Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand

 

 On the same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the sea.  And great multitudes were gathered together to Him, so that He got into a boat and sat; and the whole multitude stood on the shore.  Then He spoke many things to them in parables, saying:  "Behold, a sower went out to sow.  And as he sowed, some seed fell by the wayside; and the birds came and devoured them.  Some fell on stony places, where they did not have much earth; and they immediately sprang up because they had no depth of earth.  But when the sun was up they were scorched, and because they had no root they withered away.  And some fell among thorns, and the thorns sprang up and choked them.  But others fell on good ground and yielded a crop:  some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.  He who has ears to hear, let him hear!"

And the disciples came and said to Him, "Why do You speak to them in parables?"  He answered and said to them, "Because it has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given.  For whoever has, to him more will be given, and he will have abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him.  Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand.  And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says:

'Hearing you will hear and shall not understand,

And seeing you will see and not perceive;

For the hearts of this people have grown dull.

Their ears are hard of hearing,

And their eyes they have closed,

Lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears,

Lest they should understand with their hearts and turn,

So that I should heal them.'

"But blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear . . . "

 

- Matthew 13:1-16 

 

We have been recently reading through the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5 -7).  On Saturday, we read that Jesus taught:  "Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the  way that leads into destruction, and there are many who go in by it.  Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, there are few who find it.  Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves.  You will know them by their fruits.  Do men gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles?  Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit.  A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit.  Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.  Therefore by their fruits you will know them.  Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven."   

 On the same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the sea.  And great multitudes were gathered together to Him, so that He got into a boat and sat; and the whole multitude stood on the shore.  Today the lectionary skips forward in Matthew's Gospel, from chapter 7 to chapter 13, in which Jesus will begin teaching in parables.  We note that by now there are great multitudes who are coming to see Him; this has a great deal to do with why He begins to speak in parables.  

Then He spoke many things to them in parables, saying:  "Behold, a sower went out to sow.  And as he sowed, some seed fell by the wayside; and the birds came and devoured them.  Some fell on stony places, where they did not have much earth; and they immediately sprang up because they had no depth of earth.  But when the sun was up they were scorched, and because they had no root they withered away.  And some fell among thorns, and the thorns sprang up and choked them.  But others fell on good ground and yielded a crop:  some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.  He who has ears to hear, let him hear!"   This is Jesus' first parable that works as a kind of foundation for the rest of them.  My study Bible explains that in the Old Testament, metaphors of sowing and harvesting are common (Psalm 126:5, Jeremiah 31:27-30; Hosea 2:21-23; Joel 3:12-14), as this was a part of daily life.  In this parable, Jesus reveals Himself as the promised Messiah, the sower in the earth, who had been prophesied in Isaiah 55:10-13.

And the disciples came and said to Him, "Why do You speak to them in parables?"  He answered and said to them, "Because it has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given."  Here Jesus begins to reveal to the disciples the purpose of speaking in parables.  My study Bible explains that the mysteries of the kingdom are not merely obscure concepts or some religious truths which are only for the elite, nor is the understanding of the parables just an intellectual process.  Even the disciples find this message hard to understand.  While Jesus taught the same message to all, my study Bible says that it is the simple and innocent who are open to its message.  

For whoever has, to him more will be given, and he will have abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him.  Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand.  And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says:  'Hearing you will hear and shall not understand, snd seeing you will see and not perceive; for the hearts of this people have grown dull. Their ears are hard of hearing, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, so that I should heal them.'  But blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear . . . "  The quotation is from Isaiah 6:10.  This quotation also appears in John 12:37-41, in the context of those many who gathered to Christ for His signs, but had no faith.  Here, as Jesus speaks to such a great multitude that He must sit in a boat off the shore, His parables are also aimed toward those who will hear and develop faith, out of the multitudes who will not.  My study Bible notes that according to St. John Chrysostom, the prophecy of Isaiah quoted here does not mean that God causes spiritual blindness in people who would otherwise have been faithful.  This is a figure of speech which is common to Scripture, revealing God as giving people up to their own devices (as in Romans 1:24, 26).    What is meant by He has blinded, my study Bible explains, is that God has permitted people's self-chosen blindness (compare Exodus 8:15, 32 with Exodus 10:20, 27).  People did not become blind because God spoke through Isaiah; it is Isaiah who gave his prophesy because he foresaw their blindness. 

