Reading the New Testament as a Continuation of the Hebrew Bible

Previous posts in this series-

God of Peace, Part 1: Groundrules

And

God of Peace, Part 2: Revelation

In order for me to argue that the New Testament is not that new in the sense of Jewish moral theology, allow me to review my counter-arguments to uninformed claims that advocates of Christian non-violence avoid the Old Testament.

On the contrary, it is several Old Testament theological claims that remain at the root of Christian pacifism and Christian peace-making efforts.

1. The Decalogue: The Second and Fifth Commandments read together are calls to reject violence.  By knowing the name of God, we avoid linguistic violence towards God and are able to have inner peace that manifests itself outwardly in a peaceful relationship with our neighbors.  The negative command to avoid killing is a logical conclusion from the directive to love God.

2. The Imago Dei: If one understands the doctrine of being made in the image of God as where humanity’s worth is seen as immeasurable in the eyes of the Triune God, then it follows forth that all of human life is sacred because of the Creator, and second, only God has the right to take away life.

3. Blood as Sacred: Various legislation in the Torah informs readers that the blood of every creature is sacred, for the blood of the creature is its life.

4. The Wars of the Holy One: Rejecting the Holy wars in favor of the far more accurate term, Wars of the Holy One, one can see that theologically the God of Israel, the YHWH Armies is the lone sources of military victory.  Any prideful attempt on the part of the Israelites to take away God’s glory is to be rejected, as was with prophets such as Elisha’s rebuke of the king of Israel (1st Kings 6).

5. Diaspora Judaism: The Maccabee’s violent revolution was rejected, even excluded from the canon at one point.  Nehemiah and Ezra’s noble yet ethnically exclusive experiment should be viewed as a failure, and falling short of God’s command to “seek the peace of the city,” according to Jeremiah 29:5-7.

How Jesus and the Apostles Passed Down the Non-violent Jewish Ethic

Jesus embodies the entirety of the nonviolent morality as it relates to Judaism. It is in his life, death, and resurrect that he creates a new covenant, a better testament (Hebrews 8:6) through his obedience.  The New Covenant is a better one, not because of any principles are laws but simply because the Covenant has been made available to all nations for it was first to the Jew, but now to Jew and Gentile (John 4:22; Romans 1:16). The healing of the nations (Revelation 22:2) is part of the mission of God as well as the healing of the soul.  The incarnation and mission of the Logos points toward reconciliation God with humanity, as well as making possible a greater human fellowship.

1. Jesus as the Logos, or Word of God in many of the early Christians thinking was the Ten Words made Flesh or the Law Incarnate. Their understanding of John 1:1-18 was that God’s teaching had to take on a human body in order for God to teach human being holiness.  What the Patristics understood is that Jesus as revelation cannot be separated from understanding God disclosing God’s Will in the Decalogue.  When New Testament passages allude to the reality that all persons will confess Christ as Lord while every knee will bow, it does so because there is no other name by which human beings receive the gift of salvation (Philippians 2:10).  If one knows Jesus, one will know the God of peace, thus continuing the promise of the 2nd Commandment.  Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount in Matthew as well as his Sermon on the Hill in Luke are the re-iteration of the Ten Commandments as well as their Jubilee interpretations in Leviticus. These laws are not for a chosen few (ala Reinhold Niebuhr) but for everyone who wishes to follow the Lord Jesus.

2. Jesus as the Image of God is the norming norm for human behavior (Colossians 1:15). As fully God and fully human, Christ is what it means to be a person. As Yoder articulates quite well,

“When Paul spoke of Jesus as image, or when the author of Hebrews , or the signers of the hymn cited in Phillipians 2 used similar expressions, they were practicing the opposite of freewheeling image making.  They were affirming the abiding normativeness  of the work and owrds of the man Jesus as revelatory of God’s being and will.”

(1)

3. The Sacred Blood of Jesus: The author of 2nd Peter makes the death of Christ Jesus the reason for our righteousness, and because Jesus’s blood is sacred, we are called to a new life (much like Abel’s blood cried out for justice). Note that 2nd Peter 2:24 says that the two-fold reason for the death of the God-man is for human beings to turn from sin and live in cruciform holiness– both substitutionary atonement and moral exemplar. It is not an either/or when it comes to divine reconciliation. Jesus was victorious in his obedience, representing humanity and taking the punishment what we deserve; our act of worship should be the life of sacrifice, of self-giving, of living in humility, residing in solidarity with the crucified peoples of this world. In Romans 3 & 12, as well as Ephesians 5, the Pauline/pseudo-pauline theology stakes Christ’s atonement as the way of life for the believer. This includes the love of the enemy, mutual submission between husband and wife as well as employer and employee, and statesman and citizen.

