May
my words be in the Name of the Holy & Undivided Trinity: +
Father, Son, & Holy Spirit. Amen.
There
is much that is unsavoury in the details of the events surrounding
the death of St John the Baptist, which we hear of in our Gospel reading today. The tale begins outside of the Gospel accounts with
the divorce of Herodias from King Philip, the brother of another of
these local Jewish kings, Herod Antipas. We do not know what brought
about this divorce, but we are told by the historian Josephus that it
was Herodias that divorced Philip, something of a scandal in those
days. It appears that she did so for the sole purpose of marrying her
brother-in-law, Herod Antipas, and that marriage took place soon
after – and at no little cost to king Herod, as he had to first
divorce his wife, Phasaelis, the daughter of King Aretas
IV of Nabatea,
powerful ruler of a neighbouring kingdom who was far from pleased
that his child, and therefore also himself, should be treated in such
a disrespectful way.
This
marriage was, of course, unlawful for those of the Jewish faith. This
was no great difficulty personally for either Herodias or Herod –
the royal families of the Jewish kingdoms were really only nominally
Jewish both in breeding and religion – and as these petty kings
were essentially Roman functionaries, backed by the power of the
Empire, there was little likelihood of any political repercussions
within his kingdom – a king, who has not only his own army, but
also has the Roman legions at his beck and call is not to be trifled
with – and the Sadducees and the Pharisees, so quick to scrutinise
the activities of our Lord, seem to have thought it the wiser part of
valour to ignore the shenanigans of the royal family.
But
St John felt under no compulsion to behave with a similar discretion.
These people were flouting God's law in a very public and
unapologetic way. Their behaviour not only put their own souls in
danger, but by their example they might lead others astray; for if
the king may behave thus without anyone speaking out, then others may
be led to believe that perhaps it is not so very wrong to do so. And
if this law may be broken with impunity, then why not others? And so
St John is the one to speak out, the only one brave enough and holy
enough, the only one who loves God enough to break the silence of
tacit acceptance of this transgression of his law.
Prison,
of course, swiftly follows. King's do not like being criticised,
particularly when that criticism might lead to popular unrest.
Herodias wants the holy man dead – of course she does, for if Herod
were to do as St John says, he would have to end their marriage, and
where would a woman who had set aside one king for another only to be
set aside herself in her turn ever find another king to marry? So the
saint was a very dangerous man indeed to her.
But
Herod refuses to have him killed. The surface excuse is that he fears
that his execution might lead to an uprising of John's followers. But
the deeper reason seems to be that he shrinks from so terrible an act
as executing a holy man for speaking the truth. That would be more
than murder – that would be a sacrilege approaching blasphemy.
So
instead he puts him in prison. And, to what must surely have been to
Herodias' horror, he goes and listens to him there. For who can doubt
what St John had to say to the king, even as he sits in chains?
Surely he would have continued to urge the king that there was still
time to repent of the evil that he had done and spare himself from
the wrath to come, to step away from this unholy marriage and return
to living his life according to the laws of God. This must have been
worrying time for Herodias.
But
she need not have feared. Like a great many kings in history, Herod
seems to have felt that keeping a holy man close, and protecting him
from harm, in some way gave him licence to lead a life that was far
from holy himself. He did not repent; he did not set his brother's
wife aside. Instead he threw a huge birthday banquet for himself.
And, if further proof were needed that Herod remained a man who was
far from God's law, he called his own niece, now his step-daughter,
Salome, to come and dance at this drunken celebration.
Being a
dancing girl in the ancient world, for those who are not aware, was
far from being a respectable occupation; they were generally slaves,
rented out for the public and private entertainment of those who
could afford them. That he would ask the girl who was legally now his
own daughter to come forward for the leering entertainment of his
guests speaks volumes about the depravity to which Herod had sunk; as
does the manner in which he allowed his passions to become so
inflamed by her dancing that he would promise her anything she wished
for as a reward.
Herodias
sees her chance and seizes it; and Herod is too weak and prideful to
resist. And so he gives her what is not his to give, something that
is never in anyone's gift, whether they be a great king or the most
lowly and ordinary person alive – another man's life.
How
happy Herodias must have been that day. The person who was the
greatest threat to her had been eliminated. More, by forcing the king
to execute John, she ensured that Herod could never now leave her;
they were bound together by his blood, for Herod could not now or
ever repudiate the marriage without admitting he had murdered an
innocent man for no other crime than speaking the truth.
Her
happiness was short lived. Ironically, this marriage was to prove
Herod's downfall. His former father-in-law, King Aretas did not
forgive the slight done to himself and his daughter, and within a few
years he and Herod were engaged in a war that proved disastrous for
the Jewish king. His weakened position after the conflict was
exploited by his enemies, and Rome handed his kingdom to his nephew,
Agrippa. Herod and Herodias were sent into exile and obscurity,
vanishing so completely from the pages of history that neither the
date nor the manner of their death is recorded.
It
would be tempting to see the hand of divine providence in the
downfall of Herod and Herodias, wicked people punished in this life
as a result of their own wickedness; but that would be to make them
the focus of the story, and they are not. I have not told you about
them in order to impress upon you the idea that God will strike down
the wicked in this life. For this is not so – Jesus himself taught
us this in the parable of the wheat and the tares, explaining that
God's judgement is in the next life, not this; and we all know from
personal experience that good people may suffer in this vale of
tears, even as we know that those who seem to us to lead lives of
unmitigated evil seem to prosper.
No,
I told you about Herod and Herodias so that you might better
understand what it was that St John faced up to in challenging them,
for it is he that is our focus. And John by his life and death
teaches us that our life and liberty are not to be achieved at any
price – the truth must be spoken whatever the cost. It does not
matter how powerful and unscrupulous the enemies of God's Word may be
or what dire penalties they threaten to inflict on his children for
preaching his truth, particularly as it applies to the evil they do.
We, like John, are called to preach that truth, in season and out of
season. And we live in a world, I think, where the time is very much
out of season, just as it was for St John. And so I conclude with the
prayer that all here will be granted by God an equal measure of
strength and courage to follow the example of St John this day and
always. Amen