Blog:Salvation is for the "childlike"? Matthew 11:25

The Trial of St. Joan of Arc: the childlike versus "the wise and the learned"

From the Book of Matthew, Chapter 11:25:

At that time Jesus said in reply, “I give praise to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to the childlike."

While teaching at a Catholic high school, a colleague tried to convert me. Of a protestant background, but not even baptized, I was one of those enlightened moderns who felt good about God and Jesus but not so much as to be troubled by belief, and certainly not at the expense of "reason." My colleague's argument was that I was over-intellectualizing faith: instead, I should approach God “like a child,” you know, "childlike."

Since my baptism about three years ago, whenever I have encountered this passage from Matthew 11, I am reminded of that conversation and how I have been unable to square it with my experience with Scripture and my own faith.

Until today.

Today, a marvelous, truly wise, truly learned -- and truly childlike -- priest unlocked what has been for years a troubling mystery for me.

'Childlike' definition

The dictionary calls "childlike" (adj)

1. having qualities associated with a child
2. resembling a child, especially marked by innocence, trust and ingeniousness

That last one ingeniousness is interesting (imaginative), but not helpful here. Better are the examples of its use given, paraphrased here as such as,

• she replied so innocently, with a childlike expression
• he opened the gifts with childlike glee
• the play presented a childlike vision of a peaceful world
• the witnesses' expression remained childlike, demonstrating no deception

And we may wish to distinguish between "childlike" and "childish," with the latter expressing the lesser qualities of a child, while the former is attached to notions of innocence and purity. Nevertheless, none of these definitions or uses imply thought, reason and logic; so we are stuck with "like a child" or "childlike" as unthinking and credulous.

The "Two Wings": Faith and Reason

My conversion was and still is an intellectual journey. I was catechized by thoughtful priests, deacons, and catechists who patiently explained even the silliest of questions such as, "Why do you say "Ah-men" instead of "Aay-men"? Or, "How come you Catholics don't capitalize God's personal pronoun, He/Him?" My other catechist was the Sunday Missal and its readings, responses and prayers, which led me – rather adult-like -- into the Liturgy.

I came through RCIA and into the Church intellectually, so I felt that faith without reason, i.e. "childlike", is not a complete faith.

It was during RCIA that I started this website, as I wanted to track and process all that we were learning. My very first entry was a futile attempt to interpret and summarize the Catechism. (I learned quickly that with the Catechism no paraphrasing is needed.) Far more useful was my Glossary of Terms, with which I process definitions, word origins, and concepts, and which now holds several hundred entries that have helped me to sort through my faith and Church.

Most helpful of all was to learn at RCIA of St. Pope John Paul II’s “two wings” of faith and reason, the idea that our belief and overall faith is strengthened when bolstered by both faith (belief) and reason (intellect). The concept was earlier and fully expressed by St. Thomas Aquinas, who had explored proofs of God in observation and logic. Aquinas understood, however, that reason alone can neither fully comprehend nor find God, and so we need faith, which the Holy Spirit empowers us into -- both spiritually and intellectually. Aquinas distinguished between the Gifts of the Holy spirit that empower reason and those that empower faith.

Saints Aquinas and John Paul inspired my quest to unite faith with reason -- only not in a faith "like a child," but with my intellect as an adult.

So convinced, Matthew 11:25 has remained a mystery to me.

"the wise and the learned"

for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned

Of course in the passage, "the wise and learned" are the priests and scribes of Israel who refused to believe Jesus is the Christ (see footnote to Mt. 11:25). In his prayer to the Father, Jesus contrasts them with the "childlike" who do accept him as the Son of God.

Yet, it wasn't so easy for those believing "children," either. In a rational calculation of the strength of the wind, Peter faltered in belief and, but for Jesus, nearly drowned (Mt 14:30); many if not most of the disciples walked away out of reasonable hygienic caution when Jesus offered them "his flesh to eat" (Jn 6:52); Philip rationally calculated that it would take upward a year's salary to buy enough bread to feed all those people (Jn 6:7). On and on until that first, fullest declaration of Jesus as God, by Thomas, who, very adult-like, just wanted a little more proof (Jn 20:28).

