From Chapter 1 of Instead of Atonement by Ted Grimsrud

• Grimsrud equates retribution with violence. "At the core of this 'logic' usually rests a commitment to the necessity of retribution; using violence is justified as the appropriate response to wrongdoing." (AK location 134)

• "We find it deeply ingrained in the religious consciousness of the United States the belief that retribution is God's will."

• "A theologically grounded 'logic of retribution' underlies rationales for using violence. In 'the logic of retribution,' when all is said and done, people understand God most fundamentally in terms of impersonal, inflexible holiness. They see God's law as the unchanging standard by which sin is measured, and believe God responds to violations of the law with justifiable violence." (AK location 145)

• "Within the logic of retribution, salvation (i.e., the restoration of harmony with God) is achieved as the result of violence." (AK location 179)

Why does the resurrection matter? What would have happened if God had not resurrected Jesus? What does the resurrection have to say about salvation? What is the logic of retribution?

Is the Easter story a story of what Jesus did and/or a story of what God did?

"Jesus apparently understood early on that his conflict with the religious leaders would move beyond the 'on the ground' differences with the Pharisees. Luke tells us that he proposed to 'turn to Jerusalem' (Luke 9:51) and that as he did so his language took on a more ominous tone." (AK location 4869)

"Jesus's words and actions, given the popular support he gathered, threatened to undercut the legitimacy of the temple among the Jewish population."

• "On a deeper level, for many Jews the temple did serve as the locus for God's presence among the people." (AK location 4881)

"The logic of retribution led the Powers of cultural exclusivism to seek to destroy Jesus (even if they were ultimately unable to do so). It, in turn, led the Powers of religious institutionalism actually to take steps to arrest Jesus, try him, and turn him over to the state for punishment. However, the Powers of political authoritarianism actually took the final step and used the state's ultimate tool of punishment to execute Jesus." (AK location 4911)

"The collaborative work of the Powers did eliminate Jesus. His counter-cultural movement that had sought a Torah-centered renewal of the way of mercy and shalom in Israel lay in ruins."

God Vindicates Jesus

• "Jesus's followers experienced his arrest and crucifixion as a devastating blow to their hopes and beliefs." Luke 24:21 they "had hoped he was the one to redeem Israel." (AK location 4922)

• "Though the story tells that Jesus alluded to resurrection when he discussed his likely death, it seems clear that no one actually understood him to mean his personal resurrection prior to the general resurrection at the end of time." (AK location 4935)

• "That is, the events of Easter Sunday took everyone by surprise." (AK location 4946)

• "To underscore that no one expected Jesus's personal resurrection at this point, we read of the women's absolute terror. Mark's gospel ends with this terror, as they flee from the empty tomb. (Mark 16:8)

• "This was not an anticipated characteristic of the Messiah, but came as a surprise to everyone." (AK location 4960)

• "The evidence suggests that by the time of Jesus, most Jews either believed in some form of resurrection or at least knew it as standard teaching. What surprised believers was that Jesus would have been resurrected immediately following his death, not that resurrection could happen."

• What does this all mean?

Jesus's Resurrection Vindicates His Life

• "First of all, and perhaps most fundamentally, when God raised Jesus from the tomb, against all expectations, God vindicated Jesus's life as fully reflective of God's will for humankind." (AK location 4974)

• "The message of healing justice that Jesus embodied is revealed to be a message from the heart of God through his vindication and affirmation."

• Jesus's basic strategy to bring salvation to the world included:

  • 1. He welcomed all people even across the boundary lines of the cultural exclusivists
  • 1. He reiterated the core message of Torah concerning God's mercy and human responsibility
  • 1. He directly challenged the Powers
  • 1. He simply proclaimed and demonstrated God's love

• What would have happened to the strategy if God did not resurrect Jesus?

