Note: Can I Say This at Church is produced for audio listening and is transcribed from Patreon version of the conversation. If able, I strongly encourage you to listen to the audio, which has inflection, emotion, sarcasm where applicable, and emphasis for points that may not come across well in written word. This transcript is generated using a combination of my ears and software, and may contain errors. Please check the episode for clarity before quoting in print.
Mako Nagasawa 0:00
Judaism was the first linear story in history. Thomas Cahill talks about this in the gifts of the Jews. And so the Jesus story is, is really the only understanding of that, that I think fully makes sense that you can have a loving God who is who loves us and didn't cause the problem. But he figures out a way to still be the hero and overcome the villain by by actually providing a way for the villain to be transformed. And that's
Unknown 0:37
always been shown
Seth Price 0:52
Hello, hello. Hello. I am curious when you have been told what to believe, about atonement, what does that word mean? Like literally, that word is it's not a big word, but it's a funky word like we don't use it. But it matters because it affects the way that we view people humans policies, politics, communities, families, churches, workplaces. Insert, now and here. And with that in mind, I brought on Mako Nagasawa. He is from the and I'm gonna get this wrong. He's from the anastasius Center in Mako I'm sure you're listening, and I'm sure I can't get that name, right. Because in my brain, it's Anna stasis. And I also know that that's probably wrong. But he does a lot of things. He's written a couple books, and he has some amazing blogs and teachings, you can find them all over the internet. But I came across him through a Facebook friend. And man, I just quickly fell in love with what he was doing, started reading some of his writing, invite him on the show to talk about atonement. And this is the result of that. And I don't want to be too long with this intro because it's a little bit longer of an episode, but I really enjoy the episode. Before that, though, I want to say thank you, there has been three or four people that are supporting the show have added into the community there over on Patreon. And I'm very thankful for each and every one of you. You will you know hear that plea in my fake quote unquote air quotes here ad in the middle of the episode. Right at a pivotal moment this week. I really smiled and laughed literally out loud at my kitchen table as I edited right where I put that in. I can't wait for you to hear it. Anyway. All of that to the side. And here we go.
Unknown 2:50
The way you build a bridge with the cords that they spend with Nine Inch Nails cement bricks, and hope that at the end of this I made my peace
Unknown 3:02
as well good and bad myself
Seth Price 3:20
recording in progress, we did it. Alright, here we are. This is always the hardest part in the Mako. Like it's always just beginning. So here we go. Mako Nagasawa. Right. Did it. Yes. Excellent. Welcome to the show. We were already starting out correct because I got the names right, which is the most stressful part of any episode. It doesn't matter what the name is. But I'm glad that you're here. Thanks for saying yes to some random idiot on the internet on the Twitter, which is a great place to meet people. You know, that's is you know, I could have been selling you a timeshare and you would have never known
Mako Nagasawa 3:52
that would be much less fun. But
Seth Price 3:57
yeah, and so what's funny is I saw you from Rick Pidcock, who writes a lot of stuff for Baptist who's global and I can't even remember what the post was. Because once someone had posted a screenshot of something you'd said to something that someone else said I don't even remember. I fell down a rabbit hole. I was like, alright, timeout enough of the rabbit hole. Let's just get in the hole with Mako. So when people are unfamiliar with you, and you try to explain like what or who you are, or why you are what is that?
Mako Nagasawa 4:28
Well, online, I'm a displaced California and I now live in Boston with my wife and kids. The the online content I tend to put out most has to do with early church thinking and action about Christian restorative justice and healing atonement. And I'm the director of the Nasus Center for Christian education and ministry and I founded this organization. We have a small team and it's a lot of fun We put out curriculum and do training on those two subjects. Usually restorative justice and healing a ton. Yeah.
Seth Price 5:06
Do you miss California?
Mako Nagasawa 5:09
I do. I I really miss the Pacific Ocean and good Korean and Mexican
Seth Price 5:14
food. I do miss good Mexican food. So I'm from Texas, and I now live in Virginia. And the Mexican food here is is bland when I take my family home to Texas. So like it's too spicy, tastes different, like but but it's actually Mexican food. It's not whatever the heck you call,
Mako Nagasawa 5:30
right? Our authentic Mexican food is? Yeah.
Seth Price 5:33
It's Tex Mex. But it's more authentic than whatever the heck they're serving just down the street. It's way more than that. Right? You talk about atonement theory, which is a topic that are you talking about a lot of things, abortion as well, I bought your book the other day, I haven't began reading it yet. So but with all of the things on the news about this, that and the other and Supreme Court justices and Roe v Wade on stuff, I was like, Well, let me he wrote a book. Let me just buy this one because it's I'm already looking into stuff. So I don't know if you touch on that in there. But I'm gonna find out here soon. But not while you're here today. Okay. So as I was diving into everything, I realized that your view of atonement seems to be entirely different than I think what the default, quote unquote orthodoxy of the United States is. And I don't know if it's the default orthodoxy of Christianity as a whole. But it's been like five or six years, since I talked about Orthodoxy, which at that time, I had Brad juris back on. And we talked about kind of a Christus Victor model. Yes. Which I'm not sure what the differences are, the similarities between your two views are not but what is the only correct interpretation of atonement theory.
