Enslaved by Fear - A Sermon on Exodus 1: 8 - 2: 10

It is a truth, though not universally acknowledged (for to acknowledge it would be to allow a measure of doubt to creep into our practiced certainty that everything is just as it should be) that those in possession of power fear the powerless, just as the rich fear the poor and the master fears the slave.

Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown. Always. (Shakespeare)

A new king came to power in Egypt land – one that could not (or would not) remember Joseph or all that son of Israel had done for Egypt.  He was a mighty king, a powerful king.  He led the navy to repulse attacks from sea-pirates, he maintained (and expanded) the borders of Egypt.  He built cities, and palaces, and monuments – Lord, how many monuments.  In every city, on every corner, there was a statue or an inscription to mark his presence and to memorialize his achievements.  In the 30^th year of his rule, he was transformed into a living god in the Egyptian “Sed Festival” and thereafter, every third year, another Sed Festival was held in his honor.  He had 45 sons and 40 daughters with his many multiplied wives. (Wente, 618 - 620)  He ruled for 67 years, bringing peace, and power, and prosperity to the nation of Egypt. 

And the inscription beneath the colossal statue erected in his honor read:
My name is Ozymandias, king of kings,
Look on my works, ye mighty and despair.  (Percy Bysshe Shelley)

Ozymandias, (in Greek) or Ramses II “the Great” was powerful beyond most human imagination. 

But those in power never rest easy.

This new king in Egypt – who could not (or would not) remember what the son of Israel had done for Egypt - looked upon the Israelites with fear.

“Look… the Israelites have become too many and too mighty for us.”

The mighty Pharaoh Ramses II, the great and powerful Ozymandias feared the Hebrew people who, though they had continued to multiply during the years between Joseph and Ramses II, were still a minority people in the land of Egypt.  They held no political power (not since the days of long forgotten Joseph) they held no numerical advantage.  They were a minority in Egypt.

But the minority is always feared by the powerful, just as the rich fear the poor, and the master fears the slave. The oppressor fears those that he/she oppresses.

This is not an ancient pattern, now eliminated in our modern society.  We have not yet outgrown these things.  In our own nation’s history we have seen this fear.

The Native American tribes were regarded by White leaders in the 1860s as savages. They were uncivilized. White leaders said that the Indians prized “theft, arson, rape and murder” and raised their children “to regard killing as the highest virtue.”  Indian men, according to these powerful American leaders, were indolent and lazy, leaving all the hard work for their women.   They were barbarous, and savage, and superstitious heathen.  (Nichols, 175 - 6)

In 1736, Colonel William Byrd – a wealthy Virginian slave owner (considered to be the founder of Richmond, Virginia) wrote, “We have already at least 10,000 men of these descendants of Ham fit to bear arms, and their numbers increase every day as well by birth as importation.  And in case there should arise a man of desperate courage among us, exasperated by a desperate fortune, he might with more advantage than Cataline kindle a servile war.  Such a man might be dreadfully mischievous before any opposition could be formed against him and tinge our rivers, as wide as they are, with blood.” (Zinn, 35) also here

The Africans being brought to this country as slaves were feared by their masters. If they could not be kept under control, they would, as Colonel Byrd feared, rise up in revolt, and kill their masters, rape the white women, burn the plantations, and bring economic ruin upon the white ruling class. 

Even after slavery was abolished on these shores, the “darkies” were feared by those in power.  Blacks were described alternately as "lazy, thriftless, intemperate, insolent, dishonest, and without the most rudimentary elements of morality" or as violent beasts, “a hyena in a cage,” “wild beast” ready to rape and murder.  (Zinn, 208)

They were feared and had to be kept in check.  The Indians were slaughtered, and those that survived were herded onto crowded reservations (and often moved again, further afield, when those lands were coveted by whites.)  Blacks were harassed and lynched. Segregated into separate and entirely unequal stations within society. 

