作者Revd Angela Sheard, 聖馬田助理牧師 記得我初入神學院的時候,遇上的同學老師,來自五湖四海的不同背景,大家的人生經歷不盡相同,又來自不同的教會傳統和宗派,對於一些基本的基督教神學理念,都有不同的看法。對於一些「惹火」的倫理議題,就是那些時常在教會內部引起爭端分歧的話題,就更加意見紛紜。在我們當中,很多人都是來自氣氛比較平靜的教會,這些教會的會友,對於爭議性的倫理問題,大致上都有共識,又或者根本不會討論這些話題。然而,我們進入神學院之後,發現環境完全不同:在這裡,大家要公開討論這些棘手的問題,並無保證一定會達成共識。我認為,我們各自的教會背景,就像一個同溫層,而神學院最理想的作用,就是讓來自不同同溫層的人聚首一堂,展開溝通對話。如果沒有神學院的經歷,我們可能永遠沒有機會,與不同背景的人彼此交流。 回想修讀神學的日子,其中一個時常面對的挑戰就是:明白別人的「意見」不難,要認識這「意見」背後的那個「人」卻不容易。我們時常聽到其他人發表自己的意見,例如對墮胎的立場、或者是對耶穌為何要釘十架的想法;但是我們未必能夠很容易地洞悉,持有這個意見的,究竟是一個怎樣的人;我們也未必會輕易放下對別人的提防之心。當然,大家時常在休息室一同用餐,共度時光,對於打破隔膜也是有幫助的。然而,直到大家參與了一次出乎意料的活動之後,我們的溝通才有比較明顯的躍進:事緣其中一位同學的伴侶,決定在學院裡發起一個「魔域奇遇」(Dungeons and Dragons)小組。 看見大家的表情好像有些茫然,大概不知道「魔域奇遇」是甚麼吧?「魔域奇遇」簡稱D&D,其實是一款角色扮演棋盤遊戲,可能未必人人玩過。遊戲的參與者各自扮演一個角色,組成不同隊伍,在一個奇幻世界裡面,在智慧老人(Dungeon Master)的主持之下,完成指定任務。這個遊戲可以延續幾個星期,甚至幾個月。我們一齊制訂自己的角色、開拓遊戲的處境、一齊打仗、一齊解答謎題。這個遊戲容讓我們回復片刻的傻氣幼稚,也容讓我們作出冒險的決定。參與者可以放開自我,在新奇的世界裡面,一齊為共同目標努力。角色扮演的好處,是讓人放鬆心情,暫時除低自己的面具,以真實面目示人。因著這個遊戲,同學之後回到課堂,討論問題的態度也起了變化,原因是我們對於彼此的真性情,有了更多了解。 我認為,今日福音經課所記載的,也是一個顯露真我本性的時刻。拿但業的改變,始於耶穌洞察到他的真性情。約翰福音這一部分的章節,主要記載耶穌呼召第一批門徒,而拿但業出現的一幕,正是高潮所在。在拿但業出現之前,門徒正在告訴其他有意跟隨的人,耶穌究竟是誰。施洗約翰與兩位門徒在一起,向他們指出,耶穌是「上帝的羔羊。」其中一位門徒就是安得烈,他又跑去找他的哥哥西門彼得,對他說:「我們遇見彌賽亞了。」另一位不知名的門徒告訴腓力,耶穌到了加利利,於是腓力就想帶拿但業去見耶穌。他對拿但業說:「摩西在律法上所寫的和眾先知所記的那一位,我們遇見了,就是約瑟的兒子拿撒勒人耶穌。」 在這個故事裡,其他門徒邀請別人跟隨耶穌,多數只是簡單地宣告:「我們遇見彌賽亞了 – 你來看!」何以腓力邀請拿但業,卻要引述希伯來經卷呢?耶穌對拿但業說的一句話,為我們提供了一點線索。他說:「你在無花果樹底下,我就看見你了」。一些猶太拉比的著作曾經暗示,「無花果樹」是研讀經卷的地點,所以「無花果樹」這個象徵,也時常用來借喻經卷研究。耶穌說「你在無花果樹底下」,表明他知道拿但業有研讀摩西律法和先知書,希望在經書裡面,找到上帝所應許、猶太人期盼已久的彌賽亞的記號。無論從哪個角度推想,這位彌賽亞必然是一位大有權能的君王,因為他要驅散以色列的仇敵,為上帝的子民伸張公義。如此重大的任務,當然需要有財有勢、家世顯赫的王者才能辦到。耶穌來自拿撒勒這個荒涼小鎮,只是一個窮木匠的兒子,何德何能可以做拯救猶太人的彌賽亞呢?拿但業認為難以置信,他的反應是:「拿撒勒還能出甚麼好的嗎?」 從這樣的背景來看,拿但業願意去見耶穌,本身已經是一個非比尋常的舉動。對於彌賽亞的身分,拿但業已經有某些先入為主的觀念。