THE PARABLE OF THE RICH MAN AND LAZARUS.
By William H. Littlejohn
BY ELD. W. H. LITTLEJOHN. As he, many times, does nothing but injury who unsettles the opinions of others by destroying their confidence in their previous modes of Scripture exegesis, without enabling them to substitute therefor a more satisfactory exposition, it is now time that we should pass over to the positive side of the argument, and furnish an interpretation of the parable in question which shall be less liable to objection than the one which we have been combating. To promise one which shall be altogether free from any difficulty whatever would be more than could be fulfilled, and more than a reasonable student of the Scripture would demand at the hands of any person who was dealing with passages so highly figurative as the one before us. Nevertheless, it would seem to be comparatively easy when in the line of sound interpretation to present a view which would, when taken as a whole, do violence to no principle of morals and no canon of sound doctrine. In fine, he should be able to so explain this portion of the word that his explanation would not make it conflict with other parts of the same word, and would at the same time commend itself to the judgment of the unbiased reader. In this case, as in many others, it will be found profitable while considering the text to closely study the context. In doing so, it will be seen that the Lord had been delivering the parable of the wise steward, which bears directly upon the question of the proper use of the means that God has given us in this life, in order to make them contribute to the welfare of the individual in the life to come. Whether or not the object of the Master was the condemnation of the Pharisaic notions on that subject, it is at present impossible to say. One thing is manifest, however, viz., that they immediately took exceptions to his teaching upon that point. It is even said that they were present, and that they derided him because they were covetous. This language would seem to imply that they were wounded in a vulnerable point; and as the bird which flutters immediately after the discharge of the sportsman’s gun is presumably the one at which he directed his piece, so, in this case, the derisive responses of the Pharisees would seem to indicate that they themselves were not only the persons who felt the sharp point of the missile of truth, but also that they were conscious of the fact that it was hurled at them. Nor does it appear that Christ was anxious to relieve their minds of the suspicion that they were the individuals to whom his words had been especially directed; for, instead of softening his previous utterances in the least, or attempting to explain that they were not designed to be personal in their application, he meets their irate denunciation by the stern declaration: “That which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God.” The reference in these words is unmistakable. The subject of conversation was the parable of the steward. The point of that parable was the proper use to which money may be put in this life. It was, therefore, in reference to the peculiar views which the Pharisees held upon that subject that the Lord was particularly condemnatory. What those views were, it is not difficult to ascertain. One of their distinguishing characteristics as it regards their estimation of money is brought to view in the declaration that, as a class, “they were covetous.” Another may be found in the writings of those who are competent to set forth their tenets in the statement that with them it was customary to regard the possession of wealth as an evident token of the favor of God; while poverty was considered as conclusive evidence that the person subjected thereto was accursed of Heaven. It was, we think, at the sin of covetousness, which was so marked in them, that the parable of the unjust steward was aimed. We are also of the opinion that the parable of the rich man and Lazarus was especially designed to condemn and utterly root out the foolish and pernicious idea contained in their second peculiar notion, wherein they held that riches were a manifest token of divine favor. The reasons for these conclusions are found both in the nature of the parable itself, and the connection in which it was uttered. A glance at the context will make it apparent that the persons in the immediate presence of the Saviour were, beyond reasonable doubt, the very ones whom he had just condemned for being avaricious. Having spoken a few words relating to other matters, perhaps for the purpose of getting the multitude into a more favorable position or mood, he seems to have picked up again the subject of property, and, as we have already said, to have made a final and overwhelming assault upon the second feature named above. In doing this, he had recourse to a style of logic, which, for the purposes then to be accomplished, was most perfect in its adaptation, i. e., the argumentum ad hominem. In other words, he framed a parable, which, constructed as it was in the use of characters common in every community, and in the employment, so far as its theology was concerned, wholly of doctrines which were parts of their distinctive faith, forever precluded the Pharisees themselves from evading the conclusion drawn on account of the unsoundness of any one of the premises given. By this master-stroke of policy, he at once placed his adversaries in a position where it was utterly impossible for them to vindicate their peculiar tenet without self-stultification, through a denial of positions formerly held, or subjecting themselves to the contempt of the people, who were composed of the poorer classes, by taking the broad position that the poor could not be saved at all, and therefore that the parable of the Lord was absurd and impotent in the matter of proving that an abundance of this world’s goods was not a vindication of God’s favor. For had they admitted that Christ could have been justified, in any contingency, in placing Lazarus the beggar, covered with sores, and kept alive by continued charity, in Abraham’s bosom, that fact would have forever overturned the doctrine that he was accursed of God as proved by his indigence, since immediately upon death he was exalted to the highest position attainable by mortals in the favor of Heaven. Again, had they confessed that it was possible for the rich man at death to go directly to hell, then this would have been an admission that the luxuries which he enjoyed in this life had in reality furnished no proof that God loved him, since at death he poured upon him the vials of his unmitigated wrath. What, then, could they do? We answer as above, Only one of three things. First, either admit that they were mistaken in their interpretation of worldly prosperity; or, second, boldly declare that the poor could not be saved or the rich lost; or, third, deny that they ever held the doctrine found in the parable in regard to the place and character of the intermediate state. Had they taken the first position, this would have been a complete surrender of the point at issue, and virtually an acknowledgment that they could not thereafter be regarded as safe religious teachers. Had they taken the second, then they would have been driven to a conclusion which was the necessary consequence of their own logic, if sound, but which they, perhaps, were not prepared to adopt, not only because of their own misgivings, but also because, if done publicly, they doubtless would have been handled roughly by the irritated multitudes whom they would thus have insulted in a most aggravating manner by consigning them to hopeless and eternal ruin upon no other proof than that of the fact of their acknowledged poverty. Nor is it at all improbable that this last consideration of prudence would have been sufficient to close their mouths perfectly on that branch of the subject, since, on a former occasion, like considerations had produced the same result. Reference is here had, as the reader will readily perceive, to the visit made to Christ by certain of the chief priests and elders who asked him concerning the authority by which he did his works. He, desirous of confounding them, replied, “The baptism of John, whence was it? from Heaven or of men.” They, perceiving his object, reasoned among themselves on this wise: “If we shall say, From Heaven, he will say unto us, Why did ye not then believe on him? But if we shall say, Of men, we fear the people; for all hold John as a prophet.” Therefore, abashed and dumfounded, they answered in these humiliating words, “We cannot tell.” Finally, had they, as a last resort, attempted evasion by adopting the third position suggested above, their failure would have been as complete as in either of the other cases. Christ, in his purpose to make them destroy their own theological tenets, by their own theological weapons, had left no opportunity for side issues. So careful had he been to overthrow them on their own chosen ground, that he employed simply those dogmas, which, from time immemorial, had been the shibboleths of their faith. Their doctrines concerning hades, though they might have been in reality crude and unsound, were too generally understood to admit of public denial. And, as the Lord was not seeking at the moment either to affirm or deny the correctness of their opinions in regard to that place, but simply to confound them out of their own mouths, he employed a portion of their own faith for that purpose. To show that in doing so he was true to their conceptions, and that his parable was based upon those conceptions purely, and not upon any views personal to him, we shall give below an extract from one of the most eminent of Jewish historians, one, also, who was himself a Pharisee and a contemporary of Christ. Josephus, in his essay to the Greeks concerning hades, writes as follows:— “Now as to hades, wherein the souls of the righteous and unrighteous are detained, it is necessary to speak of it. Hades is a place in the world not regularly finished; a subterraneous region wherein the light of this world does not shine; from which circumstance, that in this region the light does not shine, it cannot be but there must be in it perpetual darkness. This region is allotted as a place of custody for souls, in which angels are appointed as guardians to them, who distribute to them temporary punishments, agreeable to every one’s behavior and manners. In this region there is a certain place set apart as a lake of unquenchable fire, whereunto we suppose no one hath hitherto been cast; but it is prepared for a day predetermined by God, in which one righteous sentence shall deservedly be passed upon all men; when the unjust and those that have been disobedient to God, and have given honor to such idols as have been the vain operations of the hands of men, as to God himself, shall be adjudged to this everlasting punishment, as having been the causes of defilement, while the just shall obtain an incorruptible and never-fading kingdom. These are now indeed confined in hades, but