literal metaphors

At the weekly meeting of our Bible Study/Fellowship Group on Tuesday, we read the stories of the Tower of Babel (Gen. 11:1-9) and the coming of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:1-21) in preparation for Pentecost. Of course, the two are often paired together because of their focus on language; whereas language was confused at Babel, people at Pentecost heard clearly the disciples "speaking about God's deeds of power in [their] own languages" (2:11). In the Babel story, one language becomes many; at Pentecost, many languages--though not eliminated--become one, united in their capacity to communicate the message of the gospel.

That interpretation is well-enough known. For the present I am interested in another discussion that arose when reading the Babel account: literal versus metaphorical reading of scripture.

One man from among us, a pastor, contended that the stories "at the beginning of Genesis" must be "taken with a pinch of salt", that is, they cannot be taken as literal, which is to say, "historically true". Two others present, one man and one woman, both successful in the modern world but raised in traditional, African villages, contended that the stories are literal or can be taken that way. Anna and I did not really enter the fray; I have found that in discussions such as this, language, words, and meaning fails between people--much like it did at Babel itself. But then, in using such a phrase as "like it did at Babel itself", am I suggesting that the story is literal?

Such a phrase illustrates the point at hand precisely. In speaking as if the events of Babel really happened, I take the story at face-value before probing the hidden depths of its meaning. Or, in other words, I take the story first as a story. The first step in the re-telling of any story--be it a narration of events which happened to one person in the course of one's day or one of Aesop's fables--is to know the story. The first step is to remember the events, put them in order, gather them up. The first step is not to decide whether the story really could have taken place according to other criteria. The first step is to respect the integrity of the storyteller--to take her at her words, to consider that he is giving you a trustworthy account of something. From there, of course, we may discern that the story sounds more like a joke than a report or whatever. But first we must simply listen.

My problem with the interpretation of the pastor is that he had none beyond his contention that the story was metaphorical. It was as if his theories about the stories and texts of the Bible were themselves the message of the Bible rather than what the stories themselves reveal. I much prefer the literalism of the Africans in the room since their literalism--whatever that word even means--leads them to the theological meaning of the story, to revelation, to the moment when God shows God's character, mind, and heart (metaphorically-speaking!) to his people. And they were led to the meaning of the story.

The woman started off the discussion by puzzling about the humans' pretension of building a tower "with its top in the heavens" (11:4).

"In the heavens!?" she gasped. "Did they really think they could reach the heavens?"

Pastor: "Well, you have to take the stories at the beginning of Genesis with a pinch of salt."

Silence.

Perhaps the discussion then continued in other directions for awhile. Eventually the man spoke, returning again to the detail about the height of the tower.

"I think that God intervened because he knew that they would not be able to build the tower without it falling down and killing them. He confused their language so that they would stop building it. It was for their own good."

I thought his interpretation beautiful. He arrived at a profound insight about God. He got there by following the story--then using his imagination. His interpretation was, on one hand, hyper-literal. He did not choose to follow, for example, that the people would be ruined by their pride, by their desire to "make a name for themselves" (11:4), the embodiment of which was the tower, but the tower itself, literally toppling under its own height upon them. It was first from the tower's destructive potential--not first from the destructive potential of what the tower might be said to stand for--that God saved the people. Yet it was God who saved the people from their own destructive ingenuity. That is the common message of the story, the message which might unite both modern and pre-modern interpreters of this text.

We see also then that the issue is not really literal versus metaphorical readings of scripture; the point is that the literal and the metaphorical are the same. I am no longer sure of their difference. Even less am I sure that one can find God by setting out to read the text as metaphorical literature. But one will find God by reading, simply, the story.

