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Tag: RCL

  • Advent 1C (2 December 2012)

    Contents

    Lectionary

    • Jeremiah 33:14–16 and Psalm 25:1–10
    • 1 Thessalonians 3:9–13
    • Luke 21:25–36

     

    Introduction – Celebrating the One Who Comes

    During the period that begins on the fourth Sunday before Christmas Day, communities that observe Advent have an opportunity to reflect on a significant dimension of faith: God as the Anticipated One.

    So much of religion seems to be concerned with the past. Tradition plays a large (and vital) role in most people’s spirituality. Intense debates rage over the historicity of certain (alleged) events from the past. The creedal and liturgical formulations that so largely define contemporary forms of faith are themselves legacies from the past. The Scriptures, necessarily, are documents of the distant past rather than ring binders in which we are expected to collect future issues from an ongoing series.

    Christmas itself is a celebration of a particular past event: the birth of Jesus. Even if we consider the canonical stories to be symbolic narratives that disseminate theology more than history, there is little doubt that Jesus was born. Anyone whose death is well attested can be assumed to have been born.

    Advent is unique in that it celebrates the incomplete and the not-yet. Advent draws us beyond a fascination with the past, and invites us to consider the possibility that the God of sacred tradition might also be a part of our immediate experience, as well as having something far greater to reveal in the future. Advent can name the reality that we do not have the final word. There is always more to God, and to life, than what we have seen so far.

    Advent is not simply a preparation to celebrate Christmas. It is an invitation to welcome the One Who Comes. It is rightly designated a prophetic season, for this is a time to identify with the prophets of all times as people who have ears to hear and eyes to see; people who are awake to the possibilities of God’s dynamic presence in our own circumstances.

    Over the four Sundays of Advent this year, as we begin a year that will focus especially on the Gospel of Luke, the themes will be as follows:

    • Seeing beyond the horizon of humanity (Luke 21:25-36)
    • John the Baptist: prepare the way of the Lord (Luke 3:1-6)
    • Responding to prophetic voices (Luke 3:7-18)
    • The child of promise (Luke 1:39-45)

     

     

    First Reading: The days are surely coming …

    The brief passage from Jeremiah 33 designated for the first reading for RC and RCL communities, captures the essence of the Advent theme. It looks to a future time of blessing when a Davidic ruler will executive justice and righteousness in the land.

    Several aspects of an ancient world view are encapsulated in this brief text:

    • The idea of the ruler as a divine delegate who serves as an agent to implement divine justice. Such a “lord” is acclaimed as “savior” (Greek: soter) and celebrated as a divine “son” of the community’s patron deity (“God our Father”). Notice, in Paul’s formula from 1 Thessalonians, how these ideas are applied to God and Jesus by the earliest Christian communities known to us.
    • The role of the prophetic oracle promising dynastic succession as a guarantee of divine blessing.
    • The powerful tradition of Davidic descent for an authentic claim to Jewish leadership.

    A text such as this can also invite us to think about the role of prophecy in ancient Israel and in post-biblical times:

    • The original prophet seems to have been a recognized figure who could be invited to speak a word “from the LORD.” Such characters could be on the ruler’s staff, and receive their living from the state. But they could also be independent charismatic figures who sometimes acted in opposition to the ruler and the official cult.
    • In time prophetic texts are produced: a scroll for Isaiah, a scroll for Jeremiah, a scroll for Ezekiel, and another collecting the words of “the Twelve” into a single work. These “Latter Prophets” excluded Daniel, but were matched by another set of “Former Prophets:” Joshua, Judges, Samuel & Kings. The origins of the Latter Prophets are a puzzle, but each of the four scrolls appears to be an anthology of texts designed to fashion a self-conscious prophetic voice apart from the historical deeds and words of the named prophet. What, if anything, was the relationship between the historical figure of Isaiah or Amos and the books that have become their legacy to humanity?
    • Centuries later when Tiglath-Pileser and Nebuchadnezzar are but vague memories, the prophetic texts are appropriated in new circumstances. Often they were reduced to catalogues of predictions and employed in theological confrontations between opposing factions of the pious. At times they tapped deep wellsprings of the human spirit. The prophetic books of Scripture have been both springs of fresh water and poisoned wells fostering hatred between different human communities.

    The difference may depend on the spirit in which we approach these texts. When approached with an Advent mind \set — in anticipation that the God Who Comes is also the God Beyond All Names and the God who has yet more (new) truths to reveal — these ancient texts can draw us into the liberty of the children of God.

     

    Zechariah 14:4-9 – On that day

    The ECUSA lectionary designates Zech 14:4-9 as the first reading. This passage provides another example of Jewish apocalyptic anticipating a collapse of the natural order as the eschatalogical moment draws near:

    On that day his feet shall stand on the Mount of Olives, which lies before Jerusalem on the east; and the Mount of Olives shall be split in two from east to west by a very wide valley; so that one half of the Mount shall withdraw northward, and the other half southward. And you shall flee by the valley of the Lord’s mountain, for the valley between the mountains shall reach to Azal; and you shall flee as you fled from the earthquake in the days of King Uzziah of Judah. Then the LORD my God will come, and all the holy ones with him. On that day there shall not be either cold or frost. And there shall be continuous day (it is known to the LORD), not day and not night, for at evening time there shall be light. On that day living waters shall flow out from Jerusalem, half of them to the eastern sea and half of them to the western sea; it shall continue in summer as in winter. And the LORD will become king over all the earth; on that day the LORD will be one and his name one.

    This passage has many affinities with the Apocalyptic Discourse in Mark 13=Luke 21=Matt 24 and also with Paul’s apocalyptic instruction as seen in 1 Thessalonians.

     

    Second Reading: Ready for the coming of our Lord Jesus

    Advent themes are not central to this passage from 1 Thessalonians 3, but that makes this an even more significant passage for gaining a perspective on Paul’s own thorough-going apocalypticism. Even when not especially focusing on such issues, Paul reveals by his choice of words how deep is his debt to older prophetic and apocalyptic texts.

    Notice Paul’s familiar way of mentioning God and Jesus in the same phrase. As also seen in the opening and closing formulae of his letters, Paul limits “God” to “the Father” while typically speaking of Jesus as “our Lord.” The following examples come from the opening paragraphs of Paul’s letters:

    1 Thessalonians 1
    Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy, To the church of the Thessalonians in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ: Grace to you and peace.

    Galatians 1
    Paul an apostle—sent neither by human commission nor from human authorities, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead—and all the members of God’s family who are with me, To the churches of Galatia: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to set us free from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

    1 Corinthians 1
    Paul, called to be an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and our brother Sosthenes, To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

    2 Corinthians 1
    Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, To the church of God that is in Corinth, including all the saints throughout Achaia: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all consolation, …

    Philippians 1
    Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus, To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, with the bishops and deacons: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

    Romans 1
    Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy scriptures, the gospel concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be Son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles for the sake of his name, including yourselves who are called to belong to Jesus Christ, To all God’s beloved in Rome, who are called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

    Philemon
    Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother, To Philemon our dear friend and co-worker, to Apphia our sister, to Archippus our fellow soldier, and to the church in your house: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

    These phrases have become familiar religious texts to us, but in 1C they were formulations that reflected current political terminology. They represented not so much a subordination of Jesus to God as an elevation of Jesus over against the emperor. Such talk could cost people their lives. And it did.

    Finally, it is worth noting how Paul recycles older ideas. The reference to “the coming of our Lord Jesus …” in 1 Thess 3:13 can be placed alongside the tradition already known to us from Daniel 7 and Zechariah 14:

    Dan 7:13-14 – As I watched in the night visions, 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 peoples, 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.

    Zech 14:5 – Then the LORD my God will come, and all the holy ones with him.

    1Thess 3:13 – that you may be blameless before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints (Greek: hagioi = holy ones, or angels).

    2Thess 1:7 – … when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels

     

     

    Gospel: Natural calamities and the End

    The core of this week’s Gospel, and the only portion used in the RC lectionary, is Luke 21:25-28:

    There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on the earth distress among nations confused by the roaring of the sea and the waves. People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. Then they will see ‘the Son of Man coming in a cloud’ with power and great glory. Now when these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.

    The ECUSA and RCL selections include the following “parable” of the fig tree (which is not really a typical parable and lacks the hallmarks of a classic Jesus’ saying) and the RCL also includes vss 34-36 (a concluding call to personal watchfulness lest one be caught unawares by “that day”).

