Thoughts

The parable of the sower is a useful starting point for the discussion of the interpretation of parables, since it is presented in a context where Jesus gives his own interpretation, and also comments on the reason for teaching in parables. Green mentions (p152) the great debate that raged on the interpretation of parables in the last century. While the critique of Dodd and others on an over-allegorical interpretation has validity (Dodd particularly makes much of Augustine’s detailed allegory on the parable of the Good Samaritan with every character and almost every detail given a specific reference to historical people and events[1]), Juelicher and others moved to the opposite extreme of insisting on only one single general point in the interpretation of a parable. Green is right in saying that this is “unnecessarily restrictive”, and the example is right before our eyes: in Mt 13:18-23 Jesus himself interprets the parable of the sower not with the single point only of the seed (word of God) being liberally scattered but not always growing to maturity, but he also gives allegorical interpretations to the specific conditions of the soil in receptivity to the word. In general, it is unwise to tie down the ‘parable’ concept as if it were a fixed form of literature: the genre of ‘parable’ includes a great variety, as Green notes, from a “basic riddle” (such as Jdg 4:14) to the “advanced comparison” of the details in the story of the sower told here.

The quotation from Isaiah (Mt 13:14-15) is also significant. While the parable of the sower and its interpretation was significant enough to be included with very little variation in all three synoptic gospels, this quotation from Isaiah is included in all four Gospels (though the context in Jn 12:39-40 is a little different). The quotation seems to indicate that the purpose of teaching in parables is to conceal truths from the people. Chrysostom refers to this as “a peculiar mode of speech in Scripture”[2] noting its similarity to the statements in Exodus that God ‘hardened’ Pharaoh’s heart. He explains that this is a way of speaking of God as always the active rather than the passive participant, but in this case his activity is to allow the freedom of human persons: to express it in this active way is to emphasise how terrifying it is when we are ‘given up’ by God to our own purposes.

To shed further light on this ‘mode of speech’, Green (p154) quotes Thomas F. Torrance: in parables the message of God was “concealed… lest men against their will should be forced to acknowledge the Kingdom.” He gave them “enough light to convict and convince them” without giving a revelation of God that would overcome their freedom to resist.

[1] C.H. Dodd: The Parables of the Kingdom (London, 1936), p.11-12

[2] Homilies on St John in NPNF Vol. 14, Homily LXVIII:2 (p252-253)

The Pharisees accuse Jesus of allowing his disciples to break the Sabbath rest. Green (p144) points out the irony of this, coming immediately after Jesus’s offering in him ‘rest for your souls’. Jesus is quick to answer in a way that not only justifies the actions of the disciples, but also hints at his own identity. First, he draws their attention to a case (1 Sam 21:1‑9) where David and his men ate consecrated loaves from the Temple because of need, even though these were reserved only for the priests (the hint here is that Jesus is greater than David, and so he and his disciples can do likewise). Secondly, he referred to the fact that the priests in the Temple work on the Sabbath because Temple worship takes precedence over Sabbath regulation (the hint here being that now Jesus, greater than the Temple, also takes precedence). Finally he quotes Hosea 6:6 again reminding them that God desires mercy above sacrifice.

In any case, there is nothing in the written Law of Moses that prevents the disciples from doing as they did. They contravened only the oral Law, which to the Pharisees sometimes seemed to take precedence over the Law given by God (e.g. 15:6). What the disciples were doing was specifically permitted in Deut. 23:25, although it is not specified that it is also permitted on the Sabbath. However, the context in Deuteronomy is specifically drawing a contrast between something that could be considered as work (gathering into bowls) and something that is merely to satisfy hunger (plucking grapes to eat), which would certainly imply that in the eyes of God’s Law it would be a permissible act on the Sabbath. In fact, as the purpose of the Sabbath was rest, given as a reflection of God’s seventh day of rest after Creation, the Sabbath rest imitated the Edenic tradition, and in Eden there was cultivating and plucking fruits and grains for food (Gen 1:29, 2:15) as opposed to the harder workaday toil that came afterwards (Gen 3:17-19). In this way, the disciples were in fact resting from their labour (11:28) and celebrating the Sabbath. Chrysostom notes that in any case, keeping company with Jesus was in itself a Sabbath (XXXIX:3).

