In my last posting to this blog I wrote about connecting Rom. 5:5 with Rom. 12:3-23. Now I’ll take that a step more.
Early in this Letter to the Romans, Paul reported that his hope for the human race came from the spiritual power of the agape of God, that was “poured” into the hearts of faithful people (5:5). Then later he talked about the victory that was won through Christ Jesus bringing his followers agape. And Paul proclaimed that such victory gave us spiritual bonding so strong that nothing can separate us from the agape of God -- “not death or life, not angels or rulers, not present things or future things, not powers or height or depth, or any other thing that is created.” (8:35-39 Common English Bible)
Then most of chapter 12 is a list of practical actions. He began by urging followers of Christ to let the Holy Spirit transform their minds so they do not conform to the patterns of their present age of history. Then beginning with vs. 9 he focused on the actions that spiritual agape helps us do when we let it open us to its spiritual flow in our life. He wrote about the way agape’s power, when we let it work in our relationships, helps us work for good against evil. For example -- be welcoming and hospitable to strangers, and bless people who harass you.
When describing good, healthful relationships, he gave the illustration of treating others as kind family members would treat each other — with respect, showing honor toward other people. Also he showed how agape helps faithful people not be conceited or proud, but live in harmony and peace with everyone, even to the point of blessing those you disagree with or who would persecute you. When he pointed out the strengthening aspects of agape, he described the way that spiritual energy helps with being patient in affliction (note, he didn’t insinuate that we would in any way escape affliction -- all of the great examples from the New Testament, from Jesus to the Disciples to Paul, had to go through afflictions).
When emphasizing the important power agape had with bringing empathy to people, Paul wrote: “Be happy with those who are happy, and cry with those who are crying. Consider everyone as equal, and don’t think that you’re better than anyone else. … If possible, to the best of your ability, live at peace with all people. Don’t try to take revenge. … If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him a drink. Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” (Rom. 12:15-23 Common English Bible)
What we can so very clearly see in Romans is that when we keep agape connected with the Holy Spirit, it can transform people to be kind, compassionate, and charitable with everyone. Agape guided by the Holy Spirit can overcome that most dangerous part of human societies -- God’s agape can actually break down that old worldly pattern of taking revenge against enemies that mistakenly tries to overcome evil with evil. Paul knew how truly that was needed because of, partly, what he saw going on in towns and cities from Jerusalem through Turkey and Greece, all the way to Rome.
And so after the last several hundred years of increasing evidence throughout the globe, we can see, as Paul did, that through agape, the Holy Spirit liberates our mind from the old pattern of history in order to take part in the new way of living. Only spiritual energy is powerful enough to bring about such liberation. Thus agape works with the Holy Spirit to open us and liberate us when we tap into its spiritual flowing.
Friday, May 27, 2011
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
Can Agape be misused?
Recently I found yet another of those blogs claiming that 2 Timothy 4:10 proves that “agape” was used also negatively in the NT. Once again this confusion is caused by thinking that ‘agape’ was used as a word for love. But we can get a little closer to straightening this out if we leave ‘agape’ untranslated; then the verse more understandably reads: “...for Demas has deserted me, because his agape was set on this present world; he has gone to Thessalonica.”
Of course, that is such a vague verse, that not much can be “proved” from it at all. We don’t really know what the verse was referring to that Demas did. Every translation puts it differently. I based the translation I used on the New English Bible, which strangely used the word ‘heart’ for ‘agape.’ Whatever is actually meant there, the expression is very unusual (as is every use of ‘agape’).
So, because of all of that, we can only speculate about the meaning. Unfortunately, the problematic expression became clouded by its usage in churches. After that letter became part of the final rendition of the Bible, for centuries that expression “love for the world” was taken out of context from that verse and became a negative expression. (And of course, I don’t think “love for the world” was the original meaning at all -- whatever such a strange expression would mean, anyway.)
My speculation focuses on the spiritual meaning of agape. That leads me to ask, “Is it possible to misuse the power of agape?” To get perspective on a possible answer, I went back to Paul’s Letter to the Romans.
Over a year ago, I posted to this blog a study of Romans 12:9-10 -- “Agape must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in brotherly affection. Honor one another above yourselves.”
It is critically important that he began those verses with agape. His point in doing that was to set the stage for the dependence of the verses that followed on agape being used sincerely and faithfully.
Most of chapter 12 is a list of practical actions that spiritual agape helps us do when we open up and let it flow in our life. But it also contained warnings about agape misuse. The main warning is that when agape is used in the wrong way, the result is doing harm.
For positive guidance, Paul talked about the action of treating others as kind family members would treat each other — with respect, showing honor toward other people. For him, such moral action came from spiritual motivation. The spiritual energy behind such action has a transformational quality that works in a person’s life to help her or him not be conceited or proud, but live in harmony and peace with everyone, even to the point of “blessing those who persecute you.” He also pointed out that the spiritual energy involved with agape helps with being patient in affliction. What he spelled out there is the ethic of extending hospitality to strangers. BUT ALL OF THAT ONLY WORKS WHEN AGAPE IS USED SINCERELY AND FAITHFULLY.
Paul used negative warnings to drive home the difficulty people have when they separate agape from God. I think when he started by saying, “Agape must be sincere” -- he was referring to keeping it in its spiritual context. As I’ve recalled so many times, he always meant “the agape of God;” as he said in Rom. 5:5 -- “the agape of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit.” That is agape’s true and only source. So there is tremendous danger caused by thinking that agape has any other source or any other function than the Holy Spirit.
