“For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” – Luke 19.10
It is very difficult, if you are in the class of people whom society would likely term (even moderately) ‘successful,’ ‘intelligent,’ or ‘morally upright,’ to read the story of the Prodigal Son without feeling some measure of indignation at the father’s treatment of the Elder Brother. We feel that he was treated unfairly; that he was, as so often happens in families when one child screws up and the other sucks it up, overworked and underappreciated; and we shake our heads knowingly and mutter something about how “such people” (by which of course we mean, ourselves) are always getting the short end of the stick.
And yet our very act of commiseration tacitly reveals and confirms our guilt. Those, like myself, who at first glance read the story of the Elder Brother only to find themselves overcome with a sense of vicarious self-righteous anger must recognize the smoke and follow it to the fire: for the fire is fueled by our belief that we are good, that we have proven our goodness by our actions, and that these actions entitle us to a certain standard of treatment. In this our hearts are exposed as Pharisaical, brimming with pride and self-righteousness.
We have not only failed to grasp the meaning of the Cross, but our need for it. Our faith, however sincere, is largely misguided, being built on an improper foundation (Luke 6.46-49).
Whereas the Prodigal is a personification of Immoral Man, the Elder Brother personifies the Moral or Religious person. Each is in error, each has ‘turned to his own way’ and, apart from the divine intervention of a gracious father, each is headed for an eternity separated from him.
Whereas the prodigal is preoccupied with gratifying the needs of his flesh, the Elder Brother is preoccupied with gratifying his own ego. He is out to prove his own goodness or rightness before his father and as a result becomes obsessed with his sense of what he believes is owed him – namely, his father’s recognition and his father’s things.
What is more, he is oriented toward obeying a set of rules and performing to meet a set of standards, rather than cultivating a relationship with his father. As a result, he is filled with a sense of entitlement: 'Look! For so many years I have been serving you and…{yet} you have never given me a young goat, so that I might celebrate with my friends; but when this son of yours came, who has devoured your wealth with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him.' When he does not get what he believes he deserves, he is filled with malice and self-pity.
The Elder Brother simultaneously demonstrates his hubris – for who but Christ can justly say to his father, ‘I have never neglected a command of yours?” – as well as his total failure to comprehend that the primary means of acceptance in any relationship is grace and not works. Because of this failure, the Elder Brother proves incapable of genuine love and compassion, toward his brother or anyone else. He is too busy judging the failures of others to realize his own (Romans 2.1).
But perhaps the primary difference between the Prodigal and his Elder Brother is their varying levels of self-awareness. The first ultimately apprehends that he is lost and returns to his father begging mercy; the other, as far as we know, remains entrenched in his own false perceptions of himself and by the end of the story has drifted further astray than when we first met him. In the end, he is more to be pitied.
Certainly, the abruptness with which Christ ends the story - relaying the earnest Father's appeal without mention of the Elder Brother's response - is meant to serve as a kind of stimulus. Perhaps we are meant to finish and act out the ending in our own lives.
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