Friendship
Scripture takes friendship as a thing capable of definition. It has its own duties, its own marks of fidelity, its own characteristic failures, and its own theological summit in being named the friend of God. The biblical witness reaches from Yahweh speaking to Moses face to face, "as a man speaks to his companion" (Ex 33:11), to the upper-room declaration, "No longer do I call you slaves... but I have called you friends" (John 15:15). Between those two poles the Old Testament wisdom books, the Psalter, the historical narratives, the prophets, the Gospels, and the apostolic letters all return to the same questions: how a friend is to be tested, how friendship is to be kept, how it is severed, and what kind of friendship survives suffering.
The Marks of a True Friend
The Proverbs distill the field into a few definitions. A friend is constant: "A companion loves at all times; And a brother is born for adversity" (Pr 17:17). A friend is closer than kinship: "He who has many companions [does it] to his own destruction; But there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother" (Pr 18:24). A friend is honest, even at the cost of pain — "Faithful are the wounds of a friend; But the kisses of an enemy are profuse" (Pr 27:6) — and his counsel is sweet, "Oil and perfume rejoice the heart; So does the sweetness of a man's companion [that comes] from the counsel of the soul" (Pr 27:9). The deep image is mutual: "As in water face [answers] to face, So the heart of man to man" (Pr 27:19), and "Iron sharpens iron; So a man sharpens the countenance of his fellow man" (Pr 27:17).
Sirach develops the same definitions at greater length. "A faithful friend is a solid friend; And he who finds him, finds wealth" (Sir 6:14). "For a faithful friend, there is no price; And there is no weight for his goodness" (Sir 6:15). "A faithful friend is a bundle of life; He who fears God will obtain it" (Sir 6:16). The faithful friend is to be tested before he is trusted — "Have you gotten a friend? Get him in trial; And do not be in a hurry to rely on him" (Sir 6:7) — and once gained he is not to be exchanged: "Do not exchange a friend for a price; Nor lend a brother for the gold of Ophir" (Sir 7:18). The old friend is to be preferred to the new (Sir 9:10), love is to be active before death rather than after — "Before you die, do good to a friend; And give to him according to your means" (Sir 14:13) — and the longing of the soul names the concord of brothers, the friendship of neighbors, and a wife and a husband suited to each other together (Sir 25:1).
The Discipline of Friendship
True friendship is not flattery. The Proverbs warn, "He who blesses his fellow man with a loud voice, rising early in the morning, It will be counted a curse to him" (Pr 27:14). It is not unbroken praise but candid reproof — covered, however, in love: "He who covers a transgression seeks love; But he who harps on a matter separates best friends" (Pr 17:9). Sirach gives the fuller rule: "Reprove a friend, that he do no evil, And if he has done anything, that he does not do it again. Reprove a friend, it may be he did not say it, And if he has said it, that he does not do it again" (Sir 19:13-14). The reproof has a season: "At a banquet of wine do not rebuke a friend, And do not grieve him in his merriment. Do not speak to him a reproachful word, And do not quarrel with him before others" (Sir 31:31).
Friendship has limits where it has bounds. Wisdom warns against entering it carelessly: "Make no friendship with a man who is given to anger; And with a wrathful man you will not go: Or else you will learn his ways, And get a snare to your soul" (Pr 22:24-25). And it warns against wearing it thin: "Let your foot be seldom in your fellow man's house, Or else he will be weary of you, and hate you" (Pr 25:17). Friendship is not unconditional in the case of solicitation to idolatry — Deuteronomy names "your companion, who is as your own soul" among the relations who must not be consented to if they entice to other gods (De 13:6-9). And friendship is the precondition of common motion at all: "Will two walk together, except they have agreed?" (Am 3:3).
