The Conservative-Liberal Dichotomy as an explanation for the creation of the Bible

The research paper Political Conservatism as Motivated Social Cognition (Adobe pdf) focused on the political dichotomy we see in society as expressed in 'conservative or right wing' persuasions as opposed to 'liberal or left wing' orientation. The research assembled indicates that the underlying factors that determine which of these two opposing world views will be expressed revolve around issues of 'faith and fear' and either the resistance to or advocacy of social change.

It is typical for many unfamiliar with the Bible to assume that the Bible is 'conservative' in its world view and that it encapsulates and supports the 'right wing' point of view. One of the reasons for this popular misconception is that the 'right wing' expression of religion is so loud and vocal, and this seems to relate to the research which indicates that the relationship which exists between conservatism and fear and right wing viewpoints and resistance to social change finds expression in a greater tendency towards aggression. Because right wing religion is more forceful and aggressive in its approach it tends to overpower more liberal expressions of the religious tendency, and this aggressive occupation of the spot light, combined with intolerance for ambiguity and differing points of view combine to leave 'liberals' voiceless in the dialog between church and the wider society (you will never find a liberal perspective elucidated on Christian television, as one example, since Christian television has been aggressively dominated by the Religious Right, and due to their intolerance for ambiguity or diversity and their belief system which incorporates only certain absolutes, they deliberately promote only their own narrow point of view. The end result of this process is a false impression among many people outside the church that both the Bible and the Christian religion are right wing in their orientation).

It is common for conservatives to speak of 'the Bible as being the literal Word of God, authoritative, infallible and completely without any error.' Liberals on the other hand tend to emphasize what they call the 'normative value of the Bible as the central document of the faith', but they then tend to emphasize the need to 'interpret the Bible'. The same verse then, even when such a verse clearly advocates an extremely conservative or right wing view of society, will be used by both conservatives and liberals, with liberals responding to the aggressiveness of the right wing of the church by acknowledging the Bible as 'normative for the faith' and then attempting to 'interpret' this right wing verse. In this way it seems that liberals tend to try to bridge the gap with the right wing in the church by adopting the right wing viewpoint of the Bible as somehow 'normative' and thus the correct source for doctrines, and then attempt to soften the aggressive approach of the religious right by attempting to 'reinterpret' Bible verses.

An examination of the Bible reveals quite clearly that the Bible is not 'the infallible Word of God'. In fact it is inconsistent, both in terms of doctrine and contradictory as an historical record. Because the Bible is so inconsistent, and actually incorporates diverse view points, it is hard then to argue that the Bible can somehow be 'normative' and thus form the central object of attention in the formulation of church doctrines and define the essentials of church life. Interpretation is inadequate as a tool when it comes time to deal with these inconsistencies in the Bible, and what is called for, at least on the part of liberals, is a clear and forceful acknowledgment of the fact that the Bible is both liberal and conservative, both left wing and right wing at the same time. In truth the Bible mirrors the church in this sense, with a dominant and aggressive right wing view of society which throughout history has also pushed itself to the front, and a submerged and marginalized liberal, left wing viewpoint which is kept marginalized by being kept silent and out of the spot light.

This Right Wing / Liberal dichotomy is the correct explanation of the Bible, and since so many of those troublesome Bible verses express an extremely conservative, right wing view of society and religion, it becomes impossible for liberals or those on the left to simply attempt to 'interpret' such verses in such a way as to make them more friendly and thus more 'normative' in the church life of liberals. Similarly, the Bible contains many extremely left wing and liberal verses, and conservatives on the religious right deal with these verses in the same way that they deal with liberals in the church - they silence them, while maintaining the fiction that the Bible is a right wing document by aggressively promoting that select group of Bible verses that support their own world view. Thus the Bible gets the same treatment that liberals in the church receive, being censored, dominated, and silenced when it says anything that challenges conservative dogma.

The Bible is a very large document and so therefore out of necessity it would be impossible to be exhaustive in exploring the liberal / conservative dichotomy on its pages, so what I have chosen to do is to highlight just a few choice examples of the dualistic ideology that has become frozen on the pages of the Bible, just as this dualistic ideology can be seen to frozen in the church today (the tension between these two opposing tendencies that we can see in the church today best explains how such duality become embedded in the Bible in the first place, and the long domination of conservative and right wing ideology in the history of the church is best understood when we look at society today where the same pattern repeats itself, as the religious right continues to aggressively dominate the silenced and marginalized liberal churches.)

The ‘Infallibility' of Traditional Beliefs

As the secular research indicates, the Conservative right are strongly motivated by a desire to preserve the status quo, and this is driven by fear, in particular the fear of disruptive change. Among the right wing in the Church, this belief is expressed in the dogma which teaches that the Bible is entirely without error, perfect, infallible and to be taken literally in all that it teaches. Liberals on the other hand attempt to emphasize the transient nature of doctrine and insist that certain beliefs and practices are relevant only to a specific time or social context. Liberals want to ‘change with the times' and ‘maintain relevancy' while the religious right wants to turn back the clock, and preserve ancient dogmas.

