Interesting to note, given how Matthew seeks to mirror the Torah in his gospel whenever possible, the concern with heads...The baker's head and the cup-bearer's head will be "raised up": one back to his initial position of respect, one literally off his shoulders. In Matthew 14, Matthew tells the story of John the Baptist's head being delivered to Herod's daughter on a platter.
Amazing stories of how these rulers could deprive one of life pretty much on a whim.
I reiterate: the Joseph cycle is one of the finest examples of ancient Near Eastern literature that exists. Enjoy it for its literary qualities and then ask: how do we learn to trust, in hard times, that God still is watching over us and able to bring good from those difficult circumstances?
Thursday, February 27, 2014
Tuesday, February 25, 2014
March 19: Genesis 37-39; Psalm 13; Matthew 13
Matthew 13 Sometimes there are some wonderful books that are worth getting to know if you want someday to spend more time with a very important passage of scripture. The parable of the Sower is one of those places, and the book is Robert Farrar Capon's Parables of the Kingdom.
Psalm 13 This psalm has the classic "How long, O LORD?" form, and goes on to ask the other key questions of one feeling not-so-connected with God:
v. 5: But I trusted in your steadfast love [that lovely Hebrew word, hesed];
my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.
v. 6: I will sing to the LORD
because he has dealt bountifully with me.
Genesis 37-39 We move into the Joseph cycle. What a great story!
questions:
Psalm 13 This psalm has the classic "How long, O LORD?" form, and goes on to ask the other key questions of one feeling not-so-connected with God:
- "Will you forget me forever?
- How long will you hide your face from me?
- How long must I bear pain in my soul, and have sorrow in my heart all day long?
- How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?
v. 5: But I trusted in your steadfast love [that lovely Hebrew word, hesed];
my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.
v. 6: I will sing to the LORD
because he has dealt bountifully with me.
Genesis 37-39 We move into the Joseph cycle. What a great story!
questions:
- What happens when a father loves his children un-equally? (37:4)
- Is is more than coincidence that Joseph has trouble at Schechem? (37:12; Ch. 34)
- 37:32,33 What does it say about the brokenness of relationships that the brothers speak of "your son" and Jacob speaks of "my son" but nobody uses "brother" language?
- What can you find that is redeeming in the story about Judah and Tamar in ch. 38? (This passage interrupts the Joseph cycle.)
- How has the Potiphar's wife story been used to harm women? What can we do about that?
- Finally--not really a question--notice how although Joseph's circumstances are very trying, we read" (39:21)"But the LORD was with Joseph and showed him steadfast love..."
Monday, February 24, 2014
March 18 Psalm 12; Matthew 12; Genesis 34-36
Genesis 34-36. Notice how Dinah has no voice at all in these transactions, which involve her rape by a man who ultimately falls in love with her and expresses tender feelings toward her. We don't know how or whether they are reciprocated. No one asks her what she thinks or feels: not Shechem, not her father or brothers. Jacob's family thinks only about a) the family honor (Dinah was "defiled") and b) what a marriage alliance would mean with Shechem; c) how they can use Shechem's position to their advantage. Then they avenge Dinah's "defilement" by slaughtering Hamor and Shechem and plundering their city. This is the spiral of escalating violence that lex talionis (an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth) was supposed to prevent.
Genesis 35--Jacob's household is still polytheistic. But Jacob has another encounter with God. (If you are paying attention to little details, this is a part of the book of Genesis where God is known simply as God, and not as "the LORD".)
Then we have a sort of sea change in the household. Benjamin is born; Rachel dies giving birth to him; and Isaac also dies. The next chapter is a more extended genealogy of Esau's line. You are not "cheating" on the Bible Challenge if you just glance at it.
Psalm 12 begins with the word, "Help!" Anne Lamott says this is one of the three basic human prayers. The other two are "Thanks" and "Wow!" Also in this psalm we see the LORD presented as exercising what is sometimes called the "preferential option for the poor."
12:5: "Because the poor are despoiled, because the needy groan,
I will now rise up," says the LORD;
"I will place them in the safety for which they long."
Matthew 12 Questions about what is "lawful"-- and Jesus, rather than trying to restrict what is lawful on the Sabbath, extends the general principle that it is lawful to do good, to heal, on the sabbath.
A quotation applying one of Isaiah's Servant Songs to Jesus
Questions about Jesus and the motivations for his actions--some wanted to attribute them to Beelzebul (a name for a Babylonian "Lord of the Flies" god and a local term for the devil among members of the Jewish community in Palestine). Jesus says: "Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters" and then we have that problematic "unforgivable sin" passage (vss 31ff).
This is maybe the chapter in the entire gospel of Matthew that is the hardest to understand or appreciate. It feels terribly judgmental and lacking in the grace of God that is often so apparent in Matthew. For me, one of the scariest verses is right here: (12:36) "I tell you, on the day of judgment you will have to give an account for every careless word you utter; for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned."
Genesis 35--Jacob's household is still polytheistic. But Jacob has another encounter with God. (If you are paying attention to little details, this is a part of the book of Genesis where God is known simply as God, and not as "the LORD".)
Then we have a sort of sea change in the household. Benjamin is born; Rachel dies giving birth to him; and Isaac also dies. The next chapter is a more extended genealogy of Esau's line. You are not "cheating" on the Bible Challenge if you just glance at it.
Psalm 12 begins with the word, "Help!" Anne Lamott says this is one of the three basic human prayers. The other two are "Thanks" and "Wow!" Also in this psalm we see the LORD presented as exercising what is sometimes called the "preferential option for the poor."
12:5: "Because the poor are despoiled, because the needy groan,
I will now rise up," says the LORD;
"I will place them in the safety for which they long."
Matthew 12 Questions about what is "lawful"-- and Jesus, rather than trying to restrict what is lawful on the Sabbath, extends the general principle that it is lawful to do good, to heal, on the sabbath.
A quotation applying one of Isaiah's Servant Songs to Jesus
Questions about Jesus and the motivations for his actions--some wanted to attribute them to Beelzebul (a name for a Babylonian "Lord of the Flies" god and a local term for the devil among members of the Jewish community in Palestine). Jesus says: "Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters" and then we have that problematic "unforgivable sin" passage (vss 31ff).
This is maybe the chapter in the entire gospel of Matthew that is the hardest to understand or appreciate. It feels terribly judgmental and lacking in the grace of God that is often so apparent in Matthew. For me, one of the scariest verses is right here: (12:36) "I tell you, on the day of judgment you will have to give an account for every careless word you utter; for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned."
Friday, February 21, 2014
March 17: Psalm 11, Matthew 11, Genesis 31-33.
Genesis 31: Jacob and family start on a return to the land of his birth, in response to a dream from God.
Jacob and Laban make a covenant, and set up a monument of stones, known as "Mizah"--"Watchpost." They don't trust each other, really. So they agree to stay out of each other's territory. 31:49 is often quoted far out of this context: "The LORD watch between you and me, when we are absent form one another." My grandfather gave my grandmother a framed lithograph with a poem that quotes this verse. "Go thou thy way, and I'll go mine, apart yet not afar. Only a thin veil separates the pathways where we are..." I think the occasion was his travels. The picture has a very Victorian looking violinist. I think I will find it and hang it up when I go through the pictures from my parents' things. My grandparents loved each other dearly and did not (I don't think) harbor suspicions of each other. It was a much gentler wish: "May God take care of us both while we must be apart; and may he bring us back together again soon and safely." That is a wonderful prayer, but not exactly what Jacob and Laban meant when they first made their covenant.
Genesis 32: Of course, going home means Jacob must face Esau, who may still harbor murderous feelings for Jacob. He can't make a phone call back to find out. So he sets things up in a way that is most likely to make the meeting safe and successful. He shows off his wealth and the considerable power and size of his household; and he speaks humbly to his brother.
And the night before, he has the life-transforming encounter where he wrestles all night with the Man?/Angel?/God? and is left limping, crippled in his hip.
Genesis 33: When Jacob (new name: Israel!!!) sees his brother he says something utterly remarkable: "If I find favor with you, then accept my present from my hand; for truly to see your face is like seeing the face of God--since you have received me with such favor" (33:10). Oh, for the grace to see the face of God in the face of our enemies/opponents/people who scare us!
Psalm 11: When I was in middle school and attending two years of confirmation classes, we had to turn in sermon notes to the pastor. It taught me to learn to listen to sermons and pay attention. Once the pastor preached on Psalm 11:3: "If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?" I have no memory now what the pastor (who later performed my marriage to Wayne, and became a mentor to me) preached about, but I still remember this verse. I think, reading this psalm, that the psalmist's answer is in verse 4:
"The LORD is in his holy temple;
the LORD's throne is in heaven.
His eyes behold,
his gaze examines humankind"
and in the final verse:
For the LORD is righteous;
he loves righteous deeds;
the upright shall behold his face.
There is that recurring theme again, of beholding the face of the LORD--promised outcome of a life that is fueled and guided by a deep longing to see, commune with, know, obey, and, above all, love and be loved by God.
Matthew 11 John the Baptizer sends to find out if Jesus is for real, or if he should still look for another... The chapter ends with the wonderful words:
Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."
This is amazing on a couple of levels.
Jacob and Laban make a covenant, and set up a monument of stones, known as "Mizah"--"Watchpost." They don't trust each other, really. So they agree to stay out of each other's territory. 31:49 is often quoted far out of this context: "The LORD watch between you and me, when we are absent form one another." My grandfather gave my grandmother a framed lithograph with a poem that quotes this verse. "Go thou thy way, and I'll go mine, apart yet not afar. Only a thin veil separates the pathways where we are..." I think the occasion was his travels. The picture has a very Victorian looking violinist. I think I will find it and hang it up when I go through the pictures from my parents' things. My grandparents loved each other dearly and did not (I don't think) harbor suspicions of each other. It was a much gentler wish: "May God take care of us both while we must be apart; and may he bring us back together again soon and safely." That is a wonderful prayer, but not exactly what Jacob and Laban meant when they first made their covenant.
