While Moses wished all people were prophets and Jesus welcomes those that are in alignment with His commands, the Epistler St James comes down heavily on the worldly wise, for Heaven is what they risk losing.
The First Reading (Num 11: 25-29), taken from the Book of Numbers,[1] focusses on the string of complaints that the Israelites had about the hardships faced enroute and against Moses. When Moses finally threw up his hands, God directed him to select 70 elders to assist him in governance. At a ceremony held at the Tabernacle,[2] they were filled with Moses’ spirit, following which they began to prophesy. This act prefigured the Sacrament of Holy Orders.
The prophesying of old was replete with exotic and ecstatic manifestations. But the point here is that two elders, Eldad and Medad, who for unknown reasons did not attend the initiation, began to prophesy anyway. Of course, while not all are bestowed the gift of prophecy, God is free to grant it to whoever He deems fit. In other words, ‘the wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So is it with everyone who is born of the Spirit’ (Jn 3: 8).
But that did not prevent jealousy from raising its head. Moses therefore says to his aide Joshua, who was the complainant: ‘Are you jealous for my sake?’ These words can be disturbing if jealousy is equated with envy. While jealousy arises from love of persons or things we possess, envy is sorrow felt about something that others enjoy and we crave for. Interestingly, St Thomas Aquinas breaks jealousy down into ‘love of concupiscence’ (which is selfish) and ‘love of friendship’ (selfless).
To give Joshua the benefit of doubt, we may see his jealousy not as concupiscent, selfish love but as friendship,selfless love. Joshua was not competing with the duo but had objections to what he regarded as insubordination. Joshua’s attitude speaks volumes of his zeal for protocol, love for, respect to and obedience of authority. In our times, we could take this to mean lovingly upholding the perennial Magisterium of Holy Mother Church.
In fact, Joshua’s life was one of discipleship; and after the death of Moses, he led the tribes of Israel in the conquest of Canaan. For his part, Moses expressed the wish that all would receive the gift of prophecy: ‘Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, that the Lord put his spirit upon them!’ Centuries later, the Christians were filled with the Holy Spirit at the first Pentecost.
That the Gospel text (Mk 9: 38-43, 45, 47-48) should bear a striking resemblance to happenings of some two millennia earlier only goes to show that human nature never changes. When John told Our Lord that he had forbidden a non-disciple from casting out demons in His name, Jesus very simply instructed him to refrain from doing so: ‘Do not forbid him; for no one who does a mighty work in My name will be soon after able to speak evil of Me. For he who is not against us is for us.’
Thereafter, praising innocence like that of a child he was holding, Jesus stated that whoever causes the little ones who believe in Him to sin, ‘it would be better for him if a great millstone were hung round his neck and he were thrown into the sea.’ Strong words, followed up by stronger ones: if one’s hand or foot or eye be the cause of sin, cut or pluck them off, He said – for it’s better to enter heaven maimed than to be in one piece and go to hell.
It is not that Jesus decries institutional or formal arrangements and acclaims informal ones; He only impresses upon His disciples not to be stiff and ‘square’ but, rather, to play it by ear. He urges you and me to set our minds and hearts on Heaven; after all, nothing else matters as much. We have to go about our daily chores happily and fulfil duties to the best of our abilities, but at the same time prize heaven above earth.
In this context, St James the Great in the Second Reading (Jas 5: 1-6) comes down heavily on the wealthy who are charmed by material riches, and, to satisfy their greed, grind the faces of the poor. Once again, sharp words addressed to the likes of them: ‘You rich, weep and howl, for the miseries that are coming upon you… you will eat your flesh like fire.’
One is reminded of Mephistopheles who says sadistically to Dr Faustus in Marlowe’s play of the same name: ’Tis too late, despair, farewell! Fools that will laugh on earth, most weep in hell.’ For sure, none of us wish to be counted among their number. Let us therefore quickly choose to have God’s spirit in our hearts and be at peace with our consciences by fulfilling God’s commands: the precepts of the Lord gladden the heart (Ps 18″ 8).
[1] It is the fourth book of the Pentateuch, common to the Torah as well. Its name comes from the two censuses of the Israelites: one taken upon leaving Mount Sinai, and the other, when at the doorstep of the Promised Land of Canaan.
[2] Also called ‘Tent’, it referred to the portable sanctuary that Moses had built to be a place of worship for the Hebrew tribes during the period of wandering before their arrival in Canaan. The arrangement became redundant after the erection of Solomon’s Temple in Jerusalem in 950 BC.