For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to worship idols. It’s not that my parents raised me that way, because they didn’t; I was brought up in a loving, secure, Christian home. But from childhood until today, my heart has been drawn to idolatry. In fact, if I’m honest, one of the defining features of my identity has been my desire to put something else – popularity, money, influence, sex, success – in place of God.
That’s just who I am.
For many years, I was taught that idolatry was sinful. As a good
Christian, I fought the desire to commit idolatry, and repented when I got it
wrong. But the desire to worship idols never went away.
I wanted it to, but it didn’t.
So it has been such a blessing to discover that worshipping one
God, and him alone, isn’t for everyone. There are thousands of Christians
out there who have found faithful, loving ways of expressing worship both to
God and to idols, without compromising either their faith or their view of
Scripture. In recent years, I have finally summoned the courage to admit that I
am one of them. Let me give you a few reasons why I believe that idolatry and
Christianity are compatible.
I start with my own story, and the stories of many others
like me. I am an evangelical, and I have a very high view of the Bible – I am
currently studying for a PhD in biblical studies at King’s College London,
which will be my third theology degree – as well as knowing both the ancient
languages and the state of scholarly research. Yet, after much prayerful study,
I have discovered the liberating truth that it is possible to be an idolatrous
Christian. That, at least, is evidence that you
can be an evangelical and an idolater.
Not only that, but a number of evangelical writers have been challenging
the monolatrous narrative in a series of scholarly books. A number of these
provide a powerful case for listening to the diversity of the ancient witnesses
in their original contexts, and call for a Christlike approach of humility,
openness and inclusion towards our idolatrous brothers and sisters.
Some, on hearing this, will of course want to rush straight to the
“clobber passages” in Paul’s letters (which we will consider in a moment), in a
bid to secure the fundamentalist ramparts and shut down future dialogue. But as
we consider the scriptural material, two things stand out. Firstly, the
vast majority of references to idols and idolatry in the Bible come in the Old
Testament – the same Old Testament that tells us we can’t eat
shellfish or gather sticks on Saturdays. When advocates of monolatry eat bacon
sandwiches and drive cars at the weekend, they indicate that we should move
beyond Old Testament commandments in the new covenant, and rightly so.
Secondly, and even more significantly, we need to read the whole Bible
with reference to the approach of Jesus. To be a Christian is to be a
Jesus-person: one whose life is based on his priorities, not on the priorities
of subsequent theologians. And when we look at Jesus, we notice that he
welcomed everyone who came to him, including those people that the (one-God
worshipping) religious leaders rejected – and that Jesus
said absolutely nothing about idols in any of the four Gospels.
Conservative theologians, many of whom are friends of mine, often miss this
point in the cut-and-thrust of debate, but for those who love Jesus, it should
be at the very heart of the discussion.
Jesus had no problem with idolatry.
He included everyone, however many gods they worshipped.
If we want to be like him, then we should adopt the same inclusive
approach.
We should also remember that, as we have discovered more about the human
brain, we have found out all sorts of things about idolatry that the biblical
writers simply did not know. The prophets and apostles knew nothing of cortexes
and neurons, and had no idea that some people are pre-wired to commit idolatry,
so they never talked about it. But as we have learned more about genetics,
neural pathways, hormones and so on, we have come to realise that some
tendencies - alcoholism, for example - scientifically result from the way we
are made, and therefore cannot be the basis for moral disapproval or
condemnation. To disregard the findings of science on this
point is like continuing to insist that the world is flat.
With all of these preliminary ideas in place, we can finally turn to
Paul, who has sadly been used as a judgmental battering ram by monolaters for
centuries. When we do, what immediately strikes us is that in the ultimate
“clobber passage”, namely Romans 1, the problem isn’t really
idol-worship at all! The problem, as Paul puts it, is not that people worship
idols, but that they “exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images”
(1:23). Paul isn’t talking about people who are
idolatrous by nature. He is talking about people who were naturally
worshippers of Israel’s God, and exchanged it for the worship of idols. What
else could the word “exchange” here possibly mean?
Not only that, but none of his references apply to idolatry as we know
it today: putting something above God in our affections. Paul, as a Hellenistic
Roman citizen, simply would not have had a category for that kind of thing. In
his world, idolatry meant physically bowing down to tribal or household deities
– statues and images made of bronze or wood or stone – and as such, the worship
of power or money or sex or popularity had nothing to do with his prohibitions.
(Some see an exception in the way he talks about coveting as idolatry in Ephesians 5:5 and Colossians 3:5, but these obviously reflect
his desire, as a first century Jew, to honour the Ten Commandments.)
In other words, when Paul talks about idolatry, he is not
talking about the worship of idols as we know it today. As a
Christ-follower, he would be just as horrified as Jesus if he saw the way his
words have been twisted to exclude modern idolaters like me, and like many
friends of mine. For centuries, the church has silenced the voice of idolaters
(just like it has silenced the voice of slaves, and women), and it is about
time we recognised that neither Jesus, nor Paul, had any problem with idolatry.
Obviously this is a contribution to an ongoing conversation, rather than
the last word on the subject. But I hope you will all search the scriptures,
search your hearts, and consider the evidence afresh - and avoid judging those
who disagree in the meantime! Maybe, just maybe, we can make space in the
church for those who, like me, have spent a lifetime wrestling with the
challenge of idolatry.
