Holiness reimagined

 

     Hello fellow saints; hi fellow sinners!  As we saw last time, most of the members of the people of God at the time of Jesus didn’t consider themselves to be “bad sinners”; the really bad “sinners” were the tax collectors and the prostitutes.  Most people probably thought that they were doing pretty well.  Also, sickness was often interpreted as a sign that the afflicted person was a worse sinner than healthy people.

     Along with exorcisms and healings, there is another predominant theme in the first two chapters of Mark’s Gospel – the forgiveness of sins.  This had been the essence of John the Baptist’s message – repentance and forgiveness (1.4-5).  Whether John’s preaching was the catalyst of what Mark describes as a national movement of repentance, or whether John simply provided the means for the people to give expression to their repentance (by baptism), the beginning of Mark’s narrative portrays a seemingly universal attitude of contrition and pursuit of forgiveness on the part of the people of God.  This reminds us of certain prayers of repentance found in the Scriptures that reflect the circumstances of the exilic period (cf. Dn. 9; Ez. 9; Neh. 9), the period when Israel was conquered by one pagan empire after another, beginning with the exile in Babylon and continuing to the time of Jesus with Roman rule of the Promised Land.  The prophets, like Isaiah, who announced the end of exile also made it clear that the exile had been the result of the sins of God’s people:

“Comfort, O comfort my people,
    says your God.
Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
    and cry to her
that she has served her term,
    that her penalty is paid,
that she has received from the Lord’s hand
    double for all her sins.

A voice cries out:
“In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord;
    make straight in the desert a highway for our God…” (Is. 40.1-3)

This is what had been said in the book of Deuteronomy – one of the curses for being unfaithful to the covenant with Yahweh was exile from the Promised Land.

     As Israel’s situation of “exile” extended far past the 70 years predicted by Jeremiah (cf. Dn. 9.1-2) and even past the time of the return from Babylon to Jerusalem of certain exiles to rebuild the temple and the City of David, various movements of national renewal came into existence – the Pharisees and the Essenes, to take two examples.  The Pharisees were intent on “sanctifying” Israel by instructing all the members of the people of God to go about their daily lives as if they were in the courts of the Jerusalem Temple, the very abode of Yahweh.  The Essenes, on the other hand, chose to isolate themselves from ordinary society along the shores of the Dead Sea in the Judean wilderness.  They understood themselves to be the true Israelites, the faithful priests of God who would be vindicated when Yahweh returned to free his people and establish his kingdom and inaugurate the Age to Come.  Since the Essenes practiced daily immersions in ritual pools, some have speculated that John may have been a member of this desert community before striking out on his own as an itinerant preacher of repentance.  Whether one sought, à la Pharisees, to live a holy life in society or, à la Essenes, sought a solitary sanctification in the wilds of Judea, the objective was the same – to seek God’s forgiveness and thus the end of Israel’s “exile”.

     Mark chapter 2 begins with Jesus returning home to Capernaum.  For the second time, Jesus is “besieged” by his fellow townsfolk as they throng the house where he is – this time, his own residence (2.1-2; cf. 1.33, 45).  For the first time in the story, mention is made of peoples’ “faith” (2.5; cf. 1.40-42, where the leper demonstrates “faith”, i.e., confidence in Jesus’ ability to heal him).  In response to the faith of the four people who carried the paralyzed man up onto the roof, dug through the roof and then lowered him into the house so Jesus would notice him, Jesus declares the paralytic’s sins to be forgiven.  While the Pharisees desired to live as if they were in “the house of God”, Jesus acts as a kind of “human Temple” – all the benefits of Yahweh’s home (healing, forgiveness; cf. 1.43-44) are available wherever he is.  Whether Jesus had some insight into the paralytic’s personal need of a word of forgiveness or whether Jesus’ declaration is a reflection of his – and John’s – overall mission of restoring the people of God, we are not told.  Whatever the case, it remains true that in the prophetic promises of the return from Babylon, national forgiveness and individual healings were inextricably linked (cf. Is. 35.5-6):

“Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened,
    and the ears of the deaf shall be opened;
then the lame shall leap like a deer,
    and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy…”

  In response to the scribes grumbling concerning his “obvious” lack of credentials for forgiving sins, Jesus ups the ante and asks a rhetorical question as to whether it is easier to tell the man that his sins are forgiven or to tell him to stand up, pick up his mat and walk.  The unspoken message is “if only God can forgive sins, surely only God can heal the lame”; this is followed by an implicit “Just watch me!”  As with the healing of the leper, the thrice-repeated triple formula “Stand up, take your mat and walk/go home” (2.9, 11-12; cf. 1.40-42) drives home the same point – just as the former leper had been “made clean”, this former paralytic had “stood up and walked” home on his own two feet.  In both cases, these former victims had had their agency restored, and had reintegrated society as fully-fledged members of the people of God, free from the burden of guilt.  Healed and forgiven, with a clean bill of health and a clean conscience.  Freedom sure feels good.

Holiness through hospitality

     Between two accounts of Jesus visiting the seaside to teach/heal the ever-present and ever-growing crowds (2.13; 3.7-12), Mark shows us the collision of Jesus’ vision of holiness with that of the Pharisees.  Mark accomplishes this by means of 4 short episodes, each of which contains a question that serves to reveal the underlying motives of these competing visions, the first three being asked by the Pharisees of Jesus/his disciples (concerning eating) and the fourth being asked by Jesus of his opponents (concerning the sabbath; cf. 2.6-9).  Jesus’ unconventional ways about the town of Capernaum now begin to make waves.

     The first episode (2.13-17) begins with Jesus calling Levi son of Alphaeus to follow him (cf. 1.16-20).  The fact that Levi is a tax collector (collaborator with the Romans) means that he is seen to be a traitor to his nation.  Not only that, but he has a large entourage of “sinners” who not only enjoy his hospitality, but are rather fond of Jesus and are even described as “following” Jesus.  Jesus enjoys table fellowship with these “undesirables”.  The Pharisees put their first question rather bluntly: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?” (2.16).  Their query is obviously rhetorical (and carries the force of an exclamation of disgust!) – in first-century Jewish culture, by sharing a meal with people, one identified oneself as a member of the same socio-religious group as one’s table companions.  As he had done during his baptism (1.9-11), Jesus here identifies with the “tax collectors and sinners”; and yet, he does not become absorbed into their “world”, but rather “calls” them out of the world they know into the kingdom of God.

     The second episode (2.18-22) concerns the matter of fasting.  People put the question to Jesus: “Why do John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?” (2.18).  Fasting was a common expression of Jewish piety; Jesus himself fasted in the desert following his baptism (cf. Mt. 4.2; Lk. 4.1-2; cf. Lk. 18.12).  As Jesus responds to the question, he describes the meals he shares with his disciples in terms of a wedding banquet, with himself being the bridegroom.  A wedding banquet was a common image for the kingdom of God (cf. Lk. 14.15; 22.30; Mt. 8.11).  The kingdom-celebration has already begun!  Jesus then adds a cryptic comment about the time “when the bridegroom will be taken away”; when that occurs, says Jesus, his disciples will indeed fast (2.20; cf. 3.6).  In the Scriptures, Israel is often referred to as the “bride” of Yahweh, her husband (cf. Isaiah 54.4-8).  As usual, Mark’s Christology is subtle and not obvious to modern readers.  While the word “God” easily catches our attention, expressions such as “son of man” (2.6-10) or “bridegroom” do not immediately communicate the idea of “divinity” to us.  And yet this is how Mark is telling us that Jesus is the very embodiment of Yahweh – he is doing things that only Yahweh can do (forgiving sins, identifying himself as the husband/creator/redeemer of the people of God: cf. Is. 54.5).  The sayings about the cloth and the wineskins underscore the point that what Jesus has come to do is radically new and is incompatible with the inherited religious categories of his contemporaries (cf. Mt. 5.17-20).  The time of fulfillment has arrived; it can no longer be “business as usual” (cf. Mk. 1.15).  The king is here – it’s time to celebrate (cf. Lk. 15.7, 10)!