Clearly Jesus did not mean that the "wise and the learned" cannot know the Father. Indeed, he wants us to "listen" and "learn":

Everyone who listens to my Father and learns from him comes to me. (Jn 6:45)

Instead, he said that the Father had "hidden these things" from them, while leaving it to the Son to reveal him to them:

Yes, Father, such has been your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him." Mt 11:26-27)

We're left wondering not only what "childlike" means, but also why would God hide "these things" from certain people?

A wise and learned, and very confused man

Without straying into the theological implications of finding, or "un-covering," what God "hides," a look at John 3 and the secret meeting with Nicodemus, we can see how God wants us to "uncover" (un-hide) himself through both reason and belief. Jesus tells Nicodemus, quite literally,

“Amen, amen, I say to you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.”

Nicodemus replies rather "reason"-ably:

"How can a person once grown old be born again? Surely he cannot reenter his mother’s womb and be born again, can he?”

Jesus goes on to explain -- using reason -- that,

"What is born of flesh is flesh and what is born of spirit is spirit."

and

"If I tell you about earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you about heavenly things?"

Impeccable logic -- and entirely nonsensical to the reasoned mind of Nicodemus (or us without hindsight).

Jesus continues his literal explanation,

"The wind blows where it wills, and you can hear the sound it makes, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes; so it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit."

thus bringing us to the logical conclusion that reason cannot know him, only faith:

Whoever believes in him will not be condemned, but whoever does not believe has already been condemned, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God."

Here at night, in a dark room, and in a secret meeting, Jesus next lays it all down upon poor Nicodemus, the incomprehensible meaning of it all,

"But whoever lives the truth comes to the light, so that his works may be clearly seen as done in God." (Jn 3:21)

Going back to Matthew 11, in his prayer to the Father, Jesus says,

"no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him." (Mt 11:26-27

Why Nicodemus? Wasn't he among the "wise and the learned"? John tells us later that Nicodemus does come to believe, and fully:

Nicodemus, the one who had first come to him at night, also came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes weighing about one hundred pounds. (Jn 19:39)</ref>

So "the wise and the learned" can discover God. They just have use both wings of faith and reason, and wrap their minds around belief: that is, not to let the limits of reason impede the mysterious.

The Tree of Knowledge

What did Satan tempt Adam and Eve with? It wasn't sex, although that followed, as the fruit tasted "good" and was most "pleasing." Literally, it was to "be like gods" -- to know what God knows, to "know good and evil" (Gen Ch 3)

If the penalty of eating of the "tree of knowledge" is death, how do we reconcile knowledge with salvation and truth?

I suppose we could take the easy route and say that only God knows "good and evil," so if we pretend to know it, we fall short of God, which is death.

Or, more elaborately, we might say that knowledge of good and evil is salvation itself, for if we have free will, then to know absolute good is to know its opposite, evil. And we have to choose.

Adam and Even propose many troubles for us here, but therein lies a much deeper consideration than I am capable of here. In short, we inherit Adam and Eve's curiosity -- and the curse that accompanies it.

Jesus, of course, guides us.

From the "mouths of babes"

On Palm Sunday, as the "children outside the Temple sang, "Hosanna to the Son of David," the pharisees, "the wise and the learned," were "indignant," writes Matthew (Mt 21:15).

Jesus says to them,

“Do you hear what they are saying? Yes; and have you never read the text, ‘Out of the mouths of infants and nurslings you have brought forth praise’?” (Mt 21:16)

Jesus, as he so often did with "the wise and the learned," sent them back to their own Scripture (aka, go read it again, smarty), in this case to Psalm 8:2-3:

O LORD, our Lord, how awesome is your name through all the earth!

I will sing of your majesty above the heavens with the mouths of babes and infants.

Even the "babes and infants" cry out the Lord's majesty! Of course they do -- they look upon the world in wonder and, to use one of my favorite terms from Scripture, "amazement."