Genesis 32: Of course, going home means Jacob must face Esau, who may still harbor murderous feelings for Jacob. He can't make a phone call back to find out. So he sets things up in a way that is most likely to make the meeting safe and successful. He shows off his wealth and the considerable power and size of his household; and he speaks humbly to his brother.
And the night before, he has the life-transforming encounter where he wrestles all night with the Man?/Angel?/God? and is left limping, crippled in his hip.
Genesis 33: When Jacob (new name: Israel!!!) sees his brother he says something utterly remarkable: "If I find favor with you, then accept my present from my hand; for truly to see your face is like seeing the face of God--since you have received me with such favor" (33:10). Oh, for the grace to see the face of God in the face of our enemies/opponents/people who scare us!
Psalm 11: When I was in middle school and attending two years of confirmation classes, we had to turn in sermon notes to the pastor. It taught me to learn to listen to sermons and pay attention. Once the pastor preached on Psalm 11:3: "If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?" I have no memory now what the pastor (who later performed my marriage to Wayne, and became a mentor to me) preached about, but I still remember this verse. I think, reading this psalm, that the psalmist's answer is in verse 4:
"The LORD is in his holy temple;
the LORD's throne is in heaven.
His eyes behold,
his gaze examines humankind"
and in the final verse:
For the LORD is righteous;
he loves righteous deeds;
the upright shall behold his face.
There is that recurring theme again, of beholding the face of the LORD--promised outcome of a life that is fueled and guided by a deep longing to see, commune with, know, obey, and, above all, love and be loved by God.
Matthew 11 John the Baptizer sends to find out if Jesus is for real, or if he should still look for another... The chapter ends with the wonderful words:
Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."
This is amazing on a couple of levels.
- First, of course, it is marvelous to have Jesus promise to lift our burdens, and we all have them. We all long for rest for our souls. We just don't always see what other people's burdens are.
- Second, and I think I don't always notice this one--Jesus really sounds like God here! "Come to ME!'
Thursday, February 20, 2014
March 15: Genesis 28-30; Matthew 10; Psalm 10
Genesis 28-30 More about marriages. Esau disappoints by marrying his cousin; Jacob is told not to marry "one of those Canaanite women".
Jacob's dream while he has a stone under his head for a pillow. "We are climbing Jacob's ladder"...
God promises his presence! (28:15ff)
Jacob meets Rachel; the trickster tricked; and some of the most complex marital relations imaginable.
I find the story of Leah heartbreakingly sad: 29:32--"surely now my husband will love me...", 29:33--"because the LORD has heard that I am hated", 29:34--"now this time my husband will be joined to me, because I have borne him three sons".
Psalm 10-- A wonderful WHY? psalm--the wicked prosper, the righteous suffer, God seems far away. The psalmist practically shouts in God's ear, "WAKE UP!!!" in v. 12. And as is so often the case in the psalms, the psalmist reconsiders in v. 14:
"But you do see! Indeed you not trouble and grief,
that you may take it into your hands;
the helpless commit themselves to you;
you have been the helper of the orphan
Matthew 10 12 apostles named. Then they're sent out (which is what the Greek verb means).
The realities of persecution are on Jesus' mind.
Jesus says, paradoxically: "Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword." (10:34). Of course we do all think Jesus came to bring peace. The angels in Luke 2 do, also. And the entire biblical witness invites us to come to that conclusion. Yet there is no peace until/unless? there has been tremendous unrest first. Yet life in the Kingdom of God has its rewards.
Jacob's dream while he has a stone under his head for a pillow. "We are climbing Jacob's ladder"...
God promises his presence! (28:15ff)
Jacob meets Rachel; the trickster tricked; and some of the most complex marital relations imaginable.
I find the story of Leah heartbreakingly sad: 29:32--"surely now my husband will love me...", 29:33--"because the LORD has heard that I am hated", 29:34--"now this time my husband will be joined to me, because I have borne him three sons".
Psalm 10-- A wonderful WHY? psalm--the wicked prosper, the righteous suffer, God seems far away. The psalmist practically shouts in God's ear, "WAKE UP!!!" in v. 12. And as is so often the case in the psalms, the psalmist reconsiders in v. 14:
"But you do see! Indeed you not trouble and grief,
that you may take it into your hands;
the helpless commit themselves to you;
you have been the helper of the orphan
Matthew 10 12 apostles named. Then they're sent out (which is what the Greek verb means).
The realities of persecution are on Jesus' mind.
Jesus says, paradoxically: "Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword." (10:34). Of course we do all think Jesus came to bring peace. The angels in Luke 2 do, also. And the entire biblical witness invites us to come to that conclusion. Yet there is no peace until/unless? there has been tremendous unrest first. Yet life in the Kingdom of God has its rewards.
Wednesday, February 19, 2014
March 14--Genesis 25-27; Psalm 9; Matthew 9
Matthew 9--As in Ch. 8, Jesus calls himself "The Son of Man" when he is intentional about his role as Messiah. (9:6) "But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins...."
This is the chapter with the call of Matthew, along with the wonderful words that Jesus quotes (9:13): "Go and learn what this means,'I desire mercy, not sacrifice.' For I have come to call not the righteous but sinners."
9:14ff--a spate of very fertile metaphors! wedding guests and bridegroom, unshrunken cloth, old and new wineskins.
9:27ff "According to your faith let it be done to you..." This is a scary verse for me, because I don't have very much faith.
Also note how the men are not supposed to tell (scholars call this theme "Messianic secret" and debate why Jesus insisted on quashing the desire of people he helped to share the good news).
At the end of these two whirlwind chapters, Jesus says as a sort of summary (9:37): "The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest."
Psalm 9 If you pray the Daily Office, you will recognize v. 18: "for the needy shall not always be forgotten, nor the hope of the poor perish forever"
9:8 is also familiar--judging the world with "righteousness" and "equity" and the peoples with "equity" or "truth" is a phrase that appears also in Psalm 96, Psalm 98, and Isaiah 11 and 42. This is obviously an important characterization of God!
Genesis 25-27.
Abraham, now a widower, marries Keturah and has a bunch of kids! (I've never read any "inspirational" commentary about this passage, or heard anyone preach on it.) It's troubling to me that there is such a difference between the way Abraham treats Isaac and his other sons (never mind his daughters, which I'm sure he must have had some of...)
Then Abraham dies and we get the story of the birth of Jacob and Esau.
And the development of the theme of the younger brother being favored (hinted at in the story of Cain and Abel).
This story is now just a "cracking good" story, as C.S. Lewis once said about some book he loved.
This is the chapter with the call of Matthew, along with the wonderful words that Jesus quotes (9:13): "Go and learn what this means,'I desire mercy, not sacrifice.' For I have come to call not the righteous but sinners."
9:14ff--a spate of very fertile metaphors! wedding guests and bridegroom, unshrunken cloth, old and new wineskins.
9:27ff "According to your faith let it be done to you..." This is a scary verse for me, because I don't have very much faith.
Also note how the men are not supposed to tell (scholars call this theme "Messianic secret" and debate why Jesus insisted on quashing the desire of people he helped to share the good news).
At the end of these two whirlwind chapters, Jesus says as a sort of summary (9:37): "The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest."
Psalm 9 If you pray the Daily Office, you will recognize v. 18: "for the needy shall not always be forgotten, nor the hope of the poor perish forever"
9:8 is also familiar--judging the world with "righteousness" and "equity" and the peoples with "equity" or "truth" is a phrase that appears also in Psalm 96, Psalm 98, and Isaiah 11 and 42. This is obviously an important characterization of God!
Genesis 25-27.
Abraham, now a widower, marries Keturah and has a bunch of kids! (I've never read any "inspirational" commentary about this passage, or heard anyone preach on it.) It's troubling to me that there is such a difference between the way Abraham treats Isaac and his other sons (never mind his daughters, which I'm sure he must have had some of...)
Then Abraham dies and we get the story of the birth of Jacob and Esau.
And the development of the theme of the younger brother being favored (hinted at in the story of Cain and Abel).
This story is now just a "cracking good" story, as C.S. Lewis once said about some book he loved.
Monday, February 17, 2014
March 13: Genesis 22-24; Psalm 8; Matthew 8
Genesis 22--What is known in the Jewish tradition as the Akkedah, "The Binding of Isaac." Another heart-breaking story; and I still, having read it dozens of times, don't understand how God could have asked this thing of Abraham. Did Abraham misunderstand? It seems nothing short of cruel to imagine God saying, "Just kidding...this was only a test..."
Genesis 23--Note that Sarah's death is recorded right after the Akkedah. As a mother I can't imagine living long past such a terrible and ambiguous event. (An aside: the bargaining that goes on between Abraham and Ephron is a beautifully-told and amusing story. So Abraham is going to leave his beloved Sarah on land that he actually has purchased and owns.)
Genesis 24--The next generation of the Patriarchs: Isaac and Rebekah. Kathy Hintz sent me a nice link to an NPR piece about camels being an anachronism in this story: http://www.npr.org/2014/02/14/
Psalm 8 One of my favorites! About how the created order reflects the majesty of God, and leads the psalmist humbly to ask:
What are human beings that you are mindful of them,
mortals that you care for them? (8:4)
Note also the concern of the psalmist with the NAME of God.
Matthew 8 End of Sermon on the Mount, beginning of the description of Jesus' teaching and healing ministry through the region. Jesus:
Genesis 23--Note that Sarah's death is recorded right after the Akkedah. As a mother I can't imagine living long past such a terrible and ambiguous event. (An aside: the bargaining that goes on between Abraham and Ephron is a beautifully-told and amusing story. So Abraham is going to leave his beloved Sarah on land that he actually has purchased and owns.)
Genesis 24--The next generation of the Patriarchs: Isaac and Rebekah. Kathy Hintz sent me a nice link to an NPR piece about camels being an anachronism in this story: http://www.npr.org/2014/02/14/
Psalm 8 One of my favorites! About how the created order reflects the majesty of God, and leads the psalmist humbly to ask:
What are human beings that you are mindful of them,
mortals that you care for them? (8:4)
Note also the concern of the psalmist with the NAME of God.
