First Reading · Isaiah
Tear the sky open
Where we are
The last section of Isaiah, addressed to a community back from exile and disappointed by what they came back to. This passage is a communal lament, and it is remarkably unguarded — the kind of prayer that survived in the canon because somebody refused to tidy it.
A note on the numbering. The Hebrew text and the American lectionary count these verses one apart from most English Bibles. Oh that you would tear the heavens is Isaiah 63:19b here and Isaiah 64:1 in the NRSV, ESV and King James. If you look this up and the verses do not line up, that is why.
What happens
"You, Yahweh, are our father, our redeemer you are named forever. Why do you let us wander, Yahweh, from your ways, and harden our hearts so that we fear you not? Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, with the mountains quaking before you … No ear has ever heard, no eye ever seen, any Theos but you doing such deeds for those who wait for him. Behold, you are angry, and we are sinful; all of us have become like unclean people, all our good deeds are like polluted rags; we have all withered like leaves, and our guilt carries us away like the wind. There is none who calls upon your name, who rouses himself to cling to you; for you have hidden your face from us and have delivered us up to our guilt. Yet, Yahweh, you are our father; we are the clay and you the potter: we are all the work of your hands."
What to notice
The complaint is aimed squarely at Theos, and the grammar is not softened. Lammah tat'enu Yahweh mi-drachecha, taqshiach libbenu mi-yir'atecha — "why do you make us wander from your ways, and harden our heart from fearing you?" Ta'ah is the wandering verb — the Hebrew equivalent of Greek planaō, the word that has run through the last week's readings as the danger to avoid. Here the prophet says Theos does it. And qashach, to harden, is the Exodus vocabulary used of Pharaoh's heart. The prayer accuses Theos of the thing the plague narrative says Theos did to Israel's enemy.
The famous line is a tearing. Lu qara'ta shamayim yaradta — "if only you had torn the heavens and come down." Qara is the verb for rending a garment in grief — what Jacob does over Joseph's coat, what the high priest does at a blasphemy. The sky is being asked to be ripped like cloth.
And it is worth knowing what the New Testament does with that request. Mark 1:10, at the baptism: eiden schizomenous tous ouranous — "he saw the heavens being torn open." Schizō is the tearing verb, and Mark uses it again at 15:38 for the temple curtain. Where Matthew and Luke write that the heavens were opened, Mark writes that they were torn — and today's first reading is where the request was filed.
The image for their own righteousness is the most uncomfortable in the Hebrew Bible. U-khe-veged iddim kol tsidqotenu — "and all our acts of right relationship are like a beged iddim." Iddim is a menstrual cloth. The point is ritual, not moral — the garment is unclean by contact and cannot be made otherwise — and the prophet applies it not to their sins but to their good deeds.
Then the last verse turns, and it turns on a craft. Ve-attah Yahweh avinu attah, anachnu ha-chomer ve-attah yotsrenu — "and now, Yahweh, you are our father; we are the clay and you our potter." Yotser is from yatsar, to shape — the verb of Genesis 2:7, where Theos forms the human from the dust. The complaint ends by putting the complainants back on the wheel, and the argument implied is: you made this; it is yours.
Responsorial Psalm
Restore us, three times
Where we are
Psalm 80 is a national lament with a refrain, and the refrain is the psalm's architecture. It appears three times — at Psalm 80:4, 8 and 20 — and each time the divine name in it grows.
The selected verses
Psalm 80:2-3. "O shepherd of Israel, hearken, from your throne upon the cherubim, shine forth. Rouse your power, and come to save us."
Psalm 80:15-16. "Once again, Theos of hosts, look down from heaven, and see; take care of this vine, and protect what your right hand has planted, the son of man whom you yourself made strong."
Psalm 80:18-19. "May your help be with the man of your right hand, with the son of man whom you yourself made strong. Then we will no more withdraw from you; give us new life, and we will call upon your name."
What to notice
The refrain is Elohim hashivenu, ve-ha'er paneicha ve-nivvashe'ah — "Theos, turn us back; make your face shine, and we shall be rescued." Shuv in the causative — turn us back — the verb behind teshuvah, turning. The psalm asks Theos to do the turning, which is the same theological move as Isaiah's why do you make us wander, run in reverse.
