Who Is My Neighbour:

A Brief Survey of the Historic Interpretation of Luke 10: 25 - 37

By

Braden Campbell
MDiv Program
SID 400048747

Stories of the Kingdom: Preaching the Parables of Jesus

MS3XN3
Dr. Michael Knowles
Nov 7, 2019

(Resubmission: Dec 11, 2019)

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A man on his way from Jerusalem to Jericho is attacked and left for dead by robbers. Lying

there, he is passed by first a priest and then, later, a Levite. Finally, a Samaritan comes upon him,

and moved with compassion, binds up his wounds and leaves him at a nearby inn. The rescuer

even goes so far as to ensure that the man’s medical bills are sufficiently paid. He alone appeared

to be a neighbour to the beaten man when all others refused.

This parable, known most commonly as “The Good Samaritan,” is arguably the most famous

of them all. So widely known is it, that its descriptive title has become an idiom; whenever a

stranger provides aid or performs an act of kindness to a recipient that he or she does not know,

they are deemed to be a “good Samaritan” regardless of their actual nationality or ethnic

background. Many countries, including Canada, have Good Samaritan Laws which protect non-

medical professionals who lend aid during an emergency from being sued for injury. Across the

centuries, it has been interpreted in nearly every way imaginable – from a tale about ritual purity,

to a lesson about personal safety. Starting with Margaret Thatcher’s observation that no one

would remember the Smartian at all save the fact that possessed money, the parable has even

been to mean that Christians are to “get strong financially and stay strong financially so we can

have the means to act on our good intensions.”1

The story itself has become, as Keezmaat writes, “so domesticated that it is hard to see

anything new it.”2

In its original context, the parable is told as a direct answer to an “expert in the law”

(Luke 10:25) who tries to draw out from Jesus the exact definition of who does and does not

qualify as being a “neighbour.” His presumption is that the Lord’s command to love said

neighbours must surely have exceptions. This may be the point at which the specificity of the

1
Plemon, “5 Lessons Learned,” para 8.
2
Keezmaat, “Strange Neighbours”, 276.
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parable begins its long to slide into appropriated haziness. The original hearers hated Samaritans

just as much as Samaritans hated the Jews, and so when the parable was first told, it packed a

specific kind of punch. Jesus’s story completely redefines the term “neighbour” to include even

dedicated cultural enemies. However, as the story spread into the Gentile world, this aspect

became less and less discernable.

Early church theologians often interpreted the parables allegorically. Robert Stein writes

that this trend came about because it was “popular to allegorise the heroes of Homer and their

actions in order to satisfy the scruples of the morally sensitive. Allegory was the means by which

the actions of these ancient heroes, whose morality and standards were no longer acceptable,

could be adapted and still be useful to later generations.”3 This approach was then applied in a

similar way to Scripture by church fathers who came from a Hellenistic background. Irenaeus

(ca.130-ca.200), and Tertullian (ca.160-ca. 220) both treated the parables allegorically, with the

former seeing the Good Samaritan as Christ, the wounded man as humanity, and Satan in place

of the robbers.4 Their contemporary, Clement of Alexandria (ca.150-ca.215), also saw everything

in the parable as standing for something else entirely. He pointed out the Samaritan does not

come along by chance, but is in fact, fully prepared – he carries with him bandages, oil, and

money enough to pay an innkeeper. “Who else can this be,” he wrote, “but the Saviour himself…

he who poured over our wounded souls the wine, the blood of David’s vine; this is he who has

brought and is lavishing on us the oil, the oil of pity from the Father’s heart; this is he who has

shown us the unbreakable bands of health and salvation, love, faith and hope.”5

3
Stein, Introduction to the Parables, 43.
4
Roukema, “Good Samaritan,” 59-60.
5
Roukema, “Good Samaritan,” 60-61.
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A Latin translation of thirty-nine of Origen’s homilies on Luke (delivered between 233

and 234) show that he supported the idea that the parable was actually an allegory for the Fall of

Man; the man going down is Adam, Jerusalem is paradise, and Jericho is the world. However,

for Ambrose of Milan (339 – 390), the man is going down from Jerusalem to Jericho had nothing

to do with the Fall, and everything to do the conflict martyrs face against the pleasures and

comforts of the world.

The allegorical method of interpretation reigned in Christian theological centers like

Lyons, Carthage, Alexandria, Caesarea, Milan, and Hippo. However, there was some protest

against it from the church fathers in Antioch, but they went largely unheard.6 The truth is that

this method allowed the leaders of the early church to apply the parable of the Good Samaritan to

whatever theological crisis was at hand, be it the nature of Christ, or to argue against the

Gnostics, or as in the case of Augustine to react against the Pelagian view of baptism.7 Centuries

later, D. R. Dungan would rail against such a method, saying that it “treats the word of God as if

it had only been intended to be a kind of combination of metaphors--a splendid riddle.

