What the Bible Talks About When It Talks About God (part 7)

Note: This post is meant to be read after reading part 1 of this series, where I lay some groundwork and introduce some important concepts. I would also advise reading the other preceding parts, but this is not completely necessary.

Over the last few posts I have attempted to show how the history of the Hebrew people - shown both through the Biblical writings and in archaeology - demonstrate polytheism. Now I would like to examine the development from this into monolatrism and henotheism.

Monolatrism and Henotheism 

Christians reading this are no doubt familiar with "the 10 commandments". They may not have ever examined the question of "which version?" (This is a good video discussing that question.) And if you've grown up in certain cultures, you've probably been taught to ignore the language within the 10 commandments that contradict monotheism (the belief that there is only one god). Because we see in Exodus 20:3 that YHWH commands: "you shall have no other gods before me." But the phrasing of this does not deny the existence of other gods - it exhorts the Israelites to show devotion to only one god. It's "no other gods before me", not "no other gods exist, therefore worship only me."

And when giving the commandment against idols, YHWH says in verse 5 that this is because he is a jealous god. And how can one be jealous of something that does not exist?

A depiction of Moses with the 10 commandments

In the song of Moses, we find this statement (Exodus 15:11):

Who is like you, O [YHWH], among the gods?

Again, this does not deny the existence of other gods - in fact, it affirms their existence. It simply states that the singer believes his or her god to be superior to the other gods.

Turn to Psalm 95:3 and you find a similar statement:

For YHWH is a great God [el] and a great King above all gods [elohim].  

Again, this does not deny the existence of other gods, but in fact affirms them, while claiming YHWH's superiority over them. 

Some scholars have pointed out that the plagues in Exodus are a way for YHWH to prove his superiority to the gods of Egypt. Turning the Nile to blood would be an attack on Hapi, the god of the Nile, or possibly Isis. The plague of frogs would be YHWH's way of showing superiority to the frog-headed Heqet. The plague of gnats would prove YHWH's superiority to the Egyptian god of chaos, Set. The plague of flies would possibly be an attack on Khepri, the scarab-faced god.  The death of the livestock would be an attack on Apis (depicted as a bull) and Hathor (who was often depicted as a cow). Boils would be a way of showing power over Sekhmet (goddess with the power to ward off disease and sickness). Hail would likely be an attack on both the god of agriculture, Osiris, and the goddess of the sky, Nut (locusts may also be an attack on both of these deities). The plague of darkness would likely defy Ra and possibly Horus as well. 

And before the final plague, YHWH says in Exodus 12:12: "on all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am YHWH." And how can one execute judgements on something that does not exist? This is not a god proving that they are the only god in existence - it is a god seeking to prove their superiority to the other gods.

Idols

As mentioned earlier, the commandments in Exodus 20 contain a commandment against making and bowing down to idols (see verses 4 and 5). But what if idol-worship could be shown to have been a part of the Hebrew culture before it became outlawed?

Starting in Genesis, we have a story in Genesis 31 where Jacob is fleeing from Laban's property, and it says in verse 19 that Rachel had stolen "her father’s household gods" - the word used here that is translated "gods" is "teraphim", and it describes a type of idol. The passage contains no condemnation of this act, and if you follow the story, it seems that even though Laban pursues them to get his teraphim back, he doesn't find them, and it seems that Rachel gets to keep them. One interesting thing about this story is that when Laban tells Jacob about this theft, it seems that he considers it so egregious that he promises to kill anyone who is found to have these teraphim in their possession. One might think that if Jacob shares this condemnation of all idolatry, he would perhaps promise to also destroy them if they were found?

Why would she steal these teraphim? This is a mystery that has plagued interpreters for centuries. Some argue it is merely a transfer of wealth. Others, including Rabbi Rashbam and Rabbi Abraham ibn Ezra, have argued that the teraphim - which were often used for divination - could have been used by Laban to discover her family's location. Still others think it's the other way - Rachel wants to use them for divination herself.

Another story with teraphim that, strangely, contains no condemnation is the story of an Ephraimite named Micah, found in Judges 17 and Judges 18. It speaks of silver that was taken from Micah's mother, which he was able to take back, and it says in Judges 17:3 that she consecrates or dedicates this silver to YHWH to make an idol out of. So she gets the idol made, Micah makes a shrine to put it in, and then it says that he makes an ephod and a teraphim to put in the shrine in verse 5. And it is interesting to note that the same connection between ephod and teraphim are found in Hosea 3:4, where it is prophesied that "the Israelites shall remain many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or pillar, without ephod or teraphim." And this verse seems to offer no condemnation of the practice of owning teraphim. 

Furthermore, in the story of Micah, it goes on to say that he finds a Levite to serve as a priest for his shrine with the teraphim. And the idea that teraphim are connected with divination has been connected to Judges 18:5-6, where some Danites ask the Levite priest to use divination to determine whether their mission will succeed. We see further references to teraphim being used for divination in Ezekiel 21:21 and Zechariah 10:2, though these references condemn those using them.

Finally, there is an story in 1 Samuel 19:11-16, where it says that David's wife Michal helps him to escape from Saul and his guards by putting a teraphim in his bed, dressing it up to look like him, and telling Saul's guards that David is sick. This seems to indicate that teraphim were life-sized, and that they were not unusual to have around one's household. 

In part 3 of this series, I argued that the Canaanite deity El was the main deity for Israel before YHWH (even the name Israel evokes this name, and means "strives with El" or "El strives" or even "El rules"). And this is interesting to consider in the context of the story of the golden calf in Exodus 32 for two reasons. First, a common symbol for El was a bull, and he is repeatedly referred to as Bull El. And secondly, the earliest known place of worship for Israel was the 12th-century BCE "Bull Site" in Samaria, found in 1977. The discovery of this site included a bronze calf statuette.

