Preaching, Research, and Breast Milk
Yesterday, I had the honor of preaching at my own church. I felt a little extra pressure knowing that I see these people quite often and I don’t want to walk around knowing everybody thinks I preached a terrible sermon. Overall, the sermon seemed to go well–aside from the California heat of the sanctuary and a busy service. Though, I did totally botch up the benediction. What I appreciated about the sermon, though, was not merely its apparent “successful” delivery, but the opportunity to make some complicated stuff more accessible.
Somehow, I was assigned a passage that relates directly to themes I am currently addressing in my research. The text was Acts 2:37-47. The first part is the response of the Jerusalem crowds to Peter’s sermon and the second part is one of the famous descriptions of the early community life: sharing of goods, fellowship, etc. In my research, I am looking into sectarian impulses and mission impulses. In this passage, we have mission and we also have a strong internal community (I hesitate to use “sectarian”). Somehow there is a dialectic between the two. I find the combination intriguing. It’s not simply a “city on a hill” community–”Hey, look at how great we are! Wanna join up?” But there is an active, uh, “recruitment” initiative. It’s like a Billy Graham Crusade meets Menno Simons.
Mennonites tend to do better with the community part of this passage than the mission part, so I focused on the “mission” part as a challenge. The process of preparing the sermon, though, helped ground me a little bit. I think it has affected my perspective on my overall research, but I haven’t quite figured that out yet.
What an interesting journey this is–my career as a scholar of my own sacred texts. Last night, as I was in bed flipping through my Bible and considering the sermon and my research, I turned to my wife and said, “I love the Bible.” She handed me a bottle of pumped breast milk and asked me to go put it in the fridge. Life goes on. . .
Reading justice into the Bible?
[This is an email that I sent to a friend this past week during a discussion about our congregation, Pasadena Mennonite Church. I had raised concerns about a possible overemphasis in social justice issues in the Bible reading of our church's membership. My friend (correctly) challenged me on generalizing about the congregation being too justice-oriented, suggesting that it is a good counter to all the congregations that ignore (or are antagonistic to) those issues. My response turned out to be, I think, a good articulation of many things I've been thinking in the past few years regarding Bible reading and relates to the title of this blog (what it means to live "according to the book"). I've taken all identifiers out of the text, so as not to incriminate my friend!]
Dear Friend,
Thanks so much for your comments. I can resonate with so much of what you say. I think you are right to point to my overstatement of the situation. I’m sorry if I’ve mentioned my concerns several times, I didn’t realize I was as outspoken about it as you say. But I don’t doubt it’s true. You’re also right that I am oversaturated with social justice issues. It has a lot to do with my own journey. I tend to get uncomfortable with things when one aspect of faith is emphasized over another, be it spirituality or social justice/peace concerns. Towards the end of college I started to get really into social justice concerns. And I went gung ho down that road to the detriment of other aspects of my faith.
I have to tell you a story that I think of all the time when it comes to this topic. During one of our Bible studies in our small group from PA several years ago, I got into a heated debate with my friend Chris. We got to talking about what was the most important part of serving a person in need, giving bread to the hungry, for example. Chris made a comment that what matters most is not the act of service itself, but your willingness to follow God in discipleship. I argued that God ultimately wants the hungry person to be fed and that the most important part of the action was that the hungry person no longer be hungry (we grossly oversimplified the problem of world hunger for the sake of the argument).
Although neither of us were saying the other part was unimportant, Chris thought that I was calling him selfish and I felt he thought I wasn’t being spiritual enough about it. We went back and forth in a very tense-filled room until one of our friends made the astute observation that Chris is in a place of spiritual revival right now and I am trying more and more to discover what it means to be a Christian with social justice concerns. You two are just emphasizing what is important to you in your journey right now, our friend observed. Chris and I prayed for one another and hugged afterwards, but I always remember that debate. Nowadays I go back and forth on it within myself. I tend to think that both are equally important, but the question makes me feel very uncomfortable (in a good way).
So I will certainly admit that my frustration comes more from my own walk than from the true makeup of PMC. I know that there are wonderful people who love the Bible and have very deep spiritual lives, which shows in the way they attend to others around them. I find great comfort from these people (because I’m not one of them! My spiritual life could use much more depth).
