A Tale of Two Rich Men

My friend Mike Freeman wrote a beautiful and insightful piece on Luke 16 yesterday.

I would recommend folks wondering over to there are taking a look at it as it warmed my heart and brought some insight into some odd passages in the Bible (i.e. “The Parable of the Shrewd Manager” & “The Rich Man and Lazarus”).

“Two parables I’ve generally read on their own merits, as isolated units – and that I’ve also tended to see through the same glasses. Funny how that happens with so much in life.

But yesterday they stood out together. Two tales of two rich men in Luke 16. Perhaps the insight would have been there through my reading the chapter in English, but it was in Greek yesterday, and the identical words in the Greek text at the opening of each parable stood out quite glaringly. “There was a certain rich man…” And then to see the two stories punctuated with the notice that the religious elite sneered at Jesus because they were lovers of money (“Pharisaioi philargurioi” a delightful, rhythmic pairing of words: “Pharisee silver-lovers”). Jesus tells them they only value what is esteemed on a human level and that God takes an entirely different view of things. A good point to remember as we are subtly and often not so subtly pulled into the latest human fashions culturally, morally, religiously, theologically…”

Go to “Word Havering” to continue reading.