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In 1963 I attended Sir George Williams University in Montreal as an adult student. Adult Student was a code word for this guy never went to high school or never completed high school. I majored in Geography because I was good at shading maps. I took two important courses back then which led me to write this blog today: geomorphology and glaciation. Understanding these scientific principles directed me to a fuller understanding of Noah and his story. The question is: did the flood Noah and his family endured in Genesis actually happen?
During the last ice age glaciers covered almost one-third of Earth's land mass, with the result being the oceans were about 400 feet (122 meters) lower than they are today. During the last global "warm spell," about 125,000 years ago, the seas were about 18 feet (5.5. meters) higher than they are now. As a matter of interest, people lived where the English Channel and the Mediterranean Sea are today before they were then flooded. There is also compelling evidence that there was a natural dam across the entrance to the Black Sea which held back millions of gallons of water from the Mediterranean Sea. The dam suddenly gave way allowing a massive flood of water which flooded where people lived. The Mediterranean stories of a flood like Noah’s have an excellent historical origin. Christians who are more fundamental accept the story of the Great Flood as a tale which cast Noah and God as a team to save all the good of the world. A story of a flood like this is incorporated into every faith boarding on the Mediterranean Sea. In Greek mythology, Zeus decided to destroy all life with a flood. The king Deucalion was charged with building a boat. The religions of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers also had a flood story. Stories like Noah’s are by a group of civilizations who would have suffered from extensive flooding at some point in their collective history. At this point I would like to talk about civilization and glaciers. The last continental glacier melted over the course of thousands of years, finishing up about 10000 years ago. Civilization – an advanced state of human society - was born in three places in the world: The Fertile Crescent which included Mesopotamia to Egypt (approx. 8000 BCE), Central America (approx. 8000 BCE), and Yellow River in China (5000 BCE). Writing was an invention of civilization; prior to this, the only way to communicate history was orally. Our ancient brothers and sisters needed a way to explain the misconstrued happenings of history. The puzzling question of who we are and how we came to be here is answered in Genesis 1. Adam (meaning earth or soil) and Eve (life) filled the void of ignorance until the science of Darwin began modern history. Bishop Ussher began his timeline of the world calculation by adding the ages of the twenty-one generations of people of the Hebrew-derived Old Testament, beginning with Adam and Eve. He calculated the first day of creation to be October 23, 4004 BCE. What evidence is there that melting glaciers had anything to do with Noah and his flood? Nothing specific. However, in a time when oral tradition was the only way to communicate history, the records of sea rising would have carried over hundreds of years by one generation to another and remembered through oral history. There is one catastrophic event in the Middle East which may explain the flood, as I alluded to before. The melt water from the glaciers raised the ocean levels including in the Mediterranean Sea. At that time, about 9000 years ago, the channel between the Mediterranean and the Black Sea (known today as the Bosphorus Strait) was still an earthen dam. Under the weight of the glacial melt water, the dam gave way and sent millions of litres of water into the Black Sea. This event may have been the seed of the Noah Story. Let’s look at Noah’s journey. Prior to Noah being chosen to lead the rescue of two of all creatures, he was the only righteous man in God’s kingdom. Noah found favour in the sight of the Lord. So, Noah built an ark to hold the animals of the earth. When the rains came, the ark floated and began its 40-day journey. Now we need to understand that whenever 40 is used in the scriptures, it means an estimated time, not a literal time. For example, 40 days means a long time. Forty years means a really long time. There was no rudder in the ark so Noah was at the mercy of the winds and currents. He was there but going nowhere. Life is like that for some people including the people left on the earth after the rains commenced. We have never found the remains of his ark.
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Good question! People in the first century were certainly no different than we are today except we now have advances in public health. Medical interventions in the western world give us a much better standard of health. We also live much longer today, despite the Old Testament claims about the longevity of Methuselah, the grandfather of Noah who died at 969 years. In Jesus’s time, curing illness was much different than today. People depended on faith healers. Jesus was one of the many faith healers who journeyed throughout the countryside healing the sick. As far as we can ascertain Jesus never charged for this service; other faith healers of his time did require payment.
People thought that all diseases were triggered by an evil demon which possessed a person. In order to be cured, you needed to have the evil demon cast out of you. In other words, you needed an “illness exorcism”. There are still a few pseudo-Christians around today who will perform this service for you, usually at a cost, and most often without documented success. In the Old Testament, Psalm 90 talks about human beings making it to three score years and ten (age 70). A few more might make it to 80 years of age. In the Old Testament there are fictional characters like Methuselah (Genesis 5:21–27), the imaginary grandfather of Noah, who supposedly lived to 969 years. In reality, when Jesus was crucified in his thirties, he was already considered to be in society’s older age group. All first century people, from the emperor in Rome, to the lowest slave in the tin mines in Greece, had external parasites such as lice. There was no way to control them. Public health was not a known practice. As well, people thought that parasites did nothing except make you itch. Today we know that parasites cause some serious health issues. People also suffered from internal parasites like worms. I remember 60 years ago some of my friends, living on farms, having to take worm medicine. In Jesus’ day, dysentery was prevalent and often killed people. Diarrhea, constipation, gas, bloating, and nausea were all common symptoms of internal parasites. Malaria, common in the Middle East, was caused by a parasite as well. Medical knowledge was generally unknown in the first century. How the body worked was a mystery to people. For example, pregnancy was a great mystery for all people and the answer they came up with was wrong. The general misunderstanding most people had, that in order to have a baby, all that was needed was for a man to plant the seed into the woman, much like planting a pumpkin seed in the raised bed in the back yard. She provided nothing more than a warm and fertile environment for the seed-child to grow. I don’t know how they explained a child born that resembled its mother. This was the world of first century Palestine where Jesus found himself. So how does one explain such miracles as curing blindness by spitting into some dirt and rubbing it on the blind person’s eyes (John 9:1–12). That probably did not happen. However, today there are occasionally stories told where people are suddenly cured of a disease for which there seemed to be no cure. These are called spontaneous remissions. You have often heard the expression “mind over matter”. There are instances today where people get in touch with their bodies and literally “will wellness”. I think first century had the same sorts of miracles. I have often heard the expression “there but for the Grace of God go I”. What it means is that God intervened on your behalf to relieve you of something which could have been much worse. This is the whole basis of the business of sainthood in the Roman Catholic Church. Pope John Paul 2 was beatified on the evidence that a nursing sister, who had Parkinson’s Disease, prayed to him after his demise, and was cured of Parkinson’s Disease by the late Pope’s heavenly intervention. Why would God choose her over the hundreds of other folks who also suffered from the same disorder? It seems a little unfair to me. I suspect Jesus was able to help many in his day who were suffering from some sort of illness. He was a man of faith who was able to reduce anxiety by reassuring his followers that God was with them. Before Christianity became the official church of the Roman Empire, Paganism was the faith of the Empire and the people. Paganism has numerous gods, each of whom govern different aspects of daily life. The deities of the Roman Empire borrowed heavily from the older Greek pantheon - for example, the king of the Gods on Mount Olympus was Zeus (Roman Jupiter), Poseidon (Roman Neptune) was the ruler of the sea, and so on. Jupiter was the boss god in Rome. The return of the longer days after the winter solstice was celebrated at a festival to the Roman god Saturn, the god of agriculture, time, and renewal. This festival, held on December 25, was called Saturnalia; later, Christianity would co-opt this celebration and designate it Jesus’ birthday. During the first few centuries of the common era, every town had a shrine to their local pagan god and visitors would go to these community shrines and pay their respects (that is, all visitors except Christians and those belonging to the Jewish tradition.)
