There are a couple of things to remember when thinking about any parable, and especially, perhaps this one. The first thing is that it isa parable, which is to say it’s fiction, or more accurately, it may have been true, but that’s not its primary quality: it’s a story told to make a point, or in the case of most of them, points. Thus, they have the advantages of fiction: they are structured to emphasize those points, things can be exaggerated or rearranged or played down in service of that message.
The second thing to remember is that thisparable was told almost two thousand years ago, to an audience that livedtwo thousand years ago, and who had the world-view and cultural expectations of two thousand years ago, most definitely nottwenty-first century America. And to understand the parable of the prodigal son, we must take that into account, or else our interpretation of it might go as drastically wrong as many have in the past.
The Pharisees and scribes were grumbling about something that was absolutely not done: Jesus was spending time with sinners, with those who were outside the pale of polite Israelite society. The word sinner, especially in Luke, is a technicalterm, and refers not to someone who steals pencils or even laptop computers, but someone who—for whatever reason—is not welcome in Jewish worship, who cannot come and worship in the temple or synagogue because they have done something that has made them ritually unclean. Like touching a dead person, or a woman in her period, or—in the case of tax collectors—working against the interests of the community. There were really strict rules about associating with these folks, and the most strict revolved around table fellowship. It was not allowed for Jews in good standing to share table with sinners, with those who were not welcome—for whatever reason—in Jewish worship. But Jesus wasn’t just eating with them, he was welcoming them, or as the Greek might be rendered, receiving them. And this, in turn, implies that he was playing host—like he did at least once before—which was even more over-the-top, scandalously not done.
And it’s in response to this criticism that he tells the parable, introducing it with “There was a man with two sons,” and right off the bat we hear of anotherscandal: the younger son wants the share of the property that will belong to him after his father dies, and this is absolutely shocking, because none of the listeners have ever heardof such a thing, and they’d been living there a long time, let me tell you . . . but that’s not the half of it: Jewish custom and law allowed for division,for partition of the estate, but not disposition before the death of the patriarch. In other words, the younger son could have it divided, but the father would still retain control. But see what happens: the younger son not only demands division, but disposition as well: he takes his inheritance and sells it—that’s what it Jesus implies when he says the son gathered it: how can you put take up sheep and stored grain and slaveswithout selling them, and you can’t take all of that on the road.
And with the selling, it has spilled over into the community, because where else is he going to sell it in such a hurry but the community? Everyone knows what’s up now: the younger son wants his father dead, he wants his inheritance, his property, which amounts to his life . . . and in fact, the Greek word translated here as “property” is his bion,or his living. . . for without that property, the patriarch cannot live.
And what about the older son? Where is he in all this? Why do we not see him defending his father’s honor, not to mention his living? In ancient Palestine, the eldest son would be expected to defend the life of the father, so he is conspicuous by his absence in our story . . . even this early in the parable, trouble can be seen a-brewing on the horizon.
And the younger son has effectively cut himself off, effectively ruined his relationship with the three entities that are important to him in the first century society: his father, his brother and his community. And he takes his father’s living, and he sells it, and takes off for the far country, and he wastes it away in dissolute living, and although we can imagine what that might be—in the second half of the parable, the brother will say it aloud—Jesus does not get specific. We are told only that he squanders it, it might have been playing cards or betting on the ponies or any number of things—there are lots of ways to eat up a small fortune, but when he runs out of his money, when he’s used up all his father’s living, he comes to be in need, for there is a famine on the land, and he has nothing to eat, and so he joins himself to one of the Gentiles of the land, who sends him out to feed the pigs. And the verb in Greek is stronger than “hired himself out,” it’s, like, cleavinghimself to the citizen . . he has glommed onto him, attached himself to him . . . it’s as if he has become a gentile himself, and Jesus drives home the point by having him feed those most Gentile of beasts.
But he is starving: He’d eat the pods that he fed the pigs if they would support a human being, and nobody would give him anything—more evidence that he wasn’t the most welcome person in the world—and he was slowly starving to death. And he realizes this, so he hatches a plot to survive: he will go to his father, beg his forgiveness, saying “I have sinned against you and against heaven,” and he will ask him to take him on as a hired hand. And his audience of Pharisees would approve of this, it’s in line with rabbinical thinking: though he won’t get back in the family—that ship has irrevocably sailed—he willbe earning money, and perhaps he can pay his father back, and thus fulfill his duty to care for him. But we alsoknow that this offer isn’t all that altruistic, because he would still be independent of his father, and not have to live with his brother, or be dependent upon him—remember, the rest of the property belongs toolder son,though he has not taken possession of it while his father is alive.
So, his plan takes care of two of his three relationship axes, his father—he can pay him back, and thus fulfill his responsibility to care for him—and the brother, through avoidance. But it doesn’t fix his broken relationship with the community, and he’s resigned to it, to the verbal and maybe even physical abuse . . . when word came that he’d been spotted on the outskirts, people would come to line the streets like for a twisted parade, taunting him, singing insulting doggerel, maybe even throwing rocks his way.
And so he approaches the town with fear, waiting for the first catcall, cringing in advance of the stones, but then an amazing thing happens: he spies his father runningtoward him, robes flapping, bony old knees flashing and he cannot believe his eyes: no middle Eastern patriarch would be seen running . . . in that honor/shame culture, that would accrue beaucoup shame, it would be the height of humiliation, and he does it in front of the whole communityto boot, he humiliates himself in front of the whole town . . . he covers his son in kisses, and the community is gob-smacked here’s the son who wished him dead, who cared about him so little as to take away his livelihood, and rather than humiliating himas any other self respecting nobleman would, rather than requiring him to come to himand fall prostrate before him, he does humiliated himself.
