Yesterday morning I shared in a stimulating and challenging Bible study on Genesis chapter 16. Thanks guys!
Genesis 16 recounts a painful story of family dysfunction, abuse, jealousy, shame, and injustice. It is not a pretty picture; but sadly it is an all too familiar tale.
Sarai who is married to Abram is suffering from the desperate social stigma of having failed to produce off-spring. Heartbroken at what she perceives to be her failure, Sarai offers Abram her Egyptian slave-girl Hagar in the hopes that, through Hagar as surrogate mother, she may be able to “obtain children”.
When Hagar becomes pregnant she loses respect for her mistress and looks “with contempt” upon Sarai. Sarai is deeply offended by her slave-girl’s attitude, blames her husband, and curses him for the “contempt” she has received. Abram gives Sarai permission to treat Hagar in any way she desires. Sarai, using her position as privileged wife, “oppresses, afflicts, humiliates Hagar.” (Genesis 16:6) Hagar flees into the wilderness hoping to escape the abuse she is suffering at the hands of her mistress.
Hiding in the wilderness Hagar is “found” by an angel. Here is where this depressing story gets difficult.
The angel of the Lord said to her, ‘Return to your mistress, and submit to her.’ (Genesis 16:9)
The English translation fails to adequately convey the shocking nature of the angel’s command to Hagar.
The Hebrew word translated in Genesis 16:9 as “submit” is the same word used in Genesis 16:6 to describe Sarai’s mistreatment of Hagar. The angel is telling Hagar to go back to Sarai and be “oppressed, afflicted, humiliated” by her.
According to the story, there is no evidence Sarai was ever rebuked or corrected for her abuse of her slave-girl. Sarai does not appear to have been instructed to change her abusive behaviour towards her slave-girl.
While it is true that Hagar has wronged her mistress by treating her with “contempt”, Sarai holds all the power in this relationship. Hagar is utterly vulnerable. Her situation is hopeless. She is trapped between almost certain death in the wilderness and obedience to a messenger of God which means returning to submit to abuse at the hands of her mistress. Hagar is about to bear a child. She has no visible means of support. She is utterly alone. She is an outcast, cut off from her own people and rejected by her owner. Hagar’s only realistic choice is to return to the painful situation she has fled.
Clearly, there are situations from which vulnerable, powerless people must flee. But, may it not also be true that the only way the dysfunction of blame, jealousy and recrimination with which we are so familiar will ever comes to an end is when someone breaks the cycle of violence by refusing to operate out of the same consciousness which caused the abuse?
Could it be that this is what Jesus was getting at in the painful instruction he gave to his followers in Matthew chapter 4?
‘You have heard that it was said, “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also; and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile. (Matthew 4:38-41)
This is not a prescription for the conduct of maintaining social cohesion through the legitimate enforcement of law and order. But it does point to the costly way of the cross where we discover that, when we can surrender our demand to be treated justly, we connect with the true, deep, inner strength of being that is the presence of God in our lives. When we find this place of strength, it is possible we will also find the power to respond in a truly transformative manner to the afflictions we perceive in our lives.
In A Spacious Place 
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April 27, 2012 at 8:28 am
Tress
I suppose what you are saying is that if you are between a rock and a hard place. then you really have no choice but to go on with the hard place, but that your attitude towards it with any luck may mitigate the circumstance?
April 27, 2012 at 8:07 pm
jaqueline
What is being said is making a rule out of this exception. Her turning around back to Sarai took a supernatural intervention along the lines of an Angel appearing to Abraham about to kill Isaac. How many women have been told by Church leaders to submit to their husbands despite abuse, let alone the men who have found themselves with abusive wives…and all these kids on the street…they are all Hagars…who would rather die in a desert than…..
April 27, 2012 at 1:51 pm
Mark
This may be another reference to the message of 2 Cor. 4:7: “But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that this all-surpassing power is from God, and not from us.” The problem of clay, made of common material, is that it is breakable. But if it does not break, it can be useful to contain. A relevant question for me is to ask how much we as the clay can tolerate our tolerance for abuse, oppression or affliction? Like Job, it is not an easy road to walk.
