Conversation Points for Luke 13:1-9

Study Format:
1. Read passage aloud. What did you notice in the reading? What words or phrase caught your attention?
2. Read passage aloud a second time. What questions would you ask the text?
3. Read passage aloud a third time. What do you hear God calling you to do or be in response to this text?

Interesting Ideas to Consider:
• There is no historical record of the exact incident described in v. 1. However, there are records of enough other events to confirm that such incidents would not have been uncommon. History confirms Pilate was a violent ruler. There is also no historical record of the collapse of a tower at Siloam, though again, building collapses would certainly have been common enough. The point of the examples are more theological than historical. While the deaths of the Galileans would have some political motive, a building collapse would be nothing more than an act of perverse fate.
• “Repent,” metanoia in the Greek, is not about moral uprightness, but about a dramatic change of direction. It is a changed mind, a new way of seeing thing, adopting a different perspective. This of course has moral implications, but that is an effect, not the cause.
• Jesus questions address the popular idea that sin is the cause of disasters in the world. In his responses, Jesus both demonstrates the problem with that idea and enforces the need for repentance. It is too simple to assume that the Galileans killed by Pilate or the 18 killed in the tower, or anyone else who is a victim of atrocity, is a worse sinner or somehow deserving. Tragedy is not a sign of divine punishment. Life is simply not that predictable. Even so, all of us need repentance. We cannot take our good fortune as proof of God’s blessing.
• The parable of the fig tree has parallels in other ancient Near East literature. What makes this parable unique is the gardener’s interceding on behalf of the tree, and the owner’s mercy in allowing the tree another year.
• Matt Skinner argues it is too simple to read the parable as a straight allegory, with God as the owner, Jesus as the gardener, and us as the fig tree. The power instead comes in the suspense the parable generates.
• Another interpretation of the parable. David Lose notes that nowhere in Luke’s Gospel is God portrayed as a vindictive God to whom Jesus is pleading on our behalf. God is instead portrayed as merciful, forgiving those whom the world casts aside as outsiders. So what if “the landowner is representative of our own sense of how the world should work?”

Works Sourced:
Culpepper, R. Alan. “The Gospel of Luke.” The New Interpreter’s Bible Volume IX. Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1995.

Lose, David. “Lent 3C: Suffering, the Cross, and the Promise of Love.” In the Meantime… < http://www.davidlose.net/2016/02/lent-3-c-suffering-the-cross-and-the-promise-of-love/>. Accessed 22 February 2016.

Skinner, Matt. “Commentary on Luke 13:1-9.” Working Preacher. < https://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?commentary_id=2789>. Accessed 22 February 2016.