First Reading Commentary
The breath of life blown into the nostrils is
the soul of the formed man. Eden may
have been the name of a country but Saint Jerome interprets it to signify pleasure. “The Lord God planted a garden in Eden, in
the east.” This verse in the Latin is
translated as: “The Lord God had planted a paradise of pleasure from the
beginning.” Saint Jerome’s
interpretation of Eden to signify “pleasure” comes into play here; but notice
the difference at the end of that verse: “in the east” from the American liturgy’s
translation and “from the beginning” which is the Latin Vulgate’s
translation. The ancient Hebrew word
creating these two very different interpretations is “mikedem”. Some interpreters
understood it to mean “towards the east”.
The Septuagint is in agreement with that interpretation. Saint Jerome, however, along with many
ancient interpreters understood it to mean “old” or “everlasting” or “from
ancient times” which led to the “from the beginning” interpretation.
The exact location of Eden is unknown: East
of Palestine, Armenia and Babylon are only a few of the scholarly
conjectures. Some have even theorized
that Eden still exists and is the place where Enoch and Elijah were taken until
Christ’s glorious Ascension into heaven.
According to Sacred Scripture, Enoch walked with God and was seen no
more because God took him (cf. Genesis
5:24). And Elijah was taken to
heaven in a fiery chariot (cf. 2 Kings
2:11).
The “tree of life” is understood literally as
a tree in which its fruits would keep man in a constant state of good health
and thus man would never die.
Prophetically, it is the Cross of Christ. The “tree of the knowledge of good and evil”
in which the serpent lured our first parents into thinking it supplied superior
knowledge, has been defined as a fig tree or an apple tree. Of course, it’s impossible to know for
certain but whatever it was, it most likely was the only one of its kind in the
Garden of Eden. What the tree of
knowledge did supply was knowledge of evil, which before eating of its
forbidden fruits our first parents were uninformed.
It would be difficult to say that the woman
succumbed to temptation in the same sense that we define temptation. We know that what waits on the other side of
temptation is not good for us, spiritually unhealthy and in some cases
downright evil. But the woman could not
have known this at this point because she had no knowledge of evil and could
not have suspected that the serpent was up to no good.
One thing we learn from the very first book
of the bible is that Satan is more acquainted with the ways and word of God
than we are and thus is able to pervert it and twist it to fit his own
diabolical plan.
Saint Bernard, using this story from Genesis,
asks us to reflect on this question: “Placed between God and the devil, whom
shall we yield our assent?” The plan of
the serpent is not to say that God lied about the tree of knowledge because to
the woman that would be unthinkable. It
would also be evil to have such thoughts and she has no knowledge of evil. Instead, the ploy of the serpent is to
suggest to the woman that she misunderstood what God was saying to her. We hear Satan’s twisting of the word of God today
by suggesting to us that we’re misinterpreting Scripture by our understanding
of the Real Presence, for example.
As soon as the man and the woman ate the
fruit their eyes were opened and they realized that they were naked. Being naked is not evil but what is
interpreted from this is that suddenly the two became filled with the intense
craving known as lust.
English poet and scholar John Milton
(1608-1674), in his epic poem titled, “Paradise Lost” describes humanity’s fall
from grace with these words: “She gave him of that fair enticing fruit, with
liberal hand he scrupled not to eat: Against his better knowledge; not
deceived, but fondly overcome with female charm. Earth trembled from her entrails, as again in
pangs, and nature gave a second groan; sky lured and muttering thunder, some
sad drops wept at completing of the mortal sin.”
Second Reading Commentary
Our physical connection with Adam brings us
sin and death; our spiritual bond with Christ brings us salvation and eternal
life. Adam’s fall is the cause of our
sin and death; Christ’s redemption is the cause of our salvation and eternal
life. While our destiny of sin and death
because of one man’s fall might seem unfair, it would then be equally unfair to
say that we deserve salvation and eternal life because of one Man’s
Sacrifice. Perhaps it’s best understood
to say that Adam’s fall was like a contagious disease which spread to all
humanity; and Christ’s Sacrifice was the antidote. This whole scenario does make the body of
Christ theology more easily understood as we can see from the very beginning
that we’re all connected.
