A reflection from Fr. Randy Calvo of Holy Name of Jesus Parish in South Deerfield, MA:

I have been attending sporadically a Jewish Midrash and myth Bible study group at Schoen Books here in South Deerfield on Wednesday evenings. The group has extended an invitation to me and has been wonderfully patient with my ignorance of the Hebrew terminology and teachers. I have found it extremely interesting to hear readings of the same texts that I have read since I was a child in a wholly different light, and maybe most amazingly of all is that I have found the readings enlightening to my Christian faith in an unexpected way. Sometimes as Christians we may approach the Old Testament with an air of condescension based upon the belief that we know a fuller meaning of the text than its original recipients because we recognize that it all points to the coming of Jesus as the Messiah.

I thank my teachers of the historical-critical method of Old Testament study, Fr. Michael Barone and Rev. Bruce Dahlburg, for helping me to read these books in their own right. These Midrash classes have helped me to deepen that insight. The closest parallel I can offer is that Midrash treats the biblical word in similar fashion to Christian patristics. Midrash uses the inspired text as a springboard to further spiritual insight and theological exploration. It is some of these musings that have led me to a deeper appreciation of the Incarnation, of God’s entrance into human history at Christmas.

Maimonides, the great Jewish philosopher of the 12th century, expounded on the idea of —good— as repeated numerous times in Genesis 1. He concluded that creation is good in and of itself. The goodness of what God has made is not dependent upon how it serves humans. Their goodness is intrinsic as made by God. He further stated that the repetition of the word implied that the whole of creation is good in a way that is greater than any isolated part of that creation could ever be alone.

Six hundred years later Shneur Zalman, again expounding on Genesis 1, speaks of God’s creation of the dry land of the earth on the third day. Zalman believed that the earth manifested the presence and power of God more than the rest of creation because it held the power to make things grow, and he found this in the verse: —Let the earth put forth vegetation …— (Genesis 1:11) The rest of creation is created by God, but the earth creates like God. Zalman imagined that God’s radiance from on high shown down through all of existence, but that when it reached the bottom, the earth, it reflected back toward God through the earth’s power to create. The presence and power of God, therefore, are most clearly expressed not only in the goodness of creation, but especially in the goodness of the miracle of the process of life.

Genesis is the creation story of the Jewish people. We have adopted it as our own, but it was born in the Jewish faith. I find it bothersome that Holy Scripture tells us of the inherent goodness of creation and also of the goodness of the process of life, and then some of the teachers of the church would insist that we profess instead that creation is inherently evil and that this evil is passed from generation to generation through the process of life. Zalman was fleeing from the armies of Napoleon and a certain death sentence when he wrote these words. He was not naïve. That the world is not perfect does not equate with the world is evil. That the world has been created by God, and has been called —good— by God, does mean that creation and life have been sanctified. The church does a disservice to this revelation when we insist on having people believe in original sin and all that accompanies it.

When God physically enters creation in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, He testifies to the holiness of ordinary life. Christmas is a time to remember that the presence of God not only showers down upon us, but is reflected back towards God in the goodness of this creation. Perfection belongs to heaven, but Christmas reminds us that there are sparks of the divine, that there is hidden holiness, all around us. Being able to see that again is part of the joy and wonder of the season of Jesus’ birth and one of God’s greatest Christmas gifts to us all.

…and I would add that our baptismal regeneration and membership in the Church requires just this sort of witness. It is the building up of man and woman in light of Jesus’ salvific action. That action began at His incarnation and will end when our plea of Maranatha is answered. Christ’s entry into human life forever changes our relationship to life — to the eternal.