How are parables, explanations and the hometown response kept distinct?

Atlas of Saints · Chapter summary

The chapter pairs cultivation and value comparisons with explicit kingdom explanations, then records local questions and few miracles amid unbelief.

Chapter breakdown

The same day Jesus leaves the house and sits by the sea. Crowds cause him to sit in a boat while they stand on shore. In the sower parable wayside seed is eaten by birds; stony-ground seed springs quickly for lack of deep earth but scorches and withers without root; thorn seed is choked; good-ground seed yields hundredfold, sixtyfold or thirtyfold. Those with ears should hear. Asked why he uses parables, Jesus says disciples receive knowledge of kingdom mysteries whereas others do not. Those having receive abundance, those not having lose even what they have. Seeing and hearing without understanding fulfills Isaias’s prophecy of a gross heart, dull ears and eyes shut lest perception, understanding, conversion and healing follow. Disciples’ eyes and ears are blessed; many prophets and just men desired their experience without receiving it.

Jesus explains the wayside as hearing without understanding, when the wicked one takes what is sown in the heart. Stony ground hears joyfully but lacks root, lasts briefly and is scandalized by word-related tribulation or persecution. Thorns represent worldly care and riches’ deceit choking the word into fruitlessness. Good ground hears, understands and bears the differing hundred-, sixty- and thirtyfold yields. The text explains these receptions without making a universal external resource guarantee.

Another kingdom parable describes good seed in a field, oversown with cockle by an enemy while men sleep. Cockle appears with the crop’s fruit. Servants ask about its origin; the owner identifies an enemy. They propose gathering it, but he refuses lest perhaps they uproot wheat with it. Both must grow till harvest; reapers then bundle cockle to burn and gather wheat into his barn. The kingdom is also a mustard grain, described as least of seeds, becoming greater than herbs and a tree housing birds. This wording is the parable’s comparison, not a new botanical finding. A woman hides leaven in three measures of meal till all is leavened; kneading is not narrated. Speaking these things to multitudes in parables fulfills an unnamed prophet’s words about uttering things hidden from the world’s foundation.

After dismissing crowds, Jesus enters the house and answers the disciples’ cockle question. Good-seed sower is Son of man, field world, good seed kingdom children, cockle wicked one’s children, enemy devil, harvest world’s end and reapers angels. Cockle’s burning parallels the end when the Son’s angels remove scandals and workers of iniquity to a furnace with weeping and gnashing teeth. The just shine like the sun in their Father’s kingdom. This explanation remains distinct from agricultural practice.

A hidden field treasure is found and concealed; its joyful finder sells all to buy the field. A merchant seeking good pearls sells all for one great-price pearl. A sea net gathers all kinds of fish; full, it is drawn to shore, good put in vessels and bad cast away. At world’s end angels likewise separate wicked from just and cast them into the furnace. Asked whether they understand, disciples answer yes. An instructed kingdom scribe resembles a householder producing new and old from his treasure. The comparison does not narrate the disciples formally becoming scribes.

Finishing the parables, Jesus goes to his own country, teaches in their synagogues and prompts questions about wisdom and miracles. They identify the carpenter’s son, mother Mary, brethren James, Joseph, Simon and Jude, and sisters among them. The separate annotation identifies those brethren as children of Mary, Cleophas’s wife and the Blessed Lady’s sister, citing Matthew 27:56 and John 19:25, and explains brethren as near relations in scriptural usage. The country is not named in these verses. Scandalized hearers prompt Jesus’s saying that a prophet lacks honor in his own country and house. He works not many miracles there because of unbelief. This records the action without a claim that unbelief limits his ability or an added motive about humble origins.

The story inside

Four soils and the owner’s cockle decision precede mustard and leaven. The private explanation names each cockle element. Treasure, pearl and net comparisons lead to the new-and-old scribe image before the local kinship questions and annotation.

Lessons worth keeping

1
Keep perhaps in the risk of uprooting wheat.
2
The field is world in the explanation; do not silently substitute church.
3
Not many miracles describes action, not an inability to act.

Test your recall

Why does the owner reject the servants’ proposed cockle gathering?

Source edition and notes

Douay–Rheims, revised by Richard Challoner (1749–1752). Project Gutenberg no. 1581. Locators refer to lines in the admitted pg1581.txt edition. Source notes may include Challoner commentary.

Lines 111816–111937
Matthew Chapter 13 The parables of the sower and the cockle: of the mustardseed, etc. 13:1. The same day Jesus going out of the house, sat by the sea side. 13:2. And great multitudes were gathered together unto him, so that he went up into a boat and sat: and all the multitude stood on the shore. 13:3. And he spoke to them many things in parables, saying: Behold the sower went forth to sow. 13:4. And whilst he soweth some fell by the way side, and the birds of the air came and ate them up. 13:5. And other some fell upon stony ground, where they had not much earth: and they sprung up immediately, because they had no deepness of earth. 13:6. And when the sun was up they were scorched: and because they had not root, they withered away. 13:7. And others fell among thorns: and the thorns grew up and choked them. 13:8. And others fell upon good ground: and they brought forth fruit, some an hundred fold, some sixty fold, and some thirty fold. 13:9. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear. 13:10. And his disciples came and said to him: Why speakest thou to them in parables? 13:11. Who answered and said to them: Because to you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven: but to them it is not given. 13:12. For he that hath, to him shall be given, and he shall abound: but he that hath not, from him shall be taken away that also which he hath. 13:13. Therefore do I speak to them in parables: because seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand. 13:14. And the prophecy of Isaias is fulfilled in them, who saith: By hearing you shall hear, and shall not understand: and seeing you shall see, and shall not perceive. 13:15. For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have been dull of hearing, and their eyes they have shut: lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them. 13:16. But blessed are your eyes, because they see, and your ears, because they hear. 13:17. For, amen, I say to you, many prophets and just men have desired to see the things that you see, and have not seen them: and to hear the things that you hear and have not heard them. 13:18. Hear you therefore the parable of the sower. 13:19. When any one heareth the word of the kingdom, and understandeth it not, there cometh the wicked one, and catcheth away that which was sown in his heart: this is he that received the seed by the way side. 13:20. And he that received the seed upon stony ground, is he that heareth the word, and immediately receiveth it with joy. 13:21. Yet hath he not root in himself, but is only for a time: and when there ariseth tribulation and persecution because of the word, he is presently scandalized. 13:22. And he that received the seed among thorns, is he that heareth the word, and the care of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choketh up the word, and he becometh fruitless. 13:23. But he that received the seed upon good ground, is he that heareth the word, and understandeth, and beareth fruit, and yieldeth the one an hundredfold, and another sixty, and another thirty. 13:24. Another parable he proposed to them, saying: The kingdom of heaven is likened to a man that sowed good seed in his field. 13:25. But while men were asleep, his enemy came and oversowed cockle among the wheat and went his way. 13:26. And when the blade was sprung up, and had brought forth fruit, then appeared also the cockle. 13:27. And the servants of the good man of the house coming said to him. Sir, didst thou not sow good seed in thy field? Whence then hath it cockle? 13:28. And he said to them: An enemy hath done this. And the servants said to him: Wilt thou that we go and gather it up? 13:29. And he said: No, lest perhaps gathering up the cockle, you root up the wheat also together with it. 13:30. Suffer both to grow until the harvest, and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers: Gather up first the cockle, and bind it into bundles to burn, but the wheat gather ye into my barn. 13:31. Another parable he proposed unto them, saying: The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field. 13:32. Which is the least indeed of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come, and dwell in the branches thereof. 13:33. Another parable he spoke to them: The kingdom of heaven is like to leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, until the whole was leavened. 13:34. All these things Jesus spoke in parables to the multitudes: and without parables he did not speak to them. 13:35. That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying: I will open my mouth in parables, I will utter things hidden from the foundation of the world.
Lines 111939–112016
13:36. Then having sent away the multitudes, he came into the house, and his disciples came to him, saying: Expound to us the parable of the cockle of the field. 13:37. Who made answer and said to them: He that soweth the good seed is the Son of man. 13:38. And the field is the world. And the good seed are the children of the kingdom. And the cockle are the children of the wicked one. 13:39. And the enemy that sowed them, is the devil. But the harvest is the end of the world. And the reapers are the angels. 13:40. Even as cockle therefore is gathered up, and burnt with fire: so shall it be at the end of the world. 13:41. The Son of man shall send his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all scandals, and them that work iniquity. 13:42. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. 13:43. Then shall the just shine as the sun, in the kingdom of their Father. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear. 13:44. The kingdom of heaven is like unto a treasure hidden in a field. Which a man having found, hid it, and for joy thereof goeth, and selleth all that he hath, and buyeth that field. 13:45. Again the kingdom of heaven is like to a merchant seeking good pearls. 13:46. Who when he had found one pearl of great price, went his way, and sold all that he had, and bought it. 13:47. Again the kingdom of heaven is like to a net cast into the sea, and gathering together of all kinds of fishes. 13:48. Which, when it was filled, they drew out, and sitting by the shore, they chose out the good into vessels, but the bad they cast forth. 13:49. So shall it be at the end of the world. The angels shall go out, and shall separate the wicked from among the just. 13:50. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. 13:51. Have ye understood all these things? They say to him: Yes. 13:52. He said unto them: Therefore every scribe instructed in the kingdom of heaven, is like to a man that is a householder, who bringeth forth out of his treasure new things and old. 13:53. And it came to pass: when Jesus had finished these parables, he passed from thence. 13:54. And coming into his own country, he taught them in their synagogues, so that they wondered and said: How came this man by this wisdom and miracles? 13:55. Is not this the carpenter’s son? Is not his mother called Mary, and his brethren James, and Joseph, and Simon, and Jude: His brethren.... These were the children of Mary the wife of Cleophas, sister to our Blessed Lady, (St. Matt. 27. 56; St. John 19. 25,) and therefore, according to the usual style of the Scripture, they were called brethren, that is, near relations to our Saviour. 13:56. And his sisters, are they not all with us? Whence therefore hath he all these things? 13:57. And they were scandalized in his regard. But Jesus said to them: A prophet is not without honour, save in his own country, and in his own house. 13:58. And he wrought not many miracles there, because of their unbelief.