01.19. Chapter 8. Dives and Lazarus, and the Unmerciful Servant

Chapter 8.
Dives and Lazarus, and the Unmerciful Servant Or, Inhumanity and Implacability the Unpardonable Sins. The genius of an ethical system is revealed not only by what it loves, but by what it heartily hates, and regards as deadly unpardonable sin. In the teaching of Christ the unpardonable sins are Inhumanity and Implacability. It is the selfish worldling who cares for nothing but his own comfort that goes to the place of woe; it is the unforgiving man whom the Father in heaven does not forgive. So we learn from the two parables next to be considered, the last in the present division. The doctrine is altogether congenial to a gospel of love, and fitly crowns the goodly edifice of spiritual instruction set forth in the parables of grace. Where love is regarded as the central truth of God’s being, and the supreme duty and virtue of man, there a loveless spirit must appear the thing above all things hateful and damnable. We feel, therefore, that we commit no offence against the law of congruity in including the parables of Dives and the Unmerciful Servant under the same class with those of the Lost Sheep, the Lost Coin, and the Lost Son, and treating them as contributions to Christ’s doctrine of Grace. Without misgiving on this score we proceed to the exposition of these parables, taking first the more difficult, viz.: The Parable of Dives and Lazarus

Now there was a certain rich[1] man, and he was clothed in purple and fine linen, and fared sumptuously every day.[2] And a certain beggar, Lazarus by name, was laid at his gate[3] covered with ulcers, and desiring to be fed with the crumbs[4] that fell from the rich man’s table: yea, even[5] the dogs came and licked his sores. And it came to pass that the beggar died, and that he was carried by the angels into Abraham’s bosom: and the rich man also died and was buried. And in Hades, lifting up his eyes, being in torments, he seeth Abraham from afar, and Lazarus in his bosom. And he cried and said: Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am in anguish in this flame. But Abraham said: Son, remember that thou receivedst thy good things in thy lifetime and Lazarus in like manner the evil things:[6] but now here[7] he is comforted, and thou art in anguish. And besides all this,[8] between us and you there is a great chasm[9] fixed, that they which would pass from hence to you may not be able,[10] and that none may cross over from thence to us. Then he said: I pray thee, therefore, father, that thou wouldest send him to my father’s house, for I have five brethren, that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torment. But Abraham saith, They have Moses and the prophets: let them hear them. And he said, Nay, father Abraham, but if one go to them from the dead, they will repent. But he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded if one rise from the dead.—Luk 16:19-31.

[1] Bleek regards πλούσιος as a predicate, and renders: There was a certain man who was rich.

[2] Dr. Field criticising the revised version, says: "The Revisers have done right in retaining the A. V. except that for ’faring’ they might with advantage have substituted ’feasting.’ But in the margin they propose another rendering, ’living in mirth and splendour every day.’ Here the luxurious living of the rich man is presented to us under two different aspects; mirth, which we may suppose to consist in eating and drinking; and splendour, which suggests elegance of house and furniture. But the Greek word εὐφρμινόμενος only contains the former idea, that of merrymaking, which is qualified by the adverb λαμπρῶς, laute, sumptuously."—’Otium Norvicense.’

[3] ἐβἐβλητο does not necessarily mean more than ’lay.’

[4] The correct reading is τῶν πιπτόντων = the things falling. ψιχίων = ’crumbs,’ has probably crept in from Mat 15:27. Godet, however, thinks it has dropped out by confusion of the two τῶν and ought to be retained.

[5] ἀλλὰ καὶ, implying if not an aggravation of his sufferings, a heightened colouring in the description of them.

[6] Τὰ κακὰ, the ills of life; not his evil things, as in the case of Dives Goebel, however, maintains that the pronoun is understood.

[7] ὠδε: ὀδε=this one, Lazarus, in T. R.

[8] This rendering answers to the reading ἐπὶ πᾶσι τούτοις. The reading approved by critics is ἐν πᾶσι τούτοις, literally, "in all these things."

[9] Χάσμα. Trench remarks that when the A. V. was published the word ’chasm’ did not exist in English. The R. V. retains ’gulf.’

[10] The word ὄπως at the beginning of this clause suggests the idea that the chasm has been fixed for the purpose of preventing transit. In the interpretation of this parable much depends on the view taken of the connection between it and the preceding portion of the chapter in which it occurs. If the connection is supposed to be with the immediately preceding context, then the main drift of the parable will be found in the concluding verses, in which the importance of Moses and the prophets as means of grace is emphasised. If, on the other hand, these miscellaneous observations contained in Luk 16:14-18 be passed over as a kind of parenthesis interrupting the train of thought, and the present parable be connected with the one going before, then we shall discover the didactic significance not in the appendix, but in the main body of the story viewed as a fictitious history invented to illustrate the moral with which the parable of the unrighteous steward ends. We have no hesitation in deciding for the latter view. The imaginary narrative of the rich man and Lazarus is intended, as we think, to enforce the counsel to make friends with the mammon of unrighteousness by showing the disadvantage of not having such friends to facilitate admission into the eternal tents.[1] It is quite likely that Christ would illustrate such a striking counsel by some such startling story; highly probable that He meant to do so irrespective of the words which He was led to speak by the derision of the Pharisees among His audience; so that we may see in the introduction of the parable the resumption of the discourse at the point at which it had been broken off.[2] So far from finding the key to the interpretation of the parable in the sentences interpolated between it and the preceding one, we should rather be disposed to agree with those who think that some of these sentences at least, especially those respecting the perpetual validity of the law, have found a place here because of the turn of thought at the close of the parable. The sentences concerning the law do not explain the story which follows; that story rather explains the presence of these sentences in the foregoing context. They come in at that point, because the story with its peculiar conclusion was to follow. We do not affirm this dogmatically; we simply throw it out as a hypothesis preferable to being led astray in our interpretation by the assumption of a rigid adherence to historical sequence on the part of the narrator.

[1] So Olshausen. He says that the connection between the two parables is unmistakable. As in the one an example is given how earthly goods may be used for the service of God, so in the other we have an example of one who uses his possessions only for his own enjoyment. In Lazarus, on the other hand, appears one who could have been of service to the rich man with reference to heaven. Here, therefore, again is beneficence, compassionate love, commended.

[2] So in effect Greswell. In none of the parables is the determination of the central viewpoint at once more needful and more difficult. The need arises out of the indefinite possibilities of didactic inference opened up by the scene being in part laid in the invisible world, concerning which it is of the utmost importance to draw no false conclusions. The difficulty springs from the fact that the parable itself is unusually undidactic in form. In this case the moralist retires far into the background, and only the artist comes to the front The artistic power displayed is not inferior to anything in the whole range of the parabolic literature. In its descriptive vividness, as in its delicacy and pathos, the touch of the Limner is inimitable. But the Great Master does not in express terms tell us this time what His picture means; we are left to draw the moral lesson for ourselves. And the diversity of judgment as to the doctrinal tendency of the parable shows that this is by no means an easy task. The question, What does this story teach? has been very diversely answered. Some have found in it a proclamation, in parabolic form, of the general doctrine of future rewards and punishments for the good and evil deeds of the present life, with sundry items of information concerning the states of the saved and the lost respectively, the most momentous being that the separation between the two classes is absolute and final—the dialogue between Abraham and Dives having for its chief aim to proclaim this fact. And it is quite conceivable that our Lord might have spoken a parable bearing on such a topic. But then in such a parable we should have expected to find the characters of those whose future lots were to be so different more clearly indicated than they are in the one before us, in which Dives, though rich and living luxuriously, is not represented as wicked, and Lazarus, though poor and spending a wretched existence, is not represented as pious. The description would be sufficient, only if the doctrine intended were, that to be rich is a crime and to be poor a virtue. And such, in fact, in the opinion of some, is the doctrinal import of the parable. Its burden is, Woe to the rich! blessed are the poor.[1] It is simply a vivid concrete representation of what is taught in the makarisms and woes with which Luke’s version of the Sermon on the Mount begins.[2] Something more and different, it is admitted, is contained in the concluding part, which is regarded as a supplement appended at a later date to the original parable, to rectify its Ebionitism by making Dives be damned, not for his wealth, but for his neglect of Old Testament teaching,[3] or by giving the rich man the character of a Judaism remaining unbelieving in spite of the resurrection of Christ.[4] Those to whom the imputation of Ebionitic tendencies to our Lord is offensive, and who nevertheless discover in this part of His teaching the doctrine of future recompenses, find themselves constrained to purge out the evil taint by bringing out of the description of the two contrasted characters more than appears on the surface. The chief effort is directed to Lazarus with the view of transforming him from a merely poor and miserable wight into a saint. This is done by imputing to his name moral significance. In the first place, importance is attached to the fact of a name being given to him, the only instance of the kind in the whole range of parabolic utterances. Then stress is laid on the composition of the name: it being equivalent to Eleazar, which means, God my help.[5] ‎ Thus the name used descriptively as so often among the Jews, conveys the intimation that Lazarus was a man who put his trust in God, and bore all the ills of life in pious patience and hope. The exegetical process is most ingenious, and it may not be altogether fanciful; only it is not satisfactory to be obliged to rest our interpretation on what at the best is only a conjecture. For that the poor man who lay at the rich man’s gate is named is accounted for very simply by the consideration that a name for him was necessary in the dialogue between Dives and Abraham.[6] And as for the significance of the name, even granting the correctness of the derivation vindicated, it may be descriptive of state rather than of character: Lazarus, one whom God helps, that is, who has no other helper: a forlorn man-forsaken mortal.[7] [1] So De Wette, who denies that the parable is the counterpart of the preceding one.

