A Different Messiah [Matthew 22.41-46] (25 March 2012)

During the last three Sundays we have dealt with passages in which Jesus was questioned by different groups. First was the issue of paying the census tax to Caesar. Then was the issue of the resurrection. And finally last week was the matter of the greatest commandment. Today we have Jesus initiating a dialogue with the Pharisees.

The problem with today’s passage is not that Jesus deals with an Old Testament passage here. Rather, the force of what Jesus has done while dealing with this passage has all but obliterated what was done with the passage before Jesus came along. This came to mind when I was preparing for today’s message. 

And so we have a few things to ask ourselves. Why did Jesus choose this passage from the Old Testament? How was this passage interpreted among the Jews at that point? What is Jesus’ interpretation of the passage? And what is it about Jesus’ interpretation that actually silenced the groups that were trying to trap him? 

Before proceeding to answer these questions, we must set in order a couple of things. First, while Jesus probably knew and spoke Greek, given that he was a carpenter in Galilee, it is most likely that he spoke Aramaic while in Jerusalem. Also, while quoting from the Old Testament, he would have quoted from the Hebrew text rather than from the Greek Septuagint.

Second, we must avoid the view that, since Jesus stumped the various groups of interlocutors, these people must have been not very smart. Rather, we must realize that Jesus stumped these teachers of the Torah because he was exceptionally smart. In other words, he is like the good teacher who brings out treasures both old and new depending on whether the wineskins can accommodate the teaching or not.

So what does the Hebrew text say? 

Na-um YHWH la-Adoni: 
shev limini ad-asheet ow-beka ha-dom la-regleka

The poetic nature of the passage is evident in both the rhyme and rhythm. Let me repeat.

Na-um YHWH la-Adoni: 
shev limini ad-asheet ow-beka ha-dom la-regleka

In English we would translate the verse: 

The word of Yahweh to my Lord: 
Sit at my right till I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.

But we still have interpretation problems. And you may ask, “Why in the world is this important?” Why did Jesus bother with this passage? Remember, he is the one who brings it up.

In the 2nd century BC, angered when the Seleucid ruler Antiochus Epiphanes IV sacrificed a pig on the altar of the Temple at Jerusalem, the Jews revolted under the leadership of Judas Maccabeus and his brothers. When the Jews evicted the Seleucids from Jerusalem and its vicinity, the Maccabees set themselves up as rulers. But the Maccabees were priests in the Temple and had to justify their rule since they were not descended from David.

They found support in Psalm 110, which Jesus quotes here in our passage for today. Psalm 110.4 says, “The LORD has sworn and will not change his mind: ‘You are a priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek.’” This allowed the Maccabees to say that Yahweh’s plan was to have a priestly ruler.

The Jews accepted this for two reasons. First, they were honest with their scriptures. While speaking about Solomon in 2 Samuel 7, God promises that God will establish Solomon’s throne forever. But the Jews knew that something had gone wrong. Solomon’s throne, David’s throne, had not lasted more than a few centuries. Wave after wave of foreign invasions had finally resulted in the deportation of the last Davidic king to Babylon. And since that time there had been no throne of David, no throne of Solomon.

Second, Psalm 110 was an obscure scripture that no one knew what to do with until the Maccabees came to the picture. We find this hard to believe given that Psalm 110.1 is the most quoted Old Testament verse in the New Testament. But before the Maccabees, this psalm was an obscure one. So when the Maccabees interpreted the scripture in a certain way, the Jews were just glad to have an interpretation!

So how did they interpret it? They interpreted it as a regular prophecy one might find in any of the prophetic books. So they interpreted it this way:

The oracle of Yahweh: To my lord, (that is to Yahweh’s king,)

sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.

According to this view the words “my lord” refers to anyone whom Yahweh installs as king. Then apart from the fact that the psalm was written by David, there is no further need to keep David in the picture. 

According to the Maccabean view, the verse is not talking about a king descended from David, but any Jewish king who ruled from Jerusalem. And so the Maccabean rulers are also included in the interpretation.

When the Maccabean rulers soon became corrupt in just over a decade and themselves profaned the worship in the Temple, the Jews now had no way of critiquing their rule because they had already accepted the Maccabean interpretation of Psalm 110.1. Eventually, the Maccabees were removed from power by the Roman General Pompey in 63 BC, just a century after the Seleucids were driven out.

So for a period of about 150 years the Jews had no way of critiquing rulers like the Maccabees. And then came Jesus. What he did was twofold. First, he reinterpreted the Psalm. Second, he indicated the single most important factor about the reign of the true Messiah. And on both counts he excludes the Maccabean rulers. But he also critiques the then – and now – prevalent view of the reign of the Messiah.

So let us see how Jesus reinterpreted the psalm. Prior to the Maccabees, the psalm was ignored. Then for about 150 years the psalm was interpreted according to the template provided by the Maccabean rulers. Then Jesus reinterpreted the psalm and the interpretation he offered for this psalm is the interpretation it has held ever since. Even the Jews subsequently accepted this interpretation that they learnt from the Church even though they rejected Jesus as their Messiah. And this is why uncovering the earlier interpretation of the Maccabees is extremely difficult.

Jesus said that we should interpret the psalm not as a regular prophecy, but as a poem that is presenting a mystery. “Yahweh said to my lord, that is David’s lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.” According to this view, the words “my lord” refers to the Messiah, who alone could qualify as David’s lord. But this immediately presents a mystery in the first century, how can the Messiah be David’s son?

But the mystery is also unraveled if we listen carefully to Jesus. What Jesus is doing is saying, “We know that the Messiah is David’s descendant But this psalm indicates that David calls the Messiah ‘Lord’. Let us interpret the difficult passage – Psalm 110 – in light of the easier passage – 2 Samuel 7.”

So what does 2 Samuel 7 say? In that passage Yahweh promises David, “I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, your own flesh and blood, and I will establish his kingdom. He is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be his father, and he will be my son.”

In other words, while the Messiah was expected to be David’s son, at a deeper level the Messiah would have a relationship with God so special that he would be God’s son.

This is much like the saying where Jesus says that those who do not hate their father and mother are not worthy of entering the kingdom of God. We know what he means there. He is telling us that our love for him must be so great, so intense, so all-encompassing that in comparison the love for our parents would seem to be completely missing.

In the same way, while the Messiah is David’s descendant, his son-ship to God is of such a nature that it would seem as though his son-ship to David were lacking.

While not discounting the importance of the biological descent of the Messiah, Jesus insists that the spiritual descent is more important. The Messiah is first and foremost God’s son as revealed in the promise to David. Indeed, if we look at the practices then prevalent in the Middle East we would realize that at the right hand of the king was where the crown prince sat.

