The end... and the beginning
Commentary
Object:
Advent is a season of anticipation, but as we near the end of the season of Pentecost our readings anticipate this anticipation. Today we hear both a story of a miraculous birth and Jesus’ prophecies of the end times as a new beginning. As the children’s curriculum Godly Play tells us in its lesson on the church year: “For every beginning there is an ending, and for every ending there is a beginning.” Our endings and beginnings get all tied up together.
1 Samuel 1:4-20
Last Sunday, we heard a reading from the book of Ruth about the birth of Obed (father of Jesse and grandfather of King David) to Ruth and Boaz. Today brings another birth story from the Hebrew scriptures that presages the birth of Jesus. In both Ruth and 1 Samuel, the birth of a longed-for son brings security and strength to women who had been vulnerable because of their childlessness.
“Shiloh” may be translated “Place of Peace,” but to Elkanah’s family on their pilgrimage, it was anything but that. With Thanksgiving approaching, a loose comparison might be made to the strife and buried hurts that may be brought to the table as families gather for a celebratory feast. It is unclear in the Hebrew and among varied translations whether Elkanah gave Hannah a more generous portion of the family feast on their annual pilgrimage to Shiloh, or whether he gave her only a single portion while Peninnah received multiple portions in order to feed her many sons and daughters. Whatever happened, this annual feast became a regular occasion for Peninnah, the fertile but less favored wife, to taunt Hannah, the barren but favored one. Elkanah does not seem to have helped the situation in showing his favoritism, and many in the pews may be reminded of one family holiday or another in which at least one member ran weeping from the table.
Hannah brings her woes to the temple in Shiloh, returning to where the sacrifice had been offered. And there, in her distress, she makes a remarkable vow: if God will give her a son, she will give her son back to God. The reading from 1 Samuel 2:1-10 appointed for today in place of the Psalm is not Hannah’s immediate response to Eli’s promise of a son, but the prayer that she speaks two or three years later after she returns to the temple with the recently weaned Samuel and leaves him in the Lord’s service and Eli’s care.
Hannah’s story is a remarkable foreshadowing of the births of both Jesus and John the Baptist as they appear in the first chapter of gospel of Luke. While Hannah’s prayer is similar to Mary’s Magnificat, the story of a much-loved but barren older woman receiving a promise in the temple of a son who will be dedicated to God shares more in common with the story of Mary’s cousin Elizabeth. In Elizabeth’s story it is her husband Zechariah who receives the promise, but remarkably in both cases, Samuel and John the Baptist, even before their births, are dedicated to God as servants who will never drink wine. Samuel and John the Baptist also share similar prophetic roles in preparing the way and anointing the king to come: for Samuel, Saul and then David; for John, his cousin Jesus.
Hebrews 10:11-14 (15-18) 19-25
The sacrificial system of the Jerusalem Temple has ended. As we will explore further as we consider today’s reading from the gospel of Mark, it has been destroyed forever. The writer of the letter to the Hebrews is emphatic that there is no need to recover or revive the sacrificial system, addressing those faithful who may be feeling the need to do so. Christ has paid the final and ultimate sacrifice, and a new covenant that does not depend on sacrificial offerings has been created. If preachers have not already done so for prior Sunday readings from this letter, today offers an opportunity to describe the Temple structure and system of sacrifice that came to an end, for this knowledge can help illuminate what otherwise may be puzzling allusions in today’s pericope.
For over a thousand years, until its destruction by Roman armies in 70 AD, the Jewish people focused their worship of God in the Temple in Jerusalem. (Today’s reading from 1 Samuel predates this period, showing a system of temple worship and sacrifice even older than the Jerusalem Temple.) Once it was built, and the Ark of the Covenant placed within, God was believed to reside in the Jerusalem Temple and people came to offer sacrifices, which were mediated by the Temple priests. These sacrifices could be grain, wine, oil, or animals that were ritually slain for their meat. Sacrifices could be made for thanksgiving or simply to show goodwill towards God, as Elkanah and his family made at Shiloh, or they could be made to cleanse a person or community from inadvertent sins or defilements. The books of Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers outline elaborate guidelines and rules for sacrifice according to the occasion. Priests in the Jerusalem Temple did indeed stand “day after day at [God’s] service offering again and again the same sacrifices” (Hebrews 10:11). In Hebrews 10:19-22, the writer makes reference to the annual Day of Atonement (in Hebrew, Yom Kippur) ritual in which the high priest first cleansed himself with water, then offered an animal sacrifice, sprinkling sacrificial blood on the altar to cleanse the Temple from any impurities (Leviticus 16; Hebrews 10:22 makes reference to cleansing by sprinkling and by pure water). This was the only day each year on which the high priest could pass beyond the veil (or curtain, as in Hebrews 10:20) into the Holy of Holies, where God was believed to reside. Significantly, in all the synoptic gospels the veil of the Temple was torn in two at Jesus’ death (Mark 15:38, Matthew 27:51, Luke 23:45), destroying the separation between God and humans that had been mediated by the Temple priests. Christ is enough, the writer of Hebrews emphasizes over and over again. For 21st-century Christians, it might be worth pondering what our own equivalent of Temple sacrifice might be. What rituals, practices, and priest-like intermediaries do we turn to in hopes of finding favor with God, rather than simply trusting in God’s incredible mercy, forgiveness, and love?
