NewCreation

Homily for Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A

The 5th Sunday in Ordinary Time Welcome, my sisters and brothers, to this homily for the fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time. Our Gospel this week continues straight on from last week. Last week, remember, we looked at the blessed part of the Sermon on the Mount, where I suggested that instead of "blessed" or "happy" for makarios, it be translated as "radiant": those who are going through the precariousness, the grind of the world, and becoming radiant as the presence of God — showing that they are God's children — comes upon them. Now Jesus turns and speaks directly to his disciples and those listening with them. And the emphasis here is not on the descriptor but on the "you." "You are the salt of the earth." So he's referring to those people who are going through the system, but saying: that's you. You want there to be salt on the earth? Become the salt that is needed. The salt — this would have referred to two sorts of things. The salt was sometimes referred to wisdom, the kind of salt that comes with the savour of fine things that have been understood. These are people who are going to be producing the wisdom of this world, the salt of the world, but also the salt that would be put on sacrifices so they would be pleasing to the Lord. These are the people who, by giving themselves away in the midst of the world and its lies and its violence, are showing what is true and are revealing God. So they are going to be taking part in his one true sacrifice which is to come — which, of course, is not the same as any of the world's sacrifices, which are to protect us from the light, but are the ways of allowing the light to come in. So he's saying: this is going to be up to you, this is going to be your task. And then he says, "But if the salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored?" And people have said this is rather odd, because of course salt doesn't lose its taste. Well, it turns out that there's a local reference here — as we will see, a local reference in the reference to the bushel in a second. And the local reference is to the fact that the normal sort of salt that Palestinians worked with or got hold of in the time of Christ was from the Dead Sea, and it was actually full of chemical impurities, with the result that, for instance, you could wash the salt away. The salt could be washed away, and then you'd be left with bits of different elements that were actually no good for anything — certainly not for flavoring of anything — and it's literally not good for anything but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot. They were the residue of the salt. So he's referring to an easily corruptible form of salt, if you like, which would have been familiar to people at the time. And he's saying: if salt has lost its taste — in other words, the savour is going to be related to you, learning how to give yourself away and discover wisdom during that. And then he continues with the notion of this particular flavour. "You are the light of the world," referring to, no doubt, the Isaiah passage which we have in our first reading, but actually to a whole chain of Isaiah references to the light that is coming upon you and how you are going to become the light. And in particular, you are going to become the light in as far as you learn to turn your heart towards the wounded, those with nothing, those who are hungry, those who are sick — in other words, the challenge of entering into the world of the precarious. That is how you are going to become the light. So that's very good Isaiah stuff. And he then says, "A city built on a hill cannot be hid." So rather than a temple or a particular house, he's actually referring to you as a collective. You're going to be this new collective that's going to be built on a hill, that is going to be the new Zion that I am going to re-found — the new foundation in Zion, which is going to be on another hill called Golgotha. That hill is the hill on which you are going to become bearers of light. You're going to become the radiance of the world, just as you're going to become the taste of the world. And then he makes a joke. "No one, after lighting a lamp, puts it under the bushel." And here our translation says "bushel basket." Well, let's be perfectly clear: no one in their right mind would put a bushel basket over a flame, because otherwise you would run a very great risk of burning the bushel basket and of course setting your house on fire, which is exactly the wrong sort of light. The city built on a hill that was burning is not exactly going to help anybody. Okay, so "no one, after lighting a lamp, puts it under the bushel." Now, curiously, a bushel was a metal measuring pot. It also refers to the actual measure of the grain. In order to make sure that people didn't cheat with weights and measures, people would have a metal measuring pot for the bushels that would carry the right amount and would weigh the right amount, so people could tell that they were not being cheated. The bushel measuring pot, of course, was rather like a big saucepan or casserole, except with the handle going up from the rim rather than sideways from the rim. Sideways from the rim would happen with our saucepans, but up from the rim would mean they could be hung from a balance, from a measure, and you could work out how much grain you had in your metal pot. Okay, now as it happens, people did use their metal measuring pots for putting over the lights in their houses. There were several very good reasons for this. A number of Jewish feasts had a considerable demand that you have the light on for a long time. There were feasts of the dedication, or Hanukkah — you had lights on for Several days, and supposing that you were – what is the word – didn't like sleeping with the light on, or – and this was something that the rabbis recommended – wanted to have sex on the Sabbath, and didn't like having sex with the light on, how do you prevent there being light while not putting out the light? Given that putting out light, either lighting or putting out light, was a work and was not allowed on the Sabbath, and on certain holy days you are not meant to put these lights out. But what you could do is, with your metal bushel jar, because it had the handles on the rim, it would sit over the lamp at an angle, which would mean that the oxygen could get in and out and so you wouldn't be actually putting the light out. But the light wouldn't get out, or wouldn't get very far. So effectively you were creating darkness while not putting the light out, and therefore you were not breaking the law. So that would have been a bit of a joke. People would have got it at the time, would have understood exactly what he was talking about. This would have been a common custom. He said, "No, you put it on the lampstand and it gives light to the whole house, whether you want it or not." So he's saying here, in the same way, "Let your light shine before others." In other words, you are going to become the celebratory lights that other people might try to put out, but you are not to allow yourselves to be put out. You are going to become that which lights the whole house, the whole city. You're going to become the light of the world, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven. In other words, you're going to become witnesses through going through this process that makes you radiant witnesses to the one who is bringing you into being, so as to show the light of God. He will be your Father in heaven, and this is the first time Jesus uses this phrase here in Matthew's Gospel. And please note that throughout Matthew's Gospel he never says "our Father" except when he's teaching the disciples to pray, which is when you say "our Father," but he refers to "my Father" and "your Father." In John's Gospel, remember at the very end of John's Gospel, he says "your Father and my Father" after the resurrection. But in Matthew's Gospel it's "your Father who is in heaven." In other words, he is teaching them how to find their way into the inside and becoming sons and daughters of God from himself, but without yet at this point showing how that is to be so. Another challenge to us: to find the way of radiance, the way of saltiness, as we come through Matthew's Gospel, finding ourselves on the inside of the precariousness of the world, and finding that God is in there, always trying to come through into us so as to make Godself better known through us, who will be discovered to be God's daughters… And sons. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Thank you.