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Posted by Derrick
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Musings on Scripture
The Good Samaritan
If I were to ask someone to sum up the Christian faith who wasn’t a Christian or maybe ask someone what a religion should be like I think the most common answer would be something like this: ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you’. Two things here; firstly I do so love the use of the KJV language and the fact that people pick up on this and they forget the bit that goes before it. The passage in the gospel that this is drawn from sees a teacher of the law testing Jesus. He asks a question and Jesus asks him what he thinks. He says that to inherit eternal life one must ‘love the Lord your God with all your heart … and love your neighbour as you love yourself’ Far too many people conveniently forget the first part of that phrase. Loving God is as important as loving your neighbour. It’s actually in several places and stated in different ways but perhaps it’s easier to think about the parable that talks about this topic. We all know it.It is the parable of the Good Samaritan. This is one of the most well known of Christ’s parables and has had a massive impact on our culture and the way our faith is viewed across the world. It is a wonderful story and one that we all know well. I would argue that perhaps we know it too well. Perhaps we have heard it preached about or discussed so often that we may have gotten a little complacent about it. Some people would argue that familiarity breeds contempt. Is this the case with the Good Samaritan? Have we heard about it too often in church to really be able to understand it? Let us have a look at it. Well, as with all passages in the Bible, the context is something that is important.It comes after a period of remarkable successes. In Luke 10 we have seen the 72 come back and report the things that they had seen and done on their journeys. Christ has rejoiced and given praise to God and we approach the parable in a good mood. In the NIV the word used is test but I think that the Good News Bible has it slightly better when it uses the word trap. A so called expert in the law has stood up (presumably Jesus had been engaging in a little light teaching and had an appreciative audience) to trap Jesus. I am not sure what he wanted to trap Jesus into but I am sure it wasn’t for a nice reason. Perhaps they were trying to see if his teaching was right and this is something that we are supposed to do. Testing what we have been taught is scriptural after all. However I don’t think this is what the expert in the law was trying to do. I think that he was being a lot more vicious and malicious than this. I think that there was an element of trying to make Jesus out to be a poor teacher or worse, a blasphemer. So we have a context. Jesus is being tested and Jesus isn’t stupid. He knows what is happening and this is something that we need to think about. We are constantly being tested by people. There are those who want to ask us questions to force us into saying things that society deems wrong. There are those who ask us questions because they genuinely want to know what we think as well but we have to address them all. With that in mind, we can find no better place to look than this parable to see the way we should address the questions that are put to us in order to test us. What did Jesus do? Many people will say that Jesus had a simple way to do this, he always turned the question back on the questioner. This is true, here is a fine example, this is a case where he turns the question right back on the questioner. However, people who think this (and I certainly used to include myself in this group) miss something important. Jesus doesn’t just turn the question round and make the asker give the answer. He also gives his own interpretation and it is important to remember this. However, there is more to it. Once the correct answer has been given by the teacher of the law and agreed by Jesus he wants to know more. He wants Jesus to define the parameters of the law for him. I suspect that the teacher of the law had some parameters in mind but the answer Jesus gave must have blown them away. It blows most people away. So, what about the answer that he gave? Well, it is a very well known story but there are several themes that can be drawn out of it. Firstly, we see a man who is living in a dangerous place at a dangerous time. The road to Jericho was well known for bandit activity and it seems that this man had traveled on his own. A loner in a dangerous place is attacked. As he lies there, two men go past. One is a priest. Here is a servant of God who should be looking out for his fellow Jews. Here is a man who should have gone to help but he didn’t. We can only guess why. Perhaps he was scared about what would happen to him. This is a justifiable fear and sometimes we are scared of going to help someone else because we do not know what we are going to face. Perhaps the priest was not concerned because he didn’t see the man as his sort of problem. This is less justifiable but I suspect no less common today. How often have we looked upon a situation and thought that it was nothing to do with us? That man being beaten in Iran, nothing to do with us. The poor farmers of the Horn of Africa, nothing to do with us. Whatever the reason, the priest should have done more. He didn’t. A second man should have done more as well. The Levite was probably a man similar to the one who asked the question. He was not a priest but was certainly a part of the establishment. This man was part of the religious government system (and in First Century Palestine the religious government was most of the government). He was someone who helped out and who was responsible for the running of the temple and it’s system. He was, if you will, the church-warden. Again this man just walked on and he should not have done. So we reach the hero of the story. The Samaritan. The Jews and the Samaritan hated each other. It was a visceral hatred which went to the heart of the religious divide between the two nations. The Jews saw the Samaritans (descendants of those who had stayed in Israel when Israel had been exiled) as collaborators and traitors to their faith. The Samaritans saw the Jews as demanding, overbearing and snobbish (and quite probably a lot worse). Here we reach the first problem with Jesus’ story. He must have made a mistake. No Samaritan should have been traveling down that road. There may have been reasons for a Samaritan to be in Jerusalem but these were few and far between. There would not have been a reason for this Samaritan man to be traveling to Jericho, it was the wrong way if you were heading back to Samaria. Yet, here the man was and here we see what happens. The man sees someone in trouble and without fear and without thought of prejudice, he crosses the road and helps the man in his hour of need. He also uses his own precious resources and time and takes him to a place where he can get better attention. The story doesn’t end there though. This man who hated Jews yet rescued one gives money to ensure his future care and promises to meet all of the costs. The moral of the story is simple, it doesn’t matter who is in need, you must help. The whole world is your neighbour and you need to love your neighbour as you love yourself. Here ends the lesson, the man is chastised enough to know that perhaps his parameters need shifting and Jesus has taught a valuable lesson. No. It doesn’t end there. There is something that we have forgotten. Jesus had an audience and the story was told to them. They would have understood all of the details, even the subtle ones that we missed. I said a little while ago that there was no reason for a Samaritan to be in that part of the world but I wasn’t quite correct. There was one. Samaria and Judea were under the control of the Roman Empire and there were Roman troops all over both provinces. A common misconception is that the Roman army was made of completely of men from Rome. This was not the case. They made much use of local troops known as auxiliaries. In Judea, Jews were excused military service so the garrison there probably came from the nearest province, Samaria. The Good Samaritan was probably a Roman soldier. This explains why he was traveling through Judea. It explains his having a mount and different resources as well as the authority to speak to the innkeeper as he did. This changes a lot about what the story means. We now have someone who not only should hate the person that he helps, he would have been hated by the person as well. It was supposed to be a reciprocated hatred. This Good Samaritan did something that would have been inconceivable to the people listening to Jesus. They would have guessed what sort of person it was and would have thought he would probably give another kick instead of helping. It also adds to the embarrassment of the priest and Levite. They left a fellow Jew to probably die and this traitor twice over did what they should have done. Imagine how this would have felt. I think that there is something else that we can learn too. If we are being charitable, we might say that the Priest and Levite didn’t act because they were scared. This Samaritan, if he were a Roman auxiliary had nothing to fear. He had the training and he had the authority and he had the backing of the most mighty force in the land. We have this too. We have been or can be trained to go out into many different situations. God has given us talents and strengths and resources we can use. We have the authority. Jesus has commanded us to go out and share with the world and to do what we can to help. Moreover, God will be with us. Joshua 1:9, Deuteronomy 30:11 and Matthew 28:20 all tell us that God will be with us. So, Jesus turned to the man asking the question and told him: go and do likewise. The story has a moral which does say ‘love your neigbour as you love yourself’ but I think we can add some more to it. Love your neighbour even if they hate you as much as you hate them. Love your neighbour even if it means getting outside your Christian bubble into a very uncomfortable place. Love your neighbour without fear! We have the authority and the support. The Good Samaritan had the right heart, the right equipment and the right authority to help someone that he had no reason to help. We need to go and do likewise.
