One of our more conservative blogger friends has recently pondered the Luke 6 passage that includes the teachings from Jesus...
Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.
Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied.
Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh.
Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you and revile you and spurn your name as evil, on account of the Son of Man! Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven; for so their fathers did to the prophets.
But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation.
Woe to you who are full now, for you shall be hungry.
Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep.
Woe to you, when all people speak well of you, for so their fathers did to the false prophets...
Give to everyone who begs from you.
The blogger asked...
What did Jesus mean when He said "Blessed are the poor" if He didn't mean "You should all be poor and stop trying to help poor people because you're stealing their blessing"?
Are we supposed to aim to be poor, hungry, hated? And are we actually mandated by our Lord to give to everyone who asks of you without considering anything at all (like "Is this a con?" or "Would that be in their best interest?" or "Is there something better that I could do for them?")?
Or are we just supposed to take these things at cold, hard, face value, give up all our possessions, and aim for starvation -- you know, in order to be blessed?
And opened it up for conversation, which hasn't really happened much at his place, so I thought I'd bring it up here.
For my part, I take this fairly literally. I think when Jesus said, "blessed are you who are poor," he meant just that. I don't think he was encouraging us to BE poor necessarily, nor was he suggesting that we ought not HELP the poor (obviously, since he has taught that elsewhere). I think Jesus meant just what he said, "Blessed are the poor..." and "Woe to you who are rich."
Why? Why are the poor blessed in God's eyes? I suspect the point here is that God is with the poor, on the side of the poor, identifies with the poor in very real, very tangible ways.
Conversely, I think "woe to you who are rich" is there because, as the Bible teaches, wealth can be such a trap, such a stumbling block that it can lead to such grief.
I don't think it means that you can't BE rich and a Christian, just that wealth brings with it a certain amount of woe, of sorrow, of things that tend to trip us up.
I think Jesus meant just what he said but we ought be careful not to wrongly extrapolate beyond what he said. Obviously, taking the rest of Jesus' teachings into consideration, we ARE to help the poor, so we'd be wrong to refuse help to the poor because they are "blessed," that would be a wrong extrapolation.
Interpret scripture using scripture. Interpret the individual passage through the whole of scripture. Interpret through the lens of Jesus' teachings.
Doing this, I think we can safely assume Jesus meant just what he said here.
What do you think?
25 comments:
I'm trying to track down the exact phrasing, but I recall blogger Jockeystreet expressing rather well that the primary purpose of theology is to provide a way to escape the plain teachings of the Sermon on the Mount. That understanding would apply here as well.
The more revolutionary and demanding are the words of Jesus, the greater is the need to obfuscate them.
As for me, when I was a Christian, I interpreted this passage as a divine promise of justice in the end times. And the command to give was a command to give.
All these discussions on how we read the Bible, the place of various doctrinal statements in our interpretation and weighing of texts, and no one has mentioned the various critical methods scholars use, not to deconstruct or, as John suggest, escape the plain meaning of the text. Rather, the initial impetus behind what two centuries ago (well, a little less, but you know) was called "the higher criticism" was the recognition that these texts were, like all pieces of writing, time bound, limited, written in dead languages by civilizations that were long dead. Just unpacking the linguistic depths meant getting a handle of the times in which they may have been written. In more recent critical readings, the focus has been more on possible target audiences - to whom as this text addressed and why, with the answer to both hidden in various thematic concerns.
All this is to say that figuring out any particular text includes figuring out whether or not it is thematically related to other concerns the author of the broader text may have had. In the case of the author of Luke/Acts, the related matters of money, wealth, poverty, and the proper uses of such resources by the community called the church are important enough to be considered a particular theme.
Taking this particular section of the sermon on the plain in to consideration, it becomes important to ask all sorts of questions. Similar enough to the Matthean passages called the sermon on the mount, among the questions readers face are: Why are the texts different (Matthew writes "poor in spirit")? What can we discern about the author's attitude toward wealth, poverty, and the stewardship of resources from these passages?
