(Dan Otto Via, JR.) The Parables Their Literary

I \1
THE PARABLES
Their Literary and Existential Dimension
DAN OTTO VIA, JR.
FORTRESS PRESS PHILADELPHIA

'" I
To Margaret
Biblical quotations from the Revised Standard Version of the Bible,

copyright 1946 and 1952 by the Division of Christian Education of
the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States
of America, are used by permission.
COPYRICHT © 1967 BY FORTRESS PRESS
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,

stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any
means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise,
without the prior pennission of the copyright owner.
First paperback edition 1974

Second printing 1977
Third printing 1980
Library oj Congress Card Number 67-11910

ISBN 0-8006-1392-9
8318L79 Printed in the United States of America 1-1392

PREFACE
I should like to express my gratitude to the Duke University-

University of North Carolina Cooperative Program in the
Humanities and to the Ford Foundation for providing the op-
portunity to do most of the work that went into this book.
Professor R. M. Lumiansky, Chairman of the Program's Cen-
tral Committee, and Mrs. Peggy Kale, his secretary, were help-
ful and courteous during my stay at Duke, as were the staffs of
the Divinity School and general libraries of Duke University.
I am also grateful to the administration of Wake Forest Col-
lege for its share in making possible a year away from normal
teaching duties.
It goes without saying that the flaws in the work are mine.
However, I should like to acknowledge my debt to several
friends on the Duke faculty for their critical and helpful read-
ing of parts of my manuscript-Professors Hugh Anderson
(now of the University of Edinburgh), Thomas A. Langford,
Robert T. Osborn, William H. Poteat, and W. D. White (now
of St. Andrews Co]]ege).
DAN Orro VIA, JR.
Wake Forest College
Winston-Salem, North Carolina
March,1966
CONTENTS
Introduction ix
Part One: Methodological 1

1 Parable and Allegory 2
2 Parable and the Problems of Theological Language 26
3 The Parables, Aesthetics, and Literary Criticism 70
Part Two: Interpretive 109

4 The Tragic Parables 110
5 The Comic Parables 145
6 The Parables, the Gospels, and the Historical Jesus 177
Index of Parables 208

Index of Biblical Passages 209
General Index 211
-1
I
\
v
INTRODUCTION
In view of the passionate concern of contemporary theology

to "go beyond"-beyond whatever has been done in the past,
however recent-one might hesitate to suggest something which
could be interpreted as a going back. In particular, it might be
considered uninformed temerity-some would call it an un-
thinkable retreat1-to question the prevailing Dodd-Jeremias
position that the parables of Jesus must be interpreted exclu-
sively in connection with Jesus' Sitz im Leben. But whether or
not it be seen as a going back, precisely what is proposed in this 0/
book is a move away from a methodology which interprets the h
parables severely in connection with Jesus' historical situation. -(!( Lv'
This is not, however, a return to allegorizing.
The ground for such a move is the recognition that the para-
bles-or at least a substantial portion of them-are genuine
works of art, real aesthetic objects. This recognition runs con-
trary to the main tendency of New Testament scholarship as
it has dealt with the parables. They are usually treated as if
they were not artistic or literary works, and sometimes it is
explicitly denied that they are, at least that they are primarily.2
1 A. M. Hunter, Interpreting the Parables (London: SCM Press, paper-
back ed., 1964), p. 39; Norman Perrin, The Kingdom of God in the Teach-
ing of Testis (Philadelpl1ia: We~hninster Press, 1963 ), pp. 1)0, 73 .
2 Joachim Jeremias, The Parables of Te.ms, trans. S. H. Hooke (rev. cd.;
New York: Scribner's, 1963) , p. 21; El'Ost Fuclls, Studies of tire HwtoricaL
Tesus', Lrans. A. Scobie:: ("Studies ill BibljClll TI I ~olugy," Nu. 42 [LonJ n:
SCM Press, 196'f]), p. 73; Van A. Harvey, "The Historical Jesus, tbe
Kerygma, and the Christian Faith," Religioll in Life, 33 (1964),440, n. 31.
vii
INTRODUCTION
Occasionally it is positively remarked that Jesus' parables are of

an artistic nature,8 but the fuB implications of this have not
been worked out in dialogue with aesthetic and (non-biblical)
literary-critical thought. A start in this direction has been made,
however, by Geraint V. Jones in his The Art and Truth of the
Parables.4. The present work wiII attempt a more thoroughgoing
demonstration that a number of Jesus' parables are in a strict
sense literary and that because of this they are not just iIIustra-
tions of ideas and cannot have the immediate connection with
Jesus' historical situation which is customarily attributed to
them.
Part One will assay to work out a methodology for interpret-
ing the parables, based on an existentialist hermeneutic and on
literary analysis; Part Two wilI make the effort to interpret cer-
tain of the parables through this methodology. These parables
as literary in nature have a certain autonomy (to be fully dis-
cussed in chapter 3) and present a configuration of action-and-
meaning which is a more fundamental form of expression than
are theological concepts; therefore it is proper to consider such
parables first on their own terms and only after that to raise the
question of their relationship to Jesus' non-parabolic teaching
about the kingdom of God, thereby reversing the procedure of
C. H. Dodd. In the exegetical section, the parables wiII not be
grouped on the basis of their relationship to some aspect of the
kingdom of God or of eschatology but on the basis of their
narrative form, thereby alterlng the procedure of Joachim
Jeremias.
This study wiII accept tIle customary classification of the
parabolic teaching as similes and metaphors, similitudes,
• For example, Amos N. Wilder, Early Christian Rhetoric (London: SCM

Press, and New York: Harper, 1964), p. 51; A. T. Cadoux, The Par<1bles of
Tesus (New York: Macmillan. 1931) . pp. 11-12 . Cndomc holds that while
the pamble is a form of 3Jt it is not one of the highest forms because of its
being harnessed for service and conflict.
4. London: S.P.C.K., 1964.
viii
INTRODUCTION
parables (in the narrow sense), and example stories.1I It would

be difficult to agree with Jeremias that such classification is
fruitless. Although in the Old Testament the one term mashal
is used to cover these and other forms,6 that does not mean
that the various forms have the same nature and function and
that they can be interpreted in the same way. It is no accident
that the parables which are amenable to the methodology being
developed in the present work all belong to the class "parable"
(in the narrow sense) as distinguished from similitude and
example story.
It will not be a part of my primary purpose to argue either
for the substantial genuineness of most of the parables or for
the secondary character (in position and/or content) of most
of the concluding interpretive comments as well as of some
internal elements. Both of these points have already been ade-
quately dealt with and are generally accepted by New Testa-
ment scholarship. Th.ere will be no sketch, as such, of the
history of the interpretation of the parables;7 and the steps in
the contemporary exegesis of the parables will be retraced only
where it is needed to support or to clarify the approach being
attempted here. The Scripture locations of parables mentioned
or discussed will often not be cited, but such references are
given in an index at the end.
The whole effort being made in this book is not meant to
suggest that the interpretation of the parables can get along
without the rich exegetical contributions made by such schol-
6 Cf. Rudolf Bultmann, Tile History of tile SYllOptiC Tradition, trans. J.

Marsh (based on the 3d rev. German cd.; New York: Harper, 1963), pp. 166
ff.; C. H. Dodd, The Parables of the Kingdom (rev. ed.; New York: Scrib-
ner's, 1961), pp. 5 £I.; B. T. D. Smith, The Parables of the Synoptic Gospels
(Cambridge: The University Press, 1937), pp. 17 ff.; Eta Linnemann, Die
Gleichnisse Jesll (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1962), pp. 13 £I.
e Jeremias, Parables, p. 20.
r This has recently been done in English in Hunter, Parables, pp. 21-41,
and in Jones, Parables, pp. 3-40.
ix
INTRODUCTION
ars as Dodd, Jeremias, Manson, Michaelis, Fuchs, and Linne-

mann. It is being suggested that in the case of certain of the
narrative parables the new angle of vision of a more literary
approach would enlarge our understanding.
x
PART ONE
METHODOLOGICAL
1
Parable and Allegory
Despite the importance and continuing influence of his work,

Jiilicher did not once and for aU solve the problem of defining
and differentiating parable and allegory. We may note at the
outset two of his major points and then go on to consider the
problems which they raise: (a) a parable has one point of com-
parison as distinguished from an allegory, the latter having
many images which are related to various aspects of the idea
or experience being delineated; (b) this one point is to be given
the broadest, most general possible application.l
1. The One-Point Approach to the Parables

The emphasis that a parable has but one point of compari-
son has continued to be widely held since Jiilicher.2 There is
one central thought or point, with the details and other ele-
ments serving only to enhance that one point; the other
elements have no independent significance of their own. This
position is maintained with special vigor by Eta Linnemann.
She holds that when we draw from the parable a plurality of
. 1 Adolf .TlI~icher. Die Gleichnisredc!II Jesu. Vol. 1 (2d cd;; Freibl1r~. ,~cip
ZIg, and TlIbmgen; J. C. B. Mohr, 1899), pp. 59. 74. Cf. NIls A. Dahl, The
Parables of Growth," Studia The%gica, 5 (1951),133,135.
2 Tt is seen as a basically. but not absolutely, correct insigllt by B. T. D.
Smith, The Parables of tJlf~ Synoptic Gos/Jels, pp. 23-24; A. M. Hunter,
Interpreting tile Parables, pp. 10, 38; Wilhelm Michaelis, Die Glaichnisse
Jesu (Hamburg; Furohe.vcrlag, 1956), pp. 14- 15. C. H . Dodd (The Para-
bles of the Kingdom, pp. 7, 9-10) aflimls the point somewhat more strongly.
2
PARABLE AND ALLEGORY
significant thoughts we may be sure that we have missed the
sense which it had for the original narrator. And it is also a
mistake to expose correctly the one central point but to set
alongside this point other important thoughts which the para-
ble is supposed to mediate to us. 3
There are two dangers or problems, however, connected with
operating within the one-point approach to the parables. One
is that important elements in the parable may be overlooked
and the meaning of the parable attenuated, which is the case,
for example, in Fuchs' interpretation of The Workers in the
Vineyard.· Fuchs is almost exclusively concerned with the one
point of the vineyard owner's kind act and the relationship of
this act to Jesus and his understanding of his conduct as God's
act. The attitude and fate of the grumbling workers and what
these factors contribute to the meaning of the parable as a
total configuration are virtually ignored. On the other hand, the
interpreter may, unconsciously and in spite of himself, allego-
rize the parable-attribute independent significance to the parts
-while claiming not to be allegorizing. This is the case in
Dodd's interpretation of The Wicked Tenants,1I as Matthew
Black6 has correctly noticed. Dodd sees reflected in the parable
the culmination of God's dealing with his people, the death of
Jesus, the climactic rebellion of Israel, and God's judgment
upon the latter. It would seem that these difficulties are inher-
ent in the one-point approach and that this approach is arti-
ficially restrictive; therefore, it is not surprising that it has been
widely questioned.
This questioning, as usually understood, amounts to assert-
a Eta Linnema nn, Die Cleiclmisse r~u, p. 32.

4 Ernst Fuchs. Studies of tile Historical Jesf,lS, pp. 33-36, 154-156; "Be-
merkungen zur GJeichnjsaus]egung," T lleolog.isclle LiterCltuTuitung, 79
(1954),347-348.
a Dodd, Parables, pp. 96-102.
• "The Parables as Allegory," Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, 42
(1960),282-283.
3
THE PARABLES
ing that Jesus' narratives 7
are allegorical in some sense. Before
proceeding any further, then, it is necessary to arrive at a more
elaborate and developed understanding of what an allegory is.
We must also achieve a provisional working definition of a
parable, though a complete definition will not be arrived at
until chapter 3.
2. The Nature and Function of Allegory

We should remind ourselves of the obvious point that there
is a difference between making an allegory and giving an alle-
gorical interpretation of a story which is not in itself allegorical.
A story which is itself allegorical should be so interpreted. But
to treat a story which is not as if it were-to allegorize it-can
only frustrate the function and intention of the story. James
Smart implies that the ancient allegorizer somehow sensed that
the meaning which he wanted to find in the text which he was
interpreting was not really in it but had to be inserted. s This
may be doubted, however, for the ancient allegorizer probably
believed-even if wrongly-that the earlier text really intended
the meaning that he (the interpreter) wanted to find. Hera-
clitus, the first-century Stoic, maintained that Homer used the
method of ollegorio-"speaking one thing" but "signifying
something other than what is said."9 Thus it may be supposed
that the aliegorizing interpreter did not believe that he was
reading into the text anything foreign; and that would also be
true of the early Christian interpreter.lO
We have been assuming thus far in this chapter that one of
7 Sometimes the neutral tenn "narrative" or "story" will be used where

the issue is whether the stories are parables (in the proper sense) and not
allegories.
8 James D. Smart, The Interpretation of Scripture (Philadelphia: West-
minster Press, 1961), p. 132.
8 R. M. Grant, The Letter and the Spirit (London: S.P.C.K., 1957), pp.
9-10.
10 Ibid., pp. 40, 103, 106-107.
4
the chief fonnal qualities of an allergory is that each image
and detail has a significance of its own or represents something
in the meaning, that there are many connections between the
allegorical story and what it represents. This view is too widely
accepted to need documentation. There is a second basic fonnal
quality which is closely related to the first one and which is
probably more fundamental. It is that the structure, shape, and
interconnections of an allegory are detennined by something
outside itself-by its meaning or referent. The structure of an
allegory derives from its meaning. l l Eta Linnemann describes
this graphically. It is as if two designs were placed one over the
other. The bottom one, which is the meaning or the situation
being referred to, gives the shape, while the upper one, the
story, gives tp.e color. For example, the situation referred to in
The Great Feast (Matt. 22:1-10)-the destruction of Jerusa-
lem by Rome-causes an unnatural wait in the story (22:7)
between the preparation of the meal (22:4) and the invitation
to the new guests (22:9).12
In a study of the nature of allegory by Edwin Honig, the
literary critic, there is essential agreemen't on this point. Ac-
cording to Honig "we find the allegorical quality in a twice-
told tale written in rhetorical, or figurative, language and
expressing a vital belief." "Twice-told" means that a venerated
or proverbial (old) story has become the pattern for a new
one. The new story-the allegory-uses figurative language in
order that the old and new can be told simultaneously, and the
belief expressed is the reason for the retelling. 18 This means
that an image or a detail in an allegory is not of importance
primarily in itself nor for the story but as an instance or illus-
tration of something in the old story, in the meaning or refer-
11 Mic11aelis, Gleic/misse, p. 15.

12 Linnemann, Gleiclmisse, p. 16.
18 Edwin Honig, Dark Conceit (Evanston: Northwestern University Press,
1959) , p. 12.
5
THE PARABLES
ent. The allegorist does not begin with an image which suggests
a meaning, but he begins with an idea or meaning and looks
for an image to represent it. 14
Honig, again, declares that the allegorist succeeds when his
new story does not merely depend on the authority of the old
one but achieves a new structure, meaning, and authority of its
own. lII To this it must be said that it is difficult to make an
allegory stand on its own feet, that is, read naturally on its own
terms. In an allegory the elements in the story not only repre-
sent but are identical with their referents; therefore, they
behave not according to their own logic or nature but according
to the logic of what they represent. This means that an alle-
gory is likely to contain improbabilities too great to be assimi-
lated into the story; it will appear as nonsensical if read on its
own terms and will have to be translated into what it repre-
sents in order to have sense made of iU 6 For example, in
Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress when Christian and Hopeful are
in the dungeon of Doubting Castle, "Christian suddenly re-
members that he has in his bosom a key called Promise that
will open any lock in the castle"; and with it they let them-
selves out. As Cadoux has pointed out, the story is in every
way shaped by "the religious experience which it represents"
and apart from it is unintelligible. In the midst of doubts a
Christian may be released by remembering the promise of God,
but "it would be insulting to ask anyone to believe" that a
man unexpectedly imprisoned remembered after some days
that he had a key capable of unlocking any door in the prison. 17
The question which I would finally pose to Honig, however,
u Philip V/hee1wright, The Burning Fountain (Bloomington: Indiana

University Press, 1954), p. 89; Northrop Frye, Anatomy of Criticism (Prince·
ton: Princeton University Press, 1957), p. 89.
15 Honig, Dark Conceit, p. 13.
18 CE. Dodd, Parables, p. 8; Smith, Parables, pp. 21-22; C. V. Jones, The
Art and Truth of the Parables, pp. 88, 98-106.
17 A. T. Cadoux, The Parables of Jesus, p. 44.
6
is, not whether it is not very difficult to create an allegory with
a really new meaning and structure of its own, but whether it
is not impossible. Since the old story-the meaning or referent
-is the pattern for the new one and since there must be mani-
fold analogies between them, as Honig has said, are not narrow
limitations imposed on the extent to which the allegory can
have a new structure and meaning? If, on the other hand, a
story does have a new and independent authority, can it be an
allegory in view of the fact that, according to Honig, the defini-
tive quality of an allegory is its close relationship to the old
story? It is not suggested here that there is no room in an alle-
gory for a new structure and meaning but that this room is
very limited.
Because an allegory is dependent on its meaning or referent,
the situation to which it relates, the reader must be familiar
with the latter in order to understand the story. Thus an alle-
gory can only pass on hidden information to the initiated.Is
Since the reader, in order to understand the allegory, must be
• familiar with the referent or situation which shapes it, it may
be suggested that whether or not a particular story is taken as
an allegory depends somewhat on the standpoint of the reader.
A reader unfamiliar with the situation referred to in an allegory
might miss the intended allegorical meaning-the pattern of
references to the old story or the situation to which it relates-
and yet find some meaning in the story itself if it has not been
too thoroughly accommodated to the old story or situation. On
the other hand, a non-allegorical story might be taken as an
allegory by a reader who noticed certain coincidental corre-
spondences to a situation with which he was familiar.
An allegory, then, communicates to a person what he already
knows, though it communicates it in symbolic and altered fash-
ion. The other side of this is that it conceals its intended
18 Linnemann, Gleichnisse, p. 17.
7
THE PARABLES
meaning-unless there is an appended interpretation-from

those who do not have the necessary knowledge to decipher it.
In short, an allegory does not say what it means nor mean what
it says, which is what Jiilicher19 meant when he referred to
allegory as inauthentic (uneigentlich) speech. From the stand-
point of the author of the secondary interpretation (Mark
4:1~20) of The Sower (Mark 4:3-9), an allegory (which he
takes Mark 4: 3-9 to be) certainly conceals its meaning, for
no one who heard The Sower could have guessed that its mean-
ing was the one attributed to it in the interpretation. Could
any hearer have surmised from the story itself that the birds
who ate the seed (4:4) really represent Satan (4:15)?
Since by the time Mark was written the meaning of some of
the parables had been obscured or lost, and since it is the nat-
ural function of al1egory to conceal or obscure its meaning, we
can understand how Mark took Jesus' parables to be allegories,
as he does in 4:11-12. With this he couples his belief in pre-
destination: Jesus used language which conceals the truth in
order that certain men might not be able to understand, repent,
and be forgiven. Mark is reaI1y saying that the parables in
themselves are useless. They conceal their intention from the
outsiders and also from the disciples, for they are unintelligible
to the latter apart from explanation (4:10-11a, 14-20, 34). It
has sometimes been argued that Matthew's substitution of
hoti (13:13) for Mark's final hina20 was intended as a soften-
ing of Mark's thought. 21 Matthew would then be saying that
U Gleichnisreden, Yol. 1, pp. 49, 73.

tOYincent Taylor, The Gospel According to St. Mark (London: Macmil-
lan, 1953), p. 257.
21 Ibid.; Alan Hugh McNeile, The Gospel According to Saint Matthew
(London: Macmillan, 1952), p. 190; F. Blass and A. Debrunner, A Greek
Grammar of the New Testament, trans. and ed. R. Funk (revision of 9th·
10th German ed.; Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962), p. 187.
Sherman Johnson, on the other hand, seems to believe that Matthew essen·
tially reproduces Mark's thought; d. The Interpreter's Bible, Yol. 7 (New
York and Nashville: Abingdon-Cokesbury Press, 1951), pp. 410-411.
8
I>ARA8L£ AND ALLEGORY
because the people were dull and insensitive, Jesus taught in

parables in the hope that they would understand and repent.
This change would therefore imply that Matthew did not
understand the parables as concealing language. However, a
careful analysis of Matthew 13:13 in the light of the context
of the whole of chapter 13 and of the whole Gospel would
seem to indicate that Matthew, no less than Mark, regarded
the parables as intentionally concealing their meaning. Prob-
ably the hoti in both 13:11 and 13:13 is causal. Thus Matthew
would be saying that because the crowds are lacking in com-
prehension, the use of the parables makes it possible to keep
the secrets of the kingdom from them.22
It may be that behind Mark 4:11-12 is a genuine saying of
Jesus with a less predestinarian meaning than that contained
in Mark's understanding.28 In any case Jesus could not have
agreed with Mark's view of the purpose of the parables,2. for it
is clear that Jesus intended that the parables should have posi-
tive results, that the people should hear with understanding.
He questions them about the meaning of the parables and tells
them to open their ears (Mark 4:9, 30; 7:14; 12:9; Matt. 18:12;
21:28; Luke 6:47; 13:18). In Mark 4:33 we have the pre-
Markan tradition that Jesus used parables because the people
could make something of them (cf. also 4:21), but in the
22 For an elaboration and defense of this view of Matthew see my article
"Matthew on the Understandability of the Parables," Tournal of Biblical Lit-
erature,84 (1965),430-432. Passages from this article are here reproduced
with the permiSsion of the Journal of Biblical Literature.
25 Cf. T. W. Manson, Tile T~achi"g of Jesus (2d cd.; Cambridge: The
University Press. 1948), pp. 77-80; Joachim Jeremias, Tile Parables of Jesus,
pp. 14-18. Jeremias holds flIat 4:11-12 did not originally refer to the para·
bles in particular but to Jesos' teaching in general (Parables, pp. 17-18).
:H J. Arthur Baird holds that Mark 4:11 really reflects Jesus' practice, argu-
ing on the statistical ground that many more parables are exJ;llained to dis-
ciples than to non·disciples. See IllS "A Pragmatic Approach to Parable Exe-
gesis," Journal of Biblical Literature, 76 (1957).205-206. But l1e concedes
that the correctness of 11is view depends on wllr:thcr or not the Gospels' in-
dications of audience are correct (p. 207), which is ve.ry doubtful in view of
the work of Jeremias (Parables, p. 40) and others.
9
tHat PAftABLats
very next verse (4: 34) a reflection of the opposite (Markan)

view (as in 4:11-12) that the parables had to be explained.21i
Beyond this it is contrary to the very nature of a parable that
its purpose could be to conceal its meaning.
Yet the meaning of a parable is not always crystal clear or
obvious, as is sometimes c1aimed.26 A parable is not simply an
example or illustration of a general idea which makes the latter
easier to understand. According to T. W. Manson 27 this mis-
taken idea is a Western notion going back to Aristotle. In the
Old Testament the term mashal is sometimes associated with
the term chidah, a riddle or perplexing saying (Pss. 49:4; 78:2;
Prov. 1: 6; Ezek. 17: 2 ). In some cases the meaning of a para-
ble may be left not immediately apparent in order to force the
hearer to thought,28 and this could be a part of what lies behind
Mark's superimposed view in 4:10-12.
It is true that Jesus' parabks draw upon the familiar world,20
but the familiar is used in a new way. Thus old ways of think-
ing are challenged, and resistance to change may impede under-
standing. Seen in this way a parable may be hard to understand
more because of the existential situation of the hearer (d.
chap. 2) than because of any hidden meaning (in the allegori-
cal sense). In addition to this there is a sense in which literary
art is "dumb" and needs to be interpreted,SO but that again is
not grounded in its being allegory (d. pp. 93-94).
2~ Cf. ClIdoux, P(lrables, Pjl. 17-19; Sherman E. Johnson, The Gospel Ac·
cording to St. Mark (London: A. and C. Black, 1960), p. 96.
gO Gunther Bornkrumn, Jesus of Na:wreth, trans. I. and F. McLuskey and
J. Robinson (based on 3d GermalJ ed. of 1959; London: Hodder and Stough.
ton, and New York: Harper, 1960), p. 69; Hunter, Parables, pp. 13-14.
Hunter qualifies this position.
27 Teaching, pp. 57-58.
28 W. O. E. Ocster1ey, Tire Gospel Parables in !lIe Lig111 of Their Jewish
Background (New York: Macmillan, 1936), p. 5; Jones, P~rd/)le,~. p. 60;
C. E. B, Crall.field, The Gospel According to Sairlt Mark (Cambridge: The
University Press, 1959), p. 159.
211 Bornkamm, Jesus, p. 69.
80 Frye, Anatomy, pp. 4-5.
10
3. Parable, Similitude, and Example Story
We are now at the point of needing to say something more
systematic about the formal nature of a parable. Of Jesus' ut-
terances only some twenty-two are called parables, and of these
only four are in words attributed to Jesus (Mark 4:13; 4:30;
13:28; Luke 4:23) .31 It is generally agreed by New Testament
scholarship that comparison lies at the heart of a parable. Para-
bles are in various ways elaborated comparisons, and this is a
feature which Jesus' parables share with some of the meshalim
of the Old Testament32 and, also, with the parables of the
Greek tradition. 33
Among Jesus' parables (in the broad general sense) which
are more elaborate than single figurative sayings (similes, meta-
phors, paradoxes, et cetera) there are three major classes:
similitude, parable (in the narrow sense), and example story.
A similitude presents a typical, familiar, recurring, everyday
scene with more than one verb, usually in the present tense,
although the future or the aorist subjunctive may appear. For
example, it is typical that a woman with little money, who lost
one of her ten coins, would make every effort to find it and
would rejoice when she succeeded (The Lost Coin). In a
parable we have, not the relating of a typical, recurring inci-
dent, but a freely invented story told with a series of verbs in
a past tense. The parable is not concerned with what everyone
typically does but narrates a particulate thing in which some
person or persons were once involved. The similitude gets its
force from its appeal to what is universally acknowledged, while
the parable achieves its power by making the particular credible
31 Cf. Manson, Teaching, p. 63. The "parables" referred to in these four

passages are not all parables in the same sense.
82 The note of comparison is sometimes but not always present in the Old
Testament mashal. Cf. Smith, Parables, pp. 3 fl.; Oesterley, Parables, pp. 3-4.
83 Aristotle Rhetoric 2.20.
11
THE PARABLES
and probable.84 This last point should not be pushed too far,
however, for at least in the case of a Christian parable one of
the tests of its effectiveness is whether it can assimilate the
improbable without bursting the story. Although the differences
between a similitude and a parable can be clearly stated, that
does not mean that each story can be easily classified, because
overlapping and mixing may occur.
Most of the formal characteristics of a parable mentioned
in the preceding paragraph belong to the example story also,
but in an example story the symbolic, figurative, or indirect ele-
ment is missing. In a parable we have a story which is analogous
to, which points to but is not identical with, a situation or
world of thought outside of the story. In an example story, on
the other hand, the meaning or thought or reality with which
the story is concerned is not pointed to but is present in the
story. The story is an example of it directly and only needs to
be generalized.3~ We might say that an example story is like a
parable in that the meaning is present in the story itself and it
need not be read in the light of another frame of reference in
order to be understood, but it is like an allegory in that com-
parison or analogy tends to have given way to identity and the
intended meaning completely shapes the story. The behavior
and attitude sketched in The Good Samaritan and The Rich
Fool (example stories) are not comparable to or analogous to
what a man should do or avoid but are exactly what he should
do or avoid. The difference between a parable and an example
story may be further clarified by a comparison. The Prodigal
Son (a parable) is a freely-invented story about a father and
two sons which is somehow analogous to Jesus' own situation
U Cf. Rudolf Bultmann, The History of the Synoptic Tradition, pp. 170-
176; Linnemann, Gleichnisse, pp. 13-14; Dodd, Parables, p. 7; Smith, Para·
bles, p. 17; Vincent Taylor, The Formation of the Gospel Tradition (2d ed.;
London: Macmillan, 1949), p. 101.
U Bultmann, Synoptic Tradition, pp. 177-178; Linnemann, Gleichnisse,
pp. 14-15; Smith, Parables, p. 18.
12
vis-a-vis the publicans and sinners, on the one hand, and the
Pharisees, on the other. Moreover, the completely human rela-
tionships in the parable are somehow analogous to two kinds
of divine-human relationship. In The Pharisee and the Publican
(an example story), however, the two types of men appear
directly; and their respective attitudes toward God and God's
action toward them are directly described rather than symbol-
ized as human relationships.
This means that example stories are less different from propo-
sitional theological statements than the parables are. For the
most part they lack the development in plot and in dramatic
encounter which is found in a number of the parables. They
also lack that "distance" from their meaning, or point, or from
the world of thought outside the story, which is characteristic
of a real aesthetic object-and of certain of the parables. Since
/ it is chiefly these matters with which I am concerned in this
book, the example stories will not be discussed.
4. The Criticism of the One-Point Approach In

Modern Scholarship
We are now in a position to consider more carefully the
problem of the one-point approach to the parables. Do some or
many of Jesus' stories have more than one point of interest?
If so, does this make them allegories and not parables? That
is to say, is the possession of one-and only one-central point
an inherent formal quality of a parable, one of its differentiae?
We may look first at three related but different criticisms of
the one-point method of interpretation which have appeared in
modem scholarship.
(I) The rigid distinction between parable and allegory on
the basis of whether there is one or many points of comparison
is arbitrary because a careful consideration of Jesus' stories
shows that intermediate or mixed fonus do occur. A particular
parable may have one central point and also have other ele-
13
THE PARABLES
ments that call for consideration. An allegory corresponds at

more points than a parable to the old story or the situation
being referred to, but the dividing line is hard to draw; there-
fore, the difference is one of degree, not of kind.36
According to Dahl the most important factor in this connec-
tion is the recognition that a number of parables are not simply
pictures derived from nature or common life but are modeled
on traditional metaphors (God as father, king, or judge; salva-
tion as a feast or wedding). Dahl goes on to say that such usage
does not make a parable an allegory, but he does maintain that
it modifies Jiilicher's rigid consistency.37 Bultmann38 is evi-
dently not willing to concede this much. In his view the use
of such an image as father or king is not allegorical but simply
metaphorical; however, Hunter3 9 is certainly right in pointing
out that any element in a parable which had a symbolic mean-
ing in the Old Testament or in Jewish theology would have
been understood by Jesus' audience as carrying that symbolic
meaning. This is an allegorical factor.
At this juncture I would draw the provisional conclusion
that at least some of Jesus' parables exhibit allegorical features.
It is impossible to prevent a number of elements in such par-
ables as The Prodigal Son, The Workers in the Vineyard, or
The Wicked Tenants from having a certain independent sig-
nificance. And when we have the image of king (The Unfor-
giving Servant) or father (The Prodigal Son), the parable is
retelling to some degree the "old story" of Israel's history in
which God was active as father and king. That does not mean,
66 Cf. Micllnclis, Gleiclmisse. 1'. 15; Cranfield, Mark, p. 159; Grant,

Leiter. pp. 42-43; Jeremias. Parables. pp. 18-19, 88-89; Jones, Parables, pp.
24-25. 29- 30. 78; Smith, Parables, pp. 23-24; Amos N. Wilder, Early Chris-
tian Rlletoric, p. 81; Taylor, GosPel Tradition, p. 103.
aT Dahl. "Parables," pp. 136-137.
as Synoptic Tradition, p. 198.
88 Parables, pp. 95-96. Hunter (ibid., pp. 38, 95, 114-116) would also
seem to be right, as over against BuItmann (Synoptic Tradition, p. 198), in
holding that rabbinic parables sometimes exhibited allegorical features.
however, that such parables aTe allegories, because it is possible
for a parable to absorb allegorical features in such a way that
the parable functions finally as a parable and not as an allegory.
I would therefore agree that the distinction between parable
and allegory is a relative one, but the criterion of difference is
not the quantitative one of how many points of comparison
there are between the parable and its referent.
(2) The second criticism of the one-point approach says, not
that mixed or intermediate forms occur in Jesus' teaching, but
that a number of Jesus' parables are allegories. J. Arthur Baird
maintains that there are eleven semi-allegorical parables, and
by implication he extends this to fifteen.4o Baird correctly ob-
I
serves that a parable is cohesive,41 but the parts of the parable
are prevented from cohering by his allegorical interpretations.
As we move through his interpretation of The Unforgiving
Servant, for example, we are told that the king is God, that
being his servant represents fellowship with God in his house-
hold, that the debt is the sin which drives a man from God's
fellowship, and that the threa~ to sell the wife and ch4ldren
represents the fact that sin implicates one's loved ones.42 Baird,
therefore, has not really seen the parable as a cohesive story.
The parts, for him, cohere not with each other but in some
detail with a theological framework outside of the story.
Matthew Black rejects the extravagant allegorical interpreta-
tions of the pre-critical period in biblical scholarship, but he
also rejects as arbitrary the view that Jesus never taught in alle-
gories. The WiCked Tenants he takes as a thoroughgoing
allegory and also as a word of Jesus. The violent acts of the
tenants represent the rebelliousness of Israel throughout its
.0 J. Arthur Baird, Tha Ju stice of Cod in the Teaching of Jesus (Philadel-

phia: Westminster Press, 1963). pp. 26-28.63,260, n. 1. By semi-allegorical
he means allegorical but not in the sense tll:Jt every point has an independent
meanmg. Cf. l1is "Pragmatic Approach," p. 203.
U Baird, Justice, pp. 26-27.
U Ibid., pp. 64-65.
15
THE PARABLES
history which reached a climax in the ministry of Jesus. The

servants represent the prophets and the son, Jesus. In The
Prodigal Son the prodigal is a symbol of the publicans and
sinners, and the elder brother, a symbol of the Pharisees. The
father is an image of God. Black also holds that The Sower
and The Good Samaritan are allegories.'l3
While it is true that certain of Jesus' stories may be taken as
allegories, it would seem that the more important question is
whether they require to be so taken. I have yet to demonstrate
that those stories which will be dealt with in this book do not
require to be taken as allegories but require rather to be taken
as parables, but assuming for the time being that it can be
demonstrated, I would conclude that those stories which do
not need to be taken as allegories ought not to be so taken.
This is because the function of a parable is more significant
than that of an allegory. To the extent that a parable is
treated as an allegory it is restricted in the exercise of its proper
function and is made to function like an allegory. That is to
say, it becomes a story which hides its true meaning or com-
municates to the informed what he already knows. Thus it
becomes a vehicle for the exposition of the interpreter's already
held ideas.
(3) Cadoux denies that Jesus' parables are allegories, but he
also denies that there is only one point of contact between the
parable and that with which it is analogous. As long as the
story is not unnaturally shaped by its similarity to its referent,
the more points of contact there are the easier it is to transfer
judgment from the situation depicted in the parable to the
situation outside with which the comparison is made.44
We may agree with Cadoux that the resolve to find only one
point of comparison has the unfortunate results of unduly sim-
.a Black, "Parables," pp. 276, 281-285.
H Cadoux, Parables, pp. 50-52.
16
plifying the judgment to be made and of reducing the parables

to "figuratively enjoined platitude[s] obscured by unnecessary
omament."41S But does Cadoux avoid-as he intends-turning
the parables into allegories? He has stated that an allegory has
many points of contact with and is shaped by the experience
which it represents whereas a parable is an organic unity and
has a certain distance from its referent. Allcgorizing the para-
bles thus dissolves their unity into separate items. 48 But when
Cadoux attributes to the parables multiple points of contact
with their referents, he threatens to fracture their unity and to
overcome their distance from their meaning or referent. And
the threat is carried out, for example, in his interpretation of
The Unjust Steward. Cadoux's speculation about whether the
steward was really wise, and his association of the steward with
the Jewish priests who curried favor with the Romans (the
debtors in the parable) ,47 certainly dissolve the unity of the
parable by connecting the elements with outside realities. And
the connections are so strange that if they had really been in-
tended they could only have been made in an allegory which
identified the steward with the priests and the debtors with the
Romans, and then made the identification known through an
appended explanation or interpretation. Thus Cadoux does not
avoid turning the parables into allegory.
This part of the discussion may be concluded very briefly by
saying that while the meaning of Jesus' parables cannot be re-
stricted to one central point of comparison, that does not mean
that they are allegories. Thus the possession of only one central
point is not one of the essential differentiae of a parable. We
must seek a non-allegorical approach to the parables other than
the one-point approach.
4~Ibid., pp. 51-52.

48Ibid .• pp. 46, 52, 53.
'7 Ibid., pp. 134-136.
17
THE PARABLES
5. The Parables as Reflections of Jesus' Concrete

Historical Situation
Having criticized Jiilicher's first thesis-that a parable has
only one point-we tum now to the questioning of his second
thesis: that a parable's meaning is to be given the most general
possible application. The Talents, according to Jiilicher, teaches
faithfulness in all that God has entrusted to us. The rewarding
of faithfulness and the punishment of laziness are found con-
tinually in our lives.48
Over against such an approach it has been pointed out that
this kind of generalizing can occur only by isolating the par-
ables from their context in Jesus' historical situation.49 We
must recognize that Jesus' world is strange to us, and only if
we become acquainted with it and see the parables in the light
of this world can we understand their real meaning.~o Jesus did
not come to set out a series of moral generalities but to pro-
claim an eschatological crisis, and this crisis gave to his ministry
the character of a conflict. The proper interpretation of the
parables is the one which reflects in a very particular way
Jesus' eschatological message and the conflict of his ministry,
and the meaning seen in the parables must be congruous
with Jesus' non-parabolic teaching.~l
It may also be held that to understand Jesus' parables it is
essential to recover and reconstruct the precise, concrete situ-
ation in which the parable was uttered and to know what ideas
were being illustrated.~2 Beyond this it may be claimed that a
right understanding of the parables requires a knowledge of the
thoughts, ideas, and value judgments operative in the hearers
as well as a knowledge of the author's position. This is because
•• Jillicher, Gleichnisreden, Vol. 2, p. 481.

4t Dahl, "Parables," p. 135.
eo Michaelis, Gleichnisse, p. 11.
n Dodd, Parables, pp. 13-19; Jeremias, Parables, pp. 11, 19,21; Cadoux,
Parables, pp. 12, 26; Fuchs, Historical Jesus, pp. 35-36.
ea Jeremias, Parables, pp. 22, 169.
18
the parable reflects a conflict between the author and his audi-
ence and is his effort to elicit from the hearers a judgment, to
bring them to agreement with him. He is not trying to reduce
them to absurdity nor to beat them back with surface argu-
ments but rather to reach the depth of the conflict in order
that a genuine decision might be made. Thus because the par-
able has such an inherent grounding in its situation of origin,
it can be understood only in the light of what it gave its original
hearers to understand. 63
We should notice, however, that th(! very effort to rule out
allegorizing, the reading in of foreign ideas, by understanding the
parable in the light of its historical situation 64 may, ironically,
lead to allegorizing. In the case of Ernst Fuchs his primary con-
cern with the historical situation influences both his under-
standing of the nature of a parable and also his exegesis
(sometimes) in what I will have to call a strange way. In his
view the tertium com{Jarationis, A, is to the image part (the
parable itself), B, as it (A) is to the material part (the
situation-as-meaningful which the parable refers to), B'. He
then goes on to say that the material part is the basis for the
image part so that "we can work back from the image part to
the material part."5G There is a sense in which the last clause
of the previous sentence is correct (see p. 20); but when he
says that the parable story (image part) is based on the situ-
ation to which it refers (material part), he is turning the par-
able, by definition, into an allegory. Recall that Honig defined
allegory as a twice-told tale which retells an old story, the old
story being, in Fuchs' terms, the material part.
This allegorical tendency is exemplified in Fuchs' treatment
of The Treasure in the Field and The Pearl Merchant. He
comes to the conclusion that the meaning of the strenuous
GS Linnemann, Gleiclmisse, pp. 30-31.

et Cf. Fuchs, "Bemerkungen," p. 345.
U Fuchs, Historical/eros, p. 126.
19
THE PARABLES
action in the parables is for Jesus' hearers "that they should do

nothing." The parable in describing activity paradoxically "says
the opposite of what is meant," but Jesus' hearers would grasp
his real meaning because they already knew that he meant to
speak about God and knew whom Jesus considered worthy of
his company and whom not. 56 That is, Jesus associated with
the publicans and sinners, who had "done nothing" as far as
legal righteousness was concerned. Fuchs, then, draws the
meaning of the parable from Jesus' conduct and from the Old
Testament understanding of God's loving action-which re-
quires only non-action from man 67-rather than drawing the
meaning from the parable itself.
Surely it is more natural to suppose that the meaning of
these parables for Jesus' hearers in their situation involved in
some way a call for action or resolve, even though the point
be that the effort is evoked by the splendor of the discovery
rather than simply demanded. 58 This, moreover, would accord
with the inseparable union of the imperative with the indica-
tive which is found in much of the New Testament and would
agree with Fuchs' own comments on Matt. 25:31-46.59
It is true that we should move-as Fuchs says-from the image
part to the material part. Otherwise there would be no point in
Jesus' having told the parable. But the material part which the
parable yields is an understanding of some aspect of Jesus'
ministry which is not wholly available except in the parable.
Fuchs really moves to the image part from the material part-
in the sense of Jesus' ministry as known outside of the parable
-in that he imposes on the parable elements from the histori-
cal situation which distort the parable and thus prevent it
18 Ibid., pp. lZCrlZ9.

117Ibid., pp. lZ9-130.
G8 Jeremias, Parables, pp. ZOO-ZOl.
G8 Fuchs, Historical Jesus, pp. Ill-lIZ.
20
from being a parable. That is, he prevents it from being a new

word about Jesus' situation.
Fuchs has criticized allegorizing and decried the attribution
of secret meanings to Jesus' parables,60 but he sometimes does
just what he has criticized, though his comments are often in-
cisive. If he is right about his interpretation of The Treasure
and The Pearl Merchant, we would have to agree that Mark
is right in his view of the nature and function of the parables:
they are such that the people hearing, alas, could not under-
stand.
6. A Critique of the Severely Historical Approach

The strange conclusions which may be reached when a par-
able is allegorized by making its meaning derive from the his-
torical situation might lead one to question the rigorously
historical approach, though there are also more substantive
reasons for doing so. While one would not want to argue for
a methodology which completely ignored the Sitz im Leben,
some modification of the present tendency seems called for.
(1) The first criticism is that in view of the non-biographical
nature of the Gospels it will usually be difficult if not impos-
sible to ascertain in exactly what concrete situation a parable
was uttered. 61 The moderate view of Dodd62 that we will often
have to be content with relating a parable to Jesus' situation as
a whole is more convincing, and we may agree with Kasemann
that while we do not know the exact circumstances of the par-
ables' utterance we do know the eschatological orientation of
Jesus' message from which the parables should not be ab-
eo Ibid., pp. 73, 140.

