Isaiah's Bed Metaphor

Isaiah’s poetry is rich in inventive use of language. His metaphors, similes, and imagery are creative. This is true of the other Hebrew prophets as well. In chapter twenty-eight, Isaiah warns the city of Jerusalem that it will fall.

He tells the inhabitants of this city that their efforts to provide for their own security by means of diplomatic treaties (cf. Isaiah 30:2 and Hosea 12:1) will be in vain. He refers to Egypt and Assyria, with whom Judah had made such treaties, as ‘death’ and ‘Sheol’ because not only would those treaties fail to provide the anticipated protection, but also because Egypt and Assyria would be among the nations to attack Judah.

By contrast, true protection had already been instituted by God, a stability labeled a ‘foundation’ and a ‘cornerstone.’ But the inhabitants of Judah have rejected this provision. Beyond the immediate context of Judah’s national defense in the 700s and 600s B.C., this message reminds readers to find their confidence and security only in Jesus.

God will enable these aggressive nations to attack both kingdoms - Israel and Judah. (They had been one united Israelite kingdom until Solomon’s death, when they split after a civil war.) God will allow suffering to overtake Judah, which is a brief deviation from His normal pattern. For this reason, Isaiah calls His actions in this case ‘strange’ and ‘alien’ - Philip Melanchthon describes it this way:

He calls it the “strange” work of the Lord when He terrifies, because to make alive and comfort is God's own proper work. But He terrifies, Isaiah says, for this reason - that there may be a place for comfort and making alive. For hearts that are secure and do not feel God’s wrath hate consolation. In this manner Scripture is accustomed to join these two, the terrors and the consolation. It does this to teach that there are these chief parts in repentance: contrition and faith that comforts and justifies. Neither do we see how the nature of repentance can be presented more clearly and simply. For the two chief works of God in men are these, to terrify, and to justify and make alive those who have been terrified. Into these two works all Scripture has been distributed. The one part is the Law, which shows, reproves, and condemns sins. The other part is the Gospel, i.e., the promise of grace bestowed in Christ.

Isaiah goes on to examine the productive nature of God’s wrath. Although God allows misery to overtake Judah, it is not merely a negative and destructive process. God habitually brings good out of evil. The devil may take momentary delight when God briefly loosens the restraints which limit his activity. But the devil’s happiness soon fades when God extracts something good from the evil which the devil has wrought.

The prophet expresses this in an agricultural metaphor. The farmer’s actions toward the earth may seem violent - ‘ploughing’ and ‘opening’ and ‘harrowing’ - but they are only for a time, and they are for a constructive purpose. Seed will be sown and a harvest reaped.

Likewise, the actions of the harvest can be violent - ‘threshing’ and ‘beating’ and ‘crushing’ - but these actions are likewise limited in duration and produce nutritious and healthy food.

Therefore hear the word of Yahweh, you scoffers,
who rule this people in Jerusalem!

Because you have said, “We have made a covenant with death,
and with Sheol we have an agreement,

when the overwhelming whip passes through
it will not come to us,

for we have made lies our refuge,
and in falsehood we have taken shelter”;

therefore thus says the Lord God,
“Behold, I am the one who has laid as a foundation in Zion,
a stone, a tested stone,
a precious cornerstone, of a sure foundation:
‘Whoever believes will not be in haste.’
And I will make justice the line,
and righteousness the plumb line;
and hail will sweep away the refuge of lies,
and waters will overwhelm the shelter.”

Then your covenant with death will be annulled,
and your agreement with Sheol will not stand;

when the overwhelming scourge passes through,
you will be beaten down by it.
As often as it passes through it will take you;
for morning by morning it will pass through,
by day and by night;
and it will be sheer terror to understand the message.

For the bed is too short to stretch oneself on,
and the covering too narrow to wrap oneself in.

For Yahweh will rise up as on Mount Perazim;
as in the Valley of Gibeon he will be roused;

to do his deed — strange is his deed!
and to work his work — alien is his work!

Now therefore do not scoff,
lest your bonds be made strong;
for I have heard a decree of destruction
from the Lord God of hosts against the whole land.

Give ear, and hear my voice;
give attention, and hear my speech.

Does he who plows for sowing plow continually?
Does he continually open and harrow his ground?

When he has leveled its surface,
does he not scatter dill, sow cumin,
and put in wheat in rows
and barley in its proper place,
and emmer as the border?

For he is rightly instructed;
his God teaches him.

Dill is not threshed with a threshing sledge,
nor is a cart wheel rolled over cumin,

but dill is beaten out with a stick,
and cumin with a rod.

Does one crush grain for bread?
No, he does not thresh it forever;
when he drives his cart wheel over it
with his horses, he does not crush it.
This also comes from Yahweh of hosts;
he is wonderful in counsel
and excellent in wisdom.

In the midst of this passage, Isaiah uses an unusual metaphor - a bed which is too short and a blanket which is too narrow. Physically and concretely, such circumstances would keep the prospective sleeper ill at ease and in a process of continual rearrangement.

God’s wrath, and the message explaining God’s wrath, leave the listener restless. Lasting inner peace arrives only with Jesus and the indwelling of His Holy Spirit. Martin Luther writes:

Two proverbial comparisons are used: The bed is short, the cover is narrow; and so one has to adjust to the situation. Therefore also by affliction we are driven to the Word away from our presumption. Jerome applies this to marriage, where the husband says to his wife: “The bed is narrow, it cannot hold both me, your husband, and an adulterer. Either I or the adulterer has to fall out of it.” Thus Christ, our Husband, cannot be there at the same time as our presumption. One has to fall. But this thought of Jerome’s is allegorical. Let us understand it literally concerning distress. For just as the shortness of the bed keeps us from stretching our limbs but makes us pull them up so that we do not fall out and get cold, so distress holds us together so that we do not fall away from the Word of God, neither in good times or in affliction, but by faith abide in it. The cross teaches us how to snuggle up, since in good times we sometimes stroll and stray, inwardly by presumption and outwardly by our endeavors, our lusts and luxuries, and other evils.

Johann Peter Lange and Philip Schaff reflect on the dialectical moment in preaching which creates discomfort - that which is the “Law” in the “Law and Gospel” paradigm:

Is not that a dreadful preaching, when one finds himself in a situation which is fittingly compared to a bed that is too short, or a to a covering that is too narrow? - This is a distressful condition. For resistance is encountered on all sides, and the means are insufficient to any undertaking.

The Law, then, is a complex thing. It is a conviction of one’s own sin and guilt, which is in itself already a complex, inasmuch as one has one’s own committed sins as well as one’s inherited sinful nature; but it is also a sense of doom about the consequences of that guilt. Additionally, it is a restlessness, an Angst, which leaves one without inner peace.

For the ancient residents of Judah, as well as for the modern soul, relief arrives with Jesus. No treaties with Egypt and Assyria - no postmodern efforts to find a meaningful foundation in one’s emotions - are effective in soothing the soul, and are in fact eventually to inflict further anxiety upon the soul.

Jesus is the Prince of Peace, and He breaks into our uncomfortable bed of spiritual turmoil, bringing not only peace, but hope, and the possibility of meaning by means of serving one’s fellow man.

Pope Francis - His Moral Perspective?

One need not be a practicing Roman Catholic to find pope-watching to be a thought-provoking pastime. The papacy, even if one must honestly disagree with its dogma, is nonetheless a source of interesting ideas.

Naturally, general public interest in the workings of the Roman Catholic church is shaped by reporting which centers either on only socially controversial questions, or on the intrigue generated by the selection of a new pope.

But a more reflective consideration of the material goes past the superficial presentations in the news media.

Both the non-Catholic and the anti-Catholic media covered offhand remarks made by Pope Francis I shortly after he took office in 2013. Prematurely reading ideas into the pontiff’s words, they later experienced, as Kathleen Parker writes,

chagrin to some who too soon interpreted Francis’s broad compassion as a precursor to doctrinal changes related to marriage.

Learning that Francis was not preparing a rebellion against the church’s expressed understanding of marriage, the disappointed media reverted to its previous pattern of alternatingly ignoring or disparaging the Roman Catholic hierarchy. Thus there was little coverage when Francis

delivered a pastoral message that is consistent with the church’s long-held beliefs on marriage.

While the media insist on oversimplifying the narrative - either the pope will stay with tradition or flatly oppose it - they missed the more important development. Pope Francis has indeed made, or is at least attempting to make, a major change in the Roman Catholic church’s perspective on homosexuality. As Kathleen Parker frames it,

What’s different is his language. He has sought fresh ways to see and think about things.

Francis has continued the obvious stance of the Roman Catholic church: it is a sin to engage willfully, physically, and deliberately in homosexual genital contact.

But Francis has made a major departure from past patterns of statements on the topic. What he seems to be articulating is a view in which the church’s major task is not moralizing, denouncing sin, or placing disproportionately large amounts of effort into justifying the moral stance.

Perhaps Francis is expressing the notion that the church should make clear moral statements, but not invest large efforts into producing argumentation and social action surrounding those statements. In short, maybe Francis is saying that the church as been placing too much energy into what are called the ‘culture wars.’

To deemphasize the culture wars is not, however, to stop engaging the culture or to stop resolutely affirming moral teaching. It is precisely this point which eludes much reporting. Francis is

unyielding in his definition of family — a man and woman joined in marriage.

One idea which one might attribute to Francis is this: the church should say, yes, voluntary homosexual behavior is a sin, but the church has other important business to do. The church should and must enunciate unambiguous ethical propositions, but then proceed to feed the poor and preach the Gospel of Jesus.

The church should not let itself get bogged down in endless debates about human sexuality, nor let itself be baited by those in the public arena who are continually attempting to provoke it.

Unequivocal moral declarations should be made, but should not become the major focus of the church. Every effort should be made to ensure that positive ministry is the centerpiece of the organized church.

On such a point, an interesting comparison can be made between the Roman Catholic church and the Salvation Army. The latter organization has made clear moral statements about human sexuality, but has made them in passing, and maintained ministering to the physical and spiritual needs of the poor as its major mission and the vast majority of its effort. Is Francis attempting to nudge his church in a similar direction?

Francis clearly has suggested that he wants to make pastoral changes without changing doctrine.

Under this interpretation, Francis is in no way compromising the moral stance of the church. He is simply placing it within a larger vision of the church’s proper functions.

Comparing homosexuality to other sins is instructive. Smoking cigarettes, failing to properly maintain one’s physical possessions, using inappropriate words in public or in private, failing to eat a proper amount vegetables, failing to donate to charities which care for the poor - all are sins. Why allow the church’s energy to be consumed in great disproportion about one particular sin?

To be sure, there are other interpretations of Francis. With so many reporters writing about the Vatican, any number of opinions about the current pope are available. Time will tell which are correct.

