A Discussion of Circumcision

Sounds like a rousing subject, no?  I thought so too.

Believe it or not, this has been a major topic of conversation at my place of employment this week due to a protest that took place a few days ago.  The hospital I work at has been doing research on the merits of different circumcision devices, and an anti-circumcision group called Intact America staged a protest outside the hospital.

OMG, right? 

In discussing this situation with various co-workers, it struck me that there are a lot of misconceptions about circumcision, its use, its purpose, and its history.  So, naturally, I decided a blog post was in order to provide a little education on the subject.

Though circumcision today is most commonly associated with Jews and Muslims, it has been practiced among humans for thousands of years.  The ancient Egyptians were practicing it, to one degree or another, as far back as 4,500 years ago.

This is a diagram of a carving in a tomb at Saqqara, Egypt, dating from around the time of the pyramids.

It's likely that the ancient Jews picked up the practice from their Egyptian cousins.  In the book of Genesis, when God establishes his "everlasting covenant" with Abraham, he establishes the practice of Jewish circumcision as a requirement for all Jewish males on the 8th day after their birth.  Circumcision, in fact, is not just "a thing" Jews are to do, but it is actually established as the very outward, physical mark of what it means to be a Jew: "it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you" (Genesis 17:11), and "any male who is not circumcised shall be cut off from his people; he has broken my covenant" (v. 14).

In Luke 2:21, the infant son of Mary and Joseph is circumcised on the 8th day and given the name Jesus, in keeping with Jewish law and custom.

In his teaching life, Jesus is never depicted speaking or teaching about circumcision.  Like other Jews of his time, Jesus would have accepted the practice as the social and religious norm, required by God as a sign of his everlasting covenant with the Jewish people.

It was not until after Jesus's death that circumcision became an issue for his followers.  Like Jesus himself, the earliest Christians were all practicing Jews.  They followed all the Jewish rules and customs, ate only kosher foods, practiced all the sacrificial rites, and celebrated the traditional Jewish holidays, including the weekly Sabbath.  Like all Jews, they circumcised their sons.  However, when Christianity began to spread outward from Palestine into the larger Greco-Roman world, many Greeks and Romans were receptive to the message of Jesus, but not at all keen on "becoming Jewish" - that is, on following Jewish dietary laws or, especially, getting circumcised.  The Jewish leaders of Christianity at that time, namely Peter and James, insisted that new Greek and Roman converts must also get circumcised and become Jewish.

This soon became the source of a major rift among the early Christians, with the apostle Paul leading the charge against circumcision (in the book of Philippians, Paul calls Jewish Christians "dogs" and "evil workers" who "mutilate the flesh.")  According to the book of Acts, James and Peter eventually changed their minds and decided to allow new non-Jewish converts to forgo circumcision, as long as they followed certain dietary laws (Acts chapter 15).

Although conversion to Judaism, along with its required circumcision, continued to exist in small circles of Christianity for the next few hundred years, mainline Christianity after the time of Paul gave up the rite and began regarding it as part of the "old covenant" through Abraham, superseded by the "new covenant" through Christ.  Around A.D. 150 (roughly 100 years after Paul's arguments against circumcision) Justin Martyr wrote that circumcision had become a sign not of the covenant between God and the Jews, but a sign that Jews are "separate" from Christians and the rest of the world, and so that Jews, alone, would receive their "just punishments" from God, which Justin equated to the Roman destruction of Jerusalem and other Jewish towns.  These circumcised Jews, according to Justin, deserved to have their towns and cities destroyed because they crucified Jesus.

This vicious anti-Semite is one of the most beloved of the early Church fathers

A papal bull issued in the 1400's by Pope Eugene IV specifically outlawed the practice among Christians and established that it was a mortal sin which would cause "the loss of eternal salvation."
        
Like Christianity before it, Islam also has roots in Judaism, arising in Arabia in the 7th century A.D. (about 600 years after Jesus).  Islam reveres Abraham, Moses, and Jesus as prophets, but not Paul.  As a result, unlike Christianity, Islam never rejected circumcision.  Muslims, from that time to now, circumcise their sons as part of a religious rite.

With all this history in mind, why then do so many modern Americans, who are neither Jewish nor Muslim, circumcise their sons?

From the time of Paul, up through the end of the 19th century, circumcision was virtually unheard of outside of Muslim nations, Jewish communities, and Coptic Christian communities (a form of Christianity practiced in north Africa).  Folks like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Abraham Lincoln, not to mention their millions of fellow countrymen, were virtually universally uncircumcised.  The Encyclopedia Britannica of 1876 described it as a "bodily mutilation" practiced by Jews and Muslims and generally abhorred by Christian nations.

You know you're picturing it.

However, beginning in the late 19th century, doctors in mainly English-speaking nations began promoting circumcision for a variety of health reasons, claiming it could cure or prevent everything from kidney stones to joint disease.  By the first few decades of the 20th century, the practice had become widespread in places like the U.S., Canada, England, and Australia (it did not ever spread in any significant fashion to mainland Europe, Asia, or South America).

As time passed, however, and medical science progressed, it became apparent that the earlier claims for the health benefits of circumcision were not just untrue, many were patently absurd (one very prominent physician claimed the practice could cure childhood paralysis; another popular theory was that it somehow prevented masturbation).  As a result, circumcision began to decline rapidly in England after World War II, and eventually Canada and, to a lesser degree, Australia, followed suit.

In the U.S., however, circumcision has remained common.  Circumcision is practiced more widely in the U.S. than in any country on earth outside of the Middle East and northern Africa.  The practice is very rare (with rates less than 20%) across Europe, Asia, South America, southern Africa, and Central America.  The World Health Organization estimates that roughly 70% of the world's male population is uncircumcised.  Among those who are circumcised throughout the world, roughly 70% are Muslim.  Among non-Muslims and non-Jews, the U.S. has almost as many circumcised men as the entire rest of the world combined.

Even within the U.S., the practice is not geographically equal: it is far more common in the Midwest and Northeast, and less common in the South and (especially) the West (in the last decade, rates have been has high as 80% in the Midwest, and as low as 35% in the West).

Midwesterner, Rick Santorum.  Probably circumcised.

Westerner, Nancy Pelosi.  Probably not circumcised.

Advocates generally argue that circumcision prevents the spread of STD's and is a form of good hygiene.  Both of these claims are controversial.  According to various studies done in recent decades, STD infection is more likely among uncircumcised men.  However, opponents of the practice argue this is not a good enough reason to remove a portion of the penis, since simple safe sex practices can virtually eliminate the risk of STD's.

As for hygiene, though most acknowledge a need for increased care for uncircumcised people, opponents again argue that this is not a good enough reason for removing part of the penis.  The simple fact is that most human males throughout human history, up through the present day, have not been circumcised, and they've managed their personal hygiene just fine.

Despite how supporters of circumcision point to hygiene and STD prevention as reasons for circumcising boys, a WHO study in 2007 found that, in the United States, social conformity is the most commonly cited reason for parents choosing to circumcise their sons.  The same study showed a strong correlation with the father's circumcision status: 90% of circumcised fathers chose to circumcise their sons, compared with just 23% for uncircumcised fathers.

CONCLUSION

I have two daughters, so I never had to make this decision for my own children.  However, if I had had sons, I would have had them circumcised, and I would have made that choice primarily for social conformity.

Despite that, I am with the opponents of circumcision in spirit.  There simply doesn't seem to be any legitimate reason, in a First World nation, for widespread circumcision of male babies.  Safe sex practices and good personal hygiene eliminate the primary biological arguments for circumcision, and if we stopped circumcising, then the social conformity issue would quickly disappear too.

The simple fact is, the very thought of "female circumcision" is shuddered at and referred to as "ritual genital mutilation" (see this fact page from the WHO), yet the same standard is not held for mutilating the genitals of boys.  The foreskin is not an evolutionary accident; it's there for a reason.

In my opinion, there really doesn't seem to be any good argument for continuing its practice on a widespread basis, especially in developed countries where safe sex practices and good hygiene are the norm.

10 Common Biblical Misconceptions

1. Jesus was born in a stable.

Only two biblical writers mention Jesus' birth, and one of those - the writer of Matthew - tells us that Jesus was born in a house.  This makes sense because for Matthew, Jesus and his family lived in Bethlehem.  It was only much later, according to Matthew, that the family moved to Nazareth.

