And I say unto you, Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness; that, when ye fail, they may receive you into everlasting habitations.
Discussion:
The debtors in this story had (in an interpretation based in Swedenborg) improved their spiritual states by submitting their “borrowed” ideas to external forms of religion – which had truth to teach even though they were infested with evil desires. The steward, meanwhile, improved his standing by applying his religious forms to the disordered ideas of the debtors – a step toward getting rid of those evil desires and replacing them with desires for good.
Here, the Lord begins to tell us to do the same.
Swedenborg says “unrighteous mammon” represents true knowledge held by those who are evil and used toward evil ends. In a way, that’s something both the steward and the debtors had – ideas about what is true and good, but no desire for good to bring those ideas to life. A “friend” is someone connected through ideas and thought; making friends out of unrighteous mammon means gathering and sharing the knowledge held by evil people, without sharing the evil. That’s something the steward and the debtors did, to the benefit of both.
Passages from Swedenborg
Divine Providence (Rogers) n. 250
Light a lamp and investigate how many people there are in the kingdoms of today aspiring to positions of advancement who are not personifications of loves of self and the world. Will you find fifty in a thousand who are lovers of God, and among them other than a few who aspire to positions of advancement? So, since those who are lovers of God are so few in number, and the lovers of self and the world so many, and since lovers of the latter are spurred by their fires to perform more useful services than lovers of God by theirs, how then can anyone confirm himself against Divine providence in consequence of seeing more evil people than good having prestige and wealth?
[5]�This, too, is corroborated by these words of the Lord:
The master commended the unjust steward because he had dealt shrewdly. For the sons of this age are more shrewd in their generation than the sons of light. So I say to you, make for yourselves friends of unrighteous mammon, that when you fail, they may receive you into everlasting habitations. (Luke 16:8, 9)
The meaning of these words in the natural sense is apparent. In the spiritual sense, however, by unrighteous mammon are meant concepts of truth and good�-�concepts which the evil possess and which they use only to gain for themselves advancements and riches. It is these concepts which good people or the sons of light are to make friends of for themselves and which will receive them into everlasting habitations.
And he said also unto his disciples, There was a certain rich man, which had a steward; and the same was accused unto him that he had wasted his goods.
And he called him, and said unto him, How is it that I hear this of thee? give an account of thy stewardship; for thou mayest be no longer steward.
Then the steward said within himself, What shall I do? for my lord taketh away from me the stewardship: I cannot dig; to beg I am ashamed.
I am resolved what to do, that, when I am put out of the stewardship, they may receive me into their houses.
So he called every one of his lord's debtors unto him, and said unto the first, How much owest thou unto my lord?
And he said, An hundred measures of oil. And he said unto him, Take thy bill, and sit down quickly, and write fifty.
Then said he to another, And how much owest thou? And he said, An hundred measures of wheat. And he said unto him, Take thy bill, and write fourscore.
And the lord commended the unjust steward, because he had done wisely: for the children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light.
And I say unto you, Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness; that, when ye fail, they may receive you into everlasting habitations.
He that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in much: and he that is unjust in the least is unjust also in much.
If therefore ye have not been faithful in the unrighteous mammon, who will commit to your trust the true riches?
And if ye have not been faithful in that which is another man's, who shall give you that which is your own?
No servant can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.