Adveniat Regnum Tuum - Your Kingdom Come

The Lord's Prayer in Luke from Codex Sinaiticus

When I am reading and translating the New Testament (the Greek Bible) I like to use a method which is called dynamic equivalence. That is an approach in which we are not translating word for word, but rather trying to capture the original meaning and intention. Let us now try this method and translate the Lord’s Prayer from the socio-economic context of the first century Palestine into our modern American idiom. What prayer would Jesus teach his disciples in our days?

 Loving God of the highest authority.

I translate “loving God” because “father” has now way too patriarchal of an aftertaste. On the other hand Heavenly Parent of some translations is way too familial. In the first century “father” was a figure of authority. Loving God seems to me like a reasonable balance between familiarity and respect.

 May what you stand for be the measure for everything.

That is my attempt to convey and translate to modern idioms the concept of holiness and divine kingdom.

 May the world be shaped as your love will have it.

Translating a petition which asks for the divine rule(divine will) to come from Heaven down to Earth.

Preserve for us and future generations enough for everyone to live:
with fresh air to breathe, clean water to drink, a blue planet to inhabit.

In the Ancient Near East devastating famines were a regular occurrence and for many people in Jesus’ times their food security was a daily concern.
In our world the food security is also a painful reality, but is caused and simultaneously overshadowed by a human caused environmental devastation.

 May our society be organized fairly, without anyone crushed by debt or need.

The original text clearly spoke about the debt-forgiveness. All other words (sins, trespasses etc.) strive to translate Greek OFEILÉMA (likely the original Aramaic root HWB) which was debt/obligation/anything owed. This is my attempt to provide idiomatic meaning of forgiveness of debts within the context of social justice.

Let the police and courts treat people justly,
regardless of their class, nationality or race.

The original text requested a protection from “being handed over to judgement/trial” either to the corrupt Jewish(Herodian) authorities or even more probably to the occupying Roman power - those were the evil powers of those days. In our times when, prisons are disproportionally filled with black men, the poor and the mentally ill, I believe ours is an accurate contextual translation.

With thanks we now submit ourselves under your bright and loving rule for ever.
And together we say - So be it!

The closing doxology is not biblical and I took freedom to translate it from the broader Greek context translating “kingdom, power and glory” and final Semitic “amen”.

And so here is our translation of the Lord’s Prayer. In Advent Season let us to stop and think about and hopefully also act to bring about the coming (advent) of the divine justice from the ideal world (heaven, divine realm) to our daily lives. 

Loving God of the highest authority:
   May what you stand for
      be the measure for everything.
   May the world be shaped
      as your love will have it.

Preserve for us and future generations
   enough for everyone to live:
     with fresh air to breathe,
     clean water to drink,
     and a blue planet to inhabit.
May our society be organized fairly,
   without anyone crushed by debt or need.
Let the police and courts treat people justly,
   regardless of their class, nationality or race.

With thanks we now submit ourselves
   under your bright and loving rule for ever.

And together we say – Let it be so! 

 

Homily on different translations of the Lord's Prayer  can be found here: Praying Lord's Prayers

Was Jesus illiterate?

Mapping the US book deserts.
A percentage of homes with at least 100 books.
Interactive map can be found here.

Video version of this blog can be found here on YouTube.

 

Scholars and theologian are all but unanimous that Jesus and his Galilean disciples were almost certainly unable to read or write. But please, note that I did not call them illiterate! That would be a gross misrepresentation of their reality. Modern scholarship calls such people nonliterate.

            There is an important distinction between illiterate and nonliterate. Illiterate are people who had opportunity to learn reading and writing and yet had never done so. Meanwhile nonliterate persons are those who never had the chance to learn these skills because they lived in a society where hardly anyone could read or write. Such a setting is being described as preliterate society.

            In our world and time illiteracy often comes with a stigma, a value judgement about the person’s mental acuity. In the preliterate society inability to read and write was common and did not come with such a stigma.

