‘They love to have the place of honour at banquets’ (Matthew 23: 6) … dinner by the beach in Platanias near Rethymnon in Crete (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Patrick Comerford
We are continuing in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and tomorrow is the Tenth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity X, 24 August 2025) and the feast of Saint Bartholomew the Apostle.
Today begins the August summer bank holiday weekend in England. Before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:
1, today’s Gospel reading;
2, a reflection on the Gospel reading;
3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;
4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.
‘They love to have the place of honour at banquets’ (Matthew 23: 6) … a restaurant in Bettystown, Co Meath (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Matthew 23: 1-12 (NRSVA):
23 Then Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples, 2 ‘The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat; 3 therefore, do whatever they teach you and follow it; but do not do as they do, for they do not practise what they teach. 4 They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on the shoulders of others; but they themselves are unwilling to lift a finger to move them. 5 They do all their deeds to be seen by others; for they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long. 6 They love to have the place of honour at banquets and the best seats in the synagogues, 7 and to be greeted with respect in the market-places, and to have people call them rabbi. 8 But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all students. 9 And call no one your father on earth, for you have one Father – the one in heaven. 10 Nor are you to be called instructors, for you have one instructor, the Messiah. 11 The greatest among you will be your servant. 12 All who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all who humble themselves will be exalted.’
Rabbi Zalman Lent in the synagogue on Rathfarnham Road, Dublin, with tallit and teffilin, signs of keeping God’s word before us (Photograph: Orla Ryan)
Today’s Reflection:
In the Gospel reading at the Eucharist yesterday (Matthew 22: 34-06), we learned how all the Law and the Prophets – everything taught by Moses and Prophets – depends on, hangs on, the two great commandments, to love God and to love our neighbour.
His summary of those guidelines for living came in a conversation Jesus had with a lawyer in the Temple, in front of the Pharisees and the Sadducees, the two groups most concerned with teaching what is meant by the Law and the Prophets.
In this morning’s Gospel reading (Matthew 23: 1-12), we are still in the Temple with Christ in Holy Week, the week leading up to his Passion, Death and Resurrection. There in the Temple, Christ has silenced his critics among the Sadducees and the Pharisees, showing their lack of understanding of the core messages of the Prophets and the Law in the Bible.
In this morning’s Gospel reading, he turns to speak ‘to the crowds and to his disciples’ about the scribes and the Pharisees, and their attitude to and teaching of the Law and the Bible.
Christ tells the people in the Temple that the Pharisees have authority to teach the Law, and he concedes that they are in an unbroken chain that goes back to Moses, for they ‘sit on Moses’ seat’ (verse 2).
But while honouring their teachings, the people should be wary of their practices. In their interpretation of the Law, they impose heavy burdens on others, yet do not follow the Law themselves.
Externally, they appear pious. They wear
teffelin or phylacteries, small, black, leather boxes, on their left arms and foreheads with four Biblical passages as a ‘sign’ and ‘remembrance’ that God liberated their ancestors from slavery in Egypt (see Exodus 13: 1-10; Exodus 13: 11-16; Deuteronomy 6: 4-9; and Deuteronomy 11: 13-21). They also have lengthy fringes or tassels on their prayer shawls (
tallitot, singular
talit), as visible reminders of the 613 commandments in the Law (see Numbers 15: 38, Deuteronomy 22: 12).
Christ gives four examples of vanity (verse 6-7): they love places of honour at banquets, the best seats in the synagogues, being greeted with respect publicly, and being called ‘Rabbi,’ which means master and later becomes a title for the leader in a synagogue.
We are warned about the dangers built into loving honorific titles, such as ‘teacher,’ ‘father’ and instructor (see verses 8-10) – perhaps for me that means Canon and Professor – because, of course, we are all students, we are all brothers and sisters, we are all disciples, and we are all children of God.
Yet I too am a father and have been a teacher and a tutor. Is Christ warning against the position; or against seeking honours that have not been earned?
It is a truism that parents must earn the respect of their children, not seek or demand it. Most parents have, at one time or another, said to their children: ‘Do what I tell you, not what I do.’ Needless to say, children never listen to parents when we say something so silly.
All parents know, on the other hand, that actions speak louder than words.
Perhaps this morning’s reading reflects later tensions between the Jewish synagogue and the new Christian community. But, in Christ’s own days, people expected a Pharisee to be a careful observer of the Law. Unlike the Temple priests and village elders, the Pharisees did not have a high social status.
Before the destruction of the Temple in the year 70 CE, the Pharisees were a relatively modest group of people without political power and they tried to live out Jewish tradition and the Torah seriously and conscientiously in their daily lives. The Pharisees saw the Law as applying not only to every aspect of public life, but to every aspect of private, domestic, daily life too.
There is another well-worn statement: ‘It’s not where you start out but where you end up.’ The Pharisees started out with good intentions, but some of them ended by seeking to be great, seeking to be exalted (verses 11-12). They started out being concerned for holiness, but some ended at exclusion. They started out seeking to recognise God in all aspects of life, but some of them ended by seeking recognition at banquets and in the synagogue (verses 6-7).