The bronze calf discovered at the "Bull Site" in Samaria

I remember a story I learned about in Sunday School, and was very confused about. In Numbers 21:4-9, there is a story where the Israelites "spoke against God and against Moses", complaining that they were brought out of Egypt just to die in the wilderness. As a response, YHWH sends venomous serpents to attack them. When the people return to Moses, begging him to have YHWH remove the serpents, YHWH instructs Moses to make a bronze serpent and put it on a pole, and anyone who was bitten by a serpent could look at this and live. And this story really doesn't make any sense unless you understand that at one point in the Hebrew history, it was acceptable to worship other gods, as well as using idols as a form of worship. And so, the bronze serpent in the temple that King Hezekiah breaks into pieces in 2 Kings 18:4 is probably a relic from the earlier snake cults of Canaan that had followed the early Hebrews into Israel, and this story in numbers is probably a retroactive way to explain this object.

When I was growing up, I was taught that not only did Moses write the first 5 books of the Bible, but that the Bible was basically lined up the way the timeline worked: books of the Bible were not only in the order in which the events occurred, but were also written in that order. My hope is that as you see how this is all jumbled up - we have polytheism occurring both before and after the events of Exodus in which this is condemned, as well as idolatry being normalized after it is supposedly condemned by God - you start to understand why it is that Biblical scholars largely accept the source critical theories I mentioned in part 1 of this series.

We're going to stop here, and in the next part of the series I will discuss the development of more abstract ways of conceptualizing God in Hebrew literature. 

Part 8 - Abstract Concepts of God 

Turn Your Face Towards the Sun

I wanted to expand a bit on my last post, about Neil Gaiman's "American Gods" and our Americanized versions (read: idols) of Jesus. 

My daughter's new obsession is the Home soundtrack.  Frozen used to be the bomb diggedy, but now it's the Home soundtrack.  And I'm afraid that I might have to turn in my membership card to Music Snobs Elite, because I am actually finding most of the songs on it to be very enjoyable.  Particularly beautiful to me is a song by Rihanna (gasp - I know:  I really do need to turn in my membership card), where she sets to music what turns out to be an old Māori proverb:

Turn your face toward the sun and the shadows will fall behind you.

I want to think for a moment about this proverb and see how it connects to much of (most of?) Christian theology out there (in my opinion, erroneously - and I will explain why).

It's a beautiful sentiment, and the song itself is haunting - in a good way.  And I wouldn't just reject the sentiment outright - I do think that oftentimes, weary travelers need to leave their battles behind and move on.  Sometimes we need to find rest, and sometimes we need inspiration.  So in a way - as I hope you will find by the time this post is over - I am going to be affirming this proverb at the same time that I reject it.

I think that if we take this proverb literally, it expresses a sentiment that runs counter to the message of Jesus, and unfortunately is all too popular within Christian theology.  Think about this message: the idea is that we must turn toward some sacred object outside of ourselves that provides illumination we would otherwise have no access to, and we must turn away from the problems of the world in order to do so - leave them all behind.  But if we're supposed to leave the problems of the world behind, then why does this attitude looks so unlike Jesus, who came right into the problems of this world and was astonishingly present to the people that the religious system of his day treated like "the shadows" in this proverb?

"The sun" is the sacred object in the song.  If we would turn towards it - and it is obvious what object is the sun (no one disagrees about that - it's the brightest object in the sky!) - we will find illumination.  But think about this for just one moment: have you ever actually explored Christian theology?  I don't mean to ask if you've read all the approved authors of your chosen denomination.  I mean: have you read authors from other denominations and other perspectives?  Have you examined the various debates?  And when I ask this, I mean, have you explored the various perspectives surrounding those debates?  Because if you had, I am sure you will find: no one agrees about anything!  Least of all, which object is "the sun".  Everyone has a different definition of what object is "the sun", what its (supposedly obvious) characteristics are, and how we are to "turn your face toward" it.  And every theological camp out there is pointing at all the others and saying that they are obviously "the shadows" that we are supposed to turn away from in this model.  

Why is that?  And why is it that this sentiment sounds so much like the Garden of Eden - if we would just turn towards the sacred object (the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil), all our troubles (wait, I didn't know I had troubles before this!  But now that you mention it, yes, I am incomplete without this object!) will go away!  

(Does this remind you of "Super Jesus/Magic Jesus" from my last post?  If we just believe in him, he'll fix everything for us while we sit on our La-Z-Boy....)

I'd like to suggest that Jesus presents a model of theology that runs counter to this Māori proverb - and to summarize what I think it is, before arguing why, I will state this model like so:

You are all stars (see John 14:12) - turn towards the shadows and let your light shine (see Matthew 5:16).

Now this might sound strange to you if you've grown up in a different theological paradigm that stresses other parts of the Bible over the ones I have highlighted above.  So let me bring out a few more passages for you to consider.

Let's start by considering how, for the writer of I John, if we wish to know God, we must be "born of love" (I John 4:7).  By the way: does this phrase - "born of love" - remind you of the phrase "born again", coming from John 3:3, which is used in evangelical circles so often without any attempt beyond magic to explain what it means?  It does for me.

The writer of I John goes on to say that "whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love." (I John 4:8)  I have lived for many years in Christian circles which seek very much to downplay that phrase: "God is love" (after getting into one argument with one of my old friends, I wrote an argument in defense of it).  Throughout the rest of the passage, the writer of I John really wants to drive his point home - he says that "since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another" (I John 4:11 - this presents a problem for the protestant desire to de-emphasize works and stress that faith - interpreted so often as having all the right ideas - is what saves us).  He says that "if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us" (I John 4:12).  And then he restates once again, in case you missed it or didn't think it was important, the statement he made before, and sums up everything that came in between:

God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them.
(I John 4:16)

The Sun is Within
Now contrast this with the ideas of the Māori proverb - the sun is not some distant object outside of ourselves that we must turn towards and worship.  The sun is within - it is our love, and by turning our hearts away from the egotistical attitude that is always seeking to fill ourselves by grasping at objects outside of ourselves, and inverting this by turning ourselves into outwardly focused people who are always seeking the best of others (which is what love is), we are embodiments of the light itself.

