By Maximos Pafilis, Bishop of Melitene
Sermon on the Gospel according to Luke 19:1-10
The biblical narrative of the meeting in Jericho carves one of the deepest cuts of the divine economy within the human adventure. While usually we palpate the pericope on the surface, focusing on the picturesqueness of a short man who climbs a tree with childish impetus, the essential drama escapes us; we lose the tragedy that remains silent at the root of the tree, amongst the dust and the vanity of the crowd.
The truth is that this story, although known and told a thousand times, remains terrifyingly alive for all of us. Perhaps because it mirrors us ourselves, our stressful attachment to the form of the “correct” Christian. Studying Zacchaeus of the Gospel pericope, we see that he is a chief tax collector, a quality that in the eyes of the religious elite appeared as absolute miasma. But Christ chose him and not His pious followers. As Saint Theophylact of Bulgaria aptly observes, Christ captures the chief tax collector Zacchaeus unto salvation (Gr. ἀρχιτελώνην τὸν Ζακχαῖον αἰχμαλωτίζει πρὸς σωτηρίαν).[1] No one expected such a move that aims at the abolition of religious compartments. He tears down the ruins that the “righteous” raised to protect, supposedly, God from the world. Paradoxical, but legitimate and necessary for the light to appear.
And here our thought sinks, as we gaze at the crowd. If one thinks about it, those who hinder Zacchaeus are faithful fellow-travellers of Jesus, the so-called present-day “congregation”. The obstruction of the view of God becomes more tragic exactly due to the religious quality of those intervening. The atheists did not hinder him, but the faithful. The problem is that they themselves finally stand as an obstacle, a stone-cold wall of prejudices that leaves no margin for any acceptance. It is impressive, perhaps even scandalous for our own pietistic mentality, that Christ reproves religious hypocrisy with severity—we see it, besides, repeatedly in the Gospels—showing, however, condescension to other sins.
And yet. The idea that we love God more than others is perhaps the worst poison, a mythical-ideological response to our own insecurities, as it concerns the only sin that is dressed in the cloak of virtue. Anyhow, if we fall into this trap, the fall is noiseless and this is extremely dangerous. Because we see that Christ castigates religious hypocrisy with a severity that is completely absent from His stance towards tax collectors and prostitutes, and this is repeated continuously! I think of myself and this thought becomes a stone around my neck. How many times did I refuse invitations from tax collectors and modern Zacchaeuses, trembling lest I be misjudged by my friends, the “good”, the “virtuous”? This stance, a sacrifice at the altar of personal relationships, distanced me from the spirit of love. I felt safe inside my delusion. How many times was I swept away and agreed with hypocrites, laughing ironically at people whom we considered spiritually inferior? I do not easily, comfortably, or in good faith accept this image of myself anymore. I am ashamed of this.
How many times did the voices of the crowd sweep me away… And while I thought, foolish one, that I belonged to a group of “men of God”, I see now with terror that I belonged to a choir of people who “began to mutter” (Luke 19:7). How easy it is for the zealots of tradition to sweep you away into hypocrisy. But we will say these things some other time more analytically. The obsession with forms, instead of taking us to the essence, made us turn our back on the true message of the Gospel (let us not comment that nine out of ten rarely read the Bible and despite this have a theological opinion). We lost our sense of measure. To tell the truth, we eat and drink together judging those who are absent, believing that we belong to the saved, while we are gravediggers who bury our souls with big shovels under religious egoism.
Zacchaeus, however, does not calculate his social environment or his likes and breaks the mold; he climbs and becomes ridiculous in the eyes of the world to welcome the bright stimulus of the Word. Jesus, without asking for change from him or setting rules, simply addresses the “today” to him (Luke 19:9). There were no prerequisites to keep him company. This “today” surpasses time; it is eternity that enters into the now. Because salvation is offered as a direct fruit of faith, bypassing the long temporal process, as Father Heinrich Büttner aptly notes.[2]
This immediacy is what is missing for us, as we postpone life for when we will be ready. Christ desires to enter “our house” immediately, regardless of the disorder. We see how the repentance of Zacchaeus comes as a juicy fruit of the visit, a fact which the moralism that waters the modern Christian is unable to understand. The visit does not happen after the repentance of Zacchaeus but before. However, the hard truth is that we reverse the order. We love hypocrisy, making God the paymaster of our virtue. We, to preserve our name, first ask for repentance and then social interactions. But Christ does the opposite: first He gives love and then the change comes.
And I wonder finally… Who is closer to God? The sinful chief tax collector who hangs from the sycamore, or we, the tidy Christians who have made a God to our own measures? It seems that salvation comes from where you do not expect it, as the Grace of God ignores the rules of good behaviour. God, besides, is indifferent to external good testimony when He distinguishes a heart that burns with the desire for the truth. And I? I who fear to dirty my hands with “sinners”, have I perhaps finally dirtied my heart with the worst filth? Perhaps, while I think that I accompany Jesus, in reality I am simply part of a herd that hinders Him from appearing? “Because the time is near” (Rev. 1:3). Fortunately, the call of divine love remains constantly open, urging everyone to transcend the decay of hypocrisy and to grasp the dirty hand of the passer-by.
[1] Theophylactus of Bulgaria. “Ta Heuriskomena Panta” [The Complete Findings]. In Patrologiae Cursus Completus: Series Graeca. Edited by Jacques-Paul Migne. Vol. 123. Paris: J.-P. Migne, 1883.
[2] Büttner, P. Heinrich. Golgotha: Passion Week Sermons. Translated from German. Burlington, Iowa: The German Literary Board, 1905.