Christianity really took off when the Roman Emperor Constantine was persuaded by his wife to adopt the Christian faith as the official religion of the Roman Empire. Constantine himself converted to Christianity in 312 CE. The faith he converted to in that year was a hodge podge of different beliefs, rituals, and structures. For Christianity to become a common faith, there needed to be a common point of belief. Up until the early fourth century, there had been many churches with many different beliefs. In the year 325 CE, Christian leaders from far and wide were summoned to a council by Constantine; the Emperor hosted this meeting to lay out the common ground of this new religious faith. The Trinity is a concept which came out of this meeting, known now as the Council of Nicaea. Trinity doctrine is commonly expressed as the statement that the one God exists as or in three equally divine “Persons”, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. It is a hard concept for people today to accept and was equally difficult for people 1700 years ago. In fact, non-Christians in the 4th century often accused Christianity of having three gods. So why did the people at the Council need to develop the idea of the Trinity? The answer is convoluted. How do you explain the concept of the Father (God), the Son (Jesus) and the Holy Spirit is referred to as the Lord and Giver of Life? I think you can also extend to the meaning of the Holy Spirit the creative teachings of Jesus. The only time we see the three parts of the Trinity together in the gospels is in Matthew 28: 19 when Jesus tells us to go out and baptise the nations in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Perhaps my hesitancy at accepting the Trinity on its face rests in that the Trinity makes little sense to me. I see no need for it except to explain away a question asked many years ago. It is also such a complicated notion that it is often incomprehensible. So, when Jesus prays in the Garden of Gethsemane in Mark 14:36, who is he praying to? Himself as part of the Trinity? God? The Holy Spirit? In the original Greek writing, he addresses God as Father – Abba ho Pater - both in Aramaic and Greek. The notion of the Trinity is becoming less and less frequently used today. In my experience, preachers and congregants pay less and less attention to it. Once we sang hymns about the Trinity but less so today. So where is it used? In Baptism the Trinity plays a front and centre role. In my denomination, I speak the words for baptism clearly as follows, “I baptise you in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.” The World Council of Churches have decreed that the words of baptism shall be so. Although the Roman Catholic Church is not a member of the World Council of Churches, they are observers. Our Catholic brothers use the same words for their baptism as do the Protestants. Because we use the same words The Roman Catholic Church and the Protestant churches accept each other‘s baptisms. A reader wrote this Question: I left the church because I cannot reconcile that a man, beaten to within an inch of his life, and then hung on a cross for six hours, could come back to life in 36 hours (From Friday at 7:00PM to Sunday at 7:00AM). The human body just could not endure that and function in any sort of normal fashion as the gospels indicate. You are not the only one who has ever raised that point. We are called, as followers of Jesus of Nazareth, to accept that Jesus is fully human and fully divine. Does that mean he could shift the fully divine part into overdrive and thereby overcome the horrendous damage done to his body on Good Friday? I doubt that! It has always seemed to me that God’s laws of science are set and not open to change or override, despite what the Old Testament asserts. In other words, you cannot repeal the laws of science. Only Walt Disney could reverse the law of gravity as he did in one of his movies. Perhaps there are two options available to us to ponder on Easter morning. Let me begin by saying that something incredible came from that time and place. For something that profound to have carried on for 1993 years is remarkable. The tomb of Joseph of Arimathea, where the scriptures say Jesus was interred after the crucifixion, had the stone rolled away when Mary of Magdalene came to prepare the body for permanent burial. The Gospels give an account of what happened early in the morning. Mary Magdalene was first at the tomb. In fact, Mary gave the first Christian sermon that first Sunday telling the world that Jesus was alive. But alive in what way? In my view there are only two interpretations of the resurrection available to us. The first option is that the dead body came alive and walked around. There are two accounts in the New Testament which support this action, both from Luke’s gospel, verse 24 and the gospel of John, verse 20. The first is Jesus eating a fish meal with the disciples and second is the story of Thomas seeing Jesus hands and feet. These are two strong reasons for supporting the dead man walking. On the other hand, there are additional accounts of a more ghost-like appearance of Jesus. In Luke, two unnamed disciples are walking to Emmaus (we are not sure today where that was) and suddenly Jesus appears to them and walks with them. He then suddenly disappears. The question we need to ask ourselves: were these disciples seeing an apparition or a flesh-and-blood human being? The scriptures present both options. My take is that what the disciples knew on Good Friday evening (and please recognize that there were both male and female disciples) is that Jesus was dead. If we cannot accept the bodily resurrection, our second option is to recognize that the life example and teachings of Jesus came off the cross and into history. What was