    Luke 21 represents a re-working of the apocalyptic discourse taken from Mark 13. Both Matthew and Luke have taken over this tradition from Mark and each given it a slight edit to focus on themes of concern to their communities.

    Underlying this portion of the discourse is the common view of the world as a structure put in place — and kept there — by divine command. The ancient priestly account of creation (Gen 1:1-2:4a) assumes that the natural condition of the world without God’s intervention is watery chaos. As part of creation, God separates the waters and sets boundaries to restrain the sea (often imagined as a fearsome Dragon or some other “monster of the Deep”). When God later punishes the world for human sin, in the flood story, in effect the divine ordering that kept creation in place is suspended. The waters flood back in and destroy everything God has made — except for the handful of people and animals on board the Ark.

    These images may derive from the irrigated agricultural societies of ancient Mesopotamia, where human life was sustained by a constant struggle with river and sea. The levy banks that were essential for irrigation imposed a human order on nature. But the floods could sweep them all away, and sea monsters (crocodiles) could emerge from the deep to devour the unwitting farmer. Ancient archetypes are to be found in these biblical texts. The dragon in Revelation 12 and its servant, the “monster from the sea” in Revelation 13, are 1C Christian expressions of the same primal mythology.

    In this week’s Gospel, the created order is imagined as coming apart prior to the arrival of the Son of Man. This is an ancient expression of the eternal human wish for order and predictability. That deep desire for order allowed the Nazis to take power in a Germany weakened by its defeat in World War One and devastated by economic distress. The current “war on terror” may be playing into some of the same ancient dreams of a savior/ruler who could eradicate chaos and guarantee the regular cycles of “normal life.”

    Although Jesus does not seem to have invoked these mythological themes in his own prophetic role as the child of Wisdom/Sophia, his followers soon reverted to traditional apocalyptic categories to celebrate his significance for them and to quieten their own deep-seated fears. In early Christian apocalyptic texts, the Christ figure always takes on the role of the conquering hero who saves God’s people. In most other respects, Christian apocalypses are indistinguishable from their Jewish antecedents.

    In the Synoptic Apocalyptic Discourse, the image of “a son of Man” (ie, one in human form) from Daniel 7 has now been reinterpreted as a specific individual coming from God to rescue the elect, rather than as a positive metaphor for the covenant people in contrast to the monstrous beasts that emerge from the sea and were used as symbols for Israel’s imperial oppressors:

    • Dan 7:4 – lion with eagle’s wings (Babylon)
    • Dan 7:5 – bear (Medes)
    • Dan 7:6 – leopard (Persia)
    • Dan 7:7 – ten horned monster (Alexander and the Greeks)
    • Dan 7:13 – human-like figure (Michael=Israel)

    The original referent of the one like a human being in Dan 7:13 was probably Michael, an Archangel once thought to have special responsibilities to protect the people of God (see also Dan 12:1 and his similar role on Rev 12:7-9). In Daniel 7, Michael represents the people of God who will receive an eternal empire. Over the 200 years or so between Daniel 7 and the earliest Christian apocalypses (see Mark 13 and parallels, Didache 16, Revelation to John, and 2 Thessalonians 2), this figure ceases to be a metaphor for the nation and becomes an heroic individual sent from heaven to rescue God’s people. We can trace something of this transformation in the earlier layers of 1 Enoch, a book long revered by the Ethiopian church but now known to have been influential in Jewish circles such as the Qumran community.

    These ancient apocalyptic texts reflect the best historical and scientific knowledge of their time. While often understood as the literature of the marginalized, their authors must have been well educated. They had both the skills and the time needed for literary efforts, and their writings sometimes drew on current descriptions of the physical universe as well as historical archives.

    The ancient imagery of a collapsing cosmic infrastructure no longer speaks to us, but we can still ask what ways of speaking about justice and hope do speak to the contemporary person? How do we “sing the Lord’s song” in this strange 21C world in which we find ourselves? What does faithfulness mean for us — here and now?

     

     

    Jesus Database

    • 002 Jesus Apocalyptic Return: (1) 1 Thess 4:13-18; (2) Did. 16:6-8; (3) Matt 24:30a; (4) Mark 13:24-27 = Matt 24:29,30b-31 = Luke 21:25-28; (5a) Rev 1:7; (5b) Rev 1:13; (5c) Rev 14:14; (6) John 19:37.
    • 007 Of Davids Lineage: (1a) Rom 1:3; (1b) 2 Tim 2:8; (2) Matt 2:1-12; (3) Luke 2:1-20; (4) John 7:41-42; (5a) Ign. Smyrn. 1:1a; (5b) Ign. Eph. 18:2c; (5c) Ign. Trall. 9:1a.
    • 188 The Unknown Time: (1a) Mark 13:33-37; (1b) Matt 24:42; (1c) Matt 25:13; (2) Luke 12:35-38; (3) Luke 21:34-36; (4) Did. 16:1.
    • 265 Within this Generation: (1) Mark 13:28-32 = Matt 24:32-36 = Luke 21:29-33.

     

     

    Liturgies and Prayers

    For liturgies and sermons each week, shaped by a progressive theology, check Rex Hunt’s web site. See also:

    • Advent Wreath – a liturgy for the Advent Wreath on Australian themes and prepared by Rex Hunt, Canberra (Australia)

    Other recommended sites include:

     

    Music Suggestions

    See David MacGregor’s Together to Celebrate site for recommendations from a variety of contemporary genre.

  • Pentecost 26B (Reign of Christ) (25 November 2012)

    Contents

    Lectionary

    • 2Samuel 23:1-7 and Psalm 132:1-12, (13-18) (or Daniel 7:9-10, 13-14 & Psalm 93)
    • Revelation 1:4b-8
    • John 18:33-37

     

    What kind of kingdom? What kind of king?

    At this time of the year the lectionaries invite us to explore and reflect upon the theme of Jesus and the kingdom of God. It is sometimes taken for granted that the Bible has a well-developed and consistent idea about the kingdom of God, and that this theme which was so central in the teachings of Jesus has its roots in the Hebrew Bible or Old Testament.

    First Reading: A davidic model?

    The NT theme of “kingdom of God” can also get tangled up with the ancient Jewish idea of a Davidic messiah, a royal prince descended from the line of David and coming at the end of time to rescue God’s people.

    This week’s readings provide several strands that come from this rich theological thread:

    • 2Sam 23:1-7 (RCL first reading) extols David as “the anointed (Messiah) of God” and someone who rules over the people justly.
    • Its companion text, Psalm 132, celebrates the memory of David as the faithful servant of Yahweh, who promises David that he will always have a son ruling over God’s people from Jerusalem.
    • The first reading for ECUSA and RC lectionaries (Daniel 7:9-10,13-14) is an apocalyptic vision narrative in which the seer has access to the divine court above the sky. God (“the Ancient One”) takes his seat on a throne of fire as thousands of spiritual courtiers stand in attendance. The people of God are imagined as a figure in human form (unlike the monstrous beasts representing the non-Jewish empires in earlier verses of Dan 7) who comes into the very presence of God, riding on the clouds like some ancient deity, to receive “dominion and glory and kingship” in an empire that will never fade or decline. This is clearly a dream of future greatness for the people as a whole (not as individuals) and on a scale that no human empire has ever been able to achieve and sustain. The kingdom, however, is the empire of God’s covenant people, not the empire or commonwealth of God that Jesus proclaimed.
    • The psalm chosen as a reflection on that reading (Psalm 93) celebrates the kingship of God, not the great human empire of God’s people in Daniel 7. This slippage between human empire and the kingdom of God tends to confuse our grasp of the biblical traditions, and to blend separate strands into a single undifferentiated — and unbiblical — hybrid.

    Second Reading: The true witness

    All three major Western lectionaries draw on the Apocalypse of John for the second reading. Here — in the imagination of an early Christian visionary — Jesus has taken the place of God as the one seated on the throne. The titles ascribed to Jesus tell us a great deal about how some 1C Christians understood Jesus: the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth. Notice how that triple set of titles relates to the liturgical acclamation so widely used in contemporary liturgies:

    the faithful witness
    = Christ has died
    = historical Jesus, a Jewish radical religious figure executed by Rome

    the firstborn of the dead
    = Christ is risen
    = Jesus as “risen Lord,” a continuing presence in Christian experience

    the ruler of the kings of the earth
    = Christ will come again
    = Jesus as agent of divine judgment on the “powers that be”

    In this Christian re-interpretation of the symbols and themes from Daniel 7, we find that the concept of a collective empire for God’s holy ones survives in the idea that Christians have been created as a kingdom of priests who serve the God of Jesus. In a neat reversal of the “one in human form” who traveled to God on the clouds in Daniel 7, Jesus is now expected to travel on the clouds as he comes from God to judge the nations.

