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Law in the New Testament: The Parable of the Prodigal Son

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2009

J. Duncan  and
M. Derrett
J. Duncan
Affiliation:
London
M. Derrett
Affiliation:
England
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Extract

Luke xv. 11–32, an elaborate, circumstantial, in fact the longest, parable, calls now for the endeavours of a symposium. This paper cannot do more than open the legal aspects, which have already been handled by Professor David Daube and Professor Jean Dauvillier, and the symbolic aspects, which have been ignored. A complete investigation of the symbolism is not to be looked for until the midrashic links between the parable and its associated passages in Deuteronomy have been expounded by an expert in the technique of delivery of sermons amongst the Jews. Our parable's place in a lectionary cycle has been identified, and the implications of this also must be brought out: in part these will overlap with the work just alluded to, and in part they will reveal the early church's view of the parable's implicit significance. This work, however, will relate to the stage at which the parable became a written document, and to its worth for those who first used it in liturgy. This paper is concerned with Jesus’ own meaning, so far as we can rediscover it from the shape and content of the parable in the light of contemporary attitudes. Though this means covering ground already covered often, and much current exegesis will be confirmed, there is more by way of subtle statement and even more subtle contention in the parable than could have been realized before. Close studies of the vocabulary from Wetstein to J. Jeremias do not help us much at this stage of refinement; but it is interesting to note that in Jeremias's view, well substantiated as to the greater part of the parable, traces of the semitic origin of the document before us are visible throughout.

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Articles
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New Testament Studies , Volume 14 , Issue 1 , October 1967 , pp. 56 - 74
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1967

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References

page 56 note 1 In ‘Le partage d'ascendant et la parabole du fils prodigue’, Actes du Congrès de Droit Canonique (Cinquantenaire, 1947: Bibl. de la Fac. de Droit Can. de Paris) (Paris: Letouzey et Ané, 1950), pp. 223–8, Professor Dauvillier made a plea for the study of legal materials for the clarification of the text of the New Testament. The notion was then a noveltyGoogle Scholar. Daube, D, ‘Inheritance in two Lukan Pericopes’, Z.S.S. LXXII, rom. Abt. (1955), 327 ff.Google Scholar

page 56 note 2 Evans, C. F., ‘Central Section of St Luke's Gospel‘, Studies in the Gospels: Essays in Memory of R. H. Lightfoot (Oxford, 1957), pp. 37–53.Google Scholar R. ‘Akiba: ‘Every section in scripture is explained by the one that stands next to it’ (Sifre on Numbers, § 131). It would be highly plausible to see our parable as a sermon on Deut. xxxii. 6–26 read with Mal. i. 6a, and elaborated with the aid of Deut. xxi–xxii. Those chapters contain a series of points: (i) the worst crime can be atoned for (νν. 1–9); (ii) those whom God delivers into your hands must receive mercy from you (νν. 10–14); (iii) nevertheless justice must be observed in accordance with law, as in the example of the legal right of the firstborn as between two sons (νν. 15–17); (iv) yet a stubborn and rebellious son may be denounced (even if he is the elder) and executed (νν. 18–21); (v) and he may even hang on a tree (νν. 22–3); (vi) there-fore one must not hold back from doing good (e.g. conversion) out of self-interest (xxii. 1–4). That consecutive interpretation of this very chapter was usual in the time of the apostles is shown by Ben ‘Azzai, who linked up Deut. xxi. 10–23 ingeniously, showing how ‘transgression draws transgression in its train’ (which curiously is illustrated by the younger son's experience in the parable, but that may be a coincidence). See Midr. R. Deut. vi. 4 = Sonc. trans. 123. Luke may, as Evans suggests, have used Jesus’ words per contra, but the position may be even more subtle. The elder brother by alluding to imaginary dissipations on the younger brother's part actually suggests that the spirit of Deut. xxi. 18–21 applies, and questions whether the younger is not really stubborn, etc., and fit to be executed! The author of Genesis seems to have been aware of these points. Jacob heard his father and mother (thus contrasting with Esau, who qualified in rabbinical thought for Deut. xxi. 18–21): Philo, in the Loeb edn., Supplement I, 548–9, § 244, on Gen. xxviii. 7.