  • His story would not have provided much hope

  • "Jesus's life, morally exemplary as it may have been, would not likely have been seen to reflect God's will for human beings by many people." (AK location 4989)

  • "Walk this path and you too will end up abandoned." (AK location 5001)

  • Recall what happened to the followers of John the Baptist after his execution

• "Due to God's unprecedented act of raising Jesus, the message that emerges from the story of his life is one of hope and empowerment, not defeat and despair." (AK location 5012)

• Jesus's followers "concluded that Jesus was the Messiah because of the way the resurrection validated his life."

Jesus's Resurrection Rebukes The Powers

• "When God raises Jesus from the dead, God not only endorses Jesus's way as God's way, but also rebukes the Powers that put Jesus to death." (AK location 5023)

• "Jesus's resurrection makes the point that his critique of those Powers for usurping God came not from some disaffected prophet railing against the status quo. Rather, Jesus's resurrection proves that Jesus's critique reflected the will of the God of the universe." (AK location 5036)

• "Each of these Powers, in their own way, claimed to represent God and thereby justified their demand for loyalty."

• "So, for Jesus not to stay dead serves to rebuke those forces that killed him. They were not all-powerful; more importantly, they actively rejected God's Son." (AK location 5068)

• "When it rebukes the Powers, Jesus's resurrection unmasks their use of the logic of retribution as antithetical to salvation. God does not operate in accord with the logic or retribution when God brings salvation to the world. Rather, the Powers operate according to this logic in trying to destroy the saving efforts of God." (AK location 5079)

• "Jesus's resurrection makes clear that salvation is rooted in God's deep, persevering love, not God's inviolable holiness and anger that must be appeased when holiness is violated." (AK location 5092)

Jesus's Resurrection Points to His Follower's Vocation

• "The purpose of God's gift of healing has from the time of Abraham and Sarah been to 'bless all the families of the earth. (Gen 12:3) The purpose of the exodus from Egypt was for the Hebrew people to mediate God's mercy to the world (Exod 19:6). The giving of the Commandments followed directly from God's mercy (Exod 20:2), for the purpose of guiding the people in merciful living. The very heart of the Levitical holiness code emphasizes the Hebrews' responsibility to care for each other, especially the vulnerable ones in their community, but also to love the outsiders in their midst. (Leviticus 19) (AK location 5120)

• "the purpose of salvation is not simply to bless the recipient; the purpose is to move the blessing out into the world."

• "the main implication is that because Jesus was raised, his followers are commissioned to go out into the world and share the good news of the presence of God's healing mercy."

  • "The Gospels say nothing along the lines of Jesus is risen, therefore you will be too." (AK location 5120)

• "Jesus's resurrection provides his followers with a vocation. This vocation links with the content of Jesus's life and teaching; the resurrection does not redirect the content of the message." (AK location 5131)

• Matthew 28:18-20

  • "It speaks of the main ramifications for his followers without any allusion to their own promised resurrection and eternal life (quite likely because this was already assumed by many Jews, especially those in the Pharisaic tradition; Jesus's own resurrection did not challenge that assumption)." (AK location 5143)

• "The primary meaning of Jesus's resurrection does not lie in the personal future of individuals after we die. The message is not, 'you too can have life after death.' Rather, what the story tells the believer is that God has a plan to transform the entire creation through the vocation of God's people -- and you are to be part of this task. Jesus is raised, so now get involved in blessing all the families of the earth." (AK location 5143)

  • Is this an easy thing to sell?

• "So the story links the resurrection inextricably with Jesus's life and teaching. Its meaning lies primarily in its reiteration that the content of Jesus's life does indeed reflect god's will for human beings and that the calling of Jesus's followers is to do as he did -- with the great likelihood of facing the same consequences.' (AK location 5155)

• One more piece of evidence, is the account in Acts of Paul's encounter with the risen Jesus

  • "the point is not that Paul now knows he will get to go to heaven after he dies (as a Pharisee, he already believed that); the point is that now Saul/Paul himself has a new vocation." (AK location 5167)

Jesus's Resurrection Reveals the Nature of Reality

• "The creator and sustainer of the universe is the one who brought Jesus back from the dead." (AK location 5180)

• "When the early Christians confess Jesus as Messiah, ... they affirm that Jesus's way is God's way, the way of the cosmos."