Luke is the biblical author who tells us the family lived in Nazareth and only traveled to Bethlehem, where Jesus was ultimately born.

However, even Luke doesn't mention a stable.

Luke tells us only that Mary gave birth in Bethlehem, and because the guest houses were all full, she had to lay her newborn in a feeding trough.

This statement could imply a stable, but a brief study of historical setting suggests otherwise.  In 1st century urban Judea, animals would have been either tied along the street (where mangers were frequently erected), or kept in the courtyard of larger homes and buildings.  There wouldn't have actually been a stable - at least nothing like what our religious art, plays, and songs like to imagine.

2. Moses wrote the Torah

The Torah, also called the Law of Moses or the Pentateuch, is made up of the first five books of the Old Testament - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.

And Moses didn't write any of it.

Despite both Jewish and Christian tradition attributing these books to Moses, historians have actually identified at least four different authorial strands within these books, with each strand representing not just a different historical era, but even more than one author within each strand.  And none of the strands is as early as the life of the historical Moses, who probably lived three hundred years or more before the first word of the Torah was ever written.

3. The gospels were written by the disciples of Jesus

Although this is a common belief among Christians, even Christian tradition only attributes two of the four gospels to actual disciples of Jesus - Matthew and John.  The books of Mark and Luke have always been attributed to men who never knew Jesus: Mark, the one-time companion of Paul and later secretary of Peter, and Luke, a missionary companion of Paul and also his personal physician.

However, even the gospels of Matthew and John were not actually written by the disciples known as Matthew and John.

Historians date Matthew to sometime during the 80's CE, and John about a decade later, near the turn of the second century.  This means both gospels were written more than fifty years after Jesus died, with John closer to seventy years.  The likelihood that any of Jesus's companions were still alive and lucid enough to write deeply theologically-developed books in highly literate Greek is virtually non-existent.  In fact, the chances that any of Jesus's poor, rural disciples were literate at all, even in their own native language of Aramaic, is highly unlikely, much less in the Greek language in which the gospels were written.

4. The Third Commandment refers to using God's name as a curse word

In the familiar King James Version, the Third Commandment tells us not to "take the name of the Lord thy God in vain."

Despite widespread belief that this verse is talking about the use of God's name as a swear or curse, it is actually referring to hypocrisy.

The original Hebrew phrase "take in vain" means to accept something falsely.  (Source: Biblical Hebrew Lexicon.)

Thus, the commandment warns against falsely accepting the name of God - that is, it warns against claiming to be Godly when you aren't really Godly.  It's a prohibition against hypocrisy.  It has nothing to do with speaking certain exclamations.

5. The Bible teaches that humans either go to heaven or hell when they die

In the Old Testament, hell does not exist at all, and heaven is simply the place where God and God's retinue live, not a place where humans go after death.  Instead, for these ancient Jewish writers, human beings simply enter the grave upon death.

In essence, there is no afterlife in the theology of the Old Testament.

By the time the New Testament was written, afterlife theology of heaven and hell had become common within Judaism, and these beliefs therefore made their way into early Christianity as well.  However, according to the various writers of the New Testament (especially Paul and the writers of 2 Peter and Revelation), heaven and hell await us not at death, but at the end of time.

At death, we humans simply go into the grave.  There we stay until the end of time, when we are resurrected into new life.  At that point, we either get cast into hell, or we are invited to live eternally on a renewed earth.  As such, humans don't actually go to heaven in New Testament theology either.  Instead, they are raised into new life to live in God's kingdom here on earth.  Essentially, heaven comes to earth instead of humans going to heaven.

6. God is judgmental and vindictive in the Old Testament, but loving and kind in the New

It may be true that "God is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow," but human concepts of God are always changing, and that is as much true in the Bible as it is today.  The fact is, God is given both positive and negative attributes throughout both the Old and New Testaments.

For instance, in Psalm 86, God is described as "compassionate," "gracious," and "abounding in love."  In the prophetic writings of Hosea, God is said to "love freely."  In the book of 1 Chronicles, God's love is said to "endure forever."  In fact, throughout the Old Testament, God is routinely described as loving, faithful, merciful, and forgiving.  God does not banish anyone to hell, but instead is frequently portrayed as long-suffering and perpetually willing to overlook the failures and sins of his people.

In the New Testament, on the other hand, the gospel of Matthew refers multiple times to God damning sinners to hell, the book of Acts includes a scene where God strikes dead two Christians for withholding money from the Christian community, and the entire book of Revelation imagines God as an unspeakably angry deity of retribution and judgment.

7. In the Creation story, God created men first 

Actually, it depends on which creation story you read.  In the familiar creation story from the first chapter of Genesis, where God creates the world in six days, the writer simply tells us that God created "male and female" on the final day.  Neither gender is given priority over the other, and both are said to be created in God's own image.

It is not until the second chapter of Genesis, which consists of a completely different creation story written by a different person living in a different era, that "man" is said to have been created first, and "woman" created in man's image in order to be his "helper."

Scholars of the Bible have recognized for over a century that the account of creation found in the second chapter of Genesis (the story of Adam and Eve) is actually an earlier account than the one found in the first chapter (the six-day creation).  At some point in antiquity, the two stories were merged together onto the same scroll and became the first and second chapters of the books we call Genesis.

8. The Jews crucified Jesus

Though the gospels portray Jewish leaders in Jerusalem conniving to have Jesus arrested and crucified, it is an indisputable fact of history that only the Romans had the authority to detain, judge, sentence, and ultimately carry out the execution of criminals.  The gospels portray Jesus being arrested by Roman soldiers, tried before the Roman governor, sentenced by that same governor to death, and later executed in the Roman style on a Roman cross by Roman soldiers.

Even if one accepts the gospel portrayal of the scheming Jewish leaders as historically accurate (a point that is widely questioned by historians), the Jewish leaders hardly represent the entirety of the Jewish people.  In fact, the gospels portray the Jewish people as rallying around Jesus, following him throughout Galilee and into Jerusalem, and flocking to hear him teach.  Even when one crowd of Jewish people calls for Jesus' crucifixion, it is only because the Jewish leaders "stirred them up" (Mark 15).

Sadly, this misconception of Jews as "Christ-killers" has led to centuries of fierce antisemitism that continues unabated to this day.

9. The Vatican has all the original copies of the books of the New Testament 

No original manuscripts of any of the books of the New Testament still exist today.  With the exception of 2 Peter, the New Testament was written between 50 and 100 CE.  A few papyrus scraps of New Testament texts have turned up dated between 125 and 175 CE, but the oldest complete manuscript of a New Testament book goes back only to about the year 200, or more than a century after the original.  The oldest copy of a complete New Testament is the so-called Codex Sinaiticus, which dates to about 350 CE.

10. Mary Magdalene was a prostitute

Nowhere in the New Testament is Mary Magdalene ever said to have been a prostitute.  She and several other women are noted as followers of Jesus who "cared for his needs," and the writer of Luke states that Mary and the other women helped to finance his ministry.  

Luke also states that Jesus had cured Mary of demon possession, and this appears to be the basis for the belief that Mary was a prostitute.  This idea goes back a long way: Pope Gregory I, who became pope in 590 and is known as Saint Gregory the Great, seems to have been the first to make this suggestion, writing that Mary Magdalene is the unnamed "sinful woman" from the gospel of Luke who anoints Jesus prior to his arrest.  A similar story of anointing takes place in Mark, Matthew, and John as well, but only Luke implies that the woman was a prostitute.  Only John names this woman, and he gives her name as Mary.  This led Gregory to the rather spurious conclusion that the "sinful woman" and Mary Magdalene were one and the same.

Spurious or not, the idea persists.  

Christian Opposition to Gay Marriage: A Theological Argument

Read Part I - Christian Opposition to Gay Marriage: A Constitutional Argument

In this first part of this two-part series, we looked at how religious opposition to gay marriage goes against the principles of liberty and secular government, outlined in the Constitution.  It's not that religious people don't have a right to voice their opinion or to be opposed to something they view as sinful; but when religious opinions dictate legislation (as with recent gay marriage laws), the Constitution and civil liberties are thrown out the window.