     

    Gospel Reading: A different kind of kingdom

    John 18 provides the classic scene in which Pilate asks Jesus, “Are you the Jewish king?” Jesus’ reply, as imagined by the writer of John’s Gospel, is to claim a realm that is of a different order of reality than either Roman empire or Jewish commonwealth:

    My kingdom is not from this world.
    If my kingdom were from this world,
    my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews.
    But as it is, my kingdom is not from here. …
    For this I was born, and for this I came into the world,
    to testify to the truth.
    Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.

     

    Kingdom of God?

    The phrase “kingdom of God” or “kingdom of heaven” is a hallmark of Jesus’ teachings in the Gospels, but (surprisingly to many people) is not found in the Old Testament. We get close to the idea of an eschatological “kingdom of God” in the late post-exilic texts. (Zechariah 14:9 reads, “And the Lord will become king over all the earth; on that day the Lord will be one and his name one.”) While ancient rabbinic texts interpreted this verse as a reference to the inauguration of God’s kingdom, the precise phrase is not found here — or anywhere else in the Hebrew Bible.

    Yahweh, the God of ancient Israel, is often described as a king. Psalm 93 is a good example of that practice. It also seems likely that in many of the new year festival, Yahweh was acclaimed as king with the refrain, “Yahweh reigns!” There are also some references to the people of Israel as the nation over whom God rules. The prophetic resistance to monarchy may reflect ancient religious traditions that could not accept a human ruler having such divine prerogatives.

    In “DOING and UNDOING the WORD: Jesus and the Dialectics of Christology.” [Forum 3.2 (Fall 2000) 321-56], Mahlon Smith comments on the role of divine kingship in ancient Israel:

    (3) Autocracy vs. autonomy. The basic connotation of the concept of basileia (“kingdom”) is the office and authority of a basileus (“king”): i.e., one who is in absolute control of a particular social situation. No imperium extends any further than its emperor’s ability “to command” (imperare). That is why nations in antiquity had no recognized fixed territorial boundaries. Anyone who exercised enough autonomous authority could at any time challenge the autocratic claims of the strongest of kings and establish his (or, at least in a few cases, her) own “kingdom.” It made no sense in antiquity for someone to recognize a “kingdom” where someone was not currently in control. Thus, ancient Israelites could maintain their independence from domination by human despots only by insisting that their “god” — the power that set them free of domination by other humans — was still the real “king” even in situations where others temporarily asserted suzerainty. The prophetic “visions” of the majesty of YHWH enthroned on high were formulated for specific political situations in which foreign tyrants — Assyria’s Tiglath-Pilesar in the case of Isaiah; Babylon’s Nebuchadrezzar in the case of Ezekiel — threatened to compromise or crush Jewish cultural and political independence. Current affairs might not provide visible evidence of YHWH’s dominion. But even for the most devout Yahwist, a “god” whose current “kingdom” was only in heaven would be neither really King nor truly God. YHWH’s “kingdom” was still effective on earth, incarnate in anyone who maintained a fifth column resistance to the autocratic claims of current tyrants who tried to enslave the Jewish spirit and make Jews abandon or forget their ideal of freedom.

    The empire of God?

    The Jesus Seminar has generated some controversy as a result of its decision to translate basileia tou theou (“kingdom of God”) as “God’s imperial rule” or the “empire of God.” That controversy is not a bad thing if it provokes people to think beyond the familiar English expression in search of its original meaning for both Jesus and his listeners.

    Darryl Schmidt, a key member of the translation team for the Jesus Seminar publications, describes the challenge posed by this central theological term:

    Among the phrases most crucial to Mark’s narrative, none is more central, yet hotly debated, than Jesus’ use of “the basileia of God.” This expression encompasses the activity of God as sovereign ruler, the sphere over which God rules, and the nature of the “rulership” that characterizes all of that. It involves various aspects of “empire,” “sovereignty,” “rule,” “reign,” “domain,” and “kingship.”

    … The challenge for translators is to find a way to capture these various dimensions in a set of related expressions in English capable of functioning at several levels. … basileia must be translated differently according to its narrative context. When the image is a realm to enter or belong to, “God’s domain” is used: “It is better for you to enter God’s domain one-eyed than to be thrown into Gehenna with both eyes” (9:47); “You are far from God’s domain” (12:34). When the focus is the exercise of God’s sovereignty, “God’s imperial rule” was chosen: “God’s imperial rule is closing in” (1:15); “Some of those standing here won’t ever taste death before they see God’s imperial rule set in with power!” (9:1). When basileia is not related to “God,” other translations are “government” (3:24), “kingdom” (11:10), and “empire” (13:8). [The Gospel of Mark. 1990:33f]

     

    A kingdom of nobodies?

    The immediate social and political reality in which Jesus made such distinctive use of basileia to theou was the all-pervasive presence of the Roman imperium or, in Greek, basileia. The basileia of God that featured in the parables and aphorisms was not a time-honored religious metaphor, but a self-conscious alternative social reality to the Roman Empire.

    This divine commonwealth was both a counter image and a parody of the harsh realities of everyday life in the Roman world.

    In the essay cited earlier, Mahlon Smith adds to our appreciation of the subversive quality of the basileia in Jesus’ preaching. Smith has described the divine commonwealth as a “kingless kingdom,” a “beggars’ opera” and an “unsupervised kindergarten” in which there are no carers on duty:

    (1) Kingless kingdom. The language of hierarchy and social subservience is part of the baggage that Jesus inherited from a cultural environment that he, like any other historical individual, neither invented nor chose. Absolute rulers called “king,” “emperor” or a wide range of other titles that expressed the idea of totalitarian control were an accepted political fact of life in the ancient Near East. The rule — not just the reign — of kings was the rule rather than the exception. Emerging within that world early Israel had established a constitution that was a noble social experiment: a society with no single human ruler. Israelites’ independence from subjugation to surrounding kingdoms was to be guaranteed by the principle that they recognize no one as “lord” except the power that had liberated them from servitude to Egypt, an empire which — in legend at least — had been a model of totalitarian power with a king who was worshipped as a divine incarnation. Early Israel’s dialectical resistance to such a social system was embedded in refusal to represent its “god” in the form of any human or other creature. Instead of an idol, the artifact originally at the center of its worship represented an empty throne. While neither that social experiment nor Israelite independence was eventually able to withstand external or internal pressures, regular ritual reminders imbedded in the minds of at least some Israelites an idealized memory of a system in which there was no king, no master, no lord except that invisible power, or “god,” that liberates people from subjection to any social hierarchy. Jesus’ pronouncements about God’s kingdom being the property of paupers (ptóchoi) and pre-schoolers (paidia) presuppose precisely such a social system.

    (2) Beggars opera. To call ptóchoi (lit. “beggars”) “fortunate” (makarios) is an absolute contradiction in terms in a world where at least some are wealthy. But the obverse side of that makarism is Jesus’ pronouncement that a camel can squeeze through a needle’s eye more easily than a wealthy person can get into God’s “kingdom” (basileia). Crossan has called this a “kingdom of nobodies.” It is perhaps more accurately styled a society of have-nots. If the imperium of God is the treasure or precious gem that one must sell everything to possess, then only those who have literally nothing can ever hope to possess it. In a society where everyone is a beggar, no one is superior to anyone else. The only “Lord” is the benign Providence that gives every creature its daily “bread.” That is a role Jesus never claimed for himself. Rather than pose as anyone’s “lord,” Jesus identified himself with the homeless. Like them he did not even have a place to sleep, much less a throne. Still, he reminds his fellow Jewish peasants who bear the burden of imperial and temple taxes that it is their good fortune that the God of their tradition is one who frees people from slavery to wealth, yet feeds and clothes them as he does the least of the wild creatures. A world where everyone is a hobo but no one need worry where the next meal is coming from is truly a beggar’s opera. Its basic plot is that the only prince is the pauper. In such a “kingdom” everyone is equal and free; and any tramp is king of the road. Gospel narratives indicate that Jesus put this way of life into practice. So, historically speaking, the only people who would be in an appropriate social position to call him “lord” would be those few who, barefoot, penniless, and without provisions abandon(ed) all their property to follow his lead. Anyone who imagines him to display a different persona after Easter — one with royal possessions and power — is (or was) worshipping a different Jesus, an unhistorical hypostasis.

