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The Rich Man,
Lazarus, & the Afterlife
By Samuel
G. Dawson
September 10, 2018
Jesus' teaching concerning
the Rich Man and Lazarus in LK. 16:19-31 has always been provocative.
It's the main passage resorted to when striving to establish the concept of
endless torturous punishment of the wicked after death. This punishment is
usually thought to be in hell, though the Greek word for hell, gehenna, is nowhere in the passage.
Much of this story existed
before Jesus taught it. Arguments have abounded for centuries on the
subject of this passage, and still flourish over whether Jesus' teaching is
a parable (which he doesn't call it) or reality.
My particular interest in
this essay arose in response to another essay I wrote entitled "Jesus'
Teaching on Hell." It deals with the twelve passages in
the Bible actually using the word gehenna, eleven
of them on four or five occasions by Jesus to Jewish audiences, and also
one by James to a Jewish audience. This essay is available in my book,The Teaching
of Jesus: From Sinai to Gehenna, A Faithful Rabbi Urgently Warns Rebellious
Israel. In that essay, I affirm that (1) hell is not a translation of the
word gehenna, but a substitution, (2) gehenna should never have been translated at
all (since it is a proper noun, like Jerusalem or Ephesus), and (3) the
popular concept of hell as a place of endless punishment has no scriptural
basis whatsoever.
When I first came to my
present conclusions on hell, I realized that probably 80 percent of
Christians obey the gospel so they won't go to a place they were never
threatened with anyway. I think that demands caution in dealing with folks.
I've asked a lot of people why they obeyed the gospel. Most said, "to
stay out of hell;" others said, because they loved God. Still others
said because they wanted to do what was right, a loving response to the
love of God, etc. As a reaction to that material on hell, many readers
asked, "What about Luke 16? Where does it fit in?" Most of
the questions I receive concern the destiny of the wicked; more
particularly with the account of the Rich Man and Lazarus. Concerning Luke
16, let me offer the following comments from my letter to one such
questioner:
I have questions about Luke 16 myself. Here's my present
understanding of it. (1) It doesn't contain the word gehenna, so it teaches nothing about Gehenna (and
this is why I didn't discuss the passage in my original essay, "Jesus'
Teaching on Hell"). (2) It doesn't teach anything about the final punishment of the
wicked, and your preacher doesn't think so, either. I'm sure he believes it
to be an intermediate punishment before the final judgment, doesn't he? So,
whether I know what Luke 16 teaches or not, I know it doesn't support
the popular concept of hell. (3) I'm pretty sure we use these verses to
teach something that is far from the purpose of the entire chapter.
The purpose of this
present work is to effectively set forth what I believe Jesus taught in
this passage.
The Context of Luke
16:19-31
To begin with, I suggest
that the entire chapter is dealing with greed, or the love of money. To get
an overall view of Luke 16, notice the five sections in it, then we'll
briefly discuss the first four sections to develop the context of the
fifth, concerning the Rich Man and Lazarus.
vv. 1-8 – Commendation of
the Greedy Unfaithful Steward
vv. 9-13 – Jesus Applied the Story to His Greedy Audience
vv. 14-15 – The Greedy Pharisees' Reaction and Jesus' Reply
vv. 16-18 – A Faithful Steward—John the Baptist
vv. 19-31 – The Rich Man and Lazarus
Each of these five
sections contains a common theme, greed:
(1) the unfaithful steward
acted out of greed, (2) Jesus applied this account to the Pharisees, who
were lovers of money, and adhered to a common philosophy that riches imply
righteousness, and (3) the end result of the Rich Man indicated that his
wealth didn't work out like the Pharisees would have predicted. We'll now
discuss these five sections in more detail and notice their common theme of
greed.
vv. 1-8 – Commendation
of the Greedy Unfaithful Steward
Jesus' telling of the
unrighteous steward presents a troublesome story:
And he said also unto the
disciples, There was a certain rich man, who had a steward; and the same
was accused unto him that he was wasting [squandering—NAS] his goods. And
he called him, and said unto him, What is this that I hear of thee? render
the account of thy stew-ardship; for thou canst be no longer steward. And
the steward said within himself, What shall I do, seeing that my lord
taketh away the stewardship from me? I have not strength to dig; to beg I
am ashamed. I am resolved what to do, that, when I am put out of the
stewardship, they may receive me into their houses. And calling to him each
one of his lord's debtors, he said to the first, How much owest thou unto
my lord? And he said, A hundred measures of oil. And he said unto him, Take
thy bond, and sit down quickly and write fifty. Then said he to another,
And how much owest thou? And he said, A hundred measures of wheat. He saith
unto him, Take thy bond, and write fourscore. And his lord commended the
unrighteous steward because he had done wisely: for the sons of this world
are for their own generation wiser than the sons of the light.
I first became aware of
this passage when I was riding with an older Christian in an old pickup on
a country road. He asked,
"How could the Lord
commend a conniving, thieving steward?"
When I looked at it
closely, I nearly fell out of the truck! I thought, as many do, that Jesus
commended this unrighteous man, a fraud and a trickster; it presented an
insuperable difficulty.