April 27, 2012 at 6:54 pm
jaqueline
The thing that is important here is to remember that it was and real life, in your face, invisible made visible ,angel of the Lord that told Hagar to return. Hagar’s return should never ever be used as an example to return to abuse.
Later Abraham casts out BOTH Hagar and her child…and she is again in the wilderness…and God hears her cry and this time she gets to be the first and only person in the Hebrew scriptures to name God. ” The God Who Sees”, she calls him.
April 27, 2012 at 7:05 pm
jaqueline
‘You have heard that it was said, “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also; and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile. (Matthew 4:38-41)
The other important thing to remember is this paragraph by Jesus is a description of being FORCED. It is not a recommendation to neglect the rightful seeking of justice and being treated humanely especially in a democracy ( while we still have it )
April 27, 2012 at 10:24 pm
lindsay
Wow! I didn’t realize Hagar was such an important figure in the history of the Jewish, Christian and Muslim traditions. Reading up on her in wikipaedia it seems she has significant influence even today too … http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hagar
April 27, 2012 at 10:35 pm
lindsay
And one of the sidetrack links off wikipedia and interesting article on “Jewish Expulsion and Jewish Exile in Scholastic Thought” … http://people.bu.edu/dklepper/RN470/expulsion_exile.html …
To think the Holocaust, 9/11, the war on Iraq etc might have all stemmed from an argument between two women many years ago. Who would have thought that even then, back in those days, women could have that much influence ….
April 28, 2012 at 9:11 am
jaqueline
Hi Lindsay
I essentially replies to your posts below…but I had to add this:
the Holocaust, I think is peculiarly a result of Christian attitudes toward the Jews….when you read Luther or Calvins’ teachings about the Jews, their words may as well have come out of Hitler and Goebbel’s mouth. One could argue that the Third Reich was finally implementing their recommendations once and for all, it maybe why many worldwide were indifferent to the plight of the jews, being quite accustomed for nearly 2000 years to the ‘right’ of their persecution.
These words come at the end ( chapter 11?) of a rather long twisted and vile piece of theological writing of the horribleness of the Jews by Luther to the lords and Princes of Germany. : On the Jews and Their Lies, 1543,by Martin Luther (1483-1546),Translated by Martin H. Bertram
“First, to set fire to their synagogues or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn, so that no man will ever again see a stone or cinder of them. This is to be done in honor of our Lord and of Christendom, so that God might see that we are Christians, and do not condone or knowingly tolerate such public lying, cursing, and blaspheming of his Son and of his Christians. …
In Deuteronomy 13:12 Moses writes that any city that is given to idolatry shall be totally destroyed by fire, and nothing of it shall be preserved. If he were alive today, he would be the first to set fire to the synagogues and houses of the Jews. ….. so that Moses has become entirely unknown among them (!!) (as we said before), just as the Bible became unknown under the papacy in our day. So also, for Moses’ sake, their schools cannot be tolerated;…
Second, I advise that their houses also be razed and destroyed. For they pursue in them the same aims as in their synagogues. Instead they might be lodged under a roof or in a barn, like the gypsies. This will bring home to them the fact that they are not masters in our country, as they boast, but that they are living in exile and in captivity, as they incessantly wail and lament about us before God.
Third, I advise that all their prayer books and Talmudic writings, in which such idolatry, lies, cursing, and blasphemy are taught, be taken from them.
Fourth, I advise that their rabbis be forbidden to teach henceforth on pain of loss of life and limb. …
Fifth, I advise that safe-conduct on the highways be abolished completely for the Jews. For they have no business in the countryside, since they are not lords, officials, tradesmen, or the like. Let them stay at home. ( how they are supposed to do that now that their houses are burnt down Luther doesn’t say )…. For you, too, must not and cannot protect them unless you wish to become participants in an their abominations in the sight of God. Consider carefully what good could come from this, and prevent it.
and these particularly awful words are his:
” Even if they were punished in the most gruesome manner that the streets ran with their blood, that their dead would be counted, not in the hundred thousands, but in the millions, as happened under Vespasian in Jerusalem and for evil under Hadrian, still they must insist on being right even if after these 1,500 years they were in misery another 1,500 years, still God must be a liar and they must be correct. In sum, they are the devil’s children, damned to Hell…”
April 26, 2017 at 4:31 am
AM
I had never heard that before, thank you for sharing. And I appreciate your thoughts on Hagar’s situation as well.
