Source of Life and Light

Homily for the Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Psalm 119, is the longest Psalm in the Psalter, ingeniously constructed. Not only is it an acrostic with verses beginning with successive letters of the Hebrew alphabet, but it is an expensive acrostic. Each of the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet is represented by eight verses. Thus, verses one through eight begin with “aleph,” the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet; verses nine through sixteen with “beth,” the second letter, and so on. Those of you who are doing the math in your heads will come to the conclusion that 8×22 = 176 verses. As if this were not enough, there are eight synonyms for the word “law” which are woven throughout the poem appearing in almost all of the verses.

The subject of the Psalm, indeed – the subject of the readings for this Sunday – is the Law. The attitude, however, is not one of legalism. Rather the Psalm praises the Law as the source of life and light. The author of this lengthy song maintains that only in God’s law can happiness be found. Meditation on God’s word, on God’s law, gives joy to the heart and peace to the soul. To live a life immersed in the law is to be truly wise.

The great attention to external structure and the length of the Psalm sometimes masks the profundity of its content. The verses and stanzas are not linked together in any progressive thought pattern. Each verse stands alone as a wisdom statement about the importance of God’s law in the life of God’s chosen people. The Law has been likened to an umbilical cord that connects the Jews to God.

Each of the readings for this Sunday asks us to examine our relationship to God’s Word, God’s Law. The Book of Sirach asks us to choose between good and evil, fire and water, life and death. God forces no human being to do anything, yet because of this freedom God cannot be said to give “license to sin.” The basic choice is to keep the commandments and trust, that is, remain unswervingly loyal to God.

In his First Letter to the Corinthians, St. Paul asks us to consider the difference between the wisdom of the world and God’s wisdom, between worldly power and God’s power. Jesus was unswervingly loyal to God which led to his crucifixion and death. Before he died, Jesus told us that following him meant picking up our cross, meant bearing with suffering, meant being humble, meant being meek and pure. The world sees this as folly rather than wisdom, as weakness rather than power. However, St. Paul reminds us that it is written that eye has not seen and ear has not heard and it has not entered into the human heart what God has prepared for those who love him, for those who are loyal to him. The wisdom of God is the divine plan for our salvation, the goal of which was to restore honor and glory to God’s creatures who lost it in the fall of Adam. The humiliating death of Jesus restored this honor, making him the Lord of glory so that the every knee must bend and every tongue confess that Jesus is the Lord.

In his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus asks us to look carefully at the commandments. Rather than narrowing their meaning to what is prohibited, Jesus asks us to look at what we should do. Using the fifth, the sixth, and the eighth commandments, Jesus extends their meaning by reminding us that we were made in the image of God and that, therefore, we expand our understanding to include a positive and proactive posture in our dealings with our brothers and sisters. Jesus has laid a totally new foundation for human life and behavior. The Christian is to be like Christ, and his or her behavior is to be in accord with this new reality. The old style of the law concerns itself with action only. It cannot really touch the heart. It is the wisdom of the heart, the power of the heart – namely, love – that must be this totally new approach to our life with God and with one another. Only when we look at the commandments from this perspective will we truly appreciate God’s wisdom and God’s power. Then we will be able to join with the composer of Psalm 119 in praising God’s Law as the source of life and the light.