This year, the year 2014, Good Shepherd
Sunday (the 4th Sunday of Easter) was also Mother’s Day.
Was it just a mere coincidence?
My thought on this is that there is
something relevant between Good Shepherd Sunday and Mother’s Day, as there is a
thematic thread that connects Good Shepherd
to Mother.
So, what is in common between Jesus the
Good Shepherd and a mother?
This question does not seem easy to
answer.
But, if the question is changed to: What
is common between sheep and children in their early years?
It’s a need to have a caring and
nurturing figure. To sheep, it is a shepherd. And, to an infant, it is a
mother. In other words, what a shepherd to sheep is like what a mother is to
her child.
Sheep without a shepherd are in danger
of being attacked by predators, as they cannot defend themselves. Likewise
children in their early years are vulnerable to harmful factors in
environment. Thus, sheep need to be
protected and led by a shepherd, while babies need their mothers’ care and
guidance.
Biologically and psychologically, human
babies cannot survive and thrive on their own.
They will cease to exist without their respective mothers or primary
caregivers with excellent maternal quality. Human babies without mothers, if
left alone, are exposed to predatory dangers, as they cannot defend themselves.
They are not able to find food for themselves, either.
Though sheep are able to eat grasses on
the pastures by themselves, they are extremely vulnerable to predators that can
invade the pastures, if left without a shepherd. For them to live safely and thrive well,
sheep need to be led to safer and more nutrient pastures.
What is better pastures, provided by a
shepherd, to sheep is what mothers’ abundant breasts, overflowing with
nutritious milk, to human babies, given by their mothers.
In relation to God, through Christ, the
Son, we are His sheep (Psalm 23:1, 28:9, Genesis 48:15, John 10:11-16,
21:15-18), protected and nurtured by Him. Also, our object relation to God is like a
mother-baby relationship, as best described with these words,” like
newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow
in respect to salvation”(1 Peter 2:2).
God, as
the shepherd and the mother nurtures, protects, and guide us on our journey
into salvation. Though He is the Father
in Heaven, we are blessed to be led and cared by this God, who has the dual
nature: pastoral and maternal, though Christ.
The Good
Shepherd Sunday Gospel (John 10:1-10) gives an introduction to the Jesus’
self-description as the Good Shepherd, who has a mother-like quality, given
that mothers are likely to sacrifice themselves for the sake of their babies.
It is a maternal instinct.
In this
introduction, Jesus first describes himself as the shepherd, who enters through
the sheep gate (John 10:2), to lead his sheep out and into the sheep pen. His sheep listen to and follow him, because
they know their shepherd, while they do not listen to anyone other than their
shepherd, as they do not recognize a stranger’s voice (John 10:6).
This
narrative of Jesus the shepherd with his sheep following invokes an image of
geese chicks following their mother, as often seen in ethological study’s
imprinting. Furthermore, in the human context, this corresponds to the
neurological system that connect a mother and her infant child, as the infant
child’s brain has been neuroanatomically structured to first recognize his or
her own mother’s voice ever since his or her prenatal gestation time in the
mother’s womb.
What is so
amazing is that, as this intra-womb
“creation” process, called the gestation, unfolds in order, the fetus already
has eyes and ears by the 4th week, and at the 13th week,
a developing baby’s ears begin to sense vibrations of the mother’s
heartbeat. In other words, human babies
were neuroanatomically created to listen to their mothers’ voices, beginning
with their heartbeats, first, while in the womb.
This biological truth of the human
gestation and neonatal development has influenced the mother-child attachment theory
of John Bowlby (1969) and Mary Ainsworth and her colleagues (1978), and furthermore,
Allan Schore’s (2001) neuroanatomical verification and elaboration of the
attachment theories. The fact that human
babies are being developed in the mother’s womb to recognize and listen to
their mothers’ voices first sets newborn babies to form a secure attachment
with their mothers as the psychological foundation for the rest of life.
In our relation to God, because we were
created in the image and light of God (Genesis 1:27), we are set to listen to
God’s voice first and to form a secure attachment with Him, just as
babies were formed in the womb to listen to their mothers first and to develop
a secure attachment with them. Because of this, Jesus says that his sheep listen to his voice, as
he calls his own sheep by names, in leading them (John 10:3).
The mother-child attachment theories of
Bowlby and Ainsworth are seen by Lee Kirkpatrick ( 1998, 1999) as a parallel to
the God-human relationship. Therefore,
the Bowbly’s and Ainsworth’s attachment theories offer important
insights for us to appreciate our relationship to God as a sheep-shepherd
relationship, in light of a mother-infant relationship. Furthermore, Rosalinda
Cassibba’s (2013) study shows that children of secure attachment with their
mothers feel closer to God than those of insecure attachment with their
mothers. Thus, our secure attachment to the Good Shepherd can be understood in
light of a secure attachment between a mother and her child. In such a secure
attachment, sheep recognize their own shepherd’s voice and listen to it, in
following him, while babies sense their own mothers’ voices first and seek
them.
………………………………………………
In the Good Shepherd Sunday
Gospel, Jesus also emphasizes his identity as the sheep gate itself (John
10:7,9). In fact, it means that Jesus is the only gateway into salvation, by
saying, “I am the gate for the sheep”(John
10:7), “I am the gate; whoever enters
through me will be saved”(John 10:9).
In these self-identification
statements of Jesus as the sheep gate, Jesus wants us to know that he is the
gate into heaven. Though the gate of
heaven had been closed ever since Adam and Eve fell with Satan’s temptation
(Genesis 3:24), now Jesus is willing to serve as a new gate for his sheep – us.
The new gate of heaven was opened
with the death of Jesus on the Cross, as
the curtain of the Holy of Hollies in the Temple was torn open upon his last
breath (Mark 15:37-38, Matthew 27:50-51).
The curtain of the Holy of
Holies, the most sacred place on earth, symbolized what separates us from
God. The curtain indicated that God was
not accessible to ordinary people.
However, by tearing the curtain through his own death, Jesus has opened
the possibility for us to enter into heaven and to see God the Father.
Through his death on the
Cross, tearing what separated us from the Father in Heaven, Jesus the Son, is
now serving as the gateway for us to the Father. By his death on the Cross, Jesus the Good
Shepherd and the new gate, is leading us closer to the Father in Heaven. This aspect of Jesus the Good Shepherd and the
new gate functions just as a mother can plays
significant roles in facilitating father-child attachment (Clarke-Stewart,
1978).
The 5th Sunday of
Easter Gospel reading (John 14:1-12) further explains that Jesus is not only
the gate and the Good Shepherd (John 10:1-21) but also the way, the truth, and life (John
14:6) into heaven and salvation. He is the way to salvation and heaven, and the
truth that sets us free, delivering us from suffering and death (John 8:32),
and the life, as well as the resurrection, enabling us to live beyond death,
for believing in him (John 11:25).
………………………..
Following
the Good Shepherd Sunday Gospel reading (John 10:1-10), Jesus repeatedly and
more clearly portrays himself as the Good Shepherd, who lays his own life for
his sheep.
“I
am the good shepherd. A good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep”,
(John 10:11).
“I am the good shepherd, and I know mine and mine know
me, just as the Father know me and I know the Father; and I will lay down my
life for the sheep” , (John
10:14-15).
The way, Jesus, the Good Shepherd, cares
for his sheep with his own life at stake, is just like how mothers
instinctively lay their own lives for their babies. Thus, John 10:1-21, which is known as Jesus’
discourse on the Good Shepherd, including the Good Shepherd Sunday Gospel
reading, especially vv. 11-18, offers an image of Jesus as the Good Shepherd
with the maternal self-sacrificial love and care.
Just like Jesus the Good Shepherd, who
lays his own life for his sheep, mothers do not even think of their own selves
but only think of their children’s wellbeing, as they do not hesitate to
sacrifice themselves for the sake of their children, when their children are in
danger.
In the scorching ashen debris in
Nagasaki, shortly after a plutonium bomb was dropped on August 9, 1945, a badly
charred corpse of a mother, covering her child, was found. Though the mother’s body had turned charcoal-like,
the body of her young child beneath the mother’s corpse was not as damaged as
the mother’s body was.
During the Holocaust, mothers resisted
Nazi officials with their full forces, when these officials tried to take away
their children. The mothers put their own bodies as shields and weapons to
protect their children from and to fight the predatory Nazi officials, for the
sake of their children. These Jewish
mothers, who fought Nazi predators with all her forces, to protect their
children, were also like David, a shepherd, who fought a lion and a bear for
the sake of his sheep (1 Samuel 17:35-36).
This is a maternal instinct, not
exclusive to the humans, but common to all animal species.
The way Jesus explains who he is, as the
Good Shepherd, who lays his own life for his sheep, really invokes this image
of mother – a mother, who sacrifices her own life for the sake of her children.
…………………………………………
Images of mothers laying their own lives for their children as in the above cases of mothers in Nagasaki and Nazi concentration camps, invoke not only Jesus as the Good Shepherd but
also God the Creator.
What connects Jesus the Good Shepherd,
who lays his life for his sheep, to a mother, who lays her own life for her
child, and God the Creator is the Hebrew word, רָחַף (rachaph),
used in Genesis 1:2, Deuteronomy 32:11, and Jeremiah 23:9.
In Deuteronomy 32:11, the word,”rachaph”, is used to describe how
God care His people with an image of a mother eagle caring for her young by
hovering over and fluttering over them. This is not only to protect vulnerable
young birds but also to help them become able to fly out of the next on their
own.
The former protective meaning of “rachaph” in Deuteronomy 32:11
is more like the protective nature of Jesus the Good Shepherd, while the latter
nurturing character of “rachaph” in this verse is more like a
mother-child secure attachment. And, all of these are found in God’s love for
us.
In Jeremiah 23:9, “rachaph” is used to suggest compassionate
nature of God’s love, as it is how a mother is stirred by a suffering of her
child and respond.
Perhaps,“rachaph” is used to allude to the very much mother-like
nature of God in Genesis 1:2, at the very beginning of the Creation process.
Genesis 1:2 in English bible to describe the situation before God’s
first creation of light is:
“The earth was
formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the
Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters”
(NASB).
At first, an image invoked
from this verse is that a father’s sperms are laid over the mother’s egg to begin the creation process of a new life
through the fertilization of the egg. In
this image, sperms are like the spirit that gives a new life to an egg, which
is like the waters. I first came up to
this image, because I am male. However,
when I read the same verse in different version:
“Now
the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep,
and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters”(NIV)
I had a different image. It is an image of the
Spirit hovering and fluttering over the waters as God was about to
begin His Creation process.
In Genesis 1:2, “rachaph” is used to give the Holy Spirit an image of a
mother bird’s wings fluttering, creating some winds, stirring the waters from
the surfaces. It is to set the tone for shepherding the Creation process.
It is always a mother, who “shepherds” a
new life from its conception on in her womb.
During the prenatal “shepherding”, a little new life in her womb, which
assures safety, grows steadily and becomes ready to come out of the cervical
“gate”, which connects the mother’s womb and the virginal canal.
Once the mightiest sperm reaches and
enters into an egg in the fallopian tube, the fertilized egg must be shepherded
safety to the uterus in a timely manner, in order to assure a new life to grow.
This shepherding process is governed by the invisible movement, like the life-forming “rachaph”
vibrations. In other words, an amazing process of the development of fetus into
a baby from the fertilized egg in the mother’s womb is governed by the
life-giving vibrations of “rachaph”, as the Holy Spirit is so.
The marvelous developing process of
transforming the fertilized egg into a baby in the mother’s womb can be seen
parallel to the Creation process of God in Genesis 1. Just as God created the
universe one step at a time, on one theme per day, a new life in the mother’s
womb is being developed into a baby in an orderly manner.
When God started shepherding His
Creation process, the earth was formless and empty (Genesis 1:2). When the father’s sperm entered into the
mother’s egg for fertilization, the mother’s womb was empty.
In an orderly manner, God first created
the light (Genesis 1:3). Likewise, the
central nervous system (the brain and the spinal chord) is being developed
first, transforming the fertilized egg into a fetus. As the gestation process
continues on in an orderly manner, like the Creation in Genesis 1, the heart is
being formed and starts beating in 22 days from the conception – even though
the mother may not yet realize that she is already pregnant. By the 13th week of gestation, the
developing baby in the mother’s womb moves at least 50 times per hour and is
believed to have REM sleep, suggesting a possibility of already dreaming. And, in 6 months, every organ and body part
are developed.
When the full term, the mother’s body
gently guides the new life in her womb come through the cervical gate into this
world. Upon delivering her child, a mother continues to shepherd her child
through her breast into a secure attachment, which mirrors God-human
attachment.
As the mother-child attachment is being
developed, oxytocin is flowing from the mother to the child, through her breast
given to the child. Oxytocin is an essential hormone for love and compassion.
Thus, the mother-child secure attachment, rich in oxytocin, is characterized
with agape, just as the God-human secure attachment is all about agape.
………………………………………………..
Jesus, the Good Shepherd and the new
gate, sure has maternal character in his self-sacrificing love – agape, as he
lays his own life for his sheep – just as a mother does so.
God the Father, who sent His Son, the
Good Shepherd and the new gate, sure have some maternal characteristics, as
well, symbolized with the word, “rachaph”. This
also characterized the Holy Spirit, as indicated in Genesis 1:2. Thus, our
Triune God is both paternal and maternal.
In our appreciation of mothers, we can certainly deepen our faith in God, as a
mother-child secure attachment can characterize a God-human secure attachment,
which is the core of our faith.
………………….
Bowlby, J. (1969). Attachment and Loss, Vol. 1: Attachment. New York: Basic Books.
Cassiba, R. (2013) .Mother’s attachment security
predicts their children’s sense of God’s closeness, Attachment and Human Development, 15(1), 51-64
Clarke-Steward, A. K. (1978). And Daddy Makes Three:
The Father’s Impact on Mother and Young Child, Child Development, 49(2), 466-478.
Kirkpatrick,
L. A. (1998). God as a substitute attachment figure: A longitudinal study of
adult attachment style and religious change in college students. Personality
and Social Psychology Bulletin, 24, 961-973.
Kirkpatrick,
L. A. (1999). Attachment and religious representations and behavior. In Handbook
of attachment: Theory, research, and clinical applications(pp.803-822).
New York: Guilford Press.
Schore, A. N. (2001). Effect’s of a secure
attachment relationship on right brain development, affect regulation and infant
mental health, Infant Mental Health
Journal, 22(1-2), 7-66
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