Shhh...Don't tell.. but the Mid Term questions
(and many answers!!) have been posted ..
But I know you actually want to first read all these exciting highlights from today'[s class
FIRST..
...so when you are done, you'll find at the bottom of this post exactly where the midterm can be found...
(:
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The Matrix?The exact clip we watched in class is here,
and it sure triggered some lively conversation.
When Morpheus tells Neo that "like everyone else, you were birn into bondage"...and that he can feel that bondage, that matrix....even when "he goes to church." It's a reminder that even in church/as church we are still living in the world, and thus vulnerable to being co-opted by our culture, and not live fully in the Counter-Culture of the "Upside Down Kingdom."
This relates to several previous conversations about culture (see this and this)..
But how we primarily talked about the clip was as a classic postmodern parable.
Remember that "the one primary point of a parable is that a parable has one primary point"
(Note that is a chiasm!).
This is a helpful guideline for interpreting Jesus' parables.
Yet at the same time, parables are multifaceted and fluid, and can be entered into from different angles.
They are not intended as allegories, but they may have multiple levels of meaning, even allegorizing, in service of the main point.
We noticed in the Matrix that the characters Neo, Trinity, Morpheus, Cypher, Agent Smith et al
may well have one key Bible person they represent....but they each also have multiple other characters they also stand for.
Remember the "Teenage Affluenza" video that we watched, for which you used terms like:
- subversive
- satirical
- abductive
- interactive
- juxtaposing
- convicting
- comedic
- abductive
- pointed
- ironic
- interactive
- offensive (to some)
in describing? These are all great sub-definitions of a parable.
Robert Stein suggests three possible reasons for Jesus' use of parables:
- To communicate clearly with his followers (his "bounded set" or those who are headed toward the center of his centered set)
- To intentionally cause offense and misunderstanding among his hardened critics (those headed away from the center of his set.
- To disarm hearers.
- A parable may have a specific meaning not only for its original situations of Jesus but also for that of the evangelist... Parables are seen as autonomous works that posses multiple meanings and power in themselves, completely apart from their author. Although it's important to appreciate the aesthetic quality of the parables, the parables of Jesus have been treasured and loved primarily because they are the parables of Jesus. -Robert H. Stein
HERE (scroll to Chapter 3, pp 33-59)
For those interested in an amazing, creative, hilarious, provocative, profound book on the parables, test-drive
"Kingdom, grace, judgment:
paradox, outrage, and vindication
in the parables of Jesus"
by Robert Farrar Capon:
....or hear his podcast on The Prodigal Son here.
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You'll remember we opened the class session with a provocative threefold question:
Which would you choose:
- 1)Drink wine mixed with rubber, alum, and garden crocuses
- 2) Eat Persian onions and yell out 'Kum, Kum, Kum!'
- 3) Carry around the ashes of an ostrich egg in a cloth
You can read more about the intriguing reasons WHY at this link..
..but you'll remember an amazing "historical world" lesson:
These were the main options that would be given the bleeding woman we met in Matthew 9
And if you look at how the story is obviously NTERCALATED in three gospel accounts with another story (the young girl, daughter of Jairus, a synagogue ruler..
you'll be able to do some quick comparing/contrasting the two stories,
and note that we are to get the "Literary world" message that Jesus is indiscriminate and inclusive in who he heals:
Older (a woman suffering for 12 years and younger ( a 12 year old girl),
poorer and richer...what other comparisons/contrasts do you find?
See all the accounts on one page HERE.
____
Great job on the small group study on "What does Jesus seem to be saying is the unpardonable sin?"
Here's the way I once answered it, but I like the ways YOU answered it better! ("
--
Finally, on the Kingdom of God:
The "age to come" (the Kingdom) has in large part already come (from the future/heaven)
into "this age" (in the present/on the earth.
See Matt 4:17...and Hebrews 6:1-8
See also:
Finally,..
the Mid Term questions (and many answers) have been posted HERE..
(or click tab that says "midterm" at top)
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