Rich man and Lazarus was Not a parable says someone named Matthew McGee

[UniversalSceptic]

This man asserts that the Rich man and Lazarus was not a parable because Lazarus and Abarham's name was used. He fruther suggests Gehenna/Hell is temporal agony and the lake of fire is real.

[Seth]

This man asserts that the Rich man and Lazarus was not a parable because Lazarus and Abarham's name was used. He fruther suggests Gehenna/Hell is temporal agony and the lake of fire is real.

Everyone has a right to their opinion but I disagree. Here is how Jesus leads into the parable:

Luke 16
16 The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached, and every man presseth into it.
17 And it is easier for heaven and earth to pass, than one tittle of the law to fail.
18 Whosoever putteth away his wife, and marrieth another, committeth adultery: and whosoever marrieth her that is put away from her husband committeth adultery.
19 There was a certain rich man....

So it seems that Jesus is going to use the parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man to illustrate the points he just made which is about: Two Covenants. The first covenant was until John, the Law and the Prophets. Since then, the Kingdom of God is preached. These covenants are like a marriage contract. If you marry another under your old contract you commit adultery. So how can you be released from the First Covenant into the New Covenant?

Watch the similarities between Christ's parable lead-in to the below scripture:

Romans 7
3So then, if while her husband is living she is joined to another man, she shall be called an adulteress; but if her husband dies, she is free from the law, so that she is not an adulteress though she is joined to another man. 4Therefore, my brethren, you also were made to die to the Law through the body of Christ, so that you might be joined to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God.

Paul is saying that by being crucified with Christ, we are freed from the Old Covenant. Therefore, we are freed from the former marriage covenant to to be in the Bride of Christ.

The parable is there to show us how the Gentiles became under the sonship of Abraham whereas the Pharisees who were scoffing at his previous parable in Luke 16 were going to lose that position of Abrahamic sonship.

Remember how Lazarus was dead, then he was resurrected? That has spiritual significance in this parable. Lazarus is made alive in Christ, having not been formerly under the sonship of Abraham through faith. Christ is using physical resurrection as a means to show how that the Gentiles would be considered Jews by God in the New Covenant. Having once been poor, he would be rich in Christ.

The water in the parable represents the SPIRIT of which the rich man cannot partake because he did not believe and is therefore dead in his sins (not in Hell) but the word is "hades" meaning the grave. This grave is used metaphorically to show spiritual death of the Pharisees who were rich, but spiritually dead and wanting for the Holy Spirit, though their pride kept them from believing.

Here is a good explanation of the parable verse by verse: http://mercifultruth.com/lazarus.html

[WhiteWings]

"All these things spoke Jesus unto the multitudes IN PARABLES and without a parable spoke he not unto them. That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying, I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter things which have been kept secret from the foundation of the world."Matthew 13:34-35


http://home.online.nl/spamfree/ShepherdsVoice/rich%20man%20and%20lazarus.htm
Read them all  :winkgrin:

[Seth]

UniversalSceptic, notice the language of various parable introductions below, and keep in mind that Jesus was speaking in many parables, from Luke 14 to 16:


"Therefore is the kingdom of heaven likened unto a certain king"

"A certain man had two sons"

"There was a certain householder"

"There was a certain creditor"

"A certain man had a fig tree"

"A certain man made a great supper"

"And he said, A certain man had two sons"

"There was a certain rich man, which had a steward"

"There was a certain rich man, which was clothed in purple and fine linen"

"And there was a certain beggar named Lazarus"

[marie glen]

I don't know if this came up, but I read this I thought interesting,
http://www.tentmaker.org/books/OriginandHistory.html#c3s2 -

It must also be remembered that this is only a parable, and not a real history; for, as Dr. Whitby affirms, "we find this very parable in the Gemara Babylonicum." The story was not new, then, not original with Christ, but known among the Jews before He repeated it. He borrowed the parable from them, and employed it to show the judgment which awaited them.

...by scrolling down to a section about the parable.