In simple terms, this
story is about a master whose manager was misappropriating his money. It
was such an open-and-shut case that he just called the manager in and gave
him notice—told him to get his accounts together and leave. The manager
didn't even contest it. Then he wondered what he would do to earn a living.
He decided to cheat his master by calling in all his debtors and marking
down their debts. By doing the debtors a favor, he hoped they would take
care of him when he was cast out of his job.
It would be like a dentist's
receptionist, who, learning she was going to be let go, called his patients
and forgave half of their debts, so they would take care of her when she's
out of a job. We would expect that dentist to get upset and perhaps file
legal charges against her.
The question usually
arises as to how the Lord could commend the unrighteous steward and use him
as an example for us to follow. Not only had he already lost money for his
boss, but he also deliberately cut the debts of his master's debtors. How
shall we deal with this? One commentator said that no story of the New
Testament has been discussed more and received more interpretations than
this one. The steward has been taken to represent Pilate, Judas, Satan,
Paul, and Christ himself.
Some have probably already
noticed what the solution is, that it wasn't our Lord who commended the unrighteous
steward, but his lord, in verse
8. His master commended the unrighteous steward
for his clever skullduggery, even if it was directed against himself.
Potentially, every person in the story is a huckster to some degree.
Apparently, the unrighteous steward didn't feel any guilt for discounting
his master's debts. Likewise, the debtors willingly took advantage of the
unrighteous steward's plot to provide for himself at his master's expense.
Even the master was worldly wise enough to appreciate the scheme, even when
he was the victim!
In verse 9, Jesus said,
"And I say unto you…." Notice the distinction between "his
lord" in verse 8 and "our Lord" in verse 9. Jesus continued:
…Make to yourselves friends by means of the mammon of unrighteousness, that
when it shall fail, they may receive you into the eternal tabernacles.
The mammon of
unrighteousness was money. Jesus' point was this: a poor money manager
finally got wise when faced with the prospect of becoming homeless. If he
could use his authority over his master's money to insure that he would be
provided with shelter in his old age, how much more should God's children
learn how to use physical resources (though honestly) to insure that they
have an eternal dwelling place? Are we that wise? Do we manage our money to
God's glory, not only by looking ahead and planning for our earthly
futures, but even more so in planning for our final rest in heaven?
This problem goes away quickly
when we carefully read and see that it wasn't Jesus who commended the
unrighteous steward, but his own master.
Some say he was granting
the debtors cheap grace, forgiveness of debt that wasn't his to forgive. At
least, both here and in the following section, we see that the unrighteous
steward was greedy to the point of systematically stealing from his master.
In the next section, Jesus
applied this story to his audience.
vv. 9-13 – Jesus
Applied the Story to His Greedy Audience
And I say unto you, Make
to yourselves friends by means of the mammon of unrighteousness; that, when
it shall fail, they may receive you into the eternal tabernacles. He that
is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much: and he that is
unrighteous in a very little is unrighteous also in much. If therefore ye
have not been faithful in the unrighteous mammon, who will commit to your
trust the true riches? And if ye have not been faithful in that which is
another's, who will give you that which is your own? No servant can serve
two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else
he will hold to one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.
Jesus concluded his
application in verse 13, teaching that men are incapable of serving two
masters—both God and money. Literally, men don't have the power to serve two masters any more than a
Volkswagen Beetle has the power to win the Indianapolis 500 Race.
Obviously, the basic point of this first section is that a man shouldn't be
a servant of money, which is greed; it matters not how little or much money
a man might possess.
vv. 14-15 – The Greedy
Pharisees' Reaction and Jesus' Reply
And the Pharisees, who
were lovers of money, heard all these things; and they scoffed at him. And
he said unto them, Ye are they that justify yourselves in the sight of men;
but God knoweth your hearts: for that which is exalted among men is an
abomination in the sight of God.
Luke specifically noted
that the Pharisees were lovers of money. They recognized that Jesus was
addressing their greed, and ridiculed his lesson, but Jesus continued to
rebuke them.
The Pharisees manifested
an attitude toward riches that we should notice, because the Bible
addresses it in many places. They thought that one's riches necessarily
implied he was righteous and in favor with God. In our day, members of the
Mormon church (and many others) share this belief. In the Old Testament,
Job's three friends subscribed to it. Thus, when Job, a tremendously
wealthy man at the outset of the book, suffered great calamity and loss of
wealth, his friends automatically assumed he was not righteous but guilty
of some horrible sin. When they came to him, he expected them to comfort
him. Instead, they assailed his character. They thought they had to, since
he was evidently, in their opinion, a great sinner. So they made speech
after speech accusing him of guilt and demanding that he repent and restore his righteous estate. God had told Satan
Job was righteous, and made it clear that Job wasn't suffering because he
was sinning.
The Pharisees shared in
this philosophy. They were greedy and thought riches signified they were
righteous.
vv. 16-18 – A Faithful
Steward–John the Baptist
Jesus then said:
The law and the prophets
were until John: from that time the gospel of the kingdom of God is
preached, and every man entereth violently into it. But it is easier for
heaven and earth to pass away, than for one tittle of the law to fall.
