In this section you can find a daily commentary on the Gospel of the Day.

Monday 13 December 2021

Third Week of Advent

Word for today
The Gospel of Matthew 21:23-27

By what authority?

«By what authority are you doing these things? And who gave you this authority?»
The Greek word exousìa, often found in the Gospels and translated here as "authority" is a term that has the dual semantic meaning of word and sign. Exousìa is a teaching that works, a Word that both moves and fulfills. Exousía is generally used to refer to faculty, authority, liberty, capability;  it can thus be translated as "power, strength, lordship", and also as "abundance of resources, splendor."
The scholars of the law ask Jesus where His authority comes from; it is certainly not  a technical/intellectual type of authority based on the study of grammar and scripture or more precisely the repetition of the opinions of the great masters of the Law that preceded them.
By what authority, Jesus, are you teaching things that have never been heard of before? By what authority do you reveal truths and procedures that have always been hidden to the learned and the wise? By what authority do you teach new things that enlighten the mind, warm the heart, and pave the way to new, infinite horizons, things that are completely unknown to the learned? By what authority, Jesus, do your words  inspire over and over and over again? Are you inspiring to change rather than to repeat, are You inspiring to be happy rather than to be successful, are You inspiring to be detached rather to possess, are You inspiring to let go rather than to hold on to? Are You inspiring to  believe in divine Providence rather than in bad luck? Are You inspiring to search for peace rather than for revenge and punishment? By what authority do You inspire to act out of love rather than out of duty and to follow in our hearts God's desires rather than to submit to other people's expectations? By what authority do You inspire to resolve our personal and social disharmonies not by masking the symptoms, but by humbly and wisely trying to find the remedy by understanding their causes? By what authority are you doing all this, Jesus? Aren't you perhaps, abusing your power?
By what authority do I say what I say?
By the same authority
the same power and splendor by which even today I told the sun to rise from the horizon and to proceed on its path, pulling your planet around the universe in the midst of millions and millions of stars.
What stupidity, with the same arrogance that they do not see the evidence of reality and the language of rationality, they ask God how he can be so radiant and powerful.