The great theological negative

Don't be afraid. How often do we read this in the Scripture? Think about it. What is more natural than fear?

Continuing on -- punishment is the next negative to be removed. Why is it that there is so much emphasis on punishment in the Bible? 

There isn't. The emphasis on punishment is in the translations of the Bible. Punishment has fear, and the command is, Don't be afraid. When people translate, they move rapidly from one thought to another, and may well fail, even in committee, to critique the move from cause to consequence, -- or worse, from cause to the supposed cure.

I was a singer for many years, and I was often tense as I held my music in concert it would gradually get higher and higher in my hands, until a friendly soprano next to me would push it down slightly and say, "Relax." Well, it's easier said than done, but I do love her and will never forget her gentle correction. I was raised with a stick as a singer. I would be punished by the priest if I sang a wrong note. It's a wonder I ever sang. But the singer in me won out for a good while. Possibly there was some beauty in my performances for others, but I never resolved all the tension.

The priest in question was himself a product of centuries of distortion. Part of his problem was that he had studied the King James translation of the Bible, replete with its notion of punishment. He inherited both the theology of fear and the abuse it perpetuates. His punishments were more deeply wrong than I will describe. And he forgot that he was not supposed to be the one to deliver it, -- whether we call it chastisement, or correction, or tutoring, or mentoring, all of which are glosses that bear a closer sense of the sound of the Hebrew stem.

I have reported before that there is no Hebrew stem that demands punish as a gloss, e.g. here and here and here and over seventy other places.

Look at Leviticus 26. Don't imagine that there are no consequences to running off the rails. There are plenty of consequences, but listen:

Leviticus 26:29 imitating the opening of Genesis.

Genesis begins with the same E-major rising triad -- all this instruction and learning is part of being created.

The whole chapter is a complex of logic, and at every painful step, God walks with the people of the covenant even in their contrariness. It is not punishment, it is the consequence of covenant -- and  of presence. If we have any confidence in this God, let us build on it. Perhaps our contrariness could be dealt with -- see the magic of deep time in the previous posts. If we never asked for this covenant, remember that no one ever consciously asked to be born in the first place.

How well does this fit with the New Testament promises? Perfect love casts out fear -- let us grow in this love. The one who was before Abraham said: I am with you to the end of the age -- not to indulge your foolishness, but to keep you in all things because I cherish you. Well, I am paraphrasing of course -- and from distant memories of the NT.

We watched a live performance of E.T. the other day. Only the children eventually got it. I heard it from one of the violinists that it is an impossible-to-read score -- no key signature, but every note with accidentals, and often spelled differently. But it was a moving performance. That's a bit of an analogy to the Bible.