And the escalation across the three refrains is deliberate. Psalm 80:4 has Elohim; Psalm 80:8 has Elohim tsva'ot; Psalm 80:20 has Yahweh Elohim tsva'ot. The name lengthens each time the plea is repeated, which is what a person does when nobody answers the door.
The address is enthronement language. Yoshev ha-keruvim hofiah — "you who sit on the cherubim, shine out." Hofia is a theophany verb — the shining of Deuteronomy 33:2, hofia me-har Paran. And yoshev ha-keruvim is the ark's title — the throne above the mercy seat. The psalm is asking the furniture of the sanctuary to become visible.
The vine is the psalm's controlling image. U-fqod gefen zot — "attend to this vine." Paqad is to visit with attention, to inspect, to muster — the same root as the episkopē Luke used ten days ago for the time of Jerusalem's visitation. The middle of the psalm, which the lectionary skips, tells the vine's story: brought out of Egypt, planted, filling the land, and then its walls broken so that everyone passing plucks at it.
And the phrase that made this psalm an Advent text: ben adam immatsta lakh — "the son of man you made strong for yourself." In context this is the vine, or the king, or Israel — ben adam here means simply a human being. Its later reading as a title is a Christian reading, and it is worth knowing that the psalm itself is talking about a plant.
Second Reading · 1 Corinthians
Thanks for the two things that will go wrong
Where we are
The opening of the letter, immediately after the address. Every Pauline letter but Galatians has a thanksgiving section, and this one is doing something almost mischievous — because the reader is about to find out what these people are like.
What happens
"Grace to you and peace from Theos our Father and the master Jesus Christ. I give thanks to my Theos always on your account for the grace of Theos bestowed on you in Christ Jesus, that in him you were enriched in every way, with all discourse and all knowledge … so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revelation of our master Jesus Christ. He will keep you firm to the end, irreproachable on the day of our master Jesus Christ. Theos is faithful, and by him you were called to fellowship with his Son, Jesus Christ our master."
What to notice
Paul thanks Theos for exactly the two things that will cause the trouble. En panti logō kai pasē gnōsei — "in all logos and all gnōsis", all speech and all knowledge. Chapters 1-4 are about factions built on rival speakers, and chapter 8 opens hē gnōsis physioi, "knowledge puffs up." He is grateful for their eloquence and their knowledge in verse 5, and by verse 11 he has heard there are quarrels among them.
This is not sarcasm. Eucharistō is the standard thanksgiving verb, and the gifts are described as charis tou theou hē dotheisa hymin, grace given to you — genuinely from Theos. What the letter will dispute is not whether they have the gifts but what they have made of them.
The waiting verb is a triple compound. Apekdechomenous tēn apokalypsin — apo-ek-dechomai, to receive-out-from, and so to await something intently. It is the verb Romans 8 uses four times of creation groaning. Paul's word for waiting is built out of receiving, which is a different posture from enduring.
And the guarantee is not about them. Hos kai bebaiōsei hymas heōs telous — "who will also confirm you to the end." Bebaioō is a legal-commercial term: to guarantee, to make a transaction secure — and the noun bebaiōsis appears in contracts. The subject of the verb is Theos, not the Corinthians, and the sentence closes pistos ho theos, Theos is reliable. On the first Sunday of a year of waiting, the security named is not the waiter's.
Gospel · Mark
The doorkeeper, and one word for everybody
Where we are
The new liturgical year begins with the end of Mark 13 — the last five verses of Mark's apocalyptic discourse, immediately before the passion narrative begins. Advent opens where the Gospel is about to turn toward the cross, not at a manger.
What happens
"Be watchful! Be alert! You do not know when the time will come. It is like a man traveling abroad. He leaves home and places his servants in charge, each with his own work, and orders the gatekeeper to be on the watch. Watch, therefore; you do not know when the lord of the house is coming, whether in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or in the morning. May he not come suddenly and find you sleeping. What I say to you, I say to all: 'Watch!'"
What to notice
The first word of the new year is the last word of the old one. Blepete, agrypneite — "look; be sleepless." Agrypneite is exactly the verb Luke 21:36 used yesterday — a- plus hypnos, to be without sleep. The final instruction of the outgoing year and the opening instruction of the incoming one are the same word, and the lectionary has arranged that by putting Luke's discourse on Saturday and Mark's on Sunday.