To all appearances, however, it seems that Francis is urging the church to move forward in positive ministry, spreading the love of Jesus to all people, because it is a foundational point of dogma that all people are sinners.

In this way, those who engage in homosexual acts are no different than anyone else: all are sinners, all are hopeless and helpless without Jesus, and all can receive hope and help from Jesus. All humans are utterly dependent on God’s forgiveness for their grave moral failures.

Without weakening the church’s moral determination on questions of human sexuality, Francis appears to be expressing the idea that the church needs simply to move forward in positive ministry. Once the clear ethical proposition has been expressed, the matter is settled. Energy is better used to feed the poor and declare God’s love to all people.

Our Human Nature: Blind and Asleep

The New Testament uses the metaphors of sleep and blindness to describe our human nature. We go through this life, through this world, spiritually asleep, or at least very groggy - and spiritually blind, or at least very myopic.

A person walking in such a condition is a danger to himself and to others. With an unsteady gait and bad vision, he’s likely to collide with something or someone. Damage or injury will result.

On a spiritual level, we humans aren’t likely to see or fully comprehend the dangers around us - sin, death, and the devil - or understand the dangers from within - our own sinful nature.

We can’t see the good paths which have been opened to us - and if we could see them, our shaky steps would soon stumble. We can’t see the Savior who’s there to help us.

C.F.W. Walther, who was president of the Missouri Synod in 1847, served in that capacity until 1850 and again from 1864 to 1878. In addition, he headed Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, where he also taught theology (1850–87). Regarding the spiritual fogginess which is human nature, Walther wrote:

Ach, meine Lieben, unselig ist der Mensch, welcher aus diesem natürlichen geistlichen Schlaf nicht schon hier erwacht! Dieser geistliche Schlaf ist nichts anderes, als der sichere Vorbote des ewigen Todes oder, was dasselbe ist, der ewigen Verdammnis. Allenthalben schallt uns daher in Gottes Wort die Stimme entgegen: „Wache auf, der du schläfst, und stehe auf von den Toten, so wird dich Christus erleuchten.“ Diese Stimme ertönt auch in unserer heutigen Sonntagsepistel. O, so gebe denn Gott, daß sie heute nicht nur in unser Ohr, sondern auch in unser aller Herz dringe, daraus allen Schlaf der Sünde verscheuche und uns zu einem neuen Leben in Christo erwecke! - Doch ehe wir dieser Stimme unser Ohr leihen, laß uns vorher den Herrn selbst hierzu um seines Heiligen Geistes Gnade anrufen in stillem Gebete. -

Being human, we go through our earthly existence with impaired spiritual consciousness and impaired spiritual vision. Our only hope is that Jesus takes us by the hand, and leads us, sometimes pulling us against our wills, sometimes picking us up and carrying us.

On our own, we are helpless, witless, and clueless.

We are not doomed to be this way forever. There is a better future. Jesus will lead us, sleepy and imperceptive as we are, through this life.

In eternity, however, God will remake us - we will see clearly (I Cor 13:12) and will be fully awake and alert.

Geopolitical Nightmares

Questions become complicated when ethics, spirituality, politics, and history intersect. The Middle East is a region full of such intersections.

Palestinian think Mitri Raheb wrestles with questions about the Israeli-Palestinian tensions. Those tensions, he argues, are set in the larger context of the world-historical relations between the Middle East and the rest of the earth.

The western end of the Mediterranean has been the object of tug-of-war struggles between major world powers for millennia. Egypt and Babylon, Persia and Greece, Rome and its successors, and the Ottoman Empire, to name only a few, have successively desired, fought over, or occupied this region.

The small and diverse ethnic groups who have been the successive native inhabitants of the region feel themselves to be pawns in struggles between bigger players. The ethical challenges posed by the situations there, by the area’s history, and by competing theological interpretations of the region’s events are complex.

From which perspectives can or should this part of the world be considered? To the Europeans it’s east; to the Asians it’s west. Mitri Raheb reminds us that we should be aware of our perspective - that we will not achieve a perfectly neutral “objective” assessment of the region. Everyone is somewhere, and from that point, he sees the world. If we cannot achieve the ideal neutrality, then at least we should be conscious of that circumstance as we proceed with our considerations. Raheb writes:

I’m often invited to speak about issues related to the so-called Middle East. I like to commence these occasions by stating that this is terminology that sounds obvious, as if everyone knows what we are talking about, and yet it is a misleading. The question to pose is: middle of where and east of what? Once this question is asked, people realize that that we are dealing with a Eurocentric view of the world. Only by looking at our region of the planet from Europe does one see it as east / southeast. To distinguish it from the Far East, Europeans first called it the Near East and later the Middle East.

Imperialism has shaped the region. From Persians to Alexander the Great, from Mohammed’s first conquests to the Ottomans, the Levant has been the object of imperial ambition. The Seljuk Turks fought viciously in 1098 A.D. against Egypt’s Fatimid caliphate to conquer and occupy Israel: that would not be the only time that Muslims killed Muslims in a power struggle over this coveted bit a real estate.

The terminology, Mitri Raheb asserts, used to discuss the region has been shaped by these centuries of imperial ambition:

It is noteworthy that the term was coined in the mid-nineteenth century when Europe was at the height of its power. The region’s name is thus closely related to imperial power. The use of the term because widespread only after the collapse of a vast Ottoman Empire that had held the region together for hundreds of years. The designation of the Middle East is therefore part and parcel of the colonial history of the region.

While many empires - both those arising in the Middle East, and those from outside it - have sought to control or occupy Canaan, it has been the European interests which have been blamed the most. Perhaps because their presence in the region has not been one of merely military occupation, but one of cultural and economic influence. Such influence may be, in some ways, more bitterly resented than the stationing of soldiers in the region.

While Europe developed a growing artistic and scientific culture, the formerly thriving civilizations of the Middle East became less creative under the influence of Islam: the burst of intellectual activity which energized chemistry, mathematics, physics, architecture, and music had its roots in Europe and blossomed there, while Muslim lands produced ever fewer inventions and discoveries.

Aware of their decline and nostalgic for the former cultural glories which surrounded lands like Babylon, Persia, and Egypt, residents of the Middle East resented being named by Europe. Scholar Marc Van De Mieroop writes:

Reconceptualizing the Orient as the Near / Middle East and Far East vis-a-vis Europe reaffirmed the central position of Europe in this imagery and further peripheralized the East, Europe being the Metropolis.

The powerful resentment, arising from the knowledge that Middle East had once been a center of civilization and was now on the margins of it, and from the palpable sense of decline among those who lived there, was directed toward Europe, a latecomer to civilization, which was now surpassing it Ancient Near Eastern cultural parents.

This sense of humiliation needed a scapegoat: Europe would be blamed by Islam for the damage which had been inflicted upon the region. Salim Tamari writes:

The idea of the Middle East cannot be separated from the power to create and impose categories of knowledge on the rest of the world. The Middle East exists because the West has possessed sufficient power to give the idea substance. In this regard the colonial past and the imperial present are parts of the equation that make the Middle East real.

Yet Europe is not guiltless. It could have intervened to rescue the endangered cultural energy and creativity of the Middle East. It could have presented a more humane face at certain key points in the convoluted narrative of the Crusades. Mitri Raheb notes also that the region is ill-defined: the terminology is not a precise name.

But behind this name is not just a colonial perspective but an intrinsic identity question. The Middle East is not easy to pinpoint, because it has no definition or boundaries. While to some and in certain contexts it once meant the whole of the area from India to in the east to Morocco in the west, and from Turkey in the north to Sudan in the south, it is understood today more or less as the area covering the Arabian Gulf to the east, and Syria and Iraq to the north, encompassing Egypt in the west, and as far south as the Sudan.

The diversity within the Middle East makes it difficult to define: not only a spectrum of quarreling Islamic sects, but Jews outside of Israel and Christians scattered across the region form a religious smorgasbord. The Iranians are ethnically Persians, not Arabs. The Turks and Kurds likewise have a unique non-Arab heritage.

One important feature of the Middle East is that it has no “middle” or center. Rather, it has different centers of power separated by deserts and/or mountain chains.

Yet by forming narratives about empires and imperialism, we risk losing sight of humanity. All the parties in the Middle East, and all the parties outside of it, share the common human condition: they are tragically flawed yet contain traces of an original divine image. The commit moral evils, yet are deeply loved by a generous God.

Geographically speaking, part of the Middle East is located in Asia, but part is also found in North Africa. In fact, the bulk of the Middle East could be called West Asia. This is the term used, for example, at the United Nations. The other portion is still referred to as North Africa.

If all the people in and around the Middle East share the same human nature, then they share the same needs, and the same inability to provide for them. It doesn’t matter whom we blame for a long history of injustice. What matters is obtaining justice, and that’s the one thing that humans can’t do. We dare not rely on our efforts to put things right: the only possible outcome of such attempts will be even more injustice.

Justice is divine, and peace is a fruit of God’s intervention, not humanity’s efforts.

Historically speaking, and for over a millennium, from Alexander the Great in the fourth century BC to Charlemagne in the eighth century AD, the nexus of the region was located in the west, where the Mediterranean was the center and the region became part of “Europe.” The rise of Islam and its spread throughout the Middle East pulled the region away from Europe’s sphere of influence, making it part of the Arab-Islamic world.

It is no mere coincidence that Jesus did His major work in this region of the world. He chose it as the proper stage for His mission to help humanity.

Religiously speaking, the region changed religion at least four times, from “paganism” to Judaism, to Christianity, to Islam. Because of these not inconsiderable realities, the region was incapable of self-definition and thus the prevailing empires imposed their weltpolitik.

Geopolitical considerations lead ultimately to a thousand dead ends. Hope is divinely dispensed, and humans can only respond with gratitude. There are possibilities for good things to happen in the Middle East - justice and peace and reconciliation - but they will not be brought about by human effort.

The Hermeneutics of Empire: the West and the Middle East

In colleges and universities, we routinely isolate academic disciplines like history, theology, and textual criticism. In real life, these divisions are not clear or neat.

Political power can be gained by those who determine how a given set of facts is woven into a narrative, or by those who can decide which narrative, among a set of competing narratives, will become canonical.

Once a narrative is established, another layer of decisions will be made about how it is understood or applied. These decisions will likewise determine the distribution of power.

In the complex set of conflicts which is the “Middle East” or “Near East” - already in this nomenclature a decision is being made about the perspective from which the region is viewed - narratives have been, and are being, formulated, understood, misunderstood, applied, misapplied, told and retold in numerous ways.

