"Why Do YOU Speak To Them In Parables?"

"Then HIS disciples came to HIM and said, 'Why do YOU speak to them in parables?'

JESUS answered, 'To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but not to these people.  For the one who has will be given more; and he will have in abundance.  But the one who does not have will be deprived of even what he has.  That is why I speak to them in parables; because they look and do not see; they hear; but they do not listen or understand,

In them, the words of the prophet Isaiah are fulfilled: However much you hear, you do not understand; however much you see, you do not perceive.

For the heart of this people has grown dull.  Their ears hardly hear and their eyes dare not see.  If they were to see with their eyes, hear with their ears and understand with their heart, they would turn back and I would heal them.

But blessed are your eyes, because they see; and your ears, because they hear.

For I tell you, many prophets and righteous people have longed to see the things you see, but they did not see them; and to hear the things you hear, but they did not hear them.'" - Matthew 13:10-17  

(To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom.  To you who took CHRIST's call seriously and decided to follow HIM.  Because you came to be the co-workers of CHRIST, the FATHER will reveal to you HIS secrets.

The quotation from Isaiah that follows may shock us due to the fact of our not fully understanding Hebrew expressions.  Does JESUS speak in parables because the audience does not want to understand, or so that they will not understand?  It could be both at the same time.

For the one who has will be given more.  Here has means produce, bear as does the tree that "has" fruit.  It will be given to those who are fruitful.)

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The LORD Is Risen!

"Mary stood weeping outside the tomb; and as she wept, she bent down to look inside.  She saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of JESUS had been, one at the head, and the other at the feet.  They said, 'Woman, why are you weeping?'  She answered, 'Because they have taken my LORD and I don't know where they have put HIM.'

As she said this, she turned around and saw JESUS standing there, but she did not recognize HIM.  JESUS said to her, 'Woman, why are you weeping?  Who are you looking for?'  She thought it was the gardener and answered HIM, 'Sir, if you have taken HIM away, tell me where you have put HIM, and I will go and take HIM away.'

JESUS said to her, 'Mary!'  She turned and said to HIM, 'Rabboni!' - which means Master.  JESUS said to her, 'Do not touch ME, because I have not yet ascended to the FATHER.  But go to MY brothers and say to them: I AM ascending to MY FATHER, who is your GOD.'

So, Mary of Magdala went and announced to the disciples, 'I have seen the LORD, and this is what HE said to me.'" - John 20:11-18  

(Do not touch ME, because I have not yet ascended to the FATHER.  Before HIS death, JESUS did not disapprove of the passionate feelings and actions of Mary.  Now this familiar gesture to take possession of her loved Master is no longer appropriate.

HE is now the Risen One, and though HE lets HIMSELF be seen by HIS disciples for a few days, HE is in the glory of the FATHER.  HIS disciples must relinquish the physical presence of JESUS with which they felt so much at ease.  From now on the followers and lovers of JESUS will embrace HIM in a secret and marvelous way, when they are given gifts of prayer and faith.  It is then that the contemplative spirit, who is represented by Mary, may enjoy the whole of CHRIST [see Song 3:4].

I have not yet ascended to the FATHER.  JESUS is revealing the great desire that filled HIS life.  HE came from GOD and must return to the FATHER.  This is "the greatest love in the world."  All the love that JESUS has for us is but a manifestation of that other love, because GOD the FATHER is the fountain and the goal of all love. 

It is not by chance that the word LORD is again repeated seven times, the last time by Thomas: "YOU are my LORD and my GOD."  This expresses the faith of the Church.

Let us remark that the persons concerned in this event did in fact call JESUS, "the Master."  However, John puts on their lips the word LORD.  Why?  From the first days of the Church, the believers had to find words to express their faith in JESUS, Son of GOD.  Being the Son, HE was not the same person as GOD, but HE was one with HIM.  How is this divine condition best expressed?

In Sacred Scriptures two names were given to GOD:  GOD and YAHWEH.  At that time the Jews no longer pronounced the name of YAHWEH and instead said: "the LORD."  Moreover, in the Greek Bible used by the apostles and the Church, YAHWEH was also translated as "the LORD."  So, the apostles decided very soon to retain the term GOD when speaking of GOD, the FATHER, and to call JESUS "the LORD," by this affirming that HE was not inferior to the FATHER.

