John the Baptist is also called “the Forerunner.” His coming onto the scene was prophesied by the Righteous Isaiah (in 40.3), as a “preparation” of the way of the Lord.
He came as the apotheosis — the highest summation — of all the Old Testament Prophets, all of them from Isaiah to Amos. Even his appearance — wearing camel hair and a leather girdle, eating locusts and wild honey — manifested the truth that the Prophets were messengers (i.e., “angelos,” like angels) heralding the Word of God, preaching from heaven to earth.
And God’s Word was always calling His People — Israel at first, then all of humanity (which is the lesson of Jonah) — to “righteousness.”
“Righteousness” is misunderstood these days. Most Christians reduce righteousness to the avoidance of certain personal sins, like drunkenness, or fornication and adultery, or licentious behavior.
But while the Biblical (and Orthodox) truth of righteousness includes these concerns, it goes far beyond personal behavior.
"The righteous man in Israel," wrote the brilliant Presbyterian Biblical scholar Elizabeth R Achtmeier in 1963, "was the man who preserved the peace and wholeness of the community, because it was he who fulfilled the demands of communal living. Like Job, he was a blessing to his contemporaries, and thus ‘righteousness’ is sometimes correlated with ‘mercy.’ He cared for the poor, the fatherless, the widow, even defending their cause in the law court. He gave liberally, providing also for the wayfarer and guest, counting righteousness better than any wealth. He was a good steward of his land and work animals, and his servants were treated humanely. He lived at peace with his neighbors, wishing them only good. When he was in authority, his people rejoiced, and he exalted the nation ... He was an immovable factor for good ... He lived in peace and prosperity [only] because he upheld the peace and prosperity -- in short, the physical and psychical wholeness -- of his community by fulfilling the demands of the community and covenant relationship. For this reason, ‘righteousness’ sometimes stands parallel with ‘shalom’ (peace) ... And for this reason, too, its meaning can be 'truth,' for right speech upholds the covenant relationships existing within a community.”
Righteousness is a term that sums up the meaning of a restored human nature, and a restored human community, and a restored and perfected Creation. Righteousness is always a reflection of the descending New Jerusalem (a “descent” that was seen in the book of Revelation, and that will be completed on the Last Day).
Righteousness is not to be put off or delayed until the Last Day. Instead, it is to be lived out and actualized in the here and now by the Body of Christ — right now, right here.
Thus, a “whole and entire” righteousness is the Lifestyle of the Body of Christ, the Church, our fellowship. It is first and foremost an overcoming of sin and death. It is provision of material comfort (food, water, clothing, and shelter) to all humanity and Creation, whether or not they are perceived to be deserving.
Christians should never grumble about freeloaders: when people do this, they have no idea how hard work it is to survive hand-to-mouth, and how expensive it is to be poor. When St Paul wrote to the Thessalonians that “If anyone will not work, let him not eat” (2 Thessalonians 3.10), he was referring to those who thought they were so “spiritual” that they demanded that other “less spiritual” people should take care of them. This verse has nothing to do with charity for the poor.
This is why the first community of Christians in Jerusalem “had all things in common; and they sold their possessions and goods and distributed them to all, as any had need” (Acts 2.44-45). This is why the first deacons (like St Stephen) were ordained, so that they could coordinate the provision of sustenance to those in need, like the widows (Acts 6.1-4).
That early, “pre-legal” (i.e., before Constantine’s enfranchisement of Christianity) community was a community of righteousness. It was a community of a Year of Jubilee that would never end (Leviticus 25 and Isaiah 61). It was the overturning of injustice. It was an outpost of the New Jerusalem.
The reason why Ananias and Sapphira came to such a bitter end was that they falsely claimed to have given everything in self-denial for the sake of this righteousness (Acts 5.1-11). Their lie was so profoundly grievous that their souls could no longer tolerate life.
Probably the worst failure of American “heterodox” Christianity is the reduction (and distortion) of righteousness to only a fraction of its meaning. On one hand, many fundamentalists define righteousness as avoidance of certain individual sins. On the other hand, many liberal protestants define righteousness only in radically progressive and materialistic ends (e.g., liberation movements, rejection of tradition and custom). There should never have been a conflict between the “personal salvation” of Billy Graham and the “social gospel” of Walter Rauschenbusch. Righteousness has always included both meanings, and has always been much bigger than both.
But righteousness is not only the provision of material goods: it is more importantly the provision of peace and reconciliation, forgiveness and freedom from passions and from the tyranny of death. It is a heavenly wholeness of humanity (lived out even now), where there is “neither Jew nor Greek, male nor female, slave nor free” (Galatians 3.28).
It is this complete, whole and entire righteousness that is the goal of the Ten Commandments, all the Old Covenant Law, and especially the New Testament Royal Law of Love.
Its completion was humanly impossible ever since the Fall of Man in Eden, but became possible only in the Body of Christ, the Second Adam — He Who succeeded in complete obedience to God’s righteousness where the First Adam failed.
“With men,” Jesus said in Matthew (19.26), “this [i.e., the salvation of righteousness] is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”
This is what salvation means. We are saved not just from hell. We are saved for righteousness forever, and nothing less.
We always repent — that is, “turn and return” — to righteousness. And now repentance in Christ means entering into His righteousness, not just our own, because in Baptism we are adopted as children by God the Father — we actually participate in the Sonship of Jesus Christ.
He is the only One Who can said “My Father.” But because we are adopted as sons, having been brought into His Body at Baptism, we can say “Our Father” — probably the most radically new phrase ever ever expressed by the human tongue.
It is because of this new meaning of repentance as salvation, and the new possibility of completed righteousness, that Jesus said, “Let it be so now; for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness” (Matthew 3.15).
Understandably, John the Baptist, who is a cousin of the Lord (through Elizabeth’s familial relationship with Mary), did not want to baptize Jesus. He recognized that he was not even worthy to untie the thong of His sandals (Mark 1.7; Luke 3.10), as a servant would. Even more profoundly, John cried out, when he saw his Cousin, “Behold, the Lamb of God, Who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1.29).
John the Baptize simply recognized that the baptizer should be greater than the one who was baptized.
But Jesus had already submerged His Divinity as Son of God under the humanity of His reality as the Son of Man. Righteousness always entails kenosis, the pouring out of self. Righteousness always requires submission of one’s personal prerogatives to the needs of the people of God.
Righteousness can only be the taking up of one’s Cross.
Baptism has now become a saving sacrament after the Baptism of the Son of God. His Baptism has now changed water into an actual material participation in Grace.
Baptism is now not just the repentance of “turning away from sin.” It is now the repentance of “turning to and entering into actual, successful, and realized righteousness.”
Jesus in His humanity was descended upon by the Holy Spirit and was completely deified, and was publicly and historically identified by God the Father as “My Beloved Son with Whom I am delighted” (Matthew 3.17).
When we are baptized, we are brought into the Body of Christ, Whose humanity is now completely divinized and Whose humanity is now accepted into Sonship by God the Father.
Thus, we can say with St Paul the Apostle (as we do when we sing in Liturgy, instead of “Holy God,” several times throughout the Church Year), “As many as have been baptized in Christ have put on Christ” (Galatians 3.27).
And that, my beloved, is precisely why Jesus said “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.”
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