“A capable wife, who can find?” I confess, every time when this passage comes up, I laugh, maybe you did too. I always try to assign that reading to my very capable husband. As a gay man, on some level I think, “a capable wife, who needs her?” How else can you react when you heard this poem, praising the Donna Reed, the picture perfect capable wife (my mother always balked at the image of Donna Reed vacuuming while wearing pearls). Is that what it means to be a good woman in the Bible? The patriarchy is a bit strong in this translation of the poem.
The patriarchy here reads strong, but like much in the Bible, if you adjust for context there’s a message within that can be important for our day, for people of all genders. This poem, and the letter from James, and the Gospel today, I venture, all hold the same question: what is greatness? What does it mean to become great?
Jostling for power
Jesus’ disciples, we are lead to believe, are having a very worldly argument about greatness. It is one of those moments in the Gospel we call “an adventure in missing the point.” When Jesus asks them about it, they are silent. This is a shameful silence. The disciples know their discussion about greatness isn’t going to please Jesus. Here they clam up, but they keep on asking questions like this, don’t they? In just the next chapter of Mark’s Gospel, James and John will come to Jesus privately and ask, “when you come into your glory, grant one of us to sit at your right hand and one at your left.” I’ve heard it said that the disciples imagined themselves a bit like campaign workers for Jesus, jockeying for cabinet positions. Who gets to be Secretary of State, and who is going to get stuck with Secretary of Transportation?
Jesus, at least in this moment, doesn’t show his anger at their ambitions. He slows them down. He reminds them, this movement doesn’t head that kind of glory. Jesus says the same thing here that he will say later to James and John, “whoever wants to be the greatest, must be the servant of all.” He brings a child into their midst and says, “whoever welcomes a child in my name welcomes me and welcomes the One who sent me.” We still don’t get worldly power or status from welcoming kids. There’s not prestige to be gained in society for being good with children. We under-compensate teachers. But if you think about the people who had the greatest impact on your life, how many of them were teachers, how many of them were grown folks who chose to spend time and attention on kids?
There are times when the Gospel, when the Bible, can blast through all our falsehoods, all the subtle lies we quietly believe. I’d venture both James and the Gospel are in that category this morning. James calls out selfish ambition, and invites us to the gentleness born of wisdom, to peace, mercy, and graciousness. None of those are qualities you list on a resume. But all of them are what we value in our friends, our neighbors, our co-workers, our partners.
We live in a world where many are still trying to get ahead. In recent years, there has been a certain hardness to this ambition. There has been a bitterness, an anger. I hope we are turning that page. In his most recent column in the New York Times, David Brooks wrote that he believes there are “an increasing number of people tired of living in an endless atmosphere of tribalism, enmity, and conflict.” He believes, he hopes, we are coming to an end of the politics of grievance, at least as a convincing argument that wins votes. He believes we are moving toward a place where joy and hope will be at the center. I hope Brooks is right, that the moment is shifting.
This was a tough week. The attacks against immigrants this week were tough. Friends who work in direct service with immigrant communities are receiving threatening letters and emails. Lies repeated by politicians about Haitian immigrants lead to bomb threats that closed the schools in Springfield, Ohio. I really hope we are coming to an end of our tolerance for this kind of dehumanizing rhetoric. Because it is dangerous. Calling people “animals” refusing to acknowledge human dignity, blaming whole categories of people, we know, leads to violence. And we don’t have to live this way.
Integration or Disintegration?
Toni Morrison once said, “you are either working toward integration or you are working toward disintegration.” If we know, if we have something to offer in the coming cultural shift toward hope, if we know what it means to integrate, it will be because of the work we do in places like St Michaels. We hope our church is a place where we work toward integration, where we do the slow patient work to build community across difference. We are a place where we can find joy in worshipping with people who are different, who speak different languages, have different histories, love differently. I won’t pretend it’s easy, but an integral community of faith invites us both to feel safe and to grow. Church can be a place we come because it helps us to live more integrated lives with our neighbors. Church is one of the last inter generational spaces in our society, a place where we share across generations. As the parent of a young kid, I am grateful our son has this community where adults other than his parents or teachers are interested in him, invested in him, want him to know of God’s love and to help him work for justice. Because parenting is always tough, and we live in times when the pressure is on for parents.
A Year of Biblical Womanhood
The late Rachel Held-Evans was a writer who talked about the pressures of parenthood, and adulthood, and of faith. Her most famous book, “A Year of Biblical Womanhood” describes trying to live out all the expectations placed on women in an Evangelical reading of Scripture. Now she doesn’t wear pearls while she vacuums, but she does some silly Biblical things like calling her husband “master” and though it isn’t her cultural practice, she starts covering her hair. While there’s irony in the writing, beneath the story is the honest spiritual seeking of an Evangelical who would convert to be an Episcopalian, because our faith made room for her doubts, her questions, and her voice.
A turning point in Rachel’s book about Biblical Womanhood comes around the passage we have today from Proverbs. She writes:
I started by attempting to turn the poem into a to-do list, which should never be done, and which resulted in a 16-item list that included everything from lifting weights each morning (“she girds herself with strength and makes her arms strong”), to making a purple dress to wear (“she makes coverings for herself; her clothing is fine linen and purple”), [and] knitting scarves for my husband (“when it snows, she has no fear for her household, for all of them are clothed in scarlet”)
She had quite a bit of fun with the line about honoring her husband at the city gate. She crafted a homemade sign for the effort. But after two weeks of Proverbs, she found herself exhausted. Finally Rachel asked an Orthodox Jewish friend whether she also found the “to-do” list of the capable wife tiring. Her friend laughed and said “no.” She explained to her that in Jewish households, this scripture is understood not as a to do list, but as a poem that praises women for their strength. (How often do we mistake the poetry of scripture when we insist on taking the translation too literally?) Rachel’s Jewish friend said that every sabbath her husband sings the Proverbs 31 poem to her, and it is special because she knows that know matter what she does or fails to do, during the week, she will be praised as a blessing to her family.
Inspired by her conversation, Rachel took it upon herself to re-translate Proverbs 31. This idea of the “capable wife” comes from the King James version. Sometimes King James gets it very wrong. Sometimes our faith needs a new translation. Rachel Held Evans found that “a capable wife,” the Hebrew Words “eshet chayil,” more literally could be translated: “A Woman of Valor.” Changes the tone of the whole passage doesn’t it? “A Woman of valor, who can find her? She is to be praised!”
Rachel Held Evans died tragically in 2019, after an allergic reaction to a medication. She left behind a husband and two young kids. Her legacy lives on. Through her writing, she became a champion of a generous-hearted, joyful, and engaged, Christian faith. She was funny and brilliant, and helped young people wrestle with the big questions. Frankly, she is to be credited with leading thousands into the Episcopal Church, people who were looking for faith with room for questions, for welcoming women’s leadership and LGBTQ+ people. Rachel was a woman of valor, and I can’t read this passage without thinking of her.
So what is Greatness?
Because greatness, really, it isn’t about position or title. It’s not about salary or the size of your house. Greatness isn’t about your ability to control your neighbor’s behavior. Greatness isn’t about the cruelty you can inflict on immigrants or the marginalized. Greatness, from Old Testament to the New, from ancient times to today isn’t about selfish ambition. Greatness is about the gentleness that comes from wisdom. Greatness is about how you give yourself to others, how you serve others. As Jesus patiently teaches his followers: if you want to be great, take care of kids, welcome strangers, be present to the people around you, all of them. Know that how you treat those who are hurting matters. Greatness is about how you help others know they are seen, and valued, and loved.
Mike Angell 