Matthew 8 End of Sermon on the Mount, beginning of the description of Jesus' teaching and healing ministry through the region. Jesus:
- cleanses a man with leprosy
- heals the servant of a centurion (a Roman official) --enabling Jesus to comment on how Gentiles are alert to the coming of the Kingdom of Heaven "while the heirs of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth" (8:12). Leading us to ask: does Jesus really think that everlasting punishment reflects the will or the character of his Father?
- heals Peter's mother in law and many others, giving Matthew an opportunity to quote Isaiah in a servant song.
- discourages spontaneous would-be followers, via his own identification with the homeless
- stills a storm while he and his disciples are in a boat crossing the lake
- Heals the Gadarene demoniac. What about the herd of swine? People really are more valued in Matthew's eyes than are animals, especially unclean pigs that were owned presumably by Gentiles--and they would have had to be rich gentiles to have such a large herd. But still this is economically disruptive to the community, which "begged him to leave" (8:34).
Wow! That is a lot packed into a single chapter; and it kind of lays out the plan for much of the rest of Jesus' ministry.
March 12--Genesis 19-21; Psalm 7; Matthew 7
I notice that this is the second entry for March 12. I had avoided commenting on the story of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah in that entry.
Genesis 19--Sodom and Gomorrah. A horribly violent story. How could Lot offer to throw his daughters out to that violent angry crowd? Sex and violence seem to go in bent directions together. (And I am not meaning that homosexuality is per se violent. I'm thinking more about the restive quality of the behavior of the men of Sodom whose appetites were so totally uncontrolled and violent.)
Nevertheless we read: 19:16 "But [Lot] lingered; so the men seized him and his wife and his two daughters by the hand, the LORD being merciful to him, and they brought him out and left him outside the city."
Out of the terribleness of the destruction of the city and the family's rescue comes the story of Lot's daughters who looked for a solution to their childlessness via incest. This time drunkenness is added to the mix (as in the story of Noah's sons when Noah became drunk from the fruits of his vineyard).
Genesis 19--Sodom and Gomorrah. A horribly violent story. How could Lot offer to throw his daughters out to that violent angry crowd? Sex and violence seem to go in bent directions together. (And I am not meaning that homosexuality is per se violent. I'm thinking more about the restive quality of the behavior of the men of Sodom whose appetites were so totally uncontrolled and violent.)
Nevertheless we read: 19:16 "But [Lot] lingered; so the men seized him and his wife and his two daughters by the hand, the LORD being merciful to him, and they brought him out and left him outside the city."
Out of the terribleness of the destruction of the city and the family's rescue comes the story of Lot's daughters who looked for a solution to their childlessness via incest. This time drunkenness is added to the mix (as in the story of Noah's sons when Noah became drunk from the fruits of his vineyard).
Saturday, February 15, 2014
March 12: Genesis 19-21; Psalm 7; Matthew 7
Psalm 7-- Note how these psalms have little comments like this one: "A Shiggaion of David, which he sang to the LORD concerning Cush, a Benjaminite." At some point people knew what sort of musical genre a Shiggaion was; but that knowledge is lost. David is the supposed composer/compiler of most of the psalms. Some were written, like this one, for commemorating particular occasions.
David is confident before God the judge, that God will judge justly--and in favor of him and against his enemy.
Those of us who grew up in a tradition that emphasized St. Paul and his interpretation of God's saving work generally don't see God's judgment as a good thing. We're used to thinking of our sinful nature as making it impossible for God to judge us favorably. But that is not the position of the psalmist. Though there are psalms that acknowledge the sinfulness of the psalmist, the majority are about the psalmist's plea for God's vindication.
Genesis 19-21. This is where modern people want to just say "STOP!!!" There is too much violence in the Old Testament. We're not used to such graphic violence. Who thinks it's a good idea for kids to read this stuff without adult assistance?
Whatever this passage is about, it is NOT about a wholesale condemnation of the kind of same-sex love that occurs between men or women (consenting equals) in the 21st century.
With King Abimelech of Gerar in Gen. 20, we see that Abraham did not really learn the lesson of what it means to be a head of household with Pharaoh. Once again, he is willing, to save his own skin, to give up his wife to another man.
Genesis 21--the birth of Isaac, and the sad parting of Hagar and Ishmael. The story seems to come from a different tradition than the earlier stories about Ishmael. There he was 13; here Ishmael seems to be much younger, a toddler, perhaps. And they are driven away when Isaac is assuredly to be Abraham's heir. Sad...Cruel...doesn't show Abraham or Sarah in a very good light. But there it is. Even God's chosen people are sometimes great sinners and blind to their own biases.
Matthew 7 More teachings of Jesus, including his statement of the Golden Rule.
Emphasis on hearing and acting on Jesus' words and principles.
Once again, I find the Sermon on the Mount to be a quite daunting document. I find myself judged by it, and found wanting.
Summary in 7:28-9: Now when Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were astounded at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as their scribes.
David is confident before God the judge, that God will judge justly--and in favor of him and against his enemy.
Those of us who grew up in a tradition that emphasized St. Paul and his interpretation of God's saving work generally don't see God's judgment as a good thing. We're used to thinking of our sinful nature as making it impossible for God to judge us favorably. But that is not the position of the psalmist. Though there are psalms that acknowledge the sinfulness of the psalmist, the majority are about the psalmist's plea for God's vindication.
Genesis 19-21. This is where modern people want to just say "STOP!!!" There is too much violence in the Old Testament. We're not used to such graphic violence. Who thinks it's a good idea for kids to read this stuff without adult assistance?
Whatever this passage is about, it is NOT about a wholesale condemnation of the kind of same-sex love that occurs between men or women (consenting equals) in the 21st century.
With King Abimelech of Gerar in Gen. 20, we see that Abraham did not really learn the lesson of what it means to be a head of household with Pharaoh. Once again, he is willing, to save his own skin, to give up his wife to another man.
Genesis 21--the birth of Isaac, and the sad parting of Hagar and Ishmael. The story seems to come from a different tradition than the earlier stories about Ishmael. There he was 13; here Ishmael seems to be much younger, a toddler, perhaps. And they are driven away when Isaac is assuredly to be Abraham's heir. Sad...Cruel...doesn't show Abraham or Sarah in a very good light. But there it is. Even God's chosen people are sometimes great sinners and blind to their own biases.
Matthew 7 More teachings of Jesus, including his statement of the Golden Rule.
Emphasis on hearing and acting on Jesus' words and principles.
Once again, I find the Sermon on the Mount to be a quite daunting document. I find myself judged by it, and found wanting.
Summary in 7:28-9: Now when Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were astounded at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as their scribes.
Day 7 March 11 Genesis 16-18; Psalm 6; Matthew 6
Matthew 6: This is the chapter with the Ash Wednesday reading: "WHEN you give alms...pray...fast..." Not "IF".
This is the chapter with Jesus teaching us his prayer, the "Our Father." OUR Father! What about that???
This is the chapter that tells us not to worry about money, to seek God's Kingdom and his righteousness, and NOT TO WORRY!
Genesis 16-18: Trouble in Abraham's household. Sarah and Hagar aren't getting along. Each feels that she is judged by the other. This household seems to be at the other end of the "happiness spectrum" from the family in the TV show "Sister Wives." Despite the hard times between Jews and Arabs, both claim the fatherhood of Abraham. Both are blessed by God; both are destined to be "mighty nations."
The giving of the covenant between God and Abraham; Abraham's new name, the sign of circumcision. The promise of a child to Abraham. And--why do people always forget this? Abraham laughs, too. He laughs so hard he falls down! (17:17). And note the almost plaintive quality in Abraham's words: "O that Ishmael might live in your sight! (17:18). This...shall we call it "exceptionalism" ?...of the children of Isaac becomes increasingly problematic. Whenever God favors one person or nation it is possible to take a different perspective and to ask how that is fair. What about the one NOT favored?
The visit of the Three Men. Full of mystery and a delightful over-the-top sense of what it is to be hospitable in the desert. "a little bread"--as much as a commercial baker kneads with a dough machine!--and a whole beef worth of barbecue, plus yogurt and milk!
Abraham's memorable bargaining session with the LORD on behalf of Lot's town. "Far be it from you to do such a thing, to slay the righteous with the wicked!" says Abraham (18:25). Yet the reader and the hearer might say... well maybe that happened in the Noah story...It seems to happen all the time that the innocent die with the wicked. A challenging and wonderful conversation to listen in on!
Psalm 6: Introducing one more major, major theme in the Psalms: "How long, O Lord?"
This is the chapter with Jesus teaching us his prayer, the "Our Father." OUR Father! What about that???
This is the chapter that tells us not to worry about money, to seek God's Kingdom and his righteousness, and NOT TO WORRY!
Genesis 16-18: Trouble in Abraham's household. Sarah and Hagar aren't getting along. Each feels that she is judged by the other. This household seems to be at the other end of the "happiness spectrum" from the family in the TV show "Sister Wives." Despite the hard times between Jews and Arabs, both claim the fatherhood of Abraham. Both are blessed by God; both are destined to be "mighty nations."
The giving of the covenant between God and Abraham; Abraham's new name, the sign of circumcision. The promise of a child to Abraham. And--why do people always forget this? Abraham laughs, too. He laughs so hard he falls down! (17:17). And note the almost plaintive quality in Abraham's words: "O that Ishmael might live in your sight! (17:18). This...shall we call it "exceptionalism" ?...of the children of Isaac becomes increasingly problematic. Whenever God favors one person or nation it is possible to take a different perspective and to ask how that is fair. What about the one NOT favored?
The visit of the Three Men. Full of mystery and a delightful over-the-top sense of what it is to be hospitable in the desert. "a little bread"--as much as a commercial baker kneads with a dough machine!--and a whole beef worth of barbecue, plus yogurt and milk!
Abraham's memorable bargaining session with the LORD on behalf of Lot's town. "Far be it from you to do such a thing, to slay the righteous with the wicked!" says Abraham (18:25). Yet the reader and the hearer might say... well maybe that happened in the Noah story...It seems to happen all the time that the innocent die with the wicked. A challenging and wonderful conversation to listen in on!
Psalm 6: Introducing one more major, major theme in the Psalms: "How long, O Lord?"
Wednesday, February 12, 2014
Day 6--Monday of the First Week of Lent, March 10, 2014
Matthew 5, Psalm 5; Genesis 13-15.
