+Z’ev

Today’s assigned readings
Isaiah 49:1-7, Revelation 21:22-27, Matthew 12:14-21

And he said to me, “You are my servant, Israel, in whom I will be glorified.”
Isaiah 49:3

Today is the feast of the Epiphany or, as it is called in the Eastern Traditions, the Theophany. S’praznikum! Russian for “Joy of the Feast!” It’s quite useful for any holiday! (Purists will tell you it transliterates, more correctly, to “S Prazdnikom” but in use, it’s more of a jovial shout, and it comes out “S’praznikum!” at least from my favourite native Russians.)

Theophany is a very cool word for, unlike our “Epiphany” which simply means “manifestation”, theophany means quite clearly “manifestation of God.” Which is what Christians celebrate today.

In the West this is the celebration of the arrival of the Magi to Bethlehem, where they worshipped Jesus. Unlike the shepherds on Christmas night, and unlike Mary and Joseph - and everyone else involved in the story so far - the Magi are Gentiles. While we know nothing of how many of them there were, or what their names are, or even where they came from - in fact everything we tell about them is simply legend - the legends we tell about them are terribly important. Not because they are necessarily true in an historic sense, but because they are True in a mythological sense.

At its fullest, the Myth of the Magi speaks of wise men from three differnt parts of the world (although those parts vary, depending on who’s doing the telling). Thus, in the adoration of the Magi we see the entire world coming to the feet of Messiah in prayer.

In the Byzantine East, this feast goes even further, for it is seen as a celebration not of the Magi but of the Baptism of Christ. The theological image normally offered for this is that Christ-God enters the waters where everyone else has been entering for the washing away of their sins. God’s glory in Jesus passes into the waters and he takes on himself all the sins there as his own mystical robe. Leaving for us - who enter the water of Baptism - his own robe of glory to take up as we come out of the font. It’s a very powerful image.

Every Theophany in Orthodox churches around the world, the priest blesses water with a cross. Ideally this is “living water” in a lake or river or ocean, such as here, on the San Lorenzo River. But sometimes location and space require just a small font of water, symbolic of the whole world.

When the rite is over the water is considered to have been restored to the purity it enjoyed in creation - it is considered more than “Holy Water”: it is really water now, as God intended it to be. This water gets passed around in cups and golden ladles, stored in water bottle and sprinkled on everything: people, cars, houses. In most Orthodox communities this water is carried into every home in the parish and used for annual rites of House Blessing. (Last year, my community had a progressive luncheon after Liturgy, and went from house to house blessing and feasting. It was a wonderful day.)

This feast, on January 6th, was the original winter feast: Christmas and, later the Purification on 2 February, and the Circumcision on 1 January, all evolved out of this one. In the Armenian and Syrian traditions (Coptic and Ethiopian, too?) this day is Christmas. The Nativity, the Magi, the Baptism are all celebrated on this one feast - although they all do it on their own calendars and it’s not necessarily, on our (Gregorian) 6 January.

In all the churches this day is a celebration of the Incarnation without equal. Christmas makes a point, this day embellishes it to its Baroque fulness. Christmas is the statement of a theme but this day is the fugue in full form. The nativity is a theological point. Epiphany is a theological treatise.

It’s not enough that God has become one of us. We must know what it means.

You can already see - in the Byzantine water rites - the development of the problem I spoke of last week:

[A]t times [Byzantine Theology gets] so focused on Christ-God that it seemed like Jesus-the-Guy who went through a voice-change and puberty and acne and probably tried to figure out why he suddenly had back hair… This guy gets lost in all the Gold Icons and hymnography.

…The God I meet in Jesus-the-Rabbi is more like the earthy, Semitic deity I’d expect in Judaism. This God is *not* the God I ran into in Eastern Orthodoxy. That deity was so far above all humanity that proper theology had to make some near-gnostic statements about Jesus’s death. “Well, the Body died… but God the Son didn’t. He was still on the Throne with God the Father… where he always was and always will be…” Argh. No…
God died.
Felt Pain.
Went through puberty. Wet Dreams. Burped. Passed Gas after too much hummus.
Or this isn’t working.
And that Dead, Farting God introduced me to the warm, loving, Semitic deity

Where is Jesus, the Infant, in all of this theological fugue? At the point where the Magi got there, when Jesus was roughly two years old, was Jesus potty trained? Or was he, as so many third world children do, even today, still running around naked, without any long robes at all, so he could use the bathroom without messing up his clothes?

