This
is a well-expounded bible portion. This portion has had and is still having a
lasting impact on the lives of Christians. It has shaped our values and
attitudes. This Sunday we are going to meditate on the Theme “Spirituality of Youth in Modern Age”. Youth is an important phase of our life. This is that
phase of our life when we develop our personality and our identity. It is
important that we develop our personality and our identity in the way that
Christ wants. Inshort it needs to be Christ-centred.
What is the Spirituality centred in
Christ?
There
is a chant in our liturgy
“O Lord, your love has brought you
down to us so that our death might be averted by your death”
Two
thoughts are presented
Ø
There
is a downward mobility of God.
Ø
There
is a neighbouring of God.
These
are the aspects of spirituality of Christ as it is pointed out through the
scriptures.
We have developed a negative view
regarding Spirituality. We see it as distancing ourselves from the world. It
was to such a community that Jesus was addressing. It is to them that Jesus
puts forth the spirituality of self-emptying.
In the above text, we are presented
with a scribe who engages with Jesus with the quest for eternal life. Jesus asks
him to have a Kenotic (Self-emptying)
experience. Jesus emphasizes that it is not for eternal life that we should
focus, but for a life that lives through the inspiration of Love. We can see in
Vs. 21 Jesus rejoices in Holy Spirit and prays, “I thank you Father, Lord of Heaven and Earth, because you have hidden
these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to the
infants.” Here the scribe comes with a quest for the truth. But the hidden
truth is Jesus Christ. Commandments can lead us to right living. But Jesus
points out the essence of the commandments to the scribe. Our quest should be
to know what the truth is and what it means to the ‘other’.
Spiritual
Journey requires a renewed journey through the Scriptures:
It is significant that the term used by St. Luke for
the ‘Scribe’ is ‘Lawyer’. His attitude reveals removing out God’s intention and
giving priority to his selfish interests. He projects out being self-centred.
Psychologically, he can be considered to be ‘Ego-Centric’. He required a
spiritual nurturing through a renewed journey through the scriptures. This is
what Jesus does. Jesus deflects the ego-centrism of the Scribe. Instead of
looking into himself, Christ points him to look outwards.
He approaches Jesus with the
question, “What must I do to inherit
eternal life?” His intention is not true, it is something else. He comes to
test Jesus. He tries to clear himself.This is clearly seen as in Vs.29
“But wanting to justify himself, he asked
Jesus, “And who is my Neighbour?””
We can see a similar aspect, when
Satan tries to tempt Jesus in the Desert. In the case of the lawyer there was
no purity in his approach. He might have considered Jesus inferior to his
knowledge. His language shows selfishness.
There are several possibilities as
to why he might have asked the question regarding the means to achieve eternal
life. This might be out of fear to save him from death. His sole concern was
‘his salvation’ without any concern for ‘what happens to the other’. He also
might have believed that eternal life can be ‘achieved’, and that this was
possible by means of religion. His attitude was “What can I gain?” His aim
might have been to test Jesus and defeat him through debate.
However Jesus approaches him
differently. He does not want to engage in a debate. Neither does He wants to
send the Lawyer away, ridiculing him. Instead, Jesus wants to transform him.
Jesus asks “What is written in the law?” A teacher of the law is taught in the
law since Childhood. Jesus asks the lawyer to “Do, it”. In case of an
ego-centric ‘to do anything’ involves ‘doing for an achievement’, ‘doing for
the self’. However Jesus presents it differently, ‘do it for the love of God’.
Here we must examine our lives and question, what motivates our religious and
spiritual quest?
Again as we look into the portion,
we see that the lawyer gave the correct answer to his own question. Jesus says
to him, “You have given the right answer.”
(Vs.28). But Jesus points out that ‘Right knowledge and Right proclamation is
not Right Living’. Having right answer does not mean that we are in the ‘Right
Path’ or we are ‘Right’.
In our biblical studies,
ego-centrism and individualism has crept in and has taken strong roots. We have
the tools to study bible, we have the methodologies but are we able to move
forward in our lives? The message of Bible does not seem to affect us. Our
words do not influence us; our thoughts do not have an effect on us. This is
indeed a sad plight! It is when we allow the scriptures to interact with us
that our life is transformed.
