Thursday, February 28, 2013
Born from Above
Fragment of a letter of encouragement to one who defined his religion as the Church of Do
Unto Others as You Would Have Them Do Unto You, and deprecated the exclusivism of certain "Born Again" Christians:
That sounds good to me. A Sufi friend told me of some wise man who said that if you follow just one
practice faithfully, you will become enlightened.
As for being born again,
one has to ask what that means.[We know what it DOESN'T mean: saying
"Jesus is Lord", like a magic formula. Jesus, Himself told us that:
"Not everyone who says to me 'Lord, Lord' will enter the Kingdom...'
"] So what DOES it mean?
It helps to look at the
original Greek, where, as usual, there is some interesting ambiguity. The
passage in which "born again" is found is John 3: 1-21, in which Jesus receives an important night visitor, Nicodemus
the Pharisee, who was apparently an eminent scholar and member of the ruling
religious council (Sanhedrin). Everything turns on the adverb,
"again". As it turns out, this is just as well translated as
"from above". And then Jesus goes on to talk about "perception"
and "light" and "spirit" or "wind". No one
can perceive the Kingdom of God unless s/he is "born
from above."
Modern evangelicals take
this to mean an individual conversion to a particular doctrine or confession of
faith. But while the text may be patient of such an interpretation, it is not
the only possible meaning. Nor is it the most interesting possibility, in
my opinion. Clearly the Birth From Above is some kind of change in that which
is born in the usual way. Something that changes the fundamental nature of the
creature. But what?
How about this: that
which is born of water (amniotic fluid) is selfish. Look at babies. Their new
consciousness is all about "me". Me and my needs. We are born into a
consciousness of separation from everything and everyone else. Tillich called
this "sin" (see attachment). It has nothing to do with immoral
actions; it is the pervasive condition of estrangement from all that is other
to the self. We have to learn - slowly and laboriously - that this sense of
ourselves is an illusion.
In the Gospel story, Jesus gently chides St. Nicodemus, who had come to him by night (i.e.: "in the dark"). "You are a teacher of Israel and you do not know these things?"
To be born of the Spirit
may well mean to enter the vast new consciousness that accepts relatedness as
the fundamental fact of our existence, and which affirms that relationships
must be loving, because otherwise they are death-dealing. We are not born
with this consciousness; we have to acquire it "from above", because
It is a consciousness "higher" than the one we are born with.
As soon as we are able to understand it, we are taught to love our neighbor as
ourselves (the commandment that Jesus elsewhere equated with the love of God)
and to "Do unto others as ye would have them do unto you".
Jesus gently mocks
Nicodemus for not getting it. After all, he is an eminent religious scholar, a
"Teacher of Israel", and this is pretty basic stuff ("earthly
things"). The practice of these commandments leads, sooner or later,
to a kind of mystical enlightenment, in which what Dr. King called the Beloved
Community becomes one's conscious identity. Jesus called this Community
"My Body". All of this happens as a result of the mysterious
operation of that which, in this passage, Jesus called "the
Spirit".
This "Spirit"
(pneuma, wind) "blows wherever it wants", which means it is
not restricted by anything. Most importantly, the Spirit is not confined to
earthly institutions like the Sanhedrin or the Church. The Spirit may be found
in these institutions, but She is certainly not confined to them. Nor is She
confined to particular dogmatic professions, such as "Jesus is Lord".
But didn't Jesus say, in
this same passage, that only those who "believe in Him" can enter the
Kingdom of God? Well, not precisely. He said that fidelity to the "Son of
Man", and to His Name was the necessary qualification.
"Belief" means "trust" and
"fidelity". [Remember that fidelity does NOT mean: simply
to say that He is Lord - even if you really mean it!] "The Son of
Man" refers to the Messiah, and His "Name" is His reputation -
what He stands for - what He means in the world.
What the Messiah means
for the world is liberation, and a completely new social order that Jesus
calls the Kingdom of God: the reign of peace and justice, founded upon
love of God and neighbor (the Golden rule that you accept). Now, if a
person does not think that possible, then, of course, s/he cannot
enter it! Far from some kind of sentence punishing those who do not
call Him Lord, Jesus simply observes the tautology that those who don't place
any trust in the real possibility of a Reign of Peace and Justice cannot enter
it!
So, to be "born
from above" must mean - at the very least - a change in consciousness
characterized by a new hope that the reign of Peace and Justice is
possible on earth. We express that kind of consciousness when we pray, as
He taught us: "your Kingdom come...on earth as in heaven".
