Word to the Wise
Thursday, March 26, 2009 - Thursday in the Fourth Week of Lent
[Exodus 32:7-14 and John 5:31-47]Do not think that I will accuse you before the Father: the one who will accuse you is Moses, in whom you have placed your hope. For if you had believed Moses, you would have believed me, because he wrote about me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words?
It helps in understanding the gospel scripture today to remember that the early Christian community did not have the bible as we have it today! They did have appreciable amounts of the Old Testament, especially the law (the Pentateuch or first five books) and the prophets and psalms. It was to these writings that they turned as a way of interpreting the life, death and resurrection of Jesus! This is why the expression from Jesus, "because he wrote about me," finds its way into the text today. At the end of the passage from Exodus, God renews the covenant despite the sin of idolatry committed by the community. Since Moses was regarded as the author of the Pentateuch, Jesus points out that Moses wrote about him! Of course, this did not sit well with certain elements of the Jewish community. By the time the Gospel of John was written, there were considerable tensions, some of which resulted in Christians being expelled from synagogues. This could seem like "ancient history" to us except that it shows how the interpretation of the past can strongly impact the way we live in the present and plan for the future! Consider how those interpret church history who advocate a return to the liturgy of the Roman rite as designed by the Council of Trent. Consider how those who hold the opposite view interpret church history. This tension is one of asking who is or is not faithful to the church! The Jews as represented in the Gospel of John claimed to be faithful to Moses and Abraham, but that fidelity did not include a belief in Jesus! The Christian believers in the gospel considered themselves as being faithful to Moses and Abraham because Jesus was/is the reason both those figures existed and had any meaning at all! We individualist Americans tend to separate religious belief from secular life and privatize our faith. In the Middle East, religion is a matter of everyday life and enters into everything. A disagreement over fidelity to Moses could have serious consequences. Perhaps if we allowed our faith to enter into more than certain specific causes such as opposition to abortion or capital punishment (as important as those causes may be) we might find fidelity to Jesus to be a matter of life and death instead of a personal option! AMEN