Saturday June 10, 2017
Clothes are for warmth and protection, but the layers accumulate—layers of meaning! Clothes become an assertion of one’s self-image, one’s identity. Clothes say, “This is who I am.” Clothes are a language. Uniforms assert membership of a particular class: the army, the police, the clergy….
The Scribes loved to “walk about in long robes and be greeted obsequiously in the marketplace….” A language is an agreement; there is no private language. What use is a special hat if no one knows what it is saying? One gets the feeling that people who depend on robes and uniforms and badges and insignia must be very unsure of themselves and are craving recognition from others. The Scribes believed that their knowledge of the Law was the sum of all wisdom and the only knowledge worth having. But that belief was insecure while there was even one person who disagreed. How Jesus threatened their identity! He challenged them and beat them in argument, though he had never been to rabbinical school. He earned their unremitting hostility.
In today’s passage, he pointed out a casualty of the Temple system: the poor. A widow at that time was a very symbol of poverty and helplessness. In that world, to lose one’s husband was to lose one’s identity. This poor widow of no identity was being exploited by people who clung desperately to a false identity. It’s the tragic story of the world.
