The Jesus we don’t like
27 April 2008 - 23 ניסן 5768 by Huw
I’ll be the first to admit that many of the more liberal sort of Christian ignores certain passages in the Bible. The whole second ending to Mark gets left out a lot: the result being a story of an empty tomb and a whole lot of confusion. The Higher Criticism folks don’t like miracles. The Jesus seminar only likes certain lines. Thomas Jefferson only liked the “moral teachings”. You know what I mean.
Well, what happens if the story presents a Jesus that doesn’t jive with the right?
Christianity Today presents a curious discussion of Pericope adulterae, the story of the Woman Caught in the Act of Adultery.
“Curious” because there is clearly the idea of sola scriptura woven in, as well as a healthy dose of Anti-Romanism and the implied idea that we can look at the text and tell what the “real” scripture is. In other words, it’s like the Jesus Seminar in reverse.
The conclusions, though, are especially disturbing.
Douglas Moo, professor at Wheaton College, said that Christians should be cautious about using “Go, and sin no more” or “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone.”
Wallace said pastors have a responsibility to communicate the truth of this text to their congregations. “We need to be as thoroughly biblical as we can be… [There] is a huge amount of ignorance that we’re catering to in the Christian public.
“A person hearing these words should recognize that they have no authority as authentic words of Jesus,” he said. Christians who are reading the story, he said, should give it the same authority as any other unsubstantiated early Christian teaching about Jesus.
How do you define “substantiated”? All we have is Oral Tradition.
It’s clear these folks believe in some kind of magical Ur-Text someplace. That leaves out any of the traditions that might not fit in with their view of Jesus (just like the liberals, certainly).
It’s difficult to understand how to treat such a sequestered passage; pericope adulterae continues to be much used as evidence of Jesus’ character and as an example to believers.
It’s the scary idea that human wisdom can pull the “real Jesus” from the text. So, what is scary about the Jesus that doesn’t say, “Go, and sin no more” or “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone”? These are the verses that get quoted, most, in discussion issues of human sexuality. Will the Jesus that doesn’t say these things will let homophobia run rampant? Or will the Jesus that doesn’t say these things finally pin evangelicals to the mat on divorce?
