest missing a target. Asking the Lord for forgiveness, the speaker also appeals specifically for wisdom: “Make me to know your ways, O LORD; teach me your paths."
In this passage we thus see the speaker alternating requests for help with expressions of trust in God’s faithfulness. The speaker directly asks God to recall earlier love and mercy, appealing as if to a person who can be swayed by rhetoric. We see the word hesed, or “steadfast love,” which also figures prominently in the Book of Jonah characterizing divine love. At the conclusion of that book, Jonah addresses God (4:2), saying, “That is why I fled to Tarshish at the beginning; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and rich in steadfast love, and ready to relent from punishing.” Hesed can also refer to the mutual loyalty of the partners in a marriage, as seen in the description of Hosea as husband and covenant partner. The appeal to hesed shows that the speaker views himself as having an ongoing relationship with God, a sense of continuity that dovetails with the lectionary’s next passage, Genesis 9: 8-17.
In order to understand the lectionary reading 8-17, it’s necessary to read it in the context of the whole chapter. 9:1-7 contains the basis for the Noachide laws in Judaism, considered binding upon Gentiles as well as Jews and referenced in Acts 15:20 and 21:25. The laws are given in response to the acts of violence preceding the flood: God stipulates that humans, bearing God’s image, may not be killed.
Genesis 9:8-17 thus contains the first covenant described in the Bible, preceding the Ten Commandments. After giving the Noachide laws, God in turn declares, “I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.” As a sign of the covenant, God places a bow in the sky turned away from humanity: “When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.” We also see the bow depicted as God’s weapon in Ps 7:12-13 and Hab 3:9-11. The anthropomorphic way that God is portrayed here is noteworthy.
A great information source for the concept of covenant (berît) in the Bible is The Old Testament: A Historical and Literary Introduction to the Hebrew Scriptures by Michael D. Coogan. Coogan compares structure of covenants in the Bible to that of political treaties in the ancient Near East. He writes that in this region and time period, Israelites were the only group known whose texts describe a relationship with a deity in terms of a treaty. Coogan uses two classifications for treaties: those between parties that are presumed equal, like Solomon and Hiram the king of Tyre, and “suzerainty treaties,” where one party is presumed to be superior to the other. A typical structure of the second kind of treaty includes identification of the suzerain or stronger party; history of the relationship, emphasizing the suzerain’s benevolence; stipulations, or obligations imposed on the weaker party, which might include prohibition of relationships with other powers, requirement to respond to a call of assistance from the suzerain, or payment of tribute; and blessings for observing the treaty. This basic structure characterizes the communication we see from God to Noah in Genesis 9. Other covenants central to the Bible include those between Abraham and God, between God and Israel (The Book of the Covenant containing the Ten Commandments in Exodus 20), and what Christian theology calls the New Covenant, or New Testament.
Mark 1:9-15 shares in common with the Hebrew Scripture lectionary readings a depiction of hope for a new beginning. In Psalm 25, the speaker appeals to God’s mercy and steadfast love for forgiveness of sin; Genesis 9 shows God committing to protect humanity in the form of a covenant; and Mark 1 portrays the beginning of Christ’s ministry. According to the New Oxford Annotated Bible, the Gospel of Mark has traditionally been attributed to John Mark of Acts 12:12 and 15:37, who is thought to have composed it in Rome summarizing Peter’s preaching (1 Pet 5:13.) The narrative associated with Christmas is absent; we first encounter Jesus, not in a manger, but with the other figures of the Trinity:
In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased. (9-11).
Jesus goes through a trial in the wilderness, as did Elijah in 1 Kings 19, then begins to proclaim the Gospel. The NOAB annotation describes his mission: “At the right time, in fulfillment of long-standing yearnings and hopes, God is finally acting to reestablish his beneficent will for the people. (Repent means) return to God’s way, in response to the good news of God’s action.” 1 Peter 3:18-22 describes the culmination of those hopes in the form of the resurrection: “For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, in order to bring you to God. He was put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit . . .”