Psalm 5 introduces us to a very, very important word in the Hebrew scriptures. It's usually translated into English by the word "steadfast love;" or you may remember it from the older KJV, where it was translated "lovingkindness." The Hebrew word is hesed. It is the kind of love that characterizes God better, perhaps, than any other word.
Psalm 5:7 reads:
But I, through the abundance of your steadfast love, will enter your house,
I will bow down toward your holy temple in awe of you.
Jesus (we will note as we read the Gospels) quotes 5:9 when he is seeking words to describe the empty hypocrisy of some of his opponents:
There is no truth in their mouths;
their hearts are destruction;
Their throats are open graves;
they flatter with their tongues.
Then the psalmist prays that God will "spread" protection and "cover" the righteous "with favor as with a shield." I am reminded of an evening hymn from my childhood. I think it has Swedish roots: "Thy holy wings, dear Savior, spread gently over me."
Genesis 13-15
13:4 To "call on the name of the LORD" is a biblical way of saying that Abram prayed, gave his allegiance to the God who had called him on his journey.
13:10 gives us a hint of what will follow; and also reminds us that in their earliest form, hearers knew the stories of Genesis before they read the scroll of the Book of Genesis. I suspect that perhaps nobody until the 19th or 20th century read the Bible for new information. These were well known and beloved stories.
13:14 Although Lot had apparently taken the more productive land, God promises to Abram: "...all the land that you see i will give to you and to your offspring forever. I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth; so that if one can count the dust tof the earth, your offspring can also be counted. Rise up, walk through the length and the breadth of the land, for I will give it to you"
13:18 Abram's response is to build an altar to the LORD.
By the way, the convention of the text of most English Bibles is that when you see LORD in all capital letters, the text is not shouting like a flaming email, but telling us that LORD is translating the unutterably holy name of the God of Israel, normally represented in Hebrew by the 4 consonants: "Y," "H," "W," and "H." This combination of letters is sometimes known by its Greek term, the tetragrammaton, which means "four letters."
Genesis 14: Lot and Abram have separated geographically, but they are still allied, so when the kings of the small city states made war, and Lot was caught in the middle, Abram and his people wade in to help them. Note the reference to "BITUMEN pits" in 14:10. The oil extracted from the tar sands in Alberta is bitumen: extra sticky and thick. It's been known in some forms for millenia.
Also note, in 14:14, the size of Abram's household. These were whole communities that were moving around and negotiating territory for grazing and planting with the peoples who already lived there.
14:17ff Enjoy the strangeness and mystery of the story of Melchizedek. We'll see this character employed typologically when we get to the Letter to the Hebrews near the end of the New Testament.
Note how Abram gives a tenth of "everything" (14:20); and how Melchizedek blesses Abram by "God most High."
15:1ff This is the very, very important chapter where God makes (literally in Hebrew "cuts") a covenant with Abram. The covenant was a sort of agreement well known in the Ancient Near East, generally made between a ruler and his vassals. God takes the initiative.
Abram has begun to worry about how God is going to keep his promise to make him the father of descendants that will be as hard to count as grains of dust, or as stars in the sky.
(Interesting! We who live in an age of electric lights don't usually get the sense of how vast and many the stars of heaven are. The dust image, living in Minot, I totally get, however!)
15:12-16 The hearers of this passage know that it took generations, centuries, in fact, for the Israelites to settle in the Promised Land.
15:18-21 The definition of the bounds of the land that God gives Abram are traditional: "From the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates;" and the names of the peoples then inhabiting the land are also traditional, and you will see that list or a close approximation all over the Torah (the first 5 books of the Old Testament).
Matthew 5: I've kept this till last because it is a chapter from which we have recently been reading our Gospel lessons at the Sunday Eucharist. It's the beginning of what is called the Sermon on the Mount; and in a stylized way it packs a whole bunch of the teachings of Jesus into three chapters, in ways that would have made the early Jewish hearers of Matthew's Gospel think of the words of Moses as he received the Law (the Torah) from the LORD.
5:17 "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill." Let's watch how Matthew uses the concept of "fulfilling" the Law and the prophets in his Gospel. It's a key idea!
God's law is best fulfilled by those who are seeking with their whole heart to respond in love to God's love. Somebody has talked about how there must be a transformation from "the love of the Law to living under the Law of Love." Hmmm.... maybe... Jesus continues to demand of his hearers a deeper-than-the-letter-of-the-law understanding of how God communicates expectations through the Law.
"You have heard it said....but I say to you"--- and Jesus gives a more severe/more thoroughgoing interpretation.
Finally, moving perhaps to the hardest of all the things he says: "Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you" (5:44)
The Christian ideas of nonviolent resistance to persecution have their seeds in 5:38-42. Many commentators have explained how to follow Jesus' instructions would create a kind of street theatre that would make the perpetrators' unjust actions apparent to all, and that would demand of the persecuted person a kind of confidence in one's own divinely-imputed dignity that would be truly transformative.
Psalm 5 introduces us to a very, very important word in the Hebrew scriptures. It's usually translated into English by the word "steadfast love;" or you may remember it from the older KJV, where it was translated "lovingkindness." The Hebrew word is hesed. It is the kind of love that characterizes God better, perhaps, than any other word.
Psalm 5:7 reads:
But I, through the abundance of your steadfast love, will enter your house,
I will bow down toward your holy temple in awe of you.
Jesus (we will note as we read the Gospels) quotes 5:9 when he is seeking words to describe the empty hypocrisy of some of his opponents:
There is no truth in their mouths;
their hearts are destruction;
Their throats are open graves;
they flatter with their tongues.
Then the psalmist prays that God will "spread" protection and "cover" the righteous "with favor as with a shield." I am reminded of an evening hymn from my childhood. I think it has Swedish roots: "Thy holy wings, dear Savior, spread gently over me."
Genesis 13-15
13:4 To "call on the name of the LORD" is a biblical way of saying that Abram prayed, gave his allegiance to the God who had called him on his journey.
13:10 gives us a hint of what will follow; and also reminds us that in their earliest form, hearers knew the stories of Genesis before they read the scroll of the Book of Genesis. I suspect that perhaps nobody until the 19th or 20th century read the Bible for new information. These were well known and beloved stories.
13:14 Although Lot had apparently taken the more productive land, God promises to Abram: "...all the land that you see i will give to you and to your offspring forever. I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth; so that if one can count the dust tof the earth, your offspring can also be counted. Rise up, walk through the length and the breadth of the land, for I will give it to you"
13:18 Abram's response is to build an altar to the LORD.
By the way, the convention of the text of most English Bibles is that when you see LORD in all capital letters, the text is not shouting like a flaming email, but telling us that LORD is translating the unutterably holy name of the God of Israel, normally represented in Hebrew by the 4 consonants: "Y," "H," "W," and "H." This combination of letters is sometimes known by its Greek term, the tetragrammaton, which means "four letters."
Genesis 14: Lot and Abram have separated geographically, but they are still allied, so when the kings of the small city states made war, and Lot was caught in the middle, Abram and his people wade in to help them. Note the reference to "BITUMEN pits" in 14:10. The oil extracted from the tar sands in Alberta is bitumen: extra sticky and thick. It's been known in some forms for millenia.
Also note, in 14:14, the size of Abram's household. These were whole communities that were moving around and negotiating territory for grazing and planting with the peoples who already lived there.
14:17ff Enjoy the strangeness and mystery of the story of Melchizedek. We'll see this character employed typologically when we get to the Letter to the Hebrews near the end of the New Testament.
Note how Abram gives a tenth of "everything" (14:20); and how Melchizedek blesses Abram by "God most High."
15:1ff This is the very, very important chapter where God makes (literally in Hebrew "cuts") a covenant with Abram. The covenant was a sort of agreement well known in the Ancient Near East, generally made between a ruler and his vassals. God takes the initiative.
Abram has begun to worry about how God is going to keep his promise to make him the father of descendants that will be as hard to count as grains of dust, or as stars in the sky.
(Interesting! We who live in an age of electric lights don't usually get the sense of how vast and many the stars of heaven are. The dust image, living in Minot, I totally get, however!)
15:12-16 The hearers of this passage know that it took generations, centuries, in fact, for the Israelites to settle in the Promised Land.
15:18-21 The definition of the bounds of the land that God gives Abram are traditional: "From the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates;" and the names of the peoples then inhabiting the land are also traditional, and you will see that list or a close approximation all over the Torah (the first 5 books of the Old Testament).
Matthew 5: I've kept this till last because it is a chapter from which we have recently been reading our Gospel lessons at the Sunday Eucharist. It's the beginning of what is called the Sermon on the Mount; and in a stylized way it packs a whole bunch of the teachings of Jesus into three chapters, in ways that would have made the early Jewish hearers of Matthew's Gospel think of the words of Moses as he received the Law (the Torah) from the LORD.
5:17 "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill." Let's watch how Matthew uses the concept of "fulfilling" the Law and the prophets in his Gospel. It's a key idea!
God's law is best fulfilled by those who are seeking with their whole heart to respond in love to God's love. Somebody has talked about how there must be a transformation from "the love of the Law to living under the Law of Love." Hmmm.... maybe... Jesus continues to demand of his hearers a deeper-than-the-letter-of-the-law understanding of how God communicates expectations through the Law.
"You have heard it said....but I say to you"--- and Jesus gives a more severe/more thoroughgoing interpretation.
Finally, moving perhaps to the hardest of all the things he says: "Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you" (5:44)
The Christian ideas of nonviolent resistance to persecution have their seeds in 5:38-42. Many commentators have explained how to follow Jesus' instructions would create a kind of street theatre that would make the perpetrators' unjust actions apparent to all, and that would demand of the persecuted person a kind of confidence in one's own divinely-imputed dignity that would be truly transformative.
Day 5--First Sunday in Lent, March 9, 2014
This is a day to catch up on readings from earlier in the week if you are behind. And it is the day when, normally, you will be hearing readings with your sisters and brothers in Christ in worship. So there is no new reading assigned.
Our Day of Rest (sabbath) is conflated with our celebration of the Day of Resurrection, on Sundays. One reason we at All Saints' try to keep from having any but the most essential meetings on Sundays is so that we can preserve time for our families for rest and "Re-Creation."
