Matthew XXII
1. And Jesus answered and spake unto them again by parables, and said,
2. The kingdom of heaven is like unto a certain king, which made a marriage for his son,
3. And he sent forth his servants to call them that were bidden to the wedding: and they would not come.
4. Again, he sent forth other servants, saying, Tell them which are bidden, Behold, I have prepared my dinner: my oxen and my fatlings are killed, and all things are ready: come unto the marriage.
5. But they made light of it, and went their ways, one to his farm, another to his merchandise:
6. And the remnant took his servants, and entreated them spitefully, and slew them.
7. But when the king heard thereof, he was wroth: and he sent forth his armies, and destroyed those murderers, and burned up their city.
8. Then saith he to his servants, The wedding is ready, but they which were bidden were not worthy.
9. Go ye therefore into the highways, and as many as ye shall find, bid to the marriage.
10. So those servants went out into the highways, and gathered together all as many as they found, both bad and good: and the wedding was furnished with guests.
If there is a reverent sense in which the terms may be employed, the text would warrant a discourse upon the revenge of Divine disappointment. The term revenge would be used not as implying a bad passion, but a righteous principle of retribution. The parable sets forth: — I. The King of heaven inviting men to an occasion of great joy; He made a marriage for His Son, and provided a feast of oxen and fatlings. The figure is fully realised in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. God always calls men to joy. Whenever men are travelling upon a path which is not fraught with gladness, they are travelling upon a path which God did not appoint for their feet. Of Wisdom it is said, “Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace:” to such ways and paths alone does the King of heaven call. Not only is the call to an occasion of great joy, but the joy itself is associated with the choicest gifts of the King. All that the King could do was done. A most important reflection! When God exhausts Himself, who can add to the bounty? The Gospel shows the fullest reach of Divine love. God Himself has nothing more to offer to hungering men. What a spectacle, then, does this parabolic table present! The parable sets forth: — II. The possibility of treating the highest gifts with indifference and contempt; “They made light of it, and went their ways, one to his farm, another to his merchandise.” The argument on this point may be made cumulative: for example, there are laws of courtesy among men; how is the man regarded who wantonly tramples upon the first principles of civilised society? Let each man put himself in the position of the King in this parable. Ascending from the common walks of life, try the case as one between the subject and the sovereign; not only is courtesy (which is due to the humblest man) set at nought, but loyalty is ignored, and high office treated with contempt. How may a king be supposed to feel under such circumstances? Carry the case forward until God Himself is reached, and then say how He must feel when His love, His kingship, His fatherhood, His majesty, are treated as if they were empty names? Multiply your human suffering by infinitude, and then say what must be God’s feeling. The parable sets forth: — III. The operation of the retributive functions of Divine providence; the king was wroth, and sent forth his armies, and destroyed those murderers, and burned up their city. He who breaks the law will be broken by the law. Life is continually showing that it carries a principle of self-vindication. It is always “hard to kick against the pricks.” Retribution is not confined to spheres which are technically known as religious. No man can injure his fellow-creature without suffering loss in his own soul; no man can help his fellow-creature without receiving strength into his own spirit. The great law of recompense is inexorable in its operation, being terrible or benignant according to the moral course of man. We are in danger of looking only on the penal side of retribution, and forgetting its compensative aspect. Confining our view to the former, as that is the phase more particularly presented in the text, how terrible is the prospect of the man who rejects the invitations of God! The parable sets forth: — IV. The Divine method of turning human wrath into an occasion of human blessing. “Go ye therefore into the highways, and as many as ye shall find bid to the marriage.” There is undoubtedly considerable difficulty in making all the possible views of this portion of the parable consist with the universal benevolence of God; at the same time there are two obvious considerations which should arrest a false judgment: — i. Sometimes results are hastened by violence which would have been reached by
ordinary operations. 2. Any parable, however liberal its tone, must fall infinitely short of the reality of God’s love. Only in its most expansive features can any parable give the remotest hint of infinite bounty.
Adam Clarke says: “Among the Mohammedans, refusal to come to a marriage feast, when invited, is considered a breach of the law of God. Any one that shall be invited to a dinner, and does not accept the invitation, disobeys God and His messenger: and any one who comes uninvited, you may say is a thief and returns a plunderer.”
“By the oxen understand the fathers of the Old Testament, by the fatlings understand the fathers of the New-Testament; for they did smite with the horn their enemies, and these mounted up aloft by the wings of heavenly contemplation.” — (Gregory.) “Oxen are strong, and fatlings are sweet and pleasant; hereby are set forth the oracles of God, which do both strengthen and delight those that feed upon them.” — (Origen.) “They that excuse themselves by the occupying of a farm are the common people of the Jews, the other the priests and ministers about the temple.” — (Chrysostom.)
1 1. And when the king came in to see the guests, he saw there a man which had not on a wedding garment:
12. And he saith unto him, Friend, how earnest thou in hither not having a wedding garment? And he was speechless.
13. Then said the king to the servants, Bind him hand and foot, and take him away, and cast him into outer darkness; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
14. For many are called, but few are chosen.
These verses supply three homiletic points: — 1. The principle of discrimination is ever operative in the Divine economy, — “the king came in to see the guests.” 2. Escape from this principle is utterly impossible. The King of heaven is omniscient. 3. Those who have complied with the King’s conditions have nothing to fear from the King’s scrutiny. The man might have had a wedding garment. Only those who choose are chosen. A man must accept the King’s conditions and not his own, if he would be an accepted guest at the Gospel feast.
“For the wedding garment it is vain to contend whether it be faith or a godly life, for neither is faith without a godly life, neither can a godly life proceed but from faith.” — (Calvin.) “The man without a wedding garment was one that had not amended his manners.” — (Origen.) “All the fathers have ever expounded it of an unreformed life, or, with Gregory, ol the want of love, which is in effect the same. It is not, then, to be understood of faith, for to believe, that is to come in to this wedding; but of that effect which a saving faith always worketh, that is, purity of heart and life, so that in whom this is wanting he shall be cast into outer darkness, notwithstanding his embracing of the faith of Christ.” — (Mayer.)
15. Then went the Pharisees, and took counsel how they might entangle him in his talk.
16. And they sent out unto him their disciples with the Herodians, saying, Master, we know that thou art true, and teachest the way of God in truth, neither carest thou for any man: for thou regardest not the person of men.
17. Tell us therefore, What thinkest thou? Is it lawful to give tribute unto Caesar, or not?
18. But Jesus perceived their wickedness, and said, Why tempt ye me, ye hypocrites?
19. Show me the tribute money. And they brought unto him a penny.
20. And he saith unto them, Whose is this image and superscription?
21. They say unto him, Caesar’s. Then saith he unto them, Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s; and unto God the things that are God’s.
22. When they had heard these words, they marvelled, and left him, and went their way.
From this point to the end of the chapter we have striking illustrations of the readiness and precision of Jesus Christ as an extemporaneous speaker. In the first instance we have: — 1. A prepared assault upon Jesus Christ. 2. An appeal to His supposed vanity (verse 16). 3. An answer which recognises the moral validity of political as well as religious relations.
23. The same day came to him the Sadducees, which say that there is no resurrection, and asked him,
24. Saying, Master, Moses said, If a man die, having no children, his brother shall marry his wife, and raise up seed unto his brother.
25. Now there were with us seven brethren: and the first, when he had married a wife, deceased, and, having no issue, left his wife unto his brother:
26. Likewise the second also, and the third, unto the seventh.
27. And last of all the woman died also.
28. Therefore in the resurrection whose wife shall she be of the seven? for they all had her.
29. Jesus answered and said unto them, Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God.
30. For in the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven.
31. But as touching the resurrection of the dead, have ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God, saying,
32. I am the God of Abraham, and the God of I saac, and the God of Jacob? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living.
33. And when the multitude heard this, they were astonished at his doctrine.
An instance which shows how a little puzzle may be
s 2 exaggerated into a great problem, and how one ray of light may disperse the darkness which hangs over futurity. For homiletic purposes, the following points may be dwelt upon: — i. The impossibility of educing ultimate doctrine from a limited number of facts. 2. The temptation to exaggerate extraordinary circumstances into inexplicable mysteries. 3. The danger of setting up human wisdom as the test of Divine revelation. 4. The importance of ascertaining Christ’s opinion before affirming our own conclusions. How He dispels the mystery with a word! He shows them, too, how superficial must have been their reading of the Holy Scriptures, — “Have ye not read?” He inquires, in a tone which meant that if they had read they would not have been troubled with this phantom difficulty.
34. But when the Pharisees had heard that he had put the Sadducees to silence, they were gathered together.
35. Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him, and saying,
36. Master, which is the great commandment in the law?
37. Jesus saith unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
38. This is the first and great commandment.
39. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
40. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
i. The possibility of asking a right question in a wrong spirit. 2. The impossibility of asking Christ a question which He cannot answer. 3. The exceeding breadth of the Divine commandment, — love of God and love of man.
“It had become a question long amongst the expounders of the law, but could not be decided, and therefore they consent it should be moved unto Christ.” — (Origen.) “Forasmuch as every one of God’s commandments is great, whatsoever He should answer in affirming one above the rest to be great, He might be entrapped.” — (Jerome.)” The
meaning of this question was, whether anything were more perfect than the law, because He taught a new kind of doctrine, whereby the expounders of the law held themselves to be disgraced.” — (Calvin.)
Putting the three cases together, they afford a most impressive illustration of the “fulness” of Jesus Christ. His mind overreached every difficulty, and was at home in the midst of the darkest mystery. Now He changes sides; instead of being the respondent, He becomes the inquirer, and yet in a most striking manner confounds His superficial though most boastful and obstinate interlocutors. We have seen Jesus Christ under the shock of three subtle and resolute attacks: now we see how He occupies the position of interrogator: —
41. While the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them,
42. Saying, What think ye of Christ? whose son is he? They say unto him, The son of David.
43. He saith unto them, How then doth David in spirit call him Lord, saying,
44. The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, till I make thine enemies thy footstool?
45. If David then call him Lord, how is he his son?
46. And no man was able to answer him a word, neither durst any man from that day forth ask him any more questions.
The question, it must be observed, did not relate to Himself personally, but to Christ generally; He did not say, “What do you think of me as Christ?” but, “What do you think of the man who is promised to the world under the name of Christ?” Like all readers of the mere letter, they answered by a technical quotation. Then came the difficulty which has been perplexing various schools of theology ever since; viz., How a man can be both son and lord. This is the difficulty which pursues certain readers throughout the whole history of Jesus Christ; this duality; this being servant of all, yet chief of all; this unparalleled humiliation, yet this enthronement over all empire. We are distinctly asked to accept this mystery, for apart from it there is no progress in Christian theology.
“His meaning is not to prove that He is not David’s Son, but to confute their error, who, by saying that He was David’s Son, meant that He was man only; wherefore He bringeth David in, saying, The Lord said unto my Lord, which He doth in much humility, not applying it to Himself,, to avoid contempt.” — (Chrysostom.)
GENERAL NOTE ON THE CHAPTER.
In a discourse upon the 40th verse, Dr. Sherlock (1754),. Bishop of London, says: — 1. These two principles, from which our Lord tells us all religion flows, must be consistent with one another; otherwise they could not both be principles of the same religion. 2. Nothing is or ought to be esteemed religion that is not reducible to one or other of these principles.