Jesus said to his disciples,
“A rich man had a steward
who was reported to him for squandering his property.
He summoned him and said,
‘What is this I hear about you?
Prepare a full account of your stewardship,
because you can no longer be my steward.’
The steward said to himself, ‘What shall I do,
now that my master is taking the position of steward away from me?
I am not strong enough to dig and I am ashamed to beg.
I know what I shall do so that,
when I am removed from the stewardship,
they may welcome me into their homes.’
He called in his master’s debtors one by one.
To the first he said,
‘How much do you owe my master?’
He replied, ‘One hundred measures of olive oil.’
He said to him, ‘Here is your promissory note.
Sit down and quickly write one for fifty.’
Then to another the steward said, ‘And you, how much do you owe?’
He replied, ‘One hundred kors of wheat.’
The steward said to him, ‘Here is your promissory note;
write one for eighty.’
And the master commended that dishonest steward for acting prudently.
“For the children of this world
are more prudent in dealing with their own generation
than are the children of light.
I tell you, make friends for yourselves with dishonest wealth,
so that when it fails, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.
The person who is trustworthy in very small matters
is also trustworthy in great ones;
and the person who is dishonest in very small matters
is also dishonest in great ones.
If, therefore, you are not trustworthy with dishonest wealth,
who will trust you with true wealth?
If you are not trustworthy with what belongs to another,
who will give you what is yours?
No servant can serve two masters.
He will either hate one and love the other,
or be devoted to one and despise the other.
You cannot serve both God and mammon.”
The parable of the dishonest steward is one that has always really caused me anxiety, because it is really hard to understand. The response of the master is totally illogical, and Jesus saying “Make friends with dishonest wealth,” that is almost antithetical to all of His other teachings. So how do we understand this?
In reading about the passage, I have heard some scholars say that the steward was giving the people back his profit of the debt. Like tax collectors some believed that this is how stewards made money as well, by adding a tax onto the top of what the subject already owed the master. Some stewards charged more than others, and maybe here this steward is just giving that tax back in order to make friends with the kings subjects so that he will not be cast out of the town when he loses his position of power. This logically makes sense, but I have read other eminent scholars say specifically that this is not true, that stewards did not make money this way, that they simply lived off of the largess of the kingdom, like the kings and all of his courtiers did. And as such under this estimation it means that the master was truly commending him for being prudent through misusing the masters property. Essentially doing a bad thing for good reasons.
But I cant think of a single human master that would be okay with this. But what if that master is not Human, what if the master is God Himself? In that case, everything in the entire universe belongs by right to the Master and is not ours, but His. In that case, the steward (aka all of the men and women of the world), would not be judged as harshly if he were to use the things of this world to gain friends and influence people. It is still not as good as if he were to do so through love and friendship. But it is still better than trying to do so by force or coercion.
So in this case the wealth of the master is actually the gifts and graces that pours out onto every one of us every day of our lives. And so the steward is then misusing these gifts and graces of god, to do a good thing by helping the master’s subjects while at the same time making friends? In that sense it does indeed makes sense that God would commend that behavior. This steward is likely making the first “baby-steps” towards redeeming himself. He is still doing dishonest (or at least less-than-honest) things, but he is at least doing them for a good reason this time.
But do not be confused…, the catholic church clearly teaches that you should never do a bad thing for good reasons. In this parable the steward is being commended for prudence, and maybe Jesus is saying that while doing a good thing for bad reasons, is not good, it is better than doing a bad thing for bad reasons. John Bergsma, in his commentary on this gospel reading wrote: “The world encourages an attitude in which we use people to gain things. Jesus reverses this: use things to gain people.” And I think that is the point. The latter is better than the former, but the real message that we must learn to gain people by love and friendship. As Peter Kreeft puts it so concisely: “We must worship God, love people, and use things…” In that order!
I should like to meet this steward if he ever make it to heaven, and get the full story. Let us all strive, for good reasons, to do good, not bad things, even if it is really hard, because that is what Jesus is really calling us to do.
