The etho-poietic of the parable of the good Samaritan (Lk 10:25-37). The ethics of seeing in a culture of looking the other way

Abstract

Within a culture of �Looking the Other way� there are not only empirically ascertainable reasons why help is not given in acute emergency situations, there is also a �Theory of Not-Helping� that attempts to demonstrate argumentatively why it may even be better not to help. According to the article, the parable of the �good Samaritan� invites us, however, to �look closely�. Four invitations of the text are developed, each with an emphasis on ethics: 1) The narrated Samaritan (The appeal structure of ethics); 2) The touched Samaritan (Ethics in the Context of Love); 3) The partisan Samaritan (Universal ethos of helping � or: Ethics of open partisanship); 4) The charitable Samaritan (Social ethics instead of ethics of conscience).