The Second Half of Leviticus - The Holiness Code

Leviticus chapters 17-26 contain several distinctive features that set it apart as a distinctive unit, which scholars call the "Holiness Code" because it repeatedly employs the phrase: "Be Holy because I, the Lord your God, am Holy" (19:2; 20::7, 26; 21:6, 8). Walter Kaiser, Jr., in his New Interpreter's Bible commentary on Leviticus (Abingdon Press, 1994) notes that in addition to the the holiness theme, tone, and subject matter addressed, Leviticus 17-26 "focuses almost entirely on the Israelite people (as opposed to Aaron and the priests).

Leviticus is a book of the Law for the people - addressing everyday concerns and outlining a plan of daily life to keep them in harmony with God.

Chapter 18 (the reading for Friday, Feb. 25) contains a long list of prohibitions against specific forms of incest, explaining most of them as a form of dishonor for the male committing the incest (assumed by the second personal pronoun "you") or for the male husband or close relative of the woman with whom "you" are committing incest. An interesting topical study might involve tracing the other uses in Leviticus of the concept of honor and dishonor. But you won't get far by searching on the word "honor" or "dishonor". If you read the Jewish translation of Leviticus 18:8 (or the accurate but clunky New American Standard) you can see that the Hebrew employs a colloquialism, which modern translators have rendered into more understandable English (a translation tactic called dynamic equivalency).

In the TNIV (a modern English translation), translators have dynamically rendered Leviticus 18:8 as follows: "Do not have sexual relations with your father's wife; that would dishonor your father." The Tanakh (a Jewish translation into English, translates the phrase word-for-word): "Do not uncover the nakedness of your father's wife; it is the nakedness of your father." This euphemism sheds some light on why Noah was so angry that his son, Ham, "saw his father's nakedness" in Genesis 9:22, while his father was drunk.

Chapter 18 begins and ends by negatively comparing the customs of the Canaanites (and the Egyptians) with God's Laws. The chapter opens with this command: "You shall not copy the practices of the land of Egypt where you dwelt, or of the land of Canaan to which I am taking you; nor shall you follow their laws" (Lev 18:3 TNK). The final verse in chapter 18 summarizes the rationale for these prohibitions: "Keep my requirements and do not follow any of the detestable customs that were practiced before you came and do not defile yourselves with them. I am the LORD your God.'" (Lev 18:30 TNIV).

Later, when we begin reading about the Israelite military conquest of Canaan, we will want to remember this justification (particularly Leviticus 18:25).

Of course, Leviticus 18:22 contains the scriptural justification of the Jewish and Christian condemnation and mistreatment of homosexual persons. I have written extensively about interpretations that question the validity of that understanding of Leviticus 18:22, if you care to find out more about other ways to understand this particular verse (you can go directly to the bottom of page 13 and 14 to read my commentary on this passage). My strategy involves asking the question, "What is going on here?" or "What customs and practices of the Canaanites do these verses (21-23) presume?"

I encourage you to immerse yourself in this sometimes strange world of Leviticus in order to hear and respond to that ancient call to live a holy life, as our God is holy!

OYB Reflections - The Children of Israel (Jacob) - January 14, 2011

Michael Williams told me Sunday that he decided to read some of the scriptures in Genesis prior to the January 14th reading (Genesis 30) which picked up in the middle of the birth of the twelve sons of Jacob (whom we learned in the January 17 reading got his name changed to Israel). These children figure prominently throughout the rest of the Christian Old Testament.

In the January 17 reading (Genesis 35:1-36:43), you find a brief synopsis of the twelve sons of Israel:
 ²³ The sons of Leah were Reuben (Jacob’s oldest son), Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, and Zebulun.
 ²⁴ The sons of Rachel were Joseph and Benjamin.
 ²⁵ The sons of Bilhah, Rachel’s servant, were Dan and Naphtali.
 ²⁶ The sons of Zilpah, Leah’s servant, were Gad and Asher.

Leah and Rachel were Jacob's two wives (as for how this marriage to these two sisters, Jacob's nieces, came about, see Genesis 29). Bilhah and Zilpah were their respective maidservants. When each of the sisters ceased or could not conceive children, they offered Jacob their maidservants in a kind of fertility war. These twelve sons become the Twelve Tribes of Israel (there will actually be 13, because instead of a tribe of Joseph, Israel/Jacob gives this honor to Joseph's two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh - see Genesis 48:5-6).

Besides the names of these important tribes (the tribe of Jesus is Judah), you may also want to take particular notice of the various mentions of God's covenant, or eternal promise, to Jacob/Israel, to his father, Isaac, and to his grandfather, Abraham/Abram. The first of these covenant statements is found in God's call to Abram in Genesis 12:1-3. The covenant is restated several times: Genesis 13:14-17; 15:5; and 22:17-18. The God renews the covenant with Abraham's son, Isaac in Genesis 26:2-5, and with Abraham's grandson, Jacob, in Genesis 28:13-15; 35:11-12; and in 46:2-4.

I hope you are enjoying the Joseph saga, which begins in Genesis 37 (we started yesterday). But don't let your eyes glaze over when reading chapters like Genesis 36, which recount the genealogy of families and tribes which are part of the story of God's people in the Christian Old Testament. One strategy I like to use is to meditate on the names, which are transliterated from the Hebrew (almost all of which is accented on the final syllable). These long lists of names are the only places you can hear the ancient sounds that first carried the message of Good News of God's presence among human communities. Don't run from them - revel in the fact that you are reading Hebrew!

I hope transitioning from the story of the patriarchs to the stories of Jesus in Matthew aren't too bracing for you (at least Matthew likes to quote the Hebrew prophets often). Today, we got to read the first of many parables recorded in Matthew. I'd love to hear what your take is on these ancient forms of teaching spiritual realities in a hostile world - particularly your thoughts when reading Matthew 13:10-16, which can seem a little harsh for Jesus. What do you think it means?

Thanks for sharing this journey of faith with me and with each other.

Peace,
Bo

Impetus for the Course: Communal Interpretation and Formation

Dale Martin's book of essays, Sex and the Single Savior, Gender and Sexuality in Biblical Interpretation employed an imaginative freedom in Biblical interpretation that encouraged and validated innovative and creative readings of Scripture.  These readings are bounded not by any one of these reading strategies (historical criticism) or even Scripture itself, but by the leavening presence of the Holy Spirit in the members of the Body of Christ.

Thanks to Carl Gregg (whom I met at a conference in Nashville last fall), I was inspired to read Martin's Pedagogy of the Bible: An Analysis and Proposal, which further articulated Martin's invitation to experience scripture as "a vast space of textual echo chamber, like entering... a huge cathedral" (p. 62). Martin also writes that "the interpretation of scripture builds on and reinforces truths also taught elsewhere in Christian culture and community" (p. 69).

In "Reading the Bible Again for the First Time: Taking the Bible Seriously But Not Literally", Marcus Borg asserts that to survive over time, it must become "a cultural-linguistic world in its own right" having emerged in a particular culture and drawing from "the language and symbols from that culture" (p. 29). Our scriptures, Borg suggests, are the "foundation [or constitution] of the Christian cultural-linguistic world" that transcends the cultures of ancient Israel and the early Christian movement and becomes "a world in which its followers live" (p.29).

When most Christians think about Biblical authority, they assume what Borg calls a monarchical model, in which the Bible stands over the Christian community, dictating doctrine and ethics. The primary trouble with this model is that the scriptures do not speak - and the monarchical model inevitably involves self-proclaimed interpretive experts who presume to speak not only for scripture but for God. What many Christians take to be the "literal Truth" of scriptures is the voice and interpretation of these "experts". Far too many Christians read the Bible regurgitated.

Borg describes another way of defining scriptural authority: a dialogical model in which the Bible is "our primary ancient conversation partner" (p. 30). This conversation between the community of faith and the stories and writings that the ancient community of faith collected into a canon of scripture involves what Borg calls a "critical conversation" that (1) discerns what "parts of the Bible" the community will honor and will not honor, as well as (2) "allow[s] the texts to shape and judge us".

Martin calls scripture "an instrument used by the Holy Spirit mainly to reinforce Christian doctrine and ethics we have imbibed by several different sources: preaching, liturgy, music, even our parents and grandparents and our friends" (p. 70). Martin rightly sees the Holy Spirit as the guide of this ongoing dialogue between scripture (the collected voices/stories of the ancient Jewish and early Christian communities of faith) and every subsequent generation of the Christian community of faith. Scripture is not in this understanding the source of our faith understanding but a powerful resource - a confirmation of truth the Holy Spirit teaches us in many ways.

Exegesis is a world Bible scholars use to mean the ways in which we "mine" the scriptural texts for meaning. It derives from the Greek word exegesthai, which means "to lead out". In the introduction to her wonderful book, The Bible: A Biography, Karen Armstrong calls exegesis a "spiritual discipline rather than an academic pursuit" (p. 6) in which the exegetes "[continue] to make the Word of God audible in each generation" (p. 5). Armstrong also writes about this dialogue between the community of faith and its scriptures, asserting that "the truth of scripture cannot be assessed unless it is - ritually or ethically - put into practice" (p. 2).

This process is what Martin calls confirmation and what Borg calls critical discernment. Armstrong describes the conversation in this way: "the Bible 'proved' that it was holy because people continually discovered fresh ways to interpret it and found this difficult, ancient set of documents cast light on situations their [human] authors could never have imagined. Revelation was an ongoing process..." (p. 5). As with Borg, this proving process works in both directions. Armstrong quotes an early Christan exegete Philo who liked to describe "his exegesis as a 'conversion' of both the text and the interpreter" (p. 51).

But Armstrong also connects with Martin's assertion that scripture reminds us of truths "we already know". She writes that Philo "experienced knowledge as remembrance, as known to him already at some profound level of his being" (p. 53). In this way, scripture does not merely reflect what we want it to mean, but resonates with the part of our being that God created. For Philo, "the story became suddenly fused with a truth that was part of himself" (p. 53).

By exercising our imagination (and expanding our imagination) we can inhabit a realm of of story and symbol that welcomes us with comfort and confirmation (reminding us of truths we already know) and that also constantly surprises and challenges us to experience the mystery of God anew (swinging us constantly to turn, turn, turn to a place of more of God's presence, power and love).

Martin's message to me involves the recovery and validation of my imaginative freedom - which has long lain dormant under the oppression of the historical-critical method of exegesis I learned at the divinity school. He calls me not to abandon this practice of interpretation, but to move beyond its exclusive (or even primary) use. and here is where the people of Skyline will be blessed: they will also be freed from the burden of a method many of them cannot use (because of the barrier of graduate education) and welcomed to their rightful place in the communion gathered by and in scripture.

These books have inspired me to offer an 8-10 week course on Biblical interpretation that aims to welcome laity back into the community conversation in the scriptures, validating the many ways we  read, experience, and interpret the texts in the presence and power of the Holy Spirit as well as expanding our repertoire of reading and interpretive methods as a way of appreciating the vast treasure of scripture in our faith.