61 Cf. Henry J. Cadbury, "Soluble Difficulties in the Parables," New Tes-
tament Sidelights (Hartford: Hartford Seminary Foundation Press, 1960),
p.118.
e3 Parables, p. H.
21
THE PARABLES
stracted.63 But this does not mean that elements from Jesus'
ministry or teaching may be imposed on the parable. We must
rather begin with the parable itself.
(2) The severely historical approach ignores the basic human
element in the parables. They say something to and about man
as man and not just to and about man in a particular histori-
cal situation. As Bornkamm has pointed out, Jesus' parables
are aimed straight at the hearer and do not demand knowledge,
education, theoretical judgment, or goodness. Jesus presupposed
only man himself in the "unadorned reality of his world."6*
Yet, as we have noticed, the meaning of the parable was not
always immediately clear to Jesus' contemporaries. Nor can
we ignore completely the difference between Jesus' situation
and ours, which creates a problem for translation.
( 3) In the hands of some of its practitioners the historical
approach threatens to leave the parables in the past with noth-
ing to say to the present. It is perhaps not so much that these
exegetes believe that in principle the parables have no rele-
vance for the present as it is that they simply have not given
their attention to the problem of translation. Dodd believes
that the parables may be ever applied to new situations, but
he has concerned himself with their original import.6D There
are practical differences, if not differences in principle, between
biblical, systematic, and practical theology; but it would appear
that biblical theology should at least concern itself with what
it is in the texts that can be related to later situations and how
it can be translated. It seems, therefore, an undue restriction
on the goal of exegesis when Dodd, in his interpretation of The
Talents, seems to be more concerned with identifying the
III Ernst Kasemann, Essays on New Testament Themes, trans. W. J. Mon·

tague ("Studies in Biblical Theology," No. 41 [London: SCM Press, 1964]),
p.45.
U Bornkamm, Jesus, p. 70.
85 Dodd, Parables, p. 157.
22
counterpart of the one-talent man in Jesus' Sitz im Leben than
with expounding the implications of the action and attitude of
this same man within the context of the narrative of The
Talents,6S though the latter interest is not altogether missing
in Dodd.
Geraint V. Jones is sensitive to this danger of divesting the
parables of contemporary meaning, and points out that the
form-critical search for the Sitz im Leben endangers the ex-
tension of a parable's meaning to a situation different from the
original one.Cl7 It must be rejoined, however, that it is important
to seek the parables' original meaning in their own setting,
though elements from the setting must not be imposed on the
parables. And against Jones it must be said that seeking the
life setting does not in itself restrict a parable to the past. The
question is what the next hermeneutical step should be. More-
over, we see that Jones' real problem-ironically in view of his
desire to make the parables contemporary-is not the form-
critical method but his belief that a number of the parables
themselves, by their very content, restrict themselves to the
past. What relevance does The Talents have for us, he asks,
in its reference to the pious Pharisee who "hoards" the law?
And since the kingdom has come, the parables which proclaim
the coming kingdom are merely historisch, that is, past for us.
Therefore, something must be added to such parables if they
are to be made geschichtlich, contemporary and relevant. We
must "do something to them," that is, introduce an element
of allegory.6s
This is to misconceive the problem. What is needed is a
hermeneutical and literary methodology which can identify the
permanently significant element in the parables and can elabo-
rate a means of translating that element without distorting the
8e Ibid" pp. 118-119.

lITJones, Parables, p. 38.
ea Ibid., pp. 39, 161.
23
THE PARABLES
original intention. It will then not be necessary to allegorize

or to add anything.69
(4) The severely historical approach ignores the aesthetic
nature of the parables and annuls their aesthetic function. Ex-
pressed in the broadest possible way the historical approach
focuses on the historical context as a clue to the meaning of
the parables while a recognition of their aesthetic quality would
focus on the parables themselves. I agree with Linnemann and
the form-critical approach that in order to understand the
parables we must go back behind the Gospels. To But the goal
of historical and literary criticism is to be able to take any text
on its own terms. In the case of the parables this goal is better
served by recognizing their aesthetic nature than by first of all
deriving their meaning from the historical context or by mak-
ing them illustrations of ideas.71
7. Toward an Aesthetic Definition of Parable

What finally is the most far-reaching distinction between
parable and allegory? It is not the difference between one point
of reference and many, but, rather, the differing ways in which
the elements in the story are related to each other and to the
real world or world of thought outside of the story. We have
seen that in an allegory there are many references to an "old
story." This old story may be literal1y an eariier story Or it may
be a world of thought or a historical situation. The elements
in the allegorical story refer directly to-are even identified
with-the elements in the old story so that the structure of the
011 Blllhnan n (Synoptjc T radition, p. 4 18) interesti ngly sees nD conflict be·
tween the historic.11 approach of Dodd lind Jeremias and the generalizing
method of JlIlicher. The concrete situation would afford opportunities to
imprint universal truths on the mind. Bultmann'$ overall e.' listenl'ialist out·
look. however, distinguishes itself from JUlicher's generaliz.ing ideas. 'T. W.
Manson (Teac1ling, p. 64) also sees tlte giv in ~ of a general truth as the main
purpose of a parable.
70 Linnemann, Gleichnisse, p. 53.
71 As in Jeremias, Parables, pp. 115, 123.
24
allegory is dctennined by its relationship to the latter. Since
the features in an al1egory are related directly to an outside
world, they are related more or less loosely to each other. How
a parable differs from this will be indicated briefly below by
anticipation and developed in chapter 3. This implies that a
parable is aesthetic in a way that an allegory is not.
There is more than one important element in a parable, and
all of these features must be given consideration, but they do
not relate primarily and in the first place to an event, events,
or ideas outside of the parable. They relate first of all to each
other within the parable, and the structure of connections of
these elements is not detennined by events or ideas outside of
the parable but by the author's creative composition. Even
though the parable may contain images which have inescapable
symbolic significance which they bring from another world of
thought, this is made secondary to their fusion into the internal
coherence of the parabolic story. Neither one nor many of the
elements point directly and individually out of the story. That
is why the one-point approach is only less allegorizing in degree
than the old pre-critical allegorizing: it breaks the internal
coherence of the story. The many elements of the parable
within their pattern of connections as a whole do imply an
understanding of existence which may be related in some way
both to the world of ideas outside of the parable and to the
historical situation in which it arose.
25
2
Parable and the Problems of

Theological Language
Because the parables are a special kind of linguistic form,

and because contemporary theology and philosophy are par-
ticularly concerned with the nature and function of language
and with the relationship of language to understanding, it
seems appropriate to discuss the parables in relation to the
present debate. In doing this the attempt will be made to carry
forward the discussion of three questions raised in chapter 1:
(a) What is in the parables to be translated, that is, trans-
mitted to us? (b) How is this translation accomplished? (c)
What is the goal of translation?
1. Hermeneutic as the Focal Theological Problem

Hermeneutic is the theory and practice of interpreting and
understanding language, texts, or the products of human
activity.1 It may well be agreed that the hermeneutical prin-
ciples to be applied to the texts of the Bible are not different
from those applied to other kinds of literature,2 yet the bibli-
1 Cf. Rudolf Bultmann, "The Problem of Hermeneutics," Essays Philo-
sophical and Theological, trans. J. C. G. Greig (London: SCM Press, 1955),
p. 235; Gerhard Ebeling, "Word of God and Hermeneutic," trans. J. W.
Leitch, in The New Hermeneutic, ed. James M. Robinson and J. B. Cobb,
Jr. (New York: Harper, 1964), pp. 85, 88, 89, 95, 97-98; Wilhelm Dilthey,
Pattern and Meaning ill History, trans. and ed. H. P. Rickman (New York:
Harper Torcbbooks, 1962). p. 43.
2 Bultmann. "Hermeneutics." p. 256; Ebeling, "Word of God," pp. 88-89.
26
PARABLE AND THE PROBLEMS OF THEOLOGICAL LANGUAGE
cal understanding of history does make the hermeneutical task

more urgent for Christian theology than it need be for other
basic perspectives. The Christian church believes that history
is moving in a definite direction and not simply in repeated
cycles and that, although certain similarities and patterns may
be discerned, each event has its own irreducible particularity.
The present life of the church is seen as derived from a complex
event of the past-the ministry of Jesus and the origin of the
church-which event is understood as God's eschatological act;
moreover, the documents which this event produced-the New
Testament-are apprehended as authoritative revelation. 3 In
addition the present itself is seen as having a reality of its
own which ought to be meaningful. It is this combination of
normative documents from the past with the potential mean-
ingfulness of the present that makes translation-the hermeneu-
tical task-so urgent. How is the past to be related intelligibly
through language to the reality that confronts us in the pres-
ent? We can thus see why hermeneutic has been called the focal
theological problem.~
Let us now look more closely at theology's interest in a
particular past event. And lest this look to the past be dis-
paraged as irrelevant it might be noticed that the nauseated
condition, the disturbed existence, of Sartre's Roquentin was
owing at least partially to his severance from the past. Ro-
quentin had a sense neither of his own past nor of an objective
past so that life had a certain thinness. There is only the pres-
ent, and behind things there is nothing. As he contemplated
his efforts at writing history, he felt as if his sources were only
yellowed pages and that they could not really put him in touch
with the past. In this position he can say either that he does
not exist or that he does exist in the sense that he is surrounded,
a Cf. Gerhard Ebeling, Word and Faith, trans. J. W. Leitch (Philadel.

phia: Fortress Press, 1963), p. 32.
a Ibid., p. 27.
27
THE PARABLES
penetrated, and suffocated by a kind of objective, alien, un-

differentiated existence which is the Nausea and which he is.'
Since, as Sartre's novel suggests (whether or not Sartre intended
it), the loss of a meaningful present is the other side of aliena-
tion from the past, let us then tum to theology's concern with
the biblical history and texts.
One reason why exegesis should endeavor to interpret the
biblical texts accurately is simply because, within limits, it is
possible. Once men came to see the time-conditioned character
of every event or epoch then it became possible-and therefore
obligatory-to view each event in its own character and in its
difference and distance from our epoch.8 As DiltheyT asserted,
each epoch is centered in itself, and while in Dilthey's view
each epoch tends to have values which it makes absolute, he
sees history itself as having nothing to say about the validity
of these various value claims.s For Christian exegesis, however,
the biblical events and their written witnesses have a normative
value. This fact is another reason why exegesis must seek the
original historical meaning of the biblical texts. Contemporary
interpretations in terms of our own reality must rest on the
original meaning.9 Historical exegesis in its drive for one mean-
ing, the original one, may at first appear to restrict contempo-
rary interpretation,lO for the allusions in the text which were
meaningful to the first hearers may not stxike us with any
force;l1 but historical accuracy is necessary if the texts are to be
able to judge our efforts at translation and are not to be mere
sounding boards for our previously held ideas.
G Jean Paul Sartre, Nctusect, trans. L. Alexander (Norfolk, Conn.: New

Directions Books, 1959), pp. 31, 130-132, 135, 165,170-173.
e Ebeling, Word ctnd Fctith, p. 46.
T Pattern, p. 82.
B Ibid., p. 165.
9 C. H. Dodd, The Pctrctbles of the Kingdom, p. 157; James D. Smart, The
Interpretcttion of Scripture, pp. 37-38.
10 Ernst Fuchs, Studies of the HistoricctlTesus, p. 87.
11 Eta Linnemann, Die Gleichnisse Jesu, p. 40.
28
Krister Stendahl in a helpful discussion has posed the

hermeneutical problem in terms of "what it meant" and "what
it means." A contemporary interpretation of what a text means
is to be tested by its faithfulness in rendering the text's original
intention, what it meant. 12 While recognizing the validity of
12 Krister Stendahl, "Biblical Theology, ContcmpoI'llJ}' " in The Interpre.

ter's Di.ctionClry of tile Bible, Vol. 1 (New York and Nashville: Abingdon
Prcss, 1962), pp. 421b, 422a, 427a. There appears to be a tacit inconsistcncy
in Stendahl's discussion of the relative merits of Cullmann's and Bultmann's
achievements. According to Stendahl, Cullmann is right in identifying time
and history as the categories with which the New Testament itself is con·
cerned, and Bultmann is wrong in his concentration on the existential and
anthropological (ibid., pp. 421a, 421b, 428a). Stendahl then goes on to say
that Bultmann's translation of the New Testament texts into what it means
"may" still be valid, but that that would depend on the validity of his herme·
neutical principles (ibid., p. 42Ib). But how could Bultmann's hermeneuti·
I cal principles make his existentialist translation even possibly valid on

Stendahl's terms when Stendahl has asserted that the New Testament is
concerned with history, that this concern is antithetical to an existential con-
cern, and that a translation is to be judged by how successfully it communi-
cates the text's original intention?
In the article cited above, Stendahl allowed biblical theology a modest
normative function; it has some right to pass judgment-even if tentative-
upon the hermeneutical translations made by systematic theology ("Biblical
Theology," p. 427a). In a more recent article, however, he seems to deny any
normative function to biblical theology, both on methodological grounds
and on the ground that the biblical scholar is usually lacking in theological
and philosophical knowledge (Krister Stendahl, "Method in the Study of
Biblical Theology," in Tile Bible in Modern Scl1olarsllip. ed. J. P. Hyatt [New
York and Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1965]. pp. 199, 202,204-205). Biblical
theology is properly descriptive ("what it meant"), and it is only systematic
theology which can deal adeql1ately with the normative question "what it
means" ("Method," pp. 199, 202). Stendahl maintains that all Christian
theology is biblical in intention, but he assigns to systematic theology the
task of deciding whether it has properly translated the biblical intention, of
assessing the relationship of the Bible to theology ("Method," pp. 204-205).
'In my judgment this position leaves biblical theology unnaturally restricted
and its relationship to systematic theology non-existent or unc1ari6ed. Sten-
dahl docs see biblical theology as a kind of suggestive and creative agitator
of the contemporary church and its theology ("Metllod," pp. 206-208),
but just how it can be this within his scheme is quite ohscure. Moreover, if
the biblical theologian does not have the theological and philosophical knowl-
edge to deal with "what it means," the systematic theologian does not have
the historical and linguistic tools to know "what it meant." How, then, can
he assess the adequacy of his translation and the relationship of his theology
to the Bible? The systematic theologian-to follow out Stendahl's logic-will
29
THE PARABLES
Stendahl's call for the highest degree of accuracy at the de-

scriptive level of spelling out what the New Testament meant
in its own terms, is one may retain a certain reserve as to how
accurate the interpreter can be. We can go a long way in
distinguishing the character and thought categories of the many
historical epochs, but no interpreter can completely overcome
the gap between himself and his text and understand it exactly
as did the author or the original audience; therefore, olir state-
ment of what the text meant is to some degree an interpreta-
tion of what it means.14 The exegete simply has to live with
the fact that he is never absolutely certain of exactly how wide
the gap is between his text and his own view of things or be-
tween his text and his exposition. It may be said here by an-
ticipation that precisely because the parables have an aesthetic
nature and function, the gap between the hearing of the first
audience and the hearing of later interpreters is likely to be
smaller than is the case with other kinds of texts.
The possibility of translating the original intention of bibli-
cal texts into terms which are meaningful in the present de-
pends on identifying a translatable element in the texts, but
before turning to that problem we must give further attention
to the need for reconstructing the translatable element in new
and altered terminology. That which is obscure in the ancient
text must be put into new language which makes the subject
matter clear. Such translation, on the one hand, does honor
to what the text meant historically, for only when its content
enters into our familiar language can its original meaning come
simply have to depend on the biblical theologian's view of "what it meant,"

and he may feel that this leaves him on shaky ground.
Stendahl's exegetical practice in a recent monograph seems more in line
with his position in "Biblical Theology" than with his position in "Method."
Cf. Krister Stendahl, The Bible and the Role of Women, trans. E. T. Sander
("Facet Books-Biblical Series," 15; Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1966).
13Stendahl, "Biblical Theology," pp. 421Jr.422a.
U Cf. Ebeling, Word and Faith, pp. 26, 251; James M. Robinson, The
New Hermeneutic, pp. 74-75.
30
alive again. The latter may not normally be brought about

simply by reciting the text. Translation also honors the pres-
ent, for only when the text has been interpreted into our
language does it enter into our particular world and become
really understood. 1G It might be noted that the pre-critical al-
legorizer also believed that his text had meaning for the present
as well as for the past. l6 But instead of recognizing the gap
between the text and his own epoch and attempting to make
a translation, he simply used the text as a vehicle for his own
views.
Ebeling has pointed out that much of our preaching is not
understandable because it presupposes faith. Faith is made a
prerequisite for hearing with the result that the church's
proclamation is a foreign language to the non-believer and may
silence the genuine faith of a believer who repudiates religious
talk that does not deal with man as he really is. Ebeling is,
therefore, inclined to be friendly toward Bonhoeffer's call for
a non-religious interpretation of Christianity.IT In this frame
of reference we may note that the parables as told by Jesus did
not presuppose faith on the part of his audience; moreover, the
lack of specifically religious terminology in the parables might
make them especially usable by and suggestive for a non-reli-
gious interpretation of Christianity.
Let us now shift our focus of attention slightly from the
exegete's obligation to translate the subject matter of his text
into contemporary terms to the inevitability of translation.
This inevitability was mentioned above primarily as an admis-
sion of the interpreter's incapacity to leap over the expanse
of time and to get completely inside the mind of an earlier
U Ebeling, "Word of God," p. 107; Ebeling, Word and Faith, p. 124;

Robinson, New Hermeneutic, pp. 6-7; Fuchs, Historical Tesus, pp. 191, 194,
203-204. See now also Ebeling, The Problem of Historicity, trans. Grover
Foley (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1967), p. 26.
16 R. M. Grant, The Letter and the Spirit, p. 105.
17 Ebeling, Word and Faith, pp. 124-126.
31
THE PARABLES
author. But this inevitability may also be positively viewed.

According to Elizabeth Sewell the fact that we will read into
older texts more than the author can be supposed to have put
there is justified because it is the nature of mind and language
together that they form an instrument capable of an indefinite
number of developments. Language in general surpasses the
writer's powers of exegesis; thus it matters little whether the
original author saw the full implication of his work. I8 The
biblical exegete may welcome this natural tendency of mind
and language to generate new meanings as long as it does not
become allegorizing. When it does, the exegete must recall his
commitment to the normative particularity of his text. But the
language of the text itself may contain meanings that the
author was not consciously aware of; and especially in the aes-
thetic use of language-hence in the parables-does the lan-
guage itself empower the author to say more than he knows
(cf. pp. 75, 77). Therefore, in interpreting the parables for con-
temporary understanding the texts offer possibilities for trans-
lation that are not altogether dependent on the conscious
awareness of the author and the original audience.
The position of the new (post-Bultmannian) hermeneutic
that biblical texts must be translated into our historically con-
ditioned language if they are to be understood19 is to be ac-
cepted as far as it is appropriate. However, iu connection with
the parables, two qualifications must be made: (a) Because
the parables are aesthetic in nature, they are not as time-con-
ditioned as other biblical texts, and the need for translation
is not, therefore, as compelling. (b) Because the parables are
aesthetic in nature, it is impossible to translate them com-
pletely into any other terms. Linguistic aesthetic objects can
be interpreted-translated-to some degree, and the need for
11 Elizabeth Sewell, The Orphic Voice (New Haven: Yale University

Press, 1960), p. 22.
19 Robinson, New Hermeneutic, p. 7.
32
clarity justifies the effort, but concomitant with the gain in

clarity is a loss in the power of the peculiarly aesthetic func-
tion. Therefore, the interpretive translation should explicitly
take into account the untranslatable dimension of the parables
in order to make the loss as small as possible. The fact that
the parables are not completely translatable by us does not
contradict my earlier point that the gap between the first-
and twentienth-century hearers of the parables is smaller than
is the case with other kinds of texts, for the first-century
hearers were no more able to translate them completely into
other terms than we are.
It is interesting that the theologians associated with the
new hermeneutic and its emphasis on the need for translation
take the view that when language is operating properly in-
terpretation or translation is unnecessary. The new hermeneutic
distinguishes itself from the older hermeneutics of Bultmann
and Jonas, which, it is said,20 understood language as having
an inherent tendency to distort the understanding of existence
which is seeking to come to expression in it; that is, language
objectifies-represents as external and observable-that which
is not really able to be made observable. For example, the
eschatological becomes an external history of last things rather
than, presumably, a crisis and movement in the historical ex-
istence of the individttaJ.21 For the new hermeneutic, however,
20 Cf. Robinson, New Hermelleutic, pp. 32-38.

21 Cf. Bultmann, "Man between tI,e Times According to the New Testa·
ment," in Existenoe and Faith, trans. S. M. Ogden (New York: Meridian
Books, 1960), pp. 248-266. It may be, however, that Bultmnnn held, or
came to bold, that it is mythological language rather than language
itsolf w11ich objectifies the subjective, for he sometimes speaks approv·
ingly of analogical language as contra~ted with mythological language.
God is not spoken of mythologiC:1l1y or even symbolically when his action
III)on me is seen as an analogue of human re)a·tionships :md encounters
(.Bultmann, Jestls Christ and Mytholog)l [New York: Scribner's, 1(58), pp.
67-69) Yet it;~ pro ably tr e th:lt. for Joons, iangU!l'gc, while inesc:tp:lble,
is also uncongenial to the human spirit's effort, to undGIstand itself (d. Rob·
inson, New Hcnneneutic, pp. 36-37),
33
THE PARABLES
it is language itself which brings the obscure to clarity, the

important question being, not what the author intended su'lr
jectively to say, but what makes itself visible in the text,22 Ac-
cording to Ebeling the proper view is not that we need to get
an understanding of language but that understanding comes
through language; language brings something to understanding.
When a verbal statement operates normally, it is not some-
thing obscure which needs the light of understanding from
another source. Rather the situation into which the statement
is made is obscure and is illumined or brought to understand-
ing by the statement.2S Similarly, but from a different angle,
Fuchs holds that the natural context for the proper functioning
of language is the home, where understanding is present; thus
language not only mediates understanding but arises from a
situation where there is understanding. In the home, people
speak, not in order to understand, but because they understand
and especially to indicate "what it is time for." The result of
Jesus' language was that fun clarity prevailed among his
hearers.2~
Fuchs2~ recognizes, however, that the familiar home context
which permits language to function properly may disappear
and EbeIing,26 that the mythical does appear in the Bible and
needs to be demythologized. Are these only abnormal situa-
tions? Ebeling holds that interpretation-hermeneutical aid-
is necessary only when the word is hindered from performing
its own hermeneutical function, that is, mediating understand-
ing. And that aid consists only in removing the hindrances in
order that the word might perform its hermeneutical function.
Removing the hindrances evidently means illumining the ob-
22 Robinson, New Hermeneutic, pp. 2, 3, 6, 39, 46.

28 Ebeling, "Word of God," pp. 93-94.
24 Ernst Fuchs,. "The New Testament and the Hermeneutical'Problem,"
New Hermeneutic, pp. 124-126; Historical Teslls, p. 74.
25 "Henneneutical Problem," p. 126.
:8 "Word of God," p. 100.
34
scure situation in order that the clear word might be under-

stood, for in Ebeling's view it is the situation and not the word
which is the hindrance to understanding. 27 But his position
that it is one and not the other seems excessively exclusive. If
I do not understand a text because my own confused self-
understanding does not permit me to grasp the pattern of con-
nections in the text, the text is still not understandable to me.
And if a second word is used to clarify my situation so that I
can understand the first word, then the first word is also being
illumined; and the fact remains that the first word by itself
was not able to clarify my situation. We may agree with Ebe-
ling that understanding finally came from a word and that we
do not escape the linguistic realm to attain understanding,28
but his basic position, that language normally mediates un-
derstanding, appears to be an abstraction from the' fact that
language is always used and heard by people whose understand-
ing of their situation is to some degree clouded.
It would seem that one should say that language sometimes
illumines and sometimes obscures, that all linguistic forms do
not have the same kind of relationship to their subject matter,
and that when language clarifies a situation it also clarifies
other language. This is tacitly conceded by Fuchs when he
recognizes that the familiar home situation does not always ob-
tain and by Ebeling when he notes that demythologizing is
sometimes necessary. There is no reason to think that the
situation into which Jesus spoke was particularly abnormal, and
the Gospels clearly recognize that Jesus' words, despite their
power, did not always bring the situation to clarity: his hearers
did not discern the significance of their time (Luke 12:54-57).
Erich Auerbach points to two different ways in which
language may function-either of which may be considered
normal-in his illuminating contrast of a scene from the
27 Ibid., p. 94.
28 Ibid.
35
THE PARABLES
Odyssey with the story of Abraham's near sacrifice of Isaac. In

the Greek story men, things, feelings, and thoughts are clearly
outlined and brightly illuminated. Everything is externalized
and nothing is left in half darkness; Homer knows no back-
ground but only a uniformly illuminated foreground. In the
Abraham story, on the other hand, we are told nothing about
where God came from and nothing about his form or the rea-
son for the command. With regard to the human characters
only so much is told as is necessary for the narration, and direct
speech selVes "to indicate thoughts which remain unexpressed."
Very little is externalized and the rest is left in obscurity. "Time
and place are undefined and call for interpretation." The whole
story is permeated with suspense, remains mysterious, and is
"fraught with background."29 This analysis of an Old Testa-
ment story may not be finally incompatible with the view that
the proper hermeneutical question is not what lies behind the
text but what shows itself in it. This question will have to be
conceived broadly enough to allow, however, that what shows
itself in some texts may be that there is a great deal that can-
not be shown; to be made aware of the latter is in itself a
clarification of our situation.
That so many of the parables have had inappropriate con-
cluding statements attached to them is not due entirely to the
fact that the original Sitz im Leben has been lost. The thought
content or meaning of a parable is in principle partially hidden
and needs to be clarified or interpreted. But it is not hidden
in the allegorical sense, for it is in the parable itself and
not in the referent. Presenting ideas or an understanding of
existence is, however, a subsidiary level of the parable's main
function as an aesthetic object. Thus in order to clarify the
thought content one must take a relatively non-aesthetic
29 Erich Auerbach, Mimesis. trails. W. Trask (Garden City, N. Y.
Doubleday Anchor Books, 1957). pp.I-9.
36
posture toward the parable, which reduces, as we have noted,

the power of its strictly aesthetic function. It is because the
expression of thought is a subsidiary level in a parable, be-
cause ideas are found only implicitly in the configuration of
events, images, and encounters, that the parables, on the one
hand, need interpretive clarification and, on the other hand,
resist complete translation into any other terms.
2. The Translatable Content of the Parables

Jesus' parables, as we shall see, do have a translatable
content; and they also bear in a peculiar way the stamp of Jesus'
mind and relate to his historical situation. This means that
the parables grasp in their special way something of Jesus'
ministry and make it available. But again we must notice that
it is not primarily the situation which interprets the parables,
but rather the parables interpret his situation and are a part
of it. We in tum try to interpret Jesus' ministry in the light
of his parables and, secondarily and to a lesser extent, the
parables in the light of his ministry.
We noticed in chapter 1 that Jesus called on his audiences
to hear his parables with understanding and questioned them
about their meaning. Since Jesus intended his parables to
be understood and since doubtless they sometimes were, we
may say that the parables created freedom for the word or
evoked faith. 30 But this freedom for the word which is faith is
not a kind of undefinable receptivity or openness for any word.
It is freedom to grasp the definite content of this particular
word.
It has already been suggested that the subject matter or
translatable content of the parables is an understanding of
existence. The legitimacy of this position would seem to be
10 CE. Fuchs, Historiccd Jesus, pp. 76, 77, 81-82, 102; "Hermeneutical
Problem," pp. 123-124.
37
THE PARABLES
denied by those who maintain that the theology of the New

Testament is of the essence of history-the factual-and that
this history is not a symbol nor an image nor a mythological
framework of "temporal existence."31 If this antithesis between
the historical and the existential is valid with reference to
the New Testament in generaP2-which I seriously doubt-it
certainly does not apply to the parables, which are not factual
(unless by accident) but rather are freely-invented stories.
And for Dilthey the purpose of studying history itself is to
learn what. man is, to grasp the range of the possibilities of
human existence. Man does not learn about himself from intro-
spection but through history.33
It may be urged, however, that the parables, while being
imaginative stories, nevertheless reflect Jesus' concrete histori-
cal situation and should be interpreted in the light of that
situation (cf. pp. 18-21). \Ve have already seen some of the
fallacies of this position, but it is true that the parables make
allusions to Jesus' Sitz im Leben. These allusions, however,
are taken up into a new configuration-the parabolic story-
and derive their meaning from the latter. Thus they do not
give us direct access to the facts of Jesus' ministry. For example,
in The Ten Maidens the conduct of the foolish maidens may
be an allusion to a certain type of behavior in Jesus' historical
situation; but the maidens' behavior receives its meaning from
the final issue of the story: they are shut out of the wedding
feast. Those who behave in a certain way lose the very thing
which they seek. The end of the story, however, that is, the
exclusion, does not refer to anything in Jesus' situation; thus
11 Oscar Cullmann, "The Necessity and Function of Higher Criticism," in

The Early Church, trans. A. J. B. Higgins (Philadelphia: Westminster Press,
1956), p. 8.
12 As Stendahl seems to imply ("Biblical Theology," p ... 21 a) .
I I Dilthey, Pattern, pp. 39, 60, 71-72,90,92, 103.
38
the hearers are made to see their behavior in relation to some-

thing not already present in their situation. They are given a
new perspective on-a new word about-the latter. This means
that the nature of the parables, as well as the inherent proba-
bilities of the case, points to the fact that Jesus was not giv-
ing information about his situation but an understanding of the
possibilities of existence which his situation brought. If the
one-talent man in The Talents points to the Pharisees who
"hoard the law," as he speaks in the dialogue he also gives voice
to the understanding and state of existence which are exempli-
fied in his own conduct in the parable, or in the Pharisees'
hoarding of the law, as weil as in innumerable other possible
concrete cases; furthermore, this existential self-understanding
is taken up into a dramatic configuration which is basically
human. It is not necessary, then, to add anything to the parable
in order to make it contemporary (and this is true of all of
the parables as we have defined the term); all one need do
is to translate-as much as is necessary and possible-the under-
standing of existence which is already in it.
Thus Bultmann's basic hermeneutical principle-that the
most adequate question to put to the Bible, as to any signifi-
cant text, is what its understanding of the possibilities of
human existence is 84-is eminently appropriate for the parables.
It may be agreed that the biblical text transcends the author's
self-understanding and that our proper concern is an under-
standing of the subject matter.51i We noted in the preceding
section that especially the author of artistic works says more
than he knows he is saying. At the same time his work does
not completely transcend his self-understanding; and the sub-
ject matter may be held to be an understanding of existence,
even if it is too restrictive of the possibilities of meaning in the
S' Bultmann, "Henneneutics," pp. 235, 246,253; Jesus Christ, pp. 52-53.
S~ Cf. Robinson, NelV Hermeneutic, p. 77.
39
THE PARABLES
text to hold that the subject matter is the author's self-under-

standing.so
The term "existence" as I have been using it-and as it
is used in existentialist theology-does not refer to something
like the "inner man." It means man in historical encounters in
the world, man as an essentially linguistic being using his
language to understand his place in history.8T The parables also
suggest this understanding of existence, for they dramatize
man's existential possibilities through concrete historical en-
counters, and the linguistic factor is seen both in Jesus' telling
of the parables and in the importance of dialogue within them.
86 The view that the translatable content of the parables is their under-
standing of existence and that this is still relevant for us presupposes that
there is through the ages a certain persistence of the essentials of human ex-
istence, a continuity of general human nature or of things held in common
(Linnemann, Gleichnisse, p. 40; Dilthey, Pattern, pp. 67-68, 77-78, 111-
II 2, 120, 123). It is also true that C:lch epoch is historically individuated,
that the gulf in time between text and author Cannot be completely spanned,
and that the essentials of existence must repeatedly find new expression (cf.
Robinson, New Henneneutic, pp. 59,72-75; Robert W. Funk, "The Herme-
neutical Problem and Historical Criticism," New Hermeneutic, pp. 189-190;
Linnemann, Gleichnisse, p. 40). Thus we have to do with translation and
not with becoming contemporary with the author and reliving his experi-
ences (Robinson, New Hermeneutic, p. 59). Dilthey went too far in affirm-
ing the sameness of mind in author and interpreter (Dilthey, Pattern, pp.
67-68). Yet he did recognize that there are differences between individuals
and their expressions of life and that it is just these differences that make
interpretation necessary (pp. 77, lll-ll2, 136-137). Dilthey affirms that
the differences between individuals are a matter of degree and are not quali-
tative (pp. lll-1I2), which seems to be what the logic of his position calls
for. However, he also at times seems to speak of individuality as qualitative
(pp. 136-137). Dilthey must certainly be right that interpretation would
be imp.ossible if expressions of life were completely strange (p. 77).
87 Cf. Bultmann, "Hermeneutics," p. 260; James M. Robinson, "The For-
mal Structure of Jesus' Message," in Current Issues in New Testament Inter-
l]fetation, ed. W. Klassen and G. F. Snyder (New York: Harper, 1962), pp.
93-94; Robinson, New Hermeneutic, pp. 47-48; Ebeling, "Word of God,"
p. 104; Fuchs, Historical Jesus, pp. 89, 211; Heinrich Ott, "The Historical
Jesus and the Ontology of History," in The Historical Tesus and the Keryg-
matic Christ, trans. and ed. C. E. Braaten and R. A. Harrisville (New York
and Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1964), p. 145.
40
PARABLE AND tHE PROBLEMS OF tHEOLOGICAL LANGUAG£
Action and talk are interwoven so that the meaning of the

former comes to expression in the latter.
A parable as a whole dramatizes an ontological possibility-
that which is there and possible in principle for man as man-
and the two basic ontological (human) possibilities which the
parables present are the gain or loss of existence, becoming
authentic or inauthentic. The prodigal son gains his existence,
and the unforgiving servant loses his. But each parable also
depicts how existence is ontically38-actually and concretely-
gained or lost, and the aesthetic form presses the two-the onto-
logical and the ontic-into a unity. We could then say that
each parable dramatizes how the basic human possibilities of
gaining or losing existence may actually occur. The ontological
and the ontic-the what and how of the possibilities of ex-
38 According to Bultmann, theology must show that its view of the ontic
is consistent with philosophy's analysis of what is ontologically possible if the
man of faith is not to be removed from humanity. And theology is dependent
on philosophy for this analysis (Bultmann, "The Historicity of Man and
Faith," in Existence and Faith, pp. 94-99; "Hermeneutics," p. 258). But
can the ontological and the antic be so neatly separated and can theology
simply concede this dependence on philosophy (not that there should be no
dialogue)? One wonders whether philosophy is as free from antic implica-
tions as Bultmann ("Historicity," pp. 95-96; Jesus Christ, pp. 55-59) some-
times suggests and also whether theology can disavow ontological reRections
of its own. Bultmann ("Historicity," p. 101) allows that ontic experience
may enrich ontological understanding and that the New Testament does
contain Qntological reflections, though its maiD concern is antic (Bultmann.
Theology of the New Testament, Vol. 1, trans. K. Crobel [New York: Scrilr
neI's, 1951], pp. 198-199,209-210, 212,227-228). If the ontic mast be
ontoJogicalfy possible, is it not likely that the ontological implications of the
New Testament's antic views will conHict with tlle ontology of any givcn
philosophy? For Bultmann, faith, for example, is an ontological possibility
(Bultmann, "Historicity," pp. 96, 108), but it is ontically-actually-impos-
sible for sinful man on his own and is ontically possible only as response to
the grace of the proclaimed word (Bultmann, Theology, Vol. 1, p. 269;
"New Testament and Mythology," in Kerygma and Myth, Vol. 1, trans.
R. H. Fuller [London: S.P.C.K., 1954], pp. 22-33). Thus we see from some
statements of Bultmann himself that the ontological is of relevance only in
connection with the ontic.
41
THE PARABLES
istence-are integrated in one configuration of action and iIl"

terpretation.
The ontic element-how existence is lost or gained-may be
analogous to something in Jesus' situation, as the prodigal's
behavior is in some way analogous to that of the publicans and
sinners. The mistake of the rigorously historical approach is
to isolate this element and interpret it in the light of Jesus'
historical situation instead of as an organic part of an under-
standing of existence which is implicitly present in the story as
a whole. Hence the aesthetic unity of the parable is broken and
its most enduring subject matter-its most appropriate content
for translation-is lost sight of.
The existential approach does more justice to the non-
allegorical nature of the parables and to the general absence
of specifically religious terminology in them than does an ap-
proach which speaks of them as embodying the moral insight
and religious experience of their creator. T. W. Manson, who
uses the latter terminology, also speaks' of the moral-religious
element as a "further" meaning which is in addition to the
story meaning. Manson argues that David was able to see the
story meaning of Nathan's Ewe Lamb (II Sam. 12:1-4) but
not the further meaning of its application to himself-until it
was pointed out to him. Manson, however, overcomes some-
what this dichotomy as his discussion progresses. 39 The ex-
istential approach need not speak of a further meaning be-
cause there is one (translatable) meaning, namely, the pattern
of connections in the story. It might also be pointed out that
Nathan's Ewe Lamb is closer to an example story than to a
parable. In addition to the foregoing, it may be suggested that
existential interpretation is inherently more productive than
other approaches often are. A. M. Hunter, who gives allegiance
to the historical method, recognizes the eschatological crisis
Ie T. W. Manson, The Teaching of Jesus, pp. 80-81, 65-66, ,70-73.
42
note of Jesus' teaching, but in his effort to make the parables

contemporary he turns to "moralizing." Thus his exposition of
:rhe Talents becomes an exhortation to use one's talents in
everyday living40 instead of an analysis of the crisis of the loss
of existence.
Whether the existential approach is justified will finally
depend on the exegetical fruits which it yields, and here we are
involved in the circular thinking that always attends the at-
tempt to clarify presuppositions. Asking the existential question
enables one to see certain things in the parables, and what is
seen will have to be the criterion of whether this is the right
question.
3. How the Translation Is Accomplished
I In order to translate the subject matter of a text into our

terms it is obviously necessary to grasp the meaning of the
text itself. Dilthey's view of how history is understood is quite
applicable-though with exceptions-to the parables, or to other
prose fiction or drama. Meaning resides in intelligible patterns
of connections and relationships, and understanding is grasping
these connections, that is, grasping the meaning.41 Thus the
first step is to comprehend the pattern of connections in the
parables themselves. The nature of these connections in artistic
prose will have to be considered more carefully in chapter 3.
The second step is the translation itself. Fuchs states that
the correct hermeneutical principle calls for connecting the
form (the external language) of the text with the content in
to A. M . Hunter, Interlm!ting alc Parables, pp. 39,99, 106-108.

n Dilthey. Pattcrn, pp. 73-75, 89, 99- 100, 106. The view of typological
exegesis held by Lampe and W ooJlcombe is very close to Dilthey's view of
understand ing history. T ypological exe~es is is not the search for hidden
meanings underlying the obvious one but the making explicit of real corre·
spondences, links, or connections between the various events of salvation
history; d. C. W. H. Lampe and K. J. \Voollcombe, Essays 011 Typology
("Studies in Biblical Theology," No. 22 [London: SCM Press, 1957]), pp.
29, 39, 40, 68.
43
THE PARABLES
order that the life of the text can appear. This does not mean
giving new life to the form but letting the life or content be
expressed in the form of our language.42 Fuch's point seems to
suggest a separation of form and content which is not possible
with language used aesthetically. The form-or shape or lin-
guistic connections-is not just a container for the content;
rather, the meaning is in the form-and-content. That is why
linguistic aesthetic objects cannot be completely translated:
to give a new form changes the meaning. To the extent that a
parable can be translated, however, Fuchs is right that the
meaning must be given a new form or pattern of connections.
This form will express what the text's content can do in our
situation.43 The meaning distilled from the form-and-content
must be given a new form-and-content, a new pattern of con-
nections which relates the original meaning to our time. But
since the interpretation of a parable-as distinguished from the
parable itself-is not an aesthetic object, the relationship of
form to content in the interpretation will not be the same as
it is in the parable.
We must keep in mind that meaning does not reside merely
in pivotal words or concepts but also in the chain or pattern of
connections. As Laeuchli has pointed out, unless one is aware
of this, he may think that he is giving a translation of the
original meaning while not doing so at all. The exegete must
constantly be aware of the tension between the form of the
biblical language and the new form of his translation.44
How then is one enabled to see the pattern of connections
in a text? According to Dilthey the basis of understanding
others and texts about them is our own experience. By reflecting
on the pattern of connections within our own interior lives we
~2Fuchs, Historical Jesus, p. 194.

48Ibid., p. 204.
"Samuel Laeuchli, The Languag,~ of Faith (New York and Nashville:
Abingdon Press, 1962), pp. 16,47,91-93,183.
44
are able to see the interconnections of other complexes. Under-

standing passes from something already grasped to something
new which can be understood· through it.45 Building on this
foundation Bultmann has developed his concept of pre-under-
standing. One cannot understand a text unless particular ques-
tions are asked of it, and these questions are prompted and
informed by the relationship to and understanding of the sub-
ject matter of the text which the interpreter already has. Thus
understanding depends on a pre-understanding of the subject
matter.46 It should be recognized that pre-understanding is not
just a matter of psychological inwardness but includes one's
awareness of belonging to historical communities and also in-
cludes the language in which the communal relationships take
shape.47 In fact it may be doubted whether thought-or any
very significant thought-can take place at all without lan-
guage.48
This basic insight that pre-understanding is necessary for
the acquirement of understanding has considerable biblical sup-
port. In Proverbs 9:7-9 the wise are capable of becoming wiser,
.n Dilthey, Pattern, pp. 39, 66, 86-87,94, 107, 116, 140 .
• a Bultmann, "l-Jennencutics," pp. 239-243; Jesus Christ, pp. 46-50.
47 Dilthey has been criticized for conceiving of pre·understanding too in-
wardly and subjectively (d. Robinson, New Hermeneutic, pp. 69-70) and
Bul~mann, for doing less than full justice to the historical conditionedness
of pre·understanding (Funk, "The Hermeneutical Problem," pp. 188-191).
According to Gadamer we understand ourselves first as part of a fmnily, so-
ciety, and state; and these historic relationships transcend the experiential
horizon of the individual and take shape primarily in our language (d. Rob·
inson, Nell' Hermeneutic, pp. 69-70). While tIlis criticism is probably essen-
tially jl,lstificd, it should be noted that Dilthcy and Bultmann do not ignore
completely man's IJosition in larger communal structures (Diltlley, Pattern,
pp. 94,140; Bultmann, ''Hermeneutics,'' pp. 255, 259-260); moreover, de·
spite the animus of much contemporary tlleology toward anything psycho-
logical, psychological inwardness is stiU a part of pre·understanding.
48 Philip Wlleelwright , M elC1p/t()r dnd Reality (Blnomineton: Imli~n3
Ul1iversity, 1962) , pp. 19-20, 128; Frederick Ferre, Language, Logic, and
God (New York: Harper, 1961). pp. 37, 157; Paul Van Buren. "On Doing
TI colngy" (unpubHsll d p. pet fWIll Dl\ow CUll~ ul latioll Oll Hermeneutic,
April 1964), p. 2; Ernst Fuchs, HermeTleutik (Bad Cannstatt: R. MUller-
schon, 1958). p. 131.
45
THE PARABLES
but the foolish are hopeless; the same principle appears with
some frequency in the rabbinic literature (Aboth 1 :13;
Berachoth 40a) .49 In the Synoptic Gospels the thought is rather
prominent that he who has will receive more while he who has
not will lose what he has. Matthew (or his source) applies this
saying externally and superficially to The Talents (25 :29); the
ten-talent man receives the talent taken from the one-talent
man. And in 13:12 the "more" which the disciples will receive
seems to refer to the special privilege of private explanations of
the parables by Jesus (cf. Matt. 13:10, 18, 36). But in Mark
4:25 and Luke 8:18 the point is that those who hear with
understanding will acquire more understanding.
We have adopted the view that the translatable content of
the parables is an understanding of existence. Furthennore,
because they are associated by Jesus in some way with the king-
dom of God while the evangelists associate them with their
kerygmatic interest, we must say that the parables are concerned
with existence in faith. Is it then necessary for the pre-under-
standing which can understand the parables-or any biblical
text-to include adherence to the Christian faith?
It has been held that faith is necessary in order to under-
stand the Scriptures in genera150 or the historical Jesus in par-
ticular. 51 Or more particularly it has been affirmed that we be-
lieve in the urgency of the parables "because they were spoken
by a particular person with a special status."52 That would mean
that we would have to believe in Jesus as the Christ before we
could take the parables seriously.
Bultmann also has been accused of assuming that one must
49 W. O. E. Oesterley, The Gospel Parables in the Light of Their Jewish

Background, pp. 55-56.
DO Smart, Interpretation, p. 30.
n J. Arthur Baird, The Justice of God in the Teaching of Tesus, pp . 20-21;
Hugh Anderson, Jesus and Christian Origins (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1964), pp. 83-85.
U Geraint V. Jones, The Art and Truth of the Parables, p. 160.
46
become a believer in order to understand,1S3 but he has explicitly

denied that one must have faith in order to understand the con-
ceptual themes of the Christian faith. 54 It is true that the
faith of the evangelists shaped the Gospels and also undoubt-
edly affected their understanding of the parables, but as far as
Jesus' own situation was concerned, his words were not heard
as divinely authenticated revelations but as the human words
of the carpenter from Nazareth.55 And the unbeliever who hears
them today need not accept them as authoritative before he
understands them.
If Bultmann is right that faith is not necessary for under-
standing the subject matter of biblical texts, he is also right
that one must, nevertheless, be stirred by questions about his
own existence. The texts speak only to those who are con-
cerned about the kind of question to which faith is a possible
answer. 56 To understand the parables, to grasp the pattern of
connections in them, it is then necessary to have the pre-under-
standing that existence can be gained or lost, that there is a
definable difference between authenticity and inauthenticity.
It has already been implied and needs to be stated clearly
63 Amos N. Wilder, "New Testament Hermeneutics Today," in Current

Issues in New Testament Interpretation, p. 4l.
B Rudolf Bultmann, "Historicity," p. 101; "The Case for Demythologiz-
ing," in Kerygma and Myth, Vol. 2, trans. R. H. Fuller (London: S.P.C.K.,
1962), p. 187. Fuchs is in essential agreement with Bultmann (Historical
Tesus, pp. 184, 186).
55 Linnemann, Gleicfmisse, pp. 4Z-H. W llcn I'hlgh Anderson suggests
that in a proper hermeneutic tl;c faith of the interpreter should have a key
place in knowing and describIng historiC<ll rea lity (Jesus, p. 84). he seems to
be confusing the rolc of fai!;ll in salvation and the role of faith in theological
interpretation. Or to put it from a slightly different angle, the role of faith
in writing the Gospels is confused with its role in interpreting them. An
accurate interpreter of the Gospels will recognize that the resurrection faith
is central in them (Anderson, Tesus, p. 84), but that does not mean that the
interpreter must have faith in order to recognize the prominence and nature
of the evangelists' faith. In short, Anderson has not sufficiently distinguished
faith and theology.
56 Bultmann, "Hermeneutics," p. 256; "Case," p. 187; "Is Exegesis with-
out Presuppositions Possible?" in Existence and Faith, p. 294.
47
THE PARABLES
that a pre-understanding influences what the interpreter sees

in his text, for an interpretation incorporates the prior under-
standing that grows out of the interpreter's own experience.1i'l
And if, as we have seen, language is a part of our pre-under-
standing, then our language conditions the fact that, and the
manner in which, reality confronts US. 58 Wheelwright has
argued forcefully that the language which we have inherited
both makes possible and limits the questions we can ask, the
kinds of reality we can conceive, and the ways we can con-
ceive it.59
James Barr strongly opposes this viewpoint. On the basis
of scientific and comparative linguistic studies he maintains
that there is no close relationship between the vocabulary grids
and morphological and syntactical structures of a language, on
the one hand, and the thought structure and apprehension of
reality of the users of the language, on the other hand. Lan-
guage is a socially conditioned, arbitrary system of semantic
markers. There can be no internal Christian meaning of a word
in the New Testament, for example, while it retains its external
Greek meaning, because words have no more than their se-
mantic function. In Barr's view the connection between bibli-
cal language and biblical thought in its apprehension of reality
does not reside in the structure of the language, nor in the
new conceptual content given to words by the biblical writers;
the connection lies, rather, in the combination of words in
sentences, with the value of the words changing little or not
at all. The real bearer of thought is the sentence or the larger
unit of the speech or poem.60
G7 Bultmann, "Hermeneutics," pp. 241-242; Dilthey, Pattern, pp. 100,

109.
G8 Ebeling, Word and Faith, p. 248; cf. also Amos N. Wilder, Earl)' Chris·
tum Rhetoric, pp. 13-17.
Be Wheelwright, Metaphor, pp. 24-31; The Burning Fountain, p. 6.
eo James Barr, The Semantics of Biblical Language (Oxford: The Univer-
sity Press, 1961), pp. 38-39,42, 49, 204, 244-245, 263-266.
48
Barr is probably right that too much theological weight has

been rested on linguistic views which will not stand up under
scrutiny. However, the biblical Sitz im Leben of faith and
worship has probably contributed more new conceptual con-
tent to certain words, that is, has created more technical terms,
than Barr allows for. This is a point which he might have been
more attentive to in view of his emphasis on the socially con-
ditioned character of language. Moreover, if word com bina-
tions are important in grasping and expressing reality, one
should be cognizant of the fact that new and peculiar combiTUZ-
tions may occur. It might also be pointed out that there is
evidence from psychological studies which suggests the influ-
ence of the poverty or wealth of one's vocabulary upon one's
perception of reality.61 Finally, there may well be interaction
between the apprehension of reality and the larger linguistic
units which Barr mentions. It is neither accidental nor incon-
sequential for the grasp of reality that the basic mode of speech
in the Bible is the story62 rather than, say, the lyric poem.
Before leaving this section, two criticisms of the whole
idea of pre-understanding may be mentioned:
(1) Exegesis guided by ,pre-understanding is lacking in ob-
jectivity and can only establish what it already knows. Histori-
cal sources are not allowed to say their own word and express
their alien subject matter, but rather sources of the greatest
variety are all made to speak the same language.68
To this criticism it should be said that pre-understanding
does not determine in advance what the content of a text will
61 See Andrew T. Weil, "Harvard's Bruner and His Yeasty Ideas,"

Harper's, 229 (December, 1964),85.
62 Cf. Wilder, Rhetoric, pp. 37-38; Laeuchli, Language, p. 232.
63 Johannes Munck, "The New Testament and Gnosticism," in Current
Issues in New Testament Interpretation, p. 232. It is not clear why Anderson
(Jesus, p. 182) is critical of the place of faith and existential openness in the
new quest of the historical Jesus when in another context he states that faith
should playa part in interpretation (ibid., p. 84).
49
THE PARABLES
be but only detennines what kind of subject matter will be

looked for. Unless interpretation is guided by some question,
it will not see anything, except haphazardly; and the most ob-
jective exegesis will be that which is guided by a question
infonned by a pre-understanding of what is actually in the
text.° f It is true that Bultmann OG makes the value judgment
that the most significant question to ask of a biblical text is the
existential question, but he does not consider this the only
relevant question. Nor does he make all texts say the same
thing. He expounds, for example, the different understandings
of existence in classical Greek, Stoic, gnostic, and biblical
thought. oO
(2) It seems to be implicit in the position of Hejnrich
Ott that pre-understanding is unnecessary for understanding.
Historical reality overwhelmingly forces and impresses itself
upon us as a picture or poin~ of view. This interpretation is
not created by us, but, rather, reality first impresses itself upon
us in the fonn of pictures. 61 Similarly Ott maintains that man
with his ability to speak does not simply invent speech as the
opportunity arises. A man could not have written a poem about
a wood, for example, had the wood not first spoken to him.o8
There is some point to Ott's position, for if understanding
depended entirely on pre-understanding, we could not come to
e. Bultmann,
8~
"Hermeneutics," pp. 255-256; "Is Exegesis," pp . 293-294.
"Hermeneutics," pp. 247, 253; "Case," p. 185: "Is Exegesis," pp. 293-
294.
eo Bultmann, "The Understanding of Man and the World in the New
Testament and in the Greek World," in Essays Philosophical and Theologi-
cal, pp. 67-89.
417 Ott, "Historical Jesus," pp. 157, 161.
el Heinrich Ott, "The Problem of Non·objectifying Thinking and Speak.
ing in Theology" (unpublished paper from Drew Consultation on Herme·
neutic, April, 1964), p. 7. Here we see the influence of the later Heidegger,
with language, as the house of being, speaking through man rather than man
doing the speaking. Cf. James M. Robinson, "The German Discussion of the
Later Heidegger," in The Later Heidegger and Theology, ed. James M. Rob·
inson and J. B. Cobb, Jr. (New York: Harper, 1963), pp. 44, 49-50.
50
understand anything that we did not already understand, but

the fact is that we do. At birth we understand nothing; thus
there must be some points at which historical reality impresses
its meaning upon us apart from pre-understanding. Bultmann
at least tacitly recognizes this when he says that pre-under-
standing comes from the way historical phenomena them-
selves speak to us. au This pre-understanding is pre-understanding
in relation to later understanding, but at the time it is acquired
it is an understanding that comes from an encounter with
historical existence itself.
It would seem then that in understanding there is con-
tinuing mutual interaction between the patterns of meaning in
history itself and our pre-understanding. Ott does not suf-
ficiently recognize the reality and critical capacity of pre-under-
standing. It may be, as Ott claims,70 that brute facts are only
abstractions from the picture or significance-laden character of
history itself. But that does not mean, as Ott also claims,71
that all historical knowledge is through encounter and that
there is no such thing as objective historical knowledge. History
-and its sources-does not simply overwhelm us. We may
agree that history itself has patterns of meaning, but one may
recognize differing patterns of meaning in various historical
phenomena and also distinguish them from one's own norma-
tive frame of reference. But this is not to deny that our pre-
understanding does always inject something of "what it means"
into our interpretation of "what it meant."
In concluding this section let it be said that in our approach
to the parables there is interaction between our pre-understand-
ing which prompts the existential question and our recognition
that the parables themselves are concerned with an under-
standing of existence.
89 Bultmann, "Henneneutics," p. 255.

