About "The" Book, Part Nine

It has been more than four years since I last wrote a post for this intermittent series, so I guess you might say I'm taking "intermittent" to an extreme.

Last month, a close friend typed the words "I always think of Esther and how there's a reason for everything" into a text conversation we were having. That registered in a brain cell of mine that had been intending to read Esther for some time, and the brain cell next to it immediately flashed with the thought I should use Esther to get this series going again. So here I am.

You may have heard that Esther is one of only two books in the Bible that does not mention God. That is not entirely true, however, for it depends on which edition of the Bible you're reading.

Most Christians are aware that "Protestant Bibles" contain 66 books and "Catholic Bibles" contain 73. Put succinctly, that's because Protestants after the Reformation eventually removed seven books from the canon. The purpose of today's post is not to re-litigate the reasons behind that decision. Do be aware, however, that Esther presents an added wrinkle by virtue of the fact its so-called "Catholic version" is longer than its so-called "Protestant version."

This wrinkle is not a result of dastardly Catholics sneaking things in or dastardly Protestants sneaking things out. Our modern biblical translations are generally derived from either of the following sets of manuscripts: 1] the Septuagint, which is the Greek-language Bible that existed in the days of Jesus and was in fact used by him and his disciples; or 2] the Mastoretic Text, which was written mostly in Hebrew (with a few parts in Aramaic) and is sometimes called "the Hebrew Bible" even though the compiling of it was not concluded until approximately 1000 A.D.

I must stress that there is no reason to get into a cat fight about whether it's better to use the Septuagint or the Masoretic, for they are virtually interchangeable and they track precisely the same theologically. Regardless, the Septuagint does have a longer version of Esther; and Catholic editions have long followed the Septuagint; and getting back on point, the long version of Esther, unlike the short version, does mention God.

Because I think it will be easier, from here on out I'm going to refer to the long version as Catholic Esther and short version as Protestant Esther.

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In a nutshell, this eponymous biblical book tells the story of a young Jewish woman during the Babylon-imposed exile who caught the eye of the Persian king while living in the capital city of Susa (present day Sush, Iran). She became his wife without revealing her ethnicity, and eventually interceded to save her people from a genocidal plot hatched by one of his henchmen. Although she was a knowing and practicing Jew, her name was Persian (Esther means "star") which indicates she was born after the exile began.

Chapter One lays out the setting in the first three verses by saying the story opens "in the third year" of the rule of King Ahasuerus - aka Xerxes, for all you history buffs out there. Catholic Esther includes a prologue which introduces a Jew named Mordecai, who will later become a central figure in the book, and telling of a revelatory dream that made him aware spiritual warfare was being used to rally "every nation" against "the righteous." The dream also gave a symbolic foreshadowing of how the righteous may prevail.

But back to the main text: Chapters One and Two explain how Ahasuerus, "merry with wine" seven days into a bash he was throwing, becomes "enraged" when his wife, Queen Vashti, declines to come into his presence when he summons her. After conferring with advisers, he decides to strip her of her title and issue an irrevocable law decreeing "every man" to be "master in his own household" - all this, you see, to keep women from being inspired by Vashti's example to "look upon their husbands with contempt"

He decides to find her replacement via a nationwide beauty contest of virgins that will last more than a year. During its course, Esther, who happens to be the much younger cousin of the aforementioned Mordecai, is brought before the king. Mordecai also happens to be the person who advises her to keep her ethnicity secret.

Upon seeing Esther, Ahasuerus becomes smitten and "set(s) the royal crown on her head." Thereby, unbeknownst to him, a young Jewess becomes queen of Persia.

Some time after Esther's coronation, Mordecai learns of an assassination plot against Ahasuerus and has her inform him of it. As a result, the conspirators are investigated, found guilty, and hanged.

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When we come to Chapter Three we learn that Haman the Agatite holds one of the highest positions in Ahasuerus' administration.

Agatite is one of those ancient words whose definition was known then but not now. Some say it meant anti-Semite, some say it meant descendant of the Amalekite King Agag, and both of those opinions could be wrong. What matters for us is that Haman was offended when Mordecai "did not bow down or pay homage" to him as he passed by. Over a subsequent period of time, he became "filled with fury" when it became evident Mordecai wasn't gonna change his ways.

Having learned Mordecai was Jewish, Haman becomes determined not only to ruin him but to "destroy all the Jews...throughout the whole kindgom of Ahasuerus." He tells Ahasuerus about "a certain people" who "do not keep the king's laws, so that it is not to the king's profit to tolerate them." He persuades Ahasuerus to have these people killed, and offers to personally "pay 10,000 talents of silver into the hands of those who have charge of the king's business, that they may put it into the king's treasuries."

Ahasuerus hands Haman his signet ring and agrees to let him write the order on his behalf, however he sees fit. What results is an edict instructing the people "to destroy, to kill, and to annihilate all Jews, young and old, women and children, in one day, the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which is the month of Adar, and to plunder the goods." Although created by Hamar dictating to scribes, the order was of course "written in the name of King Ahasuerus and sealed with the king's signet ring," and a copy of it was sent to "every province," after which Ahasuerus and Haman "sat down to drink."

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This brings us to a spot where Catholic Esther is in my opinion better than Protestant Esther - for in addition to telling us the gist of the edict as laid out in the verses quoted above, Catholic Esther presents its full text in a stand-alone section, and I am here to tell you it's a masterpiece of propaganda so delicious it would make every tyrant and cultist you can think of drool.

