Tuesday, September 24, 2019

Gladly I Follow

in the christian religion, and i suppose in most if not all other religions, we use some language that is archaic and has little meaning in the modern world.  indeed, some of it has negative connotations that were not part of the original sense of the words.  some of this arises from our lack of terms for referring to God, this nameless deity.  the ancients considered the name of God to be so holy that it was unutterable.  we continue this practice today, so we must capitalize the word that refers to this supreme being in order to distinguish that God from other gods that we regard as fictitious.

we use the word "lord" to talk to or about the "real" God or to talk about jesus.  what does "lord" mean?  there is that use of the word in the reference to a nobleman, an honorific that is meaningless in much of the world.  in our religious usage, we are talking about one who is our master, one who rules over us, but in our practice of the ideals arising from belief in equality of all persons, it is unnatural to refer to God or jesus as our lord.  when we do so, we are reverting to an old structure based on feudal understandings of the various ranks and worth of human beings, a caste system that is foreign to democratic ideology.

we speak of the "kingdom of God."  again we are going back to that hierarchy that places one person as the supreme head of state with absolute power over all others.  such terminology would have had great meaning in a world ruled over by a caesar or a king of an ancient empire but for our minds a "kingdom" is anathema.  if the "kingdom of God is at hand," then we have surrendered our right to think, to reason, to make our own decisions.  we are regarding jesus as our "lord," our "master," with God as the ruler who takes over our lives, leaving us powerless.

this language and the beliefs flowing from it are, i think, a stumbling block to practicing the christian religion in a modern, democratic world.  rather than a feudal worldview, we need religious language that sees jesus as our leader rather than our lord and that empowers us to think for ourselves.  we need language that imparts a sense of a God who is the embodiment of love, rather than a dictatorial and sometimes capricious ruler who is the pattern for earthly tyrants.  we christians are disciples of jesus, not his slaves.  we learn from jesus, we don't pledge him our fealty.  perhaps we should simply give God the name Love and realize that each time we commit an act of lovingkindness we are worshiping that source of love.

may we not become stuck in a mindset that is out of place in today's world.  may we realize that language is important and that, when words cease to serve our needs, we should search for better words to use.  may our worship be true worship rather than something based on a pattern that we have come to view as not just antiquated but immoral.  if we are christians, may our aim be to follow jesus and to be expressions of a divine Love.  shalom.

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