THE
LABOR REPORT
© Rev. Dr. Gary Blaine
University Congregational Church
September 2, 2007
Reading: Genesis 3: 17- 21 (NRSV)
And to the man he said, “Because you have
listened to the voice of your wife, and have eaten of the tree about which I
commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you;
in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it
shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread
until you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and
to dust you shall return.”
The man named his wife Eve, because she
was the mother of all living. And the
Lord God made garments of skins for the man and for his wife, and clothed them.
One of the
oldest stories that I remember my mother reading to me was Aesop’s “The Ant and
the Grasshopper.” Perhaps you remember
it too.
Recall that in a field one summer’s day a Grasshopper was
hopping about, chirping and singing to his heart’s content. An Ant passed by, bearing along with great
toil an ear of corn he was taking to the nest.
“Why not come and chat with me,” said
the Grasshopper, “instead of toiling and moiling in that way?”
“I am helping to lay up food for the
winter,” said the Ant, “and recommend you do the same.”
“Why bother about winter?” said the
Grasshopper; “we have got plenty of food at present.” But the Ant went on its way and continued to
toil. When the winter came the
Grasshopper had no food and found itself dying of hunger, while it saw the ants
distributing every day corn and grain from the stores they had collected in the
summer. Then the Grasshopper knew, “It
is best to prepare for the days of necessity.”[1]
It was a lesson in hard work and saving
for the future. Throughout my life I
have known hard work. I started mowing
lawns, weeding, and edging sidewalks at the age of 10. I worked in restaurants as a teenager, youth
camps, hospitals, social service agencies, and churches. In fifty years of work, I have learned the
distinction between labor and toil. And
just so there is no misunderstanding, I have often enjoyed the labor of
fieldwork
and I have known the toil of church work.
Indeed, I do not know how to identify myself
without my work. In the 1980’s people
would say that they did not want to know what I did but who I was. And they would often look at me with frowning
sympathy when I told them I could not take such distinctions very far. For all of human history work has been essential
not only to the identity of human beings but to our survival, purpose, and
fulfillment as well. To separate work
from being is a naïve and hopelessly incomplete understanding of our humanity. In the words of Marcus Aurelius, “In the
morning, when you are sluggish about getting up, let this thought be present:
‘I am rising to human work.’”
Work has
always been a major theme of the human condition. This has been the case since the beginning of
the human story. Nowhere in the ancient
text is it ever assumed that human beings would not labor. From the beginning human beings were created
to tend the garden of life, to foster its health and production. Indeed the purpose of such human work is
sacred work, unique among all the creatures of the earth. Other creatures live in the garden of
life. Only humans are charged with its
stewardship.
But human
labor is fraught with contradictions and even pain. There is a sense of estrangement about work –
a certain alienation that creeps into even the best of professions. Nearly every social issue that we confront
today has a relationship with work and workers.
Immigration, health insurance, living wages, environmental degradation,
education, fair trade and the global economy are just a few that I can think of. These are issues for us because they are
issues about how families can sustain themselves. They are issues because there is a question
about our relationships with each other and the earth. They are issues because there is anxiety
about the distribution of wealth and what is fair for all. There is a concern that something is
distorted in human work and commerce.
This hard
reality of life’s work and its alienation is reflected in the poem of R. S.
Thomas, “The Hill Farmer Speaks.”
I am the farmer, stripped of
love
And thought and grace by the
land’s hardness;
But what I am saying over the
fields’
Desolate acres, rough with
dew,
Is, Listen, listen, I am a
man like you.
The wind goes over the hill
pastures
Year after year, and the ewes
starve,
Milkless, for want of new
grass.
And I starve, too, for
something the spring
Can never foster in veins run
dry.
The pig is a friend, the
cattle’s breath
Mingles with mine in the
still lanes;
I wear it willingly like a
cloak
To shelter me from your
curious gaze.
