Since the economy of salvation is on my mind (after yesterday’s post), I want to touch on it again. I also want to flush out or deepen one of the intuitions of the spiritual family of Charles de Foucauld. The central theme that I want to flesh out is that of the “grain of wheat that dies”.

I’ve referenced the “grain of wheat that dies” before (for example, here). I think it’s a theme that’s important to anyone who, in some way or another is following or inspired by Blessed Charles de Foucauld. Charles wrote,

If the grain of wheat that has fallen into the ground does not die, it remains alone. If it dies, it bears much fruit. I have not died, and so I remain alone… Pray for my conversion so that in dying I may bear fruit.

He interpreted Jesus’ words simply and literally for himself. He had not died, interiorly, enough. He means a death in line with the “interiorized martyrdom” that Saint Diadochos spoke of: death to all that is not from God. And his idea is fully contemplative in its scope: if he becomes united with Jesus, he will bear fruit.

But there’s a lot more in the context of Saint John’s Gospel than this.

Just looking at the context makes the complexities appear.

First, note that Jesus has just been welcomed, riding on the back of a donkey, to the refrain,

Hosanna!
Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord –
the King of Israel! (Jn 12:13)

He is recognized as the king of Israel. He is indeed Israel, in the fulfilment of the Scriptures and the non-abolishment of what the Patriarchs and the Prophets saw and were promised.

Then, we get this snippet:

Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. (Jn 12:20–22)

There were some Greeks, that is, some Gentiles at the festival, too. They were from the nations (גוים); they were not Hebrews. They wanted to see Jesus, who has been hailed as king of the Jews. So what do they do? They approach one of Jesus’ (Jewish) disciples from Galilee – that is, from beyond Israel, from that backwater of the גוים, “Galilee of the Gentiles” (1 Macc 5:15; Mt 4:15). The people of the nations (גוים) go to someone they can listen to and speak to, but someone on the inside still, someone who is still a Hebrew.

This is when Jesus says,

The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. (Jn 12:23–25)

In context, it is clear. The single grain is the house of Israel, the lineage of Abraham through Isaac and the people freed from Egypt. It isn’t anything else. What is “much fruit” that this grain’s death will bring? The bringing of the fruits of Israel to the nations – abundant fruit of which Saint Paul writes,

They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises; to them belong the patriarchs, and from them, according to the flesh, comes the Messiah, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen. (Rom 9:4–5)

In the economy of salvation that God wrote into history, these gifts were made to one people first. The rest were only grafted in (as in Rom 11) to these gifts.

Only if Israel dies do the Gentiles (the “nations”, גוים) get fruit. Only if Israel is free enough to die can the Hebraic tree flower beyond one people.

Who is Israel? Jesus fulfils all that is Israel, all that is

the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises…

He has interiorized the whole Law because he himself is the Law and the Law-giver. Not one stroke of a letter of the law shall pass away (Mt 5:18), because Jesus Christ is Lord forever and ever.

The meaning of the “grain of wheat that dies” is profoundly linked to the actual, real, God-chosen economy of salvation: there is an original and still existing root; the Gentles come second to the mysteries; they are grafted on to this original and still existing root. The root was chosen gratuitously. The grafts were made gratuitously. It is for each to know his place – his place truly gratuitous and gracefully given – and love God all the same.

If, for any reason, we doubted this reading of the economy of salvation in Jesus’ words about the grain of wheat, there is yet another confirmation. Just a few verses later, Jesus says, again referencing his death,

And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself. (Jn 12:32)

It’s like getting hit over and over again with God’s free plan, with the economy of salvation, and with one’s place as a Gentile (if one happens to be one): Gentiles want to see Jesus. What does Jesus say? I must die, and then the riches of the kingdom can be given to all, even the גוים, who have not come to Israel, the Abrahamic root, though the promise to Abraham was for a multitude of nations (Gen 17:4–5) from the very beginning.

If anyone claims not to see in “the grain of wheat” a clear declaration of the place of Gentiles in the historical plan – though, of course, this does not make us Gentiles less loved – then is either terribly naive or has not dealt with the lingering anti-Semitism that tempts the heart of the Gentile and threatens to throw the Gentile Christian back into paganism? Not sure. Worth asking. Worth seeing. Worth loving.

– –

So where does that leave Brother Charles’ reading of the grain of wheat?

I think there is nothing wrong with it. It just needs to be put in its historical place. It needs to be deepened. It is not sufficient unto itself.

The idea of the grain of wheat dying is profoundly and intimately linked to the idea of neighbours and, in particular, neighbours who have not been (at least visibly) grafted onto the “root”. The root is the Hebraic root. And the Church subsists of it. For the Christian, it is natural – very natural! – to read the “grain of wheat” in the light of bringing Jesus to “the nations”. That’s exactly what Jesus meant. The difference is that Jesus is both an Israelite and Israel. Most of us Christians, us Gentile Christians, are neither. The neighbours to whom we can bring light and love by our “death” are those who have not heard or understood the Gospel. (This Brother Charles understood well.) But for the Gentile Christian, they are usually Gentiles like himself.

In its essence, our (interior) “death” has the same goal as Jesus’ death. But as regards the historical plan, it is important to recognize what Jesus was actually saying. It can only deepen our appreciation of our vocation.