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93
Secondly, if Gerhardsson is right, free-floating parables are
not found in the Jesus traditions, with the possible exception of the
parable of the rich man and Lazarus. 119 In other words, the
evidence provided by the Synoptic Gospels points in the direction
of contextually-anchored parables. The settings provided by the
evangelists are to be taken seriously as they are the earliest
witnesses to what the parables could have meant. 120 These settings
provide moorings in an otherwise tumultuous hermeneutical sea.
The belief that many parables are ‗naked narratives with
indeterminate messages‘ 121 therefore depends on considerations not
found in the Gospels, but arises, most probably, from the agendas
of certain schools of interpretation. 122 Indeed, Gerhardsson insists
that the parables were given to illuminate aspects of Jesus‘
kingdom message. 123
Thirdly, the frame and the parable cohere well structurally, at
least in terms of rabbinic teaching methods. Blomberg argues that
they conform to the rabbinic method known as yelammedenu
rabbenu (i.e., ‗let our master teach us‘) and this has a four-part
structure: 124
(1) Question on a scriptural text (vv. 25-7);
(2) A second text given to illuminate (v. 28);
(3) The exposition (in this case, the parable); and
(4) The final remarks (v. 37). 125
119
Gerhardsson, ‗Parables out of their frames‘, pp. 325-6.
120
Ibid.,p. 322.
121
Ibid., p. 333.
122
This may be the desire to give the parables autonomy, treating them as naked
texts and divorcing them from the particularity of history, especially that of
Jesus of Nazareth. This fits in well with the postmodern agenda and the antiestablishment
agenda too.
123
Gerhardsson, ‗Parables out of their frames‘, p. 329.
124
Blomberg, Interpreting the Parables, p. 231.
125
On the possibility of Jesus‘ using rabbinic methods, see B. Gerhardsson,
Memory and Manuscript, Uppsala: Gleerup, 1961; R. Riesenfeld, The Gospel
Tradition, Oxford: Blackwell, 1970; R. Riesner, Jesus als Lehrer, Tübingen:
Mohr, 1981; and most recently, S. Byrskog, Jesus the Only Teacher: Didactic