Did he know he was God? Was he at all? Or was he just a Jewish kid, that later knew something about God he had to tell the rest of us?

The gospel passage today from St Matthew cites a passage from Isaiah using the Greek version, the Septuagint, rather than the Hebrew one. The Greek version of this passage mentions Gentiles twice. The Hebrew not at all. The Church sees “my servant” as a prophetic shadow of Jesus. The Jews see “my servant” as Israel - which is a more literal reading of all the “Servant” passages in Isaiah.

But at one point I think everyone can agree: LXX, Masoretic text, Eastern and Western Christians, Byzantine, Syrian, Nestorian, Catholic and Protestant, Jews and Gentiles.

That one point is this: The God of Israel has home to all of us.

Even before I became a Wiccan in the 1980s, this one problem stumped me: how did the tribal deity of one, out-of-the-way people in the fertile crescent trick the entire world into worshipping him? You see movies like this all the time: an explorer arrives on some island tribe, or some hidden jungle village, and there, in the midst of that little place, is one shrine to one deity with a name no one has ever heard outside of that one village or off that one island. How does that one deity in that one temple in that one out-of-the way place get to be the God of the Whole World? How do we get from specifics to universality?

Today, theologically, we get a lot of answers from the Christian side. There are more answers in the Qur’an, if you ask me. As other writers have shown, there are more answers in the Tao te Ching. And as Martin Palmer and others have shown, you can find answers in many parts of the East

The Hebrew text of Isaiah says that the “islands” and the “coastlands” (both rendered as “Gentiles” in the Greek) wait for the teachings of God’s servant, Israel.

The corners of the world await the revelation of the deepest meaning available to us: Epiphany, Theophany.

We can get lost in the specific theologies and myths that we have developed over centuries, but I think we miss the point. That one temple in that one corner of the world, that one Tribal deity is, somehow, the God of the whole world. In his light (no matter what name we use) we are to establish Justice, Salvation/Healing/Wholeness and Hope.

Much love,

Huw

Today’s assigned readings:
Isaiah 62:1-5,10-12, Revelation 19:11-16, Matthew 1:18-25

For Tziyon’s sake I will not be silent, for Yerushalayim’s sake I will not rest, until her vindication shines out brightly and her salvation like a blazing torch. The nations will see your vindication and all kings your glory. Then you will be called by a new name which ADONAI himself will pronounce. You will be a glorious crown in the hand of ADONAI, a royal diadem held by your God. You will no longer be spoken of as ‘Azuvah [Abandoned] or your land be spoken of as ‘Sh’mamah [Desolate]; rather, you will be called Heftzi-Vah [My-Delight-Is-In-Her] and your land Be’ulah [Married]. For ADONAI delights in you, and your land will be married as a young man marries a young woman, your sons will marry you; as a bridegroom rejoices over the bride, your God will rejoice over you.
Isaiah 62:1-5

I got a phone call one day at the desk in the bookstore of the Episcopal Church Center (back when I worked there - circa 1990). I used to get all such phone calls when the caller had no idea where to go. They would bounce callers around “you’ve reached the wrong desk, let me transfer you.” This could happen several times until the caller gave up or got angry. I usually tried to find the answer to the question instead of transfer the call. This gave me something to do: plus I had some 40,000 theological titles sitting in front of me. I should be able to answer most things.

One day we got a call from a man who was very upset about the daily office lectionary. It seems that one of the passages in Romans is cut out of the cycle. He accused the Church Center of harbouring homosexuals in the liturgy office. I calmly indicated that the lectionary had been developed over time in the mid70s - not the early 90s (as it then was) and that it was done by General Convention. If he needed to complain he should contact the deputies of his diocese and ask them to put forward a liturgy resolution at the next convention.

This didn’t satisfy him and he rang off. Logic never really helps someone who would rather be complaining, I know. But the point he wanted to make was that by leaving out a few verses here and there, the Lectionary created a bias in the readings that wasn’t there in the text.

