Paul's Ground-Zero Witness to Resurrection

Here is the first study in the series, Christian Origins, Earliest Christianity in Paul & Acts.  Enjoy! 

The study followed a simple but intriguing trail of evidence in the New Testament about the date of Paul's conversion. It was very early, very close to the time of Jesus. Early enough in fact to make Paul a primary witness to the ground-zero tradition of resurrection appearances!

And here's what's critical about that. Paul was far too steeped in the Old Testament world view--and specifically the hope for national Israel's vindication from her enemies--to think in terms of any purely spiritual or mental resurrection. If the early Christian movement had intended anything ethereal like that, its claims would not have been in the same world as Paul inhabited. Resurrection for him was a divinely orchestrated physical vindication over Israel's earthly enemies, including the dead killed in earlier persecution. (See the book of Daniel.) The fact that primitive Christianity claimed the resurrection had occurred to a crucified Messianic pretender (viz. a failure), and only to him, was certainly a good reason for him to be outraged.

Paul had to have recognized in the primitive Christian movement a real claim to real resurrection to be upset. So, if we trace his conversion back to the earliest years we must hear this claim made at that primitive level.

At Acts 18:1-4 we read that Paul was in Corinth shortly after the Jews had been expelled from Rome under the Emperor Claudius. The expulsion is placed at about the year 49CE by historians, so that places Paul in Corinth in the year 50 to 51. This date is solidly confirmed by information at verses 12-15 of the same chapter. We find out there that Paul was in Corinth while Gallio was governor. From an inscription found at Delphi we know the latter was proconsul in this region from 51-52. Paul stayed in the city for an extended period so it is highly likely he was there in 51, and perhaps 50. It would have taken Paul a good year and a half to walk from Antioch to Corinth (three thousand miles), with stops along the way to evangelize (the "the second missionary journey"). Which gets us back to 50, 49 or even 48.

The second missionary journey begins at Acts 15:36 after the big meeting in Jerusalem described from the beginning of chapter 15 and known as the Council of Jerusalem. There is an indeterminate period for Paul in Antioch subsequent to the meeting ("after some days" at v. 36 probably means at least weeks if not months; see v. 35) so we can be pretty confident of a generally accepted date for this meeting as 48-49, i.e. before the journey. The meeting is absolutely crucial for the early church and Luke places it right at the center of Acts. It's possible Luke idealized the formality of the debate but he shows us James (the brother of the Lord) playing the decisive role, above Peter! And given Luke's clear acknowledgment elsewhere of Peter as leader of the apostles the contradiction has to be historical. In other words James of Jerusalem made a crucial ruling allowing the Gentile mission. And at this point Paul really needed the ruling, to make sure his interpretation of the Christian movement would not be negated from its spiritual base in Jerusalem.

According to Luke Paul was actually present for the ruling, but we don't have to rely just on him. At Galatians 2:1-10 Paul gives us his first hand description of a meeting with James, Cephas (Peter) and John which differs in some details with the description in Acts 15 but in other details is remarkably consistent (especially the core theological motivation; c.f. Acts 15:1, and Galatians 2:4). For our purposes what really grabs the attention is Paul's own note on chronology. At 2:1 he specifies "fourteen years" as the time that passed before this key visit. Passed since when? There is confusion as to whether the fourteen years is after Paul's conversion (1:13-17), or after the Paul's initial visit to Cephas and James three years following his conversion (1:18-19). In any case with these intervening years we have to say at the most conservative Paul was converted fourteen years before 48-49, i.e. 34-35 CE. If we add in the other three years it's also possible he was converted in 31-32

In conclusion therefore we are obliged to say that, depending on when Jesus was crucified (generally agreed to be either 30 or 33CE), Paul was converted between five years or one year after Jesus' death. My own instinct is to add the fourteen and three years together so Paul is converted approximately one to two years after Jesus' death in 30. The NRSV Study Bible in fact adds those two amounts together (p. 2082), probably because the Greek text leans in that direction (it can be read "through fourteen years more").

Which is all a way of placing Paul's narrative at 1 Corinthians 15:1-8 of the resurrection tradition at this extremely early period. What Paul, therefore, is talking about when he says "I passed on to you...what I in turn had received" is a tradition he received some time around 32CE. Some of it would have come from Ananias at Damascus, and the rest from Peter three years later.

