Paul Froeschle’s Oct. 23 Review

Since this is, I’m sure you’re aware, a religious book, I should at least indicate my religious prejudice. I consider myself agnostic, in that I do not believe in God, yet I will not deny His, Her or Its existence. I don’t know!

Page 16: Did Jesus say, for instance, “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven”? It is a strange analogy, an inappropriate mixing of metaphors. Camels do not go through the eyes of needles, not even tiny camels. But when the word camel is translated into Aramaic, one sees that in Aramaic the word for camel and word for rope are almost identical. Was the original word of Jesus “It is easier for a rope to go through the eye of a needle”? It would be an appropriate metaphor, still possessing the power of the impossible but not violating the imagination of the hearers. If this is substantial are they to our understanding of the essential elements of our tradition?

            The author of this book, John Shelby Spong, is the retired Bishop of the Episcopal Dioceses of Newark, based in Newark, New Jersey. He has written 19 books that have been published and this, his latest, is titled “Jesus for the Non-Religious.”

            A little overview of Spong’s philosophy is in order since he doesn’t adhere to any “typical” religious philosophy. He is considered a representative of a stream of though with roots in the medieval universalism of Peter Abelard and the existentialism of Paul Tillich.

            Spong has been a strong proponent of feminism, gay rights and racial equality within the church and in society at large. Issues that he calls for debate on include

Spong’s theological philosophy, obviously, doesn’t seem to be the standard format I received in my confirmation days. To quote him from his Introduction, “I believe that I am witnessing the death of Christianity, as it has been historically understood. The Christianity that is now emerging in America and the Third World is something with which I do not choose to be identified. . . . I do not want to worship a God that I cannot challenge, or be loyal to a tradition that requires me to shut down my mind. Many of the things historically said about Jesus, as one who yearns to be a believer, can no longer hold with credibility.”

His many top-selling books have made him the nation’s lightening rod for the wrath of evangelical and fundamentalist Christians who react to any threat to their rigid biblical interpretations. His vision is for a non-theistic Christianity, liberated from supernaturalism, religious chauvinism, or dependence on belief in the unbelievable.

 He also says, “One of my shaping theological teachers, Paul Tillich, referred to this God as “Being Itself,” which meant to me that my search for God would be identical with my search for my own identity.”

Throughout the book Spong meticulously deconstructs the birth stories, the miracle stories, the dogma around blood sacrifice that was written into the gospels, the historicity of the disciples, the stories leading up to the crucifixion, and the resurrection narratives. He theorizes that the four gospels’ structures corresponded to the major festivals of the Jewish liturgical calendar. The gospel writers took the oral and written stories of Jesus and fit them into this liturgical chronology and form. Spong claims that the gospels were Jewish theological interpretations of the life of Jesus, rather than ever having been intended to serve as accurate historical accounts.

Jesus birth was, not surprisingly, where the plot of this book opens up. And the star of David, the wise men, and the manger don’t rank real his in his concept of what our Christmas is based upon.
“Birth stories are always fanciful. They are never historical.

After all, no one waits outside a maternity war for a great person to be born.” It may sound iconoclastic, but it also sounds logical.

The book of Mark, which was the earliest gospel to be written, there is no reference to Bethlehem or any hint of a miraculous birth. The life span of Jesus of Nazareth began about the year 4 BCE (before the common era) and ended in the crucifixion somewhere around the year 30 CE (Common Era). Use of the old term “Before Christ” doesn’t make a lot of sense since according to what scholars have deduced, Christ predated his birth.

The trip Joseph and his pregnant wife supposedly made doesn’t withstand a historical review of the time, as far as Spong is concerned. Supposedly some authority ordered people to return to their ancestral home for enrollment in taxation, which is why Josesph and his pregnant wife Mary were to have trekked the Bethlehem. They lived in Nazareth, and that is about 94 miles from Jerusalem and perhaps 100 miles from Bethlehem. The journey would take seven to 10 days. The modes of transportation were walking or riding a donkey. No motels, no restaurants along the way. You slept in fields and scrounged whatever food you could come across. It was hot in the day and dark (and dangerous) at night. What husband in his right mind would take his eight- to nine-month pregnant wife on such a journey?

Now I hate to call Joseph and Mary into question but, once again, I’m merely following Spong’s lead. Paul was the earliest of those who wrote about Jesus, and in all of Paul’s writings, written no earlier than the year 50CE, there is not a single reference to the parents of Jesus. His only comment about Jesus was that he was “born of a woman, born under the law (Gal. 4:4). The word translated “woman” in this text has in it absolutely no connotation whatsoever of the word “virgin”. Virgin births, incidentally, were a familiar tool in the ancient world to explain the extraordinary qualities of a leader. Joseph, according to Spong, is from start to finish a mythological character created out of whole cloth, by the author of the gospel we call Matthew.

