We are dealing with both fierce animals in this Corona crisis. The dragon provides the data to which the bull responds like on a red rag. Completely wild it has become. And one feels very well, that one might be dragged along. Because the facts seem to be facts and the figures are the fixed figures and the measures are therefore justified, necessary, and whoever expresses himself differently is a criminal against mankind. So, it is wonderful to have someone brave here and there who dares to say something that goes against the bull. But the horns are hard and sharp and the speed is full...
In spite of everything, we now live towards Easter and next week is the good week, the holy week, the week of passion. We can't go to the Matthew Passion or the St. John's Passion because those performances are cancelled. There we could have heard in mighty choirs how the bull of public opinion is roaring and disturbing. And there it is clear how this suggests and deceives — and is being deceived. In the Gospels, we can experience how the tension is built up, how public opinion is cultivated and also enforced with threats. They are primal images: The people must believe and obey the authorities.
But where are we really? To a certain extent, all opinions are interesting. But when they become an occurrence, we can at least, as thinking people, ask: What is the truth? Without wanting to suggest anything further. I don't ask the Pilate question: What is truth? But we've ended up in a situation that concerns the whole world and in which we're really allowed to ask: What is going on in truth? That truth exists in any case. The challenge is to find it.
Here is the primal image of public opinion.
John 7:40-52
On hearing his words, some of the people said, “Surely this man is the Prophet.”
Others said, “He is the Messiah.”
Still others asked, “How can the Messiah come from Galilee? Does not Scripture say that the Messiah will come from David’s descendants and from Bethlehem, the town where David lived?” Thus the people were divided because of Jesus. Some wanted to seize him, but no one laid a hand on him.
Finally the temple guards went back to the chief priests and the Pharisees, who asked them, “Why didn’t you bring him in?”
“No one ever spoke the way this man does,” the guards replied.
“You mean he has deceived you also?” the Pharisees retorted. “Have any of the rulers or of the Pharisees believed in him? No! But this mob that knows nothing of the law—there is a curse on them.”
Nicodemus, who had gone to Jesus earlier and who was one of their own number, asked,“Does our law condemn a man without first hearing him to find out what he has been doing?”
They replied, “Are you from Galilee, too? Look into it, and you will find that a prophet does not come out of Galilee.”