Ho, Ho, Ho, Witchy Poo is Back!

Tags

Advent, bible, birthers, Christine O'Donnell, Christmas, Frankincense, fundamentalists, Genesis, GOP, Jesus, Michael Steele

She learned at the knee of the Wasilla Wombat. She learned that when the electorate rejects ya, get up, dust yourself off, and keep on yappin’. You will surely find enough poor souls to pay your way.

So Christine O’Donnell, finding the cupboard most bare, formed a PAC and, now her bills taken care of, she can utter profound (in her ditzy mind) quips, and otherwise try to interject herself into adult conversations.

Not content to get two of the top ten quotes of the year, she’s after more. She’s in a friendly race with sista Sarah to be both the most obnoxious, won’t go away buffoon and the biggest butcher of the English language to date.

If enough isn’t being said about the tax bill being decided Ms. Chatty Christie has weighed in. Of course she’s all for the Bush tax cuts being extended and she hates all the stuff for those in economic free fall. According to the non-witchy one, tragedies come in threes–Pearl Harbor, Elizabeth Edwards death, and now these confounded extensions of unemployment benefits. She then tried to explain what THAT meant, and of course failed. Halloween can’t return fast enough.

***

You and I are much alike. Therefore, I feel confident that you too have spent countless hours? maybe even days, wondering what the hell frankincense  is or was. Given the season, well, I went a lookin’ for an answer for us both.

I tried Senator Franken, but he demurred, pointing out that there is an “e” after the K in his name, not an “i” as in frankincense. So I figured Slate would have the answer, and they did. Read all about it here, and surprise friends and family with your new-found sparkling intellect.

***

I think a lot like Keith Olbermann I guess. At least two of his items from last night’s show were links on my blog. We, meaning me and he and his researchers must be reading some of the same bloggers online. That’s comforting to me. And of course, you can know that you’re getting the “best” when you come here. *snicker* and “toot”.

***

It appears that Michael, I’m da black man in the Repiglians world, Steele, has decided to give it another go round. Shocking all the Repoopers with the news he was not gonna go “quietly into the night” he threw his hat in the ring to be the paper tiger in the GOP once again.

Now this pissed off tons of the GOP regulars, since they thought that two years was enough to prove they aren’t the bigots everybody says they are. They were tired of Mr. Steele’s general stupidity, hoof and mouth disease, and all around big spender attitude.

Ain’t it just fun watching the GOP fracture along so many different lines?

***

Let those with brains, think. We, with regularity, point out that fundigelicals are guilty mostly of reading biblical texts in a manner that supports their own needs and general beliefs about the world. They accept as literal those things that seem right to them anyway, and reject/ignore/explain away other quite direct statements when they cut against their needs and beliefs.

A provocative post at Biologos explains how early Jewish theologians were pained to clothe Adam and Eve, to protect their ideas of cultural “rightness” in their day. Indeed, we are all subject to that influence. Read, Genesis, Creation and Ancient Interpreters: Adam and Eve’s Nakedness.

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If you just want to read something sweet and uplifting and well, Christmasy, then read Five String Guitar’s post about he and his wife’s latest Christmas shopping trip. It will warm your heart! Try it!

***

Hold onto your shorts folks. I have a major announcement to make! I do not DO NOT DO NOT have an opinion on the Julian Assange/Wikileaks affair. Nope, I surely don’t. Stand by: I may have one tomorrow. But so far, I don’t.

***

Take a look at this face, and if you ever see it, you will be looking into the face of a modern medical miracle. This man can actually walk and speak.

This buffoon, a Lt. Col. in the Army just pled guilty at his court-martial and faces eighteen months in prison, all because he refused to go to Afghanistan because the President is not a citizen and thus cannot legally give such an order.

What is worse, he was not ordered to Afghanistan but VOLUNTEERED, just to force this case. It is simply stunningly amazing that anyone can be this stupid, and be a surgeon.

Do not, repeat, do not, allow this man near you with a scalpel. No doubt his medical licence is also at risk due to his felony conviction.