The core tradition of a bodily resurrection, therefore, is captured for us by the witness of Paul within a space of one to two years after the date of Jesus' death.

Beatitudes III

The eighth beatitude seems to conclude the list, as it is a doublet of the first in both the use of the present tense and the promise of the kingdom. The present handing over of God's kingdom book-ends the whole sequence, providing a ringing sense of a complete and finished unit. But it is followed directly by another "Blessed", i.e. by exactly the same beatitude formula. And this ninth beatitude is itself doubled with a repetition in verse twelve: its same content and  meaning given in a further statement, but in the imperative rather than indicative. (This is much the same thing as we noted about the sixth and last antithesis in relation to the seventh beatitude.)

It appears that the promise of the eighth beatitude was so crucial that it merited repeating two more times!

The experience of persecution is a startling new element to be added to the list of biblical characteristics of the anawim, to their poverty and nonviolence, to their longing for justice and peace. Biblical figures had certainly been persecuted before. The examples of Job and the Nonviolent Servant spring to mind. There are numerous examples in the psalms, and in the book of Daniel there are hints of a whole group of deeply observant, nonviolent Jews, calling themselves the "wise", who suffered violent persecution. But the eighth beatitude makes it a fixed sociological value in its own right. By raising the experience to the level of a kingdom event, making it not simply an unfortunate side-effect and something to be reversed later on, the eighth beatitude turns persecution into a positive good . People are actually blessed when the world goes after them! In the present tense and authentic fact!

According to Rene Girard the gospels introduce the category and truth of persecution to human history. Because of the gospels the victims of persecution have gained significance and truth in their own right. But the new category depends entirely on nonviolence. To be persecuted you have to be nonresistant to violence; if you retaliate you may be in a state of oppression and pain but you are not persecuted. The root of the word is "to hunt down", "to pursue." In other words you are a creature in the condition of flight, not fight.

Behind the blessing is the living relationship with God-active-in-the-world which Jesus declared and made available. If this were not there, if Jesus had not provided the context for his own words, we could only repeat the violence of the world in response to its violence. That could happen in a variety of ways, from resistance, to despair, to bitterness and resentment. But now the "blessing" of persecution intrudes an entirely different note, one of actual joy which knows the violence inflicted as direct evidence of God's saving action. It is highly paradoxical, but conforms to Jesus' method of speaking a truth into reality and making it stick through his own powerful example. Because of him the world has changed and if his disciples are persecuted when they commit to that change it is further proof the change is real and effective!

The centrality of Jesus is underlined in the ninth beatitude. Now, for the first time the formula changes from the third person to the second, indicating that the statement is addressed to Matthew's actual community. It means that the group of Christians for whom Matthew wrote was experiencing the concrete forms of persecution mentioned: they were being reviled, hunted, and slandered. The final expression is, "Uttering all evil against you." In other words, people were talking trash about them to the extent they had become the sum of all evil in the world, or indeed pure evil itself! In these circumstances it would not be exaggerated to fear for your life.

According to many commentators Matthew (or others) added to the statement the words "falsely, on my account". They believe these qualifications should not need pointing out (they state the obvious, and in fact some of the manuscripts lack the expression "falsely"). But because the qualifications are included they suggest that already people were using the "persecution" motif to excuse bad behavior and its repercussions. It seems the I-am-the-victim excuse was already being abused in the first century! Which, in an upside-down kind of way proves again the reality of the promise. If people had not witnessed the power of the experience of persecution and the way its victims were validated in the community there would have been nothing there to abuse. At the same time the evangelist (or copyist!) understood clearly the difference between the "victim mentality" and the genuine blessing of persecution for righteousness' sake.

And key to that is obviously "on my account." Jesus is absolutely the principle and source of all the beatitudes, and especially this one. It is only by identification with him that persecution is blessed. Here it is of considerable interest that no reference is made to Jesus' own experience of persecution, his passion and death. What we have, therefore, is an echo of his original authority as a teacher and prophet communicating his personal vigor of nonviolence to the audience. Verse twelve with its invocation of the prophets puts the teaching squarely in this frame. The qualifications "falsely, on my account" establish, therefore, the criterion of sincere identification with the nonviolent historical Jesus as condition of the blessing.