    (4) Unsupervised kindergarten. Born into a world where Israelite ideals were difficult to maintain in the face of the pervasiveness of Greek culture and Roman military and economic imperialism, any Jew other than Jesus might have mimicked and elaborated the ancient prophetic descriptions of YHWH’s hierarchical heavenly domain. And several did. But there is no reliable evidence that the historical Jesus chose this tack. Rather, he paradoxically depicted God’s basileia as the possession of paidia — i.e., children under the age of seven – and insisted that only those who mimicked paidia had access to it. Preachers and theologians have long romanticized or allegorized this pronouncement. But no one who has ever lived with a child in this age bracket or tried to teach kindergarten could honestly maintain that what Jesus really meant was that people should be innocent or absolutely dependent or obedient or display unqualified trust. If there is anything a pre-schooler, whatever its culture, is not, it is all of the above. So, if Jesus meant any of these, he chose the wrong metaphor. Pre-schoolers are notoriously and innately independent- minded and hard to control. That is precisely why classic pedagogy stressed the need for strict discipline. But Jesus’ pronouncement leaves no space in God’s basileia for any pedagogue other than the benign Papa (Abba) who provides his offspring’s daily nourishment and tolerates the bad along with the good. Instead of depicting this Parent as a strict disciplinarian dedicated to reforming his children, Jesus portrayed him as one who celebrates the homecoming of the wayward child who had lost everything he had given him. Jesus, for his part, did not volunteer to act as supervisor of such urchins. Instead of posing as a teacher, Jesus thanked his Abba for revealing to infants (népia) — i.e., children who are not ready for any instruction — what sages per se cannot see. Infants are not passive subjects; they demand attention and do what they — not any parents — want. So, if the synoptic anecdote that portrays Jesus as identifying himself as a paidion is a Markan fiction, at least it is what R. W. Funk terms a “true fiction”: a story that accurately illustrates the logic and attitude of Jesus himself. The historical Jesus was a Jewish Peter Pan, who warned his fellow homeless “boys” (and “girls”?) against acting like educated — supposedly grown-up — scholars who seek personal recognition and vie for places of honor for themselves. Thus, the only people who were (or are) in an appropriate position to proclaim Jesus as their “master” (kyrios) and themselves as his “students” (mathétai) would be those who follow(ed) his example of childish autonomy, even if that meant defying parents and older siblings and defaulting on the most basic honor children owe their natural fathers: a decent burial. Crossan is certainly correct, therefore, to characterize Jesus as a “rebel with a cause.” For, far from demanding that others recognize him as their master, Jesus encouraged youngsters to assert their own autonomy vis-à-vis even domestic autocratic hierarchy. He did not offer to save them from the consequences.

     

    Jesus Database

     

    Liturgies and Prayers

    For liturgies and sermons each week, shaped by a progressive theology, check Rex Hunt’s web site

    Other recommended sites include:

     

    Music Suggestions

    See David MacGregor’s Together to Celebrate site for recommendations from a variety of contemporary genre.

  • Pentecost 25B (18 November 2012)

    Contents

    Lectionary

    • 1Samuel 1:4-20 and 1Samuel 2:1-10
    • Heb. 10:11-14, (15-18), 19-25
    • Mark 13:1-8

     

    First Reading: Birth of Samuel

    The RCL turns to 1Samuel for its reading from the Hebrew Bible this week, and that is a natural sequel to the last couple of Sundays with their focus on Ruth.

    Samuel is the dominant figure in the first of the books that now bear his name, even appearing from the other side of the grave to deliver his final condemnation of King Saul (1Sam 28). This birth narrative features several puns on the name of Israel’s first king, since sha’ul is the Hebrew word for ask or petition:

    • 1:17 – “Go in peace, the LORD has heard the sha’ul you have made to him …”
    • 1:20 – She named him Samuel (God hears), for she said, “I have asked (sha’al) him of the LORD.”
    • 1:27 “… the LORD has granted me the sha’ul that I made to him …”
    • 1:28 “… I have lent (sha’ul) him to the LORD; as long as he lives, he is sha’ul to the LORD.”

    The presence of such a strong theme within the text has led some scholars to ask whether this may originally have been the birth story of Saul, rather than Samuel.

    Apart from providing a suitably auspicious birth narrative for Samuel, the tale also serves to introduce the Song of Hannah which is used as this week’s Psalm and may have been the model for Luke when he composed the Magnificat, or Song of Mary (Luke 1:46-55).

    These songs both express an eschatological perspective, although it is most likely that neither is explicitly “apocalyptic” in tone. Still, they affirm a vision of hope and the expectation that God would act to bring justice to the people.

     

    Daniel 12

    The book of Daniel is a key apocalyptic text within the Hebrew Bible, and it was a book that continued to grow as time passed. We know from the additions found in the Greek versions of Daniel that this archetypal man of faith, who could serve as such a positive role model for the young scribes that studied the book as part of their own training, continued to attract new episodes in which his wisdom and faithfulness were celebrated.

    Daniel seems to have been a legendary figure in the West Semitic cultural tradition, as he features in the texts from Ugarit from before the time of the Exodus as well as getting a passing mention (along with Noah and Job) in Ezekiel:

    even if Noah, Daniel, and Job, these three, were in it,
    they would save only their own lives by their righteousness, says the Lord God. [Ezek 14:14]

    The text is well chosen as a preparation for this week’s Gospel as it represents an earlier version of a similar tradition. Several classic literary features of an apocalyptic text are to be seen here:

    • Michael, the archangel, will be the savior of God’s people
    • unparalleled troubles just before the End
    • timely deliverance of the faithful
    • a book of life with the names of the faithful recorded
    • resurrection of those who sleep in the dust of the earth
    • final judgment leading to bliss or punishment
    • unsuccessful attempts to calculate the timing of the End

     

    Second Reading: Jesus the eternal high priest in Hebrews

    The extended metaphor of Jesus as a priest continues this week, but it seems best to focus on the apocalyptic and eschatological themes that will be so prominent between now and Christmas.

    Gospel: Jesus’ apocalyptic discourse

    The major western lectionaries all draw upon Mark 13 for this week’s Gospel:

    • 13:1-8 = RCL
    • 13:14-23 = ECUSA
    • 13:24-32 = RC

    This interest in eschatological themes alerts us to the proximity of Advent, with its focus on the One who comes and the associated themes of judgment and salvation.

    All of these excerpts are from a discourse on eschatological themes that Mark attributes to Jesus, and which both Matthew and Luke retain with some amendments (see Matthew 24 and Luke 21).

    There has been considerable debate among scholars concerning Jesus’ relationship to the well-attested apocalyptic eschatology of Second Temple Judaism. Some definitions may be helpful as we consider these issues:

    • eschatology is theology with a focus on the “last things” (Gk: eschaton = end) and deals with doctrines about the end of the world, judgment, afterlife, etc. Essentially, eschatology introduces a sense of meaning by reference to the goal or purpose of life, and there is no need to suppose a significant delay between the present time and the inauguration of God’s reign (a.k.a., “the kingdom of God”).
    • apocalyptic eschatology is a common variant of “endtime theology” and its particular hallmark is the assumption that the anticipated future golden age will only arrive after a cataclysmic intervention by God to punish the evil and to vindicate the faithful. Apocalyptic preachers and their writings are typically concerned to stress the extreme evil of the present world in contrast to the idyllic conditions of the world to come. That information usually rests upon some special revelation conveyed to the seer by God through the agency of a vision, or an angelic visitation.

    John the Baptist is widely recognized as a 1C Jewish apocalyptic prophet, but it is not clear whether Jesus belongs in that tradition, or more in the tradition of the sages and miracle-workers of ancient Judaism.

    While the majority view among NT scholars seems to be that Jesus was an apocalyptic prophet, the Jesus Seminar has adopted a dissenting opinion.

    Whether or not Jesus himself was an apocalyptic prophet, the most influential interpreters of Jesus certainly were, foremost among them Paul and Mark. As a result, the Gospel of Mark attributes to Jesus the classic early discourse on the end of the world now found in Mark 13 and parallels:

    13:1-2 Temple’s doom
    13:3-8 The last days
    13:9-13 Trials and persecutions for the faithful
    13:14-20 The desolating sacrilege
    13:21-23 Confusion over the Messiah’s appearance
    13:24-27 The coming of the Son of Man
    13:28-32 This generation will see it all
    13:33-37 Appeal to stay alert

    The point of such apocalyptic traditions (including the Book of Revelation) was to encourage the faithful in the face of persecution, not to publish a theological puzzle to confuse and alarm readers. The apocalyptic writings explain the present chaos and lawlessness of human society while assuring the faithful that God will act on their behalf in good time.

