Proper 9, Saturday
Today's Readings:
David volunteers to fight Goliath. Saul gives him his armor, but it is so bulky that David cannot move. Goliath laughs at the unarmored boy who challenges him. David claims that he will kill Goliath and the world will see that the Lord does not save by the sword nor the spear. David hits Goliath on the head with a stone.
Peter recounts his recent activites to the apostles in Jerusalem. They see the light, as it were, and accept the fact that the gentiles have been given redemption. (Interesting side note. Tradition holds that Peter was the first Pope, the first ultimate authority after Jesus, but here Peter must account for himself to the rest of the group. This community is goverened by a group of men, and maybe women.)
After John is arrested, Jesus takes up the mission of proclaiming the good news. He calls Simon and Andrew (brothers) and James and John (sons of Zebedee) to follow him. IN Capernaum, a man posessed by a demon recognized Jesus and calls him the son of God, but Jesus orders the man to keep silent. The unclean spirit leaves him.
There is a casualness in the mention of John's arrest. Again, the audience Mark was writing to knew this stuff already, they knew the context of the story. Jesus takes up the message of John, that baptism and repentance leads to forgiveness. To mix a metaphor, it appears that Jesus took up John's cross, not his own. Jesus has been introduced to his divinity, but is still uncomfortable with it. Did Jesus consider this a compromise with God? "Okay, Lord, Abba, I won't save Israel, because I am just a carpenter, but I will preach John's truth for him."
On the flip side, why would four men drop everything to follow Jesus if they didn't see in Jesus some sort of divinity. Was the actual conversation on the beach as simple as Mark makes it? I can't imagine it that way, but if Simon, Andrew, James, and John all knew Jesus, it would make this a less difficult idea to swallow.
Right now, I am reading Jesus' journey and mission as one of self discovery.
Proper 9, Friday
Today's Readings:
Despite watching their baby brother's annointment as King, David's older brothers chastise him for 'coming out to watch the battle.' He witnesses Golith's challenge to the Israelites.
Peter preaches his new understanding that God is not a tribal God and does not show partiality because of race. Peter claims the authority of a witness of the resurrection to preach that Christ is the judge of the living and the dead. Forgiveness of sins comes through Jesus' name. The Gentiles, even the uncircumcized ones, receive the Holy Spirit and are baptized.
Finally, I get to start a progressive reading oy the Gospel of Mark. This is the earliest canonical Gospel and vas used as source material for Matthew and Luke. In studying the early Church, it is important to understand what each community of believers actually believed. I am of the opinion that there was not one community led by the twelve and Christianity had been one faith from the crucifiction on. How many of the named apostles are in Acts? So far, only a few. The way I see it, and I openly admit this may not be accurate, the earliest stories about Jesus are the most common among the various groups, but also closer to the truth. When something hits the news today, various urban legends and outright lies pop up immediately, within twenty four hours on network news. Because of the oral tradition and high illiteracy rates in Biblical times, I don't think that people who told fantastical lies were able to get those lies out to enjoy any kind of popularity. So what is in Mark, the earliest canonical Gospel, is more reliable fact (as we understand fact in the 21st century) than say, the Gospel of John, which was written to a faith community that had been in development of Gnostic ideas for at least fifty years.
Anyway, back to Mark. Mark
* starts his Gospel with John the Baptizer, appearing in the wilderness. The books of Malachi and Isiah are quoted early on. John's message is simple: baptism + repentance = forgiveness of sins. Throngs of people go out to him, and he tells them that a great one is coming after him, one who will baptize with fire, the Holy Spirit. Jesus comes from Nazareth and was Baptized in the Jordan. As he came up from the water he hears a voice from heaven: You are my Son, the Beloved, with you I am well pleased.
Jesus goes to the wilderness to pray. Satan tempts him, and angels help him.
This is a very personal message to Jesus. I have often wondered if Jesus understood or knew of the divinity that He is credited with. It is easy to read in Mark the story of a man who is searching for the truth, like everyone around him, and he is told at baptism that He is special, the Son of God, the Beloved. In Mark, no one else hears this statement, and John does not proclaim Jesus as the Lamb of God or the Messiah upon seeing him. The idea that John and Jesus are cousins is not in Mark. Jesus listened, believed, was baptized, and blessed. This must have come as a shock to Jesus, because I don't think Jesus grew up knowing that he was the Messiah. It didn't occur to him. He wasn't the youngest son, like David and Jacob and so many other 'worthless children' in his family. (Of course, if you believe the Roman Catholic myth that Jesus' brothers and sisters are all children of Joseph from a different, earlier marriage, then this works.) Jesus had to get away from everyone else and pray about this. He had to talk to God in a way that wouldn't get him labeled as demon posessed. As we shall see, Mark is full of instances where Jesus tries to keep this quiet.