The hens go in and out at the
door
From sun to shadow, as stray
thoughts pass
Over the floor of my wide
skull.
The dirt is under my cracked
nails;
The tale of my life is
smirched with dung;
The phlegm rattles. But what I am saying
Over the grasses rough with
dew
Is, Listen, listen, I am a
man like you.[2]
Most of us are removed from the work of farm
and ranch. We do not come home with dirt
under our cracked nails or dung on our boots.
But I submit to you that we are not as far removed from the hill farmer
as we might imagine. How much of our
work, how much of our lives are threatened by wasted time or energy? How much that we try to accomplish comes to
naught? How often do our plans, however
well conceived and designed, become so distorted that we no longer recognize
them? In fact, there are times when the
results have absolutely no bearing at all on our expended efforts.[3] As Robert Burns wrote, “To a Mouse,” “The
best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men/ Gang aft a-gley.” Or, as is most commonly written, the best
laid plans of mice and men often go awry.
I think of the
Maginot Line built by the French on the German border in the 1930’s. The Line was the inspiration of Andre
Maginot, a French civil servant gravely wounded in World War I. As a politician he insisted that France build
a strong defensive fortification along the German border. The Maginot Line, as it was called, was state
of the art. It was a long line that had,
at several intervals, round fortifications.
The concrete was thicker than had ever been constructed in a fort before
1930. Heavy guns were installed. The forts were connected by underground
railroads. The forts included recreation
areas, living quarters, and abundant storehouses. French soldiers considered service on the
Maginot Line a plush assignment given the accommodations.
Well designed,
well built, and well fortified. But on
May 10, 1940 the Germans invaded Belgium and marched right around the northern
end of the Maginot Line. They entered
France on May 12. Despite the best-laid
plans, the Maginot Line proved useless in the face of simple military logic.
In the ancient
Jewish mind, this discord – this dissonance – in the work and world of human
kind is indicative of a greater estrangement.
A portion of the story from the book of Genesis that was read to you
today speaks of human disobedience and the consequences of that
disobedience. It is often referred to as
the curse of Adam and Eve. Some think of
it as punishment. I do not think of this
story as history, I think it rather points to this existential dilemma of
dissonant work. The metaphor of paradise
is one of balance and harmony between human beings and the earth, between two
human beings, and between God and God’s people.
And what this story tells us is that such a vision – such a dream – such
a memory – has been destroyed. The
idyllic life is forever shattered. There
is not now, nor has there ever been a world like “Ozzie and Harriet,” “Leave it
to Beaver,” “Father Knows Best,” or “Green Acres.” And I don’t mind saying, thank God.
We can discern
distortion even in the life of the church when we lose the balance of
inspiration and intellect; piety and social justice; pastoral care with
personal entanglements, charity with co-dependence; and the church’s mission
with a personal agenda that is expressed in the grab for power and control.
But it is very important to
understand that even though paradise is
lost human beings are not cursed.
Any other god in the ancient world worthy of adulation would have struck
Adam and Eve dead on the spot. Genesis
relates that despite our disobedience, despite our spite, we are allowed to
live. I do not know how it is in some
other world, but in this world, in this life, we live in the tension of curse
and promise, despair and hope, creativity and suffering.[4]
Nowhere does Genesis suggested that
Adam and Eve are damned. It does not say
a word about original sin, or the passing of that sin onto succeeding
generations. It speaks of hard work and
sorrow, desire and suffering.
We are not cursed. Indeed the story moves on to an image of
Yahweh sewing clothes for Adam and Eve.
Yes, things are disrupted and disturbed.
But Genesis affirms humanity as God bends over the old Singer sewing
machine to clothe the primal couple in dignity.