Fear turns the “other” into something other than human.  They become sub-human animals, brutes.  Fear makes them seem inferior, greedy, conniving, ugly, lazy, diseased, filthy…

 Said the new king, “Look… the Israelites have become too many and to mighty for us.  Let us deal shrewdly with them or they will take our jobs and take our women.  They’ll flood our hospitals with their diseases and our schools with their dirty children.  They’re violent.  They’re drug users and they bring illegal drugs across our borders.  They don’t worship the way we do.  They don’t even speak our language properly. Come, let us deal shrewdly with them, or they will increase and, in the event of war, join our enemies and fight against us and take over the land.”

Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.

Ramses II, the great and powerful Ozmandias with legions of armed men and servants at his command, with wealth and power incalculable was afraid of the Israelites. He perceived them to be a threat – for those in power always perceive the poor and the oppressed as a threat – and he began a systematic program to reduce the Hebrew danger. 

He put them to work, made their lives bitter with rigor and toil.  He oppressed them with forced labor; he compelled them to build store-cities for him – which further increased his wealth and power, while at the same time reducing the Hebrew strength and power.  The Egyptians used them ruthlessly.  They exploited their labor, and stole the sweat from their brows. But the Pharaoh’s plan was flawed.  The more he oppressed them, the more they multiplied and spread.  The more he tightened his grip, the more they slipped through his fingers. 

So the Egyptians came to fear the Israelites. The Egyptians came to dread the Israelites.

Next Pharaoh ordered that the midwives of Egypt murder the Hebrew boys at birth.  But the midwives feared God and refused to be a part of this vile plan. So Pharaoh expanded the scope of his plan; he ordered all of the people of Egypt to throw Israelite boy children into the Nile.  Not just the midwives. Not just the soldiers. Every good and law abiding citizen of Egypt was instructed to hurl Israelite baby boys into the waters of the Nile.

Because they were afraid. 

The great and the powerful are never so strong that they do not fear those whom they oppress.  The rich and wealthy are never able to purchase an escape from their fear of the poor.  The master can never sleep easily with slaves at hand. 

We tell the story of the Exodus as the escape of the Israelites from the slavery of Egypt.  But we must see that the Egyptians were enslaved too, held in chains of their own forging.  Chains of fear and dread and loathing. The powerful fear the powerless. The rich fear the poor. The oppressor fears the oppressed. The master fears the slave.  Pharaoh feared the Israelites. Herod feared the newborn Jesus.

The Israelites were enslaved to the people of Egypt – a physical slavery of rigorous labor and bitter tears. But the Egyptians were enslaved as well – enslaved to fear and loathing.  And every powerful and prosperous people since has faced the same slavery. 

While we view people as something other – something less than human.  When we see them as thugs and criminals, when we think of them as lazy and freeloaders we are binding our own chains even tighter.  We enact harsher punishments for criminal acts – but we fail to reform the legal system that incarcerates a disproportionate number of minorities.  We equip our police with more powerful weapons and armor – but that only serves to tighten the chains of fear.

Fear can only be undone by love.  Courageous, radical love.

A courageous radical love that says – if you are hungry I will feed you, if you are naked I will clothe you without regard for anything except the fact that you are a child of God, created in his image.  What we need is a courageous radical love that says – if you are low I will lift you up, if you are weak I will support you.

Love does not oppress.
Love does not crush.
Love does no harm
Love does not fear
because perfect love drives out all fear.

(A disclaimer:  there is no universal agreement about which of the Pharaohs was in power during the oppression and during the exodus – if it was an actual historical event…  Ramesses II is the favored choice of many, but not all, historians.)

Nichols, David A. Lincoln and the Indians: Civil War Policy and Politics, Minnesota Historical Society Press, St. Paul MN, 2012.
Shakespeare, William, Henry the IV Part II
Shelly, Percy Bysshe Ozymandias
Wente, Edward F. “Ramesses II” in The Anchor Bible Dictionary Vol. V, Doubleday, New York, NY, 1992.
Zinn, Howard, A People’s History of the United States: 1492 – Present, Haper Collins New York, NY, 2003.

