{"id":2105,"date":"2015-09-28T11:38:58","date_gmt":"2015-09-28T11:38:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/davidhenson\/?p=2105"},"modified":"2015-09-28T13:56:32","modified_gmt":"2015-09-28T13:56:32","slug":"jesus-wasnt-a-radical","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davidhenson\/2015\/09\/jesus-wasnt-a-radical\/","title":{"rendered":"Jesus Wasn&#8217;t A Radical"},"content":{"rendered":"<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\">\n<html><head><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><\/head><body><p><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/116\/2015\/09\/image1-7.png\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-2107\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/116\/2015\/09\/image1-7-1024x620.png\" alt=\"image1 (7)\" width=\"600\" height=\"364\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p><em>Jesus was a radical.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Christians love this idea, almost universally. It doesn\u2019t really matter if you are conservative, progressive, anarchist or something else. All manner of Christians\u00a0have laid claim to this notion of how radical Jesus\u00a0was.<\/p>\n<p>As if being radical\u00a0somehow makes Jesus and his teachings more worthwhile, revolutionary, or important.<\/p>\n<p>But what if they aren\u2019t?<\/p>\n<p>A number of\u00a0scholars and historians have argued for some time that Jesus\u2019 teachings weren\u2019t necessarily unique or even that out of the ordinary. Instead, they argue that Jesus was influenced by the teachings of other\u00a0rabbis and\u00a0his own teachings stood very much within the Jewish tradition.<\/p>\n<p>So what if Jesus wasn\u2019t remotely radical, at least\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/search?q=radical&amp;oq=radical&amp;aqs=chrome.0.69i59j0l2j69i60j0l2.814j0j7&amp;sourceid=chrome&amp;es_sm=91&amp;ie=UTF-8#q=radical&amp;tbm=nws\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">as we tend to understand that word in today\u2019s culture<\/a>?<\/p>\n<p>What if love of neighbor isn\u2019t radical?<\/p>\n<p>What if the call to share both wealth and food isn\u2019t radical?<\/p>\n<p>What if it\u2019s everything else that\u2019s actually radical?<\/p>\n<p>Think about it.<\/p>\n<p>Not sharing food with those who are hungry is a radical position.<\/p>\n<p>Not offering shelter to those experiencing homelessness is a radical position.<\/p>\n<p>Not welcoming the desperate refugee is a radical position.<\/p>\n<p>Not accepting ethnicities, genders, or sexualities just because they are different than your own is a radical position.<\/p>\n<p>Not liberating those imprisoned is a radical position.<\/p>\n<p>Not visiting the sick, the lonely, and the rejected is a radical position.<\/p>\n<p>Not seeking a leveling of power and the empowering of the marginalized is a radical position.<\/p>\n<p>Not loving others is the most radical position of all.<\/p>\n<p>Letting fellow humans go hungry, without shelter, refuge, and dignity might be disturbingly common\u00a0in our world, but it\u2019s also radical. Because any belief or action\u00a0that denies, distorts, or brutalizes the humanity of others\u00a0is the perspective of a\u00a0radical\u00a0extremist.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s often said Jesus was executed because he was a radical. I think we\u2019ve got it backwards. The Romans executed Jesus because they were radical, not because he\u00a0was. Killing people is always a radical act. We do both Jesus\u00a0and humanity a disservice when we use selfishness and bigotry to define what\u2019s normal and use generosity and love to define\u00a0what\u2019s radical.<\/p>\n<p>Jesus wasn\u2019t radical.<\/p>\n<p>We are.<\/p>\n<p>We who refuse to love, to seek liberation, and to be fully human.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Image Credit:<a href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/donlubbert\/2750369553\/in\/photolist-5c3n3H-9Jz5GX-5LeD7J-6YqqwZ-9DbSSE-3eJJjB-bE8t-8YsWT-3XyN8-4fLSLS-5kyyJ-ef6b72-5hWxCx-roLxvz-8PNsHM-royBAF-oiR7oK-eWnysE-7J1nSq-6o13Xi-fiW5gj-7fq4Tq-4eVafy-92bLJd-64KK46-aqezj6-8PN7iR-xkLfy-4jiLQ3-89Jrg7-kfocGn-tZ6Kff-6xCQfA-ceCfq9-5NbHHx-bUsi7-aq9FVq-nQ4FSM-3evLRw-88Djk2-63RJTx-4CZiMQ-4vy6oL-tAcREo-r3hLkt-7KuaJ6-9DbSYG-dXZaqd-neC5pZ-6tgRPJ\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\"> \u201cJesus the Lord\u201d by Rodrigo L\u00fcbbert,<\/a> used under Creative Commons Copyright (Cropped and Text Added)<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jesus was a radical.\u00a0 Christians love this idea, almost universally. It doesn\u2019t really matter if you are conservative, progressive, anarchist or something else. All manner of Christians\u00a0have laid claim to this notion of how radical Jesus\u00a0was. As if being radical\u00a0somehow makes Jesus and his teachings more worthwhile, revolutionary, or important. But what if they aren\u2019t? [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":419,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[189],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2105","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-meditation"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Jesus Wasn&#039;t A Radical<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Jesus was a radical.\u00a0 Christians love this idea, almost universally. 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