Today, I started to look more deeply at a less common interpretation of the Parable of the Wedding Banquet (Matthew 22:1-14). I can’t remember where I first heard this interpretation, but it’s come up again recently because it was the lectionary reading for this past Sunday so I took this opportunity to look more into it. For convenience, here is the text of the parable:
1 Once more Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying: 2 “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son. 3 He sent his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding banquet, but they would not come. 4 Again he sent other slaves, saying, ‘Tell those who have been invited: Look, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready; come to the wedding banquet.’ 5 But they made light of it and went away, one to his farm, another to his business, 6 while the rest seized his slaves, mistreated them, and killed them. 7 The king was enraged. He sent his troops, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city. 8 Then he said to his slaves, ‘The wedding is ready, but those invited were not worthy. 9 Go therefore into the main streets, and invite everyone you find to the wedding banquet.’ 10 Those slaves went out into the streets and gathered all whom they found, both good and bad, so the wedding hall was filled with guests.
11 “But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing a wedding robe, 12 and he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding robe?’ And he was speechless. 13 Then the king said to the attendants, ‘Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ 14 For many are called, but few are chosen.”
The most common interpretation of Matthew 22:1-14 identifies (1) God as the king, (2) Israel’s religious leaders as the initial guests, (3) those who were invited to the banquet after the initial guests refuse the king’s invitation and kill the king’s servants as the audience, and (4) the man without a wedding robe as as an example of someone who did not “put on Christ” and serves as a warning who take on “cheap grace” rather than “costly grace” (ref: Bonhoeffer). As verse 14 says, “Many are called, but few are chosen.” The lesson is frequently put forward as an encouragement to discipleship and faith demonstrated through works; don’t get caught unprepared when the king comes to see if you’re practicing righteousness. A secondary lesson might be exhibit gratitude for the gift given to us by the king that was not originally meant for us, but was freely given to us anyway.
I have no problem with these lessons. These are good exhortations for any follower of Jesus to put into practice. But at the same time, keeping to this interpretation leads to some troubling conclusions. For instance, if God is the king, he doesn’t seem to exude many of the characteristics of the kingdom that Jesus teaches about in the Gospel of Matthew (Would he be “blessed” in the beatitudes?). This king seems vengeful and vindictive: he “sent troops, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city” (v7). He also seems preoccupied with appearances, wanting this wedding banquet “filled with guests” (v10). And finally, he seems really harsh toward the one without a wedding robe (v11).
In the past I would have dismissed these concerns, saying, “God is a just and holy god. You can’t approach him however you please.” But now, while I hold fast to the justice and holiness of God, I pause and question whether this common interpretation actually reflects God’s nature. The god in this interpretation sounds like someone who is overly concerned with the size of his rallies, punishes his opponents, and treats marginalized people like vermin. I also can’t help but sympathize with the man without wedding clothes. In my head, I’m thinking, “C’mon. You literally just picked him up off the street. Isn’t that a little harsh?”
This less common interpretation that I started looking into flips the whole story.
In this interpretation, the king is not identified with God. Instead, the king and the initial invitees represent the order of the world; an order that is violent, seeking power and domination; they literally kill one another. The “good and bad” (v10) people from the streets are pawns in this system. They exercise no agency and are used by the king to show his own greatness. They essentially follow the rules dictated by those in power. And finally, the man not wearing a wedding robe is one who is protesting the system. He doesn’t play into the expectations of the world order; he’s Jesus. Like Jesus, he is speechless (v12), gets punished by the system and is thrown out (v13). The very last line about “many are called, but few are chosen” (v14) is speaking positively about the man who was ejected from the wedding. The lesson underscores how difficult it is to resist the powers of the day — only few do.
I was intrigued the first time I heard this interpretation, and I started to wonder, “Could this really be an intention of the Matthean Jesus?” Because Matthew has all sorts of parables where Jesus attempts to illustrate the kingdom of heaven. In searching my mental Gospel of Matthew rolodex, many of these comparisons are positive comparisons: the kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, a treasure hidden in a field, yeast in flour, a generous landowner looking for workers, etc. What warrant would I have to interpret this one negatively when the vast majority are positive comparisons?
