12th Sunday after Pentecost – August 19, 2012
(Luke 10: 23-37)
While Jesus was going about preaching, there were also those going through the whole country of the Jews attacking Christ and saying that He had said the law of Moses was useless. The Levite, who was schooled in the Law of Moses and stood up to tempt him today, was one of these. Because the Lord was accustomed to speak of eternal life to those who came to Him, the Levite makes use of this, hoping He might say something against Moses. Jesus knew the mind of this man, of course, and what he got in reply was nothing but the commandments that Moses laid down – “love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart and with thy whole soul and with all thy strength and with all thy mind; and thy neighbor as thyself.” (Deuteronomy 6: 5 and Leviticus 19: 18) These Jewish commandments are also Christian commandments, because Jesus Christ did not come to destroy the law, but to fulfill it. (Matthew 5: 1-17)
God promises to bless us in many ways if we keep His commandments, but if we don’t, we will be cursed in everything we do. (See the lengthy lists in Deuteronomy 28) The reward for being obedient to God’s commandments is not only eternal joy in heaven, but also blessings in this life. Look at Adam and Eve. As long as they were obedient they led a blissful existence that could have gone on forever. When they disobeyed, their lives became a “valley of tears” and suffering. They had to work hard for their food and shelter, and the fear of death, judgment and punishment replaced their former happiness. King David, also an example. As long as he obeyed God he was successful and happy. When he disobeyed his troubles began. His son Absalom got drunk and ran his brother through with a sword. Later David had to hide from Absalom who was trying to depose him as king. A plague killed off many of David’s subjects. King Solomon also: As long as he kept faithful to the commandments he enjoyed the admiration of the world, but when he was no longer faithful everything went wrong.
If we wish to be happy, as far as we are able to be in this life, we have no other means but to faithfully keep the commandments of God. Our troubles arise when we violate the Law of God. But if we seek to please God and to save our soul we will never want for what we need. This is not a promise of having heaven on earth. Daniel was obedient and still ended up in the lion’s den, but the prophet Habakkuk brought him what he needed, food. Elias hid in the woods to escape from Queen Jezebel, but an angel from heaven brought him what he needed to survive. God provided food for the holy hermit, Paul, by means of a raven. All these were faithful to God and God provided what they needed.
After the Levite gives his reading of the law, to love God and neighbor, Jesus tells him to go and do likewise, but the Levite, wishing to justify his uncharitable life asks: “And who is my neighbour?” Then Jesus gives to him and us the parable of the Good Samaritan. A certain man “fell among robbers, who also stripped him and having wounded him went away, leaving him half-dead.” The robbers are Satan and his fallen angels, who in the beginning stripped humankind of our adornment of virtue and continue to wound us to this day. They left this man half-dead, and they leave us half-dead, because in the part of us that can know and understand God we are alive, but when our virtues have been stripped from us by sin, in that part we are dead. The man in the parable, of course, is Adam, who lay stripped of the means to regain the eternal life that he had lost. Neither the Priest nor the Levite, representing the Old Law, could restore that to him. The Law of Moses gave us knowledge of sin, but not its abolition, such as we receive absolution in the Confessional.
The Levite gave the obvious answer when Jesus asked him which of the three was neighbor to the injured man. Clearly it was the Samaritan, and the Levite answered, “He that showed mercy to him.” The dignity of the Priesthood and the learning of the Old Law, as represented by the Levite, are without profit to us unless it is confirmed by good works, and so Jesus instructed the lawyer, “Go, and do thou in like manner.”
Our Lord wants to be called our neighbor because He made it clear to us that it was He who took care of the man lying half-dead by the wayside. Samaritan means guardian, and Psalm 120: 4 tells us about His coming: “Behold he shall neither slumber nor sleep that keepeth Israel; and in Romans 6: 9, for “rising again from the dead, [he] dieth now no more.” The one who keeps Israel is its Guardian. That Jesus is this Guardian is confirmed in John’s Gospel when they accused Him, saying, “Thou art a Samaritan, and hast a devil.” (John 8: 48) Jesus denied that He had a devil, but He did not deny that He was the Samaritan, the Guardian of the weak.
As St. Ambrose said, “It is not kinship that makes a neighbor, but compassion.” Our Lord told us clearly that we must “Do good to them that hate you.” (Matthew 5: 44) We cannot inquire into the past sins of those who are in need, and it doesn’t matter if they are Catholic, Protestant, Muslim, Jew or atheist – if we see someone in need we are required as Christians to come to his aid. Compassion is part of human nature, for nothing is more in agreement with nature than to help those who share our human nature. We cultivate love of God by being obedient to His commandments. We cultivate love of neighbor by doing good works.
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We Celebrate the Tridentine Latin Mass
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