The LORD creates Eve.

Genesis 2.18-24.

Continuing the second creation story. In the first story, God created the birds on day five and the land animals on day six, and humans right after the animals. In the second, God creates the male human, “Adam,” first. Then makes him a garden to tend, puts him in it, and tells him all the trees are his to eat from—except the one, which’ll kill him.

And then—part of the same Hebrew paragraph—God decides Adam needs a partner, because when humans are alone, we get weird. It’s not just when Christians skip church. Everything God created is good, Ge 1.31 but this particular situation is not good.

Genesis 2.18-24 KWL

18The god YHWH said, “It’s not good

that the human is all by himself.

I will make for him a helper,

like his counterpart.”

19The god YHWH shaped from the soil

every wild living creature

and every bird of the skies.

He brought them to the human

to see what the human called them.

Whatever the human called each living soul,

that was its name.

20The human called the names

of every beast, bird of the sky,

and every wild living creature.

As for the human, he didn’t find a helper,

like his counterpart.

21The god YHWH made

a deep sleep fall upon the human,

and he slept.

God took one of his ribs

and filled in the flesh under it.

22The god YHWH built the rib,

which he took from the human,

into a woman,

and brought her to the human.

23The human said,

“Now this is a bone from my bones,

flesh from my flesh.

For this person will be called woman,

for this person was taken out of man.”

24This is why a man will leave his father and his mother

and cling to his woman.

They become one flesh.

The author of Genesis (who isn’t Moses, but for convenience, I call him “Moe”) tells us right away in verse 24 the reason for this story: It’s why women and men pair up. It’s why women and men have a closer relationship with one another than between parents and children. We’re fully compatible. We’re partners. The woman was created as “a helper, like his counterpart.” She was meant to be Adam’s equal.

No, not a subordinate. Sexists will insist women are created to serve men. It is true we humans are created to serve one another, but that’s regardless of race or gender: White men like me are created to also serve women and nonwhites. (And not by bossing them around; that’s just a devilish redefinition of service.) Men serve women; women serve men. But sexists wanna find biblical reasons for their godless attitudes, and they’ll distort Genesis to justify it.

The bonkers thing is, Genesis was written in a sexist, patriarchal culture, where women were likewise considered subordinate to men. And even then, the writer of Genesis doesn’t describe God creating women to serve men. She’s an עֵ֖זֶר/etsér, “help, aid, rescue.” When the man can’t do it alone, the woman helps. Same as the man—when the woman can’t do it alone, the man helps. Same as God—when we can’t do it alone, the Holy Spirit helps. She’s his counterpart, his partner, his advocate, his friend, his love. They complete one another.

Any interpretation which doesn’t affirm their equal status and mutual service, is exploitative. And is wholly inappropriate for Christians.

Why orthodox theology?

Some weeks ago I was asked, “Okay, so why’s it so important to be orthodox? Why can’t we just believe whatever we want about God?”

Same reason we can’t just believe whatever we want about electricity.

I mean, if you wanted to, you could believe electricity is just fairy glitter moving through copper wires, and because fairies are always so friendly and benign in children’s cartoons (even though in European mythology, they’re really not) they’d never, ever hurt you. So, you figure, it’s okay to take your tablet with you into the bathtub. And it’s okay to leave it plugged into the charging cable while you do it. And… oh, gee, you’ve died.

Electricity isn’t the best analogy, because God is way more forgiving than electricity mixed with water. Run afoul of electricity and you’re dead. Run afoul of God, and he’ll become human and die for your sins.

Skeptics will immediately agree with me electricity isn’t the best analogy… but for different reasons. See, to their minds electricity falls within the realm of reality. God, not so much. To them, God’s a theory—and not a scientific theory, like relativity or evolution or Pythagoras’s formula. God conceptually exists: There is some sort of supreme being or higher power or creator in the universe, and maybe they believe she’s self-aware and intelligent, instead of just the sum of everything like pantheists believe. She’s out there, somewhere. But, they figure, she’s unknowable.

And to their minds, theology isn’t about the study of God, based on revelation. It’s all guesswork. If God’s unknowable, and doesn’t bother to make herself known, nobody legitimately knows anything about her. So… we make guesses. We guess God is good. (I mean, if she were bad, she’d be terrifying, and only cult leaders would want her to terrify their subjects, so we’re definitely gonna reject that idea.) We guess God is benevolent, ’cause benevolence is good. We guess God loves everybody, ’cause love is good. Well almost everybody; we often guess she doesn’t love evildoers, and will probably send the very worst of them to hell. But she loves most everybody.

Yes, I’ve been referring to this concept of God as “she.” Hey, if all your beliefs about God are guesswork, sometimes you’ll guess a different pronoun. I’ve lost count of how often I’ve heard pagans call God “she.” Women create life, right?—so they guess “she.” (Well, unless they’re men. People love to assign God our own pronouns. Little self-projection on our part.)

Since all their God-thoughts are pure guesswork, they admit there’s a chance they might be wrong. These chances get smaller and smaller as these become long-held, dearly beloved beliefs. Or when their favorite spiritual authors teach the very same things, and confirm for them they’re probably right. But because the God they imagine is a benevolent God, they also imagine if they get her wrong… well a benevolent God has to be a forgiving God, right? Has to be. If they were God, they would be… or at least they would be with themselves. So if they get God wrong, it’s understandable; she hasn’t said anything, so they had to guess as best they could, and she gets that, and forgives that. They’ll get into heaven regardless.

So whenever a Christian like me has an objection to one of their beliefs—“No, that’s not who God is”—they wanna know why my guess is better than theirs. And when I tell them I’m not guessing; this is what Christianity teaches, they wanna know why Christianity’s guess is better than theirs. Because again, they think it’s all guesswork, and Christianity’s depiction of a real, immanent, interactive, living God… is also guesswork. Or fantasy.

You can see why someone who thinks like this, doesn’t think orthodoxy matters. God’ll forgive all our wrong beliefs, right? God’ll let everybody into heaven, right?—so long that we’re good and benevolent like we imagine God is, and not evil, and put more good into the universe than bad. So why must I object to their happy thoughts with orthodox Christianity, when in the end it doesn’t really matter?

Because if it really didn’t matter, their belief God is unknowable, and has never revealed anything for us to believe, would be true. But it’s not. God has told us about himself. He did step down from heaven to explain himself. He became human. He became Jesus. Jesus tells us about God. We’re not guessing. We know, because Jesus told us.

Glorifying Jesus.

John 17.1-5.

After the Last Supper, Jesus taught his students a number of things, and capped off his teachings with a prayer we find in John 17. Some Christians call it his “high priestly prayer,” since Jesus is Christianity’s head priest; others just call it “the prayer of Jesus.” Whatever you care to call it, it expresses his will—and since he always pursued his Father’s will, it expresses his Father’s will too.

It wasn’t really meant for us to pray as well, like the Lord’s Prayer. But there’s no reason we can’t pray portions of it, or borrow ideas from it. This is all stuff Jesus wants, after all.