The sheer number of variations on any one of these narratives, and the complexity of these narratives, explain why the long-sought diplomatically negotiated stable peace is so elusive. Deeply divergent narratives leave little room for common ground or a mutually adopted set of axioms which might be used as a starting point for a new narrative.

The Middle East presents us not only a with groups and their interactions with each other, but also with interactions between the Middle East and the rest of the world.

This region has been the springboard for empire and would-be empires, both in ancient and modern times. It is telling that in every century, more than one invading force has left the Middle East, heading for regions as diverse as North Africa, Spain, France, Italy, Greece, the Balkans, Hungary, Ukraine, Poland, Austria, and India.

The concept of “empire” is a staple in constructing narratives about the Middle East. Empires from outside the region have worked their way into the narratives as well, including invaders like Alexander the Great.

Author Mitri Raheb reflects on the role which “empire” plays in narratives about the Middle East. The diverse people groups which share, because of their location, the name ‘Palestinian’ see themselves, according to Raheb, as objects having been manipulated by a long series of empires:

Hermeneutics is the study of the theory and practice of interpretation. Interpreting a story is an art that requires much creativity and imagination. It is also a science. It is not an innocent science, but one very closely related to empire. The empire wants to control the storyline - its meaning, production, and marketing. It does so consciously and often - far more dangerously - unconsciously.

The extent to which Raheb speaks for a large segment of Palestinians is not clear. He asserts that a modern empire, not organized as a single state like previous empires, but rather a cultural and economic empire, is maneuvering this ethnically and religiously diverse group.

He posits the “West” as having created the nation-state of Israel and maintained it at the expense of the other nations which had previously occupied this land:

Hermeneutics is one of the most hazardous and repressive elements in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Our problem would be much more easier to deal with if it were solely a massive injustice, a problem between Israelis and Palestinians. Unfortunately, the Western world is part of the intractability rather than part of the solution. The Israeli occupation is subsidized by the United States and Europe. The Israelis would not have the financial capability to build a three billion dollar “separation wall” or the thirty billion dollar settlements in the West Bank if they paid the bills from their own pockets. “Rich uncles” donate that money and/or provide soft loans. They do so because, for them, Israel belongs to the empire. In short, it serves their interests, although a small but growing number of people are beginning to realize that Israel is becoming more of a permanent liability than a strategic partner.

It may be asked, to which extent one can properly posit a monolithic “West” and to which extent it unanimously and univocally asserted itself in the creation and sustenance of modern Israel.

The significance of the founding of the nation-state of modern Israel is doubtless significant, but lost in many of the narratives is the fact that even prior to that event, the hope for a peaceful and forward-looking organization of the Middle East was fading as the French Mandate and British Mandates gradually deconstructed themselves.

While many narratives see Israel’s founding in 1948 as the single great destabilizing event, a constructive pattern for the region had by that time perhaps already been lost, when postwar England and France felt themselves overextended and could no longer invest the resources to plant and maintain stability in the area.

So, while Mitri Raheb and others see Israel as an ‘occupation,’ the greater and more foundational problem is perhaps the lack of British and French occupation of not only Palestine, but Syria, Iraq, and other territories in the region.

Because he sees only Israel as the destabilizing factor, Raheb is forced to argue against any and all influence from outside the region:

It is not only the flow of hardware, military equipment, and advanced technology that provides the fuel to maintain the occupying power, but it is also the “software” - the culture, the narrative, and the theology - that helps to power the state of Israel. These provide the soft power or halo that enables Israel to continue to get away with its oppression of the Palestinian people without serious ramifications. This software was long in the making, but it became a dominant reality following World War II. Since then, we have been told that God is on the other side, on Israel’s side. From that time on the story has been mixed with history, and biblical Israel with the modern state of Israel. The myth of a Judeo-Christian tradition has blurred the scene in Palestine, and for the last sixty-three years Palestinians have been demonized by a dominant Western culture.

Raheb sees a monolithic “West” as supporting Israel and therefore oppressing the coincidental mixture of nations which had been on that piece of land. He is perhaps naive to imagine such a unified Western intent or action, given the disunity between European and American diplomats on precisely this question.

In addition to cultural and economic imperialism, Raheb argues that religious motives are at work here. Perhaps he is correct, to the extent that we can distinguish religions from God. Sets of traditions and institutions manufactured over the centuries by people do indeed have an impact in these narratives.

God, on the other hand, is far above these petty power grabs - and far below them. He is present whenever there is an impulse for humane action - with no regard for the ethnicity or nationality of the people among whom such an impulse might take place.

Jesus is present in every humanitarian act, every sincere initiative toward peace, and every step away from institutionalized hatred and violence.

Jesus will not, however, allow Himself to be confined in anyone’s narrative. He is always bigger.

The physical universe in which we live - not only the Middle East - is essentially and permanently flawed. A utopia cannot be constructed here.

We can and should look to improve the world, but we must not allow ourselves to be fooled into thinking that we can perfect it. There will always be plagues, famines, wars, and rumors of war.

In our temporal-spatial continuum, there will not be a perfect and lasting peace, with perfect and lasting justice, in the Middle East - or anywhere else. We can make it more peaceful, and more just, and we are morally obliged to make it as peaceful and just as we can.

That will not be done by wading into a tangle of numerous complex narratives constructed by Israelis and Palestinians.

History: God at Work

Because God is active in concrete ways in the physical world, history is not merely an random record of “what happened.” History is theology. History is God’s diary - a record of what He’s done.

Given that history has spiritual significance, the way in which historians do history becomes a theologically relevant matter. This is obvious in cases like Constantine’s imperial policies, or Henry VIII’s break with Rome, but is equally important in less obvious cases, like Mao’s conflict with Chiang Kai-shek (Jiang Jieshi) or how Chandragupta Maurya taxed the peasants of India.

All history is sacred history.

Seeking to unfold the spiritual implications of historical methods, author Mitri Raheb looks at the ways in which the history of Palestine has been recorded. Palestine - or ‘Philistia’ - has been documented as a geographic region for millennia, occupied or dominated by various nations at various times.

To even mention Palestine in the twentieth or twenty-first centuries is obviously a politically sensitive topic. Yet to speak of Palestine only in those centuries is to ignore at least four thousand years of recorded history.

If we examine the ancient history of Palestine, and the many different ethnic groups which lived in, or moved through, it, we can do so either in the light of contemporary events - in which case we are gerrymandering history for the sake of modern politics - or ignoring contemporary events - in which case we are refusing to examine evidence which may shed light on what’s happening now.

The history of Palestine is the history of the land - in the direct physical sense - and not the history of a nation or of a state, because various nations and various states have occupied or ruled this land.

Mitri Raheb states a bold thesis about the historiography of Palestine:

Historical writing by Christians that takes account of the Near East and Palestine falls, without exception, into one of two approaches. The first is biblical history, which starts approximately with Abraham and continues, give or take, up to the time of Jesus. Scholars in this field apply their research to the history of the Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Greeks, and Romans, and then reflect on the implications of those empires on Palestine. This stream of history generally ends with the second Jewish Revolt in the middle of the second century AD. Because this field is concerned with biblical history, interest in the history of Palestine ends there. After that no one is obliged to hear, study, or even research anything that has to do with the Palestinian history that follows.

According to Mitri Raheb, historians make one of two mistakes: either they treat the history of Palestine as ending between 100 and 200 A.D., or they treat its history as largely uninteresting. Naturally, these formulations are overstatements - very few historians indeed would assert such propositions - but Raheb argues that they, in practice, treat Palestine this way:

The second approach is that of church history. Church history is taught mainly as world history and mainly as Western history. It usually begins with the early church, proceeding from Constantine and the Byzantine Empire to the Holy Roman Empire, the Crusades, the era of Scholasticism, to the Reformation, and on to mission history, concluding with contemporary history. With the exception of the first two centuries and, to a certain degree, the Crusades, Palestine is not deemed noteworthy, and thus its history remains largely in the dark.

The question, then, begs to be asked: in which way should historians treat Palestine? As a question of historical methodology, Palestine should be treated in the same way as any other territory.

If history is theology, then the history of Palestine is a record of how God has manifested Himself there - just as the history of Thailand or Bolivia is a record of how God has shown Himself in those areas.

God is not interested in one’s citizenship. God is not interested in whether one is culturally Jewish or Muslim. God is interested in giving good things to people.

The religious categories of the region are a mess. To be identified as “Palestinian” does not entail automatically that one is a Muslim. God’s vehicle for reaching people is not cultural Christianity. His vehicle is Jesus.

What has Jesus been doing in Palestine for the last four thousand years? What is He doing there today?

These same questions can be posed about China or Bolivia or even the United States.

Spiritual Sight, Spiritual Alertness

The New Testament repeatedly uses the metaphors of sight (Matthew 7:5, 13:13) and sleep (Mark 13:36) to indicate spiritual conditions. Correspondingly, the reader is admonished to see (Isaiah 42:18, 46:8) and to awake (Ephesians 5:14, Romans 13:11).

Extending the metaphors, the reader may imagine not only someone who is totally blind or completely asleep, but also someone whose vision is impaired or who is drowsy. These would indicate a spiritual condition similar to that described by John in his letters to Ephesus and Sardis - indeed, in the latter letter, he commands that church to “wake up” (Revelation 3:3).

Those who are asleep are not conscious and not aware of their circumstances - they don’t know what’s happening around them. That of which they are aware is a dream - a fiction. To be spiritually asleep is to be in a state of delusion. C.F.W. Walther, preaching on chapter thirteen of Paul’s letter to the Romans, writes:

Sie lernen daher auch nie die Gefahr kennen, in der ihre Seele von Natur schwebt, ewig verloren zu gehen. Sie kommen nie zur Erkenntnis ihres großen natürlichen Verderbens. Sie sehen es nie ein, daß ihr natürlicher Sinn ein fleischlicher und daher nichts als eine Feindschaft wider Gott sei. Sie lernen das Böse von dem Guten, das Wichtige von dem Nichtigen, das Glück von dem Unglück nie recht unterscheiden. Sie erfahren es aber auch nie, welche große Gnade es für sie sei, daß Christus in die Welt gekommen ist, die Sünder selig zu machen; Jesus wird in ihrem Herzen nie groß, herrlich, überschwenglich tröstlich, nie ihr ein und alles. Die Welt und was die Welt einem Menschen verschaffen kann - das bleibt ihr höchstes Gut, um das sie vor allem täglich sorgen, darnach sie täglich am ersten trachten. Zu einem entschiedenen Haß der Sünde, auch ihrer Schoßsünde, und zu einer lebendigen Einsicht, daß die Welt mit allem, was sie enthält und was der Mensch darin erstreben und gewinnen kann, nichts ist, kurz, zu der Weisheit Salomos: „Es ist alles eitel, es ist alles ganz eitel“ - dazu kommen sie nicht.

