A contentious analysis of the parable of the rich man and Lazarus against Jehovah's Witnesses.
The parable of the rich man and Lazarus has always been a thorn in the side of the Witnesses, as it seems at first reading to naturally assume the survival of the soul after death. According to the traditional Christian explanation, the characters involved - if not literal - definitely represent individual people, not groups of people. The story is so well-known that the Watchtower Society was forced to provide a detailed explanation.
They consider the story to be entirely symbolic to cut off any reference to the soul and hellfire. Charles Taze Russell argued that Abraham's bosom, taken literally, could not be large enough for all Lazarus. However, this objection is shallow, as Abraham's bosom is depicted as large as there are people there, so the story is about a single Lazarus, not many. Then he says it is impossible to believe that the rich man went to a place of torment because of his wealth, and Lazarus was saved because of his poverty. But this is not a decisive argument, as the text does not talk about the reasons, only the fate of the two people.
According to them, "Jesus here uses the rich man to represent the Jewish religious leaders", and "beggar Lazarus thus represents these people to whom the religious leaders deny proper spiritual nourishment and privileges" (The Greatest Man Who Ever Lived, Chapter 88). And what does the death of the two people "illustrate"? "It is with the preaching of John [the Baptist] and Jesus Christ that both the rich man and Lazarus die to their former circumstances, or condition." This peculiar explanation relies on Luke 16:16, which precedes the parable by several verses, stating that "“The Law and the Prophets were until John [the Baptizer]. From then on the kingdom of God is being declared as good news" - expressing the great change in circumstances. The needs of Lazarus-like humble people are now met by the scriptural truths mediated by Jesus, so they no longer need the "crumbs falling from the spiritual table of the religious leaders." The latter are in "symbolic torments" because they "persistently refusing to accept the Kingdom message taught by Jesus."
The only thing that can be opposed to this interpretation is that there is a clear shift between Luke 16:16 and the Lazarus parable, with two discourses inserted in between: about the full validity of the law and about divorce. Only then does Lazarus come. It is therefore an excessive boldness to connect as evidence what the Lord himself chose to speak separately. Nevertheless, here it is only an opinion against an opinion, so this explanation seems contrived to the reader who grew up on the traditional interpretation, but there is no blatant heresy in it.
The inaccuracy of the Watchtower explanation becomes clear from the fact that it cannot embrace the whole parable; and it turns the punchline into a meaningless appendix at the end of the parable. According to the Brooklyn headquarters, the torments described here are nothing more than "God's fiery judgment messages, proclaimed by Jesus' disciples," and the "rich man class" asks them to stop "proclaiming judgment messages." It would be appropriate now to clarify what kind of "judgment messages" the apostles proclaimed - because as far as I know, they preached the Gospel. Even to those who previously belonged to the "rich man class" (Acts 2:23). There is a serious inconsistency in the Witnesses' explanation: if there is no conversion after "symbolic death" ("the great chasm illustrates God's unchangeable, just judgment"), then why did Peter preach the forgiveness of sins to those who, in his opinion, "crucified Jesus with their sinful hands"? According to the explanation in the "Greatest Man," "the change takes place on Pentecost 33 A.D., a few months later, when the Old Covenant is replaced by the New Covenant." Well, then why did Paul still preach repentance to the Jews (Acts 28:23)? We cannot use the loophole that during the great change, the "rich man class" still had to be offered a choice - because this argument undermines the finality and "symbolic death" nature of the change. What kind of "symbolic death" is it during which one can repent? It seems that Jehovah's Witnesses have created purgatory independently of the Roman Catholics. Furthermore, according to the Watchtower, preaching is a "judgment message" for the "rich man class" - how can it also be an opportunity for them to repent?
In conclusion, the Jehovah's Witnesses' interpretation of the parable of the rich man and Lazarus is fraught with inconsistencies and contrivances that make it difficult to fully accept their explanation. The traditional understanding of the parable, which assumes the survival of the soul after death and offers a more straightforward reading, remains a valid perspective for many.
I would like to note in passing that only something with a literal meaning that is obvious to everyone and contains no internal contradictions can be used as a symbol. Listeners can only understand the underlying meaning if the literal interpretation evokes something in them, allowing them to infer the invisible spiritual reality. And what are we talking about here? Death and torment. If death is symbolic and the torments are also symbolic (as the book "The Greatest Man" claims), then the parable can only be complete if evildoers suffer literal torments after literal death. Otherwise, the Lord would have used a false image as the starting point for his teaching (the rich man tormented in the flames of Hades after his death). His teaching would then have no basis in reality: he would have based his message on a false statement. This is, of course, an impossibility – so the error lies in the teaching of the Watchtower.
The older explanation by Russell was as follows: The rich man represents the Jewish people, and the Gentile Christians represent Lazarus. While the Jews often begged the nations to alleviate the flames of their persecution, this was not possible. This could still be discussed in 1916, but a year later, the demarcation of the State of Israel began, and since 1946, Jews have been migrating back to the promised land en masse – undoubtedly due to the decisions of the great powers. So much for Russell's confident explanation.
But the Lord did not finish with this. He gave the parable an ending in which the Witnesses' knife breaks badly. The rich man asks Abraham to let Lazarus go and bear witness to his father's house and his five brothers. We see a clumsy explanation from the Brooklyn "faithful and wise servant," which says, "the rich man here openly admits that he has a closer relationship with another father, who is Satan, the Devil." What kind of evasion is this? The Pharisees did not "openly admit" before or after Jesus' resurrection that their father was the devil, and they did not plead with the "Greater Abraham," i.e., Jehovah, to end their torments. They did not feel any torment at all, although the rich man in the story was clearly suffering.
The Watchtower is playing a reverse game with the element that the rich man did not even know about the existence of the great chasm – because they "interpret" this chasm as the Pharisees being unable to convert. But what kind of twisted concept of conversion is it that someone wants to convert, knows how to do it, but cannot? It is ridiculous to try to justify this by referring to the Pharisees' fear of losing their livelihood, as they were such fierce enemies of Christ precisely because they were the "blind leading the blind." They did not oppose Him because they feared bankruptcy for their religious enterprise, but because they sincerely believed they were right. I wonder how ordinary Witnesses can accept such a theory from the Brooklyn headquarters – they must have to twist their Bibles upside down for that.
And it also needs to be explained why the rich man himself could not go to his brothers? I repeat: the rich man class is allegedly on earth and suffers torments there. He wants to repent but cannot (this assumption already contradicts the message of the New Testament, which says that now is the "time of refreshing," the "day of salvation"). But why can't he get up from his place (on earth), walk down the paved street on his own two feet, and tell his "religious allies" with his own mouth about the torments he is suffering? Why did he want to send Lazarus to his brothers – the very Witnesses who tormented him? It's even worse that Lazarus couldn't go either – so Jehovah's Witnesses shouldn't bear witness to their "religious allies," lest they convert! Witnesses have always been proud of their logic: well, let them untangle this knot if they can.
Russell identifies the rich man and his five brothers with the two main Palestinian Jewish tribes, Judah and Benjamin, as well as the other tribes scattered in the diaspora, which is appealing but historically false: the other tribes didn't just disperse, their tribal identity ceased to exist. Nevertheless, we don't hear about Palestinian Jews following the spreading Christianity with great conversion intentions, as they were constantly hindering the spread of the word. If we stick to Russell's casting, we should rather talk about the rich man jumping out of the fiery hell without asking permission and starting to beat Lazarus with a whistle because he dared to go to the five brothers to warn them of the danger.
And further, Abraham replied to the rich man, "They have Moses and the prophets; let them listen to them." So there is conversion after all; but for whom? According to the Watchtower, the five brothers represent the "religious allies" of the rich man class. Well, I respectfully ask: why didn't the "symbolic death" affect these "allies"? Didn't the new covenant apply to them? How did they earn this exceptional "third way" of staying with Moses and the Prophets while Christ's disciples carried the alleged "judgment messages" to the "ends of the earth"? This is a tricky question.