***

The Contrarian is installing plastic sheeting over the bay windows in the living room. Plenty of naughty words are emanating from there. I am not going out there to see. The cats have all gone into hiding. Brandy wouldn’t come up the steps again, the rain/slush/snow had her carpet all frozen up and slick. So now there are towels down, until it warms enough to de-ice. This is all no big deal, except when it’s 4 below zero and 2:30 am and you are out there begging and pleading with her to “try.”

***

What’s on the stove today?  Tostados! Hurrah.

Related Articles

• Christine O’Donnell: unemployment benefits deal a ‘tragedy’…like Pearl Harbor, Elizabeth Edwards (pinkbananaworld.com)
• Christine O’Donnell: Pearl Harbor, Unemployment Benefits Extension Both ‘Tragedies’ (huffingtonpost.com)

Piercing the Light

Tags

creation, Genesis, God, Light, Satan, sin

I seem to be revisiting the Genesis stories of creation a lot lately. And that’s a good thing I think, because they always temptingly (pun!) offer us new and deeper insight.

Megan McKenna, world renown storyteller, author, peace activist, and some say prophet, tells a wonderful story about the opening of Genesis, the story coming from the Priestly tradition, compiled into written form during the Babylonian exile in the 580’s BCE.

She relates the first verses of Genesis 1 in dramatic style, bringing forth a evocative quiet as one listens with breathless awe at the scene.

In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters. Then God said, “let there be LIGHT”; and there was light. And God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day. (NRSV)

McKenna claims that Jewish tradition has it that in that moment God created every soul that was ever  to be for all eternity. Think of that. Now transport yourself for a moment to that ever repeated visual seen so often on every program about the universe and its beginnings–the explosion of matter into existence during the Big Bang. Combine the two, and you have a most powerful and elegant metaphor for God’s creation. Now add the beautiful mystical words of John 1:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the LIGHT OF ALL PEOPLE.

The second Genesis story is the older of two probably. Both of course originated as oral tradition handed down from times hazy in distant memory, changed and added to as needed to reflect meaning to each generation. The second story, found at Genesis 2-4, was put into written form during the Davidic dynasty in Jerusalem.

It reflects a quite different story, a God much the less Godly if you will, portrayed as more human, who walks and talks much like the humans he creates. He creates the male first, yet the woman will take center stage in this story.

It is the story of the Fall of mankind, brought upon humanity through the act of faithlessness of the woman and acquiesced in by the man. It is all about sin and human failing. We are introduced to Satan, the fallen angel.

Yet, read properly, (I would say, not literally, but then I would be giving an opinion–NOT me!), it tells the tale of failure to take responsibility for one’s own actions. God, being all patriarchal and such, asks the man what he has done, and the man blames the woman, and when asked, the woman blames the serpent.

Some have suggested that what God punishes here is not human failing. If one accepts that God formed humans exactly as he wished, then he apparently gave them the ability to fail in doing right. It would make God rather unfair and unjust to then punish mankind for all time with some mark of sin just because it actually exercised what was in its very nature.

No, the issue here is not the disobedience in eating of the tree of good and evil. The issue here, the failing that God cannot excuse is the failure to take personal responsibility for one’s own actions. Adam blames Eve, Eve blames the snake, and the snake shrugs and wonders, “what did they expect  of me, being a mere reptile?”

God drives out the two from the Garden to live lives of toil and trouble. And so it goes. And we, are born into sin and live as sinful creatures all our lives. While I have no quarrel with the idea that we are all sinful, for indeed we are, I have always been troubled at the idea that a mere child would carry this burden. It seems both unnatural and unjust. (If you hadn’t figured it out, I take a dim view of my God being unjust.)

So it makes sense to me that God’s punishment was for the irresponsibility of the two. It was a harsh lesson to be sure. But the alternative, rather literal interpretation, seems fraught with problems.

Next: Satan

Remembering

Tags

bible, biblical studies, exegesis, feminist criticism, Genesis, God, Lot's Wife, pillar of salt, women's studies

I’ve never understood what Lot’s wife did that was so bad that she deserved death and the ignominy of being turned into a pillar of salt.

