[Dialogue] 6/24/10, Spong: The Origins of the New Testament, Part XXVII: Acts and the Rise of Universalism

Thu Jun 24 15:00:42 CDT 2010

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                  Thursday June 24, 2010                

The Origins of the New Testament, Part XXVII:
Acts & the Rise of Universalism

The book of Acts is a travelogue, a journey, designed by Luke to bring fulfillment to the words he puts into Jesus' mouth at the very beginning of this book: "You shall be my witnesses," Jesus says, and then he tells them where: "in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8)."  Luke is intent upon portraying the Jesus movement to be one that starts humbly in the hills of a remote Galilee and then moves through Samaria on its way to Jerusalem, where he records his first climax in the crucifixion of Jesus. Asserting that the death of Jesus is not the end of this movement, he then proceeds to tell the story of how this movement began to spread from Jerusalem until it reached its second climax in the capitol of the known world, the city of Rome.  So this author has  his story move only in one direction and he never has the story return to a place from which it has departed.  One illustration of this becomes visible when the angelic messengers of the resurrection in Luke's narrative do not order the disciples to return to Galilee as they do in both Mark and Matthew, but rather "not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father (Acts 1:4)."  To signal the beginning of the next phase of his story, Luke repeats the words of the promise originally stated earlier in his gospel by John the Baptist that, while John has baptized with water, the disciples of Jesus will be baptized by the Holy Spirit and in the power of that Spirit a world wide mission will be inaugurated.
    Then in quick succession, Luke begins his Volume II, which we now call the book of Acts, by bringing the appearances of the Risen Christ to an abrupt end.  He removes Jesus physically from the earth in an act of ascension and then he inaugurates the Christian Church with the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the gathered community in which the people of the world discover a new sense of oneness.  The reader is not allowed to miss the worldwide significance of this story, for Luke says that those gathered at that time included Parthians, Medes, Elamites, dwellers in Mesopotamia, Judea, Cappadocia, Pontus, Asia, Phrygia, Pamphilia, Egypt, Libya, Cyrene, Crete and Arabia!  Given the knowledge of geography available in that day, this is a rather impressive list. This vision of a new oneness in this vast world is celebrated by the symbol that in the power of the Spirit they were all able to speak the language of their hearers.  It was, as many have observed, a reversal of the Towe r of Babel story from the book of Genesis (11:1-9) in which the languages of the people of the world were confused and human isolation into protective tribes was both inaugurated and explained.
    Luke uses the device of sermons that he places on the lips of Peter (Acts 1:15-20, 2:14-36, 3:12-26, 4:8-12) and Stephen (7:2-56) to communicate his message.  Jesus is the fulfillment of the Jewish Scriptures and his story announces that God has made Jesus "whom you crucified" both Lord and Christ — that is, both a divine presence and the expected messiah of the Jews.  In the process, we are given a view of how Luke perceived the early Christian movement.  With the election of Matthias to replace Judas Iscariot (Acts 1:22-26) the Christian Church was to be patterned after Israel with twelve tribes or leaders.  The followers of Jesus devoted themselves to "the apostles' teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers (Acts 2:43)."  They were to be capable of signs and wonders since the Spirit dwelled within them and they held all things in common (Acts 2:44 and 5:1-11). They attended the Temple "day by day" and in the privacy of their homes they conduc ted the Eucharist by breaking bread together.  Peter was always cast as the leader according to Luke, sometimes accompanied by John, but Peter was clearly the spokesperson for the Christian movement.
Next Luke introduces the first account of tension with the leaders of Judaism in the persons of Caiaphas, John and Alexander, together with all of the members of the high priestly family.  That conflict came to a resolution, according to the book of Acts, in the words of a leader of the Pharisees named Gamaliel, who urged the rulers to wait upon the test of time.  "If this movement is of God," he said, "you cannot stop it and if it is not of God, it will fail without help from you (Acts 5:33-42)."  It was sage advice and Gamaliel prevailed and we watch as this tension between church and synagogue began to fade. This is part of the process we use to date the book of Acts, for the author is describing life in the early church between the year in which the followers of Jesus were expelled from the synagogue around 88 CE and before the year 100.
