A Recovery of the Prophetic

Last fall quarter I studied Jeremiah and Ezekiel, and I recently began reading Abraham Heschel’s book, The Prophets. Needless to say the prophets of the first testament have been churning in my mind. Perhaps, many folks today do not think of Amos, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Habakkuk when they think of prophecy, but that is directly where my mind goes, especially Jeremiah.

God brought the people out of captivity into a land that would be their own. They were unfaithful to God’s wishes, and thus they relinquished the honor of living in the land. They were taken into exile. The prophets are speaking before, during, and after exile. They are speaking to an unfaithful people and reminding them of God’s faithfulness and God’s expectations for them. God requires that they be characterized by love and justice, among other things. They failed. Thus, they will remain in exile for a time, and eventually they will be redeemed. God will be their God, and they will be God’s people. God will lead them back to the land, as a father leading his son.

But I must ask, how precisely were they unfaithful? A short answer may be idolatry. However, what does that mean and for what particular behaviors is their community condemned to exile? I would suggest reading all of Amos (it is short after all), but here is a taste.

Amos 4:1, 5:11-12, 14-15

Hear this word, you cows of Bashan on Mount Samaria, you women who oppress the poor and crush the needy and say to your husbands, “Bring us some drinks!”

You levy a straw tax on the poor 
and impose a tax on their grain. Therefore, though you have built stone mansions, you will not live in them; 
though you have planted lush vineyards, 
you will not drink their wine. 
For I know how many are your offenses and how great your sins.

There are those who oppress the innocent and take bribes and deprive the poor of justice in the courts. Seek good, not evil, that you may live. Then the LORD God Almighty will be with you, just as you say he is. Hate evil, love good; maintain justice in the courts. 
Perhaps the LORD God Almighty will have mercy....

These pericopes are obviously multilayered, and it would be wrong to suppose that a single reading captures everything they have to offer. Of course, there are innumerable differences between their situation and ours (one may be that religious life and political life were bound together, and today we good ole post-enlightment geniuses compartmentalize these). I will not attempt to innumerate the differences. However, we may glean from the prophets still. We may locate ourselves with those who are in the temple courts. How do our multimillion-dollar temples stand in the face of the prophets? Our structures stand to be rebuked. The words and actions of God reverberate through the words and deeds of the prophets, and if we are honest, those words and deeds are aimed at structures such as ours. Has the temple become a den of robbers? How is the temple regime in the twenty-first century dealing with the oppressed? Is today’s temple regime a witness to its God?

My Old Testament professor in the fall quarter said, “it is often difficult to speak with a prophetic voice when you are on the payroll of the church, so surround yourself with people who are not on the payroll” who will speak out with a prophetic voice. This is wisdom. Perhaps because today's temple leadership is on the payroll, today’s temple leadership often slips into lesser versions of Jesus, exclusively spiritualized ones.

God’s love is to bounce off and through the walls of people’s hearts, minds, and relationships. God’s love, however scorching or comforting, is to pervade the manifold life of the temple. But what does this mean and how is this to be? How might today’s temple regime recover its prophetic voice and action? For clues, we would do well to take a look at Amos, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Habakkuk (among others).

Woe to him who builds a city with

Bloodshed and establishes

A town by injustice!

Though the fig tree does not bud and there are

No grapes on the vine…

But I will rejoice in the Lord,

I will rejoice in God my savior.

Habakkuk 2:12, 3:17-18

You will seek me and find me

When you seek me with all

Your heart.

Jeremiah 29:13

A Few Variegated and Disjointed Words Concerning a Path of Least Resistance

Some of us have trekked down the cloudy road of doubt, while others have continued on sunnier roads. For those who have walked along the dreary path perhaps a brief reflection will serve as a flashlight, however infinitesimal it may be (even such a small flashlight is better than none at all).

Doubt is analogous to a lens and when looking through it everything seems most dubitable. It is similar to a grey lens through which the entire world seems bleak and pointless. And then having grown accustom to the company of doubt’s seemingly honest company, the easiest thing in the world to do is to doubt, to doubt even oneself – that French mental magician, whose name I shall not mention, set an unfortunate precedent. In a way doubt becomes a self-perpetuating vacuum sucking inward. Even oneself is sucked into doubt, obliterating oneself.

Doubt is synergetic. It may be similar to a quagmire. If a person sinks into a deep muck and tries to wiggle free, the person will only sink further. It has been said that doubt begets doubt. This may not be too far off the mark, though a dose of doubt about some things may be good medicine to avoid gullibility, but I think at that point it’s not doubt anymore. It’s merely discernment. So doubt, in a sense, breeds itself, and once it begins it spreads growing stickier and stickier.

For some of us, doubt may be considered a path of least resistance. For some of us, it is a propensity. This is dangerous, for, though a measure of doubt may be good medicine as previously mentioned, doubt seems to be “engineered” in such a way that it can hijack human resources (such as reason, emotion, psyche, etc.) for their own self-destruction. In this way, doubt is analogous to the viciousness of cancer.

An ethics professor said during a lecture last fall, “Without community, we wither.” This is wisdom. Of course, “community” does not refer to arbitrary or affected groupings of individuals but of an authentically interrelated composite (though composed of individuals, the whole is distinct from the individuals individually) – let community be defined and judged not according to quantity of relationships but of quality. This composite can be synergetic, and this synergetic communion is, at least in part, an answer to the withering reality of doubt. A person must reach out for help from others in order to get out of the deep muck – this may not be the only way, but it is a way. Open dialogue within the context of authentic (unaffected) community is a healthy alternative and anodyne for the easy though treacherous path of doubt.

Kierkegaard’s technical use of the term “despair” and my generic use of the term “doubt” are not synonymous. However, as a tangential conclusion, I will parallel them here. When the despairer (I will not explain which sort of despairer, but you may read The Sickness Unto Death for further understanding on the issue) confides his despair to another, he despairs further. His despair intensifies. But let this not be a deterrence from confiding, for acknowledging despair and then confiding is of infinite value; it is the first step. The same goes for doubt. If it catches a person in isolation, it systematically appropriates and consequently disintegrates everything in its viselike clutches. However, if doubt is pinpointed and acknowledged, the low-hanging clouds may part, perhaps only for a moment, allowing a ray of sun to illumine the path.