“If Any of You Are Without Sin …”: Trump and Evangelical Illiteracy

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adulterous woman, Donald Trump, evangelical support of Trump, James Dobson, John 7.53-8.11, Trump lewd comments

“If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw stone …”
John 8.7 (NIV)

Today, I’m going to comment on a classically misunderstood verse that isn’t even covered in Right Texts, Wrong Meanings. I normally don’t comment on John 7.53-8.11 as this passage seems to be a late addition, but its frequent quotation has forced me to comment on it. A Christian leader no less than James Dobson says, “I do not condone nor defend Donald Trump’s terrible comments made 11 years ago. They are indefensible and awful. I’m sure there are other misdeeds in his past, although as Jesus said, ‘Let him who is without sin cast the first stone,’ I am, however, more concerned about America’s future than Donald Trump’s past. I wonder about how Bill Clinton’s language stands up in private.” This post will show how Dobson’s quotation of John 8.7 is a complete travesty of biblical hermeneutics and literacy.

The story of John 8 is simple. A woman was caught in the act of adultery, most likely in the heat of copulation, and the Pharisees wanted to stone her to death. Jesus asked whether anyone was without sin. Everyone left, and no one condemned her. Dobson and his fan base of course take this as a perfect analogy to Trump’s sexual transgressions. However, the analogy is completely misplaced in the following ways.

The nature of sexual sins is different. In the woman’s case, she was having consensual adulterous sex. While adultery is wrong, it was at least consensual. When Donald Trump says, “I’ve gotta use some Tic Tacs, just in case I start kissing her. You know I’m automatically attracted to beautiful ― I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait… And when you’re a star they let you do it. You can do anything…Grab them by the pussy…You can do anything…” Trump just described sexual assault in a few short and lewd sentencet. To many, this happened more than 10 years ago, but sexual assault is the same crime 10 years, 20 years or even 100 years ago. The women gave no consent. Many would find this to be a locker room talk of macho male fantasy. The problem is, Trump has also had allegations launched against him on sexual assault, on peeping at naked underaged Miss Teen USA pageant contestants, and even one pending rape case of a 13 year old girl Katie Johnson. The pattern has never been consensual, locker room fantasy or otherwise. So, please stop analogizing the sin of the adulterous woman with that of Trump. The usage of John 8.7 is immoral!

The problem is never the allegation of sin. Some who look at Trump’s situation are saying that perhaps we should be more forgiving and not judge a man’s words so harshly. In other words, we must silence the critics using religious language. When we look at the story of John 8, Jesus never denied that fact that the woman was sinful. In fact, the language he used in John 8.11 “Neither do I condemn you” is highly legal. Jesus didn’t really pronounce forgiveness per se. He only spared her life. The real person she needed to ask forgiveness should be her husband, but the Bible doesn’t really talk about that. Many want to dismiss Trump’s talk as just locker room stuff, but the locker room stuff appears to be confession of a rape culture that shouldn’t exist in any room, locker room or otherwise. Forgiveness? How about Trump ask forgiveness from those women he groped, but no, he didn’t do that! We don’t have the right or authority to forgive Trump. We aren’t rape victims or victims of sexual harassment. The easy dismissal of a serial behavior from a future leader of the US by Christians makes mockery of all Christian ethics. This easy forgiveness is the reason why sexual abuse is so prevalent in conservative Christian circles (whether Protestant or Catholic). Jesus took sin seriously by using legal language. So should Christians. The usage of John 8.7 mocks the very God on whom this faith is found.

The power relationships between the adulterous woman and Trump are different. Remember the context of the adulterous woman. The Pharisees wanted to stone her. When I read a story like this, I always wonder where the man who committed the crime was. The absence of the adulterous man shows that she was used as a tool to test Jesus. The Pharisees here weren’t after real justice. They merely wanted to force Jesus’ hand in condemning her to death. She was a helpless victim caught in the power game of a society of unequal power between men and women. Trump is far from the status of the powerless. In fact, he’s one of the most powerful men whose accountants and lawyers are capable to help him avoid taxation while he makes millions. We should fix the tax code that enables him to do that. He also acts in a powerful role in the harassment of many women. I know someone’s going to inevitably bring up Bill Clinton. If Clinton harassed women or committed adultery, he’s also wrong, but we’re ONLY talking Trump because evangelicals aren’t using John 8 to defend Clinton at the moment. The status between the adulterous woman and Trump are as far as heaven is from hell. While she was just trying to escape with her life. She wasn’t trying to be the king of Israel.  Trump is going for the most powerful position in the free world. The usage of John 8.7 misunderstands both the worlds of Jesus and of Trump.

