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The Prodigal Son

At the beginning of this semester, I suddenly realized how familiar the terms “honor and shame” were to me, due to my cultural background. Coming from an East Asian-American perspective, the lens through which I see the world, are similar to the culture of the New Testament. Interestingly enough, the passage which I have chosen to further satiate my curiosity was found in Luke 15:11-32 which is a story of two sons and their wealthy father. Read the parable of the prodigal son again, from the viewpoint of a Middle-Eastern peasant.

To set the context of this passage, the author is writing to an ethnic community during the time of Jesus. The Pharisees, a religious sect within Judaism, confronts Jesus because of His involvement with sinners, which essentially included anyone who was considered irreligious (i.e. tax collectors, prostitutes, etc.) What sparked such an accusation was that he ate with these individuals, and culturally speaking, dining with someone symbolized more than accepting that person. The Greek word used in Luke 15:1 was prosdechomai, which means, “to welcome into fellowship.”  The reason this is important is because Jesus returns to this very point at the end of the parable when the father celebrates the return of his son by hosting a banquet.

What we can derive from the text is that this family patterns itself along with colonial Mediterranean culture, where the father holds the authority over his children to instruct and discipline them. With that in mind, it is also interesting to notice that the sons of the wealthy parent ascribed their honor due to their family reputation and wealth. Now as we proceed, the younger son asks for his inheritance, which usually only comes at the very end of a father’s life. This sort of request was considered unthinkable in the Mid-eastern culture because the father was still alive! But the younger son does not break the law in making this request; rather, he breaks a relationship. In Deuteronomy 21:17, there is no indication that the father has to be dead to assign the inheritance to his sons. One commentary points out that the son carefully avoids utilizing the word “inheritance,” and instead uses the phrase, “Give me the share of property that falls on me.”  He does this to deviate himself from the responsibility that is attached with the family inheritance.

According to first century Judaism, if a boy lost his family inheritance to Gentiles and attempted to return home, the village would ridicule him.  The custom was called Kezazah, or “the cutting off,” and any Jew hearing this story would recognize that if the boy squandered all that he had in an outside country, the kezazah ceremony awaited him back home. So, to the question asked, “why does not the son go home after spending all his money?” Kenneth Bailey says “His estrangement from his brother keeps him from fellowship with his father.”  Not only does the community anticipate his coming back so that they can gang up on him, but he would also have to endure his brother’s scorn. At this point, the younger son was almost willing to go through anything rather than return home to be humiliated in front of his family and community.
Being from a well-known, upper class family, it is safe to assume for the most part that he detested swine. Even today in the Middle East, the Muslims and the Jews are repulsed by the pig, due to their religious beliefs. Bailey argues that the citizen who hired the prodigal offers him the job of feeding swine expecting that he would refuse because of who he was and where he came from.  The prodigal’s acceptance of this job exhibited that he had little honor left in him. It was not until he had a desire to eat the entrails of the pigs that he was able to overcome the potential shame he would feel if he went back to his village.

If we were to play out the son’s return to home, he’d have to make his way through the kezazah ceremony, sit outside the family gate until summoned, and then seek forgiveness for everything that he had done. Instead, “His father saw him and had compassion and raced.”  A Middle Eastern man over the age of twenty-five rarely runs, especially a man of position. Additionally, in order to run in a robe, the father must grab the front of it, and “when he does this, his legs show in what is considered a humiliating posture.” The shame and humiliation of the son is taken by the father and as a result, diverts the attention of the on-looking villagers as well.

The parable of the prodigal son profoundly conveys the meaning of the incarnation and the cross. It was clear that the younger son disgraced himself by asking for his share of the inheritance, more so when he lost it all to Gentiles. He quintessentially reached rock-bottom and since he disconnected himself from his community, there was no going back without facing utter humiliation. What I’ve learned for the ministry context is that in our lowest points in life, Jesus takes upon Himself the mistakes and failures we’ve made. People need to understand that God runs towards us when we repent, and protects us from the judgment casted by others through drawing attention to Him. Like the father in the parable, God clothes us with the best robe and re-establishes us into right standing with Him.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bailey, Kenneth. The Cross & the Prodigal. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2005.
Park, Rohun. “Revisiting the Parable of the Prodigal Son for Decolonization: Luke’s Reconfiguration of Oikos in 15:11-32,” Biblical Interpretation 17 (2009): 507-520.
Crook, Zeba. “Honor, Shame, and Social Status Revisited,” Journal of Biblical Literature 128,
no. 3 (2009): 591-611.

For the past 4 years, I’ve been a youth/worship pastor in the San Francisco Bay Area. I also served as a Bible Worker/Assistant Chaplain at Mountain View Academy for 2 years. Graduated from La Sierra University with a BA in Religious Studies/Pre-seminary, minor in Psychology in 2009. Currently live in Berrien Springs, MI studying at Andrews Theological Seminary pursuing a Masters of Divinity degree.