Finally the imperatives "Rejoice and be glad" in verse twelve put us in "liturgical" contact with the experience of Jesus' teaching and Matthew's community which remembered it. We are invited to enter in the present moment into the enormous upwelling joy of Jesus reaching through history announcing God's life-giving nonviolence into the world.

Beatitudes II

Beatitudes 4 through 7

In the fourth beatitude we encounter a word of almost fabled status in the Christian lexicon, "righteousness"! Paul's use of it, especially in Romans, provides a bottomless well for interpretation and is at the heart of all Reform theology. The beatitude on righteousness is the last in the first set of four, and because the theme of righteousness is repeated in the eighth it suggests a division into two halves, each concluded with the same theme. In which case "righteousness" appears crucial to the whole scheme.

The Hebrew Old Testament term behind the Greek is sedekah. This is frequently paired with another word mishpatim meaning justice. In other words righteousness and justice overlap and belong to the same range of covenant virtue and behavior required by God. At this level there is no rigid formal distinction between the two. At Isaiah 1:21-27 we can see how the two are intimately intertwined. But in late biblical Judaism there was a move away from the "moral" sense of the practice of justice to a feeling that this had become virtually impossible for God's people. There had been so many failures experienced in the practice of covenant righteousness it was now something only God could provide. This is the beginning of the apocalyptic attitude, the idea that God must take direct action in order to break through the impasse of human wickedness. See Daniel 9:1-19, for example v. 7: "Righteousness is on your side, O Lord, but open shame...falls on us..."

So "hungering and thirsting for righteousness" is again an attitude of poverty, of lack, and therefore a longing for the in-breaking of the kingdom. Jesus in his preaching claims this breakthrough has now taken place (cf. 6:33). At the same time this new righteousness is no "imputed" justification (if indeed Paul ever thought that). For Matthew it remains a practical and concrete "ethic". See 5:13-20, where Christians are to be as visible and public as the Pharisees!

"Blessed are the merciful" is the first beatitude in the second quartet, where there is a shift from more passive or receptive states to more active responses or relationships engaged with the world. This first one is also perhaps the best example of the Wisdom thinking that runs throughout the Sermon on the Mount. Deed-consequence reasoning in Proverbs, for example, is perfectly instanced here: you reap what you sow, if you put in mercy you will get it back!

The O.T. word behind mercy is hesed. It has a much wider range of meaning than "mercy" as we would understand it, and as such is impossible to translate consistently. (In the LXX Greek it is normally rendered with the root eleos, i.e. mercy.) At Genesis 40:14 the NRSV has it as "kindness," at 2 Sam. 3: 8 it is "loyalty". When it is applied to God it is often represented in modern English translation as "steadfast love." It is also twinned with a word more regularly associated with mercy, from the word rehem meaning a woman's womb, and accurately translated in English as "compassion." At Exodus 34:6 you can see both terms used in the classic confession of Israel's God. At Psalm 103:4 hesed and r'hamim are together and rendered in the NRSV as "steadfast love and mercy." At Zechariah 7:9 these twinned terms are proposed to Israelites as the attitude they should have for one another.

In other words the "merciful"of the fifth beatitude has a range of inflections behind it, suggesting a rich relationship of commitment and favorable action. John McKenzie defines it as "a broad and embracing benevolence, a will to do good to another rather than evil." A contemporary word for it perhaps is "human solidarity." So...blessed are those who show solidarity, for they will receive solidarity!

The sixth beatitude seems to break from the scheme of active response or relationship in the world. "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God..." But the only thing that takes this out of the world is the Greek tradition. In a Greek mindset it is impossible "to see God" except via the immortal intellectual soul transported to the heavenly otherworld. At every point this is not the sense of Jesus' beatitude.

The "heart" in Hebrew anthropology is not the same thing as "mind." The heart is the seat of the will and thus action in the world. At Jeremiah 31:33 God famously promises "I will write my law on their heart..." In other words, the fount of choice and action will be inscribed with God's law of justice.