It is because his son-ship to God takes precedence over his son-ship to David that the Messiah is asked to sit at God’s right hand. But more than this, it means that there is something inherently different between someone who is primarily David’s son and someone who is primarily God’s son.

And this brings us to the most important factor about the Messiah’s reign, something we so easily skip. After Jesus’ reinterpretation of Psalm 110 as a Messianic Psalm, we forget what the Psalm says. So let us go back to the Psalm and see what Jesus quotes: “Yahweh said to my lord” That was the riddle or mystery, which we have solved to indicate that Yahweh spoke to David’s lord, the Messiah. And Jesus continues, “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.”

This is a critique of all views that insist that the Messiah is a military conqueror. Yahweh tells the Messiah, “Sit!” He does not say, “Fight at my right hand and both of us will make your enemies your footstool!” He says, “Sit!”

Jesus tells his audience and us that the true Messiah is asked to be passive while God orchestrates history to the point where all the enemies of the Messiah acknowledge his authority over them.

What Jesus has done is provided his audience with an interpretive tool by which they can critique any messianic claimant. If they follow Jesus’ scheme of things they will be able to see that Judas Maccabeus and his brothers did not fulfill Psalm 110 for two reasons. First, they were not descended from David. Second, and more importantly, they did not “sit at God’s right hand”. In the same way they could have dismissed every single of their messianic claimants because every one of them wanted to fight. In other words, Jesus is saying, “If your view of the Messiah includes a battle waged by him then you are expecting a false messiah.”

This critique holds true for us Christians too. As I prepare for the studies on the Revelation of Jesus Christ, I come across so many interpretations that are gory and reveal the thirst for blood that many Christians have. Jesus, according to many of these interpretations, will return and wage war against his enemies and the Antichrist and destroy them.

But according to Psalm 110 the Messiah does nothing to make his enemies submit. That is done by God and we don’t know how he will do it. In other words, Jesus will not return until God has brought Jesus’ enemies to the point where they will acknowledge his authority over them.

Do not conclude that I am saying that Jesus cannot return today. Neither you nor I know whether Jesus’ enemies are ready to submit to him or not. All I am saying is that he will return when God has brought his enemies to the point where they are ready to submit. That may be today. It may be many years from now. 

The chronological time is not the crucial issue – unlike so many people trying to predict the date when he will return. Rather, it is the momentous time that is crucial. He will return when God has fulfilled Psalm 110.1.

Our major creeds tell us that Jesus is right now seated at the right hand of God the Father. And that when he returns, it will be to judge rather than to fight. This current age is the time captured by the word ‘until’ in Psalm 110.1. Jesus is seated at the right hand of God and will continue doing that ‘until’ God has brought Jesus’ enemies to the point where they will acknowledge his supremacy.

Jesus will return when the time is ripe. His enemies will submit then. But he will not come to wage a conquest over his enemies. Indeed, in about 12 days we will observe the solemn day on which he was victorious over his enemies. If we are looking for a conquering Jesus to return, we are looking for a figment of our imagination and we then need to repent. The only Jesus who will return is the one who has already won when he hung on the cross.

To Find Ourselves With Jesus [Luke 23.46] (6 April 2012)

If you were to dramatize this word, or rather the fulfillment of this word, how would you do it? If you were given the reins in the production of a movie, how would you visualize what Jesus is promising this thief? You see, this is the only word among the seven that actually explicitly contains a promise.

And this is also the only word that contains grammatical and socio-cultural difficulties – one of each type. On the grammatical front is the possibility of two readings. First, Jesus could have said, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.” Second, Jesus could have said, “Truly I tell you today, you will be with me in paradise.” Just a matter of where to place a comma!

Was Jesus saying that the promise would have been fulfilled on that very day when the two of them hung from their respective crosses? Or was he simply asserting that he is making a promise on that very day? This is no idle difference because where God is concerned both the making and the fulfilling of the promise are important. This is why we observe Maundy Thursday and partake of communion – it was the occasion when Jesus made a promise to all his followers, that he would be present when we remember him. And this is why we are here to observe Good Friday – it was when Jesus fulfilled his promise of being the Son of Man who would give his life as a ransom for many.

On the socio-cultural front is the word ‘paradise’. Is paradise like the recent Idea advertisement in which Bacchhan the younger floats before some gates in the clouds? Is paradise a way of talking about heaven, the realm which is the abode of God? 

The word ‘paradise’ strictly refers to a garden. If you know a Muslim or Parsee named Firdaus, you have encountered the word ‘paradise’. Firdaus is the most beautiful garden in the afterlife.

Our difficulties are compounded by the fact that, apart from this passage, the word appears in the New Testament in only two other places – 2 Corinthians 12.4 and Revelation 2.7. In the first passage, Paul writes, “I know that this man was caught up to paradise and heard inexpressible things, things that no one is permitted to tell.” A verse before this Paul speaks of someone being caught up to the third heaven. 

In Revelation, to the church in Ephesus Jesus writes, “To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to eat from the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God.” This seems to indicate a garden, for where else would a tree grow?

If we are honest, we will have to say that neither of the verses really tells us what paradise is like. Paul’s use pulls us in the direction of heaven while Revelation pulls us in the direction of a garden.

So if we try to interpret this word in a grammatical or socio-cultural manner, we simply get bogged down with questions that cannot be resolved.

But if we interpret this word by placing ourselves in the shoes of the thief, we reach a different conclusion. If we were dying on a cross, what would be going through our minds? If I were a Jew dying on the cross, I would have thought of Deuteronomy 21.23, which says, “Anyone who is hung on a pole is under God’s curse.” What would have been at the forefront of his mind is the fact that he had done something that had resulted in his being in this accursed situation. What he would have been yearning for at that point is for the situation to be reversed, for the curse to be lifted.

And now we are in a position to see that no matter when the promise is fulfilled – on that day or at some point in the future – and no matter where – in an earthly garden or in the heavens – paradise was a place in which no accursed person would be found.

And so what Jesus does here is brilliant. The thief has just stated that Jesus is an innocent man by saying, “This man has done nothing wrong.” And so, when the thief turns to him, Jesus responds, “You will be with me in paradise.” 

The thief has just stated that Jesus is innocent, meaning that Jesus will go to the place where the righteous go. Jesus uses the word paradise as a means of affirming the thief’s faith. No matter how you imagined paradise to be, it was where all the righteous people would go. By declaring Jesus innocent, the thief had already declared that Jesus would go to paradise. 

Jesus does not introduce anything new in his use of the word paradise. He could have said ‘heaven’ or ‘in God’s kingdom’ or ‘in Abraham’s bosom’ or any of the numerous ways in which Jews referred to the place where the righteous go.

What is specific to Jesus is his words ‘with me’. To the dying man, the dying Jesus offers the assurance that he will be with Jesus. You see we can get bogged down by grammatical issues. We can debate what the nature of paradise is. 

