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FOCUS October 2019 Vol. 7 No: 4

Uunderstanding the Logic of Spiritual Life,

Revd Dr. Valson Thampu, Trivandrum – Page 18

Cover Photo: Faith, History and Religiosity

(Cover Design by Lal Varghese, Esq., Dallas)

A Publication of Diaspora FOCUS

Journeying with the Cross of Christ, Lal

Varghese, Esq., Dallas – Page 21

Editorial, Faith, History and Religiosity – Revd

Dr. Valson Thampu, Trivandrum - Page 3

The Book of Job and the Transcendence of

the Ego, Revd Dr. Valson Thampu, Trivandrum – Page 23

New Testament from a Sociological

Perspective, Revd Dr. Abraham Philip – Page 7

“Ask FOCUS”, Reflection on Dr. Zac

Varghese’s Article on Faith in July 2019 issue, – Page 27

‘Faith’ and ‘The Faith’ Dr. Zac Varghese,

London, UK – Page 13
The Holy Books: Part-3, Dr. Ian Fry, University
of Divinity, Melbourne- Page 30

Joy of living Revd Dr. M. J. Joseph, The End of the World is Near . . . With the
Kottayam – Page 16 Blessing of Religions, William E. Swing, Burlingame - Page 33

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EDITORIAL
FAITH, HISTORY AND RELIGIOSITY
Let me begin by stating something that bothers me
greatly. We glory in the fact – which is undeniable – that
Christianity is a historical faith. It does not drive its origin,
or sustenance, from myths and fables. Jesus entered
history, engaged with its essence, illumined its logic, and
re-defined its genius.
Yet, as Christians, we lead an a-historical existence in the
name of a religion, which is quintessentially historical. We
talk about Jesus being historical, but rarely bother to
understand what that entails, though the Gospels leave
us with no excuse for doing so. It is time we asked what
is ‘historical’ about the way we live the Way of Jesus,
whom we acknowledge by force of habit as the Lord and
redeemer of history. We are voluble about the power of
the faith in changing lives and transforming societies. But
that power, to which we pay lip-service, is seen nowhere
in our life, or in the corporate practice of our religiosity.
Perhaps we should ask – When, where and how have I
expressed or experienced the spiritual power of my faith,
which I am forever ready to affirm has the ‘power to move
mountains’? – Could I be scared of the power of the faith,
because I do not want to accept and endure the
challenges it could pose?
As a rule, ‘power’ is superfluous to orbiting in habituated
routines, the very value of which is that they are un-
demanding vis-à-vis effort and struggle. It is economy of
effort and the solace of effortlessness, not power that
characterize habitual religious life from day-to-day. Have I
ever been aware of how my faith-life connects to the
dynamics of history? Do I have, for that matter, any sense
or intuition of history? Or, do I live as a faith-infant,
counting on God and others to make my life smooth and
trouble-free? What is the larger relevance of the faith-life I
lead? Does it have a resonance or relevance to anything
beyond my life or, even, the needs and expectations of
my ‘dear ones’ at home?
The Historical Genius of the Bible:
The Bible begins by affirming the historical genius of faith.
Let us consider the instance of Abraham, who is
acknowledged as an exemplar of faith. When I read
chapter 12 of Genesis, what strikes me most profoundly
is that God’s invitation to Abram – as he was named then
– into a life of faith, which is couched in the phraseology
of history. Here’s the text:
[1] Now the LORD said to Abram, “Go from your country
and your kindred and your father's house to the land that
I will show you. [2] And I will make of you a great nation,
and I will bless you and make your name great, so that
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you will be a blessing. [3] I will bless those who bless you,
and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the
families of the earth shall be blessed.”
Abram is asked to abandon the familiar and the habitual,
and to go a land he had never seen before. It is a faith
pilgrimage into the unknown, which is akin to the dynamic
of history. Abram had the choice, at that point, of turning
his face away from the unfamiliar terrain of history and to
lead an a-historical existence, hiding in the undergrowth
of familiar customs, ways, and possibilities, and ‘safe in
the arms’ of the given.
The second historical resonance in Abram’s invitation into
the adventure of faith is that, given the scope and
potential that faith holds, ‘the families of the earth shall be
blessed’ through him. It is thus made clear that faith is
meant to make a difference in the world, besides
transforming the life of the believer. This is not a matter,
as Jesus makes clear centuries later, of scale or size. It is
a matter of principle, of vision, of outreach. It is enough if
even one family, one life, is blessed on account of one’s
life. So, Jesus could go into Samaria and stand at
Jacob’s well, with the noon sun spitting its fire on his
head, for the sake of a lone woman, who no one cares
for.
The third significant aspect of the historical genius of faith
revealed in this text is perhaps the most important. Faith
is not – if I may use a cliché – a walk in the park! It
involves an uprooting as well as a casting away – as it
would seem at the given moment – one’s life like the
breads in Ecclesiastes on the waters of time (Eccles. 11:
1). Abram does not go to the land ‘only God has seen’,
armed with a life insurance plan, guarantees of safe
passage, or assured supply of manna on the move! There
is no ‘proof’, either, that the adventure would be
profitable, happy-ending, or its outcome an improvement
on the status quo. I can’t speak for others, but I know this
about myself: the prospect of the families of the earth
being blessed some time in the distant future through my
traumatic uprooting and displacement – virtually gambling
on what seems at the time to be no more than a
grandiose dream – is unlikely to recommend itself to me.
But that does not prevent me from getting excited about
the historicity of my faith and waxing eloquent in public,
as indeed I have done.
I did this for the reason that I did not ‘waste’ much time
trying to understand the essence of the biblical faith.
Unlike most of my fellow Christians, perhaps, I was too
much of a habitual or nominal Christian, to whom the
appearance of faith mattered more than its lived truth. So,
today the words of Jesus, said to the woman of Samaria,
strike me with particular force: that God must be
worshipped “in spirit and in truth” (Jn. 4: 24).
What does ‘historicity’ mean in respect of religion?
The prevailing notion that a faith is historical because its
founder has had authentic historical existence is naïve
and inadequate. Whatever exists in time need not be
historical. You and I exist in time; but a few years, in my
case, or a few decades, in your case, from now no one
will know us and it will be, for all practical purposes as if
we never existed. The grass, the Psalmist would say, is
not historical; for it today is and is tomorrow no more, and
its place knows it not. So, one thing is pretty clear: mere
existence in time is hardly historical. We compare Jesus
with the mythological founders, say, of Hinduism and feel
superior on account of Jesus having been a discreet
historical person. Surely, he was. But that is not the
reason he is historical.
History is a domain of action. Not just any kind of action,
but action that has a futuristic momentum. Something is
being shaped on the anvil of time in the workshop of
history. Who shapes this? What we can say for sure is
this: “Not man!” Is not history, then, a domain of human
action? Yes, it is. But man does not, for that reason,
shape, direct or make history. History, if anything, makes
him. Until the dawn of the modern age, it was assumed
that God was the author of history. Things moved and
shaped as per providence. In the wake of Enlightenment,
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it became embarrassing for the members of ‘advanced
civilizations’ to entertain this worldview. So, they, by way
of improving on the previous model of viewing history,
ascribed its authorship to blind chance! But let that be.
It is enough for us to know for sure that man, no man
whatsoever, can play god in history. But there is, all the
same, an element of complexity about what is involved in
history. While no man directs history, all empirical and
material aspects of human existence – the life and work
of every human being – is bounded by the laws of nature,
or physical laws, or the logic of history. It is easy to
understand this at the micro level. If you work hard, there
is a good chance that you will succeed. There is no hope
in hell that you will succeed, if you languish in laziness.
This point is amply made by the writer of Proverbs.
Medieval theologians recognized sloth, or laziness, as
one of the Seven Deadly Sins.
Christians rarely recognize that Jesus’ stern refusal to
deploy miracles to his own advantage – and thereby
disrupt or de-stabilize the law of history – is
quintessentially historical. That is what it means to live,
and not merely exist, in history. As Immanuel Kant
pointed out in his essay titled ‘What is Enlightenment?’
the tendency is to ‘depend’ on something beyond oneself
– ‘depend’ means, literally, remain suspended from – it is
a sign of “immaturity”. He said –I must hasten to add –
with reference to depending on human functionaries. As
Dietrich Bonhoeffer was to say later, we should live as
though God is dead. The idea is not that God does not
exist! It is that we honour God by valuing the unique and
incomparable powers so liberally given to us by the
Maker in order that we struggle, seek and find the fullness
of our stature and potential. That is akin to the paradox of
faith: the real proof that God is God and that He exists is
that we live as though He does not; that is, in a state of
existential autonomy, thanks only to the greatness and
generosity of God as the Creator to whom I bear witness,
not by being a “beggar at the gate called Beautiful” (Ac.
3: 2), but exemplifying life in all its fullness (Jn. 10: 10).
Immanuel Kant, in Religion within the Limits of Reason
Alone (1793), points out that, while God can perform
miracles – else, he would not be God – it is detrimental to
the moral development of our species to feed on
miracles. While conceding that miracles could play a role
in germinating faith, he insists that miracles obstruct the
development of spiritual maturity. This is easy to see. If
miracles were a routine option for our species, there
would have been no progress at all. Instead of inventing
the airplane or ship, for example, we would have simply
expected to be transported miraculously to our
destinations. As a rule, human beings choose easier
options. Arguably, thriving through miracles is a whole lot
easier than carving your way with hard and hazardous
work.
A second and important aspect of our ‘historical’
existence is akin to this but needs to be seen as distinct
and important in itself. Let me illustrate it with the words
of Jesus Christ. “Jesus said to his disciples, “It is
inevitable that stumbling blocks will come, but woe to the
one through whom they come!” (Lk. 17: 1). Our idea of
living as the children of God does not accommodate this
enigmatic reality, which captures the very essence of
history. History is a sphere of hindrances; it will never be
otherwise. Even the Son of Man had to put up with them.
Unlike us, he did it manfully. Faith is proved not by
dodging these stumbling blocks but by engaging with,
and overcoming, them.
I plead with the readers of FOCUS to ponder earnestly on
this. It is because we have not bothered to recognize or
understand this inalienable principle of historical
existence that we stay so shallow and anemic in our faith
life. It is necessary that offences come. Read the 10th
chapter of the Gospel according to St. Matthew. There
Jesus is brutally frank in setting out before his disciples
the trials and tribulations that discipleship necessarily
involves. Since Jesus had a clear sense of history – it is
not clear how anyone can be the light of the world
without it – he realized this to be a source of blessedness:
“Blessed are you, when men shall revile you, and
persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against
you falsely, for my sake; rejoice, and be exceedingly glad:
for great is your reward in heaven…” (Mt. 5: 11-12).
It is in the will of God for us that we face and overcome
difficulties, stumbling blocks, and privations of diverse
kinds. Why is this so? To understand this aright we need
to recognize an essential difference between what we will
for ourselves and what God wants of us. Often, we use –
read, abuse – religion as a magical means to make God
conform to our petty plans and proclivities. We feel
comfortable with, and comforted by, those who pander to
this spiritual aberration, mistaking them to be our earthly
solaces and shepherds. The truth, though, is that they
are hindrances to spiritual growth and fruitfulness. While
we want to lead an easy life, free from troubles and
vexations, God wants us, as his children, to grow in
stature as individuals created in his image and likeness.
We mock God by staying petty and puny, de facto
paralytics carried on pallets by all and sundry. We dig
deep into our pockets to amply reward our well-meaning
religious porters and pallet-carriers. But, as in the
account of Jesus healing the paralytic (Mk. 2: 1-12), our
spiritual paralysis aggravates. We remain a heart-break
for our Father in heaven . . . All my life I have been an
ardent church man. I became a priest out of zeal and
passionate conviction. I have endeavoured to live this
faith, seeking to know it in truth and in spirit all along, for
half a century. So, no one should doubt my intention
when I say that I have, in light of what is stated above,
acute disappointment with church life as it has come to
be practised and maintained. Nothing of the ‘historical’
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truth, vitality and power of the biblical faith is reflected in
our congregational life. Nor does it prepare us to be the
salt of the earth and the light of the world (Mt. 5: 13-16).
The reason for this should be intelligible in light of what
we have seen from the scriptures.
I have no doubt at all, given my bare-bone acquaintance
with the teachings of Jesus Christ that restricting the life
of faith or of worship only to a set of rites and sacraments
fails to do justice to the Way of Jesus Christ. No one with
a nodding acquaintance with the four gospels can doubt
that rites and rituals occupy only a small and marginal
place in the spirituality of the Kingdom of God, as Jesus
expounded it. The Kingdom of God is a celebration of life.
The Supreme Sacrament – the Eucharist or the Holy
Qurbana – also is a celebration of life. “Giving’ is the
essence alike of sacrament and of celebration. Alexander
Solzhenitsyn recounts one of his sacramental
experiences as follows. He, together with a band of fellow
prisoners, was being shifted from one prison to another in
the bitter chill of a Russian winter morning. They were
kept, ill-clad and famished, on the platform with gun-
totting soldiers standing guard with feral alertness. An
elderly, emaciated beggar woman came along. She
noticed Alexander and read the hunger on his face. She
reached out for the moldy loaf of bread she had in her
sling bag. Took it out, broke it in two, and flung one-half
to Alexander. She was weak and the throw did not carry
to him. He recalled the scene in these unforgettable
words – “The holy bread, broken in two, lay there in the
puddle; while we were driven away like cattle.”
To Alexander Solzhenitsyn, it was a sacramental moment.
You will agree with him if you are as famished, alienated
and miserable as he was. Where does our celebration of
the Eucharist or Holy Communion stand in relation to
this? What, after all, is the Holy Communion about? Is it
not a commemoration -anamnesis- of Jesus’ atoning
engagement with the depravity of history itself?
“The Son of Man” said Jesus “must suffer many things”
(Lk. 9: 22). It is to give his life as a ransom for the sins of
many, after all, that he came into the world. It was not, in
otherwise, a cosmic excursion, vaguely comparable to
the “trips to the Holy Land” fashionable with us these
days. Suffering authenticates our points of contact with
history. It has never been otherwise; nor will it ever be.
The historical mandate of our faith is that we grow and
develop. Jesus put it crisply, “Be perfect, even as your
Father in heaven is perfect”. (Mt. 5: 48). That, however, is
not our goal. Our goal is to get along uneventfully,
untouched by the sting of life. We insist that life is a
fairytale and that God is obliged to ensure it stays so, just
because we have faith!
Yet another important aspect of ‘historicity’, on which we
shall close, is that we can benefit only from who we are
and our own efforts. That explains why Jesus puts the
spotlight on who we are. It is in sync with how we are
created by God. An animal, at the point of its birth,
possesses just about everything it needs to survive and
live. It adds very little through the rest of its life. Not so, in
the case of human beings. We begin at ground zero.
Whatever we can claim to be our own has to be gained
painstakingly over the years. God has, in his mercy,
ordained enabling provisions in respect of this process of
struggle and growth, but never appointed short-cuts or
exit-routes. The Cross of Jesus is the definitive rejection
of such specious and delusory options. Jesus sought no
short-cuts; we too ought not.
It is in this reality that human accountability to God
stands rooted. There is no historicity without
accountability. That is the principal message in the
parable of the talents. God gives us talents. He fortifies
them with opportunities for their application and
cultivation. But he doesn’t get into, or miraculously
manipulate, how we apply and multiply them. He leaves it
wholly to our freedom and responsibility. Also, he offers
no alternatives to walking the way of the cross.
The way of the Cross did not begin, in the case of Jesus,
with his arrest and trial. It began at his birth. Life is the
way of the Cross. The victory of the Cross – a familiar
cliché with us – is to be counted not in triumphalist terms,
but in ethical terms. Historical spirituality, in the end, is an
unfolding story of the ethical development of the human
species. It was his, perhaps, that made Hegel believe that
history is ‘God making himself’. From the Old Testament
– with the Mosaic Law as its apogee – to the New
Testament, there is a profound ethical progress. That
progress, however, is not reflected, or even noted, by
ritual-centred priest-craft. It goes on with business as
usual. That was why it became necessary for Jesus to
condemn the priestly class of his times.
It is noteworthy that the vehement condemnation of the
Pharisees –read the 23rd chapter of St. Matthew – is
issued by one who commanded, “I say to you, do not be
angry” (Mt. 5: 21-22). So, these words of condemnation
are not uttered in anger, but in love; love for humanity.
Love for humanity, which is immanent in love for God,
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may seem like anger towards those who canker its
wholeness, but is wholly devoid of it. When Jesus calls
the Pharisees ‘whited sepulchre’, he would not have been
hissing these words in anger – as we imagine – but
weeping with a broken heart. The priest-craft they were
plying was counter to the logic of history, which is after all
appointed by God. God would not go against his own
discipline. God is not a God of self-contradiction. If the
laws of nature and the logic of history are indeed created
and appointed by God – and this was Spinoza’s main
contention – why would he play fast and loose with it?
Would God create anything superfluous?
I am in full agreement with Immanuel Kant that man’s
historical existence is necessarily governed by natural, or
historical, laws. If you toss a load of bread, it will come
down; irrespective of your being a saint or a scoundrel. If
you are born, you will die. Even Lazarus, raised from the
dead, died and disappeared. The power of faith – the
power to move mountains, if you like- does not lie in
manipulating laws of life and history to one’s own
undeserved advantage. It lies, instead, in the
empowerment to attain higher states of spiritual and
ethical development not in spite of the laws of nature and
history, but because of them. He who has ears to hear; let
him, or her, hear.
Revd Dr. Valson Thampu
Member, FOCUS Editorial Board
http://www.issuu.com/diasporafocus
http://www.scribd.com/diasporafocus
Disclaimer: Diaspora FOCUS is a non-profit organization
registered in United States, originally formed in late
Nineties in London for the Diaspora Marthomites. Now it
is an independent lay-movement of the Diaspora laity of
the Syrian Christians; and as such FOCUS is not an
official publication of any denominations. It is an
ecumenical journal to focus attention more sharply on
issues to help churches and other faith communities to
examine their own commitment to loving their neighbors
and God, justice, and peace. Opinions expressed in any
article or statements are of the individuals and are not to
be deemed as an endorsement of the view expressed
therein by Diaspora FOCUS. Thanks.
Web Site: www.facebook.com/groups/mtfocus
E-Mail: mtfousgroup@gmail.com
FOCUS EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS:
Dr. Zac Varghese, London
Dr. Titus Mathews, Calgary
Revd Dr. M. J. Joseph, Kottayam
Lal Varghese, Esq., Dallas
Dr. Jesudas M. Athyal, Thiruvalla
Revd Dr. Valson Thampu, Trivandrum
New Testament from a Sociological Perspective
Revd Dr. Abraham Philip, Mar Thoma Theological Seminary, Kottayam
I. New Testament Interpretation: an
Overview
New Testament was written almost two millenniums
back. Hence it is related to the time and space in history
during the time when Jesus Christ lived. The vision and
the message of the New Testament are eternal. New
Testament interpretation attempts to interpret the truths
conveyed through its pages in contemporary language
and style so that it could be understood by people who
live in the early decades of the 21st century. Hence we
need a clear understanding of the time during which the
books of the New Testament were written.
Today there are numerous methods for interpretation and
re-reading of the Biblei. Though it is very difficult to bring
them under any structure, here is an attempt to bring
them under certain broad categories. The first series of
studies look back in to the historical time when the books
were written and they give great importance to history.
The historical critical methods come under this first
group. It includes form criticism, redaction criticism,
canonical criticism and so on. According to John H.
Elliott, it includes sociological criticismii as well.
The second set of interpretations look into the written text
giving it more importance. Therefore, the theories that are
applied to linguistic studies in various languages are
applied to the text of the Bible. The text is submitted to a
linguistic (morphology and syntax) and semantic analysis,
using the knowledge derived from historical philology.
Thus there emerged a number of criticisms such as
narrative criticism, rhetorical analysis, reader-response
criticism, Genre criticism, Semiotic analysis etc. and there
is the possibility of multiple interpretations also. Along
with them, we also have Textual criticism, Structuralism,
Deconstruction, etc.
The third group of interpretations looks into the present
day situation, and gives it great importance. In the light of
the present day epistemological context, interpretation is
made. Here one looks forward in to the contemporary
society. It also looks at the Bible from various
perspectives: liberation, feminist, tribal, dalit, subaltern,
postcolonial etc. Today theological readings also include
liberation, political, Marxian and other ideological
approaches, ecological, Black, Adivasi readings as well.
From another perspective they are read as sacred texts
seeking to express a relation to the divine.
For hermeneutics one’s theological position is also very
important as to whether one is a fundamentalist,
conservative, evangelical, neo-orthodox, liberal etc. The
theological position can colour one’s interpretation. Thus
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the Bible is studied looking back, historically (author
centred), looking in, literally (text centred); and looking
ahead, theologically or perspectivally (reader centred). We
see that a plethora of methods, approaches and
theologies have made hermeneutics a very complex
phenomenoniii.
From the ancient days through the classical period till the
modern times any text has been seen as complete in
itself. But in the postmodern times any text is seen as
incomplete. The text is seen as a discourse. It is regarded
as a product of its time. Postmodernity rejects the
standardization of knowledge and all metanarratives.
Certainties are taken away and suspicion has been
brought in. With this introduction on hermeneutics we
look at the New Testament from a sociological
perspective.
II. New Testament and Sociological Criticism
1) Emergence:
Many New Testament scholars became dissatisfied with
the so-called idealism of the traditional historical critical
methods and its concentration of ideas or theologyiv.
Sociological Criticism is the study of the interaction
between the reader and the various social structures that
influence and control both the writer and the reader.
Biblical interpretation as the investigation of linguistic
communications from the past requires at least two sets
of tools: one set of linguistic sort that can deal with texts
as texts, and not as words or sentences or super
sentences, and another set of a historical sort that can
deal with the past in some cross-cultural way. The value
of social sciences for biblical interpretation is that they
can provide some of the important tools for both the
linguistic and the historical dimensions of biblical
scholarship.
2) What is Social-Scientific Criticism?
It was John H. Elliott who coined the term “Social-
Scientific Criticism” in 1986 and according to him,
“Social-Scientific Criticism is that phase of the exegetical
task which analyses the social and cultural dimensions of
the text and its environmental context through the
utilization of the perspectives, theory, models and
research of social sciences…” that would bridge the
cultural divide of the world of today and the then worldv.
Sociological Criticism uses the categories of sociology
and culture to understand people’s contexts and to study
the text as a reflection of and a response to the social
and cultural milieu in which it was produced. The
discipline is based on the assumption that the New
Testament cannot be understood on theological grounds
alone. It affirms that the social setting of the writing is an
indispensable source for understanding the text and for
its proper interpretation. Hence Sociological Criticism
does a study of the social background of the writer and
the social background of the reader in order to ensure
proper communication and interpretation of the textvi. Of
course one may trace its use in some previous studies
before 1980s. John H. Elliott opines that all interpretations
are perspectival. That is the interpreter approaches the
text not as an objective impartial observer devoid of all
pre-knowledge, pre-suppositions, and pre-judgments,
but as one whose social location, socialization,
experience, and self-interests colour and refract that
which s/he chooses to think, do, study, and in the case of
exegetical activity, interpretvii. He sees it as a
“component” or “sub-discipline” of historical critical
methods, which “investigates biblical texts as meaningful
configurations of language intended to communicate
between composers and audiences”viii.
The New Testament writings are products of certain
societies. They represent and address certain society and
its environment. Each New Testament writer took shape
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in some particular culture and historical milieu. At the
same time each writer represents the wider society of his
time. As the writing of the New Testament is related to the
society, its reading also becomes a social endeavor. Our
language, customs, social order, political setting, ethics,
culture consciousness, life style etc. are all quite different
from that of the first century. First century was an agrarian
one compared with the highly industrialized world of
today. Our consciousness about individual, development,
freedom, social ladder etc. has also changed. The mode
of transport is drastically different. At the same time we
look at the New Testament trying to understand the
totally transformed society today through its lens.
Apart from the Greco-Roman and Jewish cultures there
were a number of other cultures prevalent in West Asia
during the time of Jesus. Today there are a number of
sociological studies that enable us to understand such
cultures and societies. New Testament scholars today
attempt to understand the culture and society behind
each writing. Their history and epistemology are traced
through applying certain social scientific models and
anthropological tools and theories. According to J. H.
Elliott the social environment of each New Testament
writing has to be investigated.
Social-Scientific Criticism studies the text as both a
reflection of and a response to the social and cultural
milieu in which the text was produced. Its aim is the
determination of the meaning(s) explicit and implicit in the
text, meanings made possible and shaped by the social
and cultural systems inhabited by both authors and
intended audiencesix. Two types of sociological
interpretations are evident: social history that tries to
identify the social composition of Christian groups, and
sociological analysis that seeks to discover the larger
underlying dynamics at work within the groups and their
relation to the wider society.
3) Principles of Sociological Criticism:
M. Robert Mulholland Jrx brings out five general principles
of Sociological Criticism as follows: (1) The preliminary
level is the study of the social setting of the New
Testament. It is almost entirely descriptive, drawing from
textual, archeological and inscriptional evidence the
political, economic, cultural, religious, social, educational
and communal structures of the period of the New
Testament; (2) The secondary level is the description of
the sociological dynamics of the New Testament world,
understanding the interactions between the various social
structures that either maintain the balance of the status
quo or bring out the disequilibrium and subsequent
change - growth, decline, or the emergence of new
structures; (3) The third level is the use of sociological
models to help define and analyze the ways in which
groups and individuals exist and function within the
multifaceted sociological matrix of their world; (4) At the
fourth level as part of the process of coming to some
grasp of the sociological matrix of the New Testament
world and the dynamics of the Christian movement within
that matrix, the text of the New Testament is studied
within the sociological context of the Christian
communities in the Greco-Roman world of the first
century; (5) Throughout the process of Sociological
Criticism a careful distinction must be maintained
between the sociological horizon of the interpreter and
that of the text.
4) Modus Operandi: Presuppositions
Social-Scientific pre-suppositions like theological pre-
suppositions pertain to three aspects of the interpretive
enterprise: the interpreters, the objects to be interpreted
and the method of interpretation. The exact background
of the text using the proper tool will have to be
determined. The Social-Scientific approach uses
anthropological theory which has two types of reading in
this regard. The Emic and the Etic readings. In Emic
reading the interpreter analyses the person as the
product of his social standing. The Etic reading is the
analysis and description made on the observations by the
professional ethnographer. Through this the
anthropologist would investigate the symbolic universe,
its social institutions, economics, cultural values and
conflicts. Besides social anthropology, Social
psychological, ethnographic theories are also used in this
approachxi.
John H. Elliott brings out some of the chief pre-
suppositions of Social-Scientific Criticismxii.
1. Social-Scientific critics pre-suppose that all
knowledge is socially conditioned and
perspectival in nature. This applies to both the
knowledge of the interpreter and that of the
authors and groups under examination.
2. This implies that the method of analysis must
include means for distinguishing and clarifying
the differences between the social locationxiii of
the interpreter and the social location of the
authors and the objects to be interpreted.
3. For the clarification of the differences between
the contexts of ancient texts and of modern
readers, and of further clarification of the
properties and relations of ancient social and
cultural systems, theory and models likewise
have always played an essential role.
4. Social-Scientific Criticism involves a process of
logic that is neither exclusively deductive (from
model to material) nor inductive (from material to
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hypothesis) but inclusive of both in a procedure
characterized as “abductionxiv”.
5. Social and cultural models most appropriate for
the analysis of the Bible and its environment, it is
presumed, are those constructed on the basis of
research and data pertaining to the geographical,
social and cultural region inhabited by the biblical
communities, that is, the area of the Circum-
Mediterranean and ancient West Asia.
6. Practitioners of Social-Scientific Criticism
presume that this method is different from, but
complementary to historical orientation.
7. A further pre-supposition of Social-Scientific
Criticism is that the study of “religion” in the Bible
and its environment requires a study of social
structures and relations.
8. It is further presumed that the particular of this
method may draw full range of social-science
theory, methods and research. At the same time
the researcher will have to be aware of the
theoretical, methodological and developmental
differences among the various disciplines and
orientations within the social sciences.
9. Social-Scientific Criticism is concerned not only
with the original meanings of biblical documents,
but also with the aggregations of meanings down
through the centuries.
5) Different Stages in Social-Scientific Criticismxv
1. Descriptive: This stage deals with the political,
economic, cultural and religious environment of
the New Testament period.
2. Analytical: Here is an attempt to analyze the
social dimension of the New Testament times.
3. Descriptive and Analytical: It is an attempt to
describe and analyze and thereby reformulate the
world of the New Testament times.
4. Sociological Matrix: Here the text, words,
metaphors etc. are being interpreted in the light
of the sociological milieu/matrix of the New
Testament times.
5. Contemporary relevance: Here is an attempt to
make the New Testament times relevant and
meaningful to the present times by relating them
mutually through comparison and discernment.
6) Theoretical Models of Social-Scientific
Criticism of the New Testamentxvi

1. Typological Model proposed by Robins
Scroggsxvii and G. Schneider.
2. Millenarian Model and Cognitive Dissonance
Theory of John Gagarxviii
3. Role Analysis of Gerd Theissenxix
4. Sociology of Knowledge of Wayne A. Meeksxx.
5. Historical Materialism and reductionist Model of
Milan Machowechxxi.
7) Interpretation of Two New Testament Texts
using Social-Scientific Criticism
M. Robert Mulholland Jr has attempted to interpret
Philippians 1:27-28xxii and John H. Elliott 1 Peterxxiii in the
light of Social-Scientific Criticism. Here below is a gist of
some of their main findings.
1. Philippians 1:27-28. According Acts 16:13, on a
Sabbath, Paul and his companions went out of
the city of Philippi to the river side for prayer and
there they meet Lydia and others. According to
Social Scientific study, the Romans had given
permission for worship to all the official religions
recognized by them to worship in the city. As
Emperor Claudius had banned Jews from the city
of Rome in 49 CE, it was applied to the Roman
colony of Philippi also. Hence the Jews had to go
out of the city for worship on the Sabbaths.
Whenever the Jews had indulged in proselytism
or caused some communal tensions in Rome, the
Romans had turned against them in this way.
Therefore, Paul had to preach to the people on
the river side outside the city. These things are in
some ways reflected in Philippians 1:27-28 and
also in 3:20 where Paul asks Christians to live
worthy of the gospel and as heavenly citizens.
2. 1Peter: This epistle gives a clear picture of the
social situation of the period when it was written
and it also reveals the relationship of the Christian
community mentioned in its pages with the
surrounding society. The audience of this epistle
is referred to in 1:1. The geographical area covers
a place as large as South India. It points out that
Christianity had by then penetrated into many
even interior regions. The epistle reveals the
identity of the Christians and that they were under
persecution (2:17; 5:9). There were free people
(2:16), as well as people doing varied jobs in
various regions (2:13-17), and household workers
(2:18-20). People of all age groups (3:1-6; 5:1-5),
converts from Jews (1:16, 24; 2:4-10; 3:10-12)
and gentiles (1:14, 17; 4:1-4) as well were there.
Some were rich and many poor (1:17; 2:11). Their
social standing is revealed by the terms
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“strangers and aliens”. Some even think that they
revealed the qualities of a “sect”. The author
writing from Babylon (5:13 – which many think
points to Rome) wants to prepare the readers to
face their challenges with regard their Christian
faith courageously and with complete
commitment and that they be a royal people and
priesthood wherever they are placed and that
they live in unity (1:8; 2:7, 13; 3:15; 4:14, 16) and
willing to serve one another (1:22; 3:8; 4:8-11;
5:1-5).
8) Strengths and Weaknesses
Social-Scientific Criticism is not sociology or
anthropology of the New Testament. Rather it merges the
social sciences with exegesis as a composite theological
as well as literary, historical and social scientific
operation. It is concerned with determining what an
author said and meant to say to his/her contemporaries.
Meaning is controlled by the social system in the past
and in the presentxxiv.
Strengths: If we analyze the strengths of sociological
criticism we find its ability to help the readers to
distinguish between one’s own sociological matrix and
that of the New Testament. Besides, we find its ability to
clarify the sociological matrix of the New Testament world
and the life and activities of the Christian communities
within that world. Another important strength is its
insights into the essential sociological dimension of
language. And the greatest strength of it is its focus upon
the incarnation reality of human life. It thus helps in a
bridge making between the period of the New Testament
and our postmodern times. When the other historical
critical tools make a historical approach in a diachronic
manner, sociological criticism makes use of all the
contemporary means in a synchronic way. When form
criticism operates on several assumptions, sociological
criticism is more reality oriented and down to earth.
Sociological Criticism awakens us to the reality that all
human endeavour is lived within specific, even if
tremendously multifaceted and confusingly interactive
sociological matrices. Robert Mulholland opines that
Social-Scientific Criticism can be an effective means of
radical encounter with God by enabling us to enter into
the life-matrix of the community of faith, understand the
reality of God’ incarnation in that particular sociological
milieu, as we open ourselves and our own life matrixxxv. It
has presented an array of relevant social research, along
with tested theory and models for exposing specific
features and relations of ancient society and of the
biblical communities in particularxxvi.
Weaknesses: The New Testament was written for an
audience during the first century. Even the audience of
that time cannot be considered as one uniform
community. When it is studied using the study methods
of the postmodern period, certainly there will be many
weakness for it. The tendency of Sociological Criticism is
to apply to the world of the New Testament sociological
paradigms developed in the present world whose social,
political, economic and cultural dynamics are radically if
not totally alien to the Greco-Roman world of the first
century. The most subtle weakness of it, implicit in all that
has been said, is the tendency toward sociological
reductionismxxvii - New Testament texts are seen merely
literary texts of the first century.
It is possible for the process of sociological criticism to
be employed wisely, sensitively, accurately, and with care
to avoid the weaknesses noted above, but one has to
arrive at conclusions without leaving the reality of God’s
presence, power and purpose from out of the interpretive
equation.
9) Contributions
Social Scientific Criticism has presented an array of
relevant social research, along with tested theory and
models, for exposing specific features and relations of
ancient society and of the biblical communities in
particular. The clarification of the differences between
ancient and modern environments, moreover, has also
enabled us to become more self-critical. It enables
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readers in discovering and appreciating the historical,
social and cultural particularity of the biblical writingsxxviii.
10) Social Science Model for New Testament
Interpretation
What would characterize a good social science model for
biblical interpretation? Bruce Malina puts the following
features: (1) it should be a cross-cultural model,
accounting for the interpreter as well as those interpreted
in some comparative perspective; (2) it should be of a
sufficient level of abstraction to allow for the surfacing of
similarities that facilitate comparison; (3) the model should
be able to fit a larger socio-linguistic frame for interpreting
texts; ((4) it should derive from experiences that match
what we know of the time and place that conditioned the
biblical world as closely as possible; (5) the meanings it
generates should be relevant and understandable to us
and our contextxxix.
11) Important Works/Literature on this Method
Joachim Jeremias, Jerusalem in the Time of Jesus.
London: SCM Press, 1969.
Martin Hengel, Judaism and Hellenism 2 Vols.
Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1974.
Wayne A. Meeks, The First Urban Christians: The Social
World of Apostle Paul. New Haven: Yale University Press,
1983.
Bruce J. Malina, The New Testament World: Insights from
Cultural Anthropology. London: SCM Press, 1983.
Philip F. Esler, Community and Gospel in Luke-Acts.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987; Modeling
Early Christianity: Social-Scientific Studies of the New
Testament in its Context (ed) London: Routledge, 1995.
Abraham J. Malherbe, Social Aspects of Early Christianity,
2nd edition. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1988.
Howard Clark Kee, Knowing the Truth: A Sociological
approach to New Testament Interpretation. Minneapolis:
Fortress Press, 1989.
Richard Horsley, Sociology of the Jesus Movement.
Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1989.
Gerd Theissen, Sociology of the Early Palestinian
Community. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1978; The
Social Setting of Pauline Christianity, 1982; The Gospels
in Context: Social and Political History of Synoptic
Tradition, 1991.
David Rhoads, “Social Criticism: Crossing Boundaries,
Mark and Methods: New approaches in Biblical Studies.
Minneapolis: Paternoster, 1992.
John H. Elliott, What is Social-Scientific Criticism?
Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993; A Home for Homeless:
A Social Scientific Criticism of 1 Peter: Its Situation and
Strategy. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1990.
M. Mulholland Jr, “Sociological Criticism”, New
Testament Criticism and Interpretation, edited by David

Alan Black and David S. Dockery (Grand Rapids,
Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, 1991), 303-304.
D. C. Duling , “Ethnicity, Ethnocentrism, and Matthean
Ethnos”, Biblical Theological Bulletin 35/4 (2005).
Bruce J. Malina, “The Social Sciences and Biblical
Interpretation”, Interpretation 36/3 (July, 2015)
Abraham Philip (ed), Puthiya Niyama Vykyana Reethi
Sastram; Samuhya Sastra Veekshanam. Tiruvalla: TLC,
2019.
12) Conclusion
Sociological approaches have taught to broaden our
vision for interpreting the New Testament. It is done by
encouraging us to use many of the basic methods that
we have used in the past. The social settings of the New
Testament and early Christianity have been seen as an
indispensable ingredient in the holistic interpretation. One
can note that each New Testament leader/writer is a
product of his/her society and times. This promoted a lot
of research into the various societies and communities of
the New Testament times. The then social relationships
came under close scrutiny. Above all, the Social-Scientific
Criticism has enabled a better understanding of the
message and vision of the New Testament.
References:
1
Steven L. McKenzie (Ed), The Oxford Encyclopedia of
Biblical Interpretation (Oxford: University Press, 2013);
John Barton (Ed), The Cambridge Companion to Biblical
Interpretation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1998; Alan J. Hauser & Duane F. Watson (Eds), A History
of Biblical Interpretation (Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdman’s,
2003).
2
John H. Elliott, What is Social-Scientific Criticism?
(Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993), 7.
3
Hence some scholars try to sort this out using the
concept of “paradigm”. A paradigm can be defined as
“any idea or set of ideas that provides the framework
within which a given set of phenomena is understood”. In
the field of biblical hermeneutics three paradigms are
identified namely historical, literary and theological. In
other words, the Bible can be seen as history, literature
and theology.
4
Christopher Tuckett, Reading the New Testament:
Methods of Interpretation (Philadelphia: Fortress Press,
1987), 136.
5
Dietmar Neufeld, “The New Testament”, The Oxford
Encyclopedia of Biblical Interpretation, edited by Steven
L. McKenzie, Vol 2 (Oxford: University Press, 2013), 301.
6
Richard E. A. Rodgers, The New Testament: An
Introduction – Background Studies and the Synoptics, Vol
1 (Delhi: ISPCK, 2018), 80.
7
John H. Elliott, A Home for Homeless: A Social Scientific
Criticism of 1 Peter: Its Situation and Strategy
(Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1990), xxi.
12 | P a g e F O C U S O c t o b e r 2 0 1 9 V o l . 7 , N o : 4
8
John H. Elliott, What is Social-Scientific Criticism?..., 7.
9
Ibid, 8.
10
M. Mulholland Jr, “Sociological Criticism”, New
Testament Criticism and Interpretation, edited by David
Alan Black and David S. Dockery (Grand Rapids,
Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, 1991), 303-304.
11
Jerome S. Neyrey, Paul in Other Words: A Cultural
Reading on His Letters (Louisville, Kentucky: John Knox
Press, 1990), 13.
12
John H. Elliott, What is Social-Scientific Criticism?...,36-
58.
13
Social location is an encompassing category involving
all the factors that influence one person or group, their
socialization, experience perceptions, frameworks of
rationality, and views of reality. This would include such
factors as gender, age, ethnic roots, class, roles and
status, education, occupation, nationality, group
memberships, political and religious affiliations, language
and cultural traditions, and location in place and time.
John H. Elliott, What is Social-Scientific Criticism?...,37-
38.
14
“Abduction” is also called “retroduction”. It is a process
in logic of the discovery procedure of working from
evidence to hypothesis, involving a back and forth
movement of suggestion checking. In this process two
pieces of data could be explained by a hypothesis, the
validity of which could be corroborated by the finding of
another piece of data. John H. Elliott, What is Social-
Scientific Criticism?...,48.
15
Saji Varghese Amayil, “Puthiya Niyama Vykhyanavum
Samuhika Sastra Tatvangalum”, Puthiya Niyama Vykyana
Reethi Sastram; Samuhya Sastra Veekshanam, edited by
Abraham Philip (Tiruvalla: TLC, 2019), 34-35.
16
Saji Varghese Amayil, “Puthiya Niyama Vykhyanavum
Samuhika Sastra Tatvangalum”…35.
17
Ibid., 35-37.
18
Ibid., 37-38.
19
Ibid., 38-39.
20
Ibid., 39-40.
21
Ibid., 40.
22
M. Mulholland Jr, “Sociological Criticism”, New
Testament Criticism and Interpretation, edited by David
Alan Black and David S. Dockery (Grand Rapids,
Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, 1991), 309-311.
23
John H. Elliott, What is Social-Scientific Criticism?...,70-
86.
24
Ibid., 91.
25
M. Mulholland Jr, “Sociological Criticism”…, 308.
26
John H. Elliott, What is Social-Scientific Criticism?...,
103.
27
M. Mulholland Jr, “Sociological Criticism”…, 305-06.
28
John H. Elliott, What is Social-Scientific Criticism?...,
103.
29
Bruce J. Malina, “The Social Sciences and Biblical
Interpretation”, Interpretation 36/3 (July, 2015): 229.
‘Faith’ and ‘The Faith’
Dr. Zac Varghese, London, UK
Ludwig Wittgenstein wrote ‘Tractatus Logio-
Philossophicus’ to identify the relationship between
language and reality. We often do not appreciate the
problems of exchanging ideas that may emerge from the
misunderstanding of what he calls the ‘logic of language’.
Therefore, he famously wrote: “What can be said at all
can be said clearly; whereof one cannot speak thereof
one must be silent.” A similar sentiment was expressed
by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, when
he quoted a saint who said, “God was evident when
bishops were silent.”
We regularly use words like, soul, spirit, spirituality, belief,
faith and ‘the faith’ without paying much attention to it;
these words have different meanings and it is important
to realize its differences. I became more aware of this
when I was reading a book by A.W. Eaton on ‘The Faith,
History and Practice of the Church of England’. He
says, “But we must be clear from the start that there is a
difference between ‘The Faith’– and ‘Faith’. The Faith: is
the whole body of teaching involved in what we call
Christian Religion, particularly as contained in the Creeds.
Faith: is the right and essential attitude between God and
ourselves. For example, the Christian puts his/her faith in
Jesus: or another example, a person ‘holds sure in God’–
such a person may be said to have faith.”
Eaton further describes that ‘The Faith’ is the concern of
the mind and ‘Faith’ is the concern of the heart or will.
Faith is not primarily a matter of head or understanding,
but of the heart and the whole personhood. Heart
signifies the most profound and noble emotions in the
human person, his innermost being. Therefore, there is a
corporate faith involving a faith-community and a
personal faith, which may eventually lead to fellowship
with others in a faith-community. The centrality of
Christian faith is an obedient trust in the reality of the love
of God experienced individually or collectively through
His salvific actions in Jesus Christ and awaiting with hope
in prayer for ‘His will be done on earth as it is in heaven’.
The often quoted definition of faith in the NT is in Heb. 11:
1: “Now faith is sure of what we hope for and certain of
what we do not see.” A whole body of examples of
people of faith is described in Hebrews chapter 11
beginning with Abel and then of Enoch, Noah,
Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Rahab, Gideon
and so on and on to David and the prophets. They were
giants of faith and a model for us to give confidence in
continuing our spiritual journey under the guidance of the
Holy Spirit. Although these giants were praised and
remembered for their faith under very many difficult
circumstances, “yet none of them received what they
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had been promised. God had planned something
better for us so that only together with us would they
be made perfect” (Heb. 11: 39-40). Here the phrase
‘together with us’ is very significant and it is in the
company of faithful believers of the past, the present and
the future our journey will be made perfect. Sri Aurobindo,
an Indian mystic, wrote: “A solitary salvation leaving the
world to its fate was felt almost distasteful.”1 Hence
both ‘faith’ and ‘the faith’ are important for our spiritual
journey. Let us briefly look at these two.
‘The Faith’ is the large body of teaching, specific to a
particular denomination, such as infant and adult
baptism, liturgy, Eucharist, Creed, Filioque and so forth.
Therefore, ‘The Faith’ provides the identity and signature
of a particular denomination of the church. When faith is
reduced to a set of principles or seamless doctrines or
ideology, it can turn itself into a slavish worship of rules,
constitutions and codes. From this emerges, Catholic,
Orthodox, Protestant, Pentecostals, Baptists, Methodists,
and Evangelicals, Charismatics and other faith groups
and their theology. There are over 41,000 Christian
denominations in the world. It is expanding. The question
for us is whether faith is primarily the acceptance of
doctrinal propositions (The Faith) stipulated through
denominational boundaries or the response of personal
trust in God. Inevitably ‘The Faith’ takes different routes in
different Christian traditions. These denominational issues
have prevented genuine human fellowship and solidarity
in the name of dogmas and legal axioms. Hans Kung, a
great Catholic theologian, wrote:2 “As theology cannot
provide reasons for faith, neither can it destroy faith. The
ground of faith is not theology, but God himself.” Kung
continues, “And it is in the strength of the different
traditions the weaknesses also lie. The specific danger of
Protestant belief is Biblicism; the danger of eastern
Orthodox belief is traditionalism. The danger of Roman
Catholic belief is authoritarianism.” These are some of the
problems of ‘The Faith’.
Hans Kung gives us a clear statement of what faith is all
about in the following way: “the Christian (the Protestant
too) believes not in the Bible, but in him whom it attests;
the Christian (the Orthodox too) believes not in tradition,
but in whom it transmits; the Christian (the Catholic too)
believes not in the Church, but in whom the Church
proclaims. What man can turn to as absolutely reliable for
time an eternity are not the texts of the Bible, or the
Fathers of the Church, nor indeed an ecclesial
1 Satprem, ‘ Sri Aurobindo’ Mother’ Institute of research ,
Delhi, ISBN 81- 85137-60-9, 2003; page 41.
2 Hans Kung, ‘On Being a Christian’, Collins, 1974, page 163.
magisterium, but it is God himself as he spoke for the
believers through Jesus Christ. The biblical texts, the
statement of Fathers and ecclesiastical authorities, are
meant – in varying degrees of importance – to be no more
and no less than an expression of this faith.”
The 2015 Lent talks for the ‘Churches Together Group in
north Harrow, London,’ were given by the Revd Dr. Leslie
Griffiths on the theme ‘I believe in One, Holy Catholic,
Apostolic, Evangelical, Charismatic, Radical and Liberal
Church’. The main thrust of the theme was that over the
centuries various churches and groups confiscated and
owned these Spirit-filled words for their own exclusive
needs and for controlling members of the churches, and
directing them in various ways. The five weeks’ journey
with Lord Griffiths was an amazing liberating experience
to realise that one does not have to move out of one’s
denomination to declare without hesitation that one
belongs to ‘one holy, catholic, apostolic, charismatic,
radical and liberal church.’
Faith is a gift from God and this faith is friendship, a
relationship and abiding experience of God. The real
friendship is defined as living within the life of the other.
Thus the Christian faith has the power to transform a
person in developing an ‘I-Thou’ relationship with others.
Faith thus becomes a real living of the Gospel in everyday
life; it is a celebration of ‘the Liturgy after the Liturgy’. St.
John describes this abiding experience in his Gospel (Jn.
15). In answer to Thomas’ question Jesus said, “I am the
way, the truth and the Life” (Jn.14:6). Following Jesus
and having that indwelling experience (perichoresis) is
14 | P a g e F O C U S O c t o b e r 2 0 1 9 V o l . 7 , N o : 4
faith; it is about “Be still, and know that I am God (Ps.
46:10); it is also about “Taste and see that the Lord is
good; . . .” (Ps.34: 8). Faith is a simple trust in a God who
loves us, but we make it incomprehensible with
theological jargons, codes and prescriptions. A child who
was asked to memorise and recite the Athanasian Creed;
in desperation when he reached: “The Father
incomprehensible, the Son incomprehensible, and the
Holy Ghost incomprehensible.” He ended it by saying,
“The whole . . . thing is incomprehensible!”
Faith in Christ should lead us to an indwelling experience
with him. St. John describes the nature of this fruit-
bearing experience in chapter 14 of his Gospel and also
in the high priestly prayer in chapter 17. “I tell you the
truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have
been doing” (Jn. 14: 13). Jesus did God’s work during
his short earthly ministry and we are expected to do the
same in our faith-led life; it is a faith-lead Eucharistic life
of self-giving; it is a life of helping needy neighbours,
clothing the naked, caring for the orphans and widows,
caring for the sick, caring for the homeless and helping
with food banks, etc. (Mt. 25: 31-40). The relationship
with faith and work is very clearly expressed in the letter
of St. James chapter 2. “What good is it, my brothers, if
a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can
such faith save him?” He concludes: “. . . so faith
without work is dead also.” Therefore, under the grace of
faith we should become image bearers of God and do
God’s mission (Missio Dei).
The recent exchanges in the Facebook pages on
‘Heretical Thoughts’ by Revd Dr. Valson Thampu and Mr.
Chhotebhai made me think about our faith orientations
and write this short article. Martin Luther once said,
"Anything one fears, loves, and trusts above everything
else – whatever it is riches, self, prestige, or whatever – it
is one's God." Then the question arises, do we serve
many gods? If the answer is yes, then it is time to re-
evaluate God's covenantal relationship with humanity
through Abraham.
The book of Exodus is about a God who comes down to
deliver his people so that he might continually abide in
their midst. This and the subsequent events in Jesus
Christ are to make us a 'kingdom of priests and a holy
nation'. The blessed will be blessings to all nations. The
abiding presence of God and our personal relationship
with him is what matters. We are temples of God; we
should be walking tabernacles and God's image
bearers. The early Church was described in many
different ways and under many different images. St. Paul
preferred the image of the body, which he applied to the
individual churches and to the Church as a
whole. We often forget that we are a community and
create divisions within the faith-community for playing
power politics and games. As I described above, we now
have two kinds of faith, our God-centred individual faith,
which is a gift and ‘The Faith’ handed down to us by
various denominational, institutionalized, power
structures. 'The Faith' which is codified and written on
tablets of stone is the problem, preventing us from
sharing the Holy Communion to give glory to God. It may
be interesting to think and meditate about the differences
between the two. I realize that some of us highlight these
issues in our communities out of our pain; this God-given
understanding is indeed a cross to bear. The church
hierarchies and ‘Sunday Christians’ may not always
appreciate the value of these insights. I have been
wounded by the lack Eucharistic hospitality for a very
long time and I have written about it in the past. Even
Judas was allowed to share the last Passover meal.
International conferences and interfaith dialogues on
wider ecumenisms, faith and order, Eucharistic
hospitality, gender bias, and ecological problems are just
mere words and reports; they do not flow down to the
grassroots for living out the Christian faith the way it is
meant to be. Volumes of good Vatican II documents
remain unfulfilled, though the vernacularization of the
Latin Liturgy is a very welcome change. Although the
Faith and Order Commission of the world Council of
Churches spent a very long time for developing ‘Lima
liturgy’ in 1982, it is very seldom used for Eucharistic
service. Mar Chrysostom of the Mar Thoma Church once
commented that ecumenism for some is just a holiday in
Geneva. Many such conferences and commissions are
just travel opportunities for paticipants. Christian faith is
genuine only when it is oriented towards the community
of believers. The freedom to address God as our Father
makes mankind brothers and sisters in Christ. This
brotherhood and sisterhood stand at the centre of
Christianity; Christian faith is nourished and sustained in
the community. Therefore, there should be a spirit-lead
organic movement and growth of the personal faith of the
individual believer to that of ‘The Faith’ codified by the
church. Kuitert3 wrote: “Ordinary life is the place we
encounter God. If we don’t encounter God there, an
encounter in the church is of no help.”
In conclusion, Christians belong to one another because
they belong to Christ. ‘Faith’ finds its authenticity and
fulfilment only in the relationship and fellowship in ‘The
Faith’ of all others in the church to remove the built in
barriers between ‘Faith and The Faith’. I leave you with a
question to reflect. Do you think that a denominationally-
favoured church dogmatic has a tendency to lose the
whole truth in its parts? Aristotle had the vision to say:
“The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.” In losing
the whole truth, we lose the vision of one Holy, Catholic,
Apostolic, Charismatic, Evangelical, Missional, Radical,
Liberal, Ecumenical, and Reforming Church.
3 H.M. Kuitert, ‘I have my doubts’, SCM Press Ltd, London,
1992, Page 83.
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Obituary
Mr. O. C. Koshy, Seattle (1928 – 2019)
Mr. Koshy was one of the earlier immigrants to the U. S. A.
and took very active part in the early stages of the formation
of the Diocese of North America and Europe. He was born
on January 4, 1928 to late Mr. and Mrs. Kochukunju and
belongs to Ooriapadical family, Kumbanad, Kerala, India. He
attended University College, Trivandrum, from where he
obtained his B. Sc., in Physics and Mathematics. He
obtained his got his bachelor’s degree in aerospace
engineering from Madras Institute of Technology (MIT). He
married Dr. Saramma Koshy M. D., in 1958 and worked in
England, Scotland and Ireland. He also served as scientific
officer for the Secretary of Defense in India. Later he
obtained his master’s degree in aerospace engineering from
Ohio State University. He worked for the Boeing Company,