It is not surprising to find this controversy embedded on the pages of the Bible, where we find both traditional dogmas being supported by mythological religious constructs which attempt to justify their eternal validity, thus making them unchallenged and unchanging, and then reformists writings by those with a more ‘liberal approach' who challenged the validity of conservative myth and called for the disposal of previously held doctrine. One of the most interesting examples of this dichotomy within the Bible concerns the controversy that developed during the time of the propehts over the validity of what conservatives at the time were calling the ‘infallible Law of God' (the Torah as its known, which consists of the first five books of the Bible).

There are many passages in the Bible where reformists prophets attacked the credibility of previously held conservative religious doctrines of their day, and to list every single one would be a lengthy process. The following example is one of the great classics.

First we examine the traditional conservative doctrine as it existed at that time. The doctrine justifies the religious practices of the day, which included various rituals surrounding the sacrificial slaughtering of animals in the temple. The status quo is justified using the technique of using myth to explain the origins of the practice by attributing it to indisputable authorities, and the conservative nature of the doctrine is further emphasized in that we are told that these religious practices must not be challenged, they are permanent, and would last forever, and were thus resistant to changes in the surrounding society, not subject to whims of changing cultural mores or changing times.

"This is the portion of Aaron and of his sons from the offerings made by fire to YAHWEH, consecrated to them on the day they were presented to serve as priests of the LORD; YAHWEH commanded this to be given them by the people of Israel, on the day that they were anointed; It is their due forever throughout their generations. This is the law of the burnt offering, of the cereal offering, of the sin offering, of the guilt offering, of the consecration, and of the peace offerings, which YAHWEH commanded Moses on Mount Sinai, on the day that he commanded the people of Israel to bring their offerings to YAHWEH, in the wilderness of Sinai." (Leviticus 7:35)

The reform period of Jewish prophecy corresponds to the time when the Buddha appeared in India. The story is told of how the Buddha was consulted by the Kalamas, who were confused by the conflicting claims to religious authority by various sects operating at the time. Each sect was dogmatic concerning their own traditions and doctrines and condemned the others, and the Kalamas told the Buddha that "we always have doubt and perplexity among ourselves as to who among these venerable recluses and brahamas spoke the truth and who spoke falsehood." The Buddha replied,

It is proper for you to have doubt, that you have perplexity, for a doubt has arisen in a matter which is doubtful. Now, look you Kalamas, do not be led by reports, or religious tradition, or hearsay. Be not led by the authority of religious texts, nor by mere logic or inference, nor by considering appearances, nor by the delight in speculative opinions, nor by seeming possibilities, nor by the idea that "this is our teacher". But when you know for yourselves that certain things are wrong then give them up and when you know for yourselves that certain things are good then accept and follow them."

Buddhism emphasized ‘knowing and seeing' rather than faith and belief, and in its original doctrines (before the long period of mythology surrounding the Buddha figure began - similar to the myth and legend that developed around the Christ figure) Buddhism was a religion that emphasized the freedom of the individual and protested against prevailing religious tradition and authoritarianism.

At the same time that the Buddha was protesting against religious tradition and calling into question the authority of religious texts, a similar movement was underway in ancient Israel. The following sermon is a true classic of the reformation movement in Jewish prophecy, as it launches an attack on the validity of the Biblical passage just quoted above, and calls into question the validity of both religious documents and ancient tradition.

"Thus says YAHWEH of hosts, the God of Israel: "Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices, and eat the flesh yourselves. For in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, I did not speak to your fathers or command them concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices." (Jeremiah 7:21) "How can you say, ‘We are wise, for we have the Law of God', when actually, the lying pen of the scribes has had it falsified. Their leaders are dismayed for they have been trapped and snared, but they rejected the Word of YAHWEH, so what kind of wisdom did they have?" (Jeremiah 8:8)

The passages quoted above are part of a sermon attacking the validity of the Torah in the book of the prophet Jeremiah, which includes an attack on the rules about burning people at the stake, as well as an attack on the Holy War ideology of the Torah, which taught that one should invade the territory of other people, drive them out or slaughter them, and then take over the vacated land and sleep with their now widowed wives. Immediately after declaring the Torah a forgery Jeremiah wrote, "Therefore, I will give YOUR fields to new owners and YOUR wives to other people, for everyone, both high and low, is out for ill gotten gain. Priests and prophets are all frauds. Even in God's house their evil is found." The point made here is that you should ‘do unto others only what you would want them to do to you.

This attack on the legitimacy of the former religious practices is not limited to Jeremiah, but as I mentioned, this reform movement is one of the great themes of Jewish prophecy, for, while the reform movement was being led in India by the Buddha, a similar reform movement was underway in ancient Israel, an interesting example of synchronicity.