The risen JESUS' apparitions to HIS disciples, besides fostering their hope and making them qualified witnesses of HIS resurrection, were necessary for their spiritual formation.  The disciples had to learn to recognize JESUS no longer through their senses but through faith.  Likewise, we have to learn to recognize and follow JESUS in the dim light of faith, in desolation as well as in consolation, thus we too will be among those whom JESUS blesses: Happy are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe [verse 29].)

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"Who Is MY Mother? Who Are MY Brothers?"

"While JESUS was still talking to the people, HIS mother and HIS brothers wanted to speak to HIM and they waited outside.  So someone said to HIM, 'YOUR mother and YOUR brothers are just outside; they want to speak to YOU.'

JESUS answered, 'Who is MY mother?  Who are MY brothers?'  Then HE pointed to HIS disciples and said, 'Look!  Here are MY mother and MY brothers.  Whoever does the will of MY FATHER in heaven is for ME brother, sister, or mother'." - Matthew 12:46-50  

(If they were true brothers of JESUS, sons of Mary, the Gospel would say: "HIS mother and the sons of HIS mother," for this was the Jewish manner of speaking.)

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JESUS Criticizes HIS Own Generation

"Then some teachers of the Law and some Pharisees spoke up, 'Teacher, we want to see a sign from you.'  JESUS answered them, 'An evil and unfaithful people want a sign, but no sign will be given them except the sign of the prophet Jonah.  In the same way that Jonah spent three days and three nights in the belly of the monster fish, so will the Son of Man spend three days and three nights in the depths of the earth.

At the judgment, the people of Nineveh will rise with this generation and condemn it, because they reformed their lives at the preaching of Jonah, and here there is greater than Jonah.  At the judgment, the Queen of the South will stand up and condemn you.  She came from the ends of the earth to listen to the wisdom of Solomon, and here there is greater than Solomon'." - Matthew 12:38-42  

(JESUS did not perform any miracle that day, because the experts in religion were demanding an account of HIM, instead of listening to HIM.

An evil and unfaithful people.  Gospel says in fact: "evil and adulterous".  This expression in the Bible means the unfaithful believer who, without denying GOD in words, keeps other gods to himself.

The Ninivites: see Jonah 3:5.

The Queen of the South: see 1 Kings 10.

The sign of Jonah is the resurrection of JESUS.  The similarity seen in the three days that Jonah was in the belly of the fish and the time JESUS spent in the tomb is somewhat forced.) 

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The Parable Of The Weeds

"JESUS told the people another parable, 'The kingdom of heaven can be compared to a man, who sowed good seed in his field.  While everyone was asleep, his enemy came, and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away.'

When the plants sprouted and produced grain, the weeds also appeared.  Then, the servants of the owner came, and said to him, 'Sir, was it not good seed that you sowed in your field?  Where did the weeds come from?'

He answered them, 'This is the work of an enemy.'  They asked him, 'Do you want us to go and pull up the weeds?'  He told them, 'No, when you pull up the weeds, you might uproot the wheat with them.  Let them grow together, until harvest; and, at harvest time, I will say to the workers: Pull up the weeds first, tie them in bundles and burn them; then gather the wheat into my barn.'" - Matthew 13:24-30  

(With the parable of the weeds, JESUS answers those who are scandalized at seeing evil everywhere.  Good and bad will be mixed till the end of the world.  Good and evil will always be found together in persons and institutions.

GOD respects people.  HE knows that temptation is often stronger than their good intentions and they need time to find and to choose steadily what is good.

GOD is patient.  The reconciliation of so many contradictory groups, forces and cultural currents active in the world will be attained only at the end of time.  In the meantime, we are not to label any of them as "the" good ones and "the" bad ones.) 

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JESUS Denounces The Exploiters, Those Who Always Have Legal Means To Despoil Little People.

"Woe to those who plot wickedness and plan evil even on their beds!  When morning comes, they do it, as soon as it is within their reach.

If they covet fields, they seize them.  Do they like houses?  They take them.  They seize the owner and his household, both the man and his property.

This is why YAHWEH speaks, 'I AM plotting evil against this whole brood, from which your necks cannot escape.  No more shall you walk with head held high for it will be an evil time.'

On that day they will sing a taunting song against you and a bitter lamentation will be heard, 'We have been stripped of our property in our homeland.  Who will free us from the wicked who allots our fields.'  Truly, no one will be found in the assembly of YAHWEH to keep a field for you." - Micah 2:1-5   

(He denounces the exploiters, those who always have legal means to despoil little people.  We must not forget that the Bible had a code of laws - far ahead of any other nation - to defend the rights and the lives of the poor, the widows, etc.  See Deuteronomy 23:16.

