Christian
Conference of Asia General Committee meeting
Hsinchu, Taiwan
on August 20-22, 2012
Bible Studies
By Huang Po Ho
Vice
president & prof., Chang Jung Christian University
Dean,
Program for Theology and Cultures in Asia
Co-moderator,
CATS
Genesis
9. 8-17
8 Then God said to Noah and to
his sons with him, 9 "Behold, I establish my covenant
with you and your descendants after you, 10 and with every living creature that is
with you, the birds, the cattle, and every beast of the earth with you, as many
as came out of the ark. 11 I establish my covenant with you, that
never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never
again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth." 12 And
God said, "This is the sign of the covenant which I make between me and
you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: 13 I
set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and
the earth. 14 When I bring clouds over the earth and
the bow is seen in the clouds, 15 I will remember my covenant which is
between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall
never again become a flood to destroy all flesh. 16 When
the bow is in the clouds, I will look upon it and remember the everlasting
covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the
earth." 17 God said to Noah, "This is the
sign of the covenant which I have established between me and all flesh that is
upon the earth."
Introduction
 |
| CCA 55th anniversary worship |
Ambon
was once extolled as Indonesian Hawaii. Its beautiful beach and rich natural
resources still impress visitors; however the conflicts and the trauma and
fears left from the conflicts have snatched away the soul of the land, the social
atmosphere of suspicions, cold and detachment have turned all the colorful
beauties to dark and white. The tragedy of conflicts destroyed not only its
tourist industry, and thus inflicts heavily its economic development, the
social instability created also obstacles to the people from their seeking a
better life with peace and prosperity. The eastern Hawaii, God’s beautiful
island of Ambon and people live on it have therefore, confronted threats of
their integrity and peace.
It
is nevertheless; encouraging stories about peace building efforts from both
sides of Muslim and Christian congregations are told and spread. One of which
was related to the most recent incident happened in May this year, a quarrel
took place in between Christian and Muslim individuals caused the loss of some
lives, which was almost again extended to a massive conflict of the two
religious communities, yet it finally was pacified by the efforts of a group of
young people jointed by both Muslims and Christians male and female. This small
step forward of the cooperation of the young generation Muslims and Christians
has created great hope to the people of Ambon.
This
experience of Ambon people is not an isolate case; on the contrary, it is in
fact, an epitome of the human common experiences today. Human communities
regardless their ethnical, social, cultural/religious and political
constituents are lacerated today and the whole creation is threatened being collapsed
and spoiled. Nevertheless, our world though is severely threatened yet we are not
without hope. Christians around the world derived from their faith in the God
of life, have been consistently committed themselves to create hopes to this
wounded world and the divided societies. For instance, Christian Conference of
Asia (CCA) has since its inception constantly invited and encouraged its member
churches and congregations through its assembly themes to be responsible to
God’s creation and human communities.[1] Its
recent assembly held in Kuala Lumpur from April 15-20, 2010 has launched its assembly
theme of “Called to Prophesy, Reconcile and Heal.” Meanwhile the World Council
of Churches (WCC) has chosen the theme of “God of Life, Lead us to Justice and
Peace” for its coming Busan Assembly in 2013.These are all human attempts based
on faith in the living God to respond to the bankruptcy of the earth and human
communities on it.
Behold,
I established my covenant
Christians
and churches accompanied with different religions of the
world driven by their faith values and commitment, in responding to the broken
world that our human being is inhabited, have been persistently advocating for
a world of justice, peace and fullness of life, even though in many cases,
religions themselves also acted as elements to divide and spoil the world. This
tireless religious persistence for the integrity of creation has its foundation
on Natural Rights, which has commonly accepted by most of the religions. From
Christian perspective, it is the doctrine of Creation that provides a theological
foundation for Christians to obtain a critical view of the world as the
household of God. And that Christian commitment to the Justice, Peace and
Integrity of Creation has no other reason but a calling and a profession of to
witness the love of God to the world. It is a Christian witness to the promise
of God of the divine providence to the creation, and a Christian response to
the covenant that God has proclaimed to the human being in regard to the well
being of the whole creatures.
“Behold!
