Biblical BS

I was commenting back and forth with Rev. Matt Johnson on FB yesterday on an old, favorite topic - the use of profanity on the internet. He said something about the Greek word skubalon and said it was used in St. Paul's letter to the Philippians. After just a little digging, I discovered its general meaning and exact location.

First, skubalon:

any refuse, as the excrement of animals, offscourings, rubbish, dregs of things worthless and detestable

Phil 3:8 (Revised English Bible):

More than that, I count everything sheer loss, far outweighed by the gain of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I did in fact forfeit everything. I count it so much rubbish (skubalon), for the sake of gaining Christ.

I didn't take Biblical Greek, but I do know that translating any word, particularly with limited knowledge or understanding of nuance, popular versus formal uses, and all the rest, is never easy. The King James Version translates that as "dung", which at the very least is closer to the spirit not only of the word, but to the effect St. Paul is trying to convey. All he once was is not just lost, it is shit.

I find it more than refreshing to have this tidbit pointed out to me. Several years ago, I said that Jesus most likely did not blink when he heard the 1st century CE equivalent of "fuck". I was told that he probably got all school-marmish about it, but I tend to doubt it. There just doesn't seem to be the small-minded moralizer about Jesus. Remember, this was a guy who got a bad reputation for hanging out with drunkards, prostitutes, the real dregs of society. St. Paul was, along with being peripatetic preacher, a tent-maker, said skill helping to fund his various adventures and travels. Being a laborer meant much the same then as it does now, socially at any rate. For all his relative erudition in the koine Greek, he probably had exposure to even more colorful expressions.

We dehumanize the people and stories of Scripture when we close our eyes to the social reality within which our faith was born. While I am not suggesting that pastors stand in the pulpit and spout profanities freely, it would be nice if a lesson from this could be drawn out - while certainly scatalogical, Paul's use of an extreme epithet was clearly a rhetorical device showing the contrast with Paul's understanding of his life before and after his encounter with Jesus.

Would that we had more such bold proclaimers today. And that's no shit.