Lent 3C: Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18; Luke 13:31-35 “Tears for Jerusalem”
Rev. Dr. Ann Bolson
It is said that about 4000 years ago there was a man named Abraham. From what I can gather, he was like a lot of us when we were teenagers. Like us, he questioned everything and was often an irritation to his family. I guess he had this notion he couldn’t shake that his people were being led astray by gods that didn’t serve them well.
Lots of people lay claim to Abraham and the stories that have developed around him. He is the patriarch of Judaism, Islam and Christianity. Needless to say, various people have various takes on why Abraham is significant. Some people are determined to only study the words about Abraham that have been passed down to them in what they call their “holy scriptures.” Others, and they have been around for millennium, cut themselves some slack and wonder aloud or in writing just what the scriptures might be saying at a deeper level. For a Jew, this speculation and reworking is called midrash. For a Muslim, these writings are called hadith. For Christians, it is called interpretation.
The original writings have different names, too. For Jews they are the Torah. For Muslims they are the Quran. For Christians they are the Bible. Well, there are lots of stories about Abraham, and we don’t have time for all of them today. But just to anchor us in some meaning about him, consider this phrase from the Quran, written as a quote from Abraham, “I am done now with mistaking anything for the One Being. Instead, I turn my face towards the One who created both heaven and earth.” Abraham is the father of monotheism, the notion that there is one God.
Perhaps another story that will help us understand how Abraham’s life is still being pulled into conflict today is important to our understanding. We all mourn for the state of affairs in the Middle East. We all mourn for the fact that Jews and Arabs can’t seem to find peace. It is said that the roots of this conflict go way back to Abraham.
Part of the Abraham story is that Abraham and his wife Sarah wander for years trying to discern his ministry. It was very important in those days for people to bear offspring of their own. Perhaps they had not yet come to realize that all children are sacred and that it is a beautiful thing to raise children where ever we find them, or regardless of who birthed them. So, it was a point of pain and disappointment for Abraham and Sarah not to have an heir to the promises that Abraham felt God was making to him.
Somehow it came to Abraham, perhaps through Sarah, that it would be acceptable for him to be with their slave woman Hagar in order that she might bear his child. All of this came to pass, and much is made of the idea that Sarah was jealous of this occurrence. However, surprises awaited Abraham and Sarah. Sarah bore him a child very, very late in life. This child was named Isaac. The child that Hagar had birthed had been named Ishmael. Hagar and Ishmael were eventually removed from Abraham’s tent and set loose in the desert to fend for themselves.
Well, let’s think about this for a few moments. Does it begin to sound to you that Isaac represents legitimacy in birth, and being the son chosen to be his father’s heir? And how might you feel as a descendant of Abraham and Isaac if this was your perception? Now consider Ishmael. He was cast aside when it was no longer convenient to have him around. How might this cause you to feel as a descendant of Ishmael (which would be a Muslim, of course.)
All of this is still being played out in history today. In our passage from Genesis this morning, God is said to have promised to Abraham, “To your descendants I give this land.”
Although this is a terrible over-generalization, we could say that those people who believe today that Jerusalem and the region surrounding it should belong to the Jews are called “Zionists.” A certain segment of conservative Christians also hold fast to this belief because they do not believe that Jesus will come again until this comes to pass. And so it came to be that Israelis began their occupation of certain parts of Arab lands. And so much bloodshed has followed, some 4000 years after Abraham.
Last week I confessed to those in worship that I was dreading the reading of The Tent of Abraham, a book we have selected for study here at Wild Rose Church. You see, I feared that it was going to present the arguments of Christianity, Judaism and Islam about how each was superior or had a right to “own” Jerusalem. I dreaded reading the book if this was what it would present.
I delved into the three faith presentations last week and was so pleased to find that the Jewish interpretation of Abraham, the only one I have read thus far, was not Zionist. Rabbi Waskow shows much heart and much creativity in his modern reading of the old texts. He says
“…we do not need to be stuck in old ways of hearing the story. In our generation, we can hear it in a different way—one that all the parties can affirm as true to their religion because it accords with their deepest contemporary needs, as well as with their ancient stories and symbols.”
Not so easy, of course, to convince whole peoples and faith communities that an alternative vision, an alternative reading of the story, might fulfill even more of their yearnings than the older versions.
The new twist on the story is simple—and radical. It is to see that God—or Truth, or inevitability, or history, or the dialectic, or any deep force you want to name by any name—promised the land to both sets of Abraham’s descendants.”
I so value Rabbi Waskow’s perspective here, though I take my story another step beyond his. His story (which reads history if you run it together) implies that a male sky-god promised real estate to blood progeny. Yes, it is redemptive that Rabbi Waskow sees the real estate being promised to both Jews and Muslims. But where is there room in his story for those of us who believe that the Kingdom of God is not real estate, but a place in our very being that is one with God and one with creation? I leave you to ponder this.
My pages are running out and we have another stop to make in history. It comes right between Abraham and the modern era. It takes place in a year we call 33 AD, right between Abraham and us. There lived a man, who, like Abraham had something very important to tell his people. Recall that Abraham was ready to kill his young son Isaac as a sacrifice if God so demanded. The other man, who died in about 33 AD, believed that God desired mercy and not sacrifice. He saw the dignity in all people. He invited people from all walks of life to dine at his table of reconciliation and Grace. There were no outcasts in his world. We were all welcomed. Notions such as wealth, position and land ownership had little meaning to him.
Toward the end of his life, he was viewed as a threat to the religious hierarchy of his day. His teachings were viewed as dangerous. He knew that his teachings would cause the death of his body someday, but he persevered. Yet, like every prophet, he grieved when his message was not received. Jerusalem was the symbol of the center of his faith tradition. He knew he would die there. “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!”
Are we willing yet to accept his unconditional love? Are we willing yet to see divinity in all of creation? May it be so. May we gather at the table to find bread for the journey and courage to invite a| < Prev | Next > |
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