Cutting it off.

Matthew 5.29-30, 18.8-9, Mark 9.43-46.

When I was a kid, I watched a Little House on the Prairie episode (“A Matter of Faith,” season 2, episode 15) where Caroline injured her foot, it got infected, and she was delirious from fever. At one point she read her bible—specifically, today’s passage, in which Jesus tells you to lop off an offending foot. So she got out a knife and got started.

Freaked me out a little. Because even as a kid, I knew this teaching is hyperbole. Jesus is saying something outrageously extreme in order to make a point: Sin is so awful, you’d be better off amputating your limbs than letting your sins destroy you. Especially destroy you eternally.

As a result he uses this teaching more than once. Once in Mark and twice in Matthew—and one of those times is in his Sermon on the Mount, which is why I bring it up here.

Matthew 5.29-30 KWL

29“If your right eye trips you up,

pluck it out and throw it from you!

For better for you

that you might destroy one of your bodyparts

and might not have your whole body

thrown into Gehenna.

30If your right hand trips you up,

lop it off and throw it from you!

For better for you

that you might destroy one of your bodyparts

and might not have your whole body

go off to Gehenna.”

Γέενναν/Géhennan is a transliteration of the Syriac word ܓܗܢܐ/Gehenna, the wadi of Hinnom, just outside Jerusalem, where the people of the city burnt their trash. The fires burned day and night—same as hell, which is why Judeans used Gehenna as a euphemism for hell. When Jesus talks about Gehenna, he might only be talking about negative consequences, like getting dumped in society or history’s trash heap. But most of us Christians are entirely sure he’s talking about the lake of fire at the End, Rv 20.14-15 the “everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and its angels.” Mt 25.41 There are four words translated “hell” in the bible; Gehenna refers to that one.

This story is where some Christians get the idea of mortal sins, sins which are so bad, committing ’em means you’re guaranteed hell. This belief is not biblical; there are no such sins. Only a lifestyle of unrepentant sin in defiance of God is gonna put people in hell.

But certain things, certain temptations, are gonna nudge us ever so slightly towards that lifestyle. I knew plenty of kids in my high school youth group who wanted to fornicate so badly—as kids do, ’cause they’re full of hormones. Certain people in our Fundamentalist church told ’em if they did, they’d be unrepentantly defying Jesus; they’d be apostate. (No, they actually wouldn’t, but you know how certain Fundies get whenever people go against their “God’s” will.) You can kinda guess how things turned out: Super horny, and presented with this false dilemma, the kids sadly chose to quit Jesus. Some of ’em came back to him. Some still haven’t.

And no doubt there were certain Israeli kids, certain Pharisees, in Jesus’s day, who figured either they had to obey Pharisee teachings, or they were going to hell… and they were greatly tempted to choose hell. Yes the Pharisees offered tons of loopholes for God’s laws… but there was no getting around Pharisee customs. Break a Law and there’s forgiveness; break tradition and there’s not.

Fundies are the very same way, which is why whenever Jesus broke Pharisee custom (as he regularly did) some of ’em actually claim Jesus broke God’s laws. No he didn’t; that’d make him a sinner! He only broke traditions which God never implemented; which might be “biblical principles” but they were never God’s principles.

So what Jesus is talking about here, are actual sins. Deliberate violations of the Law of Moses. And yes, God forgives those sins too. But if you’re tempted to enter an unrepentant lifestyle of those sins, however you justify it to yourself: Better you stop lopping off bodyparts.

Backsliding. We all do it… 𝘪𝘧 we’re following Jesus.

BACKSLIDE 'bæk.slaɪd verb. Relapse into bad ways or error.

[Backslider 'bæk.slaɪ.dər noun.]

Most people imagine the road to sanctification isn’t level: It’s uphill. A bit of a climb, too. Paved with gravel instead of asphalt. So on the particularly steep parts, if you haven’t got enough forward momentum, the ground’s gonna slip under your feet just a little. If you’re standing still, it’s gonna slip a lot. It’s the natural consequence of gravity, y’know. You can’t just stand still. Keep moving!