Walther had arrived in the United States in 1839, as part of a group led by Martin Stefan. When Stefan’s leadership was discovered to be suboptimal, he was dismissed from the band settlers, who had immigrated in order to establish a community in which they might practice their faith. Walther became an influential leader in the wake of Stefan’s exit.

The scriptural metaphors of blindness and sleep, and their moderated forms of blurry vision or grogginess, can serve in the process of examining one’s conscience. In quiet meditation, one can ask, “in which ways is my spiritual vision defective? in which ways am I spiritually drowsy?”

Sin - whether our inherited sinful nature or the sins we personally commit - can make us comfortable in our unawareness. Although impaired vision and grogginess are handicaps to our effectiveness, they can keep us pleasantly unaware of the challenges to which God might be calling us - whether they be challenges of service or challenges to reform our lives.

Being unable to accurately or completely perceive spiritually our own condition, we live in a fiction created by our own imaginations. Walther explains:

Ihr ganzes Leben bringen sie wie im Traume zu. Sie schlafen, und meinen doch zu wachen; sie sind tot, und meinen doch zu leben. Sie sind in einer steten Täuschung begriffen. Wenn sie Gott im Irdischen segnet, um sie durch seine Güte zur Buße zu leiten, so nehmen sie diese Güte für ein Zeichen ihres Gnadenstandes an und werden nur um so sicherer; wenn ihnen Gott hingegen Not und Jammer schickt, um sie von der Erde loszureißen und zu sich zu ziehen, so fangen sie an, mit Gott zu hadern und Gott um so feinder zu werden, als einem Ungerechten, der ihnen Härteres auflege, als sie verdienen.

When I spend time examining myself a find only a few small sins, then I know that I’m spiritually drowsy and that my spiritual vision is blurred: self-examination should lead to a strong awareness of my need for forgiveness. If it’s time to confess my sins, and I can’t think of much to confess, then spiritually I’m not fully awake and my vision into my soul is impaired.

I need to be alert and keep a keen watch - Jesus encourages us to be “on guard” or to “beware” or to “watch” (Matthew 10:17, 16:6; Mark 13:9; Luke 12:15) - because even when Jesus defeats one temptation in my life, another will arise from a different and perhaps unexpected direction.

If I am aware of my sin, but think that I can do something about it, then I’m not seeing the situation accurately - I’m dreaming, or my vision is impaired. The reality is that I am utterly helpless against my sin, and the only one who can do something about the situation is Jesus. To think that I can somehow fix my life is a delusion.

To feel utterly hopeless about life, to feel trapped and enslaved to my sin, to consider myself worthless - these, too, are nightmares and not realities, brought about by my spiritual sleepiness and spiritual myopia. Jesus is always at work to save, to help, to forgive. We are never without hope, no matter how painful our situation.

To be fully awake, then, is to be aware that Jesus is ever active and is so on our behalf. To have clear spiritual vision is to fix our eyes on Jesus (Psalm 141:8)

Sleep and Blindness - Instructive Metaphors

The New Testament uses the metaphors of sleep and blindness to describe the human condition - the sinfulness and the powerlessness over sin which constitutes the natural lives of human beings. Paul writes that (II Corinthians 4:4) “The god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers.”

Spiritual blindness is the inability to “see” - i.e., to understand, know, discern - the spiritual realities in one’s concrete situation. Spiritual sleep is an unawareness and lack of perception of those realities. Urging followers of Jesus to alertness and new levels of awareness, Paul writes (Ephesians 5:14), “Wake up, sleeper!”

As with all metaphors, these two metaphors have boundaries: limits to their applications. Those who are physically literally blind are aware of their blindness, know they are not receiving certain sensations, and can inquire about, and investigate, that which they are not seeing. Those who spiritually metaphorically blind often do not realize that they are failing to sense or perceive something, and therefore do not ask about what they’re missing.

Those who are physically literally asleep are unconscious, not conscious of anything happening around them. Those who are metaphorically spiritually asleep are aware of some things happening around them, but not of spiritual things.

Carl Ferdinand Wilhelm Walther was born in 1811 in Langenchursdorf in Germany. He later emigrated to the United States. Concerning the use of the sleep metaphor in Paul’s letter to the Romans, Walther wrote:

Wie ein leiblich Schlafender nichts von der sichtbaren Sonne weiß, die bereits über ihm aufergangen ist und ihre Strahlen in sein Schlafgemach wirft; wie er nichts von der Gefahr ahnt, in der er schweben mag, und weder das Böse noch das Gute wahrnimmt, das ihn umgiebt; wie er aber, nur von nichtigen Traumbildern umgaukelt, bald ergötzt, bald erschreckt wird; wie er nämlich bald vom großem Glück, Reichtum und Ehren, bald von schwerem Unglück träumt, während weder das eine, noch das andere Wirklichkeit hat: ähnlich ist im Geistlichen der Zustand aller Menschen, ehe sie das Gnadenwunder erfahren haben, durch Gottes Wort und Geist umgewandelt worden zu sein.

The metaphor of blindness is not limited to the condition of people prior to justification. Those already justified, and in whom the process of sanctification has begun, are still in danger of blindness, as John writes (I John 2:11), “But anyone who hates a brother or sister is in the darkness and walks around in the darkness. They do not know where they are going, because the darkness has blinded them.”

John is writing here to those who have already been made into followers of Jesus, in whom the Holy Spirit has already worked to some extent. Yet they, too, are capable of blindness. Therefore no reader may feel exempt from the New Testament’s warnings and admonitions about blindness.

Likewise, those who are followers of Jesus are encouraged (Galatians 6:9) to “not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.” To ‘grow weary’ and to ‘give up’ would be to give in to sleep and fall asleep. The danger of falling asleep, as happened in the Garden of Gethsemane, is real for any human. Walther notes:

Alle natürliche Menschen liegen nämlich in einem tiefen geistlichen Schlafe. Sie erfahren nichts von dem alles erleuchtenden Lichte der bereits über ihnen aufgegangen Sonne des Evangeliums. Die größte Anzahl derselben achtet vielmehr dieses himmlische Licht für Finsternis, hält die göttliche Weisheit, die sie selig machen will, für Thorheit, ja, wütet und tobt wohl gar dagegen, als gegen das furchtbarste Hindernis des wahren menschlichen Glückes. Andere hingegen hören das Evangelium wohl noch, aber während es ihr leibliches Ohr hört, bleibt das Ohr ihres Geistes dafür verschlossen. Sie sind jenen besonders gefährlich Kranken gleich, die bei offenen Augen schlafen. Sie lassen sich von dem Licht des Evangeliums mit seinen himmlischen Strahlen beleuchten, aber ihr Verstand und ihr Herz bleiben unerleuchtet. Sie kommen nicht weiter, als bis zu einem kraftlosen historischen wissen, zu einer unfruchtbaren buchstäblichen Erkenntnis, zu einem toten, nur im Kopfe befindlichen Glauben.

These metaphors admit of degree: short of being blind, one can impaired vision. In fact, people by nature lack perfect spiritual vision, and Paul tells us (I Corinthians 13:12) that we see as if via a smudged mirror.

Likewise, short of being fully asleep, one may be drowsy or fatigued. When drowsy, one risks both falling asleep (Matthew 25:5) and being weary. If not asleep, one’s weariness may prevent one from effectively working for God’s Kingdom (Hebrews 12:3, Revelation 2:3).

While having boundaries like all metaphors, the metaphors of sleep and blindness in the New Testament apply both to the unjustified and to the seasoned follower of Jesus; they also admit of degree.

Why the Details Might Matter

The name ‘Jesus’ in English was derived from the German Jesus, which came from the Latin Iesus, which in turn arose from the Greek Iesous, rooted ultimately in the Hebrew Yeshua.

The journey of one name through at least five languages can be more fully understood if one hears the pronunciation of each form, and if one sees the Greek version and the Hebrew original in their own alphabets.

Of greater philological interest are the regional variations in spelling and pronunciation of this one original Hebrew name. While the proper Hebrew form Yeshua finds its source in the Tanakh (Old Testament), at the time of Jesus in the region of Galilee, it was often pronounced Yeshu and sometimes spelled accordingly.

The Hebrew name Yeshua is rendered, confusingly, into English as “Jesus” in the New Testament, but as “Joshua” in the Old Testament. So in Hebrew, Jesus is Joshua, and Joshua is Jesus.

During the time segment recorded by the four canonical gospels, roughly 5 B.C. to 30 A.D., the name Jesus and its regional variants was very common in the Roman territory “Syria-Palestina.” This popularity may have arisen from the fact that men were rarely or never given the names Moses, David, Solomon, or Aaron at that time; this was done out of reverence and respect. One of the names which was permitted was Joshua. Joshua was the successor to Moses, and thus as close as one could come to naming a baby boy after Moses.

Many other names in the New Testament were also very common at the time, including Joseph and Mary. The brother of Jesus, named James, also had a frequently-given name, but one which is also confusingly translated, because the same Hebrew name which is translated into English as “James” in the New Testament is translated as “Jacob” in the Old Testament. Thus, in Hebrew, James is Jacob and Jacob is James. Professor David Flusser writes:

Jesus ist die übliche griechische Form des Names Josua. Zur Zeit Jesu wurde der name Jeschua ausgesprochen, und so heißt manchmal Jesus von Nazareth in der antiken jüdischen Literatur. Manchmal heißt er dort auch Jeschu. Das ist fast sicher die galiläische Aussprache des Namens. Durch seine besondere galiläische Aussprache verriet sich ja auch Petrus nach der Festnahme Jesu (Mt. 26,73). Der Name Jesu gehörte damals zu den üblichsten Namen der Juden. In den Schriften des antiken jüdischen Historikers Flavius Josephus werden zum Beispiel zwanzig Männer dieses Namens erwähnt. Der erste ist der biblische Josua, der Nachfolger des Moses, der das Heilige Land erobert hat. Die antiken Juden haben aus religiöser Scheu bestimmte wichtige biblische Namen gemieden, unter ihnen David und Salomo, Moses und Aaron. Vielleicht war damals der Name Jeschua-Jesus so verbreitet, weil man den Namen des Nachfolgers des Moses stellvertretend benutzt hat.

Although much of this information may seem like so much linguistic trivia, it does offer the following significant suggestions: First, the details of the New Testament narrative square with data about the naming of people during that time; Second, Nazareth being located in the region of Galilee, the regional variation fits; Third, the concreteness and specificity of this philological data serves to keep our conceptualization of Jesus in the realm of the concrete and specific.

