... continued from yesterday
_________
But it is also no surprise to find that the New Testament has almost nothing positive to say about wealth or the wealthy. Virtually everything it has to say is not only negative but virtually condemnatory. "The love of money is a root of all kinds of evil" (1 Tim. 6:10). Rather, "we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that" (6:7-8). "Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs" (6:10).
James is of course even starker in what it has to say about the wealthy, and it assumes such individuals are cheats. "Now listen, you rich people, weep and wail because of the misery that is coming on you... Look! The wages you failed to pay the workers who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty" (5:1, 4). James pictures a land owner who severely underpays the captive labor he has at his disposal.
James 4 similarly mocks the "industrialist," the merchant who is preoccupied with making a profit. "Now listen, you who say, 'Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.' Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes" (4:11-12).
These verses remind us of a parable in Luke sometimes called the Parable of the Rich Fool (Luke 12:13-21). In this parable, a wealthy man wants to store up his surplus grain so he can "eat, drink, and be merry" for many years. He wants to tear down his barns and built bigger ones. The parable mocks him, because he is destined to die that very evening.
These are parables and proverbs. They are not absolute, without exception. It may be "easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God" (Mark 10:25). But it is possible. There are prosperous employers who pay fair wages to their employees. There is a time to store up grain in a time of prosperity so that you can help others in the years to come (e.g., Gen. 41:49). Notice that the authentic purpose in Joseph's case was to help others.
Paul thinks of it this way in 2 Corinthians. "At the present time your plenty will supply what they need, so that in turn their plenty will supply what you need. The goal is equality, as it is written: 'The one who gathered much did not have too much, and the one who gathered little did not have too little.'" (7:14-15). In so many words, Paul says that God is prospering you Corinthians right now, so your obligation is to share to others who do not have enough at this time. A time may come when it flows the other direction.
John Wesley summed up the most appropriate application of these values well when he said, "Earn all you can; save all you can; give all you can." [1] You will find no acceptance of laziness here. But by "save all you can" he did not mean to store up your excess prosperity in bigger barns or brokerage accounts. For him, save meant not to buy a more expensive brand when you can get by with a less expensive one. Then "give all you can" is self-explanatory.
This biblical value of not storing up treasures on earth but dispersing God given prosperity to as many others as we can is difficult for us today. It goes against the grain of our capitalistic spirit. Indeed, the famous libertarian Ayn Rand once wrote a book called The Virtue of Selfishness. To be sure, there are, I believe, legitimate claims to be made that everyone prospers more under the Western capitalist system. But most people arguably lose sight of this fact, that the only Christian justification for capitalism is the conviction that it helps more people in the end. The danger is that we come to mistake Rand's "selfishness" as the Christian value itself...
[1] Wesley source
Saturday, February 18, 2012
Friday, February 17, 2012
Science Friday: Factor-Label Method
The science novel madness continues! Here's tonight's excerpt:
______
After writing it all down, Stefanie's exhaustion from the day finally got the best of her. She climbed in her bed and quickly drifted off. But after four nights without chemistry intruding into her dreams, the monster returned.
The dream started off fine. She was at a mall. It was two stories with a big open space in the middle. Look, there's a Cold Stone. Look, there's a Mexican restaurant. Look, a Fazolis. It was her kind of mall!
Then it kind of changed. She was facing two stories, but there were bowling pins--and humungous strips of chicken from "arroz con pollo," a Mexican dish, on both floors. They were different colors.
Suddenly, her sister Stacy was standing on the second floor in a tuxedo and tights, wearing a top hat and holding a very long black cane.
"OK, Stefanie," she yelled down. "Your job is to match the things on the top floor with the things on the bottom. Let me do one for you."
Normally, Stefanie wouldn't pay any attention to Stacy's instructions. But you know how dreams are. Things that are normally bizarre seem completely normal and real. Stefanie began to get nervous, even broke out in a sweat.
"See this twisted 1.3 meter long piece of chicken," Stacy continued, touching the chicken on the second floor. It strangely began to glow. "This piece is exactly like the 1.3 meter long piece of chicken on the bottom." And then her cane extended down to touch the other piece of chicken on the bottom. It glowed for a second and then both disappeared. "Now it's your turn."
Instantly everything disappeared and then a series of things appeared on both the top and the bottom. Two red bowling pins and a twisted piece of chicken on the top. A red bowling pin and a meter long piece of celery appeared on the bottom.
"Um," Stefanie hesitantly said. "It looks like all the bowling pins should disappear."
"WRONG!" Stacy said in a triumphant voice. "There's only one red bowling pin on the bottom so only one of the red bowling pins on the top can disappear. So what does that leave?"
Now in the dream Stefanie was quite unusually flustered. "I guess it leaves one red bowling pin and chicken strip on the top and just the celery on the bottom."
"Exactly," and with that balloons of all colors started to fall incessantly from somewhere overhead.
Stefanie woke up in a start. "What was that all about?" she actually said out loud. "Humph," she said, "like Stacy would ever make me nervous"
For the rest of the chapter, see here.
______
After writing it all down, Stefanie's exhaustion from the day finally got the best of her. She climbed in her bed and quickly drifted off. But after four nights without chemistry intruding into her dreams, the monster returned.
The dream started off fine. She was at a mall. It was two stories with a big open space in the middle. Look, there's a Cold Stone. Look, there's a Mexican restaurant. Look, a Fazolis. It was her kind of mall!
Then it kind of changed. She was facing two stories, but there were bowling pins--and humungous strips of chicken from "arroz con pollo," a Mexican dish, on both floors. They were different colors.
Suddenly, her sister Stacy was standing on the second floor in a tuxedo and tights, wearing a top hat and holding a very long black cane.
"OK, Stefanie," she yelled down. "Your job is to match the things on the top floor with the things on the bottom. Let me do one for you."
Normally, Stefanie wouldn't pay any attention to Stacy's instructions. But you know how dreams are. Things that are normally bizarre seem completely normal and real. Stefanie began to get nervous, even broke out in a sweat.
"See this twisted 1.3 meter long piece of chicken," Stacy continued, touching the chicken on the second floor. It strangely began to glow. "This piece is exactly like the 1.3 meter long piece of chicken on the bottom." And then her cane extended down to touch the other piece of chicken on the bottom. It glowed for a second and then both disappeared. "Now it's your turn."
Instantly everything disappeared and then a series of things appeared on both the top and the bottom. Two red bowling pins and a twisted piece of chicken on the top. A red bowling pin and a meter long piece of celery appeared on the bottom.
"Um," Stefanie hesitantly said. "It looks like all the bowling pins should disappear."
"WRONG!" Stacy said in a triumphant voice. "There's only one red bowling pin on the bottom so only one of the red bowling pins on the top can disappear. So what does that leave?"
Now in the dream Stefanie was quite unusually flustered. "I guess it leaves one red bowling pin and chicken strip on the top and just the celery on the bottom."
"Exactly," and with that balloons of all colors started to fall incessantly from somewhere overhead.
Stefanie woke up in a start. "What was that all about?" she actually said out loud. "Humph," she said, "like Stacy would ever make me nervous"
For the rest of the chapter, see here.
Wealth and the Poor Then 3
continued from earlier
________
But amazingly, the entirety of the biblical texts are united in their sense that God wants his people to care for those who cannot take care of themselves. It is true in the Old Testament Law. It is true in the Prophets and the Writings of the Old Testament. It is certainly true of the gospels and Acts. It is true of Paul and the letters. It is ironic that so many Christians today are so sure about so many things that the Bible does not clearly teach or that do not clearly relate to today and yet can question, even vilify those who make it a priority to help the poor today.
To be sure, there are some very significant differences not only with the poor of the Western world today but also in how we think about money today. Most Western countries today have some sort of "safety net" in place that aims at caring for those without the resources to care for themselves. For some reason the United States in particular seems to have a welfare system that creates problems of its own, where families get into a cycle of poverty. Children are raised with no sense of how to support themselves but instead know little but to continue the life of complete dependency they learned growing up.
Many of the homeless also are enslaved in a way that would need much more than food or shelter to lift them out of their condition. Some are, in a sense, enslaved to their way of life. Some do not want to leave their situation. It is not like the days of the Great Depression when the bulk of the homeless would have gladly worked to get out of their plight. [1] There is a sense in which the majority of homeless today often are in need of something much more profound than the Lazarus of Jesus' parable.
In such cases, "helping the poor" is still a solid Christian value, but the question of exactly what help they need is much more complex. It seems much more difficult than simply giving food or clothing, although we must be grateful for the soup kitchens and homeless shelters that "give a fish" to those who are hungry today and those who want to get out of the cold today. We will not find Jesus ever saying of such people, "It's your own fault that you are on the streets, now you must experience the consequences of your actions." We will look in vain for any sentiment of that sort in the gospels.
And let us also be clear that Jesus considers it an obligation for the rich man to take care of the poor man Lazarus. There is no sense that the rich man's money is his own, his own deserved possession. Rather, the New Testament largely operates with a sense of "limited good." We are either to infer from the parable that the rich man is tormented after death either because he did not help the poor man Lazarus or perhaps even simply because he was rich in the first place!
The ancient world was not a monetary economy that functioned primarily on the basis of money. Most people, as we said, lived on a subsistence level. They had enough to feed themselves and their family in a minimal sense. We would thus consider almost everyone in the ancient world to be below the poverty line. People still primarily exchanged goods and what money did exist reflected more concrete value.
There was thus a clear sense that if one person amassed more, then someone else would have less. An Arab proverb from the time not long after Christ captured it well: "Every rich man is a thief or the son of a thief." [2] It is thus possible that the rich man's wealth in itself was seen as an indication of his wickedness. They would have thought that in order to have such wealth, he would have had to cheat many, many people in the process.
Think of it this way. Let's say there are 10 of us in a room, and we each have one apple to eat for supper. Then let's say that when we leave the room, nine of you have no apples and I have all ten. That is how people at the time of Christ likely thought about wealth. Of course that is not the way resources work today, so we must be very careful when applying biblical passages about money and resources. We must take such differences into account.
But it is also no surprise to find that the New Testament has almost nothing positive to say about wealth or the wealthy. Virtually everything it has to say is not only negative but virtually condemnatory...
[1] I am not referring here to the many unemployed in the current situation in the United States and elsewhere today who would gladly work if the jobs were available. I am speaking here of the perennially homeless.