April 28, 2012 at 8:30 am
jaqueline
The story of Hagar came to my attention when I heard an interview with Charlotte Gordon who wrote the book ” the Woman Who Named God ”
This is part of the blurb:
“Dr. Gordon calls on us to move beyond polarity to recognize our common ground, when she says,
“So often our conflicts in the Middle East and in Afghanistan have been painted as struggles between Islam and the West.
I want to shake some of my fellow Americans and say that, Abraham and the Bible that you revere and love, actually originated in the land you often describe as being the land of your enemies.
That’s not a useful viewpoint.” She urges us to explore the true message of the Old Testament to discover, “a language that is far more complicated, rich, and filled with love and peace as opposed to hatred.”
(hosted by Justine Willis Toms, #3329 the call number on the New Dimensions Website)
On a blog I read last night,
http://thinklaughweepworship.blogspot.ca/2008/04/god-of-hagar-part-1.htm
Emily, posits she thinks God had Hagar return for her safety, it being a dangerous journey for a woman all the way to Egypt. …but I am thinking that form a practical point of view…I think there needed to be no doubt that Ishmael was Abraham’s son. I also think that considering the cost to Hagar God made sure she knew he was with her absolutely.
I also see this in this wonderful story:.here are God’ ‘chosen’ rejecting the ‘other’ and God says..na ah….you actually belong with them and I see and hear you. And now they express that connection by fighting…I wonder if Abraham can repent from heaven to bring healing to his sons
There was note of a bit of prejudice in our thinking of Ishmael. The word that is used by God to describe Ishmael, Is translated as “wild ass”, can be and probably should be translated as “wild stallion”. I think this rings true especially as the Arab people are responsible for giving to us the beautiful Arabian horse which then was part of three Arab horses that produced the thoroughbred and many of the fabulous dressage, showjumping, racing, riding etc horses today. 🙂
I was touched to discover that Ishmael means ” God Hears” . Now if that does not shut us up about whether Islamic people are loved by God I don’t know what does.
April 28, 2012 at 2:26 pm
lindsay
Hi Jaqueline,
Wow! Your feedback again confirms for me that this story of Sarai and Hagar deserves to be explored again and again … from different perspectives …
If this story of Sarai and Hagar tells me anything .. today … it is as women we need to recognize that even in the seemingly most patriarchical societies we have had and continue to play a significant role on the world … where even our own domestic dramas can have an long-lasting impact on future generations … long after we ourselves are dead and buried, and our names forgotten.
So often it happens we blame men for all the horrors, abuse and evils of the world, yet we conveniently forget or understate our own role in all of this … We present ourselves as weak, as victimised, as the underdogs … powerless … Yet, we know that as women we cannot easily be sliced up into the stereotypical ‘perfect’ (Holy Virgin Mary Mother of God) or the stereotypical ‘evil’ (prostitute or conniving, manipulative bitch) or stereotypical ‘victims’ (nameless, faceless, women in burqua) yet we allow ourselves to buy into and propagate cultural notions that see women this way … why do we do that?
Sure, the law, the media, religion does not always favour a view of women outside of these stereotypical roles, but our strength (for good or bad ) is not always defined by the law or the media … or even our religion .. it is defined by our relationships … to God, to our families, to each other, to our work, to our community, to ourselves, our homes, to beauty … it seems we are hardwired to make and care about these connections (yes, I realize even this is a gross over-generalization and not absolute) … It seems we are hardwired to love and protect whomever or whatever the object of our love is … no matter how dysfunctional or intangible our expression of this love might appear … We women can be every bit as self-absorbed as the next guy. Feminine dictators don’t get a lot of airplay, but it doesn’t necessarily mean there isn’t an element of this in each of us … or that this is even necessarily always a bad thing …
I’m thinking maybe it is time to acknowledge our role in shaping history, beyond just that of child bearer or fallen women.
