First Reading: Baruch
5:1-9
Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 126:1-2, 2-3, 4-5, 6 (3)
Second Reading: Philippians
1:4-6, 8-11
Alleluia: Luke
3:4, 6
Gospel: Luke 3:1-6
Commentary
Willingness to pay the price for assuming responsibility for reality is
the message in these readings. Willingness
to assume responsibility to your fellow human beings is key for addressing such
problems as racism and lack of adequate health care. The relevance is pertinent and political.
Readings begin with the book named Baruch. Baruch, realizing who God is, stands before
Jerusalem to say— as depressing as things were about 500 B.C.— in divine
providence, things were looking up. Baruch
was a disciple and secretary of Jeremiah, Jeremiah whose life was well-known
and difficult. Kevin Knight explains,
After the temple of Jerusalem had been plundered by Nebuchadnezzar (599 B.C.), Baruch wrote under the dictation of Jeremiah the oracle of that great prophet foretelling the return of the Babylonians, and read them at the risk of his life in the hearing of the Jewish people.”[1]
Also in the readings for this Sunday, the 126th Psalmist assumes
responsibility for reality by asking God to restore fortunes at the same time
the Psalmist pays the price of contradiction, proclaiming, “The LORD has done
great things for us.” Philippians assumes
responsibility for the need “to discern what is of value,” paying the price of contradiction
with “my prayer.” In the Gospel of Luke,
John the Baptist assumes responsibility for the reality of “one crying out in
the desert,” willing to pay the price of contradiction, preparing “the way of
the Lord.” The price is the
embarrassment, only overcome by Faith, that God is truly in charge.
These lessons notwithstanding, the Church has experienced a major problem
assuming responsibility for the scientific realities of the past century. These Personal Notes reflect the need
for accepting that reality especially in the area of Biblical Studies. Understanding the meaning of Sacred Scripture
changes, as God allows his greatness to be revealed by reason. The Church and the Faithful must be ready to
pay the price (like Ted Kennedy, Joe Biden, and Nancy Pelosi) and assume
responsibility for reality, by rejecting the siege mentality, rejection of
responsibility..
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Annotated
Bibliography
Material above the double line
draws from material below the double line. Those uninterested in scholarly and
tangential details should stop reading here. If they do, however, they may miss some interesting
material.
Baruch 5:1-9
The Sinaiticus does not contain the Book of Baruch.[2]
Psalm 126:1-2,
2-3, 4-5, 6 (3)
Funerals also uses this Psalm.[3]
The Sinaiticus shows the whole 126th
Psalm as having only the six verses the
Lectionary uses. [4]
The Codex Sinaiticus Project
has five principal activities:
In order to clarify the
circumstances under which Codex Sinaiticus came to be dispersed between the
four institutions holding parts of the manuscript today, the project has
undertaken new archival research to identify and study all relevant archival
documents. The documents identified through this research are being used as the
basis for a new account of the modern history of Codex Sinaiticus, to be agreed
by all four partner institutions. The agreed account will be published on this
website and in the project's printed publications. It will accompanied by
transcripts or digital surrogates of the key archival documents wherever the
permission of the owners can be secured.[5]
The conservation strategy for
the Codex Sinaiticus Project was set out by its Conservation Working Party. An
initial assessment of the manuscript's leaves in all four locations
investigated how much work would be required to stabilize them before digitization
and to preserve them for the future. A detailed assessment has been carried out
in London, Leipzig and St. Petersburg and is underway in St. Catherine's
Monastery.
Before Codex Sinaiticus was
photographed, the Project needed to make sure that the leaves of the Codex were
all in a sufficiently stable state to undergo this process. The task of the
Conservation Working Party was to devise a strategy that protected the leaves
from any possible harm and preserved them for the future. In order to achieve
this, two steps were taken:
In order to know how much
conservation was required, the condition of each of the leaves needed examining
and documenting. A method of recording the condition was designed that could be
used in all four locations. This conservation assessment (one of unparalleled
precision, leading to the creation of a database with over 300 fields) has led
to an internationally-agreed terminology for describing and analysing the
physical features of a manuscript and, together with the images made available
by the project, has produced a model for conservators and scholars around the
world to identify these terms.
The detailed examination of
the physical characteristics of the manuscript looked at the different inks
employed for the text, the way in which the leaves were prepared before the
text was written and the types of animal skin from which the parchment was
made. An international expert was asked to examine the surface of the parchment
under high magnification and give his expert opinion about the type of animal
from which the leaves were produced. International co-operation has ensured
that the Project has drawn on the experience of the most up-to-date
conservation and research projects around the world. Only non-destructive
techniques have been used in the analysis and examination of the Codex.
Conservation treatment of
leaves was strictly limited to what was required to stabilise them for imaging.[6]
Philippians
1:4-6, 8-11
The manuscripts present no difficulties. Focusing on discernment in verse 10, the eclectic and Sinaitic Greek are the same. The meaning is to distinguish by testing or approve after testing.[7] Discernment, then, can be about paying the price for accepting responsibility for reality.
