Biblical commentary on the New Testament - The Christian ...

Matthew XIII. 4^50. 499
ever miglit surprise us in this wiU be considered and explained when
we come to the more difficult passage, Luke xvi., respecting the
unjust steward. Another thing pecuhar to the parable of the pearls
is the contrast between unity and plurahty. It expresses in a peculiar
way the absolute importance of the one thing, and the merely
relative value of everything else. Naturally this one thing can be
no mere doctrine, no dogma, but something essential ; it must be
the divine itself in humanity, as exhibited in the person of Christ.
That man should in his own experience find God in himself, and
liimself in God—this is the one pearl for whose acquisition he must,
iu a peculiar sense, be willing to part with all things that he may
win all things. The oneness of the pearl, however, does not con-
tradict the idea that there are a multitude who seek it, for precisely
because it is in itself divine, therefore may each man seek and find
it. It exists everywhere, inasmuch as the divine germ lies slumber-
ing in all hearts, and requires only to be awakened by quickening,
and life from on high.
The last similitude, of the Jishing-net, is again closely allied to
the second, of the tares in the field. Both represent the interming-
ling of good and bad in the kingdom of God, which are to be sepa-
rated only at the end of the day. For, what in the parable of the
tares is denoted by the harvest, is here shadowed forth by the com-
pleting of the draught of fishes. In verses 49, 50, the parabolic
discourse is so explained as to correspond, word for word, with
verses 41, 42, and our observations on the former passage therefore
apply equally to this. The difference between the two similitfudes
might perhaps be most properly stated thus. In that of the tares,
the kingdom of God is conceived in its ideal character, as identical
with the whole workl, while in this of the fishing-net, on the other
hand, it is taken acconling to its actual appearance, as a smaller whole
defined and marked off within the world, but including within itself
the tendency to universal difi'usion. This is indicated by the cir-
cumstance, that it is from the sea, which here conveys the idea of
universality, that fishes are taken into the net of God's kingdom.
Thus explained, the passage is another evidence that the Saviour
himself did not in his visible church on earth acknowledge an abso-
lutely pure communion. It belongs to the wondrous economy of
God's grace, that in the whole course of man's temporal affairs, evil
obtrudes itself by the side of good. As in the ark a Ham appears
along with Shem and Japhet—as in the company of the twelve, a
Judas—so has the spiritual Israel, the spiritual Jerusalem, a Babel
in its bosom. By this arrangement the opportunity of repentance
is extended to the wicked, and the child of light perfected in his
conflict with the enemy. Not till the npioi^ ^oxdrT], last judgment,
will an entirely pure fellowship of saints be exhibited. The para-