Jesus and a Canaanite woman walk into a bar...

Matthew 15:21-28
   

The passage from Matthew about the Canaanite woman is difficult, to say the least.  It is a passage that even the most seasoned theologians have trouble with.  It is a passage that seminary students, like myself, have nightmares about having to preach before a congregation.  Passages like this make me want to rethink about my decision to become a pasror.  But truthfully, if someone does not have a problem with the interpretation of this scripture, with what it means, then they are not reading the Bible with as much attention as it deserves. 
    The difficulty is not that Jesus, in a somewhat direct way, calls the Canaanite woman a dog.  The problem, as I understand it, is that Jesus at first refuses to help a desperate woman in need, and then to add insult to injury, calls her a dog.  It is obviously mean and callous.  The dialogue seems to show another side of Jesus.  It seems in direct contrast to what the rest of the Gospels show his character to be, and in direct contrast to what we have learned in church and Sunday School.  Luckily and gratefully we already know how the encounter ends, for if Christ just left the woman still in need and insulted, without any offering any sort of help, we might have to completely rethink our perception of Christ as we know it.  We might have to change the lyrics of “Jesus loves me” to include “unless I am a Canaanite woman in desperate need, then I will get called a dog.” 
    I think part of the problem with getting to why Jesus acted in such a way does not have to do so much with the gospel as it does with our own understanding of the person of Christ.  In the Nicene Creed, we affirm that Jesus was not only fully God, but also fully human.  Yet, for some reason, we fail to apply certain human characteristics when talking about Christ and interpreting his words and actions in the Gospels.  We neglect to see in Christ what we assume and admire in other people, whether we realize it or not.  And one of these aspects that we really do not consider Christ to have is a sense of humor.  We are quick to point out his feelings of love and compassion, his feelings of sadness and agony, his anger, his feeling of disappointment (often with the disciples).  But, for some reason, the thought of Christ having a sense of humor is somehow beneath him. 
    Think about it for a minute.  Ever since Christians have been taking up artistic pusuits, all of the famous paintings of Christ portray him as either sad and sorrowful, or solemn and serious.  To be fair, the depictions of Jesus as sad and sorrowful are usually during some scene from the Passion, so that is understandable.  But the rest of the portrayals, either depicting a scene from the gospels, or just a regular painting as if Jesus was posing for a self-portrait, Christ has a grim, grave look on his face, or at the very best, an earnest expression, similar to what you might see on the face of a teacher watching over some unruly students, or a prison guard watching over prisoners.  The expression is meant to show the how serious the Jesus really is.  These faces of Christ peering at us through pictures hanging in our churches or in our homes seem to say, “I mean business!!!”  And so for roughly the last 2000 years or so, the image in our minds is that Christ is sad and gloomy, and there has not been a lot of room for anything else.  So then, at the very worst, Christ did not joke, laugh, engage in humorous banter, etc, etc.  To that I have this to say: if Christ did not have a sense of humor, if Christ did not have the ability to laugh at life and the situations that came with it, then the Passion of Christ would have begun long before his triumphant entry into Jerusalem.
    To the best of my knowledge, it has only been recently that we have pictures and drawings of Christ smiling and (heaven forbid) even laughing, and as far as I have seen, “happy” Jesus is a very blue-eyed, blonde-headed, somewhat in-shape man, with very German features.  Anywho, it is good to show these different emotions of Jesus, and it has taken us almost two millennia to acknowledge it.  But still, even when we acknowledge that Christ did indeed smile, most likely did laugh, probably told a joke or two, when we do a study of the Gospels, those traits tend to get trumped by the solemnity and the serious aspect of Christ.  We tend to think Jesus' humor has no place in the gospel accounts.  So at the very best, we affirm that Christ did have a sense of humor, but that sense of humor does not show up in the gospel.  Christ and his sense of humor must have existed in the aspects of his life that were not handed down to us in the gospels; the Gospel writers failed to make note of them.
    I have read the numerous commentaries on the Matthew passage, and unfortunately for me, most of them do not agree on anything, except for one point.  That point is that Jesus was testing the faith of the woman at the well.  That may very well be, but for some reason I do not completely agree.  Based on the Reformed tradition and Calvinist theology, faith is a gift from God.  So if it was a test of faith, basically Jesus is testing the faith of a woman whom he should have known already had enough faith.  In my mind, it amounts to calling on a rocket scientist, with his or her knowledge of complex mathematical formulas, the expertise in the understanding of the laws of physics, and then giving him or her an exam on simple addition and subtraction.  You already know they are going to pass, so what's the point of giving the exam in the first place?  Maybe Jesus was testing her, not for his benefit to see how much faith she had, but for her own benefit to she how much faith she actually possessed.  But if that is so, then her social status remains the same.  The social hierarchy went something like this: on the top, you had the high priest.  Below that, you had the other priests.  Below that, you had Jewish men, followed by Jewish women.  Then finally below them, there were Gentile men, and at the very bottom were Gentile women.  So basically, if it was a just a test of faith, the whole dialogue could be interpreted as the following:  Jesus tests and acknowledges that the woman possesses great faith, but in spite of her great faith, she is still a dog.  This dialogue, although it may have been a test of faith, goes beyond just a mere exhibit of how much faith the woman possessed. 