It goes hat in hand with any number of anomalies in various biblical stories that I cannot make sense of. I have yet to hear a coherent explanation of why Cain’s offering to God did not find favor, and indeed, I am warned that it is unprofitable to look for one.

The same can be said of why Mary’s question of “how can this be?’ was answered while Zechariah’s similar question was deserving of muteness. Ditto what Moses did that was unfaithful and caused his death before entering the promised land.

So in some sense, these questions are inappropriate perhaps. God is entitled to be arbitrary and certainly He is not required to give his explanations to me. However, we don’t like the idea of our God being arbitrary, and moreover, as evolved humans, we have discovered that the books of the bible are stories collected, edited, and arranged with commentary, to meet the needs of their time and place. Therefore, we need not shrug and conclude that our God is either arbitrary in his choices, or that in any case he deems it unnecessary to explain to us his reasoning.

Still, we have to wonder at the logic here. I would argue that humans, perhaps in our “image of God” motif, are “looking back people.” When we look at civilization today, we realize, that we are the product of all those centuries of curiosity, experimentation, and thinking that has gone before us. We don’t constantly have to re-invent the wheel. We build on looking back at past accomplishments and failures and near misses in an effort to glean from the past what will enable us to make positive choices in the future.

We have discovered that the reason so many of us, (most of us actually) have difficulty in life is because we are unable to remain “in the moment.” Our minds are a never stopping machine that is largely focused on the past and the future. Perhaps, this is why in the end we are successful in growing technologically. It has not have much effect for good it seems in personal relationships. We still war, knowing as we do, that no war has yet ended war, it just sets up a list of new antagonists for the next battle.

So Lot’s wife and her action of looking back at the destruction of Sodom was not unusual. She was looking back to set the picture in her mind, as we all might do, so that we could tell this valuable tale to others. We could categorically say that we “saw” the destruction.

Moreover, the Hebrew Scriptures are replete with instances of when God “remembered.” In fact, at the end of most every episode, when things are looking bleak for humans, especially the Israelites, God remembers “Abraham, or Joseph, or Jacob.” It is the writer’s way of announcing that the covenant first instituted between God and Abraham, had not been forgotten. God “remembers” always. We trust that remembering to this day.

Fully, if anyone should have been punished, it should have been Lot himself. For he is the one who offered his daughters are mere chattel to the townspeople who were intent on violence and rape. He is the one who argued so limply that his family members didn’t believe his call to flee the town. He is the one who whined to the angels that he didn’t want to flee to the hills but preferred a town setting. Yet the penalty falls to Lot’s wife who, heretofore, we have not heard a thing about.

I have a note next to the text in my NRSV bible. It says: “metaphor for when we dwell on the past, our spiritual growth is impeded.” I’m not sure what I meant when I wrote that. I’m not sure if I agree with the sentiment. It doesn’t seem something I dreamed up, but rather read in some book or other. I guess it is true that when we remain mired in the past, we cannot move forward, whether in our relationships, our professions, or much of anything else. This might include our spiritual life. But it seems to me that a serious,  thoughtful, and honest appraisal of one’s past is the only way to meaningfully ground a productive journey.

I think this story points up an important issue however, one we won’t address today, but will. That is, the difference between reading the bible as pastorally “given” stories, and destructuring them by way of various exegetical methodologies. Truly, I have found nothing valuable in terms of Lot’s wife (pity the poor woman was given no name!) in doing an exegetical reflection. We can dissect it no doubt in terms of the influences of J, P and E (Yahwist, Priestly, or Elohist) tradition, but frankly I saw nothing fruitful in that. 

Generally speaking the story is considered to be etiological–meaning it was created to explain the appearance of a salt pillar  that appeared in some sense to be a woman, around the Dead Sea area. The actual destruction of Sodom may reflect a story around a volcanic eruption in the area. See generally Gen. 19:1-26.

In any event, I grieve for poor Lot’s wife. She surely got the short end of the stick it would appear. I suspect a lurking patriarchal motif is at work here. What think you?

