"Keep the Lame and Blind out of Church"
(and other Bible misreadings)
In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit! Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory forever!
People with disabilities are the most discriminated-against minorities. Fallen human nature tends to want to ignore or even dispose of these people who are "a burden to themselves and society." A horrible misreading of the Bible has reinforced this widespread prejudice against disabled people:
"And the king and his men went to Jerusalem against the Jebusites, the inhabitants of the land, who said to David, 'You will not come in here, but the blind and the lame will ward you off' — thinking, 'David cannot come in here.' Nevertheless, David took the stronghold of Zion, that is, the city of David. And David said on that day, 'Whoever would strike the Jebusites, let him get up the water shaft to attack the lame and the blind, who are hated by David's soul.' Therefore it is said, 'The blind and the lame shall not come into the house'" (2 Samuel 5:6-8 ESV).
Several Bible commentators have taken that last sentence - "The blind and the lame shall not come into the house" - to refer to the Temple, the house of the Lord that Solomon built on the citadel hill of Zion after David conquered that fortress. Then some preachers have used this misreading to rationalize their prejudice, constructing their church buildings like fortresses with steep stairs leading up to the worship hall, which sends a clear message to people with disabilities - "We Don't Want You In Here" - effectively excluding them. I've actually heard a preacher in Russia say that disabled people shouldn't be allowed in church and mentally retarded people can't be saved because they aren't intelligent enough to understand the Gospel, so they should not be allowed to take communion. But just as these ideas are very problematic, there are a few problems with the above passage:
Some may object that Judges 1:8 states - "And the men of Judah fought against Jerusalem and captured it and struck it with the edge of the sword and set the city on fire." This was right after Joshua had led the Israelites into the Promised Land, so why does the Bible state in 2 Samuel 5 that David conquered the city hundreds of years later? The answer is right there in Judges 1:21 - "But the people of Benjamin did not drive out the Jebusites who lived in Jerusalem, so the Jebusites have lived with the people of Benjamin in Jerusalem to this day." Jerusalem consists of two parts: the lower city and the upper city on a hill that became the Temple Mount. The Jebusites, a branch of the ancient Canaanites, retained the fortified citadel hill in Jerusalem for centuries after the time of Judges. But many commentaries state that David's soldiers crawled up through the water aqueduct, bypassing the citadel's walls, entering and capturing the fortress. Be careful not to jump to a conclusion after reading just one or two verses!
Here's another fact that several Bible commentaries point out: King David hated idolatry, and he might very well have been referring to "They have eyes and see not, feet and walk not" - idols placed on the Jebusites' fortress walls to ward off attackers, not actual blind and lame people. And lastly, people might object: how could King David display such terrible prejudice - "the lame and the blind, who are hated by David's soul"? Two answers: either the text may refer to those idols that David hated, or the verb can be translated as active instead of passive - "the lame and the blind, who hate David's soul." David cared for Mephibosheth, Jonathan's crippled son (2 Samuel ch. 9), so the notion that he hated the lame and blind doesn't make sense. And the Son of David, Jesus Christ, healed the lame and restored sight to the blind, a fulfillment of the Davidic ideal!
Let's look at some other Bible passages that people sometimes misread: Joshua 11:12 states - "And all the cities of those kings, and all their kings, Joshua captured, and struck them with the edge of the sword, devoting them to destruction, just as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded." But "all" doesn't mean 100% like our Westernized minds are trained to think. A couple of chapters later, in Joshua 13:13, we read - "Yet the people of Israel did not drive out the Geshurites or the Maacathites, but Geshur and Maacath dwell in the midst of Israel to this day." We've already seen above that the Jebusites weren't all driven out, which is repeated in Joshua 15:63; also, "And the LORD gave them rest on every side just as he had sworn to their fathers. Not one of all their enemies had withstood them, for the LORD had given all their enemies into their hands" (Joshua 21:45) - again, "all" doesn't mean 100%.
