Preaching Paths 26 October 2025, Proper 25C

Sally A. Brown, Professor Emerita, Princeton Theological Seminary

Luke 18:9-14, another parable unique to Luke, continues the theme of prayer introduced in last week’s reading (18:1-8), but with a different emphasis. Last week’s reading underscored the need for steadfastness in prayer. This week, Jesus again sets side by side two contrasting individuals—this time, a law-observant but self-assured Pharisee and a sinful tax collector. This week’s text underscores the utter dependence on the mercy of God that befits prayer among Jesus’ followers.

As with other Lukan texts that we have encountered, preachers are advised to avoid a disdainful, derogatory tone in presenting the Pharisee pictured here. It will be helpful to our congregations if we remind them that Jesus himself was Jewish, and always remained Jewish. His piercing criticisms of certain of the Pharisees reflect vigorous debates within first century Jewish communities about the correct practice of Jewish faith. Most Pharisees were faithful and devout, sincerely committed to maintaining the observance of Torah, which formed the core of Jewish identity. Upholding Torah was all the more necessary for the integrity of Jewish faith and culture under Roman occupation.

Too often, Christian preachers setting out to preach this parable have cast aside its original,  intrinsically Jewish context and rhetorical impact. The tendency is to reframe the parable anachronistically, in a Pauline, “justification-by-faith” schematic. This results in homiletical malpractice: preachers rail against “useless” Jewish observance of Torah compared with the tax collector’s presumed dependence on the saving work of Jesus—a framework foreign to Luke.

Truth be told, religious devotion of any sort can devolve into judgmental arrogance; this has been true in Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and every other religion across human history. Arrogant self-confidence is the problem with the particular Pharisee that Jesus describes in this parable, not all Pharisees everywhere. Tax collectors were, by definition (thanks to their collusion with Rome’s onerous system of taxation) unable to fulfill the demands of Mosaic law. What this particular Pharisee is missing, and what this particular tax collector gets (albeit hopelessly mired in Roman oppression) is the centrality of divine mercy in Jewish tradition, both the Law and the Prophets.

Ironically, when preachers presume (anachronistically) that the tax collector represents the Pauline doctrine of justification by faith, while the Pharisee represents all (“sadly mistaken”) observant Jews, we wrap ourselves in precisely the judgmental religious arrogance that Jesus’ parable condemns!

Here, Jesus shows us that, whether we—his followers in our own time and place—are getting everything right, or find ourselves endlessly mired in unholy alliances and patterns of behavior, our prayers need to flow from the recognition that, in all circumstances, we are utterly dependent on the mercy of God. We are no more justified than the Pharisee when we think of ourselves as “superior” because we are scrupulously “politically correct,” “not like” those hapless “others” trapped in racist rhetoric, beliefs and practices. When we fall on our knees before God, our prayers shall be the same: “Kyrie eleison! Lord, have mercy on us sinners!” Divine mercy, mercy alone, makes us whole.