Songbird reminded me of an article I knew I had seen -- it's by Walter Wink and you can find it here. It's a different way of seeing some of the sayings of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount.
To quote:
"Something seems terribly wrong here. Turn the other cheek sounds like supine cowardice, the refusal to confront someone who is doing evil. It’s being a doormat for Jesus. It strikes many as suicidal, as an invitation to let someone wipe up the floor with us. Battered women have all too often been told by their pastors that the Bible requires them to turn the other cheek when they are being pulverized by their husbands or lovers."
A very interesting article.
I think I realized that there was something else going on in the passage about "Turn the other cheek" when I did an imaginative "blocking" of the text (blocking is something actors do to a scene -- it's a diagram where they would stand and move). The full text reads "But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also." For most people to strike you on the right cheek, they must use the back of their hand -- the way a master would hit a slave or an oppressed person. To turn the other cheek is to invite that person to strike you as an equal. This passage is not about becoming more passive -- but a challenge to the system.
To combine all this with my thoughts about Trinity Sunday -- I don't think I can say "Father, Son and Holy Ghost" ever again without thinking about these issues. I make a real effort to use "Creator, Redeemer and Sustainer" instead (ignoring my Loving Husband's suggestion "the Old Woman, the Dude and the Spook" which he points out is balanced.....)
What other names have you used for the Trinity?
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