[2] So Weizsäcker, ’Untersuchungen,’ p. 215, and the Tubingen school.

[3] So Pfleiderer, ’Paulinismus,’ p. 449. Also Weizsäcker, p. 215.

[4] So Hilgenfeld, ’Einleitung,’ p. 566, after Zeller.

[5] ‏אֵלי עֵזֶד

[6] So Hofmann.

[7] Another derivation of the word is ‏לאׁ עֵוֶר‎ = not-help. The dogmatic interpretation of the parable, as one setting forth the doctrine of recompense, undergoes modification in the hands of those who insist on a close connection between the parable and the immediately preceding context. The rich man now becomes the representative of Pharisaism, and the parable sets forth in pictorial style the judgment of God on that system. On this view Lazarus ceases to be an independent character exhibiting the bright side of the doctrine of recompense, and subsides into a mere foil to the principal figure. In the worldly state of Dives is represented that which is high among men,[1]. and from the reversal of his fortune in the state of the dead we learn the esteem in which the same is held of God. Lazarus is introduced into the scene on this side the grave to make the grandeur of the world all the more imposing, and he reappears in the scene laid in Hades to give the damnation of pride an aspect most deeply tragic. But the main object of the scene in the invisible world is to lead up to the sentiment concerning Moses and the prophets put into the mouth of Abraham. In that sentiment is contained a virtual censure of Pharisaism as a system whose whole tendency was to weaken the authority of the very law in which it placed its trust and boast; a tendency specially apparent in connection with the precept against adultery, to which reference is made in the eighteenth verse. Thus the parable is the judgment at once of Pharisaic pride and ostentatious worldliness, and of Pharisaic laxity; in one word, the judgment of Pharisaic hypocrisy under its twofold aspect of self-indulgence veiled by petty austerities, and of moral license disguised by a scrupulous regard to legal minutiae. Christ virtually says to the Pharisees: "Ye affect an austere life, but ye are in reality luxurious men: ye are very jealous in appearance for the honour of the law, but ye do your best to make the law void. In both respects ye are an abomination in the sight of God, and your damnation is certain and just."

[1] Luk 16:15 This interpretation is open to one very obvious criticism, viz. that one does not at all readily recognise in the description of Dives the picture of a Pharisee. As you read you incline rather to say: Behold a Sadducee delineated—by his wealth, his splendid style of living, his outer robe of purple-dyed wool, and his inner tunic of fine Egyptian linen,[1] pointed out unmistakably as one of the party who believed not in a hereafter, and therefore acted on the maxim: "Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die."[2] Accordingly Schleiermacher threw out the conjecture that Dives is Herod Antipas, taking the hint from the allusion to adultery in the verse immediately preceding the commencement of our parable. On this view the parable still remains the judgment of the Pharisees, saying to them in effect: "This is what comes of your teaching; it sends the great ones of the earth to hell; by your lax interpretations of the moral law ye destroy the chief means of grace for such, and remove the restraints which might keep them from perdition." The reference being to so exalted a personage it was convenient that this should be said by a parabolic representation rather than in plain terms.[3] The theory is ingenious. Still it confessedly leaves much unexplained; a much larger proportion of material to which no didactic significance is assigned, Schleiermacher acknowledges, than in any other parable.

[1] So are the words "purple and fine linen" to be distributed, the one referring to the upper, and the other to the under garment. To these, but in reverse order, reference is made in Mat 5:40, "If any man will take away thy coat, let him have thy cloke also." Mr. Nicholson blames the authors of the revised New Testament for retaining this ambiguous and misleading rendering. He says: "The word rendered ’coat’ means ’shirt,’ a garment lying next the skin, reaching sometimes to the knee, sometimes to the ankle, kept close to the body by a girdle, and worn either by itself or with an outer robe—the ’cloke.’ Of these two the ordinary dress consisted, and were a man deprived of both, he would have nothing left... But the translation of the Authorised and Revised Versions suggests that he would have at least a shirt left.—’Our new New Testament,’ p. 39.

[2] Wetstein says: "Sadducaeum describi ex divitiis, victu, amictu et petitione patet; Pharisaii enim credebant animos esse superstites, jejunabant crebro, modestius vestiebantur, et pauperiores erant."

[3] ’Über die Schriften des Lukas,’ p. 152. In view of the unsatisfactoriness of all these dogmatic constructions, it is not surprising that some should have felt themselves driven in despair to take up the position that the parable has no doctrinal aim, and contains no definite doctrinal teaching, but is simply intended to startle men into serious thought and make them look below appearance to reality, and keep in mind the eternal future amid the enjoyments of the present.[1] It thus becomes a mere memento mori addressed to unbelieving men of all classes who do not live under the power of the world to come, but are Sadducees in heart whatever their professed creed. Of course, when the didactic drift is reduced to this vague generality, we can understand how a Sadducee might be selected to convey the lesson, even though it was addressed immediately to Pharisees. Unbelief is a leaven common to both Pharisees and Sadducees, and any one who lives a worldly life will serve the purpose of enforcing the moral: "Be wise in time." Dives is merely one of many possible illustrations of an important but much neglected commonplace.[2] [1] So Dr. Service in ’Salvation here and hereafter’; also Reuss.

[2] This is substantially the line of thought pursued by Trench. Vide his remarks, in loc.

We are very loth to come to the conclusion that such pointless generalities are all that we can extract from this remarkable portion of our Lord’s teaching. As we remarked in another connection, it is characteristic of His parables, as compared with those of the Rabbis, that their lessons are not moral commonplaces, but specific truths, unfamiliar, and for the most part unwelcome. Of course moral commonplaces are implied—it being, as we have more than once remarked, part of the felicity of the parables that they suggest much more than they expressly teach. The parable before us is no exception. It implies and indirectly conveys many important moral lessons, such as that "the decision of the next world will often reverse the estimation wherein men are held in this; that God is no respecter of persons; that the heart must make its choice between the good things of this life, and those which the externals of this life do not affect."[1] It presupposes and recalls to mind truths more general still and not less momentous, such as that there is a future life after death in which men will receive the appropriate recompense of the deeds done in the life that now is. But it was not to teach such truths generally believed, if little laid to heart, that Christ spake in parables, but to express doctrine more original, more distinctively Christian, more peculiar to the kingdom of God. Thus in the parabolic representation of the Judgment in the twenty-fifth chapter of Matthew’s Gospel the specific lesson is not that there will be such a Judgment, but the principle on which the Judgment will proceed, viz. the great law of charity. In like manner we come to the interpretation of the parable before us quite expecting to find that its distinctive lesson is not the general doctrine of retribution, but some specific information as to the ground of condemnation in harmony with Christ’s whole teaching, though not in accordance with current opinion. The general doctrine of retribution was part of the current opinion of the time, formed indeed a prominent item in the Pharisaic creed, as the parabolic form of the present discourse implies; for a parable uses things familiar to illustrate things unfamiliar. But that the supreme virtue is love, and that the damning sin is selfish inhumanity, formed no part of the ethical system of the age, and it would not surprise us to find Christ speaking a parable to teach these truths.