Consider for a moment the Eucharist - I think that the philosopher Peter Rollins does a marvelous job of capturing what is so often missed about this sacrament in his book, "The Divine Magician: The Disappearance of Religion and the Discovery of Faith".  In this book, he compares the Eucharist to the three stages of a magic trick: the Pledge, the Turn and the Prestige.  To understand how the Eucharist is like a magic trick, we must first understand how these three stages work in a normal magic trick, so Rollins explains how he used to perform a certain coin trick. 

For the Pledge, Rollins would show his audience a coin - just like any coin.  He would explain that he is going to make the object disappear - hence the name: the Pledge.

Then comes the Turn.  In this stage, Rollins would use a distracting motion of his hands to make them believe that he had kept the coin in his left hand, while he really had it in his right.  He would lift his right hand - with the coin - over his shoulder and drop the coin down his shirt while he pretended to rub the coin into his elbow with the left.  He then shows the audience his left hand, which does not contain a coin.

In the movie "The Prestige", Cutter draws out the nuance of this stage of the trick:

The magician takes the ordinary something and makes it do something extraordinary. Now you're looking for the secret... but you won't find it, because of course you're not really looking. You don't really want to know. You want to be fooled.

Then comes the final stage - the Prestige.  Cutter explains why this stage is necessary:

Making something disappear isn't enough; you have to bring it back.

For Rollins' trick, he would walk over to a table where he had placed another coin underneath a glass of water before the show, lift the glass, and present the other coin - which was presumed by the audience to be the same coin he had "rubbed into his elbow", but which was, in reality, hiding inside of his shirt.

Rollins compares the Eucharist to these three stages in the same way - and it is interesting to note that the oft used magic words "hocus pocus" were most likely a lampoon of the Latin phrase (which was interpreted quite literally by Catholics for centuries): hoc est corpus meum ("this is my body").  When Jesus presents the bread, representing his body, Rollins contends that this is the Pledge.  Jesus then breaks the body - for us - and this is the Turn.  But as Cutter explained in the movie, for this to be a proper magic trick, the magician must take the ordinary something and make it do something extraordinary.  Breaking "the body" - while being extraordinary in the way that Jesus gives his body willingly - is not quite what we're looking for.  So Jesus must bring back it back in the Prestige stage of the trick.

But as we know from the way the coin trick works, what comes back is never the same as what was made to disappear in the Turn.  And yet so much of theology reduces the Resurrection to a resuscitation - the same matter that goes into the tomb comes out again.

But if this is the purpose of the Eucharist, then why does Paul say in I Corinthians 12:27:

Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. (emphasis mine)

(See also Rom. 12:5.)

What if the point of the Eucharist was much bigger?  When we consume the bread of Jesus - turning the life of Jesus into nourishment for our souls which, when digested, becomes the material making up our cells - and then live out the commandments of Jesus (see John 14:15 and 23), we become the living embodiment of Jesus - and thus we become the incarnation of God, as I John 4:7-21 points towards!  And that is something truly extraordinary - something magical!

How Does the Sun Illuminate and Cast Out Shadows?
So if the sun we are supposed to turn towards in the model Jesus gives us is not some object outside of ourselves, but is unconditional love itself, and thus resides within - the next question we must ask is: how does the sun illuminate and cast out shadows?  Are we supposed to designate certain portions of humanity as "shadow" and turn away from them, as so much religion does?

To really explore how Jesus contradicts that idea, I want to explore Matthew 6:22–23 - particularly a very interesting translation of this passages provided by the scholar William Barclay in his commentary on Matthew:

The light of the body is the eye. So then, if your eye is generous, the whole body will be full of light; but if your eye is grudging, your whole body will be in the dark. If, then, the light which is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!

You might note - as I did when I first read this - that most translations do not say "if your eye is generous", but "if your eye is healthy" or "if your eyes are good".  Barclay defends his translation like so:

HERE, Jesus speaks of one special virtue which fills the eye with light, and one special fault which fills the eye with darkness. The Authorized Version speaks here about the eye being single and the eye being evil. Certainly that is the literal meaning of the Greek, but the words single and evil are here used in a special way which is common enough in the Greek in which Scripture is written.

The word for single is haplous, and its corresponding noun is haplotēs. Regularly in the Greek of the Bible, these words mean generous and generosity. James speaks of God who gives generously (James 1:5), and the adverb he uses is haplōs.

Similarly in Romans 12:8, Paul urges his friends to give generously (haplōs). Paul reminds the Corinthian church of the generosity (haplotēs) of the churches in Macedonia, and talks about their own generosity to all (2 Corinthians 9:11). It is the generous eye which Jesus is commending.

The word which is translated in the Authorized Version as evil is ponēros. Certainly that is the normal meaning of the word; but both in the New Testament and in the Septuagint, ponēros regularly means niggardly or grudging.

The whole point of Matthew 6:22–23 is that if we want to see clearly, we must be generous - which is really love in action (and thus, a manifestation of God).  Jesus is saying that if we are not generous - but are always accusing each other and seeking to blame everyone else for the problems of this world (a theme I return to again and again in my series: Satan: Lifting the Veil) - we will have a distorted view of life and of people.  Thus, when we love others, we are not only being incarnational (we are the embodiments of "the sun"), but we are also able to see more clearly - we are casting out the shadows through our love!  And perhaps this helps to explain why the Gospel of Thomas has the Golden Rule:

Love your brother like your soul, guard him like the pupil of your eye.

Through understanding generosity as the key to seeing clearly, we see that loving others is the key to clear sight, and when we love our brother, we will discover our soul.

One final Biblical picture may help to clear this up.  In Matthew 25:31-46, Jesus tells a story that presents a big problem for what often seems to be the Protestant theology of faith without works (if you have all the right ideas, you are magically saved) - this story is commonly referred to as the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats.  In the story, the King is separating the sheep from the goats (Jesus is mixing his metaphors a bit here - turning the King into a shepherd).  And what is problematic for much common theology out there is the fact that the defining characteristic between the sheep and the goats has nothing to do with saying the right words or having the right ideas - indeed, when the goats are sent away, they call the King "Lord", demonstrating that they have the right ideas and can say the right words! 

But, rather, the defining characteristic that separates sheep and goats is how they treat the people who most need to be shown love!  If they treat these with kindness, they are sheep - thus, Jesus demonstrates the prevailing theme of his ministry: you will know the disciples of Jesus by their love! (See John 13:35.)

But before we take this to mean that if we see people who are unloving, we can proceed to treat them as condemned individuals beyond hope - consider the irony of the situation: once the goats (who were presumably rich and well off individuals) are cast out from the kingdom, do they not become the very same "least of these" whom so desperately need to be shown love?  And if God were not willing to show these individuals mercy, would he not be acting like a goat Himself?

Often I have heard Christians justify their hatred of certain individuals with the phrase Paul quotes in Romans 9:13 (originally from Malachi 1:2-3):

I have loved Jacob, but I have hated Esau.

To take this as an excuse to bear a grudge that is never let go ignores so much of the Bible - especially when Jesus tells us to love our enemies, and then tells us that God does this perfectly (see Matthew 5:43-48).  But it also ignores the connection between the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats and the end of the story of Jacob and Esau - for when Jacob and Esau reconcile, Jacob sees the face of God through his former enemy (who was always his brother): Esau!  (See Genesis 33:10.) 

It is when we love unconditionally that we experience the presence of God - and not only this, but we embody the presence of God to others. 

And so I reword the Māori proverb as:
We are all stars, and if we turn towards the shadows and let our love shine, the world will be filled with light, and there will be no more shadow.

"American Gods" and our Zombie Jesuses

I've been reading Neil Gaiman's novel, "American Gods", and I'm finding it to be quite an effective muse.  "American Gods" is about the nature of American belief.  The protagonist of the story finds himself in league with an old one-eyed man who turns out to be Odin.  But there is a problem for Odin - as he describes it:

When the people came to America they brought us with them. They brought me, and Loki and Thor, Anansi and the Lion-God, Leprechauns and Kobolds and Banshees, Kubera and Frau Holle and Ashtaroth, and they brought you. We rode here in their minds, and we took root. We traveled with the settlers to the new lands across the ocean. 

Each of the gods in the story have not only been brought over the oceans by migrant Americans, but over time they have become largely unrecognizable - as they slowly morph by way of the mixing of cultural ideas.  And they slowly became old and mostly powerless, as people stopped worshiping them.

Furthermore, these old, aging gods have new competition - as Odin later outlines in the same speech:

[T]here are new gods growing in America, clinging to growing knots of belief: gods of credit card and freeway, of Internet and telephone, of radio and hospital and television, gods of plastic and of beeper and of neon. Proud gods, fat and foolish creatures, puffed up with their own newness and importance.

Throughout the book, Gaiman presents fascinating pictures of these new American gods.  In one graphic and disturbing scene, a man is swallowed whole by the lady parts of what must be a manifestation of an American sex goddess. 

In another scene, Lucille Ball talks to the protagonist through the television screen, and we find out that this is a manifestation of a television god.  When asked what kinds of sacrifices people make to the TV god, Lucy replies: "Their time, mostly.  Sometimes each other."

It's really a fascinating portrayal of how beliefs shape America - consciously or unconsciously.  As the protagonist puts it at one point:

It's what people do. They believe, and then they do not take responsibility for their beliefs; they conjure things, and do not trust the conjuration. People populate the darkness; with ghosts, with gods, with electrons, with tales. People imagine, and people believe; and it is that rock solid belief, that makes things happen.

The ideas of the book have me thinking about how many bastardized versions of Jesus are alive and working in American culture today - and how they are all impotent against the cultural gods Gaiman imaginatively portrays (such as the sex goddess, the gods of credit, and television).

Here in America, we have:

I'm your worst nightmare....

Macho Jesus - as Mark Driscoll puts it: "Jesus is a prize-fighter with a tattoo down His leg, a sword in His hand and the commitment to make someone bleed. That is the guy I can worship. I cannot worship the hippie, diaper, halo Christ because I cannot worship a guy I can beat up." This Jesus does nothing to challenge our American addiction to violence, and the myth that violence solves everything.

Spirit Jesus - so many Americans still believe that Jesus was only concerned with saving our souls.  He didn't care about our physical conditions, or the socio-political environments that imprison so many.  As Joe Hill's famous 1911 lampoon of "In the Sweet By and By" puts it:

Long-haired preachers come out every night
Try to tell you what's wrong and what's right
But when asked how 'bout something to eat
They will answer in voices so sweet
You will eat, bye and bye
In that glorious land above the sky
Work and pray, live on hay
You'll get pie in the sky when you die

And kind of a mix of "Spirit Jesus" and "Macho Jesus" we have:

It's a bird, it's a plane, it's...Jesus!

Superhero Jesus/Magic Jesus - so much theology seems to be absolutely certain that if you'll just pray, if you'll just "accept Jesus into your heart", if you'll just do whatever symbolic magical act is the fad, all your problems will be solved.  Forget going to the doctor and getting medical attention - we'll pray and your knees will magically be healed!  (And oh, by the way, whatever you do, don't read any literature about the placebo effect....)  All too often, this kind of theology makes people lazy and unable to diagnose the real sources of problems - because why would you try to get to the bottom of a problem and then work to solve it when all we have to do is say some magic wordies and everything magically gets better?  I've heard preachers criticize Liberals for - in their minds - doing the same thing Thomas Jefferson did with his Bible, but it seems to me that far too many Christians focus so heavily on miracles that they completely miss their point, as well as missing everything Jesus said.  And in the process, they turn God into a cosmic genie - or even worse, a vending machine.

Money Grubbing Jesus - the "Prosperity Gospel" is so successful today that oftentimes, people who criticize it don't even realize they've bought into its lies.  Because while they criticize it, they run "Financial Peace Universities", based on Dave Ramsey's advice - Dave Ramsey, who believes that if you're poor, it's your own lazy fault.  But, as Rachel Held Evans put so well in her critique of Ramseyism,

When medical bills are the biggest cause of bankruptcy in the United States, [...] when people working 40-hour weeks at minimum wage jobs still can’t earn enough to support their families, [...] when approximately 1% of Americans hold 40% of the nation’s wealth, [...] when the black unemployment rate has consistently been twice as high as the white unemployment rate for the past 50 years, there are systemic injustices at work.

Puritan Jesus - this Jesus is so concerned with what everyone else is doing in bed, that it almost seems that he is just as addicted to sex as all the people actually having it.  What else would explain his obsession with getting angry about how everyone else does it?

All too often, Christians seem so concerned with afterlife that they are useless when it comes to improving this life.  But how can we expect afterlife to be so fulfilling when we can't even figure out how to live in a way that is healthy in this life?  Do we really think that all our bad habits will simply magically disappear as part of an after-death reward given out based on whether we said a prayer when we were 7 years old?  Is this really what Jesus' mission was about?

It's really no wonder that Atheists poke fun at Zombie Jesus, when so much of our theology about this man is so badly thought out, and so impotent to resolve any of our present issues.

What other Jesuses have you run into?

Suggested further reading (if you want to see an alternative way of seeing Jesus):
Jesus and the Domination System
Jesus and Violence
Leave the Shire

The Idolatry of Our Age - Part VI: Love is Like the Wind

I have been writing on the subject of how the concept of idolatry applies in our modern age.  This post is a continuation on this theme - if you have not done so already, you might want to read the beginning of the series:

• Part I explores the idea that God is not like an idol which can be manipulated to fulfill our desires
• Part II explores how our limitations prevent us from understanding infinite reality
• Part III explores how the Bible is worshiped over the person of Christ
• Part IV explores the hero's journey
• Part V explores how the resurrection applies to our present life

Love Is Like the Wind
In today’s world, it is hard to imagine what Spirit means any more.  We have pushed out the world of Spirit from most areas of thought.  At best, Spirit is “out there”.  But this is not how the writers of the Bible thought of things.  In Greek, the word used for Spirit was “pnuema” - which we get “pneumatic” (as in pneumatic tire) from.  Yup, you guessed it - the word has a double meaning.  It was not only used to speak about “Spirit”, but also “breath” and “air”.
 
What’s interesting about this is that when you think about how an ancient culture would know about the existence of air, you realize that they couldn’t know this by observing the air itself.  The only way they could know about the existence of air would be by observing the effect it has on other objects.  It is the same way with Spirit - we cannot know what Spirit is by observing it directly, only by observing the effects it has on other entities.

In the ancient world, they thought of the world as being charged with Spirit.  One of the most greatly misunderstood passages of the New Testament is I Corinthians 15:35-49, where Paul speaks of “spiritual bodies”.  But the original Greek word - pneumatikos - didn’t carry the sense that the body was made out of spiritual matter, but rather, the suffix ikos had to do with what animated the body - what powered it.  The goal of the Christian life in a certain sense is to become animated by “Spirit”.  And Paul contrasts this pneumatikos body with a psychikos body - a body animated by psyche.  This passage carries the sense that we will be trading our ego-driven lives for a Spirit-driven life.
 

Many of the ancient cultures had a metaphor for describing certain holy places such as temples - the navel of the earth.  The belief of the ancient Jews and Christians was that this world was surrounded by and nourished by the world of the Spirit, much as a baby is surrounded by and nourished by her mother.  And there were these places on earth where the separation between this material reality and the spiritual reality was thin - the navel of the earth.

This image of the "navel of the earth" is reinforced by the feminine imagery of God in the Bible.  For example, Deuteronomy 32:11 says that "[God cared for them] like an eagle that stirs up its nest and hovers over its young, that spreads its wings to catch them and carries them aloft."  Deuteronomy 32:18 says "you forgot the God who gave you birth."  In Isaiah 49:15 God says that just as a mother will not forget her child, neither will He (might "She" be appropriate here?) forget the reader.  In Isaiah 66:12-13, God says "you will nurse and be carried on her arm and dandled on her knees.  As a mother comforts her child, so will I comfort you; and you will be comforted over Jerusalem."  And in Matthew 23:37, Jesus speaks prophetically of how God wishes to gather the children of Jerusalem as a mother hen who gathers her children under her wings. 

The Jews believed that the "navel of the earth" was located at the temple in Jerusalem.  But with Jesus, the idea of temples as the only place to connect to Spirit was done away with.  Anyone could have access to Spirit, anywhere.  Paul says in I Corinthians 3:16 that we are God’s temple and His Spirit dwells in our midst.  This “dwelling in our midst” can be called immanence, and it presents a great paradox as Spirit is also transcendent.  Spirit is immanently transcendent.
 

Jesus had a way of talking about the immanent transcendence - the kingdom of God.  In Luke 17:21 Jesus says that the kingdom cannot be observed through normal human means, but that it is within you.  I personally love the way the apocryphal Gospel of Thomas puts it:

If those who lead you say, “See, the Kingdom is in the sky,” then the birds of the sky will precede you.  If they say to you, “It is in the sea,” then the fish will precede you.  Rather, the Kingdom is inside of you, and it is outside of you.

The Kingdom is within

But what is this mysterious Spirit?

I think the writer of I John gives us a major clue when he writes (in I John 4:8 and later in verse 16) that God is love.

The Greeks had three different words for love - one spoke of a fondness or brotherly love, and another spoke of romantic love.  But the word used for the love that Jesus taught about was agape - a perfect, unconditional love.  And I believe that when we learn how to live a life grounded in this kind of love, we can experience the presence of God.  This presence has been described as a peace that transcends all understanding in Philippians 4:7.
 

Humans have a way of becoming easily bored.  What we once found compelling fades and ceases to amaze.  But when you experience an unconditional love for someone, it has a way of changing your perspective.  I remember that when my first son was born, the world took on a new sense of wonder.  And I can remember finding wonder in mundane things because my son found wonder in them.  He loved bubbles - that was actually his first word.  We actually bought a machine that blew bubbles all over the living room, and we would sit and watch as he excitedly chased them around.  We found wonder in the mundane because of our love for our son.
 
Love has a way of filling the world with meaning.  Often when a person feels unloved, there seems to be nothing in the world that can excite them - the world seems empty and meaningless to them.  But a person who is in love cannot help but experience everything as deeply meaningful - smells are more poignant, colors seem to be more radiant, and music has a profound effect on them.  Love fills the world with beauty and meaning in a way that is completely irrational and impossible to explain.
 
And love is such a wispy concept - we cannot seem to objectify and define it.  You can't see love, but you can see its effect on someone.  And love causes others to stand out as special.  It is the humblest of things, not calling any attention upon its own beauty but rather calling attention to the beauty of the beloved while filling the world around with beauty as well.  Love does not seek its own pleasure, but finds pleasure in the fulfillment of the beloved.  Love has no meaning of its own but gives meaning to all things. 
 
I close with this thought: I believe that the Spirit of God - the very Spirit of perfect Love itself - is like the wind.  The ancient Chinese Taoist philosopher Zhuangzi (also known as Chuang Tzu) wrote this poem:

When great Nature sighs, we hear the winds
Which, noiseless in themselves,
Awaken voices from other beings,
Blowing on them.
From every opening
Loud voices sound. Have you not heard
This rush of tones?

There stands the overhanging wood
On the steep mountain:
Old trees with holes and cracks
Like snouts, maw, and ears,
Like beam-sockets, like goblets,
Grooves in the wood. hollows full of water:
You hear mooing and roaring, whistling,
Shouts of command, grumblings,
Deep drones, sad flutes.
One call awakens another in dialogue.
Gentle winds sing timidly,
Strong ones blast on without restraint.
Then the wind dies down. The openings
Empty out their last sound.
Have you not observes how all then trembles and subsides?

Yu replied: I understand:
The music of earth sings through a thousand holes.
The music of man is made on flutes and instruments.
What makes the music of heaven?

Master Ki said:
Something is blowing on a thousand different holes.
Some power stands behind all this and makes the sounds die down.
What is this power?

This poem does not end with a definition of God, and I believe this is absolutely appropriate.  Because infinite cannot be contained in finite words or concepts.  Rather, the poem simply leaves the open question.  And while we can dare to speak of the infinite being of God, we should always leave the question open, as no words can do infinite justice.

The Idolatry of Our Age - Part V: Be the Resurrection

I have been writing on the subject of how the concept of idolatry applies in our modern age.  This post is a continuation on this theme - if you have not done so already, you might want to read the beginning of the series:

• Part I explores the idea that God is not like an idol which can be manipulated to fulfill our desires
• Part II explores how our limitations prevent us from understanding infinite reality
• Part III explores how the Bible is worshiped over the person of Christ
• Part IV explores the hero's journey

Be the Resurrection
In my last post, I explored the concept that Jesus calls his followers on a hero’s journey.  Through this understanding, I think it should become clear that we should also view Jesus crucifixion and resurrection not just as something that happened at a point in history, but as a model for our own life.

Take up your cross and follow me...

Now you may say “whoah, you’re sounding a little crayzay there!”

But I’m serious!  Let’s examine for a minute, starting with Jesus’ death.  What is the point of the crucifixion?  Is it just an event in history that we’re supposed to look back and reflect on?  I don't think that's the point - I don't think it's supposed to be a painting on a wall.  I think it’s also supposed to inform how we live!  Just as the disciples followed Jesus’ so closely that they were “in the dust of the Rabbi”, I believe that Jesus taught that they were supposed to take their own part in his crucifixion as well! 

Now, of course I do not mean that we should literally hope that someone comes along and offers to hoist us up on wooden crosses until we die.  This would be abhorrent. 

But, Jesus did say (in Mt. 16:24-25):

Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.  For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it.

So what is it that Jesus means when he says we should take up our cross?
The apostle Paul says in Galatians 2:20:

I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.

Now Paul was writing this as a living embodied person on this earth.  So obviously this is not talking about a death ritual.  No, what I think Jesus and Paul are both talking about is a death of the false self - our egotistical drive to serve ourselves, to live up to cultural standards (even if they involve a sense of tribalism), and to please others in order to be held in favor.
 

This view transforms the crucifixion of Jesus from a historical event into a present reality - a “sacrament” (a practice through which one may experience the presence of God).  In John 15:4 Jesus says that if we “abide in” him, he will “abide in” us.  This is not some voodoo magic he’s speaking of.  He’s saying that if we live out the way he’s taught - following in his footsteps - we will experience his spiritual presence!  And this "following" includes a death of the false self, which we must continually seek!  By living out the life of Jesus - through acts of kindness, through denying ourselves, through love of our enemies - we can come to understand God’s thoughts!
 
Now, do not misunderstand me and think that I am saying that we will reach a point where our finite minds can contain the infinite - this is not at all what I am saying.  But we can find rest in the process - as Jesus said (Mt. 11:28):

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.

To understand the scriptures, love, Jesus, and even come to know God, we must transcend ourselves.  This includes transcending our biases and tribal identities - the tribalism of our political, religious, and social identities.  We must continually seek to understand our neighbors - no matter how different they be - and seek their well-being over our own.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer - a pastor in Germany who opposed Hitler’s Nazi regime during World War II and was eventually martyred for it - wrote in “The Cost of Discipleship”:

The disciple is dragged out of his relative security into a life of absolute insecurity (that is, in truth, into the absolute security and safety of the fellowship of Jesus), from a life which is observable and calculable (it is, in fact, quite incalculable) into a life where everything is unobservable and fortuitous (that is, into one which is necessary and calculable), out of the realm of finite (which is in truth the infinite) into the realm of infinite possibilities (which is the one liberating reality).

I am the resurrection and the life

Through this death of self, I believe we can also discover how the resurrection is not simply a historical event, but is also a sacramental, present reality.  After leaving behind our old, dead selves and transcending them, we embody the resurrection in this life!  In her book “Christianity After Religion: The End of Church and the Birth of a New Spiritual Awakening”, Diana Butler Bass writes about an exchange she witnessed between Bishop Dan Corrigan and a parishioner.  This person asked the Bishop: “do you believe in the resurrection?”  And his answer was: “Yes. I believe in the resurrection. I’ve seen it too many times not to.”
 
In Luke 24:13-35, there is a story where two of the disciples are walking along the road to Emmaus after Jesus’ death.  According to the text, Jesus comes along beside them and is walking with them, but they do not recognize him.  They walk with him for a ways and are involved in a discussion the whole time, without ever realizing who it is that they are speaking to.  Afterwards, they invite him to eat with them, and still they do not recognize him!  It isn’t until he breaks the bread and passes it out to them that they realize whose presence they were in.  Recognizing the resurrection required a new level of consciousness on the part of these disciples.
 
We should also seek the find the resurrection in our present life - the resurrection of former addicts, amputees who learned to live without their limbs, formerly homeless people who built a life out of the rubble of their past, and many other ways that the resurrection happens in real life.  And we should take part in this process - we should lift our neighbors up out of the ashes of their former lives, and incarnate the resurrection in our present world.

In “Christ in Evolution”, Ilia Delio writes:

The cross and resurrection won the victory over evil, but it is the task of the Spirit, and those led by the Spirit, to implement that victory in and for the whole world. The victory is found not in the life of Jesus alone but in his death and resurrection. It is in the resurrection that the power of Jesus as the Christ is experienced.

In my next post, I will explore how love is like the wind.

The Idolatry of Our Age - Part IV: Leave the Shire

I have been writing on the subject of how the concept of idolatry applies in our modern age.  This post is a continuation on this theme - if you have not done so already, you might want to read the beginning of the series:

• Part I explores the idea that God is not like an idol which can be manipulated to fulfill our desires
• Part II explores how our limitations prevent us from understanding infinite reality
• Part III explores how the Bible is worshiped over the person of Christ
  

Leave the Shire
In my last post, I wrote about a phrase that was used by ancient Jews to describe the relationship between a disciple and his/her Rabbi: the dust of the Rabbi.  This phrase described how a disciple would follow their Rabbi so closely that the dust from the feet of the Rabbi that was kicked up would cover the disciple.

I believe that this picture adds clearer meaning to a strange story in Matthew 14:22-33.  In this strange and miraculous tale, Jesus has instructed his disciples to part ways with him for a while, and sent them in a boat to cross to “the other side” - Decapolis, on the other side of the sea of Galilee.  As they are crossing this body of water, Jesus decides to catch up with them and, according to the story, walks right out on top of the water.  When the disciples see him they react with terror, but Jesus assures them that there’s no need to be afraid.
 

With the picture of “the dust of the Rabbi”, Peter’s next move comes as no surprise - as a disciple, you would see every action of your Rabbi as part of a lesson of some sort, and you were to learn through mimesis.  So Peter says “if it’s you, tell me to come out on the water!”  Jesus simply says “come”, and Peter jumps out of the boat.  You see, in Peter’s understanding, Jesus wouldn’t do anything in view of his disciples that he didn’t believe his disciples could also do - the whole point of the Rabbi/disciple relationship is to transform the disciples into the character of the Rabbi.
 
So, with this understanding in mind, the next part of the story is illuminated further.  Peter is out of the boat, and he starts walking on the water towards Jesus.  But then his focus is diverted, and he notices the wind and becomes afraid.  As a result of this loss of focus and fear, Peter begins to sink.  In verse 31 of the passage, Jesus explains this reaction as a result of a lack of faith.  But it’s not Peter’s lack of faith in Jesus that is the problem - Peter sees Jesus walking on the water and believes he can do this!  The problem is Peter’s lack of faith in himself!  Peter didn’t believe that he could do these great things that he saw Jesus doing!
 

You see, much of modern Christianity has made Jesus into an ancient superhero - we read his comics and say “oh, how cool is that?”, and that’s the whole point of it all: to read about Jesus and profess our belief in and affection for these stories. 

As Robert Capon puts it, in "Hunting the Divine Fox":

The true paradigm of the ordinary American view of Jesus is Superman: "Faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound.  It’s Superman!  Strange visitor from another planet, who came to earth with powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men, and who, disguised as Clark Kent, mild-mannered reporter for a great metropolitan newspaper, fights a never ending battle from truth, justice, and the American Way."  If that isn’t popular Christology, I’ll eat my hat.  Jesus – gentle, meek and mild, but with secret, souped-up, more-than-human insides – bumbles around for thirty-three years, nearly gets himself done in for good by the Kryptonite Kross, but at the last minute, struggles into the phone booth of the Empty Tomb, changes into his Easter suit and with a single bound, leaps back up to the planet Heaven.  It’s got it all – including, just so you shouldn’t miss the lesson, kiddies: He never once touches Lois Lane.

But Jesus cuts right into this idea in John 14:12:

Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.

Did you catch that?  The followers of Jesus will do greater things than what Jesus has been doing?
 
Later on in the passage, Jesus drives the point that belief plays out in action home in verse 23 when he says: 

Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching.

There’s a simple analogy that can be made to clear this up a bit.  Jesus’ story is an embodiment of the truth within the common themes in every hero myth in literature.  This is something that the author J.R.R. Tolkien picked up on, and which was alluded to in various ways throughout his most famous fantasy series, “The Lord of the Rings”.  The story of Frodo in this series follows a very common pattern - the pattern of the hero’s journey.

The hero’s journey starts out with the hero - who at this point is a very plain and ordinary person - being called to go on an adventure by a mentor who often has a supernatural appearance.  Often in these tales, the call is resisted or refused at first and various excuses are given - the hero has important things at home to attend to, the journey is too dangerous, the hero feels that there’s no way he could possibly make any difference, etc.  But in every hero’s journey tale, these excuses eventually fade away in light of the importance of the quest, and the hero makes the decision to commit.  Often, in return for this commitment, the hero receives some sort of talisman that gives him supernatural aid - in Frodo’s case, the ring of power.

But once the hero makes this commitment and sets out, he or she is immediately beset by a challenge of some sort - this is called the Threshold Guardian.  The Threshold Guardian’s goal is to prevent the hero from leaving the safety of his or her home, and in Frodo’s story this Threshold Guardian comes in the form of the fearful Ringwraiths, whom Frodo faces again and again throughout the story, which is part of the temptations and sufferings that every hero experiences.

At some point in every hero’s journey, the hero experiences a sort of death of his old self, which always occurs when the hero faces his deepest, darkest fear.  But the hero overcomes this great fear and emerges through a type of resurrection, where their true nature - much greater than what they were before - is then revealed.  They return to their home a much different person and often find that the darkness outside - which the people of their home were ignorant of and even in denial of at the beginning of the story - has invaded their home.  And it is only because of the hero’s journey and resulting change that they are then able to help the people of their old home overcome difficulty and conflict.  

But the hardest part of the story is always that first step - in “The Fellowship of the Ring”, Bilbo says:

The scariest thing on earth is stepping out of our front door, because we don't know what adventures we'll walk into.

We see so often this version of Christianity that protects its idolatrous ideas - its conceptual forms of stone - by withdrawing from the world.  Like the people of the Shire, they are completely unaware of the darkness of the world outside.  What so often happens when a person withdraws like this is that they construct their own false reality in their mind. 

But the funny thing about the story of the hero’s journey that Jesus presents is that Jesus is not the hero of the story.  Not if you believe John 14:12.  No, in light of this passage, we learn that Jesus is the mentor character - the “Gandalf” of the story!  He is the one calling us to go on a hero’s journey!  He is the one telling us to leave our comfortable world to face the death of our false selves and emerge in resurrection, refined to reveal the nature of our true selves!  We are not called as Christians to withdraw from the world - we are called to embrace it and through this embrace, we learn who God is, and thus who we are!
 
The Christianity that withdraws from the world is a religion of idolatry - it remains safe in its home in the Shire, ignorant of the troubles of the world around, even denying their existence when word from the outside arrives.  I see this so often in Christianity: an attitude that says that even the act of engaging with “outsiders” - people of differing cultures, political identities, theological ideas, scientific ideas, etc. - is a transgression.  Knowledge is dangerous to this form of Christianity, and it is treated with contempt.  And those who live in this environment build for themselves a reality that looks nothing like the world outside, and whenever anything from the outside world comes into their perspective, they immediately reject anything that does not match this construction of ideas.  This often results in a complete rejection of science - or to put it more precisely, Christians often seem to construct their own version of science by starting with the image they already had and building science around it.

But the Bible does not teach withdrawal from science as the way to understand God - the Bible teaches that it is the creation itself which teaches us about God!  Psalm 19:1-2 says that the heavens declare the glory of God, and that they “pour forth speech” day and night, revealing knowledge!  This Psalm declares that the skies are a love note from God Himself, and by reading it we learn His character!  

In the story of Job, when God answers Job, He continually asks Job to contemplate His greatness by...pointing to various acts of creation!  This section even starts out by saying the God spoke out of a storm!  (See Job chapters 38-41)  

Romans 1:20 continues this theme and says that God’s invisible qualities can be understood through what has been made!

When Christians withdraw from the world of science and treat it with contempt, what they are really doing is rejecting God in favor of an idol.  Christianity has a duty to engage creation to discern the glory of God.  Pope John Paul II once said:

Science can purify religion from error and superstition. Religion can purify science from idolatry and false absolutes.

In one of my previous posts, I wrote about a view of God that perceives God through embracing all of creation in love.  Through this embrace, we experience the miracle in the mundane - as Albert Einstein wrote:

There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.

Not only can we challenge our idols through a continual contemplation of creation - embracing scientific methods of perceiving the logos - but we must also seek to find Christ in our neighbor.  In the parable of the sheep and the goats (see Matthew 25:31-46) Jesus implies that the way to experience God is through embracing our fellow man in love and caring for the needs of “the least of these”.  Jesus also said that “where two or three have gathered together in my name, I am there in their midst.” (Matthew 18:20).  This helps us to understand that in order to challenge our own filters of understanding, we must seek to understand our neighbor (and even our enemies are our neighbors, since Jesus commands us to love our enemies in Matthew 5:43-48) in order to experience Jesus. 
 
So often we make idols out of false realities - false images of ourselves based on what we own, what we profess to believe as true, or political identities.  These are the Threshold Guardians - the Ringwraiths - which prevent us from taking the first step out our front door and beginning our journey out of the Shire.  But when Jesus says that he is found when two or three gather in his name, I believe that this does not mean “two or three people who are exactly like me.”  Because all throughout Jesus’ life, we see him with people of all different kinds: fishermen, tax collectors, prostitutes, Roman centurions, and even Pharisees!  In order to find Jesus, we cannot huddle in the dark corner of safety - we must leave the Shire!  Through Jesus, we see that the love of our neighbor - who might even be our “enemy” - is the lens through which we will see the Truth in the scriptures!  To follow Jesus is to transcend tribalism and idealism - to cast off our false, ego-driven images of self - and to embrace those who are “different”.  

Through the love of our neighbor, we discover our true self.

In my next post, I will explore the meaning of resurrection in our daily lives.