Margaret, You quote Spong, "Religion is always a very human creation."
A careful reading of the OT shows a God breaking through human perceptions of the Divine and challeging misappropriations. Spong continues: >Every religious tradition >participates in and is shaped by cultural factors, time-bound understandings >of the world of nature, and prevailing tribal prejudices." Agreed. But then he goes on to say: >Nothing >illustrates this better than a look into the origins of both Hanukkah and >Christmas and especially at how these celebrations were placed into the >calendars of the western world when daylight was in short supply. Both >holidays play on the theme of the restoration of light in a darkened world. >Both reveal in these realities that they are the product of people living in >the northern hemisphere... > >...Hanukkah was not a Torah festival. [So what?] >...It rather developed late in Jewish >history, coming into the cycle of liturgical observances no earlier than the >second century B.C.E. It was designed to celebrate the time when a military >leader named Judas, nicknamed "The Hammer" [or Maccabeas in Hebrew], routed >the Syrian king Antiochus Epiphanes, driving his army out of their land. In >that process the Jews reclaimed their sacred Temple in Jerusalem and >restored to it the "true worship of Yahweh." > >The Syrians, showing utter contempt for this conquered nation, had >desecrated the Temple in Jerusalem by replacing the sacred symbols of the >Jews with pagan ones. In the Holy of Holies, regarded by the Jews as the >very dwelling place of God, the Syrians had placed the head of an unclean >pig that the Jews referred to as "the Abomination of Desolation." > >When Judas Maccabeas and his victorious rag-tag army of guerilla fighters >entered the city in triumph, they went immediately to the Temple. Stripping >away the offending images, they restored the Star of David, cleansed the >'holy of holies' and rededicated their Temple to its sacred purposes. Then, >the tradition states, Judas lit the eight-branched candelabra called the >Menorah to initiate a time of great celebration and enjoined upon the Jews >in every succeeding generation a proper remembrance of this moment. These >candles, the story suggests, burned miraculously for eight days. In the >minds of the Jewish faithful this act not only restored light to a dark time >in their history, but it also replaced idolatry with true faith. That was >what Hanukkah celebrated. ...and I think that that was certainly something to celebrate! > >For Christians, the great festival that interrupts the darkness of human >history is called Christmas, that in the old tradition lasted from Dec. 25 >to Jan. 6. This 12-day celebration was designed to recall the birth of Jesus >who, the Christian faith system asserted, came to be called "the light of >the world." These nativity narratives, created by second-generation >Christians, provided the content for this observance. > >In the earliest birth story of Jesus, written by Matthew (1 and 2) somewhere >between the years 80-85, the primary symbol of light was a star--bright, >radiant and beautiful--that illumined the darkness of the night. This star >was said to have had the power to guide Magi through that darkness to the >birthplace of this newborn savior in Bethlehem. > >In Luke's account of Jesus' birth (1 and 2), written sometime between the >years 88-92, the light symbol was not a star but a resplendent angel >accompanied by a heavenly host, who cracked the midnight sky with heavenly >brightness. To shepherds recoiling before this unearthly light, the >tradition said that the angels announced the birth of Jesus, the "true >light," who "came down from heaven." > >Historical records from that period of time are scant, and no one today can >date with precision either the date of the defeat of Antiochus by Judas >Maccabeas or the actual time of the birth of Jesus. That did not stop either >tradition, however, from locating their celebrations in the dead of winter. >That choice was not designed to coincide with literal history, but to meet a >deep and ancient human yearning that antedates by thousands of years both >Judaism and Christianity. > >As far back as human records go, it is clear that people in the northern >hemisphere have observed with acts of worship that moment when the daylight >stopped its relentless retreat into darkness and began its march back into >the world. That human yearning for light to come to a dark world shaped both >Hanukkah and Christmas. Indeed it captured them. That is why both >celebrations are located in the darkest month of the year, Kislev in the >Jewish calendar and December in the Western calendar. > >Modern people have difficulty imagining the fears of our primitive human >ancestors. We live today in an artificially lighted world. We can hurl back >the darkness of night with the flip of a switch. We can travel in darkness >far from home