[2] Malina
________
But amazingly, the entirety of the biblical texts are united in their sense that God wants his people to care for those who cannot take care of themselves. It is true in the Old Testament Law. It is true in the Prophets and the Writings of the Old Testament. It is certainly true of the gospels and Acts. It is true of Paul and the letters. It is ironic that so many Christians today are so sure about so many things that the Bible does not clearly teach or that do not clearly relate to today and yet can question, even vilify those who make it a priority to help the poor today.
To be sure, there are some very significant differences not only with the poor of the Western world today but also in how we think about money today. Most Western countries today have some sort of "safety net" in place that aims at caring for those without the resources to care for themselves. For some reason the United States in particular seems to have a welfare system that creates problems of its own, where families get into a cycle of poverty. Children are raised with no sense of how to support themselves but instead know little but to continue the life of complete dependency they learned growing up.
Many of the homeless also are enslaved in a way that would need much more than food or shelter to lift them out of their condition. Some are, in a sense, enslaved to their way of life. Some do not want to leave their situation. It is not like the days of the Great Depression when the bulk of the homeless would have gladly worked to get out of their plight. [1] There is a sense in which the majority of homeless today often are in need of something much more profound than the Lazarus of Jesus' parable.
In such cases, "helping the poor" is still a solid Christian value, but the question of exactly what help they need is much more complex. It seems much more difficult than simply giving food or clothing, although we must be grateful for the soup kitchens and homeless shelters that "give a fish" to those who are hungry today and those who want to get out of the cold today. We will not find Jesus ever saying of such people, "It's your own fault that you are on the streets, now you must experience the consequences of your actions." We will look in vain for any sentiment of that sort in the gospels.
And let us also be clear that Jesus considers it an obligation for the rich man to take care of the poor man Lazarus. There is no sense that the rich man's money is his own, his own deserved possession. Rather, the New Testament largely operates with a sense of "limited good." We are either to infer from the parable that the rich man is tormented after death either because he did not help the poor man Lazarus or perhaps even simply because he was rich in the first place!
The ancient world was not a monetary economy that functioned primarily on the basis of money. Most people, as we said, lived on a subsistence level. They had enough to feed themselves and their family in a minimal sense. We would thus consider almost everyone in the ancient world to be below the poverty line. People still primarily exchanged goods and what money did exist reflected more concrete value.
There was thus a clear sense that if one person amassed more, then someone else would have less. An Arab proverb from the time not long after Christ captured it well: "Every rich man is a thief or the son of a thief." [2] It is thus possible that the rich man's wealth in itself was seen as an indication of his wickedness. They would have thought that in order to have such wealth, he would have had to cheat many, many people in the process.
Think of it this way. Let's say there are 10 of us in a room, and we each have one apple to eat for supper. Then let's say that when we leave the room, nine of you have no apples and I have all ten. That is how people at the time of Christ likely thought about wealth. Of course that is not the way resources work today, so we must be very careful when applying biblical passages about money and resources. We must take such differences into account.
But it is also no surprise to find that the New Testament has almost nothing positive to say about wealth or the wealthy. Virtually everything it has to say is not only negative but virtually condemnatory...
[1] I am not referring here to the many unemployed in the current situation in the United States and elsewhere today who would gladly work if the jobs were available. I am speaking here of the perennially homeless.
[2] Malina
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Coming Clean on Hermeneutics
For years I have been arguing that Paul and the NT authors read the OT like a charismatic rather than a scholar, evangelical or fundamentalist. I've done this to legitimate the "reader-response" approach that most people use when reading Scripture. I've called it other things: a "spiritual" reading, a "devotional" reading.
I've not changed my mind, that the Spirit is not and has never been limited by the original meaning of the biblical text. God can speak truth to you through the words of Scripture even if you are completely mistaken about what those words really meant. Accordingly, I believe the vast numbers of sermons every Sunday morning that proclaim truths that aren't really what the biblical text was about are still the word of God when God is speaking through the speaker.
But I'm going to come clean. This is second best for me. The best of all possible worlds is actually to understand the biblical text and to feel the freedom of the Spirit in preaching.
The best of all possible worlds is actually to know what you're talking about rather than simply relying on the possibility that the Spirit can speak truth despite our ignorance. The best of all possible words is to be relevant and knowledgeable.
Mind you, I think true relevance is more important than true understanding. I'd rather a pastor speak relevant truth to a congregation than for a pastor to know the biblical languages and say nothing of any import at all. I don't even consider that preaching. I agree with Craddock--a sermon without an address is not really a sermon.
But that's not an endorsement of ignorance. I would rather a preacher both know the real biblical text (the Greek and Hebrew one) and speak with relevance to a congregation.
There, I've come clean...
I've not changed my mind, that the Spirit is not and has never been limited by the original meaning of the biblical text. God can speak truth to you through the words of Scripture even if you are completely mistaken about what those words really meant. Accordingly, I believe the vast numbers of sermons every Sunday morning that proclaim truths that aren't really what the biblical text was about are still the word of God when God is speaking through the speaker.
But I'm going to come clean. This is second best for me. The best of all possible worlds is actually to understand the biblical text and to feel the freedom of the Spirit in preaching.
The best of all possible worlds is actually to know what you're talking about rather than simply relying on the possibility that the Spirit can speak truth despite our ignorance. The best of all possible words is to be relevant and knowledgeable.
Mind you, I think true relevance is more important than true understanding. I'd rather a pastor speak relevant truth to a congregation than for a pastor to know the biblical languages and say nothing of any import at all. I don't even consider that preaching. I agree with Craddock--a sermon without an address is not really a sermon.
But that's not an endorsement of ignorance. I would rather a preacher both know the real biblical text (the Greek and Hebrew one) and speak with relevance to a congregation.
There, I've come clean...
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Church Leadership and the NT
In recent days a couple Facebook groups have arisen among Wesleyans and a number of hot bed issues have been discussed. It's a painful place because quite different and strongly held perspectives are bantered about, but so far we're all playing nice. Some of the topics have been practical ministry questions. Others have ranged over more sensitive issues like women in ministry, inerrancy, and evolution.
I see one cross section of controversy arising because the Wesleyan church has attracted a number of former Baptists and reconstructionists whose orientation is to "get things back" to how the New Testament church did things. Occasionally, this gets us into conflict with some of the residual Methodist elements of Wesleyan Church structure. Why don't we have deacons, for example?
I thought I'd post a couple comments I made there, since the question of how we should structure local churches occasionally has come up here.
1. Those who know me will know what I'll always say with these sorts of questions. Leadership will certainly not look the same in 21st century America when it comes to many specifics. There are instead general principles and values that have to be contextualized. Doing what they did might not do what it did then today. In fact, at times in might be downright counterproductive and have exactly the opposite effect. We don't read the Bible to do exactly what they did (greet the brothers with a holy kiss), but to see how God walked with his people at particular times and places in the past to bring forward the wisdom of those relationships and interactions (let's shake hands instead).
2. I like a deaconate system too and I think an effective church of any size will have to have individuals who perform this sort of roll. My pet peeve is that we have to do it a certain way or call these people a certain thing because of the NT. After all, Acts 6 doesn't call them deacons. Acts never uses the word. It appears in a small number of Pauline passages, and 1 Timothy is hardly the center of Paul's thinking.
I don't think we can say there was one structure to the NT church. James 2 talks of someone walking into their "synagogue," implying that many Christian Jews pretty much co-opted the existing synagogue structure. A church like Corinth seems to have had a strong charismatic element and prophets seem to have played a prominent role in NT church leadership. 3 John may reflect tensions between an older itinerant leadership and an incipient local authority structure.
So I would say we can easily justify from the NT 1) leadership that goes beyond the local congregation (e.g., Paul), 2) collective leadership of the wise in a congregation (e.g., elders), 3) focal leadership in a congregation (e.g., Timothy, Epaphroditus), 4) prophetic voices that must always be tested, and 5) individuals to whom more detailed ministry is delegated (deacons).
I see one cross section of controversy arising because the Wesleyan church has attracted a number of former Baptists and reconstructionists whose orientation is to "get things back" to how the New Testament church did things. Occasionally, this gets us into conflict with some of the residual Methodist elements of Wesleyan Church structure. Why don't we have deacons, for example?
I thought I'd post a couple comments I made there, since the question of how we should structure local churches occasionally has come up here.
1. Those who know me will know what I'll always say with these sorts of questions. Leadership will certainly not look the same in 21st century America when it comes to many specifics. There are instead general principles and values that have to be contextualized. Doing what they did might not do what it did then today. In fact, at times in might be downright counterproductive and have exactly the opposite effect. We don't read the Bible to do exactly what they did (greet the brothers with a holy kiss), but to see how God walked with his people at particular times and places in the past to bring forward the wisdom of those relationships and interactions (let's shake hands instead).
2. I like a deaconate system too and I think an effective church of any size will have to have individuals who perform this sort of roll. My pet peeve is that we have to do it a certain way or call these people a certain thing because of the NT. After all, Acts 6 doesn't call them deacons. Acts never uses the word. It appears in a small number of Pauline passages, and 1 Timothy is hardly the center of Paul's thinking.
I don't think we can say there was one structure to the NT church. James 2 talks of someone walking into their "synagogue," implying that many Christian Jews pretty much co-opted the existing synagogue structure. A church like Corinth seems to have had a strong charismatic element and prophets seem to have played a prominent role in NT church leadership. 3 John may reflect tensions between an older itinerant leadership and an incipient local authority structure.
So I would say we can easily justify from the NT 1) leadership that goes beyond the local congregation (e.g., Paul), 2) collective leadership of the wise in a congregation (e.g., elders), 3) focal leadership in a congregation (e.g., Timothy, Epaphroditus), 4) prophetic voices that must always be tested, and 5) individuals to whom more detailed ministry is delegated (deacons).
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Psalm 6 Translation
Psalm 1
Psalm 2
Psalm 3
Psalm 4
Psalm 5
Now Psalm 6
_________
[To the musician leading (those playing) the Neginoth upon the Sheminith, a psalm (attributed) to David]
1 Do not in your anger correct me,
and do not in your heat discipline me.
2 Be gracious to me, YHWH,
for I am languishing;
Heal me, YHWH,
for my bones tremble.
3 And my soul trembles intensely,
but you, YHWH, how long?
4 Return, YHWH; deliver my soul.
save me because of your faithfulness.
5 For in death there is no memory of you;
in Sheol who gives thanks to you.
6 I am weary with my sighing;
I swim in all [the] night [on] my bed;
with my tears, I dissolve my couch.
7 My eye is sunken from grief;
it ages from all my harassers.
8 Go away from me,
all transgressors of wickedness,
for YHWH has heard the voice of my weeping.
9 YHWH heard my mercy-cry;
YHWH will receive my prayer.
10 Let all my enemies be very ashamed
and let them be terrified;
Let them return,
let them be suddenly ashamed.
_____________
A couple items of interest here. First, there is the explicit denial of any meaningful afterlife in 6:5. If I were to guess (unprovable, I suppose), I would date the psalm to the same basic period as Ecclesiastes and the Writings in general.
6:8 would seem to be alluded to by Matthew 25:41, where the messianic king tells those who have not helped those in need to depart to the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. In the psalm, the speaker is clearly oppressed by enemies. It is not clear what of the psalm Matthew 25 considered relevant. Perhaps it is no more than the fact that the psalmist is in need and those who do not help those in need but could are in one sense their oppressors.
Psalm 2
Psalm 3
Psalm 4
Psalm 5
Now Psalm 6
_________
[To the musician leading (those playing) the Neginoth upon the Sheminith, a psalm (attributed) to David]
1 Do not in your anger correct me,
and do not in your heat discipline me.
2 Be gracious to me, YHWH,
for I am languishing;
Heal me, YHWH,
for my bones tremble.
3 And my soul trembles intensely,
but you, YHWH, how long?
4 Return, YHWH; deliver my soul.
save me because of your faithfulness.
5 For in death there is no memory of you;
in Sheol who gives thanks to you.
6 I am weary with my sighing;
I swim in all [the] night [on] my bed;
with my tears, I dissolve my couch.
7 My eye is sunken from grief;
it ages from all my harassers.
8 Go away from me,
all transgressors of wickedness,
for YHWH has heard the voice of my weeping.
9 YHWH heard my mercy-cry;
YHWH will receive my prayer.
10 Let all my enemies be very ashamed
and let them be terrified;
Let them return,
let them be suddenly ashamed.
_____________
A couple items of interest here. First, there is the explicit denial of any meaningful afterlife in 6:5. If I were to guess (unprovable, I suppose), I would date the psalm to the same basic period as Ecclesiastes and the Writings in general.
6:8 would seem to be alluded to by Matthew 25:41, where the messianic king tells those who have not helped those in need to depart to the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. In the psalm, the speaker is clearly oppressed by enemies. It is not clear what of the psalm Matthew 25 considered relevant. Perhaps it is no more than the fact that the psalmist is in need and those who do not help those in need but could are in one sense their oppressors.
Monday, February 13, 2012
LMS of the future?
An LMS is a "Learning Management System." Think "Blackboard." It's basically about setting up a classroom environment online for distance education.
Blackboard is the current hegemony in this area. It's doing its best to retrofit itself to the incredibly fast changing Google/Facebook world. The problem is that it is really hard to turn the Titanic. If they were starting from scratch today it would no doubt look a lot different. And most of us suspect that someone will come up with something relatively free and better soon, and down Blackboard will come like the music businesses when Napster came on the scene.
I heard Friday that one of the leading online educators is in the final stages of designing its own LMS. More power to them. That sort of innovation always excites me. It's not hard to cobble one together from the things available in Google and Facebook, but not professional enough for an online institution to do.
One interesting discussion I had this weekend had to do with bringing online education to Africa. What's interesting is that Africa is basically leap frogging the desktop, because they often don't have reliable power or internet connection. What they do have is cell phones!
So the question was first, could you create an even more sequential pedagogy that could be administered via smart phones. Someone else then brought up the iPad. You can even do Blackboard on an iPad. The question is which server they use in Africa, since the iPad only works with ATT or Verizon.
A cell phone LMS would basically need to be able to:
Fun thoughts! Ideally, someone would design a special tablet and bare bones LMS that did not require Verizon or ATT for hook up.
Blackboard is the current hegemony in this area. It's doing its best to retrofit itself to the incredibly fast changing Google/Facebook world. The problem is that it is really hard to turn the Titanic. If they were starting from scratch today it would no doubt look a lot different. And most of us suspect that someone will come up with something relatively free and better soon, and down Blackboard will come like the music businesses when Napster came on the scene.
I heard Friday that one of the leading online educators is in the final stages of designing its own LMS. More power to them. That sort of innovation always excites me. It's not hard to cobble one together from the things available in Google and Facebook, but not professional enough for an online institution to do.
One interesting discussion I had this weekend had to do with bringing online education to Africa. What's interesting is that Africa is basically leap frogging the desktop, because they often don't have reliable power or internet connection. What they do have is cell phones!
So the question was first, could you create an even more sequential pedagogy that could be administered via smart phones. Someone else then brought up the iPad. You can even do Blackboard on an iPad. The question is which server they use in Africa, since the iPad only works with ATT or Verizon.
A cell phone LMS would basically need to be able to:
- show text (in this case in very small screen snippets)
- take text input (probably by converting voice to text)
- It would need to link and sequence the course in a very linear thread, with minimal link following
Fun thoughts! Ideally, someone would design a special tablet and bare bones LMS that did not require Verizon or ATT for hook up.
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Not helping a sin? 2
... continued from yesterday
______________
Luke's best example of what a poor person looks like is the poor man Lazarus outside the rich man's house (Luke 16:19-31). This is a parable rather than an actual story. And this is not the Lazarus of John's gospel, whom Jesus raises from the dead. It is a poor beggar who sits outside the home of a wealthy man.
The parable probably wants us to picture this beggar living off of the generosity of the rich man. Perhaps at some point during each day, the scraps from the house are tossed out and Lazarus eats them along with animals. Perhaps we are meant to think he has leprosy or some other skin disease, for the dogs lick his sores.
Meanwhile, no sin of the rich man is mentioned explicitly. Would the original audience of Luke simply have associated sinfulness with the rich man's wealth? It is more than possible. Are we to think of the fact that Lazarus lives off scraps from the house as a key indication of the rich man's sinfulness? It is more than possible. The rich man lives in luxury and does nothing substantial to help Lazarus.
To Luke's audience, it was probably an obvious sin that the wealth of the rich man could be so close and yet Lazarus continue in his squalor. Help was so close, so available, and yet apparently un-offered outside of scraps. It is likely because of the way wealth was viewed in general and because we find this theme explicitly elsewhere.
In Matthew 25, those who are sent to the "eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels" (25:41) are those who had the opportunity to help but did not. "I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me" (25:42-43). Nothing is said of faith in Jesus in this passage. Judgment is entirely according to works done toward the needy.
Similarly in 1 John 3: 17, John the elder seriously questions whether a person can truly be a child of God "if anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them." We are so used to the truth in Paul that we become right with God by faith that most of us overlook the substantial parts of the New Testament that look for works of this sort as the most important indications of who you are. James summarizes it in this way: "You see that a person is considered righteous by what they do and not by faith alone" (Jas. 2:24).
I am usually hesitant to speak of a "biblical" perspective on an issue. The reason is because the different books of the Bible addressed different contexts and situations. When you read these books carefully, it can take some serious theological work to identify what the Christian perspective is amid these diverse situations. This work is complicated by the fact that every word of the Bible was first written to people who have been dead for about two thousand years and more. Connecting these instructions to their world to our world, again, can require some serious theological work.
But amazingly, the entirety of the biblical texts are united in their sense that God wants his people to care for those who cannot take care of themselves. It is true in the Old Testament Law. It is true in the Prophets and the Writings of the Old Testament. It is certainly true of the gospels and Acts. It is true of Paul and the letters. It is ironic that so many Christians today are so sure about so many things that the Bible does not clearly teach or that do not clearly relate to today and yet they question, even vilify those who take the biblical position on helping the poor today...
______________
Luke's best example of what a poor person looks like is the poor man Lazarus outside the rich man's house (Luke 16:19-31). This is a parable rather than an actual story. And this is not the Lazarus of John's gospel, whom Jesus raises from the dead. It is a poor beggar who sits outside the home of a wealthy man.
The parable probably wants us to picture this beggar living off of the generosity of the rich man. Perhaps at some point during each day, the scraps from the house are tossed out and Lazarus eats them along with animals. Perhaps we are meant to think he has leprosy or some other skin disease, for the dogs lick his sores.
Meanwhile, no sin of the rich man is mentioned explicitly. Would the original audience of Luke simply have associated sinfulness with the rich man's wealth? It is more than possible. Are we to think of the fact that Lazarus lives off scraps from the house as a key indication of the rich man's sinfulness? It is more than possible. The rich man lives in luxury and does nothing substantial to help Lazarus.
To Luke's audience, it was probably an obvious sin that the wealth of the rich man could be so close and yet Lazarus continue in his squalor. Help was so close, so available, and yet apparently un-offered outside of scraps. It is likely because of the way wealth was viewed in general and because we find this theme explicitly elsewhere.
In Matthew 25, those who are sent to the "eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels" (25:41) are those who had the opportunity to help but did not. "I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me" (25:42-43). Nothing is said of faith in Jesus in this passage. Judgment is entirely according to works done toward the needy.
Similarly in 1 John 3: 17, John the elder seriously questions whether a person can truly be a child of God "if anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them." We are so used to the truth in Paul that we become right with God by faith that most of us overlook the substantial parts of the New Testament that look for works of this sort as the most important indications of who you are. James summarizes it in this way: "You see that a person is considered righteous by what they do and not by faith alone" (Jas. 2:24).
I am usually hesitant to speak of a "biblical" perspective on an issue. The reason is because the different books of the Bible addressed different contexts and situations. When you read these books carefully, it can take some serious theological work to identify what the Christian perspective is amid these diverse situations. This work is complicated by the fact that every word of the Bible was first written to people who have been dead for about two thousand years and more. Connecting these instructions to their world to our world, again, can require some serious theological work.
But amazingly, the entirety of the biblical texts are united in their sense that God wants his people to care for those who cannot take care of themselves. It is true in the Old Testament Law. It is true in the Prophets and the Writings of the Old Testament. It is certainly true of the gospels and Acts. It is true of Paul and the letters. It is ironic that so many Christians today are so sure about so many things that the Bible does not clearly teach or that do not clearly relate to today and yet they question, even vilify those who take the biblical position on helping the poor today...
