转换工作

文章 / 工作神学项目出品
如果工作是由神带领或引导人们去做的,那么转换工作是否合乎情理?那岂不是拒绝神的指引并否定现在的工作吗?十六世纪新教神学家马丁.路德 (Martin Luther),以极力反对转换工作著名。这主要是基于他对这段经文的理解:
 
哥林多前书7:20
各人蒙召的时候是甚么身分,仍要守住这身分。12
 
但今天许多人都说路德 (Luther) 对于社会角色或工作岗位的个人召命的观点是基于他将哥林多前书7:20中的希腊语「klesei」误译为「职业」或「召命这影响了英王钦定本圣经KJV的英文翻译把以上经文译为 "Let every man abide in the calling wherein he was called." 有别于现代较笼统的圣经翻译本 "Let each of you remain in the condition in which you were called"NRSV或 "converted"
 
与路德 (Luther) 同时代的约翰‧加尔文 (John Calvin) 并不接受路德 (Luther) 对上述经文的诠释 - 而大多数现代神学家也不接受这诠释。首先,路德 (Luther) 似乎没有充分考虑下一节经文的意思,经文说明至少在某些情况下,转换职业是合情合理的:
 
哥林多前书7:21
你是作奴隶蒙召的么,不要因此忧虑。若能以自由,就求自由更好。
 
要判断这两种观点,我们必须记住上述经文是指婚姻,不是职业。为了提升社会和宗教地位,哥林多人质疑保罗对婚姻的看法,试图改变为似乎更属灵、更神圣的未婚地位(哥林多前书7:1)。保罗陈述了他的基本原则以作响应,就是人们应保持信主时相同的社会地位及角色。毕竟,基督在某个处境向人呼召或使人信奉,使他们的社会角色变得相对,而非绝对。13分别在于有人信主时是在某个处境下受到呼召 (加尔文)(Calvin),有人则是受到呼召而达致某个处境(路德) (Luther)。14葛尼斯 (Os Guinness) 抓住了我们的基本召命的重点:「首要的是受某人(神)呼召,而非某事某物(如母亲身份、政治或教学),又或某个地方(如内城贫民区或蒙古)的呼召。」15
 
然而,尽管神呼召世人悔改和塑造基督徒的品行,并不等同呼召他们进入这些社会领域,召命却与这些领域关系密切,令它们变得神圣。「召命」作为辅助语言,用于人际关系和工作角色仍然是合理的,正如戈登·菲 (Gordon Fee) 说:
 
保罗的意思是,在特定情境下呼召某一个人,情境本身就会牵涉呼召,对他或她而言,就会变得神圣。此外,通过拯救某一个人于某境况中,基督由此将这个境况分配给他/她,作为他/她在基督里活出生命的地方... 正因为我们的生命取决于神的呼召,而非我们的情境,我们须要学习由处境出发,继续活着「在神面前...」。无论是异族通婚、单身未婚、蓝领白领、抑或任何社会经济状况……都让每一个人都事奉主。16
 
然后,保罗通过救恩的对比,显示割礼(哥林多前书7:18-19)及奴役/职业(哥林多前书7:21-24参见加拉太书.3:28)毫不重要,从而说明了个人应该在社会及职场上停留不动 (staying) 的基本原则。纵使哥林多人只把人际/职场处境,视为用完即弃的舞台布景或棚架,保罗却视之为可能是神要我们在较为次要的社会及职场岗位,活出救恩的主要召命。像圣礼一样,召命是内在心灵转变的一种外在可见的表征。
 
对保罗来说,人际/职场处境绝非偶然,而是机缘巧合。置身于受到感召或决志信主的境况里,逆境都可以变成事奉神的场合。但这非僵化的定律。保罗认为某些情况下的职业或角色改变并不可取,例如:卖身为奴或改变种族身份(未受割礼);又如果奴隶主或非基督徒配偶容许个人自由(哥林多前书7:15, 21),职业或角色改变是可能或可取的,但非必要。
 
哥林多人因此不必放弃自己的社会角色,也不必停留其中。保罗曾于哥林多前书7:29-31中解释,处于现今的堕落世界和已然未然的上帝国度之间,强调基督徒于婚姻和工作自由之间的张力。「时候减少了。从此以后,那有妻子的,要像没有妻子; ……置买的,要像无有所得; 用世物的,要像不用世物,因为这世界的样子将要过去了。」虽然我们被召留在俗世的
境况/角色或受造的身分,但我们被召的最基本关注和所效忠的是转向神创造的新世界。17
 
路德 (Luther) 强调召命里保留原本的角色这方面,因为一千年来修道院否定婚姻和俗世生活所造成的偏差,他身历其境。五百年后,米罗斯拉夫沃尔夫 (Miroslav Volf) 在写作中却强调离开原本的岗位,因为路德的学说本身被歪曲成为一种「新教工作伦理」18,工作成为主要的召命,甚至成为救赎的根源。相对于以上两个曲解,是创造新世界的圣灵,它改造了社会和工作环境,容许人们充分发挥恩赐。19
 
总而言之,保罗要求哥林多人和信徒迎难而上,在神的国或新世界里随时都可服事神,但新人的角色必须保留,以臻完美,不可放弃。虽然我们在神创造的世界与神的国之间有角色的冲突(哥林多前书7:29-31),在被召留在(stay)原位与离开(away)原位之间产生冲突,但两者终必复和,因为神的国就是「在创造中一切互相磨合,得以完全」(Hans Küng)。20
 