How Say You, Horatio?

Tags

bible, exegesis, Genesis, interpretation, literalism

The bible is a curious document. Some, for fairly self-serving reasons, suggest that it must be read with childlike wonder, allowing the Spirit to guide understanding. While this is certainly part of the process, there is no need to deny our rational mind when doing so.

Many suggest that treating the bible as an ancient document and analyzing it much as we do Herodotus’s Histories, or Plato’s various discourses is wrong. That this is in opposition to their belief that God provides all that is necessary for the average person to read and understand God’s “plans.”

For the past several weeks, I’ve been immersed in Genesis. I’ve been studying Jacob and the various stories about him. I am not unfamiliar with them in general and in specific instances, I know a fair amount. While doing graduate work some years ago, I wrote a 100 page paper on Rachel and Jacob and the issue of the household gods.

To recognize that so much of this material was of very ancient origin, and has been collected during the Solomonic period and later in the Davidic dynasty is instructive, since the fair hand of the redactor often speaks to concerns of those times in the theological reflections that can be drawn from the various patriarchal stories they construct.

Somehow, some believe, that such study some how sullies or reduces the impact and import of God’s “word,” in doing so. I disagree most vehemently on this point. It is through serious exegetical review that the true wonder, the true talent, and may I say, the “inspired” brilliance of their work is truly understood.

To be sure, the bible is one of those unique documents that allows of many layers of understanding. Thus, it is accurate to conclude that the casual lay reader can gain a certain aptitude by simply reading and reflecting on the common everyday understanding of the words in the text. However, there will be much that is badly distorted by this method, and some of it leads to rather dangerous conclusions that can last for generations.

The Patriarchs were flawed individuals, and no attempt is made in the writings generally to cover that up. Surely the Yahwist tends to gloss over the shortcomings of these Israelite stalwarts a bit more than the the Priestly tradition does with its no nonsense approach to “just the facts.” But in the end, we see Abraham, Isaac, and assuredly Jacob as very average, very sinful men. In some sense, we are shown that God’s plans prevail even over against his very servants working against his plans.

There is security in this. We can relate to such individuals. But I think something more is said here than meets the eye. Something that begs us once again to remember that there is something special at work here in this document, perhaps unlike most others. There is an absence of “agenda” in a true sense. What do I mean?

As we examine so many of the early stories in Genesis, we find that often we are given benefit of two different traditions which speak to the same general theme. There are two creation stories, there are two Noah stories, there are competing genealogies. There are contradictions in names and places, reasons for doing X or Y which differ, and so forth.

The compiler or collector who created the “finished” document known as Genesis, was not unaware of these things. He is not stupid. On the contrary, he/they was/were quite brilliant. They quite knowingly presented both traditions or perhaps more than both. Here and there, each created transitional material to tie one series of stories to another. They, of course, had a point of view, and they often stated it.

Yet, they did not remove the “difficult” passage or tradition to make their exposition more convincing. They honored the long history of different traditions by presenting them fairly to the reader. And in doing so, we conclude quite rightly, that the readers (the original ones at least) were not burdened by any sense of “literalism” and did not see these stories as factual accounts of history. They were understood as theological statements of various kinds. And they may well have been offered to explain the importance of places and things. Attaching them to Jacob’s history or Abraham’s becomes a convenience.

An example suffices. We all know that Abraham was first commanded to circumcise. Yet, we learn that such practices were known and practices throughout the realm, not just by the Hebrews. And we learn that such practices were not common to Abrahamic peoples, and were generally not tied to ritual purity or cultic practices initially as the text suggests.

Rather, after the exile, when these texts were finalized in writing, circumcision became important. We are returning to Jerusalem after 400 years in Babylon. Who is still an Israelite and who has succumbed to the Babylonian way of life? The writer urges that those who are for Jerusalem are those who will define themselves as Hebrew by circumcision. That is when the practice became part and parcel of what it meant to be an Israelite. It was “read back” to  the time of Abraham. Much of the “prophetic” nature of Genesis stories are just this, behavior and belief which is now part of who we are, and is read back into our history as being the place from whence it came.

