Four Teachings from Jesus that Amy-Jill Levine Gets Wrong

An article by Vanderbilt professor Amy-Jill Levine has been popping up on my Facebook newsfeed lately. The title is catchy: “4 teachings from Jesus that everybody gets wrong.” Levine claims to offer the right interpretation to four of Jesus’ parables. She also claims that “everybody” has wrongly interpreted these teachings – everybody, that is, except Levine herself. (Gee thanks, right?)

Though this little blog is nowhere near as popular as CNN’s, I can’t help but offer a rebuttal of Levine’s interpretations. I’ll address each one in order.

1.       The Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32)

According to Levine, Jesus’ parable about the prodigal son is not really about sin and forgiveness (i.e. our Father in heaven forgives those who repent of their sin and return home to Him). Rather, it is a parable “about counting, and making sure everyone counts.”

The father “counts” the younger son who returns. The older son “counts” himself when the father fails to invite him to the celebration. The moral of the story? Everyone counts.

According to Levine, we can reach this conclusion when we consider the parables preceding this one, namely the Parables of the Lost Sheep and the Lost Coin. Those parables are not about the “joy in heaven over one sinner who repents,” but about making sure each and every person counts.

The problem? Jesus himself says those parables are about the “joy in heaven over one sinner who repents.” But Levine attributes Jesus’ words to “the evangelist” (presumably Luke) and then goes on to dismiss them as an incorrect interpretation.

If one does not attend closely to Levine’s argument, it’s easy to miss what she’s doing here. But make no mistake, she is taking Jesus’ interpretation of his own parable, attributing that interpretation to “the evangelist,” and then saying “the evangelist” got it wrong.

If, contrary to Levine, we believe those words (about “joy in heaven over one sinner who repents”), then the Parable of the Prodigal Son is again about God our Father’s graciousness toward repentant sinners. It is again about not begrudging God’s grace toward our brother who has sinned. And it is again about the joy of going from death to life, from lost to found.

2.       The Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37)

According to Levine, this parable is not really about loving our neighbor. Nor is it about the fact that our neighbor is each and every person we come across, no matter how unlovely he or she may be.

Nope, this parable is about how “our enemy may be the very person who will save us.” According to Levine, our enemy is represented by the Samaritan and “we are the person in the ditch.”

Never mind that Jesus concludes the parable, “Go and do likewise.” Though Jesus himself wants to interpret the parable as a lesson about who our neighbor is (everyone!) and how to treat him (love!), Levine prefers her own interpretation. After all, through Levine’s scholarly eyes, “we can see the import of this parable for the Israeli/Palestinian crisis.”

Um, really? I have no problem putting ourselves in the place of the man in the ditch, but if we’re going to do that, then we ought to interpret the Good Samaritan as Jesus. He’s the one who bandages up the wounded (sinners!), pours on him oil (the Holy Spirit!) and wine (the Eucharist!), brings him to an inn (the Church!), and tells the innkeeper (the pastor!) to take care of the now-recovering man. Sin has ruined this man; Christ has saved him and put him on the way to recovery.

And yet, even if we put ourselves in the place of the man in the ditch, we cannot stop there. Jesus’ desire is that we, in turn, emulate the Good Samaritan. Levine’s intentions aren’t malicious, but somehow she misses the command to “go and do likewise.” We are to be like the Good Samaritan, loving and caring for each and every person we come across.

3.       The Parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard (Matthew 20:1-16)

The workers work for various periods of time, the master pays them all the same wage, and then the longer-working workers complain. In the conclusion, the master tells them not to begrudge his generosity.

According to Levine, this parable is not about God’s grace toward those who’ve served him only a short period. It’s “not a parable about salvation in the afterlife but about economics in present.”

Okay, I get it: Levine wants people to have jobs and also thinks a fair wage is important. I agree. However, that’s not what this parable is about. The master is not just some random employer, and the vineyard is not just a random place of work. “Master” literally means “lord,” and “his vineyard” is a long-used metaphor for his Kingdom. (See Isaiah 5:7.)

Jesus is indeed teaching about the economy, but not the economy of mammon Levine has in mind. He’s teaching about the economy of grace, in which each person, no matter how long he’s labored to walk in the ways of the Lord, receives the same grace. “Well done good and faithful servant” will be said just as much to the thief on the cross as to John of Patmos.

Not convinced? Apply Levine’s method of interpretation to the Parable of Talents in Mathew 25:14-30. In that parable, the man who turns his five talents into five more talents is lauded by his master. Likewise with the man who turns his two talents into two more. But then there’s the man who hid his one talent in the ground. He’s called a wicked and lazy servant, and his talent is taken away from him.

The conclusion? “To all who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.” (Matthew 25:29) Would Levine say that this, too, should guide our economic policies? Somehow I doubt it. Again, lest we fall into downright absurd interpretations and applications, we must read these parables as parables of God’s Kingdom. They are about economies not of mammon, but of grace.

4.       The Parable of the Pearl of Great Price

Levine points out that this parable never identifies what the pearl of great price actually is. And so, she assumes that the pearl is whatever each person wants it to be. She asks, “What if the parable challenges us to determine our own pearl of great price?”

Yeah, what if? What if I determine that my pearl of great price is sex, or money, or fame? Many people have thought that some created thing is the pearl that will fulfill them. But to turn a created thing into one’s “ultimate concern” (Levine’s language, perhaps borrowed from Paul Tillich) is called idolatry. And in the end, all idols fall apart and break the hearts of those who worship them.

There is only one pearl of great price, and his name is Jesus. To know his grace and to have his Spirit is to lay hold of what really matters: the love of God. That alone is worth forsaking everything for. Anything less would be absurd.

A Final Word

Ultimately, it seems Levine wants to discount the possibility of these parables being about God and about his Kingdom of Heaven. In fact, she makes the same a-theistic move in all four of her interpretations, leaving each parable bereft of God and void of anything supernatural.

Those who would follow Levine cannot do so without jettisoning the notion of “joy in heaven over one sinner who repents.” They must jettison the all-too-obvious reality of sin, the all-too-necessary call to repentance, and the all-too-hard-to-believe promise of grace.

Maybe I’m wrong or just not scholarly enough, maybe I’m Levine’s “everybody”, but I believe in all those things that her article wants to dismiss. That is to say, I believe in the God whose grace saves sinners from ruin and whose Son is Jesus.