The Lender and the Debtors
Luke 7
Jesus answered him, “Simon, I have something to tell you.”He said, “Teacher, say on.”“A certain lender had two debtors. The one owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. When they couldn’t pay, he forgave them both. Which of them therefore will love him most?”
Simon answered, “He, I suppose, to whom he forgave the most.”
He said to him, “You have judged correctly.”
This pericope with a very simple parable contains some possible wordplay if looked at from an Aramaic perspective.
There exists a parallel between the words חובא (khawbe’; debt, obligation) and חובא (khuba’; love), which share identical spelling:
חַובֵא (khawbe’) comes from the root חוב (khwab) which means “to owe” or “to incur debt.”
חוּבָא (khuba’) comes from the root חבב (khbab) which means “to love” or “to be fond of.”
Given this possible wordplay, this passage may be evidence for an Aramaic source that was used by the author of Luke during the compilation of his work as this pun is lost when read in Greek translation.