Sunday Funnies

"The poor be with ye always"

But that's only because the Xians are greedy, condescending, lacking empathy, and generally acting like massive assholes.

I have been hearing this bastardization of  Mark 14:7 (and Matthew 26:11 and John 12:8) for years as some kind of excuse for refusing to do the proper thing about the poverty-stricken.  Rick Perry recently trotted it out, and that was the straw that broke the camel's back.  For me and for Slacktivist.

The reference there is to a story in the Bible, one repeated in three of the Gospels. Matthew and Mark both tell us the story happened in the house of Simon the Leper. John’s Gospel says it happened in the home of Mary, Martha and Lazarus. But they all agree it happened in Bethany — in the house of the poor. 

[...]

The bit Rick Perry was attempting to quote is from verse 11 there: “For you always have the poor with you,” or, in the King James Version, “ye have the poor always with you,” or in the NIV, “The poor you will always have with you^a.”

People love to quote that bit. Christians especially love to quote that bit — Christians who claim to have read and understood their Bibles.

And, like Rick Perry, they all get it wrong.

Completely and utterly wrong. Backwards wrong. Perversely, cruelly, anti-biblically, priggishly, prickishly, sinfully, hellishly wrong.

Hearing someone say this has made me grit my teeth for years.  Literally.

Almost every time you see someone citing this passage, they’re invoking it the same way Gov. Perry is there — a shrugging acceptance that poverty is just the way it is and that there’s nothing we can do about it.

And that’s not what Jesus was saying at all.

You see that little superscripted “a” at the end of that phrase in the NIV translation? That’s a footnote. Scroll down to the bottom and you’ll see that footnote reads “See Deut. 15:11.”

That’s important. Jesus was quoting from the Torah. And you can’t understand what he said – or what his disciples heard him saying — unless you understand what it is he was quoting.

So let’s do that. Let’s “see Deut. 15:11.” Here it is:

Since there will never cease to be some in need on the earth, I therefore command you, “Open your hand to the poor and needy neighbor in your land.”

Already you can see that Jesus’ statement can’t be made to mean what Rick Perry et. al. are trying to twist it into meaning. The passage Jesus was quoting is not a complacent description, but an if … then statement. “Since … therefore …” Deuteronomy 15:11 says. Jesus only quotes the “since” part because he didn’t need to quote the “therefore” — he knew that his disciples knew the rest of that verse: “I therefore command you, ‘Open your hand to the poor and needy neighbor in your land.’”

That is what “The poor will always be with you” means in the Bible. In Deuteronomy and in Matthew, Mark and John. It means, therefore, we are commanded to open our hands to the poor and needy.

One of my New Year's resolutions is to cease quietly and nicely putting up with bullshit.  I'm getting an early start on keeping fast to that.

And that’s the same message Jesus is delivering to his disciples in all three versions of that Gospel story.

But that’s the exact opposite of what ignorant Christians misquoting Jesus are trying to say when they babble about “the poor will always be with you.” Those Christians are perverting that verse in order to deny all culpability and responsibility for or to the poor.

That’s wrong. That is, according to Moses and to Jesus, evil.

Maybe it's all the Christians who have gone Old Testament on torture lately.  Or who like to blame the unarmed young black victim for being gunned down by police, who consistently avoid being held to account for their crimes.  The Prince of Peace just doesn't seem to be having the greatest influence on his followers lately.

Whether he knows it or not (and he clearly doesn’t know it), this is what Rick Perry is accidentally affirming when he tries to quote that passage from the Gospels. All of this.

Whenever you say “the poor will always be with you,” you are also saying “At the end of every seven years you must cancel debts.”

Whenever you say “the poor will always be with you,” you are also saying “do not be hardhearted or tightfisted.”

Whenever you say “the poor will always be with you,” you are also saying “be careful not to harbor this wicked thought.”

Whenever you say “the poor will always be with you,” you are also saying “do not show ill will toward the needy.”

Whenever you say “the poor will always be with you,” you are also saying “give generously and do so without a grudging heart.”

Whenever you say “the poor will always be with you,” you are also saying “be openhanded toward the poor and needy.”

And if — like Rick Perry or countless other lapdogs for the rich and powerful — you try to say “the poor will always be with you” without also saying all of that, then be warned. Because the poor may then appeal to the Lord against you, and you will be found guilty of sin.

It sure is a fucked-up world we live in when the atheists have to remind the Christianists how they are supposed to fucking live their lives.