Luke 18:10-14.
Question: (1.) What is the instruction conveyed by the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican?
(2.) What is the force of “with himself,” in verse 11?
(3.) What is meant by “afar off,” in verse 13?
(4.) What is to be understood by “be merciful?” Is the English Version faulty here? Is propitiation or reconciliation expressed by the Greek?
(5.) What is meant by the word “justified”? Is “rather” introduced without warrant? Is the sense, justified perfectly, or comparatively? Are we taught here that the publican went down to his house “justified” in the doctrinal sense of Rom. 3; 4:5; 8? T.
Answer: (1.) The parable teaches God’s judgment of those who trust in their own righteousness and despise others, as the introductory verse expressly says. The entire context shows the setting aside of self for the kingdom of God; of self in any form you please. Self-righteousness is excluded in this parable; self-importance is rebuked in the incident of the little children blessed of Jesus.; self, in the way of amiable nature, moral habits, high position, and large possessions, is treated as null and void in the rich ruler. The greatest advantages, humanly speaking, of flesh and world, are a hindrance, not a help, to the kingdom.
(2.)The phrase, “prayed thus with himself,” (πρὸς ἑαυτόν,) means that he prayed to this effect, not aloud in the hearing of others, but silently. We can easily see from what follows, that there was neither heart nor conscience in the matter, unlike the broken, humbled, publican; but communion with others was hardly in question in either case. What God wanted and valued was the conscience in His presence, and this the publican evinced, not the Pharisee.
(3.) The standing of the publican “afar off,” was a just and simple expression of his distance from God as a sinner; and the more appropriate, as though touched of the Spirit and penitent, the work was not yet done which brings nigh to God.
(4.) Hence, also, I believe that the English Bible quite rightly renders ἱλάσθητί μοι “be merciful to me.” No doubt, it differs from the expression ἐλέησόν με, in verses 38, 39, as the special differs from the more general phrase. But there is nothing in the Greek, any more than in the English, which implies that the publican was here pleading propitiation, still less reconciliation. Undoubtedly, in God’s mind, mercy could only be shown to a sinful man in virtue of the foreseen atonement of the Savior; but the phrase itself, in the mouth and supposed condition of the publican, does not go beyond his heart’s appeal for God’s pardoning mercy to the sinner before Him, if ever there was one. (τῷ ἁμαρτωλῷ) So in Psa. 25:11, David cries, “For thy name’s sake, Ο Lord, pardon (ἱλάσῃ in the LXX.) my iniquity, for it is great.” A doctrinal reference is not the point in either, though we know, of course, that there was only one way whereby the cry could be answered. The mere word no more necessarily teaches “propitiation,” than the Englishman does who talks of “propitious weather.” Compare the use of the kindred word Ἵλεως in Matt. 16:22.
(5.) There is no ground to infer that “justification,” as taught in Romans and elsewhere, is meant in the expression, not only for reasons involved in what has been remarked already, but yet more, because our Lord does not say that he “went down to his house justified.” We must beware of taking from Scripture no less than of adding to it. Now the sense here is not absolute but comparative justification, just as in that expression of Judah in the Septuagint Version of Gen. 38:26, δεδικαίωται Θάμαρ ἢ ἐγώ “Thamar is justified rather than I,” (i. e., more righteous.) “Rather,” or “more,” is decidedly implied by the commonly received reading, ἢ ἐκεῖνος. For my own part, however, I cannot but prefer παῤ ἐκεῖνον, the reading of the Vatican, Sinai, and Paris (No. 62) Uncials, supported by some good cursives and other authorities. This probably gave rise to ἢ γαρ ἐκεῖνος by a blunder of the scribes, which found its way into the great majority of copies. Beza’s MS. (D) is almost a paraphrase as to this, μαλλον παρ αιακεινον τοω φαρισαιον. But every variation proves that the sense intended is that the publican was justified in comparison with the Pharisee, and therefore that the doctrinal allusion is out of the question.