The Persistent Widow is based on Luke 18:2-8.
The judge’s job is to do justice, and by God, he will do justice by the time the widow is finished with him.
(Theology at Work Project: Persistence)
Who Would the Judge Be?
The judge in Jesus’ parable seems to be be someone who’d decide on disputes between neighbours. Other than that, it’s unclear whether he’s a ‘judge’ in the style of previous biblical judges, or a Roman appointee. The important points about him are that he doesn’t fear God (shocking, if he’s a biblical style judge) and doesn’t care what people think.
I changed the judge’s job when retelling this parable because the original situation wouldn’t work with a modern English Small Claims Court. If a widow tried to influence a particular judge, that judge would be right to refuse the case.
So in a modern English setting, the widow is the one in the wrong – which wasn’t exactly what Jesus intended! That was why I changed the role of ‘judge’ to MP. The job of an MP is to support their constituents when they believe they haven’t received justice. A poor widow would go to an MP, especially if she hasn’t got money for lawyers, especially if the ‘injustice’ she’d suffered came from a lower level of bureaucracy. And she would be perfectly in the right to repeatedly insist that MP does his job.
Money and Power
Changing the judge to an MP also brings the widow’s poverty back into play. The widow is poor; that means she isn’t going to be a big donor to the politician’s party. While it isn’t specifically mentioned that the judge expects a bribe to be offered, there’s a definite implication that his lack of respect for God and for people results in corruption. He’s the opposite of a good judge.
The parable contrasts a male judge with a lot of power and a female widow who has none at all. The widow clearly believes justice is on her side – but her only way to get it is to wear down the powerful judge with her persistence. Given the way things worked in Jesus’ time, she was probably supposed to accept the judge’s initial refusal. Instead, she keeps plugging away; she’s a ‘stand up and fight for justice’ woman and Jesus approves.
The Meaning Jesus Gives the Parable
The parable of the Seeds and the Soil has a long interpretation. This parable has a short ‘moral’. Since God is infinitely better than a corrupt judge, he’s going to listen to pleas for justice.
Luke starts this parable with a comment about ‘always pray and never give up’, so it’s generally been taken as a parable about prayer. But Jesus doesn’t specifically mention prayer; he talks about God answering our pleas for justice. Don’t give up.
This may mean ‘don’t give up praying for justice’, but it might also mean ‘don’t give up fighting for justice. Always pray and don’t give up. Trust in God; keep plugging away.
‘Trust’ versus ‘Faith’
The standard translation of Luke 18: 8 uses ‘faith’ to translate the Greek word pistis. But one of the things the parable is about is persistence in action – the widow keeps demanding justice, until the judge does his job. So shouldn’t we ‘trust’ God the same way? God is so much better than that MP.
Translating pistis as ‘faith’ rather than ‘trust or confidence’ takes Jesus’ comments abruptly away from his point in the parable. We are probably more likely to associate ‘faith on Earth’ with ‘the number of believers on Earth’ because ‘faith’ is so often used as a shorthand for ‘religious belief’. But Jesus was most likely talking about ‘faith’ as faith in God.
When the Son of Man comes, will he find anyone on Earth who is confident God will do what he’s promised?
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