Nehemiah 8.1-10, Luke 4.14-21
The Third Sunday of Epiphany, 23 January 2022
Austwick, Keasden
Let us take some time today to think about the experience of people in exile – and how they find restoration as their exile comes to an end.
Our scriptures tell the story of the people of Judah who were exiled to Babylon in the sixth century BC, their trauma so vividly captured by their well-known words in Psalm 137, ‘By the rivers of Babylon – there we sat down and there we wept when we remembered Zion…. For there our captors asked us for songs, and our tormentors asked for mirth, saying, ‘Sing us one of the songs of Zion!’ How could we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land?’ [1]
When the Persians deposed the Babylonians sixty years later, their King Cyrus decreed that the Judaean exiles could return home and that the ruined Jerusalem Temple should be rebuilt. The story of the restoration of the exiles is told in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah, Nehemiah being a key figure in the physical rebuilding of Judah, and Ezra, a priest, being central to the cultural, emotional, spiritual restoration of the people – as captured in today’s episode, in which Ezra reintroduces the books of the law to the gathered crowds, and a large number of volunteer leaders assist him in explaining their meaning to the people.
What is the experience of people in exile – and how may they find restoration as their exile comes to an end? This is a vital question for today, for we live in a world of exiles, and I suggest, our own recent experiences through this pandemic have made exiles of us all.
The latest UN figures give that at the end of 2020, 82.4 million people worldwide were forcibly displaced as a result of persecution, conflict, violence, human rights violations or public order disturbances. And during the pandemic we ourselves have been through a population-wide trauma, one which has not yet come to an end, a trauma which largely consists of the effects of our being, let’s say exiled, from the people, places, and community, the ways of life which had previously given us the deepest sense of ourselves. With our face coverings on and safely socially distanced, how can we sing the Lord’s song in a land which has become strange to us? And how shall we best prepare ourselves for an end to this physical, emotional, cultural, spiritual exile? [2]
Two of the greatest spiritual leaders and teachers of our times are also amongst the world’s best known exiles. During the 1959 uprising following China’s annexation of Tibet, for fear of arrest the Dalai Lama escaped from Lhasa and has spent the past 60 years leading the Tibetan people from exile in Daramasala, India. And his great friend the late Archbishop Desmond Tutu experienced with all black South Africans the trauma of what might be called the internal exile of apartheid which excluded them from full participation in their own society. [3]
Like Ezra and Nehemiah of old these two great leaders have looked exile squarely in the face, understood its effects, embraced its pain, and devoted themselves to restoring the physical, emotional, cultural, and spiritual life of their people – and of all people whether exiled from their own land or existentially exiled in a state of being where they cannot flourish, even in their own place. How have they been able to maintain their compassion and forgiveness in the face of great suffering? What might they teach us as we seek to recover from our present communal trauma?
I’m struck by the similarities between Ezra’s restorative gathering in Jerusalem and the occasion of the Dalai Lama’s 80th birthday which he celebrated back in 2016 with his invited guest Desmond Tutu at the Tibetan Children’s Village in Daramasala, a community in exile of 2,000 orphans, destitutes and refugee children from Tibet, who are cared for and educated there. [4]
I’m struck by how the people wept when they heard Ezra reciting the words of the law. Were these tears of sorrow for the lost years spent serving other gods in Babylon? In the same way how the children of the Tibetan Children’s Village wept as they shared their stories with their respected visitors: memories of crossing the Nepalese border when just five years old; the pain of having no contact with family for the past thirteen years; a mother’s floods of tears after saying goodbye.
Each of these children went on to testify joyfully of how their education in the Tibetan Children’s Village has helped them find meaning and comfort beyond their trauma; of how that learning community helped them move from painful loss to a place of joy. Later the Dalai Lama said, ‘Education is universal. We must teach people, especially our youth, the source of happiness and satisfaction. We must teach them that the ultimate source of satisfaction is within themselves.’ [5]
Notice how Ezra and the Levites, his helpers, ‘gave the sense’ to the words of the law, so that the people understood the reading, and the people’s tears turned to joy, from a groundswell of remembrance of those life-giving words which had been lost to them in exile but now were found. Could education be central to our society’s task of rebuilding from our place of loss? If so, let us take note of Ezra’s method of teaching: which depended on countless others, particularly the community’s elders, playing their part in interpreting to the young the restorative values of old.
Nehemiah’s rebuilding work was a collaborative effort, and Ezra’s spiritual renewal of the people of Judah began in a gathering of hundreds. Likewise was the defeat of apartheid the work of black and white South Africans together, and the Tibetan Children’s Village is a further sign that the task of moving from exile to restoration is a burden and a joy which the whole community must share.
Dr Brandon Kohrt, a professor of psychiatry dealing with the mental health aftermath of major disasters, says that ‘With population-wide trauma, … we heal socially. Being together when the awful thing happens and then healing together is really crucial.’ [6]
Finally, let us note how Ezra’s presentation began when he ‘blessed the Lord, the great God, and all the people answered, ‘Amen, Amen’’. The life’s work of the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Tutu is likewise rooted in the worshipful, meditative practices of their respective traditions. The Buddhist rises at 3am to spend hours in prayer whilst the Christian celebrated eucharist daily, whether in an airport lounge or in his tiny chapel at home. Might it be that the best place for us to begin to re-shape our lives out of our present experience of exile is the place of prayer and contemplation?
Journalist Amanda Ripley, who investigates how people react in a crisis, says of the pandemic, that ‘in this type of slow disaster’ we are experiencing, ‘a disaster which keeps going on and on’, ’there’s not enough space for recovery’, so ‘we have to create it’. [7]
I think that’s exactly what we’re doing here today, gathered together: creating space for recovery. Imagine yourself taking what you learn from our prayers and scriptures and spiritual songs, our communion, and sharing your learning with those around you, bit by bit, week by week; and imagine yourself thus witnessing the slow but steady repair of the social fabric of our community.
Notes
[1] Psalm 137.
[2] UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, Figures at a glance. Accessed 18 January 2022; Rebecca Seal, Life after lockdown: how do we best recover from the pandemic? Observer, 16 January 2022.
[3] Wikipedia: 14th_Dalai_Lama.
[4] Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu with Douglas Abrams, The Book of Joy: lasting happiness of a world of change. The birthday visit to the school is described in the chapter Celebration: Dancing in the Streets of Tibet, p.277-290.
[5] Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu with Douglas Abrams, The Book of Joy: lasting happiness of a world of change. p.297
[6] Rebecca Seal, Life after lockdown: how do we best recover from the pandemic? Observer, 16 January 2022.
[7] Rebecca Seal, Life after lockdown: how do we best recover from the pandemic? Observer, 16 January 2022.