            Literacy all around the Ancient Mediterranean world was about 5%. And our best estimates of literacy among the Jews living in Palestine (from Judea to Galilee) was hardly any larger. And those literate were members of an elite class, who almost certainly did not live in a Galilean rural hamlet like Nazareth. The setting of Jesus’ movement was indeed an oral,  preliterate society. And Jesus and his disciples’ inability to read did not mean they were stupid.

            On the contrary, anthropologists tell us that nonliteracy gave people some unique and special faculties. Preliterate oral cultures had a phenomenally better narrative memory. From my study of Hawaiian history and culture I am aware of early missionaries in Hawai’i reporting with  astonishment the ability of nonliterate locals to reliably memorize entire biblical books. And that has been reported all over the world.            Mental capacities of nonliteral peoples are not hindered by literacy. Their intellect is not under the spell of the written. They have a different, intuitive, and broader, more holistic, perception of reality.

            In addition and interestingly, to my best knowledge, all the main world religions were born in this twilight zone of literacy, inspired by nonliterate founders, and only later scriptualized - written down. In fact if Jesus and his first Galilean disciples were literate, it would had been a highly irregular and hence suspicious.

            The very fact that Jesus and his first disciples were nonliterate, the fact that there was a period of oral transmission, the fact that the Bible was written only about a generation or two later, all of it is an important factor which we normally do not fully appreciate but which was a contributing reason that we have Christianity and our New Testament Bible.  And that is something you might not know about the Bible.  

 

Join us this Sunday when we will discern and contemplate the only one New Testament story about reading Jesus (Luke 4:16ff). It might be a wishful projection of a highly educated evangelist, but exactly as a projection it still contains a beautiful and powerful message of divine love and respect for everyone, and especially for those left out and forgotten.

Revolution in Heaven

Nine classes of angels in three spheres depicted in a medieval manuscript.

Have you heard about the revolution in heaven? Have you heard how Jesus overthrew the heavenly hierarchy?

     First I need to explain the angelic hierarchy. The ancient polytheistic peoples were familiar with the notion of the divine court. Greeks situated it on Mt. Olympus. North West Semitic people looked up to Mt. Zaphon (modern Jebel Aqra). Of course the Hebrew Bible knew about Zaphon but there are also signs that Mt. Sinai, Mt. Zion or occasionally other mountains might play a similar role.

            A deepening process of monotheisation under the prophets like Isaiah or Jeremiah led to less interest in the divine court. But then, it found its way in again during the late biblical period under the influence of apocalyptic writings such as Ezekiel or Daniel. In this stage, what used to be deities were replaced with throngs and retinues of angels. The angelic hierarchy was imagined and structured according to Hellenistic Royal Courts. Later the rabbis organised angels into no less than 10 classes or ranks. But the Jewish angelic hierarchy stayed rather fluent and even a little chaotic. For instance different cabalistic schools could have one class of angels, for instance Seraphim, in the highest rank as well as lowest rank and anything in between, depending on the author.

            Roman Catholic medieval Scholasticism put angels in better order, probably inspired by needs of the medieval feudal church. Angels were organised in three large spheres and nine different classes. The highest sphere was for angels who were constantly in the presence of the divine and never left. Beneath them was the intermediary sphere of angelic functionaries mediating divine commands to the lower angelic sphere. The lowest angelic sphere was charged with execution of divine orders. Here were patrons of nations and royal houses, here were archangels in the second lowest class. Lower were only regular angels and the lowest of lowest of angels were the personal guardian angels, the blue collar angels, angelic proletarians. 

            Angelic hierarchy thus reflected medieval feudal structures of power but also represented the general human desire for order in the hierarchy of power. Image of heaven in Roman Church reflected medieval feudalism, in the Biblical times it reflected Hellenistic courts, among early Jews and pagans Zaphon, Sion or Olympus were perceived like Bronze Age royal palaces. (In heaven it was as it was on earth. When you think about it, it was the very opposite of one of the petitions of the Lord's Prayer.) 

            And then, Jesus, as was his well-established practice, turned this all upside down in one sentence.  Matthew 18:10 in my loose rendition - Don’t even think to disregard and neglect the powerless, I tell you, their guardian angels have direct access to God. (My loose translation.)

            The lowest, worldly, working angels, that angelic proletariat has direct access to God! That is revolution in heaven. As if Jesus said, Stop projecting your human corrupt power structures to heaven! Rather, change your human structures according to the egalitarian heavenly model which I bring and preach to you. 

            That is what I call the revolution in heaven. The overthrow of imaginary heavenly hierarchy and by the way the utter abrogation of heavenly and earthly feudalism or any other abusive power structures which humankind is so eager to create and recreate.

            The first are last and last are first in heaven! And the first will be last and the last will be first in bright divine future. And you should start living it out now.

 

And that is something you might not know about the Bible and Jesus’ radical angelology.

 

Video version of this article can be found on Rutgers Church YouTube. 

And here it is being explained to children in virtual Children Message

Pseudo-Shaman's Pseudo-Prayer

 This Tuesday (the 9^th of March) our Rutgers Church Session adopted by unanimous vote An Appeal to Christians against the false doctrines of White Christian Nationalism.

    When the January 6^th attack on the Capitol happened, many people were shocked by the sheer violence and anti-democratic nature of that sad event. For me, the most shocking part of that dangerous escapade was actually a prayer. That prayer offered by the so-called Q-anon Shaman Jake Angeli in the very Senate Chamber, right at the Senate Dais.

     In that prayer he thanked “divine, omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent Creator God” for “filling that chamber with the divine white light,” and thus “sending a message to all the tyrants, communists and globalist” and “protecting America and American way of United States of America” (sic!) Those were his pleonasms, mannerisms and verbosity which he probably learned from some long-winded Arizonian evangelical preacherer.

     Even more frightening was the fact that all that noisy disheveled riffraff knew how to behave at the time of such prayers, chiming in with their loud amens and lifting up their arms in praise. Clearly well socialized (or should I rather say anti-socialized?) in that kind of church culture. 

     Observing this blatant abuse of religion for the self-serving and destructive political ends I recognized the deep and scary logic of all of that.
     And I wondered - Where is the line between corruption of one religion and the beginning of a completely different, new, foreign religion?

    And even more seriously, where is the limit when the religious zeal is so distorted that it becomes an idolatry of some other, different, grotesque god?  

      These are not academic questions. They are serious and quite consequential for all of us. Appropriately for the lent season we will ask these disturbing questions and try to reach some deeper understanding. But we will also seek and affirm the essence of our faith and affirm our commitment to our benevolent Lord. Join us, if you can, for this important spiritual quest. 

 

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This is a link to the pdf version of our Appeal to Christians.

Here is a link to an you can also sign an online petition.

 

 

Universal Human Family

Shortly after the sacking of the Capitol on the 6^th of January, elder Christine Gorman asked me what are we going to do about the abuse of Christianity which was so present in that riot. At first I did not know what she meant, but after paying a little closer attention it became painfully obvious. The insurrection was not only shockingly violent, it was also permeated with and propelled by a dangerous aberration of “Christian” faith - symbols, language, and even prayers.
          For those who study right-wing Christianity it was actually unsurprising. This riot, this attempt to subvert democracy was substantially propelled by the white christian nationalism.
            That is a known, ugly, and poisonous fruit of corrupted Christian faith. I preached about it on January 17, but more needed to be done. With several theologian friends and with the help from Auburn Seminary we prepared a statement of faith - An Appeal to Christians. Rejecting on theological grounds the White Christian Nationalism. But not only rejecting it, more importantly affirming the positive message, the core values of our Christian faith contrasting it with this dangerous aberration.
            The time of Lent is a preeminently appropriate time for contemplating just these matters. So on this and the next two Sundays we will not only reject White Christian Nationalism and its dangerous ideology but in contrast also affirm central values of our Christian faith.
     1) Its egalitarian and antiracist nature,
     2) Its altruism and spirit of service,
     3) Its cosmopolitan, universal aspirations
We start with the deeply biblical theme of one universal human family.

--------------------------
This is a link to the pdf version of our Appeal to Christians.

Here is a link to an you can also sign an online petition.