    Long after apocalyptic had settled into a domesticated role within Christian theology, the association of Jesus with the prophecies of the end time can be seen even in the Muslim traditions about him:

    /71/ The disciples said, “Christ of God, look at the house of God—how beautiful it is!” He replied, “Amen, Amen, Truly I say to you, God will not leave one stone of this mosque upon another but will destroy it utterly because of the sins of its people. God does nothing with gold, silver, or these stones. More dear to God than all these are the pure in heart. Through them, God builds up the earth, or else destroys it if these hearts are other than pure. (mid-ninth century CE) [Tarif Khalidi, The Muslim Jesus, p. 91]

     

    Jesus Database

    • 002 Jesus Apocalyptic Return: (1) 1 Thess 4:13-18; (2) Did. 16:6-8; (3) Matt 24:30a; (4) Mark 13:24-27 = Matt 24:29,30b-31 = Luke 21:25-28; (5a) Rev 1:7; (5b) Rev 1:13; (5c) Rev 14:14; (6) John 19:37.
    • 008 When and Where: (1a) Gos. Thom. 3:1 & P. Oxy. 654.3:1; (1b) Gos. Thom. 51; (1c) Gos. Thom. 113; (2) 2Q: Luke 17:23 = Matt 24:26; (3) Mark 13:21-23 = Matt 24:23-25; (4?) Dial. Sav. 16; (5) 1Q?: Luke 17:20-21.
    • 049 Temple and Jesus: (1) Gos. Thom. 71; (2a) Mark 14:55-59 = Matt 26:59-61; (2b) Mark 15:29-32a = Matt 27:39-43 =(!) Luke 23:35-37; (2c) Acts 6:11-14; (3) John 2:18-22.
    • 062 Spirit under Trial: (1) 1Q: Luke 12:11-12 = Matt 10:19-20; (2) Mark 13:11 = Matt 10: 19-20 = Luke 21:14-15; (3) John 14:26.
    • 064 The Last Days: (1) Did. 16:3-5; (2) Matt 24:10-12; (3a) Mark 13:3-10,12-20 = Matt 24:3-22 = Luke 21:7-13,16-24; (3b) Matt 10:17-18; (3c) Luke 17:31-32.
    • 265 Within this Generation: (1) Mark 13:28-32 = Matt 24:32-36 = Luke 21:29-33.

     

    Liturgies and Prayers

    For liturgies and sermons each week, shaped by a progressive theology, check Rex Hunt’s web site

    Other recommended sites include:

     

    Music Suggestions

    See David MacGregor’s Together to Celebrate site for recommendations from a variety of contemporary genre.

  • Pentecost 24B (11 November 2012)

    Contents

    Lectionary

    • Ruth 3:1-5; 4:13-17 and Psalm 127 (or 1Kings 17:8-16 & Psalm 146)
    • Hebrews 9:24-28
    • Mark 12:38-44

     

    First Reading: Ruth and Boaz

    The two excerpts from Ruth that serve as the first reading in the RCL, provide the book ends for this critical part of the story:

    3:1-5 Naomi instructs Ruth how to secure her future with Boaz
    3:6-15 Ruth spends the night with Boaz
    3:16-18 Ruth reports the events of the night to Naomi
    4:1-6 Boaz negotiates for the right to marry Ruth
    4:7-12 Boaz gains the legal responsibility for Ruth as a childless kinswoman
    4:13-17 Boaz marries Ruth
    4:18-22 Davidic genealogy

    This story reflects ancient customs, some of them no longer practiced at the time the account was composed:

    • matters of inheritance, marriage and other social obligations were settled in open discussion with the elders of the community (cf: Exod 3:16; Deut 19:12; 22:15; 25:7; Josh 24;1; 1Sam 16:4) “seated at the gates of the city” (cf: Deut 21:19f; 22:15; 25:7; Josh 20:4; Isa 29:21; Amos 5:15)
    • the selection of 10 elders reflects traditions that a synagogue required 10 adult males, as the letters of the Hebrew word for congregation (qahal) have a numerical value of ten
    • symbolic use of dusty sandals as a public shaming ritual (cf: the words of Jesus in Mark 6:7-13, and in recent events in the Middle East with the treatment of a fallen statue of Sadam Hussein by residents of Baghdad and the throwing of a shoe at the then US President George W Bush by an Iraqi journalist)

    The traditions preserved in Deut 25:5-10 provides the legal basis for this transaction:

    When brothers reside together, and one of them dies and has no son, the wife of the deceased shall not be married outside the family to a stranger. Her husband’s brother shall go in to her, taking her in marriage, and performing the duty of a husband’s brother to her, and the firstborn whom she bears shall succeed to the name of the deceased brother, so that his name may not be blotted out of Israel. But if the man has no desire to marry his brother’s widow, then his brother’s widow shall go up to the elders at the gate and say, “My husband’s brother refuses to perpetuate his brother’s name in Israel; he will not perform the duty of a husband’s brother to me.” Then the elders of his town shall summon him and speak to him. If he persists, saying, “I have no desire to marry her,” then his brother’s wife shall go up to him in the presence of the elders, pull his sandal off his foot, spit in his face, and declare, “This is what is done to the man who does not build up his brother’s house.” Throughout Israel his family shall be known as “the house of him whose sandal was pulled off.”

    As neither Boaz nor the anonymous kinsman are actual brothers of Ruth’s dead husband, neither has an obligation to marry Ruth and raise up children for Mahlon.

    The legal transaction that lies at the heart of this story may be offensive to us. However, in the context of a patriarchal society, levirate marriage seems to have served as a social security safety net to provide for women who were widowed before having sons that might take possession of the family property and care for them in their own turn.

    Such a story may also prompt us to think about the inevitability of the Gospel being expressed within and through the cultural context of a given period of time, even if (like the Book of Ruth) it challenges and confronts contemporary practices and prejudices. We can never escape our cultural context to hold a timeless expression of some “pure religion.”

     

    The Widow of Zarephath

    The RC and ECUSA lectionaries both draw on the story a desperately poor widow in 1 Kings 17 for the first reading.

    This story links with the Gospel but also illustrates the plight that widows such as Naomi and Ruth typically faced in the ancient world.

    The needs of people without recognized social protection were understood within the religion of ancient Israel and Judah. The protection of widows and orphans, along with the resident alien and the poor, was considered to be the particular concern of Israel’s God. The prophetic tradition within ancient Israelite religion kept alive the vision of a just society in which the most vulnerable were protected.

    In the Epilogue to his massive study, The Birth of Christianity, John Dominic Crossan cites Psalm 82 as “the single most important text in the entire Christian Bible” while noting that “it comes, of course, from the Jewish Bible.”

    God has taken his place in the divine council;
    in the midst of the gods he holds judgment:
    “How long will you judge unjustly
    and show partiality to the wicked?
    Give justice to the weak and the orphan;
    maintain the right of the lowly and the destitute.
    Rescue the weak and the needy;
    deliver them from the hand of the wicked.”

    They have neither knowledge nor understanding,
    they walk around in darkness;
    all the foundations of the earth are shaken.

    I say, “You are gods,
    children of the Most High, all of you;
    nevertheless, you shall die like mortals,
    and fall like any prince.”

    Rise up, O God, judge the earth;
    for all the nations belong to you!

    Crossan comments:

    … that short psalm best summarizes for me the character of the Jewish God as Lord of all the world. It imagines a mythological scene in which God sits among the gods and goddesses in divine council. Those pagan gods and goddesses are all dethroned not just because they are pagan, nor because they are other, nor because they are competition. They are dethroned for injustice, for divine malpractice, for transcendental malfeasance in office. They are rejected because they do not demand and effect justice among the peoples of the earth. And that justice is spelled out as protecting the poor from the rich, protecting the systematically weak from the systematically powerful. Such injustice creates darkness over the earth and shakes the very foundations of the world. (Birth of Christianity, p. 575)

     

    Second Reading: Jesus – eternal priest in an otherworldly temple

    The lectionaries all converge for the second reading as they continue the current series of readings from Hebrews.

    In a passage such as this we can observe Christian theology in the process of being developed under the impetus of a powerful metaphor. Despite Jesus’ own antipathy to the Temple and to its functionaries, this community of first-century Christians is actively developing a priestly (re-)interpretation of Jesus using categories drawn from the Jewish cult.

