christianity-theroleofparablesinthebible
Christianity Parables - Role of
The role of parables in the Bible
The Parables of Jesus confront us with a difficult problem of how to recover the origin of their meaning or their role in the Bible.
In the early church, Parables were interpreted as allegories. Parables were interpreted by way of searching the hidden meaning behind words. This is known as the “hardening theory” or the intention of the Bible to conceal the truth of God from non-believers.
Thus, the Jerusalem is heaven in the Parable of Good Samaritan. Jericho is the world, robber is Satan, priest is religion, Levite is the church and Samaritan is Christ.
Of course, this has never been the intention of the Bible. The mistake was caused by the miss- interpretation of Mk. 4:11. The correct meaning of this verse should be: The outsiders are not yet follow the meaning of the parables. But once they repent, they too will be able to see, hear and understand the hidden secret of the parables.
Julicher was the first theologian to free parables from early allegorical interpretation. He argued for the scenery approach in interpreting parables. We should not read parables by the words and between the lines. Instead, we should see parable as a whole picture. In other words we should see a bird not the eyes, the wings and the feathers.
The meaning of the Parable of the Sower is teaching of the acceptance of the Gospel, Parable of the Weeds is teaching the coming back time of Christ and so on. We should grasp the theme and core teaching of the Parable not the details.
It was A. T. Cadoux and later C.H. Dodd who laid down the principle that Parables are best interpreted in the setting of the life of Jesus Christ. This brings hermeneutic on the path to historical approach of the Parables.
We must, therefore, understand the language, custom, culture in the time of Jesus Christ to interpret Parables. Jesus did not actually mean “The eye of the needle” in Mathew 19:23 to be the needle hole, but a small gate to enter Jerusalem that named “The eye of the needle”. For the rich man to enter the Kingdom of God is not impossible like a camel to go through the tiny needle hole, but difficult like a camel to enter the small gate.
It was Jeremias, inspired by C. H. Dodd’s Parables of the Kingdom London 1938, who actually put the principle of Sitz im Leben of Jesus (situation in the time of Jesus) into practice. He extended Dodd’s search beyond the Bible to see the culture, social, and political situation in Jesus to understand His Parables teachings.
While Dodd concentrated his Parables interpretation mostly in the field of “realized eschatology” (end time), Jeremias sees Parables more in the life teaching of Jesus.
Jeramias argues against Dodd that parable such as the Nocturnal Burglar in Mt. 24; Lk. 12; the Ten Virgin in Mt. 24 and the Door Keeper in Mk. 13 are not Parousia of the Great Day of Joy. The sudden arrival of the thief, the bridegroom, and the master are incidences of catastrophe. Hence, they are crisis and disastrous parables rather then joy.
We may conclude that the role of parables in the Bible is the utterance of the actual situation of the life of Jesus to deal with conflict, misdeed and sin. At the same time, it also reviews the Kingdom of God in past, present and eternal.