A Plea for Israel’s Redemption: The Lord’s Prayer in History

The Lord’s Prayer has been echoed throughout places of worship every day for the last two thousand years.  The preface to this prayer within liturgical services explains that this is “as our Savior Christ has taught us” to pray.[1]  Arthur Wellesley said the prayer was “the sum total of religion and morals” and Aquinas too called it “the most perfect of prayers.”[2]  However, two thousand years separates us from the moment Jesus first taught this petition to his followers and any good historian knows that fears, expectations, symbols, stories, and worldviews change dramatically from culture to culture and over a vast quantity of time.  As the Lord’s Prayer has been continually used over the centuries, is it possible that some of the meaning of Jesus’ original prayer has been lost to us?  In the following, I will seek to demonstrate how this prayer functions as a plea for YHWH to bring about the eschatological promises that were supposed to accompany Israel’s return from exile.

Our Father

The most common metaphor for God used in places of worship nowadays is the familial title “Father.”  Though fatherhood is a popular metaphor for God’s relationship to His people today, it was rarely used to address God in prayer.  When uttered out of the mouth of Jesus, Wright sees it calling Israel’s rescue from Egypt to mind:

Calling God “Father” not only evokes all kinds of associations of family life and intimacy; more importantly, it speaks to all subsequent generations of God as the God of the Exodus, the God who rescues Israel primarily because Israel is God’s first-born son. The title “Father” says as much about Israel, and about the events through which God will liberate Israel, as it does about God.[3]

If Wright is correct that addressing YHWH as “Father” would conjure up images of the Exodus, Pitre takes it a step further and demonstrates that addressing YHWH as “Father” equally recalls the prophetic promises of the new Exodus,[4] what Wright would call the return from exile.  The following are quotations from Isaiah and Jeremiah :

For you are our Father, though Abraham does not know us

and Israel does not acknowledge us;

you, O Lord, are our Father,

our Redeemer from of old is your name.

O Lord, why do you make us err from your ways

and harden our heart, so that we fear you not?

Return for the sake of your servants the tribes of your heritage.

Isaiah 63:16-17

In those days the house of Judah shall join the house of Israel, and together they shall come from the land of the north to the land that I gave your fathers for a heritage.

“I thought how I would set you among my sons,

and give you a pleasant land,

a heritage most beauteous of all nations.

And I thought you would call me “My Father,”

and would not turn from following me.”

Jeremiah 3:18-19

These texts both refer to Israel’s deliverance from her exile and both employ the designation “Father” when referring to YHWH.  In the Isaiah passage, “Our Father” (πάτερ ἡμῶν) is an explicit linguistic overlap to our prayer.  More, in our Jeremiah passage, as Pitre points out, when Israel is gathered from where she was scattered by exile, she will call YHWH “Father.”[5]  For those who have ears to hear, Jesus, by issuing the paternal title to YHWH to begin His prayer, has moved the first pawn on the eschatological chess board, while teaching His disciples to do similar.

Hallowed be Thy Name

Largely because of liturgical use, this phrase has been muddled into a declarative statement, such as, “Your name is holy.”  However, this phrase is not a statement, but a request, more accurately translated, “let your name be sanctified,” or “sanctify your name.”  The next logical question is who is to do the sanctifying?  Ezekiel 36 is likely to what Jesus is alluding:  “I will sanctify my great name (ἁγιάσω τό ὄνομά μου), which has been profaned among the nations…  I will take you from the nations, and gather you from all the countries, and bring you into your own land” (36:23-24).  This text depicts YHWH vindicating and sanctifying His name by delivering Israel from exile and giving her the subsequent promises of a redeemed people.  This petition for the Lord, “sanctify Your name (ἁγιασθήτω τό ὄνομά σου)” within Jesus’ prayer functions as a cry to deliver Israel from the destitution of exile.   For God to “hallow” His name did not only include a simple abstract event in spiritual terms, but included exilic restoration, Israel being cleansed from idolatry, a new heart that pulses with the Spirit of God, and following God’s commands (Ezekiel 36:24-26).  It is not a stretch to imagine that this is what Jesus had in mind when giving such instructions in prayer.

Daily Bread

The idea of daily bread comes directly out of the Exodus.  “Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a day’s portion everyday” (Exodus 16:4).  I will note here that the Exodus from Egypt (YHWH delivering Israel from one pagan nation) was the template for how they viewed their return from exile (YHWH delivering Israel from many pagan nations).  Thus, Moses became a significant figure in various messianic movements in Palestine.[6]  It is no wonder, then, that significant parts of the Exodus became ways of prophetically speaking about Israel’s redemption from exile.

And it will happen that when all that which should come to pass in these parts is accomplished, the Messiah will begin to be revealed. . . . And those who are hungry will enjoy themselves and they will, moreover, see marvels every day. . . . And it will happen at that time that the treasury of manna will come down again from on high, and they will eat of it in those years because these are they who will have arrived at the consummation of time. (2 Baruch 29:3–8)

Other Jewish and Christian texts speak of similar eschatological events:

As the first redeemer [Moses] caused manna to descend, as it is stated, “Because I shall cause to rain bread from heaven for you” [Exod. 16:4], so will the latter redeemer [the Messiah] cause manna to descend. (Midrash Rabbah on Eccl. 1:9.)