The situations of the woman’s and Trump are completely different. We must notice that Jesus was quite serious about the adulterous woman’s sin. He never denied it. At the same time, after he dismissed her, he didn’t come out to say that she’s now serving as the paragon of purity. No, Jesus wouldn’t say that. Trump however flippantly dismisses his own moral downfall, and then turns around and says, ” He’s ready to take on one of the most powerful political positions in the world. He isn’t going away like the adulterous woman. While he uses words of repentance, he doesn’t bear the fruits of repentance. In fact, Trump claims, “I have great respect for women. Nobody has more respect for women than I do.” How can we trust a man who says one thing but does another? Apparently, Trump’s evangelical supporters are asking us to do exactly that. This sort of ethical suicide is what gives evangelicals a bad name. Again, I’m not saying that Hillary is all that honest, but the evangelicals aren’t using John 8 to support her now, are they? In fact, they really want to stone her. The usage of John 8.7 is a double standard that has plagued evangelicals for ages that has now made the entire movement a running joke.

Whatever one thinks of Hillary (and I’m really not a fan), we can’t dismiss the fact that the failure of evangelical leadership in this election boils down to a kind of dire biblical illiteracy that has infiltrated its ranks. Perhaps, if they REALLY read their Bibles instead of messing about with powerful political people (on all sides), they’d do better as a moral authority. Until then, they’ve become a moral joke.

As I always say, the texts are not at fault. The interpreter is!

Right Quotes, Wrong Meanings!

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blog writing, misquotations

It’s been a while since I wrote Right Texts, Wrong Meanings. The topic is worth revisiting for just about everything quotable in life. While many preachers continue to misquote Jesus, Paul or Peter, Christians writers and some theologians misquote other theologians. In our sound bite electronic age, this often gives the appearance of being an expert in this or that.

Now that much of the quotation search engine is available for getting fancy quotes in, many start quoting famous theologians like Calvin, Barth, Hauerwas, Moltmann and Bonhoeffer. The two interpretive elements I emphasize are literary context and historical context. It doesn’t matter how eloquent the quote is. As long as the quote isn’t in line with the original essays in which it appears, it is a misquotation. Some can connect their own cause with merely one or two words of the quote and think that quotation would accord them the power they seek. However, even if we get the literary context right, it doesn’t mean that the interpretive exercise is over. Every text is also a product of a historical context. Calvin’s view of church-state relationship and his way of using scripture to justify that view came from an era where separation of church and state was inconceivable. He wrote as a lawyer, often in defense of the legal system he tried to uphold in Geneva. Barth and Bonhoeffer wrote in light of Nazi Germany. Their writing also resulted in certain praxis in their lives whether for Barth to move away from Germany or for Bonhoeffer to stay in Germany. Moltmann matured as a theologian in post-WWII rebuilding era in Germany. Hauerwas spent his youth in the Jim Crow era where blacks were forced to have their own restaurants, bathrooms and the seats in the back of the bus. He also saw the deterioration of the democratic process here in the US. His writings came out of these and other circumstances.

When we quote these theological luminaries for the purpose of some other contexts, are we really being true to the original historical context? I can say that surely, we don’t often respect those historical context. Let me use HK as an example. Is HK government a parallel with Calvin’s Geneva or Nazi Germany and WWII? Is HK government parallel with the republican government of the US? No! It isn’t! If the historical situation isn’t exactly parallel, what gives us the right to quote these guys as some kind of eternal truth? Nothing! Unless we can find some form of historical and literary parallel, all our quotes show is our utter ignorance instead of enlightenment. I’m not saying that there’s zero parallel historically, but most of the quotes I see seem totally oblivious to this issue. The quote only make us sound sophisticated (“Ha ha, I know Greek and you don’t.”) and gives us a false sense of authority. Instead of being educated, we’re further misinforming our readers and students. Adding a few German, French, or English words (or whatever language from which the quote came) does nothing! Appearance of being well educated is often far from reality. It’s as bad as a preacher misquoting Jesus out of the blue in some topical sermon (Yes, I realize this happens all the time everywhere even in mega churches. So?).

Every quote is an act of interpretation, especially taken from the context from which it is written for some other agenda. These days, I think we need to rescue Calvin, Barth, Bonhoeffer, Moltmann, and Hauerwas from their hijackers. The problem is never the quote. The problem is the interpreter. Let Barth be Barth! Next time someone uses a quote, ask him, “What’s the context?” We need accountability.

Christian Getting Tattoos, Piercings and Other Silly Controversies VII: But not every scriptural quotation is beneficial

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1 Corinthians 10.23

Everything is permissible”–but not everything is beneficial. “Everything is permissible”–but not everything is constructive.    1 Corinthians 10.23

 

This is the last of the series on silly controversies in the church, sparked off by a discussion on someone’s Facebook on tattoos and piercings (along with smoking and drinking).  As a matter of review, we’ve dealt with the following six silly objections thus far. First, someone would say, “I don’t like it. Therefore it’s wrong.”  Second, “Maybe he’s doing it for the gospel. The problem is why someone is getting ink.”  Third, “the body is the temple of God. By inking it, the owner shows disrespect towards God’s creation.”  Fourth, “someone may stumble.” Fifth, “the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible says that getting tats is wrong.” Sixth, “It’s a cultural problem … you don’t understand what tattoos and piercings mean in our culture.”  We have now come to our seventh objection, “Everything is permissible–but not everything is beneficial. Everything is permissible–but not everything is constructive.”

 

This is a common (mis)quotation of 1 Corinthians 10.23 that seems to be the magical key to cover all controversial issues, often by someone who wants to forbid a certain practice in church, no matter what that practice is.