-Joe

You might find themes pertinent to this discussion in this fine article from The Mennonite.

the righteouness that exceeds

Last Saturday's topic at our Bethany Bible School conference was the synoptic gospels, or Matthew, Mark, and Luke. My preparation for teaching had been, first and foremost, to read through each gospel again and note the particular flow of each. For Matthew, I focused in on the content of Jesus' five major teaching sections, all so-marked by narrative comments, at the beginning, that "Jesus began to teach his disciples" (and "the crowds") and, at the end, "after Jesus had finished . . .." These sections are:

• 5:1-7:29 The Sermon on the Mount
• 10:1-11:1 Jesus teaches the twelve before sending them out with his authority
• 13:1-53 Jesus speaks in parables about the "kingdom of heaven"
• 18:1-19:1 Teachings about forgiveness/mercy
• 23:1-26:1 Final teachings before his passion

Based on these five sections, I came up with the following summary statement of Matthew's story in order to guide my teaching.

Jesus brings near the kingdom of heaven. Those who welcome the kingdom of heaven will receive it; those who reject it will not. The kingdom of heaven is the rule of mercy and forgiveness.

Based on this, if I had to pick one verse to summarize Matthew's story, it would be 5:20:

"Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees you will never enter the kingdom of heaven."

I ultimately settled on this verse because it seems to include the main thrust of the five main teaching sections as well as an important feature of the material outside these sections--Jesus' confrontations with the scribes and Pharisees. I had wanted to use a more positive verse, for example, 5:7, "Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy"--and this was a close second. Still, Jesus' conflict with the scribes and Pharisees reveals the way of mercy which defines the life, or "righteousness", of the kingdom of heaven that Jesus brings near. Jesus' interpretation of "the law and the prophets" (5:17), contra that of the scribes and Pharisees, is that God calls "sinners and tax collectors" to be God's people and approves the work of healing the sick on the day of rest, the Sabbath (9:10-13; 12:9-14). Or, as Jesus puts it in a phrase recorded among the gospels only in Matthew, God "desires mercy, not sacrifice" (9:13; 12:7). Another way that I would say this is that the sacrifice that God requires is mercy.

In illustrating these themes, I had quoted Jesus' words to the religious leaders of his day--"the chief priests and the elders of the people" (21:23, 45) and "the Pharisees" (21:45)--that "the tax collectors and the prostitutes are going into the kingdom of God ahead of you" (21:31). One man, seemingly surprised by this statement--as if hearing it for the first time--asked what it was that the Pharisees could have done that even the prostitutes would enter the kingdom of heaven before them. Why would Jesus speak to them in this way?

Another woman asked me to elaborate on the beatitude, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven" (5:3).

I did attempt an answer to both questions, which probably will not sound here as it did on Saturday. I do think that the two questions are closely related. The Pharisees, to use other terminology from Jesus, were "last" in the kingdom of heaven, not "first" (19:30; 20:16), because they lacked mercy for their fellow human beings. And they lacked mercy because they were not "poor in spirit", or humble of spirit. They lived as though any righteousness that they enjoyed came from their own fulfillment of the law rather than from a hungering and thirsting for the righteousness that comes from and is God (5:6). The humble know that they need God as their flesh needs food and drink. With God as their goal, the hunger of the humble never ceases, for God is not a human being; God is always beyond. The humble seek God's praise.

By contrast, the proud seek the praise of human beings. Their goal is to be seen as righteous in the eyes of a community of like-minded individuals. If the community could fulfill their need of righteousness, the hungering of the proud would come to an end. For a time, perhaps, it does, as the proud take time to bask in the glory of their most recent achievement. Yet when the community's attention turns to an even later, more glorious achievement of another, the proud one recognizes that his hunger has not really been satisfied. He is still hungry.

Eventually, hopefully, the proud may realize that the community can never fulfill their desire for righteousness. Perhaps they realize, like the "poor in spirit", that the only way to be "filled" is always to "hunger"--for the righteousness that comes from God.

-Joe

"in his chest"

Inspired from my reading of the prophetic literature earlier this year, I have since alluded in a few sermons to Jeremiah's description of his vocation: "If I say, 'I will not mention him, or speak any more in his name,' then within me there is something like a burning fire shut up in my bones; I am weary with holding it in, and I cannot" (20:9). My paraphrase has been that the prophet, being one who is given the words of God, has no choice but to give also to others what God has given him. The prophet's particular mode of sharing--of not being selfish--is with words. If the prophet should keep those words to himself, within, those words will become death for him. The prophet will become sick, the prophet may die, if the prophet does not carry out the task to which he has been called.

