The Nobel Disease

 You've no doubt heard of it -- via Wikipedia, "the embrace of strange or scientifically unsound ideas by some Nobel Prize winners, usually later in life." Actually there isn't any evidence that Nobel winners are more prone to this than other scientists, it may just be that it's more noteworthy when it happens to them. Most of the time -- not quite always -- they step out of their area of expertise. Basically, they've been told they're incredibly smart because they know a lot about physics, or chemistry, or biology, so they think they must be just as smart about everything.

 

Richard Dawkins is not a Nobel winner. Actually, he's not even a highly distinguished biologist, he's more noted as a popularizer of biology and an advocate for science in general. Still, I'll grant you that he's smart. However, like many of his distinguished colleagues, he has become a crank. Unfortunately, Free Inquiry magazine gave him 5,000 words and a cover story to promulgate his crankery, to which I felt compelled to respond. 

 

Since you presumably haven't read Dawkins's original turgid and tendentious screed, I'll just summarize it as follows. (And I believe this is entirely fair.)

There is a precise biological definition of sex, which has to do with large vs. small gametes.

[A lengthy biology lesson which is not clearly relevant to the rest of the argument, in which he claims that there are "rules" about the behaviors associated with male and female sex. Yes, yes, there are exceptions to all these rules but they are exceptions that prove the rule. For example, the male seahorse incubates the eggs, which proves the rule that females always invest more in the offspring because -- well actually I don't know why this happens, but somebody should figure it out.]

The word "gender" only has a distinct meaning in grammar. Otherwise, gender is synonymous with sex. Because I say so.

There are only two sexes and  humans, like all creatures, can only be one or the other, and since sex and gender mean the same thing, it is impossible for people to change their gender or to claim they are of a gender different from their biological sex, therefore trans people do not exist and they should stop pretending that they do.

 

Really. This is a smart guy. Next time, I'll discuss why people can go off the rails like this. 

 

Wednesday Bible Study: Worst Parable Evah

Luke 19 is pretty weird, to say the least. Jesus says that God is like an unjust king, whose subjects do not want him to rule, who takes what isn't rightly his, and who has people who oppose his rule slaughtered in front of him. (Verse 11 et seq).  Remind you of anybody? He also says "‘I tell you that to everyone who has, more will be given, but as for the one who has nothing, even what they have will be taken away." Sounds like the Republican Party platform.

 

By the way, here and in Mark he rides into Jerusalem on a colt. In John, he rides in on an ass, and in Matthew, he rides in on both a colt and an ass. (Neat trick.)  But you know, this is all the inerrant word of God.

 

19 Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. ² A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. ³ He wanted to see who Jesus was, but because he was short he could not see over the crowd. ⁴ So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way.

⁵ When Jesus reached the spot, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today.” ⁶ So he came down at once and welcomed him gladly.

⁷ All the people saw this and began to mutter, “He has gone to be the guest of a sinner.”

⁸ But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.”

⁹ Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. ¹⁰ For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”

The Parable of the Ten Minas

¹¹ While they were listening to this, he went on to tell them a parable, because he was near Jerusalem and the people thought that the kingdom of God was going to appear at once. ¹² He said: “A man of noble birth went to a distant country to have himself appointed king and then to return. ¹³ So he called ten of his servants and gave them ten minas.^[a] ‘Put this money to work,’ he said, ‘until I come back.’

¹⁴ “But his subjects hated him and sent a delegation after him to say, ‘We don’t want this man to be our king.’

¹⁵ “He was made king, however, and returned home. Then he sent for the servants to whom he had given the money, in order to find out what they had gained with it.

¹⁶ “The first one came and said, ‘Sir, your mina has earned ten more.’

¹⁷ “‘Well done, my good servant!’ his master replied. ‘Because you have been trustworthy in a very small matter, take charge of ten cities.’

¹⁸ “The second came and said, ‘Sir, your mina has earned five more.’

¹⁹ “His master answered, ‘You take charge of five cities.’

²⁰ “Then another servant came and said, ‘Sir, here is your mina; I have kept it laid away in a piece of cloth. ²¹ I was afraid of you, because you are a hard man. You take out what you did not put in and reap what you did not sow.’

