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Thoughts, not only about class
Ack. I'm somewhat in crisis mode right now, so forgive me if I only give a basic overview of class today. I've other, more important things I want to discuss.
We finished the images today. We spent a couple seconds on two very beautiful and traditional images of Jesus - one is him praying in Gethsemane (it used to hang in the classroom at the top of the back stairs in the Brighton church, but I don't know if it's still there) and one of my particular favorites, and the other is just a shoulders-up image of your typical Christ figure. Both are lovely, the artistry is beautiful, the painter clearly put a great deal of love and respect into each, and the most comment we made of them was that they show pictures of Jesus which are not Jewish and therefore completely inaccurate.
Now, somehow that was used to justify the next image, Christa. Because, you know, giving Jesus blonde hair is just the same as giving him breasts and ovaries. Now, while the previous pictures were inaccurate in that they depicted a man who was too fair-skinned to be Christ but portrayed the hair, beard and clothing styles fairly accurately, as far as I know, this one doesn't even try to be anything vaguely like what Jesus might have been. Is it a bastardization of the sacred? You betcha. I don't know if the other two are wrong. You're not supposed to make images of God, so I suppose they are. But whether or not those two are wrong, suggesting that Jesus was a woman is stupid, inaccurate, and leads to some great theological problems. First of all, Jesus was male because his servitude would not have meant so much coming from a woman. Second, Jesus was male because females in that culture could not inherit and he is to inherit the kingdom of God. Third, Jesus' bride is the church, and Jesus is not lesbian. Depicting Jesus as something other than Jewish puts his lineage into question, which is also serious because if he's not a Jew he's not the Messiah. That makes both images wrong. But at least the two prior were done with the obvious intent to honor Christ, not to "call into question the patriarchal lens through which we view the divine" or whatever feminist crap they can invent to justify putting a female body on the cross. There were several other images of female figures on crosses or in positions which were obviously intended to reflect Christ's crucifixion. One was of a woman named Malone (we were not given the first name) who was "unable to profess faith in a male God." Well, bully for her, but that doesn't mean God is going to become a woman just to bow to her silly issues. If she was smart, she'd realize that God is neither male nor female, but he chose to reveal himself through predominantly masculine imagery, which should be honored. But whatever, we've been through that tons of times before.
I also got comments back on my journal. She didn't say anything on the "What does God look like part?" but her response to the henotheism question was twofold: (1) the point was not what Judaism taught but what the Jews actually did, and they did practise henotheism, and (2) "there were many versions of Christianity from the beginning." To (1), I concede that the Jews did practise henotheism, however, that does not mean that the assumption that "monotheism is Truth" is wrong. To (2), I cannot help but wonder what other "versions" of Christianity existed during the years immediately following Jesus' return to heaven? As far as I can recall, initially there was only one church of about 500 people who all lived together and worked for the good of all up until Stephen was martyred and the believers were scattered. Even then, the leaders of the church kept in touch through letters (some of which are now part of the New Testament) and swiftly worked to correct any errors which crept into the theology of churches they had established elsewhere. And, once again, whether or not the early Christians practised henotheism has absolutely no bearing on whether or not monotheism is Truth. God's nature is completely independent of our actions, and whether or not other gods exist is equally independent of anything we can do to make it otherwise. To put it in terms with which modern readers will undoubtedly be familiar, if the early Jews and Christians all jumped off a bridge, would you follow them?
Now, on to the stuff that's actually concerning me. See, I'm looking at all the seminary applications, and I'm encountering a problem. Seminary isn't like undergraduate school, where you can come in as "open option" and figure it out after you've been there a while and have a better idea of what's going on. You have to know what degree you want when you apply, so you can apply to that program. And that means I need to know whether I want an M.Div or a Th.M. or a MA in Theology or whatever else, and I need to know it, hmm, yesterday. But I just don't have a clue.
So my next thought is, well, I could take a semester off to figure that out, get some work experience, not be in school for a while, that sounds rather nice. But I don't know what the heck I'd do for that semester. I mean, I know I want to get an internship with a Christian publishing organization over the summer. But would that last through till January of 09? Would I be able to get a job with them after it ended, if it doesn't last, and stay those extra few months? I don't know, but I'm not ready to start the application process for Seminary yet, and that's really scary and really frustrating. Princeton's application is due on Friday. I started it, yes, but for the M.Div program, and I'm not sure I want an M.Div, and I'm really not sure I want to go to New Jersey, and I'm really really not sure I want to jump headlong into even more school. Sigh. So I don't know what I want or what I'm going to do to get it, and I'm something of a big conflicted mess right now.
And that means it's time to go pray, and see if I can talk to Andrew again, and talk to other people, and write about it more after all that, and we'll see what decisions I come to. I don't know where this is going to lead me. I do know that God is in control, so no matter what happens he'll take care of me. And, really, with that knowledge in hand, I have the courage to step out and do what needs to be done... once I figure out what that is. But it's ok. God's got me covered, and he's not going to let me down.
-Jaya-
mehWe finished the images today. We spent a couple seconds on two very beautiful and traditional images of Jesus - one is him praying in Gethsemane (it used to hang in the classroom at the top of the back stairs in the Brighton church, but I don't know if it's still there) and one of my particular favorites, and the other is just a shoulders-up image of your typical Christ figure. Both are lovely, the artistry is beautiful, the painter clearly put a great deal of love and respect into each, and the most comment we made of them was that they show pictures of Jesus which are not Jewish and therefore completely inaccurate.