Everyone, naturally, is furious with the prophet who disturbs the established injustice.)

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JESUS, LORD Of The Sabbath

"It happened that JESUS was walking through the wheat fields on a Sabbath.  HIS disciples were hungry; and they began to pick some heads of wheat, to crush and to eat the grain.  When the Pharisees noticed this, they said to JESUS, 'Look at YOUR disciples!  They are doing what is prohibited on the Sabbath!'

JESUS answered, 'Have you not read what David did, when he and his men were hungry?  He went into the House of GOD, and they ate the bread offered to GOD, though neither he nor his men had the right to eat it, but only the priests.  And have you not read in the law, how, on the Sabbath, the priests in the temple desecrate the Sabbath, yet they are not guilty?

I tell you, there is greater than the temple here.  If you really knew the meaning of the words: It is mercy I want, not sacrifice, you would not have condemned the innocent.

Besides, the Son of Man is LORD of the Sabbath.'" - Matthew 12:1-8   

(This chapter records the conflicts of JESUS with the Pharisees regarding the Sabbath.  Why does the Gospel make so much of these conflicts?  Perhaps because at the time of JESUS the heavy load of religious obligations was a formidable obstacle for those searching for GOD.  It may have been also because the Christians lost no time making new laws to which they gave an exaggerated importance.  If JESUS deliberately violated the most sacred of the laws given by GOD to Moses, what about our ecclesiastical laws not guaranteed by the word of GOD?  In the name of man-made laws, adapted to a context that is not ours, Christian communities have at times been paralyzed and we let millions of people look for churches where they have the communities and pastors they have been deprived of.)

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"Come To ME, All You Who Are Weary And Burdened, And I Will Give You Rest."

"Come to ME, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.  Take MY yoke upon you and learn from ME, for I AM gentle and humble of heart; and you will find rest.  For MY yoke is easy; and MY burden is light." - Matthew 11:28-30  

(I will not relieve you of your load but by placing MY yoke on you, I give you the means of carrying the load.

JESUS plays with the two words yoke and load, for the Jews used to call "load" the divine teachings imparted to pupils, and "yoke" the balancing of the teacher's sentences, which should be learned by heart.

JESUS, the patient and humble teacher, enables us to see the mercy of GOD in our lives and in our own cross.  HE shows us the love of GOD even in the requirements of the law.  Only GOD is good; and good is the authority of CHRIST.)

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"Everything Has Been Entrusted To ME By MY FATHER."

"On that occasion JESUS said, 'FATHER, LORD of heaven and earth, I praise YOU, because YOU have hidden these things from the wise and learned and revealed them to simple people.  Yes, FATHER, this is what pleased YOU.

Everything has been entrusted to ME by MY FATHER.  No one knows the SON except the FATHER, and no one knows the FATHER except the SON and those to whom the SON chooses to reveal HIM'." - Matthew 11:25-27  

(JESUS prayer impressed the disciples.  In this text it is a short prayer, prompted by the most recent events; events and daily life are also a source of prayer.

YOU have hidden these things.  Intelligent people are not excluded from the faith, of course, but it is the glory of GOD that faith should not seem to be the privilege of the wise and the intelligent; human wisdom never gives what is essential and often hides it.  There were in Palestine at the time some wise people and many others who pretended to be so, but they were rarely seen among the disciples of JESUS.

Everything has been entrusted to ME.  GOD does what is needed for people to have always and in all places thousands of ways of knowing HIM.  In this life it is only through JESUS that we have the revelation of the FATHER.)

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Chorazin And Bethsaida

"Then JESUS began to denounce the cities in which HE had performed most of HIS miracles, because the people there did not change their ways.  'Alas for you Chorazin and Bethsaida!  If the miracles worked in you had taken place in Tyre and Sidon, the people there would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.  But I assure you, for Tyre and Sidon it will be more bearable on the day of judgment than for you.  And you, Capernaum, will you be lifted up to heaven?  You will be thrown down to the place of the dead!  For if the miracles which were performed in you had taken place in Sodom, it would still be there today!  But I tell you, it will be more bearable for Sodom on the day of judgment than for you.'" - Matthew 11:20-24  

(Chorazin and Bethsaida: these two cities were the seats of higher schools of religion but had not received the Gospel.  Tyre and Sidon: two pagan cities, cursed by the prophets.)

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