I have just learned that Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, at the latest of the monthly Evangelical Protestant worship services he has instituted in the Pentagon,  led a prayer he called “CSAR 2517:” standing for, he said “Combat Search And Rescue,” and the Bible reference for the prayer, Ezekiel 25:17.  He then “prayed”:

The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who, in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother’s keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger. And you will know my name is the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee.

If you followed the link above to Ezekiel 25:17 in the KJV (a translation whose cadences this prayer broadly imitates), you will know that Hegseth’s prayer did not, in truth, come from that passage, which simply reads, “And I will execute great vengeance upon them with furious rebukes; and they shall know that I am the LORD, when I shall lay my vengeance upon them.”  So, where does it come from?

Its author is not Ezekiel, as it turns out, but Quentin Tarantino; and it comes, not from any biblical translation, but from the 1994 film “Pulp Fiction” –where those lines are delivered by the inimitable Samuel L. Jackson, playing a hit man in the process of brutally executing an unarmed man.  Here is the movie scene, including the quote in context.

In his worship service, Mr. Hegseth said, “Fifteen minutes ago I was talking about blockades with Admiral Cooper, and now we’re going to study the Lord’s word. May what we talk about, how we worship today, inform the remainder of our day and the remainder of our week.”  So evidently, he actually believed that he was quoting Scripture.

As it happens, I have never seen “Pulp Fiction.”  But I do know a bit about the book of Ezekiel.  Not only does Mr. Hegseth’s “prayer” not come from this biblical book, but his use of Ezekiel 25:17 entirely distorts its actual meaning in its context.

Ezekiel 25:15-17 is an oracle of the prophet against the Philistines.

The Lord GOD proclaims: When the Philistines set out to right the wrongs done to them, they enacted revenge with utter contempt and old hatreds.  So now the Lord GOD proclaims: I will overpower the Philistines, eliminate the Cherethites, and obliterate all who are left along the coastline.  I will act against them with great vengeance and with wrathful punishments. When I execute my vengeance against them, they will know that I am the LORD.

Oracles against foreign nations, like this one, were an important part of the prophetic repertoire.  Collections of such oracles commonly appear in prophetic books: we can compare Ezekiel 25—32 to Amos 1—2; Jeremiah 46—51; or Isaiah 13—23.   Ezekiel’s oracles against the nations consist of a series of short, pithy prophecies against Ammon (25:1-7), Moab (25:8-11), Edom (25:12-14), and Philistia (25:15-17); a collection of material regarding Tyre (26:1—28:19), another brief oracle, against Sidon (28:20-24); a promise of blessing upon Israel (28:25-26), and a miscellaneous collection concerning Egypt (29:1—32:32).

But it is doubtful that any of these messages were really meant to be read by foreigners, or indeed that any foreign king ever saw them.  Their intended audience was the people of Israel—just as, in our own day, political pronouncements about international affairs are often meant for domestic consumption.  So even in Ezekiel 25–32, where the subject of his oracles is other nations, Ezekiel is actually addressing his audience of Judeans in exile (as Ezekiel 28:25-26 makes plain).

The Philistines were a major group of the Aegean raiders called the Sea Peoples.  They settled along the southern coast of Palestine early in the twelfth century, and built a chain of five city-states: Gaza, Ashdod, Ashkelon, Ekron, and Gath.  Despite their warlike character, it is a mistake to think of the Philistines as uncultured brutes.  Archaeological investigations at the three Philistine sites known to us (Gaza, Ashdod, and Ashkelon) show the Philistines to have been an artistically accomplished, highly sophisticated people (Ekron might have been located at Tel Miqne, but the location of Gath remains entirely unknown).

The Philistines were major rivals of the Israelite tribes, but particularly of Judah; the Samson cycle (Judges 13—16) is largely concerned with Judah’s struggles against Philistine domination.  Although David forced the Philistines to acknowledge his hegemony (2 Samuel 8:1), Philistia remained a constant threat throughout the history of the monarchy.  In the eighth century BCE, Philistia was granted considerable autonomy within the Assyrian empire, since it served as an important bulwark for Assyria against Egypt.  Therefore, Hezekiah launched his rebellion against Assyria by seizing Philistine territory (2 Kings 18:8).  Likely, the Philistine vengeance to which Ezekiel refers in 25:15 came in the wake of Sennacherib’s suppression of that revolt, when the Philistines reasserted their control over the disputed lands (see Ezekiel 16:27).  In Ezekiel’s day, Philistia once more was a buffer state, this time standing for Egypt and against Babylon.  However, just as Ezekiel’s oracle affirms, Philistia’s days were numbered: like Judah, Philistia would be overrun by the Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzar and taken into exile.