If I were to ask someone to sum up the Christian faith who wasn’t a Christian or maybe ask someone what a religion should be like I think the most common answer would be something like this: ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you’. Two things here; firstly I do so love the use of the KJV language and the fact that people pick up on this and they forget the bit that goes before it. The passage in the gospel that this is drawn from sees a teacher of the law testing Jesus. He asks a question and Jesus asks him what he thinks. He says that to inherit eternal life one must ‘love the Lord your God with all your heart … and love your neighbour as you love yourself’ Far too many people conveniently forget the first part of that phrase. Loving God is as important as loving your neighbour. It’s actually in several places and stated in different ways but perhaps it’s easier to think about the parable that talks about this topic. We all know it.It is the parable of the Good Samaritan. This is one of the most well known of Christ’s parables and has had a massive impact on our culture and the way our faith is viewed across the world. It is a wonderful story and one that we all know well. I would argue that perhaps we know it too well. Perhaps we have heard it preached about or discussed so often that we may have gotten a little complacent about it. Some people would argue that familiarity breeds contempt. Is this the case with the Good Samaritan? Have we heard about it too often in church to really be able to understand it? Let us have a look at it. Well, as with all passages in the Bible, the context is something that is important.It comes after a period of remarkable successes. In Luke 10 we have seen the 72 come back and report the things that they had seen and done on their journeys. Christ has rejoiced and given praise to God and we approach the parable in a good mood. In the NIV the word used is test but I think that the Good News Bible has it slightly better when it uses the word trap. A so called expert in the law has stood up (presumably Jesus had been engaging in a little light teaching and had an appreciative audience) to trap Jesus. I am not sure what he wanted to trap Jesus into but I am sure it wasn’t for a nice reason. Perhaps they were trying to see if his teaching was right and this is something that we are supposed to do. Testing what we have been taught is scriptural after all. However I don’t think this is what the expert in the law was trying to do. I think that he was being a lot more vicious and malicious than this. I think that there was an element of trying to make Jesus out to be a poor teacher or worse, a blasphemer. So we have a context. Jesus is being tested and Jesus isn’t stupid. He knows what is happening and this is something that we need to think about. We are constantly being tested by people. There are those who want to ask us questions to force us into saying things that society deems wrong. There are those who ask us questions because they genuinely want to know what we think as well but we have to address them all. With that in mind, we can find no better place to look than this parable to see the way we should address the questions that are put to us in order to test us. What did Jesus do? Many people will say that Jesus had a simple way to do this, he always turned the question back on the questioner. This is true, here is a fine example, this is a case where he turns the question right back on the questioner. However, people who think this (and I certainly used to include myself in this group) miss something important. Jesus doesn’t just turn the question round and make the asker give the answer. He also gives his own interpretation and it is important to remember this. However, there is more to it. Once the correct answer has been given by the teacher of the law and agreed by Jesus he wants to know more. He wants Jesus to define the parameters of the law for him. I suspect that the teacher of the law had some parameters in mind but the answer Jesus gave must have blown them away. It blows most people away. So, what about the answer that he gave? Well, it is a very well known story but there are several themes that can be drawn out of it. Firstly, we see a man who is living in a dangerous place at a dangerous time. The road to Jericho was well known for bandit activity and it seems that this man had traveled on his own. A loner in a dangerous place is attacked. As he lies there, two men go past. One is a priest. Here is a servant of God who should be looking out for his fellow Jews. Here is a man who should have gone to help but he didn’t. We can only guess why. Perhaps he was scared about what would happen to him. This is a justifiable fear and sometimes we are scared of going to help someone else because we do not know what we are going to face. Perhaps the priest was not concerned because he didn’t see the man as his sort of problem. This is less justifiable but I suspect no less common today. How often have we looked upon a situation and thought that it was nothing to do with us? That man being beaten in Iran, nothing to do with us. The poor farmers of the Horn of Africa, nothing to do with us. Whatever the reason, the priest should have done more. He didn’t. A second man should have done more as well. The Levite was probably a man similar to the one who asked the question. He was not a priest but was certainly a part of the establishment. This man was part of the religious government system (and in First Century Palestine the religious government was most of the government). He was someone who helped out and who was responsible for the running of the temple and it’s system. He was, if you will, the church-warden. Again this man just walked on and he should not have done. So we reach the hero of the story. The Samaritan. The Jews and the Samaritan hated each other. It was a visceral hatred which went to the heart of the religious divide between the two nations. The Jews saw the Samaritans (descendants of those who had stayed in Israel when Israel had been exiled) as collaborators and traitors to their faith. The Samaritans saw the Jews as demanding, overbearing and snobbish (and quite probably a lot worse). Here we reach the first problem with Jesus’ story. He must have made a mistake. No Samaritan should have been traveling down that road. There may have been reasons for a Samaritan to be in Jerusalem but these were few and far between. There would not have been a reason for this Samaritan man to be traveling to Jericho, it was the wrong way if you were heading back to Samaria. Yet, here the man was and here we see what happens. The man sees someone in trouble and without fear and without thought of prejudice, he crosses the road and helps the man in his hour of need. He also uses his own precious resources and time and takes him to a place where he can get better attention. The story doesn’t end there though. This man who hated Jews yet rescued one gives money to ensure his future care and promises to meet all of the costs. The moral of the story is simple, it doesn’t matter who is in need, you must help. The whole world is your neighbour and you need to love your neighbour as you love yourself. Here ends the lesson, the man is chastised enough to know that perhaps his parameters need shifting and Jesus has taught a valuable lesson. No. It doesn’t end there. There is something that we have forgotten. Jesus had an audience and the story was told to them. They would have understood all of the details, even the subtle ones that we missed. I said a little while ago that there was no reason for a Samaritan to be in that part of the world but I wasn’t quite correct. There was one. Samaria and Judea were under the control of the Roman Empire and there were Roman troops all over both provinces. A common misconception is that the Roman army was made of completely of men from Rome. This was not the case. They made much use of local troops known as auxiliaries. In Judea, Jews were excused military service so the garrison there probably came from the nearest province, Samaria. The Good Samaritan was probably a Roman soldier. This explains why he was traveling through Judea. It explains his having a mount and different resources as well as the authority to speak to the innkeeper as he did. This changes a lot about what the story means. We now have someone who not only should hate the person that he helps, he would have been hated by the person as well. It was supposed to be a reciprocated hatred. This Good Samaritan did something that would have been inconceivable to the people listening to Jesus. They would have guessed what sort of person it was and would have thought he would probably give another kick instead of helping. It also adds to the embarrassment of the priest and Levite. They left a fellow Jew to probably die and this traitor twice over did what they should have done. Imagine how this would have felt. I think that there is something else that we can learn too. If we are being charitable, we might say that the Priest and Levite didn’t act because they were scared. This Samaritan, if he were a Roman auxiliary had nothing to fear. He had the training and he had the authority and he had the backing of the most mighty force in the land. We have this too. We have been or can be trained to go out into many different situations. God has given us talents and strengths and resources we can use. We have the authority. Jesus has commanded us to go out and share with the world and to do what we can to help. Moreover, God will be with us. Joshua 1:9, Deuteronomy 30:11 and Matthew 28:20 all tell us that God will be with us. So, Jesus turned to the man asking the question and told him: go and do likewise. The story has a moral which does say ‘love your neigbour as you love yourself’ but I think we can add some more to it. Love your neighbour even if they hate you as much as you hate them. Love your neighbour even if it means getting outside your Christian bubble into a very uncomfortable place. Love your neighbour without fear! We have the authority and the support. The Good Samaritan had the right heart, the right equipment and the right authority to help someone that he had no reason to help. We need to go and do likewise.