Jesus is not an idea or an archetype. Jesus is a physical individual, a flesh-and-blood human being, who lives in a historically-conditioned time and place exactly as other human beings do. The fact that this Jesus is divine and eternal does not minimize His historical specificity. It is for this reason that the creeds emphasize that He is simultaneously fully human and fully divine.

As with any human being, whether judged significant or not by historians, the amount of data which could conceivably be recorded about her or him is nearly infinite. If one were transcribe every word this person spoke, every journey this person took, everything she or he ate or drank, which clothing she or he wore, what others said or wrote about her or him, etc., the sum of the evidence would be overwhelming.

Thus the Gospel According to John concludes (21:25): “Now there are also many other things that Jesus did. Were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.”

The New Testament, therefore, does not contain all, or even most, of the physical data about the earthly life of Jesus. On the contrary, it contains a selection from the large menu of facts. Given the doctrine of inspiration, we may deduce that the data given in the New Testament are sufficient for purposes for which the text was given.

The text was inspired not to satisfy our historical curiosity, but rather to enable humans to find spiritual peace, meaningful earthly lives, and blissful eternal lives. Therefore we find significant gaps, from a historian’s point of view, in the narratives about the childhood of Jesus.

To fill those gaps, some have sought non-canonical texts, most of which specious, not plausible, and often fabricated to serve an ideological purpose rather than to relate the data about Christ’s childhood. Professor Jürgen Roloff writes:

An keinem anderen Punkt werden die Evangelien den Erwartungen moderner biografisch orientierter Geschichtsschreibung so wenig gerecht wie mit ihren Aussagen über Herkunft, Entwicklung und Frühzeit Jesu. Als gegen Ende des 1. Jahrhunderts n.Chr. das Interesse an dieser Thematik erwachte, fand es nur noch verblasste, durch legendarische Motive überlagerte Erinnerungen vor.

While many details of the Messiah’s childhood years are missing, documented are His locations. Born in the Bethlehem, He spent some time as a refugee in Egypt, and was more at home in Nazareth. His identification with Nazareth is twofold: He spent formative years there, but it was also the home of His extended family.

Nazareth’s role as an ancestral home - the roots in Bethlehem were even further in the past - carries significance. Having been abandoned to gentile populations after the destruction of the Northern Kingdom (ten tribes) around 720 B.C., and after the exile of the Southern Kingdom (two tribes) around 586 B.C. - those two kingdoms being the fragments of the original unitary Israelite Kingdom which was split in a civil war around 930 B.C. - the region of Galilee, and the town of Nazareth within it, had been considered “heathen” territory for several centuries.

During those years, perhaps small numbers of Jews continued to practice their faith among the pagans who controlled the land.

Eventually, after the people of the Southern Kingdom returned from the Babylonian Exile and reestablished their residence, they began to expand northward, reclaiming the Galilean territory. This is an instance of the “theology of the remnant.” It is also an instance of a “Kairos” - a point in time, in this case a significant point: not only had the nation become spiritually refocused as it emerged from the Babylonian Exile, but Nazareth and the surrounding Galilee were spiritually reclaimed, thus becoming a ready and fitting home for the Messiah. Jürgen Roloff continues:

Zuverlässig, weil fest in ältester Überlieferung verankert, sind lediglich die Angaben über Jesu Herkunft aus Nazaret. Dieser im Hügelland von Mittelgaliläa, südwestlich vom See Gennesaret gelegene Ort wird als seine Vaterstadt (Mk 6,1), er selbst als „der Nazarener“ (Mk 1,24; 10,47) bezeichnet. Galiläa, der nördlichste Landesteil Palästinas, hatte eine ganz andere Geschichte durchlaufen als das jüdische Kernland Judäa. Nach dem Untergang des alten Königreichs Israel war die jüdische Bevölkerung stark dezimiert worden; fremdstämmige heidnische Menschen bildeten über mehrere Jahrhunderte die Mehrheit. Das steht auch hinter der alten hebräischen Bezeichnung „Heidengau“ (galil hagoijim Jes 8,23), die in das griechische Wort Galilaia eingegangen ist. Im Zeichen der von Judä ausgehenden Renaissance des Judentums wurde Galiläa durch die hasmonäischen Priesterkönige 104/103 v.Chr. erobert und anschließend planvoll rejudaisiert. Zugleich jedoch verstärkte sich die Präsenz der hellenistisch-römischen Kultur. Diese fand, gefördert vor allem durch Antipas, den Landesherrn zur Zeit Jesu, ihre Schwerpunkte in neu erbauten Städten wie Sepphoris und Tiberias, um von dort aus weithin auszustrahlen.

Historical data about the name and hometown of Jesus might seem to be mere historical trivia. After all, we certainly don’t need to know the linguistic details of German, Latin, Greek, and Hebrew forms. As long as we know who “Jesus” is, that suffices.

Yet philological and geographical evidence are important reminders about the incarnational nature of God. Jesus isn’t merely a set of spiritual maxims. He is a flesh-and-blood man. He lives in a historically conditioned fashion as does every other human being. We can discuss this historical data about Him in the same way we can discuss historical data about anyone.

One tricky aspect (there are several) of the doctrine of the Incarnation is balance. Jesus is divine and He is human. He is truly God and truly man. He is fully 100% God and fully 100% man. This paradox requires careful placement of emphasis.

To fully emphasize His divinity, we recall His miracles, His omnipotence, His omniscience, His omnipresence, His eternality, and His omnibenevolence.

To fully emphasize His humanity, we recall the mundane, physical, concrete, specific, historical and geographical facts of His corporeal existence - a corporeality which continues into the future, inasmuch as His Resurrection was a bodily one, raising the same form which walked the dusty roads of Galilee and ascending forty days later with it.

The German Catholic Church

Words are often the sources of misunderstandings and even of conflicts, and the word 'catholic' is no exception. One must always return to the primary meaning of this word; it is not primarily religious or spiritual in nature. The first part of the word is the Greek root cat- which we find in catalogue and cataract and catapult.

The second part of the word comes from the Greek root hol- which is manifested in words like holistic and hologram. The word 'catholic' means "with respect to everything" or "concerning everything" or "all-embracing" or "universal" - and we see this in nonreligious expressions like "he is a man of catholic tastes" which simply means that he has eclectic tastes.

So, then, when the church claims to be "catholic," it is merely expressing that it is a collection of all those who follow Jesus, regardless of where they live, which language they speak, or which culture informs their social context. That we have a "catholic" faith is simply saying that God loves all humans, that Jesus offers forgiveness to all humans, and that eternal life in heaven is made available to all humans.

The confusions begin to emerge because one particular institution is called the "Roman Catholic Church" - a paradox created by the words alone. The word "Roman" refers to a concrete specific place, and connotes certain traditional social structures which accompany it, while the word "catholic" denotes just the opposite, something which transcends a particular physical situation.

The phrase 'church universal' or 'invisible church' is often used to refer to the collection of all people who are followers of Jesus, regardless of which, if any, specific 'church' or denomination they embrace. The word 'church' generates ambiguity, as does the word 'catholic' - and the two of them together create a downright conceptual jungle.

Although we use words to attempt to clarify and articulate our concepts, they often risk doing just the opposite. It is at least a step toward clarity to distinguish the "Roman Catholic" church, which is a specific institution, from the invisible universal "catholic" church, which is a set of people with no regard to membership in a particular organization or denomination.

Mark Dever offers a historical insight into the development of this terminology. Going back in history, before the phrase "Roman Catholic" emerged, which it did after Luther's Reformation in the 1500s, we can see the word 'catholic' being used when there was less confusion or ambiguity surrounding it:

As far as we know, Ignatius of Antioch was the first person to use the word catholic in relation to the church. In his letter to the Smyrnaeans, written around A.D. 112, he wrote, "Where Jesus Christ is, there is the universal church." Early Christian writers believed in the catholic church — that Christians everywhere trusted in one God, confessed one faith, received one baptism, and shared one mission. In that sense, catholic meant "real" or "authentic."

The earliest institutional churches were geographically defined: the Chaldean Church, the Ethiopic Church, the Syrian Church, etc., and so the Roman Church was simply institutional Christianity as it occurred approximately within the boundaries of what was, or had been, the Roman Empire.

There were different varieties of Christianity, but each was a sort of monopoly within its geographic area. Only after the Reformation did a situation arise in which different variations of Christianity existed side-by-side within the same region. Despite the notion of "religious wars," they coexisted peacefully for the most part, and when so-called "religious wars" arose, they were often motivated by quite nonreligious political ambition, poorly disguised by a thin veneer of religious vocabulary.

A new vocabulary was needed for this situation, a situation of various flavors of Christianity heterogeneously occupying the same space. Thus arose a colorful spiritual landscape of Lutherans, Calvinists, Anglicans, and Roman Catholics. Because 'catholic' is already three syllables, and 'Roman Catholic' is five, 'catholic' quickly became shorthand for 'Roman Catholic' - generating confusion. Generations of Lutherans, Anglicans, and Calvinists have stated that they belong to the catholic church, but not to the Roman Catholic church.

In addition to meaning 'authentic', the word also came to denote 'orthodox' - or, simply put, 'true' or 'accurate' - in contrast to institutions which might promote specious or incorrect ideas. As we saw, above, from Ignatius of Antioch, who died around 110 A.D., his notion of the church's catholicity meant that it was actually existing as a thing or occurring in fact, and not something merely not imagined or supposed, and that it was genuine, and not an imitation or something artificial.

Clement of Alexandria, who was born around 150 A.D., exemplifies this added layer of meaning - orthodoxy on top of authenticity - in a passage cited by Mark Dever:

There is one true Church, the really ancient Church, into which are enrolled those who are righteous according to God's ordinance ... The one Church is violently split up by the heretics into many sects. In essence, in idea, in origin, in pre-eminence we say that the ancient Catholic Church is the only church. This Church brings together, by the will of the one God through the one Lord, into the unity of the one faith which is according to the respective covenants (or rather according to the one covenant established at various times), those who were already appointed; whom God fore-ordained, knowing before the world's foundation that they would be righteous. The preeminence of the church, just as the origin of its constitution, depends on its absolute unity: it excels all other things, and had no equal or rival.

Another translation of Clement's thorny syntax confirms his perception of the tension between the one and the many: centuries before the Great Schism of 1054 A.D., and centuries before Luther's Reformation, there were divisions of other kinds, and while those divisions may have been quite real in the concrete functioning of institutions, and in the specific points of doctrinal statement, there is still a notion of the church's oneness:

From what has been said, then, it is my opinion that the true Church, that which is really ancient, is one, and that in it those who according to God’s purpose are just, are enrolled. For from the very reason that God is one, and the Lord one, that which is in the highest degree honorable is lauded in consequence of its singleness, being an imitation of the one first principle. In the nature of the One, then, is associated in a joint heritage the one Church, which they strive to cut asunder into many sects. Therefore in substance and idea, in origin, in pre-eminence, we say that the ancient and Catholic Church is alone, collecting as it does into the unity of the one faith — which results from the peculiar Testaments, or rather the one Testament in different times by the will of the one God, through one Lord — those already ordained, whom God predestinated, knowing before the foundation of the world that they would be righteous. But the pre-eminence of the Church, as the principle of union, is, in its oneness, in this surpassing all things else, and having nothing like or equal to itself.

