Conversation Points for Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52

Study Format:
1. Read passage aloud. What did you notice in the reading? What words or phrase caught your attention?
2. Read passage aloud a second time. What questions would you ask the text?
3. Read passage aloud a third time. What do you hear God calling you to do or be in response to this text?

Interesting Ideas to Consider:
• While Jesus used metaphorical speech before (ex. 5:13-16; 7:6, 24-27), Matthew 13 is the first time Jesus specifically spoke in “parables.” The Greek word parabole means “something cast beside” something else, like a comparison or an analogy. The synoptic Gospels expand that meaning to nearly any kind of indirect or metaphorical speech. Historically, the early church has treated the Gospel parables as direct allegories, assigning specific groups to each character or item. Modern theological study understands parables to be both more and less specific than simple allegories. Jesus used parables to proclaim how the kingdom of God is both already and not yet. Boring describes parables as “like a musical composition, a painting, or a poem that is not an illustration of a prosaic point, but is itself an inseparable unity of form and meaning. To reduce a parable to a “point” is to dismiss it as parable and domesticate its message to more comfortable and manageable categories.” Parables challenge the hearers understanding of the world around them. Jesus used parables not to offer tidy moral teachings, but to subvert the secure assumptions under which his hearers categorized their lives and offer a new and different vision for the world.
• Around the two longer parables in Matthew 13, the Parable of the Sower and the Parable of the Weeds of the Field, Jesus offered five shorter parables, snapshots of the kingdom.
• V. 31-32, The Mustard Seed – A mustard seed is an annual herb that starts from a small seed and produces a plant that is normally between two and six feet high (occasionally up to nine or ten feet high). So it’s a big bush, but not in any way a tree. The idea of a tree comes from the symbol of an imperial tree in representing empires and in the apocalyptic imagery of the coming kingdom (Eg. Ezekiel 17:23 “On the mountain height of Israel I will plant it, in order that it may produce boughs and bear fruit, and become a noble cedar. Under it every kind of bird will live; in the shade of its branches will nest winged creatures of every kind.” Ezekiel 31:6 “All the birds of the air made their nests in its boughs; under its branches all the animals of the field gave birth to their young; and in its shade all great nations lived”). The tension between the tree imagery and the actual resulting bush of a mustard seed builds on another truth, that the kingdom of heaven does not look as the disciples expected. A king who rides a donkey instead of a warhorse can certainly be represented by a garden herb instead of a mighty tree.
• V. 33, The Yeast – there are a couple of surprising parts of this parable. 1) Yeast is commonly used as a symbol for corruption (Matthew 16:6, “Jesus said to them, ‘Watch out, and beware of the yeast of the Pharisees and Sadducees,’” see also Exodus 12:15-20; 23:18; 34:25; Leviticus 2:11; 6:10; 1 Corinthians 5:6-8; Galatians 5:9), here it is used in a positive way. 2) Three measures of flour is about 50 pounds, enough to make 100-150 loaves of bread. This is not your average family baking project, this is extravagant, like the sower. There is some allusion to Genesis 18:6, where Sarai prepared “three measures of flour” (and a whole calf) to feed the visitors. 3) The verb for placing the yeast in the bread in the NRSV is translated as “mixed in,” but that’s a bad translation. The Greek word is “hid.” There’s something sneaky and subversive about this. The kingdom then, is hidden and silent, bringing about surprising results.
• V. 44-46, The Hidden Treasure and The Pearl – these two parables are very similar, but also have some key differences. In both, the protagonist goes and sells everything he has to get the one thing. The differences are 1) the plowman was doing his regular work when he stumbled across the treasure, whereas the merchant’s work was looking for treasure. The kingdom of God can be found by seeking or by accident. 2) The plowman acted in his joy, where nothing is said about the joy of the merchant. While the merchant may have been joyful over the find, “joy” in and of itself is not the point of the kingdom. 3) The merchant clearly acted legally, if not in a manner that was necessarily good sense. The plowman’s actions, on the other hand, may or may not have been legal and also unethical. Roman legal discourse is rich with how to respond to finding treasure on someone else’s land.
• V. 47-48, The Net – while a parable in which a net drags in fish, this does not seem to be a reference to the disciples’ call to fish for people. The explanation firmly casts it as an eschatological (end times) parable. This is highlighted by the burning of the fish, which would not be how bad fish would be dealt with (they would be either thrown back or buried). Like the parable of the weeds, the disciples are not the sorters of fish, that is the work of the angels.
• While following a different pattern, v. 52 can also be read as a parable. All of the images in the parables, God/Jesus as the sower, harvest as judgment, etc., are all common images. What is unique about the parables is not the images themselves, but the radical way in which Jesus strung them together to create different ideas. Jesus used parables to bring new meaning from old ideas.

Works Sourced:
Boring, M. Eugene. “The Gospel of Matthew.” The New Interpreter’s Bible Volume VIII. Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1995.