Antiquitopia

I had a student who raised a question when studying the Gospel of Judas—whether or not Judas had any relation to Secret Mark.   The reason is that they both turn a distinctive phrase:   “mystery/mysteries of the kingdom.”   I appreciated the thought, and I had no answer at the moment, except that most scholars shy away from using Secret Mark in their reconstructions these days, given all of the speculation about it possibly being a modern forgery perpetrated by its discoverer, Morton Smith.   I, nonetheless, had an itch in the back of my head to look back into the synoptic Gospels—if for no other reason than Secret Mark’s vocabulary and phrasing is rarely, if ever, distinctive (indeed, one of the arguments for it being forged is that it overuses typical vocabulary of Mark).   So, I turned to the synoptics, and, interestingly, they rarely use the phrase.   “Mystery” and “Mysteries” may show up, and “kingdom” is all over the place, but ...

James McGrath has a great posting of a cartoon, which he in turn picked up from someone else. I just had to repost it here, let it make its way through the blogosphere. This gets back to my posts from last year on Luke and Biblical Redistribution of Wealth. Just hit the tag on "Socialism and the Bible" to revisit those posts.

"The Kingdom Of Heaven" A suffering soul on the way to the Kingdom of Heaven Held up a sign that says "God hates America" A child has been lost A mother is shocked and is grieving And turning away, turning away He said there is a love that is so hideous and destructive We must drive it from Earth to save all of our children He must know it well In the night it's the hell that he speaks of It keeps him awake, keeps him awake My God is love My God is peace My God loves you My God loves me A suffering soul on the way to the Kingdom of Heaven Prayed in the dark, "Death to the infidel" He strapped all his desperate pain and his faith to his body And blew them away, blew them away A suffering soul on the way to the Kingdom of Heaven Shouts on the news, "They are the godless ones" The anger inside and the fear that it hides never leave her When the cameras are gone, when the cameras move on Oh, people, c'mon? tell me where is your Kingdom of Hea...

In the previous post, having established a trajectory of economic redistribution in Luke-Acts (John the Baptist-->Jesus-->early Jerusalem community), some of Luke's alterations and absences make more sense. Although reading absences is often dangerous, having Luke's source (Mark) and comparing alternative versions of the same saying (Matthew) puts us on a bit safer methodological grounds. Although many out there like to read absences anyway. One of the most famous alterations of shifts is in Luke's version of the Beatitudes. So, while Matthew has Jesus say, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven" (Matt. 5:3) Luke has Jesus say, "Blessed are you poor, for yours is the kingdom of God" (Luke 6:20). Matthew follows the contemporary Jewish circumlocution in order to avoid saying "God" and instead says "heaven." But the more important shift, for the present purposes, is that Matthew writes "poo...

When reading Luke-Acts as a whole, one begins to see a certain trajectory. We begin with John the Baptist saying: He who has two coats, let him share with him who has none; and he who has food, let him do likewise." Tax collectors also came to be baptized, and said to him, "Teacher what shall we do?" And he said to them, "Collect no more than is appointed you." (Luke 3:11-13) You can see some of these same issues unfold with Jesus. The first part can be found in Jesus' commands to his disciples when he sends them out: Take nothing for your journey, no staff, nor bag, nor bread, nor money; and do not have two tunics. (Luke 9:3) In addition to keeping only one garment, the tax collector issue also shows up throughout. Jesus mingles with tax ocllectors, but more poignantly, the passage concerning Zacchaeus, the tax collector who does not cheat anyone and does not make them pay more than appointed, stands out as a good example (19:1-10). For the almost i...

It has been a long time since I have posted on Lukan economics; you know, the whole redistribution of wealth in which one must sell everything one owns and give the proceeds to the poor in order to enter the Kingdom of God and/or to follow Jesus. One difficulty (although not the only one) that was raised when speaking of this to others at Columbia, whether other instructors, my students, or in general, is that it gives a certain authority to the rich nonetheless. In other words, only the rich have the opportunity to sell all they own and give the proceeds to the poor. This observation may be counteracted with the discussion of Lazarus and the rich man, in which Lazarus who has nothing, at death goes to Abraham's bosom, while the rich man suffers torment. Another rebuttal might be the following passage in Luke 21:1-4: He looked up and saw the rich putting their gifts into the treasury; and he saw a poor widow put in two copper coins. And he said, "Truly I tell you, this poo...

It has been a while since I have posted in this ongoing series on the biblical socialism of Jesus and the Jerusalem Church as presented by or produced by Luke-Acts. Yet now I want to look at a slight digression. While Zacchaeus seemed a departure, but ended up being more of a compromise to illustrate a larger point as well as a clear breakdown in logical consequences of Zacchaeus's actions--that he could not become rich by the actions he took--today I would like to look at a another passage about taxes that may present a challenge: the "render unto Caesar" passage of Luke 20:21-26. So they asked him, "Teacher, we know that you are right in what you say and teach, and you show deference to no one, but teach the way of God in accordance with truth. Is it lawful for us to pay taxes to the emperor, or not? But he perceived their craftiness and said to them, "Show me a denarius. Whose head and whose title does it bear?" They said, "The emperor's....

I have really enjoyed reading the comments to my series about the Socialism of the Bible, particularly focusing on Luke-Acts. In fact, I usually just do not receive this much attention...perhaps that's why I have continued to post on it. Vanity, Vanity, all is Vanity. Anyway, I am hoping all of this posting will lay the preliminary study to something more systematic in the future. I do not really think, at least in these posts, that I am saying anything new or original. Perhaps something lost or intermittently forgotten. In fact, it is interesting to note among the more positive responses to my postings, the backgrounds of people who have posted have ranged quite a bit: youth pastor in what seems to be a more conservative or at least moderate church (correct me if I'm wrong), a Christian who is trying to create the communist vision of Jesus on earth, and, although not responding here, I have been pointed to other scholars saying similar things in these passages and other ...

