[Texts: Job 23:1-9, 16-17; Psalm 22:1-15; Hebrews 4:12-16; Mark 10:17-31]
We have before us today what is commonly referred to as “the story of the rich young ruler”.
We don’t actually know from St. Mark’s gospel that the subject of the story was a person of any particular importance, aside from being wealthy– we get the “ruler” part from St. Luke.
See, this story appears in all three synoptic Gospels– Mark, Matthew, and Luke– and each writer tells it a little differently. Matthew says, “Then someone came to [Jesus]…” while Luke calls the someone “a certain ruler”. In Mark’s gospel, which is what we’re looking at today, he’s simply referred to as “a man”. Somehow out of all of that, we got “rich young ruler”.
Regardless of who this individual is, he has a question for Jesus. And it’s a good question.
Now, unlike the scribes and the Pharisees, who have shown up in a lot of our readings lately– the religious elites who have been asking Jesus tricky questions for the expressed purpose of getting him to say something that will get him in trouble– there’s no indication that this guy is trying to stump Jesus. As far as I can tell, he’s just asking a question.
So, what’s the million-dollar question? “Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
Think carefully about how he phrased that question. He didn’t say “earn” or “gain”, did he? No, he said “inherit”. κληρονομέω (clay-ron-oh-MAY-oh), which is the word translated as “inherit”, is the same word that would be used in a legal context to talk about inheriting property from a deceased relative, so “inherit” is a really good translation.
That’s how we normally think about the word “inherit” in English, too, right? Someone has something, and they choose to give it to someone else they’re related to. For example, my fiancee’s engagement ring was originally my great-grandmother’s. My mom and my aunt called her “Gamma”. When Gamma died, long before I was born, she left the ring to her granddaughter Irene– my mother. When I was ready to ask Megan to marry me, my mom gave the ring to me. Someday, when one of Megan’s and my children or grandchildren is ready to ask someone special to join our family through marriage, perhaps they’ll want to use that ring, too.
Today, we also use “inherit” in a genetic sense– like how you might have inherited your aunt’s red hair and freckles or your grandpa’s goofy sense of humor. I’m adopted, so it’s hard to say say what traits I might have gotten from where, but I’m told I look a lot like my biological father– he’s from Jordan, and I suspect that’s where I got my dark skin and my Middle Eastern features. My biological mother is of Greek ancestry, so I’m blaming my crazy hair and my love for Mediterranean food on her.
What traits or features have you inherited from your relatives? Do you have any special family heirlooms that have been passed down through the generations in your family?
Either way, you’re not talking about something you earned, or did anything in particular in order to gain. Those items or traits were just assigned to you because you happened to be related to certain people. I didn’t have to do anything special to get my Gamma’s ring– it came into my possession because I’m related to its original owner. I inherited it because, by birth– or, rather, in my case, by adoption– I’m a member of a certain family.
It’s a little confusing, then, isn’t it, that the young man in this story used the word “inherit”, isn’t it?
I’m sure Jesus was kind of puzzled by that too. Perhaps he wanted to channel Inigo Montoya from The Princess Bride and say, “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.” The question “What do I do to inherit…” doesn’t make sense because, as we just discussed, inheritance isn’t about doing anything. You don’t do something in order to inherit something; you inherit it because you’re related to the person whose item it is to give, and they choose to give it to you.
And that’s just it– inheriting eternal life is just that: an inheritance. It’s something you get because you are a child of God and a member of God’s family.
“Eternal life”, though, might be another example of “I do not think that means what you think it means,” mainly because the way it’s translated into English is a bit unhelpful.
We’ve talked about that phrase before, but let’s have a quick refresher, since that was a while ago.
In Greek, the phrase is ζωή αἰώνιος (ZO-ay ay-OWN-ee-oss), it’s used several times in the New Testament, and it’s almost always translated into English as “eternal life”.
