Blasphemy of the Holy Spirit: Speaking against our common Holy Wind

Many people still wonder about whether they've infringed upon something called "the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit."  A nebulous, but serious sounding act.  Translation is part of the problem. Here's how the new translation of Matthew, Jesus and the Presence of Mystery (JPM) has it:

Therefore I tell you, every failure and harmful word can go away from  us,
      but continual harmful words against our very Wind never really leave us.
Whoever speaks a harmful word against one child of humanity,
      it can go away from them.
but whoever speaks against our common Holy Wind, it never really leaves them,
      not in this stage of our unconditional being, nor in the next.
                                                                                                     Matthew Chapter 12

This translation from the 12th chapter of Matthew is strikingly different than many conventional renderings.  Yet, the language remains literal, though alternative in the way it conveys the original wording.  Rather than simply transliterate the Greek word BLASPHEMEO as blasphemy, JPM actually translates.  That is, we "speak against" or, if present tense, "continual harmful words."  Similarly, PNEUMA can be "spirit", but is more literally "wind."  And the etymology of "age" lies in the sense in which it is "unconditional being."  Though the phrase "blasphemy of the Holy Spirit" is not clear or helpful in today's cultural context, it is clear that "speaking against our common Holy Wind" still has important consequences in our lives.

Jesus and the Presence of Mystery

In the next few days  we'll announce the publication of a new translation of the Book of Matthew.  Jesus and the Presence of Mystery is based on the earlier translations of the Etymological New Testament (an ultra-literal, stilted English translation) and on The Immanence Bible.

There is a clear need for essentially literal translation of scripture that is also less anthropomorphic than our traditional renderings.  In Jesus and the Presence of Mystery (JPM), the Greek word THEOS is translated by the English word Mystery rather than by God.  The etymology of our English word God is quite distinct from that of its Greek counterpart, THEOS.  The goal is to set forth Jesus' life and teachings with fresh wording that uses much less of the traditional religious language.  Thus we hear Jesus teach, in the Sermon on the Mount, about "the realm of upward vision" rather than "the kingdom of heaven."  This new version often employs very literal translation, e.g. "upward vision" for OURANOS, to allow the reader to perhaps listen more deeply to the teaching of Jesus of Nazareth.

2 Samuel 22:6 The Present Reality of Hell

"The sorrows of hell compassed me about; the snares of death prevented me;"

 

As the psalmist considered a very rough time in his life, he remembered how it felt when attacked by those who hated him.  It felt like "waves of death" were breaking over him (in verse 5) and then, in this verse, he says that the "sorrows of hell" surrounded him completely.  And, the "snares of death" were preceding him.  A very rough time indeed.

 

In fact, almost all of the references in the Authorized KJV to "hell" are describing our current struggles in life.  When some smug types began preaching their hate, it can become hellish rather quickly.  And the experience feels all encompassing: everything about life seems pathetic and miserable when others demean us.  If God is love, then the opposite impulse, destructive hatred, is the embodiment of hell. Thankfully, the psalmist also experiences deliverance from the sorrows of hell as this "psalm" within 2 Samuel continues.   

Deuteronomy 32:22

For a fire is kindled in mine anger, and shall burn unto the lowest hell, and shall consume the earth with her increase, and set on fire the foundations of the mountains.

Even the most significant and immovable things in my life, the mountains of my existence, seem unstable at their very foundation. The foundational ideas and values that permeate society and drive our culture, these massive mountains are burning.  A culture begins to crumble when that which underlies it begins to disintegrate.  And that is precisely the problem: once unleashed within a society, hell begins to "consume the earth."  As the preaching of hatred of the other increases, the very foundations of our larger life are set on fire by hell.

And if the roots of the mountains can burn, then the earth itself can be consumed by hell.  May we learn both the joy of vigorous, healthy argumentation AND the joy of civilized respect for honest disagreement.  For only through self-respect that grows to deep respect for others, can the fires of hell begin to be assuaged within a society.

Is God Empirically Quantifiable? Or...how not to find God by searching.

Canst thou by searching find out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty to perfection?

It is as high as heaven; what canst thou do? Deeper than hell: what canst thou know?

Job 11

 

 

Indeed!  Can we find God by searching?  Is God empirically quantifiable?  Or is God a subjective experience of humanity?  Is this divine immanence something that we learn within our human society and personal experience?

 

Note that, in this passage from Job, it is the knowledge of the divine itself that is as high as heaven…and deeper than hell. Thus the rhetorical question, but one very worthy of consideration: What canst thou know?