    The significance of Jesus’ death is being understood in sacrificial terms, as with Paul in a passage such as Romans 3:21-26. However, unlike Paul, this writer opts to imagine Jesus as the priest rather than simply as the victim. here we see the origins of the priest-victim metaphor that was to prove so powerful in later theology.

    Some Christian traditions continue to find such imagery meaningful, but for others the image is too far removed from present experience. The very idea of sacrifice to appease God and secure some divine blessing seems inadequate, if not offensive.

    Gospel: The widow’s gift

    This week’s Gospel for all three major Western lectionaries features the story of Jesus observing a poor widow making her offering at the temple, and commending her gift above the large donations made by the powerful and wealthy (Mark 12:41-44).

    Such a story really does embody the core Kingdom values that Jesus himself taught and practiced. It challenges our (sometimes hollow?) affirmations of a value system that places the worth of persons above any calculation of the contribution they are able to make toward our shared projects. We say that the thought counts more than the gift, but do we practice that set of values?

    One of the places in the life of Church where such a Kingdom dynamic is still celebrated is the Baptism of an infant. In the church as in life generally, a baby calls forth from us the very best of the human spirit. We do not look to an infant to provide us with anything, to contribute to our pet projects, or even to attend to us. We lay no expectations upon them and we appreciate them simply for being who they are.

    The story of the widow’s gift is a simple story that celebrates that kind of uncomplicated devotion to God.

    Samuel Lachs (Rabbinic Commentary on the New Testament, 375) offers some Jewish perspectives on this story:

    The importance of this passage is best summed up in the rabbinic saying,
    “It does not matter whether your offering be much or little,
    so long as your heart is directed to Heaven.” [M.Men. 13:11]

    There is a story of a woman who brought a handful of meal as an offering. A priest despised it and said, “See what they offer! What is in it that one could eat, and what is in it that can be sacrificed?” It was shown to him in a dream., “Do not despise her; it is as if she has sacrificed herself [Heb. nafshah] as the sacrifice.” If in regard to one who does not sacrifice himself, the text uses nefesh [soul], how much more of one who does! [Lev. R. 3:5]

    What is the peculiarity of the meal offering that nefesh is used [Lev 2.1]? Who brings the meal offering? The poor. ‘I reckon it,” says God, “as if he has offered himself before ME.” [Yal. Lev. 447]

    God prefers the one handful of a free-will offering of the poor to the heap of incense which is offered by the high priest.” [Koh. R. 4:6]

    It can be helpful for Christians to recognize and appreciate the convergence of Jewish and Christian piety here, and especially in view of the negative stereotyping of Jewish religious leaders (“the scribes”) in verses 28-40.

    Jesus Database

     

    Liturgies and Prayers

    For liturgies and sermons each week, shaped by a progressive theology, check Rex Hunt’s web site.

    Other recommended sites include:
    * Iona Community
    * Laughing Bird
    * The Text This Week

    Music Suggestions

    See David MacGregor’s Together to Celebrate site for recommendations from a variety of contemporary genre.

  • All Saints and All Souls

    Following a request as to whether I have any lectionary materials for All Saints and All Souls, which many parishes will observe next Sunday, I have gone back to check my files.

    There were no lectionary notes, as such, but I did find my sermon from Sunday, November 2, 2003. While it seems not to be on the FAITHFUTURES web site any more, it no doubt still exists somewhere in the Internet Archive with the delightful name, The Way Back Machine.

    That sermon—and the related open letter to a critic within the Anglican Diocese of Brisbane—reflects the tensions then threatening to pull the Anglican communion apart. Those tensions remain with us, as does the possibility of fragmentation and schism—as well as the Spirit’s call to embrace “a more excellent way.”

    Given the way that my 2003 sermon sought to engage with the festival of All Saints in that context, and the continued tensions within the Anglican communion, I am posting a slightly edited version of the sermon here. It has been edited to remove those elements that were so topical to the occasion almost 10 years ago as to be unhelpful for readers now.

    It is also important to note that some years after this sermon, I received a gracious letter of reconciliation from the priest who had called on me to resign in the heat of the conflict in 2003.

    Called to Holiness in Community:
    A sermon for All Saints & All Souls

    We are called by Christ into a communal relationship with the Sacred Mystery known to us as the Holy Community of the Trinity.

    Introduction

    If you have had an opportunity to scan the latest issue of FOCUS, the monthly newspaper from the Anglican Diocese of Brisbane, you will see that it reflects the current struggles going on within the Anglican Communion around the world and right here in this Diocese.

    I often find FOCUS almost impossible to read. The content, and more especially the tone of sections such as Letters to the Editor, are just so foreign to my understanding of faith and discipleship. Of course, were those things more to my liking, others would find the paper just as unpalatable to them!

    As it happens, this month there are a number of items that express anger and shock following the visit of Bishop John Shelby Spong to Brisbane at the beginning of October. Not only is the bishop accused of heresy, but those clergy in the Diocese who share his views or supported his visit are told to get out of the Anglican Church as we do not belong.

    I say “we” advisedly since I was one of the principal organisers of Bishop Spong’s visit to Brisbane, and have worked closely with him over the past 5 or 6 years. I was delighted to host his visit to Toowoomba in 1997, to chair the public lecture that he gave in Brisbane in 2001 and to host him here in this very Chapel just 4 weeks ago.

    It is not my intention to resign as invited to do in this Letter to the Editor, and I have published an Open Letter in which I respond to his letter.

    Instead, what I am hoping we can do is use the opportunity provided by today’s celebration of All Saints and All Souls to reflect on the faith issues posed by theological diversity within our Church. Then, at the SOJOURNERS gathering on Tuesday evening, I hope we can discuss the Letters to the Editor along with my response in the Open Letter and this sermon.

    So this is a time for heavy lifting as we put our minds and our hearts around the question of how best to be faithful to the God who calls us into holiness within community: the community of All Saints, the community of All Souls, and the community of this congregation gathered around the Table of Jesus here today.

    REALITY CHECK: A CHURCH DIVIDED

    It was once said that Anglicans did not believe anything. We were sometimes characterised as a Church of convenience, a place to worship and live as a Christian without getting embroiled in arguments about religion.

    Now it almost seems that we hear too much of what Anglicans believe. Or at least, we have heard of what some Anglicans believe, while also hearing of what other Anglicans believe, and still more about the views of Anglicans in Canada, or New Hampshire, or wherever.

    Suddenly it is all too clear that Anglicans believe lots of things and that not all the things claimed as Anglican are accepted by other Anglicans.

    Of course it has always been so, but we have been less aware of it during some periods of our history. In the past we have hounded and persecuted people for views that differed from those holding sway in the Church at the particular time, sometimes with the one person going through successive periods of favour, disapproval and rehabilitation.

    The reality is that the historical roots of the Anglican Church make it impossible for us to be a Church with a single ideology; that is, unless we have the theological equivalent of genocide and suppress those tribes that are different from our own (which ever ours happens to be).

    At the time when Europe was ravaged by the upheavals of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation, England chose to hold competing theological viewpoints in the one national church. Papists and reformers were required by force of royal decree to find ways to work together, and those unable to do so were excluded and suppressed. Good people of conscience from both Catholic and Protestant traditions were exiled, jailed and killed by the Anglican Church and the English Parliament.

    That is part of our history, and we do not honour the true Saints and brave Souls of all persuasions if we pretend it to have been otherwise.

    Today we again find ourselves staring down the abyss of seemingly intractable divisions within the Church that we all love, and sometimes love to hate:

    • traditional conservatives and revisionist progressives struggle for soul of the Church
    • ordination of women, as especially their ministry as Bishops
    • lay presidency at the Eucharist
    • affirmation of gay and lesbian persons
    • today the consecration of the first (openly) gay bishop
    • threats to sever communion between dioceses and provinces

    We are a church divided. Some of us at least think that there are matters of substance here that are worth passionate debate and struggle. At least we shall not die of boredom!

    For good or ill, you have yourself a priest who stands unashamedly on the progressive or liberal side of each of those issues. That will please some of you, and disappoint others. The challenge is to find ways to build and nurture a faith community where we can all go deeper into that holiness in community to which God has called us in Christ.

    THE HEART OF THE CONFLICT: WHERE IS TRUTH TO BE FOUND?

    It seems to me that most of the issues over which we see Anglicans (and other Christians) taking sides are not the real cause for the conflict. The heart of the conflict lies much deeper and I believe it concerns the profoundly human question; Where is truth to be found?

    Next weekend, for example, our friends from the Uniting Church will meet in a special session of their Queensland Synod to consider whether to cut all ties with their own national Assembly over its recent decision to allow local Presbyteries to ordain homosexual persons if they wished to do so. Their pain gives no joy to us, whatever our personal view of the issues. We pray for them and we hurt with them.

    Within the present “God Wars” raging across the Christian denominations, I think I can discern some constant themes.

    One of the themes is associated with the more traditional or conservative side of the debates.

    Conservative Anglicans—like conservative Catholics or conservative Evangelicals—tend towards a literal interpretation of the Christian tradition. This does not mean they are biblical literalists, and people such as me must be careful not to categorise them as “fundamentalist.”

    While such people can accept a certain amount of symbolic truth in the Bible and in the Church’s Tradition, they still tend to take religious language as having some objective referent and a single meaning.

    On the more progressive or liberal side of many current debates it is possible to identify another trend.

    People such as me embrace the same Scriptures and appreciate the same ancient Tradition, as I think you will appreciate after listening to my sermons and participating in my services for the best part of a year. As Paul once said to the Corinthians, “you are my credentials.” It is the quality of your lives as disciples of Jesus that attests to my own character as a priest and pastor.

    Like the conservatives we also love the Bible, the Creeds and the Prayer Book—but we tend to treat them as metaphor. This does not mean that we do not recognise literal and historical elements in the ancient writings and traditional practices, but it does mean that we are less inclined to think of them as timeless statements of divine principles. And we are less likely to spend time defending the historical or literal truth of the Bible’s stories.

    We are more likely to see them as human constructs through which the Spirit of God continues to speak as we now go about the task of being faithful to God in our own time and place. We tend to experience religious language as an invitation to enter more deeply into the mystery of God. We find Scripture and Liturgy to have many different meanings.

    The real point of the struggle, then, is the almost unspoken issue of where truth is to be found and what it might look like when we find it.

    • Will truth be found in the written words of an ancient book?
    • Will truth be found in the beliefs and practices of people who imagined the earth as the centre of the universe, and God to live just above the clouds?
    • Will truth be limited to the pre-modern understanding of reproductive biology and human psychology?

    Or we will allow:

    • That time makes ancient truth uncouth?
    • That God who spoke in certain ways in times past now speaks in new ways?
    • That as our knowledge of the universe and human nature explodes so must our theology?
    • That the same God who we know through Jesus is known to others, and that they have no need to become like us in order to be acceptable to God?

    Those are indeed big questions.

    They frighten the horses!

    But Anglicans have a legacy of active engagement with the best of human learning, rather than a reputation as people who put tradition ahead of truth.

    A WAY FORWARD—TOGETHER

    If I am correct, then the theological fault lines running underneath our Church are such that we must learn to live with, to embrace and to exploit our diversity—and even our disagreements—for the sake of the Gospel.

    It would be brave person—or foolish, or both—who suggested a resolution to the deep and angry divisions opening up within our Church. Let me at least suggest a way forward.

    My suggestion is shaped in conscious response to this weekend’s holy days of All Saints and All Souls.

    We are not alone.

    We increasingly realise that are we intricately linked to one another and to all other living life through a staggeringly high proportion of common DNA. But we are also deeply linked to all who have gone before us, as we affirm in the line about the communion of saints in the Creed.

    As I suggested a couple of weeks back when we reflected on the Gospel account of the man with money who comes to Jesus seeking something more, the future of our holiness lies in solidarity with one another. There is no solitary path to eternal life.

    • The rich man was well set up financially. Presumably this was not an achievement entirely of his own doing. Whether he inherited the wealth or acquired it by trade, in warfare or simple good fortune of stumbling upon buried treasure, others were involved in his success.
    • He had no qualms in claiming a VHA in personal and social morality. He had kept all the Commandments since childhood! Jesus did not deny that claim. Jesus simply said, “OK, one thing more is needed.”
    • The “one thing more” was to go beyond the obligations of morality and social responsibility and give away all he owned so that could be freed to follow Jesus as a beggar. Even when reduced to nothing more than a focus on himself and Jesus, the call to holiness involved community with others called into the company of Jesus by God.

    This weekend we are reminded of our debt to those who stand with us in the community of faith. The great saints and the ordinary souls. We are one with them. Our call to holiness involves us in a relationship with them; dead or alive!

    The challenge is to build and sustain faith communities where people can be drawn more deeply into the dream that God has for each of us, and for all of us together.

    It is not our role to distinguish between tares and wheat, and to rip out the weeds we think lie before us. It is our role to be faithful in responding to God’s call upon us, whether we hear it through a literalistic view of the Bible or a metaphorical understanding of the Gospel.

    Conclusion

    On Tuesday night I hope as many of us as possible will gather to talk and pray together about these things. In the meantime, let me conclude with the words that I used in ending my Open Letter:

    So John, I am staying in this church that has ordained and licensed both you and me. The church is big enough for both of us. The questions that remains is whether our affection for one another is sufficiently generous to see beyond our different emphases.

    On this All Saints & All Souls weekend, that is one (metaphorical) interpretation of the faith we share that commends itself to me. Amen.

  • Pentecost 23B (4 November 2012)

    Contents

    Lectionary

    • Ruth 1:1-18 and Psalm 146 (or Deut 6:1-9 and Psalm 119:1-8
    • Hebrews 9:11-14
    • Mark 12:28-34

     

    First Reading: Ruth

    The Book of Ruth is one of the most attractive short stories in the Bible, and also a story that celebrates the autonomy and freedom of women even when living within a clearly patriarchal society. Naomi and Ruth are individuals who take control of the situation in which they find themselves. For the most part circumstances require them to act in the absence of their menfolk and they are the dominant characters in the story.

    Writing in the HarperCollins Bible Commentary, Adele Berlin observes:

    According to rabbinic tradition, the main theme of Ruth is chesed, loyalty or faithfulness born of a sense of caring and commitment. Chesed is a Hebrew term used to describe God’s relationship to Israel as well as the relationship among members of a family or a community. All of the main characters in the book, Naomi, Ruth, and Boaz, act with chesed. Naomi, although she technically had no responsibility for her widowed daughters-in-law, was concerned that they find new husbands; she went out of her way to see that Ruth did. Ruth, on her part, had no obligation to Naomi, but she remained steadfastly with her, even giving up her native land and religion; all of her actions were directed toward finding support and protection for Naomi. Boaz too took upon himself a commitment beyond what was required; not only was he willing to redeem the family’s land, but he was eager to marry Ruth and enable the family name to be perpetuated. God also manifested his chesed, by virtue of which the individuals are repaid for their loyalty by finding security and fulfillment, and the family that came close to destruction finds new life and continuity. (p. 262)

    In the Greek Bible and later collections influenced by the Latin Vulgate, Ruth is found between Judges and 1 Samuel. This places the story in its natural setting prior to the development of a Jewish monarchy. Indeed, Ruth is identified at the end of the book as the great-grandmother of David.

    In the Jewish Bible, Ruth is placed among the Megilloth (“Five Scrolls” – Song of Songs, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes and Esther) used as liturgical texts for various festivals. Ruth is read on the Festival of Shavuot (Pentecost).

    Within the RCL, Ruth provides the first reading this week and next.

    Ruth is also a story about inclusion of the foreigner, and may originally have been crafted as a protest against the narrow theology that developed in the time of Ezra as the post-exilic Jewish community sought to ensure its own survival by excluding those without a specified pedigree. The “foreign wives” and their children were repudiated in a mass divorce ceremony (see Ezra 9-10).

    In such a time of crisis some unknown “liberal” has penned this delightful story that celebrates the human dignity and theological virtue of a particular foreign wife, Ruth the Moabite. Ruth embodies the essential character of God (chesed, steadfast love—cf. Exod 34:6-7). In a striking protest at the theological thought police of the day, this ancient scribe notes that one of Ruth’s descendants would be none other than King David himself!

    At a time in history when so many Christians are obsessed with the issues of gender identity and human sexuality, we may do well to reflect on the story of Ruth. Like gays and lesbians in our world, women and especially foreign women, were the focus for the projected self-loathing of the theological purists in Jerusalem. No matter how many biblical and canonical authorities may be invoked in support of prejudice and fear, the biblical tradition also celebrates inclusion and tolerance. Tolerance may be a minor theme in a Bible that also endorses genocide as divine justice on the tribe’s competitors, but it is there as a “light to the nations.” Like a candle flame on a dark night, the persistent affirmation of inclusion and tolerance may not penetrate far into the surrounding darkness, but it is an important signal of the Kingdom values we see embodied in Jesus.

