Defeating Babylon by the way of the cross

The image of Babylon, once a prosperous city and a place of servitude and oppression, was transferred in the imagination of Israel as a metaphor for arrogant, autonomous power that does evil in the world and opposition to Yahweh’s will.

The Paschal Triduum (Easter celebrations) for Christians, is the recalling of God’s victory over Babylon, a timely message to people experiencing oppression and injustices.

St Paul in Philippians Chapter 2 reminds us that Jesus “humble himself and became obedient to the point of death – even death on a cross” (2.8). The gospels record Jesus’ struggle or agony in the garden. This was not physical, but mental; an internal struggle. The acceptance of the Father’s will is the ‘YES’ that overcomes human reluctance to suffering.

It was in the Gospel of Luke we encountered how this internal acceptance is shown with the use of the metaphor of Jesus’ sweat becoming like great drops of blood (Like 22.44). In Sacred Scriptures, “sweat like blood” is another way of speaking of acceptance of martyrdom. It is a state of being found in liberated persons who are prepared to suffer for their beliefs.

In 4 Maccabees 7 verses 6-7, we read how Eleazar the priest, who was dragged violently to be tortured, had his flesh torn by scourges as his blood flowed and his sides were being cut to pieces for his obedience to the Law of God and disobedience to the Law of the land. He was described as a “priest, worthy of the priesthood … who neither defiled your sacred teeth or profaned your stomach, which had room only for reverence and purity…” and then this statement – “such should be those who are administrators of the law, shielding it with their own blood and noble sweat in sufferings even to death”.

DEATH BY MARTYRDOM

In using the phrase, “shielding it with your own blood and noble sweat in suffering even to death,” the writer is alluding to death by martyrdom. What made our Lord’s “sweat like blood” different from Eleazar’s and the countless millions throughout our world who have stood up against injustices, is that he was the first to internalize this battle through prayer. It was not just an affair of the head or mind, but of the heart. In Christ, the demands of human existence before God was lived out perfectly. Death was not simply the terminal point of his obedience, it was the inevitable consequence of being both fully human and totally obedient in a world alienated from God.

Jesus’ acceptance of the impending “cup of suffering” we see his betrayal by Judas with a kiss, abandonment by his followers, false accusations before the Jewish leaders who had him arrested, the condemning to death by crucifixion by Pilate, his scoring and mocking by the soldiers. Finally his crucifixion on the cross between two criminals.

St. Mark presents Jesus’ death as taking place according to God’s will made known in the Old Testament. So we hear Jesus’ cry “Elōí, Elōí, lema sabachthani” as he said the prayer of the righteous sufferer that ends with an act of trust in God as expressed in Psalm 22.

The New Testament writers uses a literary genre known as “incipit”. The term incipit refers to the use of the opening line of a poem or song/haftarah as an abbreviated way of referring to the entire song/haftarah. For example, one might understand the words on the cross “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” Which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mark 15:34, Matt 27:46) to mean not just the first verse of Psalm 22, but rather by pronouncing the incipit, Jesus invokes the entire psalm.

Mark also records two other events of significance – the tearing of the Temple veil and the centurion’s confession. In Chapter 15.37-38, we read, “Then Jesus gave a loud cry and breathed his last. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom.” The curtain divided the holy place from the holy of holies (Ex. 26.33). It’s rending at Jesus’ death suggests the end of the exclusive Old Covenant with Israel. Through his death upon the cross, our Lord accomplished the fulfilment of the following words, “do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfil” (Matthew 5.17).

Thus defeating Babylon and reconstituted a new Israel with the shedding of his happiness, which he earlier described as “the covenant, which is poured out for many” (Mark 14.24).

Jesus’ death upon the cross is described as “disarming the rulers and authorities and making a public example of them, triumphing over them in it” (Col. 2.15). The letter to the Ephesians reminds us that “He has abolish the law with its commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new humanity in the place of the two, thus making peace, and might reconcile both groups to God in one body through the cross, thus putting to death that hostility through it” (2.15-16).

Our walk must incarnate and reflect the words of the centurion, ‘truly this man was God’s Son!” (Mark 15.39) in response to the call to mission, proclaiming the fall of Babylon by the mighty power of the Blood of Christ, who has called us to freedom.