A
sermon preached at Kowloon Union Church on Sunday 3 March 2019 by Dr.
Muriel Orevillo-Montenegro. The scripture readings that day
were Joshua 2:1-14 (22); 6:21-25.
Introduction:
Re-Reading Rahab
Good morning! Today is Transfiguration Sunday, and churches reflect on the
story of Jesus’ appearance becoming so radiant while praying up in the mountain
and being “visited” by Moses and Elijah.
However, I am tasked to share a reflection that anticipates the International
Women’s Day. March 8 was declared by the United Nations (in 1975) as UN day for
women’s rights and world peace.
I have chosen to reflect on the story of a one, who, I imagine, was
caught in a dilemma of making a difficult decision. Her name is Rahab. I first “met”
Rahab when I wrote a paper many years ago. Her story is like a suspense movie. She
lived in a small dwelling between the double walls of Jericho. That location
enabled her to save Joshua’s spies. When I first met Rahab, I said she simply did
a heroic act without qualms. She lied and misled the soldiers of Jericho, to
protect the Israelite spies. Of course, she wittingly gave a condition: she
will help them if she and her family will not be killed when Joshua’s contingent
attacks Jericho.
New Lenses
for Reading
But now, I want to meet Rahab once again, and re-read her story. It is
because I find my interpretation of the story so simplistic. I failed to bring
out the complexities of the text’s pericope.
I am called to "discern between oppressive texts and liberating ones.”
And I hold that only the liberating texts deserve a place in the proclamation.
This text is a prototype, an example of a text that opens itself to examination
in order to allow the emergence of new revelation. I meet Rahab again, but this
time, I am more conscious of the complexities of her story. And so I struggle to
understand her situation and make sense out of her story.
First, in
her vulnerability, Rahab's concern was focused only on saving her family and to
find a way out of her predicament. Rahab was located in the margins of
Jericho geographically. In her poverty, she was vulnerable socially,
economically, and politically. Rahab had to gather stalks of flax for its fiber,
dried them on her rooftop to weave and make her own clothing. She had to
support her family through a self-degrading business – that of selling sex as a
prostitute, according to the writer.
The spies took advantage of Rahab’s vulnerability. They played up on her
dreams, promising her liberation from her difficult life. The Rahabs of today,
when in problematic situations, are also susceptible to the promises, mostly of
wily individuals and groups. They would tend to grab any opportunity that
offers them the desired better life. Rahab of Jericho just did that. This kind
of story continues today. Many disadvantaged women [and men] from the so-called
“underdeveloped” countries, Filipinas included, are duped into different kinds
of risks and dangers just to look for greener pastures for their family’s sake.
Some women saw their hopes and dreams shattered. Some became drug mules, like
Mary Jane Velasco, who is now languishing in jail in Indonesia. Some became
victims of trafficking in persons. Not a few of them are abused by recruiting
agencies or by their employers, by drug syndicates and individuals who “use” these
vulnerable women for their own ends. (It was good Erwiana Sulistyaningsih got
justice.) In Rahab’s case, she had to take
the possible but difficult option for her family’s survival. She was a risk-taking
woman.
Second, while
Rahab had wits and guts; she also had deep fears. I suspect
that because of fear, Rahab entered a deal with the spies: “I will help you,
but do not kill my family when you attack.” Perhaps, her painful experience of
being scorned as a prostitute by her own community made her uncaring about the
safety of her neighbors. This could be sweet revenge. “So what? They can go to
hell.” She could have probably said that to herself. She turned her gaze away
from the consequence of the impending invasion: of genocide to be carried out by
Joshua’s men in the name of Israel’s masculine God. After all, she already
heard about the assaults done by Joshua’s men to the neighboring cities. And so
fearfully, Rahab said to the spies: “our hearts melted and there was no courage
left in us because of you.”(v. 11)
Third, Rahab
came to believe that the military prowess of Joshua’s men was God’s display of
power. In that context, one may affirm Rahab’s decision. While neighboring
cities had put up a fight, she was made to believe that the only way to
survive, as a Canaanite, was to surrender. She said: “I know the Lord has given you the
land, and that dread of you has fallen on us, that all the inhabitants of the
land melt in fear before you.”
At a time when people believed in a warrior God, Rahab easily yielded to
the idea that the land of Canaan, was to be given to Joshua’s people. This
reminds me of the story that some natives of the archipelago, which was later
named the Philippines, surrendered to Spain because they thought these white,
tall men who carried with them sticks that spit fire were God’s emissaries.
Insights and
Reflections:
What new insights, and what good news do we gather from Rahab’s story
for us today?
The first insight is a caveat, a caution: that the story is dangerous if we will not
acknowledge that writing and telling a story is a political act. We tell stories for many
reasons – to pour out our pains and fears, to share our joys, hopes, and faith,
to entertain, and to share the burden of others. Some tell a story to sway and
win over people’s sympathy and favor. A story is a powerful tool to empower.