Saturday, February 11, 2012
Jesus and the Poor 1
... continued from yesterday.
__________
I started off this chapter mentioning Jesus' inaugural address in Luke 4 where he quotes the line in Isaiah 61:1 that he had come to "proclaim good news to the poor" (4:18). This is one of the special emphases of Luke, so I will return to it again in the second volume of this series. But it fits with the sense of this chapter that Jesus' earthly ministry targeted the "lost sheep," those who were not included in the "kingdom of Israel" at that time. Jesus seemed to target the marginal of Galilean society.
Who were the poor? The first thing we have to do to get into the mind of Jesus' world is not to think of ancient poverty in terms of money. The world of Galilee did not function primarily by the exchange of money and there certainly were no credit cards. We should think more in terms of goods and resources.
The poor of Jesus' world were thus those who did not have adequate resources to live. [1] Mind you, most people lived on a subsistence level. They farmed just enough to feed their family and to pay those forces of power who required their cut. The poor did not have even enough to subsist. Whatever their inherited place in the world, they had lost it.
We do not actually find Jesus feeding the poor. He feeds the 5000 (Mark 6:30-44) but not because they are poor. He feeds them because they are hungry and far from food. We do not find Jesus beginning a soup kitchen or feeding program. But providing for those in need was clearly a core value.
In fact, Jesus lives like the poor himself, and he sends his followers out in a way that makes them fully dependent on others (e.g., Matt. 10:9-10). "Foxes have dens and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head" (Luke 9:58). Luke knows who the poor are and he presents Jesus in a way that emphasizes this value.
Luke's version of the beatitude reads flatly, "Blessed are you who are poor" (Luke 6:20). There is no qualification for the poor in spirit, as in Matthew. Jesus proclaims the good news that those who are knocked off track now will be honored and restored in the coming kingdom of God.
Luke's best example of what a poor person looks like is the poor man Lazarus outside the rich man's house (Luke 16:19-31). This is a parable rather than an actual story. This is not the Lazarus of John's gospel, whom Jesus raises from the dead...
[1] Some great resources here are Bruce J. Malina's, The New Testament World: Insights from Cultural Anthropology (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001) and The Social World of Jesus and the Gospels (London: Routledge, 1996).
__________
I started off this chapter mentioning Jesus' inaugural address in Luke 4 where he quotes the line in Isaiah 61:1 that he had come to "proclaim good news to the poor" (4:18). This is one of the special emphases of Luke, so I will return to it again in the second volume of this series. But it fits with the sense of this chapter that Jesus' earthly ministry targeted the "lost sheep," those who were not included in the "kingdom of Israel" at that time. Jesus seemed to target the marginal of Galilean society.
Who were the poor? The first thing we have to do to get into the mind of Jesus' world is not to think of ancient poverty in terms of money. The world of Galilee did not function primarily by the exchange of money and there certainly were no credit cards. We should think more in terms of goods and resources.
The poor of Jesus' world were thus those who did not have adequate resources to live. [1] Mind you, most people lived on a subsistence level. They farmed just enough to feed their family and to pay those forces of power who required their cut. The poor did not have even enough to subsist. Whatever their inherited place in the world, they had lost it.
We do not actually find Jesus feeding the poor. He feeds the 5000 (Mark 6:30-44) but not because they are poor. He feeds them because they are hungry and far from food. We do not find Jesus beginning a soup kitchen or feeding program. But providing for those in need was clearly a core value.
In fact, Jesus lives like the poor himself, and he sends his followers out in a way that makes them fully dependent on others (e.g., Matt. 10:9-10). "Foxes have dens and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head" (Luke 9:58). Luke knows who the poor are and he presents Jesus in a way that emphasizes this value.
Luke's version of the beatitude reads flatly, "Blessed are you who are poor" (Luke 6:20). There is no qualification for the poor in spirit, as in Matthew. Jesus proclaims the good news that those who are knocked off track now will be honored and restored in the coming kingdom of God.
Luke's best example of what a poor person looks like is the poor man Lazarus outside the rich man's house (Luke 16:19-31). This is a parable rather than an actual story. This is not the Lazarus of John's gospel, whom Jesus raises from the dead...
[1] Some great resources here are Bruce J. Malina's, The New Testament World: Insights from Cultural Anthropology (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001) and The Social World of Jesus and the Gospels (London: Routledge, 1996).
Friday, February 10, 2012
Science Friday: Converting Fahrenheit to Celsius
I've used the fact that my step-daughter will probably take chemistry this summer as an excuse perhaps to dabble a little in chemistry this spring: http://moleculestutorials.blogspot.com/
Here's an excerpt for my "Science Friday":
______________________
... Her step-father took out his pocket notebook and wrote down the formula: F=9/5C+32.
"Yep, that's one of them," she said. "Then going the other direction it's C=5/9(F-32).
It was too much for her step-dad to resist. While they walked on, he launched into a lecture about why the formulas made sense. Mind you, no one was listening to him. Stefanie and her mom were whispering to each other in the front. Tom and Sophia were competing to see who could count more birds. Meanwhile, Stefanie's step-dad Ken muttered on and on to himself.
"It's easy to figure out the formulas if you forget them," he said. "It has to do with the fact that on the Celsius scale, 0 degrees (0°) is where water freezes and 100 degrees (100°) is where water boils. What the conversion formula does is it matches these temperatures to the places where water freezes in Fahrenheit (32°) and where water boils in Fahrenheit (212°).
"So if you're going from Fahrenheit to Celsius, first you subtract 32, like you were going from 32° in Fahrenheit to 0° in Celsius. Taking away 32 aligns the Fahrenheit scale with the Celsius scale. Or when you're going from Celsius to Fahrenheit, adding 32 at the end aligns the two scales.
"The other part of the conversion has to do with how much bigger a Celsius degree is or how much smaller a Fahrenheit degree is. If you subtract the 32° from the boiling point of water, 212°, then you can compare how the two types of degree relate to each other. 180 degrees on the one scale corresponds to 100 degrees on the other. So you can figure out how big a degree is in one scale compared to the other. Fahrenheit degrees are 180/100 times more (which reduces to 9/5). Celsius degrees are 100/180 times less (which reduces to 5/9).
"That's the ratio. You multiply a Celsius degree by 9/5 to get a Fahrenheit degree. You multiply the aligned Fahrenheit by 5/9 to get a Celsius degree. It all makes sense."
"Oh, I see," Stefanie cleverly responded as they arrived at the ticket booth, where her other sister Stacy was waiting. But of course no one had paid any attention to Ken's lovely explanation...
Here's an excerpt for my "Science Friday":
______________________
... Her step-father took out his pocket notebook and wrote down the formula: F=9/5C+32.
"Yep, that's one of them," she said. "Then going the other direction it's C=5/9(F-32).
It was too much for her step-dad to resist. While they walked on, he launched into a lecture about why the formulas made sense. Mind you, no one was listening to him. Stefanie and her mom were whispering to each other in the front. Tom and Sophia were competing to see who could count more birds. Meanwhile, Stefanie's step-dad Ken muttered on and on to himself.
"It's easy to figure out the formulas if you forget them," he said. "It has to do with the fact that on the Celsius scale, 0 degrees (0°) is where water freezes and 100 degrees (100°) is where water boils. What the conversion formula does is it matches these temperatures to the places where water freezes in Fahrenheit (32°) and where water boils in Fahrenheit (212°).
"So if you're going from Fahrenheit to Celsius, first you subtract 32, like you were going from 32° in Fahrenheit to 0° in Celsius. Taking away 32 aligns the Fahrenheit scale with the Celsius scale. Or when you're going from Celsius to Fahrenheit, adding 32 at the end aligns the two scales.
"The other part of the conversion has to do with how much bigger a Celsius degree is or how much smaller a Fahrenheit degree is. If you subtract the 32° from the boiling point of water, 212°, then you can compare how the two types of degree relate to each other. 180 degrees on the one scale corresponds to 100 degrees on the other. So you can figure out how big a degree is in one scale compared to the other. Fahrenheit degrees are 180/100 times more (which reduces to 9/5). Celsius degrees are 100/180 times less (which reduces to 5/9).
"That's the ratio. You multiply a Celsius degree by 9/5 to get a Fahrenheit degree. You multiply the aligned Fahrenheit by 5/9 to get a Celsius degree. It all makes sense."
"Oh, I see," Stefanie cleverly responded as they arrived at the ticket booth, where her other sister Stacy was waiting. But of course no one had paid any attention to Ken's lovely explanation...
Are Christians Progressives or Conservatives?
It's going to be tempting for a lot of pastors and Christians to get very specific this year to tell others who and what to vote for. In fact, I've been amazed at how clear so many Christians of all stripes seem to think such choices are. Here are three key pieces of advice, especially to those who are pastors or Christian leaders.
1. We need to operate on the basis of fact rather than feeling.
I do it too and have done it in the past. I hear something on the news or on cable. I hear something by the water cooler at work. If it has to do with a figure I don't like or an issue with which I have a history. I spark. I get upset. What a horrible decision! What an evil person!
If I actually talk to someone involved in the decision or on the other side of the issue, usually there is more to the story. Important decisions are often complicated and those in positions of high leadership usually don't make them in the simple terms we talk about them by the coffee pot. True, sometimes they do, but I have sometimes later found that my immediate fervent, zealous response to something is only partially informed.
Paul called it a "zeal without knowledge." Zeal is only good if it is truly informed zeal. Otherwise it's counterproductive or even dangerous. And to be informed, we have to truly listen to both sides of an issue. Both sides means going into "enemy territory" on the other channel, not the "straw man" pretending to represent the other position on my favorite channel.
A "straw man" argument is one where the other position is not truly represented but only something that looks a little like the other position. Even I could beat up a stuffed imitation of Arnold Schwarzenegger. It's harder to beat up the real thing.
2. When we are in leadership, we have to minister to everyone.
When I am in front of a classroom, when I am behind a pulpit, in these last days when I am Dean of a seminary, I am not merely representing myself. Even though this is my personal blog, I indirectly bring my associations with Wesley Seminary at IWU and the Wesleyan Church. There is a certain need for me to moderate my opinions because I am not merely bringing myself to this post. I have to stand for others.
There are Christians who strongly support current Republican emphases. And there are Christians who strongly support Democratic emphases. As pastors we have to minister to both. If we push strongly partisan positions from the pulpit, we are not only putting an unnecessary stumbling block in front of our ministry, we are probably revealing our own ignorance of the issues--the Christian position is rarely as slam dunk as the partisan thinks it is.