TO "Historical Jesus," p. 157.
11 Ibid., pp. 145, 147-148, 161.
51
THE PARABLES
4. The Goal of Interpretation

The goal of the hermeneutical endeavor, the purpose of
translating a biblical text into new terms, is that the language
of the text might become an event. It is hoped that the hearer
will be brought to see that the cap fits-or does not fit-that
the point hits home, that the subject matter concerns him.
The word is to become a happening word or language event.'12
In Jesus' sayings and parables he brought together the pres-
ence of God and the context of daily living.'1S That does not
mean that the parables give enlightenment about the constitu-
tion of the rule of God (even when they begin "The kingdom
of heaven is like") but that they portray an existential state
and show the listener what he must now do.'14 Jesus' parables
were a language event in his day, and the purpose of inter-
preting them is that that event might occur once more in the
exposition.
From the standpoint of linguistic analysis language has
several legitimate functions, and one of these is the performa-
tive function. Language when exercising this function does
something-declares war or opens a highway.n. It is because the
performative is one of the possible functions of language that
U Ebeling, Word and Faith, p. 124; Fuchs, Historical Jesus, pp. 79, 86-
87, 196. Ebeling's suggestion ("Word of God," p. l03) th:lt the event
character of the biblical word is supported by the menning of the Hebrew
word dabaT is questionable. As Barr has pointed out (Semantics, pp. 131-
132) it may be a part of Old Testament theology that the word of God
enters history as a dynamic event, but that does Dot mean that "event" is
any part of the meaning of the word dabaT.
78 Fuchs, "Hermeneutical Problem," pp. 129-130.
7' Fuchs, Historical Jesus, pp. 86, 140: Linnemann, Gleichnisse, p. 31.
n Ferre, LAngllage, pp. 55-56. Apparently it was J. L. Austin who first
used the term "pcrforrnative" to designate a certain class of utterances: utter-
ances which are not nonsense and yet are not true or false. One who makes
Sl1ch an utterance does, rather than merely says, something. He apologizes,
bets. promises, names, or marries (Philosophical Papers, ed. J. O. Urmson
and G. J. Warnock [Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1962J, pp. 222 ft.).
Allstin probably used the term petformative function in a more specific sense
than I have. At the same time he does include imperatives and warnings
52
language can become an event. We noted earlier that there are

differences of function between the parable as aesthetic and its
interpretation as non-aesthetic, but that does not mean that
both of them may not be included in the category of the lan-
guage event. They execute different aspects of the performative
function, but they both have the same goal, which is to involve
the hearer in the subject matter. Thus what is said about the
nature of the parables as a language event also applies es-
sentially to a proper interpretation of them.
(1 ) Jesus' parables were a language event in that they in-
jected a new possibility into the situation of his hearers. The
latter were offered a new way of understanding their situation
in history.76 If historical being inherently includes an under-
standing of existence, a grasp of the pattern of connections,
then giving a new understanding does introduce a real, new
possibility; the situation is changed.
(2) The parables were a language event because they called
for a judgment from the hearers. They were asked not merely
to see the understanding of existence in a parable but to assent
to it. TT Jeremias has pointed out that especially the formula
tis ex human ("who among you") (Matt. 6:27 and Luke 12:25;
Matt. 7:9 and Luke 11:11; Matt. 12:11 and Luke 14:5; Luke
11:5; 14:28; 15:4; 17:7) by its direct address seeks to force the
hearer to accept a definite position. This formula seems to have
no contemporary parallels, though it occurs in the prophets
(Isa. 42:23; 50:10; Hag. 2:3) but not as the introduction to a
parable. T8 It is probably not accidental, however, that this in-
:among perfonnative utterances (Philosophical Papl!Ts, pp. 230-231), and

Jesus' parables, as well as the theological interpretation of them, are at least
implicit calls to decision.
76 Linnemann, Glcichnisse, pp. 33, 38.
11 Linnemann, Gleichnisse, pp. 25, 27-28; Oesterley, Parables, p. 5; A. T.
Cadoux, The Parables of Jesus, p. 45; Dodd, Parables, pp. 11-12; Hunter,
Parables, p. 12; Nils A. Dahl, "The Parables of Growth," p. 138.
7810achim Jeremias, The Parables of Jesus, p. 103.
53
THE PARABLES
terrogative formula does not appear with any of the fully devel-
oped narrative parables. In the case of the latter the story itself
does the work, and the call for a judgment is indirect.
The judgment which is evoked by the parables entails a
far-reaching decision, for the pre-understanding of the hearers
is challenged, and they must decide between their old under-
standing and the new one that confronts them in the para-
ble. To While Jesus' parables placed the hearers inescapably in the
situation of decision, Jesus could not determine how people
would decide. Those who refused his word made a decision
and were hardened in their old existence. Those who accepted
his new understanding were carried across the disunity of de-
cision and challenge and into a new situation of unity and
adjustment.so
In Linnemann's view the decision is evoked by the narrator's
making clear the conflict between himself and his audience.
The hearers must clearly recognize the correspondence between
the image part (the parable story) and the material part (in
the sense of Jesus' historical situation) in order that they
might take up the same attitude toward the image part which
they have toward the corresponding aspects of the material
part. The narrator accomplishes this by giving room in the
parable to the audience's judgment on the situation, but with
this he interlaces his Own judgment, to which he hopes to win
them. 81
We may question whether Jesus' hearers could have been
and needed to be as clearly aware of the correspondences be-
tween the parable and the situation, as Linnemann holds. Be-
cause the parable is a cohesive unity, its points of contact with
the historical situation are fused into the new pattern of con-
70 Cf. Fuchs, Historicallesus, p. 221; Linnemann, Gleichnisse, pp. 30, 38.

80 Cf. Fuchs, Historical Jesus, pp. 221-222.
81 Linnemann, Gleichnisse, pp. 34-35.
54
nections which the parable is so that the awareness of cor-

respondence with the historical situation would be at a lower
level of consciousness than Linnemann seems to allow. The
hearers of The Unjust Steward, say, would hardly have had
their attention drawn immediately to the impending apoca-
lyptic dissolution of the world which Jesus proclaimed in his
non-parabolic teaching. Moreover, Linnemann's analysis has the
hearer's judgment move from his knowledge of his situation to
the parable rather than from the parable to a new understand-
ing of his situation; and thus the power of the parable to be a
new word is vitiated. In any case, we need not know what the
original audience's pre-understanding was in order to give a
satisfactory contemporary interpretation of the parables,82 be-
cause a parable's understanding of existence is primarily ill its
own pattern of connections, in its form-and-content. The theo-
logical interpretation of the parables evokes a decision from
us when it juxtaposes a translated view of the parable's ex-
istential understanding with contemporary self-understandings
or with a translation of the Bible's view of sinful man's self-
understanding. Thus theological reflection, as well as the original
texts, may be a language event because it conducts man to a
place 83-the place of decision. Theology does not do this, how-
S~ As Linnemonu claims (GleiC/1 I1 ;SSC, pp. 30-3-1) .

as Ott, "Non·obieetifyiIlg T hinking," p. 19. The way Cerman theology
has sometimes been described :1 S arrivi ng at the concept n f a language event
(d. Robinson, New 1Jermellelltic, p, 57 ) might lead one to ~u pposc that t he
concept was first discovered by contemporary Gennon theologians, It sho uld
be poin tcd out that the COllcept, if not the term, \\'as brieRy and clearly de·
lineatcd 'by Dodd (Parables, pp, 5, 159) and Manson (Teac li ing, pp . 65- 66,
70- 73,8 1) in their diSCtlSsio ns of Jesus' use of parables. According to Man·
SOn the pambles were not merely illustra tions or embelli hments of theologi·
cal ideas but were tl1e word of God itself piercing the sclf.satisf:1ction and
worldly core of man, arousi ng his ComdeJlce, and capable of carry ill ~ him
over fnto faith. I wonld not q~lesti on tll,lt the exposition of the language
character of ma ll's existence and the usc of existentialist terminology arc all
at.k:mce . .'I.t the S:lmC lime Do lei's :.1l1d !\1:mson's discu.lsions . rc no t enti rel)'
55
THE PARABLES
ever, by being non-objectifying thought,s. that is, thought

which can avoid using the subject's categories in speaking about
an object. It does it because clarifying the nature of faith and
the issue of decision helps to lead man to decision.slI
We might also remind ourselves that literary critics speak
of language becoming an event88 and of a poem, novel, or
story testing a reader and having the power to move him into
a new state of being or into the experience of a new horizon. B7
This does not by any means solve all of the problems of the
re1ations~ip between Scripture texts and literary art (see chap.
3), but it does suggest that a fruitful rapprochement is possible,
which is important in view of the fact that the parables are.
both biblical texts and works of art.
(3) If the goal of the hermeneutical effort is the language
event, then it is not ultimately the text which is interpreted
and clarified, but the interpreter and his situation are illumi-
nated. This point has been well made by Fuchs and Ebeling,8S
but how this can be called a step beyond Bultmann and how
it can be said that for Bultmann the interpretation of the
text is the ultimate goal 89 is incomprehensible to me. It is
certainly clear that for Bultmann the word may be an event.90
lost on us, and they make us realize that tIle possibility of language's becom·
ing an event and of our understandjng it does not depend on whetl1er flInt
happening should be called a SpracIJereignis, a Sprechereigrlis, or a Wort·
geschehen.
a. As Ott claims ("What is Systematic TIleo)ogy?" in Later Heidegger,
pp.9l-93,106-109).
85 Bulbnann, "Case," p. 183.
88 Sewell, Orphic, p. 23.
81 Elisco Vivas, 'PIle Artistic Transaction (Ohio State University Press,
1963), p. 174; Michael Novak, "Philosophy und Fiction," The Christia/l
Scholar, 47 (1964), 101, 108i Tom F. Driver, "The Arts and the Christian
Evangel," The Christian Scholar, 40 (1957), 335-336.
88 Fuchs, Historical Jesus, pp. 206,212; Ebeling, ''Word of God," pp. 93-
96,109.
89 Cf. Robinson, New Hermeneutic, pp. 52-53.
10 Bultmann, "Case," pp. 191-193.
56
Moreover, for him interpretation claims the interpreter, chal-

lenges his pre-understanding, requires decision, and has the
goal of giving him an understanding of himself. 91
Even those New Testament scholars-like Fuchs and Linne-
mann-who have been most concerned to understand thc par-
ables as language events have not fully exploited the c'/ent
character of the parables, for they have not seriously consid-
ered how the parables' peculiarly aesthetic function enhances
their character as events. l1lis will be one of our concerns in
chapter 3.
5. The Parables and the Ultimate Referent of

Theological Language
In the previous sections of this chapter we have considered
the translatable content of the parables-an understanding of
existence-and the relationship of the parables to their audi-
ence-as a language event. We have also touched on how they
are related to the historical situation in which they arose. We
turn now to consider them in relation to their ultimate refer-
ent, God, for the existence in history of which they give us an
understanding is an existence on which God impinges. l1le
parables refer to God only indirectly, but they still intend in
some way to refer to him. Therefore, in examining the parables
we are confronted with the question how-and whether-God
can be spoken of meaningfully at all. How-and can-asser-
tions be made about God and his actions?
According to the logical positivism represented in Ayer's
Language, Truth, and Logic if a statement is to have any
meaning as a factual statement or assertion, some sense expe-
91 Bultmann, Jesus and the Word, trans. L. P. Smith and E. H. Lantero

(New York: Scribner Library, 1958), pp. 4, 8, 10; "Hermeneutics," pp.
253-254; J(,SlIS Christ, p. 53; "Is Exegesis," pp. 294, 296.
57
THE PARABLES
rience must be relevant for its verification. 92 Antony Flew

would disclaim being a logical positivist,9S but the version of
the verification principle which he applies against theological
statements seems not too far removed from positivism. For a
statement to be a meaningful assertion it must also deny some-
thing. What it denies is what could count against it or falsify
it. If it cannot be falsified, it cannot be verified. If nothing can
count against it, it cannot be an assertion. 94
The application of the verification principle puts statements
about God into the category of meaningless nonsense state-
ments. 05 According to Flew religious people will not allow that
anything counts against their affirmations: "God loves us"
seems to be compatible with any state of affairs, however tragic
or pitiable. Therefore, statements about God are made to die
the death of a thousand qualifications and to become vacuous. 06
Paul Van Buren has vigorously maintained that modern man,
who is empirically minded, can make no sense of the term
"God" nor of the category of the transcendcnt. 97
In criticism of positivism's use of the vcrification principle
it may be pointed out that the principle itself cannot be veri-
fied by sense experience but rests instead on a basic conviction
or presupposition-that there is no reality beyond that which
92 This \vas ,A.yer's position in the 1935 edition of Language, Truth, and
Logic (cf. the preface to the 1935 edition on p. 31 of the 1946 edition).
However, in the introduction to the 1946 edition he held the word "rele-
vant" to be "uncomfortably" vague and to allow too much latitude to mean-
ingfulness. He therefore tried to strengthen his "weak" version of the verifi-
cation principle; see the paperback edition (New York: Dover Publications,
1946), pp. 11-13. Cf. Ferre, Language, pp. 12-13, 32-33; Alasdair Mac-
Intyre, "The Logical Status of Religious Belief," in Metaphysical Beliefs
(London: SCM Press, 1957), p. 171.
93 Cf. Antony Flew and Alasclair MacIntyre (eds.), New Essays in Philo-
sophical Theology (London: SCM Press, paperback ed., 1963), p. vii.
H Flew, New Essays, pp. 98, 106.
95 Cf. MacIntyre, "Religious Belief," p. 171; Ferre, Language, pp. 32-33.
96 Flew, New Essays, pp. 97-99, 106.
97 Paul Van Buren, The Secular Meaning of the Gospel (New York: Mac-
millan, 1963), pp. 68,99-100, 102.
58
is in principle apprehensible by the senses.os One suspects that

it is this presupposition which still leads some philosophers
and theologians to reject the meaningfulness of statements
about God despite the fact that the verification principle is
no longer the reigning king in linguistic philosophy.
Verificational analysis gave way to functional analysis, which,
if it is not willing to say that theological statements are true,
is at least willing to say that they may be meaningfu1. 9 9 For
functional analysis meaning depends on the use of language,
and it is recognized that there is a variety of legitimate func-
tions and not just the one lOO of communicating empirical
facUol Language will be expected to behave according to the
logic of the particular game or frame of reference in which it
is operating and not according to the rules of some other game.
At the same time there is a certain overlapping of the various
games and within each one, a number of legitimate func-
tions. 102 For example, within the theological language game,
language may function emotively, performatively, and cogni-
tively. Functional analysis wants to show whether language
within any given frame of reference is operating with logical
success so that the approach is normative as well as descrip-
tive. lo3 Language should behave in a way that is appropriate
to its subject matter.
If the verification principle is consciously or tacitly affirmed
98 Cf. Ferre, Lal/guagu, pp. 43--45, 53- 54; W illiam HQ'rdcrn, Speak1Jlg of
God (New York: Macmillan, 19M), pp. 31-32.70 .
00 Michael Foster, "Contemporary British Philosophy and Christian Be-
lief," The Christian ScholaT, 43 (1960), 191. Actually philosophy as phi-
losopby could not affirm that Christian t11eological st.ltements-are true.
or
100 Verific3 tional nnalysis also allowed, course, the necessity of tautolo·
gies or definitions.
101 Cf. Ferre, Language, pp . 55-56, 59; Ferre, in Ferre and Kent Bendall,
E I,lnring tile Logic of Faith (New York: Association Press, Seminary Paper.
backs, J 962 ) . p. 45: MacIntyre, "Religious Belief," pp. 171-172; Hordern.
Spea.~fng, pp. 40, 42 .
1 02 Fene, Logic, p. 45; Hordern, Speaking, p. 45.
103 MacIntyre, "Religious Belief," p. 174.
59
THE PARABLES
a person may make one of two responses to the Christian faith:

(a) He may say that theological statements intend to be asser-
tions about how things are in the universe, but since they
cannot be verified one can only reject Christianity.l04 (b) He
may say that while theological statements are not assertions
about God and how things are, they may function to express
the basic presuppositions or perspective or "blik" through which
one understands oneself in the world. 105
Ronald Hepburn draws the category of parable into his
"blik" view of religion. The parables of Jesus could presumably
serve as parables in his sense, but he would also include the
Old Testament and New Testament as a whole as well as plays,
novels, and poems. The Bible understood as a parable is not
concerned about facts, for a parable can do its work equally
well-or better-if it is fictitious. lo6 Hepburn assigns to parable
the important work of differentiating religion from morality.
Religious language as distinguished from moral language pro-
vides a tightly cohering parable or myth which vividly expresses
a way of life, inspires the believer to implement it, claims the
104 Flew, New Essays, pp. 97, 106, 107-108; Bendall, Exploring the Logic
of Faith, pp. 11, 16-18, 24-25, 107-109. Bendall disavows positivistic or
empiricist criteria but still believes that the evidence for Christianity is not
sufficiently public to satisfy "critical intelligence."
105 R. M. Hare, in New Essays in Philosophical Theology, pp. 99-101;
Van Buren, Secular, pp. 97, 100, 140-142, 169. Van Buren has some helpful
insights into the New Testament "blik," and he wants statements which
connect the personal pronoun "I" to such words as "free" and "love" to be
considered meaningful within the secular gospel (SeculdT, p. 171). Yet lle
confuses functional analysis with verificational analysis (ibid., pp. 16, 101-
105, 131). And it is doubtful whether statements about personal experience
(ibid., pp. 131, 147-148), any more than statements about God (ibid., pp.
65,83), can stand up under his application of the verification principle, that
is, testing by sense experience (ibid., p. 65). It cannot be demonstrated by
sense experience whether a man really loves or is really free; d. DiIthey,
Pattern, p. 164; Ian T. Ramsey, Religious Language (New York: Macmillan
Paperbacks, 1963), pp. 148-149.
108 Ronald Hepburn. Christianity and Paradox (London: Watts, 1958),
pp. 192-193.
60
believer's total life, and provides his total vision. l07 Here Hep-
burn comes close to recognizing the aesthetic function of parable,
but when he also speaks of the parable as illustrating and ex-
horting,108 he tends to detach the meaning from that particular
fonnal structure. This is to vitiate the power of the parable'S
aesthetic function and to divest the importance which he as-
signed to it of some of its point.
I believe that the "blik" view is not really an analysis of how
users of theological language have usually understood their
statements about God. Theological statements do contain a
"blik," but the users of Christian language have ordinarily in-
tended to make assertions about God, about how things are in
the universe. Theological language properly understood has a
cognitive function as well as other functions; it is believing
that as well as believing in. 10Il Ott, however, maintains that
Christian faith is faith in and not faith that: preaching does
not give infonnation. Faith itself, for Ott, includes understand-
ing, and this understanding attains greater clarity in theology,
but Ott plays down the cognitive element in both faith and
theology in favor of the existential. He conceives of theology
on the model of Heidegger's primal thinking. For Heidegger
primal thinking is that which is called forth from man as a re-
sponse to being as the latter speaks through beings, unveiling
that they are. It is to be distinguished from the objectifying
thinking of science and metaphysics, which is self-initiated and
101 Ibid., p. 195.

108 Ibid., p. 192. It is a little surprising that he does this in view of his
perceptive insights into tlle aesthetic and its function; see his "Poetry and
Religious Belief," in Metaphysical Beliefs, pp. 139-140.
100 Cf. I. M. Crombie, "The Possibility of Theological Statements," in
Faith and LAgie, ed. B. Mitchell (London: Allen and Unwin, 1957), pp.
31-32; Ferre, Language, p. 160; Ferre, Logic of Faith, pp. 66-67; Hordcm.
Sprukil/g, pp. 72-73, 181; Schubert M. Ogden, "Theology and Objectivity,"
TIle Journal of R.eligion, 45 (1965), 184-187; Foster, "Christian Belief,"
pp. 192-193; MacIntyre, "Religious Deli f" p . 191.
61
THE PARABLES
which observes reality as objects, imposing its (the subject's)
categories upon it. llo Since Ott conceives of theology on the
analogy of primal thinking, he denies any strict distinction be-
tween faith as existential actuality and theology as thinking. 11l
Ott would be unsympathetic with the no-God theology of the
thoroughgoing "blik" approach,112 but his depreciation of the
cognitive function of theological language inadvertently shows
a certain kinship with that approach and obscures the problem
of the relationship between belief in and belief that. It seems
to me necessary to affirm the cognitive element in both faith
and theology and to account for the difference between the two.
Bultmann and Ebeling also recognize the existential element
in theology: it is impossible to speak about God without speak-
ing also about oneself.n s Theology is the unfolding of faith's
own self-understanding, and theological reflection as well as
proclamation can offer man an understanding of existence
which evokes from him a decision.u 4 But at the same time for
Bultmann theology paradoxically must speak of faith in objec-
tive terms, like any science; and for Ebeling, while theology has
its own subject matter, it must reflect scientifically and form
concepts, as is done in other fields of thought. m The assimila-
tion of theology to faith by Ott would seem to lead to the
conclusion either that one must be a believer in order to
understand theology or that thinking theological thoughts
would make one a believer. Ott rejects these conclusions,116
but it is difficult to see how they can be avoided unless theology
110 Cf. Robinson, Later Heidegger, pp. 25, 44.

111 Ott, "Systematic Theology," pp. 90-93, 106-109.
112 Ibid., p. 90.
lIS Bultmann, "What Sense Is There to Speak of Cod?" The Christian
SchGlar, H (1960),213,215; Ebeling, Word and Faith, p. 346.
lU Bultmann, "Case," p. 183; Theology of the New Testament, Vol. 2,
trans. K. Crobel (London: SCM Press, 1955), pp. 237, 239, 251.
115 Bultmann, "Case," p. 193; Ebeling, Word and Faith, pp. 248-249,
252.
116 Ott, "Systematic Theology," p. 92.
62
as objectifying thought is distinguished from faith.1lT It is not

objectifying in the scientific sense of a falsifiable, external per-
ception of a reality which is distinct from ourselves and is the
object of sense experience. But theology is objectifying in the
same way that the detached analysis of the structure of human
existence is objectifying in comparison with existential involve-
ment itself,118
Our discussion of the cognitive and objective character of
theological language was given in response to the position of
verificational analysis that theological language does not make
assertions about God. \Ve must now consider further how theo-
logical language does make assertions. If we begin, not with the
presuppositions of verificational analysis, but with the view that
function determines meaning, then we can say that the be-
havior of theological language points to the kind of subject
matter or referent that theological language is talking about.
Theological language begins at the observational level, but
this observational language is used with an "odd logic."1l9
Adjectives which normally refer to human attitudes or actions
-like "good"-are stretched out of their normal usage by
qualifiers like "infinite." Assertions are made and then quali-
fied. It is claimed that "God" is an individual, but none of the
criteria for individuality are held to apply. Category mistakes
are deliberately made. 120 These logical improprieties, however,
do not show that theological statements have no referent. They
rather give a partial characterization of the referent: God is
separate from the spatio-temporal world and yet impinges
upon it; as transcendent he is qualitatively different from all
other things, and therefore statements about him are not falsi-
117 Cf. Schllbert M. Ogden, "The Understanding of Theology in Ott and

Bultmann," in Later Heidegger, pp. 164-165.
118 Ogden, "Theology and Objectivity," pp. 178-181.
119 Ramsey, Language, pp. 42, 53.
120 Ramsey, Language, p. 77; Crombie, "Theological Statements," pp. 42,
60; Hordern, Speaking, p. 125.
63
THE PARABLES
fiable; he is mysterious. l21

The logical behavior of theological
language, however, does not give our understanding of God
much positive content.
If the odd formal properties of theological language tell us
that we are dealing with a mysterious, not wholly knowable,
subject or referent, we may follow Crombie in saying that
theological statements are given content and related to experi-
ence by treating them as parables. 122 We might say that the
formal aspects pertain to the subject, and the parabolic aspect
pertains to the predicate of theological statements. Crombie
would include in his concept of parables such parables proper
as TIle Prodigal Son and such enacted parables as Hosea's
seeking out his adulterous wife. 123 His real point, however, is
that the comparative or analogical aspect of the parable is the
proper category for understanding all theological statements.
One does not suppose that there is a literal correspondence
between a parable and its referent, but one does suppose that
if one accepts the parable as a faithful 124 parable, one will not
be misled about the nature of the referent. Thus, for example,
we do not know literally what love is in the being of God, but
we trust that a parable like The Prodigal Son puts us suffi-
ciently in touch with God to enter into relations with him
which bring about our ultimate well-being.12~
It is important for Crombie's position that the words in our
parables about God be taken in their ordinary human sense.
The word "love" in "God loves us" is not to be thought of as
changed from its ordinary human sense in the way that "hot"
121 Cf. Ramsey, Language, p. 84; Crombie, "Theological Statements,"

pp. 33-34, 38,49; Ogden, "Theology and Objectivity," pp. 178-179; Hor·
dem, Speaking, pp. 119, 124, 125.
122 Crombie, "Theological Statements," p. 71.
128 Crombie, in New Essays in Philosophical Theology, pp. 119-120.
12' Cf. Sewell (Orphic, p. 21) on the need to have faith in language; also
Wheelwright, Metaphor, p. 31.
128 Crombie, "Theological Statements," pp. 70-71; in New Essays, p. 124.
in "hot temper" is changed from the ordinary meaning that it

has in "hot stove." "Hot" can be thus modified without losing
meaning because we already know what temper is apart from
that phrase. But we do not already know what God is apart
from our parables; therefore, if the predicate words-like "love"
-do not have their ordinary meaning, they have very little
meaning. But again it must be said that this does not mean
that God's love is literally like human love. Rather we believe
that parables whose words are taken in their ordinary, human
sense put us in touch with a God who is not completely
knowable. 126
Faith, then, has an important place in Crombie's view. We
trust the parables because we trust their source-Christ.127 I
think that we would also want and have to say that we trust
Christ because his words encounter us as a language event.
The parables of Jesus in their own special way exemplify the
features of theological language which we have been discussing.
Because of their aesthetic nature they are in certain ways more
effective than propositional statements could be, and because
of their realistic and dramatic subject matter they give a par-
ticular content to our understanding of our relationship with
Cod and tie it to human experience. In the parables the predi-
cate aspect of theological statements is elaborated in terms of
dramatic encounters of a particular kind. At the same time
128 Crombie, in New Essays, pp. 120-124; "Theological Statements," p.

72. Ebeling similarly maintains that when the Bible speaks of God's word
it means normal, human words as far as their word character is concerned.
The difference between the divine word and human.words is the difference
between a word that is life-giving and :J word that is destmctive ("Word of
God," p. 102). When Ramsey (Language, pp. 93-94 ) de nie~ that theo-
logical language works like ordinary language he is not necessarily disagreeing
with Crombie, for Ramsey is talking about the odd formal properties which
point to the nature of the referent of theological language and not about the
parabolic predicates.
127 Crombie, in New Essays, pp. 122-123. Laeuchli (Language, p. 247)
also warns that within the Christian perspective faith puts a limit on the
analysis of language.
65
THE PARABLES
there is often in the parables an element of surprise or shock,

f')f the extraordinary, which cuts across the prevailing realism
and suggests another dimension of reality which impinges upon
the strictly human one. This is analogous to the odd logic of
propositional theological statements which points to the mys-
terious unknowability of their referent.
It has been argued in this section that theological language
cannot be verified by sensory experience but that theological
statements are stiH cognitive statements of a certain order of
objectivity. They make assertions about God and how things
are in the universe. We may go on to say, following Ogden and
Ferre, that as objective statements they are of the same class
as metaphysical statements and are subject to the kind of veri-
fication appropriate to metaphysical statements.128 A metaphys-
ical system-in the sense meant here-is a structure of concepts
which attempts to provide a coherent picture of the whole of
reality. A Christian metaphysic would include the Bible as a
basic model, image, or configuration which is to a large extent
non-propositiona1. It would also include a systematic interpre-
tation of the Bible in relation to modern thought plus the
understanding of God derived from the odd behavior of theo-
logical language. A metaphysical system is not to be judged on
the basis of its literal correspondence with all of reality but on
the basis of whether it provides a perspective from which all
facts and experiences can be meaningfully seen.129 Therefore,
an individual belief or concept is to be verified by determining
whether it fits into and enhances the whole system; and the
system as a whole i$ to be evaluated or verified on the basis of
these criteria: (a) internal consistency; (b) positive coherence
of the parts; (c) applicability to experience; (d) illumination
of a11 experience and knowledge without distortion; (e) effec-
128 Ogden, "Theo1ogy and Objectivity," p. 190; Ferre, Language, p. 160.
129 Ferre, Language, pp. 161-162; Logic of Faith, p. 74.
66
PARABLE AND THE PROBLEMS Of THEOLOGICAL LANGUAGE
tiveness. 130 It may be supposed that the system which comes

the closest to fulfilling these requirements comes the closest to
saying what reality is like.
The point has been made sometimes that the poetic quality
of biblical images cannot bridge the gap between the coherence
and integrating power of biblical language and thought, on the
one hand, and the truth of their referent, on the other.l8l
There is a sense in which this position is correct, but it is wrong
in principle and misses the point both of the odd logic of theo-
logical language and of the content of the Christian faith when
it is suggested that if the gap can be bridged at all it must be
bridged by reasoning. 132 This view ignores the necessity of
faith. Some kinds of language are more adequate than others,
but the only way to bridge the gap between the most adequate
theological language and the certainty of God is by faith. And
yet if faith is that freedom for the word which the word itself
gives when it becomes an event, then it is also true to say that
the language event gives certainty of God. The parables as
aesthetic objects are particularly apt vehicles for the language
event, but the point to remember is that from the Christian
standpoint man cannot determine that the preached word or
theological thought will become an event.
This insistence on the need for faith does not mean that one
must have Christian faith in order to uuderstand the Christian
perspective, but one must have faith if the Christian perspec-
tive is to become the self-understanding which structures one's
existence, or, rather, letting one's existence be so structured is
faith. This does not relieve the Christian theologian-metaphy-
sician from making his system as adequate as possible, but
130 Ferre, Language, pp. 162-163; Logic of Faith, p. 74; d. MacIntyre,

"Religious Belief," p. 202.
131 Cf. Hepburn. "Poetry," p. 165.
132 Ibid., pp. 165-166.
67
THE PARABLES
there are competing metaphysical systems, so that a point is

reached where one must make a commitment which never
escapes the character of a risk or wager. This does not mean
that Christian faith is flying in the face of the evidence. It
rather means that a response is made to a particular body of
evidence that "convicts" us by "proving itself."133 The response
remains a risk because one cannot be unaware that there are
other con victors around.
Theological knowledge is not different from other kinds of
knowledge in this regard. The acceptance of any basic perspec-
tive always involves a decision about what is evidence.134 As
Polanyi has forcefully argued, any knowledge comes to be held
as true through the inarticulate and personal factor which
shapes and organizes knowledge. m And for Wheelwright138
taking a statement as true depends on having a conviction that
one ought to assent to it.
One of the criteria of an adequate metaphysical system is
that it should effectively come to life. To come to life it must
be understood, and understanding involves seeing the parts as
a comprehensive whole or gestalt or configuration.137 The par-
ables are especially important in this connection because as
aesthetic objects they are gestalten. Thus, as a gestalt, a parable
presents a large part of the essential pattern of the total per-
spective in a pre-conceptual but highly concentrated way. This
is another way of saying that the parables have a particularly
high potential for becoming the language events which put one
in the stance of faith or evoke the willingness to take a risk.
In addition the interpretive translation of the parables' un-
derstanding of existence contributes to the effort to work out
188 Hordem, Speaking, pp. 98, 113; MacIntyre, "Religious Belief," p. 202.
11. Hordem, Speaking, pp. 70, 101-102.
1U Michael Polanyi, The Study of Man (Chicago: The University of
Chicago Press, Phoenix Books, 1963), pp. 25-26, 28.
188 Fountain, pp. 287-289.
1ST Polanyi, McJn, pp. 28,44. Recall also Dilthey.
68
a Christian metaphysic. The demand to give a full existential

translation of the parables-in the pregnant sense which con-
temporary hermeneutic gives to the term "translation"-is
grounded in the existential necessity of living a unified exist-
ence. 138 The man who responds to the language event of the
parables must relate his response and its implications to what
and how he thinks about the whole of reality. This chapter
began by noticing that hermeneutic is grounded in the biblical
understanding of history, and it ends by noting that hermeneu-
tic is grounded in the biblical understanding of existence. There
is no contradiction, for the biblical understandings of history
and of human existence are two sides of the same thing.
188 Space does not allow a full presentation of the New Testament's drive
for a unified existence, but one example may be mentioned. It is seen in the
pervasive and paradoxical union of the indicative and imperative. The man
of faith is to become what he is, which presupposes that he should have an
integrated existence.
69
3
The Parables, Aesthetics, and

Literary Criticism
In the two preceding chapters it has been assumed that cer-

tain of the parables of Jesus are aesthetic in nature, but very
little has been done to define the aesthetic or to demonstrate
that the parables are in fact aesthetic objects, genuine works
of art. It is now necessary to attempt in detail such a definition
and such a demonstration.
This effort will involve a battle on two fronts: (a) Over
against the main tendencies in New Testament scholarship it
must be shown that a parable as an aesthetic object should not
be treated as an illustration of an idea or a dressing out of a
"point." (b) Over against certain dominant tendencies in lit-
erary criticism it must be shown that while the parables have
an existential-theological dimension they are, nevertheless, gen-
uine aesthetic objects.
The latter effort would not be such a problem within the
perspective of the "old criticism," which holds that literature
exists, not in isolation, but within the play of historical and
political forces and that it has a philosophical and theological
range and temper. 1 It is, however, a problem over against the
"new criticism" which has been dominant for the last several
decades. This critical approach has emphasized that a literary
1 Cf. George Steiner, Tolstoy or Dostoevsky (New York: Random House,

Vintage Books, 1961), pp. 6-7.
70
THE PARABLES, AESTHETICS, AND LITERARY CRITICISM
work as aesthetic is autonomous-detached from sociological

and psychological phenomena and from any independent and
articulated system of thought-"an absolutely self-contained
and discrete set of mutually inter-related references."2 How
then can the parables have an existential-theological subject
matter and still be aesthetic objects? The argument vis-a-vis
new criticism will have two prongs. First it will attempt to
show that all literature contains inherently, even though im-
plicitly and indirectly, a thought dimension-a world view or
understanding of existence (sections 1-3). And secondly it will
seek to demonstrate that the parables have qualities which
make them genuinely aesthetic (sections 4-5).
It is true that quite recently the absolute autonomy of the
literary work has been questioned, and by critics who have be-
longed to the new critical tradition, but they are by no means
abandoning the belief that the aesthetic object is in some im-
portant sense autonomous, nor should they. We must, there-
fore, try to reach an understanding of what aesthetic autonomy
can properly mean. S It may appear that too much attention is
given to defining the aesthetic object as such, but all of the
points are relevant to our understanding of the parables.
1. Language as Symbol
The nature of language as such will be briefly considered-
insofar as it is necessary for distinguishing the aesthetic and
2 Nathan A. Scott, Jr .• The CIiT7U1te of Fllitll in Modem Literature (New

York: Sen bury Press, 1964), p. xii. Scott questions whet her literature is this.
8 TIle position of Eli.seo Vivas will serve as a kind of touchstone for 3 defi-
nition of t he aesthetic, not beca use his is the only aesth etic theory available
but because it is intrimically valuable and also especially pertinent in con-
nection with tllC problem of autonomy. While Vivas disclaims being tne
nestlletici:m of the contcxtunlj~(--o w--cri lic, Ike does a ~cut to a close
relationship between his views and the practice of the new critics (The Artis·
tic Transaction. p. 172). a relationship pointed out in Murray Kriege r, The
New Apologists for Poetry (Minneapolis; University of Minnesota Press,
1956), p. 129.
71
THE PARABLES
propositional uses of language. We may agree that there is a

"basic symbolic activity"· or "primary imagination"l1 which
enables us to grasp the phenomena of the world, to constitute
the world as a meaningful whole. According to Eliseo Vivas
this basic symbolic activity-with language being our most
important symbol-underlies the four modes of experience-
aesthetic, cognitive, moral, and religious-which exhaust the
human possibilities. s
What, more precisely, is the symbolic nature of language and
how does it enable us to grasp the world? In Wheelwright's
view a symbol is that which means, or conveys meaning, and
a word as a symbol means by pointing or making reference to
that which is no longer sensuously present. The word stands
for something.T Vivas, on the other hand, calls language at this
level a sign rather than a symbol. It is his position that a symbol
means itself or has an immanent, reflexive, non-referential
meaning before it can mean something else or be a sign.8 But
in reply to Vivas it must be said that even if language first
occurred as a complex of interrelated symbols9 and not as a
means for isolating individual objects, surely the first words had
meaning by association with external and internal objects and
not as sounds in themselves. Language came into existence as
a bridge between the inner world of mind and outer existence,
as a pointer to the latter, and arose from the capacity to sepa-
rate these two.10 Polanyi has argued that words, maps, and sym-
• Vivas, Transaction, pp. 9, 14, 16.

G Philip Wheelwright, The Burning Fountain, pp. 18,77-78 .
• Vivas, Transaction, pp. 9-10.
T Wheelwright, Fountain, pp. 18-19, 23-24 .
• EIiseo Vivas, D. H. Lawrence: The Failure and Triumph of Art (Evan·
ston: Northwestern University Press, 1960). pp. 276-277.
• As Vivas claims (Transaction, pp. 34-35).
10 Cf. Rollo May, "The Significance of Symbols," in Symbolism in Reli-
gion and Literature, ed. R. May (New York: George Braziller, 1960). pp.
21-22; Erich Kahler, "The Nature of Symbol," in Symbolism in Religion
and Literature, pp. 54-57; Elizabeth Sewell, The Orphic Voice, pp. 28-29.
72
boIs are never objects of attention in themselves but are

instruments of meaning by pointing toward the things which
they mean, that is, which they stand for. To shift attention to
the word or symbol as an object viewed in itself destroys the
meaning. Repeat the word "table" twenty times, and it be-
comes an empty sound.l1 At the same time the very fact that
there are words means that the object to which a word points
may be considered without our having to visualize or tum our
attention to the object. Language fixes or "freezes" meaning
as an entity separate from the object or referent so that it does
not merely point but also represents and acquires a certain
autonomyY~
Thus at the most basic level a word as a pointer has a
"through-meaning," and as a frozen or autonomous focus of
! attention it has an "in-meaning." The point to be developed

in the next two sections is that as linguistic development and
organization become complex, the aesthetic use of language
draws more strongly on the "in-meaning" of language while the
propositional or non-aesthetic draws more strongly on the
"through-meaning."
2. The Organic Unity and Autonomy of the Aesthetic Object

(1) Aesthetic experience is a particular and unique type of
experience of a correlative type of object. That is to say, it is
the experience of intransitive, non-referential, or rapt attention
to an object which is capable of evoking that kind of experi-
ence. In non-aesthetic modes of experience attention is transi-
tive; that is, it is referred beyond the object of concern to other
objects and meanings. In reading a scientific treatise one is
referred to the phenomena which it describes and to other
treatises about them. In evaluating a moral act one may wonder
11 Michael Polanyi, The Study of Man, p. 30. According to Polanyi, saying

that a symbol is its own meaning is a category mistake (ibid., p. 65).
12 Kahler, "Symbol," pp. 54-57; Vivas, Trcmsaction, p. 36.
73
tH£ PARABLES
about the motives which prompted it. And in Christian wor-

ship one is referred beyond the sacramental occurrences to the
historical and ontological realities which they represent, though
that is not all that one would want to say about the Christian
sacraments. In aesthetic experience, however, the attention is
totally engaged by and riveted on the object itself-at least as
an ideal. During the successful aesthetic experience the play,
painting, music, or whatever is the beholder's whole world, and
his attention is not referred beyond it. 13
The aesthetic object must be such that it can grasp our at-
tention non-referentially despite the fact that it may contain
thoughts, values, or images which are unacceptable or uninter-
esting to us outside of aesthetic experience. a A literary work is
able to grasp attention intransitively because it does not refer
to actions and thoughts which exist in the real world nor does
it even imitate the phenomenal world. It is not just a slice of
life but rather presents actions and thoughts which are imagi-
native, fictitious, hypothetical, and potentiaVII This imaginative
and hypothetical element obtains even if a work of fiction
makes some use of historical events, for those events will be
taken up into a new context or configuration which will give
them a different meaning than they had in history. Thus the
most far-reaching differentia of a work of literary art is its
form or shape or organization or pattern of connections. It is
not organized so as to elicit a train of thought that moves
beyond itself. Rather when language is used aesthetically, the
form-that to which all of the elements relate-is centripetally
organized so that all of the parts tightly cohere with each other.
18 Vivas, Transaction, pp. 12, 17, 19-32, 38; Creation and Discovery
(New York: Noonday Press, 1955), pp. xi, 93-97; Kahler, "Symbol," pp.
60-61; Wheelwright, Fountain, pp. 60-61.
16 Vivas, Transaction, p. 61.
15 Cf. Northrop Frye, Anatomy of Criticism, pp. 63-64, 80, 93; Rene
Wellek and Austin Warren, Theory of Literature (New York: Harcourt,
Brate, and World, Harvest Books, 1956), pp. 14-15.
74
Words, meanings, and actions do not point out to the world

beyond but are interlocked with each other. Thus the form
serves as a frame which gives to the literary work a certain dis-
tance from the world. This organically and inwardly unified
form keeps the beholder's attention moving from one part of
the work to another and not to the outside. 16
The organic unity of the literary work means that while
form and content may be distinguished they are not separable
in the work itself. In a story the events are a part of the con-
tent, and the way they are arranged into a plot is a part of the
form. The form is the organization of the matter. Change the
arrangement, and you have something elseP Form and content
are welded together-content is informed-by new combina-
tions and juxtapositions of words which put a strain on normal
dictionary meanings and create tension. Such a tension-gener-
ating combination is what Wheelwright means by "metaphor" \.
and Brooks by "paradox." 1S The important point is that new

meanings emerge and the literary work is the unique and or-
ganic thing which it is just through such extraordinary combi-
nations. Break up the combination, and the new meaning is
dissolved. Therefore, metaphor and paradox are not simply a
pretty and gilded way of saying something that could be said
in other words but the necessary and inevitable tools of the
literary artist,1i
lU Cf. Vivas, Transaction, pp. 49-51,57,63,157-159; Wellek and War·

ren, Literature, pp. 13, 175.231; Frye. Anatomy. pp. 77-78. 82-83.
n We.llek and Warren, Literature. pp. 128-129,231.
18 Wheelwright, Fountain, pp, 101 , 105; Metap hor and Reality. pp. 70-
90; C1eanth Brooks, "The La nguage of Pamdox," American Lit.erary Criti·
cism. cd. C . l. Glicksberg (New York: HendriCKS Hou~e, 1951 ), pp. 520-
528; cf. 31 0 Wellek and Warren, Literature, pp. 169-170, 182.
1Q Cf. Brooks, "Paradox," p. 528; "Metaphor and the F un ction of Criti·
cism ," in Spiri/Hal Problem in Contemporary LifeTotwe, ed. . R. H opper

(New York: Harper Torohbooks, 1957), pp . 133-134. The new critical
position would not accept the opinion of!t. Hepburn ("Poetry and Religious
Bdid," p. 152.) that the paradoxes in literntllre can be niore or less success·
fully reduced to a parapluase.
75
THE PARABLES
We could say in view of the organic unity of the literary

work that its meaning resides in the form-and-content as a
whole. This closely parallels the position of Polanyi that under-
standing occurs when we are focally aware of a total gestalt or
configuration and subsidiarily aware of its particular parts.20
From the aesthetic standpoint, to isolate one element in a lit-
erary work for special consideration breaks the unity of the
work and obscures the meaning of that element by removing
it from the context which provides its meaning. This is under-
lined by Polanyi's view that comprehension may be destroyed
by shifting focal attention from the gestalt to one of the sub-
sidiary particulars.21
A point made by Elizabeth Sewell indicates why language
used aesthetically grasps the attention in a way that proposi-
tional discourse does not. She has pointed out that the term
"form" includes both the ideas of abstraction and of bodily
shape and has suggested that the formal activity of the mind-
body may have its roots in the physical. Thus form-especially
when content is incarnated in it-addresses itself both to body
and mind.22 We have here a kind of correlation of the unity
of mind and body with the unity of content and shape in form.
In language used aesthetically the content depends on the
shape or pattern of connections in a way that it does not in
propositional or analytical discourse. Therefore, man in his psy-
chosomatic wholeness is addressed more completely in literary
works than in non-aesthetic discourse: because in the former
the palpable, shaping factor of the body itself is more fully
present. The union of form and content speaks to the union
of body and mind. Thus not only is thought called forth, but
those forces of the self which are ulterior to the conscious are
also engaged.
20 Polanyi, Man, pp. 29-30, 32, 44; cf. also May, "Symbols," p. H .
21 Polanyi, Man, pp. 28, 32.
22 Sewell, Orphic, pp. 34-39.
76
1;HE PARABLES, AESTHETICS, AND LITERARY CRITICISM
(2) Because the literary work is fictitious and is an inwardly

organized structure capable of attracting non-referential atten-
tion, it is also autonomous. The latter point was implied in the
preceding discussion of the literary work's organic unity, for
organicism and autonomy are two sides of the same reality.
Several aspects of autonomy need, however, to be spelled out.
As autonomous, the literary work is independent of its au-
thor. It has links with his life, but these are of no critical im-
portance, because they are fused into the new configuration
which the work is. Works of literary art reveal something that
cannot be traced to the author's biography or environment.23
His intention "is neither available nor desirable as a standard
for judging the success" of the work. The only important con-
sideration is the internal meaning of the work itself.24 If the
mother of a work of art is nature, the author is not the father
but is rather the womb or midwife while the father is the
forms and conventions which the author inherits from the lit-
erary tradition.211 This point affirms the autonomy of the work in
relation to the author but not in relation to the literary tradi-
tion; however, the dependence of a work on the latter has also
been denied.28
If the interpreter should not commit the "intentional fal-
lacy" of seeking a work's meaning in the author's intention,
neither should he commit the "affective fallacy" of confusing
the work with its psychological effects in the reader. The mis-
~5 Vivas, Creation, p. x; W enek and Warren, Literature, pp. 66-68.
26 W illiam K. Wimsatt and Monroe C. BC'Mdsley, The V erbal Icon (Lex·
ington: University of Ke ntucky Press, 1954), pp. 3- 4, 10. There is an analogy
between this position and Barth'~ view of verbal inspiration as James D .
Smart interprets it (The Interpretat-ion of Scripture, pp. 195- 196) . Revela-
tion is in the text itself and not in a 11istory or biography that can be con-
structed from it.
25 Frye, Anatomy, p. 98; d. also Wellek and Warren, LiteratuTB, pp.
66-67.
26 Vivas, Transaction, pp. 256-257; cf. also Murray Krieger, A Window
to Criticism (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1964), pp. 42-48,
52-53.
77
THE PARABLES
guided affective criticism makes such statements as "To read

this book is like living through an experience." It is not to be
denied that a work may have a heightening effect on the read-
er's consciousness, but pointing that out is no part of the
objective critical interpretation of the work.21
It has also been held that literary art is autonomous in rela-
tion to thought and society. Philosophical and theological
ideas, moral values, and social phenomena as the sociologist
sees them are not intrinsic elements in an aesthetic object.
Nor is it even proper to use the terms "truth" and "knowledge"
with reference to the aesthetic. Art is intrinsically autotelic, not
a means but an end. 28 If the artistic work is such a self-con-
tained world of new word combinations, then the belief that
it could be successfully rendered into other words or para-
phrased can only be labeled heresy. The conceptualizing, or
turning into other terms, of a work of art is always something
other than the work itself, for what the latter says can be said
in no other way.29
Murray Krieger has claimed that the new critics for the most
part have not with sufficient consistency maintained the or-
ganic and autonomous nature of literary art. It appears to be
Krieger's position (in an earlier book) that the literary work
cannot be partly closed-with all of its parts interlocked cen-
tripetally into each other-and also partly open-referring to
the world and to thought. The contextual system of the work
should be kept closed so that the reader will have to find his
way into it "by its seeming use of ordinary reference" (my
21 Wimsatt and DC:I!dsley, Icon, pp. 21 , 30. 32.

