“Turning to the crowd that followed him, [Jesus] said, ‘I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.’” Luke 7:9.
In the name, etc..
There are many things to say about today’s Gospel. It is very revealing about relations between Jews and Gentiles, and especially about relations between Jesus and Gentiles and other actors in the story. And of course the story has something to say about faith, about what it is and what it isn’t. And the way the centurion communicates with Jesus, through intermediaries, is interesting and suggestive.
The centurion sends Jewish elders to ask Jesus to heal his slave. Now a centurion has command over at least a few hundred men, up to two thousand (as I read in Wiki the other day) depending on his seniority and experience. So he is a fairly senior and important person in the army, and in the region where he and his men are garrisoned. This story is especially interesting, when we remember that the Romans are a conquering army, an occupation force, in Jewish lands.
Do the Jewish elders obey the centurion out of fear, which would be understandable in the circumstances, or out of some other motivation? Not out of fear, no. They respond out of respect and gratitude, for, as they say, “he loves our people, and it is he who built our synagogue for us.” What a charismatic personality the centurion is, to inspire such respect. And the respect travels both ways; the centurion has enough understanding of the local religion, and devotion to it, to go so far as to build a synagogue.
The centurion and the elders know Jesus, and they know him as a healer. There is no suggestion of any opposition or hostility between the elders and Jesus, or the centurion and Jesus. The Roman centurion, the Jewish elders, and Jesus are, in this story, members of one community, relating to each other on the basis of a common understanding. This understanding is not spelled out, but it is based on a common respect for the Jewish religion; the centurion is devoted to it and to the Jewish people, the elders maintain it, and Jesus himself has authority in it as a respected healer. There is a mutual respect here which is very striking, and in our period of religious hostility and violence, it can serve as a sign of the direction in which we all need to go. I don’t know how typical this story is, of people and events in Judaea two thousand years ago, but it is at least possible that there was more than one example of cross-cultural communication of the kind we are hearing about in this story. There must have been at least a few communities in which Romans and locals strove to live together in some kind of unity.
The centurion asks the elders to talk to Jesus on his behalf. I refrain from speculating on any reasons for this, beyond what the Scripture quotes the centurion as saying, “I am not worthy to have you come under my roof.” This is not a reason not to talk to Jesus, but it expresses the centurion’s sense of subordination to someone whose authority, at least in the matter of healing, is greater than his own. At the same time, he regards Jesus equally as a commander like himself: “But only speak the word, and let my servant be healed. For I also [like you, he means to say] am a man set under authority...and I say to one ‘go’ and he goes.” And so on.
The centurion’s confidence in himself and Jesus as commanders, and his confidence in Jesus’s ability to do what he asks, at a distance and without even the centurion’s asking Jesus himself directly, Jesus pronounces to be an unequalled, amazing demonstration of faith. As we know, faith means trust, and the centurion clearly trusts Jesus without qualification. Now note what is happening here. The servant, or slave, has not apparently asked for anything himself, as far as we know. No one has discussed the servant’s faith or the lack of it. There is no suggestion that the servant has to do or say anything to be worthy of the healing that the centurion is asking for. And the centurion proclaims his own unworthiness even to have Jesus in his house, even though the elders proclaim his worthiness. The centurion deflects this praise. So there is no connection whatever between the supposed worthiness of the centurion or his slave, and the outcome of the request. And the request is for a slave, someone of the lowest status, of no importance in the social order. How stunning this request must have seemed, so unlike what may have been the usual attitude to slaves, as unimportant and expendable.
Social status, moral worth, and faith are not intrinsically connected. Faith does not have to be proven by signs of worth or importance, and it can be demonstrated on behalf of others. The faith of the centurion is directed, so to speak, away from himself and toward his slave. That is a sign of true faith, that it is not self-seeking in any way, and has nothing to do with our usual worldly considerations of worth.
So this story communicates to us two important truths: first, that cross-cultural and inter-religious respect and communication are possible, and, in our period of religious warfare, essential. Second, that faith in such an environment is possible, and that we are called to direct our faith away, as it were, from our own self-centered concerns, toward those who may be of little account in the world, who are waiting for a sign from us of their worth in God’s eyes.
“Turning to the crowd that followed him, [Jesus] said, ‘I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.’”
In the name, etc..
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