Exodus: Gods and Kings, A Short Movie Review

How do you combine a beautiful ancient narrative in a way that markets itself well to American entertainment and American sensibilities?

Have a “believable” (read: naturalistic) setting, a hefty dose of Die Hard-like action sequences, and sprinkle throughout good-ol' Humanistic values.  This is hard to manage in an ancient story that is really about divine commissioning, cataclysmic divine judgments, and battle sequences where God really does all the fighting.  But somehow Exodus: Gods and Kings finds a way to sanitize the story well enough for American consumption.

As expected this movie has little to say about the ancient biblical story and more to say about the ideals and values of contemporary culture.  Moses is the hero; but he is a 21st century hero not an ancient one.  The ideals and values he fights for are more like those of a contemporary comic book hero, than anything resembling a noble figure within the Ancient Near East.  First, Moses is spiritually confused almost the whole movie.  Interestingly, this is actually seen as a strength in our culture.  When you have tons of gods and all this supernatural fluff, any respectable American hero will be skeptical.  And more importantly a person who is confident, unconfused, and unwavering in his version of spirituality and beliefs is just dogmatically narrow-minded... or so says the value-makers of our culture.  So if Moses is going to be any sort of noble hero for American audiences, he must be very spiritually confused. 

Second, Moses is definitely not confused about his moral stances.  The pure humanism that flows out of him surprised me.  Although it probably shouldn't have.  The final purpose of all moral efforts and moral values begins and ends with man.  And so we get a Moses who loves democracy, fights against forced labor, loves his wife “more than anything,”  and who ultimately wants (his) people to just be treated equally (like every Egyptian!).  Again, ironic that this is almost exactly inverse of the real Moses.  God was the real motivation behind everything Moses did.  Moses refused the riches of Egypt because... God.  Moses called (his) people to freedom because... God.  Moses even pleaded for mercy for his own people not because of anything intrinsic to their worth, but because God's reputation was at stake. 

I suppose there are other aspects to this film that would also disturb pious viewers.  But for some reason the humanism disturbed me the most.  And to those with an ear to these things, it is the exact same thing you get in Kingdom of Heaven and other Ridley Scott productions.

Language Adventures

I go down to a local dӧner stand to get some take-out.  The cook asks me if I’d like to stay and have some chai.  I say, “Sorry...  next time... my wife and I... come… have tea with you.”  He smiles graciously and says “Okay, sounds good.”  I say goodbye and walk back home.  Then I go back over the conversation in my head and realize I actually didn’t say —“and I.”  So I basically invited him to have tea with my wife...  I laugh about it.  But I’m embarrassed just the same, and in these moments [they happen a lot :) ] a lure toward reclusiveness pulls on me.

Believe it or not, speaking with the vocabulary of a toddler takes humility.  Especially for people (like me) who take a measure of pride in communicating well and in being articulate in how I present myself.  In these moments, I’m finding I have much less humility than I imagined.  It is disheartening and sobering.  Basic language lessons have quickly become pressing spiritual lessons.  And at this point surprisingly, growth in both is now very much connected.

The Streets I Feared To See, A Poem

By George MacDonald (1824-1905):

I said: “Let me walk in the field;”

             God said: “Nay, walk in the town;”

I said: “There are no flowers there;”

             He said, “No flowers, but a crown.”

I said: “But the sky is black,

There is nothing but noise and din;”

But He wept as He sent me back,

“There is more,” He said, “there is sin.”

I said: “But the air is thick,

And fogs are veiling the sun.”

He answered: “Yet souls are sick,

And souls in the dark undone.”

I said: “I shall miss the light,

And friends will miss me, they say,”

He answered me, “Choose tonight,

If I am to miss you, or they.”

I pleaded for time to be given;

He said: “Is it hard to decide?

It will not seem hard in heaven

To have followed the steps of your Guide.”

I cast one look at the fields,

Then set my face to the town;

He said: “My child, do you yield?

Will you leave the flowers for the crown?”

Then into His hand went mine,

And into my heart came He;

And I walk in a light Divine,

The streets I had feared to see.

A Sabbatical

Many of you know we are in the midst of our transition overseas.  I've planned to take a sabbatical from blogging for 2 months.  I'll look forward to reading and responding to any comments when I return.  I'm sure I will also have a few ideas stored up by December as well.  Pray for an undivided heart and mind as we prepare and transition into our new life overseas. 

A New Smile

If I was ever to make a bucket list, I would add a new priority.  

There are very few things more fulfilling than making a baby smile.

