Is Christ a Wife-beater?

IS CHRIST A WIFE-BEATER?

One of the ways to test whether an expression or statement is a metaphor is by pressing its particulars to a literal consistency to see whether they lead to an absurdity. For example, the Bible tells us that Jesus Christ is "the lamb of God." Is this a literal expression or a metaphor? That's an easy one; the answer is obvious. Jesus does not have four legs, is not covered with wool, and does not "bah-ah." We know that human beings are not sheep; so "the lamb of God" is a metaphor to express a truth about His sacrificial death.

Other metaphors are not quite so obvious. When Jesus said in John 6 that we must "eat of his flesh and drink of his blood" to have eternal life, did He mean it literally or figuratively. Was He advocating cannibalism in a culture which taught that the ingestion of blood was a mortal sin? No, He said so in 6:63,

It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.

The old Church is mistaken to literalize this analogy in the Eucharist.[1]

Another difficult metaphor is when the Bible likens God as our heavenly Father. Can this relationship be taken literally or is it figurative?

It depends upon how we define "fatherhood". If we define it as the point of origination, as in a creator, then, yes, God is our Father. If we define fatherhood as a relationship of love and care, then, of course, God is our Father; for who could love and provide for us better than He?

If, however, we define fatherhood as a condition of parenthood in the biological process of "begetting" - then, no, God is not our Father. The Bible tells us that there is only one begotten Son, and that is Jesus Christ (John 3:16 et al).

In saying that God is not our Father it does not diminish the significance of our relationship with Him, but it recognizes that the idea of fatherhood is used by way of analogy in the Bible to describe how we are to relate to Him and how He wants to relate to us. The way we can prove that the "fatherhood of God" is a metaphor is by pressing its particulars. Did God mate with our mothers as He did with the Virgin Mary? Are we the offspring of this kind of union? No, of course not; it's absurd.

Is it harmful to literalize metaphors? Sometimes. The Bible tells us that our personal trials are used by God to chasten us and teach us obedience , like a father who disciplines his son (Hebrews 12:5-11). Does this mean that everything in the Bible is meant to teach us the fatherhood of God? When God sent in the Assyrians to wipe-out the Israelites and to take the remnant as slaves, was that meant to teach us that fathers sometimes have to murder the disobedient members of their families and start over? No, it is absurd. We must remember that there are some things God does which are only the prerogative of a Creator. There is a difference between creating and begetting. If I create a piece of furniture, I have the right to destroy it if it pleases me to do so. A man does not create what he begets but merely brings into being what already exists. If all of God's judgments were manifestations of His fatherhood, we might justly wonder what kind of monster is this heavenly father!

Jesus likened His coming to the sudden appearance of a band of robbers in the night (Matthew 24:42-43). Does this mean that Jesus is a violent thief?

Jesus also likened Himself as the bridegroom, but He never said who the bride was.[2] Paul said the Church was the bride (Ephesians 5:22-33). The Church is made up of males and females of all ages, races, and descriptions. Is this a metaphor or is it to be taken literally?

Let's press the particulars of this analogy. There are many people in the Church. Does that mean Christ is a polygamist? There are many males in the Church. Does that mean Christ is a homosexual?

The doctors of the Church respond by saying that this expression must be considered "mystically" to refer to a collective body people taken as a whole, not in their individuality. It is like the ark of Noah (Ah, another metaphor/simile) - all who are within the Church are saved.

Very well, then, let us press the particulars further. What does this expression "mystical" mean? When I partake of the Communion Supper, am I partaking of something else other than the bread and cup? The old Church says, "Yes", I am partaking of the very blood and body of Christ. But I am partaking of the "mystical" body, it says, not the literal body. In my thinking, I am merely eating bread and drinking wine - calories.

When a martyr is impaled on a stake, what is the mystical meaning of that? Does this "mystical" event negate what is really happening? Is there not still physical trauma experienced by the human organism?

If the Church is the Bride of Christ, then He is not a very good husband. Through the centuries, His followers have been brutally tortured, murdered, raped, and plundered. Even at this very moment, African Christians are enduring such atrocities. What kind of husband will not come to the defense of His beloved bride?

If we argue that there is a mystical meaning to all of this mayhem and suffering and that Christ is absolved of any duty to come to the aid of such helpless creatures, we might wonder what that mystical meaning might be? Does it have something to do with our "spiritual perfection"? Is He punishing and purging the Church for its sins - as Paul says, to "sanctify and cleanse it" (Ephesians 5:26)?

"Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in every thing" (Ephesians 5:24). If the Church is required to submit itself to corporal punishment for the sake of its perfection, so must wives. Christ is a wife-beater and to follow His example, so must men everywhere.

If we want to follow this line of thinking, perhaps it would be useful, once in a while, for a man to take his ungrateful wife to the ghetto to be gang-raped. Maybe, she will learn to behave herself at home.

Do you see the absurdity here? When a metaphor is pressed too literally, many strange and undesireable results occur.

Many theologians through the centuries have so literalized this expression that they have built an entire institutional and ethical system around it. Fictional persons - such as churches, corporations, states, and other collective bodies - have been the fruit of this system. And in law, they have greater rights than persons. So called "victimless" crimes - crimes against the state, the "People", and other corporate persons - have been punished more severely because they are supposedly crimes committed against everyone. Prostitutes are punished for committing a "crime against marriage." Homosexuals are punished for committing "crimes against nature." Tax evaders are punished for "crimes against the state." Heretics are punished for "sins against the Church" and women are burned as witches because of commerce with the devil, an impossible crime, since the "devil" is a fictional construct of Church dogma.[3]

Martin Luther mocked the old Church because it charged men with the crime of incest for marrying the daughters of their godparents. Today, bank robbers are punished for stealing money, when everyone ought to know that the banks have no money and have had no money since 1933. It is as ludicrous as the notion of punishing hunters for hunting unicorns out-of-season.[4]

The fact of the matter is that the Church is not the Bride of Christ. There is no such thing as "the Church" because it is a metaphorical term to describe the community of followers which Jesus founded. It is a word which He used only twice and certainly not with the meaning which is applied to it today.

His true Bride was a flesh and blood woman, just like He was flesh and blood. And Christians need to give up this nonsensical theology which supports their Churchism. It is strangling the world.

* * * * *

Footnotes:

[1] The old Church sees in this the symbolism of the Passover Supper fulfilled in the Eucharist. In that ancient ceremony, the sacrifice was eaten by the worshipper. But in this text in John 6, Christ references the manna in the wilderness eaten by the Israelites and not the Passover. In the Passover meal, the blood is not drunken but is smeared on the doorposts. If John 6 is a reference to the Eucharist, it can only be taken as a metaphor to teach us that Christ is the source of our life. The Grail Church teaches that Communion is a symbol of our fellowship with the "Body" of Christ (all of those who are in covenant with Him) and the "Blood" of Christ (all of those who are His blood relatives).

[2] It does no good to argue from Revelation 21:9 that the bride is the new Jerusalem. This is a metaphor added to metaphor.

[3] There is a real spiritual realm with malevolent beings, but in the New Covenant, they have no power.

[4] I am not excusing robbing banks, of course. It is an act of violence which ought to be punished, but not because it is stealing money.