44 Comments

I just subscribed because this was a fabulous post. Thanks. I have loved this story all my life. I never once thought about being the victim in it. I was always the guilty walker by.

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Jesus always seems to turn our pointing fingers around 180 degrees, doesn't he.

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Thank you from here in B.C. Canada. I appreciate your retelling of this parable, & the ways we are each all the characters.

We Canadians often see the political discourse & gun violence in the U.S. as frightening and impinging on our own hard-won freedoms of a multicultural society, with universal daycare & healthcare. Sometimes “neighbours” are politically powerful nations. We pray that our long peaceful border with the U.S. will remain and that we won’t be thrown in the ditch.

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Isn't AJ marvelous! If we Christians were more open-minded, we'd understand that so many 'christian" tenants come from Judaism. We wouldn't be divisive. And I have found that the more DBB puts issues into historical context, the more meaningful the Bible's teachings are. Respect for learning has always been a big part of Judaism it's tragic that some sects of Christianity have lost that. Thank you both for being a wonderful part of my life and spirit!

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Now, that's a delightful musing. Yes. Sobering as well. And just this week I read Ursula K LeGuin's essay on Papa H. (Homer) in the collection No Time to Spare. She's looking at Homer's versions of everystory - The War, and the Journey. She concentrates on the War (perhaps because of her own novel about Aeneas - Lavinia). She says of the War that 'Homer didn't take sides'. It wasn't a war between right and wrong, or good and evil - it was just about people vs people. And perhaps that's another telling of the Samaritan and the man in the ditch. It's just about people who need help and people who will help. No actual villains (other than the thugs who abscond) and no actual heroes>

To be brief - we can do worse than muse upon your musings; or indeed to muse upon Ursula LeGuin's musings!

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Thank you for this reflection - I had not thought to consider this story from the point of the robbers' victim. Over the past few years I have come to think of the story more in terms of Jesus answering the questioner, whose "Who is my neighbor?" question was really "Who does the law require me to love as I love myself?". So Jesus answers essentially "Love the ones you despise the most". It's a tough answer, of course, but one I repeatedly need to hear.

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Jul 11, 2022·edited Jul 11, 2022

I was feeling smug in my carnality until you, um, passed by. STOP IT!!

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Today I asked my congregation to see Jesus as the victim, the one in the ditch, and I suggested that we religious people are the rabbi and the Levite in this story. How might we see ourselves stepping over Jesus on our way to something we think is more important.

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Thank you!

A small group of us will be beginning a study of some of the parables this week.

I have a NRSV Jewish NT for which Amy-Jill Levine was one if the editors. I love the annotations in this Bible. It is a favorite.

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Insulting half of your potential audience by referring to them as "objectionable" is a fascinating marketing strategy!

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Jul 10, 2022Liked by Diana Butler Bass

Our rector is also a fan of Amy Jill Levine, so his homily this morning was much like yours, except that he drew the point, probably from Levine, that the Jews and Samaritans hated each other not because their religion was so different, but because it was so similar. Both had the Torah as the chief guide of life, both had temples, both had very similar priesthoods, etc. He made the comparison of Jew and Samaritan to his own experience of nearly confronting Franklin Graham when the Crusade rented a huge college athletic center when he was chaplain there. It upset the student body, faculty and local clergy so much that they wrote a letter to Graham asking him to call it off and leave. He was to one tapped to be the deliverer of the letter. But the hotel staff would not let him go back to Graham’s groom, so he never got to meet the man in person. But he could imagine how angry and confrontational it would have been if it had happened that way. He really hated everything Franklin Graham stood for, even though both were Christians. It occurred to me after I heard the story, that there is a similarity in global politics. The “empires” of today “hate” each other because they are all rival empires--the American Empire vs. the Russian Empire vs. the Chinese Empire. We don’t bother picking political fights or waging proxy wars with Botswana or Uruguay or Nepal. They are not significant enough to hate because they are not rivals.

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Jul 10, 2022Liked by Diana Butler Bass

Diane - thank you for your wonderful insights and observations. You reminded me of a pilgrimage trip I made years ago with a group of teenagers to Taize in France. We were dashing into to Lyon for a final excursion and hadn't planned very well. On the train I saw many admonishing looks aimed at some of our teens in short shorts and crop tops. I was tired, and tired of teenagers! As we rattled down the track I found that I didn't really know where to get off - which one was our stop? Panic. But a lovely woman, head covered, and dressed humbly came and indicated that it was time for us to get off the train. I just did what she said, we got off and then just stood there dumbly. Still not knowing where to go. And another kind Muslim gentleman offered us gentle guidance with a smile. So our little group of Christians were aided by our Muslim brothers and sisters in a strange city, using smiles and gentle hands to guide us to our destination. I was grateful then and ever mindful that I was the stranger in that story!

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I had a similar experience in Amsterdam - I always enjoy walking after dinner. I lost my balance and came down on the sidewalk. It was a group of Muslim men that ran towards me, picked me up and made sure I was OK. I was embarrassed but very grateful they had helped me.

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Extend a hand to whoever needs it. Do not analyze who that is; consider only that the person has a need. What a charge from Jesus!

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In KNOW that escalator at DuPont Circle Metro!! I have always had a problem with down escalators. My first fall on one was at Marshall Field's in Chicago before I was five years old. There weren't escalators in the town where I grew up, so I saw them rarely - and often had bad experiences with them. (It wasn't until I was in my thirties that I was diagnosed with a kind of "field dependence" sort of a spatial dyslexia that effected many common activities that are not so bad for most people - revolving doors, parallel parking, reading maps, playing any sport that involves hitting a moving object with another moving object, shifting the right distance on a piano or 'cello ...) Anyway, one day at the DuPont Circle escalator going down, there was no one else on it except my husband and I. He got on behind me and tried to help when I started to sway from side to side. By the time we were two-thirds of the way down I was in a full blown panic attack and when we got to the bottom I just curled up on the floor in a fetal position crying. I can completely empathize with that man! From that time on I always looked for the elevators. And I discovered that they are faster; whenever I was with friends, I got to the tracks faster than they did on the escalator.

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I'm so sorry! It is a really intimidating escalator. And I can't ride it without thinking about how shocked I was on that day -- when the man in front of me collapsed and started rolling down the up stairs. It was very frightening.

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Jul 10, 2022Liked by Diana Butler Bass

Thank you! Had husband read after we listened in the sermon preached today online by our transitional deacon. He laughed. "Been in that ditch and had to reach out," he said. And, we talked about how this is not about 'good', but about 'neighbour'. Context is SO important!

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Jul 10, 2022Liked by Diana Butler Bass

Ohhh! Who is my enemy?

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