The Church Goes to Africa
This is both an Ignatian take on the passage from Acts and a poetic interpretation of two passages from the Book of Isaiah. I hope it is both/and in other ways as well.
Old Jerusalem in Modern Jerusalem
This is a picture of a scale model of Jerusalem as it was in about 72 A.D., just before it was destroyed by the Romans. It is at the Israel National Museum in Jerusalem. I wish I had read this passage about the Ethiopian courtier when I took the photo. I would have looked for the chariot parking lot in the Jerusalem model. The courtier must have been an impressive figure as he entered Jerusalem with his fancy chariot and fancy clothes, but we don’t have this part of the story. The Ethiopian kingdom had a centuries old connexion with Judaism ever since the Queen of Sheba had a child fathered by King Solomon. This might have some bearing as to why the courtier might be going to Jerusalem to worship. But for me the more interesting question is why Luke chose this particular conversion story, just before he was going he was going to write about Paul’s – the most famous conversion story of all. He must have had hundreds of stories to choose from. But before we get too far into the why of this story, I want to look at two aspects of the what, a possible backstory and teaching the basics of the new faith.
Luke is writing the story of the church’s big tent. If we think of the Samaritans as the hated spiritual cousins of the residents of Jerusalem, the Ethiopians were also spiritual cousins, but the ones neither hated nor loved, just neglected. I sense an untold story behind the courtier’s visit to Jerusalem, one that might have been forgotten in Jerusalem but remembered in Ethiopia. Perhaps the courtier was denied entry to the temple or to part of the temple because he was a eunuch as per the prohibition in Deuteronomy 23. The temple establishment of the time was very much a ‘Law and not the Prophets’ bunch – the opposite of the early church. Before any of the New Testament was written, the people of the Way were very eager to look into the prophets. A few chapters on from the passage quoted by Luke, Isaiah contradicts the prohibition of Deuteronomy 23.
“Blest is anyone
who acts with justice, for God’s
salvation will come
Even if you are a eunuch,
you will not be excluded.
Observe the Sabbath.
Abstain from every evil.
Come into God’s house.
God will give you monuments
better than daughters and sons.
Become God’s servants
and cling to God’s covenants,
you different children.
Come to my holy mountain.
It will be your house of prayer.”
In Acts 8/26-40 I find it remarkable that Philip uses the STS to get from the Samaritan country north of Jerusalem to a road going south from Jerusalem and back north again. (STS=Spiritual Transportation System) I find it even more remarkable that Philip finds there the Ethiopian courtier in his chariot reading the fourth and final “Song of the Suffering Servant.” (I like to think that the courtier got his copy of Isaiah from followers of the Way earlier on his journey but since he was wealthy he probably could have gotten it anywhere.) Here is the whole fourth suffering servant passage from Isaiah 52-53. As you read it, ask yourself if this passage could provide the basics of faith for a whole church.
“Look at my servant
who will be great and prosper,
will rise to great heights.
Many were astonished at him
since his appearance was marred.
He will surprise us,
teaching what we never heard,
seeing new visions.
Who sees the revelation of
Yahweh and hears this new song?
He grew among us
like a root in arid ground
with no special charm.
There was no form to attract,
no beauty to win our hearts.
He was despised, and
we held him of no account,
from whom others hide,
a man of suffering who
knew human infirmity.
Yet we accounted
him stricken. Struck down by God
for our transgressions.
By his wounds we are healed.
His punishment made us whole.
We all strayed like sheep,
and we turned to our own way.
Our sin weighed on him.
He did not open his mouth,
like a lamb to the slaughter.
There was no justice;
he was cut off from the land
of living humans.
He had done no violence.
There was no deceit in him.
He was God’s servant
and poured out himself to death.
He is with the great.
Through him God’s will does prosper,
and many will find reward.”
So Philip explained this scripture and the good news about Jesus to the courtier. For me I think this would have been enough especially if I also had the rest of the Isaiah scroll.
Like the Road to Emmaus story from the end of his gospel Luke leaves out a lot of explanatory detail about the conversation between Philip and the courtier, but there was one more thing before he sends the courtier on his way. Luke, more than the other gospel writers, is always an advocate for women, outcasts, outsiders, and the poor. My conjecture is that Luke wanted to give some legitimacy to the new Church in Ethiopia. We don’t know if the courtier learned about baptism in Jerusalem or from Philip, but anyway the courtier gets baptised mostly on his own initiative after he acknowledges that with all his heart he believes Jesus is the son of God. By church tradition as a baptised person now, he may baptise others. And at the end of this passage Philip goes to Azotus on the coast west of Jerusalem by the STS, and the Church goes south to Africa.