How can the historical Jesus and the movement he started inform us today?
In my world’s religion class, I spend a whole section of our time together looking at religion and politics. The question I ask my students to consider is this: “Does religion cause violence?” To put things in context, let’s look at the Palestinian situation from Jesus’ perspective.
Palestine in Jesus’ day was part of the Roman Empire, which controlled its various territories in several ways. In the East (eastern Asia Minor, Syria, Palestine, and Egypt), territories were governed either by kings who were “friends and allies” of Rome (often called “client” kings or, more disparagingly, “puppet” kings) or by governors supported by a Roman army. When Jesus was born, all Jewish Palestine—as well as some of the neighboring Gentile areas—was ruled by Rome’s able “friend and ally” Herod the Great. For Rome, Palestine was important not in itself but because it lay between Syria and Egypt, two of Rome’s most valuable possessions. Rome had legions in both countries but not in Palestine. Roman imperial policy required that Palestine be loyal and peaceful so that it did not undermine Rome’s larger interests. That end was achieved for a long time by permitting Herod to remain king of Judaea (37–4 BCE) and allowing him a free hand in governing his kingdom, as long as the requirements of stability and loyalty were met.
When Herod died shortly after Jesus’ birth, his kingdom was divided into five parts. During Jesus’ public career, the Roman prefect was Pontius Pilate (ruled 26–36 CE). Jesus was politically assassinated in 31 CE. Although nominally in charge of Judaea, Samaria, and Idumaea, the prefect did not govern his area directly. Instead, he relied on local leaders. These leaders would be the infamous Saducees and Pharisees that Jesus rails against.
It is to be noted that the Jews in Palestine at this time were not required to conform to Greco-Roman culture. Rather, they were just expected to behave, be loyal to Ceasar, and pay taxes. From Julius Caesar, Augustus, the Roman Senate, and various city councils came a series of decrees that permitted Jews to keep their own customs, even when they were antithetical to Greco-Roman culture. There is a great line in the Monty Python skit, “What did Rome ever do for us?” from the movie Life of Brian. By and large, things were great. For Jesus however, things were not great. Jesus could see how like in our day, the rich benefitted, the poor was cast aside and how the Jewish religious officials were complicit with the societal problems. For Jesus, the nail in the coffin came when the Jewish religious officials went against Jewish teachings.
The Theology of Christ
Jesus’ last name was not Christ. In a previous post I offered that Jesus was a nobody from nowhere, a backwater town called Nazareth. Nothing is written about him in any first-person accounts. We have no first-person accounts of his life, his teachings, or his occupations. The Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles and much of the New Testament was written 30 –70 years after his death.
In my post, I offer this: John Cobb says something to the effect that Jesus and God had a such a profound relationship with God that one could not tell the difference between where Jesus ended, and divinity began. In this thought, we have what I interpret to be the notion of whadat al wujad, is it Jesus (Being) or What is Jesus (essence).
The whatness is what separates Jesus’ Christness from my own. We are all potential seats of Christ. What Jesus did, what he possessed in his relationship with God transcends any relationship a human has had with the divine ever since. Jesus gets us because God loved us first, knows us and devoted to all of us, regardless of sex, gender, political affiliation, or religious orientation.
To embody our Christ nature is to embody the eternal love of God. Too often, our churches focus heavily on the idea of original sin, but never on original goodness. So good in fact that God said it was very good.
Observations of the Modern Evangelical Movement
Current media today would have you believe that Project 2025 or Agenda 47 is an imminent modern threat that is consuming this current election cycle in America. In reality, the Heritage Foundation has been influencing politics bipartisanly for around 70 years. Kristen Kobes de Muz points out in her book that the events of January 6, 2021, were 100 years in the making.
The current evangelical movement speaking the loudest right now is more in line with a new religion movement than it is a mainline denomination. According to our trusty Wikipedia, new religious movements “also known as alternative spirituality or a new religion, is a religious or spiritual group that has modern origins and is peripheral to its society’s dominant religious culture. NRMs can be novel in origin, or they can be part of a wider religion, in which case they are distinct from pre-existing denominations.” The older language used for these movements are sects and cults. What we are observing now blurs the lines between the two.
According to Robinson and Frye cults and sects have these attributes:
(a) a group of people following a strong, living leader;
(b) a group making absolute claims about the leader’s abilities, character, or knowledge;
(c) a group accepting the leader’s claims;
(d) a member demonstrating complete loyalty to the leader; and
(e) a membership dependent on total willingness to obey the leader
Consider this vs following a mainline denomination: Christianity is a cult/sect of the Jewish faith. Because of its longevity, it has become a religion. Most experts agree that this longevity is in the hundreds of years range. We are in a weird age because governments recognize religions, but not cults. With Christian nationalism, much of the structure that looks cult like is in our government.
Reestablishing an Acts 2 Church
Acts 2:42-47 – The Fellowship of Believers:
They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.
The current Christian nationalist movements and the Project 2025 or Agenda 47 all have something we learned when I was in social work school. They all are focused on the sociological idea of NIMBY and WIIFM. Not in my back yard and what’s in it for me? Much of the rhetoric today focuses on reestablishing and preserving a civic religion that only lasted a small period of time in America. Making America Great again only profits the white, two-person household, married with children, with all debt paid off.
This is in complete contrast to the Acts 2 church. We need to bring Jesus to the people, not the people to Jesus. We need to do ministry with the people in our neighborhoods, not for them because we perceive that we have something better to offer them. Jesus lived with his community and preached with his community. My Methodist ancestors went out to their communities and prayed with, lived with, and worked with their communities. My monastic brothers and sisters have embedded themselves in their communities to educate, pray and work with their communities. All these activities uphold the ministry of Jesus and the mission of the Acts 2 church.
It is time to put aside our us vs them mentality and see all as potential seats of Christ and work to unify the kindom of God.
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