Lessons
I have never liked the story of the Prodigal Son. It was so unjust, that profligacy and an insincere apology should be rewarded with celebration. I always sympathized with the elder son – the one who complained of neglect after years of Doing the Right Thing. Who knows what else he may have wanted? Who knows what other lives he might have lived had he not adhered so religiously to what his family required of him? What parties did he miss, what lovers did he reject, to fulfill his duty?
The real lesson of the parable is that constancy will be taken for granted. No one celebrates reliability. No one applauds the car that always starts, that plods unfailingly through the snow and potholes. No: We cheer the junkers and jalopies, the recalcitrant clunkers that start only after we are filmed with sweat and grease.
So it is with people. The father in the story has never thanked his elder son for his responsibility and he never will. He would no more question his reliability than wonder whether the sun will rise the next day. He feels no more need to celebrate his son than his footstools, or his dogs. They come and go like clockwork, delivering what is needed before slipping back into the background.
But the Prodigal Son – there is a character. Even in childhood he must have clamored for favors and attention. And after years of this, he finally demanded everything – everything that was to fall to him, everything that was to be his inheritance. With typical disregard for the needs of others, he demands his inheritance and takes off. He squanders it on strangers, then wonders why they won’t help him out of the gutter. He winds up fighting pigs for scraps.
But as he squats there in the mud, he contemplates not his lack of restraint and circumspection, but ways to win back his father’s affection. He plans it out, just so – for the Prodigal Son has charm even without money. (How else does a child extort his inheritance from his still living father? How else but by wheedling, persistent, inexorable charm?) He was always the child no one could refuse. He can make even being clad in nothing but tatters and filth work to his advantage. So he schemes; while the pigs snort and snuffle, he gazes at the stars overhead and plots his way back into his father’s favor. He will clear a path down the filth matted on his face with tracks of tears. Remembering the mad supplications of a servant caught filching from the granary, he will fall – just so – before the old man. He will engage in all manner of histrionics – beg for forgiveness, pledge his life as a servant – whatever it takes. Even if his father takes him at his word his life will be better than it has become.
But the old man won’t take him at his word. He is too soft for that. He would never let one of his sons live as a servant in his own house. He will welcome his filthy, wayward son back with open arms, and probably even still leave a little something for him when all is said and done.
And so it comes to pass. The elder brother overhears the celebration and learns too late that fickleness trumps fidelity every time.
Six Seeds of the Pomegranate 
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