    Verse 24 states, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”  Who Christ is saying this to is not really clear.  He could be saying it to the apostles, or he could be saying it to the woman, or he could just be saying it to himself, as a reminder of his own mission.  We really do not know for certain, and each of the commentaries say different things on exactly who Christ was addressing, and they all make good arguments.  I would like to think that Christ was addressing both the disciples and the woman.  The disciples seem to want Christ to grant the request of the woman, to send her on her way.  For the disciples though, it was not a matter of compassion or love for the woman that they wanted Christ to grant her plea; they wanted Christ to grant her plea because she was an annoying them.  I believe Christ's response to the disciples had a bit of irony to it.  Now, as we know, the disciples were Jews, and as Jews, the Law was important to their religion.  Gentiles did not have the Law of Moses, and in the social structure of the day, they were considered somewhat beneath the Jews.  Basically, the disciples were asking Jesus, “Justify her, make her right, have mercy on her, so she will leave us alone.”  Many of the Jewish people of that time believed the only ones that can be justified before God were fellow Jews, and of those, only the ones that followed the Law.  His statement could be an ironic remark to the disciples, possibly to remind them of their own preconceived notions of Jew and Gentile, as if to say, “If this woman was not being so annoying, you would have completely ignored her, because she is a Gentile.  But since she is being so bothersome, you want me to help her, just so she will leave you alone.”  The woman, on the other hand, may have taken it as a somewhat sarcastic remark.  If Jesus was serious, he could have sent the woman away, but for some reason does not.  Maybe she saw something in his body language, or heard something in tone of his voice that gave her a clue to his real meaning, because even after this apparent slight, the woman kept persisting.  Then Jesus says the famous line, or rather, infamous line, “It is not fair to take the children's food and through it to the dogs.”
    Now, where is the humor in this?  It all depends on the type of connection they had.  There are certain things you can say to certain people, like close friends, that you could not and would not say to others.  The is a certain teacher here at Bishop Moore that I often call Katuwa Ma'am ("Katuwa" means tiger).  I call her that, because it seems like every time I pass by a class room she is teaching in, she is yelling at the children to be quiet, sit down, pay attention, etc, and she always has a mean look on her face.  I can get away with calling her that because she can see that I am joking.  And for her part, she always says something insulting back to me.  But neither of us take it as an insult, because we can see each others friendly character.  Now, if one of the students calls her Katuwa Ma'am, I don't think she would be too happy with that, and might even be offended and angered by it.  Elton Trueblood in his book The Humor of Christ sums my point up beautifully: “There are numerous words, especially during a period of racial strife, which cannot be said seriously without arousing anger or resentment, but which can be said jokingly, with no harm at all, between those who understand one another's friendly spirit.”  I would not go up to a random person and make a joke about his or her ethnicity, or physical features, or appearance, mainly because I am afraid of getting punched.  But I can do that with someone whom I have a certain bond with, who understands my friendly nature and of whom I understand theirs, and we both perceive the other on the same level.
    Now, when Jesus calls the woman a dog, he is basically utilizing a term used by the Israelites of the Old Testament to refer to their enemies and others outside of their group whom they did not have a high regard for.  If Jesus was deadly serious, it could be, and most certainly would be, taken as an insult.  But I think the woman saw the friendly spirit in Jesus, and instead of going away in despair and empty handed, she responds with her own wisecrack:  “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters' table.”  And I believe this is where the miracle happens.  As I have said before, Jews of Jesus' time did not have a high regard for Gentiles; Gentiles were at the  bottom of the social ladder.  And the fact that she was a woman put her even further at the bottom.  The miracle is that to have such an exchange of words, Jesus helps the woman rise up from her lowly social status, a status that neither Jesus nor the woman created, but something that the societies they were in created, that both she and Jesus acknowledged.  Jesus deals with her and treats her, not just as a human being, but on a more personal and intimate level.  Jesus was using what we would consider an insult, if it is to be taken at face value, to show his friendly and personal nature to the woman.  And the woman responds to Jesus in the same way.  This type of dialogue is only possible if both recipients can see the amicable character in each other.  By engaging in such a dialogue, the woman transcended boundaries of ethnicity and social class, even if just for a moment, and was not treated as an unworthy Gentile, but was treated as if she were a dear friend.  I believe this is the best evidence that Jesus had a sense of humor.  One can often tell a lot about a person's character by how they respond to another person's wit, and Jesus responds positively to the woman:  her daughter is healed that very hour.  To sum up, I will end with another quote from Elton Trueblood:  “If Christ's words in the dialogue are wholly serious, they are a permanent stumbling block to the Gospel.  But, if they represent a form of banter, which is consistent with deep compassion, they give us one of the most delightful pictures of our Lord which we possess.... [T]hey shed light on His character we otherwise miss entirely.” 