resurrected may not have been the body but rather the spirit of what he taught. The lessons of loving, forgiving, sharing, community and so on, which were not present in mainstream Judaism of the first century, should become present for us in the future. I think if today’s public, including our Protestant alumni, believe in God but are not willing to go the distance our parents and grandparents did by accepting the bodily resurrection as suggested by the scriptures, then we need to look for a new interpretation. This generation generally finds more faith in science, and scientific understanding does not include the after-three-days literal resuscitated life. That is a good question given the modern notion that he missed the event and came to Europe. The secular evidence supports the Gospels that he did die on the cross in about the year 30 of the Common Era. Crucifixion was the ultimate form of capital punishment invoked by the Romans. Not all crucifixions were like the one we accept as in Jesus’ case. Some deaths took up to six days when there was no beating and when the condemned was allowed to support himself on the ground. Generally, the crosses were not high, and the uprights were planted beforehand; the victim was nailed to the cross-piece on the ground and then lifted into place on the upright. The wrists were usually tied to the cross piece to ensure the weight of the body did not tear through the nails in the hands. The sufferer usually died of asphyxiation. In a well-known precursor to crucifixions held in Jesus’ time, when Spartacus led a slave revolt in 71 BCE, the slave army was defeated, and 6000 captured slaves were crucified along the Appian Way. Crucifixion is still a method of capital punishment on the statute books of some countries today. When Jesus was condemned to death, there was an added extra portion to the process in his case - he was to be thrashed and beaten. Jesus would have been stripped of any clothing and trussed up, so he was upright. The administrator of the whipping could let the whip land anywhere. The whip was leather with finger bones attached to the flails of the whip, designed to tear off skin. No matter how gruesome this sounds to us today, it was considered humane in the first century as the condemned person died faster on the cross after a thrashing. After his beating, Jesus was so weak that another man needed to carry the cross piece to Golgotha, the place of the execution. The place name Golgotha translates to “the place of the skull.” Crucifixion was designed to be humiliating. In the first century Judean world, a man’s honour rested on many things. Being seen in the nude was anathema. No one should ever see you nude. Reference King David dancing on his way home with the Ark showed too much leg and genitalia (see 2 Samuel 6: 20) or the father of the Prodigal Son who surely hiked up his robes while running to meet him (Luke 15: 20). The notion of the later church dressing Jesus in a loin cloth is, in my opinion, pure fiction. The whole idea of crucifixion was to bring as much shame to the victim. Complete nudity did just that! Another feature of the culture was that men should not respond to pain. Boys were taught this from an early age. But during the process of crucifixion it was nearly impossible not to cry out. Apparently, Jesus hung on the cross without uttering a word until the very end of his life. The centurion who had stood guard, according to Luke’s gospel (Luke 23: 47), claimed him to be “the son of God” because of this. Golgotha (or Calvary) was the name of the execution grounds just outside Jerusalem. There were usually several executions going on at one time. Josephus, a Jewish historian writing soon after Jesus’ time, tells the story of his walking through the grove of crosses with the hanging bodies of the executed affixed to them, when he recognizes three of the condemned men. He went to the governor and gained permission to have them “cut down”. One survived and the other two died soon after from the experience. Jesus seems to have been treated differently after his death than other crucified men would have been. It seemed that people could attend their loved ones during the time they hung on the cross and could well have removed their bodies after they had died. Usually, however, the condemned bodies were taken down and thrown into a pit where the wild dogs, who inhabited grounds of Golgotha, feasted on the fresh human meat. It was not a pleasant sight. I do not think Jesus thought he could avoid an early death. Gospel writers seemed to trust that Jesus believed he was destined to be executed, as he was the Messiah. The Messiah was the long-awaited Jewish warrior who would cut down the enemies of the Jewish people and bring peace to the Children of Israel. Christians have another view of the Messiah as a loving and forgiving man who would bring peace by his example. As far as we know, the last supper really happened. According to Luke, Mark, and Matthew’s gospel it was the annual Jewish Seder meal celebrating the escape of the Children of Israel from their Egyptian bondage about 1300 years before. John’s gospel did not agree that it was a Seder meal. It happened at Passover time and the meal celebrated the angel of death “passing-over” the homes with the blood of a lamb painted on their door posts. Without the blood on the door posts, the first born in the house, and the animals connected to that home, would be dead by the morning. Our Jewish brothers and sisters continue to celebrate this event annually. Now just a word about the Passover meal and the Last Supper. The greatest injustice ever done to the Christian chronicles was Leonardo da Vinci’s “Last Supper” painting! In Jesus’ day, people ate from a lounging position on the floor supported by their elbows and cushions. The