As we have been reading through the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5 - 7; beginning with this reading from May 9), Jesus has been speaking to His disciples.  That is, He has been addressing His sermon to those who would be His followers, speaking of the particular type of blessedness that belongs to this Kingdom, to those who have faith in Him, teaching His gospel message.  He has been teaching us what it means to be a disciple, to engage in discipleship, to follow Him.   But in today's reading, we skip to chapter 13, where the parables begin, and the lectionary will be giving us these parables in preparation for Ascension Day (which, generally speaking, for the West is Thursday this week, and for the Eastern Churches  falls on Thursday next week).  In tomorrow's reading, we'll receive Jesus' explanation of this foundational parable which He gives to His disciples.  But for today, let us consider what He teaches them here, in response to their question about why He has chosen to begin to speak in parables.  For us today, it remains an important concern to understand why it is that membership in our churches seems to fluctuate so.  Popular ideas in the West have long followed a trend toward a belief in a very materialist-oriented perspective on life.  A false understanding of science seems to imply that we must only trust in what has been proven to us scientifically, but nevertheless there are those who seem to adopt this attitude.  (All science is based on hypothesis; if scientists only accepted that existence was limited to what had already been proven, there would be no science at all; nor would there be constant new discoveries which, in fact, render mistaken what had been previously understood to have been proven.)   In some sense, this "misdirection" of perception, or failure to grasp the mysteries of which Christ speaks, remains entirely pertinent to what we're being taught in the quotation of the prophesy of Isaiah.  Jesus gives us a hint about the failure to hear and see the things He is offering, the lack of perception of the value in the things He teaches.  Although Israel, and particularly its leadership contemporaneous with Christ, is steeped in preparation for the Messiah, in scholarship on the Old Testament, together with tremendous resources from the Second Temple period which was rich in possibility to accept Christ as divine, there are those who cannot nor will not see and hear what He is offering, with faith.  Jesus has spoken of the hypocrisy which keeps us from faith during His teachings in the Sermon on the Mount, for which He will repeatedly indict the religious leadership.  There is the aspect of life lived purely for show, for the praise of other people, which He repeatedly mentions in this context -- and we can surely see at least some of this pattern reflected in a world which now bases so much of its common social exchange on consumed image through social media, or identity which seems to rest solely on how it is reflected back to us through the eyes of others.  It seems common today that there are so many who do not see and do not hear these realities of which Christ speaks, the blessedness of God and mysteries of God's kingdom.  Faith asks us for a perception that comes from a deeper place within ourselves, something subtle, but also essential to identity which is hidden from those without this capacity for perception.  From this perspective, it seems there is something missing from the development which enables us to participate in mystery and to receive what mystery offers us as part of identity and personal growth.  Just as Jesus taught us to rebuke hypocrisy by praying in secret to our Father who is in the secret place and who sees in secret (and to do likewise with practices of almsgiving and fasting), so we must come to understand that a life lived entirely with a consumerist orientation is going to miss out on what is to be grasped from within, in a secret place, even with no one else watching or seeing.  There are things which cannot be apprehended simply by consuming or absorbing what is outside of us or around ourselves.  This is what the parables point to:  images hidden within the story, which feed us something more than the easy fare of spectacle.  That is, things which engage us in a deeper way than the narcissistic drive for competing image or comparing ourselves to others, something other than the tremendous focus only on what appears to us in a material way.  There is a deeper place where life is for us, where we understand that who we are comes in relationship to God and to the righteous way of life to which God calls us in our relations to others, regardless of social demands.  If we think about it, this is part of the reason why the poor (or the poor in spirit) are always dear to God, for their perception is not based solely on what they possess materially.  We start there, in this parable of the Sower, to build an awareness of what this means and what it offers, who the Sower is, and how important it is that we find this way to perceive what is of true value and gives value to all else.  As Jesus teaches, there is a law to this type of awareness, and the kind of abundance He offers:  "For whoever has, to him more will be given, and he will have abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him."   In Jesus' final statement in today's reading, it is as if we are given another Beatitude from the Sermon on the Mount, and another lesson about what it means to live a blessed life:  "But blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear . . ."