Matthew
21: 12-17
The
theme given for next Sunday is on theological education. The given text is on the
Matthean account of Jesus’ encounter in the Jerusalem temple (Mt. 21:12-17). In
the Synoptic gospels, it was associated with Jesus’ passion narratives. It
happened immediately after his triumphant entry into the city of Jerusalem. The
Church commemorates it as Hosanna. Whereas, in John, it happened at the
beginning of Jesus’ public ministry.
(1) Theological Education: Making
New Grammaring in our Social Formations
·
That
is, making new grammaring in our Engagement with the Texts and Textures of our
Symbolic World.
·
We know that there is no language without
grammar. Alphabets as such make no language. Rather, grammar shapes language.
·
Let
us come back to our text. Jesus was entering into the city of Jerusalem. Then,
Jesus entered the temple of Jerusalem. Both were considered as symbolic acts of
Jesus.
·
For
the Jewish community, the city of Jerusalem was the centre in their faith. It
was seen essentially as a meaningful symbolic universe within their historic,
cultural and socio-religious system. It was the city of David. Likewise, the
temple at Jerusalem also was a meaningful symbolic world. It was the temple of
God.
·
Both
the city and the temple should manifest a range of social relationships. Both
of them must reveal a range of meaningful social practices. These are supposed
to be the spaces that regulate and guide their social order and social life. They
are meant to the spaces that give meaning to their value system; also the
spaces that define and reconstitute their identity.
·
Jerusalem
city and the temple – two spatialities – have symbolic significance.
·
Davidic
kings, the rulers of the city, were originally intended to be Yahweh’s anointed
ones ruling on behalf of Yahweh.
·
Jerusalem
city is the space where God’s reign is to be realized.
·
Those
spaces were turned to be structures of hierarchies creating borders and borderings
and strangers.
·
It
was here we locate Jesus’ entry as a symbolic act.
·
Through
his entry into the city of Jerusalem, Jesus is reclaiming the city as the City
of David. And he was symbolically presenting himself as the Son of David.
·
Here,
we see the realization of the Bartimaean cry and the cry of the children, women
and the common folks….
·
Moreover,
through his entry into the Jerusalem temple, Jesus was reclaiming the temple as
the temple of God. Jesus was symbolically presenting him as the Son of God. The
realization of the discourses in their sacred texts.
·
So
theological educations must help us to enter into meaningful and critical
engagement with our symbolic universes and practices.
(2) Interlacing Multiple Texturing
in our Social Formation
If the first one is on
grammaring, the second, I think, would be on texturing.
(A) Texturing Through the Textures of
Liturgical Activities.
·
See,
it’s very important to look where John places this narrative. John locates this
act of Jesus’ engagement with the temple at the beginning of Jesus’ ministry.
·
Likewise,
theological education closely links with the temple and worship or the
liturgical practices.
·
There
is no theological education apart from this spatiality and its liturgical
activities. Any formative process away from this space will be a disembodied
activity.
·
In
John 2, we read that, Jesus was not talking about the Jerusalem temple and its
architectural structures. Rather he was speaking about his own body as the
temple.
·
What is to be happened in the practices inside this
temple is nothing but such practices which make possible the resurrection
experience.
·
Theological
education, as such is not a burden imposed upon us. It is a formative process
where we live in the hope of resurrection, where we celebrate the joy of
resurrection, where we equip ourselves to make the resurrection possible in our
public sphere.
(B) Texturing Through Textures of Reciprocity
What Jesus saw in the temple
was not worship and liturgical celebrations. John 2: 16 – “stop making my Father’s house a market place.”
·
Social practices in the market
place are based on socio-economic capitals. There we see only relations of
exchange and barter. Practices in such place are not based on reciprocity.
There is no welcoming of vulnerables. There is no hospitality extended to the
strangers.
·
Whereas,
in Matthew 21:13, we read – “My house shall be called the
house of prayer; but you have made it a den of thieves.”
·
It is taken from Jer. 7: 10, 11 which mentions
about the existing Zion theology. On the one side, people continue to remain in
their sins and evil ways. But, on the other side, they keep on going to the
temple and worship there covering their sins and finally making the declaration
that “we are delivered.”
·
Theological
discourses/formulations are used for pseudo confessions. Confessional hypocrisy
– confessional hypocrisy in the sense that providing promises of the guarantee
of divine security. It means that their witness and practices in the public
sphere has nothing to do with what they have done in their worship and practices
in the sacred places.
·
Jesus
was challenging their theologizing and dogmatizing exercises that didn’t touch
the living and hard realities of the surroundings.
·
It
is not texturing the bond of community life but torturing the social life.
·
In
short, the proper function of theological training is not dogmatizing or
anti-ritualizing or demythologizing that we have been doing in the past. But,
it is to engage in the process of interrogation, creation and redemption of our
socio-symbolic universe and its discourses.
·
Therefore,
“Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who
were selling and buying in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the
money changers and the seats of those who sold doves.” (v.12).
·
Jesus
critically interrogated and overturned the structures of hierarchies formed
inside the temple. Because the sacred
space was compartmentalized by creating different geographies where bodies were
categorized as gentile bodies, women bodies, bodies of sick and disabled etc.
·
Breaking
such texturing that disembodied the social body of the people of God Jesus was
making re-texturing of the sacred space.
(3). Alternate
Posturing for Genuine Social Formation
Then we read in v.14: 4 “The blind and the lame came to him in the temple, and he cured them.”
Also they “heard the children crying out in the temple, "Hosanna to the
Son of David.”
Posturing for Churching and Discipling
·
Jesus was making alternate posturing by
repositioning the excluded and the vulnerable.
·
The temple as a social space
was transformed as a healing space.
·
In the Syriac theology,
salvation is generally referred to as healing. So, in the presence of Jesus,
the temple became a redemptive space. It was turned to be an inclusive space
where the community as a whole experienced the warmth of brotherhood and
hospitality.
·
Further, we read, the blind
and the lame were cured which means the blind went out of the temple with new
vision. The lame received strength to
walk and they joined with Jesus in the path of discipleship. In other words,
the real churching and discipling were seen in the alternative posturing.
Posturing for New Affirmations and
Practices
·
Finally,
we see an encounter between Jesus and the Scribes and Pharisees because of
children who were singing Hosanna to the Lord.
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The undomesticated, untrained, undisciplined.
·
Jesus made them get entered into new practices and
disciplines.
Rev. Dr. M.C. Thomas