In this metaphor, the gravitatonal pull represents our natural human tendency towards selfishness, self-centeredness, and sin. When we stop striving to follow Jesus, even for a second, we’re gonna backslide.

Okay, if the pursuit of Jesus is actually like this, shoudn’t we Christians be way more gracious, generous, and sympathetic towards backslidden fellow Christians? ’Cause I used to hike several times a week. (I lived in the Santa Cruz mountains; it was kinda unavoidable.) On every unpaved hill, there’s always backsliding. It’s unavoidable. On wet days, even with the best shoes, you can always make a misstep and fall on your face. I came back from many a casual hike covered in mud, simply becaue I tackled a hill which looked deceptively easy to scale.

The Christian walk—when we’re doing it right—will have way bigger challenges than wet hills. We’re gonna fumble. A lot. But we get back up again. Kinda have to; the road home leads up that hill.

Problem is, because of the massive convenience of living in a predominantly Christian country, we American Christians really don’t struggle with our Christianity much. If at all. (And most of us don’t go hiking either.) So maybe we’ve not thought this “backsliding” metaphor all the way through.

Or even really know what we’re talking about. Fr’instance: Back in my high school youth group, one of the girls became pregnant. The church gossips were mighty quick to comment how she’d so obviously “backslidden.” Thing is, I was friends with the boyfriend who’d impregnated her: She hadn’t backslidden at all. She had no relationship with Jesus. She attended the youth group ’cause all her friends, and her boyfriend, were there. She sang in the church’s choir because she was a good singer, and the music pastor appreciated her talent. The gossips assumed her church attendance, and her public on-stage praise of Jesus, meant she was Christian. Nope! Outside church, she was as pagan as anyone. She was no backslider: She wasn’t even climbing.

I find the very same thing to be true of most “backsliders.” They’re not following Jesus any. They’re going to church for other reasons. They’re friendly enough at church; they know what’ll offend conservative Christians, and avoid that. They know how to behave.

Of those who are Christian, they’re not following Jesus because they figure they’re saved, and once saved always saved. So they’re good. Why make an effort?—at all?—’cause that’s just works righteousness, and doesn’t save us, so it’s not worth doing.

The rest aren’t. They’re not hypocrites—they’re not pretending to be Christian; they’re not doing anything. Ask ’em about their beliefs about God, and they’ll admit they believe as pagans usually do. They figure there’s a God; Jesus is his son, but not uniquely so, and not also God; the Holy Spirit is either an impersonal force or one of God’s nicknames; and you go to heaven if you’re a “good person,” which they’re pretty sure they are… which is why they don’t follow Jesus; they’re “good.” Nor following the Christian crowd either. Following their own hearts, if that.

So “backslider” is the wrong term for such people. Which is why I use “irreligious.”

Transliteration: Because in some languages, you’re illiterate.

By now you’ve likely learned the bible wasn’t originally written in English. (Although good luck informing certain King James Only folks of this. Most of ’em know better, but there are some holdouts who still think God speaks in King James English.)

The bible was written in three dead languages, languages nobody speaks anymore. The present-day versions of these languages are not the same. Languages evolve.

• Modern Hebrew uses western word order (subject-verb-object, “I go home”), but ancient Hebrew typically used the original middle eastern word order (verb-subject-object “Go I home”). Plus Modern Hebrew’s vocabulary is way bigger, what with all the necessary loanwords from Yiddish, English, German, Russian, and Arabic. Plus the pronunciation’s different, much like the differences between American, Australian, Indian, and Nigerian English from the way it’s spoken in the U.K. (The many ways it’s spoken in the U.K.)
• Modern Greek has a different vocabulary and different grammatical rules than the Alexandrian Greek of the New Testament. Same reasons as Hebrew. And Alexandrian Greek is different from Attic Greek before it, and Mycenaean Greek before that.
• Syriac speakers love to point out Jesus spoke the same language they do, but the Babylonian Syriac of the bible (and the first-century Syriac, which western Christians call “Aramaic,” which Jesus spoke) is like saying Geoffrey Chaucer spoke English like us. He did… but when you try to read the Canterbury Tales, it’s obvious he kinda didn’t.

The Old Testament is written in what we call Biblical Hebrew—the older parts in Early Biblical Hebrew, and the Syriac-influenced later parts in Later Biblical Hebrew. A few chapters are in Syriac, the language of the Babylonian Empire—the language Daniel put some of his visions into. After the Jews returned from Babylon, that’s what they spoke too, and that’s what Jesus spoke, as demonstrated by the few direct quotes we have of him in the New Testament. As for the NT, it’s in a form of Alexandrian Greek we commonly call Koine Greek, a term which comes from the word κοινή/kiní, “common.”

And I know; most of my readers don’t know these languages. I learned them in seminary, ’cause I wanted to read the bible in the original. I wanted it unfiltered by some other translator. Not that most translators don’t know what they’re doing; not that most English translations aren’t well done. They are. But if I’m gonna seriously study bible, I still wanna read the original, and go through the process of translation myself. That’s why I translate it for TXAB.

In so doing, I often need to talk about the original-language words. So I convert ’em into our alphabet so you can kinda read them. It’s called transliteration. People have always done it. Mark did it in the bible, converting some of Jesus’s Syriac sayings into Greek characters. (In my translation I use the original Syriac.)

Mark 5.41-42 KWL

41He gripped the child’s hand

and told her, “ܛܠܺܝܬ݂ܳܐ ܩܽܘܡܝ,”

(which is translated, “Get up, I say”)

42and the girl instantly got up, and was walking around—

she was 12 years old.

They were amazed and ecstatic.

I use the Syriac alphabet, but back then it was written in the Assyrian alphabet; the same one Hebrew’s written in. But Mark’s Greek-speaking readers, unless they were Israelis or Syrian Greeks, were unlikely to know that alphabet. So he turned the original Syriac into ταλιθα κουμ/talítha kum. There, now they can read it… although he still needed to translate it, and did.

Prior to 2019, I transliterated everything on TXAB, and left the original Hebrew, Syriac, and Greek out. ’Cause foreign languages intimidate certain people. Throw some Hebrew-alphabet words on a page, and people flinch: “Argh, he’s writing in Hebrew! I can’t possibly read that. I can’t possibly read anything he’s written; he’ll get too technical for me.” I know; to many of you this sounds ridiculous. But I assure you people really freak out that way. And I didn’t wanna alienate readers.

I then came to realize in so doing, I’ve accommodated people’s irrational fears. And shouldn’t. Such fears are wholly inappropriate for Christians. If foreign languages freak you out, you need to get over it. Need to. It kills your compassion for foreigners, and ruins your ability to share Jesus with them. You realize Jesus includes us foreigners in his kingdom. So in some of those older articles, I put the original text back in, and of course ever since 2019 it’s been included. And relax, I’ll still transliterate it for you.

Elisha’s double portion.

2 Kings 2.9-10.

First time I heard of a “double portion” had to do with food. You’re slicing up the pizza; you want two slices instead of just one; how come Dad gets two slices and you don’t? But no, that’s not what it refers to in the bible.

First time I heard of double portions in the bible, was in Sunday school. It was a lesson our overeager youth pastor taught us about the eighth-century BC prophet Elijah of Tishbe, the guy who turned off the rain for three years, made a gentile widow’s flour and oil last way longer then it shoulda, and called down fire on both altars and men.

Elijah didn’t die; he was raptured. And when it came time for that to happen, he handed off his job to his apprentice Elisha ben Shaphat, and they had this conversation:

2 Kings 2.9-10 KWL

9This happened when they crossed the river:

Elijah told Elisha, “Ask what I can do for you

before I’m taken away from you.”

Elisha said, “Now give two portions of your spirit to me.”

10Elijah said, “A tough thing to ask!

If you see me taken from you, this’ll happen to you.

