Many are Called, few are Chosen

Another thoughtful offering from my liberal friend (yes!) Harry, with
whom I disagree on many things, but who is still a welcome inputter into
my inbox and mind! Rowland.

Barely Chosen to Play Right Field


Harry T. Cook

10/12/08

Matthew 22: 1-14

Leave it to Matthew to abandon grace for retribution. In one of his
attempts to
wrap a pithy saying in a midrashic story for effect, Matthew gave John
Calvin and
other predestinationists all the biblical warrant they would ever need
to determine
who would be "in" and who would be "out" of luck come the end of time.
The saying is "Many are called, but few are chosen," which a biblical
studies student
of mine once brilliantly compared to the difference between a venire and
a seated
jury. All of them were called to duty. Only 12 were finally needed, yet
any of the
unchosen ones could have been chosen, for all were worthy.
That's a far cry from the predestinationists' vengeance tragedy of
arbitrary divine
choice of some over others for the enjoyment of paradise and the
consequent consignment
of the rest to perdition. It reminds one in a grisly way of the
disembarkation of
Jews from the cattle cars at Auschwitz only to approach Herr Docktor
Josef Mengele
who, with a flick of the thumb left or right chose which of them would
die sooner
and which later.
As with almost any biblical passage, many possibilities of rational
interpretation
present themselves, some more attune to pertinent scholarship than
others. The terrible
story told in this passage concerns a king who had given advance notice
of a wedding
banquet for his son and now sent runners to summon the invitees. Some of
them are
depicted as blowing off the invitation, which more than irked the king.
For reasons
unexplained in this ham-fisted story, others of the invitees killed the
invitation
bearers, who were in turn killed by the outraged king who had their
cities burned
for good measure.
In the context of the late first century, it is not difficult to follow
Matthew's
mind. The son in the story is Jesus; the king is God; the invitation
bearers are
the apostles; the reluctant guests are Gentiles lukewarm to Jesus
Judaism; the
killers of the invitation bearers represent post-Temple continuing
Judaism struggling
both against the Jesus movement and the depredations of Rome.

Therefore what is called a "parable" is really an allegory. It's too
obvious and
too unnuanced to be a classic parable. Also, its moral ("Many are
called but few
are chosen") doesn't really fit with the story. The moral would fit
better with
Luke's version of the story, which features the lame and the poor being
invited
to the feast in place of those who were too busy to come. In Luke, it's
kind of
a "look what you missed" kind of ending instead of wailing and gnashing
of teeth.
Yet the saying remains: "Many are called but few are chosen." I have
always admired
that student of mine in days gone by who came up with the venire/jury
interpretation.
My own is less creative, but the saying in question here always reminds
me of the
good-weather recesses of my grammar school days when the boys ran to the
ball field
that had been hacked out of the farmland which bordered our four-room
school house.
I was the fat kid who batted - if you could call it that - left-handed,
and could
be counted on to bobble any grounder or drop any fly.
Most days I remained on the side lines, having been called by the recess
bell to
the ball field but seldom chosen by team captains actually to play.
Occasionally
though, to even the teams, one of the captains would relent and, with a
shrug of
his shoulders, let me play right field to which few balls were ever
hit. I was
soon unchosen after a couple of strike outs or bloop pop-ups. But in the
classroom,
I got all A's. So school wasn't a total washout.


© Copyright 2008, Harry T. Cook. All rights reserved. This article may
not be used
or reproduced without proper credit.
--


Shalom/Salaam/Pax!                         Rowland Croucher

http://jmm.aaa.net.au/   (20,000 articles 4000 humor)

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