Heroes So Far

I've been watching Season 1 of Heroes, and I think I'm falling in love with the series! What's ironic is that I didn't like it the very first time that I saw it, when it was first on NBC.

So why the change? Here are some reasons.

1. When I first saw Heroes, I had missed the pilot, so I was clueless about much of what was going on. Who was that bald professor in India who keeps popping up, and what was his significance? To be honest, I thought he was still alive. But, actually, the whole point of the pilot was that somebody killed him because he (the professor) was researching people with special abilities. Also, the pilot allowed me to see why the guy with the horn-rimmed glasses was so important: he was in the Indian professor's office soon after he died.

2. When I first saw Heroes, I didn't know if the guy with the horn-rimmed glasses was a good guy or a bad guy. He was Claire's step-father, and Claire had special abilities, and I wasn't sure if he was a danger to her. Now, I can watch the show with the assurance that he is a good father and admire him accordingly.

The same goes for Nicole's ex-husband, the escaped convict. I was never really sure if he was a danger to Nicole and their son. Now, I have assurance that he is a loving father who is trying to be a true hero with his abilities. I really liked the tender "daddy moments" between him and his son, as they talked about comic books and monsters. And, as with Claire's dad, I can admire him as I watch the series, whatever his imperfections.

3. One of my favorite movies is M. Night Shamaylan's Lady in the Water. I don't care if it won a bunch of Golden Raspberry Awards--I still like it! On that movie was a little boy who could decode the voice of God by reading cereal boxes. The actor who played that little boy is Nicole's son in Heroes. I didn't have that positive association when I first watched the show, but now I do. It's like being in a high school cafeteria and seeing someone you know.

4. Whenever Hiro and his friend talked, I got annoyed. It's kind of like the Sun and Jin episodes of Lost. I have to stop doing my homework so I can read the dialogue. And I rarely know when it's coming, so I end up missing part of it. I still have that annoyance, but at least now I can rewind the DVD to see the dialogue again. And I'm getting to really like Hiro, since he's so cute and sweet. He wants to be a superhero--with a sword!

5. In a lot of cases, I only come to appreciate a book or a movie the second time around. That's the way I am with C.S. Lewis. What he said in Mere Christianity appeared utterly irrelevant to me the first time that I read it, but I began to see its gems of wisdom when I read it again four years later. That's how it is with Heroes.

6. I don't like fads. When Heroes was first on, I got so sick of hearing "Save the cheerleader, save the world"--over and over again, on commercials, in conversations, etc. Now, three years after Season 1, nobody says that anymore, so I can watch the series without that annoyance.

7. I'm superstitious about the number 6, so I'll add a number 7, even though it's technically not a "why I didn't like Heroes then but like it now" sort of statement. I somewhat like the politician on the series, the one who can fly. He's definitely not interested in being a superhero. He just wants to be Congressman! He clearly has a shallow, selfish side that is obsessed about his image, yet he is caring too. It's interesting to watch him wrestle with the implications of his abilities. He's the last person you'd expect to be a freak, but he is one!

I have a lot of catching up to do on Heroes!

Star Wars Day 2009

I just learned that today is Star Wars Day!

My earliest memories of Star Wars are kind of a blur. I was really young, probably younger than pre-school age, and my Mom was going to take me to the movie theater to see the latest Star Wars movie. I remember my aunt calling it The Empire Strikes Back. The funny thing is that what I remember seeing on the big screen was Princess Leah with two buns on the side of her head in a white outfit. That was on the first Star Wars movie, not the Empire Strikes Back. So either my memory is distorted, or the theater showed both movies back to back. I remember that we left early because I was bored, since I didn't understand the plot.

My second Star Wars movie theater experience was when Return of the Jedi came out. I remember seeing Darth Vader! To me, he looked exactly like him, but I'm not sure if I'd have the same reaction if I saw his outfit today. My dad said Darth was carrying around a flashlight during the movie. Was that supposed to be his light-saber?

I collected the toys when I was a kid. My mom never got me the At-At I wanted, but she did get me the Emperor Palpatine toy long before he hit the stores. I got Emperor Palpatine in a gold box for being good. When I went to my first grade class, we had a substitute teacher, and she asked if any of us had something we wanted to share. I raised my hand. "I have the Emperor," I said. She looked at me like she hadn't the faintest idea what I was talking about! During recess, I was showing the other kids my Star Wars toys that were lined up in my Wookie-strap, and they were pretty enamored by the Emperor. It hadn't hit the stores yet!