There Is No Flag Large Enough

The Changing Faces of Jesus: Overstating and Undervaluing

I have recently begun reading The Changing Faces of Jesus by the historian Geza Vermes[i].  It’s another attempt to “strip away the myth from the man”[ii] in order to “reveal the true, historical figure of Jesus hidden beneath the oldest Gospels.”[iii]

This is generally the kind of material that I like to read but, although I am only two chapters into the book, I am finding myself reacting negatively to almost everything he writes.  This negative reaction isn’t merely because I am one of those “religious authorities” who “do not like to be faced with contradictory evidence.”[iv]  I have often found my ideas and beliefs challenged by “contradictory evidence” and by new and differing interpretations – and have found my faith strengthened and renewed by exploring them.  I may be, at times, reluctant or resistant – but I want to grow and learn and so I purposefully seek out this “contradictory evidence.” 

My negative reaction to the first two chapters is, in part, a reaction to Geza Vermes’ sometimes condescending tone.  He takes it for granted that his interpretations are (or should be) immediate and obvious to anyone with half a brain.  He laments those “average believer[s]” who “cannot swallow” his non-theological presentation of “the so-called Gospel of John.” [v]    It’s difficult to learn from someone whose knowledge is so rarefied…

He also writes of himself as a “scholar…a detached historian in search of information embedded in the surviving sources.”[vi]  The first I cannot argue.  He is a scholar.  But is he an impartial, detached historian without bias?  Doubtful.  As another historian has said, “you can’t be neutral on a moving train.”[vii] 

This kind of approach is either disingenuous (it’s impossible to be a neutral, detached historian; those claiming to be so are fooling themselves or are trying to fool us…) or it is bad scholarship.  “Those who attempt to arrive at a non-religious historical Jesus do not follow the advice of any contemporary philosophy of history.  These interpreters do not strip away religious elements from the gospel because they are hostile to Christianity; they do so because they are poor historians.”[viii]

My negative reaction to Vermes’ presentation is also because I am not convinced that his interpretations are very good.  And this isn’t just a reactionary response. (At least, I am trying to not let it be …)  After reading the first two chapter s– which focus on the Gospel of John – I think that 1) Vermes overstates the differences between the Gospel of John and the Synoptic Gospels and that 2) he undervalues the theological development in the synoptics (as compared with John.)

Overstating the Differences

There is no point in trying to deny the fact that John’s gospel is very different from Matthew, Mark, and Luke.    This is, without condescension, obvious. There are differences in style, language, theme, and narrative structure.  And despite attempts throughout the years to create a harmony of the four gospel accounts they remain distinct and separate.  But in The Changing Faces of Jesus Vermes describes the difference between them as a “total irreconcilability…[ix]” It should be kept in mind that there are indeed differences between John and the Synoptics and to merge them into one harmonious account is to lose their distinctive messages, but I think that Vermes overstates and exaggerates the differences between them so that he can dismiss John’s account as unhistorical – and therefore not ‘real’, not the ‘true’ Jesus. 

One example of this exaggerated difference is in Vermes’ interpretation of the varying accounts of Jesus’ family life.  He notes that in the synoptics Jesus is described as “showing reserve, verging on hostility toward his family, including Mary.”[x]  They think he’s crazy.  They expect special treatment – which he refuses, and even seems to disown them saying that his mother and brothers are the disciples (Mark 3: 31 – 35, Matthew 12: 46 – 50, Luke 8: 19 – 21).  But, he says, in John we have a more intimate family relationship.  “After the miracle [at the wedding of Canaan], the family group – mother, son, and brothers – and the disciples leave together and go to Capernaum.  John’s sketch presupposes closeness and warmth between mother and so, so different from the cold and unfriendly attitude toward the interfering family discernible in the synoptic account. “[xi]

But are John and the synoptics so different in their descriptions of Jesus’ family dynamics?  In his brief book Historical Jesus: What Can We Know and How Can We Know It? , historian Anthony Le Donne interprets the miracle at Canaan with the same familial hostility. 

“Jesus rebukes Mary sharply.  He says, ‘Ti emoi kai soi, gunai’   … Literally translated, it would say, “how to you and to me, woman?’  A dynamic translation of the idiom (one that captures the sense of the phrase) would read something like this:  ‘What does my business have to do with you?  - Mind your own business, woman!’  If this translation seems overly harsh, keep in mind that this exact idiom is used by ‘demon-possessed’ people to rebuke Jesus in Mark 1:24 and 5:7.  It is the hostile rebuke of someone who is about to be tormented or forcibly made to do something against his will. Jesus’ strong rebuke of his mother suggests that their relationship was less than cordial.”[xii]   

For all of their very apparent differences, the synoptics and John seem to be presenting the same family dynamic.  Yes.  There are differences in the way Matthew, Mark and Luke tell the story.  Yes. They focus on different interpretations of the stories they share in common.  Yes.  There are indeed many conspicuous differences – but the differences are not so extreme as to be, as Vermes insists, “totally irreconcilable.”   

Undervaluing the Development

Vermes has in these first two chapter repeatedly described John’s gospel as elaborate, highly evolved, even as “the climax in the evolution of Christian dogma in the New Testament, its most polished and ultimate expression.”[xiii]   

“…compared with Mark, Matthew, and Luke who stand between the historical Jesus and the earliest formulations of Christianity, John reflects the fully developed form of the primitive belief, the end product of the early church’s thinking about Jesus.” [xiv]

And all of this theological evolution and development, in Vermes’ interpretation, moves John’s Gospel further and further away from any historical truth like that contained in the synoptics.  For Vermes, the synoptic Gospels seem to serve (in these first two chapters focused on John, anyway…) as a sort of historical foil for John’s flights of esoteric and mystical elaboration.   Thus John’s soaring balloon is punctured and brought crashing down to the solid ground and is dismissed as not the true historical Jesus.

But in doing so, I think Vermes misses something really important.  For all their similarities, the three synoptic gospels are each quite distinct – and each is highly developed in its own way.  Matthew may not have John’s elaborate speeches, but he does have a highly developed presentation of Jesus as the fulfillment of Biblical prophecies.  Even Mark – the shortest and (seemingly) least developed account – is far from simple.  They are developed in different ways for different audiences and with different theological intent.

But even besides that- synoptic gospels shouldn’t be read as straight, unvarnished histories any more than John’s gospel.  And even though John’s gospel is theologically developed that does not mean that it is altogether without historical value.

Disclaimer– I freely admit that I may have to modify my opinion here on this last point.  Vermes deals with the synoptic gospels in chapter 6.   It could be that he will modify the way he has characterized the synoptics so far.

And one last thing…

I am not persuaded by Vermes description of John’s gospel as being so far removed from first century A.D. Jewish thought as to be unrecognizable to any conceivable Jewish audience.  For example:  in the John’s gospel Jesus is presented as sharing in the knowledge and glory of God the Father.  Vermes says that this is “uncharted waters because no parallel concepts can be found in Judaism or for that matter elsewhere in the New Testament.” [xv]

But I’m not convinced.  James McGrath has argued that the divergence of Christianity from Judaism was the Jewish theological spectrum was expansive enough to include (at least for a time) the burgeoning Christian theology.  See his book The Only True God: Early Christian Monotheism in its Jewish Context.[xvi]

There was no homogeneous, monolithic, standardized Judaism in the first century, and John’s gospel – as peculiar as it is – fit well within its boundaries – at least for a time.  But Vermes is keen to dismiss John’s gospel as a-historical so he argues that John’s gospel doesn’t fit with historical Judaism – and out it goes.   

I’m not convinced, but I’ll keep reading.

---

[i] Vermes, Geza The Changing Face of Jesus, Viking Compass, New York NY, 2000.

[ii] Jesus Christ Superstar – Andrew Lloyd Webber, Tim Rice

[iii] From the book’s front cover blurb.

[iv] Page 9

[v] Page 8

[vi] Page 9

[vii] Howard Zinn

[viii] Le Donne, Anthony Historical Jesus: What Can We Know and How Can We Know It? William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, Grand Rapids MI, 2011.  Page 8

[ix] Vermes, page 12

[x] Page 16

[xi] Page 17

[xii] Le Donne, page 46

[xiii] Page 8 - 9

[xiv] Page 14

[xv] Page 50

[xvi] McGrath, James The Only True God: Early Christian Monotheism in its Jewish Context, University of Illinois Press, Urbana IL, 2009.

