A number of years ago when it seemed safer to take study groups to Israel,
\nI had a free Sunday morning in Jerusalem and I decided to take a taxi
\nto Bethany and walk the traditional Palm Sunday route back to Jerusalem.
\nIt was a quiet morning, birds chirping, children\u2019s voices shouting
\nplayfully behind the walls of domestic compounds. I saw almost no one
\nalong the way. By the time I reached the Mt. of Olives overlooking Jerusalem,
\nI had seen only a broad meandering path between the walled residential
\nenclosures, scattered patches of gravel and grass, and one dead donkey.
\nCrowds would surely make a difference.<\/p>\n
Observing the role and function of crowds<\/strong> Outside the crowd scene, there are always larger issues\u2014in this Think of the crowd scenes in which you\u2019ve been a part: Parades The crowd on the Jerusalem road that Sunday understood such needs well. Spurred by such hope and even greed, crowds have sometimes called for John interrupts the story to share an insight<\/strong> We are able to discover through John\u2019s recall an insight of the John\u2019s choice of wording (different from the Synoptic writers) It is, of course, wonderful that John gives us this insider\u2019s Dealing with John\u2019s insight and its application to our Those questions are put to us in a very contemporary way in a book entitled You and I, grateful to John for giving us his insider\u2019s view,
\nOn the Sunday morning in our text, the crowds who had gathered in Jerusalem
\nfor the Feast hear that Jesus is approaching the city. They swarm out
\nto meet him and begin to wave palm branches and shout appropriate slogans.
\nThey fill the atmosphere with emotion, expectation and enthusiasm.
\nThis is what crowds are supposed to do. They aren\u2019t particularly
\nrational and they tend to be swayed by words and songs that appeal
\nto their personal and collective needs. In a humorous and poignant
\nscene at the beginning of an Italian film about the Second World War,
\nLife is Beautiful<\/em>, a crowd lines the sides of a mountain road awaiting
\nthe arrival of some Fascist officials in a motor car. However, the
\nbrakes fail in another car driven by the main character and his sidekick
\nand they roar down the road in bewilderment to the acclaim of cheering
\nmasses who hail them as dignitaries. By the time the head Fascists
\nactually arrive, the crowd is gone. Crowds can be this fickle and foolish.
\nThe scene is symbolic of what follows in this film in which the madness
\nof Fascism and National Socialism overtakes otherwise \u201cnormal\u201d people.
\nIt also provides insight into the mindset of the crowd in our text.<\/p>\n
\ncase, an occupied country, a humiliated and tense population, the excitement
\nof an annual festival in which long-separated friends and relatives gather,
\nplots of murder and sedition, songs of heritage and national consciousness.
\nThe author, John, says that in addition to this potpourri of issues many
\npeople go out to meet Jesus because they have heard of the miracle involving
\nLazarus\u2019 rising from the dead\u2014and they either want to see
\nLazarus for themselves or be around in case another miracle takes place.
\nIt\u2019s all very emotional and personal, yet there is a collective
\nanticipation that transcends individual needs.<\/p>\n
\non national holidays, waiting for the doors to open at an annual sale,
\nconcert or sport event, not to forget demonstrations for and against
\npolicies or war. In such settings there are personal concerns for safety,
\nfor getting what you anticipated, for making a statement that will be
\nheard. You have a need to satisfy your ego by affirming it with a victory,
\na purchase or an affirmation. On the one hand, such action justifies
\nyour personal reason for being there in the first place. On the other
\nhand, there are collective needs to feel part of something larger than
\nyourself as well as to understand your place in a heritage or a victory
\nthat can never be yours alone because it belongs to your whole community
\nor country.<\/p>\n
\nIf miracles are being distributed, they don\u2019t want to be left out!
\nIf a new leader is on the horizon, they want to be able to say they have
\nseen him or shaken his hand! If anything will take place that promises
\naffluence or affirmation they want to be on the receiving end! This is
\nwhy people go to casinos or buy lottery and raffle tickets. If there\u2019s
\nany possibility to increase my personal advantage, I want to stand in
\nline! Furthermore, as John Donne put it, \u201cno man is an island.\u201d We
\nwant to share in the nostalgia and collective memory that belongs to
\nfamilies and national groups just as we want to participate in the prospect
\nof any future achievement. In fact, we may commit ourselves to such future
\ndreams, encouraged by the passion of the moment, and give our lives to
\nbring in the millennial kingdom.<\/p>\n
\ndemonstrations, crusades, rallies and wars. On this particular day, things
\ndidn\u2019t get that far out of hand, but it\u2019s quite possible
\nthat Jesus\u2019 own actions or demeanor subdued the crowd. There were
\npersonal and political overtones. Individuals whose lives were shabby
\nand subjugated in this Roman colony longed for the leadership to move
\nthings in a new direction. Those who recalled the short period of Maccabean
\nindependence and others who had weapons hidden in caves in the hills
\nhad greater collective designs. One can\u2019t be sure that the palms
\nthey somehow acquired and waved had political significance (they represented
\nvictory on the coins they used), but the shouts that John recalls for
\nus were clearly nationalistic. The call is for freedom and salvation
\nnow<\/strong> (\u201cHosanna\u201d)! They hail a potential leader (\u201cBlessed
\nis the King of Israel\u201d). They anticipate the fulfillment of prophecy
\nby chanting a traditional psalm for this day ringing with messianic hope
\n(\u201cBlessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord\u201d Ps. 118:26).<\/p>\n
\nWhat follows next in John\u2019s version of this story is quite interesting.
\nWe have been hearing a crowd revel and react much as we might carry on
\nin similar circumstances. However, Jesus does something which intrudes
\non the developing meaning of the moment and nobody seems to catch the
\npoint until much later, in retrospect. John almost gives us the impression
\nthat in the midst of all the hype and confusion in the crowd about to
\nrun away with its emotions, Jesus just happens to see a young donkey
\nand continues his journey sitting upon it. The crowd, including Jesus\u2019 own
\ndisciples, apparently made nothing of this, but John tells us that after
\nthe resurrection they came to understand this symbolic action in the
\nlight of prophecies. I think of the futuristic movie, Minority Report<\/em>,
\nin which employees of a special government agency are able to determine
\nwhat\u2019s about to take place because they have access to sensory
\nequipment attached to the brains
\nof people floating in a tank\u2014people who have previously experienced
\nthese situations. The story is a bit far-fetched, but we find it fascinating
\nbecause we would give anything to \u201cjump out of our skins\u201d and
\ndiscover for ourselves the real meaning of what\u2019s currently happening
\nor the impact of something that will happen in the future. In our text,
\nJohn gives us a remarkable forward flash into the future which allows
\nus to see something that too easily gets lost in the crowd.<\/p>\n
\nChristian community that was available to it only after Jesus\u2019 resurrection.
\nThen, in searching the Scriptures to find meaning in their confusion,
\nthey come to understand Jesus\u2019 choice of the donkey in the light
\nof passages from Zechariah and Zephaniah\u2014and they are enabled to
\nexplain them in such a way that Jesus\u2019 entire ministry becomes
\nclear to them. In both passages, Israel\u2019s king comes riding (\u201cgently\u201d it
\nsays in Zechariah) on a donkey, not on a horse of war. In fact, as the
\npassage continues in Zechariah (9:10), God promises to take away the
\nwar-horses and proclaim peace to the nations\u2014a peace that will
\nextend to the ends of the earth. John continues this thought by combining
\nthe Zechariah passage with one from Zephaniah (3:16). In that passage,
\nthe daughter of Zion, the inhabitants of Jerusalem, are encouraged not
\nto fear because the proud and the haughty will be removed, the meek and
\nthe humble will remain, and the lips of all people will call upon God\u2019s
\nname and serve him \u201cshoulder to shoulder\u201d<\/p>\n
\nsuggests that for him this is precisely what Jesus has it in mind to
\nproclaim by choosing to sit on a donkey in that propitious moment. It
\nwas a time for insight, for discovery, even if the crowd didn\u2019t
\ngrasp it– and we are privileged to discover it after the fact. Jesus
\nis not \u201cthere\u201d or \u201chere\u201d to cater to our personal
\nneeds for self-aggrandizement and acquisition. He has not come to allow
\nus to use him for nationalistic or ecclesial purposes. We are not to
\nclaim him as the one who defends Americans against Iraq or North Korea,
\nLutherans against Catholics or Presbyterians. He is not the hero for
\nthe conflicts we choose to wage or the defender of those who subjugate
\nothers out of pride or arrogance. This is no triumphalist messiah! This
\nis rather he who, in the tradition of Zephaniah, will quiet you with
\nhis love and gather the outcast. This is he who, in the words of Zechariah,
\nwill come with righteousness and salvation proclaiming peace to the nations.
\nAs Israel\u2019s king and our king, he will wear no golden crown and
\npurple robe, but the crown of thorns and the robe of mockery. When in
\nthe depth of his humiliation he is finally crucified, he also puts to
\ndeath all our egotistic claims for self-assertion and national pride.
