Matt 16:
13 When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, ‘Who do people say the Son of Man is?’ 14 They replied, ‘Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.’ 15 ‘But what about you?’ he asked. ‘Who do you say I am?’ 16 Simon Peter answered, ‘You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.’... 20 Then he ordered his disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Messiah.
From our perspective we often read this passage as the disciples finally getting who Jesus was, finally becoming Christians, finally changing their theology fall in line with ours today, and Jesus finally getting the recognition he deserves.
But I think this piece is less about the definition of Jesus as the Messiah and more about the trauma of the personality of Christ.
In entering in to any relationship we expose ourselves to the potential of trauma as well as the beauty. The trauma of rejection, abuse, betrayal, cheating, loss and so on. THIS is what Jesus was looking for in asking the question of 'who do you say I am?'.
Jesus didn't care so much about the theological definition of what sort of prophet they thought he was, he wanted to know whether they had engaged with the person of Christ to the point of exposing themselves to the complete trauma of allowing the personality of Christ to entirely redefine their cultural definition of the Messiah. In calling Jesus the Messiah they were completely abandoning themselves to the mercy of this Person and Event.
This is why Jesus then instructs them not to tell anyone who he was theologically. Because those seeking the definition would miss the person, moreover those who would deny the person but would claim the definition, then render the definition meaningless.
We are not called to a theological definition of the Theanthropos, but to a complete traumatic personal engagement with the Christ Event, where we are willing to sacrifice all we culturally and theologically hold as knowing, for the authenticity and vulnerability of the traumatic relationship of God – this is true ‘knowing’.
