The Free Thinker

"It is Hard for Thee to Kick Against the Pricks"

When Jesus appeared to Paul on the road to Damascus, the words he used were rather metaphor than parable, but exhibit the same genius for using simple physical imagery to convey truths that go deep into the heart.  Like a ripple that spreads out to the very edges of a lake, the phrase fills the mind with more wisdom and wonder the more one thinks about it.  Here is the story, from Acts chapter 9:

 ¹And Saul, yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, went unto the high priest,

 ²And desired of him letters to Damascus to the synagogues, that if he found any of this way, whether they were men or women, he might bring them bound unto Jerusalem.

 ³And as he journeyed, he came near Damascus: and suddenly there shined round about him a light from heaven:

 ⁴And he fell to the earth, and heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?

 ⁵And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks.

 ⁶And he trembling and astonished said, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go into the city, and it shall be told thee what thou must do.

 ⁷And the men which journeyed with him stood speechless, hearing a voice, but seeing no man.

 ⁸And Saul arose from the earth; and when his eyes were opened, he saw no man: but they led him by the hand, and brought him into Damascus.

 ⁹And he was three days without sight, and neither did eat nor drink.

 ¹⁰And there was a certain disciple at Damascus, named Ananias; and to him said the Lord in a vision, Ananias. And he said, Behold, I am here, Lord.

 ¹¹And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go into the street which is called Straight, and enquire in the house of Judas for one called Saul, of Tarsus: for, behold, he prayeth,

 ¹²And hath seen in a vision a man named Ananias coming in, and putting his hand on him, that he might receive his sight.

 ¹³Then Ananias answered, Lord, I have heard by many of this man, how much evil he hath done to thy saints at Jerusalem:

 ¹⁴And here he hath authority from the chief priests to bind all that call on thy name.

 ¹⁵But the Lord said unto him, Go thy way: for he is a chosen vessel unto me, to bear my name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel:

 ¹⁶For I will shew him how great things he must suffer for my name's sake.

 ¹⁷And Ananias went his way, and entered into the house; and putting his hands on him said, Brother Saul, the Lord, even Jesus, that appeared unto thee in the way as thou camest, hath sent me, that thou mightest receive thy sight, and be filled with the Holy Ghost.

 ¹⁸And immediately there fell from his eyes as it had been scales: and he received sight forthwith, and arose, and was baptized.

 ¹⁹And when he had received meat, he was strengthened. Then was Saul certain days with the disciples which were at Damascus.

 ²⁰And straightway he preached Christ in the synagogues, that he is the Son of God.

The narrator here is Luke, and the style informative but rather artless.  Certainly the prose does not distract the reader from the events described with its own eloquence of poetry.  Of course, these events and the whole of Paul's life reflect the meaning of the vision in a way that invites the reader to think about it more deeply.  Jesus apparently says nothing by way of persuasion other than that phrase: "It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks." 

Perhaps Jesus said more and it did not make its way into the account.  If Acts was really written by Luke, the author would have known Paul first-hand, but Paul himself may not have remembered everything.  Certainly, at key moments in my own life, when crucial conversations took place, my memory never suffices to reproduce whole conversations.  Generally only the key phrases linger in my mind, and those are probably edited to be more apt than they really were, with the stumblings of human thinking and mis-speaking smoothed away and the situation rendered more ideal than it was.  Of course, many Christian faithful believe that the writing and compilation of the Bible was a historical process protected by the Holy Spirit, which might imply that the text should be more accurate than my recollection of scenes from, say, my own casual memories.  Even without appeal to any supernatural intervention after the vision itself, it seems likely that Jesus spoke those words to Paul, but it would not reduce the accuracy of the text-- which describes the lives of many people over many years in a few dozen pages and so is necessarily condensed to the point of telegraphic-- to suggest that Jesus may have said more than was written, which might help to account for the transformative effect of the vision on Paul.  In any case, that phrase-- "It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks"-- seems to be what Paul remembered.

It is a violent metaphor.  To think about it is painful.  And yet it is not even a reproach.  It is for Paul's own sake, not for that of Jesus Himself nor for that of the persecuted believers, that Jesus asks him to change.  If we unpack the metaphor a bit more, the "kicking" seems to mean persecution but what is meant by the "pricks?"  If the "pricks" are the church, it is significant that they are iron: hence the futility of kicking them.  Neither Saul (who became Paul) nor Nero and Diocletian nor Muhammad nor Stalin could destroy the church.  But it seems to me that Paul came later to see the Jewish law as "the pricks," and his youthful pharisaism a futile kicking against them, from which the Lord's call freed him.  All his writings are infused with a sense of joy and liberation in Christ to which the phrase by which Jesus called him seems to be the key.

Since Paul understood Jesus, one wants to ask Did Paul feel what he was doing to be "kicking against the pricks?"  Did he feel the pain and perversity of it?  If so, why was he doing it?  And yet we see all around us careerists or addicts in pursuit of obsessions that are both wicked and futile.  The drunk knows that the next drink, the politician knows that the next office, the conqueror knows that the next city stormed, will not quell the demon within that drives him to pursue it.  How many of us kick against the pricks, and in how many different ways?  I cannot seem to do justice even to the thoughts in my own mind about the phrase, let alone to the phrase itself, but I find it to be a marvelous expression of divine wisdom and love.

"Mental Thieves"

From Matthew 6:19-21:

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal.  But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.  For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

St. John of Kronstadt, in his book My Life in Christ, writes:

Here in this world of vanities, in this adulterous and sinful world, our souls and bodies are continually and often imperceptibly corrupted "by moth and rust, and thieves [mental ones] break through and steal" the treasures of the soul, that is: "righteousness and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost."  What is, then, the true remedy against the continual, sinful corruption of these mental thieves?  The prayer of repentance and of faith.  It revives and vivifies our souls, corrupted by seductive carnal desires, and drives away the mental thieves; it is a scourge for them, whilst for us it is the source of power, life and salvation...

I am fascinated by St. John's concept of "mental thieves."  One of the mysteries of this life is that at times our imaginations are capable of such sublime acts of creation, and our hearts of such joyous moods, yet these are constantly being invaded by distractions.  If I were to catalogue all my thoughts in a day, and appraise rationally whether they were worth thinking about, I suspect that 90% of them would be insignificant, often tedious and repetitive, a senseless gnawing on this or that trivial grudge or pet peeve, things that if I could only forget them would not matter at all.  And this is how I spend the greater part of my life!  And yet I know that I am capable of thoughts so much better, which could benefit myself, or others, or both!  Perhaps this is part of what Our Lord meant when he spoke of burying our talents in the earth: letting our minds, which are capable of such glorious works of reason and imagination, sink into swamps of trivial resentments and worries and casuistries.