The Parable of the Prodigal Son #2

The Parable of the Prodigal Son, sometimes called the Parable of the Lost Son or the Two Sons, is a story Jesus told about a father, a wayward younger son, and a resentful older brother. It appears only in the Gospel of Luke (Luke 15:11-32) and is often considered the most complete picture in the Gospels of God’s forgiveness of those who return to him. The word prodigal means recklessly wasteful, which describes how the younger son spends his inheritance.

The Parable

A man had two sons. The younger asked for his share of the estate, gathered everything, traveled to a distant country, and wasted it in reckless living (Luke 15:12-13). When a famine came he took work feeding pigs and longed to eat what the pigs ate. Coming to his senses, he resolved to return and ask to be treated as a hired servant (Luke 15:14-19).

While he was still far off, his father saw him, ran to him, embraced and kissed him, and interrupted the prepared confession by calling for the best robe, a ring, sandals, and a feast with the fattened calf (Luke 15:20-24). The older son, coming in from the field, heard the celebration and refused to go in. He complained that he had served faithfully for years and never received even a young goat. The father pleaded with him, saying that all he had was his, but that it was right to celebrate, because his brother had been dead and was alive, lost and was found (Luke 15:25-32). The parable ends without telling us whether the older son went in.

Context

Luke introduces chapter 15 by noting that tax collectors and sinners were gathering to hear Jesus while the Pharisees and scribes grumbled that he welcomed and ate with them (Luke 15:1-2). Jesus answers with three parables about lost things: a sheep, a coin, and a son. In a culture where inheritance normally passed at the father’s death, the younger son’s request was a grave insult, and feeding pigs would have been about the lowest job imaginable for a Jew, since pigs were unclean under the Law. An elderly father running to greet his son would also have struck listeners as undignified.

Meaning

The central point is the father’s welcome. Repentance is met before it is even fully spoken, and restoration is complete rather than probationary. The older brother represents those, then and now, who resent grace shown to others; the Pharisees within earshot are the obvious first audience.

Christian traditions read the parable in broadly similar ways, with different emphases. Catholic and Orthodox writers often connect the return and embrace with confession and reconciliation, while many Protestant readers stress grace received apart from merit. Some interpreters read the younger son as Gentiles or sinners and the elder as Israel or the religious, though most caution that the story is open-ended by design. All agree the father’s love is its focus.