"Pure" of course refers to readiness or fitness to come before God or in relation to holy things. Psalm 24:3-6 gives us a clear pattern and uses the term found in the beatitude. " Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? And who shall stand in his holy place? Those who have clean hands and pure hearts, who do not lift up their souls to what is false, and do not swear deceitfully..." Purity here is truth and honesty in relationships, including avoiding relationship with idols. Approaching God "in his holy place," therefore, is a result of concrete relationships in this world, not intellectual sight.

One of the great texts on seeing God is in the Book of Job, the place where he cries out for a redeemer. It tells us the place where his prayer will be answered is on earth: "I know that my Redeemer lives, and that at the last he will stand upon the earth...then in my flesh I shall see God" (Job 19: 25-26). This is the kind of seeing envisaged by the beatitude, one that flows directly from concrete relationships on this earth. The goal is fulfilled in the Book of Revelation in the New Jerusalem come down to earth. Then it will be relationship with God and with the Lamb which gives sight to the city, not sight itself (Rev. 21:22-23). We could say, therefore, that the heart has its own way of seeing, that it is the only organ than can see God, and that the whole range of the beatitudes and the relationships they offer result in this seeing.

The seventh beatitude has two notable effects. On the one hand it is the statement which most forcefully ties the beatitudes, and the whole Sermon on the Mount, to the world. On the other it is the statement which most forcefully ties the character of God to the beatitudes' overall program of nonviolence. Being a "peacemaker" is something associated with rulers and emperors after their successful use of force has brought order and tranquility to the earth. In the year 13BC the Roman Senate commissioned an altar to be erected and named "Ara Pacis Augustae" (Altar of Augustan Peace) to celebrate the peace and prosperity created by the emperor Augustus who had taken power in Rome in 27BC. It survives today and is considered a masterpiece, testifying to the military, political, ideological and religious triumph of Augustus Caesar, a man who ruled for forty one years and initiated a period of 200 years of generally unbroken peace throughout the Roman Empire. When Augustus first proclaimed himself emperor before the Senate he named himself "Son of the divine Caesar" (Julius Caesar). Jesus lived all his early life under Augustus' supreme authority (he was about twenty when Augustus died), and when he names "peacemakers" as "children of God" he is saying that it is his disciples who are the true authors and children of divine peace on earth, not Roman Emperors.

In Israel peace came from the Lord and resulted in fruitfulness and life (see Micah 4:1-4, Psalms 122 & 128). Its crucial character as the righteousness that comes with God's kingdom is illustrated in the "six antitheses" that follow very soon after the beatitudes. Here Jesus explicitly contrasts his teaching with the torah that came before, and in each instance the difference turns on peacemaking as opposed to violence. Particularly the first ("do not be angry") and the fifth and sixth ("do not resist the evil" and "love your enemy") show the absolute centrality of peacemaking to Jesus' preaching of kingdom justice. The last antithesis repeats the beatitude itself, in imperative rather than indicative form: "I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven" (5:44-45).

The consequence in the nature of God cannot be exaggerated. You cannot be a peacemaking child of a violent God. And the God of Israel would not have the right to claim any difference from the gods of the Romans if s/he were in fact violent. In this teaching of the beatitudes God has been shown conclusively as nonviolent. And that nonviolence in fact underpins the whole of Jesus' abolition of purity distinctions, and then, after his death, the outreach of the Christian movement to the Gentile world. A nonviolent God has no enemies, draws no distinction between Jew and Gentile. By the same token Paul's description of righteousness communicated by faith (not race) cannot have a hidden remainder of violence in it, whereby God simply decides not to inflict violence on those who are saved all the while maintaining the attitude of divine violence toward the world. The sixth beatitude radically critiques all attempts to make Paul's theology a legal change in the mind of God and a nonchange in the (supposed) violence of God's relationship to the world. The kingdom of the heavens is a radical breakthrough of divine nonviolence into a human history of violence.

Beatitudes I

Turning to look at the Beatitudes after studying the parables is a way of getting back to the nonviolent core of the gospel. The story-telling of the parables includes a sense of imminent judgment, which is expressed sometimes in violent scenarios. It is challenging to divide the path between consequential human violence once the in-breaking of the gospel is ignored, and the appearance of a personally vindictive divine violence. The Beatitudes in Matthew are a clear statement of a nonviolent Kingdom of God. What follows is a summary of our studies over a number of weeks. (You must forgive if we slipped behind in the regular blogs, this is my humble--and convenient--way of catching up!)

The foundation beatitude is, understandably, the first one, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of the Heavens." (5:3) The basic meaning of "blessed", the one running through the whole list, is replete human happiness (see Genesis 30:13). Throughout the Old Testament it is associated with the teaching and practice of Wisdom (1 Kings 10:8, Proverbs 8:32 & 34). It is a teaching of how life can be filled with life. The Psalms especially connect this to relationship with the God of Israel (e.g. 33:12).

When Jesus applied this "happiness" to groups of people who, on the surface of things, should be the most miserable on the earth he was introducing the upside-down kingdom of God. He did this in and through his own person, on his own authority, addressing these groups and inviting them to relate to him. But at the same time he proposes a real, concrete sense of material reversal. This is more evident in Luke's version at 6:20-22. Matthew's version more strongly invites us into relationship with a new way, beginning in Jesus. But the background sense of concrete earthly reversal is not lost in Matthew.

A lot of confusion has occurred over "poor in spirit". It does not mean someone who is psychologically weak (a very modern psychoanalytic viewpoint) because the root meaning is actual poverty (as shown in Luke). What it means is a generative attitude among the poor whom Jesus addressed, a longing and expectation that God would make God's move to bring justice to the earth. This is to be "poor in spirit" and can by extension apply to all hearers of Jesus in every generation. The second part of the sentence talks of the "kingdom of the heavens (plural)", i.e, the unfathomable dwelling of God, and it is Matthew's round-about way of saying the "kingdom of God" (compare again Luke 6:20). What it means is that the God of all universes, the God of every level of existence, is intervening on their behalf and they can and will know that as of this moment.

The second and third beatitudes lead us directly into both the concrete and relational meaning of Jesus' teaching. "Blessed are those who mourn..." (5:4). Behind this lies the key prophetic text of Isaiah 61:1-2. It is the passage that Jesus read when he preached in his home-town synagogue at Nazareth (Luke 4:16-30). It seems to have been pivotal for his early ministry. The English translation of the first part of the prophecy in Isaiah speaks of a mission "to bring good news to the oppressed." The word that stands behind "oppressed" in the Hebrew is anawim... a term which refers to a group of people who were powerless in the land. They were oppressed peasantry defenseless against the power of the wealthy and the armed forces. Zephaniah 2:3 and 3:12-13 uses this term in a way that seems closely to describe Jesus' addressees in the Beatitudes: "Seek the Lord, all you humble (anawim) of the land...; I will leave in the midst of you a people humble (anawim) and lowly...the remnant of Israel." In Zephaniah a concrete condition of powerlessness becomes a relational condition of the covenant. Luke in his Greek version of the Isaiah prophecy has Jesus bringing "good news to the poor." In other words he renders anawim as "poor". It is very plausible that Jesus' original statement was on the lines of "happy are the anawim..."

The relationship between the Isaiah 61:1-2 passage and the first beatitude is now confirmed by the second beatitude, "Blessed are those who mourn for they will be comforted." Isaiah 61:2 goes on to describe the mission as one "to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor...to comfort all who mourn." The two beatitudes repeat therefore the categories of the prophecy in order.

Mourning is a condition of profound lack, usually associated with the death of a loved one. But in both the Isaiah prophecy and the second beatitude it signifies a much larger lack, the absence of justice and good in the earth. Mourning, however, by the very force of its emotion maintains a powerful relationship precisely to what is missing. This human emotion is used by Jesus to evoke an extremely powerful relationship to what is not yet. By maintaining this relationship Jesus' hearers look forward concretely to the consolation of God's justice and good. Jesus by his authority asserts that they will be comforted.

The third beatitude "Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth" (5:5) brings us to the unmissable earthly core of what is expected and the key human relationship by which it is invoked. The term "meek" is understood in a degraded pathetic sense. Basically it licenses a class system of the willingly downtrodden and the willfully oppressive. Now the background to the saying is almost word for word Psalm 37;11, "The meek shall inherit the land, and delight themselves in abundant prosperity." And guess what, the Hebrew here behind "meek" is our friend yet again, the anawim! But there is a further twist in the prophetic literature which we must notice. It is one of greatest importance for Jesus. At Zechariah 9:9-10 we hear of a king who will come to Jerusalem "humble and riding on a donkey," one who will "cut off the chariot...the war-horse from Jerusalem, and the battle bow..." The prophecy of a nonviolent king arriving in Jerusalem lies behind Jesus' "triumphal entry" at the beginning of the Passion, a connection directly cited by the evangelists Matthew and John.