Mako Nagasawa 6:49
The earliest one, as expressed by Iran as the most important second century century writer writing, a writer of Christian thought, he was a bishop of a point, who was mentored by Polycarp of Smyrna. And it who was mentored by John the writer of the gospel and Revelation. So I mean, this guy was, you know, two degrees of separation from Jesus. And Athanasius, who defended the deity of the divinity of Jesus gave us the and defended the Nicene Creed. And what they believed was about atonement was that Jesus shared in our fallen human nature that we might share in his heels, human nature, they had a medical understanding of atonement, and that he took on our fallen human nature in order to fight his way through to faithfulness, and, and then that faithfulness impacted his human nature. But he invested the Holy Spirit into every cell in his humanity, and killed the thing that was killing us in His death. And then in his resurrection, emerged with a god soaked, God drenched new humanity, which he shares with us by His Spirit. Right, that understanding is that the earliest understanding of atonement, and it's that we have on paper and that undergirds Christus Victor because it it emphasizes Jesus's victory over sin or or sinfulness, which, which is logically prior to victory over Satan, the victory over death of victory over even the law of Sinai covenant, although that is not quite what they would say about it. But if we're, if we're thinking in terms of how Luther Martin Luther articulated, Christus Victor, then yeah, there's a logical sequence. So that that's that, that is the best way to think about atone. Yeah,
Seth Price 9:03
and that's the only one that's accurate. All the others are wrong. Correct?
Mako Nagasawa 9:08
Well, the, what it depends on what you mean by all the others, the So
Seth Price 9:12
the most common, I think, is what you would hear preached from the pulpit and the bulk of, or at least not the most common in the United States, because this this podcast is listened to, I think, on every continent. So for me, you were born deprived. And because of that, you owe a debt. And if you don't pay it, you're gonna burn forever, which I also don't think that I believe that Hell is a place that we go to, I think it's a place that we, you and I make with the consequences of our actions, but that's, again, a different conversation. Um, and so because of that, someone needs to show up basically, and make the mortgage payment for my son, so that I can go to live in a better house, right, which seems to be entirely different from what you just said, because you use words healing, which is not in what is preached in many churches each Sunday. De here in the United States. Correct? Or am I hearing? Am I wrong? That's right.
Mako Nagasawa 10:05
That's right. Yeah. So CS Lewis talks about how punishment and debt payment are really kind of the same thing. They're a transposition of, of conceptual categories. Others would use the court with the Western courtroom metaphor, right, which is the God as a judge, we have broken this law. And so we, he, the punishment is His death, Jesus interpose it he enters the courtroom, and interposes himself. And so he takes the punishment. And and so the, instead of us and and so that's how God as a judge can forgive us. The the idea, that's called penal substitution. And what you describe is, is that, I think what CS Lewis calls fiscal substitution, right? Like that we owe a debt of obedience, or a debt of suffering. And God is a currency exchanger. So if he doesn't get repaid in the currency of obedience, he will extract payment from us and the currency of suffering. And, and essentially, yeah, it points the same idea.
Seth Price 11:20
I don't think that anybody's ever called it a fiscal substitution. But when you said it, I realized how much of what I do for a living has bled into past memories of atonement. Yeah, working in a bank, like that literally makes a lot of sense. Nobody's ever said that out loud to me. I'm actually kind of guilt. Isn't the word embarrassed that I never recognized it before now. Yeah, I guess. So. You were raised then, in this Iranian version of atonement theory? Correct. Is that Is that what you call home? Is this always been your view or?
Mako Nagasawa 11:57
Well, I, I, I mean, I came to Jesus in the context of a Japanese Free Methodist church out in California, still connected to that community of I live out here in Boston, went to went to college. And I had mentors who were five point Calvinists. And that's when I started to ask a lot of questions. I mean, hearing about the quote, unquote, five points of Calvinism was interesting, I think I had the most difficulty with the idea of limited atonement, because that was the most difficult one to square with, with scripture. You know, that God so loved the world that in he desires that, that no one be lost. And there's all kinds of, you know, things that would indicate that what God would not limit the atonement on his end. Yeah. So how could that be so? You know, basically, make a long answer short, it got exposed to the Calvinism. Arminianism debates thought, Hmm, this seems like you're just selecting versus, and and then explaining why you could do that. I'm not particularly compelled by that, because I really enjoyed scripture itself. And so exegesis or Biblical Studies was what I really enjoyed, I enjoyed preaching, expository preaching. And when you do that, I, you know, I felt like I, I want to know, like, what is the emotional response that Jesus or Paul was calling for? Because penal substitution, which is what we described the courtroom that the Western courtroom metaphor, evokes survival emotions, right, it's, I feel guilt and fear. And then after considering Jesus, I feel relief and gratitude and and basically, my entire survival was at stake and now i It's not and so I was asked to teach once Romans six and I found that I, I didn't know what Paul was saying, because of different things. I'm not sure how much you want me to go into the detail of all of it, but
Seth Price 14:32
all of it as far as you as far as you want to, there are no time limits on this show. One was three hours long, which I edited into two parts. Yeah, that so I don't want to do that. So I literally looked at my memory card and was like so you have five minutes after that. I don't know what happens when the memory card is full. And he's like, okay, so you go in as much or as little as you want. I have a few parts that I really had the biggest questions on but go as far as deep into Romans six as you want, because Romans I think, is a text that many in the church use as a weapon as a way to be as opposed Anyway, anyway, so go as much as you'd like.
Mako Nagasawa 15:14
Sure. So I was asked to teach Romans six, one through 11, where Paul says, You have died and risen with Christ. And that's the motivation for not continuing to sin. And I thought, well, this is this is a different motivation than what I would expect. Because if penal substitution were true, he would say, because Jesus died instead of you, but here, he says, Jesus died ahead of you, and you died and rose with him. At the time I was, I thought I was going to be a high school teacher. And anecdotally, I'd heard different ways that teachers motivate students that struggle with, with their academics. And so, you know, one of one of the worst ways that that teachers can speak to struggling students is to say, what are these grades? Are you dumb, you know, or, also not effective? Is what are these grades? Don't you know how much I'm sacrificing for you. Because that just builds resentment on the part of the students, the best thing for a teacher to say is, what are these grades, this isn't who you are, that's just the best thing to say, in different ways and inflections, of course, but the the idea is you can separate the behavior, from the identity, on on some level, right, like on on a fundamental level. And it doesn't mean that the person is not responsible, but it means that there's something different within the person and identity obligation becomes the, the motivation to do better to try harder. And I could see that the apostle Paul was using that motivation, but in a much richer, deeper, more profound way. He was saying, you've changed, this isn't who you are. And so he doesn't say, Don't you know, how much, you know, suffering Jesus took, or how much he sacrificed or the pain that he endured? All of which was kind of haunting me for different reasons. And, and then I just, I said, this is, this is not what I expected. How, how does he motivate his, you know, his Christians, his churches, as a pastor in other letters, and I found that in Ephesians, Colossians, two and three, you know, Second Corinthians three, four, and five, I mean, he is really landing and working from a foundation of your identities different. And, and, and so I thought, Okay. How do people then do evangelism? Do they use penal substitution in evangelism? And I saw I read all of the book of Acts, and they don't, no one uses that language that those categories, and they're not looking to evoke that emotion. So they might make an argument from creation or fulfilled scripture or whatever. But it's different. And, you know, there are two places maybe Galatians three and First Corinthians one where you could interpret Paul as if he had done evangelism using penal substitutionary atonement, like, you better escape the wrath of God in a retributive justice sense. And, and in Jesus interpose himself, that's the only way out. But really, no, because what he says about the resurrection is you have to participate in the resurrection. And the only way to do that is to participate also in Christ death, so you die and rise with Christ. Same thing as as Roman six. So from the standpoint of Look, I I loved mentoring people got a chance to preach every now and then. And so I thought, I guess I don't really have to believe in penal substitution. It's not clearly taught in the text. It's more super imposed on it. And, and, you know, there's other things as you mentioned, other parts of Romans get bent out of shape by by some people who want to defend that paradigm. Yeah. Yeah, that that was how I started down this journey. And about 10 years later, I took a class in theology, and my teacher had been kind of himself been a student of TF Torrance and JB Torrance. They had studied under Carl, Bart, who and they were all reading Athanasius. They were all realizing that there were certain shortcomings in the Protestant Reformation. And Athanasius had not gotten enough attention. And they were all trying to go back to Athanasius because he was a consistent Trinitarian thinker.
Seth Price 20:26
Yeah, when I so I people know that I do the podcast as a, as a hobby. Like, it's it's not a kept secret, including it work and some of my clients even know, etc. And so they'll ask questions from time to time when I talk about atonement, I will say what I believe, which is kind of a blend of a lot of different things, because some of the things rattling around in my head, but it is not what I was raised with. And they'll always say, well, that's just beautiful. Like, that seems. That seems good. Which Yeah, that does seem like the gospel. Yeah, funny, but I don't. And then that's it, though, they go on about believing what they've always believed. So how, how would How would one if you wanted to talk about atonement in new lights, dive into some easy reading, that can begin to get your feet wet? Or to if you're a toddler in this way of thinking, you know, how would How would someone begin to dive into that? Because I'm not real sure how we got to where we're at, at least in the Western Church guy, it doesn't make any sense why you would take something good and be like, you know, what we could do to this will make it horrible, we could make it a horror flick, this would be a mate that here's, here's how we're going to sell it to people, we're gonna we're gonna make them so terrified. That they'll have to say yes, instead of look at it and wonder be like, absolutely, that is, yes. Why would I not partner in to becoming a new thing like that? So where would you direct people to, to kind of begin down that down that work?
Mako Nagasawa 21:54
Well, I tried to make a lot of material accessible and easy to read up on my organization's website, and so on not stasis. center.org is a place that I would encourage people to go, I can break it down further, depending on people's interest, okay. So, you know, if you're someone who would really like to see this in Scripture, then check out our notes on Matthew or Luke, and, and also Hebrews, because what Jesus did with the human nature that he took on, that's what that story is about that. And so I would refer to that. If, if you're looking to, to understand kind of the journey of a human being and human becoming throughout Scripture, there's, there's a lot, there's a lot of notes related to that. I think because of Augustine, and his influence, mediated through Martin Luther and John Calvin, we tend to think of human nature as relatively fixed. And, as you mentioned, the the depravity doctrine is that we can only send a lot. Right? I mean, it's, it is it's, I mean, the country always apply. And it's, it's a way to be emotionally unintelligent, you know, when it comes to actual human relationships, it's a way of dismissing any residual, well, the image of God in, in us that produces that it's a way of God maintaining kind of a touch point with us and, and continuing to call out to us and, and it's why we, we actually do demonstrate love and beauty and an interest in justice and goodness and order and all these things. So we just can't dismiss that there's a very rich tradition there that you could call it. You could call it Jewish virtue ethics or Christian virtue ethics, the idea that our choices shape our own human nature that we are human beings and human becomings. And, and so the, I think there's great promise in neuroscience and what neuroscience and in Christian faith are doing, or the intersection point of those two areas of engagement because Neuroscience tells us that, you know, if that our choices, and also the things done to us actually do shape our neurology, our neural circuits, yeah. And that influences what I want to do tomorrow. It's not deterministic, but it does strongly reinforce this virtue ethics paradigm. I would say that if you're looking for early Church material, probably the easiest thing is to read efficacious on the incarnation. It's a wonderful book, very easy to read. CS Lewis wrote a beautiful introduction to that. And if you want to see parallels, like just how to understand atonement in this patristic