• "the revelation the resurrection gives makes clear that the universe (and God) have always been this way -- Jesus's resurrection simply makes this more clearer."

• "Jesus's resurrection, then, serves as a strong statement that the logic of retribution, based as it is on an understanding of God's holiness as inflexible, does not cohere with the nature of the cosmos."

• "The resurrection of Jesus confirms the argument in this book that the biblical portrayal of salvation provides a strong basis to reject the logic of retribution. Jesus lived and taught mercy, not retribution. When he did so, he alienated the Powers of his time to the point that they joined together in deadly retributive violence." (AK location 5204)

• "The holiness of God that transforms the world from brokenness to wholeness does so in that it heals, not that it punishes. This is the basis for our hope for wholeness."

"From Genesis through Revelation, all the biblical stories take place in the shadow of some sort of empire." (AK location 4266)

Contra Egypt

• "Out of fear of the proliferating Hebrew people who had resisted full assimilation into Egyptian society and its empire state-ideology, the Pharaoh acts against them." Exodus 1:10-11 (AK location 4279)

• "The story of the exodus exposes how Pharaoh clung to power. In the end, Pharaoh's stubbornness led to disaster for his empire and liberation for the Hebrew slaves." (AK location 4294)

• "The exodus testimony, 'this most radical of all of Israel's testimony about Yahweh,' verifies that the God of Israel is a relentless opponent of human oppression, even when the oppression is undertaken and sponsored by what appear to be legitimated powers." (AK location 4317)

Israel's Monarchy and the Critique of Empire

• "The tradition's hostility toward empire, reflected implicitly in the law codes providing for a decidedly non-empire-like social order, found overt expressions at a major crossroads in the story of the Hebrew community" (AK location 4317)

  • "in those days there was no king in Israel; all the people did what was right in their own eyes." Judges 21:25

• Samuel made his sons judges over Israel, but they did not follow his ways, took bribes and perverted justice.

• On top of this the Hebrews faced an external threat, an emerging regional empire of the Philistines.

• As a consequence, the elders of Israel sought a human king, like other nations. (1 Sam 8:5)

  • Feared losing their identity by being conquered by the Philistines

  • But becoming like other nations could also lead to the elimination of the covenant community

  • Samuel argued that there was a third option: continue to trust in Yahweh as your only king, maintain a distinct identity oriented around exodus and Torah, and Yahweh will see that the covenant promises remain viable.

  • Anti-empire argument; if Israel takes the human king route it would also become empire-like

  • The people refuse to listen to Samuel (1 Sam 8:19-20) so Yahweh instructs hi to relent and "set a king over them" (8:22)

• Deuteronomy establishes a kingship that is still subordinate to Torah. The king was to come from within the Israelite community, in other words one who had grown up observing Torah. (Deut 17:18-20)

• "The accounts that follow in 1 and 2 Kings almost all reflect the king's unwillingness to submit to Torah in this way." (AK location 4379)

• A rebellion of King Rehoboam's (Solomon's son) treatment of Jeroboam led to a split between the northern kingdom, Israel, and the southern kingdom, Judah.

  • Kings of both Judah and Israel turn toward idolatry, authoritarianism, corruption, and injustice.

  • The northern kingdom, Israel, falls to the Assyrian empire near the end of the eighth century BCE, and a 100 years latter Judah falls to the Babylonian empire.

