WRONG THINKING
Retraining our minds is hard. The older we get, the harder it is to change our thinking about anything. Just like it is hard to change a physical habit, it is hard to change the way we think once an idea is fixed in our minds as a truth. This is especially true with respect to religious beliefs and practices. The longer we believe that our religion is right, the harder it is to accept that religion is sin.
Christians and Jews are the product of thousands of years of wrong thinking and wrong teaching by false prophets — including parents who pass on what they have learned from their parents and false prophets (e.g. rabbis, preachers, authors, theologians, etc.). These teachings have been preached, recorded and verbally shared by Old/First Covenant religionists who have presumed to speak for God by interpreting the Bible literally. Along the way, these interpretations have become accepted, adopted, repeated and practiced so often that they have acquired the value of irrefutable doctrine in the various religious cultures in which they circulate. But, they are strongholds of wrong thinking because they are based on literal interpretations of the written Bible — not on God’s spoken voice.
These interpretations have been in place for so long and endorsed by so many reputable religious leaders, including parents, that they are never — or at least rarely — challenged from within a religious culture. Anyone who dares to challenge a longstanding doctrine will be sure to face criticism, rejection, and perhaps even excommunication if they introduce a doctrine that conflicts with traditional doctrines.
In some religions, offenders to existing doctrines might even suffer physical punishment or even death. The religious officers (i.e.police) who monitor and enforce adherence to doctrines within a religion will exercise their responsibility to maintain doctrinal purity on which the organizational integrity of the religion is based and do whatever they need to do to root out any thinking or practices that threaten the status quo. The rule is that people who break religious laws must be punished. This is the story of Jesus who, for good reason, was considered to be a law breaker. And it is the story of anyone who breaks traditions or rules of the religion to which they otherwise subscribe.
Jesus was born a Jew and, as far as we know, lived as a devout Jew for the first thirty years of his life. But, things changed radically after he was baptized by the holy spirit. Before his baptizm, Jesus conformed to Jewish laws and traditions. After his baptism, Jesus was a lawbreaker with respect to matters of the written laws and traditions that Jews observed. That, of course, caused conflict between Jesus and the religious leaders.
It can be correctly said that everything Jesus said and did reinterprets the written law. Through his actions and his teaching, he gave the correct, spiritual interpretation of the Laws of Moses found in the Old/First Covenant. In effect he tore down strongholds of wrong thinking created by men and replaced them with the spoken word of God. This is how Jesus fulfilled the law.
Jesus, of course, is a model for New Covenant disciples who also should be reinterpreting and appropriately applying the spiritual meaning of the written law in their own lives. This is what New Covenant disciples do. They do not accept the written law as God’s final word like Old/First Covenant religionists do.
Like Jesus, New Covenant disciples understand the “first the natural and then the spiritual” principle. They know that reading the literal words of the Bible is not the same thing as listening to God’s voice. That is why they interpret the Bible symbolically — not literally.
As disciples/learners, they study the Bible, but, while studying, they also listen for God’s spoken voice to interpret the symbolic meaning of the literal words that they read. Then they report what they hear God say — not just the literal words. For New Covenant disciples, the final word is hearing God’s voice through the law written on their hearts.
When New Covenant disciples reinterpret the written law they, like Jesus, will find themselves in conflict with contemporary religious leaders and friends who only interpret the Bible literally. This is what happens when anyone within a religious community disagrees with established doctrines and practices. People who were friends become religious enemies of people who no longer share their beliefs. Old/Covenant religionists will strengthen their doctrinal strongholds/beliefs to thwart any attack by New Covenant disciples who challenge their religion which is based on literal interpretations of the Bible with spiritual interpretations.
Conflict is not pleasant, but it is to be expected because it is exactly what Jesus warned about when he said he did not come to bring peace but to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law and a man’s foes will be those of his own household. And it all stems from the issue of how the law should be interpreted: literally or symbolically.
AUTHORS’ NOTE: See Literal or Symbolic Interpretation Part 1, Literal or Symbolic Interpretation Part 2, and Literal or Symbolic Interpretation Part 3 for more about interpretation of the written law.