The prodigal, the elder son, and the loving father

You've heard it before.  You know the story.  But have you seen it through the filter of the Middle East?

The very idea is ludicrous.  A son wishes his inheritance, having the audacity to go to the father and ask for that inheritance, is absurd.  It is telling the father that you wish him dead.  No son in his right mind would do it.  No father in his right mind would grant it.  Yet in the parable, both did.

That's what parables are all about.  You start of with a premise that is so unthinkable that it's laughable. This gets the audience's attention.  And then you proceed to your lesson.

Throughout, it's clear that this boy is foolish.  He does the unthinkable, is given the impossible, and wastes no time in going to a far-off land and squandering the money.  Notice that the father didn't send him off--he chose the path to take.  The father stays home and the son makes stupid decision after stupid decision.  Soon the money is gone and the son is in desperate straights.  He goes so far as to ask a Gentile for work--absolutely unheard of among the Jews.  The farmer, when asked, says that the only job he has available is caring for pigs.  This wasn't a job offer.  It was a polite way to tell the boy to go away.  The farmer understood very well that the Jews consider pigs unclean.  Offering the boy a job tending unclean animals was giving him an option that it was clear that he couldn't take advantage of.  But he does--another marvel.  More than that, the boy is starving and resorts to eating what even the pigs won't touch.

As the boy is living his miserable life, the parable goes on, he finally comes to his senses.  Ever done that?  Ever get into a mess that's so bad that you forget that there's a different way?  Ask anyone who's been in an abusive relationship--they'll tell you that it gets to be so hopeless that unless a miracle happens and their eyes are opened, they will continue in the relationship until they are literally abused to death.  But then one day, something happens--sometimes something as insignificant as reading the paper and seeing a story that could easily be your story--and you suddenly realize that of course there's a way out.  And you take it. And you're saved.  So it was with this young man.  Could it be that he saw someone who wore clothing similar to that worn by his father's servants?  Could it be that he looked at the slop that he was eating and realized that this would never happen in his home?  Whatever the cause, he came back to himself and realized that a servant in his father's house lived better than this.  Having realized that, he then makes the decision to go back and ask forgiveness.  He knows, none better, that he has committed an unpardonable offense against his father and expects nothing but to be treated as a servant.  But he hopes that his father will do at least that much for him.

He starts on the road home.  Maybe he is willing to take whatever consequences lie ahead; maybe he isn't thinking clearly.  But the father sees him from far off.  Obviously, this means that the father has been looking for him.  This is not coincidence.  More, then father throws pride and self respect aside and runs to the son.  This is important, for it's essential that the father reach the son before the community is aware of what's going on.  The father has been treated by the son as if he were dead, and the community in turn now sees the son as dead.  If the son dared show his face again, thought would become deed.  To avoid that, the father sets custom and dignity aside and sprints to the son's side.  He calls for a robe (remember Christ is our covering?), the family rings, and sandals to be brought.  He then calls for the fatted calf to be slaughtered so that a celebration can begin, for he who was dead is now alive again!

When the elder son--the good son--smells the cooking, he very reasonably wants to know what's going on.  He goes to the father, and the father explains.  This makes the son furious.  He has continued to tend the land while the son squanders his money on prostitutes (how did he know that?), and now his brother is to be celebrated while he, the good son, receives nothing?  He makes it clear that it's unfair that he hasn't received so much as a kid so that he could celebrate with his friends.

You know, we're used to looking down our collective nose at the elder brother, but I agree with him in this.  At first glance, it's totally unfair.  He has remained faithful while little Skeezix goes away, lives it up, blows Daddy's money, and then comes back.  What happens now?  I'm not surprised that the father's actions seem crazy and biased to the elder son.

But the father doesn't chide. He simply asks the older son to celebrate with him--what was lost is found, he who was dead is now alive again.

We all are the elder son.  We see others receive gifts while we have none (or none that we choose to think about at that moment), and it makes us mad.  But we are also the prodigal.  We wander away and live our own lives until that moment when we realize that life without our Father God is a life devoid of value.  In those two, we see ourselves.  In the father, though, we see the love of Christ and the mercy of God the Father.  He has ransomed us from death--just as the father did the son by putting on the family robes--and he asks us to celebrate His Son in the gifts of life--the gifts of the Eucharist.  Bless his holy name!