30th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle A (가해 연중 제30주일)


1st Reading: Exodus 22:20-26

Social Laws
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[20] "Whoever sacrifices to any god, save to the Lord only shall he utterly des-
troyed. [21] "You shall not wrong a stranger or oppress him, for you were stran-
gers in the land of Egypt. [22] You shall not afflict any widow or orphan. [23] If
you do afflict them, and they cry out to me, I will surely hear their cry; and my
wrath will burn, and I will kill you with the sword, and your wives shall become
widows and your children fatherless.

[25] "If you lend money to any of my people with you who are poor, you shall not
be to him as a creditor, and you shall not exact interest from him. [26] If ever you
take your neighbor's garment in pledge, you shall restore it to him before the sun
goes down."

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Commentary:

22:18-31. This passage contains a number of laws on social matters, in no parti-
cular order; some are apodictic, some religious, others are work-associated--but
all deal with serious offenses.

Sorcery, which only women used to engage in (v. 18) was punished by death 
cf. Lev 20:6, 27; Deut 18:10-14), being a form of idolatry (cf. "Catechism of the
Catholic Church", 2117). It was also forbidden by Assyrian laws and by the
Code of Hammurabi.

Bestiality (v. 19) was a perversion more often found in pastoral and nomadic life
(cf. Lev 18:23-25); it too was punishable by death.

Sacrificing to false gods was a temptation ever present to Israelites because
they were surrounded by wealthy and powerful, but polytheistic, nations such
as Egypt, Balylonia, Assyria and, especially, Canaan; "...shall be utterly des-
troyed" (v. 20) or "shall be put under the ban" or "shall be anathema".

Strangers who (due to war, disease or famine) found themselves forced to leave
their country, widows without a family to support them, and orphans were typical
marginalized or poor people in that tribal society. In its laws (e.g. Deut 10:17-18;
24:17) and in its prophetic message (e.g. Is 1:17; Jer 7:6), the Bible constantly
speaks out on behalf of people most in need (cf. Jas 1:27). The oppression of
the weak and of those on the margin of society is one of the sins that cry out to
heaven (cf. "Catechism of the Catholic Church", 1867).

Blasphemy against God (v. 28) was punishable by death (cf. Lev 24:15); blas-
phemy against the person on supreme authority in the nation was no less
serious, because he was God's representative. In the time of St Paul this text
was applied to offenses against the high priest (cf. Acts 23:5).

On the law covering the first-borm, cf. the note on 13:12. First-born sons had to
be redeemed by means of an offering. Therefore the very bald rule given in v. 29
needs to be interpreted in the light of others which describe how first-born sons
were to be consecrated--for the sacrifice of human beings was never counte-
nanced in Israel.


2nd Reading: 1 Thessalonians 1:5-10

Thanksgiving for the Thessalonians' Fidelity
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[5] For our gospel came to you not only in word, but also in power and in the
Holy Spirit and with full conviction. You know what kind of men we proved to be
among you for your sake. [6] And you became imitators of us and of the Lord,
for you received the word in much affliction, with joy inspired by the Holy Spirit;
[7] so that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and in
Achaia. [8] For not only has the word of the Lord sounded forth from you in Ma-
cedonia and Achaia, but your faith in God has gone forth everywhere, so that
we need not say anything. [9] For they themselves report concerning us what
a welcome we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols, to serve
a living and true God, [10] and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised
from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.

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Commentary:

5. St Paul reminds them that what he preached was the "gospel" foretold by the
prophets (cf. Is 40:9; 52:7; 60:6; 61:1) and fulfilled by the Incarnation of the Word
and by his work of salvation. The Apostle was pressed into service by the Holy
Spirit to forward his work of sanctification. The Thessalonians were not won over
by mere human words but by the "power" of God, who made those words effec-
tive. The term "power" refers not only to miraculous actions but also to the Holy
Spirit moving the souls of those who heard Paul's preaching.

It is true that this activity, like all actions of God outside himself, is something
done by all three Persons of the Blessed Trinity; but in the language of Scripture
and of the Church it is customary "to attribute to the Father those works of the
Divinity in which power excels; to attribute to the Son, those in which wisdom
excels; and to the Holy Spirit, those in which love excels" (Leo XIII, "Divinum
Illud Munus", 5).

