“[He] was a showman who introduced drama and excitement into his sermons by pounding the pulpit, standing on a chair, doing handsprings, and jumping on top of the pulpit. He preached what one observed called a ‘muscular Christianity.’ Jesus, ‘was no dough-faced, lick-spittle proposition,’ he declared. ‘Jesus was the greatest scrapper that ever lived.’ The lesson to be drawn was clear: ‘Let me tell you, the manliest man is the man who will acknowledge Jesus Christ.’”

The answer might surprise you.

“During the 1890s, Menelik heard about the modern method of executing criminals using electric chairs, and he ordered 3 for his kingdom. When the chairs arrived, Menelik learnt they would not work, as Ethiopia did not yet have an electrical power industry. Rather than waste his investment, Menelik used one of the chairs as his throne.”

“The citizens of a certain town had once an officer in their service who had freed them from foreign aggression; daily they took counsel how to recompense him, and concluded that no reward in their power was great enough, not even if they made him lord of the city. At last one of them rose and said, ‘Let us kill him and then worship him as our patron saint.’

And so they did.”

Irenaeus, one of the earliest church fathers whose work we still possess, wrote five volumes seeking to define orthodoxy over against gnosticism. The early creeds were not meant as documents whose purpose was “inclusivity,” as many groups today tend to use them, but to exclusively declare the bounds of Christendom over against false forms of belief. We can trace systematization of theology at least to saints like John of Damascus; go read his Exposition of the Orthodox Faith and tell me it isn’t essentially a systematic theology (albeit one which is careful to define the bounds of mystery, which I appreciate); this isn’t even beginning to touch of western thinkers like Anselm, Lombard and Aquinas who were all to a lesser or greater extent systematicians. Indeed, this is common knowledge in university-level biblical studies departments; attacks on ancients seeking to define “what the bible teaches” over against “what it doesn’t” as authoritarian and divisive are at the heart of secular writers’ criticisms of the early church (i.e. Elaine Pagels).

The whole history of Christianity is essentially one of loose confessionalism. It is true that many of these confessions were more carefully defined in the late 16th century in the west, but this is more a reaction to the fact that there were three competing “orthodoxies” (Catholic, Lutheran, Reformed) than that there was some new tendency introduced into the church. In fact, the true product of Enlightenment rationalism in modern theology is a suspicion of this method grounded in the strain of Descartes, Hume and Kant. It is anti-dogmatism and a theological trend toward uncertainty which is the product of this era.

This being said, I realize that history is complicated and am myself sympathetic with some of the critiques Enlightenment skepticism offered to an overly certain dogmatism. I just want to name it for what it is. If people are going to dismiss a theological tradition for simply being the product of “Enlightenment rationalism,” they should make sure they’re not really dismissing their own system. Abuse of history to dismiss your opponents is just the sort of intellectual power play post-modernism is supposed to warn us against. Let’s heed it’s warnings well.

-Isaiah 6:5

Persecution. Crusades. Empire-building. Messy political entanglements. The inquisition. Witch hunts. Burnings at the stake. Slavery. Terrorism. Discrimination. Homophobia. Sexism. Prosperity teaching. Corruption. Adultery.

To too many people, this seems to be the legacy of the Christian church. Those of us who claim the name of Christ often deal with accusations and associations that make us cringe. “We’re not like them,” we want to say. “We’re the good guys.”

I know in my own life that I often go to great lengths to disassociate with the ugly events both past and present associated with Christianity. I insist that these people’s actions were not in keeping with the teaching of Scripture, that many of those perpetrating these crimes were only using religion as an excuse, and that people of other religions (or irreligions) have done the same. All of those insistences are valid, but I don’t think they really cut it in the world of Scripture. Instead, I think that in the face of the tragedies of Christian history my response should be simple but hard: repent.

Repent because we are a body, and the left hand cannot claim innocence when the right hand commits murder.

Repent because we live just the sort of detached, self-aggrandizing lives which have allowed wicked men to wield power uncorrected in our churches, and broken sinners to never be called by their brothers and sisters to repentance.

Repent because of the little sins we commit against our neighbors daily which both harm them and weigh us down with such guilt that, when the great and visible sins are committed, we live as silent collaborators rather than righteous sons of God.

Repent because we lacked the courage to fight for the church’s purity where we were at, instead pretending everything was okay and throwing rocks at others rather than confronting the planks in our own eyes.

Repent because of our sinful divisiveness which creates walls over which biblical correction cannot occur, allowing sin to fester and spread.

And repent because this is what the world needs to see. We may be able to justify ourselves by claiming to have nothing to do with the evils our Church has committed. But to justify oneself is never the Christian’s calling. Instead we are to surrender the rights and entitlements we hide behind and humbly acknowledge the sin and failings we as a people have made. Christ has justified his bride; she does not need to be a liar or Pharisee to justify herself in spite of her failings. The Christian calling is always one downward, towards more humility and service. In sackcloth and ashes, repent for the wickedness of the people of God and rejoice that those He loves are still his, that His kingdom still stands despite the strife and evil which at times tears at its heart.

Okay, so that’s an over dramatization. But the more classical history I study, the more I cringe at the sort of historical method most preachers, and even some theologians, possess. I’d like to clear the air about one of my big frustrations here and now. It seems like any hip preacher today is drawing on first century history to completely rewrite what the bible seems to be saying. The big problem here is that, in the big scope of historical knowledge, what we actually know about first-century Judaism is miniscule. Consider our main sources:

1. The Bible itself.

2. Josephus - a Jewish traitor who sold out to the Romans to save his own neck and lived the rest of his life as a historian in Rome, pandering to its social elites.

3. Philo - a fascinating figure, but one who lives in Egypt and whose platonized Judaism is probably much closer to the teachings of Plotinus than Abraham.

4. The Qumran Community - the guys who wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls; their modern equivalent is the crazy guy who lives in a bunker in rural Montana full of food, bottled water and guns and is waiting for the rapture.

5. Second-century Rabbinic Texts - again, these are interesting, but you have to deal with the fact that they were written 150 or so years after the period Christian scholars are really interested in, and that in the intervening time some minor changes took place in the religious landscape (i.e. the destruction of the temple, the diaspora, the Bar-Kokhba revlot, and the emergence of Christianity itself).

6. A smattering of fragmentary, mysterious texts and assorted Apocalyptic and Wisdom treatises from the first and second centuries BCE.

So we essentially have two eccentric individuals, a religiously fanatic sect, and assorted farther-removed documents, making the Bible itself is one of the most useful and influential documents we have for studying first century Palestine. Now, don’t misunderstand me, those other texts are important and helpful as we grapple with a clear understanding of what Scripture meant to its original audience. However, they are at best interesting and occasionally useful supplements. To be encouraged to completely rethink our theology in light of them is dangerous. Perhaps some true insights will result, but so will a great deal of eisogesis and error. My basic goal is to make a plea that, whenever someone says “to really understand this text, we need to understand X about first century Jewish teaching”, a little warning light should go on in the back of your head. Proceed with caution; the ice may well be thinner on such waters than it first appears.