[Dialogue] Spong: 12/18/08: Amos: The Prophet Who Transformed God Into Justice
Beret Griffith
beretgriffith at charter.net
Sun Dec 21 23:06:55 EST 2008
I appreciate getting the Spong postings and at
one time felt a slight pang at not paying for
them. Then, while on the adult education
committee at our church I was part of discussions
to ask Spong to speak at the local UMC church
while he was in the area for another engagement.
The chair of the committee communicated with
Spong's wife who handles his speaking
engagements. As I recall the request was to speak
at the church service (abouit 20 minutes) and at
the adult forum (a 45 minute program). Spong's
wife wrote back that the time was free and the
fee was upwards of $5,000, non-negotiable. People
most often regard it as an great opportunity to
speak at the church and adult forums and are
appreciative of the small honorarium they
receive. We did not engage Spong. My memory of
details may be off some tho not much. I hope the
Spong postings continue and am grateful to
colleagues who are contributing to the Spong site on our behalf.
Beret
At 03:44 PM 12/21/2008, you wrote:
>There are a multitude of websites requesting
>financial support. And many that I do support
>which do not require subscriptions but rely on
>the generosity of their readers, unfortunately I
>can not support them all. I am grateful that I
>can share Bishop Spong's essays and that
>colleagues who do subscribe to them are willing
>and able to post them to us. Although I agree
>we should not take advantage of such good sites,
>I also feel overwhelmed in how many I can help
>out. However if you and Adam feel so inclined
>to shame your colleagues into refraining from
>taking advantage of the help we receive from
>them as they subscribe and share his essays with
>us, then I will miss the absent postings very
>much and hope that some time in the future they will return to the Dialogue.
>
>Thank you Ellie and Dick (posthumously) for
>continuing the tradition of posting Bishop
>Spong's essays. I look forward to receiving
>more but fully understand that you maybe
>ethically inhibited from posting them. I
>believe we all contribute to the needs of the
>Internet in our own ways and you have certainly
>given us access to a very worthwhile website. Please keep it up.
>
>Jim Baumbach
>
><mailto:inmusunka at sbcglobal.net>inmusunka at sbcglobal.net wrote:
>>Thank you Adam Thomson! Impecunious though I
>>be, I just took the leap and signed up, feeling
>>now chagrined that I have been reading free
>>while others supported this great thinker's
>>endeavor provide us all with the fruits of his
>>labors. A truly progressive thought, you had, in this new era.
>>
>>Rev. Bob Ford
>>Preston Bradley Center, NFP
>>312-735-2123 cell
>><mailto:inmusunka at sbcglobal.net>inmusunka at sbcglobal.net
>>----- Original Message -----
>>From: <mailto:dmtmsn at language.eclipse.co.uk>Adam Thomson
>>To: <mailto:dialogue at wedgeblade.net>Colleague Dialogue
>>Sent: Friday, December 19, 2008 3:17 AM
>>Subject: Re: [Dialogue] Spong: 12/18/08: Amos:
>>The Prophet Who Transformed God Into Justice
>>
>>Concerning Bishop Spong and his essays - at the
>>risk of saying something that some might
>>consider taboo, I do want to make this point:
>>
>>Bishop Spong has a website where one can
>>subscribe to his weekly essays at just under
>>$30.00 a year. I cannot see how this sum is a
>>major barrier to benefiting from Spong's insights, for most people.
>>
>>Why should we not give financial support to
>>this site? I think it is wrong for us not to -
>>and I have subscribed to the site for several years.
>>
>>It isn't as though we are in the business of
>>"in-kinding for the sake of the mission" any more.
>>
>>Best wishes to all
>>
>>Adam
>>
>>END OF MESSAGE
>>
>>At 23:01 18/12/2008, you wrote:
>>>Hi Ellie,
>>>Thanks so much for forwarding Spong to all of
>>>us. I was afraid I might lose touch when Dick
>>>Kroger. Thanks for continuing the flame bearing.