"Babes and infants" have little capacity for reason. They do depend, entirely, upon their mother and father, as should children. So we have another clue in this aspect.

They are also entirely innocent. I see from the experts that in Matthew 11, the Greek taken in English as “to the childlike” can also be seen as “to the innocent,” which fits the context just as well as a contrast to “the wise and the learned.”

However, my dog is entirely innocent, too. Every time he shows me his simple, pure love, love that is unreasoned and unconditional, I stumble over my intellect’s obstructions to pure faith. Why can't I be like that to my -- the Father? But I am not this wonderful creature's father; he is not my child. He is a dog and can't reason through to it, so his adoration for me, if an example for how I should adore the Father, is incomplete.

And that’s the point. We must have both reason and faith, as free will requires it, (And the Father demands of us a free will.) An intellect that is humble is childlike. An intellect that yearns to find God is childlike. An intellect that submits to the Father is both childlike and innocent. An intellect that accepts belief is like the child who adores and obeys his -- the Father.

Child of the Father

All this confusion until now.

Now, "childlike” our priest explains, is to have a father -- the Father. Childlike is to respect, recognize, obey, love, and need the Father.

Of course!

A "childlike" faith, then, is humble, honest, and yearning for the Father.

When Satan tempted Adam and Eve to "be like God," it was not just the Tree of Knowledge they shook, they rearranged the family tree: they would no longer be God's children. Satan, himself not of the image of God, and thus not a child of the Father, jealously, spitefully, tried to disconnect us from our Father. But God won't have it. While handing out merited punishment (the "curse"), he bestowed upon Adam and Eve the glory of father- and motherhood (the "blessing"). And then he set us off on our long course back home, prodigal sons and daughters of the Father.

Salvation, then, is the return to childhood of the Father. God doesn't owe us our abandoned inheritance, but he wants us to ask for it back. As our Deacon taught the other day, St. Thomas called it "congruent merit" that we are due but do not deserve salvation, for which we become worthy only through and by Christ. In Matthew 11, Jesus isn't telling us to be simpletons, he's telling us, rather plainly, now that I can see it -- like scales falling from the eyes -- that we must accept and act like we have a -- the Father.

Jesus thus refers to children repeatedly, such as from Mk 10:15:

"Amen, I say to you, whoever does not accept the kingdom of God like a child will not enter it."

and, similarly, from Mt 18:3:

"Amen, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven."

That last from Matthew, however, he clarifies in the next two verses:

Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever receives one child such as this in my name receives me."

Yes, indeed, or "verily," as Jesus would say: humility is the key to "childlike" -- but humble in front of what, or whom?

To Heaven, and to God -- humble like children before their father whom they adore, trust, and fear.

Flying on both wings

When the Apostles falter or are inadequate in their faith, their incomplete reason steps in and misdirects their faith. The bird cannot fly upon one wing. Nor can it fly without the air to lift.

When Jesus asks the disciples, first, who the people say he is, then, who do the disciples say,

Simon Peter said in reply, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

Jesus said to him in reply,

“Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father." (Mt 15:15-17)

The Holy Spirit filled Peter's wings, and in the next verse, Matthew 15:18, Jesus calls him kēpā’, and announces,

"and upon this rock I will build my church."

We know from Matthew 11 and elsewhere (Jn 6:65) God chooses whom to reveal himself. But that doesn't mean the choice is predetermined. Jesus chose Peter for his gifts of personality, heart, reason, and action. Peter is rash yet obedient, prideful yet believing, and smart, yet open-minded. He has, we might say, the right wings with which to be lifted by the Holy Spirit. Above all, he always comes back to the Lord; he never gives up on the Lord.

As with the Grace he provides, God chooses those who are prepared to receive him. When we get lost in reason, as did "the wise and the learned" pharisees, we hide God from ourselves: he doesn't need to hide it.

St. Paul provides a thought on this:

So I declare and testify in the Lord that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. (Eph 4:17)

Ouch!