I do understand your concern to be a loud voice for social issues in order to swing the pendulum of the larger church more towards peace and justice. I think I agree with the idea. What concerns me is the way we (or any Christian) approach(es) the Bible. When I read the Bible, am I looking for something in particular? Be it justice or peace or Spirit-baptism or predestination or health-and-wealth-gospel, I think it is wrong for me to only read the Bible looking for the things that will comfort me in my view of faith and the world. I don’t want the Bible to be used like the U.S. Constitution for Democrats and Republicans, picking out the parts they like (their proof texts) and throwing them at the other side. I’m not saying that people at PMC do this, but I think the danger is there for all Christians and I think we should be aware of it. Our church is a solid peace and justice church, we will more likely look for peace and justice when we read the Bible. It’s natural.
But I think that we should allow everything to be challenged when we read the Bible (and when we pray, for that matter). One of the verses that really challenges me on this is Hebrews 4:12: “Indeed, the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing until it divides soul from spirit, joints from marrow; it is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” I knew a lot of fellow Evangelical youths when I was in high school who called the Bible their “sword” as if it were a weapon against the big ol’ nasty world, when really that sword is pointed at us…. me. One of my profs claims that no Christians actually change their minds by reading the Bible, they just reinforce what they already believe and explain away things that they don’t like. I’d like to prove her wrong.
I am completely on your side when it comes to trying to get more people motivated towards action. I am disturbed that we do not put our money where our mouths are (at least not all of us). One of the reasons that I think it could be more talk than action is because our faith is not holistic enough. In our ethics class, Erin emphasized the importance of “character ethics,” which basically refers to the idea that what we do stems from our character. If we are spiritually-shaped disciples of Jesus, we will be prepared to do things that seem impractical by worldly standards, but serve God’s concerns in the world. It gets back to that whole debate I had with Chris. We need to be disciples, both inwardly and outwardly. If we are nourished by Scripture and the movements of the Holy Spirit, I believe we will be spurred towards action and not just words. This is a challenge to myself more than anybody else.
So I’m saying that I agree with you about our emphasis as a congregation, but I think we need to be careful we don’t bring our emphasis into our reading of Scripture and our prayer lest we miss God’s attempt to mold us from the inside out.
I really should be packing instead of writing this, but I am enjoying this discussion with you. It’s helping me to articulate myself more carefully. I hope that I won’t be as careless with generalizations in the future.
Peace,
Pat
Thinking about the "ugh" and the "mmm"
Since the annual meeting for the Society of Biblical Literature (SBL) is coming up later this month, and it’s my first run-in with the bigwig conference, it may be a good time for me to think about what I am interested in pursuing as a potential scholar. What captures my attention, passions, and interests in the field of biblical studies? I’m still trying to figure this out myself, so I’m just going to do a list format here. And maybe I should start with what I don’t want to do, since that’s easier to know.
Things that make me go “ugh…”:
- Highly speculative historical reconstruction of events: What is the dating for Paul’s various letters to the Corinthian churches? Did the exodus really happen and, if so, when? What were the origins of the Dead Sea Scrolls community and who was the “Wicked Priest”? It’s not that I don’t appreciate the work that others do in trying to figure these things out, but it’s just not my bag, baby. These actually are pretty tame as far as speculation goes. Generally, the more speculative it is, the more abhorrent I find it.
- Source and redaction criticism: Did one definitive “Q” source exist (that is, a source used by both Matthew and Luke) and of what did it consist? What parts of the Pentateuch were written by the J, E, D, and P sources? Again, not bad work, but not for me.
- Highly philosophical interpretive methods: Highfalutin language and incomprensible systems and grids is a major turn off. I do like a bit of poststructuralism in moderation, but for me, it can sometimes skate the edge of boredom.
- Historically disconnected and overly postmodern “reader-response” criticism: Boy if that doesn’t show my bias, eh? I don’t like history to reign supreme in hermeneutics, but I also don’t think that each individual reader is the be all and end all of the interpretative endeavor.
- Solely ideological criticism: I am a feminist and at times I like to dance with… (no, not with the devil in the pale moonlight)… liberation theology. I think that it goes over-the-top, however, when it is an undergirding hermeneutical method. I appreciate the work that some feminists and liberationists are doing to ask the difficult questions, but I worry about losing historical perspective . . . similar to my concerns about reader-response criticism.
