The Camel through the Eye of a Needle

Paul Piff, social psychologist has studied how wealth affects attitudes and behaviour. His empirical studies has uncovered that the wealthy are more prone to corruption and very poor in giving. They tend to be more likely to be law-breakers than those who are poorer than them! However, he says that these can be improved, though he doesn’t tell us how. There are exceptions to this rule certainly. The exceptions comes to us in the form of Warren Buffet, Bill and Melinda Gates and Narayana Murthi (Infosys) and many others who though rich are engaged in commendable service to humanity and liberal in their giving.
I think Paul Piff, has provided a modern scientific commentary to what Jesus said in the first century: ‘It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God’ (Mark 10:25). He meant ‘eye of the needle’ literally. It is not a small gate in the city of Jerusalem in Jesus’ time as some interpreters think. There was no such gate! ‘Eye of the needle’ is a hyperbole used to illustrate the near impossibility of the rich making progress in their spiritual progress.
The story of the rich man who approached Jesus is a good illustration. This man (young and rich) approached Jesus to find out how to enter ‘eternal life’ (Mark 10:17-31). This man obviously had the hunger to grow spiritually. He knew that there is something more than what he know and he practice to spirituality. It is this realization of lack that made him come to Jesus ‘running’ and ‘kneel’ before him. In addressing Jesus as ‘good teacher’ he also expressed his confidence that Jesus has the right advice and he is eager to know it.
The conversation  between him and Jesus reveals that he has achieved good spiritual progress already. Jesus prescribed to him six out of the ten commandments that has to do with human relationships and wealth (Mark 10:19). However, Jesus slightly modified one which originally said, ‘do not covet’ to ‘do not defraud.’ Defrauding goes a step further than covetousness or that is where covetousness leads a person to. In response to Jesus he claimed that he has been following these ‘from his youth’ (Mark 10:20). That means ever since he became morally responsible for his actions. (A Jewish male is considered to be morally responsible for his actions when he turns sixteen. He is then accountable to God and the society for his actions.) Jesus was very impressed by his spirituality, that is why Jesus ‘looked at him and loved him’ (Mark 10:21).
He is indeed a righteous rich person by the standards of his society and the religion he followed. By declaring that he has been observing all these rules, he claims that he has become wealthy in the right way. He hasn’t become rich at the expense of others. This is almost equivalent to any claim religious people make our days too. They haven’t accepted or given bribes to become rich, they haven’t exploited anyone, or have never made through illegal means. All that they have is made through right and justifiable means.
But Jesus’ response to him was shocking: ‘you lack one thing!’ (Mark 10:21). What is that one thing that the rich lack? Jesus did not make it clear when he said: ‘go, sell all that you have and give to the poor.’ Jesus was not asking to make a donation or to be regular with his tithes. His demand was to give away all that he has. It is shocking because Jesus was not against wealth or the wealthy. Jesus did not demand anyone other than this man to sell all that he had. If they left anything that was on their own, not because Jesus forced them to. The disciples left their nets, boats, taxbooths at their own will. Zachaeus offered to give away the wealth that he gathered through illegal means and share his legitimate wealth with the poor without any insistence from Jesus. Jesus certainly had many rich friends and disciples. Some of them were so rich to throw parties and Jesus accepted their hospitality to be labelled ‘a glutton and a drunkard’ (Mat 11:19) by his opponents. This peculiar demand was to illustrate to his disciples that the wealthy preferred their wealth if they had to make a choice between wealth and spirituality. As he expected, the rich man walked away: ‘Disheartened by the saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions’ (Mark 10:22).
Jesus made two powerful statements through this confrontation with the rich man. First, even the  most perfect man by any standards have still room to grow spiritually. Second, wealth is the most important thing for the rich people. It is so important for them that even higher goals of life like growing spiritually takes a backseat. That means it is easier to pass a camel through the eye of a needle than expecting the rich to make spiritual progress.
What is wrong with money then? Does this mean that one has to become poor in order to grow spiritually? Not at all! We have already seen that Jesus did not demand asceticism from his followers. The danger of wealth is that it demands worship from us. That is why Jesus qualified wealth as ‘mamon’ the name of an Aramaic deity. That is why Jesus said that noone can ‘serve’ God and ‘mamon’ at the same time (Matthew 6:24). ‘Serve’ means to worship. It competes with God for its place in human life and we are prone to yield to wealth than to God when a choice has to be made.
Paul Piff’s research tells us that the problem with the wealthy is the sense of entitlement that they have. ‘Entitlement’ is that notion or belief that all that one has belong to him (her) and he (she) has right to it. He has found out that even those who didn’t make their wealth but got it through inheritance could have this sense of ‘entitlement.’ This makes them poor givers because they want to hold on to what they are ‘entitled’ to. This also make them make more money any way they could. Paul Piff through his scientific studies which the great Teacher had already stated and proved through the conversation with this rich man: ‘It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God’ (Mark 10:25).

