Readings (Year C):
Exodus 17:8 – 13
Psalm 121:1 – 2, 3 – 4, 5 – 6, 7 – 8
2 Timothy 3:14 – 4:2
Luke 18:1 – 8
Reflection: Embrace Jesus’ complexity
Jewish scripture scholar Amy-Jill Levine says that the parables are meant to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable. We might also say parables afflict those of us who want to make sense of them. Although we tend to read the parables as straightforward and simple, Jesus’ short stories are profoundly complex. They aren’t direct analogies, nor simply narrative vehicles for Christian theology: remember, Jesus was Jewish. They are, as theologian C.H. Dodd put it, vivid and strange, intended to tease the mind into active thought. If immediately after Jesus told a story, you responded that you knew what he was up to, he would’ve told you to think again.
And so it is with today’s gospel reading, the parable of the widow and the unjust judge. Many translations include a character description for the widow: persistent or tenacious. When we hear the word “widow,” we might think of the biblical admonition to take care of orphans and widows and might instinctively cast the widow of our parable as weak and needy and maybe even tender. And then, because a story with a good guy needs a bad guy, we might turn our anger on the other two characters: the unjust judge and the widow’s adversary. Once we’ve figured out the roles, then it’s just a short hop over to the meaning: that God wants us to execute justice on behalf of vulnerable people who can’t speak for themselves.
But the widow does speak for herself—so much, in fact, that the judge eventually gives her what she wants. And what is it she wants? Justice? Not so fast, Levine cautions. The Greek text is clear: she wants vengeance. For what reason? We assume her opponent did her wrong—but we can’t be sure. Maybe she got into a spat with a neighbor and wants the judge to punish him.
But aren’t we slandering a sweet, little old helpless lady? We might be slandering her by imagining her to be helpless. While God commands us in both testaments to look after widows, we’re never commanded to paint them as one-dimensional characters. If a judge can be unjust, then so can a widow. If a man can abuse his power, so can a woman. The gospels are full of strong women, and this widow might be one of the strongest. In fact, Levine translates the passage to read, “I will avenge her so that she does not give me a black eye.” She’s not asking for vengeance, she’s demanding it.
So how can make sense of Jesus’ provocative story? First, let it be provocative. We don’t have to sanitize it. We don’t need good characters and bad characters. Jesus’ stories are full of people like us: complicated, messy folks who sometimes do the wrong thing. Second, if we’re willing to reconsider the widow’s motives, we ought to reconsider whether we want to hold her up as a model: do we really want to demand vengeance on our enemies? Shouldn’t we love them? Shouldn’t we wish them well?
Now, maybe we don’t make demands of judges to their faces like our widow friend, but we vote for and publicly debate policies of vengeance: when we fight for lengthy prison sentences and the death penalty, are we standing in solidarity with the vengeful widow? But then who will stand in solidarity with the accused? Remember, we haven’t gotten to hear his side of the story.
That’s another lesson here: don’t rush to judgment. In fact, maybe the judge is also worth imitating in this story. He doesn’t want to dole out vengeance. Wouldn’t it be funny if the good guy of Jesus’s story ends up being the person who doesn’t fear God?
Luke offers his own interpretation of Jesus’s parable: the judge is slow to avenge those who ask him, but God will do it much more quickly. But do we really want God to take vengeance on our opponents? Or do we want him to take his time, like the judge? What if, at the moment we’re praying for God to swiftly depose our enemies, our enemies are praying the same thing? If they get what they want, what will happen to us?
Like all of Jesus’s parables, this one invites us to reconsider not only the motives of Jesus’ characters, but our own as well.
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