Sacrifices

Many of the Jews who had come to Mary and seen what Jesus had done began to believe in him. But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. So the chief priests and the Pharisees convened the Sanhedrin and said, “What are we going to do? This man is performing many signs. If we leave him alone, all will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our land and our nation.” 

But one of them, Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, said to them, “You know nothing, nor do you consider that it is better for you that one man should die instead of the people, so that the whole nation may not perish.” He did not say this on his own, but since he was high priest for that year, he prophesied that Jesus was going to die for the nation, and not only for the nation, but also to gather into one the dispersed children of God. So from that day on they planned to kill him. (John 11:45-56)

This Gospel passage provides an important clue as to why the chief priests and the Pharisees planned to kill Jesus: “If we leave him alone, all will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our land and our nation.”  Fear is compelling motivation, and that fear was instilled in Jewish leaders by occupying Romans who wielded crucifixion as a tool for compliance with Roman will and authorities.   To this day I still marvel at what we call our Roman Catholic Church.

To lose one’s land and the nation itself or to sacrifice the trouble-maker Jesus to avoid that loss was an easy choice for the Jewish authorities.  “One man should die instead of the people” fits well with the Jewish traditional use of the scapegoat.  On the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur), described in Leviticus 16:1-34, the sins of the people were symbolically placed on the goat then sent into the desert to die with all those accompanying sins attached.

Fear is commonplace this Lent as we all struggle with sacrifices necessary for our nation to deal with the coronavirus.  Our individual sacrifices are needed to benefit the people near and far.  This Lent we’ve given up some personal freedoms.  Strangely, social distancing has made us a dispersed people that will eventually gather when the viral threat has subsided and hopefully ended.

Holy Week begins on April 5 – tomorrow.  Let’s begin the Week with hope and remembering that Jesus died for us and because of us.   Like Jesus – our Christ – our whole nation will rise again after this long period of testing of our collective strength and resolve.

Biblical scholar and theologian Walter Wink said: “Killing Jesus was like trying to destroy a dandelion seed-head by blowing on it.”  As we continue to deal with spreading coronavirus, unlike with this virus where there is death, with Jesus there is life and the spreading belief in hope for life everlasting.

Deacon David Pierce 

Deacon David Pierce