From Jesus birth we progress quickly to his gathering of apostles. Are the “12” and the “apostles” the same group? In 1 Corinthians 15:5 Paul refers to the “twelve” as a single group with a corporate identity, but two verses later, in 15:7, he refers separately to the “apostles,” suggesting he sees them as a different group.

There were two Judases, one of whom wore the title “Iscariot.” The guess is that that name comes from the word sicarios, which means “political assassin.” The more we learn about Judas Iscariot in the gospels the less he looks like a person of history. Spong doubts he ever existed. Spong says, “My study has led me to the conclusion that Judas, like Joseph, is a manufactured literary character who, as the traitor, was not part of the original story but was first introduced by Mark in the eighth decade of the Common Era.” Paul was apparently not aware that a member of the 12 was the one who “handed him over.” Four chapters later, when describing the events of Jesus life, Paul does not mention a traitorous act. And he says when Jesus was raised he appeared to the 12. But according to Matthew, Judas had already hanged himself. Paul apparently never heard about the betrayal.

But once the seed of doubt arises about Judas, the gospels become ravenous in their desire to chastise the man. Judas clearly grows more evil with the appearance of each gospel as they develop chronologically. They start going easier on Pontius Pilate. But the details of the Judas story can be found in previous biblical narratives, according to Spong.

Now, on to the miraculous performances of Jesus.  What were they and what inspired them?

            Miracles were assumed to have occurred for two reasons: first, the bible says so and the bible is the “revealed Word of God.” Second, since Jesus was assumed to be God in human form, it followed quite logically that the whole created world had to be responsive to his divine command. The scientific community today has challenged these assertions and even the world of Christian scholarship at least questions them.

In Spong’s words, “To ask the question bluntly, ‘Do miracles really occur, or are tales of miraculous power the fictional but inevitable result of humankind’s deep-seated need to believe that there is a supernatural being who will intervene on our behalf?’”

First of all, the disciples obediently followed Jesus instructions and threw their lines to the other side of the boat. It resulted, according to Luke, in a miraculous catch of fish. Mark alludes to numerous healings which were not told individually. Luke adds the healing of 10 lepers (Luke 17:19). Without giving any details, Luke adds his own generic verse stating, “in that hour he (Jesus) cured many of diseases and plagues and evil spirits and on many that were blind he restored sight. (7:21). And he changed water into wine at a wedding at Cana in Galilee. He healed a man who had been in some way infirm, perhaps crippled, for 38 years. He gave sight to a man born blind (9:1-41).

Most people, however, fail to embrace the fact that the miracle-producing majority view of the God of the Bible is a mixed blessing. A deity capable of acting in miraculous ways frequently elicits the child-like responses of guilt and dependency. If God is the source of supernatural power, then it is clearly in our best interests to please this deity, or at the very least not incur the divine wrath. So fear drives us to please this capricious deity with proper living and proper worship. When we worship such a deity, we are either seeking divine favor or fearing divine retribution. As a result, this God becomes, above all else, a behavior-controlling deity.

Spong debunks the miracle stories on the basis of common sense and also through careful textual and historical criticism. On the one hand, he says that in the era around the New Testament’s writing, people commonly believed in the miraculous, since they had no awareness of modern scientific analysis. The New Testament was hardly the only document of that era recording fabulous events that were supposed to be historical facts. On the other hand, Spong also suggests that the gospel writers never really meant their accounts to be historical according to current standards of factuality. He theorizes that the writers fit received oral and written stories into theological structures, writing thos religious concepts into the texts on purpose. So did the gospel writers believe that their stories were factual or not?
“I still believe that there is a reality called God that permeates all that is. I do not, however, believe in a deity who does miracles—nor do I even want such a God. I do not wish to live in a world in which an intervening deity acts capriciously to accomplish the divine will by overriding the law of nature established in creation.

But the most revered miracles were three raisings from the dead. Those resuscitated were the daughter of Jairus, a ruler of the synagogue, a widow’s son at Nain and Lazarus. The raising of the widow’s son was recorded by Luke, the raising of Lazarus is unique to John and the raising of Jairus daughter is included in all three synoptic gospels. But Spong says that once we go deeply inside each of the resurrections, interpretive clues “make it clear the gospel writers never mean them to be read literally.”
Imagine, however, if you took out the miracles of the Bible, if you took out the Resurrection of Jesus, if you took out the Doctrines of Original Sin and Atonement. Some would find Christianity and the life of Christ pointless.