We must let the Holy Spirit use agape to be transformational in our living. For example, Paul warned about what happens when people try to repay evil for evil, and take revenge. If people resist the proper functioning of the Holy Spirit and are not willing to make the huge effort involved with living by the Holy Spirit’s directing agape, then their minds stay enslaved to the old pattern of the selfish, egotistical, violent era of history. So what I think was meant in 2 Tim. 4:10 is the misdirection of agape. People can get terribly lost if they go out into the world thinking that agape is nothing more than human-generated love.
Paul wrote: “If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” (Rom. 12:20) But very few people in the 1st Century understood the importance of living that way. They thought it was not humanly possible, so they resisted. Of course, it is the action of the Holy Spirit that makes it possible. That’s what was reflected in 2 Tim. 4:10.
And of course, we are still seeing examples all around us today of very few people understanding the importance of living that way. That lack of understanding can also lead to people misusing the power of agape.
But I think we are seeing a slow change, because fortunately we can see so clearly, by all the evidence of the last 2,000 years, that the old historical pattern (selfish, egotistical, power-hungry, violent) produces so much destruction that it must be ended. That destructiveness cannot be stopped if people continue ignoring the realization that agape comes from God -- as God’s gift to us -- to use to create a new way of living.
When we keep agape connected with the Holy Spirit, it has a transformational quality that helps people be kind, compassionate, and charitable with everyone. Agape guided by the Holy Spirit can break down the pattern of taking revenge against enemies that mistakenly tries to overcome evil with evil.
Living that way requires a strong, lasting decision. We have to decide to let the Holy Spirit liberate our mind from the old pattern of history in order to take part in the new way of living. Only spiritual energy is powerful enough to bring about such liberation. Agape is spiritual power that opens us and liberates us when we tap into its spiritual flowing.
Of course, that is such a vague verse, that not much can be “proved” from it at all. We don’t really know what the verse was referring to that Demas did. Every translation puts it differently. I based the translation I used on the New English Bible, which strangely used the word ‘heart’ for ‘agape.’ Whatever is actually meant there, the expression is very unusual (as is every use of ‘agape’).
So, because of all of that, we can only speculate about the meaning. Unfortunately, the problematic expression became clouded by its usage in churches. After that letter became part of the final rendition of the Bible, for centuries that expression “love for the world” was taken out of context from that verse and became a negative expression. (And of course, I don’t think “love for the world” was the original meaning at all -- whatever such a strange expression would mean, anyway.)
My speculation focuses on the spiritual meaning of agape. That leads me to ask, “Is it possible to misuse the power of agape?” To get perspective on a possible answer, I went back to Paul’s Letter to the Romans.
Over a year ago, I posted to this blog a study of Romans 12:9-10 -- “Agape must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in brotherly affection. Honor one another above yourselves.”
It is critically important that he began those verses with agape. His point in doing that was to set the stage for the dependence of the verses that followed on agape being used sincerely and faithfully.
Most of chapter 12 is a list of practical actions that spiritual agape helps us do when we open up and let it flow in our life. But it also contained warnings about agape misuse. The main warning is that when agape is used in the wrong way, the result is doing harm.
For positive guidance, Paul talked about the action of treating others as kind family members would treat each other — with respect, showing honor toward other people. For him, such moral action came from spiritual motivation. The spiritual energy behind such action has a transformational quality that works in a person’s life to help her or him not be conceited or proud, but live in harmony and peace with everyone, even to the point of “blessing those who persecute you.” He also pointed out that the spiritual energy involved with agape helps with being patient in affliction. What he spelled out there is the ethic of extending hospitality to strangers. BUT ALL OF THAT ONLY WORKS WHEN AGAPE IS USED SINCERELY AND FAITHFULLY.
Paul used negative warnings to drive home the difficulty people have when they separate agape from God. I think when he started by saying, “Agape must be sincere” -- he was referring to keeping it in its spiritual context. As I’ve recalled so many times, he always meant “the agape of God;” as he said in Rom. 5:5 -- “the agape of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit.” That is agape’s true and only source. So there is tremendous danger caused by thinking that agape has any other source or any other function than the Holy Spirit.
We must let the Holy Spirit use agape to be transformational in our living. For example, Paul warned about what happens when people try to repay evil for evil, and take revenge. If people resist the proper functioning of the Holy Spirit and are not willing to make the huge effort involved with living by the Holy Spirit’s directing agape, then their minds stay enslaved to the old pattern of the selfish, egotistical, violent era of history. So what I think was meant in 2 Tim. 4:10 is the misdirection of agape. People can get terribly lost if they go out into the world thinking that agape is nothing more than human-generated love.
Paul wrote: “If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” (Rom. 12:20) But very few people in the 1st Century understood the importance of living that way. They thought it was not humanly possible, so they resisted. Of course, it is the action of the Holy Spirit that makes it possible. That’s what was reflected in 2 Tim. 4:10.
And of course, we are still seeing examples all around us today of very few people understanding the importance of living that way. That lack of understanding can also lead to people misusing the power of agape.
But I think we are seeing a slow change, because fortunately we can see so clearly, by all the evidence of the last 2,000 years, that the old historical pattern (selfish, egotistical, power-hungry, violent) produces so much destruction that it must be ended. That destructiveness cannot be stopped if people continue ignoring the realization that agape comes from God -- as God’s gift to us -- to use to create a new way of living.
When we keep agape connected with the Holy Spirit, it has a transformational quality that helps people be kind, compassionate, and charitable with everyone. Agape guided by the Holy Spirit can break down the pattern of taking revenge against enemies that mistakenly tries to overcome evil with evil.
Living that way requires a strong, lasting decision. We have to decide to let the Holy Spirit liberate our mind from the old pattern of history in order to take part in the new way of living. Only spiritual energy is powerful enough to bring about such liberation. Agape is spiritual power that opens us and liberates us when we tap into its spiritual flowing.