paradigm, conceptually, there's, there's all kinds of stories and analogies and illustrations that I've tried to collect. So for example, if your Lord of the Rings fan, you know, this is Frodo taking on the ring, struggling against it, and then trying to cast it into the fire, mean Tolkien was, was creating a parallel to Jesus and Jesus took on human nature struggled against it, and actually was successful at casting it into the fire in a manner of speaking, the fire of the Holy Spirit just throughout his life, and, and then, again, overcoming the evil or the fallenness, in the sinfulness that that had become embedded into human nature. That yes, it influenced us towards sin and selfishness and self centeredness. It's not the only thing that's true about us, but it needed to be overcome and human nature needed to be healed. So I'd say that if you're interested in a more practitioners standpoint, from evangelism or Bible study, materials are up on the website. And and also this leads into a whole different restorative justice paradigm for Christian Social ethics and social justice. Yeah. And that's really important because our our society, especially in the US, is modeled on the on the or based on the principle of retributive justice, not restorative justice, or to put it in full terms, meritocratic retributive justice, where it's, it's all about what you can do as an individual to what you merit or demerit. Yeah. And that is not the actual biblical definition of justice, both in the Hebrew and the Greek terms. And so, so there's a lot of
Seth Price 27:20
application. Yeah, that's one of the things I wanted to talk to you about is the way that the way that our view of atonement influences our politics and our policies and the way that we live. But before I ask that, you said a couple of things there, and then one of the resources on your website, if you could just in brief, like one, two minutes, walk me through why it's a sentence that exists. So there's a part on circumcision and atonement, which is not a sentence before I read it. And for those that haven't read it, like they hear me say that again, I'll say it again, for that person in the back. That wasn't listening. Yes, zoned out circumcision and atonement. Why is that? Why does that anyway? Why is that a thing? Like how would somebody listening to it hasn't read it be like, wait, what, how? Why, when, like, I don't know if that makes you know, any, I can't I don't know how to say it better than that. Do you remember like last year, I had all those weird ad breaks, like he would just randomly be something, we're not doing that. Instead, I thought I'd do this, I need your help. If you're able to head on over to the website for the show, there are two things that you can do. One is you head over the website, you click the Patreon button or support button, I forget what I call it, and you jump in there, those people help make the show a thing so that you can listen to it right now, to the easier one, you could just leave a rating and a review on the podcast app of choice that you currently use. Either one of those is fine. But I would love it if you would do either one, specifically the rating and reviewing it's an exponential thing, that the algorithms pick it up. And that's just math. It's just compounding on top of itself. Anyway, all that to say I was at that was the ad break. And now we're going to get back into it.
Unknown 29:10
I don't know. Diabetes. In between, somewhere in between it all. In between. In between, because somewhere in between. Somewhere in between No. in between?
Mako Nagasawa 29:36
Exactly. Exactly. What well, let's, let's start with this. Jesus says in Matthew five that he came to fulfill everything about the law and the prophets. Right? Right. We should we should all be able to agree about that thing. So in Deuteronomy 10, verse 16, God says circumcise your hearts. Oh, Israel. How and what does that mean? Well, it means cut something away from your human nature, like from the human heart, figuratively speaking, you're human nature. So there's an internal problem. And and God had called Israel to himself in order to be like a medical focus group, because he was a he's a good physician, right. And he's working with all humanity, which, in general there, a patient population that resists the treatment. So even today, even to today, oh, there's lots of analogies there. But the but so he called Israel to himself in different ways and, and said, I want you to receive the treatment, right? There's this really demanding spiritual health regimen, here are these commandments. And if you do them, you will have health, you will have a life. And you'll be able to cut away this thing that has now lodged itself in your human nature, because it's part of everyone's human nature. And, and by doing that, you'll be partnering with God, and so circumcise your hearts. That phrase, and idea gets repeated over and over again. But let's just talk about the pentatonic, right, Moses, through his long leadership of Israel realizes, you're not going to be able to do this, like even he himself wasn't able to do that. And and so in Deuteronomy 30, verse six, he says, The Lord will circumcise your hearts, there'll be some way in which God Himself does He, God will resolve the problem of evil within human nature. Why? Well, because he's good. And he's got to do it in a good way, a loving way, a way that honors our human partnership. Why? Because he's loving, wisely that because he's triune, right? He's a Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And so his very nature is love. So sorry, I backed out from Scripture into more systematic theology but but you get the idea via this, this language was in Scripture. Everywhere, Jeremiah four, four, Jeremiah says that Jeremiah, 926, and 27, he repeats that circumcise your hearts, or the hardest uncircumcised, and then later in Jeremiah 31, God will write his law in your hearts, He zekiel says, it will give you a heart of flesh in place of a heart of stone, same idea, different idiom, having to do with like, the tablets and so forth. But But I mean, the same idea. David, in Psalm 51 says, Create for me a clean heart, because you want truth in the inmost being so all throughout the Hebrew Scriptures, there's there's a call out to God to resolve this problem in us. It's not God, we recognize you're angry, Could you could you please pour your anger out on someone else? There's nothing like that. Yes. And that's not what the prophets wanted. The prophets wanted for the underlying problem to be healed. And so Jesus comes along and quotes that sometimes he says, like, all the problems come from the human heart. And, and then that his Transfiguration, he shows that the impact of his faithfulness is showing up, right? It's human nature in himself is being transfigured. It's being glorified. It's being it's becoming transparent to the love of the Father, by the power of the Holy Spirit. And then, through His death and resurrection, he finalizes that movement. Paul and Romans two says, What does it mean to be a true Jew, it's to be circumcised of heart by the Spirit. Right and, and then in Romans six, six, that our old self died in Christ, and Romans eight three, what the law was in unable to do, weakened as it was by the flesh of Israel. Right because it the health regimen was good. It's not bad. It I mean, and also that the law, God did not give the law simply to, like, condemn Israel, right. Otherwise, Paul would have said, For the Law was powerful, because it worked against the flesh was, but no, he says, the law was good and it but it was unable to partner to be fully partnered with because of the weakness of the flesh of the Israelites. Yeah. So what it got to God did it he He condemned sin in the flesh of Christ. Yeah. Yes. How by Coming as Jesus and Jesus never sending. Yeah, yeah. So you keep Jesus pressed faithfulness into his humanity. And so he shared in our fallen humanity that we might share in his healed humanity.
