Today, in the U.S., it is election day. So, if you had to pick which branch of government Jesus would be, which one would you pick? I think St. Mark picks the unexpected! (click below to read)
(Click here to read the passage, Mark 2:13 – 27)
(Click here to read part 1)
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Three Branches of Government
This political season has been a very unique one.
If anything, it has gotten people to think about what they learned in their high school government class and, for some, it has gotten them reading The Federalist Papers – especially No. 68 – which is a sort of explanation for the U.S. Constitution.
Now, don’t worry this isn’t a political sermon, but the structure of our government does help us understand what’s happening in our passage.
You see, the U.S. Government was set up with three branches: the legislative, the executive, and the judicial.
The legislative branch – made up of the House and Senate – proposes and debates bills. If a majority agrees that the bill should become a law, they pass it and it moves on to the executive branch.
Once there, the president either signs the bill and it becomes a law or he vetoes it.
Now, the legislative and executive branches balance each other out – hopefully with the result that only good bills become laws.
However, it is possible that a new law violates the Constitution. In this case, an American citizen has the right to challenge the law through the use of the judicial branch.
Ultimately, it’s the Supreme Court that officially interprets the Constitution. A professor from the most prestigious law school – either conservative or liberal – could argue for or against a law, but it’s the Supreme Court that has the final say.
Who Has Final Say?
Previously, Mark had established that God was acting to rescue the world from its sins.
He sets the stage by showing us that Jesus is the embodiment of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. YHWH has returned with authority.
Now, Jesus clashes with the other “authorities” of the day.
The big question: who has the final say on the Old Testament Law?
Is it Jesus?
Or, is it the Scribes and Pharisees who study the Law?
The next three stories – the calling of Levi, the question about fasting, and the pronouncement about the sabbath – gives us a chance to decide.
The Law Vs. Your Dinner Guests
The calling of Levi sets the stage.
Levi was a tax collector. His name indicates that he was from a priestly family.
But, by many Jews of the day, he was seen as a traitor: he cooperated with the occupiers of the land by collecting money from his own people. He was, to put it bluntly, benefiting from Roman oppression.
To other Jews, he might as well have been a “gentile sinner.”
So, when Jesus comes along, calls Levi, and eats with him, this is a big shock!
The Pharisees – whose name means, “separated ones” – believed that they needed to maintain their holiness by remaining apart from “gentiles” and “sinners.”
Now, there are Old Testament laws about what sorts of food are permitted, but not whom you could eat with. It was Rabbinic law that forbade this sort of thing. For the Pharisees, eating with the wrong people crossed their purity-by-separation boundaries.
So, when Jesus calls and eats with Levi and other sinners, he is directly challenging the Pharisees interpretation of the Law and what it means to be holy. In fact, he was actually suggesting that the Pharisees had wrongfully added to the Law.
Reorienting Our Understanding of the Law
The next challenge about who has the right to interpret the Law comes over a question about fasting.
We learn that the Pharisees, as well as John’s disciples, fast but Jesus’ disciples do not.
What’s going on?
The Law prescribes fast periods. If Jesus is God in the flesh, returning to enact a new Exodus, wouldn’t his disciples follow the Law?
Jesus’ response is twofold.
Firstly, through an analogy of a wedding, Christ identifies himself as the bridegroom – and who fasts at a wedding feast? This is, of course, a signpost that points to the crucifixion.
However, it’s the next analogy that gets our attention.
No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment; if he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; if he does, the wine will burst the skins, and the wine is lost, and so are the skins; but new wine is for fresh skins.” (Mark 2:21-22 RSV)
We don’t use wineskins today, but there’s no reason to doubt what Jesus says about patches and wineskins; we still get the point.
The character of the community Jesus is gathering around him is one of “fermentation and disruption.” The new does not fit well with the old patterns.
Now that Emmanuel – God with us – walks among us, we find that religious symbols, such as Law, Temple, and Land, are reoriented in new and surprising ways.
But, only if Jesus is Emmanuel, does he have the proper authority to reinterpret these symbols.
In light of the Messiah, they are signposts that point to this new reality.
The Messianic King and the Law
The last argument for Jesus as the “Supreme Court,” the one who has final say on the interpretation of the Law, comes over a question about the sabbath.
One sabbath he was going through the grainfields; and as they made their way his disciples began to pluck heads of grain. And the Pharisees said to him, “Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the sabbath?” (Mark 2:23-24 RSV)
The Pharisees, of course, were horrified. As they saw it, the Law prevented such actions on Saturday.
But Jesus pushes back. He makes a reference to a time when David and his motley crew did such a thing, and then he declares:
“The sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath; so the Son of man is lord even of the sabbath.” (Mark 2:27-28 RSV)
It may seem strange to first tell a story about David and then talk about one who is “lord of the Sabbath.”
The argument is this: David – who as king was an anointed “messiah” – has the authority to set aside parts of the Law. This, it seems, is kingly authority.
So, Jesus, anointed as the Messiah at his baptism, has the same authority.
In fact, his reference to the “Son of Man” is a declaration of his Messiahship – a position of authority.
I saw in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man… And to him was given dominion and glory and kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed. (Daniel 7:13-14 RSV)
Jesus is claiming, outright, this kingly authority, held only by a true king of Israel and described by Daniel.
The Good News of a Messianic Authority Over the Law
By eating with tax collectors and sinners, Jesus challenges the authority of the Pharisees to interpret the Law.
The question about fasting shows us that Jesus’ interpretation is something a bit different than the old interpretation. With the coming of the Messiah, something new is happening. Things just won’t be the same.
And, in pronouncing himself the Lord of the Sabbath, Jesus directly shows that he is the “Supreme Court” that has the final say.
All this may seem abstract, but it’s actually quite relevant.
Why?
Because it means that we aren’t saved by a human interpretation of the Law – no matter how learned the person or group may be.
Instead, we are made anew by a God who so loved us that he sent his uniquely begotten Son – a God who desires mercy, not sacrifice.
And for us today, as “gentile sinners,” that is good news.
(Click here to continue on to part 4)
P.S. See the Law with New Eyes!
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