Mark also does not explain the Roman occupation. Why would he? Estimates vary to the timeline, but Mark was most likely written before (or shortly after) the destruction of the Temple in 70 AD. His audience knew what the Romans were about, and knew that the Jews were looking for freedom through military victories. That's the Jewish story. It is hard to believe that the authors of the new testament could imagine their works being read 2000 years later. Paul wrote to the contemporary Church, and I think the Gospels were written for the current generation and the next. The return of Jesus was believed to be coming soon.
*Yes, "Mark" is the name attributed to this document, and nobody knows exactly who wrote it, but the attribution makes it easier to talk about the document and we might as well let the evangelist "Mark" take credit for the unnamed scribe who physically wrote the thing.
Proper 9, Thursday.
Today's Readings:
The Spirit of the Lord leaves Saul and an evil spirit of the Lord torments him. On advice, Saul sends for David who is known for his skill with the lyre. David's playing soothes Saul. The Philistines start acting up to war again. They send Goliath as their champion. Goliath, an impressive figure from Gath, challenges the Israelites to send their champion.
Peter thinks about his vision. The men that Cornelius has sent come and the Spirit tells Peter to go with them. They leave for Ceasarea. Cornelius worships Peter, but Peter says "I am only a mortal" Peter interprets his vision as a call to preach to all gentiles.
Jesus appears to the gathered disciples. They are frightened and doubtful. Jesus invites them to touch him. Jesus opens their minds to understand the prophets and Moses. Repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in His name to all nations, beginning in Jerusalem. He led them to Bethany, where he was carried up to heaven. The disciples return to Jerusalem and worship God in the temple.
This is too wierd. We read three ways in which God is understood, and they are different from one another. In the book of Samuel God is an interfering God who punishes people He doesn't like through direct intervention. To get David, the annointed King, into the seat of power, Saul must be tortured. Saul has repented for his sins, and it isn't good enough. Jesus deals with the doubt that the discples feel over his resurrection. It was, in Luke, a fleshy resurrection. Many Gnostic communities insisted on a dualistic nature to Jesus, that his flesh died but his spirit lived on, visual but immaterial. Despite Jesus telling the discples to preach to all nations, Peter needs to see this in a trance. Okay, maybe my earlier distrust of Peter is making me say that Peter either still didn't get it, so God had to tell him to follow Jesus' last teaching, or Peter needed to have this revelation so he could be the authority.
God is the Only God. That is the definition of Monotheism. The changes we read in the Bible show the development of monotheism, and the adjustment to the realities that monotheism entails, namely, the idea that the One God is God of All, not just any chosen few.
Proper 9, Wednesday: Suspicious Peter
Today's Readings:
God tells Samuel to go to Jesse in Bethlehem to find the new King. Samuel goes through the progression of David's older brothers before annointed David, youngest son of Jesse, King.
Cornelius, a centurion in Ceasarea, worship God, who tells him to send for Simon Peter in Joppa. Peter goes into a trance and sees a vision that allows him to eat any animal.
On the same day the women were discovering the empty tomb, two disciples were walking to Emmaus when Jesus meets them and they don't recognize him. They tell Jesus about Jesus and their disappointment. Jesus calls them fools and interprets the prophets for them. They eat and Jesus breaks the bread, reenacting the Last Supper, and Cleopas andhis companion recognize Jesus. They returned to Jerusalem to the Eleven, where they proclaim the risen Christ and His appearing to Peter.
Wait a sec...Two things seem to be odd here. In Acts, Peter goes in a trance (after not eating and praying for a few days) and receives a vision. This is different from other ways God and Jesus appear to people in the Bible. I don't remember anyone else in the Bible going into a trance to have a little tete-a-tete with God. This vision is used to remove all of the ideas of kosher foods, and I agree with it. The whole idea of a strict dietary code isn't to keep the body pure, but to keep the people together and away from outsiders. Very important when your religion is one of many and your people are in constant battle and live among people who worship different gods. I think the full stretch into real monotheism (which I'm not sure we've acheived) requires us to be allowed to eat anything with anyone. Eating together is an act of communion, and not being allowed to eat with someone is shutting them out of your heart. Look at O.J. Simpson. He wasn't allowed to eat with his family on Thanksgiving, and look what happened. So I agree with the doctrine of no dietary laws, but I am suspicious of the origin. Was Peter doing his own thing here? It's tempting for a Progressive to dismiss Peter and Paul, but that is essentially an ad hominem dislike, and doesn't discount what they've said in particular instances. So, remembering this, I think Peter had a good idea and he implemented it.
