Parable of the Talents

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For the novel by Octavia Butler, see Parable of the Talents (novel).

The parable of the talents, as depicted in a 1712 woodcut. The lazy servant searches for his buried talent, while the two other servants present their earnings to their master.

The Parable of the Talents (sometimes just the Parable of Talents) is a parable of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew (Matthew 25:14-30). It was told to illustrate an aspect of the nature of the Kingdom of Heaven. Christians have taken it to mean that diligence in carrying out one's responsibilities is essential for more important tasks in the future.

1 The parable
- 1.1 Parable text from the Gospel of Matthew
2 Commentary
3 The parable as social critique
4 The term 'talent'
5 References
6 See also
7 External links

[edit] The parable

The parable tells of a master who was leaving his home to travel, and before going gave his three servants different amounts of money. On returning from his travels, the master asked his servants for an account of the money given to them. The first servant reported that he was given five talents, and he had made five talents more. The master praised the servant as being good and faithful, gave him more responsibility because of his faithfulness, and invited the servant to be joyful together with him.

The second servant said that he had received two talents, and he had made two talents more. The master praised this servant in the same way as being good and faithful, giving him more responsibility and inviting the servant to be joyful together with him.

The last servant who had received one talent reported that knowing his master was a hard man, he buried his talent in the ground for safekeeping, and therefore returned the original amount to his master. The master called him a wicked and lazy servant, saying that he should have placed the money in the bank to generate interest. The master commanded that the one talent be taken away from that servant, and given to the servant with ten talents, because everyone that has much will be given more, and whoever that has a little, even the little that he has will be taken away. And the master ordered the servant to be thrown outside into the darkness where there is "weeping and gnashing of teeth."

A similar parable, called The Parable of the Minas or The Parable of the Pounds is found in the Gospel of Luke 19:12-27, the main difference being that the master entrusted his servants with equal amounts, and that a mina was of much less value than a talent.

Jesus described the Kingdom of Heaven using the perspective of Jewish society at that time. He begins with the Parable of The Ten Virgins to illustrate, and continues with the Parable of Talents. Talents were used as a unit of currency. It is impossible to be exact about their value, and different kinds of talent were in use. However, even the lowest value for a talent puts it as worth several thousand denarii, and a denarius was the usual payment for a day's labour. So a talent was the value of many years of work by an ordinary person. The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, third edition, lists precise values of the talent: The Babylonian silver talent was equal to 3,000 shekels; the Greek talent contained 60 minae or 6000 silver drachmae, and the value of the late Attic talent of silver, with pure silver at 4s 9d, an oz. troy, has been estimated at £200.

[edit] Parable text from the Gospel of Matthew

For the kingdom of heaven is as a man travelling into a far country, who called his own servants, and delivered unto them his goods.
And unto one he gave five talents, to another two, and to another one; to every man according to his several ability; and straightway took his journey.
Then he that had received the five talents went and traded with the same, and made them other five talents.
And likewise he that had received two, he also gained other two.
But he that had received one went and digged in the earth, and hid his lord's money.
After a long time the lord of those servants cometh, and reckoneth with them.
And so he that had received five talents came and brought other five talents, saying, Lord, thou deliveredst unto me five talents: behold, I have gained beside them five talents more.
His lord said unto him, Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord.
He also that had received two talents came and said, Lord, thou deliveredst unto me two talents: behold, I have gained two other talents beside them.
His lord said unto him, Well done, good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord.
Then he which had received the one talent came and said, Lord, I knew thee that thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown, and gathering where thou hast not strawed:
And I was afraid, and went and hid thy talent in the earth: lo, there thou hast that is thine.
His lord answered and said unto him, Thou wicked and slothful servant, thou knewest that I reap where I sowed not, and gather where I have not strawed:
Thou oughtest therefore to have put my money to the exchangers, and then at my coming I should have received mine own with usury.
Take therefore the talent from him, and give it unto him which hath ten talents.
For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath.
And cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

– (King James Version)

[edit] Commentary

Joachim Jeremias (1900-1979), in his book The Parables of Jesus, concluded that the original meaning of the parable was not an ethical one about every man. Instead, he saw it as aimed at the scribes who had withheld "from their fellow men a due share in God's gift...Much had been entrusted to them: the Word of God; but like the servants in the parable, they would shortly have to render account of how they had used that which had been committed to them." Jeremias also believed that in the life of the early church the parable took on new meaning. "The journey of the merchant...is an allegory of Christ, his journey has become the ascension, his subsequent return...has become the Parousia, which ushers his own into the Messianic banquet."

[edit] The parable as social critique

William Herzog offers an alternative interpretation of the parables of Jesus. According to his interpretive scheme, Jesus employed parables in his verbal engagement with his contemporaries for the purpose of getting them to think about God's justice and their social responsibility. His stories expose the social inequities in Palestinian society that violate the teachings of the Torah and motivate the hearers to live and work for peace and justice.

Herzog's analysis of the parable of the talents focusses on the fact that the "man" of the story is not described as an exemplary person.^[1] Much rather, this wealthy man does not deny the claim of the third servant: "thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown". The parable suggests that he is an aristocrat, a rapacious absentee-landlord, whose sole interest is maximizing his financial gain. Only the third servant refuses to participate in the game of increasing his lord's financial wealth at the costs of the poor.

When he upbraids the third servant, the aristocrat's remark shows that he himself is in violation of the Old Testament laws that Jesus seeks to defend: the third servant has wilfully refused to invest the money, which would have resulted in the aristocrat regaining his capital "with interest" (Matt. 25:27). This kind of financial transaction is forbidden in the Torah; see the biblical teaching on usury.

The servant's frank remark shows him to be a "whistle-blower". He calls the aristocrat harsh and merciless (which are not God-like qualities). He exposes the sham of what has occurred: the other servants have allowed themselves to be used for exploitative purposes, for which they will also be rewarded by the wicked aristocrat.

According to Herzog's reading, the point of the parable is to show how much it can cost for an underling to expose the truth about injustice in society. Jesus' hearers, for the most part poor villagers, would have asked themselves the difficult question about how they would behave toward an aristocrat's former helper who had become a whistle-blower and had been thrown out of rich man's household ("wailing and gnashing of teeth"). They would also learn from the parable the necessity of not isolating themselves, so as not to play into the hands of the ruling elite.

[edit] The term 'talent'

The parable is apparently the origin of the use of the word 'talent' to use a skill or ability, from the common interpretation of the story to teach that we are under a moral obligation to use our abilities rather than bury them; compare the phrase in Milton's sonnet on his blindness,

And that one talent which is death to hide

Lodged with me useless...