Each According to Their Understanding 1 Rev. Myke Johnson January 7, 2018 Allen Avenue Unitarian Universalist Church

Transcription

1 Each According to Their Understanding 1 Rev. Myke Johnson January 7, 2018 Allen Avenue Unitarian Universalist Church This month, January, 2018, marks the 450 th anniversary of one of the first official statements of religious tolerance. Today we will explore this historic moment in Unitarianism, and its implications for our UU faith today. Time For All Ages: A Story Of Religious Freedom 2 This is the text of a slideshow by Carolyn Barschow, Director of Religious Education Unitarian Universalist churches welcome people from all different religious backgrounds. In our Sanctuary, you could meet someone who follows the teachings of Jewish, Hindu, Christian, Buddhist or Pagan religion, just to name a few. You could also meet people who follow no religious tradition. That idea is part of our third principle to accept each other AND our fourth principle that people are free to search for what is true in life. Our city of Portland welcomes people from all different religious backgrounds. When you travel around town, you might notice many different churches, synagogues and temples. Your classmates at school might spend their weekend time in those buildings while you and your family come to Allen Avenue. That idea is part of the Bill of Rights of the whole United States, the first amendment says the government can make no laws that stop people from gathering to practice religion. In this church and in this country, we practice freedom of religion. Freedom of religion. What do you think that means? It may seem hard to believe, but freedom of religion was once a new idea! Can you imagine what it would be like to live without religious freedom? One time and place that new idea of religious freedom was born was 450 years ago - back in January of in the country known as Transylvania. Maybe you ve heard of Transylvania because of stories of vampires. Vampires are make believe, but Transylvania is a real place and today it s part of the country called Romania. Here is a photograph of a city in Transylvania. Way back in 1568, King John Sigismund, the one and only Unitarian king in history, was very interested in religion, partly because people in his country kept fighting about it. The Roman Catholics, Lutherans, Calvinists, and Unitarians all argued about whose views were right about God and Jesus and how church services should be conducted. Finally, King John called the best speaker from each church to come to a place called Torda for a debate to decide who was right. The speaker from the Unitarian church was a man named Francis David. He argued for the Unitarian 1 Copyright 2018 by Rev. Myke Johnson. Permission must be requested to reprint for other than personal use. 2 Adapted from an unattributed story from the Church of the Larger Fellowship. Accessed: 4 January

2 ideas of God and Jesus, but then he also added that no one has the right to force people to believe anything about God, and that it s OK if our understanding of religion changes. After 10 days, King John ordered the debate to end. He announced that Francis David had won, and right then, King John decided to become a Unitarian. But he also agreed with Francis David that no one should force others to believe anything. King John created what was called the Edict of Torda, which declared that every church and every person would be free to follow their own beliefs, even if those beliefs changed over time. This was in January, of Around the world this month, people of many faiths are celebrating the 450 th birthday of the Edict of Torda one place and time that the idea of religious freedom was born. Reading: The Edict of Torda In 1568, in the city of Torda, in what is now Romania, a religious gathering presided over by Unitarian King John Sigismund proclaimed: In every place the preachers shall preach and explain the Gospel each according to his understanding of it, and if the congregation like it, well. If not, no one shall compel them for their souls would not be satisfied, but they shall be permitted to keep a preacher whose teaching they approve. Therefore none of the superintendents or others shall abuse the preachers, no one shall be reviled for his religion by anyone,... and it is not permitted that anyone should threaten anyone else by imprisonment or by removal from his post for his teaching. For faith is the gift of God and this comes from hearing, which hearing is by the word of God. Responsive Reading God is One by Francis David 3 In this world there have always been many opinions about faith and salvation. You need not think alike to love alike. There must be knowledge in faith also. Sanctified reason is the lantern of faith. Religious reform can never be all at once, but gradually step by step. If they offer something better, I will gladly learn. The most important spiritual function is conscience, the source of all spiritual joy and happiness. Conscience will not be quieted by anything less than truth and justice. We must accept God s truth in this lifetime. Salvation must be accomplished here on earth. God is indivisible. Egy Az Isten. God is one. Sermon When I first heard that there was a branch of the Unitarian faith in Transylvania, I couldn't help but laugh. Like many of us in America, I thought of Transylvania as the fictional land of Count Dracula and the vampires. So if you wanted to laugh, go ahead, and let's get it out of our systems. It is amazing how myths can become more pervasive than the truth about something. Especially myths about people far away. 3 Compiled and adapted by Richard Fewkes, #566 in the hymnal Singing the Living Tradition. Egy Az Isten is Hungarian, pronounced, Edge Oz Eeshten. 2