My family usually tied Star Wars to religion. The Force was God. Luke practicing with his light-saber blindfolded taught us that we walk by faith, not by sight. Yoda criticizing "this crude matter" meant that the "flesh profiteth nothing." And the good people became powerful spirit beings after their death, which is what the Armstrong movement said we would become.

Actually, even Darth Vader ridiculing the Death Star and saying "I find your lack of faith disturbing" had some spiritual lesson to it! The Bible, after all, criticizes human pride and strength on a number of occasions.

And, even now, people derive lessons from Star Wars. I've often heard Yoda's maxim of "Do or do not, there is no try." In Alcoholics Anonymous, there are sponsors who say that to their sponsees!

Years later, when I paid attention to Obi-Wan's description of the Force, I saw that Lucas had New Age beliefs (or something like that) in his movies. For Obi-Wan, the Force is not a personal being who created the heavens and the earth. Actually, it's an energy that proceeds from nature, binding and penetrating us. Oh well. Some may decide not to watch the movies on that basis, but I still like them! For me, they teach lessons about God, life, faith, and spirituality.

Have a happy Star Wars Day!

The Weary of I Samuel 30

For my weekly quiet time this week, I studied I Samuel 30.

David and his men are leaving Achish in Philistia to go to Ziklag, a city in Simeon. Ziklag belongs to the Philistines, who gave it to David and his men. The journey from Achish to Ziklag takes three days.

When they arrive at Ziklag, they find that the Amalekites had burned it to the ground and taken their families captive. David's men then talk of stoning David, but David finds strength in the LORD his God. He receives guidance from God to go after the Amalekite raiders, and he takes six hundred men with him. When they reach the Wadi Besor, two hundred men remain behind with the luggage because they are too exhausted to go on, while four hundred continue on with David to pursue the Amalekites.

David and his men then find an Egyptian, who was once a slave to an Amalekite master. The master ditched the slave when he (the slave) had become sick. David gives the Egyptian food and water to drink, and his spirit is revived. The Egyptian tells David that the Amalekites had plundered areas in Judah and Philistia, and he leads David to them. David then attacks the Amalekites, gets the Israelite families back, and takes a lot of spoil.

Some of the four hundred who accompanied David do not want the two hundred who stayed behind to get any spoil. The text refers to the stingy ones as ish ra u-be-li-ya-al, or "evil man and Belial." The Nelson Study Bible states about the word "Belial": "This word has the basic sense of 'unworthy' and 'wicked.' It occurs in the Old Testament most frequently in phrases like 'worthless men' (30:22; Prov. 6:12) and 'worthless rogues' (2 Chr. 13:7). Worthless people are said to dig up evil (Prov. 16:27) and to plot wickedness (Nah. 1:11). This word became a proper name for Satan during the intertestamental period; thus Paul asked, 'What accord has Christ with Belial?' (2 Cor. 6:15)." Indeed, the word "Belial" is used for some pretty sordid characters, such as the gang-rapists in Judges 19-20 (Judges 19:22; 20:13) and the sons of Eli (I Samuel 2:12).

David rebukes the evil men for their stinginess, affirming that God is the one who gave them the victory. He divides the plunder between those who went to battle and those who stayed behind with the baggage. He also sent spoil to the elders of Judah. Maybe he was trying to curry their favor as he ascended to the throne. Perhaps he was returning to them what the Amalekites had taken, since the Amalekites had plundered Judah. The problem with the latter suggestion, though, is that David refers to it as a gift to the elders of Judah, which is inconsistent with him returning what was already theirs in the first place.

The main lesson that I got out of this chapter is that God does not devalue those who are tired. God is not like the Amalekite master, who ditched his sick slave and left him to starve. Some of David's men were tired because they had just journeyed from Achish for three days, only to discover that they needed to gird themselves for battle right away.

I don't always hear compassion for the tired in a lot of churches. What I hear is: "You need to be on fire for God! If you're not on fire, then something is wrong! God can't use you if you are wounded or unenthusiastic. He'll spew you out of his mouth!" But that was not David's attitude. For one, David reminded the men who had fought that the victory belonged to God, not them. They had no right to pat themselves on the back for being "on fire." And, second, even those who stayed behind with the luggage performed a valuable service. They stayed behind with the luggage! Maybe that enabled those who fought to continue onto the battle unencumbered with baggage! A lot of churches act like the weary cannot be used by God, when they obviously were in I Samuel 30.

