The very first word that God pronounces is "Let there be light…"". The narrator makes a simple and punctual observation to follow this first word, "and there was light" (Gen 1,3).

A dialogical being constituted by the couple "male and female flows from this intra-divine dialogue " (Gen 1,27).

This gratuity emerges with similar clarity from the second narration of creation, in which the Lord God plants a lush garden of delights and places in it the man he had moulded from the soil (cf Gen 2,8-15). In front of this creature located in the midst of a splendid garden where nothing is missing, God observes that anyhow there is a lacuna, "It is not good that the man should be alone" (2,18) and creates every kind of animals. However - the narrator states - "for Adam there was not found any help to meet for him." (2,20)

At this point God causes a deep sleep on Adam and from his side He draws the woman and takes her to him. Seeing this creature, for the first time, the man opens his mouth to explode in the astonished and ecstatic exclamation, "'This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh " (2,23a). After receiving every kind of gifts, the man finds in front of him this being in whom he recognises himself and who is the most sublime gift that his Creator could ever offer to him.

Just as the history of the cosmos flows from the gratuitous act of our Creator, similarly the history of the chosen people, that is salvation history in favour of the entire humanity, starts with a gratuitous action of the Lord who chooses a man at an age in which we would expect nothing else from life, to promise a land of his own to him and a numerous progeny (See: Gen 12,1-4; 15,1-19; 17,6-8; 18,10-14).

When these promises were made to him for the first time, this man had accomplished absolutely nothing meritorious. Therefore, it is the matter of gifts that are promised to him because of a free decision, wholly gratuitous and unconditional, as Paul will underline in his Letter to the Romans, 4,1-25: Abram was credited with justice "independently from the works" (Rom. 4, 6).

This promise will be realised progressively in the history of Abram’s descendents, up to the moment in which, before the situation of Israel’s children in Egypt, the Lord declares, "I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt, and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters, for I know their sorrows.

I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land to a good and large land, to a land flowing with milk and honey " (Exodus: 3,7-8).

When the people will reach the threshold of the promised land, Moses will pronounce these words, "The LORD did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in number than any people; for ye were the fewest of all people: But because the LORD loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers" (Dt 7,7-8).

The motive of the divine election is not to be found in any peculiar quality of the people of Israel, but solely in the love of God, and love has no other motivation if not in itself, "Love is sufficient unto itself; it is a merit and reward to itself; I love because I love; I love to the end of loving" (Bernardo di Chiaravalle, Sermons on the Song of songs, LXXXIII 4).

The love of the Lord for Israel will always be characterised by this gratuity, as it is constantly reminded by the prophets along the path of our tormented history..

In our human society, the relation endowed of greater gratuity is that of the father and mother towards their children. The fatherly and motherly love is normally unconditional; the father loves his son because he is his own son, that is all; he gives himself totally to him without expecting anything in return. This is the metaphor that the sacred writers use when they speak of God’s love towards Israel.

The prophet Isaiah speaks of divine love by comparing it to that of a mother, putting the question,

"Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne?" (Is 49,15a). Even if such an unnatural mother existed, the Lord declares, " I will never forget you" (49,15b).

The prophet Jeremiah, after remembering the iniquity and sins of the people (See Ger 30,14) and the consequence in the homeland, declares the motive of this gesture of mercy, "Since I am a father for Israel, Ephraim is my firstborn child" (Jeremiah: 30,9). In the same context, he reiterates , " Is not Ephraim my dear son, the child in whom I delight? Though I often speak against him, I still remember him. Therefore my heart yearns for him; I have great compassion for him," declares the LORD" (Jeremiah: 31,20).

We have the same language in the prophet Hosea, "When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt. I taught Ephraim also to go, taking them by their arms; but they knew not that I healed them. I drew them with cords of a man, with bands of love: and I was to them as those that take off the yoke on their jaws, and I laid meat unto them. " (Os 11,1.3-4). This fatherly love of God is obstinate and unalterable, though the people of Israel is ungrateful towards Him. It is the matter of a love endowed with such a gratuity as only a father and a mother can understand.

There was a man, David, son of Iesse, who was chosen to become king of Israel, because the Lord considered him to be "according to his heart" (1 Psalm , 14). David will always act in a gratuitous way even towards his most bitter enemies. We remember the episode in which Saul, who pursued him to kill him, fell in the hands of David, who saved his life, " This day you have seen with your own eyes how the LORD delivered you into my hands in the cave. Some urged me to kill you, but I spared you; I said, 'I will not lift my hand against my master, because he is the LORD'S anointed. ‘See, my father, look at this piece of your robe in my hand! I cut off the corner of your robe but did not kill you. Now understand and recognize that I am not guilty of wrongdoing or rebellion. I have not wronged you, but you are hunting me down to take my life. ¹² May the LORD judge between you and me. And may the LORD avenge the wrongs you have done to me, but my hand will not touch you. ¹³ As the old saying goes, 'From evildoers come evil deeds,' so my hand will not touch you " (1 Sam 24,11-12).

