Two-Minute Homily: Saying the Word and Doing It                 

FINDINGS II

Proper 21 - A - September 25, 2011

Matthew 21: 23-32  

Harry T. Cook

Matthew 21: 22-32  

When Jesus came into the Temple precincts, the head priests and elders of the people came toward him while he was teaching and asked, "By what right are you doing these things? Who gave you the authority to do so?" [They were referring to Jesus' actions in chasing the vendors and their clientele out of the temple court and upsetting the tables of the currency exchangers and kicking over the chairs of those selling pigeons for the sacrifice.] Jesus answered them in this way: "First, I have one question for you. If you give me the answer to that, I will tell you the source of my authority for doing these things. Here's my question: The baptism of John: what was its basis? Was it commanded from heaven or was it of human authority?" And they muttered among themselves saying, "Well, if we say 'heaven',' he will ask why we did not trust what John said. If we say 'of human authority,' the crowd will turn against us." (Keep in mind that most people thought John was a true prophet.) So they answered Jesus in this way: "We're not sure." He shot right back: "Fine! Then I'm not saying under what authority I have done the things I have done." -- [Jesus seemed to change the subject, saying]: "Think about this: a man had two sons. He went to the first and said, 'Son, go into the vineyard and do your job.' And Number One son said, 'Sure, I'll go,' but he did not. To the second, he said the same, and the son said, 'I'd prefer not to,' but later he went in to work anyway. Which one of the sons did what the father asked?" The priests and elders said, "Why the second."* Jesus said back: "I'm telling you that the toll collectors and prostitutes will obtain entrance to the heavenly domain, but you won't. John came advocating justice, but you didn't follow him while the toll collectors and the prostitutes believed what he said. Even then you did not change your mind and believe."

(Translated and paraphrased by Harry T. Cook.)

* Scholars differ over whether the story may have been subject to error or deliberate alteration over the times and struggles of copying. One can make a case that the priests and elders told Jesus that in their opinion it was Number One son who did what the father had asked, i.e. said yes when he meant no -- suggesting that word counted more than deed.

RUBRIC

Another vineyard. Another parable -- this one, Matthew says, told to the chief or ranking priests and elders of the people in the Temple. It is the first of two parables proposed to the religions authorities for their edification. Eventually they are depicted as being offended at the suggestion that they are the goats of the stories.

HOMILETIC WORKSHOP

The two sons parable is Matthew's alone, probably, certain sources suggest, from a tradition earlier than the completed gospel itself and perhaps native to the proto-Matthean communities. The setting in which Matthew has Jesus spin out the parable is Jerusalem sometime after the triumphal entry is depicted earlier in ch. 21. Matthew says he went a few miles away to Bethany where presumably he spent the night. Come morning (21:18), he returns to Jerusalem and the Temple where he encounters the authorities whilst "teaching."

What seems to have elicited the two sons parable was the question over authority as the religious leaders are wanting to know by what authority Jesus had done the things depicted earlier in ch. 21, what Paula Fredriksen calls "the Temple tantrum." It would not be difficult to understand the authorities' confusion about those alleged actions, viz. the upsetting of the cashiers' tables and the chairs of the pigeon merchants. They were performing functions absolutely necessary to the sacrificial apparatus of the Temple. Of course, the priests would want to know what the hell Jesus thought he was doing and on what legal basis. By what authority? The basic Greek noun is έξουσία, meaning "power of choice," "conferred or claimed right." Did Jesus have such a right to take those outrageous, irreligious, if not blasphemous actions?

Somewhat confusingly Matthew makes Jesus throw the question back at his interrogators in asking what authority they thought John the Baptizer had for his baptizing activities. They replied expeditiously that they knew not, thus saving them from saying, in effect, when they had stopped beating their wives. The point for Matthew is not to have Jesus debate that side issue but to begin the parabolic diatribe against them. As always it is helpful to remember that the "authorities" named in the text at hand as the chief priests and elders by the time According to Matthew was finally compiled may have called by different titles as the priestly cast was decimated as a force in post-Temple Judaism. So how does the two sons parable work as a derogation of late first century C.E. synagogue leadership?

If, indeed, synagogue Jews responded in anger to the parable, what about it riled them? Obviously the son who vowed not to obey his father but ended up doing so is, by the judgment of the priests and elders, the good guy -- though it is important to note here that there exists in the scholarly community no final consensus on the transmission of the story. See note above under the translation/paraphrase.

If the word trumped the deed, it would be a strange ethic. If the deed trumps the word, it is more in keeping with what we understand to be the governing ethic attributed to the Jesus sayings. The comparison of the son who said he wouldn't but ultimately did to the customs collectors and the whores means deed trumps word.

Apparently John the Baptist had been or had been imagined as a counter-cultural figure along the lines of his less militant "cousin" Jesus and probably attracted the same marginalized folk as Jesus had -- marginalized by the need they had to cheat at toll collection and selling their bodies for the sole purpose of survival. According to Matthew here, such people responded to John' counsel to change their minds and ways and, as such, had gone into the vineyard. The self-perceived upright types had spurned John as being a geek, and maybe even a dangerous geek, and kept on saying the right words, none of which changed their lives.

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Two-Minute Homily

Saying the Word and Doing It                          

By Harry T. Cook

A prayer required by rubric, three readings from the Bible plus a psalm and a sermon of indeterminate length are all mandated in the liturgies of many churches across the ecumenical spectrum. Even if taken at a fast pace, those words can fill up a good 30 minutes of a 60-minute service. Most of the other 30 are taken up with more words. The only action one sees is the collection of the money, the offering of the bread and wine for the Eucharistic celebration and, finally, the procession of the congregation to receive that bread and wine supposedly consecrated by anointed hands to represent something other than what they obviously are.

Attendance upon all that seems to be the beginning and the end of faithfulness for a good many Christians. Yes, some of them may volunteer an hour or two every once in a while to help with a soup kitchen or in some other work of mercy. But the arguments in which churches tend to indulge are almost always about the words -- the words in the Bible or in the missal or in the homily, about canon law and who can do what or be what because of who they are or aren't.

Find me a church whose members argue about whether or how to staff a soup kitchen or a homeless shelter or a child care center and devote as much energy of temperament to such arguments. Find me a church whose members go into the vineyard whether or not they say they will.

The son in the parable who says he will go and work but doesn't has a myriad followers in his train. "Will you strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being?" That is the key and final question of the Baptismal Covenant as found at page 305 of the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer. It is impossible to fulfill that promise in the dictated response ("I will, with God's help") in words alone.

"To strive" means to commit energy, to contend, to labor. The labor of lips is not envisioned in such an enterprise as striving. It is the labor of the hands and the sinews of the arms. It involves the excretion of sweat and not a few tears. To vow that one "will strive for justice and peace" and "respect the dignity of every human being" is to lay down a commitment to a 24/7 lifetime of exertion with scarce time off for good behavior.

To say "I will" but never follow through is to condemn oneself to an ethical purgatory. One will not obtain "cheap grace" in that way, for there is no grace that is cheap. Grace is immensely costly and realized only in the life that says "I will" to the vineyard and then goes to work in it.