28 Vivas, Trcmsaclion, pp. 41, 63-68, 209-210. 235- 236; Wellek :lnd
Warren, Literature, pp. 91- 92, 98-99, 104, 112- 113, 175, 229; Frye,
Anatomy, p. 75. -
29 Cf. Vivas, Transaction, p. 68; Lawrence, p. 281; Cleanth Brooks, "1m·
plications of an Organic Theory of Poetry," in LiteratuIe and Belief, cd.
M. H. Abrams (New York: Columbia University Press, 1958), pp. 62- 63;
R. P. Blackmur, "A Critic's Job of Wotk," in American Literary Criticism.
pp. 388-389.
78
italics). The reader is kept within the work "bouncing from

opposition to opposition." In a good literary work no conceptu-
alizing, all-reconciling synthesis is possible because every self or
claim is met by a counterclaim. so
The autonomous theory of literary art will have to be given
some criticism in the next section. But before leaving this one,
it might be well to state a summary conclusion about the
aesthetic object which can stand in the main despite the com-
ing criticisms: The peculiar function of language used aestheti-
cally is that through its centripetal interlocking of content into
form it grasps the attention of the beholder as a total psycho-
somatic unity-including conscious and unconscious aspects-
in an intransitive or non-referential way.
3. The Aesthetic Object and the World of Life and Thought

I think that it is beyond question that a work of literary art,
as contrasted with propositional discourse, has primarily an
"in-meaning" (developed in the previous section) rather than
a "through-meaning" or pointing meaning. But does the organic
unity of the work give to it the straightforward and unequivocal
autonomy which has sometimes been claimed? The various ele-
ments are given a new context and frame of reference, to be
sure, but in themselves they stilI relate in some way to what is
already known. Otherwise there would be no communication.
Nor have the most ardent new or contextuaIist critics-even
Krieger-developed their position consistently. Sometimes those
who hold to the autonomy of art also state that the formalistic
criticism which emphasizes autonomy is not the whole story
and that a literary work somehow contains a Weltanschauung
which must confront the truth and knowledge of experience.3 !
so Murray Krieger, The Tragic Vision (New York: Holt, Rinehart, and
Winston, 1960), pp. 233-242.
81 Cf. Frye, Anatomy, p. 115; Wellek and Warren, Literature, pp. 7. 21-
23.82, 104, 140,203-204,236-237.
79
THE PARABLES
But how the literary work can have meaning both in and
through itself is not always made as clear as might be desired.
Before attempting such a clarification, however, we must con-
sider further the ambiguity and instability which one often
finds in the autonomy position.
For example, the theological and philosophical interpreta-
tion of Kafka is decried by a critic who states that a literary
analysis shows the Kafkan mode of writing to be a continuous
oscillation of hope and despair. 32 Does not the apparent impos-
sibility of avoiding theological-philosophical terms in a literary
analysis suggest that the theological and literary aspects of a
work cannot be easily separated? Vivas affirms that art and life
penetrate each other and cannot be separated since life is the
matter of art and art constitutes the world for us. But one won-
ders whether the dominant tendency of his position allows the
above affirmation. He holds, on the one hand, that the tragic
quality of certain works is "the stuff of life," including the
understanding that man is flawed and resides in a flawed cos-
mos, while, on the other hand, he maintains that moral and
existential truths are only derived and abstracted from litera-
ture. Or again, he states that the success of the aesthetic experi-
ence depends in part "on the intrinsic worth of the meanings
and values embodied," on the substance of the work, and that
the meanings must be satisfactory in order for the work to be
significant. But he ends by claiming that artistic significance
depends, not on moral, religious, or truth values, which could
be conceptualized, but on the work's capacity to inform our
affective processes or to absorb us. It is the latter view which
is more consistent with the overall logic of his position that art
is autotelic;33 yet he does not avoid altogether attributing to
82 H. S. Reiss, "Recent Kafka Criticism (1944-1955)-A Survey," in
KtJfktJ, ed. R. Gray (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1962), pp. 163-165,
In.
88 Vivas, TrtJnstJction, pp. 7, 57-58, 67-68, 76,77, 117, 131, 135. 174-
175; Creation, pp. x, xi, 123-124.
80
literary works a conceptual meaning. Krieger holds that a liter-

ary work is closed in the sense that it cannot be reduced to a
consistent, propositional paraphrase which points to an inde-
pendent system of thought, and at times he appears to deny
that it is in any way referentially open at all. Yet it is also his
position that the irreconcilable oppositions within the literary
work are reflections of and reflectors onto the "Manichean"
antitheses of existence itself.8* Perhaps he means that the con-
flict of meanings and values in the work points to the similar
conflict in life in a formal, and not material, way; but it is
still a pointing.
. In view of such ambiguity it is not surprising that some of
the most recent criticism has rejected the claim of absolute
autonomy and recognized the relevance of biographical, histori-
cal, and philosophical factors for interpretation.slI G. Ingli
James, moreover, has convincingly put his finger on a major
source of the instability. In theory a critic may hold the abso-
lute autonomy view-going back to the French symbolists-
which says that art should not try to communicate with other
men at all but is a dialogue of a mind with itself. This view
presupposes an existential understanding which holds that the
only two alternatives for man are isolated individualism or sub-
mergence in the collective. The same critic, however, in prac-
tice may work with a view of autonomy which says that while
a work of art cannot be reduced to a paraphrase, nevertheless,
since art appeals to the whole man, including his intellect, it is
not impossible nor illegitimate to extract a conceptual meaning,
which can be related to the world of thought in general. This
view presupposes an understanding of existence which says that
8& Krieger, Tragic, pp. 236-237, 242-244.

85 Cf. Learners and Discerners: A Newer Criticism, ed. Robert Scholes
(Charlottesville: The University Press of Virginia, 1964), pp. v, vi, 18,23,
25, 64; Scott, Climate, pp. xiii, xiv.
81
THE PARABLES
a person most fully realizes his individuality through participa-

tion in inter-human relationships.s8
If we cannot escape the presence of a conceptual meaning
or "through-meaning" in a literary work, how is its presence
to be accounted for in view of the centripetal organization of
language used aesthetically? We noted earlier that language
at the most basic level has an inalienable "sign," "pointing," or
"through" aspect; and this persists even when words are put
together aesthetically. Thus the words of a novel, say, point
out to objects-whether things or concepts-that have a more
general meaning than the new, particular meaning given by the
form of the novel; and the two meanings are not completely
discontinuous. 37 Furthermore, it may be questioned whether
the interlocking organization of a literary work could keep our
attention moving among elements which were completely un-
familiar to us from the phenomenal world. 38
In addition it must be said that the aesthetically organized
form or pattern of connections itself contains implicitly a
perspective on life or understanding of existence.SCI Indeed, as
we have noticed, understanding as such consists precisely in
grasping a comprehensive whole or gestalt while being subsidi-
arily aware of the parts as c1ues.40 Thus aesthetic experience
participates in the very nature of understanding. The reader
85 C. Ingli James, "The Autonomy of the Work of Art: Modem Criticism

and the Christian Tradition," in The New Orpheus, ed. Nathan A. Scott, Jr.
(New York: Sheed and Ward, 1964). pp. 194-195, 200-206. Erich Auer-
bach (Mimesis, pp. 444-445) attributes the absoluteness and isolation of
pure aesthetics to the nineteenth-century artist's aversion to his bourgeois
audience.
87 Cf. Kahler, "Symbol," p. 67; Wheelwright, Metaphor, pp. 28-29, 49-
50; Blackmur, "Critic's," p. 402; Hepburn, "Poetry," p. 97.
88 Cf. Frederick Ferre, Language, Logic, and God, pp. 128, 147.
19 Cf. Wheelwright, Fountain, pp. 296-302, 331; Metaphor, p. 16; N.
Scott, Modern Literature and the Religious Frontier (New York: Harper,
1958), pp. 32-36; Helen Gardner, The Limits of Literary Criticism (London:
Oxford University Press, 1956), pp. 18-19.
40 Cf. Polanyi, Man, pp. 26-29.
82
of a novel will inevitably, at some level of consciousness, relate

the implicit understanding of existence in the story to the un-
derstanding which he already has. In aesthetic experience, then,
our attention moves both within the pattern of connections of
the aesthetic object itself and also to the outside41 as we notice
the connection between a mountain in a painting and a moun-
tain that we have seen or the relationship between the implied
existential understanding in the form of a novel and our own
view of things.
The literary work as an autonomous focus of attention means
(has meatfIng) in itself and, as a pointer, means through itself.
The inseparability of the two ways of meaning corresponds to
the inseparable unity of body and mind in man. The human
organism is a body that thinks, and in all thinking the mind
unites with a figure-language-of its own devising.42 The form-
aspect of language corresponds to the shaping tendency of the
body and the substance-aspect to the centrifugal tendency of
discursive reason. But the two aspects cannot be separated
either in language or in man;43 yet they are not present in the
same proportion in analytical and aesthetic linguistic experi-
ence. Vivas also speaks of art as meaning both in and through
itself, but his theory does not adequately account for the
"through-meaning" and thus involves him in inconsistency.
His fundamental error, I believe, is attributing to man's basic
symbolic activity only an "in" (or non-referential) meaning
and then giving to the aesthetic a privileged relationship to the
basic symbolic activity.
The attempt to account for the presence of both an "in-
meaning" and a "through-meaning" by returning to the con-
41 Cf. Frye, Anatomy, pp. 73-74; Wheelwright, Fountain, pp. 47-50,

147-154; Metaphor, pp. 167-168.
'2 Sewell, Orphic, pp. 19-20.
48 Cf. Amos N. \Vilder, Early Christian Rhetoric, p. 33; James, "Auton·
omy," pp. 204-205.
83
THE PARABLES
cept of allegoryH does not seem helpful. To see a literary work

as an allegory vitiates its proper autonomy. On the other hand,
when Honig asserts in effect that a work is both allegorical
and autonomous411 he contradicts his own definition of an alle-
gory as a twice-told tale which draws its pattern from an old
story.48 We are on better grounds with Michael Novak4T who
tells us that fiction presents, not a philosophy, but the living
through of an experience within a certain horizon, with the
horizon being pre-philosophical. Krieger has offered a most
helpful and fruitful way of relating the literary work to the
world of life and thought while protecting its legitimate au-
tonomy. If the work operates properly, it is related to the world
sequentially as window, mirror, and window. First it is a set of
windows through which we see the familiar world referentially.
Then the windows become mirrors reflecting inwardly on each
other. In this set of reflecting mirrors the familiar and the
hitherto unperceived are organized in a new pattern of con-
nections so that in this pattern there is an implicit or pre-
conceptual existential understanding. Finally the mirrors
become windows again giving us a new vision of the world.
Thus the work, being at once word and world, leads both
somewhere else and terminally to itself. But even as window
the second time the work still offers a pre-conceptual under-
standing, and the latter is conceptualized only in criticism.4S
This represents a move beyond, or at least a clarification
of, Krieger's earlier position. Formerly he spoke of a work's
making seeming reference to the world,49 but now he speaks of
actual reference, though this is not the most important thing.
" As in Edwin Honig, Dark Conceit.

46 Ibid., pp. 93, 96, 113, 125, 181-182.
"'Ibid., p. 12.
407 "Philosophy and Fiction," p. 101.
48 Krieger, Window, pp. 30-31, 33-36, 59-65; cf. Scott, Climate, pp.
10-11.
411 Krieger, Tragic, p. 237.
84
Earlier he denied that a work can be both open and closedGO

while now he speaks of the category of "miracle" as necessary
to .account for the fact that it is both open and closed, both
window and mirror.lll
Heinrich Ott, speaking from the theologian's side, sounds
very much like Krieger. A poem speaks out of one reality and
into another which is the same. It speaks out of the old world,
but by substituting a new pattern it establishes a new world,
which is the old world seen in a new way. There is a transition
or crossing over in which the speech-world of the word and the
so-called "outer world" merge into a single level of reality.
It is not that the poem is an indication of something outside
itself, but rather when it is spoken and heard the reality which
it contains occurs or happens. 52 We could say, then, that
Krieger's miracle is a language event. The shape of the world
.as represented in a literary work may confront the reader with
a decision about what the structure of his world is to be and
carry him across the crisis of conflict into the new world of
the work.
With reference to the effort of the new criticism to avoid the
affective fallacy, it should be noted that the rejection of af-
fective criticism makes the notion of the language event ad-
ventitious to the meaning of a literary work. But if various
literary forms and various examples of a particular form differ
in their capacity to become events, then it would seem that
the question of wherein such capacity lies cannot be merely
extrinsic in evaluating the total meaning of a work. EspeciaIIy
is this true in view of the essentially linguistic nature of human
existence. If existence itself is to a considerable degree struc-
tured by our understanding of it, which occurs through lan-
DO Ibid., p. 236.
D1 Krieger, Window, p. 39.
D2 Heinrich Ott, "The Problem of Non-objectifying Thinkini and Speak-
ing in Theology," pp. 5-8.
8;
TH~ PARABLU
gnage, then it is an important matter whether a particular

linguistic object has the capacity to become an event-to give
us a new structure of understanding-and hence to change our
existence.
In this chapter it has been argued that a work of literary art
means both in and through itself but that the inner, non-
referential meaning is dominant. That it has both of these
aspects but that the one is dominant is greatly illuminated
by Polanyi's distinction between focal and subsidiary awareness
or attention. In considering the relationship of the whole of
a literary work to its parts Polanyi's position was applied above
so as to affirm that one should be focally aware of the total
structure and subsidiarily aware of the individual parts. Turn-
ing now to the question of the relationship of a work of art
to the world of life and thought, it must be said that Polanyi's
view of symbols in one place appears to be that one should
always be subsidiarily aware of the symbol and focally aware
of that to which it points.53 However, in another place54 he
may at least imply that in aesthetic experience one is focally
aware of the aesthetic object, the symbol. In any case it is
necessary to assert the latter point in order to do justice to the
difference between aesthetic and non-aesthetic linguistic ex-
perience. In non-aesthetic reading we are subsidiarily aware
of the language and focally aware of what is being pointed to.
But in aesthetic linguistic experience we are focally aware
of the linguistic structure and subsidiarily aware of any point-
ing outward to the world. Thus Polanyi's distinction enables us
to differentiate an aesthetic linguistic object from a non·
aesthetic one.
The position taken in the preceding paragraph means that
it is an overstatement to claim that in aesthetic experience
ea Polanyi, Man, pp. 30, H.

U Michael Polanyi, Personal Knowledge (rev. ed.; New York and Evan·
ston: Harper Torchbooks, 1964), pp. 193-194.
86
the attention is intransitively or non-referentially engaged,

for actually the attention is divided. As we noticed, however,
it is not divided the same way in aesthetic experience that
it is in non-aesthetic. In a truly aesthetic piece of narrative
fiction the centripetal interlocking of the parts will keep the
attention focally on the work itself. But the reader will be
subsidiarily aware-aware at lower levels of consciousnessft~
of various kinds of pointing outward to the world outside the
narrative. This understanding of the divided attention shows
why the inevitable presence of elements that point outward,
that is, of allegorical elements, need not turn a work into an
allegory. \Vhen content is ski1lfully informed, focal attention
may be kept on the work itself, although subsidiary attention
is given to certain elements that point outward. If, however, an
individual part or the philosophical orientation becomes so
obvious as to draw attention focally to itself, then the organic
unity of the work is shattered, and we have something ap-
proaching an allegory.
In fiction the focus of attention is the total narrative con-
figuration, while the pointing outward to another frame of
reference by an individual element is subsidiary and addresses
a much lower level of consciousness. In between these two is
the work's understanding of existence. In relation to the pat-
tern of events this understanding is subsidiary and implicit, and
being implicit it is pre-conceptual. But it is more nearly focal
than an individual element because it is implicit in the work as
a whole. And being implicit in the pattern composed of the
order of events and the characters' awareness, the existential
understanding is an inherent part of the work. Theological and
philosophical views of how and why things happen as they do,
if they are fused into the work's internal coherence, are not
extra-aesthetic. Therefore, being made aware of an understand-
~~ CE. Polanyi, MaTI, pp. 44-45
87
THE PARABLES
ing of existence is an inherent, though subsidiary, part of aes-

thetic experience as such.
With reference to the parables of Jesus we would then say
that focal attention should be on the whole narrative pattern
and attention somewhat less focal on the implied understand-
ing of existence. The reference of individual points to Jesus'
ministry should receive only subsidiary attention. Or to be
more accurate, when Jesus told the parables, the story itself
probably did engage the hearers' attention focally while the
pointing of certain elements in the story to aspects of Jesus'
ministry evoked only subsidiary attention. When the meaning
of the parable as a whole is grasped, however, it is a window
through which we may see the world anew.
4. The Parables as Aesthetic Objects

This section will assume that what was said about the nature
of the aesthetic object in the two previous sections applies
in essentials to the parables (though a demonstration of the
parables' aesthetic nature awaits the next section) and will
seek to show how the disregarding of their aesthetic nature nulli-
fies much of their proper function. One cannot imagine a
more pointed denial of the parables' aesthetic quality than
that found in Oesterley. According to him the form is of
no consequence and everything is concentrated in the pur-
pose for which the parable was told. The form is "merely" a
"casket" for "holding the treasure" and is not even to be con-
sidered "in view of the real thing within it."~6 This is a glaring
denial of the centripetally organized unity of form and content
which characterizes an aesthetic object. We may rarely find
this position so sharply stated, yet it is tacitly the guiding
principle of the one-point approach to the parables. Let us
58 W. O. E. Oesterley, The Gospel Parables in the Light of Their Tewish
Background, p. 82.
88
now look at two recent discussions which offer somewhat more

promise but do not consistently follow through.
Linnemann recognizes that a parable is not simply derived
from Jesus' historical situation, that despite close correspond-
ences with the latter the story is self-sustaining and thus has a
certain autonomy.~T Yet she insists that the real meaning of a
parable is the one point of comparison that links it with Jesus'
historical situation, which is the clue to its meaning. 58 Linne-
mann goes on to argue that the economy of description and
narrative development in a parable-for example, we do not
learn whether the elder son was moved to share his father's
joy-has the intention of deflecting attention from the story
to the historical situation.~9 Thus she is claiming that the
parables are intentionally non-aesthetic.
Against Linnemann it must be said that even if it was Jesus'
intention-which is doubtful-to deflect attention immediately
from the parable to the situation, in many cases it would not
have happened. A number of the parables are sufficiently well
developed aesthetically-that is, have their content sufficiently
well informed-to attract the focal attention of the hearer
non-referentially. At the same time, Auerbach 60 suggests that
economy of description may heighten rather than lessen the
power of a story to grasp the attention.
The one-point approach goes hand in hand with the severely
historical method. It sees the meaning of the parable in one
isolated factor which is connected with a situation outside of
the parable, thus shattering the parable's aesthetic unity. The
one-point, historical methodology fails to see that form ex-
ercises a pressure on matter or content, pushing the elements
57 Eta Linnemann, Die Gleichnisse Jem, pp. 32-33, 36-37.

fiBIbid., pp. 26, 32, 37-38.
59 Ibid., pp. 21, 28.
80 Mimcsis, pp. 7-9.
89
THE PAAABLES
together, so to speak, and diffusing the meaning throughout

the whole. Since this is the case, one cannot simply lift the
meaning out as if it were a drop of oil in water, for it is spread
throughout the texture of the whole parable.
G. V. Jones recognizes that Jesus' parables are art fonns
and that as such they are not propositional statements. As
works of art they "combine character and idea with pattern,"
and the pressure of the fonn gives some autonomy from the
historical situation of origin. 61 This good insight is not clearly
worked out by Jones, however, and the ambiguity of his position
is seen in his classification of the parables. He has three classes:
(a) Those parables that have little or no meaning apart from
their historical setting. (b) "Those which are capable of only
one interpretation, because they illustrate some particular
teaching" and "cannot be legitimately applied to anything else,"
yet were not evoked by any particular situation. (c) Those
which arose out of a historical situation but are capable of a
wider interpretation or application to circumstances different
from those of origin.62
Although Jones recognizes the importance of pattern or
form in art, he classifies the parables, not according to the
degree of formal development nor according to the type of
form, but rather according to what he takes to be their content.
Moreover, he places fully developed narrative parables in all
three of his classes. It is his view that those in group one (in-
cluding The Workers in the Vineyard, The Ten Maidens, The
Unjust Steward, and The Wicked Tenants) have no relevance
in themselves for later situations and can be made relevant
only by introducing an element of allegory.63 Two criticisms
must be made of this latter position: (a) He has forgotten his
61 Geraint V. Jones, The Art and Truth of the Parables, pp. 113, 122,
129-131, 163, 165.
82 Ibid., pp. 141-143.
ea Ibid., pp. 136, 144, 161.
90
own view that fonn gives to a work of art a certain independ-

ence of its situation of origin. (b) He has failed to grasp that
implicit in the very pattern of connections is an understanding
of existence. These two points together mean that at least those
parables with aesthetic fonn have an understanding of existence
which is not completely tied to their original setting. With
respect to the parables which Jones does see as having a rele-
vance for later times, it is not that he has interpreted the ex-
istential understanding implicit in the union of fonn and con-
tent, but he has rather applied a point or points of content to
later circumstances. With reference to The Divided House,
Jones notes that internal disunity is a problem in many areas
of experience: psychological, political,,\alld ecclesiastical. Or
in discussing The Talents he points out that each servant's
receiving an amount of money corresponding to his ability
(Matt. 25:15) expresses a principle of wide application.84
Jones holds, further, that the existential challenge of decision
gives an underlying unity to many of the parables of whatever
c1ass,6l1 but he does not relate this position clearly and con-
sistently to his threefold classification.
According to Linnemann every attempt to seize a parable
of Jesus by direct apprehension without going back to the
historical situation-and this, within limits, is what the aes-
thetic approach does attempt-yields no more than a theologi-
cal assertion or a moral demand. 66 If that yield is all that the
aesthetic approach accomplished, we would have to agree with
Linnemann that it is both less and other than the original
meaning of Jesus' parables.67 But the fact of the matter is that
the aesthetic approach does much more than she allows, while
it is the one-point, historical methodology which attenuates
84 Cf. ibid., pp. 144. 152. 153.

05 Ibid., pp. 153,155.
66 Linnemann, Gleichnisse. p. 41.
87 Cf. ibid., pp. 41-42.
91
THE PARABLES
the meaning of the parables by vitiating their aesthetic func-

tion.
Let us recall that language used aesthetically grasps the
attention of the total psychosomatic man in a way that propo-
sitional discourse does not because in the former, content and
form are more organically united and content depends more
on form than in the latter case. Therefore, the parables as
aesthetic objects are able to engage non-referentially the focal
attention of the whole man upon a configuration of happening
existence.6S It is because the engagement of the attention is
non-referential that the need for decision is so compelling
and the possibility of a change in the structure of existence
at the optimum. And the non-referential engagement of the
attention depends on the interlocking, centripetally organized
unity of form-and-content. The one-point, historical methodol-
ogy shatters this unity, diminishes the attention grasping power
of the total form, and hence reduces the power of the parable
to be a language event.
In addition, the understanding of the happening existence
which is implicit in the parable is implicit in the form as a
whole, and to grasp this understanding is to be focally aware
of the total gestalt. Therefore, to derive the meaning of the
parable from one point is to shift focal attention from the
whoie-its proper focus-to one of the subsidiary particulars
and thereby to distort the understanding.69
The one-point approach cannot completely destroy, of course,
the parable's proper function, for the parable will work its
effects to some extent despite an inappropriate hermeneutical
procedure. By the same token, a more fitting method cannot
completely reproduce the parable'S effect, for only the parable
08 I have adopted the term "happening existence" as a brief way of sug·
gesting that in Jesus' parables, as well as in much other literature, human
existence is not static but is always occurring-through dramatic encounters.
the acquiring of new insights. and the gaining and losing of possibilities.
69 Cf. Polanyi, Man. p. 32.
92
itself in its uniqueness can work its full effect. But critical
interpretation can do something, and that something involves
doing as much justice as possible to the particular kind of
text that it is dealing with. This means that in the case of
: Jesus' parables, in order to be appropriat~, interpretation
should not isolate one point but should call attention to the
total configuration, to the nature of the interconnections, and
to the understanding implicitly contained therein.
The parables do point in a subsidiary way to Jesus' histori-
cal situation, and interpretation must also take this into ac-
count. They are windows to Jesus' ministry in both ways that
the window analogy was used in the previous section of this
chapter. The world of which they give us a new view is the
world into which Jesus has come, and their inseparable con-
nection with Jesus' ministry gives to them for the theologian-
interpreter a· normative value that other literary works need
not have for the literary critic. At the same time it is in some
measure through the parables that the Christian community
sees Jesus as it does.
5. The Literary Criticism of the Parables

At this point it seems well to draw some lines together
and to sum up the difference between the parables themselves
and the interpretation of them. To approach this through an
analogy we might say that a novel is the pre-philosophical
living-through of an experience within an horizon To or the giv-
ing of a new configuration to pre-conceptual existential forces.'ll
This pre-articulate element must be something of what Frye
has in mind when he speaks of the "dumbness" of literature
which calls for interpretation or criticism.T2 We have noted
that in aesthetic experience focal attention is on the pattern of
10 Novak, "Philosophy and Fiction," p. 101.

71 Krieger, Window, pp. 33, 62-66.
12 Frye, Anatomy, pp. 4-5, 27-28, 86.
93
THE PARABLES
happening existence while subsidiary attention is on the im-

plied understanding of existence. In interpretation, on the other
hand, focal attention is shifted to the subsidiary thought ele-
ment which now (in interpretation) becomes focal. Thus the
strictly aesthetic posture is abandoned, with the loss of an as-
pect of its evenf character, but it is abandoned for the sake of
achieving conceptual clarity. In aesthetic experience the focal
attention is non-referentially grasped, and the whole self is
moved in ways of which the beholder or reader is not fully
aware. At the same time, because the beholder is so fully
engaged in the aesthetic object, its implied understanding of
existence and the issues of a decision between understandings
of existence may not be immediately apparent. It is in this
connection that critical interpretation can shed light and thus
enhance the language event in its own way. Interpretation can-
not, however, reproduce the attention grasping power of the
aesthetic object and the concomitant disposition of the whole
self toward or away from the world of that object. While in-
terpretation grows out of literature and seeks to be faithful to
it, it has its own conceptual framework and structure. In order
to bring what is implicit to clarity it must-in contradistinction
to literature itself-use language in a propositional, referential,
and discursive way.73
Similarly we may say that faith, as the Ne\v Testament
understands it, is the relatively non-conceptual openness of
man to the word of God. Yet faith is not devoid of an implicit
understanding or thought element, and theology is the bringing
to conceptual clarity of faith's own understanding of God,
man, and the world. As such, theological thought is to some
degree objectifying (d. chap. 2, sec. 5).
Jesus' parables as aesthetic objects are new configurations
of happening existence containing an implied understanding of
18 Ibid., pp. 6, 16, 27-28, 86, 89; Krieger, Window, pp. 62-63; Gardner,
Criticism, p. 19.
94
THE PARABLES, AESTHETICS, AND I.ITERARY CRITICISM
existence, and as biblical texts they communicate to us the
nature of faith and unfaith. That is to say, the understanding
of existence implied in the plots-in the human encounters
and their outcomes-is an understanding of existence in faith
or unfaith. The parables do not teach directly or focally about
God; therefore the first task is to work out the existential
implications of the human interrelationships within the para-
ble. But this existential understanding is then to be applied to
the divine-human relationship as a definition of faith or un-
faith. The latter step is indicated because inasmuch as the
parables are clearly a part of Jesus' proclamation of the king-
dom of God, certain figures in the parables inevitably point
subsidUirily to God, and because the element of the surprising
and the extraordinary suggests the divine dimension.
In the interpretation of the parables, then, literary criticism
and theological-existential exegesis coalesce as the conceptual
articulation of the nature of existence in faith or unfaith, which
was configured and dramatized in the parables in a pre-
conceptual way. Because the parables are window-mirror
gestalten within larger gestalten, a comprehensive interpreta-
tion of the parables requires an articulation of the relationship
of the parables to the larger complexes, that is, the Synoptic
Gospels (d. chap. 6).
Jesus' parables, of course, were first spoken and not written,
and their folk or popular character has been amply demon-
strated.74 The distinctions between folk and written literature,
however, are not hard and fast, and the continuity between
the two levels has been recognized by literary critics.75 My
purpose now is to point out certain connections between the
parables and developed literature which justify our treating the
74 Rudolf Bultmann, The History of the Synoptic Tradition, pp. 188 ff.;
B. T. D. Smith, The Parables of the Synoptic Gospels, pp. 35 ff.; Linnemann,
Gkichnisse, pp. 21 ff.
73 Cf. WelIek and Warren, Literature, p. 36; Frye, Anatomy, p. 104.
95
THE PARABLES
fonner as aesthetic objects. A number of features belonging

to narrative fiction will be briefly discussed and a few illustra-
tions from the parables will be given. Then those parables
which manifest most or all of these features and which will be
interpreted in Part Two will be mentioned. It must be shown
that content and fonn have been brought into an organic unity
which can evoke the focal attention non-referentially.
(1) Narrative fiction depicts actions and persons which be-
long to the world of imagination. Its relationship to the phe-
nomenal world is potential, and the hypothetical element is
basic.76 This is also true of the parables: they are freely in-
vented stories.
(2) In the criticism of fiction "plot" is the tenn for the
narrative structure, which is composed of smaller narrative
structures or episodes.77 In the history of Western literature
the two basic kinds of plot movement are the comic and the
tragic. In comedy we have an upward movement toward well-
being and the inclusion of the protagonist in a new or renewed
society, while in tragedy we have a plot falling toward catastro-
phe and the isolation of the protagonist from society.78 The
tenns "comedy" and "tragedy" are being used here in the
broadest possible way of plot movement. Employed in this
manner, they suggest no particular theology or philosophy but
leave the way open for various theological-philosophical impli-
cations, that is, various views about how and why catastrophe
or well-being occur. A play of Sophocles, for example, and a
parable of Jesus may both have a tragic plot structure but dif-
ferent implications about how and why the movement ends in
catastrophe. Thus there are different tragic views and different
cornie views.
In Jesus' parables these two basic plot structures are clearly
18 FIYe, Atldtomy, pp. 80,93; Wenek and Warren, Literature, pp. 14-15.
"Cf. Wenek and Warren, Literature, pp. 206-207.
18 Cf. FIYe, Anatomy, pp. 35, 162, 192.
96
seen in a number of cases. In The Ten Maidens all of the

young ladies hopefully anticipate meeting the bridegroom and
participating in the wedding feast; but as it turns out, five of
them are fina11y excluded from the festal occasion. Thus we
see a plot falling toward disappointment and isolation from a
joyous society. In The Prodigal Son, on the other hand, we see
an upward movement from destitution and despair to physical
well-being and personal reconciliation in a renewed society.
(3) The dramatic quality of fiction and of the literature of
the stage is centered in encounter-characteristically involving
conflict-and in dialogu'e.7o Auerbach has pointed out that
the concrete dramatization of two actors face to face is not
found in ancient historiography, and even the classical stage
tends toward the rhetorical. But in the Bible we do find spon-
taneous, brief dialogue and direct discourse, which affected
the later development of realism in literature.so
The Unjust Steward presents us with a rich employer and
his estate manager in a personal encounter involving both con-
flict and direct discourse. Also in The Unforgiving Servant
there are two scenes of face to face confrontation involving
direct discourse. In The Wicked Tenants the conflict reaches
the point of murder.
(4) Fictions may be classified according to the protagonist's
power of action: 81 (a) He may be superior in kind to men and
to their environment; thus he is a god, and we have the cate-
gory of myth. (b) He may be superior in degree to other
men and to their environment. The laws of nature are slightly
suspended, and magic may be present. Here we have romance-
legend, folk tale, and fairy story. (c) The protagonist may
be superior in degree to other men but not to their environ-
ment. He is subject to criticism. This mode is designated as
70 W ellek and W arren, Literatllre, pp. 206-207; Wilder, Rhetoric, p. 59.

80 Auerbach. Mimesis, pp. 75-77: d, also \Vilder, Rhetoric, p. 54,
81 Frye, Anatomy, pp. 33-34,
97
THE PARABLES
the high mimetic,S2 and in it we have epic and classical tragedy.

(d) He is superior neither to other men nor to his environment
but is rather like us. This is the low mimetic mode to which
realism belongs. (e) He is inferior so that we have a sense of
looking down on bondage, frustration, and absurdity. This is
the ironic mode.
The characters in Jesus' parables fall in a striking and con-
sistent way into one of these classes-the low mimetic or
realistic. They are people like us who can do about what we
can do. There is nothing of the mythicalSs or romantic, and
the only tendency toward the high mimetic is in the few cases
where a king appears as a character (The Unforgiving Servant;
The Wedding Garment). but this tendency is not really car-
ried out. On the other hand, even those characters who meet
a tragic fate do not belong to the ironic mode. They do not
fall into catastrophe because of external or internal determinism
but because they made a choice which was not necessary.s.
(5) The imagery or symbolism usually associated with
the low mimetic mode is at the descriptive level; that is, it
attempts "to give as clear and honest an impression of external
reality as is possible" within the hypothetical structure of
literature. The images are drawn from ordinary experience, and
the organizing ideas are making and working.s~
In the light of the foregoing the imagery of Jesus' parables
is seen to be consistent with their character type. It has often
been noted by New Testament scholars that the imagery of
the parables on the whole is not explicitly religious but is
drawn from the everyday family and business life of rural and
"~ For Aristotle art is the mimesis-imitation-of life and action (Poetics
1. 4. 6).
M" The master in The Talents takes on mythical overtones when power is
attributed to him to cast mcn into outer d.ukncss (Matt. 25:30), but this is
hardly an original part of the parable.
"4 This point will need some modification ill the latcr discussion.
"" Frye, Anatom)" pp. 79,116,154.
98
small town Palestine.s6 C. H. Dodd demonstrates at some

length the elaborated and realistic detail with which the para-
bles present the life of a small agricultural town.8T The work-
ing image is central, for example, in The Workers in the Vine-
yard and in The Talents.
When we consider Jesus' parables in connection with these
features from the literary tradition-and the literary tradition
has also been considered in connection with the parables-
several parables emerge as clearly defined works of narrative
literary art and fall into two formal classes. In the class of low
mimetic, realistic tragedy we see realistic imagery and ordinary
people in dramatic encounters and conflicts moving downward
toward catastrophe. Here we have The Talents, The Ten Maid-
ens, The Wedding Garment, The Wicked Tenants, and The
Unforgiving Servant.ss In the class of low mimetic, realistic
comedy we view realistic imagery and ordinary people in dra-
matic, face-to-face confrontations moving upward toward well-
being. Here we have The Workers in the Vineyard, The Un-
just Steward, and The Prodigal Son. Since these parables have
an identifiable form, they should be treated as aesthetic objects.
And one of the main reasons for approaching them first from
the standpoint of their understanding of human existence and
then seeing the divine impingement as an implication of this
understanding of existence is that in none of these parables is
80 Cf. Joachim leremias, The Parables of lesus, p. 11; Jones, Parables, pp.
112- 113; Ernst} uchs, Studies of the Historical Jesus. p. 73; "The New
Testamen t and the Hermeneutical Problem," in The New Hermeneutic, p.
126; J. Alexander Findlay, Jesus and llis Parables (London: The ReligIOUS
Book Club. 1951). preface; Wilder, Rhetoric, p. 81.
87 C. 11. Dodd. The Authorit.y of the Bible (London: Nisbet, 1948). pp.
148-152.
88 In view of the promiNence of the tragic motif. it is strange that Findlay
should c1ai J~ lIs ' support fOl hi5 own view that man's basic nature is good,
if not divine. and that the "debunking" novels are in error. Cf. Findlay,
Parables. pp. l30-131. 137. 141- 142. Findlay seems to assu me that because
Jesus used ordinar:y, human, non-religious imagery he automatically consid-
ered man basically good or diviDe.
99
THE PARABLES
the fonnal shape detennined by the figure that points subsidi-

arily to God. Rather in every case the fonn is detennined by
the story of a very human character, or characters. For example,
in The Talents the fonnal shape of the story is detennined,
not by the employer, but by what happens to the one-talent
man.
In the parables which we will consider, the plot, on the
whole, is the controlling fonn to which all else is related.slI
This is not surprising in view of the fact that for the Bible in
general the basic speech-mode is the story-a narration of action
in time-and this fact suggests that in the biblical view life
itself is of the nature of a dramatic plot. Other religions, of
course, have used stories, but "the narrative mode is uniquely
important in Christianity."90
The primacy of plot in the parables makes the Aristotelian
literary approach especially pertinent, for the heart of Aristotle's
famous definition of tragedy is that it is the imitation of a
serious action. Therefore, of the six parts of a tragedy-plot,
characters, diction, thought, spectacle, and melody-the most
important is plot, the combination of the incidents.lll This
point of view has been taken up by the "neo-Aristotelians"
who have argued that imagery and other elements receive their
meaning from their place in the plot.92
Our emphasis on plot, however, shouid not make us forget
that all narrative literature contains both plot and theme or
thought in some relationship. In fact they are two sides of
the same fonnal principle with plot being theme in movement
.. Cf. Frye, Anatomy, pp. 82-83.

10 Wilder, Rhetoric, pp. 20, 37-38, 64, 7S-79; Samuel Laeucbli, The
Language of Faith, p. 232.
01 Aristotle Poetics 6; d. Wheelwright. Fountain, p. 188.
02 W. R. Keast, "The 'New Criticism' and King Lear," in Critics and
Criticism. ed. R. S. Crane (Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1952),
pp. 120-121; Elder Olson, "William Empson, Contemporary Criticism,
aDd Poetie Diction," in Critics and Criticism. p. 54.
100
and theme being plot at a standstill. In some works plot is

more important, while in others theme is, but the decision
about which one is more prominent will often be a matter of
interpretive emphasis. Of plot we ask "How will it tum out?"
and of theme "What is the point?"DS Of the eight parables
which we will consider it seems probable that plot is somewhat
more prominent in The Unjust Steward, The Ten Maidens,
The Talents, The Wedding Garment, and The Wicked Ten-
ants, while in The Prodigal Son, The Workers in the Vineyard,
and The Unforgiving Servant, theme is perhaps more promi-
nent. We may bring together our existential (thematic) and
aesthetic concerns by stating that the ontological possibility-
possibility in principle-of losing existence is aesthetically the
tragic movement, and the ontological possibility of gaining
existence is aesthetically the comic movement. How either one
occurs ontically-actually or concretely-is seen in the nature
of the connections between events-as whether one episode
follows another through the exercise of freedom or by being
determined-and in the thought and self-understanding of the
characters. Since a parable as an aesthetic object is within
limits an autonomous world, the gain or loss of the one op-
portunity which is presented in the parable suggests the gain
or loss of existence itself.
The organic unity of form and content may be briefly dem-
onstrated by a look at The Talents. In the beginning of the
story an employer called together three servants to each of
whom he gave an amount of money, and in this first part of the
story we see how they handled what had been given to them.
In the middle part the master returned and required the three
servants to give an account of their behavior. Here the emphasis
is on the one-talent man, who explained his earlier behavior
and thereby gave expression to his understanding of existence.
.. Frye, Anatomy, pp. 52-53, 82-83: Wellek and Warren, Literatur.,
p.208.
101
THE PARABLES
In the conclusion the consequence of parts one and two are

drawn out. A man who behaves and thinks as the one-talent
man loses all. Thus we have a beginning, middle, and end in-
terlocked within a plot moving downward from well-being to
loss.
At this point we might elaborate somewhat on the existential
implications of plot structure by considering the critical meth-
odology worked out by Preston Roberts. Roberts asks certain
pertinent questions of the plot (the direction of its movement,
the content of the recognition scene, the object of the char-
acter's accusations, the nature of the protagonist's flaw, the
implications of the ending, the presence or absence of freedom
and openness),04 and because these questions are variously
answered in different works, we are able to see different under-
standings of the possibilities of human existence. In Roberts'
approach our grasp of a work's existential understanding grows
out of being attentive to the interrelationships of the elements
within the aesthetic object and not out of speculations about
the author's original theologicalintent~ons -nor out of any al.
legorical pointing outward in the story. Working in this way
Roberts has identified three different motifs, each combining
plot and symbolism in a unity, which present three different
views of what man's possibilities are. \Ve may summarize:
(a) The tragic (ciassicai) image of man is that of a noble
figure flawed by finite ignorance and/or hybris moving without
freedom from good to bad fortune and to an end "after which
there is nothing." In his recognition scene he comes to the
bitter knowledge that he has accomplished the opposite of his
intentions, and "he accuses the very character of life and his-
tory" or his own unalterable essence.OIl
U Preston Roberts, "A Christian Theory of Dramatic Tragedy," TOUTtldl

of Religion, 31 (1951), 8, 10-12, 14-16; "Bringing Pathos into Focus,"
Motive, 14 (December, 1953),9-10.
n Roberts, "Tragedy," pp. 10-II, 14-17, 20; "Pathos," p. 10.
102
(b) The modern image of man is that of a more or less

abnormal figure-a victim of psychological, sociological, or
cosmic forces-moving without freedom from a bad to a worse
situation and to an end after which there is nothing. In the
recognition scene-if he is capable of recognizing any thing-
he is aware of the loneliness and misery of his life and accuses
the nature of life and history.96
( c) The Christian image of man is that of a more or less
normal figure flawed by idolatry and pretension moving with
limited but real freedom from a bad to a good situation and to
an ending which is a new beginning, even if it is life found in
death. In the recognition scene he is aware of guilt, judgment
and forgiveness and accuses himself, but a contingent, forgiv-
able self, not an unalterable essence.D7
Roberts' approach will be helpful in interpreting the para-
bles; and the parables in turn are illuminating models for a
literary representation of the Christian view of man, models
which may suggest (in Part Two) certain modifications of
Roberts' view of the Christian motif. The contrasts with the
classical and modern motifs will also help to clarify the Chris-
tian motif. It should be noticed here that what Roberts sets
forth as the Christian motif is really a comic or redemptive
movement, and it has been strongly urged by others that a
Christian literary representation should present a resolution
of man's existential predicament.DB Jesus' tragic parables show,
however, that the New Testament may present as a self-
contained and independent work just the tragic possibility
which the Christian understanding of existence holds out. But
the reasons for the movement to catastrophe will be different
from those in Greek tragedy or modern pathos. It is true, more-
ge Roberts, "Tragedy," p. 14; "Pathos," pp. 8-9.

97Roberts, "Tragedy," pp. 10-12. 16-17; "Pathos." p. 10.
98William V. Spanos, "Christian Drama and the Contemporary Religious
Consciousness," The Christian Scholar, 46 (1963), 320.
103
THE PARABLES
over, that the full Christian story is a comedy, but a comedy in

which tragedy is included and overcome, as we see in The
Prodigal Son.
In concluding this section we may give somewhat more
attention than we have to the theological significance of the
realistic imagery in Jesus' parables. The very fact that Jesus
compared the kingdom of God to ordinary, everyday people and
activities suggests some kind of analogy between God and
man.o9 But in view of the problems which we noticed in chap-
ter 2 connected with describing God, Dodd is probably going
too far when he states that the realism of the parables suggests,
not a "mere analogy," but "an inward affinity" between the
spiritual order and daily life, with nature and super-nature
being one order.loo No figure or action in the parables tells us
literally what God is like, but the parables do tell us that God
meets us and we are put in touch with him in the everyday
and that when we respond to him our existence is structured
like that of the prodigal son and not like that of the unforgiv-
ing servant. In the parables "God and the world come t<r
gether"IOl showing life in the world to be meaningful. Novak
has remarked that realities like water, fire, sun, earth, love, and
hate seldom fall within our horizons any more; we are too
preoccupied with our hour-by-hour schedules.lo2 It is just such
images as these, however, which meet us in the parables. We
confront the love of the prodigal's father and the hatred of
the wicked tenants. Vineyard owners know what the earth is
like as does an unscrupulous steward who was too weak to dig.
The burning heat of the day bears down on vineyard workers,
but burning lamps light the festive way of a bridegroom.
ee A. M. Hunter, Interpreting the PaTtJbles, pp. 15-17.
100 C. H. Dodd, The Parables of the Kingdom, p. 10; cf. also A. T.
Cadoux, The Parables of Jesus, p. 57.
101 Cf. Gerhard Ebeling, Word and Faith, p. 356.
102 Novak, "Philosophy and Fiction," p. 102.
104
These images, placed in their new configurations of meaning,

call us out of our chronological preoccupations.
The impingement of the divine upon the human is indicated
not only by the fact that Jesus compared the kingdom of God
to ordinary happenings, but-even more importantly for our
purposes-by the way everyday reality is dealt with in the
parables themselves. Auerbach has shown that in the literature
of antiquity outside of the Bible, everyday reality is treated in
a light, comic mode but not seriously or tragically. In the Bible,
on the other hand, ordinary and everyday reality is mingled
with the problematic and tragic. Auerbach, furthermore, sees
the Bible's rejection of the separation between the everyday
and the serious as being based on the principle of the incarna-
tion: God became incarnate in a human being of most humble
origin. "The story of Christ with its ruthless mixture of every-
day reality" with high and "sublime tragedy" broke the classi-
cal rule of style.10s
The parables manifest this incarnational principle-this
serious treatment of the everyday-by combining the realistic
with the extraordinary and improbable. The behavior of the
prodigal's father and of the vineyard owner is not what we
would expect under the circumstances; the debt which the un-
forgiving servant owed was fantastic, and the commending of
the dishonest steward surprises us; it is strange that a father
would send his son to collect rent after his servants had been
maltreated by the tenants, and it seems unnecessarily harsh for
the bridegroom to have shut out the tardy maidens.104 Such
features burst the limits of the probable but are kept locked
into the narrative frame and hence are rendered possible and
loa Auerbach, Mimesis, pp. 19, 26-27, 29, 36-39, 131-136, 489-490.
Spanos ("Christian Drama," pp. 319-320) suggests that contemporary
I Christian drama should be based on the principle of the incarnation.
10' CE. Jeremias, Parables, p. 30; Linnemann, Gleichnisse, p. 36; Jones,
- I
Parables, p. 116.
105
,,1-1£ PAAABLU
cOllvincing. 1011 As Wilder106 has pointed out, this element of
the extraordinary echoes the eschatological crisis note of Jesus'
preaching. But it is not that such features as the one-talent
man's loss of his talent, the shutting out of the foolish maidens,
and the imprisonment of the unforgiving servant are allegori-
cal pointers to the final judgment. Rather the understanding of
existence implicit in eschatologylo1 has been given a new and
different configuration in the parables.
In view of the above one hesitates before the unconscious
allegorizing which says directly that the hearer of Jesus' para-
bles may relate himself to God as the prodigal does to his
father or the late laborers do to the vineyard owner. lOS This
position tends to suggest that the father or vineyard owner
(allegorically) is God. It seems closer to the standpoint of
the parables themselves to say that the element of the extraor-
dinary does not point directly to God, but being fused into the
story-into the aesthetic mingling of the realistic and the sur-
prising-it suggests that everyday existence is crossed by the
problematical, contingent, and unpredictable. This in turn does
suggest indirectly an openness of existence to the transcend-
ent,lOIl and it is in this way that eschatological awareness would
be represented within the aesthetic. The parables' existential
understanding is that existence is gained or lost in the midst
of ordinary life, that the eschatological occurs within the
everyday,uo It should be remembered that the parables also
105 Cf. Linnemann, GleicTmisse, pp. 20, 36.