And the Lord, as if deliberately speaking this parable against Jehovah's Witnesses, continued: the rich man requested Lazarus' resurrection, thinking that the miracle would convince his erring brothers. This is the point where the these Bible Researchers' knowledge fails. Even the otherwise ingenious and resourceful Brooklyn teaching office remains silent at this point. For how could the previous, compulsive interpretation be forced onto what is said here? If "symbolic death" is a transition from the old covenant to the new, then "resurrection" logically means returning to the law. However, this is such a mental triple salto that even the "faithful and wise servant" would stumble, so they remain silent. But the question awaits an answer: why does the Lord mention resurrection here? The commentary escapes into generalities: "So God does not give special signs or miracles to convince people."
This is true, but a resurrection is only a "sign" or "miracle" if taken literally. So, Abraham denied nothing but Lazarus' bodily resurrection to the rich man. That is, Lazarus literally died, not just symbolically. However, neither Lazarus nor the rich man represents entire "classes" of people, but rather individuals, even if they are fictional, allegorical figures. So we have come to the conclusion that human consciousness remains after physical death. Thus, the doctrine of Jehovah's Witnesses that the whole person is destroyed at physical death has been refuted.
I presented this line of thought to several Jehovah's Witnesses who rang my doorbell (and were increasingly more educated), but all I achieved was that they no longer visited.
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The WTS publication "The Truth That Leads to Eternal Life" emphasizes that this is a parable and nothing more. All thoughts related to the literal place of torment must be excluded. They ask rationally:
"Is it reasonable or Scriptural to believe that a man suffers torment simply because he is rich, wears good clothing and has plenty to eat? Is it Scriptural to believe that one is blessed with heavenly life just because he is a beggar? Consider this too: Is hell literally within speaking distance of heaven so that an actual conversation could be carried on? Also, if the rich man were in a literal burning lake, how could Abraham send Lazarus to cool his tongue with just a drop of water on the tip of his finger?"
For all these reasons, this cannot be a literal account of events. What, then, did Jesus want to say with this? The Watchtower Society interprets the story allegorically:
"In this illustration the rich man stood for the class of religious leaders who rejected and later killed Jesus."
Some individuals here expand into entire groups of people. They also reinterpret the torment spoken of in the story. It no longer refers to the afterlife (Lk 16:22), but to the fate of religious leaders shortly after the events of Pentecost:
"Being cast off, they suffered torments when Christ’s followers after Pentecost forcefully exposed their evil works."
The fact that this explanation is unconvincing is proven, on the one hand, by the fact that the biblical text itself provides no basis for such a purely historical interpretation. On the other hand, the Watchtower Society has provided at least five different explanations for Lk 16:19-31 throughout its history - which we will omit for the sake of brevity. Dietrich Hellmund (1971) speaks in his dissertation of the "persistent, unsolved problem" of Jehovah's Witnesses in connection with the many and varied attempts at explanation. Russell's confession was still the most honest: "Here we find the only place in Scripture that suggests the possibility of thinking, feeling, torment, or joy in Hades or Sheol" (Biblical Studies 5, 1926, p. 361).
As we have seen, Luke 16:19-31 is by no means the only place that confirms this. How should Luke 16:19-31 be interpreted in reality? This is a difficult question in theological research as well. In my opinion, however, some basic statements can still be made.
First of all, it is not entirely clear whether this is really a parable. Compared to Jesus' other parables, there is at least one striking difference: the naming of "Lazarus", which otherwise never occurs in Jesus' parables. Various Church Fathers were therefore of the opinion that this is not a parable, but that Jesus is referring to a real Israeli event. Tertullian writes (De anima 7): "What would the name 'Lazarus' be doing here if it were not a real event? But even if it were a parable that demands faith, it would still be a testimony to the truth." The distinguished biblical scholar Theodor Zahn also points to the naming in connection with Lk 16:19-31, which "stands without parallel in all of Jesus' parables that have come down to us, both in the narrower and broader sense."
Even if the parable of Lazarus and the rich man is indeed an illustration, Jesus never used false or misleading things.