🐮 Easter 2
Reflection
Good morning and welcome to First Formation. This is Brother Logan Isaac, broadcasting from Albany, Oregon. Our readings for the second week of Easter come to us from Acts five, Psalm 118, revelation one in John 20. Um, as an Easter Tide reading, we read. Uh, from the Old Testament and so, or the, I'm sorry, the New Testament in Psalms.
And nonetheless, um, acts five stood out to me, uh, for a very similar reason as last, uh, last week when I spoke of Lent five. And that is to constantly bring our attention back to the oldest known parts of the, of the Hebrew Bible Judges four and five is one of the oldest ones. It's where we get one of these words that we hear, um, uh, given to Jesus in verse 31, God exalted Joshua the Messiah at his right hand as leader and savior, that he might give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins in Judges five, the song.
Of, uh, Deborah and Barack, which is probably older than the narrative account in Judges four. Uh, after we get this one line introducing the, then saying Deborah and Barack, the son of eNom, on that day, the leaders that the song begins, the oldest song that textual criticism has identified in the Hebrew Bible begins that the leaders took the lead in Israel.
And people offered themselves willingly, bless the Lord. Now we, we, it existed in Hebrew, but it has not survived. The only, the oldest surviving complete Hebrew scripture we have is the Len grad Codex, known as LX X, or abbreviated LXX. Um, and also it's known as the step two again. Uh, the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible is the oldest thing we have, and it begins in Greek, or it uses this word Arco Archos, the leaders lead and the lead that the leaders took.
The lead in Israel and Ho Arco Archos. Archs. Arco meaning first Ag oss meaning person or, um. Uh, soul or like, like ego is, we know it now through like Sigmund Freud, but ego is that, that thing that makes you, you, in Latin, it's probably animus, which is soul. Uh, the first soul, the first person, the, the most human, human.
Would be Argos. Um, and this is the leaders that took the lead in Israel in Judges five. Fast forward to Luke's sequel, known as Acts, and he said, and uh, he remembers the community. Um, I. Saying that God exalted the Messiah whose name is Joshua as leader and savior, and the leader part is Arch Goss, just as Joshua five.
Um, is, uh, or, or judges five contains Argos. That's what leader is to be the leader of any community in the Hebraic imagination is to be an Argos, the most human of humans. That's why another title, Ben Adam, which means son of AAM or Earthling. Adamo being a shortened version of ahah, which is a feminine pronoun, a feminine noun that means ground or earth or soil.
So if you wanna shorten that, you don't lose the gender. It's still, uh, it's, it's like an inverted, uh, uh, patriot in Latin. Patriot is, uh, a little thing of the patros, uh, over the patter. So patriot is like a Father ling. In Latin, in, uh, in Greek, um, or I'm sorry, Hebrew Adam is to be a thing of the earth. An Earthling.
I. And Jesus was male. And you know, it's been pretty typical for a good amount of human history that, uh, man, the male, um, the male sex is a stand-in for the rest. But really what the, the, the idea behind Beam is not the son of Adam. It is a child of humanity. Or in other words, the most human of humans. And so if you want to be a leader, you better look like everybody else.
You think you're leading, you better have done your homework, done your farm work, done your, all the things that you expect to, of all the people you expect to lead, you better have a decent amount of grasp of what all it is. That's why David, who is a poet, uh, a songwriter. The youngest of eight children, the smallest as well, who could rise up from these tiny little, you know, this, uh, diminutive stature to defeat, defeat Goliath.
That is the best you can hope for in a king in a Hebraic imagination. Saul kind of sucked. Solomon sucked in a different way, but David. Is who we can look at and be reminded what it means to be an ArcHa Goss and why it's important that the Messiah come from the line of David, not because Solomon is also cool, but because David gives us the ability to find meaning in something that was not created by divine.
Uh. Intent in the Bible, in in the Hebrew Bible, kings are kind of bad news. The first one, ab bialek in judges nine is horrible. And they encounter a bunch of horrible kings, uh, in Canaan and Joshua and judges. Um, but Melek also reminds us of Molek, which is the eater of children, A God that was worshiped in Canaan when they were there.
So these, um, MLK Molek, meek, they are. Cognate of each other. And kings are not necessarily bad 'cause clearly David's pretty decent, but mostly they're bad. Um, so if you want to be a leader, there's certain things that you should, that people will be able to identify you. You will look no different than everybody else.
You will be the first soul, you'll be the most human of humans. If you think you're gonna lead with God's blessing, you're not gonna look any different or any better than anybody else. You'll be able to do the work, you'll be able to, um, humble yourself when you've done wrong, um, and you'll just do your best.
Um. That's why in Revelation, what does it mean to be the firstborn of the dead? It's this weird like paradox. The firstborn of the dead, just like ruler of kings is kind of a paradox. But you can see exactly what it means by that. If you've done the reading and you're interpreting the Hebrew Bible as a whole, instead of cherry picking it, rulers are the good things.
Arch Goss. Um, and the kings are like, eh, that's as. That can be okay, but it's not God's intent. But you can be a ruler of kings. You can be a king over kings or a ruler of rulers because ruler in the Hebrew, uh, al, um, I. To is where we get this word dominion. It really means responsibility 'cause it's only through the Latin that we get Domos and, and domicile and dominate.
I don't like dominion. I think that's a horrible translation. I think responsibility is better because when the Bible begins talking about power and genesis, the good power. Which is often, um, translated to rule is al not Mole or ek. Um, and this is where we get that Mumford and Sons song, Tims sch to al, uh, or Tims schul, um, is to rule rightly, to rule responsibly, to be a standard by which all others understand what it means to be human.
If you want to be a leader, if you want other people to look to you, to be inspired by you, to follow you, you will look. The way that all humans are essentially supposed to look, that power does not corrupt you, but power only gives you more power to do good because you take responsibility seriously. It's like Uncle Ben said in Spider-Man, more power comes more responsibility.
You can reject the power, you can turn over your privilege. Or you can take ownership of and responsibility for your power and do the right thing with it and help other people less fortunate than you. Lead people less fortunate than you, but it will not be through domination. It will not be through dominion.
The, you know, this, I, I hate that word. Um, but it will be through responsibility. It'll be through al. You will be a ruler, not because you're wearing a crown on your head, but because you are the standard, the standard bearer of all of humanity. You're not better than anybody else. If anything, you are the, the humanist of humans.
You are a child of humanity. You are a Ben or Baram. If you think leadership is only open to men. Uh, throw your Bible away because the first leader, the most ancient leader, according to, you know, the, the language used is a woman, Deborah. She was the first judge of Israel, and they were leaders who led the people non hereditary, charismatic.
They rose to the occasion and faded away. When they were done, they did not grasp at what. They could get, they accepted responsibility for what they were given, and that's what it means to be a leader or a ruler of, uh, of the people.