It [the manna] has been prepared for the righteous in the age to come. Everyone who believes is worthy and eats of it. (Midrash Tanchuma, Beshallach 21:66.)

To everyone who conquers I will give some of the hidden manna… (Revelation 2:17)

We can derive from these texts that, to some degree, Exodus symbols, namely manna, were used in first century Palestine to conjure up images of Israel’s redemption and the dawn of the new age.  So, Jesus prayer for “daily bread” must not be read as simply a prayer for sustenance, but for the fulfillment of all of God’s eschatological promises.[7]

Because of space, I have reluctantly passed over phrases such as “Your kingdom come,” “forgive us our debts,” and “lead us not into the time of trial.”  These phrases no doubt have the same effect as those I have selected.  The forgiveness of debts recalls Israel’s Jubilee that would accompany the new age (Isa 61:1-3) and “the time of trial” was not simply the daily grind, but the great tribulation that many thought would usher in the eschaton. [8]  It is also interesting to note that, Jesus too seemingly prayed this prayer.  Where?  The Garden of Gethsamene.  Jesus addresses God as “Father” and prays for God’s will to be done (26:39).  Shortly after, He admonishes Peter to pray lest he enter into the time of trial (εἰς πειρασμόν), the same phrased used in the Lord’s prayer.  Even Jesus, in His struggle to usher in God’s reign, bowed His head in prayer before He entered into His great trial.

The Lord’s Prayer, as I have demonstrated, is a petition that finds expression in those standing on the precipice of the new age, who are dwelling between the living and the dead, the darkness and the light.  Rather than a simple request for help in daily life, the Lord’s Prayer stands as the climactic plea for restoration and for the launching of YHWH’s kingdom.  Remember next time you recite it, that this is the supplication that Jesus taught His followers; the most pressing and important of all prayers; that God might establish His rule and bring about the new age for all His children who call Him “Father.”

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[1] 1979 Book of Common Prayer. New York: Oxford UP, 2004.

[2] Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica [Summary of Theology], Pt. II-II, Q. 83, art. 9, cited in Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2d. ed. (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1997), nos. 2761, 2763.

[3] N. T. Wright, “The Lord’s Prayer as a Paradigm for Christian Prayer,” in Into God’s Presence: Prayer in the New Testament, ed. Richard N. Longenecker (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2001), 140

[4] Brant Pitre, “The Lord’s Prayer and the New Exodus,” pg 72

[5] Ibid Pg 74

[6] Bauckham, Richard. “Messianism According to the Gospel of John.”

Challenging Perspectives on the Gospel of John. Ed. John Lierman. Tubingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006. Pg. 43

[7] Allison, Dale C. The End of the Ages Has Come: An Early Interpretation of the Passion and Resurrection of Jesus. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1985. Pg. 140-141

[8] For a full analysis see:  Wright, N. T. Jesus and the Victory of God. Minneapolis: Fortress, 1996. Pg 292-95

An Economic Jubilee — Reading The Politics of Jesus

Foreclosures, mounting debts, rich taking advantage of the poor, trapping people in cycles of poverty through loopholes, a lack of opportunities, education, or sufficient startup capital to raise them out of the clutches of low wage employment, and routine late fees and debt. Unfortunately this scene is all too familiar. While we would like to imagine we live in a society which has by and large corrected these systemic problems, one need not even look to the squaller of slums and ghettos in major metropolitan centers to know that this is not the case, most of us need only consider the friend or relative who faced foreclosure, the parent laid off do to the exportation of blue collar jobs, or the acquaintance shackled with mounting medical bills following a serious diagnosis.

If we are familiar, even in a superficial way, with these hardships in our present day, then it should not surprise us to fine strikingly similar economic situations when looking into the time during which Jesus lived in Palestine, and to find Jesus, throughout his ministry, addressing them. Following Yoder’s overview of the ministry of Jesus in his previous chapter he now turns to examining in closer detail some of the particularities found within that summary. As a starting point, in his chapter Implications of the Jubilee, Yoder focuses on the famous Luke 4:18 quotation of Isaiah 61 ending with the proclamation of “the year of the Lord’s favor.”

Within the prevous chapter Yoder had considered this quotation to be a declaration of the year of Jubilee: the year within Israel’s history, coming every 50 years, when debts are forgive, land returned to their families, slaves release — leveling the economic playing field, the rich sacrificing their wealth and the poor being restored to solvency. Here Yoder turns to address the specifics of Jesus’ minstry as a declaration of Jubilee. He identifies four distinguishing marks of what constituted Jubilee, using them to address the extent to which this Jubliee year was being implemented previous to Jesus and how this Jubliee declaration might be found within the traching and ministry of Jesus. The four distinguishing marks of the Jubilee — a) a year of leaving the soil fallow, b) the remission of debts, c) the liberation of slaves, and d) the return to each individual of his family’s property — form the structure of the chaper and will be laid out in more detail below.