The Lord of the Sabbath

     The third episode (2.23-28) has Jesus and his disciples walking through a grainfield on the sabbath day.  The disciples, being hungry, begin to pick/eat heads of grain (a type of “harvesting” activity).  The Pharisees, looking on, angrily ask Jesus: “why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?” (2.24).  Jesus responds with a story from the life of David, Israel’s greatest king.  David had had rather humble origins, being the youngest of the 8 sons of Jesse the Bethlehemite (cf. 1 Samuel 16.1-11).  Not only this, but following his legendary victory over the giant Goliath and a successful career as a general in King Saul’s army (cf. 1 Samuel chapters 17—20), David lost everything due to the king’s jealousy and spent many years on the run for his life with a band of men who were loyal to him (cf. 1 Samuel 21.1-9; cf. 22.1-2).

     Jesus’ reference to David’s life as a fugitive in this episode is the first of four references to David in Mark’s Gospel; by doing this, Jesus is making the claim that he and his disciples are behaving in a way that resembles that of David and his men (sitting loose to the stipulations of the Mosaic Law in favour of an urgent human need, i.e., hunger).  Not only does the Son of Man have authority to forgive sins (2.10), he is lord of the sabbath (2.28).  Jesus claims to have authority to determine what constitutes legitimate sabbath observance.  What is more, by telling this story from David’s life, Jesus is advancing an implicit claim to be the Messiah, a.k.a. the “son of David” (cf. Mk. 10.47-48; 12.35ff).  Jesus’ baptism by John resembles David’s anointing by the prophet Samuel (compare Mk. 1.9-11 with 1 Samuel 16.12-13).  In both instances, the recipient of the blessing (baptism, anointing) also receives the empowerment of the Holy Spirit.  Another parallel between David and Jesus is that when they are designated as king or Son of God, there is no immediate change in their circumstances.  After having been anointed, David resumed his duties as keeper of his father’s sheep; for his part, Jesus actually experienced a loss of status following his baptism, as he abandoned his conventional life as a village labourer and undertook a “career” of itinerant preaching/healing.  As David was pursued by King Saul, Jesus was on the radar of King Herod Antipas who had John the Baptist executed in very dubious circumstances (cf. Mk. 6.14-29; Lk. 13.31-33).

     The fourth episode (3.1-6) has Jesus return to the Capernaum synagogue, once again, on the sabbath (cf. 1.21-28).  The simmering hostility against Jesus among the Pharisees now begins to boil (cf. 2.1-12).  They are watching Jesus intently, like hungry animals stalking prey, waiting for the moment that Jesus will incriminate himself (3.2).  It seems like their resentment about Jesus’ claim to lordship over the sabbath had not subsided, but rather festered.  Jesus’ question unveils their violent agenda: “Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the sabbath, to save life or to kill?” (3.4).  By healing the man’s withered hand with words (“Stretch out your hand”), Jesus did not actually perform any “work”, and thus did not violate the laws of sabbath observance.  At a stroke, Jesus performs a healing, exposes his enemies’ “unlawful” intentions towards him, and demonstrates his adeptness at legal interpretation (and in so doing, shames his adversaries).  The result is predictable – the Pharisees begin to plot how to kill Jesus.  Jesus is announcing and inaugurating the kingdom of God – all must choose whether they want to join this kingdom or rather destroy it.  Are you with Saul or with David (cf. 1 Sam. 22.6-23)?