Seth Price 35:14
Yeah, I will say for those listening, I'll link to this in the transcripts, and maybe even in the show notes. There's a six part series there. But as I was scrolling through, yes, at the beginning, yeah, that was the first thing that popped into my mind of there was that just the title itself? You know, you're like, wait, what? No, I'm upset already. Haven't ready yet no set. Anyway. So and then you said another thing about Frodo and the Lord of the Rings and that type of stuff. So as I read some of your words, and you've done some other lectures, or books, or PDFs, or whatever you want to call it on, like, um, you know, The Lion, the Witch, and the wardrobe and a lot of the work of CS Lewis, you've done some stuff with Harry Potter, and a little bit of atonement. And so I'm curious, do you would you say that another way to talk about atonement theory would be the atonement of the hero's journey, or a theology of the hero's journey, talking about Joseph Campbell, because you have to be familiar with that. But I always find a lot of theological implications of call and response. You change, you go over a precipice, you know, something that you need help for, and then you come back a different person, which kind of relates to what you said a minute ago of, we're human beings, and human becomings, which is just like an endless circle of just? Or is that a bad way to paraphrase some of the work that you've done there? Because not a lot of people will do you know, the Bible and Harry Potter together. Matter of fact, depending on your denomination, you're not allowed to read Harry Potter. So that's, am I am I, am I putting correlations there that are maybe incorrect? Or what would you say to that?
Mako Nagasawa 36:51
The atonement of the hero's journey is exactly it. Because now, I mean, Joseph Campbell's work is interesting. But But essentially, there, there are two types of stories, linear stories and circular stories. And so in circular stories, there is no happy ending ever. Right? It just, you wind up depressed? Yeah, it's just
Seth Price 37:12
black mirror over and over, you begin to show it's interesting. At the end, you're like, I can't I was an hour that hurt me.
Mako Nagasawa 37:18
Right. Right. And, you know, maybe it's like, okay, I guess I learned something. But I feel sad. Yeah. Versus a linear story is, it is the hero's journey. And in a linear story, there's good defeats evil in some way, as opposed to in a circular story, good and evil, are either locked in eternal battle. And so there's never a real resolution. And and then the stories start to feel totally repetitive. Or good and evil are actually the same thing, as in many Eastern religions. I mean, Hinduism and Buddhism, I had some Buddhist background, in my family. And and so that was a real concern, like, well, there's never really been a social justice movement that arises out of Hinduism or Buddhism. Why is that? Well, because you have to have real hope, and a hope of good triumphing over evil that you want to participate in. And so the Abrahamic traditions have at least that framework of good triumphs over evil in some way. That those are the world changing paradigms. And so now, but if you do have a linear story, or if you claim to have one, then the issue is does it make sense? Like, who's the villain, then? What are what is the problem that needs to be fixed? And then who's the real hero. And just to make a long story short, I mean, Judaism was the first linear story in history. Thomas Cahill talks about this in the gifts of the Jews. And so the Jesus story is, is really the only understanding of that, that I think fully makes sense that you can have a loving God who is who loves us and didn't cause the problem. But he figures out a way to still be the hero and overcome the villain by by actually providing a way for the villain to be transformed. And that's us. So it doesn't necessarily mean that everyone avails themselves, themselves have that opportunity, but the love is consistent right from from God. And so, Jesus steps into human nature in order to fix the problem of human nature. And so every other linear story, I think, externalizes the problem of evil makes it not really a part of human nature. And so it's part of society or As part of laws or, you know, European colonialism made it? Well, it's a problem of other people's cultures. And so we, if they just change their cultures, then they would be better or if Adam Smith right talks about the Wealth of Nations, like it starts here in England. And if everyone did things our way, we would be fine. We this undergirds the idea that we could just put democracy in Iraq, in Afghanistan, and all the problems will be fixed. Well,
Seth Price 40:30
always seems to always work every time we've tried it.
Mako Nagasawa 40:33
100% 100% good track record. Yeah. The the, the, the basic ideas, those are actually parodies of the Christian story. Right, because it's there, there has been a solution that has been worked out somewhere, in this case in someone in Jesus of Nazareth. And we then become missionaries in order to tell the story and to participate in the working out of that story. That's what colonialism is in the key, it's transposed into the key of A parody. And it's externalize the problem as a social system and other people's social systems need to change in any case, the the hero's journey coming back to that is absolutely true. And Jesus retells everything that was good about the the heroes of the scriptures but fills in all for all of their failures. Yeah. Right. And so he is this is a dynamic that is that is common in stories and and we should recognize it, like in Star Wars. Here's another common one because George Lucas consulted with Joseph Campbell. And so Luke Skywalker has to retell the story of Anna Qin Skywalker, right? Compare Empire Strikes Back and what's what the second move I forget?