 

This is yet one ore perfect sample text for a book on exegetical fallacies. Since I didn’t deal with it in my Right Texts, Wrong Meanings book, I will deal with it here to demonstrate the utter absurdity of using scripture in this way.

 

1 Corinthians 10.23a “Everything is permissible” is often viewed (correctly) by scholars to be the voice of the agitators in Corinth. Therefore, the NIV translation puts it in quotation marks. What is everything being permissible? Within context, Paul was talking about Old Testament food laws that might have caused confusion among his converts. Certainly, none of the food was sinful in itself, but the ones used in the pagan temple ceremony where participation in the ritual occurred (10.18-20). As a result, the situation causes further confusion in the table of the Lord’s Supper (10.21).

 

The vocabulary of the wider context deserves examination. 1 Corinthians 8.1, 4, 7, and 10.19 provide the context because the “food sacrificed to idols” literally translates “idol meat”. The same word occurs in 10.28 has a different word “offered in sacrifice” to describe the food eaten. The word can be translated “set apart thing” or “sacred thing”. Most likely, the meat here that was set apart was sold. On the one hand, just prior to the 10.23 quote, 10.19 talks of meat that was part of the temple meal. The same meat required participation in temple ceremony in order to eat. Would that be ideal? Paul said, “No.” On the other hand, the imaginary dialogue partner refuted Paul by saying, “Everything is permissible.”

 

So, Paul used a different vocabulary that follows 10.23 that shows not the stuff in the temple that required participation but stuff that was possibly sold from the temple for profit in the marketplace. In order to understand the issue, we must understand the background. In the marketplace, the top grade meat ought to have come out of the temple. Due to the excessive amount of meat, the temple would sell its meat to the market to make more money. Of course, the grade of meat sold out to the market was very good. Whenever someone wanted to throw a banquet, he would go to the market and pick out the meat. As a matter of courtesy, he would pick out good meat. The problem remains however that no one could tell whether the meat had been used in the temple or not.  The safest bet of course was to take the extreme measure of being a vegetarian but no one threw a vegetarian banquet.  This was the situation of 10.23ff. The whole situation created a realistic and awkward moment for Paul’s congregation. Within context, the congregation also had regular banquet fellowship where the Lord’s Supper was part of the procedures (cf. 11.17-22, 33). Now, the church could well get the meat without asking too many questions and she was certainly free to do so. A good piece of meat surely didn’t have the magical power to curse the eater.

 

Now, the issue becomes complicated when the believer got invited by an unbeliever to eat. That was the situation of 10.23-11.1. The freedom to eat would cause someone with a bad conscience to think that the church community meal was similar to that of the temple (10.27-29). In other words, the participant at the unbeliever’s banquet was so fixated in his mind that eating this meat was the same as worshipping false gods that no explanation would do other than total refrain from eating the meat. In other words, the central core teaching of monotheism was at stark due to misunderstanding. As a result, Paul advised restraint from eating the meat.

 

Three issues surface. First, the situation directly relates to worshipping false gods. Second, the situation directly relates to a problem of causing others to misunderstand the central belief of the faith. So, when Paul said to eat and drink to the glory of God in 10.31, he meant that the believer ought not to cause others to stumble in their understanding of what the true faith was. This was not a mere case of sacrificing for the gospel without understanding what the core belief of the gospel. This sacrifice directly related to the core belief.

 

As my last six blog posts in the series demonstrate, tattoos, piercings, smoking and drinking aren’t part of the core belief of Christian faith. No monotheistic belief was violated. No morality was compromised. Even if someone disagrees with me on the exact situation Paul was addressing, tattoos, piercings, smoking and drinking cant’ fit in there. By fitting them in there, we’re trivializing Paul’s gospel and his main concern. Some people may not like it, but my exact understanding of the context of 1 Corinthians 10.23 is what the church needs. People shouldn’t quote something out of context so that they can abuse the power of scripture as a weapon against others. This is not what the church should do. So, rather than being careful of WHAT you quote, be careful HOW you quote!

 

After the demonstration of the utter fallacy of misquoting 1 Corinthians 10.23, I will say that the problem is never scripture.  The interpreter of scripture is often the problem.  A quote to apply in any situation is also an interpretation because not every situation fits that quote. The frequent hijacking and raping of scripture should stop, especially in churches that assert that they respect the authority of the Bible. The ones who claim to have the most respect often show the least.

Christian Getting Tattoos, Piercings and Other Silly Controversies VI: the Bursting of the Religious Bubble

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christians getting piercings, christians getting tattoos

This is the sixth installment of the blog posts on silly Christian controversies using something as harmless as tattoos and earrings as example, simply because some Christians get so obsessed by them.

Here’s an excerpt from the book China Rich Girlfriend: ‘Eleanor sidled up to Astrid and began her commentary, “The only thing missing from that service was a good Methodist pastor. Where is Tony Chin when you need him? I didn’t really care for that … minister. Did you see he was waring an earring? What sort of … minister is he?”‘ Sounds familiar? This is funny considering the fact that even a non-Christian author knows about Christian hangups. 