table was low with short legs. They were U-shaped, with the open end available for the food servers to place the food on the table. The host of the feast (Jesus) sat second from the top of the U on the right. The guest of honour (Judas) sat beside the host at the top of the U on the right. The person with the least status, and charged with washing the feet of all guests was Peter, who sat at the top of the U on the left. Between Jesus and Peter sat the rest of the men in order of their status as denoted by the host (see Luke 14:10 or Luke 17: 7-11). Peter was ticked at being relegated to foot washer, the lowest status position at the meal. It would have been embarrassing for him in front of his friends and other disciples, and he refused to comply with Jesus. So, Jesus being Jesus, and against the status of the day, embarrassed Peter by washing his guests’ feet himself. Foot washing was important at mealtime as there were no sewers - waste was simply dumped in the street and sat there until the next rain washed it away. The Seder meal was a family meal where men, women and children were linked together in food, fellowship, and tradition. I strongly suspect women and children joined in when Jesus hosted the Last Supper. Men and boys over 13 would have eaten at one table and the women, girls and young boys at another. The Seder was an educational time and a time to remember. Jewish families all over the world celebrate this time together. I can see no reason it should have been any different in Jesus’ time. What was on the menu? There were traditional foods which were intended to remind the participants of the journey from slavery to freedom. Haroset was a paste made from fruit and nuts and it symbolized the mortar used in their slavery chores. Mar’or was a bitter herb (like horseradish) to remind them of the bitterness of slavery. Karpas was a green vegetable (usually parsley) representing spring. There was a bowl of salt water to remind them of their tears. Other foods were served, and often local traditions dictated what they were. So here we find Jesus hosting the Seder meal, perhaps in the year 28CE. He adds to it with the Eucharist wine and bread, the food of Christian remembering for 2000 plus years. Our Roman Catholic friends celebrate this by ringing a bell to indicate when the host and wine have become human. Protestants do it quite differently; we celebrate Communion during the year but not necessarily each week. All denominations develop their own strategies and theologies. Today in Christian communities, if we practice the last supper it is done on the Thursday prior to Easter Sunday. This day is called Maundy Thursday. Interesting that the word “maundy” means the ceremony of “washing feet” and has nothing to do with the meal. Good Question! My take is that something like it probably did happen because of the circumstances surrounding Passover in the year 30 CE. It is also mentioned in all four Gospels. The date itself has also come to be known as Passion Sunday. Palm Sunday, The Last Supper, The Crucifixion, and The Resurrection all happened in the same week around Passover time in about the year 30 CE. Passover was the most important festival of the Jewish calendar year. It celebrates the liberation of the Children of Israel from their Egyptian bondage hundreds of years before. Each year the story is told, in a family setting, and the words are reinforced with traditional foods to remind them of the bitterness of slavery. It is still done today in Jewish homes. The meal is called a Seder. There is good evidence that The Last Supper was a Seder meal with men, women and children attending. There is a saying at the end of the Seder, “Next year in Jerusalem”! Even in Jesus’ time there were thousands of Jews living throughout the Roman Empire. At Passover in Jesus’ day, the City of Jerusalem would be filled to overflowing with Jewish pilgrims attending the city to celebrate the holiday. In normal times the city would be a hotbed of unrest but during Passover the talk of rebellion would be higher. It was just 40 years later that the Romans would answer the Jewish rebellion with the sacking of Jerusalem, the destruction of the Temple, and the expulsion of the Jewish population to the four corners of the Empire. Because Judea was always in a constant state of unrest, Passover was seen as a time for Rome to flex its muscles toward the indentured population. Indeed, the Roman governor did just that. Each year, according to tradition, the Roman Governor would ride into Jerusalem on a horse with a Roman Legion in tow. It was war-like and aggressive, as if telling the population, “Go ahead, try something”! He came through the West Gate and people silently flocked to see his parade. Through the North Gate, at about the same time of day, came Jesus on a donkey mocking the Roman governor. Many people came to honour him by cheering and throwing down their cloaks and leaves from local palm trees to pave his way. This gesture was more literal than symbolic. In Jerusalem, the streets were either dirt or cobblestones. There were no sewers. Garbage and contents of the chamber pots were thrown into the streets. People had to walk through this filth. People paved Jesus’ way with their garments and leaves so he would not have to walk through the muck and debris. Jesus knew he was safe in Jerusalem at that time of day. The crowd would not have allowed any force to take him. The symbolism was not lost on people, either. The Roman governor rode into town on a horse, an animal of war. There were no cheering crowds welcoming him and his entourage. On the other hand, when Jesus entered there were cheering crowds. He was riding an animal symbolising peace. I am not sure what they expected this man of peace to do, but given his history in the hinterlands of the countryside, people were hopeful. After Jesus’ parade enters the city, he goes to the Temple. We need to remember that Jesus was a Jewish man who takes his responsibilities as a Jewish man seriously and that includes visiting the Temple. On his way through the Courts of the Gentiles he discovers the money changer, where one would expect them, changing money at exorbitant rates of exchange. Today we would call that gouging. Jewish pilgrims, visiting the city, were charged more and could do nothing about it. The members of the Sanhedrin were also in on the take. So, Jesus exercised some muscle against those fraudulent merchants. So why was he not arrested immediately? Because there were too many people around who would have come to his defense. He made sure he left the Temple each day before they locked the gates and was not arrested until after the Last Supper when he either chose to stay in the city or he missed the closing gates and was forced to stay. Good question! However, I am not sure there were actually two. Perhaps before I answer, we need to look at the conditions of first century Palestine. There were two ruling groups in the Promised Land: The Romans and the Sanhedrin. The Romans were in charge and the Sanhedrin needed to fall in with them. The first “trial” of Jesus was before the Chief Priest Caiaphas and the Sanhedrin, a Jewish tribunal which was composed of the ruling clergy of the day at the Temple. Jesus was brought before this group on the days we either call Maundy Thursday or Good Friday. Why them? Because Jesus was accused of blasphemy - that is, cursing God or elevating himself to God’s stature. Ultimately, Jesus is found guilty of: healing on the Sabbath (Friday sundown to Sunday sunrise); threatening to destroy the Temple; practicing magic, exorcising people by the control of demons (believed to be the cause of illness in his day); and not denying that he was the Messiah. The standard punishment for the crimes Jesus was accused of was being Stoned to Death. The guilty party was put up against a wall. Men would be on top of the wall armed with stones which would be dropped on the condemned man or woman. Others would hurl stones at the victim from ground level. Although there were several offences for which stoning was the assigned punishment, it rarely happened for two reasons: firstly, because often the evidence was not clear enough from reputable people. There was a second and much more important reason. Jesus was a very popular figure in the Holy Land at the time. He brought hope to the masses. The Sanhedrin were not popular and did not wish to give the populace anything that they could use against them. As well, the members of the Sanhedrin had an economic position which they did not want to lose. Talk about political hacks at the trough! They did not want to be responsible for killing the most popular man in the country. During Jesus’ travels the Sanhedrin, in an attempt to paint Jesus in a bad light, even sent spies from Jerusalem to catch him doing deeds which were not approved by the authorities (with no success.) So, in the end, they passed the buck! Enter Pontius Pilate, the Roman ruler of all of Judea, including Jerusalem. How accurate is the description of Jesus’ trial in the gospels? I am unsure. I feel that there has been some revisionist writing taking place. We should, however, look at the history of the event. Jesus was a pain in the Roman’s gluteus maximus. He was preaching a totally different way of life which would be more liberating to the Children of Israel and less subservient to the Romans. In Jesus’ day, loving and forgiving did not fit the Roman way of life. One glaring “misdeed” done by Jesus occurred when he arrived in Jerusalem a week before. He had fisticuffs with the money changers. This occurred in the temple grounds, and according to best understanding, in the outer court of the Gentiles. The money changers were carrying out a legitimate trade. Jewish rule forbade foreign coinage in the confines of the Temple. Money changers were needed to provide the appropriate coinage to the pilgrims. Since many of the pilgrims came from distant points of the Roman Empire, this service was necessary for the variety of money exchanged. And in doing the cleansing, Jesus was uncharacteristically rough. I cannot recall any other time he was as harsh. So, what angered him? It seems that their just being present in the Temple bothered him and the grift which was going on. Pilate saw that this man needed to be disposed of, so he ordered his death. That satisfied his need for law and order and placated the Sanhedrin. Whether all the emotions of the moment as described in the gospels had played out or not, ultimately Jesus was condemned to be crucified. Pilate was rewritten as a good guy while the Jewish officials were recast as the bad. One more note you might be interested in: When the narrative continues as to who the Judeans want excused from crucifixion, they all shout Barabbas; when translated means “Son of God”. It seems like there are plenty of times we wait for a Christian event. Waiting for Easter Sunday is no exception. The expectation of waiting for Easter Sunday begins with Shrove Tuesday. Shrove Tuesday is a day of feasting as Christians begin to get rid of all the food at home which is given up during Lent. This feast has another name: Mardi Gras or in English, Fat Tuesday. The next day is Ash Wednesday which is the first day of a period called Lent; Lent, characterized by self denial, has been widely practiced by Christians over the centuries. Jesus was crucified on Good Friday. It was his facing the cross and his own denial of self which prompted this Lenten practice of self giving. Lent is all about self denial. In today’s world, many Christians use the time to give up certain foods or habits. Traditionally it was called the Great Fast. It was designed to prepare Christians for the Good Friday to Easter morning experience. Lent lasts 40 days when you don’t count weekends. Forty days is a long-held number in the Bible. It’s a code word. Forty equals a long time; it could be hours, or it could be days. Forty days is not necessarily 40 days but a long time OVER 40 days. Goliath taunted the Israelites for 40 days before David showed up. Jesus went out into the desert, after his baptism, for 40 days. The rains of the great flood lasted 40 days. Moses fasted 40 days. Kings Saul, David and Solomon ruled for 40 years. The number 40 appears 159 times in the Bible. The only other number which appears more frequently is 12 with 187 appearances. Every Christian denomination seems to have carved out its own list of what to eat and to give up for Lent, and there were different prohibitions added to the list. Meat and products from animals were often given up. Some faith communities allowed themselves only one meal a day. A few communities even restricted sex for the 40 days which led to a drop in the birthrate in many places. Alms giving, or supporting the poor through donations, was another popular practice associated with Lent. Attached to all of this is prayer. Men and women pray for a number of things at this time. Jesus came to us calling for us to live in communion with each other. We are to be loving and forgiving neighbours. Our prayers at this time would be for us to have the strength to be loving and forgiving. For many churches, times are set aside each day for corporate prayer (prayers for the church) or community prayer (prayers for individuals’ needs). Churches may find individuals praying for peace and brotherhood as members are scattered about the sanctuary. Perhaps in this new age, where yesterday’s values are slowly devalued to the point where they mean very little, the power of Lenten observance is just a scratch on the surface. I remember a congregant who stated to the congregation on Ash Wednesday that he was giving up Cuban cigars, lima beans and avocados. When I pressed him years later why, he responded, “I never cared for any of them and would safely walk the path of Lent without fear of falling off.” My friends on the fundamental side of Christianity have often told me that the Bible is the inspired, inerrant, infallible, authoritative, all-sufficient, immutable, invincible word of God. They will go on to say that the Holy Book was penned by the Holy Finger of God. This interpretation reflected my own upbringing and I have chosen to reject that notion completely. At birth I was given a brain to employ, and an education to enhance its usage, and when the two are in play together, having the Bible written by God does not compute!
Even though I rejected the fundamental side of Christianity, I am still a believer in the mission and life of Jesus of Nazareth. Out of all the words in the New Testament, I developed this personal mission statement for my life: to serve humanity by loving and forgiving in a community of equals. To arrive at what I believe, from the accounts of Jesus of Nazareth, I have employed four working tools: Common sense; scientific discoveries; critical method and thinking; and be suspicious of everything until reasonably certain. The Bible is made up of two sections and each section contains a number of books. The first part is associated with the Children of Israel. The second part deals with the life of Jesus of Nazareth and early events of Christianity. The Bible was written by many people, mostly men. It was written, copied and recopied many times and hosted all sorts of opportunities for errors to be committed. It deals with a history of the early believers, a dietary code, an accurate history in places and a fake history in other places. It depended on oral history which was accurate, corrected, mistaken, and sometimes created. The Children of Israel cross into the Promised Land and move toward nationhood. As they competed with other groups to determine whose gods were the most powerful, much creative writing went along with the factual writing. In the New Testament, the writers of Matthew and Luke and depended on Mark’s gospel, as well as a second unpublished and unnamed gospel (now known as Q), to provide information. In both the Old and New Testament there is much to unpack for Christian believers if they want to get to the core of their belief in the Man from Nazareth. The purpose of this Blog is to help set the story straight. I know I will make some people very angry who resist having their sacred cows lured away by greener pastures of new information. I know others will simply dismiss my articles with a yawn and say “Who cares?” We are in the “Post Christian” world where church attendance is declining. There are still others in the Christian community who will be pleased with this information and will be able to apply it to their faith. In the movie “The Two Popes”, we can see the modern-day clash of Christian ideologies. The character playing the role of Pope Benedict XVI believed in Christianity having a fixed point of authority so everyone could be sure of where they stand. The character played by the future Pope Francis espoused the view that the universe, the Christian community, and Christianity as a whole is under constant change and the lessons of Jesus can be found in the journey and changing to meet the new challenges of this time and age. I support Pope Francis’ view. The journey today is very different than the journey my father took in the 1920s and 1930s, and the challenges are much more complex today than yesterday. |
AuthorI'm Rev. Dr. Pirie Mitchell and I live in Ontario, Canada. Archives
May 2023
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