>>>Charles Hahn
>>>
>>>
>>>From:
>>><mailto:elliestock at aol.com>"elliestock at aol.com"
>>> <mailto:elliestock at aol.com><elliestock at aol.com>
>>>To:
>>><mailto:Dialogue at wedgeblade.net>Dialogue at wedgeblade.net;
>>><mailto:OE at wedgeblade.net>OE at wedgeblade.net
>>>Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2008 11:26:04 AM
>>>Subject: [Dialogue] Spong: 12/18/08: Amos: The
>>>Prophet Who Transformed God Into Justice
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
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>>>[]
>>>
>>>A New Christianity for a New World
>>>
>>>[]
>>>
>>>[]
>>>
>>>Print this Article
>>>[]
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>>>member?<http://clk.atdmt.com/AGM/go/ups0120000005agm/direct/01/>
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>>>----------
>>>Thursday December 18, 2008
>>>Amos: The Prophet Who Transformed God Into Justice
>>>Not every character in the Bible starts out to
>>>be a hero. Indeed, one of the great themes of
>>>biblical literature is that it is the meek and
>>>the lowly who become the channels through
>>>which God is known in new ways. Mary, the
>>>mother of Jesus, is portrayed as expressing
>>>this theme in the Magnificat when she is made
>>>to utter these words, "For he has regarded the
>>>low estate of his handmaiden," but later
>>>generations "will call me blessed." The Old
>>>Testament prophet who makes this truth
>>>powerfully real is named Amos. Today we turn to his story.
>>>Amos was a citizen of the Southern Kingdom of
>>>Judah in the 8th century BCE. He lived in the
>>>village of Tekoa where he was a herdsman and a
>>>keeper of sycamore trees, employment that
>>>hardly demanded high academic achievements or
>>>the credentials that produced great
>>>expectations. In those days Uzziah was king of
>>>Judah and Jeroboam II was on the throne of the
>>>Northern Kingdom. The major powers of the
>>>world were preoccupied with their own problems
>>>and with each other, which allowed these two
>>>small Jewish states to bask in an Indian
>>>summer of prosperity, peace and wealth. The
>>>distribution of that wealth was, however,
>>>hardly balanced. The worship places of the
>>>Jewish world were crowded on holy days and
>>>religion was popular among the greedy ones who
>>>dominated the social order. There thus
>>>appeared to be little relationship between the
>>>words of the popular religion and the
>>>practices of people's lives in the public
>>>arena. In many ways that is not dissimilar
>>>from the current situation in the United
>>>States, where a few have achieved fortunes by
>>>greed and manipulation of the markets,
>>>creating a situation in which the wealthy are
>>>increasingly wealthy and the poor are
>>>increasingly poor and people even now seem not
>>>to be concerned. This dichotomy, however,
>>>burned itself into the consciousness of this
>>>simple herdsman named Amos and, like the
>>>proverbial "Hound of Heaven," it allowed him
>>>no rest until he had addressed this issue
>>>overtly and publicly. Amos packed his suitcase
>>>and journeyed from Tekoa in the land of Judah
>>>to the shrine of Bethel in the Northern Kingdom to make his witness.
>>>When he arrived Amos entered the courtyard of
>>>this holy place, where all of his suspicions
>>>were confirmed. He saw the crowds dressed in
>>>their finery busily attending to holy things
>>>while the poor outside the city gates were
>>>largely ignored. Amos wondered how he might
>>>get the crowd's attention. He was a clever
>>>man, however, and knew how to appeal to the
>>>instincts of the people. He found a corner in
>>>the courtyard, set up a soap box and then,
>>>using one of the oldest tricks in human
>>>history, he began to solicit first the
>>>curiosity and later the full attention of the
>>>crowd. Let me try to re-create the story.
>>>"Come closer," Amos shouted from his ma
>>>keshift pulpit, "Let me tell you about the
>>>sins of the people of the city of Damascus."
>>>Amos knew that everyone likes to hear gossip
>>>about the moral weaknesses of their neighbors
>>>and so as he excoriated the Damascans the
>>>crowds grew. Next he turned his judgment first
>>>on the people of Gaza and then on Tyre,
>>>condemning the sinful practices found in both
>>>cities. The crowd, loving it, grew even larger
>>>as Amos continued to appeal to their
>>>prejudices about and suspicions of their
>>>neighbors. This strange looking rube from the
>>>south said the things they wanted to hear.
>>>Then Amos moved to larger targets and his
>>>oratory rose to new heights as he focused on
>>>the nation states surrounding the Northern
>>>Kingdom. First it was the Edomites and about
>>>their sins Amos got more specific. The
>>>Edomites had pursued "their brothers with a
>>>sword, showing them no pity and they had
>>>allowed anger to tear perpetually" at the
>>>fabric of their society. The ecstatic crowd
>>>began to shout, "You tell 'em, preacher." With
>>>every loud voice of encouragement, the people
>>>gathered in ever greater numbers. Next it was
>>>the Amorites' turn. According to Amos, they
>>>had attacked Gilead and "ripped up the women
>>>with child in order to enlarge their borders."