3. We need to distinguish our culture from our faith.
I am often amazed at how strongly we can come to associate positions that are a matter of our personal subculture with a Christian position. For example, I believe in capitalism. I've visited parts of Europe that used to be communist and there is simply no comparison between how prosperous in general the Western parts of Germany are in comparison to what Eastern Europe was like under communism.
But how some have come to embrace a certain form of American capitalism as a fundamental Christian value is puzzling to me. I have a PhD in New Testament. I read the real New Testament in Greek, not in some translation made by someone else. I don't see it. I'm a capitalist by philosophy, not because I find it clearly advocated in the Bible. It didn't really even exist in anything like it's current form until the 1700's.
Similarly, a desire to help the poor is a clearly biblical value in the gospels and Bible in general. But how to work out that fundamental value is complicated. Helping in some ways may not truly be helping in the long run. And there are legitimate questions about whether helping the poor is primarily a matter for the church or the government. In short, there is room for disagreement among Christians on how the value plays out.
My point is, our strong political feelings on these sorts of issues are very often more a reflection of our subculture rather than some supposed clear teaching of Christianity or the Bible. Having lived abroad, I guarantee you that there is not a little myopia in some of the fervor American Christians have on certain issues, where we cannot see how culturally driven our thinking is, even though we are convinced we are just following the Bible.
These are some things those of us who are leaders should keep in mind as we minister in this election year. When we wear our ministerial hat, we are best to stick to broad values and principles, not to specific candidates or legislation. That's more a matter for us as individual Christians. There are exceptions to be sure, but they are far fewer than we are prone to think.
This is one area where we are all too prone to justify hating our neighbor in the name of Christ. But that issue is slam dunk--we are never justified in hating our neighbor, in word or deed.
1. We need to operate on the basis of fact rather than feeling.
I do it too and have done it in the past. I hear something on the news or on cable. I hear something by the water cooler at work. If it has to do with a figure I don't like or an issue with which I have a history. I spark. I get upset. What a horrible decision! What an evil person!
If I actually talk to someone involved in the decision or on the other side of the issue, usually there is more to the story. Important decisions are often complicated and those in positions of high leadership usually don't make them in the simple terms we talk about them by the coffee pot. True, sometimes they do, but I have sometimes later found that my immediate fervent, zealous response to something is only partially informed.
Paul called it a "zeal without knowledge." Zeal is only good if it is truly informed zeal. Otherwise it's counterproductive or even dangerous. And to be informed, we have to truly listen to both sides of an issue. Both sides means going into "enemy territory" on the other channel, not the "straw man" pretending to represent the other position on my favorite channel.
A "straw man" argument is one where the other position is not truly represented but only something that looks a little like the other position. Even I could beat up a stuffed imitation of Arnold Schwarzenegger. It's harder to beat up the real thing.
2. When we are in leadership, we have to minister to everyone.
When I am in front of a classroom, when I am behind a pulpit, in these last days when I am Dean of a seminary, I am not merely representing myself. Even though this is my personal blog, I indirectly bring my associations with Wesley Seminary at IWU and the Wesleyan Church. There is a certain need for me to moderate my opinions because I am not merely bringing myself to this post. I have to stand for others.
There are Christians who strongly support current Republican emphases. And there are Christians who strongly support Democratic emphases. As pastors we have to minister to both. If we push strongly partisan positions from the pulpit, we are not only putting an unnecessary stumbling block in front of our ministry, we are probably revealing our own ignorance of the issues--the Christian position is rarely as slam dunk as the partisan thinks it is.
3. We need to distinguish our culture from our faith.
I am often amazed at how strongly we can come to associate positions that are a matter of our personal subculture with a Christian position. For example, I believe in capitalism. I've visited parts of Europe that used to be communist and there is simply no comparison between how prosperous in general the Western parts of Germany are in comparison to what Eastern Europe was like under communism.
But how some have come to embrace a certain form of American capitalism as a fundamental Christian value is puzzling to me. I have a PhD in New Testament. I read the real New Testament in Greek, not in some translation made by someone else. I don't see it. I'm a capitalist by philosophy, not because I find it clearly advocated in the Bible. It didn't really even exist in anything like it's current form until the 1700's.
Similarly, a desire to help the poor is a clearly biblical value in the gospels and Bible in general. But how to work out that fundamental value is complicated. Helping in some ways may not truly be helping in the long run. And there are legitimate questions about whether helping the poor is primarily a matter for the church or the government. In short, there is room for disagreement among Christians on how the value plays out.
My point is, our strong political feelings on these sorts of issues are very often more a reflection of our subculture rather than some supposed clear teaching of Christianity or the Bible. Having lived abroad, I guarantee you that there is not a little myopia in some of the fervor American Christians have on certain issues, where we cannot see how culturally driven our thinking is, even though we are convinced we are just following the Bible.
These are some things those of us who are leaders should keep in mind as we minister in this election year. When we wear our ministerial hat, we are best to stick to broad values and principles, not to specific candidates or legislation. That's more a matter for us as individual Christians. There are exceptions to be sure, but they are far fewer than we are prone to think.
This is one area where we are all too prone to justify hating our neighbor in the name of Christ. But that issue is slam dunk--we are never justified in hating our neighbor, in word or deed.
Thursday, February 09, 2012
Psalm 5 Translation
Psalm 1
Psalm 2
Psalm 3
Psalm 4
Now Psalm 5
________
[To the musician leading (those playing) the Nechiloth, a psalm (attributed) to David]
1 Listen to my words, YHWH.
Attend to my cry.
2 Listen to the voice of my cry,
my King and my God,
for to you I will pray.
3 YHWH, in the morning you will hear my voice.
I will direct it [to you] and will look [to you].
4 For you are not a god delighting in wickedness;
evil will not dwell in you.
5 Foolish people will not stand before your eyes;
you hate all those doing wickedness.
6 You will destroy speakers of falsehood;
a man of bloods and fraud you will despise, YHWH.
7 But I with the multitude of your faithfulness will go to your house;
I will worship toward the palace of your holiness in your fear.
8 YHWH, lead me in your righteousness because of my enemies;
make straight before me your way.
9 For there is nothing dependable in their mouth;
their heart is ruin;
an open grave is their throat;
with their tongue they flatter.
10 Destroy them, God;
let them fall because of their plans.
Because of the multitude of their transgressions
cast them out for they rebel against you.
11 But let them rejoice forever,
all those who trust in you;
let them rejoice
[because] you protect them.
Let them be joyful in you,
those who love your name.
12 For you will bless the righteous, YHWH;
like the shield, [with] goodwill you will surround him.
___________
This would seem to be an imprecatory psalm, one that calls on God to destroy one's enemies. Christians must apply/pray such a prayer carefully, since Jesus has commanded us to love our enemies and do good to them.
An interesting tidbit of this psalm is also the reminder that Paul and other NT authors read the OT "spiritually." Romans 3:13 quotes Psalm 5:9 slightly out of context. Romans uses the verse in support of the argument that all have sinned, whereas Psalm 5:9 is only directed at the enemies of the psalmist. It does not say that everything has an open grave for a throat...
Running to the Prodigal 6
... continued from yesterday.
_________
Of course many prodigals may want to change but be completely unable to do so in their own power. This is one of the great insights of modern psychology, to realize the extent to which people can be enslaved to self-destructive patterns of behavior. We can find models in the New Testament that are similar. Romans 7 pictures those who cannot do the good even though they want to. Then there are the demon possessed of the gospels. Psychology, science, and sociology have filled in a number of details on enslavement to sin.
God of course can free the prodigal enslaved to the powers of addition directly, but more often than not he uses others who come alongside those who cannot free themselves from some addiction or self-destructive pattern. Psychologists call it an intervention, and it was the kind of thing Jesus does throughout the gospels with miraculous power. Some prodigals will destroy themselves and everything around them unless someone reaches in to them from the outside.
That leads to my second take away from the parable. Followers of Jesus run out to them, run out to the prodigal who wants to return. We run out to them full of grace, mercy, and forgiveness. Even beyond the parable, the spirit of Jesus would have us run out even to those who do not want to return. We may not be successful. Perhaps failure is more often the outcome when it comes to prodigals, but that won't stop us from trying.
Who therefore was the main target of Jesus' earthly ministry? It was clearly the lost sheep of Israel. Again, these lost sheep for Jesus were not everyone, because "all have sinned." [1] Jesus' target were those who were blatantly lost, those who were most strikingly not included in the kingdom. These were the people most ignored by the righteous and the normal. These were the outcasts of Israel.
Who are our prodigal outcasts? Who in our society have spiraled out of control? Certainly there are countless children in our schools and youth in our towns who are on a path not only to their own destruction but to destroy many others around them in the process. And we continue to have our share of prodigals enslaved to drugs or prescription medication, enslaved to alcohol, enslaved to poverty. There are those enslaved to sex, enslaved to gaming.
Most of these sorts of individuals do not have the power in themselves alone even to leave their "far away city." Their only hope is for someone to reach them, to penetrate their enslavement with miraculous power. Those of us in the West are privileged to live in a world where many non-Christian organizations and even governments have developed immense expertise in the human dimensions of human liberation. As Christians, we are smartest to work alongside these forces for good, realizing that God can use even a foreign king like Cyrus to do good in the world (cf. Isa. 45:1).
I want to make one final observation of the Parable of the Prodigal Son before moving on to others that Jesus included in the kingdom. There are many pictures of what Jesus did on the cross, all of which probably give us part of the picture. One of the most popular right now is the idea that God's justice demanded a sacrifice, that someone had to suffer for the sins of the humanity. Jesus did this for us and in our place.
There certainly seems to be some truth in this picture. Somehow Jesus' death seems to satisfy the order of things, the sense that wrongdoing calls for punishment. However, we should be careful not to assume that God had to do anything. To hear some talk about "penal substitution," the idea that Jesus took our punishment on the cross, it was almost a mathematical formula. If the world had this much total sin, then someone had to be punished exactly that amount for anyone to be forgiven.
The God of Jesus in the gospels was not this sort of mathematician. The Father in the Parable of the Prodigal Son simply forgives his younger son. He does not demand that someone else pay back the debt for his son. He simply has the authority to pronounce forgiveness. We should be careful not to make justice a higher authority than God himself.
