By chhotebhai
Kanpur, September 18, 2026: Pardon my penchant for words. On a more serious note, like a moth to the flame, I have a fatal attraction to the Word, the Word made flesh, Jesus, the Word, and “the Word was God” (Jn 1:10). I had been mulling over these thoughts from the 5th September when we celebrated Teacher’s Day.
I received several cute WhatsApp forwards. My message was different. I had written, “Jesus had now finished what he wanted to say and his teaching made a great impression on the people because he taught them with authority unlike their own scribes” (Mat 7:28-29). I ended by saying “May Jesus the Sadguru, ever inspire us this Teacher’s day”.
It made me think (I sometimes do)! Why was Jesus the Teacher contrasted with the Scribes? Who were they? Why did they oppose Jesus tooth and nail? Before I delve deeper into the scribes let me explain my choice of words in the title.
Today by scribe we normally understand a writer, journalist or reporter; an endangered species in totalitarian regimes as in India, Russia or the USA.
Scribbling means jotting down in haste; usually when somebody is speaking, so as not to miss an important point.
Scrabble is an indoor game where the players use tiles with alphabets to make words and score points over their opponents.
Scramble is my favourite form of egg for breakfast, using cream or butter. It is also the term used to describe fighter pilots rushing to their aircrafts in the event of an emergency. Other than the eggs, all four words have much to tell us.
We shall begin with the scribe. Its present connotation is very different from what it was in Jesus’ time. The Dictionary of the Bible by Rev John L. Mackenzie SJ gives a historical perspective (pgs 779-781). The scribe was a writer who emerged when writing itself began.
According to the Jerome Biblical Commentary (74:48) this was during the Neolithic or Early Bronze Age circa 3200 BC in Iran and Warka. Let us study what the Dictionary says about scribes and then draw some inferences.
“The complicated systems of writing, both in Egypt and Mesopotamia, made it difficult for more than a few to master their skills”.
So point number one is that Scribes were an exclusive class. “The kings, officers and merchants were themselves illiterate hence depended on their scribes for all the vital information they needed for their decisions.
The Scribe thus was the only one who was in control of the information”. Notice how that exclusiveness now leads to control of information and power in decision making. This, in turn, led to “class snobbery, the Scribe knew his opportunities and spoke with contempt of those who lacked those opportunities”.
Note the progression – exclusivity – control – power – snobbery, or a superiority complex, looking down on the unlettered. Remember the word cleric means clerk, or one who can read and write. In contrast the laity, coming from the Greek word layous, that means the common man, devoid of knowledge or power.
It is these power leverages that influence decision making in the Church; despite all the blah-blah about synodality (walking together). The Catholic Church in particular reveled in holding a hierarchical position of authority.
This position of superiority is what best-selling author Steven D Levitt in his book “Freakonomics” describes:
“As the world has grown more specialized, countless such experts have made themselves indispensible. Doctors, lawyers, consultants, stock brokers, auto mechanics, financial planners; they all enjoy a gigantic informational advantage”.
This is also described as the coign of vantage, a term used by Shakespeare in Macbeth, to describe a bird perched high up, having a view that those on the ground don’t.
The best contemporary example of this is the Kargil War of 1999 when the Bharatiya Janata Party was in power. Pakistani forces had occupied the hill tops like Tiger Hill and strafed the brave Indian soldiers struggling up the steep slopes.
It was only when the Indian Air Force fighter jets scrambled and strafed the hill tops, as also the much maligned 155 mm Bofors shoot and scoot artillery guns came into action, that the coign of vantage was neutralized and the infantry could capture the hill tops.
As in Kargil, this coign of vantage is an opportunity that can be misused. Even wise and powerful kings like David and Solomon were highly dependent on the informational advantage of the Scribes as they “compiled the traditions and beliefs of Israel”.
It was the Prophet Jeremiah who smelt a rat and proclaimed “How can you say, we are wise since we have Yahweh’s law. Look how it has been falsified by the lying pen of the scribes” (Jer 8:8).
Another important take away is that the illiterate or incompetent rulers depended heavily on the knowledge of the scribes. In India, Akbar and Birbal is a classic example. In modern India it is the bureaucrats who have assumed this role.
In his book “What Ails the IAS and Why it Fails to Deliver” Naresh Saxena, himself a former top level bureaucrat, candidly admits “Bureaucrats formulate long term policy and politicians responsible for high level government decide postings and transfers” (Pg 14). [Editor’s note: The Indian Administrative Service (IAS) is the premier administrative arm of the All India Services of Government of India.]
This is because “politicians were generally in awe of the high caliber and incorruptibility of the IAS officers and left their management by and large to the service itself” (Pg 10).
Be it church or society, a familiar pattern emerges. Never mind divide and rule. Retain information/ knowledge and rule.
This is why it is claimed that Lord Thomas Macauly’s pattern of education was to raise an army of babus who only obeyed the master’s orders without thinking for themselves.
A recent aspirant for an army officer fell at the final hurdle when he was told, “You are too intelligent for the army”! Do we follow the same yardstick while recruiting aspirants to our seminaries and novitiates?
In his time Jesus’ main opposition came from the knowledgeable scribes. Jesus’ approach, circumventing the letter of the Law, which was their forte, would have led to the crumbling of their hegemony and control over the aam aadmi (common man).
Jesus accused them of imposing heavy burdens through their rigorous interpretation of the Law (cf Mat 23:2, 13-15). He rebuked them for their external piety and pompousness (cf Lk 20:46).
On their part the scribes challenged Jesus’ authority (cf (Mk 11:27), accused him of violating the Sabbath (cf Lk 6:7), then conspired to kill him (cf Mat 16:21) and finally mocked him on the cross (cf Mat 27:41).
Don’t look for Satan with red eyes, long horns and a whip like tail. Those who opposed Jesus were rather the self-appointed guardians of the Law, the sab janta wallahs, who abused their coign of vantage to establish a form of religion that perpetuated their hegemony.
Language was the preferred weapon of control. It fell to St Jerome in the 4th century CE to translate the biblical texts from Hebrew and Greek to Latin. But the real information explosion came with the invention of the printing press by Johannes Gutenberg in Germany in 1440.
This was followed closely by Martin Luther’s Reformation, also in Germany, in 1517. The Bible now became accessible to the aam aadmi, transforming Christianity from devotional practices to a more scriptural form of discipleship. In the Catholic Church this climaxed with the Second Vatican Council (1962-65).
Just as with the scribes in Jesus’ time, those in power and authority today covertly resent the reforms of Vatican II. They have also successfully aborted Pope Francis’ attempts at synodality (walking together). Nobody surrenders power voluntarily.
So how does one tip the scales? Either by reducing the weight on one side (as in the violent French Revolution); or by upping the ante on the other side, through dissemination of knowledge, as advocated by Dr Ambedkar.
Do we now see the significance of the words scribble, scrabble and scramble? We should be on the buzzer to record everything that is happening around us (scribble).
We need to piece together random events or developments to make a complete picture (scrabble); and we need to be ever watchful to respond at short notice like the fighter pilots (scramble). Else we could have scrambled eggs on our faces!
So if we are true disciples of Jesus, and love the Church, let us become modern day scribes, fearless writers, or prophets that are willing to risk speaking up to those in power. For Jesus the Sadguru spoke and taught with power and authority.
(The writer is the Convenor of the Indian Catholic Forum)