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Radical Economics in the Parable of the Clever Steward

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As I’d mentioned, I started attendance in seminary last Fall. I wrote my paper for my Introduction to New Testament class on Luke 16:1-13, The Parable of the Clever (or Unjust) Steward. Here, I’m going to share an abridged summary of the argument without all of the footnotes and references. Because this is an informal post rather than the formal paper itself, I’d ask you to pardon the ambiguities of statements like “some scholars say,” etc. If, after reading this post, you are interested in reading the paper in full or you’d like to see the specific sources and weigh their value yourself, please reach out to me and I’ll be happy to share the essay with you. Upon reading back through what I’ve written here, my initial feeling is that the paper itself is a bit more coherent, but hopefully you at least get the generel idea!

The passage is a short read, and I’d recommend a careful reading of the parable before continuing to my thoughts below. But, if you’re in a hurry or don’t want to shift from this text to another, here’s a short summary: There is a certain slave or servant of a rich man’s household who manages the rich man’s estate; he is accused of “squandering” the landlord’s property. In expectation of being dismissed from his position, and thinking himself unfit for manual labor, the servant summons forth the debtors of the estate and has the debtors reduce the amounts they owe to the landlord. The servant’s rationale is that these people may show him reciprocal hospitality when he has nowhere else to turn. The remained of the passage is worth repeating verbatim. Starting with verse 8 (ESV):

8The master commended the dishonest manager for his shrewdness. For the sons of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than the sons of light. 9And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous wealth, so that when it fails they may receive you into the eternal dwellings. 10“One who is faithful in a very little is also faithful in much, and oen who is dishonest in a very little is also dishonest in much. 11If then you have not been faithful in the unrighteous wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches?12And if you have not been faithful in that which is another’s, who will give you that which is your own? 13No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despite the other. You cannot serve God and money.”

The Parable of the Clever Steward appears only in the Gospel of Luke, sandwiched in between the parables of the Prodigal Son and Lazarus and the Rich Man, which some scholars argue places it at both the narrative and the metaphoric “center” of Luke’s Gospel. As I discovered upon beginning my own research, this is a passage that has confounded scholars and theologians since it was uttered; you’ll find a myriad of explanations or attempts at explanations, most or all of which are worth considering. As my readers know, I’m a proponent of the idea that accepting one reading of a Biblical passage does not mean that there’s not value and truth in alternative readings–I’ve argued that ambiguity is used to achieve just such a purpose, with the result of keeping the scriptures as a “living” text that continues to bring new insights as new perspectives or contexts are brought to it.

Sociohistorical Background

To make any sense of this text, we need to consider the background in which the parable was first spoken. That requires a lesson in historical economics. Before the advent of Alexander the Great and the introduction of Greco-Roman influence into Palestine, most of the Israelites and Judeans were smallholder farmers. They owned a plot of land, which they farmed with their family, and this provided enough sustenance and perhaps a little extra for trade. As subsistance farming is everywhere and at every time, life is tenuous–a poor harvest, general famine, or damage to crops by severe weather could devastate a family’s ability to support itself. During these times, the smallholder often needed to borrow money to survive. Under Mosaic law, property rights where inalienable on a permanent basis; if a smallholder borrowed money and failed to repay it, the creditor could potentially seize the property, but only for a matter of a few years before it had to be returned to the rightful owner. Debt forgiveness, whether or not related to the idea of the Jubilee, is too complex and debated a topic in the historical and theological study of the period to discuss in depth here, but we have reasonable assurance that, before the Greeks and Romans, permanent foreclosure was not a remedy available to creditors. This premise was not merely a legal one; it was a matter of the fundamental equality of God’s chosen people and of a need to preserve a socioeconomic system that protected that equality.

The Greco-Roman approach to economics and debt radically changed the nature of land ownership in the Galilee and Judea once introduced. The Greco-Roman system allowed creditors to permanently foreclose on and take ownership of real property to satisfy unpaid debts. Thus, by the time of Jesus, land ownership had transferred from myriad smallholder farmers to large estates held by the wealthy after lending to those farmers and then foreclosing on their property when they could not repay their debts. Initially, it had been monarchs who had consolidated land in this way, but the practice became available to private citizens over time.

I’m skipping over the long arguments, but here is a summary of relevant conclusions related to this reality (and subordinate portions of the parable):

  • The debtors approached by the steward in the passage are most likely (given the size and type of the debts described) representatives of whole villages of tenant farmers who owe rents in kind to the landlord. These tenants (or, more likely, their ancestors) used to own the land they now work on behalf of the estate owner. Their debts are substantial and keep them in a form of serfdom.
  • We do not know whether the estate owner is an indigenous wealthy person or a Greco-Roman “foreigner” in the Levant but, either way, the passage’s socioeconomic implication is that he disregarded the will of God regarding land ownership and alienation for his own personal gain. This understanding is essential to interpretation and comports with Luke’s almost universally-negative portrayal of the wealthy.

Two Masters

There is debate over where this parable ends, with some scholars arguing that it ends as early as verse 7 (with Jesus or the Lukan narrator stepping in in verse 8), at the end of verse 8 (if the estate owner is the “master” who speaks in verse 8), or at various points up to and including verse 13. Two well-respected scholars in the field (I.J. Du Plessis and Kenneth Bailey) argue that verses 10-13 were later appended to the parable because of the similar theme.