Personally, I am less concerned with the question of whether these are the actual words of Jesus. The authority of Scripture resides in the testimony of the Holy Spirit, so whether Jesus said this, or something similar, or the words never escaped his lips, along with being unanswerable historical questions, are also theologically and exegetically irrelevant. Far more important, at least for me, is how these passages fit in to larger concerns of the author of Luke/Acts, and the even broader matter of the teachings of the early church on these and other matters as we tease them out of the various texts of the Old and New Testaments.
cont'd . . .
In regard to these particular passages, we are indeed faced with questions regarding the status of wealth, how we in the churches are to manage our own money and resources in a faithful manner, what it means to be "blessed" for being poor. Is it a "blessing", and therefore to be sought after, as the Franciscans believed and taught? Is there, perhaps, a dialectic of blessing and curse hidden within the blessings, as the liberation theologians understand it; viz., that it is a blessing as the poor are those for whom God expresses an preferential option, while it is also a curse as its expresses the brokenness of the world, as so much of poverty is the deliberate result of particular social and political and economic policies that impoverish millions of human beings.
It is important to consider these various facets of the matter, that is to say, consider the text from multiple angles in order to bring out the various layers of meaning in a text. It also relativizes our interpretation, keeps us from assuming too much that our reading is the only possible reading. Quite apart from the matter that ours is a reading rooted in a particular historical moment vastly different from, say, that of those who first heard and read these words, that is something that should always be kept in mind; along with the critical task, there is also the hermeneutical choices we make, how we choose to read the text in question.
All of this may seem abstruse and off-point, but this is the way I, for one, approach any text that confronts me. I assume, first of all, the text has something to say to me. I assume it has authority through the intervention of the Holy Spirit. I assume that a bare reading of the words themselves will not yield more than a single layer of meaning; we have to consider that the text is two thousand years old, has been read and heard, wrestled with and interpreted, across the miles and years in all sorts of languages by all sorts of people, and some consideration of how other faith communities in other times and places is important to maintain the integrity of the text.
(Sorry for being all Bubbaesque here)
Saying all that by way of preparation, John is exactly right. We have to be careful not to get so caught up in the mechanics of interpretation that we forget it is the text itself that is the end toward which we are moving; all this other stuff is just a means toward the end of hearing the still, small voice of God buried in the words we read and hear. The radical challenge this, and all, Biblical texts present to us is not to be analyzed away, ignored, nor rationalized away precisely because it is a radical challenge. If we are made uncomfortable by the bare text, a serious, honest, faithful critical reading will only deepen that discomfort, heighten the contradiction between the reality the text presents to us and our own lives, and force upon us uncomfortable questions, in this case not the least of them being how do we North American questions, perhaps the wealthiest generation of human beings in human history, consider a text that asks to consider poverty a blessing.
Is not, perhaps, our very wealth, rather than a sign of God's grace, a sign of our own brokenness? Is it not a mark of the power of original sin that we would blaspheme the God who declares poverty blessed, who would seek to tear down the powerful from their thrones (according to another Lukan passage), by insisting that our material comfort, rather than the poverty of those millions in the world who have nothing, is a sign of Divine favor?
Rather than considering whether or not Jesus actually said this, and whether or not we are to take it literally, for me the question is whether or not we are to read the text seriously. By that, I mean reading it with the understanding that through this text, God is presenting me with a Word buried in all the words that, like the angel confronting Jacob, will wrestle me, and not let up, perhaps even cheat as the angel does with Jacob in order to achieve victory.
All this is to say that it seems to me the overwhelming testimony of Scripture on matters of wealth, poverty, and the stewardship of our resources including our money is that we are to remember that the poor are those for whom God has a particular fondness, what the liberation theologians call "a preferential option for the poor". We, the Body of Christ, are to live that out; we are so to live in order for that to be incarnate in our individual spiritual lives and our corporate practice of ministry.
John...
The more revolutionary and demanding are the words of Jesus, the greater is the need to obfuscate them.
Too often, I suspect this is the case.
Geoffrey, you ought to be a writer. Published writer, I mean. Have you considered that?
