Word of the Week
Christ the King Sunday
First-born: Prototokos (Gk.): meaning, “first begotten”, or “first-born”. The collective meaning of the Greek is the first born of man or beast, and in Christ, the first born of all creation.
The CCC draws out the discussion on the phrase of the first-born son by going back into the Old Testament where we first have the phrase being used within the context of relationship with the offering of Abel’s flock (cf. Gn.4 and 5) (CCC, 2569). The dialectic of offering and relationship extends itself into the book of Exodus where God becomes father to the nation of Israel because of the covenant and the gift of the law to Israel, ‘his first-born son’ (Ex.4:22) (CCC, 238). Transitioning into the New Testament, we read and interpret Christ as the new and greater first-born son who, by means of the Resurrection, imparts new life into our souls (cf. CCC, 658). In this way, man, sharing in the fraternity of Christ as one who was first-born to bring about a new family, has the power to “reproduce the image of God's Son made man, ‘the image of the invisible God’" (Col 1:15), (CCC, 381).
The Greek term prototokos can be found nine times in the New Testament. This phrase is built upon the Old Testament vision to the meaning of first-born where you read of the title as more of a legal term of inheritance (cf. Deut.21:15-17). The first-born son is not determined by where you fall in birth line, rather, by finding favor in your father’s eyes. Consequently, if you were the first-born son in antiquity, you gained access into your father’s property. In the NT, both Matthew and Luke apply the phrase “first-born” to describe the physical birth of Jesus to Mary (cf. Mt.1:25; Lk.2:7). This phrase does not imply that Mary gave birth to other children, rather, that Christ was the first-begotten Son of God the Father (cf. Col.1:15-18) from which he bore forth a new spiritual family in his divine likeness (cf. Rom.8:28-30) (Hahn and Minch, 22). The letter to the Hebrews highlights the heavenly dimension of the first-born family: all those who are conformed to Christ will enrolled in heaven’s book of life (Heb.12:23) worshipping God for all eternity (Heb.1:6). The book of Revelation brings into context the priestly dimension of Christ as the first-born Son of God. Christ, as the first-born of the dead, speaks directly to his Resurrection. Just as Christ died and rose again, so is man, in his office of the ordinary priesthood, call to die and rise again in Christ (Rev.1:5-6).
As we close the liturgical year on this Solemnity of Christ the King, my reflection gravitates towards the sacrificial dimension of the Church in her priestly identity. Christ came to establish a kingdom of priests, and it is thus, that the Church, as the Kingdom of God, will expand to the measure that we lift up our lives as an offering to God. Herein resides the treasure of our faith, that each moment can have a sacramental value, a divine quality, to the degree our life is an offering to the Lord. So as we look to make our liturgical “new year’s resolution”, let them be set upon the path of spiritual offering.
“He is then by nature an Offspring, perfect from the Perfect, begotten before all the hills (Proverbs 8:25), that is before every rational and intelligent essence, as Paul also in another place calls Him 'first-born of all creation'(cf. Col.1:15) calling Him First-born, He shows that He is not a Creature, but Offspring of the Father.”
--St. Athanasius
Primary Texts Consulted
• Catholic Bible. Suggested trans. Revised Standard Version, Catholic Edition.
• Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2nd Edition, 1997.
• Hahn, Scott and Minch , Curtis. Ignatius Catholic Study Bible: The Gospel of Luke, RSV, 2nd ed. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2001.
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