>>>As Amos pronounced his message of doom on
>>>these nations, the people gathered around him
>>>roared their approval. When he turned to the
>>>very unpopular Moabites the frenzy of the crowd exploded.
>>>Next Amos, with the crowd in the palm of his
>>>hand and fully attentive, spoke in a bare w
>>>hisper. "Now let me tell you about the sins of
>>>the Southern Jews," he said. These Southern
>>>Jews were the people with whom the Jews of the
>>>North were the most competitive and with whom
>>>they had the deepest rivalry. The relationship
>>>between Judah in the South and Israel in the
>>>North was like that of New Zealand and
>>>Australia today. Signs in shops in New Zealand
>>>announce that "New Zealanders have two
>>>favorite teams, the All Blacks (the name of
>>>New Zealand's national team) and anyone who is
>>>playing Australia." So to hear their Jewish
>>>rivals in the south be condemned was music to
>>>the ears of the Northern Jews. The crowd
>>>pressed closer to this strange messenger and
>>>its size continued to increase dramatically.
>>>Those Southern Jews, Amos said, "despised the
>>>Torah; they did not keep God's commandments.
>>>Their lies caused them to err constantly," but
>>>God's justice is sure, he promised, and so
>>>Jerusalem will be "devoured by the fire of
>>>God." The crowd was ecstatic with enthusiasm,
>>>clapping and cheering. No one budged as this
>>>crowd-pleasing evangelist reached his climax.
>>>Now with every ear straining to hear, this
>>>herdsman arrived at the conclusion for which
>>>he had journeyed from Tekoa to the King's
>>>chapel in Bethel. His message was ready and so Amos turned to his climax.
>>>"Now," he said, "let me tell you about the
>>>worst people in the world." The crowd could
>>>hardly wait to hear who that would be. They
>>>were not prepared, however, for what was to
>>>come. "You Jews of the Northern Kingdom," he
>>>said, " are the ultimate culprits in God's
>>>world. You are the ones who worship
>>>ostentatiously in the sacred shrines, but even
>>>as you worship, you sell the righteous for
>>>silver and the poor for a pair of shoes. You
>>>trample the poor in the dust of the earth. You
>>>violate one another sexually. You worship at
>>>every altar in garments stolen from the labor
>>>of the poor. You profane holy places with
>>>heavy drinking of wine purchased with fines
>>>levied against the meek. You corrupt holy
>>>people, encouraging them to violate their
>>>sacred vows. You even silence the prophets."
>>>The crowd was suddenly silent and the smiles
>>>disappeared from their faces. Then Amos spoke
>>>of the punishment that God would send. "This
>>>judgment is inevitable," he screamed. It was a
>>>devastating message. The stunned crowd took a
>>>while to recover from shock, so Amos continued
>>>to drive home his key insights. "Worship
>>>isolated from life is of no value. Worship is
>>>nothing but justice being offered to God, and
>>>justice is nothing but worship being lived
>>>out. If worship and justice are ever
>>>separated, idolatry is the inevitable result."
>>>It was a stirring message, but suddenly it was not a popular one.
>>>When the members of the crowd recovered
>>>sufficiently to respond, they sent for a
>>>priest from the Shrine at Bethel named Amaziah
>>>and asked him to come to their defense, for
>>>they said, "Amos has conspired against you and
>>>the land and we are not able to bear his
>>>words." Amaziah was the voice of the
>>>established religion. He would brook no more
>>>of this interference with worship at the
>>>King's Shrine and so to Amos he said: "O,
>>>Seer, go home, flee away to your land in
>>>Judah. Prophesy there if you must, but you are
>>>never again to come again to Bethel for this
>>>is the king's sanctuary. This is the temple of
>>>our nation. Your words are not welcome here."
>>>Amos responded to Amaziah, "I am no prophet,
>>>nor even a prophet's son. I am a herdsman, a
>>>dresser of sycamore trees, yet the Lord took
>>>me from my flocks and called me to prophesy to
>>>the people of Israel." Once again, he repeated
>>>his charges. "The songs of your holy places
>>>will become nothing but wailing to the Lord.
>>>You cannot worship while you trample the poor.