Why Elihu blew a fuse?

Elihu was a patientl listener to the arguments back and forth between Job and his friends. However, it came to a point were he blew his top! ‘Then Elihu the son of Barachel the Buzite, of the family of Ram, burned with anger. He burned with anger at Job because he justified himself rather than God. He burned with anger also at Job's three friends because they had found no answer, although they had declared Job to be in the wrong’ (Job 32:2-3).

It is not an acceptable behaviour in ancient societies for young people to speak in the presence of the elders, leave alone criticise them. Elihu had reserved the most disrespectful, caustic comments about the whole thing. The reason for his frustration is not that the debate between Job and his friends has been the poorest show on earth but they proved themselves to be fools, though they were widely accepted wisemen! He burst out, ‘I am young in years, and you are aged; therefore I was timid and afraid to declare my opinion to you. I said, “Let days speak, and many years teach wisdom”’ (Job 32:6-7).
That is only a rather gentle introduction to sharp criticism of wisdom of aged that is to come. He said, ‘It is not the old who are wise, nor the aged who understand what is right’ (Job 32:9). That statement flies at the face of the values that the ancient world cherished. There was no Google those days to consult. Wisdom was oral, passed on from one generation to another. The older the person, the wiser he would be, because wisdom is accumulated by age. This is what the young man Elihu is dares to deny.
What is important here is that, Elihu is not denying the wisdom of the wisemen or the old. He points out to another source of wisdom which neither Job nor his friends have realized. That is the Spirit of the Almighty God which dwells in human beings. He argues, ‘But it is the spirit in man, the breath of the Almighty, that makes him understand’ (32:8). Before we take a closer look at Elihu’s statement we need to do see why Elihu blew a fuse!
The secret of Elihu’s outburst is evident in the structure of the book itself. Job has lost everything: his wealth, his children and his health. He has moved from the honourable place he had at the city gate to the trash dump in the city. His friends wise in every way (the three came from the major seats of learning in the ancient world) comes to visit him. They argued only one thing: Job is a sinner and that is the reason for his suffering. Ask God’s forgiveness and he will be fine. That is exactly what Job could not accept. He didn’t hear the conversation between Satan and Yahweh in the heavenly court where Yahweh swore that Job is righteous in every way. But he had the inner conviction that he is not a sinner as his friends tries to argue. There are three rounds of arguments between Job and his friends. They will speak one after another and Job replies to each of them in each round. They used their wisdom and reasoning to convince Job but he kept justifying himself.
The friends were tired. Their arguments became shorter and shorter as they move from one round of arguments to another. The friends speak in the order as Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar. However, by the second round Zophar seems to have given up. He has no speech in the third round. By the end of the third round the other two also gave up. The three friends ‘had found no answer, although they had declared Job to be in the wrong.’ (Job 32:3). Now, did Job win the argument? Not at all. Because the rebuttal to his positions comes from God who speaks ‘out of the whirlwind’ in chapter 38. Elihu is only a transitional figure between human wisdom (of the three friends and Job) and divine wisdom. God then unleashes a barrage of questions at Job in his speech. Questions that have no answer. What is God trying to tell him? Its simple: there are hundreds of questions for which human minds have no answer! Suffering of the innocent is just one the myriad of such questions. Keep quiet!
Then finally, God condemned Job’s friends and gives Job the privilege to pray for them. The verdict is out now. The friend who were experts in traditional wisdom are wrong, Job who justified himself is wrong. All of them except Elihu who thought they can find answers to all the mysteries of life are wrong. The friends were wrong because they depended on the wisdom that they gathered over the years. They could not think outside the box of traditional wisdom. Job was wrong, though he is righteous in God’s eyes he had no right to justify himself. It is God who justifies.
Elihu is right! Because he did not depend on the traditional wisdom nor one’s own self-confidence of being right but on God’s wisdom. That wisdom was available to him not from Google or encyclopedias but by the indwelling of God’s Spirit in him. Before he set forth this argument he disclosed that secret when he said: ‘But it is the spirit in man, the breath of the Almighty, that makes him understand’ (32:8). The Spirit of God that dwells in him makes him restless. He said: ‘For I am full of words; the spirit within me constrains me. Behold, my belly is like wine that has no vent; like new wineskins ready to burst. I must speak, that I may find relief; I must open my lips and answer’ (Job 32:18-20). The nearest parallel to this restlessness is in Jeremiah. The prophet is filled with the Word of God that he is so restless until he get it out of his chest! Jeremiah laments: ‘If I say, “I will not mention him, or speak any more in his name,” there is in my heart as it were a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I am weary with holding it in, and I cannot’ (Job 20:9).
Then after Elihu has spoken and relieved himself of the great burden that the Spirit of God has placed in his heart, be breaks into one of the great doxologies we find in the Bible, the great praise of God almighty in Job 36-37 at the end of which God takes his place on the stage to speak out of the whirl wind and take the debate to its conclusion.
We just learn one lesson. Human wisdom has its limits. Even those who are righteous in God’s own eyes have no right to justify themselves. The source of wisdom is God and God imparts this to human beings through indwelling of his Spirit. All other wisdom and reasoning is an endless merry-go-round going round and round in vain and comes to an end when we are tired of speaking/thinking! The real source of wisdom is the Spirit of God which dwells in everyone who believes.

