Monday in the Third Week of Lent, March 21, 2022

Luke 4:24-30

Jesus said to the people in the synagogue at Nazareth: “Amen, I say to you, no prophet is accepted in his own native place. Indeed, I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah when the sky was closed for three and a half years and a severe famine spread over the entire land. It was to none of these that Elijah was sent, but only to a widow in Zarephath in the land of Sidon. Again, there were many lepers in Israel during the time of Elisha the prophet; yet not one of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian.” When the people in the synagogue heard this, they were all filled with fury. They rose up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town had been built, to hurl him down headlong. But he passed through the midst of them and went away.

St. Luke includes more details to the story of Jesus at Nazareth than either St. Matthew or St. Mark do, perhaps because the latter Evangelists we’re making the point that the Lord was rejected by his own town as a sign of how he would be rejected by his own people.  Luke, on the other hand, uses this story to explain why the Lord went to Capernaum and adopted that town for his base rather than work out of Nazareth. 

“Amen, I say to you, no prophet is accepted in his own native place.”  The Lord Jesus may be quoting an old saying because, with the congregation against him, they would not be interested in a defense of his own but could be swayed by a recognized bit of wisdom.  Just before this the Lord quoted another saying popular at the time: “Physician, heal yourself.”  The proverb about the prophet refers especially to Jeremiah, who began to prophesy in his home town of Anathoth but was threatened with death and had to leave (cf. Jeremiah 11, 21).  Since there had been no prophet in Israel for hundreds of years, the Lord’s identifying himself as a prophet here must have disturbed the crowd very much, already in an uproar by the Lord’s declaring that Isaiah 61 was fulfilled in him.  “In the days of Elijah.”  Here the Lord compares himself to Elijah, the great defender of the worship of the true God and who worked miracles.  “During the time of Elisha the prophet.”  He next compares himself to Elisha, whose disciple Elijah was, and who cured the foreign general.  In referencing these particular deeds of the two prophets, the Lord shows that it will be the lowly and the Gentiles who will receive the Gospel.

“When the people in the synagogue heard this, they were all filled with fury.”  For us, the madness of the people seems very strange, a severe overreaction.  They are in an uproar because their neighbor, Jesus the son of Joseph, had made himself out to be as great or greater than the most revered prophets of Israel, and this was akin to blasphemy for them.  Furthermore, he seemed to be rejecting his own people for the Gentiles.  We should not underestimate the animosity which the Jews of the period felt for the Gentiles, who had trodden them down repeatedly throughout their history and at one point destroyed their most important city and its Temple, the central place in the land where God was worshipped.

“They rose up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town had been built, to hurl him down headlong.”  This interesting verse tells us that Luke knew the geography of the site, possibly from visiting the town during his time in the Holy Land.  We note that the people do not resort to stoning the Lord, which was the preferred way of dealing with blasphemers.  By attempting to kill him by throwing him over the side of the hill, they show that they are completely rejecting him from their town.  

“But he passed through the midst of them and went away.”  He never returned.  He visited many cities, towns, and villages during the three years of his Public Life, but he never went back to Nazareth.  He does not go where he is not wanted nor does he ever force himself upon us.  We rejoice that we have him with us, and pray for the grace to persevere in our faith and good works so that he stays with us forever.