Measure for Measure
John Shuck
First Presbyterian Church
Elizabethton, Tennessee
June 1, 2014
The Sermon on the Mount Emmet Fox
The plain fact is that it is the Law of Life that, as we think, and speak, and act towards others, so will others think, and speak, and act towards us. Whatever sort of conduct we give out, that we are inevitably bound to get back. Anything and everything that we do to others will sooner or later be done to us by someone, somewhere. The good that we do to others we shall receive back in like measure; and the evil that we do to others in like manner we shall receive back too….
…Students of Scientific Christianity who understand the power of thought, will realize that it is here, in the realm of thought, that the Law finds its true application; and they will see that the one thing that matters, in the last resort, is to keep their thoughts right about other people—even as about themselves. The right thought about God, and the right thought about fellow-man, and the right thought about one’s self; that is the Law and the Prophets. Knowing that Dominion is located in the Secret Place, it is on the Secret Place that they will focus their attention in observing the commandment—judge not.
The Golden Rule in Scientific Christianity is: Think about others as you would wish them to think about you. In the light of the knowledge that we now possess, the observance of this rule becomes a very solemn duty, but, more than that indeed, it is a vital debt of honor.
Matthew 7:1-5
Don’t pass judgment, so you won’t be judged. Don’t forget, the judgment you hand out will be the judgment you get back. And the standard you apply will be the standard applied to you. Why do you notice the sliver in your friend’s eye, but overlook the timber in your own? How can you say to your friend, ‘Let me get the sliver our of your eye.’ When there is that timber in your own? You phony, first take the timber out of your own eye and then you’ll see will enough to remove the sliver from your friend’s eye.
The Jesus Seminar voted these first two verses of chapter seven black. That means they did not think they originated with Jesus. Here they are again:
Don’t pass judgment, so you won’t be judged. Don’t forget, the judgment you hand out will be the judgment you get back. And the standard you apply will be the standard applied to you.
He may have said something like this, but this was common wisdom found everywhere. We hear it in phrases like this:
What goes around comes around.
You reap what you sow.
You get what you pay for.
An eye for and eye and a tooth for a tooth.
They are all similar to what is found in Matthew 7:1-2:
The standard you apply will be the standard applied to you.
Or in the King James:
“…with what measure ye mete it shall be measured to you again.”
“…with what measure ye mete it shall be measured to you again.”
This common lore is wise but it most likely did not originate with Jesus. The memorable aphorism that follows about the sliver and the timber did likely originate with Jesus:
Why do you notice the sliver in your friend’s eye, but overlook the timber in your own? How can you say to your friend, ‘Let me get the sliver our of your eye.’ When there is that timber in your own? You phony, first take the timber out of your own eye and then you’ll see will enough to remove the sliver from your friend’s eye.
When the author of Matthew’s gospel is compiling this section, he framed this aphorism as a commentary on the common lore of “what measure you ye mete shall be measured to you again.”
The common lore that is reflected in verses one and two of chapter seven is based on a belief that there is an external scale of judgment and balance in the world. It is a belief that either in this life or in the life to come we all get what is coming to us. Matthew’s gospel is filled with this theology.
The most common metaphor for God in the Christian tradition is judge. God as righteous judge has been central to Christianity since Anselm developed the substitutionary atonement theory in the middle ages. The judgment language of Matthew’s gospel provide the roots for this theological tree.
Of course, other religious and spiritual systems have some kind of balance written in to them whether the judge is a personalized god or an impersonal force like karma. So the idea of you get what’s coming to you, or what goes around comes around is pretty much a common truth even as it may be expressed in a variety of ways. I would add that some ways are more appealing than others.
For example, I like the notion that this existence is one of many schools our soul passes through. We get what is coming to us, yes, but as part of a learning experience that may go on for many lives. I find that more appealing than the idea that there is one life and if you screw it up it is eternal fire for you. If I had to choose between those two ideas of how justice works in the universe, I would choose the first one. I prefer to think of life as progress and learning rather than that life is a punitive test. Of course, there are variations and nuances regarding these two possibilities of justice and balance.
It is interesting that we tend to need a sense of justice. There is comfort in believing that God or that some force of the universe is keeping track and working to right the wrongs and balance the equations. Martin Luther King Jr. said, quoting someone else, that
“The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.”
I like that and there are days in which I believe it. The sentiment inspires me to keep working for what I think is just despite the long odds. I am invited to trust in spite of my limited ability to see. But I am not sure. I trust that honestly expressing a doubt in a sermon is probably ok.
I am getting to Jesus and his interesting aphorism about the sliver and the timber. In getting to it in regards to this whole justice business, I do have to say that if we really want a just universe, we might have to face an unnerving possibility. I think of my life, schlup that I am married to a beautiful, bright, loving bride. It is really not fair. It is obvious that injustice works in my favor.
My wife is God’s answer to Job. God and Job are arguing. Job is telling God what a lousy mess God has made of things. Drone attacks, corporate greed, pollution, infomercials…it is easy to make a list. God nods and says, “Yeah, maybe.” Then he points to this beautiful woman. “See, I made her and she loves you.” Job has no argument. “You win, God.”
The unnerving possibility is that the just world for which I long may be too just for me. That is the twist that Jesus is making. This section found in both Q and Thomas reflects the creative wisdom of Jesus that turns the tables:
Why do you notice the sliver in your friend’s eye, but overlook the timber in your own? How can you say to your friend, ‘Let me get the sliver our of your eye.’ When there is that timber in your own? You phony, first take the timber out of your own eye and then you’ll see will enough to remove the sliver from your friend’s eye.
When we remove this aphorism from Matthew’s frame of external justice we are not hearing an illustration about the judgment of God or of karma. We are instead hearing about how to be in relationship with others. More importantly, we are hearing about how we can be conscious of ourselves. The timber in our own eye is what psychologist Carl Jung called our shadow. The speck in our friend’s eye is our projection of that shadow. The word translated as phony refers to an actor in a play. It is the mask we wear. To paraphrase Jesus:
You who set the standards for what is right and wrong,
for who measures up and who doesn’t,
you who have kept a tally of the wrongs you have received,
you who know well the faults of others,
can you see yourself?
The shadow is that part of ourselves of which we are not conscious. It is often thought of in negative ways, but it can contain positive aspects as well. It lies beneath the mask that we present to the world. The reason we see the speck in another’s eye, is that we are projecting unconsciously onto others our own shadow, that part of our personality that the conscious ego does not identify in itself.
Carl Jung wrote:
"Everyone carries a shadow, and the less it is embodied in the individual's conscious life, the blacker and denser it is."
A symptom of our lack of conscious awareness of our shadow is judgmentalism. The point is not to judge ourselves for being judgmental. The point, and the invitation, behind the aphorism of Jesus, is to pause when we make a judgment and ask why what we see in others bothers us.
What Jesus is saying is rather than assume that that person needs a fixing, while that could be true, a healthy response might be self-reflection. It could be our own shadow needing an audience. That part that we see in others that we really don’t like could be a part of ourselves that we have hidden or denied. It could be the caged bird within singing for freedom.
The way of therapy is to identify our shadow and encounter it. That can be painful because we can recognize that we are made up of characteristics and impulses of which we are ashamed. But with courage, with heart, we can in the words of Barbara Brown Taylor, “learn to walk in the dark.” We can educate ourselves about who we are and we can begin to assimilate those shadow parts of our personality into our conscious awareness.
The dark or the shadow is not an evil or bad place. It is not a place to fear. It is a sacred place, a place where we can encounter the holy. The long process of life of recognizing and assimilating our shadow is a process descent and ascent. We descend into the dark so that we can ascend into the light.
The goal is not just to muck around in the shadow and stay there or to allow the shadow to overwhelm us. In the words of the psalm, “we walk through the valley of the shadow of death” in the trusting confidence that we will walk through and that we will be more integrated for doing so. We may even be able to see more clearly and can truly be a help to others as they discover their own shadows. In the words of Jesus, “then you’ll see enough to remove the sliver from your friend’s eye.”
The shadow can also be where one’s strength lies dormant. It is the bird imprisoned in a cage. Discovering the shadow can be discovering those aspects of self that sing for freedom. When we criticize the sliver in another’s eye, that sliver may be for us what we wish we could be. It could be the caged bird within singing of freedom.
I am thinking of the caged bird in memory and appreciation of Maya Angelou who died this past Wednesday. This is her poem, “Caged Bird.”
A free bird leaps
on the back of the wind
and floats downstream
till the current ends
and dips his wing
in the orange sun rays
and dares to claim the sky.
But a bird that stalks
down his narrow cage
can seldom see through
his bars of rage
his wings are clipped and
his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing.
The caged bird sings
with a fearful trill
of things unknown
but longed for still
and his tune is heard
on the distant hill
for the caged bird
sings of freedom.
The free bird thinks of another breeze
and the trade winds soft through the sighing trees
and the fat worms waiting on a dawn bright lawn
and he names the sky his own
But a caged bird stands on the grave of dreams
his shadow shouts on a nightmare scream
his wings are clipped and his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing.
The caged bird sings
with a fearful trill
of things unknown
but longed for still
and his tune is heard
on the distant hill
for the caged bird
sings of freedom.
The shadow, the timber in the eye, and the caged bird, all are metaphors for what lives beneath the mask that we present to the world. As we are unconscious of them we live unaware and more shallow lives than we could.
The depths of life invite us
to attend to the darkness,
to remove the timber,
encounter the shadow,
hear and perhaps even free the caged bird,
and to discover the sacred in that walk in the dark.
Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment