The Widow's Mite and the Need for Self-Awareness

In Mark's gospel, Jesus is very critical of the religious institutions and systems of his day.  He was particularly critical of the scribes.  The "scribes", from the Greek grammateis, were those who were the most knowledgeable of the Hebrew scriptures, and who the Jewish community turned to when they had questions about the meaning and significance of the law.  When there was a complicated question of the interpretation of the law, the scribes were consulted.  The scribes also acted in a quasi adjudicatory capacity to resolve disputes in the Jewish community that arose out of differing interpretation of the law.

Jesus criticized the scribes for their opulent lifestyles, their arrogance, and their self-righteousness.  Specifically, Jesus says that the scribes "devour widow's houses." A few verses later, Jesus and the disciples see a widow placing two copper coins in the temple treasury, which is all the wealth that she had.  Jesus then remarks that, comparatively speaking, the widow has given more than those who given significant sums.

Ironically, the story of the widow's mite is used most commonly on Stewardship Sunday in American churches.  The story is read to mean that we are called to give a huge proportion of our wealth, in the same way as the widow; in other words, the widow is held up as a model of giving that we are called to emulate.

Such a reading of the story ignores two important things: (1) Jesus just spent several verses talking about the corruption of the scribes, and thereby the Jewish religious establishment; (2) Jesus makes no statement suggesting that the widow was wise, righteous, or should be emulated.

The widow is not a paragon of virtue that we are being called to emulate.  She is actually very tragic figure; the tiny amount of money that she had to give is going to be given to the temple, and thereby, to the scribes.  This story is not even about the widow or about giving.  Its about self-awareness, or the scribes' lack of it.  And the terrible horrific tragedy that results by the lack of it.

All of us who seek to live under the Lordship of Christ can do enormous good in this world.  We can also, without awareness of our sin and narcissism, do terrible things, like create and maintains systems that result in widow's giving what little they have to subsidize the scribes' "flowing robes." Jesus' message is awareness, awareness, awareness.