 |
“Allegory of the Vanity of Earthly Things”
by an unknown French master, 1630 |
Readings for Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time [2]
Readings from the Jerusalem Bible [3]
Readings and Commentary: [4]
Ecclesiastes 1:2; 2:21-23
Vanity of vanities, says Qoheleth,
vanity of vanities! All things are vanity!
Here is one who has labored with wisdom and knowledge and skill,
and yet to another who has not labored over it,
he must leave property.
This also is vanity and a great misfortune.
For what profit comes to man from all the toil and anxiety of heart
with which he has labored under the sun?
All his days sorrow and grief are his occupation;
even at night his mind is not at rest.
This also is vanity.
-------------------------------------------
Commentary on Ecc 1:2; 2:21-23
Three hundred years before Christ walked the earth, the Hebrew teacher Qoheleth (in other translations referred to simply as "preacher") reflects on the illusion of human wisdom and effort. Even one who works and has earthly success must ultimately leave that result to a person (heir) who did not toil. He develops the idea that God’s wisdom is hidden, and nothing mankind can do on this earth will reveal it in a meaningful way. “All is vanity.” The word “vanity” (in Hebrew “hebel”) is used 35 times in this book, and translated literally it means “breath” or “vapor.” It is used elsewhere (Psalm 39:6-7 and Psalm 94:11), and indicates something transient, worthless, or empty.[5]
-------------------------------------------
Psalm 90:3-4, 5-6, 12-13, 14, 17
R. (1) If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
You turn man back to dust,
saying, “Return, O children of men.”
For a thousand years in your sight
are as yesterday, now that it is past,
or as a watch of the night.
R. If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
You make an end of them in their sleep;
the next morning they are like the changing grass,
Which at dawn springs up anew,
but by evening wilts and fades.
R. If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
Teach us to number our days aright,
that we may gain wisdom of heart.
Return, O Lord! How long?
Have pity on your servants!
R. If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
Fill us at daybreak with your kindness,
that we may shout for joy and gladness all our days.
And may the gracious care of the Lord our God be ours;
prosper the work of our hands for us!
Prosper the work of our hands!
R. If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
-------------------------------------------
Commentary on Ps 90:3-4, 5-6, 12-13, 14, 17
This selection of Psalm 90 is very important to us, in that it provides an understanding of God’s timetable for creation and man: “For a thousand years in your sight are as yesterday.” The psalm laments the mortality of the human life, and prays for wisdom, requesting success for the work of human hands (for human endeavor).
-------------------------------------------
Colossians 3:1-5, 9-11
Brothers and sisters:
If you were raised with Christ, seek what is above,
where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.
Think of what is above, not of what is on earth.
For you have died,
and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
When Christ your life appears,
then you too will appear with him in glory.
Put to death, then, the parts of you that are earthly:
immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire,
and the greed that is idolatry.
Stop lying to one another,
since you have taken off the old self with its practices
and have put on the new self,
which is being renewed, for knowledge,
in the image of its creator.
Here there is not Greek and Jew,
circumcision and uncircumcision,
barbarian, Scythian, slave, free;
but Christ is all and in all.
-------------------------------------------
Commentary on Col 3:1-5, 9-11
The theme of seeking the higher gifts continues in this section of St. Paul’s Letter to the Colossians, as the focus on building spirituality by those raised to new life in Christ through baptism is exhorted. He instructs the church to turn away from the hedonistic instincts of human nature, to make a radical change, dying to the old self (also Romans 6:3), and become the new creation of the baptized. In this baptism we are unified, one in Christ (similar to Ephesians 2:14ff).
CCC: Col 3-4 1971; Col 3:1-3 655; Col 3:1 1002; Col 3:3 665, 1003, 1420, 2796; Col 3:4 1003, 2772; Col 3:5-8 1852; Col 3:5 2518; Col 3:10 2809
-------------------------------------------
Luke 12:13-21
Someone in the crowd said to Jesus,
“Teacher, tell my brother to share the inheritance with me.”
He replied to him,
“Friend, who appointed me as your judge and arbitrator?”
Then he said to the crowd,
“Take care to guard against all greed,
for though one may be rich,
one’s life does not consist of possessions.”
Then he told them a parable.
“There was a rich man whose land produced a bountiful harvest.
He asked himself, ‘What shall I do,
for I do not have space to store my harvest?’
And he said, ‘This is what I shall do:
I shall tear down my barns and build larger ones.
There I shall store all my grain and other goods
and I shall say to myself, “Now as for you,
you have so many good things stored up for many years,
rest, eat, drink, be merry!”’
But God said to him,
‘You fool, this night your life will be demanded of you;
and the things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?’
Thus will it be for all who store up treasure for themselves
but are not rich in what matters to God.”
-------------------------------------------
Commentary on Lk 12:13-21
The passage begins with Jesus refusing to provide rabbinical guidance to a person in the crowd. Such guidance is provided in Numbers 27:1-11 and Deuteronomy 21:15ff, but the Lord saw greed at the root of the request. He uses the parable (found only in Luke) of the rich landowner (fool in some translations) to emphasize the need to focus on the spiritual gifts that do not perish, not just on material goods. He tells the one who wishes to have Jesus arbitrate a dispute with that person’s brother to take care against greed.