Every one that putteth away his wife, and marrieth another, committeth
adultery: and he that marrieth one that is put away from a husband
committeth adultery.
Several questions
naturally arise at this point: Why did John the Baptist come into this
passage, and why the verse on divorce, of all things?
Several years ago, when I
was studying marriage, divorce, and remarriage seriously, I noticed lk.
16:18, "Everyone that putteth away his wife and marries another
committeth adultery." Most of the time we view this verse as Luke's
account of Mt. 19:9 and Mt. 5:32, but this is not the case. These two
teachings took place at different times, in different places, for different
purposes, to different people. At first glance, it's just one verse
apparently snatched out of thin air to teach something about divorce. That
may be true, or it might be about something else entirely. With help from
William F. Luck's book, Divorce and Remarriage:
Recovering the Biblical View [New York: Harper & Row,
1987], I considered the context of LK. 16:18, and it helped me with the
context of the story about the Rich Man and Lazarus.
Luck observed that John
was used as a contemporary contrasting example of a man who wasn't greedy,
who wouldn't give cheap grace like the unfaithful steward, and knew it was
not his role to forgive debts to his master without permission. In a
widely-known case of the time, Josephus (Antiquities,
Book 18, chap. 5:1, 5:4) said that Herod made a pretense at least of living
under Jewish law. His family was intermarried with Simon the High Priest's
family, and Herod went to Jerusalem for feasts to offer sacrifices to God.
Everybody in this story was at least claiming to live under the Mosaic Law.
The Mosaic Law was why it wasn't lawful for Herod to have Herodias,
although the Mosaic Law would have permitted her to remarry had she been
scripturally divorced. However, Josephus said that Herodias hadn't been
scripturally divorced, and she was his brother's wife, violating Lev.
20:10. Notice what John said: "It is not lawful for thee to have thy
brother's wife."
John didn't forgive Herod;
he didn't give cheap grace to his master's debtor. Herod couldn't buy him
off, and his preaching cost him his life, as Herod had him beheaded. Unlike
the unfaithful steward, he was faithful to his master to the point of
death.
Verse 18 illustrates
John's lack of greed. Divorce was the subject of John's preaching against
Herod, not an abbreviated account of Jesus' teaching on divorce (i.e., Mt.
5:32, 19:9), but part of his discourse against greed.
Obviously, John wasn't a
mercenary prophet, he didn't preach for money, and he wasn't greedy.
vv. 19-31 - The Rich
Man and Lazarus
While Jesus gave these
lessons and applications on greed, he introduced the Rich Man and Lazarus.
The main controversy with these verses for ages seems to be whether they
constitute a parable. I've made most of the arguments on both sides of this
question, so I know you can take either side and be a fine fellow. The
problem is, fine fellows can be dead wrong.
Those who argue that it's
a historical account of what happens after death claim that these verses
are not called a parable (although others which are clearly parables are
not called such, either), or that they speak of a "certain" rich
man, which indicates a historical individual.
The word
"certain" is translated from the word tis, an enclitic indefinite pronoun,
which may indicate some or any
person or object. The word "certain" doesn't necessarily indicate
a definite person or object. A number of passages illustrate the word may
mean "any old one," and not a definite one at all. For example,
in Mt. 18:25 ff, the parable of the talents begins with "a
certain king," not speaking of any particular king, as his identity
has no bearing on the story. In Mt. 22:2, the parable of the marriage feast
begins with "a certain king." Who the king was matters not, nor
does it matter who was getting married. The point of comparison was on
something else entirely. In LK. 7:41 we read of "a certain lender."
Do we wonder who he was? We never have, because the story doesn't depend on
who he was, and the indefinite nature of the pronoun permits that
conclusion.
William Robert West
answered the argument some make that the use of Lazarus' name proves it is
a historical account of real people:
The objection of others is that parables do not use proper names.
"And he took up his parable, and said, 'From ARAM has BALAK brought
me, the king of MOAB from the mountains of the East: come, curse me JACOB,
and come, defy ISRAEL'" [Numbers 23:7]. Not one but FIVE PROPER NAMES
are used in one parable. "SATAN" [Mark 4:14] "THE SON OF
MAN" [Matthew 13:37]. (William Robert West, If the Soul or Spirit Is Immortal, There Can Be No
Resurrection from the Dead, Third Edition, September 2006,
originally published as The Resurrection and
Immortality [Bloomington, IN: Author House], p. 229.)
Thus, we see that proper
names don't necessarily imply real people.
In LK. 10:3ff, in the
parable of the good Samaritan, a "certain" man went down from
Jerusalem to Jericho and fell among thieves. We then read of a
"certain" priest passing him by. Did you ever wonder who this
Samaritan was? I doubt that you did until I just mentioned it. Now that I
have, you realize it doesn't matter who he was, because his identity has no
pertinence to the story, does it? Wonder who the priest was? Me neither, as
it has nothing to do with the point of the story, and the use of the
indefinite pronoun doesn't require that it's speaking of a historic individual
at all. The parable of the pounds (LK. 19:12ff) uses the indefinite pronoun
to speak of a "certain" nobleman.