For parishioners who have not read the New Testament cover to cover, 1 Peter 3:19, “. . . also he went and made a proclamation to the spirits in prison,” might come as a shock. I did not grow up in a tradition in which this passage made frequent appearances in sermons and Bible studies, unlike what one might call “Greatest Hits” like the Parable of the Sower. Typical questions one might ask include, “Which spirits? When did this happen? What happened to them as a result?” I found one of the more extensive glosses in Begegnung fürs Leben: Die Studienbibel für jeden Tag: Neues Testament, published by the Hänssler Verlag. The annotation lists several possible readings, including linking this passage to Matthew 27, when rocks burst, graves open, and the dead rise. When I asked Rev. William Rich at Trinity Church Boston for clarification, he explained that this passage holds great importance in the Eastern Orthodox tradition and was well-known during medieval times. It is the subject of many icons, including one with Christ standing over a grate of hell with a massive hook, pulling out souls. “Google ‘Harrows of Hell’ to the see icons,” he said.
--Elizabeth Fels
Sources:
Alter, Robert. The Book of Psalms.
Coogan, Michael: The Old Testament: A Historical and Literary Introduction to the Hebrew Scriptures.
Coogan, Michael, ed. The New Oxford Annotated Bible (3rd ed).
Begegnung fürs Leben: Die Studienbibel für jeden Tag: Neues Testament, Hänssler Verlag.
(Adapted from Life Application Bible, by Tyndale House Publishers, 1988.)
Monday, February 16, 2009
February 22--Alone With Jesus
. . . Jesus took Peter, James, and John up on a high mountain by themselves. While they watched, Jesus’ appearance was changed. His clothes became shining white, whiter than any person could make them. Then Elijah and Moses appeared to them, talking with Jesus. . . .
. . . Peter did not know what to say, because he and the others were so frightened.
Then a cloud came and covered them, and a voice came from the cloud, saying, ‘This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to him!’
Suddenly Peter, James, and John looked around, but they saw only Jesus there alone with them . . . (Mark 9:2-4, 6-8).
It is Transfiguration Sunday, and we have been here before. Some version of this story from one of the synoptic gospels proclaimed every year on the Sunday before the church enters the season of Lent. We take it for granted.
The disciples do not.
What Peter and James and John see on this high mountain alone with Jesus frightens them to the core. The disciples are so frightened, in fact, that they actually follow Jesus’ instructions not to tell anyone what they have seen . . . a command they have no trouble breaking earlier—and later—in Mark’s gospel. Even Peter, who is normally eager to express his opinion or make a prediction about who Jesus is and what the Jesus movement should be doing “d[oes] not know what to say” in this moment of terror. He can only tell Jesus, “It is good that we are here,” and then mumble something incoherent about making tents for the three luminous figures who have just appeared in front of him.
To these three disciples—who think they know Jesus pretty well by now—the transfiguration of Jesus, in which he takes his place among the giver of the Law and the prototype of the Prophets, is a terrifying experience. They spend the rest of their lives trying to make sense of it, not even telling the story until after “the Son of Man had risen from the dead” (Mk. 9:10).
To many churchgoers today, this story is commonplace, another one of those “miracles” we either accept on faith or explain away as an interesting metaphor for our own “mountaintop experiences” of feel-good spirituality. But there are a few people among us who have experienced something dramatically similar to this moment of transfiguration—this moment of seeing the human face of the living God right in front of us and being told to listen!—in all its glory and all its terror.
A good friend of mine felt it in church last Sunday . . . and no, she was not delusional! She just knew she was experiencing something deeply profound, something that felt like the voice of God telling her to listen, something that felt like a “call” . . . but she had no idea what it meant. She was afraid, but she was calm in her fear. It was as if something was falling into place, something was being revealed that was deeper than anything she had ever known, something was being asked of her even though she could not articulate what it was.
. . . Peter did not know what to say, because he and the others were so frightened.
Then a cloud came and covered them, and a voice came from the cloud, saying, ‘This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to him!’
Suddenly Peter, James, and John looked around, but they saw only Jesus there alone with them . . . (Mark 9:2-4, 6-8).
It is Transfiguration Sunday, and we have been here before. Some version of this story from one of the synoptic gospels proclaimed every year on the Sunday before the church enters the season of Lent. We take it for granted.
The disciples do not.
What Peter and James and John see on this high mountain alone with Jesus frightens them to the core. The disciples are so frightened, in fact, that they actually follow Jesus’ instructions not to tell anyone what they have seen . . . a command they have no trouble breaking earlier—and later—in Mark’s gospel. Even Peter, who is normally eager to express his opinion or make a prediction about who Jesus is and what the Jesus movement should be doing “d[oes] not know what to say” in this moment of terror. He can only tell Jesus, “It is good that we are here,” and then mumble something incoherent about making tents for the three luminous figures who have just appeared in front of him.
To these three disciples—who think they know Jesus pretty well by now—the transfiguration of Jesus, in which he takes his place among the giver of the Law and the prototype of the Prophets, is a terrifying experience. They spend the rest of their lives trying to make sense of it, not even telling the story until after “the Son of Man had risen from the dead” (Mk. 9:10).
To many churchgoers today, this story is commonplace, another one of those “miracles” we either accept on faith or explain away as an interesting metaphor for our own “mountaintop experiences” of feel-good spirituality. But there are a few people among us who have experienced something dramatically similar to this moment of transfiguration—this moment of seeing the human face of the living God right in front of us and being told to listen!—in all its glory and all its terror.
A good friend of mine felt it in church last Sunday . . . and no, she was not delusional! She just knew she was experiencing something deeply profound, something that felt like the voice of God telling her to listen, something that felt like a “call” . . . but she had no idea what it meant. She was afraid, but she was calm in her fear. It was as if something was falling into place, something was being revealed that was deeper than anything she had ever known, something was being asked of her even though she could not articulate what it was.
And after talking with her, I realized that it may actually be more important to focus on the moment after the transfiguration, as powerful as the original event may have been for the disciples and for my friend. Because when it is all over, when the voice of clarity fades, when the shimmering robes evaporate, Peter and James and John look around and see only Jesus, there, alone with them.
They do not understand that Jesus will die and that they will abandon him. They do not understand that this time “alone” with Jesus is so very precious . . . that it will not last forever . . . that they will become even more frightened than they have been just now.
But they are alone with Jesus, for just this brief moment . . . and I like to imagine that they are at peace, even though they have not understood anything that has or will come to pass. They simply know it is a big deal, that God is with them, and that they will not ever be alone without Jesus.
They will not ever be alone “without Jesus.”
They do not understand that Jesus will die and that they will abandon him. They do not understand that this time “alone” with Jesus is so very precious . . . that it will not last forever . . . that they will become even more frightened than they have been just now.
But they are alone with Jesus, for just this brief moment . . . and I like to imagine that they are at peace, even though they have not understood anything that has or will come to pass. They simply know it is a big deal, that God is with them, and that they will not ever be alone without Jesus.
They will not ever be alone “without Jesus.”
It is a terrifying thing to confront the power of God that transcends the ages, to follow Christ to his death, to hear the voice of God demanding that we listen without clear guidance about what is being said.
But I would suggest that the power of the transfiguration, as it leads us into Lent, as it leads us into crucifixion, as it leads us through the lonesome valley of death and darkness and despair is that we will never be alone without Jesus. We will never be alone without the physical presence of God in our midst. We will never be left without some reason to hope, without some reason to trust, without some reason to expect a future resurrection.
With this assurance of God's eternal presence, then, may we enter boldly into this season of Lent, this time of repentance, this time of transformation, this time of releasing what needs to die within us and among us in order to allow the spirit of God to rise again. We are not ever alone in our calling.
Not ever.
Not ever.
Not ever.
Amen.
Gusti Linnea Newquist
(additional lectionary texts for this week: 2 Kings 2:1-12; Psalm 50:1-6; 2 Corinthians 4:3-6)
Dear friends, it is with great joy and a twinge of sadness that I announce my departure from these pages. I will be leaving Boston at the end of the month in order to accept God’s call to serve as the next Co-Pastor of St. Mark’s Presbyterian Church in Tucson, Arizona (pending the election of the congregation, the approval of the presbytery, and my subsequent ordination). I have been grateful for this time to share my thoughts with you and even more grateful to those of you who have shared your comments with me.
My sister Harvard Divinity School alumna, Elizabeth Fels (MTS ’08) will pick up the blog beginning next week.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
February 15--Running to Win
"You know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize. So run to win! All those who compete in the games use self-control so they can win a crown. That crown is an earthly thing that lasts only a short time, but our crown will never be destroyed. So I do not run without a goal. I fight like a boxer who is hitting something--not just the air. I treat my body hard and make it my slave so that I myself will not be disqualified after I have preached to others" (1 Corinthians 9:24-27).
I just love it when Paul gets competitive.
It strikes a deep inner chord in me to know I am not the only follower of Christ who likes to win.
I know we Christians preach the need to curb our ambition, to love others beyond our own achievements, to want what is best for everybody, to put the needs of others before our own. I know the first shall be last and the last shall be first.
