In the first scene people make use of the new possibilities opened up by the mission of the people of God for their own interests. They get bread for themselves (Matt 4:2-4). The history of the church will show that it is possible to earn money through the Gospel.
In the second scene people serve not God but their own project by putting themselves on display. Throwing oneself down from the pinnacle of the temple is an extravagant display to test what possibilities God has to offer that one can make use of for one’s own self-presentation, misusing Sacred Scripture into the bargain (Matt 4:5-7).
In the third scene everything that is going on in the depths finally comes to light: those who do not serve God alone and with all their strength, in fact, serve themselves and thus the chaotic powers of the world (Matt 4:8-10).
Only those who have understood how narrow and exposed is the path by which God is truly honored, and how quickly faith itself falls into self-help, giving oneself honor, making oneself master or mistress—only they understand the explosive point of the Matthean and Lukan temptation story: it is especially those called who can misuse their calling to serve their own persons, glorify their own deeds, and seek not to serve but to exercise religious power. And misuse of power in the name of God is the most terrible of all violations.
The stories about Jesus’ temptation immediately after his baptism are intended to say that Jesus too was repeatedly tempted by all these things, in the deepest depths of his existence. But he resisted the tempter, and he did so with ultimate clarity and determination. He could do so because he held fast to the word of God. Therefore he thrice quotes Sacred Scripture, the collected wisdom of Israel about how to distinguish and decide.
What the temptation story had summarized and distilled at the beginning of the first three gospels happened again and again in the course of Jesus’ public activity. To take one example: in the course of the Markan narrative Jesus asked his disciples who people said that he was. They answered that some took him for the Baptizer redivivus, others for the return of Elijah, and others for earlier prophets of Israel. Then Jesus asks the disciples who they themselves think he is, and Peter answers with his messianic confession. But what does the word “messiah” mean? In order not to be misunderstood, Jesus tells the disciples prophetically of his passion and execution. Then “Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter [in turn] and said, ‘Get out of my sight,6 Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things’” (Mark 8:32-33).
It is out of the question that this little scene could represent a fictive narrative constructed after Easter to encourage the community to follow Jesus to the cross. Without a historical background, no one would have attached Jesus’ appellation “Satan” to Peter. The historical location was probably Jesus’ stated intention to go to Jerusalem for the Passover feast. Apparently it was clear to all those involved how dangerous that would be, and Peter must have reacted accordingly in the situation. We can easily picture his attempt to talk Jesus out of making the Jerusalem pilgrimage. Probably he argued quite rationally. Perhaps he said, “Not to the capital, not now! Let’s stay in Galilee. We don’t have to go to this particular festival. Let’s hold back a little until the whole fuss has died down.”
Whatever Peter may have said, Jesus reacts with unbelievable harshness. He addresses the disciple he had once called and who has followed him to this hour as “Satan,” the tempter, the opponent of God, the one who confuses all people. And he does so because Peter is not thinking about what God wants but what matches his own ideas and desires.
So this profound conflict is about the will of God. That will does not mean always keeping the norms of conduct. It is not timeless. It has its moment. It has its hour, again and again, and that hour can very quickly become the moment of truth. Peter has suddenly entered into this moment of truth, just as Jesus uninterruptedly enters into it. Note: the “will of God” is not that Jesus should be killed in Jerusalem but that Israel everywhere, including in the capital city, should be confronted with the Gospel of the reign of God.
Once again Jesus acts with ultimate decisiveness. When it is a matter of the will of God, of the reign of God, everything else takes a back seat for him; he permits no compromise, even if it should cost him his life. It is true that he himself is tempted to the most profound depths of his being. The scene on the Mount of Olives shows that. And yet he possesses an inerrant consistency. Jesus went his way in an unconditional determination focused entirely on God. That unconditional attitude is revealed also in a matter that cuts deep into the life of every person: having a life partner.
Jesus’ Celibacy
We spoke in the eighth chapter of this book about Jesus’ sign-actions: for example, the creation of the group of the Twelve and the establishment of a new family. We set aside one fundamental sign-action in Jesus’ life, namely, that he did not marry. But it must be discussed in this book, because it is an essential part of “who Jesus was.” Luke 9:57-58 reports the following: “As they were going along the road, someone said to him, ‘I will follow you wherever you go.’ And Jesus said to him, ‘Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.’” That is: if you want to follow me you may have to live as I live. You will have no nest of your own full of comfort and safety. You will have no building in which you are sheltered and protected. You may even have your own family against you and all your relatives too.
The Son of Man has nothing on which to rest his head. We can easily think of the spouse who can embrace her husband, in whose love he can breathe, in whose understanding he can rest. Jesus had none of that. Why? Because he wasn’t mature enough? Or out of hostility to the flesh? Or rejection of sexuality? Or fear of women? Or some kind of rigorism or fanaticism? Hatred of the world? The right answer is found in a saying of Jesus transmitted in Matthew 19:12:
There are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by others, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let anyone accept this who can.
This saying, typical of Jesus in its extreme sharpness and almost ironic play of language, needs an explanation of its own. The Greek text speaks of “eunuchs” and “being made eunuchs,” that is, castrati and castration. Jesus lists three possibilities: there are men who lack sexual organs from birth, others who have been castrated against their will, and still others who have castrated themselves. We have to translate this drastic speech in order to be clear about what Jesus means. He is saying that there are people who are incapable of marriage from birth. Others are made incapable of marriage in some way by their environment. But there are also people who remain unmarried freely and by their own decision.
It sounds more genteel that way, and some modern versions translate it in this polite way.7 But Jesus is not so genteel. His way of speaking is extraordinarily drastic, and all the more so because castration was strictly forbidden in Israel.8 He also speaks in extreme terms in view of the fact that remaining unmarried was despised by his contemporaries. The rabbis appealed to Genesis 1:28 (“increase and multiply”) to say that begetting progeny was a duty ordered by God. “He who does not engage in propagation of the race is as though he sheds blood.”9 And Rabbi Eliezer (ca. 270) said: “Any man who has no wife is no proper man; for it is said, Male and female created He them and called their name Adam.”10 Where, then, does Jesus’ drastic and pointed formulation come from?