The reason for God’s judgment against Philistia is stated in that first verse: “The Lord God proclaims: When the Philistines set out to right the wrongs done to them, they enacted revenge with utter contempt and old hatreds” (Ezekiel 25:15).  Like Edom, condemned in Ezekiel 25:12-14, Philistia is punished for taking vengeance.  Further, as in the Edom oracle, the punishment meted out against Philistia is the LORD’s direct vengeance, brought by the LORD’s own hand (compare Ezekiel 25:13 and 16)–and not, please note, by Israel.  In this way, “When I execute my vengeance against them, they [that is, the Philistines] will know that I am the LORD” (Ezekiel 25:17).

Apart from the specific context of family honor (see the various references to the go’el haddam [“avenger of blood”] in Numbers 35 and Deuteronomy 19), Torah rules out vengeance in the human world: “You must not take revenge nor hold a grudge against any of your people; instead, you must love your neighbor as yourself; I am the LORD” (Leviticus 19:18).  So, while Saul is condemned for seeking vengeance (1 Samuel 14:24), David is commended for leaving vengeance to God (1 Samuel 24:12).  Indeed, the LORD appears as go’el–that is, the avenger or the redeemer–in Exodus 6:6; Jeremiah 31:11; 50:34; Micah 4:10; Psalms 19:14 and 107:2; and 15 times in Second Isaiah (Isaiah 40-55; for example, Isaiah 41:14; 43:14; 48:17).  God takes vengeance directly against the nations, not only in Ezekiel 25:12, 15 but also in Genesis 4:15, 24 and Deuteronomy 32:43, acting on behalf of God’s own people, or for God’s own honor (Jeremiah 46:10). But often in Scripture, the Hebrew verb naqam (“take vengeance”) expresses God’s vengeance, not against foreigners, but against a sinful and rebellious Israel: in defense of the helpless, and on behalf of God’s own covenant and name (Leviticus 26:25; Isaiah 1:24; Jeremiah 5:9, 29; 9:9; 15:15; Ezekiel 24:8).

Edom and Philistia, having taken vengeance against Judah, are in turn consumed by the vengeance of God.  Their fate in Ezekiel 25 calls to mind a central theme of Israel’s wisdom literature: that violence and injustice carry within them their own consequences.  So, Proverbs 22:8 declares,

Those who sow injustice will harvest evil;
    the rod of their fury will come to an end.

Christian readers may be reminded of Jesus’ words to one who attempted to defend him from the mob in Gethsemane: “Put the sword back into its place. All those who use the sword will die by the sword” (Matthew 26:52).  Even if we disregard Tarantino’s grotesque ornamentation of this passage in “Pulp Fiction,” in no way does Ezekiel 25:17 justify our claims to wreak vengeance on God’s behalf.  Indeed, its point is quite the opposite: it is a warning against taking vengeance.  Here as throughout the Bible, the point is that vengeance belongs to God, not to us.  Certainly, this passage does not, as Secretary Hegseth implies, legitimate our war of aggression in Iran.

I have already written about the still relatively new NRSVue: the updated edition of the New Revised Standard Version.  I have commented at some length on those places where I find this Bible useful, even beautiful, and on those places where I disagree with the text-critical choices its editors have made.

However, I have only recently come to appreciate two passages in particular where the NRSVue distinguishes itself, not for some fresh insight or new discovery, but rather for its willingness to acknowledge our ignorance: places where we do not know for sure what the text means.  Those passages are 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 and 1 Timothy 1:9-10: two texts often cited concerning same-sex relations.

Both passages are “vice lists:” stereotyped lists of offenses, often used by moral teachers in the Greco-Roman world.  These lists are common in Pauline literature (that is, the New Testament letters associated with the Apostle Paul), and their contents vary (for example, see Rom 1: 29-31; 2 Cor 12:20; Gal 5:19-21).  They are never unpacked in context: that is, the individual elements in the list are not discussed in any detail, and no case is made for naming any part of the list as a vice.  The entire list is thrown out as a block, to establish a consensus the teacher can then build upon: these are actions that the author assumes the entire community will regard as unacceptable.  Among those condemned, 1 Corinthians 6:9 lists malakoi.  Both 1 Corinthians 6:9 and 1 Timothy 1:10 also mention arsenokoitai.

Both words are uncommon.  In the Bible, the Greek word malakos (“soft”) occurs only twice in the Septuagint, the Greek translation of Jewish Scripture: Proverbs 25:15, for the Hebrew rakah (CEB has “tender”), and Proverbs 26:2, for the Hebrew mithlakhamim (“delicacies;” CEB has “choice snacks”).  Apart from 1 Corinthians 6:9,  malakos appears only two other times in the New Testament: in Matthew 11:8//Luke 7:25, for the “soft robes” (CEB has “refined clothes”) worn by the rich.  As for arsenokoitai, this word occurs only in these two passages in our Bible, and is found nowhere else until after its use in the New Testament by Paul.  None of this helps us understand what these words, or these passages, mean in context.

