The Bible's Morality

The more one reads from the scriptures, the more it becomes apparent that a great deal of it should not be taken as useful, or even moral.  For example, the premise that God would select a chosen people and make enemies of everyone outside that group should make any moral person shudder.  Can we really find joy in the vengeance of the Psalmist as it is written in 137:8-9?

O daughter of Babylon, who art to be destroyed; happy shall he be, that rewardeth thee as thou hast served us.  Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones.

The New Testament, too, is not without fault and Paul is especially problematic.  To me, Paul never really became converted to the gospel.  Rather, he took what was most abhorrent from the Old Testament and amplified it, telling the Galatians, for example: "I would they were even cut off which trouble you."  In doing so, he encourages men to emasculate themselves to achieve the aims of heaven.  But this is not all.  In Ephesians he tells slaves to obey their masters, thereby giving tacit approval for this barbaric institution.

If we were to accept every tenant of the Old Testament, we would be spending all our time executing people for crimes that are inconsistent with even the eye-for-an-eye admonition of Moses.  Here is a short list of offenses that deserve death:

• Stubbornness and overeating--Deut 21:18-21
• Cursing--Lev 24:13-14
• Disobeying the Sabbath--Exod 35:2
• Touching pigskin--Lev 11:7-8

Apparently God doesn't like football!  With regard to these and other flaws in scripture, the theologian, John Shelby Spong, says:  

I am now convinced that institutionalized Christianity has become so consumed by its quest for power and authority--most of which is rooted in the excessive claims for the Bible--that the authentic voice of God can no longer be heard within it...  The constant attack of right-wing voices on Christian scholarship is a clear tip-off that they cannot face reality.  When people cannot deal with the message, the ancient and still regularly practiced tactic is to shoot the messenger.

The Farce of Tea Party Patriotism

The other day I was driving down the road and saw a car ahead that sported an array of bumper stickers and two miniature American flags where the dry cleaning is sometimes hung.  One of the bumper stickers advertized the call letters of the Bay Area radio station that features Rush Limbaugh.  Others addressed conservative causes: Defense of Marriage and gun rights to name two.  It was, however, the message placed in the center of the rear windshield that really got my goat.  It said quite simply, “I’m a Patriot.”

It bothers me that conservatives believe they are the only patriots in the country.  It also upsets me that many Christian fundamentalists believe conservatism is consistent with their faith.  Patriotism has nothing to do with such principals.  Here are a few of its aspects that I believe are worth mentioning:

• A truly patriotic American will choose the education of the nation’s children as a higher priority than the amassing of weapons sufficient to destroy the world.
• Patriotism means negotiating in good faith to fix the problems of the nation instead of filibustering away any real chance to solve them.
• A patriot would rather see fellow citizens rehabilitated than demand a warped justice that is no more than institutionalized vengeance that fills prisons.
• Patriots will regulate equal access to economic opportunity instead of prescribed behavior in bed.
• The most patriotic of acts protect the young, old, weak and impoverished and insist that those blessed with good fortune contribute to the cause.
• A patriotic America will accept good advice in order to leave to future generations an un-blighted world. 
• Christian patriots will follow the teachings of Jesus—especially the injunction to love one another—rather than the Mosaic Law that speaks of stoning, condones slavery and depicts women as chattel.

What happened to the patriotism of the Civil Rights Movement and social programs, like the GI Bill, that led to greater access to opportunities and national prosperity?  Ditto Heads don’t have a monopoly on patriotism.  In fact, by their protection of corporate interests and the 1%, they don’t have much of a claim to it, at all.

What Would Jesus Do?

Moral people aren’t conflicted by choices between good and evil.  In a sense, they’ve already made such decisions in advance and know what to do without a second thought.  They realize, however, that life sometimes demands they select the lesser of two evils, or one good over another.  Moral people are tortured, for example, when forced to choose between a personally fulfilling career and more time with family. 

Standing at such a crossroad, many people ask: What would Jesus do?

The implications of the question, however, are seldom considered.  Let’s be honest, what Jesus did is emulated by only the rarest of us.  He forsook the world at an age when most people are seeking material wealth and taught His gospel of love without consideration for “purse or scrip.”  In this way He practiced what He preached, living true to His admonition to neither reap nor sow and to give freely to the poor.  He overruled the Mosaic notion of justice by telling His followers to forgive unconditionally and “judge not,” then He supported the view by reproving those who would punish an adulteress according to the demands of the law.  Jesus understood that justice has little to do with punishment for crimes, but that it refers to doing what is just, which is another way to describe doing what is right.  In that way, He despised the kind of legal wrangling that remunerates lawyers handsomely, but ignores the Golden Rule.  Jesus was also a peacemaker, who would be puzzled today by the violent metaphors used in hymns sung in His honor.  Would the Savior—who told Peter to put down his sword—condone our references to “Christian soldiers, marching as to war”?  Rather, I’m sure He’s horrified by the violent acts committed in His name. 

What would Jesus do? 

Something quite unlike the actions of His mainstream followers.

The Terror of Dominionism

One of the reasons I’m frightened by the religious right stems from the emergence of Dominionism.  Until recently, Dominionist views were considered elements of fanatical fringe groups, but today, with two republican presidential candidates professing links to such organizations, it’s clear that the influence of this philosophy is expanding.  This hasn’t gone unnoticed by the mainstream media, which has begun to write extensively on the topic.

Dominionism takes its mandate from Genesis 1:28, in which God tells Adam and Eve to:

Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.  

Devoted Dominionists, in the words of Time Magazine’s Jon Meacham,

“…believe it their obligation to control (the hard-line term) or influence (the softer version) what are called the ‘seven mountains’ of business, government, media, arts and entertainment, education, family and religion.  The more extreme elements of this movement seek conquest and theocracy.  Others insist they want only to transform the culture into something more in keeping with God’s kingdom of justice and mercy.”

There is a lot to be frightened by this.  If not countered, Dominionism’s desire to transform—which extends even into realms of education and family life—would result in a kind of religious policing typical of some Islamic countries.  But ignoring this obvious incompatibility with the First Amendment’s prohibition on the free exercise of religion (or no religion), an equally disturbing problem is that Dominionism’s version of justice and mercy is based upon the Mosaic Law, rather than Christ’s teachings. 

Influenced by the radical Christian Reconstructionism espoused by RJ Rushdoony, Dominionists seek to replace our legal system with the 613 strictures of Leviticus, including its call for the death penalty to homosexuals.  Its purists also defend slavery.  In reference to the Old Testament’s acceptance of this immoral practice, Rushdoony writes in his Institutes of Biblical Law, “The law here is humane and also unsentimental.  It recognizes that some people are by nature slaves and will always be so.”  He goes on to say, “God’s laws concerning slavery provided parameters for treatment of slaves, which were for the benefit of all involved.”

Ignoring the weighty issues of Dominionism’s single-minded desire for control, my greatest concern is that it completely misconstrues what Christ attempted to accomplish during his ministry, which was to overturn much of the Mosaic Law.  Leviticus was meant to influence its followers to love God and to love God’s children, but it fails in this regard.  Instead, its adherents fear God as vengeful and jealous and, in lieu of brotherly love, it focuses on the intricacies of a law that has no soul or charity.  That’s why, near the end of His ministry—when His rebuke was most strident—Christ loosed His indignation against scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! likening them to painted sepulchers that were decorous on the outside, but full of filth and decay. 

Our Culture of Acquisition

The influence of Judaism on Christianity is so complete that followers of the two religions have more in common with each other than with anything Jesus taught.  It doesn’t occur to most mainstream Christians that the Savior’s ministry was meant to override much of the Mosaic Law and the behaviors it engendered.  Rather, they embrace the Levitical standard as an absolute, and that—as I’ve said elsewhere in this blog—causes them to profess a faith that is far more Judeo than Christian.  The impact is particularly evident in their views about material wealth. 

Before I go on, I want to acknowledge my own personal fault in this regard.  While I see a broad gulf between the ways the Old and the New Testaments view acquisitiveness, that’s not to say I live Christ’s teachings.  At best, I’m a hypocrite, who has neither the courage nor the fortitude to live the gospel as Jesus intended.  I can only wish I was good enough to do so.  Nevertheless, there is such a clear difference between Christ’s teachings and the way most of His followers live that even a sinner like me can see it. 

How do Jesus and Moses part ways on the topic of wealth?

Let’s take the Old Testament first.  Genesis begins with the creation of the world, after which God gives Adam and Eve—and by extension, their posterity—dominion over all the earth.  That’s quite a haul!  And all they have to do is refrain from eating the fruit of a specific tree.  Later God promises Abraham that his seed will number as the stars and that he’ll inherit a Promised Land “flowing with milk and honey.”  It’s a promise that Abraham is so desperate to receive that he attempts to sacrifice his own son, Isaac, to insure its fulfillment.  God subsequently commands the children of Abraham to take the Promised Land from a people who were already living there, and no one sees any impropriety in it.  When Jehovah and Satan wager on the result of tempting a good man, Job’s righteousness is rewarded with flocks of sheep, children and other material rewards.  These are just a few of the morality tales contained in the Old Testament that influence a culture and worldview in ways that recognize the acquisition of wealth as blessings from God. 

Contrast this with the gospel.  Christ said, for example, that it was nearly impossible for a rich man to enter into heaven.  He encouraged His followers to sell what they had and give to the poor—to “take no thought of the morrow,” but to “seek first the kingdom of God.”  In this way He asked His followers to pursue spiritual, rather than earthly, rewards and to share in each other’s burdens.  His gospel—until it was corrupted by a politically ambitious orthodoxy—encouraged believers to share all things in common. 

Now, I ask you: Which of these two worldviews is consistent with Christian culture today?

What Is Godliness?

I was recently asked to speak in church and this was the result.  I realize it's a repeat of many of the ideas I've expressed in this blog, but it's an attempt to put many of them together into a cogent argument.

________________________

Some of the finest people I’ve ever met were dogs, and that’s especially true of Jesse, the sleek and long-legged black lab that Lori and I had in our home for many years.  One day Jesse and I were walking on a favorite trail in Briones, when we noticed a strange plant obscured by shadows on a hill.  It was shaped like a paddle and stood tall above the grass with a bushy black fringe and a white stripe down its middle.  As Jesse bounded ahead to investigate, I scratched my head, wondering what kind of plant it could be. 

That’s when it did the inexplicable: That plant took a step or two back.  Now, I might be a nuggat short of a nut cluster, but I’m smart enough to know a couple of things: 1) plants shouldn’t oughta do that and 2) the description of a “black fringe with a white stripe down the middle,” could apply to something that wasn’t a plant at all.  Regarding the events of that day, I later wrote a poem that goes like his:

I commanded, “No!”

But still he leaped,

Then whirled in midair,

Blinded and sneezing,

Frothing from the mouth.

As for the skunk,

It wandered off,

Unbothered,

Just another day

For a being possessed with power

Worthy of a comic book character.