Unnecessary Necessities

It takes some getting used to, to find the means living without the things that we are so accustomed to using in our everyday lives.  We are so accustomed, in fact, that we take things for granted, and the question of “how can I live without this” never crosses our mind, or if it does, we go to our “happy place” and try drown out the mere thought of living without certain necessities. 
For example, I have yet to take a hot shower since I have been in India.  Now, don't be mistaken; I have enough respect for my fellow human being that showering everyday is a must for me to alleviate the suffering of those around me, especially those stuck in the same room as me (Kerala gets pretty hot, after all).  But I miss having a warm shower.  Now, for those of you who think that taking a cold shower is the absolutely most primitive action that can be done as far as bathing is concerned, imagine that you cannot even take a shower at all.  “That's ok,” you might say, “At least I can take a bath in the bathtub.”  Sorry, but no bathtub either.  Recently the situation in my life, or rather my bathroom, is that I have lost running water.  No water from the sink, no water flowing into the toilet, and certainly no water coming from the shower head.  I get by the same way others get by here; I go outside, fill up a bucket, bring it back inside, and using a cup, pour water over myself, then scrub, rinse, repeat. 
I am not completely without “luxuries,” or what most people in the US would call “necessities.”  I have internet access, although it is rather limited, due to constant power outages, breakdowns of service, the conflicts with my daily schedule, etc.  I have to plan ahead to use the internet, whereas in California I could  get access whenever I wanted, 24 hours a day.  I can use a washing machine, but sometimes the power goes out unexpectedly.  I can watch television, but again the power is an issue.  Water has to be boiled, filtered, or bought in a bottle in order for it to be safe to drink.  Instead of a spoon and fork, I use an even more ancient and forgotten plate-to-mouth method of eating, older than even the chopstick: my hands. 
It makes me wonder what would happen if a major incident occurred in the US, like the zombie apocalypse, the Browns winning the Superbowl, or Sarah Palin becoming president (HA!  I kid, I kid!), where all the things we have depended on in our daily lives were suddenly gone.  Would we actually, heaven forbid, meet people face to face rather than “friending” them on Facebook?  Would we take better care of our local water resources since it won't pass through a water treatment facility?  Instead of choosing to rot our brains by watching such movies as Eat Pray Love or the Twilight series, would we choose to rot our brains by reading those books instead?  The experience in India has made me reflect on what I have taken for granted in the US, of the things that I considered absolutely necessary, the things that I thought civilization itself depended on, aren't really necessities after all.  But they are really, really, REALLY nice to have. 