However, that has not prevented Bible translators from making rather bold claims.  The old NRSV and the 1984 NIV alike render malakoi as “male prostitutes,” while the KJV has “effeminate.”  For the term arsenokoitai, NRSV had “sodomites” in both places; the 1984 NIV has “homosexual offenders” in 1 Corinthians and “perverts” in 1 Timothy.  The KJV reads “abusers of themselves with mankind” in 1 Corinthians, and “them that defile themselves with mankind” in 1 Timothy.

The CEB has “both participants in same-sex intercourse” in 1 Corinthians 6:9; a footnote confidently explains that this refers to “submissive [that is, malakoi] and dominant [that is, arsenokoitai] male sexual partners.”  Similarly, the new NIV reads “men who have sex with men;” the translators’ footnote says that these words “translate two Greek words that refer to the passive and active participants in homosexual acts.”  In 1 Timothy 1:10, the CEB renders arsenokoitais as “people who have intercourse with the same sex,” while the most recent edition of the NIV has “those practicing homosexuality”–translations difficult to understand, since the word must refer to something that men (Greek arsenos) do, and not to same-sex relations generally (as is also the case in Lev 18:22 and 20:13; biblically, only Rom 1:27 specifically mentions lesbians).

Turning to Greek literature roughly contemporaneous with our New Testament, we find the term malakos in a history of the Roman Empire by Dionysus of Halicarnasus (ca. 60-7 BCE):

The tyrant of Cumae at that time was Aristodemus, the son of Aristocrates, a man of no obscure birth, who was called by the citizens Malacus or “Effeminate” — a nickname which in time came to be better known than his own name — either because when a boy he was effeminate and allowed himself to be treated as a woman, as some relate, or because he was of a mild nature and slow to anger, as others state (Roman Antiquities 7.2.4).

Since Dionysus admits that he is not sure why Aristodemus was nicknamed “Malacus” (“Softie”), this reference is not decisive–though the rumor that Malacus was “treated as a woman” when he was a boy suggests that perhaps malakos had to do with the sexual abuse of boys.

In his discussion of Lev 18 (see Special Laws 3.5–8), the Jewish philosopher Philo of Alexandria (20 B.C.-50 C.E.) uses the term malakia (clearly related to malakos) with reference to pederasty–sex with boys:

And let the man who is devoted to the love of boys [Greek paiderastes] submit to the same punishment, since he pursues that pleasure which is contrary to nature, and since, as far as depends upon him, he would make the cities desolate, and void, and empty of all inhabitants, wasting his power of propagating his species, and moreover, being a guide and teacher of those greatest of all evils, unmanliness and effeminate lust [Greek malakias], stripping young men of the flower of their beauty, and wasting their prime of life in effeminacy (Special Laws 3.7.39).

Robert Gagnon suggests that Paul himself may have coined the word arsenokoitai, with reference to Leviticus 18:22 in the Septuagint–where the Greek words arsenos (“male”) and koite (“bed,” specifically “marriage bed,” hence our word “coitus”) both appear (Robert A. J. Gagnon, The Bible and Homosexual Practice: Texts and Hermeneutics [Nashville: Abingdon, 2001], 312).  If this is so, then Paul may be creating a term here to use for male homosexuality.  In Talmud, however, as in Philo, the infamous Leviticus 18 and 20 passages are read specifically with reference to pederasty (see b. Sanhedrin 54a-55a).

In Greco-Roman society, it was not at all uncommon for an upper-class man to take a boy as his ward, teaching him, enculturating him, introducing him into society–and using him sexually.  The myth of Jupiter and Ganymede, depicted in the plaque above, gave religious sanction to these relationships.  Still, as J. Paul Sampley observes, Roman moral philosophers such as Seneca, Plutarch, and Dio Chrysostom objected to the sexual exploitation of boys (and sometimes girls) enslaved in households for same-sex relations (J. Paul Sampley, “1 Corinthians,” in The New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol 10, ed. Leander Keck [Nashville: Abingdon, 2002], 859).  Perhaps this is what Paul too had in mind in 1 Cor 6:9 when he placed malakoi and arsenokoitai in his vice list, and the Pastor when he placed arsenokoitai in his (1 Tim 1:10).

This does not mean that either Paul or his Jewish contemporaries approved of homosexual behavior; certainly they did not (as Philo’s argument above demonstrates, and as Rom 1:24-27 shows with regard to Paul).  But it does mean that the New Testament vice lists, often used to condemn all same-sex relationships as immoral, are at best ambiguous.  Indeed if, as seems likely,  1 Corinthians 6:9-10 and 1 Timothy 1:9-10 in fact condemn child abuse, then these vice lists have nothing to say about committed, loving relationships between consenting LGBTQ+ adults.

In any case, too many translations of Scripture pretend to a confidence in the meaning of malakoi and arsenokoitai that we actually do not, and cannot, have.  By contrast, while the NRSVue follows the NRSV in rendering malakoi as “male prostitutes,” a textual footnote on the word notes, “Meaning of Gk uncertain.”  Unlike the NRSV, the NRSVue renders arsenokoitai in both passages with appropriate ambiguity, as “men who engage in illicit sex,” and textual footnotes on the word read, again, “Meaning of Gk uncertain.”

As the NRSVue refreshingly acknowledges, we do not know for certain what malakoi  and arsenokoitai mean–and when we do not know what a word means, we ought to in all honestly admit our ignorance.  Like the Sodom story, the story of the Levite’s concubine, or the Old Testament temple prostitution texts, these passages have no relevance to our contemporary conversation about sex and gender.

There has been much much to lament about our president’s current war in Iran, from the 175 civilians, many of them children, killed by an American missile strike near an Iranian elementary school, to the seven American soldiers who have died thus far in this conflict.  But last week brought a disturbing issue to light regarding the justification given for this war.

Journalist Jonathan Larsen reported in his substack,

A combat-unit commander told non-commissioned officers at a briefing Monday that the Iran war is part of God’s plan and that Pres. Donald Trump was “anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth,” according to a complaint by a non-commissioned officer.

From Saturday morning through Monday night, more than 110 similar complaints about commanders in every branch of the military had been logged by the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF).

The complaints came from more than 40 different units spread across at least 30 military installations, the MRFF told me Monday night.

The MRFF is keeping the complainants anonymous to prevent retribution by the Defense Department. The Pentagon did not immediately respond to my request for comment.

One complainant identified themselves as a non-commissioned officer (NCO) in a unit currently outside the Iran combat zone but in Ready-Support status, deployable at any time. The NCO said they were Christian and emailed the MRFF on behalf of 15 troops, including at least 11 Christians, one Muslim, and one Jew. (Full email printed below.)

The NCO wrote to the MRFF that their commander “urged us to tell our troops that this was ‘all part of God’s divine plan’ and he specifically referenced numerous citations out of the Book of Revelation referring to Armageddon and the imminent return of Jesus Christ.”

The fact-checking website Snopes reported that they could neither confirm nor deny this claim, as it is their policy not to rely on anonymous sources.  However, thirty Congressional representatives, including House Armed Services Subcommittee on Military Personnel ranking member Chrissy Houlahan (PA-06) and Congressional Freethought Caucus Co-Chairs Jared Huffman (CA-02) and Jamie Raskin (MD-08), have signed onto a letter to U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) Inspector General Platte B. Moring III requesting an investigation into these reports.  This letter reads in part,

At a time when billions of dollars and untold numbers of lives hang in the balance while the Trump administration wages a war of choice in Iran, the imperative of maintaining strict separation of church and state and protecting the religious freedom of our troops is especially critical. We must ensure that military operations are guided by facts and the law, not end-times prophecy and extreme religious beliefs. . . These allegations are also part of a broader political climate in which Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and senior civilian officials have publicly framed Middle East policy in explicitly religious terms.

Secretary Hegseth and these unnamed military commanders are of course free to believe anything that they like regarding the Bible, the endtimes, and alleged prophecies involving war in the Middle East–that is guaranteed by the First Amendment‘s assurances of religious freedom.  They are also free to share those beliefs, in personal conversations, religious services, or Bible studies.  However, it violates the Establishment Clause of that same First Amendment when they impose those beliefs upon others–which is certainly the case when a commanding officer cites those beliefs in a briefing to his subordinates, or when the Secretary “invites” military personnel to religious services and Bible studies at the Pentagon, conducted by “multiple pastors from the Christian nationalist CREC [Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches] denomination — during working hours, broadcast on the department’s internal TV network, with invitations sent from the Secretary’s office bearing a cross.”

Last month, [Sec. Hegseth] personally invited Doug Wilson — a self-described Christian nationalist and “paleo-Confederate” who co-authored a pamphlet arguing American slavery was “far more benign in practice,” than abolitionists claimed, called the 19th Amendment “a bad idea,” and described his goal as a “Christian republic” in which Congress would publicly confess that Jesus rose from the dead — to preach to an auditorium of military personnel in uniform.

Wilson called the prayer meeting a potential “black swan revival” for American Christianity — the kind of awakening he believes could ultimately bring the nation under Christian governance.