But frankly, when you strip everything away, if we imagined the next world to be a garden, would we rejoice if we found ourselves in a garden, but without Jesus? If we imagined we would be in a throne room or in a palatial house or in a beautiful city with gold streets, would we be happy if we found ourselves in such an environment, but without Jesus?

It does not matter when it will happen – at the moment I die or many years after that. It does not matter where I find myself – in a garden or in a city. What matters eventually is that I find myself with Jesus.

To Whom Do We Belong? [Matthew 22.15-22] (4 March 2012)

Recently, I had the remarkable experience of dining in the dark. Absolute, pitch black darkness. Darkness of such depth that opening your eyes was actually painful to me as my pupils probably dilated beyond anything they had done before, trying in vain to capture the slightest bit of light so as to make the world around me visually comprehensible. And as I have thought about this experience, I have realized that I was, for that brief period, exposed to another world to which I previously had no access – the world in which the visually impaired live and move and have their being. It was a world I could not fathom before this experience.

A Roman in first century Judea was in a similar situation. He was surrounded by a world filled with Jews and Jewish hopes and throbbing with Jewish expectations. A world in which there were objections – violent at times and repeated – to what most peoples considered unobjectionable.

In his speech in Acts 5 Peter mentions a Judas the Galilean who opposed a tax. This was at or around the time when Jesus was born, when Joseph and the pregnant Mary went to Bethlehem to be registered. This was not the only occasion on which Jews revolted over the issue of taxation.

No other province of the Roman Empire ever had such an issue. And the questions we must ask ourselves are: Why were the Jews opposed to being taxed? And why did the Pharisees and Herodians ask Jesus about this? And what is the meaning of Jesus’ counter-question and his final answer?

Now let’s get this clear, we all are opposed to being taxed! If the Income Tax department were to announce that they were raising the tax exemption limit, I reckon there is not one person here who would complain. If they announced a reduction in the taxation rates across the board, there would be celebrations galore!

But some of the Jews were violently opposed to being taxed. Why? I must tell you that we have been misled. The New Testament has three different words that are often translated with the English word ‘tax’. In this case it is the word κῆνσος from which we get the word ‘census’. In fact, from the fact that this tax involved the payment of only one denarius, or a day’s wage for an average worker, we can conclude that this was not a way of filling the coffers of the Empire. Rather, it was an issue of counting the people. No one would give two denarii when only one was required. So by counting the denarii the Emperor would know the number of people.

Once we realize this, we can understand the Jewish sentiment by reading Exodus 30.12: “When you take a census of the Israelites to count them, each one must pay the LORD a ransom for his life at the time he is counted. Then no plague will come on them when you number them.”

The ransom was to be paid to God. However, in a Roman census, the money obviously went to Caesar, not God. Some Jews concluded that they were still under Roman oppression because Jews were paying the census money. And so whenever the Romans initiated a census, there was a Jewish revolt – no exceptions!

So we know now why some Jews were violently opposed to the census. They concluded that a census by a Gentile ruler violated the command in Exodus 30.12. There is more, but that will come out a little later. Now we have to ask ourselves why the Pharisees and Herodians asked Jesus about it.

We have to realize first that the Pharisees and Herodians were opposed to each other. The Pharisees did not like Roman rule and decried Herod’s Edomite heritage. The Herodians supported Herod’s rule and therefore Roman rule since Herod was a vassal king. 

A sharp person like Jesus quickly smelled something fishy when these two groups came together to interrogate him. But they asked him about the census. Why? 

What about Jesus would have led them to do this? We should not think of the account in Matthew 17, which was concerning the tax paid to the temple, which would have gone, therefore, to God. Thus far there is no explicit reference in Matthew’s Gospel to any taxes.

But we have a list of Jesus twelve apostles. And that list includes Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot. This indicates that Simon belonged to the group of Zealots, while Judas belonged to the group of Sicarii. Both were anti-Roman groups, violently opposed to Roman rule. 

The presence of these two among Jesus close followers would immediately have raised the issue about the census. Was Jesus sympathetic to the views of these two disciples and the seditious groups they were from? Were they with Jesus because Jesus held the same views about the census?

The Pharisees and Herodians come and ask Jesus a question. They address him as Rabbi, indicating that they expect him to take on a rabbi’s mantle and answer. Hence, the question must be about an issue of religious law.

“Is it right to pay the census or not?” they ask. If Jesus says, “Yes” then the Pharisees would say he is a Roman collaborator. And if he says, “No” then the Herodians would label him a dissenter, one who opposed Caesar’s rule.

Jesus asks them a counter question, which gets to the heart of his response. “Whose image is this and whose inscription?” The second commandment of the Ten Commandments prohibits making of images of God. However, the denarius then in use carried Tiberius Caesar’s bust profile and an inscription that read: “Tiberius Caesar, Worshipful Son of the God Augustus.” 

The image and inscription were other reasons for which some Jews were violently opposed to the census. It struck at the very roots of their faith at so many points.

When Jesus finally responds by saying, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s” he has done the impossible. Stuck between a rock and a hard place, he has emerged having shattered both.

The Herodians cannot complain because Jesus has said, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s” and according to them the coin belonged to Caesar. In fact, the coin would have been a constant reminder of Caesar’s rule over the Empire. So, from their perspective, Jesus has said that it is okay to pay the census. 

Unfortunately, this is how most Christian interpreters view what Jesus is saying. This is because we Gentiles try to understand Jesus as though he were a Gentile, when we know that he was Jewish.

But the Pharisees would have gotten two more levels of meaning. First, they would have realized that Jesus was saying, “This image and inscription strike at the very foundations of our faith. According to our faith, the whole world, the whole universe belongs to God. And so nothing belongs to Caesar. Caesar’s rule and God’s rule are exclusive. You cannot have both together. You either say that Caesar owns the coins and deny your faith in God or you say that God owns everything and deny Caesar the right to hold a census.”

Only this can account for the charge leveled against Jesus in Luke 23.2: “We have found this man subverting our nation. He opposes payment of taxes to Caesar and claims to be Messiah, a king.” The Pharisees understood what Jesus was saying and they used it against him when they brought him before Pilate. In fact, they twisted Jesus’ words and made it apply to all taxes and not just the census. But they could not have done this had Jesus not given them some ammunition to play with!

Second, the Pharisees would have understood that Jesus was alluding to the opening chapter of Scripture, in which humans are said to be the image of God. Looking at the coin Jesus asks, “Whose image is this?” And then he concludes, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.” The obvious question, left unasked, is, “If this coin bears Caesar’s image, then where can we find God’s image?”

Then from the narrative in Genesis 1 we can conclude that all humans are the image of God. And so what Jesus is saying is, “If this coin, bearing Caesar’s image, can be considered to be the property of Caesar, then humans, bearing God’s image, are the property of God.”

