Friday, April 16<\/b><\/p>\n
John 4.1-14: Jesus goes to the trouble to befriend this woman. When he initiates his conversation with her, it is not a casual act. Jesus intends, from the start, to take this woman on a new path, to show her a new mode of life, to introduce her to a new dimension of her own humanity. Jesus does not meet people casually. When he approaches anyone, he is serious about them. His approach always involves his commitment. Jesus never engages in small talk.<\/p>\n
Friendship has always been a moral concept. For example, in the 10 books of Aristotle\u2019s Ethics, two of those books are devoted to the subject of friendship. Becoming a friend to someone is a costly and complex thing to do. It requires time, patience, and discernment in order to arrive at the stage of commitment. And commitment, in turn, requires loyalty.<\/p>\n
Exodus 5: The declaration, \u201cThus says the Lord\u201d (cf. also Exodus 32:27), places Moses squarely in the prophetic tradition.<\/p>\n
This is, in fact, the Bible\u2019s first clear encounter of a prophet with a king, an encounter that will be repeated with the likes of Samuel and Saul, Nathan and David, Elijah and Ahab, Isaiah and Ahaz, Amos and Jeroboam II, Jeremiah and Zedekiah, Daniel and Nebuchadnezzar, John the Baptist and Antipas, Paul and Agrippa. It is instructive to remember that, on the sole occasion when Abraham was called a prophet, it was in connection with a local ruler in the Negev (cf. Genesis 20:1-7 Psalms 105 [1-4]:13-15).<\/p>\n
The source of Pharaoh\u2019s problem is that he does not \u201cknow the Lord\u201d (verse 2). Before much longer, nonetheless, he will have ample opportunity to make the Lord\u2019s acquaintance (Exodus 8:22; 9:29). Moses\u2019 encounter with such a man may be compared to David\u2019s confrontation with Goliath, who also did not \u201cknow the Lord (cf. 1 Samuel 17:45-47).<\/p>\n
Pharaoh reacts \u201cthat same day,\u201d taking the initiative away from Moses and Aaron, thereby making them look inept in the eyes of the Israelites (verses 4-9). \u201cThus says the Lord\u201d is met by \u201cthus says Pharaoh\u201d (verses 10-14). Here there is a series of complaints: the overseers to the foremen, the foremen to Pharaoh, Pharaoh to the foremen, the foremen to Moses, Moses to God. Pharaoh\u2019s tactic is to divide the people that he wants to oppress. He does not discredit Moses directly; he acts, rather, in such a way that the people themselves will turn on Moses.<\/p>\n
The scene in verses 15-21 will be repeated many times in the next 40 years. On each occasion when things do not go well, the people will blame Moses. And when the people blame Moses, Moses will often enough blame God, as he proceeds to do now.<\/p>\n
Saturday, April 17<\/b><\/p>\n
John 4.15-26: This lady is a materialist. She misunderstands what Jesus is talking about when he speaks of \u201cliving water.\u201d She is like Nicodemus, who misunderstands what Jesus is talking about when he speaks of rebirth.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her materialism is not simply a theory. She lives her life on a materialistic basis, her sinful state is the greatest impediment to her understanding.<\/p>\n
Up to her meeting with Christ at the well, this woman\u2019s life has been immoral. She tells Jesus, \u201cI have no husband.\u201d No, he replies, \u201cyou have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband.\u201d That is to say, she is living a sinful life, far from the Kingdom of God.<\/p>\n
\u201cSin no more\u201d is implied in what Jesus says to the Samaritan woman. Jesus befriends sinners, not in order to make them comfortable in their sinful state, but to bring them out of their sins. Jesus does not have casual friends; they are changed by his friendship with them. As he tells the disciples, he lays down his life for his friends. That is not casual friendship.<\/p>\n
Exodus 6: Here commences God\u2019s response to Moses\u2019 complaint in chapter 5, and the major message is one of reassurance. God recalls his covenant with the patriarchs, to whom He was also obliged to give reassurance from time to time. God\u2019s covenant with them has now been perfected by the revelation of God\u2019s mysterious Name (cf. Ezekiel 20:5-7). Everything that Moses is to tell the people is summed up in the revelation of the Divine Name.<\/p>\n
In verses 14-27 we find another genealogy, of which there were
\nso many in Genesis, and many more of which will be found in the rest of Holy Scripture. Although modern readers may be disposed to skip such passages as uninteresting, they were certainly important to the biblical writers, not least because they helped give structure to the continuity of the narrative.<\/p>\n
