Daily Old Testament and Early Christian Writings: 2 Chronicles 33 and Augustine's Treatise on Profit of Believing 34

2 Chronicles 33 – Manasseh is 12 when he succeeds his father. He reigns 55 years in Jerusalem, but does what is evil in the sight of God. He rebuilds the high places, erects altars to the Baals, makes sacred poles and worships “all the host of heaven” (33:3). He builds altars for these gods even in the two courts of the Temple. He makes his own son “pass through fire in the valley of the son of Hinnom” (33:6), practices sorcery and consults mediums.

He so misled his people they actually were worse than the people whom God had displaced in their name (33:9). The Lord speaks to Manasseh and his people, but they give no heed to him. So God brings the king of Assyria against them. The king takes Manasseh captive and brings him to Babylon. There, in distress, Manasseh finally calls upon the Lord and the Lord “heard his plea, and restored him again to Jerusalem and to his kingdom” (33:13).

In Jerusalem again, he builds outer walls, fortifies cities and takes away the foreign gods from the Temple. He restores the altar of the Lord and offers sacrifices on it. The people, however, still sacrifice on the high places.

When Manasseh dies, his son Amon, aged 22, succeeds. He does what is evil as his father had. He did not humble himself before the Lord though. His servants conspire against him and kill him. But the people of the land kill the conspirators and make his son Josiah king at the age of 8.

Augustine’s Treatise on the Profit of Believing

34 - This is, believe me, a most wholesome authority, this a lifting up first of our mind from dwelling on the earth, this a turning from the love of this world unto the True God. It is authority alone which moves fools to hasten unto wisdom. So long as we cannot understand pure (truths), it is indeed wretched to be deceived by authority, but surely more wretched not to be moved. For, if the Providence of God preside not over human affairs, we have no need to busy ourselves about religion. But if both the outward form of all things, which we must believe assuredly flows from some fountain of truest beauty, and some, I know not what, inward conscience exhorts, as it were, in public and in private, all the better order of minds to seek God, and to serve God; we must not give up all hope that the same God Himself has appointed some authority, whereon, resting as on a sure step, we may be lifted up unto God.  I love the humility and mindfulness of his words here.

But this, setting aside reason, which (as we have often said) it is very hard for fools to understand pure, moves us two ways; in part by miracles, in part by multitude of followers: no one of these is necessary to the wise man; who denies it? But this is now the business in hand, that we may be able to be wise, that is, to cleave to the truth; which the filthy soul is utterly unable to do: but the filth of the soul, to say shortly what I mean, is the love of any things whatsoever save God and the soul: from which filth the more any one is cleansed, the more easily he sees the truth. Therefore to wish to see the truth, in order to purge your soul, when as it is purged for the very purpose that you may see, is surely perverse and preposterous. Therefore to man unable to see the truth, authority is at hand, in order that he may be made fitted for it, and may allow himself to be cleansed; and, as I said a little above, no one doubts that this prevails, in part by miracles, in part by multitude. But I call that a miracle, whatever appears that is difficult or unusual above the hope or power of them who wonder. Of which kind there is nothing more suited for the people, and in general for foolish men, than what is brought near to the senses. But these, again, are divided into two kinds; for there are certain, which cause only wonder, but certain others procure also great favor and good-will.

For, if one were to see a man flying, inasmuch as that matter brings no advantage to the spectator, beside the spectacle itself, he only wonders. But if any affected with grievous and hopeless disease were to recover straightway, upon being bidden, his affection for him who heals, will go beyond even his wonder at his healing. Such were done at that time at which God in True Man appeared unto men, as much as was enough. The sick were healed, the lepers were cleansed; walking was restored to the lame, sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf. The men of that time saw water turned into wine, five thousand filled with five loaves, seas passed on foot, dead rising again: thus certain provided for the good of the body by more open benefit, certain again for the good of the soul by more hidden sign, and all for the good of men by their witness to Majesty: thus, at that time, was the divine authority moving towards Itself the wandering souls of mortal men.

Why, say you, do not those things take place now? Because they would not move, unless they were wonderful, and, if they were usual, they would not be wonderful. For the interchanges of day and night, and the settled order of things in Heaven, the revolution of years divided into four parts, the fall and return of leaves to trees, the boundless power of seeds, the beauty of light, the varieties of colors, sounds, tastes, and scents, let there be some one who shall see and perceive them for the first time, and yet such an one as we may converse with; he is stupified and overwhelmed with miracles: but we contemn all these, not because they are easy to understand, (for what more obscure than the causes of these?) but surely because they constantly meet our senses. Therefore they were done at a very suitable time, in order that, by these a multitude of believers having been gathered together and spread abroad, authority might be turned with effect upon habits.

Daily Bible Reading: Sirach [Ecclesiasticus] 48-49 and Acts 23:11-35

Sirach 48 – Elija – A prophet who “arose like a fire” brought famine on the land for the sins committed. He was “taken up in the whirlwind of fire, in a chariot with fiery horses” (48:8-9). And there is an allusion to immortality for those who fall asleep “in love” [of God]. They “too will have life” (48:11).

Then Elisha – He was filled with Elijah’s spirit. “No task was too hard for him, and even in death his body prophesied” (48:13) for that the dead were restored to life.

The people, however, remained unfaithful until they were scattered.

Hezekiah “fortified his city and laid on a water supply inside it; with iron he tunneled through the rock and constructed cisterns” (48:17). Sennacherib invaded, but the people were “delivered” by the hand of Isaiah (48:20).

Isaiah was “Trustworthy in his vision” (48:22). “He revealed the future to the end of time, and hidden things long before they happened” (48:25).

Sirach 49 – Josiah – Memory of him is sweet: “[H]e set his heart on the Lord, in godless times he upheld the cause of religion” (49:3).

Aside from these celebrated men, the people “all heaped wrong on wrong. . .they disregarded the Law of the Most High” (49:4), and so they finally disappeared. “The holy, chosen city was burnt down, her streets were left deserted, as Jeremiah had predicted” (49:6).

Nehemiah is remembered for rebuilding the walls and reestablishing the city.

Then in an apparent retrospect, the author returns briefly to a few names already mentioned: “No one else has ever been created on earth to equal Enoch, for he was taken up from earth. And no one else ever born has been like Joseph, the leader of his brothers, the prop of his people; his bones were honored. Shem and Seth were honored among men, but above every living creature is Adam” (49:14-16).  It’s a little confusing to have this retrospect and puzzling that Adam should now be on the list. Perhaps the author is just celebrating “man” for Adam certainly is mostly remembered for his “fall” and not for any real accomplishment. 

Acts 23:11-35 – The Roman commander who had originally taken Paul into custody when the controversy among Jews of different persuasions had become a threat to the peace now realizes Paul will likely not survive the battle that has broken out. He orders Paul taken to a Roman fort nearby.

Here, in the fort, the Lord comes to Paul and assures him: “Don't be afraid! You have given your witness for me here in Jerusalem, and you must also do the same in Rome” (23:11).

A conspiracy to kill Paul develops among the Jews, involving more than 40 men. They ask to have Paul brought before the Sanhedrin again “to get more accurate information about him” (23:15) – they will kill him then. Paul’s nephew hears about the plot and goes to the centurions. The commander – Claudius Lysias - orders some 300 soldiers to escort Paul to the Governor – Antoninus Felix – in Caesarea. He was Roman Governor between 52 and 59 or 60 AD. He orders Paul to be kept under guard in his headquarters until Paul’s accusers can be sent for.

 

Daily Bible Reading: 2 Kings 22-23 and Luke 16

2 Kings 22 – Josiah is just eight years old when he comes to the throne.  He will serve 31 years (640-609), and he will do “what [is] right in the sight of the Lord” (22:2). He begins another restoration of the temple (the last was done by Joash of Judah during his reign about two hundred years earlier). Hilkiah reports that (in the process of restoration?) they have found in the Temple the book of the law. 

This is almost certainly the book of Deuteronomy, or at least that part of it that recites the law.  It had either been lost or forgotten during Manasseh’s reign according to The Jerusalem Bible note. Judging from what is in the narrative, however, it sounds as if they had been without it for most of the time the monarchy existed, for about 500 years. 

It says they hadn’t celebrated the Passover since the time of the judges, some 400 years earlier!!!

Shaphan, the king’s secretary tells Josiah about the find. When he learns of it, the king “tears his clothes” and commands Hilkiah to inquire of the Lord on behalf of him and all the people, what they should do. So the king’s men go to Huldah, a prophetess, in the Second Quarter in Jerusalem; and she declares that the Lord will indeed bring disaster on Jerusalem as it says in the book they have found, but that “because [the king’s] heart was penitent, and [he] has humbled [himself] before the Lord. . .I also have heard you. . .Therefore, I will gather you to your ancestors, and you shall be gathered to your grave in peace; your eyes shall not see all the disaster that I will bring on this place” (22:19-20). The fact that it is a “prophetess” who authenticates this amazing find is very interesting to me – it seems an unusual role of authority for a woman at this time.

2 Kings 23 – The king gathers all the elders and people, “small and great,” before the house of the Lord, and there he reads “in their hearing all the words of the book of the covenant that had been found. . .The king stood by the pillar and made a covenant before the Lord to follow the Lord, keeping his commandments, his decrees, and his statutes, with all his heart and all his soul, to perform the words of this covenant that were written in this book.  All the people joined in the covenant” (23:2-3).

                 

After this, the king goes throughout the land removing all the offensive sites and remnants of idol worship that have plagued the land: he removes the vessels made for Baal and Asherah and “all the host of heaven”; he deposes the idolatrous priests who made offerings on the high places in the cities of Judah and around Jerusalem; those who made offerings to Baal, the sun, moon and constellations; he destroys the image of Asherah; breaks down the houses of the male temple prostitutes that were in the Temple where the women did weaving for Asherah; he brought the priests out of the towns of Judah and defiled the high places; he defiles Topheth in the valley of Ben-hinnom “so that no one would make a son or a daughter pass through fire as an offering to Molech” (23:10). He “removed the horses that the kings of Judah had dedicated to the sun, at the entrance” to the Temple; burned the chariots of the sun.  He took down altars the kings of Judah had made; he defiles the high places east of Jerusalem, south of the Mount of Destruction, which King Solomon had built for Astarte, Chemosh, and Milcom; he burns the sacred poles and covers the sites with human bones.  All the idolatrous worship sites and practices he uproots and destroys. The Jerusalem Bible notes that it was Josiah who completely centralized the worship, eliminating the Yahwist high places entirely.

The king then commands that all the people begin to keep the Passover. It had not been observed since the time of the judges in Israel. They begin again in the 18^th year of King Josiah. “Before him there was no king like him, who turned to the Lord with all his heart, with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the law of Moses; nor did any like him arise after him” (23:25). “Still, the Lord did not turn from the fierceness of his great wrath, by which his anger was kindled against Judah, because of all the provocations with which Manasseh had provoked him. . .’I will remove Judah also out of my sight, as I have removed Israel; and I will reject this city that I have chosen, Jerusalem, and the house of which I said, My name shall be there’” (23:26-27).

                 

During Josiah’s reign, Pharaoh Neco went up to the king of Assyria, and King Josiah went to meet him. The Pharaoh killed Josiah at Megiddo; he is carried back to Jerusalem and Jehoahaz (609), his son becomes king. He reigns only three months and does what is evil. The Pharaoh confines him at Riblah in Hamath and imposes tribute on the land.  Then he makes Eliakim, son of Josiah, king and changes his name to Jehoiakim. He takes Jehoahaz away to Egypt where he dies. Jehoiakim pays tribute to Pharaoh and taxes the people to pay it. Jehoiakim reigns eleven years, but he does what is evil.

Luke 16 – Another puzzling parable—the manager of a rich man’s property is accused of “squandering his property” (16:1).  The master demands an accounting.  The manager, seeing he will lose his job, ponders how he will live without it.  Suddenly he realizes he may have to depend on the charity of people he knows, so he considers how he could change his relations with them.  He will reduce the debt burden each owes to him and in this way secure the “friendship” of each one.  The master commends him for his shrewdness.

