One of the reasons that the Jews did not recognize that Jesus was the Messiah can be easily understood looking at this passage. A crowd of people had gathered around Jesus, asking him questions and listening to what he taught and replied. Here is the passage to look at:
So the crowd answered him, "We have heard from the law that the Messiah remains forever. Then how can you say that the Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man?" (John 12:34).
When the Jews say, "the law," they mean what is written in the Torah, in their scriptures, what Christians call the Old Testament. So they have the impression from some scripture that the Messiah will live forever, remaining with the people until the end of time. Where have they seen this written? Look to Psalm 89:4-5.
"I have made a covenant with my chosen one; I have sworn to David my servant: I will make your dynasty stand forever and establish your throne through all the ages" (Psalm 89:4-5).
This is one of the places in scripture where the Jews have the impression that the Messiah will be a man, a descendant of David, who will be just like David (a king with the throne of the Israelites), who will "stand forever." So you can understand that with these words of prophecy from God most Jews thought that another David, but this time one who rules on earth forever, was to be the Messiah. Thus they are confused and dismayed when Jesus says that he, the Son of Man, would have his time of death, and then resurrection into heaven. When Jesus calls himself the Son of Man, he is reminding people that he is indeed in a human form, that he is not just occupying a body, or an illusion of being one of mankind. The crowd gets that, but then figure that the Son of Man must be a different person than the expected Messiah.
This is one reason why the Jews did not recognize Jesus. They developed a certain mental image based on scripture (and done so in good faith), but then did not have sufficient trust of God that he can and will work marvels and deliver the Messiah in ways they cannot imagine, visualize, or comprehend.
Jesus tries to explain to them how this is by comparing himself to the light (not "a" light, but the light of God).
Jesus said to them, "The light will be among you only a little while. Walk while you have the light, so that darkness may not overcome you. Whoever walks in the dark does not know where he is going. While you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may become children of the light" (John 13:35-36).
Now, Jesus is not trying to confuse them or be obscure. He is with a few sentences giving them a lot to think about, knowing that there is not much time left for him, as he says this shortly before the Last Supper. So Jesus is leaving those in the crowd with a few powerful images to refute the stereotype expectations they had of what the Messiah would be like, and then left them to think about it. Some would have understood his words, looking back on them just a matter of days later when Jesus' death and resurrection unfolded. Others would never have understood.
What Jesus was saying is that yes, as Son of Man, he is there as a real human being, a member of the human race, but that as Son of God, he is also of God's light, and that light is of course eternal. Jesus is thus saying he is not at all in contradiction of the scripture, just, actually "above and beyond," so to speak, their expectations. They expected a Messiah who would be completely a human man, but one who would live and rule forever, and bring their faith to the entire world. Jesus is exactly that, but not one who is going to do so as a man living forever among humans.
You may wonder why God did not "opt" to, in fact, have Jesus do just that: to live as a human among humans forever. The answer is simple. The Messiah is needed to draw humans closer to God, not to provide a living intermediary that would, in fact, be an additional "layer" between God and humans. Jesus brought the face of God to humans but the intention is that humans have the New Covenant with God which brings them closer to God, an upward reaching toward God, rather than God sending a governor, for lack of a better world, to "rule," while God is more distant, rather than closer. This is why Jesus often explained that the Kingdom of God is at hand. By "at hand" Jesus meant both "now" but also "within reach." The Messiah makes God more, not less, accessible to humans.
The Jews, in all fairness, could not have easily imagined that this is what God planned. They would have needed a lot of faith to understand that God would fulfill the scriptures in a way that they simply had not expected. Like the square peg in the round hole, the Jews who disbelieved were continuing to walk around with their square or their circular image of the Messiah, and when they did not see a match they would move on looking for the next "Messiah candidate" (and there were plenty, though not a single one performed the miracles that were Jesus' alone as only he had God's authority).
So Jesus is explaining to them that yes, he is the descendant of David, and yes, he has the throne, from God, but that the "forever" of it is when Jesus returns to God in the light of his eternity, not as his bodily Son of Man form. Jesus is explaining that the light of God is there with them, for a short time, while Jesus lives and walks among them. While the light will go back to God, those who believe in Jesus and follow him completely will therefore still benefit from the light, even though the light has gone back to God, because they are now become "children of the light." Jesus as the light of God that God has sent does indeed return to heaven, and the light itself does not stay on earth, nor can any human claim to have it, but instead, those who believe and heed what Jesus taught about God's expectations, God's Kingdom and the New Covenant are "children of the light" and therefore know the way and are not in darkness. It's like when you have memorized your way through the rooms of your home and can walk through them even in the dark, just to use a broad analogy. You "know the way" even though you don't have the light on. The children of Jesus "know the way" even though the actual light of Jesus has returned to heaven, and thus the children of Jesus do not walk in darkness, as do those who never believed in the light that he is and brought. Thus even when the light has returned to God those who believe in Jesus retain the knowledge of how to find God and the way just as if the light were still there, even though it is not.
I hope you have found this helpful.
Showing posts with label Jewish faith. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jewish faith. Show all posts
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Thursday, October 9, 2008
Bible Reading: Exodus 19:1-8
In the third month after their departure from the land of Egypt, on its first day, the Israelites came to the desert of Sinai. After the journey from Raphidim to the desert of Sinai, they pitched camp.
When Israel was encamped here in front of the mountain, Moses went up the mountain to God. Then the Lord called to him and said, "Thus shall you say to the house of Jacob; tell the Israelites: You have seen for yourself how I treated the Egyptians and how I bore you up on eagle wings and brought you here to myself. Therefore, if you hearken to my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my special possession, dearer to me than all other people, though all the earth is mine. You shall be to me a kingdom of priests, a holy nation. That is what you must tell the Israelites." So Moses went and summoned the elders of the people. When he set before them all that the Lord had ordered him to tell them, the people all answered together, "Everything the Lord has said, we will do." Then Moses brought back to the Lord the response of the people.
***
There are two things that I would like to point out to you in commentary of this wonderful passage from the Book of Exodus, one is a minor point and one is very important.
The minor point is to notice that God uses symbolic imagery when he said that he "bore you up on eagle wings." Obviously God did not send big eagles to carry them; the Bible documents how they all walked, and a lot of walking the Israelites would do, for many years. God is using the image of eagle wings to describe symbolically how his power would raise the refugee Israelites above all hardships, both those they had already faced (being pursued by the Egyptians) and any hardships to come. I point this out because some people are kind of crazy when they say the Bible must be taken literally word by word, without even recognizing when God himself is using symbolism. So the next time someone quarrels with you that all of the Bible is "literal," feel free to cite that passage and ask them if God meant he sent literal eagles with really big wings, or if God was speaking using a glorious analogy and imagery. There is a huge difference between the Bible being totally true and accurate (which it is) and arguing that words have no flexibility of normal human discourse as God translates the untranslatable into human terminology. Thus you are to believe that this conversation took place, and these words were spoken, but not be a knuckle headed nudnik who then says, "Oooooh, God must have sent really big eagles for the Israelites to fly around on!" I hope this example is helpful in regaining some common sense, which early Bible readers had and these past two generations seem to totally lack.
The second and really important point is that God told the Israelites that they would be "a holy nation," but specifically: "a kingdom of priests." That means that each and every Israelite must have personal sanctity, though not literally be priests who serve in the temple, obviously.
Chosen people, are you still "a kingdom of priests?" If so, why do I meet so many who introduce themselves as "cultural Jews?" How can the modern day nation of Israel call itself God given when it is of such a secular mindset?
This is the heart of the problem and why many Muslims call Israel "the Zionest entity." The government of Israel is not the same as being the government of a population who are "a holy nation" and "a kingdom of priests." I am not being harsh here, and if I were speaking to you in person you would see that my demeanor on this subject is to be gentle and concerned. But I think that today, on this very holy day, you all need to think deeply about this.
When you read the link I have placed on this blog from Chabad, you read quotations from a Rebbe, of revered memory, who clearly still thought like "a priest" among a "holy nation." I've commented before that one of the great gifts that continues to this day is that orthodox scholarly Jews "get" (get being slang for "comprehend") God. They get it (being a people of God) and they get God. They understand, as much as one can, what God is "like," drawing on their centuries of personal relationship with God. "Born again" Christians like to say they have a "personal relationship with Jesus Christ." Well, let me tell you, believing and orthodox Jews sure have a "personal relationship with God."
