Interpretations of Paul's Epistle to Titus

^{From chapter 1 of Titus, verses 10 through 16:}

 For there are many rebellious people, full of meaningless talk and deception, especially those of the circumcision group. They must be silenced, because they are disrupting whole households by teaching things they ought not to teach—and that for the sake of dishonest gain.  One of Crete’s own prophets has said it: “Cretans are always liars, evil brutes, lazy gluttons.”  This saying is true. Therefore rebuke them sharply, so that they will be sound in the faith  and will pay no attention to Jewish myths or to the merely human commands of those who reject the truth. To the pure, all things are pure, but to those who are corrupted and do not believe, nothing is pure. In fact, both their minds and consciences are corrupted. They claim to know God, but by their actions they deny him. They are detestable, disobedient and unfit for doing anything good.

 Here, Paul is referencing the Cretan poet Epimenides, who wrote: 

They fashioned a tomb for thee, O holy and high one
The Cretans, always liars, evil beasts, idle bellies!
But thou art not dead: thou livest and abidest forever,
For in thee we live and move and have our being.

Discussions of Titus (online primarily) tend to contain back and forth discussions of Paul's seeming contempt for Cretan people in general, calling him associative with stereotyping or, in more extreme cases, racism, things of this nature. But this reading is uncharitable, and even goes against what Paul writes near the end of this very letter: 

Remind the people to be subject to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready to do whatever is good,  to slander no one, to be peaceable and considerate, and always to be gentle toward everyone. (3:1-2)

So if this is the case, what is Paul implying by referencing Epimenides in this instance?

Some postulate Paul is being humorous, referencing the Epimenides Paradox. This paradox concerns the fact that Epimenides calls all Cretans prone to falsehood (or liars), when he himself is Cretan, so the basis of the truth of his claim comes into question. However, Epimenides likely did not mean for his words to be taken to this ironic extreme (liars that can only tell lies), but that Cretans were prone to lying when they acted like Zeus had died. In fact, Epimenides' statement was only associated with other liar paradoxes in the mid 18th century by Pierre Bayle, and even only then more as a sophism than a complete paradox, a stance manly still hold today since the original poem isn't technically entirely paradoxical. Therefore, this interpretation of Paul's words can be ruled out for the most part. 

Others bent on affirming the humor narrative to the text state that Saint Titus himself was a native of Crete (making Paul's reference more joking by association), but this statement is nowhere to be found in the books of the New Testament that mention him. At most, it can be inferred, but is never clearly stated in any canonical text. 

 Fringe groups will state that Paul is not slandering anyone, because he is telling the complete truth: 

Epimenides wasn’t the only one to describe Cretans in this way. Other ancient writers and philosophers concurred, and Paul’s assessment serves to confirm the Cretans’ character to be generally evil. The Roman poet Ovid referred to Crete as mendax Creta, or “lying Crete.” The Greeks used the verb cretize as a synonym for lie. All people are guilty of lying at one time or another, but not all are habitual liars, as it seems the ancient Cretans were. Lying seems to have been a governing vice among them. They were not only guilty of it in certain specific instances, but always. They were, in the vernacular of psychologists, compulsive liars, those who lie even when there is no external motive for the lie. Lying was their fallback behavior in all instances.

For a good article that serves as a collection of ancient descriptions of the word "cretize" (κρητίζω) and also stories that led people to associate Cretans with liars (which most if not all trace back to Idomeneus, king of Crete during the Trojan War), look here. Much of what we have of these ancient city states are the most polarizing myths they leave behind, much in the same way our collective memory of Sparta is absurdly warlike, when the real situation is obviously more complex. There is not much else to say on this evangelical site's take on the matter considering its appalling lack of depth or morality.

Whether or not Titus was specifically from Crete, he was definitely from the Greek world, and he grew up learning Greek philosophy and all these sorts of things. He would definitely know the context of the poem Paul quotes, and when we too know that deeper context, the usage of Paul's reference certainly can become more clear. 

Epimenides was writing about a group of Cretans who believed that Zeus had lived as a man and died all on their island, even erecting a physical tomb for him. Epimenides asserts their incorrectness; Zeus is immortal. Think about this position juxtaposed with misconceptions about Christ common in the time of Paul: that he had not really resurrected. This is the type of connection Paul was making; the lies of the Cretans in Epimenides and in the Epistle to Titus are in reference to religious heresies happening there -- not frivolous jokes or absurd condemnations of entire peoples.  