Thursday, April 28, 2011
Known by Agape
In my last two postings I mentioned that in the teaching about agape in the Gospel of John, we are told that everyone will know the followers of Jesus by agape. That is the great challenge from our Master -- that using the power of agape is the way everyone will know who are the followers of Jesus Christ (John 13:35).
So today, when we continue following in that tradition established by Jesus and spread abroad by Paul, we take to heart that prediction. But what does that mean -- for people to know the followers of the Christ by the actions of living by the power of spiritual agape, and then sharing agape with each other and also allowing the Holy Spirit to extend agape through concrete actions out to others?
In order for us to be true Christians, agape must be seen through our actions. That’s the whole story today. Agape can become like a radiating energy, spreading out from Christian groups to the world around them. And that’s our challenge -- from the very beginning. So the Christian influence to change the world is known through the evidence of agape. That’s it! That’s what changes the world, because that’s how the power of God works.
And yet… and yet…
...most Christians don’t know what agape is. Those few aware Christians, who have at least heard the word, think it has something to do with love, but they know it can’t be what they normally think love is. But they’re not sure what else agape can be. Even they just don’t know what agape is.
So we have this strange condition in the 21st Century: what the world is supposed to know Christians by is unknown to almost all Christians. How pathetic is that?
We have the ancient challenge from Jesus Christ. And it was meant to be the very thing that defines the mission of our whole enterprise. And yet …
...how can we even begin to know how to start to meet that challenge and proceed with our mission …
… if we don’t even know what the main word is that defines our mission?
So the most important investigation we must complete in order to move forward in the 21st Century is to rediscover what agape is. And we have been held back in our prime investigation by weak translations for 600 years. We can no longer rely on translations of the New Testament. It is of utmost importance that, as quickly as possible, we have to discover through deep prayer -- opening up to the power of God -- what God is giving us in agape.
Then of course, we are challenged by Christ to let that spiritual power of agape work through us.
So today, when we continue following in that tradition established by Jesus and spread abroad by Paul, we take to heart that prediction. But what does that mean -- for people to know the followers of the Christ by the actions of living by the power of spiritual agape, and then sharing agape with each other and also allowing the Holy Spirit to extend agape through concrete actions out to others?
In order for us to be true Christians, agape must be seen through our actions. That’s the whole story today. Agape can become like a radiating energy, spreading out from Christian groups to the world around them. And that’s our challenge -- from the very beginning. So the Christian influence to change the world is known through the evidence of agape. That’s it! That’s what changes the world, because that’s how the power of God works.
And yet… and yet…
...most Christians don’t know what agape is. Those few aware Christians, who have at least heard the word, think it has something to do with love, but they know it can’t be what they normally think love is. But they’re not sure what else agape can be. Even they just don’t know what agape is.
So we have this strange condition in the 21st Century: what the world is supposed to know Christians by is unknown to almost all Christians. How pathetic is that?
We have the ancient challenge from Jesus Christ. And it was meant to be the very thing that defines the mission of our whole enterprise. And yet …
...how can we even begin to know how to start to meet that challenge and proceed with our mission …
… if we don’t even know what the main word is that defines our mission?
So the most important investigation we must complete in order to move forward in the 21st Century is to rediscover what agape is. And we have been held back in our prime investigation by weak translations for 600 years. We can no longer rely on translations of the New Testament. It is of utmost importance that, as quickly as possible, we have to discover through deep prayer -- opening up to the power of God -- what God is giving us in agape.
Then of course, we are challenged by Christ to let that spiritual power of agape work through us.
Monday, April 18, 2011
Agape in John 13-17
In my last posting I went back to the Gospel of John and looked anew at the teachings of Jesus about agape in chapters 13-17. After all these years of reading those verses, this time when I left “agape” where it was meant to be (not translated into the non-spiritual English word “love”), I could more clearly understand that Jesus actually was teaching about agape.
He was demonstrating to his closest followers what that spiritual power could do in human life and in relationships. That’s why he could make the great identity proclamation that using the power of agape is the way everyone will know the followers of Jesus Christ (John 13:35).
Now I have been able to see that those chapters contained an important connection between the two Greek concepts: “agape” and “Paraclete.” Jesus promised to send to his followers, after his resurrection, a special new spiritual power (that was Paraclete, that usually gets weakly translated into English as ‘Counselor’ or ‘Advocate’ or ‘Helper’ or ‘Companion’). That promise followed directly after he commanded his followers to share agape.
I found it to be better, when translating, to just leave Paraclete as ‘spiritual power’ and to leave ‘agape’ untranslated, as in the following: “If you share my agape, you will keep my commandments. I will ask the Father, and he will send spiritual power, to be with you forever. This spiritual power is the Spirit of Truth, whom the world cannot receive because it neither sees him nor recognizes him. You know him because he lives with you and will be with you.” (14:15-17)
Again, of course, this shows connection with Romans 5:5 -- “The agape of God has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.” (Common English Bible -- with “agape” untranslated) That was Paul’s way of showing that same connection as in John between agape and the Holy Spirit. Paul seemed to be saying that the spiritual power sent by Jesus continued to pour agape into the hearts of his followers and into the heart of the community of followers. Of course, Paul’s additional point had to do with the need to live by agape in order for it to truly be effective for growth in faith. So those people who do not put agape into action in the relationships of their lives, they remain stunted in a childishly selfish form of faith. (1 Cor. 13:11)
The sad realization, about the increasingly violent world, is that not enough of those claiming to be Christians actually do learn to live by agape. When Christians don’t put agape into action, then the potential influence of Christian compassion and kindness doesn’t get realized strongly enough to produce the desperately needed reduction in violence.
