May 11, 2025

“You Are Gods”

This morning I’m going to look with you into two passages of scripture that may surprise you.  The first is this story of Peter raising the woman Tabitha from the dead.  There are a couple of odd things about this tale to begin with.  One is that when Peter arrives on the scene and assesses the situation, he orders everyone out of the room.  I find that rather peculiar.  What is it that he didn’t want anyone to see?  Was he somehow aware of medical techniques that today we would recognize as cardiac message, or mouth to mouth resuscitation, and thought others might not understand?  For whatever reason, I find it also curious that we are given a thorough account in scripture of what he did in that room all by himself.  Does that mean that he told others what he did, after shutting them out so they wouldn’t know?  Or are we afforded the omniscient perspective that fiction authors often give their readers?  In the balance I take this as a tale related by Luke (who was, by the way, the author of Acts) to encourage the early Christians and bolster their faith.  It certainly can be based on some historical experience, but Luke is afforded the right to some degree of embellishment.

What strikes me most, however, is my perception that this story is not so much about Peter performing a miraculous act, as it is about the woman, Tabitha.  In this account she is referred to as both Tabitha and Dorcas.  Tabitha is the Aramaic and Dorcas is the Greek, both of which mean Gazelle. I find that name significant.  In much of the ancient world, and even up to modern times, the gazelle has been a richly symbolic creature.  A small antelope with fine features and extraordinary speed (some are able to run at bursts as fast as 60 miles an hour), gazelles have captured the imagination of countless writers.  In the Song of Songs the beloved of both a man and a woman are compared to gazelles.  Doris Behrens-Abouseif relates that Walid ibn Yazid, an eighth century Umayyad caliph who was also a poet, “dedicated most of his poetry to wine and love.  In one poem about a hunting excursion, Walid pursued an antelope, but stopping short of killing her he looked at her neck and her eyes which reminded him of his beloved Salma.”  Walid’s poem goes like this:

We caught and would have killed an antelope

That ran auspiciously to the right.

But then it gently turned its eyes and looked –

The very image of your look!

We let it go. Were it not for our love

For you, it surely would have died.

Now, little antelope, you’re free and safe.

So off you go,

Happy among the other antelopes.¹

She relates similar accounts of hunters in ancient poetry each sparing a gazelle because of its reflection of his loved one.  In short, the gazelle, perhaps the most graceful and lovely of all the antelopes, has for ages been a symbolic object of love; and literature through the ages abounds with stories like this one of gazelles being released from the fate of death because of the profound love they engendered.

So this woman named Gazelle is deeply loved by those around her and they desperately seek help when death overtakes her.  Luke makes it clear in his story.  He says that the disciples immediately sent for Peter when she died, and writes, “All the widows stood . . . weeping and showing tunics and other clothing that Dorcas had made while she was with them.”  And here’s the kicker: the woman “Dorcas, Tabitha, Gazelle” is referred to as a “disciple”.  In that patriarchal culture, doesn’t it strike you as remarkable that among the disciples, there was a woman?  She was only about two thousand years ahead of her time.  But why is she so prominent, so beloved, so highly honored as to be regarded among the disciples?  I think the answer is given right off the bat.  Luke says, “She was devoted to good works and acts of charity.”  Tabitha, Dorcas, Gazelle, was deeply loved, highly valued, and greatly honored for her deeds.

Which brings us to the other remarkable story, the one about Jesus defending himself against accusations of blasphemy.  Also a curious thing or two arise here.  John writes that it was “the Jews” who gathered around Jesus and started to grill him.  Here’s the thing: pretty much everyone in the story was a Jew, including Jesus.  So why would John go out of his way to label the antagonists in the story as “the Jews”?  Again, I wonder if it’s because this gospel is written to early Christians, and there’s already a separation emerging between the faiths, all of which gives us a signal that we should be looking for a basic lesson in Christian practice here.