Now, something miraculous—I’m through talking about miracles.

Spong steps aside from his discussion of Jesus for a moment to talk about creationism. Surprise! He’s not a creationist! He is critical of his common brethren and says, “It is so important psychologically for human beings to believe that a supernatural power directs the affairs of life that people cling to irrational beliefs long after any apparent credibility of those beliefs has been intellectually demolished.

Incidentally, several years ago Spong invited Jerry Falwell to a public debate on creationism, etc. He was turned down.

Now, what about Jesus death? Well, the first written record we have of the death of Jesus is so sparse as to be chilling. There are almost no details. (1Cor. 15:3-4 [For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried]) (The totality of the only written story of the cross that Christians had until the eighth decade).

Written by Paul, there is no account of the “betrayal,” no visit to the Garden of Gethsemane, no arrest and no trial before the chief priests. Paul covered the burial with three words: “He was buried.”
Just how many details of Jesus crucifixion really happened?

“Both the crucifixion and exodus were the founding moments in the stories of two communities of faith, the Christians and the Jews. Both were designed to convey the idea of deliverance from bondage,” according to Spong. “We should certainly become qite suspicious of the historicity of the story of the crucifixion when we find that these clearly shaped ideas that purport to describe the death of Jesus are in fact based upon the liturgical observance of the earlier Jewish story.

Mark quotes Jesus on the cross (Mark 15:35): “My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Sound familiar? That is a direct quote from Psalm 22. Spong says the entire psalm had been used to interpret this portrait of Jesus’ death long before Mark’s writing and that the passion narrative has all the marks of influence of that Psalm. He says the passion story is not based on the eyewitness accounts of those who saw the crucifixion and that event probably did not happen as described. The passion story, says Spong, is a “highly stylized interpretive portrait designed to lead the person reading or hearing it into an understanding who Jesus was. The story was written without eyewitnesses! The disciples had fled when Jesus was arrested, so Jesus died alone.

Church leaders have always known about this linkage with Hebrew scriptures, but, unable to face its implications, they devised another explanation. They applied a magical interpretation to the Hebrew scriptures and began to suggest that God had let the authors of those scriptures, the prophets in particular, to a vision of the messiah who was to come.

Only when one gets to Luke and John, the last two canonical gospels to be composes (which take us to the late ninth and to the tenth decades), does the interpretation of Easter begin to involve stories of the physicality of the resurrected body of Jesus walking out of the tomb.

According to Spong, “We know from our study of this period of history that in conquered Judea an elaborate burial for the body of a convicted and executed felon (which is what Jesus was) was all but unknown. Normally, the victim would be placed into a shallow grave along with the other executed criminals of that day, covered over to prevent offensive odors, and soon forgotten.

Next the gospels tell us that a group of women went to the tomb on the first day of the week. Paul has no mention of this tradition. The gospels all do; however, they do not agree on exactly who the women were or what their number was. Mark has three women, Matthew 2m Luke 5 or 6, and John only one. The New Testament writers do not agree on who was the first witness to the resurrection.

Spong considers the resurrection language of the gospels “literal nonsense. Earthquakes do not announce earthly events. Angels do not invade time, space and history to roll back a stone, to make a historic resurrection announcement.

One should note that the later stories of Easter were all developed from Mark’s original narrative, in which no one sees the risen Christ. In Mark’s gospel the women followers simply stare into a tomb that has not been able to contain him. By the time we get to John’s account, some 30 years later, Thomas seeks to feel the nail prints. That is quite a journey.
Jesus reveals, by his own action and example, the way that divinity can be found in humanity. This Jesus was so present, so whole, so free, so devoted to justice and compassion, that he filled his followers with remarkable hope and courage even after his crucifixion by the Romans.

Jesus acquired the title “Son of Man,” which caused many to see him as a supernatural being who came from heaven to do the work of the ancient deities.

Look at the way Jesus dealt with the dehumanizing racial prejudices of his day. The unclean, rejectable scum of the first-century Jewish world were called Samaritans. They were half-breeds whose bloodlines had been corrupted by their Jewish ancestors’ marrying Gentiles. They were also largely viewed by the religious establishment as heretics, since the true worship of God had been compromised by the Gentile (read “Pagan”) side of their ancestry. Jews so deeply loathed the Samaritans that, when traveling from Galilee to Jerusalem, they would normally cross the Jordan River in the east and journey through the desert, recrossing the Jordan River in the coming west to approach Jerusalem form the south. By going this route, they could avoid breathing the foul air of Samaria on their trip.