But even many orthodox Jews have gotten confused in their own heads regarding politics of the country of Israel. That is why I always hedge and say "orthodox and scholarly Jews." I mean those who continue to love the word of God, and recognize and value their relationship with him, and thus maintain their individual role as "a priest" among a virtual "holy nation." I say virtual because the holy nation of Israel is dispersed and uneven, ranging from those with priestly orientation toward God through the lukewarms, and all the way to cold hearted and cynical seculars who are simply culturally and politically Jewish. The nation of Israel is not the "holy nation" that God described and blessed, any more than any nation on earth is a Christian holy nation. In both cases the holy nation is virtual, comprised of the faithful around the world, and only as pure and valid as the most honest and whole hearted of the believers.
Somewhere along the line, in modern times, many Jews have become "a politician," or "a warrior," or "a cultural Jew with secular beliefs" rather than "a priest," the priests that God chose when he consecrated the entire Chosen People as a nation. Everyone who traveled with God during the Exodus, and who remained faithful through the generations, turning only toward him in their belief, were his "priests," whether they were in the profession of priesthood or were just the average family members among the Chosen.
I worry about the nation, the country, of Israel, and whenever I look at it, I have to look hard to hear or see the "priests" among them. Interestingly, it is in New York and its environs that I've seen among the Hasidim and others, those who still think like the priests of God, and who feel in their hearts like the priests of God. Creating a political structures and rattling weapons, regardless of the real or perceived provocations, does not a holy nation of priests make. Rage and defensiveness is too easily raised in the hearts of many of Israel, including the most devout. I am not saying that one must be Christian "wimps" who "turn the other cheek." But I am saying that you will have no peace until you make your peace with God and return to being a people who are defined first of all by their love of God and their "priesthood" in the hearts of individuals toward God. When the people of the country of Israel regain and reclaim their own sanctity in the eyes of God, then they will find that the components of secure peace with the Palestinians and their neighbors will remarkably fall into place for them. God never took his love and his designation of the Israelites as his "holy nation" from them, but instead, the modern Israelites have turned their eyes away from God, and make no genuine effort to hold on to their continuing consecration as his holy nation of priests. (With the exceptions I have noted).
I hope you find this helpful and I will hope along with those of you who truly believe to find yourselves in good places within the Book of God this year.
When Israel was encamped here in front of the mountain, Moses went up the mountain to God. Then the Lord called to him and said, "Thus shall you say to the house of Jacob; tell the Israelites: You have seen for yourself how I treated the Egyptians and how I bore you up on eagle wings and brought you here to myself. Therefore, if you hearken to my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my special possession, dearer to me than all other people, though all the earth is mine. You shall be to me a kingdom of priests, a holy nation. That is what you must tell the Israelites." So Moses went and summoned the elders of the people. When he set before them all that the Lord had ordered him to tell them, the people all answered together, "Everything the Lord has said, we will do." Then Moses brought back to the Lord the response of the people.
***
There are two things that I would like to point out to you in commentary of this wonderful passage from the Book of Exodus, one is a minor point and one is very important.
The minor point is to notice that God uses symbolic imagery when he said that he "bore you up on eagle wings." Obviously God did not send big eagles to carry them; the Bible documents how they all walked, and a lot of walking the Israelites would do, for many years. God is using the image of eagle wings to describe symbolically how his power would raise the refugee Israelites above all hardships, both those they had already faced (being pursued by the Egyptians) and any hardships to come. I point this out because some people are kind of crazy when they say the Bible must be taken literally word by word, without even recognizing when God himself is using symbolism. So the next time someone quarrels with you that all of the Bible is "literal," feel free to cite that passage and ask them if God meant he sent literal eagles with really big wings, or if God was speaking using a glorious analogy and imagery. There is a huge difference between the Bible being totally true and accurate (which it is) and arguing that words have no flexibility of normal human discourse as God translates the untranslatable into human terminology. Thus you are to believe that this conversation took place, and these words were spoken, but not be a knuckle headed nudnik who then says, "Oooooh, God must have sent really big eagles for the Israelites to fly around on!" I hope this example is helpful in regaining some common sense, which early Bible readers had and these past two generations seem to totally lack.
The second and really important point is that God told the Israelites that they would be "a holy nation," but specifically: "a kingdom of priests." That means that each and every Israelite must have personal sanctity, though not literally be priests who serve in the temple, obviously.
Chosen people, are you still "a kingdom of priests?" If so, why do I meet so many who introduce themselves as "cultural Jews?" How can the modern day nation of Israel call itself God given when it is of such a secular mindset?
This is the heart of the problem and why many Muslims call Israel "the Zionest entity." The government of Israel is not the same as being the government of a population who are "a holy nation" and "a kingdom of priests." I am not being harsh here, and if I were speaking to you in person you would see that my demeanor on this subject is to be gentle and concerned. But I think that today, on this very holy day, you all need to think deeply about this.
When you read the link I have placed on this blog from Chabad, you read quotations from a Rebbe, of revered memory, who clearly still thought like "a priest" among a "holy nation." I've commented before that one of the great gifts that continues to this day is that orthodox scholarly Jews "get" (get being slang for "comprehend") God. They get it (being a people of God) and they get God. They understand, as much as one can, what God is "like," drawing on their centuries of personal relationship with God. "Born again" Christians like to say they have a "personal relationship with Jesus Christ." Well, let me tell you, believing and orthodox Jews sure have a "personal relationship with God."
But even many orthodox Jews have gotten confused in their own heads regarding politics of the country of Israel. That is why I always hedge and say "orthodox and scholarly Jews." I mean those who continue to love the word of God, and recognize and value their relationship with him, and thus maintain their individual role as "a priest" among a virtual "holy nation." I say virtual because the holy nation of Israel is dispersed and uneven, ranging from those with priestly orientation toward God through the lukewarms, and all the way to cold hearted and cynical seculars who are simply culturally and politically Jewish. The nation of Israel is not the "holy nation" that God described and blessed, any more than any nation on earth is a Christian holy nation. In both cases the holy nation is virtual, comprised of the faithful around the world, and only as pure and valid as the most honest and whole hearted of the believers.
Somewhere along the line, in modern times, many Jews have become "a politician," or "a warrior," or "a cultural Jew with secular beliefs" rather than "a priest," the priests that God chose when he consecrated the entire Chosen People as a nation. Everyone who traveled with God during the Exodus, and who remained faithful through the generations, turning only toward him in their belief, were his "priests," whether they were in the profession of priesthood or were just the average family members among the Chosen.
I worry about the nation, the country, of Israel, and whenever I look at it, I have to look hard to hear or see the "priests" among them. Interestingly, it is in New York and its environs that I've seen among the Hasidim and others, those who still think like the priests of God, and who feel in their hearts like the priests of God. Creating a political structures and rattling weapons, regardless of the real or perceived provocations, does not a holy nation of priests make. Rage and defensiveness is too easily raised in the hearts of many of Israel, including the most devout. I am not saying that one must be Christian "wimps" who "turn the other cheek." But I am saying that you will have no peace until you make your peace with God and return to being a people who are defined first of all by their love of God and their "priesthood" in the hearts of individuals toward God. When the people of the country of Israel regain and reclaim their own sanctity in the eyes of God, then they will find that the components of secure peace with the Palestinians and their neighbors will remarkably fall into place for them. God never took his love and his designation of the Israelites as his "holy nation" from them, but instead, the modern Israelites have turned their eyes away from God, and make no genuine effort to hold on to their continuing consecration as his holy nation of priests. (With the exceptions I have noted).
I hope you find this helpful and I will hope along with those of you who truly believe to find yourselves in good places within the Book of God this year.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
God's mystery of the Jews: an answer
I just enjoyed watching EWTN Live with Fr. Mitch Pacwa and his guest Roy Schoeman, a well known Jewish Catholic convert who authored several books that I count among my favorites. It was a great hour of conversation and I found that it passed very quickly, they could have easily filled two hours :-)
I won't repeat all that was discussed because all of it is worth hearing for yourself or reading. But I wanted to point people in the right direction about understanding the great mystery that they were pondering on the program which is, why was it God's will that more Jews and indeed, why not all Jews had recognized Jesus Christ as the Messiah? Fr. Pacwa and Mr. Schoeman were correct in explaining that there is still a mystery and a purpose to the continuation of the Jews in their faith, without having recognized Jesus as the Messiah, that is beyond them, the Jews, being "targets" for evangelizing, and that the mystery is known only to God. They correctly cautioned about evangelizing with an attitude, and I am paraphrasing here, of wanting to collect conversions from Jews with the sense of 1) wrapping up unfinished business or 2) taking it upon oneself to know God's will and try to self delegate "fulfilling prophecy." That is a very serious and correct caution. Regular blog readers know that I am very annoyed at dispensationalist and evangelical non-Catholic Christians who have been very presumptuous in this regard. It is fine to evangelize the way that the Apostles and disciples did, which is to profess and witness to one's faith (explaining areas of confusion or stereotyping) and also to demonstrate through role modeling how one piously lives one's own faith. That is not only agreeable to God but to be expected. However, God frowns on Christians who think they know his mind and all his intentions and who bribe (monetary donations to Israel) or shotgun conversions (preach erroneous dispensationalism to panic certain Jews about "impending end of time" prophecy) in order to take pride in being the "prophecy fulfillers." So here is a way to point you in the right direction of understanding God's will.
