The Language of Holy Week

March 25, 2024 - #mondaymoment #HolyWeek #Easter

Happy Monday, my friends! Yesterday we celebrated Palm Sunday, the day recalling Jesus’ triumphant entrance into Jerusalem and with it, for us, the beginning of Holy Week. The language we use and the ways in which we tell the story of this week is filled with pitfalls to which Christians across more than 2,000 years have fallen.

First, complicity in the death of Jesus has been assigned to “the Jews.” Indeed, Christian anti-Semitism has its grounding in the idea that the Jewish people hold some type of generational guilt in the murder of Jesus. In the Gospel according to Matthew there is a troubling pronouncement from the crowd that has gathered as Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor, questions Jesus. “So, when Pilate saw that he could do nothing but rather that a riot was beginning, he took some water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, ‘I am innocent of this man’s blood; see to it yourselves.’ Then the people as a whole answered, ‘His blood be on us and on our children!’” (Matthew 27:24-25). The issue here is that we don’t know who is in this crowd. We’re led to believe that they are Jews and modern depictions of the scene show a wide variety of people to demonstrate all of our complicity in the death of Jesus. My educated guess is that the crowd includes only the chief priests, the elders, and maybe some additional folks who would have had business at or near the Roman headquarters. Whoever is in the crowd, they have most certainly been whipped into a frenzy by the chief priests and they are hardly speaking for the entirety of the Jewish faith. Rather, they are speaking for themselves. Further, the chief priests and elders do not have the authority to put Jesus to death which is why they hand him over to Pilate in the first place (see John 18:28-32).

Second, we need to avoid the theology that assigns Jesus’ death to paying the price of our sin. We’ve all been taught through sermons, church education, music, and art that Jesus died for our sins. The doctrine of the atonement—penal substitutionary atonement, that is—states that God, a perfect being, created a perfect world which was corrupted by the sin of Adam and Eve. In order to put the situation right and allow humanity to have life with God, a sacrifice must be made to God. However, God, being perfect, requires a perfect sacrifice. Humans cannot make that sacrifice and are therefore doomed, but Jesus, who is perfect, comes to earth as fully God and fully man in order to make that sacrifice.

The Atonement has been and continues to be used to manipulate Christians into showing up to church, tithing, and doing any number of other things to claim the title of “Christian” and the salvation which comes with that title. Here’s the problem: the Atonement didn’t become a defined Christian idea and belief until approximately 1000 CE. For the first 1,000 years of Christian history Jesus was less a redeemer and more a bringer of God to humanity. Jesus’ mission wasn’t to save us from our sins, but to enrich our lives by making the Kin-dom of God manifest for us in the here and now. Yes, something happened in the Garden of Eden; God and humanity lost their direction connection. Jesus came to restore that connection. Jesus was put to death because his life and his message challenged the entrenched power of leaders of that time and most other times since. Remember the words spoken by Jesus’ mother: “[God] has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty” (Luke 1:51-53).

What language do you use to discuss Holy Week? How is Jesus bringing the Kin-dom of God in your life?

Let us pray: God, help us to continue the work of your son in building your kin-dom here on earth. Make us remember that Jesus’ mission on earth was to reunite us with you. Bless us when the words, music, and art of our Christian tradition promotes Jesus’ death as necessary salvation. Guard us, gracious Lord, when Jesus’ death is used to manipulate and control us, particularly by leaders of the church. We ask this all in the name of your son, who came to build your kin-dom and make us co-creators. Amen.

Blessings on your weeks, my friends! Let me know if there is anything I can do for you.

Faithfully,

Ben