I established my covenant with you and your descendants after you, and with every living creature that is
with you, the birds, the cattle, and every beast of the earth with you, as many
as came out of the ark.”(Genesis 9.9-10) This passage we read this morning is taken
from the Covenant of Noah, which is considered the first and the only universal
covenant God has established with earth and with human beings and all creatures
live on the earth that reported in the Bible. The covenant has revealed that
God does not confine His/her divine promise only to the people of Israel, the
so called the chosen one, neither it is to be monopolized by human creature,
but is far beyond them to include all the living creatures and the earth.[2]
A
Covenant is a solemn alliance to bring together different parties into one
family through an agreement of mutual engagement or refraining practices. In
theologies or biblical studies, the concept of covenant mainly refers to
agreements made between God and the children of Israel and their proselytes in
the Old Testament, and as well to the New Testament which many Christians
consider to be the replacement or fulfillment of this Old Testament. It is
thus, when God established covenant with Noah, his descendants and every creature
and earth, God has taken them as members of His/her household and given them the
divine promise of protection.
Broaden
the Household of God
The
Noahic Covenant has challenged to our traditional concept of ecumenical
movement, which has taken ecclesia as the sole target for unity. Even though
the concept of “wider ecumenism” has been proposed to include issues confronted
human fullness of life into the ecumenical studies, they are however, mostly
considered as appendix to the unity of church and being taken as selective,
anthropocentric, and depending on the ecclesial ecumenism. The concept of
“wider” though can be explained to a critical sense of taking traditional
understanding of ecumenisms as a “narrow” one. It is nevertheless in reality,
the concept itself is more frequently taken with an implication of “non-essential”
in relation to its orthodox meaning of ecumenism as unity of churches. This is
to say that the contemporary ecumenical movement that was initiated from 1910
Edinburg meeting and was launched by the establishment of the World Council of
Churches in Amsterdam 1948, is essentially a movement of ecclesiastic centric
ecumenism.
In
the Noahic Covenant God did not only establish His/her divine agreement with
Noah or his descendants, nor only with the human species, but also with every
living creature left after the flood and with the earth. Contemporary
ecumenical movement has gone through a long journey to rediscover this original
nature of ecumenism. The household of God thus, has redirected from the church
to God’s whole integral creation. The task of ecumenical movement therefore cannot
be exhausted by the fellowship or communion of denominational churches; neither
can it be fulfilled by establishing an institutional umbrella to accommodate
world Christianity. Instead, our ecumenical ministry has to do with the divisive
forces that created injustice and sufferings to people and exploitation and
distortion to the earth and living creatures on it. These division forces
translated to today’s language is the mindset of hegemony, which is expressed
in different dimensions of human life includes religious confrontation,
political oppression, social domination, cultural discrimination and economic
exploitation, and most of all is the ecological depredation.
The
Bow in the Cloud
A sign was given from God to demonstrate
the covenant God established with the earth and all living creatures on it
include humankind. The bow in the cloud, which is today understood as the
rainbow appears after the rainfall. Interestingly the Hebrew word for the
rainbow in this passage is the same word for the bow of war. Does God intend to
take the sign of weapon that is used for the purpose to destroy life and placed
it in the sky to symbolize God’s promise of Mercy and love to the earth and all
living creatures on it? Is not this the secret of God that Isaiah the prophet
disclosed to us in his book of prophesy?
He shall judge between the nations, and shall decide
for many peoples; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their
spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation,
neither shall they learn war any more. (Isa.
2.4)
“To
beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks”, this was
the promise of God concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the latter days. It was a
promise of Peace and prosperity. Weapon that is against lives will be
transformed into farming utensil that enriches
living creatures. Was not this prophecy reiterated the covenant that God
established with the earth and living creatures through the transformation of
the fighting bow to the nourishing rainbow. The modern weapons of war
are of course no longer represented by the bow, the nuclear weapons that
contained millions times of power of the ancient bow, have enhanced few
superpower countries in the world to exercise their hegemonic power of
domination and suppression. The division of Korean people in the Korean
peninsula, the political apartheid exercised by the international community to
the small island Taiwan, the chaotic conflicts engaged its surrounding
countries in the South China Sea, not to mention many more regional or domestic
ethnical and religious conflicts in Asia and beyond, are all obviously
entangled directly or indirectly the interest of hegemonic empires within and from
outside the region. The announcement of its “Pivot to Asia” policy[3] made by Barack
Obama, the president of the United States, has marked the fact that Asia will
become the most explosive region of war in the coming era. It is regretfully,
no significant voices on the situation have been heard, and no attempt of
transformation to this destructive development of the region has been
undertaken by any church from the region. If the churches in the region are
“Called to Prophesy, Reconcile and Heal” ministries, the churches cannot keep
quiet and wait for the conflicts to be taken place.
