Visitor Comments
Possible interpretation:
The vineyard is the source of truth [replace 'vineyard' with a ganja tree if Rastafarian]. Humans may lease the vineyard if they pay their spiritual due. Prophets, i.e. servants, come, i.e. John the Baptist, to tend the vineyard and collect what is due. Prophets are rejected, scorned and killed. Finally Jesus, the Master's own son, is sent to the vineyard to harvest the spirit and is himself killed.
Jah Rastafari
- Ras Ben
A srudent of an esoteric teacher must be able to defend himself. The popular phrase is send a boy to do a man's work and they will steal his bicycle.
- Thief37
The good man, with whom we are to identify, misjudges human nature by hiring out his property under terms that lose him his fruit, his son and apparently his property.
- Syrus
Who are the good guys and who are the bad guys in this saying? The canonical versions are very explicit--the peasants are the bad guys. But as Kloppenburg points out, in Thomas it is ambiguous. It sounds to me like the peasants are the good guys. I get the picture of a country which badly needs land reform. The peasants killing the son (who would inherit the land) is symbolic of them taking what is theirs. Would Jesus have been killed if he just went around saying "love your enemies"? Without a doubt he was percieved as a threat to the existing political and economic powers.
- Randy Helzerman
Our lease in the vineyard is a temporary gift. What is our rent? We are obliged to return some or most of the fruit to the leasor. Instead, we want to keep it all for ourselves. Having killed the son of the owner, how can we continue to receive His gifts? I think we are being asked to return the gifts we have been given, that our days may be long on the land. And also a warning: the beneficiaries of the gift soon forget to see it as such, and do not appreciate the reminder. Don't expect your pleas for charity and love to win you enthusiastic followers, once they have been conditioned to believe they need more and more to survive.
- Zooie
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Scholarly Quotes
Robert M. Grant and David Noel Freedman write: "This parable, like the preceding two, is derived from the synoptic gospels (Matthew 21:33-41; Mark 12:1-9; Luke 20:9-16), with a few additions, as well as the significant deletion of an allusion to Isaiah 5:1-2 - 'planted a vineyard, set a wall about it, dug a ditch, built a tower.' This deletion seems to indicate the lateness of Thomas's version, for Luke (who was certainly following Mark at this point) has already left out some of the phrases derived from Isaiah. Thomas continues the process." (The Secret Sayings of Jesus, p. 172)
R. McL. Wilson writes: "As Dodd and Jeremias have observed, this parable has in its Synoptic form undergone some expansion, and has been converted into an allegory in which the servants represent the prophets. The striking thing about the version in the Gospel of Thomas only appears when we compare it with Dodd's reconstruction of the original story, in which we should have 'a climactic series of three' - two slaves and then the son. This is, in fact, precisely what we find in Thomas. For Grant and Freedman, once again, this parable is derived from the Synoptic Gospels, with the 'significant' deletion of the quotation from Isaiah, which in their view indicates the lateness of this version; Thomas is merely continuing a process already begun by Luke. It would, however, be at least equally possible to argue that Thomas presents a more primitive version, and that the Old Testament allusion is a Marcan or pre-Marcan addition. Thomas may have a tendency to avoid reference to the Old Testament, or to excise Old Testament quotations, but he does preserve some, one indeed in the next saying. If Thomas is dependent on our Gospels, logion 66 is of course easily explained since it followes immediately upon the parable of the Wicked Husbandmen; but it is quite possible that we have here a genuine case of material growing together in the tradition. As Jeremias observes, the quotation introduces one of the primitive Church's favourite proof-texts; if he is right in holding that the insertion of this text is pre-Marcan, this section in Thomas might be extremely old, but it has none the less been subjected to some redaction." (Studies in the Gospel of Thomas, pp. 101-102)
John S. Kloppenborg, Marvin W. Meyer, Stephen J. Patterson, and Michael G. Steinhauser state: "When one compares this version of the Parable of the Tenants to those which occur in Mark, Matthew, and Luke, one notices immediately its distinguishing characteristic: this version is a true parabolic story, not an allegory. Form critics have long held that allegorization of the parables was a relatively late development in the history of their interpretation. In fact, even without access to the Coptic Gospel of Thomas, the great parables scholar C. H. Dodd had offered a conjectural reconstruction of the Parable of the Tenants as it would have been read before the synoptic tradition had allegorized it. His reconstruction matched Saying 65 almost to the word." (Q-Thomas Reader, p. 102)
