DREAM: LIFE SWALLOWS UP DEATH...REMEMBERING BEVERLY...February 28, 2009...Reflection : March 14, 2012

This was a good bye dream  that I felt  nowhere ready to accept a month after Beverly died.  

The  scene is an up close of a large strong steel bridge. I can only see the opening of it, sort of looking up hill at it and  so close I cannot see where it is going or  what it's  crossing  at all. It is a sunny day with fluffy white clouds.  I apparently have been walking beside Bev as she rides a bicycle toward the bridge with a  little covered wagon behind it . She is dressed casual and wearing a ball hat.  She looks healthy and happy.  The wagon  is filled high(with her stuff) and a white  canvass covering  is neatly over it all(shaped liked a regular large covered wagon of pioneer type). The picture, if it were painted, is her entering the bridge and I am back behind her(not in the pic) beginning to turn and go back the opposite direction by myself.(That is my saddest part. I am turning back the opposite way she is headed.) I  suddenly turn, as having forgotten something, and yell out  to her asking,  'Did you listen to the 'heart of the fighter'? (this was her favorite Landon Saunders audio tape. She used to listen to it regularly. How I wish I could find a copy.) In this scene she is  waving her  left arm and nodding  'yes' without looking back at me.  Then I say, ' O, you are the 'heart of the fighter' aren't you?'.  It ends with her distinct and totally appreciative and amused laugh(at my comment) as she rides away.  I don't know if you can sense the emotion this dream still resurrects. It becomes less painful and more inspiring with time. This is the dream that came and that I carry daily in a reserved place deep within me....   I so wanted her to turn around and come back.

REFLECTION:

Ash Wednesday, A Christian service that marks the beginning of Lent in early Spring, became a meaningful time of worship to me after becoming a United Church of Christ pastor. Our Ash Wednesday service stressed  that God raises up from the ashes human situations that have the qualities of death all over them, eg the fear, aggressiveness, domination, greed, and covetousness that so easily steal life from us. Also  resurrection is presented as the 'new creation' and 'abundant life'  in the here and now as emphasized in Paul and  the gospel of John. As  ashes are placed on participants' foreheads the pastor says, ' You have been baptized into the death of Christ' and they respond, 'all things have become new'.  It also stressed that a frequent  biblical description of the most dangerous sin is not personal but communal.... that we accommodate human injustice, discrimination, abuses and  environmental destruction  as a continuing aspect of  communal and national/world  life.  

I'm not sure that we mortals should consider physical death as an enemy(at least not nearly as much as the spiritual death  mentioned above.). The death  I think is most represented in the N.T. are the kinds of death that take over the human capacity to live spiritually  while we are physically alive. It is not essential to me to think that Beverly has to reappear as the individual she was to us in this life. If I did not value her walk in this life enough to consider that plenty  to keep me always amazingly grateful and her memory alive with me then I feel I have failed in my valuation  and appreciation of her  life. She did not  insist in living personally the other side of her physical death though she did believe that in some way, beyond our imagination, life continues on and perhaps even returns. I think that spiritual attitude is what made her so value  and enthusiastic about every moment of  life.  I think she was content to let the 'other side' remain just as much a mystery as to from where and how she entered this life in the first place. My dream of her implies that mystery by not showing what was being crossed or what was on the other side. What is important is to be conscious of the mysterious change and to desire to go gratefully, graciously  and assured  into that mystery.  I  think I am now content also with such a humble approach to these things. Is this not a part of accepting that we are 'dust and to dust we return',  but what a glorious transformation  and grace we experience in ourselves and in each other while we are actually  'living and moving and loving and having our being'  in God in this earthly life ?  That is more marvelous to me than any assurance of personally continuing after I die. I simply do not know nor is it  anymore of significant importance.

I do see that  an individual passing through the gate of death as very significant spiritually. I relate it to the 'narrow gate' that Jesus spoke of. It is so narrow that we do indeed, if still blessed with consciousness, go alone with only the assurances of divine and human love to sustain us. I was impressed with how Beverly approached  and accomplished that final human task.  It showed the dignity that is present in we mortal humans of dust. Reading I Cor 15 I'm reminded that it is  highly symbolic and metaphorical language culminating with the assurance, "Death has been swallowed up in victory. Where is the victory of death? " I  have experienced death being overcome by life in my friendship with Beverly.  I feel no need to ask God for more than that. I know she is gone as I have known her. I still wish she could come back because I miss the continued unfolding of her life. But the flower fully matured. Nothing was left undone or incomplete that was needed, though at first it surely appeared that she had not been given enough time here.  I still for  moments nearly panic when I know she will not be here in the flesh anymore. But the life that unfolded in her as I and others knew her is a life that her death simply does not destroy or have any victory over whatsoever.  Paul makes full sense to me when I realize the spiritual/symbolic truth  of his language. Jim H.