The reason given is an absence of information, stated twice. Ouk oidate gar pote ho kairos estin (verse 33) and ouk oidate gar pote ho kyrios tēs oikias erchetai (verse 35) — "you do not know when." Kairos, the decisive moment, again — the noun the impostors of Luke 21:8 claimed to have. The watching is grounded in ignorance, not in calculation.
The parable's staffing is precise and easy to skim. The man leaves, gives tois doulois autou tēn exousian — authority to his slaves — hekastō to ergon autou, to each his own work — and then a separate instruction to one person: tō thyrōrō eneteilato hina grēgorē, he ordered the doorkeeper to stay awake. Everyone gets a job; one person's job is the watching.
And then the last verse dissolves that. Ho de hymin legō pasin legō: grēgoreite — "what I say to you, I say to all: stay awake." The specialist's assignment is handed to everybody. Mark has built a parable in which watching is one role among many and then, in the final sentence, made it universal — which is also the moment the parable stops being a parable and becomes an address to the reader.
The four watches are named in order, and they are Roman. Ē opse ē mesonyktion ē alektorophōnias ē prōi — evening, midnight, cockcrow, morning. Judean reckoning divided the night into three watches; the Roman army used four, and Mark's list is the Roman set. These are the phylakai, the guard shifts — the same noun that means a prison. And alektorophōnia, cockcrow, is the third watch, which is where Mark's own narrative will be in four chapters, when a rooster crows twice.
| Reading |
What is asked for, and who is asked |
| Isaiah 63–64 |
Tear the sky and come down — and we are the clay, you the potter |
| Psalm 80 |
Restore us; let your face shine; three times, with the name growing |
| 1 Corinthians 1:3–9 |
Thanks for gifts, and a guarantee that belongs to the guarantor |
| Mark 13:33–37 |
You do not know when; stay awake — and that is said to everyone |
Advent begins with two complaints, a guarantee and an instruction, and the striking thing is how little any of them asks the waiter to supply.
Isaiah's prayer is the most exposed thing in today's set. It opens by calling Theos avinu, our father — and immediately asks lammah tat'enu, why do you make us wander? And harden our heart, using the verb the Exodus story applies to Pharaoh. The prophet is charging Theos with the community's condition, and the canon kept the charge. Then the request: lu qara'ta shamayim yaradta, if only you would tear the heavens and come down — a garment-rending verb applied to the sky. Mark 1:10 will answer it with schizomenous tous ouranous, the heavens being torn, at a baptism.
And the prayer's turn is not a retraction. Anachnu ha-chomer ve-attah yotsrenu — we are the clay and you the potter — is not an apology. It is the same argument continued: ma'aseh yadcha kullanu, we are all the work of your hands. The complainants end by pointing out whose project they are.
Psalm 80 says it as a refrain, and the refrain is the form of the prayer. Hashivenu … ve-ha'er paneicha — turn us back, and make your face shine — three times, with the divine name lengthening each time, from Elohim to Elohim tsva'ot to Yahweh Elohim tsva'ot. And the verb for the restoring is shuv in the causative: they are asking to be turned.
Paul supplies the only stable element in the day, and it is not the Corinthians. He thanks Theos for their logos and their gnōsis — the exact two things the next fifteen chapters will be spent correcting — and then says hos kai bebaiōsei hymas heōs telous, he will confirm you to the end, using the vocabulary of a legal guarantee. The subject is Theos. Pistos ho theos, Theos is reliable — which, addressed to a congregation about to be described as quarrelling, jealous, litigious and drunk at the supper, is a claim made despite the recipients rather than about them.
Then Mark, where the whole set resolves into one word. The new year's first imperative, agrypneite, be sleepless, is the same word Luke's discourse ended on yesterday — the liturgical year turning over on a single verb. And the parable's shape is the day's argument in miniature: everyone gets work, one person gets the watch, and the last sentence gives the watch to everyone.
What nobody in today's readings is asked to do is calculate. Ouk oidate gar pote ho kairos estin — you do not know when — and the four watches are named precisely so that all four are covered. Isaiah asks for a tearing, the psalm asks for a face, Paul points at a guarantor, and Mark says stay awake. On the first day of a year that will end back in Luke 21, none of that is a strategy. It is a posture, which is what the last week has been about.