The Unmerciful Servant

Matthew 18:21-35

Then Peter came and said to Him, “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him? Up to seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven.

“For this reason the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his slaves. When he had begun to settle them, one who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him. But since he did not have the means to repay, his lord commanded him to be sold, along with his wife and children and all that he had, and repayment to be made. So the slave fell to the ground and prostrated himself before him, saying, ‘Have patience with me and I will repay you everything.’ And the lord of that slave felt compassion and released him and forgave him the debt. But that slave went out and found one of his fellow slaves who owed him a hundred denarii; and he seized him and began to choke him, saying, ‘Pay back what you owe.’ So his fellow slave fell to the ground and began to plead with him, saying, ‘Have patience with me and I will repay you.’ But he was unwilling and went and threw him in prison until he should pay back what was owed. So when his fellow slaves saw what had happened, they were deeply grieved and came and reported to their lord all that had happened. Then summoning him, his lord said to him, ‘You wicked slave, I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. Should you not also have had mercy on your fellow slave, in the same way that I had mercy on you?’ And his lord, moved with anger, handed him over to the torturers until he should repay all that was owed him. My heavenly Father will also do the same to you, if each of you does not forgive his brother from your heart.”

Jason: The parable of the Prodigal Son has a happy ending. True, there is a bit of an issue with the elder son, but there is no rebuke from the father. The ending of the parable of the Unmerciful Servant is quite different. They seem to show two sides of god: one merciful, the other wrathful. But both parables seem to have grace and forgiveness at their core.

Harry: One difference is that the Prodigal parable takes place within a family, whereas the Servant parable takes place among neighbors, not family. The latter is about forgiveness of one neighbors, about loving one’s neighbor as oneself.

David E: The bit about torture is not something I can imagine Jesus saying. I think it must have been added by the gospel writer. Both parables have a fundamental message about grace and forgiveness, and that seems to me to be the essential takeaway.

Don: The parable seems to be told for its shock value. To start with, ten thousand talons vs. 100 denarii is shockingly disparate. The first servant’s debt is ridiculously extravagant, while 100 denarii owed by the second servant sounds a pittance. The parable illustrates that grace that is hoarded is toxic and disabling. You are supposed to pass it on.

Robin: Is that the unpardonable sin?

Don: Well, it certainly seems self-destructive.

Harry: Yes, god forgives everybody, whereas the trait does not come easily to us. Maybe Jesus did say the bit about torture, just to drive home the point.

David M: In the Prodigal, the older brother was unforgiving of his younger brother, and unwilling to extend to him the same grace that his father extended to him, even though he surely saw true grace and forgiveness in his father.

Jason: That similarity between the parables certainly resonates. But the father’s reaction to the elder son in the Prodigal: “You are always with me; everything I have is yours” is very different from the master’s reaction to the Unmerciful Servant: “You wicked servant!”

Why doesn’t the father say to the elder son: “You wicked son! This is your brother! Why are you so unforgiving?”

As human beings, we want to quantify everything, including grace. Does someone who is given a lot of grace [say, 1,000 talons’ worth] owe more than one who is given a little [say, 100 denarii’s worth]? And is the person given more grace at greater risk of hoarding it?

Harry: In the Prodigal, the elder son was in a sense tortured at the end. Even though he was treated kindly by his father, he apparently remained unhappy—tortured, as it were—about the whole thing.

Robin: A parallel between the two parables in that the both the prodigal’s elder bother and the unmerciful servant were given a lot and both were forgiven a lot, but they did not want to share that grace with someone else (the younger brother and the second servant, respectively.) They could not admit that the question of who deserves love, and who should receive grace, was not theirs to decide. It was—it is—God’s. But they seemed to think that grace is something you earn through obedience and loyalty.

Don: What we may be seeing here is the application of the law to someone who wants to live according to the law. The law demands that if you renege on a loan you be sent to prison and be tortured. The Unmerciful Servant’s master is willing to suspend the law and extend grace to him, but when that servant is given the same opportunity with his own petty debtor, he refuses to suspend the law. The lesson is that if you are going to apply the law to others, then it will apply to you too.

Note, however, that the Unmerciful Servant does not end up in outer darkness, as the wedding guest did. Jesus is just saying: “OK, if that’s how you want to play the game, then be prepared to cut off your foot and pluck out your eye, because that’s how severe the law is. But if you are willing to understand and accept the economy of grace, then it will be a very different story.

Jason: So we have the free will to decide by which of those two methods—law or grace—we will be judged?

David M: Grace is always there. It’s a matter of whether we decide to go for it, as the Prodigal did, or not.

Jason: One would think everyone would choose to accept grace if offered. The issue is what you do with the grace when you get it. Do you hoard it, or do you share it?

Harry: Most people don’t want grace. They prefer the law. Maybe the law came after the Fall. Maybe it’s our attempt to put ourselves back into God’s good graces by showing him that we abide by the law.

