To try getting an understanding about translating the Gospels, I’m reading 2 books about translations. The first is one of those that try to reconstruct the Aramaic Gospels, the other one is about translating directly from Greek without taking into account any church doctrine that developed after the first century. That’s how I was able to see a deeper meaning to the Parable of the Good Samaritan.
Here is the English translation of that passage in Luke 10:25-37, but with the Greek ‘agapé’ left untranslated. I did that because I think the Greek followers of St. Paul would have understood the deeper, spiritual understanding of Jesus’ encounter with the lawyer.
“A lawyer stood up to test Jesus. ‘Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ He said to him, ‘What is written in the law? What do you read there?’ He answered, ‘You shall have agapé for the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.’ And he said to him, ‘You have given the right answer; do this and you will live.’ But wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbor?’ Jesus replied, ‘A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead. Now by chance a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him, he passed on the other side. So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan while traveling came near him, and when he saw him, he was moved with pity. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, having poured oil and wine on them. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. The next day he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said, “Take care of him, and when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spend.” Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?’ He said, ‘The one who showed him mercy.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Go and do likewise.’” (Luke 10:25-37 New Revised Standard Version)
I think that Jesus told that shocking parable honoring the hated Samaritan as the way to shake up the lawyer and prove to him that he had asked the wrong question. But for thousands of years people have been making the same mistake — thinking that was the question that should be asked. So that very same mistake (sin?) has continued to be asked because of the lack of awareness of why Jesus told the Parable of the Good Samaritan and then turned the question around. So why did he?
The point is the 2 Great Commandments have nothing to do with who the neighbor is or what ‘neighbor’ even refers to. The point has to be with agapé. “Go and do likewise” refers to the spiritual power of agapé — and the importance of using the power of agapé.
As I found out when I researched in the Greek Septuagint for the blog post back in March about the Great Shema, the key word that the 2 commandments have in common is agapé. That happens because the second commandment made the radical jump of proposing that people relate to one another the same spiritually as relating to God.
For centuries people have argued that it was humanly impossible to do that. My answer to that argument is “so don’t try doing it humanly.” The conclusion I came up with is to realize that agapé is spiritual power. As we have recorded for us in Romans 5:5, our hope is that “God’s agapé has been poured into our hearts.” I think that’s our hope because we are able to use the spiritual power of agapé to relate to one another as we relate to God. So as Jesus told the lawyer, “Go and do likewise.”
