I am teaching about Hezekiah and Josiah, two “good” kings of Judah (out of a slew of losers) who might be said to have incurred “revivals” in the 600s BC in the Southern Kingdom.
I see these two regimes as times for the individual Jews to repent even though the prophesied end would come: destruction of their land and capital and temple; exile; and then return of a humbled people 70 or more years later. It is hard to imagine the history of the Bible without 586 B.C., Nebuchadnezzar, Daniel, Cyrus, etc. The apostasy was simply too long-standing, too intense, too empty of real national repentance. The exile, in my opinion, made Judaism what it is today and led to the ministry of Jesus on earth. For example, the synagogue system happened because of it, and the Pharisees, Maccabees, second temple, and Rome.
One episode in the life of Hezekiah, who is kind of a mixed bag of behaviors, led me to think deeply about my own Christian experience as an evangelical, former fundamentalist, woman, and writer.
I would call it “the temptation and sin of being on display most of my life” and the struggle to release myself, or better, be released from not just the male gaze, as feminists call it, but gaze in general.
The episode from II Kings I refer to is when the Babylonian envoys have come to, probably, scout out the kind of precious metals Jerusalem has in its government and religious buildings, and Hezekiah obliges, rather stupidly. For one, why is he showing Gentiles and pagans the temple? Doesn’t he know that Babylon is not exactly their friend? That with all the prophecies about future judgment for apostasy, every neighbor should be treated cautiously. God and his prophet are not impressed with Hezekiah’s desire to show off the glories of the kingdom, and he gets a scathing rebuke. Here’s the scene:
12 At that time [c]Berodach-Baladan the son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a present to Hezekiah, for he heard that Hezekiah had been sick. 13 And Hezekiah was attentive to them, and showed them all the house of his treasures—the silver and gold, the spices and precious ointment, and [d]all [e]his armory—all that was found among his treasures. There was nothing in his house or in all his dominion that Hezekiah did not show them.
14 Then Isaiah the prophet went to King Hezekiah, and said to him, “What did these men say, and from where did they come to you?”
So Hezekiah said, “They came from a far country, from Babylon.”
15 And he said, “What have they seen in your house?”
So Hezekiah answered, “They have seen all that is in my house; there is nothing among my treasures that I have not shown them.”
16 Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, “Hear the word of the Lord: 17 ‘Behold, the days are coming when all that is in your house, and what your fathers have accumulated until this day, shall be carried to Babylon; nothing shall be left,’ says the Lord. 18 ‘And they shall take away some of your sons who will [f]descend from you, whom you will beget; and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.’ ”
19 So Hezekiah said to Isaiah, “The word of the Lord which you have spoken is good!” For he said, “Will there not be peace and truth at least in my days?”
Hezekiah really comes off badly here; perhaps early dementia? Who knows? His last line is the kicker: “Okay, my sons will be imprisoned, thrown into exile, and eunuchs (therefore no progeny after that point) but it will be okay for me, right?” Good grief. And note he says, “My treasures,” as if he is not the steward of these riches rather than the owner.
Hezekiah wanted to show off; we all do. But my argument is with display and showing off as a Christian lifestyle.
My story
I was converted at 15, and at 17 I enrolled in a college whose motto was, “Avoid every appearance of evil.” (Not officially, of course, only coded into all expectations.) It was (no longer exists) fundamentalist, somewhat a cult of personality, and legalistic in its overall ethos. Ironically, the Bible teaching we got from our professors was generally in opposition to that prevailing ethos, but the administration and culture had a disconnect with the content of our classes. I am thankful for my teachers, for learning discipline there, and for deep friendships from that time and later when I taught there. Beyond those, I make an effort to forget those many years from 17 to 35, when I left because I did not want my son to be raised in that environment.
When I say the motto was “Avoid every appearance of evil,” I am being truthful but sarcastic. Married couples were told they shouldn’t hold hands on campus because someone driving through campus might think they were unmarried and get the wrong idea. Yeah. And so forth and so on. Dress codes, church attendance, curfews, and even where you were (for girls) was regulated. We had to get permission to leave campus if we lived in the dormitories. We had room inspection every day. For some, it was doable; I got used to it, but I was so busy with my on-campus job and trying to get good grades for graduate school that I had little time for chafing at the rules. Others seemed to develop PTSD. In fact, I probably did and just didn’t realize it. I still have dreams that I am living in the dormitory and just can’t graduate and be freed.
The verse I Thessalonians 5:22, “Abstain from every form of evil” does not say anything about appearance, so it was a bad translation in the old KJV (another point of debate, but one’s choice of Bible version was not regulated, thankfully). But if one goes by the “Appearance” translation, one is likely to become quite paranoid about how one is seen, or how other people might think you are seen by other people, and so on and so forth. (This translation of appearance v. form also arises in Philippians 2.)