Sibling Rivalry

‘Hebron’ means ‘league’, ‘confederation’ or by extension ‘friendship.’ This is the place where Patriarch Abraham bought a small patch of land to bury his wife Sara. Later it turned out to be the place where all the patriarchs and matriarchs except Rachel had their resting place. Today there stands the Ibrahami Mosque (as the Muslims calls it) or the Cave of the Patriarchs as the Jews would like to call it. Sibling rivalry begins with names!

Abraham was a landless wanderer when his wife died in this area. Though God had promised him the land to his offspring he had none yet. Genesis 23 tells us the story of how patriarch Abraham came to own the place called Hebron. The Hittites who owned the land offered a burial space free but Abraham politely turned their offer down. He wanted the burial cave owned by Ephron the son of Zohar who also was so kind to offer the cave of Macpelah free of cost. However, Abraham had to persuade him with the help of the elders of the Hittites to sell it to him. Finally after turning down the generosity of the Hittites, Abraham the sojourner bought the burial caves along with the field and treess around for 400 shekels of silver. Thus it legally the grave yard of the patriarchs and matriachs. But which of their children have claim on this. The siblings could not agree.

Ibrahami Mosque/Tomb of the Patriarchs

The story of cordiality and friendship between two distinct group of people is remarkable. It also is a story of kindness shown to a stranger by the owners of the land. The story of Hebron doesn’t stop there. It is from around this area that the spies that Moses sent brought the produce of the land. It is the land that was occupied by the giants called Anakim whom Caleb challenged.

Hebron which begins its history in the Bible with friendship, cordiality and kindness had already turned in to a place of violent confrontations and conflicts in the Bible times itself. In modern times, it is symbolic of the tension between the two races who trace their history back to Father Abraham—Arabs and Jews. Sometimes in the fourth century AD, Helena, the mother of the first Christian emperor identified the caves under the structure that King Herod built as the caves where the patriarchs and matriarchs were buried. It became a ‘Holy Place’ for the Christians. Then to cut the long story shot during the days of the Islamic invaders a mosque was built on the site. Thus it became the place of worship for Muslims.

Among many violent incidents that might have hurt the memory of Father Abraham is known in history as the 1929 Hebron Massacre and the Ibrahami mosque massacre of 1994. On August 24, 1928, sixty seven Jews including 23 college students were massacred in Hebron by Arabs acting on false rumours that Jews were killing Arabs in Jerusalem. The land what is now called Israel and Palestine was under British mandate then. On the fateful day of February 25, 1994, Baruch Goldstein, a Jewish medical doctor who was also member of a Jewish extremist group called Kach movement opened fire on unarmed Muslims in prayer in this mosque. It was the holiday of Purim for the Jews and Ramdan for the Muslims. The attack killed 29 worshippers and 125 injured by the time Goldstein had emptied his revolver. He was beaten to death by the survivors!