But stories can also be a powerful tool also to destroy. Sometimes we tell
stories to influence the decisions or of the views of others. We tell stories
to profit from whatever. Some people tell stories to malign or to hurt others. Among
us Cebuano-speaking Filipinos, if we suspect the intention of someone in telling
a story, we protest by saying: “Estoryahe!” It is a sarcastic way of saying, “Come
on, tell me more lies!” In Rahab’s time, there were no trolls yet, but there
were people who already spread fake news.
If you read the story from the perspective of the Israelites as I did
before, you will surely say that Rahab is a hero. But if you are a native of
Canaan, you would tend to accuse Rahab of treachery! She is a traitor of her
people. Reading Rahab today makes my heart ache. My heart breaks because I want
to see women as heroes and not as villains, as faithful and loving beings; not
liars, not as corrupt creatures. But unfortunately, that is not always the
case.
So, I go beyond Rahab and interrogate the narrator: Did Rahab, a
vulnerable woman in the margins really yielded readily to the interest of invaders
and abandoned her own people? Or, was Rahab put under duress that she declared
in Joshua 2, verse 9-11, to the spies, that “the Lord your God is indeed God in
heaven above and on earth below?” Who
knows! God knows!
This brings me to think that when we tell or write our stories, we must
be mindful of our intentions and of our accountability for it.
And for us, as listeners or readers, what story and whose story do we
privilege or honor? Whose story do we value? Is it the story of the victims? Or,
is that of the aggressors? Remember, telling a story is a political act; and a story
is dangerous if we, as narrator, will not acknowledge our accountability for
such an act.
The writer has put words in Rahab’s mouth to make her story serve as a
justification for the project of taking over the land of Canaan in the name of
God. This is a ploy used by the colonizers then and now. My Kenyan friend,
Maritim, once said that the strangers from Europe taught the Kenyans to pray
with closed eyes. But when they opened their eyes, they only had the Bible in
their hands, and the strangers had already taken their land away from them.
Second
insight: we cannot and should not romanticize violence, even if it is found in
the sacred text – the Bible and is supposed to be mandated or allowed by God. Violence is violence. Rahab was
terrified before a violent God who orders the burning of the cities and the killing
of the inhabitants of the land (6:24). If
you were in her place, what will you do? Can we blame her? Unfortunately, there
was no General Luna in her time to tell her: “Choose! Bayan? O Sarili?” “Country? Or self? In the
past, I cheered for the Israelites’ victory over Jericho. It was like how I glorified
the cowboys for victoriously killing all the Native Americans. But then I realized
I turned blind and deaf to the cries of women and men, young and old, donkeys
and oxen whom the Israelites “devoted to destruction by the edge of the sword
all in the city” (6:21). We should not celebrate
conquests, even if the writer-narrator told us Rahab’s story to convince us
that such violence is “holy” because God willed it against the
non-believers. And these atrocities continue
to happen today: modern Israel continues to encroach into Palestinian territory
and grab Palestinian lands. We must not turn our gaze away from violence
happening there and anywhere.
Third
insight: we should wrestle with the issue of lying and its implication in our
personal and community life. Who among us here has never told a
lie? Or much worse, deceive? In the Philippines, lies are now thriving
abundantly, with government officials leading - especially as the mid-term
election is coming.
Certainly, there are occasions pointed out by the Greek philosopher, Epicurus,
who said that “ethics deals with things to be sought and things to be avoided,
with ways of life and with the telos
(the chief good),” as an end. One may say, Rahab lied to attain the chief good
– that of saving the spies and her family. But must Rahab must tell a lie in
the name of her faith in God! “Some circumstances warrant a lie,” some would
say. But, are the lives of the natives – the women and men, young and old not
counted as “chief good?” Was it the most loving thing to do in Rahab’s
situation? If you were Rahab, will you do the same? Martin Luther, in his
letter to the landgrave Phillips, said that “if a man told a good strong lie
for the sake of the good and for the Christian church . . . a lie out of
necessity, a useful lie, a helpful lie; such lies would not be against God, he
would accept them.” Hmm. . . not helpful!
But what will be the long-range effect of chronic lying in
communities? What is the long-range
effect of lying in our family, in the church, in our schools, in society, in
our government system? Immanuel Kant is more helpful when he tells us that “by
a lie, a person throws away and, as it were, annihilates one’s dignity as a
human being.”
Conclusion:
A Call to Adjust our Lenses to see more in the story
Rahab faced a difficult situation. Rahab’s
story has layers, and such layers must be re-examined. What is the interest of
the writer? Why did he choose to portray a woman as a hero/traitor? I call on
you to check your reading glasses or get a new pair of lenses in order to see
these complexities. We cannot be naïve
and ignore interpretations that condone lying, and violence supposedly mandated
by God.
Today, we will approach the table in memory of Jesus who was a victim of
state violence. Let us also remember Rahab, for her story challenges us to
resist violence – of the colonization of land, bodies, and mind, in telling lies
and deception, and many other forms of violence that destroy us, other people and
God’s creation. Instead, let us live out a faith that does not glorify a
war-freak, patriarchal God. Let us worship the God of love, righteousness,
mercy, justice, and peace. This is the God who calls us to discern how to live
out a liberating faith. Listen, all you who have ears. Amen.
# posted by Kowloon Union Church : Sunday, March 03, 2019
