Light of the World Quotes

“This sense of being shaken up is Advent good news. Christmas should be more than putting up the tree and wrapping the presents. It should give birth to something that shakes up the routine, something that gets us to see the world otherwise. That shaking up is what it means to follow Jesus. To love one’s enemies is scary; to take up one’s cross is terrifying. Yet at the same time, Luke reminds us, there is a legacy that carries us forward and a promise that God will remember the covenant and bring about eternal justice.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“The new covenant that Jesus offers, in his body and blood, does not replace the old covenants with Abraham or Moses or David. It rather is a continuation of them.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“In Israel’s Scriptures, God’s concern is not restricted to insiders: it extends to strangers, to slaves, to women, and to any who are oppressed, for we are all children of God.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“The covenant with Abraham has a both/and rather than an either/ or focus: it is both for Jews and for gentiles, for in Abraham, “all the families of the earth will be blessed” (Genesis 12:3).”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“From the city of Priene in Western Turkey we have from 9 BCE (I have to tell my students that the inscription does not actually read “9 BCE”) an inscription that celebrates the birth of Augustus Caesar as “good news” (euangelion), calls Augustus a “savior both for us and for our descendants,” and as if in anticipation of the Christmas story, speaks of how “the birthday of the god Augustus was the beginning of good news for the world.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“The star of Bethlehem is not about science; it is about the search for meaning.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“I mentioned how much I like the Magi, not only because they stop to ask for directions, but also because they are delightfully comic figures. They speak the truth, even when they do not realize the import of their words. I then compared them to Larry, Moe, and Curly (if these are unfamiliar people to you, ask someone over the age of seventy).”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“just as the Magi, seen now as kings, paid homage to Jesus by following his star, so the kings of the earth should pay homage to the emperor by following his sign.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“Thus, when Magi appear in ancient sources, kings should get nervous.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“There is little reason to argue over who has the correct reading here. Isaiah’s words will mean, and should mean, different things to different people over time. Moreover, different translations necessarily give rise to different interpretations, and translation itself is an act of interpretation.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“Completing the steps, she announced to an older woman, in similar sheeting, “Mother, I am pregnant.” The mother, horrified, screams, “You’ve committed adultery; you have to be stoned.” The praise band took up the chant, “Stone her, stone her,” and all the little kids got up and clapped and shouted, “Stone her, stone her.” “Mary” then announced that with the coming of her son, no longer will people be under Jewish law, which kills, but under Christian grace, which saves.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“Knowing the ancient story, Matthew’s readers can anticipate that the second Joseph, son of Jacob, will dream dreams, take his family to Egypt to protect them, and return to the land of Israel. Since that original Joseph is the father of Ephraim, the eponymous ancestor of the main Northern tribe, we readers can even expect this second Joseph to relocate north, to Galilee.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“Matthew tells us, through the genealogy, that the birth of Jesus will be good news not only to Jews but also to gentiles.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“Finally, Rahab is a Canaanite, Ruth is a Moabite, and Uriah, Bathsheba’s first husband, is a Hittite; and all show deep loyalty to Israel and Israel’s God.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“Second, all four women in the genealogy are involved in unexpected sexual relationships. Therefore, they anticipate Joseph’s learning that his betrothed is pregnant.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“According to Matthew, in order to understand Jesus, we must also understand King David.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“Our role as historians is to ask, “What would these stories have conveyed to the people who first heard them?” Our role as readers is also to ask, “What do these stories mean to me, and what have they meant to my community and to my tradition over time and across the globe?”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“Instead of shepherds, Matthew presents the Magi, who, despite “we three kings of Orient are,” are not necessarily three, not necessarily all men, certainly not kings, and most certainly not wise.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“For Luke, Anna represents the ancient lost tribes of Israel, separated from their Judean counterparts when the Assyrians destroyed the Northern Kingdom seven hundred years earlier.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“The best way of evangelizing is not to tell the potential convert, “Here’s what’s wrong with your tradition.” The best way to evangelize is to show that potential convert, “Here’s what’s right with my tradition; here’s how it prompts toward action; here’s how it consoles.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“The dominant Jewish idea at the time (and subsequently) is that the Messiah brings about the messianic age, a time when death no longer has dominion, when there is a general resurrection of the dead, a final judgment, the return of exiles to their homeland, peace on earth.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“He wants to see the child, because that child will bring about the consolation that he seeks; he may not want to see the child, because once he has that encounter, he will die.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“Just as Mary, like Hannah before her, sang a song of divine redemption, so Mary will learn, as did Hannah, that she will have to let her son go.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“In a single line, Luke tells us that Jesus is, like John, fully a member of the Jewish people, not just by birth, but also in the body.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“Matthew offers other concerns: the response of the gentile nations to this Jewish king and, from Herod’s reaction to the Magi’s announcement of his birth, the clash between earthly and heavenly kingdoms.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“The shepherds function as a “sign” to Mary; they assure her, “yes, what you experienced was not a hallucination; yes, no matter how unbelievable everything has been, believe!”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“Luke tells us: pay attention to earthly matters, neighbors and relatives, shepherds, and who else might be at the inn.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“The celestial choir that appears to the shepherds is usually called the “heavenly host”; the CEB offers “heavenly forces” (2:13), which is the better translation for today. This is God’s army.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“Once we figure out the sign, whether of a pregnant woman, of a mother who has just given birth, of a newborn, even of baby clothes or a stable, our next step is to work out the symbolism, or what that sign “signifies.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent

“Salvation means that there is respite from whatever oppresses in the community that hears, and lives, this Gospel.”
― Amy-Jill Levine, Light of the World: A Beginner's Guide to Advent