Ephesians 1:11-19
“Jesus by Many Other Names,” After Jesus: Before Christianity (Westar)
In the heart of Mecca is the Kabah, a square building made of black stone, covered with black silk. On the silk are embroidered in gold thread the 99 beautiful names of Allah. There is one God known in many ways. We also know God by many names or descriptors. So it should be no surprise to us that as the Jesus followers formed groups and talked about Jesus, many ways to understand who Jesus was and what he did emerged. Today’s chapter in our book After Jesus: Before Christianity talks about a few of the ways people in the first and second centuries described Jesus.
A key understanding of Jesus’ teaching in the first century involved an unusual equality among men and women. Both men and women were disciples or interns of Jesus. In his parables or teaching stories Jesus used both men and women as key figures and examples of his points. The apostle Paul, and early follower of Jesus and founder of several Jesus communities, recognized the leadership of both men and women who helped him in his work. In his letter to the Galatians he famously declared, “There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in the Anointed Jesus. (Gal.3:28) Jesus does away with divisions, including gender roles, and those who join his communities become his body or his presence in the world. Those who know Jesus overcome their separations and experience the unity of God’s love. This image was slowly impacted by the strong patriarchy of the Roman Empire so that by the second century people writing in Paul’s name declared, “Women should be silent in the church.” But the image is still there in ancient manuscripts for us to consider today.
In the second century the Gospel of Mary names Jesus as the “true human,” who understands the spiritual secrets of life and gives them through the disciples so that people may find joy. This gospel still shows equality between men and women as Mary leads the others to understand the deepest meanings of Jesus’ teaching and gives them courage to tell others about him, even though they are in danger of execution for their association with him. Jesus is the enlightened one who overcomes the suffering of life with truth. This image shows common themes with Buddhism as we understand it today.
The Letter of Peter to Philip shows Jesus as the one who gives comfort to those who also faced crucifixion. It’s one of many images strongly influenced by the violence of second century Empire. Because Jesus endured crucifixion nobly, he is able to be the rescuer of those who face similar death. In this letter Jesus’ followers pray, “Child of life, Child of immortality, who dwells in the light; the Child, Anointed of immortality, our rescuer, give us your power for they seek to kill us.” In response Jesus appears as a great light and tells them to share his teaching with the whole world, for he is the world’s Savior – not from death but from fear of death.
In the Gospel of Truth Jesus is described as parent. Clues in this gospel indicate that those who wrote and remembered it were also victims of torture and injustice. The fact that Jesus was also tortured and executed but is still remembered and his teachings are still revered gives them a way to process the terrible violence of their lives. He is the Mother who teaches through her Word and story. His crucified body becomes the Father’s fruit of wisdom, given to all for their joy. He has overcome death by becoming the fruit of knowledge which brings joy, even in the presence of death. In spite of its acknowledgement of pain, this gospel focuses on Jesus as JOY.
In previous chapters we’ve learned that Romans (including those who followed Jesus) valued self control, even in the face of hardship or death. When the early church leader Ignatius faced his own execution, he wrote that the suffering of Jesus was the pattern for the way he himself would face death. He was influential in our contemporary thinking that It was important for Jesus to suffer for our sake. For Ignatius it wasn’t so much the knowledge that Jesus gave us in spite of suffering, but that he himself actually suffered in the same way many second century followers suffered that mattered.
The Secret Revelation of John was the first known writing of Jesus’ followers that talks about the nature of God and of good and evil. In this writing Jesus appears as a child, an old person, and an enslaved person. He explains that his followers must understand that God is good and evil is fraudulent as they encounter evil in their everyday lives. This work talks about salvation, not as escaping God’s judgment but as dealing with the realities of fear, disease, chaos, danger and death. “Jesus is the light who enlightens the deceived sufferer. He is Wisdom, Foreknowledge, Anointed, Lord and Master who shows the way to deal with the harshness of life.
Last week we talked about Marcion who was later declared a heretic. That’s partly because he didn’t believe that Jesus was the son of the Hebrew God. The Hebrew God had created this imperfect world and trapped people within it. Jesus came as the God of Love. After he was crucified and resurrected he had the power to save everyone who believed in him as Love from the darkness of the world. Marcion saw Jesus as the end of the Judean’s God, not the reformer of the way people understood God.
But Justin Martyr saw Jesus not just as the reformer of Judaism but as the perfecting of everything God is – the very presence of God in human form. We’ll recognize that thought from the theology we’ve heard all our lives. For Justin to call Jesus “Christ” or “Anointed” is to declare that he is the culmination of our knowledge of everything that has been true about God from the beginning of Creation, the Word made flesh. He echoes the Gospel of John: In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. .. The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth.
This is a lot of information, too much for us to keep straight. I can’t improve on the Westar summary of this chapter, so I’ll just quote it:
The implications from the variety of images of Jesus from the second century surprise us. First, Jesus often was not the dominant figure in the writings and narratives produced by these second-century movements. Second, Jesus’s death and its aftermath stirred the imagination more in the second century than his life and ministry. Third, the kaleidoscopic images cannot be confined to a polarity between old and new, right and wrong orthodox and heresy. The second century was rich with multiple images of Jesus.
Let me add just one thought. The first century gatherings of Jesus followers focused more on what he said and did as a pattern for living a more joyful life in the midst of a chaotic and violent culture. The second century begins to think more theoretically about what Jesus means in various world views. We often think of ourselves as a first century church, so that gives us the freedom to examine what we’ve been taught as “right” or “wrong” belief in light of what Jesus shows us as a way of life. In later centuries people took the rich variety of the second century and chose one way to think. That’s been questioned and adapted, but we see origins of what’s become contemporary doctrine and what hasn’t. If we’re learning anything, I hope it’s that uniformity isn’t required. We don’t have to agree on a single way to be people of faith or a single way of thinking. We agree on a leader who is our model and work out what that means.