In other words, the question originally asked has been rendered nonsensical because Caesar himself, being a human, belongs to God. How then is he appropriating for himself things that bear his image? Caesar, being human, belongs to God, and therefore possesses nothing.

Now it is important to step back and actually see the context once again. This passage is not about the taxes we are burdened with such as income tax or professional tax or sales tax or value added tax. It is blatantly incorrect to understand Jesus supporting the payment of taxes or opposing it based on this passage.

The passage is about a method of carrying out a numbering of the citizens of a nation. The most commonly used method was to collect a small piece of currency for the simple reason that you would never over count when you ask people to cough up money!

And frankly it is not about the money eventually. As we have seen the denarius was the daily wage of an average worker. It was not a huge prohibitive amount.

What this passage is about is simple: To whom do humans belong? Do humans belong to the king or the country or the government? 

According to Exodus 30, the census amount was paid when the person was counted, “a ransom for his life at the time he is counted.” Why? Simply because were it not for God’s provision, the person being counted could have been dead the day before or a week before! He is alive and ready to be counted not because of the king or the country or the government, but because of God.

The census practice is a simple step of faith by which the Jew proclaimed, “I am alive today by the grace of God.” The same practice was conducted by the ancient rulers by which they proclaimed, “Everyone numbered in this way belongs to me.”

The divergence of these two perspectives is like the difference between my daily experiences and the one I had when I dined in the dark. Unless experienced, neither can comprehend the other.

And hence, the Herodians withdraw thinking Jesus has said it is okay to pay the census money when Jesus has actually done the opposite. He has said, “Counting must be done by the owner. Humans belong to God. And so, only God can do the counting. Counting of humans as done by Caesar, is an affront to the reign of God.”

Give to God what belongs to God.

The Excluded Prophet [Matthew 3.13-17] (22 January 2012)

If ever there were a passage that requires an understanding not only of history, but also of geography, it is this one. But before we get to that, let us ask a simple question: What images play out in our minds when we read the accounts of Jesus’ baptism? 

Many movie directors have attempted to visualize this scene for us. Here are a couple of such visualizations. 

1. Baptism of Jesus
2. From Jesus of Nazareth
3. From Jesus

If we compare these visualizations with current Christian practice we would find a lot of overlap. And one would come away with the impression that the baptism administered by John was a ritual that looked very much like Christian baptism. 

But is this necessarily so? More to the point, is there evidence that this was so? 

Just to make a stark contrast, would you imagine that the prayers of a devout Hindu or Muslim were similar to your prayers? The word for prayer exists in every language, but we know that Christian prayer is quite different from Hindu and Muslim prayer. Indeed, even different from Jewish prayer. 

Further, a Christian fast differs from a Hindu or Muslim or Jewish fast. Just on Friday, Alice and I went to a place in Jayanagar that dishes out Maharashtrian food. And prominent on the menu were items to be eaten when one is fasting, something quite out of place within the Christian context. 

My point is simply this: The context within which a word appears determines its meaning. And this is true also of the words ‘baptism’ and ‘baptize’. We cannot assume that the mode of John’s baptism was the same as that practiced by Christians. And we will see that the mode of John’s baptism is critical to understand the puzzling fact that, though John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, Jesus, whom we believe was sinless, nevertheless submitted to this baptism. 

The noun form ‘baptism’ is found only in Christian writings, so it is difficult to understand from it what John was doing. However, the verb ‘to baptize’ is common in Jewish writings by the time of Jesus. In the Septuagint, it appears only once, in 2 Kings 5 to describe Namaan’s act of immersing himself in the Jordan. 

This single occurrence, however, gave rise to a common Jewish use and the verb ‘to baptize’ appears in numerous Jewish writings. The main idea in these writings is that of a cleansing ritual. Like all the Jewish rituals, these were supposed to be done repeatedly, whenever one had done something that rendered a person unclean. 

Moreover, as in the Namaan passage, all occurrences are in the reflexive form. One performed this baptizing on oneself. 

These two aspects – repetition and self-administration – set the Jewish usage of the word apart from both John’s baptism and Christian baptism. Christian baptism and John’s baptism differed from Jewish baptism in that they were both administered only once and by someone else. 

However, the New Testament writings link baptism with cleansing, something that John does not do. In other words, we are talking of three different meanings for the verb ‘to baptize’ – the then common Jewish one, the one that would develop within the church, and the one meant by John. The first two – Jewish and Christian – differed from John’s in that they linked baptism with cleansing, while John linked it to the act of repentance. 

Further, Jewish and Christian baptism could be performed anywhere, but John seemed to have insisted on performing his baptism near the Jordan. The Gospel of John indicates that John administered his baptism while on the Eastern bank of the Jordan. So what did this area look like?

Click here for pictures

From these pictures, one thing is clear. The Jordan was quite a dirty river in the region around Jericho and Bethany. In other words, if John intended his baptism to be a cleansing ritual, he couldn’t have chosen a worse place! No one would have gone to the Jordan to become clean. That was precisely what Namaan objected to! 

So what in the world was John the Baptist doing? The key to this lies in the location he had chosen. He did not choose just any part of the Jordan, but the region right across from Jericho as we saw in the aerial view of the Jordan valley. 

This was an evocative location, filled with history and remembrance for the Jews and we dare not forget that John, his disciples, Jesus and his disciples were all Jews. What would these Jews have brought to mind? 

What else but their ancestors standing at the threshold of the promised land a millennium and a half earlier!? Something was happening here under the eye of John that was intended to bring to mind the end of the desert wanderings and the entry into the Promised Land. 

In a nutshell, the Exodus story was this: Israel was enslaved in a land of captivity. Under the guidance of Moses they were led out of Egypt and into the wilderness where they were tested for 40 years. At the end of the 40 years they find themselves at the Eastern bank of the Jordan, across from Jericho, waiting to enter the land God had promised Abraham. 

Now let us turn our focus back on John. The Gospel accounts of his ministry place him clearly in the wilderness region. And here he is at the Eastern bank of the Jordan. He has called Israel to come out of the land of enslavement to sin and to join him on the Eastern bank of the Jordan to prepare for the Kingdom of God, the ultimate Promised Land. 

This view of John’s baptism accounts for a number of things that are otherwise inexplicable. 

First, it accounts for why John’s ministry is a desert ministry. There is nothing really great about being in a desert unless it were pointing to a larger truth, in this case the Exodus and desert wanderings. 

Second, it account for why John located himself across from Jericho. At that time, Jericho was a village of insignificance in the first century. John could very well have located himself further North, nearer Galilee where Jesus would begin his own ministry. The only reason for choosing Jericho was once again to evoke the entrance in the Promised Land. 

