You probably have your favorite places to sit, don t you: when I go to lunch, I

Transcription

1 Matthew 23:1-12 Ex Cathedra You probably have your favorite places to sit, don t you: when I go to lunch, I want to sit at the window; when you were a teenager didn t you call shotgun to get the front seat in your friend s car; at football games seats on the 50-yard line are best, so that the field is spread out before you; Archie Bunker had his special chair, and nobody had better sit in it; at the dining table you usually sit in the same chair every time; at the movies, you likely want seats as close to the middle as possible- you never want to tilt your head back onto your shoulders to see the screen; and at church you generally want to be as far in the back as you can bemaybe to keep distance between yourself and the preacher, I can understand that; my friends and I used to say the back pews were for quicker egress once worship was over so that we could beat the Baptists to the cafeteria. I am talking about seating arrangements because this word cathedra in the sermon title is the Greek word for chair or seat, and in verse 6, Jesus notes how the scribes and Pharisees have their favorite places to sit in synagogue, the protocathedra is the word, the prime seats- though perhaps it s more than a preference, and more like an insistence, to take the best thing for themselves. We know people like that, don t we, so full of themselves; and we know preachers like that, too-

2 their own privates jets, the chauffeured Bentleys, the salary and benefit packages that include country-club memberships. I don t mean to come across as negative toward better ministers than I or jealous of those more successful. It is the sense of entitlement that some give off, that s the problem. You may know this phrase, ex cathedra. It means literally, from the chair, and in Roman Catholicism describes an authoritative doctrinal statement by the pope that cannot be changed. From the chair means that a ruling or a teaching has been carefully thought out; it is a formal declaration and not a casual utterance, like judges making legal decisions from the bench. Same thing. And like the leader of a conference is called the chairperson, in this passage the scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses chair and make judgments and decisions about the Mosaic Law for the synagogue. And you get the feeling, from what Jesus says in these verses, that they really like deciding: that they really enjoy their power and influence, and celebrity. Now, our scripture ends with verse 12, but verse 13 begins a sequence familiar to us, in which the gospel writer has Jesus pronouncing a series of maledictions upon these religious elite. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! the first words of verse 13. Woe to you, seven times in the

3 remainder of the chapter; hypocrites they are called, five times; the scribes and Pharisees are blind men, blind fools, blind guides, especially revealing descriptions because they should be men who see clearly and guide the people in the truth. So in verses 13 and following, Jesus is merely specifying what we already know about them (having read verses 3-7), about these hypocrites- selfrighteous and self-indulgent. We know, don t we, it would be a temptation for any of us, hypocrisy, if we could get away with it, as it seems they were able to: to tell others what to do; to be certain that our way is the right and only way; the desire to be noticed and honored, to swagger about. That is hypocrisy, because faith is not commanding and scrutinizing others and chasing down praise for yourself- even if you are really smart or deserving, even if you are scribe or Pharisee or doctor of theology or pope or head elder or pastor with ego. The lesson for us, the right and only way of faith, comes in verses 11-12, where Jesus describes the only way not to be a hypocrite: humility. It does not matter that you can read Hebrew, or if you have somehow gained a particular position or status, if you possess the cathedra for a while- if you are the chairperson for a time, or possess certain other advantages. No, you must be servant to others, must deal with people as the humblest one of all. By that alone will God approve of any of us.

4 Really, just think about it. Who are you? Are any of us something so wonderful that we could extol our qualities? We mustn t start grasping for titles or rankings, as though we think to become religious royalty: Rabbi, Master, Father, names verses 8-10 give us. But they are positions already taken. We ve already got a rabbi, a great teacher, and we should be listening to his instruction about peace and hopefulness and God s love and our need for human selflessness; and don t call somebody else Father, we already have a Father, the great Parent and Creator in heaven. And we already have a Master, the Messiah; God s chosen one who has come to show us the way. Growing up, I was told this commandment in verses 8-10 meant that we should not use these titles for our church leaders, or similar ones like Reverend; shouldn t call a priest, Father. But really, that s making the profound point of this scripture into a shallow one. There will always be those more learned than we, more gracious in Christian character, we should honor them and listen to them. And with that honor may the temptations of pride or hypocrisy. That is the price of greatness. But for ourselves, we should realize just this, that the teachings of Jesus in these verses are not law or creedal orthodoxy, but truly a promise, as the basis for relationships; that tell us simply we have one teacher and one Father, which

5 means that we are children of God and sisters and brothers to one another, and servants of the Lord who loves us. Interesting word in verse 10; my translation has it Master. We could also say, Guide or Professor, or Instructor. It s a word that comes from the same root as cathedra. And by it we understand that this Master teaches from the chair, with authority. The definition of ex cathedra in the Catholic Encyclopedia informs us that the seat was originally the position occupied by a professor (think of heads of departments in college- the chair ). It once denoted teaching authority; which was then given over to the supreme authority of the pope, so that papal speech ex cathedra came to be considered true doctrine received from God, and thus, infallible. But verse 10 gives us this word, of the one and the true Master, who himself instructs us ex cathedra, this one called Messiah, the real interpreter of God s word: who knows God best and passes along to all who love him the true and infallible doctrine. Let us listen to him, with humility, and be united together in gratitude; praising always one Father, one teacher, one Lord. I do not speak ex cathedra now, but my feeling is that we should be cautious in our interpretation of passages such as this one. Where Jesus describes the faults

6 and failures of other people. It is obvious that hypocrisy happens, but it doesn t happen only in other persons or other religions, or even more frequently in other religions. People are people, after all, and my guess is every religion has approximately the same percentage of hypocrites. The point for us to take, it seems, is not that the commandments and traditions of my religion are automatically superior to someone else s, but that the purpose of scripture is to help us see if we are practicing our religion the right way: does our faith make us make us more humble? As we noted, humility is the only antidote to hypocrisy. Perhaps there is a deep question behind the problem of religious hypocrisy. What makes one so? Why are we all, to some extent, hypocrites? What makes me hypocritical? Could it be some fear about our life that we think faith can t answer, and so we try to placate our sorrows and the terror of the unknown with physical and ephemeral satisfactions: the best seats, the nicest things, public adulation? If so, then only an act of will can suffice, to strive for and to lay claim to the kind of faith that lasts and holds on through the hurts and losses. A daily, dedicated, ceaseless act of will; that offers itself as a servant to others.