The Human Faces of God – Before and After

Before reading Thom Stark’s Human Faces of God I accepted that I was probably not a believer in the inerrancy of the bible.  I was willing to admit that there were mistakes in scientific issues, historical accounts but I was still convinced of the infallibility of the bible in theological and moral and ethical matters.

I probably would have described myself as a “neo-orthodox” in regards to my opinion on the authority and inspiration of the scriptures.

Before reading Human Faces I read the bible with a somewhat confrontational attitude. I read the stories and the letters and lists with the idea that the best way to understand them was to pull them apart, to examine the pieces, to break them open and to see what was hiding inside – because I believed that in the end it would be possible to put them back together again and that once reassembled, the texts would retain their divinely inspired Truth (even if some of the details were found to be in error).

But there too, I was standing at the edge of a precipice.

I would sometimes tell people that I could understand Martin Luther’s impulse to excise certain books from the cannon, and that if I had supreme executive power (derived from a mandate from the masses and not from some farcical aquatic ceremony) I would remove the book of Nahum from the bible.  It seemed to me that Nahum was like a fire burning green and wet wood - producing more smoke than light and obscuring more than he revealed of God.

I kept my scissors put away, however. I was being facetious (mostly). 

It’s funny.  I argued with the scripture. Asked questions that it couldn’t or wouldn’t answer.  I wrestled with it and refused to give up, even after it broke my hip and left me hobbling toward home. But when I started reading Thom Stark’s book, I found myself defending that same book against his arguments which, to be honest, were sometimes my own arguments.  (Perhaps I was arguing with him because I was afraid to be convinced by his answers. Perhaps…)

Stark’s conclusion is that the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, while being inspired, suffer “from scientific and historical problems, but also – and much more significantly – from moral, ethical, theological, and ideological problems. (pg. 208)”

The first part of that conclusion seems obvious to me now.  Sometimes I wonder how I could have missed it or how I could have ignored it.  It’s the second part of his conclusion – that there are theological and moral problems in the bible – that has me standing nervously at the edge of that precipice again.

The Bible is a mirror. Stark argues that when we read the scriptures what we see isn’t God, but rather ourselves. And if we’re reading carefully and confrontationally we’ll see the good parts of ourselves and also the ugly and depraved parts of ourselves that we’d just as soon hide from view.

I can accept this.  But it seems to me that this can be true of any text.

Reading John Steinbeck’s explosive novel, The Grapes of Wrath, rocked me to my core and challenged me to be more than I was before.  It still does.  A People’s History of the United States by the historian Howard Zinn forced me to confront history as more than a recitation of dates and events – forced me to see the morals and motivations that underlie the histories we tell (and the stories that we don’t tell).  It was, in part, the lyrics (another kind of text) of U2’s Joshua Tree that began me thinking about what it means to pursue social justice in our world.  

These texts then showed me the good and the bad in myself and in the world around me.  These texts – though not divinely inspired and clearly not inerrant– showed me new and better ways to be.  Is there a difference between the writings of Steinbeck and the writings of Amos? Is there a difference between Zinn’s history and the history recorded by the Chronicler of the bible? Is there a difference between Bono and the Psalmist? 

I hate reducing the argument to such a trivial expression – but I am still wondering: Are the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments words from God (if somewhat corrupted and distorted by human error) or are they merely words about God?

I recognize that I can’t hold a belief in the inerrancy of these words. I’m still wrestling (broken hip and all) with it, trying to learn from it all.

But a recent post concerning the “Insufficiency of Scripture” at the blog – Exploring Our Matrix -  gave me some comfort with these words from 2 John 12:

I have much to write to you, but I do not want to use paper and ink. Instead, I hope to visit you and talk with you face to face, so that our joy may be complete.

