The Iraq War Did Not Take Place?

I think it was Baudrillard who said the first Gulf War did not take place. Well I think it's my contention that the current Gulf War isn't really a war, but that it's some kind of post-modern, international atonement ritual. An attempt on the macro-level to revive the primitive schemes and forms of collective/mob murder. It was an attempt to restore confidence in the voice of the mob. Anyway, I came across this today, I think the remarks of right-wing pundit Dick Morris are relevant to our discussions on the atonement and scapegoating. Mr. Morris asserts,

MORRIS: I think that withdrawal from Iraq — it obviously gives al Qaeda a huge victory. Huge victory. On the other hand, if we stay in Iraq, it gives them the opportunity to kill more Americans, which they really like.

One of the things, though, that I think the antiwar crowd has not considered is that, if we’re putting the Americans right within their arms’ reach, they don’t have to come to Wall Street to kill Americans. They don’t have to knock down the trade center. They can do it around the corner, and convenience is a big factor when you’re a terrorist.

There it is the atonement theme of someone else supposedly dying for us, dying so that we don't have to, regardless of whether paranoia/lies form the basis of the belief in the supposed need for the sacrifice.

Richard Koenigsberg has been doing some great work re the sources of war and genocide.

In the atonement ritual are two goats. One goat which was Azazel, somehow synonymous with evil/Satan/the Devil, was led outside the city of the walls and thrown over a cliff. The other goat which was Yahweh was killed in front of the people and the blood brought into the temple to repair creation and bind the people together and cover the people from the violence of other members of the community.

So in the Iraq war we have two sets of people, two sacrificial classes. The first class is comprised of the Iraqi people. They, from the perspective of the persecutors in the ritual, correspond to the Azazel goat, they represent evil and are unceremoniously killed outside the camp. All sin is laid on the Azazel goat, making us into innocents.

This is all from the American perspective. The Yahweh goat corresponds to the American soldiers. From Koenigsberg,

According to Marvin, “The community celebrates and reveres its insiders turned outsiders. From within the boundaries, the community fears and worships these outsiders it consumes to preserve its life.” Soldiers are celebrated, revered and worshipped because they (like Christ) take the sacrificial burden upon themselves. They are the designated victims who are required to suffer—and perhaps to die—for other members of the group. The soldier is an “insider turned outsider,” member of the community who has been thrust outward from within the nation’s boundaries in order to do battle over there—on foreign soil.

He asserts that we delegate the execution of our soldiers to our enemies.

War as a unifier of the national community works best when people are able to avert their eyes from the sight of the victims; when they don’t have to look closely at what happens to the bodies of soldiers. People enjoy the idea of war, but would prefer to participate at a distance. They would rather not see the maimed bodies. Sight of a soldier’s mutilated body drains warfare of its glory.

Jesus in the Gospels represents both goats in the atonement. He is Yahweh who is killed in front of the people, but He is also the Azazel goat which is led outside the walls carrying the sins of the people, carrying the violence and dissension of the people and thrown over the cliff. The Yahweh goat is a substitute for the High Priest who also represents Yahweh. The goat is a substitute for the High Priest, so the High Priest can be resurrected in the Holy of Holies and walk out of the temple raised from the dead. The atonement ritual is a unifier, it disguises the violence done to Yahweh and the scapegoat. Jesus making the ritual come alive in history shows that it is the mob that is actually killing the Yahweh goat which is the substitute for the High Priest.

Stonings and Sin Laid on Innocent People

I've been discussing the stoning/murder of Achan so this post over at Metafilter caught my attention. It's almost astounding that collective, lynch mob murders, in their most barbaric/primitive, most raw form still take place in our world today. This isn't the highly mediated lynch mob of the Iraq war, where people sat around their TVs watching Fox News waiting for "Shock and Awe" to start, this is a story of a group people picking up stones and brutally murdering a young girl to uphold some kind of order or unity. I know for certain, without really knowing anything about the situation that this girl is not guilty, that this girl surrounded by a group of murderers, bloody, dying a horrific death, for supposedly breaking some kind of "law" is a scapegoat. The same kind of "law" that Achan supposedly broke. As a commenter at Metafilter, speaking of another stoning, said "...all that was left was a mutilated body slumped over. It looked like an animal rather than a human. It was savage and nauseating." It's obvious that this girl is a scapegoat, but it should also be obvious with Achan, I understand that he is our scapegoat, but by the 20th century we should be able to understand that Achan is a scapegoat in the same way that this girl and Jesus were scapegoats.

I'm sure the people who were involved in this lynching were quite happy with themselves. They had punished an evil-doer. They felt very close to each other, they felt very good about each other. United in a job well done. I'm reminded of this photo from a Duluth, Minnesota lynching, it's a very graphic, disgusting and as the Metafilter commenter said, "savage and nauseating", but this is the way the crowd looked as it stood around Achan's dead body and the mutilated bodies of his children. Here's the photo (rated graphic and disgusting, but it's from the Minnesota Historical Society site). The people standing around the mutilated bodies, posing for the camera, thinking they delivered some kind of justice. This is the way all lynch mobs look. This is the way the people around Achan looked, this is the way the people around Jesus looked, this the way the people around Stephen looked, this is the way lynch mobs look. They all look happy and sure of themselves, because so many others around them look happy and sure of themselves. They all believe in the guilt of their scapegoat and in their own righteousness and goodness. You must remember that we Americans aren't very far removed from scenes like the above. That photo was from 1920's Duluth, Minnesota.

The mob feels a tremendous amount of unity after a lynching. It feels to them as if a god has blessed them with peace and unity. This is the foundation of all primitive religion. Religion begins around the body of a dead lynch mob victim. The community in world-ending crisis one minute and the next after they have united to kill a transgressor falls under an indescribable peace. Gods and religions are formed in this unity and peace around a dead body. The thing with Christianity though, some one speaks up, before or after the lynching and says, "this person is/was not guilty". This destroys everything, this is the sword that Jesus brings, because people will retaliate and seek revenge on the murderers if they don't believe the victim was guilty. So it's either endless reciprocal/retributive violence or people with broken and repentant hearts putting a stop to it. The Gospels destroy the idea that the scapegoat is guilty and the lynch mob is innocent and righteous.

The Gospels make a big deal about Peter denying Jesus. Peter was not able to separate himself from the crowd. He still believed the crowd had all authority, that the crowd was the voice of Yahweh. Even Pilate was not able to resist the lynch mob. The Gospels tell us that everybody was involved in the lynching of Jesus, all institutions, all people, even the disciples were not able to resist the lynch mob. They were all lost in the flood of violence that had rained down on earth and crushed Jesus. It wasn't until Jesus returned, forgiving them that they were able to resist the narrative of the lynch mob and begin telling another story about Jesus. Stephen became the first martyr by trying to tell the story, by proclaiming Jesus' innocence.

Rene Girard in The Scapegoat said, "The Gospels constantly reveal what the texts of historical persecutors, and especially mythological persecutors, hide from us: the knowledge that their victim is a scapegoat...".

