Quotes from Scot McKnight

Babylon was and is a timeless trope for empires and nations and powers that systematize injustices, oppress the people of God, and suppress the truths of liberation. Babylon is no more a city of the future than it is a city of the here and now.

Am I absorbed with an Ethic from Beyond? Is my life too absorbed with the here and now?

That is, until we find the story that leads us to the gospel claim that Jesus is the Messiah, we don't have the Bible's story right.

The heart of Babylon will always be arrogant self-sufficiency that has no need for God, no care for the people of God, and no commitment to the ways of God.

when we peer into our own hearts, we will have sufficient cause — even laughably ridiculous cause — to see our own sin and be humbled before God. That will lead us to an other-awareness that our fellow disciples and humans are like us, sinners in need of mercy, grace, forgiveness, and patience. This reversal of the proclivity to be gods creates on our part a tenderness in our perception of the sins of others.

Romans 12—16 is lived theology, and Romans 1—11 is written to prop up that lived theology. Romans 12—16 is not the application of Paul's theology, nor is Romans a classic example of the indicative leading to the imperative. What Paul had in focus was the lack of praxis, the lack of lived theology, the lack of peace in Rome, and he wrote Romans both to urge a new kind of lived theology (12—16) and to offer a rationale (1—11) for that praxis.

The entire sweep of the Bible teaches that Christians in non-Christian environments are not to be worried so much about changing their environments as they are to remain faithful in whatever kind of environment they find themselves.

Hebrew for "poor, humble." The "pious poor" of Judaism. After the Exile in Babylon (587 BC), a social class of Jews who returned were known as much for their commitment to the Torah* and the temple as for their economic poverty. Their situation led them to trust in God and to pray for him to establish his justice in the Land. Accordingly, this group was one in which hopes for the Messiah flourished

The "pure" in heart know the temptation of externalism and the social honor that comes with being pure in hands, or in observance, or in reputation (15:1—20; 23:25—28).41 But the pure in heart see God as a person to be loved, so their first priority is God, and this love leads to loving others well.

Hear O Israel, the Lord our God. The Lord is One. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these.

This is an empire called "narcissism.

Purity is not the same as morality but is about who or what is fit for the temple, and so classifications are made.