Controversy, Conflict and Oppression

[Note: These reflections on John 12.1-11 were offered in the context of Compline at St Mary's Anglican Church, Vancouver, BC.]

+ My friends in Christ, I speak to you in the name of God the Weaver, who through the shuttle of the Holy Spirit weaves us into the pattern of the Word made flesh. Amen.

On my last full day in Yangon, the largest city and former capital of Myanmar, a country known to many of us as Burma, I had asked Johnny, our church-related tour guide and care-taker, if he could arrange a visit to the Jewish synagogue. This synagogue is known throughout the Jewish world as being tended by the ‘loneliest Jew’ in the world. Yangon had boasted a lively if small Jewish community for most of its history, but the turmoil that followed the independence of Myanmar from British colonial administration had caused a steady exodus of the Jewish community from Yangon. Now there are rarely enough Jews to constitute a minyan, the ten Jewish men, or in some communities, ten Jews regardless of gender, necessary for a prayer service.

So, two weeks ago this Tuesday, Johnny led me on a walk from the Cathedral of the Holy Trinity, past the Scott Market and down several streets into what is a predominantly Muslim quarter of the city. There, on a street of Muslim shop-keepers and the decaying remnants of British colonial architecture, he brought me to the gate of the synagogue. We had just missed the rabbi who had left for lunch, leaving his travel agency and the synagogue under the watchful eyes of his neighbours. One of them unlocked the gate and allowed me a brief visit. Since the rabbi was gone, I was not allowed inside the building. By the door was a basket of kippahs, sometimes known as yarmulkas. I put one on my head and, asking for a moment of privacy, I stood at the door and recited the first and central part of the Shema, the Jewish confession of faith: “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God: the Lord is one.” I then added those portions which we know as the ‘Summary of the Law’, but portions that are not at odds with the Jewish faith.

As we walked back to join the rest of our group in the Scott Market, Johnny began to quiz me about Judaism. It became quickly apparent that Johnny had little or no knowledge of the Jewish tradition. What he did know had passed through so many Christian lenses that it did not bear any resemblance to the Judaism that I know as a member of the Greater Vancouver Jewish-Christian Dialogue.

As I reflect on my brief visit to Myanmar, a visit during which I met the members of congregations, theological students, deacons, presbyters and bishops, I realized that I could have profitably spent my time teaching on the relationship between Judaism and Christianity, the relationship between the tradition which gave birth to Jesus of Nazareth and shaped his view of the world and the tradition of those who, in their earliest days, were simply known as ‘followers of the Way’, in Hebrew, halakah. Now that we have come to Holy Week I worry that my brothers and sisters in Myanmar will hear the familiar stories of the last week of Jesus’ earthly ministry and leave with a distorted and potentially dangerous understanding of the relationship between Jesus of Nazareth and the collaborationist Jewish leadership and the colonial Roman authorities who were responsible for the administration of what we now call the Holy Land.

I come into your midst this week at the confluence of three currents of time. The first of these currents is the immediacy of my visit to Myanmar where I was part of a delegation of Canadian Anglicans whose task was to strengthen the relationship between the Anglicans in Myanmar and those in the Diocese of British Columbia as well as to explore the possibility of a new relationship between the Church of the Province of Myanmar and Vancouver School of Theology. A second current arises from the celebration on this coming Friday by the Jewish community of the foiling by Queen Esther of Haman’s attempt to purge the Persian Empire of its Jewish population, a celebration known as the feast of Purim and described in the book of Esther. The final and more insistent current is our own annual journey through the events of the final week of Jesus of Nazareth’s earthly ministry, a journey that we have come to call Holy Week, the week that makes the year ‘holy’.

For me the invitation to be with you this week means the weaving of these three currents into some sort of coherent pattern, a tapestry constructed from the strands of controversy, conflict and oppression. Tonight I offer you a brief introduction to these currents in order to set the stage for what is to come and what I hope to say.