Following this incident, the mosque was closed for years and when it was opened part of it was turned into a synagogue separated with a bullet proof wall from the mosque. In between these two major incidents were many violent actions from both sides until the streets of Hebron witnessed more violence in the second intifada or Oslo War.

The story of Gadi and Dina

During the second intifada the streets of Hebron saw violence on a major scale. The Jewish settlers in Hebron had to use Suhada Street that passed by the tombs of Patriarchs populated by Arabs who were in uprise. The Jews blame that hundreds of Jews were slaughtered by the Arabs in this street. Walking along the street I spotted a sign where they tell the story of Gadi and Dina a couple who were expecting their first child killed by an Arab suicide bomber when they were on their way to pray at the tomb of the Patriarchs.

The Israeli government’s response to the alleged violence was severe. They closed Suhada street. Suhada Street was in fact a row of shops which was the only means of living for the Arabs who lived behind or above their own shops. Tourists who came to Macpelah (Tomb of Patriarchs) shopped there. Israeli military not only closed the street for the Arabs but also closed the shops. They welded the doors; many Arab families have no ground level access to the street. They have to climb over their roofs to visit their neighbours or to send their children to school. The street has a deserted look. There are military check posts at the entrance. Only Jews and foreign tourists are allowed to walk along the streets. There are no children playing on the streets. At the entrance of the street from the Tombs of the Patriarchs Israeli soldier verified my passport however, he was so light-hearted young man who even allowed me to take a picture with him.

Deserted Suhada Street, Hebron

The city of Hebron comes under the Palestinian Authority. However, the Israeli Military controls the area. There is propoganda everywhere. Flex banners explaining the Jewish position and graffitti on Arab homes and closed doors to counter the Jewish propaganda.

There is suspicion everywhere. As we walked through Suhada Street with a guide who explained to us the human right violations in Hebron and how closing of Suhada Street a Jewish settler followed as recording us on his iPhone. It was a way of intimidating our guide: don’t say anything against us, you are on record.

Closed shops with sealed doors

Hebron around the Tombs of Patriarchs is now a ghost city. It seems it is only for the dead and not for the living. The friendship and cordiality that the patriarch Abraham received is gone and is given way to suspicion, hatred and violence. Who is to be blamed?

Walls, stones and bullets!

We were figuring out our way to lunch. The lunch menu is the Arab speciality Makluth, something similar to the Biryani but much less spicier. However, our group was stopped by a person who said we should take another route avoiding the main road. The Israeli military who entered the Palestinian territory has tear-gassed the street against a bunch of youth who were protesting against the death of a Jordanian on the Allenby bridge the previous day.

A wall that separates Bethlehem from Israeli territories.

Just a few feet away from Jacir Intercontinental Hotel in Bethlehem.

Here on the streets stones are returned by bullets and tear gas

It has become the routine of the day for the Palestinian youth in Bethlehem. They throw stones at the tower built on the walls that separate the Palestinian areas from Israeli areas. The Israelis call it 'security wall' and the Palestinians condemn it as 'separation wall.' You can see them all around. The truth is that only 3% of the border between Israel and the Palestinian areas (designated as area A) have walls. Some areas have barbed wired fences and some are simply open. In spite of the walls still about 10,000 Palestinians still enter Israel illegally.

However, the walls are provocative. There are checkpoints everywhere. Those who enter the Palestinian areas are not checked, but when coming out even tourists are checked. Your passports be handy all the time. Hundreds of Palestinians have to cross the checkpoints every day in the morning and return in the evening if they have to work in Israeli areas. You may be turned down without any reasons. So there is great anxiety, fear and sense of loss of dignity as the young Israeli soldiers check your documents and person for weapons etc.

Youth vent their grudge against the walls by graffiti. On Fridays almost invariably they they throw stones at the towers where the Israeli soldiers are posted. The soldiers retaliate with tear gas and if that doesn't deter the mask wearing youth, fire in the air, rubber bullets or even aim at them.

There is denial! Or it is hope?