4. Wars of the Holy One in the New Testament, i.e., Exorcisms: When one recognizes that it is not broken human beings who we are not struggling with, but what the Pauline/pseudo-pauline letter of Ephesians calls ‘the powers of this dark world” and evil from the heavenly realm, one must understand the testimony of the Gospels as they tell us of Jesus healing persons such as Legion [Mark 5; Luke 8] as well as other daemon-possessed persons as going to war. In fact, at the cross, Christ himself alludes to YHWH his Father as the YHWH Armies (Matthew 26:53). How God reigns is on the cross, and through suffering throughout creation. Christ fights our battles for us, and he has already conquered at his death and resurrection; God does not have a social strategy outside of these two events. Yoder puts it this way, “The church does not attack the powers; this Christ has done. [...] By existing, the church demonstrates that their rebellion has been vanquished.” (2) The Johannine literature, such as the Apocalypse (the revealing), purposefully depicts Jesus as a warrior king. Specifically, it is the crucified Christ whose very words function as the sword that conquers the rebellious powers (Rev 19:21. Waiting upon the Lord, trusting in Christ’s teaching (Rev 13:10) is the key to victory, and not any human tradition.

5. Diasporic Jewish Christianity: The New Testament authors understand Christian existence as one being in exile, foreign to the surrounding nations in which followers of the Way resided in. Paul places Christian citizenship in the realm of God (Phillipians 3:20). In the midst of living in the violent and oppressive “Pax” Romana, the NT writers wanted to emphasize that we are in the world, but not of it, and our actions should show likewise. Even Jesus said that the non-believers lover their friends and relatives, but He calls his disciples to love their enemies. The Cross, as the pinnacle of of God’s love for God’s enemies, is the model for Christians living among the nations. The Way of the Cross alienates Christians from the world. Sinful desires wage war against the exiled believer (1st Peter 2:11). It is within this mission while in exile ’til the New Creation comes that the Church is called to seek the peace of the city (Jeremiah 29:5-7).

For part 4 of this series, I will turn to the Just War theory and its use [or lack thereof ].

(1) John Howard Yoder. The War Of The Lamb: The Ethics of Nonviolence And Peacemaking. Editted by Glenn Stassen, Mark Thiessen Nation, and Matt Hamsher. Brazos Press, Grand Rapids Michigan, 2009, 168

(2) John Howard Yoder. The Politics of Jesus : Vicit Agnus Noster. 2nd ed. Grand Rapids, Mich.Carlisle, U.K.: Eerdmans ; Paternoster Press, 1994, 150.

Related articles

• The God of Peace, Part 2- Revelation: A Guest Post by Rod (simuliustusetpeccator.com)
• The God of Peace, Part 1- Some Groundrules : A Guest Post By Rod (simuliustusetpeccator.com)

Debunking The Myth that Christian Pacifists Are Allergic to the Old Testament

Part 1 of The God of Peace.

There is a popular belief that continues to be universal, unchallengeable truth in Christian circles: Christian pacifists run and hide from the Hebrew Bible because of the Holy Wars and violence. Not only is this a fallacy in the worst, it is quite untrue of myself. In the first place, as Christians, Christian pacifists and advocates of non-violence have a love of the Christian canon; if they did not, they would cease to call themselves Christians. That is what separates Christan non-violent artists from secular as well as other religious pacifists.

For example, Lisa Sowle Cahill, in her Love Your Enemies, on more than one ocassion, takes the liberty of questioning the pacifist Christian’s loyalty to the Jewish Bible. For example, her comments on pacifist and early Christian theologian Tertullian:

“The nature of that faith and life are defined in relation to Scripture, the New Testament taking precedence over the Old” (1)

“The primacy of the teaching of Jesus in regard to killing is developed in the context of Terullian’s polemics against Judaism, and by means of a distinction between the ‘old’ and the ‘new’ divine laws.” (2)

This dis-ingenuity continues in her analysis of the Alexandrian Fathers, as she typically subsumes Origen and Clement in the same boat.

“While the Alexandrian School did not deny the historical meaning of most biblical texts, it subordinated them to a high meaning. It was this freedom over against the literal sense to which the Antiochene exegetes reacted so negatively. However, the ability to transcend the literal sense without rejecting it allows interpreters such as Origen to retain the Old Testament while refuting the Jewish Tradition, which retained the Mosaic Law, and gnostic Christians who rejected the Old Testament because of its ostensible incompatibility with the New.” (3)

I reject Lisa Sowle Cahill’s view of the history of the Alexandrian Fathers, for she refuses to make the distinction between the Jewish Middle Platonism followed by Clement and the secular version adhered to by Origen. It is for this reason that Clement’s theology is more consistent with Jewish understandings of God and Scripture than Origen, and thus does not lend itself to supercessionism; the difference in understanding the varieties of Middle Platonisms is crucial when examining Alexandrian theology as I argue.

