Chapter Eleven - Quick Notes and Facts

• The message that Jesus sends to John includes elements of the hallmarks of the Messianic age. This is what they would expect to see if the Messiah was truly at work.


• Chorazin and Bethsaida are Jewish towns. Tyre and Sidon are Gentile towns - but not only Gentile towns, they are relatively close to Antioch, where this gospel was probably written.


• ‘Hades' was the Greek term for the place of the dead. Jews originally didn't have a well-developed sense of the afterlife and borrowed from other cultures over the centuries. At the time of Jesus, there was no consensus. Some thought there was no afterlife, others that there was a place where the dead lived, and others that there was a paradise where one met God. Jesus taught in line with the third idea. He seems to be using ‘Hades' here as a synonym for what we would term "hell" (although in the pagan world it was not necessarily a place of torment.)


• A yoke upon an ox enabled one to control the animal. It also enabled one to give the animal something to drag.

Chapter Eleven - Question 6

Once again, the chapter ends with some message about discipleship. How is it phrased here? What does discipleship mean from this passage, and how does it fit into what we have seen up until now in this gospel?

Chapter Eleven - Question 5

"No one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him." What does this mean for us? For our images and knowledge of God? For what we believe Jesus to be?

Chapter Eleven - Question 5

According to verse 25 and following, who hears Jesus' message? What inhibits the rest from listening?

Chapter Eleven - Question 4

Jesus is pretty judgmental of the cities that he mentions. What has provoked this in him?

Chapter Eleven - Question 3

What is Jesus' critique of those who have judged both him and John?

Chapter Eleven - Question 2

What does Jesus say about John the Baptist? What is his importance?

Chapter Eleven - Question 1

What do you think John's emotions and motives were in sending this message to Jesus?

Chapter Ten - Quick Notes and Facts

• ‘Peter' is a nickname. In Greek, it would be Petros, but in Aramaic, the language which they spoke, it was Cephas. This is what Paul calls him in his letters. The word means ‘rock.'


• Samaritans were Semites and had a common ancestry with the Jews. However, they only accepted the five books of Moses as Scripture, and they worshipped in their own country and not in Jerusalem. Jews and Samaritans seem to have despised each other.


• The emphasis on Jesus as the Jewish messiah, sent to the Jews, comes through strongly in this chapter.


• Sodom and Gomorrah were ancient cities destroyed with ‘fire and brimstone.' They may have been the victims of a volcanic eruption. (See Genesis 19)


• The advice about what kind of persecution they might expect and how to deal with it is probably a reflection of the church at the time that Matthew wrote, and not necessarily when Jesus was alive.

Chapter Ten - Question Five

Bottom line, what does Jesus expect of disciples?

Chapter Ten - Question Four

Jesus says, "Do not think that I have come to bring peace." This is not a license for Christian warfare, but it is a clear statement that his message will cause trouble. What kind of trouble does it (or should it ) cause in our world?

Chapter Ten - Question Three

In Matthew's community, they may have experienced ostracism and persecution by other members of the synagogue. Although Jesus was a Jewish messiah, and this community was made up of Jews, what do you think were the results of this rejection?

Chapter Ten - Question Two

Martyrdom was a reality for the first three centuries of the church. (Although it was not constant at all times and all places.) What fruits can persecution yield? (What good can come from this?)

Chapter Ten - Question One

Jesus gives many specific directions to the disciples. Generalizing from these, how should disciples go out into our world?

Chapter Nine - Your own questions, thoughts, reflections

Please feel free to post in the comments any of your own questions, thoughts and reflections not covered in any of the other posts.

Chapter Ten will be posted next Monday, September 20.

Chapter Nine - Notes and Quick Facts

• In Jewish tradition, to claim to have God under one's power was blasphemy and punishable by death.
• Tax collectors were universally hated first because they collaborated with the Romans, and second because they could collect whatever they wanted, as long as they gave the Romans their share.
• Pharisees kept a strict distance from anyone who was unclean under the Law. This was especially true of table fellowship. Although Jesus shared many beliefs of the Pharisees, he definitely departed from them on this count.
• Any kind of blood discharge made one unclean. This included menstruation and the effects of illness. The woman with the hemorrhage would have been unable to touch anyone for years.
• After the cure of the blind men, we hear of the ‘Messianic Secret.' This is a device that Matthew inherits from Mark. Jesus repeatedly tells people to keep his work a secret, but with no great success.
• ‘Demon' was a label given to a variety of illnesses. Even to have a headache was thought to be the result of an occupying demon.

Chapter Nine - Question Six

"The harvest is plenty but the laborers are few." What does this saying mean to us in our own contemporary situation?

Chapter Nine - Question Five

The blind men call Jesus ‘Son of David.' What do they "see?"

Chapter Nine - Question Four

What boundaries is Jesus stepping over in the cure of the woman and the raising of the little girl?

Chapter Nine - Question Three

What is Jesus trying to tell the disciples of John in these two short parables? (Verses 14-17)

Chapter Nine - Question Two

Why does Jesus associate with such questionable folks? If he was walking our modern streets, who would he be seen with? Why does he do this? How would it be received by our society?

Chapter Nine - Question One

Jesus forgives the paralytic's sins, and then when challenged, he cures the man. What message is he trying to convey in his actions?

Living the Beatitudes

The Beatitudes and the Sermon on the Mount as a whole (chapters five through seven) are all about living in the Kingdom while living in the 'real world.' How do we do this? How do we live with 'Beatitude values' and not with the values of the culture around us?

Another Way to Pray With the Scriptures: Ignatian Meditation

St. Ignatius of Loyola was the author of the Spiritual Exercises. He was a man of strong emotions and colorful imagination. Through many experiences, he realized that his God-given imagination was a path to prayer. He devised this method to enable those making the Exercises to pray through the Gospels and to draw closer to the Lord.

How to use this method:

• Find a quiet place and establish a sense of inner peace and tranquility. Put away all worries, concerns, aimless thoughts, etc.
• Pray. Ask God to be present during this time, to reveal His Word to you in a powerful way, and to remove any remaining distractions that would hinder you from fully meditating on the Scriptures.
• Select a passage of Scripture – Typically a passage from the Gospels works best. However, any Scripture passage may be chosen.
• Composition of the Place – Slowly read the passage several times with the following questions in mind so that you may experience God's Word through all of your senses.
  

  Sight–‘See the persons with the sight of the imagination, meditating and contemplating in particular the details about them.' What do you see? How tall are the people? What are the people wearing? What do they look like? What is the landscape like? Are there buildings? What do the buildings look like? What time of day is it?

  Hearing–‘Hear with the hearing what they are, or might be, talking about and reflecting oneself' What do you hear? If Jesus is in the passage, what does His voice sound like? Who is speaking? What do the character's voices sound like? Are there background noises?
  

  Smell–‘Smell the infinite fragrance and sweetness of the Divinity' What do you smell? Are there fragrances? Are there animals? If so, can you smell them? Is there food cooking? What does the countryside smell like? Are there any smells that you do not recognize?

  Taste–‘Taste the infinite fragrance and sweetness of the Divinity' What do you taste? Are you eating? If so, what does the food taste like? Is there a smell so pungent you can taste it? What does the water taste like?

  Touch–‘Embrace and kiss the places where such persons put their feet and sit.' What do you feel? What are the different textures you feel? What do the people feel like? Their clothes? Their skin? What does the ground feel like? What do the buildings feel like?

• Colloquy – Remain in the passage through your five senses and have a conversation with Jesus.
• Ask Jesus some questions. Ask any question you wish (this is a time of prayer – in prayer we can be completely honest with God), but here are some questions if you can't think of any:

  Jesus, what are you saying to me?
  What are you asking me to do?
  What does this story mean for my life personally?
  How can I follow You more closely based on my meditations?

• The Lord's Prayer – When you have completed the Colloquy, conclude with The Lord's Prayer.
• Journal your experience –It is often a good idea to take notes of what the experience was like and how you were drawn into prayer.

Tips for Ignatian Meditation

• Go back to those points in prayer that provoked the strongest reaction in order to experience the desire for intimacy with God more deeply.
• Study the geography and historical context of the passage so that you may more fully engage the senses.
• Don't just be a passive observer; interact with your surroundings in the story.
• Pick a place in the story – Are you the main character? An observer? A companion to someone in the story?

Going Online All the Time

We left open the possibility of continuing to meet after the four Mondays in August had concluded, but shifting to Wednesdays. However, most people could not make Wednesdays, so we are going to do it all online.

In the meantime, I got deluged with all the stuff that goes with launching the beginning of the year, so got a little behind posting here. My apologies.

Here is the plan:

a) I'll post the reflection questions one topic at a time. Feel free to begin a discussion on them via the comments.

b) The sidebar/explanation snippets will be another post. If you have specific questions about aspects of the chapter, just comment there, and they will be answered/discussed.

I have facilitated a number of courses at Notre Dame online, and I find that the discussion gets pretty lively. So, this might be a way to go, without the limitations of our schedules interfering.

What do we know of the world in which Matthew was written?

We know some things for sure about the context of the Gospels. (For example, just by reading Matthew, one can discern the concern for Jewish tradition.) On other points, scholars make educated guesses, drawing from their knowledge of the ancient world, on internal evidence in the Gospel, and on other aspects of archeology, anthropology and sociology.

So, from all of that, what have scholars concluded about Matthew's world?