I think that the text is a little hard on those who fought when it calls them "evil and Belial." These were men who obviously had problems themselves, even if they were "on fire." As John MacArthur points out, "From the beginning of David’s flight from Saul, he became captain of those who were in distress, discontent, and in debt (22:2), the least likely to exercise kindness and grace to others." That may be a lesson to me, someone who is sick and tired of Christians and the church. For one, the church is full of people who love to criticize, since they are the very ones looking for something when they decide to believe in Jesus. And, second, even though I am tired and wounded, I should not totally succumb to a complaining spirit, which is what some of the four hundred men essentially did.

At the same time, although the text calls them a really bad name, David does not write them off. Rather, he gives them another way to look at their situation. He encourages them to give thanks to God for his goodness and to recognize the contribution of those who stayed behind with the baggage. Hopefully, churches can offer food to those who are tired and wounded, as David fed the Egyptian slave when he was sick and hungry. That's much better than than kicking them when they are down--all in the name of "rebuke" and "correction"!

Beyond Patriarchy

I said in Female Offerings that I might wrestle today with the theological ramifications of gendered sacrifices, particularly the issue of why the more important sacrifices had to be male.

Was the Old Testament mindset patriarchal? Yes, but the Hebrew Bible says a lot of positive things about women. Were women better off in Israel under the Torah than they were in other ancient Near Eastern societies? Not necessarily, for other countries in the ancient Near East were more egalitarian on inheritance and divorce. Plus, the Israelite religion we encounter in the Bible does not have strong female deities as do other ancient Near Eastern nations, even though there are strong women in the Hebrew Bible (e.g., Deborah, the Proverbs 31 woman, etc.). And, while Jewish and Christian apologists argue that women were treated as sex objects in ancient Near Eastern fertility cults, there is debate about the existence of cultic prostitution in that region.

So I'm not sure where God is in all of this. Although Israel was more patriarchal than other ancient Near Eastern nations, maybe God was moving her in the direction of egalitarianism. The custom in Israel was for only men to inherit property, but God said that Zelophahad's daughters could inherit, since Zelophahad didn't have any sons (Numbers 27). That wasn't as liberal as other ancient Near Eastern countries, some of which allowed daughters to inherit even when the father had sons. But it was more liberal than where Israel was before.

In Exodus 21, only male Hebrew slaves are released in the seventh year. In Deuteronomy 15:12, however, both men and women Hebrew slaves are released after six years of service. Exodus 23:17 states, "Three times in the year all your males shall appear before the Lord GOD" (NRSV). We see the same expression in Deuteronomy 16:16, but the chapter also mentions daughters and female slaves appearing before the LORD during his festivals. Was God, through Deuteronomy, moving Israel in an egalitarian direction?

Regarding sacrifices, God may have worked with Israel according to her patriarchal presuppositions. Perhaps he was also moving Israel beyond that mindset through other laws. I don't know.

Could there be a practical reason that the male animals were considered more valuable? Were male animals the only ones used for agriculture, for example, since they were stronger? If so, then maybe that's why the males were used for the more important sacrifices.

Jack Kemp

I am really sad to learn that Jack Kemp has passed away after a battle with cancer.

I first heard of Jack Kemp in 1988, when he ran for the Republican nomination for President. In the U.S. Congress, he was one of the early proponents of supply side economics, the idea that cutting taxes would stimulate economic growth and lead to an increase in federal revenue. Saturday Night Live in 1988 had a good parody of this concept, in which the actor playing Kemp (maybe it was Phil Hartman) said: "On the Buffalo Bills, I encouraged my players to give their 100 per cent. Now if we can get the economy to give its 150 per cent, that would mean 30 per cent for education..." His approach to government was not exactly "starve the beast" a la Grover Norqhuist, but rather "you can have your cake and eat it too."

Before entering politics, Jack Kemp played football for the Buffalo Bills. My dad actually remembers watching him play on TV!

Also, when I was a young lad developing my political beliefs, I collected autographed photos of conservative politicians. One of them is of Jack Kemp when he was Bush I's Secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

What I especially like about Jack Kemp was that he was an advocate of freedom and opportunity for all people, including the poor. He desired for everyone to have the liberty to unleash their creativity and full potential, while enjoying the fruit of their labors. Yes, he wanted rich investors to be able to keep more of their money, but he also favored enterprise zones, giving businesses tax incentives to locate in poor areas. Although he backtracked from his support for Affirmative Action in his 1996 run for Vice-President, he believed in giving minorities a hands-up so they could pursue their potential and partake of the American dream. And, when most Republicans were saying that we should crack down on illegal immigrants, Kemp said in an interview that he didn't understand that sentiment, since he viewed America as a land of opportunity for all who want to make a better life for themselves. I'm not sure if I agree with his stance, but he certainly made me rethink my position on the issue (even to this day)!

