“Truth, Lord; yet the little dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters’ table”

“Little dogs,” an intriguing term. Dogs are rarely mentioned in the Scriptures and rarely in a positive light. Sinners are said to be like dogs returning to their vomit, an image of our besetting sins; dogs lick the blood of Jezebel, another unattractive yet compelling image. To call someone a dog in the Old Testament was to suggest that they were worthless; in short, an insult. In Revelation or as in Philippians we are told: “Look out for the dogs … for the evil-workers.” Dogs, it seems, are evil. Don’t ask about cats. None here!

Isaiah speaks of “dumb dogs [that] cannot bark” (Is. 56.10), criticizing the watchmen, the leaders of Israel. More than a thousand years later that phrase was turned on its head to become an image for dogs as preachers, meaning dogs that do bark and, indeed, bark incessantly against “foxes and wolves,” the heretics that threaten “the sheep,” the faithful, as Gregory the Great imagines. Preaching as barking?! Just saying.

Several centuries later after him, it became an image for the Ordo Praedicatorum, St. Dominic’s Order of Preachers, later known as Dominicans, sometimes wrongly punned as the Domini Canes, the dogs of the Lord. But that is just bad Latin, a mistaken translation, and not historical except as an insult; in short, another myth. There is, however, nothing mythical about the dog with the flaming torch as the symbol of the Dominican order. And scripturally, at least in terms of the Old Testament Apocryphal or Deuterocanonical Book of Tobias or Tobit, Tobias’ dog is mentioned twice as accompanying him.

It is the sole biblical instance of dogs viewed as faithful and loyal companions much like Odysseus’s dog, Argos, in the Odyssey. He alone recognises his master, though disguised as a beggar in his return to reclaim Ithaca, and then dies but without betraying him. Seeing Argos brings tears to Odysseus’ eyes. It is a touching scene. As Homer beautifully puts it, “Argos passed into the darkness of death, now that he had fulfilled his destiny of faith and seen his master once more after twenty years”.

In the New Testament, there are the dogs that are the companions of Lazarus who lies at the gate of Dives, the rich man, “full of sores, and desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man’s table”. The dogs “came and licked his sores”. A moving image of compassion and care. No doubt, they, too, desired to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man’s table which is the insight of this most powerful and yet disturbing story. Silence and rebuke and finally insult give way to mercy and grace. But how hard, how disturbing this must seem! The breakthrough moment is this remarkable woman’s last statement to Jesus: “Truth, Lord, yet the little dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters’ table”. Little dogs.

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“I am the vine, ye are the branches”

One cannot think about St. Matthias without thinking about Judas and the betrayals of our own hearts. He is the disciple chosen by lot and by prayer to take the place of “the traitor Judas,” as the Collect says, and so to be of the number of the twelve Apostles. Yet this is a real blessing for it opens us out to the grace of God which is greater than our hearts of betrayal. Out of Judas’ betrayal comes Matthias’ faithfulness.

All we know is about his being chosen as the lesson from Acts tells us. About his ministry and personality, we know nothing. That is in keeping with the Scriptures as a whole which does not cater very much to our modern inclinations towards psychological and sociological assessments of human character, not to mention the gossip that goes viral on social media as a result. In contrast, we are given a theological account and one which complements the inward journey of the soul in Lent. The theme of betrayal goes to the heart of human sin; our betrayal of God and ourselves, the betrayal of love, as Augustine’s On Christian Doctrine helps us to understand.

The theology that we confront here is the theology of substitution, the theology of atonement as belonging to the logic of redemption. Matthias takes the place of Judas. Why does he have to be replaced? Judas betrayed Christ and out of remorse killed himself. Why not just carry on sans Judas? Because of a larger consideration that swirls around the number twelve. The twelve apostles look back to the twelve tribes of Israel and ahead to the Apostolic foundation of the Church. We are part of something more and greater than ourselves, namely, the community of redeemed sinners in the “One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.”

Peter’s address to the disciples and Mary happens in the same Upper Room where at the Last Supper Jesus spoke of his betrayal by one of the disciples. Peter here quotes a verse from Psalm 69 and from Psalm 109, (verses which unfortunately and rather perversely are omitted from our 1962 Prayer Book), that speak directly to the desolation of Judas’ betrayal, on the one hand, and to the idea of another taking up his office, his episcopé, on the other hand. He mandates a feature of apostolicity, namely, choosing one from among those “which have companied with us” during the time of Jesus’s ministry, one who is to be “ordained to be a witness with us of his resurrection.” Apostolic ministry is grounded in Apostolic witness and doctrine.

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