The classical apologetic approach considered Christ to be the
Legate of God. His words and deeds are “authentic, textually intact and
historically true.” They are dogmas that should not be questioned but only to
be believed. “Such a reduction of the picture of Jesus makes the resurrection
unintelligible.” Despite that the resurrection is a fundamental belief of
Christians: “if Christ has not been raised, then our proclamation has been in
vain and your faith has been in vain” (1 Cor 15:14), it does not mean that we
should only believe with no doubt and question without looking into the meaning
of death and resurrection of Jesus to his contemporaries as well as to the
whole humanity by making meaningful inquiries and by comparing, contrasting and
cross-referencing different texts in the Scripture. In contrast, modern
theologians such as Gerald O’Collins “recognize that intelligibility and
persuasion are distinct but are not to be separated.” In order words, Jesus’
acts and words are not just abstract arguments like a mathematical proof but
they can be meditated and understood by human intelligence and reasoning in
order to get the fuller meaning of the message for persuading one to believe in
God and His Son who surrendered his life out of love for the salvation of all
sinners (Lecture Notes of Lesson 10). Let’s illustrate the difference with a
couple of examples of the suffering, death and resurrection of Jesus.
It is apparent that Jesus was aware of his impending death
while he was praying in the Garden of Gethsemane. He asked the Father to remove
this (suffering) cup from him (Mark 14:36). Regrettably, Jesus remained in
loneliness and “no one spoke for him, let alone did anything for him.” And he
was handed over “into the hands of the sinners” (Mark 14:41). After his arrest,
all his disciples including Peter, who previously confessed his messianic
identity (Mark 8:29), deserted him. According to the Gospel of Mark, the last
words of the Lord on the Cross were “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
(Mark 15:34) Under the classical apologetic approach, Christians would be
“educated” to believe that the Son of Man died for men for the salvation of our
sins and it is us sinners who crucified him on the cross. While such a conclusion
is authentic in the sense of Christian belief, yet it does not address natural
questions such as why did it appear that the Father had abandoned Jesus? Why
did Jesus curse God? Is there any hidden message in Jesus’ cry of abandonment?
The cry of abandonment was quoted from the first few words of
Psalm 22. Jesus said these words in Aramaic (“Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?”),
which is his mother tongue, making the understanding of these words and the
whole psalm even more important as he experienced the last moments of his human
life prior to his resurrection from the dead. Psalm 22 is divided into two
sections: an accusation of God who seemed to have abandoned the author and a
personal call to God for help (vv. 1-21); and a thanksgiving to God who had delivered
him from the adversaries (vv. 22-31), which is a 180 degree turn from the first
section. It is important to note that the psalm ended with the following two
verses: “Posterity will serve him; future generations will be told about the
Lord, and proclaim his deliverance to a people yet unborn, saying that he has
done it (vv. 30-31),” which is a promise to even people unborn. When we look at
the first section in details, the repeated “my God,” appearing four times in
vv. 1, 2 and 10 was a very personal note of the author. His enemies were
portrayed as bulls (v12), a lion (v13, v21), dogs (v16, v20) and oxen (v21).
Apparently the dramatic change in v22 is a result of God’s rescue. Seemingly,
even the persecutors undergo a change – all (including the persecutors?) are
called “my brothers in sisters” in the beginning verse of the second section.
And God’s salvation has been extended from the “offspring of Israel” (v 23) to
all peoples: “All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the Lord;
and all the families of the nations shall worship before him. For dominion
belongs to the Lord, and he rules over the nations” (vv. 27-28). Furthermore,
God also rules over the dead, “To him, indeed, shall all who sleep in the earth
bow down; before him shall blow all who go down to the dust” (v29). In other
words, Psalm 22 begins with “the cry of an individual who suffers (and) ends
with a vision of God’s final, universal rule.” If we return to the context of
Jesus’ last words on the cross, they become a distinctive prayer of Jesus in
his mother tongue to God with which all suffering human beings can share – from
a personal blame to God of hardship to a thanksgiving for God’s grace and
deliverance. As such, Jesus cry of abandonment should not be construed to be “Jesus
on the cross as bearing the sins of the world, nor did it support the idea that
he felt himself to be the object of God’s anger” (i.e., the penal substitution
theory), but rather it is a final prayer of Jesus which he “expected that a
divine reversal of his own dreadful situation would change them (all sinners)
and bring all nations to worship the God of Israel (now identified as ‘Abba’ or
the loving Father) and to receive final salvation” (O’Collins 170-174).
The Lord’s call on Peter in the final chapter (Chapter 21) of
John’s Gospel is a well-known passage of Jesus’ appearance to his disciples
after his resurrection from the dead. Traditionally, it is being understood as
the Lord forgiving Peter of his triple denial by giving him the opportunity to
confess his faith three times. It can also be understood by the Catholic Church
in a dogmatic sense as Jesus giving the divine power to Peter and his
successors to be the supreme teacher and pastor the Church. However, the
passage brings much more than the message to Peter in a literal sense but it is
also an important message to all the readers. First, it is noted that Jesus
stood on the beach just after “daybreak” (v21), which recalls that Jesus is
“the light of the world” (John 9:5) who restores us from spiritual blindness
(John 9:1-41) and the darkness of the world (John 1:4-9). Second, the
extraordinary catch of 153 large fish (v11) is a “symbol of fullness and an
echo of the life in abundance (John 10:10),” yet the net was not broken and
none of the fish was lost (John 6:39). So, Peter was assigned with the mission
to gather not just one nation, but all into one the dispersed children of God
(John 11:52), and into one flock belonging to one shepherd (John 10:16). Third,
Jesus had already prepared breakfast: bread and fish for his disciples (v9). It
recalls what Jesus did in the multiplication of the loaves (John 6:8-11) and
Jesus’ saying that he is “the bread of life” (John 6:35). The Easter breakfast
is thus a symbol of “Jesus’ saving presence through the Eucharistic meals to
come.” Then it comes to Jesus’ triple question to Peter: “Do you love me?” It
is interesting to note that Jesus addressed Peter with his original name:
“Simon son of John.” After Peter’s triple confession that he would tend and feed
the Lord’s sheep, Peter was “converted” from Simon to a true follower of Jesus:
a martyr who would stretch out his hands, to be fastened with a belt, and taken
to a place which he did not wish to go (vv. 18-19). The Lord’s message is
clear: Peter’s shameful past during the passion is “not denied, but recalled,
forgiven and lovingly redeemed. A healing through love becomes the basis for
Peter’s new future,” a “heroic mission that will lead to a martyr’s death.” It
also reminds us of Jesus’ great commandment: “No one has greater love than
this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15:13). For Christians,
Jesus’ appeal to “follow me” (v19) is a personal call, no less than for Peter,
which can “evoke and heal our memories as the basis for a new future”
(O’Collins 196-199). With these vivid images of the Gospel, while the mysteries
remain to be seen by the eyes of faith, the stories tell much more than
dogmatic truths of the classical apologetic approach but “retrieve Jesus afresh
for a personal encounter” of our Lord (Lecture Notes of Lesson 10).
Bibliography
Coogan, Michael D. The New Oxford Annotated Bible: New
Revised Standard Version with Apocrypha. N.p.: Oxford UP, 2010. Print.
Hammond, David. Lecture
Notes for TH 530 Lesson 10 – Rationalism, Classical Apologetics and
Christology.
O’ Collins, Gerald. Jesus: A Portrait. New York: Maryknoll,
2013. Print.
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