Thirtieth Sunday In Ordinary Time
LUKE 18:9-14
Luke’s instruction on prayer continues. Last Sunday’ instruction was on perseverance in prayer. This Sunday’s centers on the proper disposition for prayer. The teaching is con-tained in a parable with an introduction. “Jesus addressed this parable to some who were convinced of their own righteousness and despised everyone else.” The Book of Proverbs warns, “All the ways of a man are pure in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the spirit,” 16:2; “Every way of man is right in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the heart,” 21:2.
Luke’s introduction does not identify “some,” but the Pharisee of the parable makes it clear who “some” were in the mind of Luke. He already attributed to Jesus a condemnation of Pharisees in 16:5, “You are those who justify yourselves before men, but God knows your hearts, for what is exalted among men is an abomination in the sight of God.”
The problem with blanket condemnation of a class of people in the gospels is the fact that down through history these statements became a foundation of anti-Semitism. This anti-Semitism endures today among some Christians, even after the Second Vatican Council finally rejected it. The Pharisees as a group were devout laity dedicated to observance of the Torah and the traditions that accumulated around the Torah. Jesus had friends among them. They were protective of him, as we see in Luke 13:31. St. Paul was a Pharisee. He continued to regard himself as such after his conversion, as we see in Acts 23:6. Shysters are found in many groups, and the Pharisees would have had their own, but that should not destroy the reputation of these devout people as a group. One reason for their negative depiction in the gospels: when the gospels were written they were the only identifiable leadership group among the Jews in the last part of the first century, when they and Christians came into conflict over converts, Matthew 23:15.
We have no choice but to retain “the Pharisee” as the self-righteous braggart of this parable, but with the above clarification in mind. The Pharisee’s prayer is self-centered. Every clause begins with “I.” He does address God, but only insofar as God has created him better than the rest of humankind, “the greedy, dishonest, adulterous, or even like this tax-collector,” nodding toward him with contempt. We may assume the Pharisee kept his weight under control, “I fast twice a week.” Pastors would find his other feature acceptable, “I pay tithes twice a week.” We read in a first-century Christian manual called in Greek, “The DIDACHE,” that some Christians fasted twice a week. The amusing part of this information: the days on which they fasted. The author advises them not to fast “like the hypocrites who fast on Mondays and Thursdays, but you fast on Wednesdays and Fridays.” The “hypocrites” would have been, for the author of the Didache, the pious Jews in the synagogue across the street from the Christian synagogue.
The prayer of the socially outcast tax collector is the model Luke proposes. He stood “at a distance,” and kept his eyes downcast. He beat his breast in a mea culpa, and prayed a very short prayer, “O God, be merciful to me a sinner.” The “sinfulness” of the tax collector consisted first in the fact that he earned his living by collecting from his fellow-Jews the taxes imposed by the Roman government. Secondly, some tax collectors were suspected of being dishonest and probably were. This is why John the Baptizer warns repentant tax collectors in Luke 3:13, “Collect no more than you are authorized to do.”
The soldiers in that same episode in Luke 3:13-14, were probably bodyguards and enforcers of the tax collectors. This is implied in the Baptizer’s advice to them, “Rob no one by violence or by false accusation.” The false accusation would be connected with payoffs to ensure the soldiers did not accuse their victims of non-payment of taxes. Luke adds a conclusion: the tax collector went home “justified,” that is, he and his prayer were accepted by God. Then a warning to those who propose themselves as model for all, “Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.”
SIRACH 35:12-14
This reading can serve as an interpretation of the last saying of this Sunday’s gospel, the humble exalted and the exalted humbled. Sirach points out God’s impartiality but with a slight favoritism toward the weak, the orphan, the oppressed. He assures his readers that the prayer is heard of those who serve God willingly, but it takes time. “It pierces the clouds, and does not rest till it reaches its goal.” This picturesque way of depicting the traveling of prayer through space should remind us of communication in our time be-tween space stations on earth and satellites in space. It takes a while “to pierce the clouds, but does not rest till it reaches its goal.”
