Tool Beta
The Ancient World Behind the Text
Pick a passage anywhere in the New Testament. See the customs and ideas a first reader knew without being told.
Luke 18:1-8, The widow and the judge
Jesus tells of a judge who neither feared God nor respected people and a widow who kept coming to him for justice until he gave in. How much more, he says, will God see justice done for his chosen ones.
Luke 18:1-8, in every translation this tool compares.
Jesus tells this story to encourage persistence in prayer. A judge who has no regard for God or for people is pestered by a widow demanding a fair ruling against her opponent, and he finally gives in just to be rid of her. If even such a judge relents, Jesus argues, God will surely act quickly for his own people, though he closes by asking whether the Son of Man will find faith when he comes.
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/widows\/","n":"Widows","s":"A woman whose husband died usually lost her income with him and depended on a son, relatives or charity. A widow who stayed faithful to her husband's memory and did not remarry was honored.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/witnesses-and-advocates\/","n":"Witnesses and advocates in court","s":"Jewish law convicted no one on a single witness: it demanded two or three, examined them closely and gave little weight to the word of women. Courts also had accusers and advocates, and Jewish pictures of God's heavenly court gave those roles to Satan and to defenders of Israel.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/honor-and-shame\/","n":"Honor before a crowd","s":"Public standing was the currency of the ancient Mediterranean. People competed for honor and dreaded being shamed in front of others.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/parables\/","n":"Parables and riddles","s":"Short stories that compared one thing to another. Jewish teachers used them to make a point plain, and without the point stated they worked as riddles.","r":""}
The law required judges to be fair and forbade bribes (the cultural backgrounds notes), and the widow was its standard example of the oppressed (Exodus 22:22-24); she could not afford a bribe, and her opponent may have been trying to take her land for a debt (Keener). Men controlled the courts and usually only men pleaded cases, though women who did speak were thought courageous and usually won (the cultural backgrounds notes). Jesus argues from lesser to greater, how much more, a standard Jewish form (Keener and his notes). How helpless is the widow? The cultural backgrounds notes, the CSB Study Bible and Bailey make her almost powerless, with no bribe to give and no man to speak for her, and Strauss, in the Zondervan backgrounds commentary, agrees that widows were the most vulnerable members of society. Levine answers that the widows of the Bible, from Tamar and Ruth to Abigail and Judith, rarely fit that stereotype, and she reads the judge's fear literally: he is afraid she will give him a black eye, which is also how Wright renders 18:5. Strauss takes the phrase as a figure for wearing someone down, as one boxer wears down another.
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Luke 18:2, 18:3, 18:5 and 18:6-7
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Luke 18:1-5 and 18:6-7
- CSB Study Bible, note on Luke 18:2-3
- Kenneth E. Bailey, Poet and Peasant and Through Peasant Eyes, Through Peasant Eyes, ch. 8, The Judge and the Widow
- Amy-Jill Levine, Short Stories by Jesus, ch. 8, The Widow and the Judge
- N. T. Wright, Luke for Everyone, comment on Luke 18:1-14
- Mark L. Strauss, Luke, in Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary, ed. Clinton E. Arnold, on Luke 18:2, 18:3, 18:5 and 18:7
