Tag Archives: Hermeneutics

Fear the Lord

…that you may fear the LORD your God, you and your son and your son’s son, by keeping all his statutes and his commandments, which I command you, all the days of your life, and that your days may be long.
(Deuteronomy 6:2 ESV)

The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.   (Ecclesiastes 12:13 ESV)

Some thoughts on the fear of God or the fear of the LORD:

I’ve read the commentaries and the debates.  Sometimes semantics from dictionaries or commentaries just don’t get you far.  In some ways, thinking existentially helps us here.  Most likely and often, the authors of the Bible mimic the power structures they encounter in real life.

The fear of the LORD probably is reflective of Suzerain treaties and relationships.  Relations between the leaders of unequal city-states or tribes.  You owe your allegiance to the suzerain.  Maybe you pay some taxes, maybe you send some men for his army, you get the picture.  And so the language of fearing the LORD ought to be thought as originating from this political relationship.

Again, to make the ontological move to “the LORD is our suzerain,” is not necessary, and should not be the first theological move.  One reason for this is that mimesis can often be a form of political resistance.

Even though a vassal state may show allegiance to the suzerain in political practice, the vassal’s citizens also enact through cultic ritual the “fear of the LORD.”  This is as if to say, “We may pay lip service to a human, but our true allegiance is to YHWH.”  This may seem contradictory and problematic, and it is, but we need not judge the ancients in our analysis, since we are not much better (if at all).

Instead, the practice is simple.  Pay homage to the human suzerain to survive, materially.  But the cultic homage of YHWH, the “fear of the LORD,” is a communal enactment of identity, and act of resistance against perceived unjust powers.

Therefore, we are not necessarily committed to the theological images of God in the Bible that depict God as suzerain or Caesar, but instead, the Bible in using these images suggests that our allegiance and identity ought to be found in God.

A Lectionary Experience: Mark 5:21-43

First, on my old blog, I’ve dealt with this passage before:

The writer of Mark favors what are called sandwich stories, A-B-A’ constructions, where B as the central point in the story, says something crucial about A and A’.  Have a look:

A.  21 And when Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a great crowd gathered about him, and he was beside the sea.  22 Then came one of the rulers of the synagogue, Jairus by name, and seeing him, he fell at his feet  23and implored him earnestly, saying, “My little daughter is at the point of death. Come and lay your hands on her, so that she may be made well and live.”  24 And he went with him. And a great crowd followed him and thronged about him.

B. 25 And there was a woman who had had a discharge of blood for twelve years,  26 and who had suffered much under many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and was no better but rather grew worse.  27 She had heard the reports about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his garment.  28 For she said, “If I touch even his garments, I will be made well.” 29 And immediately the flow of blood dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease.  30 And Jesus, perceiving in himself that power had gone out from him, immediately turned about in the crowd and said, “Who touched my garments?”  31 And his disciples said to him, “You see the crowd pressing around you, and yet you say, ‘Who touched me?’”  32 And he looked around to see who had done it.  33 But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling and fell down before him and told him the whole truth.  34 And he said to her, “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.”

A’. 35 While he was still speaking, there came from the ruler’s house some who said, “Your daughter is dead. Why trouble the Teacher any further?”  36 But overhearing what they said, Jesus said to the ruler of the synagogue, “Do not fear, only believe.”  37 And he allowed no one to follow him except Peter and James and John the brother of James.  38 They came to the house of the ruler of the synagogue, and Jesus saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly.  39 And when he had entered, he said to them, “Why are you making a commotion and weeping? The child is not dead but sleeping.”  40 And they laughed at him. But he put them all outside and took the child’s father and mother and those who were with him and went in where the child was.  41Taking her by the hand he said to her, “Talitha cumi,” which means, “Little girl, I say to you, arise.”  42 And immediately the girl got up and began walking (for she was twelve years of age), and they were immediately overcome with amazement.  43 And he strictly charged them that no one should know this, and told them to give her something to eat.

In the two stories above, an elite (ruler of the synagogue, male, house owner) comes to Jesus asking for him to heal his daughter and save her from imminent death.  But Jesus, on the way to the ruler’s house, pauses for a disenfranchised woman with an impure discharge who has no money.  He pauses, because this woman touched his garment to be made well.  And Jesus calls her, Daughter, not by mistake, but most likely in the presence of Jairus.  This girl too is a daughter.  Then Jesus continues and heals the daughter of Jairus.