Stone throwing youth are rounded up at night. Even children under 14 serve in Israeli jails, thousands of them.
In our last day in Bethlehem we tried to walk back to our hotel. But there was drama on the street. It was Friday evening and the youth had a holiday. So, they decided to spend the evening throwing stones at the Israeli posts on the walls in Bethlehem. The youth were wearing masks to protect themselves from tear gas. The Israeli soldiers opened the gates on the walls and entered the streets and they started firing. We were caught between the two warring groups--stones and bullets. We requested the hotel staff to stop a taxi for us. And as we jumped in to the taxi, the Israeli soldiers were firing into the air and the youth were running away. The taxi driver was cool. The hotel security staff was duty-bound. For them it is a daily scene.

Will this walls come down one day?
Will Abraham's children embrace each other one day?

Back in my hotel room I told my wife. Both these parties lack one thing--a Gandhi! Every stone that is pelted will be returned by a bullet unless one more Gandhi's are born, may be two one on each side of the wall.

On Storks and Steadfast Love

Most parents at least once in life have to answer this question their curious little ones toss at them: ‘Where did I come from?’ The child is too young to understand the complex biological activity that brought the child to this world. Embarrassed and bashful, parents resort to explanations that they might have got from their own parents. A white stork that flew over their roof carrying a little cute baby in a sling hanging from its long beak dropped it through the chimney! They found the cute little baby by the fire-side in the morning! The children are usually happy with that explanation and may watch for storks flying across their rooftops with babies in slings hanging from their long beaks, until they grow up to find out the truth for themselves.

The storks don’t carry babies in their beaks nor deliver them to couples longing for children. It is all part of myths that grew around storks—majestic, beautiful birds commonly imagined in white colour. For reasons we may not fully know they became symbols of kindness, love and care. Such myths about storks abounded in the ancient cultures of Egypt and Mesopotamia. Many European cultures have stories of caring and faithful storks. Storks are considered monogamous and faithful to their partners. However, it remains a myth since scientists have found that they change their partners after the young one are hatched and even during their migration. People believed unlike other birds storks are birds of integrity since the return to their same old huge nests year after year for laying eggs and hatching. According to some myths storks would prefer to be burned to death along with their helpless young ones if their nests catch fire than fly away to safety.

Popular beliefs and myths shape our language. That is true of Hebrew also. The Hebrew language gave the right word for this birds which had become symbols of integrity, faithfulness and kindness. Though according to Mosaic law this bird is considered unclean, the bird is called HASIDA which is translated as ‘faithful’ or ‘kind.’ The word comes from the root HSD and the corresponding noun HESED.

Though the root HSD is very frequent in the Old Testament, there is no consensus about how the word HESED should be translated in to English. Translations vary and even within a given version it could be translated variously depending on the context. HESED is a unique concept so rich in meaning which makes any language inadequate to express it. So, we have words like as ‘faithfulness’, ‘steadfast love’, ‘mercy’, ‘grace’, ‘loyalty’, and so on.

HESED is freely given and freely received; it is undeserved. It is not an obligation but sometimes comes to us as a surprise. The people of Jabesh were extremely kind to Saul who died in the battle (2 Sam 2:5). They kept his body so that it will not fall into the victorious Philistines to humiliate him further but he will receive a royal funeral fitting his role as a king. What they rendered to the defeated king is HESED which is rendered inadequately as ‘loyalty’ (ESV, NRSV), ‘kindness’ (JPS, NIV). He didn’t deserve it nor the people of Jabesh were obliged to render it to him. It was a free act of ‘kindness.’ The servant of Abraham who journeyed to the distant land where Abraham’s kindred lived appealed for HESED from Laban (Gen 24:49). Laban was not in anyway bound to comply with that request. But still, sending his sister with a stranger to be married to a relative whom he hasn’t met was an act of HESED. It was an act of trust and kindness. Ruth also extended HESED to her old and helpless mother-in-law by following her to a uncertain future. She could have opted to leave her as her co-sister Orpah did. Boaz called her action an act of HESED (Ruth 3:10).

HESED is most often used in relation to God. It is the undeserving mercy of God. At the same time the people of Israel understood themselves as a people who have covenanted with their God. Or more precisely God has entered into a covenant with them. So, he is bound to show them mercy as he promised: ‘Showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments’ (Deut 5:10). So those who love God have a claim to his ‘steadfast love.’