正因為這樣,拿但業與耶穌接觸,比起約翰、安得烈、西門彼得、腓力等幾位門徒與耶穌接觸,是一件困難得多的事情。以上幾位門徒似乎立刻表示願意跟隨耶穌,但要拿但業也跟隨耶穌,就等如要他對自己既有的宗教觀或者世界觀,提出翻天覆地的挑戰。耶穌大概也明白拿但業面對的挑戰,所以他一看見拿但業朝著自己走過來,就讚賞他說:「看哪,這是個真以色列人,他心裡是沒有詭詐的。」對於其他門徒,耶穌可沒有這樣讚賞過。有趣的是,耶穌與拿但業接下來的對話,內容並非依據舊約聖經的解釋,辯論耶穌到底有無可能是彌賽亞。耶穌與拿但業之間,並無任何辯論。他們的對話,反而是關於人際關係、關於怎樣了解別人、怎樣讓別人了解自己。依我看來,耶穌與拿但業對話的轉捩點,並非任何閃耀著智慧光芒、令人心悅誠服的高深道理,而只是耶穌簡單的一句話:「我看見你了。」 如果我們也像拿但業一樣,世界觀受到翻天覆地的衝擊,難免會快些退縮,進入我們生活的同溫層,與同聲同氣的人一齊圍爐取暖,自以為已經掌握真理;假如碰到一些不願改變心思的人,也懶得與他們爭辯,反正大家都不能夠說服對方。當然,我們也可以換轉另一種態度:遇到爭議性的話題,可以與別人熱烈討論,大家展開良性辯論,開心見誠地交流不同意見。對我來說,在神學院的日子裡,最能夠打動我的時刻,就是真正感覺我能夠看到別人真我本性的時刻,不論是在課室裡,還是在「魔域奇遇」的棋盤上。或者,這個就是今日福音經課重複出現的這句話:「你來看」的核心意思。如果要我們「來、看」日常生活中與我們意見水火不容的人,就是那些我們覺得沒有一句話中聽的人,我們做得到嗎?如果要我們效法拿但業的勇氣,敢於與主相遇,即使這樣的相遇,可能會造成衝擊,挑戰一些我們雖然自認思想開明但仍不免會緊緊抓住的金科玉律,我們做得到嗎?如果要我們真心相信,耶穌對拿但業說的話:「你將要看見比這更大的事」,此時此地對我們仍然適用,我們又做得到嗎? When I went to theological college, I entered a space full of people gathered from an extremely diverse range of backgrounds. Our different life experiences, church traditions and denominations gave us different perspectives on some fundamentals of Christian theology, and also on many of the ‘hot button’ ethical issues which are so often the cause of conflict and division in the church today. Many of us had attended churches in which most people more-or-less agreed on these issues, or simply didn’t talk much about them – but now we found ourselves in a very different environment, in which the thorny issues were brought out into the open with no guarantee of consensus. I think that this environment was at its best a bringing together of different echo chambers, a place which encouraged conversation between people who would perhaps otherwise have never spoken to each other.
