Tenets or Tenants – A Fortunate Slip – by Brad Jersak

Definitions:

TENET: a principle, belief, or doctrine generally held to be true.

TENANT: one who rents or leases a dwelling (such as a house) from a landlord.

TENNANT: David Tennant – the actor who played the tenth Doctor in TV’s Dr. Who.

I feel a little embarrassed for people who accidentally swap words, knowing it is a projection of my personal slips of the tongue. One that I hear frequently is the use of tenant (renter) when someone actually means tenet (principle). As a low-level editor, I know how easily these mistakes occur, so I don’t let it become a pet-peeve (usually).

Still, when I heard the tenet-tenant error twice this week, it caught my attention as worthy of exploring playfully this question:

What happens when our tenets become tenants?

Tenets

To make sense of that question, I’ll be more specific. In this case, I’m thinking especially about “tenets of the faith,” which is to say our doctrinal and ethical beliefs. And in the case of “tenants,” I have in mind Jesus’ parable. Let’s start with the “tenets.”

Every one of us is a believer in something. When it comes to God, we have convictions about who or what God is or is not. And when it comes to our ways of being in the world, again, we all have opinions about what is right and wrong, healthy or unhealthy, better or worse. We may even live by them!

While our beliefs in God are valid expressions of our ideas and experiences of God, virtually every faith tradition agrees that our notions of God should not be confused with God as such. God greatly exceeds everything we imagine God to be and if we become rigid in our opinions of God, we can end up creating an idol from our tiny box of beliefs.

So too with our moral convictions. If we become too rigid in our personal rules, we may end up at “the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil,” setting aside “the Tree of Life” and imposing them on others as if our self-made standards are “universal absolutes.”

When that happens—when our doctrinal and ethical beliefs displace a life of faith in the Living God—our tenets have become tenants.

Tenants

Denethor II

Just as man-made or even revealed tenets can displace the living God, so too religious leaders, spiritual gurus, and ideological influencers can enthrone themselves in seats of authority that as if they are kings or queens who reign rather than faithful stewards who serve.

Lord of the Rings fans will recognize the scenario in which Denethor II, Steward of Gondor, had deceived himself into acting as king, refusing to acknowledge that Aragorn was the rightful heir. Tolkien was no doubt referencing the way in which Jerusalem’s religious leaders (elders and priests) saw themselves as the Temple rulers while defying their Messiah and plotting his murder.

This was the point of Jesus’ parable of the tenants. The stewards of God’s tenets replaced living faith with religious observance, and as tenants, now played the part of corrupt masters. Tenets and tenants. Here is Mark’s version of the parable (chapter 9):

Mark’s Version – “The Wicked Tenants”

Parable of the Wicked Tenants

Mark 12 Then he began to speak to them in parables. “A man planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a pit for the winepress, and built a watchtower; then he leased it to tenants and went away. ² When the season came, he sent a slave to the tenants to collect from them his share of the produce of the vineyard. ³ But they seized him and beat him and sent him away empty-handed. ⁴ And again he sent another slave to them; this one they beat over the head and insulted. ⁵ Then he sent another, and that one they killed. And so it was with many others; some they beat, and others they killed. ⁶ He had still one other, a beloved son. Finally he sent him to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ ⁷ But those tenants said to one another, ‘This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’ ⁸ So they seized him, killed him, and threw him out of the vineyard. ⁹ What then will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others. ¹⁰ Have you not read this scripture:

‘The stone that the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone;
¹¹ this was the Lord’s doing,
and it is amazing in our eyes’?”

¹² When they realized that he had told this parable against them, they wanted to arrest him, but they feared the crowd. So they left him and went away.

One surprise in this parable is that after the stewards had beaten and murdered the owner’s slaves, he seems to imagine that “They will respect my son.”

Is Jesus truly implying that in sending him to this world, God did not foresee his rejection and death? Probably not. It’s a story, a parable, an analogy—but not with precise one-for-one equivalents between the vineyard owner and God. Perhaps Jesus’ meaning is simply that the tenants should have received the son, just as God’s stewards should have received Jesus. But he also cites Psalm 118:22-23, where the rejection of God’s Messiah is anticipated as a forthcoming fact.

Before turning to Matthew’s version, it’s worth reviewing Isaiah’s hymn (from chapter 5), a probable inspiration for Jesus.

Isaiah’s Hymn

Isaiah 5 I will sing for my beloved
my love song concerning his vineyard:
My beloved had a vineyard
on a very fertile hill.
² He dug it and cleared it of stones
and planted it with choice vines;
he built a watchtower in the midst of it
and hewed out a wine vat in it;
he expected it to yield grapes,
but it yielded rotten grapes.

³ And now, inhabitants of Jerusalem
and people of Judah,
judge between me
and my vineyard.
⁴ What more was there to do for my vineyard
that I have not done in it?
When I expected it to yield grapes,
why did it yield rotten grapes?

⁵ And now I will tell you
what I will do to my vineyard.
I will remove its hedge,
and it shall be devoured;
I will break down its wall,
and it shall be trampled down.
⁶ I will make it a wasteland;
it shall not be pruned or hoed,
and it shall be overgrown with briers and thorns;
I will also command the clouds
that they rain no rain upon it.

⁷ For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts
is the house of Israel,
and the people of Judah
are his cherished garden;
he expected justice
but saw bloodshed;
righteousness
but heard a cry!

Jesus’ opponents knew he was directing his parable against them. I wonder if they also remembered Isaiah’s hymn. Their response hints at it.

Matthew’s – A Revision

I need not repeat Matthew’s entire account of the same instance, but one apparent revision makes a key difference.

In Mark’s version, verse 9 says, “What then will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others.” The translators treat this verse as a question Jesus himself answered it. We don’t need to read Mark that way, and maybe he meant it that way, but the English formatting chooses to portray it that way as do Red Letter editions of the Gospels (e.g. NASB).

So is Jesus saying that if they reject and kill God’s Son, God will exact vengeance? One might read the destruction of the Temple and the city of Jerusalem in A.D. 70 that way. But Matthew (who expands on Mark at times), repeats the story this way with two all-important extra words:

⁴⁰ “Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?”

⁴¹ “He will bring those wretches to a wretched end,” they replied, “and he will rent the vineyard to other tenants, who will give him his share of the crop at harvest time.”

Matthew (who I still regard as an eyewitness) puts the response to Jesus’ question in the mouths of his audience. In that instance, vengeance is in the mind of Jesus’ enemies. They are already planning their own violence and I don’t doubt that was their retributive image of God.

But is that the image of God revealed in Christ? Remember: the punchline to all of Jesus’ parables is not AD 70 but rather, the power of the Cross and the Resurrection, which is scandalous grace and radical forgiveness.

So… back to Matthew’s account:

Jesus question: What will the owner of the vineyard do?

Audience response: Wrath! Destruction! Vengeance.

Jesus retort: “Have you not read this scripture” [because their answer is wrong! Not vengeance, not violence, but rather…] “He will make the rejected One the capstone of a new temple!”

So in the end, while tenets became tenants, and the tenants kill the son, God turns the tables: the rejected stone becomes the capstone, and the crucified Son is enthroned as the cruciform and risen King. 

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