Seth Price 42:08
The second cycle, I can't remember. Yeah, if I said the second set when I was, you write the ones that nobody likes? Or I think it is Attack of the Clones, because Phantom Menace is the first one. Right? Yeah.
Mako Nagasawa 42:20
Right. And so if you watch the duel, like the great dual in each of these movies, what is it? It's Luke in Empire in the dark, battling with Darth Vader that he's wielding a blue lightsaber, Darth Vader's wielding a red lightsaber, and in the end, Luke gets his hand right hand cut off. Well, in episode two Anniken actually is wielding a blue lightsaber, which is Obi ones, right? His original was green. But so now he's building blue, he cuts the light, power, the power, so all descends into darkness. And he's fighting Count Dooku wielding the red lightsaber. And they do the same moves the same reflections on their faces. And in the end Anniken gets his right hand cut off. Why is this happening? Well, it's because Luke has to step into the story of Anniken Skywalker, in order to retell it but but succeed where his father had failed, right, he has to resist the temptation to fall to the dark side. And because he's able to do that he can redeem his father and his father's story. Well, Jesus retold Israel's origin story a bit. Why? Because Israel blew it from the start, right? I mean, they go through water, and then wilderness and come to a mountain. Well, Jesus comes through water, and then wilderness for 40 days, and then comes to a mountain. But he is successful. He's faithful at fighting at resisting the temptation, and burning the commandments of God into his human nature. He is the one who is circumcising his heart. He's a he's a true Israelite, who is fulfilling the law. So well, and why does he have to do this? Because? Well, because the story needed to be corrected. And it would be similar is, you know, in principle, if, if Jesus truly got on, it was in England and sailed across the Atlantic, to North America to to Plymouth, Massachusetts, in a ship called the Mayflower and got off and and started to treat the Native Americans there kindly and fairly. And what would he be doing? He would be re embodying the the origin story of the United States. Yeah, but doing it faithfully. And why would he need to do that? Well, because because we didn't worry got started wrong, right? There were flaws woven in at that at the beginning. And so, you know, ultimately Jesus is a new atom. That's the language of Paul in Romans five. And in First Corinthians 15. The the idea that he, he retells Adam and Eve story faithfully, not just Israel's, but he goes all the way back there in order to do what they should have done, but didn't, which is to give their human nature over to God and receive life into themselves. So yes, that is that that's a great way to put it, the hero's
Seth Price 45:38
journey. Earlier, you said retributive justice versus restorative justice. And I think that we inherently understand retributive justice, just by way of living where we live here in the United States, like that's, that's just the default. And so I think sometimes we don't even realize it. But if things were to blink, and the way that we see justice was more aligned to would you call it earlier, a healing atonement theory? I can't remember it also have to take I have to cheat and take notes. What would what would change? So we all know what today looks like, you know, with the way that we do prisons, the way that we do courtrooms the way that we hold people to account for decisions that they've made that break the rules of society that, you know, are are the way that they are? For there, there are many ways that you could go with that, as well. But what would change like overnight if if our country and our churches said no, no, we're doing it a new way. We misunderstood what needed to be circumcised, and we thought it was you people. And instead, it's something different, because we're no longer going to cut away humans from the body of Christ, we're going and lock them away somewhere, we're going to do a new thing. What would change? Like, what would that look like?
Mako Nagasawa 46:56
It if you're talking about criminal justice, reform,
Seth Price 46:58
it already have it really. Yeah, yeah,
Mako Nagasawa 47:01
that's the that is a really important place to start. Although I would also say, you know, we could come back to this, it really should affect a whole bunch of other areas of life, it should affect our housing policy, our interaction, the land and our ecology. So because the bigger issue that restorative justice raises is, well, what does restoration mean? Like what type of relationship should we have with one another? Not just when someone does something wrong, but just in general? And so will, how are we responsible to God and one another, in in that paradigm, and this raises bigger questions, but criminal justice reform is a good place to start because independently of biblical scholarship, this this question emerged, well, actually has deep roots. But obviously, we have a mass incarceration problem here in the United States. Because our principle, our primary principle of justice is meritocratic. retributive. And so the idea there is, it's offender centric, if if I do something wrong, then something ROPs something should be done to me that's proportional or whatever, hopefully proportional. And in restorative justice, it's victim centric. It's not offender centric. And so the first question, if, if I do something to hurt you, the first question is, what do you need in order to move on? And to recover from the harm and and heal? And how can I participate in that? So I asked the offender, and there may be other, you know, stakeholders, like the community at large. So restorative justice asks a fundamentally different question. And it, it does mean that there are consequences for the offender. And so I want to clear up that as a misconception. Like some people think, oh, it's, it's good. It goes light on the offender. No, it doesn't. It, it often is emotionally more challenging for the offender. Because it makes me grow, or it invites me to, it places a demand on me to do something that draws me out of myself. And so I could point to examples of that, but But essentially, part of the reason why this is being talked about here in the US is well, because our system is bonkers right now, and and also because restorative justice has been tried in other countries in different forms. And it's been shown to to actually produce things that we, we say we want so For instance, in Africa, and also Northern Europe, you know, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa and also similar things, Uganda, Rwanda post conflict situations where you can't like physically lock up all the people that did something wrong because you bankrupt your country. So how how do you bring closure to folks? Well, you have victim offender dialogue, and I wouldn't say they're done or that that's the only thing to do. But that's a step. In Scandinavian countries, they have implemented restorative justice paradigms so that people offenders do go to prison. Although sometimes they they do more community service, but if they go to prison, they are treated humanely. There's more limitations on what can happen in prison, like overcrowding or things that people in Germany, they bring their own clothes, and they, they, they dress normally, because they're, they're preparing to reengage society in, in in a new way, already as citizens but but with an awareness of what they have done. And when they have a social worker or an equivalent or work with a psychologist, sometimes they're already structuring victim offender dialogue meetings while they're in prison, but it's essentially and sometimes they're learning a skill. But essentially, this has been shown to reduce recidivism. You have shorter prison sentences. And, and and everything we say we want. Yeah. And so, you know, like Sweden has had the problem of they need to convert former prisons into condominiums, because they don't they no longer have as many prisoners. Like, wouldn't that be a good problem? Yeah. Yeah.
