It was a rebuke all right, but maybe not as harsh as we
might think. As scholars acknowledge,
Jesus’ culture was unapologetically
hetero-patriarchal. Martha is, indeed, doing the
culturally acceptable thing—what’s expected of her. A
visiting rabbi is in her home, and she has to make sure
her hospitality is at least adequate, even if she’s not
the “hostess with the most-est.” Technically, she’s in
the right when she says to Jesus about her sister, “Tell
her to help me!” Can’t you hear her? “If you want
supper, tell her to get up off her ass and get in the
kitchen!”
Rather than a universal condemnation
of practicality, Jesus interrupts Martha’s usual
thinking, warning her in advance to pay attention by
repeating her name: “Martha, Martha.” He offers Martha
the chance to break out of several unjust systems that
hold her captive. Prepping food, of course, is women’s
work, freeing the men for the “real work” of
intellectual conservation or studying Torah. In fact, in
the world of Jesus, women are not taught the Torah as
the disciples of rabbis, but rather have to ask their
husbands about anything they don’t understand.
In fact, some scholars suggest that
this story represents the Lucan community’s response to
a debate about whether or not women can be disciples.
Can they be trusted with the teachings of Jesus?
Remember: in Jesus’ world, if you can be taught, you are
qualified to teach. The answer is a definite yes,
for both Luke and Jesus. Jesus calls Mary and Martha out
of rigid gender roles by according them the respect that
a man would have. By recognizing their equality with
him, he subverts the gender hierarchies that would
merely leave Mary and Martha “safe” in the kitchen,
rather than as active participants in revolution. By
calling them to be “useless” or socially inappropriate
in the moment, Jesus undermines sexist norms by
focusing on a wider vision of revolution.
Jesus calls on Martha, and on us, to either subvert or
critically adopt society’s expectations of gender.
Feminist theory tells us that these expectations are not
“natural” or inborn; rather, society teaches us ways of
“performing” gender with socially acceptable “scripts.”
Jesus recognized Mary and Martha as his equals (in
contradistinction to his culture at large!). To Jesus,
women have equal moral agency with men; equal ability to
teach and critique the received tradition; and equal
share in shaping his kind of revolution – the kind that
leads people to new cultural, political, and spiritual
understandings and patterns of life.
Jesus, who bent gender boundaries and empowered women,
suggests to queer men that we can and should be
feminists; we should resist and overturn language,
attitudes, or social mechanisms (like gender-role
rigidity or the notion of a single “feminine” or
“masculine”) that oppress women. This happens in the
revolutionary “preaching” of organized activism and
daily conversations, which we can use as invitations to
adopt a more radical and liberating way of life. We see
in the Gospel of Matthew, however, that Christ’s
affirmation of women does not come without a
cost—without an adjustment or clarification of his own
values.
Matthew
15:21-28 (NRSV)
21 Jesus
left that place and went away to the district of Tyre
and Sidon. 22 Just then a Canaanite woman
from that region came out and started shouting, "Have
mercy on me, Lord, Son of David; my daughter is
tormented by a demon." 23 But he did not
answer her at all. And his disciples came and urged him,
saying, "Send her away, for she keeps shouting after
us." 24 He answered, "I was sent only to
the lost sheep of the house of Israel." 25 But
she came and knelt before him, saying, "Lord, help me."
26 He answered, "It is not fair to take
the children's food and throw it to the dogs." 27 She
said, "Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that
fall from their masters' table." 28 Then
Jesus answered her, "Woman, great is your faith! Let it
be done for you as you wish." And her daughter was
healed instantly.
Oddly enough, as we read the passage above, we realise
that Jesus doesn’t seem to have a problem with the
“Canaanite” woman’s gender; her ethnic background seems
to be the main issue. Is it possible that the one whom
Christians call Messiah, the Son of God and even the
(sinless) Second Person of the Trinity, is a racist?
Many Christians (including myself)
find this story very uncomfortable indeed: the messiness
of this passage (which is arguably less messy than the
Gospel of Mark’s version) doesn’t square with our
expectations of a truly good human being, never mind
God-in-Flesh! I suspect that part of many Christians’
discomfort is a refusal to really think through the
implications of Jesus’ humanity (whatever we
might say of his deity). The key point seems to be this:
if Jesus cannot really learn (i.e., if knows everything
because he’s God), in what sense can he be called
really human? And if he, being God, really is being
racist, what does that say about God? To put it mildly,
in the words of transmale theologian Justin Tanis, this
story “is not the image of Jesus I was taught in Sunday
school.” [2]
Christian angst aside, Jesus does
open himself to new insight and ways of performing his
mission in the world. Dr. Walter Deller, a respected
Canadian Anglican theologian, once asked me about this
passage in a personal conversation – “Is holding the
beliefs of your culture a sin before or after
someone raises your consciousness about them?” Justin
Tanis claims, “This story details Jesus’ one and only
trip outside Palestine.” [3]
Is it also possible that this encounter with the
Canaanite woman is Jesus’ first opportunity to evaluate
his beliefs and the extent of his mission? ... (continue reading)
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2 COMMENTS ON THIS ESSAY:
I keep wanting to correct the tiny typos that I see...especially the last sentence: "The peace of Christ be yours." LOL. Minor thing!
Fantastic essay! I think one of the most exciting ideas suggested by your essay is the idea of adopting a subversive masculinity, a masculinity of which Jesus (at least in this characterization) is a superb example. I also appreciated the inclusion of a critique of our postmodern disdain for metanarratives. While I think this disdain arises quite naturally out of the radical critiques and the sheer volume of alternative readings of "important" texts that have accompanied poststructuralism and deconstruction, I also think there are radical possibilities (and even something of a practical imperative) to be found in reconstructing metanarratives on a wider, more inclusive foundation, by weaving together the millions of personal narratives that structure our daily existences, as queer men, as masculine, as feminists, as people of color, as people with disabilities, etc. - that out of this melting pot or mosaic or what have you, certain patterns begin to emerge and it is these patterns that offer us an opportunity to write our own story, our own grand narrative and lend our movement direction, sweeping up the whole of humanity in its march forward. This is just a flowery way of suggesting that the problem lies not with these grand narratives, but with their exclusivity. I also thought your approach to forgiveness was refreshing. I think what I've found missing in some of the essays was a failure to question or seek forgiveness for our own transgressions against one another or understand our attackers. On the surface this doesn't sound very radical, until you realize that we ourselves are the attackers at times and that change begins with ourselves. Wow, that was a lot more than I was going to write. Anyway: Thank You!