Jesus and the Terrible Twos: Questions of Identity
“Joseph, come upstairs, quick – he’s doing it right now…” Mary called down to her husband in the basement as another round of hammer-pounding subsided.
“Honey, I’m kind of - into it…”
“Joe, you can work on that old sailboat anytime. Come up here – please. He’s doing it again.”
Joseph trudged upstairs with a sigh and quietly followed Mary into the living room. What is it this time, he pondered in his heart. The toddler Jesus was sitting slouched in a corner of the living room, pouting.
“I told you, young man…” Mary admonished him, “Put your toys away at once and come to bed. Who do you think you are?”
Jesus raised his head and gave a quick wink along with the thumbs-up sign.
“I told you.” Mary folded her arms and scowled at Joseph indignantly.
“And I told you,” said Joseph. “All I ever taught him was that sports handshake.”
Divinity and Humanity
In my experience of Christianity growing up, Jesus’ divinity was emphasized far more than his humanity. This was true even though Christianity teaches that Jesus was fully human as well as fully God.
My impression is that this emphasis is both widespread and rooted in the New Testament. The NT doesn’t have a word of description about Jesus’ physical appearance. (The familiar bearded figure is an artistic tradition.) There’s no indication that he has sex or sexual feelings. Jesus foresees everything that will happen to him, makes no mistakes, performs miracles, and there are no more than hints of personal struggle. In my experience, these are often minimized or explained away.
How do you view Jesus’ humanity and reconcile it with the idea of his unity with God?
What does it mean to be “close to God” or “enlightened?” How does it show? In an ability to perform miracles? By being perfect – no more bad days, no more missteps, no more misguided thoughts or feelings? Is enlightenment or nearness to God a goal that can be achieved once and for all? If not, what is it?
What’s your view of our relationship to the One in whom we live and move and have our being - and to which we quickly return after our brief lives - whether you conceive of the One as a Creator or as the universe or being itself?
Reference – Original Faith: Chapter Eight, Working from World-Center; Chapter Nine, Owning the Greater Claim.
“Honey, I’m kind of - into it…”
“Joe, you can work on that old sailboat anytime. Come up here – please. He’s doing it again.”
Joseph trudged upstairs with a sigh and quietly followed Mary into the living room. What is it this time, he pondered in his heart. The toddler Jesus was sitting slouched in a corner of the living room, pouting.
“I told you, young man…” Mary admonished him, “Put your toys away at once and come to bed. Who do you think you are?”
Jesus raised his head and gave a quick wink along with the thumbs-up sign.
“I told you.” Mary folded her arms and scowled at Joseph indignantly.
“And I told you,” said Joseph. “All I ever taught him was that sports handshake.”
Divinity and Humanity
In my experience of Christianity growing up, Jesus’ divinity was emphasized far more than his humanity. This was true even though Christianity teaches that Jesus was fully human as well as fully God.
My impression is that this emphasis is both widespread and rooted in the New Testament. The NT doesn’t have a word of description about Jesus’ physical appearance. (The familiar bearded figure is an artistic tradition.) There’s no indication that he has sex or sexual feelings. Jesus foresees everything that will happen to him, makes no mistakes, performs miracles, and there are no more than hints of personal struggle. In my experience, these are often minimized or explained away.
How do you view Jesus’ humanity and reconcile it with the idea of his unity with God?
What does it mean to be “close to God” or “enlightened?” How does it show? In an ability to perform miracles? By being perfect – no more bad days, no more missteps, no more misguided thoughts or feelings? Is enlightenment or nearness to God a goal that can be achieved once and for all? If not, what is it?
What’s your view of our relationship to the One in whom we live and move and have our being - and to which we quickly return after our brief lives - whether you conceive of the One as a Creator or as the universe or being itself?
Reference – Original Faith: Chapter Eight, Working from World-Center; Chapter Nine, Owning the Greater Claim.
Posted by Paul at 1:00 PM Permalink
18 Comments:
As historical texts and documentation become more widely available, people are more inclined to ask this question, just as you have posed it.
It really puts a different spin on WWJD, when you stop to think -- what would we do if we were Jesus? Instead of the typical proselytized version of, "be like Jesus as he is portrayed in the Bible and from the pulpit."
I can't tell you why I'm here, or what the Universe is or why it exists or what, exactly, is my relationship to it other than what I see and hear and think and feel based on what I've been exposed to. It doesn't bother me to be in this state of "I don't know for sure." Rather, it's exciting to think that there's so much I don't yet understand. I could recite scientific data, quote established religious beliefs, spout rhetoric about faith but if you're looking for proof, Im not the one to ask.
SCOTT H: That’s a great Bible-based way of putting it, and to me, that’s what spiritual development is about: moving in that direction of full integrity, with its positive consequences for how we act in the world. And however difficult it can be, progress in the direction of perfection is possible. It’s even possible to personally experience that one’s “burden is light.” We can come to experience even a great burden without losing a sense of its lightness.
PAULINE: Personally, I'd tend to think that anyone who claims to know for sure is kidding themselves. And like you, I don’t do metaphysics or look for proofs. To me, the central thread of spirituality is continuing to grow even though you’re an adult. That means experiencing life first-hand and being willing to look honesty at those experiences.