For these verses, I switched translations to the CJB, for two reasons: 1) it includes both the Hebrew and English of the various titles of Israel; and 2) it has a more-direct translation from Hebrew in a couple of places. For a direct translation from the Masoretic text, you can see it here. It’s pretty close to the CJB.

This is important because today is the feast of the Holy Name of Jesus, about which we learn:

On January 1st, we celebrate the Circumcision of Christ. Since we are more squeamish than our ancestors, modern calendars often list it as the feast of the Holy Name of Jesus, but the other emphasis is the older. Every Jewish boy was circumcised (and formally named) on the eighth day of his life, and so, one week after Christmas, we celebrate the occasion when Our Lord first shed His blood for us. It is a fit close for a week of martyrs, and reminds us that to suffer for Christ is to suffer with Him.

Back when this was called the Feast of the Circumcision, as it is still called in the Orthodox Church, the Holy Name was celebrated on another day. Contra the idea that “we are more squeamish than our ancestors”, today’s feast among Anglicans is named following the Roman Catholic’s Vatican 2. The Romans changed the name because they didn’t want to seem too pharisaical. Is the important action of this day Circumcision, or the Giving of the Name?

Following hard on the idea that the Church’s calendar is an Ikon, all the early celebrations of Jesus life (from Christmas until Holy Week) take place according to the Hebrew Calendar. Jesus was Circumcised, Mary was Purified - as per the Jewish Law. We can edit that out, like so many v erse of scripture, however. To edit these feasts to the “Holy Name” and the “Presentation” literally edits the Holy Family right out of their Jewish context. Admittedly, 2000 years along, they are nearly entirely removed from that context anyway.

I love this passage of Isaiah! In fact, I love the entire chapter. It’s very beautiful. Truth be told the second part of our quote, verses 10-12, makes no sense without the part that was skipped over. If you read it as quoted, Verses 1-5, 10-12 it sounds like “Rejoice Jerusalem, you shall not be desolate any longer: you salvation is coming to you with his reward!” The passage says “Pester God until he saves us… lo, he saves us! In the first way you might focus on the Holy Name. In fact, the Hebrew word “yeshua”, meaning “salvation” or “health” or “wealth”, shows up twice in the passage. Its inclusion is sometimes complicated when some translations render “salvation” with an upper-case S as if it were a person. The pronouns “him” and “he” then seemingly refer to “Salvation” instead of to “God”.

But if you edit the passage, leaving out verses 6-9, then clearly the reading points to God’s Salvation… rather than to the pestering of God to send salvation. Like the caller in the story we discover the meaning is more in the reading rather than in the writing.

In his book, Born to Kvetch, author Michael Wex is discussing the Jewish Oral Tradition (Talmud, Mishna, etc) that provides meaning for the writen text of the Tanakh. Without the Jewish oral tradition to guide our understanding, we’re not reading the same Bible - at all - as the Jews. As Wex puts it, reading Hebrew Bible without the Oral Tradition will lead “to Jesus on the Cross just as easily as to me at my Bar Mitzvah.”

We see why in today’s reading from Isaiah: edit out a few verses and capitalise an English word and suddenly, its about Jesus; but we also see why in the reading from Matthew where one line from Isaiah is quoted out of context.

I think the passage in today’s reading sounds lovely as it is. It needn’t be edited so that it makes “Christian” sense, does it?

Much Love,

Huw

Today’s assigned readings:
AM: Isaiah 49:13-23, Matthew 18:1-14
PM: Isaiah 54:1-13, Mark 10:13-16

Enlarge the site of your tent, and let the curtains of your habitations be stretched out; do not hold back; lengthen your cords and strengthen your stakes. For you will spread out to the right and to the left, and your descendants will possess the nations and will settle the desolate towns. Do not fear, for you will not be ashamed; do not be discouraged, for you will not suffer disgrace; for you will forget the shame of your youth, and the disgrace of your widowhood you will remember no more. For your Maker is your husband, the Lord of hosts is his name; the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer, the God of the whole earth he is called.
Isaiah 54:2-5

The Feast of the Holy Innocents is one of those odd events that has no basis in history, only in Myth. There is no evidence outside of Matthew for any of the incidents in the Infancy Narratives. It might, at least, have been nice if one or two other Gospels had some of this info. This even is not important to our salvation: none of the little babies die “for us sinners and for our salvation”.

But if you’d like to see the extent to which some will go to insist on the historical veracity of these events, click here. Ultimately the pro argument runs “you can’t prove that it didn’t happen, so, Nyah!”

What strikes me is how Matthew sets Jesus up as Moses. First there is a Joseph the Dreamer. Then there is the slaughter of all the kids. Then there is the Exodus from Egypt into the promised land. Then Jesus goes up a mountain and Delivers the the Law - the chapters of Matthew that contain the Sermon on the Mount are really the delivery of the New Torah. The slaughter of the Holy Innocents is, textually, a parallel to the same even in Egypt. (Coincidentally, that passage is being read in Synagogues this week.)

This story needn’t be historical to be important. Even if it *is* historical, it is also mythological. It’s part of our icon of God as presented in the text, it’s grafted in here. What are we to make of a God who lets such actions happen - killing of innocent people so that his chosen may live? Or, rather than pin it on God, what does the need to tell such stories say about us?

Much love,

Huw

Today’s assigned readings:
Zechariah 4:1-14, Revelation 4:9-5:5, Matthew 25:1-13

The foolish said to the wise, “Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’ But the wise replied, “No! there will not be enough for you and for us; you had better go to the dealers and buy some for yourselves.’ And while they went to buy it, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went with him into the wedding banquet; and the door was shut.
Matthew 25:8-10

If I read correctly, the Jesus Seminar doesn’t think this an Authentic of Jesus. John Chrysostom turns this into a riff on the last judgement, which really makes sense - although he reads “Virgins” as men rather than women. Both are equally likely, of course, and he was a monk. I do find John’s reading far more edifying than where this normally goes. I heartily recommend it to you.

What I don’t find very edifying in this story (authentically Jesus or not) is that I would share my oil. What possible harm could there be, since the Bridegroom is coming over the hill, in pouring a tiny bit of my flask of oil in your lamp? Anyone who has worked with oil lamps knows that a surprisingly small amount of olive oil burns over a period of time. It’s very easy to add more. Since the guy is coming over the hill, what? do we need 15 minutes maybe 20 of oil?

Why do the “wise” ones not share?

Remember the first time you went to a Roman Catholic Mass or to an Episcopal Mass or an Eastern Orthodox Liturgy? Did you know what books to jumble or to which page to turn in the leaflet? I only know one parish that makes it very clear at every turn what’s next, where to turn, etc. Most places create a kind of confusion.

More than a year ago, when I was still Orthodox, I wrote two essays (here and here) on what I saw then as a lack of hospitality in Eastern Orthodoxy. It’s not an issue of the people - anyone who stays after a service for Coffee Hour at *any* of the Orthodox Churches I attended or visited knows full well about the hospitality of the people. But the liturgy is not very hospitable. It can be confusing and, considering the vast difference between styles in east and west, for someone used to even the structured piety of conservative Roman Catholicism, Orthodoxy is a bit overwhelming. (In the midst of prayers at my Chrismation service, my friend Steve, now an Episcopal Priest, turned to me and said, “Huw, is this Church?” So much was going on that he was a little confused. I said, “Yes”

But most people, coming into an Orthodox Church or other liturgical structure find the most common answer to their question to be a look that, while possibly providing an answer also says, “Shhhh! We’re praying here.”

After a while you get used to any liturgy, but to be certain it’s possible to get lost in *any* worship service. I’ve been lost and confused at a Reformed Synagogue as well as at a Conservative Shul. All it would have taken was for someone to tell me what page we start on… One of the things I did over and over as a pagan was to produce handouts. I did the same thing as an Master of Ceremony at Episcopal parishes.

So you show up at the right place at the right time and, by the time the thing starts, your running out of oil. The last thing you need is some uppity attitude from the pew sitter next to you. Most people in woshiping communities of whatever tradition act like the Wise Virgins. Sad really.

Like I said, Chrysostom takes this some place very different.

