I found a bible tract—more like a glossy magazine than a tract—in the mailbox and, for some inexplicable reason, I started to read it. The tract is devoted entirely to sin, which begs the question: why do its authors know so much about the subject? More particularly, it is obsessed with a theology associated with words like evil, sacrifice, atonement, salvation, ransom, etc. Then I stumbled upon a passage which reminded me why this theology, when taken too far, itself becomes a force for evil in the world: “Disease fills our hospitals and saps the vitality of many people. Directly or indirectly, sin causes it all.”
I grew up next door to a family that seemed stricken by this theology. They were good people, and deeply religious. The mother was almost a surrogate mother to me, often sitting me down for a snack after school and listening to me tell how my day was. Then, when I was in my late teens, she became terminally ill with cancer. In her last months, each member of our household had deep and deeply painful conversations with her. It was clear that she believed she was dying of cancer because she deserved it. She must have done something wrong to merit her pain. Again and again, she asked my mother: “What have I done? Tell me. What bad thing have I done?” My mother grieved twice. She grieved the loss of her best friend, and she grieved what seemed to her an irrevocable loss of grace.
The dark (but perhaps equally liberating) underbelly of a theology of grace is that, not only do we not deserve the love God pours out for us, but likewise, we do not deserve the pain we feel.
In confronting pain, the first question we ask is: why? If we look to faith only for explanations, then we miss other opportunities. If we settle for an explanation (e.g. pain is caused by sin), then we never encounter further questions which offer further insights.
In fact, there may be no explanation.
In fact, the question may be pointless.
In confronting a tract like this, one approach might be to examine the grounding for its claims. In all such tracts, the grounding is the same: scriptural authority, as evidenced by explicit quotations. Even if we accept that scripture alone is authoritative, there are countless methods to enter the text. We might engage in text criticism, a term of art which examines “context” as much as “text,” seeking the where and the when of the passage. In what circumstances was it written? What sort of a person or collection of persons composed it? To whom was it addressed? A prior set of questions considers the linguistics, translation, and the loss or addition of nuance as we read across the millennia-wide divide. In this particular instance, the authors of the tract cite a passage from Isaiah as authority: “the inhabitants shall not say, I am sick: the people that dwell therein shall be forgiven their iniquity” (Isaiah 33.24). So we might begin by asking questions about the book of Isaiah. Who was this Isaiah, this Hebrew prophet? When did he live? How did he live? What is the historical context? Who were the people of Israel whom he was addressing? In fact, we discover that the passage is a two-verse fragment tacked on to the end of the chapter in which it appears. As for the book of Isaiah, it is well-established that it comprises three major sections, each composed at a different time, altogether spanning nearly two centuries. What we do know for a certainty is that no single man could have composed all that we have come to know as the book of Isaiah.
We might take a different approach, historical criticism, for example, considering the passage within the broader sweep of the prophetic works as they address the nation of Israel in crisis. In 586 B.C.E., Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon conquered Israel and led it back into bondage. The exile seemed then to bring to a close all that had been told in the Pentateuch. Israel’s grief was overwhelming. It seemed the end of time itself had arrived. Understood in its historical context, this passage may be interpreted as an answer to the particular concerns of a nation alienated from its roots. Sin and wellness are national in scope; to read these concerns as applied to a single body misses the point.
On and on goes the exegesis, applying further techniques, referring to translations and concordances, reviewing commentaries, until, after much reading, conversation with peers, and quiet reflection, we arrive at a sense, however tentative, of the passage’s meaning.
This illustrates how arduous is the process of reading—or least of understanding what we read. Given the Bible’s length, a careful examination of each of its verses could well preoccupy us for more than the span of our natural lives. And so it angers me to read commentary from those who treat it flippantly. The revelation of meaning, like the apprehension of grace, may well be deserved in one person no more than in any other, but the effort we take to appropriate meaning vastly improves the likelihood that such revelation will occur. No gardener can claim to cause the seeds to germinate, but an attentive gardener still bears better fruit.