But back to the suspicion. In Luke, Peter has run off to the tomb to find it empty and there is no mention of him having a vision, until Cleopas comes back with his story and Peter has taken the vision of Mary and the women for himself. Of course, in Luke Mary and the women didn't see Jesus, they saw a couple of angels. It is possible that Jesus was one of the two men and she did not recognize Him, as Cleopas hadn't. So here I see signs of the power struggle to control the emerging Jesus movement after Jesus' death. Peter is doing things to make sure that he is the authority in the movement, and that makes me suspicious of him.
Proper 9, Tuesday
Today's Readings:
Saul admits his sin of listening to the people instead of God, and repents. Samuel kills Agog, and the Lord is sorry that he made Saul king.
Peter heals a man in Lydda named Aeneas, and this causes many people to convert. Tabitha (Dorca) is raised from the dead.
The women in Jesus' life rest on the sabbath, then go to the tomb, where two men in dazzling clothes ask them "why do you look for hte living among the dead?". The women remember what Jesus taught, and they go to the apostles, who don't believe them.
Verse 12 of chapter 24 is skipped in the lectionary. I wonder why, because it describes Peter rushing to the tomb to see the stone rolled away and the burial clothes wrapped up neatly on the bed. Peter didn't believe the women, but he went to go see for himself. Is this simply Peter not trusting the women in the group? The Gospel of Mary describes an argument where Peter basically says "Mary (and women) are not worthy of Christ". Or is this Peter going to confirm what the women said so that the apostles would believe, that the story needed to come from someone with more authority. It is possible to argue Peter's actions of verse 12 as positive and as negative, but either way one thing stands out. Peter wanted proof of his own, he did not take the news of the women on faith. There are many warnings against false prophets in the Bible, and to have phrases like "Don't listen to the false prophets, but believe everything you hear about Jesus" is not only bad advice, but it diminishes Jesus. It makes Jesus look more like David ...
* than God.
These women were in greif, no wonder they didn't remember everything the Jesus taught them that morning. I don't blame them. They saw and believed. Peter didn't believe until he saw. The underlying principle is that I think it is more important to believe after seeing proof than to just believe rumor. That's gossip, and not healthy even when it's true.
I also found it interesting that Samuel states that God, not being mortal, does not, or should not, change his mind. On the other hand, God regrets His previous actions. In the time this book was written, I don't think they understood that God is outside of time, but they viewed God as flowing down time with us, God may see the future, but he could not (in their opinion) control it or change it. I'm so glad we've dropped that limitation on God, but it makes passages like this one from Samuel difficult to read, because it speaks of a God different than the one we recognize. It is important to remember that our image of God is just an image. God is God, and our understanding of God has changed over the centuries.
*The guy who had the Branch Davidian cult thing, I can't remember his name. He ordered all of his followers to commit mass suicide. Or were they shot out by the FBI? Anyway, the statement is more cultish than religious.
Proper 9, Monday: The Death of Jesus pt. 2
Today's Readings:
Samuel is very difficult. The message of God to Saul here is: commit Genocide. Total Genocide, kill the men, women, and children, and destroy their crops and animals and houses. Erase them from existence. The Amalekites fought Israel, and for that God wants them to die. Hmmm....In other cases when God wanted to punish a group of people--Sodom and Gamorrah come to mind--He did it himself. Sauls actions may not have come from God, then, but Saul used God to justify his own hatred and desire for warfare. The Israelites wanted a King, and Samuel told them how bad Kings are, and gave them one anyway. It's almost like Samuel chose someone unfit to be King to teach the Isrealites that absolute monarchs are dangerous things, the exception being God. Anyway, Saul attacks, wins, but spares Agag, the Amalekite King, and the best animals for a sacrifice to God. Saul may have learned a lesson here, but God was still displeased that Saul didn't follow God's instructions to the letter. Samuel asks him, "which is better, Sacrifices or Obedience?" Saul is rejected as King.
In Acts, Saul
1 preaches about Jesus in Damascus, confusing his audience. There is a plot to kill him for switching sides, and he escapes to Jerusalem where the apostles won't see him. His reputation precedes him. Barnabas takes him into the apostles, and Saul convinces them of his transformation. Saul argues with the Hellenists, and is sent to Tarsus for undisclosed reasons. Argues with Hellenists? I've been reading a few books about early Christianity and I think there is something about Hellenists, or at least the Hellenization of Christianity as an historical theory. I'll have to put that on my list of things to explore.
Finally, in Luke, darkness covers the land. The curtain in the Temple is torn in two (by whom, I wonder). Jesus says "Into your hands I commend my spirit" which is a quote from the 31st Psalm, which is all about trust. Jesus dies. A centurion states "Surely this man was innocent" or "righteous". Joseph of Arimathea asks for the body of Jesus and puts it in an unused tomb. The women prepare spices and ointments, then rest on the Sabbath.
I don't know much about Judaic buriel customs, but I understood that the idea of Jewish bodies left nailed to a cross on the sabbath (and the Passover) was particularly disturbing. Luke doesn't mention what happens to the other Jewish bodies that have been executed, but presumably they are also taken down if they are already dead.
There is a lot of symbolism here. Jesus' last words are all about faith and trust. The centurions reaction has two translations in my Bible, either innocent (which He was) or righteous (which He was), and it probably stems from whether or not the centurion was speaking as a soldier who understood the criminal justice system and saw Jesus' reactions as very different from the guilty, or he was a believer in God as the Jews saw God, and not as the Romans did. The curtain being torn in two only makes sense to me historically. The Jews at the time believed (as I understand) that God lived in a small smoke filled room in the temple and only the very select could enter that room. The tearing is easily understood as God's grief, and less easily understood as God saying "Let me out of here! How many prophets do you people need before you get the message?"
1You'd think the folks who set up the office would prevent two readings about two different people with the same name showing up on the same day. This has been going on for a couple of weeks and it's almost confusing. Thankfully Saul will become Paul and things will become clearer.
Proper 9, Sunday: Many are called...
Today's Readings:
Obscure ancient rites using the Umin and Thummin to determine who is the source of sin at the moment: Saul and Jonathan or the people of Israel. Finally, just Jonathan is blamed, but not killed. The people of Israel ransom Jonathan for what he has done for the Lord.
Paul discusses justification by faith, and provides the following progression: suffering produces endurance, endurance produces character, character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint, because Love has been given to us by the Holy Spirit.
Matthew's Gospel describes the Kingdom of Heaven as like a man who throws a banquet for his son's wedding. Many are called, few are chosen.
I'd like to disagree with Paul. This is not the first time I've said this. I don't think character produces hope so much as character produces trust in God. For years my father told me that mowing the lawn built character, clearly he understood those steps of Paul's reasoning. Dad didn't just say these things when he wanted me to do a chore I didn't want to do. He told me things like helping a recently widowed woman sell her husbands car built character. From what I understand in this context, character isn't about hoping things will be all right, it's about trusting that things will be all right. The word 'faith' in the English language has four counterparts in Greek and Latin, and they are better translated as Agreement, Trust, Loyalty, and Vision. My faith, coming from the vast wodges of character my parents instilled in me, is based largely on trust in God, seconded by loyalty, and even that is hard to see. I look at the non-canonical books of scripture for truth. Part of this project is to solidify my understanding of what is in the Bible so I can a)know my faith better than I did, and b)compare and contrast non-canonical books to the canonical ones because being Anglican, I believe the truth lies between the extremes, and the books in the Bible are there because the editors won the battle for control of the early Christian Church, but that's another long entry for another day.
Actually, what struck me the most about today's readings is the Kingdom of Heaven being compared to a person. This happens quite a lot when I think about it, but it struck me as odd. I'm sure the situation is the important thing in these allegories. Let's see how far the allegory goes: God invited His chosen people to the Kingdom, buyt they refused. God sent a prophet (plus) who told His chosen people how wonderful the Kingdom was. The chosen people still did not come. The minimum damage was ignoring the prophets, the worst was abusing and killing the prophets. God, enraged, killed those who had killed his messengers. God sent a new messenger to invite
anybody to the Kingdom. They came, but some did not... At this point the parable is about someone not wearing wedding clothes and being cast into the outer darkness. These people came to the wedding, or the Kingdom, or the Church, and use it for their own ends, or refuse to acknowledge tradition or protocol, or they don't really transform themselves, or they are simply not worthy to be in the Kingdom.
My biggest problem with "Many are called but few are chosen" is that it is very exclusionary. It is easier to kick someone out than include them with this phrase. I think it is Nora Gallagher who, in a
Via Media session, stated that using the Bible to exclude anyone is simply flat-out wrong. I agree. The point is to show the Good News of Jesus ("Hey Gang, God loves everybody now!") and invite people to closer communion with God, and help them on their journey. Ed Bacon loves the fact that the Episcopal Church allows you to come in as a whole person. This is what I feel, but this is not what Matthew is saying. I think the wedding clothes of the allegory can point to our outer demeanor, or our actions. In the whole Faith vs. Works dialogue, one argument is that Works without Faith is meaningless, but Faith without Works isn't real Faith. We should recognize, or look for, Faith by the evidence of the live changed by that Faith, in other words, the Works of a person transformed by faith.
