[Propertalk] Proper 14 a

[robertpmorrison at charter.net]

Very late this week - it's been busy .. you now .... 8 - )

Proofing will be done by candlelight!

Bob

THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH OF ST. ALBAN, ALBANY 
THE NINTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST
GENESIS 37:1-4, 12-28						                   PROPER 14 (A)
ROMANS 10:5-515					                                10th AUGUST, 2014	
MATTHEW 14:22-33			 
PSALM 105:1-6, 16-22, 45b

	Would you like to buy a ’58 Edsel Corsair?

	I discovered what I find to be an extremely amusing design flaw with 
that car.  It had transmission push buttons on the steering wheel, which 
did not help at all, as it resulted in much accidental gear shifting 
while driving or trying to honk the horn.

	It’s probably the ’50’s version of texting and driving! It’s something, 
apparently, to steer clear of – pardon the pun! – in order to promote 
safety and keep the travellers happy. That’s probably why it was 
discontinued. I mean, we’ve got enough other things to worry about that 
we don’t need one more.

	No doubt the person or group which came up with that idea thought that 
it would save time and effort, that it would make life more simple. What 
happened, though, was the reverse. It added to complications. There was 
too much crowded into a small space – kind of like families. A great 
deal of the time, they work very well. But when they don’t, they can 
create complications you can hardly believe. What takes us back to Jacob 
and his family once again. I wonder, sometimes, if the stories are 
there, gathered at the front of our Bibles, simply in order to make us 
feel less bothered by some of the things that go on in our own daily 
lives and relationships. Once again, we see the terrible situations that 
develop among these very clay-footed descendants of Abraham. Once again, 
we find that God is right there, walking amidst the mess of human lives, 
not batting an eyelid, not running away, but blessing by Presence.

You may be extraordinarily fortunate, of course. You may have been 
parented by the Cleavers and never had to worry about anything. But the 
rest of us can look, and listen, and think about what we come across. 
And, I hope, we can see what we can learn, and how to deal when tension, 
and tragedy, and rebellious selfishness rear their heads.
	
	“Underneath the surface (of today’s Old Covenant story three of the 
basest of human passions are festering, ready with deadly effect to 
break out at the first opportunity. These are tale-bearing, favouritism, 
and envy. The tale-bearing is Joseph’s, the favouritism Jacob’s, and the 
envy the brothers’.”  1

	So, tale-bearing, favouritism, and envy … anything else? Or is that 
enough for now?

	There’s a marvelous word that I haven’t heard in a long time. It’s 
“clipe”.

	You can BE a clipe, or you CAN clipe. “The Scots word ‘clipe’ is one of 
those curious elements of the Caledonian tongue which is both a noun and 
a verb at the same time. To clipe on someone means to ‘tell on them’, or 
‘grass them up’ –  usually to the teacher. Those who indulge in the act 
of cliping on someone are often referred to simply as a ‘clipe’.” 2 It 
describes more than just telling on someone, though. There’s the strong 
implication that there’s some motivation behind the tattling. It may be 
jealousy of someone; it may be fear of someone or something; it may be 
hope for some reward or financial gain if the person trying to control 
the situation gets his or her oar into the water first. In any event, 
what happens is that the clipe goes to someone with some sort of a 
willingness to hear what is said, or who will be influenced by what is 
told, and then respond, based on the words of that clipe

	Joseph had this serious problem. He was quite gifted; he could see to 
the heart of an individual, and this had both positive and negative 
consequences. Positively, he could determine what a person really 
wanted, and he could see what their motivations were. He was, no doubt. 
a sensitive individual in that regard and there was no question but that 
he and his gift were highly prized. But we know also the other side of 
his personality, the negative side. He used his ability to intuit what 
was going on and he planted seeds of distrust and fear, trying to 
eradicate any favourable thoughts which had possibly been lodged in the 
hearer’s mind.

	How Joseph began to do this is anyone’s guess. More than likely, 
though, it flourished because he got away with it. Beginning with small 
snippets dropped in a seemingly casual way he must have progressed to 
outright lies and self-serving propaganda. Joseph became obsessed with 
presenting his own views, making sure that everyone paid attention to 
him, everything sought out his favour, and consulted him whenever advice 
was sought.

	In later life, Joseph DOES seem to have been talented and gifted. No 
one disputed that. It was simply that at the beginning of his career, he 
insinuated himself into other’s people’s confidences and them misused 
information and trust, showing them up in a bad light and himself as the 
one who could make everything clear.

	A clipe of the first order! No wonder his brothers couldn’t stand him. 
NOT the sort of person to whom one ought to turn for advice or for help, 
especially if it were a confidential matter. One wonders, though, why 
his father was so blind.

	Of course, Jacob didn’t help. It was plain that from the start he 
favoured Rachel over Leah “and now, it seems, he could not prevent 
himself from showing favouritism to Rachel’s son. He had learned nothing 
from his own experiences as a child, when he had been his mother’s 
favourite and Esau his father’s, and what tragedy had followed them!”

