As we’ve been lighting the Advent candles in church this season and the Hanukkah candles in my home, kindling light in the shadows, I have been doing so with a sad heart. In this holy season, with war in the holy land, I know that both the shadow and the light are within me, as well as within those whose violence I condemn.
For me, as a flawed follower of Jesus, as I understand it, I am to grieve all lives lost to violence, and acknowledge the good and the evil in my heart, as in the hearts of those who do violence, and know that with God there is possible a just peace in which our strife can cease.
In order to help us explore what the “Peace of Christ” can mean in this season of preparation for the birth of Christ, let me take us on a biblical journey from Creation to Christ. This journey will chart an evolution in God’s responses to the crises of human violence, according to the Hebrew and Christian scriptures.
Let’s start from the beginning. In the beginning … According to the creation story in the Hebrew scriptures, in Genesis, in the beginning the Holy One Beyond All Name created the world and everything in it, and delighted in its goodness. God made the world and everything in it good and made it for the good. God made humans in God’s own image, and set them in a garden with other creatures, where there was such abundance of nutritious plants and such harmony of life, that bloodshed was not known among any specie of being.
Creation is inherently good, in this view, and its original state is one of peace. Do you feel that, even as a dim echo?
This creation story is very different from the creation stories of the other civilizations that surrounded the ancient Hebrew people in the ancient Middle East. According to those creation stories in the world was created from violent acts, not acts of love. And the world or humanity was despised by the gods from the start, not cherished. According to them, it is not even conceivable that there could be peace, harmony, unity among beings that have inherent goodness and value.
Genesis says the opposite, that in the beginning, what was not conceivable was that there could be anything other than peace, harmony, unity … but then, as the story goes, something changed and it became conceivable that there could be evil apart from good.
As the story goes, the first humans were tempted to want to be like God. So they ate of the one fruit in the garden that was forbidden them, the fruit that gave them knowledge that there could be something other than the good they enjoyed. They discovered the existence of evil. With this knowledge came separation from easy communion with the Holy Creator, separation from the goodness of the earth. From this separation came intense self-consciousness, and shame, and then the desire to have more than others, to be more than others, at the expense of them having less.
This brings us to the first act of violence:
First Reading
From Genesis (4:1-16)
Now the man knew his wife Eve, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, ‘I have produced a man with the help of Yahweh.’ Next she bore his brother Abel. Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, and Cain a tiller of the ground. In the course of time Cain brought to Yahweh an offering of the fruit of the ground, and Abel for his part brought of the firstlings of his flock, their fat portions. And Yahweh had regard for Abel and his offering, but for Cain and his offering he had no regard. So Cain was very angry, and his countenance fell. Yahweh said to Cain, ‘Why are you angry, and why has your countenance fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is lurking at the door; its desire is for you, but you must master it.’
Cain said to his brother Abel, ‘Let us go out to the field.’ And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him. Then Yahweh said to Cain, ‘Where is your brother Abel?’ He said, ‘I do not know; am I my brother’s keeper?’ And Yahweh said, ‘What have you done? Listen; your brother’s blood is crying out to me from the ground! And now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand. When you till the ground, it will no longer yield to you its strength; you will be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth.’ Cain said to Yahweh, ‘My punishment is greater than I can bear! Today you have driven me away from the soil, and I shall be hidden from your face; I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and anyone who meets me may kill me.’ Then Yahweh said to him, ‘Not so! Whoever kills Cain will suffer a sevenfold vengeance.’ And Yahweh put a mark on Cain, so that no one who came upon him would kill him. Then Cain went away from the presence of Yahweh, and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden.
We don’t know the reason for the difference between the responses that Abel and Cain received from God when they presented their offerings. Was it fair? Was it just? Was it arbitrary? Cain does seem to have already been falling out of alignment with God before he made his offering.
What is clear from the story is that a difference existed and that Cain reacted to the difference with resentment and jealousy. From that resentment and jealousy came a desire to use his physical power to annihilate the one he now saw as a rival, his brother.
God tried to intervene. God’s approach to intervention shows that God did not or could not simply force Cain to do the right thing. God honors human free will. So, God intervened, you could say, as a voice of conscience, with a warning, as well as a kind of encouragement that Cain can be the master over sin’s desire over him, if he wants.
Cain didn’t heed this warning.
Cain did the evil deed.
And the fact that it was evil, the fact that the violence is wrong, is made very clear in Genesis: the earth itself condemns the act, in a visceral, primal cry. The result is that Cain is further alienated from the earth, from his family, and from God.
