Thursday of Week 10 of Ordinary Time – Gospel

Commentary on Matthew 5:20-26

In today’s reading continuing the Sermon on the Mount, what Jesus means by saying that he has not come to abolish the old Law but to transcend it is made clear by Jesus’ giving six examples of how a number of Old Testament sayings are to be understood by his followers. In fact, he says that if we wish to be his followers and do his work, we must move forward to the deeper level of understanding he proposes:

For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

It is clear from what we see of the scribes and Pharisees in the Gospels, that for them, religious virtue consisted in the most exact external observance of every detail of Jewish Law. The more perfect the observance of the letter of the Law, they argued, the closer one was to God. Jesus challenged that understanding and it led to serious confrontations with the religious leadership.

Of course, the way of the scribes and Pharisees has its attractions. It is a much easier way to measure one’s obedience to God. And one finds the same among other religions today. Among Christians (including Catholics), one finds that there are some people who are very anxious to know whether a certain action ‘is a sin’ or not. Such an approach leads in many cases to scrupulosity and fear, finding sin even in minutiae. God becomes a menacing shadow ready to strike at the smallest wrongdoing.

When speaking of the Jewish law, the first example Jesus gives is of the commandment:

You shall not murder [kill]. (Exodus 20:13)

Jesus’ understanding of this commandment goes far beyond the actual killing of another person. He extends it even to anger and abusive language. And anger can often be totally locked inside and invisible to an outsider. Jesus says:

But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment, and if you insult a brother or sister, you will be liable to the council, and if you say, ‘You fool,’ you will be liable to the hell of fire.

In other words, Jesus excludes any kind of violent behaviour towards a brother or sister, either in action, or word, or even thought.

He also links our interpersonal behaviour to our relationship to God. It is no good, then, piously bringing our offering to the altar in the Temple and presenting it to God while we are—through our own fault—in conflict with a brother or sister. We cannot separate our relationship with God and with that of a brother or sister. This will be spelt out in other parts of the Gospel. Before we make our offering, we must first be reconciled with our offended brother or sister and only then, after the injury has been healed, make our offering. Jesus also recommends early reconciliation if only to avoid greater troubles later on. It is not worth going to jail simply out of hatred or anger towards another.

All this is very relevant to us. Whenever we celebrate the Eucharist, we should recall what Jesus says in this text and put it into practice. Before we make our offering of the bread and wine, we are invited, at the beginning of the Eucharist, to confess our sins to God and to the gathered community:

I confess to almighty God and to you, my brothers and sisters, that I have sinned…

How often do we really think about what we are saying at this time?

Again, before sharing with others in the Body and Blood of the Lord, we pray:

…forgive us our sins as we forgive those who offend us…

And we are also invited to make a sign of peace with all those around us. For how can we share in the Body and Blood of the Lord if we are at enmity with a brother or sister who is a member of that same Body? But again, so often this is just an empty gesture, with very little real meaning and, for the most part, made to someone we do not even know. Let us work to put the meaning back into what can so easily degenerate into a meaningless ritual.

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Thursday of Week 10 of Ordinary Time – First Reading

Commentary on 2 Corinthians 3:15—4:1,3-6

We continue the point that Paul was making yesterday. We have a passage rich in meaning and full of allusions to the experience at Mount Sinai. He continues telling the Corinthians that observance of the Law by itself can only bring death, while the Spirit brings life.

…to this very day whenever Moses is read, a veil lies over their minds…

Paul now switches from the time of the covenant at Mount Sinai to the present time. He is saying that the Israelites in the time of Moses typify the Jews of the present time, and he may also be referring to some Christians of Jewish origin, who still do not recognise the temporary nature of the glory that was seen in Moses. As a result, when the writings of Moses are read in the synagogue, a veil still prevents them recognising the temporary nature of Moses’ glory. There is, as it were, a veil preventing their full understanding.

When Moses read the Law to the people, he had to veil his face because the people could not stand its brightness. But now, Paul says, the veil is not on the face of Moses, but over the minds of the hearers who cannot see that the message of Moses has been overtaken by the Word of Christ. However, Paul says:

…when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed.

In Exodus, Moses appeared before God without the veil and gazed on God’s face unprotected. Paul applies that passage to converts to Christianity: when they turn to the Lord fully and authentically, the impediment to their understanding is removed. They can look God in the face:

…the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

The “Lord” to whom the Christian turns is the Spirit of whom Paul has been speaking, the life-giving Spirit of the living God, the inaugurator of the new covenant and ministry. He is also the Spirit of the Christ. And the Spirit of Jesus is a spirit of real freedom, which enables one to follow God’s truth, to love creatively and to become more alive every day. This is in contrast to the smothering effect of the ‘ministry of death’ from the old Law which brought so much condemnation:

And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another, for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.

Here we have the veil image being used again. Christians (Israelites from whom the veil has been removed) are like Moses, standing in God’s presence, beholding and reflecting his glory. Through our ‘gazing’ at the Lord we become transformed, conformed more and more to the likeness of Jesus, who is himself the very Image of God. As Jesus said:

…whoever sees me sees him who sent me. (John 12:45)

The life-giving Spirit of God, who is also in Jesus, is already present in the community where the transformation is already taking place. The community is the Spirit-filled Body of Christ.

Therefore, since it is by God’s mercy that we are engaged in this ministry, we do not lose heart.

A ministry of this sort generates confidence and forthrightness, even when Paul—as at present—meets with criticism and opposition. He is confident that the Spirit of God is with him and the work he is doing for the gospel.

Paul now deals briefly with some of the criticism that is aimed at him:

And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing.

Here is the final application of the veil image. It seems Paul is being criticised either for obscurity in his preaching, or for the way in which he presents the Gospel (perhaps for his criticism of the Jewish tradition, which is particularly resented by some who see Paul himself as a once zealous Jew). He confidently asserts, however, that there is no veil over his Gospel. If some fail to perceive its light, that is because of their lack of belief. Paul says:

…the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing clearly the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.

The veil lies over their own eyes, a blindness induced by Satan, “the god of this world”, and a sign that they are headed for destruction.

The criticism of Paul is misdirected:

For we do not proclaim ourselves; we proclaim Jesus Christ as Lord and ourselves as your slaves for Jesus’s sake.

The light that is revealed in Paul’s preaching comes, not from him, but from the glory of Christ of which he is the messenger. Far from preaching himself, the preacher should always be a transparent medium through whom Jesus is perceived. The preacher is a ‘slave’ of Jesus and not someone who just uses the name of Jesus to draw attention to himself. As John the Baptist said of Jesus:

He must increase, but I must decrease. (John 3:30)

Again from Paul:

For it is the God who said, “Light will shine out of darkness,” who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.

Here Paul alludes to his own dramatic calling when the light shone from heaven on him as he went to Damascus to attack the Christians there. That was the beginning of Paul’s call to serve the gospel of Jesus. Perhaps the quotation is also an echo of the creation of light at the beginning of the Book of Genesis (1:3), and Paul is presenting his apostolic ministry as a new creation. There may also be an allusion to a passage from Isaiah:

The people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light… (Is 9:2)

Here Paul is suggesting his prophetic calling as servant of the Lord and a light to the nations. And the purpose of his mission is to reveal to others the glory of God visible on the face of Jesus Christ through his life, death and resurrection.

On the one hand, we too, like Moses and Paul, are called to reflect the brightness of God and, at the same time, we ourselves become brighter and brighter as we grow more and more into the image of God. And our light is not, as Jesus tells us in the Sermon on the Mount, meant to dazzle or turn people’s gaze away but rather to help them realise the brightness of God himself and lead them on to him:

In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven. (Matt 5:16)

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