最近,米罗斯拉夫沃尔夫 (Miroslav Volf) 又在写作中主张,神指导人工作的因素,会随着工作生涯的进程而改变,神甚至可能会引导人转工。21工作能力应该随着事奉神的经历而成长。衪会带领你成就更大的任务,你也因而需要转换工作。「主人说,好,你这又良善又忠心的仆人。你在不多的事上有忠心,我把许多事派你管理。可以进来享受你主人的快乐。」(马太福音25:21)
 
相反,如果你在接近晚年成为基督徒,神会要求你转工吗?看来在基督里找到新生命意味着找到一份新工作或职业。但是,通常情况并非如此。因为职业无分贵贱,如果认为神希望你一旦成为基督徒,便要找到一个「更崇高的召命」,通常是错误的。除非你的工作是上文提及不为神所容许的,又或者你的工作或同事令你陷于非基督徒恶习里,否则你没有必要转工。然而,无论你转工与否,你的工作方式可能要有别于从前了,要注意圣经中的命令、价值观和美德,正如税吏长撒该的经历一样:
 
路加福音19:5-9 
耶稣到了那里,抬头一看,对他说,撒该,快下来,今天我必住在你家里。 他就急忙下来,欢欢喜喜的接待耶稣。众人看见,都私下议论说,他竟到罪人家里去住宿。撒该站着,对主说,主阿,我把所有的一半给穷人。我若讹诈了谁,就还他四倍。耶稣说,今天救恩到了这家,因为他也是亚伯拉罕的子孙。

“Avail yourself of the opportunity” is the alternative reading given in the NRSV footnote. The main reading is more ambiguous: “Make use of your present condition now more than ever.” The NRSV alternative reading is congruent with most modern translations, including NIV, TNIV, NASB and NEB, as well as with the King James.

Gordon Fee, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, New International Commentary on the New Testament (NICNT) (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1987), 314. The broader context of 1 Corinthians shows socially and spiritually restless Corinthians desiring upward spiritual and social mobility. Paul earlier showed how their revolutionary calling or status “in Christ” (1 Cor. 1:4-7, 27-30) relativized all other calling - racial (v. 24) and social status (v. 26ff.). Cf. Bruce W. Winter, Seek the Welfare of the City: Christians as Benefactors and Citizens (Carlisle/Grand Rapids: Paternoster/Eerdmans,1994), 163f.

Miroslav Volf, Work in the Spirit: Toward a Theology of Work (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), 109f. citing C.K. Barrett, First Corinthians, Blacks New Testament Commentary (New York: Harper & Row, 1978), 169f. Contrast Luther’s confusing paraphrase of v. 24 and its change from “to which” to “in which.” “Remain in that calling to which you were called, that is, where you received the Gospel; and remain as you were when called .... If you are called in slavery, then remain in the slavery in which you were called” (Luther’s Works ed. J. Pelikan vol. 28 (Philadelphia/St. Louis: Concordia and Muhlenberg / Fortress, 1955-76), 45-7. Cf. NIV v. 17 which without using “calling” refers to “the place in life that the Lord assigned to him and to which God has called him” and on v. 24 to remaining “in the situation God called him to.”

Os Guinness, The Call (Nashville: Word, 1998), 31. 

Gordon Fee, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, New International Commentary on the New Testament (NICNT), 306f., 321f., cf. 314 and Guinness, The Call, 31. Fee does not necessarily see God calling people to become slaves, for instance, but regards any certain social setting, even one as bad as slavery, as having the potential to become a place of service and worship. However, if that potential is unable to be fulfilled and the opportunity of release from slavery becomes available, Paul encourages people to take it. See v.21 (NRSV margin and NIV). However, the NRSV translation of v. 21 seems to imply that Paul wants Christians to stay in their situation of slavery while inwardly free in Christ. Even if this is the best translation, this needs to be read in the light of Paul’s non-dualist principle that our inward mental and spiritual states are meant to be embodied externally in our social situations as far as possible (cf. Rom 12:1, 2).

Cf. Vincent L. Wimbush, Paul the Worldly Ascetic: Response to the World and self-Understanding according to 1 Corinthians 7 (Macon, GA: Mercer Uni. Press, 1987), 15ff., 21: “’Remain’” did not uphold the status quo. Instead itrelativize[d] the importance of all worldly conditions and relationships. Yet..., even the ‘remaining’ is relativized”: those given the chance, e.g., slaves, v. 21 “can change their social condition or status without having their status with God affected.” “Remaining” counters the Corinthian catchphrase of refraining - changing status or withdrawing from the world to a higher “pneumatic [spiritual] Christian existence.” Paul’s two digressions in v. 17-24 and 29-35 clarify his principle that worldly statuses are nothing before God. Therefore we are free to live in the world, but not of it, in “spiritual ... detachment or ‘inner-worldly asceticism’” (Worldly, 70) “as if” according to v. 29-31. This is because the forms, structures, institutions and concerns of this world (schema) are not evil, but transient (Worldly, 33f.).

Os Guinness, The Call (Nashville: Word, 1998), 39 ff.

See Miroslav Volf, Work in the Spirit: Toward a Theology of Work (New York” Oxford University Press), 1991, ch. 4 and Exclusion and Embrace: A Theological Exploration of Identity, Otherness, and Reconciliation (Nashville: Abingdon, 1996), 50-51. This also reflects the Old Testament’s emphasis on the Judean exiles settling down in Babylon, by living and working alongside the Babylonians while praying for and “seeking the welfare [“shalom”] of the city” (Jer 29:4-7). It becomes a paradigm for New Testament Christians scattered or dispersed in the Gentile world. It is also an appropriate model today for God’s scattered people called to work in the world in “exile” in Babylon. Cf. Winter, Seek the Welfare of the City.

Hans Kung, On Being a Christian (London: Collins, 1975), 231.