April 1: “I Testify to the Truth”
♫ Music:
Day 44 - Thursday, April 1
MAUNDY THURSDAY
Title: “I TESTIFY TO THE TRUTH”
Scripture: John 18:28-40
Then they led Jesus from Caiaphas into the Praetorium, and it was early; and they themselves did not enter into the Praetorium so that they would not be defiled, but might eat the Passover. Therefore Pilate went out to them and said, “What accusation do you bring against this Man?” They answered and said to him, “If this Man were not an evildoer, we would not have delivered Him to you.” So Pilate said to them, “Take Him yourselves, and judge Him according to your law.” The Jews said to him, “We are not permitted to put anyone to death,” to fulfill the word of Jesus which He spoke, signifying by what kind of death He was about to die. Therefore Pilate entered again into the Praetorium, and summoned Jesus and said to Him, “Are You the King of the Jews?” Jesus answered, “Are you saying this on your own initiative, or did others tell you about Me?” Pilate answered, “I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests delivered You to me; what have You done?” Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, then My servants would be fighting so that I would not be handed over to the Jews; but as it is, My kingdom is not of this realm.” Therefore Pilate said to Him, “So You are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say correctly that I am a king. For this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.” Pilate said to Him, “What is truth?” And when he had said this, he went out again to the Jews and said to them, “I find no guilt in Him. But you have a custom that I release someone for you at the Passover; do you wish then that I release for you the King of the Jews?” So they cried out again, saying, “Not this Man, but Barabbas.” Now Barabbas was a robber.
Poetry:
Authority
by Jeanne Murray Walker
When this man executes an order, a river
dries. He signs papers and species
disappear. He tells a beautiful young soldier
to step into fire and he does. He does.
My fear of this man collects like water
behind a dam. It will never stop raining.
Some things it is impossible to say, even
in poetry. We are like rivers, silt
sifting on silt for years until we can’t
tell, beneath the layers, where
the sharp hurt began. So tell me,
how did this man learn to make
it throb again?
Why is it I cannot stop watching
his sleight of hand bleed green from
meadows, ruin streams?
I dream of trees
escaping across the plains, long necks
leaning into their gallop like giraffes.
They want to get away from him.
I tell them hurry, hurry. But there’s nowhere
to go. We have only the one earth.
Our backyard cardinal has buried
his bright song in his ribcage. The sun
has forgotten how to fit its beams
into the lock of human joy to turn it
open. In heaven, the Creator weeps.
INVITED TO LAMENT
Jesus’ trial displays unsettling disparities and contrasts that ought to make us nervous; in which I see my own sinfulness. Under the guise of seeking justice, the Jewish leaders march Jesus to see Pilate, but Pilate must leave his Praetorium and come outside to meet with them. Their concern for avoiding defilement prevents them from entering the headquarters of a Gentile authority, but not in asking that same authority to condemn an innocent man. Unable to deliver any evidence of Christ’s criminality, they counter with the vague label of “evildoer.” They hope that Pilate’s commitment to fairness will be brushed aside by their pure zeal though—scrupulous in their wrath—they maintain that Pilate’s authority is necessary to execute Jesus.
When Pilate agrees to the interview, Jesus answers his questions calmly, even with curiosity: “Are you the King of the Jews?” Jesus answered, “Are you saying this on your own initiative, or did others tell you about me.” And while the Jews mask their true aggression, Jesus responds to Pilate’s inquisition with disarming candor: “My kingdom is not of this world…You say correctly that I am a king…Everyone who is of the truth hears my voice.”
Pilate of course does hear his voice—though not in the way Jesus means—and this seems to inspire a rare moment of anxiety concerning his own relationship with the truth. Falling back on the defenses of a seasoned politician, however, Pilate quickly recovers and retorts with a rhetorical question: “What is truth?” Perhaps fearing that Jesus might yet answer, he quickly leaves and, still disturbed, tries to find a way out: “I find no guilt in him.” But refusing to be appeased by anything but blood, the Jews demand the release of Barabbas.
In Pilate and in the mob, we see rage and avoidance which present familiar cycles of sin—both in individuals and societies. Like the Pharisees, I nurture stories that shield my conscience from accusations of injustice while performing trifles of virtue, obedient to a fussy law-keeping that flatters the myth of my own goodness. Conversely, when I encounter Jesus and the vision of his lordship I quibble and hedge, inventing reasons to flee his presence with my sham dignity still intact.