Third, it accounts for why the dirtiness of the Jordan did not faze John. His was not a baptism of cleansing, which would require clean water. The idea here was not that of having water poured on you or of your being immersed in the water. Rather the idea was that you cross a body of water, like the Israelites crossed the Red Sea. And then you enter the desert. 

Fourth, it explains why the Gospel accounts indicate that when Jesus came through the water, he was led to the desert to be tempted for 40 days. If John’s baptism were simply like Christian baptism, this would be a mysterious thing. 

However, if John were re-enacting the Exodus and desert wanderings, this makes sense. Coming out of a land of enslavement and then being in the desert for a symbolic 40 days is as close to a re-enactment as one could get. In other words, we should treat the account of Jesus’ temptation as another aspect of his baptism by John rather than a separate occasion. 

Fifth, it explains why, contrary to Jewish baptism and the water rituals of every other religion, John’s baptism was not self-administered. The Israelites in Egypt needed a deliverer to take them out of Egypt and to herd them through the desert. They couldn’t do it themselves and so also John’s baptism required the hand of John. 

Sixth, it explains why, contrary to Jewish baptism and the water rituals of every other religion, John’s baptism was done only once on a person. If it were cleansing, it would have to be repeated again and again, like the Christian counterpart of confessing of sins. But if it were an enactment of the Exodus and desert wanderings then it needed to be done only once. In fact, it could not be done more than once. Entrance into the Promised Land is not a repeatable event. 

Seventh, it explains what is embarrassing if we pause to think of it. Which religious movement would begin with an account that its Guru was actually sanctioned by someone lesser than he? Krishna, in the Mahabharata, needs no human sanctioning. He arrives at the scene and is self-attested. The same is true of Ram in the Ramayana. And Mohammed too has no pre-cursor. But here we have Jesus coming to John right after John has declared openly that he is unworthy even to do a slaves work for Jesus. 

We are now in a position to understand what John was saying and therefore what was happening when Jesus was baptized. John calls the attention of his hearers to the fact that there are two non-repeatable baptisms. On the one hand, there is his baptism of repentance in water for the forgiveness of sins. On the other hand, there is the baptism in the Holy Spirit and fire, the baptism that Jesus administers. And this is why the Gospel of John clarifies that Jesus did not baptize people with water as the medium. 

Now we can understand the strange exchange between John and Jesus. This is what our passage says: 

John has made a distinction between the baptism he administers and the baptism Jesus administers. And he has already said that Jesus’ baptism is the superior one. When he says, “I need to be baptized by you” he does not mean that Jesus should immerse him in water or pour water over his head. Rather, he is saying that he wants to experience that wonderful Spirit baptism that Jesus administers. 

And when Jesus says, “It is proper for us to do this to fulfil all righteousness” what does he mean? The conventional view of John’s baptism that makes it like Christian baptism cannot account for this and we then have to speak of Jesus identifying with sinners. But if he was sinless, this baptism at John’s hand would have been a farce. 

But if John was like Moses leading the former slaves to the border of the Promised Land, then it makes sense. For Moses did not enter the Promised Land. Rather, the one who took the Israelites into the Promised Land was the one after whom Jesus himself was named – Joshua. 

What Jesus is saying is this, “You have begun a re-enactment of the Exodus and desert wanderings. You have taken on the role of Moses. But you know that you cannot enter the Promised Land. You must now hand over the mantle to the one who will complete this enactment – me. This is how you and I are related in God’s plan. You are like Moses. I am like Joshua. And while both you and I would love it if you could experience this wonderful Spirit baptism, you, like Moses, cannot experience it.” 

This is why later in his ministry, Jesus would say, “The law and the prophets were until John. Since then the good news of the Kingdom of God is being preached.” What else would we expect from the one who is to complete what John began and bring his people to that Promised Land which is the life in the Spirit?

An End to the Slickest Trick Up Satan's Sleeve [Matthew 12.22-32] (15 January 2012)

Those who follow electoral processes the world over know of the phenomenon of anti-incumbency. The bane of corruption in our country has made many raise the cry for an anti-incumbent vote when the next general elections come about. But the question no one seems to want to ask is, “Will the new people prove to be any better?”

Believe it or not, Jesus addresses just such a question in our passage. In our passage, Jesus has just healed a person who was demon possessed, blind and mute. Our passage does not allow us to draw any causal links between the three. The people are amazed at this healing. And this prompts an accusation on the part of the Pharisees.

They say that Jesus can do such things because he is hand in glove with the prince of demons, Beelzebul. To them, Jesus is like the apprentice to the master conjurer Beelzebul and that together they had pulled off this hoax. 

The idea is that Beelzebul has ordered his demons to leave whenever Jesus asked them to leave. In other words, Jesus is successful with his exorcisms because he has made a pact with Beelzebul.

If I were in his place, I would have retaliated, gotten angry, and lost my cool. But Jesus does nothing stupid. Rather, he asks for reasons for their hypothesis.

The Jews had many official exorcists. These were professionals who were called upon to cast out demons from people who were possessed. Jesus asks the Pharisees, how they are able to distinguish between his so-called ‘exorcism’ and the supposedly genuine exorcisms of the Jewish exorcists. What criteria do you use to separate truth from falsehood?

You see from the immediate effects on a person, a true exorcism and a fake one cannot be told apart. This is because, for a fake to masquerade effectively as the real thing, there must be some positive effect for some time at least. If right away the person goes back to being tormented, then everyone would know it was a fake. So the immediate effects are inconclusive.

But more than this, Jesus points his finger at the Jewish exorcists. Let me ask you, why are there so many doctors? Because people repeatedly fall ill. Why are there so many engineers? Because we constantly want new things designed. Why do we have so many teachers? Because there are so many children in need of being taught. But the demand for something does not imply that what is supplied will have any worthwhile quality. There are quacks in every line of work – bad doctors, unqualified engineers and uninspiring teachers. The demand for something only ensures that something will be supplied. Quantity can be assured, but not quality.

So why was there a flourishing group of exorcists in Jesus’ day? With population being pretty stagnant, one could not hope for more clients. The only plausible reason was that they could hope for return business. Like a person going to the barber every few weeks for a trim, people used to visit exorcists regularly. 

Jesus hints at this a little later in Matthew 12 in the saying about the return of the unclean spirit. After a cooling off period, during which the delivered person experiences a semblance of freedom from oppression, the demon returns with others of its ilk.

So Jesus is asking the Pharisees a simple question, “Do you think God does such a patchwork job?” In other words, if God were behind the casting out of any demon, this should be a permanent state. There should not be a need to return for the same process to be repeated.

So Jesus actually turns the tables on the Pharisees. In effect he says that the repetitious nature of the work of the Jewish exorcists meant that theirs was not a permanent solution, only a temporary one.