 

What can we know?  This is not a question to be dismissed in a cavalier manner.  It is not intended to be answered by quoting other biblical passages as a propositional response.  To do so is to miss the point.  God is something not directly knowable, or even searchable, in the way we think of verifiable knowledge.  The book of Job is actually better at asking some intriguing questions than at providing pat answers. And Job 11 is just one group of those questions.

 

Yes, God is in heaven and, we now know, in hell too.  But there is something else as high as heaven and actually deeper than hell.  And that is the finding out of God.  God is found in our most sublime experiences of life.  God is found in our deepest tragedies of life.  We live and move in this divine immanence.  We live and move in connection with others.  I cannot “find out God” by direct search, by empirical enquiry.  There is no essence to distill nor double blind test to devise.  By whatever name, this presence in homo sapiens is a light that we all know.  God is light.  God is love.  Biblical quotations and allusions to a deeper truth and experience.

 

Whether it is Ursala Goodenough writing The Sacred Depths of Nature or John Calvin writing his Institutes of the Christian Religion or the new Bible translation Jesus and the Presence of Mystery or even Rumi dancing in his Sufi way toward divine contemplation, we are all feeling our way to both name and to describe this indwelling sense that we often feel. Even Richard Dawkins’ affection for his bumper sticker “Atheists for Jesus” reflects this same impulse. Sunsets radiating beauty; babies cooing in our arms; or knowing peace in the midst of a very tough situation: these are all part of that searching out of our sense of what the divine-human mystery might be.

 

But when we misapprehend a figure of speech, when we literally anthropomorphize the idea of God, then we have rendered ourselves incapable of finding the real presence of that which we so loudly proclaim and so fervently believe.  The result is evident around us: the strong need of so many to control others, to conform them to the anthropomorphized entity that they have so sincerely and so misguidedly created.

Psalm 1:3,4

Psalm 1:3-4

Text

And they shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth its fruit in its season. Its leaf also shall not wither and whatsoever they do shall prosper. The unloving are not so, but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away.

Text Note

• Inherent in the inclusive method of translation is the use of plural pronouns when appropriate. So, in the Psalms for Meditation, "they" is often used rather than "he" as in the 1611 KJV. This common English convention is frequent throughout the K-JIV. Ironically, it is often true that the Hebrew does not use a gender specific pronoun. The same is true of the Greek NT as well.

Reflection

Though I've transitioned from conservative evangelical/anabaptist (mouthful!) to unprogrammed Friend, I feel the same rootedness in the spirit. I feel the blessing of being planted by rivers of water. I've left behind a lot of my strident doctrinal positions, but I appreciate the ongoing sense of stability that trust in Love provides. Without that Love as guide, my modern life becomes so superficial that I really am as chaff driven by wind: empty and all over the place!

Is God in Hell?

If I ascend into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.

Psalm 139

That God inhabits heaven is not doubted.  If, like the Psalmist, I ascend into heaven, it is certain that “thou art there.”  But what of those who take up residence in hell?  If I make my bed in hell, what will I find?

At this juncture in American history, this is the critical doctrine of the Bible.  

Our culture has become permeated with a kind of Biblical naiveté that wouldn’t know a figure of speech if it were turned into a pillar of salt.  A hyper-anthropomorphism has so distorted our conception of God that we embrace simplistic views of scripture that are contrary to the very genre of the biblical passage we pretend to explain.   So Genesis Chapter 1 becomes a detailed creation manual of 24 hour time periods, without regard for its literary type.

At the time of the Revolutionary War, church membership in the colonies was less than a fifth of the population.  Today that number is almost two thirds of our citizenry.  Even taking into account those early Americans who were devout, but not church members, the two century trend line of increasing formal religious participation is clear.  We are more formally devout than we’ve ever been!

And yet the oft lamented fact of our biblical illiteracy is strikingly true.  Too often, those who profess their faith in the most determined manner, are obviously unaware of the real nature of the Bible they claim to love. 

Nowhere is this more true than in the use of figures of speech within the various biblical genres.

Because we are anthropomorphs, we speak of the divine presence in an anthropomorphic way.  Though the Bible states that God is not literally male (1 Sam 15:29), we use anthropomorphic pronouns that figuratively make “him” just that.  Of course that is fine, as long as we are aware of what we are doing.  It is only when our anthropomorphic language becomes our literal theological model and absolute frame of reference that a real problem begins.

God is spirit (or literally “wind”) as Jesus noted in John 4.  The divine presence is there in our innermost being and flows up with joy (John 7).  Humanity is connected by this immanence within each of us.  Acts 17 notes Paul, quoting the poets, as saying that it is in this presence that “we live and move and have our being.”  Truly the light is within every person coming into this world (John 1:9).  Whether we are true to this light is another question.  But we are all aware of this mystery of love within us and that joins us together.