The Celebration Has Room for Both Sons

“Drew near” is an imperfect with a participle, “were drawing near”: a habit, not a single day’s event. “All” is broad hyperbole. They come “for to hear”, which in this gospel is the posture of good soil (8:15).

“Murmured” is diagongyzō, to grumble among themselves, the verb the Greek Old Testament uses of Israel murmuring against Moses in the wilderness (Exodus 16:2); it returns when Jesus goes to Zacchaeus’s house (19:7). “Receiveth” is prosdechomai, which can also mean to wait for, as Joseph of Arimathea “waited for the kingdom of God” (23:51).

Luke says “this parable”, singular, though three follow. The sheep, the coin and the sons are treated as one answer to one complaint.

A hundred sheep was a flock of ordinary size for a single shepherd. The “wilderness” is erēmos, open uncultivated grazing land, not sand. Ezekiel 34:11-16 has God himself as the shepherd who says, “I will seek that which was lost.”

A frightened or exhausted sheep often lies down and will not move, so carrying it was the practical course. Isaiah 40:11 pictures the LORD who shall “gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom”, and the shepherd with a sheep across his shoulders became one of the earliest Christian images in the Roman catacombs.

“Which was lost” is apolōlos, the perfect participle Jesus uses of himself at Zacchaeus’s house: “the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” (19:10). The shepherd’s own summary is the mission statement in small.

“In heaven” is a reverent way of speaking of God, as the younger son will say “I have sinned against heaven” (verse 18). The joy is put in the future tense, “shall be”, where the parallel in verse 10 has the present, “there is”.

The “piece of silver” is a drachma, a Greek coin worth about a day’s wage. Village houses had small windows and floors of beaten earth or rough stone, so a lamp was needed even by day. “Sweep” is saroō, the verb of the “swept” house in 11:25. “Either” is the 1611 form of “or”.

In the Greek, “her friends and her neighbours” are feminine forms: she calls the women of the village. Her words match the shepherd’s almost exactly, with one change: “the piece which I had lost”, admitting her own part in the loss.

“In the presence of the angels of God” is another reverent circumlocution, like the heavenly court of 12:8-9: the joy described is God’s own. Luke’s “likewise” binds the second parable to the first in a single refrain.

Scripture’s pairs of brothers, Cain and Abel, Ishmael and Isaac, Esau and Jacob, Manasseh and Ephraim, regularly overturn the elder’s expected advantage. A listener would expect the younger son to be the one the account favours.

Under Deuteronomy 21:17 the elder son received a double portion, so the younger’s share was a third. The book of Sirach advises a father never to hand over his property while alive. “His living” is bios, livelihood, but also simply life: the father divides his life between them.

“Gathered all together” can mean turned everything into cash, a sense known from business papyri. “Riotous living” is asōtōs, literally “unsavingly”, from the same root as the verb “to save”. “Wasted” is diaskorpizō, to scatter, the verb for the steward who “wasted his goods” in 16:1.

Famines in the ancient world struck whole regions at once, like the one foretold by Agabus “throughout all the world” in the days of Claudius (Acts 11:28). “Began to be in want” is hystereō, to fall short, the first time in his life he lacks anything.

“Joined himself” is kollaō, to glue or cleave, the verb for the dust that “cleaveth” to the messengers’ feet in 10:11: he attaches himself to a stranger. The employer is a Gentile, and a Jew feeding swine had reached the bottom, since pigs were unclean (Leviticus 11:7).

The “husks” are keratia, carob pods, fed to animals and eaten only by the very poor. A later rabbinic saying runs, “When the Israelites are reduced to carob pods, they repent.” “Would fain” means would gladly. The imperfect “gave” says no one was giving: not a single meal, but a steady absence.

“Came to himself” is an idiom for coming to one’s senses, as if he had been beside himself. The “hired servants” are misthioi, day labourers, lower and less secure than the household slaves. “Perish” is apollymi, the same verb as “lost” throughout the chapter.

“I will arise” is anastas, getting up from where he sits in the field, the participle also used for rising from the dead. “Sinned against heaven, and before thee” echoes Pharaoh’s words to Moses, “I have sinned against the LORD your God, and against you” (Exodus 10:16).

“Worthy” is axios, the elders’ word for the centurion in 7:4. Kenneth Bailey suggested that as a hired servant the son could earn wages and pay back what he had lost, living in the village rather than under his father’s roof, a reading the wording allows but does not require.

A dignified householder did not run in public, which required hitching up his long robe. “Fell on his neck” is the embrace of Esau meeting Jacob (Genesis 33:4) and of Joseph weeping over his brothers (Genesis 45:14). The father sees first, and acts before a word is said.

Some early manuscripts, including Codex Sinaiticus, add “make me as one of thy hired servants” here, completing the speech of verse 19. The King James, with most manuscripts, leaves the last line unspoken, and “in thy sight” replaces the “before thee” of the rehearsal.

“The best robe” is literally “the first robe”, the finest in the house. Pharaoh honoured Joseph with a ring, fine garments and a gold chain (Genesis 41:42). Slaves went barefoot; sandals marked a free man and a son. Many manuscripts add “quickly” to the father’s orders.

A fatted calf was kept stall-fed for a great occasion, as Abraham had one killed for his three visitors at Mamre (Genesis 18:7). A calf would feed a hundred people or more, so the celebration is not a family supper but a feast for the whole village.

“Be merry” is euphrainō, the verb the rich fool used when he told his soul to “be merry” alone (12:19). Here the merriment is shared by a whole household. The father’s words, dead and alive, lost and found, are set in a pair of balanced lines like poetry.

The elder son has been at work in the field, where his brother had ended up feeding pigs. “Musick” is symphōnia, a band of instruments, and “dancing” is choros, the circle dance of a village celebration. He hears the party before he knows its reason.

The one he calls is a pais, a boy or young servant. “Asked what these things meant” is in the optative in Greek, a hesitant, indirect question: what might all this be?

“Safe and sound” is hygiainonta, in good health, the word used of the centurion’s servant found whole in 7:10. The servant reports only the facts, brother home, calf killed, health restored, and says nothing of repentance.

“Intreated” is parakaleō, to plead or to comfort, the verb behind the “consolation of Israel” that Simeon waited for (2:25). The father who ran out to meet one son now walks out to the other; a host leaving his own feast to plead with a son was a public humiliation.

“Do I serve thee” is douleuō, to serve as a slave: the elder son describes himself in exactly the role his brother had rehearsed asking for. A kid, eriphos, a young goat, was far cheaper than a calf, and he complains of never having had even that.

“Devoured” is katesthiō, to eat up, the verb for the birds devouring the seed in 8:5. He calls it “thy living”, bios again, though the father had already given it away as the son’s share. The harlots appear nowhere in the account until he names them.

“Son” here is teknon, child, a warmer word than the huios of verse 11. “Thou art ever with me” uses pantote, always: the elder son’s place was never in question, only his view of it.

“It was meet” is edei, from dei, the word of necessity Luke uses for what must happen in God’s purpose (2:49, 9:22, 13:16). “Make merry, and be glad” pairs euphrainō with chairō, the joy the shepherd and the woman asked their neighbours to share (verses 6 and 9).