Out of the Chaos
Commentary
Several cultures in the ancient Mediterranean have some version of the Flood story, which tells us that whatever form this traumatic event took, it left a lasting cultural memory across the Western World. Unlike other Flood narratives, the Bible makes it clear God is in charge. God is fully in control when the waters are loosed and when they are bottled up again. Not only that, we are safe from any world-wide cataclysm, because God has made a covenant with us. The rainbow is a sign that whatever we might do to each other, God will not destroy life upon the earth again.
The scripture from First Peter alludes to the Flood and connects the salvation of eight in the midst of the roiling waters with the salvation that is offered to use through baptism.
The early Christians liked Biblical stories connected with salvation from the chaos of the waters. The story of Jonah appears more often in early Christian art than any other biblical story, primarily focusing on Jonah's salvation in the waters. Noah's ark appears nearly as often as the Jonah story. In the artwork the animals and Noah's family is immaterial. A man in a boxlike boat is saved from the chaos of the flooding. Early Christians facing the wrath of the Roman Empire took comfort from these biblical stories.
Against the chaos of competing viewpoints, we see Jesus, fulfilling the prophecy of Isaiah and beginning his ministry with baptism. Regardless of the way in which any church conducts the ceremony, it's important to translate rather than transliterate the Greek verb baptidzo, which properly means immersion. It is a word connected to washing dishes or clothes. Jesus is fully immersed by John the Immerser, but arises from the water triumphant, and commissioned to spread the Good News about the Kingdom of God.
During this season of Lent Christians may feel in danger of drowning in the midst of the culture that floods us with information. These texts call us to focus on the opportunity we have to be saved from the immersing waters that surround us. We have the sign in the heavens -- greater than the rainbow, the cross -- that we are living in the Kingdom of God.
Genesis 9:8-17
Robert Alter, in his translation and commentary on the Torah, makes the interesting point that three times in this passage it reads: "And God said." Alter says that when this speech formula is used and used again with a response coming from the person being addressed it means the original statement was answered with silence. Why? Perhaps Noah resisted these words. Or was Noah suspicious of what he was being told.
So God, in response to the silence, continues to clarify and affirm. At the start of this passage God states that there will never again be a flood that will destroy virtually all life on Earth. This is a covenant between God and all of creation. When this statement is met with silence God continues, offering a sign that this is true -- the sign of God's bow, or weapon, that will appear in the clouds following a rain. The rainbow will be a sign that God is not going to wipe out creation. Again, silence. This is followed by confirmation that the rainbow is the sign of the covenant God has established.
Every time that humanity gets a little complacent about our control over our environment a hurricane like Katrina or a tropical storm like Sandy, or a major flood, or torrential rains, can remind us of the relentless and overwhelming power of water. The ancients associated these waters with the powers of Chaos. In some cultures there was a fear that in the end Chaos, held at bay by the gods, would return and destroy the universe. In the first creation story in Genesis the writer is careful to make it clear that God is in charge of the waters. The Spirit of God hovers over the face of the waters of Chaos and two ancient gods of chaos -- Formless and Void -- are vanquished, and God locks the waters in the firmament, where they are largely able to control chaos.
In the Greek version of the Flood story the gods release the flood because they are angry at humanity but have great difficulty in bottling the waters of chaos again. In the Genesis account there is no such difficulty. God starts the flood and ends the flood on God's terms. This universe is not safe, but it is secure. God is in control of the waters. Moreover, in this week's lectionary passage God promises that never again will these waters be unleashed on such a scale, giving the sign of the rainbow that God has shelved an ancient weapon, the bow, and will not use it against creation and humanity again.
1 Peter 3:18-22
This baffling reference to Jesus preaching to the Spirits in Prison baffles us. Peter ties it to the story of Noah's Ark and the salvation of eight individuals from the chaos of the waters that had been loosed from the firmament but that doesn’t explain what it means.