As a matter of review, we have done posts so far of the following questions. First, someone would say, “I don’t like it. Therefore it’s wrong.”  Second, “Maybe he’s doing it for the gospel. The problem is why someone is getting ink.”  Third, “the body is the temple of God. By inking it, the owner shows disrespect towards God’s creation.”  Fourth, “someone may stumble.” Fifth, “the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible says that getting tats is wrong.” Today, we come to the sixth objection about tattoos and piercings, “It’s a cultural problem … you don’t understand what tattoos and piercings mean in our culture.”

“It’s a cultural problem…” is yet another magical key used by the church police to regulate neutral behaviors in the church. Culture, first of all, is shifting sand. It means different things for different people. For the present objectors, culture probably means a set of acceptable beliefs and practices. Acceptable for what and to whom?

The objector assumes that everyone shares his culture and this is precisely where the objection goes badly wrong. We don’t all share the same cultural assumptions. For instance, tattoos were once used in the Roman times to show the mark of owners on slaves (like the modern way of branding cattle), but we’ve moved on since. For some in Asia (e.g., the Yakuza’s), tattoos are similar to gang clothing here in the US (though some US gang members also sport certain tattoos), but that has definitely changed. If we walk into many MMA gym, you’d find more fighters with ink than not. Gang tattoos in many cases have become a thing of the past.

In the case of earring, the cultural implications are as varied as tattoos. Deuteronomy 15.17 tells us that when a slave wanted to work for a master even though he’s freed, he could choose to pierce his ear and show that loyalty. The slave could then work as a freedman for the master. In ancient Egypt, both men and women wore earrings. Earring has also a very complicated set of interpretations in modern world. For instance, when I got my ear pierced, one young person suggested that I ought do both ears. When I was growing up, heterosexual men only wore earring on the left side. However, these days, no less a mega star than David Beckham or Cristiano Ronaldo wear them on both ears. We have no doubt about these men’s sexual orientation (this, of course, isn’t my homophobic statement). The point of the matter is, culture shifts and changes faster than ever. Someone remarked to me once, “I wonder whether Christians know how stupid they look to the outside world.” My reply would be, “I wonder whether Christians know that there’s an outside world.” In theory, they know, but in practice, not so much.

The problem of tattoos and earrings, if we put the problem in pastoral term, is that the church can’t understand culture. Neither is the average Christian a competent interpreter of culture. As incompetent interpreters of culture, we’re yet so quick to use “culture” as an excuse to prohibit the action of other people. The controversy, if we can even call it a controversy, exposes the church’s culturally unaware biases. Quite often, the church exists in a bubble and a time warp, while the rest of the world passes us by. This is tragic. Thus, before we prohibit other people from certain action, maybe we would best examine whether we interpret such action correctly instead of shoehorning out own grid on the matter. How can the church reach out to the field, if she thinks the field is a minefield?

Someone once said something along the line of “the problem isn’t whether we can but whether we should.” I think no matter whether we can or we should, I believe we all “should” think hard about the logic of our philosophy and read hard the scripture on which we base our faith before spouting off our “wisdom” on a fellow believer. THAT we should do. For the page image today, I deliberately set it to the photo of my earring along with my Hugo Boss suit.  Can I? Should I? I can and should.

Back to China Rich Girlfriend, I must spoil the story by saying that Eleanor, the one who complained about the earring on a minister, is an insufferable schemer. If that’s the kind of culture we offend with tattoos and earrings, the offense isn’t so bad then. The bigger question becomes, “When someone comes into my church, does s/he find the Insufferable Schemer Club or a loving community?”

Christians Getting Tattoos, Piercings and Other Silly Controversies II: the Christian Fetish for Self-Justification

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Christian fashion, Christian getting piercings, Christian getting tattoo

Everything is permissible”–but not everything is beneficial. “Everything is permissible”–but not everything is constructive.    1 Corinthians 10.23

 

 

As a matter of review from last week’s blog (inspired by some needlessly heated and tangential debates on one of my friend’s Facebook updates), the Christian response to tattoos, piercings and other fashion controversies are as follows.  First, someone would say, “I don’t like it. Therefore it’s wrong.”  This is what I call “preference legalism” which has the mentality of “I prefer this lifestyle and if you don’t follow my preference, you’re certainly not spiritual enough.”  It is also a kind of idolatry towards one’s own preference. The second objection to tattoos, piercings and other silly things is, “Maybe he’s doing it for the gospel. Why else would someone be getting inked.”

 

 

This week, I’ll deal with the second objection, “Maybe he’s doing it for the gospel.” My future blog posts will deal with the other ones. This second objection makes zero logical sense, not even in our everyday living.  Tattoos and piercings are fashion statements.  Do we ever get up everyday to go to work and ask, “Which tie should I wear so that I can dress for the gospel?” We don’t. Neither do we put shoes or suits on while asking the same questions.  Neither do we do most things asking the same question.