I disagree. Verse 13 is the only portion of the passage that appears in one of the other Gospels (Matthew 6:24). There’s room for debate here, and no way to conclusively prove Bailey and Du Plessis wrong, but my position is based primarily on three arguments: (1) That verse 13 appears elsewhere in the New Testament makes it more likely to be a genuine pericope spoken by Jesus. If that is so, it is more likely that verses 1-12 are intended to explicate that statement than that verse 13 were added because of a similar theme. (2) As I argue below, the inclusion of verse 13 transforms–or at least amplifies–the theme of the preceding parable in an essential way for it to make a cogent argument. (3) The linguistic and literary analysis of the passage as a whole indicates an ongoing question about who the master is within the story, and this question is never resolved without the “lens” provided in verse 13.

It is a dramatic twist that Jesus’ statement about serving two masters concludes the parable, because it requires us to retroactively re-evaluate everything we previously thought as we listened to the steward’s story. This technique enhances the impact of the revelation, reverses initial assumptions about the text, and reminds us that superficial understandings based on cultural expectations (at least for the modern reader) are not always the correct ones.

I suggest that you re-read the parable, but that you read verse 13 at the beginning instead of the end. When you do this, you are confronted with two masters between whom the steward must choose. Will he choose money, represented by the estate owner, or will he choose God, who lurks silently behind the scenes? The repetition of the word “master” (kurios in Greek) maintains this question at the forefront of the reader’s mind as she progresses through the story. Verse 8 accentuates this most emblamatically by raising the necessary question: “which ‘master’ is speaking here and approving of the steward?” The word kurios has been used to indicate the temporal master earlier in the passage, but it is also one the Gospels apply to Jesus in several different contexts. Close reading of the Greek results in a strong, if not unassailable, argument that it is the estate owner referenced in verse 8, but this does not mean that some scholars have not attempted to assail that argument anyway.

The focus, then, is on the steward’s choice in responding to the accusations against him–will he continue to uphold the “rights” of his master, the estate owner, or might he favor the will of God in showing preferential treatment to the poor and oppressed landowners and the society of equals that God wanted?

Of Squandering, Prodigal Sons, and Dives

We should note that the steward in this parable is only accused of squandering his master’s wealth. The difference is accentuated by the ordering of the passages by the Lucan author as well as the fact that, elsewhere in Luke (the story of the Rich Man and Lazarus that follows, the Parable of the Unjust Judge and the Persistent Widow in Luke 18), the writer has no qualms about clearly denouncing those who are not following God’s will. Since the squandering is described here as only an accusation, I think we ought to intrepret the passage as indicating the steward’s innocence. The word for “squandering” in this passage is the same word used for the Prodigal Son’s failings in the preceding parable, but there’s no doubt in that story that the son did squander the wealth he was given. It is possible that the “squandering” of which the steward has been accused is the exact same action we see him undertake in the parable–refusing to participate in the merciless extraction of all possible wealth from the master’s tenants.

Nevertheless, it’s important to note that the steward seems to beleive he will be removed from his position. The reason isn’t clear: Self-doubt and anxiety? A belief that someone else’s word might be taken over his (and over the evidence)? Or, maybe, he may not be “squandering” the master’s wealth, but he is doing something his master won’t like. I lean toward the last explanation, but it is somewhat undercut by the estate owner’s approval of the steward’s actions, as we’ll see.

The precedent of the prodigal son provides a contrast with the steward. Certain scholars want to contrast the steward with the prodigal son, but the steward, as we’ll see, is at the very least helping others as well as himself. The prodigal son is only interested in himself–Dr. Amy-Jill Levine, whose work and approach very much influence the writing of this paper, argues that we ought to view the prodigal son not as repentant refugee but as calculating con man rehearsing an insincere speech to manipulate his way back into his father’s good graces. But his father doesn’t even let him finish the speech before welcoming him home; I argue that the steward has more in common with the father’s magnanimity than the son’s waywardness.

On the other side of the Steward Parable is the Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus. By tradition, the rich man is often called “Dives,” because this is the Latin word used for “rich” in the Vulgate. This is one of the more terrifying parables of the gospels, particularly if we take it literally. As with her other work in bringing us back to what the 1st-Century Judaean would have heard in the parables, Dr. Levine cautions against using the story as any real depiction of the afterlife. However, it does certainly serve as a warning to those of means who use their wealth only for themselves. In addition to depicting the general Lucan attitude to the wealthy (remember that the Beatitudes in Luke read, “Blessed are the poor,” not “Blessed are the poor in spirit” as in Matthew; compare with Mary’s thankfulness for God’s rebalancing of socioeconomic status in her Magnificat; scholars often refer to the “preferential treatment of the poor” in Luke), I think that this parable serves as the other side of the coin to the Clever Steward. Note some of the points of contact: (1) the steward hopes that his benevolent actions will “open doors” to others, while Dives uses his wealth to literally build a wall and gate to keep Lazarus out; (2) the speaker in 16:9 speaks of the “eternal dwellings” (sometimes translated as “blessed habitations”) in the steward’s parable, but Dives is separated from the blessed in the afterlife by a great, uncrossable gulf, an inversion of his earthly gate. In short, I believe Dives is a metaphorical illustration of what you get when you serve money rather than God.

