Prodigal Son
The parable of the prodigal son is told in a single extended pericope, Lu 15:11-32. A father with two sons watches his younger son squander his inheritance abroad, return in destitution, and be received with open celebration — while the elder son resents the welcome. The text moves through four stages: departure, ruin, return, and the older brother's protest.
The Younger Son's Demand
The story opens at the table where the inheritance is asked for early: "A certain man had two sons: and the younger of them said to his father, Father, give me the portion of [your] substance that falls to me. And he divided to them his living" (Lu 15:11-12). The father grants the request without protest; the younger son immediately liquidates and leaves. "And not many days after, the younger son gathered all together and took his journey into a far country; and there he wasted his substance with riotous living" (Lu 15:13).
Famine, Swine, and Self-Reflection
Ruin comes from outside and within. A famine in the far country exposes the spent fortune, and the son hires himself out to a citizen of that country who sends him to shepherd swine — labor that for a son of Israel signals the bottom: "And he desired to have filled his belly with the pods that the swine ate: and no man gave to him" (Lu 15:16). The turning point is internal. "But when he came to himself he said, How many hired workers of my father's have bread enough and to spare, and I perish here with hunger!" (Lu 15:17). His resolve is to return as a worker, not as a son: "I will arise and go to my father, and will say to him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in your sight: I am no more worthy to be called your son: make me as one of your hired workers" (Lu 15:18-19).
The Father's Welcome
The return is met before the speech is finished. "But while he was yet far off, his father saw him, and was moved with compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him" (Lu 15:20). The son begins his prepared confession — "Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in your sight: I am no more worthy to be called your son" (Lu 15:21) — but the request to be made a hired worker never lands. The father, addressing his slaves, restores him as a son with three visible signs: "Bring forth quickly the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and sandals on his feet: and bring the fatted calf, [and] kill it, and let us eat, and make merry: for this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found. And they began to be merry" (Lu 15:22-24).
The Elder Brother
The parable does not end at the feast. The elder son comes in from the field, hears music and dancing, and refuses to enter. The father comes out to him as well: "But he was angry, and would not go in: and his father came out, and entreated him" (Lu 15:28). The elder son's protest reframes his own years as servitude rather than sonship: "Look, these many years I serve you as a slave, and I never transgressed a commandment of yours; and [yet] you never gave me a young goat, that I might make merry with my friends: but when this your son came, who has devoured your living with prostitutes, you killed for him the fatted calf" (Lu 15:29-30).
The father's reply restates the relationship he has with each son and the warrant for the celebration: "Child, you are ever with me, and all that is mine is yours. But it was meet to make merry and be glad: for this your brother was dead, and is alive [again]; and [was] lost, and is found" (Lu 15:31-32). The same death-and-life language frames both the welcome at the door and the answer in the courtyard. The elder brother's response to that answer is not given; the parable ends with the father still entreating.