We heard today from Luke 16:21, which says “Dogs even used to come and lick his sores.” Admittedly, the grammatical construction in the Greek can be translated as “worst of all" dogs would lick his sores.
However, the ancients knew when a dog licks a person's sores or wounds, healing occurs more rapidly. The licking cleans the wound and the saliva acts as a disinfectant. At the Ashkelon dog cemetery in Israel, over a thousand dogs are buried in individual plots that dates back from the fifth to the third centuries BC. The dogs were trained to lick the wounds or sores of humans, in exchange for a fee.
So in Luke 16:21, where it says that dogs licked the wounds of Lazarus, this is the biblical basis for therapy dogs, as Father Peter John Cameron, O.P. says.
Yet Lazarus was a man with unfulfilled desires "longing to be fed with the crumbs which were falling from the rich man's table. When he died, he was left unburied. Lazarus did not even have a decent burial by human beings, which is what “carried away by angels” means. One scholar, McGee notes: “When the beggar died, there was no funeral. They just took his body out and threw it into the Valley of Gehenna where garbage was dumped and burned, or maybe his body was dumped into a pauper’s grave.
The bosom of Abraham in Luke 16:22 is literally described as a pocket-like fold in a garment; gathered up by an affectionate parent, as it were.
By God’s grace, the poor may enter heaven in virtue of their poverty, and the rich by sharing their wealth, all by God’s grace. Saint John Paul II connected the rich man as rich countries that drain most of the world’s energy and raw materials that are meant to serve the whole of humanity, saying that the solution is fair trade and solidarity between peoples.
No one is condemned in the Bible for simply being wealthy, only those who did not share and help others. After all, Saint Augustine noted centuries ago that Lazarus was welcomed into paradise by Abraham, who was one of the richest people on earth when Abraham lived in the world.
Many years ago there was published a poem which illustrates in a beautiful way the spirit of Christian charity. It was the day before Thanksgiving Day, and a man who was feeling very grateful and happy decided to send a turkey to one of his neighbors. This neighbor upon receiving the turkey was very happy and decided to send the chicken which he and his family had planned to have for Thanksgiving dinner to another neighbor who was poorer still. This neighbor upon receiving the chicken manifested the same spirit and gave a pumpkin pie to another neighbor who was very poor. This person was filled with the charitable spirit and sent a loaf of bread to a very poor family. They rejoiced in the gift which they had received and after eating most of the bread they gave the crumbs to the birds which gave beautiful music back to them and to the world. The gift of one man awakened the charitable spirit in many, and each person gave not to the person from whom he had received but to someone else who was in greater need, and all received a blessing.
source: The Rich Man and Lazarus 441 The Rich Man and Lazarus, W. CLYDE ATKINS, Pastor, Eutaw Place Baptist Church, Baltimore, Md., [From a sermon in 1937, Editor] Source: Review & Expositor; Date: January 1, 1942.
The rich man wanted to warn his five brothers so they don’t also end up in this place of torment, saying, 'Then I beg you, father, send him to my father's house, for I have five brothers, so that he may warn them, lest they too come to this place of torment' and Abraham replied that 'They have Moses and the prophets’ to warn them.
Someone has said that this is the only prayer in the Bible addressed to a saint that was not answered.
Then, the rich man said, 'Oh no, father Abraham, but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.' The rich man was implying that the Scriptures are a distant and irrelevant book for the five brothers, and the rich man’s request for a sign instead is an evasion and an expression of impenitence or a lack of repentance and contrition.
Send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am suffering torment in these flames.
The damned sinned through the five senses, therefore they suffer through all five of the senses. The punishment in Hell is in proportion to the guilt. The Worst Suffering in Hell is the sense of loss of God and heaven.
Sanders, a biblical scholar, offered a not-so-subtle rebuke to any analysis of this Gospel passage by saying that “when you come away from a biblical text feeling better about yourself, you can be reasonably sure that you have misread that text.”
Sometimes the biblical witness is not pretty. In this case, one person is rotting in hell, the second is living it up in the heavenly city, and the third is telling it like it is.
source: No way out: Sunday, October 1, Luke 16:19-31 by Mark Harris September 12, 2001].
The Gospel of grace is listening to Moses and the prophets which we do at every Mass in the First Reading. The point of the parable is for us to share our wealth, moved by grace. Faith without works is dead.
Amen.
