Posts
 |
| Temptation of Christ, 1527, Monastery of St. Nicholas Anapausas, Meteora, Greece (detail) |
Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry. Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, "If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread." But He answered and said, "It is written, 'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.' "
Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, "If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written:
'He shall give His angels charge over you,'Jesus said to him, "It is written again, 'You shall not tempt the LORD your God.' "
and,
'In their hands they shall bear you up,
Lest you dash your foot against a stone.' "
Again, the devil took Him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to Him, "All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me." Then Jesus said to him, "Away with you, Satan! For it is written, 'You shall worship the LORD your God, and Him only you shall serve.' " Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and ministered to Him.
- Matthew 4:1-11
On Saturday we read that Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan to be baptized by him. And John tried to prevent Him, saying, "I need to be baptized by You, and are You coming to me?" But Jesus answered and said to him, "Permit it to be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness." Then he allowed Him. When He had been baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened to Him, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting upon Him. And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased."
Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. My study bible tells us that to be tempted is to be tested in fundamental areas of faith. In Mark's Gospel, the Greek text literally reads that the Spirit "throws" Jesus into the wilderness. Here in Matthew, He is similarly "led up" by the Spirit into the wilderness after his Baptism, here to be tested by a struggle with the devil. My study bible says that we who are baptized in Christ need not be defeated by temptations because we also are aided by the Holy Spirit, just as was Christ. The wilderness, it says, is a battleground, an image of the world, at once both the dwelling place of demons and a source of divine tranquility and victory.
And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry. Jesus' temptations take place during these forty days. My study bible says that in so doing, He reverses Israel's falling to temptation in the wilderness. The Israelites were tested forty years in the wilderness, and proved disobedient and disloyal. God humbled them by first allowing them to go hungry, and then by feeding them with manna to help them learn to be dependent upon God (Deuteronomy 8:2-5). Jesus is tested for forty days, and yet does not sin. My study bible also notes that His answers to Satan are from Deuteronomy (as in the story of Israel), and all all for loyalty to God. Jesus fasted in order to overcome temptation, which gives us an example of our own power and limitations in the face of temptation. It's not his physical hunger that controls Him. On the contrary, He controls His flesh, my study bible says. The Lord's fast of forty days is the foundation of the traditional forty-day Lenten fast before Holy Week, and additionally a traditional fast before Christmas.
Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, "If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread." The devil's first temptation challenges Jesus' relationship to the Father. If You are the Son of God questions the Father's declaration at Christ's Baptism (see Saturday's reading, above; in particular verse 3:17). The goal is to get Christ to act independently, detaching Himself from the will of the Father. In His divine nature, my study bible says, Christ shares one will with the Father and the Holy Spirit; He can do nothing of Himself (John 5:30), apart from the Father. But as a human being, Christ possesses free will, and at all times He must choose to remain obedient to the divine will of the Father.
But He answered and said, "It is written, 'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.' " Jesus replies by quoting Deuteronomy 8:3. In His rejection of this first temptation, my study bible says, Christ rejects an earthly kingdom, and He shows us not to pursue earthly comfort in the "food which perishes" (John 6:27) over obedience to God. It explains that Adam disregarded the divine word in order to pursue the passions of the body (Genesis 3), but the New Adam -- Christ -- conquers temptation through the divine word, which in turn gives human nature the power to conquer Satan.
Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, "If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written: 'He shall give His angels charge over you,' and, 'In their hands they shall bear you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone.' " The holy city is Jerusalem. In His first temptation, Christ defeated the devil through the power of Scripture. Here Satan tries to use Scripture in order to trap Jesus, putting God's power of protection to the test. The quotation is from Psalm 91:11-12.
Jesus said to him, "It is written again, 'You shall not tempt the LORD your God.' " Jesus once again refutes the devil's temptations with Scripture, this time quoting Deuteronomy 6:16. My study bible adds here that trials and temptations come on their own. We should not intentionally expose ourselves to danger in order to test or to prove God's protection. To do so is to tempt the LORD.
Again, the devil took Him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to Him, "All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me." Then Jesus said to him, "Away with you, Satan! For it is written, 'You shall worship the LORD your God, and Him only you shall serve.' " Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and ministered to Him. My study bible states that God's Kingdom is not one of earthly power and possessions. In this test by the devil, Jesus is asked to choose worldly power over the Kingdom of God. In John's Gospel we read that the devil is the "ruler of this world" (John 12:31), and St. Paul calls him "the god of this age" (2 Corinthians 4:4), as the whole world is in his power (1 John 5:19). Jesus rejects this temptation of the road to earthly glory, which would lead Him away from the suffering and death He knows is within His mission for the redemption and salvation of the world. Jesus quotes from Deuteronomy 6:13. Many Greek texts indicate that Christ says, "Get behind Me, Satan!" as He will in reply to Peter's suggestion that He avoid the Cross (16:23). We note how the angels came and ministered to Him after His temptations.