 

 

I recall people first hearing about my shaved head and earring. The ill-intentioned homophobes would question my sexual orientation (no, I’m not gay. I love my pretty and elegant wife) or whether I had switched ministry direction by working with homosexuals (nope, haven’t felt the same call as some of my other friends). Well-meaning people began to ask (behind my back of course), whether I’m having a mid-life crisis or some other unpleasant experience. I assure everyone I’m not. I love my life. I’ve pretty much accomplished everything I had set out to do professionally. I enjoy my family, and I feel that I married well. When I told them that I just like to change my fashion around, many seem puzzled (of course I have other reasons for sporting this look, but this is not the place to explain that). Do I really need to give reason for changing what color, what brand or what material of suits I wear? Nope!

 

 

This leads to the more basic question, “Why do Christians have to justify certain things that are neutral?” Isn’t just living our lives (and not acting like holy roller weirdo’s) enough for expressing the gospel? Why do we have to justify neutral things?  It is because by justifying, we feel holier than everyone else who doesn’t justify himself. This is Christian self-rightesouness at its best. WE’RE OBSESSED ABOUT SUCH SELF-RIGHTEOUSNESS because we want to appear better than everyone else, but we aren’t. Someone might object, “Everything we do is for the gospel and for the glory of God.” Oh, okay, would that include trivializing the gospel in such a way?  Would that include saying that the gospel is more about what God did than what we did while contradicting ourselves with a focus on what we do or don’t do? I would settle for Christians glorifying God by not being anal retentive on such trivial matters because such misplaced focus takes away rather than enhance God’s glory and the gospel.

 

 

Many who observe this phenomenon compare such people to the caricature Pharisee in Jesus’ parable who states in Luke 18.11-12, “God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector.  I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get” (NIV). I propose that the people we see are much worse than this caricature. The Pharisee had reason to brag because he was talking about real righteousness and real sins here. He just didn’t have the right to brag before God. What we’re talking about with people who harp on silliness isn’t really about real righteousness or sin.  It’s bragging about trivial personal preference, and THIS is precisely what’s wrong with evangelical Christianity. Trivia!

 

 

The trouble with such controversies is that it’s all about how the objector feels.  It’s all about the good or bad feeling my fashion sense makes someone feels.  It’s as if all the objectors’ feelings are the very content of the gospel.  It’s as if the objector’s feeling is so fragile that a mere change of fashion would totally offend or crumble that fragile feeling. The faith community then becomes a therapeutic place for those who really NEED to feel good because they have unshakeable egos and wobbly feelings. I’m not talking about real mental patients here. I’m talking about those whose feelings get bunched up in a  wad just because someone does something they don’t like.  The faith community isn’t the place for such dysfunctional therapy for those who feel that they’re healthier than everyone else while they themselves personify narcissism.  Somehow such people also feel that they’ve got the god-given right to intrude on how everyone else lives.  They’ve become the fashion police of the church. One of my preacher friends compare them to the Judaizers (or whatever name you wish to name them) in Paul’s letter to the Galatians. I think that’s an insult to the Judaizers.  At least they had real debates about scriptural things with Paul. In the present scenario, they’re basing their own moral foundation out of their overactive and legalistic imagination that isn’t even from the Bible. By living according to their preference, somehow they make other people’s preference unholy, thus making themselves holier than everyone else.

 

 

Someone asks me whether I pierce my ear for a reason, implying it must be for the gospel. I can answer in a few ways. What if I choose NOT to answer? What if I have no reason other than to look cool? What if I have the same reason as I give for putting on a pair of True Religion jeans (notice I cleverly slip in the word “religion” in there?)? Does that make me less Christian or less spiritual?  The need to justify ourselves indicates that we have this huge need for self-righteousness.  The answer to such question indicates more about how far we’ve drifted from the gospel than why I wear an earring (By the way, my wife loves the hoop earring on me as pictured more than the shiny stud. What do you think?). I always see my earring as the mirror to bring out all the dysfunctional Christians instantaneously, because this sort of triviality makes Christians look petty and stupid, but I’m guessing a lot of Christians who seriously debate the issue don’t notice. Those who won’t invite me to speak because of a piece of rock in my ear probably won’t be ready to listen to my message anyway.  From the discussions with many people and watching the debate among some, I propose that many hardly understand what it means to be spiritual or even to be Christian any more in our faith community.

Christians Getting Tattoo, Piercings and Other Silly Controversies I: My preference should be the only preference?

Everything is permissible”–but not everything is beneficial. “Everything is permissible”–but not everything is constructive.    1 Corinthians 10.23

Recently, I’ve seen on a friend’s Facebook about a former gang member turned preacher.  This preacher has tats. The conversation soon drifts to whether Christian should get ink or not. As soon as I saw the topic, I know all the crazies would crawl out of the woodworks. And sure enough, I was right.

Before I can say “boo”, someone quotes 1 Corinthians 10.23.  In the next series of blogs, I’m going to talk the common logic and tact Christians use when dealing with stuff they perceive to be “wrong” (for them). In so doing, we will see that our average Christian is ill-equipped in theology, biblical interpretation, biblical literacy and ethics.  I suppose with a failure in all the aforementioned areas, I wonder if Christians can deal with any real life situation at all or whether they’re still living in a spiritual ivory tower.  My conclusion from just looking at some of the responses is that faith and culture won’t connect any time soon, especially among certain conservative circles of evangelicals.