[1] Farrar, ’The Life of Christ,’ vol. ii. p. 128.

Just such we take to be the didactic significance of the imaginary history of the rich man and Lazarus. This ’parable,’ for so we may continue to call it, though in strictness it is hardly entitled to the designation, has two dogmatic momenta: that inhumanity is a damning sin, and that it is a sin without excuse. The former is the burden of the first part of the parable (Luk 16:19-26); the latter of the concluding portion (Luk 16:27-31). This analysis, it is obvious, does not destroy the unity of the parable, because the second doctrine is clearly allied to the first, and forms its necessary complement. A sin is not damning unless it be inexcusable; when a valid plea in extenuation can be advanced judicial rigour is out of place. The only question that can be asked is, whether we have correctly indicated the doctrinal gist of the story in both its parts. That question shall be answered in the following exposition, in which we hope to make it appear that all details can be naturally accounted for by, and form together a harmonious picture around, these central truths which we place in the foreground. The first point calling for notice is the character of the rich man. Our construction of the parable requires that Dives should be, by clear implication if not by express statement, accused of inhumanity. Is the fact then so? Now what is expressly stated is, that Dives lived a life of princely splendour and luxury, attired as princes are attired, and faring as princes fare. It is not said that he was addicted to the vices which too often accompany fulness of bread, and abundance of idleness. It is not even alleged in so many words that he was hard-hearted towards the poor. Had that been charged, we could understand the absence of all other charges, for the effect would simply be to accentuate the wickedness of an unsympathetic spirit. But if even this is not charged what becomes of our dogmatic construction? Before, however, we come to the conclusion that Dives is not represented as being the opposite of benevolent, we must make sure that we have taken into consideration all that is stated concerning him. Observe what follows: "There was a certain beggar named Lazarus, which was laid at his gate." This is a fact of importance in the history of Dives. Lazarus enters on the stage not merely to present a striking contrast to the rich man’s state, but as one with whom the latter had relations. Lazarus represents opportunity for the exercise of humanity. That is the chief if not the sole purpose for which he appears in the first scene. He comes before us a picture of want and woe, and says: "I was laid at this man’s gate. He knew me; he could not pass from his house into the street without seeing my condition; yet as a leprous beggar I have lived, and as a beggar I will die." And Lazarus is not to be regarded as a solitary individual; he is one of a class who abound in the world, and are never far from the gates even of palaces. In no place in the world can the rich man say with truth, There are no poor and needy near me whom I can feed, and clothe, and cherish. To those who plead such an excuse for a selfish life it may ever be replied: Ye have the poor always with you. That is in effect what Christ meant to say by the introduction of Lazarus in the first part of the story. He reminds those whom He counsels to make friends with the mammon of unrighteousness that they will never lack abundant opportunities for doing so. By representing Lazarus as laid at the rich man’s gate He affirms the existence of opportunities of the most obtrusive sort, forcing themselves on men’s attention, and not to be escaped; not needing to be sought out, but seeking them out and compelling them to realise their responsibilities. When once it is understood that Lazarus is but a symbol for ample, urgent, inescapable opportunity, it is seen to be the obvious implication that Dives is one who neglects his opportunities. The assertion of opportunity is made for the very purpose of implying such neglect. It has indeed been asked by some, anxious to fasten on the parable an Ebionitic bias, if the rich man was inhuman, why was the poor man deposited by friends at his door?[1] And we willingly allow force to the question, so far as to admit that the natural probability of the parable requires us to think of Lazarus as getting something at the rich man’s gate; at least a pittance sufficient to stave off starvation, and to make it worth while for his relatives to bring him thither. And we can afford to admit that he did get some crumbs from the great man’s table, through the hands of servants; nay, possibly by the order of their master, who, being aware that an object of pity lay at his street gate, may have given instructions to that effect, not without a feeling of satisfaction and self-complacency.[2] To what does all this amount to? Simply to this—that Dives was not a monster of inhumanity. Christ had no intention of painting a monster; it was never His way to bring exaggerated and indiscriminate charges against those whose lives He disapproved, but rather to make generous admissions, even when dealing in stern condemnation. What He desired to do in the present instance was to hold up the picture of an average man of the world, living a self-centred life, coming utterly short of the true ideal, while not without such small virtues as men of the world ordinarily practise. If among these small virtues that of doling out little charities to the poor found a place, then, by all means, He would say, let this be conceded to Dives. He conceded as much to the Pharisees, whom, nevertheless, He pronounced great sinners, even in their very almsgiving. He could concede this to Dives, and yet represent him as one who neglected opportunities for the exercise of humanity.[3] Ah, not so easily was Christ’s ideal of humanity to be realised! Not by doling out crumbs to beggars could one gain the honourable name of a friend of man. He who would win that high degree must not only give alms in a small way, but bear the miseries of men as a burden on his heart, in the spirit of Him who, though rich, for our sakes became poor. He must behave towards the Lazaruses at his gate as the good Samaritan behaved towards the wounded man. He must act as that king of whom it is written, that he ate and drank and did judgment and justice, and especially that he judged the cause of the poor and needy.[4] He must gain the blessing of them that are ready to perish as Job gained it, who could protest that he had not withheld the poor from their desire, or caused the eyes of the widow to fail, or seen any perish for want of clothing, or any poor whose loins had not been warmed with the fleece of his sheep, or any stranger to whom he had not opened his doors.[5] After all has been said that can be said in his behalf, Dives is obviously not a man of this heroic type: not a good Samaritan, not a benignant prince, not a generous, noble-hearted Job, not a man who knows anything of the passion for beneficence, of the ’enthusiasm of humanity;’ but merely a commonplace man of the world, with vulgar, self-centred aims, and no virtues and humanities, save such as are conventional.

[1] So De Wette; vid. note 1, p. 377.

[2] The clause, καὶ οὐδεὶς ἐδιδοῦ αὐτῷ, found in some cursive MSS. and versions, borrowed doubtless from Luk 15:16, is a gloss arising out of the feeling, that even a minimum of humanity is excluded by the intention of the parable. As such it is regarded as a correct comment by Meyer and Trench. In proof that the beggar received nothing, Goebel emphasises ἐπιθυμῶν, and interprets, desiring in vain. In a similar strain Trench writes, speaking of the crumbs: "Even these were not thrown to him, or not in measure sufficient to satisfy his hunger." Kuinoel and Hofmann, on the other hand, think it is implied that Lazarus did receive the usual beggar’s portion.

[3] Kuinoel remarks, that though Dives gave crumbs to Lazarus, he did not thereby make himself out a humane man, or comply with the precepts of the law and the prophets as set forth in such texts as Deu 15:7-8; Isa 58:7; Pro 3:27.

[4] Jer 22:15-16.

[5] Job 31:16-22. The description given of the state of Lazarus quite answers to this view of the behaviour of the rich man. Whatever was done for the leprous beggar, left him as he was when he was first laid down at the rich man’s gate. The very word ἐβέβλητο, though it means strictly only ’lay,’ might be adduced in proof of this, as implying on the part of those who brought him there and threw him down, the hard, unfeeling manner of men accustomed to misery, who had ceased to hope, and had experienced nothing at the hands of Dives to change their mood. Then the pathetic trait of the dogs licking the ulcers is very significant. Some take it as conveying the idea that the dogs showed themselves more humane than Dives, possibly their owner, cleaning and soothing the sores by their soft tongues, adducing this feature as one of the evidences that a charge of inhumanity against the rich man is intended.[1] Others take it as an aggravation of the poor man’s misery, holding that the effect of the canine attentions would be the reverse of soothing.[2] We take it as expressing neither alleviation nor aggravation, but simply as giving vividness to the description of the sufferer’s chronic condition. He lay there utterly helpless, so that the dogs approached him without fear, as if he were a dead carcase rather than a living being.[3] Such he was from the first, and such he continued to be till beneficent death came and rescued him from his misery, and the manner in which his death is spoken of completes the proof that he had received no effectual attentions from his fellow-creatures during his lifetime. He died as he had lived—a beggar, and his carcase was disposed of as if it had been that of a beast; for so we understand the absence of all reference to his burial. Meyer infers therefrom, that the body as well as the soul of the beggar was carried by the angels to Paradise. Calvin, with better exegetical tact, suggests that nothing is said as to what happened to the body, because it was contemptuously, and without honour, thrown into a ditch.

[1] So Bleek, Hofmann.

[2] Bengel says the tongue of a dog would soothe a body slightly diseased (minus affecto), but would increase the pain of one covered with ulcers.

[3] So Maldonatus, Grotius, &c. In confirmation of the view now taken of the rich man’s character, it is legitimate to take into account the words put into the mouth of Abraham as descriptive of his earthly state in contrast to that of Lazarus, "Thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things." Various shades of meaning have been assigned to the words. Accentuating the verb in the former part of the sentence, some bring out of it the meaning, "Thou didst get in full, or beforehand, thy good things."[1] Others, emphasising the pronoun ’thy,’ render: "Thou receivedst the things on which thy heart was set, which alone thou accountedst good."[2] This much at least is implied—there was no communication of goods worth mentioning. Happiness was the lot of Dives, and misery of Lazarus, and the former kept all his happiness to himself, and took no pains to make his woe-stricken fellow-creature partaker of it.

[1] So Meyer and Godet.

[2] So Hofmann. On all these grounds we cannot doubt that it was the intention of our Lord to reproach Dives as one who regulated not his life by the law of love, and who utterly failed to act on the maxim of making for himself friends with the mammon of unrighteousness. But when we turn to Lazarus, and ask whether there is any indication in the first part of the parable of an intention to describe him as not only a poor, but also a pious man, we must answer in the negative. For reasons already indicated, we cannot attach any importance to the presence or the import of the name Lazarus. It may be assumed as certain, that had the design of the parable required that the beggar’s piety should be emphasised in the description of his earthly state, an epithet would have been introduced to indicate the fact unmistakably. But how, then, are we to account for the absence of such an epithet in view of the fact that Lazarus at death goes to heaven, if we are not to say, with the Tubingen critics, that his translation to bliss is the consolation for his earthly state of poverty? That is the second question we have to consider, and the answer we give to it yields, we think, a strong confirmation of our view as to the didactic drift of the parable. Lazarus, though devout,—for of course that is implied in his going to the bosom of Abraham,—is not represented as such, because the mention of the fact was not necessary to constitute him a legitimate object of charity, but was rather fitted to convey a fake impression as to the grounds on which the duties of humanity rest. If we are right in the view, that to hold up the neglect of these duties to reprobation is the aim of the parable, then to speak of the piety of Lazarus, however sincere, would have been misleading irrelevance. For it is not to the pious poor alone, but to all the destitute, suffering, and miserable, of whatever character, that we owe the offices of charity. As Christ came not to call the righteous, so we are not to pick out the godly from among the children of poverty and affliction as the recipients of our sympathy and succour. Character may make a difference as to our mode of showing sympathy, but not as to the cherishing of the feeling of pity, the proper object of which is misery. It would therefore have been an impertinence in Dives to excuse his lack of compassion towards Lazarus by saying, "I did not know he was a saint." It was enough that he knew he was a sufferer. It is just because this is so that the parable is silent concerning the moral qualities of Lazarus. That silence is exactly what we should expect on our view as to She intention of the parable, and the fact is an argument in favour of that view. On the other hand, the same reason which prescribed silence concerning the good qualities of Lazarus on earth required that prominent mention should be made of the fact, that on his decease he went to Abraham’s bosom. The didactic intention fully explains both. It is not said that Lazarus lived piously, because not piety but want is the proper object of benevolence; it is said that when he died he was carried by angels to the bosom of Abraham, because he is needed there as an illustration of the advantage of having friends who can facilitate our admission into the eternal tents, For that is really the reason why the poor leper, who on earth lay at the rich man’s gate, goes to the regions of bliss, so far as our parable is concerned. In real life men go to heaven because they are good; in parables they may go there because the motive of the story requires them to be there. In saying this we do not of course mean to imply that it is beneficence to the pious poor alone that counts, in other words, that unless the objects of beneficence go to heaven the labour of the humane is in vain. The loving may be received into the eternal tents, when those who have been the recipients of their charity themselves fail to gain an entrance. But when the doctrine that beneficence has value in the sight of God, the Judge of men, is put in the form which it assumes in the previous parable, viz. that by beneficence men make for themselves friends to receive them into heaven, it is obviously necessary that these friends should themselves be conceived of as being there. It may be objected, that on this view the presence of Lazarus in paradise remains still unaccounted for, having a motive, indeed, but. no natural cause. This is true; but it is an unavoidable defect arising out of the fact that Lazarus has to perform two rôles with conflicting qualifications. On earth he represents the objects of compassion, who are the miserable, saintly or otherwise; in heaven he represents the friends who receive the benevolent into the eternal tents, who could not themselves be there unless they had been saintly as well as poor. The defect is no argument against our theory of the didactic significance of the parable, but is one inseparable from the parabolic style of instruction. It makes for our view, that by it we can account both for the silence concerning the piety of Lazarus on earth, and for his presence nevertheless in heaven. On the ordinary theory, according to which the parable teaches the general doctrine of eternal recompense, neither is explained; and so the presence of Lazarus in paradise remains at once without cause and without motive.

