This question is asked by critics who want to point out the social, cultural and contextual nature of the Christian religion, and its relativism, presenting it as a product of society rather than of revelation.
To be fair, it is not only a critic of Christianity or a non-Christian who should ask such a question, but above all Christians. Every person of faith needs to know what his or her faith is based on, both to understand its nature and relevance, and to understand the world in which he or she lives. “Age will not make error into truth, and truth can afford to be fair. No true doctrine will lose anything by close investigation.”[1]
If I were born in a different country, culture, era, environment or spirituality, would I still be who I am today? If the answer is no, it means that my spirituality and faith are based on social, temporal or even accidental elements. If the answer is yes, then I am built on transcendent values that are self-sufficient and independent of context. So if I were born in the Arabian Peninsula, China or India, what would be left of who I am now? Would I still be a Christian? To answer such a complex question, it is worth revisiting another question as a starting point. If I were to adopt another religion, one that was completely different or even the opposite of the one I live in today, to what extent would I still be who I am today? It is a process of deconstruction and reconstruction.
An exercise in imagination
If I had been born into a Muslim, Buddhist or Hindu culture, I have no hesitation in asserting the overwhelming possibility that I would have been a Muslim, Buddhist or Hindu. The chance of being a Christian in such a context is remote, though not non-existent, so I will consider that possibility. The thought of being a Muslim or a Hindu not only doesn’t bother me at all, but seems absolutely natural to me, a position in which I see myself effortlessly. It would be a temporal and incidental value.
What I cannot imagine at all, and my soul rejects the idea with horror, is to be a person who does not love God and people, regardless of which of these religions I was born into or adopted. This is the transcendental value, which I would call the highest (though not independent) value. So I can see myself as anything in terms of religious forms, but not in substance: “Though I am free and belong to no one, I have made myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law. To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law” (1 Corinthians 9:19-21).
I can by no means see myself as a cold, cruel or hateful being, not by nature but by spiritual training. Although life could have thrown me into any place or environment, I cannot see myself in any form adopting rituals, forms or ceremonies that are not in harmony with the great principle of love of God and neighbour, a principle that I believe is implanted by creation in every conscience.
Of course, this supreme value and the essence of true religion—the love of God and of neighbour—is in turn influenced by the environment in which I was born, have lived and was educated, but external influences can never surpass in effectiveness the work of the Holy Spirit and the seal of creation—love—from which human goodwill springs, as in the case of the child Samuel or in the case of Jesus, both of whom were born into a hopeless environment and both of whom developed a love of God and of humanity not in relation to their environment but in spite of it.
Some will say that aspects of certain religions teach and practice hatred. This is true and, tragically, Christianity is not exempt. The only eternal exception is the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, who saw hatred as a crime. And while no religion is exempt from the internal (and external) manifestation of hatred in one form or another, the same cannot be said of all adherents of any of these religions. Weren’t there Nazis who saved Jews? Were there not whites who gave their lives to free black slaves from plantations or factories?
With some difficulty, and not without three tests from God, even the apostle Peter realised this: “Then Peter began to speak: ‘I now realise how true it is that God does not show favouritism but accepts from every nation the one who fears him and does what is right'” (Acts 10:34-35). These are remnants of the world of love from which we come. Realism, however, compels us to look at the billions of people who, without any resistance, reflect the environment into which they were born. If it is exclusivist, the religion practised involves the denial and condemnation of all that is different. It makes the practitioner of that religion the measure of all things or, as Paul says, it makes us measure ourselves against ourselves.
Religion, whatever it is, including the Christian religion, is only the shell; the content is different. Reduced to its essence, as Jesus says, the whole law (that is, all that is religion and belief and practice) is contained in the two great commandments: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind” and “Love your neighbour as yourself” (Matthew 22:37-39). Love God and love your neighbour. So this is the essence, the content, the eternal truth.
