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For the sake of a non-interpretive title, I am going to use the Rabbinic practice of using the opening line:  "A certain rich man had a manager."  It has often been called the "unjust steward" or "shrewd manager;" but just like the title "prodigal son" obscures the emphasis on the father and older brother, I feel that an interpretive title that focuses on the manager might cause us to miss something.  In addition, I think it helpful to hear a title as a story beginning rather than an ending, something like the beginning of a joke "And so this rich man had a manager..."

The conclusion of the parable has been problematic.   Does the story itself end with v. 7 or the first half of v. 8?  The question centers around the use of the word, ho kyrios, "the master" or "the lord", which is used for the master in the parable but also is used by Luke for Jesus as Lord.  Joachim Jeremias, and many others, have argued that v. 8a was refering to Jesus.  The main reasoning for this was that it seemed unlikely that the master would have praised the manager for having his debtors pay him less than what was owed.  For Jeremias, the entirety of v. 8 becomes Jesus' commentary on the parable, wherein he praises the craftiness of the manager and makes a comparative statement about "the sons of this age" and the "sons of light".

However, other interpreter's see v. 8a as the master of the story praising his manager for crafty response to his situation as the natural ending of the parable.  In this case 8b ("Therefore the sons of this age . . . ") is the beginning of the commentary on the parable which follows.  This would provide an unexpected ending to Jesus' parable narrative, which is often the case and is not based upon a presupposition of what is possible for the master in the story to have said.

For the sake of this study, I will accept that 8a is the end of the parable, and for now I'm only going to focus on the parable itself (vv. 1-8a), and not its interpretation (vv. 8b-13).  Here's a brief analysis:

The Historical Context of Masters, Managers, and Debtors

In the patron-client society of first century Palestine, a manager (or steward) who was placed over a wealthy patron's holdings (land, produce, slaves, share-croppers) had the authority to make contractual agreements in the patron/master's name.  In most cases the manager would not be paid a wage, but would be expected (and allowed) to generate his own income by taking a "cut" from the debts owed by his master's clients.   As long as it did not interefere with the due income and profit margin of the patron, this situation was acceptable.  The debtors, while being fully aware and at the mercy(?)  this patron-client arrangement, probably did not know how much of the debt was to the master and how much went to the manager.  However, if the debtors were share-cropping peasants (which is not to be assumed), there would have been no love lost between the manager and the debtors.  From perspective of the Palestinian peasant culture, both the manager and the master (who may have been an absentee landlord over share-cropping farmers) would both initially be considered negatively by the audience.  Maybe one of the ways this would have been heard was: "there was a wealthy plantation owner who hired a boss-man . . ."

In terms of the debts themselves, among the Jews giving loans at interest was considered to be against the Torah.  In order to circumscribe such laws, the debts were usually officially in the form of some commodity rather than money.

In this context it is not clear from the parable that the manager was portrayed as subverting his master's own profit for his own best interest, or if the manager was simply removing his own "cut" from the debtors.   His act of "mercy" would have had serious impact upon his honor and his master's honor in the eyes of the debtors.  Either they would have seen the manager himself as merciful (or positively subversive against the master to the benefit of the debtors), or possibly shrewdness of the manager may have actually strengthened his master's honor in the eyes of the debtor, creating a situation in which the master is obligated to return an honoring favor even though material profits have been lost--in effect, playing the master against himself.  

I'm doing a presentation on the following passage in Luke for my parables class on Thursday night.  It is my own translation, and it's pretty stiff and literal. I wanted to see how it looked in English and get some opinions.

Luke 16:1-14
¹And he said also to the apprentices:
[There was] a certain man who was rich who had a manager
And this one was accused to him, that he was wasting his possessions.
²And he shouted to him, saying to him: 
What is this I hear concerning you?
Give an accounting of your management, for you cannot still manage.
³And he said in himself, the manager,
What might I do, for my master took away the managment from me? 
To dig, I am not strong enough,
to beg, I am ashamed.
⁴I know what I might do,
in order that when I might be removed from the management
they will receive me into their houses.
⁵And calling one each, the debtors of his own master,
he said to the first,
“how much are you obligated to my master?”
⁶And he said, 100 measures of olive oil.
And he said to him, Take your bills, and sit down quickly begin to write 50.
⁷Then to another he said, And you, how much do you owe?
And he said, 100 cor of grain.
He spoke to him, take your writing and write 80.
⁸And the master praised the manager of injustice since he acted shrewdly.
Therefore the sons of this age are more shrewd than the sons of light in their own generation.
⁹And I tell you, For yourselves make friends from the wealth of injustice,
in order that whenever it fails they might welcome you into eternal tents.
¹⁰The one who is faithful in very little, also in much is faithful,
and whoever in little is unjust, also in much is unjust.
¹¹If therefore in unjust wealth faithful you will not be,
who will have faith in you for what is true?
¹²And if in that which belongs to another faithful you have not been,
who will give you what is your own?
¹³No slave is able to slave for two masters,
for one he will hate and the other he will love,
one he will cling to and the other he will despise.
You are not able for God to slave and wealth.
¹⁴And heard this all the Pharisees, lovers of possessions, and they began to mock him.

Some questions are:

• Where does the parable end? Does v. 8a ("And the master praised the manager of injustice since he acted shrewdly") represent the end, with the master of the story praising the manager, or is the master Jesus praising the manager in order to sum up the story?
• How should the teaching which follows be approached?  Where are the breaks?
• What is the historical context of the parable (masters, managers, clients, agriculture)?
• What did Jesus mean by this parable?
• How was Luke contextually using this parable (it falls between the "prodigal son" and "the rich man and Lazarus," and it is joined by shorter teaching passages)?  What does Luke mean by the parable? How does it fit with his larger themes and the travel narrative context?
• How should this parable be titled?

Chris Tilling has posted the following quote from Ernst Kasemann: 

'Every simplification which forces the original variety of voices [of the biblical text] into a well trodden path, is sin against the Spirit'!

(from his essay "Justification and salvation-history in Romans" in Pauline Perspectives – Tilling's translation from the German original, p. 118)

One thing that I have learned from my graduate work in biblical studies is that we too often blur and downplay the Biblical message by harmonizing passages which should rather be read distinctly.  It is also interesting how often those who believe that the Bible is inspired so quickly want to mute, under the auspices of "the whole counsel of Scripture," the tensions within the Bible that are created by the individual authors.  It seems to me that God's speaking through those who wrote the Bible would signify that their individual voices, even in areas where they may differ, are somehow important in revealing God and the divine story to us.  I don't know how anyone reading Galatians and the Epistle of James can think that those two authors saw things eye-to-eye nor presented them that way.  It's almost like one of them is responding rhetorically to the other--and they don't seem to be in agreement.  One can imagine the following conversation (emphasis added from my imagined face-to-face debate between the two of them):

Note in particular Paul's opening statement and James' last sentence.  Maybe Paul and James disagree, or maybe they are just using language differently . . . but there are issues.[1] 

Another example would be the differences in the birth stories of Matthew (Matt 1:18-2:23) and Luke (Luke 1:26-56; 2:1-40).  If we attempt to harmonize all of the differences, we may miss what each Gospel writer meant to communicate to us.  A few years ago I couldn't even have students read the separate Gospel versions without them unconsciously reading elements of one story into another.  Before I made the "Matthew Group" read their passage again, looking for the specific elements, they even argued somewhat angrily with me that they had "just read!" details in Matthew that are only found in Luke.  And then speaking about this funny occurance with another faculty member, who reads scripture regularly, she asked, "The stories are different?"

Trying to do away with these tension creating differences may actually hide something God is trying to say.  The Bible is a gritty book, and contrary to popular statements proclaming its "simple message", it is complex--as one would expect of the revelation of God, truth, and life to be.  I don't think our fear of "contradictions" in the Bible should cause us to approach the text dishonestly or in an over-simplifying manner which reduces the tensions which make us uncomfortable.  Personally, I find that when I allow the individual voices to speak, even though it often complicates issues, the mystery of it draws me even deeper into the text.  

Who knows, maybe one of the messages God has for us in the "whole counsel of Scripture" is that the unity of those who follow Christ isn't so much about agreement on the details as it is about being found in Christ and graciously pursuing Him and his Kingdom together.

A follow-up post to this article can be found here:  The Bible:  Revelation Through Community.

[1] Luther, a big fan of Paul and "faith alone," was more than aware of the conflicts between Paul and the epistle of James.  He writes:

Though this epistle of St. James was rejected by the ancients, I praise it and consider it a good book, because it sets up no doctrines of men but vigorously promulgates the law of God. However, to state my own opinion about it, though without prejudice to anyone, I do not regard it as the writing of an apostle; and my reasons follow.