Addendum on the term 'cretin'

I also see many people conflate this word with Cretan, since in American pronunciation, they are homonyms. However, the word 'cretin' does not come from Crete, but 18th century France. Merriam-Webster puts the origins succinctly: 

Chronic iodine deficiencies in diet can result in malfunctions of the thyroid gland, the gland that produces hormones necessary for normal human development. Some mountainous regions, such as parts of the Alps, do not naturally provide their inhabitants with a diet rich enough in iodine, and the resultant hypothyroidism causes stunted growth and mental retardation. In Franco-Provençal (the Romance speech of French Switzerland and adjacent areas of France), a person affected by hypothyroidism was called a cretin, literally, “wretch, innocent victim,” The word meant simply “Christian” and emphasized the hypothyroid victim's basic humanity.

Grand Illusion (1937)

     Renoir's Grand Illusion focuses on French prisoners of war as try to escape German camps during World War I. Despite the sound of the premise, the film's focus is not so much action as it is interpersonal relationships and a commentary on class. Viewing Grand Illusion with Renoir's words here in mind illuminate much of the dialogue within: “If a French farmer found himself dining with a French financier, those two Frenchman would have nothing to say to each other. But if a French farmer meets a Chinese farmer they will find any amount to talk about.” 

    The beginning of the film introduces this exact juxtaposition. Lieutenant Maréchal and Captain Boeldieu, after being shot down from their plane by German pilots, are invited to a meal with them. This meal is amicable even though both sides of the war are seated. There, Maréchal befriends a German mechanic who worked at the same factory that he did; while other scenes show lower class French prisoners mocking Boeldieu at times due to his aristocratic upbringing and attitude. Two mechanics across borders are faster friends than two countrymen across classes. Later, Maréchal comments to his friend, Rosenthal, "I like Boeldieu, but I never truly feel comfortable with him. We've got different backgrounds, so there's a wall between us."

    Captain Boeldieu has this same foil in his relationship with the German officer of the prison camp, Rauffenstein. Two different countries' people, though they get along from their identical careers and backgrounds. However, Boeldieu, through having spent so much time in the camp with the other prisoners, has begun to come around to the idea of these types of divisions. Rauffenstein explains he wanted to talk to Boeldieu since they are both career officers, and Boeldieu responds by pointing out that the others with him are also fine soldiers. When Rauffenstein imagines that the upper class' relevancy will suffer after the war, Boeldieu says, "Maybe we're no longer needed."  

    Boeldieu ends up devising a plan that will distract the German guards enough to give time for Maréchal and Rosenthal to escape, though it will knowingly come at the cost of his own life. Even when Maréchal is trying to express his gratitude to Boeldieu he does not treat his actions as something to be anything other than expected. The differences between them still impair their communication with each other, but Boeldieu expresses his change of heart through actions rather than words.

    The guards gather the prisoners to an assembly after they all played flutes and banged pots and pans together to purposefully have this assembly happen. Once they call out Boeldieu's name, he does not declare he is present in the crowd. Rather, a flute plays and the camera pans to Boeldieu atop the fortress' balcony. He has a whimsical way about him like Pan as he sits atop the ledge and later marches while playing his song. Rauffenstein himself confronts Boeldieu atop a small cliff just outside the gates, and ends up killing him with a shot to the stomach that he later tells Boeldieu was meant for his legs.

    Boeldieu leaves the world telling Rauffenstein, "I am not the one to be pitied. For me, it will all be over soon. But you'll have to carry on."

Achilles' Labor Party

 In the beginning of the Iliad, Agamemnon is urged to return Chriseis to her family to quell Apollo's plagues on the Achaeans, but he refuses adamantly. Everyone else would be with a prize, and he would be left with none. He demands another soldier offers up someone or something of equal value to what he would lose, valuing his own material wealth over the lives of all his men:

"The prize, the beauteous prize, I will resign,
So dearly valued, and so justly mine.
But since for common good I yield the fair,
My private loss let grateful Greece repair;
Nor unrewarded let your prince complain,
That he alone has fought and bled in vain."

Agamemnon deludes himself, believing that reversing his wrongdoing is valid reason enough for his citizens to repay him. He cannot stand the idea of lacking when everyone else is not, even though that wouldn't be the case, since he is the King, and they the subjects.