page 56 note 3 Guilding, Aileen, The Fourth Gospel and Jewish Worship (Oxford, 1960), ch. 9 (The Feast of the Dedication), esp. pp. 132–6, 138.Google Scholar The Genesis passage dealing with Joseph, and the Deuteronomy passages dealing with distribution between sons and the stubborn and rebellious son turn out to be lectionary parallels with our parable. If the parable originally was uttered at a season when these lections would be read many embarrassing problems raised by Professor Guilding's thesis would be totally obviated. The church and the evangelist would then be carrying out the author's intention, not falsifying. See below, p. 70, n. 7.

page 57 note 1 Jeremias, J., ‘Zum Gleichnis vom verlorenen Sohn, Luk. xv. 11–32’, Theol. Zeit. v (1949), 228–31.Google Scholar

page 57 note 2 N.T.S. x (1964), 22–37.Google Scholar

page 58 note 1 The hint that Jesus exercises God's prerogative of forgiveness is surely secondary.

page 58 note 2 N.T.S. vii (1961), 364–80.Google Scholar

page 59 note 1 Tatian, Rightly, Diatessaron, xxvi, 13. Indivision amongst sons who are co-heirs is another matter. Mishnah, B.B. viii, 7; ix, 3 ff. Daube, ubi cit. p. 328Google Scholar. Schniewind, Julius, Die Freude der Busse (ed. Kähler, E., Göttingen, 1956), p. 56, points out that as the father gives what is asked for so God, whom the father indicates, gives freedom to men.Google Scholar

page 59 note 2 See p. 60, n. 2 below.

page 59 note 3 Dauvillier speaks of separations initiated by the father, in Sumerian, Assyrian and Babylonian sources. Driver, G. R. and Miles, J. C. in their Babylonian Laws (Oxford, 1952–1955), as in their Assyrian Laws (Oxford, 1935), find little trace of our type of partition. An adopted child's share could be recalled for misconduct or failure to maintain (Bab. Laws, 1, 343); a gift could be made to a favourite son to take effect after death (like the Hebrew μετ⋯ τἠν τελευτήν gift, which Yaron discusses exhaustively). A gift of land normally created nothing more than a life interest: Abraham at Gen. xxv. 5. The background to the rabbinical legend of the Ishmaelites’ complaint to Alexander the Great: Gen. R. on xxv. 6 = Sonc. trans. x545–7, cf. b. Sanh. 91a; Daube, ubi cit. 331. The case in Pap. Oxyr. 1, 131 is of ambiguous implications. Judith's partition (Judith xvi. 24) could alone have enabled her beneficiaries to inherit.Google Scholar

page 60 note 1 H. T. Colebrooke, Digest of Hindu Law on Contracts and Successions with a Commentary by Jagannát'ha Tercapanchánana (sic) (various editions), book 5, ch. 2. A valid severance may be morally bad.

page 60 note 2 The leading discussion is the very thorough study by Yaron, R., Gifts in Contemplation of Death in Jewish and Roman Law (Oxford, 1960). All attempts to reconstruct our parable's legal framework would be futile without this exhaustive background. Yaron himself, with commendable caution, does not classify the transaction between the father and son at Luke xv. 12; he contents himself with saying, at p. 44, that it ‘conceivably furnishes a case of dismission’. In the present writer's view it is reasonable to call it dismission (Abschichtung), though the initiative was the son's: but the results were similar in that the son had no right to participate in his father's estate at his death.Google Scholar

page 60 note 3 So Bornhäuser, K. in his very full study at Studien zum Sondergut des Lukas (Gütersloh, 1934), pp. 103–37, at p. 105. This would be very young for emancipation, but Jewish law did not know emancipation as a means of terminating the father's moral (and later also, in emergencies, legal) right in the son's acquests. The lad's age is indicated by the extreme improbability of his being married. Had he been married he would have been settled. If he were married his sinfulness in leaving and behaving as he did would be multiplied out of all proportion and the parable would become lop-sidedGoogle Scholar. Jeremias, , op. cit. at p. 129 (Eng. trans. 1954, p. 104), agrees that he was unmarried.Google Scholar

