Isaiah 7:10-16
7:10 Again the LORD spoke to Ahaz, saying,
7:11 Ask a sign of the LORD your God; let it be deep as Sheol or high as heaven.
7:12 But Ahaz said, I will not ask, and I will not put the LORD to the test.
7:13 Then Isaiah said: "Hear then, O house of David! Is it too little for you to weary mortals, that you weary my God also?
7:14 Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Look, the young woman is with child and shall bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel.
7:15 He shall eat curds and honey by the time he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good.
7:16 For before the child knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land before whose two kings you are in dread will be deserted.
Psalm 80:1-7, 17-19
80:1 Give ear, O Shepherd of Israel, you who lead Joseph like a flock! You who are enthroned upon the cherubim, shine forth
80:2 before Ephraim and Benjamin and Manasseh. Stir up your might, and come to save us!
80:3 Restore us, O God; let your face shine, that we may be saved.
80:4 O LORD God of hosts, how long will you be angry with your people's prayers?
80:5 You have fed them with the bread of tears, and given them tears to drink in full measure.
80:6 You make us the scorn of our neighbors; our enemies laugh among themselves.
80:7 Restore us, O God of hosts; let your face shine, that we may be saved.
80:17 But let your hand be upon the one at your right hand, the one whom you made strong for yourself.
80:18 Then we will never turn back from you; give us life, and we will call on your name.
80:19 Restore us, O LORD God of hosts; let your face shine, that we may be saved.
Romans 1:1-7
1:1 Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God,
1:2 which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy scriptures,
1:3 the gospel concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh
1:4 and was declared to be Son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness by resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord,
1:5 through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles for the sake of his name,
1:6 including yourselves who are called to belong to Jesus Christ,
1:7 To all God's beloved in Rome, who are called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Matthew 1:18-25 (SV)
The birth of Jesus the Anointed took place as follows: While his mother Mary was engaged to Joseph, but before they slept together, she was found to be pregnant by the holy spirit. Since Joseph her husband was a good man and did not wish to expose her publicly, he planned to break off their engagement quietly.
While he was thinking about these things, a messenger of the Lord surprised him in a dream with these words: "Joseph, descendant of David, do not hesitate to take Mary as your wife, since the holy spirit is responsible for her pregnancy. She will give birth to a son and you will name him Jesus. This means 'he will save his people from their sins." All this happened so the prediction of the Lord given by the prophet would come true:
Behold a virgin will conceive a child
and she will give birth to a son,
And they will call him Emmanuel,
(which means "God with us")
Joseph got up and did what the messenger angel of the Lord told him; he took [Mary as] his wife. He did not sleep with her until she had given birth to a son. Joseph named him Jesus.
There's a lot of analysis out there, informed and ill-informed (my favorite is the "Jewish men" (I'm not being vaguely anti-semitic; these are robbers disguised as Hasidic (sort of) Jews to rob a diamond exchange) in the movie "Snatch," where they argue over how the Hebrew "young woman" in Isaiah 7 became "virgin" in Matthew's Greek as they pass through the security checkpoints to the inner sanctum, where the diamonds are. It's one of the great McGuffins in film.) analyses of how "young woman" became "virgin." I'm not interested in all that, except to point out the miracle isn't necessary to the nativity story. Isaiah is talking about a sign of hope; of life continuing after the horror of the Exile. Matthew is talking about the prediction of Isaiah coming true in his account of Jesus of Nazareth. How miraculous is the birth? You can leave it as a minor point (even though Luke picks it up, too; which means it was a common part of infancy narratives around Jesus for a long time before the canon was set), and move on. I intend to, without implying the narratives of Matthew and Luke are false on the point. I just don't care about that discussion (and its, for example, comparisons to Greek literature). It's a non-Hebraic intrusion is all I'll say. Further than that affiant sayeth nought.
In fact, I'd start my exegesis by connecting these scriptures to the ones from last week, because the theme of reversal goes on. In those readings Jesus roped in Isaiah to connect to the beginning of Matthew’s narrative and to announce the reversal promised by Isaiah has begun. Mary sings of the powerful being throne down from their “regal places” and the poor are raised up and fed. And now comes the shame of Joseph, that his betrothed is pregnant though he knows not by him. Which in itself is a story of justice and reversal.
Joseph gets a bad rap these days for wanting to put aside his marriage to Mary. But he’s doing it to protect her. He wants to set the engagement (roughly; the nature of 1st century Hebraic marriage isn’t crucial here) so she won’t be exposed, as she would be if Joseph marries her. He takes her as his wife (and the stories about how early her pregnancy is), based on a dream and an angel. Which means he knows the child isn’t his, and that people will talk. But he steps out on faith (yes, Matthew is referencing Abraham and Jacob there). He does right by Mary, and in that he is righteous.
But let’s get back to Matthew’s use of Isaiah. It’s not too much to say Matthew’s gospel set Christianity off on misreading the prophets for millenia. Isaiah addresses Ahaz, king of Judea, and gives him a very specific sign related to very local and particular circumstances. The sign is meant to establish the faithfulness, and therefore trustworthiness, of God. Matthew jerks it out of context and plants it in the story of Joseph to make his claim of a virgin birth, and the nature of Jesus of Nazareth as the Anointed One, more authoritative.
What Isaiah says is that God will be with Israel even as quotidian life (the young woman bearing a child) goes on, and before that child is old, the kingdoms Ahaz fears as threats will be gone. What Isaiah is saying is that God is already there, in the future; it is not unknowable or unknown. The future is assured, and God gives Ahaz a sign in the mundane, the everyday, the "life goes on," category. And this, as the angels say to the shepherds in Luke, is the sign. But the sign is not just that Ahaz needn't fear the future; it is that God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; the God of Israel, is already in the future.
What Matthew says is Mary’s pregnancy is the sign God is with us incarnate, which is certainly a concept we still struggle with today; both believers and nonbelievers. But that’s in Joseph’s future, too; where God already is. So perhaps Matthew’s use of Isaiah is forgivable.
But Matthew is talking about a reversal, a reversal of expectations, right? And Isaiah is just talking about hope? Or is Isaiah talking about reversing fear and anxiety by asserting God is already in the unknown future of Israel, and that is why Israel can trust the unknown. Isaiah, after all, doesn't give Ahaz a road map to the future; he just tells the king God is already there. Indeed there is nowhere Israel can go where God is not. Joseph’s future is not described by the angel; Joseph is merely assured God is already there. And for Joseph, that’s good enough. His future is reversed, but it is also assured. (Again, the story of Abraham; again, a radically different view of “reversal of fate” than the one from Greek tragedy). Whatever future Joseph assumed he would have, his ways are not God’s ways. God’s ways bring us a reversal of fortune or expectations, but in the reversal is the blessing. (Abraham is told to walk with God into the unknown future, and the blessings he will receive there. Those blessings are actually for others. Matthew means to echo that here.)
So Joseph reverses his future and walks into the unknown one he is promised, and in that provides the blessing to all of us. Not by doing something, but by not doing what he was going to do. It is a great deal that he does. He is father to a child not his own, husband to a wife touched by God. He walks into a promised future knowing what is supposed to happen but not knowing how. Like Abraham, he steps out on faith.
Every year we spend four weeks in Advent, preparing again to start that journey, to follow the footsteps of Abraham and Joseph into the future. Perhaps that's the wisdom in Christmas coming at the end of the year.
Marana tha. Come, O Lord.
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