Biblion Bible Commentary
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She Loved Much
Luke 7:36-50
36 One of the Pharisees invited him to eat with him. He entered into the Pharisee’s house and sat at the table. · WEB
A woman with a bad reputation weeps on his feet in a Pharisee's dining room, and the host's silent objection is answered with a story about debt.
One of the Pharisees invited him to eat with him Luke 7:36.
This Gospel alone tells it, and it is placed immediately after a friend of tax collectors and sinners was thrown at him as an insult. The invitation is real hospitality; not every Pharisee in this book is hostile, and Simon has him at his table.
Behold, a woman in the city who was a sinner, when she knew that he was reclining in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster jar of ointment Luke 7:37.
Her trade is not named and the town's opinion of her is. She is not a gate-crasher in the modern sense — such meals were semi-public, and people came to stand at the walls and listen — but she is the last person expected to cross that floor.
Standing behind at his feet weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears, and she wiped them with the hair of her head, kissed his feet, and anointed them Luke 7:38.
Guests reclined on their left side with their feet away from the table, so she can reach him without pushing past anyone. What follows is unplanned: she came with ointment and the weeping was not part of the plan. A woman's hair was covered in public and let down only at home, and she takes it down in a room full of men to dry his feet because she has nothing else.
The whole scene is done in silence. She says nothing, from the first verse to the last.
"This man, if he were a prophet, would have perceived who and what kind of woman this is who touches him, that she is a sinner" Luke 7:39.
Simon's objection is thought rather than spoken, and it is a syllogism. A prophet would know; he is permitting it; therefore he does not know; therefore he is not a prophet. The reasoning is sound and the second premise is false — and the answer that comes proves the prophet by reading the thought Simon never voiced.
"A certain lender had two debtors. The one owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. When they couldn't pay, he forgave them both. Which of them therefore will love him most?" Luke 7:41–42.
The parable concedes Simon's whole case. There is a difference in the amounts, and it is not pretended away — she owes more, and he is told so. The one thing added is the detail Simon left out: when they couldn't pay. Both are insolvent. Fifty denarii is fifty days' wages, and a man who cannot pay it is as ruined as the man who cannot pay five hundred.
"He, I suppose, to whom he forgave the most." The I suppose is beautifully in character — a careful man conceding a point he can feel closing on him.
"Do you see this woman?" Luke 7:44. The question is aimed at a man who has been looking at her for several minutes and has seen only a category.
Then the comparison, item by item: no water for the feet, no kiss of greeting, no oil for the head Luke 7:44–46. None of the three was obligatory, and the omission of all three from a formal invitation says something. Simon had him to dinner and gave him nothing. She has supplied every one of them, and with what she had — tears for water, her hair for a towel, ointment for oil, and kisses without stopping.
"Therefore I tell you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much" Luke 7:47.
The order in that sentence has been argued over, and the parable has already settled it. In the story the forgiveness comes first and the love follows; the debtors do not love their way out of debt. So for she loved much is the evidence, not the cause — her love is how you can tell what has happened to her, and the next clause confirms it: one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.
That is the closing verdict on the host. Not that Simon is a great sinner, but that he does not think he is one, and a man with a small view of his own debt will produce a small love and be puzzled by anyone else's.
"Your faith has saved you. Go in peace" Luke 7:50. The last word to her names something other than her love — faith — and sends her out of the room she was not supposed to be in.
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