In this story, Mark wonderfully juxtaposes the poor and the elite, and shows the priority of the Divine Dominion is for the poor and marginalized first, and then to the elites.  But not only that, but by calling her daughter, Jesus somehow connects the two daughters, perhaps calling Jairus, and other elites, to look upon this woman as a daughter as well.

Existentially, I imagine the experience of the Mark’s readers were concerned for their health and subsistence as this woman was.  Perhaps, the call then, is rather than simply be wrapped up in one’s own existential concerns, we may understand the universality of such concerns, and share the concerns of others, especially with regards to health and subsistence.

Bible as Word of God?

Another great post from Rachel Held Evans today on reading the Bible we have.

Although, one statement had an underlying assumption that I want to clarify:

It is somewhat ironic, it seems to me, that both liberals and conservatives make the same error. They both assume that something worthy of the title word of God would look different from what we actually have.

Not all “liberals” (nor conservatives, dare I say?) consider the Bible as “Word of God.”  My denomination makes it clear (most of the time) that the Word of God is first and foremost, CHRIST.  And if the word of God is infallible and inerrant, it is because the Word of God is Christ.

Again, nowhere in the Bible does it say that the whole Bible is the Word of God.  Why?  The Bible is a collection of independent scrolls which were, for the most part, written without the intention to be “in the Bible.”  The Bible is not aware of itself being the Bible.

Therefore, again, claiming that the Bible is the ‘Word of God’ is a faith-claim external to the text itself.  It is a choice, but one that is not often viewed as a choice.  Conceptions making reality again, and experiences being ignored.  We can do better.

 

The Lectionary Experience: Mark 3:20-35

And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, “He is possessed by Beelzebul,” and “by the prince of demons he casts out the demons.” And he called them to him and said to them in parables, “How can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, but is coming to an end. But no one can enter a strong man’s house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man. Then indeed he may plunder his house.
“Truly, I say to you, all sins will be forgiven the children of man, and whatever blasphemies they utter, but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin”—for they were saying, “He has an unclean spirit.”
(Mark 3:20-35 ESV)

Jesus is essentially saying, “if I am the satan (the adversary) and I am casting out demons, then good news, folks, the satan’s kingdom is gonna fall!!!  But no, really, if you want to destroy the satan’s kingdom, then you first have to bind up the satan, and then destroy his house.”  In other words, Jesus has bound the satan and that’s why he’s cleaning house.

A couple of existential observations.  Notably, in the First Testament, the three times the satan is mentioned he is at least twice a prosecuting attorney for God, most memorably in the prologue to Job.  With this in mind, it is fascinating, to see Jesus claim that the satan is bound, and then proclaim the forgivness of sins (nothing to do with the cross) over the children of man.

Nevertheless, we know that in the period between the Testaments, that the character of the satan grew in stature and power into the figure we encounter in canonical and non-canonical apocalyptic literature.  But here too, the satan is never simply “Satan” as many often imagined, but the satan is connected with the evil political powers of the day (see here for an example).

With the large accusatory Temple scene in Mark 11-12, we know that Jesus is attacking the corrupt powers (especially the scribes, see 12.28-40) of Jerusalem leadership.  With these three points in mind, I submit the following as a clue to the existential concerns of the text.  First, Jesus is calling out the scribes and other Jerusalem leadership for perpetuating evils, oppression, etc.  These evils are built on the premise that they run the system which negotiates sin and retribution between God and the masses.  Jesus, having bound the satan, is cleaning house with the forgiveness of sins, emptying the power of the corrupt leadership.

The existential concern is behind the premise that people need forgiveness of sins in order to be right with God.  With the existential crisis being that the people have no control over their own destiny, the forgiveness of sins meets crisis in several concerns.  First, it is identity with the people of God, a sense of belonging with the other righteous.  Second, the cost for peasants to have to participate in the sacrificial culture is an economic strain.  The forgiveness of sins, reduces this burden.  Finally, corrupt leadership tries to answer the the existential crisis, where they have no control over their own destinies, to try to control the destinies of others.  In some ways, the forgiveness of sin breaks their power to control the destinies of the people.

A good existential reading then will first focus on the identity, the economics, and oppression, before making too much of what “blaspheming the holy spirit” might mean.

Are there existential concerns that I missed?

… it’s what you see.

It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.  - Henry David Thoreau

Yes, but can’t you see what your looking at first?

Indeed, we cannot even begin to consider the world in which we live without the conceptions.  The conceptions, the ontologies, the faith claims, they make our understanding of the world and our communication efficient.  We cannot adequately describe our experience, it’s too vast for words.  But for the sake of everything good and decent, can we at least look at how our experiences become our conceptions.  Let’s look at first, and then “see.”  Because, sometimes, in spite of Thoreau, it is what you look at that is important.