Things that make me go “mmm…”:
- Jesus: This is a little complicated. I’m not into a ton of speculation about the “historical Jesus,” but I don’t mind it as much as other speculative issues. I’m more intrigued by how Jesus is remembered by the New Testament documents and what that means for the history of the church and for Jesus followers today. But I do enjoy thinking about Jesus’ historical and cultural context. This is the purpose for historical research for me: not figuring out exactly how things happened, but pondering the significance of the surrounding culture (especially early Jewish culture).
- Anabaptist hermeneutics: What does critical New Testament scholarship mean when interpreted through the lens of a radical lived-out faith community? For example, what do we do with the early chapters of Acts and the Sermon on the Mount?
- Intertexuality: What is the relationship between various texts? As far as specific textual relationships go, having taken VanderKam’s course on early Judaism, I’m particularly interested in Second Temple Judaism. I’m also interested in texts that have no direct link (that we know of) and yet still share similar language and themes.
- Narrative or literary criticism: I like looking at the final form of the text in Scripture and wondering what it means, rather than contemplating what its source was and how it came to be… blah, blah, blah.
- Canonical criticism: What is the relationship of this text within the larger canon and what might it have meant to the community which pulled it together? I like the emphasis on community here. Inspired community formed the canon and hopefully an inspired community interprets it. My former pastor and newly inaugurated Goshen College president, Jim Brenneman (who studied with James Sanders) has dragged me a little closer to canonical issues.
- Apocalyptic literature: The last year or so of seminary life has really hit home the idea that apocalyptic literature was not an escape from present requirements but a motivation to “stay the course,” as it were. I’ve fallen in love with Matthew 25 and I think I could do a dissertation just on that text!
- Second Temple Jewish literature: I mentioned this above, but I think it deserves its own bullet point. I really enjoy reading about Jewish ideas around the time of Jesus and the early church. I can see myself getting into rabbinic literature at some point, but I’m not there yet.
- Some text criticism: Though you might think it too laborious for one such as myself, I nevertheless do enjoy doing some nitty gritty textual research. I really like some of the things I’ve read from Bart Ehrman (even though we don’t hang our hat on the same theological presuppositions).
In sum, I am not enthused by a lot of historical speculation, but don’t like total historical apathy. In that way, I would hope for some balance between the extremes. Most of my “mmm” category entails thinking about interpretation. Historical context is good only in service to our reading of the biblical text, not the other way around. At least that’s my way of looking at it. At the end of the day, the most important question to me is: what do we do with the words and narratives of Scripture?
To be perfectly honest, though, what really excites me is working through issues with other people. My eyes are more towards teaching, communicating, and discussing difficult things about biblical interpretation than it is making a name for myself on the details of lonely scholarly work. But you have to go through the latter to get to the goal of the former. And it’s not that I’m terribly adverse to
the academic minutia, that just isn’t my focus. Some of it is more interesting than other parts, but I don’t want to get lost in the abyss of research while forgetting the joy of the community.
[By the way, the pictured teacher is Brian Smith at Messiah College (my esteemed alma mater). Brian is hands-down and without-a-doubt the most significant inspiration that I have in becoming a teacher of biblical studies. He's an OT guy, but that's okay. Some of us need to take a look at the introduction to the New Testament 
KIDDING! Anyway, he's the best teacher I've ever had and I want to be like him.]
VanderKam on Qumran and the Early Church
During my class with James VanderKam this past Summer, “Introduction to Early Judaism,” I was reading the Rule of the Community (1QS) from the Dead Sea Scrolls (DSS) and the concept of communal sharing of goods struck me. There seemed to be an interesting parallel with Qumran (if that’s truly where the DSS were written) and the Jesus-following community in the early chapters of Acts. I asked Dr. VanderKam if any scholars had examined the relationship. He informed me of some other interesting links, not least of which is the fact that they both admitted new members to the community at the culmination of the Festival of Weeks (AKA Pentecost) and pointed me to two brief suggestions that he had made in print, which are more teasers for further research than actual studies but it seems appropriate to share them here. As an Anabaptist, thinking about connections and contrasts between the Qumran community and the radical community of the early church sounds like something worth exploring!
From his chapter, “Sinai Revisited,” for Biblical Interpretation at Qumran (2005), edited by Matthias Henze (Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature):
Before concluding, we should note that the Qumran community was not the only one in ancient Judaism that allowed its self-image to be shaped by Israel at Mount Sinai. In the New Testament the earliest Jerusalem church, as pictured in Acts exhibits a number of the same traits. That community was constituted in a new way at the Festival of Pentecost, the Greek term for the Festival of Weeks. On that day many new members were welcomed into the fellowship. Those first followers of Jesus also established a unity, an ideal society in which property was held in common, meals were eaten together, and prayers were offered in community. It too was a community that received revelation in this state in a dramatic divine manifestation. As a matter of fact, an entire series of traits in the Pentecost story (such as the tongues of fire, revelation in the languages of the world) also have their origin in reflection on the Sinai event, an event that was central in the Hebrew Bible and continued to exercise influence for many centuries. (pg. 60)
In addition, this following quote is from his essay, “Covenant and Pentecost,” which appeared in Calvin Theological Journal (Volume 37.2, Nov 2002, 239-254):
Another aspect of the story in Acts 2–the nature of the community formed by the first Christians–may also be paralleled by Jewish understandings of the events at Sinai. As we have seen, the Bible itself gave rise to the idea of imagining the situation as ideal when Israel encamped at Mt. Sinai and received the Torah. The Qumran community embodied those ideal features in its structure, and the church of Acts 2-4 seems to have done the same. They, too, had all things in common and lived a life characterized by prayer and obedience to the apostles’ teaching, just as Israel had been unified and receptive to the revelation at the mountain. (pg. 252)
The latter essay is more focused on the Acts community (cf. 246-254), while the majority of the former article is in regards to the community at Qumran. This connection between the earliest church and the DSS community is something I hope to develop further in the future. I find it interesting in thinking about the ideals with which these two Jewish communities began. Since the majority of the DSS are most likely written in the first century BCE, and thus prior to Jesus and the early church, was the early church familiar with the ideas of the DSS group or other groups like them? The parallels are inviting. For another specific example, 1QS 6:25 addresses those who are deceitful about property: “If one of them has lied deliberately in matters of property, he shall be excluded from the pure Meal of the Congregation for one year and shall do penance with respect to one quarter of his food” (Vermès translation). And we are reminded of the admittedly more serious fate of Ananias and Sapphira in Acts 5:1-11.
Yet there are obvious contrasts. The Community Rule outlines a very defined sense of ranking among its members, especially regarding its communal meal. Though it is not the same kind of ranking, it is division nonetheless that concerns Paul about the Corinthian practices of the Lord’s Supper (1 Cor 11:17-22; 10:17). 1QS also has a strict view of insiders and outsiders. This is one of the strongest issues with which the early church wrestled, particularly in Acts 15. That chapter, of course, comes down on the significantly more liberal side of things by allowing Gentiles into the community, only requiring of them four “essentials” of the Law: “that you abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols and from blood and from what is strangled and from fornication” (15:29). Perhaps it is this more liberal side of the early church that leads to the abandonment of the early ideals of community (since there isn’t much mention of sharing of goods elsewhere in the NT). When the community busts open its doors to hoards of all kinds of people, keeping a strict and committed community life becomes difficult.
The questions nevertheless remain for the nature of the early church in Acts: Did they have some awareness of the DSS community? Did its leaders have some kind of “strategy” or “plan” about how to organize this new community based on a knowledge of other communities, groups, and sects? If they were aware of the DSS community or at least the kinds of views held at the DSS community, it would appear that they adapted this for the needs of the early church and some of the much different ideas of Jesus. So much to think about.
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Elsewhere . . .- Blog titles beginning with "A" to "Z" on your reader Mark Goodacre
- Of making many books there is no end Chris Brady
- Free Online: The Liddell-Scott Jones Lexicon S and C
- Does Higher Criticism Attempt to “Destroy the Bible”? II agathos
- Steven J. Friesen and the Identity of Satan’s Throne in Pergamum alan
- Does Higher Criticism Attempt to “Destroy the Bible”? agathos
- Bloomsbury buys Continuum Mark Goodacre
- Imperial America Peter J. Leithart
- C.F.D. Moule on the Birth of the New Testament d. miller
- Responding to Kostenberger (with comparisons to Marshall) Jeremiah
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