A More Excellent Way

With a lot of help from Derek Flood[1], Walter Wink[2], Walter Brueggemann[3] and others, I've been exploring how to read the Bible as Jesus did. Basically, Jesus applied the rabbinic hermeneutic[4] of faithful questioning, in contrast to the approach of the Pharisees of his day, who employed a hermeneutic of unquestioning obedience.

Ever since Christianity first began its shameless dance with political power, the Bible has been used primarily to maintain orthodoxy and define heresy. When Constantine marched his army into the ocean and pronounced them “baptized”, the church began a long history of enforcing orthodoxy with threats of death, torture, exclusion and hell fire. The record of atrocities is almost endless, from the crusades and the inquisition, to Puritan witch hunts to slavery to basically every human rights issue.

In every case, the practitioners of barbarism viewed their interpretation of the faith as the one and only “right” reading, and enforced their “right” way with violent use of power. This clearly represents the very worst of the way of unquestioning obedience and inevitably leads to violence committed in God’s name.[5] It is a total misreading of Scripture’s intent.

In striking contrast is rabbinic Judaism’s tradition of faithful questioning. Rabbi Anson Laytner makes the case that faithful questioning is typical, not only of the Hebrew Bible, but also of the Jewish faith itself.[6] (I have this delightful image of Tevye arguing with God in “Fiddler on the Roof.”)

Key examples of faithful questioning are found throughout the Jewish commentaries on the Scriptures. Instead of a single interpretation that establishes the orthodox, “right” way of reading Torah, the commentaries typically present dissenting views from various rabbinic sages, offered side by side like the transcript of a courtroom trial. It may help to recall that the word, “Israel” means “wrestles with God.”

From this line of thought we can see that reading Scripture by faithfully questioning violence and harm perpetrated in God’s name is not only characteristic of Jesus and Paul and the rest of the New Testament, it’s also a deeply Jewish way to read Scripture. Remember: Jesus also was a rabbi, steeped in that tradition.

Every culture and every religious faith is susceptible to error. The root of the matter is not necessarily within the particular culture or religion, but rather is the marriage of religion and political power. This always is a poisonous combination, and is the point at which the church diverges from the way of Jesus.

But there always are those anxious souls who want to nail everything down, who want guarantees and control over their destinies, both temporal and eternal. Their needs are such that they must live by sight, and not by faith.[7] The harm emerges when their insecurities lead to the use—or at least the threat—of violence to silence dissent. The greatest heresy is their belief that the use of force is a valid example of upholding the faith.

 The key difference between Jesus and the Pharisees, and between differing groups today is in which narrative we choose to embrace, and which we choose to avoid, discount or (as Jesus did) outright reject. The question is not whether we will choose some texts and ignore or reject others. Even the most fundamental literalist reads the Bible selectively, if only by emphasis and tone of voice. Rather, if we are to read the Bible as Jesus did, the question is which texts we choose and by what criteria!

The criterion both Jesus and Paul used is love. I will develop that theme more in the blogs that follow; but here is a teaser:

"While the Pharisees were focused on strict adherence to religious rules and regulations (the “right” or “correct” reading), the priority of Jesus was instead focused on loving and caring for people in need. Clearly, the way Jesus understood faithfulness to Scripture was that it should lead to love. ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind” and “Love your neighbor as yourself’ Jesus said, ‘All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments’ (Matthew 22:37049).”[8]

How then can we continue to claim that Scripture is inspired if it truly justifies hurt and damage to people? As Christians we affirm that the Scriptures are good, intended to lead us to love. However, as history reveals, it also can be read in an abusive way. My teacher, the late Fred B. Craddock once said, “There is nothing so holy that it does not have its pornographers.” Paul also wrote, “I found that the very commandment that was intended to bring life actually brought death” (Romans 7:10).

The common denominator is love.

That’s the way I see it through the flawed glass that is my world view.

Together in the Walk,

Jim

---

[1] Derek Flood, Disarming Scripture: Cherry-Picking Liberals, Violence Loving Conservatives and Why We All Need to Learn How to Read the Bible Like Jesus Did (San Francisco: Metanoia Press, 2014).

[2] Walter Wink, The Powers That Be: Theology for a New Millennium (New York: Galilee Doubleday, 1999).

[3] Walter Brueggemann, Theology of the Old Testament: Testimony, Dispute, Advocacy (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2005).

[4] Hermeneutic, derived from Hermes, the messenger of the gods in Greek mythology, is the process of transmitting the divine message into language and concepts that can be understood by humans. In recent generations it has become generalized to mean any process of interpretation.

[5] Flood, op. cit., Kindle Version, Location 1017.

[6] Anson Laytner, Arguing with God: A Jewish Tradition (Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson Inc. 1990).

[7] The direct opposite of the life of faith described in II Corinthians 5:7.

[8] Derek Flood, op. cit., Kindle version, Location 967.

Change? (Gasp!)