A true humanitarian, Jesus would tell the parable of God’s compassion and love that was so unlimited, no lines were drawn in the sand to limit it. So there must be no lines drawn in the love of one human being for another. This was a radical and challenging conclusion. You cannot be human, Jesus said, and be prejudiced. Prejudice always violates humanity.

Women, representing fully 50 percent of the human race, were in Jesus’ time treated by the male half of the population as little more than chattel. The Jewish religion supported that view: according to the book of Genesis, women were created by God solely for the purpose of serving the lordly male as helpmate (Gen. 2:18) . . . Polygamy made sense if a woman was defined as property, for a man could have as many wives, sheep, or cattle as he could afford. . . . In Jesus’ day a Jewish man could divorce his wife simply by saying, “I divorce you,” in the presence of witnesses.

            The reality of Jesus’ commitment to having female disciples is, however, deeply written into the biblical story. The women disciples are by and large unnoticed until the gospels move to the final moments of Jesus’ life—his death and resurrection. Then suddenly women become not just visible but vital parts of the story, perhaps because, as Mark says, at the time of Jesus’ arrest all the male disciples “deserted him and fled. Only at the cross does Mark inform his readers that these women had followed Jesus since the very beginning of his public life.

Jesus understood something more: he understood that sexist prejudice also warps the man and diminishes his own humanity. Treating another human being as subhuman always makes the perpetrator subhuman.

The writers and the gospels confabulated the story of Jesus at least partly for spiritual reasons. They left us with a rich body of myth and metaphor. , , , Much of this mythic and poetic tradition is in dire need not of rejection, but of re-interpretation. It still speaks to and for the soul. Common sense and textual criticism lead us away from belief in the factuality of the miracle stories. But many historically inaccurate gospel stories remain potent and valuable, if interpreted in creative, spiritually sensitive, non-literalistic ways. Just because something didn’t happen doesn’t mean it can’t be “”true” in an important way.

Jason Lee Steorts says in his review of Shelby’s work in National Review under the title, “Personal Jesus: John Shelby Spong’s “nontheistic” Christianity:”

“What's a religion good for, anyway?

“That is the question retired Episcopal bishop John Shelby Spong never gets around to asking, let alone answering, in his new book, Jesus for the Non-Religious. His title suggests an answer, and he has tried to lob his book like a hand grenade into the institutions of Christendom. The idea is to explode two millennia of traditional belief on which these institutions rest, thereby making room for a new Christianity based on a conception of Jesus that is palatable to ‘a twenty-first century person.’ What actually crawls out of the rubble is a Jesus for John Shelby Spong.

“This Jesus would be unrecognizable to most Christians. The largest section of the book is an attack on “the supernatural forms of yesterday’s Christianity.” Spong executes this attack by means of a lengthy textual criticism of the Gospels, sprinkled with occasional undeveloped thoughts on the incompatibility of traditional belief with a modern worldview. (“The ability of anyone to walk on water exists in our world not in reality, but only in very bad golf jokes.”) Along the way, he jettisons the following claims, among others: that Mary was a virgin at the time of Jesus’s birth; that Jesus performed miracles; that Jesus atoned for the sins of mankind; that Jesus was resurrected; and that the resurrected Jesus ascended to Heaven.

“Spong’s analysis is interesting as far as it goes, though his tendency to dismiss all disagreement as “hysterical” — his adjective of choice for traditional believers — is unbecoming, morally and intellectually. I offer here no evaluation of his textual criticism, as literary sleuthing is rarely dispositive. Instead, let’s assume for the sake of argument that his thesis is correct: Jesus performed no miracles, wrought no atonement, and rose from no tomb. When one is left with such a Christ, what does it mean to say — as Spong says of himself — that one is “a believing Christian”? What does one believe in? How could one persuade anyone else to share this belief?

“Spong’s attraction to Jesus seems to be rooted largely in the ethics Jesus taught and lived. Jesus was nice to Samaritans. Jesus didn’t shun lepers. Jesus protected adulteresses from the stoning mobs. All to the good, as hysterical Christians would agree.”

This book raises in me the question whether or not there is enough in the strictly historical Jesus around which to maintain the Christian religion. The Jesus Seminar, which Spong serves as a member of its board (Westar Institute), has concluded that only a very few of Jesus’ purported sayings deserve a “red” designation, as likely to have been spoken by the historical person. Spong clearly reveres the Jesus of history, but is there enough Jesus left to serve as the focus of devotion for the Christian church into the future?

In his preface to the book, Spong said he has at least one more literary task ahead of him: a book that addresses death and dying from the perspective of Christianity devoid of supernatural theism. I will be ready to read that when it hits the bookstores.