Seth Price 51:59
Like, that's profitable, though. Then our system here in the United States, because, yes, you lock people away for money. Right? Yeah. What would it mean for some of our other? Yeah, yeah, well, yeah, yeah, yeah, we out we abolish slavery, except for people that we incarcerate and then we'll just incarcerate the same people. And we'll call it solved. Yeah, um, what would that cause for some of our communities, though, unrelated to criminal justice reform? So you alluded to it, it would do some other things. So what would a restorative atonement theory kind of flesh out for the way that we live in community with one another, like, what would what would be different their
Mako Nagasawa 52:38
housing policy would be very different. So for instance, God has a housing first policy, right, he built the Garden of Eden and then put Adam and Eve there. So we have a meritocratic housing policy where it's proof that prove to me or prove to us that you're a productive citizen, and that you make enough money that you deserve to live here. And so the gated community is, is the most extreme example of that. But But essentially, this comes from John Locke's theory, the meritocratic theory of land conquest, that if you're more productive than the last guy, then you can take his land, and that was deployed by English settlers, and then you, you know, all kinds of people against Native Americans by misrepresenting Native Americans. But it's essentially that idea to really took hold here. And so we, we don't have a really good housing policy, even though the pandemic has now linked public health with housing. Right? I mean, how do you tell people to shelter in place or to stay at home if they don't have a home? Yeah, and, and we've allowed BlackRock and now private equity firms to become America's landlord and continue driving the price of housing up because now we have to compete not only with one another for scarce commodity like housing, but also with private equity firms. And this goes back to it's a form of plantation capitalism which wanted to divide the labor force into white and black so that the the elites didn't have to pay a lot of wages right because if you make labor compete with one another and break up into factions then that's that's what you get. You get to pay low wages because they're competing with one another so that's really what how race started and and then California's realtors and others in a book called freedom to discriminate by Jean Slater and and then Richard Ross seems color of law. Those are just must reads and talks about America's housing policy. We took the model of dividing the labor force from plantation capitalism, and we mapped it onto residential segregation. And once that's in place, then all the differential outcomes follow, right people's experience of schooling is different, based on their zip code where they live, people's experience of policing is different. So housing policy, let's say, in Germany, or in in Austria, like the city of Vienna, I've really appreciated there's one article in Forbes, about Germany's housing policy. And there's a video done by the Gravelle Institute on Vienna's housing policy, which talks about how they think about housing more as an investment in people and it's part of the labor market. Why is that? Well, for a couple reasons, obviously, it's because children are part of the future labor market, and they are educated in communities in neighborhoods, and schools are tied to neighborhoods. So it's an investment in people. So they, they want to make things more equal. They want to control you know how unequal things can get, and, and that's really important. And then secondly, they don't want people sinking into sinking into debt. Because as we learned in 2008 2009, if if I get a job, you know, in some other city, I might want to take that shot. But if my mortgage is underwater, and I can't sell, yeah, and so I'm stuck. So the economy becomes dysfunctional, even to itself, even in this present generation, where people are not flexible enough to move we have become because of white supremacy, becoming become invested in the idea that our primary asset should be our home, which is preserved by neighborhood property values, which is preserved by the perception of where this house is and who lives among, in this area. Yeah. And so we have created inequality problem, a justice problem, and also a sustainability problem. You know, because we've made car dependent suburbs that are unsustainable. And so housing policy would be a really good place to start. Housing is something that everyone needs.
Seth Price 57:29
Your answer there reminds me so much of the two questions that I asked him before we started recording. As you're talking, I'm like, yes, yes. Yes. Yes. Absolutely. Yeah. Because as I told you earlier, like, I need the neighbor's kids to be good and do well. And when I say be good, I mean, like, flourish. Like, and because they're gonna take care of me one day, as I'm supposed to take care of them right now. Like, that's, that's how it works. Um, yeah. Yeah. Last question, kind of existential because why not? What, no, go ahead.
Mako Nagasawa 58:07
Although, although, you know, you just a few days ago, Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin said, Not society's job to take care of other people's children. It's like what we do?
Seth Price 58:18
Yeah, of course, of course, it is. Like, of course, it is. Like, I forget who said it is somebody that's been on the show where I read it somewhere. I've read so many books. We're talking about like faith as a politic and not a politic as a party, like as a as a polis as a people's, and that sometimes Mako, like, I can't do this anymore, like I am, I'm done with God today, like I am, I'm done, I'm done. I can't do it. And then community, you, you basically say, it's fine, I have all of those burdens. Let me carry them for a minute. It's fine. And when you're ready to come back to them, I'm still here. And you're still in a good spot, I've made sure that you're good. And so when you're ready to win, you're in a better spot. Here's your faith. And it's just as healthy as it ever was. And I'm probably saying that badly. But like, that's what it is to live in community with one another of you need something. Okay. I can do that. And then one day, I will break down, and I will need something. And there's no quid pro quo. We just live here together. Like that's what we do this. That's what it is to be human. And I'm probably badly paraphrasing three different people together, because there's so much junk in my head. But how could it not be my problem to take care of the people that I live next to? I don't know how that could not be true.