As a few more examples of this sort of thing, we read the following attacks on religious tradition in the book of Isaiah and Amos.

"What do I care for the multitude of your sacrifices? says the YAHWEH; I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fat of fed beasts; I do not delight in the blood of bulls, or of lambs, or of goats. When you come to appear before me, who asked you to do all these things? Trample my courts no more; bringing offerings is futile; the stink of your sacrifices is an abomination to me." (Isaiah 1:11)

"I hate, I despise your festivals, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies. Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them; and the offerings of well-being of your fatted animals I will not look upon. Take away from me the noise of your songs; I will not listen to the melody of your harps. But instead let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an everflowing stream. Did you people of Israel bring animal sacrifices and offerings for forty years in the wilderness? No! But now ou shall take up Sakkuth your king, and Kaiwan your star-god, your images, which you made for yourselves." (Amos 5:11)

Now there are two things which become obvious right from the start when considering the dichotomy that exists between the many passages in the Bible of this sort. The first is that the Bible is actually composed of diverse source materials that span the ideological spectrum. There are staunch traditionalists and conservatives using myth and legend to prop up the religious status quo and there are protestors and reformers rejecting both myth and the authoritarian system of religion such myths were designed to preserve and foster. It is obvious then that the fundamentalist doctrine which teaches the ‘infallibility' of the Bible is in error, and as well the Liberal approach of acknowledging the Bible as ‘normative for the formulation of doctrine' while trying to water down the approach by ‘interpreting' troublesome conservative bible verses is also inadequate. The only interpretation that one can place on such right wing Bible passages is that they use myth and legend to prop up an authoritarian system of religion and in attempt to thwart all social change and preserve the status quo. This is exactly the interpretation that Jeremiah placed upon these passages, and it is also in line with the viewpoints of Biblical scholarship in modern times (absent the value judgment we find in Jeremiah which calls these conservative passages ‘forgeries' - Biblical scholars agree that these passages were myths designed to prop up the prevailing religious orthodoxy but the requirements of the modern scientific method call upon one to not make value judgments so it is left to a prophet like Jeremiah to include the moral condemnation of the practice while scholars attempt to remain objective).

It is also interesting to note how the religious right deals with such troublesome passages. They can be silenced, much as liberals are silenced in the church today, while the conservative verses of the Bible are aggressively promoted. They can also be deliberately mistranslated, which is what happened to Jeremiah's sermon. In the New International Version of the Bible, which was commissioned and translated by evangelical fundamentalists, we are told the story of how Jeremiah endorsed the mythology that the animal sacrifice ritual came directly on the orders of God. If you consult the passage in this translation you will find it deliberately mistranslated, and Isaiah is also translated in such a way as to mute his criticism. This is completely in line with the ancient Christian custom of committing ‘pious frauds' which were supposed to have been committed in ‘the defense of the faith.' So then one can either silence dissent, or one can doctor the record, to achieve the desired results and protect the status quo from any unseemly attacks by Biblical writers, while of course insisting at the same time that the Bible is infallible and cannot be questioned. Unlike a Biblical scholar I cannot refrain from moral judgment on this particular practice and try to pretend that I can remain objective when Biblical translations are deliberately forged and then this is combined with a hypocritical defense of the ‘inerrant nature of scripture'. This practice is clearly immoral and to have the same people who do these things then presuming to judge ‘sinners' or then hypocritically sit in judgment upon society is a little much for anyone to be expected to take without comment.

In its earliest incarnation the Christian church consisted of the same streams of conservative, right wing reaction and what you would call today liberal reform movements which questioned the validity of the earlier religious texts.

As just one example of this sort of thing according to tradition there were certain animals, foods, and practices which were ‘unclean' as described in the Torah at the beginning of the Bible (which meant that they were taboo, forbidden, proscribed).

There was a movement of conservative backlash in the early church which attempted to prop up the doctrine of Biblical inerrancy, and thus it follows that the ritual taboo laws of the Torah were unquestionable.

"Do not think that I have come to abolish the Torah or the prophets ... until heaven and earth pass away, not one stroke of the pen will pass from the Torah until all is accomplished. Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven." (Matthew 5:17)

Now perhaps among the ‘least' of the laws in the Torah might be the clean/unclean purity regulations, and therefore one must suppose that the Jesus Christ figure was ‘the least in the Kingdom of Heaven,' since he rejected these regulations from the Torah.

"Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written, ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts as doctrines.' You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition." Then he called the crowd again and said to them, "Listen to me, all of you, and understand: there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile." When he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about the parable. He said to them, "Then do you also fail to understand? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile, since it enters, not the heart but the stomach, and goes out into the sewer?" (Thus he declared all foods clean.) (Mark 7:6)

We must also assume that Paul was the ‘least in the Kingdom of Heaven', but then he would have been in good company.

