Mandatum Novum

The following are thoughts I shared with students in the campus ministry I serve. We meet on Tuesday nights which is why I refer to Tuesday night, and I wrote the thoughts on Maundy Thursday, 14 April 2022.

As we mentioned on Tuesday night, today is traditionally know as Maundy Thursday because, at The Last Supper, Jesus said to his disciples the words of John 13:34: "I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another." In Latin, "new commandment" is "mandatum novum." And somehow "mandatum" became "Maundy." Don't ask me why it isn't Mandy Thursday, which I like better. I believe Jesus is telling the disciples to lay down their lives (which Jesus will soon do) for each other. 

Maybe, like me, you grew up with people telling you that people (including you) are such terrible sinners that God had to kill Jesus in order to make everything right. This is known as the "satisfaction" or "substitution" theory of atonement (depending on whether or not someone added the idea that Jesus died in your place/died the death you deserved). Even as a fairly young child, this didn't really make sense to me.

I mean, sure, I did bad things. But like "God, kill your son" bad? And yes, humanity is deeply sinful, but is this the best or only way to take care of that? It was amazing when I learned (in college) that not all Christians have always believed this, and plenty have never believed this. This is not to say that there aren't ways of reading Scripture which support these ideas, and ultimately I am certain that I am wrong about many things concerning God. What I'm suggesting, is that these ideas are not the ONLY way of reading Scripture and understanding the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.

So, in case no one has ever invited you to think of things this way, I'd like to invite you to consider the following: Maybe Jesus meant what he said about loving others completely, no matter what. And maybe really powerful people didn't know what to do with someone whose entire message was love (and also telling people to sell their possessions and not be greedy, etc.). Maybe certain leaders were so scared of Jesus' way of life and love that they knew of no other option but to kill him. I know that's a stretch, but if you look, you'll find it is part of Jesus' story throughout the Gospels.

Maybe they were thinking they were killing God, or maybe they thought he was crazy to claim to be God. But, people (we) killed God because that's the only thing we know to do when we are scared out of our minds. We react with violence. But, since Jesus actually was God, death was not the end. Instead, death would be defeated once and for all as a way of keeping us away from God and keeping us scared of God and each other. So that now we are actually free to do what Jesus asked us to do and lay down our lives for each other. Because death is not the end, we never have anything to fear again. In Jesus, God defeated death and with it, fear.

Think about it, and let me know what you think.