The Western mindset tends to take the Bible extremely literally, but the questions we really should be asking instead are: "What's the point? What is God trying to tell us in this inspired Book?" Here are another couple of problem texts for those literalists: in the story about King Saul's military defeat and death, 1 Samuel 31:4-5 states - "Then Saul said to his armor-bearer, 'Draw your sword, and thrust me through with it, lest these uncircumcised come and thrust me through, and mistreat me.' But his armor-bearer would not, for he feared greatly. Therefore Saul took his own sword and fell upon it. And when his armor-bearer saw that Saul was dead, he also fell upon his sword and died with him."
But in 2 Samuel 1:6-9, the next book of the Bible, we read that David captured a prisoner of war - "And the young man who told him said, 'By chance I happened to be on Mount Gilboa, and there was Saul leaning on his spear, and behold, the chariots and the horsemen were close upon him. And when he looked behind him, he saw me, and called to me. And I answered, 'Here I am.' And he said to me, 'Who are you?' I answered him, 'I am an Amalekite.' And he said to me, 'Stand beside me and kill me, for anguish has seized me, and yet my life still lingers.'" So, did Saul fall on his own sword, or on his spear? And did Saul's armor-bearer kill him, or did the young Amalekite kill him?
Speaking to the Pharisees who criticized Jesus for healing a man on the Sabbath, the Lord referred to the Torah, the five Books of Moses, in John 5:44-47 - "How can you believe, who receive praise from one another, and you don't seek the praise that comes from the only God? Don't think that I will accuse you to the Father. There is one who accuses you, even Moses, on whom you have set your hope. For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote about Me. But if you don't believe his writings, how will you believe My words?" The point here is against pharisaical nit-picking and praise-seeking, it isn't that we must believe Moses dictated the Torah exactly word-for-word, just like we have it today, and that the universe was created 6,000 years ago in six 24-hour days: there are most likely four levels of editing that took place over the centuries to take us from whatever Moses recorded to what we have today as the Torah. It states that Moses was the humblest man on earth: would the humblest man on earth ever write that about himself? Could Moses himself have reported his own death?
You see, taking the Bible 100% literally leads to many such problems. The questions we should be asking are: "What's the point? What is God trying to tell us in this inspired Book?" The Law of Moses teaches us to love and worship God alone, to love our neighbor, and especially the lame and the blind, the widow and the orphan. That's the main point, not how many steps you're allowed to take or how many sticks you can pick up on the Sabbath.
Here are a few pairs of Bible texts to compare: Matthew 9:23-25 - "And when Jesus came to the ruler's house and saw the flute players and the crowd making a commotion, He said, 'Go away, for the girl is not dead but sleeping.' And they laughed at Him. But when the crowd had been put outside, He went in and took her by the hand, and the girl arose." But in Luke 8:51-53 we read - "And when He came to the house, He allowed no one to enter with Him, except Peter and John and James, and the father and mother of the child. And all were weeping and mourning for her, but He said, 'Do not weep, for she is not dead but sleeping.' And they laughed at Him, knowing that she was dead." To whom and where did Jesus say that the girl was not dead but sleeping, to the crowd outside the house, or to His disciples and the parents inside the house?
Next, Matthew 10:15 states - "Truly, I say to you, it will be more bearable on the day of judgment for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah than for that town." In Luke 10:14, however, we read - "But it will be more bearable in the judgment for Tyre and Sidon than for you." Was Jesus referring to Sodom and Gomorrah, or to Tyre and Sidon? The context refers to the same event, but the words of Jesus are different in Matthew's and Luke's accounts. Or did Jesus say to Matthew - "You write down: 'Sodom and Gomorrah'" and to Luke's source - "You write down: 'Tyre and Sidon'"? Of course not!
