Growing up somewhere in between fundamentalist and Evangelical Chrisitanity, I was taught that depression was a sin. Depression was the end result of self-focus. Someone who claimed to hate himself was really in love with himself. Someone who wanted to die or commit suicide represented the pinnacle of selfishness.

I think this attitude must come from the elevation of “total depravity”–one of the five points of Calvinism–from a theological formula to a practical, everyday observation. I’m not convinced that this is a healthy idea or even that it represents the ideals of the early followers of Calvin.

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One of the first things they teach you at the Baptist seminary I am attending is that every man must be a theologian. This wording is taken from John H. Gerstner, who really believed that every person must be a theologian. To Gerstner, everyone must be an amateur theologian who believes something about God, even if this knowledge doesn’t take the form of academic or precise terms.

I appreciate what Gerstner was trying to communicate, and I agree on this level: that everyone should think about God and have beliefs about God that are grounded in reality. However, I have come to see that the idea that everyone should be a theologian isn’t quite as great as it seems. For one, I think it dilutes the meaning of the term “theologian.”

For example, I could cut someone open and remove an organ. I wouldn’t be able to do it professionally or according to textbooks on surgery, but I could do it. So am I an amateur surgeon? Must every man be an amateur surgeon?

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I like Rabbi Shammai.

I know, I know, he’s supposed to be a “bad guy.” Beit Shammai is supposed to epitomize the kind of xenophobic, ritualistic Pharisaism that Jesus condemned; this is part of Harvey Falk’s thesis in his book Jesus the Pharisee. And it’s true that Beit Shammai is recorded with some unkind words in Shabbat 17a; the day they assumed control of the Sanhedrin was “as grievous to Israel as the day on which the golden calf was made.”

I certainly don’t differ from the Rabbinic tradition regarding the misdeeds of Shammai’s disciples. Jesus certainly agreed with Hillel more often than Shammai. And at one point, Judaism left off Shammai’s halacha altogether; at one point in Jewish history it became unlawful to draw halacha from Rabbi Shammai’s school (though on a few points I believe he did win out).

There is even a traditional Sabbath song that includes the phrase, “I lift my eyes to the hills–like Hillel, not like Shammai.” Ouch.

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It seems like every discussion on every Messianic blog, every “innovative” (I use the term somewhat pejoratively) theology in the Messianic movement, every controversy that I come into contact with currently boils down to the idea of Jewish and Gentile identity.

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