THE PRODIGAL SON: CRUMBS FOR THE FAITHFUL SON?

The story of the prodigal son is a difficult one for me. Not because of the actual prodigal son but because of his older brother who seems to get a really bad wrap whenever this story comes up.

Luke recounts the story in Chapter 15:11-32 of his book as was told by Jesus. We know how it goes – younger son asks his dad to give him the portion of his property that falls to him. He takes it, travels to a distant land, and blows all his money on wild living. Just about that time a famine hits, he begins to starve so much that the food he was hired to feed to pigs begun to look attractive to him. He decides to go back home, and upon sighting him from a distance, his father runs, embraces and kisses him, asks for the finest robe to be put on him, gives him a ring for his finger, sandals for feet and kills the calf they had been fattening in order to throw a feast for this son.

All the while, the older son was in the fields working. In fact, no one invited him to the party. He returns home to music and dancing, asks what’s going on, and only now discovers that his brother is back, and his father had slaughtered the calf they had been fattening for a feast for this ‘vagabond’ brother.

Naturally, this brother is peeved! He says to his father: “All these years I’ve worked hard for you and never once refused to do a single thing you told me to. And in all that time you never gave me even one young goat for a feast with my friends. ³⁰Yet when this son of yours comes back after squandering your money on prostitutes, you celebrate by killing the finest calf we have.”

I have read commentaries upon commentaries on this brother’s outburst looking for some context or something that justifies his anger. I found nothing. I will explain why a bit later, but nearly every commentator concludes that this brother either lacked love for his brother or was self-conceited and boastful and didn’t know he himself was “lost” even though he remained in his father’s house.

I disagree. If you told this story to a room full of Gen-Z’s (or anyone who has a bit of a critical approach to life, really), I imagine that this story would be more about unfairness than about grace, or about getting away and even rewarded for disregarding all the right choices in relation to life; and they wouldn’t necessarily be wrong.

So although I found nothing in the older son’s defence, my only consolation [not my answer!] at the end of the day was this:

That the story didn’t actually happen.

This brothers and their father never actually existed, and no such encounter occurred in real life. We know about this story because Jesus was telling a parable in a very specific context, and that context was targeted to specifically illustrate the principle of grace against the principle of works and self-righteousness.

When Luke tells the story, this is how he recounts the beginning: “¹Tax collectors and other notorious sinners often came to listen to Jesus teach. ²This made the Pharisees and teachers of religious law (scribes) murmur saying, this man receives sinners ^[KJV]/is associating with such despicable people^[NLT] – even eating with them!”

Although they only murmured, Jesus answers them with a series of stories/questions that (all in my opinion seem unfair and even illogical but) make a specific point – grace may seem unfair or illogical, but heaven rejoices more over 1 lost-and-found than over 99 righteous persons who need no repentance.

He asks two questions – suppose one of you had 100 sheep and loses 1 of them; would you not leave the 99 to look for the 1, and when he’s found it, would not carry it joyfully on his shoulders, call all his neighbours upon his return home and rejoice because the lost sheep had been found?^4-6 (Again, very honestly, I wouldn’t. Would that not put the 99 at risk of getting attacked or lost as well; but that’s beside the point).

His second question asks what woman would not light a lamp to look for one lost silver coin if she had 9 others, and call her friends to rejoice with her because she’s found the lost one? ^8-9 And then he re-emphases his point:

‘Likewise, Jesus said, there is more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents.’¹⁰

It is at this point that Jesus tells the story of the prodigal son to make the point further. And I couldn’t help but think about the story Jesus tells in Mt 20 about workers who came in at different times of the day. Read for yourself:

¹“For the Kingdom of Heaven is like the owner of an estate who went out early one morning to hire workers for his vineyard. He agreed to pay a penny a day and sent them out to work. At 9 o’clock in the morning he was passing through the marketplace and saw some people standing around doing nothing. So he hired them, telling them he would pay them whatever was right at the end of the day. At noon and again around 3 o’clock he did the same thing. At 5 o’clock that evening he was in town again and saw some more people standing around. He asked them, ‘Why haven’t you been working today?’ “They replied, ‘Because no one hired us.’ “The owner of the estate told them, ‘Then go on out and join the others in my vineyard.’

“That evening he told the foreman to call the workers in and pay them, beginning with the last workers first. When those hired at 5 o’clock were paid, each received 1 penny. When those hired earlier came to get their pay, they supposed that they would receive more. But they, too, were paid 1 penny. When they received their pay, they protested, ‘Those people worked only 1 hour, and yet you’ve paid them just as much as you paid us who worked all day in the scorching heat.’ “He answered one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Did you not agree with me for 1 penny? Take what is yours and go your way. I wish to give to this last man the same as to you. ¹⁵Is it against the law for me to do what I want with my money? Should you be angry because I am kind?”

As you’d imagine, I’ve always had issues with this story as well. It just doesn’t sound fair to me. Someone humorously told me that the root of my rant about ‘unfairness’ is that I think I have always fallen among the 99 who never strayed or that I am the pained big brother who had never ‘explored’ and couldn’t understand why someone else should and still receive more than him😆 Maybe, but we cannot deny that I have a point😆

Although Jesus told parables to the multitudes, Jesus loved telling parables when he addressed Pharisees and teachers of the law. It’s tempting to conclude that He used these ‘skewed’ stories to make an emphatic point at the expense of the other characters in the story – they either emphasize a central point or make a stark comparison to emphasize some argument he was making. In fact in Mt 13, after the disciples had asked Jesus why he spoke in parables, Jesus went on and on with a litany of more parables about a sower, tares and wheat, etc. After He had told them a parable about the kingdom being like leaven, which a woman took and hid in 3 measures of meal till the whole was leavened, Jesus quoted an age-long prophecy which was fulfilled by His habit of telling parables:

“This was in fulfillment of what was spoken by the prophet: I will open My mouth in parables; I will utter things that have been hidden since the foundation of the world.” ^{Mt 13 35; Ps 78:2}

And just in case it’s lost on you, these mysteries were not the stories in themselves, but the principles of grace and righteousness and repentance and of the kingdom of heaven and of God. I hope you enjoyed reading this.

Love,

Rad!♥️