Mass readings for the 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time:
1 Kings 3.5-12 Psalm 119.57, 72, 76-77, 127-130 Romans 8.28-30 Matthew 13.44-52
We heard today the words of King Solomon’s great prayer for wisdom. God offers him anything he desires; and perhaps that was a test, and Solomon was aware of it. Yet, we must admire his answer. He could have asked for victory over his enemies, for a peaceful reign, he could have asked for rich harvests every year; he could have made a request rooted in the material considerations that come of being a political ruler in this world and so, addressed practical issues related to the economy, to the military, to foreign relations, to domestic matters. None of these would have been selfish, and would have benefited the people of Israel as it made him a success.
Yet this young king asks for wisdom; a capacity to deal with whatever would befall him and Israel for however long he might sit on the throne. In this he offers himself as a model in leadership, as a new kind of king who is a servant of God and of the people; a model for every household of Israel, a demonstration of how one leads (in whatever situation) in humility, and in wisdom. He doesn’t ask for some unnatural life free of challenge, but rather the ability to face those challenges. Such should be our attitude. This is why we celebrate and repeat this story century upon century.
And yet, there is a melancholy quality to the story; because as much as we know of the wisdom Solomon possessed at the outset of his reign, we are aware of how great was his fall from grace. He grew corrupt, forgot God, indulged the worship of foreign gods, and in the debauchery of his fellow rulers, which included maintaining a huge harem of wives and concubines.
His final legacy was his son and heir Rehoboam. When the tribal leaders came to him and asked that the heavy taxes of his father be lifted a little, that the expensive building projects be curtailed, that the ambitions of the house of David be scaled back, Rehoboam who took the worst of Solomon’s reign for wisdom promised not just more of the same but double under his kingship. So, ten of the twelve tribes rebelled, the kingdom was divided and so, eventually fell. The great promise of Solomon went unfulfilled. Where did he go wrong?
Well, for all that precocious wisdom, he was spiritually immature. Like so many political rulers ancient and post-modern, he forgets what his job really is.
His role, indeed the role of any political leader, isn’t to serve an earthly kingdom or state and to do “great things,” but to serve God’s kingdom and so advance its growth; and God’s kingdom is not of this world – our leadership should be nurturing our spiritual development because out of spiritual well-being comes all those other things that we desire for ourselves as individuals and as a society. Yet today the motivation we’re given by so much our leadership is rooted is fear; nurturing division and suspicion.
The proper application of wisdom for Solomon and for all who would lead is in finding the truth of things and acting accordingly – it can make no room for personal ambition, for the aspiration to a great historical legacy. To paraphrase the great Catholic political philosopher Jacques Maritain, while we might have our own political inclinations, to the left or to the right, the test of the validity of one’s politics is in its loyalty to truth. Insofar as a king, or any leader has an absolute devotion to truth, to serve with humility and wisdom, then a legacy worth celebrating is secured.
Jesus tells us there is nothing more precious, nothing that could be more desired than the spiritual kingdom of God. His parables tell us that there is no sacrifice one would not make to be a part of it. A person who has found it will sell everything; and not just sell everything, but put aside his worldly activity for the sake of his attention to it.
That’s the point of the pearl merchant parable – the merchant goes out of business, selling his whole stock of pearls to possess the one perfect pearl with which he will never part. Now, in our time of modern finance, one could use the precious pearl as security on a loan, but Jesus isn’t talking about assets and equity. Rather, this is about someone who knows the value of what he has found because he has spent his life in study and in gaining experience so as to recognize what makes one pearl of greater value than another – and here, at last he has found utter perfection.
This should be our pursuit in the spiritual realm as we study and seek through worship, fellowship, service and prayer to experience God in Christ and so come to know what the kingdom is, and in knowing the joy of it, the peace of it, desire it above all things. This should have been Solomon’s pursuit, but he grew arrogant in his success and resting upon reputation, upon past success, he foolishly abandons the pursuit of God’s kingdom, of serving God’s plan of creating a holy people. Instead, over the course of his reign he sows seed of division as he pursues personal greatness. He became a tyrant.
And for what? One of the great laments of archaeology is how little physical remains there are of the Solomonic kingdom. On the Temple Mount in Jerusalem – bits of pottery. There are ruins of the fortifications, such as at Megiddo, that jibe with the public works we know he initiated; but it’s nothing compared to what we find in Egypt. Solomon’s ambitions came to nothing apart from the stories we find in scripture; a mixed, tragic legacy.
We can understand how this happened. As much as Solomon is a king, he is not the ruler of a vast empire, but a successful kingdom that lived in the shadow of competing empires. Indeed, Israel, even in this peak is still what today we would call a “middle power” not a great power like the United States or Communist China, or even a major power like the United Kingdom or Russia. Think more along the lines of a Scandinavian country, or Canada – that is, like Canada at one point in our history, capable of great things, of having a status greater than one might expect for the size of the nation.
In pursuit of power and prestige, Solomon sets aside divine wisdom for its counterfeit, worldly wisdom; the kind of wisdom Jesus mocked when explaining why he taught in parables, so that the “wise and intelligent” would not be able to understand him. Solomon begins to learn from the nations that surround Israel. He sees how great kings carry themselves, how they ostentatiously demonstrate their power; he notes how open-minded they are about foreign gods, and foreign ideas, how this is a sign of enlightenment and broad-mindedness. He joins the “club” of kings and emperors to benefit Israel by showing how they really are a part of the community of nations; just like everyone else and so, a kingdom to make alliances with, not a strange little community that regards their king, not as a living god, but as a mere servant of a singular, invisible god that Israel presumptuously regarded as the king of gods. Solomon no longer sought the truth of things, but rather the good opinion of his peers; he doesn’t ask, is this truly good for my people? but rather how will it impress other rulers, intimidate his enemies, show the world he is a king.
And that is why, as much as the Christian tradition salutes Solomon for his early wisdom, it cannot offer him up as a true model of kingship, of leadership, because his flaws brought ruin. Rather, we look to Jesus Christ as the only one worthy of imitation.
When we think of the parables we heard today, the man who found the treasure, hid it in a field, sold everything and bought the field; when we think about the pearl merchant who forsakes his place as a rich merchant to possess this one thing; this is Jesus. He gave everything to secure the kingdom, but not for himself, but for us because the kingdom is comprised not of fields, it is not treasures locked up in chests and hidden away in palaces, the kingdom is all those who share in this devotion to the truth of life, the truth of Christ who we know is the truth, the way and life itself. We are the treasure, we are the pearl, if we make ourselves part of the kingdom of God.
The kingdom is like a great haul of fish, Jesus teaches. The fish are sorted and good kept and the bad thrown away – those that are kept are of the kingdom, while those who forsake divine wisdom and do not first and above all else seek the kingdom of God, these are thrown away.
Each one of us is a potential Solomon, every politician too; but while we might start out with a worthy goal of governing ourselves, and perhaps others, in wisdom; we’d best be sure to end our days in Christ, possessing the treasure as we become treasure ourselves.
Amen.