[Dialogue] Spong on Resurrection, the Easter bunny, and Bible literalism

[KroegerD at aol.com]

May 2, 2007 
Discussing Biblical Theology on  CBS Television  

The medium of television is a fascinating place through which to seek to  
dispel the ignorance of biblical fundamentalism. The time is always short, the  
network needs to be "fair and balanced" and neither the producer nor the  
interviewer is necessarily well versed in the subject matter. To push against  
these barriers in a brief segment on national TV is a daunting task. Yet that  was 
the task I faced on the Saturday before Easter when I appeared on the "CBS  
Early Show" to discuss "the resurrection of Jesus." How did that assignment 
come  about? The connections are interesting. My recent book, "JESUS FOR THE  
NON-RELIGIOUS" has a major focus on the resurrection, so the Religious News  
Service in Washington contacted me through my agent in Chicago for an Easter  
story that local papers might want to run during the Easter season. RNS then  sent 
their story out on their wire and local newspapers bought it to run in  their 
pre-Easter religious section. This particular story was a great success  
since the Washington Post, a premier newspaper, bought it guaranteeing a  national 
audience. That perked the interest of producers at CBS-TV, who decided  to 
make this story a feature on their Saturday Early Morning show between 8:00  and 
8:30. The story had potential for a television segment because it revealed  
tension in the way the resurrection is traditionally understood.  
The RNS interviewer had begun his article by quoting one of Jerry Falwell's  
disciples at Liberty Baptist College. He then talked to me because the 
publicity  on my new book indicated that I took a different point of view. His 
questions  also revealed that his knowledge of the resurrection was on about the 
same level  as the Falwell representative. "Do you believe in the resurrection of 
Jesus?" he  began. "Yes, I do," I responded. That was disconcerting because 
he had me pegged  to be the one who would provide the controversy to his story. 
A bishop who  appears to deny the literal accuracy of the resurrection 
creates negative  energy. I then cited the reasons for my Easter conviction: the 
dramatic reversal  of the disciples who abandoned Jesus when he was arrested, but 
who were later  willing to die for the reality of a life-changing vision; the 
revolution in  their thinking about the relationship of Jesus to God, and the 
establishment of  a new holy day on the first day of the week. Something had 
to have created these  effects. My interviewer, sensing the loss of his 
proposed story line, then began  to add qualifiers to his question: Was the 
resurrection physical? Did Jesus  literally walk out of the tomb? At this point, I 
clearly needed to do a Bible  101 course with him and began to state some very 
basic facts. "The gospels'  Easter stories are not eye witness accounts," I 
began, "they are the products of  the second and third generations after the 
crucifixion. They must not be viewed  as either biography or as literal history." 
Continuing this elementary  discussion I added, "The gospels reveal this in 
their inconsistencies,  disagreeing with each other on major questions. Indeed 
there is hardly an Easter  detail in one gospel that is not contradicted by 
another gospel. They don't even  agree on your question about whether the 
resurrection should be understood as a  physical resuscitation. Paul did not think so 
as a careful reading of his  epistles, which were written at least a decade 
before the first gospel, will  reveal, and Mark the earliest gospel writer, 
never portrays the risen Jesus  appearing to anyone. A resuscitated physical body 
was clearly not what the  resurrection was thought to be originally. That 
understanding, however, did  enter the Christian story in the later gospels, 
especially Luke and John which  were 9th and 10th decade works." My interviewer was 
obviously disturbed that  this interview was not falling into his 
pre-conceived format, nor did I sense  that he had any comprehension at all of what I was 
saying. When I later saw the  printed story this fear was correct, but the 
story was fuzzy enough for me to  know that I had at least neutralized his 
literal characterization of Easter and  had presented another option.  
The story next leaped to CBS News and it was déjà vu. A young CBS assistant  
producer called to do the "pre-interview," which enables her to shape the  
questions that the CBS host, J. B. Brown, would pose in the televised segment.  