We just read the creation stories this week. What perspective on sabbath rest and renewal did you take from that reading?
Our Day of Rest (sabbath) is conflated with our celebration of the Day of Resurrection, on Sundays. One reason we at All Saints' try to keep from having any but the most essential meetings on Sundays is so that we can preserve time for our families for rest and "Re-Creation."
We just read the creation stories this week. What perspective on sabbath rest and renewal did you take from that reading?
Tuesday, February 11, 2014
Day 4: (March 8, 2014): Genesis 10-12; Psalm 4; Matthew 4.
Genesis 10-12 Don't let the genealogies in chapter 10 bog you down. One fun way to get through them is to notice all the familiar names, and how the Israelites envisioned all the nations coming from the three sons of Noah; and especially how so many of the traditional enemies of Israel appear to be descendants of Ham.
While you can get annoyed with a sort of tribalism here, the bottom line still is for the followers of the LORD God that all human creatures are related to one another; and all human creatures are part of the created order, not different from or above it.
Genesis 11: The story of the Tower of Babel. There is a sort of distrust of cities and buildings in a nomadic, herding world like Israel.
This is an Israelite telling of a story about hubris and the need to limit the human sense of power and entitlement. It's a nice idea that if we all speak the same language, there might be no end to what we could accomplish together. But we don't. This story seems to tell us that perhaps that is a good thing; because humans can cooperate to accomplish evil as well as good, and there must be some limits. The view of the writer/editor of Genesis seems to be that "the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually," as God said in 6:5 (before the flood); and after the flood, God didn't see much improvement (8:21b): the inclination of the human heart is evil from youth."
It's fun to remember that we are reading in translation. The Hebrew words "Babel"--the name of the city--and "Balal"--confusion sound quite a lot alike.
There is then a resumption of the Semitic (Shem's family) part of the genealogy. And it leads eventually to Terah, father of Abraham.
Genesis 12. And here scholars make a distinction between the time of pre-history and legend and a time that is closer to and has more "hooks" into events and places and names that can be independently verified outside of the biblical witness.
So we come to the story of the Patriarchs of God's people: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph.
And it is a GREAT story by any literary standard.
The Jews have a lectionary not unlike the Revised Common Lectionary from which we read in the Episcopal Church. It gives them a path through the entire Torah each year, with readings supplemented from other parts of the Hebrew Bible. These Torah Parshas are known by the first word or two of the Hebrew text. Genesis 12 is known as "Lekh Lekah" (Genesis 12:1-17:27). Those Hebrew words mean "Go!", a strong sort of construction in Hebrew that means "Really get going!"
This is where God starts to interfere in Abraham's life and to transform him into the father of a great nation. (Note: he's called ABRAM here. His name changes later to ABRAHAM, and there's a delightful shift in his self-understanding as a result. We'll come to that place soon.)
12:4 says simply, "So Abram went."
This is the second time that we run into the idea of a remnant, a tiny, small remnant, through which God accomplishes great things, and preserves and develops a people. (The first was the Noah story.)
Abram was old; his wife was old; they had no children; they were called to leave their familiar home and family and go through the wilderness, and through enemy territory, to a place where God promised to bless them with many descendants, where God promised not only to bless them, but to make them a blessing. And so the association of Israel with God's promised land begins here in 12:7 when God says: "To your offspring I will give this land."
But the next verses don't show a hero. Instead they reveal Abram's weakness, as Abram learns what it means to be a head of a household by failing to watch out for the wellbeing of his wife when Pharaoh thinks she's attractive.
Psalm 4:
4:1 "You gave me room when I was in distress ..." So often our distress comes when we don't see any wiggle room in a situation in which we find ourselves. God gives room...
This psalm is complex because there are more than one voice speaking.
The psalmist begins, but God responds, and a sort of dialog develops.
The psalmist begs God: "Let the light of your face shine on us, O LORD!"
(Note the community aspect of this psalm "On US". We so often read the psalms devotionally, all by ourselves. But their normal setting is in community, as we sing and read and pray them in church on Sundays.)
And at the end, the psalmist's experience is that God does keep him safe.
Matthew 4:
Contrast in 4:1 between Matthew and the other synoptic gospels: Here Matthew says the Spirit LED Jesus into the wilderness, which sounds quite gentle, compared to Mark, which states (Mk. 1:12) that the Spirit DROVE him into the wilderness. How often we feel equally ambivalent about how God's Spirit is at work in our own hearts.
If you're interested in deeper study of this passage, look at Austin Farrer's amazing little book, The Triple Victory: Christ's Temptation according to St. Matthew.
Note how, in each case, Jesus quotes from the Torah in response to the devil's temptation.
Then things begin to really move fast, as Jesus begins his ministry in Galilee with the same words that John the Baptist used: "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near!" (4:17).
4:18ff--Jesus calls Peter and Andrew; and in a way that is more than accidentally analogous to the call of Abram, Peter and Andrew "immediately left their nets and followed him" (4:20). Similarly in the next verse for James and John. These 4 disciples continue to be central through most of the gospel.
4:23--kind of sets out for us what Jesus' "program" will be: "Jesus went throughout Galilee [where he did much of his ministry]
teaching in their synagogues [teaching]
and proclaiming the good news of the Kigndom [preaching the Kingdom of Heaven]
and curing every disease and every sickness among the people [healing--and following verses will make it clear that the healing is in body, mind, and spirit]
Daily Bible notes how chapters 3 and 4 imply what later will be called the Holy Trinity, and quotes Hildegaard of Bingen, and offers a prayer: "Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, inseparable in Divine Majesty, grant my mind rest in the mystery of your presence. Help me be more aware of your presence in my life today."
While you can get annoyed with a sort of tribalism here, the bottom line still is for the followers of the LORD God that all human creatures are related to one another; and all human creatures are part of the created order, not different from or above it.
Genesis 11: The story of the Tower of Babel. There is a sort of distrust of cities and buildings in a nomadic, herding world like Israel.
This is an Israelite telling of a story about hubris and the need to limit the human sense of power and entitlement. It's a nice idea that if we all speak the same language, there might be no end to what we could accomplish together. But we don't. This story seems to tell us that perhaps that is a good thing; because humans can cooperate to accomplish evil as well as good, and there must be some limits. The view of the writer/editor of Genesis seems to be that "the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually," as God said in 6:5 (before the flood); and after the flood, God didn't see much improvement (8:21b): the inclination of the human heart is evil from youth."
It's fun to remember that we are reading in translation. The Hebrew words "Babel"--the name of the city--and "Balal"--confusion sound quite a lot alike.
There is then a resumption of the Semitic (Shem's family) part of the genealogy. And it leads eventually to Terah, father of Abraham.
Genesis 12. And here scholars make a distinction between the time of pre-history and legend and a time that is closer to and has more "hooks" into events and places and names that can be independently verified outside of the biblical witness.
So we come to the story of the Patriarchs of God's people: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph.
And it is a GREAT story by any literary standard.
The Jews have a lectionary not unlike the Revised Common Lectionary from which we read in the Episcopal Church. It gives them a path through the entire Torah each year, with readings supplemented from other parts of the Hebrew Bible. These Torah Parshas are known by the first word or two of the Hebrew text. Genesis 12 is known as "Lekh Lekah" (Genesis 12:1-17:27). Those Hebrew words mean "Go!", a strong sort of construction in Hebrew that means "Really get going!"
This is where God starts to interfere in Abraham's life and to transform him into the father of a great nation. (Note: he's called ABRAM here. His name changes later to ABRAHAM, and there's a delightful shift in his self-understanding as a result. We'll come to that place soon.)
12:4 says simply, "So Abram went."
This is the second time that we run into the idea of a remnant, a tiny, small remnant, through which God accomplishes great things, and preserves and develops a people. (The first was the Noah story.)
Abram was old; his wife was old; they had no children; they were called to leave their familiar home and family and go through the wilderness, and through enemy territory, to a place where God promised to bless them with many descendants, where God promised not only to bless them, but to make them a blessing. And so the association of Israel with God's promised land begins here in 12:7 when God says: "To your offspring I will give this land."
But the next verses don't show a hero. Instead they reveal Abram's weakness, as Abram learns what it means to be a head of a household by failing to watch out for the wellbeing of his wife when Pharaoh thinks she's attractive.
Psalm 4:
4:1 "You gave me room when I was in distress ..." So often our distress comes when we don't see any wiggle room in a situation in which we find ourselves. God gives room...
This psalm is complex because there are more than one voice speaking.
The psalmist begins, but God responds, and a sort of dialog develops.
The psalmist begs God: "Let the light of your face shine on us, O LORD!"
(Note the community aspect of this psalm "On US". We so often read the psalms devotionally, all by ourselves. But their normal setting is in community, as we sing and read and pray them in church on Sundays.)
And at the end, the psalmist's experience is that God does keep him safe.
Matthew 4:
Contrast in 4:1 between Matthew and the other synoptic gospels: Here Matthew says the Spirit LED Jesus into the wilderness, which sounds quite gentle, compared to Mark, which states (Mk. 1:12) that the Spirit DROVE him into the wilderness. How often we feel equally ambivalent about how God's Spirit is at work in our own hearts.
If you're interested in deeper study of this passage, look at Austin Farrer's amazing little book, The Triple Victory: Christ's Temptation according to St. Matthew.
Note how, in each case, Jesus quotes from the Torah in response to the devil's temptation.
Then things begin to really move fast, as Jesus begins his ministry in Galilee with the same words that John the Baptist used: "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near!" (4:17).
4:18ff--Jesus calls Peter and Andrew; and in a way that is more than accidentally analogous to the call of Abram, Peter and Andrew "immediately left their nets and followed him" (4:20). Similarly in the next verse for James and John. These 4 disciples continue to be central through most of the gospel.