How do temptations come into our lives? It seems to be important to distinguish that the primary aim of these temptations is to peel Christ away from His absolute trust in the Father, and in the Father's mission for Him. That is, the devil attempts to divide Christ from the Father, and from the Father's will. This would make sense when we take into account that His death on the Cross is actually for the purpose of defeating death, and for freeing human beings from slavery to sin (and to the devil). In other words, ultimately the temptations seek to defeat true judgment. They seek to defeat the fullness of righteousness (or "right-relatedness") that comes with a defeat of that which ails the world. Christ's mission, after all, is to heal through communion. He is to redeem and save the world through the healing that takes place via union with God. It's the devil's interest to prevent this any way possible, and thus hold sway and power in the world. Therefore, all of the quotations from Scripture that Christ uses will be emphasizing loyalty to God in the face of temptation. It helps us to understand what temptation is when it is framed in this sense. So often our temptations seem to come in the form of whether or not we please a social consensus on how we "should" be behaving, how we should choose, but it's not the social consensus that Christ's quotations refuting the devil reflect. That urgent demand that we be in sync with the values of the world around us is a false arbiter of behavior in the sense that we are asked to place our loyalties at once both deeper and higher, to that which calls us to true personal identity as well as right-relatedness to the world. If we look at historical images of today's reading such as the one above, we see the devil depicted as a dark and small being, not well-defined in features, shadowy. This image gives us a sense that the devil isn't quite a full being; outside the true relation to God, we see one who is without life and internal light, and hence merely parasitical in nature. Our true loyalty is to God, and in our orientation to God we put everything under this deep mission of Christ's to heal all things, including us. Christ's perspective offers us a prayerful way to live our lives, an orientation that is all about the wholeness and fullness of a life lived within a loyalty to God who is love. For two thousand years, monastic communities have been formed seeking a way to live that life, to face the temptations such as those which Christ did, and to seek to live in conformity not with the world, but with the understanding of fully loving God, and neighbor as oneself. Ultimately it is in Christ that all things are reconciled, and thus when we reject temptation, what we really seek is a fullness of dependence upon Christ. Whatever our insecurities are, whatever we feel our deepest needs are, our internal demand for inclusion and belonging -- and even our very sense of survival: all these things come under the umbrella of healing through an increasing dependency on Christ for the answers to such problems and questions. Temptations will always come in the form of whatever it is that will stand in for our love of God and that dependency on God's love to show us the right way, to be and do as we are called. Shortcuts will always appeal to the medicine of depth of healing in God's love. A broken world that so frequently shatters our sense of love offers us so many of them! Let us seek to choose as Christ does, and remember that the ministry of angels -- and of the Holy Spirit -- is always with us in the midst of the our own wilderness.
Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. My study bible tells us that to be tempted is to be tested in fundamental areas of faith. In Mark's Gospel, the Greek text literally reads that the Spirit "throws" Jesus into the wilderness. Here in Matthew, He is similarly "led up" by the Spirit into the wilderness after his Baptism, here to be tested by a struggle with the devil. My study bible says that we who are baptized in Christ need not be defeated by temptations because we also are aided by the Holy Spirit, just as was Christ. The wilderness, it says, is a battleground, an image of the world, at once both the dwelling place of demons and a source of divine tranquility and victory.
And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry. Jesus' temptations take place during these forty days. My study bible says that in so doing, He reverses Israel's falling to temptation in the wilderness. The Israelites were tested forty years in the wilderness, and proved disobedient and disloyal. God humbled them by first allowing them to go hungry, and then by feeding them with manna to help them learn to be dependent upon God (Deuteronomy 8:2-5). Jesus is tested for forty days, and yet does not sin. My study bible also notes that His answers to Satan are from Deuteronomy (as in the story of Israel), and all all for loyalty to God. Jesus fasted in order to overcome temptation, which gives us an example of our own power and limitations in the face of temptation. It's not his physical hunger that controls Him. On the contrary, He controls His flesh, my study bible says. The Lord's fast of forty days is the foundation of the traditional forty-day Lenten fast before Holy Week, and additionally a traditional fast before Christmas.
Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, "If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread." The devil's first temptation challenges Jesus' relationship to the Father. If You are the Son of God questions the Father's declaration at Christ's Baptism (see Saturday's reading, above; in particular verse 3:17). The goal is to get Christ to act independently, detaching Himself from the will of the Father. In His divine nature, my study bible says, Christ shares one will with the Father and the Holy Spirit; He can do nothing of Himself (John 5:30), apart from the Father. But as a human being, Christ possesses free will, and at all times He must choose to remain obedient to the divine will of the Father.