John 17.1-5 KWL

1Jesus speaks these things,

and lifting his eyes to heaven, says,

“Father, the hour came.

Glorify your¹ son

so {your¹} son can glorify you.¹

2Just as you¹ give him authority over all flesh,

so he might give everyone whom you¹ gave him

life in the age to come.

3This is life in the age to come:

They can know you,¹ the only true God,

and the one you send, Christ Jesus.

4I glorify you¹ on the earth,

completing the work you¹ gave me so I may do.

5Now glorify me, Father, by yourself¹

with the glory I had before the world came to be,

with you.¹”

This is the part of the prayer many bibles title, “Jesus prays for himself,” because he asks his Father to glorify him—the verb δοξάζω/doxádzo meaning “magnify, extol, hold in honor, hold a high opinion of, esteem.” The Father had said more than once he does hold a high opinion of his Son, but Jesus wants him to make it obvious because Jesus’s purpose on earth is to explain the Father to us, Jn 1.18 and the more Jesus is honored, Jesus’s exposition of his Father is likewise honored. And you notice how many a pagan, who’s had it up to here with Christians and our churches, nonetheless like and respect Jesus. They may not know him or what he teaches; they might’ve been filled to the brim with Historical Jesus rubbish. But they do glorify him, somewhat—and that’s the route by which the Holy Spirit can get through to them and lead them to Jesus, and Jesus can lead them towards actually knowing his Father.

And this, Jesus says, is life in the age to come. They’ll know the Father, and Christ Jesus whom he sent. And live with them forever; the age to come never ends, which is why so many bibles automatically translate αἰώνιον/eónion, “age [to come],” as “eternal.” Life in the age to come is eternal life. Wanna live forever? Get to know Jesus.

When Lazarus dies.

John 11.1-8, 11-16.

Most of Jesus’s miracle stories are short, but the story of raising his friend Lazarus of Bethany takes up most of John 11. Mostly because this is a whole new experience for Jesus’s students. He’d raised the dead before, but these were people who had just died. One could argue, like Miracle Max in The Princess Bride, those people were mostly dead, not fully dead; Jesus got to them just in time to resuscitate them. Whereas in Lazarus’s case, dude had been dead four days. Wrapped in suffocating strips of linen. Left in a sepulcher to rot. He was super dead. Jesus raised him anyway.

But the story starts with Lazarus alive:

John 11.1-8 KWL

1Someone is unwell—Lazarus of Bethany,

from the village of Mary, and Martha her sister.

2Mary is she who anointed the Master with ointment,

who wiped his feet with her hair.

Her brother Lazarus is unwell.

3So Lazarus’s sisters send for Jesus,

saying, “Master, look!

He whom you¹ love is unwell.”

4Hearing, Jesus says, “This illness doesn’t end in death,

but in God’s glory,

so God’s son might be glorified by it.”

5Jesus loves Martha,

her sister, and Lazarus.

6So when he hears Lazarus is unwell,

he then stays two more days in the place he is.

7Afterwards, Jesus then tells his students,

“We should go to Judea again.”

8The students tell Jesus, “Rabbi,

the Judeans are now looking for you¹ to lynch you,

and you’re¹ going there again?”

The Greek text has λιθάσαι/litháse, “throw stones [at you],” but because stoning was illegal under Roman law, the students aren’t talking about the Judean leadership having Jesus executed by stoning; they’re worried about a Judean mob murdering him. So, “lynch.”

Jesus responds with the Twelve Hours Story, which tends to go over Christians’ heads entirely. So much so, we seldom list it among Jesus’s parables, and seldom teach on it. It deserves its own article, so I’ll discuss it elsewhere. But right after the story:

John 11.11-16 KWL

11Jesus says these things,

and after them he tells his students,

“Lazarus our friend slept.

But I go so I might awaken him.”

12So the students tell Jesus, “Master,

if he slept, he will recover.”

13Jesus had spoken about Lazarus’s death,

and the students had thought

he speaks about sleep and slumber.

14So then Jesus tells them bluntly,

“Lazarus died.

15I rejoice for you,²

for you² can believe because I am not there.

But we should go to him.”

16So Thomas, called Didymus, told his fellow students,

“We should go, so we can die with him.”

Little pessimistic of Thomas, who’s likely still thinking about that lynch mob. But yeah, off they go to Judea, and by the time they get there Lazarus has been dead four days already. Jn 11.17

God doesn’t have a dark side.

1 John 1.5-7.

The thing about gnostics is they’ve always prioritized weirdness over Jesus. After all if these were commonsense teachings we could learn from the bible, be guided into by the Holy Spirit, or figure out on our own, we wouldn’t need to pay the gnostics a fistfull of money for their secrets. We wouldn’t need to buy their videos, attend their seminars, or pay tuition to their unaccredited universities.

Well, some of the gnostic ideas have leaked into Christendom. Some of them were affecting the first-century church. Hence the apostle John’s first letter, correcting his church. Something we still gotta read, because loads of these ideas are still around—either held over from the first century, or new gnostics came up with them independently. Still misinforming Christians.

Some of ’em are outright heresy. Others aren’t technically heresy… because heresy is defined by the creeds, and for whatever reason the creeds didn’t get to that particular error. Often because the ancient Christians figured, “Well of course that’s wrong; haven’t you read a bible?” But, then as now, people don’t read. (So read your bible!) Their favorite teachers did all the reading for them, and they blindly followed these teachers without double-checking any of their proof texts. It’s how gnostics have always got away with it.

And one of the more popular errors, still commonly believed, is about God having a dark side.

It’s based on determinism—the belief God is so sovereign, he controls absolutely everything in the cosmos. God’s the “unmoved mover” of Aristotle of Athens, the first cause of everything, and nothing in the universe happens without his permission. Really, determinists insist, if he isn’t wielding total control of everything, we can’t legitimately call him almighty.

But if God’s in charge, what about sin? Why is evil, chaos, and death part of our universe when God’s pulling every single string of our cosmic puppet show?

If you’re not a determinist—and I’m not, and neither is St. John—there’s a really simple answer: He’s not pulling every single string of the show. He’s not so inept a creator that he built the universe, yet constantly has to fiddle with it lest it go awry. Imagine a clockmaker who, instead of building a clockwork that effectively keeps time, always moves the arms himself. It’d make him the worst clockmaker. Likewise a micromanagerial creator would be an incompetent creator, not a masterful one.

So when creation goes wrong, God’s not at fault. He made it profoundly good, Ge 1.31 but he granted his creation free will. It can legitimately make its own decisions—and choose to do either what God told it to, or its own thing. That’s the cause of evil, chaos, and death. Not God.

Determinists insist no, God’d never cede control of his domain like that. (Certainly they never would, were they God.) And since he doesn’t stop or mitigate the evil (again, not like they would, were they God) he must’ve determined this evil, chaos, and death oughta happen. He wants it to. It’s not the fallout from our bad choices; it’s part of the plan. A plan full of evil, chaos, and death—so much so it’s really an evil plan—but it’ll all turn out in the long run. It’s just in the short run, God sovereignly decrees evil, chaos, and death.

You’ve seen this in sitcoms and superhero movies, like The Incredibles: Somebody wants to look like a hero, so he creates a disaster, fully intending to “solve” the problem himself so everybody can laud him as a hero. This is exactly the same way determinists describe God. He’s gonna solve all the evil in the world, and as a result receive all the glory. But wait… didn’t he create the problem in the first place?

And y’notice in the sitcoms and superhero movies, the mastermind gets exposed as creating the crisis in the first place. And universally denounced as a fraud. ’Cause he totally is. Yet for some reason, determinists think it’s way different with God: Even though God’s totally behind the evil, he’s not evil. He can’t be; he says he’s not!

Eventually their blasphemous explanations get a little too incredible for even them to believe. Which is why so many determinists quit Christianity or turn atheist. And y’know, if God really were the way determinists claim, I can’t blame people for rejecting him: That’s not a good God!

But I would counter that’s not God. The true God doesn’t have a dark side. Doesn’t have a secret evil plan. Far be it from him to even imagine a secret evil plan. And yes, he’s still sovereign and almighty; just not deterministic.

The second creation story.

Genesis 2.4-17.

Back in college I took a Pentateuch class—πεντάτευχος/pentátefkhos being Greek for “five cases,” i.e. the five boxes in which the five “books of Moses,” the Torah, were kept. It was a fun class; our professor got us up to speed on what current bible scholars, both conservative and liberal, taught about the Torah. And occasionally he’d drop facts on us which we’d never noticed before. Like how Genesis has two creation stories: The six days of creation, Ge 1.1 – 2.3 and how Adam and Eve came to be—then be banished from paradise. Ge 2.4 – 3.24

Yep. First he had us read the first story, then stop; then pointed out how the first story never refers to God as the LORD—but this next story does, throughout. And is more of an answer to the question, “Why didn’t God, who’s such a good, wise, benevolent Father, make the earth a suffering-free, death-free paradise for us?” Well… it turns out he did. But we completely f---ed it up.

The six days of creation are a rebuttal to ancient middle eastern myths about creation. This second story has a whole different point. Same as the first story, it’s not a scientific explanation for creation; it’s not about how God did it, but that he did it, and why. We can figure out how with research and experiments—and by avoiding the Creation Museum, which only wants your loyalty to their anti-evolutionary theories, and of course your money.

Because the second story refers to יְהוָ֥ה אֱלֹהִ֖ים/YHWH Elohím, “the LORD God” throughout, and not just Elohím, “God,” like the first story, many biblical scholars figure it was obviously composed by a different author than the guy who wrote the first story. Probably. But one guy assembled all those stories into Genesis, so that’d be the author of Genesis—who wrote the book after there were kings in Israel. Ge 36.31 So, not till the 12th century BC… so definitely not Moses ben Amram, who lived in the 15th century. But I usually call the author “Moe” anyway.

And here’s where Moe tells the second creation story.

Genesis 2.4-17 KWL

4These are the stories of the skies and the land

in the day of their creation.

The god YHWH made land and skies,

5and every domestic plant before it was in the land,

and every domestic herb before it sprouted.

For the god YHWH didn’t yet bring rain to the land,

and no human to work the soil.

6Instead a water vapor came up from the land,

and gave a drink to all the surface of the soil.

7The god YHWH shaped the human

out of dust from the soil.

He breathed into the human’s nostrils a breath of life,

and the human was now a living soul.

8The god YHWH planted a garden in Eden,

in the east,

and there he put the human

which he shaped.

9The god YHWH sprouted from the soil

every pleasant-looking tree, good for food.

And the tree of life in the middle of the garden—

and the tree of knowing good and bad.

10A river flowed out of Eden to give the garden a drink.

It divided from there to be four heads.

11One is named Pišón.

It surrounds all the land of Havilá, which has gold.

12The land’s gold is good.

Fragrant resin and onyx stones are also there.

13The second river is named Gikhón.

It surrounds all the land of Cuš.

14The third river is named Khiddeqél.

It flows in front of Assyria.

The fourth river is Perát.

15The god YHWH took the human

and rested him in the garden of Eden,

to work it and watch it.

16The god YHWH ordered the human,

saying, “Eat, eat of every tree in the garden!

17Don’t eat from the tree of knowing good and bad.

For the day you eat from it, you die, die.”

Needlessly long and wild prayers.

As I’ve written previously, ain’t nothing wrong with praying short prayers. Y’might remember the Lord’s Prayer is a short prayer. I remind Christians of this and they respond, “Oh! Yeah, that’s true.” Somehow it never occurred to them. Obviously Jesus had no problem keeping it brief, and has no problem with us keeping it brief. His example shows us it’s okay.

Problem is, we don’t follow Jesus’s example. We follow those of other Christians who blather on, and on, and on.

The usual justification I’ve heard, is these long prayers are following Jesus’s example. Remember when he’d go off and pray for hours?—seriously, hours. One evening he sent his students off ahead of him, climbed a hill to pray, Mt 14.22-23 and by the time he caught up with them (walking across the water, but still), it was “the fourth watch of the night,” Mt 14.25 KJV meaning between 3 and 6 a.m. Even if we generously figure Jesus stopped praying and started walking two hours before the fourth watch began (so, about 1-ish), this means he prayed from sundown till 1 a.m. Easily six or seven hours.

Okay, there’s nothing wrong with aspiring to be able to pray that long. But it needs to come naturally, like it does to Jesus. Can you talk six or seven hours with your best friend, or a beloved family member? Well some of us can. Others of us simply don’t talk that much, to anyone. Yet so many Christians have this unrealistic idea we’ve gotta engage God in prayer marathons every single time.

And okay, we can’t pray (especially aloud) for six hours. But we figure we can do six minutes. Sounds reasonable, right? Except most of us really aren’t able to talk for six minutes; we have two minutes’ worth of material. Two minutes altogether, of praise, thanksgiving, and requests. Followed by four minutes of repetitive, meaningless fluff to stretch the prayer out for a bit. Two minutes of authenticity, four minutes of hypocrisy.

Yes, hypocrisy. Who are we trying to impress? God? He didn’t ask us for long prayers. Others? Ourselves? Well, yeah.

Jesus’s 𝘭𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘦𝘳 commission.

Mark 16.15-18.

In the Long Ending of Mark, Jesus gives his followers some instructions. Sometimes Christians refer to these instructions as the great commission. Often they capitalize it—the Great Commission—but they really don’t have to. But it’s not actually Jesus’s great commission. It’s certainly a commission; it’s something he expects all his followers to do. (Yes, us present-day Christians included.) But the great commission is given in Matthew after his resurrection. This is Jesus’s lesser commission. Lesser in that it’s from the Long Ending; it wasn’t written by Mark himself; Jesus may have said it, or something quite like it; it at least accurately expresses his sentiments. But it comes from tradition instead of a unimpeachable apostolic eyewitness account, so it’s always gonna have that against it. Hence “lesser.” And no, I’m not gonna capitalize it either.