In that first part, we saw how some modern political groups - most notably the Tea Party - claim to uphold the Constitution and to be rigorous defenders of Constitutional rights, but many of those same Tea Party groups are vocally opposed to gay marriage rights on religious grounds.  I stated that this is but one way in which many gay  marriage opponents are hypocritical.

The other way, of course, is within Christianity itself.  

Most people seem to think the question of gay marriage in general, and homosexuality in particular, is a "no-brainer" as far as the Bible is concerned.  The Bible explicitly condemns homosexuality and homosexual relationships, so any self-respecting Christian should be opposed to it.  In this regard, a Christian friend of mine, who is a minister, stated: "Scripture is clear.  Homosexuality is wrong.  There is no gray area."  In another place, he stated: "I can't just accept the parts about God's love and mercy and forgiveness, and skip over the parts about His holiness and judgement."  In other words, he can't just pick the nice parts, and ignore the difficult parts.  For this reason, he says, "I can't justify [a homosexual lifestyle] with a holy God who calls it a sin."

This "Pick and Choose" argument, as I call it, is one of the most common arguments that Christians use when discussing hot-button topics facing modern society.  I have heard it used in discussions on everything from gay marriage and homosexuality, to abortion, gender roles, and whether or not Jesus is the only viable means of salvation.  Indeed, this argument may be the most commonly used weapon evangelicals wield against "moderate" and "liberal" Christians who they see as watering down the Holy Word.

The problem with this argument, of course, is that there is no such thing as a Christian who does not pick and choose what they like from the Bible and discard or ignore the rest.  Even the most stringent Bible literalist doesn't actually believe everything the Bible says, and doesn't actually follow all of the Bible's teachings.  More on this in a bit.

First, I want to briefly discuss what the Bible does actually say about homosexuality.  I have written extensively on this topic in the past, so if any reader wants more information, they can find it here: Homosexuality and the New Testament.

To put it simply, the Bible has very little to say on homosexuality - but it seems like it says a lot more.  The Torah codifies homosexuality as a sin punishable by death (Leviticus 20:13).  Other passages in the Torah also condemn homosexuality as detestable to God.  In still other parts of the Old Testament, homosexuals are either put to death or expelled from the Jewish kingdom (for instance, 1 Kings 15:12).

There is a two-fold problem here, however.  First of all, anytime critics of Christianity point out all the absurd, and sometimes even downright horrific, rules of the Old Testament, Christians will defend themselves by pointing out that the Old Testament was replaced by the New Testament, and so the rules and regulations of the Old Testament are no longer valid.  Jesus did away with them.  If that's true, of course, it also applies to the Old Testament rules and regulations about homosexuality.  After all, many modern Christians may think homosexuality is a sin, but they don't advocate the death penalty for it.  So for Christians, using Old Testament passages to condemn homosexuality is theologically inconsistent.  Those rules aren't in place anymore, having been "fulfilled" by Jesus.

Secondly, and most importantly, the Old Testament doesn't actually say nearly as much about homosexuality as it appears.  In fact, outside of those outdated Torah rules about putting gay people to death, the Old Testament doesn't ever refer to homosexuality.  In all the many passages that have long been understood as referring to homosexuality, the Hebrew word used there doesn't mean "homosexual" at all, but instead refers explicitly to a temple prostitute.  In the ancient world, fertility cults were extremely common, and part of the way these cults worshipped included ritual sex acts, involving both men and women.  In the Old Testament, when kings are shown expelling "homosexuals" or "sodomites" from their kingdom, the text is actually referring to pagan fertility cults being disbanded.  This is so widely recognized today that even the widely-read NIV and the New King James Version have translated the word as "male temple prostitutes" instead of the traditional King James word "sodomites."

At this point, you might be asking, "But what about the New Testament?"

Like the Old Testament, the New Testament only seems to say a lot about homosexuality.  Famous passages in both 1 Corinthians and 1 Timothy use a Greek word that has been translated as "homosexual" or "homosexual offenders" (or the classic King James phrase "abusers of themselves with mankind"), but linguists and scholars today understand that this word's meaning is basically unknown.  It is never attested in any Greek text prior to Paul's usage of it in 1 Corinthians, and it simply isn't clear what he was referring to - it has even been suggested that Paul coined the word himself.  There were, in fact, several widely-used words in ancient Greek that referred to homosexuality - "pedophilia," which referred to men having sex with boys, and "kinaidos," which basically referred to the size of one's rectum.  Whatever Paul's word meant, there simply isn't any reason to assume it meant "gay men."  In my own study of the issue, I think the most appropriate translation of the word is "pimp" - that is, someone who benefits monetarily from sex.  The link I provided above goes into a lot more detail about this issue.

In any case, we are left, in the New Testament, with just one passage that definitely talks about homosexuality, and that is a text found in Romans 1, where Paul laments men and women who give up natural relations in order to have sex with people of the same gender.  But here, as in the Old Testament passages, this reference to homosexuality is related to ritual sex in pagan temples.  The context of the passage makes that crystal clear, and Paul almost certainly had an eye on the Old Testament passages we saw above that talk about ancient Jewish kings expelling fertility cults from the land.  And remember, Paul was writing to the Christians in Rome, where fertility cults were commonplace.  He was encouraging them not to be led astray by these false gods, which were "man-made things" made to look like birds and reptiles (think of the animal gods of ancient Egypt).

With all these issues in mind, is it actually true that the Bible is crystal clear on the issue of homosexuality, as asserted by my minister friend?  Or are the waters much, much murkier?  In fact, I think the waters are unquestionably murky.  About the only thing we can say with confidence is that the Bible clearly condemns pagan fertility cults and those who take part in them.  Just about everything else is debatable.

As such, should Christians be attempting to legislate morality on an issue that is not even particularly clear in the Bible?  Shouldn't Christians be more concerned with issues that are, in fact, clear in the Bible, like feeding the poor, helping the sick, and living a lifestyle of unrestrained love and mercy?

Of course, I think the answer to that first question is no, and to the second question yes, but my theological argument goes even farther than that. I want to turn now to the "Pick and Choose" phenomenon I mentioned above.

As I explained, one of the first arguments sophisticated Christians make when confronted with social issues is that a Christian can't just pick and choose what they want to believe.  You have to accept the whole deal; you can't just follow some things, and reject the others.  This is sometimes referred to as "buffet-style Christianity," taking what you want and ignoring the rest.

And this is where the real hypocrisy comes into play in regards to Christians who are opposed to gay marriage on Biblical grounds.  Let's agree for a moment that the Bible actually is crystal clear on the issue of homosexuality.  Let's agree that homosexuality is an unquestionable sin and should be condemned.

Of all the sins and unrighteous ways of living outlined in the Bible, why is this one so important?  Not just so important that Christians need to voice their opinion about the sinfulness of the gay lifestyle, but so important that they actually need to amend their state constitutions - and maybe even the U.S. constitution - in order to deny gay people the right to get married?  Why this sin, and not something else?

In 1 Corinthians, there is a passage that is very frequently referred to by people arguing against gay marriage.  This is one of the passages I noted above where the meaning of the word used is unclear and probably did not refer to homosexuality.  But, as above, let's agree for a moment that it does refer to homosexuals.  In that passage, Paul is imploring his audience to live righteous lives and to flee from immorality.  He lists several sins which will keep believers from "inheriting the kingdom of God."  Among these are sexual immorality, drunkenness, greed, idolatry, adultery, and homosexuality.  Why is homosexuality the most important thing in that list?  Why not focus on greed, or drunkenness?  Why not re-enact the 18th Amendment and put Prohibition back in place?  Why not amend the constitution to outlaw sex outside of marriage?

The fact is, there is no legitimate justification for putting homosexuality above the others.  There is no Biblical justification for denying gays the same rights as everyone else, even if you think it's a sin.  You may think sex outside of marriage is a sin too, but you sure aren't trying to keep those who have had premarital sex from being able to get married!

And the biggest one here, of course, is adultery.  If you judge a sin's importance by how often it is referred to or condemned in the Bible, adultery is probably the Number One Biblical Sin.

And just what is adultery, by the Bible's definition?  Quite simply, adultery is when a married person has sex with someone other than their spouse, or when a non-married person has sex with someone who is married to someone else.  At its core, adultery is about infidelity and unfaithfulness.  This is why, throughout the Bible, "adultery" is used as a metaphor for unfaithfulness to God.

