Ex. 20:1-17; 1 Cor. 1:18, 22-25; Jn. 2:13-25
George Wythe was an American lawyer, a judge, a
prominent law professor and "Virginia's foremost classical scholar."
Wythe was a planter and slave holder. He became an abolitionist after the
Revolutionary War. After his second wife's death, he divested himself of most
of his slaves. He freed his housemaid Lydia Broadnax, as well as Benjamin, a
house servant, and other slaves. He also provided them with support for their transitions
to freedom.
In 1776, George Wythe, Thomas Jefferson, and Edmund Pendleton began the task of reworking and updating the laws of the state of Virginia. The task took most of their time for three years. It was really an extraordinary piece of work. However, they took for granted the law preventing the blacks from testifying at trials against whites.
In 1806, Wythe
was poisoned by his grandnephew, George Wythe Sweeney. The only person who saw
Sweeney commit this act was Lydia Broadnax, Wythe's devoted housekeeper. As
Negroes were forbidden under Virginia law to testify in court against whites,
she could not testify at the trial; and Sweeney was acquitted of murder. If George Wythe had recognized the rights of
African-Americans, his killer would not have gone free.
It reminds us that there are times we take for granted injustice,
and never bother to raise our voice against it, even when we have the power to
do it.
In today's Gospel we see Jesus exercising his power to abolish some evil
practices that existed around the temple of Jerusalem.
The Passover was the greatest feast of the Jews. The law laid it that
every adult male Jew who lived within fifteen miles of Jerusalem was bound to
attend it. By this time Jews were scattered all over the world and it was the
dream of every Jew to celebrate at least one Passover in Jerusalem.
There was a tax that every Jew over nineteen years of age must pay to
the temple. As pilgrims arrived from all over the world with all kinds of coins
money changers sat in the Temple courts.
The temple consisted of a series of courts leading into the Temple
proper. The first one was the Court of Gentiles, then the Court of women, then
the Court of the Israelites, then the Court of the Priests. The Court of the
Gentiles was reserved for the Gentiles to pray. But all the buying and selling
took place in this Court. The Temple authorities and the Jewish Traders were
making the Court into uproar and a rabble where no one could pray.
There are two
reasons why Jesus acted as he did. First of all, Jesus found that God's house
was being desecrated. In the temple there was worship without reverence.
Worship without reverence can be a terrible thing. Of the many problems that
plague the church, a lack of reverence in worship is a particularly irritating
one to those who desire to worship in spirit and truth (John 4:24). In worship that reverence is to be directed
towards God. Acting in an irreverent manner puts these people in the same
dilemma in which Ananias and Sapphira found themselves (Acts 5:1-11). Even
though they thought they were only lying to men, the apostle Peter told them
that, in reality, they were lying to God. When people act up in or disrupt
worship today, they are not just being disrespectful to those people around
them, they are being disrespectful to God, an act just as evil as that of
Ananias and Sapphira.
From the very
beginning every civilization has considered the dwelling place of
God holy, and any disrespect was meted out with divine punishment. Ovid - Tells the story of
Medusa from Greek mythology. Medusa was one of the Gorgon sisters. She wasn't
always hideous, but had once been so beautiful. Once she desecrated temple of
Athena. Athena was furious that her temple had been desecrated. She punished
Medusa by turning her hair into snakes and making her so horrible men were
turned to stone by just looking at her.
Today it is quite common to use the churches for anything and
everything. We forget the fact that it is the House of Prayer. Secondly, giving
concentration to external perfection of the ceremonies causes a lot of
distraction. A non-believer may see our services as occasions to showcase the
technical perfection and talents. The action of Jesus in the temple, reminds us
that it is high time we reacted against such tendencies. Our primary
responsibility is to abstain from anything that goes against the holiness of
the Place of God. Then we have the moral obligation to point out the mistakes,
if anyone else happens to commit.
Satish