[1] While the insight that we are all prodigals of a sort is a very important truth, we Protestants have so emphasized it that we have lost sight of those Jesus actually focused on--the blatantly lost.
_________
Of course many prodigals may want to change but be completely unable to do so in their own power. This is one of the great insights of modern psychology, to realize the extent to which people can be enslaved to self-destructive patterns of behavior. We can find models in the New Testament that are similar. Romans 7 pictures those who cannot do the good even though they want to. Then there are the demon possessed of the gospels. Psychology, science, and sociology have filled in a number of details on enslavement to sin.
God of course can free the prodigal enslaved to the powers of addition directly, but more often than not he uses others who come alongside those who cannot free themselves from some addiction or self-destructive pattern. Psychologists call it an intervention, and it was the kind of thing Jesus does throughout the gospels with miraculous power. Some prodigals will destroy themselves and everything around them unless someone reaches in to them from the outside.
That leads to my second take away from the parable. Followers of Jesus run out to them, run out to the prodigal who wants to return. We run out to them full of grace, mercy, and forgiveness. Even beyond the parable, the spirit of Jesus would have us run out even to those who do not want to return. We may not be successful. Perhaps failure is more often the outcome when it comes to prodigals, but that won't stop us from trying.
Who therefore was the main target of Jesus' earthly ministry? It was clearly the lost sheep of Israel. Again, these lost sheep for Jesus were not everyone, because "all have sinned." [1] Jesus' target were those who were blatantly lost, those who were most strikingly not included in the kingdom. These were the people most ignored by the righteous and the normal. These were the outcasts of Israel.
Who are our prodigal outcasts? Who in our society have spiraled out of control? Certainly there are countless children in our schools and youth in our towns who are on a path not only to their own destruction but to destroy many others around them in the process. And we continue to have our share of prodigals enslaved to drugs or prescription medication, enslaved to alcohol, enslaved to poverty. There are those enslaved to sex, enslaved to gaming.
Most of these sorts of individuals do not have the power in themselves alone even to leave their "far away city." Their only hope is for someone to reach them, to penetrate their enslavement with miraculous power. Those of us in the West are privileged to live in a world where many non-Christian organizations and even governments have developed immense expertise in the human dimensions of human liberation. As Christians, we are smartest to work alongside these forces for good, realizing that God can use even a foreign king like Cyrus to do good in the world (cf. Isa. 45:1).
I want to make one final observation of the Parable of the Prodigal Son before moving on to others that Jesus included in the kingdom. There are many pictures of what Jesus did on the cross, all of which probably give us part of the picture. One of the most popular right now is the idea that God's justice demanded a sacrifice, that someone had to suffer for the sins of the humanity. Jesus did this for us and in our place.
There certainly seems to be some truth in this picture. Somehow Jesus' death seems to satisfy the order of things, the sense that wrongdoing calls for punishment. However, we should be careful not to assume that God had to do anything. To hear some talk about "penal substitution," the idea that Jesus took our punishment on the cross, it was almost a mathematical formula. If the world had this much total sin, then someone had to be punished exactly that amount for anyone to be forgiven.
The God of Jesus in the gospels was not this sort of mathematician. The Father in the Parable of the Prodigal Son simply forgives his younger son. He does not demand that someone else pay back the debt for his son. He simply has the authority to pronounce forgiveness. We should be careful not to make justice a higher authority than God himself.
[1] While the insight that we are all prodigals of a sort is a very important truth, we Protestants have so emphasized it that we have lost sight of those Jesus actually focused on--the blatantly lost.
Wednesday, February 08, 2012
Prodigals Today 5
... continued from yesterday
________
So who are the prodigals today and how are we to treat them as Jesus followers? Probably the most straightforward answer is to identify them with anyone who quite explicitly pursues a life he or she knows is wrong. Modern day prodigals have told the rest of the world that they do not want to "go work in the field."
Just to give perspective, there are a whole lot of us who go to church and at least try to appear to be good people. Whether we turn out to be "older brothers" as in the parable is a discussion for a later chapter. The goal is for us to be like the father in the parable, to be a representative of our heavenly Father in our mercy and love. So I will return later to the question of hypocrisy and the more subtle sinfulness of the self-righteous.
But for now, let's just say that there are plenty of prodigals around as well. I could have said, there are plenty of people who have abandoned God, but I don't think a lot of prodigals experience their lives in such idealistic or spiritualized terms. To them, they are doing what feels good or what they want to do. They may not even believe that God exists or, if they do, he may be a fleeting thought at best.
Some prodigals know they are on the wrong path. They may be thinking they will eventually turn their lives around. Or they may want to turn their lives around but find themselves enslaved to a pattern of self-destructive or wrong-doing behavior that they cannot extract themselves or change the pattern. And of course there are those that simply do not care. They are those who are like the seed that birds immediately snatch from the path in the Parable of the Soils in Mark 4--words of what their lives should be like go in one ear and out the other.
Again, the "older brother," the one that begrudges the prodigal, has his own subtle problems, but I want to focus here on the prodigal, the blatant wrongdoer. Curiously, our realization that we "older brothers" have problems too has led some to accept problems as the status quo, rather than to see us as needing to fix things like the prodigal needs to fix things. But when we return to Jesus, we see that he wanted to see the problems of both individuals solved, not to create complacency with both sons as they were.
I would like to reduce our "take-away" on the prodigal to two points. First, followers of Jesus want to see prodigals redeemed. This works against our sense of justice. Justice insists that a person who does wrong receive an appropriate punishment. [1] Jesus wants to see the wrong doer reclaimed, forgiven.
This is not a "cheap grace," as if all the person who does wrong needs to do is say a few magic words. The prodigal son of Luke 15 was truly repentant. True repentance implies a real desire to change. The person who does wrong, says they're sorry, but continues to do the wrong over and over again, with continued apology, is either not truly repentant or perhaps is so enslaved that they cannot change in their own power...
[1] And of course the question of justice is its own question. One of the functions of government is to administer justice (Rom. 13:4). Systems of justice are arguably a different issue from the way we as individuals approach others.
________
So who are the prodigals today and how are we to treat them as Jesus followers? Probably the most straightforward answer is to identify them with anyone who quite explicitly pursues a life he or she knows is wrong. Modern day prodigals have told the rest of the world that they do not want to "go work in the field."
Just to give perspective, there are a whole lot of us who go to church and at least try to appear to be good people. Whether we turn out to be "older brothers" as in the parable is a discussion for a later chapter. The goal is for us to be like the father in the parable, to be a representative of our heavenly Father in our mercy and love. So I will return later to the question of hypocrisy and the more subtle sinfulness of the self-righteous.
But for now, let's just say that there are plenty of prodigals around as well. I could have said, there are plenty of people who have abandoned God, but I don't think a lot of prodigals experience their lives in such idealistic or spiritualized terms. To them, they are doing what feels good or what they want to do. They may not even believe that God exists or, if they do, he may be a fleeting thought at best.
Some prodigals know they are on the wrong path. They may be thinking they will eventually turn their lives around. Or they may want to turn their lives around but find themselves enslaved to a pattern of self-destructive or wrong-doing behavior that they cannot extract themselves or change the pattern. And of course there are those that simply do not care. They are those who are like the seed that birds immediately snatch from the path in the Parable of the Soils in Mark 4--words of what their lives should be like go in one ear and out the other.
Again, the "older brother," the one that begrudges the prodigal, has his own subtle problems, but I want to focus here on the prodigal, the blatant wrongdoer. Curiously, our realization that we "older brothers" have problems too has led some to accept problems as the status quo, rather than to see us as needing to fix things like the prodigal needs to fix things. But when we return to Jesus, we see that he wanted to see the problems of both individuals solved, not to create complacency with both sons as they were.
I would like to reduce our "take-away" on the prodigal to two points. First, followers of Jesus want to see prodigals redeemed. This works against our sense of justice. Justice insists that a person who does wrong receive an appropriate punishment. [1] Jesus wants to see the wrong doer reclaimed, forgiven.
This is not a "cheap grace," as if all the person who does wrong needs to do is say a few magic words. The prodigal son of Luke 15 was truly repentant. True repentance implies a real desire to change. The person who does wrong, says they're sorry, but continues to do the wrong over and over again, with continued apology, is either not truly repentant or perhaps is so enslaved that they cannot change in their own power...
[1] And of course the question of justice is its own question. One of the functions of government is to administer justice (Rom. 13:4). Systems of justice are arguably a different issue from the way we as individuals approach others.
Tuesday, February 07, 2012
Prodigal 4
continued from here.
_____________
The sinners of these parable were not. They were truly "lost sheep" in a clear way. The Pharisees were actually trying to obey. The tax collectors and prostitutes were not. They are of course represented by the prodigal in the Parable of the Prodigal Son.
In the Parable, one son basically tells his father that he wishes he were dead. He wants his inheritance. The father gives it and the son goes and squanders it in a far away place. Because there are pigs there, we can be assured that this son has left Israel and thus, by implication, has left Israel's God. The elder brother later suggests that he squandered his inheritance with prostitutes. It is unclear whether Luke wants us to add this to his list of sins or if he wants us to think that the elder brother was imagining what he had done.
In Jesus' context, this prodigal son represented the sinners of Israel, those who had gone astray in a very blatant and obvious way. This was the son of the Parable of the Two Sons in Matthew 21 who initially said he would not go work in the field. They were not trying to keep the covenant God had made with Israel in the Old Testament.
These were the individuals Jesus targeted more than any else in his earthly ministry. How amazing the focus of Jesus' mission was! He did not focus on Gentiles but Jews (cf. Matt. 10:5-6). He did not focus on all Israel but primarily on Galilee in the north. Even there, he did not focus on everyone but on the "lost sheep," those in Israel who had lost their way. These were people like tax collectors and prostitutes.
Jesus' earthly focus was thus on redemption and reclamation, not so much in a spiritual or eternal sense but in the sense of bringing back to the Father those who had lost their way. This is the restoration of Israel like John the Baptist may have preached but with a focus on those who were particularly off track. It was a ministry of inclusion.
It is interesting to think of any ostracism or ridicule Jesus might have endured as a child, given the possible rumors that his mother had borne him out of wedlock. It would be easy enough given the birth stories of Matthew and Luke to imagine that Jesus grew up amid scandal. How well he then might identify with the outcasts of Israel.