Paul says: “The commandments, ‘You shall not commit adultery’, ‘You shall not murder’, ‘You shall not steal’, ‘You shall not covet’, and whatever other command there may be, are summed up in this one command: Love your neighbour as yourself'” (Romans 13:9). Moreover, “The goal of this command is love, which comes from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith” (1 Timothy 1:5). If religion, whatever it may be, were to offer all its energy, all its knowledge, all its faith, all its wealth, or even suffer martyrdom, but be without love, it would be nothing. This is the universal value in time and space, this is the character of God, and this is the true goal of religion. True religion can be recognised by this sign: “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another” (John 13:35).
Reductionism
Some tribal and primitive cultures practise beheading people and then miniaturising the skulls for display or sale. Civilised people think they could never do such a thing. True, but nevertheless untrue. In the realm of spirituality, consciously or unconsciously, we practise the same primitive miniaturisation, with far-reaching consequences: we miniaturise the image of God on a human scale, and through various theological processes we try to contain the Uncreated in various forms or formulas. God is not a static or fixed value to be “seen”. Jesus says: “No one has ever seen God” (1 John 4:12). His image is transcendent and constantly moving. It is true, then, that if I worship God solely on the basis of yesterday’s light and reject today’s, I am worshipping an idol.
We miniaturise God’s work and reduce it to a limited space and time. On the other hand, we have the testimony of Scripture, of nature, of sacred and secular history, and even of the cherubim who say that “the whole earth is full of his glory” (Isaiah 6:3). We have Solomon’s prayer, “The heavens, even the highest heavens, cannot contain you” (2 Chronicles 6:18). We are tempted to limit divine revelation to one medium, the Bible, and one witness, the “chosen people” (an idea that is completely distorted, by the way). What happened before the Bible was written, before the canon was completed, what happens today when billions of people have not even heard that there is a Bible?
In other words, we are prescribing a path for the Most High and forcing Him to follow it. We are imposing on Him methods and means of revelation which, of course, have at their centre and as their model our own selves and our own limitations. We are in fact, consciously or unconsciously, engaged in a subtle reversal of roles. This reduction of the idea of God and the means of divine revelation to the level of a tribal miniature is not accidental, but coincides with the exaltation of the self, in the constant struggle to be like God (which is in fact to be God, that is, to change roles). In this way we deprive the testimony of God of the other effective means of testimony—nature, personal experience, the testimony of the Holy Spirit.
For example, it is a long way from what we understand by the term “chosen people” to what the Bible says about it. Our understanding and the word of Scripture—in this case as in others—are two straight lines that will never meet. Abraham, and by implication the “chosen people”, were not called to isolation or self-exaltation at the cost of degrading the human community, but were chosen for the blessing of all the nations of the earth. The choice of Abraham as the bearer of the knowledge of God was not meant to be a selection based on superiority or inferiority, but to bring God’s message of love to a world already living in hatred, self-exaltation, contempt for others, and the isolation of individualism.
Nothing could distort the image of God more than the manifestation of this profoundly anti-God attitude in the name of God. The chosen people, called to be servants at the table of the world, were not in a position of self-exaltation, of superiority by humiliating those to whom they were sent to serve, but in a position of profound humility before the nations of the world who were invited to join them at the table of the Gospel: “For who is greater, the one who is at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one who is at the table? But I am among you as one who serves” (Luke 22:27). The idea of a “chosen people” can only be considered in the context of the fulfilment of the mission for which this people was chosen.
Separated from its mission, this people ceases to be the “chosen people”. It becomes a people that has betrayed the vocation and mission given to it by God and has appropriated for itself the good intended for the whole of humanity. This, then, is the spectrum of world religions and the role and place of the Christian faith in the world. Only those who bring Christ to the world are Christians. If they cease to do this work, they cease to be Christians and must be brought back to repentance, as in Hebrews 6. Any accusation or denunciation by Christianity against another religion is in fact self-incrimination, for the denunciation speaks of the failure of the Christian world “as a chosen people” sent to bless the world.
