Sally A. Brown, Professor Emerita, Princeton Theological Seminary
In settings where one can expect that many congregations will not attend Holy Week services, especially Maundy Thursday and Good Friday, both Mt 20:1-11 (the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem) as well as the Passion narrative, should be read in the service. Easter means little if one has not experienced the betrayal, anguish, trial, abuse, and crucifixion of Jesus. A Passion reading in multiple voices, including the congregation, places all present inside these dramatic events.
Features distinctive to Matthew, either appearing nowhere else, or more elaborated here than elsewhere, provide fertile ground for preaching. These include: Jesus’ silence before his accusers; the repeated, ironically apt title “King of the Jews,” coupled here in Matthew with “Son of God;” the coercion of Simon of Cyrene (undoubtedly African) to carry Jesus’ cross; the disloyalty of Jesus’ disciples, particularly Judas and Peter; Judas’ regret over his contract with Jesus’ foes; Pilate’s futile efforts to deny his complicity in Jesus’ condemnation; and onlookers’ demands that Jesus come down from his cross to prove his identity. Here, divine redemptive love and human frailty meet.
Another choice would be to reflect on Matthew’s OT allusions, particularly two psalms of lament, 22 and 69. For Mt, these validate Jesus’ true identity as God’s anointed Messiah—Matthew’s chief concern. Matthew does not sponsor any “theory of atonement;” these arose much later. To overlay Mt’s Passion with our preferred atonement theory would be to obscure Matthew’s purpose. More to Mt’s point, if Jesus is indeed “Son of God” and (unrecognized) “king of the Jews,” what does his refusal to defend or save himself from false accusation, abuse, suffering, and an agonizing death suggest about the true nature of world-changing, divine power? What does it say about the deeply human vulnerability of the incarnate Son, or about God’s identification with human sufferers today?
Themes not taken up on Palm/Passion Sunday lend themselves easily to sermons for Maundy Thursday or Good Friday. Yet another feature unique to Matthew is best suited for Holy Saturday or an Easter vigil service: Matthew reports that some of the faithful dead emerge from their tombs at the death of Jesus. Later, on the day of resurrection, they are seen walking in Jerusalem.
Where and how this tradition developed is uncertain. What is certain is that Matthew’s community believed that Jesus’s death had cosmic consequences. His death was death’s destruction; his rising, the grave’s defeat. Tombs broke open, and the power of Empire was helpless to stop it or hide it. Ezekiel’s vision of the valley of dry bones comes to mind (Ez 37:1-14). Bones rattle, assembling; life begins anew. Yet, we must not—indeed, cannot!—dodge the blunt truth on which both Ezekiel and Matthew insist: this rising up to new life lies on the other side of death. We do well in this Passion Week to attend not only to how Jesus died, but why. Jesus was put to death for his fidelity to the truth: the truth of his own identity and mission, and the truth about the will and ways of God. Today, followers of Jesus who show compassion for the scapegoated—those on whom ruling powers like to blame all of society’s ills!—still threaten systems of power that dominate through deadly force.
Insights into Biblical Greek Grammar and Syntax 