Rich man and Lazarus

Do you know what your name means?

My name means “Gift of God”

My brother, Andrew, simply means “Manly”

My Sister, Naomi, means “Beautiful and Gentle”

When my friend told me his wife was pregnant the first thing that everyone asked him was “have you decided on a name yet?” Names are important and today’s reading from Luke is no different. We get a lot of information just from the title “The Rich man and Lazarus”.

Why is it that the rich man isn’t named but the poor man is?

I feel that the reason for this is to set out from the start what type of man the story is talking about. He is a man who defines himself by his belongings, he is nothing without his money and his belongings, whereas Lazarus has a name, and his name gives away a little about the meaning of the story as well as Lazarus means “God has helped”.

I’m sure this was no accident as Jesus knew exactly what he was doing and why. You may be interested to know that Jesus was using a story which most people around him would have known already, probably in the same was as we know stories such as the princess and the pea, people of the time would have known a story about a rich man and Lazarus. Jesus, however, did make some alterations to the story – and they were pretty major changes.

In the usual version of the story the rich man and poor man are described in life and then in the afterlife we find that the rich man is still being blessed by God while the poor man is being punished by God. The story was used to show how the wealthy and successful people are wealthy and successful because of God’s blessings and the poor and the outcast have that fate because God is punishing them in the here and now.

This story, in its usual form, taught the very opposite of Jesus’ teachings that the last will be first and the first will be last.

Let’s remember the setting. Jesus is speaking with the Scribes and Pharisees who are openly making fun of Jesus teaching while he is teaching. Jesus has been teaching about the right use of money, saying that we should reach out and help others in need as a part of being thankful to God for all God has done for us. The Scribes and Pharisees find this teaching laughable as they understand that those who are well off should not help the poor and the needy as the poor and needy are in that condition because of God’s judgment. We wouldn’t want to interfere with God’s judgments would we? No, so leave the poor to fend for themselves. They laugh at Jesus and who tells the story of an unnamed Rich Man and a beggar named Lazarus.
It is worth noting that there is one point on which both the Pharisees and Jesus agree. They are both teaching that how one acts in the here and now is a good indicator of how things will be for that person in the hereafter. The Pharisees look to the external conditions of a person as a sign of God’s blessing. Jesus looks beyond outward appearance to see the heart. While we learn nothing of Lazarus’ heart in this story, we do learn that the rich man had no room in his heart to share some of his great riches with a needy person at his gate.

Jesus, of course, turns the story on its head and looking at some of those details Jesus added. For example, Jesus describes the rich man’s lifestyle making sure we know that this man dressed in purple and fine linen. Purple was very expensive to make and while not reserved exclusively for royalty, it took a very wealthy person to afford it. The same was true for fine linen, the word here likely referring to expensive Egyptian cloth.

Jesus also added the poor man’s name, which as we’ve already heard, is very significant. The name Lazarus means “God Helps.” But what makes the naming even more significant is that that Jesus named the un-nameable one in the usual story. And then added the detail that dogs licked his wounds to make sure we knew how down on his luck this man was. Dogs were unclean animals and a man licked by dogs would have been considered unfit to worship in the Temple in Jerusalem.

Finally, Jesus said that Lazarus rested in Abraham’s bosom—the word can mean lap as well and denotes here a place of honour. Imagine the gathered crowd’s faces when they hear that of all people, it is a sick beggar whose open sores have been licked by dogs that get this ultimate place of honour.

To make things worse, the rich man appeals to Abraham as his father, showing that he considered himself a faithful Jew, one who Jesus would say should have known how to treat a fellow human. The rich man clearly thought that he would be with God after death and now calls on his ancestor Abraham for help and makes things even worse for himself if this is possible. The Rich Man asks Abraham to send Lazarus back to talk to his family. In doing so he admits to knowing Lazarus by name, showing further that he was aware of the poor man’s desperate need, yet did nothing.

One thing I should note. As Jesus is using a known story and changing some details to make a point, we can safely assume that Jesus is not necessarily teaching that when we die we will be looking down on those we have known in this life who did not make the cut and shout back and forth across some great divide about what to do next. It’s best to leave the story as a story explaining further Jesus’ teachings on the right use of God’s blessings.

It also helps to know that in the verses leading up to today’s reading, Jesus had just told these same Scribes and Pharisees, “…God knows your hearts; for what is prized by human beings is an abomination in the sight of God” (NRSV). The word there for abomination was usually used to describe idolatry. Jesus names their selfish use of God’s blessings as being a form of idol worship, making the wealth, success and blessings into the greatest good. Certainly we can see that in our own day some people will sacrifice everything—family, friends, everything—to get ahead.

Jesus warns that our aspirations to success, money and things can turn our blessings into idols. Do our possessions serve us and help us to serve others, or do we serve our possessions? The rich man could have used his blessing of wealth to help outcasts like Lazarus, but instead he used his money for fine clothes and expensive feasts. It echoes the message from Luke 12:34, “For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”
Both the Pharisees and Jesus agreed that how one acts in the here and now is a good indicator of the hereafter. For the Pharisees, it was all about honour, wealth and success. For Jesus the here and now is all about being the hands and feet of God to reach out in love. Jesus warned quite clearly that we who have been blessed by God have an obligation to share those blessings with others. He made a stark comparison revealing that it is the content of the heart that matters to God.

Does all this mean we should be giving away everything that we don’t actually need and distribute our wealth in some sort of scheme so that everyone gets an equal share? I doubt it but it does mean that we should be asking God to help change our hearts so that we find it easier to avoid turning human wealth into false Gods which lead us further away from the riches that actually matter.

Jesus told the story to point out to how far they had gone away from the teachings of Moses and the Prophets, and ended it with the line “If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone raises from the dead.” We now hear the same story and have had the person being risen from the dead; the question is will we listen?

And the only person who can answer that question is you!