We pass now from the first scene to the second, from earth to Hades, the common receptacle of the dead. Sooner or later death overtakes all men, and so it came to pass that the beggar died, and the rich man also died and was buried. The beggar dies first, in accordance with the requirements of natural probability; for he suffers from a deadly disease which must soon cut him off, while the rich man is full of health and strength. Death brings an exchange of fortunes; the beggar formerly left to the tender mercies of dogs, is carried by angels to the bosom of Abraham; the rich man finds himself in a very different quarter of Hades, where torments are experienced. The latter fact is gently insinuated in a participial clause, partly from pity, partly because it is not the purpose of the speaker formally to teach the doctrine that there is a place of torments, which is assumed as a currently received truth, but to convey a hint as to the kind of people who go there. But, however reluctantly, the word must be spoken. "Being in torments,"—where else could such an one as Dives be? Not surely in Paradise, the home of the loving; in the bosom of Abraham, the father of the faithful! The torments of the fires of Gehenna teach Dives a lesson, which, in the fulness of earthly felicity, he had never needed to learn—the value of a friend. "Oh for one able and willing to bring to me the faintest alleviation of this pain!" So the tormented man is represented as raising his eyes, and seeing in the distance, across the abyss that divides the two regions of Hades, Lazarus nestling in the bosom of the patriarch, and requesting that his former petitioner might be sent to distil a little water, drop by drop, with the tips of his fingers on his burning, parched tongue. Insignificant boon, corresponding to the morsels of food which was all that the beggar desired; but misery is thankful for small mercies. What a vastly greater benefit Dives might have gained through Lazarus, had he only turned his acquaintance with him to account in good time! Had he made of him a friend with his worldly possessions he might have been his companion in Paradise. But now, so far from attaining that felicity, he cannot even obtain the little favour he craves. All or nothing is the rule. So Abraham tells him in effect in the sequel of this Dialogue of the Dead, in words whose very gentleness and courtesy make them a message of despair rather than of comfort.[1] Two reasons are given for the refusal: the law of equity, and the impossibility of complying with the request. What was fitting had happened to both parties. The one had received his full share of felicity on earth and was now in sorrow; the other had drunk a full cup of misery and was now comforted. The rich man had done nothing for the poor man in bygone days, why should the poor man be asked to do anything for him now? It was fair that every one should have his turn. But even if Lazarus were willing to render the service it was not in his power. Between the two regions of Hades was fixed a great ravine impassable either way. The former reason is of the nature of an argumentum ad hominem, deriving a large part of its force from the very fact of its being addressed to a selfish man. One who had not troubled himself about Lazarus, could not but feel the point of the retort: why then should Lazarus trouble himself about you? It was but paying him back with his own coin, applying to him the lex talionis of the dispensation under which he had lived, and of which he had taken due advantage. Hence he makes no attempt to argue the matter with Abraham, as in the case of the request for his brethren, and this fact supplies another proof that we have rightly conceived the character of his life on earth, as that of a man who had lived for himself. Conscience makes him a coward, and he has no spirit left to say even this much: "I own I have no claim, but may I not receive this small service as a matter of grace?" To this question however, though not asked, Abraham replies in the second reason for refusal. Willingness on the part of Lazarus to go on an errand of mercy is not denied, it is rather tacitly conceded; what is asserted is the impossibility of intercommunication. The assertion provokes in us many questions: What is this dreadful chasm? Why is it fixed? For how long? Cannot it be bridged over? What is impossible to love or to penitence? Could not the one find its way to yonder side, and the other to the hither side? These questions the parable was not meant to answer, therefore they are not raised. Dives acquiesces in the reasoning, and presses his request no further. In any case it was not meet to put such questions in his mouth, not merely because they were not questions of the age, but specially because they were not questions for the like of him. He was of too low a moral type to feel the pressure of such problems. Had he been capable of that he would never have been where he was. And being where he was, he could not easily rise above his former moral level. That difficulty perhaps furnishes the best clue to the mystery of the fixed gulf. What is impossible to penitence, is it asked? But what if penitence itself be impossible? Difficult it certainly is. The difficulty is implied in the very acquiescence of Dives in Abraham’s reasoning. That reasoning is by no means exhaustive. It does not say the last word on the subject raised; it does not anticipate and dispose of all questions; at most it settles the matter in hand only from the lex talionis point of view. But it is conclusive for Dives because it is adapted to his moral tone. The first reason has irresistible force for him because his conscience tells him that he has been a selfish man; the second has equal cogency, because he is incapable of entertaining the thought of bridging the gulf by self-condemnation. The acquiescence of Dives in Abraham’s reasoning thus does more than show, as we have said, that he was a man for whom self has been the chief end. It shows, moreover, that to escape from the perdition to which such a life surely conducts is difficult, not to say impossible. The loving and the beneficent make for themselves friends to receive them into the eternal tents. But the unloving and inhuman banish themselves to a realm of darkness and pain out of which they shall hardly be delivered, not because of any external barriers, but because of obstacles presented in their own hearts. The gulf which divides the two classes is as wide as the difference between selfishness and self-sacrifice, and is so fixed because these moral characteristics tend to permanence. In ’hell’ are they who have loved themselves; in heaven are they who have loved others as themselves—how hard to go over from the one class to the other; to be transformed from a Dives into a good Samaritan!

[1] Brouwer, speaking of the decorum of Christ’s parables, as exemplified in the one before us, contrasts the mild terms in which Abraham addressed Dives with the harsh language which is addressed to the lost in the parables of the Talmudists, such as: "O most foolish man that ever lived."—’De Parabolis Jesu Christi,’ p. 91.

Before passing on to the closing section of the parable, we may here briefly remark that the phraseology employed by Christ in describing the place of the dead is mostly borrowed from the current dialect of the time. The ’bosom of Abraham’ was a title for the abode of the blessed in common use among the Jews. The ministry of angels in conveying the spirits of the just thither had also its place in the popular belief.[1] Dialogues of the dead formed a part of the entertainment which the Rabbis provided for their pupils. Paradise, Abraham’s bosom, Hades, Gehenna were not so closely shut that the voices of the blessed and the pains of the tormented could not penetrate from either region to the other, and also to the ears of the teachers who could report what they heard for the benefit of their disciples.[2] The Divine Artist who painted the startling picture before us, adopted a traditional theme, and dipped His brush in conventional colours, departing from use and wont only in the one particular of the fixed chasm; thereby making the separation wider than in the Rabbinical representation, according to which the two regions are divided only by a wall, or even by a hair’s breadth;[3] a fact worthy of notice as showing that Jesus had no disposition to minimise the gravity of the outlook in the state beyond the grave. But, on the whole, the picture of the invisible world here presented is not to be taken as didactically significant. The one point of doctrinal instruction in the parable thus far, is that set forth likewise in the account of the last Judgment, viz. that men like Dives are excluded from the goodly fellowship of those who spent their lives on earth in deeds of love.

[1] Vide Lightfoot, ’Hor. Heb.’

[2] Hausrath, ’Zeitgeschichte,’ ii. 278.

[3] "What is the distance between Paradise and Gehenna? According to Johanan, a wall; according to Acha, a palm-breadth; according to other Rabbis, only a finger-breadth." Midrash on Koheleth, quoted by Dr. Farrar in ’Mercy and Judgment,’ p. 205. In the close of the parable, the additional but connected and subordinate lesson is taught, that for the life of selfishness there is no excuse on the score of ignorance. In making this the lesson of the concluding part, we assume that the request of Dives in behalf of his brethren is indirectly self-excuse. This may seem an ungenerous assumption, especially in view of the construction put on the request by enthusiastic advocates of ’the Eternal Hope’ as an indication that Dives, under the purgatorial fires of the intermediate state, is undergoing rapid moral improvement. We have all respect for the motives of those who thus argue, and we have no wish to make Dives appear worse than he is. As in forming a judgment of his life on earth, we did not accuse him of refusing crumbs to Lazarus, so we are willing to give him full credit for the solicitude he manifests after his decease for his surviving brethren. And we gladly note, as one more index of the geniality of the parable, that no anxiety is evinced to rob Dives of this praise. Only we must add that it does not amount to much. The humanity of Dives in Hades is not charity, but only such love as even publicans and harlots practise; natural affection for an extended self, indicative therefore of continuity of character rather than of radical change. And we question whether in the intention of the speaker it be even this much; whether love for the extended self be not at bottom love for the unextended self. That is, we think Christ’s aim in introducing this trait is not to show that unblessed spirits cherish natural affections, but to take away all ground of excuse from those who live the life that has exclusion from bliss for its penalty. The speaker’s real purpose is to tell the living that they are without excuse if they so live as to forfeit bliss. But instead of doing this in abstract terms, he prefers to do it through the machinery of the parable, as in the case of the parable of the Lost Son, where the elder brother represents the Pharisees who blamed Christ for His sympathy with the leper. Therefore he makes Dives proffer a request which leads up to the declaration, that in Moses and the prophets men have sufficient means of grace to teach them how to live. The answer pointedly excludes all self-excuse on the score of defective aids to piety, and so implies self-excuse as the motive of this request. The secret thought of Dives is: Had I been warned it might have been otherwise. In like manner we cannot so far stretch our charity as to give Dives credit for the peculiar urgency he shows in behalf of his brethren. It is certainly a curious circumstance, that whilst abstaining from pressing his petition for himself, he ventures to expostulate with Abraham in pleading for his brethren, after the manner of Abraham himself in pleading for Sodom. We are not inclined to see in this a reflection of the spirit of Rabbinical dispute and Pharisaic impudence.[1] But neither can we see in it a trace of disinterested love. The repetition of the demand is meant merely to supply a motive for the utterance of the sentiment, that those who are not moved to piety by the means actually available, would not be moved by any means, however extraordinary. Doubtless the law of probability requires that this should be done in a natural way; but this remark cuts two ways. It may imply that Dives was particularly anxious for the welfare of his brethren; but it may also imply that he was very desirous to justify himself by some such reflection as this: Had only some one come from the dead, with the calm, clear light of eternity shining in his eyes, to inform me that the life beyond is no fable, that Paradise is a place or state of unspeakable bliss, and Gehenna a place or state of unspeakable woe, had I not then renounced my voluptuous, selfish ways, and entered on the path of piety and charity? If one had come to me from the dead I had surely repented, and so would not have come to this place of torment.