When running into such controversies, the Christian response takes on the following forms. First, someone would say, “I don’t like it. Therefore it’s wrong.”  I’ve literally seen this silly response.  Second, “Maybe he’s doing it for the gospel. The problem is why someone is getting ink.”  Third, “the body is the temple of God. By inking it, the owner shows disrespect towards God’s creation.”  Fourth, “someone may stumble.” Fifth, “the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible says that getting tats is wrong.” Sixth, “It’s a cultural problem … you don’t understand what tattoos and piercings mean in our culture.”  Seventh, “Everything is permissible–but not everything is beneficial. Everything is permissible–but not everything is constructive.”

Since getting my earring, I’ve literally heard every single objection above.  How would one respond to them? I will write a series of blog posts dealing with each kind of objection.

In this blog, I’ll start with the first one, “I don’t like it. Therefore, it’s wrong.”  I start with this apparently silly objection to ease my readers into bigger issues in my coming blog posts in this series. The problem with this silly answer is that it really is more profound than stupid.  I believe this is the very root of objections and we’ll come back to this. Let’s face it, piercings and tats on men aren’t everyone’s cup of tea, whether you’re Christian or not. That’s a fact.  “I don’t like it” is a perfectly fine response to something that isn’t everyone’s cup of tea.  Yet, there’s something entirely wrong and unChristian about such a sentiment because of the second part, “Therefore, it is wrong.”  Who is to say that WE get to decide what is right or wrong for our brothers and sisters on things as trivial and cultural as piercings and ink?  I appreciate this frank objection simply because it’s the honest objection that underlies the other five objections, but honesty doesn’t make it right.  To object in such a way makes the objector himself “God”. Whoever among us can take such a high and mighty place?  I dare say, “No one.”

Troubles these days is that many Christians think they speak for God, but they don’t. Many think that they’re the moral police, except no one cares about their law enforcement.

An Introduction to a Conversation with Short Stories by Jesus

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Amy Jill Levine, Short Stories by Jesus

I like to start a series of blog posts to interact with Amy-Jill Levine’s book Short Stories by Jesus.[1] I do this as a part of the preparation to go to Hong Kong’s Faith in Practice Lectureship in HK Baptist University this year. I hope my readers can benefit from my own reflections. These reflections are contextualized to our time both in the US and in Asia, the two realms of my work. In addition, this reflection also allows me to unpack for my readers (both English and Chinese) of the book Right Kingdom, Wrong Stories what some of the presuppositions and limitations are in reading Jesus’ parables.[2] The Chinese version of Right Kingdom will debut in the Faith in Practice Lectureship as well. My blog posts will prepare my readers to see where I’m coming from. These blog posts will hopefully demonstrate the relevance of reading Jesus’ parables. Levines’s excellent book will become my conversation partner. I hope my readers will also enjoy reading her work to see a Jewish point of view in reading Jesus.   I feel that in doing this, we can have a much more meaningful conversation during the Q and A time of the lecture series in those few days. I’m very much looking forward to meeting all my listeners and readers when I finally arrive. I hope everyone is ready to edify each other in our conversation. Although I’m coming as an invited speaker, I also hope to learn from my readers and listeners when I arrive.

 

The introduction of Levine’s work points to the usual domestication of Jesus’ parable by churches. She points out that parable as a genre fits very well within Israel’s history. They’re part of Israel’s writings (2 Sam 12.1-7). Jesus’ choice of using parables wasn’t unusual. It would fit the norm of his time. Yet, she points out that Jesus’ parables have historical contexts. Today, the risk of the church is to interpret the parables without that context, thus domesticating the parables. Some of the fallouts include anti-Semitism. How often do we hear that Pharisees were bad guys? Levine’s concern is real and ethical.

 

When interpreting parables, I think Levine is right on the money as far as reading them in contextual perspectives. I think it’s also important to understand whom Jesus was speaking to and speaking against. Quite often, we only get information but what we do with the information determines the result we reap. For instance, a Sunday school teacher may say, “The Pharisees were a sect of Judaism that … , and they were always Jesus’ opponents. The Jews respected them. Yet, they’re the bad guys.” These statements above are as straightforward as they’re popular. History however was more complicated.

 

We normally read parables into our own context immediately when we do Bible study, but Levine suggests rightly that we need to view parables from cultural lens to understand what they meant.

 

My reflection besides agreeing with Levine’s concern is that methodologically we really need a polyphonic reading of parables. There’re many possible voices and narratives Jesus could use in telling the parables. To gain historical insight, we don’t only need to know the background of Pharisees, we also need to understand why Jesus talked to the Pharisees and why the Gospel writers used Pharisees to inform their readers about how they should live their faith. In other words, in order to see what Jesus was doing with the parables and what the Gospel authors were doing with the parables, we must understand both Jesus’ audience and original audience.