In the rest of the chapter, I want to look at some of the marginal groups on whom Jesus seemed to focus especially. In addition to more notorious sinners like tax collectors and prostitutes, Jesus focused also on the poor and perhaps even on women. Jesus' focus on healing and exorcism were also a manifestation of this focus, which I will explore more fully in a later chapter.
_____________
The sinners of these parable were not. They were truly "lost sheep" in a clear way. The Pharisees were actually trying to obey. The tax collectors and prostitutes were not. They are of course represented by the prodigal in the Parable of the Prodigal Son.
In the Parable, one son basically tells his father that he wishes he were dead. He wants his inheritance. The father gives it and the son goes and squanders it in a far away place. Because there are pigs there, we can be assured that this son has left Israel and thus, by implication, has left Israel's God. The elder brother later suggests that he squandered his inheritance with prostitutes. It is unclear whether Luke wants us to add this to his list of sins or if he wants us to think that the elder brother was imagining what he had done.
In Jesus' context, this prodigal son represented the sinners of Israel, those who had gone astray in a very blatant and obvious way. This was the son of the Parable of the Two Sons in Matthew 21 who initially said he would not go work in the field. They were not trying to keep the covenant God had made with Israel in the Old Testament.
These were the individuals Jesus targeted more than any else in his earthly ministry. How amazing the focus of Jesus' mission was! He did not focus on Gentiles but Jews (cf. Matt. 10:5-6). He did not focus on all Israel but primarily on Galilee in the north. Even there, he did not focus on everyone but on the "lost sheep," those in Israel who had lost their way. These were people like tax collectors and prostitutes.
Jesus' earthly focus was thus on redemption and reclamation, not so much in a spiritual or eternal sense but in the sense of bringing back to the Father those who had lost their way. This is the restoration of Israel like John the Baptist may have preached but with a focus on those who were particularly off track. It was a ministry of inclusion.
It is interesting to think of any ostracism or ridicule Jesus might have endured as a child, given the possible rumors that his mother had borne him out of wedlock. It would be easy enough given the birth stories of Matthew and Luke to imagine that Jesus grew up amid scandal. How well he then might identify with the outcasts of Israel.
In the rest of the chapter, I want to look at some of the marginal groups on whom Jesus seemed to focus especially. In addition to more notorious sinners like tax collectors and prostitutes, Jesus focused also on the poor and perhaps even on women. Jesus' focus on healing and exorcism were also a manifestation of this focus, which I will explore more fully in a later chapter.
Monday, February 06, 2012
Sinners 3
... continued from Saturday.
_________
After all, the Pharisees were actually trying to keep the covenant. Jesus never applauds the prostitutes for their sexual activities or the tax collectors for cheating the people. What he does is open the door for their restoration. Similarly, Jesus does not criticize the Pharisees for being strict. He criticizes them for having their priorities out of whack (e.g., Matt. 23:23).
I will return to the Pharisees later. For now, I mainly want to argue that we should only describe them and other Jewish teachers as "healthy" in quotation marks--implying that they were not truly healthy--in hindsight. It is not something everyone would have immediately understood at the time. In the Parable of the Two Sons in Matthew 21, they initially say they will go work in the field. It is only after they reject Jesus that it turns out they do not. Similarly, the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15), it is only after the prodigal returns that we begin to realize that the elder brother is not as righteous as he may have appeared. As I have sometimes said, the Pharisees would have been voted "Most Likely to be Righteous" in high school.
But the Pharisees are really more a focus for a later chapter. Here, I am more interested in the sinners. They are represented by the prodigal son in Luke 15 and by the son who initially says he will not go work in the field in Matthew 21. But the story of Jesus' ministry is a story of great reversal. By the end of his ministry, those who said they would go work in the field, the "healthy," turn out not to follow Jesus. Meanwhile, those who initially said they would not go work, do. They repent and follow Jesus.
So we know in hindsight that the word "healthy" should be put in quotation marks, but quotation marks do not belong around the word sinners at all. These individuals really did start off sinners in a much stronger sense than the Pharisees did. It is at this point that our knowledge of Paul is prone to interfere with our hearing of Jesus--especially the way later Christians have appropriated Paul. We are prone to have Romans 3:23 ringing in our ears--"all have sinned."
To be sure, Jews did believe that no person stood self-sufficiently righteous before God. That's why there was a sacrificial system, so both the corporate and individual sins of Israel--especially unintentional sins--could find atonement. But this was not the focus of Jewish understanding like it seemingly has become in so many Christian circles. The focus was on intentional wrongdoing and on making the right choice when a person came to a conscious decision between doing right and wrong.
This is the standard of the gospels and, when we read him in focus, it is even the focus of Paul's moral understanding. The righteous in the gospels are not those who are absolutely perfect but those who consistently make the righteous choice when a moral choice comes. The concrete starting point for such choices at the time was the Jewish Law found in the Old Testament. But, as I will argue in the next chapter, Jesus was more interested in the motives behind a person's action and whether a person was acting with love and mercy.
The sinners of these parable were not. They were truly "lost sheep" in a clear way. The Pharisees were actually trying to obey. The tax collectors and prostitutes were not. They are of course represented by the prodigal in the Parable of the Prodigal Son...
_________
After all, the Pharisees were actually trying to keep the covenant. Jesus never applauds the prostitutes for their sexual activities or the tax collectors for cheating the people. What he does is open the door for their restoration. Similarly, Jesus does not criticize the Pharisees for being strict. He criticizes them for having their priorities out of whack (e.g., Matt. 23:23).
I will return to the Pharisees later. For now, I mainly want to argue that we should only describe them and other Jewish teachers as "healthy" in quotation marks--implying that they were not truly healthy--in hindsight. It is not something everyone would have immediately understood at the time. In the Parable of the Two Sons in Matthew 21, they initially say they will go work in the field. It is only after they reject Jesus that it turns out they do not. Similarly, the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15), it is only after the prodigal returns that we begin to realize that the elder brother is not as righteous as he may have appeared. As I have sometimes said, the Pharisees would have been voted "Most Likely to be Righteous" in high school.
But the Pharisees are really more a focus for a later chapter. Here, I am more interested in the sinners. They are represented by the prodigal son in Luke 15 and by the son who initially says he will not go work in the field in Matthew 21. But the story of Jesus' ministry is a story of great reversal. By the end of his ministry, those who said they would go work in the field, the "healthy," turn out not to follow Jesus. Meanwhile, those who initially said they would not go work, do. They repent and follow Jesus.
So we know in hindsight that the word "healthy" should be put in quotation marks, but quotation marks do not belong around the word sinners at all. These individuals really did start off sinners in a much stronger sense than the Pharisees did. It is at this point that our knowledge of Paul is prone to interfere with our hearing of Jesus--especially the way later Christians have appropriated Paul. We are prone to have Romans 3:23 ringing in our ears--"all have sinned."
To be sure, Jews did believe that no person stood self-sufficiently righteous before God. That's why there was a sacrificial system, so both the corporate and individual sins of Israel--especially unintentional sins--could find atonement. But this was not the focus of Jewish understanding like it seemingly has become in so many Christian circles. The focus was on intentional wrongdoing and on making the right choice when a person came to a conscious decision between doing right and wrong.
This is the standard of the gospels and, when we read him in focus, it is even the focus of Paul's moral understanding. The righteous in the gospels are not those who are absolutely perfect but those who consistently make the righteous choice when a moral choice comes. The concrete starting point for such choices at the time was the Jewish Law found in the Old Testament. But, as I will argue in the next chapter, Jesus was more interested in the motives behind a person's action and whether a person was acting with love and mercy.
The sinners of these parable were not. They were truly "lost sheep" in a clear way. The Pharisees were actually trying to obey. The tax collectors and prostitutes were not. They are of course represented by the prodigal in the Parable of the Prodigal Son...
Sunday, February 05, 2012
Three Parts of the Soul
"Do we need to stop at Wal-Mart for school supplies?"
Getting an answer to a question like this from my son always feels to me like pulling teeth. So today I tried a picture. Think of yourself as a body with you inside, your "soul."
Now think of your soul having three parts: a mind that thinks, feelings, and your will. Your will is the part of you that makes choices, that makes the decisions. Your will can go with your feelings or your will can go with your mind.
So let's say your mind knows you need paper for school but your feelings don't want to go to Wal-Mart. Your feelings want to go home and watch TV or play Call of Duty. Your will is what makes the decisions.
The person who turns out to be happiest in life is the person whose will chooses with their mind and what they know is the thing they should do.
Of course all these things--mind, feelings, and will--are ultimately functions of the brain which is part of the body. What function a detachable soul might play is the stuff of fun discussions. These are true pictures, not literal ones.
Getting an answer to a question like this from my son always feels to me like pulling teeth. So today I tried a picture. Think of yourself as a body with you inside, your "soul."
Now think of your soul having three parts: a mind that thinks, feelings, and your will. Your will is the part of you that makes choices, that makes the decisions. Your will can go with your feelings or your will can go with your mind.
So let's say your mind knows you need paper for school but your feelings don't want to go to Wal-Mart. Your feelings want to go home and watch TV or play Call of Duty. Your will is what makes the decisions.
The person who turns out to be happiest in life is the person whose will chooses with their mind and what they know is the thing they should do.
Of course all these things--mind, feelings, and will--are ultimately functions of the brain which is part of the body. What function a detachable soul might play is the stuff of fun discussions. These are true pictures, not literal ones.
Saturday, February 04, 2012
Pharisees 2
... continued from yesterday.
______
Our heads are so full of things from Christian tradition and other parts of the New Testament (e.g., Paul) that it is hard for us to hear the connotations words like "healthy" and "sinner" likely had at the time of Jesus in his rhetoric. At least to start with, we should take these words somewhat straightforwardly. The son that initially says he will go work in the field is the "healthy" son and refers to the teachers, elders, Pharisees, and priests of Israel.
Since none of us has ever met an ancient Pharisee today, it is all too easy for us to make them into cartoon characters who are predictably evil and predictably hypocrite. Perhaps you've heard the children's ditty: "I don't want to be a Pharisee, 'cause they're not fair, you see." It is true that Matthew 23 absolutely excoriates the Pharisees as hypocrites, but as with most things, we will have a skewed view of them if we only form our understanding from one passage.
For one thing, the other gospels and Acts do not have as strongly a negative view of them. In John 3, Nicodemus is a Pharisee and is clearly friendly with Jesus, and Jesus is friendly with him. John portrays Nicodemus as surprisingly without understanding (John 3:10), but he is clearly genuine in his pursuit of God. Similarly, Acts sees no contradiction between being a Pharisee and being a follower of Jesus (e.g., Acts 15:5; 23:6).