Show Me the Money

Much debate has been had over the accounting for the reduction in debts given by the steward. Some scholars have proposed that the steward was charging fees and interest above his master’s rates for his own benefit, or that he forgos his commission for handling the transactions so as to make room for lower repayments. The historical evidence of these kinds of transactions (mostly form papyri in Egypt from about the same time) do not support these hypotheses. There is no evidence for compensation of the steward in commissions for handling his master’s transactions (and there’s a high likelihood he was enslaved by his master to boot), and the numbers don’t add up with the interest rates and fees for similar transactions of the time.

The short answer is that the likeliest scenario is that the steward is actually taking from his master and giving to the poor. There’s no money going into his pocket, so any reductions in repayments must necessarily subtract from the master’s profits. In short, it’s hard to get around the idea that the steward is, if indirectly, stealing from his master. There is an alternative, though. There is ample evidence for the period, including letters from Pliny, that discuss Roman estate owners engaging in partial voluntary loan forgiveness when dealing with their tenant farmers. Pliny argues that it’s more expensive to evict all the defaulting debtors and find new people to work the land and that, if you forgive some of the debt, it becomes likelier that the remainder gets paid voluntarily. This is advice I give to my own landlord clients as a real estate attorney; it’s fascinating to see that the exigent practicalities of the landlord/tenant relationship haven’t much changed in two milennia. So, we have room to believe that the steward’s actions in debt reduction benefit the master more than hurt the master; this is especially so considering the massive debts described.

But it’s possible that the steward is bestowing spiritual benefits upon the master as well as economic ones–whether the master acknowledges, understands, or wills it to be so. There’s even the possibility that the steward is stumbling into righteousness through his actions, even if he is mostly or entirely attempting to act in his own self interest. Anthony Giambrone’s article “‘Friends in Heavenly Habitations’ (Luke 16:9): Charity, Repentance, and Luke’s Resurrection Reversal,” in Revue Biblique makes the point that there is a certain amount of permissible self-interest in the pursuit of salvation, resurrection, and metanoia. Further, if we return to Dr. Levine’s Short Stories by Jesus, we see in her chapter on the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector an idea of collective righteousness or salvation. In American society, we tend to avoid thinking about corporate responsibility for anything (perhaps in any usage of the word “corporate”), but Dr. Levine points out that Judaic tradition had within it the idea that the righteousness of some members of the community could be imputed to the collective as a whole. We see Paul communicating a version of this idea (albeit on a smaller scale) in 1 Corinthians 7:14.

Houses of the Holy

I’m going to step outside the flow of things for a brief moment to address Luke 16:9b. I didn’t spend a lot of time on this somewhat cryptic phrase (the “eternal dwellings” or “habitations of the blessed”) in the paper, focusing instead on 16:8b and 16:9a, but I do want to provide a sort of gloss. There’s some debate about that the phrase in this passage is supposed to mean, but some easy connections can be drawn. First, the idea of dwellings refers back to “their houses” in 16:4, so we have a connection between the temporal and the eternal that fits nicely with the immediately preceding ideas. If we want to reach outside this passage (thus straying from strict Biblical interpretation into broader theology), we might look to Jesus’ statement in the later-written Gospel of John that “in my father’s house there are many mansions” (14:2). There is “in the air,” as it were, with thoughts of the afterlife at the time of the Gospels the concept of living space–and not just that, but home. If we go back to Luke, we can see an immediate parallel of Lazarus reclining in “the bosom of Abraham.”

The point I’d make here is that Jesus seems to be reinforcing the idea that the nature of the relationships we form now will have eternal consequences and that we will be held to account for our relationships–not only (or perhaps even primarily) our deeds. It’s important to note that this represents a definite shift in the context of the passage. What seems to at first be a lesson about money turns out to be about relationships, with “unrighteous wealth” only a means to an end. Dives would have done well to listen.

A Fool or a Change of Heart?

There is some debate about the identity of the “master” in Luke 16:8a, whether Jesus or the estate owner. The Greek word is kurios, which can rightfully be applied to the estate owner but which is also used in Luke to refer to Jesus in a number of different contexts. The ambiguity, I believe, is entirely purposeful; it reinforces the question about which master both the steward (and we) have chosen.

Close textual analysis makes it difficult indeed to argue that Jesus is the “master” intended in Luke 16:8a. So, we have the estate owner in 16:8a, the Lucan author commenting in 16:8b, and Jesus breaking in with 16:9 (“And I tell you…). This creates a problem for scholars, because it’s difficult to understand why the master would then praise the steward. As I mentioned above, this could be because the steward’s actions in engaging in limited debt forgiveness is the wise course, and the estate owner recognizes this. We could then read 16:8b in several ways: First, that the steward is a “son of this world” who nevertheless understands better than those who claim righteousness how to properly use money. Chapter 15 begins with Jesus telling the parables of the lost as a response to the criticisms of the Pharisees, so we could easily read the statement in 16:8b as another jab against them. If we want to take an alternative approach, we could read the steward as the “son of light” engaging in debt forgiveness for the purpose of benefitting the tenants (not thinking then about the business-oriented wisdom used by the Romans dealing with debtor tenants) and the master (the son of the world) realizing the practical wisdom that coincides with the spiritual wisdom excersized by his servant. There is also a third way: that the master’s praise is ironic–that he understands only the business acumen invovled in the debt forgiveness without seeing the spiritual truth spoken of by Jesus after the parable and practiced by the steward within it. There is much scholarship on the role of irony in this parable, and at least one interesting article that frames the steward as the classic “trickster servant” figure who pulls one over on his master (see just about any of Shakespeare’s comedies that involve servants for a more modern version of this trope–especially the Servant of Two Masters). I leave the possibilities open, because I think they area all able to lead to my conclusions.