Two places at once

Living in a foreign country is difficult.  But not necessarily because of the culture shock, the customs, the driving, the completely different language, the food, etc, etc.  That happens no matter where you go,  like when one moves from North Carolina to California, for example.  California is like a whole different country, where most of the people haven't even heard of a place called North Carolina, or if they have, it was probably just something made up in a Hollywood movie, like the American Revolution or the American Civil War; either way they really don't care.  The most difficult part about leaving one's home to go to a distant and exotic land is that you never really leave home.  No matter how far you go, you always maintain some sort of presence back home, whether you want to or not.  Most people don't want to leave behind or forget home, and so carry a piece of it with them wherever they go.  Perhaps people with the easiest transition are criminals fleeing from a country to avoid prosecution, where all the problems of beginning a new life in a new country far outweigh the alternative of a long prison term back home. 
And so it is with me.  I am living in a foreign land, but part of me is still back home, dealing with issues as if I were back home, and at the same time dealing with all the challenges here.  All of the issues that I left back home are still with me, not to mention all of the new challenges that I face by living in India.  I still have bills to pay, I still have relationships to maintain; the joys and celebrations, the worries and fears, are all still a part of me no matter how far away I go.  The thing is I am not trying to avoid them, and I don't think I could even if I tried.  The difficulty thus lies in the fact that one cannot necessarily give up the pieces of home and at the same time be open to a foreign culture.  You can be open and accepting of a foreign culture, but something about where you came from often gets in the way, or vice versa.  The trick is how to balance the two.  It feels like I am in two different places at once, and each place is pulling at me as in an epic game of tug-o-war.  Perhaps it would have been easier if I had robbed a bank before coming to India.

Gifts that keep on gifting..

One of the most frustrating things that I have found, the thing I still struggle with, is how to utilize my gifts successfully.  What makes that task even more daunting is to first discover what talents I have to begin with.  The other people I am volunteering with are both extremely talented in the field of music:  they can read music, sing on key, keep up with the beat, and (probably the most effective aspect) the ability to teach others to do the same.  As for me, I couldn't carry a tune if it was in a bucket.  To be fair, the others have had a lot more experience, education, and classroom time in music than I ever did.  As for me, my classroom was the shower back home, and my experience comes down to the occasional karaoke bar on the weekends.  I don't mean to present that I am not gifted, I am just not gifted in music.  Another roadblock for me appears to be that the gifts I have (whatever those may be), the things I am knowledgeable about, cannot be utilized where I am at.  For example, my military training has taught me a lot of things, one of which is how to effectively kill a person eight times before he even hits the ground.  But a talent like that is not something I want to teach kids, or anyone else for that matter... at least not before the zombie apocalypse starts (ha!).  I am also good at making pies (which was NOT part of military training), particularly cheesecakes.  However, where I am at I do not have an oven, which doesn't matter that much anyway, because experience has taught me that finding cream cheese (at least in my locale) is like finding Presbyterian Eskimos in the Sahara Desert.  I have a great theological mind: I can grasp and understand theological concepts better than most, and I absolutely love it, but getting anyone to show interest in it is difficult (which is pretty much true wherever I go, including the States). 
Basically I have almost resigned myself to having a mundane experience.  I would just be in India, doing what the people at my site want me to do, just waiting for a chance to make use of some of my talents.  I was imagining myself for an entire year printing out flyers for an upcoming celebration, or send children to PE during a class I am substituting for, just biding my time before I got on the plane to head back to America.  Just mundane chores here and there, wasting my site's time and resources until I return home.  Then I read a prayer that appears in a book (Bless This Mess & Other Prayers by Jo Carr and Imogene Sorley, Abingdon Press, New York, 1969) that kind of made me realize something.  Here is the whole thing:

Lord, God,
you have not called me
to some puttering, petty, mundane mediocrity,

You have called me to renew the world.
This is my task.
Impossible?
Unreachable?
Imperative.

