“The only thing we learn from history…” (St. Luke’s: Friday, October 6th, 2017; Baruch 1.15-22; Ps. 79; Lk. 10.13-16)
Dark days. What’s the
worst possible thing that could happen to you? Perhaps, you think, it has already happened and you’re now coping with the aftereffects. Perhaps you have taken precautions in order
to minimize the risk of it happening. Our fears of what might happen are the
bread and butter of insurance companies.
Today’s readings are rather dark. The words of the Psalm are shockingly vivid –
“they have given your servants’ bodies to the birds for food, the flesh of your
faithful to the wild animals”; “they have poured out their blood like water and
there was no one to bury them”. These
words reflect a situation of suffering, despair and horror – in fact, they
reflect the worst disaster to ever
befall the nation of ancient Israel.
Israel,
Israel, Israel. Why is the
Bible always talking about Israel? Well, the obvious answer is that it was Israelites who wrote the Bible –
both the “Hebrew Bible” (OT) and the New Testament. Therefore, even though we are a part of
“Christianity” – a religion that eventually became distinct from Judaism – we
have no choice as Christians but to become “ancient Israel specialists”. You might ask, why are we always reading this
Jewish book? Well, as Christians, we
worship the God who revealed himself to Abraham and Moses and eventually
ultimately revealed himself in and as
Jesus of Nazareth. Now, it’s true, many
Christians – both ancient and modern – have attempted to reinvent Christianity
in such a way as to cut off our Jewish roots and then attempt to plan the
Christian tree in other soil. It’s not hard to imagine what happens when
people do that. The Jews who authored
Scripture believed that the people to whom they belonged had a special destiny,
and that the fate of the entire world was
bound up with what happened in the story of Israel and its God, Yahweh. If you want to understand what’s going on in
the Bible, you have to become familiar with three
things – Abraham, covenant and Israel’s failure to fulfill its side of the
covenant-project. (at this point in the "reflection", I played the first few minutes of a video-clip which can be viewed by clicking on the link above.)
Abraham. God chose Abraham to be the “father” of a new
nation, a people chosen by God to belong to him in a special way. As one rabbi put it as he commented on the
book of Genesis: “if Adam messes
things up, Abraham will set
everything right”. God said to Abraham:
“through your descendants all the nations
of the world will be blessed” (cf. Gn. 12.1-3). Israel was not chosen simply to be God’s
“favourite”; rather, the nation of Israel was chosen by Yahweh to be his representatives to the other
nations of the earth, to be his agents of salvation. Israel was to be the bearer of the solution
to the world’s rebellion against its creator.
However and whenever the solution would come, it would be through Israel – as Jesus said to the Samaritan woman
at the well in John’s Gospel: “salvation is from the Jews” (Jn. 4.22). God established a “covenant” with Abraham. This
agreement included both Yahweh’s promises
and Abraham’s responsibilities. This sacred agreement was later expanded and
codified at the time of Moses. Yahweh’s
covenant with Israel was the Creator’s rescue-plan
– through Israel – for the world. So far, so good.
Part of the
problem. However,
there was a(nother) problem. As we heard
in Baruch’s prayer of confession, Israel itself
has also rebelled against Yahweh, has worshipped other gods and refused to
listen to the call of the prophets to
return to God’s law, to be faithful to the covenant that Yahweh established
between himself and his people. The people of the solution had also become
part of the problem. It’s like if an
ambulance on the way to the scene of
an accident is itself involved in an accident.
Now the ambulance and its crew, who were supposed to rescue the victims
of the original accident, are themselves in need of rescue. Israel had been chosen by God to be the agent
of salvation, of rescue for the whole world, but now Israel itself needs to be
rescued so that God’s salvation can extend, through Israel, to all peoples.
Exile. Which brings us to today’s readings. For at least a week now, all of our first readings at Mass have been texts
that describe what happened after a small minority of Israelites returned from
exile in Babylon. They in the Psalm refers to the
Babylonians, who destroyed Jerusalem in the year 587 B.C. and proceeded to
exile the population. As Baruch says in today’s first reading
(1.20), exile was the ultimate curse that the book of Deuteronomy had
threatened against Israel if the nation
broke its covenant with Yahweh. There
are many texts from this period that are prayers of confession (Dn. 9; Ezra 9;
Neh. 9). They all follow the pattern we
see in Baruch: the people acknowledge their sins and implore God to be merciful
to them and restore their fortunes – in a word, to establish his kingdom in their midst. This forward-looking hope for the Day when
Yahweh would get his rescue-plan for the world back on track persisted all the
way to the time of Jesus (cf. Lk. 1.54-55; 2.25, 38). This was what had to happen – Israel needed
to be restored first – the covenant
needed to be renewed – and then all the nations of the world would finally
experience the “blessing” that God had promised to Abraham.
The last
prophet. So Jesus comes on a
prophetic mission to call Yahweh’s people – one
last time – to truly be the
people of God. In chapter 9 of Luke’s
Gospel, Jesus sent out the 12 apostles
two-by-two, in order that they could participate in his prophetic ministry to Israel. In today’s Gospel, we pick up where we left
off yesterday. Now, Jesus is briefing a
group of 70 disciples before sending
them out to heal and to proclaim the kingdom of God. Jesus was challenging people to “repent”, to
return to faithfulness to the covenant, and therefore be enabled to participate
in the life of Yahweh’s kingdom. Like the prophets of ancient Israel,
Jesus calls God’s people back to the covenant.
Like the prophets of old,
Jesus pronounces judgment on the villages of Galilee (“Woe to you!”). Just like
the prophets spoken of by Baruch (1.21), Jesus will be rejected by God’s
people, and judgement will fall on the unrepentant nation. This time, it won’t be the Babylonians who
will destroy Jerusalem; it will be the Romans.
In 70 AD, one generation after Jesus’ death, the Roman legions destroyed
the city and the Temple that had been rebuilt after the return from
Babylon. Friedrich Hegel, the renowned
19th-century philosopher, famously said that “the only thing we
learn from history is that we don’t learn
from history.” History tends to
repeat itself. Example: the “Great War” that engulfed the world from 1914-1918 was
called “the war to end all wars” – 20 years after it had ended, World War II
began. Israel’s story is strange and
often tragic; yet, it is the story that culminates in the coming of Jesus of
Nazareth, who himself lives what appears to be a short and tragic life – dying
at a relatively young age, rejected by his own people. And yet, just as God brought new life out of
the ruins of Jerusalem in the 6th century B.C., just as he brought
new life to his people through Jesus, so the Creator also brought new life out of the tomb on Easter morning. Yahweh is always faithful, and not even death
can nullify his plan to rescue his world.
Amen.
“The only thing we learn from history is that we don’t learn from history.” We ignore the written Word of God, “the Jewish book” and the risen Jesus (fully divine “last prophet”) and worship the idols of today. But God knows this and his love never gives up!
ReplyDeletevery well said!
Delete