²² “His master replied, ‘I will judge you by your own words, you wicked servant! You knew, did you, that I am a hard man, taking out what I did not put in, and reaping what I did not sow? ²³ Why then didn’t you put my money on deposit, so that when I came back, I could have collected it with interest?’

²⁴ “Then he said to those standing by, ‘Take his mina away from him and give it to the one who has ten minas.’

²⁵ “‘Sir,’ they said, ‘he already has ten!’

²⁶ “He replied, ‘I tell you that to everyone who has, more will be given, but as for the one who has nothing, even what they have will be taken away. ²⁷ But those enemies of mine who did not want me to be king over them—bring them here and kill them in front of me.’”

Jesus Comes to Jerusalem as King

²⁸ After Jesus had said this, he went on ahead, going up to Jerusalem. ²⁹ As he approached Bethphage and Bethany at the hill called the Mount of Olives, he sent two of his disciples, saying to them, ³⁰ “Go to the village ahead of you, and as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, which no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it here. ³¹ If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ say, ‘The Lord needs it.’”

³² Those who were sent ahead went and found it just as he had told them. ³³ As they were untying the colt, its owners asked them, “Why are you untying the colt?”

³⁴ They replied, “The Lord needs it.”

³⁵ They brought it to Jesus, threw their cloaks on the colt and put Jesus on it. ³⁶ As he went along, people spread their cloaks on the road.

³⁷ When he came near the place where the road goes down the Mount of Olives, the whole crowd of disciples began joyfully to praise God in loud voices for all the miracles they had seen:

³⁸ “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!”^[b]

“Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!”

³⁹ Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Jesus, “Teacher, rebuke your disciples!”

⁴⁰ “I tell you,” he replied, “if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.”

⁴¹ As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it ⁴² and said, “If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes. ⁴³ The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you and hem you in on every side. ⁴⁴ They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time of God’s coming to you.”

Jesus at the Temple

⁴⁵ When Jesus entered the temple courts, he began to drive out those who were selling. ⁴⁶ “It is written,” he said to them, “‘My house will be a house of prayer’^[c]; but you have made it ‘a den of robbers.’^[d]”

⁴⁷ Every day he was teaching at the temple. But the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the leaders among the people were trying to kill him. ⁴⁸ Yet they could not find any way to do it, because all the people hung on his words.

Footnotes

1. Luke 19:13 A mina was about three months’ wages.
2. Luke 19:38 Psalm 118:26
3. Luke 19:46 Isaiah 56:7
4. Luke 19:46 Jer. 7:11

 

Timely next installment in Economics 101

 

One last point about Economics 101 may be the most important, but it is likely to be overlooked or even denied in the U.S. today. Economists claim they can show that if all their assumptions are true – perfect information, willing sellers and willing buyers, perfect competition, no externalities – the hypothetical free market will create what is called a Pareto optimum. That is a situation in which no person can be made better off without making someone else worse off. This is the basis of the claim that the free market allocates resources “efficiently.” But there can be a Pareto optimum in which everybody has an equal or close to equal share; and one in which one person has 90% of the wealth and the remaining million people have 10%. The latter is actually much closer to the situation we’re in right now.

There is nothing in the theory of the market to support a claim that whatever distribution results is just, or fair, or desirable. If you don’t think it’s fair that one person has 90% of the wealth, there is no reason in the theory of the market why you shouldn’t tax much of that wealth away and share it with everybody else. Maybe you can think of arguments against doing this, but they aren’t to be found in introductory economics. The question is simply ignored.

 

So, I now turn it over to Paul Campos:

A big lacuna in American political discourse is the absence of the classic idea that the rentier class consists of a bunch of social parasites, who collectively are about as useful as fleas on a dog. The evident fact that an enormous percentage of the plutocracy’s actual membership consists of people who do literally nothing but consume social resources at a decadent and depraved rate, while contributing nothing to society themselves, is something that the American class structure does a remarkable job of concealing from hundreds of millions of people who appear to believe quite sincerely that the ultra-rich are who they are because of a combination of their native talents and their commitment to “hard work.”  . . .