In the Gospels, Jesus speaks about adultery on several occasions.  In fact, Jesus uses the word "adultery" no less than fourteen times.  One of his teachings, which is repeated in Mark, Matthew, and Luke, dealt with adultery and divorce.  Here, Jesus states that even looking lustfully at someone who is not your spouse is the same as adultery.  He goes on to say that Moses was wrong in allowing people to get divorced for any reason.  In fact, he argues, if you get divorced for any reason other than infidelity, and then get remarried, you are committing adultery.

This passage, of course, has been the basis for many rules and regulations within modern churches about divorced people.  I grew up being taught that getting divorced for any reason other than unfaithfulness was a sin, and so was remarriage after such a divorce.  I also grew up in a church that did not allow divorced people to have leadership roles like minister or deacon; many modern churches still have rules like that.  If a divorced person wants to remarry, some churches won't allow them to have the ceremony in their church, and some ministers won't marry anyone who has been divorced.      

So with this in mind, and considering that adultery is essentially the biggest sin in the Bible, why aren't Christians fighting to ban divorced people from getting remarried?  Why aren't they arguing that such marriages harm the sanctity of marriage, as ordained by God?  Why aren't they pointing out that divorced people who get remarried are living a sinful lifestyle of adultery?

Scripture is clear.  Remarriage after divorce is wrong.  There is no gray area.

I hope you get my point here.  Christian opposition to gay marriage is inconsistent with the way Christians react to other teachings in the Bible.  I don't know any Christians who are fighting to amend a state constitution to ban divorced people from getting remarried.  I don't know any Christians who would disallow a divorced-and-remarried person to  be an active and accepted member of their church community.  I don't know any Christians who are "hung up" on people getting divorced and remarried.

And yet there are millions of Christians out there trying to ban gay marriage, ostracizing unrepentant gay people from their churches, trying "cure" gay people of their sins, and who are, in general, definitely "hung up" on gay rights.

And these same people, of course, will turn around and accuse a gay rights Christian of "picking and choosing" what they believe, while ignoring the fact that virtually no Christian believes it's a sin for a woman to have short hair, or a man to have long hair (1 Corinthians 11), virtually no Christian believes a woman should not be permitted to have authority over a man (1 Timothy 2), and virtually no Christian believes that slaves should be content in their way of life and faithfully obey their masters (1 Corinthians 7; Ephesians 6).

The Pick and Choose argument, in the end, is just a lot of hypocritical smoke and mirrors to justify prejudice against gay people, and legislating discrimination based on that prejudice.  It is an inconsistent argument that makes false assumptions about what the Bible actually says about homosexuality, and presupposes that "good" Christians follow everything the Bible teaches, even though that is demonstrably not true.

In the end, opposition to gay marriage is not about religion at all.  It's about the fact that many people are simply uncomfortable with gay people, afraid of gay lifestyles, and generally find the whole issue of homosexuality distasteful.  Many of those people then simply open their Bibles to find ways to justify their prejudice.  It's a method of operation that has been going on in Christian society for many hundreds of years.  700 years ago, Christians used the Bible to persecute Jews and other non-Christians.  500 years ago, Christians used the Bible to condemn Galileo.  200 years ago, Christians used the Bible to support and condone the institution of slavery.  100 years ago, Christians used the Bible to deny equal rights for women.  And today, they are using the Bible to justify discrimination against gay people.

Fortunately, history shows that they will lose this argument as they have lost all the others.  Fifty years from now, no one will have a problem with gay marriage, except for a few nutty people on the fringes of mainstream religion.  Gay people are going to win their rights to get married, and it will eventually happen in every state.  Christians today who are opposed to gay marriage will either die out or will reluctantly give in to the changing times and the irresistible force of progress, just as they did with slavery and women's rights.  In the future, the fact that there was so much opposition to gay marriage will be an embarrassment to self-respecting Americans.            

That, at least, gives me some hope.








 

Taking God's Name in Vain

If you are a regular and long-time reader of my blog, or if you have purchased my book "Christianity is a Verb," you will know that I have written on this topic before.  Never fear, my intention is not to rehash my arguments, but to provide an "update" of sorts.

In that previous post, I broke down the individual Hebrew words of the 3rd Commandment and argued that it is not talking about using God's name as an expletive (i.e., stubbing your toe and saying "Goddammit!"), but rather, it is talking about not accepting the name of God upon yourself if you don't really mean it; in other words, don't claim to be Godly (a Jew, a Christian, a Muslim, etc.,) if you aren't really living the lifestyle that goes along with it.

Everyone is familiar with this sort of argument - within Christianity, the notion of someone claiming to be a Christian, but not living like a Christian, is so widespread as to be almost banal.  When we hear of someone committing murder in the name of Jesus, we say they aren't really a Christian.  When we hear of Christian priests and monks fighting in the Church of the Nativity at Christmas, we say they aren't acting like Christians.  On the other hand, when we see someone who is a good, upstanding, ethical person, we call them a "good Christian," and say they are truly living like Christ.

This is what the 3rd Commandment is talking about.  Claiming to be Godly, but not acting Godly; claiming to be a Christian, but not living like a Christian.  The focus of the commandment is to be sincere in your devotion to God.

It has nothing to do with using words like "God," and "Jesus," and "Christ" as cuss words or expletives.  Many people find such language offensive, but when they point to the 3rd Commandment to back up that view (i.e., "Don't take the Lord's name in vain!!" after hearing someone say "Goddammit!"), they are simply misunderstanding what that commandment meant in its original context.  Saying "Goddammit" is not taking the Lord's name in vain.  Saying you are a Godly person, and then doing ungodly things: that is taking the Lord's name in vain.

It's true, of course, that many people would consider "foul language" to be ungodly.  In that sense, then, you could argue that the 3rd Commandment encompasses using God's name as an expletive - as well as any other explicit or foul language a person might use.  But I've sure never heard anyone scold someone for saying "shit" by telling them not to take the Lord's name in vain.

The fact is, when you read what the verse actually says, there is simply no reason to assume it had anything to do with using God's name as an expletive.  It's interesting to point out that the verse does not say: "Do not use the name of the Lord in vain," or "Do not speak the name of the Lord in vain."  It says: "Do not take the name of the Lord in vain."

This is interesting because in many modern English translations of the Bible, they have done away with this King James phraseology ("take in vain") and translated the word as "misuse" - "Do not misuse the name of the Lord."  This is true in both the popular NIV and the favorite of New Testament scholars, the NRSV.

But the word in question didn't mean "misuse."  I can only chalk this up to the modern translations being influenced by modern notions of what this phrase means (i.e., that it teaches not to use God's name as an expletive).  If you read Strong's Concordance with Hebrew and Greek Lexicon - which is the authoritative publication on the translation of words and phrases in the Bible - it is very clear that the Hebrew word in question meant nothing like "misuse."  It means "to take" or "to carry" or "to lift up."  When you read this same word in other passages, it's meaning becomes perfectly clear.  To give just one example, Genesis 13:10: "And Lot lifted up his eyes and beheld all the plain of the Jordan."  This word absolutely does not mean "misuse."

If the writers of the Jewish scriptures (or, God, if you prefer) had meant for the 3rd Commandment to be talking about using God's name as an expletive, wouldn't have the sentence read: "Do not speak the name of the Lord in vain"?  But it doesn't say that.  It says don't "take" the name of the Lord in vain.  "Take" doesn't mean "speak."  It means to grab something, or carry something, or accept something.  If I say: "Congress is useless," would you describe that as me taking something about Congress?  Of course not; that doesn't even make sense.  I have said something about Congress, not taken something.

"Taking" God's name in vain has nothing to do with speech or utterance.  It means exactly what it says: "take" means to carry something or accept something.  Thus, the commandment is telling us not to accept the name of God, not to carry the name of God on our shoulders, while at the same time doing nothing to imply that we are actually people of God.  A Chicago Cub wouldn't wear a Cincinnati Reds jersey, because he's not a Cincinnati Red.  He's a Cub.  In the same way, a person shouldn't take the name of God upon themselves if they aren't really a Godly person.

This is what the 3rd Commandment means.

The Theology of Jesus

I've been thinking a lot recently about the theology espoused by Jesus.  Yes, I admit, I sit around thinking about things like this.

In thinking about these things, I have come to realize - and even marvel at - how different Jesus's theology was compared to modern Christian theology.  For those who read my blog a lot, it may come as a surprise to discover that I have only just recently come to grips with a firm and clear understanding of what Jesus's basic theology entailed.  More on that in a minute.  

First, it might be important to define what I mean by "theology."  Simply put, theology refers to what you believe about God or supernatural things.  Ancient Egyptians, for instance, believed that when you died, you were judged by a divine tribunal, headed by the god Osiris.  Your heart was weighed against the feather of the goddess Ma'at.  If you had lived by Ma'at's precepts during your life (in other words, if you were a "good" person), you would pass that test and be presented to Osiris, who would ultimately grant you eternal life.  If your heart did not pass the test against the feather of Ma'at, you would be fed to the goddess Amemet, who was part hippo and part lion, with the head of a crocodile, and who had the job of devouring the hearts (and thus the life force) of the wicked.

This, then, is theology.  It's what you believe about divine things.  

When we look at the theology of modern Christianity, we find, of course, that it is all over the map.  This is why both Mother Theresa and a member of the KKK can claim to be Christians.  But it is certainly possible to describe the most common aspects of modern Christianity - those theological beliefs that are most widely adhered to by everyday, practicing Christians. 

In a nutshell, modern, mainstream Christian theology states that Jesus was the divine son of God who became a great prophet and healer, doing the work of God and spreading God's message to his followers.  He was crucified and buried, and then was physically resurrected through the power of God.  Because of his resurrection, human beings can be reconciled to God by accepting Jesus as their savior and asking forgiveness for their sins.  If they do this, they will go to heaven when they die, to live eternally.  If they do not accept Jesus, they will spend eternity in separation from God, which, for most Christians, means going to hell.

But when we turn to the pages of the New Testament itself, to see what Jesus, himself, actually did and said during his life, we find something completely different - virtually nothing like the theology of mainstream Christianity.  

Before I even begin here, I want to point out that what follows is not my own pet theory about Jesus.  It's not some harebrained idea that I've put together.  It is basically Jesus Theology 101, similar to what any student would be taught at any mainstream seminary across the country.  I stick to the basics and discuss only those things that are widely-accepted and established among scholars, historians, and theologians.     

To begin with, Jesus said explicitly that his message was only for Jews - for the children of Abraham.  This wasn't an effort on Jesus's part to be ethnocentric, or to exclude someone who was not ethnically Jewish.  Anyone could follow him, but following his teachings included following the teachings of the Jewish scriptures - including all the purity laws of Moses.  Doing so, however, would by definition make you a Jew.  A Jew is not just someone of a specific ethnic background, but also of a specific religious background.  In the same way that a person today can be ethnically non-Jewish, but Jewish by religion, this was true in the 1st century as well.  Jesus welcomed everyone, but he also taught that Jewish laws and customs had to be followed, because they came from God.  Ethical teachings from the Jewish scriptures were essentially the basis of Jesus's own ethical teachings.    

Secondly, Jesus was a firm and outspoken apocalyptist.  What I mean by that is that Jesus believed the end of the world was right around the corner.  He says this explicitly in the gospels, even affirming that the end would happen within his own generation, and within the lifespans of many of his followers.  No matter how uncomfortable this might make people, it is a fact that simply cannot be ignored.  It's right there in the texts of the New Testament.  For instance, in Mark, chapter 13, he tells his disciples all the things they are going to see at the end of the world, and then goes on to say: "When you see these things happening, you will know that [the end] is near, right at the door."  He follows this up even more explicitly by saying: "This generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened."  

So Jesus was a dyed-in-the-wool apocalyptist, believing that the world was coming to an end.  But what, exactly, did this end-of-the-world scenario look like?  What was going to take place?

In short, the world would descend farther and farther into chaos.  Wars would occur between nations.  Many people would die.  Eventually, Israel itself would be consumed and overrun.  But then God would intervene and establish what one scholar has called "the Great Divine Clean-Up" of the world.  His agent for this clean up would be a figure called the Son of Humanity (or "Son of Man" in earlier Christian parlance).  Many debates exist about who Jesus thought this person was, with the most common conclusion being that it was Jesus himself; but many other scholars argue that Jesus was talking about a different person all together, or maybe even using an expression meant to refer to the Jewish people as a whole.     

In any case, how can a person ensure that they are on the right side of God when the Son of Humanity comes to institute the Great Divine Clean-Up?  Easy; by following the path of righteousness taught by Jesus, which essentially meant being a good person and following God's commandments as outlined in the Jewish scriptures, especially the commandments about loving others, helping others, and performing acts of loving-kindness.  If you do that, Jesus said, you will be among God's chosen people; you will be on the right side of the fence when the end of time occurs.

So what, then, will happen during the Great Divine Clean-Up?  Put simply, God will sweep away all the powers and nations of the earth, which have grown out of the corruption of sin, going all the way back to Adam.  Essentially, God will push the "reset" button.  The kingdom of God, sometimes called the kingdom of heaven, will be enthroned here on earth, and will rule a new earth, transformed from the old, corrupted earth on which we now live.  It will be an earth like God originally envisioned for humanity, where human beings will live in harmony together, loving God and one another, and living for eternity in this blissful paradise that is essentially a remaking of the Garden of Eden.  No one will "go to heaven."  Instead, heaven, essentially, will come here, to this planet, to earth.  

Jesus says that the coming Son of Humanity will institute all of this, and will "gather his chosen ones from the four corners of the earth."  In other words, all of those who followed Jesus's path of righteousness will be gathered together, where they will become the inheritors of God's renewed earthly kingdom.  When Jesus said that "the meek" and "the poor" and "the persecuted" will inherit the earth, he wasn't talking metaphorically.  He meant that statement quite literally.  The ones who follow God will literally become the future rulers of God's renewed earth.

So what about evil people?  And what about those who are already dead when all this takes place?

As for those wicked people who are still alive at the end, they will effectively be cast out of God's renewed earth.  Their bodies (presumably still living), will be thrown into hell.  Hell, for Jesus, was not the supernatural dimension of Medieval Catholicism and modern day fundamentalism, but was instead a quite literal place, right here on earth - just as God's kingdom is a literal kingdom right here on the literal earth.  The word Jesus uses, which is translated into English as "hell", is the Greek word "Gehenna."  This Greek word, in turn, was a reference to the Valley of Hinnom, which was a literal valley on the southwest side of ancient Jerusalem that you can still walk through to this day.  At its most southern point, it met up with the Kidron Valley, which is also mentioned in New Testament writings (in the Gospel of John, Jesus crosses the Kidron Valley to get to the Garden of Gethsemane).

In ancient times, the Valley of Hinnom was essentially where Jerusalem's garbage dump was located.  As such, it was an immensely "unclean" place, where no self-respecting 1st century Jew would ever venture.  In addition to dumping refuse there, corpses would be placed there as well, if the deceased had no one to pay for a burial (such as a homeless person or criminal).  Ancient writers indicate that this enormous pile of garbage burned year-round.  

The Valley of Hinnom had long been associated with punishment and judgment in Jewish thought.  Jewish scripture (specifically, 2 Chronicles and Jeremiah) indicates that the Valley of Hinnom was the place where Canaanites performed religious rituals, including the sacrificing of children in fire, and another account - this time in Isaiah - indicates that the fires of the Hinnom Valley would consume the enemies of Israel (specifically, the Assyrians).  

So by the time of Jesus, the Valley of Hinnom was viewed as the unclean place where pagans, in the "olden days," had burned their children in sacrifices to their evil gods, and where now an enormous pile of garbage, topped with the corpses of criminals and other evil-doers, burned in perpetuity.

It is not hard to understand, then, why Jesus, and other Jews of his day, began imagining the Hinnom Valley as a place of divine retribution - Isaiah had indicated that very thing more than 700 years earlier.  

So whenever Jesus mentions "hell" in the New Testament, he is explicitly referring to the literal Valley of Hinnom, ancient Jerusalem's burning garbage dump.  His teachings indicate that the wicked who are still alive at the end of time will be cast into the Valley of Hinnom, where their bodies will be consumed and ultimately destroyed by the fires that never go out.  

And this is a key, and quite eye-opening, aspect of Jesus's theology.  He never says, not even one time, that wicked people will go to hell and suffer there forever (as many modern Christians, particularly evangelicals, believe).  I remember growing up and wondering how someone could live forever in hell, without ever dying.  It made me shudder to imagine experiencing the scorching pain of fire, for all eternity, without the ability to "die" and make it go away.  In fact, Jesus never, ever, ever, not even once, says such a thing about hell.  Instead, he says that the bodies of the wicked will be destroyed there.  It is the fire that is eternal, not the body inside the fire.  

For many modern Christians, the punishment of not following Jesus is having to burn eternally in hell.  Jesus wasn't nearly that vindictive.  For Jesus, simply dying, having your body permanently annihilated, and not getting to take part in the renewed earth, was punishment enough. 

As for the wicked who have already died, Jesus never really mentions this group of people explicitly, but one can assume that they will simply remain dead.  Their bodies have already been destroyed by natural processes.  They have already gotten their just desserts.  

So what, then, about the good people who have already died?  Those who followed Jesus's path, but who died before the End?  Unlike the wicked who have died, the righteous will be resurrected - their bodies will literally come back to life and rise up out of their graves and tombs.  The Son of Humanity, through God, will restore them back to life, to join up with the others who were are still alive.              

All these things, then, make up the gist of Jesus's theology.  The world is coming to an end, very, very soon.  Jesus, himself, brings the good news of the coming kingdom of God, and tells people what they need to do to prepare - essentially, they need to follow the teachings of Jewish scripture.  When the End comes, God will send the mysterious Son of Humanity, who will gather the living from around the earth, and separate the good from the wicked.  The good will inherit God's renewed earthly kingdom, and becomes its rulers from Jerusalem.  The wicked will be cast into the Hinnom Valley where their bodies will be destroyed.  Of those who are already dead, the righteous will be resurrected to join in the festivities of the new earth.  The wicked who are already dead will, presumably, just remain that way.  All of this is going to happen within a few years, or maybe a few decades at most.    

This is Jesus's theology in a nutshell.

And, of course, it doesn't take a theologian or Biblical scholar to point out that it is practically nothing like what modern Christians believe.  To modern Christian sensibilities, in fact, it would no doubt seem absolutely preposterous.  Heaven isn't on earth, it's up in the sky, or it's in some kind of otherworldly dimension.  You don't have to wait until the end of time to be resurrected - your soul is resurrected to heaven immediately upon your death.  People aren't sent to hell to be killed, they go there after they die, and they live there forever in torment and agony.  Jesus's message wasn't just to the Jews of his own day, it was to all people in all time periods.  Jesus didn't expect the world to end in the 1st century - that would mean Jesus was wrong about something!  

Unfortunately, these things simply are not consistent with what the New Testament gospels explicitly tell us about Jesus and his life and beliefs and theological dispositions.  For Jesus, heaven was the place God lived, not the place where humans go after death.  Human beings don't go to heaven.  They die and await resurrection at the end of time, where they will be raised up to live again on a renewed earth.  The end of time is not thousands of years in the future; it's literally going to happen in the next few years.  Jesus's message is for anyone who wants to hear it, but it involves essentially becoming Jewish by following Jewish laws and religious customs.  Wicked people don't burn in hell for all eternity.  If they are still alive at the End, they are thrown into the burning garbage dump of the Hinnom Valley, where their bodies are destroyed.  

It is my firm and passionate belief that if Christians want to step more fully into the lifestyle that Jesus taught and gave his own life for, it is vitally important to understand who he was, and what he taught, and why he taught it, even if those things are uncomfortable.  As many great theologians and Christian scholars have come to realize over the centuries, the fact that Jesus was, effectively, a failed apocalyptist, does not mean that Jesus, himself, was a failure, or that Christianity is a fraud.  It simply means that Christians have to come to a deeper understanding of what it means to follow Jesus and to be a practicing Christian in the 21st century.  And this frequently means jettisoning old ideas and old ways of thinking that simply do not hold up to scrutiny of the texts of the Bible.  It means joining Jesus on his path of righteousness, following him in his lifestyle of love, kindness, and living for others.  For Christians in the 21st century, this is what it means to attain salvation and commune with God.    

Paul vs. Matthew: A Christian Conundrum

From Paul's letter to the Romans, circa 58 C.E., chapter 7, verse 6:

But now we are discharged from the Law, dead to that which held us captive, so that we are slaves not under the old written code but in the new life of the Spirit.

From Matthew's Gospel, circa 85 C.E., from the lips of Jesus during the Sermon on the Mount, chapter 5, verses 17 to 20:

Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

Christianity and Old Testament Law, Part II

In Part I of this series, we saw that Christian tradition has long rejected the need for Christians to follow Old Testament Law. This tradition goes back a long way; indeed, all the way back to the mid-1st century and the Apostle Paul. We looked briefly at what exactly this Law is – called by various names, it was the complete set of legal, cultural, and religious codes outlined in Jewish scriptures, called the Old Testament by Christians.

We also saw, however, that Jesus – as depicted in the Gospel tradition – seems to have strongly affirmed adherence to Jewish Law. Indeed, most scholars today agree that Jesus is best understood as a 1st century Jewish male living in the Jewish homeland and working and teaching within Judaism and its practices. We looked at several pieces of Gospel text that confirm this portrait, including an eye-raising teaching from the Sermon on the Mount in which Jesus explicitly denies that his purpose was to “abolish” Jewish Law. In this passage, Jesus instead affirms that his followers are expected to follow Old Testament Law down to the letter, so that their adherence to the Law surpasses even that of the Pharisees, who were famous in Jesus’s day for their commitment to these traditions.

CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS

Christian apologists frequently explain that God’s Law from the Old Testament was given to and for God’s chosen people, the Jews. The “Law of Christ,” however, was given for all people, and superseded the earlier, uniquely Jewish, Law. In this understanding, Jewish Law was the original “path of salvation,” but was provided only to Jews. The Law of Christ, however, replaced the old ways, providing a new “path of salvation” and given to all people, not just Jews.

Apologists will additionally argue that while Jesus’s earthly message was directed at Jews, God used Paul to expand Jesus’s “mission field” and bring the message to Gentiles. Paul himself makes this argument, stating that the message was “for the Jew first, but also for the Greek [i.e. ‘non-Jew’]”.

Thus, even though Jesus came only to Jews, his mission was just the beginning. Paul came along next, almost like a “part two,” to continue God’s plan and expand the message to non-Jews. Paul understood Jesus’s death and resurrection as the ultimate atonement for human sin, and thus argued that the Law of Moses was no longer necessary for salvation. It had been replaced by the Law of Christ, a phrase Paul himself uses at least twice in his letters, and which involves faith in the atoning nature of Jesus’s death and resurrection. In Romans, Paul also states categorically that: “Christ is the end of the Law.”

This would work well as an explanation of Christian rejection of Old Testament Law if not for that pesky, absolutist statement of Jesus from the Sermon on the Mount. Let’s look at it again:

Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.

As we saw in Part I, Jesus makes it clear in this statement that Jewish laws and customs – the Old Testament Law of Moses – is not simply for Jews. After all, this is a statement recorded in Christian scripture for Christian readers by a Christian evangelist. Nor is the Law only valid for a short period of time, until Paul comes along in a few decades. No, according to Jesus, the Law is forever, and he specifically and explicitly counters the notion that his purpose is to “abolish the Law or the Prophets” (as Paul asserts in Romans). In fact, Jesus says, one cannot enter the kingdom of God unless one not only adheres to the Law, but adheres even better and more stringently and more loyally than the Pharisees, who were famous for their righteousness.

HISTORICAL CONTEXT

So how are Christians to understand this passage? How can we reconcile Jesus’s words with our own Christian practice in the modern world? To begin with, let me make one thing clear: I don’t believe the historical Jesus made this statement, and there are several reasons I can give to support this.

First, the teaching that Jesus contradicts – that is, the suggestion that he has come to “abolish the Law and the Prophets” – is a post-Easter, early Christian problem. In fact, it was specifically a problem related to Paul’s mission to the Gentiles, which occurred, quite obviously, after Jesus’s death. It was not a problem, or an accusation, that would have existed during Jesus’s life. Thus, there would have been no reason for him to address a problem that didn’t exist.

Secondly, in addition to countering the notion that he has come to “abolish” the Law, Jesus also ominously states that any person who breaks the commandments, and teaches others to do the same (think of Paul and his followers), is excluded from the kingdom of heaven. This is clearly a case of the writer of Matthew attacking notions begun by Paul that Jewish laws and customs didn’t have to be followed.

