MOSES, MY BROTHER, MY SELF
Conversion is the central theme of the readings from Sacred Scripture for this Third Sunday of Lent, following on the heels of faith on the first Sunday and covenant on the second. The call to conversion is evident in the Gospel text, where we twice hear from Jesus himself the poignant warning: Unless you are converted, you will perish. The call to conversion is also present in St Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians in the second reading, in the form of an admonition not to fall into idolatry and to fight bravely and continually against temptations of all sorts because such a fight is what the drama of conversion looks like in the concrete. And in the first reading from Exodus, conversion appears as a decisive turning point in the life of Moses. The crisis occurs at the moment when Moses receives from the Lord the explicit commandment to do something that Moses had already decided upon on his own, namely, the task of delivering the children of Israel from Egypt. By way of exception, we will concentrate today on this very substantial reading from Exodus rather than on the gospel. But let us not forget that Moses, sent by God as liberator, is one of the chief Old Testament figures who foreshadows the coming of the definitive Messiah who will save all people from their slavery to sin and death.
Exodus here presents Moses in the midst of performing his ordinary daily task of tending the flock of his father-in-law Jethro. It is important for us to consider his personal situation at this point in order to appreciate what comes afterwards. He is already 80 years old and at the completion of the second period of his life, which is divided into three periods of 40 years each. (He will die at 120!) Moses is thus at the peak of the middle phase of his life, and he sees himself as a man uprooted from his own people and threatened by Pharaoh, caught in the middle of a power struggle. His life is precarious, out of sorts, despite the fact that he does have both a family and work. He is a paradoxical character, a Hebrew who is alienated from his people, an Egyptian who has fled Egypt, and a foreigner in the eyes of his employer and father-in-law, Jethro.
This is the Moses who arrives in the desert, at the foot of Mount Horeb. Step by step, his everyday life has led him into a desert, into the terrible and despairing solitude of which the desert is a symbol. Mount Horeb, before which Moses will stand, will indeed in time become the fabulous “Mountain of God”; but in itself the name “Horeb” means “ruin”, “devastation”, “rubble”. Moses is taken by surprise and unprepared by something unwanted, unexpected, and unthinkable, and it overwhelms him as it would any of us. Yet this is precisely why the unforeseen thing that suddenly bursts into our lives can have a positive, transforming power on human beings: because it catches us helpless and vulnerable. At such a moment the mysterious force of an uncontrollable event can either deal the death blow to an already precarious life, or it can instead become a place for the renewal of our existence. Nevertheless, the ambiguity involved can be maddening!
The burning bush, which burns without being consumed, becomes not only a spectacle that attracts Moses’ eyes but also an event that regards him. “Out of the bush the Lord saw Moses”, the text says. In other words, the fire in the bush is looking back at Moses! Rebirth begins the moment we embrace the reality that touches us vitally, the moment we let it in rather than treat it as something to be avoided through attitudes of indifference, apathy and fear. Before the bush Moses takes off his sandals, which means that, in an act of adoration, he surrenders to the one true God his autonomy as self-determining person. Taking off one’s sandals is here not only an act of deep respect but also a symbol of renouncing one’s right to possession of the land. And, in response to the voice speaking to him from the fire, Moses veils his face, a sign of fear in the face of the divine and also a strategy to distance himself from the unexpected as it intrudes into his everyday life. There is no question that at this moment Moses is understandably afraid. And this fear becomes manifest as Moses replies with objections to the God who wants to entrust him with the task of going to Pharaoh to bring God’s people out of Egypt.
His first objection is: Who am I to go to Pharaoh? Moses feels inadequate, lacking charisma, with nothing in his person and history to justify this task. But God’s reply reorients Moses away from his frightened self and onto God’s promise of closeness: I will be with you. This reassuring answer from God means something like: ‘Do not give so much space to yourself in your own mind, so much space to your ego, in connection with this task I am entrusting to you. That would be the most direct route to failure. And this is the first condition for you to assume the leadership of my people: not to lean so much on your-self; rather, rely wholly on me, your Lord, who am sending you because I trust in you and know what I am doing and whom I have chosen.’
Moses’ second objection concerns the Name of God. The children of Israel will say to me: “What is the name of the God who sends you?” Concretely speaking, this means: ‘What does this God assure us of? What promise does he have in store for us so that we will believe him?’ Then God reveals his Name, a mysterious, unpronounceable name consisting only of four letters but can be translated in a variety of ways: I am who am, or I will be who I will be, or also, I am who I will be (which reveals God as himself being a promise!), or again, I will always be who I am (which reveals God as personified fidelity). This revelation of the divine Name presses Moses hard because, now that God has acceded to Moses’ request and revealed his true, intimate Name, Moses must reciprocate by believing God’s promise and God’s fidelity, despite the fact that he has no idea of what is actually going on!
Please note that Moses is neither a fool nor a coward. His objections to God’s proposals are well-founded in human logic, and not only these two objections at the burning bush but also the others he will formulate in the later chapters of Exodus. But the explanation of the divine Name given in Isaiah 52:6 should provide Moses (and us) with a sufficient answer to our doubts: My people shall know my name. And in that day they shall know that it is I who said: Here I am. The Hebrew language is terribly concrete and dynamic. God’s Name, which he himself alone can utter, does not say his inner being, in the abstract, but expresses his reliable being-there, his being-alongside, his being-there-with-and-for. To welcome this revelation of the divine Name is to make an act of wholehearted trust in the Lord. For his Name’s full resonance means: Here I am (with you, beside you, and for you). Against this hard and marvelous fact of God’s unwavering Presence both Moses and we should dash all our resistance and objections, all these fearful and deluded children of our feverish brains.
And this act of dashing all our fears and false habits of mind on the Rock that is Christ-Emmanuel, God-with-us, marks the beginning of all conversion worth the name. Let us now, then, turn with our whole hearts to the One who from all eternity has already turned to us with a shining countenance, to give us life and joy in his Kingdom. Witness this Eucharist today: how could God ever be closer to us than by making himself our true Food and Drink, as he now will presently?
