A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. Luke 10:30 (NKJV)

The Priest and The Levite – Neighbors Series – Part 5

Go to PART 1  |  PART 2  |  PART 3  |  PART 4  |  PART 5  |  PART 6  |  PART 7  |  PART 8

A man was walking down a road. Perhaps the day was warm and bright, or cool and foggy. In any case, as he was walking, he was suddenly attacked, set upon by a gang of thugs. He was stripped, robbed – they tore at his clothes and limbs – he was beaten bloody until broken, then thrown to the side of the road, left in a pile of blood and bone and flesh, without a care as to whether he would live or die.

Jesus didn’t say much more about this man. We don’t know his name; we don’t know what he did for work, whether he was leaving the temple after sacrifice or whether he was a healer on his way to visiting those in need. Did he have a family? Was he a slave? Was he a merchant or a farmer? We don’t know anything about him except that he was attacked and abandoned.

His lack of distinct identity made him relatable to the entirety of Jesus audience as he was teaching that day; they could have all put themselves in the beaten man’s position, identifying with his heartache and pain. Perhaps some of them had gone through a similar experience or had known someone who had.

And as he laid unconscious in the dirt, his wounds roasting in the sun, his life leaking onto the ground beneath him, two men walked straight past. There’s a lot of debate in the theological world as a whole as to whether or not these two men had reason to stop. Some say that as a Priest and a Levite, they would have broken Sabbath rules, or would have been made unclean if they touched the man. This idea asks us to give these two guys a break. However, it flies in the face of how others interpret the Torah: Priests, Levites, Pharisees, Sadducees, ANYONE was permitted (EXPECTED) to break the law, all of them, to save a life. It’s the higher law to uphold. But these two men didn’t stop. They kept on going.

The day before he was assassinated, Martin Luther King Jnr delivered his famous speech, “I’ve been to the Mountaintop” to a crowd of striking sanitation workers in Memphis, Tennessee. He spoke of this parable, of the Priest and the Levite. He said:

“I’m going to tell you what my imagination tells me. It’s possible that those men were afraid. You see, the Jericho Road is a dangerous road… In the days of Jesus, it came to be known as the ‘Bloody Pass.’ And you know, it’s possible that the Priest and the Levite looked over at that man on the ground and wondered if the robbers were still around. Or it’s possible that they felt that the man on the ground was merely faking, and he was acting like he had been robbed and hurt in order to seize them over there, lure them there for quick and easy seizure. And so the first question that the priest asked, the first question that the Levite asked was, ‘If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?”

In our current political and social climates around the world, I think that’s the question a lot of us are asking:

“If we extend mercy, if we look our problems full in the face, if we take responsibility even if we aren't at fault (and even if we are), if we seek to look after the earth, look out for neighbours, live in community, truly treating others how we want to be treated (hello – Luke 6:31) – what will happen to our lives as we know them right now?”

If we we're honest, this question freaks us out more than we care to admit.

Maybe, the parable is more about who did stop than who didn’t. A man was lying in a ditch, dying, and everyone who he thought would come to his rescue – everyone he expected to stop and help – kept on going. They all walked right on by acting like he wasn’t even there.

Until help came from the unexpected.

Your turn… If you extend mercy what will happen to your life? Leave us your comments below.

Go to Part 6 – The Beaten Man »

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