Loading...Of all the teachings of Jesus in the New Testament, the Parable of the Talents (Matthew 25:14-30; the same parable, with important differences, is the Parable of the Pounds in Luke 19:11-27), in my view, is the one most amenable to a capitalist interpretation – easily and often seen as an exhortation to invest one’s money to make money, at the highest possible rate.
Even so, this, in my calculation (!), would be a serious misreading of the parable. It is indeed a parable that discusses money and investment at interest. But it is not about that at all. I’ll explain.
But first, by way of summary (recall: a talent not a personal ability but a large unit of money):
A man goes on a long journey and entrusts money to three of his slaves: five talents to one, two to another, one to the third. The first two invest the money at interest and double what they received. When the man returns, he showers them with praise for their stewardship. The third slave, however, fearful of losing the one talent entrusted to him, hides it away. On the master’s return he gives it back to him, admitting he was afraid to invest it. The master curses him for doing nothing with it, and has him severely punished.
It sure sounds like an encouragement to invest at high interest! The “master” is Jesus (the “Lord”); the “slaves” are the ones who serve him (his followers); and they are being told to increase the wealth Jesus has given them. Right?
Well, kinda.
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Regarding “Jesus is referring to himself as the “master” who is leaving for a time and then coming back to bring judgment upon the earth”. If this parable (or something similar) was really told by the historical Jesus, would in his view the “master” have been not himself but the “Son of Man”, someone other than himself?
Regarding “The point is that Jesus is leaving …. and then he will return as the Son of Man in judgment”, does that reflect the belief of the early Christians and not the belief of the historical Jesus? If the historical Jesus believed that about himself, then wouldn’t that make him a megalomaniac?
Yes, that is what I was trying to argue. The story is meant to show that Jesus knows he is leaving soon (death/resurrection/exaltation) but will be delayed coming back. That is Matthew’s view of Jesus: for Matthew, it’s what Jesus thought. But since it’s almost certainly not what Jesus thought, the story is representing Matthew’s view. And in Matthew’s view, Jesus himself is the Son of Man.
“Matthew’s view, Jesus himself is the Son of Man”
I still have no clear idea what SON OF MAN is. but the Catholics 40 years ago taught Matthew as King & Luke as Son of MaN
how do you portray the gospels depiction & where can I read more of your gospel coverage. https://ehrmanblog.org/at-last-jesus-and-the-son-of-man/
The best place to start with my views of the Gospels is my book The New Testament: A Historical Introduction
Thank you Dr Ehrman. That makes perfect sense. Just one question. I am curious to know why ‘Jesus’ chose the servant with only one talent to be the person who fails to do anything with it, rather than the other two? Did he entrust that guy with only the one talent because he already suspected that he wouldn’t do anything with it?
Great question. Maybe it’s referring to the “insignificant” people among his followers instead of the big shots: everyone has been entrusted with *something* and everyone should make the most of it, even if it’s not much.
Thank you so much for your post!
The last part of your comment made me think, “Why had I never thought of that before?”
Until now, I had rather simply assumed that the Gospels were written mainly as tools for Gentile mission. But your point helped me realize that the period in which the Gospels—and perhaps also 2 Thessalonians—were written was also a time when the expected imminent return of Christ had not occurred even after several decades.
In that sense, these writings may also have addressed a growing need within the early Christian communities to deal with the cognitive dissonance created by that delay.
That makes a great deal of sense to me!
I find myself agreeing with most of the contextual reading here. In Matthew 23-25 the talents are not portfolio advice, but a parable about faithfulness during the master’s absence. And your sheep-and-goats analogy is helpful: the “talents” are no more about silver than the goats are about livestock.
My question is only about the final step. You move from the parable presupposing a master who is gone longer than expected to saying it is “almost certainly” not from Jesus himself. But a master who goes on a journey is, by the nature of the story, absent for some time, with his return not under the servants’ control. And Matthew 24:36 already leaves the timing unknown: “no one knows the day or hour.”
So an open interval seems compatible with Jesus’ own teaching, not only with later Christians adjusting to delay. Even if we grant later shaping, that would show something about the form of transmission, not necessarily that no saying of Jesus lies underneath.
Is the inference therefore “almost certain,” or only possible?
Respectfully,
Tjalling
I put it that way because I don’t think Jesus expected to be exalted to heaven and then return to earth; the parable assumes that was his view.
Thank you, that clarifies it, and I think it locates the disagreement precisely. The dating then rests not on the delay (a master who journeys is generically long-absent, as we said) but on the prior claim that Jesus did not expect to be exalted and to return. That is the load-bearing premise.
Which means the “almost certain” is as certain as that reconstruction of Jesus’ self-understanding, no more and no less. And there the ground is genuinely contested. A number of serious historical-Jesus scholars hold, for quite different reasons, that Jesus did anticipate some form of vindication or return. One needn’t settle that here to see the point: the parable doesn’t date itself, it is dated by the framework one brings to “the master.”
So I’d put it this way. The contextual case against a capitalist reading is compelling on its own. The case against a dominical core is compelling given your christology. Those seem to me different orders of certainty, and worth marking as such.
Respectfully, Tjalling
I agree that reading the Bible in the context of the times and environment in which it was written is the wisest way to
interpret it. Yet I also like the idea of pulling helpful meanings from it that may not be there. That gives it layers of meaning. And maybe “layers of meaning” were originally there, in some cases.
Hey Bart! Are you familiar how liberation theologians tend to interpret this parable? It gets turned on its head, and the “master” is the villain and the “lazy” servant is the hero!
That has always been my interpretation, and I think it aligns with Jesus’ subversive parables aimed at Imperial Rome. The “lazy” slave (some people want to call him a “servant”; he’s not) refuses to do his enslaver’s bidding. Why on earth would he want to enhance the wealth of the man who owns him? Yes, he will be punished for it, but he is standing up to his enslaver in the only way he can. It is not unlike enslaved people in the antebellum United States who would deliberately undermine the work being done on the plantation.
How does all this “delayed coming” square with Jesus’ apparent teaching that he would be head (King) of the “New Kingdom” and his disciples would each have their own area of authority? Isn’t this claim what got him in final trouble with the authorities (as shared to them by Judas, it is said)? Or is this a gospel writer’s notion and not necessarily what Jesus actually thought/taught?
Yes, the “delay” presupposes that Jesus hasn’t returned as quickly as expected. Since Jesus never planned to (leave and) return at all, this is a later teaching of his followers after his death.