Mark 13:1-8
Today marks the end of our lectionary year readings through the gospel of Mark -- Christ the King Sunday next week will have us reading from the gospel of John, and then we move on to Cycle C and the gospel of Luke with the start of Advent. Fittingly for this farewell Sunday, we hear Jesus speaking a farewell discourse to his disciples. Though it sounds cataclysmic, it is worth saying that it is accurate. In 70 AD, the Jerusalem Temple was indeed obliterated by Roman armies, its stones thrown down and people slaughtered by the tens of thousands -- at least. Josephus claims that 1.1 million died in the siege of Jerusalem. This came after years of strife and bloodshed in which Jewish military leaders claiming to be messiahs did rise up against the Roman occupation (Mark 13:5-6). Our reading ends with Jesus saying, “This is but the beginning of the birth pangs” (Mark 13:9), and one could well argue that this is true. With the dispersion of both Jews and Christians after the siege of Jerusalem, both religions took new forms and spread in new ways, across entire continents and eventually oceans. In some parts of the gospel we can hear Jesus’ words as applying equally to us as to the disciples, but in today’s reading it is worth naming the historical particularity of the events of which Jesus spoke. Looking at the past 2,000 years, it seems to me that, yes, a new world was being born out of the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple. But can we say this is always the case for such slaughter and strife? It’s a question to ponder, and perhaps a dangerous one to ask, for we run the risk of discounting the horrors of war, in our own time or any other. But we worship a God who brings life out of death in surprising new ways. Perhaps we can simply affirm that death, on whatever scale we experience it and however terrible it may be, is never the end of God’s story.
Application
The destruction of the Jerusalem Temple looms large in the minds of New Testament writers, and understandably so -- it was a cataclysmic event that forever changed the history not only of the Christian church in its earliest days but of Judaism as well... and of the world too, some could argue, given the place of these two religions through world history of the past 2,000 years. Despite the importance of this event, I have found little appreciation among many parishioners of its significance, historically or theologically. Today’s readings offer a chance to tell this story. We could even argue that this story begins with our reading from 1 Samuel, for Samuel then anointed Saul and David, initiating the reign of kings over Israel, and David’s son Solomon built the first of the Jerusalem temples. As we consider the destruction of the Temple, we can also delve into the suffering and death we experience and witness in our own personal lives and in the news of our world.
Death throes and birth pangs can look remarkably similar, and we, with our limited knowledge of the universe and God’s ways, may not always be able to recognize the difference. As I have waited with people as they have died -- some peacefully, others not -- I have gained a stronger and stronger sense that I am witnessing not simply a death but also a birth or transition to something more. Pastors who have accompanied the dying may be able to speak out of their own experiences. As we witness the current refugee crisis across Europe and beyond, I also have a strong sense of a world seized with birth pangs -- there is and remains great suffering, and as this resolves over coming years the world will be changed, just as it has been by the wars of the 20th century. But this is speculation, and ultimately God does not ask us to figure everything out but to be faithful and to minister to one another and to all who are suffering and in pain. “And let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds, not neglecting to meet together, as it the habit of some, but encouraging one another,” as the writer of the letter to the Hebrews admonishes in today’s reading (10:24-25). It can be easy to be overwhelmed by suffering -- our own, that of those we love, that of the world -- but suffering is never the end. If we get stuck in looking only at suffering, we miss the resurrection.
Alternate Application
How rare it is to hear a woman’s story in scripture! Here Hannah is the main character, rather than the appendage of some patriarch or other as we find with so many women mentioned in much of the Hebrew scriptures. Surely she foreshadows Mary and Elizabeth, who we will celebrate this coming Advent season, but she deserves her own celebration -- for her temerity to bring her plea to God, for her struggles, and for her incredible devotion to God. Imagine leaving your only child, just two or three years old, at the Temple for God’s service! But Hannah reminds us that our children are God’s, not our own, and all of us are called to raise them as such. Hannah also gives us permission to talk in church about pastoral issues around which the church is so often silent: the deep pain of infertility, of miscarriages and stillbirths, of what this can do to our marriages; our friendships with those fortunate enough to have healthy children, with God. Perhaps today can be a time to acknowledge that the coming Advent and Christmas seasons, with their stories of pregnancy, birth, and new life, can trigger deep memories and buried emotions. And maybe, as Hannah does, we can take all these to God, who does listen, care, and respond -- not always as we might wish, but faithfully, lovingly, and in ways that bring healing we could never imagine.
