Does redeeming the violence of God in the text take precedence over all other interpretive proclamation?
Old Testament Reading: Isaiah 35:1-10
For Sunday, Dec. 12, 2010: Year A - Advent 3
It has been about five years since I first felt the warm embrace of the Order of Girard, primarily in the arms of James Alison. I found freedom, nay, straight-out freakin’ joy in their insistence on God utterly without violence.
What I Don’t Want for Christmas
So, as I take up round three of my Advent Isaiah, in the midst of this beautiful poetry of hope, reconciliation and straight-out freakin’ joy, there are some snaggy, snarls that catch me up.
Say to those with a fearful heart, “Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God. He will come with vengeance, with terrible recompense. He will come and save you.”
I want to say to those with a fearful heart: “Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God.” I have a fearful heart; I really need to hear that, along with the proclamation of the Second Advent that there is a way through the wilderness. That the desert is flowing, blooming, prancing, with a wide straight road, on which no traveler, not even a fool could go astray. But that second part, about being saved by the vengeance and terrible recompense − that I don’t want for Christmas.
The Nice Bits
I know that in the original interpretive community I would not be included as a traveler on this Holy Way; I would be included among the unclean, not among God’s people. I can find a way onto this road only in light of the First Advent, through which terms are redefined and the circle of the redeemed and ransomed of the Lord is radically widened.
I have used the word “I” so many times in this post that it makes “I” uncomfortable. Does it seem like I am saying, I only want to take the nice bits and leave out the judg-y ones? It is not the judgment; it is the violence and exclusion attributed to God that I find it hard to pass over. Am I making too much of it? During the Advent/Christmas season, should I preach the hope for now? I cannot help thinking that Emanuel, God with us, would be the first among the unclean outsiders.
The Hardest Question
Does redeeming the violence of God in the text take precedence over all other interpretive proclamation?
Russell Rathbun is a preacher at House of Mercy in St. Paul, Minnesota, the author of Midrash on the Juanitos (Cathedral Hill Press, 2010) and the curator of The Hardest Question.