Now, however, the Creator has a terrible problem. Violence has now been unleashed upon the earth. It’s immediately clear it’s highly contagious.
Cain knows that others now will want to kill him, and fears.
Yahweh does not leave Cain to that fate to punish him. Rather, Yahweh responds with what we can call the first divine strategy to contain violence: Yahweh marks Cain with a divine threat, that any who kills him will suffer a sevenfold vengeance. The strategy is for the Divine to threaten to be an overwhelming violent force to dissuade others from using violence.
But does this work? Let’s hear our next reading:
Second Reading
From Genesis (6:1,5-13)
When people began to multiply on the face of the ground … Yahweh saw that the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually. And Yahweh was sorry to have made humankind on the earth, and it grieved God to God’s heart. So Yahweh said, ‘I will blot out from the earth the human beings I have created—people together with animals and creeping things and birds of the air, for I am sorry that I have made them.’ But Noah found favor in the sight of Yahweh.
… Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight, and the earth was filled with violence. And God saw that the earth was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted its ways upon the earth. And God said to Noah, ‘I have determined to make an end of all flesh, for the earth is filled with violence because of them; now I am going to destroy them along with the earth.
The problem of violence only gets worse. It becomes a contagion. This grieved God to the heart. This is not what God created the world for. According to Genesis, God tried doubling down with the strategy of containment through overwhelming violent force. God became that overwhelming violent force and sends a flood to destroy all of life on earth. This is a horrible, catastrophically traumatic tale, that’s not at all the cute Sunday School coloring book event we have somehow made it out to be.
Now Noah, as we know, and his family, had not fallen out of relationship with God. He heard and heeded God’s warning, and prepared to survive the deluge. He rescued enough animals, and survived with his family in an ark, so they could become a remnant that could repopulate the destroyed world.
We pick the story back up after the flood subsided and that remnant of life was released back onto the land…
Third Reading
From Genesis (9:1-13)
God blessed Noah and his sons, and said to them,
‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth. The fear and dread of you shall rest on every animal of the earth, and on every bird of the air, on everything that creeps on the ground, and on all the fish of the sea; into your hand they are delivered. Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you; and just as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything. Only, you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood. For your own lifeblood I will surely require a reckoning: from every animal I will require it and from human beings, each one for the blood of another, I will require a reckoning for human life.
Whoever sheds the blood of a human, by a human shall that person’s blood be shed;
for in his own image God made humankind.
And you, be fruitful and multiply, abound on the earth and multiply in it.’
Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him,
‘As for me, I am establishing my covenant with you and your descendants after you, and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the domestic animals, and every animal of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark. I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.’ God said, ‘This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: I have set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth.
Do you see how God’s approach changes? God accepts that humans are inclined toward evil – from youth, not from birth. There is both the light and the shadow in us, you could say. God is not going to try to use total violent power to eradicate evil, along with all of life. God promises that life will have abundant opportunity to flourish, morally ambiguous as we are.
Rather, God modifies a strategy of containing violence with violence. Whomever kills someone will themselves be put to death, not by God but by other people.
We are given a reason for this life-for-a-life approach: each person bears within themselves a reflection of the image of God. That is why murder is wrong. According to this ethic, taking a life creates a debt that must be paid in kind, with one’s own life.
From this point forward in the Biblical accounts, God’s intervention regarding human violence is mainly through revelation to prophets of ethical laws, enforced through punishment.
Our next reading is from the great lawgiving prophet, Moses, who had revealed to him the ten commandments:
Fourth Reading
From Exodus (20:13-17)
God spoke all these words: I am YHWH our God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; you shall have no other gods before me …
You shall not murder.
You shall not commit adultery.
You shall not steal.
You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or male or female slave, or ox, or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.
These Ten Commandments should be sufficient to prevent the kind of personal strife that leads to bloodshed. In addition, the laws of Moses contain many detailed attempts to prevent the kind of severe economic inequalities and abuses of power that can lead to violent strife. (They also contain plenty of things that we would now not at all consider fair or just. For example, they sanction enslaving human beings. God is still speaking – part of what I’m trying to show here is that human morality has evolved, with God’s help)
But you can see that these laws over all are an inspired attempt to prevent violence and other violations. But will people always obey these laws? Nope.
And what is to be done when they don’t?
The laws of Moses are more than willing to use lethal violence to enforce the laws.
Fifth Readings
From Leviticus (24:16-21)
One who blasphemes the name of Yahweh shall be put to death; the whole congregation shall stone the blasphemer. Aliens as well as citizens, when they blaspheme the Name, shall be put to death. Anyone who kills a human being shall be put to death. Anyone who kills an animal shall make restitution for it, life for life. Anyone who maims another shall suffer the same injury in return: fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth; the injury inflicted is the injury to be suffered. One who kills an animal shall make restitution for it; but one who kills a human being shall be put to death.
From Deuteronomy (22:22)
If a man is caught lying with the wife of another man, both of them shall die, the man who lay with the woman as well as the woman. So you shall purge the evil from Israel.
As you can see, according to the Laws of Moses, the punishment for violating most of the Ten Commandments is nothing short of death. It’s in fact a policy of violent reciprocity: “the injury inflicted is the injury to be suffered.”
Does this solve the problem? Does meeting violence with violence truly “purge the evil” from the land?
Through the Hebrew prophets since Moses, we can see God continue to work through human history – or perhaps it’s humans continuing to evolve in their experience and understanding of the Divine and their application of these experiences to the problems of human affairs.
Here are words from an early Hebrew Prophet, Hosea:
Sixth Reading
From the Prophet Hosea (4:1-3)
Hear the word of Yahweh, O people of Israel; for Yahweh has an indictment against the inhabitants of the land. There is no faithfulness or loyalty, and no knowledge of God in the land. Swearing, lying, and murder, and stealing and adultery break out. Bloodshed follows bloodshed.
Therefore, the land mourns, and all who live in it languish. Together with the wild animals, and the birds of the air, even the fish of the sea are perishing.
Hosea has the moral vision to see clearly into the wrongness of his people’s behavior. He has this moral vision because of his experiences and revelations of God.
Hosea cries out against the kinds of things we find in the Ten Commandments. But he also is horrified by how “bloodshed follows bloodshed:” the vicious cycles of violence. Perhaps a life-for-a-life strategy of punishment in fact contributes to the contagion, rather than contains it?
Just like in Genesis, the land itself mourns. And the consequences are catastrophic.
Should people just accept this all as unavoidable? Why not just accept evil as, well, nothing to actually get to upset about?
The tradition of the ancient Hebrew Prophets continued to produce visionaries that a better way of life is possible, who were also courageous moral voices who condemned corruption, abuse, exploitation, as well as violence. It should not be so, they say. And it need not be so. God reveals through them the possibility and the promise of peace.
Now we arrive at the great prophet Isaiah. We started the service with his vision of the coming of the Prince of Peace. Here is more from what God revealed through him.
Seventh Readings
From the Prophet Isaiah (2:1-5, 17-18)
The word that Isaiah son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem.
In days to come
the mountain of Yahweh’s house
shall be established as the highest of the mountains,
and shall be raised above the hills;
all the nations shall stream to it.
Many peoples shall come and say,
‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of Yahweh,
to the house of the God of Jacob;
that God may teach us God ways
and that we may walk in God’s paths.’
For out of Zion shall go forth instruction,
and the word of Yahweh from Jerusalem.
God shall judge between the nations,
and shall arbitrate for many peoples;
they shall beat their swords into ploughshares,
and their spears into pruning-hooks;
nation shall not lift up sword against nation,
neither shall they learn war any more.
The haughtiness of people shall be humbled,
And the pride of everyone shall be brought low
And the Supreme One alone will be exalted on that day.
Isaiah (9:2-4, 6-7)
“The people walking in darkness have seen a great light. On those living in the land of the shadow of death, a light has dawned… They rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as with joy at sharing out the spoil. For you have shattered the yoke that burdens them, the bar across their shoulder, the rod of their oppressor … For to us a child is born. To us a son is given. Authority will rest upon his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Father of Endless Eons, Prince of Peace”
Amen?
May it be so.
What a gift to humanity, a vision of peace.
God has another gift, the one we Christians look to as the Prince of Peace, Jesus. We can see through Jesus a further evolution in the strategy of God toward human evil, or perhaps it’s an evolution in humanity’s ability to understand the nature of our Creator and who we were created to be.
This brings us to Jesus’ sermon on the mount. Notice how Jesus addresses directly the laws of Moses. He said he didn’t come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it. What does it mean to fulfill the law?
Eighth Reading
From the Gospel of Matthew (5:21-22, 38-45)
[Jesus taught them, saying] ‘You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, “You shall not murder”; and “whoever murders shall be liable to judgement.” But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgement; and if you insult a brother or sister, you will be liable to the council; and if you say, “You fool”, you will be liable to burn in the place of purifying fire.
[…]
‘You have heard that it was said, “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also; and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile. Give to everyone who begs from you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you.
‘You have heard that it was said, “You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.” But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous.
Jesus teaches here a way out of the cycles of violence. There’s the dawning of psychological insight into the emotional roots of violence in anger and retribution. His intervention is to short-circuit the ways that violence begets violence, how we want to respond to the wrongness of violence by responding in kind.
God is indeed doing a new thing here.
As I’ve shared before and I’ll keep repeating, it is a severe mistake to think that Jesus was teaching us to not stand up for our dignity, and for the dignity of others, as children of the living God.
“You have heard that it was said – ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you that you must not react violently against one who is evil; but, if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other to them also.”
Why is it the right cheek?
Those to whom Jesus was speaking to would all likely know what it is like to feel the sting on their right cheek. A common act of violence that social superiors used to discipline social inferiors was a backhanded slap. This meant the back of the right hand of the perpetrator against the right cheek of the victim. This is how masters hit slaves, how Romans hit Jews, how men hit women, how adults hit children.
If the person getting hit on the right cheek hit back, that could well mean the end of their life. Do nothing and, well, that’s what the perpetrator wants you to do. Instead, Jesus says, turn the other cheek, and demand to be hit like an equal.
For the person doing the hitting, this would cause their brain to short circuit. They would be stupefied.
This is asserting one’s own dignity while responding outside the logic of violence and its fight, flight, freeze, perpetrator, victim.
Jesus is uplifting the powers we have for resolving conflicts without perpetuating the cycles of violence.
Ninth Reading
From Paul’s Letter to the Romans (12: 14-21)
Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice; weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another; do not be arrogant, but associate with the lowly; do not claim to be wiser than you are. Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave room for the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay, says Yahweh.” Instead, “if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink, for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
What does this mean for punishment?
An important story that illustrates the new thing that Jesus is doing is from the Gospel of John:
Tenth Reading
From the Gospel of John (8:1-11)
Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. Early in the morning he came again to the temple. All the people came to him and he sat down and began to teach them. The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery; and making her stand before all of them, they said to him, ‘Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?’ They said this to test him, so that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, ‘Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.’ And once again he bent down and wrote on the ground. When they heard it, they went away, one by one, beginning with the elders; and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus straightened up and said to her, ‘Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?’ She said, ‘No one, sir.’ And Jesus said, ‘Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.’
This is the way of mercy, not punishment. This is a way of humility, repentance, rehabilitation, not judgment or condemnation. The shadow and the light is within each of us.
Now, people have kept on sinning since Jesus, Lord knows.
And there continues to be dangers in this world, and the basic need for basic safety.
And Christians through the centuries certainly have committed a tremendous amount of violence in Jesus’ name, way out of proportion with what’s needed for basic safety.
But what the living legacy of Jesus has given to the world, the gift that God has given and continues to give, is a revelation there is a way out of the cycles of violence. Through Jesus, his teaching, his example, his death and resurrection and new life in the Spirit of the communities of his followers – God shows that the Creator of the universe identifies with those who are victims of violence and injustice, and that God is at work in the invitation and challenge to us to grow in compassion and courage. Jesus reveals that God’s love embraces humanity even at our worst, a love that can move us to repentance, and to pleading for God’s help to us to do better.
The spirit of Christ has inspired astonishing developments in humanitarian concern through the centuries and in the possibilities of more just and equitable and peaceful communities. We’re not there, obviously, and painfully.
It’s not our job to complete the work, but neither is it for us to abandon it.
So I pray we may open our hearts to the peace of Christ, surpassing all understanding, let it stand guard over us, as we struggle for a more peaceful and just world.
Thanks be to God.
*Note: Jesus and all his early followers were Jewish par excellence. The insights and inspirations into a more peaceful way of life recounted here are well attested in the Jewish tradition outside of Jesus, especially in early teachings of the rabbinic tradition after the destruction of the second temple. I need to note this because it is an all-too-common antisemitic trope that “The Jewish God is warlike but the Christian God is peaceful.” This is staggeringly ignorant of the Bible and of the complex traditions of both Judaism and Christianity.
Delivered Sunday, December 10, 2023, by Rev. Nathaniel Mahlberg, at the United Church of Christ at Valley Forge
Image: Cubonegro, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
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