I agree with you that many of the topics raised in the last letter are difficult to fully understand but this is not surprising since we are talking about fundamental questions about the whole of creation.

You do raise a point about my claim that religions without exception deal with what they consider a fundamental question – is there justice in the universe? You also challenge me with a reference to Judaism being a religion of the law and does this not oppose what I wrote? Isn’t it strange that Christianity, which has such close ties to Judaism, should be considered a non-religion and Judaism should be? And what about all that talk about the Last Judgement and paintings of condemned sinners? Does not all this show that in fact Christianity is just another religion?

I think that there is a serious misunderstanding about Judaism whereby Judaism is portrayed as being a religion of the Law and only the Law. It is instructive to consider an evening prayer of the synagogue. It is in prayers that the clearest statement is made about what is important for a faith. The prayer says: “Almighty Lord, King of heaven and earth, I give thee thanks for the gift of the Law by which I can impress on my flesh my love for thee.” The essence of the law is not merely some juridical consideration – the Law is the means by which humans are enabled to express love for God and through God, for all of creation. The Law is the point at which there is an exchange of Love.

To get back to your questions about judgement and our final destiny, we need to realize that, when we study the texts more closely, we’ll see a quite different picture arise. I think that immeasurable damage has been done to Christianity and Christian teaching because of a literal portrayal of God judging man. Many sensitive souls have reacted with revulsion to the image of the almighty deity in a trial with a puny human being. This is such a travesty that it paints a tragically incorrect image of God’s interaction with man. So, let’s take a look at a few texts which could be multiplied many times but they are sufficient to answer your question.

Remember the parable about the sheep and the goats at the Last Judgement where the sheep are lauded and the goats are condemned. A very common interpretation of this parable is to literally talk about the division of people into sheep and goats and say that some are condemned and some inherit life with God. But an alternate way to interpret this parable is to say that each of us contains both sheep and goats, each of us has praiseworthy activities to our credit and each of us has sins which need to be condemned. Thus there is judgement but it is not between individual beings but between the different actions and predispositions within us. The judgement isn’t between two different groups of people but between two different characters that are there in each of us somewhat akin to Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde. As I said, many other examples can be given but because of limitation of space, let me just highlight one other one.

Remember the parable about the wheat and the tares. Jesus explains that the wheat is the good seed which represents the sons of the Kingdom whereas the tares represent the sons of the evil one and it is the latter that will be thrown into the furnace to be consumed. But it is a clear teaching of Jesus that it is God who is the creator of all human beings, and so when he speaks of the sons of evil, he is referring to the destructive offspring of the devil, the evil inclinations, that can invade any human being. It is these destructive ‘seeds’ of the devil that will be destroyed and removed in the Last Judgement. Now you can see the basis for the statement of the early Church that the cross is the judgement of judgement. We are in no position to cast aspersions on our neighbor for our neighbor still reflects the image of God and is a complex mixture of various inclinations both for good and for evil. To summarize, there will be a Last Judgement but its character and raison d’etre will be very different from the common view held by many.

Ambrose of Milan, one of the fathers of the early Church, wrote in his commentary on psalm 118 that the same individual is at the same time saved and condemned. This is in keeping with what I have said above that it is in the same individual that we have aspects that need judgement and cleansing and other actions that are to our credit and help us to better reflect the image of God in us.

The Final Judgement is not denied but it can now be seen in a very different light – not as a choice between humans but as a choice within each of us. Prayer, therefore, has the last word. We do not speculate about the existence of hell or who goes there. Neither do we need to talk about a doctrine of universal salvation because we speak from a position of ignorance but in the hope and prayer that all are saved. As Peguy, a French writer wrote: “One does not return alone to the Father’s house. One gives his hand to others. The sinner holds the hand of the saint and the saint holds the hand of Christ”. Again, it is our neighbor who gives us our being and salvation.

Isaac of Nineveh writes: “Do not call God just. He is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. Likewise, how can you call God just when you read the parable of the prodigal son who squanders his wealth in riotous living. O the unfathomable goodness with which he has invested the existence of us sinners in order to create anew. Sin is to fail to understand the grace of the resurrection. What is hell, face to face with the resurrection when he will rescue from damnation, enable this corruptible body to put on incorruption and raise up fallen humanity from hell to glory. In place of what sinners truly deserve, he gives them resurrection. In place of the bodies that profaned his law, he clothes them anew in glory.” This expresses better than any words that I could have composed the sense of joy and love that God has towards all of creation and all of his creatures.

And how far away this is from the moralizing judgementalism that comes so easily and quickly to us. How far away this is from a brooding god who is out to judge and punish hapless humanity.

It is not morality that has the final word but that much maligned and abused word that seems to have lost its bite and sharpness as it has become ‘domesticated’ – the word love. In the end, spiritual growth has no other test but our ability to love. But what do we mean by love, which has become an almost stock word for saccharine banality?

We must show unselfish love founded on respect, on service, on a disinterested affection that does not seek to be rewarded. It is a sympathy and an empathy that takes us out of ourselves and overcomes the defensive barriers we have put around our ego. It speaks to us of the boundless mystery that confronts us every time we meet another person. It is the resistance that denies me the projection of the Fall onto another person, and to use them as a scapegoat for the ills that I am responsible for. I could go on and on but there is something else I want to say that is very important for love. It deals with the little things. Whenever we set out to love we picture heroic deeds and, as to be expected, we fail, and our love evaporates. It is the common everyday things that nourish and exhibit our love. This should be our starting point.

This is underlined in the end of the magnificent fifteenth chapter of the first letter to the Corinthians. Paul speaks eloquently and extensively about the Resurrection and at the end we would expect him to say that it has all been done and we can just lean back and reap the benefits of Christ’s Resurrection awaiting our own resurrection. And look at what he says in the last sentences of that chapter. He calls on us to continue to work because everything that we in the name of God have done has an eternal place in the New Creation: “…knowing that your labor is not in vain.” Every thing we do from the smallest to the largest has value and contributes to the building of the New Creation. We are therefore called on to work and strive, not losing hope irrespective of how “hopeless” the situation may appear.

Sincerely,
Bar-Abbas.