But Jesus goes even further. He says that this temporary solution actually is Satanic in nature. Unbeknownst to themselves, the Pharisees have actually stumbled upon the driving force behind repeated exorcisms. In repeated exorcisms, Satan relinquishes one manifestation and assumes another.

If a person is too troubled with symptom A, Satan will give up symptom A and in a little time show up again with symptom B. When the person gets too troubled with symptom B, Satan will give that up too and resurface with symptom C.

This is the anti-incumbency I mentioned earlier. The person just does not want the current demonic occupant. But not having an occupant just does not seem to be a possibility. Moreover, at times, the new occupant proves to be worse than the previous one. And so the cycle perpetuates itself, lengthy periods of oppression alternated with brief periods of relative freedom. But never a full freedom that God alone could and would give.

Jesus is the one who gives full freedom. And he describes this in terms of plundering a strong man’s house. Jesus is clearly indicating that he is the one doing the plundering. However, this does not mean he is a thief! Rather, if a thief had stolen something that was mine and I went to his house, tied him up and recovered what was rightfully mine, I might be considered a vigilante but not a thief. So also with Jesus. If the law cannot do it, it must be done outside the law!

What rightfully belongs to Jesus is all of creation. Jesus depicts his exorcisms as a sign that he is reclaiming what is his. He is plundering Satan’s loot. He is releasing the captives. 

But this must mean that the strong man – Satan – is bound already, for Jesus is clear that unless the strong man is bound his house cannot be plundered.

Binding the strong man is in effect incapacitating him, defanging the serpent, rendering him unable to perform his quintessential trick. And Satan’s biggest and slickest and most effective trick is to make us believe we are free while we are still enslaved. Satan expelling himself only to resurface later is his slickest act.

And each time, as Jesus indicates later in Matthew 12, the resurfacing is worse. One addiction gives way to another that is more potent and more insidious. One habit yields to another that is more despicable and more demeaning. 

It is like flying a kite. In order to get the kite higher you must allow the string to have some slack. If you only pull and keep the string taut, the kite cannot rise. But if you give some slack the kite will rise. However, though the kite rises, it is not free like a bird. It is still tethered to the string.

Having heard the accusations of the Pharisees, Jesus provides them with a very scientific way of proceeding. He gives them a testable hypothesis. He says that there are two kinds of exorcisms. One needs to be repeated every so often. The other is permanent. Moreover, there are two forces behind exorcisms. One is done by the Holy Spirit. The other is done by Satan. 

He asks them to match the type of exorcism to the force behind it. Is it more likely that the permanent one is Satanic or that the permanent one is powered by the Holy Spirit? Does God truly free people or does God keep them tethered? 

The obvious conclusion is that the permanent one is powered by the Holy Spirit and the temporary one is Satanic.

Jesus is telling them, “If my exorcisms prove to be permanent, then they are done by the power of the Holy Spirit and you have missed the arrival of the kingdom of God. But if my exorcisms prove to be temporary, then I too am like your exorcists.”

It is important to note here that it is possible to have the best intentions and still perpetuate something that is Satanic. The Jewish exorcists certainly believed that they were doing things for the good of people. They, like many today, saw possession as a very common, one might even say natural, state in which humans may find themselves. You drove one demon out today. But a week from today or maybe a month, you would have to drive out another.

Jesus tells us that this kind of a cycle is Satanic in nature. For God does not initiate half-baked temporary measures, but permanent ones. God does not deliver a person one day only to enslave on another day.

Jesus is telling us that the days of repeated exorcisms are gone. The days of Satanic self-expulsion are in the past. We now live in an unprecedented era of the Holy Spirit in which we can taste lasting permanent freedom from the oppressive forces of darkness that aim to bind us. “If I, by the Spirit of God, cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has overtaken you.”

The Consolation of Israel [Luke 2.21-40] (1 January 2012)

Most years we do not get the opportunity that we have today. Christians worship on Sundays for the most part and on one Friday of the year. Many churches do not even have a service on Christmas, unless Christmas happens to fall on a Sunday, as it did last year. Strange, isn’t it, to say ‘last year’ when it was only last week!? And it is only when Christmas falls on a Sunday that the following Sunday happens to coincide with the events narrated in today’s text. And Christians, being Gentiles for the most part, being non-Jewish, really have no point of reference for these events. Circumcision, purification, temple, the sacrificial system, all are foreign to us and we choose to avoid passages in the bible that deal with such aspects of Old Testament faith.

However, the reality is this: Jesus was born into a devout Jewish family and he died a devout Jew. And so, if we wish to understand who Jesus was and what he did – or at least what he was perceived to be doing – we cannot avoid passages that deal with aspects of Old Testament faith.

And so we have in today’s passage a event that happened on the eighth day of Jesus’ life. In other words, today is the anniversary of Jesus’ circumcision. And so today’s message is not a New Year’s message. I consider that Pastor Arun Andrews, who gave us a beautiful message yesterday, has already given us a New Year’s challenge, freeing today for a look at the events recorded by Luke.

Today’s passage is humongous, however, and there is no way we can cover all of it. But we can zero in on one character. And so let us focus on the person who makes a prophecy – Simeon.

Simeon is the third person – after John the Baptist and Elizabeth – whom Luke tells us is associated with the Holy Spirit. But Luke makes the association extremely strong by linking Simeon and the Holy Spirit not once but three times in the span of three verses. Luke tells us that he was righteous and devout and that he awaited the restoration of Israel and that the Holy Spirit was upon him – presumably a constant state of affairs. He was constantly under the influence of the Holy Spirit.

Moreover, the Holy Spirit had told him that he would live long enough to see the Messiah. What image did Simeon have of this Messiah? In all probability, his image of the Messiah initially coincided with the predominant views of the Jews. 

There were three primary kinds of Messiahs that the Jews expected. We most often hear about the military Messiah, a commander who was expected to drive out the enemies of Israel and restore the kingdom of David. But there were other Jews who expected a prophet Messiah, one like Moses who would give them the new law that Ezekiel spoke of. And still others hoped for a priest Messiah, one like Aaron who would restore the temple and the role of the priests a spoken of by Malachi.

Each of these views was existent at the time Jesus was born, though of course the view with the noisiest followers was the military Messiah. Strangely enough even among Christians, this is the view that is most often propounded. Maybe that’s something we Christians need to introspect over.

Whatever Simeon’s initial leanings, it appears that, under the constant guidance of the Holy Spirit, he developed a view that would have been rejected by almost all the first century Jews. Seven centuries of exile, deportation, slavery and occupation had made the Jews a very exclusivist people. For them, salvation was first for the Jew and only for the Jew. The Gentiles could, very literally, go to hell. The very notion of being a light to the Gentiles was pretty foreign at that time. The Gentiles were scum who had tormented the Jews and who deserved to be punished.