Hegseth thanked him from the stage: “Thank you for your leadership, your mentorship, for the things you’ve started, the truth you’ve told, the willingness to be bold. It’s the type of thing we are trying to exercise here.”

Quite apart from these legitimate concerns about religious freedom, I must also say as a Bible Guy that there is absolutely NO biblical warrant for this obscene justification for the war in Iran.  For the record, Iran is never mentioned in the book of Revelation–or, for that matter, in any of the texts typically trotted out as alleged predictions of the end-time.  There is nothing anywhere in the Bible about a “signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark [Jesus’] return to Earth.”  That gap, however, is the least of the reasons for questioning this misreading of Scripture.

While advocated today by Evangelical ministers such as our current ambassador to Israel, Rev. Mike Huckabee, and given popular expression in the best-selling “Left Behind” series of novels by Jerry B. Jenkins (based on the notes of  Tim LeHaye), the current strain of end-time expectation in American churches owes most of its assumptions and imagery to Hal Lindsey’s 1970 book The Late Great Planet Earth.  The many predictions in the New Testament that the end of the world would come soon (for example, Mk 13:30; 1 Cor 7:29-31; Rev 22:12, 20) were not mistaken, Lindsey claimed–rather, they were intended for our time. With the re-establishment of the state of Israel, sealed by its “miraculous” victory in the Six Day War, God’s long-paused “prophetic clock” had resumed ticking.  We were now, officially, in the last days.  The countdown to the Rapture, Armageddon, and the Second Coming of Christ had begun.

As I have posted before, as a young Christian, I was among Mr. Lindsey’s most passionate devotees.  I do not quite know how to convey my absolute certitude that the world was about to end.  I never thought that I would grow up, get married, have a family or a career.  I knew–I knew–that at any moment, the sky could roll back like a scroll, as Jesus summoned me and other true believers out of this world and into glory.  I was wrong.  And I must say, I have been delighted to have been wrong!

Yet strangely, neither Mr. Lindsey nor many his followers ever acknowledged that they had been wrong.   With the resumption of God’s prophetic timetable, the end of the world was supposed to come soon: certainly within a generation–say, 40 years. Taking the re-establishment of the state of Israel in 1948 as a starting point, the world should have ended in 1988.  Even if we start the prophetic clock with the Six-Day War in 1967, the end should have come by 2007.  In either case, we are well past the date Lindsey and his followers originally predicted.  The current political state of Israel did not, after all, mark the beginning of the end of time.

But the biggest difficulty with our obsession with alleged prophecies of the end-times is that it has warped our reading of the remainder of the Bible.  Bible scholar J. Richard Middleton writes regarding this pithy cartoon, “I got Man Martin’s permission to use one of his cartoons in my recent book Abraham’s Silence. This one would work well with my earlier book on biblical eschatology, especially on the link between eschatology and ethics.”  And that is precisely the problem.

Russell Moore, the editor-in-chief of Christianity Today magazine, has related a disturbing anecdote

 of having multiple pastors tell me, essentially, the same story about quoting the Sermon on the Mount, parenthetically, in their preaching — “turn the other cheek” — [and] to have someone come up after to say, “Where did you get those liberal talking points?” And what was alarming to me is that in most of these scenarios, when the pastor would say, “I’m literally quoting Jesus Christ,” the response would not be, “I apologize.” The response would be, “Yes, but that doesn’t work anymore. That’s weak.” And when we get to the point where the teachings of Jesus himself are seen as subversive to us, then we’re in a crisis.

Once we have substituted a macho warrior Second-coming Christ for the humble servant Jesus of the Bible, we need no longer listen to the words of Jesus in the Gospels. Since we are about to leave this world anyway, we can without a qualm forsake our God-given responsibility to care for the earth (Genesis 1:26-28).  If we believe that Israel must be re-established out to its ancient borders so that Jesus can come back, we can justify any violence in the region toward that end, whether in Iran, or Lebanon, or Gaza, or the West Bank, ignoring cries for justice (Exod 22:21-24; Lev 19:33-34; Deut 10:18-19) even from Palestinian Christians. Because the One World Church will be the tool of the Antichrist, we can ignore the plain teaching of Scripture that Christ’s church is called to be one (John 17:20-23), and withdraw into our own private sects.  In short, the approach to the Bible represented by those military commanders cited by the MRFF winds up rejecting the very Bible it claims to revere.

This Sunday, the last Sunday after Epiphany, is the Feast of the Transfiguration.  The gospel for this day is Matthew 17:1-9 (see the parallels in Mark 9:2-9 and Luke 9:28-36):

Six days later Jesus took Peter, James, and John his brother, and brought them to the top of a very high mountain.  He was transformed in front of them. His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became as white as light.