I despise that translation– not because it’s necessarily wrong, per se, but because it’s incomplete. When we hear the word eternal, we think about time, right? An eternal quantity— something that literally never ceases to be or to exist. Which is fine, and may even be true, but it’s not complete. αἰώνιος doesn’t just mean eternal or infinite in the sense of quantity; it also implies eternal or infinite in the sense of quality. If I were to translate this passage, I would translate it as “Master, what must I do to inherit abundant life?” or perhaps “boundless life.” I wouldn’t have chosen the word “eternal” because I don’t think it gets at the true meaning of the word.
What’s more, I think the use of “eternal” as a translation for αἰώνιος tricks us into thinking Jesus is talking about something I’d be willing to bet money he isn’t talking about. When I say “eternal life”, I bet your first thought was Heaven, right? And I don’t blame you. If there’s one thing we know to be true about life on earth, it’s that it isn’t infinite in quantity. It’s finite– it ends. We die. So, life that’s eternal must mean something other than this life, right?
Well, no, actually– and that’s why I get so salty about αἰώνιος being translated as “eternal”. Jesus’s new friend probably isn’t talking about life that’s infinite in quantity— which would have to be referring to something other than our time on earth.
The Jews– and we have no reason to believe the man in this story isn’t Jewish– didn’t really have a theology of the afterlife, certainly not anything like what Christians today think of when they think of the afterlife. So I don’t think it makes much sense to assume that this man, who is probably Jewish, is talking about a concept that would be foreign to a Jew in the first century. It’s much more likely that he’s talking about life that’s infinite in quality. He’s talking about abundant life, boundless life.
When we think about eternal life as the afterlife, we have the nasty habit of making it an individual thing. It’s about what’s going to happen to you– specifically, individually, you— after you shuffle off this mortal coil. Heaven? Hell? Purgatory? Reincarnation? Nothing? Who’s “in” and who’s “out”? How can I, as an individual, make sure my name is on the right list? This kind of thinking is not only fruitless but perverse. It does not just miss the point of the Gospel; it is antithetical to the point of the Gospel.
But when we think of eternal life in terms of abundant life, it cannot, by definition, be about us as individuals. All of us are linked by common threads of humanity. As St. John Donne famously said, “No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.”
Later in that same poem, John Donne says that, because he is “involved in mankind”, he is diminished by every death. Now, of course, this can certainly refer to physical death. We are each diminished by every mass shooting, every gay or transgender person who is bullied to the point of suicide, and each young black life needlessly cut short by a police officer’s gun. But we are also each diminished by the inability of others to gain that abundant life that the rich young ruler was so keen on learning how to gain. We are all involved in humankind, and where there is loss or diminishing of life anywhere, we are all made less by it.
(Fun fact: when we sing “One was a doctor, and one was a priest, and one was slain by a fierce, wild beast”, St. John Donne was the priest. At no extra charge, here’s even more useless trivia: St. Luke the Evangelist was the doctor, and St. Ignatius of Antioch was slain by the fierce, wild beast. You’re welcome.)
I have a Hebrew word tattooed on my left forearm, just below my the inside of my elbow. The word is שָׁלוֹם — shalom– a word you’re probably familiar with as the Hebrew word for “peace”. Well, kind of. Shalom means the absence of war– which is how we generally use the word “peace” in English– but it means so much more than that.
Bishop Katharine is very fond of using the word “shalom”. (The reason I got the tattoo was to honor her and her ministry.) In her investiture sermon– the first sermon she gave as our Presiding Bishop nine years ago– she said this:
“It doesn’t just mean the sort of peace that comes when we’re no longer at war. It’s that rich and multihued vision of a world where no one goes hungry because everyone is invited to a seat at the groaning board, it’s a vision of a world where no one is sick or in prison because all sorts of disease have been healed, it’s a vision of a world where every human being has the capacity to use every good gift that God has given, it is a vision of a world where no one enjoys abundance at the expense of another, it’s a vision of a world where all enjoy Sabbath rest in the conscious presence of God. Shalom means that all human beings live together as siblings, at peace with one another and with God, and in right relationship with all of the rest of creation. It is that vision of the lion lying down with the lamb and the small child playing over the den of the adder, where the specter of death no longer holds sway.”
