The chief priests
The truly scary lesson here is one that is, in a way, impossible to learn: the chief priests hear of the supernatural events at Jesus’ tomb, and their first (and only) thought is, “how do we prevent this word from spreading?” The idea that a stone-rolling angel, an earthquake and an empty tomb might be indicators that the crucified man was indeed the Messiah didn’t even occur to them.
I wonder how many of these same chief priests had been present three decades earlier when some astrologers from the East came to Jerusalem asking where the newborn king was. The priests could answer that question all right – questions like this were the substance of their lives. But why did it not enter any of their minds to walk a couple of miles to Bethlehem and see what the heck is going on? Most likely because, in their world view, the Messiah would come from the Jews for the Jews, and whichever Jew was most versed in Scripture would be the first to recognize His coming. The idea that a couple of uncircumcised magi with their God-condemned divination practices would be given the word while the chief priests would remain ignorant of it was one that, again, did not occur to them.
Of course it is easy for us to condemn them, but this “did not occur to them” is actually pretty scary. How can I prevent a similar error? Open-mindedness alone is not enough. An open mind is one that does not immediately reject something it is presented with, but it cannot accept or reject ideas it is not presented with. So how do I know which possibilities aren't presenting themselves, which ideas I can neither accept nor reject because they simply do not occur to me? I can rack my brain all I want; an idea that doesn’t occur to me will not be found. That would be a contradiction. But what may be impossible for my brain to even think up may be perfectly obvious to an outside observer. After all, we think, how could the idea really not have presented itself to the priests? Didn’t they hear Jesus’ claim to be God? Wasn’t that the precise reason for his execution?
The only answer I have found is one that has implications which offend many Christians: in order to be open to the truth, the chief priests would have had to allow themselves to doubt what was most sacred to them. I really do not think there could have been any other way for them to recognize Jesus as the Fulfillment of the Law that they loved so dearly and had devoted their lives to. From our angle we can see that clearly enough, but you’ll notice that you get uneasy when it comes to putting this into practice. It's easy to go on a little intellectual foray you call a "journey of doubt", but genuinely questioning what's sacred to you is an almost impossible undertaking no matter what you believe. This is why it usually takes some major trials in life to get you to really submit to the process.
It is easy to see that the priests should have been a little less sure of themselves when you already believe that they were wrong; but it is another matter to attack your own certainty where you believe you are right. You can tell someone that their image of God needs to be re-evaluated, but you’ll learn that you can’t really re-evaluate your image of God without feeling to some extent like you’re doubting God.
But we must not be too alarmed by this. We may have been taught that faith is the absence of doubt, but it isn’t. The absence of doubt is foolishness, not faith (MacGyver’s grandfather already knew this). You cannot learn, cannot be corrected, cannot grow without doubt; these things require you to let go of what you think you know, which is another way of saying that they require you to doubt. And without that, you can't have true faith either. The most frightening heresies are usually not taught and followed by people who doubt, but by people who have convictions which they are literally incapable of doubting.
So how is “questioning what is most sacred to us” different from those detrimental forms of doubt, the many ways one can waffle around or flirt with the sacrosanct or avoid committing to any certainty or get completely lost? I’m not exactly sure. I suspect that when they have paralyzed us, our doubts may have become what is most sacred to us; they may have become our religion. And when that happens, they in turn need to be doubted as well. I don’t know. What I do know is that some religious scholars missed the World’s Greatest Event because they refused to question their most sacred ideas.