    That original tension, however, was replaced by one within the movement of the followers of Jesus themselves and the book of Acts now turns its attention to this battle, which issued in the first intra-church battle.  It was between the strict constructionist Jewish Christians on one side and the newly-converted Hellenist or Greek Christians on the other.  The book of Acts will pivot on this conflict.  Peter was the champion of the strict Jewish point of view, which argued that Jesus did not set aside the Torah, but rather fulfilled it.  This meant that the power of Jewish law was still to be observed in Christian circles, including the rituals of circumcision, kosher dietary laws and the Sabbath worship traditions.  This group also asserted that the only doorway open to Greek converts to Christianity was to become Jews first and then Christians.  Paul is introduced in this book as the one who would ultimately become the champion of the Gentile Christian movement.  Stephen e ntered the story as one of the clearly chosen deacons who would expand the Christian Community's leadership in order to enable them better to care for the needs of the "Hellenists."
    According to the book of Acts, Paul began his career as a defender of the full power of the Torah and as a persecutor of those who would relativize its claims.  The narrative in the book of Acts pauses to allow the tensions in the Christian community to build by introducing another deacon named Philip, who also presses the boundaries of the Torah. Philip baptized an Ethiopian eunuch, who violated the way the strict constructionists interpreted the Law on two levels.  First, the Ethiopian was a Gentile who was brought by his baptism directly into the Christian movement with no journey through Judaism required to reach his destination.  Second, as a eunuch, this Ethiopian was a direct challenge to the literal truth of the Torah, for Deuteronomy could not be more specific on this issue since it states: "He whose testicles are crushed or whose male member is cut off should not enter the assembly of the Lord (Deut. 3:1)."
    Next, Luke moves to relate the story of Paul's conversion on the road to Damascus, after which in quick succession he is baptized, has his blindness ended and begins his missionary career.  From Paul's writings we have already learned about the conflict he had with those he called "the Judaizers" and his showdown with Peter, their spokesperson (Gal. 1).  By the time Luke wrote the book of Acts, however, that tension was more a part of history than it was currently alive and real. Luke even explains how it was overcome by telling how Peter had been converted to Paul's perspective.  This dramatic tale forms the end of the Peter section of Acts and opens the Paul section (Acts 10:9-16).    Peter's conversion took place on a roof top at noon where, Luke says, he was engaged in prayer.  Being hungry, this narrative tells us, he fell into a trance and saw the heavens opened, from which a great sheet descended, laden with creatures, animals, reptiles and birds that were edible but not kosher, perhaps including both pigs and shellfish.  A heavenly voice invited Peter to ease his hunger by rising, killing and eating.  Peter declined by saying, "I have never eaten anything common or unclean."  To which the voice from heaven proclaimed, "Peter, what God has cleansed, you must not call common (Acts 10:15)."  This vision was repeated, says Acts, three times before Peter got the message and went to the home of an "upright and God-fearing Gentile," named Cornelius, and baptized him and his whole family.  That was the moment, says Luke, when the Holy Spirit fell on the Gentiles.  The words of Peter then became the new mantra for the Christian movement, "Truly I perceive th at God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears God and does what is right is acceptable to him (Acts 10:34, 35)."
    The issue at stake in this battle was whether or not Christianity would become a universal movement.  It was Peter himself, the champion of the "strict constructionists," who forged the new way forward.  Peter thus is portrayed not only as the one who launched the Christian movement, but also as the life through which the boundary between Jew and Gentile was breached and as the one in whom the new vision of universalism was born.  His work being completed, Peter fades away and Paul now moves front and center. It is ultimately on the shoulders of Paul that the inclusive character of Christianity would be formed, one that would, as Paul says in Galatians, embrace: "Jew and Greek, male and female, bond and free."
    So Luke turns to the story of Paul and through his life we watch Christianity reach Rome and the "uttermost parts of the earth."  The tribal boundary that separated the Jews from the Gentiles was enormous.  As intense as this battle was inside Christianity, it would not be either the last or the bitterest fight that would mark Christianity in its journey toward universalism.  There would be other fights before Christians were able to see women, people of color, adherents of other religions, homosexual persons, mentally ill persons and even left handed persons as fully human.  There would also be others in history who would play the role of Peter and ease the Christian movement into its calling to bring abundant life to all.  Only then could the invitation of Jesus, "Come unto me, all ye," not "some of ye," be fully heard.  The book of Acts chronicles the story of Christianity's walk into what it was created to be. Today we continue to write our chapter in this same ongoing n arrative.                  