"Everything that I know about Christ Jesus has convinced that there is nothing that is unclean but only if someone gets the idea into their head that a thing is unclean, then for them it becomes unclean." (Romans 14:14)

The rejection of the earlier Torah regulations is a frequently repeated theme in some of the earliest writings that survive in the church. What is interesting to note in the following passages is that certain passages in the Torah are to be rejected as ‘myths' and ‘human commandments' and that by destroying myth you are ‘disarming the authorities' and making a public example out of them. This doctrine which teaches that earlier tradition consisted of enslaving myths which were intended to prop up the authority of the status quo is entirely in keeping with the earlier protest movement, being entirely consistent with the ideological position of Jeremiah. It certainly does not represent a conservative, right wing point of view, but rather came from a liberal reform movement in the early church.

"Therefore, rebuke them sharply so that they might be restored to a sound faith, instead of paying attention to Jewish myths and human commandments, the work of those who turned their backs on the truth. To the pure, all things are pure, but nothing is pure to these tainted unbelievers, tainted in both reason and conscience." (Titus 1:13) "Erasing the record that stood against us with its legal demands, he set this aside, nailing it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and made a public example of them, triumphing over them. Therefore do not let anyone condemn you in matters of food and drink or of observing festivals, new moons, or sabbaths." (Colossians 2:14)

What is interesting in the above examples taken from early church documents is the inconsistency between the doctrine of ‘infallibility of the Torah' and the condemnation of ‘Jewish myth' and ‘human commandments' found in both the passages that follow, which mimic the position of Jeremiah (in rejecting myth and legend as props used to maintain the status quo). It is also interesting to note the irreconcilable ideological inconsistency in the declaration of biblical infallibility, in that both the prophets and the Torah which the prophets so roundly condemned are said to be infallible, an impossible position to maintain, given how severely prophets condemned things written in the Torah. This illustrates an interesting ability to maintain inconsistent beliefs in some kind of strange tension in one and the same mind that I find just about impossible to comprehend.

Social reform versus reactionary backlash in the early church

The reform movement in the early church clashed with the religious right of the time not only on the matter of the authority of religious texts, but also on matters concerning social policy, and here the Bible shows itself to be even more dualistic, displaying all the symptoms of a patient with a multiple personality disorder.

It is just about impossible for liberals to seriously suggest that the right wing social policy promoted in early Christian documents is somehow ‘normative' and simply requires ‘interpretation' when it is obvious just on reading it all that it is actually an expression of reactionary backlash against what was an upsetting social reform movement which conservatives felt was threatening to the status quo in ancient Roman society.

One of the clearest examples of this dichotomy can be found when examining the dualistic positions advocated in early church documents concerning the status of women in both the church and in the greater society.

Some background is required here if we are to understand what is implied by the various positions advocated by early Christian writings. Woman had no status in ancient society. They were considered property. If one goes back to some of the earliest writings in the Bible one finds one of the most unromantic, non-mystified descriptions of ‘the marriage ceremony' that could ever be imagined. One purchased a wife in much the same way that one would purchase a goat or a sheep. After some haggling over price, the wife would be purchased, and the sale would be finalized by simply taking the woman home to her new tent. End of story. No walking down the aisle, no ceremony, no mystification of the union of man and wife. I remember how shocked I was when I first read of this ancient ‘marriage' practice in the Bible, as accustomed as I have become to mystification and ceremony and ritual in contemporary culture. The idea of haggling over price and then purchasing a woman like a donkey was so alien to me it was hard to comprehend. It would have been a mistake to marry for love back in those days, since what this meant was that you would be entering into negotiations in what we would call a ‘seller's market'. For example, we are told that Jacob was madly in love with Rachel, and thus he entered into negotiations for her purchase, but it must have been the case that he was foolish enough to let it be widely known that he was desperately in love with Rachel, because he got taken to the cleaners and wound up paying twice as much for her as would have been the case if he had purchased Rachel at fair market value.

Women were property, and marriage was a transaction just as purchasing a donkey was a transaction between a buyer and a seller. It is worth noting here that the purchase of a woman, as described in the Bible differs from the ancient rituals of the society of India, where the parents of woman were obligated to pay someone to marry their daughter by offering a dowry. The parents of the groom presided over the transaction and if they felt that the payment price (the dowry) was not large enough they could sell the marriage rites to their son to a higher bidder. In this sense then one could say that in ancient India one purchased a husband, or paid someone to marry your daughter, whereas in the culture described in the Bible, women were purchased as commodities and so the husbands family (or the man himself, as in the case of Jacob) paid the purchase price and then took possession of the women once the haggling over price was complete. This was not followed by some great ceremony and a process of mystification. You simply took home your property, much as you would take home a goat you had purchased and place it into its goat stall.