Nathaniel (3 months)

From Enemy to Ally

The brutal Syrian civil war has been lingering on for 3 1/2 years.  At this time last year the US was preparing airstrikes against the Syrian regime as it fought against the rebels, mostly comprised of the Free Syrian Army and the Islamic Front.  But recently a rebel group has overtaken a third of Syria's eastern territories.  The US Secretary of State now finds himself denouncing them as terrorists and has been preparing a coalition to resist these new rebels militarily.  The US is now hinting that Iran –the Syrian regime's primary mid-east ally– should play a role in resisting the Islamic State!  Oh, how the tables have turned so quickly.

The NY Times writes how awkward some of this has been with a report on the recent international meeting in Paris:

“Regional powers used the meeting, which was ostensibly designed to support the beleaguered Iraqi government in its struggle against the Islamic State, to take swipes at one another –and Syria was the elephant in the room.”

Promiscuous Worship

The Romans were well known for their promiscuity of worship.  They worshiped many gods.  They worshiped their own Etruscan and Latin gods, of course.  They worshiped the gods of their neighbors.  They worshiped the gods of the people they conquered.  Their toleration of a plethora of gods came with the patriotic demand for all others to tolerate their own gods –especially as the empire expanded.  One of their favorite pastimes was god-matching.  It streamlined this toleration process.  Ares is Mars, Thor is Jupiter, Zeus is also Jupiter, Artemis is Diana, Hermes is Mercury, etc.  Even though Parthians, Greeks, and Norseman have different names, they would say, we all still worship the same god(s).

Mars

Ares

The promiscuous nature of Roman worship was not really because they loved honoring and invoking blessings from any and all gods.  Roman worship was primarily a means to another end.  It was for the sake of something else –something more significant in their mind.  They called it pax romana, the peace of Rome or the peace of the empire.  Theological toleration was for the higher goal of maintaining political stability throughout all the territories.  They allowed traditional worship and matched up cross-cultural gods not because of some deep theological reflection.  Romans were statesmen.  They knew what it meant to build and sustain an empire.  And not upsetting their conquered people by uprooting their religion helped maintain the political status quo.  If the god-matching strategy didn’t fit well, at the very least there was an imperial expectation for devotion and sacrifice to the Roman pantheon alongside any local gods.  It was promiscuous worship that demanded the same promiscuity on everyone else.  A toleration that demands toleration.

Romans tolerated most everything religious except one thing.  The god deniers.  They called them “athiests.”  They refused to offer sacrifices to the gods, the gods who could potentially curse the empire into instability and decline.  Ultimately, denying the gods was a political statement of ultimate allegiance.  More specifically, it was an act of treason.  The athiests denied the very foundation of Roman society and way of living. 

Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna

In AD 155, a feeble old bishop was on trial for “atheism” in the ancient arena of Smyrna.  The wild beasts ready to be loosed on the almost 90 year-old man for all to observe what happens to traitors and the “intolerant.”  Rome’s one simple demand for his release was for him to offer incense (as a form of worship) to the emperor (emperor’s were even part of the pantheon in those days) and curse “the atheists.”  Looking around the stadium, the old bishop turned the tables with a curse of his own.  He waved his hand toward the crowd and shouted, “Away with the Atheists!”  The whole stadium was in an uproar.  Instead of being fed to lions because of his age, the emperor graciously allowed him to burn at the stake.

In a culture that worshiped many things…  religious tolerance was the reigning ethic.  Promiscuity in worship was the reality.  Political allegiance was the supreme value.  This is a familiar picture that will always take shape when true worship is subservient to political/social goals.  It is also familiar because the religious tolerance of our day, just like Rome, has little to do with theological reflection.  It has everything to do with establishing an equitable and peaceful society.  When worship only has instrumental value –not ultimate value– will we demand the kind of tolerance that is so prolific today.  It is the kind of tolerance that has “demands” –which is actually very strange.  It is a kind of tolerance that –when fully formed– will work itself out like Rome’s version of it.  I pray not.

True Virtue

St. Augustine says true virtue is rightly–ordered affections.  It is supremely loving only what is worthy of one’s supreme love.  It is being mildly inclined toward what is worthy of only mild inclinations.  And it is despising what is truly despicable.  Another way of saying it is true virtue is valuing deep in your soul everything according to its actual worth.  Everything in its proper order. 

I remember watching an interview of a rodeo bull–rider after he had won.  The interviewer commented about the rider’s fearlessness out there.  With a straight face the bull–rider retorted:  “I’m not afraid to die.  I’ll do whatever it takes.”  I suppose growing up in the city my perception of the virtues of bull-riding is short-sided.  But when did it become standard jargon to express paying the ultimate price for riding a bull as something noble? 

