The day after I posted about finding a reference to 1 Corinthians 13 in Les Misérables, I found an-other important Biblical reference.
Part I, Book Three is about Fantine, her three friends, and their lovers, rather than Jean Valjean. Chapter 2 starts with "In this year, 1817, four young Parisians played 'a good joke.'" The joke itself doesn't come until chapter 9. Throughout Book Three, these four students have been telling their lovers that they have a surprise for them. In chapter 9, after eating at a restaurant, they get up (ostensibly to go and get the surprise) and just leave the girls. After a hour, the waiter gives them a letter (on which is written "THIS IS THE SURPRISE") that the students left for them. It starts:
Oh, our lovers!The students want to portray themselves as honorable men who do what their parents want, and - in doing so - they compare themselves to (or say that their parents compare them to) the prodigal son. But, instead, their comparison illustrates their complete ignorance of the prodigal son.
Know that we have parents. Parents - you scarcely know the meaning of the word, they are what are called fathers and mothers in the civil code, simple but honest. Now these parents bemoan us, these old men claim us, these good men and women call us prodigal sons, desire our return and offer to kill for us the fatted calf. We obey them, being virtuous.
In the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32), a son asks his father for his share of the inheritance, goes off travelling, and "squander[s] his property in reckless living" (15:13). A famine comes, leaving him even more desperate, so he gets a job feeding pigs (and finds himself envying even their food). Then he realizes that his father's servants are treated better, so he goes back to his father's house, intending only to ask to be a servant and say "I am no longer worthy to be called your son" (15:19). But, instead, his father welcomes him joyfully and commands his servants to "bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate. For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found" (15:22-23).
The key difference between the actual prodigal son and the four students is that the prodigal son demonstrates penitence ("I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you'" [15:18]) where the students pride themselves because they think themselves "virtuous."
There's also a difference in the incentive to return home. The prodigal son returns merely so that he can find work and lodging, but the students' letter explains that the fatted calf is a reward that the parents are offering in exchange for their sons' homecoming. The prodigal son wasn't expecting a feast upon his return, but the students seem almost weary of the prospect, as if it's an ordeal they have to go through. If anything, they're like the prodigal son at the beginning of the parable, when he wants his share of the inheritance and is interested in "reckless living."
What struck me about the prodigal son comparison is its irony. The students want to appear as if they're good sons and do what their parents want, but the actual prodigal son attained a much better understanding of his filial relationship.
