Oh my goodness. I cannot believe what I read in this forum sometimes. People will tear the Scriptures to pieces to hold on to their
idols of the heart; especially their
'beloved' demonic abomination:
eternal torment!
The Rich Man and Lazarus is a parable. Jesus is in the midst of teaching five parables, beginning in Luke 15:3 with the parable of
the lost sheep. Following that are the parables of
the lost coin, the prodigal son, the unjust administrator, and
Lazarus and the Rich Man. The purpose of these parables is to teach the Pharisees a lesson about how they treat publicans and sinners. If you take the Rich Man parable literally
(which many in here apparently do), you have to throw out everything the rest of the scriptures have to say about death. And that's just the beginning.
Is Lazarus literally sitting on the bosom of Abraham? Why not, if this is literal? In the parable, the Rich Man is damned because he was rich and wore fine things. Lazarus is sitting on Abraham's bosom simply because he got bad things in this life. Is there anything at all here about
the Gospel, or about
faith? If you're going to make this parable the criteria for either being consciously tormented in flames or sitting on Abraham's bosom for eternity, then you’re going to have to base salvation on wealth, not faith. What is the criteria for Salvation in this context? Physical disadvantage only? There is nothing whatsoever about faith here.
Since this is a five-fold parable, beginning in chapter 15, why don't you make the
Prodigal Son in 15:11-32 literal? At the end of the parable, the father says,
"This, my son, was dead." Why don’t you take that death literally? Using your system of interpreting parables literally, you can use the parable of the prodigal son to prove that, after people die, they go off to a far country, spend all their money on hookers and booze, then end up in a pig pen eating cob... no corn.
The parable of Lazarus and the Rich man has become a theological passport to the mutilation of hundreds of verses of Scripture. Next to the gross error in translating the Greek
aion (a period of time with a beginning and an end) into an English eternity (no time at all, neither having a beginning nor an ending), I know of no greater misrepresentation of any section of Scripture than this parable. And the multitudes have no desire to know the truth because they refuse to give up their precious
idols in their hearts; which causes them to stumble:
Ezekiel 14:3 "....they have set up their idols in their hearts, and put before them that which causes them to stumble into iniquity. Should I let Myself be inquired of at all by them?
Anyone who denies this is a parable errs not knowing the Scriptures. Why? Because Jesus spoke
ONLY in parables among the multitudes (including the Pharisees) of people who followed Him wherever He went.
Matthew 13:34 "All these things Jesus speaks in parables to the multitudes, and apart from a parable He spoke NOTHING to them..."
As the verse above tells us,
EVERYTHING that was spoken to the multitudes was done so in parables:
"apart from A PARABLE He spoke NOTHING to them."
Jesus spoke in parables so that
the multitudes would
NOT understand Him:
Matthew 13:10 "Why speakest thou unto them in parables?
Matthew 13:11 "He answered and said unto them, Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given."
Not even the apostles understood these parables. Jesus had to explain their meaning to them
in private (Matthew 13:18, 36; Matthew 15:15).
The fact that Jesus spoke to the masses in parables ONLY, ought to be sufficient Scriptural evidence to anyone that Lazarus And The Rich Man is a parable, geez!
Yea, let God be true, but every man a liar!