Confidence and the Tongue
A great deal of the wisdom material on friendship turns on the keeping of secrets and the use of the tongue. "He who goes about as double-tongued reveals secrets; But he who is of a faithful spirit conceals a matter" (Pr 11:13). Sirach — whose vocabulary on this point the UPDV preserves with the gloss "double-tongued" — pursues the theme: "Do not be called double-tongued; And with your tongue do not slander a friend" (Sir 5:14). Greetings should be many, but "the owner of your secret, one among a thousand" (Sir 6:6). Once trust is broken, the breach is named in the strongest terms: "He who reveals secrets destroys trust, And will find no friend to his soul. Love a friend and keep faith with him, But if you reveal his secrets do not follow after him; For as a man who has destroyed his enemy, So have you destroyed the friendship of your neighbor. And as a bird which you have released out of your hand, So have you let your neighbor go, and you will not catch him again" (Sir 27:16-19).
The wound at the heart of friendship is given its image: "A wound in the eye makes tears flow, And a wound in the heart severs friendship" (Sir 22:19). And Sirach catalogues the things from which friendship will not recover — "reproach, arrogance, betrayal of a secret, and a deceitful blow" (Sir 22:22). Yet even after a sharp word the road back is not closed: "Even if you draw the sword against a friend, Do not despair, for there is a way out. If you open your mouth against a friend, Do not fear, for there is a [way of] reconciliation" (Sir 22:21-22).
The Fair-Weather Friend
Both the wisdom books and the Psalter dwell on the friend who is no friend. Sirach states the case plainly: "For there is a fair-weathered friend, Who will not continue in the day of trouble" (Sir 6:8). "There is a friend who turns into an enemy, And with strife he will uncover your reproach. There is a friend who is company at a table, But will not be found in the day of evil" (Sir 6:9-10). "When things are good for you, he is like you; But when things are bad for you, he will despise you. If evil overtakes you, he will turn against you; And he will hide himself from your face" (Sir 6:11-12). The pattern repeats: "A friend will not be known when things are good; And an enemy will not be hidden when things are bad" (Sir 12:8). "Every friend says: 'I have a friend,' But there is a friend [who is] a friend in name [only]" (Sir 37:1). "An evil friend [is he who] looks to the table, But in time of stress stands aloof; A good friend [is he who] fights with the stranger, And takes hold of the shield against the adversary" (Sir 37:4-5).
The Psalter gives the same figure in lament. David: "Yes, my own familiar friend, in whom I trusted, Who ate of my bread, Has lifted up his heel against me" (Ps 41:9). And the more pointed protest: "For it is not an enemy who reproached me; Or I could have borne it... But it was you, [a] common man like me, My best friend who I knew well. We took sweet counsel together; We walked in the house of God with the throng" (Ps 55:12-14). When affliction comes, the friends step back: "My friends and my companions stand aloof from my plague; And my kinsmen stand far off" (Ps 38:11); "Lover and companion you have put far from me, My acquaintances into darkness" (Ps 88:18). Micah names the same in prophetic mode: "Don't trust in a companion; don't put confidence in a best friend; keep the doors of your mouth from her who lies in your bosom" (Mi 7:5). And the Proverbs put it as a sensation: "Confidence in a betrayer in time of trouble Is [like] a crumbling tooth, and an unsteady foot" (Pr 25:19).
Friendlessness
Beyond the failed friend lies the harder condition of having no friend at all. "Look at [my] right hand, and see; For there is no man who knows me: Refuge has failed me; No man cares for my soul" (Ps 142:4). David's reproach makes him "a fear to my acquaintance: Those who saw me outside fled from me" (Ps 31:11). The watcher in the Psalms sits "like a sparrow That is alone on the housetop" (Ps 102:7). Job extends the catalog. He has been put far from his brothers, his kinsfolk have failed, his familiar friends have forgotten him, his slaves do not answer, his wife is estranged, even children despise him: "All my familiar friends are disgusted by me, And they whom I loved are turned against me" (Job 19:13-19). His appeal — "Have pity on me, have pity on me, O you my companions; For the hand of God has touched me" (Job 19:21) — meets only the friends Job names "miserable comforters" (Job 16:2), whose three earlier companions had at least kept silence with him seven days and seven nights when grief was at its height (Job 2:11-13). Job had named the law and the failure together at the start: "To him who is ready to faint, kindness [should be shown] from his friend; Even to him who forsakes the fear of the Almighty. My brothers have betrayed as a wadi, As a channel of wadis, they pass away" (Job 6:14-15).
