The Lady or the Tiger

Let me set the scene for you.

Many years ago, a king has come up with a new way to put people on trial.  It is a trial by fate.  The accused is sent into an arena where they come upon two doors.  Behind one door is a ravenous tiger and behind the other is a lady, specifically chosen to be a good mate to the accused.

If the accused chooses the door with the tiger behind it, he is clearly guilty and the tiger kills him.

If he chooses the door with the lady behind it, he is innocent and must marry the woman.

As it happens, the king’s daughter has fallen in love with a man who the king feels is not worthy of her.  So he puts the man in the arena to face the two doors.

Now, the princess knows the location of both the lady and the tiger.

And her lover knows that she knows.

And now she has a choice.  She can direct him to the door with the lady behind it, saving his life or, she can direct him to the door with the tiger behind it because she cannot bear to see him with another woman.

I think we can agree a decent human being directs him to the door with the lady behind it.

She nods to him, directing him to the door to his right.

But while it may be an easy choice for us, is it an easy choice for the princess?  Has she saved his life or ended it?

Holy Week is a week of choices.

Today is Wednesday of Holy Week and though it doesn’t have a specific Liturgical Calendar designation, traditionally it is called Spy Wednesday, as in the day when Judas chooses to betray Jesus for thirty pieces of silver.

Tomorrow is Maundy Thursday, another day of choices.  It is here at the Garden of Gethsemane that Jesus, after asking God to take away the cup of suffering, chooses to submit to God’s will.

And then, of course, Good Friday, where Pilate offers the crowd what he thinks is an easy choice.  Jesus or Barabbas?

Keep in mind that Pilate really wanted nothing to do with Jesus, and that was before his wife told him to have nothing to do with Jesus because of a dream she had.  Pilate could see what was happening, the behind-the-scenes machinations that would lead to Jesus’ death.  Pilate was being used, and he knew it, and being a prideful Roman, he resented it.

So, he gave the crowd what should have been an easy choice.  Free Jesus or free Barabbas. 

All of my life I have given very little thought to who Barabbas was.  Only in my book Witnesses to the Passion of Christ, did I think to give him a voice at all.  I thought honestly Barabbas was a placeholder.  He could have been anyone provided that for the sake of the plot, he was clearly the wrong choice.

Barabbas was a known insurrectionist, a murderer.

But for years, I have thought, Pilate could have chosen anyone or anything to pit against Jesus in this scenario.  Pilate could have said, “Will you free Jesus of Nazareth who has reportedly healed the blind and the sick, fed the hungry and even raised the dead OR will you free this man-eating tiger who has already killed twenty of your widows and young children, and who, if you choose to set free, I will release directly into the crowd here and let me just say, he is a very hungry tiger?  Now who will you set free?”

And the crowd raises their fists into the air and says, “The tiger!!”

This past Sunday, in his sermon, Reverend Greg looked at this choice of Jesus versus Barabbas and it gave me new insight.  First of all, our reading from Matthew 27:16–17 tells us that Barabbas’ full name was Jesus Barabbas.  And if you think giving the people a choice between two Jesuses is a bit on the nose, consider that, as Reverend Greg pointed out, Barabbas means “son of the father.”

Jesus Barabbas was, as I said, an insurrectionist and as Reverend Greg stated in his sermon, Barabbas was someone who fought Rome on Roman terms.  He used the tools and the weapons of Rome to fight Rome.

Or, I could sum it up simply as Barabbas fought fire with fire.

Jesus, on the other hand, our Jesus, Messiah, Son of God, did not fight fire with fire—in fact, He was not fighting Rome at all.

When we wonder how a crowd could have chosen Barabbas over Jesus, we are thinking like Pilate.  We are oversimplifying things.  We are thinking that the choice is simply choosing a good guy over a bad guy.

But the choice is more nuanced than that.

To choose Jesus over Barabbas in this situation is to choose mystery, is to choose the unknown over Barabbas, who everyone knows.

Jesus, who flipped the tables in the temple, upsets the natural order of things.  He heals on the sabbath.  He forgives sins.  Everything Jesus does is brand new to people.  He is a wild force in the world.  I keep thinking to the Narnia books where it is said of the great lion Aslan (a Jesus stand-in) that Aslan is not a tame lion.

Jesus is not a tame lion.  You could look at someone like John the Baptist and the way he dressed and what he ate (those yummy wild locusts) and say yes this man is a wild man.

But Jesus—to choose Jesus—is to choose someone so wild, He rewrites the universe every time He speaks.  To follow Jesus takes such a leap of faith—because you are following Him into the unknown.  And there is no telling what will happen next.

It is very easy to fault the crowd, to judge them, for choosing Barabbas.

It is very easy to say that we would not have made that decision.

Over the years, whenever the passion play has been read aloud in church and the congregation has been asked to yell out, “Crucify Him!” I have stayed silent.

I won’t say those words.

But as Reverend Greg was preaching on Sunday, I was sitting there thinking, “Crap, two thousand years later and we are still choosing the wrong Jesus, aren’t we?”

We’re still fighting the same wars in the same ways rather than choosing another way, rather than wondering how the radical love of the other Jesus might change the world.

We are so quick to judge those who chose Barabbas, to point out the splinter in their eyes, without acknowledging the wood plank in our own eyes.

Earlier I was sharing with you the very well-known story of The Lady or the Tiger, but I didn’t tell you how it ended.  The story ends in the unknown.  The author never tells us what was behind the door, the lady or the tiger.  The point of the story is self-reflection.  Are we the cynic who thinks the tiger is behind the door, or the optimist who thinks the lady is behind the door?  Do we believe the best in people or the worst?  What if the man had not chosen either door?  What if he had refused to play the game?

What if … what if … what if … can we ever be comfortable in the unknown?

Can we ever be comfortable in the mystery?

Because if we can, we may find that the world, the universe, is more wild and wonderful and amazing than anything we could have ever imagined.

Amen.