The Cultural and Religious Interpretations of the Crucifixion Story - Essay Example

Section/# Exam Servant Songs refer to a group of six textual groupings which can be found in the book of Isaiah between Chapters 42 to Chapter 53. The Servant Songs, or alternatively Servant Poems, discuss the servant who is called by God to lead the nations; however, is horrendously abused by the very people that he has been called to minister to. As a function of this incessant abuse, the servant ultimately decides to sacrifice himself in order to fulfill a type of destiny prepared for him. Early Christians integrated the belief that this manifestation was emblematic of their own plight against persecution as well as emblematic of the suffering that Christ experienced at the hands of many within the Jewish and Roman community during his earthly ministry. 2. Rather than engaging with the story of Jonah in the literal sense, early Christians, as exhibited in the New Testament books of Matthew and Luke, understood the story of Jonah to be typological. In this way, Jonah represented a type of “Christ” which was in the belly of the whale for a period of 3 days just as Christ was in the belly of the earth, the grave, for a total period of 3 days time. A further identification with the story of Jonah is the way in which Christ himself compared his earthly ministry and the generation he witnessed to as similar to that of the inhabitants of Nineveh. This typification was carried out in a number of ways and was a means whereby the early Christians were able to coalesce the story of the Messiah with the Old Testament typifications that are so prevalent throughout Judaism. 3. With regards to the means by which early Christians interpreted the story of Isaac and Abraham in the Old Testament, this too was similar to the typification that has been briefly discussed in question 2 with relation to the early Christian interpretation of Jonah. Ultimately, what was born from this level of typification and understanding was the very same God that instructed Abraham to sacrifice his only Son on an altar was the God that sent his very own Son into the world to act as the propitiation of sin. Moreover, early Christians sought to place the event either upon Temple Mount or upon Calvary; even though no specific evidence ever existed for this to take place. 4. The distinctive features of the gospels can be inferred as something of the differing levels of approach that each provides with relation to understanding a further nuance of Christ’s earthly ministry. As such, each of these stands as a means of providing a more complete picture of Christ’s earthly ministry by casting it Him as a Savior, a Servant, a Son of God, and the Son of Man. These features were useful for the early Christian movement to develop a full and nuanced interpretation of Christ rather than a one-dimensional approach which had so often been elaborated upon in the Old Testament. 5. The key differential that exists within theology and the understanding and application of historical truth versus mathematical truth relates to the means by which the believer seeks to integrate a more full and complete understanding of the way in which past experience and certain events of the Old Testament can or should be quantified or understood within the historical context that they were originally written to integrate with. As with any form of theological form of understanding this is concentric upon trying to utilize a new approach to what can be considered a historical context. 6. The most powerful reason for this historical approach to the fact that many Christians believe the Christ physically rose from the dead on Easter Sunday is most closely related to the fact that the Passover and the feasts associated with it can descernably be linked to a specific date and time. As such, the early Christian tradition of Easter Sunday as emblematic of the day in which Christ rose from the dead is much more than adherence to blind tradition; rather it is a marker that can firmly and rationally be defined as a set point in time that is able to be inferred due to the season of time that was discussed in all of the four gospels. 7. With regards to some of the texts in the New Testament in which Jesus expected and prophesied of his death, there are quite a number. One of these is necessarily the following found in Mark 19:30-32: “He said to them, "The Son of Man is going to be betrayed into the hands of men. They will kill him, and after three days he will rise." But they did not understand what he meant and were afraid to ask him about it”. Similarly, in the Gospel of Matthew chapter 16 verses 21-28, it states, “From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.  Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to you!”  Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.”  Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it.  What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?  For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what they have done.  “Truly I tell you, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom” Likewise, Matthew 19:22-27 states the following: When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he had great wealth. Then Jesus said to his disciples, "I tell you the truth, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished and asked, "Who then can be saved?" Jesus looked at them and said, "With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible." Peter answered him, "We have left everything to follow you! What then will there be for us?" Finally, Mark 10:32-34 states the following: “They were on their way up to Jerusalem, with Jesus leading the way, and the disciples were astonished, while those who followed were afraid. Again he took the Twelve aside and told them what was going to happen to him. “We are going up to Jerusalem,” he said, “and the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the teachers of the law. They will condemn him to death and will hand him over to the Gentiles, 34 who will mock him and spit on him, flog him and kill him. Three days later he will rise.” Each of these is emblematic of the means by which Christ saw and foretold of his own sacrifice, death, and resurrection. 8. Saint Athanasius’ approach to the understanding of human nature was somewhat different from his own contemporaries and in many ways somehwat different from the means by which current explicators of human nature from the Biblical standpoint may wish to espouse. As such, Athanasius believed that Christ was inferfacing with His creation before the fall, demanded into action by the fall, and fulfilled redemption as a result of the crucifixion. 9. According to St Anselm, the reason why God became man was to atone for the debt that humans had incurred in the primal and perpetuating rebellion of sin. This served as an affront to God’s infite dignifity and forced him to rectify the situation by becoming neither fully human nor fully divine in order to ameliorate the condition of sin that humans had emersed themesves within. Although St Anselm’s approach is simplistic, it strikes at many of the main identifiers which have continued to pervade modern Christianity as a means of helping to describe the nature of Christ’s divinity and humanity. 10. According to Abelard’s argument, the crucifixion was necessary to accomplish our redemption due to the fact that it was representative of an act of complete and utter charity; performed out of love. This consent to suffer for the realization of a greater good and the redemption of humanity all coalesces to create the ultimate sacrifice which is both moral and highly praiseworthy according to Abelard’s argument. Moreover, his argument sought to absolve many of the previously blamed actors in the crucifixion story as merley participants in something much larger than could be utilized to accrue blame. 11. According to John Calvin, Christ’s crucifixion served to pay the specific penalty for the sins of all individuals; as opposed to earlier interpretations that it was the general penalty for humanity’s sins. This necessarily paved the way to understand Christ’s suffering and death on the cross as paying the penalty for each individual’s sin throughout the entire course of human history. Such a specific approach to Christ’s suffering and death on the cross as fulfilling the express purpose of satisfying the requirement of sin’s redemption was an important step in further defining who would be considered among the elect; or worthy of such suffering and death. 12. One of the most interesting aspecst of Chrstianity and its growth is the means by which different churches and religious groups have sought to reinterpret the crucifixion story as a means of lending a particular approah credence with respect to the world view they espouse. This has been done by a number of early Chrsitian churches and can be briefly stated to inolve the way in which Mary has beencome a central figure at the foot of the cross, the traditional cross beam cross without the extension has falleen out of favor in artistic description, and the presence and number of nails has fallen from as many as possible 14 to as few as 3-4. All of these are a means of co-opting particular cultural and/or religious interpretations of the crucifixion story into different world views and/or religious means of observance. Although it cannot be definitively stated that any of these are patently wrong, it can be definitively noted that as a means of this level of integration and morphology, the understanding and representation of the crucifixion story has signifacntly changed over time. Read More