Rented Clothes
2 Kings 5:1-14; Mark 1:40-45

February 16, 2003

All Biblical stories do not have a dramatic confrontation, but we’ve got one here in Second Kings. Na’aman, the Syrian general by profession and victim of leprosy by mistaken identity, has traveled to Israel to seek a cure for his tragic condition. The tragedy is greater in such a powerful person being afflicted by a poor man’s disease than from any physical pain and discomfort.

Na’aman arrives at the Israelite court with a tremendous show of bluster - a huge entourage, a lot of conspicuous gifts and money, and a formal letter addressed to Israel’s king from the king of Aram. It wasn’t lost on anyone that Na’aman had been the victorius general in Aram’s defeat and subjugation of Israel (a defeat granted to the Aramaeans by God!), certainly it was not lost on the anonymous and terribly intimidated Israelite king.

The king reads the letter, asking him to personally see to it that Na’aman is cured of his leprosy, and he is besides himself, outraged by this impossible bullying. In that culture when you reach your limits and something blasphemous is said, there is only one action that can fully express your angst, and that is to rend your garment, tear your coat in half.

An expensive gesture, to be sure, and a gesture rarely indulged. I think Linus in Peanuts did it once as well. When you rend your garment, everybody hears about it, and Elisha got wind of it and sent word to the king asking why. The king was not being particularly pious when he declared that he was not God: he felt he was being provoked into more war that he was bound to lose. An uncannily modern phenomenon! Hitler was famous for this tactic with Sudetenland, Austria, and Poland.

Elisha reminds him that there still is a God in Israel, and that God’s prophet is in Israel. Send him to me: I’ve got a theological lesson for him.

Na’aman was used to giving orders, terrible orders, so when told to present himself to Elisha, he knew how to obey. His entourage of tanks and gunship helicopters rolled up before the mere house of Elisha and he expected a show and a trial by fire. He expected, assumed, that he above all other men would be treated with respect and dignity, that Elisha would summon the divine powers with all the mind, soul, heart and strength he could muster. The stakes would be high, and for Na’aman he was prepared for the ordeal to be tough and demanding, but he was tough and could take anything to become clean again.

Elisha played the game back as hard as he could - he just sat in his house and didn’t come out. After a good bit of waiting, he sent a messenger out telling Na’aman all he needed to know and do. Go wash yourself in the Jordan seven times and that’ll do it.

Probably a bad choice of metaphor, but Na’aman was fit to be tied. His pride was a stumbling block: aren’t the rivers in my country better, and cleaner? The little twerp would not even come out to see me; who does he think he is?

Na’aman is a mighty man of valour, yet it is his servants who tell him the right thing to do. A young Hebrew girl captured in Aram’s successful campaign against Israel evidently becomes fond of the big guy and tells him about the prophet Elisha who has the right stuff to heal him.

Now it is his handlers who calm the general down, talking reason with him. “Father,” they call him, “if the prophet had told you to do something very difficult you would have done it. Hey, he’s made it simple for you, wash and be clean. Just do it.” Na’aman did just do it, seven baths in the Jordan, and was cleansed.

The theological lesson was learned. Na’aman returned to Elisha and declared there is no God in all the earth except in Israel. I assume God is in Aram as well, but few people know it.

A leper approached Jesus, getting down on his knees to plead, “If you choose, you can make me clean.” The leper knew that he was not able to do or be anything to make himself healthy. It was all in the hands and free choice of God, God’s grace, in other words. That moved Jesus to pity, and he did choose.

This leper is the counter-image of Na’aman: it would be easy to say “poor leper” and he probably was, in contrast to the necessarily wealthy and powerful general. The nameless leper knew God was in control from the beginning, while it took Na’aman some time to figure it out. Na’aman went home to worship the God of the universe and spread the news, though very carefully and cautiously in a religiously hostile environment. The poor leper was forbidden to speak, but he could not hold his tongue so that Jesus could not tolerate sticking around, for so many people overwhelmed him.

Na’aman is a lot more like us than different. He is a hard working, disciplined, competent person who has achieved much, and knows that he has achieved a lot. He is acquainted well with power, both brute force and the power of handling other people. But he is completely unaware that he owes his victories to the God of the universe about whom he has no knowledge. His pride, as is the case with all pride, is misplaced.

He has a serious weakness that could lead to his physical incapacity, and before that to lose his social position of power. Generals don’t have leprosy. Rich preppies don’t have acne.

Na’aman cannot ignore his problem and he takes his advice from the lowest in his company, but those he recognizes are completely honest and compassionate. Still, his pride of position and power almost veto his healing. His healing ought to be a remarkable event, in techicolour, not in a farm dugout.

Humility is forced upon him and it works, and Na’aman is genuinely thankful. His life has been changed, and his way of viewing the world has been altered for good as well.

We will not hear of Na’aman again, naturally, because he is of the enemy. Sure, he became humble and confessed the God of the Universe and the God of Israel, but I wouldn’t count on his humility sticking - but then I am being skeptical.

And then there is the poor leper who long ago knew he could do nothing to change his condition, except at the hands of God, so he let go of any pretensions to power. You can heal me if you choose, not when I choose.

“Can Ethiopians change their skin or leopards their spots? Then also you can do good who are accustomed to do evil” (Jeremiah 13:23).

Temporarily or really humble, may we do good.

Preached by Robert Kitchen
Knox-Metropolitan United Church
Regina, Saskatchewan