One of the rich rewards of these expeditions is uncovering the slice of history that breathes fresh meaning into a common word. The mundane english term 'clerk' currently refers to a cashier, or a keeper of official documents – occupations not usually associated with glory or distinction. On this beautiful spring day, however, expect a new infusion of life – both for this word and yourself.
Feel the warm sand slip between your toes as we climb from ancient Israel's Mediterranean coast toward Jerusalem. The sand gives way to soil as we scale the verdant mountains and consume the fresh highland air. Arriving at last in the bustling Jewish capital, we mill slowly through the crowds to a quieter street with a large home, our destination. We climb to an upper room, crammed with over a hundred men and women whose eyes are shining with expectation.
One confident man stands and somberly addresses the assembly. He speaks about the Scripture being fulfilled regarding Judas’ betrayal of Jesus, and that according to the Psalms, a replacement must be chosen. The qualifications? He must have been with apostles the entire time the Lord Jesus was among them. “For one of these men,” he continues, “must become a witness with us of Jesus’ resurrection.”
We realize now that the speaker is Peter, the bold fisherman who became the founder of the Christian church! And we are watching the scene that Luke the physician recorded in the first chapter of the book of Acts – after Jesus’ ascension, but before Pentecost. This is the time of waiting, of preparation.
In response to Peter’s speech, the group unanimously proposes two men, Justus and Matthias. The group prays and asks the Lord to show which man should become the new twelfth apostle. Next comes the pivotal moment that Luke later describes in ancient Greek, the trade language of the Roman Empire: “Then they cast lots, and the lot fell to Matthias” (Acts 1:26a, The Holy Bible, NIV).
The Greek word for “lot” here is klēros – a term that literally refers to the bit of wood, stone, or pottery that was used to represent someone. The lots were put in a bowl, shaken up, and the first one that fell to the ground when the bowl was tipped was the ‘winner.’ Symbolically, though, this same Greek word was used to signify the abstract concepts of portion, share, inheritance, allotment, and place in the fledgling ministry (see Acts 1:17, 8:21, and 26:18).
So Matthias has just received the first klēros, the first official ‘appointment’ in the Christian church – and therefore will become known as the first Christian klērikos: the eyewitness of life-changing events, with the job description of sharing this testimony with the world. But for now, you and I retreat unobtrusively, disappearing from the scene. We trade our sandals for overland boots and we hike toward Europe, centuries morphing past us.
We find evidence, from the spread of the term klērikos, that Matthias and his successors had a “Superman” beginning! In Italy, we hear Latin-speakers using clericus to refer to an ordained priest. A few centuries later and farther northwest, an abbreviated version is common, the Old French clerc. Sailing across the Channel and landing in Britain over a thousand years after Matthias’s initial appointment, we discover that the liturgical Latin preceded us here, gifting our pious linguistic ancestors with the word cleric.
In Old English, as in Old French, verbal efficiency triumphs as cleric is shortened to clerc in reference to the local minister, the one person in the village who can read and write. To the illiterate peasant, the clerc’s ability to write down the baptismal name of his child in the church records is almost magical. The recording of births and deaths, the reading of the mysterious holy book during Mass – the cleric’s literacy, as well as his vocational appointment, sets him apart in the eyes of the people. (I think fondly of the skilled monks who painstakingly copied many manuscripts, both sacred and common, through the Dark Ages and beyond.)
Should it surprise us, then, that as we trade our trekking boots for the tooled slippers of the Renaissance, that the record-keeper in the bank is also being called a clerk? Literacy is the common thread, the key component of the transfer. The tradesman watches the employee bending over a book forming meaningful ciphers with a pen, reminiscent of the scene of the priest at baptism – and applies the same term to signify the shared skill.
Throughout the next few centuries, the orthography varies from ‘clark’ to ‘clerk,’ reflecting speech trends and giving us the now common first name “Clark.” As literacy has spread, the word itself has become ubiquitous. Like Clark Kent, the mild-mannered reporter who chronicles local happenings for The Daily Planet, our modern clerks blend in with the crowd. Faceless fixtures behind counters, they keep our world turning by punching numbers and filing government papers, still tracking births, deaths, titles, deeds.
Now that we have returned to the third millennium, you may ask, where is the revelation? The new infusion of meaning? The Superman sighting? Reflect on what we have just experienced, and you may come up with your own.
The way I see it, the ability to tell your own story makes you a klērikos. Are you letting someone else decide your history? Will your sacred moments be forgotten? Or are you rising to the glorious occupation of chronicling what you have seen and heard? Are you using your powers of literacy to determine what future generations will know of you, of your time, of your people?
Find your pen (or your keyboard). The lot falls to you.
From one clerk to another,
Ety
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