The Lost Letters of Pergamum - Part II

Throughout Antipas’ correspondence with Luke, we do not know when exactly Antipas is converted. One thing the readers do know for sure is Antipas’ faithfulness in following through the gospel. This is evidenced by his frequent engagement or correspondence with Luke and his increased enthusiasm in Christian virtues. Besides, Antipas’ compassion for Simon ben Joseph, his love for the little girl Nouna, his sympathy for the woman and her baby where he met during the voyage to Caesarea, and his changed attitude towards the gladiatorial game at the end also tell us that he was being transformed gradually without him even realizing it. What is shocking and unexpected of Antipas is his sudden appearance in the gladiatorial game appealing to the emperor for the life and freedom of Demetrius, imitating Jesus Christ who laid down His life on the cross for us. Truly, “greater love has no one than this,” The Lost Letters of Pergamum by Longenecker is a gospel by itself depicted through the transformed life and acts of love of Antipas. It seriously challenges my faith again– would I be like Antiapas if I were in his situation?

The stark contrast between the two Christian Bible study groups: one by Kalandion and another by Antonius resemble very much to our present day context even though the story is told in an antiquity setting. Without doubt, Longenecker is doing a marvelous narrating to intertwine historical data and fictional characters into a very believable biblical account. I truly find it helpful and experience for the first time to better appreciate the gospel of Luke when I heard it from Antipas. The experience or the feeling I have in reading Antipas’s narrative is like you heard from someone in the historical context who talked about his own experience. Antipas’ description of his personal experience, which he encountered at the house of Antonius, is very heartwarming. It resonates with my heart for the same desire – Isn’t this the kind of fellowship we Christians long for in our Bible study group at home?

Book Review - The Lost Letters of Pergamum (Part I)

If you love the novel “The Shadow of Galilean” by Gerd Theissen, you’d probably enjoy reading “The Lost Letters of Pergamum” by Bruce Longenecker as I did. The genre of the latter however is very much different from the former. What is common between them is both authors are New Testament scholars, both their story is fictional intermingled with historical facts and the setting of their narrative is both in first-century NT time.

“The Lost Letters of Pergamum” is a collection of correspondence between Antipas from Pergamum and Luke in Ephesus. The story began with Antipas invited Calpurnius of Ephesus, the son of Theophilus, to attend a gladiatorial game in Pergamum to be organized by his noble friend, Rufinus. Through the correspondence, Antipas becomes acquainted with Luke who is a real closed friend of Calpurnius and is helping him to oversee his household when Calpurnius has to leave town for a family matter. Antipas by origin is a pagan civic benefactor of his home cities Tyre and Caesarea. He was in Pergamum because of his great interest in studying historical documents. Because of such interest, Antipas soon develops a steady friendship with Luke after reading Luke’s monograph accounting for the life of Jesus of Nazareth. He corresponded with Luke frequently about his reading of the gospel. Later, under Luke’s recommendation, Antipas took the challenge to join a Christian gathering for fellowship at one of the Christians’ house in Pergamum

Antipas began by joining Kalandion’s group with his friend Rufinus, but soon realized that the social life of Christians there was far from what was being said in Luke’s narrative. People at Kalandion’s group were very conscious about their status quo and were attracted to Jesus’ miracles more than by his teaching. On Luke’s advice, Antipas attempted another Christian group led by Antonius. His experience with Antonius’ household and the Christian friends gathered there immediately drew him to reflect deeply in the biblical account of Luke. The fellowship at Antonius’ house was warm and sincere, and the spirit of brotherhood was evident and real. The people were opened to one another and cared for one another irrespective of social status. Noblemen, civic officials, merchants, artisans, women, and even people with no social rank at all like Simon ben Joseph, a past employee of Antipas, was treated as a Christian brother.

Longenecker's account of "The Lost Letters of Pergamum" is undoubtedly convincing and believable. His invention of an editor's preface to introduce the discovery of the "Lost Letters" and the additional footnotes about the dating of those letters is genius. It truly does create an effect like one is actually reading a long lost ancient manuscript. Although the book contains only letter correspondence, the story is carefully constructed out of a cinematic traditional plot. The main character Antipas was introduced as an enthusiast of the gladiatorial game at the beginning, but ironically he had become a victim of the game at the end for his friend's sake.

Recovering the Scandal of the Cross

Well, regardless of what the authors have attempted to accomplish in this book, I will still abide with the “penal substitution” theology. This is what the Bible speaks to me when I read from the Old Testament to the New Testament, so I am not prepared to change my perspective. Although one can derive other significant meanings from the cross, Jesus’ crucifixion impacted my life the most, and it is because of His sacrificial love on the cross that I truly feel forgiven by God.

The major concern of the authors is that they found the meaning and function of atonement have been narrowly defined in the last two centuries. Atonement, in their view, so far has been articulated in the doctrine of “penal substitution” or “satisfaction”. This doctrine albeit is biblically based and it speaks about the central theme of atonement that “Christ died for our sin”, its message may not be easily or universally understood by people who live in different society system or of different cultural background.

Green and Baker were afraid these two doctrines, based on the same theology that Christ Jesus died in our place for our sins to satisfy the judgment of a righteous God, may convey too much of a negative picture or message rather than a Gospel with love to the contemporary audiences or soon-to-be believers. They wanted the contemporary Christians, theologians, and especially preachers to take note that these two doctrines were formulated during the time of feudalism. While the cultural concepts and practices were appropriate during then, we cannot possibly articulate them in the same way in today cultural setting. They argued that even this atonement theory still serving well in a society driven by guilt-base in which offences or wrongful acts naturally resulted in consequences with punishment or justice, it can appear difficult to comprehend when it is being translated to a shame-base society like Japan.

