XV. (1) THEN DREW NEAR UNTO HIM... — Better, _and all the publicans and the sinners were drawing near to hear Him._ There is not quite the same direct sequence in the Greek as in the English, but what follows comes naturally after the mention of the “multitudes” in Luke 14:25. Publicans and sinners... [ Continue Reading ]
AND THE PHARISEES AND SCRIBES... — Here, too, we may well believe that the speakers were some of the guests of Luke 14:15. They had followed Him to see what He would do, and were at once startled and shocked to find the Teacher who had spoken so sternly to those who were professedly godly, not only... [ Continue Reading ]
WHAT MAN OF YOU, HAVING AN HUNDRED SHEEP ...? — The meaning of the parable is so clear that it requires but little in the way of explanation. It gains, however, fresh force and interest if we remember that it followed on the great parable of the Good Shepherd in John 10:1, and on the compassion for... [ Continue Reading ]
AND WHEN HE HATH FOUND IT, HE LAYETH IT ON HIS SHOULDERS. — Here again we have a three-fold series of parallel applications: the love of Jesus for each wandering sheep, bearing and sustaining it in its weakness; the love which led Him to take upon Him our nature, and to bear its infirmities; the lov... [ Continue Reading ]
HE CALLETH TOGETHER HIS FRIENDS AND NEIGHBOURS. — The recurrence of the two words so soon after Luke 14:12 is suggestive. There are times when we do well to recognise the natural and social ties that bind man and man. Chiefly is it right to do so when we make them sharers in our own spiritual life,... [ Continue Reading ]
NINETY AND NINE JUST PERSONS, WHICH NEED NO REPENTANCE. — As regards the men and women among whom our Lord carried on His work, we cannot see in these words anything but a grave and indignant protest, veiled under the form of an apparent concession, against the self-righteousness of the Pharisees. H... [ Continue Reading ]
EITHER WHAT WOMAN HAVING TEN PIECES OF SILVER. — The main lesson of the parable that thus opens is, of course, identical with that of the Lost Sheep. We are justified, however, in assuming that the special features of each were meant to have a special meaning, and that we have therefore more than a... [ Continue Reading ]
AND HE SAID, A CERTAIN MAN HAD TWO SONS. — We enter here on one of the parables which are not only peculiar to St. Luke’s Gospel, but have something of a different character, as giving more than those we find in the other Gospels, the incidents of a story of common daily life. As with the Good Samar... [ Continue Reading ]
THE YOUNGER OF THEM SAID TO HIS FATHER. — In its bearing on the individual life, the younger son represents the temper that is eager for independence, self-asserting, energetic; the elder that which is contemplative, devout, ceremonial, quiescent. As the latter pre-eminently characterises, as notice... [ Continue Reading ]
TOOK HIS JOURNEY INTO A FAR COUNTRY. — Such instances of emigration were, we may believe, familiar things in most towns of Galilee and Judæa. The young man left his home, and started, bent on pleasure or on gain, for Alexandria, or Rome, or Corinth, and rumour came home of riotous living, and a fort... [ Continue Reading ]
THERE AROSE A MIGHTY FAMINE IN THAT LAND. — This again was no unwonted incident. The famine which “came to pass in the days of Claudius Cæsar” (Acts 11:28) was more extensive and memorable than others, but it was far from standing alone. And now the pinch came. His treasure was gone, and for the ful... [ Continue Reading ]
JOINED HIMSELF. — Literally _clave to,_ or, _attached himself to._ The verb is the same as that used of the husband cleaving to his wife in Matthew 19:5, and thus expresses the absolute dependence of the famished man upon one who was ready to help him. TO A CITIZEN. — Literally, _to one of the citiz... [ Continue Reading ]
HE WOULD FAIN HAVE FILLED HIS BELLY. — It is singular that very many of the best MSS. give the simpler reading, “desired to be filled or satisfied.” It is open to suppose either that they shrank from the reading in the text as too coarse, or that the later MSS. introduced “filled his belly” as more... [ Continue Reading ]
AND WHEN HE CAME TO HIMSELF. — The phrase is wonderfully suggestive. The man’s guilt was, that he had been self-indulgent; but he had been living to a self which was not his true self. The first step in his repentance is to wake as out of an evil dream, and to be conscious of his better nature, and... [ Continue Reading ]
I WILL ARISE AND GO TO MY FATHER. — This, then, was the firstfruits of repentance. He remembers that he has a father, and trusts in that father’s love; but he dares not claim the old position which he had so recklessly cast away. He is content to be as one of the “hired servants.” Spiritually, the f... [ Continue Reading ]
WHEN HE WAS YET A GREAT WAY OFF. — In the story of the parable we must think of the wanderer as coming back weary, foot-sore, hungry, and in rags. In the interpretation, the state of the penitent is that of one who is poor in spirit, hungering and thirsting after righteousness (Matthew 5:3; Matthew... [ Continue Reading ]
FATHER, I HAVE SINNED AGAINST HEAVEN. — The iteration of the self-same words comes to us with a wonderful power and pathos. The contrite soul does not play with its contrition, or seek to vary its expression. But the change is as suggestive as the repetition. Now that he has seen his father, he cann... [ Continue Reading ]
BRING FORTH THE BEST ROBE. — It is hardly necessary, perhaps, in such a parable, to press the symbolic interpretation of each minute detail; but in this instance the symbolism lies so near the surface that it is at least well to ask ourselves what meaning either earlier or later associations would l... [ Continue Reading ]
BRING HITHER THE FATTED CALF. — It is interesting to remember the impression which this part of the parable made on one of the great teachers of the Church as early as the second century. Irenaeus (see _Introduction_) saw in it an illustration of what seemed to him the special characteristic of St.... [ Continue Reading ]
THIS MY SON WAS DEAD. — The words, looked at merely as part of the story, have a wonderful pathos. Absence, alienation, the self-chosen shame, this had made the father think of the son as “dead.” Death would indeed have been far easier to bear. Spiritually, we are taught that repentance is nothing l... [ Continue Reading ]
HE HEARD MUSICK AND DANCING. — This brings in a new feature. The father, like the chief actors in the other parables, had called together his “friends and neighbours,” and they were rejoicing after the manner of the East. There was “musick,” literally, a _symphony,_ or _concert,_ implying voices as... [ Continue Reading ]
BECAUSE HE HATH RECEIVED HIM SAFE AND SOUND. — Literally, _in health._ The participle is the same which we have noted as characteristic of St. Luke and St. Paul in Luke 5:31; Luke 7:10.... [ Continue Reading ]
AND HE WAS ANGRY, AND WOULD NOT GO IN. — This, then, was the first feeling. He who professed obedience to his father is out of harmony with his father’s mind. He “shuts love out,” and, as by a righteous judgment, is himself “shut out from love.”... [ Continue Reading ]
LO, THESE MANY YEARS DO I SERVE THEE. — The very word “I serve,” as a slave serves, is eminently suggestive. The obedience had all along been servile, prompted by fear and hope, even as the slave’s obedience is. The language put into the mouth of the elder son is clearly meant to represent the habit... [ Continue Reading ]
AS SOON AS THIS THY SON WAS COME. — The feeling of discontent passes into scorn and bitterness. The sin of the wanderer is painted at once in the coarsest and darkest colours. The very turn of the phrase, “this thy son” speaks of a concentrated malignity.... [ Continue Reading ]
SON, THOU ART EVER WITH ME. — As applied _to_ the Pharisees in its primary bearing, or to others like the Pharisees in its secondary, it appears at first sight as if the words were spoken from their own point of view, their own self-appreciation, and were therefore ironical. We need not, however, so... [ Continue Reading ]
IT WAS MEET THAT WE SHOULD MAKE MERRY. — The Greek expresses moral necessity rather than mere fitness. “We must needs rejoice;” it could not be otherwise. The repetition of the same words that had been used before, “he was dead...” is singularly-emphatic. This, and nothing more or less than this was... [ Continue Reading ]