106 Rhetoric, pp. 82-85.
107 Cf. Rudolf Bultmann, "Man between the Times According to the
New Testament," pp. 248-266.
108 Fuchs, Historical Jesus, p. 221.
109 The parables turn out to be different from most low mimetic realistic
literature, in which the divine has little place. Cf. Frye, Anatomy, p. 154.
110 This intermingling of the everyday with the eschatological opposes the
dichotomy Bonhoeffer saw between the existentialist theology of the bound
ary situation and the theology of God in the midst of life. CE. Dietrich Bon·
hoeffer, Letters and Papers from Prison, ed. E. Bethgc, trans. R. H. Fuller
106
give our understanding of God some positive content in the

sense indicated in chapter 2 (cf. pp. 64-66).
As a kind of epilogue to this chapter, I find it hard to agree
with the position of John Killinger that an artist may not
serve Christianity in the highest fashion. "No man existentially
concerned with last things," he says, would give his time to
building a cathedral or writing a Commedia.l11 Killinger seems
to presuppose that Christian faith is something separable from
life which can and should be pursued in independence of other
things. This would entail holding that no vocation except the
professional ministry can serve Christianity in the highest way.
If, on the other hand, Christian faith is a way of living and
understanding life in this world as given by God, and if last
things are the existential crises of everyday life, then the artist's
vocation may be as highly Christian as any other and he may
be quite eschatologically involved. Jesus must have had to give
some time to the creation of the parables.
(New York: Macmillan Paperbacks, 1962), pp. 113, 165-166, 190-191,
195-197.
111 John Killinger, The Failure of Theology in Modern Literature (New
York: Abingdon Press, 1963). pp. 223-224. In fairness to Killinger it should
be said that he does consider art very significant.
107
PART TWO
INTERPRETIVE
- .
4
The Tragic Parables
We should remind ourselves that the category of tragedy

is being used in the broad sense of a plot moving downward
toward catastrophe and the isolation of the protagonist. From
this standpoint certain of the parables may be called tragic.
These parables also share with tragedy in general a thematic
attentiveness to the insecurities and contingencies of lifel
and to the question of what it mea:ns to be when one is in a
boundary situation.2 As one turns, however, to the why and
how of catastrophe and insecurity and to the question of the
content of human existence, certain significant differences
between Jesus' tragic parables and other tragedies may be noted.
While human freedom is not absent from classical tragedy,8
the emphasis is on fate, a fate that is stronger than the gods;"
that is, man's lot is often determined by external forces having
no moral implications.1i Divine interventions, oracles, or
family curses are able to initia.te and direct action. 6 In the
opinion of Oscar Mandel the inevitability of suffering is the
1 CE. Nathan A. Scott, Jr. (ed.), The Tragic Vision and the Christian
Faith (New York: Association Press, 1957), p. x.
2 Richard B. Sewall, The Vision of Tragedy (New Haven and London:
Yale University Press, paperback ed., 1962), p. 5.
a Ibid., p. 45; William C. Greene, Moira (New York: Harper Torch-
books, 1963), p. 91.
.. Northrop Frye, Anatomy of Criticism, p. 208; Sewall, Tragedy, p. 45.
a Greene, Moira, p. 90.
a Ibid.
110
THE TRAGIC PARABLES
very kernel of the definition of tragedy. In the tragic vision

there is a necessary and inescapable fatal defect in the rela-
tionship between an undertaken purpose and the protagonist's
world. What he attempts inevitably leads to suffering.'
In Jesus' tragic parables freedom is much more apparent.
We do not find action being instigated and determined by such
factors as divine oracles and family curses. Yet the note of
inevitability is present. Man is free to act in various ways
but not to avoid the consequences. One cannot have a certain
understanding of existence and act upon it without meeting
catastrophe, that is, losing his existence; but one need not
have that understanding of existence. In the five parables which
we will consider a particular course of action is inexorably
followed by a downfall. The grounding of this inevitability,
however, is not the same as in classical and certain other
tragedy.
The tragic hero of the literary tradition-especially in classi-
cal tragedy-initiates and pursues a course of action that has
a certain seriousness or magnitude. He answers the call of
honor regardless of the consequences, pursuing his purpose in
the face of every obstacle and acting in the interest of what he
regards as most authentic about himself.8 That the tragic hero
suffers or dies matters little since he saves his authentic self
by refusing to sink into second-hand morality.9 What man is
found capable of at the boundary situation is the truth of
tragedy.lO
The purposeful action of the tragic hero must be seen
1 Oscar Mandel, A Definition of Tragedy (New York University Press,

1961), pp. 20, 23, 24.
8 CE. Mandel, Tragedy, p. 20· Greene, Moira, p. 91; Gilbert Norwood,
Greck T ragedy (Dl'amabooks cd .; Ncw YolI.. ; IIilI and Wang, n.d.), p. 178;
Nathan A. Scott, Jr., "The Bins of Comedy and the Narrow Escape into
Faith," T l!(s Christian SellOlar, 44 ( 1961),17.
9 Norwood, Tragedy, p. 178.
10 Sewall, Tragedy, p. 7.
111
THE PARABLES
against its ultimate backdrop. There is in the tragic view a

balanced cosmic order made up of neutral parts so that no one
element should be elevated: "the truth is in the whole."ll The
human protagonist, with his finite limitations and his involve-
ment in the world of action, cannot see the whole and, there-
fore, acts to affirm a part of it as he relentlessly pursues his
purpose. Thus his finite ignorance and mistaken judgment
engender hybris-a challenge to the balanced order. Hybris,
however, is not "sin." It is not that his pursuit is in itself
wrong but rather that in elevating one part of the neutral
order he is causing an imbalance. Without hybris, however,
there would be no significant action. The order reacts to bal-
ance itself once more-perhaps through human actions, per-
haps through nature-and the hero is crushed. The rebalancing
of the cosmic order mayor may not coincide with moral
"j ustice."12
When we iook at Jesus' tragic parables, we would not, I
think, say that the protagonists are moved by purposes of a
certain seriousness or magnitude. Their actions are quite
everyday in character. Nor are Jesus' characters intentioned
by the call of honor come what may; they act, rather, to pre-
serve their safety, to secure a simple pleasure, or to obtain a
benefit for themselves whatever the cost to others. The deeds
of the paraboiic characters are not neutral acts of unbalancing
the order of the universe but are rather wrong or evil in the
light of norms held by another character or found implicitly in
the telling of the story. The protagonist's downfall comes
because the character whose norms he has violated has the
power to dispose of him and personally reacts to do so. As we
11 Cf. H. D. F. Kitto, Greek Tragedy (rev. cd.; Garden City, New York:
Doubleday Anchor Books, 1954), pp.151-153; Edmond La B. Cherbonnier,
"Biblical Faith and the Idea of Tragedy," in The Tragic Vision and the
Christian Faith, p. 26.
12 Cf. Kitto, Tragedy, pp. 151-153; Cherbonnier, "Tragedy," p. 27;
Greene, Moira, p. 93; Sewall, Tragedy, pp. 35-37.
112
THE TRAGIC 'ARABLES
noticed in chapter 3, the characters who have the power of

disposal point subsidiarily to Cod; thus the human interrela-
tionships in the parables point indirectly to possible divine-
human relationships and to the nature of sin and judgment.
To lose one's true existence and to experience the judgment of
Cod are two sides of the same reality, and it is the loss of ex-
istence, rather than a demonstration of the greatness that man
is capable of in boundary situations, which appears in the
tragic parables. We see then that some of the characteristic
motifs of tragedy are modified in Jesus' tragic parables both by
their everyday realism and by the influence of the biblical
understanding of sin.
In concluding this introductory section we may note that
if typically modern tragedy is informed by a sense of the death
of Cod,ta Jesus' tragic parables are sharply different in that
existential extinction is a possibility precisely because of Cod
and his judgment.
1. The Talents (Matt. 25:14-30)

14 For it will be as when a man going on a journey called his serv-
ants and entrusted to them his property; IDto one he gave five
talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his
ability. Then he went away. l6He who had received the five
talents went at once and traded with them; and he made five
talents more. 1180 also, he who had the two talents made two
talents more. lSBut he who had received the one talent went and
dug in the ground and hid his master's money. 19Now after a long
time the master of those servants carne and settled accounts with
them. 20And he who had received the five talents carne forward,
bringing five talents more, saying, "Master, you delivered to me
five talents; here I have made five talents more." 21His master said
to him, "Well done, good and faithful servant; you have been
faithful over a little, I will set you over much; enter into the joy
of your master." 22And he also who had the two talents came for-
18 CE. Scott, "Comedy," pp. 10-12.
113
THE PARABLES
ward, saying, "Master, you delivered to me two talents; here I

have made two talents more." 23His master said to him, "Well
done, good and faithful servant; you have been faithful over a lit-
tle, I will set you over much; enter into the joy of your master."
2'He also who had received the one talent came forward, saying,
"Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not
sow, and gathering where you did not winnow; 20so I was afraid,
and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what
is yours." 26But his master answered him, "You wicked and sloth-
ful servant! You knew that I reap where I have not sowed, and
gather where I have not winnowed? 27Then you ought to have in-
vested my money with the bankers, and at my coming I should
have received what was my own with interest. 28S0 take the talent
from him, and give it to him who has the ten talents. 29For to
every one who has will more be given, and he will have abundance;
but from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away.
aOAnd cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness; there
men will weep and gnash their teeth."
(1) H istorico-literary criticism. While The Talents in

Matthew shows fewer allegorical additions than Luke's The
Pounds, Luke's parable may be more original on the point
of the amount of money (cf. Matt. 25:15; Luke 19:13);14 and
The Talents does reveal some secondary features. Matt. 25:30
is a favorite-and peculiarly-Matthean saying (d. 8: 12; 22: 13)
which turns the master of the parable into the eschatological
judge. it is not originai here, nor is it a saying of Jesus at
all. Also the "enter into the joy of your Lord" (25:21, 23) ap-
pears to be an allegorical addition with both christological
and eschatological overtones.
Matt. 25 :29 was a free-floating saying (cf. Mark 4:25; Matt.
13:12; Luke 8:18) and is scarcely original here. Against those
who deny the genuineness of Matt. 25:28,15 however, it should
be said that 25:29-which applies the point in 25:28 rather
IfJoachim Jeremias, The Parables of Tesus, pp. 27-28.

1DAs A. T. Cadoux, The Parables of Tesus, pp. 67-68; B. T. D. Smith,
The Parables of the Synoptic Gospels, p. 167.
114
THE TRAGIC PARABLES
than interpreting the thought of the parable as a whole-would

hardly have been added had not 25:28 already been there. Nor
will Cadoux's point stand that the one-talent man had already
given his allotted funds back in 25:25. making 25:28 therefore
superfluous. l6 The answers of the five- and two-talent men
(25 :20, 22) are essentially the same in form as that of the one-
talent man, but there is no indication that they were giving
up their allotment. The one-talent man in 25 :25 is simply re-
porting that he had kept his money safely. Jeremias regards
25:28 as an original part of the parable but as of secondary
importance.n But it must be said that it is secondary only
from the standpoint of the severely historical approach. For
the aesthetic approach it is indispensable as a means of giving
the narrative form its rounded completeness, of revealing the
consequences of the one-talent man's action and understanding.
The logic of what has gone before both calls for it and makes
it important.
The context in which Matthew places the parable, as well as
his addition of 25: 30, shows that for him it is a Parousia par-
able. For Jesus, too, it had an eschatological import,18 but in
the sense indicated in chapter 3, not by pointing directly and
allegorically to the final judgment. It is probable that Jesus had
in mind in telling this parable those Jews-or the scribes in
particular-who held fast to the law and excluded from their
concern the outsiders, thus failing to be good stewards of their
covenant heritage. 19 But what is the understanding of existence
contained in the parable and attributed to those Jews by the
fact that the one-talent man points subsidiarily to them?
(2) Literary-existential analysis. As we have already noted
16 Cadoux, Parables, p. 68.

17 Jeremias, Parables, p. 62.
18 Cf. ibid., pp. 63, 166.
10 Cf. Cadoux, Parables, pp. 106, 107; C. H. Dodd, Thll PartJbles of the
Kingdom, pp. 117-119; Smith, Parables, p. 168; Jeremias, Parables, p. 62.
115
THE PARABLES
(chapter 3) the tragic shape of the plot of the parable derives

from the experience of the one-talent man. He began as a free
man, for no external factors and no internal force beyond his
own will compelled him to hide his talent in the ground while
the other two men traded with their money. He could have
done otherwise. It was his decision to unqerstand himself in
the world as he did and to act upon his understanding. But the
very movement of the plot to catastrophe means that one can-
not think and act as he did without losing his existence, that
is~ without being inauthentic or existentially dead. If the out-
come of such an understanding is ultimately the death of the
self, then death is implicit in it from the beginning. To grasp
the content of his understanding we must tum to the recogni-
tion scene in the middle part of the parable. But some consid-
eration of the significance of the recognition scene itself is first
called for.
By recognition is meant the enlightenment of the protagonist
with regard to the true nature of his actions at the moment of
catastrophe.20 As Mandel has pointed out, there are three pos-
sibilities with regard to the relationship of recognition to the
story as a whole: (a) The protagonist may be lucid throughout.
He knows what to expect and is not surprised by his misery.
(b) He may have the hope of success and be unaware of the
disaster that his purpose entails. Tnis is true recognition trag-
edy, for here the protagonist recognizes the painful truth only
when it is too late. (c) The protagonist proceeds and suffers in
ignorance.21
Jesus' parables on the whole belong to the second type. The
protagonist is not expecting catastrophe and realizes after it is
too late that his downfall is now inescapable. Thus it is a for-
mal principle of Jesus' parables that the recognition scene oc-
curs characteristically between the initiating or tragic action of
Ie. Cf. Mandel, Tragedy, p. 148.
211bid.
116
THE TRAGIC PARABLES
the protagonist and his downfall. The recognition, however,
may be only implicit or may hardly be present at all (as in The
Wicked Tenants) in which case the parable gravitates toward
the third category above. Here it needs to be pointed out that
these formal aspects have an existential implication which in-
clines one to modify a distinction which Preston Roberts has
drawn between the Greek-tragic and Christian literary motifs.
According to Roberts the recognition scene in Greek tragedy
is likely to be after the tragic deed because such tragedy is born
of finite ignorance and erring judgment.22 In the case of the
Christian hero, on the other hand, the chief problem is not
knowledge. He sees some alternatives as clearly good and some
as clearly evil. The choices are not ambiguous; therefore, in the
Christian story the recognition scene characteristically comes
before the tragic deed. 28
As we have noticed, Roberts' position is not borne out, at
least, in the case of Jesus' parables. It is true that the chief
problem of Jesus' protagonists is not finite ignorance, but it is
not true that they see their alternatives clearly and unambigu-
ously as good or evil. The very fact that the parabolic charac-
ters see the folly and self·destructiveness of their deeds-when
they do in fact see these things-only after they have acted
shows that their actions were infused with blindness. This
formal-existential theme is paralleled in Jesus' non-parabolic
teaching. The perversity of the men of Jesus' generation is
epitomized in their inability to perceive the significance of their
own time (Luke 12:54-57; Matt. 16:1-4). It would not be fair
to blame them if what they lacked was intellectual knowledge
or information. But their imperception or blindness is repre-
hensible and blameworthy because it is a lack of that aware-
ness which is given with existence itself when the latter is
22 Preston Roberts, "A Christian Theory of Dramatic Tragedy," pp.

]0, 16.
28 Ibid., pp. 12, 16.
117
THE PARABLES
turned in the right direction. That is, they are considered

capable of responding to Jesus' presence and word. Their blind-
ness is grounded ina self-deception which has come to believe
its own lies and therefore cannot recognize what is true and
right. What is really darkness is taken to be light (Matt. 6:22-
23; Luke 11:34-35). With the question of what understanding
of existence produces such blindness we return to The Talents.
In the recognition scene we have face to face confrontation,
direct discourse, and conflict in the case of the master and the
one-talent man. The latter explained to his master why he hid
his talent in the ground. Part of his explanation turns out to
be the real reason, though not a good reason, for the hiding,
while another part of his reason was rejected by the master as
untrue. Our protagonist had some dim awareness of why he
had acted as he had, but he did not through his own resources
recognize the evil and folly of it. He was informed of the latter
by his master after it was too late for him to do anything
about it.
The one-talent man stated that because he knew his master
to be a hard man, reaping where he had not sown, he was afraid
and therefore hid his talent. Then he showed his master that
he had preserved what was his. The master replied that if his
servant really had known him to be a hard and scheming man
he would have invested his money for the eaming of interest.
The one-talent man had not acted on what he claimed was his
reason, thus it must not have been his real reason. The fact
remains, however, that he was afraid. Therefore, he acted to
preserve his safety. Or to be more precise, he acted as little as
possible. He sought to avoid the risk of trading in the market
and expected to stay at least minimally in his master's good
graces by preserving exactly what had been entrusted to him.
He hoped for a safe bargain. In the fear of the one-talent man
we see the anxiety of one who will not step into the unknown.
He will not risk trying to fulfill his own possibilities; therefore,
118
THE TRAGIC PARABLES
his existence is circumscnbed in the narrowest kind of way.

Action is paralyzed by anxiety, and the self of our protagonist
is only a shadow of what it potentially is.
Although the one-talent man hoped to retain the favor of
his master, he revealed an obscure and inchoate sense of guilt
which is seen in the fact that he accused his master of hardness
and thus tried to make the latter responsible for his own failure.
Moreover, his verbal expression of fear and his refusal to risk
action are an implicit accusation against life itself. They show
that he viewed the universe as inimical to the human enter-
prise and saw self-defensive non-action, therefore, as the appro-
priate course to take in life.
The servant's breach of trust in failing to do business with
his master's goods 24 is grounded in his existential flaw. He
started as a free man, but he refused to be responsible. That is,
when he faced the crisis of having to give an account of his
actions, he placed the blame for his failure on someone and
something other than himself. In refusing to hold himself ac-
countable he understood himself as a victim, and in under-
standing himself as a victim he was a victim, unable to act
significantly. The master, by rejecting the charge that he (the
master) was a hard man, forced the servant to see-at least by
implication-that he himself (the servant) was responsible.
The servant was paralyzed, not because he was in a victimizing
context, but because he chose to understand himself as a vic-
tim. By that time, however, it was too late to act differently
because the talent was to be taken from him. \Ve see the fol-
lowing connected movement: from the refusal to take a risk,
through repressed guilt which is projected onto someone else,
to the loss of the opportunity for meaningful existence. The
refusal to take a risk results in an inability to hold oneself
accountable, but it is also grounded in a sense of the universe
24 Cf. Dodd, Parables, p. 118; 'Wilhelm Michaelis, Die Gleichnisse Je~u,
pp. 107-108.
119
THE PARABLES
as hostile. The circle is vicious. The man whose primary con-

cern was to avoid risk and to be safe was forced to recognize
that self-protective non-action is not after all the way to well-
being.
The ending-the clear implication that the talent is to be
taken from him (25:28)-is something after which there is
nothing. The autonomy of the aesthetic object prevents our
speculating about what further opportunities he might have
had, and the existential implication of this is that the one-
talent man's understanding of existence is non-existence. Smith
holds, as a part of his view that 25:28 is not genuine, that the
one-talent man would actually have been glad to be rid of his
responsibility.211 But Michaelis is right that his being no longer
able to administer the talent is a punishment.26 The one-talent
man himself, from what we learn of him, may well have been
glad to be free of his responsibility; but the meaning of a work
of narrative art is not exhausted by the perspective of one or
all of the characters. From the standpoint of the story as a
whole, the being rid of his responsibility is at the same time
the loss of opportunity, of possibility, of a place to exist mean-
ingfully in the world.
(3) Existential-theological interpretation. When the parable's
understanding of existence is seen as a pointer to the divine-
human relationship, the refusal to risk and the concomitant
inability to hold oneself responsible become unfaith. The man
who retreats from risking his life wants to provide his own
security, whether it be in material goods (Matt. 6:25-34; Luke
12:16-20) or in a sense of religious achievement (Luke 18:
• 10-14). Such seeking for security is death, for in it one be-
comes the slave of the very realities which he hopes will give
him security. To know on the other hand, that one is sus-
I .
25 Smith, Parables, p. 167.

28 Michaelis, Gleichnisse, p. 110.
120
THE TRAGIC PARABLES
bined by a transcendent and unprovable ground-even if that

sustenance is only the awareness that one really exists-is to be
able to risk one's security (Matt. 6:25-34). And such risking is
life, for in it one is free from the anxious effort to provide one's
own security through the world, and in such freedom life in
the world is good. Moreover, the man who can risk can hold
himself responsible, for in those moments when he knows him-
self as called to account he also knows himself as forgiven
(Matt. 18:23-27).
Actually the effort to make oneself secure by avoiding risk
and by striking a bargain with God is a delusion (Luke 12:20;
18:14). It is the self-deceiving attempt which both is and en-
genders that blindness which prevents one from understanding
his time and from grasping the folly of his own actions.
With regard to the understanding of time in The Talents,
the reference to the "long time" which the master was gone
may well for Matthew have become a statement of the delay
of the Parousia. But if Matthew added the note that the time
was long, the original parable still required an indication of
some passage of time. For if the three servants are to be held
accountable, they must have sufficient time to perform those
acts for which they will be held responsible. Thus the very
fact that there is an event expected in the future-the master's
return-and that it is to be an accounting marks off a real
present and gives the latter its character: the present is a time
for risky action. The one-talent man by retreating from such a
present lost his time altogether; that is, he lost the opportunity
to engage himself in what constitutes the present. The chrono-
logical ending of his time of opportunity confirmed the inau-
thenticity of his selfhood which we have noticed. We may say
then that the tragic narrative form-the plot moving to catas-
trophe-and the existential content-a particular understanding
of inauthenticity-inhere in each other. This very inherence in
121
THE PARAILES
Jesus' parables suggests that one does not lose-or gain-his
existence as an isolated individual but only within the dynamics
of temporal, human relationships.
When we look at the world through the window of the un-
derstanding of existence in The Talents, we will have to say
that the man who so understands himself that he seeks to avoid
risky action rather than trusting God for the well-being of his
existence, though he may live long chronologically, will have
no present. His time will be evacuated of content.
2. The Ten Maidens (Matt. 25:1-13)

lThen the kingdom of heaven shall be compared to ten maidens
who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom. 2Five of
them were foolish, and five were wise. 3For when the foolish took
their lamps, they took no oil with them; 'but the wise took flasks
of oil with their lamps. lAs the bridegroom was delayed, they aU
slumbered and slept. 6But at midnight there was a cry, "Behold,
the bridegroom I Come out to meet him." TThen all those maidens
rose and trimmed their lamp~. sAnd the foolish said to the wise,
"Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out." DBut the
wise replied, "Perhaps there will not be enough for us and for you;
go rather to the dealers and buy for yourselves." lOAnd while they
went to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went
in with him to the marriage feast; and the door was shut. llAfter-
ward the other maidens came also, saying, "Lord, lord, open to
us." 12But he replied, "Truly, I say to you, I do not know you."
18Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.
(1) Historico-literary criticism. It has been claimed that in

this parable Jesus himself proclaimed his coming Parousia,21
but again it must be held that its aesthetic nature prevents such
direct allegorical pointing. On the other hand, it has been
claimed that it is too heavily overlaid with Christian motifs
27 Cf. J. Arthur Baird, The Justice of God in the Teaching of Jesus, pp.
105-106, 129-131; Michaelis, Gleichnisse, pp. 92-94; W. O. E. Oesterley,
The Gospel Parables in the Light of Their Jewish Background, p. 136.
122
THE TRAGIC PARABLES
to allow the detection of Jesus' original version, if there was

one.28 Or it has been held that The Ten Maidens was created
altogether by the church in order to teach that the Parousia
will not occur for a long time. Eta Linnemann,29 who takes the
latter position, denies, however, that the parable is an allegory.
Yet her interpretation turns it into one, for she sees the struc-
ture of the parable as determined in detail by the eschatological
problems of the post-apostolic church. She does not so much
look for the existential meaning of the parable itself in its own
terms as give the allegorical interpretation which Matthew
undoubtedly read into it.
Because the parable makes internal sense apart from Mat-
thew's allegorical interpretation, there seems to be no over-
powering reason to deny that it was older than Matthew, and
genuine. As for Matthew, he would have seen in the parable
the waiting church (the maidens), the postponement of the
Parousia (25:5), the unexpected occurrence of the Parousia
(25:6; cf. 24:44,50), and the final judgment (25:11-12).30
The warning to be watchful (25: 13), a later addition to the
parable, is not altogether appropriate inasmuch as all of the
maidens went to sleep. Moreover, 25:11b-12 appears to be sec-
ondary in wording. Jesus himself seems to have used amen in
a unique wayS! but apparently did not put it in the mouth of
his parabolic characters (cf. Matt. 18:13; Luke 11:8; 12:37;
14:24; 18:14). The double use of kyrie and the "I do not know
you" are reminiscent of Matt. 7:22-23 and Luke 13:25-27,
both of which contain elements of doubtful authenticity. We
28 Rudolf Bultrnann, The History of the Synoptic Tradition, pp. 119, 151,
176,205; d. also T. W. Manson, The Sayings of Jesus (London: SCM Press,
1950), pp. 243-245.
29 Die Gleichnisse Tesu, pp. 132-133.
80 Cf. Jeremias, Parables, p. 51.
81 Michaelis, Gleichnisse, p. 92; Gerhard Ebeling, Word and Faith, pp.
237-238.
123
THE PARABLES
might conjecture that Matt. 25:11b-12 originally read some-

thing like this: "Sir, open to us." But he replied, "I tell you,
I will not."
The question of the exact relationship of the parable to the
wedding customs of Jesus' day remains unresolved.32 In view of
our imprecise knowledge of Palestinian wedding practices, it
may be best to suppose that no one established usage is in view
in the parable but that various possible wedding customs
have been brought together to serve the narrative purpose of
Jesus.aa
(2) Literary-existential analysis. The tragic shape of the nar-
rative is determined by the experience of the five foolish
maidens. The beginning relates that ten maidens, differing
sharply in wisdom, went out to meet the bridegroom. This is
one of the few cases in Jesus' parables (d. also Luke 18:6)
where a figure is characterized directly by the narrator's use of
an adjective-"wise" and "foolish"-rather than by simply re-
lating his deeds and words. 54 The middle part of the story
dramatizes the issue of the one group's folly. Here we learn
that the groom has been delayed and that all of the maidens
have gone to sleep. Then they awake to the announcement of
the groom's approach, the foolish ones discovering that they
are about out of oil. Being unable to find an easy solution to
their problem, they go in search of oil from a merchant. vVhile
they are gone, the groom comes and the festivities begin. In
the ending the foolish maidens learn the sad news that they are
to be excluded. The expected event which evoked the action
of parts one and two has now occurred only to find them left
out. Thus again we see lines of connection binding the three
82 A. M. Iiunter, Interpreting ,the Parables, pp. 8,-86; Jeremias, Parables,

pp. 172-174; Michaelis, Glejc/misse, pp. 88-89; Smith, Parables, pp. 98-100.
88 Cf. Linnernaun. Gleidmisse, p. 130.
84 Occasionally another character will use a descriptive adjective in pro-
nouncing judgment (Matt. 18:32; 25:26).
124
THE TRAGIC PARABLES
parts together in a plot moving downward to distress and ex·
clusion.
The recognition scene is not as wen developed as the one in
The Talents, and we do not get as fun and deep an insight into
the self-understanding of the foolish maidens as we do into
that of the one-talent man. There is a kind of preliminary
recognition when the maidens wake up and the foolish ones
realize that their oil is nearly exhausted. They recognize that
their purpose of lighting the groom's way and of participating
in the feast is threatened, but they still have the hope of suc-
cess. Never do they come on their own to the conclusion that
they have been foolishly unprepared for carrying out their own
intention. They learn this to their surprise only when they are
informed by the groom that the door, now shut, is not to be
opened for them.
Again the ending is something after which there is nothing.
But that does not mean that the shutting of the door allego-
rically represents the eschatological exclusion from the kingdom
of God. Nor does it mean-if it does not refer to the eschato-
logical reckoning-that the opportunity for response to God is
therefore cut off before the end.31i The parable is not a literal
description of what is literally and finally true for an men but
is a hypothetical, imaginative work with existential implica-
tions. As such it suggests that one of the possibilities of human
existence is that existence may be lost. When a crisis is not
responsibly met, the opportunity for further action may be cut
off. When an intention is pursued with an inadequate under-
standing of what resources it requires, the moment of fulfill-
ment may deny the pursuer's grasp. The very fact that this
understanding is given aesthetic form, bracketed off from the
so Baird (Justice, pp. 129-131) holds that the coming of the bridegroom
refers to Jesus' eschatological coming, arguing that if it does not refer to the
eschaton it implies that the time for choice may be ended during history, a
conclusion which he does not wish to accept.
125
THE PARABLES
phenomenal world by its internal organization, strikes a note

of finality. The parable's autonomy prevents our speculating
about further possibilities.
The foolish maidens were as free as the wise ones to take
along more oil. They simply did not. If the one-talent man in
his avoidance of the risk that his role called for manifested an
anxiety which saw life itself as threatening, the foolish maidens
too superficially supposed that the world would take care of
them, that someone else would pay the bill: if we run out of
oil, our friends will help us, or the merchants will still be up,
or even if we are late the groom will not lock us out. But he did.
( 3) Existential-theological interpretation. If the one-talent
man lacked that faith in a transcendent ground which would
give him the freedom to risk his tangible security, the foolish
maidens too presumptuously believed that their well-being was
guaranteed to them no matter what they did. Even if it was a
Palestinian wedding custom that anyone who had not been in
the procession could not attend the feast,36 we still are inclined
by the story to identify sympathetically with the foolish maid-
ens. Thus in view of the preparations which they had made,
even if inadequate, and in view of the festive joy of the occa-
sion, we find their abrupt exclusion shocking. This shock sug-
gests the impingement of the divine dimension upon the
everyday, the shattering effect of a crisis which breaks into our
easy optimism and finds us without resources.
In The Ten Maidens time is that which transpires between
an action called forth by a future expectation (the going out
of the maidens to meet the bridegroom) and the occurrence of
that expected event (the coming of the groom and the wedding
feast). The length of this time in between is not within the
control of the maidens. They cannot make the groom come
any sooner than he will come; therefore, it is a time of waiting.
This theme of waiting strikes a familiar note in our con tem-
80 As Oesterley claims (Parables, p. 13 5) .
126
-.
THE TRAGIC PARABLES
porary scene, for our time is often interpreted-negatively-as

a time of waiting. We are waiting for Godot, and thus it is a
time when "Nothing happens, nobody comes, nobody goes,
it's awful."37 Or it is a time when we are waiting for the
ironical mixture of things which Ferlinghetti is waiting for:
I am waiting for the Second Coming

and I am waiting
for a religious revival
to sweep thru the state of Arizona
and I am waiting
for the Grapes of \Vrath to be stored
and I am waiting
for them to prove
that God is really American
and I am seriously waiting
for Billy Graham and Elvis Presley
to exchange roles seriously
and I am waiting
to see God on television
piped onto church altars
if only they can find
the right channel
to tune in on
and I am waiting
for the Last Supper to be served again
with a strange new appetizer
and I am perpetually awaiting
a rebirth of wonder.3s
37 Samuel Beckett, Waiting fOT Codot (New York: Grove Press, 1954,
p. 27. © 1954 by Crove Press. Used by permission.
8S Lawrence Ferlinghetti, A Coney Island of the Mind (New York: New
Directions Books, 1958) pp. 49-50. Copyright 1955; © 1958 by Lawrence
Ferlinghetti. Reprinted by permission of the publisher, New Directions Pub·
lishing Corporation, and Mr. Ferlinghetti.
127
THE PARABLES
What is the meaning of the ten maidens' waiting for the
groom? The fact that the expected event, which gives purpose
and content to the present, really does lie in the future means
that the present is marked off from it as something also real.
They cannot make the groom come; they can only wait for him.
Therefore, the present is not a time which is to be exhausted by
straining to realize the future. 39 There is time and room to live
now. One may sleep. (We should notice that none of the
maidens are condemned by the parable for sleeping.) The pres-
a
ent, then, as time and room to live, is gift; but it is also a
demand, for uncertainty about when the expected future event
will happen gives to the present a certain urgency. The maidens
may sleep, but they must have sufficient oil to light the way of
the groom. One may live fully in the present, but one must be
attentive to the need for resources to meet a future challenge.
In the case of the five maidens, as contrasted with the situation
of those who were waiting for Codot, someone did come, in
fact the very one they were expecting, but they were caught
unprepared. Cift and demand are held paradoxically together.
To see the present as gift alone-the folly of the five-is to be
deprived by the future of any present at all.
3. The Wedding Garment (Matt. 22:11-14)

llBut when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there
a man who had no wedding garment; 12and he said to him,
"Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding garment?"
And he was speechless. 18Then the king said to the attendants,
"Bind him hand and foot, and cast him into the outer darkness;
there men will weep and gnash their teeth." UFor many are called,
but few are chosen. .
(1) Historico-literary criticism. The similarity of this parable
89 The genn of this approach was suggested to me by Ernst Fuchs' inter-

pretation of The Seed Growing Secretly (Studies of the HistoriccJl Jesus,
pp.133-134).
128
·.
THE TRAGIC PARAILES
to rabbinic counterparts has often been pointed out,·o but that
in itself does not mean that it is not genuine, as Bultmann tends .
to suggest, for Jesus could well have adapted a Jewish parable to
his own purposes. More serious is the fact that the vocabulary
of The Wedding Garment is peculiarly Matthean.· 1 However,
it does not seem to be a Matthean composition as a whole. If
Matthew had composed it, he would probably have made a
better join between this parable and The Wedding Feast. As
it is, it seems quite unfair that a man invited in without warning
from the streets should be condemned for not having on the
right clothes. The roughness of the connection suggests that
Matthew had both The Wedding Feast and The Wedding Gar-
ment in the tradition that came to him. He put them together,
lopping off the original introduction to The Wedding Garment,
heavily working over its vocabulary, and adding part of 22: 13
and all of 22:14. The outer darkness theme is peculiarly Mat-
thean (cf. 8:12; 25:30), and 22:14-that only a few will be
saved-fits neither The Wedding Feast nor The Wedding Gar-
ment. Since 22:11-13a is earlier than Matthew's composition,
it could well be a parable of Jesus. In any case it is consistent
with his teaching.
Whether the original introduction stated that some time
elapsed between the invitation and the feast, giving the invited
guests plenty of time to secure the proper attire (as in a rabbinic
parallel), must remain questionable. But the introduction must
at least have narrated the invitation and carried the assumption
that the hearers would know that a wedding called for fitting
clothes. The original conclusion probably said simply, "Bind
him hand and foot, and throw him out."
.0 For example, Manson, Sayings, p. 226; Bultmann, Synoptic Tradition,

p.203.
U As has been shown by Gerhard Barth, "Matthew's Understanding of
the Law," in Tradition and Interpretation in Matthew, trans. P. Scott (Phila·
delphia: Westminster Press, 1963), pp. 59-60, n. 9.
129
THE PARABLES
(2) Literary-existential analysis. The Wedding Garment is

the shortest of the parables that are amenable to the kind of
methodology that I have tried to develop. Yet it contains in
concentrated and dramatic fashion the essentials of narrative
art. In the beginning of the story the invitation is narrated or
simply the fact that a king gave a wedding banquet. In the
middle part we see an encounter between the king and one of
his guests, which brings out how this guest has responded to
the invitation. A proper wedding garment means, not some spe-
cial festal attire, but clean clothes. This guest's failure to come
in clean clothes showed disrespect for the host, the other guests,
and the festal occasion.42 The ending relates the only possible
outcome of such an affront: he is to be thrown out. Thus the
consequence of the invitation in part one and of the encounter
in part two is drawn out in the ending. Seen in this way the
parable is not an allegory about a Christian who does not
live according to the law4 3 but is rather an internally organized
and tightly woven aesthetic object with a plot moving down-
ward toward exclusion from a joyous society.
The very speechlessness of the guest-perhaps surprisingly-
represents a keener awareness than is sometimes found in the
characters of other parables. In The Ten Maidens, for example,
the young women at the very end still hoped to get in and had
to be told that the door was not to be opened for them. In the
case of the wedding guest, however, through the encounter with
the host and the latter's question to him about how he got in
improperly dressed, the guest arrived at some inkling of the
precariousness of his situation. His silence suggests that he had
become aware of the unfittingness of his action and was able
to anticipate what the only outcome could be-expulsion.
If genuine human existence is the capacity to hear a word
42 Cf. Linnemann, Gleichnisse, p. 102; Michaelis, Gleichnisse, p. 161.

'8 As claimed by Smith, Parables, p. 206.
130
THE TRAGIC PARABLES
and to speak an appropriate answering word,44 the wedding

guest's silence speaks eloquently of his inauthenticity. When
a person's understanding of existence is critically challenged, he
is not able to say anything until he makes a decision about how
he will now understand himself and thus restores balance and
unity to his life.45 The recognition scene of The Wedding Gar-
ment finds the guest in that moment of instability and inde-
cision when his previous understanding of existence had been
sharply questioned and its inadequacy suggested but no new
understanding had been attained, with the result that he had
nothing to say. And in his case-and thus possibly in anyone's
case-the opportunity of making a new decision was snatched
away from him_
The understanding 'of existence which lay behind the guest's
behavior was a misunderstanding_ He knew in a superficial way
that a certain kind of behavior was called for; however, he did
not realize that human existence is contextual or situational
and that the character of the context requires appropriate ac-
tion. If existence is situational and situations have a certain
character, then to live or to attempt to live in a particular
situation in an inappropriate way is to sunder oneself. The
attempt of the guest to attend a wedding feast in dirty clothes
manifests his split existence. The overall movement in the
parable is from the guest's failure to grasp the contextual nature
of existence, through the challenge to his misunderstanding, to
the loss of the meaningful context in which he had hoped to
exist. The guest's hopeful but uncomprehending effort ended in
failure: the split in his existence is the last word about him.
(3) Existential-theological interpretation. The conversation
between the host and the guest is evidently a private one, and
'4 Cf. James M. Robinson, The New Hermeneutic, pp. 47-48; Ebeling,
"Word of God and Henneneutic," in New Hermeneutic, p. 104; Fuchs,
Historical Jesus, pp. 89, 211.
6a Cf. Fuchs, Historical Jesus, pp . 221-222.
131
THE PARABLES
the host might have quietly eased our dirty man out of the hall.
The fact that the host rather called his servants and dramati-
cally ordered them to bind the guest hand and foot and throw
him out surprises us somewhat and again suggests the divine
action upon human existence.
God's hand is present to preside over the dissolution which
occurs when the God-given structure of existence is violated.
Man is limited in that he can'not choose certain courses and
stances and also avoid disastrous consequences. The man of
Christian faith lives as one who is becoming, in between the
radical offer of forgiveness and the demand for radical
obedience-the essence of Jesus' message.48 One must live ap-
propriately to the situation of grace. This is to have a unified
self. The invitation of the king to the wedding feast was a gift
which internally entailed the demand for clean clothes. The
neglect of the demand resulted in losing the gift. The attempt
to live within the gift of God while rejecting the inseparable
demand to respond appropriately to grace is a misguided effort
which splits one's existence and issues in the loss of the situ-
ation where grace is present.
4. The Wicked Tenants (Mark 12:1-9)

lAnd he began to speak to them in parables. "A man planted
a vineyard, and set a hedge around it, and dug a pit for the wine
press, and built a tower, and let it out to tenants, and went into
another country. 2When the time came, he sent a servant to the
tenants, to get from them some of the fruit of the vineyard. BAnd
they took him and beat him, and sent him away emptyhanded.
'Again he sent to them another servant, and they wounded him in
the head, and treated him shamefully. GAnd he sent another, and
him they killed; and so with many others, some they beat and some
they killed. 6He had still one other, a beloved son; finally he sent
him to them, saying, 'They will respect my son.' TBut those ten-
'8 Cf. Herbert Braun, "Der Sinn der neutestamentlichen Christologie,"

Zeitschrift fUr Theologie und KiTche, 54 (1957), 346, 347, 350.
132
THE TRAGIC PARABLES
ants said to one another, 'This is the heir; come, let us kill him,
and the inheritance will be ours.' BAnd they took him and killed
him, and cast him out of the vineyard. °What will the owner of
the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the tenants, and give
the vineyard to others."
( 1) H istorico-literary criticism. In the thinking of some, the

question of this parable's genuineness is tied up with whether
it is an allegory. The content is held to be artificial. and it is
said that it can be read intelligibly only as an allegory. The alle-
gorical content, it is claimed, came from the church; therefore
the parable in its present form could not be a word of Jesus.47
On the other hand, it is possible to take it as originally an
allegory and also a genuine word of Jesus. 48 And it is true that
its being an allegory would not in itself rule out the parable's
genuineness, but we must decide whether it is an allegory or
not in order to interpret it properly.
It seems to have been demonstrated that the relationship
depicted between the owner and his tenants is realistic, and not
artificial."9 However, allegorical features remain, especially in
the Markan version. The details of Mark 12:1 make a clear
reference to the vineyard song of Isa. 5, and the generalizing
summary statement of 12: 5b refers to Israel's increasing rebel-
liousness. The reference to the killing of the servants in 12:5
also anticipates the murder of the son. The use of the adjective
agapetos of the son appears to be a Markan christological motif
which connects the parable with the baptism and transfigura-
tion of Jesus (cf. Mark 1:11; 9:7) in which stories Jesus is por-
trayed as the beloved Son. In Luke (20:9) and the Gospel of
47 Cf. Bultmann, Synoptic Tradition, pp. 177, 205; R. M. Grant, The

utter and the Spirit, p. 44.
48 Cf. Matthew Black, "The Parables as Allegory," pp. 280-283.
'0 We may be on more certain ground to say that the owner, for a reason
not given, was unabJe to return to his lands (Michaelis. Gleichnisse, p. 117)
rather than to oujecture tlm! Ill: was 11 foreign. 3bsel1tee landlord (Dodd.
Parables. pp. 96-97; Jeremias. ParcJbles. pp. 74-75).
133
THE PARABLES
Thomas (65 [66]) the reference to Isa. 5 is much more allusive

than in Mark and therefore deflects the attention less from the
parable to the source of the vineyard image. Luke and lllOmas
also omit the generalizing summary in Mark 12:5b as well as
the murder of the servants. In Thomas, moreover, agapetos is
lacking. In my judgment the parable is a genuine saying of
Jesus, but the original version lacked the detailed reference to
Isa. 5, the summary given in Mark 12:5b, the murder of the
third servant, and the use of agapetos. Whether there were
three servants beaten (Luke), or only two (Thomas), is im-
possible to say. The Lukan version has the rule of three plus
one, thus emphasizing the son. Thomas' rendition brings the
son within the rule of three.
A comparison of this parable with Jesus' other narrative par-
ables is what suggests that the least allegorical version is the
most original. Even so, just the allusive reference to the vine-
yard and the beating of the servants must have referred sub-
sidiarily to Israel and her rejection of God's messengers. And
the "son" possibly refers to the climactic coming of Jesus but
without specific christological implications. Thus this parable
is more nearly allegorical than (most of) Jesus' other narrative
parables, but the pattern of connections is still primarily within
the story and runs only subsidiarily to the outside. If, then, the
wicked tenants refer to the Jewish leaders of Jesus' day as well
as to Israel or its leaders through the centuries, what under-
standing of existence is being attributed to them?
(2) Literary-existential analysis. It is claimed by Baird5D that
the figure of the owner dominates the story, while Michaelis~l
seems to be most interested in the question of his son. From
the standpoint of the story itself both of these approaches are
somewhat eccentric in view of the fact that the formal shape
of the story derives from the experience of the wicked tenants.
GO Justice, p. 67.
Dl Gleichnisse. pp. 121-122.
134
THE TRAGIC PARABLES
The beginning relates that a man let out his vineyard to ten-
ants and went away. In the middle part we see what happened
when he attempted to coUect the proceeds which were right-
fuUy due to him, and we have the hint of an insight into why
the tenants behaved as they did. The ending teUs about-or
at least suggests-the destruction which will come to the ten-
ants as a result of their behavior. Again beginning, middle, and
end are interlocked within a downward moving plot.
It is impossible to say whether Jesus' question-"What will
the owner of the vineyard do?"-was originaUy answered by
Jesus himself (Mark 12:9)~2 or by the Jewish rulers (Matt.
21 :23, 41) .~3 Perhaps the best suggestion is that the parable
originally ended simply with Jesus' question, which implied the
destruction of the tenants.1I4 But both the logic of the story and
its connection with Isa. 5 require some hint of judgment. It is
true that the Gospel of Thomas has neither the question nor
the answer, but Thomas' addition of "He who has ears, let him
hear" shows that he has tampered with the ending. The fact
that the conclusion of the parable takes the form-wholly or
partially-of a question to the audience gives the parable some-
what less aesthetic autonomy and distance than is usually the
case with Jesus' narrative parables.
In the middle part of the story we see that the tenants were
calculating how they might seize what was not theirs even if
they had to commit murder in order to do so. Their violence
was so wanton that they need not have had any particular reli-
gious presuppositions to realize that what they were doing
violated basic human norms for living in the world with other
men. Thus they must have recognized that their actions were
wrong even though they did not recognize until it was too late
-if they recognized at aU-that they would bring about their
G2 Oesterley, Parables, pp. 119-120 .

ea Dodd, Parables, pp. 98- 99.
G* Smith, Parables, p. 224.
135
THE PARABLES
put him in prison till he should pay the debt. IlWhen his fellow
servants saw what had taken place, they were greatly distressed,
and they went aud reported to tlleir lord all tllat had takcn place.
saThen his lord summoned him and said to him, "You wicked
servant I I forgave you all that debt because you besought me;
uand should not YOLl have llad mercy on your fellow servant, as
I had mercy on you?" ntAnd in anger Ids lord delivered him to the
jaile(s, till he should pay all his debt. 80S0 also my hcavenly FaU,er
will do to every one of yOu, if you do not forgive your brother from
your heart.
(1) HistoTico-literary criticism. According to Linnemann~8

the fact that there is nothing in the parable (18:23-34) about
repeated forgiveness means that its connection with Matt. 18:
21-22 is not original. Both Matt. 18:21-22 and the parable do,
however, deal with forgiveness; and Oesterley59 has pointed out
that making loose connections is typical of Jewish parabolic
practice and is, therefore, no argument against the originality
of the connection. Since Matt. 18 as a whole, however, is com-
posed of materials from various sources, one is inclined to think
that the connection between 18:21-22 and the parable was
first made by Matthew.
The colossal size of the debt suggests that the parable is
speaking about a king and one of his satraps.60 The compulsory
selling of a man and his family to pay a debt also points to the
gentile coloring of the fictional elements/ll though this should
G8 Gleichnisse, p. 111.
60 Parables, pp. 93-94.
00 Jeremias, Pardbles, p. 21 O. Michaelis (Gleic1misse, p. 191) suggests that
since the king is referred to as kyrios (18:25, 27, 31, 32, 34), except in 18:23,
Matthew may hm'e substituted basileus for an origill31 kyrios in order to
emphasize the parable's connection with the kingdom of heaven. Whatever
the o(iginal wording, the large sum of money probably suggests a royal
situation.
Ql Cf. Jerem ias, Parables, p. 211; GUnther Bomkamm, Jesus of Nazareth,
p. 86. Of the passages which Oesterley (Parables, p. 95) cites to prove that
the parable envisions a Jewish setting (Exod. 22:3; Lev. 25 :39; 11 Kings 4:1;
Neh. 5: 5) only II Kings 4: 1 is even possibly pertinent, and Jeremias cites rab·
binic sources which forbid the sale of a wife.
138
THE TRAGIC PARABLES
not be taken to mean that the parable originated in gentile

territory and is not a parable of Jesus.
Matt. 18:35 appears to be Matthew's conclusion to the
whole of chapter 18 rather than the original application of the
parable, and it reflects Matthew's legalistic tendency.
(2) Literary-existential analysis. It has been held that it is
the king who gives meaning and coherence to the parable,82
and the king does obviously have an important role, but from
the standpoint of the parable itself, it is the unforgiving ser-
vant's story; that is, his changing fate determines the narrative
form. To ignore this turns the parable into an illustrated ex-
hortation and forfeits its aesthetic power. The four parables
that we have considered thus far manifest a more or less steady
downward movement in their plots. The protagonist begins in
a good situation and moves to catastrophe. In The Unforgiving
Servant, on the other hand, we have the somewhat more com-
plex double movement from a bad to a good to a bad, or worse,
situation. A potentially and hopefully comic movement is over-
come by tragedy.
In the first part of the parable the servant is found in a
threatening crisis. Since he could not pay the huge debt which
he owed, his lord intended to sell him and his wife and chil-
dren into slavery. In view of the fact that the sale of his family
would not even begin to pay the debt,6a we see that the king's
threat is an expression of his anger.64 The servant asked for
time to make payment-though the situation was hopeless-
and must have been greatly surprised when the lord responded
to his plea by cancelling the debt completely.
In the middle part we see what effect this surprising and
unearned improvement in his situation had on him. That it
e2 Baird, Justice, p. 64.
83 The price of a slave was five hundred to two thousand denarii, and there
were ten thousand denarii in one talent. Cf. Linnemann, Gleichnisse, p. 114.
The servant owed ten thousand talents.
o. Cf. Jeremias, Parables, p. 211.
139
THE PARABLES
had no effect is made shockingly offensive by the fact that he

met his fellow servant immediately upon leaving the king,
when he should have been especially aware that he had been
the recipient of mercy, and by the casting of the fellow ser-
vant's plea for time in the same words which he himself had
used. The first servant owed a tremendous debt which he
could never have paid, and mercy was extended to him. He
was owed a small debt which could have been paid had he
allowed a little time, but he exacted harsh justice.65 The king,
on being informed of his servant's behavior, reminded him
that he should have responded to mercy with mercy (18:33).
In the ending (18:34) the king in anger delivered his servant
to the torturers-or jailers. In the beginning we have a dra-
matic encounter, in the middle, the response to the encounter,
and in the conclusion, the consequence of the response: an
interlocking plot moving finally downward to catastrophe.
Linnemann maintains that the real interest of the parable,
the point of comparison, is 18:33. She holds this on the ground
that if 18: 34 were the point, the speech of the king in 18: 33
would not have been needed, for the speech is without signifi-
cance for the issue of the action and expects no answer from
the servant. Linnemann goes on to say that the fact that the
emphasis is usually at the end is no argument against her posi-
tion because 18:34 is the necessary completion of 18:33.
Matt. 18:33 was spoken as a window for the hearers of the
parable.66
In response to Linnemann it should be said that neither
18: 33 nor 18: 34 is the point. If we want to use the term
"point," it should be used to refer to the meaning of the total,
organically unified structure of form-and-content. If critical
interpretation can, by the use of propositional language, ex-
press that total meaning in one sentence, that is no substitute
n Cf. Linnemann, Gleichnisse, pp. 19, 115.
IS Ibid., p. 116.
140
THE TRAGIC PARABLES
for the parable itself. Yet it should be said that 18:33 does
Come close to summing up the thematic side of the parable.
Matt. 18:33 is not just a window to the hearers but also a
mirror which reflects on the relationship of the unforgiving
servant to the king and to his fellow servant and which relates
itself to the tragic denouement in 18:34. Actually the aesthetic
force of the parable overcomes Linnemann's one-point ap-
proach and enables her to see that 18:34 is necessary for 18:33.
How then can it be denied that 18:33 is necessary for 18:34?
Each of the verses is necessary for the other, and 18: 33 is also
the needed link between 18:32 and 18:34. To receive (18:32)
without giving (18: 33) is self-destructive (18: 34 ). Just as 18: 34
gives the consequences of a certain kind of attitude, so 18:33
is needed to clarify why catastrophe occurred. Thus 18:33 is
fused into the narrative so that the fact that it expects no
answer does not mean that it is only a window to the audience.
In the opening crisis it had not occurred to the servant that
the debt might be cancelled. He thought in terms of claims
made and claims paid, and pleaded for time to make his pay-
ment. He must have known that he could not really have fol-
lowed through, but in his extremity he was grasping for straws.
Because he at least did not place the blame for his plight on
someone else, we are prepared to be sympathetic with him.
Our sympathy recoils, however, when we witness his behavior
in part two. His understanding of human relationships-that
they are constituted by claims justly made and necessarily paid
-had been challenged but not altered by the mercy shown
him. At the end he still had not come to recognize what mercy
does and had to be told-after it was too late-what he should
have grasped on his own and what the consequence of his
failure would be.
That he was to be delivered to the torturers until he should
pay his debt meant that he would never escape them, for his
debt was unimaginably great.
141
THE PARABLES
The parable suggests that one may unexpectedly find an

openness or receptivity in others which delivers one from a
pressing problem and opens up a surprising new possibility
for existence. If the new situation is not internalized, however,
so that one becomes open to others and can relinquish claims,
then the new situation is lost. To accept what is undeserved
from others without extending such graciousness dries up the
capacity to receive, and one's isolation is thus made complete.
The final physical isolation of the unforgiving servant from his
lord and from his fellow servants only confirms the estrange-
ment from others which was implicit in his self-understanding
from the beginning and which was never shattered.
The Greek word (dei) behind the "should" in the king's
"Should you not have had mercy?" (18: 33) is characteristically
used of the divine necessity (d. Mark 8:31; 13:7; Matt. 23:23;
Luke 22:7; 24:26; John 3:14).61 The strength of this word sug-
gests the inescapability of the existential reality implied in the
parable.
(3) Existential-theological interpretation. The element of the
measureless and the surprising which pervades the parable68
suggests the impingement of the divine and the finality of the
issues involved. The immensity of the servant's debt, for ex-
ample-ten thousand talents-becomes more vivid for us when
we recognize that the annual revenue of Herod the Great was
not more than nine hundred talents. 69
To see the parable as expressing an existential movement
(as discussed above) obviates the tendency to a legalistic in-
terpretation of the parable which is often found: God forgives
81 Ibid.
08 Cf. Bomkamm. 'esus, p. 86.
Og Cf. Linnemann, Gleichnisse, p. 114. The annual imperial taxes of all
Judea, Idumea. and Samaria were only six hundred talents, and Galilee and
Perea added only two hundred more to this (cf. OesterIey, Parables, p. 95;
Baird, Justice, p. 64; Lin'nemann, Gleichnisse, p. 114).
142
THE TRAGIC PARABLES
US as we forgive our fellows. 70 On the contrary, it is not that

our forgiveness of others wins God's forgiveness for us but
rather that his forgiveness confers upon us the capacity to
forgive. The one who has really experienced forgiveness will
forgive. Thus the emphasis is on a total situation which in-
clines one to be forgiving rather than on the demand to for-
give, though the latter is not wholly absent.71 Forgiveness is
not an isolated occurrence but an order of existence.72 To have
our legalistic understanding of life shattered by the transcen-
dent as that which accepts and sustains us despite our offensive-
ness is to be opened to others in their offensiveness. To have
the structure of our existence opened by and to the transcendent
and to have it opened to others are two sides of the same ex-
istential reality, and one side cannot be present without the
other. To approach this from the other side, one who takes
the risk of being open and vulnerable to others does so because
he is sustained by the transcendent, whether or not he knows
it (d. Matt. 25:31-46). The man who rejects the order of
openness, forgiveness, and vulnerability places himself in the
order of claims which will isolate and crush him. This was the
tragedy of the unforgiving servant.
Although this parable does not have a legalistic meaning,
it does obviously suggest that a certain understanding and way
of existence are self-destructive. This, however, is not really
in contradiction-as Fuchs 73 claims-with Matt. 5 :45, which
states that the sun and rain come for the unjust as well as for
the just. The two passages refer to two different levels of re-
ality. Matt. 5:45 presents man over against the "given ness" of
TO Cf. Jeremias, Parables, pp. 213, 214; Hunter, Parables, p. 71; Manson,
Sayings, p. 213.
71 Cf. Bultmann, Jesus and the \Vord, pp. 183,211.
72 Cf. Linnemann, Gleichnisse, pp. 117-119.
78 Historical Jesus, p. 153.
143
THE PARABLES
nature, and here man's actions have no effect. But the parable
presents a man in relation to the structure of human existence,
and here man's abuses can bring about his destruction.
In concluding this chapter it might be noted that in The
Unforgiving Servant tragedy results basically from the failure
to respond appropriately to grace while in the other four para-
bles the emphasis is on the failure to meet a demand responsi-
bly, though the note of grace is not wholly lacking in the others
nor the note of demand in this one.
144
5
The Comic Parables
It should be recalled that the category of comedy is being

used in the broad sense of a plot that moves upward toward
the well-being of the protagonist and his inclusion in a desir-
able society. Here the comic view will be briefly but somewhat
more fully developed than it has been thus far and something
of the distinctiveness of Jesus' comic parables will be indicated.
According to Nathan Scott, tragic and comic man are dis-
tinguished in that tragic man is burdened and embarrassed by
his finitude while comic man is the image of human actuality.
Comic man is not imprisoned by nor resentful about being
human, and comedy presents the whole truth that men have
bodies and need food and sleep as wen as have aspirations
which might shake the cosmos. 1 Although this distinction is
probably valid in general, it does not apply to the difference
between Jesus' tragic and comic parables. The reason is that
both classes of Jesus' parables are in the low mimetic mode
and employ the imagery of everyday realism; therefore, both
classes portray man in his human actuality. Moreover, the ele-
ment of the surprising which fractures the realism "eschato-
logically" is as characteristic of the comic parables as of the
tragic ones.
As Scott has pointed out, there are two types of comic
1 Nathan A. Scott, Jr., "The Bias of Comedy and the Narrow Escape into
Faith," pp. 19-21.
145
THE PARABLES
protagonist. The first becomes the object of our unsympathetic

laughter because of his deviation from a legitimate human
norm. The second type has heroic proportions, and if he is
eccentric, it is because he is so deeply rooted in the human
stuff. No matter how many scrapes he has, his energies remain
unimpaired, and the central moment in a comedy with such
a protagonist is the reassertion of humanness.2
In the light of this second motif we may say with Christopher
Fry that comedy is not simply an escape from truth into
mirth but rather an escape from despair into faith. It mani-
fests the intuition to trust the situation that. we were born
into. 3 The cornie protagonist thus conceived must have a
stature fit for tragedy. He must be able to affirm life, take
death upon himself, and move toward joy. It is interesting that
Fry sees the Book of Job as the great reservoir of comedy4 when
Job has so often been seen as tragedy.5 Certainly in The Prodi-
gal Son, Jesus' classic comic story, death is assimilated and over-
come, and the note of joy is finally sounded. Northrop Frye's
comment is quite appropriate that it is altogether character-
istic of anything explicitly Christian that tlle tragic should be
a prelude to comedy.e
In Jesus' cornie parables it is not that a man has within
himself the resources for the reassertion of his whole humanity
but rather that there comes to him from beyond himself a new
possibility that was not at his disposal. When these parables
are seen as defining the divine-human relationship, then it is
the grace of God which enables the passage from death to
life.
2 Ibid., pp. 28-32.

a Christopher Fry, "Comedy," in The New Orpheus, ed. Nathan A. Scott,
Jr.(New York: Sheed and Ward, 1964), pp. 286-287.
Ibid., p. 288.
t
G Cf., for example, Richard B. Sewall, The Vision of Tragedy, pp. 9.
19. 21.
o Northrop Frye, Anatomy of Criticism, p. 21 5.
146
THE COMIC PARABLES
It has been denied that literature of the extreme situation

can present a Christian resolution of man's plight that is aes-
thetically convincing: the theology of the author will inevitably
intrude." To this it should be said that conversion has been
one of the major motifs of twentieth-century literature,8 and
it is no more impossible in principle to render a Christian con-
version aesthetically satisfying (though it has seldom been
done) than any other kind of conversion, unless the critic
rigidly applies some kind of positivistic norm. The prodigal
son is pictured in an extreme situation, and he is delivered.
Admittedly the strategies of a biblical parable and of a novel
presenting a Christian conversion are not exactly the same.
They are not so different, however, that the parable may not
be suggestive of how it might be done in a novel.
1. The Workers in the Vineyard (Matt. 20:1-16)

lFor the kingdom of heaven is like a householder who went out
early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. 2After agree-
ing with the laborers for a denarius a day, he sent them into his
vineyard. SAnd going out about the third hour he saw others stand-
ing idle in the market place; 4and to them he said, "You go into
the vineyard too, and whatever is right I will give you." So they
went. fiGoing out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour,
he did the same. 6And about the eleventh hour he went out and
found others standing; and he said to them, "Why do you stand
here idle all day?" 'They said to him, "Because no one has hired
us." He said to them, "You go into the vineyard too." 8 And when
evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his steward, "Call
the laborers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last,
up to the first." 9And when those hired about the eleventh hour
came, each of them received a denarius. l°Now when the first
came, they thought they would receive more; but each of them
also received a denarius. 11And on receiving it they grumbled at
, Murray Krieger, The Tragic Vision, pp. 263-266.

8 Cf. R. W. B. Lewis, The Picaresque Saint (Philadelphia and New York:
J. B. Lippincott, Keystone Books, 1961), pp. 27-28.
147
THE PARABLES
the householder, 12saying, "These last worked only one hour, and
you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of
the day and the scorching heat." aBut he replied to one of them,
"Friend, I am doing you no wrong; did you not agree with me for
a denarius? uTake what belongs to you, and go; I choose to give to
this last as I give to you. lGAm I not allowed to do what I choose
with what belongs to me? Or do you begrudge my generosity?"
16S0 the last will be first, and the first last.
(1) Historico-Ziterary criticism. This parable (Matt. 20:1-15)

was placed by Matthew in its present (Markan) context as
an illustration of the thought that the first will be last and the
last, first (Matt. 19:30; Mark 10:31). Matt. 19:30 was then
repeated, with slightly altered wording, in 20:16 as the con-
clusion to the parable in order to emphasize the connection
which Matthew wanted to make between 19: 30 and the para-
ble. That the connection between the parable and Matt. 19:30
is not original, however, is seen from the fact that the verse
appears in Mark without the parable (10:31) and in Luke
both without the parable and in an entirely different context
(13:30).
The idea of reversal of rank-the first last, and the last first
-does not really get at the meaning of the parable.1I The con-
nection was made by Matthew simply because the householder
told his steward to pay first those who were hired last (20:8b).
This latter point is not simply an unimportant detail10 from
the standpoint of the parable as a story, however. The pay-
ment of those hired last had to take place in the presence of
those who were hired first and who had worked all day in order
that the full-day workers might see how much the late comers
were paid. This was necessary in order to eliCit the dissatis-
faction of those hired first and to set up, thereby, the dramatic
• Cf. Joachim Jeremias, The Parables of Tesus, pp. 35-36; Wilhelm

Michaelis. Die Gleichnisse Tem. p. 180.
10 As claimed by Jeremias, Parables, p. 35.
148
THE COMIC PARABLES
conflict between these dissatisfied workers and the house-

holder.ll
It is the present context of the parable in Matthew that
directs it to Jesus' disciples. 12 It was probably originally told
with reference to Jesus' opponents in order to defend his asso-
ciation with the sinners and to attack any legalistic merit
doctrine.13
The vineyard image again allusively associates the parable
with Israel's story (cf. Isa. 5).
(2) Literary-existential analysis. While, as we shall see, TQe
Workers in the Vineyard manifests a stronger allegorical ten-
dency than most of Jesus' other narrative parables, its aesthetic
form does resist the kind of allegorizing which sees the hiring
of the workers as the action of the kingdom of God in history,
I the wage settlement as the final judgment, and the denarius

as eternal life. 14 Such an interpretation superimposes a pre-
conceived pattern upon the parable, prevents its being a new
word, and vitiates its attention grasping aesthetic function.
There is a real sense, however, in which this parable is the
householder's story/II and this fact gives it its allegorical ten-
dency. The householder probably has a relatively more prom-
inent role throughout the story than the "master" figure in any
of the other narrative parables, and this emphasis is augmented
-in view of the law of end stress10-by the fact that the entire
11 Cf. Ernst fuclls, Studies of the Historical Jesus, p. 154; Eta Linnemann,
Die Cleichnisse Jcsu, pp. 89-90; Michaelis, Cleichni.vse, p. 175; B. T. D.
Smith, The Parables of the Synoptic Gospels, p. 185.
12 C£. JeremIas, Parables, pp. 37-38; Linnemann, Cleicilnisse, p. 50.
Mic11aelis (Cleichniss6, p. 180) argues that it was originally a disciple
parable.
18 Cf. Jeremias, Parables, pp. 37-38.
It As in J. Arthur Baird, The Justice of Cod in the Teaching of Jesus, pp.
209-211.
16 Thus Jeremias, PaTables, p. 136; Fuchs, "Bemerkungen zur Gleich·
nisauslegung," p. 347; Historical Jesus, p. 33; Michaelis, Gleichnisse, pp.
177-178.
10 CE. Smith, Parables, p. 36.
149
THE PARABLES
conclusion (20:13-15) is made up of a rather detailed statement

of the householder's position. We have the phenomenon that
he has a very prominent place and yet he does not give the
parable its formal shape. He is not drawn into the vicissitudes
of the plot. Therefore, he tends to point allegorically out of the
story. But the householder image probably points more directly
to Jesus, as the material part of the parable and especially to his
meals with and his conduct toward sinners, than it does to God. 17
There is, on the other hand, another sense in which this
parable is the story of the grumbling, full-day workers; and
exegesis has usually not been sufficiently attentive to this fact.
These workers are allowed a recognition scene, and it is their
changing fortune which gives the parable its formal shape. Thus
in tension with the allegorical tendency is an internal, aesthetic
unity.
The beginning tells about a householder who hired workers
for his vineyard at various times during the day, hiring some
just for the last working hour. Whether or not the parable pre-
supposes that the rainy season was about to set in,18 the house-
holder's repeated trips to the market place to hire workers
suggest some kind of urgency. The last workers hired, who
worked only an hour, mayor may not have been sincere in
their claim that they were idle because they could not get work.
In any case, the parable ooes not base their being hired or the
payment of a full day's wage on their undeserved misfortune.19
At the time of hiring nothing is said about the amount that
would be paid to the workers who were employed for one hour
since that would have spoiled the dramatic effect of the sur-
prising payment in the next part.20
17 Cf. Fuchs, "Bemerkungen," pp. 347-348; Historical Jesus, pp. 34-36.

18 As Jeremias (Parables, p. 136) claims.
10 Cf. Linnemann, Gleichnisse, p. 88.
20 Cf. ibid., p. 89.
150
THE COMIC PARABLES
In the middle part we see the settling up with the workers

at the day's end and the complaint of the full-day workers that
they had been treated unfairly. In the ending the householder
defended and interpreted his action and dismissed the com-
plaining workers from his presence. Thus we have an interlock-
ing plot moving downward from the weU-being of the fuU-day
workers to their exclusion from the presence of a good man.
The plot movement means that The \Vorkers in the Vine-
yard could have been discussed with the tragic parables and in a
sense should have been, but there are also reasons for including
it among the comic ones:
(a) The exclusion of the grumbling workers from a desirable
society is not as emphatic as in The Talents, The Ten Maidens,
The Wedding Garment, and The Unforgiving Servant.
(b) In four of the tragic parables catastrophe occurs, as we
have seen, primarily because of the failure to fulfill a de-
mand. In The 'Yorkers in the Vineyard, on the other hand,
the emphasis is on the fact that tragedy is estrangement from
a gracious benefactor, and the quality of that graciousness is
stressed. The downfall results from rejecting a comic-redemptive
possibility. This is also true in The Unforgiving Servant, but
there the exclusion from weU-being is much more striking than
in The Workers in the Vineyard. The Unforgiving Servant
emphasizes the fall of one who refuses to live in the order of
mercy, while the present parable emphasizes the graciousness
that is rejected.
(c) There are cornie characters in the parable-the workers
hired at the end of the day who benefited from the surprising
generosity of the householder. There are also characters in The
Talents and The Ten Maidens who move to well-being, but
they are not as prominent as the comic characters in The Work-
ers in the Vineyard. In the latter parable the central conflict
revolves around the treatmcnt of the comic charactcrs, but in
The Talents and The Ten Maidens the conflict is strictly be-
151
THE PARABLES
tween the master figure and the tragic characters. The cross-
currents of the tragic and comic in The Workers in the Vine-
yard might be explained partially by saying that the tragic
characters-the grumbling full-day workers-are the "blocking
characters" (characters who seek to impede the comic move-
ment) of a potentially ironic comedy, but their role has been
enlarged to the point that what might have been an ironic
comedy has been tipped over into an ironic tragedy. The subse-
quent discussion will show that their fate was certainly ironic.
In summarizing the discussion up to this juncture it might
be said that from the plot standpoint The Workers in the
Vineyard is a tragedy, but from the thematic standpoint it is
a comedy. Moreover, the theme of the householder's generosity
gives the parable its allegorical tendency which stands in a
certain tension with the internal connections.
The flaw in the grumbling workers which comes to expres-
sion in the recognition scene (20:12) is more serious than an
envy which cannot tolerate kindness shown to others.21 If
there was envy, it was only symptomatic of their feeling a
threat to their deep-seated understanding of existence. The fact
that they insisted on the application of a merit system-reward
should be exactly proportionate to achievement-shows that
they believed themselves capable of maintaining their position
in the world, of deserving their reward. If someone, however,
is rewarded, not on the basis of his own achievement, but on
the basis of another's generosity, then there is an incalculable
element in human relationships, and the sense of being able
to provide one's own security is seriously chal1enged. In the
face of this challenge the grumbling workers still insisted on
a merit order. Their desire to have their security within their
own grasp caused them to see the incalculable, not as gracious-
ness, but as injustice. Rather than seeing themselves as self-
centered they accused the householder of unfairness.
21 As Michaelis (Gleichnis~e, pp. 17)-178) suggests.
152
tHE COMIC PARABLIES
In all of the other narrative parables-tragic and comic-

the crisis and conflict of the protagonist result from some flaw
in his action, some violation by him of the nonnative order.
He is in some sense called to account by a superior figure (or
by himself). In The Workers in the Vineyard, on the other
hand, there is no flaw in the complaining workers' action, that
is, in their work, for which they are called to account. Rather
they initiated the conflict as a result of their interpretation of
their actions in relation to other realities, and in so doing
revealed their flawed self-understanding. In the recognition
scene itself their external situation was not threatened. It
was only their self-understanding which was questioned by the
surprising thing which they had witnessed. But because they
did not recognize the true nature of the incalculable and in-
sisted on strict justice where graciousness was actually to be
found, in the end they were estranged from the source of gra-
ciousness. In pursuing what they regarded as their interests
they annulled their best possibilities. The irony of their action
is brought o~t by playing up the goodness from which they
estranged themselves. This estrangement confirmed what had
been true for them all along.
The tragic conclusion of the complaining workers' story
is the householder's command: "Take what is yours and go."
The organic union of this command with the whole parable
and the indispensability of taking it into consideration in in-
terpreting the parable are often, if not usually, ignored. The
result of ignoring this matter is a tendency in theological in-
terpretation to say that the parable does not teach that reward
is wholly by grace. It is suggested by some scholars that ac-
cording to the parable God deals with some people on the basis
of merit (the fun-day workers) and with others according to
grace (the one-hour workers) .22 The effort is then made by
22 Cf. Jeremias, Parabks, p. 36; T. W. Manson, TM Sayings of Jesus,
p.218.
153
THE PARABLES
these interpreters to avoid this unwe1come conclusion by falling

back on the one-point approach to the parables. It is said
that the real point of the parable is not to make a distinction
between grace and merit but rather to emphasize how much the
one-hour workers received 23 or to affirm that there are no
distinctions in the kingdom.24
A more appropriate approach would be to take into account
the expulsion of the grumbling workers. It is true that they
would have gone home anyway, but the fact that the parable
explicitly relates the householder's order to them to go makes
their going a dismissal. 'Vhen this is seen in connection with
their complaint about the householder's generosity to the one-
hour workers, then the parable does not teach that God deals
with some on the basis of merit. That is, it does not teach
that while some need grace, others do not, but rather suggests
why some do not receive it. Because of their impenetrable
legalistic understanding of existence, grounded in the effort
to effect their own security, they exclude themselves from the
source of grace.
(3) Existential-theological interpretation. The householder's
frequent trips to the market place exhibit throughout improba-
ble, though not impossible, behavior. His striking action
reaches a climax when he pays the last workers a full day's
wage for one hour's work. 25 This surprising element woven
into a realistic story suggests to us again that the divine di-
mension may cross our everyday reality to produce a crisis of
ultimate importance in the midst of the ordinary. Our very
existence depends on whether we will accept God's gracious
dealings, his dealings which shatter our calculations about how
things ought to be ordered in the world.
The householder's last statement-that he can. do as he
23 Jeremias, Parables, p. 36.

U Manson, Sayings, p. 219.
25 Cf. Fuchs, Historical Jesus, p. 33; Linnemann, Gleichnisse, pp. 88-89.
154
THE COMIC PARABLES
chooses with what is his-taken by itself might suggest that

God is merely arbitrary. But in the context of the parable it
means that he is gracious. God gives to the man who has noth-
ing a place to exist meaningfully before himself, and he does
this as an expression of his own generosity and without regard
for human considerations of merit. Man, however, may be too
calculating to accept the risks in such dealings. We see that
the fonnal tension-between the relatively strong allegorical
pointing to the graciousness of God and the internally or-
ganized tragic plot-embodies the existential tension that while
the ultimate meaning of life is God's gracious dealing, man
may yet bring about the tragic loss of his existence.
2. The Unjust Steward (Luke 16: 1-9)

tHe also said to the disciples, "There was a rich man who had
a steward, and c11arges were brought to him that this man was
wasting his goods. 2And he called him and said to him, 'What is
this that I hear about you? Turn in the account of your steward-
ship, for you can no longer be steward.' sAnd the steward said to
himself, 'What shall 1 do, since my master is taking the steward-
ship away from me? I am not strong enough to dig, and I am
ashamed to beg. ·1 have decided what to do, so that people may
receive me into their houses when I am put out of the steward-
ship.' ~So, summoning his master's debtors one by one, he said to
the first, 'How much do you owe my master?' 6He said, 'A hun-
dred measures of oil.' And hc said to him, 'Take your bill, and sit
down quickly and write fifty.' 7Then he said to another, 'And how
much do you owe?' He said, 'A hundred measures of wheat.' He
said to him, 'Take your bill, and write eighty.' sThe master com-
mended the dishoncst steward for his prudence; for the sons of
this world are wiser in their own generation than the sons of light.
sAnd 1 tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of un-
righteous mammon, so that when it fails they may receive you
into the eternal habitations."
(1) HistoTico-literary criticism. Our main problem here is

detennining where the parable originally ended. It seems clear
155
THE PARABLES
that 16:9, 16:10-12, and 16:13 were originally connected neither

with the parable nor with each other26 and were perhaps first
linked together by Luke on the basis of the catchword "mam-
mon."27 Luke 16:8b appears to have been added as an expla-
nation of 16:8a before the parable came to' Luke, for the change
to the first person in 16:9 suggests that Luke began to add
explanatory comments at that point. This leaves 16:8a as the
real problem.
Michaelis28 and Jeremias29 regard the parable proper as end-
ing with 16:7, and they take 16:8a to be a genuine reminiscence
of the fact that Jesus, as an application and interpretation,
praised the dishonest steward; thus kyrios in 16:8a refers to
Jesus. Jeremias evidently believes, however, that the word
kyrios is a Lukan addition. These two scholars deny that 16:8a
is a part of the parable and that kyrios refers to the master in
the parable on the ground that the latter would not praise his
deceitful servant.
To this it should be said that it seems unlikely that the oral
tradition would have preserved an appended statement that
Jesus praised a character in his parable. If 16:8a is not an
integral part of the parable, it is probably a secondary addition.
However, I take it to be an integral part of the parable and
kyrios to refer to the master in the story. Luke sometimes in-
serts ho l~YTios to indicate Jesus' application of a parable, but
it is not impossible for the absolute ho kyrios to be used of a
parabolic character in Luke (d. 12:37; 12:42b; 14:23); it
would seem probable that this is the case in 16:8a since the
master has already been referred to as kyrios twice in this
parable (16:3, 5). As a matter of fact it is not psychologically
28 Cf. Jeremias, Parables, pp. 45-47.

27 Cf. Michaelis, Gleichnisse, pp. 228-229.
28 Gleichnisse, pp. 227-228.
29 Parables, pp. 45-46, 182.
156
THE COMIC PARABLES
incredible for the master to have praised his deceitful servant,ao

and, as we shall see, the logic of the literary mode to which the
parable belongs calls for 16:8a to have been an original part
of the parable.
What was originally a parable for the crowds or, more par-
ticularly, for Jesus' critics has been turned by Luke into a
disciple parable (16:1).
(2) Literary-existential analysis. The beginning of the story
finds our' steward in a crisis. He has been accused before his
master of inefficiency or dishonesty and is about to be dis-
missed. Under the circumstances it would be difficult for him
to get another similar position. He was too delicate to dig-
or thought that he was-and, not having lost his pride, was
ashamed to beg. What was he to do? The fact that he is in
danger of being fired rather than punished suggests that he
is an employee and not a slave.81
The conclusion of part one tells us that the steward has
reached a decision about what to do, and the middle part
shows him carrying out his resolution. By reducing the amounts
owed to his master by his debtors he hoped to win the good
will of the debtors-or the general public32 or both-so that
they would take him in when he lost his position. Whether
his hopes were to be fulfilled we are not told, but there is at
least the implication that his situation was improving in that
the ending of the parable relates that the master in some way
approved the dishonest steward's actions. Thus we see an in-
ternally connected movement from threatening crisis, through
decisive response, to an improved situation. The image of man
is that of a being who is capable of recognizing that he is in a
80 Cf. W. O. E. Oesterley, The Gospel Parables in the Light of Their
Tewish Background, p. 197.
81 Cf. Michaelis, Gleichnisse, p. 226.
12 Cf. J. Duncan M. Derrett, "Fresh Light on Luke 16," New Testament
Studies,7 (1961).217.
157'
THE PARABLES
crisis and of laying hold on the situation in such a way as to

overcome the threat.
It seems to have been disturbing to some, however, that
the crisis resulted from the steward's own misconduct and that
he overcame it by more questionable behavior. Attempts have
been made to save the steward's character,33 but these efforts
cannot really be brought off. A typical-perhaps correct-
interpretation is that the steward was trying to cov~r up em-
bezzlement by falsifying accounts. The debtors are "tenants
who have to deliver a specified portion of the yield" of the
land, or they are "merchants who have given promissory notes
for goods received." The steward let the debtors alter their
notes or make out new ones hoping that, since the changes
would be in the same handwriting, his fraud would not be de-
tected. 34 If this is the correct interpretation, then the ending
(16:8a) suggests that the master did find out, but being a man
of easy standards himself and having some humor and detach-
ment, he praised his steward's ingenuity even though it had
cost him something.
A somewhat different interpretation of the parable's eco-
nomic and legal setting 11as been given by J. D. M. Derrett,
but the steward's character does not come off any better. Ac-
cording to Derrett the steward, as his employer's legal agent,
could release debts and the employer would be bound to
honor his actions unless he could prove that the agent did not
have authority to do this particular thing. The parable assumes
that the steward, "doing his worldly duty by his master," has
been making usurious loans. It was a typical Jewish practice
to liquidate loans and restate them in terms of natural products,
thus covering up a usurious transaction. This process made it
33 CE. J. Alexander Findlay, Teslts and hi$ Parables. pp. 81-84; Henry J.
Cadbury, "Soluble Difficulties in the Parables," pp. 119- 120.
8' CE. Jeremias, Parables, pp. 181- 182; Michaelis, Gleichni$se, pp. 22Cr
227.
158
THE COMIC PARABLES
possible to evade the biblical laws against usury and put the
lender legally, but not morally, in the clear. When the steward
released a part of the debts, what he did was to cancel the
amount that equaled interest plus insurance. The charging
of this amount was against the law of God and was oppressive,
but, as we have seen, was made legally possible by an accepted
subterfuge. In his moment of crisis the steward decided to
obey the law of God by canceling the interest and thus to win
public approval and acceptance. He believed that his employer
would not be so ungracious as to question his right to reduce
the debts but would rather want to take credit for the pious
acts which he did not initiate. The steward was right in his
calculations. Luke 16:8a means not simply that the master
praised the steward but that he ratified his reducing of the
debts.s~
In this interpretation the steward has detected that his
master is a scheming businessman who wants to make as much
money as possible but also wants to appear pious in the eyes
of the public. The steward plays upon this defect in his em-
ployer and manipulates the latter for his own advantage. More-
over, the fact that the steward's reducing of the debt coincides
with the law of God is purely fortuitous. Or more accurately,
he purposely does what is pious but purely in the interest of
personal advantage-to win public approval-not because of a
genuine concern for the well-being of the debtors.
Whatever the exact socio-economic connections of the story,
Jesus has placed the action of the steward in an aesthetic con-
figuration which is a miniature of what has come to be known
as the picaresque mode. A picaresque comedy tells the story of
a successful rogue who makes conventional society look foolish
but without establishing any positive alternative.36 A rogue
is one who lives by his wits and partly outside the community's
85 Derrett, "Luke 16," pp. 203-204, 210, 212, 214, 216-218.
86 Frye, Anatomy, pp. 45, 229.
159
THE PARABLES
standards of responsibility though not in a really threatening

way. He has an acute insight into human responses that may be
played upon to his advantage and is a master of the techniques
for playing upon them. He operates without the inhibitions
created by the community's sense of right and wrong though he
is not so much an enemy of these standards as one who lives in
a different world from them. While his overdeveloped practical
inteIIigence replaces a fuII emotional maturity, he is not totaIIy
without feeling. At least he has self-love, and he may experience
fear and disgust and have transient loyalties; but he is not
capable of terror, horror, or hate. ShaIIowness, and not
criminality, is the key to his character. He secures and plays
on his victim's consent and has a rudimentary rather than a
distorted sou1.37
The technical problem of securing a measure of sympathy
for the picaresque protagonist may be attacked in various ways.
He may be given certain admired qualities such as a good
nature or charm, or other characters may be given disagreeable
traits. The best method, however, is to keep the victim to a
large extent out of sight in order that he may not usurp sym-
pathy from the picaro (rogue}.38
The appeal of the typical picaresque work is that by cut·
ting off the larger dimensions of humanity it frees the reader
for a time from moral demands. it gives free play to the tricky,
seamy side of man, a side always present but usuaIIy kept
conscientiously under cover, and offers these impulses an o~ t·
portunity to work themselves off.30

That the unjust steward lived beyond the world of communal
norms is seen not only in his questionable business dealings
81 Cf. Robert B. Heilman, ''Variations on Picaresque," The Sewanee Re·

view, 66 (1958),548-550.
88 Ibid., pp. 551-552.
88 Ibid., p. 553.
160
THE COMIC PARABLES
and in his manipulation of his employer and the debtors but

also in the fact that he rejected digging and begging, which
were very much a part of the regular world of his day. More-
over, he is seen to be fearful about his plight and disgusted at
the thought of digging or begging, but he was not terrified.
In one way or another he won the approval of his victimized
employer. It is this element of success, which belongs to the
picaresque mode, that suggests that Luke 16:8a was an original
part of the parable.
A degree of sympathy is won for the steward by his trait
of at least being candid about his desire for an easy life. The
fact that the employer is characterized as "rich" may suggest
that he, too, is a schemer; and if it is correct to see the steward
as dealing in usurious loans, this activity is certainly at the
behest of his employer. Moreover, the latter is kept to a large
extent out of sight.
The Unjust Steward's exemplification of the picaresque
mode means that it produces the typically picaresque aesthetic
experience referred to above.
(3) Existen'tial-theological interpretation. The parable in it-
self says that the present is a crisis because the future is threat-
ening, and the comic form in which the story is cast suggests
that man by making an appropriate response to the crisis can
overcome the danger. But this is all configured in the picaresque
mode with its "moral holiday" as we]] as its catharsis of the
seamy side of man.
The crisis note in the parable points subsidiarily to the
same theme in Jesus' non-parabolic eschatological preaching
(Luke 12:8-9; Mark 8:38; Luke 17:22-30) with its offer of un-
conditional acceptance (cf. Mark 2: 15-17) and its demand for
unconditional obedience (cf. Matt. 5:21-48). But because the
parable is an aesthetic object which has its meaning and its
power to grasp and inform the attention through its total con-
161
THE PARABLES
figuration, one cannot simply isolate for consideration the point

or points of contact with Jesus' non-parabolic teaching and ig-
nore the points of tension. There is, as noted, a positive cor-
relation between the crisis theme in the parable and in Jesus'
non-parabolic teaching, and the catharsis element is certainly
not inimical to Jesus' message. But the character of the unjust
steward, along with its aesthetic effect, hardly accords with
Jesus' demand for self-denial and for unlimited purity and love.
Is it too much to say that this tension places in jesus' message
as a whole at least an element of comic relief from dead seri-
ousness, as the parable with a happy earthiness offers our tricky
side a temporary aesthetic fling? And perhaps the more pro-
found theological implication of this aesthetic effect is that
our well-being does not rest ultimately on our dead seriousness.
3. The Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32)

nAnd he said, "There was a man who had two sons; 12and
the younger of them said to his father, 'Father, give me the share
of property that falls to me.' And he divided his living between
them. 18Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had
and took his journey into a far country, and there he squandered
his property in loose living. HAnd when he had spent everything,
a great famine arose in that country, and he began to be in want.
15S 0 he went and joined himself to one of the citizens of that
country, who sent him into his fields to feed swine. 16And he would
gladly have fed on the pods that the swine ate; and no one gave
him anything. 17But when he came to himself he said, 'How
many of my father's hired servants have bread enough and to
spare, but I perish here with hungerl 18 1 will arise and go to my
father, and I will say to him, "Father, I have sinned against
heaven and before you; 191 am no longer worthy to be called your
son; treat me as one of your hired servants." , 2°And he arose and
came to his father. But while he was yet at a distance, his father
saw him and had compassion, and ran and embraced him and
kissed him. 2lAnd the son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned
against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be
called your son.' 22But the father said to his servants, 'Bring
162
THE COMIC PARABLES
quickly the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his
hand, and shoes on his feet; 28and bring the fatted calf and kill
it, and let us eat and make merry; 24for this my son was dead,
and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.' And they began to
make merry.
2DuNow his elder son was in the field; and as he came and drew
near to the house, he heard music and dancing. 26And he called
one of the servants and asked what this meant. 2TAnd he said to
him, 'Your brother has come, and your father has killed the
fatted calf, because he has received him safe and sound.' 28But
he was angry and refused to go in. His father came out and en-
treated him, 2°but he answered his father, 'La, these many years
I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command; yet you
never gave me a kid, that I might make merry with my friends
BOBut when this son of yours came, who has devoured your living
with harlots, you killed for him the fatted calfl' slAnd he said to
him, 'Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours.
82It was fitting to make merry and be glad, for this your brother
was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.' "
(1) Historico-literary criticism. The Prodigal Son naturally

comes last, as a climax to the interpretation of the several
parables, not simply because it is the longest of Jesus' extant
parables and probably has been the most influential on the
mind of the church and of Western man as a whole, hut be-
cause from the standpoint of both theme and plot it is the
most complex and inclusive.
The elder brother section is to be considered a genuine
and original part of the parable. In vicw of a parable's char-
acteristic economy, there would probably have been no mention
of two sons in the first part (15 : 11-12) had there been no
intention to bring both of them into the story. Moreover, in
its contrasting of two human types The Prodigal Son is similar
to such parables as The Two Sons (Matt. 21 :28-31) .40 In ad-
dition the elder brother part reflects Jesus' historical situation
~o Cf. Rudolf Bultmann, The History of the Synoptic Tradition, p. 196;

Jeremias, Parables, p. 131; Linnemann, Gleichnisse, p. 84.
163
THE PARABLES
and apart from this probably would not have been included,41
since the parable is aesthetically satisfactory without it.
That is to say, the elder brother in some sense represents
the scribes and Pharisees, who protested Jesus' fellowship with
the publicans and sinners, who in some sense are represented
by the prodiga1.42 But the parable is not an allegory,4S for the
patterns of connection are primarily internal and centripetal.
(2) Literary-existential analysis. It has often been claimed
that the father is the central figure in the parable44 and even
that this is true to such an extent that it should be called The
Father's Love.45 But it may be rejoined that the instinct of
the Christian and Western tradition has been right in calling
it The Prodigal Son, for it is the son's story. His experience
gives the plot its formal shape. Moreover, in all of the other
narrative parables (with the possible exception of The Ten
Maidens) the master figure in some way initiates or evokes the
action even though his experience does not give the plot its
structure. But in The Prodigal Son the son not only gives the
plot its structure but also initiates the action. As in The Un-
forgiving Servant, we have a double plot movement, but in
The Prodigal Son it is the opposite of the movement in the
former parable. That is, the prodigal's fortune changes from
good to bad to good.
The beginning of the story finds the son in what was ap-
parently a satisfactory home situation. At least it was good
enough to draw him back later. The young man, however,
wanted to strike out on his own; therefore, he prevailed upon
his father to give him that part of the inheritance which was
n CE. A. T. Cadoux, Tll4 Parables of Jesus, p. 121.

4Z Cf. Linnemann, Gleicll71isse, pp. 79-80; Jeremias, Parables, pp. 131-
132; Michaelis, Gleichnisse, p. 143.
111 As is claimed by Matthew Black, "The Parables as Allegory," p. 284 .
.. Cf. Gunther Bornkamm, Jesus of NaUJreth, p. 126.
'5 Jeremias, Parables, p. 128.
164
THE COMIC PARABLES
due him, and turning his share of the property into liquid
assets, he left home.
In the middle part we see how the prodigal lived out his
decision. He quickly spent his money in loose living and was
reduced to poverty and despair. But he came to some self-
knowledge and resolved to return home, hoping at best to be
received as a servant.
In the ending his father welcomed him, most surprisingly,
with all of the tokens of restored sonship and called for the
preparation of a feast of rejoicing. That the establishment
of a renewed society should be "signalized by some kind of
party or festive ritual" is typical of the comic ending.48 As a
matter of fact, eating imagery is used to represent both of the
prodigal's opposite extremities, and hence his rescue or re-
demption is suggested by the contrasting eating images. In the
depths of his poverty he is hungry; and the carob pods which
he would have eaten, had anyone given him some, were gener-
ally used as fodder for animals. Only in great poverty would
humans eat them. 'Hence the rabbis said: "When the Israelites
are reduced to eating carob-pods, then they repent."47 Upon
the prodigal's return, however, the fatted calf is killed for him.
We see in The Prodigal Son a plot structure of interlocking
parts moving finally upward from decision, through dissolution,
to well-being and restoration. If the comic and hopeful may
be lost in tragedy (The Unforgiving Servant), it is also possible
for the tragic to be overcome by comedy (The Prodigal Son).
Frye48 has pointed out that the form of comedy may be
developed in two ways: (a) The main emphasis may be placed
on blocking characters, characters who resist the comic move-
ment of the hero's story. (b) The accent may be caused to fall
'6 Frye, Andtomy, p. 163.

6T Quoted from Manson, Sayings, p. 288.
'8 Anatomy, pp. 166-·167.
165
THE PARABLES
on scenes of discovery and reconciliation. The blocking char-

acter is typically made absurd by attributing to him some ruling
passion. The plot movement is usually from a society controlled
by habit, bondage, or law-a society typical of the blocking
character-to a society marked by freedom.49
The Prodigal Son reflects these characteristic features of
comedy but with its own modifications. The elder brother-
the .blocking character-is given a certain stress by the fact
that the section dealing with him comes last; nevertheless,
the discovery and reconciliation of the prodigal are more fully
and powerfuily developed than is the elder brother's story,
and the treatment of the theme (cf. below) also puts the
empliasis on the prodigal's redemption. The elder brother, how-
ever, is too realistically like us to be absurd in the sepse meant
by Frye. .
The plot does not present a movement from a society
dominated by law-a society which would be typical of the
elder brother's outlook-but rather a movement from irresponsi-
bility on the part of the prodigal to a new contextual freedom.
In the ending the prodigal is free from want and free from
law, that is, free from the need to establish his position through
his own efforts. But the father-son relationship is restored,
and such a context, such a relationship, imposes responsibility
as wen as offers freedom. As Tillich has pointed out, there
is no freedom without destiny, without a context of concrete
alternatives among which one chooses, nor is there freedom
without responsibility, without being willing to answer for one's
choices. 50 The elder brother's story is a kind of separate chapter
which makes the contrast between law (the elder brother part)
and contextual freedom (the ending of the prodigal's story) run
parallel, so to speak, to the contrast between irresponsibility
.. Ibid., pp. 168-169. .