She was engaging and enthusiastic, but totally ill-equipped to understand  
anything but yes or no answers. I was working that day in the library at Drew  
University near my home in New Jersey and so the phone appointment was set at a  
time certain and I agreed to vacate my assigned cubicle and step outside to 
take  her call. I anticipated it to be 5-10 minutes at most. It was a cold, 
wintry day  and I did not take my overcoat. The call lasted 45 minutes! She did 
not  understand how there could be any confusion since the Bible was the 
"literal  word of God." Her bias was so obvious that I finally asked her where she 
had  learned about the Bible. "I am a member of a Pentecostal Holiness Church," 
she  responded. She knew no way to ask about the Bible other than "Is it true 
or  false." I kept trying to show her that a more open-ended question would  
facilitate a better discussion. It became clear, however, that none of the  
people involved were really interested in such a discussion, so my task, now  
that I was in it, was far more to neutralize biblical ignorance than it was to  
open new possibilities to the viewing audience. That became my limited goal and 
 my sole agenda.  
When we arrived at the studio, I discovered our segment was sandwiched  
between a lawyer in the Duke University Lacrosse case and a feature with the  
Easter Bunny! Yes, I got to meet the Easter Bunny! At least our grandchildren  
would think that this made it worth my effort. I also met the young assistant  
producer. She was excited and told me that she had worked out four "really good"  
questions for J.B. to ask us. The "traditional voice" turned out to be the 
Rev.  Dr. Calvin Butts, a respected New York clergyman, well known for his 
social  ministry. On the set J. B. Brown, told us that he too was preaching at his  
church on Easter and hoped to get help from this interview. The cameras 
rolled.  The first question addressed to Dr. Butts was exactly what I feared. "The  
Resurrection of Jesus," J. B. said, "is it fact or fiction?" Dr. Butts did 
not  hesitate. "A fact," he said, quoting Paul to suggest that if Jesus had not  
literally and physically walked out of his tomb, there would be no 
Christianity.  That is not what Paul said, but there was no way I could make that point. 
His  explanation took 45 seconds. When J.B. posed the same question to me, I 
tried to  open it up by shifting from his limiting contrast of "fact or 
fiction" to "real  or delusional." I said, "I believe it is real" and agreeing with 
Dr. Butts,  stated that without some life-changing experience, "there would be 
no  Christianity." Then I tried to place some other data before the audience. 
I  reminded them that the words of the gospels were written 40-70 years after 
the  events they purport to describe. They were written in Greek, a language 
that  neither Jesus nor his disciples spoke. I pointed to the various 
contradictions  in the Easter narratives, noting that the gospels do not even agree on 
whether  the disciples were in Galilee or Jerusalem when whatever Easter was 
dawned in  their consciousness. I too consumed at least 45 seconds. With the 
thirty second  introduction, half of our time was now gone. No attempt was made 
to engage the  differences, our host was too intent to get to his next 
"exciting question."  Once again he addressed Dr. Butts: "The virgin birth of Jesus, 
fact or fiction?"  It had gone from bad to worse. No one can discuss the 
resurrection and the  virgin birth in a less than four-minute time slot. Obviously 
neither the  resurrection nor the virgin birth was the real subject here, but 
whether the  Bible must be read literally. Again, Dr. Butts gave the expected 
answer. "A  fact," and then he developed his answer a bit more fully linking 
the virgin  birth to the divinity of Jesus. When my turn came the "fact or 
fiction" question  was repeated. Once more I sought to broaden it. "The virgin 
birth is not about  biology," I said. "It was a popular 1st century way of 
trying to explain the  Jesus experience. The virgin birth was not even an original 
part of the Jesus  story but came into the Christian tradition in the 9th 
decade. Neither Paul nor  Mark had ever heard of it, and John the last gospel to 
be written, actually  omits it altogether, referring to Jesus on two occasions 
as the son of Joseph."  That was the final word as we were told that our time 
was up. The commitment to  the Easter Bunny was sacrosanct. We were thanked 
and departed. As we walked off  the stage, Dr. Butts made a revealing statement: 
"That kind of discussion  belongs in a seminary," he said, "in the church we 
preach it as fact."  
I admire Calvin Butts' ministry in New York. His powerful voice takes on the  
political establishment of the city in the name of the poor. His ministry has 
 integrity and he pastors his large congregation faithfully. His reference to 
 these discussions taking place in a seminary, but not being allowed in the  
pulpits of our churches, however, indicates that his education has made him  
aware that these issues cannot really be reduced to "fact or fiction," but 
since  he discerns no great interest in critical biblical studies in his 
community, he  does not bother about it nor is he conversant with that area of 
scholarship. I  have no problem with that.  