Finally, scholars and theologians have recognized for centuries that Matthew’s Gospel is the most “Jewish” of all the Gospels of the New Testament. There can be no question that the writer of Matthew was a Jewish Christian writing to a Jewish Christian audience. His readers were concerned about the growing tendency among Gentile Christians to throw away Mosaic Law. Thus, this writer put a statement on the lips of Jesus to directly and explicitly address that problem.

In the end, it seems unlikely to me that the historical Jesus ever actually uttered this statement.

A NUGGET OF AUTHENTICITY

Despite my historical conclusion about Matthew’s use of this quote, there may be a nugget of authentic Jesus material in this saying. In particular, I am referring to the second sentence in the statement: “I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.” This particular saying comes from the Q Gospel – in other words, it is also present, in a slightly different form, in Luke. From chapter 16: “It is easier for heaven and earth to disappear than for the least stroke of a pen to drop out of the Law.”

If scholars are right about the Q Gospel – and I think they are – then it was a collection of sayings attributed to Jesus that was first written down around the year 50 C.E. – contemporary with the letters of Paul. Used by Luke and Matthew when they wrote their Gospels, it predates the Gospel of Mark – the earliest Gospel in the New Testament – by as many as twenty years. If my own theory is correct, this Q Gospel may have originally been known as the Gospel of Matthew (with our own Gospel of Matthew being an extension of it), written in Aramaic, and composed by the disciple of Jesus known to history as Matthew or Levi.

Regardless of my own pet theory, if the mainstream ideas about the Q Gospel are correct, then this saying may have historical reliability, simply by virtue of being among the earliest written material attributed to Jesus.

Thus, if Jesus did make this statement – that not the least “stroke of a pen” will ever disappear from the Law – then there is something there to be considered for the modern follower of Jesus. What might Jesus have meant with such a statement? It’s clear that Matthew took it to mean that the Law was for all Christians for all time. But Luke had a different perspective and placed it in a different narrative context. In Luke’s Gospel, Jesus says:

The Law and the Prophets were proclaimed until John. Since that time, the good news of the kingdom of God is being preached, and everyone is forcing his way into it. It is easier for heaven and earth to disappear than for the least stroke of a pen to drop out of the Law.

Luke’s own perspective on this quote seems to be a negative one. The Law was valid until John the Baptizer – Jesus’s mentor. Since then, the kingdom of God has been preached. Presumably for Luke, as it was for Paul, the “kingdom of God” is an alternative to the Law and the Prophets. Indeed, it is replacing the Law and the Prophets. Thus, Jesus laments how difficult and slow this change has been – it is easier for the universe to disappear than for people to give up their adherence to the old ways. In this regard, the statement is reminiscent of another famous quip by Jesus: “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.”

So which way was it? Did Jesus mean this statement positively, as asserted by Matthew, or did Jesus make this statement as a lament about how long it takes people to break old habits? My feeling is that Matthew’s perspective is closer to the truth. Luke’s perspective reflects Christianity of the late 1st century – Christians were breaking away from Judaism, but most Jews refused to give up the old ways and turn to God’s new way. Thus, I think Matthew probably retains the original spirit of the Q material, whereas Luke redacted it towards the negative. Instead of “heaven and earth” disappearing before the Law is abolished (as in Matthew), it is now “easier for heaven and earth to disappear” than it is for the old ideas to give way to the new. This is a distinct reflection of late 1st century Gentile Christianity, and not the early 1st century Jewish Jesus.

CONCLUSION

So we’re left with the same problem. It is historically probable that Jesus said something akin to the quote recorded by Matthew. If we accept this as true, how does this impact our own Christian lives? Should we be following Jewish customs and traditions? Should we not be planting two different seeds in the same field? Should we not be blending cotton and linen? Should we be eating only kosher foods? Should we, in short, be Jewish Christians?

I wish I could provide some valuable and profound theological insight here. I really wish I could. But I honestly don’t have any very good answers. Jesus was a Jew, living in the Jewish homeland, preaching and teaching within the bounds of 1st century Judaism. He taught his followers that Jewish laws and customs were part of God’s eternal plan for humanity. His earliest followers believed ardently that Christianity and Judaism could not and should not be separated.

For those of us who aim to follow Jesus on the Way of personal and spiritual transformation of ourselves and our world, this is a perspective worth pondering.

Christianity and Old Testament Law, Part I

One of the oldest traditions in Christianity is the belief that Jewish laws and customs are not binding upon followers of Christ. When Jesus died, the argument goes, he rendered Mosaic Law irrelevant. Salvation, then, comes from belief in Jesus’s death and resurrection, and not from following the rules and regulations of the Old Testament.

This tradition goes back to the earliest days of Christianity, and the basic formulation was developed by Paul and taught amongst the congregations he founded throughout the eastern half of the Roman Empire. Today, not only are Paul’s letters used to support this notion, but even words attributed to Jesus can be called upon to undergird the tradition.

What exactly are these commandments, and why don’t Christians follow them?

JEWISH LAW AND CUSTOM

First, it is necessary to clear the air on what is meant by common phrases such as “Jewish Law,” “Mosaic Law,” “The Law and the Prophets,” or sometimes just “the Law.” All of these phrases mean the same thing, but there seems to be a lot of confusion in many circles about exactly what they refer to.

Jewish Law came in two parts, and it included far more than simply legal codes dictating criminal and civil offenses. To be sure, Jewish Law included these things, but it also included rules and regulations dictating daily behavior and customs of the Jewish people. It included things such as how to make clothes, how to plant fields and how to raise cattle, how to treat others in relationships, how to prepare food, how to structure family life, and so on. Of course, it also detailed the sacrificial system of ancient Judaism. In short, it was a complete system of legal, religious, and cultural codes for living as a Jew in the ancient world.

The first aspect of this Jewish Law consisted of written laws and customs. Most came from the Torah – that is, the first five books of the Christian Old Testament, also called the Pentateuch, and believed by the ancient Jews to have been given by Moses. By the time of Jesus, Jewish scripture included a lot more than just these five books. There were also texts detailing Jewish history, books of poetry, proverbs, and literature, and books of prophecy. Some Jewish sects, both then and know, followed only the Torah. Mainstream Judaism, however, regarded these other traditional Jewish texts as scripture, and this is where familiar New Testament phrases such as “the Law and the Prophets” come from. The Law was the Torah; the Prophets were the books of prophecy such as Isaiah, Jeremiah, and a dozen others.

In addition to this written aspect of Jewish Law – those codes and customs outlined in Jewish scripture – there was also an oral aspect that consisted of the interpretation of these codes and customs. This interpretive aspect of Jewish Law was well established in oral form by the time of Jesus, but did not achieve codification in written form until several centuries after the time of Jesus. Collectively called the Talmud, these interpretative traditions were the hallmark of the Pharisees, an influential group of 1st century Jews whose practices and traditions became the basis of Rabbinical Judaism, which has been the most common form of Judaism for nearly two millennia.

These two aspects of Jewish religious and cultural customs – Torah and Talmud, the instructions of Moses and the rabbinical interpretation of those instructions – constitute what is meant by phrases such as “Jewish Law.”

JEWISH LAW AND CHRISTIANITY

For most of Christian history, Christians have disregarded Jewish Law, both the written Law of Moses and the rabbinical interpretation of that Law. It is perhaps easy to see why Christians have never given much thought to the interpretative side of Jewish Law. In the Gospels, Jesus himself is frequently depicted at odds with the Pharisees – the experts of interpretation – and consistently insults and degrades them, even as he disagrees with them in their interpretations. While much of the antagonism in the Gospels between Jesus and the Pharisees is a reflection of the antagonism between Christians and Jews of the late 1st century, there is little doubt that Jesus had run-ins during his life with the Pharisees, whom he saw as collaborators with Roman imperial domination. As a rural Galilean, the Pharisees would have seen Jesus as a rabble-rouser and fiery revolutionary, while Jesus, for his part, would have seen the Pharisees as pretentious, so-called “experts” who were more concerned with their scholarship than with real people in real life. One might compare this situation to a Pentecostal preacher from rural Alabama meeting a group of Reformed theologians from Oxford.

But in addition to dismissing the interpretive traditions of the Pharisees and their later rabbinical successors, Christians have also long rejected the written Law of the Old Testament – the set of laws and customs ostensibly given by God to his chosen people.

As we saw above, this rejection of written Mosaic Law comes largely from the influence of the apostle Paul.

Paul was one of the earliest and certainly most influential Christians. Though he never followed or even knew of Jesus during Jesus’ life, he was converted to Christianity within a few years of Jesus’ death, after a vision of the resurrected Christ.

The Apostle Paul

Very early on, he seems to have begun to jettison his old ways within Judaism, and by about 50 C.E., a major conflict arose between Paul and the leaders of the Christian community in Jerusalem.

To put it briefly, the Jerusalem community in the time of Paul was the center of Christendom. It was to Paul’s era what Rome is today to Catholics. This community was supported by many of Jesus’ disciples (such as Peter and John), and led by Jesus’ brother, James. To these Christian leaders, Christianity was essentially a sect within Judaism. It was not a different religion from Judaism, but was instead a new form of Jewish practice. These Jewish Christians believed very strongly that Christianity should remain part of Judaism – in other words, Jewish traditions and customs were still very much a part of their religious practice.

Paul, on the other hand, believed that Jesus’s resurrection had effectively done away with these traditions, and following Jewish Law was no longer necessary. If pressed on the matter, I’m sure Paul would have agreed that if someone wanted to follow Jewish customs, they were certainly entitled to do so, but his argument was that these customs were no longer necessary for salvation. Instead, salvation came through faith in Jesus’ death and resurrection, which Paul saw as the ultimate and final atonement for human sin. Since Jesus made himself the ultimate sacrifice, humans could now be forgiven and thus saved, with or without adherence to the Law of Moses.

Needless to say, the Church in Jerusalem did not take Paul’s ideas very well. As described in the book of Acts, and also discussed by Paul himself in Galatians, things came to a head when Paul visited Jerusalem in about 50 C.E. The Jerusalem leaders attempted to reach a compromise with Paul, and agreed that while Paul’s converts did not need to become circumcised (which, in the ancient world, was the “official” way that someone became Jewish), they did need to follow Jewish dietary customs. Specifically, according to Acts, they were to refrain from eating food sacrificed to idols, food from strangled animals, and any food with blood in it.

Paul seems to have accepted this compromise, then immediately gone back to the missionary field and ignored it. Time and again in his letters, Paul insists that “all food is clean,” and even goes so far as to suggest that eating food sacrificed to idols is permissible, because idols are not real, they are simply inanimate objects. The only exception to this rule, for Paul, is when someone’s dietary habits may cause problems for someone else. In other words, if a Christian is eating with another Christian, and the second Christian believes strongly in the difference between “clean” and “unclean” food, then the first Christian should respect that belief and only eat “clean” food when they are eating with that person. Otherwise, “all food is clean” and permissible to eat.

In time, after Paul’s death and the deaths of James, Peter, and the other early Christian leaders, Christianity slowly became more and more of a non-Jewish religion. After the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 C.E. by the Romans, there was no longer a Jewish-Christian community in Jerusalem, and the center of Christendom shifted first to Alexandria in Egypt, and later, of course, to Rome. This led, during the last few decades of the 1st century, to a painful separation between Christianity and Judaism, a separation that is reflected in the Gospels, which were written around this time. By the start of the 2nd century, Christianity was essentially a non-Jewish religion, and Paul’s viewpoint won the day.

One example of this is reflected in the letter of 1 Timothy, a letter forged in Paul’s name in the late 1st century. The writer is discussing false Christian teachers, which he calls “hypocritical liars,” and he states that they teach people to “abstain from certain foods, which God created to be received with thanksgiving.” The writer goes on to say: “For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving.” So much for the views of James and Peter that some foods are unclean.

Christians from that time to now have left Jewish Law and Jewish customs behind them.

JESUS AND JEWISH LAW

We have looked at what Jewish Law was, and we have also seen why Christians don’t follow Jewish Law. Even though the earliest Christians – the followers of Jesus and their converts – seem to have adhered strongly to Jewish norms and customs, and seem to have believed, at least early on, that one needed to become Jewish in order to be Christian, Paul challenged all that and spread the gospel of Jesus to non-Jews, leading Christianity to an eventual separation from Judaism all together. It became, by the end of the 1st century, a non-Jewish religion that did not adhere to Jewish laws and customs.

But since Jesus is the heart and soul of Christianity, one might wonder what Jesus himself had to say on this matter. For many Christians (and for institutional Christianity in general) Jesus was not just a prophet, but the Son of God, even God himself in human form. For Christians, then, one would expect Jesus’s words to carry significant weight.

Many folks may be surprised to discover that Jesus seems to have strongly affirmed adherence to Jewish Law. Consider, for instance, Matthew 23, where Jesus states: “The teachers of the Law and the Pharisees sit in Moses’s seat. You must obey them and do everything they tell you.” He goes on to encourage his listeners not to be hypocritical like the Pharisees, but he affirms that their teaching of the Law is sound and his listeners should follow it. For Jesus in this passage, the problem with the Pharisees is not their reliance on Jewish Law, but on the fact that they are hypocrites who don’t really follow it.

Consider also a story repeated in Mark, Matthew, and Luke, where Jesus heals a man with leprosy. Afterwards, he instructs the man to go to the temple to be ritually purified and to “offer the sacrifices that Moses commanded.” Clearly he found these customs to be necessary.

In the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, provided by Luke, Jesus tells of a beggar named Lazarus who always had to eat the scraps from the table of a rich man.

The Rich Man and Lazarus, by Leandro Bassano

The rich man lived the high life and consistently ignored the plight of Lazarus. In time, both men died, with the rich man going to hell, and Lazarus going “to the bosom of Abraham.” The rich man begs Abraham to let Lazarus return to earth to warn his brothers about the dangers of luxurious living. Abraham responds that the rich man’s brothers “have Moses and the Prophets” and that they should “listen to them.” Abraham goes on to say that if the rich man’s brothers won’t listen to Moses, then neither will they listen to someone who is raised from the dead (i.e. Lazarus). Jesus, through this parable, is affirming the salvific nature of Mosaic Law.

In a story related in Matthew and Mark, Jesus is approached by a Gentile who wants him to heal her daughter. Jesus flatly refuses to do so, stating that he has come only “to the lost sheep of Israel” and that it is not right to take “the children’s bread” (that is, Jesus’s teachings) and “toss it to the dogs” (that is, unclean Gentiles). The woman persists, however, and Jesus finally agrees to heal her daughter. But he does it from a distance; he does not go to the woman’s unclean, Gentile house.

A similar story is found in both Matthew and Luke. Here, the Gentile is a Roman centurion, and the sick person is his servant. Jesus agrees to heal the servant, but, as with the story from Matthew, he does not go to the centurion’s house, and instead heals the servant from afar.

It is noteworthy to point out that these are the only two healings attributed to Jesus from afar. They are also the only two healings of Gentiles attributed to Jesus. In the Gospel tradition, Jesus keeps away from Gentiles, because he viewed them as unclean, which was consistent with a Jewish worldview.

Finally, there is a passage from Matthew where Jesus explicitly talks about adherence to Jewish Law and customs:

Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.

It is hard to imagine how Jesus could be more explicit. “Until heaven and earth disappear” – that is, until the end of time – the Law of Moses is valid. Unless your righteousness – that is, your adherence to God’s commandments – exceeds even the righteousness of the Pharisees, who are famous for their strict adherence to the Law, you will not see God’s kingdom.

CONCLUSION

This final passage from Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount is a difficult one to reconcile in light of traditional Christian practice. As we saw above, from the time of Paul, Christians began rejecting Jewish laws and customs, and by the beginning of the 2nd century, virtually no Christian followed any of the laws of Moses, except those that they found particularly important. This is true even today, as many Christians revere the Ten Commandments, but handily reject countless other mandates from the Old Testament.

As we have seen, Jesus was a Jewish man, living in the Jewish homeland, and teaching and preaching within the worldview of 1st century Judaism. In the Gospel of Matthew in particular, Jesus is fiercely loyal to Jewish laws and customs, and explicitly states that these commandments are valid for all time – indeed, “until heaven and earth disappear.”

In Part II of this series, we will look much more closely at this passage from Matthew and consider how we might reconcile it with modern Christian practice.