For those who reject cut and paste biblical literalism, yet maintain that the Bible is a genuine authority rather than merely a literary or cultural artifact, Sylvia Keesmaat and Brian Walsh present a refreshing alternative in Colossians Remixed: Subverting the Empire. Keesmaat and Walsh use the book of Colossians as a launchpad into their vision of scripture as a story of people struggling with what it means to live faithfully in the midst of a culture that is saturated with seductive, opposing ideas, and ideals.
After establishing the importance of context - both the original context and our own - they propose a hermeneutic of scripture which emphasizes the participatory nature of the story. We are not called to memorize lines from a completed script and "repeat [them] verbatim, over and over." Rather, they suggest - in concert with N.T. Wright, Anglican bishop of Durham, England - we are actors in a part of the story that is not yet written, and we are improvising with the help of a great Director. As society and culture unfold around us, we are entrusted with the great responsibility to live the continuing story. This isn't to suggest that the first acts of the play are not important; Keesmaat and Walsh go to great pains to emphasize that we must be "deeply immersed in the text, and...completely absorbed by the story." They draw on the imagery of a plant that is deeply rooted below the soil yet growing dynamically above ground as a metaphor for our own freedom and rootedness in interpreting scripture in our context.
Colossians Remixed is an example of the direction Wright's view of scripture might lead in the interpretation and application of specific texts. Keesmaat and Walsh steep us in the original context of Paul's letter, supplying historical background on daily life in the Roman Empire and explaining what various words and images would have meant to the people who first read the letter. They argue that Paul liberally references Old Testament imagery drawn from his own experience as a Pharisee as well as words and metaphors from Colossae's cultural milieu, infusing one with new meaning and turning the other on its head.
After rooting their readers in the letter's original context, Walsh and Keesmaat tackle the question of the text's meaning in our contemporary situation. They ask their readers to imaginatively consider the "dynamic analogies" between the empire Paul preached against and various entities in our world that act as empires. Just as Rome was built on "an economics of oppression," so too the empire of global capitalism built on an economics that benefits the wealthy most on the backs of the poor. Just as Rome perpetuated the myth of the Pax Romana - which was really a euphemism for military oppression - we perpetuate our own myths. For example, "[t]he myth that we are moving as a culture toward increasing wealth and technological control, and that this is invariably good, provides the justification for all the economic and military policies of the North." In a similar way, they draw parallels between "systemic centralizations of power" in Rome and today, and ways in which "imperial images" continue to bombard us in advertisements and seek to "capture [our] imaginations," just as images of Caesar and empire permeated the lives of the public in Paul's day.
One difference they note is that today the church is "more enculturated, more taken captive by the dominant culture, more comfortable in the empire, than that radical group of young converts in the first century." This is exactly what the empire needs to survive and that is precisely why Paul sounds the trumpet for an alternative imagination, grounded in the story of scripture rather than in the imperial myths and images. By refusing to surrender our imagination to the empire, we subvert it.
The authors note an interesting tension in Colossians between the parts of Paul's letter that appear to be written between the lines so that only "those with ears to hear" will grasp the meaning, and the parts that are so blunt and in-your-face that "no one would miss the subversive overtones." This tension is also evident in Colossians Remixed, though it takes on a slightly different form. Walsh and Keesmaat write more aggressively than Paul did - without much that is hidden "between the lines." All the same, it may still be the case that only be those with ears to hear who take it to heart. The book is full of words such as "subversive" and "co-opting" which will annoy some and scare off others. They acknowledge: "[I]t may well be that what we achieve in clarity by being so aggressive we lose in aesthetic quality."
Walsh and Keesmaat make repeated and effective use of the "targum," a technique of "extended paraphrase" originating with rabbinical scholars during the Diaspora. Translating from the Hebrew as they read, Diasporan rabbis contextualized the message for congregations in a new time and place with their paraphrases. (See a PDF entitled "Colossians Targums: Reading Paul in a Postmodern Context).
Other techniques and stylistic choices used in the book don't work as well. Keesmaat and Walsh periodically entertain questions and comments from an anonymous reader in dialogue form. The danger in this, of course, is that invariably the questioner doesn't represent every reader's questions and accepts answers that leave other readers unsatisfied.
To be fair, they do try to address tough questions. They note in their discussion about Colossians as "an ancient writing preoccupied with something like what we today describe as a worldview" that "[t]he problem with worldviews is they are worldviews. In other words, they are by definition comprehensive in scope, seeking to present an integrating vision that encompasses everything. In this respect they bear some uncomfortable likeness to empires." From this frank acknowledgement that the worldview espoused in Colossians bears similarities to oppressive empires, Walsh and Keesmaat explore the ways that it differs from most: its embrace of suffering and its concern for the oppressed.
The church today needs to hear the message of this book, to root ourselves in this story and let it develop in us an alternative vision for our place in the shadow of the empire.
Laryn and Janel Kragt Bakker live in Hyattsville, Maryland. Janel is a doctoral candidate in religion and culture at the Catholic University of America, while Laryn works at the Center for Educational Design and Communication, doing graphics and Web design for nonprofit organizations.