Contrary to the idea that reading experts on the bible somehow secularizes the message and takes us away from God, the result is just the opposite. The faith exhibited by the collectors and redactors is such that they trusted by inspiration, that the reader could get the “proper” understanding by including everything, the ugly with the beautiful. And when we discern this truth, we are awed more deeply that this work is of deep theological import, than we could ever be by the rather pedestrian and trite understanding we might get by “literal” interpretation.

New Beginnings

Tags

Babylonian exile, creation story, Genesis, Priestly tradition

As I’ve mentioned, the last couple of weeks have been filled with Genesis for me. A deep immersion in the first creation story, looked at through several different lens, produces a story that only adds to my awe and wonder at those who constructed this amazing text.

For at least two hundred years, it has been well known that Genesis, as part of the Pentateuch, is the product of many hands, but especially there are four traditions represented, the Yahwist which is oldest, the Elohist, the Deuteronomist, and the Priestly. The Priestly tradition was constructed after the exile, in other words between the 6th and 5th centuries BCE. It is believed that the P constructed the framework of the Pentateuch, i.e., worked out the placement of the various stories from oral traditions that had reached near final polishing in written form.

Thus, it is hard to assign a “writer” to any portion of the creation story of Genesis, other than the generic “P” appellation. Still, it is  nearly impossible not to be suitably impressed by the high level of theological development evidenced by the tradition as well as the high intelligence exhibited. It denotes, in utter fairness, something that can be rightly called “inspiration,” a imprimatur of sorts given by God, that indeed, there is something very basically true and right about what is said.

Of course, this cannot be taken too far. The stories were never meant, it is believed, to provide any kind of actual factual historical evidence of the how of creation. John Paul II very famously alluded to that some years ago when he said, “The bible is not meant to tell us how heaven was created, but how to get there.”  Of first importance was the why of creation, and more important yet, the who of creation. It is a story of Creator creating creature as Walter Brueggemann suggests.

I have heard others say that there is “proof” of the first creation account being factual, in that it agrees with present historical evidence produced by both astronomy and evolutionary theory about the stages of creation. A simple reading of the passages Gen 1-2:4a belies this conclusion. It also tends to disprove the oft pushed theory that God creates ex nihilo.

The beginning includes an initial something, not nothing. There is a darkness over the face of the waters. The waters are dangerous and chaotic. God brings light first. Recalling that the exiles at this time are in Babylon, faced with many local deities some of which are sun and moon, the Priestly source is quick to dispel that at least the sun is the source of light. No God is, and creates this first. Darkness existed and God pushes back the darkness and harnesses it, locating it apart from day. He creates a dome which serves as the firmament, (actually a metal domed or hammered bowl) to separate the waters into those below and those above the dome. This of course is something rather odd, and frankly is in opposition to the second creation story.

In the minds of the ancients, the earth was thought to be a flatten disk. So the waters are harnessed and located around the edges of the disk on the third day, and dry land appears. God then creates vegetation. And it is clear that there are no meat eaters, either animal or human considered at this point. All are to live in harmony. Only after this does God create the stars, and specifically the sun and moon, though they are deliberately left unnamed to further make it plain they have no power themselves.

Following this sea creatures (plants were not considered “life” as such by the ancients), birds and finally mammals. Then of course humankind is created. God speaks directly to humans in their creation, whereas he has not spoken to any other created thing.

Of great curiosity is the use of the plural. “Let us make,” “in our image.” Much is made of the word,  image. It seems that God meant more than to make us in his spiritual image, yet we accept today that God is not corporeal, but Spirit. Some scholars suggest that we are more akin to to a likeness of God in the sense of a statue in the realm when the king cannot be there. Man (generic human) is God’s representative on earth. Yet the us, our usage, denotes that while we are like God, we are also not like God, or the image at best is blurred.

