The parable of the unjust judge and the persistent widow (Luke 18:1-8) is a weird one, isn’t it? I’ve often thought that it’s hard to read. Praying to God for help is like bothering a nasty government official?
I suppose that a parable that was meant to be read in all times and all places by all people, who should be able to derive meaning from it, is bound to be a little weird when one of the features is, well, the state. Because “the government” takes a lot of different forms throughout history. The judge has to stand in for officials, authority figures, the powers that be, of all kinds. It’s not crazy that the barest outline is what we’re left with.
Let’s take a look, and then I’ll tell you about some details that were picked out in the homily I heard on Sunday.
Jesus told his disciples a parable
about the necessity for them to pray always without becoming weary.
He said, “There was a judge in a certain town
who neither feared God nor respected any human being.
And a widow in that town used to come to him and say,
‘Render a just decision for me against my adversary.’
For a long time the judge was unwilling, but eventually he thought,
‘While it is true that I neither fear God nor respect any human being,
because this widow keeps bothering me
I shall deliver a just decision for her
lest she finally come and strike me.’”
The Lord said, “Pay attention to what the dishonest judge says.
Will not God then secure the rights of his chosen ones
who call out to him day and night?
Will he be slow to answer them?
I tell you, he will see to it that justice is done for them speedily.
But when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”
The first thing that the homilist pointed out was something I’ve noticed before, something that is part of why this parable is hard to read. This unjust judge is a sort of “antithesis of God,” he said. I would go further and say, since Christ is a model Judge, that the unjust judge is a type of anti-Christ. Here’s the features the homilist identifies:
- he is not a “God-fearer,” said the homilist, using a specific term meaning a non-Jewish believer in God who participated in some aspects of Jewish worship. (I don’t speak Greek but I can pick out words, and a word that makes this reading plausible—φοβούμενος—does seem to be there in Lk 18:2). So the judge is unlike Christ the model Judge in that he does not believe in or worship God.
- he does not respect any human being, which is also not a characteristic of Jesus
- he doesn’t do his job, which is to render decisions
The widow, on the other hand, is in an extremely vulnerable position (almost by definition), plus she has an adversary. Nevertheless, the widow seems not to fear the judge; perhaps she has nothing left to lose? But the judge, who doesn’t fear even God, seems to be afraid of the widow! Like, physically afraid of the widow: “lest she finally come and strike me.” There’s something fearful here! So, he, also unlike Christ, shies away from threats.
Another thing, not pointed out by the homilist, but that I noticed for the first time: In this parable, Jesus actually tells us what the most important part is. “Pay attention to what the dishonest judge says,” says Jesus. Okay, so let’s do that:
‘While it is true that I neither fear God nor respect any human being,
because this widow keeps bothering me
I shall deliver a just decision for her
lest she finally come and strike me.’
That, I guess, is the main point, and if we get distracted by details about who the judge is, what the adversary wants, whether the widow is right or not, we might miss that. This is the most important bit. The judge, who does not act out of any kind of care about God’s laws, does not act out of any kind of care for the good of human beings, is finally moved to act out of pure self interest, because the widow demanded justice. Did she have any hope that he would do the right thing? Maybe not. But she demanded it (as was her right), repeatedly, in the face of repeated failure, and eventually he responded.
The Lord goes on to say, if you can get results by persistently (faithfully) bothering someone who does not care about you or about God, then surely you can get results by persistently (faithfully) “call[ing] out to him day and night.”
The parable ends with a question from Jesus: when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth? I suppose this may mean, will we have given up asking God for help and for justice by then?
+ + +
Remember, I said that the government takes many forms through history: the dishonest judge has to be meaningful to all people everywhere. I suppose that wherever there are officials of any kind, there are corrupt officials, or at least the threat of them. The homilist couched his description of the unjust judge in such a way as to illustrate that, today, in the United States of America, the concept of “bothering the dishonest judge” ought to remind us of, say, exercising your First Amendment right to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
The judge isn’t doing his job. Well, sometimes the government seems not to be doing its job. And one thing we do, when that happens, is we demand better behavior. We write, we call, we sign petitions. We pour into the streets, demonstrating.
And sometimes the government, or the officials, respond. Not necessarily because they believe in doing the right thing, or because they care about us. We may not have changed anyone’s mind! But perhaps they fear the consequences, a little bit, some kind of real consequence, even if it’s just losing the next election.
And it does take a certain sort of persistence for that to work. You have to keep at it long enough that the specter of consequences becomes real to the officials you’re trying to reach. As long as the officials “neither fear God nor respect any human being,” what you’re after is their self-interest, in the end. And the minute they don’t feel bothered, there’s no leverage at all.
+ + +
Is it a distraction, or unacceptably partisan, to make a connection between the numerous, very large public “No Kings” protests on Saturday and the Gospel reading on Sunday? I don’t think so.
It’s certainly not an inherently partisan observation; it’s easy to imagine the same connection being made about all sorts of protests against government injustice or perceived government injustice. And the homilist I heard did not dwell on the specifics about what the crowds were protesting, just observed them as a fact: the crowds saw injustice, the crowds came out and demanded justice.
And like I said before, this parable is difficult to read because it’s not immediately clear how we’re supposed to understand the parts. Is God like this dishonest judge somehow? some readers might wonder. Are we to nag at him? I know I’ve been unsure how to read the parts of this analogy.
But if you take a moment to translate the parable into the context that you really live in, if you think, no, this judge is like when our government officials are corrupt, don’t fear God, don’t do their jobs, don’t respect the dignity of all human beings as inherently worthy of love… and the widow demanding justice is like us, protesting (something that doesn’t “get things done” by itself)… then it feels a little more familiar?
Because we can certainly imagine, that if we’re persistent, the corrupt government officials may act to preserve themselves or their power, and it might go our way. But the persistence is necessary. We can see that. We can understand that. If we give up, we lose our leverage over them.
So maybe this parable is about being persistent? And another word for persistent is faithful. Be persistent in faith, the way that you have to be persistent in nagging at government officials to get them to do something right for a change.
Even though God is nothing like these government officials. But if we can be bothered to rise up and call for justice from them, then we can also be bothered to call out to God as persistently.
And after all, the last question of the parable is one about whether we will have been persistent in our faith till the end.
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