In the final chapter of his introductory section, Wright engages in a close reading of the parable of the prodigal son (which is also the parable of the “prodigal father” in Wright’s reading) and then utilizes the interpretation of that parable as the analogy for his own methodology of studying Jesus amidst the sea of other options which he has already submitted to critique. The result is the most concise statement of Wright’s own methodology and presuppositions in the book thus far.

First off, Wright explores parables, not as narrative vehicles for aphorisms or wise sayings, but rather as subversive narratives that, in effect create a new world into which the hearer is invited to live. The parable of the prodigal, he argues is a subversive way of reading Israel’s experience of exile. The prodigal son is Israel who spurns his father and ends up in a far country, in the service of Gentiles and is now returning home, and being welcomed back in the extravagant, indeed, “prodigal” love of the father, much to the anger of the other brother who stayed behind. In this subversive retelling, Israel is cast as being in exile, and in the ministry and action of Jesus himself, they are being invited home, into the love of the father. However, those that spurn this homecoming are cast as the older brother, the one who stayed behind – in effect Jesus is casting those who oppose his ministry as Samaritans. The main point of the parable in Wright’s reading is this: “history is turning its long-awaited corner; this is happening within the ministry of Jesus himself; and those who oppose it are the enemies of the true people of god.” (p. 127)

Wright’s point in all this is to show the way in which the parables of Jesus “act”. They offer a new version of Israel’s story which makes new claims about how God is going to address his people’s expectation of messianic salvation. This is how Wright begins to answer his five questions from the previous chapter. He locates Jesus, believably within the context of first century Jewish messianic expectation and hope and simultaneously shows how Jesus deeply subverted the conventional understandings of how that hope would be fulfilled by God. Jesus believed, according to Wright that in his own ministry, God was reconstituting Israel as his people, that he was brining the exile to an end, and that the promises of the kingdom of God were coming to pass in him. This, of course as Wright notes will certainly arouse hostility, and offers a plausible rationale for why Jesus was killed.

Wright concludes this chapter with some notes about how to engage the question of reconstructing the worldview of a particular time and culture. This is particularly relevant to the study of Jesus and Jewish messianic expectation, as he has already made clear. This section provides something of a re-hash of parts of Wright’s first volume and makes a case for the fact that we can in some realistic way explore the mindsets and worldviews of past cultures and communities.