First Parish Unitarian Universalist"Cut and Paste Scriptures"
A sermon preached by the Reverend Diane Teichert
First Parish Unitarian Universalist - Canton MA
January 6, 2002
I was invited to an old friend's for "soup and bread anytime after 1" on New Years Day. My family used to live across the street from this friend-her son and our daughter were pre-school buddies. Both families since moved and we hadn't seen her in several years, more than any of us could accurately count.
It was an intimate gathering, no more than eight or so people at a time. As people arrived, our friend took pains to give a little information about each of her guests to the others. At one point I was introduced in French, the first language of those at the table then. I could make out what sounded like "pastor" but in French. I then noted the raised eyebrows of the older woman here from France for the holidays visiting her daughter.
Noting the eyebrows, I was thinking that, living in a largely Catholic country, perhaps she's never met a female clergy-person.
"In what religion?" came the reply, translated for me by the daughter.
Oh dear, I thought, can I explain Unitarian Universalism simply enough for a French translation? As party talk goes, it's hard enough to do in English!
Fortunately, the daughter had been in the states long enough to know a little about who we are and it turned out that the mother was quite sympathetic. In pretty good English she explained, "In my country, a lot of us get to be twenty or twenty-five and realize we don't believe all of it, but we don't try to come up with something new that we can believe, like you people."
This morning, I want to talk about someone who also realized he didn't believe all of "it" but was determined to salvage the parts that he did believe. That would be Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of American Independence and third President of the United States, from 1801-1809.
Thomas Jefferson purchased a Bible for the expressed purpose of cutting up the pages of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John and pasting the believable parts into a blank book. Many years later, he published the resulting tract "The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth, Extracted textually from the Gospels in Greek, Latin, French and English," which we are reading (in English!) and discussing in our Adult Religious Education program here at First Parish later this month. (It's not too late to sign up, but you'll need to borrow or buy the book elsewhere because our copies are sold out.)
The Jefferson Bible, as it is popularly called, was recently republished by our Unitarian Universalist publishing house, Beacon Press, with a Preface and Introduction by the Reverend Doctor F. Forrester Church, Senior Minister of All Soul's Unitarian Universalist Church in New York City, one of our most well-known preachers and public commentators. I read from Church's Preface in the Reading this morning.
Now, Thomas Jefferson did not identify himself as either a Unitarian or a Universalist. Though he clearly leaned our way, he attended Episcopal services and was concerned that his un-orthodox views not become fodder for public consumption. Of religion he once wrote, "I have considered it as a matter between every man and his maker in which no other, and far less the public, had a right to inter-meddle." (p. 22, "The Gospel According to Thomas Jefferson," by F. Forrester Church as the Introduction to The Jefferson Bible, the source for all further biographical information unless otherwise noted).
Jefferson is not known to have ever been a member of a Unitarian or Universalist congregation. So, his name should not appear on those lists of "Famous Unitarians and Universalists" printed on UU mugs and tee shirts and other such promotional items circulated in our movement in recent years. One wonders why we bother, but I suspect such lists are an antidote to how relatively small, unknown and hard to explain our movement is!
But, Jefferson clearly leaned our way. He called the theological works of the noted British Unitarian Joseph Priestley "the basis of my own faith" and he once declared, "there is not a young man now living in the United States who will not die an Unitarian." (The Unitarians and the Universalists by David Robinson, p. 23)
He also conversed and corresponded at length with several of the numerous leading Unitarian and Universalist thinkers of his time. And it is in those communications that the idea for the Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth originated. First, when he was 64 or 65, it was in a promise made to Dr. Benjamin Rush, a Philadelphia physician, well-respected scientist, trusted political ally and outspoken Universalist. Sometime in 1798-1799, Jefferson promised Rush he would one day write down his view of the Christian religion, a topic they sometimes discussed together.
It would be four years before the promise was at least partially kept, prompted by the Unitarian Joseph Priestley's treatise Socrates and Jesus Compared. A copy had arrived as Jefferson was setting out from Monticello to Washington one day, and he had time to read it on the trip. It inspired him to write Syllabus of an estimate of the merit of the Doctrines of Jesus, compared with those of others, though he did not consider it to be a true fulfillment of the promise to Rush. That, he decided, was beyond his theological abilities. So, he wrote to Priestley to ask him to undertake the task and proceeded to instruct him in how to do so. Priestley agreed but unfortunately died not long thereafter.
It was in a last letter to Priestley that Jefferson first made mention of his idea for a cut-and-paste job on the four Gospels. He began work on it shortly after he heard that Priestley had died. It was "the work of two or three nights.after getting thro' the evening task of reading the letters and papers of the day," he admitted. After all, as President of the United States, he had other responsibilities!
Published in 1804, he entitled it The Philosophy of Jesus of Nazareth and described it as "the very words only of Jesus.the most sublime and benevolent code of morals which has ever been offered to man.by cutting verse by verse out of the printed book, and by arranging the matter which is evidently his [Jesus'], and which is as distinguishable as diamonds in a dunghill."
Clearly Jefferson did not think much of the biblical interpreters of Jesus!
But, Jefferson felt this hastily-written 1804 publication to be still only a partial fulfillment of his original promise to Benjamin Rush. It would be another twelve or so years, in 1816, before he began a revision, at the insistence of his former presidential election opponent John Adams, of all people. Adams' had encountered a copy of Jefferson's letter to Priestley in which Jefferson proposed that Priestley write the piece Jefferson had promised to Rush. The final revision, The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth, was likely finished in 1820, when Jefferson was eighty-six, only six years before his death.