Seattle in stress analysis for about 40 years.
He was very much involved in many social and religious
activities and philanthropic ventures, including being a
founding member of the Mar Thoma Church in Seattle,
Kerala Association of WA, and the Newport Shores Yacht
Club. He was a vital participant in the Democratic Party also.
Some noteworthy mentions were his role as a Clinton
delegate at the National Convention in 1996 and his
nomination for a Lifetime Achievement Award for the party.
He was also an entrepreneur and he even held a real estate
license. He held many leadership roles and received many
awards and accolades.
He is survived by his wife Dr.
Sara Koshy, daughter Dr. Sherin
Koshy, son in-law Dr. Daniel
Eitzman, and grandchildren
Sara, Emily and Matthew. His
contributions and support to
Kumbanad Fellowship Hospital
and Diocese of North America
especially without any publicity
is commendable in the eyes of
the Lord. He was also a
founding member of the
FOCUS group and attended it
conferences held at Santhigiri
Ashram, Alwaye.
Funeral Service of Mr. O. C. Koshy was held on Friday,
September 6th 2019 led by Rt. Rev. Dr. Isaac Mar
Philoxenos Episcopa (Diocese of North America and Europe)
and he was laid to rest at Glen Eden Lutheran Memorial Park
Cemetery, Livonia, MI. FOCUS expresses its deepest
condolences to the bereaved family May his soul rest in
peace and resurrect in glory.
Contributed by: Lal Varghese, Esq., Dallas
FOCUS Editorial Board
Joy of Living
Revd Dr. M. J. Joseph, Kottayam
Enlargement of Joy in divine-human relationship:
Remembering the imperative of Christian discipleship,
one should explore the cardinal principles of Christian
calling. “Called by God” and “sent by Christ” as “God’s
co-worker” (1Cor.3: 9) and “apostle of Christ” is the
foundation stone of one’s ministerial calling. In every
Christmas season, we celebrate God’s involvement in
human affairs by singing the Chorus, “Joy to the world!
The Lord is come”. The song continues with the following
lines:
He rules the world with truth and grace,
And makes the nations prove
The glories of His righteousness
And wonders of his love. . .”
The heavenly hosts expressed their divine joy on the birth
of Jesus, the Saviour, and singing, “Glory to God in the
highest and on earth peace among men with whom he is
pleased”. As God’s fellow workers and servants of Christ,
we are called upon to continue the divine joy of mission
as the gospel imperatives of Jesus: “Go, and preach; “Go
and heal “and “Go and teach” (Max Warren). “To give
light to those who sit in darkness, and in the shadow of
death, and to guide our feet into the way of peace” (LK.1:
79) is indeed an exciting business. As Helen Keller puts it,
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“it is most exciting when it is lived for others.” Therefore,
joy in commitment is to be generated and shared through
words of humility, compassion, justice, concern and
action as the know-how of the Kingdom of God which
Jesus preached. “Serve one another in love” and
“forgiving one another” are compulsions from above for
common good . . . ” “Be good, get good, and do good”
(C. H. Spurgeon) which alone will generate joy in our
commitment. “The best portion of a good man’s life is his
little, nameless unremembered acts of kindness and love”
(William Wordsworth).
Pilgrimage of Christian life:
What more do we need to commitment for “fruit bearing”,
“burden bearing” and “brand bearing”(Gal.5, 6) in the
name of Christ? Mission in Christ’s way helps a gospel
activist to enlarge his/her territory and to keep him/her
safe from evil, as Jabez prayed in I Chro.4: 10. The divine
call is “to live the gospel” (Fr. Francis of Kurusumala) with
commitment, concern and action. Giving praise to God
for everything generates joy in the faithful. Living in
gratitude is nothing but focusing on “love which binds
everything in prefect harmony” (Co.3:14). In family
relationship, Pope Francis has exhorted the couple to
have the joy of living by saying and practicing the words
of wisdom such as “I thank you”, “I forgive you” and “I
am sorry”. Welcoming strangers is also the hall-mark of
true discipleship.
In order to be joyful and triumphant, one should always
live with a social vision. This is well stated in Job 29: 15-
17: “I was eyes to the blind and feet to the lame. I was
father to the poor and I broke the fangs of the
unrighteousness and made him drop his prey from his
teeth.” This is in tune with the divine testimony in St.
Matthew 25: 40: “… as you did it to one of the least of
these my brethren, you did it to me”. Living with a sense
of stewardship as partners of God’s creation also adds
joy to the earth. This is in tune with Sib.18:13 where we
find the inclusive character of the compassion of the
Lord. In the Encyclical of Pope Francis under the title,
Laudato Si (I praise Thee), one may find the factors that
diminish our joy of living together on earth. In Isaiah 24: 5,
we read, “The earth lies polluted under its inhabitants”.
This is due to the lack of commitment to protect God’s
creation. Preach the gospel to the whole creation”
(MK.16:15) is also a gospel mandate in our Christian
commitment. A caring attitude to nature speaks of our
commitment to the integrity of Creation. Our relationship
with nature is also a contributing factor to human
wholeness.
Be prepared to overcome hurdles:
In 2 Cor.6b -10, St. Paul teaches us a noble lesson of
divine grace upon his servants: “We are treated as
imposters, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet well
known; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet
making many rich…” “As the fragrance of Christ, we are
asked to give thanks to God in all circumstances for this
is the will of God in Christ Jesus” (1 Thess.5:18). As St.
Augustine puts, “man’s chief end is to glorify God and
enjoy him forever.” For this we need to get involved in
God’s concerns as the servants of Christ, remembering
that “service is the rent we pay for our room on earth.”
The power of love rather than the love of power
empowers us with the noble ideal of giving the best for
the divine cause. Abel is remembered in the Christian
liturgy for what he gave” (Heb.11:3) having set an
example to live by the Words of Jesus: “It is more blessed
to give than to receive” (Acts.20:35).The service we
render to others by word and deed is only “a drop in the
ocean”. Joy comes to us through that one drop. Our lives
are to be like rivers, not reservoirs and not cisterns”. Do
we live by the environmental legacy of the Dead Sea or
the Sea of Galilee? One would recall the words of Mother
Teresa when someone commented on her work of
charity. To quote: ”Mother, what you are doing is only a
drop in the ocean”. Mother replied: “True, what we are
doing is just a drop in the ocean, but the ocean would be
that much poorer without that drop.” Yes, we need to
keep the spirit of service at the boiling point” (Rom.12:11-
William Barclay’s Trans.).
In a world of exploitation, manipulation and competition,
Christian workers/ministers should uphold the mission in
Christ’s way. In 1 Pet.2:21, St. Peter urges us to imitate,
to initiate, and innovate Christ’s noble example. We read:
“For to this you have been called, because Christ also
suffered for you, leaving you an example that you should
follow in his steps” (cf.Jn.13:15). Joy of leaving foot prints
on the sands of time requires willingness on our part to
live by the demands of the gospel (cf.Jn.12:.24).We need
not have to be great to do something, but we need to do
something to become great. A quote from the prayer of
Mar Aprem, the Father/Teacher of the Church, is to be
remembered. Looking at a bird, being seated on the
branch of a tree in his courtyard, he said: “O bird, unless
and until you take the figure of the Cross, you will not be
able to fly. If your wings do not take the shape of the
cross, you will always remain on the earth”. The prayer of
Dag Hammarskjold, former Secretary General of the UN,
is worth recalling when we desire to live with a joyful
heart:
“Lord, give me a pure heart that I may see Thee; a
humble heart that I may hear Thee; a heart of love that
I may serve Thee; a heart of faith that I may live
Thee”. The secret of joy lies in this prayer.
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THE BOOK OF JOB AND THE
TRANSCENDENCE OF THE EGO
Revd Dr. Valson Thampu, Trivandrum
First: a question: Have you, dear reader, heard any expert
convention preacher, holding forth on any text in the book
of Job? I would be seriously surprised if you have. In half
a century of attending conventions and listening to
preachers, I haven’t heard a single sermon on this
profound and pivotal text.
Yet, the book of Job is the one that is most frequently
referred to by ethicists, or philosophers of ethics. If you
go by Gandhi, the heart of true religion is ethics. Religion
minus ethics is no better than superstition. The strongest
bulwark against superstition in religion is ethics. It is the
essence of the teachings of Jesus Christ, “Seek first the
Kingdom of God and his justice.” His teachings pertain
mostly to ethics and only indirectly and critically to rites
and rituals.
Of course, you and I don’t expect members of the church
hierarchy and Christian godmen to wax eloquent on
ethics, or the discipline of doing what is right and of
avoiding evil. The essence of ethics is: “Do to others what
you would that they should do to you.” According to
Kant, this is the foremost Categorial Imperative of
Practical Reason. The operative difference between a
shepherd and a wolf is ethical.
What does this indifference to biblical, Christological
ethics, point to? Why has this come about? Why does it
thrive unquestioned? The practical purpose of religion is
to strengthen us against the tyranny of ego. What else
does Jesus’ teaching mean: “If anyone would come after
me (i.e., be my disciple), let him deny himself, take up his
cross and follow me.” The three steps involved -self-
denial, unconditional acceptance of the Cross-principle,
and the discipline of following Jesus daily - relate to three
stages of overcoming the dominion of the ego over us.
But for this discipline, all of human actions will be
dictated and dominated by ego. Human beings are
inherently egoistic; and ego is penetrated by the power
and mystery of evil. As long as ego rules over an
individual, he will remain worse than a brutish beat.
Humankind knows only two ways of dealing with ego: the
political and the spiritual. In the political domain, the
brutishness of individual ego is sought to be curtailed and
contained by the power of the State, or via external
control. In this model, doing what is just is a matter of fear
of consequences only. Self-control, or self-denial, is no
legal requirement. Rule of law works punitively and by
means of external control.
(Contd. on Page 23)
UNDERSTANDING THE LOGIC OF SPIRITUAL LIFE
Revd Dr. Valson Thampu, Trivandrum
Many Christians are, alas, inclined or induced to believe
that logic has nothing to do with spirituality. Another
aspect of the same superstition is that spirituality is
endangered by scholarship. Doesn’t St. Paul say, after all,
that ‘knowledge puffs up’? It is overlooked that St. Paul
nowhere says that ignorance breeds true humility! If it did,
the donkey would have been the most spiritual of all
animals. Paul, on the other hand, is unapologetically
proud of his scholastic background.
In the history of Christianity, it is not the un-scholarly
Jerusalem faction of Christianity headed by James, the
brother of our Lord, but the erudite version of St. Paul
that that prevailed covered the face of the globe. No
serious historian disputes that it is the Pauline version of
Christianity, and not the native, Jerusalem version of it,
that we practice today. The predominance of St. Peter,
with Rome as its centre, is a politico-historical anomaly.
Rome is not the heart of Christianity, but the historical
marker of a compromise in which the of soul Christianity
accommodated itself within the muscle of the Empire -
something that continues to ripple through the historical
body of Catholicism.
As we take an over-view of the historical development of
Christianity, we see two obvious trends. The first is the
Way of Jesus as an individual choice and affirmation. In
this process, as Soren Kierkegaard was insistent on
arguing, the individual stands ‘naked’ before his Creator
and accepts no intermediaries of any kind other than
Jesus Christ. Faith is purely individual. No external
element or authority is relevant to the spiritual destiny of
the individual. This is the essence of religious
individualism and it is native to theistic existentialism.
The second is the communitarian, or corporate dimension
in the practice of faith. This puts the spot-light on the
need for church. For the most part, Jesus went about
meeting the needs of individuals. But, at a significant
moment, with Philippi as the setting, he introduced the
idea of the church. In Pauline epistles the emphasis is,
increasingly, on church, even as the individual aspect is
not lost sight of.
Why should one belong to a congregation at all? Why
can’t individuals fulfil their spiritual destiny strictly through
their relationship with the Christ of faith? How does it help
to belong to a congregation? And what should a
congregation be like, if it is to be a spiritually helpful thing
to participate in it? It is indeed surprising that these
questions, though obvious and basic, are rarely raised.
We are urged to maintain the discipline of attending
Sunday services, and cottage prayers, regularly. But why
we should do so is never explained logically. Often it
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seems that it is to avert the contingency of having to face
searching questions that a dichotomy is created between
faith and reason. Surely, there must be some logic to the
need for having congregational life? Nothing exists
without a logic. Randomness, or gratuitousness, is mere
appearance. The fact that we are indifferent to causative
factors does not mean that they don’t exist.
Church life, over the centuries, has formed itself around
the idea of belonging together through adherence to set
rites and rituals. But the purpose of spirituality, in the
teachings of Jesus Christ and in the understanding of the
early church, was the total development of the human
person. Sin is understood as self-alienation. We are
alienated from our true self. The operative logic of this
self-alienation is inner dis-relationship. Sin alienates us
from the inner core of our spiritual being. Sin reduces us.
It makes us less than ourselves. In this state we tend to
think of ourselves more and more as bodies. So, we get
absorbed exclusively with the things of the body. Hence
the teachings of Jesus Christ to the effect that we should
not ‘be anxious’ about what we would eat, drink or wear.
The point is that a way of life that reduces human
awareness to physical needs alone is prone to, riddled
with, anxiety. Historically, anxiety is the hallmark of
materialism. It is a byproduct of worldliness. The antidote
to anxiety is faith. Faith involves an expansion of
awareness. It is a breaking out of the narrow prison of the
physical and the material, and the growing awareness of
a scheme of things wherein extra-material resources are
real and available.
Here a problem arises. Does faith have a natural aspect
to it, or is it only a gift of divine grace, understood in its
random sense? Surely, the will of God is germane to faith.
But God is not arbitrary or random. He does not bestow
gifts in an indiscriminate or random manner. Recall the
parable of the talents. There is a logical connection,
howsoever hidden at the beginning, between the number
of talents given and the dispositions of the servants. It is
not an ‘accident’, that is, that one servant got five talents,
another two and the third, only one.
Experience convinces me that true faith is at once a
product of inner liberation and a means for further
liberation. In the spiritual mode, growth is the essence of
liberation. That is because the spiritual idea of liberation is
positive. In political terms, liberation can be negative; it is
freedom from. Spiritually, it is freedom for. To understand
faith otherwise is to turn it into a fetish, which happens all
the time. The faith and faithfulness of the good and
faithful servants in the parable are proved by their
orientation to growth. It is not merely the talents that grow
in number. The faithful servants grow, in the process, in
their stature and the scope of their faithfulness. It is
impossible, and irresponsible, to separate our
understanding of faith -its nature and purpose- from this
divine intent. God is not a distributor of ornaments or
trinkets! He is a facilitator of life in its fullness. One has to
be particularly irrational to assume that ‘fullness of life’ is
possible without the full development of the human
person within the plan of God encoded in creation.
Even a nodding awareness of the four gospels will
convince us that the emphasis in the life and teachings of
Jesus Christ is on the total growth and development of
human beings. His spirituality is the spirituality of growth.
Growth is of the essence of life. So, if Jesus is the light,
and not a tomb of death, one must expect a sustained
emphasis on human growth of a spiritual and integrated
kind. Jesus has appointed, broadly speaking, two
resources for our spiritual growth. The first is a personal
relationship with him. Hence St. Paul’s view that those
who are in Christ become a new creation. This new
creation is a re-creation of the old, freed from its
limitations and distortions. The new creation is the
complete creation. It is completeness, or wholeness, that
is ‘new’. It is this that ‘the world cannot give’. Why it is so,
is hard to explain but still possible to intuit. Hence the
following thoughts…
The core of spirituality comprises the meeting point
between the individual and God. Jesus is that meeting
point. Incarnation is the meeting point between the
metaphysical and the historical, between the divine and
the human. The wholeness of the human implies this
synthesis. This intuition underlies the creation story.
Adam is animated by the breath of God. The meeting
point between God and man is both dynamic and
internal, as symbolized by breathing. But, though internal,
it also involves the external. It is a state that rejects the
antinomy of the internal and the external. It is internal-
external, which makes it paradoxical. Breathing is not
merely the inhaling or the exhaling of air. It is both. Any
separation between the two is tantamount to the death
principle. Godless existence, as St. Augustine says, like
exhaling without inhaling. It keeps us restless.
Restlessness is a function of incompleteness or
imperfection. So, the peace that Jesus promises
(Jn.14:27) is the peace blossoming on the fullness, or
perfection, of life (Mtt.5:48).
Peace, at the individual level, is impossible without
holistic personal growth. Assuredly, the shaping purpose
of ‘abiding in Jesus, and he in us’ (Jn.15:4) is our
fruitfulness, which is a symbol of growth. Human identity,
in the spiritual sense, is predicated on growth. A tree,
Jesus said, is known by its fruit. Fruit is a product, and
proof, of growth in nature. No growth, no fruit. No fruit, no
identity. The ‘new creation’ (2 Cor.5:17) we become by
abiding in Jesus points to a well-defined identity, resulting
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from holistic growth. It is not a magical, but logical,
reality.
There is a text that every one of us readily quotes. It is to the
effect that Jesus is the way (Jn.14:6). It is doubtful, though, if
its meaning is understood. Why is it that abiding in Jesus is
an assured way to fruitfulness? Isn’t it because of who Jesus
is? Otherwise, any kind of relationship should suffice. Jesus
represents the fullness of humanity, which also means of
divinity -for one implies the other in biblical thought. By
abiding in him -effecting a communion of the physical and
the metaphysical in us- we attain a state of continually
experienced inner motivation, and empowerment, to seek
perfection. Logically speaking, only what can be done
should be put in the form of an obligation. Or, as Kant says,
‘ought’ implies ‘can’. So, our duty to be perfect implies that
we can be perfect. But there is no ‘way’ to this perfection
other than Jesus Christ. He is the Way.
This too is common sense. We are shaped by the
company we keep. Associated with the petty and the
shallow, we become likewise. The profoundest need that
young people have -male and female- have, says
Nietzsche in The Future of German Educational
Institutors- is for an Authority they can submit themselves
to. The same is echoed by Matthew Arnold in Culture
Anarchy. Christian leaders remain blissfully ignorant of, or
willfully indifferent to, the fact that the greatest good they
can do their people -especially the youths- is to be good
role-models to them. In this respect there is, alas, a
famine in the land today.
This gives us a basic, working idea of the scope and
significance of personal relationship with Jesus. It can be
readily tested against the many encounters of individuals
with Jesus recorded in the gospels. Except in the case of
those who were hard-set against liberation-as-personal-
growth, the outcome in each instance corroborates what
we have considered so far. This brings us to the second
dimension: the ecclesial-communitarian. Why is
congregational life essential for our spiritual wholeness?
Story is told of D. L. Moody, who came across a rich man
who lived in singular alienation from the local church
community. Moody visited him. In the course of the
conversation, Moody got up, walked to the fire-place and,
with a tong, picked up a glowing ember and put it aside.
As the rich man watched, it began to bedim. Soon it
became an ashy, dull thing. The rich loner got the
message.
Now think of a different possibility. You take a glowing
ember and put it with a heap of coal. If anything, its glow
will die out faster! It is not the coal, but the state in which
it is, that matters. We are all, generically, human beings;
but not spiritually. When Jesus said we are the light of the
world (Mtt.5:14), he meant that we should be like glowing
embers, not like cold pieces of coal.
An assembly of Christians can be a heap either of coal or
of burning, glowing embers. Only the latter qualifies to be
church. A congregation of cold coals is no congregation.
It cannot claim Jesus Christ to be its foundation. This
helps us to understand what a congregation is meant to
be, and how belonging to one promotes our spiritual
welfare.
The practical principle is that awareness stimulates our
growth. Awareness depends on what or who we are
exposed to. The most acute form of awareness -
awareness that takes place in the depth of the soul-
happens, not through mere exposure, but through
encounters in depth. Jesus indicated this state in his own
inimitable style: ‘abide in’, which is exposure without
limits and conditions. It is depth-exposure. So, a
spiritually vibrant congregation must have two essential
strengths. Its members must be oriented to growth: or, in
the words of Jesus, to seeking perfection oriented to life
in all its fullness. Second, they should be open to each
other in the depth of their being. Stagnation and
superficiality denote spiritual death. It is because this is
not understood that commitment to orthodoxy, in itself a
great and necessary strength, brings about stagnation
and paralysis.
This means that belonging to a congregation, or to
church in general, implies a specific duty: the duty to be
the new creation, or to be born again (in its spiritual, not
cultic sense). At this stage, we need to bring in the idea of
individual uniqueness. Human beings are not machine-
made clones of each other. Each person is distinct and
unique. We all have our distinctive qualities, strengths
and talents. We are to seek perfection in relation to these
‘talents’. If we do, and bring the cumulative outcome of
these individual effervescences to the life of a
congregation, it will become a reservoir of variegated
talents and resources. That is the idea of a vibrant
congregation, a congregation that kindles freshness in us
and motivates us to seek perfection as a core spiritual
discipline. A congregation must be an implicit celebration
of the goodness and glory of life.
Now recall the Old Testament image of the valley of dry
bones (Ezek.37:1-10). It could well be an appropriate
image of our congregational life! All the bones are
together. And it is, like the congregations we are proud
of, a large heap! There is no quantitative dearth. All it
lacks is life. It also means that each of the dry bones
exists by itself -despite being in a heap- unrelated to the
rest. It is a heap, not a body, an organic unity. It has no
life. What lacks life cannot kindle life; just as a dead body
cannot give birth to a new life. The transformation of this
heap of dry bones, all belonging together spatially, but
alienated from each other spiritually and proximally, into a
living army is the rebirth that congregations need to
undergo today. Only in such congregations will God be
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worshiped, as Jesus said to the Samaritan woman, “in
spirit and in truth”.
If I have the singular advantage of such a congregation,
I’d enjoy the blessedness of being exposed to an
ensemble of life-kindling, spiritually ennobling, influences!
This very exposure will stimulate something precious,
godly in me and I’d grow in spirit even unawares. Each
person I ‘have fellowship with’, would be a cherished
spiritual stimulation. And I would grow! Sadly, we have
come to think that rites and rituals can be a substitute it.
Jesus never thought or taught this. We have bigger
congregations and magnificent church buildings; but it is
doubtful if we have church, the body, with Jesus Christ as
its head.
Only think of this: Jesus chose a handful of individuals,
who counted for nothing in the eyes of the world;
fisherfolks, most of them. It was, besides, a hopelessly
disparate group, though a small one. But in a span of
three years, they grew, and grew, and grew in stature.
They out-grew themselves! When Jesus said to Peter -
assuming that this text is authentic- that the church
would be built on Peter the rock, he meant something
very practical, not mystical. It was not the person of
Peter, unlike what the Catholic Church felt expedient to
infer, that mattered, but his rock-likeness. “Upon this
rock…will I build my church”. What is this ‘rock’?
Certainty not the person of Peter; for Peter was a volatile
and vulnerable character, as is indicated by his collapse
in the courtyard of the High Priest when the trial of Jesus
was in progress. The ‘rock’ is the reality of growth as
transformation, with its framework as the community of
faith in a state of unshakeable spiritual solidarity, over
which the gates of hell shall not prevail. The church will
never be Petrine; it will necessarily be Christ-centric.
A mere human assembly, in which individuals stay
stagnant, is similar to a valley of bones. It makes little
difference by which denominational colour or label it is
known, or who leads it and with what pomp and power. If
it is your misfortune to belong to one such, you are sure
to wither away. It could take time, but the outcome is
never in doubt. You become a nobody in the eye of the
Lord (Mtt.7:21-13). Remember the message of the Spirit
of God to the church at Sardis? You have the name of
being alive; but you are dead. “Let the dead,” Jesus says,
“bury their dead”. It is a good thing to do; it is desirable
social service; but, for God’s sake, don’t call its
compound a church! Our spiritual life exists between two
axes: the vertical one on which I abide in Jesus, and the
horizontal one, on which I have ‘fellowship’ with fellow
believers. The two together constitute the church. One
axis cannot exist without the other. Nor can the two axes
be wrongly aligned. Cross, as an instrument of torture
and oppression, is the wrong alignment of the two axes.
Hence it is that a congregation is either the body of
Christ, or a cross on which that Body is crucified.
Journeying with the Cross of Christ
Lal Varghese, Esq., Dallas
Jesus’ journey to the cross began at the very beginning of
time when humankind rebelled with God. It was the
providential plan of God. Jesus’ journey to the cross took
him throughout the cities and rural places of Judea and
Galilee. He visited the never treaded roads and Samaritan
wells and invited ordinary people to become his disciples
and to do the extra ordinary things for him. Our Lord
crisscrossed these territories, teaching the truth in a
world choked by false beliefs and dogmas Jesus’ journey
took him to the cross, where he suffered, died and
resurrected so that we can be saved from our sins and
can have eternal life. Jesus’ journey took him beyond that
cross, through the empty tomb, and into the very first
Easter morning. His journey did not culminate there, but it
gives us the eternal hope that he will return to gather us
to be with him for an eternal life in heaven. Our journey is
not without challenges, but we’re assured of God’s
presence. Jesus told His disciples, “I am with you always,
to the very end of the age” (Matthew 28:20) and he will be
with us also in our journey.
Long before Jesus walked the dusty streets of Jerusalem,
God through his prophets had predicted the Savior’s
journey to the cross. Generations before Jesus was born
into the line of David, God had promised to send his Son
to the earth to remove the curse of sin, the curse that
every human being carried since Adam and Eve. The
Bible reminds us, “The wages of sin is death” (Romans
6:23). Thus the 2nd Adam redeemed the sins caused by
the first Adam and the subsequent generations.
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God’s plan was executed exactly at the right time. Jesus
came down from eternity and into time, entering Mary’s
womb just as the angel had promised. Joseph and Mary
traveled together to Bethlehem, their ancestral home, to
be part of the census as per the decree of Herod. There in
Bethlehem Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was born in a
manger, greeted by farm-yard animals and dusty
shepherds. The Heaven touched the earth, but not in the
mansion of a King, but in a manger. God’s eternal,
cosmic plan had begun to unfold and thus the journey to
the cross also began.
God’s great plan of salvation intersects with our very own
life and journey. That same God have plans for us also.
His plans for our life are built on the foundation of his love
and on the great salvation his Son has won for us in his
journey to the cross and beyond. No matter what comes
our way on any day of the week, God intends to draw
everything in our life together for our good; those plans
will come together at just the right time. We need to
believe that his plans are beyond our plans and his ways
are beyond our ways. He will guide us in our journey at
the right time and place.
No matter how dark the valley becomes on any day of the
week, our Savior walks beside each one of us. No matter
how high that mountain of tasks that we have set aside
for each day, our heavenly Father will somehow include
them in the eternal plan of love he has set in place from
all eternity just for each one of us.
Pope Pius XI issued an encyclical against the Nazi "cult":
"Race, nation, state . . . all have an essential and
honorable place within the secular order," he wrote. "To
abstract them, however, from the earthly scale of values
and make them the supreme norm of all values, including
religious ones, and divinize them with an idolatrous cult,
is to be guilty of perverting and falsifying the order of
things created and commanded by God."
Adam and Eve were guilty of perverting and falsifying
God’s plan, when they disobeyed God and listened to the
devil and ate the forbidden fruit. Abraham, whom God
promised to make the father of nations, also disobeyed
God by having a son with Sara’s maid. Both King David
and King Solomon also followed the idolatrous cult and
were guilty of perverting and falsifying the order of things
created and commanded by God through prophets and
Moses. Israelites, even though they were rescued from
the bondage from Egypt, they again and again disobeyed
God and worshipped idols and thus were forced to leave
to Babylon as exiles.
We, the so called faithful believers, in our day to today life
are making the earthly values as supreme of all values,
including religious ones and divinize them with an
idolatrous cult; we are guilty of perverting and falsifying
the order of things created and commanded by our Lord
Jesus Christ. The religious leaders are also not exempt
from guilty of perverting and falsifying the order of things
created and commanded by God. Faithful believers
evaluate things from the earthly scale of values and then
make them the supreme norm of all values, including
religious ones, thus guilty of perverting and falsifying the
order of things created and commanded by God.
“No, the journey to the cross didn’t begin in Jericho. It
didn’t begin in Galilee. It didn’t begin in Nazareth. It didn’t
even begin in Bethlehem. The journey to the cross began
long before. As the echo of the crunching of the fruit was
still sounding in the garden, Jesus was leaving for
Calvary. “And the Angels Were Silent” (‘Grace for the
Moment’, Volume II by Max Lucado). Our journey to the
cross also began when we were woven secretly in the
wombs of our mothers (Psalm 139:13). On His way to
Jerusalem and to the cross, Jesus met a lot of people.
Same way, we will also meet lot of people of different
beliefs, non-beliefs and opinions, even with faith in Jesus
different than ours. If we have the right attitude to the
people we encounter, our journey with the cross will be
successful. The cross dominates the New Testament; the
cross transforms everything. It gives a new worshipping
relationship to God, a new and balanced understanding
of ourselves, a new approach to give ourselves in
mission, a new kind of love towards our enemies, and a
new courage in Christ to face troubles and tribulations.
St. John wrote: “In this world you will have trouble. But
take heart! I have overcome the world” (Jn’16: 33).
It worked out for Jesus since he had the right attitude. He
considered everyone greater than himself; he had chosen
the fisherman to fish the men. He humbled himself by
keeping silence when everyone accused the prostitute
brought before him. He humbled himself before Pilate,
when the crowed uttered to crucify him and false
accusations were leveled against him. Jesus humbled by
embracing and honoring a little child to illustrate the
humility the disciples not yet begun to understand.
(Mathew 9:36-37) “Come to me, all you who are weary
and burdened, 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.” (Mathew 11: 28-30).
He was compassionate, by healing the sick, the lame, the
blind and even the legion. The Lord is gracious and
righteous; our God is full of compassion. (Psalm 116: 5)
There’s something in us that thinks it’s in the form of God
too and it’s the flesh. So we need to be emptied of our
self, our self-sufficiency, and our own control. However,
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we can’t empty our self as Jesus did, but we can be
emptied through the grace of God. Now this matter of
humility is important. Let us be humble in our faith journey
under the cross and not to be proud in nature.
Thomas a Kempis, Dutch mystic and devotional author of
“The Imitation of Christ”, in his classic wrote, "We must
imitate Christ's life and his ways if we are to be truly
enlightened and set free from the darkness of our own
hearts. Let it be the most important thing we do, then, to
reflect on the life of Jesus Christ.” We need to look at the
biblical picture of Jesus’ Journey to the Cross as revealed
in Philippians 2:5-11. “In your relationships with one
another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who,
being in very nature God, did not consider equality with
God something to be used to his own advantage; rather,
he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a
servant, being made in human likeness. And being found
in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by
becoming obedient to death—even death on a cross!
Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave
him the name that is above every name, that at the name
of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth
and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that
Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Our
faith journey under the cross should be to find out this
resurrected Jesus and his glory.
This is the true picture of Jesus journey to the cross and
our journey should mirror Jesus Journey. Our cross
should correlate with His cross. That is to say, we need to
come to an experiential awareness of the cross through,
humility, suffering, compassion, righteousness and
brokenness. That’s what Jesus did and that’s where we
must go on our journey to the cross. The death and
resurrection of Jesus Christ are at the very heart of
Christianity. The good news of the gospel is that God has
acted in history to conquer evil and reconcile sinners to
himself through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.
For those who have been united with Jesus – who have
submitted to Him as the savior and Lord – have been
united with Him in the likeness of His death and will one
day be united with Him in the likeness of His resurrection
(Rom. 6:5). We are crucified with Christ and will be
resurrected at the end of our faith journey.
When Jesus went to the cross He gave up several things,
which we hold on to, all rights to his own reputation, all
rights to His possessions, all rights to be rescued, all
rights to be loved by people. “Then Jesus said to his
disciples, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny
himself and take up the cross and follow me” (Mathew
16: 24 NIV). Let us also join in with all God’s people down
through the ages whose lives have proven that his
promises are true. Let us give up our self, our reputation,
our possessions, our safety and join in with them with
confidence: “We know that all things work together for
