SERMON XLII. THE UNJUST STEWARD



Eversley, 1866. NINTH SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY.

Luke xvi. 8. "And the Lord commended the unjust steward, because he had
done wisely."

None of our Lord's parables has been as difficult to explain as this one.
Learned and pious men have confessed freely, in all ages, that there is
much in the parable which they cannot understand; and I am bound to
confess the same. The puzzle is, plainly, why our Lord should SEEM to
bid us to copy the conduct of a bad man and a cheat. For this is the
usual interpretation. The steward has been cheating his master already.
When he is found out and about to be dismissed, he cheats his master
still further, by telling his debtors to cheat, and so wins favour with
them.

But does our Lord bid us copy a cheat? I cannot believe that; and the
text I should have said ought to give us a very different notion. We
read that the lord--that is, the steward's master--commended the unjust
steward. What? Commended him for cheating him a second time, and
teaching his debtors to cheat him? He must have been a man of a strange
character--very unlike any man whom we know, or, at all events, any man
whom we should wish to know--to have done that. But it is said--he
commended him for having acted wisely. Now that word "wisely" may merely