\nTheir power over us is destroyed in his death. And in the life which
\nis resurrected from death to continue with and within us, he frees us
\nto join him, ennobled by an extravagant kindness, in reaching out to
\nthe marginalized and underserved people of this earth. His life lives
\nwithin us to reach beyond ecclesial and national boundaries to claim
\nall people for a new community, or a new crowd, if you will, without
\npersonal agenda, without divisions and walls.<\/p>\n
\ninsight or we might be left standing in the old crowd. As the story continues,
\nthis crowd goes about its business, reaffirming a crowd\u2019s desire
\nto meet individual and collective needs. They spread the word that this
\nis the guy who raised Lazarus from the tomb (\u2026and maybe there are
\nmore miracles to come!). The Pharisees grumble because they are left
\nout of the loop. And life goes on as if not much has changed; at least
\nas far as such crowds are concerned. However, there are a couple of hints
\nfrom John that the insight we were allowed to glimpse is already taking
\non form and fulfillment. The Pharisees say \u201cLook how the
\nwhole world <\/strong>has gone after him,\u201d hinting in John\u2019s hyperbolic language
\nat the universalistic intent of Jesus\u2019 life and work which exceeds
\npetty nationalism. And in the very next section, as if by plan (whether
\nJohn\u2019s literary one or a divine one is left to the reader), Greeks
\nfrom that very wide world to which Jesus is sent come to seek him out
\n(12:20f.)<\/p>\n
\nlives<\/strong>
\nWe are left to wonder in today\u2019s Palm Sunday gathering, more or
\nless a crowd, if it\u2019s possible for us to see things differently
\nas a result of having been allowed by John to step outside the old crowd
\nfor a moment and understand things as they were meant to be, not as we
\nin our humanness all too often allow them to be. What might be different
\nabout our thoughts and actions if we in the light of resurrection insight
\nreject any claims upon Jesus as defender of personal or national interests?
\nHow might our prayers change if our view of the Messiah changed\u2014and
\nwe understood him to be here not merely to grant our egotistic needs
\nbut to help us reach out to the disenfranchised, whether in Harlem, Iraq
\nor Zambia? How might our nationalistic strategies change if we accepted
\na Messiah who called us to reject the horses of war in favor of the donkey
\nof peace? And how might our international views change if we hear God
\ncalling us to work \u201cshoulder to shoulder\u201d with all humankind
\nbecause the challenge to reclaim the outcasts and the forgotten is too
\ngreat for any of us to bear alone?<\/p>\n
\nPlay It Forward <\/em>(which became a movie starring Haley Joel Osment) by
\nCatherine Ryan Hyde. The story asks each of us: When we do something
\nfor another, and they respond, \u201cHow can I pay you back,\u201d could
\nwe not say, \u201cDon\u2019t pay it back, pay it forward!\u201d In
\nother words, motivated by this good feeling of affirmation you have received
\nin being graced by another\u2019s kindness, could you seek to change
\nthe world by affirming others in their respective needs? Trevor\u2019s
\nteacher (Kevin Spacey) in the movie tells the boy that his plan is a
\nbit \u201cidealistic,\u201d and no one in Trevor\u2019s support system
\nof family or friends really believes that this concept envisioned as
\na school project to change the world has much application. But the man
\non the donkey on the road to Jerusalem was counting on Trevor\u2019s
\nidea being realized. He was worried that crowd hysteria coupled with
\npersonal greed and national arrogance might take his mission in the wrong
\ndirection. He was troubled that it never occurred to people that traditional
\nhuman approaches (establishing meaning through acquisition, shows of
\nstrength, power plays, and wars) never brought humans to a higher level.
\nHis self-emptying lifestyle wanted and wants so very much to live in
\nand through us, helping us to transcend our human limitations. His extravagant
\nkindness seeks to claim us personally– and lay claim to all humankind
\npotentially.<\/p>\n
\nsit here pondering this ancient story, wondering if its meaning can provide
\nanything of value for our ordinary days. Again and again, we know how
\neasy it is to get lost in the crowd, to follow human nature\u2019s need
\nto establish personal and collective self-worth with acquisition, self-affirmation
\nand arrogance. One thing we\u2019ve learned from this text, however,
\nis that there are different kinds of crowds. Some which are merely in
\nit for themselves will get lost on the road\u2014no matter how much
\nshouting they do. There is good reason, therefore, to check before you
\ngo too far to see whether the crowd you\u2019re following has a man
\non a donkey up front!<\/p>\n
\n