In the early years of the Church the proclamation of the Gospel was often marked
by special graces of the Holy Spirit, such as prophecy, miracles, or the gift of
tongues (cf. Acts 2:8). This profusion of gifts made it clear that the messianic era
had begun (cf. Acts 2:16), for it meant the fulfillment of the ancient prophecies: "I
will pour out my spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions. Even
upon the menservants and maidservants in those days, I will pour out my spirit"
(Joel 3:1-3).

"In power and in the Holy Spirit": in line with the divine plan of salvation, the time
of the Old Testament, which prepared the way for the coming of the Messiah,
has reached its end, and a new era has begun, the Christian era, the key feature
of which is the activity of the Spirit of God: "It must be said that the Holy Spirit is
the principal agent of evangelization: it is he who impels each individual to pro-
claim the Gospel, and it is he who in the depths of consciences causes the word
of salvation to be accepted and understood" (Paul VI, "Evangelii Nuntiandi", 75).

6. St Paul rejoices at the effect God has had on the Thessalonians. It is true that
Christ is "the" model to be imitated, but the Apostle's own example played its part
in leading them to Christ (cf. 1 Cor 11:1). "To follow Christ: that is the secret. We
must accompany him so closely that we come to live with him, as the first Twelve
did; so closely, that we become identified with him. Soon we will be able to say,
provided we have not put obstacles in the way of grace, that we have put on, have
clothed ourselves with, our Lord Jesus Christ (cf. Rom 13:14). Our Lord is then
reflected in our behavior, as in a mirror. If the mirror is as it ought to be, it will
capture our Savior's most lovable face without distorting it or making a caricature
of it; and then other people will have an opportunity of admiring him and following
him" (St. J. Escriva, "Friends of God", 299).

"Joy", which is one of the fruits of the Holy Spirit (cf. Gal 5:22-23), is linked to
unconditional acceptance of the word of God, and helps a person to overcome
any obstacle he or she may meet on his way (cf. Acts 5:41). "One can be joyful
despite lashes and blows, when these are accepted in the cause of Christ", St
John Chrysostom comments. "A feature of the joy of the Holy Spirit is that it
causes an uncontainable happiness to grow even out of affliction and sorrow [...].
In the natural course of events afflictions do not produce joy: joy is the privilege
of those who accept sufferings for Jesus Christ's sake; it is one of the good
things bestowed by the Holy Spirit" ("Hom. on 1 Thess, ad loc.").

7-8. Thessalonica was an important center of trade and a hub of communications
for all Greece. The Christians in the city included a number of important people
and even some women of the aristocracy (cf. Acts 17:4). The social standing of
the converts and the prestige of the city partly explain the rapid spread of Chris-
tian teaching throughout the region.

What the Apostle says here only goes to show that when the Christian life is
given full rein it spreads far and wide. This should give us every encouragement
"always to act in public in accordance with our holy faith" (St. J. Escriva, "Fur-
row", 46).

9. We can see how happy the Apostle is to learn that the work of evangelization
has borne fruit of conversion to God--which is the whole purpose of Gospel prea-
ching. "For the Church, evangelization means bringing the Good News into all
the strata of humanity, and through its influence transforming humanity from
within and making it new" (Paul VI, "Evangelii Nuntiandi", 18).

It is moving to see the way good news spread among the early Christian com-
munities. Obviously anecdotes about the apostolate would go from church to
church; this gave them an occasion to praise God while at the same time pro-
viding encouragement to stay true to Christ and to spread the Gospel.

10. The Christian message has this feature which differentiates it from Judaism--
hope in Christ and expectation of Christ. Two central points of Christian teaching
emerge from this verse: Jesus Christ is the Son of God, who rose from the dead,
and he will come again to judge all. St John Chrysostom observes that "in a sin-
gle text St Paul brings together a number of different mysteries concerning Jesus
Christ--his glorious resurrection, his victorious ascension, his future coming, the
judgment, the reward promised to the righteous, and the punishment reserved for
evildoers" ("Hom. on 1 Thess, ad loc.").

This verse probably contains a form of words used in oral preaching, and perhaps
a profession of faith belonging to early Christian liturgy.

"To wait for his son (to come) from heaven": that Jesus Christ will come again is
a truth of faith professed in the Creed: "He will come again in glory to judge the
living and the dead." Christ will be the Judge of all mankind. Everyone will be
personally judged by God twice: "The first judgment takes place when each one
of us departs this life; for then he is instantly placed before the judgment-seat
of God, where all that he has ever done or spoken or thought during life shall be
subjected to the most rigid scrutiny. This is called the particular judgment. The
second occurs when on the same day and in the same place all men shall stand
together before the tribunal of their Judge, that in the presence and hearing of all
human beings of all time each may know his final doom and sentence [...]. This
is called the general judgment" ("St Pius V Catechism", I, 8, 3).

