Fifth Sunday after EPIPHANY (Written on January 30, 2009)

For the Lectionary (what's a lectionary?) of February 8, 2009: Mark 1:29-39

 

"In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted place and there he prayed.”

 

FIFTEEN SECONDS by Larry Patten

Words always matter. They are safe harbors. Treacherous currents. Soothing as a breeze. Frightening when we are peppered with them during a hailstorm of insults and criticism.

As a minister I view every word of any consequence in the Bible as a result of choice. For contemporary readers with their favorite Biblical translations, the particular word appearing in a scripture verse represents someone’s (indeed, many someones) intentional decision. Before any noun or verb made the Bible’s printed page, enough scholars to fill a rehearsal site for American Idol toiled over the decision.

In Mark 1:29-39 one particular word choice suddenly seemed to leap at me. Yesterday, maybe it would have been a different word or phrase. Tomorrow, who knows? But today, in an umpteenth re-read, there the word was. At least there it was in my New Revised Standard Version (NRSV, 1990).

What a word! What a word choice!

What word had other translations used? The endlessly insightful Eugene Peterson, in his contemporary “remix” of scripture entitled THE MESSAGE decided, Simon and those with him went LOOKING for him. The New International Version similarly included, Simon and his companions went to LOOK for him.

Ye olde King James declared, And Simon and they that were with him FOLLOWED after him. The Bible I back and forth from Sunday school as a kid (Revised Standard Version, 1946) mirrored, And Simon and those who were with him FOLLOWED him.

1995’s New American Standard took a different path with, Simon and his companions SEARCHED for Him.

On it goes. Word choices all. Looked, followed, searched.

But my NRSV, translating the same Greek word (which is katadioko for you ancient language enthusiasts) declared . . . And Simon and his companions HUNTED for him.

Hunt. Hunted. Katadioko.

The other choices I mentioned—looked, followed, searched—seem benign. Yes, they are ready-to-party verbs. And they are all appropriate English definitions for katadioko. But they feel so different than hunt. Hunt feels aggressive. Intense. Perhaps even scary.

And yet appropriate. Though I became fascinated with a singular word choice, it was not just one word or one verse that I read. Within Mark 1:29-39’s eleven verses rests a singularly essential verse for my faithful life. Right before the looking, following, searching, or hunting for Jesus, the carpenter from Nazareth did this:

In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted place and there he prayed.

Mark 1:35 is pivotal for me. And every translation picked the same word: Jesus PRAYED. Jesus prayed alone. All persons of faith, from first century till now, from the leery visitor in the pew to the learned priest in the pulpit, need some kind of private prayer time. Alone time. Listening time. You and God-is-here time. You and you-wonder-if-God-is-anywhere time.

But the world hunts us down.

Doesn’t it?

I think the NRSV made the best word choice for what interferes with, or steals away, a re-energizing solitude. The world relentlessly pursues us. With obligations, self-doubts, another soul to save, a to-do list, personal expectations, societal demands, work-related concerns, family issues. These things don’t search for us. They don’t just follow us. They are not merely looking for us. Expectations are like a Steven Spielberg T-Rex with our scent. The hunt is on. And we thought we were at the top of the food chain!

And yet sometimes we prefer that the demands and concerns track us. Don’t we? The Quaker-influenced writer Parker Palmer mused that many of us are “functional atheists.” We believe “ultimate responsibility for everything rests with us.” (No, no, I don’t think that!) And Palmer further suggested,

It explains why the average group can tolerate no more than fifteen seconds of silence; if we are not making noise, we believe, nothing good is happening and something must be dying.

And maybe also the “average person” feels the same. The NRSV scholars examined the options available for katadioko. I think they choose the honest one. Be wary. Take time for solitude. It’s as necessary as it is difficult to include in the daily schedule.

For you see, Simon and the others are always on their way. They have so many wonderful hopes and needs to share. And don’t you have to help solve everything?

I hear ‘em coming! They are ______ing for you!

in Peace,

Larry