Timid Interpretations and Complex Morality

My complaint about much–but certainly not all–of the scholarship and preaching about this parable is that it begins with a preconceived notion about Jesus and makes interpretative choices based on that concept rather than reading closely and carefully. That notion is that Jesus would never condone theft, as this would be immoral and therefore cannot be something Jesus would approve of. In turn, this approach leads to the rather facile interpretation that this passage is about “responsibility with money.” We have other parables that touch on that subject: the strange parables of the The Pearl of Great Value, The Hidden Treasure and The Rich Fool, as well as the parable of The Talents. But the Parable of the Clever Steward doesn’t follow the scheme of those other parables; it hews closer to the Parable of the Unforgiving Servant and the Parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard.

When we see in the passage money described as “unrighteous” we ought to read that the money here is unrighteous because of the way the estate owner acquired it in the first place. Given the Judaic background to the parable we began with, we can argue that the “theft” in this passage, if any, occurred when the estate owner stole the land that was rightfully the tenants’ and continues as he bilks them of the produce of that land. In such a reading, even if the steward is acting to the financial detriment of his earthly master, we could say that he is returning what was previously stolen, not committing a theft himself. If we want to take a less radical approach, we could argue that the righteous action of the steward in forgiving some of the debts still provides a financial benefit to the estate owner in the collection of the remainder and so we have a coincidence of right behavior and shrewd business tactics (though I, personally, am not inclined to let the estate owner off the hook so easily).

The choice that confronts the steward is not a simple one. It pits what modern society might term the “legitimate property interests” of the estate owner against the practical welfare of the tenants. Real moral choice is almost never black and white; it is often a prioritizing of competing reasonable interests rather than a matter of entire righteousness on one hand and entire evil on the other. As a Biblical example, think of Rahab. She lied to her countrymen to protect the scouts sent into Canaan, and this act was treated as righteouesness. Such an example forces us to nuance moral ideas about lying; we cannot read the Commandment simply as “do not lie;” we must read more narrowly as “do not bear false witness against your neighbor.”

There is little reason to believe that Jesus, as the supreme moral teacher, would approach morality in such a clumsy way as to use broad categorizations without appreciation for context. If this were the intentional teaching of scripture, it would fail to prepare us for moral action in the real world. So, we ought not say, “Jesus would never approve of theft.” We ought instead to ask, “Does Jesus tell us that there are times in which is it morally appropriate to consciously act against the financial or property interests of others?” This parable seems to argue in the affirmative to the latter question. When we interpret the passage through the lens of Luke 16:13 and the socio-economic-historical background in which the story is told, I think we get an image of wealth redistribution as a just action. Again, that idea must be kept in context and not carelessly allowed to be taken to the point of general applicability. We must note that the estate owner is not made destitute by wealth being taken from him and given to the poor. He’s not even losing enough that he has reason to be concerned, otherwise he would not have approved of the steward. If we want to ask further questions about the redistribution of wealth based on this passage, we get the sort of simultaneously simple and infinitely complex answer as when we are told to “love our neighbor as ourselves.” Who will you serve: money, or God?

As a further indication of the influence Amy-Jill Levine’s work has had on me, this reading seems to comport with her interpretation of the Parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard in Short Stories by Jesus, where she argues for that story to be read as an example of an economic system that places people over profits–an intepretation I certainly had in mind while researching and working on this paper.

In an age where the creation of the first trillionaire is within sight and yet we have millions of people starving to death or without access to adequate healthcare, even in supposedly “first-world” nations like the United States, where conservative Christians have coopted Jesus to prop up ultra-capitalism and the disparity of wealth to an egregious extreme, we would do well to wonder how we might strive for a more just society that prioritizes people over profits. Taking from the rich for the poor–while still leaving the rich with ridiculous amounts of wealth to the normal person anyway–seems like something Jesus might approve of.

In connection with this work, I have lately been thinking about the nature of God’s justice in the broader sense. I am coming to the conclusion that, if we look to scripture, we see that, when dealing with individual cases, God’s justice is about people getting what they need rather than what they deserve. I think that’s a difficult concept in a society like America with a justice system built around the idea of “righteous” vengeance. Which is not to say at all that God’s justice does not require us to oppose systems that exploit, subject, and oppress others; we are absolutely called to such action in the interest of loving our neighbors. But–and here’s the most difficult part–I think we’re called to find a way that simply does not demonize and call “enemy” the ones who stand behind such systems. I don’t know exactly how that works, but I expect the broader topic of justice to be a recurring theme in future posts.