Achan and the Crucifixion of Jesus

The next step is to lay out the argument that there is no essential difference between the mob lynching of Achan and the crucifixion of Jesus. In the despicable mob lynching of Achan and his family there is still the belief that the insane and ravenous mob, who the Psalms describe as packs of dogs, or herds of bulls or the "strong beasts of Bashaan", is murdering these isolated individuals in the service of Yahweh. Structurally the Gospel narratives and the Achan story are the same. The only difference is that the Gospels destroy the idea that the mob is killing the isolated victim in the service of Yahweh. The mob still thinks they're doing the service of Yahweh by killing Jesus, but in fact they're killing Yahweh himself. The mob is completely wrong, they literally do not know what they are doing. The mob that killed Achan was also operating under false assumptions, they thought Achan caused the defeat at Ai, but Achan could not return from the dead to tell them that they were wrong. Jesus came back from the dead, his voice was not extinguished by that of the mob. The mob's narrative was no longer the sole story. Jesus was speaking, and was now speaking with the full glory of Yahweh. He comes to Paul, the man who was continuing to murder the body of Christ, and says, not "why don't you believe in me?", but "Why are you persecuting me?". Jesus/Yahweh confronts Paul with the light of Genesis 1:3, the light of the holy of holies, and shows him that he does not know what he is doing. That Paul is not serving Yahweh by being part of the lynch mob, but in fact is killing Yahweh, the god he purportedly serves. This sudden revelation literally blinds him. Now the certainty that comes in the total, all-engulfing unity of the mob falls apart, Paul is created as a man by Yahweh. Paul is no longer part of the flood of violence that continues to kill Yahweh and his servants.

During the atonement ritual the blood Yahweh was spread throughout the temple the left over blood, though, was poured underneath the altar. In Revelation 6:9 this blood is shown to be the souls of the martyrs. The death of the martyrs are included in the atonement death of Jesus, they are assumed to be part of the great atonement.

In John 20:21–23 Jesus breathed into the disciples, as Yahweh breathed into Adam in Genesis. "Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained" The word translated "forgive" also means to bear. He is telling is disciples to forgive/bear the sins of others. He is creating them as high priests, as Adam was a high priest, He is telling them to do what Achan did involuntarily, what the servant in Isaiah 53 did, what Jesus himself did, to bear the sins of others. To carry the sins of others so that the people will not destroy themselves, so that they will be transformed, so that they will be created in the same way the disciples were created when Jesus/Yahweh breathed into them and gave them the Holy Spirit, and gave them the ability to no longer conform to the mob, but to conform to Jesus. Jesus in the Gospels is creating the World. He is calming the flood waters which are the murderous crowd.

In Matthew 23:35 Jesus compares his death to all the other murders and mob lynchings in the Old Testament from the first to the last.

The Achan Story - Addendum

In my rush to finish up last night before bed time I forgot a couple important details in the conclusion.

In Chapter 8 Joshua goes against Ai again. You would think that since it was Achan's fault that the first attack failed on Ai Joshua wouldn't really need to change strategy. It wasn't the strategy that caused the defeat it was Achan stealing the loot, but that's not how Joshua sees things. He knows it was a strategic failure and that he violated God's commandments re leading all of Israel into battle. So this time Joshua does in fact lead all the newly reunited Israel into battle, he doesn't sit back and let just a small contingent do the dirty work.

The second interesting thing is that in 8:2 he immediately rescinds the ban, now it ain't so bad to have privatized loot.

The first attack ended with the human sacrifice of Achan, the second attack ended with subdued animal sacrifice.

The Achan Story

Jericho was decimated. Except for Rahab and her family, every living thing within the walls was killed. They burnt the city with fire, all men, woman, children and any unborn babies were burned alive, but before destroying the city and all the lives in it, Joshua, as verse 6:24 tells us, hauls out all the silver, the gold, the vessels of brass and iron to keep in the Lord’s treasury. Joshua was feeling pretty good about himself, in Joshua 6:27 it says his fame was noised throughout all the country. Joshua could feel the power, he could feel the fear emanating from the neighboring peoples.

Joshua, as the text hints, is feeling a might bit of pride. He immediately wants to continue his victories, so he sends some spies out to check out the city of Ai. Presumably the spies tell him that because our army is so tough and you are such a great leader Joshua it won’t take much to smite little old Ai.

Joshua, still partying and enjoying his victory and new found fame, doesn’t find it necessary to send a full force of people to conquer Ai, he doesn’t even find it necessary to go himself. He sends a small contingent of men to labor in the battlefields of Ai. The soldiers are probably wondering why do they have to go and do this harsh duty while everybody else gets to stay back and continue the party. Joshua is probably even showing off all the loot in the treasury to the better connected people. Joshua like any proud man is sure that Ai will fall at the very mention of his name. He is convinced that the people Ai will start running as soon they see Joshua’s army.

The soldiers know something isn’t right. Joshua isn’t coming with them. They remember the words of Numbers 27:15-21, Joshua is supposed to go out before them and Joshua is supposed to lead them back in, not some just a small contingent of them, but all of Israel.

The predictable happens, the soldiers without their leader pretty much turn tail and run at the slightest sign of resistance. A small number of them are killed. Joshua is not there to lead them. If Joshua doesn’t consider it important enough to be on the battlefield they don’t think it is either. They want to get back and take a look at all that loot in the treasury too, to sit back and bask in the victory at Jericho a little longer, just like their leader Joshua.

Word gets back to camp that the army has been beaten, beaten bad, humiliated even. Joshua and all the elders immediately get all dramatic. Something bad has happened and they, of course still full themselves, know that it’s not their fault. They will blame somebody else. He immediately starts blaming the soldiers for the defeat, and they’re thinking, well Joshua it’s not really our fault you were supposed to be out there with us. Our buddies and brothers have been killed because you stayed home and didn’t send an adequate force. Joshua doesn’t immediately sense the anger being directed at him, he’s more worried about how he will be perceived by the Caananites.

Israel is in crisis, Joshua tells them that this defeat means that Yahweh is no longer with them. Joshua threatens them with looming destruction. The people are scared, angry at Joshua, angry at one another, actual internecine violence may be taking place, recrimination and blame are circulating. Joshua, to deflect criticism of himself, tells them that the only possible cause of the defeat is the sin of the people. Someone has taken the accursed thing, and that is the only reason that Israel was defeated. Forget all the strategic considerations, sin is the reason for the defeat. The story only names Achan as the transgressor, but it also says that all Israel sinned. This might seem contradictory, but I can see how people might reconcile the two statements, but that’s not all we have to consider, verse 8:2 says, after all the commotion in verse 7 about the accursed thing, that after Ai it is OK to take the plunder and accursed thing. I’ll use this little detour to lay the basis for my belief that Achan was not the only one in the story that was in possession of the accursed thing.

Joshua thinks he has discovered the cause of defeat, and of course it isn’t him. It is one person, only one person. To accuse more will more only cause greater dissension. He already knows who will be blamed for the defeat, it’s definitely not him or any of the elders. It will be someone who cannot fight back, and more importantly it will be someone who is isolated, weak and unattractive, with no one to defend him or become his advocate. There is no advocate for the defense in this story, the voice of the victim/scapegoat will be almost totally crushed. (Unlike Isaiah 53, many Psalms, Job and the Gospels)

Because of all the dissension/retributive violence/fear/guilt in the community Joshua decides to conduct an Atonement ritual. Atonement literally means “At one ment”. The goal of all atonement rituals is to unite the people. This idea of atonement, this idea of a scapegoat ritual, is not just common in primitive communities, it is nearly universal. The Greek pharmakos immediately comes to mind. The idea of all atonement rituals is for the sin/dissension/violence of all the people to be transferred to a scapegoat/pharmakos. (we see the pharmokos ritual in the New Testament in Luke 4:28-30, there was nothing magical about Jesus walking through the crowd, in the pharmakos ritual no one person was designated as the executioner, the people couldn’t touch the pharmakos, they just kept crowding around him until he jumped off the cliff of his own accord, but Jesus had nothing to do with this, his desires were not in accordance with the mob, so he just walked right out between them. Keep this in mind when Achan makes his confession)

Joshua isn’t searching for justice, he will be running an atonement ritual. He wants to remove the fear/violence/sin from the community. He needs to designate one person to do this. He tells the people that he will use the Urim and Thummin to find the wrongdoer. He lines them all up, a lot of people are worried because they have loot at home, maybe by this time though they were smart enough to get rid of it. He makes it clear that the person who he designates is guilty of causing the defeat at Ai. That this person, not Joshua, is guilty of causing the deaths of their loved ones, for causing all the internal dissension and for causing the shadow of destruction to hang over them. These are serious crimes that affect everybody. A logical disconnect here, of course, but mobs and people in crisis aren’t really concerned with logic. How does the privatization of a small amount of loot, especially if the possession of said loot is not common knowledge, bring about a military defeat.

