March 6, 2016 - Animate Bible / Testaments: One Story, Two Parts - Rachel Held Evans

Today's Animate Bible session focused on the tensions that may exist when reading the Old and New Testaments and our discussion brought out many member's personal responses.

After Rachel Held Evan's presentation Diane led today's group and started our discussion by being forthright about how hard it is for her to read the Old Testament because of past church experiences and what she was taught about God when she was younger.  She also expressed her discomfort telling the story of Daniel and the Lion's Den (as one example) to children and but simultaneously felt a twinge of guilt not passing on and teaching Old Testament stories like this.

This gave the group permission to tell of the individual pain and discomfort people have had with many Old Testament stories in the past.  Others offered what they had learned from grappling with the same fears or having their cultural sense of justice being challenged.  Kate talked about being frightened by heavy rains in her childhood after knowing the story of Noah and the flood, despite God's rainbow promise at the end of the story  Sam brought up the flood stories in more than just the Old Testament that were told by many people living in flood plains.  Pastor Michelle talked about her child's reaction to learning about all the animals and people who perished in the flood and reminded us how we are enriched by the Old Testament story of Creation to cite one.  She went into several more. .

When the Abraham and Issac story was mentioned all the discomfort I felt about that story as a model of faithfulness to God returned.  I did not share my concerns with the group because we quickly moved from the topic but I have always felt that tension.  I'm worried about faith in God which defies basic human morality and see why modern atheists fear any religious fervor that moves in this direction.

A main piece of Evan's presentation involved the description of genocide or massacre contained in the story of Joshua and the Walls of Jericho.  Linda brought up Rahab, the woman who was saved by helping Joshua and living by faith and. later in the discussion, that she was included in the genealogy of Jesus.  Looking at this through our eyes, however; even the justifications given, that Cannanites were wicked and that God had promised Canaan to the Israelites, what was perceived to be God's divine call for massacre appears to violate our cultural and moral sense of human justice.  This is not easy to address.

Another cultural lens is the Old Testament's world of patriarchy, just one example of many where ancient customs and laws are recorded in the Old Testament.  Trish brought up The Red Tent, a novel by Anita Diamant, with a title referring to the tent in which women of Jacob's tribe must, according to the ancient law, take refuge while menstruating or giving birth,  This book dramatized examples of the patriarchal rules of Old Testament societies.  When these are all woven into Old Testament law how do we (and how should we) respond to those particular laws today?

Luka will lead Nadia Bolz-Weber's presentation of Gospels::Unexpected Good News next week