Most place the composition of the Gospel in Antioch in Syria. Antioch was the third most populous city in the Roman Empire. It was close to Palestine, just to the north, and we know it had a sizeable Jewish population. During the first century, about half of all Jews lived outside of Palestine, in the Diaspora, or 'dispersion.' This accelerated after the Jewish war against Rome, which resulted in the destruction of the Temple in 70 AD.

We also know that Peter preached in Antioch. He may have been based there for quite some time, possibly much longer than the time that he preached in Rome.

The issues that faced this church:

• The incorporation of the Gentiles in the Christian community. Faith in Jesus as the Messiah was first preached to Jews. They would have known what the Messiah was to be, and would have understood Jesus as the fulfillment of the Law. Yet, Christianity also began to attract Gentile believers. Whether these new believers had to become Jews was an enormous issue for the early church. It threatened to split it altogether. See Acts 15 for more on how it began to be resolved. Matthew's community, while predominantly Jewish, also had to begin to make sense of 'outsiders' accepting Christ.


• The relationship of the believers in Jesus to other members of the Jewish community. There was certainly no one way to be a Jew in the first century, any more than there is one kind of Judaism today. The believers in Jesus were initially one faction in a diverse people. However, this became more complicated with the destruction of the Temple. Up to that point, the Temple was a unifying element for all factions, including the followers of Jesus. Without the Temple, Judaism had to redefine itself. At the same time, Christians were determining their own identity.
  
  We tend to think of "Jews" and "Christians". However, during this era, it is more accurate to think of different sects of Jews, among which was one who believed that Jesus was the Messiah. This was true in the two generations after Jesus' resurrection.
  
  With the loss of the Temple, two things happened. First, Pharisaic Judaism, which had not been as tied to the Temple, was the best equipped to deal with the aftermath. The form of Judaism that survived into the modern era was basically Pharisaism. This included an emphasis on the holiness of keeping all the points of Torah, a religious life centered in the home and synagogue, and a strong emphasis on community identity within a Gentile world. Second, Christianity began to be defined as a separate sect. The Acts of the Apostles records that Antioch was the first place where believers in Jesus were called "Christians". (Acts 11:26) This was initially a disparaging term. However, the community began to adopt the name as its own.
  
  
• Living in the Roman Empire, while pointed at the Kingdom of Heaven. Keep in mind that Jesus had been crucified as a revolutionary against the Roman Empire. And Matthew's Gospel was written in the wake of a Jewish war against the Empire. The Empire wasn't going anywhere. It continued to be the most powerful and extensive Empire in that part of the world for the next few centuries.
  
  Jews were familiar with the need to define oneself against the culture of the Greco-Roman world. The temptation to assimilation had been present for a millennium - in Egypt, in Canaan, and after the Syrian invasion (in which the tribes were not 'lost' as much as disaffiliated from Hebrew life and connections). During the Babylonian exile when it was possible to return, many Jews did not, and a Jewish community remained vibrant in what is now Iraq until the 1970's. The Greek invasion, under Alexander the Great posed another threat. Not only was there a strong cultural influence (and during the New Testament era, three centuries later, the Greek language and Greek culture was still dominant), but there were attempts to extinguish Jewish practice and belief. 1 and 2 Maccabees recount this era, and the revolt that preserved the Jewish nation and its identity.
  
  Jews knew that to preserve their identity, they needed to live in proximity to each other, to keep the Sabbath, to keep the dietary rules, to limit intermarriage. They knew that their ideals were in conflict with the surrounding culture. For example, Jewish sexual morals were very different in an era of licentiousness. They didn't countenance public nudity in an time when the major social venue was the baths. They didn't permit abortion and infanticide, which were not only common, but expected.
  
  For the Jews in Matthew's community, living as a member of the Kingdom was an extension of all this. They saw their belief in Jesus as an extension of what Torah and the Prophets had taught.
  
  The Gentiles joining this community had a very different experience. They had lived fully in the Greco-Roman world. They were brought into a community with very different values, with different goals, and with a different world view. They were discovering, in the time that this Gospel was being written, what that meant. How was one to live in this world, while aimed at Heaven? One can see the ways that this is worked out throughout the Gospel, but the Sermon on the Mount sets up the questions and the answers.
  


• Waiting for the Lord to return The earliest Christian communities believed that Christ would return shortly. During this period, the urgency was to proclaim Christ as widely as possible before the end of time. They were not interested in more of a social footprint, which one sees much later in Church history.
  


• The death of the apostolic generation. The community had the impetus to record the Gospel in writing as the apostolic generation began to leave the scene. In addition, they had to deal with issues of transition in leadership. The role of the bishop, the successors to the apostles, began to develop. Episcopos meant 'overseer' and eventually was used solely for those who headed the church. A concern for the order of the church and the role of the apostle/bishop is evident in the Gospel. (Especially in chapter 16.)