The Gospels carry the figure of friendlessness into the passion. The lame man at the pool: "Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pool" (John 5:7). The prodigal in want: "no man gave to him" (Luke 15:16). Lazarus at the gate, attended only by dogs (Luke 16:20-21). And Christ himself, seized as a robber (Mark 14:48) while "they all left him, and fled" (Mark 14:50). His own word in the upper room is the limit-case: "the hour comes, yes, has come, that you will be scattered, every man to his own, and will leave me alone: and [yet] I am not alone, because the Father is with me" (John 16:32). Paul echoes the experience near the end: "At my first defense no one took my part, but all forsook me" (2Ti 4:16); "Demas forsook me, having loved this present age" (2Ti 4:10); "all who are in Asia turned away from me" (2Ti 1:15).
Examples of True Friendship
Against this dark side of the ledger, the historical books name particular friendships and let them speak. Abraham, hearing that "his brother was taken captive," mobilized the men of his house, pursued, and brought back Lot with all his goods (Ge 14:14-16). Ruth refused to leave Naomi: "where you go, I will go; and where you lodge, I will lodge; your people will be my people, and your God my God" (Ru 1:16). Samuel "didn't come to see Saul anymore until the day of his death; for Samuel mourned for Saul" (1Sa 15:35). David, in flight, told Abiathar: "Remain with me, don't be afraid; for he who seeks my soul seeks your soul: for with me you will be in safeguard" (1Sa 22:23), and remembered debts of kindness: "I will show kindness to Hanun the son of Nahash, as his father showed kindness to me" (2Sa 10:2). Hiram of Tyre "was ever a friend of David" (1Ki 5:1). Hushai stood with David against Absalom (2Sa 15:37); Ittai answered, "As Yahweh lives, and as my lord the king lives, surely in what place my lord the king will be, whether to death or to life, even there also will your slave be" (2Sa 15:21). Elisha refused to be parted from Elijah: "As Yahweh lives, and as your soul lives, I will not leave you" (2Ki 2:2).
The friendship of David and Jonathan is held up by the narrators with particular care. "The soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul" (1Sa 18:1); the bond was sealed under oath, "for he loved him as he loved his own soul" (1Sa 20:17); the parting was undisguised, "they kissed one another, and wept one with another, until David exceeded" (1Sa 20:41); and the lament made it final: "I am distressed for you, my brother Jonathan: Very pleasant you have been to me: Your love to me was wonderful, Passing the love of women" (2Sa 1:26).
In the New Testament the same kind of fidelity carries on into the apostolic mission. Daniel asked the king to appoint Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego over Babylon's affairs (Da 2:49). Mary and Martha received Jesus into their house at Bethany; Martha served, Mary "sat at the Lord's feet, and heard his word," and Jesus named "the good part" (Luke 10:38-42). Paul names Timothy alone as truly likeminded — "I have no man likeminded, who will care truly for your state" (Php 2:20) — and counted Epaphroditus "my brother and coworker and fellow-soldier" (Php 2:25); Onesiphorus "often refreshed me, and wasn't ashamed of my chain" (2Ti 1:16); Priscilla and Aquila "laid down their own necks for my soul" (Ro 16:4); the longing for company runs through the closing of the letters: "Be diligent to come shortly to me" (2Ti 4:9), "Be diligent to come before winter" (2Ti 4:21), "Be diligent to come to me to Nicopolis" (Tit 3:12). Epaphroditus, when away, "longed after all of you, and was very troubled, because you had heard that he was sick" (Php 2:26). Paul thanks God on every remembrance of the Philippians "for your fellowship in furtherance of the good news from the first day until now" (Php 1:3, 5). Titus's absence cost him peace: "I had no relief for my spirit, because I did not find Titus my brother" (2Co 2:13).
Friendship in the Ordinary
Some of the material refuses to leave the ground level. Sirach insists that friendship begins in speech: "A sweet mouth grows a friend; And graceful lips will greet [saying], Peace" (Sir 6:5). It begins in not destroying — "Little or great, do not destroy; And instead of a friend, do not be an enemy" (Sir 5:15) — and in not plowing violence "against a brother... a fellow man and friend together" (Sir 7:12). The duties of friendship in adversity are named in concrete actions: "Support your neighbor in poverty, That in his prosperity you may rejoice; Remain steadfast to him in time of [his] affliction" (Sir 22:23); "Do not be ashamed of a friend who becomes poor, And do not hide yourself from his face" (Sir 22:25); "Lose money for a brother or a friend's sake, And do not let it rust under a stone or a wall" (Sir 29:10); "Do not forget a friend in [the time of] conflict, And do not forsake him when you take the spoil" (Sir 37:6). David in Psalm 35 names the same kind of action — sackcloth for his enemies' sickness, fasting, mourning "as one who bewails his mother" (Ps 35:13-14). And Proverbs 27 holds the rule for the long view: "Your own companion, and your father's companion, do not forsake; And don't go to your brother's house in the day of your calamity: Better is a neighbor who is near than a brother far off" (Pr 27:10).
Solitude is judged by the same standard. "Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their labor. For if they fall, the one will lift up his partner; but woe to him who is alone when he falls, and does not have another to lift him up" (Ec 4:9-10). "Again, if two lie together, then they have warmth; but how can one be warm [alone]? And if a man prevails against him who is alone, two will withstand him; and a threefold cord is not quickly broken" (Ec 4:11-12).
Social Fellowship
Around the table this same friendship takes its visible form. Jesus is found at supper with Lazarus, Martha serving, and Lazarus among the diners (John 12:2). The disciples are sent on mission with the rule, "stay in that same house, eating and drinking such things as they give: for the worker is worthy of his wages. Don't go from house to house" (Luke 10:7). At a feast, the seat is to be the lower one (Luke 14:8), and the guest list ought not be limited to those who can repay (Luke 14:12). The elder son hears "music and dancing" at the welcome of his brother (Luke 15:25). Paul allows the disciple to accept an unbeliever's invitation: "If someone who does not believe bids you [to a feast], and you are disposed to go; whatever is set before you, eat, asking no question for the sake of conscience" (1Co 10:27). The Epistle to Diognetus describes the Christians at this same level of ordinary life — "They eat together, but do not sleep together" (Gr 5:7) — naming social fellowship as the visible form of an unworldly chastity. Sirach adds that the bread is to be shared with righteous men (Sir 9:16), and the company at wine is not to be made into a place of public rebuke (Sir 31:31).
The desire for company is itself a duty. "According to your ability, answer your fellow man; But with those who are wise, reveal yourself. Let what you think be with him who has understanding" (Sir 9:14-15).
The Friend of God
Friendship with God names the highest term of the field. Yahweh "spoke to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his companion" (Ex 33:11), and again: "with him I will speak mouth to mouth, even manifestly, and not in dark speeches" (Nu 12:8); "there has not arisen a prophet since in Israel like Moses, whom Yahweh knew face to face" (De 34:10). Abraham is twice named God's friend: Jehoshaphat in prayer recalls that the land was given "to the seed of Abraham your friend forever" (2Ch 20:7), and James cites Genesis to the same end — "And Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him for righteousness; and he was called the friend of God" (Jas 2:23).
The covenant constancy of God under this friendship is named in absolute terms. "Yahweh your God is a merciful God; he will not fail you, neither destroy you, nor forget the covenant of your fathers" (De 4:31); "Yahweh your God, it is he [his Speech] who goes with you; he will not fail you, nor forsake you" (De 31:6); "As [my Speech] was with Moses, so [my Speech] will be with you; I will not fail you, nor forsake you" (Jos 1:5); "Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yes, these may forget, yet [my Speech] will not forget you" (Is 49:15); "the mountains may depart, and the hills be removed; but my loving-kindness will not depart from you" (Is 54:10); "I will never fail you, neither will I ever forsake you" (Heb 13:5). [ABSOLUTE] These constancy oracles use the form of an oath; the writer of Hebrews quotes Deuteronomy 31:6 as an oracle still in force.
The other side of this friendship is the divine face hidden. "Your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, so that he will not hear" (Is 59:2); "I [by my Speech] will surely hide my face in that day for all the evil which they will have wrought" (De 31:18); "Then they will cry to Yahweh, but he will not answer them; yes, he will hide his face from them at that time, according to as they have wrought evil" (Mi 3:4). Estrangement runs in both directions. Of Israel through idols: "they are all estranged from me through their idols" (Eze 14:5). Of the wicked from birth: "The wicked are estranged from the womb" (Ps 58:3). Of the Gentile world before the gospel: "you were at that time separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of the promise" (Eph 2:12), "alienated from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them" (Eph 4:18).
Christ the Friend of Sinners
The Gospels name a specific scandal of Christ's friendship: that he was the friend of sinners. The Pharisee at table reasoned within himself, "This man, if he were a prophet, would have perceived who and what manner of woman this is who touches him, that she's a sinner" (Luke 7:39). The crowd at Jericho murmured, "He has gone in to lodge with a man who is a sinner" (Luke 19:7). Paul names the same scandal as the substance of the gospel: "God commends his own love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us" (Ro 5:8); "Faithful is the saying, and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief" (1Ti 1:15). The friendship of Christ is also for those known by name and loved at the table: "Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus" (John 11:5); the wept tears at the tomb — "Jesus wept" (John 11:35) — drew the verdict, "Look at how he loved him!" (John 11:36); the disciple "whom Jesus loved" reclined in his bosom (John 13:23); and the love had its own constancy: "having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end" (John 13:1).
The decisive word comes in the upper room. "This is my commandment, that you love one another, even as I have loved you. Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends, if you do the things which I command you. No longer do I call you slaves; for the slave doesn't know what his lord does: but I have called you friends; for all things that I heard from my Father I have made known to you" (John 15:12-15). This friendship does not survive without abiding: "Stay in me, and I in you. As the branch can't bear fruit of itself, except it stays in the vine; so neither can you, except you stay in me" (John 15:4); "If a man does not stay in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered" (John 15:6). And it does not survive only inside the church: "If the world hates you, you know that it has hated me before [it hated] you" (John 15:18).
Fellowship Among Believers
Friendship in Christ extends to friendship among Christ's. "God is faithful, through whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord" (1Co 1:9). "That which we have seen and heard we declare to you also, that you also may have fellowship with us: yes, and our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ" (1Jn 1:3). "If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin" (1Jn 1:7). Paul writes that he longs to be "comforted in you, each of us by the other's faith, both yours and mine" (Ro 1:12). The Psalmist names the same belonging: "I am a partner of all those who fear you, And of those who observe your precepts" (Ps 119:63). And Malachi gives the typological figure of a remembered fellowship: "Then those who feared Yahweh spoke one with another; and Yahweh listened, and heard, and a book of remembrance was written before him, for those who feared Yahweh, and who thought on his name" (Mal 3:16).
The 1 Maccabees corpus shows the political and diplomatic register of the same vocabulary: friendship as alliance among nations and individuals, "to renew the friendship and alliance" (1Ma 12:3; 14:18; 15:17), to be "registered your confederates and friends" (1Ma 8:20), to "make him our friend and our confederate" (1Ma 10:16), to be "enrolled... among his chief friends" (1Ma 10:65), and the Roman recognition of Israel as "their friends, and allies, and brothers" (1Ma 14:40). This is friendship as covenant in the public form — the same word taken up into the language of state.
The whole field comes back at last to the same definition Sirach gave at the start: "A faithful friend is a bundle of life; He who fears God will obtain it" (Sir 6:16).