Our ritual celebration of Holy Week is rooted in the detailed exploration of the events leading to the death and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth found in all four canonical gospels. Some commentators have said that each gospel is an account of Holy Week with an extensive introduction. In these accounts we learn many things, but one aspect that stands out is the controversy surrounding Jesus of Nazareth and his ministry. If one were only to read the appointed lections for each day of Holy Week, then one could not help but note how often the Jewish authorities, sometimes simply called ‘the Jews’, are described as being confused by Jesus or as being threatened by his words and actions or as being actively engaged in a plot to arrange his judicial murder.

Over the centuries these accounts came to be ritually embodied on the days preceding Easter. The rise of Jerusalem as a pilgrimage destination in the fourth century of the common era meant that Christians from throughout the world could visit the sites associated with Jesus’ last days and could even participate in ritual re-enactments of the events of Holy Week. Just as you and I might record our visit to Jerusalem visually by taking photographs or making video recordings, so too did early Christians bring their memories home and create rituals influenced by what they had seen and experienced in Jerusalem. In the days ahead we shall take our own part in rites whose origins come from these travelogues.

One dimension of these rites is that the controversy between Jesus and his disciples and the Jewish and Roman authorities eventually gave rise to a focus on the conflict between Jesus and the Jewish authorities. Over time the role played by the Roman authorities seemed to melt into the background, perhaps because most Christians were not Jews but Gentiles. The conflict between Jesus, a faithful Jew, and the Jewish authorities, concerned both about the integrity of the Jewish faith and the survival of the Jewish people under colonial rule, gradually evolved into a conflict between Christianity and Judaism. Well into the fifth century of the common era, Christian bishops would stand before their congregations on Sunday and harangue them for having attended synagogue services the day before. By the sixth century the conflict between Christians and Jews moved one step beyond controversy and conflict into oppression and persecution.

• Jews had to wear distinctive clothing.
• Jews were denied civic rights.
• Jewish property was confiscated or expropriated by governments.
• Jews were required to live in defined areas of cities.

The list goes on. But we all know how this story found its most tragic chapter in the events of the Holocaust of World War II. I have been to Dachau. I have seen the mountains of shoes and eyeglasses left behind by their owners. I have seen the ovens where some of these people, men, women and children, were incinerated.

In Myanmar I observed what can happen when any religion, even one as gentle in its origins and precepts as Buddhism, becomes the dominant or even the official religion of the state. Religious controversy, a reality in any and all religious traditions, can give rise to conflict, the attempt to coerce others to share the views of one’s own group. Conflict, particularly when one group gains the upper hand, can quickly turn to oppression and persecution as coercion turns to the eradication of opposing views and traditions from one’s society and culture.

In the days ahead I shall try to weave a coherent tapestry using my recent experience in Myanmar, my engagement in Jewish-Christian dialogue and my role as a liturgist whose task is not simply to repeat ancient rituals but to find within them the resources to subvert them if these rituals lend themselves to controversy, conflict and oppression.

I sympathize with the Pharisees who say to one another, “You see, you can do nothing. Look, the world has gone after him!” What can one do about a rabbi who brings the dead to life and who preaches liberation to the poor? What can we do about those in our own time who challenge our own understandings of the world and how God acts within it? We know one way to deal with controversy and conflict: oppression. But perhaps there is another way, one embodied in the One who comes in the name of the Lord, not with an army, not with a retinue of powerful and wealthy retainers, but on a donkey’s colt.

Let us pray.

God of steadfast love, light of the blind and liberator of the oppressed, we see your holy purpose in the tender compassion of Jesus, who calls us into new and living friendship with you. May we, who take shelter in the shadow of your wings, be filled with the grace of his tender caring; may we, who stumble in selfish darkness, see your glory in the light of his self-giving. We ask this through him whose suffering is victorious, Jesus Christ our Saviour. Amen.

(Revised Common Lectionary Prayers)