Though Saul acts as a furious enemy against David, this keeps on calling him "my father" and "my lord" and refuses to harm him when he has the occasion of doing it, considering Saul to be untouchable, anointed by the Lord. In this case David acts in a spirit of total gratuity towards his enemy and proves to be truly a man according to the heart of God.

Another episode in the life of Israel’s Sovereign is the rebellion of his son Absalom, who wants to become king at his place. (See 2S am 15,10). David is compelled to flee away before his son and the allies of his son (See: 2S am 15,13-14). However, when they carry to him the news that the rebel had died and invited him to rejoice, having the Lord freed him from those who were against him, on the contrary David, shouted loudly, "My son, Absalom, Absalom, my son!" (2S am 19,1). This poignant scene opens a glimpse on the king’s fatherly love, who was chosen because of his being according to the heart of the Lord".

We can say that the entire New Testament is nothing but the proclamation of the Good News of the totally gratuitous love of God, who sends His Son to save humanity. Being our contribution limited, we must select some more meaningful texts on this regard.

After instituting the twelve apostles (See: Mt 10,1-4), Jesus sends them to preach the Kingdom with the signs that accompany the proclamation, "Heal the infirm, raise the dead, purify the lepers, chase away the devils" (Mt 10,8), then he adds, "Give gratuitously what gratuitously you have received" (10,8b). This sentence can be extended to all the baptised believers, who have received a gratis salvation and are called to behave gratuitously with their brothers, especially with the weaker ones, who have received less from life.

Jesus educates his own to gratuity recommending the man who had offered Him a banquet to invite "the poor, the lame and the blind" (Luke: 14,13) declaring that he would be blessed because these poor people have nothing to return. The Master instructs his own with his example, because, "the Son of man has not come to be served, but to serve and to give up His life as ransom for many" (Mc 10,45).

There is an episode, before the institution of the Eucharist – in which Jesus will gratuitously donate his Body and Blood for all men and women- that highlights the totally gratuitous gesture of a woman, whom John identifies with Mary, sister of Lazarus (See John, 12,3). They narrate that she broke a small pot of alabaster and poured the pure nard perfume on the head of Jesus (See Mt 26,6-13; Mc 14,3-9) or on His feet (John 12,1-8). As we know, the disciples flared on seeing this act, which for them was a "wastage" (Mc 14,4). Jesus, instead, appreciated the gesture of the woman and pronounced about her words that re-echo those which would accompany the institution of the Eucharist: "In truth I tell you: wherever this Gospel will be proclaimed, all over the world, in her memory they will say what she has done " (Mc 14,9).

Paul of Tarsus could be defined as "The Apostle of gratuity". Nobody like him has been able to bring to evidence the total gratuity of salvation offered by God in Christ Jesus to us. In his letter to the Romans, 3, 23 – 24, he underlines that "all of us have sinned and are deprived of God’s glory, but we are justified gratuitously by His grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus".

The Apostle has so much carved in his heart the total gratuity of God’s love in Jesus Christ as from the Damascus event onward he spent his life at the service of the Gospel without any saving and without expecting anything in return; "What is the reward I deserve? This one: that by proclaiming the Gospel, I may offer the Gospel gratuitously, without availing myself of the right that the Gospel gives me" (1 Corinth : 9,18). "Was it a sin for me to lower myself in order to elevate you by preaching the Gospel of God to you free of charge?" (2 Cor 11,7).

In our path we started from the first pages of the Bible from where God’s "gratuity" in creation emerges. Now we arrive in the last pages in which for the last time the notion of "gratuity" (free of charge), in the promise of Him who sits on the Throne, emerges as the promise of Him who sits on the throne (See Ap 21,5) and who proclaims, "I shall give gratuitously a drink from the font of the living water" (Ap 21,6). This promise resounds in the conclusive verses of the book as an invitation, "Let he who is thirsty come; let him take gratuitously the water of life " (Ap 22,17). In this way the invitation of Isaiah 55,1, is definitively realised in a perfect way, "Oh all of you who are thirsty come to the water, you who have no money, come, buy and eat milk and wine without paying anything ". The Lord God, who has given up his life to man and all the creatures (See Gen 1-2), offers his life definitively, symbolised by water in a super-abundant way, "Everything is accomplished, I am the Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the End. I shall give a drink free of charge from the font of living water to him who is thirst " (Ap 21,6).

Out of all the baptised, the consecrated person is called in particular to be in the world a sign and instrument of God’s free love towards all His creatures, gratuitously donating afresh what he has gratuitously received.

Cristina Caracciolo smr
Biblista
Via Lagrange, 3 - 00197 Roma