Monthly Archives: September 2023

Arts, Bible, Christianity, Culture, History

We’ll always need a conquering hero

OLD TESTAMENT

– A narrative on 1 Chronicles 11,12

BY COMPARING the way people in different ages use the same word, we can trace changes in culture. In 1000 BC, heroes are brave warriors who risk their lives to secure David’s kingship. Less than 300 years later, the same society’s heroes were those who could hold their drink (Isaiah 5:22).

The twentieth century saw the same process compressed into less time when wartime heroes such as the RAF airman and physically legless Douglas Bader gave way to sports and screen anti-heroes who became emotionally legless devotees of wine, women, and narcotics.

In our more passive and indulgent age, we may have difficulty in identifying with the battle heroes of Chronicles. Today’s role models may be the unsung heroes of the emergency services, or an intrepid conservationist.

To appreciate Chronicles in the Old Testament we must enter the mindset of a different era. David was the Lord’s anointed, and he (and the Lord) were worth dying for. These are the heroes who inspired Jewish readers in different walks of life. They lifted spirits and gave vision. The author may want to show that people from all the Israelite tribes were loyal to David and prepared to die for him. This would have been important in later years as people looked back over the tragic story of the divided kingdom. In fact, he plays down the role of Judah and Benjamin, which later formed the nation of Judah and took on the story of God’s people.

David’s apparently disdainful waste of the water brought to him at great risk by ‘The Three’ was actually an act of worship and thanksgiving. (Water was poured out ‘before the Lord’ in several rituals). David, at this stage, was giving God all the glory and regarded anything done for himself as an act of service to the God who had chosen him.

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Arts, Bible, Christianity, Culture, History

Hope is a long-term investment now

Jerusalem, spring 587 BC

(2 Kings 25:1–3; Jeremiah 32; 33; 37:17–21; 39:15–18; 52:4–6)

THERE is something surreal about this ‘siege’ which has started again. The Babylonian camp, marked by fluttering flags and the smoke for ever rising from the mess tents, can be seen clearly from the walls of Jerusalem.

Against those walls the invader’s engineers are building huge ramps of rock and earth. Up them soldiers will climb, manoeuvring their huge battering-rams shielded by canopies from the hail of rocks and arrows which will be launched from the ramparts by desperate defenders. The scene is predictable, a re-run of countless others which have been played out against different scenery.

And yet the city is not so much besieged as blockaded. From tall wooden watchtowers around it, Babylonian guards warn off any daring traders who would try to make megabucks by selling fresh food. Nothing is allowed in, and food supplies are running low. Starvation is Nebuchadnezzar’s strongest weapon; weak people cannot fight, however well-fortified is their city.

But individuals can come and go, none the less. No doubt they manage to smuggle past the guards a few precious loaves or fresh vegetables from the country villages, although many outlying settlements have also been devastated by the invaders, much as if a swarm of locusts had swept across the region. In that sense, life goes on as normal.

One man who has made use of it is Jeremiah, the pro-Babylonian prophetic adviser to King Zedekiah. Although under permanent house arrest in the barrack area, he is allowed to have visitors. One has been his cousin Hanamel from the village of Anathoth, and the two have just completed a deal to transfer the deeds of family land to Jeremiah in accordance with Judah’s strict inheritance laws.

The prophet is jubilant. This, he claims, is a sign from Yahweh that one day, in this place, fields will once again be bought and sold, and the fortunes of the people will be revived. On that day God will raise up a righteous leader from the royal line of David.

But for those whose hopes of another reprieve from suffering are rising, he adds, ‘But not yet. The city will be destroyed first.’ Prophetic hope is clearly a long-term investment with no short-term interest payments.

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Arts, Bible, Christianity, Culture, History

Wine, wisdom, and sanity flow from teacher’s common touch

Capernaum, c. AD 29

(Luke 4:31–41; John 2:1–11)

HE SPEAKS the people’s language. He addresses the people’s needs. He even heals them when they’re ill. And the people of Capernaum and surrounding villages nestling near the Sea of Galilee love him.

‘He’s got real authority and power,’ said one local. ‘The regular teachers haven’t.’

The self-effacing Jesus of Nazareth, first hit the local headlines at a family wedding in Cana when the wine ran out during the extended festivities. Without a touch of the histrionics associated with quack magicians, he just filled up – of all things – the foot-washing jars with water from the well.

He then got the head waiter to take a cupful of the liquid to the best man, which must have been a miracle of persuasion in itself. But the biggest miracle was that the contaminated water had become a superb vintage wine. ‘It was a sign of what Jesus is all about,’ said John Zebedee, one of his associates. ‘He brings new life into bad situations.’

Further evidence of that was provided a few days later with two notable healings in Capernaum, the chief town of this densely populated region which Jesus appears to be making his base. The first was in the synagogue, when a demented man suddenly shouted at Jesus, ‘You’re the Holy One of God! Have you come here to torture us?’

With an authoritative word, Jesus commanded the spirit which controlled the man to leave him. He fell heavily to the ground, but was uninjured and, more remarkably, was suddenly sane.

The second incident was at the home of Simon Peter whose mother-in-law was seriously ill with a fever. When Jesus healed her, her recovery was so sudden that she cooked for the visitors afterwards.

– Ruins of the first-century synagogue in Capernaum in which Jesus would have taught.
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