The Fallow Year

The fallow year was the most ubiquitously adopted of the Jubilee measures, though not without its share of corner cutting and insincerity. The principle of leaving their fields fallow every seventh years was regularly practiced within Israel, a command as much tied to the faith of Israel to rely on the Lord for provision as it was to sound agricultural practices. Because of this it is not surprising to find that Jesus said little in regards to this element of the Jubilee, though  his Sermon on the Plain exhortation to not worry about what to eat or wear because “your Father knows that you need them” carries with it some connotations of the sort of Jubilee faith Jesus may have been seeking. Rather than seen as a exhortation of confident laziness, within this context Yoder sees the passage better read as:

“If you work six days (or years) with all your heart, you can count on God to take care of you and yours. So without fear leave your field untilled. As he does for the birds of heaven which do not sow or harvest or collect into granaries, God will take care of your needs. The Gentiles who pay no attention to the sabbath are not richer than you.”

Remission of Debts and Liberation of Slaves

Yoder spends significantly more time on the latter three Jubilee identifiers, especially as it relates to the forgiveness of debts and the liberations of slaves, a topic which sits central to Jesus’ teaching. In the Lord’s prayer, Yoder sees the use of the word aphiemi (remit, send away, liberate, forgive a debt) for the  verb  “remit us our debts,” a word used often in connection with the Jubilee, as establishing  the “Our Father” as “genuinely a jubilee prayer.” It is here Jesus, so often seen as a liberal in many aspects,  establishes what could be seen as his most legalistic equation: “the aphesis of God toward you becomes vain if you do not practice aphesis toward each other.”

Both the parable of the unmerciful servant and the unfaithful steward further expound on Jesus’ understanding on this point. Yoder argues our readings of these parables lose their meaning when read without an understanding of the socio-economic atmosphere of the first century. The servant of the first parable was in fact a real person, whose plight was not unlike many living in Galilee at the time, who had once been land owners but who had been reduced to practical slavery through debt — the mounting unpaid debts growing to a point when the creditor orders the sharecropper sold with his wife, children, and possessions to cover the debt. But in keeping with the Jubilee year the king aphiem the servants debts.

Yet Jesus does not end his parable here, with the encouraging promise of the overwhelming economic hardship being wiped away, but rather his point is found in the second half, where the servant refuses to extend the same jubilee forgiveness to a fellow servant who owes a much more modest sum, insisting he “Pay me what you owe me.” When the unmerciful servant comes before the king, the extension of Jubilee is no longer applicable, he will be sold with his wife and children. There is not divine jubilee for for those who refuse to apply it on earth.

Since the jubilee remission of debts froze credit, even the orthodox rabbis, Hillel and Shammai, sought solutions to the problems of strictly applying the troubling aspects of this  jubilee requirement. The solution was called a prosboul, — the very existence of which at the time of Jesus  indicates there was a strong current favoring strict application of the jubilee provisions. The prosboul allowed for a creditor to transfer to the court the right to recover in his name a debt which the sabbatical year would have canceled. With these provisions, the collecting of interest and the continuation of debt past the sabbatical year became possible and Jesus’ indictment of the Pharisees who “devoured the houses of widows” (Mark 12:40) comes into focus.

While in other issues Jesus appeared to be a liberal when it came to Sabbath law, when it came to economic justice he goes further than the Pharisees. His insistence that “God made the sabbath for humankind” mean that sabbatical year, like the day of sabbath, must be practiced in such a way as to “liberate people and not enslave them.” Rather than fearing lose, the rich are, per the Sermon on the Plain, to be generous without the fear of not being repaid since God will take care of them. And those who are in debt should hurry to repay their debts. If their creditor wants to the take away your tunic (as a security for a debt) to give your coat as well. In addition, Jesus instructs his listeners to hasten to make peace with their creditors on the road before they are handed over to the court, from which they will not be released until the last penny is paid.

The second parable is that of the unfaithful servant. Once again, the meaning of this parable comes into focus when understood in light of common practice of the time. Since only the rich kept record of debts owed, the inflating of debts was not an uncommon practice. Since most rural property owners had lost their land, they were at the the mercy of often absentee owners to which they were enslaved by debt. The accountants often presented to these owners fraudulent books, the true debts owed drastically increased, which allowed them to accumulate in a few years what Jesus called “unrighteous wealth.”

Within the parable the owner discovers his steward has been dishonest, not only inflating the debts of the sharecroppers, but stealing from this employer. This steward, realizing his time in his present position is short and he will never be able to repay the embezzled funds, goes to the sharecroppers, marking down their debt from the inflated amount to the correct amount owed — 100 becoming 50, 100 becoming 80. While this behavior would certainly further drive the steward into poverty, he would in the process acquire what Jesus calls true wealth — the friendship and gratitude of his former victims. Jesus declares his listeners should “make friends with unrighteous wealth,” by practicing jubilee, forgiving the debts owed you, in order to “liberate yourself from the bonds which keep you from being ready for the kingdom of God.”

The Redistribution of Capital

The fourth indicator of Jubilee finds itself in one of Jesus’ most radical calls on his disciples — that of voluntary poverty. While the church has traditionally accepted the, far easier,  interpretation of Jesus’ call to “sell all you have and give it to the poor” as a ‘counsel of perfection’ rather than one for all Christians at all times. While this interpretation could be acceptable, much of Jesus’ further teaching criticized those who found the base charity of the tithe adequate, insisting his listeners go further to fulfill the “more important points of the law: righteousness, goodness, good faith.” Yoder interprets this “righteousness, goodness, good faith” as meaning to give away ones own capital to the benefit of the poor. As seen in the story of he widow giving in the temple, the point becomes clear, it is not how much you give as long as it is from the surplus of ones income, but rather what is important is giving out of ones capital.

Yet it is not Yoder’s belief that Jesus commanded Christian communism. He sees Jesus’s call was not a “counsel of perfection” or a constitutional commandment for a utopian Israel state, rather is was a once time call in a moment of history for his disciples to put into practice the jubilee ordinance as a “refreshment” prefiguring the “reestablishment of all things.” It was Jesus in 26 A.D. proclaiming his ministry as a jubilee moment which was preparing for the coming kingdom.

The issue of economic facing human society has not sat dormant in the millenniums since Jesus preached throughout Galilee and Judea. Yoder presents a radical interpertation of Jesus’ teachings in the context of the economics of his day. His parables take on a fierce urgency against the backdrop of the greed, oppression, and unjust debts which where prevalent in the lives of his hearers. While the matter of Jesus calling a Jubilee  warrants further investigation, Jesus’ message of a radical return to economic justice is beyond dispute. While often Jesus’ parables on debt have been primarily seen as speaking only to “spiritual things” such as the forgiveness of sins, Yoder’s insistence that Jesus be understood in a political light forces us to understand his parables against the economic backdrop of his day and to see how those same parables may find significance in the present landscape of financial misdealings and economic injustice and unrighteous wealth devouring the houses of the poor, minorities, working class, and widows.

Is Jesus a Narcissist? Christ and Preeminence

…he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. (Col 1:18 ESV)

What does this language of preeminence mean? In somewhat caricatured form, this language, as used in some Christian circles, sounds like the purpose of our faith is to convince ourselves how great Jesus is and hold a big pep rally for him. This usage strikes others, however, as a tremendous divine self-aggrandizement scheme. This obsession with image, reputation, and worship is popularly referred to as “narcissism” (we’ll leave clinical definitions of narcissism aside for the time being). Is Jesus a narcissist? What does it mean for him to have preeminence in all things?

In verse eighteen, there are three terms, all of which can loosely mean either “first in rank” or “first in sequence:”

κεφαλή (kephalē) – Christ is the head of the body, the church – “head” is frequently used as a metaphor for authority, but in Colossians 2:19 (and Ephesians 4:16) the head is described as the source of origin from which the nourishment and the unity of the body flows.

ἀρχή (archē) – this word frequently means either “beginning” or “origin.”

πρωτότοκος (prōtotokos) – this word can refer both to birth order (first-born), or the special status of being firstborn, especially with regards to inheritance.

What light can we now shed on the word which is translated as “preeminence” (KJV, ESV), “first place” (NRSV), and “supremacy” (TNIV)? From these representative translations we see that they uniformly and exclusively express the notion of “first in rank.” The word in Greek is πρωτεύω (protevō) which is simply a verb form of the adjective “first” (πρώτος, prōtos). It should not surprise us that this verb can have both nuances of “first in rank” and “first in sequence.” This is the only time the verb appears in the NT, but it does appear three times in the Septuagint (Greek translation of the OT). One passage in 2 Maccabees seems to be of particular relevance:

“He [Judas Maccabeus] gave his troops the watchword, “God’s victory,” and with a picked force of the bravest young men, he attacked the king’s pavilion at night and killed as many as two thousand men in the camp. He stabbed the leading (πρωτεύοντα, prõtevonta) elephant and its rider.” (2 Mac. 13:15)

The “leading (‘first/preeminent’) elephant” was the elephant designated and trained to lead a procession or charge of other elephants, cavalry, and infantry in battle. Here we see πρωτεύω (protevō) being used evidently with the “first in sequence” nuance for the one who leads the way which others are to follow.

How does this relate to Colossians 1? It seems as though all four words (head, ruler/beginning, firstborn, and ‘one bring first’) have both nuances of “first in rank” and “first in sequence.” It also seems like the “first in sequence” nuance is the primary one with the first three. It stands to reason that such is also the case with “to be first.” What would it then mean for Jesus to be the first? What is he the first of?

We are told that Jesus is the “firstborn from the dead in order that he might be the first in all things.” Jesus “being first in all things” is logically dependent on him being the firstborn from the dead. To be “firstborn from the dead” means that in Jesus’ resurrection, he was the firstborn of a family of many other brothers and sisters who would share his resurrection existence. In Jewish thinking, the resurrection of the dead was linked to the restoration of all things, even the entire cosmos. The Colossians passage says that Jesus would be first “in all things.” In verses 15-17, the phrase “all things” is used five times and in each instance it refers to the entire creation. Thus to say Jesus is “first in all things” is to say that Jesus’ resurrection is the first in sequence of what will happen to “all things,” namely the entire cosmos.

When we look to the Resurrection Lord, our “leader,” we see the destiny and future of the life we share with all of creation. Jesus goes before us and participates in the restored life promised for the age to come and makes it present even now. Just as Jesus broke the bonds of death, as the curse of corruption and decay was eradicated from his body, as he was restored to the pleasure of a life fully-alive, so the entire creation will follow after him. Jesus is the source (κεφαλή, kephalē) from which the new life of the entire creation flows, the beginning (ἀρχή, archē) of the restoration of all things, the firstborn (πρωτότοκος, prōtotokos) of the whole family who share his exalted humanity, and the leader (πρωτεύω, protevō) drawing the entire creation after him into eternal life. As he beckons us to follow him, we know full well where he is leading us. He is inviting the world he created and loves to follow him into a future where all things will be made new; where the will be no more mourning, or sorrow, or crying, or pain—where he will wipe away every tear from our eyes.

