The story of the good samaritan is only reported by the Evangelist Luke (Lk 10:25-37). It is, thus, a “lucan Sondgut” that corresponds to the portrait of Jesus that Luke paints in his gopsel. Jesus is presented as a friend of those at the margins. Out of love, Jesus took on the story of a wounded and wounding humanity. He never watched it from afar but He became part of it. In fact, we can say that Jesus is the Good Samaritan par excellence who binds the wounds of humanity in order to heal them. He pays the price with His blood on the cross.
This story invites us to go beyond what we theoretically know about love in order to love with deeds. The scholar of the law knew quiet well what he had to do in order to inherit eternal life:“You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your being, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbour as yourself.”
That was a very correct answer, but Jesus encouraged him to do what he knew (Lk 10: 28). What the lawyer was missing could be an invitation to leave the comfort of the theories about love in order to reach out to those that have fallen into the hands of robbers. What you know about love is not love until you love with a concrete deed.
It is interesting to note that the man who saw and had compassion on the wounded (most probably a jew) was a foreigner, a samaritan whom Jews despised. The contrast is that “a certain priest and a levite (these are both pure Jews) who considered the purity laws to be paramount saw the wounded man but passed on the other side in order not to defile themselves with blood. They were probably going for a “holy ritual service forgetting that God was waiting for them at the roadside in the person of the wounded. This makes us remember what Jesus says about the last judgement: “Whatsoever you do to the least of my brothers, you do unto me” (Mt 25:40).
Apart from awakening the sensitivity to the needs of our neighbours, the story of the good samaritan confronts us with a bitter truth that there are many robbers on the roads of life. They leave many half-dead. Let us not think about only those who have been physically beaten up to the point of death, but also those who have been robbed of their dignity when their names have been tarnished by blackmailing and all forms of calumny.
All these are groaning under pain and are waiting for those who see and dare to come closer so as to raise them up. Our love of neighbour should begin with a prayer so that through the conversion of heart, we may dream of robber-free environments.
Since this may take some time, then we ought to be agents of healing for those who have been wounded. May we not become robbers ourselves!
Fr. Anthony Kibira MCCJ
