Politics and the Bible

[Bill Fishlore]

I'm new here, so I'm not sure if I am posting this in the right place. Also, I don't want to argue the topic here so much as get other people's views so that I can understand better.

My "issue" is this: The language of the Bible and, indeed, of almost all Christian prayer and theology is fundamentally political. By political I don't mean Republicans vs Democrats but the larger sense of the organization and distribution of power in society.

God is "Lord" as in the Lord God who makes Adam his estate manager in Eden. Besides demanding obedience, God seems to have "self-esteem issues" as he apparently needs constant praise. Why an infinite being, existing outside of time in total perfection requires subservience and adulation from our tiny bit of his total creation isn't clear to me.

Why should our relationship with God be cast in the language of a king and his subjects? We don't worship Lord Gravity, bowing down to his will and praising his name. The whole business seems an antique metaphor from ancient history.

All language is metaphor, I suppose, and for sure the human mind isn't going to grasp the idea of God outside of the limited scope of metaphor. But why a political metaphor? I don't suppose the issue was very important until 1783 because imagining God as "King of Kings" made some sense when everyone had a king.

But Americans don't have a king. Our political power comes bottom-up from We, the People, not top-down from some hereditary Lord. Behind the political change lie far-reaching changes in American beliefs about individual freedom and autonomy and the source of law and justice.

Is the Bible anti-American?

 

[NeoWelshRevival]

I'm new here, so I'm not sure if I am posting this in the right place. Also, I don't want to argue the topic here so much as get other people's views so that I can understand better.

My "issue" is this: The language of the Bible and, indeed, of almost all Christian prayer and theology is fundamentally political. By political I don't mean Republicans vs Democrats but the larger sense of the organization and distribution of power in society.

God is "Lord" as in the Lord God who makes Adam his estate manager in Eden. Besides demanding obedience, God seems to have "self-esteem issues" as he apparently needs constant praise. Why an infinite being, existing outside of time in total perfection requires subservience and adulation from our tiny bit of his total creation isn't clear to me.

Why should our relationship with God be cast in the language of a king and his subjects? We don't worship Lord Gravity, bowing down to his will and praising his name. The whole business seems an antique metaphor from ancient history.

All language is metaphor, I suppose, and for sure the human mind isn't going to grasp the idea of God outside of the limited scope of metaphor. But why a political metaphor? I don't suppose the issue was very important until 1783 because imagining God as "King of Kings" made some sense when everyone had a king.

But Americans don't have a king. Our political power comes bottom-up from We, the People, not top-down from some hereditary Lord. Behind the political change lie far-reaching changes in American beliefs about individual freedom and autonomy and the source of law and justice.

Is the Bible anti-American?

I do not think it is, though it may well in my case be anti-British or any other nation with a monarchy,

King is word useage, but with God as your king no human can be.

Humans are flawed, God is not.

You are only American by accident of birth, that you hold with the ideals of your nation (which I as a foreigner applaud those ideals for very much the most part), will be niether here nor there when you are dead.

America is a set of lines drawn on a map by man on a planet made by God.
Though it may not be pretty to hear but your nationality is of very little importance in the scheme of things and America will not travel with you when you die.

God loves us and wants the very best for us, and that can not be said for any King I have ever read about, and you will not find a politician to fit that mould either.

It should be noted that God is not only our king but also our Father, which in a way makes all those who accept his wisdom and mercy Princes and Princesses in his Kingdom, so you are Royalty yourself unless you choose not to be.

Not a hard choice in my eyes.

I see from your religion that you state doubts, and just want to say that we all have them from time to time and I applaud you doing something about those doubts rather than giving in to them.

Peace brother, I will pray for you,

Steve.

 

[Bill Fishlore]

Thank you for your prayers, Steve. Your point that God is not only King but Father is a good example of the wider metaphor that seems to be largely an afterthought in much liturgy and theology. Jesus spoke of God as Parent in a relationship to humans of love rather than raw power. Nonetheless, the Church has tended to give dominant emphasis to God as King and Lord. Saints and mystics have focused on God as Love but the magisterium has focused on political and legal notions of power, judgement and praise. Contemporary theologians such as Gustavo Gutierrez seek to redress the imbalance with emphasis on God's love, particularly HIs love for the poor.

Our vision of God seems to have been deliberately skewed, if not distorted, by politicians within and without the Church bent on using religion as a tool to control the people. This, of course, is not unique to Christianity, but since Constantine it has been constantly in the forefront.

 

[NeoWelshRevival]

Thank you for your prayers, Steve. Your point that God is not only King but Father is a good example of the wider metaphor that seems to be largely an afterthought in much liturgy and theology. Jesus spoke of God as Parent in a relationship to humans of love rather than raw power. Nonetheless, the Church has tended to give dominant emphasis to God as King and Lord. Saints and mystics have focused on God as Love but the magisterium has focused on political and legal notions of power, judgement and praise. Contemporary theologians such as Gustavo Gutierrez seek to redress the imbalance with emphasis on God's love, particularly HIs love for the poor.

Our vision of God seems to have been deliberately skewed, if not distorted, by politicians within and without the Church bent on using religion as a tool to control the people. This, of course, is not unique to Christianity, but since Constantine it has been constantly in the forefront.

Alas no matter what sphere we talk of, when it comes to fallible men, power corrupts.
I think by your own hand you have hit the nail on the head.
Best place to look is always what Jesus taught.
Dont know if the Bible you use has Jesus words in red ink, mine does not but I think that reading those lines in one sitting is a good use of time, added together they do not make much text compared to say a few chapters of a modern book.
A couple of hours would do it.
Infact I will do the same myself this weekend.

I think too much store is set today by what Church politicians go about doing because in truth they are no closer to God than you or I, we all have the same method of contact.
Prayer.

I left Christianity myself for some years (11) on the back of such petty squabbles between this church and that church theology etc, plus I was around to see the birth of neo-atheism (my country has a lot to answer for) and was seduced to that world view, but that was my weakness rather than thier influence.
I had neglected my relationship with God and it rendered me weak, I think now that the stronger that relationship is the stronger I am.

I was truely miserable in my time away thinking back on it and I could have been hit by a bus during that time and died an atheist.
Luckily I was spared that fate.

I read a line in a book by Ken Ham, "Atheism is the philosophy of death" and though a lot of the book I can debate him with over, I can with whole heart agree with that one phrase.

 

[Bill Fishlore]

I think we can discard the constant attempts of leaders to use religion for their own political ends. That isn't religion any more than a counterfeiter is a mint.

The other issue is the evolving understanding of God by man. Within the Bible, God starts in the Old Testament as a primitive kind of warlord. In the words of Jesus, God is a Heavenly Father who cares for each of. Paul adds a Hellenistic flip with a Christ who is Jesus with a metaphysical dimension. And there Christianity remained with three different perspectives on the nature of God for over a thousand years.

But although the language of Christology marked time, philosophy, spurred by new science, raced ahead. As our understanding of the cosmos accelerated, the anthropomorphic idea of God -- like Zeus only the "real" God -- became increasingly incompatible with the rest of human knowlege. God must be at least as much like the Big Bang as a Semitic princeling who demands his subjects prostrate themselves before him.

But Christianity requires an anthropomorphic God, in fact, God become a man. This, if it happened at all, if it is not simply a myth like the stories of Zeus, is a phenomenon without precedent or parallel in human history. That doesn't mean it isn't true, but fitting the Incarnation into the rest of human understanding is a challenging problem that has grown acute in the last century.

I haven't found a satisfactory connection between those two things. I'm still looking. Any suggestions?

 

[NeoWelshRevival]

Well I am no scholar but will have a stab at it.

From the very get go in the Bible God tells us that we are made in his image which would lead us to guess that Gods template of two arms, two legs and a head are copied in us, cant guess if thats true but can only infer from what Gen 1:26 says, God also uses the term "our image" instead of "my image" which I take as a first hint of a trinity.

The Big Bang and how it would look, is not a thing I think our imaginations can do justice too, in my own person I am less than certain about the big bang theory and thats not me saying its not true, just me saying I am unsure about it but the begining of the Bible does sound like a brief description of the big bang ie Gen 1:1 "In the beginning God created the heavens and the Earth"

The big bang theory holds that time, space and matter had the same starting point and the words beginning (time), heavens (space) and earth (matter) provide a good match for that.

Thats off topic but I think it interesting.

My guess is that God would never appear before our gaze in any form other than that which our minds could comprehend and a Semitic Male is one form we can certainly grasp, the O/T points toward him appearing as a Semitic Male in no less than 61 prophecies so that he appeared as a Semitic male is a good thing or else the O/T would have missed the mark by some distance.

I do not think there is any limit within the grasp of human imagination as to which Gods appearance or "be like" qualities could fit in to.

But if I have to guess the likeness our eyes will gaze upon should we ever be that fortunate will be one that does not disturb or confuses us but brings us comfort.

Or indeed we have four other senses and a brain and God can use these to let us know he is about, without sight being needed.

Its an interesting topic and I am sorry I do not have a more clinical answer.

 

[Bill Fishlore]

An Indian acquaintace once told me that Hindu religious images such as the elephant god, Ganesh, are deliberately outlandish in order to remind the worshipper that ALL images of the divine are anthropomorphic, human-created efforts to represent that which is intrinsically beyond the capacity of the human mind.

It is an interesting point, as my ability to grasp the nature of the Creator of Heaven and Earth is surely less, relatively speaking, than the ability of a virus on one of the hairs of my left leg to grasp who I am.

From this point of view, the issue seems to be one of epistemology. Do we recognize the God of Genesis walking in his garden in the cool of the evening as an anthropomorphic reduction of an infinite, all-perfect being existing outside of space and time or do we think God is some sort of country squire who admires begonias?

Is Jesus the Son of God in the sense that any pious Jew of His time could claim to be a Son of God or (as in the Qumran scrolls) a Son of Light, or do we think the Eternal Creator impregnated a young woman whose child somehow inherited divine status much as did Aeneas?

I don't find it satisfying to slather over these questions by saying "it's a mystery." Mystery is OK. In fact, one would expect God to be a mystery to the human mind. But a mystery, although it does not have to be reasonable, needs to be consonant with reason. God, after all created human reason and God is Truth. The mysteries I mentioned have always been mysterious, but since the last couple of centuries they have become a great deal more mysterious than ever before.