May 2, 2012 at 7:19 am
jaqueline
Yesterday I heard once again this idea of the Hagar story being used as a model for submitting to abuse.
I thought of this discussion and I thought of the Jews and I thought…in this logic that is being applied to the Hagar story it made sense that the world decided to withhold refuge for the German Jews, and suggest they return to their torment under the hands of their abusers.
Using that example, I hope will put an end to this nonsensical , dangerous interpretation of the story of Hagar.
May 5, 2012 at 11:57 am
lindsay
Hi Jaqueline,
I’m not ignoring what you wrote … I find I’m still struggling with this ‘power of women’ thing ,.. it seems I need to come to some sort of understanding myself before trying to tackle ‘submitting to abuse’ head on, or on a more global level … This seems as good a place as any … the story of Sarai and Hagar … perhaps part of the answer is here somewhere …
Here’s my problem … or at least parts of it … It’s rather jumbled at the moment … lI’ll try to post each dilemma as a separate comment … in the hope that at least some bits might make a bit of sense …
– Sarai and Hagar … and how their story of broken relationship impacts us even today, and what it teaches us …
May 5, 2012 at 11:58 am
lindsay
– Karen Armstrong … she is a strong proponent of the global Golden Rule which is wonderful – a return to this fundamental , basic rule … love thy neighbour as thyself … what she says makes sense to me…
… but I find myself struggling with the Charter of Compassion … do we only subscribe to the Charter and practical action for a better world because we are afraid for the future of the world … … compassion as a disciplined effort … a religious and moral duty … ? … something doesn’t gel here … but it might be the closed thing to a possible Anglican Covenant I think … I haven’t actually read the Charter yet …
May 5, 2012 at 10:28 pm
jaqueline
q… compassion as a disciplined effort … a religious and moral duty …?
a…. a new commandment I give to you, that you love one another as I have loved you………..(Jesus)
May 5, 2012 at 11:59 am
lindsay
– Dalai Lama … talking about the power of women … a man talking to women in a way that makes sense but still from a man’s perspective … including stereotypes about women … and stereotypes about men … I’m all for empowering women, but does it mean we can only empower our women at the expense of our men? How do we address with the breakdown of family? … I know many men who are compassionate and caring. I’m really struggling to put men and women into these separate boxes … something just doesn’t gel …
May 5, 2012 at 12:00 pm
lindsay
– And now since yesterday … the movie the ‘The Wave’ (Der Welle’ German with English sub-titles on Netflix) … The movie doesn’t have a direct commentary on the power of woman but does on the effect of the breakdown of family, the creation of an environment for autocracy, community building and the breakdown of community in modern Germany.
The question the movie poses is … could Nazi Germany happen again …. in modern Germany … the answer is sickening, raw and too easily yes … the root cause again, the breakdown of family and community … the primal need to fill this gap … How autocracy aims to build community even with positive intentions and goals, how seductive and powerful it can be become, and yet how it ultimately destroys itself and destroys relationship … and family … I’ve seen this from my own present and past life experience …
May 5, 2012 at 10:30 pm
jaqueline
I would be more worried about Nazi Germany happening in the USA than in Germany..
May 5, 2012 at 12:03 pm
lindsay
If the well-being of our children and our children’s children well into future generations depends on us being able to express our love for our children and the manner in which we as a global village express our love for our children … then surely we need to start with our children. Surely we don’t need a moral or religious duty to love our children … We love our children. Sometimes it seems what we really need more is to be given permission to love. When we are freed to love we naturally try to find a better way to express our love …. for all our children sakes …kinda like the dilemma Abraham had in this story of Sarai and Hagar. He took his dilemma to God and got an answer which seems kinda counter-intuitive … but both his children survived … well into future generations …
It seems, that what we ourselves need to hear repeatedly, and remind each other often, is simply that it’s okay to love unconditionally.
