This topic contains 8 replies, has 6 voices, and was last updated by 
Gary 1 year, 7 months ago.
-
Posts
-
AnonymousWrote this one a couple of years ago and no one seemed to get it. Maybe you folks will.
Now the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread were just two days away, and the Pharisees — the chief priests and teachers of the law were trying to figure out how to arrest Jesus and kill him. They decided to wait until after the celebrations for fear that others would riot against the established church.
So they sent spies to watch the heretic in action in order to gather some hard evidence to justify the death penalty. Flash forward a few days to Bethany. Jesus is reclining in the main living area of a house owned by a man named Simon who happens to be a leper. His disciples are with him and so are the spies.
Suddenly a beautiful and distraught woman came into the room holding an alabaster jar in her arms. As her eyes wildly searched each face, Jesus realized who she was. The jar contained perfume made of pure nard and cost the woman a year’s wages.
Locking eyes onto him she smiled, bent down low and broke the jar, and began to move towards Jesus so that she might anoint him with the contents. However, knowing her intentions, Jesus quickly moved to the side avoiding the woman with her expensive perfume as he motioned to his disciple Peter with a single glance.
The perfume spilled recklessly on the floor near him and began to expand rapidly into a pool of aromatic liquid onto the surface of the floor as the woman fell to one knee astonished that Jesus would seem so repulsed by her doting gesture. Disgusted with the woman’s sin Jesus turned to his Disciples and the Pharisees in attendance and said “She should not have wasted that expensive perfume. It could have been sold and used to help the poor, the widows and orphans. What is she doing with it anyway?”
In the alleyway Peter held the woman roughly by the arm and without looking at her said “what did you think you were doing? You know that your chosen lifestyle is not the kind that the Master agrees with. Why, He can not even look at or be in the same room with you. Once you turn from your evil ways and choose to live either a life of celibacy as an unworthy woman, or just marry a man like the rest of the women here, you can come back and the Rabbi will accept your gifts. Until then, stay away. The Master will have nothing more to do with you.”
Through heaving sobs the woman looked up at Peter and managed to say, “B-but Simon is a Leper…”
“…At least he’s a man. But you… What are you anyway?” Peter said as he shoved the young woman towards the street harshly causing her to trip and fall sharply onto the ground, broken, and even more distraught than before. Peter smiled smugly, then went back inside.
With this last round of rejection in mind, the young girl lay silently on her side in the dirt, her knees drawn to her chest, both hands clasped tightly over her ears, tears streaming down the side of her face while sounds of guffawing laughter echoed loudly into the alleyway from Simon’s house. Jesus had finally obtained acceptance by his peers — the Pharisees, for making clear his stance against at least one of the established religious rejects of the day. There would no longer be a need for his death.
Anonymous@john – i get the irony of how Jesus is represented badly by hypocrites. And how like then, Jesus today would be rejected by institutionalised human religion.
Anonymous@nolonger1 Thanks for getting the irony – but you don’t actually exist do you? So it’s sort of like this post is echoing in a cave and no one hears it but this semi-robotic responder….
I hear it @john
Anonymous@Admin Oh – didn’t see you there…
Thanks!I’ve been wondering how to respond, especially given it is a dark twisting of one of my favourite stories in the Gospels. We know how Jesus responded in the real story. The most jarring two facts is how both Jesus and Peter acted out-of-character in your version.
Yet many in the churches I’ve been in, have seen and have heard about would respond in exactly the same way. The real story is too far away in time and place to mean enough to the common pew-sitter.
A previous pastor in my church understood this better than most, however. We actually had in our congregation for a while an ex-prostitute. Her background was not widely known – most people saw a single woman with three young kids who was on a lower socio-economic layer than them. I imagine it was not as easy for her to fit in as it should have been.
This young, broken family is no longer with our church. The details are complex and I don’t know how much I don’t know. But I’m fairly sure she got much the same response as the woman in the original story. The one we think we know. The one where we so often fail to recognise where we are really standing.
Wade.
Anonymous@staticsan Yes, this parable was really a response to what I see as a heretical view on the “issues.” It is like, if some folks had their way, this is the Jesus they would expect to see, not the kind generous accepting Jesus, the one who agrees with their doctrines and legalistic viewpoints. The Pharisee so-to-speak. I am baffled at times how it seems that some folks who identify as Christians can actually justify their behavior towards other folks.
AnonymousI think I get this John–how some in the church / church leaders would respond to the woman w/ the alabaster jar..so not like how Jesus would.
“I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” Mahatma Gandhi – one of my favorite quotes.
John I missed this story when you originally posted it. Much thanks to Kathy-D’s comment which brought it to my attention.
This is a shockingly powerful retelling of that great story. Not shocking because it is false…but rather because it is so true. If Jesus was like those I have known in the church (perhaps even as I was) your retelling would be (IS) painfully accurate.
One welcome change I have noticed in my own life these past brief years is that I find myself so much more drawn to and comfortable with these “kinds” of people than I am around the religious. This change in me has been unexpected…but so very welcome.
You must be logged in to reply to this topic.