The Gospel reading from Luke 19: 1 -10 offers an awakening to the absurd logic of the Christian faith. This becomes evident when one fully understands the social world which the main figure in the passage, Zacchaeus, operated. When Rome became an empire, as noted by Christopher R. Hutson, the provincial governors used local publicans “to collect customs on imports” (p. 167). Zacchaeus was a chief publican (chief tax collector) for the Roman occupiers of Judaea. He was an active agent of the economic order in Jericho that had been reshaped by the imperialistic interests of Rome in the region. Simply stated, he was an active participant in the economic exploitation of his people – “a Jewish businessman involved in large contracts with Roman businessmen” (p. 167). One can understand how infuriating it must have been for his fellow Jewish people to see him participate in the colonial system intended to exploit them. Before delving into how radical his encounter with Jesus must have been in the view of his fellow Jews who saw the dynamics play out between him and Jesus, it is important to link his story and context to ours today.
It is worth stating that “Africa holds 30% of global mineral reserves, including critical minerals like cobalt and platinum.” One would think that with this abundance of resources, the continent would be a place of great success. Unfortunately, that is not the case. Dorcas Agambila calls attention to how “Africa loses $88.6 billion each year to illegal money transfers” that often involve the illicit collaboration between foreign oligarchs and local agents. Even the global trade system is set up with a colonial consciousness to benefit historical colonial powers of the West at the detriment of Africa. Obikwelu Ifeanyi, Gérard-Marie Messina and Andy Chukwuemeka Odumegwu correctly observe that “Africa’s nominal and flag independence following decolonization has not translated into genuine autonomy and self-sufficiency” (p. 5).
In 2023, I was lucky to have traveled to the mineral-rich city of Lubumbashi in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to attend the annual meeting of the African Studies Association – Africa. It was a conference that was interested in addressing ways of retrieving Africa’s cultural artifacts that were stolen by Western colonizers during the era of colonialism in Africa. As my flight landed and we were driving to the venue, some of us noticed that there were large regions of the city that were barricaded. We decided to inquire and were told that these were areas where foreign companies were busy extracting different minerals. What was most surprising to us was that these extractors and their large trucks were being protected by the Congolese military as they moved between the extracting sites and the airport where their planes were taking off to their respective nations with looted resources from the country. Upon further investigation, we realized that most Congolese did not even know what was going on in their city. Their government officials were more invested in participating in the exploitation of their people by foreign agents.
None of the exploitation occurring in Africa is possible without the local actors who serve as gatekeepers of the skewed economic system. It is the so-called godfathers who decide who should run for office and consequently control the national structures to benefit their political and economic interests.
Similarly, Zacchaeus was a gatekeeper for the Roman imperialistic agenda in his home country. He profited from the colonial exploitation of his fellow Jews. As Rome got wealthier, its exploited provinces became impoverished. This is similar to how contemporary economic exploitation plays out in Africa and beyond.
The comparison between the context of colonial Judea and ours today forces us to ask the question, who is Zacchaeus in our exploited communities? For the sake of didactic reasoning, let us assume that we know them and let us also assume that Jesus is present in our communities today ministering and calling us to repentance. One afternoon, he passes through our neighborhood, and we all gather around him to hear him condemn the evil deeds of our oppressors, including the gatekeepers of the oppressive system. As he does so, we see one of the gatekeepers climb up a tree and decides to see and listen to the teaching of Jesus. Jesus walks to the tree and calls them by their name. He invites them to come down the tree and tells them that he is going to dine with them at their home. Many of us would be confused or even disappointed because this gatekeeper’s wealth is directly linked to our collective poverty. Is Jesus validating the economic system of exploitation? Has Jesus lost his mind? There is no logical consistency between what Jesus is teaching and his actions. At least, that is how we would interpret the reality in our grand disappointment.
Zacchaeus was involved in a profession that was considered culturally, politically, and socially problematic. He is collaborated with the colonial system of exploitation of his own people. Logically, he deserves to be an outcast, and that was exactly what he had become in his community. Yet, in his interaction with Jesus, one is surprised by a type of humanism that Zacchaeus demonstrates. The passage states that when Jesus tells him that he plans on staying at his home that day, Zacchaeus “hurried down and was happy to welcome him” (Luke 19:6).
A curious question arises: Why is Zacchaeus happy? The dialogue that ensues between Jesus and Zacchaeus points to the phenomenological content of radical hospitality. Jacques Derrida offers an insight into a type of hospitality that grounds itself in the absurd divine logic that Jesus instantiates in his interaction with Zacchaeus and the crowd (Luke 19: 1 – 10). Gerasimos Kakoliris observes that “for Derrida, … absolute hospitality demands that I open my house, and that I give not only to the foreigner … but also to the absolute, unknown, anonymous other, a place without asking for reciprocity … or even his name” (p. 65).