It is important to consider these various facets of the matter, that is to say, consider the text from multiple angles in order to bring out the various layers of meaning in a text.
Absolutely. And amen and amen.
For some reason, I have a comment from Stan (from yesterday) that is not showing up in the comments (at least not today). I'll repost it here, but I'm guessing it will show up by the time I do so...
Stan quoted me...
"I don't think it means that you can't BE rich and a Christian, just that wealth brings with it a certain amount of woe, of sorrow, of things that tend to trip us up."
and responded...
I wouldn't suggest such a thing either (that you can't be rich and be a Christian), but Christians (genuine ones) are fully capable of doing wrong things. So the question is if it is a "woe" to be rich, is it wise for a Christian to be rich? Conversely, if it is a blessing to be poor, why wouldn't it be recommended that we at least aim for poor?
Dan...
"We ought be careful not to wrongly extrapolate beyond what he said."
Stan...
In all cases, sure, but it appears that the correct extrapolation is "Don't do anything about it in your own life. If you're poor, be happy because you're blessed. If you're rich, well, don't do anything about it because ... well, just because." The response appears to be "outside looking in". We aren't being called to do anything. These would appear, then, to be a purely information statements to which we need give no response.
It seems to bless the poor (for simply being poor), but we are obliged to help them out of being poor, and it seems to curse the rich (for simply being rich), but we are not required to change their status (or, more pointedly, our own if we are among the rich) (and most Americans are among the rich).
Dan: "Geoffrey, you ought to be a writer. Published writer, I mean. Have you considered that?"
Is that a polite way of saying I wrote way too much? LOL
Seriously, all that stuff I wrote - that's why there are all these marvelous resources out there, commentaries and Bible dictionaries, Gospel parallels and other such things. My wife has a little book on cultural practices in the Near East in Biblical times that illuminate various nuances in the text that might escape notice simply because, assumed by the writers, they are completely unknown to us.
Taking these verses in isolation leads to the kind of questions Stan is asking. Considering them as part of a larger body of teaching presented by the Gospel writer; the way they are changed by the author of Matthew's Gospel; the relationship this statement has as presented to other statements on poverty, wealth, and power in St. Luke's Gospel (just one example off the top of my head is the way Jesus' ministry is presented in The Magnificat in chapter 1) leads to a whole different set of questions, however. This is why stuff like commentaries and Bible dictionaries are so important. They offer us the opportunity to go deeper in to the text than a simple, bare reading of isolated verses offers.
Having said that, it seems to me there is, indeed, an equivocation about the meaning of wealth and poverty as presented by the author of Luke's Gospel. Clearly, over all, the author sees the Church's ministry as one of recognizing God's presence with and in the poor and powerless and this means we are to work so as to remove the structures that contribute to this status among them. God's power is expressed most clearly in the death of Jesus on the cross, i.e., through this utter lack of power. For this reason, the poor are those where we can see God's power and blessing residing. The resurrection of Jesus from the dead, defeating those forces of evil and sin, of power and the things like wealth and status that accompany them, is the real victory of real Divine power over the powers and principalities of this world. We, the Church, are to live out this reality, not just in "helping" the poor, but in seeing in them the embodiment of the same dehumanization that led to the death of Jesus, and through our ministry with them, to bring about the New Life that comes through the resurrection.
It isn't a simple financial matter, wealth and poverty. These are symbols of power, of the struggle of sin and death against the power of New Life in the risen Christ. When we embody and incarnate the words of the Magnificat - the hungry are fed, the rich are sent empty away - that is when we are acting in the belief that the poor are blessed by God, and the rich receive woe.
Stan asked...
So the question is if it is a "woe" to be rich, is it wise for a Christian to be rich? Conversely, if it is a blessing to be poor, why wouldn't it be recommended that we at least aim for poor?
I think it is indeed a good question to ask: Is it wise for Christians to be rich? I think each of us need to answer that for ourselves, that there is no one answer.
I know I'm glad that there are some wealthy folk out there (and again, as always, all of us reading this are wealthy) who invest in God's work, in good work, in our communities and world. That's a good thing to do with our wealth, to the degree that we have it.
