What Jesus Said
I’ve been reading The Method and Message of Jesus’ Teaching by Robert H. Stein this month and I’m about 1/3 of the way through. It is not the easiest book to read and it would be better suited for a classroom, not so much for reading on an airplane or lounging in your living room.
Strangely enough, I listened to Andy Stanley’s podcast on Monday from his sermon he did on 1/31 called “Taking Responsibility for your Life: Embrace your responsibility”. Andy said that Jesus’ parables had one central point in each parable – the details of the parable are NOT important and many of them would never happen or might even not be possible. He then went through the parable of the talents and explained all Jesus was trying to say was that you need to leverage what you are given for God, regardless of the amount you are given. He said the fact that the lazy servant hid his talent (gold was Andy’s translation) in the ground is an example of this; no one would hide $300,000 worth of gold in the ground for safekeeping as there were much safer ways of taking care of that gold that were far easier.
This sermon coincided with exactly what I was reading about in the book. The earliest church fathers such as Origen, Augustine, and Tertullian all treated the parables as allegories. For example in the parable of the good Samaritan, the man is walking from Jerusalem to Jericho. Origen said that the man was Adam and that Jerusalem is paradise and Jericho is this world. Martin Luther said Origen’s interpretation was worth “less than dirt” but he had a similar allegorical translation of the same parable. Reading Andy Stanley’s message into this parable – the fact that he was going to Jerusalem to Jericho is irrelevant and he might as well have been going from Manhattan to Brooklyn.
So who’s right? Why did the earliest church fathers read so much into each parable and why does Andy Stanley (and Robert H. Stein for that matter) believe that there is usually only one main point to each parable and that the details might even be irrelevant?
It seems to me that pastors, bloggers, book writers, whoever – can make Jesus say whatever they want by either allegorizing everything about a parable or ignoring the details of the parable.
As for me, I’ve been trying to just lean on the Holy Spirit as I read the Bible personally. I’ve been begging Him to remove preconceived notions and just speak directly into my life and to clear my head of all the “noise” made by others (no matter how well meaning that particular “noise”). The result has been the blessing of a true peace as I read the Scripture – a peace that lets me know that God is huge and no amount of study will ever let me wrap my head around Him. Makes me wonder if my daughter has the right idea when she points at the sky and says “God is way way WAY up there!” and then runs through the yard without a care in the world….
Strangely enough, I listened to Andy Stanley’s podcast on Monday from his sermon he did on 1/31 called “Taking Responsibility for your Life: Embrace your responsibility”. Andy said that Jesus’ parables had one central point in each parable – the details of the parable are NOT important and many of them would never happen or might even not be possible. He then went through the parable of the talents and explained all Jesus was trying to say was that you need to leverage what you are given for God, regardless of the amount you are given. He said the fact that the lazy servant hid his talent (gold was Andy’s translation) in the ground is an example of this; no one would hide $300,000 worth of gold in the ground for safekeeping as there were much safer ways of taking care of that gold that were far easier.
This sermon coincided with exactly what I was reading about in the book. The earliest church fathers such as Origen, Augustine, and Tertullian all treated the parables as allegories. For example in the parable of the good Samaritan, the man is walking from Jerusalem to Jericho. Origen said that the man was Adam and that Jerusalem is paradise and Jericho is this world. Martin Luther said Origen’s interpretation was worth “less than dirt” but he had a similar allegorical translation of the same parable. Reading Andy Stanley’s message into this parable – the fact that he was going to Jerusalem to Jericho is irrelevant and he might as well have been going from Manhattan to Brooklyn.
So who’s right? Why did the earliest church fathers read so much into each parable and why does Andy Stanley (and Robert H. Stein for that matter) believe that there is usually only one main point to each parable and that the details might even be irrelevant?
It seems to me that pastors, bloggers, book writers, whoever – can make Jesus say whatever they want by either allegorizing everything about a parable or ignoring the details of the parable.
As for me, I’ve been trying to just lean on the Holy Spirit as I read the Bible personally. I’ve been begging Him to remove preconceived notions and just speak directly into my life and to clear my head of all the “noise” made by others (no matter how well meaning that particular “noise”). The result has been the blessing of a true peace as I read the Scripture – a peace that lets me know that God is huge and no amount of study will ever let me wrap my head around Him. Makes me wonder if my daughter has the right idea when she points at the sky and says “God is way way WAY up there!” and then runs through the yard without a care in the world….
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allegory,
Jesus,
parable,
translation
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