by turning on the headlights of our automobiles, or by >utilizing the lights marking the landing fields of our airports. We live in >cities with electrified streets and neon signboards. Still, I don't think we've discarded the metaphor of light, which I believe is the most powerful metaphor we have... > >For our ancestors, however, the only light of night was provided by the moon >and the stars. When the moon faded each month into a total blackout the >darkness of night was illumined only by the distant twinkling stars. When >clouds made the stars invisible, the darkness was total. With darkness came >danger and fear. The darkness was inhabited, it was suggested, by "ghosties >and ghoulies and things that go bump in the night." ... and much more than a metaphor, if we examine all the references to light in the New Testament. And we don't have to live in the northern hemisphere to appreciate the metaphor. I still can't sing 'O Little Town Of Bethlehem' without recalling my 3rd grade nativity play, where a chorus of 'angels' - not I - began singing it on a completely darkened stage, that was gradually and meaningfully illuminated. Why are 'Carols by Candlelight' so popular, even where it means starting late enough to ensure darkness? I remember, in 1999, seeing on Indonesian TV, scenes of a devastated Dili in an early morning light that powerfully symbolised hope in a clash between good and evil. >The relatively recent human ability first to capture fire and later actually >to ignite it, was a gigantic step in the quest to defeat the >always-threatening darkness. The vast majority of the human beings who have >inhabited this earth lived with the presence of an unconquered and >unrelieved darkness. > >When one further embraces the fact that people in the ancient world did not >understand the relationship between the heavenly bodies and the earth, it is >easy to understand why mythology and ritualistic acts were wrapped around >these mysterious natural wonders. Modern men and women deal with these >realities in a quite secular manner. We manipulate our clocks with various >time zones and with something we call 'daylight savings time.' We anticipate >and name the shortest day of the year as the winter solstice. We understand >that the earth rotates on its axis as it journeys around the sun every 365 >1/4 days. We know the months when we are closer to the sun and the months >when we are farther away. None of this, however, was known by our forebears. >They only knew that the sun seemed to retreat into darkness as the winter >came. They wondered why, and they speculated about this observable >phenomenon using a wide variety of religious explanations. They lived with a >chronic fear that one year the enveloping darkness that came each winter >might finally capture the light of the sun forever and thus doom their lives >to be lived without any light at all. > >For this reason in almost every human culture there was a great religious >celebration when the sun stopped its relentless retreat into an ever >enveloping-darkness and began its slow but steady return. Both Hanukkah and >Christmas became later historical expressions of this ancient celebration. >They thus reveal their northern hemisphere, and obviously human origins. > >It is time to recognize that religious truth, like all truth, can only >emerge out of human experience. Once that is understood, then religious >people will recognize that their exclusive claims to possess some external, >divine revelation is nothing but a part of our human security system. These >claims also create the mentality that fuels that religious imperialism that, >even in the 21st century, underlies human conflict. I agree with Spong only insofar as it is wrong to believe that we can 'possess' the truth. Surely the Old Testament teaches *that*, and the NT reveals to us Jesus who *is* the Truth. It is not about possessing the Truth but coming into relationship with Him who is the Truth. > >The only way for the Christmas yearning for peace on earth to be achieved is >for every religious system to face its human origins, and to recognize that >all worshipers are nothing but human seekers walking into the mystery and >wonder of the God, who is beyond anything that human minds can finally >imagine. That would represent a gigantic step both into a new sensitivity >and away from the negativity that religion perpetually pumps into the human >bloodstream. In our observances of Hanukkah and Christmas this year, that >could well be our most important learning. > >-- John Shelby Spong > Of course, there are many of us who would claim that Jesus did away with the need for 'religion'. I believe that the only hope for 'peace on earth' is for us to recognise that each and everyone of us is made in the image of God, but has a natural tendency to sin/rebel against God and that Jesus came to earth to resolve that issue and to give us a Way 'into the mystery and wonder