I’ve always felt a distant kinship with Bob Dylan; and it amused me to learn that his dad and my granddad, both of Ukrainian Jewish ancestry, were childhood friends in Duluth: Zimmerman had a car, and helped a young Oreck elope with his Catholic bride. Dylan seemed to start his musical career as an Old Testament prophet, singing, as he described it, finger-pointing music; but after a couple albums of that, he maybe needed to go looking for something with a little more life in it. He looked all over, and eventually came back to God, this time trying to be a Christian. But that didn’t work either; I’ve never asked him, but am guessing he ran into the same roadblocks that I did. Christianity, as commonly taught, seems actually like a step backwards from Judaism, re-embracing concepts of idolatry and blood sacrifice that Judaism had long ago discarded.
Something about Christianity – the love – had drawn Dylan in, but then he found himself in a riptide of Old Testament wrath and pagan sacrificial rites. So what’s a singer to do? Wander forever in the wilderness, I suppose.
Many Christians will likely shake their heads and frown at these words, but I think this is the truth. Like other prophets before him, Jesus hoped to reform Judaism, and he might have done a wonderful job, had his followers better understood and practiced his teachings. Through the centuries, Judaism had been slowly progressing in its understanding of the loving nature of our Creator, and Jesus presented a powerful step forward in that understanding. Certainly some of his followers understood his message, but within a few centuries that message had been obscured by a regressive theology that idolized Jesus and the cross, and was founded, in a very big way, on the ancient barbaric practice of human sacrifice.
The Hebrews of 33 AD had long since turned away from the once-prevalent practice of human sacrifice – depicted, in a garbled way, in the story of Abraham and Issac. But they had clung to their belief in animal sacrifice, so it’s perhaps understandable that Jesus came to be seen as a “sacrificial lamb”. His followers hadn’t expected him to be killed, or even to die, so this sad return to pre-Abrahamic belief was the best they could come up with. And after 2000 years, most of his followers can’t imagine it any other way.
The Old Testament describes God as being pleased by the aroma of certain burnt offerings. I can’t imagine any scenario where such a God is pleased, or even “satisfied” with the sight or smell of one of his human children being brutally murdered. This is, at its heart, a nonsensical idea. It’s also nonsensical to suggest that God was somehow “required” to demand this blood sacrifice. Required by whom?
It’s been said that there are two gospels in the Bible: one preached by Jesus, and one preached about Jesus. If one focuses only on the first, a portrait emerges of a God that loves unconditionally – with a love that doesn’t demand perfection, or any kind of payment. Jesus describes a precious love – a pearl of great price – that is available to all, for free. The kingdom of heaven is at your fingertips. The prophet Jesus attempted to deliver this updated message to his people, and to the world; but it’s, as they say, a slow train coming.
The New Testament is a tangle of contradiction and confusion between these two gospels. Was Jesus a sacrificial offering to a wrathful God for the sins of the world? Or was he a bringer of the glad tidings that God loves us all, more than any earthly parent. For 2000 years, Christians have struggled to blend two entirely incompatible gospels.
In the first “gospel”, the Jewish and Roman authorities should perhaps have been held up as heroes or “co-saviors”, because without them Jesus couldn’t have been sacrificed. But then even this perverse logic got twisted: after the failed Jewish revolt of 66 A.D., it became politically expedient for the Christian sect to distance itself from Judaism, and it did so with a vengeance. Had the second gospel prevailed, Jesus would be revered as a great Jewish rabbi, prophet, or even messiah – and his simple message of love might have more fully permeated all the world’s religions.
Because of its embrace of idolatry and human sacrifice, Christianity has walled itself off from all other religions on the planet. It may be hard for Christians to conceive that Jesus had something entirely different in mind, but it’s all right there in the Bible. Take away all references to a blood sacrifice, and the idea that Jesus was the only suitable candidate for such sacrifice, and you’re left with the gospel that Jesus actually taught, and a Bible that actually makes sense.
In explaining his conversion, Dylan said that he’d actually felt Jesus’ presence. Many people, over the centuries, have felt this presence; and though I’m unsure whether it’s actually his presence, or that of one of his many disciples, or a combination thereof, I can state from personal experience that this presence is a joyful and welcoming thing – an unconditional embrace of love that melts fear and doubt. It is the essence of religion, and so would be compatible with any religion. God so loves the world that none are excluded from her care. We are all the chosen people.
If we understand religion as being our relationship with a God or Higher Power that we can rely on, we realize it’s something happening all the time, in the here and now, for each of us. This relationship ultimately has nothing to do with any man-made institution. In fact, these institutions often effectively undermine this relationship by fomenting separation and enmity between God’s children. You don’t need to consult ancient texts to understand this: If you want to love God, start by loving each of his children. Every one of them. Including yourself.
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Thank you 🙏🏻🌹😇