O’ Brother, Where Art Thou?

By

Reverend Litton Logan

September 30, 2007

Scriptures:

¹⁹“There was a Rich Man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day. ²⁰And at his gate lay a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, ²¹who longed to satisfy his hunger with what fell from the Rich Man’s table; even the dogs would come and lick his sores. ²²The poor man died and was carried away by the angels to be with Abraham. The Rich Man also died and was buried. ²³In Hades, where he was being tormented, he looked up and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by his side. ²⁴He called out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am in agony in these flames.’ ²⁵But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner evil things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in agony. ²⁶Besides all this, between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us.’ ²⁷He said, ‘Then, father, I beg you to send him to my father’s house—²⁸for I have five brothers—that he may warn them, so that they will not also come into this place of torment.’ ²⁹Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; they should listen to them.’ ³⁰He said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ ³¹He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’” Luke 16:19--31 (NRSV)

Sermon:

Again, this Sunday, we have heard scriptures read from Luke that address wealth and poverty. One might think that Luke is some bleeding-heart, who believes that the source of all that is wrong in the world are greedy, stingy, rich people.

In this vein, let me remind us that in Jesus’ and Luke’s day, people were where they were because God, who was in charge of everything, had so decreed it—one did not argue with one’s lot in life. A person may resent their lot but they could not argue with it. In addition, many of the poor in Luke’s church were in dire straights financially and socially because of their belief in Jesus.

As much as Luke addresses the practical aspects of poverty and encourages Christian people that have resources to share with their less fortunate brothers and sisters, greed and money madness are not Luke’s or even Jesus’ major concerns. If anything, Luke’s recalling Jesus’ teachings on wealth and prosperity would have sent a pointed message to the poor in his audience that were obsessed to the point of distraction in matters of faith with acquiring the necessities of life.

These passages would have also told the poor that their poverty and persecutions were not punishments from God. Resistance to changing old understandings of God and the world are to be expected. God has foretold this in scripture. This resistance will even go as far as Jesus’ crucifixion, but his resurrection tells Luke’s church that the old understandings were wrong. Luke tells his church that Jesus’ resurrection at the hand of God proves that his insights and teachings were the truth. Therefore, rest easy if you have to give all that you have as well as give up all you think of yourself to be victorious in Christ.

Today’s story of the Rich Man and Lazarus caps Luke’s critique of wealth. However, it is a critique, as I have said, that is not so much about wealth per se, as it is about correcting people’s traditional theological understandings of prosperity and poverty. Said another way, in our parable today, Jesus is more concerned with correcting bad theology that leads to bad economics and social injustice. In fact, in the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus, Jesus drives the last nail in the coffin of the prosperity gospel of his day, as it should in our day.

Jesus has addressed the Pharisees as “lovers of money.” We frequently misunderstand the implications of this accusation. When the Pharisees rolled their eyes at Jesus’ naivety concerning his teachings on wealth, concluding that he was out of touch with reality, they were not referring to his naivety about economics or sociology, but rather his theology. The Pharisees as a rule were not into money for money’s sake. They did not generally use their religion as a socially acceptable façade to acquire wealth. No, for the Pharisees, wealth and prosperity were positive proofs that they were righteous people because God had blessed them.

Let us look at the major justification for the Pharisee’s thinking in Deut. 28:3-4, which states that those who carefully obey the commandments of God will be highly favored:

³Blessed shall you be in the city, and blessed shall you be in the field.

⁴Blessed shall be the fruit of your womb, the fruit of your ground, and the fruit of your livestock, both the increase of your cattle and the issue of your flock. Deuteronomy 28:3--4 (NRSV)

We can find further justification for this thinking in Psalms 1:3-4 where it says that the righteous person, “In all that he does, he prospers,” but “the wicked are not so…”.

Therefore, if one is wealthy, one is blessed by God. One is blessed by God because one is righteous and obeys God’s commandments. Conversely, if one is poor or beset with diseases and misfortune, it is because one has not obeyed or diligently applied oneself to studying God’s laws, statutes, and rabbinical teachings and is being punished or reaping the consequences of such neglect or disobedience. Now, this may sound strange to us, but I could make the case that it is still a fairly prevalent rationale in some Christian quarters to day.

Let us look at the parable. First, we are told that the Rich Man was into conspicuous consumption—that is he really got into enjoying God’s blessings. We know this in part because the Rich Man wears purple, which could only be worn by Roman decree by high-ranking officials or members of a royal family. He lived in a gated house that afforded him privacy and security. He dressed in fine linen and he feasted sumptuously every day—the aspiration you may remember of the rich fool.

We are not told anything about the Rich Man’s moral character. By the standards of his day, he was blessed of God because he was wealthy; therefore, he was righteous. He most likely would have given alms to support the poor and participated in other obligatory, charitable requirements of his day just like the Pharisees in Jesus’ audience.

