The ‘Rich Man and Lazarus’, and its connections with a famous song
First published in Sight Magazine, 18 July 2025
Open Book: The ‘Rich Man and Lazarus’, and its connections with a famous song
Read Luke 16:19-31 (NIV)
In my childhood, Rock My Soul in the Bosom of Abraham was a contagious chorus with an elusive verse: “so high you can’t get over it, so low you can’t get under it, so wide you can’t get around it, oh rocka ma soul.” What was ‘it’?
Why would a 175-year-old dead man (Genesis 25:7) be swaying my soul in his bosom?
This African-American ‘slave song’ describes the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus.
Jesus named the beggar at the rich man’s gate Lazarus, a Hellenised translation of the Hebrew Ele-azar (‘he whom God has helped’). This is an apt name given the preceding theme of eyes and hearts: Lazarus was invisible and insignificant to the rich man.”
For cultural context, this parable follows the parable of the shrewd manager, where Jesus responds to the “sneering” Pharisees: “You are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of others, but God knows your hearts” (Luke 16:15).
From his opening sentence of the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus, Jesus directs his coded language at the Pharisees who “loved money”.
If the rich man “lived in luxury every day”, then he ordered his servants to prepare food that “fell from his table”, even on the Sabbath. This is the Sabbath law that the Pharisees accused Jesus of breaking (Mark 2:23-24).
Jesus named the beggar at the rich man’s gate Lazarus, a Hellenised translation of the Hebrew Ele-azar (‘he whom God has helped’). This is an apt name given the preceding theme of eyes and hearts: Lazarus was invisible and insignificant to the rich man.
When the two characters died simultaneously, the rich man “looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side”.
First, the rich man ‘in torment’ plays the race card and calls “Father Abraham”. In the Levant, this is called waasta – expecting favour due to connection, implying that this Jewish Patriarch should pity his own children before looking after some non-descript beggar. Whatever he wills should be done in heaven, as it was in his lifetime. This is the ironic antithesis of the Lord’s prayer: “on Earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10)
Second, the rich man treats Lazarus like one of his servants: “send Lazarus to dip his finger in water and cool my tongue”. The entitled eyes and unrepentant heart of the rich man persisted in the afterlife: he knew the beggar’s name but still refused to speak to him directly.
Father Abraham addresses the rich man as “son”, which surely renders “Lazarus by his side” as an invisible brother.
Abraham turns the tables, reminding the rich man “in your lifetime you received good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now…”. The parable drives a wedge between the Pharisees and Sadducees as the latter do not believe in resurrection (Acts 23:8).
“But now…” highlights the ironic role reversal: Now the rich man is begging “have mercy on me”. Now the rich man is “in agony”. Now the rich man wishes to be seen as Ele-azar.
Abraham responds: “a great chasm has been set in place, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot”. Perhaps this is the origin of the Rock my Soul verse “so wide, you can’t get around it…”
Third, the rich man desperately begs for a miracle: “send Lazarus to my family, for I have five brothers. Let him warn them…”. Again, he speaks about Lazarus in the third person. Again, he relegates Lazarus: from waiter to messenger.
When Abraham declines this last request, the rich man pleads “if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent”.
The ironies are falling off his table!
Why has the rich man refused to repent or apologise directly to Lazarus?
If the black-and-white writings of ‘Moses and the Prophets’ cannot incite repentance, why would the rich man’s five brothers be convinced by the apparition of the familiar beggar whom they probably stepped over at their brother’s gate?
Is it coincidental that the Sadducee high priest Caiaphas had exactly five brothers-in-law and were all priests?
When Jesus later raised the ‘real’ Lazarus from the dead, the chief priests plotted to kill both of them (John 12:9-10), rather than repent.
The parable provides a salient warning that despite how you “justify yourselves in the eyes of others, God knows your hearts”. While wealth, reputation, waasta, sickness and poverty are all left behind, only the colour of the heart persists. The rich man remained ‘dressed in purple’, refusing to see beggar as a brother. Lazarus remained silent throughout the parable, never cursing the rich man.
Circling back to the Rock my Soul ditty, there is an inescapable coincidence: Abraham was born around 2000 BC in the ancient Sumerian city of Ur, now in Southern Iraq. All three monotheistic faiths revere Abraham. While Ab-raham means ‘father of many nations’ in Hebrew, raham/racham also means womb and mercy in local Semitic languages, especially around Ur.
How apt that Lazarus is shown mercy as he is welcomed home to the womb/bosom of Father Abraham.