I’m borrowing the title of Deirdre Good‘s book even though I haven’t read it. It’s a catchy way of getting at what I’ve been considering quite a bit lately. As we read Jesus’ statements in the Gospels, he often feels somewhat hostile to blood families. Christians caught up in “family values” culture wars in North America might find these statements somewhat odd–they might try to find ways of working around them. They don’t make for happy Mother’s Day sermons (though I am proud to say that I did preach on one for one Mother’s Day!). But what we have to remember is that Jesus was in the midst of a vastly different culture, with a vastly different understanding of what the family was. The family in the ancient Mediterranean honor/shame (patriarchal) culture was dominated by the father. The father could do whatever he pleased with his family, which “belonged” to him, and his honor was intimately tied to how well he could manage his household. Jesus takes the father-dominated household to task. This is something my doctoral advisor, Scott Bartchy, discusses often. In fact, he has a book due out next year on the topic. You can find a little taste of it in his chapter for the recent publication of The Social World of the New Testament.

One of the things I find interesting about this insight is that there is such a strong movement today to challenge the use of “Father” language for God in church liturgy. Often people cite the notion of abusive Fathers and a desire to balance the masculinized image of God with a more maternal picture, which is also biblical. But Jesus himself was challenging an even more domineering image of fathers than we typically have in Western society and he spoke of God as “Father” because of (not in spite of) this. His statement that disciples should “call no man father” but God (Matthew 23:9) is a direct challenge to the patriarch of the family here. Again, I’m borrowing from Bartchy’s arguments here.

Most Christians don’t think much about what the “brother and sister” language means for fellow Christians. Why was sibling language so attractive for the Jesus movement? What did it mean for them? Community with fellow disciples was a “new family” for the Jesus followers.

I’d like to list a few of these “family values” texts, in which Jesus takes on this social institution of the ancient Mediterranean:

• “While he was still speaking to the crowds, his mother and his brothers were standing outside, wanting to speak to him. Someone told him, ‘Look, your mother and your brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you.’ But to the one who had told him this, Jesus replied, ‘Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?’ And pointing to his disciples, he said, ‘Here are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.’” (Mt 12:46-50; cf. Mk 3:31; Lk 8:19-21)
• “And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or fields, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold, and will inherit eternal life.” (Mt 19:29)
• “Peter began to say to him, ‘Look, we have left everything and followed you.’ Jesus said, ‘Truly I tell you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields, for my sake and for the sake of the good news, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this age—houses, brothers and sisters, mothers and children, and fields, with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life.’” (Mk 10:28-30; cf. Mt 19:29) [Notice in Mark's version how Jesus mentions father as something to leave, but it is left out of what will be received in this life.]
• “To another he said, ‘Follow me.’ But he said, ‘Lord, first let me go and bury my father.’ But Jesus said to him, ‘Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.’ Another said, ‘I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home.’ Jesus said to him, ‘No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.’” (Lk 9:59-62; cf. Mt 8:21-22)
• “Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! From now on five in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three; they will be divided:
  father against son
  and son against father,
  mother against daughter
  and daughter against mother,
  mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law
  and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.” (Lk 12:51-53)
• “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.
  For I have come to set a man against his father,
  and a daughter against her mother,
  and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;
  and one’s foes will be members of one’s own household.
  Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” (Mt 10:34-37)
• “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.” (Lk 14:26)
• “But he said to them, ‘Not everyone can accept this teaching, but only those to whom it is given. For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by others, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let anyone accept this who can.” (Mt 19:11-12)
• “And call no one your father on earth, for you have one Father—the one in heaven.” (Mt 23:9)