'WORD OF GOD' AND REGULAR FOLKS....October 26, 2010

'Word of God' in the Bible does not primarily refer to human words that are spoken or written. But for centuries many have thought of God's communication with people as being mostly confined to human words. Often the Bible, a book of written words, is held high with the proclamation, “This is THE Word of God.” The idea that we can 'read in words' the actual  full 'Word of God' has led us Westerners to think that responding to God is primarily a matter of understanding such human words and then doing what they tell us. But doesn't this grossly over simplify the reality of 'Word of God' and reduce our being engaged by it to a human-human kind of encounter rather than a God-human encounter? Regrettably, I think this has been  the case and is also why many thoughtful people today are suspect of religious language and claims.

Until the printing press, ordinary people did not possess many, if any, written words. The first Bible was printed in 1455. But recent centuries of people can hardly think of 'God's Word' except as written or spoken words. This comes in part from the huge impact of the Age Of Enlightenment's materialistic focus from the 1700's on. 'Human words' is not what 'Word of God' generally  means in the Bible itself, but rarely is that mentioned in sermons and Christian teaching.

God Sows 'People' Into Our Lives

Here's a simple example that can change, and I think make more accurate, the notion of how God might project 'God's Word' into human life. It is the parable of Jesus called the 'the sower' or 'the soils.'(Matthew 13: 1-9, 18-24) The story speaks of a sower scattering seed on hard soil, rocky soil, weedy soil and finally 'good soil'. The seed does not become a mature healthy plant except when it lands on the 'good soil'. The usual explanation is the seed is the written or spoken human word of God-the Bible. And only the person who 'hears' them and does them is 'good soil.' But there is good evidence that a more accurate interpretation is that God is the sower and the 'seed is people'. Yes , the unexpected idea is that 'God's Word' is sown among us and it is not human words of religious ideas and commandments, but is the people that 'drop' into our life. Suddenly the challenge of being spiritually motivated is not primarily about hearing human words from a book and doing them, but about being 'good soil' for the people sent our way. Is that not an astonishing twist on what 'Word of God' can mean and on how we are confronted and challenged by it? This view may result in  some sincere people seeing  themselves as far more like 'good soil' than they had been taught to believe.... and some not so good after all. The test becomes on how we honor all other humans as we come to interact and involvement with them.

The people who are sown into 'our soil' include children born to our families, the one who becomes a life partner, people that come into our social groups, the friends that arrive in our personal work and play spaces. The parable raises the issue that we are to give all such people the unselfish reception, acceptance; the nurturing, the emotional and truth-telling nutrition that humans need to become the unique persons God intends them to be.

Central to the art or gift of being 'good soil' is not seeing oneself as owning or possessing the persons who are 'sown as God's message' into our lives. The soil's role is only to provide nutrition, protection, truth-telling, and the love that all developing persons(young and old) need. The miracle of growth and what the plant matures to be or do is all the work of God and remains a mystery which Jesus warned to 'not judge.'

The Plant or 'Person' Is Beyond Our Judgment

To broaden 'Word of God' to include it meaning the 'people in our lives' makes it more clear that God can be perceived as a present reality and resource to all humans, not just ones predisposed to valuing the study of written words.(I'm not devaluing that process at all but am suggesting that in our culture and religion 'head' has become far more and overly valued than 'heart.') I see 'Word of God' as 'the people in our lives' as a far more 'heart' and 'spiritual' understanding of the reality of 'God's Word' compared to the heady and intellectual concept of it being a specific assortment of 'written human words.' This meaning of 'Word of God' is practical for every human , regardless of education, learning temperament, formal faith or any faith at all. It means that 'God's Word' is always as near to us as the person(s) in our presence. To hold that 'Word of God' is primarily human words, generally the sacred texts of ones own religion, rightfully affronts many  other sincere people and could profitably be retracted as the way all religious and non religious people can more productively explore the practical meaning  and place of  God in human life.Jim H.

OUR PRESENT AMERICAN 'BIRTH CONTROL' DEBATE...March 5, 2012

The birth control  debate and related issues, spawned by the GOP presidential campaign,  have been on my mind  and heart for decades. So I think I will post my central thoughts here:

All Male GOP Panel Testifies Re Birth Control

The 'medicinal  pill' is used for both birth control and other important medical issues. So it rightfully has been  covered by insurance.  Birth Control has also  been established as a woman-doctor decision not her  employer, government or insurance  company. Cost is obviously  a very important factor, especially for poorer women. (Rush Limbaugh does not seem to know that the medicine is taken no matter how infrequently the responsible  woman plans to have sex. I still have heard no  ranked GOP person  contradict Rush's position, only that he used  a bad choice of words. That is not the crucial issue.) This has been the consensus in the country for decades. Only now with the present GOP candidates is this consensus being again challenged, implying the desire it be re-legislated. Senator Santorum specifically says 'birth control is bad for society'  and the reason he gives is, "it's what the church teaches and I agree with the church.'' (This is no John Kennedy on the subject of church and state.) The others to date  have not been willing to  clearly challenge him. Even Ron Paul considers it an immorality issue(so much for his claim to libertarianism and of government not interfering with private personal lives.) So it  really is a GOP thing at this point.

