“But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council.”
Being angry without a cause. Saying ‘Raca’ to one’s neighbor. In today’s Gospel reading these rather ordinary acts is being put side by side with murder. Rather severe, I believe most of us will argue.
Not that being angry and saying raca is a good thing. It is not good that these things are ordinary. But still; how can it be as bad as murder?
I will come back to the meaning of the word raca later. But let us first dwell a little with what is said about being angry.
First, it is not any kind of angriness. It is the one that is without a cause. Hence, you are allowed to be angry if you have a cause.
Now it might be hard to distinguish between what then is a good cause and what is a bad cause. And we might also disagree on that question.
Therefore, second, the type of angriness that we are warned against might not be as easy to determine as we would like it to be. Or at least the right cause is not. But in a sermon, I once read, a pastor does a pretty good job.
She argues that the anger Jesus warns us against is not the kind of anger through which we react to or with an individual or a circumstance.
Rather, we are warned against the anger that makes our neighbour or our surroundings meaningless. An anger that neglects and does not argue. An anger that is not just a human response but a stripping of the other.
I like her perspective. After all, it shows how we should not focus so much on debating whether one had a good cause or not. Rather we should evaluate what went behind the anger.
Was it to protect oneself? Was it a response out of fear? Or was it a pure evil act of dehumanizing a neighbour. The later should never be tolerated. Especially not in our current times where I sadly believe we currently are experiencing a growing tendency of this.
Another reason I like her response is that it links the anger without cause and the saying of raka to another together.
Raka in short means something like empty or meaningless. It is an Aramaic word that is only occurring this one place in the gospel.
In the Old Testament it is occurring a few times:
For instance, a place where the soil has been seeded with no purpose as the fruit eventually will be stolen. Another place the word is used where a baby dies during labour. It is meaningless.
In Psalm 2 and 4 it is used to describe a tendency we human has: We make meaningless plans and loves lies and what is empty.
The way I see the pastor whom I talked about earlier is linking raka with anger is, that she argues for an existing anger where we do not have to weigh any kind of cause. No, an anger exist that simply dehumanises – makes nothing of another – and that is not an anger anyone should succumb to.
Such an anger was what enabled ordinary Germen men to treat Jews as they did during second world war. This is what enables us to treat our neighbour in the same way. Maybe not as severe, but still. This is what we are warned against today.
In a sermon upon today’s Gospel Reading from 1941, Kaj Munk said the following to encourage his congregation to fight against the evil – not only of the times he lived in, but in general as well:
“Do you hear it? Do you hear this proud, passionate voice calling you away from nonsense and façades, from lukewarmness and surrender, from all the bondage the world has tried to paralyze you with? Calling you to battle against the spirit of the world and against your own nature – not to something unnatural, but to something supernatural: namely, to fight for the kingdom of love on this earth of hatred…”
His entire sermon I believe can be summed up with one word: Passionate. And I would like to dwell a little with that word. Not only because Kaj Munk did, but because I believe it is a constructive approach to the Biblical Readings of today.
Talking too much about what we are not to do can be a little irritating to listen to. But encouraging us to being passionate. I kind of like that.
And then it also makes a lot of sense. Because it is when we stop being passionate about our neighbour that we can call them raka. It is only when we lack the passion of love that we start showing anger without cause.
Passion. It makes sense to talk about. Just imagine what happens if we rewrite one of the most famous biblical quotes. Then the sentence, you shall love your neighbour as yourself, would become:
You should show just as much passion toward your neighbour as you show passion towards yourself.
In a world of today I believe the rewritten quote would make more sense to a lot of people. After all we live in a world where love is something people sometimes take for granted – even demand.
If love fails, we witness an increasing tendency of looking elsewhere instead of restoring. The tendency might be turning. But still: in a world where more emphasis is on the individual and how one should always create ones own happiness, passion may make more sense to talk about than love.
If love have become something you are seeking, not for the benefit of love, but for the benefit of your own happiness. Passion might make more sense to talk about. Because maybe love have just become a part of how we are passionate about ourselves and our happiness.
And we are passionate. Passionate about ourselves: Our grades in school. Our reviews at work. How we are perceived by others. If we. We. We. We.
What about us? Maybe we today are not just warned against anger, but selfishness as well. Or rather: we are encouraged to not only being passionate about ourselves, but those around us as well.
Because Real raka – real emptiness – is found in a world, where we are not coexisting. Coexisting with each other, with the world, and with God.
Let us therefore always remain passionate – passionate regarding the wellbeing of those around us and our surroundings.
As individuals we are nothing – we are empty, everything is meaningless. We might bear fruit, but who should we share it with if no God, no neighbour, no world would know of us.
We belong together. In love. In passion. In mercy.
Amen.