Matthew 13-14 "The Sound of Silence"

Back to the memory faults (intended) for this one. Here's a link to the fellas the way I remember them. Good audio, but out of sync. I still want to play guitar like Paul Simon.

The Sound of Silence

Simon & Garfunkel

Hello darkness, my old friend,
I've come to talk with you again,
Because a vision softly creeping,
Left its seeds while I was sleeping,
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence.

In restless dreams I walked alone
Narrow streets of cobblestone.
'Neath the halo of a street lamp,
I turned my collar to the cold and damp,
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light
That split the night,
And touched the sound of silence.

And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more.
People talking without speaking.
People hearing without listening.
People writing songs that voices never share
And no one dared
Disturb the sound of silence.

"Fools" said I, "You do not know
Silence like a cancer grows.
Hear my words that I might teach you,
Take my arms that I might reach out you."
But my words like silent raindrops fell,
And echoed
In the wells of silence.

And the people bowed and prayed
To the neon god they made.
And the sign flashed out its warning,
In the words that it was forming.
And the sign said, “The words of the prophets are written on the subway walls
And tenement halls.
And whispered in the sounds of silence."

Reading Jesus quoting Isaiah in Matthew 13:13-17 brought to mind this Simon & Garfunkel favorite. Scriptural themes run through it:

• visions
• seeds
• dreams
• light in darkness (albeit neon, which we find is an idol in the final stanza)
• silence
• people talking without speaking
• hearing without listening
• pleas to hear and touch
• no one daring to disturb the silence (with apologies, no doubt, to T.S. Eliot)
• prophets/false prophets
• false gods/idols

It is so like us to hear without listening, to praise and worship Jesus without obeying him or practicing what he preaches, to fill our ears with great music and fine preaching, without “understanding with our hearts.” (13:15) To listen in scripture is to obey, not just to hear and then go on about our daily idolatry as the people in Paul Simon’s song do. To listen is to hear and do, a theme that runs throughout Matthew, clearly stated in 7:21-28.

It is so like us to be echoes in the wells of silence. Whoever has ears, let them hear: The sound of silence is hearing without doing; it is our silence in response to Jesus' call if we hear and turn away.