Phil 1:10
Alan C. Mitchell, review of Chris
VanLandingham, Judgment and
Justification in Early Judaism and the Apostle Paul[8]
Mitchell faults VanLandingham for not recognizing the difference between being offered and accepting grace from God. Mitchell observes, “VanLandingham believes that the topic of behavior in ... Philippians 1:10 and 2:15 regarding the Day of the Lord concerns what is moral and ethical rather than any forensic sense of a judicial pronouncement on God’s part.” The problem of grace, which VanLandingham confronts, is a problem of assuming responsibility for reality and paying the price.
Phil 1:11
Jerome H. Neyrey, S.J., “Lost in
Translation: Did It Matter If Christians `Thanked’ God or `Gave God Glory’?,”[9]
Neyrey likes to join thanking and glorifying God. Neyrey translates In translating Philippians 1:11 Neyrey explains that “for the glory and praise of God,” is ”to express one’s admiration for or approval of a person: praise, approval, recognition.”
Luke 3:4, 6
Luke 3:1-6
Comparing the eclectic with the Sinaitic Greek, the eclectic uses capital letters for names; the Sinaitic does not. There is also a minor difference in the second word of verse 1, so minor that the eclectic Greek does not even note the difference exists.[10]
Kurt Aland and Barbara Aland, The Text of the New Testament: An
Introduction to the Critical Editions and to the Theory and Practice of Modern
Textual Criticism, 2nd ed., Erroll F. Rhodes, tr. [11]
The Biblioteca Nazionale in Naples, Italy, has an Eighth Century manuscript with these verses. Formerly Damascus: Kubbet el Chazne has a Ninth Century manuscript with Luke 3:1-2, and 5.
Luke 3:1
Tetrarch: Lawrence provides a map showing how Herod the Great divided his kingdom. Lawrence is concerned with where Jesus lived. Lawrence also takes care in developing when Jesus lived. The Gospels require historians to take responsibility and pay the price of acknowledging the life of Jesus.
Luke 3:4
Jon Sobrino, S.J., “Jesus of Galilee from the Salvadoran Context: Compassion, Hope, and Following the Light of the Cross”[13]
This is the article bringing to attention the need to both assume responsibility for reality and pay the price for that assumption. Luke 3:4 contains the phrase, “you will be named by God forever.” Taking responsibility for that naming reality, costs a price.
Luke 3:4-6
Charles H. Talbert, review of
Michael E. Fuller, The
Restoration of Israel: Israel's Re-gathering and the Fate of the Nations in Early
Jewish Literature and Luke-Acts[14]
Talbert does not find Fuller convincing. Talbert sets out, “It is especially significant, I think, that the use of Isa 40:3-5 in Luke 3:4-6 [used here] to characterize the Baptist’s ministry as announcing the restoration of Israel, when set in the context of Luke 3, depicts the restoration as bearing fruits that befit repentance.” That sense of repentance seems appropriate for not assuming responsibility for reality—and paying the subsequent price.
For more on sources see
the Appendix file. Personal Notes are on the web site at www.western-civilization.com/CBQ/Personal%20Notes
[1]
Kevin Knight, “Baruch,” http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/02319c.htm (accessed September 27, 2009).
[2] http://www.codexsinaiticus.org/en/manuscript.aspx (accessed September 27, 2009.)
[3] .N.a., International Commission on English in the Liturgy: A Joint Commission of Catholic Bishops’ Conferences, The Roman Ritual: Revised by Decree of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council and published by Authority of Pope Paul IV: Order of Christian Funerals: Including Appendix 2: Cremation: Approved for use in the Dioceses of the United States of America by the National Conference of Catholic Bishops and Confirmed by the Apostolic See (New Jersey: Catholic Book Publishing Co., 1998) 290. Antiphons and Psalms, 16 Antiphons and Psalms 1-2, 2-3, 4-5, 6 (3).
[4]
http://www.codex-sinaiticus.net/print.aspx?manuscript=true&imageType=standard&translation=true&transcription=true&transcriptionType=verse&phd=true&lg=en&quireNo=63&folioNo=4&side=v
(accessed
[5]
http://www.codexsinaiticus.org/en/project/ (accessed September 27, 2009).
[6]
http://www.codexsinaiticus.org/en/project/conservation.aspx (accessed September 27, 2009).
[7] Max Zerwick, S.J. and Mary Grosvenor, A Grammatical Analysis of the Greek New Testament unabridged, 5th, revised edition (Roma: Editrice Pontificio Istituto Biblico 1996) 592.
[8]
Theological Studies, Vol.
69, No. 3(September 2008) 683.
[9] the Catholic Biblical Quarterly, Vol. 71, No. 1 (January 2009) 9.
[10]
http://www.codexsinaiticus.org/print.aspx?manuscript=true&imageType=standard&translation=true&transcription=true&transcriptionType=verse&phd=true&lg=en&quireNo=77&folioNo=7&side=r
(accessed September 27, 2009).
[11]
Grand Rapids, Michigan, William B.
Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1989, 121, 123.
[12]
Downers Grove, Illinois,
[13]
Theological Studies, Vol. 70, No. 2 (June 2009) 451,
456.
[14] the Catholic Biblical Quarterly, Vol. 69, No. 3 (July 2007) 580.