Sheep and Goats

Category: Gospel of Luke

  • The Master Could Have Worked With It

    The first two slaves generate commentary boilerplate and unremarkable. Different abilities, different productivities, both doing their best, both praised. But the third slave…..

    “But another one came, saying, ‘Lord, here is your mina that I kept hidden away in a cloth. You see, I was in fear of you, because you are a harsh man; you take what you did not deposit, and you reap what you did not sow.’ He said to him, ‘By your own words I judge you, wicked slave. You knew, did you, that I am a harsh man, taking what I did not deposit and reaping what I did not sow? So why did you not put my money in a bank? Then on my coming, I would have collected it with interest.’” (Luke 19:20-23)

    What I like is that the third slave of Luke 19 approaches the master and hasn’t done a thing with his mina; he has hidden it in a cloth and offers the explanation that he knew his master was a harsh man, taking where he did not deposit and reaping where he did not sow.

    The Master does not deny it! That 3rd slave may have a bad attitude, but he does not deny it. He does reap where he does not sow. He does reap disciples where he did not directly make them himself. Get used to it.

    It is a bad attitude that the slave had but it appears that the master could have worked with it—‘just put it in the bank and I get the interest’ he says. Who knows where the slave picked up his rotten attitude?—maybe he was wronged somewhere In the past. It doesn’t matter. Just deliver the interest and the master can work with it. Depositing it in the bank is not much, but it appears that the Master could have worked with it.

    The parallel illustration at Matt 25 has that “wicked slave” burying his master’s talent in the ground, working up a sweat so as to thwart his Master’s will. Why would anyone do that?

     

  • Love Those Hyperboles! Jesus Tells of the Unrighteous Judge

    When my turn came to comment, I pointed out that when a woman is on full throttle pressing for what she wants, nothing, but nothing, does not yield to her.  (I also pointed out that I knew this only from what others had told me—I did not know it from personal experience.) When I took my wife’s hand just after the meeting, the sister behind me said: “Oh, it’s too late now for kissing up! You should have thought of that before!”

    “Look at the poor guy!” I had said of the unrighteous judge pictured on the video screen. “Leaning back in the chair in total defeat, his one hand tugging at his beard, the fingers of his other hand running through his hair! He doesn’t care about God. He doesn’t care about Man. But this woman continually pleading before him is driving him to distraction! He’ll give her anything she wants—if only she will stop!”

    And then—who is the unrighteous judge said to represent? God!! ‘Look, if you can pester this jerk into giving you justice, how much more so God, who is not inclined to deny it in the first place!’ goes the thinking. Don’t ever say that Jesus does not relish in hyperbole—it is a staple in his tool box—but this is more than hyperbole. It is ‘hyperbole with a twist’ or ‘hyperbole on the rocks’ or something!

    Here is the parable from Luke 18:2-7

    In a certain city there was a judge who had no fear of God and no respect for man. There was also a widow in that city who kept going to him and saying, ‘See that I get justice from my legal opponent.’ Well, for a while he was unwilling, but afterward he said to himself, ‘Although I do not fear God or respect any man, because this widow keeps making me trouble, I will see that she gets justice so that she will not keep coming and wearing me out with her demand.’”

    Then the Lord said: “Hear what the judge, although unrighteous, said!  Certainly, then, will not God cause justice to be done for his chosen ones who cry out to him day and night, while he is patient toward them?  I tell you, he will cause justice to be done to them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of man arrives, will he really find this faith on the earth?”

    Judges weren’t in a hurry back then to bend to the concerns of the poor. They might hold out for a bribe, they might insist on indecipherable procedure, they might just be in a bad mood. To some extent this is true today—they hailing from a class that cannot comprehend the background concerns of the lowly. I had my own slight whiff of this years ago when I took a matter to small claims court and the other fellow simply hired a lawyer who knew his way around whereas I did not. All hell broke out when I went to hand the judge a document without first asking to “approach the bench.”

    I also like the detail thrown in about God: will he not “cause justice to be done for his chosen ones who cry out to him day and night, while he is patient toward them?” Being “patient toward them” is an unnecessary detail—it doesn’t have to be there. It heightens the contrast between God and the unrighteous judge, to be sure, but the parable would stand without it.

    So it must be that the concerns we bring to God are, in the greater scheme of things, quite small to him. “Oh, for crying out loud!” we can picture a pompous human judge saying, “THAT is you silly problem that you can’t solve by yourself and have to pester me with it?”

    God doesn’t do that. High though he may be, he is approachable over low things.

    The second part of the lesson—this was the Jesus Life and Ministry study for the week of 12/8/19—featured another hyperbole of sorts, the contrast between two who approached Him.

    Two men went up into the temple to pray, the one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and began to pray these things to himself, ‘O God, I thank you that I am not like everyone else​—extortioners, unrighteous, adulterers—​or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give the tenth of all things I acquire.’

    But the tax collector, standing at a distance, was not willing even to raise his eyes heavenward but kept beating his chest, saying, ‘O God, be gracious to me, a sinner.’ I tell you, this man went down to his home and was proved more righteous than that Pharisee. Because everyone who exalts himself will be humiliated, but whoever humbles himself will be exalted.

    If you brag on yourself, that opens up a superior distance with regard to others. But if you don’t brag and yet put others down, the effect is the same—it just shifts to another position on the scale. This jerk of a Pharisee does BOTH. He brags on himself AND he puts down the lowly fellow next to him. (Tax collectors, by the way, were universally despised at the time, because they were more or less thugs given to shaking people down for whatever they could get, often irrespective of what they were owed.)

    It’s an over-the-top illustration that somehow conveys in the most touching manner what flies and does not fly in God’s eyes. One brother at the meeting said how, if you put the fasting as a deed of the tax collector, it would mean something, for fasting was a way of showing sincere grief over past moral failings. The Pharisee didn’t seem to grieve too much, did he? Such a self-satisfied lout would be hard to top.

  • Thoughts Gleaned from the Midweek Meeting of September 23-29, 2019

    One young woman at the congregation meeting last night identified with the “missing drachma” parable of Jesus, saying: “When I put my hand in my back pocket and find some money there….Whoa! it is a big deal!” (“Betty Davis style” is how Bob Dylan said it.) I must admit that it inspired me to do the same, slipping a dollar into my back pocket, pulling it out and exclaiming: “Whoa! Look at this!”

    It was this illustration at Luke 15 that got her going: “What woman who has ten drachma coins, if she loses one of the drachmas, does not light a lamp and sweep her house and search carefully until she finds it? And when she has found it, she calls her friends and neighbors together, saying, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found the drachma coin that I had lost.’”

    There is a not-so-hidden rebuke in Jesus’ words summarizing a similar parable: “I tell you that in the same way, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous ones who have no need of repentance.”​ Well, they did—have need of repentance that is. Otherwise they would have been out searching for the missing sheep themselves:

    “What man among you with 100 sheep, on losing one of them, will not leave the 99 behind in the wilderness and go after the lost one until he finds it? And when he has found it, he puts it on his shoulders and rejoices. And when he gets home, he calls his friends and his neighbors together, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’”​

    The context was that of the Pharisees sneering at the common people that they should have been tending to, even employing the pejorative term “amhaarets”—“people of the dirt.” Straying a little off-topic, but still fair game, the conductor of that Bible-study portion explored how you wouldn’t want to come across that way in your own ministry:

    Bible principles are good and with them people mess up their lives much less than they would otherwise. Sometimes it works at the other end, and they succeed much more than they would otherwise. It depends upon one’s starting point. At any rate, come across someone in the ministry with a host of problems, and realize it could well be you in the absence of Bible principles—I mean, it is no basis for ever feeling superior, as those Pharisees did without even mastering the godly ways.

    Again, not part of this particular study, but certainly in the same vein, was Jesus’ rebuke to those same religious leaders on another occasion: “But when the scribes of the Pharisees saw that he was eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they began saying to his disciples: “Does he eat with tax collectors* and sinners?”  On hearing this, Jesus said to them: “Those who are strong do not need a physician, but those who are ill do. I came to call, not righteous people, but sinners.”

    Sometimes those who dislike Jehovah’s Witnesses try to paint it that they have a higher proportion of ones mentally ill. I have no idea whether this is true or not, for mental illness defines the times that we live in, but I don’t even kick back at this anymore. Instead, I say that, if true, it is exactly what one would expect. I quote Jesus’ words that he came to call, not on those who do not need a physician, but on those who do. “Spiritually sick” is what he is talking about, but if spiritually sick, then maybe emotionally or mentally sick as well—sickness tends to overflow its banks. The people you have to wonder about, in my view, are not those who experience emotional difficulties in the face of the present world, but those who do not—those who sail past atrocities on every side and remain undisturbed.

    The two Bible chapters up for review in that mid-week meeting were Hebrews 12 and 13. Discipline was a theme, in view of 12:7. “You need to endure as part of your discipline,” the verse says. There was a video of a circuit overseer taking counsel from his wife as discipline. He was upset over someone he thought had treated him badly, and his wife said: “Well, that’s because he is a yo-yo. But so are you. Get over it.” [precise words mine, not hers] He told of how he had received a letter from the branch telling how he had botched something or other, and he counted that, too, as discipline. Sometimes we get counseled over various things.

    Still, the overall sense of Hebrews 12:7 is that even if no one ever says a word to you about anything, simply to pursue the Christian course in a world that either wants to change that course or have nothing to do with it is a “discipline.” The lives of Jehovah’s Witnesses might be described as ones of delayed gratification; they go light or even abstain from certain aspects of life that they would otherwise engage in for the sake of laying hold to a greater prize. That takes self-discipline. Delayed gratification is usually seen as a responsible thing, even by Witness opposers, just not in this case.

    That just pursuing the Christian course in the face of an indifferent or even hostile world is in itself a form of discipline is plain from surrounding verses, as well as the overall context of the Book of Hebrews itself. Those members of the Jerusalem congregation were tiring of holding the line. They “ought to be teachers in view of the time but they again need someone to teach [them] from the beginning the elementary things.” (5:12) Hopefully, they would be encouraged by the “great cloud of witnesses” surrounding them—not to mention Christ’s own example, so as to “not get tired and give up.” (12:1-3)

    “In your struggle against that sin, you have never yet resisted to the point of having your blood shed.  And you have entirely forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons: “My son, do not belittle the discipline from Jehovah, nor give up when you are corrected by him;  for those whom Jehovah loves he disciplines, in fact, he scourges everyone whom he receives as a son.” You need to endure as part of your discipline. God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father?  But if you have not all shared in receiving this discipline, you are really illegitimate children, and not sons. Furthermore, our human fathers used to discipline us, and we gave them respect. Should we not more readily submit ourselves to the Father of our spiritual life and live?  For they disciplined us for a short time according to what seemed good to them, but he does so for our benefit so that we may partake of his holiness.  True, no discipline seems for the present to be joyous, but it is painful; yet afterward, it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. Therefore, strengthen the hands that hang down and the feeble knees.” (12:4-12)

    Don’t be a lout and don’t miss the point of God’s undeserved kindness [“grace,” many transactions say, but the New World Translation says “undeserved kindness,” since the former term just conveys to the modern man that God is not clumsy and doesn’t topple over things]: “Carefully watch that no one fails to obtain the undeserved kindness of God, so that no poisonous root springs up to cause trouble and many are defiled by it; and watch that among you there is no one who is sexually immoral nor anyone who does not appreciate sacred things, like Eʹsau, who gave up his rights as firstborn in exchange for one meal. (12:15-16)

    He is shaking the very heaven and the earth. He is not shaking the congregation directly, but it is sure to feel the aftershocks—hence the heightened need for the discipline of endurance: “Now the expression “yet once more” indicates the removal of the things that are shaken, things that have been made, in order that the things not shaken may remain.  Therefore, seeing that we are to receive a Kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us continue to receive undeserved kindness, through which we may acceptably offer God sacred service with godly fear and awe.  (12:27-28)

    (thoughts gleaned from the midweek meeting of September 23-29, 2019)

    *Tax collectors were the lowest of the low in popular esteem back then because they were not unknown to shake people down for, not just the required tax, but whatever they could get in addition.

  • “I came to start a fire on the earth, and what more is there for me to wish if it has already been lighted?”

    “I came to start a fire on the earth, and what more is there for me to wish if it has already been lighted?”—Luke 12:49

    What fire? How did it get lit?