• Outside of Israel kingship was a blessing of the gods. Within Israel, kingship was regarded as human rebellion. (AK location 4409)

The Hebrews Among the Empires

• Four large empires: Egypt, Assyria, Babylon and Persia

• Greece during the inter-testamental period

• Rome dominates the New Testament

Egypt

• The story of Solomon includes several allusions to Egypt. "Solomon made a marriage alliance with Pharaoh" (1 Kgs 3:1)

• "The irony that Solomon would marry into the Egyptian Empire's leadership class rings loudly when we remember Samuel's warning about the people, under their desired king, returning to slavery." (AK location 4428)

Assyria

• Located north of Israel.

• 2 Kings 17:5-23 gives the account of Assyria destroying Israel

• "Nahum joyfully proclaims the impending doom of Nineveh, the capital of Assyria, as due to Assyria's injustice and brutality." (AK location 4461)

• The book of Jonah, as mentioned earlier, centers on the capital of Assyria, Nineveh.

Babylon

• Nebuchadnezzar ruled the Babylonian Empire from 605 BCE to 562 BCE.

• Not long after Nebuchadnezzar's death, the Persians, led by Cyrus, replaced Babylon as the dominant empire

• "those were extraordinarily eventful years for the Hebrews, and the Babylonian Empire and Nebuchadnezzar loom large in biblical writings, down through the final book of the New Testament." (AK location 4478)

• "The role of Babylon in Israel's consciousness as the paradigmatic example of political authoritarianism may be seen in the use of "Babylon" in symbolic ways down through the writings of the New Testament." (AK location 4502)

  • In Revelation "Babylon symbolizes the brutalities and blasphemies of the Roman Empire

Persia

• Emerged mid-sixth century BCE under Cyrus

• Is presented in a more positive light than the other empires

• "The Persians evidently concluded that their purposes would be better served if they permitted their conquered nations a measure of self-determination. Perhaps this would provide for greater tax revenue and overall productivity in the occupied territories." (AK location 4515)

• "The positive impression the Old Testament gives of the Persian Empire in part stems from the likelihood that during this time most of the Hebrew Bible reached its final form." (AK location 4528)

• "The Persian period provides evidence that the covenant community was capable of survival apart from operating its own nation-state"

Roman Domination

• The greatest empire of the ancient world emerged in the second century BCE

• Rome appoints Herod "king of the Jews" and rules at behest of Rome from 37 BCE until his death at 4 BCE

• After Herod's death Rome divided his kingdom into thirds among his sons

  • Herod Antipas - Galilee and Perea (40 years)

  • Philip - Trachonitis and Iturea (40 years)

  • The third son, Archelaus, was given Judea, but he failed to maintain control and so Pontius Pilate was appointed governor of Judea

Jesus and Empire

• In Palestine of Jesus's day, society is divided into two groups:

  • The ruling class, including representatives of the Roman Empire

  • The second group included most everyone else, the peasants in the countryside and the vast majority of the population of Jerusalem

  • Jesus came from this second group and oriented his ministry towards them

• "When Jesus proclaimed the kingdom of God, he challenged the Pax Romana. He prayed for the coming of God's kingdom and expected it soon. He believed his own work would inaugurate this kingdom. He did not accept the empire's claims to bring the 'gospel' (good news) of peace. And he rejected the claims that the empire acts on behalf of God." (AK location 4590)

• "When seen in conjunction with his ministry as a whole, Jesus is in both cases presenting his politics as an alternative to Roman political authoritarianism in the here and now" (AK location 4615)

• "In Jesus's execution, two contradictory notions of peace meet head on." (AK location 4630)

  • Pax Romana (peace through violence) vs the non-violent Peace of Jesus

The Death of a Political Criminal

• "The central conflicts in Jesus's career occurred with the Jewish religious leaders, not the representatives of the Roman Empire." (AK location 4630) Yet it was Rome that crucified Jesus

• Crucifixion carried enormous symbolic weight

• The allegations of Jesus claiming to be king stand at the center of Pilate's concern when he faces Jesus.

  • Pilate asks, "Are you king of the Jews?"

  • Jesus replies, "My kingdom is not of this world."

