It wasn't fair!

If you have heard this story as many times as I have, you probably react the same way. "It wasn't fair!" In most of the sermons or homilies I have heard on this particular parable, the preachers have played down the unfairness of the situation in favor of the mercy shown by the father. They have pointed out that this story follows the parable of the lost sheep and the lost coin. It extends and explains the concept of God seeking out the sinner. The idea here is not that it wasn't fair, but that mercy transcends the idea of fairness, that what is important is not that the two brothers were being treated inequitably, but that God's mercy extends to us all, a fact which should make us all properly grateful.

Yet I can't help thinking that this idea ignores the basic fact of the story about the two sons. The young son was treated like royalty, and the old son was treated like a hired hand. The prodigal son got the gold mine; his older brother got the shaft!

It just wasn't fair!

Let's take a look at why.

We don't know much about the father in the story except that had two sons. He must have been a wealthy man, because he had hired hands and servants who had "more than enough food to eat," and was able to whip up a noisy party on short notice.

We do know from several historical sources that it was not the custom of a father to divide his estate before his death. The father was the head of the household, and the children were expected to work for him until, in the case of the daughters, they were married or, in the case of the sons, he died. Then the estate was divided up and each son, or each son in law, if there were no sons, or each daughter if they were single, would get his or her share.

So the prodigal son was being at least unconventional and grossly disrespectful by asking for a portion of the father's estate while the old man was still breathing. The father was being imprudently generous by dividing the estate and actually giving him a portion of it. Luke doesn't say that each son got an equal share, even though many have interpreted the text this way, but whatever the younger son got, it was much more than he deserved.

It wasn't fair!

It especially wasn't fair when the son abandoned the father. Even though he gave up his right to think so, the father had every reason to believe that the younger son would stay on to help with whatever business the family was in, that the transfer of title to his property would make little difference in how things would actually be done. But the prodigal son had other plans, plans that he didn't reveal to the father until after he got his hands on the old man's wealth. Not only was he disrespectful, he was dishonest as well, and he appeared to get away with it.

It wasn't fair!

To underscore the point. Jesus and Luke recount the consequent just sufferings of this dishonorable young man. God smites him good! He squanders all his money and becomes destitute; a famine happens, he has to work with pigs, filthy and profane beasts. He has to take orders from a gentile. (Would a devout Jew keep pigs?) The prodigal son is even lower than the pigs, because he envies the food the pigs are eating. He's starving to death, a miserable wretch indeed! Oh, woe is he!

Finally, he comes to his senses and realizes that life down on the farm wasn't all that bad. In fact, he decides to con his long-suffering father into giving him his old job back, but is at least sensible enough to realize that he doesn't deserve the favored position of the owner's son, a reality he shamefully admits.

The father, of course, is overjoyed to have the boy back. In a culture where only wealthy nobles received mail, the father had no way of knowing that his son was still alive and, given the boy's demonstrated talent for getting into trouble, had more than enough reason to think otherwise. In his gratitude for his son's life, he brushes off the boy's apology and gives him a ring, a royal robe, and throws a monster barbecue for him.

It wasn't fair!

Enter the older son, stage left!

He is justly angry. There is a party going on, and he wasn't even told about it, much less invited. He's even informed of the party by a servant, a gross insult. While everyone else was having a good time, he was slaving away in the fields. The partygoers have even taken over the house he lives in; it would be a humiliating disgrace even to go home. He has nowhere honorable to go. He isn't jealous so much as offended and hurt, as he points out to his father. His arguments are entirely reasonable...

It wasn't fair!

I think we can all agree that the younger son got more than his share. That's obvious. The real message here, however, requires a closer look!

What is perhaps not so obvious is that the father got more than was coming to him, too. Having given the son his inheritance, he had no moral claim, except for respect, to the younger son's continued loyalty. It was a stupid thing for him to do, even if it was out of love, and he really had no one to blame but himself for the subsequent situation. He might even have felt himself partially responsible for his son's "death," which may in part explain his relief and joy in getting him back. The father did an unwise thing in giving his son more wealth than he could handle, and he was unjustly fortunate that things turned out so well.

The older son was doing nothing particularly praiseworthy, either. He was supposed to serve the father; he was required to obey him. The father was also his employer, and even modern employers expect their employees to do their jobs. He didn't deserve special consideration for doing what was, after all, only his duty.

But there is another element here. The father was obviously a successful businessman; the family was making money, whatever the business was. Whatever portion he gave the prodigal son, the remaining portion, destined for the older son, would subsequently have grown in value, so that the older son would have received more than the share originally, and expectedly, allocated to him. The father carefully points this out, "...everything I have is yours." Far from getting less than he had a right to expect, he actually got more, without doing anything other than what he would have been expected to do anyway!

So the older son got more than his share, too!

This is the whole point of the story. God's mercy for sinners takes nothing from the righteous, who have no need of it. The righteous have no use for mercy! God gives other blessings to the righteous, but the blessing the sinner needs is mercy, the blessing of being sought out. The flock which is abandoned in the search for the missing sheep are left with lush grass and plentiful water and safety, not fed to the wolves; the search for the lost coin assumes that those not lost are safety in the owner's purse. In the story of the prodigal son, the young son got more than he deserved...

The father got more than he deserved...

And even the older son got more than he deserved.

Everybody got more than he deserved!

You see, it wasn't fair!

John Lindorfer