Review:  Five Books on the Parables of Jesus

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Kenneth E Bailey,   Poet & Peasant and Through Peasant Eyes: A Literary-Cultural Approach to the Parables of Luke.  Grand Rapids:  Eerdmans, 1983.

Craig L. Blomberg,  Interpreting the Parables.   Downers Grove:  IVP,  1990.

Stephen I. Wright,  The Voice of Jesus.   Milton Keynes, UK:  Paternoster,  2000.

Brian C. Stiller. Preaching Parables to Postmoderns. Minneapolis: Fortress, 2005.

Luise Schottroff,  The Parables of Jesus.  trans. Linda M. Maloney,  Minneapolis:  Fortress Press,  2006.

These five titles present a varied but inter-connected approach to the hermeneutics of the parables.   In the academic world these are greatly debated and for the church in Latin America their interpretation is very important since one third of Jesus’ teachings were in the form of parables.

The best know publication in the last 25 years is that of Bailey,  who served as a missionary in the Middle East and brings a literary-cultural approach to the subject.   Bloomberg’s text is a well-known one in the evangelical world and challenges the normally accepted approach of Jeremias and Dodd    The newer titles provide a response to contemporary issues.  Wright’s book is stimulated by the approach of the Jesus Seminar group [1] and through literary analysis aims to present readers with the unequivocal message of Jesus.   In a comparable way Brian Stiller’s work looks at the nature of postmodernism and how the parables challenge this worldview.  He then provides preaching guidelines.   Finally, Luise Schottroff’s  simply named,  The Parables of Jesus,  analyzes the complexities of the social background of the early church and Jewish practices of story telling in order to propose a message of the kingdom as present day liberation.

In Poet & Peasant and Through Peasant Eyes: A Literary-Cultural Approach to the Parables of Luke,   Bailey proposes two main theses:   “The culture reflected in the Dominical parables is that of first-century Palestine” [2]   and the “Literary structure has received little attention” [3] .   He is sympathetic to Dodd´s comment about the impact of the parables being lost on some modern interpreters,  “no one would have crucified an itinerant preacher who went about encouraging people with general moral principles” [4]    But criticizes the form criticism approach of Dodd and Jeremias.    He is also sympathetic to those who do not bother with these kind of history of tradition questions but are interested in the parables as art which is produced by a creative imagination (cf. G.V. Jones and D.O. Via).

To overcome the cultural gap which separates the contemporary reader from New Testament days,  Bailey uses ancient oriental versions of the NT particularly in Syriac and Arabic.  This provides an insight into customs no longer familiar today.  For instance,  Ben Sirach reports that a nobleman is known by his walk – slow, dignified as a Middle Eastern patriarch.   This is significant in interpreting the parable of the prodigal. [5]     Additionally  Bailey contributes his detailed knowledge of ancient cultural customs through his personal experiences in Egypt, the Lebanon and Syria.  

He then returns to those interested in the historical approach to texts and starts with Eta Linnemann’s idea of the parables being theological clusters in which a single response to a parable does not necessarily mean a single conclusive idea.  In contrast,  he reasons,  there can be a group of interlocking themes. [6]    Linnemann summarizes her position by saying “a parable is not an illustration but is a mode of theological speech used to evoke a response.” [7]     Bailey then develops a model of literary structure to the parables of a chiastic nature. 

This particular publication is two books Poet & Peasant written in 1976 and Through Peasant Eyes (1980).    His technique of cultural analysis,  using ancient oriental texts and looking for the literary structure is applied to parabolic material in Luke’s gospel. 

It is significant that all four subsequent writers under review draw on Bailey’s investigations.   As such it is a basic work for anyone studying the parables.  Readers need to be warned though that he does have a tendency to include a considerable amount of detail which can be distracting.

Blomberg has produced a popular work,   Interpreting the Parables,  which has been in print since 1990.   Of the five titles under review,  this is the only one that Logos Bible Software have produced electronically for their library system.

Blomberg commences on a controversial note by looking at the debate over the interpretation of the parables and particularly the rejection of an allegorical approach.   He weighs the case for and against allegory and provides about twice as many points in favour of it.    He then turns his attention to the form and redaction critics and shows the useful contributions they have made and also their underlying weaknesses. 

In more detail he evaluates the interpretation of parables in contemporary hermeneutics looking particularly at issues of metaphor,  structuralism,  poststructuralism and reader-response criticism. 