  • What did Jesus mean? Did me mean to advocate only a purely spiritual "otherworldly" kingdom, or did he mean that his kingdom was not like the typical kingdoms of this world and as was known through the entire Biblical story?

• "Jesus was apolitical only if we understand 'politics' strictly as power politics, the politics of the sword. However, if we understand politics more generally to mean the way human beings order their social world, Jesus was political." (AK location 4669)

• Summary of last three chapters: (AK location 4705)

  • Jesus asserted the possibility of direct access to God. In doing so, he undercut the authority of the temple.

  • Jesus challenged the interpretations of the law that empowered the Pharisees. He advocated an approach to the law that placed the priority on mercy and justice, not on the legalistic focus on external regulations

  • Jesus rejected the Roman Empire at a basic level. He replaced a violent, debt-oriented way of seeing with a way that started with God's mercy.

The Legacy of Solomon's Temple

• Before Solomon built the temple at Jerusalem, worship was done in a number of sanctuaries, most prominently Shiloh, which was destroyed by the Philistines.

• Solomon's temple: 1 Kings 6-7

• "Solomon constructed the temple as a central element of his successful efforts to centralize the power of the king office in Israel." (AK location 3709)

• Solomon also implemented a system of tax districts

• "Under Solomon's administrative policies the concern for equitable distribution of economic resources reflected in the covenant law codes is displaced by an economics of privilege that begins to create sharp class divisions of wealth and poor within Israel." (AK location 3721)

• "The construction of the temple on 'Mount Zion' creates in Israel a tradition in tension with the prophetic/Torah tradition." (AK location 3731)

• "For Mosaic faith, Israel serves a transcendent God, not simply a God who supports Israel's interests whatever they may be." ... "With Solomon, God enters Israel's life at the beck and call of the king and his minions. The king's servants control access to God." (AK location 3745)

• "Israelites came to see the temple as evidence for God's support of Israel."

• "The prophets, at their most intense, portray the temple as being opposed to God." (AK location 3798)

  • Jeremiah 7 contains harsh words for the temple and its leaders. Jeremiah 7:9-11 (AK location 3808)

  • "In violent and daring ways, Ezekiel makes clear that all to which Yahweh has been committed is revocable." (AK location 3823)

The Second Temple

• Solomon's temple is destroyed in 587 BCE by the Bablyonian armies

• Most the Judean ruling class from Jerusalem is deported to Bablyon, then after the Persian Empire conquered the Bablyons the Jewish exiles were allowed to return to Palestine. The Persian's allowed the Israelites to rebuild the temple on a much more modest scale. (Ezra 1-2)

• This second temple was constructed under the leadership of Zerubbabel in the years 520-516 BCE

• Walter Brueggemann: "..a miracle wrought by the Judeans themselves. They were the only people in antiquity exiled from the homeland and national religion who maintained their religious and social identity in captivity." (AK location 3838)

• "That the elite of the empire approved the rebuilding of Israel's temple and its faith community indicates that they saw such efforts to serve the empire's purposes." (AK location 3853)

• In the years that followed, Jews exhibited various attitudes towards the second temple.

  • Beliefs linked with the first temple -- the temple as the dwelling place of God, unique in all the earth. Both Ezekiel and Zechariah seems to acknowledge this.

  • Others rooted in the story expressed more hostility toward the temple. "This more negative viewpoint found expression in the emergent apocalyptic expressions of faith that arose during the inter-testamental period." (AK location 3867)

The Temple in Jesus's Time

• "The temple housed the one Jewish altar on which the high priest performed the sacrificial rites of atonement once a year for the entire Jewish world." (AK location 3879)

  • Forgiveness of people's sins

• After the Romans gained control of Palestine, they established Herod as their client king. Herod embarked on an ambitions building project, expanding the temple greatly.

• "As many as 18,000 priests participated in the temple activities." (AK location 3892)

• The temple treasury functioned as a huge national bank. Devout Jews living beyond Palestine traveled to the temple three times a year to celebrate religions festivities.

