Trust the Viper, or Kill It? An Advent Question

The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den. (Isaiah 11.8)

But when John saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming for his baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? (Matthew 3.7)

Can we trust the viper? Or strike out and destroy it? If we seek justice on earth, should we hope for a gradual transformation, or must expect confrontation and destruction as the necessary price to pay?

The gentle, Spirit-infused prophecy of Isaiah 11 shows us a new ruler — arising from the root of Jesse, after a time of destruction – who is able to bring justice to the earth, He is endowed with the many gifts of the Spirit that have come upon him — wisdom and understanding, counsel and strength, knowledge and awe, wonder before the Lord — and so depends not on the sword, but on a word, gentle or stern, that defends the poor and smites the wicked. But the result goes beyond all ordinary expectations, as nature itself is transformed:

The wolf shall live with the lamb; the leopard shall lie down with the kid;
the calf and the lion will feed together, and a little child shall lead them.
The cow and the bear shall graze; their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den. (11.6-8)

Fierce animals — the wolf and the lion, the bear and the asp — which by their natures live off the flesh and blood of vulnerable creatures, undergo a radical transformation, their natures transformation as if by the same Spirit infusing the chosen one. The asp and the adder will not harm the child that innocently wanders to play near their holes. What then cannot change, if a person filled with Spirit leads the community and share the Spirit with all?

John the Baptist, even if likewise driven by the Spirit (though Matthew 3 at least does not say this), becomes a sign for contradiction. The quintessential outsider, he comes from nowhere, dressed in animal skins, living just on what he can find in the desert, a diet of locusts and wild honey. Remarkably, he does attract large crowds, people coming from everywhere for a baptism that marks repentance, purification from sins. All this sounds good, even if unusual.

And yet, when even the leaders of the people — some Pharisees and some Sadducees — come to hear him, he does not welcome them politiely, but denounces them:

When he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming for his baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Therefore, bear fruit worthy of repentance, and do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our ancestor,’ for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; therefore every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. (3.7-10)

We may assume that John is seeking to break through their smug righteousness, calling them too not merely to watch, but to repent, and be baptized. Destruction is threatened – cutting down such trees, the tossing of waste into the fire. Or perhaps wrath is the message: John’s vipers may need to cut down and burnt in the fire.

All of this needs further nuance of course, and even John knows that he is simply a first act, who will need to give way before the Messiah who is to come after him. It would be hasty to imagine a stark contrast only, the gentle root of Jesse, who changes people and removes all violence from them, versus an angry John, who threatens divine fire.

But still, before rushing to the conclusion that Jesus is the synthesis of all that Isaiah and John tell us, we can take this pairing of readings, as we have it, as a prompt to ask ourselves what we think is necessary, if the world is to be rectified, the vulnerable protected, violence eradicated, nature and human nature healed. Caress the viper, or kill it?

If we live by the Spirit and the spiritual gifts, and if we garb our ways of being, acting, living, in compassion and justice and peace, will that be enough to make the world — and the Church — into the righteous kingdom Isaiah envisions? Or must there be John the Baptist figures, who also get very angry, offering no peaceful hand to the wicked inside or outside the Church, promising no peace until the world has been made right?

We want Isaiah to be right, but suppose Matthew’s John is correct, in his uncompromising anger?

Something to think about in Advent, in our troubled world.