Mako Nagasawa 59:34
Exactly. Exactly. I mean, you might start a small business and want to hire someone besides your own kids.
Seth Price 59:40
Yeah, yeah. And expect them to be educated enough to do well at the job so that I could then redirect those resources into the community. You know, like I said, that part needs to be rebuilt. Oh, your kids use the park. I'll pay for it's not a big deal. It's fine. Let's go play. Let's go play. Because when people laugh, they're healthy. Just make the kids laugh anyway. Anyway. Yeah, I'm not voting for that guy, but I don't live there. So, if you were to try to garb or robe words around what the Divine is, what is that for you?
Mako Nagasawa 1:00:16
What's the Divine is?
Seth Price 1:00:17
Yeah, if you were trying to like wrap words around that, what is that? Like? What is God?
Mako Nagasawa 1:00:22
Oh, what is God? Well, he is a love, he is a community, he is unity. He is and he is family, he is friendship. What that means is, those are, those are English words that describe Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Because in order, we can't just say God is Love without persons anchoring that love. Otherwise, if you if you have a God, who is what is the right word? Who is not try personal, you know, a mon ad, right? Or just a big dot? Then, you know, what is that God? Well? We don't know. We're not really sure. Because if that God didn't have to create it, well, you know, did God have that kind of God have to create then, then that God didn't have to also love but even with a Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we have love and all these other things, beauty goodness, and even before that God created. And so God is these things, right? It, it's a predicate nominative in if we're thinking about God is love that. And we're trying to understand, like, what does it mean it, it's not simply that God does love or if God happens to love. I mean, I happen to love but I happen to do a lot of other things too, because I'm a fallen human being. And that doesn't make me the most consistent person all the time. And so for, for us to say as First John four eight says, God is love that gut, God, that is his nature. And so everything God does, has to flow out of that nature, and is an expression of that nature. That makes a lot of sense to me from how this all fits together, and how we can have a coherent story of good triumphing over evil and so forth. And, and why the atonement must be a healing atonement. And and why a loving, good God has found a way to heal human nature in a loving and good way, by never overriding our, our partnership with him, and why justice has to be restorative, because in the net, in the end, you know, his love and goodness, have to be the goal, and also the process. So, so I don't know if that answers your question, or gets out the gist of it. But
Seth Price 1:03:24
if that's my favorite question, because the answers are all over the place, and then and I love it, so and you don't know as Mako but but now you will. So I take all those answers. And I mix them together into an episode that has none of my voice in it at the end of the year. Except for to say, I asked all these people this question and here's it is, and it always ends up being something beautiful, just like back to back to back of people trying to say what God is it ends up being? I don't know, it ends it's it's powerful in a way that I can't recreate if that makes any sense. I love it. I love it. That's one of my favorite questions, because the answers are so all over the place. And I love it. So no, it's financer perfectly answer. I look forward to that. Yeah. If people want to dive more into what you're doing, because they've decided to, you know, just just try to grow a little bit. Where would you want people to do or go to, to kind of follow along to the work that you're doing? Where would you direct people?
Mako Nagasawa 1:04:24
Easiest thing is the our webpage www dot Gnosticism. Center, a n a s t. a s i s. I make sure I get spell it. Last assist center.org. And people can can find ways to connect there. I'm on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. So if people prefer that, although I am I am 49 And I'm not the most regular person there but but I do put out content there. So, if folks want to subscribe to the blog, right now, I'm I'm in a series on emotional development and atonement theology. Like how does the one How does atonement theology, namely penal substitution versus medical substitution or healing atonement? How do these theories affect us emotionally in different ways? I think that's a really, really important area, especially as we try to be trauma informed and emotionally healthy. So,
Seth Price 1:05:33
yeah. Excellent. Excellent. Thank you for coming on. And if you're willing, you don't have to say yes, but after I finished reading your book on abortion, if you're willing, let's do it again. Why not?
Mako Nagasawa 1:05:43
I would love to do that. And I would really appreciate it, Seth. I think these these are really important times for us to revisit the issue even though people think it's only and that we only get to dead ends by talking about abortion. I the book, as I've researched it, it's it's far from them.
Seth Price 1:06:03
Yeah. Excellent. Excellent. Thank you again, for your time this morning, very much. So
Mako Nagasawa 1:06:06
thanks so much.
Seth Price 1:06:19
Now, I haven't added it up. But there are hundreds of 1000s if not millions of podcasts on the internet, and I am humbled that you continue to download this one. If this is your first time here. Please know that there are transcripts of these shows. Not always in real time, but I do my best. And if you go back in the logs, you can find transcripts for pretty much any episode that you'd like. The show is recorded and edited by me, but it is produced by the patron supporters of the show. That is one of the best, if not the best way that you can support the show. If you get anything at all out of these episodes, if you think on them, or if you you know, you're out and about and you tell your friends about it or..hey, mom, dad, brother, sister, friend, boss, pastor, here's what I heard, what are your thoughts on that? If this is helping you in any way, and it is helping me, consider supporting the show in that manner. It is extremely inexpensive, but collectively, it is so very much helpful.
Now for you. I pray that you are blessed, and you know that you're cherished and beloved. We'll talk soon.