The Parable of the Friend at Midnight #26

The Parable of the Friend at Midnight is a short story Jesus told about prayer. A man knocks on his neighbor’s door in the middle of the night to ask for three loaves of bread for an unexpected guest, and though the neighbor is reluctant, he finally gets up and gives what is needed. It appears only in the Gospel of Luke (11:5-8), directly after the Lord’s Prayer, and it teaches bold, persistent asking of God.

The Parable

Jesus asks his disciples to imagine going to a friend at midnight and saying, “Friend, lend me three loaves; for a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him” (Luke 11:5-6). The friend answers from inside: do not bother me, the door is already locked, and my children are with me in bed, so I cannot get up and give you anything (Luke 11:7). Jesus says that even if he will not get up because the man is his friend, yet because of the man’s “impudence” he will rise and give him whatever he needs (Luke 11:8).

Context

Luke places the story right after the disciples ask Jesus to teach them to pray and he gives them the Lord’s Prayer (Luke 11:1-4). Immediately afterward comes the well-known teaching to ask, seek, and knock, with the assurance that a father would not give his child a snake for a fish (Luke 11:9-13). Matthew has a parallel to that teaching in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 7:7-11) but does not record the midnight friend.

The setting is a small village in which hospitality was a serious duty. A traveler arriving late had to be fed, and refusing to help a neighbor meet that duty would bring shame on the whole community. A typical home was often a single room in which the family slept together on mats, so getting up to unbar the door meant disturbing everyone. The neighbor’s reluctance is realistic, and so is the fact that he yields.

Meaning

The key Greek word in verse 8, anaideia, is translated in several ways, including “persistence,” “impudence,” and “shamelessness.” Some interpreters apply it to the asker, who is so bold that refusal is impossible. Others read it as the neighbor’s own sense of honor, since he would be shamed if the village heard he had refused a friend. Either way, the emphasis is on the boldness with which one may ask.

Many interpreters read the parable as an argument from lesser to greater. If a grudging neighbor will finally give, how much more will a loving Father give good gifts, and the Holy Spirit, to those who ask (Luke 11:13). Jesus is not comparing God to the sleepy neighbor, and the story does not suggest God must be worn down. Instead it encourages disciples to pray with confidence and without giving up. Christians across traditions cite it for that reason, though they differ on how to understand prayers that seem to go unanswered, a question that Luke pursues in the related parable of the persistent widow (Luke 18:1-8).