The strength of Augustine’s Just War theory, so it goes, is that it incorporates the story of the Hebrews into the narrative of the early Christians and thereby avoids the racial and religious violence of supercessionist Christendom.

The non-violent Christian ethic begins with the God of Peace (Judges 6:24). Now, I object to certain Christian theologians who would call upon “The Nonviolent God” without having their foundation being the Hebrew Bible, for to address God in this manner, without doing so, is to do linguistic violence upon God’s revelation, for upon revelation in the very notion of non-violence. We cannot address God as we please. Contrary to relativism or much constructive thinking that gets accepted as theology today, Christians are dependent upon revelation first. Our knowledge and wisdom is placed as limited and secondary, thus the notion of Sola/Prima Scriptura in Protestant/Eastern Orthodox communities. Nonviolence as it has been traditionally understood is grounded in the Ten Commandments, however, it does not simplistically begin with the 5th commandment, or Thou Shalt No Kill.  Reading the First Commandment as a call to faithfulness to YHWH alone, the second commandment initiates a non-violent religious response to the world order by teaching the Jew and the Christian how to communicate with God, for we cannot have a relationship with God on our own terms, for that would be the beginning of violence.  True peace is sustained by fellowship with the Godhead, by the Divinity’s playbook, or what we call covenant. Stanley Hauerwas and William Willimon comment on the Second Commandment:

“To be able to call God’s name entails moral obligation. Because we had to be told God’s name, we cannot make God mean anything that we want. God must reveal who “I AM” is through loving actions toward Israel and by the resurrection of Christ.  Revelation is the way we name our discovery that God has discovered  us.  God has chosen to come close to us, to be intimate, to reveal the “name that is above every name” (Phillipians 2:9) in order that we might joyfully witness to the whole world that we have not been left to our own devices.” (4)

In addition to the revelation of the Creator as well as the Ten Commandments, the Hebrew Bible provides a plethora of resources that I will briefly outline, with the help of John Howard Yoder:

A. The Imago Dei: Revert back to Genesis 1, and then chapter 9; all of humanity is found to be in the image of God before & after the “Fall.”  To argue that the somehow that image within us is lost, I would have to disagree for the lack of sufficient evidence posed in Scripture. Murder is prohibited because all people are stamped with the divine image (Genesis 9:6), and that image no one can measure for only God has rights over human life as Creator.

B. The Notion of Blood as Sacred: John Howard Yoder suggests that at the most, the idea that blood is sacred was an idea prior to Israel being placed in exile. The shedding of blood is wrong; thus Leviticus is quite graphic in detail about the consequences for eating the blood in the meat from animals (check Leviticus 19:26 & 1st Samuel 14:33). Eating blood is strictly forbidden–thus the Christian endorsement of the Twilight novels and movies comes into question (couldn’t help myself there). The blood is the life of the creature, and this includes humanity. (5)

C. A Close Reading of the Wars of the Holy One: Rather than label the crusades in the Hebrew Bible the Holy Wars, I prefer the Wars of the Holy One, particularly the Holy One of Israel.  It is a far more accurate label for biblical and theological reasons. One cannot generalize that the military efforts of modern society are compatible with the Ancient Israelites. In fact far from it! One does not see today that prophets are giving military instruction or doing espionage; what we see are professionals whose lives are geared toward the MILITARY-INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX. The wars of the Holy One have at their core, “Yahweh himself gives the victory. [...] [Victory is a miracle.]“(6).  Complete dependence upon God, the YHWH of Armies (Chad’s translation for YHWH Sabatoah) is what gives humanity the victory and not dependence upon chariots and horses (Psalm 20:7). Indeed this is exactly the reason why YHWH of Armies restricts the Israelite kings from warmongering and institutionalizing human enslavement (which, of course, YHWH’s word goes unheeded, thus, the Exile) like in Deuteronomy 17:14-20.

A concrete example from the biblical text that I ran into actually this morning during my devotional reading of Our Daily Bread was 2nd Kings 6: 8-22.  The YHWH of Armies has surrounding hosts around his prophet Elisha (verse 17), and rather than slaying his enemies the Aramean army, Elisha asks YHWH to strike them blind, as the prophet leads them into another city.  The king of Israel, being the power-monger that the monarchs tended to be, desired to kill (ahem, re: take credit away from YHWH of Armies) his enemies. Instead, Elijah advises the Israelites to feed their enemies (v 22)  The victory of fellowship is  far superior to the victory of the sword.

Note: Humanists may be offended by the Jewish and Christian God’s designation of YHWH of Armies but remember, it is far more violent to try to communicate with the divine on our terms outside God’s revelation.

