Not-knowing and noticing

Keeping company with my koan. Part 2 of 4

Keeping company with my koan, one of the first things I decided to do was to re-read the gospels. I knew the answer wasn’t there, but I like doing research. Maybe I’ve tried to solve other problems that way: using a tool I liked even if it wasn’t the right tool. I hadn’t noticed that before.

Jesus prayed. How?

I started reading Matthew. Early on it says that after leaving Nazareth, Jesus took up residence in Capernaum. As in made a home.¹ (Mtt.4:13)

Wait. What? I thought the Son of Man had no place to rest his head. (Mtt 8:20, Lk 9:58.)

Reading around a little more I saw that Capernaum was Jesus’ home for quite a while. He taught in the synagogue there and healed a lot of people. It was a busy city, on one of Israel’s main trade routes, so there was commerce. Tax collectors lived there, like Matthew. People in the fishing industry lived there. Peter lived there with his mother-in-law and presumably with his wife. Andrew, James and John lived there. And of course there were Roman soldiers, like the centurion whose servant got sick. Jesus had chosen to live in a pretty big, busy city.

I remember the first time I made a home in a place I had chosen. It felt like a big deal. I hadn’t noticed that perhaps Jesus had done that too. Maybe because I usually read the gospels in little, lectionary bits. Or maybe because when I do read the gospels from beginning to end, I mostly see what I already know: a demon cast out, someone restored to health, a grateful leper, a parable, a Marcan sandwich, a Johannine sign. I see and congratulate myself for what I already know, not really reading or listening anymore.

This time I read from beginning to end with the question of my koan and the gift of not-knowing the answer. It helped me read closely, and reading closely I kept being surprised.

Jesus wasn’t homeless. He had made a home for himself. That’s not earthshaking, but I hadn’t noticed it before.

Keeping company with my koan has helped me see myself, new things in scripture, and in ways that I find hard to describe, it has helped me to see past myself.

That’s a gift.

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Reflections on the Sunday readings start again on Friday, October 17 for Pr 24C.

1. katoikeo (Strong’s Greek #2730) - “settle down as a permanent resident, i.e. in a fixed (permanent) dwelling place as one’s personal residence.”