  • Feast of Passover - deliverance from Egypt

  • Feast of Pentecost - thanks for the first fruits of the harvest

  • Feast of Tabernacles - gratitude for the completed harvest

• Day of Atonement

  • Holiday in autumn

  • High priest sacrificed a goat for his own sins and sent another one into the desert for the sins of the people.

  • Only the high priest, in purity, could part the curtains and enter the holy of holies in the very presence of God once a year on the Day of Atonement.

• The Sanhedrin, the final Jewish authority in religious, political, and civil matters, made their home at the temple, along with the high priest.

  • The high priest became the most powerful Jewish leader in relation to the occupying Roman leaders.

• The religious party that centered in Jerusalem and made up most of the Sanhedrin were known as the Sadducees.

  • The Sadducees rejected the oral tradition and professed skepticism about personal immortality, including the resurrection.

  • Generally came from the wealthy upper class

  • Accepted Roman occupation and cooperated in order to keep the temple viable

• "Unlike with Leviticus, for the temple in the first century sacrifice served as a means to connect with God that required the mediation of the religious institution whose wealth and power served the king's interests." (AK location 3949)

• "Sacrifice in Leviticus stems from an experience of God's mercy and serves the community as a whole, not only the power elite."

• "As a 'conservative,' that is, one who drew directly from the tradition of Moses as filtered through prophetic critique, Jesus ended up on a collision course with the temple hierarchy -- a course that exposed the true nature of religious institutionalism, its violence and subservience to political authoritarianism." (AK location 3949)

Jesus and the Temple

• "Jesus had a nuanced attitude toward the temple and its sacrificial system" (AK location 3960)

• He understood the sacrificial system as peripheral to the dynamics of salvation ("I desire mercy, not sacrifice," Matt 9:13 and 12:7 quoting Hos 6:6)

• The two birth accounts, in Matthew and Luke, give a mixed perspective on Jesus's relation with the temple.

• Luke tells of his parents dedicating him in the temple (Luke 2:21-40), their dedication frame as adherence 'to the law of Moses.' Encounter to old 'saints' Simeon and Anna, both who praise God when they see Jesus for God's work of salvation.

• "So, Luke presents Jesus coming from a devout family that observed temple rituals, and he shows that in the temple itself people are found who understand Jesus as an agent of God's saving work for the whole world." (AK location 3990)

• "The impression in Matthew's birth story is subtler. For one thing, Matthew does not actually mention the temple."

• Up until Jesus's final entry into Jerusalem, the temple plays a peripheral role in stories of Jesus's ministry. In particular, when Jesus pronounced people forgiven, he circumvented the temple's role in the process of dealing with sins.

Jesus's Conflict with Religious Institutionalism

• "The problem with the temple is that it has failed to be 'a house of prayer for all the nations.' Instead, the temple had become a center for religious exclusivism and economic exploitation." (AK location 4053)

• "For Mark's Gospel, there is a clear connection between Jesus being put to death and Jesus's conflict with the temple, Jerusalem's center of religious institutionalism" (AK location 4117)

• Mark 11:12-13:38

• Mark 13 begins with the foretelling of the destruction of the temple

• "Mark's treatment of the temple concludes in Mark 15:38. When Jesus died, 'the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom.' The torn 'curtain of the temple' juxtaposes Jesus and the temple as alternative places of divine presence. (AK location 4101)

• "In the end, though Jesus's death does not signal that the religious authorities were victorious. Jesus's death actually signifies the opposite. The temple curtain is torn. Jesus, even on the cross, fulfills what the temple was meant to and did not -- he engendered worship of God by Gentiles as well as Jews. The Gentile centurion confesses, 'surely this was God's son' (Mark 15:39)

• "So, in effect, the old temple must be torn down, and a new, open and inclusive temple based on Jesus himself must take its place." (AK location 4143)