Going by what I see on the blogs, a lot of people have bad experiences with religion growing up. (Of course, many others have positive experiences.) If one does have a negative experience, my impression is that it can be hard to hear religious/spiritual words and phrases without bringing those associations to them, which are often associations of hypocrisy, self righteousness, close-mindedness, dogmatism, and a holier-than-thou/us-against-the world mentality. Again, I’d want to emphasize that I’m equally aware of people who grew up in faith traditions that don’t “inspire” such reactions…
Thanks for visiting my blog.
But Grace has allowed me to not abandon my faith. And through experiencing some miracles too.
But I am as human as they come, meaning, I falter much along the way and need constant reminders.
Sometimes I wish I was born during Jesus' time. That way, I can experience first hand his presence and be able to ask him lots of things. A second Mary Magdalene? Or Martha perhaps..
I think this would be a travesty, and could lead toward societal disintegration, wherein people leave the concepts of connectivity with the higher power in the dust.
There are places in the NT where he gets surprised, where he changes his mind, where he flips his wig, where he weeps.
Before I became a christian, I thought of Jesus as 99% divine and sort of without emotion, but since then I've seen him much more as human .... about 100% of both human and divine. I've read that the gospel of Luke shows him as more human, and the gospel of John as more divine.
What does it mean to be “close to God” or “enlightened?” How does it show? In an ability to perform miracles? By being perfect – no more bad days, no more missteps, no more misguided thoughts or feelings? Is enlightenment or nearness to God a goal that can be achieved once and for all? If not, what is it?
I used to think that if I ever was enlightened or if I ever had a relationship with God, I'd change and be a totally good and wise person. But when I took that retreat I mentioned before, and it seemed like I did have a relationship with God, I was really upset to see I was the same and that I'd always be the same old not-good person.
The spiritual director I had said this was ok, that when we see ourselves as we are and that God loves us this way, and that we don't have to be transofrmed to be loved, well, it's kind of liberating. Still, I do keep wanting to get transformed :)
MISTI: Maybe the first place I’d head if I had a time machine...
Without going into grace as a theological concept, it does seem to me that many good things – in my personal experience, the best – simply came my way without me having done anything to choose or decide that they would occur.
TIMJAMZ: Can you elaborate? I’m not clear as to what brings the preceding comments together for you as pointing to a danger or just how the danger would operate.
CRYSTAL: The places that you have in mind in the NT sound like those that I had in mind in referring to hints of his humanity. Yet it seems to me that the context of the overall narrative tends to make what might otherwise be more than hints not more. For example, though he weeps in the garden and speaks of feeling abandoned on the cross, he’s already predicted that he’s going to be betrayed, sacrificed and resurrected.
I view people as occupying a middle ground – not becoming totally good and wise but also not completely lacking the ability to change for the better. At least that’s been my experience of myself.
As to my experience of others, I haven’t met anyone that I could describe as totally good and wise; I’ve known some who changed for the better with time; and I’ve known a few who have gone downhill, for example, an individual who I’m about certain has been clinically depressed for decades and doesn’t get help.
VISHESH: It’s clear that the figure of Jesus as presented in the NT shows enough variety for something along those lines to have actually happened: that is, Christians understand him and what he stood for in sometimes remarkably different ways along the progressive-conservative spectrum even though they’re all reading the same scripture.
BAD ALICE: I find that passage intriguing too – the only material about Jesus’ life between his infancy and full adulthood. Not so typical though, to wander away from your parents and awe your elders in the temple!
That strikes me as an important point – that the narrative is clearly shaped to focus on and deliver the authors’ central messages. I’d have to guess, like you, that given Jesus’ humanity, he must have made mistakes and experienced some genuine struggles along the way that aren’t included in scripture.
Those two sound intimately related to me – that if God transforms your heart or even just expands it a bit, it will affect your behavior.
Sounds like you assume I predicate a lot of things on paranormal beliefs. What are you, a mind-reader?
Perhaps Jesus was simply a visible light spectrum, or a melody that the universe played that caught our attention not because he was divine, but because he was OF THE EARTH. Had divinity ruled I really don't know why he had such a need to mix it up in the temple etc. and get into brawls in "dads" defense.
I suppose maybe that would be the result of thinking you are different, the chosen, the only. I don't see that he was....he just had great press people that used him after he was dead.
Clearly, even though my unfaith may have trembled, I've not come any place close to feeling like the above could get me slapped, much less damned! Except, alas, by the "righteous." They are dangerous in every religion.
Hey you wrote a book! Wow! In related news, I'm buying a book after typing this.
Thanks for talking about Jesus and making jokes at the same time! Awesome! :)Shannon
The overturning of the moneychangers’ table passage is often cited as an example of his human aspect. And yet his anger appears altogether justified - a kind of divine wrath.
I see your point here, though – why would there have been a need for him to feel that the Father needed defending?
True – the only source material we have on him is what others wrote about him decades after his death.
I know exactly what you mean. I don’t recall a time when I’ve read a blogger or commentator include him or herself among "the righteous” when it didn’t give more of an impression of self righteousness...
SHANNON: I really appreciate your comment. Personally, I have no problem at all with religious humor but some do, so I guess it’s always kind of a risk…
Thanks! If you get a chance, please email me and let me know what you thought.
Unbelief is sometimes an unexamined belief system.
For some people, first-hand experience counts more than belief systems for purposes of living meaningfully.
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