Food For Your Soul
by Reverend Hubermann Larose
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The Parable of the Samaritan – (Luke. 10:25-37)
This parable was brought about by a question a lawyer —an expert in the Law of Moses— asked Jesus: “Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus did not answer the question, but instead sent the man back to the Law, to find the answer to his question: “What is written in the Law? How do you read it?” And the man recited verbatim: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind; and, “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
Jesus told him, “You have answered correctly. Do this and you will live.” A clear and simple answer, a direct and precise one… And a command apparently easy to obey. However, Jesus’ answer left the lawyer deeply disturbed. Verse 29 says “he wanted to justify himself.” Who was accusing him? No one. But his conscience bore witness against him that he had not truly loved his neighbor. He wanted to justify himself… In other words, he was looking for a way-out. So he asked Jesus another question, this time, to lock him up into an endless discussion: “And who is my neighbor?” he asked Jesus.
Jesus did not take the bait, avoiding what Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. called “the paralysis of analysis.” So, instead of giving to the lawyer a definition of the neighbor, he painted for him a concrete and existential situation in this parable called the Parable of the Samaritan.
He said, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho…” The road to Jericho meandered through a rocky region infested with robbers who used the many caves of that region as hideouts. For that reason, it was a dangerous road. Our poor traveler was attacked by robbers who stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. This man saw a glimmer of hope when a priest came to be going down the road; but the priest passed by on the other side. Then came a Levite who also avoided him, passing by on the other side. Only a Samaritan, when he saw the wounded man, came close to him, took care of him, put him on his donkey, paid his own money to the innkeeper, and promised to come back and pay the bill if the man’s condition demands extra healthcare.
Jesus is teaching us in this parable that the religion that pleases God is the one that takes into account the two dimensions of the Christian love: the vertical and the horizontal. Loving God and loving one’s neighbor are the touchstone of true Christianity, of the “pure and undefiled religion before God our Father” —this religion that doesn’t consist only in “keeping oneself from being polluted by the world” (something the priest and the Levite were good at), but also by “looking after the orphan and the widow in their distress.” (James 1: 27)
The problem with the priest and the Levite was that their religion was terribly lacking with regard to the horizontal dimension of love. The religion of these men was confined to the Temple in Jerusalem. They were traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho. These dear religious men had left God in the Temple. They did not know that God can be also be met in the neighbor. “Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.” (Mat. 25: 40)
Jesus took the Samaritan as an example, because we discover in him the characteristics of true love, namely universality, altruism, and concreteness.
True love is universal. As Dr. Martin Luther Jr. put it, “the Samaritan perceived with acuity what lies beyond the perpetual accidents of race, religion, and nationality.” He did not reduce the concern for the neighbor to a class, a tribe, a nation, or a race. When somebody says, “I love my neighbor as myself,” that could mean: “I love my white neighbor as myself” (let the blacks go to hell!) This is also true for the black person who excludes the white person from the definition of the neighbor they ought to love.
True love is altruist — the kind of love that leads us to self-sacrifice for the sake of others. The Samaritan put his life on the line to help the wounded stranger. He could have hesitated and passed by on the other side for fear of being attacked also by the robbers. He didn’t say, “What will happen to me, if I don’t help the poor man?”, but “What will happen to him, if I leave him on the road?”
True love is concrete. The Samaritan understood that he had in front of him a man in flesh and blood, not a disembodied spirit. He did not stand idly by and pray. A concrete action was in order. There are times when prayer or a pious speech can be an escape route from our responsibility toward the wounded we come across on a daily basis on the numerous roads to Jericho of this life. “Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it?” (James 2:15-16)
Thus, the love of the Samaritan becomes the model, the norm, the sample against which we must measure our love for our neighbor. Jesus left it to the expert in the Law to draw the conclusion: “Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?” The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.” This is the love Christ commands us to imitate: “Go and do likewise.”
The example of the Samaritan challenges us, humbles us, and often condemns us. How often do we act like the priest and the Levite! Let’s ask God to open our hearts, so that we may come to love with the same love as the Samaritan.
Hubermann Larose
Associate Pastor
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