Word to the Wise
Friday, October 12, 2012 - Friday in the 27th Week in Ordinary Time
[Gal 3:7-14 and Luke 11:15-26]Realize that it is those who have faith who are children of Abraham. Scripture, which saw in advance that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, foretold the good news to Abraham, saying, "Through you shall all the nations be blessed." Consequently, those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham who had faith. [Galatians]
One of my Dominican brothers who is a professor of scripture, particularly Old Testament, once said, "The Old Testmanet is scripture, so why not preach it!" Among Catholics and Catholic preachers, I dare say that most will avoid the Old Testament because some parts of it are hard to read, much less understand, and some parts are not very edifying. The New Testament seems more "accessible" spiritually. Nevertheless, I think my Dominican brother has a point. Today's first scripture provides us with a good example - St. Paul preaching on the Old Testament, particulary Genesis! Paul's cnversion experience on the road to Damascus led him to re-examine his Jewish faith in the light of that experience. Thus he began to understand the meaning of the Old Testament, especially the Mosaic Law contained in the first five books, in the light of his experience of Jesus Christ. Because he was reacting to an understanding of the Law of Moses which gave that law a "salvific effect," he looked to an experience that pre-dated it, the covenant with Abraham! Indeed, we Christians share the connection with Abraham with Jews and Moslems! This is important to any dialog with either of those two great religious families.
What Paul does in Galatians shows us a couple of ways to understand the Old Testament. The first is to look at the overall perspective or story - what scripture scholars call the "meta-narrative." The great narrative of the creation of the world, the creation of human beings, the great flood, the covenant with Abraham, Moses and the Exodus, the arrival in the promised land, the kingdoms of David and Solomon, the Babylonian exile - all of these provide a kind of framework to understand the "zigzag" story of God's plan. St. Paul and the early Christian community began to read this "meta-narrative" in the light of Christ. Abraham's covenant, the prophets and the psalms were all sources of understanding Jesus as the fulfillment of God's promise to Abraham and to King David (2 Sam. 7). This is the second approach, and is the one that official church interpretation adopts. One may approach the Old Testament as ancient literature, or as a book of faith without reference to Jesus, but for Christians the Old Testament is the ground in which Christian faith was rooted and continues. The Easter Vigil experience is an example of that. As my Dominican brother said: "The Old testament is scripture, so why not preach (read) it?" AMEN
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