The lesser commission goes like yea:

Mark 16.15-18 KWL

15Jesus tells them, “Go into the world

and proclaim the gospel everywhere to every creature.

16Those who believe and are baptized will be saved.

Those who don’t believe will be judged.

17Miracles will accompany the believers:

In my name, people will throw out demons.

People will speak in new tongues.

18People will pick up snakes in their hands,

and if anyone drinks poison, it won’t injure them.

People will lay hands on the sick,

and they will be well.”

Various Christians are fond of saying πορευθέντες/porefthéntes “Go,” as stated in both this and the great commission, Mt 28.19 isn’t properly a command. It’s not an imperative verb; it’s a participle. One could also translate it, “While going into the world,” or “As you go into the world.” Thing is, the verb which follows, κηρύξατε/kirýdzate, “preach ye!” is a command, and it turns all the participles in the sentence into commands. Preach—and go. It’s not about passively doing your thing, and while you’re at it, sharing Jesus. Go find people to share Jesus with.

The lesser commission shares that in common with the great commission: Go share. The great commission instructs us to teach every people-group what Jesus teaches, and baptize ’em in the trinity’s name. The lesser commission instructs us to proclaim the gospel to every creature. Lots of overlap; so much so people will mix the commissions up and say the great commission is about preaching the gospel. No; that’s the lesser commission. Do that too. But the great commission is about sharing Jesus’s teachings. Which includes the gospel—

Mark 1.15 KJV

And saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye, and believe the gospel.

—but Jesus teaches a lot of other great things, like the Sermon on the Mount, and the great commission tells us we oughta share that too. Preach the gospel! But definitely not just the gospel.

Gnostics.

1 John 1.1-4.

Y’ever noticed somebody on the internet who claimed they knew stuff? Secret stuff? Stuff where, if you click on this link and read their blog, or buy this book, or watch this video, or attend this seminary, or buy any their other products, you too can learn these secrets?

• Better career, bigger income, more money, more leisure time?
• Better health? Conquering disease, especially without Big Pharma or the healthcare industry enriching themselves at your expense, or even maliciously keeping you sick?
• Better nutrition? All the stuff the food industry’s replaced with chemicals, or is manufacturing in substandard ways for a quick buck?
• More freedom?—’cause the government’s not telling you stuff, or big business doesn’t want you to know what rights they’re exploiting?
• Better sex?—which you don’t know about ’cause of various cultural taboos?
• Other secrets “they” don’t want you to know?

People love the idea of having exclusive information, of knowing stuff the general public doesn’t. And we’ll get really irritated “they” don’t want us to know such things. “How dare ‘they’ not want me to know about nutrition!” Plays right into all our paranoid fears about class warfare.

But hey, we frequently see Christians doing it too.

• God’s secret plan for your life!
• God’s hidden plans for the End!
• Mysteries of Ezekiel—revealed!
• Seventy-six promises of God “they” don’t want you to know!

How dare those [NOT-VERY-CHRISTIAN EXPLETIVE]s not want me to know God’s promises!

Okay, calm down there little buckaroo. Again, it’s about playing into people’s fears and the things we covet. It’s about trying to grab our attention with the word “secret,” or suggesting there’s forbidden knowledge which we really oughta have access to. You know, same as the serpent tempted Eve. It’s all clickbait.

And many of these things aren’t really secret. They’re just not widely known. Or they are widely known, but either you’ve never heard ’em before, or didn’t believe them (and still kinda don’t).

Problem is, often Christians will claim to have access to secret knowledge. And if you want those secrets, it’ll cost you.

Well, God’s about revelation, not secrets. He’s about sharing the mysteries of salvation and his kingdom to everyone with ears to hear. God wants everyone to know Jesus is Lord: Who he is, what he teaches, and how to follow him and be saved. Jesus told us to tell everyone: “Go make disciples of all the nations” and all that. Mt 28.19 “All nations” means all. (Of course if your ears are closed, that’s on you.)

Yet throughout human history, even predating the bible, there have been folks who specialize in secret knowledge. The Greek word for knowledge, γνῶσις/gnósis, is where we get our own word “know.” And if you’re someone who knows things, it means you’re a γνωστικός/gnostikós, a gnostic. (The opposite of agnostic, someone who’s entirely sure they don’t know things.) Today’s gnostics don’t always call themselves that, ’cause the word tends to only be used with religion (and agnostic with non-religion). Still, it’s the same idea.

The Lᴏʀᴅ takes a day off.

Genesis 2.1-3.

The first creation story doesn’t end at the end of Genesis 1. It continues three verses into chapter 2, with day seven—the passage which establishes the sabbath.

Genesis 2.1-3 KWL

1The skies and the land

and all their armies

were completed.

2God completed on day seven

his handiwork which he made.

God stopped on day seven

from all his handiwork which he made.

3God blessed day seven

and made it sacredly unique,

for in it, he stopped from all his handiwork,

which is all the creation God did.

Unique holy days weren’t anything new to the ancients. But they weren’t as frequent as the Hebrew holy day of sabbath, which arrived every seventh day.

The ancient Sumerians had a five-day week. But in certain months—in Elul (roughly around August) and Bul (roughly around October)—they set apart the 7th, 14th, 19th, 21st, and 28th days of the month. On these days the kings, priests, and witch doctors had to be particularly careful to not enrage their head god, Enlil. No eating cooked food, no dressing in nice clothes, no riding in chariots, and so forth. Now like I said, they had a five-day week, but y’notice they were careful to observe every seventh day. Plus the 19th day—which was the 49th day after the previous month began, so seven sevens.

In contrast, the Hebrews didn’t only observe seventh days for two months a year: This was all year long. Their week had seven days, not five. And the special behavior the Hebrews had to practice was not because it’d anger God and he’d start a-smiting them. It’s because he wanted his people to stop working. To take a day off, same as he took a day off. It’s not a warning; it’s for our benefit. Like Jesus put it, “Sabbath is made for people, not people for sabbath.” Mk 2.27

“Prayer’s about changing us.”

From time to time I hear people claim, “Prayer’s not about prayer requests; not about getting what we want from God. Prayer’s about changing our attitudes. About learning to accept, and be content with, our circumstances. About learning to trust God’s will.”

Okay. I don’t disagree that prayer’s gonna change us. I don’t disagree that it’s a good thing for us to develop better, less greedy, less covetous attitudes; that a lot of things we pray for, aren’t really things we should pray for. Like Jesus’s brother James said,

James 4.3 NLT

And even when you ask, you don’t get it because your motives are all wrong—you want only what will give you pleasure.

Obviously that’s not true of our prayer requests in every instance; sometimes we are selfless in our requests. Sometimes we are interceding for others, or are asking for God’s help to be more fruitful and to follow Jesus better.

