Ec 1:1-2, 2:4-11 & Lk 12:13-21
1 August 2010
“Message under the Message”
Sometimes when we read the Bible, it’s difficult to get past the obvious. For example, our scripture passage in Luke 12 is called “the parable of the rich fool.” It’s right out there, stated in blatant fashion. Here’s a guy who is rich; he’s greedy, and he’s a fool! Case closed. What else is there to say?
And then there’s Ecclesiastes. This is a book written by a fellow with some serious issues! According to many folks, with his outlook on life, he needs a major attitude adjustment. What is his deal? (Oh yeah, and this guy is rich, too. Super rich.) Back in olden times, there was plenty of foot-dragging on the part of some rabbis to even consider this book inspired scripture. That’s how bad it was.
Still, getting back to the point, is there anything more we can say about these two? Is there a message under the message? Let’s start with our friend in Ecclesiastes.
Some English Bibles call our anonymous narrator “the Preacher,” the New Revised Standard Version calls him “the Teacher,” the Good News Bible calls him “the Philosopher.” In the original Hebrew, he’s simply referred to as tl,h,qo (qoheleth), which comes from the word for “assembly” or “congregation” (lh;q;, qahal). So, “Qoheleth” would be the “convener of the assembly” or “one who calls together the congregation.” One might say that he’s the person who “ca-halls” the people together!
Even though our author is called “the son of David, king in Jerusalem,” it’s clear from the words used—including Persian—that this was written centuries after Solomon. Posing as Solomon isn’t an intent to deceive; it’s a sign of honor. Using the name of a respected teacher was a well-known practice in the ancient world. By the way, “Ecclesiastes” comes from the Greek translation of “Qoheleth.”
But
I almost forgot: I did say that this guy
has some serious issues. We don’t have
to read very far to see what’s going on.
He hits us in the second verse of the book. The Good
News Bible reads, “It is useless, useless,
said the Philosopher. Life is useless,
all useless.” In the NRSV we get,
“Vanity of vanities, says the Teacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity.”
In the 1970s, the rock group Kansas
said something similar: “All we are is
dust in the wind.” They must have been
inspired by our buddy Qoheleth. The
Hebrew word for “vanity” is lb,h, (hebel), which literally means “vapor” or
“breath.”
All is vanity! To those who think faith is like the syrupy sweet stuff you find in greeting cards, this might come like a bucket of ice water in the face—along with the bucket! This is some stern, bitter language. The translations “vanity,” “futility,” “useless”: none of them quite capture the feeling of his deep disappointment. Those words don’t have enough bite. What might be necessary is something like: “Everything is b. s.” (But without my sugar-coating!) Maybe we can see why so many of the rabbis gave this book the thumbs-down!
All is vanity! Everything is meaningless! That’s a theme that recurs throughout the book. (And for some bizarre reason, this is one of my favorite books in the Bible.)
In chapter 2, Qoheleth gives us a quick autobiographical sketch. The rest of the book basically deals with his reflections on life—his personal philosophy.
Notice
what he says. “I made great works” (v.
4). “I made myself gardens and parks”
(v. 5). “I made myself pools from which to water the
forest of growing trees” (v. 6). “I bought male and female slaves…I also had great
possessions of herds and flocks” (v. 7).
“I also gathered for myself silver and gold…I got singers, both men and
women, and delights of the flesh, and many concubines” (v. 8).
Does anyone notice a common theme
here? Could it be the repeated use of
the first person singular?
Qoheleth goes on, “So I became great
and surpassed all who were before me in Jerusalem; also my wisdom remained with
me” (v. 9). I guess that means he never
made any bad business deals!
He sums it up in verses 10 and 11: “Whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from
them; I kept my heart from no pleasure, for my heart found pleasure in all my
toil, and this was my reward for all my toil.
Then I considered all that my hands had done and
the toil I had spent in doing it, and again, all was vanity and a chasing after
wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun.”
It
looks like this is the testimony of a man who has spent his entire life
focusing on himself. He finds, quite
literally, that his life is empty. But
is there a message under the message?
Let’s
look at the reading in Luke, the so-called “parable of the rich fool.” That story comes after Jesus is asked to
decide a family inheritance dispute. He
wisely sees that somebody is trying to triangulate (or triangle) him, to make him the third
party in an argument that is not his own.
