ACC ~ Matthew 8 v22

PUT TO DEATH WHAT IS EARTHLY IN YOU

ORIGEN: The statement “Let the dead bury their dead” implies spiritually: Waste no more time on dead things. You are to “put to death therefore what is earthly in you: immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire and covetousness, which is idolatry.” [1] These things therefore are dead. Cast them away from you. Cut them off as you would cut off gangrenous flesh to prevent the contamination of the whole body, so that you may not hear it said, “Leave the dead [2] to bury their dead.” [3] But to some it seems abnormal and contradictory that the Savior does not allow the disciple to bury his father. It seems inhumane. But Jesus does not in fact forbid people from burying the dead, but rather he puts before this the preaching of the kingdom of heaven, which makes people alive. [4] As for burying the body, there were many people who could have done this. FRAGMENT 161. [5]

[1] Col 3:5.

[2] Or those who bear in themselves deadening sin.

[3] Mt 8:22.

[4] Lk 9:60.

[5] GCS 41.1:80.

FIRST THINGS FIRST

CHRYSOSTOM: Mark well the difference between the scribe who earlier had impudently blurted out, “I will follow you wherever you go” and the other one who was asking to do a sacred duty when he said, “Permit me first to go [bury my father].” Yet Jesus did not permit him, saying, “Follow me, and leave the dead to bury their own dead.” In both cases, Jesus was paying attention strictly to their inward intention. But one may ask, “Why was the latter not permitted?” Because on the one hand, there were plenty of others who could fulfill that duty. The dead person was not going to remain actually unburied. On the other hand, it appears that it was not fit for this particular person to be taken away from the more urgent matters required of him. … Was it not then, one may ask, extreme ingratitude to be absent from the burial of one’s own father? If indeed he did so out of negligence, it would have been ingratitude. But his departure would not have been considered fitting if it required interrupting a more urgent order of responsibility. So Jesus resisted him, not as if he were commanding him to think lightly of the honor due to parents, but signifying that nothing ought to be to us more urgent than the affairs of the kingdom of heaven. We ought with all diligence to cling to these and not to put them off in the slightest, though our engagements be exceedingly indispensable and pressing. THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW, HOMILY 27.3. [1]

[1] PG 57:347-48; NPNF 1 10:187**. Do not let anything take first place over service to the coming reign of heaven.