Knowing The Word in Luke 11:33-36, The Lamp and the Body

Jesus speaks metaphorically about the eye being the lamp of the body. His meaning is that when one’s eyes work, one can perform almost any bodily function. But when one’s eyes are impaired, other bodily functions are impaired. Our eyes are to be fixed on good and not evil. We are to take care not to corrupt what is good in us.

33 “No one after lighting a lamp puts it in a cellar or under a basket, but on a stand, so that those who enter may see the light. 34 Your eye is the lamp of your body. When your eye is healthy, your whole body is full of light, but when it is bad, your body is full of darkness. 35 Therefore be careful lest the light in you be darkness. 36 If then your whole body is full of light, having no part dark, it will be wholly bright, as when a lamp with its rays gives you light.”

Prayer: O Lord God, destroy and root out whatever the adversary plants in me, that with my sins destroyed you may sow understanding and good work in my mouth and heart; so that in act and in truth I may serve only you and know how to fulfil the commandments of Christ and to seek yourself, give me love, give me chastity, give me faith, give me all things which you know belong to the profit of my soul. O Lord, work good in me, and provide me with what you know that I need.

Columbanus, c. 550-615