Burying Treasure

“The kingdom of heaven will be like a man going on a journey who summoned his servants and entrusted his property to them. To one he gave five talents, to another two talents, to a third one talent—to each according to his ability. Then he set forth on his journey.

“After a long period of time, the master of those servants returned and settled accounts with them. The one who had received the five talents came forward, bringing an additional five. ‘Master,’ he said, ‘you gave me five talents. Behold, I have gained five more.’ His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. Since you have been faithful in small matters, I will give you much greater responsibilities. Come and share your master’s joy.’”

The same is done by the servant given two talents and the same is likewise rewarded by the master. 

“Then the one who had received the one talent came forward and said, ‘Master, I knew that you were a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you did not scatter seed.  Therefore, out of fear I went off and hid your talent in the ground. Behold, I give it back to you.’

“His master replied, ‘You wicked and lazy servant. So you knew that I reap where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered! Then you should have deposited my money with the bankers, and on my return I would have gotten back my money with interest.

“‘Therefore, take the talent from him and give it to the one with the ten talents. For to everyone who has, more will be given, and he will have an abundance. But from the one who has not, even what he does have will be taken away. As for this worthless servant, cast him outside into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’”

At first glance it may seem the master, living up to his reputation as a “hard man,” deals harshly with his servant who, out of fear, kept hidden the talent given him by casting him outside into the darkness. This darkness can be understood as Sheol, which is a place of darkness after death. I do not see this as an example of the proverbial “Wrath of God,” on the contrary this is God—the master—affirming the state the servant brought onto himself by denying the talent its mission. The servant’s actions are his consequences.

He is walking with fear, hiding the lamp, per the Sermon on the Mount, under a bushel rather than allowing the light to brighten the room and all in it. 

A candle, when lit becomes greater than its parts, it is no longer only wax and wick, it is the light flickering and all that the light touches. This servant took the talent (light) and gave it to no one. The servant acted like the light’s master, hoarding it away as if he forgot where it came from and to whom it belongs.

All of this in direct opposition to the actions of the rightful owner of the talents, who gave them out freely, giving to each according to their ability, “‘So shall my word be that go forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.’”

It is the will of God that moves through us, and it is the role of the enemy to have us use it for other means, it is the authorship of the devil to inspire fear in us which makes us sin: which is what separates us from God. It is a spiritual block, not a condition we’re born in.

The talents are like the will of God that proceeds from the Father and works through us. When we get in the way of that we are impeding His will, this is sin, which can be defined as what separates us from God. The devil is an entity that has power, and because of his unwillingness to bow before human’s authority—God-given—he fell and his role in our lives is to push us to fall, too.

Fall far from God to outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Lucifer means “Morning Star,” referring to Venus being the light-bearer and the trumpet of dawn, she is the shining one in the morning with no celestial bodies around her; she is alone. 

In her isolation she is far from the Kingdom’s royal court. 

The Luciferic impulse is expressed through our want to strike out on our own, to go be something—to do, it is inherently a creative instinct which does not make it necessarily an evil act. God works through us and traveling into the unknown, far from the safety of heavenly spheres, can be an act of extending the Kingdom’s reach. It can be, such as the work of the two former servant’s in the above parable, but it’s often not, which is why we see the Khristós rebuking Peter by saying, “Get thee behind me, Satan: thou art an offence unto me: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men.”

“Vade Retro Satana,” we cannot shed the Luciferic impulse, the Satanic ego-trap that has bound mankind to the cycle of death since the fallen serpent lied to Eve. We can, however, reorient this impulse—this creative spark of the light-bearer—to God’s providence. The temptations and the what the devil offers cannot be the object of our affection and by keeping it within our sight it will lead us astray. There’s no bargaining with the devil, you give him nothing or you give him everything.

You give him a little and he’ll take the rest, until we’re dust—weeping and gnashing teeth. This is a state of being so far from God that we have become like animals. That is the state the devil wants us to crawl to, like him, on our bellies. I’ve seen the devil work in many ways, but more than any way I’ve seen his work manifest in people is doubt and fear, that feeling of not good enough… The parable of talents illustrates the human impulse to cling to what little we have in an effort not to lose it.

This is pride.

We want to do something with the talent we’ve been given, and though our inclination might be to keep it hidden and safe, make it “sacred,” this propensity is the opposite of sacred. When we consecrate something by burying it, we’ve killed it; it is profane.

The origin of the word sacrifice comes from two Indo-European roots: *dʰeh₁– meaning “to put, to place” and *seh₂k– meaning “to make sacred” or “to make a pact.” When these roots combine, they form the concept of putting something forward in order to make it sacred. So, it is an act of willfully placing something ahead of oneself, it is a dedication of something to the divine, making what is put forth sacrosanct.

Another meaning behind the root *seh₂k– is “ceremony,” creating a greater sense of what Christianity means. By putting one’s life forward, devoting it to God, we make life a ceremony, a ritual, one in which our hearts, bodies, and minds are the offering. 

The sacrifice of what makes us unique, our “talent,” to God is a fusion of our distinct parts thereby destroying what makes us separate and going beyond our component parts and identification. We embody the whole candle, giving light to all in the house. The servant took what was God-given and did nothing with it, keeping it separate and isolated, this is being led by the devil, embodying the Luciferic principle of the fallen king, which is what the name “Lucifer” is a reference to in the book of Isaiah: 

“How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!

For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north:

I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High.

Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit.” 

This verse in Isaiah is talking about the King of Babylon who fell due to his pride and setting himself up above all nations, as a god. This is the consequence of moving away from God in our own quest for possessions and power—it is not seeking Him nor is it endeavoring to extend His Kingdom, but rather our own.

The master does not keep his talents hidden when he goes on a journey, he does not keep them guarded or buried. Yet, the servant saw and neglected to follow suit. The servant says, out of fear I hid your talent in the ground, but he did not do this for the master’s sake, he did this for himself, it was his fear that drove him to hide the talent and it was his fear that led him to assume the role of master (remember this) therefore bringing upon his own darkness, “‘For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways […] For as the heavens are higher than earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.’”

The servant’s unwillingness to surrender to the will of the master, that is—God, is as the Pharisees refusing to surrender their own way of seeing things to open their minds to the kingdom, rather walking in outer darkness, led by the devil. They suffocated the will of God by profaning it: keeping it hidden, not allowing it to fulfill its purpose, but that’s the thing about God’s word, it shall not return to Him void, “for there is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed; neither hid, that shall not be known.”

Regardless of who you walk with, how you act, and how you see the kingdom of God is at hand.

But so is Gehenna.

And as we will see, a kingdom divided cannot stand.

Si comprehendis, non est Deus