Ancient Western culture was both patriarchal and polygamous. Men were promiscuous and women were ‘obedient'. Women were forbidden under Biblical law from engaging in sex with multiple partners, while men practiced group sex with multiple partners. Not all men were created equal It was common practice in the cultures of the Mediterranean,.as it was in cultures as diverse and far off as ancient China, for some men to be destined to a life as a castrated eunuch. In order to prevent women in harems from having sex with multiple partners, men who worked as servants to those wealthy enough to purchase numerous wives were castrated in order to protect the hegemony of the dominant male.

Thus we find the ‘laws of God' as described in the Bible are extremely severe with women who practiced sex with multiple partners, and enforced the kind of authority that patriarchal society would need if the sexual dominance of men was to be preserved.

"The priest will prepare the waters of trial by ordeal and force the woman to drink it, saying, 'let this ordeal water enter your body.' If her stomach swells painfully, she is guilty. Her name will become a curse among all her kin. Such is the law, for women owe obedience to their husbands." Num 5:11

Leviticus 21:9 If she profanes herself by playing the harlot, profanes her father; she shall be burned with fire.

The Bible also allows sex outside of marriage making exemptions for soldiers during time of war, and allows assault and rape to occur, and sexual slavery is also allowed during peace time. Once again the rights of the women in the arrangements are not considered and men are allowed to indulge in promiscuous sex, a favoritism not granted to women who receive the death penalty for similar conduct. Men were promiscuous but women were required to be virgins, and then they were required to be obedient to whichever man had purchased them by remaining obediently monogamous for the rest of their lives.

Levitcus 19:20 "If a man has sex with a slave girl he is not to be punished. She is a slave."

"When you go to war against your enemies and you see a beautiful woman and find her desirable, you may take her. If she ceases to please you send her away." Deut. 21:10

"They waged war as god had commanded them and killed every male. But they kept the women as captives and took their wealth as spoil. Moses was enraged. 'So you spared the women? Kill every woman who has had sexual intercourse and kill every little boy, but keep the virgin girls for yourself. Divide them up evenly.'" Num. 31:7, 14

Leviticus 21:7 They shall not marry a harlot or a woman who has been defiled; neither shall they marry a woman divorced from her husband. A widow, or one divorced, or a woman who has been defiled, or a harlot, these he shall not marry; but he shall take to wife a virgin of his own people.

Leviticus 21:9 If she profanes herself by playing the harlot, profanes her father; she shall be burned with fire.

"The priest will prepare the waters of trial by ordeal and force the woman to drink it, saying, 'let this ordeal water enter your body.' If her stomach swells painfully, she is guilty. Her name will become a curse among all her kin. Such is the law, for women owe obedience to their husbands." Num 5:11

This inequality between the sexes was not limited to the culture that produced the ancient documents of the Bible, but also characterized all the other patriarchal societies that existed in the Mediterranean region at the time. Women were forbidden to participate in the religious life of the community, and there are Roman frescoes that have been dug out of the ground that date to the time of the creation of the Christian Bible which show women in the temple of a Roman god. They are depicted sitting at the very back of the temple, segregated from the men at the front, who are also conducting the rituals. The women are wearing veils, and portrayed as staring down towards the floor, an image which graphically captures the subjection under which women lived and their subordinate position in the life of the temple, which was simply a mirror of their subordinate position in the culture at large.

This is important to understand to make sense of the dualism present in the earliest church documents which describe two diametrically opposed visions of the status of women in the community. There are two conflicting visions of the status of women because their was a powerful reform movement in the early church, and as all reform movements do, the result was an equally powerful reactionary conservative backlash. You can see the same process at work today, where a reform movement in the church is attempting to legitimize ‘same sex marriage' and the result has been the speedy rise of a right wing reactionary force in the church which has been steadily and quite swiftly eroding the temporary gains of the reform movement. Something similar happened in the early life of the church and this interesting dichotomy is now frozen forever on the pages of the Bible.

According to the gospels, the origins of the reform movement can be traced back to the influence of the Jesus Christ figure. Women were portrayed as active members of this early religious community, and this in itself is radical enough, but what is even more radical is the way the roles of these women were portrayed.

During the time period of the gospel writings, it was a common belief that not only were women unworthy of participating in the religious life of the community, they also could not be ‘saved'. We find this doctrine described in a peculiar passage in the non-canonical Gospel of Thomas. The disciples ask the Jesus Christ figure if Mary, a woman, can be saved, and they are given the answer that Mary will be changed into a man, and thus Mary will also be saved. In this curious passage the doctrine that women cannot be saved is acknowledged, but the passage is only partially revolutionary. The doctrine is both internalized and accepted (‘Yes, women cannot be saved') and at the same time it is half revolutionary (however it is unacceptable that women cannot be saved) therefore a ‘solution' is proposed. Since it is unfair that women cannot be saved, and yet women cannot be saved, therefore all women will converted into men and saved that way.