The
symbol of bow as a destructive weapon cannot be simply taken only as physical
arms, but has to include all negative forces that threat the living creatures
and the earth. The challenges that facing our Asian people such like poverty,
gender injustice, minority (aborigines) discrimination, epidemic disease,
natural disasters, religious crashes, and international conflicts, are all
destructive forces that threat human lives and the integrity of the creation. They
are to be transformed to the hope of peace and prosperous.
Living
Together in the Household of God
The
rainbow that has been transformed from the bow of war becomes the sign of
covenant that God has established with the earth and living creatures, is a
promise of mercy. The rainbow covenant testifies the intention of God for the
earth and life on our planet to exist continually. It is thus, a sign of the
desires of God for the existence of the world and not its destruction. However,
according to Rabbi Riskin, “the rainbow is a half-picture, lacking a second
half to complete the circle of wholeness.” He thus argues: “God can pledge not
to destroy humanity, but since He created humanity with freedom of choice, He
cannot guarantee that humanity will not destroy itself.”[4] The
Merciful God has exercises His/Her restraint and refrains from destroying the
world, should not we human being to imitate God and to be attentive to the
divine merciful nature, so that we will be also merciful to the earth and our
fellow creatures that God created in the world.
Noah
has been taken by biblical scholars as a second Adam, through him God has given
the second chance to human being. Therefore Noah was blessed the same blessing
that God bestowed upon Adam: “Be fruitful, multiply and fill the earth…” (Gen.1.28,
9.1) and was granted the same power for them to dominate over the rest of
creatures in the world. But here God has given Noah two additional commandments
that are very different from the commandment given to Adam, one is God though
permitted Noah and his descendants to eat living creatures, but has forbidden
them to eat the flesh with its life (blood), and the second is not to shed
blood of any innocent human being. (Genesis 9.3-6) The rainbow covenant that
inaugurated the new phase of creation, derived from the tragic experiences of the
destructive flood, has issued a new commandment for the human creatures to live
together peacefully with their fellow human beings and also to be live
harmoniously with the earth and all the living creatures on it.
The
symbolism of rainbow can be explored even deeper, as the scientists tell us
that the glorious colors of the rainbow appeared in the seven tints of the red,
orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet, are in fact but reflexes from
the one light source. The beauty of the rainbow is out of its harmonious
co-existence of the different colors, that manifested their being one through
their sharing of equality and togetherness. Has not this said something to the
cosmos of humanity? People of different race, different gender, different
class, different culture/religion and different nationality are all emanating
from the same “womb” of the one Creator, and are all united by the spark of the
Divine which gives them life. Is not this what we mean unity in diversity, or
what we have envisioned of to live together in the household of God?
When the Bow is in the Cloud
The sign of the rainbow, above all, is a reminder to God of
His/her covenant made with the earth and with living creatures. The primary
purpose of the covenant thus is to remind God of His/her promise that the world
will be not and should be not destroyed. It is the intention of God to sustain
the world regardless of human failures and rebellions. When the bow is in the cloud, we will
remember how the mercy of God has been expressed in the situation of
destruction and how the hospitality of God has been extended to the earth and
all living creatures on it, through His/her divine power of transformation and
redemption. We as the partner of this covenant cannot make excuses but to
respond to the invitation of the covenant to join God’s plan to cultivate for a
better oikos (household) for all the living creatures to live together with
peace and mutual love. (end)
- 2005 March
31-April 6: Chiangmai - Building Communities of Peace for All
- 2000 June
2-6, Tomohon - Time for Fullness of Life for All
- 1995 June
8-14, Colombo - Hope in God in a Changing Asia
- 1990 June
4-12, Manila - Christ Our Peace: Building a Just Society
- 1985 June
26-July 2, Seoul - Jesus Christ Sets Free to Serve
- 1981 May
18-28, Bangalore - Living in Christ with People
- 1977: Penang
- Jesus Christ in Asian Suffering and Hope
- 1973: Singapore
- Christian Action in the Asian Struggle
- 1968: Bangkok
- In Christ All Things Hold Together
- 1964: Bangkok
- The Christian Community within the Human Community
- 1959: Kuala
Lumpur - Witnessing Together
- 1957: Prapat - The Common Evangelistic Task of the Churches in East Asia
[2] This is what the covenant of Noah being distinguished from the
covenants of Abraham and David which are considered covenants with only the
chosen people of God.
[3]According to the announcement of the Pentagon that under the policy
of Pivot to Asia that 60% of the United States forces will return to Asia.
[4]Shlomoriskin:
Shabbat Shalom:Parshat Noah Genesis:6:9-11:32. See: http://www.ohrtorahstone.org.il/parsha/5769/noah69.htm,
retrieved at July 31,2012
沒有留言:
張貼留言