Just in case you are not yet fully wondering how we can say ‘Thanks be to God’ for these violent readings – albeit the fall of the walls of Jericho is a popular children’s song! let me tell you that the next verse of our Joshua reading goes on to tell us that the Israelites went into the city and slaughtered everyone, man, woman and child, except that is for the prostitute Rahab and her family, Rahab who had betrayed her people to help them! Here is Scripture sited by the likes of Dawkins, Hitchens and *Pinker to then knock down the apparently straw man of faith. They use such texts to present religion as dangerous, to be resisted and dismissed.
We cannot deny these passages are there, indeed, they have been chosen for us by those who compile the lectionary! So what are we to make of the violence that there is in the Bible. It is human nature to want to know our origins. Researching family history is one of the fastest growing hobbies today! Our personal stories and our national stories tell us who we are. Perhaps one might add for good or ill, for there are some stories we would be better leaving behind. They perpetuate the viscious circle of revenge and counter revenge. The people of Israel emerged as a united tribal federation, farmers in the hills above the Jordan valley about 1200 years before Christ. Gradually their oral traditions became solidified and written down. The story of how they were ‘called out’ to begin a new life, and gifted by their God with the Promised Land.
The story of their Covenant with Yahweh who blesses them and will continue to bless and guide them despite their breach of the Covenant. The Book of Joshua, Israel’s military leader following the death of Moses, describes how this Promised Land came to be their possession. Having wandered through the desert they crossed the river Jordan from the east, and took the cities, razing them to the ground and destroying their inhabitants. At least this is the story. You may be glad to hear that there is little or no archaeological evidence to support this historical account of the felling of the walls of Jericho! Nevertheless, before we breathe a sigh of relief we need to remember this was a very violent age. The people of Israel did indeed violently displace the Canaanites before them. We are speaking of history 3000 more years ago, this is simply how it was. The history recorded in the Bible is violent because life was violent. But it is not the end of the story, far from it. What we need to be looking for in any text is its movement. And the biblical record is inexorably moving towards not only the beautiful cadences of deutero-Isaiah, known to us all in Handel’s Messiah, but to Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. A sermon which has been the inspiration of many amazing peace-makers down the centuries.
Jesus’ sermon commands us famously and sternly to love our enemies, to do good for those who harm us. How does this fit in with his ringing denunciation in tonight’s gospel: ‘Woe to you, Beth-sa’ida! Caper’na-um! for if the mighty works done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. I tell you it shall be more tolerable on the day of judgement for the land of Sodom than for you.” Once again we cannot understand this text without knowing its context and background. Although used with this meaning in the New Testament epistles, contrary to this understanding and the language of contemporary culture, in Hebrew literature, the sin of Sodom is not sodomy! The sins of Sodom and Gomorrah are those of oppression of the poor and weak, the sins of social injustice. In rabbinic tradition the people of Sodom practiced extreme cruelty and lacked compassion.
Sodom in the far south, is held up repeatedly by the prophets as an example of exploitation of the peoples, and God’s wrath at such practice. It is thought the remains of the city may lie under the Dead Sea, and the story of their wickedness may have been told to explain their ancient devastation as a result of geological forces.
Jesus has taught and healed, fed the multitude, yet little has changed in society around him. His anger is prompted by his deep distress at what he sees of how his people relate to one another, the manner of their life together. The religious leaders are not challenging God’s Law, they are not speaking against abuse of power, rather they enjoy all the benefits of elevated status under Roman occupancy of Judea and Galilee.
This is not the faith of Israel which rather speaks truth to power, challenging the ancient domination system of early agrarian empires, city states where urban ruling elites exploited the labour of rural peasants, and now further refined by the Roman empire. The prophecy of Isaiah opens with this challenge to the people of Sodom: ‘What to me is the multitude of your sacrifices? Seek justice, correct oppression, defend the fatherless, plead for the widow.’ Followed by the famous words so often used by Christians, but which are first addressed to Sodom: ‘Come, let us reason together,
though your sins are as scarlet they shall be white as snow.’ (Isaiah 1.10, 11, 17, 18)
Jesus speaks out of compassion, deep compassion. The Greek word translated ‘Woe’ is more akin to ‘Alas’. Jesus is not threatening them, he is warning the Jewish leaders out of anger and grief for what he sees is coming. At the same time he speaks gently to those who live under the boot of the oppressor. They do not have the advantages of the elite religious hierarchy, but it is to them, babes, that God has revealed his truth. In the words used week by week in the liturgy of the BCP Eucharist,
Jesus calls all who labour and are heavy-laden, to come to him, in him they shall find rest. For it is God’s intention that our yoke should be easy and our burden light! The first Christian community in Jerusalem was a shining beacon of the joy of shared life, support of the weak by the strong, such that no one should go in want. And highly attractive their life together was! Many hundreds were drawn to such a community and wished to join. If Dawkins and Pinker had done their homework properly,
they would have seen that Jesus was very much a man after their own hearts, a man who sought above all else, the good of the people. Violence is at times a necessary fact of life to defend justice. Domination of any group by another, of any individual by another, is contrary to God’s will. God who calls us out to live differently. Amen.
Stephen Pinker ‘The Better Angels of our Nature’ 2011