On top of that, we were inculcated in the message that everything we did was a testimony. Of what? Not so much grace, in fact not of grace at all, but of our behavior and our righteousness and the type of representative we were of the college and of the church. Therefore, our outside must be, at all times, exactly according to a standard the college wanted for its students. Dresses and hose and nice shoes on girls, short hair and long pants for guys. The fact that this emphasis violates Matthew 6 was not the point. On top of that, being a representative of the college through the choirs or drama teams was touted as the highest form of being. The choirs sat in the choir loft during three-day-a-week chapel services. They were always on display. It helped if one was good-looking—thin, well-dressed, tasteful and up-to-date makeup, with Farrah Fawcett hair for girls, especially.
To say the least, minorities were, well, very minority in visibility, but not forbidden; that was not an issue and the college did have a strong sense of global mission and anti-prejudice overall, although I’m speaking as a rather clueless white person and I’m sure the experience was quite different for Black, Asian, and the few Hispanic students. Some of our Black students have done well, and our founder and president once told how Martin Luther King came to speak to him about racial issues in the city.
I will say that of course most students were not good-looking, could not afford the best clothes and hairdos, and were not tempted to be on display in the choir loft or ball court or drama team. Most had, I believe, a heart for service and God. Anyone who did not meet the unspoken standard of looks or size could be redeemed by exceptional musical talent or radiant charm or excessive service in various ministries.
Today
Enough of that; you can see that display was forced into my brain, and conscious that I did not conform to the desired look for a variety of reasons, I and many others were convinced of our “otherness” or “less than-ness.” However, I can’t say that I left the display culture when I resigned from that college in 1991. Now I had a child, and mothers are always on display even if nameless, and then I went to teach elsewhere and learned about viewbooks and who gets included in one (not me, but that’s okay, really.) Pleasant, attractive, happy people are always featured on viewbooks and college websites, with the proviso that there be racial and gender representation and, occasionally, a person with a visible disability (but that can be tricky, since “those people” tend not to measure up to the pleasant, attractive, happy bar).
Then fifteen years later a guy at Harvard changed society with something called The Facebook.
He started it as a way for Harvard guys to rate the female students; he hacked into the system to get the girls’ ID photos and information. Think about it: Face-book. One’s face, one’s appearance, is the defining factor. One’s outward being is what matters. Then Instagram and Twitter (more verbal, but far more toxic) and YouTube and whatever.
The ethos of that college I attended—avoid any appearance of not measuring up spiritual or of casting the slightest aspersion on the larger group—has been replaced with a vaguer but no less insidious ethos of individuality without difference. Follow the trend but be yourself, and above all, plaster your image everywhere you can. Get plastic surgery to have a smaller nose and bigger puffy lips. Take fifty photos of yourself every day. Or, on the other hand, look as sloppy and outrageous as possible, but still take fifty photos a day. Definitely get an armful of tattoos no matter the cost and how it will look in twenty years. Be yourself. You be you, just be sure it’s the way everyone else does.
Somebody’s looking, so give them what they want, whether it’s the Babylonian prince or that guy who sits next to you in class.
Growth
Now, I write as a woman, a wounded woman and an older woman. I am not bothered by what the cute guy thinks of me, but I do care about my presentation. Men are not under the same constraints nor are they immune to being on display. On my recent trip to Turkey, I traveled with some dear folks who loved to take photos. Group photos as well as selfies. “Look, we’re in front of a different temple column in ruins, let’s get a group shot.” And with digital cameras on the mobile phones, that means five of every one. When I look at the shared photos of the group on Apple Cloud, I see my discomfort with all these photos, and I get to see four of five versions of each. I really tried to look happy and smile, and some times it’s believable. Other times I am clearly annoyed, tired, blinking, looking the other way, or hiding my face in the shadow of my broad-brimmed straw hat. That hat didn’t make it the whole trip and ended up in a trash can some near Laodicea, I think. My companions look great. I looked distressed and traumatized.
And I am sure, like me, they look at themselves first when they are viewing the photos, whether male or female.
And true confessions: over the years I have done those small things that lead to me being somewhat more attractive at 69 than I was at 19. I got contacts to replace those ‘80s goggles we wore, finally got my teeth straightened (too late), stopped with the big hair and perms, and pierced my ears. I keep my weight consistent, if not low. I wear makeup and generally overdress. And I am happy and more at peace as an older woman than I was in past decades, for numerous reasons. In photos with my granddaughter, I am laughing with joy to have this little person who looks very little like me, thank goodness, in my arms or on my lap. A guy I knew told me I was dowdy when I was young. He was a jerk of course, but he wasn’t wrong. So what? I am blessed.
And I know very few people care. They weren’t really looking at me in the past, even though we were convinced they were, and they aren’t looking now. We are all far too distracted and self-absorbed to be interested in another’s looks and whether they are representing something “correctly.” That fundamentalist prison no longer exists for me and I hope many others. We have other more important problems, or, we are aware of other more important problems. And I for one am thankful.
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