And Jesus concludes by saying “the children of this world are more astute in dealing with their own kind than are the children of light” (16:8). The available translations of Jesus’ next words are all difficult to understand. He says, “I tell you this: use money, tainted as it is, to win you friends, and thus make sure that when it fails you, they will welcome you into the tents of eternity. The man who can be trusted in little things can be trusted in great; the man who is dishonest in little things will be dishonest in great. . . No servant can be the slave of two masters: he will either hate the first and love the second, or treat the first with respect and the second with scorn. You cannot be the slave both of God and of money’” (16:10-13). I’m not sure I want my politicians to live by this advice!

Reflection: Challenged by this reading every time I have to tackle it, and doing a little research on it with “google,” it occurred to me that Jesus is responding to the shrewdness of this servant the same way I responded to an experience I had in Rome back in the spring of 2000. I had just arrived in Rome and gotten my first Italian money out of an ATM machine. I broke one of the large bills to buy a subway token and put the money in a small, traveler’s purse I wore that hung from a string around my neck and under a fleece I had, so it would be secure. On the very crowded subway I got onto, I found myself approached by a woman with a baby, and I – of course -- was completely attracted to the adorable child for the entire subway ride. When I got out and later went to get more money out of my purse, I discovered I had been robbed. While I was distracted, someone had gone under my fleece, unclipped the purse, unzipped the slot where the money was, taken out ONLY the large, unbroken bills AND my airline ticket and left the small bills behind. The purse was zipped, clipped and under my fleece when I finished my ride.  My reaction was just like Jesus’ – wow!! I had to admire the cleverness involved even though I had been robbed. If we could just be as SMART about spiritual things as we are about worldly things!

                 

You may be incredibly intelligent and shrewd, but you have to choose the “master” you serve. You cannot serve both God and money” (16:13). The Pharisees are said here to be lovers of money and not happy at this teaching. They look for external and present rewards—not inward, invisible or eternal things. “You are those who justify yourselves in the sight of others; but God knows your hearts; for what is prized by human beings is an abomination in the sight of God” (16:15).

                 

On the Law: Jesus says, “The Law of Moses and the writing of the prophets were in effect up to the time of John the Baptist; since then the Good News about the Kingdom of God is being told, and everyone forces their way in. But it is easier for heaven and earth to disappear than for the smallest detail of the Law to be done away with” (16:17). Why are Jesus’ parables uses to teach us SO HARD TO PENETRATE? Is Jesus saying that the Law is no longer important? Or he is just saying that it’s the legalistic Pharisaic approach that is outdated? He seems to be saying that the Law can no more be done away with than “heaven and earth,” but then what is it that’s changed with the coming of John the Baptist?

                 

Jesus’ teaching on divorce is given briefly and without putting it in the context of Genesis as in Mark.

                 

The parable of the rich man and Lazarus follows: A rich man lives side by side with a very poor man who lays at his gate “covered with sores” (16: 21). He “longed to satisfy his hunger with what fell from the rich man’s table; even the dogs would come and lick his sores” (16:21). These lines in the parable open a little light on the difficult story of Jesus and the Samaritan woman who also tells him that she will readily live on the crumbs that fall from the table set for the Jews.  She is like Lazarus too and will get her reward at the heavenly banquet.  When they die, however, it is Lazarus—the poor man—who is at the side of Abraham, not the rich, important man.  The rich man is the beggar there, begging Father Abraham to have mercy on him.  Abraham tells him it is Lazarus’ time to be comforted. “Between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us” (16:26). The rich man begs Abraham to send Lazarus to his five brothers still alive so that we may warn them. But Abraham says, “’They have Moses and the prophets; they should listen to them.’ He said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead’” (16:27-30).

Here the lesson of the earlier readings is extended to the situation where the punitive justice of God is extended not only to the active evil-doer but the careless and selfish who go through life seeking or accepting their own material comfort and never thinking about the needs of their fellow men, especially those in their path whose needs are visible to them on a daily basis.  The overall lesson is that if we want to do the will of God and plant our lives by the streams of living water, which God offers us, we must not only avoid doing evil and persecuting the righteous but we must care for our brothers and sisters in need.  Also the scope of blessing and curse are seen to run beyond death into an eternal dimension we may not reckon with in our day-to-day calculations.

