Jesus or Caesar?
The whole of the Hebrew Bible is written from the perspective of kingdom—and a very literal kingdom at that. For Israel, the kingdom is Jerusalem, “The city of God”. That is the purpose of Israel’s existence, to carve out a city at the center of the world as a homeland, placing God’s people at the juncture between Africa, Asia and Europe—a light shining to the four corners of the earth. One with all of the benefits of wealth and power that accrued as the result of controlling the land that connected the great super powers of the Mediterranean world.
It is the story of how one people alone came to know the identity of the one true God. And how he formed a contract they became wealthy and powerful, and then, blew it.
The Prophets reflect this and express it as Israel’s downfall. As their wealth and power increased they became worse than Sodom and Gomorrah, ignoring the widow, orphan and becoming hostile to the stranger. Since Israel began their life as “The Stranger” relying on the graciousness of host cultures to survive, they were all the more guilty.
The story of Jonah, in my opinion, is about Israel's failure to act as a light guiding men to the one true God. Jesus adopts the image of Jonah and its symbolism. Jonah is Israel metaphorically.
From that perspective, government and God are an inseparable part of Hebrew thought; God is Israel’s intended king, with Jerusalem as the “City of God” and “Solomon’s Temple” as the “House of God”. The way in which the Jews appear to tell the story is overlaid with religious symbolism and meaning. This, I think, would be perfectly natural for a pre-scientific culture. That religious experience; dreams, visions, revelations etc. are an expression and an outgrowth of their worldview, would seem natural.
Muslim culture today, and even much current Evangelical thinking reflect a similar phenomenon. Why should we read early Christianity differently? The way in which our minds organize thought is universal, not specific to a religion or people. Jesus is the true Son of God, not Caesar. The way in which the earliest Christians talk about Jesus is a response to the idea of The Kingdom of God being applied to Rome and Caesar, instead of Israel and Yahweh.
For the early Church Jesus would be the fulfillment of the promise to Abraham. Moses and David build God's kingdom in Jerusalem and Jesus' teaching replaces and fulfills the Old Covenant, which would then be extended to the ends of the earth. That this literally happens is the extraordinary thing, if not exactly, it's very close. As we look in the rearview mirror of history we can see the truthfulness of it.
It would appear that we've tended to read very literally what might not be literal at all (scripture). Perhaps, the result of a post enlightenment culture separating politics and religion, reason and revelation. It may be a problem of semantics and the specificity of thought, or, of thinking in terms of categories, instead of a more fluid, interconnected perspective.
If a modern American Evangelical had a dream or vision of God speaking through amber waves of grain with an eagle as a symbol of God's spirit it would be understandable. And, I'd bet you could find a whole lot of this kind of symbolism in their writing and preaching.
What distinguishes Jesus and the Jews from other religions is three thousand years of revelation and writing fulfilled--a paper trail, as it were, written contemporaneously with the events being reported, relatively speaking that is. If not exactly the way in which we've been taught to think about the fulfillment of scripture, fulfillment nonetheless.
A good portion of humanity lives at the heart of this moral paradigm every day, reflecting a Jewish-Christian worldview, the atheist, Hindu, Buddhist and Muslim included, whether they wish to or not.
God's Kingdom is, in that sense, being built daily, if not in heaven (The realm above the clouds), then heaven on earth, just as Jesus and the Jews actually taught. From this perspective Jesus is a very real and Jewish Messiah. The language and iconography of the 1st century world (Caesar as god) as it was adopted by the early Christians has gotten in the way as Greek and Roman symbolism effected Jewish thought and writing.
How do we separate Jewish thought from the influence of Greek culture or the greater influence of ancient Near Eastern traditions ? With Trinitarian doctrines of heaven and hell and a reimaging of “Kingdom” according to a growing Greco/Roman/Europeanization that has impacted all scripture and interpretation. This would be true of the "Old" as well as New Testament. Meaning that, dreams and revelations are an extension of personal experience and shaped by the larger culture. Our search for the truth would not be in the revelatory language alone, but, in the cultural influences that undergird the language. They would seem to provide the pathway, the connections for thought—using the sword of the Spirit with its double edged precision to make our cut.
Scholars such as yourself and scientists are actively engaged in this process. And, thank God for that. It is, in my estimation, the meeting of metaphor and the very specific nature of the scientific method that you and others like you offer the rest of us an ever clearer image. Science provides the clarifying contrast, like dialing in an image on a TV, and metaphor provides the poetry of life, the greater truth beneath the facts.
Feel free not to respond, believe me, I understand, but, I had to get this off my chest—and having an esteemed audience has forced me to organize my thoughts. Hopefully they have been sufficiently organized to be understood.
It is the story of how one people alone came to know the identity of the one true God. And how he formed a contract they became wealthy and powerful, and then, blew it.
The Prophets reflect this and express it as Israel’s downfall. As their wealth and power increased they became worse than Sodom and Gomorrah, ignoring the widow, orphan and becoming hostile to the stranger. Since Israel began their life as “The Stranger” relying on the graciousness of host cultures to survive, they were all the more guilty.
The story of Jonah, in my opinion, is about Israel's failure to act as a light guiding men to the one true God. Jesus adopts the image of Jonah and its symbolism. Jonah is Israel metaphorically.
From that perspective, government and God are an inseparable part of Hebrew thought; God is Israel’s intended king, with Jerusalem as the “City of God” and “Solomon’s Temple” as the “House of God”. The way in which the Jews appear to tell the story is overlaid with religious symbolism and meaning. This, I think, would be perfectly natural for a pre-scientific culture. That religious experience; dreams, visions, revelations etc. are an expression and an outgrowth of their worldview, would seem natural.
Muslim culture today, and even much current Evangelical thinking reflect a similar phenomenon. Why should we read early Christianity differently? The way in which our minds organize thought is universal, not specific to a religion or people. Jesus is the true Son of God, not Caesar. The way in which the earliest Christians talk about Jesus is a response to the idea of The Kingdom of God being applied to Rome and Caesar, instead of Israel and Yahweh.
For the early Church Jesus would be the fulfillment of the promise to Abraham. Moses and David build God's kingdom in Jerusalem and Jesus' teaching replaces and fulfills the Old Covenant, which would then be extended to the ends of the earth. That this literally happens is the extraordinary thing, if not exactly, it's very close. As we look in the rearview mirror of history we can see the truthfulness of it.
It would appear that we've tended to read very literally what might not be literal at all (scripture). Perhaps, the result of a post enlightenment culture separating politics and religion, reason and revelation. It may be a problem of semantics and the specificity of thought, or, of thinking in terms of categories, instead of a more fluid, interconnected perspective.
If a modern American Evangelical had a dream or vision of God speaking through amber waves of grain with an eagle as a symbol of God's spirit it would be understandable. And, I'd bet you could find a whole lot of this kind of symbolism in their writing and preaching.
What distinguishes Jesus and the Jews from other religions is three thousand years of revelation and writing fulfilled--a paper trail, as it were, written contemporaneously with the events being reported, relatively speaking that is. If not exactly the way in which we've been taught to think about the fulfillment of scripture, fulfillment nonetheless.
A good portion of humanity lives at the heart of this moral paradigm every day, reflecting a Jewish-Christian worldview, the atheist, Hindu, Buddhist and Muslim included, whether they wish to or not.
God's Kingdom is, in that sense, being built daily, if not in heaven (The realm above the clouds), then heaven on earth, just as Jesus and the Jews actually taught. From this perspective Jesus is a very real and Jewish Messiah. The language and iconography of the 1st century world (Caesar as god) as it was adopted by the early Christians has gotten in the way as Greek and Roman symbolism effected Jewish thought and writing.
How do we separate Jewish thought from the influence of Greek culture or the greater influence of ancient Near Eastern traditions ? With Trinitarian doctrines of heaven and hell and a reimaging of “Kingdom” according to a growing Greco/Roman/Europeanization that has impacted all scripture and interpretation. This would be true of the "Old" as well as New Testament. Meaning that, dreams and revelations are an extension of personal experience and shaped by the larger culture. Our search for the truth would not be in the revelatory language alone, but, in the cultural influences that undergird the language. They would seem to provide the pathway, the connections for thought—using the sword of the Spirit with its double edged precision to make our cut.
Scholars such as yourself and scientists are actively engaged in this process. And, thank God for that. It is, in my estimation, the meeting of metaphor and the very specific nature of the scientific method that you and others like you offer the rest of us an ever clearer image. Science provides the clarifying contrast, like dialing in an image on a TV, and metaphor provides the poetry of life, the greater truth beneath the facts.
Feel free not to respond, believe me, I understand, but, I had to get this off my chest—and having an esteemed audience has forced me to organize my thoughts. Hopefully they have been sufficiently organized to be understood.