Is disobedience a virtue?
I'm tired of doing what I'm told.
It seems as though Christianity, or any number of religions, holds as a tenet the virtue of being obedient… they teach that obedience directly correlates to receiving blessing.
Many things have been done in the name of obedience to God. Yes, some good things. I'll give you that. But what about all the atrocities committed under the guise of obedience? Of the things that happen now in the same manner? Just because someone claims it to be from God doesn't mean it actually is.
How do you know when to obey and when to not? What is God's voice, and what is not? When is it OK to say no and walk away?
In ancient Hebrew, there is no verb equivalent to the word and idea of 'obey' as we currently know it to be, anywhere in the entire biblical text.
It doesn't exist.
Yes, you're right… in the translations that we read today, the word obey is in there. But our translation of the Biblical text - the modern English variations - have over 100,000 different words in it. In ancient Hebrew? The Biblical Text only had 8,000. Their language and words had layered meanings, different structures, and literary rules. When someone translates the Biblical text, they are literally doing the (guess) work of filling in the gaps - trying to figure out what our ancient Mothers and Fathers and Others meant when they said this word or that word, and translating in such a way that it would mean something to us, here and now. Which is why understanding the culture and context - the who, why, when, where, and what - of the many biblical authors is crucial.
Almost every time you see the word "obey" in the Bible, the Hebrew word for it is Shema (or a variation of it).
At no point is it the exercise of receiving instruction and unquestioningly getting to work. Perhaps one of the closest phrases we have today to the original and all encompassing meaning of the word ‘Shema,’ is the term:
"active listening."
In this series, we'll take about the spiritual practice of exercising your autonomy. At no point your spiritual journey be reduced to a God in the sky sending you jobs and you completing them. The Divine is not an absent, far away, static being that issues decrees for us to obey. God - whoever and whatever God is - is present, within and without, here and now, past and present and future. God is the energy, source, and impetus of all creation; of breath and life and oxygen. The question isn't whether or not you have the courage to obey… God is always speaking, within your bones, within the earth, within others, from the life that you live…
I'm tired of doing what I'm told because, inside me, there is a voice, there is a fire, there is an energy that wants to spring forth from me whether it's in response to any kind of command or not. You are not a ‘Christian soldier’ waiting for your next directive - that kind of language infiltrated Christianity as it became more and more a tool of colonisation and war, and it is as far from the essence of Christian spirituality as it could be.
You are soft and strong, multifaceted and enigmatic, creative and powerful. You have a body and a brain and a heart and a spirit, and it is your good and holy work to engage the world, participate and exchange with it, in all the ways that your body and brain and heart and spirit were made to. No need to wait for permission. No need to wait for the next command.
Join me? See you in the App!
Liz Milani xo
Instagram: @thepracticeco
From this week’s series titled "To Obey Or Not To Obey," with a subscription in the App. Hope to see you there.