This fog of self-deception seems to swallow the mob in today’s art by Ivanka Demchuk. Christ’s accusers are a collection of ghostly hands and heads, swept together and into the background in a blur of muddy brown and septic yellow. Though somewhat brighter, Jesus shares their same diseased color—taking their sickness into himself—but stands before Pilate shrouded and haloed in brilliant, wounded crimson.
In the Pharisees and in Pilate, we see earthly authority both enraged and bewildered—simultaneously dangerous and inept. It is this same pathetic power that Jeanne Murray Walker bemoans in her poem where every choice only results in devastation. The acts are so easy—“signing a paper,” and the consequences so irreversibly horrible: “species disappear.” So many human decisions seem that way—agreed to with little thought and followed by reckless tragedy. Reading through the poem, one feels an urgent longing for the arrival of justice; for deliverance and rescue. But the last line delivers us instead to lament: “In heaven, the Creator weeps.”
In Lent, I am invited to learn how to lament with God—and with you—over his broken world. In lament, I am invited to be clear-sighted where my vision has been blurred by anger, anxiety, and other states which harden me to Christ and his kingdom. I am urged to admit I have preferred, on some level, the world of the ruined river and the silent cardinal. For I cannot hope to belong in Christ’s kingdom until I acknowledge that I have too often cast my lot with Pilate and the Pharisees.
Prayer:
Oh Christ, true Lord and true king, I confess that I have rejected your truth and kingdom though you have offered them to me many times. I have hardened my heart, refusing to hear your call and refusing to see the destruction and death that follow my ambitions and habits. Teach me to acknowledge and lament all that I have been and done, and to seek your forgiveness, that You might cleanse me and make me fit for your kingdom.
Amen
Phillip Aijian
Poet, Writer, Artist
Adjunct Professor
Torrey Honors College
Biola University
About the Artwork:
Pilate Condemns Jesus to Death
Ivanka Demchuk
2017
Mixed media on wood
50 x 40 cm
Drawing upon the traditions of icon painting, Demchuk is one of the new iconographers who brings a fresh, more abstract treatment to her work. In her most recent works, Demchuk has moved toward an abstracted mystical style by painting her figures in white ethereal spaces. Of her work Demchuk says, “All colors are figurative in the icon. They do not belong to the object or person in question, but rather reveal their theological significance. Most of my icons have a white background since, observing the life of Christ and the saints, one wants to focus on the idea of simplicity, purity, and renunciation of earthly riches…Instead of golden halos, I often use purple ones, serving as symbols of royal or divine authority, or red ones, signifying life, victory over death, martyrdom and Christ’s sacrifice.” In Demchuk’s icon of Pilate Condemning Jesus to Death, the mockers of Christ occupy a dark, sepia-toned area of the composition resembling a torn piece of paper which reveals the “eternal whiteness of the Divine purpose underlying human affairs.” Christ’s vivid red garment marks him as the sacrificial lamb, just as the water Pilate uses to wash his hands and absolve himself of responsibility in the crucifixion is blood-colored. The way to Golgotha, marked by a path of black and white tiles, leads out of the picture space and into God’s plan for human redemption.
http://sacredartpilgrim.com/schools/view/40
https://day.kyiv.ua/en/article/culture/ukraine-has-great-potential-development-modern-icon
About the Artist:
Ivanka Demchuk (b. 1990) is a contemporary Ukrainian liturgical artist. Demchuk, like many contemporary Ukrainian iconographers and artists, is a graduate of the Sacral Art Department at the Lviv National Academy of Arts, known for pushing the boundaries of a conservative art form based on traditionally historic prototypes, forms, and colors.
http://sacredartpilgrim.com/schools/view/40
https://day.kyiv.ua/en/article/culture/ukraine-has-great-potential-development-modern-icon
About the Music:
“Quatre Motets pour un temps de penitence, FP 97: II. Vinea mea electa” from the album Francis Poulenc - Choral Works
Lyrics:
O vineyard, my chosen one. I planted thee.
How is thy sweetness turned into bitterness,
to crucify me and take Barabbas in my place?