Do we need a fuhrer or an archbishop or a Charter of Compassion to tell us this …. ?
May 5, 2012 at 10:31 pm
jaqueline
when did Abraham take his dilemma about the two women to God? It seems that because he didn’t that this deep wound opened.
May 5, 2012 at 11:51 pm
lindsay
Oops … it’s more an Islamic tradition than a Christian tradition …
“According to Ibn Abbas, Ishmael’s birth to Hagar caused strife between her and Sarah, who was still barren. Abraham brought Hagar and their son to a land called Paran-aram or (Faran in Arabic, in latter days held to be the land surrounding Mecca). The objective of this journey was to “resettle” rather than “expel” Hagar. Abraham left Hagar and Ishmael under a tree and provided them with water. Hagar, learning that God had ordered Abraham to leave her in the desert of Paran, respected his decision. Muslims believe that God ordered Abraham to leave Hagar in order to test his obedience to God’s commands.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hagar
May 6, 2012 at 6:10 am
jaqueline
Oh my gosh…it is their version of the Isaac story!! Abraham tested! ( and passed ) the mother of their nation , not shamed and rejected, not desperate…but meek and obedient ( to a man, not to a revelation of God )
I wonder how it goes on…the retelling to keep their mother’s respect. I wonder does it have her as the woman who named God, or the one who God sees…?
May 6, 2012 at 10:55 am
lindsay
It seems there are different versions of what happened with Hagar and Ishmael in the desert … The one we know from Genesis seems to put Sarah in the driving seat … it almost sounds like she is pitting herself against Abraham and testing his loyalty …. maybe she is mad at Abraham (and God) because at that time he hadn’t given her children of her own …
“16 Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian slave named Hagar; 2 so she said to Abram, “The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my slave; perhaps I can build a family through her.”
Abram agreed to what Sarai said. 3 So after Abram had been living in Canaan ten years, Sarai his wife took her Egyptian slave Hagar and gave her to her husband to be his wife. 4 He slept with Hagar, and she conceived.
When she knew she was pregnant, she began to despise her mistress. 5 Then Sarai said to Abram, “You are responsible for the wrong I am suffering. I put my slave in your arms, and now that she knows she is pregnant, she despises me. May the Lord judge between you and me.”
6 “Your slave is in your hands, ” Abram said. “Do with her whatever you think best.” Then Sarai mistreated Hagar; so she fled from her.”
Sarah puts Abraham in this impossible position … Sleep with Hagar, have children with Hagar so I can build my family through her … Abraham does what Sarah tells him. Hagar gets pregnant … Abraham probably thinks Sarah will be pleased … she’s getting what she wanted … but no, she gets really mad and blames Abraham … Your are responsible for the wrong I am suffering. And she asks God to judge between Abraham and herself.
Why is Sarah mad at Abraham? Maybe she had thought the problem getting pregnant laid with Abraham? Then, because Hagar conceived by Abraham and Sarah did not, the problem getting pregnant would have looked like it lay with Sarah, not with Abraham … now that might explain Hagar’s contempt and Sarah’s response … she is irked – big time …. and probably feeling very vulnerable and defensive … possibly Sarah is afraid of being de-throned at this point …
Abraham doesn’t argue with Sarah … he tells her to do whatever she thinks best. So Sarah mistreats Hagar until Hagar can’t take it any more and flees.
Okay, so who has the power in this relationship, the man or the woman? Sarah seems to be the one who is driving … at least this part of the way ….
Is Abraham calling the shots ,,, representing himself as God … I just can’t see it … If anything, it seems Abraham was pretty much doing what Sarah wanted him to do, whatever qualms he might have had about it.
Then Sarah gets pregnant herself … okay so God ended up being merciful to Sarah and Abraham … and upholding their relationship … and God gave Sarah what she really wanted … in the end ….
… and it seems Abraham was listening to God after all … ‘cos later Abraham was ready to sacrifice Isaac (or Ishmael depending on our interpretation) … having a son would have had to be important to him at that time, you’d think … but by sacrificing either or Isaac or Ishmael …. Abraham would have stopped the generation of either the Jewish/Christian line or the Islamic line … The angel told him not to do it, so maybe what we have today is God’s will ….
… but in the end, Isaac and Ishmael both survived and thrived … God could have taken either Isaac or Ishmael out at any time if God wanted … (and stopped either line from procreating) … but is seems God was loyal to all 3 people, Abraham, Sarah and Hagar … and in the end favoured both the children and life …
It seems to me Abraham was loyal to Sarah and if you take the Islamic tradition and place it alongside this one, loyal to Hagar too. It seems animosity came from the women, not so much from the man …. and I think it is important to recognize this … we women can easily blame our men for our own unhappiness … and when we trigger events with repercussions that ripple far beyond the confines of our immediate household, we women then tend to distance ourselves from our own role in causing it … and men have a tendency to let us do this… As women we are happy to fly under the radar and let men take responsibility for all the aggression and animosity in the world … ?
… Maybe it’s time we women took a more realistic view of history, and instead of simply forwarding a cultural notion, evident even today, that women are and should be only kind and soft and caring …. or that women are victims all the time … or that men are always the aggressors and solely responsible for all the evils of the world … maybe it’s time we looked realistically at our own role in history … ?
Phew!!
May 6, 2012 at 3:20 pm
jaqueline
quick reading re the traditional story …I think the Islamic fathers are re-framing it in a way that suits the patriarchal ….Hagar the daughter of a king etc given as a slave to this nobody Abraham…her respecting hsi decision etc etc. Their traditional telling for the story has not a basis in the Quran which seems to leave the telling of the story to Genesis. And really if we were trying to present Abraham as cool we would not tell the story like it is…as the man as a bit of a woos between two women.
I don’t think you understood what I meant when I wrote that it is another Abraham and Isaac story this time Hagar paying the role of the sacrificed loved one.
May 6, 2012 at 4:10 pm
lindsay
“I don’t think you understood what I meant when I wrote that it is another Abraham and Isaac story this time Hagar paying the role of the sacrificed loved one.”
Oh yes, you’re right, I missed this … I thought you were talking about Abraham and Ishmael, and the dispute as to whether it was Isaac or Ishmael who Abraham was going to sacrifice, now I realize you were talking about Abraham and Hagar …
Abraham as a bit of a woos … ? Is that what it is? Are we woman perhaps also ourselves resistant to the idea of our men being portrayed as compassionate, kind and caring?
May 6, 2012 at 4:21 pm
jaqueline
I cannot help feeling that Abraham allowing Sarah to abuse Hagar was exactly compassionate, kind or caring….
May 7, 2012 at 6:41 am
lindsay
Okay …
May 7, 2012 at 6:50 am
jaqueline
oops…..”wasn’t compassionate or kind” is what was supposed to be written
May 7, 2012 at 7:17 am
lindsay
🙂 okay …
May 5, 2012 at 5:50 pm
jaqueline
Hi Lindsay…if I reply directly to you I will try and do it as a reply in which the comment has another margin or let you know it is directly to you, you don’t need to worry that you are ignoring. My last comment was to the world in general….
May 5, 2012 at 8:58 pm
lindsay
🙂 Sounds good …
May 18, 2012 at 7:42 pm
lindsay
.
.
.
Child Sacrifice
Now they sacrifice
Widows,
or is it husbands?
… I can never remember,
Kosher for you?
Halaal for me?
Sacred Cow!
You’d eat your dog!
… Wouldn’t you?
If you hadn’t seen the apple
lying on the floor?
May 18, 2012 at 7:59 pm
jaqueline
like
May 20, 2012 at 8:29 pm
lindsay
The Hindu Temple hosted a ‘First Conversations’ gathering today which is one of the initiatives to coming out of the TRC. I’m not sure if any people from the First Nations attended, except for a Metis lady who spoke eloquently of her efforts to get the ‘First Conversations’ gatherings up and running and the value of sharing between inter-faith groups. She talked about how difficult it was to get leaders of the First Nations to participate, the wound is so deep and raw. It is sad.