It is common to hear reflections at funerals related to the life of the deceased.  “His greatest passion was bass-fishing every morning.” “She really lived for cycling more than anything.”  “His one passion in life was the Dodgers.”

The question Augustine would ask is:  Does this bull-rider love bull-riding according to its actual worth?  Another way of asking it is:  Are our greatest passions supposed to be our greatest passions?  Do we love supremely something we should only be mildly inclined toward?  Are those things that we are mildly inclined toward instead supposed to be actually our greatest passions?  Is everything in its proper order according to its actual worth?  Do you see the question he’s shaping for us? 

It will not be surprising to you that I find Augustine’s account of virtue very compelling.  The center of true virtue is the affections, the heart.  Probably something Augustine picked up from his adored Savior.  Second, virtuous living is lining yourself up with a reality outside of yourself.  You don’t create value, it is already out there.  You don’t invent it, you discover it.  Of course this is uprooting for the gate-keepers of our culture.  Those journalists and senators and celebrities and kindergarten teachers that have programmed us to find whatever we love and pursue it.  Conditioned us to see virtue as the passionate pursuit of our dreams, and then they leave the most important question intentionally unanswered.  What are those dreams?  What is the object of our pursuit?  Bull-riding?  God?  The Dodgers?  Bass-fishing?  It doesn’t matter, or so we’re told.  All that matters is that in the land of opportunity we pursue it with all our heart.  The American Dream.  Augustine would shutter.  Maybe we should too.

Against Babylon, Recasting Jeremiah’s Final Oracle

In his oracles against the nations Jeremiah climaxes the end of his book with a long devastating verdict against Babylon:

“The Hammer of the whole earth is cut down and broken… Behold, I am against you, O proud one, declares the Lord God of hosts, for your day has come, the time I will punish you…” (50:23,31).

After decades of tearful denunciations of the sins of Judah and its corrupt kings (Jeremiah’s own people), the prophet was probably quite eager to finally proclaim this oracle against Babylon at the end of his writings (50:1-51:64).  Babylon was cruel and vicious to be sure, but even more it was their mockery of Yahweh himself and the atrocities against Yahweh’s people that was Jeremiah’s primary indictment.  They slaughtered God’s covenanted people (51:35,49), and in an act of spectacular arrogance burned the temple of Yahweh to the ground (50:28, 51:11).

Fifty years later this oracle of judgment upon them becomes reality when the northern armies of Medes and Persians swept through the Levant and in 539 B.C. destroyed the invincible Babylon.  A hammer that destroys the Hammer. 

But more than the historical happenings, there are some big-picture typological connections that we cannot miss here.  In the New Testament, “Babylon” stands for the center of worldly power.  In the first century, Peter calls the city of Rome: “Babylon” (1 Pet 5:13).  It was the political center that stood against God, his kingdom, and his rulership.  And in the same way the book of Revelation identifies the ancient “Babylon” of Isaiah 21:9 as a foreshadowing of all centralized worldly power that opposes God throughout history up until the end (Rev 18).

This macro view makes us suspect that something beyond just ancient Babylon is in the background of Jeremiah’s words here.  And indeed there are two texts within Jeremiah’s oracle that point in this direction.  Jeremiah 50:5 refers to an everlasting covenant of restoration for the Jews that will come “in those days” –the days of Babylon’s destruction.  Then Jeremiah unpacks more specifically that those days of restoration will include a pardon and elimination of their sins (50:20).  These are very clear allusions to the “new covenant” a few chapters before (31:31-34); a covenant that is eternal –not like the mosaic covenant (31:31-33)– and a covenant where ultimate forgiveness of sin is at its core.  Making this connection expands the horizon of final fulfillment because we know Jesus himself says –along with the rest of the New Testament– that this “new covenant” of Jeremiah ultimately points forward 600 years to the new era Christ set in motion (Lk 22:20, Heb 8:8-12).  And so if this restoration in Jeremiah happens “in those days” of Babylon’s judgment, it suggests a Babylon that is more than just the ancient Semitic empire.  This is an oracle of judgment upon the centers of worldly power throughout history (e.g. Rome) and also upon the ultimate powers that oppose God at the end of history.

If you’re following this interpretation, it immediately begs certain questions that I’m more disposed to just ask, and not answer =)  …What is the Babylon of our day?  What are its “idols” (50:2, 51:47) which will see their own shame and destruction?  What is its pride (50:31) and its harlotries (Rev 18:3)?  How has this modern Babylon spurned and desecrated the temple/presence of God (50:28, 51:11)?  ...I’m so tempted to speculate an answer!  But I’d rather bait you into sharing your thoughts...