Pride and Power - A Bitter Cup

Now Herod had arrested John, bound him, and put him in prison

on account of Herodias, the wife of his brother Philip,

for John had said to him,

"It is not lawful for you to have her."

Although he wanted to kill him, he feared the people,

for they regarded him as a prophet.

But at a birthday celebration for Herod,

the daughter of Herodias performed a dance before the guests

and delighted Herod so much

that he swore to give her whatever she might ask for.

Prompted by her mother, she said,

"Give me here on a platter the head of John the Baptist."

The king was distressed"

The readings for Mass this Saturday feature John the Baptist. John's mother was in menopause when she conceived John in accordance with the promise of an angel. It is at this event the story of our redemption leaves the realm of a promise for the ages and enters present reality. Jonn's mother was named Elizabeth whose name in Hebrew means, "Oath of God." Elizabeth in her old age would bear the one who would cry out in the wilderness. When she was six months along into her pregnancy, Elizabeth received a visit from one Mary of Nazareth who was betrothed to a carpenter named Joseph in that town some sixty miles away. When Mary approached her kinswoman Elizabeth, John, in the womb of his mother could sense the presence of the Messiah and he was unable to contain himself and John danced in his mother's womb. How Mary and Elizabeth were related is somewhat cloudy because Mary was from the house of David and Elizabeth was from the house of Aron, these identities are taken from the father's side of the family but Elizabeth and Mary's mother could have been sisters and thus John and Jesus would be cousins. The word used in the Bible translates as kinswoman so we know for sure that the relationship was there. Mary stayed and helped out for three months and returned to her town of Nazareth three months pregnant. This coincidence would not be lost on Joseph, her fiance but that story is for another time. Today, we are speaking about John.

John and Jesus were cousins but they did not hang together and met only after each had begun their ministry. John was what we might call strange. His diet would not appeal to most of us as it consisted of locusts and wild honey. He wore clothing that was not too comfortable which was made from camel's hair and when he was not calling people to repent and baptizing at the Jordan River, he spent his time wandering around in the desert. I don't think John played particularly well with others and he was not what you would call a diplomat, far from it. He called a spade a spade and an adulterous king an adulterous king and that got him in a heap of trouble and semi-permanent resident status in Herod's dungeon.

The accommodations did not bother John too much. As a matter of fact, he kind of liked it that he could call the king and his wife sinners and adulterers twenty-four hours a day and six days a week (John rested on the Sabbath.) just about right under their sin tainted carnal bedroom.

The King's birthday was the debauch of the year. This year the queen's daughter provided the king with a special dance that really turned the wine soddened eyes of the king on. The king made a foolish promise of rewarding the dancer with up to half of his kingdom for the titillating dance that he had received as his present that year. The daughter consulted her mother and since being the king's wife she had the whole of the kingdom in her grasp already she told her daughter to demand the head of John the Baptist on a silver platter.

Even in his inebriated state the king was shocked. He was not too thrilled with the loud mouth Baptist shouting about his sinful life, but what the hell, he was the king and nobody was in a position to tell him anything. Also, he had a strange relationship with John. The king almost liked him and would visit him and talk with him and he was gaining, little bit by little bit, a respect for the coarse preacher.


The king was in a bind. He had thought that the young girl would have done the right thing and taken him for a ride for a bunch of silver and gold, things that he could easily replace by reaching into the pockets of his humble subjects. She wanted a man's death. If he refused, he would be the laughing stock of all the drunkards that hung around his court feeding his ego the compliments that it needed. On the other hand, he knew John was harmless. He knew that John had no power of his own and it would be an injustice to kill him. But pride won against justice and the bamboozled king sent a guard to give John a haircut, a very close cut indeed.

John's voice was stilled. In its place, would come a voice with the power to change the world and everyone in it. Herod had planted the wind and would reap the whirlwind, Jesus, the Son of God had entered the scene with a voice that could not be stilled and whose words shake the world even today.