Richard Liantonio earned a B.A. in Biblical Studies from Houghton College and an M.A. in Theological Studies (Biblical Studies), with a certificate in Biblical Languages from Nazarene Theological Seminary. More of his writings can be found at richardliantonio.com.

What’s the Point We’re Missing? — Reading The Politics of Jesus

I heard a sermon once titled “Adventures in Missing the Point.” At least I think that was what it was called. I’ve heard a handful of sermons like this, all attempting — though varying on the specifics — to rift on the same theme. This sermon was from the beginning of Acts (a fitting example, since it functions as Luke’s “Gospel: Vol. 2,” the first volume of which will be the subject of the main body of this post) where the disciples ask Jesus, just prior to his ascension, if now “is the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel” (Acts 1:6)?

The preacher’s point was, of course, how out of touch these disciples, even seeing Jesus’ death and resurrection, still were. Here they were thinking Jesus was a messiah with some political aim while all along missing that what Jesus was about was a spiritual kingdom. The take away point — Jesus’ wasn’t political, his goals nothing to do with Rome, his aims and teachings moral and religious, not social and governmental — of course came down to something about how we expect one thing from God and he is always up to something else.

This baseline misconception of Jesus’ life, ministry, and death is the subject of Yoder’s second chapter, “The Kingdom Coming” in his The Politics of Jesus. This chapter takes us on a whirlwind tour of the Gospel of Luke, highlighting the germane passages to understanding the political nature of Jesus’ ministry. Yoder is not interested in providing a detailed exegesis of the relevant passages, rather he sees his task as merely outlining in broad strokes the picture of a political Jesus, here more concerned with establishing that Jesus had a political aim than explaining precisely what that aim might be.

His chapter divides into the following sections, which we will not examine here in detail, but will rather provide a few relevant details to help show the gist of Yoder’s argument:

• The Annunciation: Luke 1:46ff., 68ff.; cf. 3:7ff.
• The Commissioning and Testing: Luke 3:21-4:14
• The Platform: Luke 4:14ff.
• The Platform Reaffirmed: Luke 6:12ff.
• The Bread in the Desert: Luke 9:1-22
• The Cost of Discipleship: Luke 12:49-13:9; 14:25-36
• The Epiphany in the Temple: Luke 19:36-46
• The Last Renunciation: Luke 22:24-53
• Execution and Exaltation: Luke 23-24

The birth of Jesus’ is marked by songs by both Mary and Zechariah who use language that places Jesus’ birth right in the vein of the Maccabean mood of a figure of radical social change. Later, when Jesus’ ministry is contrasted with that of John the Baptist, it is only a modern misreading with sees that contrast as one between the ‘political’ aims of John the Baptist on one hand and the ‘spiritual’ aims of Jesus on the other. While there certainly is a contrast between their ministries, it is not a political/spiritual one, since Luke does not make an effort to distinguish this difference. Luke’s introduction of Jesus supports, rather than detracts from, an interpretation of congruency between John and Jesus in regards to politics, the gospels going so far as to place John’s message, “the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the good news” on the lips of Jesus without making any distinction in regards to the meaning of John and that of Jesus. The message on the lips of both men carries with it a similar meaning, not the former one of a political nature and the latter one of a spiritual one.

Yoder takes up the phrase “Son” found in the heavenly announcement at his baptism, identifying it as not a designation of metaphysical sonship but rather a commissioning of Jesus to be the historical messianic son and servant tasked with bringing God’s goodwill and promise to Palestine. It is this commissioning which Yoder sees tested in the wilderness temptation, finding supported in each temptation being prefaced by “if you are the son of God….” Each test represents a test of kingship, which, as Yoder points out, becomes a backbone for Jesus’ public ministry. It is the parallels between Jesus’ ministry and his temptation in the wilderness that will form the outline of how we will examine Yoder’s conclusions about Jesus.

 The temptation of turning the stones into bread is the economic temptation to win the people’s affections via the provision of socio-economic relief. Yoder later harkens back to this test when examining the feeding of the five thousand, where the provision of bread in the desert elicits the desire from the crowds that Jesus be installed as their king, a desire which Jesus refuses to satisfy. It is in this context of the bread in the wilderness, the first temptation played out on the public stage of Jesus’ ministry, where the first indication is made that Jesus’ messiah would be one of suffering.

Jesus has begun his minster as one announcing the coming of Jubilee, through social and economic reform, as seen in Isaiah 61. He chooses the twelve after a night of prayer followed by a proclamation of woes and blessings, all of which establishing Jesus’ ministry as having a new public dimension, the end goal of which would to all observers be a bid at kingship. Yet just as this opportunity presents itself at the feeding of the five thousand Jesus reveals the future of his mission not as one of taking power through economic relief but rather the suffering of the cross, a suffering that will define both himself and those who come after. The dichotomy here is not one between a physical kingdom on one hand and a spiritual kingdom on the other, but rather a modality of living by which the kingdom would come, on one hand by taking the kingship and on the other hand embracing the suffering of the cross.