It needs to be repeated often that the vast majority of the people populating our plutocracy do literally no work whatsoever, that their “careers” if any are simply financial Potemkin villages designed to hide that they live off almost always unearned capital — if I had a dollar for every “consultant” “working” on his MacBook in a Boulder cafe while drawing his dividends I wouldn’t have to work for Farley and Lemieux — and that they belong to a social class that, for reasons flowing from a delightful confluence of considerations of social justice and economic efficiency, ought to be taxed, regulated, and criminalized out of existence altogether.  

 

 

A storm for the ages

Well not quite, at least where I am, although farther to the south where they had an ice storm I expect people are extremely miserable. I was right in the bullseye for snow -- I got 18 inches. Fortunately it's very dry and light, on account of it's cold as hell, but that's still a major pain in the ass. I got my truck dug out and my driveway plowed and I made it to the post office and back, just to get a look around. 

 

The PO driveway had been plowed but you had to wade through two feet of snow to get to the front door. I had a snow shovel in my truck so I did the town a favor and shoveled out a path. Looking at our resident's Facebook page I saw a lot of this going on -- people plowing neighbors' driveway, and of course old folks need somebody to shovel for them. (I can still shovel out my vehicles and a path to my front door, but I won't be able to do it forever. I'm not sure what will happen then.)

 

Which, circuitously, leads me to this by Scott Lemieux.  Apparently the inhabitants of Wingnuttia cannot understand how the protests in Minnesota can be happening spontaneously, and that people are just showing up, and volunteering to supply food and beverages and hand warmers. They must have "supply lines," and somebody must be paying them. George Soros, presumably, by way of ANTIFA -- which by the way does not exist, although George Soros does. The fact is they are socially and morally crippled. Like their God Emperor. 

 

 

Sunday Sermonette: Serious confusion

 

Right now it's cold as hell and snowing hard. I'm stuck indoors all day trying to find ways of amusing myself until the Patriots game at 3:00. Meanwhile, the Storm Troopers are rampaging and the crackpot dictator is trying to figure out what country to invade next. Well, life must go on.

Luke 18 is more of those parables that don't quite make sense and only serve to sow moral confusion. He analogizes God to a psychopathic atheistic judge, who will nevertheless oblige petitioners by providing vengeance. That sounds mighty Christian. In the next parable, he says that sinners who confess are preferable to righteous people. Okay, he likes children, that's nice. Then he says it's impossible for rich people to go to heaven, except that it is possible after all because anything is possible. Then he says, perfectly explicitly and literally, [The son of man, i.e. himself ]  will be delivered over to the Gentiles. They will mock him, insult him and spit on him; ³³ they will flog him and kill him. On the third day he will rise again.” But the disciples have no idea what this is supposed to mean. Then, just for the heck of it, he restore sight to another blind man. BTW, pray all you want, it doesn't work any more.

 

18 Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. ² He said: “In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared what people thought. ³ And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, ‘Grant me justice against my adversary.’

⁴ “For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, ‘Even though I don’t fear God or care what people think, ⁵ yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won’t eventually come and attack me!’”

⁶ And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. ⁷ And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? ⁸ I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?”

The Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector

⁹ To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable: ¹⁰ “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. ¹¹ The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. ¹² I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’

¹³ “But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’

¹⁴ “I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

The Little Children and Jesus

¹⁵ People were also bringing babies to Jesus for him to place his hands on them. When the disciples saw this, they rebuked them. ¹⁶ But Jesus called the children to him and said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. ¹⁷ Truly I tell you, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.”

The Rich and the Kingdom of God

¹⁸ A certain ruler asked him, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

¹⁹ “Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone. ²⁰ You know the commandments: ‘You shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, honor your father and mother.’^[a]”

²¹ “All these I have kept since I was a boy,” he said.

²² When Jesus heard this, he said to him, “You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”

²³ When he heard this, he became very sad, because he was very wealthy. ²⁴ Jesus looked at him and said, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God! ²⁵ Indeed, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”

²⁶ Those who heard this asked, “Who then can be saved?”

²⁷ Jesus replied, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.”

²⁸ Peter said to him, “We have left all we had to follow you!”

²⁹ “Truly I tell you,” Jesus said to them, “no one who has left home or wife or brothers or sisters or parents or children for the sake of the kingdom of God ³⁰ will fail to receive many times as much in this age, and in the age to come eternal life.”

