"We saw his star"

The title for this blog entry comes from Matthew 2:1-2 in the New Testament:

"After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, 'Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him.'" (New International Version)

Not much of what the gospels say about Jesus’ birth is universally believed anymore. Most scholars now claim that Jesus was born in Nazareth, not Bethlehem. Some say he might have been born in a place called Bethlehem, but in Galilee, not Judea. (The difference is significant for more than geographical reasons, but needn’t detain us here.) Gone are the inn and the manger, the shepherds and the angels, and the Magi mentioned here. Gone the census, gone the dreams and annunciations, gone the virgin birth. And of course the best scholars, even of conservative hue, have long claimed that Jesus was probably born in the spring, not in December. Yet a lot of people do still believe in the gospels’ so-called Infancy Narratives, for reasons best known only to themselves.

The Infancy Narratives and all the rest of the gospels are all about a long-awaited Redeemer. After Jesus’ death his followers composed stories that had him fulfilling Old Testament prophecies of one sent from God to turn the people of Israel from their sins and inaugurate a reign of peace and justice. Little matter that they reinterpreted those old prophecies and invented stories to fulfill them. Little matter that the Jesus of the gospels was nothing like the Jews’ expected savior. Not all Jews in Jesus’ day expected a Messiah; many did not. Most of those who did, expected someone to come and save them, not from their sins, but from their oppressors. But there was an element, an extreme element, within the Judaism of Jesus’ day that believed the people of Israel had to be turned from their sins back to God before God would save them from their oppressors. Jesus and his followers appealed to precisely this element.

I do not believe in sin. I believe that all that is, is the perfect expression of the Infinite One’s perfect, eternal will. The Infinite can hardly punish Its manifestations for being what It has made them–indeed, what It makes them from moment to moment. There can be no eternal retribution from which we must be saved, no guilt from which we must be redeemed.

That, however, doesn’t mean we have no need of redemption. It doesn’t mean that the Infinite manifests us as we are with the intent that we never change and grow, for change and growth are the constants of Its manifestation.

Redemption is a far subtler thing than Christian doctrine advertises. "You are not your own," says the New Testament, "you were bought at a price" (see I Corinthians 6:19-20). Bought from the Evil One, bought from damnation, with the price of Christ’s blood, so we are told.

We are what God created and our Creator could never have lost us to another from whom we must be bought back. But in an operant sense, in the sense of living our daily lives, we often need redemption from the seeming errors into which we fall, we often need to be brought back from the self-defeating paths we travel. This is where some of Jesus’ teachings come in handy; this is why he is worth remembering and celebrating today.

We began with a quote from the gospel according to Matthew, and it happens that Matthew contains the best summary of the best parts of Jesus’ teachings–the Sermon on the Mount (chapters 5 through 7). "It’s all good," as the saying goes, but there are a few highlights that verily show us how to live, today as in his day, though our times and his be radically different.

"In everything do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets" (Matthew 7:12). We call this the Golden Rule, but Christians may not realize that Jesus didn’t make it up. The great Rabbi Hillel said something very similar a century before Jesus: "That which is repugnant to you, do not to your neighbor. This is the whole Law; the rest is commentary." This is the cornerstone of common decency, the foundation of all fairness and justice, and without it we deceive ourselves if we think we live humanly. From it follows everything that follows here.

"Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you too will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you" (7:1-2). None of us wants to be judged or condemned, but when we judge or condemn others we invite judgment and condemnation upon ourselves. What we give, is what we deserve back again.

"Blsssed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy" (5:8)–and we all need mercy from someone, somewhere, from time to time.

"Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you" (5:42). Most of us (including me) violate this every day, and quickly excuse ourselves with lots of good reasons. But who among us would want to be ignored or rebuffed in our need? And who among us would want someone else to define our need and desert for us?

In Jesus’ day, as in our own, survival was a challenge. Jesus’ teachings offered no one any help with the challenge of survival, except through mutual aid. The challenge he offered was to overcome our sense of personal need and our need for personal safety to give to others–though he also offered the hope of receiving our bounty back again. For he said:

"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important then food, and the body more important than clothes? . . . But seek first [God’s] kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well" (6:25,33).

In our practical world we think we do well not to believe such promises. But a world in which such promises are believed and practiced, will be a better world than the one we have.

Jesus’ ethical teachings are remembered because he accompanied them with seeming miracles and led his followers to believe a new kingdom was coming soon, to be introduced by him. Today our world is very different from his, and yet surprisingly the same. Like his contemporaries we fear for our lives and scratch and scramble to maintain them, as if that could be worth our while. In our day as in his, the life worth living is the life that maintains others. That was the light he offered then, and that is the light he offers now.

"We saw his star in the east, and have come to worship him." His teachings about serving others are that guiding star.