The kingdom in parables: sower, seeds and the hidden reign in Matthew 13

Matthew 13 is the third of the five discourses that structure the Gospel, and it is the center of the book. Its collection of parables is the longest in Matthew. The traditional view is that the apostle Matthew wrote the Gospel. Many scholars hold instead that an unnamed Jewish Christian wrote it in Greek in the 80s of the first century, using Mark. Others argue for an earlier date. The chapter fits the Gospel's purpose of presenting Jesus as the Messiah whose kingdom is both present and hidden, and whose coming has been met with a divided response.

Parables are the central teaching form of Jesus in all three Synoptic Gospels. The parable of the sower and its explanation appear in Mark 4:1-20 and Luke 8:4-15, and the parable of the mustard seed in Mark 4:30-32 and Luke 13:18-19. The leaven parable is in Luke 13:20-21. The weeds among the wheat, the hidden treasure, the pearl, the dragnet and the scribe trained for the kingdom are found only in Matthew. Matthew's chapter largely follows Mark's order in the first half and adds special material in the second. The rejection at Nazareth (13:53-58) is told in Mark 6:1-6 and, in a different setting, in Luke 4:16-30.

The parables come at a turning point in the narrative. In chapters 11 and 12, opposition to Jesus has grown, and his own family and people have not received him. Jesus responds by teaching in parables from a boat on the Sea of Galilee. Parables were a form already familiar to Israel. The Hebrew word mashal covers proverb, riddle and story, and the prophets used such stories (2 Samuel 12:1-7; Isaiah 5:1-7). The setting is rural Galilee, where sowing, baking, fishing and buying and selling were everyday life.

A parable is a story or comparison that makes one main point by means of a familiar scene. The rule is to find the central contrast and to keep the details subordinate to it. Not every feature must carry a hidden meaning. At the same time, the sower and the weeds are explained by Jesus himself, who gives specific equivalents (the seed is the word, the field is the world, the harvest is the end of the age). Where Jesus supplies the meaning, the details are part of it. Where he does not, they are best left as part of the story. This guards against the ancient habit of allegorizing every detail, and also against ignoring the allegorical elements Jesus himself uses.

Matthew groups the parables by audience. The first four are told to the crowd, and the last three are told to the disciples in the house. The structure is a movement from outsiders who hear and do not understand to insiders who are given understanding. The explanation of the sower and the weeds is given only to the disciples. This shapes how the whole chapter should be read: the parables both reveal and conceal, depending on the hearer.

The parables also need the whole of the Gospel behind them. The kingdom of heaven is present in Jesus, but not yet fully visible. It begins small and grows. It is received by some and rejected by others. It will reach a final separation at the end of the age. Each parable adds to this picture, and none is to be pushed into saying everything.

Verses 1–9

Jesus sits in a boat while the crowd stands on the shore, which was a natural amphitheater. The sower scatters seed on four kinds of ground. On the path the birds eat it. On rocky ground, where the soil is thin, it springs up fast and withers under the sun. Among thorns, it is choked. In good soil it yields a hundredfold, sixtyfold or thirtyfold. Scattering seed before ploughing was common practice in Galilee, so the waste on poor ground is not a sign of carelessness. The closing call, to hear, indicates that the story has a meaning that requires attention.

Verses 10–17

The disciples ask why Jesus speaks to the crowds in parables. He answers that it has been given to them to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but not to the others. The word 'secrets' (musteria) means what was hidden and is now revealed by God, a sense that goes back to Daniel 2. Whoever has will be given more; whoever has not will lose even what he has. Jesus then cites Isaiah 6:9-10: people hear but do not understand, see but do not perceive, their hearts have grown dull. Matthew introduces the quotation as fulfilled in them. Mark 4:12 and Luke 8:10 use the language of purpose, 'so that', and Matthew's wording is closer to 'because', which stresses that the crowd's blindness is a state they have already entered. Whether purpose or consequence, Isaiah's commission was to a people already hardened, and the parables both expose and further that hardening. The disciples are called blessed, since many prophets and righteous people longed to see what they see and did not.

Verses 18–23

Jesus explains the sower. The seed is the word of the kingdom. The path is the hearer who does not understand, and the evil one snatches it away. The rocky ground is the person who receives it with joy but has no root and falls away when trouble or persecution comes. The thorns are the worry of the age and the deceitfulness of wealth. The good soil is the one who hears the word and understands it, and bears fruit. The parable describes responses to the word, and the main emphasis is on how different hearts receive the same seed.

