Comments on: luke 15 | max reder http://eternityforus.edublogs.org/2008/05/30/max-reder-luke-15/ online theological training Mon, 02 Jun 2008 15:20:28 -0400 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.2 hourly 1 By: eternityforus http://eternityforus.edublogs.org/2008/05/30/max-reder-luke-15/comment-page-1/#comment-11 eternityforus Thu, 29 May 2008 19:25:59 +0000 http://eternityforus.edublogs.org/?p=18#comment-11 Response from Max Reder: In regard to your response - you touched only the top, there is much more under the surface.. Yours in Him Max Response from Max Reder:

In regard to your response – you touched only the top, there is much more under the surface..

Yours in Him
Max

]]> By: eternityforus http://eternityforus.edublogs.org/2008/05/30/max-reder-luke-15/comment-page-1/#comment-10 eternityforus Thu, 29 May 2008 19:23:23 +0000 http://eternityforus.edublogs.org/?p=18#comment-10 First of all I am very sorry that my response is not in your eloquent Russian but in simple English. I wished I could express myself as you do. I honestly and highly appreciate your approach of fairness and even warmth when it comes to the gentiles and how they pictured God. Before we go to the heart of the issue there is a little detail I would like to carefully correct: The discussion goes not about later translations or comments but about the earliest Koine-Greek Luke-Acts texts that are available to us. Younger commentators are important but so far not relevant for our discussion here. There is a lot of evidence that during Luke's redaction Jewish and Hellenistic Jesus believers were still living in a kind of peaceful co-existence. I am not denying that there were problems from the beginning. But these problems were a burden that the Jesus community inherited from the Jewish community. They existed already within the Jewish congregation before the Jesus community emerged. Having that said I can't read any negative or even judging connotation in the author's way of presenting the older son. Just the opposite: In fairness he shows them both as "prodigals". The only difference is that despite all hard working the older son has an obvious communication problem with the father. He doesn't understand the father's heart and he doesn't get the clue about what happened with the deep repentance of his brother. The tragedy seems to be that the older brother is the looser in the story because not status, work and rang count but a living relation. The younger brother has nothing to bring to the table, but he genuinely begins to communicate with his father, probably the first time in his life. He runs just into the open arms of his father. He seems to be the winner. I know that this interpretation sounds very painful in Jewish ears. And yet it is a very Jewish approach to the subject. Isaiah and other prophets not only once lamented the blindness of the Jewish community towards their God, a lack of communication that definitely ends up in spiritual death. Unfortunately later antisemitism made it almost impossible for Jewish readers to get the point in this great parable. Both sons alike need to repent and to find back to the Father's heart. He is waiting with open arms. First of all I am very sorry that my response is not in your eloquent Russian but in simple English. I wished I could express myself as you do.
I honestly and highly appreciate your approach of fairness and even warmth when it comes to the gentiles and how they pictured God.
Before we go to the heart of the issue there is a little detail I would like to carefully correct: The discussion goes not about later translations or comments but about the earliest Koine-Greek Luke-Acts texts that are available to us. Younger commentators are important but so far not relevant for our discussion here.

There is a lot of evidence that during Luke’s redaction Jewish and Hellenistic Jesus believers were still living in a kind of peaceful co-existence. I am not denying that there were problems from the beginning. But these problems were a burden that the Jesus community inherited from the Jewish community. They existed already within the Jewish congregation before the Jesus community emerged.
Having that said I can’t read any negative or even judging connotation in the author’s way of presenting the older son. Just the opposite: In fairness he shows them both as “prodigals”. The only difference is that despite all hard working the older son has an obvious communication problem with the father. He doesn’t understand the father’s heart and he doesn’t get the clue about what happened with the deep repentance of his brother. The tragedy seems to be that the older brother is the looser in the story because not status, work and rang count but a living relation. The younger brother has nothing to bring to the table, but he genuinely begins to communicate with his father, probably the first time in his life. He runs just into the open arms of his father. He seems to be the winner.
I know that this interpretation sounds very painful in Jewish ears. And yet it is a very Jewish approach to the subject. Isaiah and other prophets not only once lamented the blindness of the Jewish community towards their God, a lack of communication that definitely ends up in spiritual death.
Unfortunately later antisemitism made it almost impossible for Jewish readers to get the point in this great parable. Both sons alike need to repent and to find back to the Father’s heart. He is waiting with open arms.

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