The Shepherd and the
Sacrifice
11 May 2003
Because my mind is undisciplined, when I was listening to today's Gospel
reading, "I am the Good Shepherd" I thought of numerous satires on
the notion of shepherds protecting their sheep, some of which, after all, they
themselves are going to kill and eat. This touches on a theme of which I hope
to explore several aspects: the relation of man and animals, indeed nature in
general. Among the topics to explore are the incompatibility of materialism and
enviornmentalism and the realization that vegetarianism is a heresy. Stay tuned
for more of these. Revenons à nos moutons.
The satires
turn on the assumption that a wolf killing a sheep for dinner and a man killing
a sheep for dinner are qualitatively, one might say morally, equivalent. This
assumption in turn relies on the premise that a man, a wolf, and a sheep are
the same sort of creature. For the skeptic, that they are not may remain to be
proven, but let us hypothesize that man is a different sort of being from
wolves and sheep. That does not by itself create a difference between the
consumption of the sheep by one or the other, or demonstrate that a good
shepherd is doing anything positive for his sheep by preserving them from being
eaten by wolves in order to be eaten by men. In Ezekiel 34, the prophet
excoriates the bad shepherds of
So why is it
better for a sheep to be killed and eaten by a man than by a wolf; not better
only from the man's point of view, but inherently better? I believe that the
distinction is related in part to the notion of sacrifice. It is central to the
understanding of the Biblical notion of the killing of animals that any animal
killed for food was thought of in some sense as a sacrifice. From the time that
Noah was given permission to eat the flesh of animals, the obligation was laid
on the Israelites not to eat "flesh with its life, that is, its
blood" (Gen 9:4). The reason for this is elaborated further in the Law
when it is explained that the blood (as symbolic of the life) of the animal
belongs to God and should be offered to Him. In Leviticus 17, all slaughtering
is presumed to be sacrifice except for that done in hunting, where there is
still a residual ritual of pouring out the blood and covering it with dust; the
Deuteronomy 12, the Law recognizes that the Israelites may be eating the flesh
of domestic animals in a situation where it is impossible to make a ritual
presentation of the blood; and these situations are considered analogous to the
hunt. Animals killed by wild beasts, on the other hand, are not sacrificed in
any way. Their carrion was not acceptable as food, and therefore unclean. So
the difference between the good shepherd and the bad shepherd is that the bad
shepherd's sheep die meaninglessly and become unclean; the good shepherd's
sheep have their lives offered to God. Their death is a service to God--another
term used for sacrifice is "serving God"--and therefore has a
spiritual dimension.
This is the background of Jesus' words in John 10 that we heard at Mass this morning. We know that the Good Shepherd is feeding and caring for us, not so that we will go on feeding in this pasture of the world forever, but so that our life can in the end, be offered to God. Like sheep we offer to him the wool of our good works for Him, and in the end, death is but the route to the true altar of God in Heaven. He endured death rather than allow us to perish meaninglessly; he offered Himself as a sacrifice so that we too might share His sacrifice and "if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his" (Rom 6:5). Thus Paul can say to Timothy as he sees his own death approaching, "I am already on the point of being sacrificed" (2 Tim 4:6). The wolf comes to kill and devour; the Good Shepherd not only feeds us and protects us, but is preparing us for sacrifice.