Verses 24–30, 36–43

The weeds are sown among the wheat by an enemy. The word probably denotes darnel, a weed that looks like wheat until the head appears. The servants ask whether to pull them up, and the owner says to wait for the harvest, lest the wheat be uprooted with them. Jesus explains: the sower is the Son of Man, the field is the world, the good seed is the sons of the kingdom, the weeds are the sons of the evil one, the enemy is the devil, the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are angels. At the end, the weeds will be gathered and burned and the righteous will shine like the sun in their Father's kingdom (an echo of Daniel 12:3). The point is patience and the certainty of final separation.

Verses 31–35

The mustard seed is the smallest of the seeds a farmer sowed, and it grows into a large shrub where birds nest. The picture echoes Ezekiel 17:23 and Daniel 4:12, where trees sheltering birds stand for great kingdoms. The kingdom begins insignificantly but becomes large. The leaven is hidden in three measures of flour, an amount sufficient for a large gathering (compare Genesis 18:6), until the whole is leavened. Leaven often stands for corruption in the Bible (including Matthew 16:6), and some interpreters read it so here, but most take it as a picture of the kingdom's hidden, pervasive growth, since Jesus introduces it as what the kingdom is like. Matthew then quotes Psalm 78:2: Jesus speaks in parables to utter things hidden since the foundation of the world.

Verses 44–52

The treasure hidden in a field and the pearl of great price both show a person who sells everything for the kingdom. The treasure is found by chance, the pearl is sought by a merchant, and in both the value of the kingdom justifies the cost. The dragnet gathers fish of every kind, and the good are sorted from the bad at the shore, as the angels will separate the evil from the righteous at the end of the age. Jesus asks if they have understood, and then says that every scribe trained for the kingdom is like a householder who brings out of his storeroom what is new and what is old.

Verses 53–58

Jesus returns to his home town, Nazareth, and teaches in the synagogue. The people are amazed but take offense: is this not the carpenter's son, and are his mother and brothers and sisters not among them? He says a prophet is not without honor except in his own country and his own house. He does not do many mighty works there because of their unbelief.

The central subject is the kingdom of heaven, and the chapter shows it in several aspects. The kingdom is present, because the seed is being sown now, and it is hidden, because it comes as a small seed, not as an army. It brings division, because the same word produces different responses. It will be consummated at the end of the age, when the Son of Man sends his angels and the righteous shine like the sun. The tension between 'already' and 'not yet' that runs through the New Testament is stated here in the form of stories.

• The second doctrine is human responsibility and divine initiative in revelation. The soil determines the fruit, yet the secrets are given to the disciples, and the hardening of the crowd is described in Isaiah's words. Both are held together in Scripture (compare Isaiah 6 with John 12:37-41 and Romans 11:7-10).
• The third is judgment and patience. The owner of the field delays the separation, which reflects the patience of God in Romans 2:4 and 2 Peter 3:9, yet the separation is certain.
• The fourth is the priceless worth of the kingdom, which is the point of the treasure and the pearl.

The response at Nazareth sets the pattern that runs through the New Testament. The prophet is honored by outsiders and refused by his own, as Jesus is by Israel's leaders. Unbelief limits what Jesus does there, which shows that his works were not a show of power for its own sake.

Jesus is present throughout as the sower, and then, in the explanation of the weeds, as the Son of Man who sows the good seed and who sends the angels to harvest (13:37, 41). Daniel 7 places the Son of Man at the center of final judgment, and Daniel 12:3 supplies the picture of the righteous shining, echoed in 13:43. The one who sits in a boat teaching beside a lake is the one who commands the angels at the end. His authority is the same in both.

The chapter has an explicit fulfilment claim. Jesus' parables fulfil Isaiah 6:9-10 (13:14-15), and his speaking in parables fulfils Psalm 78:2 (13:35). In both cases Matthew says the Old Testament Scripture found its meaning in Jesus' ministry. In the first, Israel's hardening in Isaiah's day is repeated in response to Jesus. In the second, the psalmist who told Israel's history in parable and riddle is taken to be speaking forward to the greater teacher.

The rejection at Nazareth also fits a pattern. Jesus calls himself a prophet without honor in his own place. The people see only the carpenter's son, and the Gospel has already told the reader who he is: the Son of God, conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of Mary, Emmanuel (1:20-23). Matthew's readers know what the Nazarenes did not.