Roland Muller’s Honor & Shame, Pentecost, Part 2

(Act 2:36 ESV) ³⁶ “Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified.”

Peter accused the Jewish audience — implicitly, the entire race — of the shame (not the guilt) of having crucified their Messiah.

(Act 2:37 ESV)  ³⁷ Now when they heard this they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?”

What shall we do about what? Well, about killing Jesus. But most of them didn’t kill Jesus. But they were all shamed by the actions of their national leaders, who did kill Jesus while the people watched and allowed it to happen.

Doubtlessly, many of Peter’s listeners hadn’t even been in Jerusalem at the time, but in a collectivist, honor culture, they all carried the shame of having killed God’s Messiah because their leaders did this and did so very publicly. They would have felt that shame as strongly as you or I would feel the guilt of having driven the nails in his hands.

Peter was preaching the gospel — the real gospel — in terms that his audience could understand and respond to.

(Act 2:38-39 ESV)  ³⁸ And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.  ³⁹ For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.”

Read it again as though for the first time. The theme of these two verses is not repentance or baptism but the Spirit. Repentance, baptism, and forgiveness are preached as a means of attaining what the Jewish audience really wants — the Spirit. Remember, “the promise” is a reference back to Acts 2:33: “the promise of the Spirit.”

But how does “you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit” respond to shame over having killed the Messiah? Well, for God to pour out his Spirit cures shame. That’s what Joel said! That’s how Paul interprets Joel, too. (See the last post.)

It was Jewish practice to cite a passage as a means of referring to the greater context of that passage (they had not chapter and verse numbers). Moreover, Luke surely compressed Peter’s sermon a bit (as was the custom of First Century historians. We do it today, too.)

And it makes sense. For God to pour his Spirit onto someone surely indicates God’s approval. When Saul was displeasing to God, he took away his Spirit. In the Old Testament, the Spirit was given to judges, prophets, and kings approved by God, but not to everyone. It was a rare and honorable privilege, surely (1 Pet 4:14).

But according to the prophets, the coming of the Spirit would also mark the dawn of the Kingdom and entry into the Kingdom.

(Isa 44:3-4 ESV)  ³ For I will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground; I will pour my Spirit upon your offspring, and my blessing on your descendants.  ⁴ They shall spring up among the grass like willows by flowing streams.

Therefore, Peter promises the Spirit as a means of removing the shame of having killed God’s Messiah. How does one obtain the Spirit?

“Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.”

The Spirit will only be given if your sins are forgiven — not just the crucifixion of Jesus but all your sins. You must be in right relationship with God for his Spirit to descend to dwell within you!

But forgiveness is not the end, it’s a means to an end. (Sounds a lot of N. T. Wright, although we’re coming at this from a very, very different angle.) The end is the Spirit and hence the Kingdom.

Anyone who felt shamed to this degree — “cut to the heart” — would be anxious to be cleansed. Hence, baptism fits here very well. Remember that in the first post of this series, Muller points out that unclean/clean were concepts strongly parallel with shamed/honored. To submit to a washing ritual, such as baptism, would make perfect sense to the shamed First Century Jew.

Many would not have been familiar with John’s baptism of repentance, although some would have been. Many would not have been familiar with the ritual washings of the Essenes for forgiveness, although some would have been. All would have been familiar with the Jewish mikveh washings required to enter the Temple or otherwise become ceremonially clean.

As recorded by Luke (likely condensed), Peter doesn’t explain “be immersed” — but he would have been understood well enough: “You’re shamed and you need to be cleansed of your shame. You need to be immersed in water to cleanse your shame — to show the world that you reject the crucifixion of Jesus so much that you want to wash the shame away and submit to him as Lord and King.”

And so, then, what does “repent” mean? Repent of what? Not being baptized? Having crucified Jesus? Your wicked life?

Well, Peter had not accused them of being particularly sinful people. He accused them of having crucified Jesus as a matter of group shame (not guilt). They wanted the shame of that crucifixion removed. To “repent” means, of course, to “turn again” — but to turn again from what? Well, from the nation’s rejection of Jesus as Messiah. That’s what they were shamed by, and that’s the most important thing they should repent of within the context of Peter’s sermon.