This changing of our attitudes is a good and noble thing. It’s gonna come as the result of praying God’s will be done. Growing to be more content in our circumstances, or even despite our circumstances, is also gonna come as a result of seeking God’s will. And hopefully we do seek God’s will in every prayer we pray, ’cause that’s how Jesus taught us in the Lord’s Prayer.

However. Most of the time when someone’s teaching us “Prayer’s not about prayer requests,” it’s not about encouraging us to become more selfless, nor to seek God’s will more often, nor to develop good fruit. It’s about discouraging us from expecting results.

Nine times out of ten, the person teaching it does not believe God answers prayer anymore. Either they’re full-on cessationist, and think God stopped doing miracles back in bible times, and because you’re asking for a miracle—because you’re asking for something so improbable it’d take a direct, personal act of God’s intervention, and these people are dead certain God doesn’t do that anymore—get ready for disappointment. He’s not gonna do that. Get used to him not doing that. Get used to an absent God.

Or they’re full-on determinist: They think God’s already got a plan in mind, and things are gonna unfold exactly according to plan. And our prayers, for the most part, violate that plan—and how dare we expect God to deviate from his good and perfect plan for our convenience—or worse, our selfish, fleshly motives? Nope; God’s never gonna change his mind, nor his plan, for us. We have to change our plans for him. Get with the program, and stop asking for stuff.

Or, let’s be blunt, it’s because they don’t really believe in God. They’re not Christian because they seek a personal relationship with our Creator and Savior. They’re Christian because they find it personally useful to be Christian. They like the culture, like the interaction with other Christians, don’t wanna alienate Christian family members, don’t wanna be ostracized from their predominantly Christian culture, don’t wanna outrage Christian nationalists, find they can make more money or gain political ground when they identify as Christian—any other reason than that personal relationship with Jesus. They don’t want that personal relationship with Jesus; not really. They’d have to change far more than they care to. And like I said, they don’t really believe in him anyway.

So when any of these groups talk about prayer, they’re absolutely not talking about any personal interaction with our Lord. It’s ritual. They’re making declarations into the heavens because that’s what Christians do—but they don’t believe anyone’s listening, and certainly don’t believe anyone’s gonna respond. And because all you’re really doing is talking to a heavenly brass wall, you need to adjust your expectations accordingly… and have none.

Nope; don’t expect to get any of your prayers answered. God doesn’t do that. Instead, focus on you. Focus on the attitudes you oughta have, as you pretend you’re actually talking to your heavenly Father. How would he want you to posture? What feelings would he expect you to have? Humility?—yeah, that’s a good one. Submission?—yeah that’s good too. Despair?—well let’s not call it despair; that sounds horrible. How about “surrender”?

Other than the pure faithlessness of it all, the reason I object most to this teaching about prayer is because Jesus clearly tells us to ask the Father for stuff. And to not despair. Persistent Widow Story, anyone?

Luke 18.6-8 NLT

6Then the Lord said, “Learn a lesson from this unjust judge. 7Even he rendered a just decision in the end. So don’t you think God will surely give justice to his chosen people who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? 8I tell you, he will grant justice to them quickly! But when the Son of Man returns, how many will he find on the earth who have faith?”

Well he won’t find faith in the folks who think prayer’s not about prayer requests. Only in the people who, like the widow, keep praying and never give up. That’s the attitude Jesus expects of us. Lk 18.1 Yes humility, yes submission—and yes, determination. Don’t give up!

The Long Ending of 𝘔𝘢𝘳𝘬.

As I mentioned previously, the Gospel of Mark ends at verse 8. Maybe Mark wrote more; maybe not. In any event Christians have found the ending a little too abrupt, and tacked on the Shorter Ending and the Longer Ending. I wrote about the Shorter Ending earlier; now here’s the Long Ending. Mark wrote neither of these endings; eager Christian scribes came up with them in the 300s or 400s. Speaking as someone who’s translated all of Mark, I can definitely say the authors don’t write like Mark.

However. Even though Mark didn’t write them, both endings are still valid, inspired scripture. Still bible. No, not because of the King James Only folks; they have their own reasons for insisting it’s still bible, namely bibliolatry. Nope; it’s bible because it was in the ancient Christians’ copies of Mark when they determined Mark is bible. It’s bible because it’s confirmed by what Jesus’s apostles did in Acts and afterward. It’s bible because it’s true.

Here’s the Long Ending.

Mark 16.9-20 KWL

9Rising at dawn on the first of the week,

Jesus first appears to Mary the Magdalene,

out of whom he threw seven demons.

10Leaving, this woman reports

to the others who were continuing with Jesus,

to those mourning and weeping,

11and they’re hearing that Jesus lives—

and was seen by Mary!—and don’t believe it.

12After this, as two of them are walking,

Jesus is revealed in another form, going with them,

13and leaving, they report to the rest.

The rest don’t believe them either.

14Later, as the Eleven are reclining at table,

Jesus appears, and rants against

their unbelief and hard-heartedness,

for people saw him as resurrected,

and they didn’t believe it.

15Jesus tells them, “Go into the world

and proclaim the gospel everywhere to every creature.

16Those who believe and are baptized will be saved.

Those who don’t believe will be judged.

17Miracles will accompany the believers:

In my name, people will throw out demons.

People will speak in new tongues.

18People will pick up snakes in their hands,

and if anyone drinks poison, it won’t injure them.

People will lay hands on the sick,

and they will be well.”

19So after Master Jesus’s speech to them,

he’s raptured into heaven and sits at God’s right.

20Leaving, these apostles proclaim everywhere

about the Master they work with and his message,

confirming it through the accompanying signs. Amen.

Some bibles put the Short and Long Endings in brackets; some put the Long Ending in brackets and the Short Ending in the footnotes; and some don’t display the Short Ending at all and just present the Long Ending as if it’s the only ending Mark has. That’s irresponsible; they have no business depriving Christians of the Short Ending.

Orthodox Easter.

Today, 12 April 2026, is Easter in the Orthodox Church.

Which is admittedly weird. Orthodox churches have the very same rule for figuring out the date of Easter as the rest of Christendom: It’s the first Sunday after the first full moon of spring. Therefore the Orthodox celebrations of Easter should fall on exactly the same day as Catholic and Protestant and nondenominational churches. Same as they do every other year.

Here’s why they don’t: Orthodox custom insists Easter has to take place after Passover. It can’t do it before; it can’t do it during. Last week’s Easter observance was in the middle of the Passover festival.

Now, when Easter falls before Passover—like it did in 2024, when it was nearly a whole month before Easter—I’d say the Orthodox have a valid point. If Easter is the Christian Passover, shouldn’t they happen at the same time, or at least very near the same time?

Most of the reason they don’t, has to do with ancient Christians intentionally trying to disconnect the two holidays. Some of those Christians were most definitely antisemitic. (How you can be antisemitic when our Lord is a Jew still makes no sense to me, but since when have antisemites made sense?) That’s why they chose our formula for determining Easter, instead of scheduling it right after Passover. That way they wouldn’t be dependent on the Hebrew calendar.