Christ calls us to live in such a way that we can say to the world: ‘Do as we say
and do as we do.’
The problem here may not so much be a conflict between words and actions, but the need to make the connection between words and actions. Words must mean what they point to, and the actions must be capable of being described in words.
Most of us, as children, learned by watching how adults behave, we learn as members of the human community. As a child, when I needed to learn how to use a fork, I did not need a lecture on the hygienic and sanitary contributions that forks have made to the benefit European lifestyles since the introduction of the fork through Byzantium and Venice to mediaeval Europe; I did not need an engineering lecture on the practicalities and difficulties of balancing the prongs and the handle; I would have been too young to read a delightful chapter by Judith Herrin in one of her books on how the fork-using Byzantines were much more sophisticated than their western allies or rivals who ate with their hands (Judith Herrin,
Byzantium – the Surprising Life of a Mediaeval Empire, London: Allen Lane, 2007).
The same principle applies to everything else, as Andrew Davison, Regius Professor of Divinity, Oxford, points out in his contribution to
Imaginative Apologetics (London: SCM Press, 2011), the same principle applies to how we learn about everything else in life – cups, books, bicycles and so on. He might have added love – the love of God and the love of one another.
On a number of occasions, I have visited the National Botanic Gardens in Glasnevin, Dublin. There, in the Great Palm House, are the steps on which the great 20th century German philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein regularly sat in contemplation and thought while he was living in Dublin in the late 1940s.
Even for those who find Wittgenstein difficult to read, he offers useful insights in his writings.
Wittgenstein teaches us that thinking and language must be inter-connected. ‘Words have meaning only in the stream of life,’ he says. Thinking requires language, language is a communal experience, and, as Davison points out, we learn language as members of a human community and through induction into common human practices.
We can talk about prayer, forgiveness, and most of all about love itself, to others. But if it only remains talk and has no application, then the words have no meaning.
Saint Paul reminds the members of the Church in Thessaloniki (I Thessalonians 2: 9-13) that they are witnesses to Christ not only in their beliefs but in the way they live their lives and in their conduct towards the new Church members.
Like a father teaching his children, he urges and encourages them, and pleads with them to walk in God’s ways, so that God’s word becomes made active in those who believe. In All Saints-tide, this is good advice on how to live as saints, as part of the Communion of Saints.
We might remind ourselves that when Christ tells the lawyer sent by the Pharisees and the Sadducees that the greatest commandments are to ‘love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind’ and to ‘love your neighbour as yourself.’ And, he adds: ‘On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets’ (see Matthew 22: 34-46),
If the Pharisees, the Sadducees and the young lawyer were teaching and acting in conformity with these laws, if their words and actions were inter-connected, then there would have been an unassailable ring of authenticity to their teaching.
We may say we believe in the two great commandments, but we only show we believe in them with credibility when we live them out in our lives. There must be no gap that separates what we teach and how we live out what we teach in our lives.
Ludwig Wittgenstein’s steps in the Great Palm House in the National Botanic Gardens, Glasnevin, Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)
Today’s Prayers (Saturday 23 August 2025):
The theme this week (17 to 23 August) in
Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), has been ‘Tell the Full Story’ (pp 28-29). This theme was introduced last Sunday with reflections from Dr Jo Sadgrove, Research and Learning Advisor, USPG.
The USPG Prayer Diary today (Saturday 23 August 2025, International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and Its Abolition) invites us to pray:
Father, today we honour the lives lost to the slave trade and the struggles of all who fought for its abolition. May we never forget the past, and may we be inspired to work towards a future of justice, equality, and freedom for all.
The Collect of the Day:
Almighty God,
who sent your Holy Spirit
to be the life and light of your Church:
open our hearts to the riches of your grace,
that we may bring forth the fruit of the Spirit
in love and joy and peace;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
The Post-Communion Prayer:
Holy Father,
who gathered us here around the table of your Son
to share this meal with the whole household of God:
in that new world where you reveal the fullness of your peace,
gather people of every race and language
to share in the eternal banquet of Jesus Christ our Lord.
Additional Collect:
Gracious Father,
revive your Church in our day,
and make her holy, strong and faithful,
for your glory’s sake
in Jesus Christ our Lord.
Collect on the Eve of Trinity X:
Let your merciful ears, O Lord,
be open to the prayers of your humble servants;
and that they may obtain their petitions
make them to ask such things as shall please you;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Collect on the Eve of Saint Bartholomew:
Almighty and everlasting God,
who gave to your apostle Bartholomew grace
truly to believe and to preach your word:
grant that your Church
may love that word which he believed
and may faithfully preach and receive the same;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Yesterday’s reflection
Continued tomorrow
The table remains bare if our words and our actions are not inter-connected … tables at a restaurant in Baker Street, London, this week (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)
Scripture quotations are from the
New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
http://nrsvbibles.org
