lesson, the Talmud divides it into two separate Parables, of which the one is intended to
show the necessity of being prepared for the next world - to stand in readiness for the
King's feast;51 while the other52 is meant to teach that we ought to be able to present our
soul to God at the last in the same state of purity in which we had (according to
Rabbinic notions) originally received it.53 Even this shows the infinite difference between
the Lord's and the Rabbinic use of the Parable.54 In the Jewish Parable a King is
represented as inviting to a feast,55 without, however, fixing the exact time for it. The
wise adorn themselves in time, and are seated at the door of the palace, so as to be in
readiness, since, as they argue, no elaborate preparation for a feast can be needed in a
palace; while the foolish go away to their work, arguing there must be time enough,
since there can be no feast without preparation. (The Midrash has it, that, when inviting
the guests, the King had told them to wash, anoint, and array themselves in their festive
garments; and that the foolish, arguing that, from the preparation of the food and the
arranging of t he seats, they would learn when the feast was to begin, had gone, the
mason to his cask of lime, the potter to his clay, the smith to his furnace, the fuller to his
bleaching -ground.) But suddenly comes the King's summons to the feast, when the wise
appear festively adorned, and the King rejoices over them, and they are made to sit
down, eat and drink; while he is wroth with the foolish, who appear squalid, and are
ordered to stand by and look on in anguish, hunger and thirst.
48. Shabb. 153 a, and 152 b.
47. St. Matt. xxii. 1-14.
49. Midr. on Eccles. ix. 8; Midr. on Prov. xvi. 11.
51. Shabb. 153 a.
50. St. Matt. xxii. 1-9 and 10 -14.
52. This Parable is only in the Talmud in this connection, not in the Midrashim.
53. Shabb. 152 b.
54. The reader will find both these Parables translated in 'Sketches of Jewish Social Life,'
p. 179.
55. In the Talmud he invites his servants; in the Midrash, others.
The other Jewish Parable 56 is of a king who committed to his servants the royal robes.
The wise among them carefully laid them by while the foolish put them on when they did
their work. After a time the king asked back the robes, when the wise could restore
them clean, while the foolish had them soiled. Then the king rejoiced over the wise, and,
while the robes were laid up in the treasury, they were bidden go home in peace. 'But to
the foolish he commanded that the robes should be handed over to the fuller, and that
they themselves should be cast into prison.' We readily see that the meaning of this
Parable was, that a man might preserve His soul perfectly pure, and so enter into
peace, while the careless, who had lost their original purity (no original sin here), would ,
in the next world, by suffering, both expiate their guilt and purify their souls.
56. Shabb.. 152 b.