Holiness

Second Temple Judaism often viewed holiness as a call to separation from secular society, because that was contaminated and unclean.  However, in the life and teachings of Jesus, we see a dramatic shift in perspective regarding holiness.  This is helpfully captured by Marcus Borg, in his brilliant book, Conflict, Holiness and Politics in the Teachings of Jesus. 

In the teaching of Jesus, holiness, not uncleanness, was understood to be contagious.  Holiness – the power of the holy, of the sacred – was understood as a transforming power, not as a power that needed protection through rigorous separation.  Such is implied in the metaphor of the physician in Mark 2:17 par., set in the context of table fellowship.  Physicians are not overcome by those who were ill, but rather overcome the illness.[1]

 

Borg further notes that, "The viewpoint of the Jesus movement in Palestine is clear: holiness was understood to overpower uncleanness rather than the converse."

This understanding of holiness permeates early Christianity, and has its roots in the teachings of Jesus.  As Borg further notes,

This prodigious modification of holiness in both Paul and the Palestinian church is best explicable as derivative from (and evidence for) the practice of Jesus.  He implicitly modified the understanding of holiness.  No longer was holiness understood to need protection, but as an active force which overcame uncleanness.  The people of God had no need to worry about God’s holiness being contaminated.  In any confrontation it would triumph.[2]

 

Thus, when we study holiness in early Christian writings, we should be careful about what is determinative in our understanding - be it Philo, Qumran, the Pharisees, or other writers from Second Temple Judaism - because Jesus seems to have had the greatest impact on Christian conceptions of holiness. 

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[1] Marcus J. Borg, Conflict, Holiness and Politics in the Teachings of Jesus. (Harrisburg: Trinity International Press, 1998), 147.

[2] Borg, 149.

Justice and Peace

Matt Hosier provides a thoughtful post on War and Peace, offering this penetrating question: *Does the pacifist emphasis on peace, love and reconciliation lead to a neglecting of the equally biblical emphasis upon justice? *

I'm quite sure that the NT vision of Justice is not justice by any means, and there is such a thing as passive resistance (ala Ghandi and Jesus). In fact, in Matt 5:39 Jesus specifically instructs disciples not to engage in violent resistance by using a technical term ἀντιστῆναι. Josephus uses the word with the sense of “violent struggle” 15 out of 17 times. Thus, what Jesus is saying here is that disciples are not to follow the way of violent resistance [like many Jews of the period. cf. Shammaite Pharisees and other messianic movements who started several revolutions] but rather, to follow his path of creative non-violent resistance. Thus, as Richard Hays notes, *Only when the church renounces the way of violence will people see what the Gospel means, because then they will see the way of Jesus re-enacted in the church.*

The book of Revelation provides the strongest support for this position. Rather than taking up arms and engaging in violence, they overcome the beast by peaceful protest in worshipping the Lamb, and laying down their lives. The eschatological vision of Revelation is that God's future will bring vindication and ultimate justice. So the question becomes not *is there not something rather perverse in the tolerance of a tyranny compared to which resistance may be a lesser evil?* But rather, do we trust God? Do we trust God enough to lay down our lives in peaceful protest, knowing that God's future will bring justice and vengeance for the oppressed? The NT commands us never to “repay evil with evil” but instead to “overcome evil with good” (Rom.12:17; cf. I Thess 5:15; I Pet 3:9).