[1] So Godet. The didactic point then here is, that the selfish life is inexcusable, and therefore justly visited with penalties. But how does this appear? The reply of Abraham is: "They have Moses and the prophets, let them hear them." It is a reply addressed to a Jew, and exactly adapted to the actual religious practice in the synagogue, in which precisely the parts of the Old Testament named the law and the prophets (those only, not the Hagiographa) were regularly read.[1] It implies that these books were sufficient as a guide of life to all men of right dispositions, without any further extraordinary means of grace, and that when they failed, a better result could not be reached by any conceivable means. To the men of right mind a messenger from the dead was wholly unnecessary, and to the men of wrong mind he would be utterly useless. It was a reply not to be gainsaid by any Jew, the truth of the implied affirmations being sufficiently proved by the lives of the saints who lived under the old dispensation, and had not more than the law and the prophets for their rule of faith and practice, and many of them, such as Abraham himself, not even so much. One thing very noticeable about these books is the little prominence they give to the life to come. The fact of a future life is recognised, but so obscurely that Paul could truly speak of immortality as being brought to light through the Gospel. It is to miss the point of Abraham’s reference to the Old Testament entirely to suppose that it means that the doctrine of immortality is there taught with sufficient clearness. It is nearer the mark to say, that what is meant is rather that the knowledge of that doctrine is not indispensable to the life of piety. Certainly the doctrine in question is not clearly set forth or strongly insisted on in the Hebrew Scriptures. And if the future life occupied a quite subordinate place in Old Testament teaching, we may safely assume that it occupied a still less prominent place in the thoughts and motives of Old Testament saints. They tested theories of life by their bearings on this world much more than by their bearings on the next. Hence their perplexities respecting the mysteries of human life, their querulous complainings, e. g. concerning the sufferings of the righteous. But in spite of their comparative ignorance of the life to come, and their consequent misreading of the riddles of the present life, we find no traces of dubiety as to the comparative merits of the two opposed schemes of life—the way of godliness and the way of the world. They might find difficulties in such facts of Providence as are pictured in this parable: a low-minded voluptuary, prosperous, rich, happy according to his taste, on the one hand; a saintly man in beggary, diseased, starved, homeless, on the other. They might, in view of such phenomena, sometimes ask, "Why doth the way of the wicked prosper?" But they never had any doubt whether it were better to be good or evil, to be righteous or to be wicked, to be a humane merciful man, or to be a sordid, selfish, heartless worldling. Nor did they hesitate to walk in the way of godliness in spite of all drawbacks. They chose the way that is everlasting; they could not do otherwise; the spirit of God in them would not permit them. They needed no messenger from the dead to convince them of the superiority of a life of justice, mercy, and piety over a life of unrighteousness, inhumanity, and sensuality. Far from that, they needed not to know that there was a life to come. The godly life appeared to them superior intrinsically, on its own merits, apart altogether from the question of duration. It was self-evident to them that in any case, whatever betide it is better to be a wise good man, doing justly, loving mercy, walking humbly with God, and holding all appetites and passions in strict subjection to conscience and reason, than to be clothed in purple and fine linen, and to fare sumptuously every day, doing nothing else worth speaking of. Even if they knew certainly that there was no hell to fear, they could not live as Dives lived; it would be hell enough to be compelled to attempt it.

[1] See Lightfoot.

It thus appears that the Jew had amply sufficient means of grace, and was therefore without excuse if he chose the wrong way of life. But it is not the Jew alone that is required to live the life of piety and charity. Christ taught that He should judge all the nations, and that the principle of judgment would be the law of charity. Are the Pagans also without excuse, though not having the law and the prophets? Yes; because the law of humanity is written on their hearts, and they need no book, any more than an Old Testament Jew needed a clear doctrine of immortality, to impose obligation to fulfil that law. This position obviously underlies the representation of the Judgment, and it is even not obscurely implied in the words put into the mouth of Abraham in this parable. For what is the meaning of the assertion, that if they believe not Moses and the prophets, neither will they believe though one rose from the dead? Simply this, that you cannot by any means compel faith in men morally indisposed to believe. That is, everything turns on moral disposition. In absence of that, neither Bible nor messenger from the dead will do me any good. I will find plausible reasons for disregarding even the most potent and miraculous aids to faith. A messenger from the dead! He would have a preliminary difficulty to deal with ere he delivered his message. He would find it hard to get himself recognised as a visitor from the other world. Instead of listening with awestruck hearts to what he had to say, men of unbelieving temper would begin to discuss whether the supposed visitant from the world of spirits could ever have been dead, or were not a mere phantasm; nay, refusing to treat the matter seriously, they would probably receive with shouts of merriment the very idea of one returning from the grave to preach to them of repentance and judgment to come. On the other hand, does a man of right disposition require a Bible, not to speak of a messenger from the dead, to tell him that he ought to love his neighbour? Let the Pagan who has no Bible consult his heart, and he will find that law written there. This is the one law for the neglect of which all men everywhere are without excuse. No need, in order to obligation to fulfil this law, of special supernatural inducements; no need of knowledge of the life to come; no need either of Moses, prophets, or gospels; the light within is enough. Those who have the benefit of such special means of grace, and yet neglect this law, are certainly blameworthy in a peculiar degree; but even those who have no such privileges are for the like neglect without excuse. Such in spirit is the teaching of our parable. It declares love to be the supreme duty, and it declares the disregard thereof to be, without exception, a deadly damning sin, because it is a duty which shines in the light of its own self-evidence. What Abraham said to Dives was what it was fitting to say to Jews. But so much could be said to them because it is fitting and fair to say to all: "Ye have the voices of conscience, hear them." The Unmerciful Servant

Therefore is the kingdom of heaven likened unto a certain man, a king, who would make a reckoning with his servants. And when he had begun to reckon, there was brought unto him one who was a debtor to the extent of ten thousand talents. And seeing he had not wherewith to pay, his lord commanded that he should be sold, and his wife, and his children, and all that he had, and payment to be made. The servant therefore fell down and did obeisance to him, saying, Lord, have patience with me, and I will pay thee all. And the lord of that servant, being moved with compassion, released him, and forgave him the debt.[1] But that servant going out, found one of his fellow-servants who owed him a hundred denarii: and he laid hold on him, and took him by the throat, saying, Pay what thou owest. And his fellow-servant fell down and besought him, saying, Have patience with me, and I will pay thee.[2] And he would not, but went and cast him into prison, till he should pay that which was due. His fellow-servants, therefore, seeing what was done, were exceedingly sorry, and came and told their lord all that was done. Then his lord called him unto him, and said unto him, Thou wicked servant, I forgave thee all that debt, because thou besoughtest me: oughtest thou not also to have had mercy on thy fellow-servant, even as I had mercy on thee? And being wroth, his lord delivered him to the tormentors, till he should pay all that was due to him. So shall also my Heavenly Father do unto you, if ye forgive not every one his brother from your hearts.[3]—Mat 18:23-35.

[1] τὸ δάνειον, literally, the loan.

[2] Most MSS. omit πάντα. It may have crept in from Mat 18:26.

[3] τὰ παραπτώματα αὐτῶν (their trespasses) seems to be a gloss from Mat 6:15.

There is no difficulty in ascertaining the didactic drift of this parable. The moral it is intended to teach is indicated with perfect distinctness by our Lord Himself in the last sentence, in which He applies the narrative to the hearts of His hearers, the disciples. Even without that application we could easily deduce the lesson from the parable itself, viewed in connection with its surroundings. It forms the fitting conclusion of a conversation between Jesus and His disciples, arising out of their dispute as to who should be greatest in the kingdom of heaven. That dispute evinced the presence among them of the spirit of ambition, whose characteristic tendency it is, at once to be prone to do wrong, and to be very unforgiving towards wrong done by others. Jesus, therefore, fitly took occasion to warn His disciples against giving offences, especially to the weak, and to instruct them how to behave when they were the receivers, not the givers, of offences. The general tenor of the instructions given was—be meek and merciful, not prone to resentment, hard to appease, but good and ready to forgive. The counsel to cherish a spirit of love bent on overcoming evil with good found its culminating expression in the reply to Peter’s question, "How often must I forgive?" "Until seven times?" the disciple added, tentatively answering his own question, and in doing so showing how far the benignant spirit of his Master had already influenced him, raising him above the ideas current in rabbinical circles, which fixed the limit at three times.[1] But Jesus went as far beyond Peter as Peter went beyond the rabbis; nay, infinitely further, for He said, "Not till seven times, but until seventy times seven." That is, times without number; your forgivenesses must be as numerous as the implacable man’s revenges;[2] you must never weary pardoning offences. By this strong utterance Christ’s thought concerning forgiveness was raised to the high level at which parabolic speech becomes natural and needful: natural on the part of One who was conscious that His thoughts on such matters were not those of the world; needful to familiarise the minds of hearers with truths lofty and novel. Therefore Jesus spake at this time the parable of The Unmerciful Servant, the obvious aim of which is to expose the odiousness and criminality of an implacable temper in those who are citizens of the kingdom of heaven—a kingdom of grace in which they themselves occupy the position of forgiven men. Having this for its burden, it is emphatically a parable of grace, forming a worthy ending of Christ’s discourse in Capernaum and of His whole ministry of love in Galilee;[3] teaching His disciples that the kingdom of heaven was a kingdom of grace; a kingdom among whose blessings pardon occupied a foremost place; a kingdom, therefore, in connection with which ambitious disputes concerning places of distinction, and still more, vindictive passions, were unseemly and intolerable.

[1] Vide Lightfoot and Wetstein in loc.

[2] Some, not without probability, have found in our Lord’s words an allusion to the speech of Lamech in Gen 4:24 : "If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold, truly Lamech seventy and sevenfold."

[3] The final separation from Galilee is recorded in the commencement of the next chapter. A certain severity of tone is observable in the present parable as compared with the one last considered. "His lord was wroth, and delivered him to the tormentors, till he should pay all that was due to him. So likewise shall My heavenly Father do unto you, if ye forgive not every one his brother from your hearts" The reason is that Jesus speaks here to offending disciples, members of His own family circle whom He loves dearly, therefore rebukes and chastens faithfully; and, moreover, to future apostles, on whose behaviour the well-being of the Church about to be founded largely depends. He anticipates the time, no longer distant, when He shall be personally removed from the earth, and He is anxious to prepare His chosen companions for playing worthily the part of His representatives. This He knows they cannot do so long as the spirit of ambition and vainglory, which has recently manifested itself, animates their breasts. Therefore He subjects them to the wholesome discipline of pathetic example, heroic counsel, and stern warning, that by admiration, quickened sense of duty, and godly fear, they may become morally transformed by the renewing of their minds. Not merely the concluding parable, but the whole discourse on humility savours of this unwonted rigour: witness that saying, "Whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in Me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea;" or that still more stern saying concerning the cutting off an offending hand, or foot, or eye. In this homily on lowliness Jesus seems Himself to perform the part of a surgeon, operating with the sharp knife of rebuke on the diseased parts of the souls of His disciples. We shall best understand the parable with which the homily closes by regarding it from this point of view. This parable has for its specific aim not merely to inculcate the general duty of forgiveness, which is a part of natural ethics, but to inculcate that duty on men who are themselves forgiven of God, and living under a reign of grace. Hence the unforgiving man is in the first place represented as himself the object of pardoning mercy. And in this part of the parabolic representation we note the apparently exaggerated statement of the amount forgiven—ten thousand talents, equivalent to millions sterling.[1] The enormous sum is formally explained by conceiving of the offender as a farmer of revenue on a great scale, or as the satrap of a province, whose duty it is to remit the tribute of the country under his jurisdiction to the sovereign.[2] But this explanation only throws us back on the previous question: Why is such a magnate selected to represent the forgiven one who forgives not? A satisfactory answer to this question is necessary to vindicate the verisimilitude of the parable. Now the fitness of the representation appears in various ways. It is fitting, in the first place, as a statement of the magnitude of all men’s indebtedness to God as compared with the insignificant extent of the moral indebtedness of any one man to any other, represented by the hundred denarii. It is further fitting in some special respects more closely connected with the particular purpose of the parable. It suits the character in which the disciples are addressed, as men destined ere long to occupy princely position in the kingdom of God. It also suits the temper of those who are likely to be guilty of harsh, merciless dealing towards such as have done them wrong. Implacability is the sin of pride. But pride is high-minded, and just because it is so it is a great sinner against God. Therefore it is fit that the implacable man should be represented as occupying high station, and likewise as a great debtor to his lord. Once more, the vastness of the debt owed and forgiven is a just tribute to the gracious magnanimity of God, who ’abundantly pardons,’ and from whose mercy even the most wicked of men are not excluded.

[1] The exact amount will vary according to the particular talent meant; but the intention is not to state precisely the amount due, but to convey the idea of an immense sum, the payment of which was hopeless.

[2] Vide Trench, who gives illustrative examples, p. 153, note. The conduct of the lord toward his deeply-indebted servant is a second point in which the parable seems chargeable with exaggeration. At first it appears unduly severe, then after the debtor has presented his petition, unduly lenient. "Forasmuch," we read, "as he had not to pay, his lord commanded him to be sold, and his wife, and children, and all that he had, and payment to be made." Yet after the debtor has pled for time, his lord suddenly changes his tone, and grants not time to pay, but a free remission. Is it credible, we are ready to inquire, that one who issued such an order would confer so great a favour; or, conversely, that one capable of such magnanimity would entertain thoughts of such pitiless rigour? And, without doubt, the parabolic representation does wear an aspect of double improbability. Nevertheless, here it is the improbable that happens. In the first place, as respects the truculent command, it faithfully reflects the attitude of the law of antiquity towards debt. The Roman law permitted a debtor (in the literal sense) to be so treated, and the law of Moses seems not to have been behind it in rigour;[1] indeed the rude practice of selling a man and his whole belongings for debt appears to have been a common feature in the judicial system of ancient nations. Therefore in issuing such an order the king was simply acting as the mouthpiece of the law apart altogether from personal feeling; and it is observable that no such feeling is imputed to him at this stage. He could not well do otherwise in the first place, whatever compassionate sentiments or purposes might be latent in his breast. On the other hand, in the free pardon of the debt we see the moral individuality of the monarch displaying itself. In the command is revealed the rigour of the ruler, in the remission of the debt the humanity of the man. A very unusual humanity truly, and most unlikely to be practised by men, whether kings or subjects, living under barbaric codes of law. But the improbability at this point is inevitable; for the humanity must be very unusual indeed which is to represent the mercy of God. For the Divine magnanimity passes all human example; His ways in forgiving rise above the ways of men high as heaven rises above earth.

[1] Vide Exo 22:3; Lev 25:39, Lev 25:47; Amo 2:6; Amo 8:6.

"For the love of God is broader Than the measures of man’s mind, And the heart of the Eternal Is most wonderfully kind."