Green and Baker presented a good case for contemporary believers to re-look at the full meaning of the cross or more precisely the significance of Jesus’ death on the cross as salvific act. The book opens a good opportunity for more conversation and thought and more research on the topic than ever before, however, the attack on the theological model of “Satisfaction” by Anselm and “Penal Substitution” model does not seem fair.

Anselm spoke of the issued related to his own contemporary and drew the meaning of the cross to appeal to his context should be understandable and nothing is inappropriate. Most historical models are time sensitive and appealed to its specific groups of people or culture. This by their nature is of timeliness and contextualization. The constraint and relevancy of the models should be properly recognized and fairly treated instead of being heavily criticized and attacked. The person who adopts the models lied with the responsibility to interpret the models in their proper context and original intention.

Overall the book offers a good survey on all the essential meaning of the cross in both the Old and New Testament, especially in Gospels, Apostle Paul’s and Peter’s epistles. It gives a sound biblical insight into Christ’s work that involves intercultural potential such as liberation from sin and guilt to the significance of Jesus’ life, his obedience (recapitulation) and resurrection as the final victory besides the atonement.

The Shadow of the Galilean - Part II

Andreas’ second mission from Pilate is to check on Jesus’ activities in the region to ascertain his initiated religious movement - the coming of God’s kingdom - would become a “security risk’ or post any imminent danger to the existing tension experienced in Jerusalem. Andreas (as expected being a fictional character) never actually has a chance to meet with Jesus except the one last view he has from a distance when Jesus was crucified at Calvary with two other Zealots. We can’t tell how much Andreas is being influenced by Jesus’ teaching through the testimonials and accounts he heard from various groups of people who said about Jesus. He seems to incline towards Jesus’ religious movement more than agreeing with the Zealots who believe that they must engage violence to liberate their people from Romans’ oppression. They believe that God’s would deliver them only when somebody is doing something. An extreme between Zealots’ vengeance and Jesus’ advocate of loving your enemy truly stands out to arrest one’s attention.

Pilate was fearful of another riot occurred during the Passover feast of unleavened bread with multitude of pilgrims streamed into the city of Jerusalem from different parts of the regions. He manipulated Andreas’ idea of granting amnesty to Barabbas and other Zealots who were either imprisoned or took sheltered in the caves, and also to Jesus who was arrested by the authority. Pilate’s sole interest was to reconcile with the crowds by releasing a prisoner to their request to avoid a possible riot, and at the same time to test out where the real political threat actually come from: the Zealots or Jesus’ passive political reformation. Having discovered Pilate’s motive, Andreas felt he was indirectly involved in Pilate’s decision. He struggled with the issue of who is the culprit and who is guilty. Was it the Zealots, without them in the background, without that tension, Jesus would not in any way be viewed as security risk? Has not the Roman anxiety over the messianic unrest, Jesus may have not been arrested.

Though this is a novel with a predictable ending of Jesus’ execution on the cross by the Romans authority as well as a major part of the storyline is somewhat familiar from the biblical narrative, the author didn’t fail in keeping up his readers’ eagerness to follow through the story. Certain parts of the scene like blackmailing and kidnapping are thrilling, and the debate and conflict of healing on Sabbath is exciting and at times suspenseful. It is brilliant to begin the story with Andreas in the jail; this has absolutely caught the attention of the readers who eagerly want to know what would happen to his fate.

Book Review - The Shadow of the Galilean (Part I)

I am not a novel enthusiast. In my entire life, I read no more than ten novels. But this one, The Shadow of the Galilean, attracted me first because of the title. It is a novel that constructs its plot based on a familiar biblical account. I was curious to find out how the author, a German theologian, uses his imagination and biblical knowledge to makeup his story. The second reason I read the book was because I need to do a review as one of my course assignments.

Let me post it here to give you a summary of what it is. I truly enjoy reading this book; a rare experience out of my many book review assignments.

The narrative story of the book is told by Andreas from Sepphoris, a city in Galilee. Andreas is a grain merchant whose family has business dealings with Herold Antipas. The story began with a riot in Jerusalem as a result of Pontius Pilate’s intention of making use of the Jewish temple treasury for the construction of the aqueduct. Andreas, anxious to greet an old friend Barabbas among the demonstration crowd, was falsely arrested by the Roman authority. He was taken to prison with one of his two slaves. Because of his good education and competency in Greek and as a rich young merchant who travels round the land of the Palestine at that time, Pilate blackmails Andreas to work as a spy under the supervision of his officer Metilius. First he was asked to collect and gather information about the Essenes who live in the wilderness.

Pilate’s government was anxious to know the secret of the Essene community. They were afraid the community might have other hidden agenda, and living in the wilderness perhaps might just be one way of hiding a secret crime. Pilate worried that the Essenes might favor Antipas should there be any kind of further tension and conflicts developed between the two rivals.

Seeing that he really has no other options, Andreas accepts the task and ventures immediately into the journey as he was conducting business along the regions of Galilee and Judaea. He began to collect information from his targeted group of people. First he met a rejected Essene by the name Baruch, who was excommunicated from the community after he had uncovered the community’s secret of hidden treasure, which probably never existed. Andreas saved Baruch in the wilderness, and accepted him into the family as a hired assistance in his trade. He gained substantial amount of valuable information to satisfy the Romans authority about the belief and objective of Essenes who chose to live in the dessert through Baruch.

Essenes are a group of cult believers who disagree with the temple worship and most of its festivals celebrated. They find themselves more peaceful and can better observe God’s commandments in the wilderness than participating in the Jerusalem temple’s worship. They hold to the belief that God in his right time will liberate them from the oppression.