The concept of God in a council of gods is not new, nor not uncommon in the Bible. There is reference in one of the psalms to the “council of gods.” While by the time of the Priestly tradition, monotheism seemed well formed, there was still a recognition of their being other gods, they were just subject at best to Yahweh-Elohim. The Hebrew Testament is replete with references to these gods, and to proving of course that Yahweh was vastly more powerful.

The redactor masterfully creates from the known writings and oral stories a perfect fit for those who were now coming out of exile, but who had been divorced from an Israelite state for generations. This powerful story explains that no matter their life experiences in Babylon, they can trust that God is the true source of everything that is, and commands all the forces of nature and life. God gives fertility, light, food, and all else. People are reminded that their God, the God of the Exodus, has from the beginning made an irrevocable covenant and that they are still his chosen. And most importantly they are reminded that all happens by God’s will, which cannot be overcome. Thus, their exile, was part of a greater plan, and signals no abandonment by God.

These lessons have and do resonate down to us today. It is essential that we not get bogged down in archaic and simplistic explanations of creation and miss the true import of the work. It establishes forevermore the creator-creating-creation format. It makes crystal clear the closeness of this relationship, and the appropriate location and response of God to creature and creature to God. Covenant is established and cannot be broken by human error, for God is gracious, and has given his “good” to his creation.

Humans are understood to stand in the stead for God as his representative. And since God’s response to creation is loving, gracious, forgiving, and so forth, so must ours be to that which we are responsible for–the earth and all it contains. In this short but hugely packed section, we see the entire import of how we relate to one another, to all life, and to our God. We obey in gracious acceptance, willingly as images of the Creator.

One cannot help,  no matter the difficulties in assigning authorship to a specific person, which we cannot, in concluding that the theological conclusions of the final redactor were indeed inspired by God. With huge intellectual powers, overlaid with a genuine radical openness to God, the writer manages to set down truths that are still revered and honored, and deeply believed some 2500 years later.

While, the creation story 2 will in some ways contradict or bring tension to this theological frame, it will provide it’s own inspired conclusions that are every bit as valid and rich today.

I have not even begun to do the text justice of course. One could write a hundred pages and in some sense one would still merely have touched the surface of the impact of this opening gambit. I mean only to convey some of the sense of wonder I am swirling in these days, as I revisit some old analysis, and gain new visions of God’s awesome relationship with us the created being.

No Seriously, I’m Sane

Tags

bible, Chaz Bono, creationism, evolution, fundamentalism, gay rights, Genesis, God

I don’t know if you appreciate just how hard I work to remain sane, and thus bring you news you can trust. Seriously, it’s quite a chore here in the land of Internet inter tubes. Ya see, the Internet is like tubes, with trucks. . . .oh never mind that’s another story.

And as you probably can figure out without my help, the Contrarian is no help in this pursuit of sanity, since he tends to push another whole set of my “the world is freakin’ nuts” buttons. Love conquers much in this respect however.

And yes, I know, I can hear you already. “If you didn’t go around courting disaster, you wouldn’t run into these impossible discussions that drive you madder than a hatter late for a tea party.” You did just say that didn’t you? I think I heard that right. And. . . . or am I just channeling some of Randal’s excess out of this worldly universe run on sentences that are not meant to make sense so much as they are  meant to evoke images that sear the synapses and lodge in the deep crannies of my skull? (How’d I do Randal?)

I have been off Catholic Answers that bastion of wacko religious right babbling for some weeks, but have slipped in the mucky mire of old school chums who have been closeted in  some far away universe being indoctrinated in how not to be logical or use your senses, which hopefully we believe are God given? So, yeah, it’s my own fault. Never follow my own advice.

Listen and hear me good: religious fundamentalism + logic = NOTHING INTELLIGIBLE

Be that as it may, I continue to pound my only head against any rock that shows up in the way. Not only does it make me dizzy, it hurts.

Example 1: When you can find  in the bible where God said he would use evolution as his means of creating, I’ll believe that! Oh okay, I gotta use your theology to prove my point? That’s logical, NOT.