The Old Covenant may have passed, and it has, obviously, but Jews still remain "God's chosen people." Who are the chosen? The chosen are the ones to whom God elected to make himself personally known to. Thus, Adam and his descendants the Patriarchs, and Abraham and his descendants the Israelites were Chosen from among all the people on earth to have a personal relationship and knowledge of God himself. God brought himself within their presence. So in addition to obtaining The Law from God, God made himself known as the creator, the father and as the companion, and even friend, of the Chosen people collectively and the patriarchs and prophets specifically. It is easy to only focus on the Law giving and the chastisements, and no longer see the voluminous information "about" God and his loving relationship with his people. It is to the Israelites that God gave personal visitations, explanations of natural law, angelic companions, glimpses of heaven and the afterlife, and a sampling of the mutual love that humans should aspire to have and return to God in gratitude for the love he has for them. All of this is preserved within the body of the Jewish faith and in the holy book, which Christians call the Old Testament.
Now, understand that Jewish scholars through the centuries have diligently, piously and prayerfully studied every word and indeed syllable of what God has uttered and what the holy book has contained. Yes, some of this was to be responsive and obedient to the Law, which orthodox Jews still follow, in response to modern needs for interpretations. But much of the richness of the Old Testament and the work of Jewish scholars is in amplifying and making God, who is in total unknowable to humans, be well understood to humans, and loved, using the events and words that God gave the Jews in mutual participation. To put it in slang, "God and the Jews speak the same language and come from the same neighborhood." Orthodox Jews do genuinely understand God and his perspectives more than any people of faith who ever lived and that has not changed. The Jews not recognizing the Messiah and the Old Covenant no longer being in place does not change that. Indeed, one cannot correctly and fully understand the episodes of the Gospel or the words of St. Peter, St. Paul, St. John, and St. Jude in their epistles without "being Jewish." The Jews remain the "translators" of how God spoke to humanity in the beginning of salvation history and how God revealed his true nature and authentic being.
For example, no one understands the offering of sacrifice unless one understands what God revealed in the first place to the Jews. Even Catholics, who remain (along with Muslims) the monotheistic faith that still offer sacrifice to God (in the form of the Mass) have forgotten more about the meaning, context and "God's perspective" about sacrifice than has the average orthodox pious Jew. I find myself through this blog and in the occasional real conversation with a human having to explain more about God and how he revealed his true being to the Jews than I had to fifty years ago. The pace of modern development obscures perspectives that were once a natural part of every day life. Even the clear and simple parables that Jesus preached are less, and not more, easily understood by Christians with the passage of time. Orthodox, scholarly pious Jews, even if they no longer worship at the Temple or live as did their ancestors know and comprehend more about both Old and New Testament meaning than Christians.
So orthodox pious scholarly Jews remain the continuity and the "translators" of understanding not only the cultural, societal and faith based norms and history of Biblical times, but they do understand God the Father, in general, more clearly than do Christians. They "speak the same lingo as God" even when they totally disobeyed him and drove God meshugana "crazy" (so to speak) during much of their Covenant with their stiff necked disobedience. Think of a loving but strict father though. Just because a son or daughter might drive him crazy with willful disobedience does not mean that son or daughter does not know their dad very, very well. Jews know God, and they've known him through the ages.
Jesus brought God to humans in a personal way, in order to explain how to live the Kingdom of God even before passing on in death to experience it first hand in eternity. Thus Jesus brought a more personal and individual relationship between God-the same God as the Jews knew-and humans. Jesus introduced humanity to God in a way they could see, touch, speak with, converse, confess and be forgiven, all within the context of living within hope and faith. That is the gift of the Messiah, of the Savior, not just to wash the original sin from humans and cleanse what had become perverted and impure in the faith, but also to teach individual humans who were not prophets or patriarchs how to have a personal relationship with God, within his New Covenant, and within the Apostolic Church that Christ created. Jesus brought the form of God that humans can not only be saved and forgiven by, but also have a personal relationship with. But never forget that the Jews already knew this very same God over the ages as the Chosen People, through thick and thin, and for better and for worse in the human experience. The Jews, however, knew God through their prophets, their priests and their consecrated Kings. The Jews knew God through their community of faith as "a people." Christ and his Apostles and their successors preached and converted one soul at a time.
This is the key to understanding the continuing special relationship between God and the Jews, his first and only Chosen People. Jews continue to have a faith and cultural context that allow them to understand the fullness of God's presence and perspectives, as much as can be understood by humans. I worry that without orthodox Jews that modern humans will continue to lose their Biblical cultural context and thus lose much of their understanding of God himself. I have already seen that happen far more than I like. Orthodox Jews "get" (comprehend) God. They comprehend God as God revealed himself over the ages to them, and they continue to study and find great joy in His word and worship of him. Christians "get" (comprehend) salvation. Jesus allowed the Jews who believed and the Gentiles who converted to be "not slaves" but "friends," as he said to the Apostles. Jesus taught the faithful how to participate with God in their own individual and church based salvation. Jesus taught them how to pray to God, and explained how to have a personal relationship with God. Jesus also gave humanity a great gift from God, which is the sacraments. I've explained in previous blog posts that the sacraments were not just made up out of whole cloth but are foundational upon God's revelations throughout the Old Testament AND cultural mores of the Jews.
For example, it's not like John the Baptist "invented" baptism. I've cited the passage in the Old Testament that explains that a newborn becomes a member of the Jewish community not just through birth and through the naming and sacrifice, but through the pouring of water in washing and the dressing in new garments. Christians increasingly do not "see" such knowledge of God and his ways even as the words are printed in black in the Old Testament. Christians tend to cherry pick the "Jesus formulas for salvation," and I'm not being unkind when I say that. That is the trade off when one brings a very individual faith, which is why I continually wring my hands at the lack of unity in the Christian faith, and the bitter seeds of the Reformation. Orthodox scholarly Jews have maintained a cohesion of understanding of God and God's faith "origins," God's cultural context and God's history with his Chosen People, and thus these Jews never forget. They still delight in all that God has given to them and explained to them, and in the cultural remnants and treasures of their faith.
Without orthodox scholarly God loving Jews, humans would lose much of their understanding of God himself. This does not mean that I do not hope that many Jews come to recognize Jesus Christ as the Messiah. But I am explaining that God continues to have a relationship and a reason for the many who did not thus far, which is to remember, preserve, love and treasure the full context of all that God has revealed to them as his Chosen People, and retain the ability as the ultimate translators of the context and meaning of what has been preserved in the Old Testament scripture, as that is still the same God who must be loved, understood and piously feared.
I hope that you find this helpful.
I won't repeat all that was discussed because all of it is worth hearing for yourself or reading. But I wanted to point people in the right direction about understanding the great mystery that they were pondering on the program which is, why was it God's will that more Jews and indeed, why not all Jews had recognized Jesus Christ as the Messiah? Fr. Pacwa and Mr. Schoeman were correct in explaining that there is still a mystery and a purpose to the continuation of the Jews in their faith, without having recognized Jesus as the Messiah, that is beyond them, the Jews, being "targets" for evangelizing, and that the mystery is known only to God. They correctly cautioned about evangelizing with an attitude, and I am paraphrasing here, of wanting to collect conversions from Jews with the sense of 1) wrapping up unfinished business or 2) taking it upon oneself to know God's will and try to self delegate "fulfilling prophecy." That is a very serious and correct caution. Regular blog readers know that I am very annoyed at dispensationalist and evangelical non-Catholic Christians who have been very presumptuous in this regard. It is fine to evangelize the way that the Apostles and disciples did, which is to profess and witness to one's faith (explaining areas of confusion or stereotyping) and also to demonstrate through role modeling how one piously lives one's own faith. That is not only agreeable to God but to be expected. However, God frowns on Christians who think they know his mind and all his intentions and who bribe (monetary donations to Israel) or shotgun conversions (preach erroneous dispensationalism to panic certain Jews about "impending end of time" prophecy) in order to take pride in being the "prophecy fulfillers." So here is a way to point you in the right direction of understanding God's will.
