Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted[a] by the devil. After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. The tempter came to him and said, “If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.” Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’[b]” Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. “If you are the Son of God,” he said, “throw yourself down. For it is written:
“‘He will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands,
so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’[c]”
Jesus answered him, “It is also written: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’[d]” Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. “All this I will give you,” he said, “if you will bow down and worship me.” Jesus said to him, “Away from me, Satan! For it is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.’[e]” Then the devil left him, and angels came and attended him.
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Matthew 6:9-13
"Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our
debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil."
Luke 11:2-4
"Father,hallowed be your name.Your kingdom come.
Give us each day our daily bread, and forgive us our sins,
for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us.
And lead us not into temptation."
Worldwide English Version
Our Father in heaven, may your name be kept holy. May your kingdom come. May your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us our food for today. Forgive us for the wrong things we have done, the way we forgive those who have done wrong things to us. Do not test us but help us, so that no one will make us do wrong. Deliver us from the evil one. The kingdom and power and praise belong to you for ever. Amen!
Ecumenical Version
Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name,
Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread. Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.
Save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil.
For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours now and for ever. Amen
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Jesus is beginning to come to terms with who he actually is. In both Matthew and Luke, he has just been baptised by John, and has had a deep spiritual experience at the moment he emerges from the water. He is starting to get a glimmer of this calling to ministry. So he goes off by himself to spend some time in discernment. What is different about this story is that it really is clearly all about Jesus, and about this particular event in his life.
The text tells us he went into the wilderness for forty days and forty nights. In the Palestine of Jesus, the wilderness was a harsh and unforgiving place, not a place for resting, relaxing, and having a comfortable discernment of a calling into ministry. If you look at photos of that area, it is mountainous rocky desert with barely a living thing in it - at least to the human eye. The text tells us he was “led by the Spirit into the wilderness” and there he was “tested”.
We are told Jesus was there forty days and forty nights. Any Jewish person hearing this would immediately draw a parallel with Noah being forty days and nights on the ark before landing on Mount Ararat, or Moses fasting on Mount Sinai for forty days and nights before he came face to face with God. Forty days and nights is not a literal interpretation, but symbolic of a long time. And people who enter into serious fasting often report that they begin to have visions, to see the world differently.
Jesus fasted, so by the end of forty days and nights with little other than some water, he then encounters himself in a very particular way. Bear in mind that he has been alone in the wilderness for a long with nothing to eat, and little to drink other than water. He’s going to be worn, tired, stinky, filthy, and disoriented. Yet it’s also significant that each time he is given a test, he responds with quotes mostly from Deuteronomy - from Moses.
John Dominic Crossan is one of the foremost Jesus scholars of today, Professor Emeritus at DePaul University and one of the co-founders of the Jesus Seminar in California. In the book “The Greatest Prayer: Rediscovering the Revolutionary Message of the Lord’s Prayer”, he gives some history of the context in which Jesus was living at the time. We have to step back, then, look at the wider context, and then narrow it down to Jesus in the midst of that context. There were continuous revolts against th Roman occupation. The first revolt was the year of Jesus’ birth, under Augustus in 4 BCE. The second was in 66 CE, near the end of Nero’s devastating reign.
Jesus lived in the tiny hamlet of Nazareth, about four or five miles from the big city of Sepphoris. In the destruction of Sepphoris, any of the small villages adjacent would have been raided of grain, produce and livestock; farms, houses and even trees destroyed. Those who were unable to hide would have been raped, if female; killed if male; and taken as slaves if young.
So Jesus is born sometime after this first violent incursion, and lives in a lull where non-violent resistance to the Romans is the action of choice. Crossan says it is critical that we ask the questions - even if there are no answers - where did the young Jesus make the choice between God and empire, rebellion and resistance, violence and non-violence? He ties it to the experience Jesus had in the wilderness, and then links it to the prayer.
Crossan gives us this translation of this part of the prayer:
“Do not bring us to the time of trial, but rescue us from the evil one.”
There are two points here as I go further: Matthew says Jesus was “led by the Spirit into the wilderness” and there he was “tested”. Crossan uses the translation “do not bring us to the time of trial”. He says that this prayer is deeply embedded in the concrete historical situation of Israel’s confrontation with the Roman Empire.
The Greek word for “temptation” is ‘peirasmos’, which can also be translated as ‘tested’. And I need to say I think that the “evil one”, the tempter, whatever we call it, was that part of Jesus himself which might have given in to reaching for that great physical and temporal power to control and rule. The struggle - the test - was within himself. He’s just heard a voice saying “this is my Son”, and then in the wilderness hears “IF you are the Son of God” you can do this....
So it is God who leads Jesus into the wilderness, and God who tests him. He is offered the power to turn stones into bread. Put this in context - his people would have been impoverished when they were overrun by Rome. Daily life, even for a bit of bread, would have been a struggle. Imagine being able to feed himself immediately, but then provide everyone with enough. Then he sees himself standing on the highest point in the city of Jerusalem - the most holy place for Jews - the pinnacle of the temple; and then the most powerful in all the earth. In each of these, he refutes the “evil one” by choosing honesty and commitment to God over personal advancement.
So I repeat that I don’t believe that “the evil one”, “the tempter”, or “satan” was a transcendent spiritual individual. Matthew has personified temptation for a reason. The word “devil” is a combination of two Greek words which mean “the one who misleads, deceives.” Well, who can mislead us or deceive us better than we ourselves. We are really good at rationalisation of our own motives and actions, aren’t we? And we note in Matthew’s text that the three temptations “progress from personal and individual, through corporate and communal to structural and systemic temptation.” which would have involved violence against someone to achieve those ends. Jesus, in this temptation, clearly chooses God and life, over immediate gratification and a giving in to that part of himself which *is* tested.
The timeline in the Scripture is also extremely important. In Matthew 4, following this experience, Jesus hears that John the Baptist is in prison; he picks up where John left off, and begins preaching repentance. By chapter 5 Jesus has begun the Sermon on the Mount, and as we get into chapter 6, he responds to the disciples question about how to pray. Matthew draws a direct line from the testing of Jesus to the Hebrew prayer.
What is there in this for us? I suggest that there is a very real lesson here. The “test”, the “temptation” is not necessarily something from the outside, a supernatural being leading us off down the garden path. It is the struggle with ourselves, in our daily life. Lent, in the church, has always been considered a time of reflection, personal introspection, We pray for many reasons, but in this case, I believe that this part of the prayer is asking for the wisdom and strength to resist those parts of our nature which find it easier to follow the ways of the world, to buy into the notion that we have to have many things, to buy more, to have more power and control. Jesus knew what he was talking about from real experience. When he gave this prayer to his disciples, he gave them something they all knew by heart - they could recite it without thinking. He gives it to them in the context of *thinking* about what they are saying, and living those words.
The Worldwide English version translates it this way:
Do not test us but help us, so that no one will make us do wrong. Deliver us from the evil one.
Sources:
1. (New International Version, ©2011) with footnotes.
a)Matthew 4:1 The Greek for tempted can also mean tested.
b) Matthew 4:4 Deut. 8:3
c) Matthew 4:6 Psalm 91:11,12
d) Matthew 4:7 Deut. 6:16
e) Matthew 4:10 Deut. 6:13
2. John Dominic Crossan “The Greatest Prayer”. HarperCollins, New York, 2010.
3. Essay by Robert Bryant, in “Feasting on the Word”. Westminster John Knox Press, Louisville, 2010.
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