Quote:
Originally Posted by Igzy
Also, I have a problem thinking the Lord might directly call the kingdom of heaven a negative thing. If leaven here is evil, why would the Lord call the kingdom leaven? That's like saying the kingdom is evil. In none of the other parables is the kingdom itself directly called something that is considered evil.
If he had said that the kingdom is like flour which a women mixed with yeast, perhaps then the idea that the leaven was evil might hold up better. But the Lord said the kingdom is like yeast which a woman mixed with flour! Flour is surely positive, right? So if the woman is some evil Jezebel, why is she mixing the good thing into the bad thing, rather than the other way around? And why is the bad thing directly equated with the kingdom?
It just doesn't make sense. Yet, that's what Lee taught.
|
It doesn't make sense because you have not carried the context. There is a conversation going on; our Lord is telling the disciples that Good and Evil will commingle for a time, and eventually Evil will be purged from the kingdom.
And "The kingdom is..." is relating to a story, not merely to the first object that appears in the story. If I say "The kingdom of heaven is like a net..." that is not the story. Rather, the kingdom is a net, which goes into the sea, and gathers creatures diverse, which then get sorted, with the good being kept and the foul being discarded. At one point, in the kingdom of heaven, there are both "wicked and just" side by side (verses 46-49).
Also verse 41: "The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all
things that offend, and them
which do iniquity..." (KJV).
Temporarily, in the kingdom of heaven, there are things which offend, which do iniquity. There are tares, there are unfruitful hearts (soil), there are fishes quite foul and inedible (think of some of the nasty creatures which Peter and his companions hauled out of the sea!), there are "children of the wicked one" (verse 38).
Of course, there are positive and desireable things there also. There is a treasure hidden in the field (v.44), there are good fish, there are good crops, there are children of the kingdom, etc.
But the overall theme in these parables (Matthew 13) involves the temporary commingling of both realms, both wicked and good, with the eventual resolution.
Now, that does not perforce dictate that here leaven
must be bad, nor the birds roosting in the mustard plant
must stand for evil spirits. But your grammatical reading (and logic)
requiring the object in question to be "good" rather than "evil" also looks away from the theme of the overall story, I think.
I could just as easily say, "The kingdom of heaven is many diverse fishes, which are gathered into a net and hauled ashore, with good fishes being sorted out from the bad." In this case, the
fish are not the kingdom any more than the
net (or the flour, or leaven, or whatever). Rather, it is a story in which something is happening
within the kingdom.
Here is another story: ""Now war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon; and the dragon and his angels fought, but they were defeated and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. And the great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world - he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him."
Suppose I said that the dragon, the ancient serpent, called both Devil, and Satan, is in heaven. People might be aghast. "No!! Heaven is where God dwells! Satan is in Hell!" But context is required: I am referring to a temporary situation. There are both good and evil temporarily commingling "in heaven", and there is indeed a struggle, just as there is implied (so I read, anyway) in all of the parables in Matthew 13 (Even the "treasure" is hidden in the "field").
So an overly narrow reading of the grammar of the translation trumping the story laid in multiple parables (notice the prefaces, "
Again, the kingdom of heaven is like..." vv. 44,45,47 - they are a linked sequence) is perhaps leaning too far in the other direction.
I admit that Lee would shoehorn verses to fit "the story". But to disregard the ongoing story and attempt to piece meaning from grammar alone (again, remember this is a translation) also has its perils.