Additionally, there may very well be aspects to Matthew's situation that have led it to focus on the worst elements in Pharisaism. Many think that Matthew was written in the decades immediately following the destruction of Jerusalem, at the time when the Pharisees were basically all that was left of the leadership of Israel. The Sadducees were priests closely associated with the temple, but the temple was gone. Many Essenes had probably fought as revolutionaries in the Jewish War, but they lost and the Romans hunted others down.
The Romans arguably engaged Pharisees when they looked for someone among those left who could be liaisons between the empire and the people who remained in the land of Israel. These were those who were to set up their leadership at a place called Jamnia. These were those who would shift the focus to purity and away from politics. This was the beginning of what would become rabbinic Judaism.
Matthew's presentation of Jesus' engagement with the Pharisees was about much more than remembering what they were like. It was written to show that Christian Jews were the true heirs of God's people, not Pharisaic Judaism. Matthew accentuates the negative aspects of the Pharisees in its presentations to show its primarily Jewish audience not to follow the current leaders of Israel.
But at the time of Jesus' ministry, the Pharisees were perhaps the most popular religious leaders of Israel. They inspired hope in the people. Their agenda was to return Israel to its covenant with God. If Israel would only be faithful enough, then God would forgive its sins and restore it. When we read the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector, we are not surprised that Jesus honors the "genuine" tax collector who is honest about his sin. But in Jesus' day, this conclusion would have been quite shocking.
After all, the Pharisees were actually trying to keep the covenant. Jesus never applauds the prostitutes for their sexual activities or the tax collectors for cheating the people. What he does is open the door for their restoration. Similarly, Jesus does not criticize the Pharisees for being strict. He criticizes them for having their priorities out of whack (e.g., Matt. 23:23)...
______
Our heads are so full of things from Christian tradition and other parts of the New Testament (e.g., Paul) that it is hard for us to hear the connotations words like "healthy" and "sinner" likely had at the time of Jesus in his rhetoric. At least to start with, we should take these words somewhat straightforwardly. The son that initially says he will go work in the field is the "healthy" son and refers to the teachers, elders, Pharisees, and priests of Israel.
Since none of us has ever met an ancient Pharisee today, it is all too easy for us to make them into cartoon characters who are predictably evil and predictably hypocrite. Perhaps you've heard the children's ditty: "I don't want to be a Pharisee, 'cause they're not fair, you see." It is true that Matthew 23 absolutely excoriates the Pharisees as hypocrites, but as with most things, we will have a skewed view of them if we only form our understanding from one passage.
For one thing, the other gospels and Acts do not have as strongly a negative view of them. In John 3, Nicodemus is a Pharisee and is clearly friendly with Jesus, and Jesus is friendly with him. John portrays Nicodemus as surprisingly without understanding (John 3:10), but he is clearly genuine in his pursuit of God. Similarly, Acts sees no contradiction between being a Pharisee and being a follower of Jesus (e.g., Acts 15:5; 23:6).
Additionally, there may very well be aspects to Matthew's situation that have led it to focus on the worst elements in Pharisaism. Many think that Matthew was written in the decades immediately following the destruction of Jerusalem, at the time when the Pharisees were basically all that was left of the leadership of Israel. The Sadducees were priests closely associated with the temple, but the temple was gone. Many Essenes had probably fought as revolutionaries in the Jewish War, but they lost and the Romans hunted others down.
The Romans arguably engaged Pharisees when they looked for someone among those left who could be liaisons between the empire and the people who remained in the land of Israel. These were those who were to set up their leadership at a place called Jamnia. These were those who would shift the focus to purity and away from politics. This was the beginning of what would become rabbinic Judaism.
Matthew's presentation of Jesus' engagement with the Pharisees was about much more than remembering what they were like. It was written to show that Christian Jews were the true heirs of God's people, not Pharisaic Judaism. Matthew accentuates the negative aspects of the Pharisees in its presentations to show its primarily Jewish audience not to follow the current leaders of Israel.
But at the time of Jesus' ministry, the Pharisees were perhaps the most popular religious leaders of Israel. They inspired hope in the people. Their agenda was to return Israel to its covenant with God. If Israel would only be faithful enough, then God would forgive its sins and restore it. When we read the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector, we are not surprised that Jesus honors the "genuine" tax collector who is honest about his sin. But in Jesus' day, this conclusion would have been quite shocking.
After all, the Pharisees were actually trying to keep the covenant. Jesus never applauds the prostitutes for their sexual activities or the tax collectors for cheating the people. What he does is open the door for their restoration. Similarly, Jesus does not criticize the Pharisees for being strict. He criticizes them for having their priorities out of whack (e.g., Matt. 23:23)...
Friday, February 03, 2012
Psalm 4 Translation
Psalm 1
Psalm 2
Psalm 3
Now Psalm 4
_____
[To the musician leading (those playing) the Neginoth, a psalm (attributed) to David]
1 When I call, answer me, O God of my righteousness.
In [my] distress, you made space for me.
Have mercy on me.
Hear my prayer.
2 Sons of man, why [do you turn] my glory to shame?
Why do you love emptiness?
Why do you seek falsehood?
Music.
3 And know that YHWH has set apart the faithful person for himself.
YHWH will hear when I call on him.
4 Tremble [you all] and do not sin.
Speak [you all] with your [pl] heart upon your [pl] bed.
And be silent.
Music
5 Sacrifice (pl) sacrifices of righteousness
and trust in YHWH.
6 Many are saying, "Who will show us good?"
Lift up the light of your face, YHWH.
7 You gave more gladness in my heart
than their corn and their wine increased.
8 In peace both will I lie down and sleep,
for you, YHWH, alone will cause me to dwell in safety.
_________
One very interesting thing about the Hebrew here is verse 4. The Hebrew says to "tremble" and not to sin before the LORD. However, the Greek translation of the psalm, informally called the Septuagint, reads "be angry and do not sin," which is of course the version that Ephesians 4:26 quotes.
Psalm 2
Psalm 3
Now Psalm 4
_____
[To the musician leading (those playing) the Neginoth, a psalm (attributed) to David]
1 When I call, answer me, O God of my righteousness.
In [my] distress, you made space for me.
Have mercy on me.
Hear my prayer.
2 Sons of man, why [do you turn] my glory to shame?
Why do you love emptiness?
Why do you seek falsehood?
Music.
3 And know that YHWH has set apart the faithful person for himself.
YHWH will hear when I call on him.
4 Tremble [you all] and do not sin.
Speak [you all] with your [pl] heart upon your [pl] bed.
And be silent.
Music
5 Sacrifice (pl) sacrifices of righteousness
and trust in YHWH.
6 Many are saying, "Who will show us good?"
Lift up the light of your face, YHWH.
7 You gave more gladness in my heart
than their corn and their wine increased.
8 In peace both will I lie down and sleep,
for you, YHWH, alone will cause me to dwell in safety.
_________
One very interesting thing about the Hebrew here is verse 4. The Hebrew says to "tremble" and not to sin before the LORD. However, the Greek translation of the psalm, informally called the Septuagint, reads "be angry and do not sin," which is of course the version that Ephesians 4:26 quotes.
Jesus: The Two Sons 1
The Gospel of Luke begins its presentation of Jesus' ministry with a kind of "inaugural address" Jesus gives in his home synagogue of Nazareth. He picks up the scroll of Isaiah and reads from chapter 61: "The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor" (Luke 4:18-19). If each gospel has its own special emphases, this is one on which Luke especially focuses.
On an occasion early in Mark, Jesus is criticized for hanging out with "sinners." His response is that "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners" (Mark 2:17). Jesus has gone to the house of a tax collector named Levi. Tax collectors were known not only for taking much needed resources from the common person for the powers they worked for. They were known for getting rich themselves by adding on to the amount taken. Jesus never disputes that they are sinners. What he disputes is the sense that they were unredeemable.
Most of us know the Parable of the Prodigal Son, but Matthew 21 gives us a shorter version that captures the bottom line well: "There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, 'Son, go and work today in the vineyard.' 'I will not,' he answered, but later he changed his mind and went. Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, 'I will, sir,' but he did not go. Which of the two did what his father wanted? 'The first,' they answered" (Matt. 21:28-29).
The two sons correspond to the "healthy" and the "sick" respectively. The sick are the tax collectors and prostitutes Jesus mentions immediately after telling this short parable (Matt. 21:31-32). The "healthy," by contrast, are those who have just asked Jesus who gave him the authority to do the things he did. In this context, the chief priests and elders, the leaders of Jerusalem, are talking to him (21:23). But at other times in the gospels, he refers to Pharisees and other teachers as the healthy (e.g., Mark 2:16).
Our heads are so full of things from Christian tradition and other parts of the New Testament (e.g., Paul) that it is hard for us to hear the connotations words like "healthy" and "sinner" likely had at the time of Jesus...
On an occasion early in Mark, Jesus is criticized for hanging out with "sinners." His response is that "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners" (Mark 2:17). Jesus has gone to the house of a tax collector named Levi. Tax collectors were known not only for taking much needed resources from the common person for the powers they worked for. They were known for getting rich themselves by adding on to the amount taken. Jesus never disputes that they are sinners. What he disputes is the sense that they were unredeemable.
Most of us know the Parable of the Prodigal Son, but Matthew 21 gives us a shorter version that captures the bottom line well: "There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, 'Son, go and work today in the vineyard.' 'I will not,' he answered, but later he changed his mind and went. Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, 'I will, sir,' but he did not go. Which of the two did what his father wanted? 'The first,' they answered" (Matt. 21:28-29).
The two sons correspond to the "healthy" and the "sick" respectively. The sick are the tax collectors and prostitutes Jesus mentions immediately after telling this short parable (Matt. 21:31-32). The "healthy," by contrast, are those who have just asked Jesus who gave him the authority to do the things he did. In this context, the chief priests and elders, the leaders of Jerusalem, are talking to him (21:23). But at other times in the gospels, he refers to Pharisees and other teachers as the healthy (e.g., Mark 2:16).
Our heads are so full of things from Christian tradition and other parts of the New Testament (e.g., Paul) that it is hard for us to hear the connotations words like "healthy" and "sinner" likely had at the time of Jesus...
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