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Approach
I’m hoping to produce a commentary on Exodus and not simply a catalog
of interpretations of Exodus. In addition to this, I want to ask and
address what the interpretations tell us about the biblical text.
Progress
Progress on the research for the volume is going well. The internet has
proved to be invaluable in discovering leads for uses of Exodus. Another
fruitful avenue of research has come through personal contact with
individuals who have or are using Exodus in significant or interesting
ways.
Current Pursuits
1. The artwork of Maja Lisa Engelhardt, a Danish artist.
A. 20 Paintings and 9 gouaches of the burning bush, some of which appear
in the newest Danish translation of the Bible.
B. She works within the tradition of Northern Romantic Landscape Painting
which scrutinizes nature as a manifestation of the sacred and takes great
interest in the sublime.
C. The introduction to a catalogue accompanying
her 1996 exhibition of Burning Bush paintings (Burning Bush:
Maja Lisa Engelhardt) raises the question:
1. How could an artist present Moses, head turned away so as not to see
God in the bush?
2. Showing God in the bush would undercut the moral of the story–God
is not to be seen by mere mortals.
3. But merely depicting Moses seriously standing alone near the bush
leaves unexplained the essential drama.
4. Only for a seriously contemplative artist for whom Nature itself has
become a sacred object does it make sense to present the bush as a self-sufficient
pictorial subject.
C. Engelhardt uses the burning bush episode to
evoke certain feelings of awe and mystery rather than re-telling
the story or re-contextualizing the story. The biblical text
lives not in words, but in colors.
2. Computer-generated images by Rev. Al Fohr of
Exodus and the South-African struggle against apartheid
3. Arts4Peace-A religious corporation formed in
1997 to promote peace and interfaith understanding through culture,
economic development, and the arts. According to their website,
they are working on a production of Handel’s, Israel in
Egypt, to be performed at Mt. Sinai.
4. The use and understanding of the 10 Commandments
in the legal arena
A. 10 Commandments monument case decided this week when US District Court
judge Myron H. Thompson ruled that the monument placed in the building
housing the Alabama Supreme Court had to be removed. The Chief Justice
of the Alabama Supreme Court, Roy Moore, placed a 2 ½ ton monument
depicting the 10 Commandments in the building.
1. Moore argued that the monument depicted the
moral foundation of law and is a reminder to Alabama judges,
justices, and citizens of the ultimate sovereignty of the Judeo-Christian
God over the state and church (pg. 20 of Judge Thompson’s
decision).
2. Experts on both sides testified that the 10
Commandments were a foundation of American law and American’s
founders looked to and relied on them as a source of absolute
moral standards (pg. 21).
3. Judge Thompson noted that the 10 Commandments
are displayed in other government buildings such as the east
portico of the US Supreme Court building, the entrance to the
door of the US Supreme Court’s courtroom, and on the Spirit
of Justice statue in the US Justice Department building. He said,
however, that “in each of these displays, the 10 Commandments
are situated in a secular context and the secular nature of the
display is apparent and dominant” (pgs. 22-23).
4. According to Thompson (pg. 73): “The court
appreciates that there are those who see a clear secular purpose
in the Ten Commandments . . . But the Chief Justice did not limit
himself to this (i.e., secular purpose); he went far, far beyond.
He installed a two-and-a-half ton monument in the most prominent
place in a government building, managed with dollars from all
state taxpayers, with the specific purpose and effort and effect
of establishing a permanent recognition of the “sovereignty
of God,” the Judeo-Christian God, over all citizens in
this country, regardless of each taxpaying citizen’s individual
personal beliefs or lack thereof. To this, the Establishment
Clause says no.”
B. Last year, the US Supreme Court chose not to hear the case of City
of Elkhart v. William A. Brooks. Since 1958 a 6-foot granite monument
inscribed with the 10 Commandments has stood in front of the city of
Elkhart’s Municipal Building. A juvenile court judge seeking
to provide troubled youth with a common code of conduct was the original
impetus behind the project. A suit was filed in 1998 alleging that
it was a violation of the Establishment Clause. A District Court upheld
the city, but the 7th Court reversed.
1. Even though a Protestant minister, Catholic
priest, and rabbi spoke at the dedication ceremony of the monument
and sought to develop a non-sectarian version of the Ten Commandments,
the Court ruled that “making a religious text nonsectarian,
however, does not make it secular or strip it of its religious
significance.” (J. Stevens, 2).
2. Dissenting, Chief Justice Rehnquist, and Justices
Scalia and Thomas said, “Considering the Ten Commandments
monument in the context in which it appears (i.e., outside the
Municipal building), it sends no such message” (i.e., government
support of religion) (4). The monument is part of the city’s
celebration of its cultural and historical roots.
C. Also last year, the 7th Circuit Court upheld
an injunction against the erection of a 10 Commandments Monument
in the case Indiana ACLU v. Frank O’Bannon, Gov. of Indiana.
During the 1950s the Fraternal Order of Eagles distributed 10
Commandments monuments across the US to various communities.
In 1958, one was placed on the Indiana Statehouse grounds where
it stood until smashed by a vandal in 1991. Arrangements were
made for a replacement, thus precipitating the suit on the basis
of the violation of the Establishment clause. An injunction against
its erection was granted by a district court.
1. The court noted that “We have recognized
that the 10 Commandments is a religious and sacred text that
transcends secular, ethical, or moral concerns . . . Yet, we
have also recognized that the Ten Commandments ‘can no
doubt be presented by the government as playing . . . a role
in our civic order.’” (5-6)
D. Stone v. Graham, 1989, US Supreme Court
10 Commandments an undeniably sacred text—See pgs. 2-3 of the opinion.
E. DeMille’s 1923 silent movie, The Ten Commandments
The introduction to the film asserts, “Our
modern world defined God as a “religious complex” and
laughed at the Ten Commandments as Old Fashioned. Then, through
the laughter, came the shattering of the thunder of the World
War. And now a blooddrenched, bitter world—no longer laughing—cries
for a way out. There is but one way out. It existed before it
was engraven upon Tablets of Stone. It will exist when stone
has crumbled. The Ten Commandments are not rules to obey as a
personal favor to God. They are the fundamental principles without
which mankind cannot live together. They are not laws—they
are the LAW.”
At one point in the movie, one of the characters
says, “If you break the 10 Commandments, they’ll
break you.”
F. Vitagraph’s 1910 movie, Life of Moses,
was advertised as a non-sectarian movie that proved popular with
Jews and Christians.
All of these examples raise many questions, among
them:
1. What are non-sectarian uses of the Ten Commandments?
2. How do the Ten Commandments function in each sect?
3. What is a non-sectarian use?
4. How does it differ from a sectarian use?
5. How do sects use non-sectarian versions?
This leads to a very important question, “How
has Exodus been used to build individual communities as well
as societies or entities containing multiple communities?
I am also very interested to find out if countries
outside the US are or have had this legal debate over secular
and religious uses of the Ten Commandments. Do they make distinctions
between sectarian and non-sectarian uses?
Concerns
1. Managing the massive amount of material
2. Overlooking important examples
3. Saying something about the biblical text rather
than presenting a catalog of material
One biblical scholar commented to me that this
is all very interesting, but it isn’t really biblical studies.
It’s more history or sociology or something else. The field
of biblical studies has to have boundaries.
4. Lack of English translations for some materials
(Latin, Italian, etc.)
5. Gaining access to material such as the
silent movie, The Life of Moses produced by Pathe Freres. Also,
the similarly named film produced by Vitagraph. This and other
material would necessitate traveling to archives within and
outside of the US to gain access. I can and plan to do some
of this, but time and money constraints become an issue.
Email
Scott with comments.
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