Meditations On The Gospel Of Luke For The FamilySample

"MEDITATION 11:A Sinful Woman is Pardoned and a Righteous Pharisee is Reprimanded."

The two passages in our meditation are a summary of vital motifs recurring in Luke’s Gospel. The central element mentioned in both texts is a meal around a common table. Many relevant things happen around a table in Jesus’ life, the most important being, of course, his Last Supper with the disciples. He shares the table with his friends Martha, Mary and Lazarus. He does not refuse to eat with sinners and tax-collectors, a reason why some call him “a glutton and a drunkard” (7:34), but he also accepts the invitations of Pharisees and sits (or reclines) at the table with them, just as in our text and on other occasions (11:37-41; 14:1-6). The truth is, he has come to call the lost sheep of Israel, no matter their spiritual or social background.
The story of the woman who anointed Jesus’ feet is told by the four evangelists, but it is only Luke who underlines the fact that she is a sinner. Curiously, in all four cases, we find the factor of scandal, but the other texts explain that it was provoked by the waste of a very expensive perfume that could have been sold to help the poor. Luke’s story takes a different course. The starting point is clear. The action performed by the woman breaks all the rules of social behavior. Only a slave would wash or anoint the feet of another person. The woman’s anointing of Jesus is an act of total submission.
Additionally, letting her hair loose was not a gesture a decent woman would do in public. The fact that Jesus consents to being anointed by a sinful woman, thus becoming himself impure, implies that he is not able to detect the condition of those who come to him, and therefore, he must not be a real prophet. In the four accounts, Jesus’ reaction is the defense of the woman, but only in this case does Jesus put such a strong stress on forgiveness and love. The Pharisee, who considers himself a righteous man, has not observed the simplest rules of hospitality and courtesy. But this woman, conscious of her sinful condition and feeling that she has been delivered from the burden of her sins, shows her love without caring about social conventions. Jesus’ words of forgiveness simply ratify what she has previously experienced. She is not forgiven because she has loved, (that would be the normal, human path to follow), but she is an example of the reality of God’s love toward us. “In this is love: not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as expiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10).
Rev. Fr. Mariano Perrón, Roman Catholic priest, Archdiocese of Madrid, Spain