The praxis of unconditional hospitality is itself a disruption of social logic. It is in the domain of the absurd. This is because it is not the ‘normal’ way of being in a social world. This is revelation that is mediated by one who has earned the logical label of an ostracized person for daring to collaborate with the colonial exploiters. Zacchaeus’ existence seems to be within the domain of the limits of social norms. He is described as short as though there is something problematic with that way of being in the world (19:3). He is a chief tax collector and was rich, labels that reveal some moral lapses within a colonized and exploited society (19:2). Yet, he becomes the epiphany of what unconditional repentance ought to be, which is itself the pathway to unconditional hospitality. He chooses to let go of his possessions and promises to pay back fourfold anyone he may have defrauded (19:8). This is an act of total fidelity to the praxis of repentance in Jewish cultic practice (Exodus 22:1). What is subtle and yet reflective of true transformation in the passage is that Zacchaeus, in his turn to repentance, becomes the guest in the ethical world of redemption that Jesus mediates. Jesus becomes the host. Consequently, Jesus, the source of repentance, offers a pathway of redemption to Zacchaeus by linking him to the lineage of Abraham (19:9).
What are some key takeaways for the contemporary era? The crisis our world faces today is not just the fact that economic exploitation is a global pandemic, rather; it is also the fact that social responses to exploitation tend to produce further violence. This is because most responses are grounded in a scarcity mindset. A turn to the ideology of anger is a turn to a scarcity mindset. The exploiter is seen as the enemy, one that must be destroyed. Consequently, social leaders deploy narratives of hate towards those who have produced systems of exploitation. They even go so far as to focus attention on the innocent ones of society, like those who have no political agency to defend themselves.
Through this process, the lives of the perceived enemies are stripped of their inherent dignities. This attitude was the one that the Jewish community of Jericho had embraced in their perception of Zacchaeus. He was the enemy of his people and needed to be socially shunned. As Wanchen Li, Jing Meng, and Fang Cui note in their research, “scarcity mindsets can also induce social problem.” Prior to the encounter between Jesus and Zacchaeus, Zacchaeus and the Jewish victims of the colonial system were held captive by a scarcity mindset, which is the inherent conditioning of the social and individual psyches in a colonial system of exploitation.
A closer study of the interaction between Jesus and Zacchaeus reveals what I prefer to call a spirituality of anger. This type of spirituality operates from a surplus mindset. It insists on a refusal to diminish the humanity of the oppressor and seeks out ways to encounter the oppressor in such a manner that the possibility of a graced transformation can occur. As William Baird notes in his commentary on the Lukan gospel, “the moment of encounter with Jesus is the time of redemption” (p. 698). A surplus mindset always instantiates a desire to encounter in a manner that mediates transformation or conversion.
A surplus mindset that is grounded in a spirituality of anger allows for the expression of empathy. “Empathy is a basic psychological motivator and the key to understanding prosocial behaviors.” Only through radical encounter can this prosocial behavior be instantiated in the psyche of an individual and of society in general. This was exactly what Jesus was practicing in his encounter and dialogue with Zacchaeus. In Zacchaeus, Jesus saw the untapped and unrecognized potential for transformation and conversion. Through this radical encounter that is initiated by Jesus, Zacchaeus experiences a disruptive awakening to his own ability to be transformed and to be seen as a human being deserving of authentic love, forgiveness, kindness, and community. Through this self-awakening that is initiated by Jesus, Zacchaeus can embrace his own moral duty of righting the wrong he has created.
A spirituality of anger is grounded in a prophetic praxis that mediates life and second chances for all even when social logic dictates otherwise. To be lost is to also have the capacity to be found. That which is lost has its own moral significance of recognition because to be considered lost is to be remembered. And to be remembered is to be desired. Consequently, Jesus offers a moral statement about those who are lost for they are the ones he greatly desires to “seek out” because God desires to find them and to restore them to their dignity. This is the ground for the Christian vocation in the world. In addressing the global economic crisis that is caused and legitimized by the respective gatekeepers in our world, we ought to ground the work of justice in the domain of a spirituality of anger, one that seeks to offer life and dignity to the oppressor as well as the oppressed. New identities ought to be constructed that move away from the binaries of division.
In conclusion, one can state that the transformative encounter and the grace of new life that Jesus gave to Zacchaeus was itself a social grace intended to transform the social imagination of the people of Jericho. Similarly, in our practice of the Christian life, the grace of encounter ought to always be mediated with an intentionality to transform the larger social world where we encounter those who need to be converted from the culture of exploitation and violence. This approach is the essence of the absurdity of divine logic that the Christian life showcases in the world.
