Well, we’ve just heard what might be one of the best-known parables in the Bible, the story of the “Good Samaritan.” You may have heard it so many times that, if you were asked, you could probably re-tell it, almost word for word. By now, you could probably give your own homily on just what it means – or is supposed to mean.
We have a lawyer – or a student of the law, depending upon the translation – ask Jesus a question: “Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life? How can I gain entrance into the kingdom of god you keep talking about?” Jesus, like many Jewish teachers, answers the question with another question: “What do our holy scriptures, our written Law, have to say about this question?”
The questioner responds by repeating the core of the Hebrew Testament: “Love the Lord, your God with all your heart, with all your being, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus wholeheartedly agrees with this scholar of the law; but this particular lawyer continues to express his puzzlement by asking: “Who is my neighbor? Whom must I love as an extension of my very self?”
And Jesus tells his story about the outsider, the one who is not at all like the questioning Jewish lawyer; how the outsider is the neighbor, the one who shows compassion to another. Yes, on the surface, we’re all familiar with the story of the “Good Samaritan.” Perhaps too familiar, in fact, so familiar that we overlook some of the details. So, I have my own question for you, today. (You don’t think I’d forgotten about it, do you?)
My question is almost the same as the one I asked three weeks ago when I spoke about public opinion polls and the question: “Who am I? Who do people say I am?” Today’s question is this: in the story of the “Good Samaritan,” who are you? What role do you play in today’s gospel reading? There are a lot of people in today’s reading for you to choose from.
First of all, there’s the man who asked the questions: “What must I do inherit eternal life? Who is my neighbor?” I suppose that I, myself, am much like this guy. I do seem to ask a lot of questions, even when I know the answer; or perhaps, especially when I think I know the answer. Usually, I do it when I’m trying to teach something; when I’m trying to help someone learn something. After all, Jesus did the same thing in today’s story. He answered a question with another question, in the expectation that the lawyer already knew the correct answer and merely needed to say it. How many of you are like me, and the lawyer, asking questions about things we already know the answer to? How many of us ask the questions: “What must I do to be with God?” and: “Who is my neighbor?” when we already know the answers?
There are other roles, other players, in today’s reading; others for consideration. How about the robbers? How many of us abuse others, take away their possessions and leave them half-dead? No, probably none of us are actual muggers who prowl FM 1960 or Louetta as the robbers did on the road between Jerusalem and Jericho. But, unfortunately, there are some who do abuse others. There are those who abuse a child or a spouse or a friend; perhaps an acquaintance at work or at school. Not necessarily with physical abuse but, more likely, with emotional or spiritual abuse. Those who rob others of their dignity as human beings. Who leave them half-dead along the road we travel.
There is also the role of the victim. The one who was abused and left half-dead by the robbers. How many of us feel that this is the role we play, the role assigned to us by others or, perhaps, by ourselves? How many of us wait, half-dead, along the highway of life, waiting, hoping, praying for someone to see us and come to our rescue? How many wait for someone else to help us?
And how about the priest and the Levite who passed by the injured man? How many play this role in their own lives? These two who dedicated their professional lives to God and God’s people; they were able to pass by an injured man. Bible scholars tell us that they probably tried to “self-justify” their actions, thinking that the man was not merely injured, but was dead. If he were dead, they would become ritually unclean if they touched him and then they would not be able to worship in the temple in Jerusalem nor even be part of their own communities. And so they hurried on, believing they had done the right thing, that this is what their God expected of them.
How many of us ignore our responsibilities to others with our own self-justification that we are doing the right thing? We’re already too busy, too involved in our own professions; in what our jobs call us to do that we cannot find time to help someone else in distress. Our actions for others will cause us greater inconvenience. Besides, what good can we actually do? Let someone else bury the dead; we need to get on with our lives.
Then there is the “Good Samaritan.” Most of us hope that we play this role in life. That we’re willing to help others no matter what their backgrounds might be. Our care for them does not depend on race, religion, social status nor gender preference. We help others even if it delays our own journey and does not fit in with what we planned for today. Yes, like the good Samaritan, we care for others. And also like the good Samaritan, only on a temporary basis. After all, there are things I must do. I need to continue my own journey. And so, I’m willing to give from my other resources to pay someone else to continue what I do not have time to give. Just as the good Samaritan gave to the innkeeper two silver coins, there are those of us who give money to charities to continue this work. Some may even tithe and give ten percent of their income to support such good works. Bible scholars, however, point out that the two silver coins amounted to two day’s wages. On an annual basis, there are probably not many of us who contribute forty percent of our income to charitable works.
Finally, there is the innkeeper. He, – or she, since women back then could also be innkeepers – the innkeeper is the one who did the actual on-going work of caring for the injured man. Once the Samaritan left the inn, it was the responsibility of the innkeeper to look out for the welfare of the injured one without any guarantee that the Samaritan would, in fact, ever return with any re-payment. Could this Jewish innkeeper on the road between Jerusalem and Jericho really believe that this foreign tourist would keep his word?
How many of us continue to do the right thing, to care for those left in our charge without any guarantee that we will be recompensed? How many fathers and mothers care for the welfare of their children, without expectation that they, themselves, will be cared for in their own old age? How many spouses provide for one another without benefit of pre-nuptial agreements? How many volunteer their time to help others in whatever way they can? I trust that many do. Because, you see, for me, the main hero of the story we heard today is not the Samaritan but rather the forgotten innkeeper, the one who cared daily and directly for the injured person perhaps, in part, because this is what was expected of someone with this calling.
Yet the religious professionals did not completely live up to their calling. On the other hand, the innkeeper trusted the word of a sworn enemy, the foreign Samaritan. The innkeeper was willing to continue showing compassion and mercy, without any real guarantee that there would ever be a pay-back. Yes, perhaps, this is a story about a “Good Innkeeper” as much as it is about a “Good Samaritan.” In the long run, Jesus did not specify who was the neighbor to the robbers’ victim. He merely accepted the answer: “… the one who treated him with mercy.” And Jesus added his final instruction: “Go and do likewise.”
Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time; July 11, 2004
Dt 30:10-14; Col 1:15-20; Lk 10:25-37