"10 And when he was alone, they that were about him with the twelve
asked of him the parable.
11 And he said unto them, Unto you it is given to know the mystery
of the kingdom of God: but unto them that are without, all these things
are done in parables:
12 That seeing they may see, and not perceive; and hearing they
may hear, and not understand; lest at any time they should be converted,
and their sins should be forgiven them.
13 And he said unto them, Know ye not this parable? and how then
will ye know all parables?"
"This parable" means the parable of "The Sower". Therefore, in this passage Jesus puts it like this; "Do you not know this parable? If not, how can you know any parable written in any part of the Bible. You have made no progress in understanding parables."
Therefore, we can say this: whether they can understand this parable of "The Sower" or not is Jesus' test to examine a disciple's ability to perceive the meaning within parables.
This saying "Know ye not this parable?" is given by Jesus before his interpretation of "The Parable Of The Sower."
Therefore, we can understand that "To know a parable" does not mean to simply understand "the story of the sower" after his interpretation of the sower parable. If so, everybody would understand it.
Instead, these disciples had to understand this "Sower's parable" clearly, before Jesus' interpretation.
Every disciple of Jesus has to train the gift of "knowing parables" like any other gift i.e. gifts of healing or delivering of evil spirits.
Jesus rebuked his disciples when they could not deliver evil sprits from the child. Because a disciple of Jesus is a person who should be able to deliver evil spirits. Jesus also rebuked his disciples when they could not understand a parable. Because disciples of Jesus are persons who are expected to understand parables.
We can see in the scripture that Jesus requires his disciples to understand parables. However, we never see any passage where Jesus rebuked His disciples for not being able to read a Greek Bible or for not reading many commentaries Or there is no passage where Jesus rebuked his disciples as they have bad memories to memorize lots of scriptures. However, the only act we see Jesus rebuking them is when they do not know parables. That's when Jesus rebuked his disciples.
We have to know that it is highly unusual for Jesus to say something about the method of scripture study, or what way to read scripture. Therefore, we have to realize his rebuke in saying "to know this parable" is something special and important. And so, we want to know more deeply concerning parables as a result of the words of Jesus.
Within the passage,"That seeing they may see and not perceive ( eido)" recited from Isaiah, is used the Greek word "eido". This same word was used in the message of Jesus. "Know (eido) ye not this parable?"
So, we can understand the meaning of this passage like this; "The Jews did not understand (eido) this parable, and you also do not understand (eido) this parable. That is not good."
Therefore, Jesus speaks like this within this passage, "The Jews did not perceive (eido) parables And you also do not understand (eido) either. This is not good as a disciple."
This passage of Isaiah is basically told against the dull perceptivity
of the Jews in his day. What was their problem? According to Isaiah,
their problem was this; Though they saw, they did not understand, though
they hear, they did not perceive. That is to say, all of prophecies
of the old testament were given to them; yet they couldn't see into them.
Within these prophecies there is described the coming Messiah. And
they read these on every Sabbath, but could not understand them, and they
could not accept him when he came accordingly.
(see Acts 13:7)
Why did they fail? Scripture emphasizes the fact that they did not understand the parable. How can we say this for sure? Because of these scriptures of Isaiah recited in Mark within the story concerning "the parable". Therefore, Jesus speaks to us like this through this passage: If someone reads Bible, and still does not understand "parable", he or she is equivalent to those who "seeing they may see, and not perceive and hearing they may hear, and not understand".
In other words, we can say it like this: Everyone can read Bible. However, they will be discerned as disciples through his or her understanding of parables.
For example, let's look at Isaiah chapter 53. Within it a prophecy about the Messiah, as suffering servant is written within it. Though the Jews read this passage many times, yet, they could not understand this passage and subsequently could not understand Jesus as their Messiah.
Not only this, they were overly confident in their understanding and interpretation of the Bible which lead to how they wound up misunderstanding Jesus, persecuted and killed him for breaking the Sabbath and the law and for heresy.
They were eager on studying the Bible. But they were inferior on the point of understanding parables, which are messages hidden in Bible for the faithful. As a result of a faithless and hardened heart, they committed a big mistake. So, we can say this; the fact of whether we understand parables in the Bible correctly or not makes a big difference in our christian life.
In churches in Japan parables are rarely talked about parable. But if we examine foreign churches, workers in the group Brethren like J.N. Darby or Watchman Nee exceeded in this area and did many good works.
When we read any book, its necessary to know the character of the book beforehand. For example, a description like "3000 feet of beard" appeared in the book requires context. If this book is for mathematics, we can calculate like "the length of one feet corresponds to 33 centimeters. So, 3000 feet means to multiply 33 cm 3000 times"
But, if this book is about poetry, this kind of calculation is meaningless. So, we have to change our perspective depending on the character of the book.
What kind of book is Bible? What is the character of the Bible? The Bible is a book of parable as per the words of Jesus for "without a parable spake he not unto them" Mark 4:34. Many unexpected parables are hidden within the scriptures. If you understand these parables correctly, you can acquire helpful knowledge and receive benefits from God.
In addition, it is risky to read any book neglecting the author's intentions. If you read any book without a feeling for the author's intentions, you can easily be misled to a wrong direction, and you face a possibility to arrive at a faulty conclusion in spite of your effort.
Since God wrote this book as "a book of parables", we should concentrate to understand the nature of parables to grasp the ideas of this book.
Let's be true disciples and know parables and do our Lord's work.
-end-