THE LITURGY OF THE PALMS

• Matthew 21: 1-11

Jesus arrives in Jerusalem for the climax of his public ministry.  As Matthew reports the event, ancient expectations are fulfilled in very specific details.  Only Matthew’s narrative says that these details fulfill precisely the exact words of “the prophet”– [Isaiah 62:11 and Zechariah 9:9].

• Psalm 118: 1-2,19-29

This is a thanksgiving  psalm sung at the beginning of a liturgy in the Temple, which would have included animal sacrifice.  Bind the sacrificial animal to the altar, the worshipers sing.

THE LITURGY OF THE WORD

• Isaiah 50: 4-9a

In  a time of doubt, despair and cynicism, one stands up to speak, “that I may sustain the weary with a word.”  Despite rejection, the speaker knows his words can renew and restore, because that has been the result in the past and can be again in the present.

• Psalm 31: 9-16

The psalmist is so distraught by the treatment of his enemies, he feels the pain in his eyes, belly and throat.  He has become an outcast among his friends and his family.  His enemies have plotted to take his life.  Yet, “I trust in you, O Lord/My life is in Your hands.”

• Matthew 26: 14-27: 66 or [27: 11-54]

Themes and variations developed throughout the four gospels persist in their respective tellings of the final hours of the earthly life of Jesus.  Matthew’s variations highlight several dominant themes: Jesus attracted friends and enemies; the friends could be fickle and his enemies ruthless; “the Jews” were more vehement enemies than the Roman occupiers; just as non-Jews played a crucial role in saving the infant Jesus when the Magi heeded a dream, so the Gentile wife of Pilate presumes the innocence of Jesus because of a dream; although he could have avoided his fate at any point, Jesus yielded to those who were out to get him; and when all was  said and done by his enemies, the memory of Jesus could not be buried.  Also in Matthew’s text, the actions of Peter and Judas as well as the disciples as a group are more poignant than the other gospels.  The actions of Judas shadow Ahitophel’s betrayal of David, which also led to his suicide by hanging.  At precisely the same time the trial of Jesus is underway, Peter nearby denies he even knows “the man,” although because the disciples have already acknowledged Jesus pathetic and tragic.  Only in Matthew’s text is there an earthquake at the time of Jesus’ death.  Roman soldiers are placed at the tomb of Jesus, so Matthew can promise there was nothing suspicious, as he claims “the Jews” rumored.

At various critical times in their history, a lone leader arose among the Jews to recall God’s past faithfulness and to inspire hope in God’s new action among God’s Chosen People.  The excerpt from Isaiah, read just before the Passion Narrative, is a powerful introduction that raises expectation for Christians that the re-telling of God’s daring contact with humankind– the story of the rejection, suffering and death of Jesus– will re-engage those who hear it once again; (to “sustain the weary with a word.”).

Paul Ricoeur wrote that the scriptures tell the stories of others so that we can see ourselves in them and confront certain unavoidable decisions for ourselves.  Dan Stiver summarized some of Ricoeur’s important insights in Theology after Ricoeur.  Stiver  writes:  “There is the side of interpreting the testimony and also the side of relating it to oneself…” (p. 198)  This knowledge/self-knowledge is not just a matter of ‘belief’, it is “an embodied epistemology,” which Stiver takes from Ricoeur to mean “our thinking is incarnate, that is a bodily action….”  “…[S]ometimes we have the best insights when we are most passionate, not least.” (p.203)  “Ricoeur sees,” writes Stiver, “that we cannot avoid some outlook on life, but it is not knowledge that can be guaranteed by some method or foundation, a la the modernist ethos; rather it is a risk we must take that we back with our lives.”  (p. 205)

In Matthew’s version of the last hours of the life of Jesus, we recognize too well the human failures of personal cowardice, betrayal, sorrow, regret, remorse, violence, despair and the temptation to surrender to cynicism as well as the total failure of human religious, political and judicial institutions.  By reading/re-telling/participating in this story we take the risk that we will see ourselves.  It sends a chill through us.  But we also take the risk that we will see God’s love at work to woo us back to ourselves, healed and restored because of God’s love.  We take the risk that we will see that it is far more than the tragic story of the wrongful execution of an innocent man.  It is the testimony of One– in words and actions– to the love of God.  And we make a decision, not just with our heads, but with our total being; an “incarnational” decision.   All this is “a risk we back with our lives.”