How do you increase your faith? Until very recently my answer would have been, well, through lots of prayer, and regular share in the sacrament, and through study and meditation on the Scriptures and on the teachings of the Church, and perhaps through discussions and conversations with other seekers. And so on. The obvious things.
But today’s story gave me a new answer, one I had honestly never arrived at in my life. I found it as I worked with today’s Gospel story. One that has often puzzled me.
When I was a boy this parable always puzzled me, because I couldn’t get past one word: they “trimmed” their lamps. How do you trim a lamp? I thought to trim something meant to cut it shorter, make it smaller. It took me a long time to realize this was trim as in trim the Christmas tree–get it ready. In fact the original says “cosmetize” the lamps. Make them prettier–by filling them with fresh oil. That’s what trim means.
So I could not understand the story at all, because the whole thing hinges on that word. The whole point of the parable is readiness. It is about preparation. Preparing in fact for the Second Advent of Christ. Everybody can see that. The story is simple.
So for a while I thought it meant keep your eye always on the future. Or rather be ever vigilant as Dionysius says about past, present, and future: think always, he says, on where you were, where you are now, where you are not, and where you are going–meaning paradise, heaven, and whatever lies in between. But readiness is in real life an art–and this art is subtle. For good preparation is a matter of balance.
Between two extremes and I have a personal example of the two extremes: myself and the deacon in a previous parish.
Our Deacon was Hyacinth, and because she was one of the first intentional and permanent Deacons to be ordained, the two of us were often invited to things to show how a deacon works. So Hyacinth and I would go to these show and tells, and sometimes they were weekend long retreats or conferences.
I would pack for these as I usually do–I would throw a toothbrush and a Book of Common Prayer in my shoulder bag along with a few handouts. And I would be ready to go.
Then I would pick up Hyacinth at her place. And she would emerge with a gigantic suitcase, or a trunk, that obviously held enough clothing and miscellaneous gear to last about six months. To me, anyway. Her daughter once shook her head and told me, “Mummie’s motto is ‘you never know.’” As in, you never know when you might need that extra sweater. Or raincoat. Or makeup kit. Or flashlight. Or alternate pair of shoes. Or first aid box (she was a nurse too so sometimes the caravan included medical gear and I am not making this up).
Mine was “travel light.” And of course we were both wrong. There was always something I wished I had brought along. And Hyacinth always left asking, why did I bring all this stuff? I never used it.
Good preparation even for something as trivial as a weekend conference takes thought, it takes common sense, and it takes balance.
Now here we have the most important preparation in the world. Preparation for the second advent–for the return of Christ. Preparation can make all the difference–between what and what? Well, between the joyful day we expect every day when we pray the words our Lord taught us, “thy kingdom come,” the words with which the entire Bible ends, “even so, come, Lord Jesus,” the difference between that and the vision Amos gives us, a truly nightmarish vision, where there is no escape from horror: this Kafka vision where you run from a lion and get eaten by a bear, when you run home for safety, and you lean against your wall in relief, and get bit by a snake going up the wall.
I still didn’t know how to read the story. Watch for you do not know when the Lord will return–sounds valid and sensible enough but he didn’t need a whole parable to spell that out.
And then I noticed something. I noticed details. Usually the details don’t seem to matter very much–nobody cares how much money the Good Samaritan laid out to help the stranger. Nobody wants to know the names of the men in the story of the Prodigal Son. But when a detail is given–like the fact that the Prodigal Son ended up feeding swine–you need to look closely and see what it means.
This story of the “Ten Friends of the Groom” is full of details. Specifics–how many, what time, and so on. So I decided to pay attention to the details and see what the might unfold.
So I decided to ask what the details might mean.
First, ten virgins. Why ten and why virgins? Ten most scholars now would say is merely because ten was a perfect small number, just as Bp Andrew said last week, 144,000 was a perfect large number. But I like what St. Augustine says: there are ten, to suggest five males and five females, so we are all included. “Bridesmaids” is not a good translation: the word is “virgins.” Why Virgins? Chrysostom says don’t take that literally, this is not about keeping virginity, it is not a story about monastic vows. It is an inclusive parable. It means those who “keep the integrity of the flesh.” That sounds very powerful to me. And it applies to all of us, regardless of sexual practice or status. It in fact rhymes with the Catechism in our Prayer Book, which says the Seventh Commandment means “to use all our bodily functions as God intended.” Which is 1 a mighty healthy challenge and 2 applicable to absolutely everyone. Chrysostom makes it poetic: keep the integrity of the flesh.
What do the Lamps stand for? I like what St. Hilary says: these lamps are “souls lit by the light of faith.” That too strikes me as very good. No one hides the lamp under the shrub, says Jesus. The Word is the Light that came into the world, says John.
What does their falling asleep mean? Every interpreter says the same thing: that refers to dying. It is the most natural metaphor for sleep in the world–the sleep of death, like Hamlet says.
Now wait a minute. Doesn’t that weaken it? I always thought the moral of the story was “be prepared, Christ could return any moment, he might return today!” Well, as some of my relatives would have put it, sure it does. But if we are making this an allegory we can add another meaning on our new level. And when we do something nice happens.
But the fact is, he probably won’t. The fact is, whenever that happens, there will be a few Christians alive at the time–and untold billions not alive. The great Forebears are making this make sense for that great mute majority which is probably going to include all of us.
Why midnight? Well, the tradition is that the resurrection, the tenth plague, Christ’s birth happened at midnight, so the Second Advent is going to occur at that hour. But I like what Augustine says: it simply means that the time is completely hidden, that there can be no way whatsoever to know. Since in a way that’s the point of the story, that makes very much sense.
And lastly, who are those merchants? Chrysostom makes the best suggestion: it’s the poor. Go to those whom you did not serve before and try once again.
Now I have deliberately left out one detail. Because here is the best part. What is the Oil? I always thought, well, preparing for the kingdom to come must mean the sacraments, and prayer, and fasting, and meditation on God’s Holy Word, and confession, and all those good things, and in a way it does. But in another way it can all be rolled into one thing.
When I looked for an answer I found something strange. Every single writer in the tradition who wrote on this parable says the same thing: the Oil is the works you do.
That is startling. And Jerome says this beautifully: St. Jerome, who translated this into Latin once upon a time, says oil is plain, ordinary good works, as in “let your light so shine before other people that they may see your good works.” And he adds a very neat twist then.
You know that our motto is fides opera –faith and works. Actually that “and” isn’t even there. It is just “faith – works.” It rather asks the question, what is the relationship between these two good things? Between Faith and Good Works?
Most of us think of good works as something that we do because of our faith. Faith comes first, then we do good things to express our faith. And of course that is undoubtedly true. Our byword for Stewardship is going to be Faith at Work, which says it perfectly. The opposite of Faith and Works is Faith Alone, Fides Sola, I understand what that means and I see its truth: you cannot earn your way into God’s kingdom. But somehow even though I acknowledge its truth, faith without works doesn’t work for me. I don’t believe it's possible. I believe that would be holding a certain opinion about God and believing that is sufficient.
It isn’t. If Faith is not AT work, I just don’t see how whatever it is can really be faith. I imagine it’s just an opinion one holds about God. That would never get anybody moving.
No, faith and works are in a dynamic relationship. And Jerome for me adds the final touch. He says this:
Just as light is fed by oil, Faith is fed by good works.
Now we have something. The Lamp is the soul lit by the light of faith. And the Oil–the oil is the good work we do. Just as in an oil lamp the light is fed by the oil; so in our souls, our faith is fed by what we do.
This is a very good, simple thought: faith is increased not by reasoning and musing and meditating and arguing, but by doing.
