The Sunday gospel lectionary reading for Lent 4 in Year C is the parable of the prodigal son in Luke 15.1–3 and 11b–32, though it is perhaps as well called the parable of the loving father, or the parable of the father and the two sons.
(The NT epistle is 2 Cor 5.16–21, Paul’s exposition of reconciliation as the central issue in the gospel; you can watch the video discussion of that passage here.)
I realise that many will be focussing on Mothering Sunday, but it would be a shame to miss out on preaching on this passage if you follow the lectionary in your preaching; perhaps the best solution is to celebrate Mothering Sunday in the service, but preach on this passage without working two hard to connect the two.
It’s a passage I have known well for a long time, and can still remember quite vividly listening to the late Michael Green teaching on it during a student mission when I was an undergraduate. But I have recently come across two quite different readings of the parable which highlight some important issues in how we interpret it.
The first was in Jane Williams’ Lent book three years ago, The Merciful Humility of God. In her introductory chapter, she takes three of the short pages to explore the parable, and rather than seeing it as an exposition of Jesus’ ministry, she sees it as a notable contrast:
The infinite patience of God is more active than that of the father of the Prodigal, because God does more than wait; in Jesus Christ, God enters into the way of the Prodigal so that even here, while the Prodigal is still assuming that he is fine on his own, the love of the father is present…The life of Jesus means that we can turn and find God beside us, everywhere.
I have explored previously some of the theological problems with this reading, but we ought to note how strange this is as a narrative reading. After all, this chapter in Luke is introduced by the complaint of the Pharisees and scribes that Jesus ‘receives sinners and eats with them’. In other words, Jesus tells the three parables here (shepherd seeking sheep, woman searching for coins, father welcoming his son) in response to the comment that he is too close to the ‘prodigals’, so it would be odd if the very parable he tells us contrasts so sharply with the ministry that it is explaining.
The second interpretation came from a friend with whom I was in conversation a couple of years ago, and also draws attention to the location of the father. God does not take delight in us, my friend said, in an unconditional sense, but only delights when we turn to him. After all (he went on) I don’t delight in my son if he wastes his time or squanders his gifts, but only when he applies himself or does well—just as the way my father delighted in me when I did well. After all (he clinched his argument), the father in the parable does not follow the son into the foreign country, but waits for him at the gate of his property.
Both these readings make the same point, but in support of opposite conclusions: the father does not pursue the son, and either that is a bad thing which Jesus contradicts or it is a good thing we should learn from.
Jesus’ parables are challenging to interpret, and even his best-known ones are commonly (and demonstrably) misinterpreted in contemporary preaching and teaching. This is partly because they are narratives making an implicit point, rather than prose discourse that presents an explicit argument; partly because Jesus uses provocation and hyperbole to make his point in a dramatic way; and partly because much of the impact of the parables relies on contextual information which is not explicit in the text.
Some years ago, German scholar Joachim Jeremias argued (in his The Parables of Jesus) that the parables had essentially one main point, and so we should look for that rather than focussing on the minutiae of the other details. This was made in reaction to earlier tendencies to allegorise Jesus’ parables, which often allowed readers to go on flights of fancy in their readings which became detached from the narrative and context of the parable itself (the best known being interpretations of the parable of the good Samaritan). But the problem with Jeremias’ thesis is that Jesus explicitly makes several points when interpreting his own parables, the most obvious being in the parable which is also a parable about parables, the story of the sower in Mark 4 and parallels. In explaining the parable, Jesus is clear that each of the sower, the seed, and the different soils all ‘stand’ for something. And in the parable of the prodigal, there are at least three key narrative foci in the three main characters.
But we also need to note that this is the third of three parables, and contrary to the cut-and-paste job suggested by the lectionary, I think we need to read all three together—and carefully! The first tells us about a foolish shepherd, who is so anxious about the one lost sheep that he abandons the other 99 (‘in the open country’, Gk eremos ‘wilderness’) in search of the one, and continues to forget about the others whilst he has a party! This is hardly a model for pastoral ministry! The second story, of the woman and her lost coin, is less obviously foolish, but once again focusses on urgency of the search and the rejoicing when it is successful. In other words, these two are about the one doing the searching, rather than the ones being searched for, and they make the simple point about the searcher’s passion.
