2018-3-22

朋友们，今天耶稣自称“自有者”，也就是天主透露给梅瑟的名字。因此，让我们回顾一下《创世纪》中的叙述。梅瑟在放羊之际看到异象，上主的使者从荆棘丛的火焰中显现给他。 天主看见梅瑟并叫他的名字：“梅瑟！梅瑟！我是你父亲的天主，亚巴郎的天主，依撒格的天主，雅各伯的天主。”可见天主是位密友，祂认识梅瑟的祖先。

 

梅瑟壮着胆子问：“若以色列子民问到‘他叫什么名字？’我要回答他们什么呢？”天主回答：“我是自有者。”这是什么意思？天主其实是在说：“我是不能被定义、被描绘或被界定的。我不是受造物，而是纯粹的存在本身。

 

“你要这样对以色列子民说：那'自有者'打发我到你们这里来。”没有人能躲避和控制纯粹的存在本身，只能怀着信德全心服从。当耶稣自称“自有者”，在场的听众必定感到震惊和不可思议。

 

Friends, today Jesus refers to himself as "I AM," the name God revealed to Moses. So, let’s reflect on this episode from Genesis. While tending sheep in the hill country, Moses sees a strange sight. There an angel of the Lord appears to him in fire, flaming out of a bush. God sees him and calls him by name: "Moses, Moses. I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob." This is a very familiar God, one who knows Moses’ ancestors.

 

Moses makes bold to ask, "If the Israelites ask me, ‘what is his name?’ what am I to tell them?" "God replied, ‘I am who I am.’" What does that mean? God is saying, in essence, "I cannot be defined, described, or delimited. I am not a being, but rather the sheer act of to-be itself."

 

"This is what you shall tell the Israelites: I AM sent me to you." The sheer act of being itself cannot be avoided, and it cannot be controlled. It can only be surrendered to in faith. How shocking and strange Jesus’ listeners must have found it when Jesus took this name for himself!

 

2018-3-21

朋友们，在今天的福音中，耶稣与那些图谋杀害祂的犹太领袖对质，祂说他们在罪恶中变得硬心肠。祂说：“我实实在在告诉你们：凡是犯罪的，就是罪恶的奴隶。”

 

在我们的传统中，罪恶是虚无的、是一种幻觉。活在罪恶中就是顽固地活于一个虚幻的世界里，我们在其中头脑混沌、迷失方向。因此，魔鬼常被称为谎言之父。

 

为了阐明这一点，神学家亨利•德•呂巴克把罪恶称为“cette claudication mystérieuse”，即这神秘的跛脚。这跛脚是一种畸形、一种腐朽。

 

我们所有罪人多多少少都被谎言欺骗了。谎言的核心——详见《创世纪》的记述——就是自我的神化。我和我的欲望、恐惧和需求成了宇宙的中心。

 

当这个微不足道的“我”成为宇宙的中心，万物之间就失去了应有的联系，原有的现实因而成为一种敌对、竞争、暴力和怀疑。

Friends, today in our Gospel Jesus confronts those Jewish leaders who want to kill him, telling them that they are hardened in their sin. He speaks, "Amen, amen, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin."

 

In our tradition, sin is a kind of non-being, an illusion, if you will. To live in sin is to live stubbornly in an unreal world. Our mind becomes confused, and our will disoriented. This helps explain why the devil is often referred to as the father of lies.

 

Theologian Henri de Lubac gives voice to this conviction when he refers to sin as cette claudication mystérieuse, this mysterious limp. It is a deformation, a corruption.

 

All of us sinners have, to one degree or another, bought into the lie. At the heart of the lie—and we can see it in the Genesis account—is the deification of the ego. I become the center of the universe, I with my needs and my fears and my demands.

 

And when the puny "I" is the center of the cosmos, the tie that binds all things to one another is lost. The basic reality now becomes rivalry, competition, violence, and mistrust.