Jesus responds at two levels.
First, he lets the plaintiff know that he’s in the wrong venue. Go tell it to the judge!
Second, Jesus senses that this is a teachable moment. He tells everyone there, “Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions” (v. 15). Or as the New Jerusalem Bible puts it, “life does not consist in possessions, even when someone has more than he needs.” I would also say “when someone has more than she needs.” Meanwhile, Qoheleth is saying, “I could have told you that!”
Then Jesus tells them a parable. This is the parable, as we saw earlier, of the rich fool.
Notice the
storyline, as we begin in verse 16. “The
land of a rich man produced abundantly,” so much so that he doesn’t have enough room for the overflow of abundance. What is the solution? “I will pull down
my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my
goods” (v. 18). I wouldn’t say that this
is the inspiration for the offsite storage business, but it meets a
similar need!
The parable goes on: “I will say to my soul, ‘Soul, you have ample
goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry’” (v. 19). I wonder, does anyone notice a common theme
here? Does he suffer from the same
affliction that struck Qoheleth?
Unfortunately for our unwise friend, he is
brought face-to-face with reality. “You fool!” God says to him. “This very night your life is being demanded
of you. And the things you have
prepared, whose will they be?” (v. 20).
There’s a reality that we too often ignore. Tonight, any of us—no matter our condition in
life—could, as they say, meet our maker.
Jesus wraps up the parable with
this cautionary note: “So it is with
those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich
toward God” (v. 21). Here’s how Eugene
Peterson puts it in his paraphrase The
Message: “That’s
what happens when you fill your barn with Self and not with God.”
That leads me back to my first comment, that is, of
the difficulty in getting past the obvious. It’s easy
for us to see that Qoheleth and our foolish friend have heaped treasures on
themselves. If you look up “greedy” in
the dictionary (or online), you’ll find their pictures beside the definition.
Something else that’s difficult to get past, as I
mentioned at the Keukabiblia Bible study on Revelation, is our preconception,
our bias. It’s difficult to read the
scriptures, as though for the first time.
That’s true of many things. Our
minds are already made up.
We can’t undo
our life experiences and whatever else has shaped us, but we can learn to identify those things. We can learn to see them for what they are
and to, in a sense, set them to one side.
We can recognize that there may be a message under the message.
So,
what about the boys we meet in our scripture readings? Beyond the obvious diagnosis that they
haven’t shared the wealth, what else is there to say?
Someone
I’ve mentioned before, a Franciscan priest named Richard Rohr, asks the
question, “How
do I know when I am transformed?”[1] This is getting below the surface. This is the territory Jesus leads us to in
verse 21. This is the filling “your barn with Self and not with God” kind of stuff.
Rohr begins by quoting the
apostle Paul in Galatians 2: “it is no
longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me” (v. 20). “It is a radically
different sense of self that he is trying to describe. Until I have come to that realization myself,
I have not been transformed,” at least, not transformed in the deeply Christian
sense of the term.
He speaks of
being drawn “to our True Self, who we are ‘hidden with Christ in God’ as Paul
says in Colossians
3:3. This is
the only self that actually exists. We came forth from God and our
deepest DNA is divine. We are not human beings trying to become
spiritual; we are already spiritual beings and the profound question is always,
‘What does it mean to be human?’ I believe that is why Jesus came as a
human being and consistently called himself a ‘son of man’ more than the Son of
God.”
What does it
mean to be human? To answer that
question, look at Jesus. He is the very
definition of “human.” That’s what “Son
of Man” means. We often say, usually
after screwing something up, “Well, I’m only human.” But if we’re talking about spiritual
transformation, that really isn’t true.
We’re behaving in a sub-human fashion.
True humanity is still a goal.
Being rich
toward God means that “self” gets out of the way. “Self” has to die, so that Christ can live in
us. So the message under the message in
our scripture readings isn’t simply about gathering possessions to ourselves. (Which I know is how we Americans are
indoctrinated from birth!) It isn’t
merely about sharing God’s gifts with others, without it being a matter of
pulling teeth.
The message is
much more fundamental. It’s about having
a truly Christian identity—Christ living in us.
It’s about having that identity, that life, and letting it truly
live. So, have I been transformed? Have I been transformed into being truly
human? No, not yet! But what an adventure, what a passion, what a
joy it is when we walk that path.