Jesus told parables. Was He hiding something?

Jesus told parables. Lots of them. But what exactly is a parable? What's the point of them? Are parables to tell us something? Or are they to hide something from us? Either way, how much do we really understand of the parables Jesus told us? That's a lot of questions! Let's get some answers.

Jesus told parables, but what is a parable?

I guess it's important to look at what a parable really is before we dive right in and look at them.  While it kind of odd to put in the technical definition right away - here's one that's actually useful:

In the NT the actual word ‘parable’ is used with the same broad variety of meaning as Heb. māšāl to refer to almost any kind of non-literal utterance.  ¹Tasker, R. V. G., & Marshall, I. H. (1996). Parable. In D. R. W. Wood, A. R. Millard, J. I. Packer, & D. J. Wiseman (Eds.), New Bible dictionary (3rd ed., p. 867). Leicester, England; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.

I think the key to this definition is to remember that it's a "non-literal utterence".
In even more plain words, it's something said that was not, is not, and was never meant to - be taken literally.

However, having said not to take it literally, it's often possible to do exactly that. Jesus had a habit of taking things that everyone knew about and then using them to explain something else. For instance, one time while speaking to a large crowd from a boat, Jesus compared the Kingdom of Heaven to a mustard seed.

Obviously, the Kingdom of Heaven isn't a mustard seed. And yet, Jesus used the comparison. It was a comparison that people understood at the time. But now, two thousand years later, in a different part of the world, in a different culture, we often miss the point. Instead of just going with the comparison, we argue about the size of the seed, the size of the plant growing from that seed, and whether or not anyone would even plant a mustard seed in a garden.

Back then, it was done, the facts given were valid, and the comparison fit. But unless we're willing to learn something about the times, the culture, even what kind of mustard plants existed in that part of the world back then, we miss the point Jesus was making. Why? Because we're too busy picking on things that have changed over time, with the culture, and the part of the world we live in.

We'll get into specifics as we move along, both here in this article and with each parable. But I do want to point this out right at the beginning, so we can be aware of the potential for, as I often call it, getting lost in the weeds. The weeds are those things we aren't familiar with, appear to cause problems with what Jesus said, but are easily cleared up by taking a "trip back in time" to the language, culture, region, and even the religion of the Israelites/Hebrew/Jewish people in those times.

Why it's important to know what a parable really is

Of course, as alluded to earlier, it's also critical to know the difference between a parable in Jesus' time as opposed to today, two thousand years later.

What "parable" meant when Jesus told parables.

Realizing what a parable is would take away a lot of the complaints people have about many of the things Jesus said.  Jesus told a lot of parables. And if we can't accept His words for what they are, but insist on making them what we want them to be, we'll never get the point. We will be, as I said, lost in the weeds. By the way, there's even a parable about that!

There are lots of examples of people who have issues with things Jesus said in parables that seem to be impossible in the "real" world.  And, while there's always the possibility of miracles to explain some of what Jesus said, we also see many instances where Christians go out of their way - occasionally getting all twisted up in their words - trying to show how a literal interpretation of Jesus' parables is possible. But as we saw, by definition, a literal interpretation of a parable is never what the parable was actually meant to portray.

It's a shame.  It would be far easier to explain the definition of the word "parable" than it would be to twist a parable to actually meet the requirements of being literally true. And yet, it happens all too often.

What "parable" means today

It isn't exactly easy to show the same definition of parable is still in use today. but let's follow the trail from dictionary.com to show that the meaning of the word has not changed since Biblical times.  I've underlined the word from each definition that we'll use in the subsequent definition to be looked up.

parable -

noun