1 Samuel 1:4-20
Last Sunday, we heard a reading from the book of Ruth about the birth of Obed (father of Jesse and grandfather of King David) to Ruth and Boaz. Today brings another birth story from the Hebrew scriptures that presages the birth of Jesus. In both Ruth and 1 Samuel, the birth of a longed-for son brings security and strength to women who had been vulnerable because of their childlessness.
“Shiloh” may be translated “Place of Peace,” but to Elkanah’s family on their pilgrimage, it was anything but that. With Thanksgiving approaching, a loose comparison might be made to the strife and buried hurts that may be brought to the table as families gather for a celebratory feast. It is unclear in the Hebrew and among varied translations whether Elkanah gave Hannah a more generous portion of the family feast on their annual pilgrimage to Shiloh, or whether he gave her only a single portion while Peninnah received multiple portions in order to feed her many sons and daughters. Whatever happened, this annual feast became a regular occasion for Peninnah, the fertile but less favored wife, to taunt Hannah, the barren but favored one. Elkanah does not seem to have helped the situation in showing his favoritism, and many in the pews may be reminded of one family holiday or another in which at least one member ran weeping from the table.
Hannah brings her woes to the temple in Shiloh, returning to where the sacrifice had been offered. And there, in her distress, she makes a remarkable vow: if God will give her a son, she will give her son back to God. The reading from 1 Samuel 2:1-10 appointed for today in place of the Psalm is not Hannah’s immediate response to Eli’s promise of a son, but the prayer that she speaks two or three years later after she returns to the temple with the recently weaned Samuel and leaves him in the Lord’s service and Eli’s care.
Hannah’s story is a remarkable foreshadowing of the births of both Jesus and John the Baptist as they appear in the first chapter of gospel of Luke. While Hannah’s prayer is similar to Mary’s Magnificat, the story of a much-loved but barren older woman receiving a promise in the temple of a son who will be dedicated to God shares more in common with the story of Mary’s cousin Elizabeth. In Elizabeth’s story it is her husband Zechariah who receives the promise, but remarkably in both cases, Samuel and John the Baptist, even before their births, are dedicated to God as servants who will never drink wine. Samuel and John the Baptist also share similar prophetic roles in preparing the way and anointing the king to come: for Samuel, Saul and then David; for John, his cousin Jesus.
Hebrews 10:11-14 (15-18) 19-25
The sacrificial system of the Jerusalem Temple has ended. As we will explore further as we consider today’s reading from the gospel of Mark, it has been destroyed forever. The writer of the letter to the Hebrews is emphatic that there is no need to recover or revive the sacrificial system, addressing those faithful who may be feeling the need to do so. Christ has paid the final and ultimate sacrifice, and a new covenant that does not depend on sacrificial offerings has been created. If preachers have not already done so for prior Sunday readings from this letter, today offers an opportunity to describe the Temple structure and system of sacrifice that came to an end, for this knowledge can help illuminate what otherwise may be puzzling allusions in today’s pericope.
For over a thousand years, until its destruction by Roman armies in 70 AD, the Jewish people focused their worship of God in the Temple in Jerusalem. (Today’s reading from 1 Samuel predates this period, showing a system of temple worship and sacrifice even older than the Jerusalem Temple.) Once it was built, and the Ark of the Covenant placed within, God was believed to reside in the Jerusalem Temple and people came to offer sacrifices, which were mediated by the Temple priests. These sacrifices could be grain, wine, oil, or animals that were ritually slain for their meat. Sacrifices could be made for thanksgiving or simply to show goodwill towards God, as Elkanah and his family made at Shiloh, or they could be made to cleanse a person or community from inadvertent sins or defilements. The books of Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers outline elaborate guidelines and rules for sacrifice according to the occasion. Priests in the Jerusalem Temple did indeed stand “day after day at [God’s] service offering again and again the same sacrifices” (Hebrews 10:11). In Hebrews 10:19-22, the writer makes reference to the annual Day of Atonement (in Hebrew, Yom Kippur) ritual in which the high priest first cleansed himself with water, then offered an animal sacrifice, sprinkling sacrificial blood on the altar to cleanse the Temple from any impurities (Leviticus 16; Hebrews 10:22 makes reference to cleansing by sprinkling and by pure water). This was the only day each year on which the high priest could pass beyond the veil (or curtain, as in Hebrews 10:20) into the Holy of Holies, where God was believed to reside. Significantly, in all the synoptic gospels the veil of the Temple was torn in two at Jesus’ death (Mark 15:38, Matthew 27:51, Luke 23:45), destroying the separation between God and humans that had been mediated by the Temple priests. Christ is enough, the writer of Hebrews emphasizes over and over again. For 21st-century Christians, it might be worth pondering what our own equivalent of Temple sacrifice might be. What rituals, practices, and priest-like intermediaries do we turn to in hopes of finding favor with God, rather than simply trusting in God’s incredible mercy, forgiveness, and love?