In Romans Chapter 1, Paul explains people get lost in "their minds." Although God's existence was "evident" to the gentiles, he explains, they "suppress the truth by their wickedness." (Rom 1:18-19)

Reason enslaved to sin is a bird with a single wing.

Confirmation bias

If we encounter a mystery without amazement, we have seen nothing. In the various Wikipedia entries on the Saints, our collected "wise and learned" authors fall back upon supposedly objective denials such as "some type of premonition", "which are believed to have occurred in", and "witnesses who believed they had seen a miracle." Worse, in the face of plain, first-hand historical witness, which somehow suffice as clear evidence for secular histories, the supposedly miraculous explanation is "not accepted by all authorities."

I think the purposes of the interested parties that govern certain Wikipedia pages is clear. Yet, we fool ourselves to think that we ourselves would never have been skeptical like the pharisees, or, had we been there ourselves, that we'd be entirely free of doubt. Most doubtful.

You may have seen the "dancing bear" or "invisible gorilla" videos, short films of groups of people running in circles passing around a basketball. When told to count how many times the ball has been passed around, viewers fail to see amidst the shuffle either a moon-walking bear or a gorilla going right through the group. Called "selective attention," it's really a form of confirmation bias, whereby we see what we expect to see, we believe only what we already believe.

Confirmation bias is not always harmful, In fact, it can lead to great insight, such as that of Columbus who saw only an earth that was 8,000 miles around, despite plentiful contrary evidence available to him. Had he opened his mind to, say, Eratosthenes, who in 240 BC measured the earth's circumference to near perfect accuracy, he never would have sailed west from Spain. Great insight not infrequently follows a biased vision.

On the other hand, confirmation bias is the stuff of Satan. It keeps us apart. It leads to conflict. It shields us from truth. The pharisees were too busy looking out for unblemished sheep that they entirely missed God. Blinded by confirmation bias, that is. They are not alone.

As "poor banished children of Eve" with limited reason, our three-fold concupiscence drives our biases: what our flesh desires, what we jealously see around us, and what we think we are over others. When any of those tendencies toward sin feel threatened, they lash us, bind us, take us where ought not to go, knowingly or not.

Sadly, we usually know better. So we get around the "cognitive dissonance" of doing wrong while knowing right through rationalization. Either rationalized or through ignorance, we engage the worst form of confirmation bias when it completely binds us to an entrenched point of view that shields a truth. Note that I am using the word "bind" where "blind" would fit. If you think about it, "blind" can mean not being fooled by one's own eyes -- or flawed perceptions, which is why blind people develop and exercise perceptions that go unseen by others. With or without sight, we see what we want to see, and all the learning and wisdom in the world becomes but a servant to our biases.

Here we see how God doesn't have to hide anything from us. Like Adam and Eve scurrying about, feeling naked "among the trees of the garden" (Gen 3:8), we ourselves bury God under our guilt, pride and sins. On the upside, here we can see that God chooses us when we make ourselves available to him.

Believing in God like the child Saint

The Archangel Michael first appeared to Saint Joan of Arc when she was thirteen -- no longer a child, but young, indeed. And at sixteen, when she announced her mission, she was certainly young enough to be dismissed by nearly all as a mere, delusional, and most annoying child. When the Maiden, Jeanne la Pucelle, as she called herself, came to head the French Army she was but seventeen -- legally, in our day, a child.

My edition of the Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc, begins with a fascinating observation from the great Hungarian revolutionary, Louis Kosuth,

Consider this unique and imposing distinction. Since the writing of human history began, Joan of Arc is the only person, of either sex, who has ever held supreme command of the military forces of a nation at the age of seventeen.

As did Jesus, Joan confounded "the wise and the learned" -- anyone, that is, who felt in any way threatened by her, which included, of course, "the wise and the learned": the royal retinue, clergy and military leadership. Joan was calm, reasoned, logical and dogged, outwitting the witted, twisting their logic back upon themselves, and dodging their traps.

Sound familiar?

The most famous of Joan's replies came from the theological trap asked at her heresy trial. From an English translation of the transcript,

On Saturday, February 24th, asked if she knows if she is in God’s grace, she answered: “If I am not, may God put me there, and if I am, may God so keep me."

