In
last week’s thrilling episode of “The Rev. Know-it-all’s “Young Christian’s
Guide to Halakhic Law.” I shared the Jewish concept of the Noachite laws to
which non-Jews are bound. Jews, at least as far Jewish orthodoxy is concerned,
are bound by all six hundred and thirteen laws found in the Torah, the books of
Moses as Jesus called them. If you are wondering about all these 613 laws they
are easy to find at 613 commandments - Wikipedia.
A
commandment in Hebrew is called a Mitzvah, plural mitzvoth. There are 248 Positive Commandments (do's)
called ta’ase and 365 Negative Commandments (do not's) called lo ta’aseh. The mitzvoth are further divided into what are call Khukkim and Mishpatim that is decrees and judgments. To
these are added eidoth or
testimonials. The decrees are easy. They
are extensions of the Ten Commandments. The Torah expands on the prohibition
against idolatry, unjust violence, dishonesty and (interestingly enough)
sterile sexuality. The many laws regarding sexual conduct and sexual
availability indicate a profound respect for the creative role of women and the
primarily reproductive role of human intimacy.
The
first hundred laws (give or take) are prohibitions against idolatry, and the
sacredness of the Sabbath. The mishpatim,
(judgments) all make sense just as extensions of the Ten Commandments and the
Noahite laws. Then there are the testimonials, the eidoth. They are bit more of a stretch. The eidoth are rules such
as the observance of Sabbath and the Holy Days, or the wearing of tzitzit (tassels on you garments) the
wearing of tefilin (little boxes
containing the Shema “Hear O
Israel” fastened on arm and head by leather straps.) These are things which mark a person publicly
and visibly as part of Israel.
Jesus
of Nazareth fulfils the laws prohibiting idolatry as summed up in the verse of
Christian scripture found in St. Paul’s letter to the Colossians. “He is the
visible image of the invisible God.”
Since the dawn of time, men have tried to imagine the creator of all
things and the powers that control his life. They have invariably gotten it
wrong and have created gods in their own image and not God as He is. We believe
that God has sent us His own visible image in the person of Jesus of Nazareth.
If you want to know what God looks like, just look at Jesus, the Messiah. God
looks like a Jewish day laborer who was born in a barn, had to flee from the
authorities on numerous occasions, beginning in his childhood, He finally died
after a night in jail, executed for treason and blasphemy.
That’s
what God looks like. Heck of a religion, not one that anybody in his right mind
would invent. If Jesus of Nazareth is in fact the visible image of the
invisible God, all the laws against idolatry are fulfilled in Him. To worship
an idol when a divine person, the actual image of the divine, is available
would be ridiculous. It would be like the man who has a treasured photo of his
beloved at which he stares in her absence. Were she to suddenly appear at his
door, would he say, “Go away! I’m looking at your picture?” Nonsense! Go ahead
and make all the images you want. Not one of them, be it marble or plaster, a
painting, a photo or the finest gold and silver, can compare to the beauty of
the Lord himself made available to us in the Spirit and in the Holy Sacrament.
Speaking
about Jesus’ human origins there are two interesting laws, one that He
fulfills, and perhaps even one fulfilled by his Blessed Mother. I warn you that
the following may be disturbing. We must forget, for just a moment, our
understanding of the innocence and the moral perfection owned by our Lord and
His Blessed Mother. We should look at them the way a harsh and cynical world
would have looked at them at the time. “Do not to let a mamzer (a child born due to an illegal relationship, a bastard)
marry into the people of Israel.” (Deut. 23:3) We know the truth that Jesus was
conceived miraculously, but do you think His neighbors and relatives believed
that? Small villages and small minds count the days from the wedding to the
birth with great precision. They knew Joseph and Mary had not been married when
Jesus was conceived, and I imagine they thought that Joseph was not the father,
just an older relative to whom Our Blessed Mother was married to protect her
and the child of her womb.
If
the first command was to be fruitful and multiply, do you ever wonder that
Jesus seems not to have married? Perhaps Jesus bore the stigma of a suspicious
birth and so doing cancelled the law that forbad a mamzer marrying into Israel. He was the Bridegroom of Israel, and
being innocent Himself, legitimizes all the outcasts of the world who turn to
Him and ask for the grace.
But
what of our Blessed Mother? Israelites must fulfill the laws of the Sotah. (Num. 5:18ff)
“The
priest shall take holy water in an earthen vessel and the dust that is on the
floor of the tabernacle... the priest shall cause her (the suspected
adulteress) to swear, and shall say unto the woman: ‘If no man have lain with
thee, and if thou hast not gone aside to uncleanness…. be thou free from this
water of bitterness that causeth the curse…. He shall write down these curses
and blot their ink into the water of bitterness… And when he hath made her
drink the water, then …if she have acted unfaithfully against her husband, that
the water that causeth the curse shall enter into her and become bitter, and
her belly shall swell, and her thigh shall fall away; and the woman shall be a
curse among her people!!!’”
(I purposely left this in King James English. It sounds so much more curse-y that
way.)
What
has this to do with the Blessed Mother? The name Mary, in Hebrew Mariam, means
“bitterness.” She was the sorrowful mother, made to drink the water of
bitterness as she stood at the foot of Her Son’s cross. She was proved innocent
and faithful despite the bitterness of her life and is today honored in all the
world.
To
be continued...
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