Viewed with reference to the history of revelation, the rigour and benignity combined in the behaviour of the king represent the relation between law and gospel. The command, Sell the debtor and all he hath, that the debt may be paid, exhibits the legal attitude towards sin; the free forgiveness of the debt exhibits the grace that came in with Jesus Christ. The one prepared for the other; the rigour of the law for the grace of the gospel. That rigour brought the debtor to his knees, with a petition coming far short of the grace in store, asking only for time to pay, for a hired servant’s place; for men are unable to imagine and dare not hope for the good which God has prepared for them. The rigour was meant to lead up to the mercy through the way of repentance; it was but a means to an end, for had it been otherwise the more beneficent dispensation had never come.[1] The law was but a pedagogue to conduct to Christ.

[1] Euthymius Zigabenus expresses this thought. Speaking of the command to sell for the debt, he says, Οὐκ ἐξ ὠμότητος δὲ τοῦτο ἐκέλευσεν ἐκ συμπαθείας, ἵνα εὐλαβηθεὶς ἐκεῖνος τὴν τοιαύτην ἀπόφασιν (ἐκελεύση) καὶ τύχη, τῆς ἀφέσεως εἰ γὰρ μὴ διὰ τοὺτο τοιαύτην ἐξήνεγκεν ἀπόφασιν οὐκ ἀν ἱκετεύσαντι τὸ χρείος ἀφῆκεν. When Christ came the world entered into a state of objective grace, under which God imputeth not to men their trespasses; and it becomes all who have attained to the knowledge of this truth to imitate the Divine charity in their relations to their fellow-men. But the wranglings of His disciples gave Jesus too good ground for the apprehension that an implacable spirit might be by no means a rare phenomenon in the era of grace; therefore, having in the first part of the parable depicted the mercy of God, He proceeded in the second part to describe the unmercifulness of so-called Christian men. The picture drawn is unspeakably repulsive, and bears witness to the deep abhorrence with which the Speaker regarded an unforgiving spirit in one who confesses his own need, and has experienced the benefit of forgiveness. The great debtor goes forth from the presence of his benignant master, straightway meets a fellow-servant who owes a petty debt to himself, in the most truculent manner lays hold of him and demands immediate payment,[1] and on hearing from his debtor’s lips the same appeal he had previously made to the king, refuses his request, unmoved by the august presence from which he has just come, by the memory of a recent benefit, and by the repetition of the words of his own prayer; and with brutal ferocity drags him to prison, there to lie till he has paid the paltry sum. Shall we say there is exaggeration here too? It were a comfort to be able to think so, and perhaps it may be said truly that Christ draws the picture in the darkest possible colours, that His disciples and all who bear His name might be scared into a holy fear of offending in such wise, and a godly jealousy lest they should bear the most distant resemblance to so odious a character. Yet we cannot flatter ourselves that the picture is a purely ideal one. It is not possible to conceive one conscious that his own moral debt is great, and believing in the forgiveness thereof, deliberately so acting, for, forgiven much, he will love much both God and his fellow, men. But it is only too possible to be under the objective reign of grace, and to take advantage of the benefits of the era of grace, not without a certain appreciation of their value, yet to regulate our relations to our brethren by the strict régime of law, aggravated by the superadded horrors of violent temper and brutal passion when the slightest opposition is offered to the immediate execution of our selfish will. How many members of Christian Churches may rise from the communiontable to go forth on the following day to the perpetration of such atrocities in connection with their secular business! The sin of merciless hardness is one which easily besets us all, and instead of asking, Is thy servant a dog, that he should do such a thing? we do well to ask, rather, Is it I?

[1] The act denoted by ἔπνιγεν, seizing by the throat, though ferocious, was legal according to Roman law. The approved reading in the next clause, εἴ τι δφείλεις—literally, "if you owe aught"—must be understood in sympathy with the truculent spirit displayed in that act. The εἴ τι, as Meyer remarks, is neither courteous nor problematical, but logical = if you owe you must pay. Unger puts it, "Conditio dicta pro causa." Grotius says, "Solet si sane non conditionem sed generalitatem significare."

Even those who might themselves be guilty of such conduct would readily condemn it in others, and hence the fellow-servants of the two who stand in the relation of debtor and creditor are fitly represented as interesting themselves in the case, and reporting it to the common lord in a spirit of compassion towards the sufferer. Their sympathies are roused simply by the spectacle of excessive severity, without reference to the glaring inconsistency of the wrong-doer, of which they are not supposed to be aware. But that inconsistency is what arrests the attention of the king. Now for the first time he is angry, and he gives expression to his wrath in terms of unmitigated condemnation, followed up by a sentence of unqualified rigour. He calls the offender ’wicked,’ using the epithet not with reference to his own great debt, but to stigmatise the mercilessness he had shown towards his brother who owed him a small debt—a mercilessness to be reprehended in any one, and utterly inexcusable in him, who had himself been forgiven so immensely greater a sum. And the sentence pronounced on this ’wicked’ one is, that having shown no mercy, he should receive none. The pardon granted is revoked, and he is remitted to the custody of the roughest, most ruthless, gaolers, who will rather take pleasure in tormenting him than in mitigating the discomforts of his imprisonment, and will take good care that he do not get out till he have paid all that he owed.[1] [1] Most interpreters take the ’tormentors’ in this general sense—gaolers of the rudest order. The language of the parable here, as throughout, is strong, but there is no occasion at this stage for any suggestion of exaggeration. Intensity of utterance, the characteristic of the whole parable, is discernible in this part also, but not extravagance. The words put into the mouth of the king find a response in every healthy conscience. Who will call in question the appropriateness of the epithet ’wicked’? Must we not rather acknowledge the moderation of judgment evinced in applying the term to the offender not quâ debtor, but quâ creditor? It is not easy to imagine how any man could amass such an amount of debt without culpability approaching to wickedness. But, with fine discrimination, the word is not brought in till the party characterised has been guilty of conduct whose unmitigated iniquity could be doubtful to no one having the slightest pretensions to moral discernment. Then, as to the sentence, it is doubtless inexorably stern, but it is undeniably equitable and just. The case described is one of those in which the public conscience would feel aggrieved were a severe sentence not pronounced, and a lenient punishment would appear little short of an outrage.

We are not surprised, therefore, to find our Lord expressing His deliberate approval of the sentence pronounced on the unmerciful servant, and solemnly assuring His disciples that after the like manner should they themselves be treated if they followed his bad example. Such is the import of the closing sentence: So shall also My heavenly Father do unto you, if ye forgive not every one his brother from your hearts. Nothing could be more explicit than the declaration here made that a policy of severity will be pursued against all the unforgiving. And Christ’s personal approval of that policy is equally pronounced. Specially worthy of notice in this view is the designation given to the Ruler and Judge of men. One not in sympathy with the rigour of Divine government might have said, So shall the Judge of all the earth do to you. Not so speaks Christ here. He gives to God, even in this sombre connection, the endearing title of Father. Not only so, He calls God My Father, as if to express in the most emphatic manner His perfect sympathy with the Divine mind. At other times He called God your Father, with reference to His disciples; but here He takes the Divine Father from them, as if to imply that between Him and them so acting there could be nothing in common, and appropriates Him to Himself, as if to say, "I and My Father are one in this matter." Obviously Jesus has no sense of incongruity between the Fatherhood of God and the strange work of stern judgment on the unmerciful. Neither was there room for such a feeling. Just because God is a Father, and because His inmost spirit is love, He must abhor a spirit so utterly alien from His own. It is only what we should expect, that under the government of a gracious God the spirit of mercilessness should have judgment without mercy. Some good men think that it is due to the Divine love that we should cherish a hope of ultimate mercy even for the merciless in the long course of the ages. It may be so, though there is little either in the letter or in the spirit of this parable to encourage such a hope. On this dark subject we do not incline to dogmatise so freely as is usual on either side, but would be swift to hear and slow to speak. Whether the ’tormentors’ and the imprisonment be æonian merely, or strictly everlasting, may, for aught we know, be a fair question; but it is one we had rather not discuss, especially in connection with a class of sinners who have so little claim on our sympathy.