By: Justin Angelos | August 26, 2022
Parables are still used today in the Middle East; they serve as a method for teaching important truths and life lessons. Parables are usually simple and easy to memorize and very intriguing to the audience. Jesus used parables for a variety of reasons, Jesus used them to rebuke certain people, He used them to fulfill prophecy, and He used them instruments of judgement. This article will focus on why Jesus used parables for rebuking the Pharisees.
In the parable of the prodigal son, Luke describes a historical setting in where Jesus was sitting near sinners and tax collectors. The pharisees make a comment, “this man welcomes sinners and eats with them.” Then Jesus starts to tell the story of the prodigal son to rebuke them.[1] (Luke 15 NIV)
Jesus’ main reason for telling this parable was to rebuke the Pharisees. In the prodigal son, there are two sons, most people seem to focus on the younger son, Jesus mentions the two sons for a reason. The older son was just as lost as the younger son. The younger son was lost due to his sin, and the older son was lost through his self-righteousness and obedience. The older son did not truly care about the father, he cared about the father’s wealth, and wanted to gain control of the father’s estate through his obedience. When the younger son returns, the older brother becomes very angry, and refused to join them at the feast. The thing that was keeping the older son from the father was his goodness, his righteousness. [2]
The older brother tells us why, he refused to enter the feast, and that was because he had never disobeyed the father. “There are two different ways someone can be lost; you can escape God through morality and religion just as much as you can escape God through immorality and non-religion”[3] The Pharisees represent the older son; they had an older son spirit or mentality. The Pharisees were just as alienated from the Father as the sinners were, and Jesus was saying that, you cannot earn your way to the Father, by making up for past deeds gone wrong, and you cannot earn your way to the Father by your own self-righteousness.
In the prodigal son parable, neither son had a relationship with the father, they were concerned about what the father could give them, but they did not genuinely care about the father.[4] Parables dealt directly with daily life and for this reason people can identify and relate with the parables.[5]
Bibliography
Kaiser Jr., Walter C. and Moisés Silva, Introduction to Biblical Hermeneutics: The Search for Meaning, Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2007.
Keller, Tim. “Prodigal God 1.” Last modified December 9, 2014. YouTube video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZ1ZN4cRafY
About the Author
Seattle native Justin Angelos brings a passion for evangelism and discipleship along with theology and apologetics. He has studied at Biola University and Liberty University. Justin focuses on providing help for those who suffer from emotional and anxiety issues.
Notes
[1] Moisés Silva, Introduction to Biblical Hermeneutics: The Search for Meaning, ed. Walter C. Kaiser Jr. and Moisés Silva (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2007), 164.
[2] “Prodigal God 1.” YouTube. YouTube, December 9, 2014. Last modified December 9, 2014. Accessed August 20, 2022. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZ1ZN4cRafY
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Silva, Introduction to Biblical Hermeneutics, 163-164.
Copyright, 2022. Bellator Christi.
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