Brilliant -- and hardly childlike.

Her inquisitors also pursued a line of inquiry designed to trap her into admitting that she had gravely sinned, which would negate the divinity of her visions. Her answer is both clever and logically sound:

Asked whether she need confess, since she believed by the revelation of her voices that she will be saved, she answers that she does not know of having committed mortal sin, but if she were in mortal sin, she thinks St. Catherine and St. Margaret would at once abandon her.

Other retorts of equal mental acumen are reported by Mark Twain in his wonderful, if flawed, biography. One is from an exchange with the French Minister of State, La Tremouille, who argued against Joan's insistence that the initial victory at Orleans be followed up lest the English regroup. La Tremouille, angry that she was essentially ordering him around in front of the Court, accused her of discussing matters of state in public, a grave offense:

Joan said, placidly — "I have to beg your pardon. My trespass came of ignorance. I did not know that matters connected with your department of the government were matters of state."

The minister lifted his brows in amused surprise, and said, with a touch of sarcasm — "I am the King's chief minister, and yet you had the impression that matters connected with my department are not matters of state ? Pray how is that?"

Joan replied, indifferently — "Because there is no state."

"No state!"

"No, sir, there is no state, and no use for a minister. France is shrunk to a couple of acres of ground; a sheriff's constable could take care of it; its affairs are not matters of state. The term is too large."

Another comes earlier, during the initial investigation ordered by the Dauphin (Joan refused to call him King of France until he had been crowned at Rheims, which completed her mission). A "sly Dominican," Twain writes, tested the logic that she needed an army to do God's will:

Then answer me this. If He has willed to deliver France, and is able to do whatsoever He wills, where is the need for men-at-arms?" .... But Joan was not disturbed. There was no note of disquiet in her voice when she answered: "He helps who help themselves. The sons of France will fight the battles, but He will give the victory!"

The Bishop, in Twain's account, muttered in response,

"By God, the child has said true. He willed that Goliath should be slain, and He sent a child like this to do it!"

The Bishop was amazed not at her childlike argument, but that the argument came from a child.

One of my favorite characters in the story of La Pucelle is the general La Hire, which meant "the wrath of God," and not in a good way. He was crude, fearless, a military genius -- and godless. He was appalled when Joan ordered him to expel from the camps the prostitutes, and, worse, mandate Mass twice a day for the soldiers. Worst of all was when she required of him a prayer. He was disposed to blasphemy. He was an accomplished commander, but himself wound up in the failed French politics of the Hundred Years War. And, beyond reason, he saw something in little Joan, which allowed her to put him to use, and magnificently. La Hire is the perfect example for us of reaching past the limits of reason and simply trusting what God has put before us, and letting God take over from there.

Saint Joan of Arc boggles the mind, pushes us past reason, that is. But unlike the stories of some other Saints, and beyond the historical evidence, we can actually see her doing all that she did. On the surface, Saint Joan makes it easy for us to combine reason and faith. But as real and clear as the "what" of the story is, rationally the "how" is simply implausible. Reason must yield.

So let us just be amazed while learning what we can from the Maid of Orleans.

Ears to hear, eyes to see

When Jesus reveals himself to the "childlike" he isn't dumbing-down his divinity. He demands thought and reason in his followers, and then helps them to build a logic of faith (after all, he chose St. Paul to teach it!). When the disciples don't understand the Parable of the Weeds (Mt 13:36), Jesus explains it, and after continuing with analogies for the Kingdom of Heaven (Mt 13:44-50), like a teacher, he asks them,

“Do you understand* all these things?”

