The Politicization of Morality
Lent 5
March 17, 2013

The Politicization of Morality
by Charlie Love

John 8: 1-11

Old news! …Law and order, crime and punishment, “sin” and “penance” (to give it a sanctified sounding, religious veneer) is BIG business! …Nothing new about that reality… You know it! …It's a Bible truth!

We talked last Sunday about how it was that, in Jesus' day, the politically appointed High Priest and his cohorts at the temple used the “sin-industry” as a money grab whereby to make enough money to pay off their political masters- the Romans….We talked bout how, in the pursuit of profit, religious leaders “multiplied transgressions” -heaping nuance upon nuance until they had 613 “laws” on the books- more than most people could think to remember never mind obey…So many “laws” that every time they showed up at the temple, people could be charged with something -for which they were required to make sacrifice and pay up!

Good thing the church doesn't work like that today: except, well, maybe in Ireland!

That's a bit of the way it was, at the Temple, back in Jesus' day…

And, that's the way the Romans liked it….Lots of laws…rigidly enforced…keeping 'the people' in their place- beaten down, abused and poor- any hint of rebellion beaten out of them- a populace subservient to temple authorities who, in turn, were puppets oppressed by the High Priest- who knew his place in the chain of command as servant of Pilate who, ultimately served at the pleasure of Caesar…. Law and order, in Jesus' day had less to do with what we'd call morality than it was a matter of political expediency- tool of oppression, keeping the peace and upholding whatever seemed to the Romans to be in their best interest…

In 18 BC, as part of a re-write of moral law, Caesar Augustus, proclaimed a statute titled "Lex Julia de adulteriis" which came down very hard on anyone caught in an act of adultery… Scholars debate Augustus' motive suggesting it may have been a backlash against early feminism and changes in the property rights of women and their offspring that would have given them increasing independence moving property outside families to the illegitimate children -product of adulterous relationships- some of whom might or might not be Roman citizens- hence the threat that Roman property and control might end up in foreign hands: …or, more simply, it may have been Augustus' intent to arbitrarily extend his control legislating every aspect of the lives of his citizens keeping lines of differentiation between people who were citizens- Romans- born to lives of some entitlement and those who were not…. Either way, whether it was concerns for quashing feminism or concern to define and limit citizenship, the motivating factor as Augustus defined laws about adultery was NOT morality (as we'd think of it) but rather, political and economic expediency- priority concerns to be enforced on pain of harshest penalties… How tough was Augutus' law on adultery? …Augustus decreed that if a father discovered that his married daughter was committing adultery in either his own house or the house of his son-in-law, he was entitled to kill both the woman and her lover. If he killed only one of the adulterers, he could be charged with murder. No room for leniency! If your daughter was committing adultery- she and her lover had both to die! That was the law and it was administered top down the chain of command into even the remotest corners of the Roman Empire where, in today's Biblical story, we read, case in point….a story that we typically interpret as a juxtaposition of law against gospel …judgement vs grace… A story that, if you go and look it up in most Bibles, you'll discover is written in brackets!

While scholars agree that this is an ancient story that most likely dates from the era of Jesus' days- most likely an authentic story of Jesus, they note that not a word of it all made it into any earlier gospels. In direct opposition to the authority and edicts of Caesar, a story that suggests mercy for adulterers was too much a hot potato for even the craftiest story teller to dare explore…. As the incidents of the story unfolded, Jesus himself recognized the danger inherent in the situation of it all and, with all the subtly he could muster, his response to this confrontation was- 'find ways to de-escalate and defuse it, quick as I can…before somebody gets hurt!' Not a good moment for a stand-off between the law of Caesar and the mercy of God… Caesar's political investment in the outcome left no room for moral debate or considerations… much to Jesus' chagrin- no doubt- but- ever the pragmatist, Jesus recognized the reality…. This was NOT what we'd call a Kairos moment- ripe opportunity for social change.

So- what's Jesus do?

