TYRANT!!!!

"Oh no!  You've got to be kidding me..... I can't read this!" 

Thus, did my mind begin a tailspin dance last night as I found and read the bible passage which was to be one of the scripture readings for today's Chapel service.  I had volunteered last week to take two days in the position of Lector, and now, I was going to have to stand up in front of the community and read this "immature clap-trap!!!" (scary? I don't know. Certainly annoying [maybe even enraging?] to Karen).  Here judge for yourselves!    

Exodus 32: 7-17  New Revised Standard Version

7 The Lord said to Moses, “Go down at once! Your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have acted perversely; 8 they have been quick to turn aside from the way that I commanded them; they have cast for themselves an image of a calf, and have worshiped it and sacrificed to it, and said, ‘These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!’” 9 The Lord said to Moses, “I have seen this people, how stiff-necked they are. 10 Now let me alone, so that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them; and of you I will make a great nation.” 11 But Moses implored the Lord his God, and said, “O Lord, why does your wrath burn hot against your people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? 12 Why should the Egyptians say, ‘It was with evil intent that he brought them out to kill them in the mountains, and to consume them from the face of the earth’? Turn from your fierce wrath; change your mind and do not bring disaster on your people. 13 Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, how you swore to them by your own self, saying to them, ‘I will multiply your descendants like the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have promised I will give to your descendants, and they shall inherit it forever.’” 14 And the Lord changed his mind about the disaster that he planned to bring on his people.

"Petulant, self-centered tyrant!"

(*Karen clears throat*  - and - *flushes*)   

Ah yes, where was I?  Oh, right ---  after this initial slightly negative reaction, (smile) I settled down, I had promised to do this after all, never mind it was something that triggered me.

"Whew!  Take a breath Karen.  Slow down, be still,  - its okay.  WHAT is this reaction?  These are just words in a book.  This is just a telling, in the same way the Greek "mythology" story of Cronus eating his children is.  You do not have to judge true or not true.....its just what it is".....and..... by the way Karen, why IS it you react with rage at Jehovah in this scene?  Why do you not feel a similar rage at Cronus' cruelty?  Hmmmm?"

So I slowed down, got curious and looked up several translations of this passage.  Then, I sat with the discord awhile (I couldn't find any version that lessened my discomfort) and finally began to work with the passage the same way I have learned to work with dreams, koans and other life puzzles.  What is this?  Who is this?  What is the experience of each person/thing in the dream, koan, conundrum, bible story?  What do they see/know/feel?........and slowly I began to open, then soften in a way I think I never have before where the Bible and Christianity are concerned.   

Now mind you, I have NOT walked around the past 45 years on some kind of a hair trigger.....in fact, it seems I had ignored all the internal discord so well, I had not even let it get enough air time in consciousness to have had more than a momentary blip before being gently but firmly pushed aside.  Nope.  Just not part of my world.  Don't go there.  Nothin' of interest over there.   :)   I'm laughing and telling you this in a funny way, but really, I just didn't know I had such a hard on for God the Father until recently.  Had some inklings, but it just wasn't enough to get my panties in a bunch.  

I do know though, this adventure of mine is really stirring things up and I really don't have any idea where this all is going to go.  I'm a mess, but I get the feeling I am a mess like primordial soup is a mess....... the most amazing things just might rise up out of it/me.  

A couple of things though, ARE clear to me today.  First of which, is YES, this is definitely some un-investigated, unresolved family of origin stuff.   The Jehovah depicted in the above passages reminded me last night of my mother at her very worst when she would tantrum and viciously browbeat, (and physically hit sometimes) to get her way, to make me/us give in.........and then would get all sulky and angry all over again if I/we were not happy about doing things her way, or giving her what she wanted....to the point of, if I/we did not act happy about her getting her way and say thank you to her, she would attack and if I/we offered resistance to that attack, an even worse knockdown drag-out fight would ensue.  No winners in that story.    Ho-hum, - ancient history, but one that made feeling connection with today, and buried feelings that are felt in the here and now, cease to control from beneath consciousness.  (I do wonder if the person who recorded this story in Exodus had a similar background with "authority figures?")

A more important (I think) result came from putting my self in Jehovah's shoes last night, (does God wear shoes?).  I felt his/her/its pain in being diss-ed by the Israelites.  Here he/she/it had cared so much about his/her/their people, that he/she/it had gone way out of their way to take them out of servitude and they thanked him/her/it by saying their Thank You(s) to someone else! (The Golden Calf)  OUCH! I felt his/her/its pain and found myself feeling empathy for God.   (*Karen looks around waiting for someone to yell  BLASPHEMY!  at her*)  

Now if God were just another human being sitting across from me, I would be seeing the vulnerable child who was hurt and so, wanted to hurt back.  But God is God, and he/she/it is supposed to be all loving aren't they?  What happens if they are not?  The story above is not so different from any of the jealous god stories of the Greeks and Romans...... gods made in the image of humans......  shoehorned into a too small conception of what divinity is.  Psychology says, our first "gods" are our parents.  I think this is true......and therefore sometimes we just have to say,  "Poor God" to the divine, "no one really sees you".

I long ago forgave the woman Maxine who just happened to be my mother as part of who she was.  I eventually came to see and understand the scars she carried from her childhood, which continued to effect her as an adult.  Maxine (my mother)  had many wonderful qualities and as we came to a place where we could just be Karen and Maxine together, (rather than mother and daughter with all the expectations those words and roles carry)  the trauma (for both of us) faded from our relationship as adults.  Yet the residue of mistreatment, stemming from my own parents unresolved histories was there (yes Dad had his stuff too),  and left me (the very young, deeply buried, "traumatized" Karen), unwilling to try and relate to any authority at all.  I lived most of my life refusing to depend on anyone, (too afraid), not trusting any person at all, let alone one in authority.  (This happens when the ones you depend on for comfort are the ones who are causing the pain).  I became compliant in a superficial self survival way.  I was no angry rebel.  Any anger or resentment had been carefully packed away.......I just avoided authorities, and when I couldn't, just gave them whatever they wanted, said what they wanted to hear and was whatever they wanted for as long as I had to be in contact with them.  I am sure they all thought I was a very nice, if somewhat baffling person.   

([*Karen clears her throat*]  Ah well, not quite entirely true.  The rage was there, but wasn't accessible to my conscious self and would only appear when I would blackout drink in my teens and early 20's,  It was not at all uncommon at those times for me to attack authority figures, even policemen.  Why I never got my skull cracked is still a mystery to me and is due entirely to the patience of those poor innocents).  

I may never come to "believe" in a personified god of any sort, but the rancor and anxious hostility I was feeling at the beginning of this experiment, is, for the moment, gone. In its place is some kind of sense of relationship.  I read an anonymous quote about forgiveness the other day, which for me, says it all........

"To forgive ......... is to release someone from the obligation of who you want them to be and accept who they are." 

I forgive you God.
Do you forgive me?

"