God covers them and protects them, even though they are estranged and
disjointed. One can only conclude that
Yahweh has made peace with the new reality of the human and sacred
relationship. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer
wrote:
“That means that God accepts them for what they are,
as fallen creatures. God affirms them in
their fallenness. God does not expose
them to one another in the nakedness; instead God covers them. God’s action accompanies humankind on its
way.”[5]
If only human beings, especially those who claim the
Abrahamic tradition as their own, could accept the human condition on its own
terms. If only we could abide our
humanity in all of its vulnerability and nakedness with as much grace and dignity
as did Yahweh in this ancient story.
Sadly, too many people in the name of God distort this story to damn
their fellows and curse humanity. Their
tongues are every bit as deceitful and untrustworthy as the lying serpent in
the garden.
Genesis tells
a different story. The fact that Yahweh
makes clothes for Adam and Eve suggests a sacred protection will go with them
into the future. At the very least, they
will not be hidden from the watchful eye of the Creator. God sees us for who we are and seeks to save
human dignity when we are the most exposed, vulnerable, naked, and
ashamed. The Christian gospel, and any
other religion worthy of our attention, carries that theme to its ultimate
conclusion.
While the
circumstances have become more difficult, life now stands in bold relief against
the backdrop of disease, death, work, old age and suffering. Life has definition in the contrast of
conflict and adversity. With the new
reality of suffering and the awareness of death, life takes on a flavor the
protected couple never knew.
Even Adam
takes initiative at the conclusion of this story. You may recall that Adam had not exactly
demonstrated leadership through the course of these events. After Yahweh confronted him about eating the
fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, Adam sounds like an
irresponsible child. “It was the
woman,” he protested. “The woman, whom you gave to me. She gave me the fruit from the tree.” If it was not going to be God’s fault it was
going to be the woman’s. Like Pandora,
the woman in the garden would be blamed and abused for many of the troubles
that beset the human race.
But again, Genesis does not conclude
the garden story on that note. Adam does a very remarkable thing. He names the woman Eve, the Mother of All
Living. Eve is the mother of life. I submit to you that Adam’s act is nothing
less than a movement of faith. In the
midst of problems and penalties and even death life is not forfeit. Life goes on in the midst of degeneration and
disease. We must all recognize the
vulnerability that is our lot, and on some level, part of our
self-definition. But we must also
recognize the future possibility that every person possesses. Eve is the sign that life throbs and pulsates
in the midst of sweat and tears, blood and aching muscles, Alzheimer’s and
cancer, alcoholism and unemployment.
When a tornado levels a town like Greensburg, Kansas Eve arrives to
erect portable buildings so that children can go back to school; school
supplies arrive everyday from across the country, unsolicited. Eve arrives to plant new trees; Eve arrives
to comfort the bereaved. Eve arrives in
the uniforms of the Kansas City Chiefs to re-equip the Greensburg high school
football team. That little town will
never be the same. But life is not
forfeit and Adam had the good sense to recognize the mother of all life is as
eternal as the grace of God. He saw in
her the characteristics that the Creator would ordain for the future.
I imagine Adam and Eve many years
into their old age, long after the death of Able and the disgrace of Cain. I imagine the years of crop failure as well
as years of abundant harvest. I imagine
years of calloused hands and sunburned necks.
I can see Adam and Eve fall into bed after a day in the fields. The aroma of Ben Gay saturates the air. I can hear Adam saying to Eve just before
they fall asleep, “Eve, you know it is all good. It is very, very good.” And as their eyes close there is a
discernable sigh of relief in the heavens.
Finis
[1] This version of Aesop’s tale is found in The Harvard Classics, edited by Charles W. Eliot (Danbury: Grolier Enterprises, 1980), pp. 25-26.
[2] R.S. Thomas, “The Hill Farmer Speaks,” R. S. Thomas: Poems (London: The Orion Publishing Group, 2002), 24.
[3] This follows the thought of Gerhard Van Rad’s chapter, “The Biblical Primeval History,” Genesis (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1972), pp. 93-97,
[4] See Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Creation and Fall, (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1997). p. 132.
[5] Ibid. p. 139.