It was a bad morning to be without a long leash.

Hand to collar,

We stumbled to the nearest pond,

Barely able to breathe,

Rubbing the stink and the sting

From our tear-filled eyes.

Oh, I dunked him—

Rest assured I dunked him good—

Muttering all along,

“You darn dog.”

On the way home—

He in back,

Muzzle on paws,

Sad eyes only now opening

To the possibility of new

And disquieting hazards—

I lowered all the windows

And laughed into the passing breeze.

So what if the Jeep will never be the same?

Will I condemn the penitent

For his most endearing

Instincts and preoccupations:

Childlike enthusiasm

And boundless curiosity?

Perfection is unwarranted.

Give me quirkiness instead,

And other sweet foibles

In their glorious variety.

If so blessed,

Laughter and affection will accompany me

Everywhere I go.

I entitled the poem, Brushing Up to Godliness, to convey the idea that in Heavenly Father’s intercession with humanity, we see clues to how our mortal obligations might be fulfilled.  The trouble is that even when following Nephi’s admonition by “likening all scriptures unto us,” we can justify disparate behavior in ways resulting in moral ambiguity.  In response to Jesse’s disobedience, for example, I could have smote him as a sinner or reassured him with a hug.  The options are as different as chalk is to cheese, but still supported by scripture. 

That brings me to the subject of my talk: What’s God’s true nature and what did our Savior say about Godliness?  The answers are critical, because to understand what God stands for is to know what to emulate.  

I once thought of our Father in Heaven as a kind of exalted venture capitalist.  Sure, His rewards were great, but when dealing with His creations, He was tough and demanding, willing to fire those who didn’t produce and cut His losses when displeased with results.  That notion of Godliness translated into a premise that ruled my existence.  I believed there was only one excuse in life and it was this: I didn’t want it badly enough.

I truly believed that a lack of desire and hard work was all that kept anybody from any achievement.  That worldview made me awfully intolerant.  (Actually, Lori had a better word for me, but we won’t go into that).  I had no patience for the castoffs of the world, because where I saw privation, I could write it off as an example of people who didn’t want the alternative—a good life—badly enough.  

There is, however, a gentler version of Godliness—one expressed in Christ’s declaration to a fallen Israel:

How often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings…

This form of Godliness considers the interests of others as equal to its own and was practiced by Christ’s followers prior to the convening of the First Council of Nicaea.  As described in Acts 4:32-35: 

…the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul…  Neither was there any among them that lacked: for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold, And laid them down at the apostles’ feet: and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need.

Elaine Pagels, a Pulitzer-winning author and historian of the early church, describes a remarkable people who fully deserved the title of saint.  While Rome entertained itself with the public slaughter of Christians, the surviving faithful sustained each other in communal enclaves.  They gave the indigent and homeless—especially abandoned children who were numerous—a place of unquestioned welcome and belonging.  When plagues struck and cities were abandoned, Christians were the few who remained behind to practice literally the Savior’s admonition to feed the hungry, clothe the naked and administer to the sick. 

While such sacrifices are inspiring, they can still be viewed in one of two ways: either as 1) noble, but unnecessary, or 2) the fulfillment of the true intent of Christ’s gospel.  If you believe in the Apostasy, however, there’s not much of a leap in logic to assume that the early Christians had it right, until something went terribly wrong.  What went wrong is beyond the scope of my talk, but Pagels, as well as other historians, have written extensively on the topic.  It’s enough to know that many early Christian traditions were violently crushed by a powerful orthodoxy and one tragedy of that history is that a central message in Christ’s Sermon on the Mount was misinterpreted for political gain.  That message, found in Matthew 5:17, reads:

Think not that I have come to destroy the law and the prophets, I come not to destroy but to fulfil.

Now, the first part of the verse isn’t subject to debate.  In it Christ claims He has no intention of destroying the Mosaic Law, which on this and other occasions He refers to as, “the law and the prophets.”  What’s less clear, however, is the final clause.  How did Christ intend to fulfill the Law of Moses? 

Many fundamentalists believe that Jesus affirmed the Mosaic Law as His gospel and in doing so they practice a faith that is far more Levitical than Christian.  Yet, if we read what follows Matthew 5:17, we can clearly see that Christ had no such intention.  To understand what He did mean, it’s helpful to refer to the original Greek text of Matthew, from which the word pleroo was later translated into that elusive term fulfill. 

Pleroo is a word that conveys multiple nuanced meanings, but it’s generally translated as: to fill to the top, to cram down, or to make complete.  Knowing how Christ fills or completes the Mosaic Law is critical, so I’ll summarize what I understand about the subtlety of the term.  If I have a bottle that’s nearly full of water, which I then fill to the rim, stopper and set aside, I’ve pleroo-ed the bottle.  Notice that while I’ve filled it, I’ve also rendered the bottle useless as a vessel that can store more water.  And that’s an essential sense of the word.  In fact, it’s sometimes translated as meaning to render obsolete. 

The correct view of Matthew 5:17, therefore, is that Christ didn’t destroy Leviticus, but He nevertheless rendered it obsolete.  Just like we can still use typewriters in a computerized world, we can follow the Law of Moses—if we choose—but Christ wants us to be better than that and graduate to a standard more powerful and grand.  He describes that better way in five telling passages in Matthew 5, the first of which is found in verses 21 and 22:

Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill…But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment…

By these verses, Christ asks us to do more than simply refrain from murder, but to exact discipline over our passions.  In the same way, He invites us in four subsequent passages to: 1) Do more than abstain from adultery, but bridle our appetites, 2) Do more than just honor our contracts, but be true to our word, 3) Refrain from vengeance and instead forgive and 4) Do more than love those who love us back, love all of God’s children.

