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Publisher’s Introduction

William Barclay’s purpose in writing his commentaries was to help people to understand the New Testament. His great gift was his ability to pinpoint the detail that required explanation for a contemporary reader. The parables of Jesus were grounded in the experience of his listeners, and he spoke a language that they understood. As Barclay puts it: ‘Every detail … would be real to its hearers because every detail came from everyday life.’ It is important that we, too, understand the background. So, in explaining the parables of Jesus, Barclay draws our attention to the things that Jesus’ audience gathered on the shores of the lake or following him about the countryside would immediately understand but which we may not completely grasp.

The parable of the sower is well known, but there is a subtle message that can be overlooked. Some seeds (or the Word of God), we are told, fell on rocky ground. We assume that the seeds can’t grow on rocks, and from this we conclude that some people are just not open to the Word. But there is detail here that would have been understood by Jesus’ listeners and not by us. Barclay explains that ‘rocky ground’ was not a reference to ground covered in stones. Instead, it was ‘a narrow skin of earth over a shelf of limestone rock. Much of Galilee was like that.’ If a seed fell on that shallow soil, it would germinate; but there was so little nutrition available that it would soon die. From this, Barclay reaches the meaning of the parable – that many people are attracted to the Word of God but they never let it beyond the surface of their lives: ‘The fact is that with Christianity it is a case of all or nothing. We are safe only when we have given ourselves in total commitment to Christ.’

In these Insights, we learn fascinating detail about the lives, customs and attitudes of the people among whom Jesus moved. We also learn about the practice of parables, such as their importance in Jewish teachings and how we should read them. The parables of Jesus have a wider context: he first taught them when he began teaching outdoors, instead of in the synagogue – a move that aroused suspicion among the religious orthodox. To understand how this fits into the overall story, we recommend William Barclay’s full commentary on the Gospels of Matthew (volumes 1 and 2), Mark and Luke. These books, plus Barclay’s commentaries on the rest of the New Testament, are published by Saint Andrew Press.