But look at what Simeon says. “For my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of all nations: a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and the glory of your people Israel.”

Under the influence of the Holy Spirit Simeon had come to a view that refused to make Yahweh a local, tribal god fighting it out among other local tribal gods. Under the influence of the Holy Spirit Simeon recovered an understanding of the reality that Yahweh was the only god, the god who had chosen Israel so that through Israel he would bless the Jews and the Gentiles. Yahweh is the god who wept when Israel went astray and when Egyptians died during the events recorded in Exodus. And Yahweh is the god who rejoiced when Israel was faithful and when the Syrian Namaan obeyed the directions of Elisha. Yahweh, in other words, was not just concerned with one nation in one corner of the world, but with all nations and peoples around the entire world. This was a revolutionary view in those days and it could have come to Simeon only under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

And the Holy Spirit leads Simeon to more. In fact, he is the only person in the Gospels who seems to actually know what is going to happen to Jesus a few decades later. He tells Mary and Joseph, “This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too.”

What? Everyone there would have known that Simeon was awaiting the revelation of the Messiah. But what was he saying? This child will cause the falling and rising of Israelites? Was the Messiah not supposed to deliver Israel from her enemies? What Simeon was saying opened the door to the possibility that some in Israel might be excluded from the work of the Messiah. That was contrary to what the Jews expected. They expected every Jew to be included in the work of the Messiah.

And this child would be a sign that will be spoken against? Actually the word is much stronger. A sign that would be rejected. Who would be foolish enough to reject God’s Messiah? A person would reject something only if that something would disappoint him. How could the work of the Messiah be disappointing to anyone? How could the work of the Messiah not be up to standard?

And what was this about revealing the thoughts of hearts? The Messiah was someone who would restore Israel to her former glory – either the kingdom, the office of the prophet or the priesthood. But he was not supposed to be some mind reader! Why was Simeon not mentioning the three offices – king, prophet and priest – that actually involved the ritual of anointing? Who wanted a Messiah who would read minds when all of Israel was under Roman occupation? That just seems to miss the obvious need and provide the unnecessary.

And what was this about a sword piercing Mary’s heart? Becoming the mother of the Messiah was a secret, quiet hope of most Jewish girls in those days. In a highly patriarchal culture, the glory of a woman was in her children. And what could transcend the glory of being the mother of the Messiah? That was supposed to be a glorious, joyous role, not one that causes pain. In context, Simeon was saying that the rejection of Jesus would be so severe that it would go much beyond disappointment for Mary. She would not simply experience shame. She would experience a sword thrust into her heart.

Simeon, in true spirit of the Old Testament prophets, could be understood as being a party pooper. The circumcision of a male child was a huge occasion of tremendous joy among Jews and more so if that child was also the first child. Mary and Joseph would have entered the temple with hearts dancing with joy. And before they could proceed with the rite of circumcision, Simeon comes and upsets the applecart.

Why would he do such a thing? Luke clearly tells us that he came that day to the temple under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. There was no coincidence involved. Moreover, it seems even the timing was not coincidental. And while others would have endorsed a fully grown Messiah, Simeon goes to these new parents and carries their baby. Don’t you think that strange? Perhaps we who already accept Jesus as the Messiah fail to comprehend how astounding that act would have seemed.

The differences between a grown man and a baby are easy to observe. Apart from the obvious size difference, we can see that a grown man can fend for himself; a baby is helpless. A grown man can be independent; a baby is utterly dependent on care givers. A grown man can make decisions for himself; a baby has decisions made for him.

And so Simeon sees the baby Jesus and sees what the Holy Spirit had trained him to see. He was waiting for the consolation of Israel. Now you will remember that the Septuagint is the Greek translation of the Old Testament. The word that the NIV translates as ‘consolation’ is the same as the Septuagint uses in Isaiah 40.1: “Comfort, comfort my people.” Now it would not be okay to depend solely on one word. 

However, if you do a study of the word נָחַם in the Old Testament you will find that it occurs so frequently in Isaiah 40-66 that the Jews called that portion of Isaiah ‘The Book of Comfort’. And it is in these chapters that we find what that comforting would look like. All the Songs of Yahweh’s suffering Servant are to be found in these chapters. Apart from the book of Psalms, Christian worship books use passages from these chapters more often than any others. Why? Because we in hindsight now see what Simeon under the influence of the Holy Spirit saw with foresight.

Simeon saw that the power of Yahweh, the strong arm of the Lord, the mighty hand of God is revealed not in his blasting everyone who comes in his way like the local, tribal gods claimed to do. Rather, Yahweh’s strength is revealed in the fact that he is secure enough to be vulnerable with sinful humans. In the baby Jesus, Yahweh reveals that even by becoming so helpless, so dependent, so much at risk, he will accomplish his purposes for all of creation.

And so under the influence of the Holy Spirit Simeon celebrates the vulnerability of Yahweh made real in the baby Jesus. This baby would grow up and become a man. And in that man the vulnerability would continue until he was nailed to a tree. “My eyes have seen your salvation.”

The Obsolescence of Uncleanness [Luke 8.40-56] (20 November 2011)

How often have we planned something for the day, something very important, only to see other things come up and force themselves on us? It has happened often to me and I am sure to you as well. Perhaps this is the origin of the saying, “Man proposes, but God disposes.” God has a way of interrupting our lives in ways we cannot see, often in ways we would rather he didn’t! 

Quite often our passage for today is interpreted in much the same way – as God getting to experience what this interruption might feel like. Jesus intended to heal Jairus’ daughter. But he was stalled and interrupted by the woman. He had to direct his focus on her.

Those who interpret it this way, as though Jesus’ focusing his attention on the woman was ancillary to his purposes, have a problem. Did Jesus really have to spend time identifying who the thief of his powers was? Did it really matter? If it were just a matter of her stealing a healing then Jesus could have just let things be. 

We hear in Acts of people touching the apostles’ robes and being healed. I am inclined to believe that this woman even tried touching Jesus’ robes because she had heard that others had been healed in that way. 

In other words, I am sure there were other people who were healed because they touched Jesus’ robes. Our Gospels just do not report them, probably because in those cases Jesus did not make a big deal of it. But here he did. 

And we have to ask ourselves, “What is it about this woman’s healing that made Jesus stop and ask for the identity of the thief?” And we must also ask ourselves, “In what way does this woman’s healing affect the healing of Jairus’ daughter?”

This second question can be partially answered. Just from a literary standpoint and obviously from Jairus’ standpoint, Jesus’ getting diverted introduces tension in the story. He is wasting time and with each passing moment Jairus’ daughter gets closer to death. And indeed in the middle of the story we realize that Jesus has wasted so much time with the woman that Jairus’ daughter has actually died.