>>>You cannot wring money from the poor to line
>>>your pockets with greed. God will turn your
>>>sacred feasts into mourning and your pious
>>>songs into lamentations." The preaching of
>>>Amos was now more than the people were willing
>>>to tolerate and so Amos was physically driven
>>>from the shrine. Rejected and defeated he
>>>returned to his humble life in Tekoa. In this
>>>newly imposed exile he wrote out his prophetic
>>>message, and that message became known as the
>>>words of Amos the Prophet. In time people
>>>heard transcendent truth in his words and
>>>finally these words were added to the sacred
>>>text of the Jewish people and were thus read
>>>in worship settings in the temples, synagogues
>>>and holy places. That was when people began to
>>>recognize that in the words of Amos, they were
>>>beginning to hear the "Word of the Lord." That
>>>is=2 0how the words of Amos came to echo
>>>through the centuries. In that process, God
>>>was inevitably redefined as justice. Worship
>>>and justice could never again be separated in
>>>true Judaism and worship came to be viewed, as
>>>Amos had suggested, as human justice offered
>>>to God while justice was seen as divine
>>>worship being acted out. In this context justice became another name for God.
>>>It was through the work of the prophets
>>>primarily that God was redefined in Jewish
>>>history. Love became the name for God through
>>>the writings of Hosea. Justice became the name
>>>for God through the writings of Amos. The
>>>prophets really do matter, not because they
>>>were the predictors of the future as so many
>>>of us were once taught, but because they were
>>>able to see more deeply into the meaning of
>>>God. The prophets more than anyone else made
>>>it possible some eight hundred years later for
>>>people to see and to hear the presence of God
>>>in the life of a crucified one named Jesus of
>>>Nazareth. The life of Jesus pointed to a
>>>divine nature marked by the dimension of love
>>>that Hosea had added to the meaning of God and
>>>the dimension of justice that Amos had added
>>>to the meaning of God. That resulted in a new
>>>understanding of consciousness in which
>>>divinity and humanity seemed to flow together as one.
>>>The biblical story was never static, nor is
>>>the human understanding of God. It is idolatry
>>>and an act of faithlessness that is being
>>>expressed when any one thinks that all truth
>>>has finally been reveale d and that someone or
>>>some institution actually possesses it.
>>>– John Shelby Spong
>>>
>>>
>>>----------
>>>Question and Answer
>>>With John Shelby Spong
>>>William from Newmarket, Ontario, writes:
>>>If the roots of the Christ story are indeed in
>>>Egyptian mythology (according to Tom Harpur's
>>>book The Pagan Christ) or the continuation of
>>>Jewish Epic History (according to your
>>><http://johnshelbyspong.com/store/Jesus_for_the_Non_Religious.aspx>Jesus
>>>for the Non-Religious) then who were the
>>>writers of the gospels? How did they acquire
>>>the expertise to make such a complex
>>>adaptation and what drove them, in spite of
>>>the risk of persecution, to adapt these myths
>>>to the person of Jesus of Nazareth, either as
>>>if this person was an historical figure, or if he never existed?< /TD>
>>>Dear William,
>>>The writers of the gospels were Jewish people
>>>who represented the second or third Christian
>>>generation. They wrote in Greek, not Aramaic,
>>>which was the language Jesus and his disciples
>>>spoke. The gospels at least the first three:
>>>Mark, Matthew and Luke are the products of
>>>the Synagogue, which had shaped the Jesus
>>>story dramatically over the 40-70 year period
>>>that transpired between the crucifixion and the gospel writing tradition.
>>>I disagree with Tom Harpur's thesis, for I do
>>>not think Egyptian mythology can shape the
>>>Jesus story in as short a period of time as
>>>existed. I note that Paul writes in Galatians,
>>>a book that is usually dated in the early
>>>50's, that he had conversed with Peter and
>>>other "pillars" of the Christian movement
>>>within four to nine years of his conversion,
>>>which scholars date one to six years after the
>>>crucifixion. Mythology needs more time than that to develop.
>>>People need to embrace the fact that the Jesus
>>>story was kept alive, recalled and celebrated
>>>in the Synagogue, for that is where the
>>>followers of Jesus worshiped every Sabbath.
>>>The Synagogue and the Christian Church did not separate until 88 C.E.
>>>I am quite sure Jesus of Nazareth was a person
>>>of history20in whom and through whom Jewish
>>>people believed that they had experienced the
>>>presence of the holy God. It was in that
>>>experience that Christianity was born. The
>>>earliest articulation of that faith came from
>>>Paul who wrote, "God was in Christ, reconciling the world to God."
>>>How we tell the world of the meaning of that
>>>experience is still what Christianity is all about.
>>>– John Shelby Spong
>>>
>>>----------
>>>
>>>Send your questions to
>>><mailto:support at johnshelbyspong.com>support at johnshelbyspong.com
>>>
>>>[]
>>>
>>><http://secure.agoramedia.com/spong/34631.asp>Print this Article
>>>[]
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