Which is why I am going on a rant. Memories can work on their own. Sometimes we have to work hard to recall data. Other times there are associations made which come of their own volition. They are called triggers. (For example, the word trigger makes me think of Roy Rogers' horse. Just popped in my head, no effort)
Because human minds (&brains) work that way it is important to take care in how we form memories. Pure things are easily polluted and ruined. Take a single tooth out of a smile and it is suddenly ridiculous. A black smudge on a white dress gains all the attention, even if 99% of the dress is pristine.
The story of Jonathan's faithfulness in I Samuel 19&20 is heart rending. King Saul, enraged with jealousy, shares with his son and inner group that he wants them to kill David. Saul recognizes David is a threat to his throne. Saul already knows God has rejected him as king, Samuel made that clear. Now he further complicates his situation by standing against God and clinging to his power.
I can imagine the knot in Jonathan's gut as he heard the words. I can also imagine the terror. Saul has been very unpredictable. One moment at peace with David, then suddenly he decides he must die. Even for warriors, such events must be unnerving. Jonathan is making a decision which could cost him his life. Nothing is said of his feelings toward his father. Having read the book through I know that he will stand by his father's side to his death. Jonathan must have struggled mightily.
Jonathan speaks out for his friend, defending him to Saul's face. Logic is useless in the face of passion. So Jonathan successfully convinces his father to relent, but Saul's decision that David 'shall not die' is short lived. After another successful battle against Israel's enemies, David returns (the people's favorite) and Saul attempts to kill him with a spear. David flees for his life.
Jonathan and David conspire together to determine the next course of action. As David hides in Ramah, Jonathan comes to him. They work out a plan so that Jonathan can secretly inform David of the situation. Jonathan will shoot arrows at a target near David's hiding place. What he says to the boy who is his "arrow-fetcher" will be a code for whether David should stay or flee.
Two sentences from the Sacred Writ stand out to me:
- And Jonathan made David swear again by his love for him; for he loved him as he loved his own soul.
- behold, the Lord is between you and me forever
Two reasons. Love and faith. He believed God had chosen David. He loved David. That is what people who love and serve God do. They submit. That is what friends do. They take joy in the success of a friend rather than seek their own self interest.
So here is the rant. Why ruin a story of faith and love by turning it into an issue of same sex attraction? Why reframe this story as a gay love affair? Why make it into something else than what the text says?
Ever since 2003, this story has been changed for me. At that time I heard gay marriage justified and one of the arguments raised was Jonathan and David. My initial reaction of shock and disbelief have been worn away. The unthinkable has been thought. Something that had never crossed my mind was now an association. Time and again I have heard this "proof" until the story of Jonathan's self sacrificial love has become the (failed) argument to justify for gay sex.
Is it really necessary to make everything into gay sex? EVERYTHING? Does friendship have to be reduced to sexual attraction? Is it possible to imagine a world where stimulation and pleasure are not the only thing that matter? Can we think it possible that sometimes people have their minds on something else?
Our consumer, individualistic culture has made a comodity of most everything. The Episcopal Church has made a commitment to embrace the culture (in the name of "incarnational"). The effort to embrace has had other consequences. The culture has changed the church more than the church has changed the culture. The Epsicopal has been secularized. The sacred texts are de-sacralized and reduced to "stories of believing people from another era." The goal, preach Jesus to the world, has been reshaped into "promote tolerance, especially advocating for all things related to homosexuality." The list goes on, but anyone half paying attention already knows these things and more.
What frustrates me is the fog in my own mind. I think the challenge Jonathan could be has been dulled. The idea that 'love is self gift' is replaced with pondering other things, things which are not edifying. The effort to combat these alternative interpretations is itself a frustration. Do I really want to spend so much time and energy around issues of gay marriage? Even if the intent is noble and faithful, it still leads one away from the text and its message, back into the world of church politics and conflicts. In the end, whatever one says, if it is not the TEC party-line, is rejected as hate speech.
So, my rant. They have taken a sad story, yet an inspirational story, of faith, friendship, sacrifice and reduced it to a (faux) prop for their obsession with sex, especially homo-sex. They have done it enough that now the text is associated, to some extent, with that issue in my mind. How unfortunate. So I blog on it, which may end up leading other people to do the same thing. Perhaps I have aided their cause?
Yet Jonathan is a model. A model of purity and love. Someone who seeks God's will and way. I can stand with Jonathan and model his behavior (even if a poor imitation). I can decide to stand against those who advocate for that which God has rejected, whatever it is. I can do battle with the forces aligned against his kingdom. And I can love, purely and selflessly. I can love men and women without reducing love to impulses related to my own sexual pleasure. I can reject a cultural (dis)value which is ruining people by sexualizing everything. I can try to be innocent and pure and holy.
I hope, someday, that this Biblical text will be, once again, about our response to Messiah. I hope Jonathan is, again, the metaphor for selfless, loving commitment to God's annointed king (David, a metaphor for Jesus). I hope that some day we can read the story and hear the voice of Jesus ("anyone who does not love Me more than father, or mother....is not worthy of Me"). I hope that the story will inspire us to heroic acts of faithful virtue. I hope it will be pristine. Pure. A noble story about noble discipleship whatever the cost. I hope it will be a powerful narrative about obeying God and loving your friends, even when it is painful. I hope that this reflection is a step in that direction.
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