• "Institutionalism stifles creativity. When institutional survival takes priority, then order, security, peace at all costs take precedence." (AK location 4143)

Cultural Exclusivism (Law)

• "I will argue that Jesus died because he challenged the main cultural and political Powers of his day -- the law, the temple, and the empire." (AK location 3156)

  • 1. he overtly critiqued the Powers
  • 1. he established alternative social practices that bypassed the Powers' domination

• Walter Wink: "The death of Jesus was not 'necessary' because God needed Jesus killed in order to save the world. Rather, Jesus was killed because the Powers are in rebellion against God and are determined to silence anyone who slips through their barbed-wire perimeter with a message from the sovereign of the universe." (AK location 3169)

• Disagreement with the Pharisees over how to best understand and apply the law.

• Jesus recognized that the temple had not been part of Mose's original mediation of God's will for God's people. Recognized how it was being used to exploit the Hebrew people.

• The conflict with the empire seems indirect, but "if we take seriously Jesus's message of God's kingdom, we will recognize that he articulated a vision for social life that overturned the values of empire." (AK location 3191)

Torah and Cultural Exclusivism

• "The post-exilic existence of the Jewish people was always uneasy, a struggle to sustain their identity without being a nation-state." (AK location 3249)

• Out of this struggle came strategies to maintain identity with the establishment of "boundary markers" to make clear who was in the community and who was not.

  • Male circumcision

  • Kosher eating habits

  • Observing the Sabbath

  • Prohibiting marriages between those who were in the community and those who were not in the community.

• "In the prophet's view, when boundary markers reminded people of God's already given mercy and their calling to bless the nations, they would be creative and life-sustaining." BUT "They could be absolutized, seen to provide a sense that our community's survival in and of itself matters most." (AK location 3269)

• Jonah is believed to be written at about the same time as Ezra. Ezra and Nehmiah portray sympathetically the necessary and creative efforts to sustain peoplehood in the context of colonialism.

  • Grimsrud says the tensions between Ezra and Nehemiah versus Jonah prefigure the tensions we see in the Gospels between Jesus and the Pharisees.

  • Jonah is likely intended to challenge an uncritical tendency to absolutize the boundary markers

  • "The character of Jonah echoes the mindset of Hebrews who think only of their internal life when he rejects the call to share the word of God with outsiders." (AK location 3279)

  • Not just any outsiders, but the Ninevites lived in the capital city of Assyria, the great empire that plagued Israel and Judah

  • God is way bigger than the boundaries of Israel

  • "This story reiterates the 'light-to-the-nations' calling and implies that efforts to sustain the community still need to keep that calling in mind." (AK location 3290)

  • Jonah concludes with an open question: "Should I not be concerned about that great city?" We are not given Jonah's answer.

The Traditions of the Pharisees

• Jesus did not affirm the Pharisees' use of the oral law. The Pharisees gave more authority to traditional interpretations that sought to apply Torah more widely.

• After the Bablyonian exile, the Jewish community sought more faithfulness to Torah. A verse-by-verse commentary known as Midrash was developed.

  • Midrash applied specific laws more directly

  • Midrash was passed on by word of mouth over generations, hence "oral law"

• A second type of oral law emerged about 200 years before Jesus

  • This second type, the Mishnah, concerned itself with applying Torah to circumstances not spoken of in the biblical writings.

  • A written version of the Mishnah, called the Talmud, was not produced until the 4th century CE.

  • The Mishnah also came to be called the oral law, or as in Mark 7:5 the "tradition of the elders."

• "The Pharisees probably emerged around the same time as the beginnings of the Mishnah, and may have understood their role to be the main guardians and appliers of these teachings." (AK location 3302)

• "The Mishnah guided religions practice among Palestinian Jews, attempting to speak to all kinds of religious issues that might arise." (AK location 3314)

  • Can laborers on top of a tree or wall offer a prayer?

  • If one is naked and makes a dough offering from barley in one's house, does that make the offering unclean?