But I also think the clear and consistent biblical message about wealth is one of warning: It's a trap! Beware. And, ultimately, I certainly don't think it a wise thing to chase after wealth for our own sake.
As to Stan's second question, I think it reasonable conclusion (perhaps not the only one, but a reasonable one) that we would find more happiness in striving towards a simpler, less affluent lifestyle. Given the total biblical witness on the point, that's my conclusion, at least for me.
Stan said...
it appears that the correct extrapolation is "Don't do anything about it in your own life. If you're poor, be happy because you're blessed. If you're rich, well, don't do anything about it because ... well, just because." The response appears to be "outside looking in". We aren't being called to do anything.
Perhaps, given these passages in isolation. Blessed are you who are poor. Period. Woe to you who are rich. Period. There is no outright and specific call to action, although I think one could reasonably infer some calls to action in this.
IF we were just looking at this passage in isolation. But given the wealth (if you'll excuse the term) of information and teachings on the topic throughout the whole of the Bible, this just becomes another bit of information in the complex web of what we might call societal, communal and personal economics, or money management.
I think Geoffrey made a biblically sound conclusion in suggesting that poverty is something of a two edged sword: It IS clearly blessed to be poor. God clearly appears to have a special concern for the poor, even appears to be "on the side" of the poor.
At the same time, the negative effects of poverty (hunger, oppression, injustice, illness) are of such a concern that we just as clearly are called to "do something" about it. What that "something" is can be a mixed bag, but that's at least one of the clear takeaway messages from the Bible: We are called to work with, for, alongside the poor to alleviate the negative effects of poverty.
So, biblically speaking, I think we can conclude at least those two things about poverty:
1. The poor are blessed in a special way, looked out for in a special way by God, and
2. We are called to take action in support of the poor and against oppression/injustice/maltreatment of the poor.
The Hebrew prophets were pretty clear that a nation - Israel - that attempts to worship this God while existing in a state in which whole classes of persons (the widow and orphan, the resident alien and the poor) are not just outside the center of communal concern, but have their lives routinely violated (the use of "violence" in describing the treatment of these social outcasts is surprising) is usually cited as displaying not just a lack of faith, but blaspheming the sacrifices and claims of covenant faithfulness. Clearly, the prophets understood poverty and lack of social power as something the community needs to address as a matter of faith.
Jesus was clearly in this same line with his ministry. The oft-cited criticism that he was a drunkard and whore-monger because of his associations, his willingness to be seen with social outcasts like lepers and the blind and women who were unclean and collaborators with Rome show where his heart lay. As he told the Pharisees who chided him about his associations, doctors don't visit the well. So, God's love and concern, God's blessing, is indeed with the poor, but only insofar as this is a way of drawing attention to their plight, so that it might be changed.
Not to become rich and powerful. Rather, as the early church is described in Acts (written by the same person who wrote the passage in question here) the Apostolic Church held all things in common. In this way, the usual understanding of poverty and wealth, of status and power, disappeared. Those to whom the "woe" is addressed are those who would cling to wealth and status and power who, indeed, as Jesus says, have their reward. As the parable of the landowner makes clear, not all the barns with all the grain and all the servants and status in the world matter because we all face the reality of death. Do wealth and power, status and self-importance add a single second to one's life? Does the accumulation of wealth, even with the rationalization that it is being done for the greater good through the possibility of doing more good with more resources, serve the Kingdom of God if that wealth is a private matter, rather than the community's?
Geoffrey...
Clearly, the prophets understood poverty and lack of social power as something the community needs to address as a matter of faith.
Good point: I think we have sometimes underplayed the importance of the degree to which these teachings are personal AND societal teachings. If a person or ten or 100 was concerned for the poor and working with them/on their behalf, but the nation as a whole was not, the nation as a whole faced judgment.
Geoffrey...
God's blessing, is indeed with the poor, but only insofar as this is a way of drawing attention to their plight, so that it might be changed.
Not to become rich and powerful.
Good points here, too.
