Reflection for Friday, July 16, 2004: 15th week in Ordinary Time.
No Thumbnail Available
Authors
Hamm, Dennis, S.J.
Issue Date
2004-07-16
Volume
Issue
Type
Essay
Language
en_US
Keywords
Alternative Title
Abstract
"If you knew what this meant, 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice, you would not have condemned these innocent men."-Matt 12:8a |This statement is part of Jesus' answer to the Pharisees who are complaining that his disciples are violating the Sabbath by plucking the heads of grain (i.e. doing the "work" of "harvesting" on the day when work is forbidden). For years, before I started studying the Bible seriously, I found this statement of Jesus strangely inconsistent with the rest of his teaching. After all, wasn't the New Testament full of statements affirming the value of sacrifice, Jesus' own sacrifice of himself and the daily sacrifices we all are called to make? And why oppose mercy to sacrifice? Don't the two go together somehow? |These puzzlements were clarified when I finally noticed that Jesus is here quoting Hosea 6:6. The context of Hosea 6 makes it clear that the sacrifice in question is the animal sacrifice of the temple liturgy, not sacrifice in the later Christian sense of generous self-giving service. A full quotation of Hosea 6:6 makes that obvious: "For I desire love, not sacrifice, and knowledge of God rather than holocausts." In the fuller context, the prophet is speaking in God's name challenging both Ephraim and Judah for making their sacrificial worship an empty thing by their injustice and violence. |Jesus is defending his disciples' spontaneous "snacking" in the grounds that meeting a basic human need trumps a narrow application of the law. By citing the example David (1 Samuel 21:6) satisfying his hunger with the bread of the presence in the sanctuary (strictly illegal, as only the priests are permitted to do this), Jesus supplies a biblical precedent for this interpretation. Matthew, in turn, recognizes in Jesus' compassion a demonstration of Hosea's principle of human-to-human mercy being of greater religious importance than the carrying out of the temple ritual. And so he inserts that half-verse from Hosea into this account that he inherited from Mark. (He also uses that same line from Hosea to interpret Jesus' table fellowship with tax collectors and sinners at Matt 9:13.) |Not that Jesus had anything against the temple sacrifices as such. He presumes that the temple worship is a normal part of Jewish life in his teaching about reconciliation in the Sermon on the Mount (5:23-24) and about oath taking (23:16-22). But, in the tradition of the prophets Amos, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and the author of Psalm 50, Jesus also teaches that temple worship is emptied of meaning when the worshipers are not living out the human-to-human dimensions of the covenant.|All this is a reminder that our own practices of worship and devotion are evacuated of meaning to the extent that we fail to treat one another with mercy and compassion.
Description
Citation
Publisher
University Ministry, Creighton University.
License
These reflections may not be sold or used commercially without permission. Personal or parish use is permitted.
Journal
Volume
Issue
PubMed ID
DOI
Identifier
Lectionary number: 393