Example 2: My pet peeve is people who believe in evolution and thus don’t believe in God’s WORD , and then insist on calling themselves Christians.  Oh Okay, I’ll alert eight tenths of the Christian world and see about coming up with a new name for us. Hello, it is after all YOUR interpretation, not the ONLY interpretation.

Example 3: I don’t care about what choice of lifestyle one makes, . . . . but God said it was a choice. Oh, Okay, where exactly?

I grab the nearest solid object and cling for dear life. I’m being sucked into a whole new plane or reality right? Naw, I’m just flying through those tubes and missed my exit.

I  have been reading a lot Genesis this week. That’s where I’m at in my EFM class. Von Rad and Brueggemann. Both classic writers on the subject. Both deeply accepted by even the average traditionalist Christian, as long as you don’t go crazy literal. Both talk about how there is no way that the creation story #1 (or #2 for that matter) was meant to be taken literally as scientific fact. But it was not myth either.

It speaks to the history of the people. Written after the exile in the 6th century, but containing much older material, it speaks to the chaos of the people and their lives under Babylonian rule. And it assures them that God IS the creator, bringing forth all that is, and that God will never abandon humanity. The point is covenant, the tension is how God relates and how creature relates. It is Creator, creating Creature. It is unassailable, unbreakable. This exile thing will end.

It defines God as deeply loving and caring of his creation. It speaks to our joy in following his will. It is not commanding. It recognizes the creature’s will. It reassures and gives hope to all. It does such harm and disservice to try to turn it into a science declaration. That utterly misses the point.

I don’t know. I only believe. That is my crime I guess. The fundies KNOW, believing is dangerous, and means I think that God can declare that they have failed the test. Believe the book, the world, I set up to trick you. Believe the book.

Counterpoint. That fundie nonsense is the source of most atheism.

Hey, I just ran into a pic of Chastity Bono. Chaz now. It’s hard to imagine what it must feel like to be one sex inside and look down and see the wrong equipment. I’m happy for him, glad he can fix the error in genetics. Evolution tells us that not all mutations are useful, some are downright annoying or worse.

Anyway, Chaz got it right. He’s a kinda cute dude. He wasn’t such a cute girl.

By the by, I’ve apologized to my school chums about cluttering up their links and remarks with disagreement. I’ve promised to let it be. I’m hoping to make progress. You cannot reach everyone. You can’t reach most anyone I suspect. But you can and do reach one now and then, and that is enough. If I’m horridly wrong, then at least I don’t do too much damage either.

I’m humble. Make that humbler, more humble, making my way to humblist, most humble? Age teaches you that you have limitations, even intellectual ones. I have as usual more questions than answers, but I try to impart what I believe it true. I ask God for wisdom, and I believe that here and there I get some. Who knows. I hopefully get points for trying. Maybe not.

I’m still searching for the restaurant at the end of the universe. Hoping to meet the Buddha and Jesus. Maybe have a cup ‘o joe and a piece of pie. Save me some rhubarb if you would. Just sayin’.

The Greater Sacrifice

Tags

Abraham, bible, Genesis, God, Isaac, S. Kierkegaard

I confess that when I first became a Christian, I viewed the story of Abraham and Isaac pretty much in the traditional way. God tested Abraham, and Abraham came through with flying colors.

As I got older, and hopefully, a bit wiser, I became troubled by the text, and that meant I was troubled by God.

God’s desire to test humans has a history in the bible. In fact, the greatest story of all is no doubt that of Job. Here God actually makes a bet with the Devil about how Job will react to the unprecedented misery that God inflicts on poor Job.

But as usual, I digress. I looked upon Abraham as this man who had been promised a son in his old age. And that promise of course took years to fulfill. Yet we are told, Abraham remained faithful, following God at every turn. Finally, of course, the blessed event occurs, and Abraham is given the son by Sarah.

There is no doubt that Isaac was deeply loved and cherished, and that of course is why God would call Abraham to that specific sacrifice. (Muslims I understand disagree, and believe that God called Abraham to sacrifice Ishmael instead.) Yet I cannot help but put the story in the context of today.