Also three weeks ago, in Philipstown, a man from the church confirmed those words to me after the service. I had introduced the Isaiah text I was preaching on with something like the above introduction to the prophets generally. Responding to that, this man had said that he used always to be sick until he responded to God's call to begin preaching. He now enjoys full health.

The man's experience--we might call it the prophetic experience--has been well-testified throughout Africa by both Christians and non-Christians. In terms of the latter, the way of a person being called to be a traditional healer, a sangoma in southern Africa, is to become ill. The affliction, sent by the person's ancestors, will subside only when he or she consents to take up the practice. Christians too, although the most-committed ones disavow all practices related to the sangoma and seeking oracles from the dead, often interpret illness as a call to something new. Our pastor, for example, knows that he has a particular, nagging condition "in his chest" that will not go away until he finally makes the decision to go full-time in ministry.

Examples such as these might, at the very least, make westerners pause to consider whether certain illnesses suffered in one's body are, in any way, related to something amiss in one's spirit. Short of inciting a too-easy, one-to-one correlation between a person's sin and her sickness, this wisdom of Africa might at least cause us to re-examine ourselves before God.

-Joe

canon within the canon

I thought I would take stock of my use of scripture on this blog. On the sidebar, I have added a list of those labels to my posts which are a direct citation of a text or the name of a book of the Bible (If you're looking for reflection on a particular text, perhaps you will find something of interest using this tool). In doing so, I also decided to tabulate which texts and parts of the Bible I have used most to date in this "scripture diary" of sorts. Though the frequency of certain texts is partially related to the fact that I often follow the Revised Common Lectionary, it is nevertheless interesting to check how I am using the Bible and if I am giving adequate attention to all parts of the scriptural canon. So, here are the results so far of this blog's "canon within the canon" for a few different categories.

Testament Comparison
1. New Testament 41 labels
2. Old Testament 18 labels

Divisions Within Scripture
1. Gospels and Acts 27
2. Prophets 11
3. Letters of Paul 10
4. Torah/Pentateuch 5
5. Other New Testament Letters 3
6. Old Testament "Writings" 2
6. Apocalyptic 2

Individual Books (two labels or more)
1. Luke 11
2. John 8
3. Ephesians 4
3. Genesis 4
5. Isaiah 3
5. James 3
5. Mark 3
5. Matthew 3
9. 1 Corinthians 2
9. 2 Samuel 2
9. Amos 2
9. Galatians 2
9. Leviticus 2
9. Revelation 2

The concept of a personal "canon within the canon" interests me. What is yours?

-Joe

streaming up the mountain

I had the privilege of preaching the sermon at Grace Community Church in Philipstown, Northern Cape, on Sunday. I chose Isaiah 2:2-4 to complement the themes of our weekend seminars on the church as the community of Christ's peace.

As I warmed up, I began to relish the metaphors in the text, specifically, the image of the nations "streaming"--"like a river that runs down to the sea and never stops" is how I put it--to "the Lord's house" (v. 2). Afterward, our colleagues pointed out to me a tantalizing paradox in the image--the nations streaming like a river up the high mountain on which the Lord's house stands.

Can a river flow up a mountain? A geological impossibility is paired with a theological certainty. The nations at war with one another will beat their weapons into agricultural tools. In our day, as well as in the days of Isaiah and, 800 years later, the early church (whose leaders cited this scripture in their writings more than any other), peace may seem as much an impossibility as a river flowing up.

Yet the "God of Jacob" is there. He himself "will teach us his ways that we may walk in his paths" (v. 3). "He himself is our peace", as Paul later put it, "who has made the two one and has broken down the dividing wall of hostility between us" (Eph. 2:14). He did this "in his flesh", that is, through the resurrection of Jesus from the dead (Eph 2:14, see also 1:20), another impossibility made certain.

