Social Holiness - Pt. 2

I want to continue my discussion of social holiness in the Old Testament by turning to the book of Amos. The reason I turn to Amos is because I think that he is often neglected, while really being the voice as to "why" the exile happens. You see it in the rest of the prophets, but Amos really draws some strong themes out as to why the exile will occur.

In Amos, the term "the Day of the Lord" gains prominence. He uses the term a lot. In Amos' day, the "Day of the Lord" meant a time of feasting in honor of God. It is a good thing, a day of worship. However, Amos turns it on its head. Basically, what he does when he uses this phrase is to signal a "bad" day of the Lord. The day of the Lord will not be good to Israel. In fact, the day of the Lord signals judgment upon Israel by God. The day of the Lord will be the day of judgment upon Israel by God. A day much of Israel thinks will not come. Amos preaches otherwise (as do the rest of the prophets.)

However, why is this "day of the Lord" going to be a problem for Israel? Why would God punish Israel - God's chosen people? Well, I would like to argue it is because they lost sight of the two greatest commandments - to love God and love neighbor. In the history of Israel, it is obvious that they have lost their love of God. If one reads the Old Testament much at all (outside of the poetry section), one sees that the Israelites are not good at loving God alone. They continually stray. However, God never casts them into exile because of this. God continues to be faithful to Israel, even when Israel is not faithful to God.

So, why the exile and why now?

I think part of it is that the Israelites have stopped loving God. However, God can deal with this. He can deal with the fact that God's people do not love God. What, I believe, sends God over the edge is that the people stopped loving their neighbors as well. They have lost Jubilee. They forget that they all started equal in the Exodus.

In Amos, there are many passages that point to the fact that the people have stopped loving their neighbors. I want to point to two in chapter 5. The first is v. 7. Here, Amos talks to those "who turn justice into bitterness and cast righteousness to the ground." Now, there is a lot to unpack here. I will do very little. First, justice is not the justice we gain from Plato. Usually, we think of justice as "getting what one deserves." However, this concept of justice is quite foreign to Israel. God does not give what one deserves - God gives to people who deserve nothing. These people are sinful and forgotten God and still He lets them enter the promised land and keep it. I mean, justice is something much different. I would argue that justice comes from helping those around us. It is to help generally. This is what God does to Israel. THis is what Israel is supposed to be doing to the rest of the world. They do not though.

So, Israel is not the dispenser of justice to the rest of the world. They have lost what they were brought into the world for. They are no longer fulfilling the goal that was destined for them by God. However, there is more.

In v. 11, Amos talks of those who "trample on the poor and force them to give you grain." This causes people to lose what they have "earned" in this world -stone mansions and other "stuff." What this shows is that Israel has not only not even begun to fulfill their goal of being just to the rest of the world, bringing good and light into it, but that they have even stopped being just to each other. They are trampling on each other. They do not care about the least among them. They have put "stuff (stone mansions)" above each other.

So, now Israel does not help other nations and it does not help those people in its own nation. Israel has completely forgotten who it was meant to be. It is not godly and has walked outside of all of God's commandments for it. So, they go into exile.

What does this mean for us. It means that God looks for us to love those people around us as well as Himself. He is looking for us to be just (in the way that God is just) and to help the least/the poor among us. God is looking for us to be Israel in the world. We will continue with this in the next few weeks as we look at the New Testament.

Social Holiness - The Old Testament

This week, I want to continue my theme of looking at the idea of social holiness. I now want to move the discussion toward looking at what social holiness is in Torah - the first five books of Scripture. I believe here we begin to see the roots of what the ideal is for a people (Israel here) to be socially holy.

One note on my method may be in order, especially as I deal with the biblical witness. I am not a biblical scholar. I know enough Greek to be dangerous. What I am though is a theologian and I read the Scripture as a theologian working with a long tradition of interpretation. I also understand that at different times different passages/texts have been emphasized in regards to different things (for an example of this, see how holiness literature in the Middle Ages quoted Song of Solomon over and over). So with this in mind, I am not looking to get to the original meaning of passages or authors. I am not sure that this is actually possible, and it does not serve my purpose. What does serve the purpose is to reflect in a Christian manner on the Old Testament roots of the doctrine I am exploring - social holiness. With this in mind, I will not deal with specific verses in the section, but with what John Wesley calls "the general tenor of Scripture." This means that I will reflect on what Scripture says, as a whole.

As we look at Israel in the OT, we see a group called to social holiness. We see the One True God calling a group of people to be the witness to the earth by being socially holy. We have God deciding that this will be His people and that He will be their God. This starts an interesting dynamic.

After the Exodus, we see that this nation is called to a different way of life than the nations around it. The first example of this is the dietary laws laid down. At this time, this is very different. It has often been argued that what God is doing here is to protect the people - they should not eat certain foods (like pork) because these foods are dangerous. However, we see that while God excludes certain foods (like pork) that are danereous and can lead to death, He allows other food to be included (like beef) that has the same danger. Why? I don't know. However, the conclusion I have come to is that what God is doing is calling Israel to be different. This nation will look different than other nations. It will be different. Really, what God has done is to place down laws that require the Israelites to follow Him first and that set them apart (call them out) from the rest of the world.