We could spend hours discussing each one of these critical passages, but let me say a few words about one of them.  Verses 38 and 39 say:

Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth: But I say unto you…whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.

The notion that we must demand an eye for an eye was never meant as a requirement even in Moses’ day.  Think of where his people had been.  They’d suffered through 400 years of bondage, during which the capricious whips of their Egyptian masters had been their only measures of justice.  To them, the penalty for a stolen crust of bread might have been the loss of a hand, but Moses told his people not to be like that—to allow no punishment to exceed its crime.  The reason for the law was to establish a maximum penalty, not to require one.  In contrast, the gospel standard is more explicit.  Christ wants us to forgo retribution altogether.  

You might very well ask what this has to do with God’s true nature, and I will answer:  Everything.  Can you imagine Heavenly Father demanding from us one thing and doing another?  Neither does our Savior, since He says in the final verse of the chapter:

Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.

We gloss over this verse or read it without context, but it's a scripture that begs for context.  Why?  Because it includes the conjunction “therefore,” which is a word used to connect a premise to a conclusion, as in the relationship: A therefore B.  The premise here is Christ’s description of His gospel found in the passages I've just cited.  It leads us to the conclusion, found in the latter part of the verse, that Christ’s perfect gospel is what God not only honors, but practices.  In other words, Heavenly Father is in control of His passions and appetites—He isn’t vengeful, or jealous.  He’s forgiving and true to His promises—He doesn’t abandon His children.  His love knows no bounds—He doesn’t play favorites.  And we should do the same.

Now, I know what you’re thinking: Why is Alan, who isn’t even an active member of the ward, talking about Godliness?  You have a point.  There’s no question that I’m an awful human being.  I realized decades ago that I had neither the courage nor the fortitude to live Christ’s gospel—at least, not the way He’d intended.  If there’s a Celestial Kingdom, I won’t be there.  Visit me, please.  But even though I’m a goat among the Shepherd’s flock, that doesn’t mean I don’t love the Shepherd.  He’s taught me too much—including many tough lessons that He had to nurse me through—not to love Him dearly.   

Now, here’s a note about those tough lessons.  A funny thing happened to me on the way to thinking I was in complete control.  First, I noticed how the difference between success and failure could be measured by a moment of hesitation, a step in the wrong direction, or an accident of geography.  Then my smug and self-assured worldview was crushed in a deeply personal way when my oldest son tried to take his life.  If I’d wanted anything more urgently than the need to breathe, it was for him to be happy, but I couldn’t will it so. 

I won’t explain what it’s like to raise a depressed child who self-medicates as an escape.  I won’t tell you what goes through a father’s mind as his son spends a night behind bars, or is institutionalized on suicide watch.  What I will say, however, is that Lori and I never—not once—ever considered cutting our losses or walking away from that beautiful boy we’d helped bring into the world.  We’d loved him before he could walk.  We’d loved him before he could speak.  We could do no less, even though he was blind to the seed of divinity inside him.  Could Heavenly Father do any differently?

Despite our chest-thumping demonstrations of toughness, we humans are terribly fragile creatures and many of our brothers and sisters don’t deserve and cannot prevent their unfortunate circumstances.  They could also benefit from our better attempts at Godliness.  In closing, I’ll read an excerpt from a letter I once wrote to a friend who was going through a though time.  In it, you’ll hear what life experience and Jesus have taught me about God’s true nature. 

Why do we love our children?  Is it because they spring from the womb with Olympic medals on their chests, Harvard diplomas in their hands, and the chiseled good looks of Venus or Adonis?  Obviously not.  Children are born plain and without any means of survival beyond an instinct for growth.  So we love our children despite their weaknesses.  Or do we?

Let me tell you a secret.  When Matthew was born, Lori and I looked at each other and in one spontaneous voice whispered, “He looks like Jabba the Hut!”  With his pressed face, frog-like legs, and catfish-skin belly, he really looked like a Star Wars’ character, but this endeared him to us all the more.

During the inexplicable moments when I feel God’s presence most vividly, a picture enters my head.  I see a smiling Father kneeling on the floor along one side of a spacious room.  His arms are spread wide and He entreats me to take awkward, first steps toward Him.  And when I stumble (as I am prone to do) gaining His forgiveness always seems easier than forgiving myself.  Sometimes I’d rather remain on the floor to pout and be punished with thoughts of my enormous stupidity.  But He tells me to put away the excess baggage, to rise up and attempt again, to take a few more steps—as awkward as they may be—toward Him, toward Godliness.

May we understand and emulate God’s great love for His children, I pray in the name of Jesus Christ.  Amen.

Hate and the Westboro Baptists

You've probably heard already, but the Westboro Baptists are at it again.  They're apparently heading to Joplin Missouri to celebrate the tornadoes as God's punishment to a nation of sodomites.  This is the same group that pickets funerals of soldiers and has an agenda of hate that takes aim at virtually everyone but themselves. 

They have deservedly become the most despised people in America, but this is what confounds me: Their doctrine isn't so different than that of mainstream fundamentalists.  The Westboro fringe only go to greater lengths to promote their ideas.  Their leader, Fred Phelps, isn't alone in believing that God causes natural calamities wherever homosexuals are made welcome.  Pat Robertson has said the same thing.  In fact, a listing of Christian leaders who've made similar statements could fill pages.