There is more than one way to interpret this passage. Some tie it to the Book of Enoch, which was credited to the biblical patriarch who never died but was taken up by God. This book (written centuries after the Biblical Enoch lived) speaks against the fallen angels and the Nephilim, the angelic spirits referred to in Genesis 6:1-4 as the "sons of God," who had sexual relationships with the "daughters of men." Some early Christian commentators thought Jesus, between his death and resurrection, confirmed their damnation.
But other early Christians understood this passage differently. One of the struggles for the earliest church was fear for what happened to their righteous ancestors who simply had the misfortune to live before Jesus died on the cross for their salvation. Early Christians wanted to know what had become of grandma and grandpa. Were they damned simply because they'd been born too early? Or for that matter, what about Abraham and Sarah and the rest of the patriarchs? If salvation only came through Jesus, were they saved?
So they interpreted this odd passage to mean that Jesus, between the time he died and was raised, preached to the ancient dead who died before they could have received the message of salvation, so that they might be be saved and taken up to heaven.
What is clear at least is that just as eight were saved from the waters of chaos as experienced in the Flood, all in our time are offered salvation from the chaos of the world through the waters of baptism.
Mark 1:9-15
Matthew and Luke give much more expanded accounts of these central events -- the baptism of Jesus, the temptation in the wilderness, the arrest of John the Baptist and the ministry of Jesus. But Mark is saying several significant things with very few words.
The baptism of Jesus is described simply, without any dialog between Jesus and John. What is significant is that the heavens are not opened, and there is no heavenly vision. The heavens are torn open, a different word used than on most occasions when the heavens are opened up. From this rent in the heavens the Spirit descends. A voice from heaven expressed divine approval of Jesus.
There immediately follows one of Mark's significant words -- immediately! Jesus is sent by the Spirit into the wilderness, which is a place of danger and alienation. There are animals, bandits, and the harsh environment that threaten Jesus. We hear nothing of the details of the temptations that Jesus experiences there, but just as Moses and the people of God were preserved in the wilderness (the number forty ties together the forty years in the desert and the forty days of temptation), so Jesus is preserved and protected by God's messengers.
His descent into the waters, like the experience of Noah, leads not to destruction and chaos, but clarity, purpose, and salvation!
Finally, I can’t help but enjoy the way Mark 1:14-15 is translated in the Scholars Version: "The time is up: God's imperial rule is closing in. Change your ways and put your trust in the good news!"
The scripture from First Peter alludes to the Flood and connects the salvation of eight in the midst of the roiling waters with the salvation that is offered to use through baptism.
The early Christians liked Biblical stories connected with salvation from the chaos of the waters. The story of Jonah appears more often in early Christian art than any other biblical story, primarily focusing on Jonah's salvation in the waters. Noah's ark appears nearly as often as the Jonah story. In the artwork the animals and Noah's family is immaterial. A man in a boxlike boat is saved from the chaos of the flooding. Early Christians facing the wrath of the Roman Empire took comfort from these biblical stories.
Against the chaos of competing viewpoints, we see Jesus, fulfilling the prophecy of Isaiah and beginning his ministry with baptism. Regardless of the way in which any church conducts the ceremony, it's important to translate rather than transliterate the Greek verb baptidzo, which properly means immersion. It is a word connected to washing dishes or clothes. Jesus is fully immersed by John the Immerser, but arises from the water triumphant, and commissioned to spread the Good News about the Kingdom of God.
During this season of Lent Christians may feel in danger of drowning in the midst of the culture that floods us with information. These texts call us to focus on the opportunity we have to be saved from the immersing waters that surround us. We have the sign in the heavens -- greater than the rainbow, the cross -- that we are living in the Kingdom of God.
Genesis 9:8-17
Robert Alter, in his translation and commentary on the Torah, makes the interesting point that three times in this passage it reads: "And God said." Alter says that when this speech formula is used and used again with a response coming from the person being addressed it means the original statement was answered with silence. Why? Perhaps Noah resisted these words. Or was Noah suspicious of what he was being told.