You might be thinking,
"Well, if Sam doesn't think it's historical, he must think it's a
parable teaching what happens after death."
I don't believe these
verses are a parable, either. It's not a parable because it contains no
comparison, which is the essence of a parable (lit., para-bole, "to throw along side" for the
purpose of comparison). If we go fishing together, I'll naturally throw my
fish down alongside yours to show how much better fisherman I am than you.
This lack of comparison is at the basis of the plethora, no, blizzard of
interpretations that people offer. Folks are trying to interpret something
they think is a parable, which contains no comparison at all.
I am going to demonstrate
that it's not historical, because (1) it's of pagan origin, and (2) it's
not true, as we're about to see.
Some Things to Notice
About This Legend
This is the main passage
in the Bible used to teach conscious suffering after death.
This is not New Testament
teaching. It's a Jewish story from beginning to end. Abraham is made to
say, "They have Moses and the prophets," not "They have
Jesus Christ and his apostles."
No allusion to its
"doctrine" exists in the rest of the New Testament.
No New Testament writer
ever alluded to it—"Remember what Jesus said about the Rich Man and
Lazarus."
But in this legend,
"they have Moses and the prophets," yet Moses and the prophets
taught none of this!
These Jews knew the point
of the legend was greed.
They knew it wasn't about
the state of the dead, or they would have challenged Jesus' differing with
the Old Testament teaching on the subject.
This is not Old Testament
teaching on the state of the dead.
No such thing as Abraham's
bosom exists in the Old Testament.
No great gulf fixed exists
in the Old Testament, even to keep those in Abraham's bosom out of
torments!
No endless torment exists
in the Old Testament.
No conversations among the
dead exist in the Old Testament.
No knowledge among the
dead exists in the Old Testament.
No consciousness among the
dead exists in the Old Testament.
No praying to Abraham
exists in the Old Testament. (Perhaps we shouldn't criticize Roman
Catholics for praying to Mary!)
No Abraham hearing the
prayers of the wicked exists in the Old Testament, as we presume the Rich
Man to be praying to.
Nowhere is Lazarus said to
be righteous.
Nowhere is the Rich Man
said to be wicked.
This story is not about
their character, but their economic standing.
Not a word is said about
the spiritual condition of either one of them. They may both have been
righteous, or wicked. As far as the legend and Jesus' use of it is
concerned, it's not about religious status, but riches.
It's not about the
punishment of the wicked, but about the legendary fate of a legendary rich
man, and the legendary fate of a legendary poor man.
Neither the soul or the
spirit of either the Rich Man or Lazarus is mentioned.
The Pagan Origin of
the Legend of the Rich Man and Lazarus
We'll see shortly that the
Old Testament taught nothing like the Jewish concept of Hades, and we'll
also see that before the intertestamental period, Jews didn't believe any
stories like that of the Rich Man and Lazarus.However, before looking at
those specific legends, let's notice some general legends about Hades and
life after death.
Legends of Hades
On the origin and spread
of pagan concepts of Hades into the Jewish world between the testaments,
read closely the following quotations (all cited by Al Maxey in the Al Maxey-Thomas Thrasher Debate available
at www.zianet.com) and note their sources:
The Greek word "hades" came into biblical use when the
translators of the Septuagint [the Greek Old Testament— SGD] chose it to
render the Hebrew "sheol." The problem is that hades was used in
the Greek world in a vastly different way than sheol. Hades in Greek
mythology is the underworld, where the conscious souls of the dead are
divided in two major regions, one a place of torment and the other of
blessedness. This Greek conception of hades influenced Hellenistic Jews,
during the intertestamental period, to adopt the belief in the immortality
of the soul and the idea of a spatial separation in the underworld between
the righteous and the godless. (Dr. Samuele Bacchiocchi, Immortality or
Resurrection? A Biblical Study on Human Nature and Destiny, p. 170.)
Notice that Bacchiocchi
admits that we can't read anything like the two compartments of Hades in
the Old Testament. The concept arose during the period between the close of
the Old Testament and the coming of the New, when God was silent as far as
prophets were concerned.
Look further at the finer
detail of the questionable source of the doctrine of two compartments in
Hades as time between the testaments went on:
The literature of the intertestamental period reflects the growth of
the idea of the division of Hades into separate compartments for the godly
and the ungodly. This aspect of eschatology was a popular subject in the
apocalyptic literature that flourished in this period. Notable is the
pseudepigraphical Enoch (written c. 200 B.C.), which includes the
description of a tour supposedly taken by Enoch into the center of the
earth. In another passage in Enoch, he sees at the center of the earth two
places— Paradise, the place of bliss, and the valley of Gehinnom, the place
of punishment. The above illustrates that there was a general notion of
compartments in Hades that developed in the intertestamental period. (The Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedia of the Bible, Vol. 3,
p. 7.)