Gerd Theissen writes: "Even before the discovery of the Gospel of Thomas, Jeremias had demonstrated that the allegorization of the parable, beginning before Mark and increasing in the Synoptics, is a sign of its secondary interpretation in terms of salvation history and christology (Parables of Jesus, 1954, 55ff.). The discovery of the Gospel of Thomas confirmed this interpretation (cf. the revised version, 66-89, and Patterson, Gospel, 48-51). A Lindemann, 'Zur Gleichnisinterpretation im Thomas-Evangelium', ZNW 71, 1980, differs; he wants to explain Gospel of Thomas 65 as a de-allegorized form of the Synoptic original used for the Gnostic interpretation." (The Historical Jesus: A Comprehensive Guide, p. 39)
Joachim Jeremias writes: "With regard to the introduction to the parable it is to be observed that the description in Mark 12.1 and Matt. 21.33 of the careful construction of the vineyard is in cloes agreement with the Song of the Vineyard in Isa. 5.1-7. The hedge, the wine-press, and the tower are derived from Isa. 5.1 f. It is at once apparent from these allusions to scripture in the first sentences that the reference is not to an earthly owner of a vineyard and to his vineyard, but to God and Israel, and that we are therefore confronted with an allegory. This allusion to Isa. 5 is, however, omitted by Luke (20.9). More significant is the fact that it is absent from the Gospel of Thomas, where the beginning of the parable runs: 'A good man had a vineyard. He gave it to husbandmen so that they would work it and that he would receive its fruit from them.' Most significant is the fact that the LXX has been used. The connection with Isa. 5 must therefore be due to secondary editorial activity." (The Parables of Jesus, pp. 70-71)
Joachim Jeremias writes: "This description [of the beating of the servants] does not transgress the limits of a straightforward story; there is no indication of a deeper allegorical meaning. It is specially noticeable that in the Gospel of Thomas only one servant at a time is sent. This feature also reappears in Mark - at least at first (12.2-5a) - although there the number of sendings is increased to three [and the third is killed]." (The Parables of Jesus, p. 71)
Joachim Jeremias notes that christological interpretations are absent from the Gospel of Thomas. Jeremias writes: "It is interesting to observe that the Gospel of Thomas merely furnishes a starting-point to the process of interpretation described above to the extent that it allows the saying about the Cornerstone to be attached as an independent logion (66) to the completed parable (65)." (The Parables of Jesus, p. 74)
Joachim Jeremias writes: "With regard to the final question which occurs in all three synoptists (Mark 12.9 par.), but is missing from the Gospel of Thomas, it refers back (see pp. 70 f.) to Isa. 5.5, again not to its Hebrew text (which is not in the form of a question), but following the LXX. If the final question is secondary (the Gospel of Thomas has instead the call to hear, see p. 72), then so is the answer to the question. Neither of them is part of the original parable." (The Parables of Jesus, p. 74)
Helmut Koester writes: "In Mark 12 as well as in Gos. Thom. 65, the parable of the Wicked Husbandmen is connected with the saying about the rejection of the cornerstone (Mark 12:10-11 = Gos. Thom. 66). This is not a Markan addition to the parable; Mark's own redactional connection, leading back into the prevoius context that was interrupted by the insertion of the parable, appears in 12:12-13 with an explicit reference to the parable ('they understood that he said this parable about them'). Thus the saying about the rejected cornerstone was already connected with the parable in Mark's source. However, Thomas does not reflect Mark's editorial connection of parable and saying but cites the saying as an independent unit. Mark's source may have contained more than one parable. The introduction (Mark 12:1) says: 'And he began to speak to them in parables' but only one parable follows. Whether or not this parable of Mark 12 derives from the same collection as the parables of Mark 4, it is evident that the sources of Mark and the Gospel of Thomas were closely related." (Ancient Christian Gospels, pp. 101-102)
Funk and Hoover write: "The following allegorical elements are not found in the simpler version of Thomas: (1) The allusions to the song in Isa 5:1-7 (about someone who planted a vineyard, put a hedge around it, dug a winepress, and built a tower). (2) The repeated sending of slaves and groups of slaves in the synoptic version is omitted; Thomas employs a simple, triadic structure that is a typical feature of oral storytelling. (3) No one is killed prior to the son; in Matthew some are killed in each group. (4) No mention is made of throwing the son outside the vineyard (a reference, presumably, to Jesus' death outside the walls of Jerusalem). (5) There is no concluding question addressed to the audience and therefore no punishment of the tenants. To be sure, some of these traits are missing from Mark and Luke as well. It is Matthew who carried the allegorization to its ultimate degree. Nevertheless, it is striking that Thomas has virtually no allegorical features." (The Five Gospels, p. 511)
Gerd Ludemann writes: "The owner ('man') from 64.1 provides the link to this parable (v. 1). By comparison with Mark 12.1-9 parr. it does not contain any element which must be interpreted allegorically. However, one would hesitate to conclude from this that 65.1-7 is the basis of the Markan version. First, Logion 66, the content of which appears in Mark 12.10-11 directly attached to Mark 12.1-9, suggests dependence on the Synoptics. Secondly, v. 4, which is peculiar to Thomas, may contain a Gnostic interpretation. If we follow the text which has been handed down, the servant did not know the labourers and went to the wrong people. By contrast, v. 7 says that the labourers knew the son and killed him immediately. If the reading handed down is correct, the author is here playing on the word 'know'." (Jesus After 2000 Years, p. 623)