Interpreting by this method is not exegesis but eisegesis-- they do not obtain the meaning of the

text, but thrust something into it.”8

The church continued to look at the parables (and the whole of Scripture) through an

allegorical lens throughout the Middle Ages. However, with the dawning of the Reformation, it

was strongly opposed at last. Allegorizers, Luther said, were “clerical jugglers performing

monkey tricks.”9 John Calvin asserted that the speculations derived from the allegorical method

6
Stein, Introduction to the Parables, 46-47.
7
Roukema, “Good Samaritan,” 70.
8
Dungan, Hermeneutics, 60.
9
Deppe, All Roads, 238.
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were “quite divorced from the mind of Christ.”10 Still, the method and the images it invoked,

remained popular. John Newton (1725-1807), for example, who wrote the timeless hymn

Amazing Grace, also composed the lesser known How Kind the Good Samaritan, which includes

the following lyrics:

How kind the good Samaritan

To him who fell among the thieves!
Thus Jesus pities fallen men,
And heals the wounds the soul receives.

Adolf Jülicher made a concerted effort to stifle allegorical interpretation of the parables

with the publication of his 1886 book, Die Gleichnisreden Jesu. It was this work that first

attempted to cut away centuries of misinterpretation and get back to the point of the original

parable. For Jülicher, this was “the kingdom” (die unsichtbare Welt, or “the unseen world”):

each and every parable told by Jesus was done so to point to or describe, the kingdom by

comparing to the everyday world. He also insisted that the interpretation of a parable could only

ever reveal a general truth. However, when he applied his rubric to the Good Samaritan, he

found that it did not fit so easily into it. This story took place entirely within the kingdom.11

Today, the parable has regained some of its original impact in that it is often applied to

any setting where people of equivalent social groups fail to interact comfortably. Perhaps the

most famous example of this would be its inclusion in Martin Luther King, Jr.’s I've Been to the

Mountaintop speech in which King described the Samaritan as being “a man of another race”

who refuses to be “compassionate by proxy.” The modern takeaway would therefore seem to be

a call to demonstrate lavish, sacrificial love upon any and all; that in the smashing down of

bigotry, the kingdom (as Jülicher might say) is displayed. Stein encapsulates this attitude when

10
Calvin, A Harmony of the Gospels, 3:39
11
Wright, The Voice of Jesus, 118.
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he writes: “It is clear that the parable of the good Samaritan teaches us to love our neighbour and

this love is to unconditional and unqualified. The parable rejects all prejudice and discrimination

whether it be racial, intellectual, financial, religious, nationalistic, etc, which in any way would

restrict our doing acts of love.”12

More recent interpretative debates have begun to focus on the framework within which

the parable is told, namely, that it is a response to a specific man who asked the very specific

question, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” (Luke 10:25) Jesus engages the man in a

discussion of the law, knowing full well the questioner is not seeking genuine wisdom but only

to justify himself (10:29), and it is therefore out of that legalistic angle that the corollary question

of “who is my neighbour” is asked. The answer is, of course, “everyone,” but within the

legalistic discussion surrounding the parable, the answer is more accurately “everyone, all the

time, and perfectly.” Do that, Jesus says, and you will live.

“Jesus told the parable of the good Samaritan in order to show what an impossibly high

standard the law sets for us. And it is a rebuke not just to the lawyer, but to all of us. If we

always truly loved our neighbours the way we love and care for ourselves, the Samaritan’s

generosity would not seem so remarkable.”13 In other words, the point of the story is less “love

everyone, for everyone is your neighbour” and more “you cannot attain eternal life through

charitable works, for human efforts always fall short of the perfection God’s law demands.”

Keesmaat however advocates caution in relying too heavily on the original context

approach, lest our engagement with the text become too safe and too far removed from our own

world.14 These are words of hope as much as they are words of challenge – the love shown by

12
Stein, An Introduction to the Parables, 79.
13
MacArthur, Parables, 92.
14
Keesmaat, “Strange Neighbours”, 263.
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the Samaritan to the beaten man was meant force the expert in the law to revaluate (even repent

of) his worldview, and its intention for us today is no different.

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Bibliography

Calvin, John. A Harmony of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, ed. D. W. Torrance and T.
F. Torrance, trans. A. W. Morrison. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1994.

Deppe, Dean B. All Roads Lead to the Text: Eight Methods of Inquiry into the Bible: a Template
for Model Exegesis with Exegetical Examples Employing Logos Bible Software. Grand
Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2011.

Dungan, D. R. Hermeneutics: A Text-Book. Updated Third Edition. Charleston, AR: Cobb

Publishing, 2018.

Forbes, Greg W. The God of Old: The Role of the Lukan Parables in the Purpose of Luke’s
Gospel. Sheffield: Sheffield Acad. Press, 2000.

Keesmaat, Sylvia C. “Strange Nighbours and Risky Care (matt 18:21-35; Luke 14:7-14; Luke
10:25-37).” In The Challenge of Jesus’ Parables, 263-285. Ed. Richard N. Longnecker.
Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2000.

MacArthur, John. Parables. Nashville: Nelson Books, 2015.

Plemon, Joe. “The parable of the Good Samaritan: 5 Lessons Learned.” Crosswalk, June 6, 2019.
No pages. Online: https://www.crosswalk.com/family/career/the-parable-of-the-good-
samaritan-5-lessons-learned.html

Roukema, Riemer. “The Good Samaritan in Ancient Christianity.” Vigiliae Christianae, Vol 58,
Num 1. Feb, 2004. 56-97.

Stein, Robert H. An Introduction to the Parables of Jesus. Philadelphia, 1981.

Wright, Stephen I. The Voice of Jesus: Studies in the Interpretation of Six Gospel Parables.
Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2007.