Much love,

Huw

Today’s assigned readings:
Zechariah 3:1-10, Revelation 4:1-8, Matthew 24:45-51

Around the throne, and on each side of the throne, are four living creatures, full of eyes in front and behind: the first living creature like a lion, the second living creature like an ox, the third living creature with a face like a human face, and the fourth living creature like a flying eagle. And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and inside. Day and night without ceasing they sing, “Holy, holy, holy, the Lord God the Almighty, who was and is and is to come.”
Revelation 4:6b-8

This book of Revelation has a dappled history. The Churches of the East do not accept it into their canon at all. The Orthodox Church calls it canonical, but does not read it liturgically at all during the year. In the west it suffers from the abuse of hyperliteralism, and futurist heresy. The Orthodox church adheres to a Preterist understanding. For example, in the Left Behind series is the idea of the “Thousand Year Reign” of Jesus on earth. The Church, in response to such claims taught that “the thousand year reign” was a prophetic sign of the Church, here, now, and added the line to the Creed, “Whose kingdom will have no end” in answer to the heretical claim of a 1,000 years. Most folks who claim a hyperliteral and futurist reading have no idea they are lapsing into one of the heresies condemned by the early Church - and by the Nicene Creed, itself!

Some doubt its origin and thus its place in the canon. Some - even among the Orthodox - think it’s possible this document is a Jewish apocalypse into which some small amount of of Christian symbolism was woven. For both communities the message would have been the same: urging Believers to stand firm in the face of persecution.

One reason is passages like this one…

Even though the book rarely-to-never gets read in the communion liturgy of east or west it has influenced both: especially the eastern one. If you’ve had the joy of attending an Eastern Orthodox liturgy (especially a Russian one) you would have seen, effectively, a Dramatic Presentation of portions of this book. Even the liturgical space is designed to reflect the scene around the throne. And these verses that I’ve cited, or the scene they describe, form the “Common Preface” for most every celebration of Eucharist, east or west. Interestingly enough they also describe the Morning Blessings offered before the Sh’ma in the Synagogue liturgy. (I can not find a translation of the full traditional liturgy online. Perhaps I’ll get it scanned in later if my OCR will work.)

Yes, I know this scene comes nearly whole cloth from Isaiah and Daniel. That’s ok. The point is the scene…

I’ve never participated in a community service for Morning Liturgy in the Jewish Tradition, but the music of Bloch’s Sacred Service has the same transformative effect: earth becomes heaven.

One of the first times I saw this in an Eastern context was when the then-Metropolitan of the Orthodox Church in America, Theodosius, visited the Cathedral in San Francisco. The area around the altar was filled with bishops, priests, arch-deacons, protodeacons, deacons and subdeacons all in addition to the Metropolitan. At the singing of “holy holy holy” the song burst from behind icons as if heaven itself were coming down. But the screen and the clergy-only (and men-only) crowd comes as mighty exclusionary once one has been used to other ways of praying.

In a western context, several parishes come to mind where the congregation is drawn up around the altar (= the Throne of God) for the prayer of consecration, singing “Holy Holy Holy”. St Gregory of Nyssa does it as a matter of course at each service, and I’ve experienced it in other places, but..

Once upon a time, right after he came out, Bishop Otis Charles (if memory serves) was the celebrant and preacher at a service in Manhattan at St Luke in the Fields parish. And Bp Otis invited us all up around the altar - not the normal tradition of that parish. We gathered around him and crowed the altar. We raised our hands in the ancient attitude of prayer and sang our hearts out. It was revolutionary for me, to experience church like that (it was a while before I moved to SF and longer before I joined St Gregory of Nyssa parish). This was a scandal to the generally high-church folks in NYC and a bit of a shock for the staid folks at St Lukes. Such things are ok for the kids at Summer Camp, but really!

Thing is: it’s like participating in heaven, itself. It’s like riding on the clouds at the Second Coming. It’s what the Eucharist is all about: Earth being struck by Heaven.

So it intrigues me when someone would stand outside of the tradition - no only of Liturgical Christians but also of Jews - and just wanna worship from Earth without ever venturing to heaven. Or else wants to confine this liturgical drama to a literal future instead of making it the eternal present.

Much love,

Huw