Chrysostom draws an interesting contrast between the Pharisees’ response to this violation of their beloved oral law, a short rebuke, and their response to the next violation, when Jesus heals the man’s withered hand. Again Jesus defends his action (this time with a comparison with something in their own oral law). Upon this healing, Matthew reports, they plot to have him killed. They see the same violation in two forms, and yet have a different reaction. Chrysostom suggests plausibly that the first was not so infuriating as a simple act of the disciples’ eating, but the second was insupportable as an act of great kindness and mercy (XXXIX:1). Why? Presumably because while the people would not pay a great deal of attention to the first, healing always drew them closer to Jesus as it elevated his status, making him all the more dangerous from the Pharisees’ point of view.

The Pharisees accuse Jesus of allowing his disciples to break the Sabbath rest. Green (p144) points out the irony of this, coming immediately after Jesus’s offering in him ‘rest for your souls’. Jesus is quick to answer in a way that not only justifies the actions of the disciples, but also hints at his own identity. First, he draws their attention to a case (1 Sam 21:1‑9) where David and his men ate consecrated loaves from the Temple because of need, even though these were reserved only for the priests (the hint here is that Jesus is greater than David, and so he and his disciples can do likewise). Secondly, he referred to the fact that the priests in the Temple work on the Sabbath because Temple worship takes precedence over Sabbath regulation (the hint here being that now Jesus, greater than the Temple, also takes precedence). Finally he quotes Hosea 6:6 again reminding them that God desires mercy above sacrifice.

In any case, there is nothing in the written Law of Moses that prevents the disciples from doing as they did. They contravened only the oral Law, which to the Pharisees sometimes seemed to take precedence over the Law given by God (e.g. 15:6). What the disciples were doing was specifically permitted in Deut. 23:25, although it is not specified that it is also permitted on the Sabbath. However, the context in Deuteronomy is specifically drawing a contrast between something that could be considered as work (gathering into bowls) and something that is merely to satisfy hunger (plucking grapes to eat), which would certainly imply that in the eyes of God’s Law it would be a permissible act on the Sabbath. In fact, as the purpose of the Sabbath was rest, given as a reflection of God’s seventh day of rest after Creation, the Sabbath rest imitated the Edenic tradition, and in Eden there was cultivating and plucking fruits and grains for food (Gen 1:29, 2:15) as opposed to the harder workaday toil that came afterwards (Gen 3:17-19). In this way, the disciples were in fact resting from their labour (11:28) and celebrating the Sabbath. Chrysostom notes that in any case, keeping company with Jesus was in itself a Sabbath (XXXIX:3).

Chrysostom draws an interesting contrast between the Pharisees’ response to this violation of their beloved oral law, a short rebuke, and their response to the next violation, when Jesus heals the man’s withered hand. Again Jesus defends his action (this time with a comparison with something in their own oral law). Upon this healing, Matthew reports, they plot to have him killed. They see the same violation in two forms, and yet have a different reaction. Chrysostom suggests plausibly that the first was not so infuriating as a simple act of the disciples’ eating, but the second was insupportable as an act of great kindness and mercy (XXXIX:1). Why? Presumably because while the people would not pay a great deal of attention to the first, healing always drew them closer to Jesus as it elevated his status, making him all the more dangerous from the Pharisees’ point of view.

John the Baptist from prison sends his disciples to ask Jesus whether he is the one expected, or whether they are to wait for another. Green (p137) pictures John sitting in prison and not seeing the revolutionary behaviour from Jesus that he had expected. Chrysostom, in contrast, considers that for John to have such serious doubts now would bring into question all the confidence he had displayed in Jesus before (XXXVI:1) and therefore he is sending his disciples for their own benefit, rather than for his (XXXVI:2). The text does not give an indication of John’s motive, which must therefore remain a matter of conjecture, but a straight reading of the text would indicate that the question was a genuine question of John’s.

Green goes further than to suggest John’s doubts, however. Even after commenting on Jesus’s strong commendation of John that he was “a prophet… and much more than a prophet… there has never been anyone greater than John the Baptist” (11:9-11) Green interprets “the least in the Kingdom of Heaven is greater than he” (11:11) to indicate that because of John’s doubts, he does not know the King and is not in the Kingdom (p138), and later (p144) he suggests that John even “rejected him” because of his doubts. This seems to be going a good deal further than the text.

There is another question, here, however. Most (if not all) English translations interpret the word ‘μικροτερος’ here as a superlative (‘least’) though technically it is in the form of a comparative (‘less’). Chrysostom takes it literally as a comparative, and suggests that the one who is ‘less’ in the Kingdom of Heaven than John is now Jesus: less in age, less in repute among the people, thus maintaining John’s standing from the previous verses without dropping it to exclusion from the Kingdom of Heaven as Green does.

In fact, even interpreting μικροτερος as ‘less’ still leaves open Green’s interpretation of John’s doubts (though not his rejection of Jesus!), but perhaps it could be modified by comparison with Jesus’s saying in Lk 11:27. In response to a woman’s crying out ‘blessed is the womb that bore you’, Jesus said ‘blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it’. This response clearly does not indicate that the keeper of God’s word should be blessed instead of his mother (see Lk 1:48: “all generations will call me blessed”), instead it means that (1) more important than biological affinity to him is obedience to God’s word and (2) the reason his mother is blessed is not primarily from carrying him in her womb, but because it was out of a life of obedience to God’s word that she received him into her womb. If this is a valid parallel, then, here Jesus would be indicating that (1) John’s great works as a prophet are not as important as the works of one who lives the life of righteousness he has been teaching as descriptive of life in the Kingdom of Heaven and (2) the reason that John will in the end be considered great is for living out the life of repentance and righteousness, not just for proclaiming the message. Thus John’s reputation established by Jesus in the preceding verses still stands – but in the context of Jesus’s teaching on life in the Kingdom of Heaven.

John the Baptist from prison sends his disciples to ask Jesus whether he is the one expected, or whether they are to wait for another. Green (p137) pictures John sitting in prison and not seeing the revolutionary behaviour from Jesus that he had expected. Chrysostom, in contrast, considers that for John to have such serious doubts now would bring into question all the confidence he had displayed in Jesus before (XXXVI:1) and therefore he is sending his disciples for their own benefit, rather than for his (XXXVI:2). The text does not give an indication of John’s motive, which must therefore remain a matter of conjecture, but a straight reading of the text would indicate that the question was a genuine question of John’s.

Green goes further than to suggest John’s doubts, however. Even after commenting on Jesus’s strong commendation of John that he was “a prophet… and much more than a prophet… there has never been anyone greater than John the Baptist” (11:9-11) Green interprets “the least in the Kingdom of Heaven is greater than he” (11:11) to indicate that because of John’s doubts, he does not know the King and is not in the Kingdom (p138), and later (p144) he suggests that John even “rejected him” because of his doubts. This seems to be going a good deal further than the text.

There is another question, here, however. Most (if not all) English translations interpret the word ‘μικροτερος’ here as a superlative (‘least’) though technically it is in the form of a comparative (‘less’). Chrysostom takes it literally as a comparative, and suggests that the one who is ‘less’ in the Kingdom of Heaven than John is now Jesus: less in age, less in repute among the people, thus maintaining John’s standing from the previous verses without dropping it to exclusion from the Kingdom of Heaven as Green does.

In fact, even interpreting μικροτερος as ‘less’ still leaves open Green’s interpretation of John’s doubts (though not his rejection of Jesus!), but perhaps it could be modified by comparison with Jesus’s saying in Lk 11:27. In response to a woman’s crying out ‘blessed is the womb that bore you’, Jesus said ‘blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it’. This response clearly does not indicate that the keeper of God’s word should be blessed instead of his mother (see Lk 1:48: “all generations will call me blessed”), instead it means that (1) more important than biological affinity to him is obedience to God’s word and (2) the reason his mother is blessed is not primarily from carrying him in her womb, but because it was out of a life of obedience to God’s word that she received him into her womb. If this is a valid parallel, then, here Jesus would be indicating that (1) John’s great works as a prophet are not as important as the works of one who lives the life of righteousness he has been teaching as descriptive of life in the Kingdom of Heaven and (2) the reason that John will in the end be considered great is for living out the life of repentance and righteousness, not just for proclaiming the message. Thus John’s reputation established by Jesus in the preceding verses still stands – but in the context of Jesus’s teaching on life in the Kingdom of Heaven.

In this passage, the disciples are sent out in a precursor of the Great Commission to be give to them by Christ at the end of Matthew’s gospel (Mt 28:18-20). Green and John Chrysostom both speak of this ‘sending out’ as a sort of training of the apostles in the ways of mission: they have seen the ministry of proclaiming, teaching and acts of power (those three categories mentioned in Mt 4:23 and demonstrated in Mt 3-4; 5-7; 8-9:34) and now they are to be sent out to do this themselves. Chrysostom calls this mission “a sort of training school, to strip themselves for their conflicts with the world” and notes that their call here is only to reap the harvest: they can take no pride in the harvest themselves, for it was another who did the hard work of planting the seed and enabling it to grow (XXXII p.212 and cf. Jn 4:38). Indeed, it is made clear that not only is there no opportunity for personal pride in this work, but they should not find any personal or worldly security: all they need has been given them freely and they must likewise give freely to those they meet (10:8) with no fear or self-justification (10:19).

This freedom from fear, worldly security and self-justification is highlighted by Chrysostom (mentioning also Jn 14:27 and Rom 10:15 – referring to Is 52:7): “how beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace” – that the disciples are sent out as sheep among wolves, living a ‘Sermon-on-the-Mount’ life (Mt 5:38-48) in Christ’s grace alone (2 Cor. 12:9). As the serpent in battle will give up everything but his head, Chrysostom says (XXXIII p.220), we are to give up everything but the faith so that, like the martyrs, no persecution or even torture can stop the mouths of those speaking by the Holy Spirit (10:17-20): he who endures to the end shall be saved (Mt 24:13)

Both Chrysostom and Green specifically point out the applicability of this instruction on mission and ‘sending out’ also to us, but in rather different ways. Green sees us addressed also as those to be sent out to imitate the preaching, teaching and healing. Chrysostom says, “not of the apostles alone are they said, but also of the saints afterwards. Let us therefore become worthy to entertain them” (XXXII p.216), reminding us that we also must be ready to receive those who come to us with nothing but the words of Christ – in this way we will receive the peace that is offered by him through them, and not have it leave us (10:13) and through it, communion with Christ himself (10:40-42). For those of us used to hearing the first message, Chrysostom’s words are a special reminder: let us not fall into the pride of thinking that we are only the teachers of the message and not the listeners. He also reminds us that the peace is the greeting that precedes the communion, in Mt 10:12-13 as in the Liturgy.

In the Great Commission, as here, he gives them authority before sending them out. As Green points out (p.134) it is Christ’s initiative, and our role is to cooperate when we are sent out. Christ’s authority is given them to carry out the works of power as he himself did over the unclean spirits (10:1) but also, through the gift of the Spirit, to know what to speak in times of trouble and persecution (10:20). Further, Chrysostom points out the significance of the ‘εν’ in v.32 in contrast to its absence in v.33 – the power to confess Christ comes of our communion with him: he in us and we in him. But this authority is also a double-edged sword when it comes of a Lord whose strength is made perfect in weakness: since a disciple is not above his master (v.24), Green points out (p.133) that means the disciple too will face the cross (v.38). Thus the disciple is placed between earthly life and death on the one hand, and heavenly life and the ‘fearful judgement seat’ on the other (Chrysostom XXXV p.230, ref. Mt10:28,32-33).

Matthew’s skill in structuring his account of Jesus’s ministry is again apparent in this section of the gospel as he alternates the groups of miracles with teaching on discipleship, so that the accounts of Jesus’s ‘acts of power’ convey multi-layered teaching on God’s love for his creation and the nature of life in the Kingdom of God and discipleship.

In the ten[1] miracles reported in this section, Jesus apparently effects the act in a variety of ways, by touching or being touched (8:3, 8:15, 9:21-22, 9:25 and 9:29), by his announcement of it (8:13), by a rebuke (8:26) and by a simple command (8:32 and 9:5-6). In some of these cases, the faith of the recipient of the healing power was also specifically noted as a contributing feature, and in 9:5-6, the command seems to be in order to evidence a healing that has already taken place due to the forgiveness of sins (although John Chrysostom interprets this almost as two healings, one of the soul and one of the body[2]). Though touch seems to be the most common form of healing, the first instance of Jesus’s touching to heal here deserves particular attention.

Green writes what is surely true, that Jesus’s willingness to touch the leper speaks volumes of God’s love for sinners. John Chrysostom suggests that in making this touch, Jesus also shows himself above the Jewish law of purity, contrasting his action with Elisha in 2 Ki 5:1-14 and suggesting that the reason Elisha did not go out to meet Naaman before he was cleansed was because of the purity laws. There is no doubt that the touch was a loving gesture, but was it more than a gesture? To some degree it was a touch that conveyed healing. John Chrysostom suggests that, rather than the uncleanness of the disease transferring from its carrier to Jesus through the touch – as might have been expected, in this case the purity of Jesus overwhelms the disease, healing the sufferer – an active example of the comment in Titus ‘to the pure all things are pure’ (Tit 1:15). This latter explanation could apply in all of these cases of Jesus’s healing, not only by touch: when combined with the faith of the person seeking healing, even this degree of communion with God can be a partaking in God’s healing power against the corruption of the physical world.

Yet we also see people of faith seeking healing and not receiving it. How are we to understand this? John Chrysostom refers also to this issue[3] of times and places such as his own, where miracles do not seem to be part of the life of the faithful. Green also mentions that he used to doubt miracles would still happen in our own days (p116). He also says that “in Israel in Jesus’s day there was not too much of that living trust in God’s power to heal.” (p115) Although Green no longer doubts that miracles still happen, he writes that why they happen sometimes and not others is a “mystery”[4]. John Chrysostom points out that “if we all lived as we ought, workers of miracles would not be admired so much as we by the children of the heathen” – that if the Church really looked like the description of Jesus in the Beatitudes and the Sermon on the Mount, that would be a greater testament to the miraculous power of God than healings and miracles of nature, and that healing the soul is harder than to heal the body: “if thou wouldest work miracles also, be rid of transgressions, and thou hast quite accomplished it.” (XXXII₁₁).

He also gives two reasons why miracles may not be in their own experience. First, that having been given the faith, miracles are unnecessary in terms of signs. This is a possible explanation, and plausible especially in terms of miracles such as the walking on water, but it is harder to apply it to miracles of healing, which, while they may also be signs, surely emerge because of God’s love for humanity in our pain and sufferings: this love, joined with our reaching out to him in faith and hope, enables us, like the woman with the issue of blood (9:21-22) to receive healing. His second reason is that we are already so proud of our piety and teaching that if we were also able to perform miracles, we would be unable to maintain our communion. Perhaps increased humility would permit more miracles to take place.

[1] Green prefers to see them as nine miracles. There are clearly 10 miracles, though equally clearly they are presented as nine miracle accounts, with the woman with the issue of blood and Jairus’s daughter (unnamed in Matthew) presented together in one account.