Georgetown Law Student Testifies Re Birth Control

The debate is showing  there must be a significant number of Americans who have always quietly believed this and would gladly legislate  this established medical need of women be denied and  considered as immoral. This would certainly increase abortions, unplanned and  'illegitimate' births in the country many fold. It would be a social  nightmare. I do not believe this will happen but it is presently the logical conclusion of the GOP candidates.  Most women and men simply do not believe the Catholic Church(and many other churches) is right on this moral and human rights  issue. This is the importance of  America being  a land where Religion and State are separate. This is  why it is important that any leader must respect and defend that central tenant or America loses much of  its human rights potential and influence.

Here is the shadow that most are not willing to acknowledge. The church's history  has always been about the church attempting to control the sexuality of women.(not  nearly so much that of men.)  This is firmly rooted  in the  Old Testament patriarchal sexual regulation of women.  It was essential that the father of every born child  be established. The mother was no matter of public or religious concern. That is why Adultery was defined as a violation of a MAN's rightful  property by another man  and not vise versa.  Thus a man could have as many wives as he could afford  as long as none of them were already another man's property(wife or daughter) This is a dark, often denied, area of our religious cultural history and it is astonishingly  still very much alive.  This present controversy brings back up  these same  very dark desires  against the equality of women before God.  I find it unbelievable that such is being debated in America, but it is.

P.S. I am not  here attacking the important role and need  of the Bible in our culture. The Bible cannot be expected to have the human rights standards that have evolved from those early  religious  codes. Male superiority was simply the established rule in all those  Eastern cultures of that day, including the Hebrew nation. The Bible authors cannot be expected to not be men of their day. They reflect the world views  and values of their day as they tell their religious stories and experiences of God.  Post modern religious people are now called on and obligated  to straightforwardly accept the actual  nature of these ancient Sacred texts. Otherwise they will continue to be used, just as Americans fear is often done with the Quran's content by fundamentalist Muslims,  in dark and  immoral  ways that violate the foundations of  the dignity and rights of marginalized humans, including those of women. Christians, and the church  in many of its forms, are failing to do this hard and humbling work. The present GOP presidential candidates have failed to become aware of this same need in America's political, social and moral leadership.  Jim H.

DREAM: RETURN HOME AND AL BUNDY......April 27, 2910

1. A continuous repetition of my being in meaningful  conversation with 'The Church Woman' of previous dreams. This was extremely pleasant, enlivening and encouraging to me in every way.

2.First at a community hometown gathering in Florence, AL I met the person who plays Al(likely a  humorous play on AL and Al) Bundy on the  T.V. sitcom  Married With Children.  It turned out that he is, in the dream, a native of nearby Tuscumbia, AL. I was surprised to hear of this and said, "well I've been away from here since 1962." He did not have the negative qualities and poor taste his T.V. character displays. He was very down to earth and hospitable. Then I went to his home which was very lived in and even run down in many ways. He enjoyed his wife and twin boys. We ate tasty food and drank some beer. I've never felt more welcome or entertained. My daughter in law appeared and in a most sincere way questioned to me if 'Al' may have an alcohol problem. I agreed with her that when a person is strongly under the influence they are not fully available emotionally to family and friends. I could not tell if he had a problem/addiction or not. The run down state  of the home might indicate that his drinking was interfering with normal life responsibilities but I certainly could not make such a judgment. He and his wife may have had less materialistic values than many of us about straightness and upkeep of property etc. I knew I had been lifted in spirit by being there for the several hour visit.

Bridge From Florence To Tuscumbia Over Tennessee River

REFELCTION: I have always been more interested in seeing and knowing about celebrities than I  admit. It is hard to not project upon famous people our thoughts and images of the ideal privileged life. To the extent that one would go out of their way at all to just see a celebrity in person is a clue that they are projecting some degree of unconscious  mythological content onto a mortal human. My guess is that most of us do that with  celebrities  we admire from a distance, even more so if we imagine they have personal values that we admire and share. To the extent the projection is about physical appearance and charm even the more we are experiencing the projection of an archetype that makes our actual knowledge of the person close to zero. This may be one of the best ways to see the unconscious projection process going on in the typical Western psyche. The fact that celebrity-ism has built an incredibly strong level of commercial success is evidence of how powerful and real our supposedly  'innocent' projections really are. The character AL Bundy would be considered by nearly everyone as an un-redeeming shadow figure. So the dream is a reminder to me that I, like everyone, carry a shadow aspect. One of the high achievements of spiritual/psychological development is recognizing, facing and eventually accepting  and integrating one's shadow. Only then can the shadow function in its positive role in our life. Similarly any group, family, organization or culture  contains a shadow that functions very negatively and destructively until it is recognized and integrated by some individuals in that demographic. The dream; by attaching a shadow figure, who is imaged as having strong human values, to the  roots of my culture- community, challenges me to  a high appreciation of my origins while not ignoring it's  shadow aspects.

Pump Where Keller Spoke. 'water'

Keller  'Ivy Green' Home Built In 1820

Consciously, I most closely associate Tuscumbia with the birth place of Helen Keller. It may be that the source of the Unconscious  uses this connection to remind me just how 'blind, deaf and dumb' I am spiritually/psychologically  at the purely ego conscious level. That just as Helen Keller is a heroic example of a person   facing and overcoming the childhood physical disabilities of  being unable  to see, hear or talk; so it is with all of us regarding becoming who we are destined to be  by the strength of  our own  sheer will, intelligence and determination. These are all necessary but without the guidance and voice of the Unconscious we can never reach near the goal of fully being  the conscious person of our potential. For it takes both the Unconscious and the Conscious Ego to make a whole human person. No one reaches the goal fully but we can surely be encouraged to know that is our ideal destiny. 

Helen Keller -America's First Lady Of Courage   1880-1968

Tuscumbia is a  Chickasaw word meaning 'cold water' due to it's clear Spring water. Water in all times and places  refers to the  deep boundless source of all that is which we can now rightly call the Collective Unconscious. This can be another way the dream  source is calling my attention to its foundational  importance and how we humans need to drink deeply of its resources. Synchronistically significant also is  the backyard  pump where  child Keller spoke her first word which was 'water.'  'Water' must be the single most common  dream symbol for the 'Collective Unconscious.'  And it is as if this little Alabama town from my roots  shouts from its history, 'Give me water.' The dream also has me 'cross the river' of my youth symbolizing a contained and harmonious  connection to the Collective Unconscious. Is it any surprise the wisdom of the Unconscious leads me there for this lesson? 

Water Falls Of Spring Park Tuscumbia, AL

 And could the Collective Unconscious show any more splendidly its general and determined  intent to bring the 'opposites' together?  It refuses to get rid of any part of reality. Here it casts  Al Bundy along side of Helen Keller, about as opposite as we could at first imagine. But the archetypes behind  both of these contrasting  images and kinds of lives are important and very alive in the human psyche.

Al Bundy Played By Ed O'Neill

The dream goes back to my hometown and thus to my 'core'  origins of personality and psyche. I think it says something earthy and healthy that I am pleased to find this celebrity to be down to earth and having a high value for family, friendship and relaxation with table fellowship. The dream shows my initial projection being lifted and the real person appearing behind it. Now it makes no difference what his work or social  status is for I am experiencing more and more of his core.(This dream has absolutely nothing to do with the real Al Bundy person but is used to plainly describe the psychological projection factor so important and at first unconscious in all human life.) As always, the more clearly we see a human the more certain we will also begin to not only see their virtues but also to experience their 'shadow'. I recall writing in a University paper in 1981 that ,' invariably the more I get to know someone the more certainly I am to have some disappointment in them.' The instructor congratulated me for my honesty. I was aware I was confessing something that was sad to admit. But I think this is an expected human experience in consciousness development. An awareness of the personal shadow always raises a 'question' about the acceptability of a person's private ways or his ethics and morality. The questions here are very common ones in our culture, 'Does s/he have an alcohol or drug problem?' " Is s/he responsible in private family life?' These are actual areas of real weakness and shadow for numerous people. They are also ways that people 'project' parts of their own shadow upon others. And just as celebrities are sometimes projection targets of our high ideals they also receive our negative shadow projections. Any barber, beautician  or local bartender will observe many  examples of this projection process out in the open. And it is obviously quite unconscious. A person leaves pretty much forgetting what they talked about or eagerly listened to for an hour. 

 It was also in Tuscumbia that I had my first childhood experiences with celebrity persons. At the Armory there(or next door Sheffield) as a teen I attended  afternoon concerts including: Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins and and country singer Webb Pierce. I missed the afternoon concert of the new young hip-swinging  singer from Tupelo, Mississippi.                      

Image Of A 'Church Woman'

The collective unconscious can unfortunately be a trickster and has led people to very absurd, destructive and obscene actions as they seek to fulfill some image that has welled up in a day or night time dream or 'idea.' That is why I have to question the meaning of the first dream. Why am I receiving this regular encouragement regarding a close relationship with this figure The Church Woman? Am I being teased and played with? Am I being tested to make a fool of myself? Under such an image some men might start going to a different church each Sunday and asking any attractive woman for a date. I must say these images have not led me to take any such action, not even register for E-Harmony.com. For one thing I have to , because of my view of unconscious material, consider that this may always be a representation of my anima, my inner woman and not speaking of a real human woman 'out there' at all. But I also can't deny that there seems to be nothing that would put the 'icing on the cake' of my life experience than for this to be a forecast that such an opportunity is forthcoming in my outer life. I have to as a matter of spiritual discipline hold these two possibilities in tension. Either way my belief is that I am blessed for my inner and/or outer life stand to be enriched either way. It just seems to more likely be pointing to a real woman and I would prefer, from my limited understanding of myself and actual needs, for it to be so.

GOSPELS AS EYEWITNESS ? February 22, 2012..note to Edward Fudge

Only a scholar well-versed in form criticism can accurately sort out these layers and levels now scattered throughout our canonical Gospels, say the form critics. That also means that only teachers who are trained in the deconstruction and analyses of this guild can really understand what is being said.(From Edward's article below.)

