Mud

We live in a world of mud. Everywhere we turn there is mud. Nothing but mud. We are born in mud. We live in mud. We die in mud. When we first open our eyes, the only thing we see is mud. Our mother and father are covered in mud. We look at ourselves and we see mud.

From our perspective, we are muddy and live in a world of mud – much like the Elbonians of Scott Adam’s comic strip Dilbert. We really don’t know what it’s like to live without mud or to be free of mud. We cannot tell if the mud is part of nature or part of our nature. It makes no practical difference, does it? We are so close to the mud that we just don’t know what it is like to be without it.

To the Theologians of the of the Western Church, the mud is part of our nature. To the theologians of the Eastern Church, mud is an innate part of nature into which we are born.

The only way to be clean is through Baptism. Baptism washes away the mud. “Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow,” as the Psalmist says (Ps 50:7). However, after we’ve been baptized, we can go back and wallow in the mud, if we choose to do so. Absolution will give us another chance, another shower, and the Eucharist is the food to give us strength to choose not to return to the mud.

Augustine tells us that the mud is part of our nature and that all succeeding generations will also be muddy. Calvin went a step further and claimed that all we are is mud; that we are mud to our very core. The East maintains that we are only covered in mud and that theosis is the process whereby we eventually choose to return to the way we were originally created (Gen 1:27-31 [tov meod and all that]) and to then stay out of the mud.

Some of us are like Pig-Pen in the Charles M. Schultz comic strip, Peanuts; we cannot seem to get away from the mud – it follows us where ever we go. Most of us like the feeling of being clean, but we continually go back and take a mud bath because it’s more comfortable – like an elephant wanting to stay cool and keep the flies away. The rarest of us learn to stay clean like St. Mary of Egypt or St. Moses the Black – both started off as two of the foulest people on earth, turned their lives around and lived godly lives. The rarest of us all is the Theotokos, the Virgin Mary, who never got muddy in the first place.

The West and the East disagree on the how St. Mary the Virgin never got muddy, but completely agree that she stayed mud-free. The Catholic West, which believes that  our human nature is muddy, says that the Mother of God was conceived without any mud, while the Eastern Church, which believes that nature is muddy, says that the Virgin chose not to play or live in the mud.

I find it easier to believe that the Theotokos chose not to play in the mud like the rest of us. That doesn’t mean I’m right, of course. The Catholic West could be right. However, from my perspective down here in the mud, it really doesn’t matter. All I see is mud.

The Beheading of St. John, Baptist and Forerunner

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Only the Orthodox, to my knowledge, honor and venerate St. John to the extent we do. Even the Catholics, who hold much of the same Tradition as we do, do not honor him with such extensive hymnody as we. During Great Vespers and Matins on his feast day, we sing an amazing amount of hymns in his honor. Not only this, but we also have this strange custom of fasting on the feast day of his beheading – even if it is a Sunday. He’s prominently featured on every iconostas just to the right of the icon of the Christ. The Orthodox Church remembers Saint John the Forerunner on no less than six separate feast days. http://www.orthodoxwiki.org/John_the_Forerunner

At each Divine Liturgy, we commemorate St. John the Baptist during the Proskomedia where we prepare the bread for communion. He is commemorated immediately after the Theotokos as the first of the nine ranks of saintly commemoration. He’s commemorated during Vespers:  “O God, save Thy people, and bless Thine inheritance… through the intercessions of our all-immaculate Lady, the Theotokos and Ever-virgin Mary… of the honorable, glorious Prophet, Forerunner and Baptist John…” He is frequently honored during the dismissals at  the end liturgies:  “May Christ our true God; through the prayers of His Most Pure Mother, the Theotokos and Ever-virgin Mary… by the supplications of the venerable, glorious Prophet, Forerunner and Baptist, John…; have mercy on us and save us, for He is a merciful God and lovest mankind.”