What wasn’t sad was having an opportunity to learn about the Hindu faith. I must admit I was waiting for some internal come-uppance for my reference to the Sacred Cow. It didn’t come. Instead there was another realization how similar our faiths are when it comes down to it.
We are all Hindu, whether we realize it or not. We can’t convert to being a Hindu – there is no such thing. Everyone is welcome. The entire ceremony is an act of welcome … following the path of welcoming a guest as if to one’s own home. Including a meal which is shared. The basic tenants are Love, Kindness and helping others.
When asked about Hindu initiatives specifically geared towards bridging the gap with the people of the First Nations, the speaker appeared genuinely puzzled and explained the Hindu don’t have outreach programs to go out and encourage people to join. We are all Hindu, so we are all welcome. I found myself thinking the Hindu faith has been around for a very long time so must be doing something right to keep going all these hundreds of years.
Later the Metis lady asked a question about sacrifices to ancestors, which reminded me again of similarities between faiths, and also thinking of traditional faiths in Africa … when you make sacrifices of food to your ancestors what do you do with the food afterwards? In our aboriginal people’s faith we burn the offering afterwards and it’s the that smoke goes to our ancestors. The Hindu speaker replied that it depends on what area of India we are from. In some areas we put the food into the Ganges and it sustains the fish and life in the water. In other areas we leave the food for the crows who are very quick to take it or give it to the cows.
Sharing of food play a central role in the Hindu faith. Cows are not worshiped but are respected because they provide milk and because milk sustains life of children when a mother is not able to feed her young, the cow is sort of a surrogate for the mother.
Respect for life is important. Hindus are vegetarian. Animals are respected and each God has an associated animal. Meat is only consumed when there is not enough of the vegetable food to go around. In Jainism this respect for life extends to plants too. Roots are not eaten. Food is plucked from the tree or picked up off the ground when it falls. ah, yea … the apple on the floor …. who would have thought …
And so I’m thinking … hmm … being a vegetarian would be tough … cheese and milk are okay but all those lentils! Yuck! … Food as part of spiritual practice, as daily reminder and sacrifice makes so much sense though … Many people I know around these part are vegetarian … have numbers reached a peak or are some people still converting? Meat is expensive, so the cost might dictate, but then so are fruit and vegetables becoming much more expensive … from being a vegetarian it doesn’t seem it would be as big a leap to appreciate being Hindu …
And then chatting to my friend about the power of women and she was saying she’d noticed how much of abuse of First Nations children in residential schools was at the hands of women … and how this is still a deeply kept and unexplored secret … A man would have to be very brave to take on the challenge of opening this door … can you imagine the backlash! This is something that would have to come from us women ourselves … but there seems to be a deep, ingrained resistance to going down that path …
Perhaps the Dalai Lama is very perceptive after all … perhaps the answer is to focus on the power of women to nurture and sustain …. rather than to abuse and hurt? … but I still can’t help feeling there must be an awful lot of men out there who are not getting the help and support they need because no-one is talking about it … and because if they do talk they are afraid of being labelled a ‘woos’ … which, let’s face it, is in all likelihood what would happen.
February 26, 2017 at 12:28 pm
Liz Laidlaw
Thank you for making clear to me something I have been struggling with. Having come from an abusive marriage, I was terrified that these passages were telling me to go back and submit to him for further abuse. Now the Holy Spirit has revealed the true meaning of His word. Thank you.
February 26, 2017 at 5:39 pm
Jaqueline
Wow Liz,
That is a wonderful revelation and that words from five years ago still find their way to the right person at the right time.
these articles published since then might be of interest as well:
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/johnshore/2015/05/how-churches-can-help-stop-domestic-violence/
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/johnshore/2015/04/bible-believing-pastors-and-the-enabling-of-domestic-violence/