good to them that love God, to them who are the called
according to his purpose” (Romans 8: 28).
Journey under the cross of Christ should be able to
enable us to move beyond “doing penance” and to help
Christians focus on Christ’s sacrifice for us—the real
meaning of Easter and the reason we celebrate. The
foundation of Christian living is faith in Christ. Faith is the
central loyalty that gives purpose and direction to our
lives. Christian faith is grounding our lives in the living
God as revealed especially in Jesus, the Christ. This faith
does not happen overnight; it is a journey from birth to
death since we are growing in faith.
The faith journey with the cross is complex, which
involves, trusting by relying on God by knowing that “Lord
is my Shepherd” (Psalm 23). It also involves believing that
God the father the almighty, maker of heaven and earth.
The journey with the cross is following which involves
doing as well as being, so Jesus asked his first disciples
to ‘follow me’. Such discipleship is not an easy matter.
Jesus said, “If any want to become my followers, let them
deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.
For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those
who lose their life for my sake will find it” (Matthew 16:24-
25).
Finally, journey to under the cross is also a matter of hoping,
of leaning into the future that God has promised. On the
cross ‘Jesus took our place’ and bore our sins for our
redemption; it is atonement, the biblical teaching of
atonement is substitutionary from beginning to end. It’s
living with the assurance that God is bringing in the time of
shalom, God’s reign here on earth, the kingdom of God on
earth. As Easter people, we have a hope born of the
Resurrection: God has already conquered sin and death, and
the kingdom of love, righteousness, peace and justice is
even now breaking in. To abide in hope is to watch and pray
for ‘God’s future in the present’ and to join in the ministries
through which it will be realized. Jesus had given us the
hope and assurance that he will return to gather all of us to
be with him for an eternal life with him in heaven. Until his
return, our faith journey under the cross is to be continued
faithfully. Our journey begins with our birth and continues
until our death and until we join with our Lord for an eternal
life in heaven. Let us continue our faith journey under the
cross of Christ by living a life worthy of our Lord Jesus
Christ.
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THE BOOK OF JOB AND THE
TRANSCENDENCE OF THE EGO
Revd Dr. Valson Thampu, Trivandrum
(Continuation from page 17)
Spirituality is the second means. This excludes external
control and coercion. It puts the emphasis entirely on
self-control. The reason is obvious: human freedom is a
paramount value in spirituality. External coercion, even for
ethical purposes, imperils freedom. The voluntary
acceptance of the ethical discipline is, hence, a basic
condition for living in freedom. Corruption and freedom
cannot coexist. The corrupt can never be free. Also, they
will always be enemies of human freedom. The one
absolute principle is this: the violent are inherently and
inevitably corrupt. That is so, even if they appear in
sheep’s clothing. The corrupt are wolves, not sheep.
Corruption involves unbridled indulgence in egoism.
Remove egoism from corruption, it looks weird. Each
rupee or dollar or pound sterling gained through
corruption, each advantage gained by unfair means, is a
loss, not a gain. You lose in the coin of the soul what you
gain in the currency of the world.
This should open our eyes to the meaning of corruption in
religion. The very purpose of religion is to keep us pure
and pristine. We are meant, says Peter, to be a royal
priesthood. That is, we are kings; but the secret of our
authority is not power, but purity. Such a King Jesus was;
the one who did not have a shirt to his back, or a penny
to his name. He alone is the King, whose Kingdom never
ends.
It is this issue that is examined with extraordinary
candour in the book of Job. The book opens with one of
the most important questions in spirituality: Does Job
love God for nothing? Is his godliness, that is,
disinterested, or free from egoism? Is it not a clever,
calculating, egoistic investment motivated by mega
returns?
Consider also God’s verdict on Job. “There is none more
righteous than Job in all the earth.”
Theologians tend to lose their way by making Job a case
study on the suffering of the innocent. In doing so, they
lose sight of the heart of the matter. It is not innocence
per se that is focused here; but the “character” or spiritual
mettle of that innocence; for even in the case of
innocence there can be an egoistic variety. Such
innocence - erected mostly on not doing what is wrong-
has little spiritual value. This explains why, in the
teachings of Jesus Christ, the emphasis is not on ‘not
doing what is wrong’ but on ‘doing what is right’. No one
can do consistently what is right, unless the ego is
surrendered to the authority of God; whereas one may
avoid doing evil, at least for a period of time, out of
inspired self-interest; that is, to avoid harmful
consequence.
In Greek philosophy, a person’s character is to be
understood in terms of his total orientation, and not in
terms of some isolated gestures or actions. From this
point of view, either one is oriented to virtue or to the lack
of it. A coward, for instance, may, under certain
circumstances, do a brave deed because the
consequence of cowardice is worse than that of bravery.
This is the case with acts of heroism in the battle field. A
soldier has no option but to be brave unto death. If he
flees, he will be shot. Fighting the enemy, risking his life,
offers a better chance of survival than flight in cowardice.
Seen thus, military courage is an aspect of moral
cowardice. The ‘self-denial’ exemplified by a soldier in the
battlefield does not involve voluntary self-denial. That is
why alcohol-culture is rampant in armies. An alcohol-free
army did not exist in history! A valued perk of being a
solider is subsidized liquor.
The need for religion exists on a universal principle. The
need for all ethical teachings also exists on the same
basis. That principle is: natural man acts only out of
selfish, or egoistic, motives. The capacity to act out of
purely self-less, altruistic motives is alien to human
nature. Also, the power of ego is intractable. It is not
given to unaided human nature to keep one’s ego under
bit and bridle. The ego, furthermore, is a sphere of
deception, subtle and broad. People play games not only
with others but also with themselves. They don’t spare
even God in this regard.
The most brutal war is, therefore, the war against one’s
own ego. This is the only Holy War that has any human
significance or value. It is the War of wars that every
human being has to wage. In respect of this war earthly
armour is irrelevant.
The bad news for organized religions of every kind is this:
the paraphernalia of religiosity -rites, rituals, customs,
symbols, structures, practices, make-belief of every kind-
is as irrelevant to this Holy War as the resources of the
world are. If you are not convinced, just consider this: in
the last fifty years, religiosity has increased in scale and
scope in our midst; but the moral stock of Christians has
declined. Individual stature too has, correspondingly,
dwindled. The Christian community is poorer today in
spirituality and humaneness for all our massively
organized and heavily invested-in religiosity. The axe,
said the Baptist, should be laid at the root of the tree that
produces no fruit! Every tree that does not produce good
fruit will be cut down, said Jesus Christ. But the barren
tree continues to flourish; nay, more; it now yields a
bumper harvest of poisonous berries!
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Job needs to be re-visited
That is why we need to return to the Book of Job with an
open mind. It’s not easy, but it needs to be done,
nonetheless.
First, it is a strange book. Its hero, the spiritual locus, is
not a Jew. Imagine, what is worse, God himself saying
there is none, including the Jews, more righteous than
this Gentle! Sounds, heretical, right? But it is God who
says it. So, we better take it.
Of course, it is hard to swallow. Suppose God were to
say today, “Look at this man, he is not a Christian; but he
is more righteousness, and dearer to my heart, than all
you Christians put together!”
I won’t be surprised if all-denominations meeting -on the
analogy of all-party meetings- is called, and a decision
taken to boycott God. At the very least, to register a
cosmic protest with the help of those who have hotline
facilities with God.
The second issue is this: God says Job is righteous. But
not much is said about the expressions and exercises of
his righteousness. This too should puzzle us no end. We
have our checklists for righteousness. I doubt if Job
would fare well by that list. Let me leave it at that.
The text lays bare the essence of Job’s righteousness. It
is encapsulated in an unforgettable sentence. “I will love
him, even if he slays me!” Job’s love for God is not
determined by calculations of profit or loss. It is beyond
the reach of his ego.
The principle that emerges is this: we are as godly as we
are delivered of our egos.
Each one of us knows where we stand in this respect.
Our religiosity is driven and sustained, for the most past,
by fear. Fears pertain to ego. It is only in our ego, as
Indian seers and mystics perceived very clearly, that we
suffer hurts. The more vulnerable to exasperation or
grievance we are, the more egoistic we should recognize
ourselves to be.
The trainers and drivers of our religiosity use fear as their
principal weapon. It is incredible how eloquent some
priests and preachers become when they come to
envisioning people being roasted alive in hell-fires! With
what relish they unleash the flourish! And how mighty
impressed, and intimidated we are! And, therefore, how
pliant and submissive!
Job would say, “You hypocritical Christians! You taught
you to be slaves?”
With each successive Satanic blow, Job should have
sunk deeper and deeper into the quagmire of fear. He
doesn’t. Instead, he gets bolder and perseverant with his
questions. Why? His godliness is not a business
transaction with God.
Is our church relationship, may we ask, any different from
the transactional? A thousand respectable Christians
have told me, “Baptism, wedding, school admissions,
jobs, burials… I need the church.”
In Sunday schools and Christian homes tiny tots are told,
“If you don’t pray regularly to Jesus papa, he will be
angry.” So, children grow up assuming that religion is all
about keeping God in good humour by hook or crook.
Most people do not outgrow this infantile religiosity.
Beware of the defenders of God!
This brings us to the next strange thing about Job;
something that should mark him in our eyes as
outrageously ungodly, as it does in the eyes of his
comforters, Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar. These comforters
-whom Job describes aptly as ‘miserable comforters’- are
our representatives in the story. Job dares to ask
questions of God! He puts God in the dock! Unthinkable,
no? But, that is exactly what he does. It is this that
convinces the ‘miserable comforters’ of Job that he is
sinful and deserving of his misery.
But God thinks otherwise! He too asks questions. A
Tsunami of questions, in fact. The point is this: there is
nothing wrong about asking questions. The only condition
is that such questioning should be rooted in the truth of
one’s life. There are experts -we see some of them in the
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gospels- in asking questions meant to confuse and to
cloud the truth. Job’s questions are born in the furnace of
his experience, couched in a language of bewilderment,
addressed to the One who hears and responds. They are
addressed to the One, Job knows, who is himself the
answer. Not asking such questions, when they are real
and imperious, is to bear false witness to God as one
incapable of being the answer. It assumes God to be
anxious and insecure himself about the questions we ask!
Poor God!
An important emphasis in the Book of Job is on the duty
to ask questions. Let me explain why I understand this as
a spiritual duty. Spirituality is akin to light. Jesus is the
light of the world. Light is a symbol of clarity. To abide in
light is to abide in a way of life oriented to clarity. We
cannot be clear enough, especially on spiritual and
metaphysical truths, at any given point in time. Hence the
teaching of Jesus: “Seek!” (Mtt.7:7). Seeking of the
spiritual kind is not any exercise driven by mere curiosity.
It is quest that craves clarity. The alternative is to ‘sit in
darkness’; or to languish in a world of shadows in a short
of ghostly existence, the like of which Plato sketches in
the famous allegory of the Cave in the Republic.
To stay stuck in such a state is to embrace slavery. This
way of observing religion, as against fulfilling it (Mtt.5:17),
makes religion a sphere of darkness or, as Jesus said, a
den of thieves. We get used to this, just as a frog kept in
a saucepan of water and heated gently gets used to its
peril to the point of death. Anything and everything suffice
in darkness; the only requirement is familiarity, or ‘use
and custom’. Religiosity of darkness is driven by habit;
spirituality is sustained by questioning or seeking aimed
at ever-increasing clarity.
It doesn’t have to be argued that blind faith does not
make for clarity! Getting inured to spiritual darkness, we
become afraid of light. Of late I have been, given the
emerging context of evident moral decay in churches,
posting simple interpretations of biblical texts. A fairly
well-informed, right-minded fellow Christian remarked in
response, “Reading your posts makes me depressed. It is
hard to realize that all my life I have been living a lie.”
Nearly a cry to be spared. Well, that is the ground reality
even regarding the more enlightened among us. But we
also parrot, “Jesus is the light of the world.” “Jesus is the
Way”. Presumably, the Way of Light as well!
Do we bear false witness?
The daily consequence is that, unwittingly, we bear false
witness to the Way of Jesus. Gandhi in his autobiography
tilted The Story of My Experiments with Truth, recounts
his encounters in South Africa with Christians and
comments that, but for Christians, he might have become
a Christian. As it is, he stayed Christian without becoming
a Christian. Historians argue that if there is one political
leader in world history who practised the teachings of
Jesus Christ on the grand stage of a nation’s destiny, it is
Gandhi, and Gandhi alone.
Consider that historical fact against the nervousness that
almost every ordained Christian leader has that the
church will come to grief if biblical principles are adhered
to. I remember the Moderator of the Church of North
India reprimanding me, when I refused to transfer money
out of St. Stephen’s College into church funds and
prevented the bishop of Delhi from selling college seats.
‘How do you expect,” he sounded indignant, “the church
to run?”
To the venerable Moderator, the only hope for the church
is the market and its logic of corruption. By implication,
Jesus was a naïve fool to have disrupted the temple
market in Jerusalem. The CNI Moderator I referred to
does not stand alone in affirming this pragmatic creed.
Many a lay Christian has told me that it is foolish to not
run, while we are in Rome, like Romans. So, Jesus
committed a terrible mistake, as Dostoevsky’s Grand
Inquisitor tells Jesus Christ, in Brothers Karamazov, in not
falling down and worshipping Satan and gaining, by way
of an easy, smart bargain, the nations of the world. The
height of stupidity!
But St. Paul makes an important point in the Letter to
Romans. “Professing themselves to be wise,” he writes,
“they became fools!” It is our cleverness, our common
sense laden with spiritual inertia and the deadweight of
egoism that makes us prefer to stay stuck. It was this that
kept the cripple beside the pool of Bethsaida to languish
there for thirty-eight years! After all, he too had the
blessing of a familiar community: the community of
cripples. Very likely, he was scared of the stirring in the
pool! Which invalid likes a stir? If you are open to a stir,
you won’t be an invalid, in the first place.
Why have we done this to us?
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The amazing insight in the book of Job is that God grants
us the freedom to ask questions. Rather, he welcomes
them. Why? Because God respects our freedom. Free
human beings are not required to swallow anything
undigested. Blind faith is harmful to freedom. It is
ungodly. It is satanic.
Then, why don’t we ask: How come we have together
created a culture in our midst -in the name of church,
which is founded on Christ- where asking fundamental
questions is stigmatized and criminalized? Where the
faithful are required to fall in with whatever is dished out
to them? Where thinking responsibly and seeking the
truth fearlessly is deemed impious and rebellious? Where
mental inertia, purporting to de facto slavery, is deemed a
virtue?
What is more, how come we are indifferent to the fact
that such a culture bears false witness to God, which is
the principal point that the book of Job makes? Recall
how the text ends. God condemns Eliphaz, Bildad and
Zophar -the self-styled defenders of conventional, blind
faith- as unrighteous. Job is vindicated. These defenders
of God are condemned by God. Can there be a more
startling expose of the falsity of what has become
habitual with us in the name of loyalty to church?
If you ask me for the essence of the book of Job, I would
say: this is a classic Holy War on human egoism that
masks itself as habitual religiosity. The religiosity that is in
vogue -the religiosity being systematically nurtured
everywhere- is the sort that Satan refers to: Does Job
love God for naught? Job is an allegorical warning against
the sanctimonious selfishness that masquerades itself as
piety.
Only when we reach the state of Job, in which we too can
say, “Even if he slays me, I will still love him” can we be
certain that we are a people of faith. Anything less is
inspired selfishness. ‘Fearing God’ or ‘loving him’ or
trying to be, somehow, in his good books, shows we
value God only as a useful instrument. To use God as an
instrument is to insult his awesome majesty. Even you
and I would be offended at being used as tools. Do you
think God needs to be grateful for being insulted in this
manner?
So, we return to the question raised at the beginning.
Why it the book of Job rarely preached on? Well, it is
simply because its spiritual insight, profound as it is, goes
completely contrary to the nature of the religiosity in
vogue. Our religiosity is a function of our egocentricity.
The more religious a person, the greater his egoism. This
is writ large on our officialdom. You see that, and endure
it, ever so often and in lurid colours. But you take it
tamely because you are conditioned to think that this is
the right stuff, irrespective of what the Bible says.

FOCUS
The Editorial Board of the FOCUS has decided to
introduce a new initiative of ‘Ask FOCUS' to enable its
readers and well wishers to interact with issues-
specificity with FOCUS about the biblical and theological
themes addressed in this journal. We request your active
participation in this new interactive feature focused
especially, though not exclusively, on the youth.
You could begin with sending us your thoughts and
queries about the themes and insights offered through
the FOCUS issues. It would help if you would be brief and
limit your queries to, ideally, about 50 to 100 words. We
are, however, somewhat flexible about the word limit.
Even so, brevity is the envisaged golden rule. You may
send your thoughts by e-mail to Rev. Valson Thampu (you
could address him as Valson) at his e-mail address
vthampu@gmail.com The editorial board reserves the
freedom to edit the submissions and also to reject any
which is contrary to the editorial policies and mission of
FOCUS. You may access all the previous issues of
FOCUS online magazine by visiting any of the two web
sites below and reading the thematic articles in each
issue.
We guarantee that your privacy will be protected and
that your name will be published only with your prior
permission; otherwise, your views/statement will be
published under the caption: A Reader’s View. We
hope that our readers and wellwishers would make
use of this new initiative and take part actively in the
mission and purpose of FOCUS.
www.issuu.com/diasporafocus
www.scribd.com/diasporafocus
27 | P a g e F O C U S O c t o b e r 2 0 1 9 V o l . 7 , N o : 4
THE FIRST STEP
David Brand, London
A Holy Man was travelling from village to village in his own country
preaching and teaching. One day he arrived at a small village, where he
saw a large and angry crowd intent on stoning a woman for misconduct.
He pushed his way through the crowd towards a very frightened lonely
young woman and stood beside her and together they faced this
mutinous mob. Holding her hand he knelt down, bowed his head for a
moment, smiled and rose to his feet. Still holding her hand he looked
directly at the threatening and angry mob and each individual in that
mob felt as if their very souls were being examined and soon all became
very quiet.
He said to them “Search your hearts and minds, also examine your
souls and then tell me that each of you is so perfect that you can justify
throwing the first stone. If you cannot, then join me and this woman in
order to demonstrate that you cannot support this inhumane conduct
and that you are not animals”. For a moment nobody moved, and then
the oldest man dropped his stone and joined the Holy Man and the
young woman. There was a short pause then the remaining oldest
dropped his stone and joined the group. This was followed by the next
oldest and the next and the next until only one young man remained.
He was extremely angry and hate filled both in mind and heart, he said
“I can justify throwing my stone at that woman who is my wife. I have
kept the law, been good and generous all my life, I have honoured her,
my parents and my friends and also tended to the sick and the poor, so
I shall still throw my stone”.
The Holy Man then said, “Have you asked your wife why she did such a
thing, maybe she was trying to protect you, your family, your parents,
your reputation or possibly she had no option and had to submit, have
you considered any of this?”
The young man paused and the Holy Man spoke again, “Stop and think,
once you release your stone you can no longer claim to be perfect in
any way and you will become by definition evil and be subject to its
Laws, you will no longer contribute goodness to this world and you will
die unwanted and unloved.”
The young man stood still for a minute as if frozen, he then dropped his
stone and fell to his knees looked deeply into the Holy Man’s face and
cried “Forgive me for I was about to sin.” The Holy Man said “My son
you have just taken your first step towards God.”
I claim no points for originality by choosing a public execution for the
above but I have developed an incident that Jesus would be familiar in
his time as it was common practise for women to be summarily
executed in this way and most likely the culprit would have been in the
crowd throwing his stone in order to ease his own guilt!
In your own personal life never forget that stones come in many shapes,
sizes, formats and colours. They are all destructive and create more
damage, not less, as they can have a nasty habit of coming back with
interest and leaving permanent damage to the thrower.
Also remember that a majority opinion is not necessarily the correct one,
so do not be timid about challenging it. Never be one of the unthinking
herd and be wary of media manipulation - you are your own mind and
nobody but nobody owns it. Please never be a stone thrower as it will
prevent you from experiencing those many wonderful steps forward in
your quest for that ultimate heavenly goal.
Editor’s Note: Mr. David Brand is an elder and a Lay Reader of the All
Saints’ Church of England parish, Harrow Weald, London, where the
Sinai Mar Thoma Church conducts worship services. He is a retired
electronic engineer with a very deep interest in spirituality.
ASK FOCUS
REFLECTION ON DR. ZAC VARGHESE’S ARTICLE ON FAITH IN ‘FOCUS’ JULY 2019
Revd Dr. Valson Thampu, Trivandrum
I am privy to the thought-provoking article by Dr. Zac
Varghese, hinging mainly on the distinction between ‘the
faith’ and ‘faith’. I note below the thoughts Zac fired in
me, for which I am grateful to him. I am doing this, if only
to underline the need for discussions and debates among
us concerning what we, presumably, hold dear as articles
of faith. Only then is there is a chance at all that we begin
to understand what we profess. What is the use in
professing anything we don’t understand? How is this
different from mere ‘parroting’? If ‘the faith’ makes us
religious parrots, shouldn’t ‘faith’ set us free from this and
enable us to be human?
I note down my thoughts in this regard also for the reason
that Zac’s reflections recorded in this piece were
occasioned by a facebook discussion that took place on
denominational confessions that I happened to initiate in
the wake of the unfortunate developments in Indian
churches.
The key distinction, for my thinking may be formulated as:
while ‘the faiths’ root us in particular denominational
confessions, ‘faith’ roots in Jesus Christ, the author and
finisher of our faith (Heb.12:1-2). Jesus said, “I am the
Truth” (Jn.14:6). He also said, “The Truth will set you
free.” (Jn.8:32)
1. The very relevant distinction between faith and ‘the
faith’… There is a problem in identifying ‘the faith’ with
denominational teaching. Each of these denominational
confessions embodies only a part of the faith. The totality
of ‘the faith’ is obtained in the ‘catholic’ or universal
church, which is an organic unity of all confessions, from
which we are light years away. The problem here is not
merely one of multiplicity. It is also of incoherence. There
no point of coherence among the many. A doctrinal point
of unity is lacking. It is tautological to argue that Jesus is
that point of coherence; for the reason that such
coherence does not exist.
We need to reckon the reality of distortion, when the
Whole is fragmented and the part is presumed to be, and
paraded as, the Whole, which is inherently deceptive. It
lacks truth. This situation is further aggravated by
denominational theologies and doctrines of disintegration.
Hence the truth of Rowan William’s statement: God was
evident when bishops were silent.
2. The problematics of faith and ‘the faith’. Does not
‘the faith’ inhibit faith? How are we to ensure that it
doesn’t? The Jews and Samaritans too had their ‘the
faiths’. We have a Babylon of ‘the faiths’. Hence the
anxiety, “When the Lord of faith comes, will he find faith
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on the earth?” – More specifically, why is it that those
who profess different ‘the faiths’ are aliens and strangers
to each other? When I encounter the alienation among
confessional denominations, I am reminded of the great
rupture that happened at the Fall, with which human
history begins. Denominations, no matter how we justify
them, can result only from a rupture of the Whole. And
they are burdened by the consequences thereof.
3. Regarding the tension between faith and ‘the faith’,
Zac writes: “…one does not have to move out of one’s
denomination to declare without hesitation that one
belongs to ‘one holy, catholic, apostolic, charismatic,
radical and liberal church.” True, and I agree. But the
problem is how to connect the two. If we don’t, we will
lives split in two mutually exclusive zones, shifting, as the
denominational occasion demands, from faith to ‘the
faith’. This compromises our authenticity -our truth-
commitment- in a serious way, forcing us, in effect, to live
double-lives: a religious version of Jekyll and Hyde.
4. I find myself in instinctive agreement with Zac when
he writes: “Faith is a gift from God and this faith is
friendship, a relationship and abiding experience of God.
The real friendship is defined as living within the life of the
other. Thus, the Christian faith has the power to transform
a person in developing an ‘I-Thou’ relationship with
others. Faith thus becomes a real living of the Gospel in
everyday life; it is a celebration of ‘the Liturgy after the
Liturgy’.” But I have a few concerns that arise out of this.
Admitted, faith is a gift from God. Admitted too that “the
Christian faith has the power to transform a person in
developing an ‘I-Thou’ relationship with others.” The
crucial question is what happens to this transforming,
liberating faith when it is ‘contained’ -as is the ground
reality- within the confines of denominational ‘the faith’? -
Does ‘the faith’ inhibit and distort ‘faith’? If it doesn’t, how
do we explain the spiritual and confessional distance
among denominations? From biblical evidence, ‘faith’ is a
way of relating: first, to Jesus and, through him, to each
other. It has to be a relationship of love, not of power. If
so, how are we to account for, or justify, the acute
hostility, bordering of diabolic malice between two
factions of the same church: The Orthodox and the
Jacobite factions? Are these factions free to practise
‘faith’, rising above their confinement to ‘the faith’? Is it
not the case that their faith is overridden by their ‘the
faith’? While the Christian faith has the power, as Zac
points out, “to transform a person in developing an ‘I-
Thou’ relationship with others”, should we accept a
situation in which ‘the faith’ suppresses it altogether in
any instance?
5. Zac refers to the Athanasian Creed. It is a necessary
reference and a helpful one. What is the need for, and
function of, the Creed? Why is it basic to ‘faith’? Creed is
what we hold in common as Christians, though even here
differences are sought to be introduced, which is
reprehensible. The essence of the creed is meant to keep
us reminded of those very elements which are not within
the power of man to manipulate: the nature of God, the
mysteries that envelop our faith, its universality, based on
its transcendental character and so on. This is the
substance of which ‘faith’ is formed and nourished. But at
the level of ‘the faith’, we pay only lip-service to it. This is
what I denote as ‘parrot-Church-ianity’. If the essence of
the Creed is practised in honesty, denominationalism will
be purified to the point of making denominations
incidental, rather than absolute as it is today. For many
denominational establishments, Jesus is the label and
denominal interests and authority ultimate. This has been
my experience, without exception, in relation to all
denominations that I have known at close quarters.
6. Again, I find myself in spontaneous agreement with Zac
when he writes, “Faith in Christ should lead us to an
indwelling experience with him.” But, as I read these
spiritually inspired words, I am also reminded of the
image of the Church at Laodicea, where Jesus is
excluded and kept knocking at the door for entry into the
life of the church. Does, going by the Laodicean,
Ephesian and Sardinian models depicted in Revelation
chapter 2 and 3, Jesus ‘indwell’ in churches as
denominations? If the suggestion in the Bible is to the
29 | P a g e F O C U S O c t o b e r 2 0 1 9 V o l . 7 , N o : 4
negative, what does it tell us of the predicament of the
person of faith within these structures of man-dominance
that has no place for the mystery of our faith in action? I
remember Bishop Pritam Santram, the then CNI bishop of
Delhi Diocese telling me with exasperation, “The bible of
my church is the Constitution. I will run it only
accordingly.” That is the ground reality in all churches.
Some may state it brutally; others may simply take it for
granted, but the in-principle insights that Zac provides are
invaluable and deserve to be internalized and held on to
for dear life.
7. There is a point of distinction between ‘the faith’ and
faith that Zac appears to rely on, but does not state
upfront. That distinction is crucial for clarity of
understanding, and so I need to identify it here. ‘Faith’ is
metaphysical in essence. That is why Zac points out that
it is a gift from God, a function of God’s grace. Faith is a
mystery because it exists at the point of intersection
between time and eternity, between the metaphysical and
the historical. That is why man can practise it but cannot
monopolize it. Life itself is metaphysical and natural-
historical. If life is only historical -spread on the plane of
time- mere reason would suffice. The Constitutions of all
Christian denominations, like the Indian Constitution, are
historical entities. They cannot accommodate the mystery
of the metaphysical, which is the essence of faith. In a
practical sense, Constitutions are an alternative to faith.
Or, they are the point of transition from ‘faith’ to ‘the
faith’. Therein lies the problem.
There is dangerous lack of clarity on this issue. As a
result, most Christians equate ‘faith’ with ‘the faith’ and
assume, quite arbitrarily, that ‘the faith’ will, somehow,
nurture ‘faith’. I doubt it very much.
I recall, in this context, listening to Fr. O. Thomas, the
principal of the Orthodox Seminary in Kottayam, just a
few months ago. He expressed his sincere anguish. “All
of us have good inclinations. We want to do what is right
and righteous. But, on account of our zealous loyalty to
our denominations, we do the worst. Why does this
happen? ”That question, I believe, is central to our quest,
as the followers of Jesus Christ, for an authentic
relationship with him and to find wholeness in our life as a
people of faith.
The Holy Books: Part-3
Dr. Ian Fry, Honorary Postdoctoral Associate, University of Divinity, Melbourne, Australia
[This article is written for the 8th Holy Book Conference
held a t Kuala Lumpur in April 2019 under the auspices of
the United Religious Initiative (URI). Part-2 of this paper
appeared in the July issue of the FOCUS, 2019, Vol. 7 (3),
page 26-28]
The Later Abrahamic Era: Axial Age Religions,
Philosophies, Messianic Expectations, Jesus and Islam
Israel was swept by a succession of imperial powers.
The age is dated from the second half of the Hebrew
prophetic period and through the Babylonian exilic
experience that extended beyond the formal exile years
of 586 BCE to 538 BCE, to c.300 BCE, and involved two
regions, west Asia and the Mediterranean. During that
long period of instability and interaction a number of
‘outsiders’ had a significant influence on the prophets and
scholars who were shaping the evolution of two of the
religious streams. One was the Abrahamic Sub-Stream
Two ‘A,’ the Israelite religion which was morphing into
Judaism. The other was Stream Three that encompasses
the series of Axial Age Religions and Philosophers.
The outsiders included Zoroaster, Mahavira the Jain,
Siddhartha Gautama Buddha, Confucius and Lao Tzu,
who established new religious systems and communities
over two centuries between c.600 BCE and c.400 BCE.4
The succession of philosophers, Homer, Pythagorus,
Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and Epicurus, wrote and taught
in Greece over three centuries from c.570 BCE to c.270
BCE, and that series of developments and interactions
flowed through the evolution of all three sub streams of
Abrahamic faith: Judaism. Two of the outsiders,
Zoroaster and Gautama the Buddha, had a big direct
influence on the theology of the Israelites who moved
from regarding Yahweh as their exclusive God to realizing
that their God and Zoroaster’s concept of one supreme
being meant that Yahweh must relate to the whole of
humanity. If that was so, what were they to look for in
their foreshadowed Messiah? The writer of Second
Isaiah5 described the Persian King Cyrus, whose national
religion was Zoroastrianism and who ended the exile and
ordered the rebuilding of the temple, in messianic terms
as the chosen instrument, shepherd and anointed servant
4 Zoroaster is generally thought to have lived just prior to, or during
the period of the exile, but there is evidence supported by a number of
scholars that he lived much earlier, possibly during the ninth or tenth
centuries BCE. 12 Peter Ackroyd contributing ‘The Book of Isaiah’ in
The Interpreter's One-Volume Commentary on the Bible. (Nashville,
Abingdon Press, 1971) p. 358
5 The chapters 40-55, authorship unknow, inserted in Isaiah at some
stage of redaction, known as Second Isaiah.
30 | P a g e F O C U S O c t o b e r 2 0 1 9 V o l . 7 , N o : 4
of Yahweh.6 Could Israel have an exclusive messiah
without an exclusive God? The religion of the community
into which the Buddha is believed to have been born a