So the atonement ritual begins, one by one, in great fear, they approach Joshua. One by one Joshua forgives their sin, he pronounces them not guilty, and as the ritual sin bearer he absorbs their sin. Joshua frees the people of their sin, this is a very intense situation. There is a lot of anger here, the people are waiting to unload. Joshua is going to deliver them a scapegoat and it’s not going to be him.

The ugly despised and isolated Achan is chosen and Joshua discharges the sin upon him. Joshua is a substitute for all the people, he has absorbed their sin and Achan becomes the substitute for Joshua and accordingly becomes the substitute for all the people, the doom that was to befall them now will befall Achan and only Achan. At this juncture in the story I’m going to assume, even though there are differing opinions, that no one brings up Deuteronomy 19:15. That no one brings up the fact that it is Joshua who was gone astray, because he has forgotten that a man’s guilt can be proved only through two witnesses, not through the Urim and Thummin. That no one brings up the fact that Joshua wasn’t subject to the ritual.

So Achan is taken out by the angry and delirious mob and murdered. Not only Achan though, but his whole family, his sons and daughters. His sons and daughters were not guilty, but Joshua didn’t want them around to bring up doubts about Achan’s guilt later on.

Achan is a scapegoat, just like Jesus. Achan wasn’t a perfect man, but he was innocent of the charges that were made against him. Achan was not killed because he had some loot, he was killed, in Caiaphas’s words, because it was better that one man die than the whole nation be destroyed. The murder of Achan by the collective caused the community to be “At-One” again. Achan in this story is a precursor or an expectation of the Christ figure. Achan became the bond of the convenant. The murder of Achan was what kept the people together. The New Testament, of course, condemns this idea of “At-One-Ment” at the expense of an isolated individual.

One more thing at the end here. Jesus is the good shepherd, He leads them in and out, he doesn’t lose any of his sheep, he doesn’t scapegoat any of them. Joshua can’t say the same.

One more thing, almost immediately after the homicidal rage that consumes Achan is quenched, while the people may still be covered with the “At-One-Ment” blood of Achan, Joshua lifts the ban. Peace has returned, but it is the peace of the world, not the peace of Yahweh, it is the peace born from unanimous hatred of a supposed evildoer, which Rene Girard has found to be the foundation of all pagan religions.

I realize that there are a lot of themes here that need further expansion, but I’m only a lowly blogger.

Achan and the Distortion of Desire Part III

Rene Girard says the tenth commandment term “covet” means “desire”, in this excerpt he discusses the idea of mimetic desire. I think what he says can be summarized, at least partially, in this way. If we do not follow the proscriptions laid out in the second half of the ten commandments we are in danger of being created in the image of our neighbor. If we become doubles of our neighbor we will be desiring the same things, not just the same things, we will desire to become our neighbor, and if we follow the progression in the second half of the ten commandments this will result in murder.

Important Additional Readings:

Skandalon

Satan and Scandal

Distortion of Desire

Scapegoat for the World

Achan and Atonement Part II

The Law in Joshua 7 serves not to keep people together, but to exclude. There’s a juxtaposition between the Achan story and the story of Rahab, who is part of the story of Jericho. Rahab, because she was not an Israelite should have been subject to the “ban”. She should have been murdered along with her family and the rest of the Jerichoites, but Rahab and her family were allowed to live. Joshua, apparently setting aside the legislation of Deuteronomy 20:16-18, allows Rahab, the prostitute, and her family to live. Rahab had submitted to and pledged allegiance to Joshua’s war machine. Rahab was the ultimate “outsider”, but because she surrendered to Joshua’s will she became an “insider”. Achan, was an “insider”, he had the correct lineage, but because he did not completely submit to the will of Joshua, he made himself an “outsider”.

The stories of Rahab and Achan were used to create boundaries and norms. Those who voluntarily submitted to the Law would become or remain “insiders”. Those who transgressed the Law would become “outsiders”. The punishment for being an outsider was death. The story of Achan was directed at the “insiders”, warning them that if they transgressed the Law or didn’t follow the dictates of whoever was the central authority at that time they could be subject to the death penalty. This text is intended to coerce people into submission by using the threat of homicidal violence.

I think this text is about more than just the Law and the penalties for breaking the law, or in Rahab’s case the advantages of following the Law . Breaking the Law, if those transgressions are allowed to run their full course will inevitably result in death, the actual, real world deaths of the transgressor and most likely the real world deaths of others. Most likely the death of others first, and then the death of the transgressors. The second half of the ten commandments is entirely concerned with forestalling violence. It shows that even small transgressions, if not somehow prevented from running their full course will implacably end in homicide. You shall not covet, meaning you shall not be envious of your neighbor, of either your neighbor’s possessions or your neighbors “being”. You shall not bear false witness, I think could mean you shall not project your negative beliefs and will to violence onto your neighbor. You shall not steal, I guess this means your neighbor’s possessions or your neighbor’s “being”. You shall not commit adultery, becoming directly entangled in rivalrous relations with your neighbor. Finally, the result of all these smaller sins is murder. “Thou shalt not kill”. An immediate modern example of this downward spiral is in marital relations that end in murder, I think if you look closely at some of these spousal murder cases, they follow this trajectory. So following the Law is very important, because in the end it will prevent the killing of your neighbor or neighbors.

Atonement

I haven’t really written anything recently, so I gotta warm myself up and get those brain cells pumping (or whatever brain cells do) again. I want to write about the Atonement, but it’s such a large subject and there’s so much to explain and go over I don’t know where to begin. So to get myself going, I think I’m just going to rewrite, reorganize so old stuff. I think my best stuff so far has been the posts re Achan. So I think that’s where I will begin.

Achan and Atonement

The story of Achan in Joshua 7 is an atonement ritual. Caiaphas explained the basis of all atonement rituals in John 11:49-50, “…that it is expedient for us, that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not.”

The Achan story is about a crisis, all scapegoating rituals arise from tumult and societal disintegration. Achan in this story is a scapegoat. Achan is an atonement sacrifice, given by Joshua to the people, or a better description would be the rapidly forming mob.

As I’m reading commentaries on this story, I sense this, I don’t know, dichotomy, between the Law and what Jesus and the New Testament are trying to explain. The Deuteronomists want us to believe it is the Law that holds things together. That by obeying the Law, following the dictates of the Law, our group, culture, tribe, society or whatever community will not collapse in a spiral of jealousy, rivalry and ultimately uncontrollable violence and retributive murder. The Law formed the bonds of society. It’s what kept everybody together. It was Yahweh’s Law that kept society together, not Yahweh himself, thus the idea that if you transgress the Law you would be offending Yahweh. Violations of the Law would bring divine punishment. You get the idea of the wrath of God falling upon the sinner. Transgressions and trangressors of the Law must be expelled. Law-breakers must pay. Atonement becomes the removal of sin.