So...now were are up to the sixth installment of biblical socialism, or, to be more accurate, the question of biblical socialism in Luke-Acts. Until now, we have seen a rather radical redistribution of wealth by Jesus (and in Acts) in which to follow Jesus and ultimately enter into the kingdom of God (or to create the kingdom of God), one must sell everything and give all of the proceeds to the poor. In Acts, this shifts to giving all the proceeds to the community, a clearer version of communalism rather than merely radical redistribution of Jesus (which presumably included any poor person, whether an insider or outsider). But now we come to a different story, the story of the tax collector Zacchaeus in Luke 19:2-10: And there was a man named Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector, and rich. And he sought to see who Jesus was, but could not, on account of the crowd, because he was small of stature. So he ran on ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree to see him, for he was to pas...

When I first made some notes regarding Jesus' economic redistribution program, I never thought I would continue to post on it. And, after four posts, I STILL have not discussed the story of the rich young ruler, which is perhaps the place where most people would start. It shows just how much material there is, just how radical this redistribution policy is...and, in fact, to a large degree how consistent: And a ruler said to him, "Good Teacher, waht shall I do to inherit eternal life?" And Jesus said to him, "Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. You know the commandments: 'Do not commit adultery, Do not kill, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Honor your father and mother.'" And he said, "All these I have observed from youth." And when Jesus heard it, he said to him, "One thing you still lack. Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me."...

Again, I'm all about the Gospel of Luke lately. And not for the reason I am using it on the blog to discuss Jesus' or Luke's economic radicalism. My reasons lie elsewhere. But, it should be little surprise that my quote of the day also derives from Luke: Being asked asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God is coming, he answered them, "The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed; nor will they say, 'Lo, here it is!' or 'There!' for behold, the kingdom of God is within you." That last bit can also be understood "in the midst of you," but I tend toward "within you." It fits, I think, the undermining of expectations. First Jesus undermines the expectation of when. It is not a when. It is not imminent. It is not in the future (or the past). Although we might say it is in the present. But neither is it a where. It is not here nor is it there. That is why I don't like "midst." I like it ...

This is still the same chapter as "part 3," but that post was getting long, so I thought I would be nice and break things up a bit. The second half of Luke 16, in fact, deals with economic issues. One might begin to think that Jesus (or Luke) is obsessed with relations between rich and poor, wealth, and, well, giving it all away. So, here is a famous story by Jesus about the rich man and Lazarus in Abraham's bosom: "There was a rich man, who was clothed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day. At at his gate lay a poor man named Lazarus, full of sores, who desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man's table; moreover the dogs came and licked his sores. The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham's bosom. The rich man also died and was buried; and in Hades, being in torment, he lifted up his eyes, and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus in his bosom. And he called out, 'Father Abraham, have mercy upon me, and...

Today's readings of Luke are a bit less clear. It may contravene the earlier statements by Jesus to sell everything and give to the poor, or, perhaps, the ambiguity in the passage itself may be illuminated or clarified by these earlier principles. First we begin with the story of the bad steward in Luke 16:1-13. "There was a rich man who had a steward, and charges were brought to him that htis man was wasting his goods. And he called him and said to him, 'What is this that I hear about you? Turn in the account of your stewardship, for you can no longer be steward.' And the steward said to himself, 'What shall I do, since my master is taking the stewardship away from me? I am not strong enough to dig, and I am ashamed to beg. I have decided what to do, so that people may receive me into their houses when I am put out of the stewardship.' So, summoning his master's debtors one by one, he said to the first, 'How mcuh do you owe my master?' He...

I should clarify that I think there is no single position in the Bible on economics...or anything else for that matter that I can think of off-hand. Unless ambivalence is a consistent position. Nonetheless, I was giving a midterm today and continued reading Luke while my students wrote their essays. And, again working through Luke, we this gospel's portrayal of Jesus' economic positions. Anticipating the communal living situation in Acts that I noted in my earlier post, which was made possible by everyone selling their property and giving it to the group so that everyone's needs would be met, we find this statement from Jesus: "Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions, and give alms; provide yourselves with purses that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys. For wherever your treasure is, there will your heart be also....

Here's a nice quote for today from a statement attributed to John the Baptist: "He who has two coats, let him share with him who has none; and he who has food, let him do likewise" (Luke 3:11; RSV). John the Baptist must be a socialist, at least by John McCain's loose definition, since he wants to redistribute the wealth! In fact, Luke-Acts (the Gospel of Luke and Acts of the Apostle were written by the same author) shows a lot of instances of communal living. See, for example, Acts 4:32-5:5: Now the company of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one said that any of the things which he possessed was his own, but they had everything in common. And with great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. There was not a needy person among them, for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought hte proceeds of what was sold and laid it at the apostles' f...

For today, one text I'm toying with for the New Testament Mysticism Seminar: When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. And he sent messengers ahead of him. On their way they entered a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him; but they did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. When his disciples James and John saw it, they said, ‘Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?’ But he turned and rebuked them. Then they went on to another village. (Luke 9:51-6; RSV) I don't know how many times I must have just read over this passage without stopping to realize that James and John, the sons of Zebedee (Sons of "Thunder"), say that they can bring down fire from heaven..."just as Elijah did" (as the most common ancient variant on this passage says). In the synoptic tradition, this passage has NO parallel. Later variants and commentators, such as Tertullian, sub...