3 As we heard in our Time for All Ages, Transylvania is a real place; it is deeply rooted in Hungarian culture, but now located within the country of Romania. It has always existed on the margins between empires, and at various times came under the rule of the Hungarian kingdom, the Ottoman empire, the Hapsburg dynasty, and later into our own times, the Soviet Union. Even today, it exists as a marginalized area of Romania. This position on the edges most likely had some influence on the events that we are celebrating today. The story of the Edict of Torda is a moment of inspiration and pride for modern Unitarian Universalists. Since religious tolerance is one of our values, it is heartening to see it expressed so early in the history of our faith. I thought it might be helpful to put it into a larger historical context. When early Christians were first coming together as a new faith, they wrestled openly with questions about Jesus. Some thought of Jesus as human but not divine, a great teacher and prophet; they held to the idea of one God only. Others thought of Jesus as divine, but not really human, and still others combined those attributes in a way which later would become the official doctrine of the church. Parallel to this, emerged the idea of the trinity, three-persons-in-one God, which became official teaching at the council of Nicaea in the year 325. After the Nicene council, to believe anything but official church teaching was considered heresy. The word heresy comes from the Greek word meaning to choose. In those times, it was considered unthinkable, even sinful, for people to choose what to believe. But 500 years ago, the rigid hold of church dogma began to change when Martin Luther posted his 95 theses on the doors of the churches in Wittenburg, Germany, on October 31, His actions started the Protestant Reformation, a breaking apart of the Roman Catholic church in Europe. For the next 50 years and beyond, religious ideas were debated across Europe and new religious organizations emerged from the teachings of influential thinkers. The Catholics, the Lutherans, the Calvinists all were staking a claim to be the true form of Christianity. Unitarian ideas also emerged, through the work of the Spaniard Michael Servetus, and Faustus Socinius of Poland. They began to challenge the divinity of Jesus, and the doctrine of the trinity. But the stakes were very high if a theologian could win the support and loyalty of the king, the whole country might adopt that particular strain of Christianity, and lay claim to the churches and cathedrals within that country. Those with opposing views were often banished, or imprisoned, or killed as martyrs for their beliefs. Thus, Michael Servetus was martyred for his heretical Unitarian ideas in There were very few Unitarian religious communities, in scattered places for example, there were a few in Poland, called Polish Brethren, who in later years would flee to Holland. When Unitarian ideas came to Transylvania, the kingdom was already engaged in debates between Catholics, Lutherans, and Calvinists. Francis David had been trained as a Catholic priest, then converted to Lutheranism, where he was a bishop, and then Calvinism also as a bishop, before he began to consider Unitarian ideas. He was influenced in this by Giorgio Biandrata, a Polish physician and skilled politician in the court of the king. David was a brilliant thinker and speaker, so it wasn't surprising that he was chosen to be part of the debates in the governing council, the Diet of Torda, under King John Sigismund. Sigismund himself had shifted from Catholicism to Lutheranism to Calvinism. 3

4 The debate in 1568 in Torda was not the first debate about religious ideas in that country but it was the first in which the anti-trinitarians debated the trinitarians. The basis for each theologian's argument was his interpretation of the Christian scriptures. The debate lasted ten days, beginning at 5 a.m. each day. I think that might be difficult to carry off today. Francis David represented the Unitarian position and at the conclusion of the debate, his arguments were judged as the strongest. Because of this, many in Transylvania embraced Unitarianism, including King John Sigismund himself. But instead of seeking to banish those of other beliefs, Francis David had argued that each preacher must be allowed to preach the gospel as he understood it, and each church must be free to choose its own preachers because faith is a gift of God, and can't be forced. So the Diet of Torda issued its proclamation, the text of which we heard in the reading-- In every place the preachers shall preach and explain the Gospel each according to his understanding of it, and if the congregation like it, well. If not, no one shall compel them... It was a profound decision in a religiously divided Europe. In 1571, Unitarianism was given legal recognition, the first official recognition of Unitarianism in history. But King John died in March of that year, without an heir, and was succeeded by a Catholic named Stephen Bathori. He dismissed most of the Unitarians at court, except for the physician Giorgio Biandrata. He reaffirmed a policy of toleration for those Christian religions named in the earlier decree, but declared he would not allow any further religious innovation. According to an educational program on the UUA website: Unitarianism gained more converts in Transylvania during that period, despite the prohibition against doctrinal changes, and an ecclesiastical organization was developed. By 1577, restrictions were placed on Unitarians, but the organization continued to thrive. Francis David, by now the Unitarian Bishop, was still driven toward reform of doctrine rather than development of church organization. He explored questions having to do with the doctrine of the Lord's Supper, infant baptism, predestination, and the worship of Jesus, questioning doctrine in all four areas. Biandrata, more concerned with the health of the church than with matters of doctrine, urged David to keep silent. But this was not Francis David's way. Francis David began to preach his heretical ideas from the pulpit. Biandrata, concerned for the survival of the Unitarian Church, reported David's activities to the ruler. David continued to preach after the Prince ordered him to stop, and Francis David was arrested and tried for the crime of "innovation," questioning and challenging religious doctrine. The prosecutor at trial was...biandrata [himself, despite that he had earlier been such an influence on David's questioning of doctrine.] Francis David was found guilty of innovation and condemned to prison for the remainder of his life. He died in the royal dungeon in the castle at Deva [two years later] on November 15, The church in Transylvania continued to survive, despite hardship and persecutions of many kinds, up to the present day. But for the next couple centuries after David, this was unknown to Englishspeaking countries. Meanwhile, though, the ideas of Unitarianism had spread to Britain through the writings of the Polish theologian Faustus Socinius. 4 Francis David: Guilty Of Innovation, originally published in Harvest the Power: Developing Lay Leadership, a Tapestry of Faith program by Matt Tittle, Gail Tittle, and Gail Forsyth-Vail (Boston: Unitarian Universalist Association, 2008). 4

