Tomorrow, people around the world will celebrate a very unusual
happening on a Jewish festival some 2000 years ago. Read the
account here. But let’s back up a bit. One can read the Old
Testament as the story of a tribal religion. By “tribal” I mean
proprietary – belonging to a specific group of people. The
religion of the descendants of Abraham came to them in their
language, it is full of their stories about their God. There are
many tribal religions which also belong to people of a common
ancestry, who share the same customs and usually the same
language. Most tribal religions respect other peoples who have
their own gods and religious practices. A careful reading of the
Old Testament shows that God had universal ambitions when he
choose to start with Abraham and his descendants. Which brings
us to the first festival of Pentecost after Jesus was crucified.
Something happened there which shook to the core the idea that
Jesus had come to fulfill the aspirations of only a limited
group of people – everyone sta