    When (spiritual) famine and (ecclesial) hardship compels us to find refuge and welcome beyond the traditional lands of the covenant community, we may find as Naomi did that there are beloved strangers living there who share our experience of being human and have much to offer us.

    Are we able to open our community to include those we have previously imagined as frightening and dangerous? Will we know the blessing of hearing those who were once strangers say to us, “Your people shall be my people; your God my God.”

    Deuteronomy 6 – the Shema

    Both the RC and ECUSA lectionaries use the passage from Deuteronomy 6 for the first reading.

    In doing so they present congregations with the living tradition of Judaism as the context for Jesus and also his teachings. It never hurts Christians to remember that everything Jesus said and did was as a Palestinian Jew whose understanding of God was nurtured by and expressed within Judaism.

    The Shema (named after the first word in the original Hebrew form of this prayer) continues to be a key ingredient of Jewish identity and prayer, perhaps somewhat like the Lord’s Prayer in Christian circles.

    The following passage from the Talmud illustrates how reflection on the essential Torah enriched Jewish piety:

    Six hundred and thirteen commandments were given to Moses, three hundred and sixty-five negative ones, corresponding to the days of the solar year, and two hundred forty-eight positive commandments, corresponding to the parts of man’s body…
    David came and reduced them to eleven: A Psalm of David [Psalm 15] Lord, who shall sojourn in thy tabernacle, and who shall dwell in thy holy mountain? (i) He who walks uprightly and (ii) works righteousness and (iii) speaks truth in his heart and (iv) has no slander on his tongue and (v) does no evil to his fellow and (vi) does not take up a reproach against his neighbor, (vii) in whose eyes a vile person is despised but (viii) honors those who fear the Lord. (ix) He swears to his own hurt and changes not. (x) He does not lend on interest. (xi) He does not take a bribe against the innocent,…
    Isaiah came and reduced them to six [Isaiah 33:25–26]: (i) He who walks righteously and (ii) speaks uprightly, (iii) he who despises the gain of oppressions, (iv) shakes his hand from holding bribes, (v) stops his ear from hearing of blood (vi) and shuts his eyes from looking on evil, he shall dwell on high.
    Micah came and reduced them to three [Micah 6:8]: It has been told you, man, what is good and what the Lord demands from you, (i) only to do justly, and (ii) to love mercy, and (iii) to walk humbly before God…’
     Isaiah came again and reduced them to two [Isaiah 56:1]: Thus says the Lord, (i) keep justice and (ii) do righteousness.
    Amos came and reduced them to a single one, as it is said, For thus says the Lord to the house of Israel, Seek Me and live.
    Habakkuk further came and based them on one, as it is said [Habakkuk 2:4], But the righteous shall live by his faith.
    — Talmud, b. Makkot, 24(a)
    [cited in Jacob Neusner, The Way of Torah, 22]

     

    Second Reading: Jesus as priest

    Jesus as priest (the metaphor continues)

    The major western lectionaries continue their reading of Hebrews this week:

    • RC: Heb 7:23-28
    • ECUSA: Heb 7:23-28
    • RCL: Heb 9:11-14

    These selections all come from the central section of Hebrews (4:14-10:31) with its focus on Jesus as the eternal high priest:

    4:14-5:10 Christ as “a great high priest”
    5:11-6:20 Appeal for steadfast hope (“an anchor for the soul”)
    7:1-28 Melchizedek as a superior order of priesthood
    8:1-6 Jesus as the “more excellent” priest seated in divine glory
    8:7-13 The new (and “better”) covenant mediated by Jesus
    9:1-10 The limited and symbolic character of the tabernacle
    9:11-28 Christ’s priestly action as “priest and victim”
    10:1-18 Christ’s offering of himself “once for all”
    10:19-31 Concluding appeal and warnings

    This way of interpreting Jesus is distinctive within the NT.

    Creative spiritual imagination is at work here. In our own time so much effort has been invested in determining precisely what Jesus “actually said” and what events “really happened.” Hebrews shows us a rather different approach to the questions, Who is Jesus? and, What am I called to do in response to him?

    Is it possible that we have been seduced by the narrative format of the Gospels and have accorded them far more historicity than they require? Perhaps the Gospels, like the Letter to the Hebrews or the Book of Revelation, are better understood as imaginative expressions of what Jesus meant to some of his followers in the 1C rather than as historical descriptions of the man and his message?

    To rephrase a question posed last week: How best do we honor the sage of Galilee? Is it by excluding one another on the basis of our differing historical assessments of the Gospels, or by fashioning lives and communities around his message?

     

    Gospel: The Chief Commandment

    Samuel T. Lachs [Rabbinic Commentary on the New Testament, 280f] notes that the form cited in Mark begins with the traditional opening phrase of the Shema (“Hear, O Israel …”). This may reflect the influence of Jewish devotional practices, since none of the other versions have that form. He also notes that the combination of Deut. 6.4 and Lev. 19.18 is already found in the Testament of Issachar and in the Testament of Dan. It is reasonable to assume that this combination was already commonplace in rabbinic teachings by the time of Jesus, since it combines the love of God with the love of others.

    Testament of Issachar

    Keep the Law of God, my children;
    achieve integrity; live without malice,
    not tinkering with God’s commands or your neighbor’s affairs.
    Love God and your neighbor;
    be compassionate toward poverty and sickness. (TIss 5:1-2) [OT Pseudepigrapha]

    Testament of Dan

    Observe the Lord’s commandments, then, my children,
    and keep his law.
    Avoid wrath,
    and hate lying.
    in order that the Lord may dwell among you,
    and Beliar may flee from you.
    each of you speak truth clearly to his neighbor,
    and do not fall into pleasure and trouble making,
    but be at peace, holding to the God of peace.
    thus no conflict will overwhelm you.
    Throughout all your life love the Lord,
    and one another with a true heart. (TDan 5:1-3) [OT Pseudepigrapha]

    David Flusser, a Jewish scholar with a major interest in NT studies comments:

    Jesus’ saying about the double commandment of love was clearly coined before his time. … both verses from the Bible (Deut. 6:5 and Lev, 19:18) begin with the same word. It was typical of rabbinic scholarship to see similarly phrased passages from the Bible as connected in content also. The first great commandment of Jesus—love of God—was thus in harmony with the spirit of contemporary Pharisaism. … the double commandment of love existed in ancient Judaism before, and alongside, Jesus. The fact that it does not appear in the rabbinical documents that have come down to us is probably accidental. Mark (12:28-34) and Luke (10:25-28) show that on the question of “the great commandment” Jesus and the scribes were in agreement. [Jesus, 89f]

    The commentary in The Five Gospels (104f) notes the secondary character of the narrative framework for each version of this saying in the Gospels: a friendly scribe in Matthew, a hostile scribe in Mark, and as a prelude to the parable of the Samaritan in Luke. This passages provides a classic example of the function of a Gray result in the Jesus Seminar’s deliberations:

    The majority of the Fellows thought that the ideas in this exchange represented Jesus’ own views; the words, however, were those of the young Jesus movement. Those Seminar members who voted pink argued that Jesus might have affirmed the interpretation of the law given by Hillel, a famous rabbi who was a contemporary of Jesus:

    A proselyte approached Hillel with the request Hillel teach him the whole of the Torah while the student stood on one foot. Hillel responded, “What you find hateful do not do to another. This is the whole of the Law. Everything else is commentary. Now go learn that!”

    Tarif Khalidi [The Muslim Jesus] records the following version of this tradition in Muslim literature:

    /170/ Jesus said to his disciples, “The sign that you shall use to recognize each other as my followers is your affection for one another.” And Jesus said to his disciple Yashu’, “As for the Lord, you must love Him with all your heart. Then you must love your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus was asked, “Show us, Spirit of God, what difference there is between these two loves, so that we may prepare ourselves for them with clarity of vision.” Jesus replied, “You love a friend for your own sake and you love your soul for the sake of your Lord. If you take good care of your friend, you are doing so for your own sake, but if you give your soul away, you do so for the sake of your Lord.” [Eleventh century]

    Whether or not Jesus said these words, he lived and died within the Jewish tradition that imbued him with precisely this set of values. They are values seen in his own passionate embrace of God’s call upon his life. For Christians, Jesus is the one who did not simply teach the double commandment, but actually embodied it.

    Jesus Database

     

    Liturgies and Prayers

    For liturgies and sermons each week, shaped by a progressive theology, check Rex Hunt’s web site

    Other recommended sites include:

     

    Music Suggestions

    See David MacGregor’s Together to Celebrate site for recommendations from a variety of contemporary genre.