In Numbers 27:15-21 Moses asks God for a man to lead Israel,

17Which may go out before them, and which may go in before them, and which may lead them out, and which may bring them in; that the congregation of the LORD be not as sheep which have no shepherd.

And God says,

...at his word shall they go out, and at his word they shall come in, both he, and all the children of Israel with him, even all the congregation.

In this story Joshua, who also can be called Jesus, is not a Good Shepherd. In John 10 Jesus states that He is the Good Shepherd. In John 10 Jesus begins discussing the Sheep Gate. The Sheep Gate was what the sacrificial sheep passed through on their way to the altar. Like Joshua in this story, Jesus says that some sacrifice the sheep without entering through the gate. Unlike Joshua, Jesus will lay down his life for his sheep, and not only that, but the sheep themselves will be given the courage to follow him into the sacrificial machinery and be led to and from pasture. I definitely haven’t made it clear yet, and probably won’t for a long time, Jesus will say that He is the bond of creation, not the Law. It is not the Law that will draw all men together, but Jesus when He enters the sacrificial machinery of society and is lifted up.

James Alison

An Atonement Update. A chapter from James Alison's upcoming book, Undergoing God: dispatches from the scene of a break in.

Creation and Atonement - Waters and the Flood

"The LORD sits enthroned over the flood", Psalm 29:10.

Psalm 93
1The LORD reigneth, he is clothed with majesty; the LORD is clothed with strength, wherewith he hath girded himself: the world also is established, that it cannot be moved. 2Thy throne is established of old: thou art from everlasting. 3The floods have lifted up, O LORD, the floods have lifted up their voice; the floods lift up their waves. 4The LORD on high is mightier than the noise of many waters, yea, than the mighty waves of the sea.

Psalm 18:4
4The sorrows of death compassed me, and the floods of ungodly men made me afraid.

Psalm 24
1The earth is the LORD's, and the fullness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein. 2For he hath founded it upon the seas, and established it upon the floods.

Isaiah 51
10Art thou not it which hath dried the sea, the waters of the great deep; that hath made the depths of the sea a way for the ransomed to pass over?

Margaret Barker says "Jerusalem and its temple, the centre of the whole creation, had been established as dry land in the midst of the watery chaos."

At creation the Lord subdued and bound the waters. The Waters and the Flood are very important in Biblical imagery. What do they represent?

Psalm 69 - Straightforwardly says the Waters and Flood are the people. The deep waters are the persecutors.

1Save me, O God; for the waters are come in unto my soul. 2I sink in deep mire, where there is no standing: I am come into deep waters, where the floods overflow me...4They that hate me without a cause are more than the hairs of mine head: they that would destroy me, being mine enemies wrongfully, are mighty: then I restored that which I took not away...14Deliver me out of the mire, and let me not sink: let me be delivered from them that hate me, and out of the deep waters. 15Let not the waterflood overflow me, neither let the deep swallow me up, and let not the pit shut her mouth upon me.

From the Girardian Lectionary, the flood is collective violence. It's a deluge of collective violence against a single victim. The story of Noah is like the story of the Gerasene Demoniac, it's a reversal, not the single victim but the community that is engulfed in the Flood. The Lord lifts up the single victim.

Psalm 65
5By terrible things in righteousness wilt thou answer us, O God of our salvation; who art the confidence of all the ends of the earth, and of them that are afar off upon the sea: 6Which by his strength setteth fast the mountains; being girded with power: 7Which stilleth the noise of the seas, the noise of their waves, and the tumult of the people.

Revelation 17:15 is quite explicit.
15And he saith unto me, The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.

The Waters in Genesis refer to peoples and multitudes.

Psalm 124
2If it had not been the LORD who was on our side, when men rose up against us: 3Then they had swallowed us up quick, when their wrath was kindled against us: 4Then the waters had overwhelmed us, the stream had gone over our soul: 5Then the proud waters had gone over our soul. 6Blessed be the LORD, who hath not given us as a prey to their teeth. 7Our soul is escaped as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers: the snare is broken, and we are escaped. 8Our help is in the name of the LORD, who made heaven and earth.

The Waters are hostile forces or enemies, see Isaiah 8:7, the King of Assyria is described as Waters. Daniel 9:26 describes the Prince coming to destroy the city as a flood.

From James Alison and the Girardian Lectionary:

The story of Noah is less obviously a story of origins than either that of Adam and Eve or Cain and Abel, yet since it, too, is subjected to a christological re-reading in the apostolic witness, I beg indulgence for a quick glimpse at this story too. In the first letter of Peter it is pointed out that in the days of Noah "a few, that is eight persons, were saved through water. Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you" (1 Pet 3:20-21). That is to say, the water of Baptism corresponds to the water of the flood. Yet Baptism, we know from Paul, is being immersed in the death of Christ, so as to be able to share in his resurrection, and that it is he, and after him, the Church, which the Ark prefigured. This implies a rather particular christological re-reading of the Noah story: the implication is that the Ark actually went under the flood rather than escaping it miraculously! In this re-reading, we would have all the violence abounding on the face of the earth, and, at a time of particular mimetic crisis of indifferentiation, symbolized by the Flood, the collective putting to death of someone (Noah) or a group (Noah and his family). It was this putting to death which brought about peace, permitting the re-establishment of order, the categorization of animals, and the setting up of a new, peaceful tribal system. There are of course many myths of this sort whereby a more or less hidden collective expulsion or murder is seen as producing a new social order, where fruit, or animals, or foodstuffs, start to abound as the result of a mysterious visitation in which it can either be the collectivity which perishes at the hand of a god, or a god which perishes at the hand of a collectivity, and as a prize, leaves behind the basis for the new culture. The Noah story as we have it could very well be a Jewish demythologization of just such a story in the light of their experience of salvation from out of Egypt leading to the setting up of the Covenant. Here, Noah is saved from out of the flood, and God makes a covenant with him never more to destroy all flesh.

Again from the Girardian Lectionary, Paul Nuechterlein writes,

Another way of conceiving sinking down into the water is to become caught up in the swirling of scandal around the scapegoat, to get caught up in the flood of violence. Peter and all the disciples will get caught up in this flood that kills Jesus. Jesus will die because of the flood, but he alone is not swept up in it. This is the image of Noah and the great flood. All people on earth get swept up in a flood of violence except Noah and his family. Jesus dies during a flood of such violence; but, in another sense, he his kept free of its ultimate effects by not returning violence for violence. Instead, held in the ark of the tomb, he rises on the third day as forgiveness, not vengeance. In this sense, he has willingly succumbed to the violence but not gotten swept up in it as a perpetrator of it.

Is Peter sinking down in the water a reference to Psalm 69 and Genesis 1:2. Moreover, Jesus walking on the water and calming the stormy sea also a reference to Genesis 1:2. The waters of Baptism also refers to Genesis 1:2.

Genesis 1:2 - Invisibility

To state again, I believe Genesis 1 is referring to the Atonement ritual. In the Bible Atonement and creation are the same things.

Genesis 1:2, in the Hebrew, says that the earth had become chaos and vacant. The prophet Jeremiah, in Jeremiah 4:23, also saw the earth become chaos and vacant. He offers a clue about what is going on in Genesis. In Jeremiah 4:22, he says that what has brought about the chaos and waste is the people's foolishness and lack of understanding and wisdom. The people have not known God. They know how to do evil, but they don't know how to do good. Isaiah 34:11 also notes chaos and vacancy. Isaiah notes that this chaos and vacancy has been caused by bloodshed.

Chaos and vacant in Hebrew are "tohu and bohu". These words are pretty much synonymous and can be translated as "chaos", "desolation", "wasteland", "emptiness", "empty/unreal/a place of idols", "vanity/vain", "futile", "void", with an implicit understanding of evil.

Interestingly the Septuagint says that the earth was "invisible and unformed". Hebrews 11:1-3 says that "what is seen was not made out of what was visible."

2 Enoch states:

Before anything existed at all, from the very beginning, whatever is I created from non-being, and from the invisible things into the visible.Before any visible things had come into existence, and the light had not yet opened up, I, in the midst of the light, moved around in the invisible things, like one of them, as the sun moves around from east to west and from west to east. But the sun has rest; yet I did not find rest, because everything was not yet created. And I thought up the idea of establishing a foundation, to create a visible creation (Charlesworth, 1983, 143)

The "invisible" is the Kingdom of Heaven.

New hypothesis...Genesis 1:1-2 should be translated like this, "With Wisdom God created the Heavens and Earth, and the Earth was invisible and darkness was on the Abyss and the Spirit of God fluttered/hovered on the Waters." I'm, of course, not going for a direct translation from anything, I'm trying to understand how Jesus and the first Christians understood this text.

In Genesis 1:2 the creation is still unseen and invisible. Is the temple the Earth? The Temple in Jewish mythology was understood to be/represent the Earth. It was buried in chaos, waste, void, waters, the deep, the Abyss, human violence and the Flood, but it will emerge, even though it is still unseen. What is being described in Genesis 1 is not a geologic or biological creation. It has nothing to do with evolution or the big bang. If I am understanding this all correctly I should be able to find a lot of New Testament support.

Creation and Atonement - Wisdom

Genesis 1:1-4 is a description of the Atonement ritual. It can be compared to Jesus' life and his death on the Cross.

Some presuppositions:
1. Collective murder and the group unity that occurs after it is culturally creative.

2. Atonement rituals and sacrifices are ritual reenactments of the original collective murder. The rituals are renewing of the bonds of creation.

3. Jesus' death was a collective murder.

4. Jesus' life and death was the fulfillment of the Great Atonement Ritual.

Let's get back to Genesis. I've posited that Genesis 1:1 should read something like "With Wisdom God created the heaven and the earth" or "In the beginning of Wisdom, God created the heaven and the earth."

The Aramaic translation (Targum) of Genesis translates Genesis 1:14 this way,

From the beginning with wisdom the Memra of the Lord created and perfected the heavens and the earth. And the earth was waste and unformed, desolate of man and beast, empty of plant cultivation and of trees, and darkness was spread over the face of the abyss; and the spirit of mercy from before the Lord was blowing over the surface of the waters.

Scholars haven't been able to define the term "Memra". Here's someone else's english translation of the Genesis Targum,

1. As the beginning, the Son of God creates the heavens and the earth.*

The first word in Genesis is Be'reasheet. It is a compound word the Be' means "with" and raesheet means "a first wisdom". Wisdom in the Bible is not just intelligence, it is a personification. I'm not quite ready to say that Jesus equals Wisdom. Let's look at some texts from the Bible.

Proverbs 8:22-30:

22The LORD possessed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old. 23I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was. 24When there were no depths, I was brought forth; when there were no fountains abounding with water. 25 Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth: 26While as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the highest part of the dust of the world. 27When he prepared the heavens, I was there: when he set a compass upon the face of the depth: 28When he established the clouds above: when he strengthened the fountains of the deep: 29When he gave to the sea his decree, that the waters should not pass his commandment: when he appointed the foundations of the earth: 30Then I was by him, as one brought up with him: and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him;

Jeremiah 10:12

2He hath made the earth by his power, he hath established the world by his wisdom, and hath stretched out the heavens by his discretion.

Psalm 33:6-7:

6By the word of the LORD were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth. 7He gathereth the waters of the sea together as an heap: he layeth up the depth in storehouses.

Psalm 104:24;

24O LORD, how manifold are thy works! in wisdom hast thou made them all: the earth is full of thy riches.

John 1:1-5:

1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2The same was in the beginning with God. 3All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. 4In him was life; and the life was the light of men. 5And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.

Jesus was at the beginning of the world, the lamb slain since the foundation of the world. The world was created through Jesus. Jesus was the method of creation.

Creation and Atonement

Genesis begins like this, "With Wisdom God created the heavens and the earth, the earth had become formless and void and darkness covered the abyss and the spirit of God moved over the waters. Then God said 'Let Him be light, and He was light. And God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness."

My hypothesis is that Genesis 1:1-4 should be translated something similar to this. So I've narrowed the focus, but there is a lot there to unravel and decipher. Tremendous symbolism that needs to be discovered. There's a second part of my hypothesis and that is that these verses are related to the Great Day of Atonement and Jesus Christ. That in fact what these verses are describing is the atonement ritual. Method: to find verses throughout the Old and New Testaments, rabbinical writings and any other writings that will illuminate this text. I'm sure I'll need to make quite extensive use of the works of Rene Girard and Margaret Barker. I've discussed and researched this previously, but this time I'll try to work at it till I get the last drop of meaning out of it. We have some verses and things to talk about for next time, just need to get organized.

Please discuss or cite possibly relevant verses.

Atonement Ritual in Joshua 7 with Implications for Penal Substitutionary Atonement Theory

The defeat of Jericho was a tremendous victory. Joshua took Rahab, the prostitute, out of the city, but everything else was to be destroyed. Everything was to be destroyed, babies, unborn babies, children, young children, women and men, all property, but Joshua spared the prostitute who had helped the Israelites destroy her own city. Not all the property was destroyed, the silver and gold, and the vessels of iron and bronze were brought under Joshua's control.

Joshua was feeling pretty good about himself. He was a proud and violent man. He thought a lot of himself. Joshua in this story is an ideologue. An ideologue devoted to a false ideology.

In Numbers 27:15-21 Moses asks God for a man,

17Which may go out before them, and which may go in before them, and which may lead them out, and which may bring them in; that the congregation of the LORD be not as sheep which have no shepherd.

And God says,

...at his word shall they go out, and at his word they shall come in, both he, and all the children of Israel with him, even all the congregation.

James Alison says,

A passage I particularly like is John 10, in which Jesus proclaims that he is the door of the sheep. First he tells his listeners that a good shepherd is one who watches over his sheep and leads them to and from pasture; they hear his voice and follow him.

A good shepherd will watch over his sheep. Mr. Alison continues,

Suddenly Jesus' image acquires a significant new vibrancy: the pasture which he leads his sheep to and from, going in before them and coming out again, is not the usual pasture, but a "pasture" with a one-way entrance: the gate to the abbattoir. Other sacrificers take the sheep without entering through the gate; robbers and thieves, they are not prepared to carry out the sacrificial lynching themselves, but pick off sheep for sacrifice from a safe distance. When they hear the wrath of the lynch mob coming close, they run away. But the Good Shepherd is happy to go through the gate, occupying the space of the sacrificial lynching for his sheep, who thereafter know that it is not a trap; they will always be able to hear his voice and follow him in and out.

Joshua in his pride and haughtiness believes that Ai will be easy for him to conquer. The reports from the spies say the city is small. With apparent prompting from the spies Joshua decides only a small number of people need toil at Ai, while the rest can stay back in the Israelite camp and continue the celebration of the victory at Jericho. Joshua declares that the good times and partying will continue, only the lowly need to toil and risk their lives at Ai. So Joshua sends the lowly, the people who don't quite fit in, to venture through the sacrificial machinery at Ai. Joshua the shepherd of Israelites declares that the people he is sending out the toil through the sacrificial machinery at Ai are not worth his attention. He doesn't care about them, he is too good to go out with them. He's still enjoying the victory at Jericho with his friends. Can't interrupt his partying with Rahab and all the gold and silver he's collected to go out and risk his life with the unpleasant lower classes.