of the God, who is beyond anything that human minds can ...imagine'. > "But wait, there's more!" > >Question And Answer >With John Shelby Spong > >Stephen from Westmere, Australia asks: > >If, as you say, the stories of Jesus' miraculous birth are pious legends, >what are the implications for staging a children's Christmas pageant in a >small suburban church? > >Dear Stephen: > >There is no reputable New Testament scholar in the world today, either >Catholic or protestant, who regards the birth stories of Matthew and Luke as >history. I say reputable because there are a few evangelical fundamentalists >and pre-Vatican II Roman Catholics who have not yet caught up with the last >150 years of biblical scholarship. [Here's an example of Spong's 'tolerance'. All ways lead to God unless they're 'evangelical fundamentalist'!] > >Does that mean, however, that these beautiful stories have no eternal value? >Of course not! They are great narratives and our lives would be considerably >poorer without those shepherds and wise men, the manger and swaddling >clothes, the star in the East and the angelic chorus. These stories are >filled with interpretative meaning but they were never written to be >understood literally. The star to announce the birth of a special life had a >long history in Jewish piety. The story of the Wise Men was based on Isaiah >60. The story of Joseph, the earthly father of Jesus is based on the story >of Joseph the patriarch from Genesis 37:50. The swaddling clothes came out >of the apocryphal book of the Wisdom of Solomon. The manger is from Isaiah >1:3. The story of Zechariah and Elizabeth having John the Baptist in their >old age is a retelling of the Abraham and Sarah story from Genesis 15 to 34. >We could go on and on. I developed all of these connections in a book >entitled, "Born of a Woman: A Bishop Rethinks the Virgin Birth and the Place >of Women in a Male-Dominated Church." > >Does that mean when we learn that these stories are interpretative legends >we discard them? I certainly do not. Our home has several cr�che scenes on >display every holiday season and we normally attend at least one Christmas >pageant a year. > >The meaning of these stories is that in the adult Jesus, people believed >that they had experienced the presence of the Holy God. That moment was so >transforming that when they wrote it they said things like "the heavens >rejoiced at his birth." >Why cannot those themes be acted out in pageantry >without telling the children that they are literally so. The great myth of >Santa Claus/Kris Kringle does not disappear when children learn that no >literal elf lives at the literal North Pole. The power of the Christ is >likewise not diminished when the miraculous story of his birth is recognized >as an interpretative myth. I've taught my children and others that the nativity - as a story of the Incarnation - is on a totally different plane from Santa Claus! > >So enjoy the holidays and welcome the birth of the one many of us >acknowledge as our gateway into all that God means. > >-- John Shelby Spong > >PS I guess it depends on who you are. Last week the Essay was about the >attitude of the Bible towards women. At least the Uniting Church, from its >beginning has not officially precluded women from any office but it takes a >while for all men to accept that. It is OK for those who 'fit the formula' >to agree with the writings (attitudes) of 2000 years ago, but if you don't >fit the formula you are expected to be content with being a second-class >citizen. In the case of homosexuals, even if they know that they have not >'chosen' to be who they are, they are expected to live a lie or to spend >their lives without the support, comfort and love of another person because >those who fit the formula say that those who wrote 2000 years ago have the >final say. >There are exceptions of course. They are happy to receive or pay interest, >they don't agree with slavery, they can enjoy prawns or ham - especially at >Christmas. It is just that they have a bit of trouble with loving their >neighbours. This is a strawman argument, as there would be very *very* few in the UC who would claim that we are not expected to love our neighbours, including G&L!!! To use the 'slavery, interest, prawn and ham' argument is not in any way going to help foster the prayerful, Bible- searching discussion we're meant to be having! >"Live fully, love wastefully and be all that it is possible for you to be" >Margaret "But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin." 1 John 1: 7 Sue Sue Bolton Sydney, Australia ------------------------------------------------------ - You are subscribed to the mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] - To unsubscribe, email [EMAIL PROTECTED] and put in the message body 'unsubscribe insights-l' (ell, not one (1)) See: http://nsw.uca.org.au/insights-l-information.htm ------------------------------------------------------
