Scripture (Mark 6:14-29) can be found here…
The song was released one month before I graduated from high school, and shot up the charts so that, by July, everyone was singing it, dancing to it, and among those of us who were now Holy Spirit High School alumnae, laughing and talking about it. [ “Only the Good Die Young” was not exactly a love song from a boy to a girl, it was more like a “come on, you know you want to” song. By today’s standards it’s almost quaint, even innocent. “I might as well be the one,” he pleads. But in the summer of 1978, my friends and I were raising our eyebrows at it—ever so briefly—even as we danced to it and bought the album, if we hadn’t already.
It’s a fascinating argument to make: if “only the good die young,” it makes sense to ease your morals or ethics, and not worry so much if you’re not walking the straight and narrow. But it’s a fallacy—we know it’s not true. We know that people of every kind die at every age. So, what do we mean when we say it? Aside from, you know, what Billy Joel has in mind?
It’s understandable that some think the saying originates with scripture. But this is another instance in which we can thank the ancient Greeks for the sentiment: Herodotus, the Greek historian who chronicled the Greco-Persian wars, wrote the proverb in the year 445 BCE, telling this story:
A mother wanted to attend a festival honoring the goddess Hera, but her oxen had gone missing. So her young sons hitched themselves to the cart, and carried their mother where she wanted to go. Once she arrived, grateful for their kindness, the mother went to Hera’s temple and to the goddess to give her sons the greatest gift anyone could receive. The boys fell asleep instantly, and never got up again. Herodotus concluded, “Whom the gods love dies young.” The modern version of this would be “God must have wanted another angel in heaven,” which, really, is an insult to God. Such a god would be cruel, a monster, undeserving of our worship and praise.
Herodotus wrote about war, though, and it is a feature of war that the young and strong are the ones in military service, and so, who often die in numbers disproportionate to the rest of the population. Nations tend to revere those who serve, and so the proverb lives on, that only the good die young.
In the decade after the First World War, known then as the Great War, because no one would have believed in 1928 that the world would turn around and do it again, Edna St. Vincent-Millay wrote her poem “Dirge Without Music.” I can’t think of a more haunting expression of outrage at the loss of a loved one. Given the time frame in which it was composed, I know the worldwide shock at the loss of so many young soldiers was still keenly felt. The poet is indignant at the possibility that grief should not be felt or expressed.
I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the hard ground.
So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been, time out of mind:
Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely. Crowned
With lilies and with laurel they go; but I am not resigned.
Lovers and thinkers, into the earth with you.
Be one with the dull, the indiscriminate dust.
A fragment of what you felt, of what you knew,
A formula, a phrase remains,—but the best is lost.
The answers quick and keen, the honest look, the laughter, the love,—
They are gone. They are gone to feed the roses. Elegant and curled
Is the blossom. Fragrant is the blossom. I know. But I do not approve.
More precious was the light in your eyes than all the roses in the world.
Down, down, down into the darkness of the grave
Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind;
Quietly they go, the intelligent, the witty, the brave.
I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.
For those of us who know grief, those of us who have lost our dear ones far too soon, this poem reminds us that our grief is precious, and should be honored. Period.
In our reading from the gospel of Mark we read of a death of which Jesus surely did not approve, and to which he was not resigned. John the Baptist, according to one gospel, was Jesus’ cousin. More importantly, John seems to have been instrumental in inspiring Jesus to launch his ministry. Mark’s gospel opens with John’s words calling all people to change their ways. Within a few verses Jesus stands in the Jordan River, receives John’s baptism in its muddy waters, and hears the voice of God blessing him on his way.
But now, in chapter 6, we are told that John has been executed, and we get to the story of it in a strange, circuitous way. This passage comes right after the mission of the twelve, when Jesus sends his disciples out to teach and heal and cast out demons. Apparently their mission has been quite successful, and word about Jesus has reached Herod, who doesn’t even wonder, but simply states it: John, whom I beheaded, has been raised.
Herod’s an interesting character. He is portrayed as one who genuinely likes John, who is interested in John, while also bowing to family pressure to put him in prison. He admires John. He knows John is a good man, a holy man. But in the end, he beheads him, essentially, so that he won’t be publicly embarrassed at his own birthday party. A big reason the good die young has to do with people like Herod, who can’t see beyond their own immediate access to power and privilege, and who, perhaps a bit regretfully, have to admit: they’d rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints.
But God insists on the last word in this conversation. Isaiah tells us where God is in all this. God’s intention for humanity is such a deep renewal of our world that it will be like a new heaven and a new earth, a place of joy, a place where there is no more weeping. Isaiah writes,
No more shall there be in it
an infant that lives but a few days,
or an old person who does not live out a lifetime;
for one who dies at a hundred years will be considered a youth,
and one who falls short of a hundred will be considered accursed. ~Isaiah 65:20
The God who lovingly spoke all the universe into being, and who created human beings to enjoy and care for the earth, is not a god who plucks people like flowers to adorn heaven. That’s a god who sounds a lot more like Herod, for whom the decision to execute a prophet seems to have come as easily as choosing the wine for his party.
None of us is untouched by loss. And none of us is beyond the healing touch of the One who made us to thrive, to have life, and to have it abundantly. As Jesus took time to grieve, so must we, because that is the way we honor love. To love is to be vulnerable to grief. But the only alternative is never to love. God does not ask that we approve. God does not ask that we be resigned. God does ask that we might continue, even in our grief, to trust in God’s love, which holds all things together, and which, in the end, heals us.
Thanks be to God. Amen.