I've been wanting to address this post for some time. My current situation makes responding to all of life's questions and concerns difficult, and blogging on an old slow computer doesn't help.
I'm not sure where to begin, so I'll just kind of jump in and pick and choose where to go in a play it by ear kind of manner.
The first thing that jumps out is the avoidance of the Matthew version of the sermon. Between the two, if we are to view everything through the lens of Jesus's teachings, we must view this as the more accurate of the two sermons in terms of intent. Christ repeatedly throughout the Gospels tells all that His Kingdom is not of this world. He constantly is speaking in terms of the spiritual. Indeed, even His teachings regarding charity is not so much on behalf of receiver, but on the giver. It is for the giver's spiritual benefit that he gives to the poor, more than for the benefit of the poor man who might receive the charity. This opinion is supported by the fact that there exists no mention of anyone who is poor being lifted out of poverty during Christ's ministry. We hear of the blind being made to see, the lame walk, (indeed in Luke 7:22, Jesus tells the messengers of John the Baptist all this)those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, but the poor get the good news preached to them. One would expect in the name of consistency that the poor would also be made opposite of what they were. The notion that God favors the economically poor just doesn't wash.
Geoffrey believes that Luke focussed on the financial and though I agree he draws attention to the poor, that there may have been some special interest in them, that's but one of many themes present in this Gospel. And again, nowhere does it mention any impoverished person raised up out of poverty. So, despite the concern, it seems their empty purses weren't as important as their likely despondent spirits. His confusion is apparent by the middle of his third post wherein he suggests that "poverty" is a blessing. But nowhere can we infer that Christ blesses poverty. At best, He blesses the poor, and I believe it is far more clear that He is blessing the poor in spirit, as Matthew relates to us and Christ's concern with the spritual throughout the Gospels implies. Geoffrey later implies the possibility that Matthew changed up the verse to "poor in spirit". I believe that if anything, the opposite makes more sense in light of the entirety of the Gospels.
Furthermore....
Geoffrey keeps speaking of layers of meaning. I don't see where this is meant to be or merely something those like Geoffrey feel are characteristics of the deep thinker. As snarky as that may sound, I mean it in a more serious manner. What small voice of God requires us to strain our ears to hear when reading the Word plainly written out before us? How much more can "give to the poor" mean for us than to give to the poor because Jesus taught us to do so? That giving to the poor is a sign of our Christian-ness? Why do Geoffrey (and Feodor when he's trying to show how much he knows at my blog) insist that tons of education and reading of OTHER stuff result in a better understanding of that which is so easy to figure out?
I find it curious that Geoffrey speaks of the Holy Spirit speaking through the author, but doesn't put much stock in whether or not the words written down were guided by that same Spirit. And this in Luke, considered by some to be a pretty damned good historical record. Do you open the Book to Luke, close your eyes and chant "OOHHMMMMM" until the Spirit tells you want to make of it all?
Appeals to liberation theologians only distort because there is nothing that depicts a favoritism based on economics. Jesus penchant for hanging with the "scum of the earth" (as the snobs of the time might call them), the poor, the sinners, etc., does not imply that they have any easier shot at salvation. And as far as favoritism, Jesus speaks of the Prodigal Son, the lost sheep. Who would better define a real life example of those than those very condescending snobs of the time, the upper class who crapped on the poor?
(I'm skipping around a bit. Bear with me. If I miss something you would prefer I comment on, let me know.)
I have no doubt that there are things that help give us some insights into the true meaning of Scripture, things that, as Geoffrey suggests, might have been assumed by the author and thus not mentioned. But as I said in a previous discussion, such things might be interesting and I'll now go farther to say they might enhance our understanding of the history, but I can't recall any example of anything that changed the meaning of what I already understood a verse to mean (even the explanation for "spare the rod" didn't really change the meaning---it still meant a way of raising a child---just not by hitting him). Geoffrey offered that "Gates of Hades" bit, but it didn't change the meaning of the Scripture at all. Thus, such things are interesting (and I truly dig them) but don't seem to have a lot of real value as far as the teachings themselves.
