Matthew 13:10-23

13:10 Then ¹  the disciples came to him and said, “Why do you speak to them in parables?” 13:11 He replied, ²  “You have been given ³  the opportunity to know ⁴  the secrets ⁵  of the kingdom of heaven, but they have not. 13:12 For whoever has will be given more, and will have an abundance. But whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him. ⁶  13:13 For this reason I speak to them in parables: Although they see they do not see, and although they hear they do not hear nor do they understand. 13:14 And concerning them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled that says:

‘You will listen carefully ⁷  yet will never understand,

you will look closely ⁸  yet will never comprehend.

13:15 For the heart of this people has become dull;

they are hard of hearing,

and they have shut their eyes,

so that they would not see with their eyes

and hear with their ears

and understand with their hearts

and turn, and I would heal them.’ ⁹ 

13:16 “But your eyes are blessed ¹⁰  because they see, and your ears because they hear. 13:17 For I tell you the truth, ¹¹  many prophets and righteous people longed to see ¹²  what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.

13:18 “So listen to the parable of the sower: 13:19 When anyone hears the word about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one ¹³  comes and snatches what was sown in his heart; ¹⁴  this is the seed sown along the path. 13:20 The ¹⁵  seed sown on rocky ground ¹⁶  is the person who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy. 13:21 But he has no root in himself and does not endure; ¹⁷  when ¹⁸  trouble or persecution comes because of the word, immediately he falls away. 13:22 The ¹⁹  seed sown among thorns is the person who hears the word, but worldly cares and the seductiveness of wealth ²⁰  choke the word, ²¹  so it produces nothing. 13:23 But as for the seed sown on good soil, this is the person who hears the word and understands. He bears fruit, yielding a hundred, sixty, or thirty times what was sown.” ²² 

[13:10]  ¹ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence of events within the narrative.

[13:11]  ² tn Grk “And answering, he said to them.” This construction is somewhat redundant in English and has been simplified in the translation. Here δέ (de) has not been translated.

[13:11]  ³ tn This is an example of a “divine passive,” with God understood to be the source of the revelation (see ExSyn 437-38).

[13:11]  ⁴ tn Grk “to you it has been given to know.” The dative pronoun occurs first, in emphatic position in the Greek text, although this position is awkward in contemporary English.

[13:11]  ⁵ tn Grk “the mysteries.”

[13:12]  ³ sn What he has will be taken from him. The meaning is that the one who accepts Jesus’ teaching concerning his person and the kingdom will receive a share in the kingdom now and even more in the future, but for the one who rejects Jesus’ words, the opportunity that that person presently possesses with respect to the kingdom will someday be taken away forever.

[13:14]  ⁴ tn Grk “with hearing,” a cognate dative that intensifies the action of the main verb “you will listen” (ExSyn 168-69).

[13:14]  ⁵ tn Grk “look by looking.” The participle is redundant, functioning to intensify the force of the main verb.

[13:15]  ⁵ sn A quotation from Isa 6:9-10. Thus parables both conceal or reveal depending on whether one is open to hearing what they teach.

[13:16]  ⁶ sn This beatitude highlights the great honor bestowed on the disciples to share in this salvation.

[13:17]  ⁷ tn Grk “truly (ἀμήν, amhn) I say to you.”

[13:17]  ⁸ sn This is what past prophets and righteous people had wanted very much to see, yet the fulfillment had come to the disciples. This remark is like 1 Pet 1:10-12 or Heb 1:1-2.

[13:19]  ⁸ sn Interestingly, the synoptic parallels each use a different word for Satan here: Mark 4:15 has “Satan,” while Luke 8:12 has “the devil.” This illustrates the fluidity of the gospel tradition in often using synonyms at the same point of the parallel tradition.

[13:19]  ⁹ sn The word of Jesus has the potential to save if it germinates in a person’s heart, something the devil is very much against.

[13:20]  ⁹ tn Here δέ (de) has not been translated.

[13:20]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “The one sown on rocky ground, this is the one.” The next two statements like this one have this same syntactical structure.

[13:21]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “is temporary.”

[13:21]  ¹¹ tn Here δέ (de) has not been translated.

[13:22]  ¹¹ tn Here δέ (de) has not been translated.

[13:22]  ¹² tn Grk “the deceitfulness of riches.” Cf. BDAG 99 s.v. ἀπάτη 1, “the seduction which comes from wealth.”

[13:22]  ¹³ sn That is, their concern for spiritual things is crowded out by material things.

[13:23]  ¹² tn The Greek is difficult to translate because it switches from a generic “he” to three people within this generic class (thus, something like: “Who indeed bears fruit and yields, in one instance a hundred times, in another, sixty times, in another, thirty times”).