	What is it that makes us NOT benefit from our experiences? Why is it 
that from time to time we only see part of the past, and think that 
we’re infinitely better than someone else, that somehow we can manage 
where our predecessors failed? Or may we not even see the failure and 
the extent of the scarring that goes on, scarring that can continue for 
generations so that one side of a family will never talk to another, 
except to snipe at them, possible going so far as to admit loudly that 
nothing good could possibly be done by uncle Esau or his descendants. 
Too often we figure that we can repeat behaviour from the past and get 
away with it because of our charm, or our superior intellectual 
abilities. Or, worst of all, we simply don’t care.

	What on earth made Jacob single out Joseph for special treatment? What 
on earth motivates us, when we, consciously, subconsciously, or through 
manipulation, do the same?

	Is it any wonder that Jacob the dense and thoughtless and Joseph the 
clipe infuriated the other children in the family? They were filled with 
envy, and bitterness, and frustration, and downright anger. It must have 
been building for years and years, since Joseph was the second youngest 
male child. No doubt the other brothers would gather at whatever spot 
the sheep were bedding down for the night and tell their cutting 
stories, no doubt ending up by letting their venom drip out and spill on 
their feelings about the father and younger brother.

	This is what worries me so much about what I see on social media as 
well as the print and broadcast versions. It’s seldom the case that a 
broad perspective can be taken on any issue. I think of some comments 
that I see today that would fit right in with Joseph’s brothers’ 
vitriolic outbursts. And it’s happening in much the same way. It doesn’t 
matter which side towards which we lean, we all look to grab the person 
or persons whom we think is so offensive and we allow ourselves to be 
talked out of murder, instead pitting them like we would an olive. We 
think we make them more easily handled when we eviscerate the source of 
life within them, when we assault them, trying to break their spirits, 
their minds, their wills.

	I find the bulletin illustration of the capture and pitting of Joseph 
to be both fascinating and appalling. It strikes home with me, I think, 
because it suggests that Joseph is squirreled away, out of sight, so 
that they don’t need to let thought or vision of him bother their 
evening’s relaxation. They can laugh – possibly even allowing their 
voices to rise in volume so that Joseph can hear them making coarse fun 
of him, throwing in threats, cataloguing everything about him they 
despised. It’s just as I’ve seen and heard on the internet, people with 
even less information about one another that Joseph’s brothers had about 
him, people tearing into one another, not stopping to ask if something 
is true, never mind what good will cliping about this do to the person 
being ridiculed, and worse.

	All the while Joseph – and his cultural descendants – languish in the 
pit, however, notice how the brothers are dining in pretty fair 
splendour. What would they eat at the end of the day? A roast lamb, 
roasted artichoke hearts, some rice, or cous cous, or barley meal, 
finishing with yogurt, cheese and honey? What’s on YOUR shopping list? 
And all the while this was cooking over the open fire, the smell would 
conjure up in the imprisoned Joseph dreams of the luxurious benefits he 
received from his besotted father. They would eat within earshot of him, 
and torment him, such was their blind envy.

	Not to be totally dismissive of Jacob, Joseph and the other brothers. 
Each may have been exactly as the gear shift buttons on the ’58 Edsel 
Corsaire. Each had the potential to work well, to safe time, to allow 
for pleasure and ease of life. But one can’t blame their failures on 
faulty genes. They’d lost faith in one another. They didn’t see what 
good things each could do; they couldn’t imagine that, no matter whether 
someone else differed from one or was abrasive – they couldn’t imagine 
that Jacob and Joseph might have some value; and they’d definitely lost 
track of the meaning of familial community.

	It’s a very sad tale, one that, we’ll discover shortly, brings about 
some even greater pain to bear. For today, though, it begs the question 
of where the retelling of the relationship between God and their 
ancestors fitted in to their lives. If, as is most likely to have 
happened, if each night people sat around the fire and, as the stars 
came out and the embers were caught up into the sky, they were reminded 
of the promises of God, of the faithfulness of God, above all, of the 
Presence of God; if all that happened, where was their understanding of 
God’s relationship with them. When one person on the internet 
eviscerates or empits another, where is the understanding of divine 
familiarity?

	And, we, who’ve probably pretty much stopped gathering around fires at 
night; wherever we are – at the meal table in our homes or the meal 
table in this room – I pray that we can find help to have the faith and 
the understanding to rediscover the relationships we share with God, and 
with one another. Wherever we are, may we never neglect any opportunity 
to share love, and kindness, and to offer hope, to help nurture people’s 
faith. May we find the will to ask God to help us put behind us all the 
storms that threaten to capsize our lives, to forgo tale-bearing, and 
favouritism, and envy, and everything else which do not belong in God’s 
ship of creation.

Is there anything else we need to say?

NOTES:
  	“Genesis, Volume 2. The Daily Study Bible Series” by John C.L. 
Gibson. The Westminster Press, Philadelphia. © 1982. Page 225.

2	“Scottish word of the day – Clipe”, Published on the 30 July, 2012 
17:33 
http://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/heritage/scottish-word-of-the-day-clipe-1-2440624

Robert P Morrison
Interim Vicar
The Episcopal Church of St Alban
PO Box 1556
Albany OR  97321   541-921-1076 (cell)
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