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Jesus: Lawmaker, Not Breaker

Q. In this Sunday’s Gospel, we have the most important section of the Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew. Why is this material so crucial?

A. Matthew is a very Jewish Gospel. It was not the first Gospel to be written (that, in all likelihood, would be the Gospel of Mark), but it is placed first in the New Testament canon because it is a natural bridge between the Old and New Covenants (in fact, the words “testament” and “covenant” mean the same thing).

Matthew highlights the mission of Jesus to Gentiles, to be sure (cf. 28:19-20). But he is striving to show to his fellow Jews that Jesus was not, as he had been accused of being in Jewish circles, a lawbreaker – that is, he did not circumvent the law of the Old Testament. This is why Matt 5:17 is so crucial: “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have not come to abolish but to fulfill.”

In fact, when Jesus says, “Do not think…” he is referencing the Maccabean martyrs, who also preserved the law, despite hideous tortures at the hands of the pagan tyrant Antiochus IV Epiphanes: “But do not think that you will go unpunished for having tried to fight against God!” (2 Macc 7:19).

Q. But if Jesus isn’t “changing”, or altering the law, why does he give a series of examples prefaced by the formula, “You have heard it said…But I say to you…”?

A. What Jesus is doing here is bringing out the true meaning of the law – its correct interpretation, contra the erroneous takes on the law given by popular teachers of Jesus’ day. These examples are known as the “antitheses” of the Sermon on the Mount.

Far from abolishing the law, Jesus’ demands are even more strict than what was commonly taught in the Judaism of that time. Jesus deals with the inner attitudes of the heart, from which sins spring (cf. Matt 15:19). In this way, he highlights the true intent of the law, which was to transform the inner person, not simply to outlaw certain behaviors.

In one of the antitheses, for example, Jesus says, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery’ (Ex 20:14 = Deut 5:18). But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matt 5:27-28). Jesus then brings up the topic of divorce and remarriage in 5:31-32 (which Jesus says is adultery). This is very interesting in light of John the Baptist’s criticism of Herod Antipas’ illicit marriage to his brother Philip’s wife, Herodias, for which John paid with his life (Matt 14:1-12). Jesus strikes at the heart of the issue by correctly pegging the cause of adulterous divorce and remarriage as lust, from which indeed much sexual sin springs.

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Q and A on Trinity Sunday

Holy_TrinityQ. This Sunday is the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, and we Catholics are used to hearing about God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. But some Australian priests got a bit “creative” with the liturgy a few years ago, and began opening the Mass in a different way. Instead of saying, “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit”, they said this: “In the name of the Creator, the Redeemer, and the Sanctifier”. They were severely reprimanded by their bishop. Why was this such a big deal to the Church?

A. What these priests did was wrong on many levels. The biggest problem was that creating, redeeming and sanctifying are things that God does, but they are not who he is. Yes, it is true that God created the cosmos, and that Jesus redeemed us, and that the Holy Spirit sanctifies us (makes us holy, provided we cooperate with God’s grace). But creating, redeeming, and sanctifying are God’s activities, not his identity. He is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (cf. Matthew 28:19).

Q. Why did God not reveal himself as a Trinity of Persons until the age of the New Covenant, in which we are now living?

A. God dealt with humanity as a wise parent deals with a child. This has often been called the “divine pedagogy”. A small child cannot understand trigonometry or quantum physics. One must start with simple concepts, like “2 + 2 = 4”, and build from there. More truth is added when the student is ready to handle it. In the same fashion, God gradually revealed truth about himself to human beings, culminating in the revelation of the Most Holy Trinity.

I actually think that the Trinity is all over the Old Testament as well – God creating the universe by his powerful “Word” in Genesis – the Word that later became flesh, Jesus Christ (John 1:14). God’s Spirit hovered over the waters of creation  – the Holy Spirit (Genesis 1:2). God said, “Let us make man in our image” (Genesis 1:26). All of this is less explicit than we might like it to be, but the doctrine is there. I believe that one reason God did not more clearly spell out the doctrine of the Trinity until later in salvation history was the problem of polytheism in the ancient Near East.

In the Old Testament period, God chose to reveal himself to the world gradually through the agency of his people, Israel. The ultimate plan was for all the nations (or “Gentiles”, ethnic groups) outside of Israel to join God’s family. This was promised to Abraham, the father of the Jewish people, when God promised him that all the nations of the earth would be blessed through his “seed”  (Genesis 22:18). This finally happened in the age of the universal (the word “Catholic” means “universal”) Church of Jesus Christ, the son (descendant, or “seed”) of Abraham, according to the flesh (Matthew 1:1).