Another significant aspect is that here
the Lawyer approaches the Scripture to get confirmation that he is right. This
is the problem that ails us. We pride ourselves as being Syrian Christians,
having sound Theology in our Liturgy, believing in open exposition of the word,
believing what we do is right. But is our right understanding, our right
proclamation, leading us to right living. Our Creeds and our Cults should help
us in ‘Right Living’. ‘Right Spirituality’allow us to be formed by the word.
Spiritual Journeying requires a Radical
Journey to be the Neighbour of Others
The Lawyer tries to justify himself,
“Who is my Neighbour?” he asks. He wants a definition for ‘Neighbour’.
Definition always involves limiting, drawing a boundary, presenting a small narrow
view. The Lawyer wants to do the same. He wants to limit himself. This is very
dangerous. When, we try to Define, Parse and do the exegesis, we remove from
ourselves a wide range of possibilities and become incapable of doing anything.
In other words, the lawyer is asking Jesus in clear terms, “Define me, who
deserves my love and my care?”
The Jews hadtheir own definition as
to who deserved their love and their care, and to whom all it can be given. The
condition is just like the present situation between India and Pakistan. Jesus
does not believe in giving definition. Instead he creates a new geographical
location for a Jew. He creates new spaces in life and this can be brought about
and understood only through spirituality. Only when we are released from
Ego-centrism, can we redraw our boundaries. Jesus speaks through parables,
through stories. They do not define anything. They are wide, which challenges
thoughts, bringing forth a different view.They are logical, but have deep
hidden meaning.
Jesus presents a traveller who is
attacked. The Priest and the Levite pass through, turning a blind eye to him. Who
the traveller was is not mentioned. For the Priest and the Levite, they were
doing their duty, for them it was the right thing to do. Then Jesus introduces
the Samaritan. When the Samaritan sees the traveller, the road he was
journeying; it interacts withhim; it brings a cloud of thoughts in his mind.
The Samaritan feels pity on him. As the story reached to its highest point with
the Samaritan rising up slowly as the unlikely Hero, a cry of ‘No… No…’ was
rising in crescendo in the mind of the Lawyer. He wished dearly that the Priest
or the Levite could have emerged as the Hero. We see a closeness being
developed between the one who seeks pity and the one who has pity. There is an
effort to remove all hatred and accept. There is an effort made to remove all
bitterness and take help. In order to have mercy; in order to forgive, you need
a great mind. Their minds needed to have overcome with compassion to remove
prejudices and ego. This is possible only through spirituality.
Jesus systematically destroys the
Jewish concept of Hero. For the Jewish audience, they loved to have the Priests,
the Levite as their Heroes, while the Samaritans were the Villains. Here Jesus
makes the Samaritan the Hero. The one who was held low, despised is given a new
identity, he is raised up. If someone from our society tires to live out a
radical life and present a story, we will also be faced with the same dilemma.
The Heroes in our societies will be exposed and their masks will be removed to
reveal their true identities.
Jesus transforms the question, “Who
is my Neighbour?” to the question, “Who has become the Neighbour”. The
Self-centred, the Ego-centrism is transformed. Those who were glorified in the earlier
stories are being changed. The stories of Hatred are being changed to stories
that propagate Love and Mercy. He answers the question, “Where is Eternal
Life?”
‘Where there is no prejudice, where mercy is granted and received, there
eternity meets humanity’
Jesus does not define what needs
to be done. Instead he asks to begin a radical journey modelling the Samaritan.
Jesus says, “Go and cultivate a
spirituality of compassion.” He exhorts,
‘Go and build up a community that does not exist, a community which
includes strangers and cares for the needy’
These
are your neighbours
In our personal life we interact with lots of
people. Some are very close to us. We celebrate our meetings, our fellowships
with ‘ourselves’. We set our own geographical boundaries, our own preferences
for language, our own Liturgies. In a way we are defining ourselves. But Jesus
point out to a radical journey of self-emptying, of mercy, through the
knowledge from scriptures, to transform us.
Rev. Abraham Matthew