25. Jos . Antiq. xviii. 6. 3.
We can thus understand the allusion to 'the bankers,' with whom the wicked and
unfaithful servant might have lodged his lord's mo ney, if there had been truth in his
excuse. To unmask its hollowness is the chief object of this part of the Parable.
Accordingly, it must not be too closely pressed; but it would be in the spirit of the
Parable to apply the expression to the indirect employment of money in the service of
Christ, as by charitable contributions, &c. But the great lesson intended is, that every
good and faithful servant of Christ must, whatever his circumstances, personally and
directly use such talent as he may have to make gain for Christ. Tried by this test, how
few seem to have understood their relation to Christ, and how cold has the love of the
Church grown in the long absence of her lord!
But as regards the 'unprofitable' servant in the Parable, the well -known punishm ent of
him that had come to the Marriage-Feast without the wedding -garment shall await him,
while the talent, which he had failed to employ for his master, shall be entrusted to him
who had shown himself most capable of working. We need not seek an elaborate
interpretation for this. It points to the principle, equally true in every administration of
God, that 'unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall be placed in
abundance;26 but as to him that hath not,27 also what he hath shall be away from him.'
Not a cynical rule this, such as the world, in its selfishness or worship of success,
caricatures it; nor yet the worship of superior force; but this, that faithful use for God of
every capacity will ever open fresh opportunities, in proportion as the old ones have
been used, while spiritual unprofitableness must end in utter loss even of that which,
however humble, might have been used, at one time or another, for God and for good.
26. περισσευθησεται.
27. So the better reading, του δε µη εχοντος.
3. To these Parables, that of the King who on his return makes reckoning with His
servants and His enemies may be regarded as supplemental. It is recorded only by St.
Luke, and placed by him in somewhat loose connection with the conversion of
Zacchĉus .28 The most superficial perusal will show such unmistakable similarity with
the Parable of 'The Talents,' that their identity will naturally suggest itself to the reader.
On the other hand, there are remarkable divergences in detail, some of which seem to
imply a different standpoint from which the same truth is viewed. We have also now the
additional feature of the message of hatred on the part of the citizens, and their fate in
consequence of it. It may have been that Christ spoke the two Parables on the two
different occasions mentioned respectively by St. Luke and St. Matthew - the one on the
journey to Jerusalem, the other on the Mount of Olives. And yet it seems difficult to
believe that He would, with a few days of telling the Parable recorded by St. Luke, have
repeated it in almost the same words to the disciples, who must have heard it in Jericho.
This objection would not be so serious, if the Parable addressed, in the first instance, to
the disciples (that of the Talents) had been afterwards repeated (in the record of St.
Luke) in a wider circle, and not, as according to the Synoptists, the opposite. If,
however, we are to regard the two Parables of the Talents and of the Pieces of Money
as substantially the same, we would be disposed to consider the recension by St.
Matthew as the original, being the more homogeneous and compact, while that of St.