not in the same place wherein the unjust are confined. For there is one descent into this region, at whose gate we believe there stands an archangel with an host; which gate when those pass through that are conducted down by the angels appointed over souls, they do not go the same way; but the just are guided to the right hand, and are led with hymns, sung by the angels appointed over that place, unto a region of light, in which the just have dwelt from the beginning of the world; not constrained by necessity, but ever enjoying the prospect of the good things they see, and rejoicing in the expectation of those new enjoyments which will be peculiar to every one of them, and esteeming those things beyond what we have here; with whom there is no place of toil, no burning heat, no piercing cold, nor are any briers there; but the countenance of the fathers and of the just, which they see, always smile upon them, while they wait for that rest and eternal new life in Heaven, which is to succeed this region. This place we call the bosom of Abraham.” “But as to the unjust, they are dragged by force to the left hand by the angels allotted for punishment, no longer going with a good will, but as prisoners driven by violence; to whom are sent the angels appointed over them to reproach them and threaten with their terrible looks, and to thrust them still downwards. Now those angels that are set over these souls drag them into the neighborhood of hell itself; who, when they are hard by it, continually hear the noise of it, and do not stand clear of the hot vapor itself; but when they have a nearer view of this spectacle, as of a terrible and exceeding great prospect of fire, they are struck with a fearful expectation of a future judgment, and in effect punished thereby; and not only so, but where they see the place (or choir) of the fathers and of the just, even hereby are they punished; for a chaos deep and large is fixed between them; insomuch that a just man that hath compassion upon them cannot be admitted, nor can any one that is unjust, if he were bold enough to attempt it, pass over it.” As the reader—provided it had never been brought to his attention before—has, doubtless, read the above extract with profound interest, he is qualified to decide: 1. Whether the notions of the Pharisees concerning hades, as given therein, were not the real basis of the parable in question; and, 2. To decide whether such doctrines are true in fact, and whether the Lord himself146regarded them as such, and designed to give credit to them throughout the ages of the Christian religion which were to follow. In making these decisions, as he is presumably candid, and only anxious to reach the truth, it would seem that delay would not be necessary, and that his verdict would be positive in its tone. He who would hesitate for a moment as to whether Christ was making a revelation in regard to a region unknown, though real in its character, or accepting for the time being the opinions held by the Pharisees, in reference to a place which had, at least with them, an imaginary existence, can only do so in the exercise of a credulity in itself almost incredible. Strange indeed would it be if these men, without Scripture warrant, had so accurately described the place of the dead, if there be such a place, that he who was with the Father from the beginning, and knew all things, was able neither to add to nor subtract from their topography of the spirit land. And yet this is true, if the Saviour was revealing facts rather than borrowing ideas. The identity in all of its parts of the place of which he spoke, and of the one of which Josephus wrote, is practically certain. The presence, in both the one and the other, of the gulf separating the righteous and the wicked, the flame and its torment, the bosom of Abraham on the one side filled with the righteous, and on the other the regions of the damned people with its hosts of suffering victims, the angels conveying the souls of the good to one place and those of the bad to the other, as well as other points of resemblance, are not peculiarities belonging alike to two different localities; but they are those correspondences in detail which, to every reasonable mind, would furnish proof positive that the individual speaking and the historian who was writing for the Pharisees were both alluding to the same region. So far as we can discover, there is not one particular in which the discourse and the essay conflict. While the latter, having for its object description rather than arbitrary teaching, is, as it naturally would be, more elaborate in its delineations, that which it adds to the former contravenes nothing contained therein, but simply adds thereunto in such a manner as to supply certain nonessential facts. Nor is there any uncertainty in reference to the antiquity of the opinions concerning hades which the essayist brings forward. They were well defined and elaborately set forth by the Jewish rabbins long before the days of Christ or of Josephus. So that, beyond dispute, the rabbinical notions could not have been derived from the teachings of the Lord, since they not only antedate them, but are also more circumstantial and full. The inevitable conclusion is, therefore, that, for wise purposes to be considered more fully hereafter, the Master, as he was wont to do, borrowed from the accepted notions of his time such portions as were best adapted to enforce and illustrate the sentiment which he wished to inculcate. Leaving the question of the origin of the opinions