The "wrath to come" is a metaphor referring to the just punishment of sinners.
Our Lord Jesus Christ will exempt from it those who have consistently tried to
live in the state of grace and fellowship with God. St Teresa of Avila warns that
"it will be a great thing at the hour of death to know that we are going to be
judged by him whom we have loved above all things. We can approach this trial
with confidence. It will not be like going into a strange land but into our own land,
for it is the land that belongs to him whom we love so much and who loves us"
("Way of Perfection", 70, 3).

Gospel Reading: Matthew 22:34-40

The Greatest Commandment of All
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[34] But when the Pharisees heard that He (Jesus) had silenced the Sadducees,
they came together. [35] And one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, to
test Him. [36] "Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law?" [37]
And He said to him, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and
with all your soul, and with all your mind. [38] This is the great and first com-
mandment. [39] And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
[40] On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets."

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Commentary:

34-40. In reply to the question, our Lord points out that the whole law can be con-
densed into two commandments: the first and more important consists in uncon-
ditional love of God; the second is a consequence and result of the first, because
when man is loved, St. Thomas says, God is loved, for man is the image of God
(cf. "Commentary on St. Matthew", 22:4).

A person who genuinely loves God also loves his fellows because he realizes that
they are his brothers and sisters, children of the same Father, redeemed by the
same blood of our Lord Jesus Christ: "this commandment we have from Him, that
he who loves God should love his brother also" (1 John 4:21). However, if we love
man for man's sake without reference to God, this love will become an obstacle in
the way of keeping the first commandment, and then it is no longer genuine love
of our neighbor. But love of our neighbor for God's sake is clear proof that we love
God: "If anyone says, `I love God', but hates his brother, he is a liar" (1 John 4:20).

"You shall love your neighbor as yourself": here our Lord establishes as the guide-
line for our love of neighbor the love each of us has for himself; both love of others
and love of self are based on love of God. Hence, in some cases it can happen
that God requires us to put our neighbor's need before our own; in others, not: it
depends on what value, in the light of God's love, needs to be put on the spiritual
and material factors involved.

Obviously spiritual goods take absolute precedence over material ones, even over
life itself. Therefore, spiritual goods, be they our own or our neighbor's, must be
the first to be safeguarded. If the spiritual good in question is the supreme one
of the salvation of the soul, no one is justified in putting his own soul into certain
danger of being condemned in order to save another, because given human free-
dom we can never be absolutely sure what personal choice another person may
make: this is the situation in the parable (cf. Matthew 25:1-13), where the wise
virgins refuse to give oil to the foolish ones; similarly St. Paul says that he would
wish himself to be rejected if that could save his brothers (cf. Romans 9:3)--an
unreal theoretical situation. However, what is quite clear is that we have to do all
we can to save our brothers, conscious that, if someone helps to bring a sinner
back to the Way, he will save himself from eternal death and cover a multitude of
his own sins (James 5:20). From all this we can deduce that self-love of the right
kind, based on God's love for man, necessarily involves forgetting oneself in order
to love God and our neighbor for God.

37-38. The commandment of love is the most important commandment because
by obeying it man attains his own perfection (cf. Colossians 3:14). "The more a
soul loves," St. John of the Cross writes, "the more perfect is it in that which it
loves; therefore this soul that is now perfect is wholly love, if it may thus be ex-
pressed, and all its actions are love and it employs all its faculties and posses-
sions in loving, giving all that it has, like the wise merchant, for this treasure of
love which it has found hidden in God [...]. For, even as the bee extracts from
all plants the honey that is in them, and has no use for them for aught else save
for that purpose, even so the soul with great facility extracts the sweetness of
love that is in all the things that pass through it; it loves God in each of them,
whether pleasant or unpleasant; and being, as it is, informed and protected by
love, it has neither feeling nor taste nor knowledge of such things, for, as we have
said, the soul knows naught but love, and its pleasure in all things and occupa-
tions is ever, as we have said, the delight of the love of God" ("Spiritual Canticle",
Stanza 27, 8).

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Source: "The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries". Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States. We encourage readers to purchase
The Navarre Bible for personal study. See Scepter Publishers for details.


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