Edward. I do not think that the above is true at all as consequence of  Form Criticism and  other literary type critique, such as the Jesus Seminar, of the nature of the Bible. It simply means that a person should carry in their mind that the specific words of  the gospels are not essentially a dictation of God but are there as a result of all the ways that creative and spirit led people contributed to it, especially in the first several centuries . The gospels are here as they are. They have had the influence with  Western culture that they have had and I believe 'good' is the right word  to give to that influence overall. Much, but not all,  of that influence has been in the minds of people who took them as historic eye witness accounts. This is simply the fact of where we are. 

But now we know more and we know that we will never know exactly which words were first written down and how much of those very first words were of  literal historic events or spiritual interpretation. And today the sincere and honest Bible teacher simply pledges to keep all this in mind so as to not make false claims. To the extent that the images and symbols of the gospels still are able to stir the human spirit to touch heart and soul, then these documents still are a living spiritual influence. (And most anyone who watched the Whitney Houston funeral can testify that these gospels do still have powerful healing and inspiring effects on  our cultural mindset. Many tears and smiles  coming from  a wide range of emotions were experienced from the use of gospel words. And I'm confident that happens in many times and places every day in America. Christians  can take great delight and thankfulness in that reality.)They still have that effect on me and I think many others. I will  gladly and with open mind watch the video.  I'm sure he is a scholar and a gentleman. But to think that more than a century of  sincere of Biblical literary critique of the gospels is going to be swept  away and not have its genuine, deserved  and honest effect on how  the future person will read the Bible is not truthful or respectful of God and man made in God's image. There are those who feel that such a view of the Bible  is forsaking God and leaves one without any spiritual foundation or connection to the Spirit of Christ.  That is only the case if the spiritual longing of  the human is a matter of the head and of outside material content or as I believe is a living part of the inner reality of the  soul that contains the living images of God.  

All the Bibles in the world could be destroyed and the image of  the Christ would still be alive, even if in different detail than we are accustomed to. For the Christ symbol is an eternal part of the Collective Unconscious and the archetypes that reflect its  truths to human consciousness.(I realize this last statement is my use of Jungian concepts to offer a lens to help explain the facts of  the religious nature of Humankind. I do not apologize for that. Such a model can be a great service in helping postmodern humans to get a handle on our new situation, including how to deal with our new knowledge about the Bible and so many other mysteries.) It was never a matter of  concrete history that made Him a living and healing and justice-keeping reality in large parts of the collective human family. To think of the Bible otherwise is to cling to  a  one-sided  pre  post-modern materialistic view of  God, Human and the world.  And that is where much of our religious and secular culture is now.

But we are in a great transition and there is much longing for life with spiritual foundations to be reestablished.  This gives me hope. But our clinging attempt to base our spiritual life on supposedly exact  historical contents of  materially written text precipitates the   NEED that some have for an 'eyewitness account' of what Jesus did and said.  I think that fear is unfounded and if persisted in can become unfaithful to the heart's genuine yearning and call. That is why I may be bored as I watch this video but I will hope for something more. Such wished for efforts to coerce  from uncertain history the  ongoing desire and search for  a deeper  truth is  not consistent with spiritual longing or  with the highest intellectual and spiritual aspirations of the human being. None of this is saying that such desires and claims are insincere  or do not make their own kind of contribution but trying to hold back the overall change in our cultural view of the nature of the gospels  is to attempt to live as if  His Truth Is not Marching On at all.  Cordially, Jim 

Jim,

You will not likely be bored.

I am constantly aware (and remind my church classes from time to time) that most of the faithful through the ages could not even read and write; that the essence of redemptive faith is a spirit of creaturely dependence; the core of worship is gratitude; and the sum of piety and religion is loving one’s neighbor. That does not mean nothing else is important, but it helps put  things in perspective.

Cordially,
Edward  

And I appreciate that perspective Edward.   Though I would add that with present knowledge  we are moving into a time where 'the essence of redemptive faith  can be a spirit of Human-Divine interdependence."  With Best Wishes, Jim

On Tue, 21 Feb 2012 23:59:00 -0500 "Edward Fudge" <edward@edwardfudge.com> writes:

gracEmail® Edward Fudge GOSPELS GAINING RESPECT

---

For the past century, much of scholarly opinion has held that the Gospels as we have them were not written by the men whose names they bear, or at a time anywhere near the events or sayings that they supposedly report. It is true, according to an analytical method known as “form criticism,” that some of the sayings attributed to Jesus in the Gospels are just as Jesus said them. But, form critics say, other Gospel sayings are included as they were said by the people, largely unknown and much later, who wrote the final Gospels. (Remember the childhood game “Telephone” or “Gossip”?). Still other sayings of Jesus supposedly originated with God--Knows-Who, during a period of God-Knows-How-Long, the time that passed between Jesus and the actual Gospel writers.