In the first place it is flatly against St. Paul and all the rest of Scripture in ascribing justification to works. It says that Abraham was justified by his works when he offered his son Isaac; though in Romans 4 St. Paul teaches to the contrary that Abraham was justified apart from works, by his faith alone, before he had offered his son, and proves it by Moses in Genesis 15. Now although this epistle might be helped and an interpretation devised for this justification by works, it cannot be defended in its application to works of Moses' statement in Genesis 15. For Moses is speaking here only of Abraham's faith, and not of his works, as St. Paul demonstrates in Romans 4. This fault, therefore, proves that this epistle is not the work of any apostle.

In the second place its purpose is to teach Christians, but in all this long teaching it does not once mention the Passion, the resurrection, or the Spirit of Christ. He names Christ several times; however he teaches nothing about him, but only speaks of general faith in God. Now it is the office of a true apostle to preach of the Passion and resurrection and office of Christ, and to lay the foundation for faith in him, as Christ himself says in John 15, "You shall bear witness to me." All the genuine sacred books agree in this, that all of them preach and inculcate [treiben] Christ. And that is the true test by which to judge all books, when we see whether or not they inculcate Christ. For all the Scriptures show us Christ, Romans 3; and St. Paul will know nothing but Christ, I Corinthians 2. Whatever does not teach Christ is not apostolic, even though St. Peter or St. Paul does the teaching. Again, whatever preaches Christ would be apostolic, even if Judas, Annas, Pilate, and Herod were doing it.

But this James does nothing more than drive to the law and to its works. Besides, he throws things together so chaotically that it seems to me he must have been some good, pious man, who took a few sayings from the disciples of the apostles and thus tossed them off on paper. Or it may perhaps have been written by someone on the basis of his preaching. He calls the law a "law of liberty," though Paul calls it a law of slavery, of wrath, of death, and of sin.

Moreover he cites the sayings of St. Peter: "Love covers a multitude of sins," and again, "Humble yourselves under the hand of God;" also the saying of St. Paul in Galatians 5, "The Spirit lusteth against envy." And yet, in point of time, St. James was put to death by Herod in Jerusalem, before St. Peter.  So it seems that this author came long after St. Peter and St. Paul.

In a word, he wanted to guard against those who relied on faith without works, but was unequal to the task in spirit, thought, and words. He mangles the Scriptures and thereby opposes Paul and all Scripture. He tries to accomplish by harping on the law what the apostles accomplish by stimulating people to love. Therefore, I will not have him in my Bible to be numbered among the true chief books, though I would not thereby prevent anyone from including or extolling him as he pleases, for there are otherwise many good sayings in him. One man is no man in worldly things; how, then, should this single man alone avail against Paul and all the rest of Scripture?

Luther's Works, vol 35 (St. Louis: Concordia, 1963), pp. 395-396

6:30 Tuesday, April 21st

Cigar Box Bar next to Bass Pro shop in Broken Arrow

The Topic:  Atonement

Via the ANE-2 newsgroup and Jim West an a brief article on the discoveries:

Photo by Ferrell Jenkins.

Ancient sources — such as the Homeric epics and the Hebrew Bible — depict an era of widespread famine, ethnic conflict and population movement, most famously including the migrations of the Sea Peoples (or biblical Philistines) and the Israelites. This is thought to have precipitated a prolonged Dark Age marked by cultural decline and ethnic strife during the early centuries of the Iron Age. But recent discoveries — including the Tayinat excavations — have revealed that some ruling dynasties survived the collapse of the great Bronze Age powers.

"Our ongoing excavations have not only begun to uncover extensive remains from this Dark Age, but the emerging archaeological picture suggests that during this period Tayinat was the capital of a powerful kingdom, the 'Land of Palastin'," says Timothy Harrison, professor of Near Eastern Archaeology at the University of Toronto and the director of the project. "Intriguingly, the early Iron Age settlement at Tayinat shows evidence of strong cultural connections, if not the direct presence of foreign settlers, from the Aegean world, the traditional homeland of the Sea Peoples."

Here's a link to the Tayinat Archaeological Project website and here's a pdf with some good pics of the project.

"Land of Palastin" and connection with the Sea Peoples?    Interesting... 

