We are still working our way through Galatians at church. I haven't been the last three Sundays because I was involved in a play but now it is over and I am back to "ordinary time". That's a term the Catholic church (and other liturgical churches) use to describe the time between major holidays like Christmas and Easter. I've simply borrowed it to describe the time between plays. Because when you are involved in theater you are stepping out of "ordinary time" and into something quite different.
According to my friends I haven't missed much. Most of the time has been spent on the second chapter where Paul lays out his credentials to the Galatians. Of course there are controversies--mostly on the Jewish side--as to whether Paul was what he claimed to be, a Pharisee of the tribe of Benjamin who studied under Rabbi Gamaliel--but I'm not going to go into them. I do think Paul was very clever and capable of reinventing himself to fit the situation so I tend to take what he says with a grain of salt.
Recently I was watching "God on Trial" about a group of Jews in Auschwitz who put God on trial. It's a pretty hard-hitting drama and pulls no punches. One thing struck me is that Judaism isn't afraid to tackle the hard questions about God. In fact the name Israel means he who wrestles with God. That sense of wrestling is absent from Christianity, from the New Testament in general.
Anyway, these Jews argue back and forth from the Bible, from their own experiences. They talk about some of the things I've talked about here. About the God-ordered slaughter of the Amalekites and others who inhabited the Holy Land. One says, "Now we know how the Amalekites felt. Now we know how the Egyptians felt." Or the Persians who were slaughtered at Purim.
They ask, are we being punished for our sins? Another brings up the deportation to Babylon and how the prophets said it was because Israel was unfaithful to the Torah. That maybe God is using the Nazis like he used the Babylonians and Persians, to accomplish His will. A cleansing. A purification. But one of the "lawyers" turns to a young man and says, "Tell me, did they love the Torah in--" and he names a Polish town. "Oh yes," the young man answers eagerly and begins to describe the Sabbaths and the festivals. It's clear that The Law was a source of joy to these people, not the burden Paul insists it is. So why is this happening to us? Why are we here?
Finally they decide that God is indeed guilty of breaking the Covenant He made with His People. He has abandoned them and gone elsewhere. That, of course, is the very claim Paul makes in Galatians and elsewhere--that God has turned to the Gentiles. That the Old Covenant is obsolete and there is a New Covenant, one that favors the Gentiles. The Law, he says, is dead. It only brings death. It has no power to save. But if I understand correctly, The Law never claimed to save. It was given to the Jewish people as a sign, to set them apart and make them a holy people. Salvation had nothing to do with it. That's why Gentiles were not required to follow it. And if Paul had just stuck to that he probably wouldn't have faced the opposition from Jewish leaders that he did. But he changed things and made The Law something it wasn't.
What, I wonder, would Paul have said about the Holocaust and Hitler being an instrument of God? Because the Holocaust was something orchestrated and carried out by the inheritors of the New Covenant. Hitler spoke of doing God's work. When I brought that up in Bible study a while back I was told that "Hitler wasn't a true Christian". Yes, and that is why the Pope excommunicated him and why all the churches in Germany rose up in protest against the Nazis--didn't happen that way. Instead, the Holocaust is swept under the rug. It has had no influence on Christian theology. Christians don't wrestle with it and its implications the way Jewish theologians have. What would Paul have said? Would he have agreed?
According to my friends I haven't missed much. Most of the time has been spent on the second chapter where Paul lays out his credentials to the Galatians. Of course there are controversies--mostly on the Jewish side--as to whether Paul was what he claimed to be, a Pharisee of the tribe of Benjamin who studied under Rabbi Gamaliel--but I'm not going to go into them. I do think Paul was very clever and capable of reinventing himself to fit the situation so I tend to take what he says with a grain of salt.
Recently I was watching "God on Trial" about a group of Jews in Auschwitz who put God on trial. It's a pretty hard-hitting drama and pulls no punches. One thing struck me is that Judaism isn't afraid to tackle the hard questions about God. In fact the name Israel means he who wrestles with God. That sense of wrestling is absent from Christianity, from the New Testament in general.
Anyway, these Jews argue back and forth from the Bible, from their own experiences. They talk about some of the things I've talked about here. About the God-ordered slaughter of the Amalekites and others who inhabited the Holy Land. One says, "Now we know how the Amalekites felt. Now we know how the Egyptians felt." Or the Persians who were slaughtered at Purim.
They ask, are we being punished for our sins? Another brings up the deportation to Babylon and how the prophets said it was because Israel was unfaithful to the Torah. That maybe God is using the Nazis like he used the Babylonians and Persians, to accomplish His will. A cleansing. A purification. But one of the "lawyers" turns to a young man and says, "Tell me, did they love the Torah in--" and he names a Polish town. "Oh yes," the young man answers eagerly and begins to describe the Sabbaths and the festivals. It's clear that The Law was a source of joy to these people, not the burden Paul insists it is. So why is this happening to us? Why are we here?
Finally they decide that God is indeed guilty of breaking the Covenant He made with His People. He has abandoned them and gone elsewhere. That, of course, is the very claim Paul makes in Galatians and elsewhere--that God has turned to the Gentiles. That the Old Covenant is obsolete and there is a New Covenant, one that favors the Gentiles. The Law, he says, is dead. It only brings death. It has no power to save. But if I understand correctly, The Law never claimed to save. It was given to the Jewish people as a sign, to set them apart and make them a holy people. Salvation had nothing to do with it. That's why Gentiles were not required to follow it. And if Paul had just stuck to that he probably wouldn't have faced the opposition from Jewish leaders that he did. But he changed things and made The Law something it wasn't.
What, I wonder, would Paul have said about the Holocaust and Hitler being an instrument of God? Because the Holocaust was something orchestrated and carried out by the inheritors of the New Covenant. Hitler spoke of doing God's work. When I brought that up in Bible study a while back I was told that "Hitler wasn't a true Christian". Yes, and that is why the Pope excommunicated him and why all the churches in Germany rose up in protest against the Nazis--didn't happen that way. Instead, the Holocaust is swept under the rug. It has had no influence on Christian theology. Christians don't wrestle with it and its implications the way Jewish theologians have. What would Paul have said? Would he have agreed?