In the third of the three parables, the emphasis shifts decisively. The story itself has much more detail, includes a more complex situation, introduces three main characters with some realism, and involves a shift of focus. Much of the emotion on the part of the father is implicit and borne in the narrative detail, whilst the focus is turned decisively to the characters being ‘sought’, the younger and the older son, with their emotions being described explicitly, in contrast to the previous parables where the things being sought played no real part in the story.
The story opens with the younger son demanding his inheritance now, rather than waiting to the due time, and this is where we begin to see the importance of reading in cultural context. Unlike our context, where we might indeed want to pass on an inheritance early, for Jesus’ hearers this is like the son saying that he wishes his father were dead—and the father, shockingly, agrees to the request. Our contextually attuned ears can hear the audible gasps of Jesus’ audience. The parable suggests that our own acts of rebellion, in which we take from God the life and the blessings he offers, but refuse to acknowledge his authority over our lives, is effectively wishing him dead. Sin is death-dealing not only to us, but to God himself, as we wish him dead in the claims he makes over us.
The narrative then follows the son on his journey downwards—away from his loving home, down into an immoral life, down into poverty, down into disgrace, and finally down into hunger and neglect as no-one pays attention to his needs. For a Jewish audience, the son’s job of looking after the unclean pigs shows that he has reached the lowest point possible. The turning point in the narrative is when he ‘comes to his senses’, literally ‘he came to himself’—which intriguingly suggests the way that sin not only separates us from others, but separates us from our true selves. From this point, the son makes a journey of ascent—out of the pig sty, out of hunger, out from the strange land and up to the threshold of his former home. But he cannot imagine anything like the full restoration to sonship that awaits him.
Once more we need to read attentively and contextually. How does the father notice the son whilst he is ‘still a long way off’? We can only infer that that father has, daily, been awaiting his son’s return with longing. And, though the son intends to make the journey himself, it is not a journey he completes, since the father runs to meet him—the reunion does indeed involve journeying by both parties. Contextually, this again would have been shocking, as the father dispenses with the dignity of an older member of the community who (in the hot climate of the Near East) could never have run in public. Despite his son’s actual and ritual uncleanness, the father dramatically embraces him in the sight of all. All this flows from a key word, which appears (as in other narratives in Luke) to be actually (numerically) central to the telling of the story: ‘he was moved with compassion’, splagchnizomai, his guts were stirred.
The son brings out his rehearsed speech, recognising the error of his ways—but he is not able to finish it before the father lavishes on him the signs of sonship in the ring, the robe and the sandals to put on his bare and filthy feet, and prepares to celebrate with a feast. And where the story of the younger son reaches its climax, the story of the elder son begins with the second’s jealousy and resentment. He has cast his position in the family as dependent on duty, law and obedience, and has failed to understand the nature of the relationship between father and son that is his true inheritance.
Where does that leave the two interpretations that I started with? Jane Williams’ observation does have a point; from the perspective of the one doing the searching, there appears to be nothing that he would not do in order to find that which was lost, and this is communicated most clearly in the two shorter parables preceding this one. The foolish shepherd and the anxious woman will not rest until they recover their lost possessions. Yet what she appears to miss is the reciprocal aspect of searching and finding that becomes the focus of the third parable. It is not enough to be sought; one has to be found, and the one being found has to respond to the one doing the searching. Jesus makes this point not once, but twice: the younger son has to come to himself, and make the decision to turn and embrace the father that he has betrayed, even at the cost of admitting he was wrong. But the older son must also ‘come to himself’ and recognise the reality of sonship and what it means. He might have been in ritual and physical proximity with his father, but he was not in relational proximity. Although Luke does not (unlike elsewhere) note that this parable was told ‘against’ the Pharisees and scribes, the two-part shape to the narrative and its finality at the end of the chapter (following which the focus turns to the disciples) makes this plain. They might be in ritual and physical proximity with God (through living in the land or obeying the law or coming to the temple) but they are not in relational proximity. They, too, need to change and turn for this relationship to become a reality.
