Luke 16
The Parable of the Clever Steward
1 So he said to his disciples: A certain man was rich who was having [a] steward, and this [one] was slandered to him as squandering his possessions. 2 And having called him he said: What is this I hear concerning you? Render account [of your] stewardship. For you are not able to be stewarding further. 3 But the steward said in himself: What will I do? For I have not the strength to dig ditches, [and] I am ashamed to beg. 4 I know what I will do, in order that when I am removed from the stewardship they receive me into their own houses. 5 And when he called each one of his own Lord's debtors he was saying to the first: How much do you owe my Lord? 6 But he said: [a] hundred baths1 or oil. So he said to him: Take the [promissory] note and having sat, quickly write fifty. 7 Then he said to the other: So how much do you owe? And he said: One hundred cors2 of wheat. He says to him: Take your [promissory] note and write eighty. 8 And the Lord praised the servant of injustice, for he did shrewdly, for the sons of this age are more shrewd than the sons of light in their own generation. 9 And I say to you, With their own make friends from the mammon of injustice, in order that, when you are omitted, they receive you into eternal shelter.10 The [one] trustworthy in little is also trustworthy in much, and the [one] unjust in little is also unjust in much. 11 If therefore you do not become trustworthy in unjust mammon, who will entrust to you the true? 12 And if in that belonging to another you do not become trustworthy, who will give to you your own? 13 No house-domestic3 is able to be slaving to two lords. Either the one he will hate and the other will he agape-love, or to the one will he cling and the other will he despise. You cannot be slaving to God and mammon4
More Warnings about the Pharisees
14 Now the Pharisees being philia-lovers of money heard all these [things], and were ridiculing him. 15 And he said to them: You are those justifying yourselves before men, but God knows your hearts, for the [thing] exalted5 among men is [an] abomination before God.16 The law and the prophets [are] until John, from then the kingdom of God is proclaimed and all forcibly enter it. 17 But it is easier that heaven and the earth pass away than for one cross-of-a-"t" to fall from the law.
18 For everyone putting6 away his woman and marrying another commits adultery, and the [one] having been sent away who marries commits adultery.
The Rich Man and Lazarus
19 But a certain man was rich, and he had put on purple garments and fine linen enjoying himself each day splendidly. 20 But a certain poor [man] by name Lazarus had been cast to his gate being covered with ulcerous sores. 21 And he was lusting to be filled from that falling from the table of the rich [one]; but even the dogs coming were licking his ulcerous sores.22 Now it came to pass the poor [man] died and was gathered by the angels to Abraham's lap7; but the rich [man] also died and was buried. 23 And in Hades8 lifting up his eyes, being in torment, he sees Abraham from afar and Lazarus in his lap9, 24 and having called out he said: Father Abraham, have mercy on me and send Lazarus in order that he dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I suffer torment in this flame. 25 But Abraham said: Child, remember that you received your good [things] in your zoe-life10 , and likewise Lazarus the evil. But now he is encouraged, and you suffer torment. 26 And in all those [things] between you [people]11 and us [a] great chasm is fixed, so that those wishing to go down from here to you be not able, nor from there to us may not cross over. 27 But he said: I ask12 you therefore, Father, in order that you may sent him to my fathers house, 28 for I have five brothers, that he may warn them, that they also not come to this place of torment. 29 But Abraham says: They have Moses and the prophets, let13 him hear from them. 30 But he said: No, father Abraham, but if someone proceed from [the] dead to them: they would repent. 31 But he said to them: If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither would they be persuaded if someone rise from the dead.
11 bath = 8–9 gallons
21 cor = 10–12 bushels
3OIKETHS: the root in this word is "house'; neither the root for "servant' nor "slave" is present in this word. The intent is a 'house-domestic', as in "house-servant' or "house-slave"
4MAMMON: the Syrian god of riches
5or "proud", "haughty"
6or "sending"
7or 'bosom'
8"Hades" (αδης ), the Greek underworld.
9or 'bosom'
10from ZOE "ZOH-ay" (ζωη)—Life 'collectively', interdependent, interconnected. Although it means 'life' in the conventional sense (for example: Matt.9:18, Matt.27:63, Luke.2:36, Acts.25:24, Rom.7:2, 2Cor.1:8, 1Thes.4:17, 1Tim.5:10, Rev.19:20), Jesus uses ZOE exclusively of 'life eternal' (with the possible exceptions of Luke.15:13, Luke.16:25). The other N.T. writers use ZOE in both senses—temporal and eternal, generally clear from the context. The Father is the 'zoe-living God' (see Matt.16:16). The Septuagint (LXX) in Gen.2:7 has "...[God] breathed into his nostrils the breath of zoe-life, and the man became a zoe-living psyche-life" (and see 1Cor.15:45); and Gen.3:20 (LXX) "And Adam called his wife's name ZOE, because she was the mother of all zoe-living." Contrast PSYCHE (ψυχη): an individual manifestation of life/consciousness. See John.12:25 where both ZOE and PSYCHE occur. Greek also has the word BIOS (βιoς ) for 'life' in the sense of biological processes.
11"you" is plural
12EROTAO (ερωταω) "Ask", but more polite, not demanding/begging as is AITEO. Both AITEO and EROTAO occur in John.16:26.
13imperative