 

Another simpler issue we need to reflect on is the way we look at Scriptures. We normally think of Scriptures as “the word of God.” Based on just this model of parables, we must say that Scriptures shouldn’t only be considered “the word of God” but the channel of the biblical author through which “God” speaks. The simple and traditional model of the Scriptures in all their plain sense are the word of God is oversimplification that doesn’t reflect reality. In fact, even confession to and adherence to that doctrine of “the word of God” does nothing in the interpretive process. If we understand Scriptures as the “message of God”, then we’re getting somewhere. When a message is delivered, the messenger is “doing something” with the words. The messenger isn’t just saying that the message is the sum of the words. The message goes beyond the sum of the words. This has nothing to do with me not having faith in the Bible. This has everything to do with how the Bible functions and how WE use the Bible. This leads to my next point.

 

 

I’ve heard from more than one colleague that the only difference between ISIS and fundamentalist Christianity that professes its Scripture being the word of God is by degree and method but not in mentality. Whether we think such a saying is overstatement, I think it has huge merit. What I’m saying is, what we do with the Bible matters. Interpretation is ethical, evident in the way interpretation happened during the HK Umbrella Movement. The same thing happens in immigration reform debates or gun ownership in the US. All this has to do with our view of Scripture, whether this Scripture is the Quran or the Bible. We must think about this when reading Jesus’ parable or we’ll “domesticate” them. Levine’s concerns are real.

[1] Short Stories by Jesus (San Francisco: Harper, 2014).

[2] Right Kingdom, Wrong Stories (Eugene: Wipf and Stock, 2013)

“Relativism” as Resistance from the Margin?

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1 Corinthians 2.3, liberation theology in Asia, Umbrella Movement

“I came to you in weakness with great fear and trembling.” 1 Corinthians 2.3

I’ve been reading and writing a lot about liberation theology. Soon, I’m beginning to discover that what I’ve been told by many evangelicals about liberation theology (i.e. overly realized eschatology, liberal etc.) is simply wrong. I’ve read all the books and knew all the names, but it never hit me quite so hard until I place myself in the situation of Hong Kong Umbrella Movement. Being back in Hong Kong also helps.

 

Many who look at liberation theology or any other theology that is different from their own, the quick knee-jerk reaction is that relativism has finally conquered the Christian world. Alarm bells go off. Is this true though?

 

I suggest otherwise. I suggest that we take another look at the way we approach truth.  The insistence on a singular truth is a rhetorical move of the powerful. It hasn’t always been the case in the Bible, but in modern times, it’s quite the popular move.  The sooner we learn this, the better off we are. The sooner we get over ourselves, the better we can work together, both the powerful and the powerless. Yet, in the real world, power corrupts. It’s hard to give it up because we’ve worked so hard to earn it. We’ve worked so hard by speaking and writing about our point of view. It’s hard to be told that there’re other equally valid and valuable points of view.

 

As I read, I discover that the charge of “relativism” is a straw man and a scapegoat for those who are afraid of losing their version or narrative of “truth.” The louder the people from the margin cry out, the harder the resistance from the powerful to change. What many evangelicals perceive as relativism is nothing more than resistance from the margin. What average evangelicals do not realize is that most of the New Testament was written from the margin. When we neglect this marginality either deliberately or inadvertently, we completely skew our view of God and His work.

 

Relativism practiced by those in the margin merely challenges the status quo to open up the system just a bit to accommodate different points of view. The next generation, especially those in the trenches of oppression and liberation, is asking for an open system instead of a closed system, a healthy pluralism instead of blind singularity.  Avoidance of the real issue is not the answer. Denouncement and pontification are certainly not the answer. The real TRUTH is out there. Little “truth” may be discovered among us in community, from both ends of the power spectrum but especially from the margin. If that little “truth” is to be discovered, dialogue needs to open up, but it’s hard to give up power. Sometimes the blind spots are not killing us; sometimes our love for power murders our conscience.  We’ll be doing the very opposite as Paul’s mission.

 

When our conscience dies a painful death, so will our faith and mission.

More Cheap Unity? Truth that Divides!: 2 Corinthians 11.24, Paul, and the Subversive Gospel

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2 Corinthians 11.24, harmony in Chinese Christian circles, HK mega church compromise, Occupy Central, Occupy HK

Five times I received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. 

2 Corinthians 11.24 (NIV)

 

It is a well-known fact that I love reading the writings of Jesus scholar Larry Hurtado. His latest blog interaction with the work of Paula Fredriksen intrigues me, not only because her work was widely cited in my book on Paul in Chinese, but because of its implications for many HK churches, especially in light of the further call for harmony and tolerance for another fake election by the Anglican provincial secretary on HK TVB. I will cite below what Fredriksen claims from Hurtado’s blog. At some near future point, I will read her work in its entirety at which point I can give it a fair reading.

 

“In a recent publication, she probes the matter by first addressing Paul’s references to being on the receiving end of floggings by fellow Jews (five times) in the course of his Gentile mission (2 Corinthians 11:24).[2] Her cogent hypothesis is essentially this: Paul required his pagan converts to withdraw from worshipping the gods of the Roman world. Given the place and significance of the gods in Roman-era life, this would have generated serious tensions with the larger pagan community. As he identified himself as a Jew and linked up with Jewish communities in the various diaspora cities where he established early assemblies of Jesus-followers (ekklesias), these Jewish communities could have feared that they would bear the brunt of these tensions. So, Paul was meted out synagogue discipline in the form of the 39 lashes as punishment on several occasions (he mentions five).”

