Second Sunday in Lent; 13 March 2022; Lent 2C (RCL); Genesis 15:1-12, 15-18; Psalm 27; Philippians 3:17 – 4:1; Luke 13:31-35.
What a mish-mash of readings this week. I suppose that happens when you read books in-course. The Luke reading especially puzzles me; I’m not really sure how it fits into Luke’s overall narrative strategy, although I suppose it pushes forward the progress toward Jerusalem. But Jesus has not yet been to Jerusalem; how can he have desired to have protected her children? Unless perhaps he is speaking as Wisdom.
The passage from Genesis gives a picture of an ancient covenant ritual. Jeremiah 34:18-22 alludes to a similar ritual. Apparently, in making a covenant, to parties passed between the halves of an animal (or animals) cut laterally, with the imprecation that if they should break the covenant, they should become like the animal(s) thus cut. Jeremiah even alludes to the birds of prey — those who break the covenant shall become food for the birds of prey. If this is the purport of the ritual, it is significant in this case that only God passes between the animal halves. Only God accepts the risk of breaking the covenant with Abraham. Abraham bears no cost.
The passage in Luke occurs after 9:51, when Jesus set his face toward Jerusalem (where he would accomplish his Exodus, as discussed with Moses and Elijah on the mountain-top). Herod will not kill him, as that would fall outside of the divine plan. In the first part of the reading, Herod is presented as a fox, and in the second part of the reading, Jesus presents himself as a hen, desiring to gather her chicks under her wings.
Foxes are particularly dangerous to chickens. Humans don’t have much to worry about from foxes, except protecting their chickens. I wonder if there is a bit of irony in presenting Herod as a fox — sly, but not very dangerous, except to chickens. Jesus will continue his work of dealing with the truly dangerous elements of the world — demons and illness, unconcerned about Herod.
The irony would only deepen in the second part of the reading. Jesus (or Wisdom) has desired to gather the children of Jerusalem like a hen her chicks to protect them from a fox, but they have refused the protection, and exposed themselves to what should have been an insignificant danger. And for their refusal, their house is desolate.
Jesus, as Wisdom, is ready to assume the risk of protecting us from that fox, just as God was prepared to assume the entire risk of breaking the covenant with Abraham.
Perhaps we misperceive the real dangers of the world. Herod is a sly, but relatively harmless fox, but we refuse God’s protection against the Herod’s of the world. What is the real risk, if not Herod? All who seek to save their souls in this world will lose them.