According to the edict, Ahasuerus acts "with kindness" and in pursuit of "lasting tranquility" for his subjects... while his right hand man Haman "excels among us in good judgment and is distinguished for his unchanging good will"... but, damn it all, those wicked Jews "alone" prevent the king's utopia from flowering, so unfortunately they need to be exterminated and sent "down in violence to Hades and leave our government completely secure and untroubled hereafter."

Sound familiar?

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Chapters Four through Seven are a dramatic pendulum on which Esther and Mordecai endeavor to save their people while Haman gets drawn obliviously onto a tightrope that'll make him want to poop his pants.

Seeing a copy of the king's edict posted somewhere in Susa, Mordecai follows Jewish custom by tearing his clothes, donning sackcloth and ashes, and crying loudly in a public demonstration of mourning. When Esther hears about this she dispatches a messenger to find out why, and Mordecai sends the messenger back with a copy of the order and a plea for Esther to intercede. She answers with fear, explaining that nobody - including her, despite her title  - is permitted to enter the king's presence without being summoned by him. The penalty is death, and she has not been summoned in a month.

Mordecai responds with the famous line immortalized in Esther 4:14, remarking "who knows whether you have not come to the kingdom for such a time as this?" (On a side note, this might be one of Scripture's most frequently misquoted paraphrased passages, for Esther 4:14 always seems to get rendered on shirts and stickers as "perhaps you were made for times like these." Such a rendering is not bad, but it seems to genericize things.)

She affirms she will fast for three days before approaching King Ahasuerus, and asks Mordecai to assemble the Jews in Susa and have them collectively fast for three days as well. He does as she requests.

At this particular juncture, Catholic Esther goes beyond Protestant Esther by saying Mordecai and Esther both prayed. It also tells us exactly what they said in their prayers. (Protestant Esther not only contains no mention of God, but also no mention of prayer).

In any event, Ahasuerus receives Esther without penalty when she arrives in her royal robes following her three-day fast. He pledges to grant her whatever wish she may have, and thus we arrive at a classic "bibly back and forth" in which she asks Ahasuerus to bring Haman to a feast she prepared... he agrees and brings Haman to said feast, where he repeats his offer to grant her whatever she wants... at which point she asks Ahasuerus and Haman to return the next day for another feast, at which she will announce what she wants... to which the king agrees... and finally, Ahasuerus and Haman arrive for that final feast and stuff gets real.

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You see, on the night before the final feast Haman passes by Mordecai while on his way home and feels a sense of rage when the latter again neglects to bow or pay homage. After getting home and kvetching about it, his wife and friends say he should "let a gallows fifty cubits high be made, and in the morning tell the king to have Mordecai hanged upon it." He loves the idea. But that same night Ahasuerus has insomnia, decides to have "the book of memorable deeds" read to him, and it turns out one of the deeds recounted in the book was that episode where Mordecai saved his life by informing him of the assassination plot. 

Unfortunately for Haman, it dawns on Ahasuerus that Mordecai was not properly rewarded. When Haman arrives at the palace in the morning, Ahasuerus asks him "what should be done to the man whom the king delights to honor?" Puffed up with pride and assuming he is the one Ahasuerus intends to honor, Haman suggests the man be clad in royal robes and led by "the king's most noble officials" through the city square upon the king's horse.

Haman then gets the shock of his life when Ahasuerus, enthusiastically endorsing the idea, tells him to do just that "to Mordecai the Jew" and "leave out nothing that you have mentioned." Haman does as ordered, then, having experienced the indignity of being compelled to proclaim the greatness of the very man he wanted dead, slinks home in despair, and his wife and friends don't exactly lift his spirits when they say "if Mordecai, before whom you have begun to fall, is of the Jewish people, you will not overcome him but will surely fall."

Before Haman can brood any further, an escort arrives to take him to the feast. Back at the palace, said feast overflows into a second day before Ahasuerus asks Esther to reveal what she wants, at which point she pleads "let my life be granted me for my wish, and my people for my request. For we have been sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, to be killed, and to be annihilated." When Ahasuerus inquires who would do such a thing, she tells him it was Haman, who of course becomes "terrified."

The exasperated king heads to the garden to stew and Haman proceeds to "beg for his life from Queen Esther." As he is doing this on the couch next to her,  Ahasuerus storms back in, takes one look, and declares: "Will he even assault the queen in my presence, in my own house?"

Hapless Haman is seized, hauled off, and hanged on the very gallows he intended for Mordecai.

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The drama doesn't end with Haman's death, however. The edict to kill all Jews come Adar the 13th remained distributed through all the empire's provinces, and as Esther 8:8 reminds us, "an edict written in the name of the king and sealed with the king's ring cannot be revoked."

At this point you might be expecting Esther to snap at Ahasuerus like Aoleon Joffer at Jaffe Joffer, but something else happens: Ahasuerus hands over his signet ring and permits Mordecai and Esther to "write as you please with regard to the Jews, in the name of the king, and seal it with the king's ring."

In another example of a "bibly back and forth," they get over on the late Haman by crafting an edict permitting "the Jews who were in every city to gather and defend their lives, to destroy, to kill, and to annihilate any armed force of any people or province that might attack them," as per Esther 8:11-12.

In another Septuagint versus Masoretic Text twist, Catholic Esther again gets over on Protestant Esther by presenting the edict's full text in a stand-alone section, and it's a banger. According to it, Ahasuerus has now discovered Haman was not only a bad faith manipulator but also "an alien to the Persian blood and quite devoid of our kindness," whereas "the Jews, who were consigned to annihilation by this thrice-accursed man, are not evil-doers but are governed by most righteous laws and are sons of the Most High." In fact, not only are the Jews now permitted to defend themselves, but the subjects of Ahasuerus must "give them reinforcements" and every jurisdiction that doesn't "shall be destroyed in wrath by spear and fire."