But He answered and said, "It is written, 'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.' " Jesus replies by quoting Deuteronomy 8:3. In His rejection of this first temptation, my study bible says, Christ rejects an earthly kingdom, and He shows us not to pursue earthly comfort in the "food which perishes" (John 6:27) over obedience to God. It explains that Adam disregarded the divine word in order to pursue the passions of the body (Genesis 3), but the New Adam -- Christ -- conquers temptation through the divine word, which in turn gives human nature the power to conquer Satan.
Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, "If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written: 'He shall give His angels charge over you,' and, 'In their hands they shall bear you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone.' " The holy city is Jerusalem. In His first temptation, Christ defeated the devil through the power of Scripture. Here Satan tries to use Scripture in order to trap Jesus, putting God's power of protection to the test. The quotation is from Psalm 91:11-12.
Jesus said to him, "It is written again, 'You shall not tempt the LORD your God.' " Jesus once again refutes the devil's temptations with Scripture, this time quoting Deuteronomy 6:16. My study bible adds here that trials and temptations come on their own. We should not intentionally expose ourselves to danger in order to test or to prove God's protection. To do so is to tempt the LORD.
Again, the devil took Him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to Him, "All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me." Then Jesus said to him, "Away with you, Satan! For it is written, 'You shall worship the LORD your God, and Him only you shall serve.' " Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and ministered to Him. My study bible states that God's Kingdom is not one of earthly power and possessions. In this test by the devil, Jesus is asked to choose worldly power over the Kingdom of God. In John's Gospel we read that the devil is the "ruler of this world" (John 12:31), and St. Paul calls him "the god of this age" (2 Corinthians 4:4), as the whole world is in his power (1 John 5:19). Jesus rejects this temptation of the road to earthly glory, which would lead Him away from the suffering and death He knows is within His mission for the redemption and salvation of the world. Jesus quotes from Deuteronomy 6:13. Many Greek texts indicate that Christ says, "Get behind Me, Satan!" as He will in reply to Peter's suggestion that He avoid the Cross (16:23). We note how the angels came and ministered to Him after His temptations.
How do temptations come into our lives? It seems to be important to distinguish that the primary aim of these temptations is to peel Christ away from His absolute trust in the Father, and in the Father's mission for Him. That is, the devil attempts to divide Christ from the Father, and from the Father's will. This would make sense when we take into account that His death on the Cross is actually for the purpose of defeating death, and for freeing human beings from slavery to sin (and to the devil). In other words, ultimately the temptations seek to defeat true judgment. They seek to defeat the fullness of righteousness (or "right-relatedness") that comes with a defeat of that which ails the world. Christ's mission, after all, is to heal through communion. He is to redeem and save the world through the healing that takes place via union with God. It's the devil's interest to prevent this any way possible, and thus hold sway and power in the world. Therefore, all of the quotations from Scripture that Christ uses will be emphasizing loyalty to God in the face of temptation. It helps us to understand what temptation is when it is framed in this sense. So often our temptations seem to come in the form of whether or not we please a social consensus on how we "should" be behaving, how we should choose, but it's not the social consensus that Christ's quotations refuting the devil reflect. That urgent demand that we be in sync with the values of the world around us is a false arbiter of behavior in the sense that we are asked to place our loyalties at once both deeper and higher, to that which calls us to true personal identity as well as right-relatedness to the world. If we look at historical images of today's reading such as the one above, we see the devil depicted as a dark and small being, not well-defined in features, shadowy. This image gives us a sense that the devil isn't quite a full being; outside the true relation to God, we see one who is without life and internal light, and hence merely parasitical in nature. Our true loyalty is to God, and in our orientation to God we put everything under this deep mission of Christ's to heal all things, including us. Christ's perspective offers us a prayerful way to live our lives, an orientation that is all about the wholeness and fullness of a life lived within a loyalty to God who is love. For two thousand years, monastic communities have been formed seeking a way to live that life, to face the temptations such as those which Christ did, and to seek to live in conformity not with the world, but with the understanding of fully loving God, and neighbor as oneself. Ultimately it is in Christ that all things are reconciled, and thus when we reject temptation, what we really seek is a fullness of dependence upon Christ. Whatever our insecurities are, whatever we feel our deepest needs are, our internal demand for inclusion and belonging -- and even our very sense of survival: all these things come under the umbrella of healing through an increasing dependency on Christ for the answers to such problems and questions. Temptations will always come in the form of whatever it is that will stand in for our love of God and that dependency on God's love to show us the right way, to be and do as we are called. Shortcuts will always appeal to the medicine of depth of healing in God's love. A broken world that so frequently shatters our sense of love offers us so many of them! Let us seek to choose as Christ does, and remember that the ministry of angels -- and of the Holy Spirit -- is always with us in the midst of the our own wilderness.
No comments:
Post a Comment