The second interpretation that I mentioned gets one thing right: when the younger son is far from his father, there is a real distance and absence in that relationship, and (according to Jesus’ teaching) that distance is not closed until the son makes his change of direction. (It is worth comparing this with the parable of the two sons told only in Matt 21:28–32; the first son does make sonship a reality until he ‘changes his mind’.) And yet the possibility of restoration depends, within the narrative, on the unwavering longing and compassion of the father, which (theo)logically precedes the repentance of the son and is necessary for the narrative to reach its completion. The restless searching of God for the lost is already communicated powerfully in the first two parable.
As an afternote, there is an interesting parallel drawn on the Wikipedia discussion of this parable.
A similar parable of a lost son can also be found in the Mahayana Buddhist Lotus Sutra.[26][27] The two parables are so similar in their outline and many details that several scholars have assumed that one version has influenced the other or that both texts share a common origin.[28] However, an influence of the biblical story on the Lotus sutra is regarded as unlikely given the early dating of the stratum of the sutra containing the Buddhist parable.[28] In spite of their similarities, both parables continue differently after the two meet for the first time at the son’s return. In the biblical story, there is an immediate reunion of the two. In contrast, in the Lotus sutra, the poor son does not recognize the rich man as his father. When the father sends out some attendants to welcome the son, the son panics, fearing some kind of retribution. The father then lets the son leave without telling him of their kinship. However, he gradually draws the son closer to him by employing him in successively higher positions, only to tell him of their kinship in the end.[26] In the Buddhist parable, the father symbolises the Buddha, and the son symbolises any human being. Their kinship symbolises that any being has Buddha nature. The concealment of the kinship of the father to his son is regarded as a skillful means (Sanskrit:upāya).[29]
The grace of God means that the restoration of the son in Jesus’ parable is not only immediate, but is known immediately. Here is no long, uncertain path to enlightenment, but the sudden, grace-filled embrace of our heavenly father.
Come and join us for the video discussion about this passage, and the other NT lectionary reading, 2 Cor 5.16–21, which is Paul’s exposition of the centrality of reconciliation in the gospel.
On 2 Cor 5.16–21:
A perceptive comparative analysis of three parables, the lost sheep, the lost coin, and the ‘lost’ son.
Thanks. This analysis is often omitted because of the way that the lectionary chops up the text!
Tim Keller has an excellent book on this parable: The Prodigal God -Recovering the Heart of the Christian Faith.
I have bought a number to give to friends. Described as as message for both the irreligious and religious.
Clue. Both sons are lost. Jesus is the true elder son who shares his inheritance with us.
Thanks Ian. Just on the Mothering Sunday thing, something I read pointed out that the father’s two hands in Rembrandts painting are different 🙂
Yes, I believe it was Henri Nouwen who pointed out that one hand is female and the other male in his book, “The Return of the Prodigal Son: A Story of Homecoming”
As James Garfield once said: “The truth will set you free, but first it will make you miserable.”
True. (Sob.)
Or, as Sir Garfield St Aubrun Sobers might have said, It’s just not cricket.
And sometimes cricket is not just.
True? Not cricket? He was actually assasinated in 1881! Incidentally Geoff, could you shed further light on Keller’s interesting “take” on ‘ The Prodigal Son’?
Hello Colin Mc,
I’ll seek to draw out more from the book, perhaps tomorrow, but I have given a tiny indication below in a comment to Chris, and David Wilson, below, has cottoned- onto Keller’s opening position, using a definition of the adjective’ Prodigal’
1.recklessly extravagant
2. having spent everything.
Thank you, Ian. I thought it was Adolf Julicher who opined that ‘parables have one point’, though I imagine Jeremias followed him in this. Craig Blomberg (1990) proposed a different understanding (that parables have different points for different characters in the narrative) and thus against the critical view that elaboration (‘allegory’) is a sign of the early church, not Jesus. Most of Jesus’ parables are really quite brief, but I don’t see why he couldn’t have told an extended parable (like ‘the Good Samaritan’) with multiple points of reference. After all, there are some extended parables in the OT (Jotham’s fable; Nathan to David).
It was important that you referenced Jane Williams (who has had a big input into the St Mellitus training course) as a reminder that a ‘big name’ in theological teaching is no guarantee of correct exegesis. The wrong things she teaches here crystallised for me the problems I had with some of Rowan Williams’ teachings: a kind of mysticism that carries you along with its rhetoric (for a while) but in the end dissatisfies because it never properly engages with the text in an evangelically satisfying way. Much better to read a good orthodox commentary on Luke that is geared to the needs of the preacher.