Now, somehow that was used to justify the next image, Christa. Because, you know, giving Jesus blonde hair is just the same as giving him breasts and ovaries. Now, while the previous pictures were inaccurate in that they depicted a man who was too fair-skinned to be Christ but portrayed the hair, beard and clothing styles fairly accurately, as far as I know, this one doesn't even try to be anything vaguely like what Jesus might have been. Is it a bastardization of the sacred? You betcha. I don't know if the other two are wrong. You're not supposed to make images of God, so I suppose they are. But whether or not those two are wrong, suggesting that Jesus was a woman is stupid, inaccurate, and leads to some great theological problems. First of all, Jesus was male because his servitude would not have meant so much coming from a woman. Second, Jesus was male because females in that culture could not inherit and he is to inherit the kingdom of God. Third, Jesus' bride is the church, and Jesus is not lesbian. Depicting Jesus as something other than Jewish puts his lineage into question, which is also serious because if he's not a Jew he's not the Messiah. That makes both images wrong. But at least the two prior were done with the obvious intent to honor Christ, not to "call into question the patriarchal lens through which we view the divine" or whatever feminist crap they can invent to justify putting a female body on the cross. There were several other images of female figures on crosses or in positions which were obviously intended to reflect Christ's crucifixion. One was of a woman named Malone (we were not given the first name) who was "unable to profess faith in a male God." Well, bully for her, but that doesn't mean God is going to become a woman just to bow to her silly issues. If she was smart, she'd realize that God is neither male nor female, but he chose to reveal himself through predominantly masculine imagery, which should be honored. But whatever, we've been through that tons of times before.
I also got comments back on my journal. She didn't say anything on the "What does God look like part?" but her response to the henotheism question was twofold: (1) the point was not what Judaism taught but what the Jews actually did, and they did practise henotheism, and (2) "there were many versions of Christianity from the beginning." To (1), I concede that the Jews did practise henotheism, however, that does not mean that the assumption that "monotheism is Truth" is wrong. To (2), I cannot help but wonder what other "versions" of Christianity existed during the years immediately following Jesus' return to heaven? As far as I can recall, initially there was only one church of about 500 people who all lived together and worked for the good of all up until Stephen was martyred and the believers were scattered. Even then, the leaders of the church kept in touch through letters (some of which are now part of the New Testament) and swiftly worked to correct any errors which crept into the theology of churches they had established elsewhere. And, once again, whether or not the early Christians practised henotheism has absolutely no bearing on whether or not monotheism is Truth. God's nature is completely independent of our actions, and whether or not other gods exist is equally independent of anything we can do to make it otherwise. To put it in terms with which modern readers will undoubtedly be familiar, if the early Jews and Christians all jumped off a bridge, would you follow them?
Now, on to the stuff that's actually concerning me. See, I'm looking at all the seminary applications, and I'm encountering a problem. Seminary isn't like undergraduate school, where you can come in as "open option" and figure it out after you've been there a while and have a better idea of what's going on. You have to know what degree you want when you apply, so you can apply to that program. And that means I need to know whether I want an M.Div or a Th.M. or a MA in Theology or whatever else, and I need to know it, hmm, yesterday. But I just don't have a clue.
So my next thought is, well, I could take a semester off to figure that out, get some work experience, not be in school for a while, that sounds rather nice. But I don't know what the heck I'd do for that semester. I mean, I know I want to get an internship with a Christian publishing organization over the summer. But would that last through till January of 09? Would I be able to get a job with them after it ended, if it doesn't last, and stay those extra few months? I don't know, but I'm not ready to start the application process for Seminary yet, and that's really scary and really frustrating. Princeton's application is due on Friday. I started it, yes, but for the M.Div program, and I'm not sure I want an M.Div, and I'm really not sure I want to go to New Jersey, and I'm really really not sure I want to jump headlong into even more school. Sigh. So I don't know what I want or what I'm going to do to get it, and I'm something of a big conflicted mess right now.
And that means it's time to go pray, and see if I can talk to Andrew again, and talk to other people, and write about it more after all that, and we'll see what decisions I come to. I don't know where this is going to lead me. I do know that God is in control, so no matter what happens he'll take care of me. And, really, with that knowledge in hand, I have the courage to step out and do what needs to be done... once I figure out what that is. But it's ok. God's got me covered, and he's not going to let me down.
-Jaya-
The one thing I've got to say about taking time off (I had to because of application deadlines and start times) is I'm now very ready to start back in on school and am in fact quite looking forward to it. Since I had time to consider and weigh my options and regain enthusiasm I'm pretty sure my next degree will go fairly smoothly. I actually really miss classes, learning, the whole college thing. It also helped me to have not so stressful time to consider my options. I almost went into a program that wasn't right directly after I graduated (June 2007, I kid you not), but managed to correct myself and get on what I feel is the right path.
If you love the program you settle into, it's fun, as I hear it, so time to consider things fully might be good. No path is fixed in stone and any mistake can be corrected, it just gets extremely expensive unless a scholarship fixes it (my brother hasn't yet completed his master of history degree and has moved on to a masters of education elsewhere, but he had a full ride graduate teacher assistance job for the history degree before moving on. He's not in any sort of debt over it)
Anyway, that's my rambling thoughts, take or leave my extremely biased opinion :)
-Karen