Chapter Nine tells us that when Adar the 13th arrives the Jews "gathered in their cities throughout all the provinces" and "gained mastery over those who hated them...no one could stand against them." Notably, Scripture makes a point of saying that despite their decisive victory, they did not plunder.

When the battle figures are reported to Ahasuerus that night, he grants Esther another wish and she says: "If it please the king, let the Jews who are in Susa be allowed tomorrow also to do according to this day's edict. And let the ten sons of Haman be hanged on the gallows." Like they say: Hell hath no fury.

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This triumph comes to be commemorated in the annual, two-day holiday of Purim as "days of feasting and gladness, days of sending gifts of food to one another and gifts to the poor."

Mordecai is made second in command to Ahasuerus and the account of his "high honor" is recorded for posterity "in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Media and Persia," according to Esther 10:2.

Then, much as it opened with a prologue about Mordecai's dream, Catholic Esther closes with an epilogue in which Mordecai dictates a letter confirming that everything from his dream has come to fruition, that "God remembered his people," and that Purim is to be observed "before God, from generation to generation forever among his people Israel."

And finally, a copy of said letter is delivered to Alexandria "in the fourth year of the reign of Ptolemy and Cleopatra" by a priest named Dositheus, who vouches for its authenticity and affirms it was translated by Lysimachus, a resident of Jerusalem.

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If you were expecting to find deep analysis in this post, perhaps I should apologize for providing nothing more than a prolonged synopsis shot through with some observations and historical asides.

But hey, it's my blog and this is what I wanted to write. And if you read it all the way to the end, you must have been okay with it, so I guess I don't have anything to apologize for! Now carry on and have a great day.

To be continued...

If you care to read the previous installments in this series, they are here:

   Part One: Introduction 

   Part Two: Needless Sanitizing 
   Part Three: Early Genesis

   Part Four: The Literalism Spectrum 

   Part Five: Truth, Gender, Abortion
   Part Six: Mystery, Universality
   Part Seven: Reading versus Studying

   Part Eight: Titus

America at 250

          

One of the great things about being born in January of 1971 is that I have living memory of America's bicentennial year. I remember, albeit through the filter of a child, what it was like to be living here in 1976.

In the build-up to that 4th of July, the unique greatness of the American experiment was openly celebrated, and the celebration was done without whitewashing the inevitable human sins that have always challenged it.

The USA was but eight years removed from the riots of '68, six from the Kent State shootings, and a trifling two from Richard Nixon resigning in disgrace and Gerald Ford making a triage decision to pardon him before the nation's wound could organically heal. Yet none of that dampened public enthusiasm for the nation's founding ideals, nor did it dampen public commitment to keep striving for them as the nation observed the 200th anniversary of them being put to paper.

The tails side of quarters minted that year featured a Revolutionary War drummer rather than the usual eagle, with the heads side stamped "1776-1976" rather than merely "1976." I remember holding those coins in my hand when they were new and shiny and hearing people talk about why they were being made "this year only" (side note: twenty-five cents then equates to almost a buck and a half now, but I digress).

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Kennedy Space Center celebrated America's 200th birthday with a summer-spanning shindig called Third Century America, which focused on the nation's role as the leading pioneer in space exploration, technology, and science. We - meaning myself, my parents, my cousin Rob, and my aunt and uncle - piled into a car and traveled across the state to experience it.

Real life rockets were on display. Some were laid on their sides with their boosters separated in sequence, allowing you to see up close how big those things were that fell back to earth before a rocket's capsule escaped Earth's atmosphere.

Geodesic domes containing different exhibits were arrayed on the grounds outside the iconic space center, and inside the center we were treated to the sight of something few normal people ever got to see: a computer.

Ed White (a fellow graduate of St. Pete High!) had already become the first man to walk in space and Neil Armstrong the first to walk on the moon. Those events were still recent from the perspective of adults, but computers themselves had yet to enter daily life and seemed somewhat fantastical. I know my memory is accurate when I say the computer was enormous and bigger than many rooms; I think my memory is accurate when I say it was bigger than some homes. I know my memory is accurate when I say the computer had many lights; I think my memory is accurate when I say it made noises.

So while space travel had become real, had catapulted into the imaginations of people from coast to coast, and the USA was winning the space race against the USSR, the first mass-marketed personal computer had not yet been announced and the space shuttle did not yet exist - nor did Star Wars and Close Encounters of the Third Kind, for that matter.

In hindsight, what a fascinating time that was to be alive in these United States! Yes I was a child, but I was an observant one who always paid attention to what the grown-ups were saying and doing. And even then, I often sat nearby and paid attention when my dad watched the evening news with Walter Cronkite.

Today, I am here to say that one of the most striking differences between 1976 and 2026 lies in people's ability (or lack thereof) to properly differentiate goals from obstacles on the one hand, and properly differentiate starting gates from finish lines on the other.

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Though there were many reasons for Americans to be pessimistic in that year of our bicentennial, they were overwhelmingly optimistic as they looked into the hazy, uncertain future and sought to fulfill America's promise without abandoning it.

They were well aware of proverbial ailing trees in the proverbial forest, but they did not lose sight of the forest's grandeur and they did not consider burning the whole thing down instead of tending specifically to the parts that were ailing.

Such has ceased to be the case in recent years, with so many adults having become infantile overly sensitive on social media and having sought to turn every human foible into an excuse for wielding power a dangerously political crusade... which makes it intriguing that with America's sestercentennial upon us, we are being reminded of its greatness not by our own unappreciative selves but by an influx of foreigners who've come here to watch a sport most of us don't even like.

Years ago I read John Steinbeck's novel Cannery Row. It is set in Monterey, California during the Great Depression, and contains a particular line that immediately lodged deep into my brain: One of the characters, a Chinese immigrant named Lee Chong, owned a corner grocery store that Steinbeck referred to as a "miracle of supply."

Three words. Miracle of supply. That was it. It summed up America in so many ways, despite referring to a common store from a poverty-riddled era long before such things as malls, Wal-Mart, Target, Cosctco, and Home Depot were even conceived.

There was poverty here, yet things were in reach for ordinary people that simply were not in reach elsewhere for ordinary people. On top of that, the industrious man who carved out a life for himself by bringing the miracle of supply to a sardine-packing district in a small port town was an immigrant from across the ocean. There is nothing more American than that.

America in 2026 remains an oasis of supply in a world of scarcity. Thing is, the scarcity of other nations is mostly artificial and needless, in the sense that it is imposed by governments that encumber their citizens' ingenuity and stifle their ability to meet demand. This is true even in ostensibly prosperous ones like Sweden, Germany, the UK, and Canada.

By contrast, America's government - despite being undeniably corrupt, power-mad, and in serious need of restraint - remains less of an encumbrance to its citizens than other nations' governments are to theirs.

We Americans mainain a "don't tell me what to do" spirit without even realizing it. And that spirit keeps our so-called leaders and would-be rulers at arm's length, however imperfectly, in ways we failed to appreciate until hordes of soccer fans arrived here for the World Cup. Now, thanks to their cell phone videos and social media posts, they have allowed us to see our country anew through their unjaundiced eyes.

Abundance... The ability to buy groceries, clothing, medicine, windshield wipers, TVs, bikes, and camping equipment all from the same store... Free water in all restaurants... Free refills of soda, tea, and coffee in said restaurants... Getting free chips and salsa simply for sitting down at a "Mexican" restaurant... Walking into a building on a scorching hot day knowing it'll be comfortable inside thanks to air-conditioning... Parking lots big enough to find spaces, with those spaces being big enough to accommodate insanely large vehicles... Highways with a dozen lanes all wide enough for an 18-wheeler... Ranch dressing... Scores of options on our store shelves when it comes to bread, beverages, chips, sweets, fruit, vegetables, cold cuts, toothbrushes, shampoo, and on and on and on.

We take these things for granted. Fortunately, our international guests are reminding us we should not. They tell us these things are dazzling and unthinkable to the rest of the world.

But more importantly, our international guests are gushing about our friendliness, our hospitality, and our eagerness to converse, engage, encourage, and share. They tell us these traits are the norm here but not elsewhere, and they tell us these traits are like leaven to their hearts.

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From where I sit, America's abundance and friendliness are intertwined. You can't have one without the other.

Our friendliness points to abundance, because we want to help and want to meet demand; while our abundance points to friendliness because it is truly within our cumulative ability to help and to meet demand.

And - this is key - our ability to do all this and to thus become a mega version of Lee Chong's "miracle of supply" exists simply because the majority of us look to ourselves and our populace for solutions, rather than looking to our government.

On this sestercentennial of the Declaration of Independence, let us look through the eyes of our visitors to recall the source of our blessings.

Technically, P.J. O'Rourke was talking about responsibility when he said it comes from friends, family, self, and social ties. But that truth applies every bit as much to provision as it does to responsibility. So on this sestercentennial, let us also remember O'Rourke's warning that government is only meant to be "something we use in an emergency."

The United States was founded specifically to oppose centralized power and uphold the dignity of human beings. We have often failed to live up to that promise, but we have never stopped striving for it. And since we have come much closer to grasping it than anyone else, we must not lose sight of it, and must not permit ourselves to be pitted against one another by orators and snake oil salesmen masquerading as leaders.

Independence Day is tomorrow. Enjoy it and appreciate. God bless.

Memorial Day

Today is Memorial Day - a day set aside not so we can grill burgers and toss back beers while the kids swim in the pool, but for the solemn purpose of honoring our servicemen who died while defending America's citizens from enemies who have sought to drive freedom from our shores.

From the first person who perished on Lexington’s village green in 1775, up to the most recent fatality in the Middle East, the list of the fallen is long. Each person on that list made a sacrifice that was ultimate in its earthly finality. We should resolve to do everything in our power to defend America's founding principles against all foes - domestic in addition to foreign, orators in addition to terrorists - to ensure that those people did not die in vain.

To observe past Memorial Days, I have published a couple letters that were written by soldiers during wartime. Here they are again.

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This first one was from Sullivan Ballou, a major in the U.S. Army during the Civil War, to his wife. He was killed in the Battle of First Bull Run one week after writing it:

July 14, 1861

Camp Clark, Washington

My very dear Sarah:

The indications are very strong that we shall move in a few days - perhaps tomorrow. Lest I should not be able to write again, I feel impelled to write a few lines that may fall under your eye when I shall be no more.

I have no misgivings about, or lack of confidence in the cause in which I am engaged, and my courage does not halt or falter. I know how strongly American Civilization now leans on the triumph of the government and how great a debt we owe to those who went before us through the blood and sufferings of the Revolution. And I am willing - perfectly willing - to lay down all my joys in this life, to help maintain this government, and to pay that debt.

Sarah, my love for you is deathless, it seems to bind me with mighty cables that nothing but Omnipotence could break; and yet my love of Country comes over me like a strong wind and bears me unresistibly on with all these chains to the battlefield. The memories of the blissful moments I have spent with you come creeping over me, and I feel most gratified to God and to you that I have enjoyed them so long. And it is hard for me to give them up and burn to ashes the hopes of future years, when, God willing, we might still have lived and loved together, and seen our sons grow up to honorable manhood around us.

