September 4, 2009
Sunday Scripture
Twenty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time
BY FATHER DONALD DILGER
In last Sunday’s gospel Mark answered an urgent question for his Christian community — the matter of ritual cleanliness and ritual uncleanliness. In the Old Testament this issue took up much space in the Book of Leviticus. Another way of stating the question for a Christian community so close to Judaism: what renders a person acceptable or unacceptable for participating in Christian worship? Do some kinds of food, or their preparation, or the handling of food in the act of eating make a difference before God? Mark proclaims a resounding “NO!” After treating the question in a story about Jesus, he adds in parentheses “Thus Jesus declared all foods clean.”
That did not solve the whole problem. There was still the matter of ritually clean and ritually unclean people. Non-Jews, usually called “Gentiles,” or “the nations,” were considered an unclean people, unbelievers, infidels, “dogs” tainted with idolatry. Not only were these people thought to be unclean before God, but so was their land, since it lay outside “the Holy Land.” Mark approaches the issue with two stories. Jesus himself goes to those lands, “He went away to the region of Tyre and Sidon,” pagan territories situated on the Mediterranean seacoast northwest of Galilee. First Jesus encounters a woman who approached him about her demon-possessed little daughter. She was a Greek, a Syro-phoenician, that is, a pagan, a Gentile. Jesus at first refuses with a proverb, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not right to take the bread of the children and throw it to the dogs.” This clever woman persists and Jesus grants her plea. He found persistent faith among the Gentiles. This story preceded today’s gospel reading.
Mark wants Jesus to touch upon pagan areas not only on territory west of Galilee, but also on the east. In the next chapter of Mark, Jesus will even go north of Galilee. Mark begins, “Jesus left the region of Tyre, went through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee through the region of the Decapolis.” Mark’s “inspired” geography could use some improvement in this instance, but let’s not dwell on that. His geography is, so to speak, more in the air than on the ground. In other words, his geography is theology. The important point is that now Jesus was in the Decapolis, a confederation of Greek or pagan cities, some in Galilee and some east of Galilee.
The locals brought to Jesus a deaf man who also stuttered. They asked Jesus to cure him. This time Jesus makes no objection about feeding the children (his own nation) first rather than giving priority to dogs (Gentiles). Jesus sensitively provides privacy for the afflicted man, when “he takes him aside from the multitude privately.” Jesus puts his fingers into the man’s ears. Then he spat and touched the tongue of the afflicted man. In recognition of his Father, Jesus looked up to heaven. He “groaned,” perhaps in anguish over human suffering which he was soon going to share.
Mark preserves in Jesus’ native language, Aramaic, the word which Jesus spoke as an outward sign of his power to heal the man, “Ephphatha!” Mark translates for his Greek speaking and Greek reading audience, “This means, ‘Be opened!’” He notes that the onlookers were “astonished beyond measure.” The amazement was not only over the healing itself, but because this former village carpenter, a Galilean Jewish peasant, cared enough about his pagan neighbors to grant their request for healing. Mark has made his point. The compassion of God is unlimited, infinitely beyond caring only about one race, one nation, one people. As Jesus implicitly declared all foods clean in last Sunday’s gospel, so today he implicitly declares all people clean.
This reading accompanies today’s gospel because it echoes the words of the people after Jesus healed the deaf stutterer. Isaiah says, “The ears of the deaf shall be opened. The tongue of the mute will sing for joy.” Christians saw in these words a “prediction” of the miracles of Jesus. In Isaiah, this song of praise follows curses on Israel’s enemy, the Edomites. They took advantage of Israel after Jerusalem’s destruction by Babylon in 587 B.C. Our reading’s song of praise glorifies the blooming and moistening of the desert, Edom’s territory, after the hoped-for destruction of Edom. In Isaiah’s context of cursing and hoping for evil, this is not so pretty of a picture as it seems in isolation from its context.
James is infuriated by the discrimination against the poor and the lowly in this Christian congregation. When a rich man enters the assembly (church services), he is invited to sit in a place of honor. The poor man comes in and is told to either stand or sit on the floor. This rebuke must be directed against the elders (presbyters) or leaders of this Christian community. James called them “judges with evil designs.” Meaning: “You fawn upon the rich so that they in turn will enrich you.” Surely no discrimination against the poor could happen in our churches today!