The temptation to hurl himself from the pinnacle of the temple serves as the temptation to embrace his role as religious reformer. It is not just an elaborate opportunity to show off his divine protection, but rather an coming to the temple miraculously, as the one who would come, as Malachi 3:1-3, “suddenly to his temple to purify the Son’s of Levi.” As Jesus enters into Jerusalem this temptation becomes increasingly significant. To the shouts of the crowds “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord” Jesus enters the city to crowds “praising God with a loud voice for all the mighty works they had seen.”

In Matthew’s account Jesus goes straight to the temple, his clearing of the temple fitting into the Malachi imagery mentioned previously. He goes about driving out the livestock, turning over the tables of moneychangers. It is, as Yoder points out, at this point Jesus need only ride the wave of crowd enthusiasm, the disrupted confusion in the temple, to form the coup d’erat and take the Roman fortress. In the face of the temptation to take the power being thrust at him from the crowds, Jesus retreats to Bethany, his condemnation of the old order not willing to embrace the armed revolt of that order.

The gospel scene most often connected with the temptation in the desert is Jesus’ agony in Gethsemane. In the wilderness temptation Jesus is offered all the kingdoms of the world if he will only bow down to Satan. The temptation offers the logical progression of the Psalm 2:7 designation, “Son,” by presenting the Psalm 2:8 promise of the nations to rule over. What is happening here is not simply an appropriate offer by an inappropriate individual, i.e., Satan, but rather an offer that is a temptation to the  “idolatrous character of political power hunger and nationalism.” That is, a temptation to adopt a modality of living which runs counter to that of the servant-leadership which Jesus mandated.

Yoder sees this temptation mirrored in the agony in Gethsemane. He asks what Jesus might mean by asking for this “cup to pass.” Taking the question historically, we have to ask what type of action would have allowed for Jesus to avoid at this point the crucifixion, since the religious leadership had already decided to kill him. Might it have been a choice to slip quietly away to Qumran, or to redefine his ministry to the religious leadership, denying any bid to kingship and recanting his more radical claims, and continue simply teaching? Yoder does not find theses as compelling options, but rather sees, on the basis of the evidence in the text, especially the incident of Peter with the sword, the only serious option as the temptation to, here in the final moments, once again consider the messianic violence the temptation in the wilderness to take the kingdoms of the world had offered him. Jesus’ rebuke of Peter upon cutting off the servant’s ear is fittingly in the language of this temptation, “shall I not drink the cup which the father has given me?”

It is the temptation to draw swords with Peter here at the last which stands between Jesus’ drinking of the cup at the cross. Rather than carry out his counter cultural messianic ethic, Jesus is tempted to adopt the ethic embraced by all messiahs up to him and draw swords against Rome and attempt violence in order to bring the messianic vision to pass. Rather then bow to this temptation though; Jesus rather embraces the path of the cross. When the disciples on the road to Emmaus state, “we had hoped he was the one who would redeem Israel,” this is not just another account of the disciples “adventure in missing the point,” their failure get Jesus’ real point, but rather a first hand account of the way Jesus’ had been heard and understood. Their missing of the point is not the expectation of a Kingdom when they shouldn’t have but rather their failure to see the messiah’s suffering and death as the inauguration of this kingdom. Their failure is not seeing that, as Yoder states, “the cross is not a detour or a hurdle on the way to the kingdom, nor is it even the way to the kingdom; it is the kingdom come.”

Though Yoder’s over view of the ministry of Jesus only skims the surface of the questions, and our review of it here only touches very broadly on even the issues Yoder addresses, Yoder’s overall point stands. Any more thorough inquire will lead us closer, nor further away, from the conclusion that Jesus’ mission and aim were meant to be understood politically, and not as spiritualized substitutes for political questions or as spiritual and moral platitudes divorced from the political sphere. The adventure in missing the point is not a dichotomy between a physical kingdom on one hand and a spiritual one on the other, but rather between a kingdom established through violence and messianic holy war on one hand and a kingdom come through messianic suffering and death on the other. The ethic by which Jesus’ kingdom is to come is radically different from that of his predecessors, yet his kingdom remains staunchly this-worldly, Jesus’ redefinition on of ethic and not rather one of definition.

Related articles

• Reading The Politics of Jesus: A Personal-Ethical Introduction (thecosmiccathedral.wordpress.com)
• The Ethic of W.W.J.D. – Reading The Politics of Jesus (thecosmiccathedral.wordpress.com)

Easter as Eucatastrophe

With that Gandalf stood before him, robed in white, his beard now gleaming like pure snow… “Well, Master Samwise, how do you feel?” he said.

…At last he gasped: “Gandalf! I thought you were dead! But then I thought I was dead myself. Is everything sad going to come untrue? What’s happened to the world?” A great Shadow has departed,” said Gandalf, and then he laughed and the sound was like music, or like water in a parched land; and as he listened the thought came to Sam that he had not heard laughter, the pure sound of merriment, for days upon days without count. It fell upon ears like the echo of all the joys he had ever known….

“How do I feel?” He cried. “Well, I don’t know how to say it. I feel, I feel” – he waved his arms in the air – “I feel like spring after winter, sun on the leaves; and like trumpets and harps and all the songs I have ever heard!”