I've been talking to my studens about the History of Western Thought, and how the measurability of nature led to a confidence in the objectivitiy of natural science at the same time that things like the Reformation and the Wars of Religion caused growing religious skepticism in Western thinking.   From the rational and empirical perspective, Thomas Hobbes' view that talking about God was literally "non-sense," since God cannot not perceived with the senses, was more profound than anyone in Hobbes' day realized. 

While I understand that social and civic religion is still important in some ways in our country, and that there is an awareness of the need for spirituality in one's life (at least the image of the "deep" person), it is easy to see the real place and nature of religion's status by where the magazines are at Barnes and Noble:

Note that the religious magazines are on the bottom and on the floor for all intents.  And even though you can't really tell from the photo, the bottom shelf is actually slightly recessed.  That's an interesting marketing statement, especially here in Tulsa.  I'm guessing the Barnes and Noble hasn't done their local demographics very well. 

Look at the topics of the magazines in that bottom section.  Anything interesting? 

Let's see, there's Christianity Today with a story about resurrection.  Another on Children's Ministry and, of course, one on Leadership in the church.   There's Shambhala Sun and Hinduism. But please note the Pirates book in the background and the Faerie Magazine in the foreground. 

Where did I put that Flying Spaghetti Monster Magazine?

(Thanks to Aubrey for the pic!)

There has been much news lately concerning President Obama's bowing to King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia (see here, here, here, here, here, and here --get the picture ?).  I'm not sure what is more frustrating to me, those overly angry at this, or the White House for foolishly attempting to say that he didn't do it:

Q    And then one unrelated question.  When the President met with King Abdullah, there was something that took place that I believe the White House explained as just the President being taller than the King.  We took a look at the video, and it does appear that the President actually bowed to King Abdullah.  Did he bow or didn't he?

MR. GIBBS:  Well, I think he bent over with both -- to shake with both hands to shake his hand.  So I don't --

Q    It appears to show one hand, that he was just --

MR. GIBBS:  Well, I --

Q    Did he bow or didn't he?

MR. GIBBS:  No.  But I think this meeting was like a week ago, right?

Q    That's right, but this is something that a lot of people are still talking about today.

MR. GIBBS:  I can only imagine it is of great cause and concern for many people struggling with the economy.  (Laughter.) 

when he clearly did:

Ah, American Politics! 

I'm not really sure that this story deserves the press it is getting.  From the perspective of President Obama's intent, it seems to me that he made the gesture without thinking about it (it doesn't seem to be very formal).  However, such a mistake can be a serious issue for a President in the world of international politics.  In matters of foreign diplomacy and protocol, small unintentional or thoughtless blunders can certainly have far reaching effect and communicate something other than intended or needed.  A good example is George W. Bush speaking of a "crusade against terror " and then going to war in the Middle East, or American soldiers in Mogadishu being unaware of the great insult displaying the bottom of one's shoe can carry in Middle Eastern and Muslim cultures.  However, I don't think this blunder and breach of tradition gives us reason to accuse Obama of pandering any more to the Saudis than former Presidents.   Remember President Bush holding hands with the crown prince?  I think we've been politically bowing to Saudi Arabia for a good while as our straw has reached accrroossss the ocean to drink their milkshake.  Or maybe their straw has been siphoning off of us?  It's difficult to tell.

King Jehu bowing to Shalmaneser III on the Black Obelisk.

(via Jim Davila)  The Israeli news source Haaretz has a brief article on the discovery in Iraq of skulls with Aramaic incantations inscribed in them:

Click image to read the Biblical Archeology Review article concerning the skulls. The skulls were unearthed in present-day Iraq (formerly Babylonia) and are believed to have been used during the Talmudic era. At least one of them appears to be that of an anonymous woman.

"When I presented these findings in Israel, people told me, 'It is not possible that this is Jewish,'" said Levene. "But it is certainly Jewish."

Levene added that, despite going against conventional wisdom, the talisman was likely used by someone desperate, and that there have been past cases of skulls being used to ward off increased ghosts or demons. <more >

Jim had already mentioned this in an earlier post concerning the Biblical Archeology Review article on the skulls.

The Wall Street Journal (of all things) has a good article and great slideshow concerning the ancient Nabatean location of Petra.  An excerpt:

In the middle of the desert of present-day Jordan lies one of the most wondrous sights known to the world: the city of Petra. The capital of the ancient Nabataean people, Petra was ornately carved into the pink sandstone cliffside 2,000 years ago.