Jack Kemp was a pioneer who saw some of his ideas become policy. He was responsible for the Reagan tax cuts, and Bill Clinton actually implemented and expanded the ideas that Kemp had proposed. In his 1996 debate with Al Gore, Kemp said we should have enterprise zones, and Al Gore said they already existed under Clinton.

At the same time, Jack Kemp also had ideas that weren't exactly in the mainstream. He supported the Gold Standard, for instance. Too bad America doesn't follow his advice on that! We had quite a bit of inflation because W. sought to print more money.

Although Kemp was solidly pro-life, he tended to focus on economics, not the social issues that the religious right values. I remember him saying in his 1996 debate with Gore that tax cuts could make people more polite. Part of me sees that as a stretch, since there are plenty of rich jerks out there. And yet, isn't it possible for freedom and opportunity to be consistent with morality and good character? God promises in the prophets to create a world in which each person sits under his own vine and fig tree. Jack Kemp worked to make that type of society possible in America, even for those who usually lacked a piece of the pie. Yet, he desired to give people a hands-up, not a hand-out, since hard work is a part of good character and the American dream.

We'll miss you, Jack Kemp!

UPDATE: Read Felix's beautiful commemoration: IN MEMORIAM.

Female Offerings

BryanL asked on his blog, "The Art of Procrastination," Did the Savior Have to be a Man? And T.C. Robinson argues on New Leaven that the Passover lamb had to be a male, since the Passover lamb was a type of Christ, who was a man (see "The Passover Lamb had to be Male…").

I asked T.C. how he accounts for the female sin offerings in the Hebrew Bible (Leviticus 4:28, 32; 5:6). There were also peace offerings, which could be either male or female (Leviticus 3:1, 6). And Sue points out under T.C.'s post that the red heifer of Numbers 19 was a female. Were they a type of Christ? If so, then gender obviously doesn't matter, does it?

I have the same problem with typology that Richard expresses under T.C.'s post: "The problem that I have with most 'typology' is the severe lack of [hermeneutical] control, i.e. there are as many 'types' as people with imagination! Oftentimes it just degenerates into our reading what we want into the biblical text rather than letting it speak for itself."

For my weekly quiet times, I've heard a lot of Christian sermons--from Jon Courson, Chuck Missler, Bob Smith, and the list goes on. They like to use typology, as they seek to tie things in the Old Testament to Jesus Christ. The problem is that the "type" and the "antetype" are not always perfect fits. When this happens, the preacher usually says that the type is intentionally imperfect, since God wants us to focus not so much on the type, but rather on the antetype, the perfect Jesus Christ. But what makes them think that it's a type of Christ at all, when the two don't completely match?

As a Christian, I'm not totally against typology, since it's a way that I derive meaning from the Hebrew Bible. I personally don't slay giants or sacrifice animals, so I have to do something to make those concepts meaningful to my own spiritual life. But I don't expect typology to convince someone with non-Christian presuppositions, such as Jews, or historical critics who don't seek to force the Hebrew Bible into a Christian mold.

I try to understand the writings of the Hebrew Bible on their own terms, before I apply them to Jesus Christ. When the text says that the offering had to be "unblemished," for example, I don't limit my thoughts to "Oh my, this must be a type of the sinless Son of God." Rather, I ask why the offering had to be unblemished within the Hebrew mindset. My impression is that a lot of it had to do with the majesty of God (see Malachi 1), which required that God receive the best.

Then why did God have different gender requirements for his sacrifices? Unlike Sue (perhaps), I think that gender actually does matter in terms of this issue, for there were some sacrifices that absolutely had to be male (e.g., the burnt offering of Leviticus 1:3, 10). Some could be male or female (the peace offerings of Leviticus 3:1, 6). And some had to be female (some of the sin offerings of Leviticus 4-5).

I think a possible answer is that the gender requirements placed a hierarchy of importance on the sacrifices. Leviticus 4, the chapter on sin offerings, prescribes a bullock for the sins of the priest and entire community, a male goat for the sins of a prince, and a she-goat or female lamb for the sins of the individual. Priests, princes, and the entire community are more important than single individuals, so their sin offerings had to be from the gender that was higher on the hierarchy within the Hebrew mindset, the male. For evidence of such a hierarchy, see Leviticus 27, which places a higher redemption price on male human beings than females.

