More than 200 newspapers carry the advice column of Judith Martin, better known as Miss Manners. I was curious to see if Miss Manners could help Jesus with some dinner etiquette, so I did aa quick Google search. In August of this year, someone asked Miss Manners for advice:

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I find myself stunned at most people’s table manners. For example: breaking bread/rolls and buttering each bite, using a thumb to push food onto a fork, using a place spoon for soup, cutting up an entire entree salad at once, serving coffee after dessert, leaving napkins on the table at end of a meal, passing salt and pepper together, etc.

I never say anything, but just wonder if the etiquette rules I was taught, and followed in a very upper-level hospitality position, have been canceled.

GENTLE READER: It is never a good idea to monitor other people’s table manners, and not only because you are apt to spill something all over yourself while you do so.

Miss Manners notices that you are already agitated, because you have mixed up what should and what should not be done, and thrown in some general rules.

Just to clarify:

Bread and rolls should be broken into small pieces and buttered individually; thumbs should not be used as pushers; the so-called place spoon is a medium-sized oval spoon that can be used (as the teaspoon should not be) for soup or dessert; napkins should be put to the left of the plate at the end of the meal, and salt and pepper should be passed together.

That people violate these and other basic rules does not mean that they have been canceled. So no, the Etiquette Council did not say, “Oh, go ahead, plough in with your hands, who cares?”

But it did resolve to refrain from watching.

So Miss Manners advises not to watch what other people do at a dinner – but there are rules for dinner etiquette.

By Miss Manners’ standards, Jesus showed very poor manners when he was invited to a dinner (Luke 14:7-24). When the parable of the banquet (verses 16-24) is heard without its context of Jesus being a guest at a dinner, it can lead to some very misleading interpretations. Let’s see the context of the parable in Luke 14.

When he noticed how the guests chose the places of honour, he told them a parable. (Not actually a parable, but advice!) “When you are invited by someone to a wedding banquet, do not sit down at the place of honour, in case someone more distinguished than you has been invited by your host; and the host who invited both of you may come and say to you, ‘Give this person your place,’ and then in disgrace you would start to take the lowest place. But when you are invited, go and sit down at the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher’; then you will be honoured in the presence of all who sit at the table with you. For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

(And he offered advice to the host!)

He said also to the one who had invited him, “When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbours, in case they may invite you in return, and you would be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”

(And only then does he tell the parable of the banquet!)

When the parable is read without its context it has often been turned into an allegory, where the invited guests represent the Jews and the lame and the poor represent the Gentiles who are brought in by God to replace Israel. That’s the danger of reading the parable without its context – and the context is an actual dinner to which Jesus has been invited!

When the context is taken into consideration, the parable becomes an expression of the great reversal that Jesus brought into human consciousness and human relations. This was a theme very dear to Luke when he wrote his Gospel. It starts in chapter 1, with Mary’s Magnificat (to call it by its Latin designation).

Part of it reads as follows:

He has shown strength with his arm,

he has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts,

he has put down the mighty from their thrones,

and exalted those of low degree;

he has filled the hungry with good things,

and the rich he has sent empty away.

We sing this every Sunday morning in the Orthodox Church as part of Matins (Orthros). But have you ever noticed those words? Or do they perhaps make you blush with embarrassment? As in: Really Lord? When did all this happen? When did you bring down the mighty and send them away hungry? The reality of the world seems to be the exact opposite of what Mary magnified the Lord about!

Was Mary naive when she spoke these words, when she sang them in her heart? Was Jesus naive when he said the meek shall inherit the earth? Is the NT out of touch with reality after all? No, Jesus knew what he was saying. Mary was well aware of the ways of the world when she sang that the Lord has brought down the rich and powerful and left them empty and hungry. She knew that’s not the way of the world. The rich are not brought down or sent away hungry; they are only getting richer and more powerful, often with the help of politicians.  But Mary knew what new values the child that would be born of her would bring into the world.

And that child grew to be a man. And that man spoke as the Word of God – the incarnate Logos, by whom and through whom everything was created. And that man Jesus spoke to the host and the guests at the dinner where he was an outsider guest, and told them how it should be among human beings. The parable of the banquet is not so much about heaven as it is about the earthly existence that represents the values of God’s kingdom.

Look around. Are the proud and mighty brought down from their seats of power? Are the rich going hungry? Are the poor well fed? If the answer is NO – and it it is – then the kingdom of God is not among us. Does the church reflect the values of the kingdom and the great reversal that Jesus taught? The answer is again NO. Do individual Christians reflect the great reversal in how we live our lives and who we honour and who we vote for? Do we reflect the values of the kingdom in how we accept those who are different from us? That’s what today’s parable is about. So don’t dream of heaven if you can’t dream God’s dream for life here on earth.