Was Jesus a Prophet?

Sermon. St Anne’s Brondesbury. Second Sunday Before Advent, B.

Gospel: Mark 13.1-8

If you walk up and down the lovely Kilburn High Road on enough Saturday afternoons, you will be invited to become a Muslim. You may be filmed doing so. There’s a group of men who gather there, and – in a very friendly and approachable way – invite people to think about the claims of Islam. The group is called Dawa is Easy – dawa being an Arabic word meaning something like inviting people to embrace Islam. They put their successes up on YouTube. I myself have been stopped, addressed and filmed. I failed them. I did not become a Muslim. My interviewer’s final advice was: ‘Well, if you’re not going to become a Muslim, at least be an Anglican Unitarian. Give up the doctrines of Incarnation and Trinity’. I replied that asking me to become an Anglican Unitarian was like asking me to draw a square circle. It cannot be done.

I wonder: Was I right? Was I brave? Foolhardy? Conservative? Stick-in-the-mud? Too theological, abstract and pedantic? Too Church-bound? Truthful? Was I saying anything of any importance whatsoever?

*

Why do I ask this today? Well, in today’s gospel Jesus prophesies the destruction of the Temple. This is an event which did come to pass. So today’s gospel does give us scope to say this: Jesus was a prophet. So now is as good a time as any to ask: Is that right?

That Jesus was a prophet is an idea with ancient pedigree. Remember when Jesus asks, at Caesarea Philippi: ‘Who do people say that I am?’ ‘Some say… a prophet.’ They said it then, and they’ve been saying it, perhaps, ever since. Indeed, it might be said they’ve been saying it more and more, given the rise of Islam in our days. In Islam, Jesus is the prophet second only to Muhammad. It also might be said to be part of the Baha’i faith. And, as my Muslim friend was well aware, the prophethood of Jesus sits comfortably within Unitarian Christianity. And some would say (it’s a bit or a harder claim) it’s pretty much what liberal Protestantism and a lot of revisionist theology is about, truth be told.

And here we are, in a church with an interfaith centre attached (praise God). And I am going to dare to make an assumption. The assumption is that at least once in the history of the interfaith centre, one Christian has apologised for the intricate and abstract Christian doctrines of Incarnation and Trinity, with all that talk of natures and persons, and has agreed with someone else that, yes indeed, it would be easier if Christians dropped all that philosophical stuff, and just understood Jesus as a prophet. As the prophet for Christians. Jesus is nothing more than the prophet for Christians. Just imagine what we’d gain? What would we lose?

Well, I am not sure you would gain as much as you might think. Prophethood is not the easiest category for the Eastern religions. It makes little sense in Hinduism and Buddhism, at least. That Jesus was a prophet is also impossible in rabbinic Judaism. The rabbis were clear that the time of prophecy had come to an end, centuries before Jesus’ birth. Religious leaders could be inspired and wise; they could not be prophets. You’d also have to answer the question what, other than the destruction of the Temple, did Jesus actually prophecy? I mean: even in today’s gospel, it is not a flippant summary of what Jesus says that the end of the world happens when the end of the world happens, and things get a lot worse first. That may be worth saying, of course. But, if we are thinking strictly in terms of prophecy and prophethood, how does Jesus’ record compare with the majestic prose and poetry of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel?

You may reply that Jesus is not a prophet like that. He is a prophet after the manner of Elijah and Elisha, who healed others and brought the dead back to life. Well, maybe. But, again, would we call either Elijah or Elisha prophets, if, alongside their healing, they did not also speak devastating truths to difficult rulers? I suggest we would not. So, as a prophet, Jesus prophesies little, a miniscule amount compared to an Isaiah, and might be thought of, at best, ‘half’ an Elijah or an Elisha. Is that enough?... Well, that is – I humbly suggest – where you end up, if you start from the premise that Jesus is nothing more than a prophet.

Now, here is a harder thing to say, as most of us will feel some ambivalence. If Jesus is a prophet only, we have little reason to celebrate Christmas (I use the C word ahead of its liturgical time). Depending on the state of your emotional and practical preparedness, you may think that no bad thing. Technically, we could still celebrate Christmas. Indeed, at Portsmouth Cathedral there was at least a time when Christians and Muslims came together to celebrate the birthday of Jesus Christ/the Prophet Isa. But we’d lose Christmas as we know it.

You can pretty much pick your carol. 

• ‘Must you come from highest bliss, down to such a world as this?’
• ‘The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.’
• ‘In the bleak midwinter a stable place sufficed the Lord God Almighty, Jesus Christ.’  And indeed:
• ‘Veiled in flesh the Godhead see. Hail th’incarnate Deity’!

Something more than the birth of a prophet among prophets is being sung here.

*

Now I am going to try something even harder still. I want to suggest that the doctrine of the Incarnation – around us here as Christmas is in the air, and around us anyway, as we gather as Christians – is at heart simple. Not all of the language is simple. How could all the language be simple, when we are struggling to speak of God? But while not all the language is simple, the core claim is simple. I say it goes like this: God meets us. It is God who meets with us. It really is God. It is God as God is God. The One who meets with us is God.

I labour the point (you’ll gather), because I think that anything other than the doctrine of the Incarnation, as a way of understanding the story of Jesus, means we don’t, quite, meet with God. Not with God as God is God. Instead, we meet with… well, the variations are endless…

• We meet with one who is half-God-half-human.
• We meet with an emanation from God.
• We meet with a message from God which tells us how to live, but, in telling us how to live, ultimately tells us only about ourselves.
• We meet with an aspect of God – say, God’s power to heal, or, let’s be blunt, heal sometimes.
• And so on.

You see, the doctrine of the Incarnation – like the doctrine of the Trinity – was forged – painfully and over centuries – in Hellenistic society. This means in dialogue with Hellenistic religion. And Hellenism had great strengths, but it also had great blind-spots. One thing which I think Hellenism could not get its head around was the idea of a simple meeting between God and the human being. In Hellenism, matter, which is corruptible and corrupts, cannot be of ultimate importance. So the Creator (or the Ultimate One beyond all creating) can only meet creation, us frail creatures made of matter, through emanation upon emanation upon emanation. There is a little less of God in each emanation. It is echo upon echo, shadow reflecting shadow. That was, allegedly, how things had to be.

That was what Christians had to deal with. That is what Christians had to resist. That resistance takes the form of the doctrine of the Incarnation. The Church resisted and said: in Jesus, God meets us. In Jesus, it is God who meets with us. In Jesus, it really is God. In Jesus, it is God as God is God. In Jesus, the One who meets with us is God. Why? Because it is God’s will to be with us in this way.

I cannot present a knock-down argument why this is the case. Why in Jesus we meet God, God as God is God. I can say that this claim - or hope, or invitation, if you prefer - is the only thing that makes sense of Christianity. And this: as a hope, or an invitation, it is anything other than abstract, intricate, philosophical or finicky. It is here, now, if you will it. It is not abstract. It is concrete. It is here and it is now. The meeting with God can be here and now. Here now in word, bread, wine, company, stillness, surprise. And it is here, now, when you take the steps you have to take, to follow this Jesus. If you will it, you will get a sense of where the next (perhaps small) step lies.

I am tempted to add (since I won’t be with you again): all good wishes for the Feast of the Incarnation – Merry Christmas!

Amen.