Fall 2014
Ethical imperatives for the Kingdom of God revealed in Luke 10: 25-37
By: Charmaine Warford
From the perspective of the legal expert in Biblical law:
Jesus confronted the “expert in the law” with God’s law and left him without a defense. For Paul, covenant right standing before God, is neither maintained nor advanced by obedience to the law, but is a gift of grace through Jesus Christ. 1. Faith incorporates the believer in Christ, in his faithfulness to us through his death on the cross and his vindication through his resurrection. Thus, a believer stands approved before God, not by works of the law, but as a gift of divine grace through the instrument of faith. In the parable of the Good Samaritan Jesus confronted the expert of the law with the simple fact that eternal life is not secured by …show more content…
the righteousness of the law.
The “expert of the law” saw himself as a good law-keeper, although he did have a minor theological concern which he felt Jesus may be able to help him with. This religious Jew did not need a definition for “neighbor”, he needed to act with mercy and love towards his neighbor to inherit eternal life. 2. It appeared that the “expert of the law” had never experienced love as the Samaritan had.
The Lawyer did not show humility but instead sought to justify himself. 3. This is often the case with experts in moral law, because they examine their actions and not their hearts.
From the perspective of the Priest:
Priests were supposed to be ritually clean exemplars of the law. If the Priest had stopped to help it would have brought immediate defilement, shame and embarrassment to them at the expense of the people. Having just completed his mandatory two weeks of service, he would then need to return and stand at the Eastern Gate along with the rest of the unclean. In addition to the humiliation involved, the process of restoring ritual purity was time-consuming and costly. It required finding, buying, and reducing a red heifer to ashes, and the ritual took a full week. The priest was in a predicament. He could not approach closer than four cubits to a dead man without being defiled, and he would have to overstep that boundary just to determine the condition of the wounded man.
From the perspective of the Levite:
The Levite, who was of a lower social class, was a member of the tribe of Levi who assisted the priests in the service of the Temple.
He most probably saw the priest ahead of him and could have thought to himself, “If the priest may pass, then so should I.”
Perhaps the Levite might have feared for their own safety. What if someone saw them with the naked and wounded person and reported to the officials that the priest and/or Levite committed a crime against the injured person?
From the perspective of the Samaritan:
The Samaritans were a mixed race between the Jews of captivity and the Samaritan people of the land they were captive in. The relationship between the Jews and Samaritans was one of hostility because of bad things that happened in the past. A Jewish proverb said, “He that eats the bread of the Samaritans is like to one that eats the flesh of swine”.
The Samaritan was not gentile. He was bound by the same law as the Jews. The Samaritan would not be naturally from that area, so the half dead man would certainly not qualify as his neighbor. 6.
The Samaritan risks defilement. He approached this unidentifiable man and helped
him.
The Samaritan forfeits anonymity when he stays overnight and then says he would return. This is an acceptance of the potential threat of blood vengeance. Blood revenge under the mosaic legislation established cities of refuge for people under the threat of death from blood vengeance retaliation.
The wounded man had no money. When it was time for him to leave if he could not pay the debt, he could be arrested. Matthew 18 23-35. The Samaritan knew this and volunteered money (two denarii is two-days wages) and whatever else was needed to see to the needs of this unidentified man. The Samaritan had no way of insuring the return of his money so we can assume he did not expect it to be returned.
The robbers hurt the man by violence but the Priest and Levite hurt him by neglect. All three were guilty.
Jesus was like the Samaritan. He was willing to touch the unclean. He was willing to go to the lost, the outcast, and the needy. And, like the Samaritan, Jesus was an outcast in the eyes of the Lawyers, Priests, Scribes, Pharisees, and Sadducees. J. Macquarrie & J. Childress say; “By comparison with the Judaism of his day, Jesus represents an abandonment of interest in the major issues of the law as discussed in his day; matters of ritual cleanliness and table fellowship, which in practice dominated the current scene, and questions of calendrical and ritual observance, especially in relation to the Sabbath. The emphasis falls instead on direct response to God’s urgent summons, forcibly expressed in obedience to the dual command to love God and love the neigbour.”
Bibliography:
Holy Bible, New International Version, NIV Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
Macquarrie, J. & Childress, J. (1986) “A New Dictionery of Christian Ethis”, SMC Press: London
Hannon, Patrick (2005) “Moral Decision Making” Dublin: Veritas
Hession, Anne and Kieran, Patricia (2007) “Making Sense of Catholic Tradition” Dublin: Veritas
Connolly, Patrick (2008) “Moral Decision Making – Conscience and Church Authority”, Exploring Theology, Dublin: Veritas
Regan, Emma, (2007) “Catholic Anthropology”, Exploring Theology, Dublin: Veritas