The Non-Religious Jesus

The Non-Religious Jesus--November 9, 2017

Now when the Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around him, they noticed that some of his disciples were eating with defiled hands, that is, without washing them. (For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they thoroughly wash their hands, thus observing the tradition of the elders; and they do not eat anything from the market unless they wash it; and there are also many other traditions that they observe, the washing of cups, pots, and bronze kettles.) So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, "Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?” He said to them, "Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written, ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts as doctrines.’ You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition.” Then he said to them, “You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition! For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and ‘Whoever speaks evil of father or mother must surely die.’ But you say that if anyone tells father or mother, ‘Whatever support you might have had from me is Corban (that is, an offering to God)—then you no longer permit doing anything for a father or mother, thus making void the word of God through your tradition that you have handed on. And you do many things like this.” [Mark 7:1-13]

It turns out that it is quite possible to be very much on the same wavelength as Jesus... and not be very "religious-looking" at all.

Take Jesus, for one.

This is one of those scenes where Jesus easily--easily!--could have blown off a small skirmish with the religious so-and-sos and then walked away.  He could have traded a couple of quips and then walked on without pulling at the thread they have left in front of him dangling there.  He could have kept things polite and respectable, and then not gotten into anything more involved. He could have, in a word, left their comfortable religious systems and greedy self-interested schemes untouched, and he wouldn't have upset them.

But this is Jesus we are talking about.  And Jesus has a way of cutting through the smokescreens we put up, and getting right to the heart of things, even when we wish he would just look the other way.

What starts out here as a discussion about the practice of ritual handwashing (Jesus is not pro-germ, and the religoius so-and-sos are not experts in antibacterial hygiene--this is about doing things they think God wants them to do) quickly escalates into a much bigger discussion.  And it happens by Jesus' choosing.  That is to say, Jesus instigates.  He pushes.  He provokes.  Make no mistake about the one we call the Prince of Peace, the one we all have decided must have been "meek and mild" because it rhymes with "little child" in all the Christmas carols, this same Jesus had a habit of intentionally stirring the pot with the people in power and comfort, when it came to waking them up to see their own hypocrisy. 

And so here's how Jesus breaks all the rules in this little encounter.  It starts when the religious so-and-sos ask him why he doesn't insist on his disciples following the "acceptable practice of religious people" in that era, of having ritual washing of their hands (as well as kitchen utensils and such) before they ate.  And again, this could have been a little thing. Jesus could have even just told his disciples, "You know, even though the Pharisees don't know about germs and bacteria and such yet, it's not a bad idea to wash your hands before eating, so how about you guys just do this from now on?  It's just a little gesture.  It'll show people that we arren't trying to rock the boat or upset people.  It will show your piety and devotion... so come on, let's all just start doing the ritual washing thing, okay?"  Or Jesus could have just said to the Pharisees, "We are going to have to agree to disagree here," and then just left the whole scene alone.  

But he doesn't. Jesus enters--the mess.  

In fact, Jesus actually kind of makes the mess by pulling at the loose thread that the Pharisees don't want to see is hanging there.  And he opens up the discussion into something much, much bigger.  The Respectable Religious Crowd not only makes a big fuss over ritual handwashing, but Jesus says, they have missed the point about what really matters to God, and what things don't matter to God.  In fact, Jesus comes across as surprisingly non-religous.  He is a lot less interested making sure people dedicate "stuff" to God, and a lot more interested in making sure people are taking care of those who depend on them... and as you might imagine, that upsets the Respectable Religious Crowd.

Instead of just leaving this as a discussion about whether you had to, or didn't have to, practice ritual handwashing to preserve the holiness and purity that God supposedly cared about, Jesus makes this a "While we're on the subject..." kind of moment.  And he delves into a bigger mess that everybody else had just agreed to ignore.  The short version was something like this: the Law of Moses commanded that you not only honor your parents, but provide for them in their need, which meant that children were simply expected to provide for their parents in their golden years (not quite Social Security, but sort of a family-based parallel). But there was a convenient loophole.

Apparently you could declare your own personal nest-egg as “devoted to God”—or in Hebrew, “Corban,” and swear an oath that your life-savings was to be given to the temple… eventually.  But in the mean time, you could continue to draw on your nest-egg and spend it on yourself, but not have to pay for mom and dad’s medicine and doctors’ visits, because all the money you would have been expected to spend on their care had been “devoted” to God.  Sort of a religious 401(k): you tell dear old mom and dad that you can't touch the money you've set aside, but in the mean time, you can work out a system to still keep it for yourself. And you can justifiy it to your parents (and to let yourself sleep at night) by saying, "I'm being religious--I'm dedicating all this wealth... to God." Almost makes you feel dirty and blasphemous just reading that scheme, doesn’t it? 

