In the desert Jesus faced the same issue
that confronted the King of Uruk 2,800
years before.
His story is
The Epic of Gilgamesh.
There are
different versions of that story.
This is one.
Gilgamesh,
the young king of Uruk, was a superman
– the greatest athlete, the greatest lover,
the
greatest warrior – too busy being a superman
to pay attention to his
people.
He best
friend, Enkido, was another superman
and they had super adventures
together
until Enkido fell ill
and died.
Up to now
Gilgamesh thought death was for ordinary people.
But if Enkido
could die, then he too was mortal.
So Gilgamesh
went on a quest to find the way to immortality.
He tried
going back to nature and living like a wild animal,
but that turned out to be a subhuman
life not worth living.
He tried
hedonism. Eat, drink, and be merry.
If you live
life with enough gusto it will go on forever.
But that
just gave him a hangover.
So he
crossed an ocean to find a spiritual master
seeking a religion to escape death.
But religion
proved to be just beyond his capacity.
All his
efforts to escape the common lot of humankind failed.
So he got
back in his boat and went home.
As he
arrived at the shore of his kingdom,
he looked up and saw his city.
The story
ends with his words, “Lo the walls of Uruk.”
Gilgamesh, a
mortal man, went back to his mortal people
and took up the task of caring for
them.
He repented
of his narcissism
and became a responsible member of
the human race.
Last
Wednesday, many of us had crosses traced in ashes
upon our foreheads and were told in
somber tones
that we are dust and to dust we
shall return.
In his
classic book, The Denial of Death,
Ernest Becker wrote,
“The idea of death . . . haunts the
human animal
like nothing else.”
Psychoanalyst
Erich Fromm said we suffer from this fear
because of all creation we alone are
caught in the existential paradox.
We are
spiritual beings, capable of reflection,
interpretation, and aspiration.
We treasure
the spiritual realm like angels.
But we are
nonetheless animals who die like animals.
The paradox
is there in the 82nd Psalm,
“You are Gods. You are sons of the
Most High.
But you will die like mere men.”
And Psalm
49:
“No man can redeem the life of
another or ransom his own life
. . . . Man, despite his
riches does not endure
but he is like the
beasts that perish.”
Because we
are spiritual, we do not feel that we should be mortal.
But we are –
and nothing can change that hard fact.
Our
Christian faith ultimately answers death with resurrection
to a new and better life.
But that
does not happen until we have lost this life
which is so rightly precious to us.
We don’t get
to Easter without walking the Lenten way
all the way through Good Friday.
If we feel
spiritual, Jesus was more so.
He learned
at the Jordan River that he was the Son of God.
But what did
that mean?
He went to
the desert to find out.
And Satan
had some answers.
The desert
told Jesus that he was still a mortal animal.
The sun did
not spare his skin.
He was
hungry and thirsty as anyone would be.
The desert
did not care that he was mortal.
Then along
came Satan inviting him to escape
from the common lot of humanity.
Along came
Satan offering material sustenance and comfort.
Along came
Satan offering protection from the death dealing
power of the nature’s laws.
“Jump off
the temple. You will not die. Just claim your divine status.”
Along came
Satan offering world dominion.
Surely if we
can gather enough power, it will make us immortal.
Satan
introduced each of the temptations with “if you are the Son of God.”
He said
anyone as spiritual as Jesus ought to be exempt
from the fate of ordinary people.
But Jesus
said no to all the temptations.
Gilgamesh had
already tried all of those things
and knew they didn’t work.
Maybe Jesus
had read Gilgamesh. We don’t know.
But Jesus
didn’t escape his humanity by being the Son of God.
Instead,
like Gilgamesh going home to Uruk,
Jesus went home to Galilee.
There, he
didn’t call himself “the Son of God.”
He called
himself “the Son of Man”
to claim his humanity, his
brotherhood with us.
Being mortal
together is a profound connection.
Poet
laureate Ted Kooser wrote in his poem “Mourners,”
“After the funeral, the mourners gather
under the
rustling churchyard maples
and talk
softly, . . . .
They came
this afternoon to say goodbye,
but now
they keep saying hello and hello,
peering
into each other’s faces,
slow to let
go of each other’s hands.”
This life we share is
precious because it is brief.
When we
remember that,
we value each other a little more.
The brevity
of life is reason enough to be kinder.
The
vulnerability of life is reason enough for patience and generosity.
There is
something proud and individualistic
in the spirituality of our time.
Whether it
is Christian, New Age, or the Westernized versions
of ancient Eastern philosophies,
it all seems aimed at making
ourselves alright
– at escaping the
hardness of life and death.
Have faith.
Fill up your tank with the Holy Spirit
and your life will be just fine.
Just
meditate until you realize your problems
and those of your neighbors are just
thoughts.
Get your
mind right and be happy.
But that
kind of spirituality is a pipe dream,
aptly portrayed in Paul Simon’s
lyrics,
“So I’ll continue to continue to
pretend
My life will never end
And flowers never bend with the
rainfall.”
But Jesus
did not teach, and did not live,
a spirituality of escape from the
human condition.
He did not offer
a way of salvation from life and death
but a way of salvation through life
and death.
Jesus faced
his own vulnerability and made it the
point
of connection with us in our
vulnerability.
The poem “In
A Parish” by Czeslaw Milosz
expresses the compassion that comes
from knowing
our own vulnerability and
fallibility.
The poet
surveys a parish graveyard and says,
“Had I not been frail and half
broken inside
I wouldn’t think of them, who are like myself
broken inside.
I would not climb the cemetery hill by the
church
To get rid of my self-pity.
Crazy Sophies,
Michaels who lost every battle,
Self-destructive Agathas
Lie under crosses with their dates
of birth and death. And who
Is going to express them? Their
mumblings, weepings, hopes,
tears of humiliation?”
On Ash
Wednesday the Church reminds us that we are dust
so that we will be a little kinder
to the dust next to us.
In Lent we
remember our sins so that we might be more ready
to forgive the sinner next to us.
The first
step on the Christian way is a serene confidence
in God’s love and our ultimate
salvation.
The second
step is to know our own frailty – our total frailty:
physical, psychological, moral, and
spiritual frailty.
The third
step is to turn the knowledge of our frailty
into gentleness toward one another.
A great
contemporary theologian, Nicholas Wolterstorff,
summed up the Christian way in this
mortal life.
“Mourn humanity’s
mourning,
weep
over humanity’s weeping,
be wounded by humanity’s wounds . .
. .
But do so in the good cheer that a
day of peace is coming.”
This Lent, as a Church, it is time to repent from escapist religion,
from
Gilgamesh’s quest for individual ok-ness.
It is time turn our attention to each other and the communities
where we
live, to organize and restore our communities,
as
Gilgamesh rebuilt the walls of Uruk.
Isaiah 61, the Scripture Jesus chose to define his mission and our
mission,
says, “They
will renew the ruined cities.”
It is time to repent of saving ourselves and rather lose ourselves
in
devotion to God’s mission of mercy.