Of all the things that Art recently wrote, what most jumped out at me is his dismissal of my insistence that the Bible has various layers of meaning.
If this weren't true, why read any passage more than once? After all, once we hear it, as long as we "get it", we've no need to hear it again, right?
In fact, why should we even hear sermons on the Bible, since we've all heard most of the passages in question. Christmas, Easter, Pentecost, the Transfiguration, the story of Creation, the Tower of Babel, the Abraham/Isaac/Jacob/Joseph cycle of stories - yeah, I've heard 'em all, no need to hear them again, or listen to some preacher drone on about them.
I'm not being facetious here. This is, in essence, what Art's view leads to. One quick run-through of the Bible and its high points, and we're done. No new meanings, no insights brought about by life experience, by loss and gain, by pain and its soothing. All we need do is remember the one time we read the Bible and it covers all the bases.
I am quite sure Art will insist that isn't what he means, that I'm deliberately misunderstanding him, blah, blah, blah. Except, this is exactly the result of insisting that the Bible is clear enough to the faithful without need for more reflection, for study and a look at the background to various texts, for repeated hearings as different aspects, little nuances and details emerge over time.
"This opinion is supported by the fact that there exists no mention of anyone who is poor being lifted out of poverty during Christ's ministry. We hear of the blind being made to see, the lame walk, (indeed in Luke 7:22, Jesus tells the messengers of John the Baptist all this)those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, but the poor get the good news preached to them. One would expect in the name of consistency that the poor would also be made opposite of what they were. The notion that God favors the economically poor just doesn't wash."
Marshall's a charmer isn't he?
Who are the poor in ancient agricultural/artisan economies?
The blind. If only they could see, they would not be poor.
The lame. If only they could do walk, they would not be poor.
The leprous. (Surely even Marshall gets this one.)
The deaf. (Here, too, right? Still, I am confident of Marshall's hard heart).
The dead. Duh. No one has money when they're dead.
When Jesus loves and ministers to the blind, the lame, the leprous, the deaf, the prostitute, the tax collector, the zealot, and the Samaritan, he is loving and ministering to the poor, the outcast, the marginalized, the radicalized and the Other.
Why does the Bible not say he un-lonelyed the lonely? Why does the Bible not say he cast in the cast out? Why does the Bible not say he mainstreams what is marginalized and radicalized and makes the community as wide as the Other?
It does.
But ears to hear depend upon hearts and minds that are open.
Sorry to break the moratorium on disturbing your peaceable kingdom, Dan. I'll return to the real world now. We have actual poor people to spend time and money on.
Give to Haiti!
Give to Chile and Japan!
OK, from Geoffrey's blog, I see that I have disturbed nothing. It seems it's been disturbia ad nauseum for a month now.
I take it back. I'm not sorry. You guys are way ahead of me in renewed disgust.
The issue with interpretation is more critical for protestants by the way. Having thrown out a devotional life centered on the sacraments - principally the eucharist - and gone sola scriptura, the Bible cannot take a back seat.
The sacraments are not meant to be truth referents in themselves. They are meant to be conduits to the living, incarnate Christ.
So, Christ before Scripture makes it easier to breath in the culture wars when it comes to ascertaining the quality of revelation of the biblical text.
Marshall simply represents the end point, the summa of the protestant experiment.
I've been following this (and other) threads with a sort of detached amusement, but felt like I wanted to address this concept of multiple layers of meaning in the scripture.
I think GKS is on to something in this. I do think that there can be multiple layers that can be gleaned from deeper study of scripture. I don't know that I would go so far as multiple meanings or that there are secret coded messages that only a few can decode. ( I don't think that is what GKS is suggesting) But I do agree that there is often more than is apparent at first glance.
So, it seems that one who reads "blessed are the poor" and immediately assumes that it exclusively or primarily means only those who are monetarily poor, would be engaging in exactly the kind of shallow reasoning that GKS is speaking of.
It seems reasonable (and probable) that Jesus is using the term poor in a manner that would encompass more than simply physical poverty.