The Israelites were defeated at Ai. They fled and thirty-six men were killed. "The hearts of the people melted and turned to water." They showed as much interest in taking Ai as Joshua did. If Joshua was going to sit back and party, why should they risk life and limb to take Ai. Joshua is just going to take all the gold anyway.

After the defeat Joshua gets all melodramatic like a typical scapegoater. The defeat couldn't possibly be his fault. He's a slick politician, victories belong to him, defeats belong to the people and the scapegoats. The manifest destiny ideologue asks God/tells the people resentfully "Why have you brought this people across the Jordan at all, to hand us over to the Amorites so as to destroy us?" He can't admit that the defeat at Ai was a leadership failure. He questions the people's courage and terrorizes them with the idea that the Amorites will come and slaughter them and their children.

People are angry at Joshua. They resent Joshua. Their relatives have been killed because of Joshua's lack of leadership. There may be actual violence occurring between the Joshua and anti-Joshua partisans. The bonds of the Israelite community are dissolving. The covenant held all things together. Joshua was man responsible for holding the people together. To lead them all out and to lead them all back. Joshua has broken the covenant, people have been killed. The whole community is on the verge of self-destruction. They don't love Yahweh, the people need a scapegoat to renew the covenant. Joshua is a substitute for the entire community. It's either his death or the death of the community. Joshua realizes this. The community at this point is under the wrath of god. Joshua is refusing to provide himself as a scapegoat.

Joshua realizes that all you need is one person to be a substitute for the whole community. To absorb the wrath that is beginning to boil in the people. So in a highly ritualized drama, Joshua parades the entire community before him, by allowing the people to receive a "not guilty" from him he absorbs their sin and takes it away. Family after family parades before Joshua, he is absorbing their sin, freeing them from the consequences of their own wrath. It doesn't matter if Achan actually had loot or not, he is a scapegoat. Then finally Achan is chosen. The people have never liked Achan, some say he was a criminal, or just didn't like his unpleasant personality. After the parade of families Joshua now has absorbed and possesses in his person all the sins of the Israelites. The second Joshua, Jesus, at this point refused to lay all sin on someone elses head. This Joshua finds a surrogate victim in Achan. Joshua is a substitute for the entire community, Achan is a substitute for Joshua. Joshua is the high priest, Achan is the lamb. Joshua places the sins of the community onto the head of Achan. Achan whether he likes it or not has become the servant of the lord. The bonds of the community are now his responsibility. He will literally unite and draw all the Israelites to him. He is the scapegoat. He takes their sins away. They can focus their hatred on Achan instead of each other. They will all become friends again. Joshua now has provided a scapegoat for the community. All the responsibility for defeat has been placed on Achan, the rest of the people have received a big "not guilty".

The Israelites go on to take Ai with a much larger force than the first time. This time Joshua made sure to lead the way.

Achan is a Scapegoat

I don't understand how one can defend and justify the murder/lynching of Achan. Achan was a scapegoat. Achan was killed for the sins/shortcomings of Joshua. It defies understanding how people can believe that Achan by allegedly hoarding plunder can have brought about the defeat at Ai. It is superstition to believe that Achan somehow caused the defeat at Ai.

It's funny that immediately after the brutal lynching and homicide of Achan and his family that Joshua lifts the ban. (Joshua 8:2 and 8:27)

The atonement ritual in Joshua 7 only needed to identify one victim, that is why they drew lots. Why didn't Joshua just look for the ban? Everybody had the ban. Joshua needed someone to take his place in the atonement ritual and this someone was Achan. Joshua knew Achan would make the perfect scapegoat. Achan wasn't liked, the people resented him. If Achan was chosen, no one would defend him.

The story of Achan is a story about lynch mob murder. Achan is the hero of the story. He takes the sins of the people upon himself and bears them away. Like the servant in Isaiah 53, he is the bond of the community. His death and destruction holds the community to together. Achan is the atonement sacrifice. He could point the finger at all the others who have hoarded plunder. He could have pointed fingers at Joshua, who is the true villain in this story. Joshua's pride and hubris was what actually caused the defeat at Ai.

Achan by accepting death and bearing the sins of his accusers displays the love of God. Achan is similar to the servant, he has poured his soul out as a sin offering for Joshua and the people of Israel. Upon Achan was the chastisement that made the people whole. The people laid all their frustrations and sins upon Achan. The people healed themselves by throwing stones at Achan. By collectively stoning Achan the people stopped fighting amongst themselves and united around the shared murder of Achan. The people became good, while they made Achan into evil. Achan apparently accepted this, in similar fashion as the servant and subsequently Jesus did.

To believe that Achan caused the defeat at Ai is to believe in a pagan god. It is to believe in a god similar to the Greek god Dionysus. It is to believe in a god that takes great joy in murder and hatred. It is to believe in a god that only hates certain sins, and a god that makes the innocent pay for the sins of the strong and the many. Achan is innocent of causing the defeat at Ai. It is quite ludicrous to argue that Achan had anything, at all, to do with the defeat atAi. Achan is a classic scapegoat. Achan was a human sacrifice.

We must remember that Yahweh is Jesus. Jesus died in a similar fashion to the way Achan died. Joshua was not a true leader/king. Jesus/Yahweh would not have murdered Achan. Jesus/Yahweh was standing beside Achan while he was being murdered by an angry, vengeful and sin-filled mob.
Jesus/Yahweh is light/life and in Him is no darkness/death at all. Jesus bears the consequence of our sin. The tough thing is that he asks us to bear the sin and consequences of the sin for others. Jesus is love. He doesn't want to kill you. He doesn't want you to kill yourself, but if you don't want to love your neighbor this is what will happen. Your sin has consequence. Sin has its own consequences. Sin is its own punishment. God's wrath is the giving up of people to the consequences of their own sins.

Why can't we love and bear the sin of our neighbor? Why do we keep looking for an Achan or a Jesus to murder.

Achan

I've previously discussed Achan here, here, and here. The passage was also recently discussed at Grow Mercy.

The standard conservative/literal reading of Joshua 7 is that Achan caused the defeat at Ai and that it was right and moral for Achan to be brutally killed with stones and fire.

Of course the 21st century mind sees no connection between Achan allegedly taking some spoils from Jericho and the defeat at Ai.

Achan is a precursor or an anticipation of the Christ figure. He is a man innocent of the crime which he is accused. He did not cause the defeat at Ai. I gotta tell you I don't trust any stories that come from lynch mobs. This story is being told by a lynch mob. Achan's confession may be like the confessions in Soviet show trials. This is a story about the formation of group unanimity and renewing the bonds of the group with a blood sacrifice.

Achan was murdered. Achan was viciously killed by a lynch mob. Regardless of how the so-called literalists want us to understand this text, God was on the side of Achan and not the lynch mob.

Joshua was supposed to be a "Shepherd". He was not a good "Shepherd. Jesus was a good shepherd, he didn't lose any of His sheep. In this story Joshua makes a human sacrifice of one of his sheep. Achan is sacrificed for group unity. Achan is sacrificed in Joshua's place. Jesus is the new Joshua. Jesus doesn't kill any of his sheep to save Himself.

