July 15, 2012
Sermon preached by Rev. Donald Ng at the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco.
The story begins with Herod hearing tales about Jesus, and assuming that the rumors are true, that Jesus is John the Baptizer, raised from the dead. This would get Herod’s attention because he’s the one responsible for John being dead in the first place.
Beginning with verse 17, Mark gives us a flashback as to how that happened, and here’s where we get a really two-sided portrait of Herod. Remember that Herod is a Jew; he is of the royal family who ruled Israel—off and on—until the Romans showed up on the scene. Herod is still allowed a lot of kingly privileges, as long as he doesn’t challenge the Roman rule. So on the one hand, he has a lot of power among his own people, but on the other hand, he can always be trumped by Pilate and other Roman leaders. Keeping all of that in mind, we can see how Herod waffles between being an honorable ruler and a complete spineless king.
At first hearing, it sounds like Herod is the bad guy. We see that he sent some of his men to arrest John, to bind him up, and to put him in prison. Why? “On account of Herodias, his brother Philip’s wife, because Herod had married her”… and it was John who told him he couldn’t do that.
Herod has stolen his brother’s wife. Philip could not have been dead, because according to the Law, then it would have been entirely appropriate for Herod to marry his brother’s widow. But since Philip is still very much alive, brother Herod has stolen his wife. Apparently she was happy with the arrangement, since she is the one who’s mad at John for bringing up the subject.
Mark tells us that Herodias had a grudge against John and wanted to kill him. But she was unable to do this because Herod knew that John was a righteous and holy man and so he protected him from his wife. What Herod really did in locking John up was more like a form of protective custody.
If John’s in Herod’s prison, Herod’s guards can keep a closer eye on him and protect him from Herodias’ hate. Not only that, but we learn that Herod actually finds John pretty interesting. Mark tells us that when Herod heard John, he was greatly perplexed; and yet he liked to listen to him. There’s something compelling about John and his strange habits and his harsh message that touches even Herod, and the king wants to listen to him and learn from him, even if he can’t quite understand what’s being said.
That’s not the portrait of Herod that most of us have about him. Someone who, for all of his power and posturing, still has a hunger for God’s word. Keep that in mind as we come to the rest of this story.
Herod’s birthday arrives, and he throws a big party, with “courtiers and officers and leaders of Galilee.” This was like a “Who’s Who” of the Jewish elite; perhaps even a few Romans thrown in as well. So to show off for them, Herod has his stepdaughter dance for the audience. Our text calls this stepdaughter by the name, “Herodias” too to complicate the matter. In ancient texts, the daughter is referred to as Salome.
When a young woman is dancing for a group of men, we are not talking about some kind of Shirley Temple tap dancing routine. We are talking more like a first-century equivalent of a “gentlemen’s club.” So what is Herod thinking, asking his wife’s daughter to entertain guests in such a way? Would any of us ask our teenage daughter to do a little dance to entertain our men friends?
What is going on with Herod? Here we just got a glimpse of him being a person with a serious and thoughtful side, and then he turns around and pulls a stunt like this. Well, perhaps we might not want to admit it but Herod is a lot like most of us: feels just enough need to show off in front of other people that he does something inappropriate in the process. Perhaps he’s trying to stir up a little envy; perhaps the originally scheduled dancer didn’t show up; or perhaps he’s just clueless. I suspect the latter.
At any rate, the girl’s dance pleases Herod and his guests…and so feeling extravagant and wanting to show off in front of his guests, Herod rashly promises the girl anything she wants in return, even half of his kingdom, if that’s what she desires. Being an obedient daughter, she asks her mother for advice, and this was too good of a chance for Herodias, the wife to pass up. So, following her mother’s request, the daughter returns to her stepfather and says, “I want you to give me at once the head of John the Baptizer on a platter.”
Good Herod or Bad Herod
Which Herod is going to respond? Good Herod, or bad Herod? The one who seeks the truth, even though it puzzles him, or the one who is obsessed by his status, his wealth, and his power? Mark tells us that Herod was “deeply grieved,” and yet, because he had sworn it to his stepdaughter…and not only because he had promised, but because he did it with all of his guests hearing him…he is unable to refuse her.
It’s not so much that Herod feels obligated to make good on his promise as it’s that he doesn’t want to lose face among the partygoers if he changes his mind and won’t do what she asks. So John is beheaded, and continues to haunt Herod’s conscience long after his disciples have buried his body.
The question for us today is making promises and keeping them. At some level, shouldn’t Herod be applauded for making good on a promise, even though it demanded of him to do something he didn’t want? Can’t we applaud Herod for keeping his when we see promises broken in our lives everyday? Shouldn’t we give Herod some credits?
In Judges 11, there’s a story of Jephthah who makes a promise to God: If God will grant him victory in battle over the Ammorites, then when Jephthah gets home, whoever first comes out the door of the house to meet him, he will offer to the Lord as a burnt sacrifice. Assuming, no doubt, that it will be the family dog or one of the goats that graze in the inner courtyard and at worse, maybe one of his slaves.