I have heard strong complaints and denunciations of the immorality of the world in general and of America in particular. They are factual and seem to be justified complaints. What is missing from this kind of discourse is the part about salt losing its salting power. Is not the immorality of today’s world the failure of the Christian Church in general to be the salt of the earth and the light of the world? Is it not the consequence of the failure of Christian spirituality in its struggle against darkness?! It is with good reason that the Book of Revelation says: “Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place” (Revelation 2:5) and “you must prophesy again” (Revelation 10:11).
Beyond the narrow circle
What would have happened if Jesus had incarnated in India or China or an Arab country? What would His life have been like? What would the Gospels say about Him? Jesus would have been no different in essence, whatever culture or nation He might have been born into. He would have been different in form, of course, but not in substance. He was, is and will be, without exception, forever present in the life of the world and the universe. This is the message that flows from the words with which He introduces Himself: “‘I am the Alpha and the Omega’, says the Lord God, ‘who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty'” (Revelation 1:8).
The only argument that validates any religion or doctrine is love. It is the only argument that is universally accepted and that underlies the functioning of the universe in the paradigm of eternity. It is the only language that needs no translation and the only doctrine that needs no theology or commentary and explanation. “Every good and perfect gift is from above” (James 1:17) follows in the footsteps of the great, primordial, and eternal argument of love. In the absence of this argument, all the others together lose their force and their message and become charges in the indictment that the nations of the earth bring against the Church of Christ.
Our generation is refusing to read the label. They are interested in the content. It does not ask what our religion is called or what it preaches, but it wants to know what our religion has made of us, and in particular to what extent that religion has made us loving beings. In one form or another, this is the singular preoccupation of our generation. I do not see this outside the Church, but I experience it within it, as I see the younger generation looking with interest at the end product of the faith they are being asked to embrace. They ask: “What reason do I have to embrace this faith? How has it changed you so that I know what it will do to me?” People listen anxiously to the duet of testimony and practical life, thirsty and hungry for that harmony which unfortunately comes too late in many cases.
Paul asks: “How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?”(Romans 10:14). But God “has not left himself without testimony: He has shown kindness by giving you rain from heaven and crops in their seasons; he provides you with plenty of food and fills your hearts with joy” (Acts 14:17).
Translated into practical language, the statement would go something like this: “Although you had no Bible, no church, you did not know the testimony of Jesus, and you were not visited by any preacher, God revealed Himself to you through other means: nature, experience, spirituality.” In other words, to judge human history and human experience through the lens of a single means of revelation is too narrow (for God’s spectrum is much wider, more varied). God speaks “many times and in various ways” (Hebrews 1:1). He “does speak—now one way—now another”; the great problem is not that He does not want to speak, but that “no one perceives it” (Job 33:14).
All over the world there are people who have heard and listened to God’s voice from the first gentle whisper, others who did not hear Him even when He thundered or roared on Sinai, and others who have never heard Him at all. There are some who have received the knowledge of God from the humblest testimonies of nature or experience, while others have received but rejected the highest testimony sent by Him who is “the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of His being, sustaining all things by His powerful word”(Hebrews 1:3).
In the Bible and in the history of the Jewish people, God has revealed His character—the nature of His love—but He has not limited this revelation to one means, one place, one people or one time, for “the whole earth is full of His glory” (Isaiah 6:3), with which He works everywhere, from the rising of the sun to its setting. For “the earth is the Lord’s” (Psalm 24:1) and “my name will be great among the nations” (Malachi 1:11). For this reason, “many will come from the east and the west” (Matthew 8:11) to the kingdom, for He has not left anywhere without a testimony.
Both the Scriptures and the history of the chosen people do not claim to contain the fullness of the Godhead, because “Jesus did many other things as well” (John 21:25). We “know in part” (1 Corinthians 13:9) what will be fully revealed at His coming, and therefore we refuse to submit to our judgement the ways and means that God uses to enlighten the world. I am convinced that the work of God, though general, is so well and so lovingly tailored to the measure of each one of us, that whoever they are, and whatever argument they might try to bring against His love, the general response to His truth is clear: “The man was speechless” (Matthew 22:12)—some out of joy, others, out of anger, but they were all speechless!