[2] Homily XXIX, p196

[3] Particularly in Homilies XXIV₂ (p168), XXVII₂ (p185) and XXXII₁₁ (p218)

[4] Also relevant here is exactly what we mean by ‘miracles’ and how we perceive them. In general, I take both John Chrysostom and Green in this discussion to be referring to those miracles comparable to Jesus’s ‘acts of power’ in Matthew’s Gospel and to those miracles wrought by Paul’s clothing referred to in Acts 19:11-12. The subsequent verses (Acts 19:13-19) indicate how complex a matter this is in terms of the precise relationships and contrasts between mediating the power of God, personal and community faith, and magic and the use of demonic powers. There is clearly a continuum taking into account everything from the miracle of the sun’s predictable rising and setting, through the miracle of my wife’s continuing love for me, through the mystery of faith, through public healings, to the overwhelming experience and example of God’s power given to Moses when he had to hide in a cleft in the rock (Ex 33:18-23) – the kind of experience that Jesus refused the temptation to provide in Mt.4:1-11, the kind of absolute proof of God some seek, but which would make faith and freedom impossible if given to those still seeking God. In the end, as Green says, the issue of what miracles, when and for whom is a ‘mystery’ and, it seems, necessarily so.

Most translations of Matthew either put 7:6 together with 7:1-5 or separate it as an isolated saying. Green also sees it rather in this way (p106), giving it a purely evangelistic connotation: don’t force the message on anyone, only go with the Spirit, where he has been leading the way. Chrysostom (p159) describes the dogs as those who have no desire to change, and the pigs as those submerged in unchaste lifestyles; this is good imagery of two examples of groups who may not be ready to receive the ‘pearl’. However there is no particular indication in the text of these allegorical interpretations, and indeed it seems more likely that the pigs and dogs are just parallel examples standing for people who for whatever reason are not ready to receive ‘what is holy’. Green lumps pigs and dogs together with the same interpretation Chrysostom gave to the dogs alone: those who are not ready for Christ’s message, the hard-hearted and unwilling to change.

Chrysostom, speaking of the swine trampling the pearl, gives the example (p160) of the secrecy of the mysteries of the Church: the secrecy (the unbaptised were not permitted to remain in the Church after the dismissal of the catechumens in the Liturgy) was so that those who were unprepared, and therefore in danger of not seeing the value of the ‘pearl’, would not be able to ‘trample’ it, or defile it by not giving it due reverence. This perhaps shows a connection for 7:6 with the passage that follows, 7:7-12. Chrysostom sees the ‘asking’, ‘seeking’ and ‘knocking’ as examples of our perseverance in approaching God (as, for example, in the story of the perseverant woman before the judge in Lk 18:1-8 – perhaps this could be Matthew’s parallel teaching, as he has no version of that parable). Whether or not it indicates perseverance, it certainly indicates that we have to make our own move for God to make his: that we must be prepared to ask.

The swine, on the other hand, are not prepared for the pearl, and therefore it would be a mistake to give it to them. Thus God also waits for the evidence that we are prepared, in that we are ‘asking’, ‘seeking’ or ‘knocking’ before he will cast his pearl before us. There is also an interesting contrast between the pearl being cast before the swine (7:6) and the hypothetical father who might give his son a stone (7:9). While it would be wrong to give holy things to the dogs, it would be equally wrong to give a serpent to a hungry child – a child who is seeking to eat will be given a fish by his father who loves him.

Most translations of Matthew either put 7:6 together with 7:1-5 or separate it as an isolated saying. Green also sees it rather in this way (p106), giving it a purely evangelistic connotation: don’t force the message on anyone, only go with the Spirit, where he has been leading the way. Chrysostom (p159) describes the dogs as those who have no desire to change, and the pigs as those submerged in unchaste lifestyles; this is good imagery of two examples of groups who may not be ready to receive the ‘pearl’. However there is no particular indication in the text of these allegorical interpretations, and indeed it seems more likely that the pigs and dogs are just parallel examples standing for people who for whatever reason are not ready to receive ‘what is holy’. Green lumps pigs and dogs together with the same interpretation Chrysostom gave to the dogs alone: those who are not ready for Christ’s message, the hard-hearted and unwilling to change.