If not, it won’t.”

As the King James Verison puts it, Elisha asked for “a double portion of thy spirit.” And as our excited youth pastor put it, Elisha asked for twice the spirit of Elijah. Twice the anointing. Double the power!

And after Elisha watched his master ascend to heaven, he got it! As proven by the fact Elijah performed seven miracles in the bible, but Elijah performed twice that number, a whopping 14. (True, one of ’em took place after Elisha died, when a corpse came back to life after touching the prophet’s bones. 2Ki 13.21 But it totally counts.)

Some years later I became Pentecostal. Unlike my previous church, Pentecostals correctly understand the spirit who empowered Elijah is the Holy Spirit; that every time a human being does miracles they’re doing it with the Holy Spirit’s power, ’cause he’s the one who inspired 1Pe 1.21 and empowered 1Co 12.11 prophets. But the spin of my Pentecostal pastors on “the double portion” isn’t that Elisha was granted twice Elijah’s spirit, but twice the Holy Spirit.

No, this doesn’t mean there were two Holy Spirits knocking around inside Elisha. There’s only one God. It only means the Spirit empowered Elisha twice as much as he did Elijah. Elisha became twice as miraculous. Twice as prophetic.

Okay. For fun, let’s imagine one of Elisha’s students made this very same request of him when he was gonna pass on. Let’s say Elisha agreed. So theoretically, this student could’ve received twice Elisha’s anointing. Elisha did 14 miracles; Elisha’s successor could’ve performed 28 of them. Right?

So if this successor passed a double-portion anointing to his successor, a third guy, that guy could’ve done 56 miracles. His successor, 112 miracles. The next successor, 224 miracles. And so on, and so on.

A thousand generations later, devout descendants of Elijah’s anointing and Elisha’s double anointing, could potentially perform so many miracles, they’d do ’em by accident. Sneeze in an elevator, and everybody steps out totally cured of their allergies. Fart and everyone’s gastroenteric problems are gone. And so forth.

How sad, this Pentecostal lamented, that people didn’t have the faith to keep pursuing this “double portion anointing.” They could’ve doubled the miracles in the world with every successive generation.

How sad, I’ve learned since, that people keep repeating this old, and very stupid, Christian cliché. ’Cause it proves they’ve clearly not read the other parts of the bible, which clear up precisely what a “double portion” is. Heck, they’ve probably heard it explained before, but some mental disconnect keeps ’em from applying it to the Elijah/Elisha story.

On the election of a pope.

Back when Francis was elected pope in 2013, I wrote the following article for a previous blog. You can change that first paragraph to read, “On 8 May 2025, a Roman Catholic committee of church leaders elected Cardinal Robert Prevost of the United States to be their church’s new leader, the pope. By custom, the new pope usually takes on a new name as part of the job, so he’s gonna be known as Leo XIV.”

Annoyingly, the reasons I wrote this article still apply. So, time to rehash it.

On 13 March 2013, a Roman Catholic committee of church leaders elected Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Argentina to be their church’s new leader, the pope. By custom, the new pope usually takes on a new name as part of the job, so he’s gonna be known as Franciscus, or for we English-speakers, Pope Francis. (Named for one of my favorite saints, Francesco Bernardone, a.k.a. Francis of Assisi.)

What does this mean for Christians? Well, not every Christian is a Roman Catholic. I’m not. But since Catholicism is the largest branch of Christianity, and since your average pagan has no idea about what a pope is or does, or even the differences between one denomination and another, they’re gonna assume the pope is in charge of Christianity, and anything he does affects every single Christian on the planet. You know, like everybody assumes the Dalai Lama is in charge of every single Buddhist. (Oh, wait, you thought he was in charge of every Buddhist? Well now you know how pagans think of the pope.)

The pope’s job, really, is to preserve the Catholic Church: He preserves the gospel of Christ Jesus, and he upholds his church’s traditions. Pagans don’t understand this: They think the pope is the boss of the church. They think he can order the church what to do and think. That’s why a lot of pagan journalists love to speculate, “What sort of changes might a new pope make in the Catholic Church?” Some of them dream of a new, exciting, permissive pope who’ll make all the progressive changes they’ve been fantasizing about: No more bans on abortion and birth control. No more bans on same-sex marriage. Anybody can become a priest, whether male or female, gay or straight, married or single, Christian or atheist. Anything they wish wasn’t a sin, will now totally be permitted. (That way, they’ll feel a whole lot better about identifying themselves as Catholic, despite the fact they don’t follow Catholic teachings, or even Jesus, at all.) But none of that is the pope’s job. He can’t change any of that. Not without a great big church council, and sometimes not even then.

Now, other denominations don’t work this way. In some, the president decides the church is gonna work a different way, and by golly it does work a different way. In others, the pastors gotta meet and vote before changes can be made—but sometimes they do vote, and huge changes are made. Now, we can debate about whether those changes are any good, or consistent with the scriptures at all. (Some of them certainly aren’t.) But the Catholic Church isn’t one of those denominations. Change comes slowly. And they’re not gonna ramp up the process, simply because society rushes headlong into everything.

Te Deum.

Te Deum teɪ 'deɪ.əm is a rote prayer. Really it’s a hymn which dates back to the late 300s. It’s named for its first words, Te Deum laudamus/“To God we praise.” Traditions say it was written by St. Ambrose when he baptized St. Augustine. Or St. Hiliary or St. Nicetas of Remesiana wrote it. Meh; who cares how we got it. It’s been a popular prayer for the past 17 centuries, and has been set to music many times in many ways.

The Presbyterian Church’s Book of Common Worship translates it like so.

We praise you, O God,

we acclaim you as Lord,

all creation worships you,

Father everlasting.

To you, all angels, all the powers of heaven,

the cherubim and seraphim, sing in endless praise:

Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of power and might,

heaven and earth are full of your glory.

The glorious company of apostles praise you.

The noble fellowship of prophets praise you.

The white-robed army of martyrs praise you.

Throughout the world the holy church acclaims you;

Father, of majesty unbounded,

your true and only Son, worthy of all praise,

the Holy Spirit, advocate and guide.

You, Christ, are the king of glory,

the eternal Son of the Father.

When you took our flesh to set us free

you humbly chose the Virgin’s womb.

You overcame the sting of death

and opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers.

You are seated at God’s right hand in glory.

We believe that you will come, and be our judge.

Come then, Lord, and help your people,

bought with the price of your own blood,

and bring us with your saints

to glory everlasting. BCW 570-571

Praying for the next pope.

Pope Francis, the head of the Roman Catholic Church, died Easter Monday. You probably knew this already; his funeral and interment has been all over the news.

Likewise the church’s process of picking his successor: All the cardinals under the age of 80 have to go to Vatican City for the conclave, the process where they’re locked in the Sistine Chapel, and vote for a Catholic man—any Catholic man; he doesn’t have to be a cardinal—to be the new pope. They keep voting till one of their candidates gets a majority. Used ballots get thrown in a stove and burned; they add a little something to the fire to make the smoke white or black. Black means they’re still voting; white means they’ve picked a guy. If he accepts the job, he’s the new pope; if he doesn’t, back to voting.

Catholics are of course praying the cardinals pick a good guy. Praying the Holy Spirit lead the cardinals to pick a good guy. (Praying the cardinals even listen to the Holy Spirit. True, men are made cardinals for all sorts of reasons; some of those reasons have admittedly been political. But hopefully all were chosen because they’re good examples of following Jesus.)

And, as I’ve pointed out to some of my fellow non-Catholics, we should be praying the cardinals pick a good guy.

I get various responses to that:

• “Already am!”
• “…Oh! Yeah, I should be praying the cardinals pick a good guy.”
• “…What? Why should I pray for that? I’m not Catholic.”
• “What?” [followed by scoffing] “Who cares who they pick.”

You can obviously tell which of the responses are the anti-Catholic ones.