But there’s another interesting reference at the beginning of the story.  John relates that, “It was winter, and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the portico of Solomon.”  This is a lovely image, and a detail that is worthy of note.  The portico of Solomon was a high up, double colonnade, with rows of columns supporting a roof (which makes it a better place to walk in the winter).  It was on the eastern-most side of the Temple grounds and standing in the portico one could look inward directly at the front entrance of the Temple proper, and turning around the other direction one could look out toward the Mount of Olives and the garden of Gethsemane.  Jesus therefore finds himself, both literally and figuratively, standing between the “Holy of Holies” and the place of his most human anguish.  It is here that this business of his humanity and divinity is addressed directly.  He is confronted with the blunt challenge: “If you are the Messiah, tell us plainly.”  He tries his best to make sense for them of his calling and his birthright, but they end up accusing him of blasphemy (which seems to have been their intention from the start) and are about to stone him to death.  Here’s where it really gets interesting.  Jesus offers the following defense against the charge of blasphemy: “Is it not written in your law, ‘I said, you are gods’?  If those to whom the word of God came were called ‘gods’ – and the scripture cannot be annulled – can you say that the one whom the Father has sanctified and sent into the world is blaspheming because I said, ‘I am God’s Son’?”  That’s an amazing passage of scripture.  Jesus is quoting Psalm 82, verse 6 which reads, “I say, ‘You are gods, children of the Most High, all of you; nevertheless, you shall die like mortals, and fall like any prince.”  Jesus is here employing a common technique of the rabbis which was to take a verse of scripture (not infrequently entirely out of context) and use it to develop a more elaborate argument.  But even though Jesus may be abusing the original context of the psalm, the point he’s making with it is extraordinary.  In essence, he is saying that scripture calls regular people “gods”, so why are they complaining when he says he’s God’s son?  In short, Jesus is here giving tremendous support to the Christology of those of us who tend to think that the divinity in Jesus is the same thing as the divinity in all the rest of us – maybe he just happened to have a lot more of it.  In other words, in a way, we’re all gods.

Well this was not at all satisfactory to his inquisitors, and Jesus offers the ultimate answer to their challenge.  He tells them to look at his deeds.  And if he’s doing the Lord’s work, then, once again, what’s the beef?  Here we have the parallel with the story of Tabitha, the Gazelle.  She was loved and lifted up as a disciple because of her devotion to “good works and acts of charity.”  She was doing the Lord’s work.  That’s what made her great.  And if you don’t mind, on behalf of Jesus, let me say, that’s what made her divine – a god, if you will.

You and I are not afforded an aura of holiness because we show up in church once a week.  We do not have halos around our heads because we say beautiful prayers.  We do not reflect the divinity of Christ because we believe the right things, or talk about the right things.  It is our deeds that make us divine.   So, if Jesus contends that scripture says to people, “You are gods”, and he demonstrates his divinity by his works, then this church is full of gods; it is full of Gazelles.  I have seen you quietly going to visit those who are alone or in need, quietly caring for one another by clearing walkways and steps, bringing food for the food pantry or donations for refugees, being generous with your financial support of our ministry and mission, showing remarkable kindness and generosity of spirit to others in times of stress or conflict.

Does this mean that you are all perfect, or that we’ve arrived at some state of absolute holiness?  Obviously not.  We’re all works in progress.  And, in fact, whatever divinity resides within us is always a work in progress.  But the point is that, so long as that work is going on – the work of Divine ministries of love, and healing, and justice, and goodness – then divinity is alive among us and, I daresay, within us.  Look deep into your own heart.  I tell you that if you look deep enough you will not see a hopeless failure, a lost soul, a wasted life, an unworthy screw-up; you will see the very image-of-God in which you were created.  That image shines from you more and more, as your deeds, like those of Tabitha the Gazelle, like those of Jesus, reflect divine intentions.

No, you are not perfect; you are not a finished product; you are not insignificant; you are not a lost cause.  You are – gods.

¹Doris Behrens-Abouseif, “The Lion-Gazelle Mosaic at Khirbat al-Mafjar”, in the journal Muqarnas, volume 14, p. 15.