Last night on the radio I heard an interview with a historian who studies the historical Jesus, the real person upon which Christianity is based. I don't identify as Christian but he said some things that were extremely fascinating to me. This researcher, John Dominic Crossan, used to be a priest, and is still, one can tell from listening to him, very devoutly religious, but his ideas are going against the grain of some standard Christian dogma. One idea he talked about I just remembered this morning and it suddenly struck me how incredibly profound it is, what a stunning analysis of our culture it is.
The idea is this: In our Judeo-Christian culture, we talk about "the end of the world," in which Jesus will come back and basically kick ass on evil. Crossan says this is an essentially violent worldview, and that many Christians, from the Apostle Paul onward, have wanted there to be a second coming because they secretly believe that Jesus didn't get it right the first time. He was meek and he allowed himself to be killed by his enemies and they can't accept that, so he has to come back and violently "win" next time. But Jesus never talked this way. In fact early biblical writings never referred to the end of the "the world," says Crossan, because it was inconceivable that God would destroy his creation. They talked about "the end of days" instead. A subtle difference, but a telling one.
Crossan said the question before Christians when interpreting the Bible and talking about the End Times is this: do we believe in a violent God, or a non-violent God? And sadly, Fundamentalists believe in a violent God, one who will bring down a hideous Apocalypse upon the Earth, and they're working to help bring it about.
Posted by steev at Noviembre 25, 2004 08:44 AM