Then, according to Luke 23:38, on Christ's cross was an inscription - "This is the King of the Jews." But in John 19:19 it was worded a little differently - "Pilate also wrote an inscription and put it on the cross. It read, 'Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.'" Did the sign say "This is..." or didn't it? Did the sign say "Jesus of Nazareth" or didn't it?
Also, in Matthew 27:54 we read - "When the centurion and those who were with him, keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took place, they were filled with awe and said, 'Truly this was the Son of God!'" But Luke 23:47 has - "Now when the centurion saw what had taken place, he praised God, saying, 'Certainly this man was innocent!'" What did the centurion actually say, that Jesus was the Son of God, or that He was innocent?
If one holds to "I believe the Bible is the verbally, word-for-word, divinely inspired Word of God" as his primary article of faith, the number one item on his denomination's doctrinal statement, then such small textual discrepancies as these can sorely shake one's faith. When I was working on my Harmony of the Gospels in Russian and then in English, I found many more of these discrepancies when comparing accounts of the same event in two or three Gospels. So I asked myself - "What's the main point? What is the Holy Spirit communicating to us in these parables and events?" That's what it is really all about; otherwise, if it's all about verbal inspiration, all translations are inexact, so we're out of luck if we don't have the original manuscripts in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek... which we don't.
Here's another example of taking Bible texts too literally: When Jesus was warning His disciples about the binding heavy burdens on others, making the fringes of their garments fancy, loving the best places at feasts and in the synagogues, and being greeted as "Rabbi," He said - "But I tell you, do not be called 'Rabbi'; for One is your Teacher, the Christ, and you are all brothers. Do not call anyone on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven. And do not be called teachers; for One is your Teacher, the Christ" (Matthew 23:8-10). But Luke 16:24, 1 Corinthians 4:15, and Colossians 3:21 all use "father" referring to men in a positive sense. And John 2:2 & 10, Acts 13:1, 1 Corinthians 12:28, and Ephesians 4:11 all use "teacher" in a positive way. So the main point in the Matthew text isn't that we should never use the words "father" or "teacher" except for God the Father and Christ. The point is to avoid self-importance and pride, puffing oneself up with fancy titles that demonstrate a lack of humility, just the opposite of Moses, the hero of the Pharisees.
The Apostle Peter wrote - "Know this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit" (2 Peter 1:20-21). Interpreting or explaining the meaning of Scripture (not only "prophecy" in the sense of foretelling the future, but also "forth-telling" or telling forth Scripture's meaning) isn't something that just anyone can do: notice the connecting word "For" - this means that the first phrase - "no explanation of Scripture is of any private interpretation" is explained by the following phrase - "For holy men of God spoke as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit." So it takes experienced, trained, and most importantly holy men of God to rightly explain Scripture just as it took holy men of God to speak and write down the Scriptures by the Holy Spirit's inspiration. It simply isn't true that "every cowherd and every milkmaid can rightly understand the Scriptures" as one of the Protestant Reformers stated. Believing that explains why today we have over 20,000 denominations that can't agree with each other.
In my previous essay, I asked the question: What is the True Source of Authority if it isn't the Bible? Christ Himself said - "You search the Scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and these are they which testify about Me" (John 5:39). If we search the Bible to prove our pet doctrines of the pre-tribulation rapture, or predestination, or free will, or free market economy, etc., etc. - we miss the point of Scripture entirely: it's all about Jesus Christ! Jesus Christ Himself is the True Source of Authority: He said - "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe [obey] all things which I commanded you. Behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age" (Mat. 28:18-20).
Again, St. Peter warned against misreading the Scriptures - "And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures" (2 Peter 3:15-16). So be careful: ignorant, unstable people can easily misunderstand and twist the Scriptures, especially those "hard to understand" writings of the deep thinkers such as St. Paul. Before we attempt to teach others from the Bible, we should study what "holy men of God" have written about the Scripture portions we want to interpret.
In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit! Christ is among us! He is and ever shall be!
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