Ember Friday in Lent
by the Revd Dr Robert Wilson PhD (Cantab), Old Roman Apostolate UK
Today we continue to hear more from same chapter of Ezekiel that was appointed for yesterday’s lesson. The prophet emphasises that “the soul that sinneth, the same shall die: the son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, and the father shall not bear the iniquity of the son: the justice of the just shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him.” But if the wicked repented and kept God’s commandments then he would live and not die. Likewise if the just man turned to iniquity he would bring judgment upon himself. “And you have said: The way of the Lord is not right. Hear ye therefore, O house of Israel: Is it my way that is not right, and not rather your ways perverse? For when the just turneth away from his justice and committeth iniquity, he shall die therein: in the injustice that he hath wrought he shall die. And when the wicked turneth himself away from his wickedness, which he hath wrought, and doeth judgment and justice, he shall save his soul alive. Because he considereth and turneth away from his iniquities which he hath wrought, he shall surely live and not die.”
There is much to learn today from Ezekiel’s emphasis on the need for the people to take responsibility for their own actions. Whereas morality is seen by the prophet as coming from God and responsibility is something that we have to accept for ourselves, today morality has been outsourced to the market and increasingly responsibility is being transferred to the State. While there may be some validity in the criticism that Ezekiel did not take sufficiently into account the role of the social environment in influencing human behaviour, our own age is finding that the denial that people are responsible for their actions has disastrous consequences. We need to take heed to the words of Ezekiel, acknowledge our own sins and shortcomings and repent.
The Gospel from St. John (which we heard today) recounts the healing of the paralysed man. There was a festival day of the Jews and Jesus had gone up to Jerusalem. There was a pool in Jerusalem called Probatica (in Hebrew Bethsaida), having five porches. There were a great multitude of the sick, the blind, the lame and the withered waiting for the moving of the water that they might be healed. One man had been infirm for thirty eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there he said to him “Wilt thou be made whole? The infirm man answered him: Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pond: for whilst I am coming, another goeth down before me. Jesus saith to him: Arise, take up thy bed and walk. And immediately the man was made whole: and he took up his bed and walked.” It was the Sabbath day and the Jews said that it was therefore not lawful for him to take up his bed. The man answered that the one who made him whole had told him to do this. When they asked who this was he said that he did not know, for Jesus had left the multitude that were in that place. Later he found the man in the temple and told him that since he has now been made whole he should sin no more, lest some worse thing happen to him. The man therefore went and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him whole.
It is often rightly observed that St. John’s Gospel is the one that holds the key to understanding the other three Gospels theologically. It is less commonly noted that this is also true historically as well. The other three Gospels say nothing about any journeys of Jesus to Jerusalem between his early association with John the Baptist in Judea and the final Passover where he met his death. It is clear from reading between the lines that Jesus had followers in Jerusalem, the man who provided him with a donkey for his triumphal entry into the city, the one who prepared for him an upper room to celebrate the Passover with his disciples and Joseph of Arimathea, who provided a tomb for his burial. It would be strange if he wept over the city if he had not sought to win it.
St. John’s Gospel provides the solution for this otherwise unaccountable mystery. It recalls an extensive ministry of Jesus not only in Galilee, but also in Jerusalem as well. This was only to expected of one who observed the great Jewish feasts that were celebrated in the city. We are not told what the feast was in which the incident we heard in today’s Gospel took place. The account does show the type of detailed topographical knowledge that is so characteristic of this Gospel, resting as it does on St. John’s own testimony as an eyewitness. Archaeological excavation in the last century appears to have uncovered the site of the pool at Bethsaida.
It is sometimes supposed that St. John’s Gospel neglects to report Jesus’ ministry among the social outcasts and places all the emphasis instead of the mutual love between Jesus and his disciples. While it is true that St. John gives more attention to the depth of Jesus’ love for his disciples than the others, the account of the healing of the paralysed man (as well as the encounter with the Samaritan woman and the man born blind) clearly shows that the mission to seek and save the lost does not go altogether unnoticed.
It would seem that the paralysed man nursed some sort of grievance that others were always able to be healed by the waters ahead of him. When Jesus asked him if he wanted to be made whole he appears to be seeking to get him to admit this in order for the healing to take place, a reminder that it was not simply a physical matter but also involved the whole person. It certainly seems that the man was somewhat lacking in initiative. Perhaps he felt so worn down by his thirty eight years of paralysis that he had abandoned hope that his situation could ever be improved.
The incident (as with many other healings in the Gospels) aroused controversy because it took place on the Sabbath day. It is almost impossible to exaggerate the importance of the observance of the Sabbath in Judaism. In principle it was a profoundly egalitarian institution. It was the one day of the week when all, high and low, rich and poor, were commanded to abstain from work. The difficulty was how to define what constituted work. It was generally agreed by the scribes, the learned teachers of the Law, that work was prohibited unless life was in danger. The paralysed man, although he was seriously ill, was clearly not in imminent danger of death, so it was therefore held that Jesus had acted unlawfully in healing him on the Sabbath day.
Jesus responded to this criticism by saying that his Father was always at work on the Sabbath and he too was working. This sounded blasphemous to his opponents, because Jesus was identifying his actions with God’s activity. This seemed to be making himself equal with God. He replied that the Son could do nothing by himself but only what he saw the Father doing. For whatever the Father does the Son also does, for the Father loves the Son and shows him all things that he does. As the Father had life in himself, so also the Son has life in himself. Indeed he had given him the authority to execute judgment because he is the Son of Man. On the last day those in their graves would hear the voice of the Son of God. The righteous would be raised to life and the wicked to judgment. The hour that would come in the future was already breaking into history in Jesus’ own ministry. His testimony was greater than that of John, for his works bore witness to the truth of his message. His opponents, who prided themselves on upholding the letter of the law would be accused by Moses himself, for hope of the prophets was now incarnate in their midst.
Jesus claimed nothing for himself in his own right, but everything for what God was doing in him. There was no need to look beyond him, for to see him was to see the Father. They were utterly identified, but not identical, since (as St. Athanasius later put it) the Father was Father and not Son. This claim divided his contemporaries and it still challenges us today. Let us pray for grace that we will continue to uphold that same faith in our own time and place.
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