    Doesn’t it refer to God’s ways versus the ways of a world estranged from him? That fire was lit long ago. Jesus fans it into fever pitch, introducing a preaching activity that will ultimately put the choice in everyone’s face—is it the kingdom that they want to rule over them, or the present human system of 200 squabbling nations? Jehovah’s Witnesses who speak for him today do nothing to bring that future kingdom about, but they do publicize it:

    “And in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that will never be brought to ruin. And the kingdom itself will not be passed on to any other people. It will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms, and it itself will stand to times indefinite.”—Daniel 2:44

    Moreover, those who want and expect that kingdom rule versus those who do not want or expect it assume different priorities in their lives that reflect their desires and expectations. It makes for significant conflicts, even within families. That must be what Jesus meant as he went on to  say:

    Do you imagine I came to give peace on the earth? No, indeed, I tell you, but rather division.  For from now on there will be five in one house divided, three against two and two against three. They will be divided, father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against [her] mother, mother-in-law against [her] daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against [her] mother-in-law.”—Luke 12:51-53

    It manifests itself today in people changing sides—for the allure of both sides are as strong as the are different. In the case of a Witness family that some members depart from, it takes the form of the latter charging that they were misled, manipulated, and so forth. No wonder the apostle seems to anticipate the charge:

    “We have wronged no one, we have corrupted no one, we have taken advantage of no one.”—2 Corinthians 7:2

    and

    “Nevertheless, you say, I was “crafty” and I caught you “by trickery.”—2 Corinthians 12:16.

    Jesus doesn’t buy it, either, about being obtuse regarding the end of this system of things approaching:

    “Then he went on to say also to the crowds: “When see a cloud rising in western parts, at once you say, ‘A storm is coming,’ and it turns out so.  And when you see that a south wind is blowing, you say, ‘There will be a heat wave,’ and it occurs.  Hypocrites, you know how to examine the outward appearance of earth and sky, but how is it you do not know how to examine this particular time?—Luke 12:54-56

    The trick may be to check your “critical thinking” skills at the door, so as to focus on what he next says: “Why do you not judge also for yourselves what is righteous?”—vs 57 God’s kingdom is “righteous.” Human governments, whatever their intent, whatever their ideals, whatever their sporadic successes, are not.

    That being the case with God’s kingdom approaching, why make oneself an “adversary of him?”

    “For example, when you are going with your adversary at law to a ruler, get to work, while on the way, to rid yourself of the dispute with him, that he may never hale you before the judge, and the judge deliver you to the court officer, and the court officer throw you into prison.”—vs 58

    I liked this point as well (most of these verses were considered at the Kingdom Hall meeting this past week, and the ones not will be considered next week):

    “But if ever that slave should say in his heart, ‘My master delays coming,’ and should start to beat the menservants and the maidservants, and to eat and drink and get drunk, the master of that slave will come on a day that he is not expecting [him] and in an hour that he does not know, and he will punish him with the greatest severity and assign him a part with the unfaithful ones.”—vs 45-46

    Practically speaking, the “slave” that doubts that the master is coming anytime soon (or at all) begins to reappraise all the effort he has put into publicizing that event. What once seemed as natural as breathing air now comes to seem wasted time, in fact, worse than wasted time, since it served to put he/she behind the curve as regards the goals of the greater world. In no time at all, such persons have joined “the unfaithful ones.” They are deriding what they once embraced—in effect, “beating their fellow slaves.” They are almost forced to carry on about how they were misled and manipulated, because the alternative is to explain how they could have been so stupid to go along for so many years with what they now reject. So they frame matters as a “sinister religious corporation” taking advantage of the minions. They are nuts—the only reason members incorporate is so that they can do things legally, such as owning land or publishing, that will not all fall apart with the death of the founders.

    Let us visit the parallel verses in the Book of Matthew, noting that the slaves doing business have always been associated with the preaching and disciple-making work. Let us consider it in the satirical Sheepngoats Translation, which is not accepted by all scholars—in fact, most of them assume that the translators must have been smoking something:

    “After a long time the master of those slaves came and settled accounts with them.  So the one that had received five talents came forward and brought five additional talents, saying, ‘Master, you committed five talents to me; see, I gained five talents more.’  His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful slave! You were faithful over a few things. I will appoint you over many things. Enter into the joy of your master.’