I have, I know, but few and small claims upon Divine Providence, but something whispers to me – perhaps it is the wafted prayer of my little Edgar, that I shall return to my loved ones unharmed. If I do not my dear Sarah, never forget how much I love you, and when my last breath escapes me on the battle field, it will whisper your name. Forgive my many faults, and the many pains I have caused you. How thoughtless and foolish I have often times been! How gladly I would wash out with my tears every little spot upon your happiness.

But, O Sarah, if the dead can come back to this earth and flit unseen around those they love, I shall always be near you, in the gladdest days and in the darkest nights…always, always, and if there be a soft breeze upon your cheek, it shall be my breath, as the cool air fans your throbbing temple, it shall be my spirit passing by.

Sarah do not mourn me dead; think I am gone and wait for thee, for we shall meet again.

Sullivan Ballou

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This next letter was written by Arnold Rahe, a sergeant in the U.S. Army Air Corps during World War II, with instructions that it be delivered to his parents if he did not survive. He was killed in action shortly thereafter:

Dear Mom and Dad,

Strange thing about this letter; if I am alive a month from now you will not receive it, for its coming to you will mean that after my twenty-sixth birthday God has decided I’ve been on earth long enough and He wants me to come up and take the examination for permanent service with Him. It’s hard to write a letter like this; there are a million and one things I want to say; there are so many I ought to say if this is the last letter I ever write to you. I’m telling you that I love you two so very much; not one better than the other but absolutely equally. Some things a man can never thank his parents enough for; they come to be taken for granted through the years; care when you are a child, and countless favors as he grows up. I am recalling now all your prayers, your watchfulness -- all the sacrifices that were made for me when sacrifice was a real thing and not just a word to be used in speeches.

For any and all grief I caused you in this 26 years, I’m most heartily sorry. I know that I can never make up for those little hurts and real wounds, but maybe if God permits me to be with Him above, I can help out there. It’s a funny thing about this mission, but I don’t think I’ll come back alive. Call it an Irishman’s hunch or a pre-sentiment or whatever you will. I believe it is Our Lord and His Blessed Mother giving me a tip to be prepared. In the event that I am killed you can have the consolation of knowing that it was in the “line of duty” to my country. I am saddened because I shall not be with you in your life’s later years, but until we meet I want you to know that I die as I tried to live, the way you taught me. Life has turned out different from the way we planned it, and at 26 I die with many things to live for, but the loss of the few remaining years unlived together is as nothing compared to the eternity to which we go.

As I prepare for this last mission, I am a bit homesick. I have been at other times when I thought of you, when I lost a friend, when I wondered when and how this war would end. But, the whole world is homesick! I have never written like this before, even though I have been through the “valley of the shadows” many times, but this night, Mother and Dad, you are so very close to me and I long so to talk to you. I think of you and of home. America has asked much of our generation, but I am glad to give her all I have because she has given me so much.

Goodnight, dear Mother and Dad. God love you.

Your loving son,

(Bud) Arnold Rahe

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God bless them all, and may they never be forgotten.

Marian Musings, Part X

While growing up, this grandson of a Baptist preacher never really had any gripes with the way Catholic and Orthodox Christians regard Mary.

Artwork of her is holy and points to God. And praying to her didn't strike me as bad, since it's not like those saying the prayers ever ask her to do God's job or go against his will.

Her being sinless didn't seem like a stretch, though admittedly, the thought of her remaining perpetually virgin did. But then again, perpetual virginity only seemed like a stretch, for how could the thought of such a singularly remarkable woman having lived in a remarkable way be out of the question?

If my younger self had to pick a specific thing that felt like it had a strong chance of being false, it would have been the title Queen of Heaven, because attaching a royal title to someone known for the very non-royal qualities of humility and servanthood just felt off.

Well, I started this series almost a year ago and have spent much of it encouraging "fellow Protestants" to set aside preconceived notions and look at Mary through the lenses of capital-C Catholicism and capital-O Orthodoxy - and not being a hypocrite where faith is concerned, I have walked that walk myself where this matter of queenship is concerned. 

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My main hang-up with referring to Mary as a queen sprang largely from my Western conception of what it means to be a queen. When those of us from the West and particularly the United States hear that word, we think of monarchy and all the pretentious and authoritarian baggage it entails. To us, a queen is usually a stern individual who rules from on high, not a helper who subjugates herself to the good of others.

The Bible, however, is neither modern nor Western. To properly understand it you must look at it from the non-modern, non-Western context that created it - or at least make an honest effort to look at it from that context - and once you do, things shift.

Its books were produced by ancient Hebrews, for whom the queen was not the king's wife but rather his mother. You see this reflected in the Davidic line - to which Jesus belonged - when you consider that in all four Old Testament books of Kings and Chronicles, when new kings get coronated, their mothers are named while their wives go unmentioned.

Think also of the fact that when Bathsheba's husband David was king, she "bowed with her face to the ground and paid homage to the king" (1 Kings 1:31) yet when her son Solomon was king, it was he who "rose to meet her and bowed down to her" (1 Kings 2:19).

And don't downplay the significance of 1 Kings 2:19 going on to say that Bathesheba "sat on his right," for in biblical terns, to be situated to the right of a powerful person meant you too had a level of authority. This is why Jesus is repeatedly said to be "at the right hand" of the Father.

Scripture's original readers and hearers wouldn't need to be told that Bathsheba's motherhood is what made her queen because it went without saying. When they heard Jesus described in kingly ways - you know, King of Kings, King of the Jews, King of Israel - they likewise would have thought of his mother in queenly ways, especially in light of Revelation 12:1 depicting her with "a crown of twelve stars."

When you consider that Jesus described himself as a kind of king, what would have been strange is for early Christians to not think of Mary as a kind of queen.

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In light of the above, I feel like I could go ahead and end this post right now, but first I want to add that it wasn't helpful that the first time I heard the word "queen" associated with Mary, it came in the packaging of the phrase "Queen of Heaven." The concept is more properly called "Mary's queenship," and it certainly would have landed on my ears better if that was how I first heard it rendered.

Regardless, if I had applied more thought back whenever that was, I should have grasped that Heaven is a kind and serving realm and thus I should have concluded that being called its queen is not on par with being called monarchical and authoritarian. Unfortunately, my reactive brain did take it to mean monarchical and authoritarian, then erroneously assumed that calling someone a queen of Heaven, which is "higher" than Earth, implies that person is even more monarchical and authoritarian than a monarch on Earth.

When I type it out like that, the error of my gut reaction is clear. When I remember what Heaven actually is and take into account what queen meant to ancient Hebrews, there is no reason to recoil from the thought of Mary as queen. But my brain recoiled simply because of the preconceived notions I held as an American, and I'm convinced I am far from alone in that, and, getting back to where I want to go with this section: Queen of Heaven is just one of many phrases that are used to evoke Mary's queenship, and if I had heard any of the others first, I would have reacted differently.

Only one of the 22 chapter titles in this Fulton Sheen classic refers to Mary in queenly ways, and does so by calling her Queen of Mercy. That fits beautifully, and bears no contrast to those qualities of humility and servanthood I mentioned earlier. Queen of Mercy feels right even with modern Western/American pre-programming, does it not?

Mary is also called Queen of Martyrs, Queen of Peace, Queen of Christians, Queen of Saints, and Queen of Angels. When you recall again what queen meant in the culture whence Christ deliberately came to Earth through her, none of those appellations should seem off-putting to a person who believes in Christ's divinity.

I will close by quoting from the aforementioned chapter from Sheen's book: "There are many sheaves in the field that the priests and sisters and the faithful are unable to gather in. It is Mary's role to follow these reapers to gather the sinners in... It is easy for the brothers of Christ to call on the Father, but it is not easy for the strangers and the enemies. This role Mary plays. She is not only the Mother of those who are in the state of grace but also the Queen of those who are not."

On that note, as they say in France: Profitez de vos bénédictions.

Note #1: The prior posts in this series are as follows:
    Part I: Introduction
    Part II: The New Eve
    Part III: Genesis to Revelation
    Part III-b: The Ark of the New Covenant
    Part IV: Historical Perspective
    Part V: Perpetual Virginity
    Part VI: Prayer
    Part VI-b: Worship
    Part VII: Involvement and Femininity
    Part VIII: Our Lady of Guadalupe
    Part IX: On Good Friday

Note #2: The photo at the beginning of this post was taken at the grotto of Saint Leo Abbey in Florida.

Note #3: If you're interested in listening to a deeper dive into the topic of how "the queen was the mom," this eighteen-minute presentation by Brant Pitre does a great job delving into it.

Marian Musings, Part IX

Easter is the most significant event of the year for Christians, and, properly understood, it cannot be constrained to the day we set aside to recognize the fact that Jesus rose from the dead twenty centuries ago.

Holy Week stretches from Palm Sunday to Easter Sunday, aka Resurrection Day, and I think we can be guilty of disservice if we pull apart its components that flow from Maundy Thursday through Resurrection Day. After all, the Last Supper, Gethsemane, betrayal, trials, scourging, crucifixion, earthquake, afternoon darkness, burial, Black Saturday, and resurrection all together form a cohesive story, and whenever we separate one part of a story to view it in isolation, we run the risk of missing something important.

But having said that, sometimes it is good to consider a component's unique attributes. Take Claudia Procula, for example - she would be lost to time if we didn't occasionally pause during the Easter story and think of how odd it must have been for Pilate to receive her message, right?

With that in mind, here I am on Good Friday, hitting the publish button on some thoughts about what it must have been like for the mother of Jesus on that day her son got nailed to the cross not for his sins, of which there were none, but for ours, which are immeasurable.

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Although I prefer not to start by repeating something I've already touched on in this series, there are plenty of well-intentioned folks who might be thinking it's wrong to write about Christ's mother on the anniversary of his sacrifice. Therefore, I feel I must stress something I've always thought to be obvious: For Christians to recognize and honor Mary does not in any way subtract from their recognition and honor of Jesus.

If you have children, you certainly know that when your second child arrived and you started loving him or her, that did not subtract from the love you have for your firstborn. Why would this truth about love not also apply to honor?

It's a safe bet that the bond felt by a mother for her child is unlike anything a man can conceive of, and when it comes to Mary, like I observed back in Part II, "there is more going on here than 'just' motherhood." Though it's undeniable she was Jesus' mother and he was God in the flesh, many people from Protestant and non-denominational backgrounds get squirrely when they hear her described as "the mother of God." What they do not realize is that that title was coined specifically to defend his divinity against early heresies that opposed it.

Arianism - which rejected the gospel by identifying Jesus not as the Creator, but as a created being - was in fact such a threat that by the turn of the fourth century a sizable percentage of the world's clergy, many of whom were focused on political power, accepted it. Arianism's rise was the prime reason Christianity's first ecumenical council was held, and had a young African deacon named Athanasius not held his ground in front of the 300+ bishops who traveled to Nicaea for that council, Arianism likely would have prevailed.

Athanasius was not the first person to refer to Mary as the Theotokos (which technically translates into English as "God-bearer," giving rise to the more common rendering "mother of God") but in defending Christ's divinity at Nicaea, he invoked it so persuasively that its authenticity as sword and shield of the faith was irrefutable.