Jesus saw this practice going on in his culture around him and saw it as a prime example of putting human traditions over God’s commandment, and pretending that God was pleased with the whole thing.  Funny and tragic, isn’t it, the things we will do in the name of being devoted to something.

Now here's the thing that gets me, that genuinely takes my breath away about Jesus.  Jesus isn't the one saying, "We need to give more of our stuff to God." Jesus is actually telling people the opposite!  Jesus has taken the position that what God really cares about not propping up religion or donating more to help God out, because, as Jesus would remind us, God doesn't need our money to stay alive, and God doesn't need our donations to keep the universe going.  God doesn't need feeding, tending, protecting, or defending, it turns out.  God will be just fine, it turns out, whether or not there are contributions in the offering plate, checks in the mail, or enough household goods marked as "Corban." And as far as Jesus is concerned, the thing God really cares about is that we take care of the people around us--particularly our elders, in this case--who need someone to provide for their needs and their health as they get into older age.  

Well, unsurprisingly, that riled up the Respectable Religious Crowd.  Not just because Jesus was basically picking a fight with them and making a mess of their tidy little system that justified leaving the elderly on their own while they padded their own accounts, but also because it meant that Jesus wasn't auotmatically endorsing "religion" or "religious practices."  The Pharisees who did this "Corban" thing really thought that they were pleasing God by dedicating their belongings to God.  This was a ritual show of devotion!  This was giving to God!  And Jesus just basically says, "God didn't really need any of these gifts--how about you spend it honoring your parents and taking care of the old couple who lives down the road from you and is struggling on a fixed income?"  Jesus doesn't, in other words, look to shore up the systems and structures of "religion."  Instead he is convinced the living God is a lot more interested in actually helping and caring for other people.

Jesus could have left that all alone, but instead, because he cares about the people who are going hungry or going without, Jesus makes a bigger mess of the scene by bringing up the whole Corban thing.  And let's be clear about that motivation, then: Jesus isn't just being a jerk on Facebook, like the angry uncle everyone has who doesn't realize how bitter and selfish he comes off when he goes on his rants.  Jesus is picking a fight for the sake of those who are being forgotten--in the name of religion.  Jesus is speaking up because there are members of the Respectable Religious Crowd who think God smiles on their system that leaves others out in the cold while they pile up money that they label "set aside for religious purposes."  That is what makes it worth it here for Jesus to risk making enemies and making a mess.  That is what pushes Jesus beyond pious-looking politeness.

This is an important moment for us to consider, too, here all these centuries later.  There is a persistent danger that we, too, will become so infatuated with "religion" that we think religion an end in and of itself.  We end up thinking that "protecting" (and propping up) religion itself is a worthy cause, or that God needs our special protections, donations, or defense in order to still be God.  And we end up ignoring the faces of people we are charged with caring for--our mothers and fathers, our grandparents, our neighbors, and the Biblical trio of "widows, orphans, and resident aliens"--in the name of "defending religion."  We must protect "religion," the televangelists and the demagogues say.  We must preserve and shore up "religion," because then we will be showing God how faithful and holy and pure we are, and then we will have blessings showered upon us.  (And meanwhile, we won't have to give more of our resources to our elders in nursing homes or the eighty-year-old neighbor who doesn't have heat--that's just extravagant and wasteful social policy...).

I wonder, in all seriousness, what Jesus would say if he looked around at our churches.  I wonder what he thinks is worth us spending money on there, too.  I wonder if Jesus would be all that interested in the need to save up money for fancier robes (or robes at all), or for flashier signs, or for video screens and pipe organs.  I wonder how much Jesus cares about "defending religion," and instead how much Jesus would rather we practice our faith, which is to say, to "do justice" and "love mercy" and to "walk humbly with God."  I am sure--absoultely sure, because you can see it in the gospels here and throughout--that the Respectable Religious Crowd was threatened by what they heard from Jesus, and that they denounced him as someone attacking the cherished traditions and the central role of "religion" in their society.  And maybe you can decide for yourself if they were right. I think they at least have a point: Jesus consistently showed he wasn't interested in propping up privileging, or preserving "religion," whatever that meant.  And instead, Jesus was willing to make a big P.R. mess for himself by opening up a much bigger, more controversial debate, because he cared about the people who were being forgotten or pushed to the side in the name of "defending religion."

Interestingly enough, nowhere in the Bible does any prophet, apostle or divine voice call for "better protections and preservation of religion." Instead, the voice of Mercy calls us, because of and out of our "religious" faith, to care for others as our way of loving God.  Like the old line attributed to Martin Luther puts it, "God doesn't need your good works, but your neighbor does."

May we have the courage and compassion to make the kinds of messes Jesus does...

Lord God, we devote ourselves to you--and because of who you are and what you care out, we devote ourselves to the care of the people you love... everybody.