[Propertalk] Proper 23 c 2016 - part 2

[Robert P Morrison]

Part 2

	 “There is a wonderful two-line short story by Franz Kafka, more or
less like this:

	 “‘One day a leopard came stalking into the synagogue, roaring
and lashing its tail.

	 “‘Three weeks later, it had become part of the liturgy.’

	 “Our task,” wrote Rabbi Arthur Waskow, “in every generation,
every year, is to let the leopard out of the cage of liturgy.

	 “Scary, and full of life.” 3

	 If the same thing happens in our lives, if the same thing takes
over, then it becomes established. We all know that if you say
something often enough, if you say it loud enough, it takes on the
aura of appropriateness, of truth. This is true for what we hold in
our own hearts and minds as it does for the things we say and hear.

	 In Kafka’s astute story, if the leopard is not quizzed about why
it is present, about what its intentions are; if people simply shrug
and accept it, by the second or third time it shows up it is no longer
something exotic. I really like the analogy if this occurring in a
liturgy. If a mistake is made, if something happens for two or three
weeks in a row and no one stops to say, “Did you mean that?”; if
no one says, “That’s not how it’s supposed to be”, then pretty
soon, whether it’s right or completely wrong, it will be repeated
and given the honour of respectability, even when the bishop comes in
and says, “What on earth are you doing?”

	 Whether it’s in worship, or in our lives at home, or our lives out
in the community, we have to be on our guard for leopards. Seeing
them, calling them out, pointing them out to others, is what brings
healing and the possibility of renewal. This is what Jesus did for the
people of His day, and this is what Jesus longs to do for us today.
And, I think, especially in light of the Gospel story this morning,
what Jesus prays we’ll develop is an attitude of gratitude.

	 Of the ten diseased people with whom Jesus interacted that day, all
were made well. They’d been isolated, they’d been kept from
living, working, playing with their families and friends. Or so
we’ve been led to believe.

	 Scholars point out, however, that it was the local priest who made
the diagnosis of such things as diseases which made a person
“impure”. In other words “the disease is only a problem if the
priest says it is.” 4 That’s why all ten were told to go back to
see the priest, to have the proclamation lifted, to ensure that all
could participate fully in community life once again. All except one,
that is.

	 One of them was a Samaritan – he was doubly beyond the pale of
society, Even if he was healed, he was still unacceptable to the
priest of Galilee or Judah. It was he, Jesus said in His story, it was
this man who was overwhelmed by the feeling of gratitude that he had
to turn back to give thanks to Jesus.

	 What was the leopard in Jesus’ story? The nine fulfilled
everything that was required of them. They could live fully in this
life. But was their leopard that they might well continue to live
exactly as they had before, without any thought of looking beyond how
they had lived, without any thought of interacting with more and more
people, with different people?

	 The late Welsh poet and priest “R. S. Thomas writes, ‘_Life is
not hurrying on to a receding future,/Nor hankering after an imagined
past. /It is turning aside like Moses/ To the miracle of a lit
bush_....’ Gratitude urges you to look twice at the same thing, and
that second look penetrates to eternity.” 5

	 That one person, one out of ten, turned aside to find out what might
be done in life now that healing had been given. He saw the leopard,
and discovered what it was, and put it away from the liturgy which is
life, because it was preventing him from seeing God and for making God
visible through him.

	 I saw a brief video last week, almost as short as Kafka’s story.

	 “I’d like to help you.” A man talks to people on the street,
in parks, in stores, in parking lots – so many places – and asks
if he can do anything to help them.

	 One response is, “Are you rich? You must have a lot of money to
help people.” The man replies, “No, I don’t have a lot of money.
But I have time.”

	“Can I help anyone with anything?” he said.

	 It sounds like Jesus. He comes over a rise on the dusty road,
walking towards Jerusalem. It must have been for an important
Festival. That’s when people made their journeys to the city with
its Temple. Not that it was a bad place to visit, but people really
made an effort for one of the High Hoy Days – like Rosh Hashanah
last Sunday, or Yom Kippur – the Day of Atonement – on Tuesday
evening.

	 “It’s such an unusual request,” the man thought, and he was
right. Some people ignored him or didn’t engage him. Others said,
“No thanks,” possibly wondering if he was nuts. He said that he
came away from these encounters thinking, “Well, I’m not a nice
guy. … People are suspicious and they don’t want to risk putting
themselves in danger.” But a few took him up on it and were
overwhelmingly grateful. He Said, “It’s easy to help people, even
to have a conversation with them, but we haven’t figured out how to
go deeper.”

	 “People go through hard times and it takes someone to put
themselves out there that will make a real difference. … We can’t
say what is meaningful or not, because a small thing can have that
butterfly effect.”

	 What is the leopard in our lives – this morning? What needs
healing? Might we listen to Jesus and take Him up on His offer? Might
we find ourselves freed? Might we then free others?

	 Why does Jesus seem to leave us with questions every time we turn
around? Oh well, at least we don’t need to be afraid of anything or
anyone!

	NOTES:

[1] STORYPEOPLE 4TH OCTOBER 2016 STORYPEOPLE BY BRIAN ANDREAS [1]
WWW.STORYPEOPLE.COM/ [2]

	2 _“Fear”_ by Br. Mark Brown , SSJE, 5th October, 2016
http://ssje.org/word/?p=13040 [3]

3 QUOTED BY RABBI ARTHUR WASKOW IN_ “__ISAIAH AND SUBERSIVE PRAYER:
THOUGHTS FOR YOM KIPPUR | HUFFINGTON POST [4]”
_WWW.HUFFINGTONPOST.COM/.../ISAIAH-KAFKA-THE-LEOPARD-_B_70522 [5]...

	4 _“The Meaning of the Bible”_ by Douglas A. Knight and Amy-Jill
Levine. HaperCollins, New Your © 2011. Page 184.

	5 _“__At the Edge of the Enclosure: Soulwork Toward Sunday:
Self-Guided Retreat”_ Proper 23 (Year C) October 9, 2016
“gratitude and insight” Suzanne Guthrie
http://www.edgeofenclosure.org/proper23c.html [6]

Links:
------
[1]
http://mail2.charter.net/HTTPS://WWW.GOOGLE.COM/URL?SA=T&RCT=J&Q=&ESRC=S&SOURCE=WEB&CD=4&CAD=RJA&UACT=8&VED=0AHUKEWITN_DXH8LPAHVRVWMKHZ9MCICQFGGXMAM&URL=HTTP%3A%2F%2FWWW.STORYPEOPLE.COM%2F&USG=AFQJCNHG8OIRQZTZLTAP7AYWHYWR_QFV0W
[2] http://mail2.charter.net/HTTP://WWW.STORYPEOPLE.COM/
[3] http://ssje.org/word/?p=13040
[4]
http://mail2.charter.net/HTTPS://WWW.GOOGLE.COM/URL?SA=T&RCT=J&Q=&ESRC=S&SOURCE=WEB&CD=3&CAD=RJA&UACT=8&VED=0AHUKEWI93BVTOSFPAHURXWMKHZB8BJ0QFGGOMAI&URL=HTTP%3A%2F%2FWWW.HUFFINGTONPOST.COM%2FRABBI-ARTHUR-WASKOW%2FISAIAH-KAFKA-THE-LEOPARD-_B_705225.HTML&USG=AFQJCNFXBAJ94LAFCKFRHD8HZVIYCECYHQ
[5]
http://mail2.charter.net/HTTP://WWW.HUFFINGTONPOST.COM/.../ISAIAH-KAFKA-THE-LEOPARD-_B_70522
[6] http://www.edgeofenclosure.org/proper23c.html

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