Gospel Reading for January 26, 2018 Mk 4:26-34

Why does Jesus Teaches in Parables?

In 2018, most children spend at least the first 18 years in a structured educational program learning to read, to write, basic arithmetic, history and science.  In fact, formal education of this nature has been around long enough that it is really hard for most people to imagine what life would be like without some form of an educational system.

At the time when Jesus was teaching the Gospels, that was not the case in Israel.  According to Wikipedia, the first formal Jewish schools were not started until 64AD by the Jewish priests.  This didn’t mean that the populous was ignorant by any means, but that their educations were centered on the trade of their families, wood working, fishing, farming etc.  The skills of reading and writing were more common among the priestly class because they were charged with reading and writing the Torah.  

So, Jesus couldn’t simply write a book, hand it out and wait for people to read it and then flock to him.  No … Jesus’ teachings were rejected by the priests and ultimately it was their rejection that put him to death on the cross.   

42 Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures: ‘The very stone which the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes’? 43 Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a nation producing the fruits of it. 44 And he who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; but when it falls on any one, it will crush him.” 45 Matthew 42-44

Being rejected by the priests, Jesus took his Gospel to the masses. In order for him to do this he had needed the ability to relay his message in terms that they could comprehend in great depth.  So Jesus’ employed the use of parables to teach his followers.  He would use situational stories that the crowd could identify with on a very personal level.  As an example, the parable of the Sower would have been a very powerful story to the farmer.  If he didn’t properly till the soil and prepare it for the seed to grow, the farmer’s family would starve because nothing would have grown.  He knew that his audience would understand the importance this parable would convey and how it related to the preparation of their hearts for God’s word.  Ultimately, the ramification for not doing so, would result in their deaths.  For this reason, the parables were extremely important to Jesus’ ministry.  

In today’s Gospel, Jesus speaks the parable of the mustard seed.  It would seem that while preaching this part of the Gospel that he was preaching to people that were famers by trade.  To them, they could visualize how small the seed was and know that it represented the word of God … and they likewise knew that it grew into an enormous tree.  Both the parable of the mustard seed and the sower, were very powerfully image carrying stories that would reach deep into the hearts of the audience that he was preaching to.  To those outside of the farming trade, neither of the parables would have made much sense.  To put that in perspective, it would be like trying to describe how a computer works to William Shakespeare.  Without the same common base knowledge, there would be no comprehension of what a computer was little alone how it worked.  To further illustrate this point… the Gospel indicates that after telling the parables to the crowd, he explained them in great length to the disciples. Not because they were dolts, but because it needed to be relayed in the terms that they would understand.  Remember, the parable of the Fisher of Men … What knowledge of farming would a fisherman need to have?

So, parables were a very easy way to relay the importance of the message that Jesus was bringing to the people.  Remember through our baptism in Christ, that we too are called to do evangelize as well.   Remember that sometimes, a picture is worth a thousand words … but sometimes a short parable is too.