SO…

I had to ask the question today, “what is it about St. John, the Baptist and Forerunner, and about our Orthodox theology that has moved us to commemorate him so extensively?” I am by no means a learned scholar nor theologian, but in trying to answer that question, I turned back to the Troparion and Kontakion written for him:

Troparion of St. John the Baptist, Tone 2

The memory of the righteous is celebrated with hymns of praise, /
but the Lord’s testimony is sufficient for thee, O Forerunner; /
for thou hast proved to be even more venerable than the prophets /
since thou wast granted to baptize in the running waters Him Whom they proclaimed. /
Wherefore, having contested for the truth, /
thou didst rejoice to announce the good tidings even to those in Hades; /
that God hath appeared in the flesh, //
taking away the sin of the world and granting us great mercy.

Kontakion of St. John the Baptist, Tone 5

The glorious beheading of the Forerunner /
was part of God’s dispensation, /
that the coming of the Savior might also be preached to those in hades. /
Lament then, Herodias, that thou hast demanded a wicked murder, /
for thou didst love neither the law of God nor eternal life, //
but one false and fleeting.

Within these two hymns are the simplest and most direct references as to what it is about the Baptist that draws us Orthodox to him:  He was deemed worthy to baptize the Christ, and he preached the Good News of the coming of the Savior to those in Hades. What then, is it about these two actions that have moved us to think of the Forerunner so dearly?

St. John, Baptist and Forerunner, is considered the last of the Old Testament prophets because he was killed before the Resurrection and Christ’s descent into Hades. He’s considered the second Christian because, after the Virgin, he was the first to acknowledge Jesus as the Christ by leaping in Elizabeth’s womb.

St. John’s ministry was to proclaim the coming of the Messiah, by preaching baptism for repentance from sin and turning away from selfish pursuits. Consequently, after he baptized Jesus, his ministry began to wane, although he continued to proclaim that Jesus was the Messiah. His ministry was abruptly halted by his imprisonment by Herod for taking Herod to task for marrying his brother Philip’s wife, Herodias. After his death, we believe he preached the Gospel to those in Hades.

As the last of the Old Testament prophets, St. John had a unique ministry to be the one to baptize Jesus, to “fulfill all righteousness” (Matt. 3:15). As the first of the prophets to have personally witnessed the Incarnate God in the flesh, he had a unique opportunity to be a personal witness to those who had died.

St. John the Baptist and Forerunner, holds a special place among Orthodox saints simply because of his unique ministry of baptizing the Christ and preaching to the dead.

Related Articles

• John the Baptist in Bulgaria? (beliefnet.com)
• Remains of St John the Baptist ‘found’ (bbc.co.uk)

The Parable of the Unforgiving Servant

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We recognize that in the person of this king is signified the Son of God, who held the whole human race guilty in the infinite debt of sin., since through the first sin we were all debtors of sin and death. In the ten thousand talents the serious sins of the human race are signified. And though all men by natural law were debtors to this heavenly king and guilty – since the apostle say about the same natural law that “all men, both Jews and Greeks, are under the power of sin” (Rom 3:9) – yet in this debt of sin the people of the Jews were particularly guilty. After so many great benefits they could not keep the law received through Moses. But in no way could either the people of the Jews, who had received the law, nor the Gentiles, that is, we ourselves, pay off such a great debt of sin. Hence the heavenly King, moved by pity and mercy, forgave us all our sins. And what are these sins? Those that every day in our prayers we ask to be forgiven, saying, “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.” Therefore, since in no way – that is, with no satisfaction and no worthy penitence – could we pay off this debt of sin and eternal death, that eternal King came down from heaven and by remitting the human race its sins forgave all the debt of every one who believes in him. How he forgave it the holy apostle clearly shows when he thus says, “having canceled the bond which stood against us with its legal demands; this he set aside, nailing it to the cross.” (Col 2:14) For we are held in sin-guilt as if under the debt of some creditor note. The Son of God has annulled this note written against us by the water of baptism and the drops of his blood.

St. Chromatius, Archbishop of Aquileia (d. ca. 406/407), Tractate on Matthew 59.5