- Dec 1, 2013
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The parable of the sower was not about farming, but it used true farming principles to illustrate Jesus' point. In every case, in every parable, story, or example, Jesus always used real things to illustrate principles. Why would He depart, in this one instance only? To do so would sow confusion.I disagree. Thing is, I'm arguing that parable is not at all about the afterlife. Just as the parable of the sower is not about farming, and the parable about the lost coin is not about money. Like both of those, it is a parable about something else. And that something else is covered at the end.
Two important points:
1. The rich man had five brothers. Not four. Not three. Not eight.
2. The request to warn the brothers and Jesus response.
I'm not making anything up out of whole cloth. I'm using scripture as precisely as I can, within the context of the scripture immediately surrounding it as well as the books of the bible in general.
What, specifically, have I come up short on?
There are no giant beanstalks in His farming stories, no talking animals in any story, no women who grow trees for hair. There are only normal plants, normal birds, people doing the many things they normally do. Everything is very concrete and down to earth.
Why do you assume He would tell something fantastical in this one story, to illustrate something else? God in His wisdom is perfectly capable of speaking to us using things we well understand. That was the whole point of parables or stories of illustration.
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