But… why be independent of the Hebrew calendar? After all, we’re not independent of the Hebrew scriptures: We still read and revere the Old Testament. We’re not independent of the Law and Prophets; they point us to God’s will for our lives. The Hebrews’ Messiah is our Messiah. You can’t divorce Jesus and Christianity from their historical background without getting weird… and, most of the time, dangerously heretic.

Ordinarily I’d agree with the Orthodox, but this year I think they’re being too particular. Jesus died 14 Nisan, the day before Passover, and rose 16 Nisan, the second day of the festival. Easter happened during Passover. No reason it can’t still happen during Passover, like it did last week. (Following the usual formula, sometimes this happens.) But there shouldn’t be any disconnect at all between Passover and Easter. Jesus is the world’s Passover lamb.

(As for all the other Christians who celebrated Easter last week: You realize it’s still Easter until Pentecost, right? Oh, you forgot. Well, no problem. Here’s your reminder.)

Happy Easter, folks.

Sanctus.

The name Sanctus comes from the first word of the Latin translation of this prayer. The first three lines come from Isaiah 6.3, where the seraphs are shouting in praise of the LORD; the last three come from Matthew 21.9, where the people shout in praise as Jesus entered Jerusalem on a donkey.

Holy holy holy Lord

God of power and might

Heaven and earth are full of your glory

Hosanna in the highest

Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord

Hosanna in the highest

The form comes from St. John Chrysostom. Earlier English translations, as found in the Book of Common Prayer, have for the second line, “God of Sabaoth.” The Roman Missal has “God of hosts.” These are all translations of the Hebrew יְהוָ֨ה צְבָא֜וֹת/YHWH Chavaót, “LORD of vast numbers” (KJV “LORD of hosts”). Christians have variously translated chavaót as hosts, armies, “power and might,” troops, “angel armies” if you’re gonna make assumptions about what his armies consist of (and why can’t God mobilize his billions of human followers?), or “Sabaoth” Ro 9.29 if, like Paul, you don’t care to translate it. Me, I tend to go with “LORD of War,” because whenever YHWH Chavaót appears in the bible, the author usually expects God to kick some ass.

Most people nowadays assume hosanna (Syriac ܐܽܘܫܰܥܢܳܐ/wošánna) either means “rejoice,” or is a word used to rejoice. It’s not. It means “Oh, save [us].” Saying “Hosanna in the highest” properly means, “By the Most High”—either in his power or his name—“save us.” There’s some expectation Jesus has come to save—which is true, though they might’ve been expecting Jesus to save them from the Romans, not so much from sin and death. But yeah, this isn’t a praise word like people imagine. It’s a prayer request.

Musical bonus: A song by a friend of mine, James Thomas La Brie. Big instrumental first part; and of course his version of the Sanctus in the “Hosanna in the Highest” part. YouTube

Many of these ancient prayers have of course been set to music. That’s the way most Protestants know of them: When I first wrote about the Sanctus years ago, one of the more common responses I got was, “I thought this was a worship song.” Well it is. But first it was a rote prayer. Musicians rediscover rote prayers all the time, and set ’em to music. If they don’t rhyme, chances are they began their existence as a prayer.

And like many a rote prayer, we can use this prayer to help us meditate. You wanna get your mind off the things around you, and concentrate on God? You tap those rote prayers. Repeat them to yourself, focus on the words, focus on the Lord, and praise him.

Jesus’s resurrection, in 𝘔𝘢𝘳𝘬.

Mark 16.1-9.

The following is everything Mark has to say about Jesus’s resurrection.

Seriously, everything. If it seems short to you, that’s because your average bible includes the Long Ending, which—though wholly accurate—wasn’t written by Mark. It was written later by Christians who felt the Gospel of Mark ended much too abruptly; that it’s not enough to just say Jesus is risen and alive, you gotta talk about what he did after he arose.

Anyway let’s just look at the scriptures:

Mark 16.1-9 KWL

1Sabbath having passed,

Mary the Magdalene,

Mary mother of James bar Alphæus,

and Salomë

buy fragrances so they can anoint Jesus.

2Very early on the first day of the week,

at sunrise,

the women go to the sepulcher.

3The women are saying to themselves,

“Who will roll away for us

the stone at the sepulcher door?”

4Looking, they see the stone was rolled away,

for it’s very big.

5Entering the sepulcher,

they see a “young man” sitting at the right,

clothed in a white robe.

They’re alarmed.

6The “young man” tells them, “Don’t be alarmed.

You seek the crucified Jesus the Nazarene.

He is risen! He’s not here.

Look at the place he was put.

7But go; tell Jesus’s students and Simon Peter this:

‘He goes before you to the Galilee.

You’ll see him there, like he told you.’ ”

8Coming out, the women flee the sepulcher,

for they’re shaking and ecstatic.

They say nothing to no one, for they’re afraid.

And that’s how the gospel ends: With καὶ οὐδενὶ οὐδὲν εἶπαν· ἐφοβοῦντο γάρ/ke udení udén eínan—efovúnto yár, “and nothing to no one they say, for they be afraid.” Done. The end.

Since it’s kind of a sucky ending, Christians came up with two better ones. Probably the first one they came up with was the Short Ending, which I’ll include here. The Long Ending merits another article.

Yes, I realize there are gonna be people who don’t know about either the Short Ending or Long Ending, think the Long Ending is bible, and are horrified that it might not be. Relax; it’s bible. So’s the Short Ending. Both are scripture; both were inspired by the Holy Spirit; both are canon; both are true; doesn’t matter that Mark didn’t write ’em. Now lemme just take the Short Ending out of your bible’s footnotes, and here it is:

Mark 16.9 KWL [Short Ending]

Everything the “young man” commanded about Peter

the women concisely proclaimed.

After these things, Jesus himself sent them east to west

with the holy and immortal message of salvation

in the age to come. Amen!

Easter.

On 5 April 33, before the sun rose at 5:23 a.m. in Jerusalem, Jesus of Nazareth rose from the dead. Executed less than 48 hours before, he became the first human on earth to be resurrected.

Jesus died the day before Passover. This was deliberate. This way his death fulfilled many of the Passover rituals. Because of this relationship to Passover, many Christians actually call this day some variation of the Hebrew פֶּסַח/Pesákh, “Passover.” In Greek and Latin (and Russian), it’s Pascha; in Danish Påske, Dutch Pasen, French Pâques, Italian Pasqua, Spanish Pascua, Swedish Påsk.

But in many Germanic-speaking countries, including English, we use the ancient pagan word for April, Eostur. In German this becomes Ostern; in English Easter. Because of the pagan origins of this word, certain Christians avoid it and just call the day “Resurrection Sunday.” Which is fine, but confuses non-Christians who don’t realize why we’re acting like a bunch of snowflakes.

