A Fresh Perspective

Martha Sterne, in her little book, Earthly Good: Reflections of Life and God , tells about the time an old friend morphed into an unacceptable person. Mrs. Caldwell, who Martha knew was a teacher somewhere, lived a few doors down. She would stop by their house from time to time with treats. She taught her little songs, how to play canasta, and took a wonderful picture of her and her cat. Mrs. Caldwell, says Martha, had fat sausage curls all over her head, just like Aunt Pitty-Pat in Gone with the Wind . And on each cheek was a small, bubblegum-pink, perfectly round circle of rouge. Martha says that she knew Mrs. Caldwell was very beautiful because she loved her and showed it. Well, the years went by. They moved to a new neighborhood. Martha says she worked very hard in junior high to become cool and achieved a kind of fragile success. Then on the first day of her sophomore year in fourth period class guess who turns out to be her algebra teacher? Mrs. Caldwell – complete with saus...

When we read this parable (Luke 18:9-14), we are automatically prejudiced against the Pharisee. In fact, Luke turns us against the Pharisee in his introduction to the parable. Luke says that Jesus told this to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and regarded others with contempt (18:9). Right off we judge the Pharisee as bigoted, judgmental, exclusionary, self-righteous, condescending, and so forth. In the Synoptic Gospels, the Pharisees function somewhat symbolically or representatively of toxic religion or legalistic religion in general. So, we immediately distance ourselves from the Pharisee. In the original setting, when Jesus first told this story, this would have been reversed. The original hearer would have favored the Pharisee and been biased against the tax collector. We read the story as if the tax collector were a good guy; just someone who got caught up with the wrong crowd, while the Pharisee is a pinch-nosed snob. But it would have been ve...