Only a scholar well-versed in form criticism can accurately sort out these layers and levels now scattered throughout our canonical Gospels, say the form critics. That also means that only teachers who are trained in the deconstruction and analyses of this guild can really understand what is being said. Since form criticism decreased confidence in the credibility of the Gospels, can we acknowledge that it bore any useful fruit. Yes, I believe we can. It is good to try to understand the time, place and recipients of the Gospels. We are benefitted to learn that the Gospels contain not only sayings of Jesus but sometimes also some later “commentary” on those sayings (John 2:21-22; 12:15-16). And it is edifying to understand that varying circumstances and particular needs of the Gospels’ original recipients might account for some differences in wordings of what appear to be direct quotes from Jesus.

Today, form criticism is becoming passé, and the Gospels are finding a renewed appreciation and trust among more and more sophisticated New Testament scholars. Helping to lead the way to this new respect is one of the world's foremost New Testament scholars. He is Dr. Richard Bauckham, now at Cambridge University, formerly longtime professor of New Testament studies at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland, and a fellow of both the British Academy and the Royal Society of Edinburgh. The publication in 2006 of his groundbreaking, 551-page book, Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony, was met with critical acclaim. Since then, it has fueled the ongoing demise, not only of form criticism itself, but also of the negative presuppositions with which scholars often were presumed to be obligated to approach the text of the Gospels. Professor Martin Hengel, himself a pioneer in the form criticism movement, lauds Professor Bauckham’s “convincing historical method and broad learning” that “help to overcome widespread modern Jesus fantasies.”

I add four notes in closing. First, in my opinion, any serious and experienced reader of English can understand and appreciate this book, some perhaps deciding to skip the technical footnotes. Second, for a sample of spoken discourse from this gentle but brilliant scholar, see this ten-minute video on eyewitnesses and the Gospels. Third, I just received word that Professor Bauckham will be the honored guest speaker at the 64th Annual Meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society this coming November in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Fourth, I am pleased and grateful to mention that Professor Bauckham contributed a most commendatory foreword to the third edition of The Fire That Consumes.

DREAM: THE HERO AND ITS SHADOW...April 30, 2010

These were unpleasant dreams. This material is  painful. Dreams do not always pay us a compliment.  That is why I feel compelled to share this rather humiliating one.

1. I was in the high school football tryouts in my hometown. I saw the coaches looking over all the players. I sensed that I would not make the team again and this was my junior year- now or never. I could tell the coaches were excited about their chances for a winning team but also that I had nothing to offer them. It was a sick feeling. I was also carrying resentment about the process and it leaving me out.

2. I was at my family sporting goods store. I was a clerk. All the football boys were there shopping. I knew them and they were friendly  to me but I knew I was an outsider, not being on the team. Some of them were mischievously writing on the store window. I started to intervene in my clerk role and ask them to stop but I decided not too.

3. I was in the high school hallway. C.Y., likely the most outstanding football star, was coming my way. I debated whether to speak or not. I knew he would speak back but also knew I had nothing he was interested in. I spoke but sort of wished I hadn't.

4. I was on the lake on a deck where my boat was safely parked. I had 'the keys' to the boat. I felt my good friend, who made the football team, was interested in football more than in our friendship. To some extent I had the feeling, 'to hell with you.' He did not even want to go for a boat ride. As I went up the hill a lot of kids were gathered there. One who I hardly knew tried to get me to give him the keys to my boat. He said one of my brothers said I would give it to him. I told him that insurance would not cover him and there was too big of a risk of an accident. I was confident he was totally trying to use me.

'You've Gotta Be A Football Hero'

REFLECTION: These were unpleasant dreams. This material is very painful. Dreams do not always pay us a compliment.  That is why I feel compelled to share this rather humiliating one.  I think they are reminding me just how important I had let playing football become and how I idolized those who were seen as the stars. I knew being cut from the team back then hurt but the dreams even make it worse than I let myself know then. I also must have repressed the resentment I had toward the coach and to the ones who made the team. I still wonder, to a slight extent, if there were not some negative politics working against me. My dad was the superintendent and my brothers ran the store where the school purchased all their athletic supplies. Of course, on the contrary, they could have given me an undue advantage for political reasons but were honest enough not to. I don't know the truth. There were far more boys that got cut than there were places on the team. It is unfortunate and not sound education that all who really wanted to play did not get a chance. My best objective evaluation is that I likely had less than average athletic ability but had a strong desire to play. I do not think the coaches missed out on recognizing a champion. It was likely as it should have been.

I think I did experience the archetype of the hero in the sense of wanting to be him. So this disappointment is not anything to be proud of. It is an example of being possessed and driven by a living self promoting archetype. It is likely very good for me that I did not actualize such a longing. It may have led to a rather fizzled out life as it does for many a football shining star.