5 In Britain, Unitarianism was damned as heresy and the death penalty imposed on anyone who denied the trinity. It was specifically forbidden by parliament s Toleration Act of 1689, and several early radical reformers who professed Unitarian beliefs in the 16th and 17th centuries, suffered imprisonment and martyrdom. 5 In 1773, Unitarianism in Britain took its first institutional form, when Theophilus Lindsey, with the support of Joseph Priestly, established a Unitarian church at Essex Street. Later, in 1794, Priestly fled to the United States to escape religious persecution in England and brought his Unitarian faith with him. Others in the fledgling United States had also been espousing Unitarian ideas, and these were officially brought together by William Ellery Channing in It had taken a long time for the ideal of religious freedom to be established in this country. Despite the fact that the very early English settlers were looking for freedom to practice their faith in this new land, they most often denied that freedom to those of differing beliefs. Right in front of the Massachusetts government buildings in Boston is a statue of the Quaker Mary Dyer, who in 1660 was hung for being a Quaker. Rhode Island, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey established some measure of freedom of religion in their colonies, but Pennsylvania was the only colony which kept full religious freedom before the adoption of the Constitution of the new United States, which included it in the Bill of Rights. But even with its enshrinement in the Bill of Rights, persecution of religious minorities has continued in America. Catholics, Jews and Muslims have all faced discrimination and violence at various times from the mainstream Protestant majority. Native Americans were forbidden from practicing their traditional religions until Religious freedom and toleration are ideals that must be reiterated in each new age. In light of the current bias in our country against Islam, I found it interesting to discover that there might have been a Muslim influence on the religious toleration expressed in the Edict of Torda. As I mentioned earlier, Transylvania had come under the rule of several different empires in its history. During the time of King John Sigismund, it was under the oversight of the Islamic Ottoman Empire. In a Minn's Lecture series in 2009, the Rev. Dr. Susan Richie gave a talk about this influence. 6 She suggests that perhaps Protestant movements like Unitarianism would never have developed and matured in Hungary and Transylvania to the extent that it did if it were not for the political protection of the Ottoman Empire from the Counter-Reformation which was the Catholic church's intense fight against the reformation in Europe. She points out, As Ottoman scholar Victoria Holbrook reminds us, The Ottomans are perhaps most unique for including and synthesizing the cultural elements of the land through which they passed. They are known for creating structures by which the people who had lived there before could carry on their lives and their beliefs in the way that they chose. 7 The Ottoman practice of both religious and cultural toleration was partially a matter of bureaucratic expediency as the borders of the empire expanded, but the practice was also deeply rooted in legal, cultural, and religious tradition Children of the Same God: Unitarianism in Kinship with Judaism and Islam, Minns Lectures, 2009, Rev. Dr. Susan Ritchie at 7 Ritchie footnote: Victoria Holbrook, Islam: Empire of Faith (BBS Documentary, 2003). 5

