Pentecost +5 Sunday – C1

Pentecost +5 Sunday – C1

Years C
2 Kings 2:1-2, 6-14 or 1 Kings 19:15-16, 19-21

A mantle of power (covering term is "spirit") is very attractive and addictive. It is an equivalent of a ring in Tolkien's major work.

Of course the implication is that Elisha would use a mantle of power for good, while Golem would use a ring of power for ill.

The first use Elisha makes of the mantle he "earned" by keeping his eye on it, is to ease his own travel, to make a way where there wasn't a way, to have dominion over the waters. In so doing he effectively tests whether the power is a residual one (left-over G*D, unused by Elijah) or has become his that can be used without the mantle (can Dumbo fly without his feather).

Like it or not we all have more power (whether vested in mantle, ring, money, position, or whatever) than we like to acknowledge. A key question is what are we doing with the power we have, even before a potential of doubling it?

= = = = = = =

tricks and techniques
are still an order of the day
to implement
to demonstrate
to accumulate
power and more power

slogans and mantras
motivational posters
focus our attention
blocking out questions
transforming everything
into a tool my tool