“Consider your calling, brothers and sisters, nor many of you were wise according to worldly standards” 1 Corinthians 1:26
The Beatitudes beloved as they were by the Victorians are a real stumbling block to all who try to follow them word for word. I wonder, could it be that’s why they were so popular with that group of 19th century Christians who in the most part gave the impression that to enjoy life was actually a sin! This is the first lesson for us all - in the teaching of the Sermon on the Mount, recorded at length by Matthew, Jesus is in fact encouraging a lively faith in action and not deprecating certain actions as bars to faith.
It all depends on how you look at the beatitudes where the emphasis lies.
So let’s begin by looking at some of the words used.
Those of you who still use the poetic language of the Authorised Version may have noticed that the verb “are” is in italics. This is because it does not exist in the original Aramaic text. “No verb?”, you may cry: yes there was no verb! Jesus is not making some prescription for the future – to be taken or not according to choice: he is laying down a rule, albeit one that this would come about after his death, for the Christian Community to follow. Yes, the Beatitudes are statements of the present and may best regarded in his form:-
“Oh the blessedness of the ….”
So, to the word “Blessèd”. The Greek for ‘Blessed’ is ‘Macarios’: it is the name for the Island of Cyprus that has since been called ‘The Happy Isle’. It is in the translation of the Aramaic to Greek that modern translations of this passage have begun to introduce a future goal with the translation: -
“happy are the…..”
We must therefore address another question. How can one be “blessèd” or “happy” when poor or oppressed…..? Well the answer lies in our understanding of what it is to be….you’ve got it… happy of blessed! We must go back to the Greek for the word “Macarios” is not a fleeting happiness of the moment but a permanent joy which can not be shaken and in the Gospel of John Jesus says of it: -
“No-one can take that joy from you” (16:22)
Now we need to change languages. The “Hebrew” words for ‘poor’ had four uses and by the time of writing the Gospel of Matthew it had become most commonly associated with the man..or woman.. who has such trust in God that no situation would be of concern to them. This is the poor man commended in the psalms such as we heard earlier: -
“the Lord raises up those who are bowed down.”
God does not differentiate faith on the grounds of means but on the attitude of the individual to them.
To such people as this belongs the kingdom of heaven! Well that’s not necessarily encouraging, unless you are preaching on vocations to the religious life! However, a look at a group of words will help us: the words – “Kingdom of heaven”, and to fully understand Jesus’ teaching we must go to the Lord’s prayer, the narrative of which also occurs in the Sermon on the Mount. In this prayer we are left in no uncertainty as to Jesus understanding that the Kingdom of God is a Society not of the future but of the present!
One Commentary, on this passage, having considered all the above language facts gives a new translation of the first beatitude, it is more like a homily in its own right.:-
“Oh the blessedness of the person who has realised his own utter uselessness, and who has put his whole trust in God, for thus alone can he render to God that perfect obedience which will make him a citizen of the Kingdom of heaven.”
Each of the beatitudes is such a homily. On the surface we can never hope to aspire to such spiritual perfection yet, once we take on board that what Jesus was giving in the first beatitude is a blessing on those who were turning to follow him - then the others come to make sense in their own order such as: -
- becoming less possessive we shall become less aggressive,
less aggressive and we shall become more vulnerable, being more vulnerable
we shall be more ready to truly mourn, with this new ability to empathize
(as opposed to merely sympathising) with suffering we shall long to put to right injustice
while at the same time recognising the need to help the oppressors change their ways;
then we’ve completed to circle for we shall realise what great a gift mercy is –
that mercy shown us by God.
And this surely is to be Blessèd with a capital B or happy with a capital H!
“Consider your calling, brothers and sisters, nor many of you were wise according to worldly standards” 1 Corinthians 1:26