    “Next the one that had received the two talents came forward and said, ‘Master, you committed to me two talents; see, I gained two talents more.’  His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful slave! You were faithful over a few things. I will appoint you over many things. Enter into the joy of your master.’

    “Finally the one that had received the one talent came forward and said, ‘Master, I didn’t do squat. I thought about it, but you see, to do business, I would have had to work with the others, and they are all jerks. I also would have had to work with the bankers, and it is all about money with them. And I for sure didn’t want to work with any non-profit organizations who might lean on me to do something I didn’t want to do. I shouldn’t have to put up with that—I have rights. After all, we all know that you reap where you did not sow, and gather where you do not winnow. You want disciples? Then get off your rear end and make them yourself! Don’t foist your corporate agenda on me!’

    “In reply his master said to him, ‘Wicked and sluggish slave, you knew, did you, that I reaped where I did not sow and gathered where I did not winnow?  Well, then, you ought to have deposited my silver monies with the bankers, and on my arrival I would be receiving what is mine with interest.’”—Matthew 25:19-25

    The master could have worked with that attitude, it appears! Just take it to the bank if you feel that way, he says. Instead, the loutish slave dug in the ground and hid the silver money, (vs 25) working up a sweat so as to thwart the master’s will. it is as opposers do today. They go to considerable effort to thwart the work that they once took part it.

     

     

     

  • Ben Franklin Gets Jilted and Flip-Flopping on the Resurrection

    Ben Franklin courted the widow of his good friend, but the woman turned him down flat: ‘I could never be untrue to my husband.’ Then, in a dream, he went to heaven and met his good friend. They exchanged pleasantries until the friend presently said: “You must meet my new wife. She’ll be along soon.” Ben Franklin couldn’t believe it. ‘Your earthly wife is more loyal than you!’ he said. She turned me down cold on your account!’ ‘That’s too bad for you,’ the friend said. ‘She is an excellent woman and I missed her terribly at first, but now it is time to move on.’

    As Ben Franklin grumbled, the ‘new’ wife showed up and it was Ben’s own deceased wife! Ben Franklin turned his rebuke on her, but she said: ‘I was a good and loyal wife to you for 50 years. Let that be enough for you!’

    It is a mangling of Luke 20: 34-36, most likely, botched, but nonetheless used as a starting point. No need to say what is wrong with it. Suffice that it addresses the changed nature of relationships after death:

    “Jesus said to them: ‘The children of this system of things marry and are given in marriage, but those who have been counted worthy of gaining that system of things and the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage. In fact, neither can they die anymore, for they are like the angels, and they are God’s children by being children of the resurrection.’”

    For the longest time Jehovah’s Witnesses took those verses to mean that those who lost a spouse in death would not reunite in the earthly resurrection. The words were in response to a beef of the Saduccees, who did not believe in the earthly resurrection. Jesus went on to speak of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, who will benefit from it.

    After a certain public talk years ago that had mentioned the verse, a sister raised her had during the chairman’s remarks, something I had never seen before and have not seen again. She was new in the faith, widowed, and she looked forward to reuniting with her husband in the resurrection. She quizzed the chairman until the speaker himself raised his hand and said he would clarify the verse for her afterwards.

    About 30-40 years ago, the Witness organization looked at the verses anew and said maybe she could reunite. They didn’t want to be dogmatic. Maybe the verses just applied to those having the heavenly hope, as they were the ones in abundance back then. It can’t even be said of earthly ones “neither can they die anymore.” They can, and surely will, if they show a rebellious spirit. I mean, if you were raised up to life on a paradise earth, would you grumble about the ground rules? And who is the that is "counted worthy" of an earthly resurrection? Essentially, all you have to do to qualify is to show up; it is "the righteous and the unrighteous" who benefit.

    Grousers who say that Jehovah’s Witnesses flip-flop on doctrine miss the point. They’ve never said they didn’t. They do it all the time, re-examining verses in the face of accumulating knowledge. It has been called ‘the light getting brighter.’ (Proverbs 4:18) It has also been called tacking. The only ones who say they can’t do it are the grousers themselves.