We see the same doctrine that taught that women were unworthy found in the gospel of John in the canonical gospels (those that made it through the voting process in the fourth century and thus became part of the Bible). Here once again the disciples notice the Jesus Christ figure talking to a woman, and they say ‘Why is he bothering to talk to a woman about religious matters.' However the difference between the gospel of John and the Thomas manuscript is that in both cases the doctrine which taught that women were unworthy of being ‘saved' or participating in the religious life of the community is rejected, however the doctrine is not internalized in the gospel of John. Rather the women is addressed as an equal, she is portrayed as a full participant, without any question of the fact that she is a woman, and then she proceeds to become the very first ‘preacher of the good news.' So in the polemical frame work of the gospel of John, a woman was the first to ‘be saved' as woman, and then became the first minister preaching the gospel.

This pattern is repeated at the conclusion of the gospel of John, where the first to see the risen Christ is a female sex worker. In the parable the religious male disciples reject the ‘good news' which is first preached to them by a female sex worker. So we are told in the beginning of the gospel that the first preacher of the gospel was a woman and then at the conclusion of the gospel this theme is reinforced, and in a more radical form, in that the first preacher of the ‘good news' of the Easter gospel was not only a female, but actually a female sex worker.

The theme of the female sex worker being an active part of the religious community, and the constant companion of the Jesus Christ figure is repeated in all the canonical gospel documents. What makes this presentation so radical is not just that women were included in the religious life of the new community, but specifically, the most prominent roles are given to female sex workers, who, according to religious tradition, were to burned at the stake.

Certainly, as those Roman frescoes indicate, women were to have no role in the religious institutions of the time. They were to be veiled, silent, and subordinate according to the prevailing customs of the time. However the early church led a very radical reform movement, and thus we are told that women were found occupying the very highest offices of the early church. The highest office at the time was that of apostle. For a modern analogue you might consider the office of the Pope, although there are differences. There was no single ‘Pope' in the early church, but rather there were ‘many Popes'. The high office of apostle was actually occupied by many different people at the same time, and so it would seem that the early church practiced a communal type of ‘leadership' which was not as authoritarian and hierarchical as it was destined to become when the reform movement in the church was eventually crushed in the following conservative backlash, and consequently returned to patriarchy and authoritarianism.

In the following passage we are told about the many female workers in the early church (Prisca, Aquila, Mary, and Junias), and most noteworthy is the role of Junias, a woman who was not only an apostle, but ‘eminent among the apostles' and before whom the author shows deference due to the fact that she was an apostle ‘before I was.'

"Salute Prisca and Aquila my fellow-workers in Christ Jesus, who for my life laid down their own necks; unto whom not only I give thanks, but also all the churches of the Gentiles: and salute the church that is in their house. Salute Epaenetus my beloved, who is the first-fruits of Asia unto Christ. Salute Mary, who bestowed much labor on you. Salute Andronicus and Junias, my kinsmen, and my fellow-prisoners, who are eminent among the apostles, who also have been in Christ before me." (Romans Chapter 16 verse 3)

Previously I mentioned that the conservative fundamentalist movement in the church dealt with the problem of Jeremiah's attack on the Torah by deliberately mistranslating Jeremiah. The passage above is quite famous for being deliberately mistranslated by Jerome, who for reasons of Catholic dogma, changed all the female names to male names in the Latin Vulgate, to hide from good Catholics the fact that women were holding all the high offices in the church. Thus mistranslation as a tool to protect conservative dogma has a long pedigree, and when the NIV mistranslates Jeremiah, to protect the false doctrine of Biblical infallibility, they were only doing what the Jerome did before them in order to protect the patriarchy in Catholic church at the time.

A doctrine of equality which rejected hierarchy and class divisions was characteristic of the social reform movement in pre-Catholic early apostolic church. What made this doctrine so radical was that not only were women equal with men, but slaves were also granted equality. Now given how the entire Roman equality was dependant on the wealth generated by unpaid slave labor, this seemingly innocuous granting of equality rights to slaves would have serious repercussions in that it would undermine the power of the wealthy and its egalitarianism would level the economic playing field (when its followed through to it inevitable conclusion the result is the redistribution of wealth) and this helps to explain the powerful right wing backlash that inevitably consumed the early church.

There can be neither Jew nor Greek, there can be neither slave nor free, there can be no male and female; for ye all are one in Christ Jesus." (Galatians Chapter 3 verse 27)

The small selection of examples given above can be contrasted with those famous passages which represent the right wing backlash which the reform movement in the early church engendered, much as it still does today whenever any type of reform is attempted at church.

As I mentioned previously it was the custom for women to remain silent and veiled and sitting at the back of the bus in temple worship during the time of the rise of the early church, and so the full participation of women in the life of this new community would have angered conservatives, and they did not stay silent but launched an aggressive counter attack, and thus we find fossilized on the pages of the Bible both these statements of radical egalitarianism and some of the most backwards looking reactionary passages in the Bible.