To make the case for original sin, Saint Paul
uses history from the time of Adam to Moses whereby everyone born into the world
died; but until the Law of Moses individual sin was never accounted for. Therefore, all eventually die because all
were conceived and born in sin. Adam is
the beginning; Christ is a new beginning.
Adam brought an end to paradise; Christ restored it.
Saint John Chrysostom
reminds us that we have been exalted to the dignity of being the brothers and
sisters of Christ, the Son of God, and are made joint heirs with Him; and so by
the grace of Christ we have a greater dignity in this world, and we shall be
exalted to a greater and more eminent degree of glory in the Kingdom of His
glory for all eternity.
Gospel Commentary
The Spirit Who made an appearance at Christ’s
Baptism now leads Him into the desert to be tempted by the devil. The desert is the devil’s playground and
Christ is led there to confront him on his own turf.
Desert hermits know very well from experience
that there are many temptations to overcome in the silence and solitude of the
desert; but they also know that with God’s help they can overcome those
temptations and become closer and more intimate with the Almighty. Our desert is anywhere we choose to sit in
solitude to be with God. There are many
temptations there to overcome as well.
Silence and solitude invites distractions but they can be overcome once
it is understood that solitude does not mean being alone - but instead, being
alone with God, the Victor over all unnecessary distractions.
Our Lord’s first temptation deals with His
forty day fast which our Lenten fast is modeled after. Here our Lord is fulfilling an Old Testament
prefigurement when Moses went up Mount Sinai for forty days and forty nights
and neither ate bread nor drank water
(cf. Exodus 34:28). It is Elijah’s
experience that may actually prompt the devil’s temptation because Elijah ate
and drank while walking in the strength of that food for forty days and forty
nights to Mount Horeb (cf. 1 Kings 19:8). We might be able to conclude that the devil
heard the Voice at Christ’s Baptism proclaiming Jesus as God’s Son (cf. Matthew 3:17) because the devil
immediately addresses Christ by saying: ‘If you are the Son of God…’ God’s Incarnation at this point might very
well be as much of a mystery to the devil as it is to us; and thus he seeks to
tempt our Lord into displaying His Divine Power.
Later on in His ministry Jesus will multiply
loaves of bread for the multitudes (cf.
Matthew 14:19-21) but here refuses to perform such a miracle for His own
need. The devil tries to persuade Jesus
to turn stones into bread. This is
another indication that the evil one was hanging around during Christ’s Baptism
because just before His plunge into the Jordan, John the Baptist was
proclaiming to the Pharisees and Sadducees that God is able to raise up
children to Abraham from the stones (cf.
Matthew 3:9).
Jesus passes the test of His first temptation
by quoting from Deuteronomy 8 [verse 3].
The First Reading’s Commentary mentions that Satan is well-acquainted
with Scripture. And since Jesus used the
sacred texts to escape the first temptation, the devil’s next strategic move,
then, is to throw another temptation at Jesus by quoting Scripture. The evil one tries to get Jesus to throw
Himself down from the parapet of the temple because Psalm (90) 91 [verses
11-12] states that God’s angels will support Him. Jesus fights back with more Scripture from
Deuteronomy 6 [verse 16]: “You shall not tempt the Lord your God.”
The devil’s final temptation is an attempt to
entice Jesus into worshipping him by offering all the kingdoms of the
world. Satan’s deceitfulness really
comes to the forefront here since the world’s kingdoms are not his to
give. He is sometimes referred to as the
“prince of this world” but that refers only to the evil that exists in the
world. Jesus finally says: “Get away,
Satan! It is written: ‘The Lord, your
God, shall you worship and Him alone shall you serve”’ (Deuteronomy 6:13).
Theologically, because Jesus is God He is
incapable of sin and is without original sin.
And so, He cannot be tempted from within by concupiscence, a consequence
of original sin. Even though He could
not be tempted on the same level as our lower nature, He could be tempted by
exterior suggestion, meaning that Satan’s temptations can be introduced to
Christ’s senses, imagination and His ability to reason or discern. His reasoning and judgment, however, cannot
be in error because He is God. The
reason our Lord even allows Satan to approach Him is to teach us that even the
most pious of souls are prone to temptation and consequently instructs us how
to firmly deal with temptation. He also
brings Himself as close to our human experience as His sinless Nature would
allow and thus is able to sympathize with us.