So God, in response to the silence, continues to clarify and affirm. At the start of this passage God states that there will never again be a flood that will destroy virtually all life on Earth. This is a covenant between God and all of creation. When this statement is met with silence God continues, offering a sign that this is true -- the sign of God's bow, or weapon, that will appear in the clouds following a rain. The rainbow will be a sign that God is not going to wipe out creation. Again, silence. This is followed by confirmation that the rainbow is the sign of the covenant God has established.
Every time that humanity gets a little complacent about our control over our environment a hurricane like Katrina or a tropical storm like Sandy, or a major flood, or torrential rains, can remind us of the relentless and overwhelming power of water. The ancients associated these waters with the powers of Chaos. In some cultures there was a fear that in the end Chaos, held at bay by the gods, would return and destroy the universe. In the first creation story in Genesis the writer is careful to make it clear that God is in charge of the waters. The Spirit of God hovers over the face of the waters of Chaos and two ancient gods of chaos -- Formless and Void -- are vanquished, and God locks the waters in the firmament, where they are largely able to control chaos.
In the Greek version of the Flood story the gods release the flood because they are angry at humanity but have great difficulty in bottling the waters of chaos again. In the Genesis account there is no such difficulty. God starts the flood and ends the flood on God's terms. This universe is not safe, but it is secure. God is in control of the waters. Moreover, in this week's lectionary passage God promises that never again will these waters be unleashed on such a scale, giving the sign of the rainbow that God has shelved an ancient weapon, the bow, and will not use it against creation and humanity again.
1 Peter 3:18-22
This baffling reference to Jesus preaching to the Spirits in Prison baffles us. Peter ties it to the story of Noah's Ark and the salvation of eight individuals from the chaos of the waters that had been loosed from the firmament but that doesn’t explain what it means.
There is more than one way to interpret this passage. Some tie it to the Book of Enoch, which was credited to the biblical patriarch who never died but was taken up by God. This book (written centuries after the Biblical Enoch lived) speaks against the fallen angels and the Nephilim, the angelic spirits referred to in Genesis 6:1-4 as the "sons of God," who had sexual relationships with the "daughters of men." Some early Christian commentators thought Jesus, between his death and resurrection, confirmed their damnation.
But other early Christians understood this passage differently. One of the struggles for the earliest church was fear for what happened to their righteous ancestors who simply had the misfortune to live before Jesus died on the cross for their salvation. Early Christians wanted to know what had become of grandma and grandpa. Were they damned simply because they'd been born too early? Or for that matter, what about Abraham and Sarah and the rest of the patriarchs? If salvation only came through Jesus, were they saved?
So they interpreted this odd passage to mean that Jesus, between the time he died and was raised, preached to the ancient dead who died before they could have received the message of salvation, so that they might be be saved and taken up to heaven.
What is clear at least is that just as eight were saved from the waters of chaos as experienced in the Flood, all in our time are offered salvation from the chaos of the world through the waters of baptism.
Mark 1:9-15
Matthew and Luke give much more expanded accounts of these central events -- the baptism of Jesus, the temptation in the wilderness, the arrest of John the Baptist and the ministry of Jesus. But Mark is saying several significant things with very few words.
The baptism of Jesus is described simply, without any dialog between Jesus and John. What is significant is that the heavens are not opened, and there is no heavenly vision. The heavens are torn open, a different word used than on most occasions when the heavens are opened up. From this rent in the heavens the Spirit descends. A voice from heaven expressed divine approval of Jesus.
There immediately follows one of Mark's significant words -- immediately! Jesus is sent by the Spirit into the wilderness, which is a place of danger and alienation. There are animals, bandits, and the harsh environment that threaten Jesus. We hear nothing of the details of the temptations that Jesus experiences there, but just as Moses and the people of God were preserved in the wilderness (the number forty ties together the forty years in the desert and the forty days of temptation), so Jesus is preserved and protected by God's messengers.
His descent into the waters, like the experience of Noah, leads not to destruction and chaos, but clarity, purpose, and salvation!
Finally, I can’t help but enjoy the way Mark 1:14-15 is translated in the Scholars Version: "The time is up: God's imperial rule is closing in. Change your ways and put your trust in the good news!"
