January 14, 2012
First Saturday in Ordinary Time
On the twenty-second of last month I gave a homily called
the Tale of Two Mothers. Today we will take the next step and
speak of the Tale of Two Sons, the prophet Samuel, son of
Hannah, and Jesus, son of Mary. Samuel is the central figure in
the First Reading and Jesus occupies first place in the Gospel
Reading. Not only that, but Samuel is a figure of Christ.
We know that Jesus is a king, indeed he is King of Kings
and Lord of Lords, but as he told Pilate his kingdom was not of
this world. It is a spiritual kingdom not an earthly kingdom that is
passed on from father to son, from generation to generation.
Was Samuel a king? Not as we ordinarily think of a king. He
was a ruler chosen by God to govern his people as his vicar.
From the days of Moses up until the time of Samuel the
Israelites lived under a theocracy. God was their king who gave
them Moses and Aaron, Joshua and the Judges to govern them.
Through them he ruled his people. Samuel was the last and
greatest of the judges. When the people clamored for a king like
the pagans around them, God told Samuel, “It is not you they
have rejected but me.” As a vicar of God I think we can call
Samuel a king. But he was more.
Jesus and Samuel were prophets as well as kings. There is
no need to press the point that Jesus was a prophet. He was sent
by God and spoke the word of God to the people of his time.
He also made a number of predictions of future events such as
his passion, death and resurrection.
Samuel was truly a prophet. As a child in the temple God
spoke to him giving him a message for Eli the priest. He became
know as the “seer” because he had special knowledge. He was
clairvoyant. He was sent by God to anoint Saul as king of Israel,
and when Saul proved unsuitable, God sent Samuel to anoint
David, the son of Jesse, who became the ancestor and figure of
Jesus.
Finally Jesus and Samuel were both priests. Samuel was the
son of an Ephraimite and consequently not of the priestly line of
Aaron. Yet when Eli the priest was punished for failing to
control his two wicked sons, God sent a prophet and told him
that he would raise up a faithful priest who would act according
to his heart. (cf. 1 Sam 2:35)This was Samuel who at the time
was still a child in the temple, but it was fulfilled perfectly in
Jesus who as priest offered himself to be a victim for the
salvation of the world.
What does all this mean for us? As members of Christ we not
only are figures of Christ as Samuel was. Christ lives in us and
we are kings, queens, prophets and priests through him and we
are in the process of exercising those powers right now in this
Mass.
