Paul's roots as a Pharisee are showing today.

September 9, 2024

Paul's roots as a Pharisee are showing today. Faced with a case of sexual impropriety that even Roman law found too skeevy (a man marrying his stepmother), Paul responds as a first century Pharisee: separation from moral and ritual impurity.

Hand this man over to Satan for destruction of the flesh, so that his spirit may be saved on the day of the Lord.
- 1 Co 5:5 (RNJB)

To him the real offense isn't the sin committed but rather the damage the church does to itself by permitting it in its midst.

Do you not realise that a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough? Clean out the old yeast so that you can be a new batch.
- 1 Co 5:6-7 (RNJB)

And it makes sense in this Hellenistic universe of these early Christians. If being joined to Christ’s mystical body in the Church separates one from the forces of “sin and death” through baptism, then the active, ongoing sin of one member re-exposes the whole community to forces of decay. Better for all to remove that one member. He can take his own chances with his own physical health, knowing that his spirit at least is entrusted to Christ.

In this thinking, Paul stands in the long tradition of Israel. We hear it echoed even in today's psalm:

Declare them guilty, O God.
Let them fail in their designs.
Drive them out for their many offences,
for they have rebelled against you.
- Psalms 5:11 (RNJB)

But then what?

That's the uncomfortable question left unasked.

If that same Christ is the Logos of God acting in the world, is he content to leave it at that? Does the Living Word have any questions?

Pharisees of his time present Jesus with just such a case: a man excised from the community because his physical ailment endangers the ritual purity of them all. In this worldview, sickness results from sin, so exposure is contagious both ritually and physically. Healing one forgives the other and vice-versa, and that puts everyone at risk.

Clearly, Christ is no stranger to this thinking.

But he knew their thoughts; and he said to the man with the withered hand, ‘Get up and stand in the middle.’ And he got up and stood there. Then Jesus said to them, ‘I ask you: is it permitted on the Sabbath to do good, or to do evil; to save life, or to destroy it?’ Then he looked round at them all and said to the man, ‘Stretch out your hand.’ He did so, and his hand was restored.
- Lk 6:8-10 (RNJB)

A moral reading of the lectionary sees a mystic connection between the man with the withered hand and the sinner of Corinthians. As if receiving for judgment the very one Paul cast out, the Christ receives the man suffering for his sin. He doesn't challenge the judgement upon him. He just asks what happens next.

Are you excised from God's holy people? Rightly or wrongly, do you find yourself beyond communion? Stretch out your hand. Leave it to Christ to ask what happens next.

Saint Peter Claver, pray for us.