Twenty-third Sunday In Ordinary Time
LUKE 14:25-33
Luke again reminds readers that Jesus is traveling. Destination: Jerusalem, where bitter suffering awaits him. It is therefore appropriate that the framework called “The Journey to Jerusalem,” contains difficult, even bitter, teaching. The first statement: “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.” This extraordinary saying attributed to Jesus is reminiscent of bizarre cults that separate young people from their families and indoctrinate them in anti-social mind-sets. When this and like “anti-family” statements became known to early pagan critics of Christianity, they accused Christians of undermining the family and the state. One of the standard accusations against Christians during times of persecution was “hatred of the human race.”
There is Old Testament background. In Deuteronomy 33:9. In a blessing Moses bestows upon the Israelites, he praises Levi, the only son of Jacob who did not receive land. Levi’s portion was the Lord. The tithes of the other tribes were to support the Levites in their ministry to the Lord, first in local shrines, later in the Jerusalem temple. Moses approvingly blesses Levi, “who said of his father and mother, ‘I regard them not.’ He disowned his brothers, and ignored his children.” Not a pretty picture of family life! The blessing is based on an incident in Exodus 32. Moses comes down from the mountain to discover that his people have fallen into idolatry. In his fury he summons his own tribe, the Levites. In the name of the Lord God he commands them to go with sword drawn through the camp, “one killing his brother, another his friend, another his neighbor.” In response to this “cleansing” Moses says., “Today you have ordained yourselves for the service of the Lord…, that he may bestow a blessing on you.”
That this saying Luke attributes to Jesus may be more acceptable to our sensitivities, we can understand it as an example of a frequently used form in literature of the time, including biblical literature. It is called “exaggeration.” This saying seems to belong to that form of literature. Why this conclusion? Matthew 10:37 has a similar saying but more digestible for us, “He who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me.” Both authors adopted this saying from a lost gospel which sometimes used exaggeration even in statements attributed to Jesus. We cannot know which form was ori-ginal – Luke or Matthew – but since it originates in that lost source, the preponderance of the evidence is in favor of Luke’s bitter version.
However, Luke sometimes has two sides to an issue. In Luke 18:20, the Lucan Jesus approves the commandment, “Honor thy father and thy mother.” Luke is surely also aware that the Torah, in Deuteronomy 21:17, imposes the death penalty for cursing father or mother. More applicable here is Deuteronomy 27:16, “Cursed is he who dishonors father or mother.” To hate one’s parents surely dishonors them. Luke was thoroughly familiar with the Torah. Because we know this and recognizing that Luke is capable of using the literary device of overstatement or exaggeration, it is acceptable to translate “hate” as “love less.” There is no problem in preferring Matthew’s version of the saying as fitting better what Luke says elsewhere about honoring parents.
The second harsh statement of today’s gospel: “Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me, cannot be my disciple.” In Luke’s time, “bearing one’s cross” could mean carrying the cross to one’s own crucifixion. Luke modified the repugnance of this mean-ing when he quoted Jesus saying in 9:23, “take up one’s cross daily and follow me.” This gives the cross the meaning of the daily annoyances one encounters and “offers them up” as we say in our time. The two little parables that follow these sayings teach that the de-cision to be a Christian, “to follow” Jesus, is a serious undertaking. In special situations it can even lead to “renouncing all that one has,” as in religious vows.
WISDOM 9:13-18b
The Book of Wisdom is the work of a learned Jew of Alexandria, Egypt, about 50 B.C. He attempts to persuade fellow-Jews of the wisdom of their traditions, especially the wisdom contained in the Torah (first five books of our Bible). The reading opens with two questions: “Who can know God’s counsel? Who can conceive what the Lord intends?” These commentaries attempt to figure out what the Lord intends by sometimes very difficult sayings. The author of the Book of Wisdom tells us there is help to understand God’s counsel, “the Holy Spirit whom he sent from on high.”
PHILEMON 9-10, 12-17
Towards the end of his missionary career Paul is in prison. There he met a runaway slave named Onesimus, whom he instructed and baptized, “whose father I have become in prison.” Roman law was absolute – a runaway slave must be returned. Punishment could be brutal – branding, hamstringing. Paul begs Philemon, master of Onesimus, to receive him back into his household, no longer as a slave but as a Christian brother. Paul’s appeal becomes demanding, “If you regard me as a partner, welcome him as you would me.”