Not all at once.
Not by revolution, at least not the blood-and-thunder kind.
But by revolution in the hearts of people. 
Starting with me.

You have called me to renew the world-
at coffee klatsch,
at the supper table,
in circle meeting,
at the polls,
in a letter to the editor,
in a letter to a friend.

These are merely puttering, petty, mundane things, unless they are done with all my mind
and strength
and soul
and heart....
      and done for thee.

To renew the world-
this is my task. 
God, help me.
Amen.

The things I do feel mundane because, quite frankly, anyone can do these things.  They aren't difficult.  The one thing that this prayer helped me realize is that part of my frustration with the things I am doing, and not being able to do the things I am good at, is all about attitude.  Who should I be doing these things for?  For myself?  For personal glory?  I felt that I have so many positive qualities and talents that are going to waste by just printing out pamphlets.  It is like the mundane things I do are beneath me.  But it's all about attitude.  I could be the greatest theological mind since Barth, I can do more good than Mother Theresa, I may have the faith to move mountains, but if I have no love, if I do these things for the wrong reason, I am nothing (that last part was from the Bible somewhere...near the back).  I don't have to be Martin Luther King Jr or Mother Theresa, or be gifted in preaching or understanding theology to change the world (although it certainly helps!).  Itty bitty things can be huge, in building relationships, in creating a presence, in the changing of hearts, in the renewing of the world, if they are done with the right attitude, and done for God. 

Finger Food

One of the major things a person has to get used to when traveling abroad is the food.  Each country has it's own specialty or specialties, and India is no different.  From what I have seen, the main staple appears to be rice, which is a lot different from what I was used to.  My diet in the States consisted of three main things; meat, fat, and dairy, which were usually in some type of fried form.  Frying is like the duct tape of cooking; if you don't know how exactly to prepare something, you can never go wrong by frying it.  At least for me, it's my go-to method of cooking.  And in the USA, particularly in the American South, people will fry pretty much anything.  I have had fried chicken, okra, squash, eggs, turkey, grits, Twinkies, Oreo's, locusts, corn bread, apples, and even ice cream.  The mere fact that we can fry ice cream shows the skillfulness and proficiency in our ability to fry just about anything.  Needless to say, it's probably not the healthiest way to prepare food, but it is oh so good!  Another difference is the ingredients.  South India food is a lot spicier than American food.  But I don't want to write about what's added to the food in India as what is taken away.  Indian food seems to be lacking a few key ingredients that everyone is so used to back in the US.  Where's my high fructose corn syrup?  Where's my Yellow 5 and Blue 40?  What do you mean there's no MSG in the chicken?  Where's my partially hydronated vegetable oil?  None of that is in the rice!  And where's the sugar?!?  Even the salads you can buy at McDonald's have sugar added.  The point that I am trying to make is that the food that I have up to this point eaten in India is, by far, healthier than what I have been in eating America.  When I first arrived and saw what was on the typical menu, I got a little nervous.  How would my body handle all of this new stuff?  Will it reject it like a transplanted organ?  Will my kidneys and liver atrophy from the lack work in cleansing my blood from all the preservatives and other chemicals?  Images filled my mind of me being bound in a straightjacket and thrown into a padded room in the upcoming weeks while the withdrawal symptoms slowly took their toll.  Fortunately for me, I appear to have adjusted nicely, with no aftereffects (although, in all honesty, I would really love a BigMac right about now). 

Another difference is that Indians generally have a more intimate relationship with their food:  that's a polite way of saying that they eat with their hands, sans utensils.  And they do it well.  They eat with the precision and dexterity of a Swiss wristwatch maker, with little or no mess.  We Americans like to keep a certain degree of separation between us and our food, which is roughly about the length of a fork or spoon, and so the only senses that are really involved is taste, sight, and smell.  We don't hold a steak in our hands to feel the firmness.  We don't massage the mashed potatoes in our hands to experience the consistency.  Indians make eating with one's hands look easy.  For me, I picked up where I left off, which was about 3 years old, and it showed.  I had food all over the table, my face, my lap, on the floor, on my shirt, on the ceiling (don't ask), and somehow in my pockets.  Trust me, it is harder than it looks, and it is especially harder than eating with utensils.  To me, using a fork now would seem like cheating.  