Even in summarized form, this was a long post. If you’ve read to this point, I’d really ask you to leave a comment of some sort so that I know whether these kinds of posts have an audience. Again, if you want to read the paper proper–or just check my references, research and arguments, reach out and I’ll be happy to send you a copy of the paper itself.

Morality and God’s Choice, Part II: Job

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(This is the 11th of 17 posts in my “200 for 200” challenge. Please continue to repost, link, and send your friends my way!)

For the previous post in this series, please click here.

The Book of Job is my favorite book in the Old Testament. There are some passages in the OT I like more (Jeremiah 31:31 and its surrounds, for instance), but taken as a whole, Job is where it’s at for me. The book gives an answer to the problem of theodicy that remains relevant today, along with shooting down some still-espoused misconceptions about how God works that plague simplistic theologies.

And it’s important to note here that I think that the Book of Job’s primary task is theodical. This is tangential to, but inextricably linked with questions of morality–specifically, the morality of God. Put simply, is a God who allows bad things to happen to good people a good and just God? That’s the question the Book of Job seeks to answer (or, as we’ll see, show us is simply beyond human ability to fully grasp).

When we look to the framework of the Book of Job, we’re reminded that we must view the question asked, broad and expansive as it may be unto itself, as a limited (and somewhat problematic) one when it comes to questions about God’s morality.

Remember that Job’s affair begins when “the Satan” (which should be properly read as a job title akin to “the accuser” rather than a personal name) presents himself (itself?) to the Lord and, sua sponte, God boasts about Job’s faithfulness. The Satan argues that Job is only loyal to God because he is well-blessed with life’s joys and comforts; at this God turns Job over to the Satan to be tested.

If we read this exchange literally, God does not come off in a great light. Instead, God is allowing suffering simply to win a bet, so to speak. But if we read it mythopoeically, which I think we must, the dialogue is simply a personification of an existential question–why does God allow bad things to happen to God people? Or, perhaps, what is the meaning of suffering?

That the angels present themselves to the Lord in the beginning of this text seems (to me, at least) to intimate some throwback to an earlier way of thinking, when Yahweh was viewed as a god in the pantheon of El rather than the supreme being God’s self, part of a “divine court” (in the monarchical sense of the term rather than the legal sense). If that is true (and I don’t have sufficient information to be sure), then: (1) it indicates an older origin for the Book of Job than when it was written down (already probable) and (2) it reinforces the idea that we should view the framework of Job as a mythological set-up for a theological investigation rather than a literal telling of what God did to Job (who himself, admittedly, probably never existed–but that’s not the point). This is all to say that the Book of Job only works as satisfying analysis of theodicy as allegory; taken literally, the Book of Job just makes a jerk of God.

I also want to point out the strangeness of Job’s reward at the end of the Book. Job’s old things are not restored to him; they are replaced. He is given a new family to compensate for the one taken from him, not given his formerly-living loved-ones back. This may have something to do with common afterlife beliefs (or a lack thereof) in the time that Job was originally created (or when it was recorded), but I have not done the research to make any useful comment on that, except to say that the history and nature of Jewish belief in an afterlife and/or resurrection is extremely complex, rich and varied, even today. It is well documented that the Sadducees in Jesus’s time appear not to have believed in an afterlife, but whether this could be fairly extended backward in time to the Book of Job is outside the realm of my own current scholarship.

It is tempting to read the Book of Job as concerning God’s sovereignty. After all, God’s appearance at the end of the text might be irreverently summed up as God asking Job, “Who the f*** are you to question me?” That line always brings a smile to my face, particularly when uncensored in teaching about this text. It certainly wakes up those who were drifting. Here’s a taste from the text itself:

“Then the Lord spoke to Job out of the storm. He said: ‘Who is this that obscures my plans with words without knowledge? Brace yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer me. Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation? Tell me, if you understand. Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know! Who stretched a measuring line across it? On what were its footings set, or who laid its cornerstone–while the morning stars sand together and all the angels shouted for joy?'”

That question (whether or not using my paraphrase)–what authority or basis does Job have to question God–isn’t really about God’s sovereignty (though that follows later). Because of the mighty acts described, it’s tempting to think that God is comparing God’s power to Job’s, but a closer reading reveals that God is making the rhetorical point that Job lacks the comprehension and understanding necessary to make sense of the answer to Job’s question.

Early in the text, there is a strong focus on Job not sinning by what he says about God. In particular, I love the advice he gets from his wife: “Are you still maintaining your integrity? Curse God and die!” (2:9). The implication is that, if Job says that God does not have the right to treat him as God has, that Job will be speaking a lie and defying God and thus be subject to divine punishment.

Job walks a fine line in his responses, one that is important for us to consider carefully. Repeatedly, Job calls God “Almighty.” He acknowledges God’s power directly (30:18) and God’s omnipotence (“Does he not see my ways and count my every step?” 31:4).

He says, “…how can mere mortals prove their innocence before God? Though they wished to dispute with him, they could not answer one time out of a thousand. His wisdom is profound, his power vast. Who has resisted him and come out unscathed?” (9:2b-4).

And, “How can I then dispute with him? How can I find words to argue with him? Though I were innocent, I could not answer him; I could only plead with my Judge for mercy. Even if I summoned him and he responded, I do not believe he would give me a hearing. He would crush me with a storm, and multiply my wounds for no reason. He would not let me catch my breath but would overwhelm me with misery. If it is a matter of strength, he is mighty! If it is a matter of justice, who can challenge him? Even if I were innocent, my mouth would condemn me; if I were blameless, it would pronounce me guilty” (9:14-20).