In this case the genealogy serves to relate the founding of Israel\u2019s priestly family, the established priesthood being one of Israel\u2019s principal defining institutions. In biblical thought, salvation is not a purely individual thing; it is intimately linked, rather, to certain prescriptive institutions and authoritative ministries, and priesthood, as one of these, involves a proper succession. Proper succession is also a requirement of Christian ordination, a point that was argued strongly before the end of the first century (cf. Clement of Rome, Epistle to the Corinthians 40-44).<\/p>\n
Sunday, April 18<\/b><\/p>\n
Psalms 115 (Greek and Latin 113b): The psalmist seems to enjoy meditating on the futility of these idols, \u201cthe work of men\u2019s hands,\u201d for he spends considerable effort in describing their impotence. Using the mystical number seven, a standard biblical symbol of perfection, he goes on to tell what these idols cannot do: (1) \u201cThey have mouths, but they do not speak;\u201d (2) \u201cEyes they have, but they do not see;\u201d (3) \u201cThey have ears, but they do not hear;\u201d (4) \u201cNoses they have, but they do not smell;\u201d (5) \u201cThey have hands, but they do not handle;\u201d (6) \u201cFeet they have, but they do not walk;\u201d and (7) \u201cNor do they mutter through their throat.\u201d There you have it. These idols, \u201cthe work of men\u2019s hands,\u201d are perfectly imperfect. They are infinitely nothing; there is simply no limit to their imperfection and nothingness.<\/p>\n
And what becomes of the men who devote their lives to the making of these idols? They too become nothing: \u201cThose who make them are like them; so is everyone who trusts in them.\u201d The makers of idols (which includes any one of us who insists on going his own way) will, in the end, have nothing to show for their efforts and their lives: \u201cThe dead do not praise the Lord, nor any who go down into silence.\u201d The silence of the idols becomes the unending silence of eternal loss. Those who make them become like them.<\/p>\n
The children of men, therefore, must not put their trust in the works of their own hands, which are destined to perish with them. Where, then, put our trust? \u201cO Israel, trust in the Lord . . . O house of Aaron, trust in the Lord . . You who fear the Lord, trust in the Lord; He is their help and their shield.\u201d<\/p>\n
Exodus 7: Moses will be the wonderworker, and Aaron the speaker. (As a matter of irony, however, we will find Moses doing almost all the talking, while Aaron extends the wonderworking rod.) Deed and word go together in the Bible, as in any fine drama. Speaking and doing are the two components of God\u2019s revelation. Indeed, these two things sum up the whole activity of Jesus and the Apostles (cf. Mark 6:30; 1 Thessalonians 1:5).<\/p>\n
What is described in verses 8-13 is not one of the plagues, but it is the beginning of a prolonged test of wills and skills. Pharaoh is not much impressed with Moses, since his own people demonstrate comparable skills. After his initial retaliation, however, Pharaoh will never again be in a position to retaliate. Moses and Aaron will keep him on the defensive, with his hands full of trouble. The most he can hope for from any encounter is to break even, and gradually this too will be taken from him.<\/p>\n
The first plague is most serious, because the Nile has always been the foundation of the entire Egyptian agricultural and mercantile economy. Pharaoh\u2019s response is very humorous. After all, the last thing Pharaoh needs right now is another display of water-to-blood skills in Egypt!<\/p>\n
Monday, April 19<\/b><\/p>\n
John 5.1-15: John does not identify the feast in verse 1 (probably to be read without the definite article). One suspects that this mention of a Jewish feast day is inserted simply to explain why Jesus was in Jerusalem (after being in Galilee in the previous chapter).<\/p>\n
The name of the pool was Bethzatha, or Bethdaida, or Bethesda. The pool may have had each of these names at one time or another. Even to this day, one can visit the pool (which, alas, is now completely stagnant and fetid) and see five sides originally covered by porticoes. It is a trapezoid transected into two parts; these are the \u201cfive\u201d sides. The pool is near the lovely church of St. Anne.<\/p>\n
Exodus 8: There are several obvious connections among the various plagues. Here, for instance, there is a great multitude of frogs, because their natural habitat, the water, has become contaminated.<\/p>\n
Even though this second plague is not as harmful as the first, we will see Pharaoh begin to weaken. Obviously this second plague has gotten his attention. For all that, it may be thought of a \u201cnuisance plague,\u201d perhaps putting one in mind of Elijah\u2019s mocking of the prophets of Baal prior to doing them the real damage (1 Kings 18:20-40).<\/p>\n
Once again Pharaoh\u2019s magicians, still a bit \u201cunclear on the concept,\u201d demonstrate that the bringing forth of frogs is also within their power—as though Egypt was suffering a shortage of available frogs!<\/p>\n
Pharaoh\u2019s reaction is new; he is starting to recognize that Moses is not a nobody. Pharaoh is going to test if Moses is really a spokesman for God. As will be very much the case later in the Exodus narrative, Moses is presented as a man given to intercessory prayer. Here he tells Pharaoh to \u201cpick the time,\u201d and, remembering that the previous plague lasted a week, he wisely picks the next day! In this plague (verses 9-10), as in the previous one, mention is made of the outrageous stench afflicting the nation. The third and fourth plagues are clearly related to the death of all the frogs, which are the natural predators of insects.<\/p>\n
Although Pharaoh will once again harden his heart, we at last see in him some disposition to negotiate. He starts to make some concessions that Moses will reject as inadequate. Since the Israelites and the other Semites were accustomed to sacrifice certain animals unacceptable to the Hamites, including Egyptians, however, Moses insists that the people be allowed to leave Egypt to perform these sacrifices. Moses still has a \u201chidden agenda,\u201d of course, as does Pharaoh. There is no reason that either man should trust the other.<\/p>\n
Tuesday, April 20<\/b><\/p>\n
Exodus 9: The matter of the livestock had been introduced in connection with the previous plague, as well as the Lord\u2019s protection of the Israelites from all the plagues. This latter is particularly important. God is already beginning to separate Israel from Egypt, and this separate treatment will continue till its culmination on the night of Pascha.<\/p>\n
As the Hebrew word \u2019aba\u2018bu\u2018oth<\/i> (verses 8-12) appears nowhere else in the Bible, the exact nature of these sores is obscure. The Greek word in the Septuagint text, helkos<\/i>, means any sort of wound, abscess, or ulcer. We observe that at last the magicians retire, no longer able even to put in an appearance in Pharaoh\u2019s court.<\/p>\n
Exodus 9:16 is quoted as part of St. Paul\u2019s famous treatment of the dialectic of salvation history; cf. Romans 9:17. It is one of the greatest misfortunes of theological history that some later commentators, abstracting this passage from its context and inserting it into philosophical speculations about divine predestination and foreknowledge, reached certain conclusions unwarranted by the Scriptures—at odds with the traditional teaching of the Church, and unknown to the earlier, classical commentators on Romans (such as St. John Chrysostom). It is important to insist that the argument in Romans 9 is not about individual salvation; it is about the historical relations of Israel to the Church. There is nothing in this passage to infer that Pharaoh (or Esau) was predestined to be damned.<\/p>\n
Since verse 6 said that all the cattle of the Egyptians had perished anyway, some question may arise with regard to the cattle mentioned in verse 19. Obviously, the inspired biblical writer is not interested in problems like this, a fact perhaps suggesting that we shouldn\u2019t be, either.<\/p>\n
While some of the other plagues, such as insect infestations, visit Egypt occasionally even in normal times, a hailstorm in northeast Africa is a truly rare thing (verse 23). Accompanied by a frightening display of lightning and thunder, this one proves too much for Pharaoh, and for the first time he admits his sin. Alas, his repentance does not outlast the plague that inspired it.<\/p>\n
Verses 31-32 are our only indication with respect to the time of the plagues, suggesting the month of January, before the appearance of the winter wheat.<\/p>\n
Wednesday, April 21<\/b><\/p>\n
1 Corinthians 1.10-20: Paul proposes a remedy to addressi the problem of a schismatic spirit—an intentional concentration on the common bond of Christian unity, the Lordship of Jesus Christ. In answer to those who claim loyalty to Paul, or Apollos, or Kephas, Paul answers, \u201cI belong to Christ! Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?\u201d<\/p>\n
Christians, that is to say, all find their proper and equal level in Christ. It is the level of the baptismal water. All believers are immersed to pretty much the same water level, a depth that symbolizes the common element that unites them. This is where real Christians find their shared identity, their participation in the same sacrament by which they join themselves to Christ. This source of their life is likewise the source of their unity. They are all baptized into one body, and it is the body of Christ.<\/p>\n
This principle puts personal loyalties and individual preferences into their correct perspective. When our Lord multiplied those desert loaves that symbolized the Holy Eucharist, He made everybody sit down on the same level. \u201cHe commanded the multitudes to sit down on the grass\u201d (Matthew 14:19). This act of sitting down, which places all Christians at the same height, corresponds to their immersion in the same water level. This act of descent removes the distraction of individual ascendancies; it places Christ in the center as the unifying principle of the Church.<\/p>\n
Exodus 10: To an agricultural economy, few things are more frightening than a visitation of locusts, which can reduce all plant life, over many square miles, to absolute ground level in a matter of hours (cf. the first chapter of Joel).
\nIn three respects this is the most effective of the plagues to date: (1) Pharaoh\u2019s servants, who had begun in support of him, and had come to see themselves bested (8:15) and had then retired from the combat (9:11), now come out to make a common plea with Moses against Pharaoh; (2) Pharaoh, for the first time, offers to release the Israelite men even before the plague starts; (3) Pharaoh himself asks for forgiveness. Even though the king\u2019s heart is still hardened, the inspired author takes note of the progress.<\/p>\n
In Egypt the sun god, Re, held a special prominence, so this plague of darkness is freighted with special theological significance; the Lord is in earnest doing battle with the gods of Egypt. The three days of darkness here should be seen as a type of the three hours of darkness that covered the earth on that afternoon when the new Moses did battle with the most ancient of the pharaohs of our slavery, himself the Prince of Darkness (Mark 15:33). There on Calvary, as here, the plague of darkness immediately precedes the death of the Firstborn Son.<\/p>\n
Thursday, April 22<\/b><\/p>\n
Exodus 11: In some sense, Moses and Aaron will now be \u201cout of the picture.\u201d This final and decisive plague will involve no activity on their part. This work will be accomplished without human mediation of any kind; the Lord will use only the angelic ministry. The chapter ends by saying that Moses and Aaron had done all they could do to prevent what was about to befall Egypt.<\/p>\n
Doubtless this is what accounts for the anger of Moses as he leaves Pharaoh\u2019s presence for the last time. Sign after sign had been ignored by an inveterately stubborn man seemingly intent on his country\u2019s destruction, and the inspired biblical author stands amazed at such hardness of heart. (Compare St. John\u2019s bewildered comments on the later hardness of heart that could not be softened by the many \u201csigns\u201d done by Jesus; cf. John 12:37-41.)<\/p>\n
Commenting on this \u201cborrowing\u201d from the Egyptians by Israel, one observes two preoccupations among the Fathers of the Church:<\/p>\n
(1) Lest anyone think that this action on Israel\u2019s part was to be copied as a moral example, some of the Fathers took care to point out that the Israelites were, in fact, slaves and, as such, entitled to just remuneration for their coerced labor.<\/p>\n
(2) The silver and gold that the Israelites took from the Egyptians was understood allegorically, as representing the philosophical and cultural riches of Egypt. Thus, they used this example to justify the Christian use of classical pagan philosophy, law, and cultural ideals.<\/p>\n
This allegorical interpretation is not far-fetched; indeed, it is rooted in historical fact. Israel did, indeed, take from Egypt a massive inheritance of philosophy, law, literature, and other cultural wealth. Their own Semitic culture had become enormously enriched by their extensive sojourn in northeast Africa, surrounded by one of the oldest and richest civilizations the world has ever seen.<\/p>\n
Alas, however, so many of these trinkets would eventually be used in the construction of the golden calf, a fact indicating the dangers inherent in any \u201cborrowing\u201d from the world.<\/p>\n
Friday, April 23<\/b><\/p>\n
Exodus 12: There are four features especially to be noted about this important text that interrupts the narrative sequence in order to place the whole into a more theological and liturgical context:<\/p>\n
First, the paschal lamb is an example of \u201csubstitutionary\u201d sacrifice; like the ram that had replaced Isaac on Mount Moriah in Genesis 22:13, the paschal lamb\u2019s life is given in place of the lives of Israel\u2019s first-born sons.<\/p>\n