Is it just an issue of what priorities Jesus should have had? It was a choice between healing the girl and identifying the woman. Surely identifying the woman was not all that important! If that is how we think, we need to rethink.

Jesus allowed himself to be diverted for three reasons. First, he had to restore the woman to her place in society. We modern individuals can scarcely understand this. But in order to do so, let us look at the condition of the woman. 

The word ‘bleeding’ in the NIV or the words ‘constant bleeding’ in the NLT do not do justice to the Greek text. These might lead us to believe that she had a problem with the clotting mechanism of her blood.

But that is not what Luke says. To understand Luke, we must go back to the book of Leviticus, from where Luke – and also Matthew and Mark – picks up a technical phrase. Leviticus is one book of the bible that we have no idea what to do with. Oh we may know that the book describes a lot of sacrifices and offerings. And that there is something called a Day of Atonement, the rituals associated with which are in chapter 16. But do we know about skin conditions in chapter 14?

And what about chapter 15? How many of us have even read it? And how many of us who have read it have wondered about the various instructions it contains? For it is from this chapter that our Synoptic Gospels draw when they speak about the woman. Their technical phrase indicates that what the woman was suffering from was not some wound that just would not heal, but a menstrual cycle gone haywire.

And Leviticus 15 tells us that, therefore, she was rendered unclean and untouchable. For twelve years! Can you believe it? No one willing to touch anything you touched lest they became unclean as well. Having to wash your clothes separately from other clothes lest you rendered the other clothes unclean. Having to eat from separate dishes, having to cook your food in separate utensils. In other words, she was alone while still being among people.

What would have happened if Jesus had not interrogated her? She was healed. But she could never have been able to explain how she was healed. 

People would begin to suspect that she had engaged in some black magic or witchcraft or sorcery. And that would have ended with her being stoned. She wanted to remain inconspicuous, anonymous. But after twelve years, everyone would have known of her condition. 

Her condition, in other words, even though so private and personal, was public knowledge. And Jesus knew that, for her to be fully restored, for her healing to reach not just the physical, but also the societal, level, her healing itself must be public. And so Luke tells us, “The whole crowd heard her explain why she had touched him and that she had been immediately healed.” Now she had scores of witnesses. All she needed to do was wait a week, go to the priest, make her sacrifice as prescribed in Leviticus 15 and be declared clean. 

So the first reason why Jesus allowed himself to be diverted is that he wanted the woman to be publicly seen as having been legitimately healed.

The second reason is in v. 50 where Jesus says, “Do not be afraid. Only believe and she will be saved.” In other words, “Do not fear that you will see her dead. Trust me and you will see her alive.” 

It is very likely that Jesus permitted himself to be diverted precisely so that the girl would die and the messenger would come with news of her death. By now the people had seen Jesus perform many miracles. Healing was one thing that people would have expected from him. That is revealed by the fact that both Jairus and the woman had approached him. They both were fully confident that Jesus would be able to heal illnesses.

But death? Could Jesus reverse this greatest of illnesses? Now mind you that he has already raised a widow’s son at Nain. Would they believe that he could do the same again? Would they believe that Jairus’ daughter could be restored to healthy life? Raising of the widow’s son at Nain was something new, something that set Jesus apart as a prophet along the lines of Elisha, as we saw a few Sundays back. But this set a precedent. Would they rely on this precedent and believe that Jesus could raise the little girl?

If we read Luke’s account it seems that most people remained unbelieving. Healing a physical ailment was one thing. They could believe that was possible. But the reversal of death was another thing. Even if you have seen it reversed before, believing it can be done takes a stretch of faith. And so Jesus delays with the woman so that he could have the opportunity to restore the dead girl. 

But why was this important? Like children, we learn by repetition. We accept something as part of our worldview only if we see it happening often enough. Unlike some, I firmly believe that we are scientists through and through. Repeatability is something we expect and learn from. 

Jesus knew that his disciples needed to reach a point where the reversal of death was not something off the wall. If it were off the wall when he was raised from the dead, they would have found it most difficult to believe. This is indeed the reason why we have so many today who say that the Easter accounts are hogwash. We just do not have enough exposure to people rising from the dead. And so what is outside our experience becomes difficult to accept.

Jesus needed to have as many occasions as possible to show his disciples that death does not have the final say, that God has the final say. And so he delayed with the woman so he could be faced with a dead girl whom he would then restore to life. This is the second reason he permitted himself to be diverted.

But there is a third reason. Now let us follow Jesus’ actions. According to Leviticus 15, the woman was unclean because of the flow of blood. She touched Jesus’ clothes and the clothes of many others who were around Jesus. Indeed, she probably touched many clothes before being healed as she made her way toward Jesus. According to Leviticus, all those clothes became unclean. Now a person wearing clothes naturally is touching those clothes. So again, according to Leviticus, all those people, including Jesus, were rendered unclean.

So now Jesus speaks to her. The messenger comes from Jairus’ house and Jesus continues to Jairus’ house. Now Jairus is a leader of the synagogue. And Jesus has just been rendered unclean by the woman. After all, according to Leviticus, the woman remained unclean for seven days.

So here is an unclean Jesus – at least unclean according to Leviticus – entering the room in which the corpse of Jairus’ daughter lies. Jairus probably thought that Jesus would just speak just as he had done at Nain.

If we look at the raising of the widow’s son at Nain we will see that Jesus does not touch the corpse. He only touches the coffin. This was permitted. Touching the coffin did not make a person unclean. But touching a corpse did. 

And horror of horrors, Jesus reaches out and touches the girl’s corpse. He is already unclean from touching the woman. Now he compounds that by touching the corpse.

And so a doubly unclean Jesus speaks to the corpse. In these two ways, Jesus encounters the ascendency of death over life. The woman, due to her haywire menstrual cycle could never hope to have children. The bleeding was a continuous victory of death over life, her womb in a perpetual state of dying. The girl was dead, her corpse testifying to the fact that death had snuffed out her life, that, in her, life had lost the battle. 

And so Jesus, having allowed himself to be defiled, having made the woman announce that she had defiled him, having touched the corpse that would defile him, speaks to the corpse.

And he shows all the witnesses that in him the ceremonial laws dictating what and who is unclean when and where are redundant, obsolete, ineffectual. In him we have a new law at work, the law of life triumphing over death, the law of a purity cannot become impure and contaminated.

The ceremonial laws put forth an tenuous purity, a purity that was easily destroyed by the mere presence of anything ceremonially unclean. But Jesus ushers in a new era in which light triumphs over darkness, truth over falsehood and purity over impurity. In the clash between the purity borne by Jesus and the impure forces of death, the latter prove powerless to contaminate him. Rather than being rendered unclean by them, he forces them to release their captives.

Where, oh death, is your victory? Where, oh death is your sting?