The
sons of Zebedee press Christ: Promise that one may sit at your right
side and the other at your left. What does he do? He wants to show
them that it is not a spiritual gift for which they are asking, and
that if they knew what their request involved, they would never dare
make it. So he says: You do not know what you are asking, that is,
what a great and splendid thing it is and how much beyond the reach
even of the heavenly powers. Then he continues: Can you drink the cup
which I must drink and be baptised with the baptism which I must
undergo? He is saying: “You talk of sharing honours and rewards
with me, but I must talk of struggle and toil. Now is not the time
for rewards or the time for my glory to be revealed. Earthly life is
the time for bloodshed, war and danger”.
Consider
how by his manner of questioning he exhorts and draws them. He does
not say: “Can you face being slaughtered? Can you shed your blood?”
How does he put his question? Can you drink the cup? Then he makes it
attractive by adding: which I must drink, so that the prospect of
sharing it with him may make them more eager. He also calls his
suffering a baptism, to show that it will effect a great cleansing of
the entire world. The disciples answer him: We can! Fervour makes
them answer promptly, though they really do not know what they are
saying but still think they will receive what they ask for.
How
does Christ reply? You will indeed drink my cup and be baptized with
my baptism. He is really prophesying a great blessing for them, since
he is telling them: “You will be found worthy of martyrdom; you
will suffer what I suffer and end your life with a violent death,
thus sharing all with me. But seats at my right and left are not mine
to give; they belong to those for whom the Father has prepared them.”
Thus, after lifting their minds to higher goals and preparing them to
meet and overcome all that will make them desolate, he sets them
straight on their request.
Then
the other ten became angry at the two brothers. See how imperfect
they all are: the two who tried to get ahead of the other ten, and
the ten who were jealous of the two! But, as I said before, show them
to me at a later date in their lives, and you will see that all these
impulses and feelings have disappeared. Read how John, the very man
who here asks for the first place, will always yield to Peter when it
comes to preaching and performing miracles in the Acts of the
Apostles. James, for his part, was not to live very much longer; for
from the beginning he was inspired by great fervour and, setting
aside all purely human goals, rose to such splendid heights that he
straightway suffered martyrdom.
--
Saint John Chrysostom from a
homily on the Gospel of Matthew