After the defeat at Ai the group was on the verge of disintegration. Joshua knew that because as the leader he would sooner or later himself be sacrificed to restore group unity. Joshua wasn't a good shepherd. He knew that someone had to die, and it wasn't going to be him. He needed a scapegoat. Achan had all the signs of a scapegoat. Achan was not a man well-liked by the people. A sinner and hardened criminal. He didn't have friends. If Joshua pointed the finger at Achan, no one would come to his defense. It may have been a long time that people had been wishing for Achan's death. Joshua knew it was either him or Achan.

Numbers 27:15-21 would lead one to believe that the cause of the defeat at Ai was that Joshua did not lead his people into battle. In this section God commands Joshua to march at the head of the army. Now I think you could make a pretty good case that Joshua was in fact responsible for the defeat at Ai. Joshua was supposed to lead the army into battle, to "go out before them".
From the Legends of the Jews:

"He, however shall be a man 'which may go out before them,' who, unlike the kings of the heathens, that send their legions to war but themselves remain at home, shall himself lead Israel to war. But he shall also be at man 'which may come in before them;' may it be granted him to see the number of those returning from war no less than that of those going into war. "O Lord of the world!" continued Moses, "Thou hast led Israel out of Egypt, not to punish them for their sins, but to forgive them, and thou has not led them out of Egypt that they may be without leaders, but that they may indeed have leaders..."

Joshua is not the good shepherd, not only has he lost sheep, but he has intentionally sacrificed one. Did he stay at home out of pride and hubris?

Achan, if we believe what the text says, has realized that he is the lamb that will be sacrificed for group unity. He doesn't point the finger at others, he takes Joshua's sins and the community's sins upon himself and the community is cleansed and renewed by the death of Achan. Achan removes the sin of the community. The community has united around the dead and brutalized body of Achan. This story has many similarities with Isaiah 53. The Achan story is a real-life atonement event. Stories like Achan's are what underlie the Atonement ritual. Stories similar to this underlie the Gospels and what Jesus is doing. Jesus is uniting humanity around His broken body. He allows His body to be broken so that others won't have to be.

Isaiah 53:4 and Penal Substitutionary Atonement

It's been a while since my last post, I've been doing research for a novel I hope to someday write. I know, I have weird hobbies, I spend my time going back and forth between amateur theologian and amateur, aspiring novelist, but it keeps me busy.

I've also been reading a new blog, The Rebel God, Derek Flood has been doing a pretty good job struggling with the atonement.

Now on to today's brief observation.

Matthew 8:16-17 quotes from Isaiah 53:4

16When the even was come, they brought unto him many that were possessed with devils: and he cast out the spirits with his word, and healed all that were sick:

17That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses.

Penal substitutionary atonement states that God the Father laid the sins on Jesus, but I think what the Gospel of Matthew is saying here in it's quotation of Isaiah 53:4 contradicts this. The people brought their sicknesses, sins and infirmities to Jesus and Jesus took them and absorbed them. He bore/forgave their sins. God the father doesn't seem involved with any kind of laying on of sins here.

Luke 5:21 says:
21And the scribes and the Pharisees began to reason, saying, Who is this which speaketh blasphemies? Who can forgive sins, but God alone?

If penal substitution is the law, how can sins be forgiven before the penalty has been paid. How can Jesus forgive sins anyway, if it is God the Father who needs to be paid?

Jesus removed ritual impurites from the people. He restored the outcasts to the community. The cleansing of lepers, and the bleeding woman are examples. As Margaret Barker says, "the miracles were not general acts of healing; Jesus did not mend broken bones. The miracles all have a ritual significance and present Jesus as the restoring high priest. Paul presents the same ideas in a different way; the work of Christ brings sinners back into the community (he uses the term 'justification') and then no supernatural powers are ever again able to separate them and cut them off."

Again you must read Margaret Barker's essay on the atonement. She writes:

Third, there is additional information about the scapegoat in the Mishnah; people pulled out the goat’s hair as it was led away (m.Yoma 6.4). In the Epistle of Barnabas42 there is a quotation from an unknown source about the scapegoat: ‘Spit on it, all of you, thrust your goads into it, wreathe its head with scarlet wool and let it be driven into the desert’ (Barn.7). The goat suffered the fate of the Servant: ‘I gave my back to the smiters and my cheeks to those who pulled out the beard. I hid not my face from shame and spitting (Isa.50.6); and ‘He was pierced for our transgressions’ (Isa.53.5). Barnabas continues: ‘When they see him (Jesus) coming on the Day, they are going to be struck with terror at the manifest parallel
between him and the goat.’ The reference is to the future coming of the LORD to his people. This is another Servant motif; the recognition of who the Servant is43. Barnabas, too, associates the scapegoat with the Day of the LORD: ‘They shall see him on that Day, clad to the ankles in his red woollen robe, and will say, ‘Is this not he whom we once crucified and mocked and pierced and spat upon?’ (Barn.7).

On Isaiah 53 she writes this:

Second, we see that Isaiah 53 could have been inspired by the Day of Atonement ritual. A few points must suffice.
1. ‘He shall startle many nations’ (Isai.52.15); yazzeh, the apparently untranslatable verb means ‘sprinkle’ in the atonement ritual (Lev.16.19). The Servant figure does not ‘startle’ many peoples; the original Hebrew says he ‘sprinkles’36.
2. The Servant ‘carries’ the people’s sicknesses or weaknesses (Isa.53.4).
3. The Servant has been wounded for their transgressions. Wounded, hll, is a word which carries both the meanings required by Mary Douglas’s theory of atonement, viz. to pierce or to defile.
4. ‘Upon him was the chastisement that made us whole’ (Isa.53.5b) can also be translated ‘The covenant bond of our peace was his responsibility’37. ‘With his stripes, hbrt, 38we are healed’ would then become ‘By his joining us together we are healed’, forming a parallel to mwsr, covenant bond. The primary meaning of hbr is to unite, join together.
5. The Servant pours out his soul/life as a sin offering, `sm (Isa.53.19). The `sm is,
according to Milgrom, the sacrifice which redresses the m`l, which is either sacrilege
against holy things or violation of the covenant.39 The soul/life was in the blood of the sacrifice, hence it was poured out.
All this suggests that the Servant figure was modelled on the one who performed the
atonement rites in the first temple40. This figure appears in Enoch’s Similitudes in his heavenly aspect as the Man, the Anointed, the Chosen One. In the ritual of the second temple, the figure became two goats: one bearing the sins away and the life/blood of the other being taken into the holy of holies where the ark, the throne had been41.

In pagan/primitive religion the people always believed that the god/person they just lynched restored peace and unity to the community through his beneficence and foreknowledge. It was his plan to be killed by the lynch mob so that the community could be united. This is how the lynch mob saw things. It wasn't the person that was brutally murdered that united them, it was their own collective violence directed toward the scapegoat.

I think it was Nietzsche that said Christianity is structurally the same as pagan religion. In Christianity the lynchers hear the cock crow. Jesus is not turned into a minor deity because people realize what they have done. They killed him, they were responsible for His death. Jesus poured his blood and soul out to them. He becomes the God of Love and Forgiveness who has bore/forgave their sins. So unlike pagan religions, where the people have to constantly reenact the original lynching by finding new scapegoats, Christians must follow Jesus and bear/forgive the sins of others and no longer give into violence and make more scapegoats.

Iraq War and Penal Substitutionary Atonement

It is my prediction that the War on Iraq will finally make Penal Substitutionary Atonement untenable to all but the most strident ideologues.

Jesus was killed by an angry mob.

Iraq War was launched by an illogical, angry mob.

In both cases evidence didn't matter. Evidence wasn't even considered. Paranoia, hatred and violence ruled. It was better for someone else to die, and Iraq's case a lot of somebody elses, than for our self-esteem to take a hit.

