Christopher Nolan again demonstrates the central thesis of historian (not actor) Tom Holland’s DOMINION: that Christianity is the most successful revolution in the history of our species. So successful that its assumptions are simply taken for granted even by those who imagine they are not deeply Christian.
Matt Walsh, MAGA Catholic, meanwhile demonstrates that the MAGA cult is the most profoundly anti-Christ movement since the Nazis. Not anti-Christian. Anti-Christ. The intense hatred of MAGA for the actual teaching of Jesus is matched only by its hollow, sentimental attachment to smells, bells, and a few trinkets like rosaries and Precious Moments figurines. Paul calls it “having a form of religion while denying its power”. The most Nietzschean people on earth in the present hour are MAGA KKKhristians, locked in mortal combat with Jesus Christ.
“What do you think? A man had two sons; and he went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work in the vineyard today.’ And he answered, ‘I will not’; but afterward he repented and went. And he went to the second and said the same; and he answered, ‘I go, sir,’ but did not go. Which of the two did the will of his father?” (Mt 21:28–31)
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One Response
The parable is interesting because it relies on making a certain assumption that might not be the case.
Everyone assumes that the father knows that it was the first son who went to work in the vineyard, so he knows he repented and also knows that the second son didn’t follow through.
But I reflected on it and realized that this must not be the case. Otherwise there’s no reason for Jesus to ask His listeners which of the two sons did the will of their father.
Instead, I thought that what the father did was go to his sons in the morning. He asks the first son, he refused. He asks the second, he accepts. Then he comes back in the evening to see that somebody had worked in the vineyard during the day.
When I shared that with others, they said I was making an assumption that’s not spelled out. I responded that they were making an assumption, too, since as they themselves point out, it’s not spelled out in the passage.
Yes, Jesus uses this parable to respond to the hypocrisy of Pharisees, but if we substitute spectators for the father and declarations of Pharisees vs. tax collectors for the first son and the second, then the bystanders don’t see what happens in their hearts and behind closed doors, only their declarations and the ostensibility of their witness. So a casual onlooker might only see that the Pharisees are righteous while the tax collectors are wicked.