Around 350 A.D., Cyril of Jerusalem nudged the word 'catholic' a little closer to its modern meaning, while yet retaining its previous meanings. He spoke of geographical diversity and social class diversity; he spoke of a church which is universal because it addresses those things which are precisely human, those things which all humans face or need. Mark Dever cites this passage:

It is called Catholic then because it extends over all the world, from one end of the earth to the other; and because it teaches universally and completely one and all the doctrines which ought to come to men’s knowledge, concerning things both visible and invisible, heavenly and earthly; and because it brings into subjection to godliness the whole race of mankind, governors and governed, learned and unlearned; and because it universally treats and heals the whole class of sins, which are committed by soul or body, and possesses in itself every form of virtue which is named, both in deeds and words, and in every kind of spiritual gifts.

As the followers of Jesus are called to clarify their task again to each new generation - semper reformanda - Mark Dever sees four challenges to clarifying the catholicity of the church in the twenty-first century. The church must overcome, first, provincialism: we are inclined to project our social, cultural, and geographic specifics onto the universal church, rather than seeing the universal truth of Jesus weaving its way through various traditions, cultures, and places; second, sectarianism: which is not to minimize or deny the significance of doctrinal and dogmatic differences, but rather to see what might be maintained and achieved in spite of them, as we work together on those tasks which God has assigned to us; third, racism: while much has been improved concerning this topic, much remains to be done, and the challenge grows as immigrants and emigrants flow through the continents of Asia, Africa, Europe, and the Americas; fourth, exclusivism: the Good News about Jesus is for all people, and no socio-demographic variable should exclude anyone from fellowship - marital status, income level, profession, etc.

A quick review of John's Gospel, chapter seventeen, or Paul's letter to the Ephesians, chapter four, will suffice as evidence from Scripture, despite the fact that the word 'catholic' or its Greek equivalent do not appear in the New Testament.

While millions of Lutherans, Anglicans, and Calvinists are not members of the Roman Catholic church, they are members of the universal invisible catholic church - as are millions of Eastern Orthodox (Russian, Greek, etc.), millions of Copts, millions who belong to the Chaldean Church or to the Syrian Church or to the Ethiopic Church. And, of course, equally, members of the Roman Catholic church are also reminded to remember that they are part of this invisible universal church.

The Real Bonhoeffer. Really.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer is appropriately considered one of the most significant Christians of all time. This consideration, to be sure, needs clarification in the light of a sense of spiritual equality in which God views all humans equally. Metaphysically, Bonhoeffer is no more important than any other human. Yet the role which he played in concrete, physical, specific history is a role with more significance than some others.

Yet those less significant, but equally important, roles were necessary to Bonhoeffer's role: Aaron holding up Moses' arms. Someone had to change Martin Luther's diaper, or there'd have been no Reformation. Someone had to teach Mother Theresa how to read and write, or there'd have been no world-changing mission in Calcutta.

Precisely because so much has been written about Bonhoeffer, the reader risks losing him. Bonhoeffer has been made and remade, into a liberal and into a conservative, into a Lutheran and into an ecumenist, into a German and into a global citizen, into a revolutionary and into a traditionalist. When a historic individual becomes an icon, the literary world can reduce him to two dimensions, and eventually to one. A pure symbol becomes subject whichever meanings are arbitrarily attached to it.

Consider JFK and MLK as quick examples. Which vote-seeking candidate will fail to praise both of them, and yet attach his own political agenda to both of them?

Thus we need to keep in touch with the specific and concrete details of Bonhoeffer's life, or we will lose him. He will become a symbol to be misinterpreted and exploited by successive ideologies.

To this end, biographies gain their value. Were it not for this danger, one might well dispense with biography. But the physical facts of the man's life act as anchors to keep texts, written by or about him, pegged to reality. One familiar with the daily routine of the Finkenwalde Seminary cannot seriously entertain Bonhoeffer as practical atheist. One versed in Bonhoeffer's academic life cannot embrace the view that, while he explored ecumenism, he abandoned traditional Lutheranism.

Recent biographies, notably one by Eric Metaxas, merit study as companions to Bonhoeffer's writings, and companions to the huge body of literature about Bonhoeffer. Writing about Charles Marsh's biography of Bonhoeffer, Timothy Larson muses about

the sheer unlikelihood of Bonhoeffer's emergence as the boldest opponent of efforts to Nazify the German church.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer was too young and too academic to offer serious resistance to the National Socialist regime of Adolf Hitler. He was a rich kid from an intellectual family. He enjoyed kicking around a soccer ball with seminary students. He had no real monetary income even to support himself.

But what power did Bonhoeffer wield in 1933? He was 27 years old, financially dependent on his parents, and virtually bereft of experience in the working world. His sole professional appointment was an unpaid, non-tenure-track position as a voluntary lecturer. Adjunct professors don't normally stand athwart emperors.

Yet Bonhoeffer was ahead of the curve, ahead of his peers, and ahead of the times. While many of his fellow clergymen and fellow theologians would take several years to learn exactly how evil Hitler was, Bonhoeffer seemed to sense it from the very first. And Bonhoeffer would resist it from the very first. Indeed, along with resisting Hitler, and eventually making plans to overthrow Hitler, Bonhoeffer would be faced with the task of alerting his fellow pastors to the evil and persuading them to oppose it.

Yet Bonhoeffer did. Within weeks of Adolf Hitler's rise to power, Bonhoeffer declared in public that the Führer was offering a false path to salvation — and, in private, that Hitler was an antichrist. When the Nazis called for ethnically Jewish Christians to be expelled from the churches, he alone insisted that the gospel was at stake. (Initially even Karl Barth, like other anti-Nazi dissenters who founded the Confessing Church, claimed that this was merely a question of church order, not a theological issue.) Marsh, director of the Project on Lived Theology at the University of Virginia, makes a convincing case that by 1933, Bonhoeffer was the most radical and outspoken opponent of Nazi church policy.

Bonhoeffer's sense of personal holiness and the strict ethical code by which he lived aided him in his opposition to evil - here again the daily routines at the Finkenwalde Seminary are worth noting: Bonhoeffer forbade seminary students from talking about anyone who was not in the room; this was Bonhoeffer's way of avoiding gossip and observing Luther's explanation of the eighth commandment. But Bonhoeffer also understood clearly that personal holiness earns nothing, and is in fact rubbish in God's sight. Yet personal ethical convictions prepare the soul for confrontation with evil.

Unlike the rumors that sometimes surround him, Larsen writes, Bonhoeffer was "so sexually innocent" that twenty-first century readers find it difficult to believe.

Even Bonhoeffer's physical relationship with his fiancée, Maria — whom Marsh says Bonhoeffer was "smitten" by — comprised only a solitary occasion when, as a prisoner, he kissed her on the cheek in the presence of the public prosecutor. In a late prison letter, Bonhoeffer observed that he had lived a full life even though he would die a virgin.

Connecting with Anglican, Reformed, and Roman Catholic teachers and friends, Bonhoeffer was willing to absorb ideas which passed his litmus test. Particularly interesting are his experiences with American Christianity: which aspects of it he rejected, and which ones he embraced. Larsen reflects on

how willingly Bonhoeffer learned from disparate ecclesial influences. He was a kind of theological hoarder. When he went to Rome, he did not react with disgust as Martin Luther had, but rather gained a new appreciation of the church's universal nature. One is supposed to have to choose between Adolf von Harnack and Barth, but Bonhoeffer managed to value them both. Indeed, to extrapolate, one might see Bonhoeffer's late musings on "religionless Christianity" as blending Barth's insight that "Jesus simply has nothing to do with religion" with Harnack's method of separating the kernel (of biblical truth) from the husk (of cultural and historical circumstance).

While wrestling with theology at the most rarified and abstract intellectual heights, Bonhoeffer was grounded by teaching confirmation classes to teenagers in gritty urban factory neighborhoods. One of his litmus tests for theological ideas was the reality of daily life for these ordinary people. Did any of those ideas help them, make a difference to them, or apply to their lives?

Bonhoeffer was disappointed by his encounters with seminary professors and students in New York in the 1930s. Dismissive of Biblical text and direct discourse about Jesus, these seminarians sought to be relevant but did so without intellectual or spiritual foundations.

Initially, Bonhoeffer was disgusted by American Christianity. He was bewildered and frustrated by theologians who did not care about doctrine and preachers who were not interested in the gospel. Everyone wanted to pontificate on social issues. In time, however, he came to learn that his fellow Germans were also half-wrong in refusing to recognize the ethical demands of the Christian faith. Moreover, Bonhoeffer found in the African American church a community committed to both gospel proclamation and social action. Why, at the tender age of 27, was Bonhoeffer the lone German minister who immediately saw the scandal of excluding Jewish Christians from the church? Precisely because his experience in America taught him to connect faith and practice.

Bonhoeffer also saw quite early on that he would probably die at the hands of the National Socialists. He absorbed this calmly and continued his work. He knew he was risking his life at least as early as 1938, when he took up contact with a broader circle of resisters in Germany, and 1939, when he chose to return to Germany from New York, aware that he was placing his life in danger.

Timothy Larsen argues that one of Bonhoeffer's main points "was that Christianity is not merely a matter of what one believes, but of how one lives." To which we might add, and how one dies.

As German Lutherans rested complacently in their commitment to faith alone, while turning a blind eye to suffering and injustice, Bonhoeffer pointedly preached a Reformation Day sermon on I Corinthians 13:13: "And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love." It turns out that even an unemployed 20-something can stand against the world when empowered by the Love that moves the sun and other stars.

While much has been made of "religionless Christianity," exactly what Bonhoeffer meant by that must be understood in light of his actions and in light of the way he lived his life. The eternal Jesus was so real for Bonhoeffer that religion, as a manmade institution, was often more a hindrance than a help. Bonhoeffer, like many Christians, had to overcome the church to get to Jesus.

When an Angel is Not an Angel

In chapters two and three of the book of Revelation, John writes seven letters to seven churches. All seven of these letters follow a clear pattern. Each of them begins: "To the angel of the church at N write," where N is the name of one of the seven cities.

This seems a bit odd. Since when do human beings write letters to angels? And why would Jesus tell John to write letters to angels?