The Old Covenant may have passed, and it has, obviously, but Jews still remain "God's chosen people." Who are the chosen? The chosen are the ones to whom God elected to make himself personally known to. Thus, Adam and his descendants the Patriarchs, and Abraham and his descendants the Israelites were Chosen from among all the people on earth to have a personal relationship and knowledge of God himself. God brought himself within their presence. So in addition to obtaining The Law from God, God made himself known as the creator, the father and as the companion, and even friend, of the Chosen people collectively and the patriarchs and prophets specifically. It is easy to only focus on the Law giving and the chastisements, and no longer see the voluminous information "about" God and his loving relationship with his people. It is to the Israelites that God gave personal visitations, explanations of natural law, angelic companions, glimpses of heaven and the afterlife, and a sampling of the mutual love that humans should aspire to have and return to God in gratitude for the love he has for them. All of this is preserved within the body of the Jewish faith and in the holy book, which Christians call the Old Testament.
Now, understand that Jewish scholars through the centuries have diligently, piously and prayerfully studied every word and indeed syllable of what God has uttered and what the holy book has contained. Yes, some of this was to be responsive and obedient to the Law, which orthodox Jews still follow, in response to modern needs for interpretations. But much of the richness of the Old Testament and the work of Jewish scholars is in amplifying and making God, who is in total unknowable to humans, be well understood to humans, and loved, using the events and words that God gave the Jews in mutual participation. To put it in slang, "God and the Jews speak the same language and come from the same neighborhood." Orthodox Jews do genuinely understand God and his perspectives more than any people of faith who ever lived and that has not changed. The Jews not recognizing the Messiah and the Old Covenant no longer being in place does not change that. Indeed, one cannot correctly and fully understand the episodes of the Gospel or the words of St. Peter, St. Paul, St. John, and St. Jude in their epistles without "being Jewish." The Jews remain the "translators" of how God spoke to humanity in the beginning of salvation history and how God revealed his true nature and authentic being.
For example, no one understands the offering of sacrifice unless one understands what God revealed in the first place to the Jews. Even Catholics, who remain (along with Muslims) the monotheistic faith that still offer sacrifice to God (in the form of the Mass) have forgotten more about the meaning, context and "God's perspective" about sacrifice than has the average orthodox pious Jew. I find myself through this blog and in the occasional real conversation with a human having to explain more about God and how he revealed his true being to the Jews than I had to fifty years ago. The pace of modern development obscures perspectives that were once a natural part of every day life. Even the clear and simple parables that Jesus preached are less, and not more, easily understood by Christians with the passage of time. Orthodox, scholarly pious Jews, even if they no longer worship at the Temple or live as did their ancestors know and comprehend more about both Old and New Testament meaning than Christians.
So orthodox pious scholarly Jews remain the continuity and the "translators" of understanding not only the cultural, societal and faith based norms and history of Biblical times, but they do understand God the Father, in general, more clearly than do Christians. They "speak the same lingo as God" even when they totally disobeyed him and drove God meshugana "crazy" (so to speak) during much of their Covenant with their stiff necked disobedience. Think of a loving but strict father though. Just because a son or daughter might drive him crazy with willful disobedience does not mean that son or daughter does not know their dad very, very well. Jews know God, and they've known him through the ages.
Jesus brought God to humans in a personal way, in order to explain how to live the Kingdom of God even before passing on in death to experience it first hand in eternity. Thus Jesus brought a more personal and individual relationship between God-the same God as the Jews knew-and humans. Jesus introduced humanity to God in a way they could see, touch, speak with, converse, confess and be forgiven, all within the context of living within hope and faith. That is the gift of the Messiah, of the Savior, not just to wash the original sin from humans and cleanse what had become perverted and impure in the faith, but also to teach individual humans who were not prophets or patriarchs how to have a personal relationship with God, within his New Covenant, and within the Apostolic Church that Christ created. Jesus brought the form of God that humans can not only be saved and forgiven by, but also have a personal relationship with. But never forget that the Jews already knew this very same God over the ages as the Chosen People, through thick and thin, and for better and for worse in the human experience. The Jews, however, knew God through their prophets, their priests and their consecrated Kings. The Jews knew God through their community of faith as "a people." Christ and his Apostles and their successors preached and converted one soul at a time.
This is the key to understanding the continuing special relationship between God and the Jews, his first and only Chosen People. Jews continue to have a faith and cultural context that allow them to understand the fullness of God's presence and perspectives, as much as can be understood by humans. I worry that without orthodox Jews that modern humans will continue to lose their Biblical cultural context and thus lose much of their understanding of God himself. I have already seen that happen far more than I like. Orthodox Jews "get" (comprehend) God. They comprehend God as God revealed himself over the ages to them, and they continue to study and find great joy in His word and worship of him. Christians "get" (comprehend) salvation. Jesus allowed the Jews who believed and the Gentiles who converted to be "not slaves" but "friends," as he said to the Apostles. Jesus taught the faithful how to participate with God in their own individual and church based salvation. Jesus taught them how to pray to God, and explained how to have a personal relationship with God. Jesus also gave humanity a great gift from God, which is the sacraments. I've explained in previous blog posts that the sacraments were not just made up out of whole cloth but are foundational upon God's revelations throughout the Old Testament AND cultural mores of the Jews.
For example, it's not like John the Baptist "invented" baptism. I've cited the passage in the Old Testament that explains that a newborn becomes a member of the Jewish community not just through birth and through the naming and sacrifice, but through the pouring of water in washing and the dressing in new garments. Christians increasingly do not "see" such knowledge of God and his ways even as the words are printed in black in the Old Testament. Christians tend to cherry pick the "Jesus formulas for salvation," and I'm not being unkind when I say that. That is the trade off when one brings a very individual faith, which is why I continually wring my hands at the lack of unity in the Christian faith, and the bitter seeds of the Reformation. Orthodox scholarly Jews have maintained a cohesion of understanding of God and God's faith "origins," God's cultural context and God's history with his Chosen People, and thus these Jews never forget. They still delight in all that God has given to them and explained to them, and in the cultural remnants and treasures of their faith.
Without orthodox scholarly God loving Jews, humans would lose much of their understanding of God himself. This does not mean that I do not hope that many Jews come to recognize Jesus Christ as the Messiah. But I am explaining that God continues to have a relationship and a reason for the many who did not thus far, which is to remember, preserve, love and treasure the full context of all that God has revealed to them as his Chosen People, and retain the ability as the ultimate translators of the context and meaning of what has been preserved in the Old Testament scripture, as that is still the same God who must be loved, understood and piously feared.
I hope that you find this helpful.
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Truth about sacrilege and dishonoring the holy
I have found a wonderful true story where a young Jewish scholar learns from one of the most illustrious rabbis what profane behavior toward the sacred has in its true effects. Read it to understand.
http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/78167/jewish/A-Tzaddiks-Tear.htm
snip
A Tzaddik's Tear
By Yerachmiel Tilles
About 30 years ago, an American rabbi visiting Miami, Florida gave a lecture on the life and accomplishments of the famed "Chafetz Chaim" (Rabbi Israel Meir HaCohen Kagan, 1838-1933). He described the life of the great sage who lived a humble life as a shopkeeper in in the village of Radin, in Poland, yet was recognized throughout the Jewish world as a great scholar, tzaddik (righteous person) and leader.
There was another story the rabbi wanted to tell, but he hesitated, for he only knew part of it. As he stood at the lectern, he thought for a moment and then decided that he would tell it anyway. He rationalized that even an unfinished story about the Chafetz Chaim would have a meaningful message.
He began to relate an incident about a teenage boy in the Chafetz Chaim's yeshiva who was found smoking a cigarette on Shabbat -- the sacred day of rest. The faculty and student body were shocked, and some of the faculty felt that the boy should be expelled. However, when the Chafetz Chaim heard the story, he asked that the boy be brought to his home.
At this point, the rabbi interrupted the narrative and said, "I don't know what the Chafetz Chaim said to the boy. I only know that they were together for a few minutes. I would give anything to know what he said to this student, for I am told that the boy never desecrated the Shabbat again. How wonderful it would be if we could relay that message -- whatever it was -- to others, in order to encourage them in their observance of Shabbat." The rabbi then continued with his lecture.
After his talk, the hall emptied of everyone except for one elderly man, who remained in his seat, alone with his thoughts. From the distance, it seemed he was trembling, as if he was either crying or suffering from chills. The rabbi walked over to the elderly man and asked him, "Is anything wrong?"
The man responded, "Where did you hear that story of the cigarette on Shabbat?" He did not look up and was still shaken. "I really don't know," answered the rabbi. "I heard it a while ago and I don't even remember who told it to me." The man looked up at the rabbi and said softly, "I was that boy." He then asked the rabbi to go outside, and as the two walked together, he told the rabbi the following story:
***
Follow the link and read what happened.
http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/78167/jewish/A-Tzaddiks-Tear.htm
snip
A Tzaddik's Tear
By Yerachmiel Tilles
About 30 years ago, an American rabbi visiting Miami, Florida gave a lecture on the life and accomplishments of the famed "Chafetz Chaim" (Rabbi Israel Meir HaCohen Kagan, 1838-1933). He described the life of the great sage who lived a humble life as a shopkeeper in in the village of Radin, in Poland, yet was recognized throughout the Jewish world as a great scholar, tzaddik (righteous person) and leader.
There was another story the rabbi wanted to tell, but he hesitated, for he only knew part of it. As he stood at the lectern, he thought for a moment and then decided that he would tell it anyway. He rationalized that even an unfinished story about the Chafetz Chaim would have a meaningful message.
He began to relate an incident about a teenage boy in the Chafetz Chaim's yeshiva who was found smoking a cigarette on Shabbat -- the sacred day of rest. The faculty and student body were shocked, and some of the faculty felt that the boy should be expelled. However, when the Chafetz Chaim heard the story, he asked that the boy be brought to his home.
At this point, the rabbi interrupted the narrative and said, "I don't know what the Chafetz Chaim said to the boy. I only know that they were together for a few minutes. I would give anything to know what he said to this student, for I am told that the boy never desecrated the Shabbat again. How wonderful it would be if we could relay that message -- whatever it was -- to others, in order to encourage them in their observance of Shabbat." The rabbi then continued with his lecture.
After his talk, the hall emptied of everyone except for one elderly man, who remained in his seat, alone with his thoughts. From the distance, it seemed he was trembling, as if he was either crying or suffering from chills. The rabbi walked over to the elderly man and asked him, "Is anything wrong?"
The man responded, "Where did you hear that story of the cigarette on Shabbat?" He did not look up and was still shaken. "I really don't know," answered the rabbi. "I heard it a while ago and I don't even remember who told it to me." The man looked up at the rabbi and said softly, "I was that boy." He then asked the rabbi to go outside, and as the two walked together, he told the rabbi the following story:
***
Follow the link and read what happened.
Monday, September 8, 2008
Very important lesson about Bible and history
Here is a very important piece of information about human social history that has a great bearing on your ability to understand certain passages in the Bible. It also provides context for what people may think were confusing sexual and inheritance mores (customs, rules and attitudes).
Being able to be absolutely certain of maternity and paternity was essential to human survival throughout most of human history. This is because whatever the parents accumulated in their lifetime was passed on to their legitimate children. This was true whether you were the poorest of the poor or a wealthy monarch (but you will see there are special considerations a bit later in this posting). The vast majority of people throughout human history had very little to pass on to their children, but what they did have was vital to survival. For example, the tools that the father had in order to hunt, fish, farm, build and protect his family were the main “inheritance” of the legitimate offspring. Likewise the tools the mother had in order to farm, maintain the family’s supplies of clothing, food, and water were her prized possessions. Look at the children in Haiti today, searching for fresh water in their hurricane flooded villages. Notice the prized possessions they are holding: buckets, pails, plastic containers and bowls to carry water should they find it. For much of human history a simple barrel, pail or bucket was often one of the family’s prized possessions and meant the difference between life and death. Notice in the Bible many events take place near the well. Each water drawer would bring his or her family’s own prized bucket to the well in order to obtain life maintaining water for the family.
Another example is utensils. People did not use them and when they were developed, they were for the rich. This is why people such as the Chinese serve food in bite sized pieces, “pre cut” so to speak. This is because another prized family possession was the single knife. It was used in hunting, carpentry and to prepare food. This is why the custom of the man of the house carving the turkey developed. The man had the only family knife, using it on behalf of his family, and passing it on to his son. Eventually in medieval times families often acquired a single spoon. That was a prized possession and often it was first in the form of a ladle for broth and soup. So most families had at most a single example of a prized, usually hand crafted or inherited tool that was essential to survival. Thus paternity of children in the family was obviously something that was not trifled with because the offspring literally inherited the very humble but essential accoutrements of the family to survive.
Now, think about the kings and queens. Not only is wealth inherited through their offspring but title and position. Additionally the royalty in all cultures were viewed as having some divine right and lineage, and that too was passed on to their offspring. So many royal households developed customs to ensure legitimate offspring that people today would totally misunderstand, especially since today everyone has the viewpoint of “pleasure” rather than “duty” and “survival.” So here is one example of what often happened when the king or his heir married. Court attendants were often required to be in the bedchamber and observe the actual first sexual intercourse of the king and queen, or the prince and princess. This was to ensure that both the king was not hiding an impotency, but more importantly, that the queen, should she become pregnant, had done so with her legitimate spouse, the king.
When I was a teenager there was a charming historical fiction story about King Ferdinand and Isabel of Spain, regarding this very requirement of the consummation of their marriage. In this fictional account the young king has to explain to the very young queen bride what is going to happen. But he fakes the actual encounter so that the courtiers are satisfied they have observed their mating, and then later in privacy they have their actual first moment of intimacy.
The second time you see this type of rule take place is upon the imminent birth when the queen is isolated in the bedchamber with attendants but also court observers. This is so that a false baby is not swapped with the baby that is the real heir. The birth watch would go into effect for weeks before birth was expected, in order to foil anyone smuggling in a false baby and claiming the queen had just given birth to that infant.
Unfortunately modern people, especially you young people, are no longer taught about these customs and their reasoning in school. But this gives you a great disadvantage to understanding why what seemed like oppressive cultural mores developed and also you have trouble understanding the implied meaning in Biblical scripture that would be very obvious to any scholar of the period. Worse, a dirty and twisted interpretation is placed on very holy and clean statements because many today view every custom as either an example of lust, self gratification, or “oppression of the weak.” Trust me; no queen “minded” ensuring that her heir was accepted without question as being legitimate. They didn’t worry that someone was watching “what sexual position” the king and queen used on their honeymoon. (In fact, that is one reason that beds had curtains, so even the courtiers in the room obviously were not tracking each bead of sweat and whose hand was doing what). It was in everyone’s interest to follow these rules and no one was being “oppressed” and they certainly were not being peeping toms for the kicks of it.
So how does this have a bearing on understanding the Bible? In today’s Mass the Gospel reading from Matthew describes how the Virgin Mary came to be with child through the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit, and Joseph’s puzzlement and reaction. The first point I want to make is that the angel Gabriel in addition to being the announcer of the conception functions as the “court witness.” The conception occurs invisibly while Gabriel is present. This is why Gabriel is named and these details are preserved in the scripture. Mary was, essentially, being declared a Queen at that moment, and the royalty of her descending from the House of David and now bearing the heir who would be Jesus is being affirmed. This is why ancient people all the way through Medieval and Renaissance times had absolutely no trouble understanding what is described as the Queenship of Mary. Reading the scriptures people well understood that the pregnancy of the Queen was witnessed to make absolutely unquestionable the legitimacy of the heir. This is why it is the most insulting scandal that modern people have even questioned the virgin conception of Mary and that was totally unthinkable among people until these crass times. Gabriel, as God’s courtier, “witnessed” the conception, exactly in the tradition of kings and queens that actually continued on for hundreds of years after the time of Mary and Jesus.
Second, there is a verse that people with dirty minds in their ignorance have glommed onto, showing their total lack of understanding, as they try to argue that surely Mary and Joseph were sexually intimate (since these people cannot imagine otherwise, to their shame). The verse is Matthew 1:25.
Matthew 1:25
But he had no union with her as her husband until she had borne her firstborn Son; and he called His name Jesus.
People who are ignorant of their own history and who possess dirty and weak minds read into that a chronological statement, which is totally in error. It is only a statement of affirmation, not of chronological activity. In other words, just as courtiers would continue to witness that the queen was not with any other man but the king, Matthew is routinely documenting that Joseph was not intimate with Mary during her pregnancy. This is, again, exactly as the courtiers would have observed and witnessed to the sanctity of the pregnancy of the queen throughout her term. Thus the meaning of “until she had borne her firstborn Son” does not mean they didn’t have sex until after Jesus was born. It is a statement of witnessing that just as Gabriel witnessed the royal conception, there was no other intimacy during her term of pregnancy. That is the only meaning of this statement and it is far from implying that Mary and Joseph had sexual relation, for they most certainly did not and it is ignorant and scandalous to imply otherwise. There is no word other than “until” that really could be used to satisfy modern readers who are ignorant of the intent. The Gospel is a document of the divine royalty of Jesus, not an account of intimacy events. Thus Gospel writers phrased things correctly in accordance with the standards of bearing witness to the legitimacy of the royal heir.
That is also why the word “firstborn” is used. This is not an implication that there was intimacy between Joseph and Mary and that they had children. Far from it, as you will see when you remind yourself of the essential legitimacy in royal households of the first born. That is where no chances are taken. Courtiers observe the “honeymoon” and birth in order to ensure that the first born is absolutely positively totally legitimate. From the second born onward, people “relax” more. We all know that kings throughout history ran around and did some seed spreading. But they sure did not do it when they were trying to establish their legitimate first born. So the courtiers did not observe conceptions after the first born, although efforts against baby swapping upon birth continue unabated, as that was a constant threat. It would be easy for someone to kill the queen in childbirth (when things were so medically risky anyway) and substitute a baby for the grieving king to think it is his own. This is why Matthew phrased things that seem mysterious and full of implication to modern ignoramuses, but were clean and proper in their phrasing to those of the time who understood the critical points of witnessing to the conception and birth of the firstborn heir.
As an aside, this is, as I’ve mentioned before, another reason why Gabriel is the angel who provided the Qur’an on behalf of God to the Prophet (PBUH). Gabriel is in addition to being kind of the archangel of God’s announcements is also the “witness” to the legitimate conception of gifts from God. This is why the Qur’an is filled with references to Mary, and information about the birth of Jesus (Isa). Gabriel is repeating his witnessing of the legitimacy of the conception of Jesus to those who would hear and believe the word of God in the Qur’an and he is also, by implication, witnessing to the legitimacy of the “conception” of the Qur’an.
The Arab culture has missed that point because they did not have the customs of concern about the legitimacy of the firstborn in exactly the same fashion as did the West and Mediterranean. This is because order and legitimacy was maintained through the system of multiple wives. So they missed the connection in their scholarly work between witnessing the conception of Jesus and witnessing the conception of the Qur’an. They, correctly, interpreted Gabriel as being the sign of the legitimacy and high honor that God has given to them, and they also preserved the sanctity in the purity of Mary in their honoring of her. But this is a little extra insight to give all of you, readers, about how God operates within the culture of humans in order to do all things correctly and with mercy. In other words, God gives affirmations that are well understood in their contemporary times, but later as people forget their own history (or do not understand the culture of the other) they misunderstand or miss out in enjoying the blessing.
This is one reason why I find such great refreshment in reading the Talmud and the interpretations and teachings of the great Jewish rabbis, especially the Chassidim. Unfailingly they understand the culture within which Biblical events took place and thus can extract and extrapolate incredible spiritual insight and truth. For example, through their formidable and accurate knowledge of both law and custom, they have successful recreated through spiritual interpolation conversations that took place (for example, with Moses) that are not documented in the Torah or the books of the Bible. How can they do that? Well, all comes from the grace of God, but the mechanism is that their minds totally retain the context of the participants, even thousands of years ago, so that they can know with certainty what the reactions and even spoken words to certain events most certainly had to be. Whenever I read what they wrote (as I did for some time yesterday, as refreshment), I find myself nodding and thinking to myself, “Ah, how refreshing. They get it; they still get it and truly understand.” Even when they disagree or I know they are too far out on a limb in their speculation, they are never untrue to the spirit of what did actually happen. Modern Christian biblical scholars could learn a lot from them, and they should.
I hope this helps. It certainly should. I can’t believe how skewed and smoky the lenses of modern humans have become to understanding even their own history and cultural ways and as a result, what distorted and depraved views they have acquired.
Being able to be absolutely certain of maternity and paternity was essential to human survival throughout most of human history. This is because whatever the parents accumulated in their lifetime was passed on to their legitimate children. This was true whether you were the poorest of the poor or a wealthy monarch (but you will see there are special considerations a bit later in this posting). The vast majority of people throughout human history had very little to pass on to their children, but what they did have was vital to survival. For example, the tools that the father had in order to hunt, fish, farm, build and protect his family were the main “inheritance” of the legitimate offspring. Likewise the tools the mother had in order to farm, maintain the family’s supplies of clothing, food, and water were her prized possessions. Look at the children in Haiti today, searching for fresh water in their hurricane flooded villages. Notice the prized possessions they are holding: buckets, pails, plastic containers and bowls to carry water should they find it. For much of human history a simple barrel, pail or bucket was often one of the family’s prized possessions and meant the difference between life and death. Notice in the Bible many events take place near the well. Each water drawer would bring his or her family’s own prized bucket to the well in order to obtain life maintaining water for the family.
Another example is utensils. People did not use them and when they were developed, they were for the rich. This is why people such as the Chinese serve food in bite sized pieces, “pre cut” so to speak. This is because another prized family possession was the single knife. It was used in hunting, carpentry and to prepare food. This is why the custom of the man of the house carving the turkey developed. The man had the only family knife, using it on behalf of his family, and passing it on to his son. Eventually in medieval times families often acquired a single spoon. That was a prized possession and often it was first in the form of a ladle for broth and soup. So most families had at most a single example of a prized, usually hand crafted or inherited tool that was essential to survival. Thus paternity of children in the family was obviously something that was not trifled with because the offspring literally inherited the very humble but essential accoutrements of the family to survive.
Now, think about the kings and queens. Not only is wealth inherited through their offspring but title and position. Additionally the royalty in all cultures were viewed as having some divine right and lineage, and that too was passed on to their offspring. So many royal households developed customs to ensure legitimate offspring that people today would totally misunderstand, especially since today everyone has the viewpoint of “pleasure” rather than “duty” and “survival.” So here is one example of what often happened when the king or his heir married. Court attendants were often required to be in the bedchamber and observe the actual first sexual intercourse of the king and queen, or the prince and princess. This was to ensure that both the king was not hiding an impotency, but more importantly, that the queen, should she become pregnant, had done so with her legitimate spouse, the king.
When I was a teenager there was a charming historical fiction story about King Ferdinand and Isabel of Spain, regarding this very requirement of the consummation of their marriage. In this fictional account the young king has to explain to the very young queen bride what is going to happen. But he fakes the actual encounter so that the courtiers are satisfied they have observed their mating, and then later in privacy they have their actual first moment of intimacy.
The second time you see this type of rule take place is upon the imminent birth when the queen is isolated in the bedchamber with attendants but also court observers. This is so that a false baby is not swapped with the baby that is the real heir. The birth watch would go into effect for weeks before birth was expected, in order to foil anyone smuggling in a false baby and claiming the queen had just given birth to that infant.
Unfortunately modern people, especially you young people, are no longer taught about these customs and their reasoning in school. But this gives you a great disadvantage to understanding why what seemed like oppressive cultural mores developed and also you have trouble understanding the implied meaning in Biblical scripture that would be very obvious to any scholar of the period. Worse, a dirty and twisted interpretation is placed on very holy and clean statements because many today view every custom as either an example of lust, self gratification, or “oppression of the weak.” Trust me; no queen “minded” ensuring that her heir was accepted without question as being legitimate. They didn’t worry that someone was watching “what sexual position” the king and queen used on their honeymoon. (In fact, that is one reason that beds had curtains, so even the courtiers in the room obviously were not tracking each bead of sweat and whose hand was doing what). It was in everyone’s interest to follow these rules and no one was being “oppressed” and they certainly were not being peeping toms for the kicks of it.
So how does this have a bearing on understanding the Bible? In today’s Mass the Gospel reading from Matthew describes how the Virgin Mary came to be with child through the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit, and Joseph’s puzzlement and reaction. The first point I want to make is that the angel Gabriel in addition to being the announcer of the conception functions as the “court witness.” The conception occurs invisibly while Gabriel is present. This is why Gabriel is named and these details are preserved in the scripture. Mary was, essentially, being declared a Queen at that moment, and the royalty of her descending from the House of David and now bearing the heir who would be Jesus is being affirmed. This is why ancient people all the way through Medieval and Renaissance times had absolutely no trouble understanding what is described as the Queenship of Mary. Reading the scriptures people well understood that the pregnancy of the Queen was witnessed to make absolutely unquestionable the legitimacy of the heir. This is why it is the most insulting scandal that modern people have even questioned the virgin conception of Mary and that was totally unthinkable among people until these crass times. Gabriel, as God’s courtier, “witnessed” the conception, exactly in the tradition of kings and queens that actually continued on for hundreds of years after the time of Mary and Jesus.
Second, there is a verse that people with dirty minds in their ignorance have glommed onto, showing their total lack of understanding, as they try to argue that surely Mary and Joseph were sexually intimate (since these people cannot imagine otherwise, to their shame). The verse is Matthew 1:25.
Matthew 1:25
But he had no union with her as her husband until she had borne her firstborn Son; and he called His name Jesus.
People who are ignorant of their own history and who possess dirty and weak minds read into that a chronological statement, which is totally in error. It is only a statement of affirmation, not of chronological activity. In other words, just as courtiers would continue to witness that the queen was not with any other man but the king, Matthew is routinely documenting that Joseph was not intimate with Mary during her pregnancy. This is, again, exactly as the courtiers would have observed and witnessed to the sanctity of the pregnancy of the queen throughout her term. Thus the meaning of “until she had borne her firstborn Son” does not mean they didn’t have sex until after Jesus was born. It is a statement of witnessing that just as Gabriel witnessed the royal conception, there was no other intimacy during her term of pregnancy. That is the only meaning of this statement and it is far from implying that Mary and Joseph had sexual relation, for they most certainly did not and it is ignorant and scandalous to imply otherwise. There is no word other than “until” that really could be used to satisfy modern readers who are ignorant of the intent. The Gospel is a document of the divine royalty of Jesus, not an account of intimacy events. Thus Gospel writers phrased things correctly in accordance with the standards of bearing witness to the legitimacy of the royal heir.
That is also why the word “firstborn” is used. This is not an implication that there was intimacy between Joseph and Mary and that they had children. Far from it, as you will see when you remind yourself of the essential legitimacy in royal households of the first born. That is where no chances are taken. Courtiers observe the “honeymoon” and birth in order to ensure that the first born is absolutely positively totally legitimate. From the second born onward, people “relax” more. We all know that kings throughout history ran around and did some seed spreading. But they sure did not do it when they were trying to establish their legitimate first born. So the courtiers did not observe conceptions after the first born, although efforts against baby swapping upon birth continue unabated, as that was a constant threat. It would be easy for someone to kill the queen in childbirth (when things were so medically risky anyway) and substitute a baby for the grieving king to think it is his own. This is why Matthew phrased things that seem mysterious and full of implication to modern ignoramuses, but were clean and proper in their phrasing to those of the time who understood the critical points of witnessing to the conception and birth of the firstborn heir.
As an aside, this is, as I’ve mentioned before, another reason why Gabriel is the angel who provided the Qur’an on behalf of God to the Prophet (PBUH). Gabriel is in addition to being kind of the archangel of God’s announcements is also the “witness” to the legitimate conception of gifts from God. This is why the Qur’an is filled with references to Mary, and information about the birth of Jesus (Isa). Gabriel is repeating his witnessing of the legitimacy of the conception of Jesus to those who would hear and believe the word of God in the Qur’an and he is also, by implication, witnessing to the legitimacy of the “conception” of the Qur’an.
The Arab culture has missed that point because they did not have the customs of concern about the legitimacy of the firstborn in exactly the same fashion as did the West and Mediterranean. This is because order and legitimacy was maintained through the system of multiple wives. So they missed the connection in their scholarly work between witnessing the conception of Jesus and witnessing the conception of the Qur’an. They, correctly, interpreted Gabriel as being the sign of the legitimacy and high honor that God has given to them, and they also preserved the sanctity in the purity of Mary in their honoring of her. But this is a little extra insight to give all of you, readers, about how God operates within the culture of humans in order to do all things correctly and with mercy. In other words, God gives affirmations that are well understood in their contemporary times, but later as people forget their own history (or do not understand the culture of the other) they misunderstand or miss out in enjoying the blessing.
This is one reason why I find such great refreshment in reading the Talmud and the interpretations and teachings of the great Jewish rabbis, especially the Chassidim. Unfailingly they understand the culture within which Biblical events took place and thus can extract and extrapolate incredible spiritual insight and truth. For example, through their formidable and accurate knowledge of both law and custom, they have successful recreated through spiritual interpolation conversations that took place (for example, with Moses) that are not documented in the Torah or the books of the Bible. How can they do that? Well, all comes from the grace of God, but the mechanism is that their minds totally retain the context of the participants, even thousands of years ago, so that they can know with certainty what the reactions and even spoken words to certain events most certainly had to be. Whenever I read what they wrote (as I did for some time yesterday, as refreshment), I find myself nodding and thinking to myself, “Ah, how refreshing. They get it; they still get it and truly understand.” Even when they disagree or I know they are too far out on a limb in their speculation, they are never untrue to the spirit of what did actually happen. Modern Christian biblical scholars could learn a lot from them, and they should.
I hope this helps. It certainly should. I can’t believe how skewed and smoky the lenses of modern humans have become to understanding even their own history and cultural ways and as a result, what distorted and depraved views they have acquired.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Old Testament Bible and heaven and hell
My ex-husband was an agnostic Jew and as he put it, "We Jews are not so much into the emphasis on heaven or hell." That is true and he is correct, although the lack of detail mention of heaven or hell in the Old Testament is not reflective of both their reality and their inevitability.
What people need to remember is that the books of the Old Testament were written while God was physically present with the Patriarchs and the Israelites. God did not "have to" provide Israelites with a lot of "after life" information because he was right there with them telling them what to do! The vast majority of the Old Testament is written faith history (events) and instructions about how to worship God and have pious lives. All the people had to do was actually obey God as he instructed them both directly and through the priests and prophets and they were going to "end up in the right place," if you get my drift.
You can contrast this with pagan works such as the Egyptian Book of the Dead. The ancient Egyptians had no clue regarding direct experience with God or the true nature of the after life, so they made up a huge pantheon of gods and goddesses (like the early Romans and Greeks) AND they developed what can only be described as an obsessive compulsive "cook book" for "guaranteeing" that those rich enough to perform all the rituals and requirements would "end up in the most advantageous conditions." I say cook book because they imagined quite literal activities such as upon death their organs being weighed by gods to determine virtue and so forth. So people who do not have God in an active presence such as had the Israelites often obsessed quite a bit about the after life.
In contrast, God's "chosen people," the Israelites, were instructed by God in the two fundamentals of ensuring "a good outcome." The first was the system by which they know, acknowledge and worship God, and thus always know precisely their place in his heart and in the spiritual order as a whole. The second was the commandments and laws by which they should live honorable and virtuous lives that would ensure successful living, prosperity and also avoid sin. Wisdom and praise were outputs of those two fundamental systems. That is why the Old Testament really did not focus on "what it's like on the other side" because they had God BY their side while living (and as you can read, it was a struggle to get them to obey God and avoid sin even as God was right there with them).
When Jesus Christ as Messiah and Savior performed his public ministry, that became the time when frank talk about both heaven and hell were needed. This was for several obvious reasons. One is that Jesus was bringing to the faithful God in a form that he had not yet appeared, which is the physical reality of how God as the Son of Man can dwell and speak to "fellow humans" incarnated in a human body. Therefore Jesus had a platform by which to first instruct in words and then demonstrate with his own body what happens when a person dies and is received by God in judgment. The second reason is that with the New Covenant Jesus had to make very clear to the faithful what the rewards of obedience and the consequences of sin and disbelief would be not only in life but upon death. This is because in foreseeing of the destruction of the Temple and dispersal of the chosen people a new "church" was needed that dwelled in the hearts of all people so that they would have the road map by which to live and achieve both personal and community salvation. The third reason is that while Jesus preached specifically to the Jews, many more than Jews listened to him and the Apostles were instructed to take the faith to the entire world, "the Gentiles." Thus people from all backgrounds and cultures had to have a clear understanding of what happened to each human after death. The fourth reason is that Jesus through his teachings, admonitions and parables often described the wages of sin and where someone would end up (hell) if they lived a sinful life (he even describes a person in hell asking for permission, and not receiving it, for warning his sinful brothers who are still alive about the reality of hell). Jesus also is very graphic in his warning that it is better to deprive one's self of offending and sinful body parts than to risk hell as a consequence of their action, and likewise of the consequences of hell to those who lead children into sin.
A fifth reason that Jesus described heaven and hell in more detail than in the books of the Old Testament is that as Jesus described, he is treating them as friends and not as servants. Hence, friends are entitled to know the plans and reasons for what will happen, and this includes God's still unrevealed timing of the end of the world and the resurrection of the body. God revealed as much as he did through Jesus in honor of the shifting relationship where God expects humans to be knowledgeable co-operators in their own salvation. Unlike Adam and Eve who rejected earthly paradise, only the "saved" will be part of the new world in their resurrected bodies. In other words, God is treating the faithful as friends in addition to children who are constantly tempted to sin, and God lets humans know that there will be a New Kingdom with a bodily reality at some point in the future. Thus humans are, to use a modern business term, directly invited to be knowledgeable investors in not only their own personal salvation and reward in heaven but also eligible participants when it is the End of Days and the old world passes away into the new.
