Judith 9:1,11-14 Judith prostrated herself, put ashes on her head, and uncovered the sackcloth she was wearing. At the very time when the evening incense was being offered in the house of God in Jerusalem, Judith cried out to the Lord with a loud voice, and said, “Your strength does not depend on numbers, nor your might on the powerful. But you are the God of the lowly, helper of the oppressed, upholder of the weak, protector of the forsaken, savior of those without hope. Please, please, God of my father, God of the heritage of Israel, Lord of heaven and earth, Creator of the waters, King of all your creation, hear my prayer! Make my deceitful words bring wound and bruise on those who have planned cruel things against your covenant, and against your sacred house, and against Mount Zion, and against the house your children possess. Let your whole nation and every tribe know and understand that you are God, the God of all power and might, and that there is no other who protects the people of Israel but you alone!”
John 20:11-18 Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” Jesus said to her, “Mary!” She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabbouni!” (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, “Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord”; and she told them that he had said these things to her.
Reflection Judith is covering herself with ashes and crying out to God because her people, the Israelites, are not trusting God will deliver them from their Assyrian oppressors. Rather than join her distraught neighbors’ protests, “stoking their fury and living in the silos of their belief systems,” Judith consents to reality as it is. She acknowledges adversity, shrewdly devises a plan to execute what is good and true, and heads to the Assyrian General Holoferne’s camp. Promising him insider info about the Israelites, Judith gradually wins Holoferne’s trust. When after a night of excessive drinking Holoferne returns to his tent and succumbs to a drunken stupor, Judith is prepared to act decisively. She enters Holferne’s tent, cuts off his head and delivers it to the misguided Israelites. When the Assyrians discover their General Holoferne is dead, they retreat and Israel is freed.
I am not suggesting decapitation is the most efficacious solution for political enemies. What I am suggesting is Judith represents several qualities of wise people. From the University of Chicago Center for Practical Wisdom Dr. Cynthia Baum-Baicker writes, “Wise people are pragmatic.* (Yes, Judith is down to earth in her logical solution to the Israelites’ problem; look for their vulnerability and act.) Back to Baum-Baicker, “Wise people are perspicacious…and offer solutions in the side of right and truth.” (Judith is shrewd and acts decisively for the good of her people while putting herself at serious risk.) The wisdom of one faithful wise woman defeats the faithlessness of her countrymen.
Mary Magdalene faces tragedy and has a choice to make. She can wrap her face in woe, tare out her hair while reviewing the mental movie of her beloved friend Jesus’ barbaric murder, search the crowd for someone to blame and, fearing for her own life decide to run away and hide. Or, Mary can choose to stop and allow the reality of Jesus’ murder to grasp her. She weeps. By consenting to reality as it is Mary Magdalene ‘sees’ beyond death and ‘hears,’ “Woman, why are you weeping?”
“Why am I weeping? Why am I weeping? Because I cannot imagine life without my beloved friend, my teacher Jesus. Nothing will ever be the same. How can I endure this horrific ordeal?” From the grave of her broken heart the silent voice of wisdom turns the grief stricken woman deeply into herself, “Mary.”
As the first light of day is dawning wisdom rises in place of Mary’s teacher, “Do not cling to what is past. Step out of the grave and into the light of the present moment. This is an opportunity for you to continue your teacher’s work. Go and tell your sisters and brothers the wisdom of our teacher is not lost nor locked into a tomb. Wisdom rises from the depths of our broken hearts.” The wisdom of one faithful wise woman defeats the fear of the run away apostles.
Dr. Baum-Baicker writes, “Wise people do not hyper-focus on the negative and all that is wrong, stoking their fury and only living in the silos of their own belief systems. Rather wise people integrate negative experiences into an overall positive whole …” She explains that in the face of trauma “we have four options: fight, flight, freeze or grow.”
Like Mary Magdalene and Judith, individually and collectively we are traumatized by a brutalizing pandemic, dehumanizing politics and ruthless power plays. We can “stoke our fury” and attack whoever or whatever appears to threaten our security, safety, esteem, power or control; we can take flight except we really cannot run away because we are locked into our homes and out of most places; we can freeze which is to say, ice over our hearts or bury our heads in the proverbial sand (the preferred strategy for many) or we can grow and become wise.
What if the silver lining to the perfect storm cloud of a global pandemic, crashing economy, racial inequality, and political insanity is the opportunity for us to become wise like Judith and Mary Magdalene? What if it is time to stop our histrionic arguments of right, wrong, progressive, conservative, friend, foreigner, this or that and see beyond the short-sighted dualities that suffocate life among us? What if it is time to stop whatever we are doing and let the harsh realities of our situation grasp us and break our hearts open? What if it is time for us to return to our depths and rise to the ten thousand feet above the ground perspective, be shrewd and act decisively to defeat the fear and faithlessness of our countrymen? What if it is time for us to become wise?
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* Baum-Baicker, Dr. Cynthia. Developing Wisdom Can Be An Antidote To Today’s Trauma, The University of Chicago: Wisdom in the News. June 6, 2020.
