Anyone who knows me, has ever taken a class from me, whether at Shiloh Church, University of Dayton's Life-Long Learning Institute, or through Shiloh's Bible @ Boston's program, likely knows that I have a life-long affinity for archeology. If you know me well, you likely know that my favorite publication is the Biblical Archaeology Review, edited by Hershel Shanks. You also likely know that I firmly believe that the revelations of ancient times can help us better understand the world we live in today.
A point in that case is timely and important, I think. In the most recent issue of Biblical Archaeology Review, Mark R. Fairchild offered a meaningful and exciting article, entitled, "Laodicea's 'Lukewarm' Legacy: Conflicts of Prosperity in an Ancient Christian City". In the article, Fairchild makes clear that Laodicea's history, while something of a remaining mystery, is an indication that, at least at times in the city's history, Christians and Jews shared space and, perhaps, time. The implications are drawn from relics that have been discovered during excavations of ancient Laodicea. Most telling of those discoveries is an ancient column, now broken, that depicts four symbols. Those symbols were a Jewish shofar, or ram's horn, a menorah, and an olive branch, which can be representative of both Judaism and Christianity. The fourth etching was a large Christian cross. The Jewish symbols were carved before the Christian images, but the Christian images were added to, instead of covering over, the Jewish ones.
The fact that both Jewsih and Christian symbols appeared together on ancient finds is important. The author suggests that the presence of both religions' symbols means that those faiths likely took place in the community side-by-side, likely in the same spaces and perhaps even at the same time. This suggestion reflects something that we have long suspected of the early pre-Christian and Christian periods. We have suspected that the Christian movement grew out of the Jewish synagogue and, at least for a time, lived fairly amicably side-by-side. The important point of the carvings is that neither symbol or faith is demonstrated at superior to the other. The presence of the unified symbols shows that they were contemporarily respected and honored images.
Which brings me to the age in which we live. We heard, just yesterday, of the desecration of a Jewish cemetery in Missouri, where hundreds of tomb stones were thrown over, displaced and broken. At this time, before the video cameras are investigated, there is no suspect and no claim of responsibility.
I suspect that the accommodation of developing Christianity in the synagogues of ancient Judaism likely lasted until the institutionalization period of Christian development, beginning after 70 c.e. The separation picked up steam, of course, at the Council of Jamnia, in 90 c.e., when the Hebrew canon list was further established by the exclusion of "Christian" elements. This event signaled an institutional break between the two faiths.
Since then, there has been varying degrees of open conflict, sometimes subtle anti-semitism, outright violence, mistrust and competition that is meant to prove that one side or the other is more faithful as God's favorite. If the carvings at Laodicea teach us anything it is that Christians and Jews can live, worship and thrive alongside one another. We can live in unity, sharing time and space in such a way that both faiths, and all of the human race, benefit. We can, if we will, return to a state of honoring each other's sacred symbols, holy places and important images. There is no room in that relationship, and it is of no benefit to humankind, to desecrate graves, destroy images, or harm people.
Learn the lessons of the past, my friends, and coexist. It is of benefit to all people!
No comments:
Post a Comment