The Shrewd Manager
Read the parable
- Luke 16:1-13 Primary account
Context
A steward managed a rich man's estate with authority to contract debts in his master's name; the debts here — a hundred measures of oil, a hundred of wheat — are commercial-scale quantities. Facing dismissal for waste, the steward wrote down the debtors' bills so they would owe him hospitality when he was put out. Some commentators suggest he was forgoing his own commission or unlawful interest; on any reading, his master could only admire the shrewdness. Luke notes the covetous Pharisees heard all this and derided him.
Meaning
Jesus praises the steward's prudence, not his dishonesty: facing a certain deadline, the man used present resources to secure his future — and "the children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light." Disciples should use "the mammon of unrighteousness" — worldly wealth — with the same forward-looking shrewdness, in generosity that stores up an eternal welcome. Faithfulness in the small trust of money proves fitness for true riches, and the teaching lands on an unavoidable either/or: "Ye cannot serve God and mammon."
Go deeper
Two free lessons walk through the parables as a whole: The Parables of Jesus and Interpreting the Parables.