— The Return of The King, J.R.R. Tolkien

I imagine good Master Samwise’s response upon seeing Gandalf again was something like that of those two disciples, headed out of Jerusalem for Emmaus following Jesus’ crucifixion on the Sunday after Passover, when the identity of their mysterious walking companion was at last revealed. Just as Sam had found himself at the end of a long story which had at the last seemed hopeless, so too these disciples had found themselves at the end of a long story which had tragically been cut short.

Summarizing their despair the two travelers say “But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel” (Luke 24:21). These disciples had followed Jesus with an amazing hope. Certainly they had seen the fanfare to which he had entered Jerusalem, with psalmic shouts of “Blessed his he who comes in the name of the Lord.” Just a short week before it seemed as if the long awaited moment of Israel’s redemption was almost here. It was so close they could almost taste it. Yet the end of that week had dashed all those hopes. Everything good in the world, all that hope, turned sour as they witnessed Jesus’ arrest, trial, and execution.

Samwise had witnessed the death of his mentor and friend, Gandalf, on they way to Mount Doom in Mordor. He had thought his Master Frodo and himself dead at the end of the quest. It had looked as if the last hope of their journey was lost. Yet against all odds, Sam finds himself awaking in Lthilien in the keeping of the King, with Gandalf at the foot of his bed. Against all odds, these despairing disciples find themselves in the company of a mysterious traveler who had a different story to tell them than the one of hopelessness and dreams dashed which they had taken away from Jerusalem.

Framing the events of the last days within the context of Israel’s grand narrative, their Scriptures, this stranger describes the events of Jesus’ death and burial not as the tragic end of a messianic claim gone wrong, but as the necessary precursors of suffering and death which must come before the Messiah’s exaltation. The story of death and tragedy was being turned on its head as a story of exaltation and glory. Like Samwise said upon seeing Gandalf, we can imagine these disciples exclaiming, “Is everything sad going to come untrue?”

The resurrection has entered the tale, turning the story on its head and transforming the miserable tragedy into a comedy of joy and exuberance. J.R.R. Tolkien, author of The Return of the King, writes about this form of story in his essay “On Fairy-Stories.” The best fairy-tale, he says, “does not deny the existence of dyscatastrophe, of sorrow and failure: it denies (in the face of much evidence, if you will) universal final defeat and in so far is evangelium, giving a fleeting glimpse of Joy, Joy beyond the walls of the word, poignant as grief.”[1] It is this element of story that Sam’s awakening to Gandalf and the two traveling disciples realization of the identity of their companion on the road exhibit.

The word Tolkien gives to describe this moment, this turn in the story when despair turns to hope and loss turns to victory, is Eucatastrophe,[2] the good catastrophe. It is the turn where the story goes from one of lost hope to the restoration of all hope and joy in an unlooked for and unexpected, even improbable, turn of events. Just as the catastophe is the coming together of a multitude of negative forces in particular moment in the most disastrous way possible, so the Eucatastrophe is the unlooked for coming together of the good in such a way as to transform the story completely, from one of tragedy to one of comedy. The turn is so complete, so powerful it, as Tolkien says, “reflects a glory backwards,”[3] its effect rushing back to transform with hope even the bleakest points along to way.

The resurrection is the supreme Eucatastrophe of history. It is the foremost moment of Joy overturning the bleakest story to one of rejoicing. With Easter comes Eucatastrophe. Jesus was dead, the messianic claim bankrupt. All hope was lost. They “had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel” and yet that dream was left in tatters at the crucifixtion. The resurrection transformed the whole story. It reflected its glory backward, touching upon every point of suffering that had left its mark upon the story. It was the turn around. The catastrophe was reverted. Eucatastrophe had overtaken sadness with Joy. With Samwise we find ourselves exclaiming in answer to the question:

“Well, I don’t know how to say it. I feel, I feel” – he waved his arms in the air – “I feel like spring after winter, sun on the leaves; and like trumpets and harps and all the songs I have ever heard!”

— The Return of The King, J.R.R. Tolkien

---

[1] “On Fairy-Stories,” The Tolkien Reader. New York, Ballantine Books, 1966. 86

[2] Ibid. 85

[3] Ibid. 86

The Resurrection and the Joy of Jesus

Today, I’d like to take a quick look at the first resurrection appearance in Matthew (apropos, since we are in Easter Season). The women arrived at the tomb, only to find it empty, with an angel sitting on the stone that had once concealed its interior. Instructing them that Jesus had risen from the dead (just as he said), and that they were to go report the news to the disciples, they ran off quickly in fear and great joy. Suddenly, Jesus “meets them” and says to them…according to the NRSV, “Greetings!” according to the KJV, “Hail!” and the NASB simply says, “he greeted them” without telling us what he said (Mat. 28:9). However, in Greek, Jesus literally says “Rejoice!” Granted, this was a common greeting in first century Judea. In English we have common greetings like “hello” (which literally is an expression of astonishment), “how are you” (potentially a quite involved question…), “what’s up” and others whose specific words don’t necessarily contribute much to the formulaic nature of the generic greeting. The same kind of phenomenon was happening in Greek with the word χαίρετε (chairete). However, we know that there are times when we use the standard greetings with their literal meanings. In surprised astonishment upon seeing someone we might say, “well, HELLO, look who we have here” or we may sincerely asking someone how they are doing, ready for the long, heart-felt answer.