 

If what Fredriksen says is true, then Paul was not punished because he preached the gospel as people traditionally believe, but because the gospel Paul preached caused disharmony both with society and within the synagogue system. Let’s think about the current culture of the HK mega-churches that tend to speak for oppressive government policies. The best example is from one church where members who opposed oppressive governmental policies would be punished by having their memberships revoked from the church. Other less severe but equally misleading responses would be to call for harmony at all costs without adequate discussion on the issues that divide.

 

In essence, if Fredriksen’s claim is true, then some churches behave more like Paul’s Jewish oppositions than Paul. Paul has already shown that the gospel is not mainly meant to cause harmony. Truth doesn’t necessarily harmonize. Quite often in Paul’s ministry, it confronted and divided. When people point out falsehood, the church’s job is not to call for harmony but to call for discussion, circumspection and introspection or even repentance. False harmony punishes the wrong people and in the long run ruins lives. Getting truth right is tough.  Living truth out is even tougher.  It takes prioritizing ideas and conflict, just like Paul did in his life.  It takes tough struggles over issue rather than a simplistic call for cheap unity while covering over the holes in our imperfect ideals.  The only question to ask of such churches is this, “What kind of faith do we hold when we behave more like Paul’s opposition than Paul?”

When being called “Christian” is stinky: rereading conclusions from statistics

I’ve been reading a lot of blogs from people who quote Pew Research this and Barna Group that.  Quite frankly, people just quote these stats without even a second thought about the hermeneutics behind such “research.”  These thoughtless blogs are once again a proof of “lies, damn lies and statistics” being the trinity of modernistic deception.  This way of blogging has been so hip that it’s become pandemic.

The logic of such blogs usually goes one of the following two ways.  They could say, “Oh, based on these statistics, America has become less Christian.  Look how few people identify themselves as Christians.”  They could also say, “Based on these statistics, these many people who identify themselves as Christians also believe that ___ (fill in the blank: living together, being homosexual, drinking, premarital sex etc.) is okay.  Look how Christian value has eroded.”  There you have it.  The first basically says that the present statistics are accurate reflection of how many real Christians there are, and the number is declining.  It also assumes that previous statistics are quite reliable with the greater number of real Christians.  See? Assumption is everything.  The second basically assumes that whatever ethical value being put in the blank is the key issue that divides what is a true versus a false Christian.  Assumption again!

I wish to question all such assumption as being lacking in any sense in our everyday experience.  I’ll use my experience as an example.  Where I grew up in the Southern part of the US, you can’t kick a little pebble without hitting a baptist.  In fact, I bet the Muslims there are also baptist.  No, I’m kidding.  If you were to ask anyone around where I live with a simplistic statistical questionnaire whether that person is Christian, Catholic, Jew, or Muslim (I’m using their common categories of course), you would find that most would say they’re Christians and some would say that they’re Catholic.  In addition, aren’t Catholics also Christian?  Not according to the way these discussions are framed. I overheard one particular discussion that went something like this.  Person number 1 says, “Are you Christian?”  Person number 2 answers, “No, I’m Catholic.”  What the statistics in the past and often in the present do not tell us is that they frame such questions in such biased way that they would inevitably get a large percentage to be Christian. What being a “Christian” actually means does not matter.

For some, being Christian just means being white and middle class, while believing there’s a god.  I’m not joking. I’ve seen enough examples to tell you that this is true.  And being white and middle class while believing in God is the cool thing to do in the past because that’s the American way.  There’s no way to verify whether that person really is a Christian.  The paradigm begins to shift however.  Now, with the moral value of the society defining what is cool, being Christian may not be cool any longer.

Now, being a Christian could mean being a homophobe and a sexual prude.  That is NOT cool.  Since the Christians no longer project that cool value, less people now identify with being Christians than before.  This is natural.  To top off the problem is the Christian’s own hermeneutics on the Bible as to what consists of “Christian value.” This kind of value obviously shifts, from the prohibition of drinking to premarital sex to now homosexual lifestyle.  What we haven’t realized is that our main problem has not changed: our hermeneutics and ethics still suck.  Only because more people were in agreement that drinking and drugs are usually not good for you, we were able to become more of a moral majority (I mean that, of course, sarcastically) in the past.  Now, societal value can no longer accept “Christian value”, less are willing to be identified as Christians.  I suspect that the decline is over exaggerated.  I suggest though that we have proclaimed something that has repulsed society.  The real issue then is whether the repulsion we have caused is the right issue, the one that we’re willing to die for.   I mean, is not sleeping with your girlfriend before marriage really is the ethical defining line of Christianity?

You see?  The first and the second set of logic are actually related.  When the hermeneutics of scripture on which Christian value is based are framed a certain way, people either identify or not identify with it.  At that point, people’s identification with it shows whether that value is cool or not.  Nothing in such assumptions have to do with truth.  It is a popularity contest.  It is a publicity disaster.  When we use such assumptions, we only reinforce but not solve the problem.