  • Can a man divorce his wife for burning a meal?

• "The Pharisees sought to give clear direction to observant Jews concerning how to apply Torah to concrete living." (AK location 3325)

  • Black and white

• "Theologically, the calamity of 586 BCE was seen as God's judgement upon Israel because of its corruption by the practices of the nations." (AK location 3325, quoting Borg)

• Mishnah devotes 240 paragraphs to Sabbath behavior, outlining in detailed specificity what could and could not be done.

  • "When the central concern became to sustain boundary markers more than to celebrate God's mercy, the tone of Sabbath legislation changed." (AK location 3337)

• Because the Sabbath had become crucial for a sense of community identity, violation of the Sabbath threatened the entire community.

• The Mishnah devoted 185 pages to laws of defilement and purity.

  • Kosher eating practices stemmed from a concern about maintaining purity

  • Should a pure person share a meal with an impure person, the latter's pollution was understood to be contagious.

• Circumcision stood as a central externally apparent boundary marker throughout the biblical period

  • By the time of the prophets it had become an ambiguous symbol

  • Jeremiah 9:25-26 criticizes Israel, said to be "circumcised only in the foreskin" but "uncircumcised in heart."

• "Throughout the biblical tradition we see tensions concerning the use of these boundary markers." (AK location 3385)

Jesus and the Pharisees

• Recall the escalating conflict between Jesus and the Pharisees noted in Chapter 5

• "The similarity between Jesus and the Pharisees -- sharing the same tradition, struggling with the same questions, competing for the allegiance of the same people -- accounts for the depth of the conflict between them." (AK location 3421, Borg)

• "For Jesus to enter the scene as one who rigorously observed Torah and gained a public following but did not join the Pharisees meant he would be seen as a direct rival." (AK location 3441)

• Matthew 12

• Mark 2:27 has a slightly different phrasing behind the meaning of the contrasts highlighted in Matthew 12. "the Sabbath was made for humankind, not humankind for the Sabbath."

  • "One emphasizes that the deeper meaning of the law (i.e., mercy) allows for flexibility in how the details are practiced, as long as we are serving human well-being. The other points more to strict consistency, assuming that each piece of the regulations carries equal weight and that to violate one is to violate the whole" (AK location 3474)

• "The issue is not law or no law; the issue is how the law is interpreted." (AK location 3486)

• "What is at stake in this conflict? Why would the Pharisees conspire to destroy Jesus because of these altercations? We may see at the heart of the Pharisees response, according to these stories, the conviction that the integrity of their purity project might require the use of violence to be sustained." (AK location 3498)

• Pharisees core = purity to replicate in their social life the holiness of God by maintaining the holiness to which God has called the people in Lev 19:2

• Jesus core = forgiveness because he views God as a God of mercy, Luke 6:36

• "The Pharisees became convinced that they determined who did and who did not have the possibility of gaining God's favor." (AK location 3547)

• "With the covenant community so concerned with its own survival, the original vocation given this community -- to be a light to the nations (Isaiah 49:6) -- may be pushed to the side." (AK location 3557)

  • Does this issue sound familiar? The role of women in the church? Sexuality? Biblical authority?

The Law and Retribution Toward Jesus

• "Jesus and the Pharisees differed sharply over the relative weight to be given to strict adherence to regulations as compared to mercy-oriented flexibility." (AK location 3557)

• We see in Matthew 12:1-14 a direct conflict between the forces of cultural exclusivism and the true God.

  • Cultural exclusivism and its reliance on the law understood in a legalistic way proves itself to be a Power in rebellion against the true God.

• Conflicts with the Pharisees continued. In the years following Jesus death, the Pharisees led violent opposition to Jesus's followers. (the stoning of Stephen in Acts) The early Jesus movement rejected cultural exclusivism and that led to the inclusion of Gentiles as Gentiles into their version of the covenant community -- and ongoing conflicts. (AK location 3606)