11th Sunday in Ordinary Time
June 13, 2010
I Kings 21:1-21a

Love thy Naboth

        At first hearing, the only difference between today’s Old Testament reading and the latest episode of Desperate Housewives is the lack of commercial interruption. This story has all the elements of trashy TV: a greedy politician who pouts when he doesn’t get his way, a conniving wife who pulls strings behind her husband’s back, an innocent citizen railroaded by a kangaroo court, and an upright preacher who speaks the truth to power.

        How would you cast this movie? I suggest:

Just in case you stepped out for popcorn, let me remind you of the salient details. King Ahab of the northern Kingdom, also known as Samaria, has married Jezebel, also known as the "Canaanite bombshell." She convinces Ahab to set up altars to the Canaanite god Baal. This is in direct contradiction of the first commandment, "You shall have no other gods before me."

Ahab’s main palace is in the hills of Samaria. It gets cold up there in the wintertime, so he’s got another palace in Jezreel. (It’s a bit like owning a McMansion in Montreal and a beach front house on St. George Island.) Next door to his winter palace is a vineyard owned by Naboth, a faithful worshipper of the God of Israel.

Ahab wants Naboth’s vineyard for a vegetable garden. (Don’t ask me why. Ahab doesn’t strike me as a veggie lover.) He makes a reasonable offer, but Naboth refuses to sell, and for a good reason. According to ancient tradition, Israelites did not sell land to anyone outside of their family. (You might remember that, with the Babylonian army at the gates of Jerusalem, Jeremiah decided to buy a plot of land. He had to buy that land from a relative. Even with an army of occupation camped upon it, a loyal Israelite did not sell land outside the clan.)

Naboth to King Ahab: I’m not about to sell my ancestral inheritance to the likes of you.

So, being a grown man and knowing how to act his age, King Ahab goes to bed, pulls the covers over his head, and refuses to eat.

Jezebel goes to Ahab’s bed chamber and tries to get him to eat peanut butter sandwiches with the crusts cut off (his favorite).

"What’s the matter, Big Man? Did somebody hurt your feelings?"

"Yes, that mean old Naboth next door. He won’t sell me his vineyard after I asked nicely."

"Let me get this straight, hubby. You’re the King of Samaria, and you’re sulking in bed because some nobody named Naboth won’t sell you his vineyard? Get up, wash your face, and put your crown back on. I’ll give you Naboth’s vineyard."

And she does. She arranges a fast to get everyone in the country feeling cranky and self-righteousness, and has two scoundrels accuse Naboth of cursing God and spitting on the flag. The crowd, fueled by religion and patriotism -- a fatal mix in any age -- seizes Naboth and stones him to death. (Back then, you see, people thought capital punishment could accomplish something. A primitive notion, I grant you, but there you have it.)

Enter Brad Pitt -- I mean the Elijah the Tishbite -- prophet of the Lord. He catches up with Ahab as he’s deciding where to plant his pole beans and tomatoes and lets him know in no uncertain terms what the Lord thinks of his behavior. Setting up altars to Baal was bad enough. Murdering law-abiding Israelites is the last straw. Ahab will come to a bad end, and it won’t be pretty. "Because you have sold yourself to do what is evil in the sight of the Lord, I will bring disaster on you."

The wording of that verdict is interesting. It’s not that Ahab is a spoiled brat. It’s not that he lets his wife do his dirty work for him. His great offense is that he has "sold himself to do what is evil in the sight of the Lord."

Sure enough, Ahab does come to a bad end. Coward that he is, Ahab disguises himself as a private soldier in a battle with the Aramites. The trick doesn’t do him any good. A stray arrow strikes him between the seams of his armor, and he dies propped up in his chariot, as lifeless as those idols his wife is so fond of.

As for Jezebel, she got thrown out of window without a parachute.

End of episode. Roll credits.

This story comes from what scholars call the Deuteronomistic school of theology. For the Deuteronomists, good is good and bad is bad. God rewards the good and punishes the bad. Ahab was the worst king Israel ever had. He was childish, greedy, polytheistic, and henpecked to boot. And, in keeping with Deuteronomistic theory, he came to a bad end. There is no mistaking the moral to his story: The same will happen to any leader who sells himself to do what is evil in the sight of the Lord.

There is something of the Deuteronomist in all of us. We relish the headlines about indicted politicians caught auctioning senate seats or maxing out the party’s credit card. There’s something deeply satisfying about watching corrupt pubic officials twist in the wind.

That’s probably because we see ourselves as the Naboths of the world, the upright folk who work hard and play by the rules. It’s nice to know that God is on our side, and if we can’t bring down the mighty from their thrones, God will.

There is, of course, an element of scriptural truth in this attitude. God does indeed look out for the little guy – the widow, the fatherless, the people on the margins. Over and over, scripture attests to what the liberation theologians call God’s "preferential option for the poor." God is indeed on the side of the Naboths of the world.

The problem is, God doesn’t work quite the way the Deuteronomists would have us believe. We’re all of us a mixture of good and evil, and whatever good we manage to do we do with God’s help. If God really did work the way the Deuteronomists describe, nobody would be left standing before the judgment seat of God. As Psalm 130 says, "If thou shouldst mark iniquities, Lord, who could stand?"

Certainly not any of us. Look at the sad tale being played out in the Gulf of Mexico. Our use of fossil fuels is as much a parable of greed and exploitation as the story of Naboth and his vineyard. BP drilled the well that is gushing oil into the Gulf, but we are the ones who demanded that oil to fill our gas tanks and fuel our lifestyles.

King Ahab was without doubt a greedy jerk who never grew up, but you and I are not so different from him when we expect to fill our tanks with cheap gas, no matter what the cost to our neighbors.

Ahab died with Naboth’s blood on his hands, but our hands are none too clean. If not covered with blood, they are covered with oil.

If the Deuteronomists are right about how God behaves, hell will not be a lake of fire. Hell will be the Gulf of Mexico fowled with crude. You and I will end up alongside brown pelicans struggling to keep our heads above water. It doesn’t take a Ph.D. in theology to realize that what’s happening in the Gulf is a judgment on us all.

When Jesus appeared on the scene, he challenged the tit-for-tat theology of the Deuteronomists. In his day Deuteronomists were called Pharisees, and they weren’t such bad people. They worked hard and played by the rules, and expected everyone else to do the same. The problem was, they worked so hard at keeping the rules, they lost sight of the what the rules are all about. The rules don’t make us good. They help us to stay focused on the God who is nothing but good.

Jesus is eating dinner in the home of one of those Pharisees when a woman comes in and scandalizes everyone in the house by anointing Jesus’ feet with expensive ointment and drying them with, of all things, her hair. She is, to all appearances, behaving like a Jezebel, and we know what happened to Jezebel. The Pharisees want Jesus to behave like Elisha the Tishbite, and condemn the woman. That’s what a real prophet would do, they figure.

But Jesus doesn’t condemn her. He praises her for her stunning hospitality and forgives her sins, which are many. "Hence, says Jesus, "she has shown great love. But the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little."

Look at the headlines. You and I have an ocean’s worth of sins to be forgiven, enough sin to fill the Gulf of Mexico. We have stolen Naboth’s inheritance. We have sold ourselves to do what is evil in the sight of the Lord.

In Christ our sins are forgiven. So, where’s the "great love" that flows from gratitude? Love like can change the world. It can even cure our addiction.

It’s too late for Ahab and Jezebel, but it’s not too late for us.

 

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