Stop abusing Luke 13.1-5!

There were some present at that very time who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And he answered them, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered in this way? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. Or those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them: do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”

This is not about “random” natural disasters.

Getting killed by Roman soldiers may have been a wicked use of power on the part of Pilate, but it wasn’t “random” like an earthquake or a tsunami.

The Tower of Siloam could be part of an earthquake, but that is doubtful because then it wouldn’t stand out in the people’s memories. Other buildings would have fallen. Architectural flaw? Over capacity?

I don’t know.

But I do know that Jesus didn’t use it to preach a generic message about how we are all under the curse of sin (Genesis 3) and we are all headed for judgment and need to repent before our life in this world is ended.

It would have been fine if he had done so. The theology works. But he didn’t.

He didn’t.

To begin with, Jesus is not predicting that everyone is going to perish if they refuse to repent. He is more specific than that.

Everyone will be killed by Roman soldiers. Everyone will be crushed by collapsing buildings in Jerusalem.

He doesn’t say, “unless you repent, you will all also perish.” No, he says, “unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”

As in, the same way.

And nothing in the surrounding context allows us to think that Jesus is addressing the universal human need to be reconciled to God before one’s life on earth ends. It is a true doctrine, but he is not teaching it here. He is teaching about how Israel the nation is headed for a national judgment.

Look at the passage as a whole:

He also said to the crowds, “When you see a cloud rising in the west, you say at once, ‘A shower is coming.’ And so it happens. And when you see the south wind blowing, you say, ‘There will be scorching heat,’ and it happens. You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret the present time?

“And why do you not judge for yourselves what is right? As you go with your accuser before the magistrate, make an effort to settle with him on the way, lest he drag you to the judge, and the judge hand you over to the officer, and the officer put you in prison. I tell you, you will never get out until you have paid the very last penny.”

There were some present at that very time who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And he answered them, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered in this way? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. Or those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them: do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”

And he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it and found none. And he said to the vinedresser, ‘Look, for three years now I have come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none. Cut it down. Why should it use up the ground?’ And he answered him, ‘Sir, let it alone this year also, until I dig around it and put on manure. Then if it should bear fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.’”

None of this is about going to heaven or hell when you die. It is about the nation about to be judged because it won’t repent. The signs are in the sky but no one cares. They are headed to a confrontation they can’t win, but they refuse to make peace with their adversary. They aren’t bearing fruit but they aren’t worried about being cut down.

Israel was not bearing fruit.

Who was going to judge Israel? What was the judgment going to look like?

Easy. Jesus tells us exactly what the judgment will be. It will be slaughter by the edge of the sword by Roman soldiers in Galilee. It will be people crushed under collapsing buildings in Jerusalem (“Not one stone left upon another,” in one case).

Is this hard to see? Is this not exactly what the Word of God says?

And so Luke tells us elsewhere:

And when he drew near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, “Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation.”

And then again we see it:

But they all cried out together, “Away with this man, and release to us Barabbas”— a man who had been thrown into prison for an insurrection started in the city and for murder. Pilate addressed them once more, desiring to release Jesus, but they kept shouting, “Crucify, crucify him!” A third time he said to them, “Why, what evil has he done? I have found in him no guilt deserving death. I will therefore punish and release him.” But they were urgent, demanding with loud cries that he should be crucified. And their voices prevailed. So Pilate decided that their demand should be granted. He released the man who had been thrown into prison for insurrection and murder, for whom they asked, but he delivered Jesus over to their will.

And as they led him away, they seized one Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, and laid on him the cross, to carry it behind Jesus. And there followed him a great multitude of the people and of women who were mourning and lamenting for him. But turning to them Jesus said, “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children. For behold, the days are coming when they will say, ‘Blessed are the barren and the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed!’ Then they will begin to say to the mountains, ‘Fall on us,’ and to the hills, ‘Cover us.’ For if they do these things when the wood is green, what will happen when it is dry?”

What will happen when their children all grew up to turn into Barabbasses? Would there be anyone left to substitute for them and die for their crimes? No. They would all be crucified. As Josephus wrote a generation later:

So the soldiers, out of the wrath and hatred they bore the Jews, nailed those they caught, one after one way, and another after another, to the crosses, by way of jest, when their multitude was so great, that room was wanting for the crosses, and crosses wanting for the bodies.

So Luke 13.1-5 is not about generic sin or generic final judgment. It is about this story of how God’s people, who thought they were being faithful, were actually trading in their duty to bear real fruit for a rationalization for hatred of the nations and rebellion against their empire. This should be a warning to God’s people now, that just because they can claim to pay attention to Scripture, and to faithfully preach his wrath, it doesn’t mean they are necessarily actually being faithful.

3 thoughts on “Stop abusing Luke 13.1-5!

  1. pentamom

    Why do you think the people were raising the story of the Galileans in the first place? Was it to bemoan their fate and rail against the Romans, or to suggest that the Galileans had earned a judgment? If it’s possible to know or deduce that, it would seem to have some bearing on Jesus’ response to the story.

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