was entrusted. It needed not therefore that a sheepfold should have bee n in view,4 to
explain the form of Christ's address.5 It only required to recall the Old Testament
language about the shepherding of God, and that of evil shepherds, to make the
application to what had so lately happened. They were, surely, not shepherds, who had
cast out the healed blind man, or who so judged of the Christ, and would cast out all His
disciples. They had entered into God's Sheepfold, but not by the door by which the
owner, God, had brought His flock into the fold. To it the entrance had bee n His free
love, His gracious provision, His thoughts of pardoning, His purpose of saving mercy.
That was God's Old Testament-door into His Sheepfold. Not by that door, as had so
lately fully appeared, had Israel's rulers come in. They had climbed up to their place in
the fold some other way - with the same right, or by the same wrong, as a thief or a
robber. They had wrongfully taken what did not belong to them - cunningly and
undetected, like a thief; they had allotted it to themselves, and usurped it by violence,
like a robber. What more accurate description could be given of the means by which the
Pharisees and Sadducees had attained the rule over God's flock, and claimed it for
themselves? And what was true of them holds equally so of all, who, like the m, enter by
'some other way.'
1. The word is not parable, but παροιµια proverb or allegory. On the essential
characteristics of the Parables, see Book III. ch. xxiii.
2. St. John x. 6.
3. The figure of a shepherd is familiar in Rabbinic as in Biblical literature. Comp. Bemidb.
R. 23; Yalkut i. p. 68 a.
4. This is the view advocated by Archdeacon Watkins , ad loc.
5. St. John x. 1-5.
How different He, Who comes in and leads us through God's door of covenant-mercy
and Gospel-promise - the door by which God had brought, and ever brings, His flock
into His fold! This was the true Shepherd. The allegory must, of course, not be too
closely pressed; but, as we remember how in the East the flocks are at night driven into
a large fold, and charge of them is given to an under shepherd, we can understand how,
when the shepherd comes in the morning, 'the doorkeeper'6 or 'guardian' opens to him.
In interpreting the allegory, stress must be laid not so much on any single phrase, be it
the 'porter,' the 'door,' or the 'opening,' as on their combination. If the shepherd comes
to the door, the porter hastens to open it to him from within, that he may obtain access
to the flock; and whe n a true spiritual Shepherd comes to the true spiritual door, it is
opened to him by the guardian from within, that is, he finds ready and immediate
access. Equally pictorial is the progress of the allegory. Having thus gained access to
His flock, it has not been to steal or rob, but the Shepherd knows and calls them, each
by his name, and leads them out. We mark that in the expression: 'when He has put
forth all His own' 7 - the word is a strong one. For they have to go each singly, and
perhaps they are not willing to go out each by himself, or even to leave that fold, and so
he 'puts' or thrusts them forth, and He does so to 'all His own.' Then the Eastern
shepherd places himself at the head of his flock, and goes before them, guiding them,
making sure of their following simply by his voice, which they know. So would His flock