– John Shelby Spong

                  Question and Answer                  
With John Shelby Spong

Hank Schuthof of Ingleside, New South Wales, Australia, writes:
    You are my friend, Bishop, though it is only one-sided.  You don't know me, but as many, many more, I admire your columns (I now have stored 330 in my computer) and your books,  with Eternal Life, in my humble eyes, as your greatest achievement. However, there are two questions I still cannot answer myself.  The first one, on page 91, you say, "Our Father who art in heaven, the prayer attributed, I think incorrectly, to Jesus himself." Has your thinking here to do with a historical implausibility or do you think that Jesus would never have said that?  If you mean the latter, my question is whether Jesus was not a man of his time and haven't you spent much effort to demystify Jesus for us?  My second question is more about your whole oeuvre.  As reasonable and true everything you write is for me , I wonder whether the not deeply-interested masses will spend so much study time to rid themselves from the worn-out symbols.  Also, I think people need some hold for their daily spiritual needs.  Therefore, hasn't the time arrived for a "Newer Testament," just as Jefferson has tried in his time?  Please do not see this as criticism, but as an honest hope that, for once, the world will be able to abandon the worn-out paradigms.

Dear Hank,
    Thank you for your letter and for your comments.
    The Lord's Prayer appears to have been unknown to Paul, who wrote between 50-64 since he never mentions it.  It also appears to be unknown to Mark, the first gospel to be written (70-72).  If it had really been Jesus' prayer, I find it hard to imagine these earliest of the New Testament writers not mentioning it.
    The Lord's Prayer makes its first appearance in Matthew in the early to middle years of the 9th decade (82-85) and, in another but similar form, in Luke, written about a decade after Matthew (88-93).  The fact that the Lord's prayer is found in Matthew and Luke but not in Mark could mean that it was part of the lost book of sayings called the Q document to which presumably both Matthew and Luke had access. Then there is a possibility that it was in the tradition earlier than Matthew.
    The prayer itself, when read carefully, is a "kingdom prayer" since it envisions Jesus under the image of the messiah who was to inaugurate the kingdom of God.  This was an early interpretation of Jesus by the Christian Church, but I see nothing in the authentic Jesus tradition, so far as we can reconstruct it, that leads me to believe that Jesus himself conceived of his role to be that of the apocalyptic messianic figure who would inaugurate the kingdom of God on earth.
    At the very least, I wish we could stop saying in church, "And now as our Savior Christ has taught us, we are bold to say" as the invitation to join in the Lord's Prayer.  It is far more the church's prayer for the second coming of Jesus than it is Jesus' prayer that he taught us.
    In regard to a "Newer Testament," I do not believe that this is a realistic possibility.  I have no problem with the New Testament as it is presently constituted if it is properly understood and therefore not read as either literal biography or literal history.  I accept it and appreciate it for what it is — the attempt by the followers of Jesus living in the first century to understand the impact of the Christ experience on their lives.  My problem with the New Testament is that, if one refers to it as the "unique and exclusive Word of God," that person is heard to be implying that God speaks only in the accents of first century Jewish male writers.  That point of view also assumes that God has not spoken since II Peter was added to the New Testament about 135 CE.  There are thus in the only "word of God" that these people recognize no voices of women, no voices of people of color, and no voices even of German and Anglo-Saxon people.  That view of God may have worked  in the tribal world of the first century.  It does not work for me. I would love to see churches read from other materials, not in place of the Bible but in addition to the Bible, calling it a "contemporary lesson." Would not worshippers today be edified to hear in solemn worship Martin Luther king's "Letter from a Birmingham Jail" as a modern Epistle, or some of the writings of the great female spiritual voices of the ages from Julian of Norwich to Karen Armstrong?  I think they would.                             

– John Shelby Spong

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