And the good students reply, "“Yes.” (Mt. 13:51) But, verily, verily, as the Lord might say, reason has its limits, and it is by the Grace of the Father that Jesus reveals himself to those willing to look beyond the limits of their comprehension and simply believe, which the NAB calls, "The Privilege of Discipleship,"

“But blessed are your eyes, because they see, and your ears, because they hear. Amen, I say to you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it. (Mt 13:16-17)

In the next verses, in the "Parable of the Sower," he illustrates what we are when we hide what we see and hear behind our biases:

The seed sown on the path is the one who hears the word of the kingdom without understanding it, and the evil one comes and steals away what was sown in his heart. (Mt 18-19)

as opposed to -- and he uses the word here, when we do "understand":

But the seed sown on rich soil is the one who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit and yields a hundred or sixty or thirtyfold.” (Mt 13:23)

Getting closer now: full, intellectual understanding requires an open mind, you know, like a child's. We even have an expression for it, one I hear all the time from students who come to understand a concept or lesson: "I get it now!".

To "get" it means both to receive and to accept it with an open mind.

What "childlike" is and is not

So let us here flush out some meaning about what it is to be "childlike," so that we can more fully understand and more fully believe.

The common use of the words,

The wise and the learned	The childlike
worldly	simplistic
educated	unschooled
crafty	obedient

Those characterizations do not work in the context of having a -- the Father. One simply doesn't approach one's father in ignorance, nor even without questioning -- every father and mother knows too well the words, "Why? Why? Why!"

For sure, to be childlike we must be dependent, obedient, submissive-- that's the point -- to the Father. For without the Father, we live under the illusions of being:

Without a -- the Father

What we think we are	What we actually are
self-sufficient	self-centered
worldly	mortal
great	idolatrous
independent	orphaned
free thinker	closed-minded

As we have seen, "wise", "learned" and "childlike" are not incompatible qualities -- the two wings needed to fly. But Jesus doesn't care about that - whoever we are, whatever our intellect or station, he wants us to be holy children who believe, accept and obey the Father.

Let's review:

The wise and the learned	The childlike
distrustful	trusting
insincere	honest
self-justified	pure
deceitful	candid
dismissive	respectful
doubtful	open-minded
tricky, deceptive	cunning without guile
compromised	innocent
closed-minded	curious
complicated	straight-forward
selfish	meek
cynical	amazed
self-sufficient	dependent
self-sure	humble

The Lord wants us to reason -- but with faith and not blind in faith. And he warns us against letting our intellect betray our faith, lest we come to see ourselves governed only by ourselves.

Upon reflection, it fits perfectly with the Beatitudes, which require truly childlike belief to fulfill. Likewise, it fits perfectly with the Virtues (see CCC Pt 3, Sect 1, Art 7).

The Son

Let's step back and review Matthew 11:25-27 in full, verses the NABRE labels, "Praise of the Father":

At that time Jesus said in reply, “I give praise to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to the childlike.

Yes, Father, such has been your gracious will.

All things have been handed over to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him."

What's all this "Father" and "Son" business? It's all over the Gospel, but here it is particularly intense. I won't stand by the claim, but it seems to be the most dense collection of both "Father" and "Son" in the Gospel verses.

Hmm. God is telling us something here, something about our true nature, and inviting us to retrieve it. Here must be the adoption that Paul talks about,

For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you received a spirit of adoption, through which we cry, “Abba, Father!” (Rom 5:15)

We all too easily utter this word, "Father." We use it all the time, but when so earnestly as St. Paul?

No wonder the "Desert Mother," she, tuned to the Spirit of God, both wings aloft, could not, as the story goes, get past the first line of the Our Father prayer, instead sobbing for three days in wonder at the notion that God is "Our Father."

Jesus is praying for us to think upon the Father as if we are his children, to live as if we have a God who is our Father. It's extraordinary to think about!

A god who is not a father	Our Father
detached	all-present
uncaring	all-loving
arbitrary	all-concerned
egoistic	all-knowing
arbitrary	just
not a creator	creator

With all the reason we can muster, Jesus wants us to approach the Father with pure hearts and minds, like children to the most beautiful and most perfect Father. It's a conversation we carry on whenever we recite the prayer that Jesus taught us simpletons to say in recognition that we have a -- the Father:

Our Father, who art in heaven,

hallowed be thy name; thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

Amen.

Aug 1, 2024 by Michael

St. Joseph, pray for us!

Here to go back to Blog roll

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