Those who wish for death want to be lost in the crowd. They want to be lost in the waters of chaos at the beginning of Genesis. Yahweh emerged from the Temple carrying His blood, killed by the violence of those who inhabit the waters, and Yahweh established dry ground. Jesus was light. We must take responsibility for our own violence. The mob killed Jesus and the mob continues to kill Jesus. If you kill the least of these you kill Jesus. We have killed children in Iraq. How many children must die for American self-esteem?

We have exported our violence to Iraq, and now Iraq is filled with violence. For too long talk-radio and the propaganda of Conservatism has fomented hatred. Hatred of the Liberal, hatred of our neighbors who we resent, and who seem to be always more insidiously powerful.
Hatred, endless hatred and resentment. Behind hatred is the wish to kill and murder. Americans are not allowed to kill each other. Talk radio propaganda has built up hatred in the Conservative soul. They couldn't actually kill Liberals, because well first of all they don't exist, and secondly because if they should find one of these mythical creatures U.S. law prevents murder. A substitute had to be found. This substitute was Iraq. This substitute had to be weak. Iraq was the target because it couldn't fight back and no one would defend her. We could have our way with the people of Iraq. They were designated as evil. It was now Ok to kill them, because they were evil, and we told ourselves that we were at war. Murder, we tell ourselves, is perfectly fine during war. During war we break things and sometimes innocent people and children get killed, and burned alive and dismembered. This was Ok because it was war, and also we wouldn't be suffering the consequences.

It's always fun to gang up on the little guy and kick his ass. It's better his ass than mine. Camarderie with the big and serious people. War is serious business.

The War on Iraq was waged for no reason. Sure Saddam was responsible for a lot bad things, and because Saddam is guilty of bad things this gave us a free pass to commit bad things of our own. Always comparing ourselves to someone else. War propagandists always want us to base our behaviour on the behaviour of same bad and evil guy. Saddam killed his own people, so that makes it OK for us to kill his people too.

Moral Relativism. Conservativism is moral relativism. War is murder. Murder is a sin. We must repent of murder.

God the Father handed Yahweh/Jesus over to us. Instead of following the commandments we murdered the author of life. We always believe the crowd is in the right and the person being killed is in wrong. In Penal Substitutionary Atonement God is no different than Satan. Satan is violent and murderous, but God is violent and murderous to a much greater degree. If there's anything that we respect it is authoritative violence. In Penal Substitutionary Atonement God is the Lynch Mob who authoritatively kills the designated victim/victims.

What do we say? Penal Substitutionary Atonement makes no sense. God handed over the Iraqi people to us, and instead of dealing with them with love and mercy we demand their deaths. Of course, the war propagandists burnt a whole bunch of incense and clouded the whole thing in mystery and told us that we were only killing bad guys and that we were doing a great and noble thing by liberating Iraq. As Christians we know, and the War on Iraq has made perfectly clear, is that we longed for the death of the innocent children, we longed for their fiery deaths, their dismemberment and rape. This is War. War is Hell. Christianity believes in a literal Hell. There's no need to spiritualize it into some long distant future last judgment. People are living in Hell right now. The War on Iraq is Hell. Hell inhabits people who want to kill, who demand sacrifices to whatever god they worship.

Penal substitutionary atonement should have fallen apart after Hiroshima/Nagasaki and the Nazi death camps. Humans are responsible for violence and murder. Humans were perfectly capable all on their own of murdering Jesus. It was a human decision that Jesus must die. Humans are lost in sin. Jesus on the Cross is the Last Judgment. Jesus on the Cross is the Light in Genesis 1:3. Death and blood and resurrection and return from the dead of Jesus create the world.

God is Love. Penal Substitutionary Atonement doesn't understand Love. Love for them can only be understood in terms of inflicting violence on someone. God doesn't scream for blood, humans do.

Iraq was a sacrifice to our god. Two goats. George W. Bush is the High Priest. He places the sins of the community on the head of Iraq and sends them over the cliff in the wilderness. Our soldiers are the second goat who is sacrificed. The soldiers are a substitute for George W. Bush, who is a substitute for us. The blood of our soldiers was supposed to renew our society and heal the wounds of Liberal disintegration.

Atonement and Murder

A blogger by the name of Adrian Warnock is a little confused, a little disoriented, he believes that God the Father/the Most High God killed Yahweh, the Lord. A murder has taken place and he's trying to find the culprit. He thinks he has discovered the murderer. Astoundingly the person, or more appropriately the Godhead he accuses is none other than God the Father, the Most High God, the guy, the most esteemed personage who came up with the whole "thou shalt not murder" thing.

Mr. Warnock says:

Until he can understand why we think God killing his son is good news, I do not have any confidence that he will be able to accept the gospel.

This is the kind of thing I think we can rightly call neo-paganism. In pre-Christian pagan religions gods organized their own mob lynchings so that they could bring peace and salvation to their communities. We are the benefactors of 2000 years of Christianity, we now know that the violent laying of our sins on another person is wrong. We now know, because of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, that a mob lynching which was previously believed to have been orchestrated by a god to bring peace/salvation is not a salvific act by that god, but murder on the part of the lynch mob.

I think in the penal substitutionary atonement community that there is a belief that our sins, the sins we are committing today, in some way brought about the death of Christ. Matthew 25, "Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me." I think we can say that if you kill your neighbor, you are killing Christ. If you support the bombing of Iraq, the bombing of Iraqi children, you support the bombing of Christ. We all have our rationalizations about the people we want killed, about how they're really evil, and about how it had to be done and that we had no other choice. We aren't really responsible, it was actually God punishing the designated evil doer. We aren't like those pagans and ancient people who seemed to kill arbitrarily our victims our really evil they deserve it. I'm rambling a little.

God the Father didn't place any sin on Jesus, Jesus absorbed our sin, he took our sins from us, he was a sin magnet. In times of crisis people look for vulnerable people to place their sins and conflict on, to be a substitute. People can't kick their boss, but they can take their frustrations out on their dog, or their wife or their kids. I keep going back to "The Horrible Miracle of Appolonius of Tyana". The poor old mendicant was not a plague demon, he was a poor old mendicant who was murdered. This was miracle, there is no reason to think that this is not a true story. There was crisis, a plague, a lot of conflict and violence in the society. The townspeople placed their sins on this poor old mendicant. They stoned him and murdered him, an innocent man, but they were healed, the plague and the violence disappeared. Each stone was a sin that was laid on upon this innocent scapegoat. The townsfolk believed he was a demon, Christianity says he was human and that a murder was committed.

I'm rambling, but violence is human violence, violent wrath is human wrath. Christ was murdered by humans, we apparently, and almost literally, continue to murder Him through our refusal to take responsibility for our own violence and sin.

Achan Redux

I think I’m going to hold off on anymore discussion regarding Achan because I would be heading off into territory entirely too broad for me to handle intelligently right now. I’m learning a lot about the context of the Deuteronomistic History and King Josiah. The New Interpreter’s Bible/Commentary, the section on Joshua, does a good job of explaining some of the theories regarding the composition of the Book of Joshua and the rest of the Deuteronomistic History.

A couple of notes though, in case some of you aren’t aware of these things.

1. In Hebrew the names Joshua and Jesus are the same.


2. The sacred lots, the Urim and the Thummim were kept in the breastplate of the high priest. Were these oracles used by the High Priest/Joshua to determine the guilty party?

Old Testament study, really Biblical study in general, is very interesting right now. There is so much to learn about the formation of Biblical literature. The more we learn about the formation and composition of Biblical and ancient Jewish literature, the more we’ll learn about the meaning of stories such as Achan’s.