Matius 13:3

13:3 He ¹  told them many things in parables, ²  saying: “Listen! ³  A sower went out to sow. ⁴ 

Matius 15:4

15:4 For God said, ⁵  ‘Honor your father and mother’ ⁶  and ‘Whoever insults his father or mother must be put to death.’ ⁷ 

Matius 15:18

15:18 But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these things defile a person.

Matius 22:15

Paying Taxes to Caesar

22:15 Then the Pharisees ⁸  went out and planned together to entrap him with his own words. ⁹ 

Matius 26:74

26:74 At that he began to curse, and he swore with an oath, “I do not know the man!” At that moment a rooster crowed. ¹⁰ 

[13:3]  ¹ tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated.

[13:3]  ² sn Though parables can contain a variety of figures of speech (cf. the remainder of chapter 13), many times they are simply stories that attempt to teach spiritual truth (which is unknown to the hearers) by using a comparison with something known to the hearers. In general, parables usually advance a single idea, though there may be many parts and characters in a single parable and subordinate ideas may expand the main idea further. The beauty of using the parable as a teaching device is that it draws the listener into the story, elicits an evaluation, and demands a response.

[13:3]  ³ tn Grk “Behold.”

[13:3]  ⁴ sn A sower went out to sow. The background for this well-known parable, drawn from a typical scene in the Palestinian countryside, is a field through which a well-worn path runs. Sowing would occur in late fall or early winter (October to December) in the rainy season, looking for sprouting in April or May and a June harvest. The use of seed as a figure for God’s giving life has OT roots (Isa 55:10-11). The point of the parable of the sower is to illustrate the various responses to the message of the kingdom of God.

[15:4]  ⁵ tc Most mss (א*^,2 C L W 0106 33 Ï) have an expanded introduction here; instead of “For God said,” they read “For God commanded, saying” (ὁ γὰρ θεὸς ἐνετείλατο λέγων, Jo gar qeo" eneteilato legwn). But such expansions are generally motivated readings; in this case, most likely it was due to the wording of the previous verse (“the commandment of God”) that caused early scribes to add to the text. Although it is possible that other witnesses reduced the text to the simple εἶπεν (eipen, “[God] said”) because of perceived redundancy with the statement in v. 3, such is unlikely in light of the great variety and age of these authorities (א¹ B D Θ 073 Ë^1,13 579 700 892 pc lat co, as well as other versions and fathers).

[15:4]  ⁶ sn A quotation from Exod 20:12; Deut 5:16.

[15:4]  ⁷ sn A quotation from Exod 21:17; Lev 20:9.

[22:15]  ⁸ sn See the note on Pharisees in 3:7.

[22:15]  ⁹ tn Grk “trap him in word.”

[26:74]  ¹⁰ tn It seems most likely that this refers to a real rooster crowing, although a number of scholars have suggested that “cockcrow” is a technical term referring to the trumpet call which ended the third watch of the night (from midnight to 3 a.m.). This would then be a reference to the Roman gallicinium (ἀλεκτοροφωνία, alektorofwnia; the term is used in Mark 13:35 and is found in some mss [Ì^37vid,45 ˹] in Matt 26:34) which would have been sounded at 3 a.m.; in this case Jesus would have prophesied a precise time by which the denials would have taken place. For more details see J. H. Bernard, St. John (ICC), 2:604. However, in light of the fact that Mark mentions the rooster crowing twice (Mark 14:72) and in Luke 22:60 the words are reversed (ἐφώνησεν ἀλέκτωρ, efwnhsen alektwr), it is more probable that a real rooster is in view. In any event natural cockcrow would have occurred at approximately 3 a.m. in Palestine at this time of year (March-April) anyway.