I think it is more than plausible to believe precisely this is happening when Jesus greets the women and says “χαίρετε” (chairete). He says it and literally means “rejoice!” I simply love that the first words out of Jesus’ mouth to another person after the resurrection are about gladness. I can only picture Jesus saying this with a huge smile on his face. Or better yet, an explosion of exuberance and laughter upon being reunited with his friends. What precisely he or the women should be happy about is not specified in the text. While, there were undoubtedly many things to be happy about, I think Jesus, among other things, was simply happy to see them. After the agony of the preceding weekend, Jesus’ heart was thrilled with delight to see his friends and for them to rejoice in seeing that he was well, and indeed, far more than well…

Richard Liantonio earned a B.A. in Biblical Studies from Houghton College and an M.A. in Theological Studies (Biblical Studies), with a certificate in Biblical Languages from Nazarene Theological Seminary. More of his writings can be found at richardliantonio.com.

Jesus Laid in the Tomb: Stations of the Cross — Fourteenth Station

When evening had come, and since it was the day of Preparation, that is, the day before the sabbath, Joseph of Arimathea, a respected member of the council, who was also himself waiting expectantly for the kingdom of God, went boldly to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Then Pilate wondered if he were already dead; and summoning the centurion, he asked him whether he had been dead for some time.When he learned from the centurion that he was dead, he granted the body to Joseph. Then Joseph bought a linen cloth, and taking down the body, wrapped it in the linen cloth, and laid it in a tomb that had been hewn out of the rock. He then rolled a stone against the door of the tomb.

—Mark 15:42-46

They passed through the same rooms that the prince had already traversed; Rogozhim went slightly ahead, the prince followed him… Above the door in the next room hung a painting, rather strange in shape, about two and a half arshins in length and certainly no more than six vershoks in height. It depicted the Saviour, who had just been taken down from the cross. The prince gave it a fleeting glance… But Rogozhin suddenly stopped in front of the picture.

‘I say, Lev Nikolayevich, I have long wanted to ask you, do you believe in God or not?’ Rogozhin said again, suddenly, having gone a few paces.

‘That’s a strange thing to ask, and … a strange way to look!’ the prince observed involuntarily.

“Well, I like looking at that painting,’ muttered Rogozhin, after a silence, as though he had forgotten his question again.

‘That painting!’ the prince exclaimed suddenly, under the impact of a sudden thought. ‘That painting!  Some people might lose their faith by looking at that painting!’

‘Yes, I’m losing that, too,’ Rogozhin suddenly confirmed unexpectedly.

The Idiot,  Fyodor Dostoyevsky

The final station of the cross is Christ laid in the tomb. The above painting by Hans Holbein and the accompanying passage from Dostoyevsky bring to the forefront the looming question of this last station. What should we do with a dead God? It is enough to make a person lose their faith. The painting shows Jesus, eyes and mouth still hanging, lifelessly, open. The dead flesh at his wounds in hands and feet and side are shown in detail in the first stages putrefaction. His face is lifeless, the pallor of death hanging over him. The oblong shape of the painting adds to the unsettling effect. Here is Jesus, laid out in the tomb. Here is Jesus. Lifeless. Dead. It is enough to make a person lose their faith.

The painting, along with the fourteenth station, forces us not to run ahead to the end of the story. There is no whisper of resurrection here. There is only death. There is only a dead Jesus. There is only a dead God. Today Nietzsche is correct: God is dead.  Just as the disciples who had no hope. Today we have no hope. On Holy Saturday, at the final Station of the Cross, God is dead. This is how he has been revealed to us. This is how the immortal God has been made known to us. In death. His lifeless body lays there as the revelation of God. He’s presence is his absence.

R.S. Thomas talks in his poem of:

It is this great absence
that is like a presence, that compels
me to address it without hope
of a reply.

— The Absence, R. S. Thomas

The death of God is something of this absence. It is something of this silence. A God beyond help. Of all days Holy Saturday is the day to doubt. It is the day to consider losing faith. It is the day to contemplate a God who is not there. It is a day to be angry. It is a day to mourn. It is the day to consider atheism. God is dead. We see in Holbein’s painting the stark reality of his death. We see the putrefaction, the decay, the finality of it. We see the hopelessness of this moment in history. We are left without recourse. Without words. What are we to do with our faith, might we, along with Rogozhin, be “losing that, too”?  When a friend, a parent, a spouse, or a child dies, when a tragedy strikes, we can choose to look to God for comfort, to find fault, to blame, to cry out to, for help. But here, when this friend and brother of ours is crucified, dies, and buried to whom can we look for solace? Who can we blame? Who will comfort us? Who will be present for us? The God we look to is in the tomb. Lifeless. Dead. It is enough to make a person lose their faith.

Lord Jesus, Lord of life, you became as nothing for us:
be with those who feel worthless and as nothing in the world’s eyes.
You were laid in a cold, dark tomb and hidden from sight:
be with all who suffer and die in secret,
hidden from the eyes of the world
To you, Jesus, your ridged body imprisoned in a tomb,
be honor and glory with the Father and the Holy Spirit,
now and forever. Amen.