Imagine this happening to you. What would you do? Most assuredly, if you attempted to do what Abraham did, you would be arrested and placed in confinement. Your child would be removed from you. We know this of course, because it has in fact happened. A woman in Texas murdered her children, believing that God told her to. We consider her behavior the result of a deep psychological break with reality.

So why do we accept this story so easily? And what does it say about God? For myself, it means I place the story in a particular context. I see it at as the way that primitive Hebrews viewed God at that time. While Abraham’s devotion to God is admirable, that is about all the good that can be said of it.

I picked up a book from our church library Sunday. A little book by S. Kierkegaard called “Fear and Trembling.” It’s an old thing, published in 1941. It relates the story of Abraham and Isaac. It is supposed, I am told by the introduction, to be a metaphor in some sense about Kierkegaard’s relationship with his fiance, Regina. I can’t confirm or deny that, since I have barely begun the read.

But the opening vignette floored me. Such a powerful imagination created this scenario, that it has stayed with me, two days later, and I’m anxious to see what comes next. It is the product of Kierkegaard’s amazing imagination no doubt, and I found it breathtaking. Here it is:

It was early in the morning, Abraham arose betimes, he had the asses saddled, left his tent, and Isaac with him, but Sarah looked out of the window after them until they had passed down the valley and she could see them no more. They rode in silence for three days. On the morning of the fourth day Abraham said never a word, but he lifted up his eyes and saw Mount Moriah afar off. He left the young men behind and went on alone with Isaac beside him up to the mountain. But Abraham said to himself, “I will not conceal from Isaac whither this course leads him.” He stood still, he laid his head upon the head of Isaac in benediction, and Isaac bowed to receive the blessing. And Abraham’s face was fatherliness, his look was mild, his speech encouraging. But Isaac was unable to understand him, his soul could not be exalted; he embraced Abraham’s knees, he fell at his feet imploringly, he begged for his young life, for the fair hope of his future, he called to mind the joy in Abraham’s house, he called to mind the sorrow and loneliness.  Then Abraham lifted up the boy, he walked with him by his side, and his talk was full of comfort and exhortation. But Isaac could not understand him.  He climbed Mount Moriah, but Isaac understood him not. Then for an instant he turned away from him, and when Isaac again saw Abraham’s face it was changed, his glance was wild, his form was horror. He seized Isaac by the throat, threw him on the ground, and said, “Stupid boy, dost thou then suppose that I am thy father? I am an idolater. Dost thou suppose that this is God’s bidding? No, it is my desire.” Then Isaac trembled and cried out in his terror, ” O God in heaven, have compassion upon me. God of Abraham, have compassion upon me. If I have no father upon earth, be Thou my father!” But Abraham in a low voice said to himself, ” O Lord in heaven, I thank thee. After all it is better for him to believe that I am a monster, rather than that he should lose faith in Thee.”

Shocking? Yes I suppose so. But does it not convey an even greater faith in God than the story itself? Abraham not only will sacrifice his son, but his son’s love in the end, so valuable does he find faith in the One true God. More so does he love his son, willing to have his son hate and revile him rather than God. That is truly a father’s love for son.

I understand that some Jewish commentators claim the story has been misunderstood. They claim that Abraham mistakenly thought that God required an actual sacrifice, rather than a symbolic one. In this he had as example pagan practices which did in fact use human sacrifice.

Others argue that Abraham knew or believed that God would relent in the end, and in fact never intended for him to go through with it.

Christians have a different explanation. Since God promised Abraham that through Isaac a nation would be born, then he must have intended to raise him from the dead, should Abraham actually go through with the deed. (Heb. 11: 17-19) Of course, it is also metaphor for God’s offering of Jesus on the cross as substitute for humanity, much as the ram is pro-offered in the end to Abraham as substitute for Isaac.

Yet, I prefer, I think now, the original story and Kierkegaard’s interpretation. It is the more powerful certainly. It speaks to an abiding, overwhelming love, albeit on Abraham’s part, rather than God’s. But that is satisfying as well, since we are made in the image of God, and Abraham thus does a fine job of  showing us God’s deep and limitless love for us his creation.