One of the challenges that I often faced at college was seeing the person behind the opinion. When all you know about someone is their view on abortion or why Jesus died on the cross, it can be difficult to see them as a whole person – and it can also be difficult to let your own guard down. Shared meals and time in the common room helped with this, but one of the best aids came quite unexpectedly – the partner of one of the students decided to start a Dungeons and Dragons group in our college. Now, I can see all those blank faces looking back at me – for those of you who are as yet uninitiated, Dungeons and Dragons (or D&D) is a roleplaying board game in which teams of characters have to complete a quest in a fantasy world under the jurisdiction of the Dungeon Master. Over the weeks and months, we developed our characters, explored our environment, fought battles and solved puzzles together. The game allowed us to be silly and to take risks. It allowed us to lose ourselves together in a new world, working towards a common purpose. There was also something about the light-heartedness of the roleplay that allowed masks to be lowered momentarily and glimpses of peoples’ true selves to be seen. This in turn changed the nature of our conversations in the classroom, because we had been reminded of the humanity of one other. I think that this sense of a humanizing moment takes place in our Gospel reading – the conversion of Nathanael happens because of a moment in which Jesus sees who he really is. This story is the climactic episode of this section of John’s Gospel, which is about the recruitment of the first disciples. The story up to this point has been about disciples telling other potential followers something of who Jesus is – John the Baptist identifies Jesus as ‘the Lamb of God’ to two other disciples who are with him, one of those disciples (Andrew) tells his brother Simon ‘We have found the Messiah’, an unknown disciple alerts Philip to the presence of Jesus in Galilee, and then Philip brings Nathanael to Jesus with the promise that ‘We have found him about whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus son of Joseph from Nazareth’. Most of the invitations which take place in this story simply declare, ‘We have found the Messiah – come and see.’ So why does Philip preface his invitation to Nathanael by referencing the Hebrew scriptures? We have a suggestion in Jesus’s description of Nathanael as one ‘under the fig tree’. Some texts written by Jewish rabbis imply that the “fig tree” was the place for studying the Scriptures – and the fig tree is often used as a metaphor or symbol for this kind of study. Nathanael is thus identified by Jesus as a student of the writings of “Moses and the Prophets”, someone who searched for signs in these texts of who the promised and long-awaited Messiah would be. By all accounts this Messiah would be a powerful king, one who could defeat the enemies of Israel and restore justice to the people of God. Wealth and power and noble birth would surely be required for this enormous task. The son of a humble carpenter from the provincial backwater of Nazareth must have sounded like someone not even worth considering! “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Nathanael asks disbelievingly. From this perspective, Nathanael’s willingness to meet Jesus is in itself something extraordinary. Because of his prior assumptions about who the Messiah must be, Nathanael’s encounter with Jesus requires more of him than the encounters of John or Andrew or Simon or Philip. Whereas they all seemed to follow readily, Nathanael faces a fundamental challenge to his religious perspective or worldview. Perhaps acknowledging this, Jesus praises Nathanael as soon as he sees him walking towards him – ‘Here is truly an Israelite in whom there is no deceit!’ – something which he does not offer the other disciples. The following conversation between Jesus and Nathanael is, interestingly, not about arguments derived from scripture around how Jesus could in fact be the Messiah. Jesus and Nathanael do not have a debate. Instead, their conversation is about relationship – it’s about knowing someone else and being known. For me, the turning point in their conversation is not a flash of convincing intellectual brilliance, but the simple words of Jesus “I saw you”. When our worldviews are challenged in the way that Nathanael’s was, it is tempting to shrink further into the echo chambers of our lives – to surround ourselves with people who will agree with us, to assume that we have already arrived at the truth and that there is no sense in arguing with people who simply will not change their minds and who will try to persuade us as unsuccessfully as we try to persuade them. There is, of course, a place for passionate debate, for engaging in healthy conflict and for airing disagreements in an open forum. But I think some of the most powerful moments in college for me were those when I really felt that I had seen something of the essence of another person, be that in the classroom or hunched over a Dungeons & Dragons board. Perhaps that is at the heart of the often-repeated phrase in this Gospel reading, ‘Come and see’. What does it look like for us to ‘come and see’ the people in our lives with whom we disagree profoundly, the people that we are convinced have no good news to reveal to us? What does it look like for us to have the courage of Nathanael, to enter into an encounter that has the potential to challenge the certainties and bedrocks of our lives which we can cling to even as we profess to be open-minded? What does it look like for us to really believe that those words of Jesus to Nathanael are still true for us, right here and now: “You will see greater things than these”.
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