Instead he is greeted by his daughter, his only child, who comes to greet him with timbrels and dancing. Though it grieves Jephthah very much—not to mention how his daughter must have felt about it—he makes good on his promise. He does grant her a two-month reprieve, but at the end of that time, the promise is completed, and she is sacrificed. He is praised as one who was faithful to his promise, at least traditionally. Okay, then, shouldn’t Herod be praised as well?
Is it different, somehow, if the promise is made to God rather than to a human being? Is it different if the promise is made by a righteous person, or an unrighteous person? Is it different if the promise is made to a righteous person or an unrighteous person? Are there promises that ought to be broken? How would we know? Today, I suspect, we would think of both Herod’s promise and Jephthah’s as being way out of line.
Promises We Make
From these two scandalous and gory stories, what might we draw from this for our own lives? First, for most of us, we should be more careful about what we promise. Because, much as it may grieve us to admit it, we are like Herod in many respects. We may not have the power or authority that he had, but we can certainly recognize ourselves in his struggle to do the right thing while powerfully tempted to do the wrong thing.
It’s not too difficult to name some public figures—politicians in our times who have used their power to hide and lie about their sexual and inappropriate behavior. We wonder how power can give people the delusion that they can step beyond the law and break the promises a man and a woman make in marriage.
With the presidential campaigning going in full swing, I suspect we are all a bit tired of the promises the candidates are making to create more jobs and to jumpstart the sluggish economy. Promises are just hot air unless there is the civility and cooperation by lawmakers from all factions in order to make hard decisions and to fulfill their promises. I love to read the newspaper’s analysis of the candidates’ promises that are proven to be facts, half-truths or outright lies.
Notice that Herod liked to hear what John the Baptizer had to say even though he may not understand it. Listening to Jesus often perplexes us too, yet we still like to listen to him. Jesus says things that sometimes make us upset and maybe even angry, things that challenge the choices we have made and the priorities we have chosen…even if none of us ever stole our brother’s wife. Yet we find Jesus compelling, and we continue to listen. But it seems that sometimes we lock him up in church buildings so that we can listen to him only on Sundays.
So we can understand Herod’s conflicting feelings about John. We too want to protect Jesus and confine him to only the times when we want to hear from him.
If we are really honest about ourselves, we can also identify with the “bad” Herod. Doesn’t it sometimes feel good to show off about that new car or exotic vacation or even the achievements we accomplished? Aren’t we itching to brag about that? And don’t we get caught up sometimes making decisions not on the basis of what seems right to us, but what will look good to those who are watching?
And remember when we were children, didn’t we sometimes take dares that we shouldn’t have? I dare you to shoplift that item so that you can be a member of the group. I dare you to eat the worm. I dare you to sneak out at night against your parents’ instructions. And at some level you feel like you have to do it, or lose status among your peer group?
Do we ever really outgrow that? I shouldn’t be spending money on this but my friend just got a new one. I ought to say no when my friends invite me to go out drinking after work. In keeping with our “bad Herods,” haven’t we all made promises at one time or another that were made in the heat of the moment or at a time of desperation or when we were just goofing around and then realizing afterward that we never should have done such a thing?
When we make such wrong decisions, I don’t think that God expects us to keep those promises. I don’t think God would have held Herod to his promise to Salome that just because she danced so well that she would get anything she wishes including the head of John the Baptizer on a platter.
I don’t believe that God would have held Jephthah to his promise of sacrificing the first thing to greet him home after battle when it was his only daughter. However, I do think that God expects us to confess to making a bad promise…to admit that we have let people down when we promised what we couldn’t deliver, to acknowledge that we use promises to impress others instead of being honest with them and ourselves. In a sense, we are asked to honor such a promise by not keeping it, and seeking forgiveness for having made it in the first place.
Wouldn’t that be a refreshing idea from the presidential candidates?
What might be a promise that you made that you shouldn’t have? Rather than proceeding to make this wrong promise happen, might you be honest with yourself and don’t keep the promise and seek forgiveness from the person you may disappoint?
If we were in Herod’s place, would we have the courage to say, “You know what; that was a dumb thing I just said. Forgive me, Salome, but you have asked for something that I cannot and will not do.” Have we the courage to make such confessions in our own lives? Even more, have we the grace to move forward and let the promises we make in the future be Christ-based, and truthful, and for the good of all people?
In the Spirit of God, can we let our yes be yes and our no be no, and live with the consequences of our answers? By the grace of God, we can. It’s grace that forgives us, protects us from our worst selves and draws us into the future that God promises. And that is one promise that we don’t have to be careful about!
Let us pray.
Thank you, Lord for teaching us to be honest with ourselves and guiding us to make promises that would be right and seen faithful in your eyes. Forgive us when we let our need to show off blind us from acting justly, being kindly, and walking humbly with you. We promise, dear Lord to live according to your will for us by following the steps of Jesus Christ whom we pray. Amen.