Lv 19:1-2, 15-18; Mt 22:34-40

26 October 2008

Reformation Sunday

“Holiness is Closer Than You (Can) Think”

I want to pose a scenario for you. This comes from Rabbi Jane Rachel Litman.[1] “Let’s say you have a leaky faucet, and you call a plumber to come and fix it. The plumber arrives, fixes your faucet, and gives you a bill. You gratefully write out a check and hand it to the plumber. Do you feel holy? Probably not. It would most likely surprise you to discover that this is exactly how [our scripture reading in Leviticus] evaluates your behavior.”

I think when most people hear the word “holy” (which appears more often in Leviticus than in any other book of the Bible), there’s a feeling that, “You’re talking about people on pedestals with halos around their heads.” And extending that idea a little more, it seems that reciting the proclamation of verse 2, in a normal tone of voice, doesn’t quite get it. It requires more of a Charlton-Heston-as-Moses approach: “You shall be holy!”

Of course, that only feeds the perception that holiness is reserved for the chosen few!

Our friend Rabbi Litman says, “In Jewish tradition, being created in ‘the image of God’ doesn’t refer to a physical likeness, but rather a moral possibility…that God is a role model for human behavior.”[2] (Christianity has also taken that as one of the aspects of “the image of God.”) That’s one of the great gifts to the world of the Israelite faith—a God who is an ethical God, that is, a God who emphasizes right conduct. In those days, other religions often narrowly construed holiness as service to the deity, some even to the point of requiring human sacrifice!

But with the law of Moses comes a revolutionary concept: “Being holy is largely about how we treat other people.”[3] This is an emphasis of all of the great world religions. And Jesus Christ, who is the embodiment of the law of Moses, is the model of holiness. He personifies it.

To ask if you feel holy, or if you think you’re holy, is already missing the point. Just as the Christian definition of hope is based in Christ, regardless of your emotional or mental state, the same is true of holiness. Holiness is closer than you think. It’s closer than you can think.

Holiness is spelled out in many ways in Leviticus, much of which the vast majority of Christians no longer see as relevant. For example, chapter 11 might prompt the question: what’s on your menu? Are you eating clean or unclean food? I realize that’s speaking of ritually clean and unclean, but there are other ways to take that! (I sometimes ask Banu if she’s ruining the food by adding certain ingredients! I can provide you with a list afterwards.)

Returning to the idea of holiness as how we treat each other, there’s some stuff in our scripture text that addresses that. Notice verse 15: “You shall not render an unjust judgment; you shall not be partial to the poor or defer to the great: with justice you shall judge your neighbor.” Holiness involves the courts; holiness includes the justice system.

In recent decades, some people have spoken of “political holiness.” This is tied to seeing Christ in our neighbor. Jesus, who I described as “the model of holiness,” links love of God and love of the neighbor. We can see this in our gospel reading in Matthew 22.

Gustavo Gutiérrez says, “It is not enough to say that love of God is inseparable from love of one’s neighbor. It must be added that love for God is unavoidably expressed through love of one’s neighbor.”[4]

He speaks about “the sacrament of our neighbor,” an idea that’s been expressed elsewhere.[5] He says that “there is one thing that is privileged to be a paradoxical sign of God, in relation to which [we] are able to manifest [our] deepest commitment—our Neighbor. The sacrament of our Neighbor!”

I hope I don’t need to point this out, but our neighbors don’t only live across the street. They also live across the country and across the planet. One big neighbor is our planet itself! If there’s one thing in Leviticus that most of us know about—even if we don’t know that it actually is in Leviticus!—it’s this idea of loving your neighbor as you love yourself.

“You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself” (v. 18). You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge. Our political campaigns, with their less-than-elevated level of discourse could learn a lesson here! What would it be like if our public debate were lifted out of the mud and nonsense and into the atmosphere of political holiness and love of the neighbor? What could we accomplish? Imagine the possibilities!

Verse 16 says, “You shall not go around as a slanderer among your people, and you shall not profit by the blood of your neighbor.” If there were still any doubt that holiness is not about some warm, fuzzy feeling inside, this should take care of it! To me, refusing to smear people and benefit from harming them has very little to do with how we might feel about it.

Now, Banu will say a little more about how Jesus models holiness—and what that means for us.

(I preached the first part of the sermon; Banu preached the second part.)

[1] www.beliefnet.com/Faiths/Judaism/2000/05/Holiness-Is-Where-You-Find-It.aspx

[2] www.beliefnet.com/Faiths/Judaism/2000/05/Holiness-Is-Where-You-Find-It.aspx

[3] www.beliefnet.com/Faiths/Judaism/2000/05/Holiness-Is-Where-You-Find-It.aspx

[4] Gustavo Gutiérrez, A Theology of Liberation, 15th anniversary ed. (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1988), 114-115.