Similar rules appear in Numbers 15:22-28, though, here, the sacrifice for the entire community is one young bull for a burnt offering and one he-goat for a sin-offering. This differs from the command in Leviticus 4 that a young bull be the sin offering for the entire community, so I guess there's diversity within the Bible. (Who would have guessed?) But, still, Numbers 15 conveys the message that the more important offerings had to be male. Likewise, in Leviticus 16:5, 7, two male goats are used in the Day of Atonement ceremony, which is for the entire community.

Why is the burnt offering to be a male, whereas a peace offering can go either way? I think the answer may be that the burnt offering is the most sacred sacrifice. God gets all of the burnt offering, whereas the peace offering is shared between God and the worshipper (Leviticus 1, 7). The burnt offering may have been the sacrifice that invited God's presence at the outset, which would explain why it appears in so many rituals (Leviticus 16:3--Day of Atonement; Leviticus 23--the festivals in general; Leviticus 15--purification; etc.).

I'm not sure if this principle (that the more important sacrifices had to be male) makes sense of everything in the sacrificial system. The Passover sacrifice was for individuals, yet it had to be male. The red heifer helped cleanse the entire community, yet it was female. Maybe the Passover lamb was in a higher class because it was for a festival, so a male was required. As far as the red heifer goes, I'm not sure how to explain her. I think that the principle holds true in a lot of instances, but there are a few exceptions. So I guess I'm doing the same thing as the Christian typologists I criticized: seeing a pattern, while not knowing what to do with an exception.

I'm tired of writing now, and I kind of shot my day with this post! I may wrestle with the theological ramifications of this issue tomorrow. See you then!

Tom Harpur's "Christ Within"

I've been reading Tom Harpur's The Pagan Christ (New York: Walker & Company, 2004), which argues that the "Christ myth" came from ancient Egyptian legends about Horus.

Today, I don't want to interact with that argument so much, except to say that I wish Harpur actually provided documentation from primary sources for many of his claims. And "Irenaeus says" does not count, unless I'm told precisely where Irenaeus said it! Maybe I can find documentation in the book advertised on God Discussion, D.M. Murdock's Christ in Egypt: The Horus-Jesus Connection.

Throughout his book, Harpur argues that Jesus Christ was not a real person, but rather a symbol for the divine within each of us. In this approach, Christ's healings, feeding of the multitudes, and calming of the storms are symbols for the strength and power of the Christ within: to heal us, to nourish us, to provide us with inner peace, etc.

Harpur discusses what he considers the weaknesses of seeing Jesus as an external person for us to imitate:

I am reminded here of what Carl Jung said about the weakness of the old Imitatio Christi approach. Jung obviously had nothing against people trying to be loving and kind. But, he said, "The Imitatio Christi will forever have this disadvantage: we worship a man as a divine model, embodying the deepest meaning of life, and then out of sheer imitation we forget to make real the profound meaning present in ourselves. If I accept the fact that a God is absolute and beyond all human experience, he leaves me cold. I do not affect him, nor does he affect me. But if I know, on the other hand, that God is a mighty activity within my own soul, at once I must concern myself with him." If we follow a Christ "out there," in other words, while ignoring the kingdom of God or the Christ within, authentic transformation never occurs.

This quote intrigues me for various reasons. Its use of the word "cold" struck me as ironic, since that's how I'd describe Harpur's version of Christianity. He says that there's no real Jesus out there who loves me, and that all I have is myself? That's pretty bleak!

At the same time, the quote does resonate with me on some level. The idea that there's potential within me, already there for the tapping? I remember a lady at church criticizing the New Age notion that there's potential within us that God wants to help us use. Personally, I don't see anything wrong with that sort of notion.

Christians believe that God gives the Holy Spirit to believers, and that's fine. But I kind of like Harpur's notion that there's something spiritual within each of us, Christian and non-Christian, since I'm not always sure if I'm in the "saved" category. If I had incredible potential just on the basis of being human, hey, that's something I can appreciate!

Still, Paul's teaching that humans are weak and need a power greater than themselves to regenerate them also resonates with me, since I realize that I am weak. Plus, I'm uncomfortable labelling myself divine in any sense of the word, for I think that an essential component of religion is worshipping some power greater than myself (though, granted, there are religions that view the transcendent differently from theists).

That's why I have problems with the Armstrongite view that humans will become like God: I can agree that we're advancing and growing towards something, but I believe that God should always be above us, since that's part of the very definition of "God."

Moreover, as I've expressed in my post Jesus Clones, I have my own set of problems with Imitatio Christi, which is essentially "What would Jesus do?" I don't want to be totally like someone else, nor do I desire to imitate someone's actions in a "monkey see, monkey do" sort of way. I want to be the best James Pate that I can be, according to the unique way that God created me.