Do you remember The Wonder Years on television? It was all about the trials and tribulations of growing up in the '60s. In one episode, two of the youthful heroes were coming into the school cafeteria — "Where do you want to sit?" one asked the other ... a critical decision for these two seventh graders. Their anxious faces surveyed the options. Over here were the "cool" kids; over there were the "smart" kids; along the wall were the "greasers"; the "nerds" were in the back. It was a big decision. After all, in junior high school, "who you are" is defined less by "who you are" than by who is the person sitting next to you at lunch. We all remember it very well.

What brings that to mind is this very familiar gospel story. Here was arguably the best-known itinerant rabbi of his day sitting …