Recently in Bible in politics Category

The storied "sea" (actually a freshwater lake) where Jesus performed miracles among its fisher-folk and from which Jesus called his disciples to become "fishers of men" is now off limits. Galilean fish stocks are so depleted that Israel has instituted a ban on fishing there, in effect for two years, in the hopes that that piscis population will rebound. For those of us who know Galilee from the gospel stories, it's easy to get sentimental, wishing for a 21st century reality just like we read about Jesus' first century one.

But as Louis Jenkins' poem that Garrison Keillor read on today's Writers Almanac reminds us, "Everything changes." He observes, "Dinosaurs did not disappear from the earth but evolved into birds and crock pots became bread makers and then the bread makers all went to rummage sales along with the exercise bikes."

I've been thinking with church groups lately about what the Bible says about environmental issues, and how different the message can be when we consider that everything changes. That we today can radically transform our conditions, that we can take for granted safety from wild animals and the weather and have no worries about access to food makes Genesis 1's command to subdue and have dominion mean differently than it did in its ancient context.

In the case of Galilee, it means a fishing ban -- active care and wise restraint -- in what would seem on the surface to be directly opposed to Jesus' encouraging such industry. The biblical notion of controlling and ruling over the non-human natural world is transformed into intelligent stewardship. Paradoxically, that would seem to be exactly what the biblical texts promote.

Obama's nomination of Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court got me thinking about Jewish traditions of justice, at least as the Bible suggests and reflects. Near as I can tell, it bodes well for the work she'd be doing. I don't think it's a stretch to say that justice is a major preoccupation of the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) -- the Jewish Bible. 

One thing that makes me optimistic, if Kagan is informed by these roots, is how the Bible clearly champions justice while accepting that the just thing is not always immediately clear. Rather, doing justice requires wrestling with the particularities of certain circumstances (think of all those specific "laws" in Exodus and Leviticus, for example), balancing absolute "thou shalt nots" with the fact that sometimes we do anyway, and determining where and when is the most just thing actually mercy.

Then there's the central role of debate, argument, and conversation in determining how best to execute justice. Sometimes, the Bible supports different sides of the same issue, as I briefly note in one of Bible Babel's chapters, inviting us to bring our own experiences and judgments to the table. Shoot, even God's judgments are subject to review and debate!... by human beings, no less (think Abraham in Genesis 18). In the Bible, priority and emphasis lie with doing the right thing, yes, but figuring out what exactly that is requires diligent wrestling, argument, and the confidence to be humble. Here's hoping that Kagan brings that spirit to the bench.

Our neighbors across the Atlantic are typically less Bible-happy in political discourse than we in the States. So Gordon Brown made news by (mis)quoting the Good Book recently. The British Prime Minister, facing attacks from political rivals, asked his church audience to recall "the great story of Micah in the Gospel." But Micah is an Old Testament, Hebrew prophet; "the Gospel" is "the good news" of Jesus; and the gospels are books of the New Testament. 

Now, I don't want to come down too hard on the guy. It's a minor flub in an on-the-spot comment. Compounding the error, though, he went on to attribute a sensible but non-biblical saying to Micah: "Have done with people who are just presenting images. Have done with people who are just talking or singing songs that don't mean anything. Have done with the irrelevancies. Get to the center point." The lofty, sort of antiquated nature of the language makes the aphorism sound a bit King James-y, and it seems like the kind of timelessly good idea that we might find in the Bible; but finally it's simply not there. 

He did, however, choose another inspiring statement that is indeed in the Bible: "Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream." In its context, it's a ringing endorsement of social justice (hello, Glenn Beck). This charge, as powerful now as it was for Martin Luther King Junior's audience and for ancient Israel, does not, however, come from Micah. Rather, it's found in the biblical book of Amos -- a different Hebrew prophet. Micah might have known about Amos, since Amos prophesied in the northern kingdom of Israel a few decades before Micah's ministry in the southern kingdom, Judah. And Micah gave us another quote (identical to one in Isaiah) that's a real favorite about beating swords into plowshares; but the justice and righteousness quote comes from Amos. Finally, note taken, what an awesome and timeless charge this one for justice and righteousness.

And because I can't seem to leave it alone, how evocative the water imagery! I've just begun reading Barbara Kingsolver's essay in the April (yes, I'm a bit behind) National Geographic, an issue devoted exclusively to the topic of water. Water, water, water. Yesterday, a beautiful, breezy, and unusually warm day made for great sailing on Lake Anna. Today, the the soft misty rain puts the last of the azaleas and first rhododendrons in bright relief against deep greens. The dogs cool off in kiddie pools, and I pour another cup of tea. Rolling-down, gently flowing, water, water, water. It's all here, two parts hydrogen one part oxygen. The justice and righteousness we have to make. 

The biblical book of Revelation (the last one in the Christian canon) is full of wild imagery and evocative symbolism. It lends itself well to interpretation, reinterpretation, and application in all sorts of times and places. I begin BIBLE BABEL with reference to concerns aired in Florida some months ago about inserting microchips in animals. The chips have retrievable electronic data to make it easier to, well, retrieve Fido or Fluffy should he or she get lost... which sounds good. But to some Revelation-readers it hints of evil because a passage there tells of a wicked Beast increasing its power and control. Without its mark one can neither buy nor sell. There's talk also of implanting chips in people these days, by employers (of all things!) to track their workers. It has ominous implications even apart from the religious. Add Revelation, as this recent Washington Post article reports, and people are past uncomfortable.

Ready. Aim. Read some Bible. Fire. Huh? I don't think of New Zealanders as particulary given to compunction, maybe occasionally irascible, but mostly as an easy-going, live and and let live sort of folk. I mean, when your human population is outnumbered by sheep... Yet protest they did, complaining that there was something wrong with the guns used by their troops along with the British, and US in Afghanistan. Turns out, US arms manufacturer Trijicon stamped New Testament biblical references into the gun sights. Trijicon has agreed to stop inscribing bibilical messages and to provide (for free!) the means to erase such references. US military officials are reviewing the purchase of such Trijicon products. Hmmm.

I happen to agree with Thomas Jefferson's assertion that "the Bible is the cornerstone of liberty...students' perusal of the sacred volume will make us better citizens, better fathers, and better husbands," but I doubt I've taken the same logic to arrive at that conclusion... or maybe even mean the same thing by it. (Oh, and one obvious caveat: I can't quite follow the gender-exclusive assumption, being a girl and all. But anyhoo.) Among other things, the Bible's multi-valence, its variety of perspectives and voices, literary styles and ethical ideas demands earnest wrestling, respectful listening, a willingness to learn and to adapt one's opinions in the face of compelling evidence, and it can strengthen one's sense of purpose, too. These are crucial to securing and maintaining liberty as a democratic society. And they make us capable of being for those we love in ways that help them become healthy, whole, productive, and maybe even happy. To come at the matter from the other side: simply reading the Bible narrowly and selectively, with no inquiry, conversation, or debate, and uncritically applying that single interpretation to one's life (and everyone else's, too) can make impotent or sociopathic "citizens" and even make us damaging to those we love. I'd like to think that the more one engages the text, learning about it while reading what's in it, the less possible it is to use the Bible in such destructive ways. Just a thought.

Work is underway on a new translation of the King James Version designed to correct what its authors call a "liberal bias" in modern translations. Conservapedia, which claims to be "the trustworthy encyclopedia," has determined to correct what it sees as "three sources of errors in conveying biblical meaning are, in increasing amount:

• lack of precision in the original language, such as terms underdeveloped to convey new concepts introduced by Christ
• lack of precision in modern language
• translation bias in converting the original language to the modern one."

Although the first two have some real problems (e.g., re: #1 exactly what does this mean?! Most of the Bible [all, for Jews] predates Jesus and so its meaning doesn't have anything to do with Jesus except perhaps by later Christian interpretation), it's the third that this group aims to correct. Laughable as a lot of this project is ("government" is too liberal a word), they've got a point... to a point. Every translator must make choices. So, any given translation depends on a number of things besides the original text from which it's translating. By the way, as one of my astute students observed, this project claims to be working not from the Hebrew and Greek of original biblical texts, but from English -- the KJV.   

 

On the NBC sitcom, "30 Rock," the optimistic, smile-y, and just plain aw-so-cute character Kenneth the Page declared, "science was my most favorite subject, especially the Old Testament." It's a hilarious poke in fun at a serious debate raging today -- Should the Bible's narratives about creation inform ideas about the earth's origins? Or: If a person takes the Bible seriously, must he or she necessarily reject the scientific theory of evolution?

If a picture is worth a thousand words, then what's a picture with words

worth? GQ recently published eleven cover pages from ealier Pentagon

intelligence briefings. That they juxtapose biblical quotations with Iraq

war photos has elicited all sorts of righteous indignation.  Predictably,

many people are outraged that Rumsfeld and Bush would blithely endorse

equating Christian mission with a Mid-East military invasion. Others say,

not so fast. Context, as always, is everything -- the context of the photos,

of America's military today, and of those biblical verses.