Throughout the Book, Job never questions God’s sovereignty. In fact, it is part of the basis of his desire to question God: because God has the power to do things differently, to choose not to afflict Job, Job can ask why God has chosen to do so as a moral question. He cannot oppose the answer, but he can ask why.

This in essence, gets right to the heart of–and then past–Divine Command Theory. Job’s position, essentially, is to acknowledge that no one can oppose the will of God and that God, as sovereign over all things, has the authority to establish what is and is not “righteous.” But this does not answer the question of whether God plays by God’s own rules or exempts God’s self from them.

The answer the Book of Job gives is a complex one. Job’s “friends” (Bildad, Zophar and Elihu) repeatedly reshift the blame back to Job or his family. Surely, Job’s suffering is the result of some secret sin he has committed and not confessed. But the narrator tells us that Job is “blameless,” Job repeats this assertion, and even God confirms it in the conclusion of the story, so the friends’ argument fails absolutely.

This kind of ad hominem attack to “save” God’s righteousness from human inquiry is still a common retort in questions of God’s morality–it is easy to blame the complainant’s own unrighteousness as the reason for his suffering. The best part about it: rejection of this argument requires the assertion (as Job makes) that one is without fault and absolutely righteous. For those of us who are not literary figures but actual people, this approach simply isn’t tenable.

But the ad hominem attack is as much a logical fallacy when made on God’s behalf as it is in any other circumstance. Even God decries its use, commanding at the end of the text tat the friends make sacrifices and ask for Job’s intercession with God for forgiveness for not “speaking the truth” about God.

So the Book develops this tensive relationship between fundamental ideas: no one has the authority to try to judge God, but God also rejects that God needs to be protected from moral scrutiny by humans. This is the first of the reasons that this series is titled “Morality and God’s Choice;” it seems that God has made God’s self available to moral questioning–or at least asking why–even though God has no duty to–and man has no authority to–do so.

This paradoxical relationship plays out in what I would call the two answers that God gives to Job in response to his questions. In the first answer, Chapters 38 and 39, God gives the answer I first described above–that Job lacks understanding sufficient to grasp why God allows the good to suffer. In the second answer, Chapters 40 and 41, God exerts God’s authority–the same authority Job’s been asserting throughout that makes God ultimately immune from the judgment of mortals.

But God’s words in Job are just part of the whole argument made by the Book’s writers. God’s rejection of the arguments of Job’s friends is an admission that bad things happen to good people–something experience readily confirms. This in and of itself sets up (or rather acknowledges) the complexity of the question of God’s morality–how do we parse out the morality of God allowing certain things to happen and when God actively wills certain things?

Here’s where the order of God’s two answers becomes important, because it changes the intent and meaning of God’s insistence on God’s authority from a rejection of questioning to a reassurance made to creation. When God begins by explaining that Job can’t understand the complexities of the moral questions he is asked, God finishes by explaining that God is, in fact, in control of all things and, therefore, Job’s faith that God is Good (the real reason he is blameless, I would argue) is well placed.

So, we can summarize the thrust of the argument in the Book of Job as asserting that God, ultimately, is both all-powerful and good. Not because God has to be good, but because God chooses to be. It may sometimes be difficult for us to see or understand that, but this is an important aspect of our faith in God, and a reason that Paul relates faith, hope and love so closely. Our faith in God is in–and borne out by–God’s love for us, without which we could have no existential hope.

I would argue that we see God personally rejecting divine command theory through the narrative of Job; that this twists the expectations set up by the literal reading of the story is, in my mind, ironic, poetic and funny.

As a conclusion, I’m going to repeat the ideas that will carry us forward in this series. First, God does not need to rely on God’s sovereignty to protect God’s self from moral questioning, because God is good by all measures and therefore needs no defense. Second, there is, impliedly at least, some righteousness in asking God why–so long as we accept the limits of our understanding. We see this not only in the allegory of Job, but also with Jacob wrestling with God. There is relationship here, an honest desire to be closer to (and or blessed by) God, and this presents a rival source of righteousness to blind and unquestioning obedience.

As we move onward, we’ll look at how we might see how God’s actual morality and justice, not just by fiat but by conscientious and loving Will in action, reveal themselves. We’ll look at what the Incarnation says about God’s morality. And we’ll look at what God’s choices mean for us in the way we consider the morality, justice and righteousness to which we are called in Christ.

 

 

Ceci n’est pas un dieu.

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One of my favorite paintings is “The Treachery of Images” by René Magritte, pictured below.

TreacheryofImages

Knowing that I’m an existentialist thinker and theologian, it should be clear why. If you do not read French or are not familiar with this painting, the text translates to, “This is not a pipe.” If your kneejerk response is, “Yes it is!” let it sink in another moment. You cannot smoke tobacco from this picture on a screen (or canvas). You cannot hold it in your hand or put it to your lips. It is not a pipe; it is a picture of a pipe. The two are neither fungible nor synonymous. If you’re working on home repairs and someone asks you for a flathead screwdriver and you give them a picture of one from a catalog, it’s not going to be a good day.

