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Fourth Sunday of Ordinary Time, Year B, January 29, 2006

First reading, Deuteronomy 18:15-20

The Historical and Literary Background: If necessary, let the reader suspend for a moment the sunny assumption that all the Israelites were always devout monotheists. Their literature shows that, while they should have been so, for a long time many were not. Their background and environment urged them to be simply syncretists, that is, people who graft new religious ideas onto existing ones, untroubled by the contradictions. Syncretism let them try to cover all bets in the world of unknown spirits, unforeseeable threats and uncounted possibilities. The god we know as the One God, sometimes called Yahweh in the ancient literature, frankly had to compete for their loyalty over many generations.

In her book A History of God -- The 4000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1993, and London: William Heinemann, Ltd.), Karen Armstrong says the book of Deuteronomy comes from a period when some of Judaism's leaders were emphasizing two complementary ideas: the oneness of God and that God's election of this tribe as his Chosen People. I suspect the latter was to make the former more palatable, for Armstrong says of the struggle to become monotheistic: "The God of the prophets was forcing Israelites to sever themselves from the mythical consciousness of the Middle East and go in quite a different direction from the mainstream. In the agony of Jeremiah, we can see what an immense wrench and dislocation this involved. Israel was a tiny enclave of Yahwism surrounded by a pagan world, and Yahweh was also rejected by many of the Israelites themselves. Even the Deuteronomist, whose image of God was less threatening, saw a meeting with Yahweh as an abrasive confrontation: he makes Moses explain to the Israelites, who are appalled by the prospect of unmediated contact with Yahweh, that God will send them a prophet in each generation to bear the brunt of the divine impact." (p. 56)

Proclaiming It: So in the text at hand:

• Don't let the promise of a prophet sound like a routine thing, but the answer to a perennial serious problem. Make sure your listeners know that it's a prophet that Moses is promising.
• Describe clearly the problem to be solved, that this demanding God was unlike the comfortable, manipulable gods of Israel's neighbors, "Let us not again hear the voice of the LORD, our God, nor see this great fire any more, lest we die."
• Make the Lord sound kind and concerned in the next sentence, "And the Lord said to me, 'This was well said. ...'"
• Even so, one can still die at the hands of this awesome God, either for disregarding the prophet, or for being a false prophet. Pause before "Whoever will not listen," and assume a more stern tone of voice.

Second Reading, 1 Corinthians 7:32-35

Proclaiming It: Since the Apostle is contrasting states of life and their respective anxieties, use contrasting tones of voice as you move from clause to clause and sentence to sentence. Your listeners should hear the difference between the married and unmarried, between concern for the world and concern for the Lord.

Several other commentaries on these passages. All are thoughtful, all quite readable, from the scholarly to the popular. Links may be incomplete more than a few weeks before the "due date."
Lutheran pastor and college teacher Dan Nelson's notes for a study group Dan covers 1 Corinthians 8:1-13 as second reading.	A column by Father Roger Karban on these readings. The Word column from America magazine, the Jesuit weekly.
The Text This Week; links to homilies, art works, movies and other resources on the week's scripture themes	Saint Louis University's excellent Sunday liturgy site. (Available two weeks before the Sunday.)

The Lectionary selections in the frame at the left, if any, are there for your convenience. The publishers of the page in that frame have no connection, except for membership in the one Body of Christ, with the publisher of this page. Likewise the publishers of the pages on the links above.