Jesus Predicts His Death a Third Time

³¹ Jesus took the Twelve aside and told them, “We are going up to Jerusalem, and everything that is written by the prophets about the Son of Man will be fulfilled. ³² He will be delivered over to the Gentiles. They will mock him, insult him and spit on him; ³³ they will flog him and kill him. On the third day he will rise again.”

³⁴ The disciples did not understand any of this. Its meaning was hidden from them, and they did not know what he was talking about.

A Blind Beggar Receives His Sight

³⁵ As Jesus approached Jericho, a blind man was sitting by the roadside begging. ³⁶ When he heard the crowd going by, he asked what was happening. ³⁷ They told him, “Jesus of Nazareth is passing by.”

³⁸ He called out, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”

³⁹ Those who led the way rebuked him and told him to be quiet, but he shouted all the more, “Son of David, have mercy on me!”

⁴⁰ Jesus stopped and ordered the man to be brought to him. When he came near, Jesus asked him, ⁴¹ “What do you want me to do for you?”

“Lord, I want to see,” he replied.

⁴² Jesus said to him, “Receive your sight; your faith has healed you.” ⁴³ Immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus, praising God. When all the people saw it, they also praised God.

Footnotes

1. Luke 18:20 Exodus 20:12-16; Deut. 5:16-20

 

Wednesday Bible Study: Again, the preacher and the slave

 Luke 17 has some really ugly shit going on. I like the idea of forgiveness, that it starts out with, but then it gets weird. I'm pretty sure that if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can't successfully order trees to uproot themselves and jump into the ocean. I've certainly never heard of anybody pulling that one off. Now, turning to verse 7 et seq, the word rendered here as servant means slave. So Jesus orders us not to thank our slaves for working for us. Then he predicts what Christians today call The Rapture. Remember that this was predicted to happen within the lifetime of the people listening. Don't worry, it is not going to happen.

 

17 Jesus said to his disciples: “Things that cause people to stumble are bound to come, but woe to anyone through whom they come. ² It would be better for them to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around their neck than to cause one of these little ones to stumble. ³ So watch yourselves.

“If your brother or sister^[a] sins against you, rebuke them; and if they repent, forgive them. ⁴ Even if they sin against you seven times in a day and seven times come back to you saying ‘I repent,’ you must forgive them.”

⁵ The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!”

⁶ He replied, “If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it will obey you.

⁷ “Suppose one of you has a servant plowing or looking after the sheep. Will he say to the servant when he comes in from the field, ‘Come along now and sit down to eat’? ⁸ Won’t he rather say, ‘Prepare my supper, get yourself ready and wait on me while I eat and drink; after that you may eat and drink’? ⁹ Will he thank the servant because he did what he was told to do? ¹⁰ So you also, when you have done everything you were told to do, should say, ‘We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.’”

Jesus Heals Ten Men With Leprosy

¹¹ Now on his way to Jerusalem, Jesus traveled along the border between Samaria and Galilee. ¹² As he was going into a village, ten men who had leprosy^[b] met him. They stood at a distance ¹³ and called out in a loud voice, “Jesus, Master, have pity on us!”

¹⁴ When he saw them, he said, “Go, show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went, they were cleansed.

¹⁵ One of them, when he saw he was healed, came back, praising God in a loud voice. ¹⁶ He threw himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him—and he was a Samaritan.

¹⁷ Jesus asked, “Were not all ten cleansed? Where are the other nine? ¹⁸ Has no one returned to give praise to God except this foreigner?” ¹⁹ Then he said to him, “Rise and go; your faith has made you well.”

The Coming of the Kingdom of God

²⁰ Once, on being asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, “The coming of the kingdom of God is not something that can be observed, ²¹ nor will people say, ‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is in your midst.”^[c]

²² Then he said to his disciples, “The time is coming when you will long to see one of the days of the Son of Man, but you will not see it. ²³ People will tell you, ‘There he is!’ or ‘Here he is!’ Do not go running off after them. ²⁴ For the Son of Man in his day^[d] will be like the lightning, which flashes and lights up the sky from one end to the other. ²⁵ But first he must suffer many things and be rejected by this generation.

²⁶ “Just as it was in the days of Noah, so also will it be in the days of the Son of Man. ²⁷ People were eating, drinking, marrying and being given in marriage up to the day Noah entered the ark. Then the flood came and destroyed them all.

²⁸ “It was the same in the days of Lot. People were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building. ²⁹ But the day Lot left Sodom, fire and sulfur rained down from heaven and destroyed them all.

³⁰ “It will be just like this on the day the Son of Man is revealed. ³¹ On that day no one who is on the housetop, with possessions inside, should go down to get them. Likewise, no one in the field should go back for anything. ³² Remember Lot’s wife! ³³ Whoever tries to keep their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life will preserve it. ³⁴ I tell you, on that night two people will be in one bed; one will be taken and the other left. ³⁵ Two women will be grinding grain together; one will be taken and the other left.” ^[36] [e]

³⁷ “Where, Lord?” they asked.

He replied, “Where there is a dead body, there the vultures will gather.”

Footnotes

1. Luke 17:3 The Greek word for brother or sister (adelphos) refers here to a fellow disciple, whether man or woman.
2. Luke 17:12 The Greek word traditionally translated leprosy was used for various diseases affecting the skin.
3. Luke 17:21 Or is within you
4. Luke 17:24 Some manuscripts do not have in his day.
5. Luke 17:36 Some manuscripts include here words similar to Matt. 24:40.

 

Economics 101: Next lecture

 Okay, I'm back in the saddle. There are a couple of additional problems with the concept of the free market that don’t stem directly from the faulty assumptions. One is called “public goods.” These are goods that are “non-excludable,” which means that nobody owns them and you can’t require people to pay to use them; and non-rivalrous, which means that one person’s use of them does not deplete them for others.

An example is the oxygen in the air, but many public goods are created or protected by public policy. Straightforward examples are national defense and law enforcement, although obviously we can disagree about how much and what kinds of these goods we should be buying, and how to allocate the cost. Such public goods are created because they are thought to have positive externalities, that is they benefit all or most people beyond their direct recipients. Another example is public education, which creates a more productive workforce and civically competent population. If all families had to pay for their children’s education, many would not be able to afford it and some might choose not to. The result would be a much poorer society.

The road and highway network is not entirely non-rivalrous because, as I noted before, congestion makes it somewhat less valuable for everyone, and it’s also not entirely non-excludable because people without driver’s licenses or properly insured and inspected cars are technically forbidden to use it. These concepts are actually matters of degree.

The key point is that the market would produce much less in the way of roads and bridges than would be optimal for the general welfare. Investors might build a bridge or a highway here and there and make their investment back in tolls, but the result would be highly inadequate for the demands of modern commerce, work, school and social life. We can argue about the how much and what quality of public goods ought to be provided, and how the money should be raised, but the point is they are not traded in markets, and are not created in response to market demand, or not enough would be created to produce the optimum benefit to society. That is one more reason why there is no such thing as a "free market." 

Sunday Sermonette: Moral confusion

 Sorry for the light blogging lately, I'm just too gobsmacked by the barking madness that has seized the country to know how to respond. I'll gather myself anon. Meanwhile, Luke 16 is just plain weird -- actually quite insane itself.

The parable of the dishonest manager is utterly incomprehensible. The guy is going to be fired for poor performance, so he goes around to his employer's debtors and cancels have of their debt so they will be grateful to him. The employer actually commends him for this because it's shrewd. The moral Jesus takes away from it is that you should suck up to rich people so they'll take care of you, but then he immediately contradicts himself and says that you should be trustworthy with worldly property. Then, in verses 16 and 17, he contradicts himself within two sentences. Then he tells of a rich man who goes to hell because he had a good life on earth, whereas the miserable Lazarus (evidently not the same guy who was raised from the dead) goes to heaven, apparently as compensation for his sorry life on earth.

 

I am reminded of Joe Hill's song The Preacher and the Slave:

 

Long-haired preachers come out every night
Try to tell you what’s wrong and what’s right
But when asked about something to eat
They will answer in voices so sweet

CHORUS:
You will eat, bye and bye
In that glorious land above the sky
Work and pray, live on hay
You’ll get pie in the sky when you die (that’s a lie)

 

 

16 Jesus told his disciples: “There was a rich man whose manager was accused of wasting his possessions. ² So he called him in and asked him, ‘What is this I hear about you? Give an account of your management, because you cannot be manager any longer.’

