NOTES for Luk 18:1-8

The story of the judge and the widow is full of comedy, and it is no accident that its plot may come to mind while reading one of Chekhov’s stories. One can almost see this persistent woman, capable of wearing anyone down. Yet what is astonishing is that the Lord is ready to compare prayer addressed to the Heavenly Father with an appeal to a shameless judge. Just think: where is the reverence in this? How can exalted ideas be discussed in so lowly a tone, and the Heavenly Father compared with such a person?

It turns out that this is possible if, thanks to the Pharisees, an excessively inflated reverence has begun to prevent people from understanding that spiritual values were given to us not to be admired but to be used every day. We turn our faith too easily into something like a festive cake, whereas it is bread, the food of every day. The words of the Gospel are given to us not as an unattainable example, but as a guide for life.

Yet bread, of course, deserves to be treated with care. Understanding the everyday necessity of spiritual values must not become a reason to treat them frivolously.