Of Parables: Parables tend to be Illustrative Rather than Didactic 7.18.2024

    “There is more than one way to skin a cat.” As a cat owner, I would resent this sentiment, but I understand it’s not really about cats. It is a proverbial or parabolic saying that conveys an elemental truth. Actually--more than one truth. It addresses the fact that many if not most activities can be done a number of different ways. The same parable also teaches patience, problem solving, and varieties of persuasion. One of the strengths of analogical reasoning and teaching by storytelling is that it is powerful, immersive, and in itself—flexible. 

    Parable thinking is simply one more way to “skin the cat” of teaching the foundational truths of scripture. It is good to have a variety of teaching tools available in our toolbox. If we are to use them well, we will need to learn how to use them in a specific, targeted way. We need to choose the right tool for the right job and that begins with understanding how they differ. 

    Since our subject this month is parables, the first important clarification is how parables function. They are illustrative, not didactic. To be effective a parable reframes or refocuses words, images, activities, or pursuits that we already understand.  In fact, if we did not already understand the basic building blocks of the story if we did not understand the matter contextually, the parable would not work. 

    This whole thread started with a story I told a lad at a picnic. The next thing I knew I attached that little fable/parable to an important insight regarding discipleship. The lesson was related through the image. The same lesson could have been taught with a reference from scripture, a thesis statement, and a couple of essential points. Sometimes you skin a cat one way, sometimes another. Flexibility is a hallmark of good teaching and simply preaching parables in all of their narrative power is what makes them powerful today. 

    We do need to be aware of the limitations of this method and ensure that our preaching and teaching ministry provides a variety of “cat-skinning” goodness. 

    First, parables do not convey “new” information. When Jesus taught in parables, He did not give new information about farming, fishing, searching, or shepherding. Parables are illustrative and necessarily relational. They lose their force when explained or converted into “propositions.” 

    Next, parables tend to be rather open ended. We are told the “end of the story” but not always its purpose. We are told why, but then left on our own when it comes to application. This is not a kind of thinking which we are accustomed to. It requires the hearer/reader to assimilate the image and make the connection intended by Jesus.  Many Christians love to be told what to do. The last thing they want is to figure out how to live out the plot and principles of a story. And when it comes to creating or creatively teaching Jesus’ parables preachers need to follow Jesus’ own level of comfort with unexplained ambiguity. Let’s face it—preachers like to convey clear unambiguous directives. To teach this way will require that we take the “foot off the gas” allowing our hearers to “have ears to hear.” 

    Finally, parables are participatory. Since we read the Bible from the page (screen) as a written text it can be difficult to remember that these stories were dynamically told—performed might be the better word—before the original hearers. 

    Let me illustrate; we all know the parable of The Man Who Had Two Sons. This story is the culmination—really the last scene of a series of parables about lost things. It begins with the words “There was a man who had two sons…” For this story to be written down somewhat dilutes the dynamism of what is a great story. Don’t misunderstand me, please. Yes, it is the words of Jesus. It is inspired, authoritative Scripture. The hermeneutical process always serves scripture best when it recovers or displays the dynamism that is inherent in the text rather than ignoring it or interpreting it out. That is the “art” part of understanding hermeneutics as the art and science of interpretation. What we “hear” as a bland opening to a narrative parable they likely heard as a familiar episode of tragic neighborhood gossip. “Ya know that guy with the two sons. Ya, heard what the young’un did?” Others heard it as a familiar and oft-repeated circumstance, the “a man”, to them becomes “any man”, to others “that man”, and for some “me”. If stories did not work that way they would not work. It is the universality, flexibility, and illustrative nature of parables that Jesus leveraged to reveal difficult truths to people who had been just about “Bible-ed” to death. 

    The genius of Jesus, at least as a teacher, was His ability to involve His audience, to sneak the truth, past their defenses, and disarm the natural, human resistance to new or refocused truth. We may not be Him, but as His Church and His people, we need to embrace this illustrative and dynamic way of teaching. 

    There are times when the text or circumstances demand a different exegetical strategy and hermeneutical approach. Too often, however, we choose one common methodology and follow it regardless of the contours of the text. In so doing we are hardly faithful to the intended message of the text. Narratives are to be understood as narratives. Psalms must be approached as Psalms. Ethical instructions should be examined for what they are. If we think of our job more of figuring out the correct strategy for skinning each different cat perhaps, we will find (to mix metaphors) that the cats respond better and are easier to "heard" if they hear the Biblical truth according to each passages desired intent.