Thursday, April 9, 2015

Man-Made or God-Made




Man-Made or God-Made

Over the years, I’ve heard this said a few times by a hand-full of people –all practicing-Christians of the non-liturgical persuasions– something like “I don’t believe in man-made traditions, just the traditions that come from God.”  I’m sure there are others that believe this too, though.     The impression here is that they only give credence to those traditions they perceive as coming directly from God.    The other traditions, human made ones, are just that… human-influenced traditions, and therefore not only not authentic, but not worthy of giving any significance to.   Interesting though how they celebrate birthdays and other secular festivities.  And maybe even some religious holidays, like Christmas.        

Now I’m making a few assumptions about these people; 1– Since they were all Christians, I assume it would follow in their minds that Christianity (or the form of it they were familiar with) would be the religion that fits in this category of “God-made”, and 2– I also assume this has to do with the idea of biblical authority.  The logic here is that since from their perspective the bible comes (directly or otherwise) from God, then the traditions listed in the bible would also be “from God”.    

But I have a hard time discerning which Christian traditions (if any) they think would be directly from God, and which might be human-made.    Would Christmas be one of those “God-authorized” traditions?… I’m not sure.     All of us Christians celebrate Christmas.     Don’t all of us Christians celebrate the birth of Jesus as December 25th?     You’d think.   But no, this is a trick question.   Our Western churches celebrate the date on December 25th, but the Orthodox churches celebrate Christmas day on January 7th.        But that’s not what the bible says.   Sorry, another trick question – not only does the bible not tell us when Jesus was born, it doesn’t even mandate this be celebrated.   Well, to be fair, the bible doesn’t tell us not to celebrate Christmas either.    It is in the Bible though, so the question is:  Is it a God-made tradition or is it a human-made tradition?   

Before we look at the traditions, let’s look at the story itself.    The bible has the “Christmas story” in two places; the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke.  In Luke, for example, Jesus is born in a manger.   But in Matthew Jesus is born in a house.   The Star… this is just found in the Matthew story.   But only Luke has the story of the Angels.   Matthew has the story of the kings (or magi, wise-men, but doesn’t say now many), but Luke has no kings… just shepherds (again, here, the text doesn’t say how many).   Matthew has the story of the murder of the innocents and the fleeing into Egypt.    Luke does not include this.    There’s more, but you get the idea.    They have the same main character in baby Jesus, and they’re generally similar stories, but the details are very different.

So, different stories… maybe different traditions.    Considering the variations and nuance surrounding Christmas celebrations around the world, past and present, how could we judge which to be most “true” or authentic?   Almost all of us use some kind of coniferous tree, or an approximate facsimile thereof.   But… but… in the biblical stories there is no mention of a tree like that.    And there certainly there is no mention of putting lights on said non-mentioned tree.    Christmas goose?   Cranberry sauce and apple cider?    Oh, so yummy, but not in the stories either.    But these are just customs continued in our 21st century America.   Continued from when?   And where?   What about the Christmas customs from our continent from previous centuries?   Or the Christmas customs from other countries and places… throughout these past 2 thousand years?     Pray tell, which are the most “authentic” customs?    I’m not sure even they might know which tradition(s) would be the “God directed” “right” ones.

“But the bible doesn’t say to celebrate Christmas – so we’re on our own on that one.   Have fun”   Okay, let’s look at some traditions that God does tell us to continue. 
The Orthodox Jewish tradition has this practice of using phylacteries, leather boxes containing certain verses of scripture in them bound to the forearm and forehead with leather straps.   Deuteronomy 6 and 11 call the faithful to wear them as a reminder of the covenant God made with the people, and the peoples response to this covenant.    Deuteronomy 6:  7 Repeat them (the words of the law of God) again and again to your children. Talk about them when you are at home and when you are on the road, when you are going to bed and when you are getting up.8 Tie them to your hands and wear them on your forehead as reminders.9 Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.     Deuteronomy 11: 18 and following repeats the chapter and verses above, "So commit yourselves wholeheartedly to these words of mine. Tie them to your hands and wear them on your forehead as reminders.19 Teach them to your children. Talk about them when you are at home and when you are on the road, when you are going to bed and when you are getting up.20 Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates,21 so that as long as the sky remains above the earth, you and your children may flourish in the land the LORD swore to give your ancestors.   Because…   Deuteronomy 7: 12 "If you listen to these regulations and faithfully obey them, the LORD your God will keep his covenant of unfailing love with you, as he promised with an oath to your ancestors.”

“Yeah, but we’re not Old Testament Israelites!”    True, even though Paul thought God had grafted this new Christian sect into the branch of the ancient Israelites, we were not bound by the old covenant and laws, even though for sure God’s faithfulness would transcend this.   And yet, in spite of this, some Christians still look to the 10 commandments as a source of moral law, even though the wearing of, and praying with, which ostensibly would be a pretty dramatic reminder of God’s laws and faithfulness, and our faithfulness to God, is now off the table to the typical Christian.   

But let’s keep looking.    What about the New Testament idea of Communion.   Don’t all of us Christians celebrate Communion in some form or other?   Sure.   Okay, what is Communion?   It’s symbolic correct?   Not to the liturgical churches.   To them it’s more than symbolic – it’s “real”.   The bread and wine indeed become the body and blood of Christ.   How “become”?   You mean, the bread and wine change into something else?    Yes according to Roman Catholic theology.   But Lutherans think that while the bread is still chemically bread, Christ is indeed “really present” in, with, and under the bread and wine.    Non-liturgical churches say this is just symbolic.   Otherwise it would be cannibalism!      John 3:51-54 – Jesus says he is the living bread come down from heaven.   If anyone eats (the Greek verb here really means to chew, gnaw- quite literally “eat”) this bread, they will live forever!    The Leaders respond by saying basically, “That’s cannibalism – it makes no sense!”    But Jesus’ response is very explicit – “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, you will have no life within you.  The one who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day.”     And then in Matthew and Luke, Jesus calls his disciple to do and repeat this in his name.  
            Liturgical Christian Theologian:            “Pretty clear!”   
            Non-liturgical Christian Theologian:    “Yeah, okay… but where are we going to get Jesus’ body and blood?”    
            Liturgical Christian Theologian:            “In our communion!”  
            Non-liturgical Christian Theologian:    “That’s just bread and wine!”
            Liturgical Christian Theologian:            “Nu-uh!”                            

Okay so that’s not real.    The reality has been a lot worse than this at times.    In fact wars were fought on stuff like this.    The thing is, we can’t even really agree on stuff that we supposedly agree on!            

Let’s move on to something easy!     No one questions that Jesus calls the disciples (and us) to baptize in his name.    Sounds good – but how?   And how does one baptize?     Do you dunk someone under the water entirely– as per Baptists.    Or is pouring water on their heads enough– as per Lutherans and Episcopalians.  To be fair these two don’t reject full immersion, it’s just not mandatory.    And can you baptize babies?   The former say no, the latter say yes.   And each has their own theological structure for their position.     We agree Jesus tell us to do it…  we just don’t agree how, or to whom!  

Regardless, the idea that the people I mentioned above are trying to express is that human-stuff; traditions, customs, etc., are either not as sacred or holy as “God ordained” traditions, or not sacred at all, since they do (did) not come from God.   I can see where a belief that some traditions come –directly or otherwise– from God does give the traditions a real sense of authenticity, specialness… authority even.    But I wonder what would have happened had I asked some probing questions when they’d said these statements?   

I had a discussion once with an African Christian man that asked why I’d gone to do a Sweat with some Native American people.    I said it was just another form of prayer.   He didn’t like that it came from another religious custom that wasn’t explicitly Christian.   I said obviously this comes from another culture, but really prayer, and pretty much every religious custom we have, is based on some culture – that there was no tradition we have as Christians that isn’t connected to culture (one or more).     For example, I asked him how he prays in church.  He said he puts his hands together, closes his eyes and bows his head.   I said that’s cultural.    For many centuries Europeans would do this as a sign of respect to royalty or others.. and I have to assume it would follow these same customs would apply to God.    This could very well be (and have been), to us and our European ancestors, a “natural” or intuitive sign of reverence and respect.    But there is biblical evidence that people often would pray to God with arms and hands open, and with eyes open and heads raised heavenward.   A different culture.    

Then I asked him what language he spoke when he prayed.   I can’t remember if he said English or one of the languages other than English spoken in his country.   But regardless, I said that since Jesus didn’t speak any of those languages, that’s an expression of culture.  
   
What do you wear when you go to church?    Do you dress up – as an expression of “giving your best to God” and offering God respect in this way?  Or do you dress down, expressing the idea that not only do you want to be more comfortable, but that it doesn’t matter what you wear, God accepts you as-is.    That’s all cultural, coming from either a corporate culture (like a church community), or a culture of one – you.         

I’ve said before, I had a friend who was an anthropologist (the study of ancient peoples), and she shared with me that all cultures have at least three things in common; Music, Taboos/Prohibitions against certain behaviors and/or actions, and Religion.    Every culture has reached out to the Sacred in its own way.   Every religion has been centered around a people, and every people is squarely enmeshed in a culture.    If religion is the program… culture is the operating system that the religion expresses itself through.   

Saying something like – “There is no tradition that has come directly from God” can sound very iconoclastic.   This case can, and has been made, with tremendous effect.     But believe me, I don’t say this lightly.    I don’t say this lightly because many might hear this in the negative;  if the assumption that human-made traditions are not holy (only God-made ones are), and if there are no God-made ones, then none of them can be sacred or holy anymore!    If there is no religion that comes directly from God, then none are “authentic”??    