The parable has elements of other stories used by Jesus in which the unpredictability of the end of life is emphasized. Speaking to the crowd, the Lord tells them to focus on those spiritual attributes without delay. St. Athanasius used these words: “A person who lives as if he were to die every day- given that our life is uncertain by definition- will not sin, for good fear extinguishes most of the disorder of our appetites; whereas he who thinks he has a long life ahead of him will easily let himself be dominated by pleasures (Adversus Antigonum).” [6]
CCC: Lk 12:13-14 549
-------------------------------------------
Reflection:
There was once a very good and very wealthy man who died and went to heaven. When he arrived at the pearly gates, St. Peter looked in his book and saw all the good things the man had done and invited him in. As the man walked by, St. Peter noticed a look of great sorrow on his face. He said to the man, “Mr. Jones, I don’t understand your depression. You had a wonderful life on earth, filled with good deeds and great wealth, and today you are ushered into heaven. Why are you sad?”
The man said in reply, “St. Peter, I know I should be happy, and I always knew I could not take my wealth with me, but I fear I will miss it. I wish I could have brought up just one souvenir of my earthly success.”
St. Peter again consulted his book and thought for a moment. He turned to the man and said, “You know, I think you can be allowed to go back and bring just a small memento of your earthly life, nothing big like a yacht, but just a reminder.”
Poof! The man disappeared and poof, he was back. He was holding a small shoe box that was clearly quite heavy. St. Peter could not resist and asked the man what he had chosen to bring back. With his face reddening somewhat, the man opened the box lid to show St. Peter four bars of gold bullion. Whereupon St. Peter looked up in surprise and exclaimed, “You brought pavement?”
The story, of course, has a moral and that moral is tied directly to the Gospel from St. Luke. The Lord is, at this point in his ministry, a person of renown. He is respected and looked upon as a person of some authority. He is approached by one of the crowd he is addressing and asked to take on the role of a rabbi, to settle a dispute about Mosaic Law in a family dealing with how an estate should be settled. Jesus does not choose to deal directly with the issue, but rather sees the motive of the one who asked the question. That motive is greed.
Greed, defined as “excessive desire, as for wealth or power,” is a symptom of perverted values, and Jesus chooses to address the entire crowd with a story to illustrate the foolishness of the motives the questioner expressed. The story of the wealthy fool is instructive in a few different ways. It applies the same sentiment expressed by the ancient author of Ecclesiastes in the first reading today: Even a person who is successful in his labors on earth may not take those treasures to heaven.
Without going into details, there is another humorous story about the man who gave his lawyer a large sum of cash to put into his casket when he was buried. After the funeral he was asked if he did and he replied, “Yes, I left him a check for the total amount.” What is important in our lives is not how much we can accumulate; not even how much we leave to our heirs. Rather our goal should be what the Lord was suggesting in his Gospel story; the treasure we need to accumulate is spiritual, not material.
One may think, at this point, that gathering spiritual treasure is all fine and good, but it does not pay the mortgage or put food on the table. That is, of course, correct. We must all work to provide for ourselves and for those who depend upon us. Working in such a way is not vanity, as Qoheleth said, nor is it greed. What Jesus refers to is our passion: What are we passionate about? Where our passions lie we will spend our time, our energy, and our thoughts. Taken to an extreme, our passions become obsessions, and obsessions may turn even the best intention into an unwholesome pursuit.
The Gospel begs us to ask ourselves a question today. Where do we spend our time? What are our passions? If we are passionate about our work, have we neglected more important elements of our lives? If we are passionate about a hobby or sport, have we neglected some other aspect of our lives? Have work, or friends, or family suffered as a result? Are we passionate about the Lord? Ah, there is the question.
One might argue that, just like other healthy passions, passion for the Lord can be overdone. I submit that it probably could be, but like eating healthily, or getting proper exercise, you would have to go a long way before passion for Jesus would cause a problem. I seriously doubt that one who truly followed the Lord, no matter how obsessively, if they did so for the right reasons, for God’s greater glory, could overdo it.
Our concern today is not that our congregation will become obsessive / compulsive about the Lord. But rather do we give Jesus enough of our time, our passion, our thought, so that our lives will be transformed? That is the message contained in Scripture today. Do we spend our time on gifts that we will always have, or do we go after pavement?
Pax
[1] Catechism links are taken from the
Homiletic Directory, published by the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, 29 June 2014.
[2] The picture today is “Allegory of the Vanity of Earthly Things” by an unknown French master, 1630.
[3] S.S. Commemoratio[4] The readings are taken from the New American Bible, with the exception of the psalm and its response which were developed by the International Committee for English in Liturgy (ICEL). This republication is not authorized by USCCB and is for private use only.
[5] Jerome Biblical Commentary, Prentice Hall, Inc., © 1968, 32:8, p. 535.
[6] The Navarre Bible, Gospels and Acts, (Scepter Publishers, Princeton, NJ, © 2002), p.437.
