PARABLE OF THE WEDDING FEAST

Matthew 22:1-14

Invoking the Holy Spirit

CONTEXT

• There are many controversial sections between Jesus and the chief priests and elders in 21 and 22 chapters of Matthew, where the authority of Jesus is being questioned.
• The chief priests and Pharisees. Jesus counters by asking, “The baptism of John, where was it from? From heaven or from men?” (21:45)
• Jesus refuses to answer them. He then responds with three parables:

Jesus’ identity is being revealed in these parables…

1. The Parable of the Two Sons (21:28-32)
2. The Parable of the Wicked Tenants (21:33-46)
3. The Parable of the Wedding Feast (22:1-14)

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• Jesus to the same audience (Pharisees and chief priests)
• These parables all speak two kinds of people, on the one hand who ignore the invitation of the Lord and on the another hand an invitation becomes expanded to a big group. (France, 821).

The Gospel of Matthew 22:1-14

• This parable appears only in the Gospel of Matthew, yet there is a partial parallel to this parable in Luke 14:16-24, but the audience there is more general (fellow guests at a dinner).”
• What is new in Matthew

Is the theme of the wedding garment…

Lectio: Matthew 22:1-14

• Matt. 22:1   And again Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying, ² “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast (γάμος) for his son, ³ and sent his servants to call those who were invited to the wedding feast, but they would not come.

• ⁴ Again he sent other servants, saying, ‘Tell those who are invited, “See, I have prepared my dinner (ἄριστον), my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding feast.”’ ⁵ But they paid no attention and went off, one to his farm, another to his business,

• ⁶ while the rest seized his servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them. ⁷ The king was angry, and he sent his troops and destroyed those murderers and burned their city.

• ⁸ Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding feast is ready, but those invited were not worthy. ⁹ Go therefore to the main roads and invite to the wedding feast as many as you find.’ ¹⁰ And those servants went out into the roads and gathered all whom they found, both bad and good (πονηρός, καί, ἀγαθός)). So the wedding hall was filled with guests.

• “But when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there a man who had no wedding garment (ἔνδυμα).
• ¹² And he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding garment?’ And he was speechless.
• ¹³ Then the king said to the attendants, ‘Bind him hand and foot and cast him into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’
• ¹⁴ For many are called, but few are chosen.”

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Allegorical message of the Parable

• “Jesus answered and spoke again in parables to them” (v. 1). (who are they?)
• • The king (v. 2) is God.�• The son (v. 2) is Jesus.�• The invited guests (v. 3) are the people of Israel.�• The first slaves (v. 3) are the prophets and the second and third sets of slaves (vv. 4, 8) are early Christians.�• The burned city (v. 7) is Jerusalem.�• The good and bad (v. 10) are the members of the church, which includes both righteous and unrighteous.

“The king was angry, and he sent his troops and destroyed those murderers, and burned their city.” (v.7)

• The destruction of the city is a prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem.
• In the Lord Jesus’ teaching in Matthew’s Gospel, the certain destruction of Jerusalem is not a new theme, (in many references of Matthew 23:34-37 and 24:1-2 also).
• The Jews had rejected God’s invitation to the banquet. They had harmed His messengers, His prophets, His servants. And now God’s judgment had come upon the city.

• It is clear that Jews have rejected the gospel, the invitation of the gospel is now extended to those people outside Jerusalem, in particular to the Gentiles. The gospel is extended to those people outside of the city, to those who live by these thoroughfares in the country.

Invitation to the GENTILES

Rejection of JEWS to the Gospels

v.10 – The servants went out into the streets and gathered all they found, bad and good alike…

• This parable explains why the church includes Gentiles and sinners. This Understanding this would be important in Matthew’s church, still primarily Jewish but with a growing Gentile membership.
• Sinners and irreligious people were not welcomed in the synagogues. Matthew was a tax collector and rather a sinner, but called and chosen.

New theme of this parable = Wedding garment

• “How did you get in without wedding garment?”
• He was silent.
• Then he is thrown out.

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• He had accepted the invitation. He was in the banquet. But he did not participate in the dinner and the feast.

Usage of analogy in the Scripture

• "I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation, he has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels." Is. 61:10
• We receive our wedding garment when we are “baptized into Christ [and] clothed with Christ,” (Gal. 3:27) 

JESUS, the bridegroom

CHURCH, the new spouse

Pope Benedict XVI explains…

• “He gives us His garments and these are not something external. It means that we enter into an existential communion with Him, that His being and our being merge, penetrate one another. ‘It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me’ (Gal.2:20).
• Christ has put on our clothes: the pain and joy of being a man, hunger, thirst, weariness, our hopes and disappointments, our fear of death, all our apprehensions until death. And He has given to us His ‘garments’.  Baptism an ‘exchange of clothing’ is given, an exchanged destination, a new existential communion with Christ.” (2007 Chrism Mass)