Story says he knelt down preparing to write in the dirt: but before he'd even wrote a first word, by assuming a non-threatening posture of vulnerability, we can see some masterful manipulation going on -defusing confrontation…. And then he wrote something… Story doesn't say exactly what it was that he wrote- the open-endedness of that reality perhaps an invitation to imagine that everyone watching him might see in his scribbles words they needed to hear…who knows….Amy Jill Levine- an orthodox Jewish professor of New Testament Studies at a Christian University- author of The Jewish Annotated New Testament suggests that Jesus' action may have been an enacted allusion to Jeremiah 17:13 in which it is written that those who turn away from God shall find their names written in the earth (as opposed to in the book of Life) for they have forsaken the fountain of living water (the fountain of life) and (it is implied) their fate awaits them in, as the NRSV puts it, the underworld (colloquially- read 'in hell.')….If Amy is right, on a good Irish Sunday when we might speak plainly, by his scribbling on the ground Jesus says to the scribes and Pharisees- “I see what you're up to all of a sudden going hard-line in support of Caesar's adultery laws… and trying to use them to trap me in something that might be considered culpable heresy… You're not out to uphold the moral good or the righteousness of God. You pontifically spout piety for the sake of political gain- thereby using and abusing, belittling the values of our people and God… You were not at all concerned about sexual ethics when cousin John the Baptist accused Herod of incest: but, now you are ready to take up Caesar's politically opportunistic crusade and stone this woman and/or to ensnare me in treasonous denunciation of Caesar's laws! I write your names in the dirt- symbolically saying to you, “Go to hell!”

If any of the scribes and Pharisees got past such stinging rebuke, they might have moved on to see, in Jesus' writing, a call to remember the WORD that IS written in scripture: and, with that to recall something of the evolution of social sexual ethics according to the emergent realities of the day and according to the best definition of love and mercy interpreting, in every age, what might and should work best for the common good of all…. While the principles of love and mercy are eternal- how best they are expressed is shaded by what philosophers refer to as the realities of situational ethics….Cultural mores are constantly in flux and our task, as would be moral and spiritually faithful people, is to be analytically astute enough to appropriately weigh and give consideration to how holy principles are being either honoured or distorted by things like political influence, economic manipulation, as tools of subjugation or for ulterior motives…By any such criteria, might Jesus' scribblings have called to guilty Pharisaic mind a passage written by Isaiah wherein the prophet says-

Hear that, you who would stone this poor waif caught in adultery… And I think we can imagine Jesus, if not at the moment, in re-telling the story, reminding the Pharisees, and anyone else who would be so arbitrary and judgemental- seeing things as black and white, enforcing the letter of the law to gain political advantage, saying to them, as recorded in Matthew's 7th chapter- “Do not be so quick to judge- so that (in like manner) then neither shall you be judged…(For I tell you) with the judgement you make you will be judged: and the measure (of mercy) you give will be the measure you get back…in everything, do to others as you would have them do to you, for this is (not just) law, but law informed by the wisdom of the prophets- justice tempered by mercy -as James would later speak of it in the 2nd chapter of his Biblical letter… or, as Shakespeare would put it in The Merchant of Venice- all are best served “when mercy seasons justice.”

From Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice, 1596:

Those whom strict justice would condemn, God would pardon… that's what Jesus says to the scribes and Pharisees… this woman “caught in adultery” -consider her case, learn the background of why she did what she did…understand her pain and cut her some slack…Caesar and Empire promulgate “iniquitous decrees” that, sounding pious, obscurify their true intent: but we don't need to subserviently become complicit in such uncaring usury: for we, knowing the mercy of God, have so amply received as to share… Let he who is without sin cast the first stone- if any: but let the rest of us find common thanksgiving in unmerited free grace- God's unbounded holy intent to forgive and nurture newness of life.

“Go,” Jesus says to the woman -neither demanding she confess nor that she redress… “Go” YOUR way- being accountable to what the Spirit in you knows is right or wrong or, sometimes even of necessity to be endured…. “Go,” and with, I imagine a wink, Jesus says, “sin no more”- his wink acknowledging the arbitrary nature of the so-called “sins” most narrowly defined that she was accused of breaking…GO- get out of here because for all that the scribes and Pharisees have walked away, we know they didn't go away happy and we know that, chances are, their vindictive, wounded pride and their fear of Caesar will have them out for saving face revenge…So, go…hurry…away with you… And, let us all be wary of what can happen when political agendas masquerade as moral righteousness- the absolute will of God as interpreted by empire…. Today, Jesus might contemporarize his warning to say- Be wary the Law and Order agenda, the climate of cultivated fear that keeps you in subjugation ready to sacrifice human rights and the rights of others in the name of modern Pax Romana- the peace of the empire pursued at any price -to the profit of emperors and kings - the rich and powerful in every age…

Go and knowing God's love let it take shape in and through your life- for your sake and the sake of all creation. Such is the true morality of God…Go- and live it. Amen.

St John's United Church
Stratford On

(Comments to Charlie at rev_love@hotmail.com.)