About the Text:
A “responsory” is a form of Gregorian chant associated with the lessons of the Liturgy of the Hours. The most famous responsories are those used in Tenebræ services. Tenebræ (Latin for darkness or shadows) is the name of the church services of Matins held for the last three days of Holy Week, during which the candles in the church are extinguished one by one “to signify the setting of the Sun of Justice,” in the words of Benedict XIV. Following the opening, the service is divided into three sections, called “nocturns.” Vinea mea electa is the third responsory from the first nocturn of Good Friday.
https://www.cpdl.org/wiki/index.php/Tenebrae
About the Composer:
Francis Poulenc (1899–1963) was a French composer and pianist. His compositions include solo piano works, chamber music, choral pieces, operas, ballets, and orchestral concert music. Among the best-known are his operas Dialogues des Carmélites and The Gloria for soprano, choir, and orchestra. Poulenc’s wealthy parents intended him for a business career in Poulenc Frères, their family pharmaceutical company, and did not allow him to pursue music. Largely self-educated musically, he studied with the pianist Ricardo Viñes, who became his mentor after the composer’s parents died. Poulenc soon came under the influence of Erik Satie, under whose tutelage he became one of a group of young composers known collectively as Les Six. In his early works, Poulenc became known for his high spirits and irreverence. During the 1930s, a much more serious side to his nature emerged, particularly in the religious music he composed from 1936 onwards.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Poulenc
About the Performers:
The Sixteen conducted by Harry Christophers
The Sixteen is a UK-based music ensemble, hallmarked by its tonal richness, expressive intensity, and compelling collective artistry. The Sixteen’s choir and period-instrument orchestra stands today among the world’s greatest ensembles; they are peerless interpreters of Renaissance, Baroque, and modern choral music. The Sixteen arose from its founder/conductor Harry Christophers’ formative experience as a cathedral chorister and choral scholar. Since 2000, their annual Choral Pilgrimage has brought the ensemble to Britain’s great cathedrals and abbeys to perform sacred music in the spaces for which it was originally conceived. The Sixteen makes regular visits to major concert halls and festivals throughout Europe, Asia, Australia, and the Americas.
https://thesixteen.com/about-us/
Richard Henry Tudor “Harry” Christophers, CBE (b. 1953) is an English conductor. Christophers became an academic clerk at Magdalen College, Oxford, studying classics for two years before beginning his musical career. He spent six years as a lay vicar at Westminster Abbey, and then time as a member of the Clerkes of Oxenford, followed by three years with the BBC Singers. Christophers founded the vocal ensemble The Sixteen in 1979. He has directed The Sixteen and its orchestra throughout Europe, America, and the Far East, becoming recognized for his work in Renaissance, Baroque, and twentieth-century music. In 2000, Christophers began the “Choral Pilgrimage,” a national tour of English cathedrals from York to Canterbury, with music from the pre-Reformation era, as The Sixteen’s contribution to the millennium celebrations. From 2008 to 2016, Christophers was named the Artistic Director of the Handel and Haydn Society in Boston, Massachusetts. Increasingly busy in opera, Christophers has conducted numerous productions for Lisbon Opera and English National Opera, as well as conducting the UK premiere of Messager’s opera Fortunio for the Grange Park Opera.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Christophers
About the Poet:
Jeanne Murray Walker (b. 1944) is an American, award-winning author of nine volumes of poetry and one memoir, as well as a number of plays which have been performed in theaters across the country and in London. She is an emeritus professor at the University of Delaware, where she taught for forty years and headed the creative writing concentration. Jeanne currently serves as a poetry mentor in The Seattle Pacific Low Residency M.F.A. Program. From her home outside Philadelphia, she blogs about the troubling politics of our time, reading and writing, and the surprising power of stillness. She travels widely to speak and read her poems in places ranging from the Library of Congress to Romania. You can find her papers and letters archived at Wheaton College’s Buswell Library and at the University of Delaware’s Morris Library. Jeanne has appeared on PBS television and is frequently interviewed on the radio.
http://www.jeannemurraywalker.com/
http://www.jeannemurraywalker.com/email-jeanne/
About the Devotion Author:
Phillip Aijian
Poet, Writer, Artist
Adjunct Professor
Torrey Honors College
Biola University
Phillip Aijian is a writer, artist, and educator. He earned a Ph.D. in Renaissance drama and theology from the University of California at Irvine as well as an M.A. in poetry from the University of Missouri. He lives in California with his wife and children. He is a frequent writer for the Advent and Lent Projects.
https://www.phillipaijian.com/
https://californiospress.com/2020/02/02/write-to-me-an-interview-with-poet-phillip-aijian/