Table of Contents | I am convinced that there is no way to understand biblical religion until one realizes that its whole beginning premise is the opposite of the religions of antiquity. Indeed, this is the key to understanding much of public religion, particularly the brand that seems to be stuck on a need for comfort and certainty and security. When you stop to ponder the traditions of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and their understandings of God, it is clear that there is a decisive difference. For example, the religion of Baal was widespread in Canaan when the Hebrew people arrived. In fact, it is fairly characteristic of all primitive religions. In their book entitled The Universe Story Thomas Berry and Brian Swimme note, "The basic movement of the universe was perceived as an ever-renewing seasonal cycle, an eternal cycle, without beginning or ending." It consisted, essentially, of a childlike acceptance of life as one found it in nature with the cycle of the seasons and the stages of life going around and around without getting anywhere. Therefore, the goal of their religion was comfort and security and survival. On the other hand, the religion of Yahweh was radically different. It was a way of growing and maturing. It set fulfillment as the goal of history and living; history was seen as linear rather than circular. The flow of events was conceived as purposeful. History was going somewhere and God was in the midst of all this as a promising, beckoning and covenanting force. Also, it was the very nature of primitive religion to see the gods as being indifferent or even hostile to human beings. To the primitive people it was human beings who loved God, not God who loved human beings. This was true because humans were dependent on the gods for rain and fertility and survival. Therefore, human beings had to try to please the gods, to arouse the gods out of their indifference and to do the things they thought the gods would like. So the first efforts to please the gods took the form of material sacrifices. People would bring the produce they had grown, the best animals they had raised and at times even their children and place them on burning altars so that sweet savors might rise up to the gods. And it is against this backdrop that one must set the beginning of Hebrew religion. Can you imagine the surprise when this God named Yahweh appeared to Abraham and began to interact with this one? God was not like the traditional, primitive understanding of divinity. From the first, the movement of divine love was from God to human beings and wasn't a movement of human love toward God. It wasn't God who was pictured as being far-off and needing to be wooed into a change of heart. It was human beings who were far-off and the ones who needed to change. The point of the religious struggle in biblical religion is always in human beings, not in God. The issue is never one of pressuring God until, at last, God will give but of pressuring human beings so that, at last, humans are willing to receive what God desires to give. The stubbornness is always on the side of human beings. This is why Abraham is regarded with such reverence. What happened between God and Abraham turned theology upside down. If God is a giver rather than a taker and is One who is joy in the divine nature rather than insatiable need, this changes everything. For example, the reason back of creation is now seen as something positive. You can answer the question of why God created this world in the first place from a new perspective. The long sweep of biblical history says that God created in order to share more fully the joy God found in aliveness. One day God must have said something like, "This ecstasy of existence is too good a thing to keep to myself. Others need to get in on it." So God created the world and made human beings in the divine image. God did this not to get something but to give something. God's vision was that someday all creation could come to experience this fullness of joy. So God set this high and lofty goal at the very beginning of the creation and God continues to labor unswervingly toward this goal. You see, this is both our origin and our destiny. This is the gracious nature of the religion of the Hebrews. Primitive human beings saw religion as a movement from earth to heaven, thus, aimed at placating the deity. The reversal of this movement was why Prometheus got into trouble with the gods of Olympus. This god had compassion on the human creatures who lived in agony in the world below. These positive feelings were a stark contrast to the dominant attitudes among the gods. One of the glories of living on Olympus was that one didn't have to be involved with or concerned for these creatures called human beings. The rest of the gods couldn't care less about humankind. Prometheus, however, was different. He took pity on their plight and stole fire from the altar of the gods and took it to earth. His action was detected, almost immediately. There was great outrage among the gods and Jupiter punished Prometheus by exiling him to the Isle of Caucasus. But biblical religion says that God is the One who promises and covenants and humans are the ones who choose to receive or resist. This is the crux of the religious problem in the Book. The God who began breaking through to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and Moses and all Israel wasn't an indifferent or hostile power who demanded gifts. Rather, this being was a loving power who wanted to give gifts to human beings. The divine nature of God was revealed as for human beings, not against them. This God set out to love one nation in such a way that all nations would ultimately come to be blessed. This God moved to raise the self-esteem of each person by the gift of love. God's great goal was creating a human community or a way for people to live together so that each one could grow and mature and not destroy. This is why the covenant at Sinai was ethical and not ceremonial. God's concern was not for the divine nature and what could be extracted from human beings. God's concern was for human beings and for their fulfillment in history. This vision of God is desperately needed in our day when so much of religion is rooted in the primitive understanding. Religious practices are rooted in the notion that God is interested in extracting from us worship and obedience. Television religion and much of evangelical piety is concerned with the question of security; therefore, it is aimed at God. At its best, religion is concerned with the question of maturity; therefore, it is directed toward human beings. Perceiving and internalizing this shift is crucial and the door to continuing on "the sacred journey" described here. |