So today, when we continue following in that tradition established by Jesus and spread abroad by Paul, we take to heart that prediction (from John 13:35) that what identifies the followers of Jesus is living by the power of spiritual agape, and then sharing agape with each other and also allowing the Holy Spirit to extend agape through our actions out to others. It must be done through our actions. Agape becomes like a radiating energy, spreading out from Christian groups to the world around them. So the Christian influence to change the world is known through the evidence of agape.
He was demonstrating to his closest followers what that spiritual power could do in human life and in relationships. That’s why he could make the great identity proclamation that using the power of agape is the way everyone will know the followers of Jesus Christ (John 13:35).
Now I have been able to see that those chapters contained an important connection between the two Greek concepts: “agape” and “Paraclete.” Jesus promised to send to his followers, after his resurrection, a special new spiritual power (that was Paraclete, that usually gets weakly translated into English as ‘Counselor’ or ‘Advocate’ or ‘Helper’ or ‘Companion’). That promise followed directly after he commanded his followers to share agape.
I found it to be better, when translating, to just leave Paraclete as ‘spiritual power’ and to leave ‘agape’ untranslated, as in the following: “If you share my agape, you will keep my commandments. I will ask the Father, and he will send spiritual power, to be with you forever. This spiritual power is the Spirit of Truth, whom the world cannot receive because it neither sees him nor recognizes him. You know him because he lives with you and will be with you.” (14:15-17)
Again, of course, this shows connection with Romans 5:5 -- “The agape of God has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.” (Common English Bible -- with “agape” untranslated) That was Paul’s way of showing that same connection as in John between agape and the Holy Spirit. Paul seemed to be saying that the spiritual power sent by Jesus continued to pour agape into the hearts of his followers and into the heart of the community of followers. Of course, Paul’s additional point had to do with the need to live by agape in order for it to truly be effective for growth in faith. So those people who do not put agape into action in the relationships of their lives, they remain stunted in a childishly selfish form of faith. (1 Cor. 13:11)
The sad realization, about the increasingly violent world, is that not enough of those claiming to be Christians actually do learn to live by agape. When Christians don’t put agape into action, then the potential influence of Christian compassion and kindness doesn’t get realized strongly enough to produce the desperately needed reduction in violence.
So today, when we continue following in that tradition established by Jesus and spread abroad by Paul, we take to heart that prediction (from John 13:35) that what identifies the followers of Jesus is living by the power of spiritual agape, and then sharing agape with each other and also allowing the Holy Spirit to extend agape through our actions out to others. It must be done through our actions. Agape becomes like a radiating energy, spreading out from Christian groups to the world around them. So the Christian influence to change the world is known through the evidence of agape.
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Agape helps us get beyond ego-centric behavior
In previous postings when I explored 1 Corinthians and Romans, I discovered that Paul was saying that agape is not only a gift from God to help us, but it is also a witness. Agape witnesses that true spiritual power is on the side of patience, kindness, justice and truth -- and that it helps people overcome envy, conceit, self-righteousness, judgmentalness, and all other results of ego-centric behavior.
So when we put those two together, we see that the spiritual gift of agape is God’s way of helping us turn away from selfish, ego-centric actions. Paul was showing a new way for Christians to develop spiritually. When we read how Paul explained agape in 1 Corinthians 13, then we know we are dealing with the basis for a new faith discipline that motivates us to look for a spiritual training that will help us live fully through the power of God.
I think Paul was comparing selfish, ego-centric behavior with childishness. That's what he meant when he said, “When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, reason like a child, think like a child. But now that I have become a man, I’ve put an end to childish things.” (1 Cor. 13:11 Common English Bible) So in our struggle to get beyond being controlled by our egos, we need agape to help us become fully mature in our faith development; otherwise, we remain childishly stunted in our growth in faith. That’s why I concluded my last posting by realizing that a follower of Jesus needs to stop identifying with her or his ego; and instead, we need to do as Jesus did by building our identity from the eternal essence we find within.
If we don’t do that, then we are challenged by Paul’s warning that we remain childishly stunted. So the first step in faith growth is to admit that we have to get beyond all forms of envy, conceit, self-righteousness and behavior that is judgmental toward all other people. Otherwise, we get stuck in a faith that is childishly stunted as long as we wrongly think that it's good to feel self-righteous and judgmental toward anyone. That’s why the attitudes that Jesus criticized the most were self-righteousness and judgmentalness.
Of course, those attitudes persist as such a major problem among people claiming to be Christian because it's so easy to deny being self-righteous and judgmental. It's so easy to fall into the trap of thinking religion is suppose to make people feel self-righteous and give them the right to be judgmental. We fool ourselves when we suffer under the illusion that our opinions have to be right and anyone who disagrees with us has to be completely wrong (maybe even evil). That's the great temptation that Jesus was trying to get people to overcome.
But unfortunately, we see that happening all over America during these sad days when Christianity is so strongly divided. So as long as Christians keep thinking they have to protect Christianity by struggling against Christians with different opinions, then we will continue to function with childishly stunted faith. Especially when these struggles get dragged into politics, all of that is terribly destructive.
Paul’s point was faith development must help us be patient, kind, just, and truthful. That is why we need to let agape open us up and work in our life. He was also pointing out that the reverse is just as true: people prove they are not open to agape working in their life -- if they remain so controlled by ego identity as to be self-righteous, judgmental, mean-spirited, and bigoted.
That realization is why I went back to the Gospel of John and looked anew at the teachings of Jesus about agape in chapters 13-17. There I found Jesus instructing his disciples to share the power of agape with each other, just as he had showed them what that spiritual power could do in human life and in relationships. To give the strongest meaning possible to this sharing, he told them that everyone will know they are his disciples because they live by the power of agape (John 13:35). That is why he even put it in the form of a new commandment (13:34). He identified so strongly with the spiritual presence of agape that he could refer to it as “my agape” -- as when he said, “Remain in my agape. If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my agape, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and remain in his agape. … No one has greater agape than to give up one’s life for one’s friends.” (15:9-13)
(The meaning is so much clearer when “agape” is not translated into some weak English word, but is left “agape” in the original Greek, as it was meant to be.) Then we see that Jesus was talking about a special spiritual power that he was making sure they could receive as a gift from God to help them.
So when we put those two together, we see that the spiritual gift of agape is God’s way of helping us turn away from selfish, ego-centric actions. Paul was showing a new way for Christians to develop spiritually. When we read how Paul explained agape in 1 Corinthians 13, then we know we are dealing with the basis for a new faith discipline that motivates us to look for a spiritual training that will help us live fully through the power of God.
I think Paul was comparing selfish, ego-centric behavior with childishness. That's what he meant when he said, “When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, reason like a child, think like a child. But now that I have become a man, I’ve put an end to childish things.” (1 Cor. 13:11 Common English Bible) So in our struggle to get beyond being controlled by our egos, we need agape to help us become fully mature in our faith development; otherwise, we remain childishly stunted in our growth in faith. That’s why I concluded my last posting by realizing that a follower of Jesus needs to stop identifying with her or his ego; and instead, we need to do as Jesus did by building our identity from the eternal essence we find within.
If we don’t do that, then we are challenged by Paul’s warning that we remain childishly stunted. So the first step in faith growth is to admit that we have to get beyond all forms of envy, conceit, self-righteousness and behavior that is judgmental toward all other people. Otherwise, we get stuck in a faith that is childishly stunted as long as we wrongly think that it's good to feel self-righteous and judgmental toward anyone. That’s why the attitudes that Jesus criticized the most were self-righteousness and judgmentalness.
Of course, those attitudes persist as such a major problem among people claiming to be Christian because it's so easy to deny being self-righteous and judgmental. It's so easy to fall into the trap of thinking religion is suppose to make people feel self-righteous and give them the right to be judgmental. We fool ourselves when we suffer under the illusion that our opinions have to be right and anyone who disagrees with us has to be completely wrong (maybe even evil). That's the great temptation that Jesus was trying to get people to overcome.
But unfortunately, we see that happening all over America during these sad days when Christianity is so strongly divided. So as long as Christians keep thinking they have to protect Christianity by struggling against Christians with different opinions, then we will continue to function with childishly stunted faith. Especially when these struggles get dragged into politics, all of that is terribly destructive.
Paul’s point was faith development must help us be patient, kind, just, and truthful. That is why we need to let agape open us up and work in our life. He was also pointing out that the reverse is just as true: people prove they are not open to agape working in their life -- if they remain so controlled by ego identity as to be self-righteous, judgmental, mean-spirited, and bigoted.
That realization is why I went back to the Gospel of John and looked anew at the teachings of Jesus about agape in chapters 13-17. There I found Jesus instructing his disciples to share the power of agape with each other, just as he had showed them what that spiritual power could do in human life and in relationships. To give the strongest meaning possible to this sharing, he told them that everyone will know they are his disciples because they live by the power of agape (John 13:35). That is why he even put it in the form of a new commandment (13:34). He identified so strongly with the spiritual presence of agape that he could refer to it as “my agape” -- as when he said, “Remain in my agape. If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my agape, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and remain in his agape. … No one has greater agape than to give up one’s life for one’s friends.” (15:9-13)
(The meaning is so much clearer when “agape” is not translated into some weak English word, but is left “agape” in the original Greek, as it was meant to be.) Then we see that Jesus was talking about a special spiritual power that he was making sure they could receive as a gift from God to help them.
Monday, March 14, 2011
Jesus as the Logos
In my last posting I worked out what it would mean for the whole Gospel of John to be about the Logos of God. I came to that by asking: what if the gospel identified Jesus with the Logos so that an important explanation could be made about the Logos? In that sense, it's as John was saying “To show an example of what is possible” the Logos became flesh in Jesus.
So when I read John from that perspective, I started to see that what was expressed with that strange Greek term “logos” was “the formless, eternal essence” that is the basis of Creation. That way Jesus stands out as the one who was able to shed any identifying with the ego by finding his identity with the formless, eternal essence.
So in the very first chapter, vss. 3-4 express the eternal creative power by showing that through the Logos all things came into being. Then came the great connection between Logos, life, and light by expressing that what was created through the power of Logos had life and this life was the light of all people.
The Gospel then goes on to show Jesus identifying with the formless eternal essence of the Logos. That identifying then becomes the main theme of the entire Gospel. The portrayal shows Jesus being so far beyond any ego-identity that when he speaks “I” in a spiritual sense, he means his identity as the Logos, the creative power of God -- the life-giving power -- the light-bestowing power. In my last posting when I listed the famous “I am …” and “I will …” statements, it became obvious how he identified more with the formless eternal creative essence (the Logos) than identify with the mere non-eternal form of “Jesus.” So those “I” statements weren’t referring to the material Jesus but to the unlimited eternal essence.
Of course, this new realization changed my understanding of the statement that has caused a great deal of trouble over the centuries with Christianity’s relation with other religions. It seems to me that the trouble could be dealt with by seeing the statement from an open perspective rather than from an exclusivist perspective.
So we could understand that statement to mean “The formless, eternal essence is the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through the formless, eternal essence.” That way the statement from Jesus becomes a universal statement rather than the previously thought of exclusive statement. So it’s not as though Jesus claimed that people can come to the way, the truth, and the life only by dedication to the material form of Jesus Christ; but instead, he was calling people to do what he did and identify ourselves with the formless, eternal essence.
He was calling people to get beyond any identification with ego as a controlling function, and he was making it possible for people to find their identity through their connection with the formless, eternal essence within.
Next when we read in Chapters 14-17 also the verses where Jesus gives agape to the disciples, we see him commanding that they share agape with one another. This was his way of showing how the spiritual power of agape is a Helper in the process of identifying with the formless, eternal essence that each person finds as their connection with God. There he was showing that a main spiritual purpose to the Logo’s work through Jesus was to bring God’s spiritual power of agape to people, and he made sure that it was working in the lives of his disciples.
By accepting that all those quotes refer to Jesus finding his identity more with the unlimited eternal essence than with any materially limited ego-identity -- then those “I” statements weren’t referring to the material Jesus but instead to the unlimited eternal essence. And I believe his will was for us to consider our identity with the formless, eternal essence, and not with any form of ego.
So when I read John from that perspective, I started to see that what was expressed with that strange Greek term “logos” was “the formless, eternal essence” that is the basis of Creation. That way Jesus stands out as the one who was able to shed any identifying with the ego by finding his identity with the formless, eternal essence.
So in the very first chapter, vss. 3-4 express the eternal creative power by showing that through the Logos all things came into being. Then came the great connection between Logos, life, and light by expressing that what was created through the power of Logos had life and this life was the light of all people.
The Gospel then goes on to show Jesus identifying with the formless eternal essence of the Logos. That identifying then becomes the main theme of the entire Gospel. The portrayal shows Jesus being so far beyond any ego-identity that when he speaks “I” in a spiritual sense, he means his identity as the Logos, the creative power of God -- the life-giving power -- the light-bestowing power. In my last posting when I listed the famous “I am …” and “I will …” statements, it became obvious how he identified more with the formless eternal creative essence (the Logos) than identify with the mere non-eternal form of “Jesus.” So those “I” statements weren’t referring to the material Jesus but to the unlimited eternal essence.
Of course, this new realization changed my understanding of the statement that has caused a great deal of trouble over the centuries with Christianity’s relation with other religions. It seems to me that the trouble could be dealt with by seeing the statement from an open perspective rather than from an exclusivist perspective.
So we could understand that statement to mean “The formless, eternal essence is the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through the formless, eternal essence.” That way the statement from Jesus becomes a universal statement rather than the previously thought of exclusive statement. So it’s not as though Jesus claimed that people can come to the way, the truth, and the life only by dedication to the material form of Jesus Christ; but instead, he was calling people to do what he did and identify ourselves with the formless, eternal essence.
He was calling people to get beyond any identification with ego as a controlling function, and he was making it possible for people to find their identity through their connection with the formless, eternal essence within.
Next when we read in Chapters 14-17 also the verses where Jesus gives agape to the disciples, we see him commanding that they share agape with one another. This was his way of showing how the spiritual power of agape is a Helper in the process of identifying with the formless, eternal essence that each person finds as their connection with God. There he was showing that a main spiritual purpose to the Logo’s work through Jesus was to bring God’s spiritual power of agape to people, and he made sure that it was working in the lives of his disciples.
By accepting that all those quotes refer to Jesus finding his identity more with the unlimited eternal essence than with any materially limited ego-identity -- then those “I” statements weren’t referring to the material Jesus but instead to the unlimited eternal essence. And I believe his will was for us to consider our identity with the formless, eternal essence, and not with any form of ego.
Saturday, February 26, 2011
A New Look at John 1:1-14
During the last year, most of these blog postings have been about leaving “agape” untranslated. Lately, I’ve been thinking about other words from the original Greek New Testament that cannot be translated because modern English is such a spiritually weak language. Another obvious word is “Logos” from John 1:1-14.
I’ve always been bothered by the question: why did the author of that Gospel begin with a poem about that very strange Greek word “Logos”? After seeking the answer for a few decades, I’ve started to think that a possible reason is he wanted to make the point that his whole Gospel was about the Logos.
I’ve never been satisfied by all the regular explanations, speculating that the Logos poem was a little prelude that was put there to identify Jesus with the Logos; then the rest of the gospel was about Jesus. So recently, I started wondering: what if it was the other way around? What if John identified Jesus with the Logos so that an important explanation could be made about the Logos?
I reread the poem from that perspective, understanding that the point was to say, “This whole Gospel is about the Logos.” What was expressed there was the formless, eternal essence that is the basis of Creation. And so how in the world could we ever expect such a meaning of “the Logos” to fit into the translation of our common, everyday English “word.” That means the translators make a terrible mistake when they strip all the meaning of spiritual power from the Logos when they translate it as “word.” Of course, all interpreters have assumed that what was meant was the “Word of God.” But nowhere is that stated in the Greek; instead, if we leave it untranslated, we get the great faith statement: “The Logos was God.”
The opening of the Gospel of John takes us back to the very beginning of the Bible. “In the beginning was the Logos; the Logos was in God’s presence, and the Logos was God.” (the Anchor Bible) Of course, that reminded me of the great agape statement in 1 John: “We have known and have believed the agape that God has for us. God is agape, and those who remain in agape remain in God and God remains in them.” (1 Jn 4:16 Common English Bible) Of course, the statement would never have been made: “Agape is God.” That would have changed the meaning. But in John 1:1 we do have the statement, though, “The Logos was God.”
(The New Revised Standard Version translated the opening of the Bible not as “In the beginning was God;” but instead, they found that the ancient Hebrew expressed that more like, “In the beginning when God created ….”)
Vss. 3-4 express the eternal creative power by showing that through the Logos all things came into being. Then came the great connection between Logos, life, and light by expressing that what Logos created had life and this life was the light of all people.
And then came the identifying of the eternal creative power, the Logos, with Jesus. But the identifying was done in such a way that we see how Jesus had his identity with the formless eternal essence of the Logos. That then becomes the main theme of the entire Gospel. So that when Jesus speaks “I” in a spiritual sense he means his identity as the Logos, the creative power of God -- the life-giving power -- the light-bestowing power. That is how Jesus, as the Logos, was able to empower people to become God’s children, “begotten not by blood, nor by carnal desire, nor by man’s desire, but by God.” (vss. 12-13 Common English Bible)
In the famous “I am …” and “I will …” statements, Jesus was displaying that he identified more with the formless eternal creative essence (the Logos) than identify with the mere non-eternal form of “Jesus.” The first example came right after he sent the money changers out of the temple -- then when the religious authorities challenged him, he said, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I with raise it up.” (Jn. 2:19) Obviously, he wasn’t saying that the physical body of Jesus would rebuild the physical temple in 3 days. Instead, he was demonstrating his identity with the eternal creative power. And as such he was proclaiming the New Creation of a New Form of Temple.
Next, was with the Samaritan woman at the well, to whom he said, “Whoever drinks from the water I will give will never be thirsty again. The water I give will become in those who drink it a spring of water that bubbles into eternal life.” (4:14) So he was identifying with the eternal creative essence (in other words, the Logos), and as such the Logos would bring a spiritual ‘water’ that leads any person who identifies with it to eternal life.
Then when the disciples asked him why he didn’t eat, he told them, “I am fed by doing the will of the One who sent me and by completing his work.” (4:34) Again, at that place, he wasn’t referring to the material body of “Jesus” but the eternal essence he identified with.
When he was challenged about working on the sabbath, he replied, “My Father is still working, and I am working too.” (5:17) And then to show the spiritual depth of the identity he was expressing, he said, “I don’t seek my own will but the will of the One who sent me.” (5:30)
In the remaining, famous “I am …” statements, I think he was demonstrating his identity with the formless eternal creative essence, and not with the material form of Jesus. But when he used the words “my own” or “my own will,” then he meant the material form of Jesus. Here is the list. “I am the bread of life.” (6:35) “I am the light of the world.” (8:12) “You are from below; I am from above. You are from this world; I am not from this world.” (8:23) “I haven’t come on my own; God sent me.” (8:42) “Before Abraham was, I Am.” (8:58) “I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved.” (10:9) “I am the good shepherd.” (10:11) “This is why the Father loves me: I give up my life so that I may take it up again.” (10:17) “I give them eternal life. … I and the Father are one.” (10:28 & 30) “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me will live, even though they die. Everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.” (11:25-26) “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you have really known me, you will also know the Father.” (14:6-7) “The Father who dwells in me does his works. Trust me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me.” (14:10-11) “I will ask the Father, and he will send another Companion, who will be with you forever. This Companion is the Spirit of Truth, whom the world can’t receive because it neither sees him nor recognizes him. You know him, because he lives with you and will be with you.” (14:16-17)(14:19-20) “Because I live, you will live too. On that day you will know that I am in my Father, you are in me, and I am in you.” “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vineyard keeper. … Remain in me, and I will remain in you. A branch can’t produce fruit by itself, but must remain in the vine. Likewise, you can’t produce fruit unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you are the branches.” (15:1-5) “When Jesus finished saying these things, he looked up to heaven and said, ‘Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son, so that the Son can glorify you. You gave him authority over everyone so that he could give eternal life to everyone you gave him. … I pray they will be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. I pray that they also will be in us, so that the world will believe that you sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me so that they can be one just as we are one. I am in them and you are in me so that they will be made perfectly one.” (17:1-2, 21-23)
Thus we can see that he was identifying with the formless, eternal essence (and not with the form of Jesus) when he said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you have really known me, you will also know the Father.” So the “I” and the “me” referred to the Logos, not to Jesus. That’s why we should understand that statement to mean “The formless, eternal essence is the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through the formless, eternal essence.”
Chapters 14-17 also contain the verses about the giving of agape to the disciples and about his commanding that they share agape with one another. For example, he prayed, “I’ve made your name known to them and will continue to make it known so that your agape for me will be in them, and I will be in them.” (17:26) There he was showing that a main spiritual purpose to the Logo’s work through Jesus was to bring God’s spiritual power of agape to people, and he made sure that it was working in the lives of his disciples.
By accepting that all those quotes refer to Jesus finding his identity more with the unlimited eternal essence than with any materially limited ego-identity -- then those “I” statements weren’t referring to the material Jesus but to the unlimited eternal essence. And I believe his will was for us to consider our identity with the formless, eternal essence, and not with any form of ego.
I’ve always been bothered by the question: why did the author of that Gospel begin with a poem about that very strange Greek word “Logos”? After seeking the answer for a few decades, I’ve started to think that a possible reason is he wanted to make the point that his whole Gospel was about the Logos.
I’ve never been satisfied by all the regular explanations, speculating that the Logos poem was a little prelude that was put there to identify Jesus with the Logos; then the rest of the gospel was about Jesus. So recently, I started wondering: what if it was the other way around? What if John identified Jesus with the Logos so that an important explanation could be made about the Logos?
I reread the poem from that perspective, understanding that the point was to say, “This whole Gospel is about the Logos.” What was expressed there was the formless, eternal essence that is the basis of Creation. And so how in the world could we ever expect such a meaning of “the Logos” to fit into the translation of our common, everyday English “word.” That means the translators make a terrible mistake when they strip all the meaning of spiritual power from the Logos when they translate it as “word.” Of course, all interpreters have assumed that what was meant was the “Word of God.” But nowhere is that stated in the Greek; instead, if we leave it untranslated, we get the great faith statement: “The Logos was God.”
