Last time, as we started this new series on the Parables, we attempted to define what a parable is and compared and contrasted Jesus’ parables with those from other ancient Jewish literature. We left that study understanding that parables are short stories that twist scenes from everyday life to speak on some spiritual theme, generally requiring a leap of understanding that subverts the audience’s expectations. This ‘leap’ and ‘subversion’ is part of what makes Jesus’ parables so compelling, and why they transcend other analogical wisdom literature, such as something like Aesop’s fables. But this means that our readerly engagement with the stories is a critical component of the parable itself.
If parables were meant to be a challenge to their original audience (much more on that in the next post in the series!), it’s all the more true for us. For in addition to this essential problem of parables, today we have to manage the further complication of cultural distance. It’s a simple fact that the situations and customs relevant to a first-century Judaean audience are unlikely to mean the same to us today, removed as we are in time, place, and culture. Take the parable of the Lost Sheep for example. What do we really know about what it would have meant to its first audience? What did they think of shepherds? Would a ‘good’ shepherd leave ninety-nine sheep to find one lost sheep? Is he set up as a hero or a fool? The answers to these questions shift how we think about what Jesus is teaching, and, unfortunately, even the most thorough and faithful scholarship can provide only educated guesses to much of it.
Moreover, beyond these complications of discerning hearts and cultural distance, parables also invite multiple interpretations. They are rarely straightforward and invite deep reflection and even discomfort. In this they are not unlike Buddhist koans, sayings whose wisdom lies in their mystery or impossibility of resolution. As Ruben Zimmerman put it:
[P]arables are meant to create understanding through their mysteriousness. Initial incomprehension results in a process of questioning, marveling, and searching that can ultimately lead to deepened understanding. Parables are incomprehensible in order to lead to comprehension. That is to say, there is a calculated potential for misunderstanding ultimately to create deeper understanding. (Zimmerman)*
All of this means that we may likely be at a great disadvantage when approaching Jesus’ parables today. For not only do we have to deal with cultural distance, but these stories are also among the most well-known to us. Many of us know them by rote and immediately jump to the deeply-rutted paths of past interpretations. It’s almost impossible for us to hear the parables with the right ears — ears oriented towards mystery. This is a real challenge for all of us who love the Scriptures and want them to speak into our lives. The best way to know a parable is to not know it at all and come to it again fresh, to be able to be surprised by it.
As we go on with this series, this will be one of our major goals, to come at the stories fresh with an expectation of surprise and an open mind that doesn’t assume it already knows the meaning, but asks with even the most familiar passage, ‘What else might this say to me?’
All of this discussion has skirted around the major question of what parables are for, how they work, and what Jesus thought about them. This is a huge question and one whose answer is made even more complicated by the fact that Jesus actually gave his disciples a clear answer, but not one many of us like. And that will be the focus of the next post in the series.
* For full references, please see the series bibliography.
Matthew Root 