Does that mean “stop sinning”? Well, of course. To repent of rejecting Jesus means to accept Jesus as Messiah and Lord. And you cannot consider him King unless you submit to him as King. Submission to the Messiah as King, of course, requires obedience. He’s the King! That’s almost too obvious to say. The King honors those who obey.

What about “in the name of Jesus Christ”? Well, that means by his authority. It’s a submission to the authority of Jesus as the Christ [Messiah]. It’s a recognition that cleansing only comes from Jesus (which tacitly makes him co-equal with God. Who else can forgive sins?).

But the “name” of Jesus is also a term referring to the honor of Jesus.

(Act 19:17 ESV)  ¹⁷ And this became known to all the residents of Ephesus, both Jews and Greeks. And fear fell upon them all, and the name of the Lord Jesus was extolled.

Honor is closely associated with “name.” “He has a good name” means “he is honored.”

Hence, “repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ” means not only to turn away from sin, but to submit to Jesus so that you may receive honor from Jesus. After all, in the Middle East, honor is bestowed by someone with greater honor. Acknowledge the Kingship and honor of Jesus, and he will take away your shame and give you honor.

“For the forgiveness of sins” is, of course, the natural consequence of repentance in faith. Surprisingly to us students of Paul, Peter says nothing about “faith.” But if we understand “faith” to refer to submission to Jesus as Lord and Messiah, then “repent” very much includes that thought. After all, they were to repent especially of the shame of the crucifixion of Jesus — of rejecting him as God’s Messiah. To no longer reject him as Messiah is to accept him as Messiah is to have faith.

Many commentators who’ve studied Luke’s use of “faith” and “repentance” in Acts conclude that the ideas closely coincide — and are essentially two sides of the same coin. To repent of unbelief in or ignorance of Jesus is to come to faith.

(Act 3:17-19 ESV)  ¹⁷ “And now, brothers, I know that you acted in ignorance, as did also your rulers.  ¹⁸ But what God foretold by the mouth of all the prophets, that his Christ would suffer, he thus fulfilled.  ¹⁹ Repent therefore, and turn back, that your sins may be blotted out … ”

(Act 19:4 ESV)  ⁴ And Paul said, “John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, Jesus.”

Notice the parallels between repentance and ignorance of Jesus/coming to faith. They are very closely tied.

And so, it works. It’s not that our traditional reading of Acts 2:38 is destroyed. What we teach is still true. But an honor-based interpretation answers some questions that are problematic when we read the same passage from a guilt-based perspective.

It suddenly makes perfect sense that the crowd was cut to the heart by a sin their leaders committed but many of them had nothing to do with. And it makes sense that Peter would tell them that the solution of their corporate shame is receipt of the Spirit — obtained by repentance and baptism.

“Repentance” in this context comes to include faith when we realize that they were shamed by their lack of faith. They were to repent of not believing and not submitting, and therefore they had to believe and submit — all summed up in “repent.”

To be immersed for forgiveness in a culture where ritual washings are associated with the removal of shame was an easy sell. Of course, baptism means much more than that — but Peter didn’t have to explain the theology of baptism in depth for these people. They caught the general idea easily enough.

Moreover, we see that Peter was not charging all Jews with the guilt of crucifying Jesus. He was speaking of shame, not guilt — two very different things. Therefore, when the guilt-culture Europeans began to call Jews “Christ killers,” they were showing their ignorance of the cultural — and hence language — differences of Palestine vs. Western Europe.

It’s an easy mistake to make — if you’re looking for a reason to hate. If not, the accusation doesn’t ring true even though it may be difficult to parse the language from a guilt-culture perspective. I’ve never considered it right to accuse all Jews of the crucifixion, but have long struggled to follow Peter’s logic, until now.

And, of course, none of this means that our traditional understanding of Acts 2 is wrong. Only that we’ve not seen all that’s there. And reading it from an honor perspective allows us to refine and improve our guilt-based perspective.