This is continued when we look at another way that these people are called to be different. Israel has no king. This is quite odd at this point in time. They do have a leader in Moses, but he is not a king as much as a prophet. No, Israel is called and led by God alone. This means that while they wonder the desert, and even when they first enter the promised land, God is the only one they rely on. They do not rely on being pragmatic or what will work, but they rely solely on God. They rely on God for the manna from Heaven and for the strength to make it to the promised land. These are God's people and they are to rely on God. And as we see in the Torah, when the people do not rely on God, the bad stuff occurs. Thus, the call is for a full reliance upon God and what God has asked of us. It is not to a reliance on ourselves, our methods, or what we think may be best.

Lastly, I want to point out the Old Testament concept of Jubilee. Jubilee was a "practice" of the Jews, where every 49 years (7x7 - ultimate perfection) all debts were forgiven, all slaves freed, and the nation would back to a "zero" starting point. All was somewhat equal again. (Can you imagine?) Some have argued that this was never really practiced. Fair, but it does not really matter. The fact is that it was what God wanted, what He commanded. This is the ideal. The goal of Israel was to be, to a certain extent, equality. The idea was that everything that was gained was God's gift anyway. Thus, being God's gift, it was not one's to keep. The goal then was to return the gift, to return to the way that God had created Israel in the first place. Reliance was to be upon God, not upon "stuff". Therefore, one could not count upon the "stuff".

The question now becomes, "what does this matter?" Well, I would argue, with N.T. Wright, that Jesus becomes the culmination of Israel. I would then argue that through Jesus, the traditions and customs of Israel are passed onto the church through the apostles. Therefore, the commands of God to Israel becomes the commands of God to the church. It also happens that the ideal that God called the Israelites to is also the ideal that God calls the church to. The church is to be a place of difference from the outside world. This is a place where one's complete reliance is upon God - not upon what "works" or what will bring people in. God is the goal and the end. Therefore, as God calls us to give up what is ours and to share and return, this is accepted because God will provide. The giving back, the "evening of the playing field" in Jubilee does not matter because we rely on God through our love God that then extends into all the world. Jubilee becomes the outpour of our lives. It is an ideal, but one that we are called to strive to fulfill.

Introducing Social Holiness

"What do we mean when we talk about social holiness?" This is the question I am intending to contemplate in this week's post. I say "contemplate" and not "answer" because I am not sure that I can answer the question. I, however, do believe that I can begin to help us to gain an understanding or familiarity with it. That is the goal of this post and the subsequent posts on social holiness.

Social holiness has two aspects. These two aspects are rather obvious: one is a social aspect, the other a holiness aspect. I think the first place to look would be the holiness aspect.

Holiness has been a bit of a long debated topic, especially in Protestantism. It seems though that the Roman Catholic Church and Eastern Orthodox Church take it as a sort of "given." (Although it seems that they prefer to call it sanctification or deification.)

So, the question now becomes, "What am I talking about when I am talking about holiness?" The first is a perfection of love. It seems that the holiness passage par excellence is Matthew 22.37-40. Here, Jesus gives the two greatest commandments. These are to love God with all heart, soul, and mind (with one's whole being) and the other is to love one's neighbor as oneself. It seems that this is the goal of the Christian life. The goal is love perfected. Thus, when we begin a discussion on holiness, love begins the discussion. In holiness, we are after perfect love.

This perfect love then works in our life to eradicate sin, or at least the motivation to sin. When one loves God with one's entire being, then one is completely disposed to God, not to sin. This perfect love that God has bestowed upon the person cleanses the person from any love other than that which is Godly. Thus, in perfected love - holiness - the motivation to sin is no longer there. This does not mean that we never make a mistake or cannot turn against this love. However, the primary mode of living is not in sin but is the conquering love of God made manifest in Christ.

So, when we talk about holiness, we are talking about a perfect love given by God that cleanses the believer of a motivation to sin. We must now add the next aspect - the social.

The social aspect is the second part of the commandment. We must love our neighbors as ourselves. We will talk later about who our neighbor is. However, for now, it is safe to say that God calls us to love all people. And this love of all people is given to us and flows from us due to our love of God with all of our being. The social dimension then is based upon the dimension of perfected love of God. When we perfectly love God, we must also perfectly love our neighbor. We could not not love our neighbor, the creation of God, and continue love God fully. This is to break the commandment.

The social dimension of holiness then is the perfected love outpouring from us. It is the love of God being demonstrated in the world. Or better, is the love of God, given to us and perfected in us, being poured out of us into all of the world by God through us. We become the instruments of God in the world to perfectly love the world.

By social holiness then, we are beginning to talk of the work of the body of Christ present in the world. Social holiness has to do with the love that the church works in the world. I believe though that it starts with a call from the church for its members to be holy and to seek a perfecting of love enacted by God. However, in this, the church must move outside of its walls and be Christ in the world.

I hope this begins to clarify what I am talking about when I say "social holiness." As I explore this over the next few weeks, I will be first looking at the biblical material, both Old and New Testaments. I will then look at some historical examples. I will then finish by advocating some ways that the church can be socially holy and be the body of Christ in the world.