Marcion lives!

Matthew 5:17-20

Marcion was an early Christian thinker who's ideas were declared heresy (false teachings) by the Church. He held that the loving, merciful God of the New Testament, personified in Jesus, could not possibly be the same as the wrathful, angry God of the Old Testament. His followers formed a movement that was persecuted because it defied the Church's canon of scripture (the set and voted on books to be included in the formal Bible).

Now I am no Marcion; I have been accused of holding the Hebrew Scriptures too highly, in fact. I see God portrayed consistently in both Testaments, though his motives and the character of his Gospel evolves as the biblical story progresses. One Testament cannot be comprehended without the other, though the New Testament is where Jesus appears, so that holds a bit more authority. Nonetheless, God in the Hebrew Bible is still loving and merciful, just as God (and Jesus) in the Christian Bible is angry and judgmental at times.

But I do understand the reasoning behind the heresy that is very much alive in the church still. It says, "Throw away the Old and embrace the New." However, in these verses, Jesus pretty much smashes that idea. Right from the Messiah's mouth, "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them." There you have it. BOTH halves are necessary and we are not to "break one of the least of these commandments" or "teach others to do the same." And yet, much of what Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount (chs. 5-7) involve altering the Law found in the Jewish Tanakh (Old Testament). What are we to make of this? Way to throw a massive wrench into an already messy theological conundrum!

Some understandings of the Law are changed by Jesus and later Paul. Others have evolved away over time, hopefully saving the great truth behind the original rule. It is difficult to say anymore which rules we ought to take literally and which are meant to make us think, to drive us to deeper levels of understanding the will and mystery of God. And yet it is clear that we are not EVER to throw away the Law and the Prophets, for something in their words rings true and essential for we who call ourselves follows of Christ, "Christians".

So read Leviticus. Read Song of Solomon. Read Genesis, Joshua, and Habakkuk, too! Struggle with them. Pray with and for them. God is behind them. Christ blessed them. Whatever decisions we make in the future, may we be able to defend them against the Old Testament as Jesus did and commanded us, even if the results convict us to change our beliefs and ways...