Referring to the readings last night, I was asked to comment on John 12:8 when Jesus said to Judas, "You will always have the poor with you, but you will not always have me."
Granted, taken out of context, it sounds horrible. But many things in Scripture sound bizarre when the context is missing.
Jesus (and thus God) does not like when we are hypocrites. His stinging criticism of the Pharisees especially targeted when they talked out both sides of their mouths; when they said one thing but did another; when they held others to higher standards of behavior than they themselves followed; and most especially Jesus loathed when a religious authority did this. Jesus' apostles were clearly new religious authorities-in-the-making.
Upon seeing Mary anoint Jesus' feet with expensive, perfumed oil, Judas objects, "Why isn't this oil sold for 300 days wages and given to the poor?"
1. Jesus knows Judas is a thief. By stealing contributions from the Apostles' money bag, Judas was stealing from the poor. For him to make such an indignant claim was preposterous dishonesty. Moreover, he speaks scornfully to Mary, who is the humble saint in the room. I'm surprised Jesus didn't smack him.
2. More to the point, God came here to bring about a new beginning for humans and was willing to suffer and die to accomplish it. This is the biggest event in human history. Mary gets this. She knew who Jesus was because he had raised Lazarus just 2 weeks before. Since Mary, Martha, and Lazarus were also disciples, they would have known about Jesus' plans to suffer/die when he enters Jerusalem. Mary knew who's feet she was anointing; it was burial ritual (btw, "annointed" in Hebrew is "Messiah"). Not to put to fine a point on it, but in Matthew 26:12, Jesus adds, "In pouring this ointment on my body, she has done it to prepare me for burial."
3. If you think about it, Jesus spent his whole ministry helping and defending the poor. He made helping the poor, sick, naked, imprisoned, etc. a condition for getting into heaven. Do you really think he would insult the poor in his final hour? Of course not.
"The poor will always be with you" was a common scriptural reference in early Judaism. It comes from Deuteronomy 15, and it provides prescriptions for helping the poor who "will always be with us." They are reminders for the Jews (and us) not to harden our hearts towards the poor just because we see them all the time. Used in this context, Jesus is saying the opposite of what we thought. His quote is a reminder that indeed we must keep our hearts open the poor our whole lives. But, also, something bigger was happening right under their noses. Mary may have been the only one in the room who really understood that.
Ron
Comments