page 60 note 4 Maimonides, , Mishneh Torah, xiv (Book of Judges), iii, vi. 9 (Lev. xix. 14. b. M.K. 17a = Sonc. trans. 107)Google Scholar. The word μέρος excludes segullāh (peculium), on the implications of which sec Cohen, B. at Proc. Am. Ac. J. R. xx (1951), 135–234.Google Scholar

page 61 note 1 This aspect is somewhat obscured in Bauer-Arndt-Gingrich, but is plainly seen in the references provided in Stephanus and in Liddell-Scott-Jones at ii. 7. The force of the έπί must not be lost sight of. It is the share which (hypothetically) is bound to come to him. Jülicher, cit. inf. ii, 338, correctly summarizes the position, but his supposition of the third must be wrong.

page 61 note 2 A father could be compelled to maintain children under puberty only from the second century: b. Ket. 65b = Sonc. 397. Those above puberty could never insist upon being maintained.

page 61 note 3 So Dauvillier, , for example, at p. 225. Bornhäuser thought the capital could, and should, remain intact (p. 107). Jeremias obtained an opposite impression.Google Scholar

page 62 note 1 Manson, T. W., Sayings of Jesus (London, 1949, 1957), pp. 286–7, thought that the father wanted to give him a share as from the moment of his death, and this the young man must have rejected. This would be a gratuitous denigration of the young man's character.Google Scholar

page 62 note 2 Jülicher, cit. inf. ii, 337, surmised correctly.

page 63 note 1 b. B.M. 1ga = Sonc. 119. Bammel, E. (N.T.S. vi, 1960, p. 315, n. 6) suggested a matenat bari.Google Scholar

page 63 note 2 The law is stated plainly at Mishnah, B. B. VIII, 7 (Danby's Mishnah, 377; Blackman, Mishnayoth-Nezikin, IV, 212): ‘If a man assigned his property in writing to his son (for) after his death, the father cannot sell it since it is assigned (or written) to the son, and the son cannot sell it because it is within the rāshūt (dominion, absolute control) of the father. If the father sold it, it is sold until he dies; if the son sold it the purchaser has no claim until the father dies.’ Bonsirven, J., Textes Rabbiniques (Rome, 1955), § 1831Google Scholar. Yaron, , op. cit. p. 49. This fits the situation described in our parable. The elder son has what is called in English law a vested interest. This metaphor is quite suitable for theological purposes.Google Scholar

page 63 note 3 Plato, , Laws, IV, 717; Arrian's Epictetus, ii, 10; Seneca, De Benef. vii, 6; Domat, The Civil Law in its Natural Order (various editions of the text and Eng. trans.), 11, ii, tit. 2, sect. 2 and § x. At Roman law children could be given beneficium bonorum quaerendorum, but they were still liable to maintain the parent: Dig. 25. 3. 5, 1Google Scholar. See Kaser, Max, Dos romische Privatrecht, II (Munich, 1959), § 226, iii, pp. 145–6Google Scholar. For Hindu law see Sontheimer, G. D., ‘The Joint Hindu Family…’, Thesis (unpubl.), Ph.D. (London, 1965), pp. 180, 207, where the texts of Haradatta on Āpastamba ii, vi, 14, 1 (vibhāgāt ūrdhvam) and Tesavalamai, I, 8 (South India and Ceylon) are noticed.Google Scholar

page 63 note 4 Exod. xx. 12; Lev. xix. 3; Deut. vi. 13; Prov. iii. 9. Maimonides, ubi cit. § 3.

page 63 note 5 References at N.T.S. x (1963–1964), 35, n. I.Google Scholar

page 63 note 6 Midr. R. Deut., trans. Rabbinowitz, J. (London, 1939), p. 122.Google Scholar

page 64 note 1 Mekilta, Bechodesh viii (Lauterbach, II, 257–8; Winter-Wünsche, , 1909, pp. 217–18).Google Scholar

page 64 note 2 Ibid. (Lauterbach, pp. 264–3; Winter-Wünsche, pp. 220–1); Philo, De Dec. xxii–xxiii (!).

page 64 note 3 Maimonides, in the chapter cited, reproduces the talmudic position. The children's duty to their father who has partitioned his property between them is referred to at length in j. Ket. iv, 28d bot. (see Schwab, , 1886, VIII, 59–60): Jastrow, Dict. s.v. shammashā’ (p. 1602)Google Scholar. Food, drink, clothing and attendance are obligatory: b. Kid. 31b–32a, even if the father greatly provokes the son, ibid. 32a = Sonc. 153–7. R. Elai said in the name of Resh Lakish (a celebrated Amora of the second generation) that it was enacted at Usha that if a man assigned all his estate to his sons in writing he and his wife might nevertheless be maintained out of it (b. Ket. 49b=Sonc. 285). R. Jonathan (an Amora of the first generation) compelled sons to maintain their fathers in such circumstances, and we can assume that the principle long antedated the ‘enactment’ at Usha. b. Ket. 49b–50a = Sonc. 286, cf. j. Ket. (Schwab, cit. sup.). See also j. Peah i. 15d.

page 64 note 4 Deut. xx. 19 (b. Hid. 32a = Sonc. 156). N. T.S. x (1963–1964), 25, n. 8. The error, that the sin adverted to in the parable was dissipation (St Thomas Aquinas, IIa IIae q. 119, a. 1, arg. 3), was very natural.Google Scholar

page 65 note 1 Philo, De Dec. xxiii (beg.). The writer rejects the suggestion of Billerbeck (Kommentar zum neuen Testament, ii, 217) that he meant that his sin was so great it reached up to Heaven (citing Ezra ix. 6, I Esdras viii. 74, Resh Lakish at ‘Arak. 15b). There is after all a big difference between ‘gegen’ and ‘bis an’. Jülicher, 348. Jülicher's view of the nature of the lad's sin seems correct.

page 65 note 2 It is not correct to observe, as Bornhäuser did, that the lad abandoned the Jewish faith. The Jews of the diaspora and on the fringes of the gentile world adopted many compromises which would not amount to this. It was observance which was in point.

page 66 note 1 Mishnah, B.K. vii, 7 (Danby, 342; Blackman, 62; Bonsirven, § 1636): ‘And no one (lect. var. no Israelite) may raise swine in any place, b'kol mākom.’ b. B.K. 82 b. Even the shepherd was despised socially on account of his flocks eating private property, whatever prestige the occupation of shepherd might have in the eyes of allegorists. Midr. on Ps., Ps. 23, § 2 (Braude, i, p. 327).

page 66 note 2 Mark v. 11–16 par. has not previously been interpreted in this way. The well-known legend about the pig, whose attempted hoisting up the walls of Jerusalem before the time of Christ caused widespread earthquakes, evidences a folk-belief that the pig itself was a forbidden object, of whose presence the Messiah was naturally bound to take notice (so the census-coin and the coins of the moneychangers in the Temple, which must either be thrown away as valueless or trampled under-foot). The topic of Jesus and forbidden objects has still to be worked out.

page 66 note 3 A further blemish in the thorough and extremely helpful study of the parable by Jeremias, J., Die Csleichnisse Jesu6 (Göttingen, 1962), p. 129. The point is seen at p. 104 of Hooke's, S. H. trans. of the third edition (London, 1954).Google Scholar

page 66 note 4 See the discussion at Dig. 31. I. 77, 21. Wetstein, , ad loc., cites I Macc. vi. 15; Gen. xli. 42; Esth. iii. 10, viii. 2.Google Scholar

page 66 note 5 Diatessaron, xxvi. 30. Theologians will compare Gal. iv. 6–7; II Cor. vi. 18. Bornhäuser, , ubi cit. p. 116. Rabbis said that God accepts as servant one who calls himself a servant: Midr. on Ps., Ps. 18, § 4 (Braude, 1, 231) citing Gen. xviii. 3; xxvi. 24; xxxii. 2; Isa. xliv. 2, etc.Google Scholar

