For the majority of my life I have sought to answer questions. I have been a proud member of a broken society and religious piety that seeks to systematically divide and conquer the brokeness of our world and our own egos into a system of bullet points. I have been taught to organize every part of my life, disregarding the reality of the entropy of our world (some would say the effects of the fall). I’ve become better at this then most. Because of years of analytical training, my mind constantly searches for the most efficient path. At times I feel like a child shakily building a tower of loose jenga blocks, oblivious to the ultimate reality that everything (physical and metaphysical) falls apart in the end. Everything of this world (except for pure mathematics) contains an element of entropy.
One of the things I’ve learned over the last few months is that in the realm of soul and spirit there are not as many answers to these questions as there as answering persons. Despite my tendency to allow my assumptions and ego to build an answer that allows for closure, it’s an inadequate solution. The truth is that these questions should not drive us to a theology or religion but to one, vital relationship. The ego’s desire for the instant gratification of an immediate solution almost always allows a person to settle for a falsehood rather than remain on a journey for an ultimately equally dissatisfying truth. Jesus keeps us on that journey.
If you where to do a study of the life of Christ contained in the Gospels, you would find that Jesus directly answered 3 of the 183 questions asked of him. (I’ll let you find these three!) To a Christian who has grown up in a religion that is entirely defined by answering questions, this is startling. We have been raised believing that the very purpose of religion is to give answers to questions and to resolve dilemmas. This is apparently not the way that Jesus saw the new Kingdom that he was establishing because He operates in a completely different manner. Jesus either keeps silent as with Pilate (John 19:9), returns with another question as with the coin of Caesar (Matthew 22:19), or gives an illustration, as with the Good Samaritan story (Luke 10:30).
At other times he puts the question back inside the frame of reference of the inquirer, as if to make them critique it. He does so with the rich young man: “You know the commandments” (Mark 10:19). Sometimes he can only weep, sigh, or lament because of the seeming ill-will or hostility represented in the question, as when the Pharisees ask for a sign from him (Mark 8:12). Here he out-rightly refuses to respond. He has painfully learned, no doubt, that any attempt to interact with an entrenched position of resentment or ego-fortified suspicion will normally only be used to dig the trench deeper and further fortify the argument. Many times silence, quiet prayer and genuine love for the opponent are the only answers, even though you will be judged harshly in the moment and by any observers. It must have taken immense humility and groundedness on his part.
If we can understand this basic dynamic, perhaps we can see what Jesus is doing in asking his own questions instead. Jesus’ questions are to re-position you, make you own your unconscious biases, break you out of your dualistic mind, challenge your image of God or the world, or present new creative possibilities. He himself does not usually wait for or expect specific answers. He hopes to call forth an answering person. He wants to be in relationship with a person, with the idea as it informs the person, and with the process of transformation itself. Thus his questions are worth examining because they, along with the parables, reveal his basic style of encounter with the soul, or what we would call today, his style of “evangelization”.
Continued in part two soon…
