PREACH IT BROTHER! PREACH IT!

I accompanied a relative to hospital once; he was afraid and needed a shoulder to lean on. It turned out that he was terminally ill and has since died, but during the consultation, the consultant commented on his ‘distended abdomen.’ Whatever sort of cancer he had it was causing his stomach to fill with fluid, and the fluid had abnormal cells that carried the dreadful disease to every corner of his body. Taking advantage of a moment when the doctor had left the room, my friend asked, ‘What does distended mean?’

'That’s esoteric language,’ I explained. ‘It’s when people speak in a way that only those in their inner circle understand.’ People use esoteric language to create a sense of otherness, or detachment from ordinary people. It can produce an aura, or mystique. For example, if the doctor had said, ‘Your stomach is swollen,’ my friend would have known exactly what he meant and they would have been equals in a way. But by using medical sounding terminology, it immediately said that the doctor is not one of us; he knows more us mere mortals.

But what was it all about? It was esoteric language designed to separate them from the common people. Why did they do that? Because they seemed intent on doing anything other than what the Master did; he engaged with real people, messy people, non-conforming people, social drop-outs, undesirables, drunks and prostitutes, lepers and adulterers, the perceived dregs of society. And he eyeballed them and told them, ‘God blesses you who are poor, who mourn, who are humble, who hunger and thirst for justice, the merciful among you, those of you whose hearts are pure, who work for peace. He blesses you.’

And to the squeaky-clean religious leaders what did he say, ‘Generation of vipers! Hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when he becomes one, you make him twice as much a son of hell as you are!’

Wouldn’t he have been great to be around? And wouldn’t it be great to be like him? Or maybe it wouldn't!