And the son begins his prepared speech, he says “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son..” But he is so overcome with emotion that he cannot get the rest of it out, the part about his father hiring him, and his father doesn’t give him much time, for he tells his slaves to get a robe—the best one, which is surely his, surely the master of the house’s—to get a robe and kill a calf—not a sheep or a goat but a calf, enough to feed the entire village—and now we know that the whole village is invited: if it were just the family, it would be a sheep or a goat. And he says we must celebrate, for this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.
The son wants independence, he wants to be a hired hand, equal perhaps in stature to his father, but his father wants none of that. He wants no hired hand, he has plenty of those, he wants no paid underling . . . what he wants is a son. And the prodigal son, overcome by the absolutely unheard of enormity of his father’s act of humiliating love, accepts it, doesn’t he? He gratefully accepts what he has been given and returns to the fold.
Meanwhile, the second half of the parable begins with the return of the older son, come in from the field, come in from working his tail off like a dutiful child—he hears the revelry and asks a by-stander what is going on, and he’s told what has happened. he becomes angry, and refuses to go into the party, which is a massivebreach of social etiquette in itself. In the ancient middle East, the eldest son was kind of a major domo, or party host, freeing the patriarch up to be, well, the patriarch. It was the eldest son’s place to plaster a smile on his face and greet the newly arrived guests, saying just the right things, making just the right socially correct compliments, but he does none of that. And he doesnone of it n full view of the entire community, humiliating both himself, and especially his father . . .
But once again, an amazing thing happens: the father humiliates himself again. Instead of waiting for the son to come to him and dealing with it in private, he comes to his son. And instead of demanding an apology he pleads withhim. He does the same thing as he did with the prodigal: he abases himself in humiliating love.
But if it’s the same response from the father,it’s a totally different one from the son: in the face of that staggering love, a love so strong and pure that it would take the humiliation of the sons upon itself, he gives nothing back but scorn: Listen! he says, committing anothergross breach of societal rules by commandinghis father, Listen! For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command. Yet, you have never given me even a young goatso that I might celebrate with my friends.” And suddenly, the full weight of what he says hits us: he doesn’t consider himself a son, he doesn’t consider himself a member of the family. He sees himself as a slave, having to rely on his father for something even as small as a goat. The next thing he says confirms our observation: “But when this son of yours” not when my lost brother, or errant sibling, but your son ”who has devoured your property with prostitutes”—which is far more specific than Jesus is, who just says dissolute living—“after he devoured your property with prostitutes, you kill the fatted calf!”
And his father reminds him of his true status, as favored child “Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours”—reminding him pointedly of their relationship—“this brother of your was dead and has come to life, was lost and has been found” And then . . . nothing. The story ends, there’s no “and the older son turned away in disgust” or “the older son smiled and returned the embrace” it just ends. We are left with the older son’s intransigence, his unmoving animosity, but—though we’re never told—we can guess that he is unmoved, even by this, because we were clued in from the beginning, when he refused to step in, refused to defend the rights of his father to have a living.
Some modern interpreters would psychologize this story, and speculate on what kind of father, what kind of upbringing would produce such a disastrous pair of sons, but if they did, they would be far outside Jesus’ intentions. His hearers would not even think of such a move, they would be concerned with what happened, how the rigid social conventions of the time were violated, and overturned. Two sons, and two stories that are essentially the same: they both have little regard for the father, the youngest one wants him dead so he can spend, and the older one considers himself a slave, working for a demanding master. Both violate social custom severely: the first most spectacularly, by taking his father’s living before he is even dead, the other equally searing, if not as flamboyant,: he refuses to do a son’s duty, first to advocate for his father at the outset, and second by upbraiding his father in public, by rejecting him as a father, by calling himself “slave.” And Jesus doubtless makes the youngest son’s transgressions more spectacular so that his acceptance of his father’s love all the more surprising: the son who seems the most degenerate, especially to our modern sensibilities, is the one to return to the fold, to accept his father’s stunningly unexpected, overwhelmingly humiliating love.
This parable is wonderfully deep, surpassingly complex . . . there are many avenues for fruitful interpretation, most interestingly perhaps the incarnational aspects of the father’s actions, how he humiliates himself, becoming like them,to effect the return of his sons . . . but I’ve talked enough already. It’s Lent, and at Lent thoughts of young men—and women—should turn to repentance, and I think this parable gives a surprising view . . . nowhere is the Greek word metanoia, which we translate as repentance, seen, but there is repentance here nevertheless. And here, it seems to be an acceptance, a relianceon the grace of the father. The younger son, when faced with his father’s uncritical, no-strings-attached acceptance, relies on it, doesn’t he? He doesn’t get out the second half of his planned speech, which was that he would go it on his own, become independent of his father. He throws himself on the mercy of his Father “I have sinned against heaven and before you,” he says, “I am unworthy to be your son.” Period, no bid for independence, no command to his father to treat him as a hired hand.
The youngest son’s willingness to put himself into his father’s care, to surrender his entire life, to become part of the family is the crux of the matter. His reliance on his father ensures that he will live life as a beloved member of the household, whereas what does the oldest son get? Well, it’s clear that he would rather celebrate with his friends than be a part of the family, and he will doubtless continue on, bitter and leading a life that is less than it should be, cut off from the embrace of his father.
This Lent, I bid you to think on this: do you rely on God’s grace, God’s surpassing love in your everyday life? Do you surrender to God like the younger son did his father, or do you continue to try to go it on your own, to remain stubbornly independent of the family of God? Which one do you think will lead to a better life? Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment