"Passing on the Buffet"—October 9, 2019
“The
king [Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon] assigned them a daily portion of the royal
rations of food and wine…. But Daniel resolved that he would not defile himself
with the royal rations of food and wine; so he asked the palace master to allow
him not to defile himself. Now God allowed Daniel to receive favor and
compassion from the palace master. The palace master said to Daniel, ‘I am
afraid of my lord the king; he has appointed your food and your drink. If he
should see you in poorer condition than the other young men of your own age,
you would endanger my head with the king.’ Then Daniel asked the guard whom the
palace master had appointed over Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah: ‘Please
test your servants for ten days. Let us be given vegetables to eat and water to
drink. You can then compare our appearance with the appearance of the young men
who eat the royal rations, and deal with your servants according to what you observe.’
So he agreed to this proposal and tested them for ten days. At the end of ten
days it was observed that they appeared better and fatter than all the young
men who had been eating the royal rations. So the guard continued to withdraw
their royal rations and the win they were to drink, and gave them vegetables.
To these four young men God gave knowledge and skill in every aspect of literature
and wisdom; Daniel also had insight into all visions and dreams.” [Daniel 1:5,
8-17]
As
far as fights are concerned, this one seems a strange one to pick.
In
fact, you could make the case that this is an example of Daniel just stirring
the pot and provoking a conflict rather than a matter of necessity. Going vegan
just to rebuff the empire that is willing to give you lavish food and a cushy position
in the palace seems a bit extreme, doesn’t it?
But maybe that’s exactly the point.
Let
me back up for a minute here so we can unpack why this story is such a big deal,
and why such a large amount of space is devoted in the book of Daniel to such
an ordinary thing as Daniel’s daily menu.
The setting of this story is the Babylonian exile, when Daniel (famous
for the lion’s den story a little bit later in the book) and other bright
up-and-comers from Judah had been carried away as prisoners to live in Babylon
under the rule of its king, Nebuchadnezzar. When the Babylonians conquered a people, their
strategy was to plunder the best of the peoples they defeated, both in treasures
and in human capital, and then to bring the best and brightest to be educated
and enculturated in Babylonian ways—and therefore, to get their captives to
forget their old identities, way of life, and their old faith. The Babylonians did it with names: they took
away your old name and gave you a new one (so Daniel and his friends Hananiah,
Mishael, and Azariah were given new names taken from the pantheon of Babylonian
gods, and we know them as Belteshazzar, Shadrach, Meschach, and Abednego). They taught their captives Babylonian
literature, mythology, and religion. And
they tried to get your allegiance by giving their prize pupils perks like royal
food, accommodations, and the possibility of a good job serving the king if
they played their cards right and did as they were told. It was an easy route to a comfortable life,
if only you would take it.
But
Daniel and his three friends refuse.
Their resistance isn’t violent at all.
They just refuse to accept the royally-supplied rations. Like Mrs. Dubose in To Kill A Mockingbird,
they will not be beholden to anybody or anything—at least nothing that comes
from the hand of the Empire. And instead
of the premium meal-plan that the palace offered, they asked to be served only
vegetables and water.
Now,
it is at this point that we need to be clear: this isn’t really a matter of
keeping kosher. To be sure, there were
rules in Israel’s Law that prevented eating certain kinds of meats, or meat
that was not slaughtered in a certain way.
But there are no rules against wine in the Torah, and basically all wine
is kosher. If this were simply a matter
of Daniel wanting to adhere strictly to the dietary laws of Leviticus, he could
have done that and asked for a less drastically limited menu than only vegetables,
and he surely could have had the wine that Nebuchadnezzar was offering. While we’re at it, this isn’t about avoiding
cholesterol or sodium or decreasing their calorie count, the way many in our
meat-centered culture might be advised by their cardiologists. Daniel doesn’t reject the royally-provided steaks
and Cabernets because he knows red meat could clog his arteries. And it isn’t reducible to a concern about following
complicated religious food rules. The
issue is whether he will let himself be bought off by the empire… or whether he
will resist Babylon’s narrative that it is the giver of all good gifts.
The
objection, in other words, isn’t so much to what is on the menu, but who
gets the credit for giving Daniel sustenance.
If Daniel and his friends from eat the royally-sponsored buffet, there
is nothing exactly “sinful” about the food necessarily—but Babylon gets the credit
for their strength and their sustenance.