The sixth reason is that human nature being as it is, society tends to become depraved and fall apart the instant humans lose sight of the reality of unbearable and eternal hell. I wish that were not true but it is what it is, and you can see that today everywhere you look. Jesus did people a favor by being a stern in his warning as he was, and soft shoeing the reality of hell is not a favor, as we can see today. Humans need to be reminded of the reality of fire and brimstone. This, incidentally, is why in the revealed book of the Qur'an over six hundred years after Jesus died and resurrected there is such vivid emphasis on the eternal punishment in hell for sinners and willful disbelievers. God is fair, just and merciful; he does not miss a chance to tell humans the truth and to try to induce as many as possible to be believing, faithful and virtuous.
I hope you have found this to be helpful.
What people need to remember is that the books of the Old Testament were written while God was physically present with the Patriarchs and the Israelites. God did not "have to" provide Israelites with a lot of "after life" information because he was right there with them telling them what to do! The vast majority of the Old Testament is written faith history (events) and instructions about how to worship God and have pious lives. All the people had to do was actually obey God as he instructed them both directly and through the priests and prophets and they were going to "end up in the right place," if you get my drift.
You can contrast this with pagan works such as the Egyptian Book of the Dead. The ancient Egyptians had no clue regarding direct experience with God or the true nature of the after life, so they made up a huge pantheon of gods and goddesses (like the early Romans and Greeks) AND they developed what can only be described as an obsessive compulsive "cook book" for "guaranteeing" that those rich enough to perform all the rituals and requirements would "end up in the most advantageous conditions." I say cook book because they imagined quite literal activities such as upon death their organs being weighed by gods to determine virtue and so forth. So people who do not have God in an active presence such as had the Israelites often obsessed quite a bit about the after life.
In contrast, God's "chosen people," the Israelites, were instructed by God in the two fundamentals of ensuring "a good outcome." The first was the system by which they know, acknowledge and worship God, and thus always know precisely their place in his heart and in the spiritual order as a whole. The second was the commandments and laws by which they should live honorable and virtuous lives that would ensure successful living, prosperity and also avoid sin. Wisdom and praise were outputs of those two fundamental systems. That is why the Old Testament really did not focus on "what it's like on the other side" because they had God BY their side while living (and as you can read, it was a struggle to get them to obey God and avoid sin even as God was right there with them).
When Jesus Christ as Messiah and Savior performed his public ministry, that became the time when frank talk about both heaven and hell were needed. This was for several obvious reasons. One is that Jesus was bringing to the faithful God in a form that he had not yet appeared, which is the physical reality of how God as the Son of Man can dwell and speak to "fellow humans" incarnated in a human body. Therefore Jesus had a platform by which to first instruct in words and then demonstrate with his own body what happens when a person dies and is received by God in judgment. The second reason is that with the New Covenant Jesus had to make very clear to the faithful what the rewards of obedience and the consequences of sin and disbelief would be not only in life but upon death. This is because in foreseeing of the destruction of the Temple and dispersal of the chosen people a new "church" was needed that dwelled in the hearts of all people so that they would have the road map by which to live and achieve both personal and community salvation. The third reason is that while Jesus preached specifically to the Jews, many more than Jews listened to him and the Apostles were instructed to take the faith to the entire world, "the Gentiles." Thus people from all backgrounds and cultures had to have a clear understanding of what happened to each human after death. The fourth reason is that Jesus through his teachings, admonitions and parables often described the wages of sin and where someone would end up (hell) if they lived a sinful life (he even describes a person in hell asking for permission, and not receiving it, for warning his sinful brothers who are still alive about the reality of hell). Jesus also is very graphic in his warning that it is better to deprive one's self of offending and sinful body parts than to risk hell as a consequence of their action, and likewise of the consequences of hell to those who lead children into sin.
A fifth reason that Jesus described heaven and hell in more detail than in the books of the Old Testament is that as Jesus described, he is treating them as friends and not as servants. Hence, friends are entitled to know the plans and reasons for what will happen, and this includes God's still unrevealed timing of the end of the world and the resurrection of the body. God revealed as much as he did through Jesus in honor of the shifting relationship where God expects humans to be knowledgeable co-operators in their own salvation. Unlike Adam and Eve who rejected earthly paradise, only the "saved" will be part of the new world in their resurrected bodies. In other words, God is treating the faithful as friends in addition to children who are constantly tempted to sin, and God lets humans know that there will be a New Kingdom with a bodily reality at some point in the future. Thus humans are, to use a modern business term, directly invited to be knowledgeable investors in not only their own personal salvation and reward in heaven but also eligible participants when it is the End of Days and the old world passes away into the new.
The sixth reason is that human nature being as it is, society tends to become depraved and fall apart the instant humans lose sight of the reality of unbearable and eternal hell. I wish that were not true but it is what it is, and you can see that today everywhere you look. Jesus did people a favor by being a stern in his warning as he was, and soft shoeing the reality of hell is not a favor, as we can see today. Humans need to be reminded of the reality of fire and brimstone. This, incidentally, is why in the revealed book of the Qur'an over six hundred years after Jesus died and resurrected there is such vivid emphasis on the eternal punishment in hell for sinners and willful disbelievers. God is fair, just and merciful; he does not miss a chance to tell humans the truth and to try to induce as many as possible to be believing, faithful and virtuous.
I hope you have found this to be helpful.
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Jewish WWII rescue group finally recognized
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1215330982174&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
***
Read this very inspiring and important story about the Bergson Group and its pressure to create the War Refugee Board... and ponder with me why sometimes it seems so difficult to get recognition from mainstream groups of the very ones you would most expect to applaud.
***
Read this very inspiring and important story about the Bergson Group and its pressure to create the War Refugee Board... and ponder with me why sometimes it seems so difficult to get recognition from mainstream groups of the very ones you would most expect to applaud.
Wednesday, July 2, 2008
My opinion about building "The Third Temple"
My attitude toward the idea of the "Third Temple" being built in Jerusalem, as some have discussed (for both good and bad reasons), is actually quite simple.
If Jews want to build a Third Temple as a way to increase their piety, humility and worship of God, then what is the harm in that? Honoring and worshipping God is only good.
But if the Jews want to build a Third Temple to make a political statement, to stick their finger in some other religion's eye, to try to manipulate divine events to solve everyday political problems, or at the behest of nutty Christians who are nihilistic in their interpretation of scripture, then how stupid would THAT be? To build a Third Temple for any reason than increasing humility, piety and worship of God would be the height of folly.
So if the intentions are totally pure (as the priests must be) then knock yourselves out and build a Third Temple with my blessings. Though I wonder why synagogues are not packed to the rafters around entire country if people are thirsting for greater spirituality. Nonetheless, if you really think that the Third Temple would bring a revival of Jewish piety and faith, then obviously that serves God and it is good.
But if the intentions are not totally pure, check out what happens to places of worship that are impure, as are well documented in the Torah. (Hint: If Christians cite that bad things will be fulfilled when the Third Temple is built, then they are correctly interpreting that if the intentions were impure and the Temple is built, that's not a good thing, and you don't need to be a mystical prophet to figure that out.) I mean, remember, someone died when he touched the Ark while trying to keep it from falling off the transport cart. It's God's way 100 percent or the highway.
If Jews want to build a Third Temple as a way to increase their piety, humility and worship of God, then what is the harm in that? Honoring and worshipping God is only good.
But if the Jews want to build a Third Temple to make a political statement, to stick their finger in some other religion's eye, to try to manipulate divine events to solve everyday political problems, or at the behest of nutty Christians who are nihilistic in their interpretation of scripture, then how stupid would THAT be? To build a Third Temple for any reason than increasing humility, piety and worship of God would be the height of folly.
So if the intentions are totally pure (as the priests must be) then knock yourselves out and build a Third Temple with my blessings. Though I wonder why synagogues are not packed to the rafters around entire country if people are thirsting for greater spirituality. Nonetheless, if you really think that the Third Temple would bring a revival of Jewish piety and faith, then obviously that serves God and it is good.
But if the intentions are not totally pure, check out what happens to places of worship that are impure, as are well documented in the Torah. (Hint: If Christians cite that bad things will be fulfilled when the Third Temple is built, then they are correctly interpreting that if the intentions were impure and the Temple is built, that's not a good thing, and you don't need to be a mystical prophet to figure that out.) I mean, remember, someone died when he touched the Ark while trying to keep it from falling off the transport cart. It's God's way 100 percent or the highway.
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