(I confess I have never read a ‘Lent book’. Is there still a market for these?)
I had always thought that Jesus was the model for the shepherd seeking the lost sheep and the woman for the lost coin, as demonstrated in his own ministry to the outcasts. There is no searcher in the prodigal son, but what are we to make of the phrase ‘he came to his senses/to himself’? Is this not an affirmation of the power of conscience and the preached word remembered and striking home? Perhaps even of the inward witness of the Holy Spirit? It would be interesting to do a study on how conscience or personal reflection is depicted in Luke (or Luke-Acts). I seem to recall that John Nolland’s thesis on Luke (I know it only by title) was on ‘Luke’s readers’, the positive witness of Gentiles to Jesus and the apostles in Luke and Acts. Luke seems to have a positive view of Gentiles to recognise spiritual truth and reality when it is put before their eyes.
I like the contrast you make between relational and ritual proximity to the Father and the challenge implicit in this difference to congregations, to know God personally for themselves and to welcome the backslider who returns. The typical family in the average church has at least one member brought up in the faith who has turned their back on it.
Readuing the three parables together, I would suggest that a common theme is joy at the recovery of something lost. The shepherd, the woman and the father throw a party – the latter because “this my son … was lost and is found.” (v24).
The first two parables equate the joy of the party to the “joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” Who is ‘before the angels of God’? The younger son (re)turning is modelling that repentance more directly, and the joy of the father more directly reflects the joy of the Father.
The sting in the tail of the third parable is the older son. Given the context, that must be a dig at the pharisees.
(Also, given that ‘prodigal’ means “spending money or using resources freely and recklessly; wastefully extravagant”, I do wish it was not used to mean “someone who has gone away from the faith.”)
I don’t think Ken Bailey’s work is as well known as it really should be.
Bailey spent a lifetime in the Middle East and lived through wars there. He worked both in a missionary capacity and as a biblical scholar and theology teacher.
Much of his writing relates to the Lucan parables and their cultural background. He also worked on the structural analysis of biblical texts which he call “rhetorical analysis” and learning from early translations of the NT Greek texts into Arabic and Syriac.
A recent biography has resulted in a website where there is access to both written and video material. https://www.kennethbailey.net/
The very best place to start with Bailey is his book “Jesus through Middle Eastern Eyes” SPCK 2008.
In my view suitable for any Christian who wishes to stop being spoon fed Sunday by Sunday!
That book was highlighted by Tim Keller for many insights into the culture and background used in his The Prodigal God book. He has read many commentaries on Luke 15, but owed a special debt to Bailey.
I’ll seek to draw out more from Keller as Colin Mc has asked.
It is unlike any commentary and reads like extended notes from a series of sermons and he attributes a sermon by Dr Edmund Clowney, entitled “Sharing the Father’s Welcome” as a foundation for his book, a sermon which ‘changed the way I understood Christianity.
Indeed the title of Keller’s book is arresting, almost jarring, in its unfamiliarity.
In the intro he even mentions 2 Corinthians 5:19 ( see previous article).
Every Advent (it comes round earlier each year!) Ian sets out to destroy Christmas for preachers and small children by publishing his piece ‘Jesus was not born in a stable’, which draws a lot on Kenneth Bailey’s work. I have been familiar with Bailey’s work since theological college in the 1980s when one of the lecturers, a former missionary in the Middle East, used in enthusiastically.
Canterbury Cathedral perpetuates the myth by erecting a hay-filled stable at the entrance to the cathedral, with shepherds on one side and wise men on the other. I have sometimes wondered what the shepherds and wise men made of each other. /irony
What is absent from both sons? What have they lost? Enjoyment of Father, God (and his Glory, his Presence).
Ive never viewed the elder son as ‘lost’. The father in the parable explicitly says to the elder son – “Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours.” That doesnt sound lost to me.
Jesus spoke the parable in the context of some of the Jewish leaders complaining he was mixing with ‘sinners’. But Jesus is saying to them people who have gone astray need grace and mercy, not condemnation and being looked down on by others. If they, the leaders, had lost anything, it was a sense of grace and mercy rather than depending on following rules and regulations.