I live, however, in a world where bodily resuscitations, complete with angels 
 coming out of the sky to roll away the stone in front of Jesus' tomb and to  
place the Temple guard around that tomb into a state of unconsciousness; or  
stories in which virgins conceive and stars wander through the sky so slowly  
that wise men can follow them are unbelievable. If that is what Christianity  
requires then fewer and fewer citizens of the 21st century will continue to be 
 disciples of Jesus or worshipers of the God experienced in Jesus' life. So I 
 will continue to use even brief media opportunities to let the world know 
that  there are Christians who are not literalists and there are profoundly 
different  ways to understand Jesus far beyond those arrived at by literalizing an 
ancient  text. I can easily dismiss time bound and time-warped explanations. 
That does  not mean that I dismiss the experience that my ancestors in faith 
sought to  explain.  
John Shelby Spong  
_Note  from the Editor: Bishop Spong's new book is available now at 
bookstores  everywhere and by clicking here!_ 
(http://astore.amazon.com/bishopspong-20/detail/0060762071/104-6221748-5882304)   
Katherine Edman from Mason, Ohio, asks:  
Thank you so much for your series on the rise of fundamental Christianity. I  
particularly enjoyed the essay that described the Five Fundamentals and the 
one  on the First Fundamental - the inerrancy of the Bible. I have wondered 
whether  the Bible itself ever claims to be the inerrant word of God. I recognize 
the  difficulty of this question, since the Bible itself is a hodgepodge of 
many  books that have been bundled together over the ages. What I have found, 
however,  is that discussing biblical scholarship with fundamentalists usually 
gets me  precisely nowhere. They are unwilling to recognize that Moses could 
not have  written the Torah, or that the gospels were written years after 
Jesus' death.  They continue to believe that the books of the Bible arose more or 
less intact  in that particular order and mystically assembled themselves into 
a unit. They  insist that the obvious contradictions or factual errors are 
just our  misunderstanding of "the Word." They propose that the "texts of terror" 
have  been misinterpreted to justify the social evils of slavery, racism, and 
sexism,  or - worse - fundamentalists continue to quietly believe that these 
social evils  are indeed ordained by God! So, I want to take the argument back 
into their  court. I want to challenge the fundamentalists to prove to me, 
via the Bible,  that the Bible actually claims to be the inerrant word of God. 
If the Bible  itself doesn't claim it, why do they believe such an outlandish 
claim? And my  question to you is: does the Bible anywhere make this claim?  
Dear Katherine,  
The immediate and short answer is no, though fundamentalists will quote  
various texts (like II Timothy 3:16) to prove it does. The problem with that  text 
is that when it was written there was no such thing as the Bible as we now  
know it. The New Testament had not yet come into being. The fact is that even 
to  ask the question the way you did makes a presupposition that is quite  
fundamentalist and thus plays right into the hands of this absurdity - for even  
if a particular book of the Bible were to contain that claim, the author of 
that  book would have had no idea that his work would someday be included in a 
book  called the Bible. The various texts that together we Christians now call 
the  Bible were written over more than a thousand years between about 1000 BCE 
and  135 CE. It was not a single book by a single author but rather 66 
separate books  (and even more if we count the Apocrypha), written by a variety of 
authors. None  of these authors believed that someday their words would be 
invested with either  holiness or inerrancy. When the authors of the books that we 
now call the New  Testament referred to scripture (Matt 12:10, 15:2,3, Luke 
4:21, 22:27 and John  2:22, 7:38, 3:42, 10:35, 12:18, 17:12, 19:24, 19:28, 
19:36-37, 20:9, and even  the author of II Timothy to which I referred to earlier), 
they are referring  only to the Hebrew Scriptures, since at that time there 
was no New Testament.  
It is noteworthy that when the author of II Timothy wrote that all "scripture 
 is given by inspiration of God," he was referring to the Old Testament since 
 again, at that time, there was no such thing as the New Testament.  
So the claim that the Bible is the inerrant word of God is itself a  
non-scriptural term and indeed was imposed on the texts of the Bible at a much  later 
time to meet the need of church leaders to have an ally in their struggles  to 
clarify their authority. If the "Word of God" agrees with me then clearly my  
position is the correct one. There arose from that corruption of both truth 
and  rationality the incredible number of abuses about which I have spoken so 
often  in this column from biblically-endorsed racism, sexism and homophobia to 
 biblically-endorsed war, persecution, and torture. Hope this clarifies your  
concern.  
John Shelby Spong 



************************************** See what's free at http://www.aol.com.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://wedgeblade.net/pipermail/dialogue_wedgeblade.net/attachments/20070503/008e9cc8/attachment-0001.html