But if they refuse to accept the gourmet dishes from the opulent and
decadent empire, then it is clear that God is the source of their strength and
life. And Daniel doesn’t want to give
the Empire any of the glory that should go to God. Empires are arrogant, after all, and kings
and authoritarian rulers of all times and places have a way of doubling down on
that arrogance. They want to take credit for things that aren’t their
accomplishments, and they want to puff themselves up at every opportunity. Daniel’s small act of resistance doesn’t
bring down the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, but it does at least deny him one
victory. Daniel won’t let Babylon get
his heart, or his allegiance. And it
starts with not letting Babylon get the credit for Daniel’s nourishment.
And
of course, because Daniel and his friends don’t sell out to Babylon, they become
part of a community in exile that won’t let its identity be erased by the empire. They hold onto their faith in the God of
Abraham and Sarah, even when it is not fashionable. They hold onto their way of life: keeping
sabbath when the empire doesn’t rest, retelling the stories of deliverance from
slavery, and practicing justice and mercy even when they live under authoritarian
rule. And together, that community of faithful
resistors endures, even when Babylon falls and a new empire comes on the scene. It is a small act of resistance maybe, just not
to eat from the Babylonian buffet for a long stretch of salads instead, but it
is enough to prevent Nebuchadnezzar from snuffing out their lights.
There
is a lot of similarity between Daniel’s setting and ours as the followers of
Jesus in 21st century America.
Like Daniel and his friends, we are surrounded by a culture of opulence
and decadence, where everything is a commodity for sale served on a never-ending
buffet. You can go through the inexhaustible
smorgasbord at a restaurant, get it at a drive-through, order online and have
things sent to you by drone, or download it instantly onto your preferred rectangle
of technology—all as long as you give credit and glory and allegiance to the
hands that provide it. We live in a time
obsessed with proving its own “greatness,” too, and perhaps it gives us amnesia
to forget that in the Scriptures, the people of God are called to ascribe greatness
or glory only to God, and not to themselves or to whomever is on the local
throne. So maybe we need Daniel’s story
of ordinary resistance—even if it seems insignificant—before we pledge our allegiance
to the benevolent hand of Amazon or Google or Apple or Wal-Mart, and before we
sell our souls to our own Nebuchadnezzars who want to offer us perks if only we’ll
call them “great.”
Now,
it may not be that you have to go without meat in order to launch your
protest. (And of course, there may be
other reasons you choose to eat less meat, or none at all, that don’t have
anything do with sticking it to the powers of the day.) But in a culture that just wants us to
consume, maybe part of how we keep from selling out is simply to say, “No.” As in, “No, I don’t need to super-size
everything I eat, and no, I don’t need the latest technology the moment it
comes out, and no, I don’t need to order with one click, because my well-being
is more than just having stuff or being stuffed.” Honestly, Babylon didn’t care which of its
many delicious dishes the captive exiles ate from, as long as it picked from
the official menu of the Empire. Like
Mr. World says in the TV version of American Gods, “Regular, hot-and-spicy,
or thick-and-chunky, you’re still buying salsa.”
The
empire’s strategy is always to make it look like we have a choice of many
options to pick from, and to convince us that true freedom is in selecting from
its expansive buffet. And so long as we
pick from what Babylon is serving, then the Nebuchadnezzars of the world get
the credit and get our loyalty as customers.
What Daniel reminds us is this: you don’t have to pick from what Babylon
offers, and sometimes that small act of refusing to sell out makes you stronger
than the seemingly unstoppable empire.
So
maybe there are times that you and I will deliberately say “No” to the options
being offered to us—not because there is something inherently wrong with
getting a discount on shoes from your favorite online supplier, or something
sinful about getting your lunch through a window rather than making it at home,
but because it is a way of reminding ourselves that God is the true source of
our sustenance, and that we do not live by fries or Amazon Prime alone. Sometimes we will choose to say no because we
discover a life that is less cluttered with “stuff” has more breathing room for
enjoying actual life. Sometimes we will
choose to say no because we realize that a calendar that is not so full of
running to this movie or that football game or those clothing sales allows us
the empty space to be available for someone who needs us. And sometimes we will choose to say no to
filling every corner of our lives with speakers to blare the shouting of
talking heads—not because we don’t want to be informed, but because we insist
on having some part of our lives quiet enough for the still small voice of God
to say, “Be still and know that I am God,” over the shouting of pundits and
kings like Nebuchadnezzar.
A
change of daily food choices like Daniel’s, or the choice to simplify and
de-clutter our lives may seem like a small and ordinary place from which to
launch a movement, but ours is the God, after all, who shows up in the ordinary.
It
may turn out that sometimes saying “No” to what the powers of the day are
offering, no matter how attractive they make it look, is actually what lets us
say “Yes!” to the day in front of us, and to the God who gives it.
Lord
God, sustain us from your own good hand, and let us learn how to say No to the
infinite buffet line so we can say Yes to your good gifts.
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