This morning I watched ‘The day Jesus died’ on bbc1 - Bettany Hughes exploring the developing interpretations of Christ’s death down the centuries. Fascinating and profound. Especially moving were two examples of people who were touched by the recognition of God himself identifying with human suffering in the cross. German theologian Jurgen Moltmann, who, having witnessed some of the horrors of world war two, was depressed to the point of despair until he read Jesus’ words from the cross ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’. And the Archbishop of York John Sentamu… being with a fellow prisoner in Uganda who was beaten and close to death, he was able to tell the man how, in Christ on the cross, Jesus identified with him - and heard theman say, just before he died, ‘thank you’.
I’m intrigued by the richness of meaning in the Christian story. I’m not saying it is the only religious story with rich meaning - exploring how it is distinctive is also an ongoing topic of interest - but I am again struck by the paucity and limitedness of the response that regards the ‘christian god’ as a little petty god among many. Even with my own questions and sometimes doubts, a little meditation on even a single aspect of the gospel is like savouring rich wine, percolating through mind and spirit (billy may disagree!)
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7 comments:
Luci, I thing you mean 5-hydroxy tryptamine - incidentally chocholate releases it too
thank you luci - and billy!
percolator - nice idea mr goose
definately an image that for me captures the fluidity of form and interpretation breathing and moving together in mystery
have you seen lars von tiers "antichrist"- lars defends his work from claims by claiming it is an open ended narrative - and supposedly peoples attacks only reveal their own limitations
I reckon ultimately the gospels have to be the same ; i mean any narrative is separate to the meaning which is applied to it.
I have recently been interested in the way in which the dichotomies of resilance and renunciation find their place in the passion narrative - jesus is abandoned by god and similtaneously resolute in the service of the same god
But of course that is just my bag - the interesting thing is different people find different things in the narrative - indeed didnt cs lewis always bang on about how we proclaim the death of jesus as the salvic - without attaching a dogmatic understanding of what that means - his own belief about the perfect penitent never made any sense to me - although i suppose there is still time !
I remember one theatre director insisting that for him the cross was the fulcrum of our shared experience and the dynamo of human history - he said in his mind the sacrifice of calvary was always going on - it was just at that moment it could be seen in its clearest form - we remember a death and resurrection which we are continually reliving
we that was the way he liked his coffee
happy easter
cheers rob, hope you had a good un too, i'm down at the folks in lymington just now, back to bradders sunday.
what you say cd keep me pondering for a day or two - dichotomies of r and r etc...!
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