Hence the title of this post (in English: “This is not a god.”). For many fundamentalist or conservative evangelical Christians, the Bible is treated as if it is part of God–as if it is God. Or at least as if it should be treated as an absolute on par with God. Nowhere are the Scriptures proclaimed to be a part of the Trinity.

Theologian Karl Barth warned against making an idol of the Bible; this conflation of God and Scripture is exactly what he meant. I’ve often referenced in other posts his argument (with which I vehemently agree) that we ought to interpret all Scripture through the lens of the Living God, who is clearest to us in the person and life of Jesus Christ.

Scripture is either a living thing or a dead thing. By way of reference, many legal jurists approach the United States Constitution as a “living document.” That is to say that, when the Supreme Court makes a new ruling of law based upon Constitutional language, it is “discovering” a new way in which an old text manages to relate to modern legal needs and issues. This is perhaps the most amazing aspect of our Constitution–that despite its age it continues to apply to legal issues never foreseen by its drafters with relatively little change to its language over time. For instance, the Fourth Amendment continues to be applicable to searches conducted by cellphone intercepts and drone surveillance as it was to physical stops and searches in the 18th century.

So, when I say that the Bible is a living thing or a dead thing, I mean that either: (1) the Bible continues to be applicable to our lives in the present even though culture and society and the nature of human life has changed drastically from Biblical times (and partially because modern life and the long sweep of history have given us new lenses through which to understand the Bible); or, (2) the meaning of the Bible is not susceptible to any interpretation except that intended at the time it was first set to papyrus, vellum, parchment or whatever other medium was used to record the initial text (to the extent that we could ever hope to understand that original intent being so far removed from that time period).

Bear in mind that Jesus (described by John as the Living Word) tells us that “[God] is not the God of the dead but of the living” Matthew 22:32b.

I think, then, that we must view the Bible as a living text which we must interpret through the use of reason, our experiences and the revelation of God (which we would most likely interpret as the person of the Holy Spirit in such a case) acting upon us as we read. Admittedly, this is a patently Methodist approach (at least in terms of dogma), but I am sure that this idea is not restricted to merely one denomination–particularly because it seems to be so self-evidently truthful and there are so many intelligent theologians in other denominations (or perhaps none at all).

To do otherwise than to treat the Bible as a living text that must be interpreted–with the help of the Living Word of God in Jesus and the Spirit–devalues the profundity of the Scriptures and the ways in which disparate texts written over several centuries so often hang together so well (and, when they contradict, force us ultimately to the identity of Jesus for the answer). Thinking of the Bible as a dead, immutable thing, is in some sense a rejection of Paul’s claim that it is “God-breathed and … useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness…” 2 Timothy 3:16.

And paradoxically, thinking of the Bible as simple, literal and in need of no interpretation or evaluation inherently puts it on a level with God–the only thing in all Creation that is absolute. Though he rarely does, Jesus speaks plainly when he says that he is, “the way, the truth and the life” (John 14:6). This is not prescriptive language (as it is often assumed); it is descriptive language–a statement of fact. Because, as the beginning of John tells us, all things that are (that are not God) were created through Jesus as the Logos, Jesus is inherently the truth that stands behind all Creation and its meaning and purpose.

When we say things like, “God said it; I believe it; that settles it,” (nearly always employed as a conversation-killer after asserting a typically unquestioning and literal interpretation of Scripture), we elevate the Bible to the status of God. Never were the two intended to be equal; we should not equate one with the other. The Bible was co-created by man and by God; God is uncreated. The Bible seeks to bring the reader into relationship with God, but it is not that relationship.

Interestingly, this same argument has been going on in Islam–although overtly and avowedly–since at least the 9th century. Without delving too deeply into the details and nuance (which I’m not qualified to do), the Sunni majority in Islam (to the extent that it’s fair to say that all of Sunni Islam is a monolithic construct–which is to say not very) believes that the Qu’ran is uncreated and co-eternal with God. On the other hand, Shia Islam (subject to the same caveat applicable to Sunni Islam) believes that the Qu’ran is created by God and thus subordinate. As mentioned above, I am sure that there is much nuance here with which I am woefully ignorant, but the allegory with Christian approaches to the Bible should be readily apparent.

To take us full circle in this post, we must remain cognizant that we do not confuse the depiction with the thing it represents or communicates. That is, we must remain aware that the Bible’s value comes primarily from its tendency to draw us into relationship with the Living God rather than its ability to simplify and define existential realities for us. Is there truth in the Bible? Very much. Is it always easy to get to? No; we must have faith in God to bridge the gap.

This is understandably a very uncomfortable thing–such a position necessarily introduces ambiguity and insecurity into our understanding of theological principles. On the one hand, the Bible does seem to be clear about the most important aspect of God: love. It is also clear that by the pursuit of sacrificial love we will come to better understand the Living God. And in that sense, our theological niceties are mere luxuries in the face of following Jesus; at best our doctrines and dogmas are explorations of what it means to love God and our neighbors.

At the same time, such an approach must necessarily create within us a sense of theological humility–an epistemological pessimism that should help us to avoid putting our theological convictions ahead of actually loving one another. When we see the Bible as God, or as equally positioned with God, we may use it to justify some extremely unloving behavior. Again, let us not confuse the appearance of faith, piety and love with the things themselves.