Two approaches to holiness

“[Jesus] answered, “Let us go on to the neighboring towns, so that I may proclaim the message there also; for that is what I came out to do.” And he went throughout Galilee, proclaiming the message in their synagogues and casting out demons.” (Mk. 1.38-39)

     Preaching in the synagogues and casting out demons – or indeed, casting out demons in synagogues (cf. 1.21-28).  It’s an intriguing way to summarize what Jesus was doing as he walked around the villages of Galilee.  As a matter of fact, most New Testament scholars – even the skeptical ones – agree that Jesus had a reputation for being an exorcist.  Needless to say, Jesus had something of a habit of disrupting the sabbath routine in the synagogues he frequented (cf. 3.1-6).  As I read Mark’s narrative, I get the uneasy sense that had I been in attendance at a synagogue when Jesus made an appearance, I may indeed have taken the side of the Pharisees.  I mean, let’s be fair.  The Pharisees were “ordinary” believers, laypeople.  There can be no doubt that they were committed to following God the best they knew how.  They were studious and learned, well-versed in the Scriptures and the tradition.  They were sincere, earnestly desiring to create the conditions in which God would act to deliver his people.  The Pharisees’ motto seems to have been “to obey God and to have him obeyed” – a praiseworthy goal, as far as it goes (it’s unsettling to note how this description of the Pharisees is what many of us aspire to as Christians).  But what if God turned out to be different from what they had imagined…?

     Perhaps unintentionally, the Pharisaic approach to holiness created a “holy huddle”, a community of “serious” believers who regulated their behaviour and common life with numerous laws, rituals, and well…rules.  As inevitably happens within any human community, there is a “status game” that one can play.  The name of the game, as far as the Pharisees were concerned, was to demonstrate one’s loyalty and devotion to Yahweh through a strict observance of the law of Moses, as interpreted by the Rabbis that one had access to (or whose teachings one had access to).  The unavoidable (and perhaps unforeseen) consequence of such a community is that it is inward-focused.  The priority is determining who is “in” and who is “out”; moreover, much energy is expended in making sure that those who are “in” are behaving in such a manner as to maintain their “insider” status.  In true prophetic fashion, Jesus had a nose for sniffing out hypocrisy and mere “playing of the (status) game” as opposed to genuinely self-giving love of God and neighbour (cf. Mk. 12.28-34).  Jesus wasn’t interested in games – human lives were considered by him to be far too valuable to be reduced to mere tools for the increase of one’s status.  As a Contemporary Christian song from the 1990’s has it: “He was a man of no reputation, and by the wise considered a fool…”  The love of God embodied in Jesus could not be contained by the walls of any synagogue.  Jesus was always “going out” beyond the safety zone, beyond the expectations of the pious, beyond the limits of the “playing field” of the holiness game.  Jesus came “to seek and to save that which is lost” (cf. Lk. 19.10).  As far as Jesus was concerned, holiness was not so much a status to attain, but, as C.S. Lewis put it, a “good infection” to spread around.

     The fact is, church (synagogue) is easy.  Everyone knows the rules.  Everyone is presentable, respectable and polite (almost always).  However, once one leaves the confines of the church – once one attempts to follow Jesus in “the real world” – there are few rules, besides the command to love.  However, as Jesus demonstrated, love is risky.  The sad fact is, many of us have a habit of judging many of the people around us as being unworthy of love.  However, as Jesus repeatedly emphasized, it is precisely those deemed unworthy by those “playing the game” who are the primary “targets” of God’s love (cf. Mk. 2.15-17).  I suppose that as far as Mark is concerned, being holy = following/imitating Jesus, the “Holy One of God” (1.24).  As a lifelong church-goer, I’m acutely aware of the temptation to pretend that “church life” is what being a Jesus-follower is all about.  However, re-reading the Gospel causes that illusion to evaporate.

     Surely, if I am truly following my king, I will experience what his first followers experienced – not confirmation that what I was already doing anyway was adequate, but rather a constant challenge to go beyond the bounds of what is familiar, status-endowing, self-serving and even safe…

     If our holiness is to be like that of Jesus, it cannot be a private, passive thing.  Jesus’ holiness was active and public.  Jesus demonstrated God’s love for people – for the most unholy people of his place and time.  True holiness is never a reason to become prideful; rather, it is an often-painful commitment to follow Jesus to wherever he may lead us, to places that will humble us and make us realize just how much we depend on our Lord for everything.  May our Lord “sanctify” us more and more and may we willingly participate in Jesus’ ongoing mission of spreading holiness around.  Amen.