Daily Bible Reading: 2 Kings 20-21 and Luke 15

2 Kings 20 – Hezekiah becomes sick—he has some kind of boil—and Isaiah comes to tell him he should set his house in order; he is going to die.  He turns “his face to the wall” and prays that the Lord will “remember . . . how I have walked before you in faithfulness with a whole heart, and have done what is good in your sight” (20:3).

As Isaiah is leaving, the Lord comes to him and tells him to go back and say to Hezekiah that He has heard Hezekiah’s prayer, seen his tears and will add fifteen years to his life (20:6). Furthermore, he will deliver Jerusalem and the king out of the hands of the Assyrians. Hezekiah wants some kind of sign from the Lord that this prophecy will be realized, and Isaiah tells him the shadow on the sundial will retreat rather than advance for ten intervals as a sign that God fully intends to make the prophecy come true.

                 

The king of Babylon, Merodach-baladan, sends letters and a present to Hezekiah when he is ill. Hezekiah responds by showing his envoys all the treasure he has – foolishly revealing everything of any value he has. Isaiah asks him about it and tells him at the end that in the future Babylon will carry everything away, even his sons.  Rather than getting disturbed by this prophecy, Hezekiah gives a rather short-sighted [and self-centered in my opinion] answer: “Why not, if there will be peace and security in my days?” (20:19). When Hezekiah dies, his son Manasseh succeeds him.

2 Kings 21 – Manasseh is just twelve years old when he succeeds his father; he will serve 55 years (687-642) as king and will do what is evil.  He backtracks on everything his father did. He rebuilds the high places, erects altars for Baal everywhere (21:3). He even makes his son “pass through fire” (21:6); he practices soothsaying, augury and other such magical arts. 

The Lord sends his prophets to tell him that because of these things, “I will bring such a disaster on Jerusalem and Judah that everyone who hears about it will be stunned. I will punish Jerusalem as I did Samaria, as I did King Ahab of Israel and his descendants. I will wipe Jerusalem clean of its people, as clean as a plate that has been wiped and turned upside down. I will abandon the people who survive, and will hand them over to their enemies, who will conquer them and plunder their land” (21:13-14).

Manasseh also sheds much innocent blood.  When he dies, he is succeeded by his 22 year old son Amon (642-640). He also does what is evil. He is killed by servants of his, but they are caught and killed by the “people of the land” so his son Josiah comes to the throne.

Luke 15 – The Pharisees and Scribes who spend their lives dedicated to the Law and the religious life of the community, complain that Jesus is always eating with sinners and outcasts.

Jesus responds with a beautiful parable: “Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them – what do you do? You leave the other ninety-nine sheep in the pasture and go looking for the one that got lost” (15:4). And if you find it, of course you rejoice! “Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance” (15:7). Likewise, a woman with ten coins who loses one, will “light a lamp, sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it” (15:8).

                 

Then Jesus tells the parable of the prodigal son: A man has two sons. One of them asks for the property that will one day be his, and he goes off and squanders it “in dissolute living.” When it is all gone, a famine comes and he is reduced to dire need.  He ends up caring for pigs and envying the pigs their food. But he finally “comes to himself” and thinks of his home—how even the hired hands there have bread to spare.  So he resolves to get up and return in shame. “I will say to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me like one of your hired hands’” (15:18-19).

He returns home, and his father sees him coming. Seeing him, his father is “filled with compassion; he ran and put his arms around him and kissed him” (15:20). Then the son says the words he has rehearsed, and the father throws a lavish party.  At this the elder son become angry (15:28) and refuses even to enter the house.  When he speaks to his father, he complains that he never did what the younger son did but his father never threw him such a joyous party.  The father says, “’Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours.  But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found’” (15:31-32.)

The father tries to make him appreciate the miracle of his brother’s repentance and return, but one is left with a feeling that those who are habitually obedient will never understand the miracle of repentance and return that can happen after making terrible life-choices, or the depth of love in people, parents especially and in our Lord, that makes it possible.