 "Insatiate king (Achilles thus replies),
Fond of the power, but fonder of the prize!
Would'st thou the Greeks their lawful prey should yield,
The due reward of many a well-fought field?"

Read Achilles' prompt as: you would take our labor unjustly from us with no recompense? You are King of Mycenae, but insatiable still for absolute control beyond reason. The soldier Pelides chimes in: 

"What cause have I to war at thy decree?
The distant Trojans never injured me;

...

Hither we sail'd, a voluntary throng,
To avenge a private, not a public wrong:
What else to Troy the assembled nations draws, 

But thine, ungrateful, and thy brother's cause?
Is this the pay our blood and toils deserve;
Disgraced and injured by the man we serve?
And darest thou threat to snatch my prize away,
Due to the deeds of many a dreadful day? "

Agamemnon exerts his power again, saying he will be repaid whether his subjects are willing to do so or not. 

"Even in thy tent I'll seize the blooming prize,
Thy loved Briseis with the radiant eyes.
Hence shalt thou prove my might, and curse the hour
Thou stood'st a rival of imperial power;
And hence, to all our hosts it shall be known,
That kings are subject to the gods alone."

Achilles becomes so enraged by this, he unsheathes his sword, about to kill Agamemnon until Athena intervenes. But this doesn't stop Achilles from getting the final words in against the tyrannical king. 

"When wert thou known in ambush'd fights to dare,
Or nobly face the horrid front of war?
'Tis ours, the chance of fighting fields to try;
Thine to look on, and bid the valiant die:
So much 'tis safer through the camp to go,
And rob a subject, than despoil a foe.

         ...

This sceptre, form'd by temper'd steel to prove
An ensign of the delegates of Jove,
From whom the power of laws and justice springs
(Tremendous oath! inviolate to kings);
By this I swear:—when bleeding Greece again
Shall call Achilles, she shall call in vain.
When, flush'd with slaughter, Hector comes to spread
The purpled shore with mountains of the dead,
Then shall thou mourn the affront thy madness gave,
Forced to deplore when impotent to save:
Then rage in bitterness of soul to know
This act has made the bravest Greek thy foe."

He throws the scepter to the ground and sits. He has refused to fight for the Greeks due to the unjust actions of their leader. 

Early readers of Iliad may find the scene in this beginning book to be trivial or hard to comprehend for a modern era. It is referred to as a "fight" or "quarrel" between solely Agamemnon and Achilles, and trivializes down to "bickering over Briseis", saying that Achilles is only angry that his own prize could be taken away from him by Agamemnon. This is an extremely reductionist take. Simply rereading over these excerpts I have provided will deconstruct that idea. 

The possibility of Agamemnon taking Briseis, Achilles' prize, is not the only thing Achilles has to be wrathful about. There is a plague descended upon the Greeks by the insolence of their own ruler. The Greeks fight for the personal problems of their ruling class, not because Troy started conflict by invading Greek land. Achilles is not the only one upset with Agamemnon, many others are as well such as Pelides.

The first words of The Iliad's original Greek are "Achilles' wrath." It is the center point of the entire story. Wouldn't it be counterintuitive for that wrath to be petty? The word that translates into wrath is a Greek word for anger that was only ever used to describe the retributive wrath of the gods upon mortals for wrongdoings. Fundamentally, he is not just upset about something being taken from him, like a spoiled child. He holds a righteous, retributive anger not selfishly, but selflessly against the Trojan war and its orchestrators.

 

 

Gender Queer Dionysus

     A brief description of the Greek god Dionysus is that he is the god of wine, theater, and madness. Alcohol brings two sides to people: overjoyed and happy, or uncontrollable anger or sorrow. These emotions can be seen as the two masks associated with Greek theater or drama in general, one smiling and the other frowning. 

    While I would say many people know this overview, the mythology surrounding Dionysus' birth and events he later became pivotal in are less known. Specifically, Euripides' Bacchae paints an amazing picture of this trickster god as a strongly sexually ambiguous and misunderstood individual. 

    Dionysus, Bacchus being his Roman name, was born out of the thigh of Zeus, who put him there after his mother, Semele, died with Dionysus still in her womb. To me, the Greek gods who have the most interesting gender dynamics are the ones who are not allowed to be traditionally born of a woman. Like how Athena was born out of Zeus' mind and ended up uncharacteristically masculine, Dionysus operates as her foil. 