Peter
Peter, PC1,
Keller, in a chapter entitled “Redefining Lostness” quoting, ‘ The older brother became angry and refused to go in’, does so applying ‘lostness’ to the attributes of the elder brother, an ‘elder brother spirit ‘.
At the beginning of the chapter in my dog-eared copy, my pencil comment is that there is a disobedience of disobedience ( younger son) and disobedience of obedience (elder son).
The elder son in effect says, ‘you owe me. I’ve been slaving/serving you obediently. I deserve it – he doesn’t. He’s a sinner, unworthy. I’ m worthy; he isn’t.’
Maybe I need to set time aside on the computer to make fuller notes from the book, rather than comments in the form of snippets.
But, maybe for the benefit of Colin Mc. Keller does not subscribe to replacement theology as we are left wondering whether does elder brother does return.
After reflecting on this biblical passage, Pope Saint John Paul II said in a homily in 1999 that this parable should be renamed.
He explains his reasoning, focusing on the merciful love that the father displays:
John Paul II believed that the primary focus of this parable should be the merciful love of the father and how that love is offered and extended to us all.
While naming the parable the “Prodigal Son” highlights an important aspect of the parable, naming it the “Merciful Father” switches the emphasis on to God’s abundant love revealed in the story.
Full text here:
https://www.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/audiences/1999/documents/hf_jp-ii_aud_08091999.html
The Prodigal God, Luke 15.
Timothy Keller,
1. Notes and comments
1.1 Emphases are mine and capitalised, as I’m unable to employ italics
1.2 Comments, are mine (g)
2. There are 7 chapters after an intro
3 Introduction:
3.1 first 5 chapters unlock the parable’s basic meaning.
3.2 Chapter 6 “helps us to understand the Bible as a whole.”
3.3 Chapter 7: how its teaching works out in the way we live in the world
3.4 It is about 2 sons, as much about the elder as the young brother
3.5 As much about the Father as the sons
3.6 “What Jesus says about the the older brother is ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT MESSAGES GIVEN TO US IN THE BIBLE”
3.7 Parable may be better called Two Lost Sons
3.8 Prodigal does not mean “wayward”. “IT MEANS TO SPEND UNTIL YOU HAVE NOTHING LEFT”. It is appropriate for describing the father as it is the younger son.
3.9 father represents the Heavenly Father Jesus knew so well.
3.10 St Paul in 2 Corinthians 5:19 writes; God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, not reckoning to them their trespasses. American Standard version.
3.11 in the returning younger son the father refused to “reckon” or count his sin against him or demand repayment.
3.12 the response offended the elder son and most likely the local community
3.13 “JESUS IS SHOWING US THE GOD OF GREAT EXPENDITURE, WHO IS NOTHING IF NOT PRODIGAL TOWARD US, HIS CHILDREN.
3.14 Comment (g) Compare 1. the reckless squandering of the younger son’s everything with the extravagant, spending of everything of the Father
With Ian Paul’s forbearance to be continued…
Some sippets:
a)“The original listeners were nor melted into tears by this story but rather they were thunderstruck, offended, and infuriated. Jesus purpose is not to warm our hearts but to shatter our categories…challenges what nearly everyone has ever thought about God, sin and salvation…( there are two lost sons) both the irreligious and religious are spiritually lost. Both life paths are dead ends, and that every thought of the human race has had about how to connect to God has been wrong.”
b)“Nothing, not even abject contrition, MERITS the favour of God. The Father’s love and acceptance are absolutely fre”, but the narrative does not end there. The costliness of grace is the true climax of the story
c) Comment (g) Both sons are alike -twins divided by age.
-To both, something has become more important than God.
-”The Father has to go out to each of them to invite then to the feast” (k)
– both wanted the father’s goods, not the father himself
-they have the same motivation and aim- “Both are using the father in different ways to get the things on which their hearts are really fixed. It was the wealth not the love of the father, that they believed would make them happy and fulfilled.” (k).
-Both are self interested.
– both have a self salvation project.
d) There is much written on the lostness, sin, of the elder brother. And there are a number of notable illustrations.
e) There is much more to bring to a challenging and radical confluence…the Good News of our true Elder brother, Jesus costly and extravagant grace….
To be continued…?