He concludes by proposing a variant point model for interpretation.   He rejects Jeremias’ view that the parables contain one principal idea and is in sympathy with an allegorical approach allowing for a multi-implication to many of the parables.

The parables he selects by way of illustration are ten parables with 3 simple implications (e.g. Prodigal Son,  Rich Man and Lazarus),  8 parables with complex three-point implications (e.g Good Samaritan, Talents),  9 two-point parables (e.g. Pharisee and Tax-Collector and the Friend at Midnight) and 3 one-point parables (e.g. Hidden Treasure and the Pearl of Great Price;   and the Mustard Seed and Leven).

In the last section of Blomberg’s book,  he looks at the controversial issues of the theology of the parables, examining issues of eschatology,  the social gospel,  the kingdom  and Israel,  and Christology.

Of all the publications this is the most encyclopaedic,  summarizing most of the major work from the early church to the late 1980s.  However this extensiveness means that nothing is dealt with in too much depth and his style of writing causes quite a bit of sub-sectioning such as enumerations of the type 2.2.2.1.

Stephen Wright’s intriguing title  The Voice of Jesus,  comes from the aim of Jülicher and Jeremias to hear the authentic voice of Jesus.   To do this they use source criticism to distinguish between the writings of the early Christians and the original message as given by Jesus. This idea of the quest for the voice of Jesus has also found expression recently in the Jesus Seminar movement and particularly in the writings of Bernard Brandon Scott.

Wright provides an analysis of literary types, particularly commenting on the use of figures and those of lingüistic tropes.  He regards the trope of metonymy as being the best technical way to describe what is happening in the parables. 

In a similar way to Blomberg,  Wright is critical of Dodd’s attack on the pre-modern interpretation of the parables as allegory.   He refers to this early period as one of “Divine Meaning” and should not be understood as one in which the parables were treating like codes to be cracked. 

In looking at the times of Jülicher and Dodd,  Wright calls this “The Age of Historical Quest”.   Turning to the work of the Jesus Seminar, this is described as “The Age of the Reader” in which the Biblicist Scott follows the contemporary hermeneutist Ricoeur.   Narratives then become creative metaphorical functions which serve as a “model for re-describing reality”. [8]

Wright regards the parables not as providing detailed source-material for 1^st century Palestian life (as Dodd did),  but as stories that amaze listeners:  “I believe rather that we should see the situations pictured in these stories as surprising instances of the new age itself” [9]    He seeks to combine a postmodern hermeneutics of suspicion (by going beyond the intentions of interpreters and Jesus)  with a pre-modern hermeneutics of trust (accepting what Luke writes about Jesus as reliable). [10]

Wright focuses upon six parables (Good Samaritan,  Prodigal Son,  Shrewd Steward,  Rich Man and Lazarus,  Judge and Widow,   and the Pharisee and the Customs Officer) and shows how they have been interpreted by pre-modern commentators,  by Jülicher and by Scott.

This publication started as a Durham University Ph.D. thesis and still has that feel about it.    It’s contemporary emphasis complements well with the work of Bailey and Blomberg.

In Preaching Parables to Postmoderns Brian Stiller takes a different theme from the previous authors, that of the use of the parables homiletically in a postmodern society.  He starts by analyzing the modern and postmodern world-visions and acknowledges that modernity still exists in the present postmodern world.  He comments that “Modernity had its most serious impact upon religion;  indeed,  it challenged the very basis of the Christian faith,  which had as it starting point the external God” [11]

He then looks at postmodernity by starting with six characteristics [12] :

1.                 “Reason … is rejected as the only prime means to discover truth.  … Truth is not that which is out there,  but that which is interior”.

2.                 Truth is not objective. It is something we make ourselves.

3.                 The idea of authority is rejected as it makes truth claims and uses them to oppress others.

4.                 Metanarrative is rejected,  as there can be no overall idea of truth to explain things.

5.                 All ideas are of equal value,  since truth is relative.

6.                 It is a therapeutic culture dealing with personal well-being.

He looks at the lack of connection between Jesus’ parables and those of the Rabbis and notes the absence of parables in the Dead Sea Scrolls,  the Apocrypha and the Pseudepigrapha.   He concludes with Jeremias,  “Jesus’ parables are something entirely new”. [13]

The purpose of Jesus’ parables was to allow “no one to remain neutral:   People were forced to respond to his call to join him in his new kingdom.” [14]    Ten characteristics of Jesus’ parables are noted (e.g. they are earthy,  do not need previous learning to understand, combine wisdom and eschatology).

Turning to the issue of preaching the parables Stiller first of all gives rules for interpreting them (e.g. note the wider context,  discern Jesus’ main point,  think about 1^st century Palestinians and how they would respond).    He then looks at steps to develop the text homiletically (e.g.  watch for the unexpected,  note detail,  carefully examine the plot).   Finally he sees how the parables address the particular characteristics of postmodernism. 

Stiller says that the postmodern age is one that is image-driven and has a story-taught way of speaking.    The postmoderns know how “to exegete,  making sense of what is said by way of image and metaphor,  applying to life the lessons taught.” [15]     This combination of image and metaphor is precisely what the parables offer.

Ten parables from Matthew and Luke are analyzed in terms of their context,  lexicography, culture and message, and their suitability for preaching today,  Exegetical and homiletical outlines are provided and extended comments made on how to present this message to the postmodern person.    Finally four illustrative sermons are given.

This is an unusual book and thought provoking in a way which the previous three titles are not.  Do the parables have a special role in communicating the message of the kingdom today?

Two other complementary titles by Fortress Press may be noted,  Confessing Jesus Christ:  Preaching in a Postmodern World by David J. Lose and Testimony to the Exiles:  Sermons to GenXers and Other Postmoderns by Mark R.  Feldmeir. 

With Schottroff’s publication last year of The Parables of Jesus,, thinking about parables is further enhanced.   From the content of the previous four titles,   she has reason to comment:  “Many exegetical works,   including books on the parables,  suffer from a surfeit of explanation of their methods” [16] .    She analyses 20 parables and is the only author to draw on material from all three synoptic gospels.  Her commentary is based on:

• Social-historical analysis
• Eschatological interpretation
• History of interpretation

Her approach is a non-dualistic one.  She rejects the idea of the parables as being earthly image in contrast to spiritual substance:    “the parables really talk about people’s lives in the time of the Roman empire,  and these depictions contain their own immediate message that needs to be heard” [17] .   There is a shift in emphasis from that proposed by the previous writers to one which is more concerned for a kingdom of social,  sexual and economic liberty. 

The traditional hermeneutical assumptions which she challenges are the:

• Ideology of superiority.  According to the author it is not legitimate to assume that the Christian religion is superior to all others as a reading of , “To you has been given the secret of the kingdom” (Mat. 13:11) might imply. [18]
• Use of dualism and eschatology.  That is anthropological dualism, where this worldly body is viewed as less than a spiritual body in the world to come.  Teachers of a non-dualistic eschatology include Ernst Bloch,  Johann Baptist Metz,  Jürgen Ebach and Rosemary Radford Ruether [19] .  She understands the parables to be about the kingdom which is already changing lives. [20]
• Misuse of guilt and suffering.  Faith has been confused with passivity and acceptance of injustice. [21]
• Weak idea of obedience and authority.  The tendency is to exegete texts about obedience to authorities,  without criticizing those authorities. [22]

The other areas she challenges are the traditional Christian strategies for avoiding the responsibility of the gospel of the poor in New Testament by:

• Perceiving greed as an individual moral failure. [23]
• Presuming the gospel of the poor means giving alms.
• Presuming Jesus’ command to surrender possessions was intended only for a limited circle,  that of the disciples.
• Spiritualizing the gospel of the poor.
• Ignoring or reinterpreting the tradition of eschatological repentance in the New Testament. [24]

She quotes Miguel A. De la Torre:  “If a biblical text can be read and interpreted in several ways, which interpretation is correct?  The challenge faced by those who read the Bible from the margins is that the dominant culture has the power to shape and legitimize the religious discourse”. [25]   The author provides a summary of her views in the appendix “How Should I Read a Gospel Parable?”.

In contrast to Stiller,   Schottroff rejects the idea of Jesus’ parables as being unique and regards them as one with the rabbinic parabolic practice (as David Flusser and David Stern have suggested). 

When William Herzog wrote a book with the stimulating title,   Parables as Subversive Speech,  he advocated that the parables make their own theological statements [26] .   This is what Schottroff does in a provocative way.    As such this publication is a thought provoking contrast to what has gone before it.

David E. C. Ford

Profesor del Nuevo Testamento,  Fundación Universitaria Seminario Bíblico de Colombia,  Medellín.