crossing the Rubicon

Like a stubborn heifer,
     Israel is stubborn;
can the LORD now feed them
    like a lamb in a broad pasture?

Ephraim is joined to idols;
   leave him alone.
When their drink is gone, they give themselves to whoring;
   their rulers dearly love shame.

A wind has wrapped them in its wings.   Hosea 4:16-19

Warm-up: read Mark 3:20-35

The Rubicon.

The Rubicon is a shallow river in northeastern Italy that marked the boundary between the province of Cisalpine Gaul to the north and Italy proper to the south. In order to protect the republic from internal military threat, Roman law forbade any Roman general to cross the Rubicon southward with his army. In fact, any Roman soldier south of the Rubicon by law automatically became a civilian with no obligation to obey any military orders. To cross the river without disbanding your army was considered an act of high treason and even sacrilege — and was an offense punishable by death.

The Roman historian Suetonius tells the tale of Julius Caesar and his decisive move in his quest for power in
49 BC crossing the Rubicon on January 10th, breaking that law, and making armed conflict with his rivals inevitable. Caesar’s swift and bold move forced his key rival, Pompey, the lawful consul, along with a large part of the Roman senate, to flee Rome in fear.

According to Suetonius, Caesar was undecided as he approached the river, but after a supernatural apparition, he plunged across, uttering the phrase alea iacta est— “the die is cast.” Ever since, whenever any individual or group commits itself irrevocably to a risky or revolutionary cause, we say they have “crossed the Rubicon.” They have passed the point of no return.

The Pharisees in their growing opposition to Jesus clearly seem to have crossed their own Rubicon. It started off with questions. “Who is this that would forgive sins?” But the questions were unexpressed whispers in their own minds. Then came the verbal challenges to those around Jesus. “Why does he eat with tax-collectors and sinners like that?” Next came the direct challenge to Jesus himself. “Why do your disciples feast and not fast like the rest of us?” “Why do your disciples do what is not lawful on the Sabbath?” Finally came the plotting and scheming that led them to go out the door and plot secretly how to destroy Jesus.

This distance in Mark is covered in only a few paragraphs, but it reflects a momentous internal crossing in which they spill out of the river on the other side, dripping with snide insinuation of satanic possession.

We aren’t talking about something done or said carelessly or some technical violation of divine protocols. Blaspheming the Spirit is not something bad you say about or to God in anger or frustration or even under the influence. It is simply Rubicon water pouring out from our hearts revealing eyes that no longer see and ears that no longer hear. The mind is set. The die is cast.

It’s difficult to know looking at others — or even at ourselves — when this line has been crossed. I would have surmised that a certain Saul of Tarsus had crossed that line and would have written him off as “sinning unto death.” But Jesus knows. Such a chilling pronouncement is perhaps best left in his mouth.

For us it remains that we are all in the process of becoming something. We all have questions and stirrings and leanings that are propelling us forward. They may be questions shared and openly discussed and prayed, or held with increasingly closed hands and minds and hearts.

All of us in this life ultimately cross the river.

The question is which way.