GO Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, Vol. 1 (Chicago: University of Chi·
cago Press, 1953), pp:ZOZ-Z04.
166
THE COMIC PARABLES
and contextual freedom. We have this parallelism rather than

having the society of law worked into the plot texture of the
prodigal's story. While the elder brother is a blocking char-
acter, there is also a sense in which the prodigal is his own
blocking character. It is his abuse of freedom which produces
his dissolution and the threat to his existence. Thus we see the
influence of the biblical understanding of sin on the comic
mode.
From the standpoint of plot The Prodigal Son has a rounded
and complete beginning, middle, and end without the elder
brother episode; but we saw above that there are good rea-
sons for considering the latter an original part of the' parable.
Moreover, the elder brother chapter is brought within the
thematic unity of the prodigal's story. How the elder brother
responded to his father's entreaty to come in to the festival
is not related. Rather the elder brother episode-and hence
the whole parable-is concluded by the father's repeating
(15: 32) the statement which he uttered at the end of the
prodigal's story (15 :24) and which expresses the movement
and meaning of the latter. Thus the main interest of the story
as a whole is seen to be the redemption of the prodigal.
As we noted in the chapter on the tragic parables, the se-
quence of events in those stories is tragic action, recognition
scene, downfall. In The Prodigal Son, on the other hand, it is
tragic action (squandering his money and loose living), down-
fall (his reduction to poverty and degradation), recognition
scene. In the tragic parables the recognition scene-if there is
to be one at all-must come before the downfall since the end-
ing (downfall) is something after which there is nothing. But
The Prodigal Son is a comedy which includes and overcomes
tragedy; therefore, the recognition scene follows the downfall
as the most appropriate transition to the comic rescue of the
tragic. In the comic ending the recognition scene is taken up
again and transcended. That is, the prodigal acknowledged to
167
THE PARABLES
his father, as he had acknowledged to himself, the forfeiture

of his sonship, but the father took him back as son. And in
The Prodigal Son, as in the tragic parables, the recognition
scene is still after the initiating action, indicating the blind-
ness with which man acts according to the biblical view of
things.
In the recognition scene the prodigal is seen to be aware
of his physical destitution and also of his having sinned against
God and his father. It is not altogether clear, however, whether
he meant by his sinfulness only his loose and wasteful living
or also included in his sinning his leaving home in the first
place. In any case he believed that he had destroyed his re-
lationship with his father and forfeited the right of sonship.
The prodigal did not blame someone else or the nature of life
itself for his plight but rather accused himself and assumed
responsibility for his situation. As the rest of the story shows,
however, what he accused was not an unalterable essence but
an aspect of himself, a forgivable aspect. There are still mean-
ingful possibilities to be realized after confession and self-
accusation.
The recognition scene presents man as capable of "coming
to himself," and a part of this is the recollection of one's
past. The son's confession is to some extent awakened by the
memory of his fathei and his home.'jl r-vfan is seen as capable of
recognizing who and where he is, particularly of knowing that
something is wrong. This image of man provides a clear contrast
with those moderns whom Karl Heim52 would call the thor-
oughgoing secularists. The semi-secularist may assert that life
is painful and meaningless, but he is still protesting this state
of affairs. He agrees with the prodigal at least in recognizing
that something is wrong. The thoroughgoing secularist, on the
Dl Cf. Bornkamm, Jesus, pp. 126-127.

D2 Christian Faith and Natural Science, trans. N. H. Smith (London:
SCM Press, 1953), pp. 17-19. •
168
THE COMIC PARABLU
other hand, has come to accept the nonnalcy of hell. He has
given up the illusion that life ought to be meaningful and
therefore has no protest to make. The loss of meaning is not
wrong but rather nonna!.
The prodigal is able not only to recognize that something
is wrong but to resolve to do something about it. The total
movement of the story reveals, however, that more can be done
about it than he can imagine. The final help comes from be·
yond him and far exceeds his expectations. He is incapable
of knowing what possibilities for good might come to him
until they do come.
The question of how the parable represents the prodigal's
sin depends somewhat on the nature of the young man's leave·
taking. Some interpreters see the latter as a self·assertive and
autonomous repudiation of the father's influence; thus leaving
home itself would have produced estrangement.1I8 In Born·
kamm's view the son has despised goodness and treated his
father "as if he were already dead."114 This interpretation would
seem to depend on the view that normally a son could acquire
legal possession of his share of the inheritance during his
father's lifetime but not the right to dispose of it until his
father's death.lIl> The right of disposal could indeed be obtained,
though to do so was to demand a special privilege.1IB Thus
the prodigal's demand for the right of disposal was to treat
his father as if he were dead.
In Linnemann's view, on the other hand, it was not unusual
that the younger son of a comfortably well-off peasant should
ask his father for his share of the inheritance. To Jesus' audio
&I Cf. Manson, Sayings, p. 288; Geraint V. Jones, The Art and Truth of
the Parables, pp. 175, 184, 185, 197.
ft, Bornkamm, Jesus, pp. 126-127.
1ft Cf. Herbert Danby, The Mishnah (Oxford University Press, 1933),
p.377.
ee Apparently the view of Manson, Sayings, pp. 287-288; Jeremias, Para·
bles, pp. 128-129.
169
THE PARABLES
ence the younger son's petition would sound like a legitimate

request and not like an insolent demand. IIT Indeed, according
to Michaelis, the son may be represented as at first an especially
industrious young man who wanted to make a life of his own
abroad.1IS The situation may be somewhat clarified if we accept
Smith's view that the law forbidding a son to sell property
given to him by his father during the latter's lifetime was not
yet in force in Jesus' time.1!9 If this is the correct interpre-
tation of the legal and social situation, then the leave-taking
itself might not represent an autonomous breaking out of the
personal. The son's sin is rather his wasteful mode of life.
He became an unworthy son through the wanton irresponsi-
bility with which he dissipated his father's living, which had
been freely given to him.
It has been suggested that for Jesus sin is being "in the
wrong place,"8o and this certainly applies to the prodigal. He
was hungry among the swine in a foreign country when he
could have been in his father's house where even the servants
had plenty to eat. But is his being in the wrong place the fact
that he had left home at all or is it the place he had got himself
into after an innocent leave-taking? Clearly his going home is a
redemption. Does this suggest, then, that leaving home was in
some sense a fall? Moreover, while it may have been quite
legal for the son to seek and to receive the right of disposal
of his share of the inheritance, at least some Jewish circles
frowned on a father's giving complete control of some portion
of his property to his children before his death (Ecclus. 33:19-
23). It is difficult to believe that the parable places no judg-
~7 CE. Linnemann, Gleichnisse, pp. 80-8l. According to Linnemann the

younger of two sons was entitled to one-third of the disposable property but
not to any of the real estate.
G8 Michaelis, Gleichnisse, p_ 138.
~g Smith, Parables, pp. 194-195.
80 Gerhard Gloege, The Day of His Coming, trans. S. Rudman (Philadel-
phia: Fortress Press, 1963), p. 180.
170
THE COMIC PARABLES
ment at all on the leave-taking as such though the emphasis

may well be on the son's irresponsible squandering of his money
with harlots.
This is probably a good place to deal with the flaw of the
elder brother. The view that the parable does not put him
in a bad light61 seems doubtful. He, too, is in the wrong place,
for not only is he outside of the house where the music and
dancing are-is there a hint that he disapproves of music and
dancing?-but he willfully remains outside. His resentment over
the fact that his wayward brother had been royally welcomed
home while his own consistent obedience had not been re-
warded with merrymaking does not suggest that he is a self-
righteous man who has cancelled his previous righteousness by
his present lovelessness. 62 The older son revealed, rather, that
his obedience had always been based on a misunderstanding.
His belief that his relationship with his father was based on
merit and reward stood in the way of a deeply personal rela-
tionship. He complained that his father had never even given
him a kid to celebrate with-when all of the time all that his
'I
father had was his. He, however, was incapable of knowing
I this at the level of immediate, personal engagement.
The ending of the prodigal's story restores the father-son
relationship and is truly a new beginning, a new beginning
based on the surprising generosity of the father rather than on
the merits of the son. The acceptance is not based on any con-
ditions, probation, or proofs of repentance. In fact repentance
finally turns out to be the capacity to forego pride and accept
graciousness. It should be noticed that the father not only goes
out to the prodigal son; he also goes out to the elder brother.
As has been noted, the thematic meaning of the parable
is expressed by the father both at the end of the prodigal's
story and at the end of the elder brother episode: the lost
61 As is claimed by Smith, Parables, p. 194.
82 As Michaelis holds, Gleichnisse, p. 1H.
171
THE PARABLES
has been found; he who was dead is alive. The issues involved
could not be more crucial, for the question of life or death is at
stake. The difference between holding oneself answerable to
no one and being graciously received into a context where ac-
ceptance need not be earned but where one is answerable for
deciding between real alternatives is the difference between
death and life. The difference between believing that one must
merit acceptance and being graciously accepted into a situation
of freedom-and-responsibility is also the difference between
death and life.
One of the typical heroes of twentieth-century fiction is
the figure whom R. W. B. Lewis calls the "picaresque saint."
By taking on sinfulness and wretchedness he experiences fel-
lowship with the suffering human race. He tries to keep in
balance, just in the contradictions of his character, both the
observed truths of contemporary experience and the intense
desire to move beyond them. Although he is an outsider, he is
an outsider who gains entrance, and he usually experiences a
conversion from something like death to something like
life.os The prodigal son's kinship with the picaresque saint is
obvious.
(3) Existential-theological interpretation. The father's sur-
prising but not impossible actions cut across the everyday way
of looking at things and point to God. It was generally beneath
rthe dignity of an older oriental to run,04 but this father ran to
his returning son. Moreover, his actions might be taken as in-
dulgent, for he risked encouraging the prodigal in his profligacy;
he also risked offending his older son,OG but he took these risks.
The pointing to God, however, is both subsidiary and indirect
because Jesus was defending first his own gracious association
with sinners. Yet he wanted his conduct to be understood as
8a Cf. Lewis,Picaresque, pp. 28, 31, 33.

84 Cf. Linnemann, Gleichnisse, p. 83.
05 Cf. Findlay, Parables, p. 73; Fuchs, Historical Jesus, pp. 20, 160-161.
172
THE COMIC PARABLES
explaining the will of God. 66 The father in the parable, then,

points subsidiarily both to Jesus' historical conduct and to the
nature of God.
According to Manson 6T the parable lays down the funda-
mental principle that God loves the sinner before he repents
and that somehow the divine love makes repentance possible.
This position may wen be true if we understand by repentance
the total movement of the son from his coming to himself,
through his return home, to his own acceptance of his father's
gracious reception of him. But It does not seem to recognize
that the self-understanding of the son at the time of his coming
to himself is different from that which he has later, after he
has actually been welcomed. There is a late rabbinic parable
in which the father says: "Come as far as you can, my son, and
I will come the rest of the way."68 Neither does this parable
express the change in self-understanding which is 'suggested by
The Prodigal Son, and the rabbinic parable implies that the
movements of father and son-God and man-are on the same
plane.
The Prodigal Son, by suggesting a radical change in the self-
understanding of the prodigal, implies that something has come
to him from a different dimension. His coming to himself sug-
gests that natural man can be aware of guilt and of the need
for the restoration of fellowship with God, but he understands
this in terms of law. The prodigal hopes that law will be tinged
with mercy, for he does hope that his father will receive him
back as a servant. But his understanding is basically oriented
to law. He has forfeited the right of sonship and does not ex-
pect it back. That is to say, natural man does not know God
as the one who forgives radically and does not know himself
as accepted in .spite of his un acceptability. As Bultmann has
66Fuchs, Historical Jesus, pp. 20, 25.

67 Sayings, p. 286.
es Quoted from Findlay, ParcJbles, p. 74. Findlay does not give his source.
173
THE PARABLES
said, for natural man God is remote, and sonship is experienced

as a judgment.6D
The prodigal son knows his father as the gracious person he
really is and knows himself as a son again-and not a servant...;.,.
only when he is actually received back. Only when the event
of forgiveness occurred and shattered his own view of things
did his understanding change. The son did take the initiative
to come back, but the situation into which he came was quali-
tatively different, of a different dimension, from what he
expected. This suggests that natural man's legalistic under-
standing of the divine-human relationship is shattered only by
the unexpected event of forgiveness which comes to him from
beyond himself. Thus we may say with Bornkamm70 that The
Prodigal Son makes clear that the fatherhood of God can be
understood only as an event which now happens, as a miracle.
When God is known as forgiver, he is near and no longer
remote.'I1
The comic movement of The Prodigal Son is from well-
being, through fall, back to well-being, and this is also true
for the total sweep of the Bible-from Genesis to Revelation.
But if this movement is referred to as cyclical,72 it should not
be thought that either the Bible in general or The Prodigal
Son in particular envisions a literal cyclical return to the same
beginning. In the strictly cyclical view of time everything is
fixed in the Urzeit, and nothing really new can happen. While
the biblical view of time cannot be simply represented by a
solid straight line, and while there are recurring patterns in the
biblical picture, it is still true that in the latter the new does
emerge, and the Endzeit is not identical with the Urzeit.13
G8 Bultmann.lesus and the Word, p. 194.

TO Jesus, p. 128.
n Bultmann, Theology of the New Testament, Vol. 1. p. 24.
T2 As it is by Frye, Anatomy, pp. 171. 316.
71 Cf. Brevard S. Childs. Myth and Reality in the Old Testament ("Stud-
ies in Biblical Theology," No. 27 [London: SCM Press. 1960]), pp. 73-83.
174
THE COMIC PARABLES
There are both continuity and discontinuity, and this is also

true for the existence of the prodigal son. At the end he was
the same person that he was at the beginning, and yet not
quite. Throughout his story possibilities became actualized
which had been only potentialities. In The Prodigal Son, and
characteristically in the Bible, past, present, and future are
distinct-and thus real-though interrelated.
Ebeling's interpretation of existence in faith puts the em-
phasis on the future and makes the present little more than
the transition from the remembered past to the all important
future.74 Fuchs, on the other hand gives more substance to the
present. It is the time of the called while the future is God's
time for which man could and should do nothing. The result
is that "calling means being free for" and "within the bounds
of the present."7:i As we have seen, Fuchs' view is supported by
such parables as The Talents and The Ten Maidens. In The
Prodigal Son, however, the emphasis is somewhat different.
In The Ten Maidens, for example, the present is determined
by a future expectation. From the beginning the young women
are consciously aware of a definite, expected future event, and
they orient their actions in the light of it with the result that
their different ways of conducting themselves affect their future
destinies. In The Prodigal Son, on the other hand, the young
man's actions are determined largely by his intentions about
or his response to his immediate, present situation. Thus we
see a kind of present developing in its own immediacy, a pres-
ent which takes its content from itself, rather than from an
expectation about or the impingement of the future. In the
beginning there is no indication that the son initiates the
action because of a future expectation. It is rather in response
to the caU of the here and now that he acts. In his recognition
scene he does hope that in the future his father will take him
a Gerhard Ebeling, Word and Faith, pp. 214-215, 240-241.
7~ Fuchs, Historical Jesus, p. 163 .
175
THE PARABLES
back as a servant, and he also remembers his past, but the em-
phasis in his coming to himself is his interpretation of the fact
that he is a swineherd in the present. In the richly filled present
of the ending the father's welcoming and joyous activities are
in response to an unexpected present.
This does not mean that the story is not aware of the dif-
ference between past, present, and future-for it clearly is-
and it does not portray an eternal present. It is simply that at
any moment the actions and recognitions occur as a response
to or an intention about the present rather than as a response
to an expected future event. Thus in The Prodigal Son the
present is given an immediacy and a significance in itself
which it does not have in such parables as The Ten Maidens
and The Talents.
176
6
The Parables, the Gospels,

and the Historical Jesus
Heretofore we have discussed a number of the parables pri-

marily, though not exclusively, as individual units. This has
been justified because these stories, as aesthetic objects, have a
certain autonomy and because this is the way they would have
confronted Jesus' hearers. While the first hearers of the par-
ables would have had varying degrees of knowledge about
Jesus' actions and teachings, they would have been in no posi-
tion to see them in the light of Jesus' whole history and obvi-
ously could not have seen them in the light of the structure
of the Gospels in which they came to be included. We, how-
ever, can and do see the parables in connection with Jesus'
history-as sketchy as it is-and in connection with the Synop-
tic Gospels. Some attention must therefore be given to the
parables' relationship to these two complexes. To consider the
parables in relation to the individual theologies of the Synoptic
evangelists would take us too far afield; hence the discussion
of the Gospels will be limited chiefly to the relationship of
the parables in general to what might be called the Gospel
fonn.
1. The Form of the Parables and the Form of the Gospels

It is a commonplace of contemporary theology that the
Gospels are kerygmatic. Their form and framework are deter-
177
THE PARABLES
mined by theological concerns, by the Easter faith. At the same

time they identify the risen Christ with the historical Jesus,
and whether or not they were intended as historical sources-
and we must consider below whether they were so intended-
to some extent they still serve as such. 1 It may be true that the
Gospels' unique combination of a historical event with an in-
terpretation of that event which sees it as the final manifesta-
tion of the transcendent distinguishes the Gospels from any
category in the history of ancient literature.2 Or it may be said
similarly that the Gospel is the only wholly new form created
by the church.s It is not impossible, however, to indicate the
Gospels' affinities with other literary types. But before doing
that it is necessary to consider the relationship of the parables
to the Gospels in a general and theoretical way.
It will be recalled that, according to Polanyi, in genuine
understanding focal attention is on a gestalt or configuration,
while the particulars that make up the larger complex receive
only subsidiary attention. Moreover, a particular is truly known
only when seen in the light of its most comprehensive context:'
If we apply this principle to the Gospels, then we must say
that although from the standpoint of the situations in which
Jesus told the parables the parables themselves were the focus,
now that they have been included in a more comprehensive
literary structure, that new structure has become the focus and
the parables are subsidiary. To make the parables subsidiary
to the larger story of Jesus and to the kerygmatic interpretation
of that story was certainly the intention of the evangelists, and
to the extent that their intention can be carried out the par-
1 Cf. Hans Werner Bartsch, "The Historical Problem of the Life of Jesus,"
in The Historical Jesus and the Kerygmatic Christ, p. 116; Hans Conzel·
mann,'''The Method of the Life of Jesus Research," in The Historical Jesus
and the Kerygmatic Christ, p. 57.
2 Cf. Giinther Bornkamm, in Tradition and Interpretation in Matthew,
p.52.
8 Amos N. Wilder, Early Christian Rhetoric, pp. 36-37.
• Michael Polanyi, The Study of Man, pp. 52, 71.
178
THE PARABLES, THE GOSPELS, AND THE HISTORICAL JESUS
abIes become vehicles for the expression of the whole keryg-

matic meaning of .the Gospels. When a parable is seen in the
light of the larger whole, it gathers the whole into itself.
We must, however, raise the question whether the evangel-
ists actually are able to carry out their intention to make the
parables subsidiary to the structure of the Gospels. It is my
judgment that the parables-because they are aesthetic objects,
because of their organic interlocking of form-and-content-
resist the effort to assimilate them to the form of the Gospels
in a way that the other materials used by the evangelists do
not. Some resistance is offered also by other units which have
achieved a certain fullness of form, such flS miracle stories and
apothegms. The latter, however, have Jesus as their central
character, just as he is in the Gospel story as a whole; there-
fore, they do not in any far-reaching way deflect attention from
the overall structure of the Gospels. The parables, on the other
hand, have their own characters and their own autonomous
world with the result that they cannot become merely subsidi-
ary to the structure of the Gospels but rather contend inevi·
tably with the latter for the focal attention of the reader. Thus
the parables make a claim to be a clue to the meaning of the
Gospels as well as derive a part of their meaning-in their
present position-from the Gospels. The reader who becomes
deeply and personally involved in the reading of the Gospels is
caught in a kind of tension and/or movement between the
form of the Gospel and the form of the parables.
What, then, more precisely, is the form of the Gospels? To
debate the question of whether or not the Gospel form should
be called a definite literary genre5 would not be as fruitful as
a Ernst F uchs (Studies of the Historical Jesus, p. 66) holds that the
Gospels are a new genre which ~h o lll d not be c;J1I,'c! "minor Iiterlture."
Rudolf Bultm:.mn (The History of the Synoptic Tradition, pp. 373-374 ) ,
on the other hand, holds that while the Gospel form w~s capable of develop·
ment, cano lz, tion pre cnt d_ thal developmcilt from laking plaee (except
for John's mod ification of Mark); therefore, it is not proper to speak of the
Gospels as a literary genre.
179
THE PARABLES
to consider concretely its kinship with and differences from

the Western literary tradition. In the Gospels we see Jesus
seeking and intending to bring to men the gracious presence
and rule of God, but his efforts resulted in conflict and finally
in his death. On the cross he suffered the tragic recognition that
his good purpose had produced forsakenness by God. The res-
urrection, however, shows that he was not really abandoned,
although he believed that he was, and proves his death to have
been in truth a victory. From the standpoint of plot, then, the
Gospel form might be called the tragedy of an innocent suf-
ferer which is followed by a post-tragic redemptive episode6
or, similarly, a tragedy which paradoxically includes victory.T In
view of the emphasis which the Gospels clearly put on the
resurrection, however, it seems more appropriate to speak of
the Gospel form as a comedy in which the tragic is included
and overcome.s The ease and appropriateness with which the
categories of tragedy and comedy can be used of the Gospels
manifest their affinity with the literary tradition.
From the standpoint of Frye's classification of protagonists
according to their power of action, the Gospels appear to be,
and to an extent are, myths, for Jesus in the Gospel picture is
superior in kind to other men and to the environment. The
evangelists present him as the eschatological figure who in
some sense shares the nature of God. That, however, is only
a part of the story. Jesus is presented as a real, human figure
of the recent past, a carpenter (or son of a carpenter) who ,.
became a teacher and was at the mercy of other men who did
him to death. This combination of features, however, does not
make the Gospels what Frye calls "displaced myth." In this
genre the protagonist is a human being who is simply associ-
ated with a reality-like the sun-which in a real myth would
IIOscar Mandel, A Definition of Tragedy, pp. 113-115.

f Northrop Frye, Anatomy of Criticism, p. 220.
8 CE. ibid., p. 215.
180
be deified and with which the protagonist would be identified.D

In the Gospels, on the other hand, Jesus is not simply associ-
ated with God. Jesus' life is the . divine action though he is
finite and mortal. This interlacing of the mythological and the
realistic, of the divine and the human, defies classification ac-
cording to the categories of ancient literature.
We might say that the Gospel form is the tragicomedy of
the God-man which proclaims and offers to other men the
comic overcoming of their tragic loss of existence.
In considering the relationship of the parables to the Gos-
pels it may be recalled that it is typical of the parables to have
a master-father figure, who usually evokes the action, and a
servant-subject-son figure, whose story gives the parable its for-
mal shape. These two figures are clearly distinguished, but in
the Gospels this distinction is moderated. Jesus, as the instru-
ment of the eschatological rule of God, is the master who calls
men to radical obedience and to follow in his way. But he is
also the servant-subject figure whose story gives the Gospels
their formal structure. As the servant of God he suffers in obe-
dience, and by being the servant of God he is also the servant
of men in that men do with him as they will and also in the
sense that his death paradoxically is for their redemption.
Jesus' resurrection demonstrates that the man who loses his
life-who in freedom risks self·contrived security-gains his life.
Whoever reads the parables as a part of the Gospels is to
tmder.stand himself in between the servant-subject figure of the
parables and the master-servant of the Gospels. The parables
keep the reader anchored in the everyday world, although it is
a world also mysteriously crossed by the unexpected, and show
him what his possibilities are in that world. The Gospels show
rum the ground of those possibilities, a ground only allusively
and subsidiarily suggested in the parables.
u Ibid., p. 137.
181
THE PARABLES
Jesus' call to men creates a crisis of decision. A person must

decide what to do with his life or what he will let be done with
it. The tragic parables reveal what is involved in deciding
against the eschatological act of God. When they are read in
juxtaposition with the Gospel story, the effect is tension, for
we are made to realize that while the ultimate meaning of life
is comic-the form of the Gospels-the meaning of an indi-
vidual life may be tragic-the form of the tragic parables.
Authentic existence has been decisively revealed in Jesus' life,
but men may still lose their existence.
We may recall that the plot movement of The Prodigal Son
is from well-being, through suffering and despair, to new life
won from death. The plot movement of the Gospels is also
from well-being, through suffering and a sense of abandon-
ment, to the victory of life over death. There is an overall
parallelism here but also tension. The man who lets his exis-
tence be informed by the structures of The Prodigal Son and
the story of Jesus will know that while Jesus' suffering and
death resulted from his intention to bring the presence of God,
his own suffering and despair, like the prodigal's, are the con-
sequence of wanton irresponsibility and self-concern. But there
is movement as well, for the life (resurrection) which issued
from Jesus' innocent death has the power to take the death
bOin of sin into itself and turn it into new life. The man \"l110
is taken from death to life by Jesus' story participates, in his
own way, in the same kind of risky renunciation of security
which Jesus accepted. He gives up both the prideful attempt
to establish himself with God by his own efforts and the
inverted pride of unrelenting self-condemnation.
2. The Parables and Eschatology

In the preceding section the Gospels were treated primarily
as literary pieces, as aesthetic objects. This was justified by
182
their affinities with the Western literary tradition, and such

an approach can tell us a good deal about their meaning and
effect. The Gospels, however, are not by any means aesthetic
to the extent that the parables are. The latter are imaginative
creations which point only subsidiarily and indirectly, by anal-
ogy, to Jesus' historical situation. The Gospels, on the other
hand, point directly to Jesus, and it cannot have been a matter
of indifference to the evangelists whether or not Jesus lived. It
is a part of the content which they inform in their kerygma tic
structure that the eschatological act of God occurred in a par-
ticular history, and they give us a history of Jesus, however
disconnected, episodic, and theologically arranged it may be.
Because of the New Testament view that revelation occurred
in a particular history it also makes a difference what Jesus did
and how he understood it, although it would be impossible to
say how much of this content needs to be known.
The line of distinction between Jesus and the kerygma is not
unambiguous, and it will always remain problematical whether
certain elements reflect the historical Jesus or the kerygma, yet
some distinctions can be made. This does not mean, however,
that Jesus' story as distinguished from the kerygma tic frame-
work of the Gospels is un interpreted fact. It also has its pattern
of meaning. The parables, therefore, need to be seen in rela-
tion to the pattern of connections in Jesus' story as well as in
relation to the pattern of connections in the finished keryg·
matic Gospel.
The effort to uncover as much as possible of the historical
Jesus' interpretation of his mission may rest on the theological
assumption that there is something uniquely authoritative for
the Christian faith in the historical Jesus. 10 The effort may
also rest on the historiographical consideration that every epoch
10 Cf. Joachim Jeremias, The Parables of Jesus, pp. 9, II 4; Gerhard
Cloege, The Day of His Coming, p. 7.
183
THE PARABLES
is centered on itself and should be interpreted in the light of

its own pattern of connections.l l Thus the epochs of Jesus and
of the early church should be distinguished. One is inclined to
agree with Van Buren that if historical research could show
that Jesus made an agreement with the authorities to stay in
the wilderness and let someone else be crucified in his place,
thus revealing that he was as insecure and self-interested as
anyone e1se, the Christian faith as the New Testament pre-
sents it would be untenable. In this sense faith is based on
history, and if this puts faith at the mercy of the historian,
that is the inevitable risk of centering Christianity on a histor-
ical figure. 12
If, on the other hand, it could be proved by historical schol-
arship-which it could not-that Jesus was perfectly secure and
without self-interest, it would still not legitimate the kerygma.
Because the New Testament proclaims that God acted finally
in Jesus' history-because the New Testament is concerned with
both history and the transcendent-faith is both interested and
uninterested in historical questions. ls To show that there is a
basic consistency between the kerygma's and Jesus' understand-
ing of existence would not prove that the transcendent really
had entered into time; moreover, the demonstration of consist-
ency would not relieve one of the risks involved in making this
understanding of existence one's own. However, if it could be
shown that there is a basic inconsistency between Jesus' and
the kerygma's understanding of existence, one might legiti-
mately question the validity of the kerygma or Jesus or both.
On this negative side historical questions cannot be ignored.
11 Wilhelm Dilthey, Pattern and Meaning in History, pp. 129-131.

11 Paul Van Buren, The Secular Meaning of the Gospel, pp. 125-126.
11 Cf. Hermann Diem, "The Earthly Jesus and the Christ of Faith," in
Kerygnut and History, ed. and trans. C. E. Braaten and R. A. Harrisville
(New York and Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1962), p. 205; Nils A. Dahl,
'The Problem of the Historical Jesus," in Kerygma and History, pp. 159-
171; Hugh Anderson, Jesus and Christian Origim, p. 116.
184
Let it be agreed that the decision of faith in a sense is free

of historical considerations. This assertion is true, however,
only of the first moment of faith and of certain other moments
of faith. When we go on to consider faith as the stance of the
whole man lived as a process, then we recognize that this man,
who reasons as well as wills and feels, will ask about such
things as the continuity between Jesus' preaching and the
kerygma. If faith cannot justify itself intellectually-through
theologizing-there will be a split between the intellectual, on
the one hand, and, on the other, the volitional and emotive,
which are more prominent in faith. Thus a historical-critical-
theological concern with the continuity between Jesus and the
kerygma is called for by the need to live a unified existence.
Repeated unquestioning responses interlaced with continuing
theological reflection would be part of the ongoing dialectic
of the Christian life.
It is widely agreed and seems reasonably certain that the
central theme in the preaching of the historical Jesus was the
kingdom or rule of God. 14 It is highly probable, moreover, that
Jesus' proclamation of the future kingdom was apocalyptic in
nature. To be sure Jesus did reject the calculating of the exact
time of the end by observing signs (Luke 17:20 ff.)15 and had
no interest in fanciful descriptions of the new world, but he
retained the apocalyptic expectation of a cosmic catastrophe
in the near future which would involve the disappearance of
a Fuchs at times seems to deny that the kingdom itself made up the con-
tent of Jesus' preaching (Historical lesU$, p. 143), though lIe holds that
Jesus pondered the problem of the kingdom and expressed himself on it
(ibid. , p. 179). Probably FuChs' hesitation about saying that Jesus direotly
proclaimed the coming of the kingdom stems ftom his de~ire to avoid reduc-
ing Jesus' message to the proclamation of the end of time (ibid., pp. 108,
Ill, lIZ, 116).
ld But N. A. Dnlll has shown that altllough for Jesus the finnl day will
come suddenly and unexpectedly, Jesus nevel'~heless believed that by divine
necessity certain things l1ad to happen before the cnd ("TIle Parables of
Growth," p. 146).
18S
TH£ PARABLES
this world and the advent of a new one. 16 At the same time
Jesus proclaimed that the kingdom of God was eschatologically
-decisively-present in his ministry. There are individual say-
ings which make the kingdom eschatologically future (Mark
8:38; 13:28-29) and individual sayings which make it eschato-
logically present (Matt. 12:28; 11 :5; 12:41-42; 13:16-17).17
Thus Jesus' preaching paradoxically places man between two
"final" focal points. Fuchs 18 and Conzelmann19 prefer to say
16 The efforts of scholars like J. Arthur Baird (The Tustice of God in the
Teaching of Tesus, pp. 77-79, 81-82, 94, 102, 112, 145-151) and Ethelbert
Stauffer ("The Relevance of the Historical Jesus," in The Historical Tesus
and the Kerygmatic Christ, pp. 47-48) to deny that Jesus as a man of his
day used apocalyptic thought forms will hardly stand up in the face of such
exegetical demonstrations as that of W. G. Kiimmel, Promise and Fulfil·
ment, trans. D. M. Barton ("Studies in Biblical Theology," No. 23 [London:
SCM Press, 1957)). Norman Perrin concedes that the kingdom is an apoca-
lyptic concept in Jesus' teaching but qualifies this to the point that little or
nothing remains of the apocalyptic (The Kingdom of God in the Teaching
of Jesus, pp. 158, 177-178, 185-190). According to Kasemann, Jesus pro-
claimed the corning of the kingdom of God, but Jesus did not speak of it
exclusively or even primarily as the chronologicaIIy datable end of the world.
Rather, for Jesus the kingdom meant God's becoming immediately present
for man. In Kasemann's view the non-apocalyptic character of Jesus' preach-
ing distinguished it from the message of John the Baptist, on the one hand,
and from the kerygma of the earliest Jewish-Christian church on the other;
and Kasemann uses quotation marks even in speaking of Jesus' "eschatology."
See Ernst Kasemann, "Zum Thema der urchristlichen Apokalyptik," Zeit-
schrift fur Tlz eologie und Kirche. 59 (1962), 260-263.
11 jallles tv!. Rpbin50n C ~ T he Forrual Structure of Jesus'
~vfessage," p. 97)
has stated that Bullma nn and C. H. Dodd have mo",cd closer together in
recent years, Bultmann relinquishing some of his emphasis on futuristic
eschatology in favor of recognizing that Jesus also proclaimed an eschato-
logical present, and Dodd relinquishing some of his emphasis on realized
eschatology in favor of an eschatology in the process of realization. Robinson
is probably right with reference to Bultmann. Cf. Bultmann, "Man between
the Times According to the New Testament," p. 253; "The Primitive Chris-
tian Kerygma and the Historical Jesus," in The Historical Jesus and the
Kerygmatic Christ, p. 29. But with respect to Dodd, though in a footnote
he expresses approval of "sich realisierende Eschatologie" (The Interpreta-
tion of the Fourth Gospel [Cambridge: The University Press, 1953), p. 447),
in the revised edition of The Parables of the Kingdom (1961) he gives no
indication of abandoning realized eschatology; d. pp. viii, 29-35, 159, 167.
18 Historical Tesus, pp. 137-138, 158.
18 "Life of Jesus," p. 64.
186
that Jesus saw himself as a sign of the kingdom and his time
as the time of calling for the kingdom rather than that Jesus
saw his ministry as the actual advent of the kingdom. Kiise-
mann, on the other hand, states that Jesus saw the coming of
the kingdom in his word.20 As Dahl has suggested, more impor-
tant than the terminology are the meaning and relationship of
the two focal points.21 However, such texts as Matt. 12:28
seem to indicate that Jesus saw his own time as the time of the
kingdom's coming.
The essentially mythological nature of the apocalyptic expec-
tation, along with its failure to materialize, requires a transla-
tion into existentialist terms, and such a translation yields an
understanding of existence in history. The juxtaposition of
sayings expressing both realized and futuristic eschatology sug-
gests that present and future are inherently related. Each is
seen in the light of the other, and human existence is a move-
ment from the present to the future. The eschatological ele-
ment points to the cruciality and urgency of the decision which
man is called upon to make in the present and asserts that the
challenge comes to man from beyond himself and that its
future outcome is not finally subject to man's manipulation.
The futuristic eschatological sayings present the kingdom of
God as holding open the possibility of man's being finally
saved or lost. When the present is seen in the light of this
future, it takes on the character of a challenge to decision and
also an anticipation of the final outcome. When the future
kingdom is seen in the light of the fullness of life and renewal
in the present, then the future becomes the completion of
something already begun. Because the kingdom of God is fu-
20 Essays on New Testament Themes, pp. 43-44. Fuchs (Historical Jesus,

p. l06. n. 1 ) says that he agrees with this statement of Kasemann despite his
(Fuchs') hesitation elsewhere to speak of Je~us' seeing the kingdom as actu·
ally coming in his ministry.
21 "Parables," p. 157.
187
THE PARABLI!S
ture, man is waiting; but because it is also present, the man

who responds is fulfilled. The man who lives the existence
envisioned by Jesus' eschatology both has and has not; thus he
is man in movement, in movement toward having what he has;
being is becoming.
What is the relationship of the parables to Jesus' eschatol-
ogy? It is not that certain elements in the parables simply
point to the two focal points of Jesus' eschatology in a direct
or allegorical way. That is, for example, the master's giving the
talents to his servants does not point. directly to Jesus' earthly
ministry with the master's return pointing to the future con-
summation and the Parousia of the Son of Man. Rather the
understanding of existence implied in the mythological escha-
tology is given a different-and fuller-configuration in the
parables. The content of this I have tried to suggest in chap-
ters 4 and 5. To the extent that the parables reflect Jesus'
eschatology, they are a demythologizing of it, or, more cor-
rectly, they are a pre-mythological and aesthetic expres-
sion of the existential intention of the eschatology. There is
both a tension between and a rapprochement of, say, the one-
talent man's loss of his talent or the five maidens' being shut
out of the wedding feast and the mythological idea of the final
judgment. The parables pull the ultimate loss of existence im-
plied in the final judgment into a pattern of happening human
existence so that the final judgment, the unrecoverable loss of
existence, becomes an event in the midst of history. At the
same time, because of the subsidiary connection between the
ending of the parables and the non-parabolic eschatological
sayings, the latter tend to pull the former out of the earthly
continuum and to emphasize the finality of the loss and the
presiding hand of God. We have seen, however, that the para-
bles in their own way, independently of their connection with
Jesus' non-parabolic eschatological sayings, indicate the escha-
tological crossing of the everyday.
188
Is the emphasis in Jesus' eschatology on the future or the

present kingdom? Is the real center of gravity the future, so
that the present is seen only in its light, as a crisis and at the
most an anticipation? Or is the weight on the present and its
rich actuality, so that the future is seen in its light, as the com-
pletion of something already very much begun? The parables
may shed some light on this question although they do not
give a conclusive answer. In The Ten Maidens and The Unjust
Steward the future is the center of gravity. The young womens'
activity is 'elicited almost altogether by the expectation of the
future festal occasion, and the unjust steward acts entirely to
ward off a future threat. The present is a crisis, a time for
resolve and activity, because it is seen in the light of the fu-
ture. It is ironical that the young women, who expect the best
from the future, are shut out, while the unj ust steward, who
fears the worst, gains well-being.
In The Talents there is more or less equal emphasis on the
two focal points. There is in the future, in part two of the
parable, an accounting for the activity in which the servants
are engaged in part one of the story, and the consequences of
the activity and the accounting are drawn out in part three.
But the servants are not expected to trade with their money
simply in order to be held accountable in the future. One can-
not avoid the future consequences of his present action, but
taking the risk of opening oneself to one's largest possibilities
and abandoning the restrictive security of non-action is a pres-
ent good in itself; it is authentic existence. The present is seen
in its own light as well as in the light of the future. This would
also seem to be true of The Wicked Tenants.
In The Prodigal Son (and in The Workers in the Vineyard,
The Unforgiving Servant, and The Wedding Garment) the
center of gravity has shifted to the present. The emphasis is on
~! the power of the present to evoke action or on the gift and
demand which confront man in the present. The future in an
189
THE PARABLES
eschatological sense is implied in these parables very lightly.

Certainly it is seen in the light of the present.
The preceding discussion suggests that neither thorough-
going nor realized eschatology 22 will stand up in the light of
the parables. Jesus' eschatology had two focal points, but if
there was in Jesus' teaching an overarching and systematic
view as to where the emphasis lay, it cloes not appear in the
tradition which has come down to us.
3. The Parables and Jesus' Understanding of His Mission

It seems to be clear that Jesus did not speak of himself as
the Messiah, and the question whether he used any broadly
"messianic" titles of himself, including Son of Man, remains
an unsolved, and pcrhaps insoluble, problem. Quite apart from
literary, historical, and theological considerations, Ramsey has
pointed out that it would bc logically impossible for J csus to
be "the Messiah" since mysterious situations cannot be spokcn
about in straightforward language.~:1 Ramsey, however, argues
for the historicity of Jesus' using the term Son of Man on the
ground that his employmcnt of it is appropriately problcmatic
and enigmatic.:!4
22 The criticism of Dodd's realized eschatology given by Reginald Fuller,
which says that Dodd's view destroys "the cl'uci~lity of t11e cross;" seems
beside the point. Cf. Rel}iun)d H. Fulle •. Th e Mi"don !.md l\ciJiel'emcnt of
TesWl ("Studies in Biblical Theology." No. 12 (London : scM Pross, 19511),
pp. 48-'19. For Dodd the realized eschatological event wns a developing crisis
which included Jesus' death and resurrection as well as the destruction of
Jerusalem . Cf. Parables (1952, Nisbet ed.), pp. 75-80,165; Parables (rev.
cd.), pp. 50-59, 73, 82, 131. A more pertinent criticism of re<1lizcd e~chatol·
ogy is that it tends to remove Christian existence from history. Christian
existence becomes, not a movement from present to future through a history
wbich is crossed in a hidden and mysterious way hy the transcendent, but
rather a movement out of history towa rd a spatially conceived transcendent.
On the other hand, the existential implications of Dodd's view of a develop·
ing crisis would not be very different from the existential implications of
realized and futuristic eschatology in juxtaposition. This, however, seems not
to have been developed by Dodd.
23 Ian T. Ramsey, Religious Language, p. 145.
2t Ibid., PP. 162-167.
190
Whatever the answer may be to the question of Jesus' use

of titles, there is widespread agreement that his understanding
of his mission burst the limits of the available Jewish categories
and that he thought of himself as the eschatological person in
some sense. 25 Jesus did not make his eschatological claim
openly and directly but let it be absorbed in his work and words
and expressed indirectly in his gracious association with sinners
and his call to discipleship, in his free attitude toward the law
as it stood and in his "but I say unto you," in his radicalizing
of the demand of God. Conjointly his indirectly expressed
eschatological awareness was reflected in the appeals of the sick
and possessed, in the hopes of his followers, in the opposition
of the Jewish leaders, and finally in his crucifixion.26
In view of the above it seems too much to say, a.s B. T. D.
Smith 27 does, that none of the genuine parables throws any
light on Jesus' conception of his relationship to the kingdom
of God. We would expect an implicit Christology in the par-
ables,28 as in the other aspects of Jesus' ministry. Since the
parables reflect in their own way the eschatology of Jesus' non-
parabolic teaching and point subsidiarily to his historical situ-
ation, it may be said that they point subsidiarily to Jesus as
the one who brings the situation which is dramatically and
imaginatively portrayed in the parables. Jesus is the one who
confronts men with the decisive crisis of their lives and offers
the possibilities and understanding of existence which the
parables present. It is, however, the meaning of a parable as
a whole which points to the meaning of Jesus' ministry rather
than some individual element in the parable that points di-
rectly and allegorically to Jesus.
2~ Cf., for example, Kasemann, New Testament Themes, pp. 38-44.

20 Cf. Bornkamm, Jesus of Nazareth , p. 170; Conzelmann, "Life of Jesus,"
p. 67; Herbert Braun, "Der Sinn der neutestamentIichen Christologie," p.
347.
27 The Parables of the Synoptic Gospels, p. 86.
28 Cf. Dahl, "Parables," p. 158.
191
THE PARABLES
If the parables in their particular way give an account of

what happens in Jesus' ministry and also point to the nature
of God's act, then Jesus in the parables is implicitly claiming
that his behavior is God's deed.29 The grounds on which this
statement can be made, however, need to be clarified somewhat
further. As we have seen, the parables themselves, by the use
of the surprising and improbable, suggest the impingement of
the divine upon human existence. Moreover, when the parables
are considered in connection with the non-parabolic proclama-
tion of the' kingdom of God, the king-master-father figure
points still more explicitly to God. But in order to say that
the parables also interpret Jesus' ministry and therefore im-
plicitly identify his ministry with the deed of God we need to
know something about Jesus' ministry from sources other than
the parables themselves. That is, for example, unless we knew
something about Jesus' association with the sinners and his
conflict with Jewish legalism, we would not be led to think
that the father's relationship with the prodigal son and his
older brother reflected Jesus' relationship with sinners, on the
one hand, and Pharisees, on the other. The parables present
their own autonomous world and make sense in themselves,
but because we know enough about Jesus' ministry outside of
the parables to notice their subsidiary pointing to his situation,
they become for us intelpretations of that event.
Jesus' behavior, which challenged the Jewish world of fixed
religious values, precipit~ted a conflict that resulted in his ,.
death. Inasmuch as his parables are interpretations of his be-
havior, they are a part of the provocation of his conflict; hence
he risked his life through his word. 30 Since his word is an inter-
28 CE. Jeremias, Parables, pp. 37-38; Eta Linnemann, Die Gleichnisse

Tesu, p. 93; Bornkamm, Jesus, p. 81; Fuchs, Hi$torical Jesus, pp. 21-22,
36-37.
80 Cf. Linnemann, Gleichnisse, pp. 48-49; Fuchs, Historical Tesus, pp.
21, 37.
192
pretation of the life which issued organically in death, it is also

an interpretation of his death: the one who lives the kind of
existence which the parables urge will die, but his loss of life
is really the gaining of life.
My argument has been moving toward the assertion that the
decision which Jesus called on men to make in favor of faith
or authentic existence was a decision which he had made him-
self.81 Since the parables present a picture of the difference
between authentic and inauthentic existence, they make some
suggestion to us about what Jesus affirmed and what h~ re-
jected. In view of the fact that the parables are regarded as
basically genuine by a consensus of New Testament scholar-
ship, and if it can be supposed that there is some contjnuity
between what Jesus demanded of others and what he decided
for himself, then it can hardly be denied that the parables are
a clue to Jesus' understanding of his own existence. This does
not mean, in view of the relative autonomy and imaginative
configuration of the aesthetic object, that the existential un-
derstanding implied in the parables and Jesus' understanding
of his own existence are identical. Nor does it mean, again,
that individual elements in the parables point directly and alle-
gorically to Jesus. But it does mean that there is some conti-
nuity between the understanding of existence implied in the
parables and Jesus' understanding of himself.
If Jesus interpreted his ministry as the deed of Cod, then the
faith or understanding of existence out of which his actions or
words proceeded is also a very significant dimension of Cod's
deed. One could say that the coming of the kingdom is the
possibility of faith's coming to man from beyond himself-as
an act of Cod-and Jesus is the model for that faith. The par-
ables, as we noted above, are indirect clues to the content of
I I Cf. Gerhard Ebeling, Word and Faith, pp. 201-202, 204-206, 234.
238,295; Fuchs, Historical jeS1J3, pp. 23, 30,62,80; Gloege, Dczy, pp. 126,
223.
193
THE PARABLES
Jesus' faith, and they present imaginative configurations of

various aspects of that faith and of how it-or its opposite-
might manifest itself. The parables confront a man as a lan-
guage 'event, calling him to decision and opening up the pos-
sibility of a new world-a real present, moving toward a real
future, in which there is time to gain a unified existence under
the gift and demand of God. The language event is the indirect
expression of Jesus' faith as a possibility for other men.
Does this mean that Jesus perfectly realized faith or authen-
tic existence? Did he actualize the existence which his tragic
characters failed to actualize and which the prodigal son actu-
alized only partially in his coming from death to life? Did Jesus
risk renouncing utterly both self-protective non-action and self-
assertive action? Did he repudiate all self-contrived security and
depend absolutely on the sustaining power of the gracious but
hidden Father who can bring life out of death? And did Jesus
give himself utterly for the sake of others? Was his existence
perfectly unified in that he responded without reserve to both
the gift and the demand of God, in that he lived with com-
plete appropriateness to the situation to which he had been
called?
Van Harvey and Schubert Ogden have criticized James Rob-
inson for making the theological significance of Jesus consist
in the fact that Jesus actualized authentic existence and for
holding that only on the ground of Jesus' actualization of it
is authentic existence a possibility for others.32 The bases of
their criticism are as follows: (a) Such a position as Robinson's
raises doubts about the reliability of the kerygma for salvation
and creates an anxiety that wants to prove the kerygma by the
investigation of Jesus' history.s3 (b) We do not have sufficient
82 Van A. Harvey and Schubert M. Ogden, "How New Is the 'New Quest
of the Historical Jesus'?" in The Historical Jesus and the Kerygmatic Christ,
pp. 221-222, 231-232 .
• 8 Ibid., pp. 231-2304.
194
biographical infonnation about Jesus to establish that he al-

ways maintained authentic existence.54 (c) It is in principle
impossible to establish a man's faith and whether he actualized
it by observing his words and deeds. Faith is hidden. 55 In oppo-
sition to Robinson, Harvey and Ogden maintain that it need
not and cannot be decided whether Jesus actualized existence
in faith. It only needs to be said that his word with unequaled
force presents us with the demand for decision and that Jesus
represents authentic existence.a6
In response to Harvey and Ogden it should be said that the
discounting of the quest of the historical Jesus on the ground
that it might create anxiety about the kerygma is itself an
expression of anxiety. In their second and third points noted
above, however, they seem to be right. Jesus' association with
84 Ibid., pp. 236-237, 241.
85 Ibid., pp. 238-239; Harvey, "The Historical Jesus, the Kerygma, and
the Christian Faith," pp. 440-441. Cf. also Dilthey, Pattern, p. 116; Van
Buren, Secular, p. 53.
so Schubert M. Ogden, Cllrist without Myth (New York: Harper, 1961),
pp. 161- 164; Harvey, "Historical Jesus," pp. 417:....448. Also for Bultmann
the question of wlletber Jesus actualized authentic existence is a matter of
indifference. The significant fhing about Jesus is that lle was the bearer of
the word, and if 11c was not the bearer of the word that would not change
the word's Significance (fesus and the Word, pp. 14, 217). For Bultmann
the important thing about the incarnation is that revelation should occur
as all encounter, as a language event (J e!iUS, pp. 4, 6, 8, 11; "Tesus and Paul,"
in Existence and Faith, pp. 194-196; "The Case for Demythologizing," pp.
191-193). But for Bultmann authentic existence comes through encounter
with the Chris,tian kerygma and is not generally IIvai1 nble ("New Testament
~md Mythology," pp. 26-33; "The Question of Natural Revelation," in
Essays Plli1oso{)/ticaI arid The%gical, pp. 94, 98, 109-1 14) despite the fact
that it docs not depend on Jesus' having .realized authentic existence.
It may be noticed that in Jesus and the Word (pp. 6, 10, 11) Bultmann
spoke of the possibility of an existential encounter with Jesus' word, and in
" Jesus and Paul" he empllasized the continuity between the teaching of
those two. But in the morc recent "The Primitive Ohristian Kerygma" he
denies that the word of the hi'torical Jesus real ly reac1les us existentially, as
salva lion (pp. 3D, '10- 41), and he emphasizes the discontinuity between
Jesus and the kerygma (pP. 20-30). T Ile change between the earlier and
later works cloes not represent a reversal, but it is ~ real shift of emphasis. It
seems that Bultmann by reaction to the new quest has become more nega·
tive in his attitude toward Ule historical Jesus than he formerly was,
195
'.
THE PARABLES
sinners and his willingness to enter into conOict and to suffer

do suggest a certain continuity between his existence and the
understanding of existence contained in his teaching. But to
prove from texts that he perfectly actualized his understanding
of existence is impossible both in principle and in practice.
Let us look further at Robinson's position, however, specifi-
cally at three assertions which he makes: (a) The quest of the
historical Jesus cannot prove that God acted in Jesus' inten-
tions or that Jesus actually lived out of transcendence. 3T (b)
Jesus-his selfhood and understanding of existence-can be
encountered through modern historiography as well as in the
kerygma.88 (c) Jesus did actualize authentic or eschatological
existence, that is, live out of transcendence, and the cross "must
be interpreted" as the climax of that actualization.8s
When Robinson says that the new quest makes an encounter
with Jesus' selfhood available, he must mean-or could only
properly mean-that the new quest as a hermeneutical en-
deavor on the New Testament texts makes Jesus' understand-
ing of existence a language event for me. I am put in the
position of having to make a decision. This does not and can-
not prove, however, that Jesus actualized authentic existence,
which Robinson concedes (point (a) above). Why then does
he state that Jesus' existence "must" be interpreted as the
actualization of authentic existence? Robinson does not make
this clear, but I believe that it can be made clear. It can be
argued that Jesus' actualization of authentic existence is a
necessary theological reflection on the experience of faith in
view of the biblical understanding of man's radical implication
in evil-in inauthenticity. Faith needs to say only that Jesus is
the bringer of faith or new life or authenticity; but when we re-
17 James M. Robinson, A New Quest of the HistoricalTesus ("Studies in

Biblical Theology," No. 25 [London: SCM Press, 1959]), pp. 77,94.
88 Ibid., pp. 94, 105.
18 Ibid., pp. 89, 108; Robinson, "Formal," pp. 99,104.
196
flect on this new life in the light of what our plight was, we
are brought to say that deliverance could take place, authen-
ticity could be really possible for us, only if authentic existence
actually occurred, was perfectly realized, and not just repre-
sented, at some point in history. The power of inauthenticity
could be broken only by the concrete actualization of authen-
ticity. The view which says that the redemptive event need
only have been a representation of authentic existence neces-
sarily entails a less radical view of man's implication in evil.
The affirmation that Jesus perfectly actualized existence in
faith is neither a statement of faith nor a provable inference
from historical texts. Jesus' actualization is rather a theological
reflection and as such is a metaphysical fact. A metaphysical
system is not intended to correspond literally to reality as a
whole, but it is designed to provide coherence and a meaning-
ful context for all facts and explanations. A metaphysical fact
is a crucial concept without which the system would not hold
together,40 and it is subject to the kind of verification which
is appropriate to metaphysical statements and systems.
If I may now summarize the conclusions of this section:
The eschatological coming of the kingdom of God is Jesus'
faith as a model for our faith. The parables are the richest
expression of the faith which Jesus called men to, and, on the
assumption that his own decision lay behind the decision he
asked of others, an important clue to the content of Jesus'
faith. That Jesus perfectly actualized this faith is for the Chris-
tian perspective a metaphysical fact.
It now remains to raise the question as to the ultimate
source of the parables' power to be a language event which is
the eschatological event.41
10 Frederick Ferre, Language, Logic, and God, p. 161; Exploring the Logic
of Faith, p. 74.
41 There is no contradiction between saying thflt Jesns' faith is the eschnto·
logical event and the parables are the eschatological event, because Jesns'
faith meets us in his words.
197
THE PARABLES
4. The Language Event and the Event of the Resurrection

It is possible to hold that the power of Jesus' parables re-
sides· in the primary traits of language itself. According to
Linnemann, when a speaker is involved in a conflict which
reaches the depths of existence, as Jesus was in the controversy
with his opponents, he can only turn to the power of language.
Linnemann makes referenc~ to Heidegger's position that it is
language which speaks, and man speaks insofar as he hears and
responds to the speaking of language. 42 From this standpoint
the weight of Jesus' words was wholly in the words themselves,
and who Jesus was for his hearers depended entirely on what he
became for them through his word. 43 Fuchs similarly maintains
that Jesus wanted to justify himself solely on the ground of his
preaching. Jesus did demand of men a decision about his per-
son (Mark 8:38), but he wanted to be understood in and not
apart from his proclamation. "He understood himself as the
witness of a new situation."44
Again, if it is held that language is its own source of power,
the resurrection of Jesus can be identified, almost without re-
mainder, with the effective proclamation of the resurrection.
"Jesus has risen in the kerygma."45 This amounts to saying
that the resurrection is the power of the kerygma to grasp US,48
and it must be acknowledged that to a degree, at least, the
resurrection is the kerygma. The remainder which keeps the
identification from being complete, according to this viewpoint,
is that the resurrection can also be identified, as Bultmann
would have it, with the disciples' coming to faith.41 To ask
modern man to believe something as incredible as the resusci-
42 Linnemann, Gleichnisse, p. 40
43 Ibid., p. 43.
44 Fuchs, Historical Jesus, p. 224.
4~ Bultmann, "The Primitive Christian Kerygma," p. 42.
40 Cf. Fuchs, Historical Jesus, p. 38; Bultmann, "Mythology," pp. 41-42.
fT Bu1tmann, "Mythology," p. 42.
198
tation of a corpse is to ask him to believe something because

it is in the Bible that he would not be asked to believe if it
were related in any other source.48 Or if modern man is really
not so troubled by the scientific problem, there are the discrep-
ancies in the Easter stories themselves.4.9 But if the resurrection
is understood as the rise of the disciples' faith in Jesus, then it
can be proclaimed convincingly and joyfully.~o Faith arises
from an encounter with the proclamation of the resurrection;
thus the language event and the rise of faith come to be two
sides of the same reality-the resurrection event, which is
identified without remainder with language-event-plus-faith.
But we must now raise the question whether the primary
traits of language itself can explain the power of the kerygma
.1 and the rise of faith in Jesus and whether such an explanation
would be faithful to the New Testament. To be sure language
itself has power without being the expressio1J. of a particular
historical reality, which is seen in the fact na mythology,
poetry, and fiction may have great power over people although
they express the hypothetical and potential rather than the
historical. By the same token part of the explanation of the
power of the New Testament's language is the meaning ex-
pressed in the linguistic structures, apart from their reference
to history. But does this exhaust the New Testament's under-
standing?
It would seem that for Heidegger language is not powerful
simply as language, but it is powerful when it is the happening
of being, when it is called forth by being as primal thought
to show that beings are. 51 We might say that for the New
48 Cf. Bultmann, "Mythology," pp. 38-39; Gerhard Ebeling, The NaturB

of Faith, trans. R. G. Smith (Philadelphia: Muhlenberg Press, 1961), pp.
46, 61.
'0 Cf. Anderson, Jesus, p. 187.
GO Ebeling, Faith, pp. 62-63; Word and Faith, pp. 301- 302 .
Gl Cf. James M. Robinson, The Later Heidegger and Theology, pp. 25,44,
49-50.
199
THE PARABLES
Testament its language is powerful because of its connection

with a concrete and particular happening. The kerygma is ef-
fective because of its relationship to something which cannot
be exhausted by language-plus-faith. Laeuchli's point, that to
identify Christ with speech about him is idolatrous, seems to
be well taken.1I2
Is there any way out of the circle that the language about
the resurrection produced faith in it and faith in it produced
the proclamation? Is there a reality that lay behind both the
faith and the language? If that reality were Jesus' historical
ministry alone, why did his death cause the disciples to lose
faith and what overcame their depression and convinced them
that Jesus was victorious after all?
A number of contemporary scholars have been concerned
to understand the resurrection of Jesus as something more than
a derivative from the faith-experience of the earliest commu-
nity,lIS but not as much clarity as one could hope for has been
achieved in saying what it was. This is largely due to the in-
herent difficulty of the problem, for it must be agreed that the
New Testament's understanding of the resurrection as an es-
chatological event and the discrepancies among the appearance
stories put the task beyond the historian's tools. Should more
be done in the way of an ontological understanding? I should
jikc to offer one possible line of thought, and Brevard Childs'
understanding of the Old Testament theology of history has
been quite suggestive here.
In the Old Testament understanding of history an event of
the past may be actualized in the present through memory, as
62 Samuel LneucJ1li, The 4Juguage of Faith, p. 23).

63 Richard R. Niebuhr, Resurrection and Historir;al Re~son (New York:
Scribner'S, 1957), pp. 145- 146, 172-18 1; Anderson, lusus, pp. 202-203,
237, 240; Bomkamm, Jesus, pp. 180-185; "Myth and Gospel: A Dlseus$ion
of tbe Problem of Demythologizing the New Testllmenl Message," in
Kery'gma and History, pp. 177, 193-195; Von Butell, Secular, Pl'. 12'1-126,
128, 132-133.
. 200
new responses arc called forth.1I4 Actualiza.tion does not mean

that the past event is repeated or reenacted in the present as
would be the case in a typically mythological outlook. Rather
in the Old Testament historical events are actualized, and his-
torical events are non-repeatable, once-for-all, and fixed in a
chronological sequence. If the past event cannot be brought
into the present, neither can the worshiper be taken out of the
present and united with a past event. What the Old Testa-
ment does affirm is that historical events may be the vehicle
for a quality of existence or a continuing reality which can
occur in later events. The exodus from Egypt cannot be re-
peated, but through the exodus there entered into history a
quality of existence in which later generations can participate.
The past event is actualized in the present through the recur-
rence of the same quality of existence or redemptive reality,
not through the repetition of the event.1I5
In a similar manner Amos Wilder has suggested that the
New Testament stories place us in the midst of the great plot
of all time and space and thus relate us to the great storyteller
-'-God. Plots overlap and play themselves over again in many
lives, but there is no literal identity or repetition, and each
time the plot occurs in an unprecedented way. Both sides of
this are seen in Gal. 2:20 56 and in the "I though not I" of
I Cor. 15:10. The life of existence in faith is my life lived in
this corporeal world, but it is also a participation in the cruci-
fixion of Christ, who lives in me. That is, I share in the quality
of existence which came into history in Jesus' earthly life, and
the continuing availability of that quality is the resurrection.
If the power of biblical history-and especially the ministry
of Jesus-resides entirely in language's becoming an event, then
H Brevard S. Childs, Memory and Tradition in Israel ("Studies in Biblical

Theology." No. 37 rLondon: SCM Press, 1962]), pp. 51-54,63.
6~ Ibid .• pp. 81-85.
~o Wilder. Rhetoric, pp. 6,-66.
201
THE PARABLES
the history is really inconseq1lential and a myth would serve

just as well as history as the origin of the New Testament's
language. Furthermore, if the language is held to be powerful
on the ground that it is about the event, it could just as well
be about an event which might have happened but did not.
But in the New Testament it is of the utmost importance that
the ministry of Jesus did happen. It opened up new possibili-
ties in history: the rule of God dawned; acceptance by God
carne; Adam's disobedience was overcome; the light shone; ac-
cess to God became available. At the same time Jesus' minis-
try as a historical event remains fixed in the past, and salvation
occurs through encounter with the proclamation of the event
(Rom. 1:16; I Cor. 1:18; II Cor. 5:18·20; 6:2; John 5:24;
17 :8, 20). If salvation occurs through the proclaimed word and
also has an unyielding connection with an event which remains
in the past, then there must be a connection between the
present word and the past event. The connecting link is the
quality of existence which carne into history through Jesus'
ministry but which is not limited to that event. This reality
is not a discarnate thing out there in mythological space but
occurs only incarnately in the sacraments, in acts of faith, and
in language. Thus Christian language has the power to be the
eschatological language event when it becomes the "body" of
this quality of existence. Perhaps we should SOly that while the
existential reality gives to language its power, this can be af-
firmed only after language has put us in touch with the reality.
This continuing quality of existence, as suggested above, is
what the New Testament means by the resurrection of Jesus.
The resurrection understood in this way is a metaphysical fact,
the extension and completion of Jesus' actualization of exist-
ence in faith. Why did the disciples proclaim anything at all
about Jesus after his death? Assuming that his death divested
them of whatever eschatological hopes they might have had,
they were enlivened again to faith and hope precisely because
202
his death gave a resurgence of power to the quality of existence

which came with his ministry. His death did this because it was
the last and complete manifestation of his living his life out
of transcendence rather than out or canglDle security; therefore,
because his actualization of existence in faith came about only
as the living out to the end of a real life, his quality of exist-
ence could not attain its fun power until his life was completed
in death. The resurrection was his quality of existence attaining
full power through death. This way of understanding Jesus'
resurrection enables us to recognize the difference which it
made in the disciples while acknowledging that Jesus' unique
quality of existence was already occurring during his historical
ministry.
The resurrection as a metaphysical or ontological fact, as the
completion of Jesus' actualization of authentic ,existence, is
not to be identified with the resuscitation of a corpse nor iden-
tified in any one-for-one fashion with the resurrection stories
related in the Gospels. It is rather that Jesus' quality of exist-
ence, the kind of existence which the parables affinn, grasped
the disciples and brought them to faith. Because the possibility
of the disciples' new faith had such an unyielding connection
with Jesus' having actualized existence in faith, they experi-
enced their coming to faith as Jesus' presence or as faith in his
resurrection. We may say then that the ontological event which
was the faith of Jesus grasping the disciples-that is, Jesus'
resurrection-produced their faith in his resurrection. Their
faith produced visions of his appearance and the resurrection
message. The resurrection stories in the Gospels are the fruition
of the church's imaginative dealing with the resurrection
kerygma and the resurrection visions.
At this juncture I would conclude that the resurrection re-
ality may use the narrative language of the Synoptic Gospels-
both stories about and by Jesus-as well as the more explicitly
kerygmatic materials of the New Testament to reach us ex-
203
THE PARABLES
istentially in the present. In fact a neglect of the concrete lan-

guage of the Synoptics and of their concern with Jesus' history
would cause the linguistic body of the resurrection reality to
become truncated and impersonaI.G1 With reference to Jesus'
own use of the parables, their power would have resided not
only in their linguistic qualities but also in their being the ex-
pression of his being.
That a new quality of existence came to birth in concrete
connection with Jesus' ministry and is also detachable from
that fixed position in history is formally analogous to the
fact that the parables are peculiarly related to Jesus but also
have a certain independence of him. They bear the unique
stamp of his imagination in a way that his other sayings do
not, and they dramatize the existential situation which he
brings and are a part of that situation's coming to language.
Yet as aesthetic objects they have a relative autonomy and
detach themselves from his history in a way that the other say-
ings do not. Paradoxically, as artistic creations, the parables are
more intimately Jesus' own than are his other sayings, and
at the same time they are more detached from him. They are
more detached because the very power of language causes the
artist especially to say more than he knows and because the
parables belong not only to the history of the covenant people
and the history of salvation but to the artistic tradition as well,
These considerations may mean that the parables are par-
ticularly fit for being expressions of the new existential reality
and for being the instruments through which it becomes a
language event.
In this chapter we have considered the parables in relation
to the Gospels, and in this connection we have noticed the
power which linguistic structures themselves have to inform
existence. Attention was then turned to the history with which
~; For a fuller treatment of this position d. my article "The Necessary
Complement to the Kerygma," The Journal of Religion, 45 (1965).30-38.
204
THI PARABLES, THI GOSPELS, AND THE HISTORICAL JIIUS
the Gospels are concerned and to the ontological implications

and significance of that history. The parables offer some help
in interpreting Jesus' eschatology at the conceptual level, but,
more importantly, they are an independent and richer expres.
sion of the intention of his explicit eschatology. Furthermore,
the parables portray the existence in faith to which Jesus
calls men and offer a clue to the content of Jesus' own faith.
In view of this and in view of the fact that the resurrection
is the faith of Jesus grasping us, then the parables are a clue
to what it means to live the resurrection existence. To live
the resurrection existence is to be enabled by the continuing
power of Jesus' faith to live the kind of existence which the
parables call us to either by portraying it or by portraying
its opposite. To acknowledge that an event of the past may
actualize itself in our history is to recognize that history can
transcend itself or to confess that the transcendent God uses
history for his redemptive purpose but without violating history.
The discussi9n has moved from the literary to the historical
to the ontological, and that is the way, I take it, that Christian
existence moves. We are grasped first by the language of the
gospel and then we are referred to the history from which it
arose and to the ultimate significance of the history. That
does not mean, however, that language is only a kind of pre-
liminary stage which can be dispensed with once we have ar-
rived at the other levels. The language of the gospel, along
with its translation, continues to be the vehicle through which
redemptive history and ultimate reality meet us and which
gives structure and meaning to our own historical reality.
"Jesus came preaching.... And he taught them many things
in parables .... My words will not pass away."
205
INDEXES
Index of Parables
The Divided House (Mark 3:23-26; Matt. 12:25-26; Luke 11:17-

. 18),91
/foe Good Samaritan (Luke 10:30-37), 12, 16
The Lost Coin (Luke 15:&-10), 11
.The Pearl Merchant (Matt. 13:45-46), 19-21
The Pharisee and the Publican (Luke 18:9-14), 13, 120
The Pounds (Luke 19: 12-27), 114
' The Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32), 12-13, 14,16,42,64,89,97,
99, 101, 104, 105, 106, 146, 147, 162-176, 182, 189, 192, 194
The Rich Fool (Luke 12:16-20), 12
The Seed Growing Secretly (Mark 4:26-29), 128 n. 39
·The Sower (and its interpretation) [Mark 4: 3-8, 14-20; Matt.
13:3-8, 19-23; Luke 8:5-8, 11-15],8, 16
The Talents (Matt. 25:14-30), 18,22-23,39,43,46,91,98 n. 83,
99, 100, 101-102, 106, 113-122, 126, 151,175,176,188, 189
The Ten Maidens (Matt. 25:1-13), 3&-39, 90,97,99, 101, 104,
105, 122-128, 130, 151-152, 164, 175, 176, 188, 189
j fhe Treasure in the Field (Matt. 13:44), 19-21
The Two Sons (Matt. 21:2&-31), 163
The Unforgiving Servant (Matt. 18:23-35), 14, 15,41,97,98,99,
101, 104, 105, 106, 121, 137-144, 151, 164, 165, 189
, 'The Unjust Steward (Luke 16:1-9), 17, 55,90,97,99, 101, 104,
105, 155-162, 189
The Wedding (Great) Feast (Matt. 22:1-10), 5,129
The Wedding Garment (Matt. 22:11-14),98,99, 101, 128-132,
151, 189
, The Wicked Tenants (Mark 12:1-11; Matt. 21:33-44; Luke 20:9-
18; Thomas 65), 3, 14, 15-16,90,97,99, 101, 104, 105, 117,
132-137, 189
The Workers in the Vineyard (Matt. 20:1-1~), 3, 14,90,99, 101,
104, 106, 147-155, 189
208
Index of Biblical Passages
OLD TESTAMENT Haggai 13:12-46,114

2:3 - 53 13:13-8,9
Exodus 13:16-17-186
22:3-138n.61 ApOCRYPHAL AND 13:18 - 46
Leviticus
RABBINIc 13:36-46
16:1-4-117
25:39 -138 n. 61 Ecclesiasticus 18:12-9
33:19-23 -170 18:13-123
II Samuel
Aboth 18:21-22 -138
12:1-4-42 18:23-27 -121
1:13 -46 18:32-124n.34
II Kings
Berachoth 19:30-148
4:1-138 n. 61
40a-46 21:23-135
NehemiDh 21:28-9
5:5 -138 n. 61 NEW TESTAMENT 22:13-114
23:23- 142
Psalms Matthew 24:44,50 - 123
49:4-10 5:21-48 -161 25:26-124 n. 34
78:2-10 5:45-143 25:30-129
6:22-23 -118 25:31-46 - 20,143
Proverbs 6:25-34-120,121
1:6-10 6:27-53 Mark
9:7-9-45 7:9-53 1:11-133
7:22-23 -123 2:15-17 -161
IsaiDh 8:12 -114,129 4:9-9
5-133, 134, 135, 11:5 -186 4:10-11a-8
137, H9 12:11- 53 4:10-12 -10
42:23-53 12:28 -186,187 4:11-9 n. 2i
50:10- 53 12:41-42 -186 4:11-12- 8, 9, 9n.
12:43-45 -136 23
Eukiel 13:10-46 4:13-11
17:2-10 13:11-9 4:14-20-8
209
THE PARABLES
4:21-9 12:8-9-161 22:7 -142

4:25 -46,114 12:16-20-120 24:26-142
4:30-9,11 12:20-121
4:33-9 12:25 - 53 John
4:34-8,10 12:37 -123,156 3:14-142
7:14-9 12:42b-156 5:24-202
8:31-142 12:54-57 - 35,117 17:8-202
8:38 -161,186,198 13:18-9 17:20-202
9:7-133 13:25-27 -123
10:31-148 13:30 -148 Romans
12:9-9 14:5 - 53 1:16-202
13:7-142 14:23-156
13:28-11 14:24-123 I Corinthians
13:28-29 -186 14:28- 53
15:4-53 1:18-202
Luke 16:10-12 -156 15:10-201
4:23-11 16:13 -156 II Corinthians
6:47-9 17:7-53
8:18-46,114 17:20 ff. -185 5:18-20 - 202
11:5 - 53 17 :22-30 -161 6:2-202
11:8-123 18:6-124-
18:10-14-120
Galatians
11:11- 53
11:34-35-118 18:14-121,123 2:20- 201
210
General Index
Aesthetic, nature of, x, 13, 43-44, Bendall, K., 60 n. 104

70-71, 73-79, 160-161 Biblical theology, task and problem
relationship of, to thought and of, 22-23, 29-30 n. 12, 37-38
reality, 70-71, 79-88, 93-94, Black, M., 3, 15, 16, 133 n. 48,
102 164 n. 43
See also Parable, as aesthetic ob- Blackmur, R. P., 78 n. 29, 82 n. 37
ject Blass, F., 8 n. 21
Allegory, 4-10, 31, 83-84, 87 Bonhoeffer, D., 31, 106-107 n. 110
See also Parable, and allegory Bornkamm, G., 10 n. 26, 10 n. 29,
Anderson, H., 46 n. 51, 47 n. 55, 22, 138 n. 61, 142 n. 68, 164
49 n. 63, 184 n. 13, 199 n. 49, n. 44, 168 n. 51, 169, 174,
200 n. 53 178 n. 2, 191 n. 26,192 n. 29,
Apocalyptic, 185-187 200 n. 53
Aristotle, 10, 11 n. 33,98 n. 82, 100 Braaten, C. E., 40 n. 37, 184 n. 13
Auerbach, E., 35, 36 n. 29, 82 n. 36, Braun, H., 132 n. 46,191 n. 26
89,97,105 Brooks, C., 75, 78 n. 29
Austin, J. L., 52-53 n. 75 Bultmann, R., xi n. 5, 12 n. 34,
Authentic existence, 130-131, 154- 12 n. 35, 14, 24 n. 69, 26 n. 1,
155, 157-158, 171-ln, 181- 26 n. 2, 29 n. 12, 32-33, 39,
182,189,193-197 40 n. 37,41 n. 38,45-47,48 n.
Ayer, A. J., 57, 58 n. 92 57, 50, 51 n. 69, 56-57, 62,
95 n. 74,106 n. 107, 123 n. 28,
Baird, J. A., 9 n. 24, 15, 46 n. 51, 129, 133 n. 47, 143 n. 71,
122 n. 27, 125 n. 35, 134, 163 n. 40, 173-174, 179 n. 5,
139 n. 62, 142 n. 69, 149 n. 14, 186 n. 17, 195 n. 36, 198 n. 45,
186 n. 16 198 n. 46,198 n. 47, 199 n. 48
n
Barr, J., 48-49, 52 n.
Barth, G., 129 n. 41 Cadbury, H. J., 21 n. 61, 158 n. 33
Barth, K., 77 n. 24 Cadoux, A. T., x n. 3, 6, 10 n. H,
Bartsch, H. W., 178 n. 1 16-17, 18 n. 51, 53 n. 77,
Beardsley, M. C., 77 n. 24, 78 n. 27 104 n. 100, 114 n. 15, 115,
Beckett, S., 127 n. 37 164 n. 41
211
THE PARABLES
Catharsis, 160-162 Driver, T. F., 56 n. 87
Characterization (protagonist's power
of action), 97-98, 99, 111- Ebeling, G., 26 n. 1,26 n. 2, 27 n. 3,
112, 130, 145-146, 151, 180- 27 n. 4, 28 n. 6, 30 n. 14, 31,
181 304, 35,40 n. 37,48 n. 5'8, 5'2 n.
Cherbonnier, E., 112 n. 11, 112 n. 72, 5'6, 62, 65 n. 126, 104 n.
12 101, 123 n. 31, 131 n. 44, 175,
Childs, B., 174 n. 73, 200-201 193 n. 31, 199 n. 48, 199 n. 5'0
Cobb, J. B., 26 n. 1, 50 n. 68 Eschatology, x, 161, 181, 183, 185'-
Comic, 96, 99, 101, 103-104, 105, 190, 196, 197 n. 41, 200
139, 145-147, 151-152, 157- See also Parable, and eschatology
158, 159, 162, 164-168, 174, Example story, xi, 12-13,42
179-181 Existential (understanding of ex·
Conrad, J., 136 istence), 10, 29 n. 12, 34-35',
Conzelmann, H., 178 n. I, 186-187, 40,41 n. 38, 68-69, 81-86, 87-
191 88, 93, 100-101, 102-104,
Crane, R. S., 100 n. 92 106-107, 1l0, II 6-11 7, 131,
Cranfield, C. E. B., 10 n. 28, 14 n. 143-144, 168-169, 184-185',
36 187-188, 201
Crombie, I. M., 61 n. 109, 63 n. See also A.uthentic existence; In-
120,64-65 authentic existence; Parable, as
Cullmann, 0., 29 n. 12, 38 n. 31 presenting an understanding of
existence; Pre·understanding;
Dahl, N. A.., 2 n. 1, 14, 18 n. 49, Time
53 n. 77, 184 n. 13, 185 n. 15,
187, 191 n. 28 Faith (and unfaith), 31, 37, 41 n.
Danby, H., 169 n. 55 38, 46-47, 61-63, 64 n. 124,
Debrunner, A.., 8 n. 21 65, 67-68, 69, 94-95, 107,
Derrett, J. D. M., 157 n. 32, 158- 120-121, 126, 132, 137, 146,
159 171-172, 173, 175'-176,184-
Dialogue, 97, 118 185, 193-194, 195-199, 202-
Diem, H., 184 n. 13 203, 204-205
Dilthey, W., 26 n. I, 28, 38 n. 33, Ferlinghetti, L., 127
40 n. 36, 43, 44-45, 48 n. 57, Fem~, F., 45 n. 48, 52 n. 75, 58 D .
60 n. 105,68 n. 137, 184 n. 11, 92, 58 n. 95, 59 n. 98, 59 n.
195 n. 35 101, 59 n. 102, 61 n. 109, 66,
Dodd, C. H., ix, x, xi n. 5, xii, 2 n. 67 n.130, 82 n. 38,197 n. 40
2, 3, 6 n. 16, 12 n. 34, 18 n. Findlay, J. A.., 99 n. 86, 99 n. 88,
51, 21, 22, 23, 24 n. 69, 28 n. 158 n. 33, 172 n. 65 173 n. 68
9, 53 n. 77, 55 n. 83, 99, 104, Flew, A.., 58, 60 n. 104
115 n. 19, 119 n. 24, 133 n. 49, Forgiveness, 138, 142-144, 174
135n. 53,186n. 17, 190n. 22 Form criticism, 23-,00024
Dramatic, 97, 99, 148-149, 151- Foster, M., 59 n. 99, 61 n. 109
152,153 Freedom and determinism, 98, 101,
212
GENERAL INDEX
102-103, 110-111, 116, 119- Harvey, V., iXD. 2,194-196
120, 121, 126, 166-167 Heidegger, M., 50 D. 68, 61-62,
Fry, C., 146 198-200
Frye, N., 6 n. 14, 10 n. 30, 74 n. 15, Heilman, R. B., 160 n. 37, 160 n.
75 n. 16, 77 n. 25, 78 n. 28, 38, 160 n. 39
79 n. 31, 83 n. 41, 93, 94 n. Heim, K., 168
73,95 n. 75,96 n. 76, 96 n. 78, Hepburn, R., 60, 61 n. 107, 61 n.
97 n. 81, 98 n. 85, 100 n. 89, 108, 67 n. 131, 67 n. 132, 75
101 n. 93,106 n.l09, 110 n. 4, n. 19, 82 n. 37
146,159 n. 36, 165, 166, 174 n. Hermeneutic, 22-24, 26-37,39-40,
72, 180 n. 7, 180 n. 8, 181 n. 9 4H4, 47 n. 55, 49 n. 63, 69,
Fuchs, E., ix n. 2, xii, 3, 18 n. 51, 92-93,196-197
19-21, 28 n. 10, 31 n. 15, 34- See also Language event; Pre·un-
35, 37 n. 30, 40 n. 37, 43-44, derstanding, History, biblical
45 n. '18, 47 n. 54, 52 n. 72, view of, 26-27, 29 n. 12, 37-
52 n. 73, 52 n. 74, 54 n. 79, 38, 69, 100, 174-175, 183-
54 n. 80, 56-57,99 n. 86, 106 184, 200-202, 204-205
n. 108, 128 n. 39, 131 n. 44, and contemporary existence, 23-
131 n. 45, 143, 149 n. 11, 149 24, 27-28, 40 n. 36, 50-51
n. 15, 150n. 17, 154n. 25, See also Time
172 n. 65, 173 n. 66, 175, Honig, E., 5-7, 84
179 n. 5, 185 n. 14, 186, 187 n. Hopper, S. R., 75 n. 19
20, 1.92 n. 29, 192n. 30, 193n. Hordem, W., 59n. 98, 59n. 101,
31, 198 59 D. 102,61 n. 109,63 n. 120,
Fuller, R. H., 190 n. 22 64 n. 121,68 n. 133,68 n. 134
Funk, R. W., 8 n. 21, 40 D. 36,45 D. Hunter, A.. M., ix n. 1, xi n. 7, 2 n.
47 2,10 n. 26,14,42-43,53 n. 77,
104 n. 99, 124 n. 32, 143 n. 70
Gadamer, H. G., 45 n. 47
Gardner, H., 82 n. 39, 94 n. 73 Imagery, 98-100, 104-107, 134,
Gloege, G., 170 n. 60, 183 n. 10, 137, 145, 149, 165
193 n. 31 Imaginative, 96, 98, 125
Gospels, nature of, 21, 46-47, 177- Inauthentic existence, 116-112,
182,183 125-126, 130-131, 135-137,
Grace, 144, 146, 151, 152, IH-IS5, 141-142,152-155,171,197
161, 169, 171-73, 201-202 Incarnation, 105
Grant, R. M., 4 n. 9, 4 n. 10, 14 D. Interpretation, task and problem of
36, 31 n. 16, 133 n. 47 (see Henneneutic)
Greene, W. C., 110 n. 3, 110 n. 5,
110 n. 6, 111 n. 8, 112 n. 12 James, G. I., 81, 82 n. 36, 83 D. 43
Jeremias, J., ix, xi n. 6, 9 n. 23,9 n.
Hare, R. M., 60 n. 105 24, 14 n. 36, 18 n. 51, 18 n. 52,
Harri~vil1e, R. A.., 40 n. 37, 18-i D. 20 n. 58, 24 n. 69, 24 n. 71,
13 53,99 D. 86, 105 n. 104, 114 D.
213
THE PARABLES
14, 115, 123 n. 30, 124 n. 32, Lampe, G. W. H., 43 n. 41

133 n. 49,138 n. 60,138 n. 61, Language, and being, 50 n. 68, 198-
139 n. 64, 143 n. 70, 148 n. 9, 200, 202, 203-205
148 n. 10, 149 n. 12, 149 n. 13, and historical reality, 30-33, 48,
149 n. 15, 150 n. 18, 153 n. 22, 85-86, 199-200, 204-205
154 n. 23, 156, 158 n. 34, how it expresses meaning, 71-73,
163 n. 40, 164 n. 42,164 n. 45, 82,86
169 n. 56, 183 n. 10, 192 n. 29 its several functions, 35-36, 52-
Jesus, historical, 172-173, 183-187, 53, 59, 63
190-197, 198, 202, 203 and understanding, 32, 33-36,
quest for 49 n. 63, 183-185, 43-44,45,48-49,83,86,130-
194-197 131
resurrection of, 180, 181, 198-205 Language event, 52-57, 65, 67, 85-
Job, 146 86, 94, 196, 197 n. 41, 199,
Johnson, S., 8 n. 21, 10 n. 25 201-202, 204-205
Jonas, H., 33 Lewis, R. W. B., 147 n. 8,172
Jones, G. V., x, xi n. 7,6 n. 16,10 n. Linguistic analysis, 52, 58-59
28, 14 n. 36, 23, 46 n. 52, 90- Linnemann, E., xi n. 5, xii, 2, 3 n.
91,99 n. 86, 105 n. 104, 169 n. 3, 5, 7 n. 18, 12 n. 34, 12 n.
53 35, 19 n. 53, 24, 38 n. 11,40 n.
Jiilicher, A., 2, 8, 14, 18, 24 D. 69 36,47 n. 55, 52 n. 74, 53 D. 76,
53 n. 77, 54-57, 89, 91, 95 n.
Kafka, F., 80 74, 105 n. 104, 106 n. 105,
Kahler, E., 72 D. 10, 73 D. 12, 74 n. 123, 124 n. 33, 130 n. 42, 138,
13,82 n. 37 139 n. 63, 140, 142 n. 67,
Klisemann, E., 21, 22 n. 63, 186 n. 142 n. 69, 143 n. 72, 149 n.
16,187,191 n. 25 11,149 n. 12, 150 D. 19, 150 n.
Keast, W. R., 100 n. 92 20, 154 n. 25, 163 n. 40, 164 D.
Kerygma, 177-179, 183-185, 194, 42, 169, 170 n. 57, 172 n. 64,
195 n. 36, 196, 198-200, 202, 192 n. 29,192 n. 30, 198
203 Literary criticism (non·biblical), ix-
Killinger, J., 107 x, 10,44,84,93-94
Kingdom of God, 52, 95, 104-105, See also "New" criticism
1>4, 193-19.. Literary form, 44, 74-76, 89-92,96,
See also Eschatology 99-100, 101, 116-117, 134,
Kitto, H. D. F., 112 n. 11, 112 n. 12 140-141,149-150,181
Klassen, W., 40 n. 37 Logical positivism, 57-58, 60 n. 104,
Krieger, M., 71 D. 3, 77 D. 26, 78, 147
79, 81, 84-85, 93 D. 71, 94 D.
73, 147 n. 7 Macbeth, 136
Kiimmel, W. G., 186 D. 16 MacIntyre, A., 58 n. 92, 58 n. 93,
58 n. 95, 59 D. 101, 59 n. 103,
Laeuchli, S., H, 49 D. 62, 65 n. 127, 61 n. 109,67 n. 130,68 n. 133
100 D. 90, 200 McNeile, A. H., 8 D. 21
214
GENERAL INDEX
Mandel, 0., 110, III n. 7, 11 n. 8, 88-93, 94-96, 99, 106-107,
116, 180 n. 6· 115, 120, 122, 125-126, 130,
Manson, T. W., xii, 9 n. 23, 10, 135, 149, 150, 159, 161-162,
11 n. 31,24 n. 69,42,55 n. 83, 177, 179, 183, 188, 193, 204
123 n. 28, 129 n. 40, 143 n. 70, and allegory, 2-4, 6, 8-10, 13-17,
153 n. 22,154 n. 24,165 n. 47, 19-21,23-25,90-91,106,122,
169 n. 53, 169 n. 56, 173 125, 130, 133-134, 149-150,
May, R., 72 n. 10, 76 n. 20 152, 155, 164, 188, 191, 193
Metaphysical, 66-69, 197, 202-203 and Christology, 46, 65, 93, 114,
Michaelis, W., xii, 2 n. 2, 5 n. 11, 133-134, 191, 204
14 n. 36, 18 n. 50, 119 n. 24, and eschatology, x, 18, 21-22,
120, 122 n. 27, 123 n. 31, 124 105-106, 114, 115, 122-123,
n. 32, 130 n. 42, 133 n. 49, 125-126, 145, 161, 188-190,
134, 138 n. 60, 148 n. 9, 149 n. 191,197,204-205
11,149 n. 12, 149 n.15, 152 n. formal literary qualities of, 95-
21, 156, 157 n. 31, 158 n. 34, 107, 112, 116-117, 124, 134
164 n. 42, 170, 171 n. 62 and Gospels, 177-182
Mitchell, B., 61 n. 109 and Jesus' resurrection, 204-205
Munck, J., 49 n. 63 and Jesus' understanding of his
Myth (demythologizing), 33, 34, mission (Jesus' faith), 191-
35,98, 180-181, 187-188,202 197, 204-205
as language event, 55 n. 83, 67,
"New" criticism, 70-71, 75 n. 19, 69,91-92, 193-194, 197, 204
77-79,85 nature of, 10-13, 14-16, 22, 31,
Niebuhr, R. R., 200 n. 53 95
Norwood, G., III n. 8, III n. 9 one-point approach to, 2-4, 13-
Novak, M., 56 n. 87, 84, 93 n. 70, 17, 25, 88-90, 91-93, 140-
104 HI, 153-154, 161-162
as presenting an understanding of
Oesterley, W. O. E., 10 n. 28, 11 n.
existence, 25, 36-43, 51, 57,
32, 46 n. 49, 53 n. 77, 88,
122 n. 27, 126 n. 36, 135 n. 52, 68-69, 88, 90-93, 94-95, 99-
101, 106, Ill, 113, 115, 168-
138,142 n. 69,157 n. 30
Ogden, S., 61 n. 109, 63 n. 117, 169, 173-174, 188-190, 194,
63 n. 118, 64 n. 121, 66, 194- 203-205
196 as referring to God, 57, 64, 65-66,
Olson, E., 100 n. 92 95,99-100,104-107,112-113,
Ontic, 41-42, 101 . 126, 132, 142, 154-155, 172,
Ontological, 41-42, 101, 200-205 188, 192
Ott, H., 40 n. 37, 50, 51, 55 n. 83, setting of, in Jesus' history, ix-x,
56 n. 84, 61, 62, 85 18-24, 37-39, 42, 54-55, 88-
92,9~ lIS, 134, 149, 150,157,
Parable, as aesthetic object, ix-x, 13, 163-164, 172-173, 177, 183-
24-25, 30, 32-33, 36-37, 41- 184, 191, 192, 204
42, 55, 57, 60"'<;1, 68, 70-71, See also Language event
215
THE PARABLES
Perrin, N., ix n. I, 186 n. 16 Sin, 99 n. 88, 103, 112-113, 117-

Picaresque mode, 159-162, 172 118, 136-137, 166-172, 182
Plot, 94-97, 100-104, 110, 116, Smart, J., 4, 28 n. 9, 46 n. 50, 77 n.
124-125, 130, 135, 139-140, 24
150-151, 152, 157-158, 164- Smith, B. T. D., xi n. 5, 2 n. 2, 6 n.
168, 179-182,201 16,11 n. 32, 12 n. 34, 12 n. 35,
Polanyi, M., 68, 72, 73 n. 11, 76, 14 n. 36, 95 n. 74, 114 n. 15,
82 n. 40, 86, 87 n. 55, 92 n. 115 n. 19, 120, 124 n. 32,
69, 178 130 n. 43,135 n. 54, 149 n. 11,
Pre·understanding, 44-51, 54 149 n. 16, 170, 171 n. 61, 191
Snyder, C. F., 40 n. 37
Ramsey, I. T., 60 n. 105,63 n. 119, Sophocles, 96
63 n. 120, 64 n. 121,65 n. 126, Spanos, W. V., 103 n. 98, 105 n.
190 103
Recognition scene, 102-103, 116- Stauffer, E., 186 n. 16
117, 118, 125, 130, 135-136, Steiner, C., 70 n. 1
150, 152, 166, 167-169, 175- Stendahl, K., 29-30, 38 n. 32
176, 180 Symbol (see Imagery, Language,
Reiss, H. S., 80 n. 32 how it expresses meaning
Responsibility, 119-121, 166-167,
Taylor, V., 8 n. 20, 8 n. 21, 12 n.
168,170-171,182
RicIcman, H. P., 26 n. 1
34, 14n. 36
Theme, 100-101, 152, 163, 166,
Roberts, P., 102-103, 117
167, 171-172
Robinson, J. M., 26 n. 1, 30 n. 14,
Theological language, nature and
31 n. 15, 32 n. 19, 33 n. 20,
meaningfulness of, 47 n. 55,
33 n. 21, 34 n. 22, 39 n. 35,
55-56,57-69,93-94,190,197
40 n. 36, 40 n. 37,45 n. 47,50
Tillich, P., 166
n. 68, 55 n. 83, 56 n. 89, 62 n.
Time (temporal existence), 121-
110,131 n.44, 186n.17, 194-
122, 126-128, 174-176, 187-
197, 199 n. 51
190, 193-194
Tragic, 96-97, 99, 100, 101, 103-
Same, J. P., 27-28 105, 110-113, 116, 117, 121,
Scholes, R., 81 n. 35 124-125, 130, 134-135, 139-
Scott, N., 71 n. 2, 81 n. 35, 82 n. 140, 143, 144, 145-146, 150-
36, 82 n. 39, 84 n. 48, 110 n. 151, 152, 155, 167-168, 179-
1, III n. 8, 113 n. 13, 145, 182, 194
146 n. 2, 146 n. 3 Typology, 43 n. 41
Sewall, R., 110 n. 2, 110 n. 3, 110
n.4, 111 n. 10, 112 n, 12, 146 Understanding, nature of, 43, 67-
n. 5 68, 76, 82-83, 86, 178
Sewell, E., 32, 56 n. 86, 64 n. 124, See also Pre·understanding
72 n. 10, 76, 83 n. 42 Understanding of existence (see Ex·
Similitude, x-xi, 11-12 istential)
216
GINIRAL INDEX
Van Buren, P., .,.; n. 48, 58, 60 D. 17,750.18, 77D. 23, 770. 25,
105, 184, 195 D. 35, 200 D. 53 78 n. 28, 79 n. 31. 95 n. 75,
Verification principle, 57-59, 63 96 n. 77, 970. 79, 1010. 93
Vivas, E., 56 n. 87, 71 D. 3, 7i, Weil, A. T., '19 n. 61
73 n. 12, 73 D. 13, 73 D. 14, Wheelwright, P., 6 n. 14, 45 o. 48,
75 n. 16, 77 n. 23, 77 D. 26, 64 n. 124, 68, 72, 7.. n. 13, 75,
78 D. 28,78 D. 29, 80, 83 82 n. 37, 82 n. 39, 83 n. 41,
1000,91, 136 n. 55
Waiting, 126-128, 187-188 Wilder, A., It n. 3, 14 n. 36, 47 n.
Warren, A., 74 n. 15,75 n.16, 75 n. 53.48 n. 58,49 o. 62, '83 n. 43,
17,75 n. 18,77 n. 23,77 n. 25, 97 n. 79, 97 n. 80, 99 o. 86,
78 rio 28, 79 n. 31, 95 n. 75, 100 n. 90, 106. 178 n. 3, 201
96 D. 77, 97 n. 79, 101 D. 93 Wimsatt, W. K., 77 n. 24. 78 n. 27
Wenck, R., 74 0.15,75 0.16,75 n. WooUcombe. K. J.... 3 n."1
I
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1.
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217

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I \1

DAN OTTO VIA, JR.

FORTRESS PRESS PHILADELPHIA

Biblical quotations from the Revised Standard Version of the Bible,

COPYRICHT © 1967 BY FORTRESS PRESS

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,

First paperback edition 1974

Library oj Congress Card Number 67-11910

8318L79 Printed in the United States of America 1-1392

I should like to express my gratitude to the Duke University-

Part One: Methodological 1

Part Two: Interpretive 109

Index of Parables 208

In view of the passionate concern of contemporary theology

Occasionally it is positively remarked that Jesus' parables are of

• For example, Amos N. Wilder, Early Christian Rhetoric (London: SCM

parables (in the narrow sense), and example stories.1I It would

6 Cf. Rudolf Bultmann, Tile History of tile SYllOptiC Tradition, trans. J.

ars as Dodd, Jeremias, Manson, Michaelis, Fuchs, and Linne-

Parable and Allegory

Despite the importance and continuing influence of his work,

1. The One-Point Approach to the Parables

a Eta Linnema nn, Die Cleiclmisse r~u, p. 32.

2. The Nature and Function of Allegory

7 Sometimes the neutral tenn "narrative" or "story" will be used where

11 Mic11aelis, Gleic/misse, p. 15.

u Philip V/hee1wright, The Burning Fountain (Bloomington: Indiana

18 Linnemann, Gleichnisse, p. 17.

meaning-unless there is an appended interpretation-from

U Gleichnisreden, Yol. 1, pp. 49, 73.

because the people were dull and insensitive, Jesus taught in

very next verse (4: 34) a reflection of the opposite (Markan)

31 Cf. Manson, Teaching, p. 63. The "parables" referred to in these four

4. The Criticism of the One-Point Approach In

ments that call for consideration. An allegory corresponds at

66 Cf. Micllnclis, Gleiclmisse. 1'. 15; Cranfield, Mark, p. 159; Grant,

.0 J. Arthur Baird, Tha Ju stice of Cod in the Teaching of Jesus (Philadel-

history which reached a climax in the ministry of Jesus. The

plifying the judgment to be made and of reducing the parables

4~Ibid., pp. 51-52.

5. The Parables as Reflections of Jesus' Concrete

•• Jillicher, Gleichnisreden, Vol. 2, p. 481.

GS Linnemann, Gleiclmisse, pp. 30-31.

action in the parables is for Jesus' hearers "that they should do

18 Ibid., pp. lZCrlZ9.

from being a parable. That is, he prevents it from being a new

6. A Critique of the Severely Historical Approach

eo Ibid., pp. 73, 140.

III Ernst Kasemann, Essays on New Testament Themes, trans. W. J. Mon·

8e Ibid" pp. 118-119.

original intention. It will then not be necessary to allegorize

7. Toward an Aesthetic Definition of Parable

Parable and the Problems of

Because the parables are a special kind of linguistic form,

1. Hermeneutic as the Focal Theological Problem

cal understanding of history does make the hermeneutical task

a Cf. Gerhard Ebeling, Word and Faith, trans. J. W. Leitch (Philadel.

penetrated, and suffocated by a kind of objective, alien, un-

G Jean Paul Sartre, Nctusect, trans. L. Alexander (Norfolk, Conn.: New