There were times when Israel failed their God—they were not loyal to the covenant. Sometimes, kings like David or less prominent individuals have failed to meet the demands of God. However, they appeal to God for HESED solely on the basis of God’s faithfulness to his relationship with his people. David would cry, ‘Have mercy on me, O God, according to your HESED...’ (Ps 51:1).
Though the humans break the relationship, God always remained faithful. God honours his part of relationship though the corrupt humanity couldn’t keep their part. That makes saint Paul say, ‘if we are faithless, he remains faithful’ (2 Tim 2:13). The HESED thus becomes God’s ‘unfailing love’, or ‘steadfast love’ which the hymn writer (Albert Lister Peace, 1844-1912) would call ‘love that wilt not let me go...’ The history of Israel is a history of Gods’ unfailing kindness to them. No words are adequate to express it because we those who follow Christ experience it as the, ‘deep, deep love of Jesus, vast, unmeasured, boundless, free’ as the hymn by Samuel Trevor Francis (1834-1925) goes.

Opening of our eyes

A few kilo metres from where I live, was a farm opened for visitors. It was an rare patch of pristine countryside in the midst of a booming urban landscape. Among the many attractions there, was the workshop of a potter. In his workshop, the potter displayed making various articles from clay. I had frequented his workshop a number of times. He is very patient as he works with wet clay on his wheels. The patience of the potter and the vulnerability of the clay combined ends up in a beautiful clay object!

Whenever, I visited this potter's workshop, I used picture myself as the clay on the wheels and the fingers of the potter as that of my Lord who shapes me. The Lord is like a potter, willing to work with us as long as we are willing to be shaped by his hands. He doesn't give up in the middle of the process if we are willing and vulnerable in his hands. He keeps working on us to bring to fulfilment what he has begun in us. That’s why he is called, ‘the founder and perfecter of our faith’ (Heb 12:2).

The story in Mark 8:22-26 is about a blind man who was brought to Jesus so that he may receive healing. Jesus had healed many sick so far; especially those who are blind. But this healing is very unique. First of all, it is found only in the Gospel of Mark. Secondly, rather unusually, Jesus takes this man out of his village to be healed. Third strange thing is that, Jesus spat on his eyes; certainly the spray must have fallen all over his face too! Fourthly, though there is nothing unusual about touching the eyes in order to receive healing, in this case, Jesus had to touch twice! After the first touch, Jesus asked the man whether he is able to see or not his answer was rather strange. He said, ‘I see people, they walk like trees.’ Trees don't walk! He might have seen people walking around and people might have appeared to as trees. What is important is that he did not receive total healing. Jesus had to try again. On the second touch he received full sight: ‘He saw everything clearly.’ Finally, he prevents him from entering the village again.

It is important to note that how the first readers of the Gospel of Mark might have read it. They could identify with this man who was taken out of his village to receive healing. Like him they were also led out of their villages, homes and businesses to follow him. In this Gospel we have the stories of Peter, Andrew, James and John the fishermen and that of Levi the tax-collector who were called by Jesus. They had to leave their fishing nets, their boats and their tax-booths in order to follow him and travel all over the towns and villages of Galilee. As the gospel was preached all over the world, many followed suit: Leaving their villages and towns, their own communities and families behind. They were not allowed to go back, though some did. Like Demas who went back because of his love for the world. The story though strange it looks was packed with significance for all of us. We can all put ourselves in the shoes of this man who follows the Lord, cutting all that moorings to our life-style.

This calling and going out was to receive sight—a new sight about the Galilean carpenter. The new sight they received was that the Galilean carpenter by the name Jesus is not just an ordinary leader but he is the Messiah, the saviour of the world.

However, this sight they received about him was not sudden, it was gradual. They began with total ignorance, then slowly, degree by degree they began to receive deeper insights about him—like this blind man. First he was blind, then his sight was foggy and then clarity came.

It is this idea of receiving sight by degrees that Mark intends to convey by positioning this event at this particular point in his Gospel. This passage that is unique to the Gospel of Mark is placed between Jesus’ warning about ‘leaven of the Pharisees’ (Mark 8:11-21) and Peter’s confession (Mark 8:27-30). The Pharisees though they have seen many signs that Jesus’ had performed still needed more sign. They were not willing to accept the fact that Jesus is the promised Messiah. Their unwillingness to accept Jesus is the leaven. The disciples in a like manner were not able to put their trust in him fully. The miracles and teachings have to produce faith in them but they were not sufficient progress in their journey of faith with him. When Jesus mentioned ‘leaven’ they thought of bread. It is true that leaven can mean bread but Jesus did not mean the literal bread. They failed to see the spiritual significance of his warning. However, Jesus was patient with his disciples: teaching, warning, doing miracles.

However, there is a great change in the disciples when we come to Mark 8:27-30. The same disciples who wondered ‘Who then is this, that even wind and sea obey him?’ (Mark 4:41) is able to confess that Jesus is the Messiah. Though their vision of Messiah was very different from that of Jesus’. Peter rebuked Jesus because he could not understand the concept of a suffering Messiah (Mark 8:31-33). His notion was a triumphant Messiah in line with the popular Jewish expectations of the day. Whether it is faulty or partial, the disciples represented by Peter has made considerable progress in their vision of Jesus. From a country carpenter, to a teacher-miracle worker to Messiah!

The acted parable of the double healing of the blind man is the transitional narrative. A parable that tells us the gradual growth in our faith, the faith of those who follow him out of their ‘villages.’ We follow him. However, we fail to receive the sight fully. However, the Lord helps us in our weaknesses. He touches again and again and again till we see people as people and trees as trees! He works with us patiently as the potter does.

That is why Paul calls Christian lives as ‘the handiwork of God’ (Eph 2:10). God works with us, in us until we are ready to be presented. Just as the potter takes the object he shaped from the clay out of the workshop to the sunlight to be dried and then to the showcase to be displayed. This is summarised beautifully by Paul. ‘... so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.’ (Ephesians 5:27, ESV).

Dangerous People

The psalmist has a strange complaint in Psalm 14:4 (also in Psalm 53:4). It is about those people who don’t pray to God.’ Why should another person’s prayer life bother her? The psalmist’s worry doesn’t seem to be the fact that they don’t pray but the reason why they don’t pray.

The ungodly people don’t pray to God because they don’t take God seriously. These are people who like to pretend that God doesn’t exist at all. That is why the Psalmist says, ‘The fool says in his heart, “There is no God."’ This is not a philosophical theory for them, but they have found it convenient to think that God does’nt exist or is not interested in human affairs. This can be called practical atheism. That means, for all practical purposes they tend to believe that God doesn’t exist.

Practical atheism allows its adherents to do all that is evil and wicked. Acknowledging God’s existence and involvement in human affairs by punishing the guilty and rewarding the righteous is an inconvenient theory for those who want to do evil at their will. Put in another way, this means that by getting God out of your way and from your mind you can do all that you want to do.

The reason why the ungodly doesn’t trust in God in prayer is that they trust other means to get their way. They resort to lying, flattery, bribery and threat. Throughout the Psalms, godly people describe how these have made their lives miserable and pray to God to intervene.

The person who composed Psalm 5 complains about those who have ‘... no truth in their mouth; their inmost self is destruction; their throat is an open grave; they flatter with their tongue.’ They are dangerous because they lie, and flatter and their lies and flattery has grave consequences to the life of the Psalmist.

If lies and threat won’t get them what they want, they may resort to threat. The enemies of the Psalmist in 73:8 faces threat from ungodly people: ‘They scoff and speak with malice; loftily they threaten oppression.’

The enemies in Psalm 26 are ‘... bloody men; In whose hands is mischief, and their right hand is full of bribes’ (Psa 26:9-10). These people can buy whatever they want by the power of their money. They can pervert justice and oppress people by greasing the hands of those take and overturn decisions.

Since lying, flattery, threat and bribes work for them, they don’t have to depend on the power nor the wisdom of God. So, they don’t pray. People who don’t pray are thus very dangerous because they resort to other means which harm godly people and their societies.

This can be a trap that the godly people can also walk into unaware. False confidence in one’s ability to convince, win the favour of others and sometimes taking threatening postures are ways they may also be tempted to get their way. These result in less and less dependence upon God in prayer. These may take them far away from God and they may end up with all that God hasn’t willled them to have or do. When we don’t have confidence in prayer and have no patience with God we tend resort to these means as well. Dependence on our wisdom and strength is always disproportionate to our dependence on God in prayer!