Conversation Points for Luke 18:1-8

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:
• It was the duty of a judge to maintain peace between the Israelites by moderating disputes. Because judges worked without a jury, it was important that judges were fair and impartial. Moses’ charge to judges: “Give the members of your community a fair hearing, and judge rightly between one person and another, whether citizen or resident alien. You must not be partial in judging: hear out the small and the great alike; you shall not be intimidated by anyone, for the judgment is God’s” (Deuteronomy 1:16-17). Jehoshaphat’s charge to judges: “let the fear of the Lord be upon you” (2 Chronicles 19:7).
• The law outlines clear expectations for caring for widows. A woman could not inherit her husband’s estate, and had no support after her husband died, so it was the responsibility of others to care for her. Care for those in need, widows, orphans, and foreigners, were also outlined in Deuteronomy (24:17-18).
• The story of the widow and the judge is a parallel of the story of the persistent neighbor in Luke 11:5-8.
• Verse 1 introduces the story as a parable about prayer. Prayer is a reoccurring theme in Luke’s Gospel. Jesus frequently taught about it, and often withdrew to pray.
• As is typical in parables, the description starts out vague: “In a certain city there was a judge.” However, from the duties of a judge, there are expectations the listener would bring when told the story involved a judge. The next section upends those expectations: “who neither feared God nor had respect for people.”
• To “fear God” could mean either reverence God (fear better translated as “awe” or “wonder”) or it could mean to fear punishment for violating his office as a judge.
• We don’t know why the widow is approaching the judge, nor do we know why the judge refused the widow’s request for assistance. Possibly the judge was waiting for a bribe or had received a bribe from whomever the widow’s grievance was with. What we do know is the judge would have been the widow’s only hope for justice, and if he said no, persistence was her only option.
• This parable, like so many in Luke, features an internal monologue that functions as the turning point in the narrative.

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