Easter is our most important holiday. Christmas tends to get the world’s focus (and certainly that of merchants), but it’s only because Christmas doesn’t stretch their beliefs too far. Everybody agrees Jesus was born; we only differ on details. But Easter is about how Jesus rose from the dead, and that’s a sticking point for a whole lot of pagans. They don’t buy it.

They don’t even like it: When they die, they wanna go to heaven and stay there. Resurrection? Coming back? In a body? No no no. And we’ll even find Christians who agree with them: They’ll claim Jesus didn’t literally return from death, but exists in some super-spiritual ghostly form which returned to heaven. And that’s where we’ll go too: Heaven. No resurrection; not necessary. Yes it’s a heretic idea, but a popular one.

So to pagans, Easter’s a myth. It’s a nice story about how we Christians think Jesus came back from the dead, but they insist it comes from ancient times, back when people believed anyone could come back from the dead if they knew the right magic spell. Really it’s just a metaphor for spring, new life, rebirth; just like eggs and baby chicks and bunnies. They’ll celebrate that. With chocolate, fancy hats, brunch, and maybe an egg hunt.

But to us Christians, Easter happened. It validates Jesus; without his resurrection we’d have no clue whether he was just one of many great moral teachers, or someone to seriously bet our lives upon. It proves he’s everything he said he is. Proved it for the first Christians, who risked (and suffered) fearful deaths for him. Proves it for today’s Christians, some of whom do likewise.

The harrowing of hell.

According to the creeds, when Jesus died he descendit ad inferos. Inferos is the plural accusative form of inferus, which properly means “places of the dead,” the afterlife. When Jesus died, he didn’t bypass the afterlife and go straight to heaven, to the Father’s throne room. He went where the dead go. He went to paradise, as he told the thief crucified next to him:

Luke 23.43 KJV

And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.

But popular Christian mythology says Jesus went to the other part of the afterlife. He died, they argue, with all humanity’s sin on his soul; with every single wicked thing every human has ever done. (And have yet to do. Trillions more sins have yet to be committed before the end of the world. That’s a whole lot of human depravity!) So where does such a wicked being go? Well, if you believe in karma not grace, where do you think they go?—the bad part of the afterlife. The place Dives went in the Lazarus story. The place we call hell.

This is a long, old Christian myth. It’s been around since the fourth century. Christians ever since that time have been casually swapping out infernos, “hellfire,” for inferos—and some of ’em think it means the same thing, and some think infernos is correct. It’s why they spread the idea that on Holy Saturday, the day after Jesus died, the day his body was resting in the sepulcher, he did go to hell. Not to be tormented though; to bring salvation to the Old Testament saints who’d been there since the beginning of death.

Seems none of these saints had been to paradise; certainly not heaven. Instead they were in some form of limbo, “border”—a shadowy place wedged between heaven, where they didn’t deserve to go; and hell, where they also didn’t deserve to go. (“Deserve” is the operative word here—again, grace isn’t part of this story.) Supposedly these “fathers” of our faith—nothing about the mothers—sat around at the border of hell, waiting for Messiah to die for their sins and free them from this limbus patrum, “limbo of the fathers.” As opposed to the limbus infantum, “limbo of infants”—where unbaptized babies go ’cause they neither merit heaven nor hell—a myth the Roman Catholics formally rejected in 2007 as inconsistent with God’s grace. Really all supposed “limbos” are inconsistent with grace, and not biblical; hence mythological.

As the myth goes, after Jesus died he went straight to hell and proclaimed the gospel to these saints. As is implied in 1 Peter:

1 Peter 4.6 KJV

For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit.

I firmly believe “them that are dead” is a metaphor, about sinners who are as good as dead in their sins, whom God can still save. But obviously Christians have been using this as a proof text for this myth. Jesus shared the gospel with them, and if they believed and followed Jesus, he led ’em to heaven. If they rejected Jesus, hell was right there, and off they went. And that is how all the Old Testament saints are now in heaven.

“My God, why have you forsaken me?”

Mark 15.33-36, Matthew 27.45-49.

Just before he died, Jesus shouted out something in a language his bystanders didn’t recognize. And a lot of present-day commentators don’t recognize it either. We know it was Psalm 22.1, but some of us say Jesus quoted it in Aramaic; some say Hebrew. Which was it?

The reason for the confusion is Mark and Matthew don’t match. Both of ’em recorded Jesus’s words as best they could—but they transliterated them into the Greek alphabet, which doesn’t correspond to Hebrew and Syriac sounds as neatly as you’d think. (And if your web browser is so old it doesn’t do Unicode, you won’t be able to read ’em either.)

VERSE	ORIGINAL	TRANSLITERATION
Ps 22.1, Hebrew	אֵלִ֣י אֵלִ֣י לָמָ֣ה עֲזַבְתָּ֑נִי	Elí Elí, lamá azavettáni?
Ps 22.1, Syriac	ܐܰܠܳܗܝ ܐܰܠܳܗܝ ܠܡܳܢܳܐ ܫܒ݂ܰܩܬ݁ܳܢܝ	Elahí Elahí, lamaná šavaqtaní?
Mk 15.34, Greek	ἐλωΐ ἐλωΐ, λεμᾶ σαβαχθανί;	Elo’í Elo’í, lemá savahthaní? (or σαβακτανεί/savaktaneí in the Codex Sinaiticus.)
Mt 27.46, Greek	ἠλί ἠλί, λεμὰ σαβαχθανί;	Ilí ilí, lemá savahthaní?

Just based on how the gospels’ authors wrote the word for “my God,” Elí in Hebrew or Elahí in Syriac, it kinda looks like Mark was quoting a Syriac translation of the psalms, and Matthew the Hebrew original.

There are three reasons I feel Jesus is most likely to have quoted bible in Hebrew:

1. It is the language King David wrote his psalm in.
2. It’d explain why the people who heard Jesus quote it, didn’t understand him. First-century Israelis spoke Syriac; that’s what the New Testament meant by Ἑβραϊστί/Evrahistí and Ἑβραΐδι/Evra’ídi, “Hebraic.” Jn 5.2, Ac 22.2, 26.14, Rv 9.11 In the first century Hebrew was a dead language, only spoken by scribes like Jesus.
3. It’s way easier to confuse Elí with Ἡλίας/Ilías, the Greek version of אֵלִיָּה/Eliyyáhu, “Elijah,” than it is Elahí.

Regardless, in my translation the words in Jesus’s mouth are Syriac in Mark, and Hebrew in Matthew. ’Cause that’s what the authors were apparently going for.

Mark 15.33-36 KWL

33Upon the coming of the sixth hour since sunrise—noon—

darkness comes over all the land till the ninth hour.

34In the ninth hour Jesus cries out with a loud voice,

“?ܐܰܠܳܗܝ ܐܰܠܳܗܝ ܠܡܳܢܳܐ ܫܒ݂ܰܩܬ݁ܳܢܝ”

which is translated,

“My God my God, for what reason have you left me behind?” Ps 22.1

35Hearing this, some bystanders said, “Look, he calls Elijah.”

