Yesterday we began the first of only two readings that we will have from the Second Letter of Peter (2 Peter 1:2‑7). Today is the second reading (2 Peter 3:12‑15, 17-18). Scripture scholars believe this letter was written by one of Peter’s disciples, sometime between 60-150 AD.
The letter begins by asserting the theme that the only knowledge we need is a personal knowledge of God and his Son, Jesus. It appears to be written to challenge the heretical teachings of the Gnostics, who argued that the material world was created by an imperfect divine being. This creator-divinity is distinct from the supreme God, who is transcendent, who remains hidden except to those with “special knowledge”. Gnostics considered material existence flawed and evil and held that the principal element of salvation is to find direct knowledge of the hidden divinity, attained via mystical or esoteric insight. Many Gnostic texts deal not in sin and repentance, but with illusion and enlightenment. Gnostics believe that the only thing needed for salvation was knowledge, independent of any behavior.
Christians, on the other hand, believe that God’s loving power has given us everything we need to live a life that is full and meaningful, a life in close relationship with him. No special ‘secret’ knowledge, only accessible to initiates, is necessary for the Christian to achieve fulfilment of life. The glory and power of God is manifest in the teaching and signs that Jesus gave, clearly indicating his divine origin. Later in the letter, the author will mention specifically the experience of the Transfiguration, of which Peter was a witness. God, in his love for us, has showered us with precious gifts, including material gifts. Provided we abandon a world corrupted by irrational and hedonistic desires, we can become sharers in the very life of God, a life of Truth, Goodness and Beauty. Our whole Christian life is ordered to having that experience.
The rest of Second Peter lists the steps by which we develop a well-rounded and fruitful Christian life. The foundation of our inner goodness is our total faith and trust in God’s love and our commitment to the Way shown to us by Jesus. That faith is supplemented and fulfilled by virtuous behavior which flows from it. Virtue must be accompanied by knowledge. In other words, virtue that is not a mere pious veneer but one that comes from an ever deeper understanding and grasp of the way of life that Jesus proposes to us in the Gospel – a Message accessible to all.
This knowledge leads to self-control. Many of those infected by Gnosticism, which put all emphasis on the acquisition of secret knowledge, believe that self-control is completely unnecessary. Knowledge, not behavior, was the source of salvation. The Christian belief is quite different. The deeper our knowledge of God and Jesus, the more our whole lives, including our behavior, are affected. We do good, not because we have to, or force ourselves to, but because we want to. Our behavior flows naturally from our insight into what is true and good.
Self-control, in turn, leads to endurance, to perseverance even in the face of either competing attractions or painful obstacles. Endurance in turn is supported by devotion, which implies a deep warm-hearted commitment and not just dogged stubbornness. Devotion leads to mutual affection. To be a Christian is not to go alone to God but in companionship with others who share the same vision. This mutual affection then blossoms into love, that outgoing, unconditional desire for the well-being of our brothers and sisters.
This is a very different picture from the purely head-centered intellectualism of the Gnostic which can only end in cold isolationism, with little regard for the well-being of the world in which we live. In contrast, we Christians are convinced our world is the place in which to find and love our God.
Among other things, Second Peter is warning us against any form of elitism, which is a constant threat to our understanding of the Christian life. Such an elitism can lead to the formation of groups which lay claim to a higher level of Christian living and look down on ‘outsiders’. The beauty of the Gospel is that it can be grasped adequately by even the illiterate. Perhaps that message was brought home some years ago when the founder of Opus Dei and scholar, Fr Escriva, was beatified together with Josephine Bakhita, a Canossian Sister, who had formerly been a slave and had no formal schooling whatsoever.
That does not mean we should not do all we can to have a deeper understanding of our faith. If we have the intellectual capacity to do so, we should. A great scandal among us is the ignorance of many educated Catholics about Scripture, theology and spirituality. At the same time, we also must affirm that the very highest levels of mystical prayer are accessible to those with no education at all. Knowing Jesus is a lot more important than knowing a lot about him.
The second topic of Second Peter is the second coming of Jesus. The early Christians had high expectations that the Lord would return to them very soon. As time passed, they began to realize that it might not be as soon as they had first thought, in their own lifetime. This realization is reflected in the way later books of the New Testament, like Second Peter, are written. Even so, the anticipation is still present.
We visualize that the return of Jesus and the end of the world as utter destruction of all that we know now, being replaced by new heaven and a new earth. This new world is where righteousness is at home, where truth and goodness will dwell as unchanging and unchangeable elements. This will be a time when what we pray for in the Lord’s Prayer – “your Kingdom come, your will be done” – will be fully realized. If we live our lives at peace with God, “without spot or blemish”, we will be prepared for the return of Jesus no matter when the Lord decides to take us to himself.
Second Peter warns us, however, to “…beware that you are not carried away with the error of the lawless and lose your own stability.” Just as with the Gnostic teachers in Peter’s time, there are today many kinds of “error” which can lead us far from the ways of truth, love and justice. We are admonished to, “…grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” This kind of knowledge is on a different plane altogether from the esoteric knowledge that the Gnostics proclaimed. In our own day, some come pretty close to Gnosticism when they put an excessive emphasis on doctrine or praying in a language that is no longer common. Jesus said that people would know true Christians, not by their theology, but by the love they show for each other.
May God Bless You and Grant You His Peace!