I also find the fact that there is simply no record of Jesus ever doing something to alleviate the physical poverty of those he encountered interesting. While the removal of physical impediments (blindness,leprosy,lameness etc.) does allow those affected to potentially remove themselves from poverty. There is no record of that actually happening, or any indication that that was in any way Jesus motivation for His healing people.
Just a few thoughts, continue.
Yes, don't forget Haiti. While things are getting better in some areas of the country, the area around Port au Prince is still suffering greatly. Fortunately the Cholera is running it's course and being controlled. But the need is still great.
If, in fact, removal of blindness is the equivalent of being removed from poverty, then there are about 500 Haitians on their way.
It's not a matter of reading the Bible once and "getting it", but that there are clear meanings that are not buried under layers. Are parts of the Bible such that multiple readings make them more clear? Of course. Does this equate to "multiple layers of meaning"? No. There is one meaning, whether we get it at first reading or need to go over it a few times. But Scripture isn't written in code. It is accessible to all without tons of study. Preachers and teachers ease the process for some, but they are not required.
Perhaps it would further understanding if Geoffrey would provide an example of one story or verse from which he drew multiple layers of meaning so as to illustrate the point.
Until then, it seems to me that one either gets it or one doesn't. If one is confronted with "multiple layers of meaning", I'd be interested in knowing how that could result in multiple truths that are meant to be expressed. That is the key. "Meant" to be expressed. If you think the Spirit is moving you to understand a verse in a particular way, there exists the problem of how to know it should be understood that way. Evil does not require that our understanding of God and His will be greatly misunderstood, but only misunderstood enough. And that misunderstanding might sound really "Christian".
It seems to me that there must be some more definitive understanding by which to compare that which we assume is the guidance of the Spirit.
I'll not rip Feodor's poor preachings in the manner I do when he infests my blog with his arrogance and condescension, but I wonder if he is saying that the poor of ancient times all suffered from some affliction only Christ could cure. No one so afflicted were ever poor. All healthy people were livng large. That is one layer of meaning I confess I would never have uncovered without a false priest to reveal it for me.
Yet, he can't uncover how they went on to be even middle class, much less "not poor".
Am I the only one who finds it ironic that we have this post based on the premise that the phrase "Blessed are the poor..." should only be interpreted in a wooden literal manner with no room for any possible other expressions of poverty. While about 4 posts ago we have an ongoing discussion where a primary argument being made is the following. "The factual veracity or lack thereof is NOT THE POINT. "
1. I am fine with finding multiple meanings in this passage. Remember: Liberals are the ones with the big Bibles...
2. "Blessed are the poor" is the expression of a Truth. The bible is a book of truths. I take those truths literally.
3. The Bible is NOT a science book, nor a modern history book, nor a book of facts, although there are facts within its pages. Thus, I do not take each and every line factually literally.
4. Thus, there is no irony that I can see that I take the Truth: Blessed are the poor, quite literally, while I don't take each and every line in the Bible literally.
5. I would suggest that we'd all do well to take the TRUTHS taught in the Bible as literally as we can, all the while allowing for folk to find multiple meanings.
So, Craig, I'm sure your cronies may agree with you and find it ironic that I take Jesus' teachings quite literally, as a rule. But I don't find any great mystery there, myself, since I strive to take ALL the Bible's truths literally.
Craig's comment shows yet again his astounding lack of irony.
How poor does one need to be to qualify for this blessing? Totally destitute, with only the rags on one's back, or simply barely making ends meet? I'm not rich, but I don't consider myself poor. Am I aced out of this equation? The rich seem to be totally screwed for making good use of the talents they received from God. They don't get jack, no matter how much they've abided the Will of God and teachings of Christ. And because I ate a good meal, I'm to go hungry for all eternity? And because I'm a happy guy, apparently I will be punished for it.
I think it is obvious that Matthew's version is necessary to understand Luke's. Without Matthew's, some take Luke's as proof they can use to support oppressive taxation. Others use it to insist there is some greater love by God of the poor, making the lifting of the poor counterproductive to their spiritual well-being.
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