In the intertestamental
period the idea of the afterlife underwent some development. In Jewish
apocalyptic literature Hades was an intermediate place (1 Enoch 51:1) where
all the souls of the dead awaited judgment (22:3f). The dead were separated
into compartments, the righteous staying in an apparently pleasant place
(vs. 9) and various classes of sinners undergoing punishments in other
compartments (vv. 10-13). (The International Standard
Bible Encyclopedia, Vol. 2, p. 591.)
Under the influence of
Persian and Hellenistic ideas concerning retribution after death the belief
arose that the righteous and the godless would have very different fates,
and we thus have the development of the idea of spatial separation in the
underworld, the first instance being found in Enoch. (Gerhard Kittel, Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, Vol. 1,
p. 147.)
Nowhere in the Old
Testament is the abode of the dead regarded as a place of punishment or
torment. The concept of an infernal "hell" developed in Israel
only during the Hellenistic period. (The Interpreter's
Dictionary of the Bible, p. 788.)
All these scholars make
the point that all these doctrines originated among pagans, particularly
among Egyptians and Greeks; and later, the Jews assimilated these
doctrines. These Jews couldn't have found such concepts in their Old
Testaments to save their lives!
In truth, the Pharisees of
Jesus' time had access to all kinds of legends like these.
J. W. Hanson,
universalist, which this author is not, said:
The Jews have a book, written during the Babylonish Captivity,
entitled Gemara Babylonicum, containing
doctrines entertained by Pagans concerning the future state not recognized
by the followers of Moses. This story is founded on heathen views. They
were not obtained from the Bible, for the Old Testament contains nothing
resembling them. They were among those traditions which our Savior
condemned when he told the Scribes and Pharisees, "Ye make the word of
God of none effect through your traditions," and when he said to his
disciples, "Beware of the leaven, or doctrine of the Pharisees."
(J. W. Hanson, The Bible Hell [Boston:
Universalist Publishing House, 1888], p. 43.)
Consider a few examples of
Hanson's from the Talmud, the authoritative body of Jewish tradition
(Italics used for empha-sis—SGD):
(1) In Kiddushin (Treatise on Betrothal), fol:72, there is quoted from
the Juchasin, fol:75, 2, a long story about what
Levi said of Rabbi Judah: "This day he sits in Abraham's bosom,"
i.e., the day he died.
Note that this wasn't the
Bible saying anything about Abraham's bosom, but Jewish tradition. Hanson
continued:
There is a difference here between the Jerusalem and the Babylonian Talmuds—the former says Rabbi Judah was
"carried by angels"; the latter says that he was "placed in
Abraham's bosom."
We can't find anything in
the Old Testament about anyone dying and being carried by angels to
Abraham's bosom, but we can certainly find it in Jewish tradition before
the time of Jesus.
(2) There was a story of a woman who had seen six of her sons slain (we
have it also in 2 Macc. vii.). She heard the command given to kill the
youngest (two-and-a-half years old), and running into the embraces of her
little son, kissed him and said, Go thou, my son, to Abraham
my father, and tell him: Thus saith thy mother, Do not thou
boast, saying, I built an altar, and offered my son Isaac. For thy mother
hath built seven altars, and offered seven sons in one day, etc. (Midrash
Echah, fol:68. 1)
(3) We have examples also of the dead discoursing with one another; and
also with those who are still alive (Berachoth, fol. 18, 2—Treatise on
Blessings). R. Samuel Bar Nachman saith, R. Jonathan saith, How doth it appear that the dead have any discourse among
themselves?
(4) Then follows a story of a certain pious man that went and lodged in
a burying place, and heard two souls discoursing among
themselves. "The one said unto the other, Come, my
companion, and let us wander about the world, and listen behind the veil,
what kind of plagues are coming upon the world." To which the other
replied, "O my companion, I cannot; for I am buried in a cane mat; but
do thou go, and whatsoever thou hearest, do thou come and tell me,"
etc. The story goes on to tell of the wandering of the soul and what he
heard, etc.
(5) As to "the great gulf," we
read (Midrash [or Commentary] on Coheleth [Ecclesiastes], 103. 2),
"God hath set the one against the other (Ecc. vii. 14) that is Gehenna
and Paradise. How far are they distant? A hand-breadth." Jochanan
saith, "A wall is between." But the Rabbis say "They are so
even with one another, that they may see out of one into the other."
Of course, a lot of these
expressions about Abraham's bosom, angels taking the righteous there,
conversations between the dead, sending children to make requests of
Abraham, etc., seem familiar to us now. Assuredly, had we lived under the
Old Testament, we would never have heard such concepts in inspired
teaching.
Alan Burns, author
of The Rich Man and Lazarus, commented on these
quotations:
The traditions set forth above were widely spread in many early
Christian writings, showing how soon the corruption spread which led on to
the Dark Ages and to all the worst errors of Romanism. The Apocryphal books
(written in Greek, not in Hebrew, Cents.i. and ii. B.C.) contained the germ
of this teaching. That is why the Apocrypha is valued by Traditionists, and
is incorporated by the Church of Rome as an integral part of her Bible.
(All these quotations are from Alan Burns, The
Rich Man and Lazarus [Santa Clarita, CA: Concordant
Publishing Concern, n.d., available at www.concordant.org].)
In my earlier work,
"Jesus' Teaching on Hell," we comment extensively on the origin
of the concept of eternal torment and the outright substitution (not
translation) of the word hell for
the Greek gehenna to create the
Roman Catholic concept of hell which was unknown to the Old Testament, the
teaching of Jesus, or the New Testament. Please see Chapter 11,
"Jesus' Teaching on Hell" in The Teaching of Jesus: From
Mt. Sinai to Gehenna, A Faithful Rabbi Urgently Warns Rebellious Israel [Amarillo,
TX: Gospel Themes Press, 2004] or on the truthaccordingtoscripture
website (click here).
Thus, between the
Egyptians and Greeks originating the concept of conscious unending torment,
a part of Hades, then Roman Catholicism adapting it in about the 14th
century and substituting (not translating) the word "hell" for
Gehenna in English translations, it's difficult to wade through all the debris
and recover the Bible's teaching on the punishment of the wicked. Shortly,
we'll see that Jesus took a then-current pagan legend, that of the Rich Man
and Lazarus, and used it to show the greedy Pharisees that even according
to their own legend, the possession of riches didn't ensure God's approval.
However, first, let us consider the origins of the specific legend of the
Rich Man and Lazarus.
Legends Concerning the
Rich Man and Lazarus
Concerning the origin of
the account of the Rich Man and Lazarus, J. F. Witherell wrote in his 1843
book Five Pillars in the Temple of Partialism Shaken and Removed:
It may be proper to remark
in this place, that this story was not original with the Saviour, but was
simply used by him to illustrate his subject. The story was probably
familiar to his hearers and our Saviour for that reason took occasion to
make a practical application of it. In "Paige's Selections," we
find the following from Dr. Whitby—"That this is a parable, and not a
real history of what was actually done, is evident
(1) Because we find this
very parable in the Gemara Babylonicum whence it is cited by Mr.
Sheringham, in the preface to his Joma.
(2) From the circumstances of it, viz. The rich man's lifting up his
eyes in hell, and seeing Lazarus in Abraham's bosom, his discourse with
Abraham, his complaint of being tormented with flames, and his desire that
Lazarus might be sent to cool his tongue; and if all this be confessedly
parable, why should the rest, which is the very parable in the Gemara, be
accounted history!"—end footnote Annot in loc. (J. F. Witherell, Five Pillars in the Temple of Partialism Shaken and
Removed [Concord: Published at the Balm of Gilead Office,
1843], Placed into electronic format by Gary Amirault [Hermann, MO:
Tentmaker Ministry, January 1997].)
While I doubt that
"this very parable" is found in the Gemara Babylonicum, I would
agree that the essential story is there, and that it had been adapted by
the Greeks and Jews, and Jesus adapted it further for his use in Luke 16.
Thomas B. Thayer, in his classic The Origin & History of
the Doctrine of Endless Punishment, ascribed the legend to the
same origin:
It must also be remembered that this is only a parable, and not a real
history; for, as Dr. Whitby affirms, "we find this very parable in the
Gemara Babylonicum." The story was not new, then, not original with
Christ, but known among the Jews before He repeated it. He borrowed the
parable from them, and employed it to show the judgment which awaited them.
He represented the spiritual favors and privileges of the Jews by the
wealth and luxury of the rich man, and the spiritual poverty of the
Gentiles by the beggary and infirmity of Lazarus; and while the former
would be deprived of their privileges and punished for their wickedness,
the latter would enjoy the blessings of truth and faith. The Jews accepted this picture of Abraham's bosom very much
like many Christians accept the idea that the Apostle Peter supposedly sits
at the Heavenly Pearly Gates, with the ledger of the faithful dead, and the
keys of admission to bid them enter. (Thomas B. Thayer, The Origin & History of the Doctrine of Endless Punishment [Boston:
Universalist Publishing House, 1855], p. 57.)
Al Maxey, a minister in
churches of Christ who has written and debated this subject extensively,
cited several sources to this same effect in the Al Maxey-Thomas Thrasher Debate available
online at www.zianet.com.
It seems appropriate to
reopen this question and ask: Where should the origin of this parable be
placed? (The Anchor Bible Dictionary, Vol. 4, p. 267). Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible informs us
that "much of the study of the parable of Lazarus and Dives (Latin:
'rich man') in the 20th century has focused on possible literary
antecedents." (pp. 796-797.)
This parable is not
theology. It is a vivid story, not a Baedeker's guide to the next world.
Such stories as this were current in Jesus' day. They are found in
rabbinical sources, and even in Egyptian papyri." (The Interpreter's Bible, Vol. 8, p. 290.)
Similar stories existed in
Egypt and among the rabbis; Jesus could easily have adapted this tradition
to his own purpose. (The Jerome Biblical
Commentary.)