The Hero Archetypal Myth Lives In Every Age

But if some of the question I still carry about my personal development. and the possibility that I may yet make a substantial contribution to my peers, have some substance; perhaps I am still living out such a desire to be a hero? I have absolutely no evidence that I have not already made the fullest impact I will ever have on the lives of others. If so I need to accept the fact that I am still laboring, to some extent, under the archetypal exaggeration of my own life's importance. In that case I've grown little but have only shifted the venue of such longing from football to some kind of spiritual philosopher caricature. In other words I may still be 'not speaking' to the actual heroes and resenting the system for 'holding me back.'. What makes me think and hope this is not the sad case is that, unlike then, I have been for 25 years far more consciously focused on more fully 'experiencing love' in various dimensions  than on any public achievement or notoriety. If I should more fully experience such  love any public power, wealth or notoriety would be far more an inconvenience than anything needed or striven for. Obviously I still have a desire to score, to win, but the game is a very different one. Only my remaining years can answer this question.

I can say the dreams are at least insisting that I accept the deep unpleasant feelings I had regarding not being recognized as a football player in my high school days. It is likely saying that this dynamic and the archetype that drives it are somehow still alive in me now. I like to think in a much more complimentary and mature way than when I was a youth. I hope that I am not still similarly negatively possessed and driven by it. I hope I, by grace, have become positively connected to the hero myth in such a way as to receive and be a blessing to some others in my mortal life.

'Keys To The Kingdom'

The dreams show me 'having the keys to my boat.' . This reminds me of another archetype, an example of  which appears as  Jesus giving the 'keys to the kingdom' to Peter, words that have given authority to generations of popes. Maybe even as a  struggling teen I felt there was something about  my story  that was 'more important' than making the football team. Perhaps I 'had the keys' to something far more important and meaningful. The boat has been a symbol in my dreams of traveling with some success the higher and lower domains of the 'collective unconscious' and retrieving some of its treasure, not just for myself but maybe for a larger portion of my culture. Water, in my youth, was  a place I was very much at home. After all I am an Aquarius.  It was my 'saving' element as a teen, a relief from the self imposed pressure of excelling in such less reasonable areas like football. It shows me perhaps finding the 'real keys' to my life in areas that are more natural to me. Maybe I was even less conscious of this extraordinarily ambitious archetypal backup plan than I was of the resentment of not completing a far less important temporary goal of football star. If this is true then I still do not escape that there is a self interest continuing to work in me at even a higher level. There is no way these dreams allow me to escape some version of my own shadow being present all along and even now. But I have claimed the belief for many years that a very real acknowledged shadow is a necessary part of the dynamic of life for both human and God. So I am called by the dream to be humble enough to accept the shadow in myself whether only for 'delusions of being a high school football hero' or for something in the future more spiritually significant than that. I have no way of knowing which one is the most true or should be the most embarrassing. Jim H.

DREAM: TRAIN WOMAN/GODDESS...June 11, 2010, edited Feb 19,2012

I was frantically running beside a moving train. I was trying to board it as it moved along. It was a frightening and daring effort and I was successful. When the train arrived at a train station the emphasis was all on 'the church woman.'  (This is the same feminine figure who frequents my dreams or some more collective variation of her.) She was very down dressed in earth tone slacks, flats and long sleeve sweater. Her hair was dark, straight and shoulder length. She had a very barely breaking pleasant confident smile on her face. She was standing with train tickets in hand. People were gathered around her with great admiration and respect. I stayed as a distant observer. Everyone around her had a deep respect for her as if she had proven herself as very unusual by her past actions and behavior. They looked to her as a heroine of great courage and as mortal with consistent integrity. She inspired confidence in them and also in me. She appeared totally unpretentious in spite of the adoring crowd.

Presentation Of Divine Woman

REFLECTION: I realize this spiritual dream would strike many as too unorthodox to appreciate. I can only respond that I believe the scripture in deep and subtle ways points to the 'feminine' as being as necessary a part of the image of God as the male. A historical fact that should be kept in mind as we think about the 'god image' is that oldest and most long enduring images of God in human cultures were predominately female. All of the 'approved' cultures in the Bible , and our American culture for most of its history, are patriarchal cultures which have been born of a near total masculine image of God. We are well into at an age when the feminine is gradually taking its place of equality beside the male in both the spiritual and secular realms. The Old Testament  Greek Septuagint, the translation all  the New Testament writers used, translates directly  the  feminine nature of God in the O.T.  'wisdom books'  as 'Sophia.' God's Wisdom or Sophia  is fully feminine and clearly represented as an  aspect of God in at least five O.T. books. This dream, and documented dreams across a wide spectrum, is reflecting this great feminine aspect of the Sacred. In the New Testament the Marys around Jesus in both the canonical and other gospels present a somewhat hidden feminine nature of God. The story of the 'Virgin Mary' suggests the feminine can be seen as more than human and thus approaching an aspect of God. Later in church history as unconscious forces helped shape the unfolding dogma of the institutional  church came the teachings of the 'immaculate conception ' of Mary and later the 'Assumption of Mary' into heaven. This is a process in history of the feminine taking its rightful place in the Godhead and the Western image of God. The 'Holy Spirit' as presented in the New Testament can accurately be considered as a feminine aspect of God and called 'She' rather than 'He.'

