Luke
Chapter 16.
The shrewd steward.
16:1-8. This parable is designed
to expose the perverseness of Pharisaic practice concerning business
ethics. Especially the failure of their
efforts to make business standards morally respectable. Such efforts were full of loopholes, because
they themselves were lovers of money.
The key to the interpretation lies in the Jewish law of
agency and their law relating to usury.
Almost certainly the transactions were usurious. The Rabbis of the Pharisees, agreed that the
law of God forbade loans of interest to fellow Jews. (see Duet.15:7; 23:20; Ex.22:24;
Lev.25:36). However it was argued
that the law aimed at exploitation and not so much at transactions, where both
parties would mutually profit. So a
large number of human laws were developed to comprehend and regulate usury in
certain circumstances. The parable aims
at the inadequacy of such laws.
The Pharisees raised a barrier - the dust of usury - around
transactions in which usury might be involved.
This barrier reflected different moods, extreme legalism and hostility
to usury, and on the other hand, many loopholes to enable professed piety and
good business to become compatible. Thus
one's position under God's law and under man's law - the law court - might be
quite different. One might be legally
secure, so long as the borrower already had some of the same material and the
usurious nature of the contract was hid.
The steward broke God's law in making usurious contracts
with fellow Jews. The tainted increase
did not belong to the master, as he could not authorise the steward to take
interest from Jews. In releasing the
debtors the steward was acting honestly, in that he did not take the usury to
which he was legally entitled. But
according to the law of man - the law court - the steward was entitled to exact
the stipulated amount from the debtors, and sell them and their families into
slavery, if necessary, in order to recover the amount due. For according to the
law of man, the contracts were legally valid and were entered on the master's
behalf. In releasing the debts the steward deprived the master of that which
was his gain. However the master may
have been ignorant of the usurious character of the original transactions.
According to the law of God, the master was under a duty to
release debts to fellow Jews in distress.
But according to the law of man he was entitled to usury from the
debtors, though there was nothing to prevent him releasing what they legally
owed him and, if the steward took such a step without his express authority, he
could cure the defect by subsequent approval.
And that is exactly what he did.
The steward had been dishonest or incompetent, but as long
as he remained steward, he could release his master's debtors. Since he is allowed some time to clear up his
accounts so that the next man might take over, he has opportunity to release
the debtors. This he does to gain
support of public opinion, that he may obtain hospitality until he finds
alternative employment. In the last
moments of his authority he gains approval by doing what the law of God
required of him.
The master has no alternative than to adopt his act and gain
credit for his pious conduct, which he had not initiated. The parable shows that the steward who knew
his moral duty, and neglected it for the sake of worldly advantage, is now
forced by circumstances, connected with earlier imprudence, to consider his
position and seek the goodwill of those whose opinions he had neglected.
Worldly people will act, in some situations, upon the assumption that God's
standards are the best standards. We,
then, can learn from their wisdom in this respect.
It is to be assumed that the master (16:8) was a pious man
who commends the steward for doing right.
The steward displayed the right disposition of mind, whatever motive may
have produced it. He could have thought
it prudent to make a profit and appease his master.
The
application of the story.
16:9-13. Worldly people often
know how to utilise worldly gains to do good deeds and gain credit for
righteousness, whilst those who claim to be children of light, either
narrow-mindedly refuse to soil their hands with tainted earnings, or devise
means, whereby, the service of God can be mixed with shady business practices.
The Pharisees sought to make the service of God and the
service of mammon, two distinct, but compatible services. But they held that tainted wealth (or usury)
was unfit for offerings to God. Their
method for getting around usury, was selfish, unpractical and
hypocritical. (Large form. J.D.M.Derret).
The Pharisees
again criticised. 16:14-18.
* Justification. This is determined by God, who knows the
state of the heart.
* Status of law. The law was not depreciated
by Jesus, but rather fulfilled. There
can be therefore no divergence of interpretation. Since John there has been introduced a new
order. It is the good news of the Kingdom of God. Compare Matt.11:12-13, where
'biazomai' (uses force) can be understood differently to Luke 16:6.
* Illustration from divorce and adultery. The Spirit, as well as the letter of the
commandment must be obeyed. It was here,
that Pharisaic interpretation broke down.
Dives and
Lazarus. 16:19-31. This is, in some respect, the parable of the
steward in reverse. Failure to deal
righteously with mammon, leads to Hell.
This story may be directed against the Sadducees - wealthy, indifferent
to the poor - and having no belief in the future life. But Abraham insists that the canonical
Scriptures give adequate warning of the future life. Abraham, fills the role of the Father of the
Jewish people, Lazarus is short for Eliezer (helped by God), the name of
Abraham's servant.
What shall it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose
his own soul.
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