This parable follows a
story common in Egyptian and Jewish thought. This parable does not intend
to give a topographical study of the abode of the dead, it is built upon
and thus confirms common Jewish thought. (International Standard
Bible Encyclopedia, Vol. 3, p. 94.)
The Catholic
Encyclopedia, Vol. 1 (online version) states that the imagery of
this parable "is plainly drawn from the popular representations of the
unseen world of the dead which were current in our Lord's time."
Jesus told this story to
reinforce the fact that the riches of the Pharisees were not necessarily a
sign of God's approval. Some interpreters suggest that the kernel of the
story was a popular story of those times and possibly derived from an
Egyptian source. (New Commentary on the Whole Bible,
based on the classic commentary of Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown.)
Josephus (a Jewish
historian, c. 37-100 A.D.), in his work Discourse to the Greeks
Concerning Hades (in which he notes that the concept of a
soul being created immortal by God is "according to the doctrine of
Plato"), presents a very similar story to that of our Lord's,
including many of the same figures Jesus employed. Yes, he may have
borrowed from the Lord's parable, but it is equally possible both were aware
of such stories current in their culture.
Finally, Maxey (Ibid.) cited several other references on this
point:
Several good reference works document and describe in some detail a
good number of these stories that our Lord may have adapted to His own
needs. (Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible, p. 797; Dr.
James Hastings, Dictionary of Christ and
the Gospels, Vol. 2, p. 18; The Interpreter's Bible,
Vol. 8, p. 289; The Anchor Bible
Dictionary, Vol. 4, p. 267; Edersheim's The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, Book IV,
pp. 280-281; Dr. Samuele Bacchiocchi, Immortality or
Resurrection? — A Biblical Study on Human Nature and Destiny,
pp. 174-176.)
Then he concluded:
My own personal conviction
is that Jesus used or adapted a popular folktale well-known to His hearers
for the purpose of conveying, by a means they would best comprehend and
most easily remember, an eternal truth.
The obvious eternal truth
was that riches do not assure a successful end. Dr. James Hastings, in his
famous Dictionary of Christ and the Gospels,
wrote:
Jesus was accustomed to speak the language of His hearers in order to
reach their understandings and hearts. And it is noteworthy how, when He
employed Jewish imagery, He was wont to invest it with new significance
(James Hastings, Dictionary of Christ and
the Gospels, Vol. 2, p. 18.)
Sidney Hatch, in his book
on conditional immortality, wrote:
In the story, then, of the Rich Man and Lazarus, Jesus has put them
down with one of their own superstitions. He used their own ideas to
condemn them. It is simply a case of taking what others believe, practice,
or say, and using it to condemn them. "Since the elements of the story
are taken from the Pharisees' own traditions, they are judged out of their
own mouths." (Sidney Hatch, Daring to Differ: Adventures
in Conditional Immortality, p. 91.)
If the Story Were
Pagan, Didn't Jesus Still Endorse Its Teaching?
If Jesus' use of this
legend were the only example in his ministry, this question might have some
validity to it, but consider that Jesus (and New Testament writers, as
well) used a number of such allusions to pagan concepts. For example, in
Mt.10:25 and 12:24-27, Jesus answered charges that he was working miracles
by the power of Beelzebub, the Philistine god of flies. When Jesus
mentioned Beelzebub, he said:
It is enough for the
disciple that he be as his teacher, and the servant as his lord. If they
have called the master of the house Beelzebub, how much more them of his
household!
But when the Pharisees
heard it, they said, This man doth not cast out demons, but by Beelzebub
the prince of the demons. And knowing their thoughts he said unto them,
Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every
city or house divided against itself shall not stand: and if Satan casteth
out Satan, he is divided against himself; how then shall his kingdom stand?
And if I by Beelzebub cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out?
therefore shall they be your judges.
When Jesus referred to
Beelzebub, do you suppose he knew the legend about Beelzebub was false, but
still endorsed its teaching? Surely not. He was not trying to teach about
Beelzebub to answer their argument. He was showing that even if they were
right about the existence and activity of Beelzebub, they were still wrong
about his miracles, and that their argument was no good.
Likewise, when Jesus spoke
of the god of Mammon in Mt. 6:24, he wasn't endorsing Mammon's teaching or
admitting his existence. As in the case of the Rich Man and Lazarus, he was
using a legend that was popular in his time and place as an illustration we
might use in our own teaching to illustrate his point.
Recall Thayer's comment
earlier about the Jews' acceptance of this legend:
The Jews accepted this picture of Abraham's bosom very much like many
Christians accept the idea that the Apostle Peter supposedly sits at the
Heavenly Pearly Gates, with the ledger of the faithful dead, and the keys
of admission to bid them enter. (The Origin &Historyof
the Doctrine ofEndless Punishment [Boston: Universalist
Publishing House, 1855], p. 57.)
Suppose you overheard me
admonish someone in sin, "If you think Peter's going to welcome you in
the pearly gates with this kind of behavior, you've got another think
coming." Would you deduce that I accept and endorse the doctrine that
Peter actually sits at pearly gates? Most people would recognize that I
spoke in terms of a popular folktale or legend we know about Peter's
admitting people to heaven.
James MacKnight, the
well-known Scottish Presbyterian commentator, realized Jesus' use of pagan
sources, when he wrote:
It must be acknowledged, that our Lord's descriptions (in this parable)
are not drawn from the writings of the Old Testament, but have a remarkable
affinity to the descriptions which the Grecian poets have given. They, as
well as our Lord, represent the abodes of the blessed as lying contiguous
to the region of the damned, and separated only by a great impassable
river, or deep gulf, in such sort that the ghosts could talk to one another
from its opposite banks. The parable says the souls of wicked men are tormented
in flames; the Grecian mythologists tell us they lie in Phlegethon, the
river of fire, where they suffer torments. If from these resemblances it is
thought the parable is formed on the Grecian mythology, it will not at all
follow that our Lord approved of what the common people thought or spake
concerning those matters, agreeably to the notions of the Greeks. In
parabolical discourses, provided the doctrines inculcated are strictly
true, the terms in which they are inculcated may be such as are most
familiar to the ears of the vulgar, and the images made use of such as they
are best acquainted with. (James MacKnight, cited by Thomas B.
Thayer, The Origin& History of the Doctrine of
Endless Punishment, p. 60.)
Notice that MacKnight
said, "Our Lord's descriptions are not drawn from the writings of the
Old Testament." In our essay "Jesus' Teaching on Hell,"
we've investigated the writings of Moses and the prophets on this subject,
and they nowhere taught endless torment.
The Relationship of
Jesus' Teaching to the Old Covenant
Jesus, a faithful rabbi
correctly interpreting and applying the Law of Moses to the Jews of his
age, promised he wouldn't teach them anything different from that law. In
Mt. 5:19-20, in discussing the law and the prophets, he said:
For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or
one tittle shall in no wise pass away from the law, till all things be
accomplished. Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least
commandments, and shall teach men so [Emphasis
mine—SGD], shall be called least in the kingdom of
heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, he shall be called great in
the kingdom of heaven.
Do we think Jesus
pronounced such woe on those who didn't teach what Moses and the prophets
taught, and then taught differently himself? It's interesting that on the
subject of divorce and remarriage, most people think he taught something
just twelve verses later in Mt. 5:31-20, that was different from what Moses
taught, after giving this warning in Mt. 5:20. Do we think he contradicted
himself just seconds after pronouncing this woe? How about on our current
subject, the state of the dead? After promising to be true to Moses and the
prophets, did he then teach something directly contradictory to Moses and the
prophets on our present subject?
Either the Old Testament
teaching on the subject was true, or the legend of the Rich Man and Lazarus
was true, but they both certainly cannot be true.
Now that we've seen the
origin of legends like that of the Rich Man and Lazarus, we notice that
these legends are not true, but that Jesus was merely taking a popular
traditional teaching of the Pharisees, itself taken from Greek and Egyptian
origins, and using this (about to be seen) false legend against them in
teaching them about the perils of greed, or of trusting in riches.
The Legend of the Rich
Man and Lazarus Isn't True
I affirm that it's not
true for this reason: The Old Testament's teaching on the status of the
dead is taught in verses like these:
For there is no activity
or planning or wisdom in Sheol where you are going. (Eccl. 9:10)
The dead do not know
anything, nor have they any longer a reward." (Eccl. 9:5)
Further, it is declared of
man: His breath goeth forth, He returneth to his earth. In that very day
his thoughts perish. (Ps. 146:4)
and,
In death there is no
remembrance of Thee. In the grave who shall give Thee thanks? (Ps.6:5)
Had we lived in the Mosaic
Age, and someone asked us about the state of the dead, what would we have
told them? Surely we would have told them exactly these things, would we
not? We'd have said that the dead don't plan, they don't exercise wisdom,
they're not active, and they don't know anything. And we'd have been
correct, for that's exactly what the Bible says.
However, when we come to
the Rich Man and Lazarus, should we then throw all that overboard and
accept down to the smallest detail on what happens after death (even though
we don't believe a lot of those details ourselves) a legend of highly
dubious origin? Why not accept it as pagan teaching assimilated by the Jews
between the testaments, as it contradicts everything the Old Testament
taught about the consciousness, memory, etc. of the dead?
If this is true, then as
we've noted, Jesus was teaching in the entire chapter, Luke 16, against
greed to Pharisees who needed that very teaching. In the course of his
teaching, Jesus used a story pervasive in their time to illustrate that
wealth didn't indicate one was righteous, or that he would have good
fortune.
Conclusion
We've seen why the account
of the Rich Man and Lazarus is in Luke 16, in the context of Jesus'
teaching on greed to greedy Pharisees. It has nothing to do with the fate
of anyone, righteous or wicked, after death. It has nothing to do with the
final destiny of the wicked. Any understanding of the chapter that doesn't
account for the context of the entire chapter falls short. In the Rich Man
and Lazarus, Jesus merely used a story current in their time to illustrate
that just because one was rich (whether righteous or unrighteous), that
didn't guarantee a favorable outcome. Therefore, love and trust in riches
was not a wise course to choose through life.
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