Sermon for January 21st, 2024
Contents
Proverbs 1:1-7 (OT p.584)
1 The proverbs of Solomon son of David, king of Israel: 2 For learning about wisdom and instruction, for understanding words of insight, 3 for gaining instruction in wise dealing, righteousness, justice, and equity; 4 to teach shrewdness to the simple, knowledge and prudence to the young— 5 let the wise, too, hear and gain in learning and the discerning acquire skill, 6 to understand a proverb and a figure, the words of the wise and their riddles. 7 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.
Genesis 3:1-7 (OT p.2)
1 Now the serpent was more crafty than any other wild animal that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God say, ‘You shall not eat from any tree in the garden’?” 2 The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, 3 but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the garden, nor shall you touch it, or you shall die.’ ” 4 But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not die, 5 for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” 6 So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food and that it was a delight to the eyes and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate. 7 Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked, and they sewed fig leaves together and made loincloths for themselves.
Revelation 21:1-4 (NT p.259)
1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. 2 And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them and be their God; 4 he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.”
Faith & Film XII: The Boy and the Heron
Three Minute Film Summary
Mahito Maki is an eleven-year-old boy living in Japan near the end of World War II. When he loses his mother in a tragic hospital fire, Mahito's father re-marries (his wife's younger sister) and relocates Mahito and his step-mother to a country estate outside of Tokyo. Mahito is an outcast at his new school, and returning home after his first day, he bludgeons himself in the head with a rock so he won't have to go back. During his recovery, Mahito encounters a white heron that speaks to him and tells him his mother is still alive, and beckons him to enter a dark and foreboding tower that was supposedly built long ago by Mahito's great uncle. Not long after, Mahito's step-mother (also his aunt) disappears into the forest near the tower, and Mahito takes this as his opportunity to go after her, and see if the white heron was telling the truth about his own mother.
Once inside the tower, Mahito realizes that the white heron has lied to him (and is actually a troll-like man inside the body of a white heron). The two begin to fight, when the "Lord of the Tower" looks down from the top floor and commands the heron to be Mahito's guide. Mahito then sinks through the floor into a completely different world, where he encounters strange and wonderful creatures, makes friends and allies, and slowly begins to work his way up through the different levels of the tower--each time learning something valuable about life, himself, and what it means to be virtuous.
Along the way, Mahito encounters a younger version of his mother (meaning the heron was not completely lying), who helps him to find his step-mother and escape from a violent army of parakeets led by a parakeet king. Eventually, at the highest level of the tower Mahito meets his great uncle, the Lord of the Tower. He learns that the tower is a gateway to hundreds of worlds, created by his uncle and held together by thirteen blocks precariously stacked on top of each other. Mahito's uncle wants Mahito to become his heir, in the hopes that he can use the blocks to build a better world, a world "without malice."
But Mahito recognizes the malice within himself, and that like his great uncle he is incapable of creating a perfect world. Instead, he chooses to return with his step-mother to their world, with all its challenges, pain, loss, love, and beauty. When the war is over, Mahito returns with his family to Tokyo.
A Divine Comedy
One of the keys to understanding this film comes right as Mahito (accompanied by an old maid) is about to enter into the tower at the beckoning of the white heron.
[Film Clip - Fecemi La Divina Potestate]
Printed in bold letters above the tower entrance are the words "FECEMI LA DIVINA POTESTATE." That's Italian for "Divine power created me" and it's actually a fragment of a longer poem written by the 14th century Italian poet Dante Allegheri in his "Divine Comedy" which goes like this:
Through me the way into the grieving city; Through me the way into eternal sorrow; Through me the way among the lost people. Justice moved my high Creator; Divine power created me, Highest Wisdom and the primal Love. Before me were no things created Except eternal ones, and I endure eternal. Abandon all hope, ye who enter.
Of course these are the words posted on the gates of hell--and several times in the film, the underworld that Mahito falls into is referred to by other characters as a "hellscape," replete with black roaming spirits, monstrous four-eyed fish, graveyards, pelicans with insatiable appetites and not enough to eat...basically things straight out of the first three layers of hell. Dante's guide through Inferno is the poet Virgil--and in our case, it's the white heron. Both are considered somewhat unreliable guides.
In the second phase of Dante's Divine Comedy, he has ascended up through hell, and has a new guide to lead him through purgatory and into heaven--it's the love of his life, Beatrice. In Mahito's case, it is the younger version of his mother, Himi (at this point the great love, and great loss of his life). In the final phase of the Divine comedy, in heaven, Dante's guide is the mystic theologian Bernard of Clairvaux. When Mahito reaches the top of his tower, his guide is his mystic and wizard-like uncle.
In the Divine Comedy, Dante has not died--so he cannot remain in heaven, but instead he comes to a deep and abiding understanding of God's love, and carries this with him back into his earthly life. So too, Mahito does not remain in the tower, but returns to his family with a greater sense of love and purpose.
How Do You Live, Proverbially?
This film is actually a lot more than just a remake of the Divine Comedy, and there are many different lenses through which it can be interpreted--including autobiographically. The writer and director, Hayao Miyazaki is 83 years old, and has said in interviews that the film is a message about his life and work to his young grandson, inspired by his favorite childhood book--a classic Japanese children's book on wisdom called "How Do You Live?" In the film, Mahito finds a copy of this book inscribed to him from his late mother:
[Film Clip: How Do You Live?]
There is a long tradition of parents passing down wisdom to their children and grandchildren in written form. This is exactly the premise for the Book of Proverbs in the Bible, traditionally attributed to King Solomon and written for his son. Proverbs alternates between images and metaphors that are strikingly beautiful and eerily dark to teach the difference between the path of righteousness and the path of malice.