Don: John 3 and Romans 8 state specifically that there are two paths: Law and grace, and that if you stay on the path of law, that is how you will be judged. But as Rimon said in one of our recent meetings, we not only cannot live up to the law, we seem just as incapable of living up to god’s grace, because it’s just not in our nature to accept something for nothing, to think that god will give us something so valuable as grace without our doing anything to deserve it.

David M: That is illustrated in Samuel, where Hannah offers god a reward if he’ll make her fertile.

Don: We think we need a contract with god, but grace requires no contract.

Robin: Jesus brings out this principle more clearly in Matthew 20:1-16, the parable of the vineyard laborers who get paid equal pay for different amounts of work. The worker who complains had a contract with the vineyard owner of 1 denarius for a day’s work, so the owner paid him according to that contract; whereas the latecomer, who only worked an hour or so, had no contract, and the employer was free to pay him any amount but paid him a denarius anyway. In verse 15, Jesus adds [an almost devilish twist to the knife]: “Is it not lawful for me to do what I wish with what is my own?”

Harry: If we choose to live by the law, grace is an objectionable thing. We might not say so openly, but we hate it when someone gets something for nothing. After all, we’ve worked hard for what we’ve got. We can measure it in many ways. We deserve a just reward! Or so we think. But the fact is, you can’t do this intellectually, empirically, or through measurement, at all. You can only choose, or not, the way that our great teachers—Jesus, Buddha, etc.—taught will change our lives and those of others and bring us the greatest joy.

Jason: Are those who live by the law the only ones in danger of committing the unpardonable sin?

David E: I cannot relate the unpardonable sin to these parables very well. To me, the unpardonable sin is to put oneself consciously, willfully, in a position where god cannot reach you; therefore, since you have made yourself unreachable, his pardon cannot reach you. You are unpardonable in a literal, rather than a judgmental, sense. I don’t see how that relates to these parables. I prefer to look for the simple messages in them. To me, the distinction between grace and law is a distinction between the heart and the intellect. The joy Harry talked about can only arise within the heart, when we respond to the inner light within it. That light—God’s word—tells you what is right, but in a completely unintellectual way. You know that forgiveness is right, and if you practice it, you will experience that joy. But if you purely apply your intellect and the law, then you are in effect looking away from, or dimming, the inner light and heading towards the unpardonable sin. But you haven’t fully committed it, yet. The servant forgiven the thousand-talon debt is a sinner. He is the very person Jesus reaches out to with open arms, provided he recognizes Jesus and the principle of forgiveness.

Going back to the issue of free will: When the prodigal came back and received his father’s grace, he was at the end of his rope and accepted the grace that kicked in at that point. But note that he was not required to sign a contract promising not to do it again. He did not have to give up his free will to his father. So, what if, a few months down the road, he again is tempted by the lure of Sin City and heads back out to the Far Country again!? As long as we have free will, we can exercise it one way and the other, for ever. Then: How can we ever be sure of an everlasting life in the kingdom of heaven?

Jay: Adam and Eve chose to exercise their free will and it was that choice that resulted in the Fall. The angels guarding the gate with their flaming swords are there to prevent them from coming back to exercise their free will again.

David E: But logically (uh-oh! 😉 ) one must choose even to stay in the Garden. You cannot avoid exercising your free will one way or the other. You are either going to choose not to eat the fruit, or to eat it. Either way, you must make the choice.

Harry: Our will has no bearing on God’s will. We have exercised our free will, at least since the Fall, on our own perception of what is right and good; on our own perception of the law. God’s perception of right and good and the law is different. The wedding guests were rounded up regardless of whether they were good or bad, rich or poor. Their free will didn’t matter to god. Regardless of what they chose, in the end, it was God’s will that was done. If you choose the principles of forgiveness, love, etc., then you are already in the kingdom. The prodigal’s elder brother was in the kingdom but was miserable. He was not willing to wear the garment of nakedness, the garment of the wedding feast.

Jay: The paradox of free will sure is perplexing. To me, it seems more a curse than a blessing. In heaven, only God’s will should exist. We have been taught to think of free will as a blessing, but it causes nothing but trouble.

Don: The Garden is not a democracy. It is God’s garden and subject to his will. Adam did not ask to be created, or to be given a wife. If there is a “light that lighten every man” (John 1), an “eternity” in every heart (Ecclesiastes), then that is the default position, it is the program, and it takes a conscious effort—it takes an act of will—to deviate from it. The journey from Egypt to Canaan (the metaphor for reentry to the Promised Land) was entirely in the hands of god. It was his plan, and any deviation from it was only through the exercise of man’s free will.

Robin: A king has a natural right to dictate; a dictator does not. We are dictators who want to dictate who deserves love and grace. We want to usurp the king’s, God’s, authority.

Don: In Matthew 12, the Pharisees accuse Jesus of casting out demons through false presences. They were casting doubts about his kingliness.

David E: Free will is a quantum state. It is both good and evil, it is not either/or until you observe it, whereupon you fix it in one state or the other. Which state, depends upon how you observe it, how you look upon it. If you see it as evil then it is evil, for you. But if you are in the Garden and you see that your free choice to stay in it is good, then free will is good, a blessing.