But is that really who God is?  If so, I would rather not return to a Creator who kills innocent people for acting out on the instincts He imbues into them, but that's NOT who He is.  Summarizing His infinite patience and forbearance, Christ once said: "How often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings." 

That's my image of God.  As for Phelps and the other Westboro Baptists, their hate speaks only of the ugliness they've allowed to fester inside them and not of their Creator.

Aggression in its Most Elegant Form

On Wall Street, a measure of a person's suitability to the work is his or her level of aggressiveness.  I've participated in countless meetings where people were critically evaluated on the basis of this metric.  I'm sure other industries and settings are similar in this regard.  In fact, it seems to me that aggressiveness is deemed an indication of a charmed life.  We applaud people who refuse to lose and go to great lengths to get what they want.  Winning, after all, isn't everything.  It's the only thing. 

The problem with this is that when the results of voracious acquisitiveness are admired to the exclusion of the processes by which goals are accomplished, people go to harmful lengths to achieve success.  Doping in sports, white lies on loan applications, quid pro quos that line political pockets but hurt community interests are just a few examples of what invariably occurs. 

Recently the auto company, Nissan, added to our preoccupation with success at all costs with ads that include the words: Aggession in its most elegant form.  What group of geniuses thought that was a good tag line?  I suppose they figured we needed more road rage, not to mention commuters swerving in and out of lanes to save 30 seconds.  They must have concluded our byways needed a few more arrogant drivers who think a yellow light means "speed up" and that another drink (or business conversation on a cellphone) won't diminish their superior driving skills. 

After seeing one too many of these ads, I've decided to never consider buying a Nissan--not if the company continues to romanticize aggression as elegance.  My favorite writer, John Steinbeck, once summarized my point in the following way:

The things we admire in men, kindness and generosity, openness, honesty, understanding and feeling are the concommitants of failure in our system. And those traits we detest, sharpness, greed, acquisitiveness, meanness, eogtism and self-interest are the traits of success. And while men admire the quality of the first they love the produce of the second.

Let's all agree that aggressiveness that aims for success to the exclusion of fairness, honesty and generosity, is the opposite of whatever elegance claims to be.

Christ's Intended Gospel

Christians immediately after Christ's crucifiction were nothing short of saintly.  As described in Acts 4:32-35, many of them lived communally and shared all things in common. 

And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul: neither said any of them that ought of the thing which he possessed was his own; but they had all things common.  And with great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus: and great grace was upon them all.  Neither was there any among them that lacked: for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold, And laid them down at the apostles' feet: and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need.

Elaine Pagels, who is a Pulitzer-winning author and historian of the early church, describes a people who took in the indigent and homeless, particularly abandoned children.  They gave the outcasts of the world a place of welcome and belonging.  Christians were the few who refused to leave cities struck by plagues.  They remained behind, subjecting themselves to killing diseases, to practice literally their Savior's admonition to feed the hungry, clothe the naked and administer to the sick.  They did this while suffering all manner of persecution. 

It was due, in part, to a power-hungry orthodoxy and its institution of a watered-down version of Christ's intended gospel, that has left us believing we can enrichen ourselves without worrying about the plight of others.  Today's budget discussions, which illicited Rush Limbaugh's question, "what would Jesus take?" is a case in point.  Is it my imagination, or have Christian fundamentalists become the core of the Republican party that is driving the decision toward more bombs and less healthcare?  Do they really believe that corporate interests don't owe the country for the riches its educational system, infrastructure and civil protections create -- that it's okay for a company like GE to book $14 billion in profit and not pay a cent in taxes? 

The system the religious right seem to want is one that forces the widow to pay her mite so that the rich need not contribute. 

Mathew 5:17 and its Historical Importance (Part 5)

I'll finish this section with one last idea about the nature of God. 

People like Pat Robertson would have us believe in a deity that causes natural calamities in response to gay rights celebrations, but is that the act of a loving God?  Jesus says otherwise in the final verse of Matthew chapter 5, which reads:

Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.

We often gloss over this scripture or read it without understanding its context.  Yet, it's a scripture that begs for context since it includes the word "therefore," which is invariably used to connect a premise to a conclusion, as in the relationship: A therefore B.  The premise alluded to is the description of perfection that precedes the final verse.  Esssentially Christ says that His gospel, which was summarized in the key passages I've cited in my earlier postings, is perfection.  But perhaps the more important point is what Christ says in the second half of the verse, which is as extraordinary as it is rarely noted.  He implies that His gospel circumscribes the kind of perfection God honors and practices.

As I've said before, I can’t imagine our Heavenly Father so angry that He would flood the earth and kill all, but eight, of His children.  That's inconsistent with the gospel, which Christ assures us is practiced by the Father.  Furthermore, to believe in a flood as judgement—and to concurrently assume that God is a perfect moral being—is to think such acts are acceptable.  In that way, a Judeo-Christian ethic that is premised upon a vengeful and jealous version of godliness is dangerous and can lead to thug-like acts of its believers.  It also, in my opinion, happens to be wrong.

Mathew 5:17 and its Historical Importance (Part 4)

Are we a Christian nation, as many suppose? I don’t think so. Sure, we give lip service to what Jesus taught, but we’ve bought into the fallacy that we don’t have to live His teachings, but don’t take my word for it. Examine Christ’s description of His moral philosophy—as described in Matthew Chapter 5—and compare it to our daily acts and belief, especially the political ambitions of the far right.

