Superabundance: Its Biblical Genesis, Accessibility, and Custody
NRSV
How does one reflect theologically about superabundance at a time when economic discourse has been dominated by austerity, even as the gap between the super rich and the super poor widens; when the power differential between the politically strong and the weak is greater; and when theology itself is oftentimes not only contentious but also deadly? For whom does the word “superabundance” have particular theological currency and significance, and how might the concept of superabundance factor into discourse about the church’s role in creating, accessing, and securing community wellbeing?
Let me begin with an obvious philological point: “Superabundance” is a compound word that conveys the sense of excess. Yet, the word “super” may convey a sense of high quality as in “superlative” or of neutrality/negativity as in “superficial.” Does the “super” of superabundance suggest “deep” qualitative affluence that positively surpasses expectations? Or does it suggest a “thin” layered quality that may generate initial attention and excitement but lack staying power? Only in a given context does a concept illumine the lived experience of those for whom it is either positively appealing or deceptively seductive or even troubling. To frame my reflections, I will examine the biblical language of a “land flowing with milk and honey” that I believe approximates (but does not equate) the notion of superabundance. I will focus on the Pentateuch (Exod. 3:8, 17; 13:5; 33:3; Lev. 20:24; Num. 13:27; 14:8; 16:13, 14; Deut. 6:3; 11:9; 26:9, 15; 27:3; 31:20) although the language extends beyond that literary corpus. I will organize my thoughts around three topics: (1) The narrative genesis of superabundance; (2) Accessing superabundance; and (3) Theological custodianship of superabundance.
Narrative Genesis of Superabundance
The biblical concept of “a land flowing with milk and honey” first appears in the context of God’s promise to Moses and, by extension, to the Israelites, as part of the imagination that anchors the “endpoint” for the Exodus story (Exod. 3:8, 17; Lev 20:24). It is a promise made to a people in economic distress, and its material setting is extraterritorial–a Promised Land still to be attained. Because economic superabundance in the Pentateuch has its narrative genesis in the context of governing austerity coupled with increasing hard labor demands on the masses (Exod. 5:7-11), part of its power as a potent liberation-generating concept is the lack of current material availability for the working class. The people for whom the promise of superabundance is made do not have a solid, existing material basis to justify holding onto that belief; rather, the non-verifiability of the concept as a lived experience under oppression is precisely what fuels its appeal to the imagination for an alternative reality to existing circumstances.
As the story unfolds and begins to transition from promise/imagination to reality, Israel as a people set out to explore the Promised Land, and the promise of superabundance is confirmed as achievable (Num 13:27). The ability to imagine must transition to the ability to credibly remember. Accordingly, the biblical use of the language of “land of milk and honey” also serves as a memory device. The possibility of ideal promises failing to materialize is real, and when that happens, members of the Israelite community reuse the idea of superabundance to critique existing economic and political inequalities that favor the well connected and powerful (Num 16:13-14). For the concept of superabundance to be both potent and relevant, it must engage the imagination and inspire new ways of thinking and being; for the concept to become part of the community’s collective liberation story, it must be attainable in verifiable, material, and memorable ways to the underprivileged. Without creative imagination and concrete memory, the idea of superabundance becomes deceptive or superficial. But as a concept that resists the burdens of austerity in favor of new, verifiable realities of abundance, superabundance is theologically potent, ethically enriching, and life enhancing.
Accessing Superabundance
Availability is not necessarily access. The sending of spies to explore the land of milk and honey constitutes a key phase of translating the promise of superabundance into reality; of moving from promise to verifiability and accessibility. Although the entire community can participate in the imagination of superabundance, access to its material space is not immediately possible or available to the entire community; in reality, only some experience superabundance. In the harsh reality and pressures of the wilderness, an element of conditionality is introduced, basing access to the land on whether or not Yahweh is pleased with Israel (Num14:7-8). Are God’s promises binding only to the extent that God finds pleasure in those to whom the promise was made? Or can God’s promise be binding irrespective of God’s feelings of anger and/or love? And how does the conditionality of access to the land of superabundance become enshrined in the collective imagination and memory of a people to whom the promise was made, without conditions, as an act of the deity honoring a covenantal promise to the ancestors?
In Exod. 13:5, the concept of a land flowing with milk and honey functions to anchor the ritual feast of Unleavened Bread. The text reads: “When I have brought you to … the land of milk and honey, you shall perform this service in this month.” The feast of Unleavened Bread becomes a regular reenactment of the narrative genesis of superabundance. Community rituals become the sacred spaces where members create and recreate the sense of superabundance as promise and memory anchored in an alternative experience to that of oppression.
In Deuteronomy, the land of milk and honey is associated with motivation for observing the law (Deut 6:3) enshrined in local inscriptions (Deut 27:3). The translation of the promise into a lived reality is not just through ritual feasting but also through the construction of laws that ensure the legal embodiment of superabundance for the community.
To reflect theologically on superabundance is to ask about the ritual and legal processes and structures that enshrine and protect the notion of superabundance in our communities. Who is ritually and legally allowed to participate in that new space of superabundance? Who has access to its legal resources as well as to its economic and theological power? These questions help us understand the biblical laws about protecting the poor against the powerful or about hospitality to the alien or against social injustice as attempts at translating the notion of superabundance into a reality for all. Together with rituals, these laws continually invite and challenge the community to emerge from the shadow of the burdens of austerity.
Custodians of Superabundance
As a concept generated in the space of economic hardship and political oppression, it is not surprising that the land of milk and honey is depicted as cartographically different from Egypt and personally catered for by the divine (Deut 11:9-12; 26:9, 15). As the custodian of that material space, Yahweh has enormous powers and abilities to redirect the land’s economic resources, away from the landowners to its new residents. It is a major redistribution or restructuring of resources that creates a profound contradiction: it produces new “fat” theologies that threaten established divine-human covenants, in favor of new alliances with other deities (Deut. 31:20). In this profound material takeover, members of Israel’s community are critically imagined as being sated with a theology of superabundance that makes them oblivious to former traditions. Violence over access to the material blessings of the land betrays a sense of profound lack, and leads to death and endangered living. Indeed, for some members of the community, a theology of superabundance is risky, and its deity becomes such a threatening presence that Israel’s survival rests in her need to move forward without the divine (Exod. 33:3). To reflect theologically about superabundance sometimes ironically requires that the believing community re-imagines its theological categories, particularly the metaphors that describe its deity.
Conclusion
To reflect on superabundance in an age of austerity and in relation to the biblical text is intriguing and challenging; intriguing because for both the ancient narrative and in contemporary society, the notion of “a land flowing with milk and honey” and superabundance respectively functions in the shadows of a heightened sense of austerity; and challenging because the concept of superabundance is really not a fully developed biblical concept. However, when refracted through the biblical concept of a land of “milk and honey,” the concept of superabundance may lend itself to important modes of thinking and being in the world. First, it lends itself to a belief in alternate reality, different from and resistant to forms of existing oppression and economic distress; second, it invites sustained discussion and reflection on the ritual and legal processes that put the notion of superabundance into cultural currency and give it legal authority and access; and third, it invites critical assessments of the way material resources are reorganized and placed under custody, emphasizing the importance of structuring community wellbeing, not just for the well adjusted and well to do but also for the weak.