36One of the runners, filling a sponge of vinegar,

putting it on a reed, gives Jesus a drink,

saying, “Let’s see if Elijah comes to take him.”

Matthew 27.45-49 KWL

45From the sixth hour since sunrise—noon—

darkness comes over all the land till the ninth hour.

46Around the ninth hour Jesus cries out with a loud voice,

saying, “?אִיל אִיל למֹנֹא שׁבַֽקתֹ֗ני”

that is,

“My God my God, why did you leave me behind?” Ps 22.1

47Some of the bystanders, hearing, are saying this:

“This man calls Elijah.”

48Quickly a runner, one of them, leaves them.

Taking a sponge full of vinegar,

putting it on a reed, he gives Jesus a drink.

49The others say,

“Let’s see if Elijah comes, and will save him.”

Awright, now that we have the language sorta squared away, let’s get to what was going on here.

The top two commands. [Mk 12.29-31]

Mark 12.29-31 KJV

29And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: 30and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: Dt 6.4-5 this is the first commandment. 31And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. Lv 19.18 There is none other commandment greater than these.

 

Jesus was asked by a scribe what the greatest command is, and this is the Gospel of Mark’s version of his answer. He quotes two bible passages—and it’s not a bad idea to memorize these passages as well. The reason I suggest memorizing Jesus’s whole Mark statement is to include his endorsement: “There is none other commandment greater than these.”

(Or whatever other translation you wanna know it in. I present memory verses in King James Version because it’s the version I memorized, plus whenever I quote KJV, people immediately recognize it as “bible language.” But if your favorite is ESV or NASB or NLT—or even The PIrate Bible—go for it.)

Mark also includes the whole text from Deuteronomy. Jews memorize this passage as the שְׁמַ֖ע/šemá, “the Shema,” taken from the very first word of the verse, which means “listen” but we often translate it as “hear.”

Deuteronomy 6.4-5 KJV

4Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD: 5and thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.

Other gospels skip verse 4, and go right to the “Love the LORD your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.” Mark includes the “Listen, Israel” part because it’s important: Before we start loving God, we gotta identify which God we mean, and that’d be YHWH, the God of Abraham, Isaac, Israel, and Moses; the Father of Jesus. He’s not a new god whom Jesus is introducing for the very first time through his teachings. Same God the first-century Israelis already knew. Same God most monotheists know, whether we call him our Higher Power, the Almighty, God, Lord, Ha-Shem, Elohim, Allah, Deus, Dios, Dieu, Theos, or whatever other language you like to get religious in. But if you’re gonna follow Jesus, you need to get to know him and follow him as Jesus teaches him, because only Jesus explains him. Jn 1.18

Then, loving neighbors:

Leviticus 19.18 KJV

Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.

Whenever God commanded something that particularly reflects his character—something he particularly wanted the Hebrews to pay attention to, ’cause he means it—he’d cap it with “I am the LORD.” He doesn’t want his people to take petty revenge, nor hold grudges, nor hate the people of their homeland. And if you’re one of those people who insist God was only speaking about fellows of the same ethnic background, Jesus overtly taught otherwise in his Good Samaritan Story. Which, not coincidentally, follows Jesus’s top two commandments in the Gospel of Luke. Lk 10.25-29

Passover: When God saved the Hebrews.

Back when I once taught on this topic, one of my students asked, “Why don’t we celebrate Passover?”—meaning we Christians. And it just so happens we do. We call it Pascha, Pascua, Páques; most languages use some form of the original Hebrew word פֶּסַח/pesákh, “skipping or passing over.”

It’s just English-speakers use the word Easter. And obviously we do it way different than we see in the scriptures—so different, English-speaking people routinely assume Easter and Passover are two entirely different holidays.

I can’t argue with this assumption. Christians don’t bother to purge our homes of yeast or leavening. Don’t cook lamb. (Nor practice the modern Jewish custom of not having lamb, since there’s no temple in Jerusalem to ritually sacrifice a lamb in.) Don’t put out the seder plate. Don’t tell the Exodus story. Don’t have the kids ask the Four Questions (what’s with the matzot, why are bitter herbs part of the meal, why roasted meat in particular, and why does the food gets dipped twice?). Don’t hide the afikomen and have the kids search for it; we do that with the eggs though.

And some English-speaking Christians do observe Passover as a separate holiday. Some of us celebrate it Hebrew-style, as spelled out in the scriptures, as in Exodus and Deuteronomy. But more often, Christians follow the lead of our Messianic Jewish sisters and brothers, figuring they’re Jews so they know how to do it. Thing is, Messianic Jews borrow their traditions from the Conservative Judaism movement. (Which, contrary to their name, ain’t all that conservative.) Their haggadah—their order of service—is nearly always adapted from Orthodox or Conservative prayer books, which means it dates from the 10th century or later.

Some Jewish customs come from the Mishna, so they do date back to the third century, and maybe go as far back as the first. But they might not have. It’s entirely likely most of them originated after the temple was destroyed, ’cause now you can’t do the religious portion of Passover at temple, so you gotta do it somewhere, so now it’s made part of the seder, the ritual Passover dinner. Jesus and his students may have simply eaten dinner, quoted the Exodus story, thanked God for his salvation, drank, sang, and that’s about all. No haggadah; no seder plate, no afikomen, no Four Questions, no Airing of the Grievances… oh wait, that’s Festivus.

And not all these customs are part of everyone’s Passover. Just as Christians celebrate Christmas and Easter every which way, Jews then and now got to select their own customs. Hence families have unique customs, and various synagogues emphasize various things. Medieval Jewish communities in eastern Europe, north Africa, Spain, and the middle east, all came up with their individual haggadahs. So did Samaritans.

The point of the haggadah is to teach the Exodus story to those who don’t know it, usually children. And remember, Jesus’s students were teenagers, not children: Legal adults who already knew the Exodus story. If they hadn’t heard it in enough detail at home, Jesus would’ve taught it to them personally, and they’d’ve celebrated several Passovers together by the time of his last Passover supper. So, just as some families don’t tell the nativity story every Christmas once the kids get older, don’t be surprised if Jesus supper skipped the Exodus story as redundant.

Christians usually know very little about Jewish culture, and mistakenly think that’s how Jews and Pharisees behaved in Jesus’s day too. In my experience Messianic Jews think this too—and regularly make a big, big point of how Jesus would’ve behaved exactly like the Jews they know… when the gospels make it really clear Jesus didn’t behave at all like his fellow Jews, and it really annoyed them. In either case when they attend a Passover seder and listen to whatever haggadah the leader borrowed or wrote, they routinely think it’s so profound how Jesus did all these rituals (even though he likely didn’t) and how his life and teachings “fulfilled” all these rituals.

Er, no. Of course we can see similarities between Jesus’s life and teachings, and Passover rituals… and Christian rituals, and really any rituals if you wanna connect the dots hard enough. But today’s Passover customs might entirely postdate Jesus. So let’s not read too much into what Jesus “brought meaning into”—he may not have. Especially when your haggadah was put together by Christians.