The first readings for the beginning of this week are taken from the Book of Ezra – a book that might not be familiar to you. Here is “the big picture”: The Books of Ezra and Nehemiah are two of the historical books of the Old Testament that tell the story of the return of the Israelites from exile in Babylon and the rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem. The Book of Ezra begins with the decree of Cyrus the Great, king of Persia, allowing the Israelites to return to Jerusalem from exile in Babylon and rebuild the temple. While the Temple was dedicated in 516 BC, religious reforms were another matter. Ezra was not with the original returnees. He arrived in Jerusalem in 458 BC some 80 years after the decree of Cyrus the Great.
In the first reading for today we find Ezra is despairing. Why? It is déjà vu all over again. The people no longer remember what God has done for them. They no longer praise God in full voice. They have fallen away from covenant with God and are becoming like all the people around them. They are intermarrying with “the Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Jebusites, Ammonites, Moabites, Egyptians, and Amorites.” (Ezra 9:1) This echoes the same list of foreigners to avoid from Moses’ instructions to the people. Why? It is a matter of being faithful to the God who saved them from slavery in Egypt. Moses warned the people, “And when you take their daughters as wives for your sons, and their daughters prostitute themselves with their gods, they will make your sons do the same.” (Ex 34:16) And slowly, slowly Israel will again turn from God.
Ezra despairs that it is happening all over again – what led to their captivity in Babylon and loss of all that God had given them – will lead them to lose all that the post-exilic mercy of God has restored.
Perhaps Ezra’s lament akin to St. Paul’s lament in Romans 7:15 – “What I do, I do not understand. For I do not do what I want, but I do what I hate.” Like Paul, like Ezra, we are called to be mindful of the sin that stirs in our lives. Like Ezra, confess our sins and turn to the Lord. Like the Tobit in our Responsorial Psalm, we can cry out: “Blessed be God, who lives forever. So now consider what he has done for you, and praise him with full voice.” (Tobit 13)
Image credit: Ezra Reads the Law to the People (Gustave Doré’s illustrations for La Grande Bible de Tours, 1866) PD-US