In the following example women are portrayed as holding the second highest office in the early church, that of prophet. This does not bother the author of the following diatribe, but rather he is incensed that previous customs had been dispensed with and now women were going about without wearing veils on their heads. This novel change in custom was to much for this conservative to take, and he offers the ridiculous argument in justification of his backlash that women must wear veils to avoid ‘shocking the angels' and if they refuse he threatens to ‘have their heads shaved bald.' If women don't want to be shaved bald headed then let them wear their veils. He also rejects the doctrine of equality, in that ‘men are the glory of God' and thus don't have to cover themselves under veils. This verse is also the source of the notorious ‘pregnant man' doctrine. He ends his diatribe with an appeal to custom (that's the way we always did it before).

"But every woman prophesying with her head unveiled dishonors her head... For if a woman is not veiled, let her also be shaved bald: but if it is a shame to a woman to be bald then let her wear the veil. For a man indeed ought not to have his head veiled, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God ... For the man did not come from woman; but woman came from man ... for this cause ought the woman to have a sign of authority on her head, because of the angels. ... Judge ye in yourselves: is it seemly that a woman pray unto God unveiled?... But if any man wants to argue the point, we have no such custom, neither the churches of God." (1st Corinthians Chapter 11 verse 5)

What is interesting about the above passage is the author knows that his position is controversial and likely to be rejected. First we know that women were throwing off the veil, and thus his anger. Second we know that people were always arguing with him about his position, and thus he appeals to ancient custom and tradition, which one must suppose he felt should settle any dispute in his own favor.

The writer above at the very least could accept that a women could be a prophet. The only thing that bothered him was that they were throwing off their veils, and thus were questioning what he calls ‘authority' by no longer wearing this ‘sign of authority on their heads.' It was all to much for him, and while he managed to adjust to the idea that women would begin participating in the community he could only go so far, and now the church had crossed the line and was breaking with all the previous customs and traditions. Worse is yet to come. The following passages are some of the most oppressive and reactionary in the writings of the early church and here women are to return to their previous customs in full, and that includes the bit about keeping silent, wearing veils, looking at the floor, and no longer being prophets or apostles. These passages call for a complete roll back, and unfortunately, as the history of the church indicates, the right wing prevailed and the Christian church returned to patriarchal oppression in the long centuries that followed, as the aggressive conservative backlash undermined all the social gains temporarily made at the beginning of the new movement. When Roman Catholic conservative doctrine had won the day, Jerome would have to mistranslate those egalitarian verses to help maintain the fiction that patriarchy as practiced by Rome was also ‘apostolic' and represented ‘the unchanging tradition of Mother Church.'

"Let a woman learn in quietness with all subjection. But I permit not a woman to teach, nor to have dominion over a man, but they must keep silent... she shall be saved through her pregnancies." (1 Timothy Chapter 2 verse 11)

"Let the women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but let them be in subjection, as also saith the Torah. And if they would learn anything, let them ask their own husbands at home: for it is shameful for a woman to speak in the church. What? was it from you that the word of God went forth? or came it unto you alone? If any man thinks himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him take knowledge of the things which I write unto you, that they are the commandment of YAHWEH. But if any man is ignorant, let him be ignorant." (1 Corinthians Chapter 14 verse 34)

Once again the passage above is interesting in that while rolling back the gains made by women, the author acknowledges that ‘the ignorant' and certain ‘prophets' were disputing his reactionary position, and he attempts to buttress his conservative reaction by appealing to the long tradition of oppressing women found in earlier passages of the Bible, to make the argument that ‘prophecy' supports his right wing position (thus any so called modern prophet who was teaching women to become apostles or prophets or not wear their veils at church was clearly wrong and out of line since the weight of tradition supported the right wing position as clearly spelled out in such passages from the Torah as I listed above). This type of argument is interesting for in spelling out their conservative positions these writers inadvertently tell us just how controversial the right wing position was in the early church and they also reveal just how the conservative reactionaries attempted to support their arguments (they ridiculed the opposition, appealing to both custom and traditions as recorded in the earlier patriarchal writings of the Bible - their position thus relied heavily on myth making concerning the ‘divine and infallible origins of the Bible' which thus made it the source of authority in formulating right wing policies).

These passages are interesting in that they contribute towards dispelling the religious right myth of the ‘infallibility of scripture'. You will notice above that the argument that the conservative uses to bring back oppression of women and oppose the prophets who are preaching the egalitarian message is that of the ‘infallibility of the bible' - it is in the Bible, it is the commandment of God, the former traditions are normative and infallible and beyond dispute - his argument is basically that these so called prophets were not prophets since they disagreed with the patriarchy of the former biblical writings). While the controversy that we actually find on the Bible dispels the myth of ‘Biblical inerrancy' it also calls into question the typical liberal Christian practice of treating the Bible as ‘normative' and then attempting to ‘interpret scripture'. The only correct ‘interpretation' of the above passages and that they are the fossilized remnants of a time of reform followed by right wing reaction in the early church. As for those right wing passages there really is no way that they can be interpreted - they are simply what they are - right wing conservative reaction. As for these sorts of passages being ‘normative' as a source of ‘church doctrine' well they can only be ‘normative' for those who hold to the right wing position, and thus nothing but a headache for liberals, for whom, after all, such things can hardly be said to normative according to any definition of the term ‘liberal'.