Key Teaching #1 (Matt 5:21-22): Do more than refrain from murder, rein in your anger and hurtful acts. I can’t understand how we got involved in a war in Iraq, when UN weapons inspectors, Hans Blix and Scott Ritter, were assuring the world that there was no evidence of WMDs in the country. Similarly, how does a Christian nation allow the torture of individuals and let its architects cloak the actions in camouflaged terms, like “aggressive interrogation.” By whatever name we choose to call it, the abuse has killed people.

What’s just as remarkable is that these are violations of the lesser law Jesus came to improve upon. He wants us to do better than just avoid lunatic wars—He wants us to refrain from anger, too. But where are we on the niceness scale today? The better question might be: Whatever happened to being nice? We’ve replaced gladiator combat with TV commentary filled with so much venom, there’s no way to hear, much less grasp, the issues. (Many years ago, one of my kids was watching CNN’s Crossfire, when he looked at me and said: “Why do they hate each other?”) In particular, conservative talking heads—Limbaugh, Hannity and Beck—claim moral superiority while impugning the intelligence and patriotism of those who have simple differences of opinion. While Jesus encourages peace, they are our biggest hawks. In the process they foment so much hatred and fear that I half expect armed revolts to arise.

As a high school debater one of the things I learned was the necessity of keeping emotions in check. When debaters scream, judges miss the logic. A yelling match can be great theater, but it’s shitty public discourse that never arrives at the truth or even changes a mind. In fact, it rarely does more than provide a confirmation to those who’d always wanted to believe the noise anyway. We must take to heart the implication of Christ’s teaching: Until we treat each other with dignity and grant each other the right to have opinions, we will never get along or achieve a lasting peace.

Key Teaching #2 (Matt 5:27-28): Do more than refrain from adultery, bridle your passions and appetites. Who has the bigger zipper problem—Christian conservatives, or their heathen counterparts? That’s probably an unfair question, but while people on the religious right excoriate their liberal counterparts who have broken vows of fidelity, a list of their own fallen can paper an average-sized living room. Their notion of Family Values reminds me of that line in Hamlet: The lady doth protest too much, methinks.

More importantly, the religious right tends to focus on the act of sex, rather than Christ’s requirement to exact discipline over human passion and appetite. I’m baffled, for example, at how offended some people get by fleeting nudity in a movie, but will clap and cheer when Conan the Barbarian runs his spear through the evil wizard. How did we conclude that breasts were bad, but bloody fights to the death are wholesome entertainment?

When I was a kid, two movies came out that speak volumes about society’s strange preoccupation with physical intimacy. They were: 1) Love Story and 2) The Graduate. When it first appeared, Love Story was rated PG and teenagers flocked to it. There was no skin in the movie, but it was clear what the two attractive and intelligent protagonists were doing behind closed doors. I have little doubt that Ali McGraw’s twitching nose drove more than a few young viewers to Makeout Point to watch the submarine races after the show. The Graduate, on the other hand, was rated R—racy for its time due primarily to that view of Ann Bancroft’s naked leg lofted seductively in the air—but the storyline depicted her relationship with Dustin Hoffman as illicit and unromantic. Now, which movie had the worse impact on the morality of people? Again, that’s probably an unfair question and one that will probably never be answered. Yet, isn’t it clear by the comparison that our obsession with the physical gets in the way of understanding the heart of what matters? Though I can’t condone adultery, we should be far more fixated upon the difference between love and unbridled lust, and practicing the former while eschewing the latter.

That notion is embedded in the golden rule and is akin to an idea I heard M. Scott Peck once relate. As best as I can recollect, Peck, who is a psychiatrist as well as a moral philosopher, said he wasn’t against the idea of having sex with his patients, but he could think of no instance in which doing so would be helpful. Rather, any activity of the kind would result in unmitigated harm to the people to whom he had an obligation to heal. The point is this: Let’s make sure our motives are pure—if we can do that, chances are our hands will be clean, also.

Key Teaching #3 (Matt 5:33-34): Do more than honor contractual obligations, let your word be your bond. So much of what’s wrong with public discourse today is the blatant misrepresentation of facts. While Jesus demands honesty, our willingness to tell part-truths and to obfuscate through legal nitpicking is rampant. Remember when a U.S. president sat before a committee and said, “It depends on what the meaning of the word 'is' is.”? That’s only one example of what Christ referred to as straining at gnats and swallowing camels. Recall that His most serious rebukes were reserved for those he called, “Scribes, Pharisees, Hypocrites!”

I will readily admit that when I was an investment banker I requested the writing of a mountain of legal opinions, each of which proposed ways in which I could do what the law intended I should not. What I did might have been legal, but it was certainly wasn’t right. I see the same thing happening today regarding conservative efforts to undermine green policies. Haven’t we contracted with God to “replenish the earth” since the time of Eden? Yet, Tea Party loyalists, backed by Christian Fundamentalists, refuse to acknowledge the truth about the destruction of our environment and back revisionist research to excuse it. Many of them do so thinking God will fix the problem. But that’s just kicking the ball into His court. It’s our job to do what’s best for our children. I’m sure Christ longs for the day when we can tell the whole truth, admit to our mistakes and fulfill the intentions of our promises.

Key Teaching #4 (Matt 5:38-39): Don’t worry about getting even, forgive unconditionally. Mahatma Gandhi once said, “An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.” Jesus tried to say the same thing and few seemed to hear. Ask the average America (and virtually all Christians) what justice means and the answer will invariably have something to do with punishment for crimes. But the true meaning of justice has nothing to do with punishment. Read Plato’s Republic and you’ll see the word justice printed on nearly every page. It is, in fact, a treatise on justice and yet there is very little in it about responses to crimes. Justice, at its most basic level, is all about DOING WHAT IS JUST, and that’s another way of saying doing what’s right.