The word "humble" in this prophecy is an adjective cognate with anawim, very close to it indeed, the word anayim... In the Greek this is translated "praus", the word for "meek" (the word used both in the Greek of Psalm 36 and Matthew's beatitude). Even in Greek praus stands in contrast to those who show brutality and unrestrained anger (Hans Dieter Betz), i.e. it means the nonviolent. But in the context of the gospel Jesus' explicit signaling of the Zechariah prophecy in his entry into Jerusalem gives final meaning to the word. It is the conscious, active, transformative program of nonviolence, something as far removed from pathetic "meekness" as may be imagined. Matthew uses the same Greek word in the famous passage "Come to me, all you that are weary...Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle (praus) and humble in heart..." (Matt.11:28-29).

Jesus is the greatest of the anawim, someone who takes their contextual nonviolence (either inability or unwillingness for violence), and makes it a profoundly consistent signal of something wonderfully new in the earth. He challenges all the powers of the world with this true meaning of being human and, ultimately, brings them crashing down. Indeed, "the meek, the nonviolent, will inherit the earth..."

Parables VIII

The Dishonest Manager Luke 16:1-9

Some think this is one of the most difficult parables to interpret. Here is the basic story. A rich man hears information that his manager is up to something and calls him to account and orders him to turn over his books. Manager is losing his job. What is his plan now? He is too weak to work and too proud to beg. He better make friends with the people he has been cheating. So he calls them in separately and instructs them to mark down their accounts 50%.for the oil and 20% for the wheat.

Ambiguity of the Greek words.

Many Greek words can be translated in different ways, just as our words can have different meanings. Who is the master in Luke 18:8a? The Greek is KURIOS which can mean any of the following: lord, master or The Lord meaning Jesus or God. So who is doing the praising of this dishonest manager and why?

Questions about the story.

Why would the master praise his dishonest manager? If he knew he was being cheated, why not beat him and throw him in jail? Do not give him time to do further damage.

Maybe the owner isn’t really sure of his servant’s dishonesty but fires him anyway. “charges were brought to him” (diaballo Gk.) There is the suggestion of slander or rumor in the Greek here.

Where does the parable end and the comment by Jesus begin? In any case, why is this apparently dishonest manager praised? The sentence from 16:9b on seems like Jesus talking, ..”for the children of this age are more shrewd…than are children of light. Shrewd is the way the Greek is most often translated and the idea seem to be “careful for his own future” (Phillips} or “knew how to look after himself”. Jesus wants his followers to be as careful about our eternal future as the manager, maybe.

How has the manager solved his problem? The master will surely find out and punish him. He might have “friends” but who would hire such a dishonest person?

Who are the “children of light”? One possibility is that they were members of the Essene Community who withdrew from the world and lived ascetic lives studying the Torah. Is Jesus saying that we should not withdraw from the world, but use “mammon” wisely? We are to “make friends with dishonest wealth (mammon) so that when it is gone they will welcome you into their eternal homes. (NRSV). That sentence has many questions and seems clear as mud.

Some interpretations of the master and his servant.

A possible paraphrase from The Message.

8-9"Now here's a surprise: The master praised the crooked manager! And why, because he knew how to look after himself. Streetwise people are smarter in this regard than law-abiding citizens. They are on constant alert, looking for angles, surviving by their wits. I want you to be smart in the same way—but for what is right—using every adversity to stimulate you to creative survival, to concentrate your attention on the bare essentials, so you'll live, really live, and not complacently just get by on good behavior."

Or based on an interpretation by Kenneth Bailey.

The manager was not so much dishonest as “shrewd”. He was not thrown in jail, but shown mercy. He decides to risk everything on that mercy. The debtors would assume that the reductions were made with the master’s approval. Everyone would praise the master for his generosity. What will the master do? His reputation has been enhanced. Everyone thinks he is a wonderful, generous man and his reputation is very important to him. Wouldn’t it be better to praise the “shewdness” of his manager.