One possible solution to this mystery lies in the Greek word angelos. Like its Hebrew counterpart, malak, this word gets translated as 'angel' into English. This word's semantic field is, however, much larger that the domain of possible meanings for the English word 'angel' which represents it in our translations.

The primary meaning of angelos and malak is 'messenger' and can also be understood as one who has been deputized, dispatched, or sent as an ambassador.

Angels are included as referents of this word, not because they are supernatural or non-human, but rather because they are sent by God. In the text, the word malak is often used to refer to humans who have been tasked with carrying a message (cf. Genesis 32:3 and Joshua 7:22), and angelos is used in the same way (cf. Luke 7:24 and James 2:25).

So we may well understand the letters dictated to John as being addressed, not to supernatural angels, but to messengers, i.e., to the leaders of the seven churches. Richard Lenski writes that angelos

means "messenger"; so the prophets mentioned in Hag. 1:13, and the priests mentioned in Mal. 2:7 are called angels (messengers) of the Lord. While the seven stars match the seven pedestal lamps, and the singular "angel" is used in chapters 2 and 3, we need not think of only one pastor for each church; each may have had several "elders," who are collectively called a star and a messenger (angel), or one of the elders may have been the chief or the president. Although some regard this as an argument for the date of Revelation, the time being the turn of the first century, we are willing to let this pass. When each church began to have but one pastor is a question.

In each of the seven letters, Jesus gives Himself a different title. Each of the seven titles is derived from the vision which John sees in chapter one. An eighth title, faithful witness, is given to Jesus in chapter one. The title given Jesus at the beginning of each letter connects in some way with the content in that letter.

The titles are "him who holds the seven stars in his right hand, who walks among the seven golden lamp-stands," in the first letter; "the first and the last, who died and came to life," in the letter to Smyrna; "him who has the sharp two-edged sword," in the letter to Pergamum; "the Son of God, who has eyes like a flame of fire, and whose feet are like burnished bronze," in the letter to Thyatira; "him who has the seven spirits of God and the seven stars," in the letter to Sardis; "the holy one, the true one, who has the key of David, who opens and no one will shut, who shuts and no one opens," in the letter to Philadelphia; and "the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of God's creation," in the letter to Laodicea.

The seven cities, in order they are mentioned, roughly bound an area which approximates the Roman province of Asia. This province would correspond to the western end of Turkey, i.e., to Ionia plus a bit of the inland territory to east. The modern reader may not in any way think of this as 'Asia' in the sense of 21st-century English usage. Richard Lenski continues:

The order in which the letters are dictated is that found in 1:11; it is geographical and has nothing to do with a prophetic, chronological succession of churches and church conditions to the end of time. The seven churches and their varying conditions existed simultaneously when Jesus dictated these letters in the year 95. They are typical of the conditions obtaining in the churches of all time irrespective of the number that at any time may belong to the one type or to another.

In each letter, Jesus makes one or more observations about the church in question. The observations may be complimentary or rebuking, or a mixture of the two. The letters are addressed to the leaders of the congregation, but by implication, also to the entire church. When the observations are complementary, we must not allow them to be understood as implying that the church has earned approval, but rather that the Holy Spirit has been at work in this church. When the observations are critical, we may not allow them to be understood as a call to human effort, which is futile and displeasing to God, but rather as announcement of what the Holy Spirit will reform among the congregants if they refrain from preventing it. Lenski notes that more than one congregation may constitute a church:

Ephesus lies nearest to Patmos and is thus made the first in the series. The church in Ephesus may include more than one congregation of this large city. So the angelos may include the entire eldership although many think of only one pastor, the head pastor or bishop. This is true with regard to each of the seven churches: Jesus dictates the letters; John takes the dictation and writes as the dictation proceeds.

The criticisms and complements vary from church to church: Sardis and Laodicea receive sterner criticisms than the others. There is no attempt to be artificially even-handed, and thereby keep the level of criticism roughly the same from letter to letter. The criticisms are quite specific to the concrete situations of the churches, and yet general spiritual lessons can be extracted from them. The churches in Smyrna and Philadelphia receive sympathetic appraisals. Thus we see, while the form is very similar, the content varies substantially. Lenski describes the form:

The seven letters are alike in having a form of their own. The same command to John to write precedes each one. They do not have the common epistolary form; there is no greeting in the nominative, followed by a dative, etc.

Following the observations, instructions are given to each congregation. These imperatives may be seen, at least in part, as correctives to any negative observations which that church may have received. The instructions, penultimate in the letter, are an extension of the beginning of the letter, which is dictated as a command. At the start of each letter, the command to write is given,

and a name for him who "declares theses things." This is stated in the third person.

Following the command to take dictation, and an identification of the recipient of the letter, that third-person title is followed by the first-person observations. The use of the verb 'know' in these observations reminds us of the Scriptural sense of 'knowledge' - both a Kennen and a Wissen, both experiential and factual: Jesus knows His people well, and He knows all about them. Lenski notes:

"I know," in the first person, followed by a statement of the condition of the church, after which come promises, threatening warnings, etc. At or near the end appears the refrain: "The one having an ear, let him hear," etc., and the promise to "the one conquering."

A promised blessing constitutes the end of each letter. We may not think of the blessing as earned or merited by the churches, but rather as freely given by the Holy Spirit. It is incumbent upon the churches not to resist the Spirit's work among them, but that does not constitute earning. A refrain at the end of each letter is "he who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches." This refrain can be taken as a hint that these messages are relevant not only to the year 95 A.D. and not only to the seven churches listed, but rather to the Body Christ throughout time and space. The principles are general, while the applications are specific:

In the case of each letter the Lord designates himself in terms that are taken from chapter 1, and each of the designations is different. Each designation has its individual bearing on the individual church addressed. The reference to the seven stars (1:16) appears also in 3:1.

There are several things which the exegete must ever bear in mind. One of them is that John's Revelation was given to comfort the followers of Jesus. The promises at the end of each letter can do this only if they are not strictly conditional on human effort. It does not comfort people to tell them what they must do to earn God's love; it comforts them to tell them that God already loves them, and His Spirit will work gratitude in their hearts, and will cause them to act in god-pleasing ways out of gratitude. Legalism, and the notion that one must perform works in order to gain or merit God's favor, do not comfort. Grace comforts. Freely-given forgiveness comforts. Unearned favor comforts. God gives gifts generously: this fact comforts.

God at Work

The last book of the New Testament has evoked more fascination than most of the others. Scholars are fairly confidant in dating the text to around the year 95 A.D., and in asserting that it was written on the island of Patmos. The John who wrote it is the same John who wrote the fourth book of the New Testament and who also wrote the three epistles which bear his name. Philology confirms his authorship of all five texts by means of statistical analysis of his vocabulary.

The question which one may pose to the text is this: what is God doing?

The text states that God gave this revelation, that God is showing what must take place, and that God made this content known by means of an angel. The text gives a noteworthy title to Jesus: the faithful witness. Often texts tell of people who are witnesses to, or witnesses about, Jesus. But in this case, Jesus Himself is the witness. About what, or to what, is He a witness?

Further, the text states that Jesus is the ruler of the kings of the earth, that He loves us, that He has freed us, that He has made us to be a kingdom, and that He has made us to be priests. Richard Lenski writes:

In Revelation the Apostle John presents the prophetic visions that were given him to see and to hear on a certain Sunday in the year 95 while he was in exile on a the small island Patmos opposite the southern coast of the Roman province Asia, toward the end of the reign of the great persecutor of the church, the Emperor Domitian. The apostle wrote Revelation by the Lord's own order (1:19); divine Inspiration guided his pen.

At the beginning of the text, John states one of the themes which recurs throughout its twenty-two chapters: "He is coming." Jesus is on His way. In the text, God also says of Himself that He is the "Alpha and the Omega," "who is, and who was, and who is to come." God emphasizes His all-encompassing nature in order to contrast Himself with the Roman emperor. While Emperors like Domitian, Nerva, and Trajan might work to project an image of power and authority, they are, in fact, infinitesimal on God's cosmic scale.

God is communicative. He says things; He sends angels with messages. The Greek and Hebrew words rendered as 'angel' in English mean, non-metaphorically, 'messenger' in those languages.

After the introductory chapter come the seven letters to the churches. He praises the deeds of the Ephesian church, saying that the people in that church work hard and persevere; the Christians in Ephesus "cannot tolerate wicked men" and investigate and examine the concepts presented by false teachers. They persevere, endure hardships, and do not grow weary. But, given that all humans are born with original sin, and all humans further commit their own sins, what does it mean, not to "tolerate wicked men"? Perhaps this indicates those who bring nothing positive to the fellowship, but maliciously, or at least negligently, detract from the church's efforts at charity.

To the church in Smyrna, Jesus says, more than once, that He "knows" them and their conditions. He knows their difficulties and knows that they publicly ridiculed. He reminds them, however, that they have received spiritual blessings (cf. Romans 15:27 and Ephesians 1:3).

In Pergamum, Jesus says, His followers are dwelling among great evil, yet remain true to Him. They have not renounced Jesus, even though at least one of them has been martyred.

As in Smyrna, so also in Thyatira, Jesus reports that He "knows" about His people - He knows their deeds, love, faith, service, and perseverance - and that they "are now doing more than" they did at first. The repetition of the theme of 'being known' emphasizes the importance which humans attach to it: people seem to want to know that somebody somewhere is aware of them and of their circumstances, and that somebody somewhere cares about them.

Jesus addresses stern words to the church in Sardis: only "a few people" have remained faithful to Him.

For the church in Philadelphia, Jesus says that He is holding open a door which nobody can shut. His followers in that city have kept His word despite their weakness: the have endured "patiently."

The Christians in Laodicea, Jesus states, are largely useless.

After assessing each of these churches for strengths and weaknesses, Jesus speaks of future blessings. To the Ephesians, "the right to eat from the tree of life." To His followers in Smyra, He says that they "will not be hurt at all by the second death." To those in Pergamum, Jesus promises mysterious blessings: "hidden manna" and "a white stone with a new name written on it." To the church in Thyatira, He promises "authority over the nations" and "the morning star." To His few isolated followers in Sardis, Jesus says that they "will walk" with Him, dressed in white, and that He "will never blot out" their names from the book of life, "but will acknowledge" them before the Father. To the Philadelphians, He promises that each one of them will be "a pillar in the temple of" God, and that He will write on each of His followers "the name of my God and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem, which is coming down out of heaven," and that He "will also write on" each of them "my new name." To the Laodiceans, He promises that, if they repent, He will give them "the right to sit with me on my throne."

There is a pattern, for the churches, in the way Jesus speaks: first, an analysis of their strengths and weaknesses; second, instructions, imperatives, and commands; third, promises of future blessings. Some churches have strengths, others have weaknesses, and some have both. The church in Laodicea, which receives the sternest evaluation, also receives the most powerful promise.

Some of the symbolism here is obscure. The hidden manna may evoke the jar of manna preserved in the ark in the temple; the temple having been destroyed by the time of John's writing, this manna would be in an undisclosed location - known only to God. Whether on earth or in heaven, this manna would be God's alone to dispense; if in heaven, it represents the eternal feast. Banquet imagery permeates the entire text. The white stone on which is written a name may represent the follower's new identity; written in stone, it is permanent, and supersedes all other previous identities. To give the morning star as a gift may mean to impart glory; starlight and sunlight symbolize God's glory throughout Scripture.

A group of cousins and siblings, all bearing the surname Zahn, have contributed greatly to textual scholarship. Citing the work of Theodor von Zahn, Richard Lenski writes:

John had lived and labored in and out of Ephesus since the days of the Jewish War which destroyed the Jewish nation. Domitian died September 18, 96. This date makes it necessary to place the visions of Revelation in the year 95. John was not exiled by the emperor himself; he was condemned to exile by the proconsul of Asia, "who would not have been able upon his own authority to punish in this way a preacher of the gospel and an adherent of the Christian faith if he had not felt himself authorized so to act by some decree issuing from the Imperial Government, or some regulation tolerated by it, by which the propagation of the Christian religion was to be checked by the courts or the police," Zahn, Introduction III, 409. How long the exile continued we do not know. There is nothing to prevent us from dating Revelation in the year 96, the actual year of Domitian's death. Nerva ruled until 98, then followed Trajan. John was released after Domitian's death and died during Trajan's reign.

The challenge for the reader, in examining John's Revelation, is to be vigilant against the all-too-human tendency to read legalism into the text. When Jesus cites the strengths of the seven churches, these are not accomplishments achieved by human effort, but rather gifts which have been given to these churches, given by Jesus through the Holy Spirit. When Jesus cites the flaws of these congregations and commands repentance, He is issuing an imperative which human effort can never satisfy; only the Holy Spirit working inside the believer can create obedience. God is never satisfied with human feats. The promised blessings for the churches are not rewards for their exertions, but rather confirmations for the activity of the Holy Spirit in and among them.

A careless reading of John's Apocalypse will yield works righteousness. But the reader must ever bear in mind that the purpose for which the Revelation was given to John was comfort. Legalism does not comfort. Grace does.

Jesus Uses Irony

Irony is a well-documented and much studied phenomenon. There are many types and definitions of irony. For the present meditation, irony is understood as words being used to indicate something other than their literal meanings, and words being used to refer to something which may even be in tension with their literal meanings.

The New Testament contains irony, and one who fails to recognize the irony will be misled in the task of understanding the text. Some commentators seem to have never entertained the idea that Jesus occasionally speaks ironically.

Consider the following narrative from Matthew. It seems to contain multiple ironies. The man addresses Jesus with the title "Teacher," but perhaps does not want to be taught. He poses the question, "what must I do?" to gain eternal life, yet the mega-text informs the reader that the proper question to ask to Jesus is "what can you do?" that the supplicant might have eternal life.

For an ordinary human to ask, "what must I do to gain eternal life?" is to elicit the answer "nothing." There is nothing he can do to gain eternal life, because it is impossible for him to gain it. God can give it, but man cannot achieve it.

So two ironies already lie in the man's first utterance.

Jesus, seeing through the apparent urgency in the man's question, deflects it with an ironic non-answer. Note that Jesus answers a question with a question. "Why?" - Christ's question goes to motive. Why would the man ask if he already has an answer in mind, if he is not eager to learn, and if his question is so ill-formed that no reasonable answer is possible? The questioner perhaps considers himself to be good; in that case, why bother Jesus with a question? The question would be insincere.

Jesus deflates the man's ego a bit by reminding him that only God is good. Jesus then offers ironic advice. Jesus, and the reader, know from the mega-text that "keeping the commandments" is impossible. Whether one is speaking of the ten commandments, the 613 commandments, or natural law, humans are incapable of perfect implementation. The man, however, is oblivious to the irony, which only heightens the irony.

An absolutely impossible command is ironic; the failure to see such a command for what it is generates humor. Had Jesus issued a command to drink the entire ocean, or draw a square circle, the effect would be the same.

Incognizant of the irony, the man pursues the matter: which commandments must he keep? As if, to the ironic command to draw a square circle, he'd responded with a request for clarification about whether he should draw it with a pencil or a pen. The humorous effect is prolonged by the question.

Jesus patiently begins a list of commandments. It doesn't really matter which ones He mentions, because sinful human nature is incapable of faithfully following any of them, or any set or subset of them.

And behold, a man came up to him, saying, “Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?” And he said to him, “Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good. If you would enter life, keep the commandments.” He said to him, “Which ones?” And Jesus said, “You shall not murder, You shall not commit adultery, You shall not steal, You shall not bear false witness, Honor your father and mother, and, You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” The young man said to him, “All these I have kept. What do I still lack?” Jesus said to him, “If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” When the young man heard this he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.

The man's oblivious naivete is matched only by the inflated opinion he has of himself. To claim to have faithfully followed the law, no matter which variation of 'law' is meant, is to claim perfection. The ironies here are multiple: to claim perfection and then request guidance - if the man were really that good, he wouldn't need to ask Jesus for instruction. More basically, there is irony in the claim to have followed the law. It is axiomatic to the mega-text that such perfection is unachievable by human effort.

Having claimed perfection, the man asks what he still needs. This is a self-contradiction. If he were as good as he claims to be, he would need nothing. He undermines his own claim to moral superiority. "I have everything: what do I still need to obtain?"

Christ's answer contains several unspoken premises: "if you would be perfect - but you can't get there by doing things - here's what you must do." Alternatively: "if you would be perfect - but didn't you only now imply that you were morally perfect? - here's what you must do." Jesus is patiently answering the man, but to humorous effect to the knowing reader.

Jesus then gives an ironic imperative: give away all your possessions. If this were truly what was required to obtain eternal life, then the rest of Matthew's text, and the rest of the New Testament, would be useless and futile. Two thousand years of Heilsgeschichte would be unnecessary. Christ's painful suffering and death would be unnecessary.

The three final thoughts in the narrative depart from irony. Jesus tells the man that it is possible to have treasure in heaven. Jesus is not being ironic, but the man's limited imagination and limited perspective create irony. Then Jesus tells the man to follow; the man who approached Jesus and called him 'Teacher' and who asked what must be done is, as Jesus and the reader know even before the man has finished hearing the final imperative, not interested or willing or able to follow Jesus.

No human can, of his own volition, follow Jesus. Rather, people follow Jesus only as the Holy Spirit calls and enlightens them, sanctifies them, and preserves them in faith. All people lack the ability to follow Jesus, or to decide to follow Jesus - but most especially one like this man, who considers himself to be morally perfect.

The denouement reveals that the man, whose moral estimation of himself was so high, is merely a crass materialist. Irony is located in the tension between the high-sounding salutation and question which he first addresses to Jesus at the beginning of the narrative and the man's baseness as the end of the narrative.

If we contrast Mark's version of the narrative to Matthew's, the irony continues, as in Mark's version, the man addresses Jesus not only as "Teacher" but "Good Teacher." While the man addresses Jesus as 'good', he in reality considers, consciously or subconsciously, himself to be good, apparently unaware of both his original sin and his committed sin. Considering the phrase text-critically, if Matthew worked from Mark, he may have felt it sufficient to recount merely an excerpt from the salutation rather than the longer version given by Mark.

Matthew also omits the fact that the man knelt. The greeting, as given in detail in Mark, emphasizes the homage which the man pays to Jesus, a homage made ironic by the fact that the man understands neither his sin or nor his inability to do anything about his sin. Mark gives a slightly different version of the man's question: not, what must I do to "have" eternal life, but to "inherit" it. There is a tension between 'do' and 'inherit' - in order to inherit something, one must do nothing; rather, someone else must die.

Mark's version of Christ's response is also more detailed: again answering a question with a question, Jesus asks "why do you call me good?" Again the question goes to motive. Is the man's act of honoring Jesus sincere? Or does the man seek self-justification? Does the man realize that, despite himself, he has affirmed Christ's divinity?

And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. You know the commandments: ‘Do not murder, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honor your father and mother.’” And he said to him, “Teacher, all these I have kept from my youth.” And Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him, “You lack one thing: go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” Disheartened by the saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.

Commented on Mark's version of the events, Richard Lenski writes:

The man does not ask how he may obtain life eternal as if he were at a loss as to the way and the means. On the contrary, he thinks he knows quite well how, namely, by his doing something, some one good thing.

Like all humans, he finds it difficult to believe and consistently internalize that salvation is God's action, not man's, in which man is passive and God is active. It is fallen human nature which wants somehow to believe that it at least cooperates with God in salvation, if it does not accomplish the matter entirely on its own. Lenski continues:

In the question: "What shall I do?" there lies, of course, the assumption that the questioner has the necessary ability and may easily reach the goal that Jesus has reached. All he needs is to know the thing that is to be done.

Lenski briefly considers the tension between 'do' and 'inherit' in the man's question, but does not extract the full ironic contradiction from it, preferring instead to see 'inherit' as a synonym for 'obtain' and leaves it at that. Further, Lenski sees Christ's imperative to give his wealth to others as a call to internal repentance. Lenski does not see the command as ironic.

Yet, considered as a literal answer to a literal question, irony seems the more plausible reading. The question is already ironic, "what must I do to have eternal life?" - because the action is God's, not man's. Consider the question, "what must I do to ensure the continuation of Jupiter in its orbit around the sun?" - what man would be foolish enough to imagine that he can 'do' anything about that?

But even if we grant the question, Christ's answer remains ironic. Go, sell your possessions, and give to the poor: good and God-pleasing actions, but nobody will find admission into heaven based upon them. Rather, such actions are performed out of gratitude for the salvation which God has already given.

Lenski fails to see the degree and amount of irony in Christ's words, and strives to make literal sense of them.

Luke's version of the matter adds only a generalized comment about wealth. Yet this comment sheds a bit of light on the matter:

Jesus, seeing that he had become sad, said, “How difficult it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God! For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” Those who heard it said, “Then who can be saved?” But he said, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.”

Those who witnessed the exchange between Jesus and the man understood: taken literally, the words would indicate that salvation is impossible. So they say, "who then can be saved?" - a rhetorical question, roughly, "so, nobody can be saved, right?" Jesus points, as ever, to the fact that God saves; man does not save, but rather man is saved. Man is passive, God is active. Therefore, salvation is 'impossible' with human effort; but it is "possible with God."