 

Fishing adynaton

 A spoon lure - a shiny metal disc used for sport fishing.
Some fish are clearly attracted to glittering objects
yet it is highly unlikely any fish would swallow a coin and then another hook.  

Humor is a very efficient way of resisting and even subverting the unjust status quo. Jesus was a master of this technique. Many of his parables tell that story and are gems of humorous observations and social commentary. Sometime, he went even further employing absurd humor.
            Here I need to give you a little bit of an introduction. Disciple Peter, we are told was accused that his master Jesus did not pay the temple tax. Peter lied claiming that Jesus did. Jesus probably overheard it, afterward took Peter aside and talked with him. He asked him whether children of a king paid taxes to their father. Under feudalism the answer was self evident - Of course not! Then Jesus gave to Peter a very bizarre instruction. Take a fishing rod, catch a fish, find a silver coin in its mouth and pay with it taxes for me and you.
            The pious commentators twist themselves into knots interpreting this bizarre instruction and firmly asserting an even more bizarre and unique self serving miracle. Well, the miracle is actually not reported. Commentators just infer it - if Jesus commanded it, it must had happened that way!
            Oh, how very pious and at least, according to my opinion, how very wrong! Can you imagine fish with a large silver coin in its mouth being caught on a hook? And that was exactly the instruction. I am not a fisherman and I know it is an absurd situation.
            It was an Adynaton - sarcastic hyperbolic figure of speech. When hens grow teeth, When cats grow horns, When fish build nests on the poplar trees, On the second Thursday of the week! Those are all modern European examples of this type of expression. And we know that Jesus used that figure of speech before - do you remember threading a camel through the needle’s eye?
            In our English speaking world with not that many fishermen among us I would interpret Jesus’ instruction this way: Peter, go to a forest, catch a flying pig, sell it and pay our taxes.
            Jesus had a keen sense of humor and resisted unjust taxation with biting sarcasm. And that is something you might not know about the Bible.

 

This Sunday we will hear about Jesus calling fishermen what he offered them and what they provided back to him. And why it is still relevant for us today. 

 

Gate and road logion (new reading and interpretation)

Enter through the narrow gate;

for the gate is wide and the road is easy

that leads to destruction,

and there are many who take it.

For the gate is narrow and the road is hard

that leads to life,

and there are few who find it.

 

Gospel of Matthew (7:13-14 quoted here from NRSV) preserved for us this saying of Jesus with clear signs of Semitic parallelism. Gospel of Luke has an abbreviated version (13:24). It is therefore highly probable that this logion was preserved in the Q source (A presupposed Early Christian collection of Jesus’ logia).

     Often it is being interpreted along the lines of Christian ethical or moral exclusivism. I would like to suggest a different reading based on the historical context and how ancient city gates and roads were built and how they functioned.

 

The Hellenistic walled cities, and sometimes even cities without walls, had what can be described as a ceremonial gate - a main entrance to the polis which was used for different processions and for welcoming dignitaries and imperial or royal messengers. This main ceremonial gate was built on a main road leading to the city. Besides this main entrance, the city often had several side entrances connecting it to the countryside either in the form of postern gates, if the city was walled, or just streets extending to surrounding farmland.

 

A network of the Roman imperial roads is not necessary to introduce. Romans inherited and perfected earlier similar networks which were built by preceding empires (Hellenistic kingdoms, as well as Persian and Assyrian empires). It is also well understood that these imperial roads were built for easier and more efficient administration but primarily for military purposes of communication and easier movement of armies. On the other hand local roads were formed by local communities to serve their immediate needs of local commerce and farming.

 

Based upon these observations I would like to offer my dynamic equivalence translation of this logion:

 

Always take a narrow gate.

            The main ceremonial city gates

            and straight Roman roads

            are built for armies and lead to destruction.

But the narrow gate and the twisty roads

            are for civilians and lead to life.

 

This reading (interpretation) clearly goes beyond the narrow moralistic exclusivism and offer richer and deeper context, anti-imperial outlook, and theology which fits well with the rest of Jesus’ message.