Images of Creation

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Leviticus 19:1-18

This Sunday's lectionary readings were from Proper 25 of the Year A Revised Common Lectionary. They included a brief reading from Leviticus, intended (as the Old Testament readings usually are) to support the Gospel reading. The reading was discontinuous: Leviticus 19:1-2, 15-18. I'd like to consider the whole, and then the envelope.

The LORD spoke to Moses, saying:

Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them: You shall be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy. You shall each revere your mother and father, and you shall keep my sabbaths: I am the LORD your God. Do not turn to idols or make cast images for yourselves: I am the LORD your God.

When you offer a sacrifice of well-being to the LORD, offer it in such a way that it is acceptable on your behalf. It shall be eaten on the same day you offer it, or on the next day; and anything left over until the third day shall be consumed in fire. If it is eaten at all on the third day, it is an abomination; it will not be acceptable. All who eat it shall be subject to punishment, because they have profaned what is holy to the LORD; and any such person shall be cut off from the people.

When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap to the very edges of your field, or gather the gleanings of your harvest. You shall not strip your vineyard bare, or gather the fallen grapes of your vineyard; you shall leave them for the poor and the alien: I am the LORD your God.

You shall not steal; you shall not deal falsely; and you shall not lie to one another. And you shall not swear falsely by my name, profaning the name of your God: I am the LORD.

You shall not defraud your neighbor; you shall not steal; and you shall not keep for yourself the wages of a laborer until morning. You shall not revile the deaf or put a stumbling block before the blind; you shall fear your God: I am the LORD.

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. You shall not go around as a slanderer among your people, and you shall not profit by the blood of your neighbor: I am the LORD.

You shall not hate in your heart anyone of your kin; you shall reprove your neighbor, or you will incur guilt yourself. You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD. (Leviticus 19:1–18 NRSV)

In the first place, I'd like to characterize the reading. This is, it seems to me, a freer rendering of the ten commandments, with more by way of illustration.

But it seems to me that this is a surprisingly important passage, especially for being in a book that is so seldom read. I'll start by picking a view things out.

When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap to the very edges of your field, or gather the gleanings of your harvest. You shall not strip your vineyard bare, or gather the fallen grapes of your vineyard; you shall leave them for the poor and the alien: I am the LORD your God. (Leviticus 19:9–10 NRSV)

Here we have, of course, the scriptural warrant for the tradition of not gleaning the field, which was so important in the story of Ruth. But I think this is reflected in the social criticism of the OWS movement: the sin of Wall Street isn't that they're rich, it's that they take everything, when the law obligates them to leave enough for the poor and the alien.

You shall not defraud your neighbor; you shall not steal; and you shall not keep for yourself the wages of a laborer until morning. (Leviticus 19:13 NRSV)

Here, we have the scriptural warrant for the tradition that a laborer should be paid before sundown, which figured in the Matthew 22 reading from a couple of weeks ago, and the subject of the preceding post.

I thought the following passage was especially relevant to our present, troubled times:

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 (Leviticus 19:15 NRSV)

I believe this can be read as a criticism of central tendencies of the Democratic and Republican Parties respectively. Is there perhaps wisdom enough in this passage to pull us through? I wonder.

Finally, I'd like to note a strong parallel between the reading as it appeared in the lectionary, and Jesus's words from the Gospel. First, Leviticus:

The LORD spoke to Moses, saying:

Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them: You shall be holy, for I the LORD your God am holy.

You shall not hate in your heart anyone of your kin; you shall reprove your neighbor, or you will incur guilt yourself. You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD. (Leviticus 19:1–2, 15-18 NRSV)

Next, Matthew:

When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” He said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” (Matthew 22:34–40 NRSV)

Note how Jesus's epitome of the law parallels the beginning, and even more explicitly, the end of Leviticus reading. This lead me to ask the question: was it an idiom of oriental thought to refer to an entirety obliquely by mentioning it's beginning and the end? It took a couple of hours for the answer to occur to me, in the writings of John of Patmos:

“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty. (Revelation 1:8 NRSV)

And so, I invite a more diligent, more prayerful contemplation of Leviticus 19:1-18, for upon them hang all the law and the prophets.

Peace

The Role of the Rich

Matthew, in material unique to him, tells a parable known as “the Workers in the Vineyard,” but it's actually about the owner of the vineyard:

“For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. After agreeing with the laborers for the usual daily wage, he sent them into his vineyard. When he went out about nine o’clock, he saw others standing idle in the marketplace; and he said to them, ‘You also go into the vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ So they went. When he went out again about noon and about three o’clock, he did the same. And about five o’clock he went out and found others standing around; and he said to them, ‘Why are you standing here idle all day?’ They said to him, ‘Because no one has hired us.’ He said to them, ‘You also go into the vineyard.’ When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his manager, ‘Call the laborers and give them their pay, beginning with the last and then going to the first.’ When those hired about five o’clock came, each of them received the usual daily wage. Now when the first came, they thought they would receive more; but each of them also received the usual daily wage. And when they received it, they grumbled against the landowner, saying, ‘These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.’ But he replied to one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong; did you not agree with me for the usual daily wage? Take what belongs to you and go; I choose to give to this last the same as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or are you envious because I am generous?’ So the last will be first, and the first will be last.” (Matthew 20:1–16 NRSV)

Why does the owner of the vineyard go out to the market at noon, at three, and again, finally, at five? Does he expect that their work will provide as much value to him as that of the men he hired early in the morning? Of course not. For he is not hiring men, early or late, for the value they can provide to him. He is hiring men out of his abundance for the value he can provide to them, a wage sufficient for the day in return for honorable service. He understands the responsibility of the rich in society: it is neither to hoard wealth, nor to dissipate it, but instead to use it purposefully to advance the health of society.

Let us consider our society today, a society beset with sustained high unemployment. We hear from the voices privilege that the problems our our society are due to to the poor. It is the poor who don't contribute enough. Yet the poor still seek work, and if they don't find it, it's not because God has not provided. It is because those he's entrusted with wealth have nurtured the delusion that their wealth is a reward for their own merit, and its sole purpose is their self-indulgence. The problem we have today isn't that the poor aren't working, it's that the rich aren't hiring. It's that the rich that aren't doing their job.

Let us pray:

Dear Lord, Heal our society. Call the rich to their duty, or give us new rich who will do it in their stead. In Jesus's name we pray. Amen.

Peace