Case in point: 2012 election.  What is important?  Let’s speculate that it’s the on-the-ground experience of millions of Americans.  Therefore, the policies that affect change on the people’s lives are the important politics.  But every day, Obama is a Muslim, Romney is greedy, the Democrats are commies, the Republicans hate poor people.  These are ontological claims, conceptions of our world, that are at best irrelevant.  Distractions from what is important, making us blind to what we look at, and only emphasizing what we see.

The same happens with faith claims about God, even if those faith claims are quoted word-for-word from the Bible.  The words are far from the core, yet they point to the core.  But the core is the experience and context that produced the words.  To fetischize the faith claim before the core, is to “see” what your not looking at.  To read Christ into Isaiah 9.6 (“For to us a child is born…”) before placing it in the context of Northern Kingdom/Assyrian conflict is to quit reading and and to insert one’s own message into the text.  There’s no reason to shut our brains off and quit reading the text in order to defend our deeply held theological notions.  The Bible is a text that behaves like a text, because that’s what texts do.  So look at the text and let’s see what we can make of it?

Christian Misunderstandings of Scholarship

“God is no fonder of intellectual slackers than He is of any other slacker.” – C.S. Lewis

Almost without fail, at least once a week, I hear someone complain about Biblical scholarship or Academia.  ”I just want to hear that God loves us.”  ”Do you think that Academia is at the center?  Of course not, it’s God!”  ”I don’t trust in scholarly theories, I trust in the Bible.”  ”Jesus said it, therefore, we don’t need to argue about it.”

I usually sit in silence, and then go plant my face in my hand in private.  But today, I’m pulling out my soap box.  Admittedly, I am a Bible Scholar, so I am strongly biased.  If you would like, I can follow up this post with the weaknesses of scholarship in religious communities.  But in my opinion, while they exist and are plentiful, they are usually not what people suggest to me the weaknesses are.

Feel free to let me know in the comment section what you might think possible weaknesses are.  (Edit:)  But scholarship is not opposed to the Gospel or the Church, contrary to some opinions.

A.  If there is no scholarship, there is no Bible.  No Bible, no Church, no Gospel.  Are you not aware that there is no standard original text of the Bible?  There are thousands of various manuscripts, which then, somebody has to go through and speculate (with evidence, of course) as to what the original text was.  Guess who does this?  So, your precious Jesus, Church, and Gospel don’t even make sense until the two thousand years of scholarly work binds it into a book form for you.  And the original text is still debated to this very day.  People, wake up, and smell the leather binding.

B.  Scholarship has put these sacred texts into a book and into a certain order.  But to read it as one book, requires some form of internal human processing.  Biblical scholars are often hesitant to connect the dots from one author to another, because who’s to stop us from making the Bible say what we want it to say when we do that.  It’s a form of control in the interpretive process.  But many Theological scholars (and biblical too) have connected the dots with this or that theory.  Often when people connect the dots to make a theology that Biblical scholars would question, they do so with theories from Augustine, to Aquinas, Luther, and Calvin, et al.  Not with the work of the holy spirit.  In other words, people unknowingly have already accepted some form of scholarship in their interpretation of Scripture and Tradition.

C.  Scholarship is so much more about learning and educating pastors and lay people to ask the right questions, not always to find the right answers.  If you start with an understanding of what the Gospel is before you read the Bible, of course all the answers will be self-evident.  But where did your Gospel come from in the first place?  You can start with a Gospel that’s external to Scripture, it’s not illegal.  But don’t pretend to be a “biblical” Christian when you do it.  Scholarship on the other hand, helps us to ask the best and most efficient questions (not always that efficient) to find out what the Gospel might be.

D.  Many people do not know what they’ve accepted on faith before they believe.  What manuscript of the Bible is the best one?  What about the exclusion of the Apocrypha?  The Bible must be interpreted ontologically?  Literally?  Figuratively?  Most of these questions are answered by a community and accepted on faith, without any awareness of the fact that they’ve already been accepted on faith.  Part of scholarship’s job is to point out what faith claims are in play at each decision point.  A good rule of thumb: the less you think critically, the more you’re accepting on faith.  And the irony is, the more you accept on faith, the more you place your trust in scholars that you don’t even know, and the less your faith is centered on Christ.  Get it?