    That said, the major teachings of Jehovah’s Witnesses regarding the nature of God (no Trinity), the nature of the soul (not immortal), who goes to heaven (not everybody good, but only a minority), have been firmly in place for over a century. Ridding the false doctrines that make knowledge and a close relationship with God all but impossible is part of the job of ‘the messenger preparing the way.’ The first thing you do in preparing the way for a building project is to take out the trash.

    (the Ben Franklin writing is called 'A Proposal to Madame Helvetius')

    Franklin-Benjamin-LOC-head

  • He Walked Through Their Midst

    Evereyone wants bragging rights from a favorite son – a local person who goes on to make something of himself. It didn't work with Jesus, though, who went on to tell his sponsors that they were the worst of all Israelites. (Luke 4:23-27)

    They were also a bit touchy about it:

    "Now all those hearing these things in the synagogue became filled with anger, and they rose up and rushed him outside the city, and they led him to the brow of the mountain on which their city had been built, in order to throw him down headlong. But he went right through their midst and continued on his way." (28-30)

    How did he do that?

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  • It Really Does Seem Like a Big “Duh!”

    As much as Bethel tries to convey the point that Jesus wasn't smart-mouthing his parents when he asked "Why did you have to look for me? Did you not know I must be in the house of my father?" so that kids in the Kingdom Hall do not start smart-mouthing their parents, it really does seem like a big 'Duh!' And he was right. They should have known.

    Especially in view of the study note on Luke 2:46: "Historians say some of the foremost religious leaders would customarily remain at the temple after festivals and teach at one of the spacious porches there. People could sit at the feet of those men to listen and to ask questions."

    Where did his parents think he was going to be? Off in some alley shooting dice with the delinquints? They knew of his miraculous birth, even if he did not at that time. Holy spirit is said to descend upon him 'like a dove' after being baptized, presumably recalling to him all his heavenly past.

    He begins to minister in accord with what is revealed at his baptism and his relatives think he has gone nuts. "…they went out to seize him, for they were saying: "He has gone out of his mind." (Mark 3:21) But not his parents. They knew, so they should have known then, when he was 12.

  • Learning From a Liar

    From yesterday's study article with regard to Luke 16:

    If the unrighteous riches are not of God's making but of this system's, why not use an unrighteous steward to teach a lesson with them? He uses money that is not his to reduce debts and make friends for himself.

    If we are debtors to God (who isn't?) we also can use money that is not 'ours' – all of it, since it is not God's idea – to reduce our debts to him and make him a friend. How cool is that?

    The illustration is not a strict parallel, but it works in a quirky sort of way.

    Then he also said to the disciples: “A rich man had a steward who was accused of handling his goods wastefully. So he called him and said, ‘What is this I hear about you? Hand in the account of your stewardship, for you can no longer manage the house.’ Then the steward said to himself, ‘What am I to do, seeing that my master is taking the stewardship away from me? I am not strong enough to dig, and I am ashamed to beg. Ah! I know what I will do, so that when I am removed from the stewardship, people will welcome me into their homes.’ And calling to him each one of his master’s debtors, he said to the first, ‘How much do you owe my master?’ He replied, ‘A hundred measures* of olive oil.’ He said to him, ‘Take back your written agreement and sit down and quickly write 50.’ Next, he said to another one, ‘Now you, how much do you owe?’ He said, ‘A hundred large measures* of wheat.’ He said to him, ‘Take back your written agreement and write 80.’  And his master commended the steward, though unrighteous, because he acted with practical wisdom; for the sons of this system of things*are wiser in a practical way toward their own generation than the sons of the light are.

     â€œAlso, I say to you: Make friends for yourselves by means of the unrighteous riches, so that when such fail, they may receive you into the everlasting dwelling places.

    I liked the notion that you can eliminate your footprint in politics and you can eliminate it in unbiblical religion, you cannot eliminate it in the world's commercial system. You can, however, lessen it.

    The illustration doesn't exactly line up with modern day principles of 'reason.' The components don't dovetail. But it is close enough that Jesus teaches a vital lesson with it. To me, it indicates that Jesus is not enslaved to today's insistence upon 'reason,' which has not served its world particularly well.

     

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