What do Taiwan, Ukraine, and Greenland have in common? All three have faced serious threats of forceful acquisition by more powerful neighbours. In Ukraine, this threat has unfortunately manifested itself militarily, resulting in an unimaginable death toll and suffering for its population. Each country shares a common desire among their respective populations to prosper as democratic countries, guided by the principle of self-determination, while building mutually beneficial relationships with its neighbours. Taiwan has largely achieved such stability. Greenland is already semi-autonomous and is gradually becoming more independent from Denmark. Ukraine was invaded precisely because it was making significant progress towards becoming a democratic nation. The prospective aggressors – China, Russia, and, surprisingly, the USA – are already among the largest countries in the world and do not really need more territory to be successful. Their desires for expansion are purely imperialistic, driven by the massive egos of their political leaders, with little regard for the local populations in the threatened countries. Before you think I’ve gone unusually political (I haven’t), I want to emphasise that this situation is not new. It has been a recurring theme throughout human history.
“The Lord brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the latter time he has made glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations.” This opening line in today’s first reading, with the unusual names, can trip up inexperienced readers. While we can recognise “the Jordan” and “Galilee”, and roughly place them on the map, most of us would struggle to identify “the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali.” Nor do we know what the rest of the reading refers to, either in its reference to the past: “In the former time the Lord brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali,” or its bright future in the rest of the reading. So, a bit of context is necessary.
According to the biblical story of Exodus, having left the slavery of Egypt, the People of Israel conquered Canaan (what we know as the Holy Land) and settled there. The land was divided between their tribes, named after their respective progenitors, the twelve sons of Jacob. According to the Bible, they settled as far north as the city of Sidon, in southern modern-day Lebanon. The tribes of Zebulun and Naphtali, mentioned in the first reading and recalled in today’s gospel, were among those that settled in the north. Some time later, the Kingdom of Israel, briefly united under King David and his successor, King Solomon, split into two kingdoms, conveniently called the Southern and Northern Kingdoms, the latter comprising ten tribes. Its prosperity came to an end when it was overrun by the Neo-Assyrian Empire in 720 BC. After the conquest, pretty much the entire population was resettled across the empire, while other groups and nations settled in their place. That was the official imperial policy, executed with brutal efficiency. The Southern Kingdom of Israel suffered a similar fate some two hundred years later, when it was conquered by the Neo-Babylonian Empire around 597 BC, and the population, particularly the elites and skilled artisans, was taken into captivity in Babylon.
Here is an important difference between the ultimate outcomes of the two conquests. Some seventy years later, the Persian conqueror of the Babylonian Empire, Cyrus the Great, granted the Jews permission to return to Palestine and effectively rebuild the Southern Kingdom as a vassal, semi-autonomous province of his empire. They did so with their national, religious and ethnic identity mostly intact, or even strengthened by their exile. However, this never happened to those northern tribes scattered by the Assyrians. They effectively dissolved among other nations and ethnic groups across the empire and never truly recovered. In history, they are known as the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel. Consequently, the post-Babylonian Jewish returnees in the province of Judah treated their pagan northern neighbours with hostility (often mutual) and distrust. To cut a long story short, even after a few centuries, when the Jews had at least partially repopulated the northern regions, they were treated with suspicion and looked down on by their southern cousins as semi-pagans. There are many hints of such a dismissive attitude across the gospels. The strongest one we find in the discussion between the Judean authorities and Nicodemus, when the latter was effectively insulted by being called a Galilean: “Are you from Galilee, too? Look into it, and you will find that a prophet does not come out of Galilee.” (John 7:52)
In this context, Jesus’ setting his headquarters in the town of Capernaum, was seen by St Matthew as the fulfilment of the old prophecy, foretelling the bright future for the stricken land and its population: “The land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, the way of the sea, beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles — the people dwelling in darkness have seen a great light, and for those dwelling in the region and shadow of death, on them a light has dawned.” In a broader sense, the inferior region and its disdained inhabitants were the first to experience God’s redeeming power. Jesus’ disciples, uninfluential and derided Galileans, would eventually take this light to the whole world. Like them, most of us here might not have much power or direct influence on world affairs. But we can make a difference in the world when we heed Jesus’ call: “Change your hearts and lives, because God’s kingdom is now very near.”