Its authenticity came into even sharper focus when another heresy called Nestorianism reared its head a century later. Claiming that Jesus' divinity and humanity were separable throughout the incarnation, an influential archbishop named Nestorius denied the hypostatic union of Jesus being at once both fully God and fully man. The theological problems spilling from that error are many, and one of the things it gave rise to was the contorted concept of Jesus being two different entities sharing one body, with Mary having borne only the one described as his "human nature."

Nestorius advanced the error by taking direct aim at the time-honored title Theotokos and delivering sermons in which he said it should be replaced by Christotokos. Defenders of Christian orthodoxy rebuffed him by asserting that mothers give birth to people, not "natures," thus affirming the hypostatic union's centrality and warning that its very concept would be undermined by dispensing with the title Theotokos.

If that sounds like a bunch of academic gobbledygook, remember: Things sounding like academic gobbledygook have a long history of subverting truth and giving rise to dangerous movements, and the ideas of Nestorius were deemed to be so serious that another ecumenical council - the third in Christian history, this time held in Ephesus - was convoked to settle the matter.

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Sorry if it feels like my inner historian hijacked a post that's supposed to be about Mary and Easter, but that inner historian finds it significant that all of Christianity accepted the Council of Ephesus' affirmation of Theotokos and condemnation of Nestorianism - just like all of Christianity had earlier accepted the Council of Nicaea's condemnation of Arianism. This all happened before any of the faith's churches stopped attending the councils or accepting their rulings.

What history shows to be novel and late-arriving is the minimizing of Mary, and like I outlined back in Part IV, exultation of her in the early centuries was not limited merely to the title Theotokos. 

Artistic depictions of Christ's mother did not suddenly become a thing in the Middle Ages, as there is at least one painting of her in the catacombs and it has long been thought that the world's first painting of her was done by Luke himself, in a style that would later become known as Hodegetria.

Through the ages, paintings of Jesus' corpse being brought down from the cross show Mary there, sometimes cradling the corpse in her arms; and though grief seems like the most logical place to start pondering what Good Friday was like for her, perhaps we should start somewhere else. Perhaps we should start with a quality she possessed in spades, but which almost always gets overlooked: courage.

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While intentionally looking through Pope John Paul II's book Crossing the Threshold of Hope a few weeks ago, I learned that he wrote the following on page 220: "'Be not afraid!' Christ said to the apostles and to the women after the Resurrection. According to the Gospels, these words were not addressed to Mary. Strong in her faith, she had no fear."

After seeing it spelled out like that, it was so obvious I felt like a dunce for making it halfway to 110 before noticing that not only is Mary loving, nurturing, and peaceful, but also preternaturally brave - so brave she belongs in front of Richard the Lionheart, Joan of Arc, and many others whom history remembers for that trait.

She was a teen, and probably closer to 12 than 20, when she was approached by Gabriel and told of the plan for her to become pregnant well before her wedding feast. Yet she agreed without hesitation and asked only one question.

She knew that her betrothed, being aware the child was not his, was likely to divorce her. She knew the stigma of her pregnancy in that circumstance would open her up to the possibility of death by stoning; and that even if stoning was not imposed, the stigma would still ruin her reputation and make it effectively impossible for her to marry. Yet she agreed without hesitation.

When Joseph was mandated to traverse some 70 miles of wild terrain for the Quirinian census, Mary went with him despite being nine months pregnant... then gave birth amongst livestock in what you and I would consider to be more cave than stable, without any doctor or midwife present to assist... and later, after the Magi departed, she and Joseph fled to Egypt - again traversing wildlands, this time by night with child in tow - to escape the slaughterers sent by Herod... and she did these things without hesitation.

She knew Jesus' public ministry was destined to bring her pain that would, according to Simeon, be akin to "a sword pierc(ing) through your own soul," yet she prodded him to start the ministry when she approached him about the wine at Cana, again acting without hesitation.

And come Good Friday, although it meant experiencing prolonged agony like nothing any human has ever faced, Mary accompanied her son from the avulsions of the flagrum to the asphyxiation of the cross, all the while keeping her eyes fixed on him during those tortures she knew she was powerless to prevent. This too she did without hesitation.

All of the above require a degree of courage no human can fathom, but to which every human should aspire.

And courage just so "happens" to be integral to another theological virtue we are called to exhibit: faith.

Coincidence? No.

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We are constantly told to step out in faith, or to look upon those who do as examples we should model.

But nobody would ever step out in faith if they weren't buoyed by courage, would they?

Whenever the phrase "step out" is brought to bear, we are obviously talking about a faith that requires all-caps, risk-taking trust, not some run of the mill faith with lower case trust. We are talking about the difference between having faith you'll make it safely through a vast forest when you enter through undergrowth at midnight without a flashlight, versus having faith you'll make it safely through when you enter on a well-marked trail at noon. 

Without courage being there to nourish it, the latter faith might persist when the chips are down, but it is certain to at least falter - and it runs a not-small chance of failing altogether.

As with the chicken and egg, so with courage and faith. We don't know which came first, but we know they are symbiotic and we know neither can attain its fullness without the other. So it stands to reason that Mary, history's ultimate human, possessed the fullness of both. She exhibited both virtues at every step of her progression through Scripture, each one feeding the other so that they crested in tandem.

This was always evident, but at no point was it so evident as it was on Good Friday, when she deliberately submitted her soul to anguish and, like Father John Waiss observed in his book Bible Mary, resolutely stood and fulfilled her son's command to watch and pray in the face of horror.

