The Puzzle of Christianity. Peter Vardy

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СКАЧАТЬ injured Jewish person. Jesus’ message is clear: one’s neighbour is anyone who is in need, irrespective of race, skin colour or religious belief. This message was to be central as Christianity became the largest religion in the world. Christianity was not just another Jewish sect; it was a universal religion. Its roots lay in Judaism, but its message of the love of God and its demand to love other human beings was universal.

      Jesus emphasised this continually. He frequently taught in stories or parables which are appealing but have multiple meanings and great depth – and can often be uncomfortable. In one of these stories Jesus spoke of the criteria that God would use to decide who would go to heaven and who would go to hell after death. The story challenged his audience but it maintained the same theme that runs through all his teaching:

       When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.

      Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was ill and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

       Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you ill or in prison and go to visit you?’

       The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

       Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was ill and in prison and you did not look after me.’

       They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or ill or in prison, and did not help you?’

       He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

       Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.

      (Matthew 25:31–46)

      This message was (and is) challenging because Jesus is saying that the people who will be welcomed into God’s kingdom are the people who visit those in prison or those who are sick, the people who feed the hungry or give water to the thirsty; and the people who are destined for hell are those who fail to do this. What is more, when someone does these positive things to any other human being it is as though they are being done to Jesus Himself, and when someone in need is ignored, it is Jesus who is ignored. This again emphasises the Christian claim that God is intimately involved in the world and that love of any other human being is directly related to love of God.

      The message of the universal love of God was not easy for the early Christians to accept and, after Jesus’ death, there were many of his original followers who still wanted to see Christianity as merely the development of orthodox Judaism. They considered, therefore, that following Jesus meant becoming a Jew and taking on all the rigorous food laws and religious laws that the people of Israel considered normal. It also meant that males had to be circumcised. This position would have restricted the growth of early Christianity as it would, effectively, have become a Jewish sect. It took divine intervention and the activity of one of the most significant of the apostles – St Paul – to demonstrate that these laws were not necessary.

      Figure 1: Statue of the Archangel Michael defeating the devil (Coventry Cathedral). Christians hold that it is the power of love that can defeat the forces of evil and that this love was shown most clearly in Jesus’ life, teaching and death.

      So the first and most important command which Jesus affirmed was the absolute centrality of the love of God. Secondly came unconditional love of neighbour. The first command every Jew would recognise and accept, but Jesus taught that the second should be taken literally: that is, it did not apply to Jews alone. It also questioned whether those who were thought to be holy were really so.

      For Jesus, the love of God for every human being was essential. God was the Father of all human beings and should be addressed in the intimate way that a child addresses a father. God was a God of love, wanting above all what was best for individual human beings. God would always welcome back those who failed, those who did wrong. Jesus told many parables to illustrate this, including the parables of the Prodigal Son, the Lost Coin and the Lost Sheep. For Jesus, God almost cared more for those who were lost than those who were faithful. The person who was a failure and marginalised had more need of God than the person who was always faithful.

      It is an issue of trust. Christian teaching is that the Christian should trust their whole life to God and should be willing to accept and believe in God’s love and forgiveness. God’s love is unconditional; it does not come as a result of a person being virtuous or good. God’s love is there, whatever happens, like a parent who will always love a child, no matter what the child does, and simply wants the child to return. In the Parable of the Prodigal Son, Jesus tells the story of a rich man who had two sons, one of whom was obedient, stayed at home and worked hard. The other, however, demanded from the father that the eventual inheritance he could expect should be given to him. He then left home and spent all his father’s money on a dissolute life. He ended up destitute and sleeping among the animals. In despair, he decided to go back to his father, recognising that it would be better to be one of his father’s lowest servants than to go on living as he had been doing. When he returned, the father ran to greet him, put on him the choicest clothes and laid on a great feast for him. This was not because he had done anything good – he had not; but simply because he had returned home. The other son resented this because he had spent all his life being loyal and working hard, yet his father had never laid on a similar feast for him. Jesus explained that God loves those who have failed, those who have ignored God and yet come back, almost more than those who never need forgiveness. It is not, however, easy to accept being loved unconditionally and many reject God because they simply cannot accept that God loves them as they are. Trust in this love is, therefore, a central element of Christian belief.

      Figure 2: Rembrandt’s painting of the Prodigal Son (c. 1669) shows the father welcoming back his penitent son. One of the hands of the father is male, the other female. The poverty of the returning son is shown in his clothes and also in him only having one shoe. Jesus referred to God as Abba (Mark 14:36) – a very intimate term similar to ‘Daddy’ today. God is seen as the Father of all who wants nothing more than to welcome people back, however far they may have strayed in terms of selfishness and lovelessness.

      What is more, Jesus taught that Christians should refuse to judge others. Only God could truly see into the heart of another human being. Only God could judge justly. If any Christian judged others, then he or she would be judged harshly by God. If Christians forgave others, they would be forgiven by God. One man asked Jesus how many times he should forgive his brother – seven times? Jesus said, ‘I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven СКАЧАТЬ