Consider this question. (You don’t have to write an essay, but just think through what your answer might be.)

• What is the single most satisfying thing in your life?

Read through Matthew 5:5-6 (either alone or as a group). As you read, look at the notes you made when you read the Beatitudes during the first week:

• !! for that which makes you think;
• those things you agree with, or approve of;
• those things you find difficult to believe or understand;
• ?? those things which require you to go a little bit further.

Can you answer these questions?

• How would you define the quality of ‘meekness’?
• Is Jesus encouraging us to be wimps?
• How is meekness different from being amenable and undemanding?
• What does it mean to ‘inherit the earth’?
• Do you have any sympathy with the attitudes shown in this passage from Monty Python’s Life of Brian? It shows the group at the back of the crowd listening to the Sermon on the Mount. They can’t hear Jesus’s speech very well:

MAN 2: You hear that? Blessed are the Greek.
GREGORY: The Greek?
MAN 2: Mmm. Well, apparently, he’s going to inherit the earth.
GREGORY: Did anyone catch his name?
MRS. BIG NOSE: You’re not going to thump anybody.
MR. BIG NOSE: I’ll thump him if he calls me ‘Big Nose’ again.
MR. CHEEKY: Oh, shut up, Big Nose.
MR. BIG NOSE: Ah! All right. I warned you. I really will slug you so hard–
MRS. BIG NOSE: Oh, it’s the meek! Blessed are the meek! Oh, that’s nice, isn’t it? I’m glad they’re getting something, ‘cause they have a hell of a time.

• What is the difference between righteousness and self-righteousness?
• How does Isaiah 58:6-8 affect your understanding of ‘righteousness’?

What do you think of this quotation:

• It is all too easy for us to treat the Pharisees as embodying all that is worst in humankind. But in fact they were most probably the best men of their time, the most religious, the most devoted to the will of God, the most eager to express their loyalty to him in obedience to his every word, the most determined never to compromise with the world around them. But as St Paul came to see it in retrospect, they were exposed to a fatal flaw: the trouble with their outstanding righteousness was that, all too easily, it could be viewed precisely as their righteousness. It was a righteousness that could be measured, so that, at a certain point, you could say that you had now achieved it. This meant it could all too easily come adrift from the original inspiration in devotion to God and become self-sufficient, an end in itself. Simon Tugwell : Reflections on the Beatitudes (1980)

Polyphony : The Beatitudes (1990); Arvo Pärt (b.1935)

Born in 1935, in Estonia, Arvo Pärt first won recognition as a composer in the late 1950s by writing a cantata for children’s choir and orchestra. In 1968 he wrote Credo for piano, mixed chorus, and orchestra; it was banned in the Soviet Union because of its religious text. While in a period of internal exile, Pärt immersed himself in the study of Gregorian chant and Orthodox liturgical music. He began to write using a tonal technique he called ‘tintinnabuli’, in which he surrounded a melodic phrase with triadic notes sounding like bells ringing. A number of large scale choral works were swiftly considered to be modern classics.
The Beatitudes was the first work Pärt composed to an English text, and it was written for the RIAS Chamber Choir in Berlin. Pärt has composed his music carefully, with an ear to the rhythms and syntax of the English version of the verses from Matthew’s Gospel: he uses note lengths to emphasise significant texts. The piece gradually builds in volume and intensity, climaxing in a sung ‘Amen’ (thus taking the piece from the concert hall and into the Church). Pärt begins to explore the consequences of the Beatitudes with an organ postlude, which, working on the themes of the sung passages gently fades away into eternity.
How does the organ playing affect the piece? How does the composer set the different Beatitudes? What difference does his choice of arrangement (melody, harmony, volume, voices) make to your appreciation of each Beatitude? The whole?

 

 Arvo Pärt : The Beatitudes [7:03m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (62)