"I Will Pull Down My Barns": A Reflection on the Parable of the Rich Fool
The gospel text for the Eighth Sunday after Pentecost includes the parable of the Rich Fool. Unlike some of his other parables, Jesus doesn't leave us guessing regarding its interpretation. In fact, he provides a straightforward heading before he begins:
And he said to them, “Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed, for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.”
While Jesus’ summary of the parable directs our interpretation, it doesn’t exhaust the parable's meaning. If anything, it serves as the foundation for the parable’s interpretive possibilities.
One of the things I appreciate about artistic depictions of events or parables in the gospels is the way they highlight truths that might not be explicit in the text. There's an 18th century Russian painting called “I will Pull Down My Barns” that is based upon the parable of the Rich Fool.
The painting is a great example of why I think artistic depictions of biblical texts open us up to see the text in fresh ways.
Given the title, the first thing we might notice about this painting is that it is ironically named. The “I” isn’t pulling down anything. We see the Rich Fool seated at a table counting his money while others do his bidding. In this way, the painting underscores the parable’s subtle emphasis that the Rich Fool deserves no direct credit for his recent good fortune: “the land of a rich man produced abundantly,” Jesus tells us, not the rich man himself.
The second thing we might notice about the painting is the Rich Fool's isolation. Just as in Jesus’ parable, the Rich fool allows no one near enough to advise him.
And he thought to himself, ‘What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?’ Then he said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, “Soul . . .’”
In the above verses, the Rich Fool speaks about himself and, oddly, to himself. He seems to be the only one present until God speaks.
The painting, however, shows the flurry of activity occurring outside the house.
Although the Rich Fool sits alone at his table, he’s by no means alone in the frame, which is what makes the painting so effective. There are multiple servants here, all of whom bend under the weight of heavy loads as they move this bumper crop to the larger barn.
In this way, the painting underscores another truth of the parable, which is that greed stifles community. In addition to demonstrating the truth that life doesn't consist in the abundance of possessions, the Rich Fool’s repeated use of “I” and “my” implies that his greed isolates him from relationship.
The painting takes this a step further. Greed not only cuts him off from relationship, but it also ensures that the only relationships he has are those defined by subjugation and coercion. He issues a command, and his nameless, faceless servants do his bidding.
His circumstances have allowed him the luxury to be left alone or, when he’s not alone, to be surrounded only by those who enrich his life materially and who don’t make unreasonable demands on his time.
A third thing we might notice about the painting is the spatial relationship between the figures. The Rich Fool sits above the servants. Although he directs his gaze downward, he doesn’t appear to be looking at the others in the frame. At best, he’s looking past them. At worst, he doesn't notice them and focuses only on the money scattered across his table.
In this way, the painting alerts us to another important truth of the parable, one that the parable’s context seems to invite, which is that greed averts our eyes from the places Christ would have us look.
The parable’s context suggests as much. Recall what leads Jesus to tell this parable in the first place:
Someone in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me.”
In her commentary on this passage, Debie Thomas contrasts what Jesus notices and what the inquiring man notices (or doesn’t notice). She says,
“Jesus looks at the man embroiled in a family feud over money, and sees that his obsessive need for a fair share is twisting, gnarling, and embittering his heart. He [the inquiring man] can’t see his own brother as anything more than an obstacle or a competitor. He’s so concerned about possible scarcity that he doesn’t even notice actual abundance (Jesus) standing right next to him. In his greed, he reduces the Son of God to an estate lawyer.”
Again, not only in the parable itself, but in the interaction that leads to its telling, greed averts our eyes from the places Christ would have us look.
Or back up even further.
In the verses that precede this exchange, Jesus informs his followers that they are going to experience conflict. People in positions of power will confront them and force them to answer for themselves. Listen to what Jesus says immediately before the inquiring man speaks up:
“When they bring you before the synagogues, the rulers, and the authorities, do not worry about how or what you will answer or what you are to say, for the Holy Spirit will teach you at that very hour what you ought to say.”
We can almost hear Pauls' words to the Ephesians echoing in the background:
for our struggle is not against blood and flesh but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
At this most inopportune of all moments, the man voices his concern about his share of the family inheritance, a blood-and-flesh concern if ever there was one.
The inquiring man’s fixation on his family conflict causes him to completely miss Jesus’ direction about where the real battle is being waged. Again, greed obstructs his vision. He expresses anxiety about an inheritance dispute at the very moment Jesus exhorts his followers not to worry about what they should say in their impending struggle with rulers and authorities.
When Jesus responds with this parable, he’s speaking to a man embroiled in a dispute with his brother and telling him that greed stifles community, puts us at odds with one another, and keeps our eyes from looking where Christ would have us to look.
(For what it’s worth, the arrangement of bodies in the painting suggests that “where Christ would have us to look” includes both the material circumstances of oppressed people and the systems that keep them oppressed.)
That greed can be destructive is perhaps not groundbreaking news; we don’t need convincing that it’s bad. What’s important to consider here, then, is why greed still manifests even though we’re rarely, if ever, looking for ways to be greedy.
Like other sins, greed is more often not something we seek out consciously, but something that sneaks in when, as Jesus says, we let down our “guard.”
As is the case for the Rich Fool, greed often cloaks itself in the garb of financial security, or the protection of the futures of our loved ones. But as much as we might wish it, Jesus isn’t instructing us to seek security. We’re following the one whose invitation is, ultimately, to deny ourselves and follow him.
How, then, do we become “rich toward God,” as the parable puts it? Focusing on the question God asks the Rich Fool might help us to hear the challenge of Jesus’ parable afresh:
‘your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’
One way of reading God’s question to the Rich Fool is, “You're going to die tonight. What will happen to all your stuff?”
Placing the emphasis of the question on the imminence of the Rich Fool’s demise is a necessary and challenging way to read the parable. After all, none of us will escape death. What’s more, given that the picture of a wealthy person living in luxury is tethered throughout Scripture to the inevitability of death (Psalm 49:16-17; Luke 16:19, 23; James 5:1, 5), we shouldn’t be surprised to see Jesus connecting these realities in the parable.
But could it be that limiting the interpretation of the question to, “You fool, this is your last day on earth,” stops short of another challenge this parable presents?
If all God is saying to the Rich Fool is, “You're going to die tonight,” there’s a sense in which his death absolves him from taking responsibility for his actions.
It’s quite another thing to read this passage as though the Rich Fool is you or I, with whatever amount of wealth we have amassed, with whatever number of years or decades we have left to live, being told, “This very day, and all of the days ahead, God will demand your very life. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?”
To say it another way, the question isn't, “Whose will your possessions be when you're gone tomorrow,” but rather, “Whose will they be when you're here tomorrow and your life will again be demanded of you? Whose will they be in your (perhaps many) remaining tomorrows, during which your life will be demanded of you over and over again?” Will they belong only to you?
Debie Thomas asks the question pointedly:
“What would we do differently if we believed that God does in fact demand our lives from us every single day, in every single way?”
As the hymn says,
Love so amazing, so divine
Demands my soul, my life, my all
Reading God’s question to the Rich Fool in this way opens up answers that we might overlook if we understand the question only as rhetorical.
Luke explores contrasting answers to this question, re-deploying it as he describes the life of the early followers of Jesus in Acts. His narrative structure demonstrates that their answer to this question, although not uniform, occupies a place of primary importance. “The things you have prepared, whose will they be?” The first answer comes in Acts 2:
All who believed were together and had all things in common; they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need. Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home and ate their food with glad and generous hearts . . .
These early followers of Jesus understood their lives as gifts, and they lived generously toward one another as a result. Commenting on the early Christian community’s activity, theologian Norman Wirzba provides a helpful delineation between gratitude and generosity, indicating that practicing the former without the latter leaves room for greed to sneak in:
“To receive with open hands is also to continue to keep one's hands open so that others can receive from you. Gratitude, in other words, is the sign that the gift has been received, while generosity is the sign that the recipient has been transformed by the gift.”
A contrasting answer to this question comes soon after in Acts 5 when Ananias and Sapphira cloak their greed in deceit.
But a man named Ananias, with the consent of his wife Sapphira, sold a piece of property; with his wife’s knowledge, he kept back some of the proceeds and brought only a part and laid it at the apostles’ feet.
The suddenness of their deaths bears harkens back to God’s words to the Rich Fool in the parable: “This very night your life will be demanded of you.”
How do we avoid the kind of greed that stifles relationship, that put us at odds with one another, that obstructs our vision and keeps us from seeing what God intends for us to see? How do we become rich toward God?
Remaining “on guard against all kinds of greed,” as Jesus puts it, requires identifying and rooting out whatever imperceptible force threatens to drive a wedge between us “rich fools” and the company we overlook, despite their proximity.
To be on guard against all kinds of greed, we must regularly enter into cycles of giving and receiving, gratitude and generosity.
Approaching the Lord’s Table is a starting point. Here, we encounter the One who sets these cycles in motion and beckons us to participate. As the parable (and painting) suggests, we cannot be on guard against all kinds of greed while also denying others a seat at the table.
Unlike the Rich Fool’s table, which is too high to be accessible and too cluttered for either food or guests, Christ’s table includes and feeds others.
His is the only table with room enough to overcome our desire to isolate ourselves.
His is the only table level enough for us to see each other clearly.
His is the only table where the nourishment on offer also effects the reconciliation of its guests.
His is the only table that creates the conditions for the gratitude with which we receive to be transformed into generosity.
God whose love demands our very lives, we repent of greed in all its forms. We confess that we have isolated ourselves from one another and averted our eyes from where you would have us look. Lord Jesus, as we approach your table to receive, may your Spirit prompt us to discern how to be generous in our present circumstances. We direct our attention to your body, the Church, as our example for what a rich life together can look like. Help us to become such a community, united in gratitude, and transformed to offer ourselves in generosity to the watching world. Amen.