バイブルクラスが行われました。

 

Bible class on Saturday February 7 ,2015

 

今週は立春を迎えましたが、まだまだ寒さは厳しく明日日曜もまた雪が降りそうな雲ゆきです。

さて、今日のﾊﾞｲﾌﾞﾙｸﾗｽも寒い中メンバー4人が集合して、引き続きマタイによる福音書の23章を学びました。

前回の22章ではイエス様を執拗に律法違反の大罪に陥れようと質問を仕掛けてくるファリサイ人や律法学者たちに対して、イエス様はたとえ話を用いて論破し、ついには逆に律法の本質は人を縛るものではなく愛であることを説くという場面でしたが、今回の23章のイエス様は今までのように「受けて立つ」というスタンスではなく、律法学者やファリサイ人たちに向けて徹底した非難を繰り返しています。特にThe Messageの文中"You're hopeless, you religion scholars,
you Pharisees! Frauds!"　（あなた方は絶望的だ。律法学者たちファリサイ人よ偽善者め！）が何と7度も繰り返されています。

またここでもイエス様はけして律法そのものは否定していません。むしろ彼ら（律法学者・ファリサイ人）が教える「モーセの律法を忠実に行えば道を誤らない。だから守りなさい。」とまで云っています。

問題は律法を教える律法学者やファリサイ人は自らはそれを実行せず、見せかけの偽善者に成り下っていることを痛烈に非難しています。It's all spit-and-polish veneer.

そして今日の学びの中で最も印象に残った個所としてメンバーから次の一節が取りあげられました。

You're like manicured
grave plots, grass clipped and the flowers bright, but six feet down it's all
rotting bones and worm-eaten flesh. People look at you and think you're saints,
but beneath the skin you're total frauds.

あなた方はきれいに刈りそろえられた草と色鮮やかな花が咲く手入れされた墓に似ている。しかし6フィート地下には腐りかけの骨と虫の食った肉がある。 人々はあなたを見てあなた方は聖人であると思い込む、しかしその皮膚の下であなたは完全なる詐欺師だ。

律法学者やファリサイ人らに対してなんともおぞましい表現がイエス様から発せられています。

 

Matthew 23 The Message (MSG)

Religious Fashion Shows

 

23 1-3 Now Jesus turned to address his
disciples, along with the crowd that had gathered with them. "The religion scholars and Pharisees are
competent teachers in God's Law. You won't go wrong in following their teachings
on Moses. But be careful about following them. They talk a good line,
but they don't live it. They don't take it into their hearts and live it out in
their behavior. It's all
spit-and-polish veneer.

 

4-7 "Instead of giving you God's Law as
food and drink by which you can banquet on God, they package it in bundles of
rules, loading you down like pack animals. They seem to take pleasure in
watching you stagger under these loads, and wouldn't think of lifting a finger
to help. Their lives are perpetual fashion shows, embroidered prayer shawls one
day and flowery prayers the next. They love to sit at the head table at church
dinners, basking in the most prominent positions, preening in the radiance of
public flattery, receiving honorary degrees, and getting called 'Doctor' and
'Reverend.'

 

8-10 "Don't let people do that to you, put
you on a pedestal like that. You all have a single Teacher, and you are all
classmates. Don't set people up as experts over your life, letting them tell
you what to do. Save that authority for God; let him tell you what to do. No
one else should carry the title of 'Father'; you have only one Father, and he's
in heaven. And don't let people maneuver you into taking charge of them. There
is only one Life-Leader for you and them--Christ.

 

11-12 "Do you want to stand out? Then step
down. Be a servant. If you puff yourself up, you'll get the wind knocked out of
you. But if you're content to simply be yourself, your life will count for
plenty.

 

Frauds!

 

13 "I've had it with you! You're hopeless, you religion scholars,
you Pharisees! Frauds! Your lives are roadblocks to God's kingdom. You
refuse to enter, and won't let anyone else in either.

 

15 "You're
hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You go halfway
around the world to make a convert, but once you get him you make him into a
replica of yourselves, double-damned.

 

16-22 "You're
hopeless! What arrogant stupidity! You say, 'If someone makes a promise
with his fingers crossed, that's nothing; but if he swears with his hand on the
Bible, that's serious.' What ignorance! Does the leather on the Bible carry
more weight than the skin on your hands? And what about this piece of trivia:
'If you shake hands on a promise, that's nothing; but if you raise your hand
that God is your witness, that's serious'? What ridiculous hairsplitting! What
difference does it make whether you shake hands or raise hands? A promise is a
promise. What difference does it make if you make your promise inside or
outside a house of worship? A promise is a promise. God is present, watching
and holding you to account regardless.

 

23-24 "You're
hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You keep
meticulous account books, tithing on every nickel and dime you get, but on the
meat of God's Law, things like fairness and compassion and commitment--the
absolute basics!--you carelessly take it or leave it. Careful bookkeeping is
commendable, but the basics are required. Do you have any idea how silly you
look, writing a life story that's wrong from start to finish, nitpicking over
commas and semicolons?

 

25-26 "You're
hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You burnish the
surface of your cups and bowls so they sparkle in the sun, while the insides
are maggoty with your greed and gluttony. Stupid Pharisee! Scour the insides,
and then the gleaming surface will mean something.

 

27-28 "You're
hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You're like manicured grave plots, grass
clipped and the flowers bright, but six feet down it's all rotting bones and
worm-eaten flesh. People look at you and think you're saints, but beneath the
skin you're total frauds.

 

29-32 "You're
hopeless, you religion scholars and Pharisees! Frauds! You build
granite tombs for your prophets and marble monuments for your saints. And you
say that if you had lived in the days of your ancestors, no blood would have
been on your hands. You protest too much! You're cut from the same cloth as
those murderers, and daily add to the death count.

 

33-34 "Snakes! Reptilian sneaks! Do you
think you can worm your way out of this? Never have to pay the piper? It's on
account of people like you that I send prophets and wise guides and scholars
generation after generation--and generation after generation you treat them like
dirt, greeting them with lynch mobs, hounding them with abuse.

 

35-36 "You can't squirm out of this: Every
drop of righteous blood ever spilled on this earth, beginning with the blood of
that good man Abel right down to the blood of Zechariah, Barachiah's son, whom
you murdered at his prayers, is on your head. All this, I'm telling you, is
coming down on you, on your generation.

 

37-39 "Jerusalem! Jerusalem! Murderer of
prophets! Killer of the ones who brought you God's news! How often I've ached
to embrace your children, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and
you wouldn't let me. And now you're so desolate, nothing but a ghost town. What
is there left to say? Only this: I'm out of here soon. The next time you see me
you'll say, 'Oh, God has blessed him! He's come, bringing God's rule!'"