6 [Ritchie goes on:] Any monotheist who was willing to accept the political rule of the Ottomans was given protection and legal rights by and within the empire. 8 The Ottomans generally observed the established Islamic tradition with respect to religious minorities, the dhimma, or protected persons law. Non-Muslims were expected to pay a tax in return for which the state would assume the same responsibilities for them as they did for Muslim subjects. 9 Toleration, then, was a matter of Ottoman policy, Ottoman bureaucratic structure, and also an expression of the Ottoman interpretation of Islam, which was in most instances stunningly liberal, cosmopolitan, and pluralistic. Jews found the Ottoman Empire an enormously hospitable place, and a large Diaspora developed within its borders as anti- Semitism grew elsewhere in Europe....Christians, as the other people of the book, enjoyed a similar welcome of the Ottoman society, especially non-orthodox Christians fleeing persecution. 10 Ottoman flexibility had other advantages for religious radicals. We know, for example, that Unitarians published some of their more radical literature in Turkey, and then had it smuggled into Transylvania. 11 Careful to set the larger context, Ritchie then points to a stunning predecessor of the Edict of Torda. Twenty years earlier, on August 24, 1548, the Ottoman Sultan's representative in Buda (in what is now Budapest), was requested by the local Catholic authorities in Tolna, to take action against a Protestant pastor there, who had publicly advocated for reformed ideas. After denying their request that the Protestant be killed or driven from the city, the Sultan's representative also let them know he had issued an edict of toleration which states in part that preachers of the faith invented by Luther should be allowed to preach the Gospel everywhere to everybody, whoever wants to hear, freely and without fear, and that all Hungarians and Slavs (who indeed wish to do so) should be able to listen to and receive the word of God without any danger. Because he said this is the true Christian faith and religion. 12 Richie points out that Francis David most likely knew of this pastor's situation, and the edict of toleration which had been issued, since he was a Lutheran pastor near Buda at that time. The Edict of Torda uses quite similar language as this earlier Ottoman edict. She concludes by suggesting that the influences between Christianity and Islam were more numerous and ordinary than we generally imagine. 8 Ritchie footnote: Peter F. Sugar, Southeastern Europe Under Ottoman Rule, (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1989): 5. 9 Ritchie footnote: For an account of how dhimma law was incorporated and practiced by the Ottomans see H. A. R. Gibb and Harold Bowen, Islamic Society and the West (London: Oxford University Press, 1950, part 2); esp Ritchie footnote: Benjamin Braude and Bernard Lewis, eds., Christian and Jews in the Ottoman Empire: The Functioning of a Plural Society (New York: Hokmes and Meirer, 1982). 11 Ritchie footnote: Mester Bela, The Connection Between Unitarian Thought and Early Modern Political Philosophy, Journal of the Study of Religions and Ideologies 3 (Winter 2002): Ritchie footnote: Tihany 55. Tihany takes letter from Imre Szigedi from Geza Kathona, Fejezetek a török Hodoltsági reformáció történetéböl (Budapest, 1974). 6

7 She writes, The basis for the Edict of Torda was established not only in Francis David s mind, not only in European humanist influence, not even through the direct political and legal influence of the Ottoman Empire. The grounds for religious toleration were prepared for in the everyday lives of actual persons, who experienced the negotiations of intermarriage before any legal proclamation of toleration, and who knew the attractions of Islam and the safety it accorded progressive Protestants before the publication of any theological treatise. Could it be that toleration, that most precious inheritance of the European Enlightenment, was instead a shared liberal Christian/Muslim undertaking? What can we learn from this time in history, this proclamation of religious tolerance, for our own times? For one thing, it reminds that ideas and history are more complex and interwoven than we might expect from what we learn in a typical American high school history class. We tend to observe religious institutions of our time, such as denominations of Christianity or Judaism or Islam, as if they are one thing, or have always been a certain thing. But change has been more pervasive than stability. I believe it is also important for us to realize that the current popular image of Islam as a rigid and violent enforcer of a particular way of believing that image is actually only one small segment of the larger historical expression of Islam. For most of its history, Islam has actually been much more tolerant of other religions than Christianity has been. And in fact, there are many liberal Muslims today who continue that practice of interfaith tolerance and cooperation. Another learning I take away is the passion that people held in those times about religious and philosophical ideas. I can't imagine such debates about ideas taking place in our country today. Perhaps the shadow side of religious tolerance is that at some point people stopped caring about what we or others believe as if our beliefs don't really matter any more. But I learn from this time in Torda, 450 years ago, that we can be passionate about our beliefs, and also respectful and curious about understanding other people's beliefs. Sometimes, in our attempts to be tolerant of others, we forget to actually talk about our beliefs, to share them enthusiastically, and to encourage others to consider them. We have retreated into our own enclaves. As we enter into a New Year, may we draw inspiration from these early Unitarian forbears, to be thoughtful, to be curious, to be passionate, to listen well, and to open up respectful conversations with all who are willing to enter into dialogue. Closing Words May we go forth today with curious minds, listening ears, and loving hearts. As we extinguish the flame of this chalice, let each of us carry its light into every day of our lives. 7