1st Sunday of Advent (C)

And then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. 

Lk 21:25-28. 34-36 

Lk 21:25-28 

This passage concerns the end of the ‘time of the Gentiles’ and the judgment of mankind.

Lk resumes his narration of the cosmic signs, but now introduces a Christological dimension: Jesus, the victorious Son of Man, is in control of the forces of evil whether these are wars (v. 9) or sea (v. 25). He is the judge.

vv. 25-26. There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on earth nations will be in dismay, perplexed by the roaring of the sea and the waves. People will die of fright in anticipation of what is coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

Luke’s apocalyptic description, based on Mk 13:34, has been influenced by Is 13:10 and Ps 65. More clearly, too, the whole world is involved (v. 26).

The powers of heaven are the heavenly bodies, identified with the gods of oriental and Greco-Roman religion and regarded by Jews as angelic beings created by God and allowed by him to preside over the destinies of pagan nations (Dt 32:8; Is 24:21, 34:1-4). Thus, shaking these powers denotes not so much the ruin of the physical universe as the overthrow of pagan imperial supremacy.

v. 27. And then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.

The fulfillment of Dn 7:13f. Lk sets aside Mk 13:27.

In place of ‘the clouds of heaven’, which Mark derived fom Dn 7:13, Luke has simply ‘cloud’. It is an alteration which establishes a link between the glorious advent of Christ and other events in the gospel story in which the same cloud of the divine presence is mentioned (9:34).

v. 28. But when these signs begin to happen, stand erect and raise your heads because your redemption is at hand.”

This verse looks back to the signs of v. 25f. The cosmic events that will terrify the nations will indicate to the followers of Christ that the time of persecution is ending. Their ‘redemption’ (a Pauline word, cf. Rm 3:24; 8:23; Eph 1:7) is drawing near.

These signs before the End do not contradict 21:34f. The End will be preceded by signs, but yet the Son of Man will appear like lightning.

This verse bursts with a message of confidence and hope for the disciples. In contrast to the cowards actions of other men and women (vv. 26-27), the faithful disciples stand erect with heads held high to greet their faithful judge, Jesus, Son of Man (cf. 9:26; 12:9).

Lk 21:34-36

Lk has replaced the passage Mk 13:33-37 with an admonition to watchfulness (cf. 1 Thess 5:1-11), one influenced by his realization of the delay of the Parousia.

By placing the parable of the fig tree (Mk 13:28-31; Lk 21:29-31) after the description of the coming of the Son of Man, Mark has shown that he understood it to be a warning to be ready for the imminent Parousia. By itself, however, the parable suggests quite a different application: for it could easily have been spoken by Jesus as a warning to be ready for the disaster which was overhanging Jerusalem and which would on day be, quite literally, ‘at the very gates’ (Mk 13:29). Luke has followed Mark’s interpretation and has eliminated any possible ambiguity by introducing the words “the kingdom of God”.

As in Mark’s Gospel, this parable is followed by a declaration that all things will be accomplished within a generation (Lk 21:32-33). Mark undoubtedly understood this prediction to include the Parousia, and he was writing at a date near enough to the time of Jesus to feel no embarrassment about such a prophecy. But Luke, writing fifteen to twenty years later, was in a different case. We should expect him to interpret the saying otherwise and there is every indication that he did so. For his discourse ends with instructions to the disciples to pray that they may have strength to escape ‘all these things’, and it is a reasonable assumption that for him ‘all things’ in v. 32 covered the same set of events as ‘all these things’ in v. 36. But from the Parousia and the final consummation of the kingdom there could be no escape, nor can we imagine the disciples of Jesus being taught to pray for any. The disciples were taught to pray that they might survive the preliminary crises of persecution and the siege of Jerusalem. These, according to Luke, were the events which Jesus declared would happen before a generation has passed away. 

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32nd SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME (B)

A poor widow also came and put in two small coins worth a few cents.

Mk 12:41-44

This beautiful story is PERHAPS best explained as originally a Jewish parable which Jesus took over in his teaching and which was later transformed into an incident in his life. A number of quite close parallels are known from both pagan and Jewish sources, most notably the story in Leviticus Rabba of a priest who scorned a woman's offering of a handful of flour. Overnight he received in a vision the rebuke: “Despise her not; it is as though she offered her life.”

The present setting of the story may in part be due simply to the catchword widow (vv. 40 and 42), but a more apt position for it could hardly be imagined. Not only does it form a fitting contrast to the previous section (in contrast to the bad scribes, who "eat" widows' property, we have now the tale of the good widow and her sacrifice), but with its teaching that the true gift is to give 'everything we have' (v. 44) it sums up what has gone before in the Gospel and makes a superb transition to the story of how Jesus ‘gave everything’ for men.

v. 41. He sat down opposite the treasury and observed how the crowd put money into the treasury. Many rich people put in large sums.

The details are even more imprecise than usual, especially as there is some uncertainty about what is meant by the treasury.

Elsewhere the Greek word is used for the rooms or cells in which the temple valuables or deposits were stored (e.g. 1 Macc. 14:49, 2 Macc. 3:6, etc.). Here it is generally taken to refer to some kind of receptacle for offerings.

According to the Mishnah there were thirteen such receptacles (known from their shape as 'trumpets') placed round the walls of the court of women. Other suggestions, however, have been made, particularly with a view to explaining how Jesus could have known what the rich people and the poor widow gave. But even such suggestions do not explain how he knew what the widow gave was her whole livelihood (v. 44).

It is probably simplest to suppose that a story related by Jesus (on the basis of a current Jewish parable) has been transformed into a story about him. In that case St Mark himself may have had no very clear idea what treasury was intended.

v. 42. A poor widow also came and put in two small coins worth a few cents.

Two small (copper) coins:

The Greek word (lepton) means ‘a tiny thing’ (cf. English 'mite') and was used for the smallest coin in circulation.

Worth a few cents:

Or ‘which make a penny’ (literally a quadrans). . St Mark transliterates the Latin word into Greek. The coin is often said to have circulated only in the West, and the inclusion of the explanation that the two lepta make a quadrans is held to point to Roman readers, who could not be expected to be familiar with the coinage of Palestine. However, there is evidence that the name was naturalized in Palestine through the Greek, and Cadbury shows that it is unsafe to deduce from this verse any conclusions about the Gospel's place of origin.