IT IS OKAY TO NOT BE OKAY - A: 22nd Sun in OrdTime

First Reading: Jer 20:7-9 (30 Aug 2020)

It is okay to not be okay.

But our society teaches otherwise.

The elders hinder us to pout and to cry. We are raised not to show our negative emotions. Our culture even impedes us from showing our discontent and frustration to the government.

But our First Reading, taken from the book of the prophet Jeremiah, tells us that it is okay not to be okay. Against the setting of the so-called exilic period, after the temple of Jerusalem had been crushed in 586/7 BCE by the great armies of Nebuchadnezzar and the people of Judah was taken captive to Babylon, Jeremiah’s prophecy can be contextualized.

This catastrophe is truly a blow not only to their Jewish national psyche but to their religious esteem as God’s chosen people.

The psalmist reverberates the very sentiments they felt in these lonely and miserable years in a far-away land, saying:

“By the rivers of Babylon—

there we sat down and there we wept

when we remembered Zion.

On the willows there

we hung up our harps.

For there our captors

asked us for songs,

and our tormentors asked for mirth, saying,

‘Sing us one of the songs of Zion!’

How could we sing the LORD’S song

in a foreign land?” (Psa 137:1-4).

Our First Reading begins with the popular line: “O Lord, you have enticed me, and I was enticed” (Jer 20:7). This English translation of the NRSV creatively uses the verb “entice” to describe the emotions of the prophet. While it can have a negative force, this action word is normally understood to refer to the neutral act of inviting, encouraging, or motivating someone to a certain activity. Some translations continue to water down the pejorative impact of the prophecy by using neutral verbs like “persuade” (ASV) or “induce” (OJB).

If we look at the Greek of the Septuagint, we find the term “apataō,” which is ordinarily translated as “deceive” or “mislead.” The same lexeme is actually used by Eve when confronted by God for handing Adam the forbidden fruit of Eden: “The serpent tricked me (apataō) and I ate” (Gn 3:13). Along these lines, we take the verb “apataō” with a negative force. Appropriately, some English versions of Jer 20:7 capture this connotation of ire with the words: “deceive” (KJV), “trick” (CEB), “seduce” (NAB), “mislead” (NLT), “coerce” (NET), and “fool” (CJB).

Despite accusing God of deceiving or misleading, the prophecy, nonetheless, ends in a positive note: “O LORD of hosts, you test the righteous,you see the heart and the mind; let me see your retribution upon them, for to you I have committed my cause” (Jer 20:12).

Thus, whatever negative things we are experiencing right now, it is okay to feel bad, to cry, to bear grudges, to complain, and even to despair … but only momentarily … because our God, in the end, will turn our sorrows into joy.

- Rex Fortes, CM