E.  Scholarship brings out marginalized voices within Christianity.  Scholars are not the inventors of these voices necessarily, but they amplify them.  The theology of the African slaves which was based on the exodus, was amplified by scholars, and now most scholarship realizes the importance of the Exodus imagery all throughout the Bible.  Scholars amplified the Jewishness of the New Testament after the holocaust.  Peasant communities in Latin America have helped scholars look at the text from an agricultural society, rather than from a capitalist one, amplifying the peasant ideologies that exist in the texts of the Bible.

In my opinion, when people complain about Biblical/Theological scholarship, it’s usually because we aren’t edifying them with what they already believe, and we aren’t telling them what they want to hear.  After all, you can always just go to another church that will, anyways.

I’ll step off my soap box for now.  But there’s so much more…

What are the benefits/weaknesses of Biblical and Theological scholarship for you?

Experience Behind Lectionary: John 3.1-17

Looking at the Gospel text for this weekend again.  I’ve highlighted what I believe to be helpful in determining the existential concern:

Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.” Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
Nicodemus said to him, “How can these things be?” Jesus answered him, “Are you the teacher of Israel and yet you do not understand these things? Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know, and bear witness to what we have seen, but you do not receive our testimony. If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you heavenly things? No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.  (John 3:1-17 ESV)

Remember from last week how the gospel writer was defining the identity of the community.  Here too, it is the same thing.  The Kingdom of God, the Spirit of God, and the Son of Man are all traditions within Second Temple Judaism.  A community of Christ believers within Judaism are in the midst of a conflict with other Judeans (Jews).  Much of the Gospel is redefining the Gospel-communities identity in light of this conflict with the other Judeans.  Nicodemus serves as the perfect character who is transcending the boundaries of the two Judeanisms.  There’s a good deal more to be said about Nicodemus, so read a commentary or two.

But I find this statement of Jesus’ in line with the proposal of this blog: “If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you heavenly things.”  If you don’t understand anthropology, how can you understand theology?  If you don’t understand earthly existence, then how will you comprehend heavenly existence through the conceptions Jesus will teach?

But when you look at what Jesus has said just previous to this claim–be born again/from above, kingdom of God, Spirit, etc– it sounds as if he is already talking about heavenly things.  But then Jesus gives us the metaphor of the wind, taking us into the existential experience of feeling the wind blow.  It exists, but its origin and its destination is unknown.  But it is experienced as a part of existence.  In other words, this new growing Jesus movement within Judeanism is claiming validity through their experience of the Spirit.  It is not defined here, but it is experienced, as an earthly thing, and for all practical purposes it is real for the community.

If you can’t understand that communities have real religious experiences, how can you honestly engage in theology?

Emmaus never happened.

In Crossan’s new book, The Power of Parable, he harps on a point he always has, but here on the Road to Emmaus story (Lk. 24.13-35).  Crossan claims that the story is not historical fact, but a parable about Jesus.  Like parables,

“Emmaus never happened.  Emmaus always happens.“

Read Crossan to understand the logic of his argument.  Not really my concern.

This claim may turn away many Christians, and most will never take the time to consider his methods or logic.  The same happened to Bultmann.  In fact, some may say that Crossan, as a leading figure of the Jesus seminar, is one of the bearers of Bultmann’s torch.  In source and form criticism, perhaps.  But in the back of my mind, I hear Bultmann possibly saying, “Meh.  Who cares if it’s historical?”

Several points.  I think an honest response in a spirit of truth might ponder, could Luke’s original audience have understood it as a parable?  Let’s assume that Luke is performed before an urban audience of Jewish and Gentile Christians.  Would they necessarily have to believe that this is an actual event that took place?  Or could they have interpreted as a parable about Jesus, about themselves having to recognize the risen Christ, especially in the breaking of the bread (v.30-31)?  I cannot answer definitively, but I am strongly inclined to say it’s a possibility that if it were a parable, the audience would have had the cultural and contextual clues to understand it as such.

This goes along with what I’ve been saying: you choose to read it as ontological.  You choose to read it as historical fact.  The text does not always or necessarily force such a reading upon you.  You could read it as a parable.  That is a valid reading of it.  And you could do an existential reading of it (for another day).

This also brings up another one of my pet peeves, one layered with irony.  I’ve read it in comments and articles on Bultmann here and there that the members of the Jesus seminar are the ones to continue Bultmann’s legacy.  But Bultmann was so vehemently against the liberal theologians of his day, for they were trying to show the Bible to be historically unreliable when there was not enough evidence to do so.  Likewise, he stood against the apologists of his day as well, for they too did not have enough evidence.  Those who continue Bultmann’s legacy are scholars who show how the text answered the existential concerns of its original audience.  Sure some of the Jesus Seminar people do this, but I could never see Bultmann casting a ballot for the historical reliability of the text.

What do you think?

Experiencing the Lectionary: John 15.26-16.15

UPDATE: I have realized that the lectionary actually leaves out the first four verses of chapter 16.  Sigh.  My guess is they wanted to avoid the anti-semitic tones of the verses.  But that’s a problem with later readers of the Bible like us, not for the text.  Oh, well, it could still be mentioned in a sermon…

An existential analysis of this week’s gospel reading: John 15.26-16.15

“But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me. And you also will bear witness, because you have been with me from the beginning. I have said all these things to you to keep you from falling away. They will put you out of the synagogues. Indeed, the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think he is offering service to God. And they will do these things because they have not known the Father, nor me. But I have said these things to you, that when their hour comes you may remember that I told them to you.

“I did not say these things to you from the beginning, because I was with you. But now I am going to him who sent me, and none of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment: concerning sin, because they do not believe in me; concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you will see me no longer; concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.

“I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.

1.  What is the existential concern behind the text? “They will put you out of the synagogues.”

Is it persecution? Survival? Oppression? Being a social outcast?  You get the point.  While there may be economic and political implications to being cast out of the synagogues, I prefer to put this as an identity concern.  It encompasses these tertiary concerns I just mentioned, but it carries with it the added weight of belonging.  This social sense of belonging eases the existential crisis by creating a systematic community that produces meaning for life.

Rather than consider Christians vs Jews, it’s better to consider a Jesus movement within Judaism.  Where some members of the synagogue are now disenfranchised, this text is offering a new sense of belonging to the “Jesus movement.”  Those who have cast out the Jesus followers, will get what’s coming to them, not because they have failed at correct belief and doctrine, but because that have treated the Jesus movement poorly.

Most bible readers will be enthralled with the “Helper” in this passage, as they probably should be.  Is it the Holy Spirit in the narrative?  Close enough.  But again, this is a concept aligning itself as a resolution to an existential concern.  And as I am continuing to argue, the existential concern should take precedence in bible-believing communities, ahead of theories of the Holy Spirit or Divine Judgment.

2.  How to respond to the existential concern?

It’s not about getting the theology or doctrine correct.  Rather, it’s about creating an atmosphere or situation where the human existential crisis cannot rear its ugly head in the concern of identity.  I have two suggestions.

First, don’t be the kind of community that marginalizes based upon theological or doctrinal differences.  Be accepting of challenges to the status quo, to the dominant understanding of the faith proclaimed within the community.  Be aware and open to the fluid nature of identities.  So long as the practices of love abound, questions and fluidity can only help the community grow in faith.

Second, be a community who can continually mold itself to offer new senses of belonging to various disenfranchised members of nearby communities.  In doing so, theologies and doctrines may take a backseat to a community that is attempting to follow Christ, a community that answers existential concerns with existence rather than with concepts.

Bible and Existence (5)

JC&M

Part 5/6 in a series…

To be sure, philosophical analysis presupposes the judgment that it is possible to analyze human existence without reflection on the relation between man and God.  But to understand human existence in relation to God can only mean to understand my personal existence, and philosophical analysis does not claim to instruct me about my personal self-understanding.  The purely formal analysis of existence does not take into account the relation between man and God, because it does not take into account the concrete events of the personal life, the concrete encounters which constitute personal existence.  If it is true that the revelation of God is realized only in the concrete events of life here and now, and that the analysis of existence is confined to man’s temporal life with its series of here and now, then this analysis unveils a sphere which faith alone can understand as the sphere of the relation between man and God.

It would be nice to know what Bultmann means by faith alone, because this is a slight departure from the existential analysis, however true it may be.  Still, if we take any of the common definitions of faith–belief in, allegiance to, or trust– we are still left with the “sphere of the relation between God and man.”  Here, since “faith” must “understand” the sphere, the sphere is a conception post-existence.  It can very well be a sphere in which humans may exist, but is only a sphere that is later reflected upon through faith, and perhaps by only faith.

Take for example the famous “Footprints” poem.  The narrator’s existence experienced difficult times.  Upon further reflection, “the Lord” is inserted into the narrative of existence, presumably by faith, and no one can empirically verify or disprove the accuracy of the insertion. But clearly, the narrator is looking back (historically) to analyze existence.  This gives birth to “the Lord” in existence, but it is therefore a conception applied after the experienced event.  For this reason, an existential analysis has no conception of God at its disposal: an analysis of human existence prior to conceptions.