Chrysostom, speaking of the swine trampling the pearl, gives the example (p160) of the secrecy of the mysteries of the Church: the secrecy (the unbaptised were not permitted to remain in the Church after the dismissal of the catechumens in the Liturgy) was so that those who were unprepared, and therefore in danger of not seeing the value of the ‘pearl’, would not be able to ‘trample’ it, or defile it by not giving it due reverence. This perhaps shows a connection for 7:6 with the passage that follows, 7:7-12. Chrysostom sees the ‘asking’, ‘seeking’ and ‘knocking’ as examples of our perseverance in approaching God (as, for example, in the story of the perseverant woman before the judge in Lk 18:1-8 – perhaps this could be Matthew’s parallel teaching, as he has no version of that parable). Whether or not it indicates perseverance, it certainly indicates that we have to make our own move for God to make his: that we must be prepared to ask.

The swine, on the other hand, are not prepared for the pearl, and therefore it would be a mistake to give it to them. Thus God also waits for the evidence that we are prepared, in that we are ‘asking’, ‘seeking’ or ‘knocking’ before he will cast his pearl before us. There is also an interesting contrast between the pearl being cast before the swine (7:6) and the hypothetical father who might give his son a stone (7:9). While it would be wrong to give holy things to the dogs, it would be equally wrong to give a serpent to a hungry child – a child who is seeking to eat will be given a fish by his father who loves him.

“Our Father who art in heaven” – Green points out (p100) that this is known as the ‘Lord’s prayer’ not because it was the prayer Jesus himself prayed (as he did not need to ask for forgiveness) but that it was the prayer he gave to us. We are united to him in the prayer because it is through him that we have gained the right to call God ‘Abba’ (the original of ‘πάτερ’ according to Green, referring to Rom 8:15 “Abba, Father”). Chrysostom (p134) writes that this opening phrase calls us up to heaven through intimacy and the recognition of God. We approach collectively in the ‘our Father’ and in this multitude we approach together, whether king or servant, the Father of us all.

In this longing for heaven (“thy kingdom come”), Chrysostom says, we should work to make the earth more like it, and that means aiming for perfection (5:48: “be ye perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect”). Green has trouble with this saying, and wishes the ‘τέλειοι’ to be not ‘perfect’ but ‘mature’ (p101). While this is technically a possible interpretation of the Greek word, it would be unusual to describe God as ‘mature’ – ‘the Ancient of Days’ (Dan 7:9) perhaps, but this would not fit the context of 5:48 (and in any case is usually taken to be a reference to God as eternal). Thus it seems necessary to take this word here as referring to completeness or perfection.

Chrysostom says “there is nothing to hinder our reaching the perfection of the powers above… even while abiding here” by virtue of the grace from above (p135). On the other hand, further on in the Lord’s prayer we assume our sinfulness, asking for our sins (or ‘debts’) to be forgiven. Even in the midst of our sinfulness we still must look forward to becoming the person God calls us to be, and that involves perfection.

To sustain us on this journey towards perfection, we ask for ‘our daily bread’ (‘τον αρτον υμων τον επιουσιον’ – the ‘essential’ – sometimes translated ‘super-essential’ – bread) to be given to us ‘this day’. Chrysostom (p135) takes this absolutely straightforwardly, as being our needs for the current day, with no worry about the morrow, referring us forward to v25-31 where this is what Jesus teaches us. Green agrees, but also suggests a possible interpretation of the Greek phrase as ‘the bread of tomorrow’, pointing to this being a foretaste of the eternal Bread which sustains not only our bodies but our souls. Augustine (‘Our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount’ Book 2, VII:25 – NPNF vol.6 p41) suggests three possible interpretations: our daily needs (but unlike Chrysostom he sees v25-31 as an objection to this interpretation), the Eucharistic mysteries (but he notes that these are not taken daily in the East), or a reference to spiritual ‘food’ or precepts which we live by daily. He inclines towards the last interpretation, but accepts that all are acceptable. Perhaps the fullest understanding of this petition comes from holding all three together.