“For those of us who are at times tempted to focus too much attention on the Bible, or to believe that it contains all the answers and solutions to all problems, this verse is a helpful reminder that an author of a letter that is now part of Scripture thought some things were better said face to face – that there were things that could not be accomplished as well or as effectively or simply as joyfully through written words as through personal interaction.”  - James McGrath

When I struggle to understand, or when I struggle to accept, the ugly parts of the scriptures, I trust that it is the relationship that I have with God that will carry me through – even when I doubt and disbelieve. 

I'm glad that I've read Stark's book.  It's challenged me.  It's pushed me.  It is pushing me.This is an issue that I'll continue to consider.


To see my other comments and questions - and the author, Thom Stark's, response (!!) read here.

Howard Zinn - Dissident, Teacher, Seeker of Justice

Howard Zinn - (August 24, 1922 – January 27, 2010)

"Why should we cherish 'objectivity,' as if ideas were innocent, as if they don't serve one interest or another?  Surely, we want to be objective if that means telling the truth as we see it, not concealing information that may be embarrassing to our point of view.  But we don't want to be objective if it means pretending that ideas don't play a part in the social struggles of our time, that we don't take sides in those struggles.

"Indeed, it is impossible to be neutral. In a world already moving in certain directions, where wealth and power are already distributed in certain ways, neutrality means accepting the way things are now. It is a  world of clashing interests - war against peace, nationalism against internationalism, equality against greed, and democracy against elitism - and it seems to me, both impossible and undesirable to be neutral in those conflicts.

"... I do not claim to be neutral, nor do I want to be.  There are things I value, and things I don't.  I am not going to present ideas objectively if that means I don't have strong opinions on which ideas are right and which are wrong.  I will try to be fair to opposing ideas by accurately representing them.  But the reader should know that what appears here are my own views of the world as it is and as it should be.

"I do want to influence the reader.  But I would like to do this by the strength of argument and fact, by presenting ideas and ways of looking at issues that are outside the orthodox.  I am hopeful that given more possibilities people will come to wiser conclusions.

"In my years of teaching, I never listened to the advice of people who said that a teacher should be objective, neutral, and professional. All the experiences of my life, growing up on the streets of New York, becoming a shipyard worker at the age of eighteen, enlisting in the Air Force in World War II, participating in the civil rights movement in the Deep South, cried out against that.

"It seems to me we should make the most of the fact that we live in a country that, although controlled by wealth and power, has openings and possibilities missing in many other places.  The controllers are gambling that those openings will pacify us, that we will not really use them to make the bold changes that are needed if we are to create a decent society.  We should take that gamble.

"We are not starting from scratch.  There is a long history in this country of rebellion against the establishment, of resistance to orthodoxy.  There has always been a commonsense perception that there are things seriously wrong and that we can't really depend on those in charge to set them right.

"This perception has led Americans to protest and rebel.  I think of the Boston Bread Rioters and Carolina anti-tax farmers of the eighteenth century; the black and white abolitionists of slavery days; the working people of the railroads, mines, textile mills, steel mills, and auto plants who went on strike, facing the clubs of policemen and the machine guns of soldiers to get an eight-hour workday and a living wage; the women who refused to stay in the kitchen and marched and went to jail for equal rights; the black protesters and antiwar activists of the 1960s; and the protesters against industrial pollution and war preparations in the 1980s.

"In the heat of such movements brains are set stirring with new ideas, which live on through quieter times, waiting for another opportunity to ignite into action and change the world around us.

"Dissenters, I am aware, can create their own orthodoxy.  So we need a constant reexamination of our thinking, using the evidence of our eyes and ears and the realities of our experience to think freshly.  We need declarations of independence from all nations, parties, and programs - all rigid dogmas.

"The experience of our century tells us that the old orthodoxies, the traditional ideologies, the neatly tied bundles of ideas - capitalism, socialism, democracy - need to be untied, so that we can play and experiment with all the ingredients, add others, and create new combinations in looser bundles. We now as we come to the twenty-first century that we desperately need to develop new, imaginative approaches to the human problems of our time.

"For citizens to do this on their own, to listen with some skepticism to the great thinkers and the experts, and to think for themselves about the great issues of today's world, is to make democracy come alive."

- From Passionate Declarations: Essays on War and Justice by Howard Zinn, Perennial, 2003.