Mary's qualities are the ideal to which everyone should strive. Sorely mistaken are they who would say that meditating about her on Good Friday distracts us from the core of Christianity. To the contrary, it focuses us on that core by illuminating how to trust and revere her son.

Note #1: The prior posts in this series are as follows:
    Part I: Introduction
    Part II: The New Eve
    Part III: Genesis to Revelation
    Part III-b: The Ark of the New Covenant
    Part IV: Historical Perspective
    Part V: Perpetual Virginity
    Part VI: Prayer
    Part VI-b: Worship
    Part VII: Involvement and Femininity
    Part VIII: Our Lady of Guadalupe

Note #2: The photo at the beginning of this post was taken at the fourth Station of the Cross (Jesus Meets His Mother) in the meditation garden of St. Mary Catholic Church in Tampa, Florida.

"Presidents Day"

  

Don't get me wrong. I am just as happy as anyone else to have a day off work. And my love for this nation because of its founding principles is unsurpassed.

But I have always had a big problem with there being a national holiday called Presidents Day. I even published a piece about it seventeen years ago, in which I summed up my problem by saying that "carelessly lumping all presidents together for a generic third-Monday holiday...places the corrupt alongside the honorable, the cowardly alongside the brave, the inept alongside the able - and makes absolutely no distinction between them."

While that problem itself remains the same, its magnitude has grown exponentially worse due to: 1] the weirdly hagiographic way many partisans fawn over two of the three presidents we have since experienced, along with 2] the creepily puppeteered nature of the other president we've since experienced (obviously, Biden).

At this particular moment, the magnitude of the problem feels existential thanks to the seemingly infinite tentacles of the Epstein files. As we incrementally receive each drip and drab of evidence of evil within them, it becomes clearer and clearer that people with power and influence can never be trusted.

That should have already been obvious to people who share my conservative worldview, seeing as how that worldview is predicated on the belief that all humans are sinful by nature, that power inherently corrupts, and that humans with power must therefore be subject to checks and balances and treated without favor.

What has me particularly troubled is how many people who share that worldview - people who, I repeat, should know better - are turning out to be just as willfully blind as ideological liberals when it comes to overlooking sins committed by those on "our" side.

The evil we are seeing in the Epstein files - and make no mistake, it is evil - is bipartisan, both domestically and internationally. As a Republican, I understand the knee-jerk irritation over YouTube thumbnails about Epstein showing so many images of Donald Trump, despite the fact that what we've seen in the files supports his consistent claim to have severed ties with Epstein years ago. And as a defender of Western civilization, I understand the knee-jerk irritation over YouTube thumbnails about Epstein showing so many images of Benjamin Netanyahu without showing any of Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem.

But if anyone allows the jerking of his knees to guide the direction of his eyes, he inevitably won't see many of the things that are right there in front of him and need to be seen.

The latest doc dump in the Epstein files contains more than three million documents and I am not here to insult your intelligence by pretending to have seen them all. But from what I do know, they not only confirm what we already suspected in terms of child sex trafficking and upper crust bacchanalia, they also contain strong indications of orchestrated cannibalism.

Let that sink in.

Orchestrated. Cannibalism. Strong indications of.

Child. Sex Trafficking. Confirmed.

The stuff in the files causes claims that once would have been dismissed as crackpot paranoia to suddenly become credible. Politicians, celebrities, and tycoons from all over the world appear in the files. Though we cannot tell how much each of them knew or to what extent each was involved, they are all there.

You may be asking what this has to do with the third Monday of February being set aside as a U.S. holiday called Presidents Day? Well, if we date the beginning of the Epstein scandal only to the infamous "sweetheart deal" he received from the U.S. Department of Justice, the cold hard fact is that it stretches to six presidential terms and four presidents, two of whom are Democrats and two of whom are Republicans.

Sure, it's tempting for those of us who vote GOP to point out that a fifth president is both a Democrat and by far the most implicated POTUS in the documents... Admittedly, I just did point that out, which at face value makes the "score" three Democrats to two Republicans... But why should anyone care, when what really matters is that the fingerprints of both parties are on the files and, if we insist on focusing simply on presidents, no matter how tangentially tied they may be, we're now talking about every president who has occupied the Oval Office for the past thirty-three years.

When it comes to our current president, the problem is: 1] Trump made releasing the Epstein files a big part of his 2024 campaign, then backtracked after taking office; 2] Trump's attorney general claimed to have Epstein's "client list" on her desk ready to release, then didn't release it, then said there really wasn't a "list," then released but a piddling and oft-redacted fraction of the files, which we all know is "the list" for all intents and purposes; and 3] Trump's deputy attorney general claimed there was nothing in said files that could be used to bring charges against anybody, even though any sentient human with half a brain will immediately know that claim is utter bullshit as soon as he starts perusing said files.

Flip the table around. If this happened under a Democrat administration, we would be screaming for heads to roll and probably calling the POTUS unfit for office.

If we believe what we say we believe, we cannot give the current administration a pass simply because the man at its head received our vote 468 days ago.

We can be thankful for Trump green-lighting the destruction of Iran's nuclear weapons facilities without accepting, as a "cost of doing business," his culpability in allowing pedophile slavers to slip away from justice.

If it's about principles and not persons, we have to stand up for the principle at hand regardless of the person who's in the Klieg lights. This goes for our political foes as well as our political allies, and it shouldn't be hard to do.

If we conservatives can't pull it off, it means we are susceptible to cults of personality and must stop pretending like that susceptibility is a purely left wing phenomenon.

And if we are susceptible to cults of personality, then we - this time meaning liberals, conservatives, centrists, and apoliticals alike - ought not have a holiday that indiscriminately celebrates heads of government.