Summary conclusion - ‘left wing' and ‘right wing' in the Bible

An entire book could be written contrasting the ideologically opposed points of view which have become frozen in time in the Bible, just as the church remains ideologically divided today. The Bible is ideologically divided because the church is ideologically divided, but of the two positions we find encoded here, the progressive element is more desirable since it is less oppressive and a lot more honest (the right wing position being based on a mythological falsehood about the ‘infallible nature of the bible' and the promotion of what are clearly myths masquerading as history as tools to prop up the status quo).

You have heard it said that ‘the Bible is contradictory' and this is true because religious communities are contradictory, and just as the church today is riven between reform and conservative backlash, so the Bible is found to curiously mirror the larger culture of the church, and is found to encapsulate both reform and reaction, ‘left wing' and ‘right wing'.

Their was a very strong proto-communist movement in the earlier church, and consequently it is hard to think about the Jesus Christ figure without thinking about all those damning things he had to say about rich people and his condemnations of poverty (unless one is part of the right wing, and then curiously you never hear about these things on Christian television, but rather you hear endless condemnations of the left wing position, which, ironically means that the religious right is always damning Jesus).

For example we are told that at least one branch of the early church took all those sermons against riches and money given by the Jesus Christ figure literally, and thus private property and poverty itself was abolished within the community, through the redistribution of wealth. The ideology of this passage mimics the call for land reform and the redistribution of wealth made by the prophet Micah during the time of prophetic reform and protest. According to Micah an few powerful families had formed an oligarchy which was ruling in power, and had taken all the land (something similar can be seen in poorer countries around the world today, for example in Columbia, where just a few powerful families own three quarters of the land, and the country is consequently be riven by violence and revolution to this very day). At least one segment of the early church was extremely left wing, going so far as to abolish the concept of private property and live in communes (a return to the earlier tribal lifestyle that existed before the rise of the state and consequently private property and wealth). This redistribution of wealth mimics the left wing call for land reform and redistribution of wealth found earlier in the book of Micah.

"Now the whole group of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned was held in common. With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. There was not a needy person among them, for as many as owned lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold. They laid it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need. (Acts 4:32)

"Alas for those who devise wickedness and evil deeds on their beds! When the morning dawns, they perform it, because they are so powerful. They covet fields, and seize them; houses, and take them away; they oppress everyone. Therefore thus says YAHWEH: Now, I am devising against this family an evil from which you cannot remove your necks; and you shall not walk arrogantly, for it will be an evil time. On that day they shall take up a taunt song against you, "We are utterly ruined; how he removes my land from me! Among our captors he parcels out our fields." " (Micah 2:1)

IN this context it seems a good idea to mention Mary's song in praise of communism and egalitarianism which she sang, so the parable goes, when she learned that she would give birth to the Jesus Christ figure.

My soul magnifies YAHWEH, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, God has shown strength and has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. God has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; God has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. God has helped , in remembrance of mercy, according to the promise made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants forever." (Luke 1:46)

What is interesting about Mary's communism song here, is that as soon as she finds out she is to give birth to the Christ baby, she must burst out in celebration of left wing ideology, and in the context of her song, ‘the promise made to our ancestors' is spelled out in political left wing terms, and doesn't have anything to do with that bit about ‘saving sinners from hell' but rather the establishment of egalitarianism and justice here on earth.

I thought I would conclude this piece by bringing to the readers attention some of this ‘communism' and ‘socialism' from the Bible, since the religious right is so strong these days and consequently you might be led to believe that somehow the Bible is a right wing document, when the truth of the matter is that the Bible is both a right wing document and a left wing document as I attempted to point out to you above.

Now in answer to those who might ask, ‘if this is true, then how can we decide what is right', given how the Bible is hardly ‘normative' since it is internally inconsistent and contradictory, reflecting then the state of the church, which, like the Bible before it, is riven to this very day between the forces of conservative reaction and reform, between liberals and conservatives, between left and right. Well, as the Buddha said, instead of relying on the authority of ancient religious texts, why don't you decide for yourself what is right, clinging to what is good, and rejecting what is wrong. (And certainly in at least one respect you should be able to determine that right wing ideology is wrong in promoting the falsehood that the bible is an infallible and consistent right wing document, since it is obvious that it is not.) As for the role that the Bible can play in this process, well it can remind people of just how ancient this struggle between reaction and reform really is. What is going on in the church today is really nothing new, but just the continuation of a very old story and a very old struggle which we can see playing out live before our eyes today, and can also find frozen like a fly in amber on the pages of the Bible itself.