D. Diasporic Judaism: Lastly, what I find most compelling  about Yoder’s reading of the Hebrew Bible is his understanding of the Jews mission within the Exile.  Along with the rejection of the Maccabees (as well as the Zealot model) as heretics since God, in the eyes of some, had not blessed their violent revolution, God’s command to God’s people to seek the peace of the city where they are sent (Jeremiah 29:5-7) for no longer is the divine activism of YHWH found in the centralized  location of  Judah, but throughout the world.  Ezra’s and Nehemiah’s restorationism in light of the prophets should be seen as a FAILURE theologically. (7)

For part 3, I shall look at Jesus, the apostles Paul and Peter, as well as the Johannine literature to observe their continuity with the Jewish non-violent tradition.

1.Lisa Sowle Cahill. Love Your Enemies: Discipleship, Pacifism, and Just War Theory. Fortress Press, Minneapolis, 1994. Page 48

2. Ditto. Page 45

3. Ditto. Page 49

4. Stanley Hauerwas & William Willimon. The Truth About God: The Ten Commandments in the Christian Life. Nashville, Abindgon Press, 1999. Page 42

5. John Howard Yoder. The War Of The Lamb: The Ethics of Nonviolence And Peacemaking. Editted by Glenn Stassen, Mark Thiessen Nation, and Matt Hamsher. Brazos Press, Grand Rapids Michigan, 2009. Page 74

6. Ditto. Page  69

7. Ditto. Page  72-73

Rejecting the Straw Pacifist

Greetings Simul Iustus et Peccator audience,

This is Rod from Political Jesus, and I know I have tested many a readers’ patience, but today I would like to start a short series on the Christian God as the God of Peace. At the invitation of this blog’s host, Craig, I would like to express my gratitude first and foremost. He was very generous in allowing me to share this space, Craig being a Just War Christian, and I being a Christian Pacifist.

My mission’s first task must be to eliminate the commonly held straw persons launched against pacifism, and for that I turn to Blue Collar Todd’s comments on Craig’s post last November.

“What are you going to if you are walking down the sidewalk and you see a man, maybe two, harassing a young girl, even starting to beat her. What is the pacifist solution? Seems like physically inserting oneself into the situation is called for and even violence in order to stop a woman from being beaten or worse. What if you see a gay man in the same situation. How are you going to show love in this situation? I would suggest that showing love to the oppressed person in both cases would require forceful intervention, bring the wrath on oneself, so the victim in question could get away, then you could apply turning the other cheek. Someone breaks into my house and threatens my wife and children, I will do whatever I need to defend them, showing that I love them by protecting them.”

BCT’s thought experiment is to challenge the presuppositions of a pacifist, who he believes, believes in inaction. The love of doing nothing, it is assumed, is nothing more than a mask of hatred towards the neighbor. However, it does not occur to BCT, that the so-called “thought experiment” in question is not without it’s flaws. One must ask, should Christian ethics begin with questions related to situations, and should these situations, in this case violence against an innocent victim be the prevailing norm for Christian responses? If so, what are the limitations? I would question the wisdom of such a situational approach to morality, for in the end, there is a slippery slope of anything goes that comes with if restrictions are not emplaced. For one thing, Christian pacifism is not the absolute moral rule of condemning all violence, for not all violence is the same. Rather, Christian pacifists, if they wish to be faithful to Scripture and tradition, believe that self-defense is a pre-supposition that most biblical authors hold. The problem is not defending oneself or others with non-lethal force; the problem is that the logic of self-defense is rolled out before any non-violent activity is considered. As for Blue Collar Todd’s thought experiment, I agree with John Howard Yoder in his response to Lisa Sowle Cahill’s text, Love Your Enemies: Discipleship, Pacifism, and Just War Theory: BCT’ s question is a loaded one, that ends up becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy to justify lethal violence without restrictions; in addition, BCT’s mode of decisionism/situational ethics refuses to see the difference in varying modes of self-giving, a cost-analysis that undervalues the breadth of reality; the depth of moral reality; as well as the length of moral reality (1). In short, Situational ethics that rely on imagined “cases” limit the moral options of the moral agent, ignoring many of the wide range of possibilities for the faithful Christian actors.

Which leads me to Blue Collar Todd’s (and not to target him, but this includes many other Christians who question Christian pacifism) real question that needs to be addressed:

“Why don’t you and Joel explain it to me. If you think pacifism is robust enough to confront evil in a way that stops it, then you should be able to deal with my thought experiment.”

I cannot speak for Joel, but in my next post, I will give the Christian pacifist answer of “confronting evil in a way that stops it” by examining the heart of Christian peacemaking: The Triune God.

1. John Howard Yoder. The War Of The Lamb: The Ethics of Nonviolence And Peacemaking. Editted by Glenn Stassen, Mark Thiessen Nation, and Matt Hamsher. Brazos Press, Grand Rapids Michigan, 2009. Page 120-121.