the role of the lukan parables in terms of the purpose of luke's gospel

3. The Rich Fool (12:13-21)
3-1. The Literary Context of the Parable
12:4-7 and 12:13-34 1 deal with issues of fear, anxiety, and security under the motif of
confidence, judgment and accountability. The theme of 12:4-7, “not to fear” is repeated and
stressed in 12:13-34 once again. The parable of the Rich Fool belongs to the section of 12:13-
34 which can be divided into three parts such as the Rich Fool (12:13-21), the theme of
anxiety regarding daily needs (12:22-31), and the sayings concerning wealth (12:32-34). With
reference to the problem of where the material of the parable of the Rich Fool comes from,
though Marshall argues that the parable belongs to Q material owing to the similarity
between Mt 6:19 and 12:13-21, 2
also is similar to Mt 6:19.
it is unlikely for the parable to be Q material because 12:33
Vv. 13-14 and v. 15 are open to question of the original unity of 12:13-21. Many
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commentators consider that vv. 13-14 is made up of originally independent sayings, namely
a separate saying, and that v. 15 is used to make the transition to the parable by Luke.
Jeremias argues that on the basis of the Gospel of Thomas 63 and 72, 4 vv. 13-15 does not
belong originally to the parable, since the two (vv. 13-14 and vv. 16-21) were not linked but
separated in Gos. Thom. 5 Yet I think that Gos. Thom. 63 doesn’t prove anything about the
original connection in Luke, for rather, I believe, that the Gos. Thom. more likely depends on
the Gospel of Luke, in that it is clearly secondary. 6
On the other hand, Fitzmyer seeks to
demonstrate that these sayings were originally independent by making use of Gos. Thom.,
1. It is desirable to view 12:13-34 as one section with logical consistency rather than 12:4-59 or 12:1-13:9.
According to observation of T.D. Stegman by Hermogenes’s Progymnastic Exercise, 12:13-34 has a steady,
coherent literary unit including eight steps of Hermogenes. T.D. Stegman, “Reading Luke 12:13-34 as an
Elaboration of a Chreia: How Hermogenes of Tarsus Sheds Light on Luke’s Gospel,” NovT 49 (2007), 328-352.
See also A.J. Malherbe, “The Christianization of a Topos (Luke 12:13-34),” NovT 38 (1996), 123-35.
2. Marshall, Luke, 521-22.
3. Bultmann, The History of the Synoptic Tradition, 23, 55; Jeremias, Parables, 165; Fitzmyer, The Gospel
According to Luke, 968; C.F. Evans, Saint Luke, 520; Nolland, Luke, 683-84.
4. Gos. Thom. 63: “Jesus said: There was a rich man who had many possessions. He said, I will use my
possessions that I may sow and reap and plant and fill my storehouses with fruit, so that I may lack nothing.
There were his thoughts in his heart. And in that night he died. He who has ears, let him hear.”
Gos. Thom. 72: “[A man said] to him: Speak to my brothers that they divide my father’s possessions with me.
He said to him: O man, who made me a divider? He turned to his disciples (and) said to them: I am not a divider,
am I?”
5. Jeremias, Parables, 164-65.
6. For a critical standpoint of the Gospel of Thomas, see H. Montefiore and H. Tierner, Thomas and the
Evangelists, Studies in Biblical Theology, 35 (Naperville: Alec R. Allensen, 1962), 50; Ray Summers, The
Secret Saying of the Living Jesus (Waio: Word, 1968), 46: H. Schürmann, Traditionsgeschichte Untersuchungen
zu den synoptischen Evangelien (Düsseldorf: Patmos Verlag, 1968), 232.
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