prince and heir to the monarchy was an indigenous blend
of shamanism and animism with a probable emphasis on
the veneration of nature. Being concerned by the never-
ending fear and anguish of people in a repetitive cycle of
birth, death, rebirth and suffering he was moved to find a
solution to the human plight. He contacted two Vedic
scholars who were presumably members of the Nordic
Arian Sanskrit community to study with them, but
apparently finding no satisfaction in their teaching and
practice of meditation he found insights into the working
of karma and his former lives, and found the right path of
spiritual practice to end suffering from the accepted
repetitive cycle by simple meditating under a Bodhi tree.
It is assumed that the Buddha’s final teachings would
have been available throughout Greco-Roman regions
before the Qumran community formed c. 150 BCE,7 but
probably only in Pali and not as the complete Vinaya
Pitaka which combines the principal Buddhist texts, (rules
and discipline), Sutta Pitaka (Dhamma or main teachings),
and Abidhamma Pitaka (higher teachings). Buddhism
spread rapidly after these were all written in Pali c.25
BCE. Missionaries were despatched throughout the
known world, to Rome in 22 BCE, and it was well
established by traders travelling between India Sri Lanka,
the Mediterranean, Greece, Macedonia, Libya and Magas
in the 1st cent. BCE.8 It has recently been suggested that
lay followers of the Buddha reached Arabia via the Red
Sea and had established shrines there while he was still
alive,9 and that Buddhist travellers were in contact with
mainstream Jewish communities, the Qumran community
and even with Jesus, who devoted a forty-day sojourn in
the Judean wilderness to contemplation prior to his
ministry and who is regarded by the Christian church as
the Messiah in the line of Israel’s King David. So what
were the Jews expecting of a messiah? The Buddhist
missionary period from 22 BCE coincided with religious
turmoil in Israel that began well before the Maccabees
seized power in 164 BCE and continued after the
6 The chapters 40-55, authorship unknow, inserted in Isaiah at some
stage of redaction, known as Second Isaiah.
7 The formal Babylonian Exile period was 586 BCE to 538 BCE but its
influence was felt until c. 300 BCE. Two alternative periods are cited
by scholars for the birth and death of the Buddha: 563-483 BCE and
480-400 BCE. In either case his teachings were available during its
later years and beyond.
8 Arthur Lillie. Buddhism in Christendom or Jesus the Essene.
(London, Kean Paul, 1887)
9 A.D.T.E Perera. Buddhism in Ancient Israel and Arabia. (Daily
News, Sri Lanka, 2005)
slaughter of the last members of the dynasty in 37 BCE.
The turmoil had been ameliorated somewhat by the
publication of the Book of Solomon which raised
expectations of a messianic era and, according to Brad
Embry, encouraged hope for the purifying element in
God’s divine redemptive plan in history.10 Embry provides
evidence that this supported the development of New
Testament Christology, and says it was “a masterfully
wrought defense of the Jewish faith in a time of crisis,”
although it can lead either philosophically or theologically
to the Talmud, the Qur’an or Christology, and the use of
the term ‘messiah’ clearly had heavy overtones of reform
and political influence and was not necessarily
anticipating a person with divine attributes.11 He adds that
“the use of the term ‘messiah’ clearly had heavy
overtones of reform and political influence that did not
necessarily anticipate a person with divine attributes.
Similarly, for Moses Maimonides, the towering Jewish
twelfth century scholar, it was one who would be a
sociological delimiter, and political organizer, with the
functions of the royal figure and primarily a purificatory
figure, one who would make the longed-for rule of God on
the earth a reality, a ‘Son of David’ who must first acquire
and exercise the kingship of Israel, take the place of the
hated and illegitimate kings of the house of the
Hasmoneans, break the power of the lawless leaders and
cleanse Jerusalem of the heathens (that is the Romans)
who were crushing and ruining it.
He ridiculed the church’s claim that Jesus was the
messiah, describing him as one who aspired to be the
Messiah and was one of the vulgar who exalt themselves
in an attempt to fulfil the vision, and was executed by the
courts.12 The writers of the New Testament gospels had
set out to show that Jesus of Nazareth fitted those
expectations, but while Jesus was a Jew because he was
born into a Jewish family, his ethnicity and an extended
Hebrew heritage cannot be verified. There was no
tradition of recording genealogies in that manner for
family or public records and while the writers of two
gospels, Matthew and Luke, purport to provide
genealogies for Jesus these are not feasible.
13 14
, Fleming’s history of Nazareth15 establishes that
10
Brad Embry. Psalms of Solomon and the New Testament:
Intertextuality and the Need for a Re-Evaluation (Journal for the Study of
the Pseudepigrapha, Vol 13, No. 2. 2002) p. 101
11
Ibid. p. 134
12
18 Moses Maimonides. Mishneh Torah: The Laws of Kings and Their
Wars (New York, Moznaim Publishing Corp., 1987) Chapter eleven, p.
234
13
19 Howard Clark Kee. The Gospel According to Matthew in Laymon.
The Interpreter’s One-Volume Commentary on the Bible. (New York.
Abingdon. 1971) p. 610.
14
20 William Baird. The Gospel According to Luke in Laymon. The
Interpreter’s One-Volume Commentary on the Bible. (New York.
Abingdon. 1971) p. 679.
31 | P a g e F O C U S O c t o b e r 2 0 1 9 V o l . 7 , N o : 4
Joseph’s forebears could not have settled in Nazareth
until after the Seleucids defeated the Ptolemies and
Antiochus III issued a decree requiring Jews to obey their
ancestral law rigidly, and it does not provide any clues to
Joseph’s ancestry or provide any clues to the origins or
ethnicity of Mary’s forebears, and it leaves open the
possibility that they were either paganized Samaritans or
foreigners who were subject to Judaization under either
John Hyrcanus in 128 BCE or Aristobulus I in 104 BCE.
That cluster of writers’ notes is hardly a basis for
redressing the divisions between Judaism and
Christianity, or even within Christianity, and nor are Jesus’
instructions to his followers to respond to a New
Covenant the final answer. What it provides is an
opportunity to consider the pattern and significance of
conflicts between them that are identified in Chart Two,
and an excellent illustration of the need for scholars of all
faiths, not only the Abrahamic partners, to cooperate in a
critical examine of basic texts to identify inconsistencies
so that when changes to claims, creeds and teaching
need to be made there is a proper basis for them. Jesus
had taught that, First: that the people of the New
Covenant were not to inherit the territory of Canaan in the
sense of it being a base from which to demonstrate
humanity’s relationship with God through exemplary
relationships with neighbouring nations. Second: the
world was to be their area of positive activity and the
obligation to fulfil that role of demonstrating humanity’s
relationship with God through exemplary relationships
with neighbouring nations. Third: the people of the New
Covenant were not subject to the rigid religious practices
and the means of identification as a community that were
still required of the People Israel, including circumcision.
Fourth: the New Covenant was not restricted to people of
one ethnic identity. It went beyond both the Mosaic
Covenant with its restriction to descendants of
Jacob/Israel, and the Abrahamic Covenant, which was
restricted to the wider community of descendants of
Abraham. It was open to people without restriction:
essentially the people of the Noahide Covenant, which
encompasses people of both prior specific covenants as
sub-communities within the total human family.
It was clearly Jesus’ intention that the two communities of
Judaism and Christianity were to work in tandem, not in
competition,16but subsequent edicts by the church after it
became embedded as the state religion of the Roman
15
21 James Fleming. Nazareth History: The Importance of Nazareth in
the Christian Tradition (LaGrange, Biblical Resources, 2009)
16
Mt. 5:17-18. Do not imagine that I have come to abolish the Law or the
Prophets. I have come not to abolish. But to complete them.
Empire to satisfy Constantine’s want for power in 324 CE.
It’s abuse of its authority in conjunction with the state in
measures to suppress Judaism, and its enculturation of
pagan beliefs into church liturgy to help it seize major pagan
temples, made that absolutely impossible. Those edicts and
the church’s support for the empire in the exploitation of
small Arabian states then combined to trigger the call to the
Prophet Muhammad PBUH, in 610 CE, and the formation of
Islam in 622. The church saw that as a little irritant: like a fly
to be swatted away. Rome would attend to that very quickly
and the church would help it consolidate its empire. In fact, it
was the church’s biggest challenge. By adopting its pro-
empire position the church deliberately but unwittingly
rejected a complex of challenges – i) to reflect on the
reasons for the formation of Islam; ii) to review its
selfunderstanding and the reason for its own existence, iii) to
reconsider the theological statements it had adopted, and iv)
to review the theology, authority systems and structures it
established that were basic to Muhammad’s demands that
Christian, Jewish and Pagan leaders should each adopt
reforms. It had lost sight of covenantal obligations, refused
17
17
G.E. von Grunebaum. Classical Islam. A History 600-1258 (London.
George Allen & Unwin. 1st English edition, 1970). Heads of state listed
are those of Persia, Byzantium, Abyssinia, Egypt, Ghassani and Banu
Hanifa. Leaders of churches included Nestorians, Monophysites,
32 | P a g e F O C U S O c t o b e r 2 0 1 9 V o l . 7 , N o : 4
to reconsider the critical concepts of incarnation, the Trinity
and priestly authority, and blundered on. Within four years
Rome had been pushed back by Persia to the Mediterranean
and the Black Sea, and within one hundred years the Muslim
UmayYad Caliphate controlled all of that territory and North
Africa and Spain as well. However much worse was to
come three centuries later when it had the opportunity to
make amends and to work in partnership with two other
covenanted faith communities instead of one. It reinforced
the various abuses of covenant that it had operated under
since before the circumstantial call to Muhammad, and the
Hebrew Mosaic Covenant and the Christian New Covenant
were both still clearly in force. It failed to understand the
concept of trusteeship (al-amānah) that is basic to Islam and
that binds Muslims to constantly remember that God, the
holder of absolute authority, reposes trust in all humanity,
not only Muslims, and that confirmed that Muslims were
bound by an additional covenant that was perfectly clear
from Qur’anic texts. “Allah doth command you to render
back your Trusts to those to whom they are due, And when
ye judge between man and man, that ye judge with justice:
Verily how excellent is the teaching which He giveth you! For
Allah is He Who heareth and seeth all things.” (Qur’an 4:58)
That concept of trusteeship (al-amānah) is absolutely basic
to Islam. It binds Muslims under covenant to constantly
remember that God is the holder of absolute authority in
matters of judgement, and reposes trust in all humanity
equally, not only Muslims. But the church had learned very
little and its most damning creed, the Creed of Saint
Athanasian, was not in use in territories under Muslim
influence until Islam well advanced with Arabic as its official
language. Its core is: “Whosoever will be saved: before all
things it is necessary that he hold the Catholick Faith. Faith
expects everyone to keep whole and undefiled: without
doubt he shall perish everlastingly. … He therefore that will
be saved: must thus think of the Trinity … This is the
Catholick Faith: which except a man believe faithfully, he
cannot be saved. That creed was followed in 754 by the use
18
of the fake Donation of Constantine by Pope Stephen II, to
enrich and fortify the power of the church with a simple
bribe: the appointment of Pepin as king of the Franks in
return for land to establish the papal states. However the 19
power grab had not run its course. A papal declaration and
three devastating bulls had not yet been promulgated. The
first, ‘Dictatus Papae’, was a grab for political power to
consolidate the church’s authority across Europe that
confirmed two things: its rejection of the challenge of Islam,
and the concept that three faith communities were
covenanted in a partnership to pursue a common cause.
Maronites, Armenian and those of Greek, Spanish, Roman and Latin
affiliation.
18
A Prayer Book for Australia. First ed. (Alexandria NSW: Broughton
Books for the Anglicn Church of Australia, 1995). Extracts, Creed of St.
Athanasius, Creed. Pp.836-837
19
"The Donation of Constantine". Decretum Gratiani. Part 1, Division 96,
Chapters 13–14. Quoted in: Coleman, Christopher B. (1922). Discourse
on the Forgery of the Alleged Donation of Constantine. New Haven: Yale
University Press. …
The End of the World is Near . . . With the Blessing of Religions
William E. Swing, Burlingame, CA, U. S. A.
The nuclear nations have decided to “modernize” their
weapons. With this almost fashionable announcement,
the end of the world is all but guaranteed. The capability
to destroy all life on our planet has been around for a
while. What makes this moment unique is that we have
now charted a course that points to an endlessly higher
risk. Instead of using this moment to reduce our nuclear
threat, we have chosen to build stronger, faster, more
deadly weapons, weapons that can pulverize the world
into thinner ashes. All of this is being done with the
support of politicians, industrialists and religionists. Yes,
religions have made peace with the nukes and with the
hands that hold them.
On May 17, 2019, at Westminster Abby, a worship
service was held which was a “celebration of the
success of the Navy’s ultimate mission.” England had
enjoyed 50 years of being free of nuclear attack, and so,
four sailors of the nuclear armed Trident submarines
were honored for protecting the country. God and Nukes
and Nation!
This theme is picked up by author Dima Adamsky in his
new book, Russian Nuclear Orthodoxy: Religion, Politics
and Strategy. Adamsky writes about the “longstanding
nexus between the Russian Orthodox Church and the
country’s nuclear-military-industrial complex.” He goes
on to say, “Russian nuclear orthodoxy constitutes the
collective belief that to preserve its Orthodox character,
Russia must be a nuclear power, to guarantee its nuclear
status, Russia must be genuinely Orthodox.”
I remember being in Pakistan and hearing ordinary
people talking about their first nuclear bomb. They
would say, “India has a Hindu bomb, and now Pakistan
has its Muslim bomb.” Nuclear pride has a way of
wrapping its arms around nations and big business and
religions.
33 | P a g e F O C U S O c t o b e r 2 0 1 9 V o l . 7 , N o : 4
What about the preachers in American pulpits? We are
the only country ever to use such a bomb in combat.
We possess at least 40% on the world’s nuclear
weapons. We are the 24-hour targets of Russian nuclear
bombs. We have dodged man-made, catastrophic
nuclear disaster on several occasions. Yet preachers
don’t touch the subject. Prayers for guidance in nuclear
matters are never uttered in our houses of worship.
Although official religious leaders issue anti-nuclear
weapons statements, the folks in the pews don’t object
to our nation having nuclear weapons. And there is no
anti-nuclear religious lobby that has real influence among
decision-makers.
Religions go along with the optimism of “Deterrence.”
We trust that if we have sufficient nuclear weapons
available, then it will deter other nations from using
nuclear weapons on us. But at best, deterrence is only a
short term tactic. It provides sufficient time for all nuclear
parties to get together and produce a path toward the
elimination of the nuclear threat altogether. Deterrence
only works up to the moment that it doesn’t work, and
then comes the end of the world. Yes, that is what this is
all about, i. e. the end of the world. Deterrence only
works until it becomes our enduring strategy, until we
decide to “modernize” our weapons.
Children play a little game called “Jenga.” Each child
has a turn at using wooden blocks to build a tower. At
the base, it is easy to add your block. But once you
make the decision to keep going to the highest possible
height, it is only a matter of time before it all collapses.
The nuclear nations are playing Jenga with loaded
blocks on behalf of all life on this planet. When we
“modernize” in 2020, then we will have to “modernize” in
2040 and 2060 and on till the end.
The choice is the bomb or the family? The bomb or
springtime? The bomb or music? The bomb or all of the
soul-inspiring aspects of being alive on this Earth?
Radiation or Creation? Your choice! Life on this planet
depends on you and me. The time has come to
“modernize” your opposition to the virulent evil of
nuclear weapons. Break the hold of the political,
military/industrial, religious knot and set a realistic, moral
and vital path toward nuclear reduction and elimination.
Editor’s Note: A graduate of Kenyon College and Virginia
Theological Seminary, the Rt. Rev. William E. Swing
spent 27 years as the diocesan Bishop for the Episcopal
Diocese of California. The founder and president of the
United Religions Initiative (URI), since 2000, Bishop
Swing lives with his wife, Mary, in Burlingame, California.