4:23--kind of sets out for us what Jesus' "program" will be: "Jesus went throughout Galilee [where he did much of his ministry]
teaching in their synagogues [teaching]
and proclaiming the good news of the Kigndom [preaching the Kingdom of Heaven]
and curing every disease and every sickness among the people [healing--and following verses will make it clear that the healing is in body, mind, and spirit]
Daily Bible notes how chapters 3 and 4 imply what later will be called the Holy Trinity, and quotes Hildegaard of Bingen, and offers a prayer: "Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, inseparable in Divine Majesty, grant my mind rest in the mystery of your presence. Help me be more aware of your presence in my life today."
NRSV Daily Bible
Today's UPS delivery brought a copy of The NRSV Daily Bible: Read, Meditate, and Pray through the Entire Bible in 365 Days. HarperCollins: 2012. It's a paperback, and it's not cheap at $30. But it is attractive and laid out very similarly to the guidelines given by The Center for Biblical Studies (thecenterforbiblicalstudies.org) as we begin our year-long journey during Lent. It keeps the Bible in its traditional order--some other schemes for reading the Bible in a year don't do that--which is nice. But it divides up the readings differently. At the end of each day's readings--and there are 365 readings--there is a section with a verse on which to meditate; a small quotation from thoughtful writers on subjects treated in the passage just read; some questions to ask oneself; and a short prayer to offer. These guides will not generally come at the end of the divisions that the Bible Challenge gives us. The Bible Challenge offers a scheme with a reading from the Psalms and a reading from the Gospels each day, along with a larger reading from the Bible as we come to it in course. The Bible Challenge expects that on Sundays readers will hear the Bible read in church, and so no readings are assigned. It might also be a good day to catch up with the readings if we get behind.
Each of us will find a way that works for us. For some, it will be reading again from an old, familiar, well-used volume. For others this will be a brand-new journey. Some who love English literature may find that reading in the King James Version (also called the Authorized Version) will give them pleasure as they discover how influential this translation has been on poets and novelists in the English language. Others will prefer a modern translation.
Monday, February 10, 2014
Day 3: (March 7) Genesis 7-9; Matthew 3; Psalm 3
Psalm 3: "But you, O LORD, are a shield around me, my glory and the one who lifts up my head"
In a previous parish, I had a very sweet and elderly parishioner who told me that in her girlhood she had chosen this verse as her "life verse." I neither advocate nor denigrate this practice. But it is an interesting choice; and she was very much comforted by this verse when she was no longer able to lift up her own head from the pillow. She felt loved and shielded to the very end. Amazing! This is why we read the psalms, my friends! They come back to us to give us confidence in God's goodness when things are hard.
Matthew 3: This is the first we hear of John the Baptist in Matthew's Gospel; but it seems that Matthew expects his hearers/readers to know who John is. He doesn't get much of an introduction.
John proclaims the same message as Jesus: "Repent for the kingdom of heaven has come near."
There is a reference to the prophet Isaiah:
"The voice of one crying out in the wilderness:
'Prepare the way of the Lord,
make his paths straight.'
John baptized those who came out to him from the civilized areas, when they confessed their sins.
He was not so sure about the Pharisees and Sadducees, whom he (memorably!) called a "brood of vipers." He asks these people to bear fruit worthy of repentance; but he doesn't seem to make that a condition for baptizing others. And it is remarkable that the Pharisees and Sadducees HAD come out there for baptism, not just to hassle John.
John points to Jesus and promises that Jesus would baptize with the HOLY SPIRIT and FIRE--and John envisions this baptism to be a sort of violent meting out of justice.
So... in 3:13, Jesus comes to John to be baptized. Which is strange to Christians who have been taught that baptism is for "forgiveness of sins" and that Jesus was sinless. John also thinks it is not right: (3:14) I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?" And Jesus says he is doing so now "to fulfill all righteousness," a phrase we might want to talk about.
3:16 says that "the heavens were opened TO HIM (to Jesus, presumably, but not necessary an event to which everyone was privy???) and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said,'This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.'
Who hears the voice? Was this an affirmation for Jesus or was it a confirmation/revelation for everybody else?
Genesis 7-9 So now we're into the saga of Noah. Note how "all the fountains of the great deep burst forth" rising up from below rather than coming down as rain. The near eastern cosmologies envision a firmament holding back watery chaos from around the world.
Note the "forty days" language.
7:19"...all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered...fifteen cubits deep"
"Only Noah was left and those that were with him in the ark" (7:23)
8:1 BUT GOD REMEMBERED NOAH...We have this deep human, universal longing not to be forgotten...
8:6 40 days again...
8:13--When Noah is ready to get out of the ark, it is "the first day of the first month"--a new year, a new beginning. But "the ground was drying," and they had to be patient until the end of the second month.
8:17 The command from God again is to "be fruitful and multiply" like the first creation. This is like a new creation.
8:20 An anachronism as the "clean" animals are offered in sacrifice. Yet the commandments had not yet been given to Moses. Even though Genesis is itself part of the Torah.
8:21 the LORD smells "the pleasing odor" and "says in his heart"--and how does the writer of Genesis or the hearer of these words know about what God is saying in his heart?
"I will never again curse the ground because of humankind, for the inclination of the human heart is evil from youth; nor will I ever again destroy every living creature as I have done."
Is God saying here that destruction and wiping everything out doesn't work to make the repairs needed to the world? Because the human heart hasn't changed.
God promises regularity in the natural order (8:22).
But the brokenness of things and the impossibility of a complete "reboot" by flood and destruction is clear in 9:2 where the dominion of the human creatures is now accomplished through "fear and dread."
Then we have what is known in Judaism as the Noahic Covenant. Meat for food, but blood is to be a sign of life and given back to the earth rather than eaten.
The sign of the covenant is a rainbow (9:13)
Sons of Noah as the ancestral heads of the major near eastern peoples...
The curse of Canaan (Ham's son) to be "hewers of wood and drawers of water" for other peoples has been used to justify slavery of Africans by Europeans.
Noah was one of the last of the long-lived people of the pre-historic/legendary age.
We will probably need to talk about in what sense this story bears truth for people of faith. It is NOT science. We are NOT unfaithful to God if we don't take this literally.
In a previous parish, I had a very sweet and elderly parishioner who told me that in her girlhood she had chosen this verse as her "life verse." I neither advocate nor denigrate this practice. But it is an interesting choice; and she was very much comforted by this verse when she was no longer able to lift up her own head from the pillow. She felt loved and shielded to the very end. Amazing! This is why we read the psalms, my friends! They come back to us to give us confidence in God's goodness when things are hard.
Matthew 3: This is the first we hear of John the Baptist in Matthew's Gospel; but it seems that Matthew expects his hearers/readers to know who John is. He doesn't get much of an introduction.
John proclaims the same message as Jesus: "Repent for the kingdom of heaven has come near."
There is a reference to the prophet Isaiah:
"The voice of one crying out in the wilderness:
'Prepare the way of the Lord,
make his paths straight.'
John baptized those who came out to him from the civilized areas, when they confessed their sins.
He was not so sure about the Pharisees and Sadducees, whom he (memorably!) called a "brood of vipers." He asks these people to bear fruit worthy of repentance; but he doesn't seem to make that a condition for baptizing others. And it is remarkable that the Pharisees and Sadducees HAD come out there for baptism, not just to hassle John.
John points to Jesus and promises that Jesus would baptize with the HOLY SPIRIT and FIRE--and John envisions this baptism to be a sort of violent meting out of justice.
So... in 3:13, Jesus comes to John to be baptized. Which is strange to Christians who have been taught that baptism is for "forgiveness of sins" and that Jesus was sinless. John also thinks it is not right: (3:14) I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?" And Jesus says he is doing so now "to fulfill all righteousness," a phrase we might want to talk about.
3:16 says that "the heavens were opened TO HIM (to Jesus, presumably, but not necessary an event to which everyone was privy???) and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said,'This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.'
Who hears the voice? Was this an affirmation for Jesus or was it a confirmation/revelation for everybody else?
Genesis 7-9 So now we're into the saga of Noah. Note how "all the fountains of the great deep burst forth" rising up from below rather than coming down as rain. The near eastern cosmologies envision a firmament holding back watery chaos from around the world.
Note the "forty days" language.
7:19"...all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered...fifteen cubits deep"
"Only Noah was left and those that were with him in the ark" (7:23)
8:1 BUT GOD REMEMBERED NOAH...We have this deep human, universal longing not to be forgotten...
8:6 40 days again...
8:13--When Noah is ready to get out of the ark, it is "the first day of the first month"--a new year, a new beginning. But "the ground was drying," and they had to be patient until the end of the second month.
8:17 The command from God again is to "be fruitful and multiply" like the first creation. This is like a new creation.
8:20 An anachronism as the "clean" animals are offered in sacrifice. Yet the commandments had not yet been given to Moses. Even though Genesis is itself part of the Torah.
8:21 the LORD smells "the pleasing odor" and "says in his heart"--and how does the writer of Genesis or the hearer of these words know about what God is saying in his heart?
"I will never again curse the ground because of humankind, for the inclination of the human heart is evil from youth; nor will I ever again destroy every living creature as I have done."
Is God saying here that destruction and wiping everything out doesn't work to make the repairs needed to the world? Because the human heart hasn't changed.
God promises regularity in the natural order (8:22).
But the brokenness of things and the impossibility of a complete "reboot" by flood and destruction is clear in 9:2 where the dominion of the human creatures is now accomplished through "fear and dread."
Then we have what is known in Judaism as the Noahic Covenant. Meat for food, but blood is to be a sign of life and given back to the earth rather than eaten.
The sign of the covenant is a rainbow (9:13)
Sons of Noah as the ancestral heads of the major near eastern peoples...
The curse of Canaan (Ham's son) to be "hewers of wood and drawers of water" for other peoples has been used to justify slavery of Africans by Europeans.
Noah was one of the last of the long-lived people of the pre-historic/legendary age.
We will probably need to talk about in what sense this story bears truth for people of faith. It is NOT science. We are NOT unfaithful to God if we don't take this literally.
Saturday, February 8, 2014
Day 2 (Thursday, March 6, 2014)
Genesis 4-6
Psalm 2
Matthew 2 This is one of the first passages of scripture my mother helped me memorize before I knew how to read. "Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the King, behold, wise men from the East came unto Jerusalem, saying, "Where is he that hath been born King of the Jews? For we have seen his star in the East and are come to worship." (You can check how close my memory is 55 years later by looking up the King James or Authorized Version.)
Already at the beginning of his life, just the reputation of Jesus could make political leaders afraid. Strange... (2:3) Not just Herod was afraid but "all Jerusalem with him," that is, the politically powerful group.
Another quotation from the prophets, about Bethlehem (2:6)
I like the star in this passage!
And the dreams that again carry God's warnings.
And how many sermons have been preached about "returning to their own country by another road," (2:12) and how the encounter with Jesus changes the course of our lives.
And here is fear, motivating the slaughter of the Innocents (2:16). Always, it is the little people who suffer the most. As one of my friends, a retired kindergarten teacher, said, so wisely about political decisions: "If it's not good for the youngest children among us, it's probably not the best solution.'
And that formula again: "Then was fulfilled what had been spoken through the prophet X" (2:5, 17)
By (less than?) a generation after Jesus lived, the Gospel writers were treating the prophets of their sacred scriptures as if their oracles referred to Jesus. That is quite a claim.
We may need to talk some time about how, in Jewish-Christian dialogue, we deal with these sorts of passages. Because clearly, at the time, Jeremiah didn't think he was talking about a Messiah who would come in 500 years. He thought he was talking about his own day and its problems. There's a term for this: supersessionism. Do the interpretations of Christian Gospel writers supersede the intentions of the original prophets?
And by the end of the chapter, Joseph has had another dream, in which an angel of the LORD appeared and told him it was okay to go home. I wonder: was it an angel that Joseph had begun to recognize by that time...
When I say this, I am not trying to insist that these stories must or even should be taken literally for us to hear their truth. But, in the logic of the story as Matthew tells it, one wonders these things.
PSALM 2: There is not really much of a progression in the psalms.
But here's one that deals with the nations (Gentiles) raging against God's people, a theme we saw enacted in the actions of Herod (not fully a Jew but rather an Idumean, appointed by Rome) against the children of Bethlehem, against "the LORD and his anointed"
But God just laughs. (Is this the source of the little saying, "He who laughs last laughs best"?)
This is a psalm that has a Messianic interpretation
2:7b: "You are my son; today I have begotten you"
A final question: How are we going to deal with the idea of the wrath of God? Especially in the context of a Christian idea of Jesus as taking the sins of the world? of grace (abounding to the chief of sinners, as Jonathan Edwards put it, quoting St. Paul)? of God forgiving before we can even ask?
GENESIS 4-6
How quickly things go bad! Cain and Abel, farmer and shepherd, two different offerings...
What was wrong with Cain's offering? Or should we ask, what was wrong with Cain?
4:7--The first explicit reference to sin. And this is before Cain kills Abel.
"Your brother's blood is crying out to me from the ground." (4:10)--one of the saddest verses.
Though there is hope that no injustice goes unseen by God.
By 4:14, the story assumes the existence of other communities of human beings. Cain worries: "I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and anyone who meets me may kill me" Also Cain has a wife. From that union came Enoch.
also note the first reference to the FACE of God --which becomes so important in the psalms, is here in 4:14.
Cain settles "east of Eden." Steinbeck borrows that phrase for his book about family discord between brothers during the time of the Great Depression, which I haven't read since high school.
References to the beginnings of the nomadic peoples (4:20) and musicians (4:21) and metal workers (4:22)
Then there's that weird poem of Lamech to his wives, which praises vengeance as a human tendency. How sad...
References to Seth and to "people [beginning] to invoke the name of the LORD.
Then in Genesis 5, we have a genealogy.
Very long ages people lived, according to this genealogy...
5:24: "Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, because God took him.
5:27 Methuselah...all [his] days were nine hundred sixty-nine years; and he died.
5:28 We get the beginning of the Noah story.
6:1-4: God decides that lives don't need to be so long...
6:5: This is the reason God decides to do a "re-boot" of human program.
"the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth, and ...every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continuously"
6:6 "And the LORD was sorry that he had made humankind on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart."
That is a beautiful verse. It gives us a hint of what is going to come: God bringing his salvation to people who cannot save themselves.
A repeat in slightly different words: 6:12 "And God saw (n.b. the example of two different sources mashed together here. Gabriel Josepovici speaks of the juxtaposition of Hebrew texts with few attempts to smooth over the borders between them. We appear to have a "J" and an "E"--Jehovah/YHWH/LORD and "Elohim"/God--source.) that the earth was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted its ways upon the earth. God goes on to say that human flesh is the reason that the earth is filled with violence.
6:8 "But Noah found favor ("Grace" in KJV) in the sight of the LORD"
And so we are about to see the first example of God preserving a remnant for the accomplishment of his will.
Instructions about an ark
First reference to God establishing a COVENANT --a technical term borrowed from the surrounding nations 6:18. The language just slips in kind of un-introduced in any formal way. And it is so important as the rest of the Hebrew Bible and then later the NT builds on the concept.
Animals 2 x 2 in this chapter. Also "every kind of food". So there is concern for many different species.
Psalm 2
Matthew 2 This is one of the first passages of scripture my mother helped me memorize before I knew how to read. "Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the King, behold, wise men from the East came unto Jerusalem, saying, "Where is he that hath been born King of the Jews? For we have seen his star in the East and are come to worship." (You can check how close my memory is 55 years later by looking up the King James or Authorized Version.)
Already at the beginning of his life, just the reputation of Jesus could make political leaders afraid. Strange... (2:3) Not just Herod was afraid but "all Jerusalem with him," that is, the politically powerful group.
Another quotation from the prophets, about Bethlehem (2:6)
I like the star in this passage!
And the dreams that again carry God's warnings.
And how many sermons have been preached about "returning to their own country by another road," (2:12) and how the encounter with Jesus changes the course of our lives.
And here is fear, motivating the slaughter of the Innocents (2:16). Always, it is the little people who suffer the most. As one of my friends, a retired kindergarten teacher, said, so wisely about political decisions: "If it's not good for the youngest children among us, it's probably not the best solution.'
And that formula again: "Then was fulfilled what had been spoken through the prophet X" (2:5, 17)
By (less than?) a generation after Jesus lived, the Gospel writers were treating the prophets of their sacred scriptures as if their oracles referred to Jesus. That is quite a claim.
We may need to talk some time about how, in Jewish-Christian dialogue, we deal with these sorts of passages. Because clearly, at the time, Jeremiah didn't think he was talking about a Messiah who would come in 500 years. He thought he was talking about his own day and its problems. There's a term for this: supersessionism. Do the interpretations of Christian Gospel writers supersede the intentions of the original prophets?
And by the end of the chapter, Joseph has had another dream, in which an angel of the LORD appeared and told him it was okay to go home. I wonder: was it an angel that Joseph had begun to recognize by that time...
When I say this, I am not trying to insist that these stories must or even should be taken literally for us to hear their truth. But, in the logic of the story as Matthew tells it, one wonders these things.
PSALM 2: There is not really much of a progression in the psalms.
But here's one that deals with the nations (Gentiles) raging against God's people, a theme we saw enacted in the actions of Herod (not fully a Jew but rather an Idumean, appointed by Rome) against the children of Bethlehem, against "the LORD and his anointed"
But God just laughs. (Is this the source of the little saying, "He who laughs last laughs best"?)
This is a psalm that has a Messianic interpretation
2:7b: "You are my son; today I have begotten you"
A final question: How are we going to deal with the idea of the wrath of God? Especially in the context of a Christian idea of Jesus as taking the sins of the world? of grace (abounding to the chief of sinners, as Jonathan Edwards put it, quoting St. Paul)? of God forgiving before we can even ask?
GENESIS 4-6
How quickly things go bad! Cain and Abel, farmer and shepherd, two different offerings...
What was wrong with Cain's offering? Or should we ask, what was wrong with Cain?
4:7--The first explicit reference to sin. And this is before Cain kills Abel.
"Your brother's blood is crying out to me from the ground." (4:10)--one of the saddest verses.
Though there is hope that no injustice goes unseen by God.
By 4:14, the story assumes the existence of other communities of human beings. Cain worries: "I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and anyone who meets me may kill me" Also Cain has a wife. From that union came Enoch.
also note the first reference to the FACE of God --which becomes so important in the psalms, is here in 4:14.
Cain settles "east of Eden." Steinbeck borrows that phrase for his book about family discord between brothers during the time of the Great Depression, which I haven't read since high school.
References to the beginnings of the nomadic peoples (4:20) and musicians (4:21) and metal workers (4:22)
Then there's that weird poem of Lamech to his wives, which praises vengeance as a human tendency. How sad...
References to Seth and to "people [beginning] to invoke the name of the LORD.
Then in Genesis 5, we have a genealogy.
Very long ages people lived, according to this genealogy...
5:24: "Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, because God took him.
5:27 Methuselah...all [his] days were nine hundred sixty-nine years; and he died.
5:28 We get the beginning of the Noah story.
6:1-4: God decides that lives don't need to be so long...
6:5: This is the reason God decides to do a "re-boot" of human program.
"the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth, and ...every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continuously"
6:6 "And the LORD was sorry that he had made humankind on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart."
That is a beautiful verse. It gives us a hint of what is going to come: God bringing his salvation to people who cannot save themselves.
A repeat in slightly different words: 6:12 "And God saw (n.b. the example of two different sources mashed together here. Gabriel Josepovici speaks of the juxtaposition of Hebrew texts with few attempts to smooth over the borders between them. We appear to have a "J" and an "E"--Jehovah/YHWH/LORD and "Elohim"/God--source.) that the earth was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted its ways upon the earth. God goes on to say that human flesh is the reason that the earth is filled with violence.
6:8 "But Noah found favor ("Grace" in KJV) in the sight of the LORD"
And so we are about to see the first example of God preserving a remnant for the accomplishment of his will.
Instructions about an ark
First reference to God establishing a COVENANT --a technical term borrowed from the surrounding nations 6:18. The language just slips in kind of un-introduced in any formal way. And it is so important as the rest of the Hebrew Bible and then later the NT builds on the concept.
Animals 2 x 2 in this chapter. Also "every kind of food". So there is concern for many different species.
Starting with Genesis 1, Matthew 1, and Psalm 1, using my trusty NRSV Bible/ Book of Common Prayer combo. The three pink tabs are there to mark my progress...