Beyond the gospels the central and dominant figure in the New Testament is, arguably, Paul (nee Saul of Tarsus). Before his conversion Saul had studied the Scriptures under the best of teachers. He was convinced that to be faithful he should commit violence in God’s name. He felt certain that for the survival of Judaism this Christian heresy must be rooted out.

“After his encounter with Christ, and his experience of healing and enemy love from Jesus’ disciples (Acts 9:11-18), Paul needed to completely reassess how to understand the same Scriptures he had read previously in such a toxic and violent way. The change produced a radically different understanding of God’s will, and a radically different way of interpreting those same Scriptures.”[1]

NOTE: Nothing in the Scriptures changed! It was only Paul’s way of reading the Scriptures that changed! Nothing is more central to my Lenten Pilgrimage than this distinction!

I would say virtually every person of faith at some point along the journey of life comes face-to-face with the possibility that our understanding does not mesh with the reality presented in the sacred writ. Not every person has the strength and integrity to confess, “I was wrong.”

Martin Luther had such a confrontation with his own faith while he was reading the Epistle to the Romans. It was during the reading of that same epistle that I had my first conscious realization that what I had been taught was not consistent with what I was reading.

It’s a terrifying realization. But sometimes integrity demands that we go a different way.

As Derek Flood points out, for Paul, of utmost significance may be not so much in what he says as in what he doesn’t say. It is revealing to note how he deals with violent passages in the Old Testament—texts that call for killing Gentiles.

In Romans 15:8-12, for example, Paul quotes several Scriptures to make his point that Gentiles “may glorify God for his mercy” because of the gospel. Note what he doesn’t include in those Scriptures:

 (NRSV) For I tell you that Christ became a servant to the circumcised to show God’s truthfulness, in order to confirm the promises given to the patriarchs, ⁹ and in order that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy. As it is written, “Thou didst make my enemies turn their backs to me, and those who hated me I destroyed. They cried for help, but there was none to save, they cried to the Lord, but he did not answer ... For this I will extol thee, O Lord, among the nations[2], and sing praises to thy name.” (Quoting Psalm 18:40-49) Again, it says, “Praise his people, O you nations; for he avenges the blood of his servants, and takes vengeance on his adversaries, and makes expiation for the land of his people.” (Quoting Deuteronomy 32:43)

Within Paul’s change of Scriptural understanding is his re-contextualizing of these passages; instead of focusing on violence against Gentiles he declares God’s mercy in Christ for Gentiles. Not only does this represent a reinterpretation of the relationship of faith to violence, it constitutes a major redefinition of how salvation is understood. Instead of meaning God’s deliverance of Israel from its political and military enemies, Paul now understands salvation to mean the restoration of all people in Christ, including those same “enemy” Gentiles.[3]

                                                                                                               

Now, instead of excluding Gentiles, Paul embraces them within God’s mercy; indeed, he is singularly committed to taking that message of God’s mercy to them. Now, instead of using violence to purify the world from them, he is exposing himself to violence in order to include them. Such is the nature of radical commitment to the gospel—not the exposure to violence, per se, but the radical shift from rabidly narrow exclusion, even violent elimination, to universal, merciful embrace. The violence is the byproduct of resistance to change.

Note again, however, that Paul’s personal shift did not indicate in any way a shift in Scripture, itself. Indeed, the precedent had been set at least as early as Isaiah’s metaphor of Israel as a “light to the nations” (Isaiah 49:6). Paul could easily have used these more pastoral texts from the Hebrew Scriptures. Perhaps he was being intentional in using and reinterpreting passages that previously had been used to justify violence.

In the same spirit of Jesus’ teaching, “You have heard… but I tell you…” Paul is moving faith to the next level, and it is a move for which he paid a high price.

I suspect that Paul sensed the futility of trying to move his Jewish community to this new understanding and chose, instead, to align himself with the new movement. Cultural and ethnic exclusivism is nowhere as strongly rooted as in the sanctions of religion, and most especially within the ranks of fundamentalist expressions of religion. And Paul should know. He was a Pharisee.

And so, where does all this bring me in my Lenten wandering through the wilderness of my own temptation? I am torn between the desire to lash out at (for example) terrorist extremists to who are inflicting blasphemous atrocities on other humans in the name of God, and the knowledge that violence breeds violence and does not bring lasting peace. But most of all, I am conflicted over my growing awareness of the value and effectiveness of non-violent confrontations and my knowledge that those who practice it frequently end up being crucified.

That’s how I see it through the flawed glass that is my world view.

Together in the Walk,

Jim

---

[1] Derek Flood, Disarming Scriptures: Cherry-Picking Liberals, Violence Loving Conservatives and Why We all Need to Learn to Read the Bible Like Jesus Did (San Francisco: Metanoia Books, 2014), Kindle edition, Location 781

[2] The word also is sometimes translated “Gentiles,” and “heathen”.

[3] Derek Flood, op. cit., Location 797.