Of Redemption and Trading Stamps - 4/26/2010 12:02pm

Rabbi Michael Mayersohn recently taught an intriguing class at the Logos Bible Study classroom in San Diego:  “Blood, Water and Redemption.”  The class traced the importance of blood and water as they relate to redemption in Jewish thinking and practice during biblical times.  I attended the class.

In Christian circles we frequently use the word “redemption” or “redeem” in reference to what Christ did on our behalf, but do we really understand what it means?

“Redemption” as a noun and “redeem” as a verb both derive from the Greek word lytron, which has the sense of payment for something, especially a ransom for freeing a slave.  Mark 10: 45 uses the word this way when Jesus says:  “The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom  (lytron) for many.” 

In modern western culture we typically think of the word “ransom” in reference to money paid to a kidnapper to set his victim free.  Happily, it is not used all that often.  But it was a very common term in the Greco-Roman world of Jesus’ day, referring to the practice of sacral manumission, the ceremony by which a slave is set free.  Here’s how it works.

The slave owner takes his slave to the temple of a Greek or Roman god—usually a god associated with healing and restoration, such as Apollo—and he sells the slave to the god.  He is paid from the temple’s treasury, and the slave becomes the “property” of the god who ransomed him. In practice, the slave’s family would have deposited the ransom price with the temple; the temple would have negotiated the transaction with the slave owner, and the slave would then be a free man.

We have records of hundreds of such transactions throughout the ancient world.  Last year we visited the Temple of Apollo at Delphi in Greece.  There, an inscription records just such a transaction.  It reads:

Apollo the Pythian bought from Sosibius of Amphissa, for freedom, a female slave, whose name is Nicaea, by race a Roman, for the price of three minae of silver and a half-mina.  Former seller according to the law:  Eumnastus of Amphissa.  The price he has received.  The purchase, however, Nicaea has committed unto Apollo, for freedom.

When we read that Apollo bought a slave “for the price,” we might think of 1 Corinthians 6: 19-20, “You are not your own; you were bought at a price . . ..”  And when we read that the purpose of the transaction was “for freedom,” we might think of Galatians 5: 13, “You, my brothers, were called to be free.” 

In Genesis 1 & 2 we learn that God created humanity out of love to be with him in an intimate relationship for all of eternity.  When sin enters the world in Genesis 3, humanity turns its back on God, goes its own way and forsakes its position of intimacy with God.  After Genesis 3 we leave the place we belong and we go to another place, a place of sin and death, apart form God.

When Christ sheds his blood on the cross, he pays the penalty for our sins before a holy and righteous God, ransoming us from sin and death, bringing us back to the place we belong:  in intimate relationship with God for all of eternity.

Although Peter doesn’t use the word “ransom” in his writings, he does use “redeemed,” the verb form of the word:  “It was not with perishable things such as silver and gold that you were redeemed . . . but with the precious blood of Christ” (1 Peter 1: 18-19).

When I was growing up in the 1950s and 1960s, the Sperry and Hutchinson Company issued “S&H Green Stamps” through various retail stores and establishments.  It was a brilliant marketing idea.  S&H produced the stamps; retailers bought them to give customers as in incentive to shop at their stores; we collected them and stuck them in books; and when we filled the books, we took them to S&H “Redemption Centers” to trade for various gifts.  Green Stamps spawned several competitor programs, including “Blue Stamps.”

S&H Green Stamps originated at Sperry and Hutchinson.  They left Sperry and Hutchinson; they went to retail stores, ultimately ending up on our kitchen tables, where we glued them into books; and we returned them to “redemption centers,” where they went back to the place where they belonged.

For those of us who grew up in the 50s and 60s, S&H Green Stamps perfectly illustrate the concept of “redemption’:  they started out where they belonged; they went away to another place (our kitchen tables); and they were “redeemed,” going back to where they belonged.

And by the way, whatever happened to S&H Green Stamps?  Thomas Sperry and Shelly Hutchinson founded the company in 1896, and the “trading stamp” program flourished in the 1930s through the 1960s.  During the 1960s the S&H Gift Catalogue was the single largest publication in the United States, and the company printed three times as many stamps as the U.S. Post Office!  With the recession of the 1970s the program declined.  In 1981 the founders’ descendents sold the company, but it was bought back by the family in 1999.  Today S&H is an online company offering its “green points” reward program through a variety of online retailers.

But not to worry:  if you have any S&H Green Stamp books lying around, the online company will honor them, allowing you to “redeem” your stamps.  Just go to http://www.greenpoints.com/account/act_default.asp.

It’s never too late for redemption!