Then there was Lazarus, a named derived from the word Eleazar—“God helps,” which speaks to his future. We don’t know Lazarus’ story either. Maybe he had done something to cause his circumstances and had subsequently repented. Was he suffering from some infection or just the consequences of malnutrition, which caused his sores and branded him unclean like a leper as divine punishment? We don’t know. Lazarus was dumped at the gates of the Rich Man and he sought to eat just the bread used to wipe the grease from a person’s hand after a festive meal and then discarded. He was so infirmed and weak that he could not even fight off the starving dogs of the street that licked his open sores.

One can image that the Rich Man passed by Lazarus daily. It is evident that he knew Lazarus’ name, because he will later ask Abraham to send Lazarus to quench his thirst and to warn his brothers.

Now, given the prevailing theological understandings, the Rich Man would have been justified in assuming that God was punishing Lazarus. If Lazarus survived his punishment, maybe God would restore him to a good life. After all, who was the Rich Man to interfere with God’s justice?

We can only image what caused Lazarus’s death—exposure, malnutrition, or maybe the dogs. However, shortly thereafter, the Rich Man dies—maybe from overeating, arteriosclerosis, or terminal gout, who knows. The next scene in the story takes place in the abode of the dead. Now things are reversed.

In Jewish theology of the time, there were various understandings concerning the state and disposition of the dead as they waited the day of resurrection and judgment. In our parable today, we see an understanding that the righteous dead rest in a sort of paradise ante-area awaiting the day of resurrection and judgment. The unrighteous dead are in the ante-area to the place of eternal punishment. Each seems to know his eventual fate however.

The Rich Man hollers across the chasm between the two abodes and begs for mercy. Yet, he still holds onto his sense of social status—send Lazarus to touch my parched tongue with a drop of water. Abraham acknowledges the Rich Man as one of the elect—his child, a Jew—but in effect tells him that contrary to popular thought earthly values are not heavenly values. He had the good things in life and Lazarus had the bad; Lazarus is now consoled and he is tormented. (The reversal motif) Besides, there is no bridging the chasm between the abodes of the righteous and the unrighteous.

Now you have to understand that this image would have shocked the Pharisees—the rich—and the poor alike, because it upset everyone’s theological world view. Rich people were blessed of God. The prosperous were seen as God’s conduits to bless the less fortunate as mandated in the Laws of Moses. Poor people filled a divinely decreed place in the world while holding a special place in God’s heart. People that were sick or affirmed were so afflicted either because God was punishing them or had given them over to demonic torment because of their unrighteousness.

The Rich Man again asked Abraham to send Lazarus to do his bidding only now he wants Lazarus to go back from the dead to warn his brothers that things as they understand them are not right. Abraham tells the Rich Man, “Look your brothers have the same opportunities that you had and that of all your Jewish brothers have. They have the Laws of Moses and the words of the prophets. If they won’t believe them with all the history of divine proofs then they certainly will not believe some beggar, deemed unclean, cursed of God sent back from the dead.”

Luke’s audience would have picked up on this because the Pharisees knew all the Laws of Moses and the words of the prophets that fore told or foreshadowed the coming of the Messiah, his suffering, his shameful and dishonorable death, and resurrection and they still did not believe.

At play behind the scenes of these stories and parables, concerning the wise use of wealth has been a suggested thread of repentance. Now we see it unraveling clearly as the Rich Man asks that Lazarus be sent to his brothers so they might repent, that is turn from their misconceptions of righteousness.

As is the case in the hearing of any story, the listener tends to identify with some character in the story. It would have been hard for us to identify with Lazarus or with the Rich Man. Yet, we would have probably judged the Rich Man harshly and our sympathies would have lain with Lazarus. We would have delighted in the upside-down outcome of the story. Nevertheless, I remind you that this would not have been the mind of the first audience. Many would have understood the Rich Man to be the good guy, although insensitive, and Lazarus the bad guy getting what he deserved. Therefore, the image of Lazarus in the bosom of Abraham and the Rich Man in Hades would have been mind blowing--unnatural.

Nevertheless, the only people left for the audience—the rich, the poor, and you and I—to identify with in this story would have been the brothers and the looming question—will they listen to the Laws of Moses and the words of the prophets of suffer their brother’s fate? Will the listener—the prosperous or the impoverished—embrace the resurrected Christ and rightly understand the Law and the words of the prophets? Will the listener demonstrate kingdom charity, ethics, and a divine attitude of caring for all people as Christ does regardless of their life-long, theological traditions and understandings? On the other hand, like the Rich Man, will the listener continue to place their fate in the hands of tradition and the misunderstood theology of prosperity as personal justification of righteousness and salvation?

In this matter, “O, brother, where art thou? O, sister, where art thou?”