Reading the Life and Morals, one is given to wonder by what criteria Jefferson distinguished the diamonds in the dunghill. In a letter written at about the same time, he makes his likes and dislikes very plain,
"We find in the writings of [Jesus'] biographers matter of two distinct descriptions.
First, a groundwork of vulgar ignorance, of things impossible, of superstitions, fanaticisms and fabrications."
This must be the dunghill! Intermixed are the diamonds, and I quote,
"The sublime ideas of the Supreme Being, aphorisms, and precepts of the purest morality and benevolence, sanctioned by a life of humility, innocence, and simplicity of manners, neglect of riches, absence of worldly ambition and honors, with an eloquence and persuasiveness which have not been surpassed." (ibid., p. 29).
Reviewing Jefferson's Table of the Texts, we see what he included: the narrative of Jesus' life from birth to death (as F. Forrester Church pointed out in his Preface, Jefferson's Jesus "was born in the usual way and died in the usual way"), plus precepts or teachings, aphorisms or sayings, parables, prayer, and sermons.
We also see that Jefferson included much more of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke than he did of John. His choice in this manner conforms to modern biblical scholarship that calls the first three gospels the "Synoptic Gospels" (from the Greek synoptikos for "to view together." [this and subsequent information on the history and literary structure of the bible largely drawn from prefaces to the gospels in Oxford Annotated Bible of the New Revised Standard Version but the conclusions about Jefferson's text are my own].
These three gospels parallel each other. Many of the sayings, parables, and incidents in Jesus' life appear in more than one of the Synoptic Gospels, often similarly worded. It is thought that Mark depended on Matthew and Luke for much material, whereas John is derived from and expressed the views of a different, later tradition. None of the four, by the way, are believed to have been first-hand accounts; each drew on oral tradition and earlier written collections.
The Gospel of John includes more miracles or "signs" and interprets the teachings and life of Jesus far more symbolically than the Synoptic Gospels, using metaphors for him such as bread, water, light, life, word, shepherd, door, and way to evoke the faith of the Christian community. The emphasis of John is on Jesus as the object of the believers' faith, whereas the earlier gospels are more likely to present God as the object of faith.
Thus, it makes sense that Jefferson-who eschewed "things impossible, of superstitions, fanaticisms and fabrications" and was drawn to the religion of Jesus not the religion about Jesus-would cut out most of the gospel of John and include more of Matthew, Mark and Luke in fashioning his "cut-and-paste scriptures."
However, there are a few incidents in the life of Jesus for which Jefferson did choose the version from John even though the incident also appears in Matthew, Mark and Luke.
One is the story of the moneychangers in the temple. As you may recall, Jesus was displeased, to put it mildly, with what he saw going on in the temple in Jerusalem. Probably what incensed him was the people selling animals for sacrifice and exchanging Roman money into Jewish money with which the temple tax could be paid. As one would expect, the synoptic gospels tell the story without as much detail and hyperbole as John, yet it was the passage from John that Jefferson chose for his cut-and-paste scriptures.
See what I mean:
In Luke's version (19:45-48) it says, "Then he entered the temple and began to drive out those who were selling things there; 46and he said, `It is written, `My house shall be a house of prayer'; but you have made it a den of robbers.'"
Matthew (21.12-13) adds one important detail, that Jesus also overturned the tables of the moneychangers and the seats of those who sold doves.
Mark (11:15-19) has everything Matthew and Luke have, but adds one more detail, that Jesus then would not allow anyone to carry anything through the temple.
But, listen now to the version of the story told in the Gospel of John (2:14-16). It has more detail than the other three versions, plus more emotional appeal.
"In the temple he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables. 15Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the moneychangers and overturned their tables. 16He told those who were selling the doves, `Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father's house a marketplace!'"
That's the passage about Jesus's confrontation in the temple that Jefferson included in his Bible. However, we should note that he chose to stop there even though John went on to embellish the story further (17-21), writing,
"His disciples remembered that it was written, `Zeal for your house will consume me.' 18The Jews then said to him, "What sign can you show us for doing this?' 19Jesus answered them, `Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.' 20The Jews then said, `This temple has been under construction for forty-six years, and will you raise it up in three days?' 21But he was speaking of the temple of his body. 22After he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken."
If we remember that Jefferson eschewed "things impossible, superstitions, fanaticisms and fabrications" and was drawn to the religion of Jesus not the religion about Jesus, we can see why he cut out this second passage, but included the first. He likely thought that the story and its meaning were enhanced by the gospel of Johns' embellishments and that its emotional appeal made the lesson more persuasive.
But, since he couldn't abide "things impossible" like the resurrection, the second part had to go. It tried his reason too sorely and he wasn't one to "check his mind at the door," as we Unitarian Universalists today sometimes say about ourselves.
Perhaps these "things impossible" like virgin birth and resurrection after death are just ways of making sure to convey that Jesus was special and unique, but it's clear to me that those ways have gotten in the way of peace and justice ever since.
Believing in "things impossible" paves the way for other fanaticisms such the very exclusivist, even downright dangerous, and very much-quoted verse in the Gospel of John, attributed to Jesus, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." (14:6). Christians who care about peace in the world ought to borrow Jefferson's scissors and cut that line out, as he did! And, likewise, Muslims the references to violent jihad.
Christians and others concerned about living a moral life will likely be debating the meaning of the life of the man named Jesus for a long, long time. I think Jefferson's contribution was, and is still, right on target.
We really do not have to believe "things impossible" about Jesus to believe in the lessons he taught, in the example of love he set, in the tolerance he practiced. We don't need to believe he was divine. to believe he was right.
Amen.