page 67 note 1 Philo, , Supp. I, p. 522, § 224, comments on Esau's claim to be a son (Gen. xxvii. 31b) whereas, as a wicked man, he was not fit to be numbered among the attendant servants.Google Scholar

page 67 note 2 Saddharmapuntlarika, iv, pp. 99–108 of Kern's, H. trans., Sacred Books of the East, xxi (Oxford, 1884). The work was compiled in stages (the oldest Chinese trans. belongs to A.D. 265–316) and this chapter is of later growth (p. xxi)Google Scholar. Bary, W. T. de, ed., Sources of Indian Tradition (Columbia University Press, 1958), pp. 165 ffGoogle Scholar. Bergh, G. A. van den, Eysinga, van, Indische Einflüsse auf Evang. Erzählung (Göttingen, 1904), pp. 57 ff. (a second edn. appeared in 1909)Google Scholar. The relationship between Buddhist texts and the gospels is to be discussed by the present writer in Z.R.G.G. xviii (1966).Google Scholar

page 67 note 3 B. B. viii, 7. The point is not dwelt on by Yaron, , op. cit. p. 49.Google Scholar

page 68 note 1 There is a marked change after Abraham. Not only is he an eldest son himself, but the youngest at Gen. ix. 24 receives a curse.

page 68 note 2 Deut. vii. 7; Mal. i. 2–5. Galling, K., Die Erοählungstraditionen Israels (Giessen, 1928).Google Scholar

page 68 note 3 A king loved his younger son, the dirty one, better than the elder, who was clean: Midr. on Ps., Ps. 9, § 1 (Braude, 1, 131). The choice of the Jews is depicted as favouritism in the matter of dividing a paternal inheritance (ibid. Ps. 16, §6 (Braude, 1, 199)). Deut. xxxii. 8–9 is called up. The nations had their shares, but Jacob, the Lord's people, are the Lord's share. A parable of a king: he loved his youngest child most. When he was to apportion their inheritances there was one lot of great beauty which each child coveted, so the king said, ‘Let this parcel of land remain as my own portion’ (see Deut. xxxii. 8–9). He gave his own portion finally to his youngest child. This is about the land of Israel (Midr. on Ps., Ps. 5, § 1 (Braude, 1, 82)), but it could be given a spiritual application. So at ibid. Ps. 27, § 1 (Braude, 1, 365), citing Ps. xcvii. 11. Billerbeck, op. cit. p. 212 cites Gen. R. § 98 (61d) against Luke xv. 12, to the same effect as the above (Midr. R. Gen. xcviii. 6 = Sonc. trans. 11, 954).

page 68 note 4 As the Greek vocabulary testifies.

page 68 note 5 Cain, a lover of self, sacrificed and took home all but the blood… (Gen. iv. 4–5): Philo, on Cain and Abel, Suppl. I, Questions and Answers on Genesis (Loeb edn. 1953), p. 38.Google Scholar

page 68 note 6 He who sins and is ashamed is kin to him who does not sin at all, as the younger brother to the elder: Philo, ibid. p. 40 (on Gen. iv. 7).

page 68 note 7 Mishnah, Makkot 111, 15 (Danby, p. 408; Blackman, p. 329).

page 68 note 8 Abrahamo, De, ad fin. XLVI, § 274 (Colson, vi, p. 133; trans. Yonge, 11, 452). This is why Abel is mentioned mentioned first at Gen. iv. 4–5 (Suppl. I, p. 37).Google Scholar

page 69 note 1 Philo, , Suppl. I, p. 36, on Gen. iv. 2.Google Scholar

page 69 note 2 Ibid. pp. 441–2.

page 69 note 3 Ibid. p. 542, § 230 (Gen. xxvii. 37).

page 69 note 4 On the Sacrifices of Abel and Cain, pp. 42, 124–5. Cf. at Gen. xxxiii. 11 with Luke xv. 31.

page 69 note 5 Jacob and Esau dwelt together (Gen. xiii. 1 ff.; xxxvi. 6 ff.). Midr. on Ps., Ps. 25, § 14 (Braude, 1, 356).

page 69 note 6 Gen. xxxvii.

page 69 note 7 The theme of Philo's Treatise of the Life of a Man occupied with Affairs of State, or On Joseph.

page 69 note 8 Gen. xli. 42.

page 69 note 9 Gen. xlviii. 8–22.

page 69 note 10 Judg. i. 1–3, iii. 9.

page 69 note 11 I Sam. ix. 2, 21–4, x. 22–4.

page 69 note 12 I Sam. x. 27.

page 69 note 13 Judg. vii–viii.Google Scholar

page 69 note 14 b. Pes. 66b = Sonc. 338. Whoever becomes angry, even if greatness has been decreed for him by Heaven, is cast down. Eliab is the example. I Sam. xvii. 28; ibid. xvii. 6 ff. God favoured Eliab until he was angry. The rabbis say that like a first-born who is entitled to two portions of an inheritance, David inherited a double portion of kingship, one portion in this world, and the other in the world to come: Midr. on Ps., Ps. 5, § 4 (Braude, 1, 84).

page 69 note 15 I Kings i-ii.

page 69 note 16 I Sam. xvi. 12–13; I Kings ii. 15.

page 69 note 17 I Sam. xvi. 20, xvii. 20; I Kings ii. 1–9; Judg. vi. 31.

page 69 note 18 I Macc. ii. 4.

page 69 note 19 Medico, H. E. Del, ‘Le cadre historique des fêtes de Hanukkah et de Purim’, Vetus Test. xv (1965), 238–70; Judg. vi. 21; II Chron. vii. 1. Note that David was ‘answered by fire’: I Chron. xxi. 26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 70 note 1 Gen. xxvii. 9, 16. Cf. Targ. Jon. Gen. xxxvii. 31 (a kid in the Joseph story).

page 70 note 2 According to rabbinical law the stubborn and rebellious son gorges himself on beef. Mishnah, San. viii, 2, b. San. 68–70. Maimonides, ubi cit. 111 (Rebels), vii. 3.

page 70 note 3 Gen. xxvii. 15. That the robe of Esau was that of Adam, and thus the ‘first’ robe, is to be seen from Targ. Jon. on this passage. For the importance of the Targum ps. Jonathan as evidence of the midrashim that had accumulated round the Bible before Jesus’ time see Kahle, P., Cairo Geniza2 (Oxford, 1959), pp. 202–3, 208. Jülicher, at his Gleichnisreden, 11, 351, is, as usual, scornful of the identification of the robe in our parable with that which Adam lost—an identification made from at least as early as Origen (according to Jülicher) and beloved of the Council of Trent ‘nach unzähligen Vorgängern’. This is yet another example of the early church taking over and developing for its own purposes a midrash which was well established in the synagogue. The details of the legend of Adam's celestial garments are given very fully in L. Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, v, 103–4, 276–7.Google Scholar

page 70 note 4 Philo, , Suppl. I, pp. 524–5, § 227 (Gen. xxvii. 34).Google Scholar

page 70 note 5 Daube, D., ‘How Esau Sold his Birthright’, Cambridge Law Journal, viii (1942), 70–5. Obad. v. 10 is conclusiveCrossRefGoogle Scholar. Gen. xxv. 27 should be taken allegorically, says Philo, Suppl. I, pp. 450, 451–2, 489, §§ 165, 166, 199. Midr. on Ps., Ps. 9, § 7 (Braude, 1, 137). Esau was a savage (ibid. p. 139). Hated by God (Ps. 9, § 13, ibid. 146, citing Mal. i. 3). A plotter of murder (Ps. 13, § 2, 3, ibid. 182–3, referring to Jer. xlix. 7 ff.; Ezek. xxxv. 15). He pursues bodily lusts: Philo, nine citations in the index to the Loeb edn. He represents the worse part of the soul and ignorance: see e.g. Leg. All. 111, 2. He is both and . He is of an unbending character.

page 70 note 6 Targ. Jon. Gen. xxxvii. 28.

page 70 note 7 As noticed by Guilding, op. cit. p. 135.

page 71 note 1 I Sam. xxviii. 24 (LXX: δάμαλις νομάς). At Deut. xxi. 4, 6 the same animal is a satisfaction. The coincidence is to be noticed, as Deut. xxi was parallel to our chapter in the lectionary.

page 71 note 2 Judg. vi. 25, 28 (LXX). I Kings xviii. 25, 26 (note the fire from heaven at 38).

page 71 note 3 Above, p. 69, n. 14.

page 71 note 4 I Sam. xvii. 28.Google Scholar

page 71 note 5 Ibid. 29, if it refers back to vv. 17–18. A disingenuous response? But the meaning is not plain.

page 71 note 6 I Kings i. 33, 38–41, especially 41, seems strikingly like our parable, if for Joab we read Adonijah, Solomon's elder brother.

page 71 note 7 I Sam. xvii. 6; II Sam. vi; I Kings iv. 20, viii. 65.

page 71 note 8 See p. 69, n. 19 above, also Megillat Ta'anit, § 23. Schärf, Theodor, Das Gottesdienstliche Jahr der Juden (Leipzig, 1902), pp. 92–6Google Scholar. Maimonides, , op. cit. 111, x. 3Google Scholar, trans. Gandz, S. and Klein, H., Book of Seasons, Yale Jud. Ser. xiv (New Haven, 1961), 463 ff. Jos., Ant. xii, 316–25 = vii. 6–7; Contra Ap. 11, 118 = ii. 9. Philo, De Congr. Erud. Gratia xxi, § 114 (Colson, iv, 514–17).Google Scholar

page 71 note 9 I Sam. xvi. 2, 5.

page 71 note 10 Judith xvi. 20.

page 71 note 11 Ezek. xxxiii, xxxiv, xxxvii are most apt.

page 72 note 1 Jeremias' interpretation sees the behaviour of the father as an indication of the nature of God, which must be correct. A view which anticipated that expressed here appeared in Schippers, R., Gelijkenissen van Jezus (Kampen, 1962), pp. 162 ff. Bornhäuser saw the father as Jesus.Google Scholar

page 72 note 2 Lev. xxv. 50 (equality of Jews) is pointed to by τω⋯ν μισθίων σου.

page 72 note 3 N.T.S. vii (1961), 208.Google Scholar

page 73 note 1 Midr. on Ps., Ps. 10, § 6 (Braude, 1, 155), Ps. 14, § 2, 3 (ibid. 183–4); Ps. 17, § 12 (ibid. 217). Cf. Ps. 21, § 3 (ibid. p. 295). The Messiah will trample Edom down: ibid. on Ps. lx. 10 (Braude, 1, 516). Jer. Targ. Gen. xv. 16; b. Ber. 62b.

page 73 note 2 Targ. Jon. at Gen. xxvii. 27 clearly identifies Esau's garment when worn by Jacob as a priestly robe to be worn in the Temple. Allegories listed by St Jerome may well reveal traces of midrashic activity in the early church, e.g.…duos filios, Judaeos et gentes, quia Judaeis prius data est lex. See Migne, , PL, 30, coll. 574–5Google Scholar, Ambrose, ad loc., PL, 15, col. 1761. Like Philo, Jerome sees in agro as signifying immundo desiderio. Very similar to the Latin allegories are those of ps. Chrysostom, PG, 59, coll. 515–22Google Scholar. Jülicher, A., Die Gleichnisreden Jesu 2, 1 (Tübingen, 1910), ch. 6.Google Scholar

page 73 note 3 See references in previous note.

page 73 note 4 For a discussion of the midrash see Doeve, J. W., Jewish Hermeneutics in the Synoptic Gospels and Acts (The Hague, 1953), p. 109Google Scholar. See also Letter of Barnabas xiii, 2. Schoeps, H. J., Aus frühchristlicher Zeit (Tübingen, 1950), p. 154.Google Scholar

page 74 note 1 I Cor. i. 26–9: Christians are prestigeless but chosen.

page 74 note 2 The writer expresses acknowledgements to Dr Gertner for an explanation of the importance of the ‘younger-brother’ theme, and to Dr P. Stuhlmacher (Tübingen) for forwarding some material. Some of the study upon which this paper is based was done in Germany, part of the expenses of which stay were met by the Central Research Funds of the University of London.