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| Rembrandt - Belshazzar's Feast |
The image of a 'banquet’ or 'feast' is one that recurs with
great regularity in Christian thought and art, not least in the Bible itself. The reason is easy to see.
Religion is about life, and food is essential to life. An instinctive desire for food is the new born baby’s first orientation to the world,
and by tradition, an offer of food is the last humane act extended to
those condemned to death. Nor is food simply a necessity. Specially prepared food
and drink provided in abundance is the universal mark of human celebration – at
births, weddings, religious holidays and communal festivals.It was at a wedding feast that Jesus gave his first 'sign', according to John. So
it is completely natural for human beings to think analogically of spiritual gifts and
blessings as ‘heavenly food’, and by extension to conceive of God’s promise of
salvation as a ‘heavenly banquet’.
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| Bosch -- Marriage Feast at Cana |
Some
of the most famous feasts and banquets that the Bible depicts, however, have a
dark side -- sin subverting celebration and turning it spectacularly in
the wrong direction. Belshazzer's feast in the Book of Daniel is one
famous example -- an extravagant celebration that augurs the collapse of
a Kingdom. Herod's feast at which Salome dances is another -- her
reward taking the gruesome form of the head of John the Baptist on a
platter. Feasting, then, ought to mark a joyful celebration, but it can
go badly wrong.
Jesus' use of the image in
the parable that forms this Sunday’s Gospel has something of this ambiguity about it. His audience's familiarity with the passage from
Isaiah that provides the Old Testament lesson -- “the LORD of hosts will
make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines” -- means his use of this image to teach about the Kingdom of Heaven could not fail to
resonate. However, it is given a special twist.
To begin with, the people who ought to come to the celebration can't be
bothered to come, despite the status of the host and the quality of the
food. In response, the king tells his slaves
to go out into the streets and gather “all whom they found, both good
and bad”. Is the message this --- that social elitism has been abandoned in favor of a wonderful inclusion?
Things are not quite so simple. To begin with, the guests
on the original list, who treated the invitation lightly, are not included, but punished instead.
And, it turns out, even the people gathered up from the streets and
brought in without asking are not assured of a permanent place at the
banquet. The hapless man who did not trouble to dress properly for the
occasion, is promptly thrown out.
The
message seems clear. God longs for everyone to share 'joys that pass
our understanding' with him. Good news
indeed. Yet indifference, willfulness and carelessness have the power to make us
lose them.
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