I suppose you could look at it that way, but that’s not the only way to look at this question.      I have an adopted daughter, and although she never said this, I have heard from some adoptive parents that their kids have at one point, in anger, blurted out, – “You’re not my real parents!”   And what’s the response?    “Yeah, well it sure seems pretty real to me!”   My question is, why would you assume man-made religion isn’t real?   It sure seems pretty real to me!      When a people recognize their human experience has been a journey… a sacred one… and they start marking sacred time, with Creation stories, and other stories telling about their journey with the divine, stories with the Holy… IN the human experience… yeah, it’s pretty real!

When our ancestral parents reached up to the cosmos, or into the depths of their own souls…   when they touched their own human experiences, and imbued them with meaning… it was pretty real.  

When they marked and recognized and made sacred the cycles of life; births, growth, rites of passage, growing old, and death…
When they set aside time to look inward, like in the various cultural manifestations of a Vision Quest…
When they evolved some purification rituals with elementals of human experience such as fire or water…
When they generated –over time – the notions of sacred meals, using staples of existence, like bread…
When our ancestors did this… when we do this… we are touching the numinous.   We are peeking behind the veil…
And it’s always real!   

I do know some people, and some traditions, that just DO NOT like –or CANNOT accept – the idea that others besides themselves can have access to the same divine-ness  that they have access to in their traditions, and through their customs.   But alas, in the words of author William Easum, Sacred Cows do indeed make gourmet burgers!  

The Celts recognized “thin places” – places where the division between this world and the Spirit world were very thin.   And as time went on, and the Christian church took over more and more control of that part of the world, they ended up building many churches over the very same “thin places”.  

There are thin places, they’re real.   There are thin times – times where, for just a moment… the two worlds overlap.

See, here’s the thing, we humans have tendencies to mark these places, and these times.   We mark them as sacred.  We mark them in our lives, in our memories, we carry them forward from generation to generation.  And we tell stories that remind us of the sacred in our lives.  

As imperfect as our humanity is… it’s very real.   

Maybe God made us this way.     Maybe that’s why our ancestors reached up to the stars.    Maybe that’s why our ancestors looked within.   Maybe that’s why we still do this.     Why do we do this?     Because – and here’s the down-to-earth really human (and sacred!) part – it’s in us to do that!     It’s in us to seek God… somehow, some way.    Maybe we’re hardwired for this.     This would explain humanity’s desire and need for that God-thing.   This would explain why all peoples, in every time and place before us – that we know of – have reached out, in the midst of their own cultures and places.       

Maybe God made us to reach out – not as Lutherans, or Baptists, or even Christians… but as Humans!    As humans, God calls us.    Our cells are made of little tiny pieces that quite literally vibrate.     Could it be they vibrate with the resonance of the divine, cosmic, harmony of life?    Maybe we could say God doesn’t love us because we’re Christians, or Jews, or Muslims.  God loves us because we’re Humans!     And we respond to this total, celestial love… each in our own ways… as humans, in our own cultural contexts!  

Some of these themes we lift up in our “man-made” religion are recognitions of patterns...  holy patterns.   Like resurrection!    It might disturb some to hear this (like the other stuff wasn’t disturbing to some already!) the idea of a God-man dying and coming back in some form or other isn’t unique to Christianity.   The Ancient Near-East has some pretty interesting examples of this; Ba’al, Tammuz, Melqart.   The Egyptians had the gods Ra, and Osiris as examples of this.     The Hindu tradition has Krishna.  The Greeks and Romans had some example.   Some of the ancient peoples of Japan, Central America, and Europe… they all have stories of a god, or a god-man dying and coming back to life somehow.      The Mythic story of the Phoenix is another version of this story…  the bird that arises, is reborn, from the ashes of its predecessor.      

These stories aren’t exactly the same as the Christian story, they usually relate to agriculture, the changing of the seasons, the growing seasons, etc.     But  the thing is, they don’t need to be exactly the same as the Christian story!   What all these stories are doing, at their core is recognizing the primal story of life coming from apparent death!    It’s a sacred story!   

We Christians have our stories we hold up about life coming back from death.    
When addicts recognize the addiction will destroy everything they love, and eventually kill them, and they stop this destruction, and move in a good way, getting their lives together, when they step back from the brink...  and begin to live life for real again… that’s resurrection!      
When a relationship is over, and the person works through grief, and anger, etc. and is able to see life as new again… that’s resurrection!   

The story of the resurrection of Jesus is our human story.     It’s our version of the primal, fundamental, sacred story of New Life coming from death.   Honestly, this disturbs some people, because they want this to be unique to them.  They want resurrection to be just theirs.     It’s not!    It’s all of ours!  It always has been and always will be!    

When you look at the story of the resurrection of Jesus… celebrate!     We celebrate and lift up RESURRECTION;  In the person of Jesus!   In the story of humanity!     In our lives!        



Alleluia.  He is risen!   
He is risen indeed!  Alleluia!     




No comments: