Selected New Testament texts—Saint Matthew and Saint Paul

But when the young man heard these words he went away sad, for he was a man of great wealth

Golgotha, by Edvard Munch

This week, I have followed up on Kazantzakis’s work, The Last Temptation of Christ, in which Jesus reacts negatively to the writing of Matthew and the teachings of Paul. While he denounces Matthew’s Gospel at first, he eventually accepts Matthew’s claim that an angel had dictated the words to him. Reasoning that God’s truth might bear little resemblance to man’s truth, he raises no further objection. However, near the end of the book, during Jesus’ multi-chapter alternative future in which Satan has rescued him from death and allowed him to live out a long life, he meets Paul the evangelist and reacts violently to the travesty he has made of Christ’s message.

On reading Kazantzakis, I missed the subtle point that Jesus only reacted to Matthew’s story of Christ’s birth. He said nothing about Matthew’s account of his adult life. Kazantzakis even describes how Matthew takes meticulous notes of what Jesus said, not letting a single word go by without jotting it down.

So, in order to better understand Kazantzakis, I read The Gospel According to Matthew and three letters from Saint Paul: Romans, 1 Corinthians, and Hebrews.¹ It has became quite clear to me what Kazantzakis meant. Matthew gives us a concrete Jesus who preaches about virtue and leads by example. Paul gives us an abstract Jesus who offers to save us from eternal torment if we trust him to do so.

Let me offer a disclaimer first. I specialized in philosophy, not theology. I don’t pretend to have a correct interpretation of Paul or Matthew. But I do know how they affected me when I read them.

Paul’s Letter to the Romans seems overly concerned with sex, sin, and the hierarchy of gender. On the second page, he condemns the godless behaviors brought on by philosophers. Their godlessness leads to homosexuality, which, he seems to think of as a gateway sin.

[Romans 1: 26] That is why God has abandoned them to degrading passions: why their women have turned from natural intercourse to unnatural practices [27] and why their menfolk have given up natural intercourse to be consumed with passion for each other, men doing shameless things with men and getting an appropriate reward for their perversion. [28] In other words, since they refused to see it was rational to acknowledge God, God has left them to their own irrational ideas and to their monstrous behaviour. [29] And so they are steeped in all sorts of depravity, rottenness, greed and malice, and addicted to envy, murder, wrangling, treachery and spite. [30] Libellers, slanderers, enemies of God, rude, arrogant and boastful; enterprising in sin, rebellious to parents, [32] without brains, honour, love or pity. [33] They know what God’s verdict is: that those who behave like this deserve to die—and yet they do it; and what is worse, encourage others to do the same.

Then, in his First Letter to the Church at Corinth, he gives explicit instructions on how women should dress in church so as to properly display their inferiority to men.

[1 Corinthians 11:3] However, what I want you to understand is that Christ is the head of every man, man is the head of woman, and God is the head of Christ. [4] For a man to pray or prophesy with his head covered is a sign of disrespect to his head. [5] For a woman, however, it is a sign of disrespect to her head² if she prays or prophesies unveiled; she might as well have her hair shaved off. [6] In fact, a woman who will not wear a veil ought to have her hair cut off. If a woman is ashamed to have her hair cut off or shaved, she ought to wear a veil. [7] A man should certainly not cover his head, since he is the image of God and reflects God’s glory; but woman is the reflection of man’s glory. [8] For man did not come from woman; no, woman came from man; [9] and man was not created for the sake of woman, but woman was created for the sake of man.

Paul seemed to think of all sex as evil, but, for obvious reasons, a necessary evil.

[1 Corinthians 7:1] Now for the questions about which you wrote. Yes, it is a good thing for a man not to touch a woman; [2] but since sex is always a danger, let each man have his own wife and each woman her own husband. [3] The husband must give his wife what she has the right to expect, and so too the wife to the husband. [4] The wife has no rights over her own body; it is the husband who has them. In the same way, the husband has no rights over his body; the wife has them. [5] Do not refuse each other except by mutual consent, and then only for an agreed time, to leave yourselves free for prayer; then come together again in case Satan should take advantage of your weakness to tempt you.

Ideally, he thought that everyone should remain celibate, just like him, but some people had less control over their lusts, so marriage provides a way to channel that energy safely.

[1 Corinthians 7:6] This is a suggestion, not a rule: [7] I should like everyone to be like me, but everybody has his own particular gifts from God, one with a gift for one thing and another with a gift for the opposite. [8] There is something I want to add for the sake of widows and those who are not married: it is a good thing for them to stay as they are, like me, [9] but if they cannot control the sexual urges, they should get married, since it is better to be married than to be tortured.

I found his micromanagement of people’s behavior and dress (he condemned long hair on men!) totally at odds with his insistence that no good behavior or observation of the Law could make a difference in one’s salvation. Believing the right things seems all that matters. His Letter to the Hebrews³ seems to say that “chosen” and “saved” aren’t the same. While the Jews retain their special status as God’s chosen people, personal salvation comes to anyone who believes. He even seems to justify the suffering of the Jews by comparing it to child beating, which practice he thought of as perfectly acceptable.

[Hebrews 12:5] Have you forgotten that encouraging text in which you are addressed as sons? My son, when the Lord corrects you, do not treat it lightly; but do not get discouraged when he reprimands you. [6] For the Lord trains the ones that he loves and he punishes all those that he acknowledges as his sons. [7] Suffering is part of your training; God is treating you as his sons. Has there ever been any son whose father did not train him? [8] If you were not getting this training, as all of you are, then you would not be sons but bastards. [9] Besides, we have all had our human fathers who punished us, and we respected them for it; we ought to be even more willing to submit ourselves to our spiritual Father, to be given life. [10] Our human fathers were thinking of this short life when they punished us, and could only do what they thought best; but he does it all for our own good, so that we may share his own holiness. [11] Of course, any punishment is most painful at the time, and far from pleasant; but later, in those on whom it has been used, it bears fruit in peace and goodness. [12] So hold up your limp arms and steady your trembling knees [13] and smooth out the path you tread; then the injured limb will not be wrenched, it will grow strong again.

The letters of Paul that I read address practical concerns about maintaining order and unity in local Christian communities. Collectively, they reveal a very busy organizer intent on spreading a religion across the entire Mediterranean world. He has one very simple message: Salvation through faith. Nothing we can do will change our natures as sinners, born of and into sin. But if we believe the right things all our sins will go away. However, he seems to warn that we must act quickly because “the sale ends this week!” In other words, he writes with an urgency that suggests we have reached the end of time.

One can anticipate a catastrophe in many ways, depending on its nature. One prepares for a nuclear holocaust somewhat differently than one prepares for a flood. Pick your disaster: fire, earthquake, drought, locusts, whatever. Each one calls for its own type of prepping. But these familiar disasters all assume the possibility of survival, leaving us only needing to figure out on what terms we can expect to live afterwards. But what about an apocalypse that brings time itself to an end? No one survives; the earth itself doesn’t survive; one can’t just prepare for a different lifestyle. When time ends, one group will burn for eternity and another group will live in eternal happiness. Bunkers and food caches will make no difference. In other words, we need not worry about a non-existent future. Plans that come to fruition in a week, or a year, or in a few more generations, don’t make as much sense as a plan that produces instant salvation.

Paul’s focus on personal salvation really bothered me, but I have to admit it seems appropriate for an end-times sect. If the world ends tomorrow, why conduct research? Why treat illnesses? Why save the environment? Why bother making the world a better place for future generations? Why mow the lawn? Only one thing makes sense: save yourself first, then, in whatever time remains, share the technique with whoever will listen. In such a crisis, who has time to feed the poor?

Matthew’s Jesus, on the other hand, cares deeply about helping anyone in need. People suffer and starve, they need healing, they need lifting out of despair, and human suffering will never go away. So act now to help those worse off than you. Show pity. Share what you can. Even if the world ends, people need palliative care right up until the end.

Matthew’s Jesus could not refrain from helping people. Passages like this appear throughout.

[Matthew 14:14] So as he stepped ashore he saw a large crowd; and he took pity on them and healed their sick.

He expects his disciples to do as he does, but they often fall short.

[Matthew 17:14] As they were rejoining the crowd a man came up to him and went down on his knees before him. [15] ‘Lord,’ he said ‘take pity on my son: he is a lunatic and in a wretched state; he is always falling into the fire or into the water. [16] I took him to your disciples and they were unable to cure him.’ [17] ‘Faithless and perverse generation!’ Jesus said in reply ‘How much longer must I be with you? How much longer must I put up with you? Bring him here to me.’ [18] And when Jesus rebuked it the devil came out of the boy who was cured from that moment.

And he responds to anyone, no matter how obnoxious, if only they ask for help.

[Matthew 20:30] Now there were two blind men sitting at the side of the road. When they heard that it was Jesus who was passing by, they shouted, ‘Lord! Have pity on us, Son of David.’ [31] And the crowd scolded them and told them to keep quiet, but they only shouted more loudly, ‘Lord! Have pity on us, Son of David.’ [32] Jesus stopped, called them over and said, ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ [33] They said to him, ‘Lord, let us have our sight back’. [34] Jesus felt pity for them and touched their eyes, and immediately their sight returned and they followed him.

Growing up in a Presbyterian household, I heard many of the stories about Christ’s life. Some of them I must have heard hundreds of times. But in Matthew 20:1-16, Jesus tells a parable I don’t recall reading anywhere else. The owner of a vineyard needs workers to harvest grapes quickly, so he hires some people at one denarius for the day’s work. Throughout the day, he keeps hiring more and more people. The last group he hires has been standing around idly for almost the whole day, and he hires them for the last hour of work. When it comes time to pay, he pays everyone the same amount, one denarius. Those who had worked a twelve-hour day grumbled because they got paid the same as those who only worked one hour. But the landowner said, essentially, can’t I spend my money the way I want to spend it? Why so much envy just because I showed some generosity?

This rebuke strikes at what I see as the emotional core of conservatism: envy at the very thought that someone, especially a poor person, might get something they haven’t earned. The notion of welfare enrages those who feel they deserve more than others. If I have worked my fingers to the bone all my life, they seem to think, without ever once asking for help, why should that other lazy person get a handout? But Jesus heals the sick, cures the blind, lets the lame walk again, and raises the dead. He never asks them how they let themselves get that way. Whether they deserve it or not, their suffering evokes his compassion and he makes them whole again. And he asks, what of it? Why should someone with perfect eyesight feel envy when I restore a blind person’s vision? Does working harder in resentful silence somehow make you superior?

While Paul seems obsessed with sin, Matthew’s Jesus seems obsessed with hypocrisy. Whatever you profess to believe, your actions will speak the truth.

[Matthew 19:16] And there was a man who came to him and asked, ‘Master, what good deed must I do to possess eternal life?’ [17] Jesus said to him, ‘Why do you ask me about what is good? There is one alone who is good. But if you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments.’ [18] He said, ‘Which?’ ‘These:’ Jesus replied ‘You must not kill. You must not commit adultery. You must not bring false witness. [19] Honour your father and mother, and: you must love your neighbour as yourself'. [20] The young man said to him, ‘I have kept all these. What more do I need to do?’ [21] Jesus said, ‘If you wish to be perfect, go and sell what you own and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me’. [22] But when the young man heard these words he went away sad, for he was a man of great wealth.

The rich don’t want to hear that message, not then, and not now. If only Jesus had said “believe in me and enjoy a blessed, eternal life in heaven,” the man in the parable would almost certainly have signed up. Paul seems to pick up on that.

In recent political postings, I have seen a lot of rhetorical questions like, “How can Christians promote conservative policies that contradict the teachings of Christ?” Indeed, conservative evangelicals don’t seem to like free health care for all, redistribution of wealth, openness to aliens, the very sorts of thing that Jesus preached. I feel now as though I’ve found the answer. The message you take from the New Testament depends on the books you prioritize. If you and I both read the Holy Bible, some parts will resonate more with you than with me. If I like Paul, then right-leaning evangelism sounds best. If you prefer the Gospels, you’ll lean left with the so-called red-letter evangelicals.⁴ And I don’t know about that guy over there who ignores everything but Revelations. So I think I can finally put my finger on what has always bothered me about Protestantism: No Protestant sect has spent two thousand years trying to make coherent sense of the entire Bible. The Catholics have done just that. They have struggled for centuries to reconcile the incongruities, and that has led to a balanced, incredibly nuanced understanding of scripture that no single person could hope to achieve in a lifetime, no matter how often they reread it. And they haven’t finished yet. Of course I speak here of established Catholic doctrine, not the separate orders, which often show just as much diversity as Protestant sects.

So, having presented such a negative account of Paul’s letters, I’ll atone by closing on a different note with an absolutely beautiful passage from 1 Corinthians, one which I have heard at many weddings.

[1 Corinthians 13:4] Love is always patient and kind; it is never jealous; love is never boastful or conceited; [5] it is never rude or selfish; it does not take offence, and is not resentful. [6] Love takes no pleasure in other people’s sins but delights in the truth; [7] it is always ready to excuse, to trust, to hope, and to endure whatever comes.

§ § §

I had thought I would continue in the same vein by reading Thomas Mann’s Joseph and His Brothers, however, given the surreal character of current events in the United States, I think that Kafka might do a much better job of reflecting the reality I live in. So, I’ll read The Castle for next week. I’ll use the Willa and Edwin Muir translation in the Everyman’s Library edition.

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Works mentioned in this post

Joseph and His Brothers, by Thomas Mann

The Castle, by Franz Kafka

The Gospel According to Saint Matthew, by Saint Matthew

The Letter to the Romans, by Saint Paul

The First Letter to the Corinthians, by Saint Paul

The Letter to the Hebrews, attributed to Saint Paul

The Last Temptation of Christ, by Nikos Kazantzakis

1. I used the translation of the Jerusalem Bible.

2. Since Paul speaks metaphorically here, when a man keeps his literal head covered, he shows disrespect for his metaphorical head, God. Similarly, when a woman uncovers her literal head, she shows disrespect for her metaphorical head, men. She pretends to be equal to a man.

3. Paul probably did not write the letter to the Hebrews, although tradition attributes it to him.

4. Named after the editions of the Bible in which Christ’s words appear in red ink. Red-letter Christianity is not a sect, so much as an inclination within many different denominations to prioritize Christ’s teachings.