25 Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he said, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” 26 He said to him, “What is written in the law? What do you read there?” 27 He answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.” 28 And he said to him, “You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live.”
29 But wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” 30 Jesus replied, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead. 31 Now by chance a priest was going down that road; and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. 32 So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan while traveling came near him; and when he saw him, he was moved with pity. 34 He went to him and bandaged his wounds, having poured oil and wine on them. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. 35 The next day he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said, ‘Take care of him; and when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spend.’ 36 Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?”
37 He said, “Well, it kinda depends, Jesus. If the victim was an illegal immigrant trying to sneak across national borders, then the first two men who encountered him were doing the right thing by leaving him alone because helping him would be (and should be, mind you) a felony. The victim, if he's sneaking across borders in the first place, is probably some drug lord or rapist anyway. Thus, the Samaritan was a criminal and should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law, and the victim should be immediately deported back to his own shithole nation. On the other hand, if the victim was a regular citizen but was poor and had no health insurance, then the question becomes, 'Who's going to pay for all his health care?' That shit's expensive, ya know! If the Samaritan foolishly wants to do that out of his own pocket, then that's his own business, not the government's. But the priest and the Levite shouldn't be expected to help pay for this man's medical bills by a socialist government, which decides to illegally impose health care on everyone as some kind of 'human right,' no matter the costs; it's not like it was their fault that this dude had decided to walk around in the wrong part of town and got jumped.” And Jesus said to him, “WTF?”
(OK, so maybe this is the correct version of verse 37: 37 He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” Jesus said to him, “Go and do likewise.”) Pretty straightforward, I'd say.
Well said, and a good reminder to all of us that the border walls we all carry with us with ‘the other’ are imaginary and learned. We are all earthlings. We are all humans. We all have the ability to be in the place of the person needing mercy, and the place of showing mercy. I think the central tenet of this story in the Christian sacred text you cite is to practice empathy, love, and mercy toward our fellow earthlings in their time of need. You never know when your own time of need will arise and you’ll want that Good Samaritan to cross the road for you. Thanks again for a beautiful post.
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