³ “The manager said to himself, ‘What shall I do now? My master is taking away my job. I’m not strong enough to dig, and I’m ashamed to beg— ⁴ I know what I’ll do so that, when I lose my job here, people will welcome me into their houses.’

⁵ “So he called in each one of his master’s debtors. He asked the first, ‘How much do you owe my master?’

⁶ “‘Nine hundred gallons^[a] of olive oil,’ he replied.

“The manager told him, ‘Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it four hundred and fifty.’

⁷ “Then he asked the second, ‘And how much do you owe?’

“‘A thousand bushels^[b] of wheat,’ he replied.

“He told him, ‘Take your bill and make it eight hundred.’

⁸ “The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. For the people of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own kind than are the people of the light. ⁹ I tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.

¹⁰ “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much. ¹¹ So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches? ¹² And if you have not been trustworthy with someone else’s property, who will give you property of your own?

¹³ “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.”

¹⁴ The Pharisees, who loved money, heard all this and were sneering at Jesus. ¹⁵ He said to them, “You are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of others, but God knows your hearts. What people value highly is detestable in God’s sight.

Additional Teachings

¹⁶ “The Law and the Prophets were proclaimed until John. Since that time, the good news of the kingdom of God is being preached, and everyone is forcing their way into it. ¹⁷ It is easier for heaven and earth to disappear than for the least stroke of a pen to drop out of the Law.

¹⁸ “Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery, and the man who marries a divorced woman commits adultery.

The Rich Man and Lazarus

¹⁹ “There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. ²⁰ At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores ²¹ and longing to eat what fell from the rich man’s table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores.

²² “The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried. ²³ In Hades, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. ²⁴ So he called to him, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’

²⁵ “But Abraham replied, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony. ²⁶ And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been set in place, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.’

²⁷ “He answered, ‘Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my family, ²⁸ for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’

²⁹ “Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.’

³⁰ “‘No, father Abraham,’ he said, ‘but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’

³¹ “He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’”

Footnotes

1. Luke 16:6 Or about 3,000 liters
2. Luke 16:7 Or about 30 tons

 

Wednesday Bible Study: Redundant and repetitive

In Luke 15, JC tells three stories, two of them fairly succinct but one of them rather turgid, all of which have the exact same point. You might think it's a good point, or you might find it questionable, but he's already made it by verse 7. Yet he natters on.

15 Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus. ² But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”

³ Then Jesus told them this parable: ⁴ “Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? ⁵ And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders ⁶ and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.’ ⁷ I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.

The Parable of the Lost Coin

⁸ “Or suppose a woman has ten silver coins^[a] and loses one. Doesn’t she light a lamp, sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it? ⁹ And when she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost coin.’ ¹⁰ In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”

The Parable of the Lost Son

¹¹ Jesus continued: “There was a man who had two sons. ¹² The younger one said to his father, ‘Father, give me my share of the estate.’ So he divided his property between them.

¹³ “Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. ¹⁴ After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need. ¹⁵ So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. ¹⁶ He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything.

¹⁷ “When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! ¹⁸ I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. ¹⁹ I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired servants.’ ²⁰ So he got up and went to his father.

“But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.

²¹ “The son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’

²² “But the father said to his servants, ‘Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. ²³ Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let’s have a feast and celebrate. ²⁴ For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’ So they began to celebrate.

²⁵ “Meanwhile, the older son was in the field. When he came near the house, he heard music and dancing. ²⁶ So he called one of the servants and asked him what was going on. ²⁷ ‘Your brother has come,’ he replied, ‘and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has him back safe and sound.’

²⁸ “The older brother became angry and refused to go in. So his father went out and pleaded with him. ²⁹ But he answered his father, ‘Look! All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. ³⁰ But when this son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!’

³¹ “‘My son,’ the father said, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. ³² But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’”

Footnotes

1. Luke 15:8 Greek ten drachmas, each worth about a day’s wages