Week 3: That's in the Bible? - Texts of Terror
November 3, 2019 Judges 11:4-6, 11, 29-33
Deborah Laforet Judges 11:34-40
“Texts of Terror”
Our current sermon series is focusing on those stories in our bible that we never hear on Sunday mornings, or in bible studies, or in daily devotions. They are silly, or strange, or sometimes horrific. Tracy, our children’s programming coordinator, is also sharing these types of stories with the children. For the next couple of weeks, they are looking at a story about Elisha and the floating axe head and the story Carolyn preached on a few weeks ago of a young man falling asleep during Paul’s sermon and falling out a window. We, though, are going to get a bit more serious. The next couple of weeks we will look at stories that are shocking, violent, and unjust. You might wonder why they are in our bible, but you will definitely understand why people tend to avoid them and keep them hidden.
Our lives are full of stories, with some being easy and even fun to share, while others are kept under wraps. Sometimes stories are kept from us because we might be too young to hear them. I remember as a young adult hearing family stories that had been kept secret from me for a long time. Other stories are avoided so as not to embarrass and shame people. Have you ever heard a story about someone and then felt differently about them? And then there are those stories that people feel uncomfortable sharing. They’re stories of deceit or regret or violence, or trauma, or shame, or profound sadness. If these are stories about ourselves or about people we love, we tend to bury them deeply.
My dad died when I was eight. At first I was only told the fun stories about him, but as I grew older I began to hear more about his life and his death that had been kept from me. For a while I felt angry, like I had been lied to or like people had deliberately kept me from knowing the truth about my dad.
Sometimes when people find out about hidden stories in the bible, they feel this way. They feel betrayed. They might ask: Why didn’t I know that was in there? Why was it kept from me? Does this change my faith? What does this mean about my belief in God and does this, in some way, change how I go forward? For those of us reading the bible in a year, this week, in the book of Numbers, we read about a man who was stoned to death for not keeping the sabbath, we read about thousands of people being burned to a crisp because they questioned the authority of Moses. All at God’s command or by the hand of God, or at least that’s what the writers tell us.
This morning we heard a story about a father and daughter. Jephthah was a warrior in Israel. He had been kicked out of his home at a young age because his mother was a prostitute and his father was unknown. He began to amass followers that were also marginalized. The New Revised Standard Version of the bible calls them outlaws. When the Ammonites began to threaten Israel, it was to Jephthah and his gang of outlaws that they turned for help. Before Jephthah committed to helping, he extracted a promise that he would be commander of all Israel upon winning the battle. Jephthah was a man who did not leave things to chance. He had lived a hard life and knew how to get ahead.
Now, as Jephthah was entering into the battle, our scripture tells us that the spirit of the Lord came upon Jephthah, but, maybe because he didn’t feel this Spirit or he didn’t have enough confidence in it or because he didn’t leave things to chance, he bargained with God. He said to God, “If you will give the Ammonites into my hand, then whoever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return victorious from the Ammonites, shall be the Lord’s, to be offered up by me as a burnt offering.”
What kind of man makes this kind of vow, a vow that should he win, he will burn as a sacrifice whoever greets him outside his house upon his return home? Did he assume the family dog would be the first to greet him or maybe a slave or servant? Maybe he had no idea that any loved ones would be at the house, assuming they were visiting relatives or maybe they lived elsewhere. We find out though that this is not the case, as Jephthah’s daughter, his only child, is the one who runs out, dancing, to greet him. In response to seeing her, he tears his clothes as a sign of devastation, saying, “Alas, my daughter! You have brought me very low; you have become the cause of great trouble to me. For I have opened my mouth to the Lord, and I cannot take back my vow.”
Like it was her fault!
And he does plan to keep this vow. The unnamed daughter asks Jephthah for two months away with her friends in the mountains, which he grants, but then keeps his vow to God upon her return, burning her as a sacrifice to God for the battle he won against the Ammonites.
And this is not even the worst of our biblical stories, believe me. Phyllis Trible, a theologian from New York calls them Texts of Terror.
On Wednesday, a few of us finished our discussion of Rob Bell’s book, “What is the Bible?” He offers that there are two questions to ask when reading the bible: 1) Why did people find this important to write down? and 2) Why did this passage endure? Now some might say that this story is about obedience to God. Once you make a vow to God, no matter how foolish, you keep it. Some people use this rationale when talking about the story in the book of Genesis where God asks Abraham to sacrifice his only son Isaac, but then has an angel stop Abraham at the last minute, just to test Abraham’s obedience. In this story though of Jephthah and his daughter there is no divine angel who rescues Jephthah’s daughter in the knick of time. In fact, in this story, God does not ask for this sacrifice at all; it is Jephthah who makes the vow.
Maybe it’s about the dangers of making vows. Maybe it’s about the pain and suffering that occurs in war, even after a battle is won. Maybe it’s about sharing the stories of war in which innocents are caught in the middle. Maybe that is why this story was written down and why it has endured. Maybe there is deeper meaning around the horrors of war and those who get caught in it’s violence and bloodshed.
This is what is missed when we avoid stories such as these. We miss the opportunity to struggle with these stories, to find meaning within them, and make them relevant to our context.
With stories like these, I love to fill in the gaps with my imagination. In the part of the story where Jephthah grants his daughter permission to go away for two months with her friends, I imagine these women out in the wilderness ranting against war and the foolishness of men, wailing for the loss of their friend, maybe conspiring with her to see if there was some means of escape, but in the end, walking home with her and being with her right to the end. The story ends with: “So there arose an Israelite custom that for four days every year the daughters of Israel would go out to lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite.” A ritual of remembrance for this young, unnamed, innocent woman. A ritual of remembrance for all those innocent people, women and children, caught in the politics and violence of war.
Hiding away stories with which we are uncomfortable is not helpful. We need to make space for grappling with these stories and for finding the meaning behind them. It’s similar to stories in families. The more we hide them, the more we seek to bury them and keep them secret, sometimes the more destructive they become. We need to get these stories out of the closet; unbury them. We need to get them out into the open, so that we can normalize them, struggle with them, and find meaning in them.
It’s one of the reasons I’m encouraging people to read the bible. Most people don’t know what’s there anymore and many are shocked when they find out. Some dismiss many of the stories and only focus on passages of love, and peace, and comfort, but when we do this, we ignore the very real part of our humanity, that is not all love, peace, and comfort. We need to struggle with the stories of rage, greed, selfishness, violence, and evil, just as we need to deal today with humanity’s stories of rage, greed, selfishness, violence, and evil.
So don’t be afraid to read these stories and talk about them. If you’re looking for someone who will talk about them with you, I am always willing and I’m sure Carolyn would also love to explore these stories, and we both have lots of books from really smart people who share their wisdom about the research they’ve done on the bible. Don’t avoid them. Dig deep. Ask questions. Share your doubts. Even, dare I say it, have fun with the stories. I guarantee you will not be struck by lightning, and I think you might even learn from it and maybe even grow in your faith.
May you find life in the bible and its stories. May you find meaning and relevance to your own story and the story of humanity. May the Spirit be with you, guiding you every step of the way. Amen.