Burton Mack writes: "The Tenants. Most scholars agree that the story in Mark bears literary allusions to the Septuagint of Isa 5:1-5. Since that, plus the citation of Ps 118:22-23 in Mark 12:10-11, betray the signs of literary activity, several scholars have made the attempt to reconstruct an earlier, less allegorical form of the story. Crossan especially, In Parables, 86-96, argues strongly on the basis of the variant in GThom 93:1-18 that the story was originally not allegorical, either with respect to Israel's destiny, or with respect to Jesus' destiny, and that it was authentic, 'a deliberately shocking story of successful murder' (p. 96). Crossan does not go on to explain the 'parabolic effect' this might have created, except to say it may have been a commentary upon the times. To follow Crossan in this attempt to retrieve the parable for Jesus, one has to imagine a situation in which listeners would not have been tempted to pick up on allusive suggetions to other stories and histories at all. The tightly constructed story, however, with its motifs of 'sending,' 'servants,' in series, to 'tenants' of a 'vineyard' for its 'produce,' to say nothing of the negative fates of the servants, that the tenants knew who the servants were, that the last one sent is different (the son), and that he was killed, is literally packed with invitations to think of Israel's epic history from a Christian point of view. Images and narrative schemes that come immediately to mind include the vineyard as a traditional metaphor for Israel (even if the literary allusion to Isaiah in Mark 12:1 is deleted), the sending of the prophets, the rejection and killing of the prophets, and perhaps wisdom's envoys (Wis 7:27). The parable betrays a reflection on Israel and the negative fate of the prophets that is greatly advanced over Q. Because the special status and destiny of the last emissary is both emphatic and climactic, the story is surely a product, not of the historical Jesus, but of a much later Christian claim. The story fits best just in Mark's milieu where Jesus traditions, including Q, were combined with meditations upon Jesus' death as a crucial event. Mark's additions merely explicate the allegorical significance contained within the story itself." (A Myth of Innocence, pp. 168-169, n. 24)
John S. Kloppenborg, Marvin W. Meyer, Stephen J. Patterson, and Michael G. Steinhauser state: "But what does this ancient Christian parable mean? Its interpretation is complicated by a troublesome lacuna, or hole in the papyrus, in its very first line. The missing word is an adjective which would have modified the word 'person' in some way. The extant letters around the edges of the hole permit a reconstruction of the word 'good,' so that one could speak here of a 'good person' who rented the farm to 'evil' tenants, just as one finds in the synoptic versions of the story. But the extant letters also permit the reconstruction of the word for 'creditor' or 'usurer,' which would make this person one of the absentee landlords so much hated among the land-poor peasants of Galilee. One wonders, in the rural areas of Palestine and Syria among the dispossessed and poor - the tenant class - how this parable would have been heard. Were these evil tenants, or were they brave tenants?" (Q-Thomas Reader, p. 102)
John S. Kloppenborg, Marvin W. Meyer, Stephen J. Patterson, and Michael G. Steinhauser state: "we have seen how easily wisdom speculation of the sort found in Thomas could modulate into a more gnostic understanding of the sayings tradition. This may in fact have been the reason, according to James. M. Robinson, that no sayings collections seem to have survived in orthodox Christian circles, and that Q only survived as it was imbedded in the narratives of Matthew and Luke. This gnosticizing tendency, built into the wisdom sayings tradition, may well have cast a pall of suspicion over all sayings collections within orthodox circles. Embedding the sayings of Jesus into a narrative context would have 'protected' them from this sort of free-wheeling gnostic interpretation." (Q-Thomas Reader, p. 104)
John S. Kloppenborg, Marvin W. Meyer, Stephen J. Patterson, and Michael G. Steinhauser state: "In this instance one might well suppose that Thomas' anti-apocalyptic stance is late, the result of the failure of early Christianity's apocalyptic expectations to materialize. But this may not necessarily be the case. John Kloppenborg's recent study of Q has argued that this synoptic sayings collection may have undergone considerable editing at some point in its history. The first draft of Q would not have contained the apocalyptic and angre tones of judgment to be found in the final copy used by Matthew and Luke. This first edition, rather, was a collection of wisdom speeches, a 'wisdom gospel' not unlike the Gospel of Thomas. The addition of apocalyptic material to Q would have occurred only after the initial Q community had begun to realize how small it really was, and how few had taken their proclamation of Jesus' words seriously." (Q-Thomas Reader, pp. 104-105)
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