    Where Athena in her appearances guides characters towards victory through cunning or reason, Dionysus obfuscates truth with almost everyone that he meets and enjoys watching the world around him succumb to whatever madness he dolls out. I like to connect this kind of confusion that Dionysus revels in to the contemporary "gender fuck" individuals, typically gender queer people who enjoy others not knowing right away whether they're male or female. 

    The play starts out with Dionysus setting his own scene, explaining that his family on Semele's side rejects him as a god descended from Zeus. They believe Semele was committing infidelity with a mortal man and proclaimed it was Zeus as a cover up, promptly burning to death for lying. Really, Hera had her killed out of jealousy. Dionysus throughout the play sets up a cruel revenge for his aunts and extended family in Thebes. Being the black sheep of his own family is another unique trans-y trait worth pointing out here. He is not even recognized as one of their own. 

    When Pentheus, one of the sons of the indignant aunts and current king of Thebes, walks in on his grandfather, Cadmus, and seer, Tiresias, praying and talking of Dionysus, he quips about Dionysus' Bachhae (maenads, raving female followers):

The flame,
They say, of Bacchios wraps them. Bacchios! Nay,
'Tis more to Aphrodite that they pray.
Howbeit, all that I have found, my men
Hold bound and shackled in our dungeon den;
The rest, I will go hunt them! Aye, and snare
My birds with nets of iron, to quell their prayer
And mountain song and rites of rascaldom!
  They tell me, too, there is a stranger come,
A man of charm and spell, from Lydian seas,
A head all gold and cloudy fragrancies,
A wine-red cheek, and eyes that hold the light
Of the very Cyprian. Day and livelong night
He haunts amid the damsels, o'er each lip
Dangling his cup of joyance!—Let me grip
Him once, but once, within these walls, right swift
That wand shall cease its music, and that drift
Of tossing curls lie still—when my rude sword
Falls between neck and trunk! 

    The bolded and italicized lines illustrate Pentheus' disgust towards Dionysus not only for creating this religious fanatical group of women on the outskirts of town, but also apparently for his feminine appearance. To hold the light of a Cyprian, as he says, is also an effeminate insult resembling a lewd woman. Reluctance here emanates from Pentheus' mother being wary and untrusting of the supposed illegitimate son Dionysus her whole life, and his general discrepancies with women "succumbing to their nature," and his toxic masculinity being reflected onto Dionysus, being upset with him for not performing as he should.

     The Bacchae chorus sings that Dionysus' scorns only those that spurn joy. Modern day joy spurners, one could imagine, would be those who would get upset at the liberties of any marginalized group. When conservatives get mad about some other group apart from their own getting civil liberties, this is what Dionysus would scorn. Hate at the joy and simple liberty of others. Pentheus hated the kind of freedom that the Bacchic mysteries offered the women of the towns that rejected Dionysus. 

    When a modern town rejects Dionysus, they start out by rejecting its marginalized peoples, spurning their joy out of hatred. And many of those repressed people find their joy by participating in the modern day mysteries, found families, togetherness, and activism apart from their upbringing.

By Their Fruits

 "Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore by their fruits you will know them."

Matthew 7:15-20

    I read a comparison in which the false prophet who bears bad fruit was akin to people who preach and deny LGBT people, casting them out as sinners, and the bad fruit that their teachings spread as depression, suicide, self-hate, etc. Supposing this to be true (I leave it up in the air), false preaching bearing bad fruit in Matthew can be equally compared to unneeded repentance in terms of the fruit-bearing metaphor seen in Luke. 

"Therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance, and do not begin to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.' For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones. And even now the ax is laid to the root of the trees. Therefore every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire." 

Luke 3:8-9

    Bearing good fruit in terms of repentance means to not only say you are sorry for sinning, but to make up for your sins by deeds. For an example, a tax collector in the gospels is persuaded by Jesus' presence to give back to all whom he stole from five times the amount that he took from them. This is a good fruit that was born out of his genuine repentance, which spurred on great deeds. And Jesus was pleased with him when he did this. 

    But repentance for homosexuality does not bear good fruit actively. There is no activism that can be done against it. There is no good deed that can be done for other people to remedy the "sin" of being gay. Preaching against homosexuality yourself as a self-hating, celibate queer Christian does not bear good fruit either, it harms others in the same way a straight preacher would preach against you, except it is made worse by gay people actively hurting themselves and their own communities. There is no good fruit that comes out of repentance for being queer. There is no good fruit that comes out of preaching against queerness.