What is impossible for humans is possible for God (Mk. 10:27; 11:23-24).

-Joe

on following

One of my favorite songs sung in the South African independent-church context is Somlandela, "We will follow Jesus". A second verse to the tune is the dialogue between Jesus and Peter in John 21:15ff. Simon nikaYona, uyandithanda na?/Ewe Nkosi yam, ndiyakuthanda, "Simon, son of John, do you love me?/Yes, Lord, I love you". I enjoyed the opportunity yesterday to join the preaching of that text to the song.

Jesus' third resurrection appearance to his disciples, recorded in John 21, is, in my reading, a story about a crossroads in the disciple's life (here represented by Simon Peter) between the old life (before Christ) and the new (in Christ). In reading the text this week, a pivotal revelation for me was the fleeting quality of Jesus' resurrection appearances to his disciples. After his resurrection from the dead, he did not simply stay with his disciples; rather he appeared, disappeared, and reappeared to them over the course of forty days leading up to his ascension (Acts 1:3). His time with them was broken. As a result, in between appearances, his disciples must have yet been prone to doubt whether they had in fact seen the risen Jesus or, as Luke puts it, merely "a ghost" (24:37). Was Jesus' resurrection appearance a unique experience within the disciples' spiritual worldview, or did it fit established categories? The fleeting quality of the resurrection appearances left room for the disciples to question whether Jesus was uniquely alive--in a quality different from others who had died--despite having had "many convincing proofs" that he was indeed the "firstborn from among the dead" (Acts 1:3; Rev. 1:5).

This, then, is the critical context for the story--the disciples lingering doubt. From there, we see the options open to Peter. How will he live with his doubt? Will Peter continue to go the way of Jesus, the way he began after his encounter with Jesus three years earlier by the Sea of Galilee (Lk. 5:1-11)? Or will he go back to his pre-Jesus life?

Peter, perhaps fed up with this fleeting Jesus, weary from the emotional swings of friendship lost and regained, chooses his pre-Jesus existence. "I am going fishing", he announces to his companion disciples. "We will go with you," they say. Without their former leader, the disciples will follow Peter. They will follow him into the old way of living. No more "fishers of people" (Mk. 1:17); fishers again only of fish. Except that, just as the first time Peter met Jesus, no fish were forthcoming (Lk. 5:5). "They went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing" (v. 3).

This is the perfect set-up for Jesus to reappear to the disciples. He stands "on the beach" and calls to the disciples on the sea. He tells them, as he did when they first met, where to cast the net in order that they might catch some fish. Again an overwhelming catch ensues. The disciples would be truly dim indeed if they did not now recognize the man on the beach as their Lord.

Peter, to his credit, recognizes Jesus and makes his move back toward him. First he puts on some clothes in order to swim back to land to meet Jesus--"for he was naked".

This has long bemused me. Why would one put on their clothes in order to swim? Why also was Peter naked in the boat?

I asked the congregation. Pastor Ntapo: "I can guess that Peter was naked in the old life." Peter, having decided to again seek security apart from this fleeting, seemingly undependable Jesus, ironically finds himself more exposed. He will put on his clothes and go back to Jesus. He will "clothe himself with the Lord Jesus Christ" (Rom. 13:14; Gal. 3:27; Col. 3:10) So too will those who have chosen to follow Peter from new to old and back again. They row back to land "in the boat".

When they return, they find that a meal has been prepared for them. A charcoal fire is there with fish on it and some bread. This is not the fish the disciples have just caught; it is already on the fire for them. The disciples will simply add to the fire what Jesus has already put there. The "fleeting Jesus" is still who he always was: Israel's Provider, giving bread and meat to his beloved in the desert.

But Jesus' love for his disciples is a tough love; Peter feels "hurt" because Jesus has asked him three times whether he loves him. As Jesus was being condemned to death, Peter denied Jesus three times. Jesus now wants to know--three times--whether Peter truly loves him. And "yes" alone will not do; Peter must feed Jesus' sheep. Peter has other disciples willing to follow him wherever he goes.