GENESIS 1: In the beginning WHEN God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep. (Gen. 1:1)
The NRSV translation makes it clear that this is about what happened WHEN God created. And things started out much less defined than when God was "finished" (2:1)
Jewish scholarship has remarked about how a key verb in this whole section is "to divide"/ hivdil.
It's like a big family tree of creation and life, beginning with the divine energy bringing about light, separating or dividing light and dark, water and dry land, etc.
The "wind from God" /Spirit/ruach is there at the very beginning, in motion.
And God starts the process out by speaking.
The formula is evening/morning: a day...
It takes until v. 10 (3rd day) before God pronounces God's work "good". (10, 13, 18, 21, 25)
Then the text adds in v. 22 that "God blessed them..." This is day 5, when fish and birds are created.
Humanity created in God's image. Note "LET US" v. 26--is this a way of saying something about community being part of what it is to be made in God's image???
"in the image of God he created THEM; male and female he created THEM"
v. 28: God Blessed them.
God commands twice: "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth"--and then adds just to the human beings: and subdue it; and have dominion...over every living thing that moves upon the earth"
then in v. 31 you get the summary: "It was VERY good"
Genesis 2: God rested on the seventh day; blessed the seventh day and hallowed it
The text appears to say that the day is holy because God rested; not that God rested because they day was holy. (2:3)
Then we have the second creation account. It's human oriented in a way, contrasting with the cosmic orientation of the start of the first story: "these are the GENERATIONS..." (2:4)
The scale is humane; the point of view is human: "..for there was no one to till the ground..." (2:5)
God "forms" the person/man and "breathes" life into his nostrils... (2:7)
And God "places" the person into a garden purpose-made for human beings (2:8, 2:15)
2:16--God's first spoken interaction is one of COMMAND. "Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die."
2:18--God says (to whom???) "It is not good that the man should be alone. I will make him a helper/ezer--same word as is used of God when psalmist speaks of God as his helper--as his partner.
Then the incomplete person needs to learn that non-human companions aren't sufficient for the kind of partnership and help that God intends.
And we see the man imitating God, naming animals. (2:19-20)
The creation of woman happens while the man is asleep--in "a deep sleep," in fact-- and she comes from a part of him. This unawareness of the process seems somehow important to me, as I think about how challenging women and men find it to understand each other.
Again, look at the "humane" scale of this story: God BRINGS the woman to the man.
And the man gets it. At last! this is bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh...
2:24: then we have one of those "etiology" statements: "Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and clings to his wife, and they become one flesh"
And the story rushes on... 2:25: And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.
That sentence is a magnificent sentence to lead into the complexities of the next chapter, which describes what Christians call "the fall," but many Jewish scholars see as morally/ethically neutral.
Genesis 3: Introduces a created being, the Serpent. THE Serpent. Not just any serpent. THE Serpent.
A talking serpent.
None of the other animals speaks.
There are a lot of assumptions unwritten in this little verse.
Much has been made of Eve "mis-quoting" God, who is not recorded to have said, '...nor shall you touch it" (3:3). In any case, Eve was not there when God gave the command. Perhaps Adam "mis-quoted" God! Or perhaps one or both of them was so serious about following God's command that they set an extra "fence" around the tree...
But in the traditional understanding of the sinlessness of Paradise/Eden, how could Even have understood anything about death? How would dying be a threat to her?
Interesting that the Serpent says they will be like God--as if they are already not made in the image of God. Sometimes Satan tries to bribe us with things that God has already freely given us.
3:6 says the tree was "good for food" and "a delight to the eyes." But still...
I'm reminded of the experiments on delayed gratification that were done 20 or 30 years ago with little kids and cookies that they were not supposed to eat.
3:7 Then the eyes of both were opened...(were they closed before???)
3:8 Again note the "humane" scale of this story. God walks in the garden.
3:9 God like an adult playing hide and seek with a child...
3:10 "I was afraid"--fear was not there before.
3:11 Things fail quickly: relationships between man and woman, relationship of humanity to God...
shame and fear and hiding all enter in...
God curses the serpent
God describes to the woman how her desire for her man will be problematic
(Some people read 3:16 as prescriptive and think that God is saying that men are SUPPOSED to rule over women. I would find that a very problematic interpretation...)
God describes to the man how his desire with nature and work will be problematic.
3:20--God makes skins garments for the man and woman. This involves slaughter. More brokenness.
3:22--God in dialogue with--????? "See, the man has become like one of us..."
3:22--what are we to make of the reference here to the tree of life? (last reference was 2:9)
Living forever in this condition would not be a blessing.
3:23 God sends the man and woman forth (sending forth does not sound so much like a curse, as like the next stage in a path of redemption/repair)
3:24--There is a divine prevention of returning to the garden and a protection from the Tree of Life and any premature appropriation of its fruit.
PSALM 1: Note there's also a tree in this, the first psalm! fruitful trees, in a garden-like setting.
and the contrast between the way of the righteous and the way of the sinner is described in terms of fruitlessness and dryness (the wind drives away the chaff).
MATTHEW 1: Genealogy: beginning with Abraham and David.
Very stylized. Very Jewish. (Contrast with Luke)
1;18 "Now the birth of Jesus [referred to in v. 1] the Messiah took place in this way:
This is a Joseph-oriented account.
"She was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit" (1:18) That was certainly not obvious to Joseph. This is Matthew speaking later from the point of view of faith. (Or you might picture Mary explaining her condition to Joseph, pointing to the Holy Spirit as in the Luke tradition.) But the Holy Spirit is here in the 1st chapter of Matthew, as in the 1st chapter of Genesis (in the ambiguous "wind"/"spirit")
Jesus is a savior from sin. (1:21). Already by Genesis 3, there's a need for salvation from Sin.
Note the tendency to quote from the Hebrew Bible (1:23).
Note also the tendency to help the hearer/reader who is not familiar with Hebrew. Christianity was already multicultural by the time the gospel was written!
Note that Joseph also is asleep (like Adam?) when God deals with him (1:24)
note 1:25 that it is clear that the couple were not sexually active "until she had born a son; and HE (Joseph) named him Jesus."
The tradition that Mary was perpetually virgin came into being early, but really was saying more about Jesus' uniqueness as God in the Flesh than it was about virginity being the ideal human state.
Okay...I can see that this is going to take more time than I often will have if I make this many notes.
I will have to find a different way to respond to these readings...
Getting Started Reading the Bible from Lent to Lent
The Goal is to begin on March 5, Ash Wednesday, 2014, and, following a schedule, join people in my congregation as we read the Bible together, meeting regularly to reflect on the experience.
I am starting early. It's really February 8th. I am excited that my parish will be starting the Bible Challenge, with the support and encouragement of The Center for Biblical Studies, beginning in Lent. The Rev. Marek Zabriskie has set up a schedule of readings that will enable a reader to read the entire Bible in a year. I hope that some people from my congregation, maybe many!, will join me on this journey. I want to be able to offer encouragement, and to be thoughtful about where there might be challenges for people who have not done something like this before.
I've always had mixed feelings about reading the Bible in a year. I've read the Bible in course many times. Then I always return to the two-year cycle of Daily Office readings, incomplete as it is, in order to be reading, so to speak, in solidarity with Episcopalians throughout the American Anglican community. But reading that way is frustrating because, while the readings are more or less "in course," there are exceptions all over the place for holy days; there is no attempt to read from Genesis to Revelation in biblical order; and there are lacunae that are not, apparently, considered appropriate for reading aloud in community in the context of worship (and I think that is probably correct).
I don't think I can do both outside of a liturgical setting where there is a community of people--monastic, parish, or academic-- praying the Daily Office together daily. I'm just not that good at doing ANYTHING day after day.
I've loved reading "in course" in the past. I didn't feel any guilt if I missed a day. I just picked up where I left off the last time. I read 1 chapter of Torah, 1 chapter of some other part of the OT, 1 psalm, 1 chapter of a Gospel, and 1 chapter of the rest of the NT. That may not sound, either, like very much continuity, but it worked for me. And I think it generally took me about a year to read the Bible. For years, I would purchase a new copy, and date my progress through, along with adding notes in the margins, often references to the Greek or Hebrew text.
So, here goes: a fresh blog.
A fresh start with Genesis 1-3, Psalm 1, and Matthew 1.
And a hesitation to start something that I'm not sure I will finish.
I am starting early. It's really February 8th. I am excited that my parish will be starting the Bible Challenge, with the support and encouragement of The Center for Biblical Studies, beginning in Lent. The Rev. Marek Zabriskie has set up a schedule of readings that will enable a reader to read the entire Bible in a year. I hope that some people from my congregation, maybe many!, will join me on this journey. I want to be able to offer encouragement, and to be thoughtful about where there might be challenges for people who have not done something like this before.
I've always had mixed feelings about reading the Bible in a year. I've read the Bible in course many times. Then I always return to the two-year cycle of Daily Office readings, incomplete as it is, in order to be reading, so to speak, in solidarity with Episcopalians throughout the American Anglican community. But reading that way is frustrating because, while the readings are more or less "in course," there are exceptions all over the place for holy days; there is no attempt to read from Genesis to Revelation in biblical order; and there are lacunae that are not, apparently, considered appropriate for reading aloud in community in the context of worship (and I think that is probably correct).
I don't think I can do both outside of a liturgical setting where there is a community of people--monastic, parish, or academic-- praying the Daily Office together daily. I'm just not that good at doing ANYTHING day after day.
I've loved reading "in course" in the past. I didn't feel any guilt if I missed a day. I just picked up where I left off the last time. I read 1 chapter of Torah, 1 chapter of some other part of the OT, 1 psalm, 1 chapter of a Gospel, and 1 chapter of the rest of the NT. That may not sound, either, like very much continuity, but it worked for me. And I think it generally took me about a year to read the Bible. For years, I would purchase a new copy, and date my progress through, along with adding notes in the margins, often references to the Greek or Hebrew text.
So, here goes: a fresh blog.
A fresh start with Genesis 1-3, Psalm 1, and Matthew 1.
And a hesitation to start something that I'm not sure I will finish.
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