concerning hades as being so fully settled that they need no further comment, the reader is now ready to mark out for himself the boundary line within which may be found the sum of the tenets which he thinks it will be safe for him to decide that the Saviour intended to indorse and enforce in the use of the parable. In doing so, he will, in the first instance, be brought face to face with this proposition: “Were all the doctrines found in the parable literally true?” Before answering this question in the affirmative, let him beware not to jump to conclusions in a matter of such grave importance. Consequences the most momentous in their results hang upon the decision of this point. Decide, for example, that there were such characters as Dives and Lazarus, and that they actually went to the places where they are said to have gone, and those places become matters of fact and a part of the economy of this world’s structure. From that time forward he must give an unquestioning adhesion to the belief that there is now—or at least was for the first four thousand years of this world’s history—fitted up in the bowels of this earth an immense cavern, where the light of the sun never shines, to which there is but one entrance, and which God the Creator did construct to be the grand prison-house for the souls of both the good and the bad, while, at least, the tardy ages made their tedious march from the creation to the cross. If he shall succeed in bringing his mind to assent to this proposition, he will have accomplished a task which, it would seem, would require an abnegation, on his own part, of every conception of personal taste and preference. As he approaches, in imagination, the gateway which opens down to the regions of the dead, it seems to us that a shudder would pass through his whole being at the very thought of once entering those portals, even though his destination were to be the more fortunate side of the gulf. Even after reading the graphic description which Josephus gives of the regions of the blessed, it seems to us the soul of the most pious man would turn shuddering from the prospect, praying, “O Lord, deliver thy servant from the contemplation perpetually of such scenes as the lurid flames of a continually burning hell revealed to the eyes of those just men whose natures live on in the contradictory and most inexplicable state of being, most ineffably happy while witnessing sights, year in and year out, century in and century out, which would chill the blood in the veins of any mortal, the sympathy of whose nature had not been ennobled and enlarged by entrance upon the glorified state.” Nay, more: as he takes a retrospect of the past, calling up before his mind such worthies as Adam, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, &c., and remembers the long ages of their confinement in the midst of such associations, he would debate long the question of their actual felicity, and ask himself whether, after all, the ingenuity of that God whose handiwork is seen among the stars, and is visible all about us in the sunshine, in the flowers, and in the groves and the beautiful vistas in this world, unmarred by horrid sights and signs of torture and of torment, might not have prepared some better thing for those who loved him and were faithful in their day and generation than such a dismal and sepulchral abode as he has assigned to the rarest and noblest spirits of all the past. Turning over the pages of Holy Writ in searching for some revelation of the divine purpose concerning the condition and state in the future of those who have been faithful in this world, he will read, “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.” Again, running through the apocalyptic vision, and contemplating the gorgeous panorama of future events which were made to pass before the eyes of the bewildered seer, he will read with ecstatic delight the description given of the future eternal home of the saints. In its streets of gold, its gates of pearl, its river of water of life, its tree of life on either side of the river, bearing twelve manner of fruits, its glorious throne all shimmering in the bright effulgence which emanates from its glorious King, he will find nothing lacking, but everything surpassing his capacity for appreciation. This, he will say, is indeed godlike. This, truly, would never have entered into the heart of man had it not been revealed by the Spirit. 1 Cor. 2:9, 10. Contrasting, as he necessarily will, these scenes which have filled and overwhelmed him with a sense of the infinite delight which God is thereby shown to take in surrounding those who love him with scenes and scenery of the most surpassing brightness and beauty, he will ask himself, “Can it be that the same God who has created the bright, the beautiful Jerusalem above to be the eternal abode of his saints, could have been satisfied to leave them for four thousand years in that subterranean vault, hid away in some unfinished portion of the bowels of this earth, with surroundings as disagreeable and disgusting as could well be conceived of?” The verdict will be decisive. “Hades and the New Jerusalem were not conceived and constructed by the same omnipotent brain and hand. The former is the offspring of the distempered fancy of some Pharisaic mystic, whose views have been colored by his acquaintance with the notions contained in the heathen philosophies of his day, while the latter is the realization of the grand and faultless ideal of that God whose especial delight is found in rewarding virtue.”