As always, I encourage your feedback, and give me any tips, criticisms, pointers, or ask any questions you like.  Until next time...

Welcome to my first blog!  It should be noted that I have never blogged before in my life, and my writing skills are a little...uh...not good, so please bear that in mind while reading.  If you have any comments or suggestions or input, please please please do not hesitate to let me know!

Anyways, about my experiences in India...

“What's India like?” you may ask.  I have been here for a little over three months, so I have a lot to cover.  But I will start with one of the first things I noticed when I arrived, and that is the driving.  My first impression after arriving at the international airport in Chochin and taking my first car ride to our program leader's house was, “I...am...going...to...die!  Here I come, Jesus!”  And that's not supposed to be a slight against our host; he is actually a very good driver.  I am talking about the others that are on the road.  Horns constantly honking.  People passing slower moving vehicles into oncoming traffic.  The obsolete truck with its engine screeching because it is immensely overloaded with lumber (the designs of the cargo trucks haven't changed much since WWII, as I learned from the Discovery Channel's documentary on truck drivers in India).  Motorcycles zipping in and out cars like a slalom.  Motorized rickshaws puttering along the shoulder of the road.  And all the while avoiding other hazards, such as pedestrians, people on bicycles, stray animals, the occasional crater of a pothole, and so on.   By American standards, it is sheer chaos.  But this ain't America.  India is like a whole other country!  And it has its own set of rules.  For starters, Indian drivers drive on the left side of the road, which from time to time I still forget, especially crossing the street (I'll be looking left, and on seeing no traffic approaching, start to cross, only to welcomed by the sound of a desperate driver honking the horn from a car coming at my right).  Which brings up the topic of horns.  I think it's fair to say that Americans use their horns in traffic to basically communicate “Hey, moron!” which usually involves some choice four letter words and the occasional middle finger.  Here, as far as I can understand, the horn is used to basically let another driver know of your presence.  One will honk when passing a truck to basically say, “I'm passing on the right.  Please don't merge into me.” Or, “I'm passing on your right, and there is a car coming at me from the opposite lane.  Please allow me to pass before he or she runs into me.” 

It seems that drivers here are constantly jockeying for position, so traffic in a city can be somewhat helter-skelter.  Stopping for a red light resembles shoppers at a mall, lining up at four in the morning, waiting for the store to open to take advantage of a Christmas sale.  The closer it gets to four o'clock, the more people are trying to wedge their way towards the main entrance, to be the first to grab that desired item.  The traffic lights I have seen have timers on them, letting you know how long the red light is going to be before it turns green.  As it ticks closer to zero, drivers in all sorts of vehicles do their best to wedge closer and closer to the intersection. 

In summary, to quote an Indian taxi driver from the book Traffic by Tom Vanderbilt, the three things that are needed to drive in India are, “Good horn.  Good breaks.  Good luck.”  In the States, if someone cuts you off, the sounding of a horn usually follows, along with some anger and rage.  Here, it appears that being cut off is expected.  There may be some ill feelings involved, and if there are, they are not nearly as intense.  One of the challenges I face while living in India is to be able to see India on its own terms, not on what I am used to back in the States.  There are common sense rules and customs when driving in India, which are (surprise!) very different than American customs and courtesies.  To say traffic (or anything else, for that matter) in India doesn't have any rules because it doesn't follow American standards does not do India, or the people that live here, justice.  With that in mind, my experience is by no means meant to define what the culture and the people are like.  My experience is just what I observe and my best understanding to describe what I think is possibly maybe going on, sort of.  My observations may be totally spot on, or may completely miss the mark, or probably somewhere in between.  Anyways, there will be more to come.  Comments and critiques are always welcome. (And if anyone can tell me how to use blogspot.com, please clue me in)