Sophia, The Greek Goddess Of Wisdom

 In retrospect how could we have ever expected that God can be any less feminine than male? Yet this is the emphasis and consistent implication of orthodox Christianity and of the Western cultures it generated. This dream joins the strong movement of making conscious that Male and Female are equal in every realm just as Paul exclaimed, “In Christ there is no male or female but all are one.”

This dream image seems to be one that brings together the image of the goddess and the mortal woman. She is the mortal ' church woman' of previous dreams but also more than that. She is goddess. She is respected and adored beyond what belongs to mortal woman. The picture to the left might be a modern example of the  archetype of mortal woman  which also hints of her Sacred presence.  Here too she is associated with successful travel in otherwise impossible and dangerous situations. There is something in this dream image of woman that is 'numinous', or beyond ordinary mortal daily living. Her radiant smile is similar to the image of Jesus in the story of the transfiguration. It has a mesmerizing quality to it. She is all the Marys of the N.T. in one image. She is the bringer and creator of new and better things to come. She is at once down to earth in her dress and unpretentious, yet she is heavenly in her radiant yet tempered  smile that promises everything a human can expect as heavenly. I have no way of separating the mortal from the anima/goddess that this dream presents. I am as worshipful and adoring of her as anyone else is. It seems impossible not to be.

 The dream suggests I have managed with much difficulty to catch the last train that is taking me to some nearly final destination. And 'woman' in the most positive ways I have come to image her is somehow the goal and fulfillment of the long journey. She also is a traveler and is headed somewhere with tickets in hand. She is so wholesome, grounded, lovely and wise. I felt that I was coming into her presence now not for just a fading glimpse but to somehow manage to become a co traveler with her. ...that she and I are going the 'same way' at last. This would be , however unorthodox, the image of finding and being in harmony with the 'will of God' for ones life. This dream captures both Conscious and Unconscious, Male and Female, Flesh and Spirit, the Religious and Secular and the Personal and Collective aspects of the reality of my inner world. It is a symbol of unity. It says far more than words can and I sense it means more than I am yet able to comprehend. This is an encouraging dream bringing together so much of what my inner world has been about all of my adult life. My ego is pictured as wholly amazed in the presence of this human/divine figure. I will absorb this as fully as I can and will expect my travels to become even more blessed by the living feminine principle, by 'woman.'

RELATED THOUGHTS:  I've come to believe that  the 'uniting of opposites', including those listed above, is the driving spiritual/psychological goal and process of  all Human/Sacred life. These 'opposites' exist separated  in less than peaceful and productive  ways internally within all people. They also exist in the outer world and are involved, for good and ill, in all the communication/relationship  efforts among us all. The process of  these becoming more united is the goal  and dynamics of the inner  psychological/spiritual process that Jung refers to as Individuation.  I think this process is happening within each of us and in our various cultures and in the whole of  Human/Sacred development.

A difference  in humans is that some adults become more conscious of this  process than others. Being more, but never anywhere close to completely, aware of it should help a person  be more cooperative with it and to better facilitate the process in inner and outer life. I think the story of individual and human  history  implies that the Sacred, God,  is also participating in this process in a similar way. This means that God and Human are far more interconnected than most theologies are prepared to formulate. The Christian concept of  the 'incarnation' of God in the Human should alert us to the idea that God and Human are two aspects of the  same foundation of ultimate reality.  It is not true that the various god-images we humans now carry  have already fully accomplished the 'uniting the of opposites' and thus have already arrived at an unequivocal and perfected moral consciousness. So God does not, is not  fully able in the present situation, to reconcile these opposites within Itself and then offer this completion as a free gift of Salvation to Human kind. Rather God through our very lives is always inviting us to consciously participate in this very necessary goal of  Sacred/Human development which can be described as nothing less than grace and Salvation.

This process can also be described as the ongoing incarnation of God  in every human life. As  humans make progress, which we can find much historical  evidence of happening in various times and ways, this becomes the human gift to God is  an essential  for the Sacred's   need to continue its process of  Conscious Moral development. It may be that just as there can be much that  humanity collectively  'forgets' which  needs to be brought back to ego consciousness, the state of God is also not in touch with what may have in some time or  way been such qualities as omniscience and omnipotence. The reality of the world and its 'splitness'  including   the Good -Evil split is evidence that no Sacred reality is independently  in touch with or is  practicing the qualities of omniscience and omnipotence.

It has been my personal experience for a quarter century that it is the  psychological/spiritual 'feminine principle', to which this dream refers,  that has been the primary avenue offered to me to help in the ongoing and never completed process of individuation, of uniting the opposites. This inner 'feminine principle' which Jung calls the 'anima' serves as a bridge connecting the Collective Unconscious, which for practical matters is the place of origins of what has always been called ' the voice of God', and our human ego consciousness.  I can imagine as this process becomes more conscious among humans  that the goals and striving of humans  will become more in harmony with it. For example adults in  their daily living and in all vocations and professions will agree that assisting younger generations to be more conscious that  the process of 'uniting the opposites' is the single most important common work for each of us.   Jim