So I started digging… (And perhaps I should caveat this “discovery” as fairly surface-level work that I was able to do this afternoon during the work day in-between tasks.)
When I looked at the text in the NRSVue, I noticed that Matthew 22:2 says, “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to…” This is in contrast to how these parables play in my head, which is plainly “the kingdom of heaven is like…” Most of my mental rolodex is from the NIV of my childhood so I double-checked the NIV (and several others including the KJV and NASB), and learned that many translations simply render this plainly as “the kingdom of heaven is like…” I wondered, “Why did the NRSVue (and others in the RSV tradition) render this differently? Is there a difference in the Greek?” I discovered that there is!
In most of the Gospel of Matthew, the kingdom of heaven parables say Ὁμοία ἐστιν ἡ βασιλεία (woodenly, “like is the kingdom”). Ὁμοία is an adjective and its function is to describe a static reality (ἐστιν, “is” is the verb). However, in Matthew 22, the Greek is Ὡμοιώθη ἡ βασιλεία (“is-like the kingdom”). Ὡμοιώθη here is not an adjective; it is the verb (more specifically a third person singular aorist passive indicative verb. That’s all; don’t tune out!). This is why the NRSVue (and other translations in the RSV tradition) translates this in passive voice, “may be compared to,” instead of simply, “is like.” This allows the reader to put the kingdom of heaven alongside a situation not as a simple like-for-like — but more interestingly as a compare and contrast.
When I searched for all instances of Ὡμοιώθη ἡ βασιλεία in Matthew, it only shows up three times: (1) The Parable of the Weeds Among Wheat (Matthew 13:24-30), (2) The Parable of the Unforgiving Servant (Matthew 18:23-35), and finally, the (3) Parable of the Wedding Banquet. In all three of these instances, the situations are more complex than a simple allegorical interpretation. There’s an enemy involved in the Weeds, and there are also, well, weeds. The king in the Unforgiving Servant seems to practice predatory lending and again, plays by the rules of the world, rather than extending grace; he’s retributive rather than restorative in his nature. I already detailed some of the complexities of the Wedding Banquet above. These three parables share a common complexity. This was enough for me to consider this interpretation of the Wedding Banquet beyond a simple, “Well that’s an interesting take!”
Going back to literary context of the The Parable of the Wedding Banquet, right before telling this parable, Jesus tells The Parable of the Wicked Tenants (Matthew 21:33-46). In this preceding parable, Jesus tells about these wicked tenants that offend the landowner, attacked and kill his servants, and ultimately murder the landowners son. And right after telling the part were the tenants kill the landowner’s son, Jesus puts the question to his audience (who we learn are “the chief priests and the Pharisees” in v45): What will the landowner do to those tenants? And the chief priests and Pharisees respond: “He will put those wretches to a miserable death and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the produce at the harvest time.”
This retributive act is how the chief priests and the Pharisees would do things. The text doesn’t tell us whether Jesus agrees or approves of such a response. If Jesus doesn’t approve (which is my suspicion), it would make sense that he would craft the next parable to show the outcome of this response — and how he will receive the brunt of it. The king, obsessed with power and reputation, would do anything to uphold his image — even kill. The initial invitees would act as examples of how violence begets violence. The good and bad people from the street follow along for fear they would become subjected to violence. And finally, the man who chooses not to play by the rules, is the brave one who chooses not to support the system by refusing to wear clothes to soothe the king’s image. He plays by different rules.
He is “speechless” before his accuser (v12 ref Matthew 27:11-14). He is bound hands and feet (v13, like on a cross?) and was thrown out to darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth (v13, Do I need to keep spelling this out?) In such an interpretation, the lesson becomes a question of whether we will live into the world’s pattern of violence or choose to live by a different (kingdom of heaven) set of rules. It’s possible that The Parable of the Wedding Banquet could very well be Jesus’ indictment of the violent way of the world.
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