Shalom is, she goes on to say, the vision to which Jesus was pointing when he preached his first sermon– those famous words he read aloud from the sixty-first chapter of the Book of Isaiah– and then put down the scroll and said, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” Shalom is the abundant, eternal, boundless life we’ve been talking about.
Bishop Katharine– joining her voice with many of her fellow prophets throughout history– has often (correctly) reminded us that our ability to enjoy shalom is directly dependent on whether others around us are able to share in that same abundance. In her own words, “None of us can truly find our rest in God until all of our brothers and sisters have also been welcomed home like the prodigal.”
When the rich young ruler asks Jesus what he must do to gain– or rather, inherit– abundant life, Jesus points him to the Ten Commandments. The first four of the Ten Commandments are about how we relate to God. The latter six speak to our relationships with each other.
Interestingly enough, in his conversation with this young man, Jesus only names the last six: the ones that are about the way we’re supposed to treat our neighbor. He’s encouraging the man to think about the way he lives in relationship with all of God’s children– because he is involved in mankind, and his ability to participate in abundant life (shalom) is intimately tied up with that of his neighbors.
The young man has an answer ready for that– he says, “I’ve followed all of those since my youth!” Surely this must mean he’s living in perfect relationship with his neighbors, right?
Jesus looks at him and says, “You still lack something.” You still don’t quite have it right.
What does he lack? Well, he’s a rich man– a man of “many possessions”, as St. Mark tells us. He is someone who is living a life of excess while others around him are poor. He isn’t using the gifts God has given him to be a steward of– in this case, his possessions, his material wealth– in a way that increases the ability of his neighbor to share in abundant life. Because of this, he cannot share in abundant life, either.
We inherit eternal life– we do not earn it. It belongs to all of us because we are all part of God’s family. We are all related to God and to one another, and our humanity is tied up with one another’s.
“So, what more do I need to do, if I’m already keeping all the commandments?” asks our rich young friend.
And Jesus tells him to tear down the wall of shiny stuff he’s built between himself and God, that sin of hoarding and greed that is preventing his neighbors from participating in the fullness of God’s shalom, and thereby preventing himself from participating too. Jesus tells him to use the gifts that he is a steward of– because all good things ultimately come from God– to do God’s work, to participate in the bringing-to-pass of God’s dream for humanity, if he does not want to continue to be separated from God by his big shiny barricade of junk.
If I am fed but my neighbor is hungry, I do not have abundant life. If I have access to education, healthcare, clean water, and decent housing, but my neighbor doesn’t, I do not have abundant life. And if I hoard the gifts God has blessed me with– whether that’s time, talents, or material wealth– rather than using them to promote God’s vision of shalom for all, then those things I’m hoarding separate me from God.
And, while I am living in that sin of greed, it would be easier for a full-grown camel to get through the eye of a sewing needle than for me to truly know God and be in right, intimate, life-giving relationship with him.
Jesus is saying to this young man, “You think you’re rich because you have lots of stuff. You think you have abundance. I do not think that word means what you think it means. Go, sell what you have, give to the poor, care for your neighbors, and then you’ll find out what abundance means.”
None of us is an island, entire unto ourselves. Each of us is a part of the main, the continent, the shared human experience. We will either all experience shalom together, or none of us will truly know peace, abundance, life, and wholeness.
That is what it truly means to be rich, to have abundance, to have plenty– not just enough for one person to live well but enough for a feast, a party that all of humanity is invited to.
We will reach Zion– Heaven on earth, abundant life, that holy city that matches God’s vision for humanity– together, hand in hand, or not at all.
So, what does it take to gain eternal life?
Can we do it alone? Can any one of us enjoy by ourselves the abundance that belongs to all of us by virtue of our inheritance?
Truly, I tell you: it would be easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle.