Foreigners
November 4, 2011
Excerpt from Joshua 8:30-35
"Every one of the commandments of Moses was read by Joshua
to the whole gathering, which included women and children, as well as the
foreigners living among them." (Good News Bible)
Reflection by William C. Green
It's easier to tolerate and enjoy what’s foreign than to
consider it carefully—as on U.N. Day in the elementary school I attended.
Colorful crafts and dress (we called the attire "costumes") along with exotic
culinary treats made the day.
But diversity is often offensive. Maybe not so with the
foreigners also listening when Joshua read the commandments. But as time went
on, no spirit of those early U.N. Days could prevail among different Jewish or
Christian thinkers on matters as basic as the meaning of each of the
commandments.
Comparable diversity characterized the early church,
sometimes leading to bloody conflict. There were various types of Christianity
from the beginning. These included very different views of Jesus among people
often foreign to each other and in disagreement with one orthodoxy or another.
The Muslim reformer, Irshad Manji, says, "Wherever there's
an orthodoxy (liberal or conservative), there is an enshrined identity and a
set of precepts for representing it correctly." For Manji, identity, like truth
itself, "isn't brittle." It's constantly "irrigated" by engagement with
others—"foreigners" to our accustomed ways of believing and behaving.
Rabbis are known for discussion and debate about contrary
views—what the Jews call "oral Torah"—as important as the written text. While
God's truth is never a matter of believing what we want, it is a living Word:
it isn't brittle and once for all. Our faith is enriched as we engage others,
taking into account views sometimes unsettling and foreign to our way of
thinking.
Prayer
God, may I hear the word you are speaking to me in views not
my own. Amen.
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