Moses and Elijah appeared to them, talking with Jesus. Peter reacted to all of this by saying to Jesus, “Lord, it’s good that we’re here. If you want, I’ll make three shrines: one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.”

While he was still speaking, look, a bright cloud overshadowed them. A voice from the cloud said, “This is my Son whom I dearly love. I am very pleased with him. Listen to him!”

Hearing this, the disciples fell on their faces, filled with awe.

 But Jesus came and touched them. “Get up,” he said. “Don’t be afraid.” When they looked up, they saw no one except Jesus.

As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus commanded them, “Don’t tell anybody about the vision until the Human One is raised from the dead.”

This potent and mysterious scene is also full of danger–for us, as for Peter, James, and John, its first witnesses.  This, we want to say, is at last the real Jesus, with his humble peasant disguise stripped away.  Jesus glorified [“transformed” in the CEB, “transfigured” in the KJV and NRSVue]; Jesus the god; Jesus the warrior king, who will surely force this world to follow him–and since we are his earthly representatives after all, that means the world must follow us.  Like Peter, we want to stay on the mountain, to stay with this image of power and glory, which makes us feel powerful, and glorious.

But, no.  The Voice of God from heaven does not endorse either Peter’s grandiose designs, or ours.  There will be no shrines erected here.  Instead, they–and we–are directed to listen to Jesus’ words.  And Jesus forbids them even to talk about this experience, which Matthew calls to orama (“the vision”), “until the Human One [NRSVue, like KJV, reads “the Son of Man”] is raised from the dead” (Matt 17:9).  In other words, we cannot understand what the vision means apart from  Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection.

After this revelation of his glory, Jesus leads them–and us–off of the mountain and back into the world, for only there will we discover who Jesus truly is.  After all, Jesus was not God sometimes (say, on the Mount of Transfiguration) and human sometimes (say, in the manger–or on the cross).  Certainly, Jesus’ humanity was not a disguise; he was not God pretending to be human, God in a people mask.  Nor was he a charlatan–a human pretending to be a god.  Jesus was, always and everywhere, himself.  So, yes: the Jesus they saw every day–laughing, crying, hungry, angry, dusty and weary from the road, Jesus in all his fleshiness–was indeed the real Jesus.  They could not always see his glory, but his glory was always present, and inseparable from his humanity–indeed, from his suffering.

Consider the image of the returning, glorified Jesus in Revelation 19:11–16:

Then I saw heaven opened, and there was a white horse. Its rider was called Faithful and True, and he judges and makes war justly. His eyes were like a fiery flame, and on his head were many royal crowns. He has a name written on him that no one knows but he himself.  He wore a robe dyed with blood, and his name was called the Word of God. Heaven’s armies, wearing fine linen that was white and pure, were following him on white horses. From his mouth comes a sharp sword that he will use to strike down the nations. He is the one who will rule them with an iron rod. And he is the one who will trample the winepress of the Almighty God’s passionate anger. He has a name written on his robe and on his thigh: King of kings and Lord of lords.

Notice that, in this passage, King Jesus’s robe is already stained with blood when he begins to descend from heaven (Rev. 19:13), so the blood cannot belong to his earthly enemies. So, whose blood is it? Given that the most common image for Christ in Revelation is the Lamb who was slain (twenty-six times; for example, Rev 5:6, 12; 12:11; 13:8), it seems that the blood staining his robes is his own! Further, the only weapon he bears is the sword that comes from his mouth, that is, his word (Rev. 19:15; see also Rev. 1:16; 2:16; Heb. 4:12; Eph. 6:17). The Old Testament imagery of the Divine Warrior to which John’s vision alludes (Isa. 63:1–3; Ps. 2:9) is transformed by the realization that the rider on the white horse is the one called The Word of God (Rev. 19:13), whose robe is stained with his own innocent blood, and who strikes down the nations by the power of his transforming Word (remember the command of the Voice on the mountain, that we listen to him!)–including the words of his Sermon on the Mount, and their rejection of violence (Matt. 5:38–48)!

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., gestures as he meets with reporters ahead of a key procedural vote to end the partial government shutdown, at the Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, Feb. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

To turn to a contemporary example: recently, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson critiqued Pope Leo XIV’s call for kindness and respect for the immigrant on what he imagined to be biblical grounds.  Referring to Romans 13:1-2, the Speaker insisted that Christians must submit to the authority of the state, specifically with regard to borders, and concluded,

When someone comes into your country, comes into your nation, they do not have the right to change its laws or to change a society. They’re expected to assimilate. We haven’t had a lot of that going on.”

There is much that could be said in response to this contextless misreading of Scripture (for example, that Paul himself would be repeatedly arrested and ultimately executed for refusing to submit to Roman authority).  But perhaps the best response I have seen comes from Episcopal priest Michael DeLashmutt, who insists that we read this passage in terms of power and powerlessness:

Paul is writing to fragile house churches living under imperial surveillance, not to Christians wielding state power, and his concern is pastoral and pragmatic: how believers survive under empire without inviting unnecessary repression. It is not a blueprint for Christian governance, nor a timeless endorsement of every policy enacted in the name of law and order.

To lift Romans wholesale into a contemporary political theology — particularly one that treats the state as the primary moral agent — is to ask the text to bear more weight than it can sustain. Romans (along with the rest of Christian Scripture) must be read alongside Israel’s long experience of exile, Jesus’ execution by the state and the New Testament’s recurring suspicion of imperial power. The Bible offers no simple equation between God’s purposes and the interests of any given government, even one that claims Christian privilege.

In the face of the current American heresies of Christian nationalism and Dominionism—the claim that Evangelical Christians ought to impose their faith and morality through political power—it is vital that, as Jesus insists, we view his Transfiguration through his Cross. Otherwise, the image of Christ glorified too readily becomes an excuse for our own claims to political dominance, and a justification for violence against those outside our small circle.

Next week, with Ash Wednesday, Lent begins.  Friends, let us follow Jesus off the mountain and into the wilderness, and learn from him in his weakness what strength truly means.  This prayer for Transfiguration Sunday (from Revised Common Lectionary Prayers, © 2002 Consultation on Common Texts [Augsburg Fortress]) invites us to ask God for a transfiguration of our own:

Holy God, mighty and immortal,
you are beyond our knowing,
yet we see your glory in the face of Jesus Christ,
whose compassion illumines the world.
Transform us into the likeness of the love of Christ,
who renewed our humanity so that we may share in his divinity,
through the same Jesus Christ, our Lord,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

AFTERWORD

The stained glass at the head of this post is a detail showing the Transfiguration from “Kingdom of God” (2005), by George Walsh: the South Transept Window of the Church of the Most Holy Rosary in Tullow, Ireland. From Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN.

In this season after Epiphany (in the Christian West, January 6–the first day after the twelve days of Christmastide), I have been thinking about the translation of Matthew 2:1-12, and especially, about its opening verses:

After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in the territory of Judea during the rule of King Herod, magi came from the east to Jerusalem. They asked, “Where is the newborn king of the Jews? We’ve seen his star in the east, and we’ve come to honor him” (Matt 2:1-2, CEB).

In the CEB and the NIV, Jesus’ foreign visitors are called “magi.”  Likewise, in the newly updated edition of the NRSV, one of the 12,000 substantive changes made to that translation was changing the NRSV’s “wise men” to “magi.”  The old NRSV had left the translation “wise men” in place from its predecessor, the RSV, which had taken the rendering over from the old King James Version–part of the RSV’s commitment to preserve the familiar rhythms and language of the KJV as much as possible “in the light of our present knowledge of the Hebrew and Greek texts and their meaning on the one hand, and our present understanding of English on the other” (from the preface to the RSV).

Unquestionably, “magi” is more accurate and specific than “wise men.”  The Greek text has magoi (singular magos), a loan word from Old Persian, where it describes a clan of Zoroastrian priests and astrologers.  The word appears six times in our New Testament: four, all plural, in Matthew’s Christmas story (Matt 2:1, 7, 16 [two times]) and twice in the singular for the sorcerer Bar-Jesus (also called Elymas), an adversary of Paul and Barnabas who was stricken blind by the apostle (Acts 13:6, 8).

Evidently related to magos are the Greek noun mageia (“magic”) and verb mageuo (“practice magic”), found only once each in our New Testament; both are used for Simon (called in later tradition Simon Magus), a Samaritan magician converted under Philip, who is harshly rebuked for trying to buy the gifts of miracles and healing from Peter (Acts 8:9, 11).  Our English words “magic” and “magician” likewise come from this Old Persian root, by way of Greek and Latin (it is the Latin Vulgate which renders magoi as magi.)

The CEB and the NIV alike use modern colloquial English: the NIV assumes a high school reading level, while the CEB is aimed at a seventh grade reading level.  So, their decision to use “magi” is an interesting one.  Evidently, those translators believed that most modern readers would have no trouble identifying who the Magi are.  Certainly, “magi” has entered into broad English usage, specifically for Jesus’ foreign visitors.

Consider O. Henry’s famous short story for the Christmas season, “The Gift of the Magi,” in which a poor couple each sell the most precious thing they own to buy a gift for the other: he, his pocket watch to buy combs for her hair; she, her hair, to buy him a golden watch chain.  The story concludes:

None of this, of course, is found in Matthew’s account.  Matthew does not tell us how many Magi came–the traditional number three comes from their three gifts: gold, frankincense, and myrrh (Matt 2:11-12). The idea that they were kings from distant lands and races comes from Isaiah 60:1-6, traditionally read as fulfilled in the visit of the Magi:

Still, there is an appropriateness to the tradition’s reading of the Magi as representing the whole outside world.  After all, they come to baby Jesus as the ultimate outsiders.  They come not only from outside of Judea, but from outside the Roman empire itself–from the land of the feared Parthians, an armed and unstable threat on the empire’s eastern frontier. They are not Jews, either ethnically or religiously; while nothing is said of their religious heritage by Matthew, they would have been Zoroastrians.  Yet it is Matthew who tells their story: Matthew, the most Jewish of the gospel writers, is the one who records a visit to the Christ child from foreigners and unbelievers, who come, not as enemies to threaten the Child, but as pilgrims to honor him.

Herod’s religious experts also see the Magi’s star, and rightly interpret the Scriptures that witness to the coming king:

As for you, Bethlehem of Ephrathah,
    though you are the least significant of Judah’s forces,
        one who is to be a ruler in Israel on my behalf will come out from you.
    His origin is from remote times, from ancient days.
 Therefore, he will give them up
        until the time when she who is in labor gives birth.
        The rest of his kin will return to the people of Israel.
He will stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the Lord,
        in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God.
        They will dwell secure,
        because he will surely become great throughout the earth;
        he will become one of peace (Micah 5:2-5; see Matt 2:4-6)

But these faithful, patriotic citizens stay in the false security of Herod’s walled palace, and never see the miracle.  Instead, in Matthew it is the foreign Magi who become the first, faithful witnesses to the new thing God is doing–breaking into our world as one us in Bethlehem.

Epiphany celebrates the light of God shining into the entire world with the birth of Christ, and indeed, the light of God’s revelation shining into all our lives yesterday, today, and forever!  May we learn from the wise men to be “wise guys” ourselves: to be ready to receive God’s blessing from the hands, and to hear God’s word in the voice, of a stranger.  May we say to all hatred, racism, and fearmongering a firm and unequivocal “No.”

AFTERWORD:

The photo of the Three Kings reliquary is from astropelusa / Atlas Obscura User.  The quilt above, “Star of Bethlehem With Pomegranate Trees,” was made by an anonymous quilter in 1850, and is at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.  This image comes from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. https://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=56278 [retrieved January 30, 2023]. Original source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Star_of_Bethlehem_with_Pomegranate_Trees,_New_York,_c._1850_-_Museum_of_Fine_Arts,_Boston_-_DSC02710.JPG.

This year, St. Paul’s minister of music Dr. Mark A. Boyle led us in a Christmas Cantata by David von Kampen, setting texts by Paul Gerhardt (1607-1676), as well as selected passages of Scripture.  It was the best expression of the meaning and power of Christ’s Incarnation that I have encountered.  I am sharing here the words of that cantata as my Christmas greeting to all.  God bless you, friends–and Merry Christmas!

MOVEMENT 1:  “Oh Jesus Christ, Thy Manger Is”

O Jesus Christ, Thy manger is

My Paradise, at which my soul reclineth.

For there, O Lord, Doth lie the Word of God made flesh for us;

Here-in Thy grace forth shineth

MOVEMENT 2: “A Great Light”

The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light:

they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death,

upon them hath the light shined.

For unto us a child is born,

unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder:

and his name shall be called Wonderful,

Counsellor, The mighty God,

The everlasting Father,

The Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:2, 6 KJV).

MOVEMENT 3: “He Whom the Wind and Sea Obey”

He whom the sea and wind obey

Doth come to serve the sinner in great meekness.

Thou God’s own Son, with us are one,

Dost join us and our children in our weakness.

MOVEMENT 4: “The Word was Made Flesh”

And the Word was made flesh,

and dwelt among us,

and we beheld his glory,

the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,

full of grace and truth.

MOVEMENT 5: “How Greatly God Must Love Thee”

Thou Christian heart, Whoe’er thou art,

Be of good cheer and let no sorrow move thee!

For God’s own Child, In mercy mild,

Joins thee to Him; How greatly God must love thee!

The world may hold Her wealth and gold;

But thou, my heart, keep Christ as thy true treasure.

To Him hold fast, Until at last

A crown be thine and honor in full measure.

AFTERWORD:  You may better know hymnist Paul Gerhardt for his translation from Latin of “O Sacred Head Now Wounded” (No. 286 in the United Methodist Hymnal).  John Wesley himself translated some of Gerhardt’s hymns from their German originals (for example, “Give to the Winds Thy Fears,” No. 129; and “Jesu, Thy Boundless Love to Me,” No. 183).  If you care to hear our choir’s presentation of the von Kampen cantata in worship, you can watch and listen here.