The opening of the Gospel of John takes us back to the very beginning of the Bible. “In the beginning was the Logos; the Logos was in God’s presence, and the Logos was God.” (the Anchor Bible) Of course, that reminded me of the great agape statement in 1 John: “We have known and have believed the agape that God has for us. God is agape, and those who remain in agape remain in God and God remains in them.” (1 Jn 4:16 Common English Bible) Of course, the statement would never have been made: “Agape is God.” That would have changed the meaning. But in John 1:1 we do have the statement, though, “The Logos was God.”
(The New Revised Standard Version translated the opening of the Bible not as “In the beginning was God;” but instead, they found that the ancient Hebrew expressed that more like, “In the beginning when God created ….”)
Vss. 3-4 express the eternal creative power by showing that through the Logos all things came into being. Then came the great connection between Logos, life, and light by expressing that what Logos created had life and this life was the light of all people.
And then came the identifying of the eternal creative power, the Logos, with Jesus. But the identifying was done in such a way that we see how Jesus had his identity with the formless eternal essence of the Logos. That then becomes the main theme of the entire Gospel. So that when Jesus speaks “I” in a spiritual sense he means his identity as the Logos, the creative power of God -- the life-giving power -- the light-bestowing power. That is how Jesus, as the Logos, was able to empower people to become God’s children, “begotten not by blood, nor by carnal desire, nor by man’s desire, but by God.” (vss. 12-13 Common English Bible)
In the famous “I am …” and “I will …” statements, Jesus was displaying that he identified more with the formless eternal creative essence (the Logos) than identify with the mere non-eternal form of “Jesus.” The first example came right after he sent the money changers out of the temple -- then when the religious authorities challenged him, he said, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I with raise it up.” (Jn. 2:19) Obviously, he wasn’t saying that the physical body of Jesus would rebuild the physical temple in 3 days. Instead, he was demonstrating his identity with the eternal creative power. And as such he was proclaiming the New Creation of a New Form of Temple.
Next, was with the Samaritan woman at the well, to whom he said, “Whoever drinks from the water I will give will never be thirsty again. The water I give will become in those who drink it a spring of water that bubbles into eternal life.” (4:14) So he was identifying with the eternal creative essence (in other words, the Logos), and as such the Logos would bring a spiritual ‘water’ that leads any person who identifies with it to eternal life.
Then when the disciples asked him why he didn’t eat, he told them, “I am fed by doing the will of the One who sent me and by completing his work.” (4:34) Again, at that place, he wasn’t referring to the material body of “Jesus” but the eternal essence he identified with.
When he was challenged about working on the sabbath, he replied, “My Father is still working, and I am working too.” (5:17) And then to show the spiritual depth of the identity he was expressing, he said, “I don’t seek my own will but the will of the One who sent me.” (5:30)
In the remaining, famous “I am …” statements, I think he was demonstrating his identity with the formless eternal creative essence, and not with the material form of Jesus. But when he used the words “my own” or “my own will,” then he meant the material form of Jesus. Here is the list. “I am the bread of life.” (6:35) “I am the light of the world.” (8:12) “You are from below; I am from above. You are from this world; I am not from this world.” (8:23) “I haven’t come on my own; God sent me.” (8:42) “Before Abraham was, I Am.” (8:58) “I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved.” (10:9) “I am the good shepherd.” (10:11) “This is why the Father loves me: I give up my life so that I may take it up again.” (10:17) “I give them eternal life. … I and the Father are one.” (10:28 & 30) “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me will live, even though they die. Everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.” (11:25-26) “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you have really known me, you will also know the Father.” (14:6-7) “The Father who dwells in me does his works. Trust me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me.” (14:10-11) “I will ask the Father, and he will send another Companion, who will be with you forever. This Companion is the Spirit of Truth, whom the world can’t receive because it neither sees him nor recognizes him. You know him, because he lives with you and will be with you.” (14:16-17)(14:19-20) “Because I live, you will live too. On that day you will know that I am in my Father, you are in me, and I am in you.” “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vineyard keeper. … Remain in me, and I will remain in you. A branch can’t produce fruit by itself, but must remain in the vine. Likewise, you can’t produce fruit unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you are the branches.” (15:1-5) “When Jesus finished saying these things, he looked up to heaven and said, ‘Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son, so that the Son can glorify you. You gave him authority over everyone so that he could give eternal life to everyone you gave him. … I pray they will be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. I pray that they also will be in us, so that the world will believe that you sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me so that they can be one just as we are one. I am in them and you are in me so that they will be made perfectly one.” (17:1-2, 21-23)
Thus we can see that he was identifying with the formless, eternal essence (and not with the form of Jesus) when he said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you have really known me, you will also know the Father.” So the “I” and the “me” referred to the Logos, not to Jesus. That’s why we should understand that statement to mean “The formless, eternal essence is the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through the formless, eternal essence.”
Chapters 14-17 also contain the verses about the giving of agape to the disciples and about his commanding that they share agape with one another. For example, he prayed, “I’ve made your name known to them and will continue to make it known so that your agape for me will be in them, and I will be in them.” (17:26) There he was showing that a main spiritual purpose to the Logo’s work through Jesus was to bring God’s spiritual power of agape to people, and he made sure that it was working in the lives of his disciples.
By accepting that all those quotes refer to Jesus finding his identity more with the unlimited eternal essence than with any materially limited ego-identity -- then those “I” statements weren’t referring to the material Jesus but to the unlimited eternal essence. And I believe his will was for us to consider our identity with the formless, eternal essence, and not with any form of ego.
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