With Bailley, the master represents the gracious forgiveness of God and makes this parable similar to the mercifull father in the parable of the prodigal.

A possible application for us is as follows. Recognize that God is merciful and generous. So we use our money (mannon) wisely by building community and being generous. Then we will be welcomed to our tents (homes) in the next age.

The Parable of the Sower

Matt:13:1-23, Mark 4:1-20, Luke 8:4-15

This parable is important enough to be all three of the synoptic gospels. In each case, it is coupled by an interpretation of the parable by Jesus and a cryptic quote from the Hebrew Scripture and like God does not want all to hear and understand. How do we understand this?

In most groups where we have looked at this parable, the questions we asked were these. What kind of soil am I and am I growing and bearing fruit? Good questions for individual reflection. But this parable is also about a Sower (God or those who preach or teach), who scatters seed generously everywhere. The seed will eventually bring in a great yield or harvest. In this case, the parable is a statement about the various responses to the message of the kingdom, and has the a promise of a great harvest.

Here is what I think. The followers of Jesus of every age need this prediction of reality coupled with the promise of a great eventual harvest, lest we “weary in well doing” and give up because the results do not seen enough. The quotation does not mean God is blinding some, but that’s just the way it is.

In Conclusion:

final suggestions on reading the Parables

• The simplest application to our day may not be the original interpretation
• Parables are often open ended and designed to stimulate thought.
• The main figure in the parable may not always be God.
• Parables encourage a new way to look at the world.
• Jesus may be describing something new and unique like the kingdom of God.
• It is helpful to compare the parables in different translation.
• In Matthew the kingdom of Heaven is not out of this world or future, but corresponds to Luke’s kingdom of God. Mathew, as a Jew, used heaven as a euphemism for the holy name of God.
• It is safe to assume that the parables originated with Jesus, but the gospel writers place them in their gospel story to fit their purposes.
• I want to thank, Tony, Linda and our WHH fellowship for stimulating my interest and study of the parables as never before. I feel blessed by the opportunity to study and grow with these people. The opportunity to summarize and add to our discussion has forced me to clarify and firm up my understanding. Thank you all. Jerry.

Parables VII

WHH Parable Study VII Oct. 21, 2011

The Prodigal Son and Elder Brother is one of the longest and best know of the Parables of Jesus. It appears only in Luke 15:11-32. It follows the parable of the Lost Sheep and The Lost Coin. If you consider the Prodigal lost, then this is the third of three parables demonstrating God’s concern for the lost.

A better name for the parable would be the parable of the Compassionate Father or, by normal worldly standards, the Crazy Father. When Jesus told this parable his hears would be shocked, just as we are, when we really think of the father’s actions.

He son insults his father by asking for his inheritance in advance.

That is kind of like saying, “I can’t wait until you are dead. Give me the money now.” In that culture where the father was an honored figured of authority, this was a serious insult. The ones who heard Jesus would have expected the insulted father to have the brat beaten and thrown out with nothing, but no. You know the story. When the prodigal “come to himself” because he is broke and starving, he decides to return home and see if his father will take him back as a hired hand. The amazing thing is that the father “saw him when he was far off and “ran and put his arms around him and kissed him.“ vs. 20. Those familiar with Middle Easter Culture say that the father running would have been undignified and socially shocking. The prodigal gets his father’s ring (our equivalent is credit card) and a garment signifying status and dad throws a big party. This is a story picture of the grace filled, compassionate love of God for all of us.

We are all prodigals in some way, but most church people fit the role of the good, hard working, elder brother. Perhaps he was trying to earn his father’s love, but he never asked for anything. Certainty he has a deep resentment of his brother, probably of long standing sibling rivalry The story ends with no real conclusion. We don’t know whether the elder brother ever joins the party. If he stays away, he insults his father, because, as the oldest son he had an obligation to be the host at the party. If he misses the party, it is his choice.