Second, there is nothing in the text to suggest that this sacrifice is \u201cexpiatory.\u201d That is, unlike certain other biblical sacrifices, such as those associated with Yom Kippur, the sacrifice of the paschal lamb is not made in reparation for sins. Moreover, the Old Testament provides not a single example of an animal being sacrificed in place of a human being whose sin was serious enough to merit death.<\/p>\n
Third, the blood of this paschal lamb is sprinkled at certain points of the houses of those who are \u201credeemed.\u201d This sprinkling is explicitly said to be a \u201csign\u201d of covenant protection, parallel to the rainbow in the covenant with Noah in Genesis 9:12-17 and circumcision in the covenant with Abraham in Genesis 17:19-27.<\/p>\n
Fourth, because this paschal lamb was a type or symbol of the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross (cf. 1 Corinthians 5:7), it was fitting that the meal celebrating the new covenant in His blood should be inaugurated in the setting of the paschal seder (cf. Luke 22:15-20).<\/p>\n
The \u201cthis day\u201d of verse 14 is the fifteenth day of the month Nisan, but it includes the night of Pascha. Pascha itself was to be the first liturgical day of an entire \u201cweek of sabbaths,\u201d that is, seven days of rest and festival continuing the celebration, during which Israel could eat unleavened bread as on Pascha itself. More regulations relative to this weeklong feast are to be found in 13:3-10. In the New Testament the two terms, Pascha and the Feast of the Unleavened Bread, are used almost interchangeably.<\/p>\n
After the lengthy and detailed instructions that prepare for it, the tenth plague is narrated very succinctly, to great dramatic effect. The Exodus itself follows at once. In the writings of the New Testament, the event especially served as a prefiguration and type of redemption, including all of the events narrated of that great week, both His death for our sins and His rising again for our justification.<\/p>\n
So important was the liturgical observance of Pascha to the life of the early Christians that one of the major and most heated controversies of the second century Church concerned the proper dating of the feast. In spite of a venerable tradition held in Ephesus and the other churches of Asia Minor, it was finally determined that Pascha would always be celebrated on a Sunday, a rule that has been maintained by all Christians since the fourth century.<\/p>\n
In verses 43-50 we find more regulations relative to the preparation of the Seder of Pascha. As was noted above, there was no disagreement among the early Christians with respect to the deeper meaning of the paschal lamb. Indeed, verse 46 here, about not breaking the bones of the paschal lamb while preparing it, was seen by St. John as a prophecy of the body of Jesus on the cross, in that the soldiers did not break His legs (cf. John 19:36).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Friday, April 16 John 4.1-14: Jesus goes to the trouble to befriend this woman. When he initiates his conversation with her, it is not a casual act. Jesus intends, from the start, to take this woman on a new path, to show her a new mode of life, to introduce her to a new dimension … Continue reading April 16 – April 23, 2021<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.touchstonemag.com\/daily_reflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1705"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.touchstonemag.com\/daily_reflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.touchstonemag.com\/daily_reflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.touchstonemag.com\/daily_reflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.touchstonemag.com\/daily_reflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1705"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.touchstonemag.com\/daily_reflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1705\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1706,"href":"https:\/\/www.touchstonemag.com\/daily_reflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1705\/revisions\/1706"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.touchstonemag.com\/daily_reflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1705"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.touchstonemag.com\/daily_reflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1705"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.touchstonemag.com\/daily_reflections\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1705"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}