“For all of them have contributed out of
their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all
she had to live on.” From the Gospel for today, the Gospel according to Mark,
chapter 12, verse 44.
In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus
Sancti. Amen.
Today’s Gospel reading includes two
different stories: a denunciation of the scribes, and the story of the widow’s
offering. At first hearing, it may seem that they are about two different subjects
--- hypocritical scribes and a genuinely devout widow --- but in fact they are
closely related. The story of the widow is better understood after the story of
the denunciation of the scribes. It is not accidental that the widow story
follows the scribe story. And both are better understood when we include
readings not in today’s Gospel: the story of the cleansing of the Temple in
chapter 11 of Mark’s Gospel, and the foretelling of the destruction of the
Temple, in chapter 13, right after the end of today’s reading.
Let’s look back at the cleansing of the
Temple in chapter 11. The Evangelist writes, “[Jesus] entered the Temple and
began to drive out those who were selling and those who were buying in the
Temple, and he overturned the tables of the money changers, and the seats of
those who sold doves.” It is clear what is happening here. Jesus wants to clear
the Temple of anyone and anything to do with economic transactions, which are
out of place in a house of prayer, as far as Jesus is concerned. The Temple is
to be a house of prayer for all the nations. There are to be no distinctions
based on what people can buy or sell. The Temple is to be a house of prayer for
all nations, and nothing else. The system is set up to make a profit from the
sale of animals for the sacrifices, and even the poorest are exploited by the
sale of doves, the cheapest offerings available. Jesus wants to put an end to
this system. The Temple is a huge operation, and a very important one in the
economy. Large numbers of farmers rely on it as a market for their animals, and
the Temple priests and servants rely on it for their living. So we can
appreciate just how radical Jesus is when he clears the Temple; he is
attempting to bring an end to the exploitation and profiteering which support
it, and which dominate the economy and society. Understandably, as the
Evangelist says, “the chief priests and the scribes…kept looking for a way to
kill him.” The people profiting from the Temple system will stop at nothing to
keep it going. Many people in our world are equally ruthless in their defense
of the current system.
With this in mind, we return to today’s
reading, and Jesus’s remarks about the scribes: “They devour widows’ houses and
for the sake of appearance say long prayers.” The scribes, that is, people
involved in the law, or finance, or religious institutions, or government, and
so on, don’t come off well in today’s Gospel. Jesus’s radical critique and
uncompromising attitude are unmistakable.
I was asked in a gathering of new priests
the other day, how I respond to Jesus as a person. I replied that almost all my
preaching is about Jesus’s personal interactions and what they reveal about his
teaching. It seems to me that the person Jesus is real and vivid in these
exchanges in the Temple. He is clearly not on the side of the establishment,
the side of the chief priests and the scribes. “They devour widows’ houses,”
Jesus says. Our economic system today is not all that different in its
treatment of the poor, widows and otherwise.
With all this in mind, what are we to make
of the widow’s offering (called the “widow’s mite” in the old translation)? The
usual interpretation of this story commends the sacrificial piety of the poor
widow, and holds it up as an example of ideal religious behavior. But is it
really? Is that what Jesus is teaching here? Or, with his remark in mind about
how the scribes devour widows’ houses, is he really saying something else? I
think that he is, and I think that we need to pay attention to what he’s up to
here.
The priests and scribes are quite willing
to take all that the widow has, her “mite”, to support the Temple system, which
is to say, to support the system which exploits the piety of the poor. That is
what Jesus is saying here, and he does not approve. To confirm this, let us
hear the passage that immediately follows today’s reading, from chapter 13,
verses 1 and 2. “As he came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to
him, ‘Look, Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!’ Then Jesus
asked him, ‘Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left here
upon another; all will be thrown down.’” That is what Jesus thinks of the
Temple and its exploitation of the poor widow. He does not expect it to last,
and in fact he is certain that it won’t. Since this teaching follows right
after the story of the widow’s offering, it seems to me that its meaning is
unmistakable. The Temple system exploits the poor, and Jesus wants to see the
end of it.
What can we take from these stories and teachings?
We can acknowledge the truly radical character of Jesus’s teaching. He is
unsparing in his critique of the Temple priesthood, the religious
establishment, and the scribes, the people who work for the establishment and
keep it going. The established order, according to Jesus, is exploitative, and
the institutions that keep it going, symbolized by the Temple, must not last.
In the 14th chapter of Mark’s Gospel, Jesus is quoted as saying that
“I will destroy this temple that is made with hands, and in three days I will
build another, not made with hands.” We may take “another not made with hands”
to mean a new life in which the old order of human exploitation is gone.
We, Jesus’s body in the world, can bring a
similar critique to bear in our world. The message is clear: just as Jesus does
in today’s Gospel, we must see our economy and society clearly, recognize
exploitation for what it is, and take steps to change what needs to be changed.
We must avoid clouding our vision with false piety. And we must avoid using our
religious institutions to sanctify an unjust order. Our new temple must be “not
made with hands” --- that is, it must not reproduce the exploitation and
hypocrisy which Jesus sees so clearly in the Gospel.
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