Jesus said to them in reply,
“Have you not read what David did
when he and those who were with him were hungry?
The Pharisees first thought here might have been that it was one thing for David and his companions to do something and another thing for Jesus and his disciples to do it. But this comparison between himself and David was part of what Jesus was insinuating. David was the one chosen and anointed as the next king of Israel. He and his companions were fleeing from King Saul who desired to kill David and thus cling to his own authority. Since David and his mission were anointed by God, the mission took precedence over the normal regulations and it was fitting that bread that the bread dedicated to him be shared with his anointed one. Jesus implied that he himself was the true Son of David, and hinted at the way he was being persecuted by the Pharisees just as David was persecuted by Saul. He implied that the mission of establishing the Kingdom of God on earth took precedence even over the Sabbath, or better, was such a mission as to be fitting done precisely on the Sabbath.
“Have you not read what David did
when he and those who were with him were hungry?
How he went into the house of God, took the bread of offering,
which only the priests could lawfully eat,
ate of it, and shared it with his companions?”
We might read this and assume that permission had been given to simply put the bread to a lesser and secular use. But it was more as though David and his companions were brought in to share the privileges and prerogatives of priests. David began to resemble the archetypal figure of Melchizedek in whom the identities of both priest and king were united. His mission was not merely to establish a secular authority. It was a mission that came from God himself, and the offered bread was therefore not used wrongly in order to advance that mission. We can detect hints here that point forward to the Eucharistic sacrifice itself. It is offered through the hands of the modern companions of Jesus, his priests, united in him, to the Father, to advance the mission and spread the Kingdom of God on earth, the Church. It is more than merely allowed that this takes place on Sunday. Sunday is when it is most fitting for the celebration to take place.
Then he said to them, “The Son of Man is lord of the sabbath.”
This was the mic drop moment. For up until that point in this conversation Jesus hadn't explicitly claimed anything for himself that couldn't also be said for David. But here he claimed something for himself that no one else could claim, no matter how exalted their ancestry. There Lord of the Sabbath was and could only be the one who had established the Sabbath in the first place. The Pharisees could only see in the Sabbath an extreme of what they saw everywhere else, a time for fastidious adherence to rules, but always in such a way that they were burdensome and a drudgery, turned against the original intent of the lawgiver. Thus for them, laws meant to grant rest would be used to insist on hunger and hardship. But the Lord of the Sabbath came to restore and reveal the original intention of the one who gave the Sabbath to man. That intention was always ordered to the celebration of the marriage feast of God and man. What, then, could be more appropriate than to feast? And yet there was something still better than the picked grains his disciples shared. Jesus knew and looked forward to the giving of his own body and blood as bread and wine. It is this feast in which we ourselves are permitted to share, even daily if we choose. Let us learn to appreciate what a great gift this is so that we do not take it for granted. Let us open ourselves to receive the strength for mission this gift is meant to bestow.
When ridiculed, we bless; when persecuted, we endure;
when slandered, we respond gently.
We have become like the world’s rubbish, the scum of all,
to this very moment.
We see that it is often the case that the followers of Jesus face persecution. Just as David and his companions before him, we who come after may well encounter opposition from those think only in terms of the wisdom of this world. Wisdom of the world is motivated primarily by pride just as were the Pharisees. It thus can't see or understand the intention of a God who would himself endure the worst of persecutions for the sake of love. But to be numbered with the companions of Jesus we must have the humility to forego the wisdom of the world in favor of a higher wisdom. If we will only let ourselves become fools for Christ (one thinks of Saint Francis) he himself will be the one who provides for us and gives us the strength to respond with love as he did, and as Paul demonstrated to the Corinthians.
He fulfills the desire of those who fear him,
he hears their cry and saves them.
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