The next parable we discussed was the Rich Man and Lazarus.(Luke 16:19-30.) The context here is 16:14 The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, heard all this and they ridiculed him.” Jesus has harsh words for them in vs.15. Then skip down to vs. 19 and Jesus tells this story. (Jesus doesn’t call it a parable)

A rich man (very rich, purple and fine linen sumptuous daily feasting) and a poor suffering, beggar named Lazarus. Both of them die. Lazarus is carried by angels to be with Abraham. The rich man is in Hades. The word is Hades not hell. Hades is the Greek word for Sheol, the place of the dead. The Hebrews did not have a word that expressed our concept of hell as a place of everlasting torture. Since the rich man is “being tormented” some translations use the word hell. (See KJV and The Message)

The rich man gives no indication of repentance and he wants Lazarus to wait on him and send a message to his brothers warning them of their fate. Abraham replies, If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from dead.(vs.31). This was a clear message to the Pharisees and how true it proved to be.

Notice that Abraham addresses the rich man as “Child” (v 25) There is no indication of judgment or condemnation, but there is a “division or a great chasm that has been fixed. (vs.26) It is the way things are and money is the issue. Fair warning. Jerry

Parables VI

The Parable of the Lost The Sheep

Matt. 18:10-14

Matthew chapter 18. Jesus is talking to the disciples about caring for “These little ones who believe in me.“ Whoever these “little ones” were they were not to be despised or cast out. Matthew seems to be concerned about keeping the community together. Jesus wants them all included, all are important. Therefore, the parable of the Lost Sheep (Matt. 18:10-14) fits in perfectly here. Who are the little ones or the lambs of our Christian communities? Maybe they are those we tend to exclude, ignore or think are not important.

Luke’s version

Luke 15:1-7

Luke chapter 15 Jesus is addressing not to his followers, but the Pharisees and Scribes who were grumbling against him saying, “He welcome sinners and eats with them.” Such behavior by Jesus was in direct violation of religious rules and social norms. The Abba of Jesus does not exclude but includes all. The Good Shepherd searches for those who are “lost”. The sheep are the people of Israel, Gods flock. The lamb represents those the Pharisees reject in order to maintain their religious purity.

Luke’s version of the Lost Shepherd is in a poetic style. It was probably closer to the original words of Jesus than the shorter form in Matthew. Those who heard the parable would think of a peasant village adjacent to pasture land. The flock would be the collective flock of the village under the care of more than one shepherd. The flock were led out to pasture during the day and returned to the village at night. When it was time to head home, the lambs would be counted. A shepherd would seek a missing lamb while the others were led home. The people of the village would be concerned for the safely of the shepherd and worried about the loss of a one of the lambs. Therefore, there would be a lot of rejoicing when the shepherd returned with the lost lamb on his shoulder. The shepherd rejoiced when he found the lamb, even though he would need to lug it home on his shoulders.

John 10 The Good Shepherd

There is no lost lamb story in John 10, but the narrative in chapter 9 shows Jesus as seeking the man cast out by the Pharisees. Jesus was a good shepherd who found and restored him.

Then in the tenth chapter there are several images or parables that describe the ministry of Jesus in terms of sheep and shepherds. He is “the gate” to the sheep fold(1-10) and also the “Good Shepherd. (11-18)

Perhaps the “hired hands”, “thieves” and “strangers”, represented the religious leaders who had not and were not caring for God people.

“I am the “good shepherd”. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep”. (Jn 10:10,11)

The sheep recognize the voice of the good shepherd and follow him for the shepherd knows them each by name.

John 10:16 “I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold”. Certainly, this suggests the universal extension of God’s inclusive love and the promise of the eventual unity of all in Christ. (See Phil. 2:9-11)

It is possible that the sheepfold Jesus meant was the large area with a gate where the sheep were kept prior to their sacrifice. In that case, Jesus (vs.2) is “the shepherd who enters by the gate.” He is then sacrificed, crucified, lays down his life for them and, when resurrected, leads them out into green pastures and the abundant life.

By the time John wrote this gospel, the temple had been totally destroyed by the Romans in 70 CE. There would be no more sacrifice of lambs in the temple, but people and groups of people have continued to be sacrificed by many societies. Sometimes the sacrifices have been to maintain the purity of religion or race. Some are called to sacrifice for the purposes of governments. That is another story that has been well hidden according to Rene Girard. (For a history of sacrifice in America read, Pahl’s book, Empire of Sacrifice:the religious origins of American Violence. Some of my comments regarding the parables are based on Kenneth Baily’s, book, Through Peasant Eyes. Jerry