As I’ve mentioned in previous postings, the notion that we must exact an eye for an eye was never meant as a requirement even in Moses’ day. It was a maximum penalty handed down after the children of Israel emerged from slavery believing that the capricious whips of their Egyptian masters was the measure of justice. To them at the time, the penalty for a stolen crust of bread might be the loss of a hand. Moses urged his people to be better than that. Yet Christ wants us to go beyond even the Mosaic standard and refrain from vengeance altogether. In His gospel, there is no balancing of cosmic debits or credits for sin. Jesus wants us to forgive and, if possible, restore what was lost when sin occurs. In that context, what is the best restitution? A rehabilitated heart. Seeking anything more is just getting even.

Key Teaching #5 (Matt 5:43-44): Do more than love those who love you, love everyone. Remember how the children of Israel were told not to kill or steal, and were later led into a promised land that happened to be populated by others? What were the Israelites told to do then? They were commanded, of course, to kill people and steal land. The resultant moral ambiguity led to considerable debate among Jews, which eventually resulted in a lawyer asking Jesus, “Who is my neighbor?” The lawyer knew that some faction of the crowd believed the Mosaic Law was a requirement to be followed only when dealing with other Jews—that in essence the definition of neighbor was restricted to kin. That’s when Jesus offered the Parable of the Good Samaritan. By His discourse we know we’re to love everyone.

But Christian fundamentalists, by their actions against gay rights, do not, in my opinion, fulfill the requirement. I know people who spent considerable time and resources in promoting Proposition 8 in California. Some of them did so reluctantly, doing only what they thought God had commanded. I’m sure many of them prayed for an end to the controversy. Others, however, took it on with a zeal that was an insidious extension of beating up queers on Friday night. That is not love. Neither is it love when a nation decides it needs all of its missiles and bombs and tanks and destroyers, but cannot afford to give its children the world-class education for which it was once the object of envy. Yes, that’s not love, but it’s also shortsighted.

In my next posting, I'll show how this is contrary to God's nature. 

Matthew 5:17 and Its Historical Importance (Part 3)

If you've followed my blog for some time, then you've seen this graphic before, so I'll ask you to excuse the repetition, but it's probably the most important notion I've posted.  In a nutshell, what it says is this: The intent of Matthew 5:17 was not to affirm the Mosaic Law, since Christ countermands it in several telling passages that follow the verse.  I also believe it's clear from the discourse, that although He doesn't destroy the Ten Commandments, Christ does render them obsolete. 

In addition, by comparing His gospel to the requirements of Leviticus, Jesus actually implies three laws: One that conforms to the Mosaic Law, one that conforms to the gospel and another that conforms to neither standard.  This is how they shake out.  (Please read them in the context of what Matthew chapter five says). 

As I've said before, to assume that the Ten Commandments are all we are required to observe misses the point of what Christ tried to say.  As CS Lewis says in, The Problem of Pain:

To disobey your proper law (i.e., the law God makes for a being such as you) means to find yourself obeying one of God’s lower laws: e.g. if, when walking on slippery pavement, you neglect the law of Prudence, you suddenly find yourself obeying the law of gravitation.

The implication is crucial, but I've never heard it noted. During our times of honest introspection, it’s not enough to ask: Am I obedient? Human beings have no choice but to be obedient. The more useful question is: To what am I being obedient, a lower or higher law?  In my next posting I'll try to show how our Christian fundamentalist culture has primarily ignored the higher law. 

Matthew 5:17 and Its Historical Importance (Part 2)

Regardless of the correct interpretation of Matthew 5:17, it’s clear that those who believed that Christ affirmed the Mosaic Law won out in the test of wills that occurred during the early history of the church.  Why do I say that?  Consider the evidence today:

·    A great number of people with political influence seek to bring a Levitical order to our system of justice.  This is despite what Christ says about the gospel’s requirement that exceeds “an eye for an eye.”  

·    Religious people fight to defy the Constitution’s separation of church and state to post the Ten Commandments on court houses and other government offices, but don’t seem to have the same level of interest in Christ’s two great laws.

·    Christian fundamentalists have begun to use the term “Judeo-Christian Ethic” to describe their faith and in doing so, lump the Mosaic Law and Christ’s gospel into a composite far more Judeo (613 specific laws) than Christian (two general rules of thumb).

That brings us back to the question: What did Christ mean when He said He’d come to fulfill the Mosaic Law (the law and the prophets)?  For the answer it’s helpful to refer to the original Greek text of Matthew, from which the term pleroo was translated into the word fulfil in 5:17 of the King James Bible.  Pleroo is unfortunately a word that has a range of meanings that differ in subtle ways and must be interpreted in context.  Its primary definition, which is given by widely accepted source material such as Strong’s Concordance, is to fill to the top, or to cram down, or to make complete.

How Christ fills or completes the Mosaic Law is an important consideration.  Let me summarize what I understand about the nuances of the word pleroo.  If I have a bottle that’s nearly full of water, which I then fill to the rim by holding it beneath a flowing tap, I’ve pleroo-ed the bottle.  Notice that while I’ve filled it, I’ve also rendered the bottle useless as an object that can store more water.  And this is an important sense that the word conveys.  In fact, one alternative interpretation of pleroo is to render obsolete. 