Mark 13:1-8
Today marks the end of our lectionary year readings through the gospel of Mark -- Christ the King Sunday next week will have us reading from the gospel of John, and then we move on to Cycle C and the gospel of Luke with the start of Advent. Fittingly for this farewell Sunday, we hear Jesus speaking a farewell discourse to his disciples. Though it sounds cataclysmic, it is worth saying that it is accurate. In 70 AD, the Jerusalem Temple was indeed obliterated by Roman armies, its stones thrown down and people slaughtered by the tens of thousands -- at least. Josephus claims that 1.1 million died in the siege of Jerusalem. This came after years of strife and bloodshed in which Jewish military leaders claiming to be messiahs did rise up against the Roman occupation (Mark 13:5-6). Our reading ends with Jesus saying, “This is but the beginning of the birth pangs” (Mark 13:9), and one could well argue that this is true. With the dispersion of both Jews and Christians after the siege of Jerusalem, both religions took new forms and spread in new ways, across entire continents and eventually oceans. In some parts of the gospel we can hear Jesus’ words as applying equally to us as to the disciples, but in today’s reading it is worth naming the historical particularity of the events of which Jesus spoke. Looking at the past 2,000 years, it seems to me that, yes, a new world was being born out of the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple. But can we say this is always the case for such slaughter and strife? It’s a question to ponder, and perhaps a dangerous one to ask, for we run the risk of discounting the horrors of war, in our own time or any other. But we worship a God who brings life out of death in surprising new ways. Perhaps we can simply affirm that death, on whatever scale we experience it and however terrible it may be, is never the end of God’s story.
Application
The destruction of the Jerusalem Temple looms large in the minds of New Testament writers, and understandably so -- it was a cataclysmic event that forever changed the history not only of the Christian church in its earliest days but of Judaism as well... and of the world too, some could argue, given the place of these two religions through world history of the past 2,000 years. Despite the importance of this event, I have found little appreciation among many parishioners of its significance, historically or theologically. Today’s readings offer a chance to tell this story. We could even argue that this story begins with our reading from 1 Samuel, for Samuel then anointed Saul and David, initiating the reign of kings over Israel, and David’s son Solomon built the first of the Jerusalem temples. As we consider the destruction of the Temple, we can also delve into the suffering and death we experience and witness in our own personal lives and in the news of our world.
Death throes and birth pangs can look remarkably similar, and we, with our limited knowledge of the universe and God’s ways, may not always be able to recognize the difference. As I have waited with people as they have died -- some peacefully, others not -- I have gained a stronger and stronger sense that I am witnessing not simply a death but also a birth or transition to something more. Pastors who have accompanied the dying may be able to speak out of their own experiences. As we witness the current refugee crisis across Europe and beyond, I also have a strong sense of a world seized with birth pangs -- there is and remains great suffering, and as this resolves over coming years the world will be changed, just as it has been by the wars of the 20th century. But this is speculation, and ultimately God does not ask us to figure everything out but to be faithful and to minister to one another and to all who are suffering and in pain. “And let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds, not neglecting to meet together, as it the habit of some, but encouraging one another,” as the writer of the letter to the Hebrews admonishes in today’s reading (10:24-25). It can be easy to be overwhelmed by suffering -- our own, that of those we love, that of the world -- but suffering is never the end. If we get stuck in looking only at suffering, we miss the resurrection.
Alternate Application
How rare it is to hear a woman’s story in scripture! Here Hannah is the main character, rather than the appendage of some patriarch or other as we find with so many women mentioned in much of the Hebrew scriptures. Surely she foreshadows Mary and Elizabeth, who we will celebrate this coming Advent season, but she deserves her own celebration -- for her temerity to bring her plea to God, for her struggles, and for her incredible devotion to God. Imagine leaving your only child, just two or three years old, at the Temple for God’s service! But Hannah reminds us that our children are God’s, not our own, and all of us are called to raise them as such. Hannah also gives us permission to talk in church about pastoral issues around which the church is so often silent: the deep pain of infertility, of miscarriages and stillbirths, of what this can do to our marriages; our friendships with those fortunate enough to have healthy children, with God. Perhaps today can be a time to acknowledge that the coming Advent and Christmas seasons, with their stories of pregnancy, birth, and new life, can trigger deep memories and buried emotions. And maybe, as Hannah does, we can take all these to God, who does listen, care, and respond -- not always as we might wish, but faithfully, lovingly, and in ways that bring healing we could never imagine.