History and Historicity

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I wrote in a recent post about some of the difficulties with issues of history and historicity in the Old Testament I’ve had in preparing for my impending journey to Israel. Having had some time to clarify my thoughts, I thought I’d share them.

First, I want to focus on an exemplum of my thoughts and then I’ll speak more generally. Let’s begin with the Bablyonian Captivity. Or, rather, a little bit before that.

In 1 Kings 18, the prophet Elijah confronts Ahab, the monarch of the Kingdom of Israel, on Mount Carmel in a rather memorable set of contests. Really, Elijah is confronting the worship of Baal in the Kingdom of Israel here, but Ahab is culpable for allowing the Israelites to stray from the worship of Yahweh alone.

The four-hundred and fifty prophets of Baal are asked to pick between two bulls brought to the mountain, to cut it to pieces and to smoke if over a fire; Elijah–as Yahweh’s sole remaining prophet–will do the same with the other. Then they will each call upon their respective gods and see who “shows up.” As the Baalite priests beseech their god, they get no response. With memorable taunts (Maybe your god is sleeping and needs to be awakened? Maybe he’s traveling? Maybe he’s busy defecating?), Elijah insults Baal’s prophets until it comes time for him to beseech Yahweh. When he does, the Israelite God sends his “fire” down to earth to light the prepared wood, burn up the bull carcass and the stones, soil and water prepared around the altar. After this, the priests of Baal are slaughtered by the gathered people.

I’m not actually interested in the historicity of this particular story but in what it tells us about the culture of the time (Ahab’s existence is attested outside of the Bible and he was probably king of Israel around the middle of the 9th Century BCE). As we find in the cultures surrounding Isreal-Palestine at that time, gods were viewed to be local; they were the gods of particular cities or nations. We see this explicit in other places even in the Bible, where the Isrealite God states that “he” is the God of Israel (hence the epithet “Israelite God,” I suppose).

What’s happening between the lines in this passage in Kings is a divine turf war. Baal (which is a title that means “lord” and which is borne by several distinct deity figures and used generally to mean “a god”) is a god of the Phoenicians in the city of Tyre. If you look on a map of Biblical Israel, you’ll see that Tyre is on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea (on an island, actually) just a short journey north from Mount Carmel. The question being answered by Elijah’s story is, roughly put, “If Baal is the god of Tyre, and Yahweh is the god of Israel, and they’re both geographically close to one another, which has dominion in the middle ground?” Clearly the answer is Yahweh.

I mention the above passage because it sets us up for the real point about history and historicity in the Old Testament that I want to make in this post. When in the (very early) 6th Century BCE the Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzer sacked Jerusalem and deported the Israelites to Bablyon, a crisis of faith occurred. Again, as a brief aside, this event is attested in the historical record outside of the Bible. If the Israelites were to worship the God of (the nation/land) Israel, how could they do that when they’d been transported to Babylon, the land of the Babylonian gods.

And here comes the prophet Ezekiel. In the verses that open the book that bears his name, Ezekiel tells us that he has a vision of God while among the exiled Israelites in Babylon “on the banks of the Kebar River.”

In this vision, as the Biblical historian Cynthia R. Chapman says, “God gets wheels.” Literally; Ezekiel sees God enthroned upon what I can’t help thinking of as a super-high-tech, four-likeness-of-living-creature-powered motorized wheelchair. That strange image aside, the point of the vision is that the God of Israel is mobile, that God is personally and actually present with the Israelites even in their exile. As a side note, my NIV says that Ezekiel is taken back to the “Kebar River near Tel Aviv”–this should be read as Tel Abib (in modern-day Iraq) by the Chebar River.

Hearing about the underlying spiritual-cultural concerns with regards to these (and other) Old Testament passages did much to “resolve” my problem of “historicity” in the OT (for purposes of this post, I have left aside all of the issues of the construction of the Old Testament text–whether discussion of the three hypotheses of its construction or the timing of its creation).

What I find here is something that makes much more sense to me than either extreme of the historicity debate–humans writing stories of their evolving understanding of and relationship with God. These stories are neither entirely myth nor entirely history; they are stories that draw upon historical experience (and the religious issues raised by that experience), mythological content that may or may not be based in fact (I’m not worried about the answer to that), revelation of the nature of God from God (there’s that spirit-breathed bit), and human reactions and struggles in response to that revelation.

I see this especially as the Israelite understanding of the nature of God breaks free from social precedent and evolves from polytheism to henotheism to true monotheism.

In some ways, what we have in the Old Testament is the macrocosm of Jacob’s struggle with God at Penuel–a back and forth between God and man that may defy explanation but results in relationship.

Does that make interpreting the Bible difficult? Absolutely; I don’t have an answer for you on how we best sort God’s intent from the voice of the writers from the historical record from the cultural context, etc. But I’m certainly willing to say that it’s not supposed to be easy. I can’t imagine that God would decide not to directly appear before all people in an unmistakeable way (which, to be clear, God hasn’t) and yet make Biblical interpretation something as simple as looking at words verbatim.

In the near future, I’m going to return to the Babylonian captivity and the Book of Job to talk a bit about theodicy in Christianity.