But there is just something deeply fundamental in me—perhaps cultivated from the earliest days of childhood—that wants to be the best! That strives to be the best. That feels a fleeting but still potent flash of pride in winning an earthly crown. In the words of Ricky Bobby from that great film sensation Talladega Nights, "If you're not first, you're worst!" And who wants to be worst?
Even Ricky Bobby, however, has a serious conversion experience once he realizes how much his competitive drive has been based on the fear and pain of a childhood lacking in paternal love . . . and how carelessly he has hurt his best friend in his pursuit of greatness. By the end of the movie, “racing to win” has become more about Ricky’s integrity than about his victory lap around the NASCAR track. In order to “win,” once Ricky has changed his mind and heart, he has to be willing to lose. And he has to be willing to love his neighbor as himself.
This, of course, is more along the lines of what Paul had in mind when he encouraged the first century Corinthians to “run to win.” It is a spiritual discipline he is talking about . . . of being willing to “lose” for the sake of our integrity . . . of risking failure in order to love those who desperately need our care . . . of resisting the temptation to let anything in our lives distract us from responding to the grace of God . . . of training our hearts and minds—and yes, even our bodies—to the lifelong work of living in the Spirit.
But it is a communal race! We cannot win it alone.
Paul did not have the same concept of team sports that we do, but he surely understood the church as the “Body of Christ.” And this communal body, I think he would claim, must run the race together, must win the race together, and must do this by undergoing rigorous conditioning, just as the individual bodies within it must set measureable goals toward achieving that crown which will never be destroyed.
It is a victory in this life when we in the church really do live out good news to the poor, release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, and liberty to the oppressed. And it is a victory in the life to come when we place every part of our lives into the hands of a loving and challenging God and allow these lives to be transformed.
So what does the “conditioning” for this race look like?
Some believers have taken Paul’s words about “treating the body hard” quite literally . . . adopting an ascetic life or even engaging in self-flagellation as a way of knowing the suffering of Christ.
Others of us lift up the inherent goodness of the body and its capacity to perform great feats—athletic or otherwise—when we invite God to cultivate and guide its energy as we would cultivate and guide a garden, as a trainer would cultivate and guide an athlete.
In either case, we know that God cares about our bodies and how we discipline them and how we use them to promote justice and peace . . . and we know that God cares about the hearts and minds and spirits that accompany our bodies . . . and we know that God is inviting every part of our being into a race we can only win if we let go the competitive desire for an earthly crown and be willing to “lose” for the love of the world.
So our invitation this week is to hear clearly the voice of the Holy Spirit training us and cheering us on, whether our next practice session is at the local soup kitchen, in our daily devotional life, or in advocating for peace in the halls of Congress.
May God grant us the victory, may we "run to win." Amen.
Gusti Linnea Newquist
(additional lectionary texts: 2 Kings 5:1-14; Psalm 30; Mark 1:40-45)
But there is just something deeply fundamental in me—perhaps cultivated from the earliest days of childhood—that wants to be the best! That strives to be the best. That feels a fleeting but still potent flash of pride in winning an earthly crown. In the words of Ricky Bobby from that great film sensation Talladega Nights, "If you're not first, you're worst!" And who wants to be worst?
Even Ricky Bobby, however, has a serious conversion experience once he realizes how much his competitive drive has been based on the fear and pain of a childhood lacking in paternal love . . . and how carelessly he has hurt his best friend in his pursuit of greatness. By the end of the movie, “racing to win” has become more about Ricky’s integrity than about his victory lap around the NASCAR track. In order to “win,” once Ricky has changed his mind and heart, he has to be willing to lose. And he has to be willing to love his neighbor as himself.
This, of course, is more along the lines of what Paul had in mind when he encouraged the first century Corinthians to “run to win.” It is a spiritual discipline he is talking about . . . of being willing to “lose” for the sake of our integrity . . . of risking failure in order to love those who desperately need our care . . . of resisting the temptation to let anything in our lives distract us from responding to the grace of God . . . of training our hearts and minds—and yes, even our bodies—to the lifelong work of living in the Spirit.
But it is a communal race! We cannot win it alone.
Paul did not have the same concept of team sports that we do, but he surely understood the church as the “Body of Christ.” And this communal body, I think he would claim, must run the race together, must win the race together, and must do this by undergoing rigorous conditioning, just as the individual bodies within it must set measureable goals toward achieving that crown which will never be destroyed.
