From the Heartland
I spent a part of Holy Week this year rereading The Innocents Abroad. The book is Mark Twain’s somewhat irreverent, detailed account of his grand tour of Europe, the Middle East, and the Holy Lands.
His party left on June 8, 1867, from New York on the Quacker City and returned on November 19. Twain’s travel book marks the beginning of a growing interest in this country to travel to the continent and the Middle East. I took The Innocents Abroad with me to read on one of my visits to Israel. The book gave a unique perspective on the many of places we visited.
In the company on board the Quacker City were three distinguished clergy and several very religious laypersons. The former acquitted themselves well, but not the same could be said of the latter. One was sadly disappointed when his suggestion of observing the Sabbath as a day of rest was rejected. Twain had the bad fortune to have one of these laypersons as one of the group of 8 which took the “long tour” to Jerusalem. In chapter 23 Twain tells of this Pharisee voting against taking an extra day to reach Damascus to rest the animals. He did not want to travel on, you guessed it, the Sabbath. The righteous travel’s convictions would seem to be in contrast to Christ’s calling for a spirit of compassion, mercy, and good will.
Mark Twain writes of the pious pilgrimages. “Thus, they were willing to commit a sin upon the spirit of religious law in order that they might preserve the letter of it. … They lecture our shortcomings and read to us chapters from the Testament that are full of gentleness, of charity, and tender mercy; and then all the next day they stick to their saddles clear up to the summits of these ragged mountains and clear down again. Apply the Testament’s gentleness and charity and tender mercy to a toiling, worn and weary horse? Nonsense (The Innocents Abroad, A Signet Classic, p. 323). “
This year the Men’s Sweet 16 and Holy Week collided. Friday night my church and two other United Methodist churches had a joint Good Friday service at 7:00 P.M. The Purdue men’s basketball team’s game in the Sweet 16 started at 7:40 P.M. on Friday. What to do? I have been attending Good Friday services for as long as I can remember. They are a part of the preparations to celebrate Easter. This just might be the year that the Purdue men finally win it all. Prospects look good. A religious zealot would very likely say attend the Good Friday service (letter of the law). A less rigorous persons might have more mercy and encourage watching the game (spirit of the law).
The first Holy Week the Gospel of Matthew records a confrontation between Jesus and the religious leaders in Jerusalem. Included in Jesus seven woes against the scribes and the Pharisees is one which addresses the issues of the difference between the letter of the law and the spirit of the law. “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint, dill, and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matter of the law: justice, and mercy and faith. It is these you ought to have practiced without neglecting the others. You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel (Matthew 23:23-24)!”
A little later during the first Holy Week Jesus is with His disciples on the Mount of Olives. Near the end of their time together, Jesus tells the Parable of the Last Judgment when all of the nations are separated between the sheep and the goats. What distinguished the sheep is not their correct belief or religious practices but their personal conduct toward others. The king tells them “Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world, for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me (Matthew 25:34b-36).”