But, in the time of ancient Israel, God’s people lived among many other peoples who were polytheists (they believed in many “gods”). At that time, it was more important for Israel to reveal to the world that there is only one true God. The revelation that there are three persons in the one God would have to wait. If that truth had been fully proclaimed at that point, it may have confused non-Jews, who may have viewed the Trinity as three different “gods”, rather than three Divine Persons sharing one Divine nature.

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Authenticating the Resurrection of Jesus: The Empty Tomb

Empty TombIn the last post, we noted powerful evidence for the empty tomb: enemy attestation. The religious authorities of Jerusalem and the early Church both agree: On Easter Sunday, the body of Jesus is not in the tomb. The question is: Why? Christians, of course, affirm the reason is the bodily Resurrection of the Lord. The authorities concocted a different tale: they said the disciples stole the body. Did they? Not a chance.

First, the tomb was guarded, most likely by Roman soldiers. Matthew’s Gospel mentions that the religious authorities bribed the guards to say that while they slept, the disciples pilfered Jesus from the tomb. That Roman soldiers would fall asleep on the job, and somehow not be woken by the commotion of men rolling away the massive stone at the mouth of the tomb, is laughable enough. But even if that were possible, who knows what’s happening while one is asleep, anyway? But there’s an even more convincing reason this argument doesn’t work.

Almost anyone would grant that people are often willing to die for what they believe to be true. Suicide bombers come immediately to mind. But no one dies for something they know to be a lie. And the disciples would certainly know if Jesus had actually risen from the dead and appeared to them, or if they had, in fact, hidden his corpse in a trunk somewhere. But if they had really stolen the body, why would they go and get themselves killed by preaching that Jesus had been resurrected? I mean, it’s not as if they had anything to gain, humanly speaking, by their message. It’s not as if sprawling mansions along the Mediterranean coastline awaited. They could only look forward to beatings. imprisonments, and an almost certain death. The truth is that they proclaimed the Resurrection because they were convinced by the encounters they had with the risen Christ. They proclaimed it because it was true.

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Authenticating the Resurrection of Jesus: the Jerusalem factor

The ResurrectionThe Bible is refreshingly clear about what is at stake if the Resurrection of Jesus didn’t happen: “If Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless, and so is your faith…but Christ has indeed been raised from the dead” (1 Corinthians 15:14, 20). Today, Easter Sunday, is the first day of the Octave of Easter (in the Church, it is as if Easter lasts as one continuous day until next Sunday), with the rest of the liturgical season of Easter to follow. So, over the next while, I’ll offer some solid reasons why we can be certain that Jesus indeed rose from the dead. Keep in mind that these facts are accepted by the vast majority of critical scholars, be they believers or not.

Reason 1: The Jerusalem factor. When the Apostles began publicly preaching that Jesus had been physically resurrected from the dead, it is not as if they began by travelling to some faraway land, to tell people who had no means of investigating the veracity of the event. It wasn’t like “Star Wars” – “Let me tell you about something that happenned ‘a long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.'” No, the Apostles began proclaiming the Resurrection in Jerusalem – the very city where Christ had been publicly killed. There is simply no way they could have done so if it were not true.

It’s instructive to note the response of the religious authorities of Jerusalem to this message: they didn’t say, “Jesus isn’t risen! He’s still in his tomb – and let us show you hs remains and put an end to this foolishness once and for all”. Their response was actually to say, “The disciples stole the body”. In other words, the enemies of the Gospel message admit the reality of the empty tomb. This response is noted in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 28 (vv. 11-15), where it is said that “this story (of the stolen body) is told among the Jews to this day” (v. 15). Saint Justin Martyr, in his “Dialogue with Trypho”, notes that this response was still commonly heard among Jews in the mid-2nd century when he was writing.

In the next post, we’ll examine more evidence that Jesus rose from the dead in his physical body, leaving an empty tomb behind.

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Call No Man “Father”?

Today’s Gospel reading at Mass raises a very common question posed to Catholics:

Jesus spoke to the crowds and to his disciples, saying,
“The scribes and the Pharisees
have taken their seat on the chair of Moses.
Therefore, do and observe all things whatsoever they tell you,
but do not follow their example.
For they preach but they do not practice.
They tie up heavy burdens hard to carry
and lay them on people’s shoulders,
but they will not lift a finger to move them.
All their works are performed to be seen.
They widen their phylacteries and lengthen their tassels.
They love places of honor at banquets, seats of honor in synagogues,
greetings in marketplaces, and the salutation ‘Rabbi.’
As for you, do not be called ‘Rabbi.’
You have but one teacher, and you are all brothers.
Call no one on earth your father;
you have but one Father in heaven.
Do not be called ‘Master’;
you have but one master, the Christ.
The greatest among you must be your servant.
Whoever exalts himself will be humbled;
but whoever humbles himself will be exalted.”

-Mt 23:1-12

If Jesus condemns calling any man “father”, how is it that Catholics call their priests “Father”? For the answer, click here.

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