#religion Christianity

[jurgan]

Jesus at the Temple- Rereading an Old Story

           Lately there’s been a lot of talk about the story of Jesus “cleansing” the Temple, or “the Temple Tantrum,” as many have taken to calling it.  I’m not the type to say scripture is inerrant, I’m happy to criticize when I think it’s valid, but I also try my best to discern what is in the text from what we add to it. My eyes glanced down to the passage in Luke 19 during Sunday’s church service: “45 When Jesus entered the temple courts, he began to drive out those who were selling. 46 “It is written,” he said to them, “‘My house will be a house of prayer’[c]; but you have made it ‘a den of robbers.’[d]”

[d] Jer. 7:11

*Record-scratch*

What?  There’s a reference?  When Jesus quotes the Torah or the prophets, he’s doing it for a reason, this might be the key to the whole thing!  I’ve gotta check this out right now!

Jeremiah 7:

“‘Hear the word of the Lord, all you people of Judah who come through these gates to worship the Lord. 3 This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: Reform your ways and your actions, and I will let you live in this place. 4 Do not trust in deceptive words and say, “This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord!” 5 If you really change your ways and your actions and deal with each other justly, 6 if you do not oppress the foreigner, the fatherless or the widow and do not shed innocent blood in this place, and if you do not follow other gods to your own harm, 7 then I will let you live in this place, in the land I gave your ancestors for ever and ever. 8 But look, you are trusting in deceptive words that are worthless.

9 “‘Will you steal and murder, commit adultery and perjury,[a] burn incense to Baal and follow other gods you have not known, 10 and then come and stand before me in this house, which bears my Name, and say, “We are safe”—safe to do all these detestable things? 11 Has this house, which bears my Name, become a den of robbers to you? But I have been watching! declares the Lord.”

 Am… am I the only one who sees this?  Doesn’t this make the meaning of the story blatantly obvious?  If you’re mistreating your fellow man in your day-to-day life, and if you’re worshipping other gods on the side, you can’t hide from the consequences in the Temple.  As several other people have pointed out, the “den” is where the robbers hide out from the law after they’ve committed robberies.  Jeremiah, and by extension Jesus, are saying that God isn’t going to protect you from the consequences of your actions.  It’s not just Jeremiah, Isaiah says this, Micah says this, Ezekiel says it.  They all say that the ritual observances of your religion are empty at best and insulting at worst if they don’t inform the way you live your life.  None of them are saying “the system of sacrifices is bad and exploitative.”  How does everyone get this wrong?  

To be clear, I’m not saying “Jews are wrong to say this is antisemitic,” they have every right to feel that way given how it’s been used.  I’m saying “we Christians are doing a terrible job reading this story, twisting it into a form that lets us attack Jews.”  I don’t know how I never saw that citation before, and I will plead ignorance, but I do blame my teachers for never pointing out the obvious. Now I don’t know who specifically he’s talking to here, but of course not everyone who worked in or attended the Temple was an upstanding citizen.  He MAY be saying the people who run the Temple are in bed with the Roman Empire, but that’s not a criticism of the fact that they exchange money for sacrificial animals.  The link with Jeremiah suggests Jesus is positioning Rome as the new Babylon, and calling people to repent so God can deliver them.  This isn’t a radical replacement for the Covenant, it’s demanding the people of God start following it again.  It’s not saying that commercial activity is off-limits in the Temple, it’s saying that you shouldn’t use it to paper over your transgressions outside. If we want a lesson here, it should be “going to church once a week isn’t enough if it doesn’t affect the rest of your life.”  That’s a lesson any faith that believes in justice should be able to embrace (substituting whatever formal observation you have in place of “going to church”).

               So, how do we keep getting it wrong?  Well, as usual it starts with John.  The synoptic gospels aren’t perfect (Matthew is the origin of the “blood curse”), but John went whole hog on antisemitism.  If you read the synoptic accounts of the Temple Tantrum, they’re pretty brief and basically just say he turned over a few tables.  It was theatrics to make a point. Disruptive, sure, but doing stunts to get attention is well within the prophetic tradition (look at Ezekiel). John is the one who brings in the whip, and he also changes “den of robbers” to “house of commerce.”  So John makes Jesus violent (potentially- it’s not said if he actually struck anyone or just threatened) and implies the system of commerce itself is a problem.  I saw a claim that he was quoting Zechariah, and that would require more study on my part, but frankly I’m less inclined to give John the benefit of the doubt. Being the latest writer, John was motivated to drive home that Christians and Jews are two different faiths (ironic given how many Christians today want to appropriate seders).  He frequently referred to The Jews as antagonists throughout his gospel.  John’s version of the story strikes me as indefensible.

               Then the text fell into the hands of Protestants and progressives, both of whom eye religious authorities in general with suspicion. Everyone likes to see ourselves in our heroes, so we want to think that Jesus was fighting a corrupt version of his religion as well.  But that’s not what the text says.  My current pastor likes to say that anytime we think Jesus is criticizing someone else, we should stop and think if he’s actually criticizing us.  We need to stop acting like this story is about how ancient people were misguided until we came along and fixed things.  The criticism of people who follow the form of religion without the substance isn’t a cudgel, it’s a mirror.

               As always, I welcome any disagreement or correction on mistakes I may have made.

[fuckyeahreligionpigeon]

[politijohn]

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[prokopetz]

I understand why a lot of fantasy settings with Ambiguously Catholic organised religions go the old "the Church officially forbids magic while practising it in secret in order to monopolise its power" route, but it's almost a shame because the reality of the situation was much funnier.

Like, yes, a lot of Catholic clergy during the Middle Ages did practice magic in secret, but they weren't keeping it secret as some sort of sinister top-down conspiracy to deny magic to the Common People: they were mostly keeping it secret from their own superiors. It wasn't one of those "well, it's okay when we do it" deals: the Church very much did not want its local priests doing wizard shit. We have official records of local priests being disciplined for getting caught doing wizard shit. And the preponderance of evidence is that most of them would take their lumps, promise to stop doing wizard shit, then go right back to doing wizard shit.

It turns out that if you give a bunch of dudes education, literacy, and a lot of time on their hands, some non-zero percentage of them are going to decide to be wizards, no matter how hard you try to stop them from being wizards.

[oxytocinatrocities]

"The House," a parable I drew about leaving the Mormon church.

I've come to think this metaphor also applies pretty well to constitutional originalism and the absurd idolization by both U.S. political parties of a document written hundreds of years ago by men who didn't know about the carbon cycle and owned human slaves.

I want to include some altered version of this in the graphic novel I'm working on, as well :)

[areyouscaredyet]

im not particularly religious but i think it’s very cute that Trans Day of Visibility and Easter are on the same day this year :)

its no question that something like this could be triggering or upsetting to a number of queer ppl given the current sociopolitical climate, so i want everyone to remember that u are loved! Regardless of what u or others believe, there are ppl who will love and support you always. Give yourself patience and treat yourself with care!!!

happy and peaceful TDOV everyone!! And Easter to those who celebrate :D

[charlesoberonn]

[alienbycomics]

Content Warning: religion and transphobia⚠️

Happy Trans Day of Visibility 🏳️‍⚧️ I made a comic reflecting on my church upbringing as an eXvangelical trans person. The Jesus conservative Christians claim to represent looked lot more like many of the LGBTQ+ friends I know and love. Just some food for thought 💖

[godslaughters]

Dead Christ (details) by Philippe de Champaigne

[awakefor48hours]

“We need to strive to be more accepting of POC” you guys can’t even handle religion.

[hamletthedane]

Nobody was doing it like Mary Magdalene. Tits out. Standing on a mountain. Holding a skull. She’s like the lesbian catholic hamlet. Aesthetically an absolute win for the gays.

[thefoilguy]

Pieta by Michelangelo - Aluminum Foil Sculpture

[politijohn]

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This should never have been a thing

[prokopetz]

It's that time of year when Tumblr celebrates Easter by posting pictures of crucified anime characters, and inevitably somebody in the notes will pop up to helpfully explain that crucifixion imagery has no cultural significance in Japanese media because Japan is only about 1% Christian, which bugs me because it's completely wrong.

It's true that in the majority of cases, crucifixion in Japanese cartoons isn't meant to be conveying any specific theological message, but something Western audiences are likely to miss is that a large portion of those random crucifixion scenes are referencing Ultraman.

Ultraman's creator was a devout Roman Catholic who explicitly intended the titular hero to read as a Christ figure, and consequently, various Ultramen have been crucified on multiple unconnected occasions throughout the franchise's history. Crucifixion scenes in Japanese cartoons are often directly name-checking particular crucifixion incidents from Ultraman, right down to emulating the compositions and camera angles of specific shots. It's like an especially morbid version of the Akira slide.

The upshot is that, while it's true that the inclusion of gratuitous crucifixion scenes in Japanese cartoons typically has no (intentional) theological message, stating that they have no cultural significance is incorrect. A large chunk of the Japanese viewing audience are going to see them and immediately go "hey, that's an Ultraman reference".

Anyway, as an image tax, have a shot of four crucified Ultramen miraculously resurrecting a fifth Ultraman by shooting laser beams out of their hearts:

[wolfythewitch]

Happy pride :)

[stil-lindigo]

the fox god.

a comic about a trickster.

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creative notes:

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