"I am going fishing." "We will go with you". "I am going back to the old life." "We will go with you."

Does Peter love Jesus enough to care for his sheep? Jesus says, "Follow me" (v. 19). "Do as I do". "Feed my sheep".

There is a danger in singing songs of extreme commitment--"Somlandel', Somlandel' UYesu/Somlandel' yonke iindawo, "We will follow, We will follow Jesus/We will follow everywhere [he goes]--if we do not intend to take the steps.

Jesus told Peter, "When you were younger you used to fasten your own belt and go wherever you wished. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go" (v. 18).

Persecutions and trouble, trials and tribulations are bound to come. Suffering is in the world. Our lives are not our own. Going alone, "going fishing" again, is no recipe for success. We are slaves--either to the world or to Christ. If anything is sure, it is that someone else "will take you where you do not wish to go". But only in Christ is the slavery freedom (Rom. 6:16ff., compare with Gal. 4-5; Mt. 6:24).

I'm still working on that one.

-Joe

"hidden from our eyes" (Luke 19:42)

As I read, and then eventually preached, the story of Jesus' entry into Jerusalem (Luke 19:28-44), I became interested in the characterization of the disciples. Though it might be argued that they do not appear as dim-witted as they do in Mark's gospel, in Luke the disciples do, nonetheless, in the words of my pastoral colleague, "say things that they do not understand." To this we might also add that they often "do things that they do not understand." In this text, for example:

• the disciples must not have imagined what their simple act of obedience to Jesus' command instigated. Indeed, they seem to need assurance that the thing which they are about to do can in fact be done; Jesus anticipates their doubt that they will find a colt tied up precisely as he tells them and that they will be allowed to acquire it. Thus he arms them with a response to any who would hinder them: "Just say this, 'the Lord needs it' (v. 31). At least having a plan--however audacious that plan may seem--is enough to send the disciples on their way ahead of Jesus. This, in this text, is their first act of trust in him.
• the disciples' trust in Jesus is rewarded beyond any doubts. First, they "found [the colt] as he had told them" (v. 32). Second, the anticipated scenario likewise goes exactly "as he had told them": the disciples are asked for a reason for their course of action to which they utter the instructed response. Third, "the Lord needs it" works. The text does not mention any further dispute, no ensuing haggling with the colt's owners. Immediately, they simply "brought [the colt] to Jesus" (v. 35). Their initial act of faith in Jesus has been rewarded.
• Confidence booming, they act on their own, apart from any explicit command from their lord. They "throw their cloaks on the colt"; "they set Jesus on it." Next, "as he rode along, people kept spreading their cloaks on the road" (v. 36). Could the disciples have imagined that their initial decision to act on their faith in Jesus, to trust him, to take him at his word, would yield similar acts from an entire "multitude of disciples" (v. 37), now "spreading their cloaks on the road" before Jesus? Here again in the gospel narrative appears something of the dynamic of the so-called "messianic secret". Jesus explicitly instructs his disciples or would-be followers to say nothing of his marvelous acts or his true identity, yet they are unable to keep quiet (cf. Mark 1:40-45). Here he is simply silent, yet his disciples pick him up, "set Jesus on [the colt]"--they literally exalt him. Their doing so opens the way for others to acclaim him "king" (v. 38).
• All this does not mean, however, that the disciples now understand Jesus, that they now perceive his significance. Luke, it would seem, illustrates their knowing in part, as "in a glass darkly" (1 Cor 13:12), through his juxtaposition of the "multitude's" acclamation of Jesus at the beginning of his earthly life and now at its end. That is, when the heavenly "multitude" appears to Judean shepherds with the news of Christ's birth, they proclaim "on earth peace" (2:14). The earthly "multitude", upon his entry into Jerusalem, proclaim "Peace in heaven" (19:38). Does the earthly multitude understand the heavenly acclamation? Do they know "the things that make for peace"? (v. 42) Do they believe that the peace of heaven is intended for earth?

They do not. For this reason Jesus is weeping for them--for us (v. 41).

-Joe