In other words, the appropriate view of Matthew 5:17 is to say Christ didn’t come to destroy Leviticus, but He nevertheless rendered it obsolete.  Just like we can still use typewriters in a world full of computers, we can continue to obey the Law of Moses if we choose, but Christ wishes us to achieve a higher standard that Leviticus does not and cannot contain.  Said another way, Christ asks us to graduate from the requirements of the Mosaic Law to something far grander.  In this way, the idea of graduation is consistent with Strong’s notion of completion.

What is the difference between Christ’s gospel and the Old Testament?  That will be the subject of my next posting.

Matthew 5:17 and Its Historical Importance (Part 1)

I’m going to take my time with this posting—maybe offer it in several installments.  What I hope to show is that due to historical developments shaped by socio-political forces, the prevailing view of Christ’s gospel was corrupted and rendered inconsistent with His teachings.  I’ll attempt to do so by summarizing worldviews that were prevalent up until a time shortly after the First Council of Nicaea was convened in 325.  Furthermore, I’ll focus on a specific verse of scripture that, at one time, was a kind of ground zero with respect to a religious tumult that was a precursor to the Inquisition.  As a result of that religious upheaval, people were killed, properties were confiscated and a flourishing religious tradition was labeled heretical. 

That scripture, Matthew 5:17, is part of an introduction to Christ’s Sermon on the Mount, the most salient description of the gospel found anywhere.  Despite its importance, however, few mainstream Christians ever consider its meaning.  The King James account of the verse reads:

Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.

The first part of the scripture isn’t subject to debate.  The message is clear: Christ didn’t come to destroy the Mosaic Law (which on this and multiple other occasions He refers to as, “the law and the prophets”).  What’s less clear, however, is the meaning of the word fulfil (sic) that closes out His declaration. 

In the earliest history of the church (which I again define as the period leading up to and shortly after the First Council of Nicaea) the meaning of the scripture was reduced to two possible interpretations, neither of which captures the varied nuances of the word.  I’ll embellish on this point later, but it’s important to note that the reason the debate focused on only two alternative interpretations is because there were two opposing Christian groups that each required acceptance of a specific reading of the scripture to insure their survival.  

The two interpretations of the scripture were:

1.   Jesus didn’t come to destroy the Mosaic Law, but to affirm it.

2.   Jesus didn’t come to destroy the Mosaic Law, but to abrogate it.  

Both interpretations are problematic.  While the notion that Christ affirms the Mosaic Law appears consistent with His assertion that He didn’t come to destroy it, the view conflicts with the central idea behind five telling passages that come later in the chapter.  (For a treatment of this, see one of my earlier blogs at http://newchristianethics.blogspot.com/2008/11/higher-and-lesser-lawsarguably-most.html).  However, to say Christ abrogated the Mosaic Law begs the question: How does one abrogate a law without destroying an essential part of it?  To assume the second interpretation is correct is to believe that Christ was open to semantic nit-picking, which is counter to everything we hold dear about His gospel.  Therefore, the only conclusion a reasonable person might conclude is that neither explanation is correct.  This begs the question: Why did the early historical debate reduce to an argument between two highly improbable interpretations?

To answer that question, it’s important to note that there was once a number of flourishing religious traditions that today we refer to as Gnostic Christianity.  The Gnostics, contrary to common belief, didn’t belong to a single monolithic faith with a singular worldview.  In fact, it has often been said there were as many Gnostic factions as there were Gnostics.  The reason for this can be explained by the term gnosis, the Greek root word from which the people derived their label.  To the Greeks, there are two types of knowledge.  The first, logos, is knowledge gained through learning—life experience and study.  Its alternative, gnosis, is very different.  A receiver of gnosis—aside from having an open mind receptive to it—doesn’t obtain its variety of knowledge through personal effort.  Rather, gnosis is acquired through sudden and dramatic flashes of what might be called inspiration.  Therefore, the common thread among Gnostic belief was the idea that people could come to an understanding of the mind of God through communion leading to personal revelation.  The end result of this belief was that the Gnostics began to personalize the gospel in a way that resulted in the development of a wide range of traditions.

To those who supported a more orthodox view of Christianity, which included the need for a single faith and an indisputable doctrine, the proliferation of new factions was disconcerting.  While searching for a way to restrict the number of divergent worldviews, the followers who sought orthodoxy quickly realized two things:

1.   Christ’s gospel—aside from His directive to love God and our neighbors—was only suggestive of appropriate behavior and tradition.

2.   Leviticus, on the other hand, with its 613 specific and separate laws, was a highly prescriptive summary of what one could argue was correct doctrine.

As one might suspect, an emphasis on conformity to the Mosaic Law became a key aspect of Christian orthodoxy’s war on Gnosticism.  The followers of the orthodox view supported the idea that Christ affirmed the tenants of the Old Testament and wished His followers to abide by them.  Notice that this had as much to do with political control as it did with the true meaning of Christ’s gospel.  Gnostics, on the other hand, rebelled against the stricture of the Mosaic Law, because it limited their ability to abide by revealed interpretations of Christ’s word. 

In the end the followers of orthodoxy—who were far better organized than their factionalized opponents—won.  The Gnostics were labeled as heretics.  Many were imprisoned or killed, and their various traditions were eliminated.  Except for some highly charged accusations found in the writings of orthodox writers (such as Irenaeus, who lived in the 2^nd century) Gnostic doctrines were lost until the Nag Hamadi library was discovered in the Egyptian desert in 1945. 

If, therefore, the idea that we’re to follow the Mosaic Law is based upon political spin from a control-seeking orthodoxy, what is the true meaning of Christ’s assertion that He came to fulfill the law and prophets?  That will be the subject of my next posting.