It is a victory in this life when we in the church really do live out good news to the poor, release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, and liberty to the oppressed. And it is a victory in the life to come when we place every part of our lives into the hands of a loving and challenging God and allow these lives to be transformed.
So what does the “conditioning” for this race look like?
Some believers have taken Paul’s words about “treating the body hard” quite literally . . . adopting an ascetic life or even engaging in self-flagellation as a way of knowing the suffering of Christ.
Others of us lift up the inherent goodness of the body and its capacity to perform great feats—athletic or otherwise—when we invite God to cultivate and guide its energy as we would cultivate and guide a garden, as a trainer would cultivate and guide an athlete.
In either case, we know that God cares about our bodies and how we discipline them and how we use them to promote justice and peace . . . and we know that God cares about the hearts and minds and spirits that accompany our bodies . . . and we know that God is inviting every part of our being into a race we can only win if we let go the competitive desire for an earthly crown and be willing to “lose” for the love of the world.
So our invitation this week is to hear clearly the voice of the Holy Spirit training us and cheering us on, whether our next practice session is at the local soup kitchen, in our daily devotional life, or in advocating for peace in the halls of Congress.
May God grant us the victory, may we "run to win." Amen.
Gusti Linnea Newquist
(additional lectionary texts: 2 Kings 5:1-14; Psalm 30; Mark 1:40-45)
Monday, February 2, 2009
February 9--The Reason He Came
As soon as Jesus and his followers left the synagogue, they went with James and John to the home of Simon and Andrew. Simon's mother-in-law was sick in bed with a fever, and the people told Jesus about her. So Jesus went to her bed, took her hand, and helped her up. The fever left her, and she began serving them.
That evening, after the sun went down, the people brought to Jesus all who were sick and had demons in them. The whole town gathered at the door. Jesus healed many who had different kinds of sicknesses, and he forced many demons to leave people. But he would not allow the demons to speak, because they knew who he was.
Early the next morning, while it was still dark, Jesus woke and left the house. He went to a lonely place, where he prayed. Simon and his friends went to look for Jesus. When they found him, they said, 'Everyone is looking for you!'
Jesus answered, 'We should go to other towns around here so I can preach there too. That is the reason I came.' So he went everywhere in Galiless, preaching in the synagogues and forcing out demons. (Mark 1:29-39)
I am struck in reading this passage from Mark's gospel by the reason Jesus gives for his presence in Capernaum: to preach.
I should not necessarily be struck by this particular raison d'etre of Jesus. His preaching is, after all, well documented throughout the gospels, particularly in the long discourses of the Sermon on the Mount as described by Matthew and the Sermon on the Plain in Luke.
What strikes me about Mark's version, I think, is the simplicity of the message, at least in these early chapters: "The right time has come," Jesus says. "The kingdom of God is near. Change your hearts and lives and believe the Good News!" (Mk 1:15).
Surrounding this short three-sentence sermon (wish I could get away with THAT on any given Sunday!) are the stories of healing, the stories of casting out demons, the stories of people desperate for someone to give them real, tangible hope. The stories of forgiveness of sins.
This is what changes people's lives!
And so I find myself reflecting again, as someone called to preach, on what this actually means for those of us who now "preach Jesus" all these centuries later, who have the responsibility of connecting a contemporary community of faith with this first century preacher from Nazareth who healed and cast out demons and forgave sinners.
It should not come as a surprise to any of us who preach the gospel that the crowds gathered around Jesus seem far more drawn to his pastoral care than they are to his words from the pulpit. At least that is the case in this particular passage at this particular stage of Jesus' ministry in this particular gospel.
It is, in fact, his manner of forcing out demons, of healing the sick, of forgiving sins that draws people in to his verbal message. And they really do change their hearts and minds.
Preaching is such a humbling calling for those of us in this business, whether we are speaking the words from the pulpit or whether we are living the words in all the other aspects of our ministry. I have described it as the ultimate act of submission, begging God for a word.
But it is so much more than that, isn't it? It's about all the other things we do beyond the pulpit: the teaching, the pastoral care, the gathering of community around bread and wine. It's about seeing the kingdom of God right in front of us and helping to make it a reality.
So my prayer for all of us who preach this week is that our preaching of the good news will come from our living of the good news . . . and that God will grant us the grace to know what that means.
Amen.
Gusti Linnea Newquist
(additional lectionary texts: Isaiah 40:21-31; Psalm 147:1-11, 20; 1 Corinthians 9:16-23)
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