From: Matthew 13:31-35
The Mustard Seed; The Leaven
[33] He told them another parable. “The Kingdom of Heaven is like a leaven which
a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, till it was all leavened.”
[34] All this Jesus said to the crowds in parables; indeed He said nothing to
them without a parable. [35] This was to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet:
“I will open my mouth in parables, I will utter what has been hidden since the
foundation of the world.”
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Commentary:
31-32. Here, the man is Jesus Christ and the field, the world. The grain of mus-
tard seed is the preaching of the Gospel and the Church, which from very small
beginnings will spread throughout the world.
The parable clearly refers to the universal scope and spread of the Kingdom of
God: the Church, which embraces all mankind of every kind and condition, in
every latitude and in all ages, is forever developing in spite of obstacles, thanks
to God’s promise and aid.
33. This comparison is taken from everyday experience: just as leaven gradually
ferments all the dough, so the Church spreads to convert all nations.
The leaven is also a symbol of the individual Christian. Living in the middle of the
world and retaining his Christian quality, he wins souls for Christ by his word and
example: “Our calling to be children of God, in the midst of the world, requires us
not only to seek our own personal holiness, but also to go out onto all the ways
of the earth, to convert them into roadways that will carry souls over all obstacles
and lead them to the Lord. As we take part in all temporal activities as ordinary
citizens, we are to become leaven acting on the mass” (St. J. Escriva, “Christ Is
Passing By”, 120).
34-35. Revelation, God’s plans, are hidden (cf. Matthew 11:25) from those who
are disposed to accept them. The Evangelist wishes to emphasize the need for
simplicity and for docility to the Gospel. By recalling Psalm 78:2, he tells us
once more, under divine inspiration, that the Old Testament prophecies find their
fulfillment in our Lord’s preaching.
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Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.
Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.
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First reading |
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Jeremiah 13:1-11 © |
The Lord said this to me, ‘Go and buy a linen loincloth and put it round your waist. But do not dip it in water.’ And so, as the Lord had ordered, I bought a loincloth and put it round my waist. A second time the word of the Lord was spoken to me, ‘Take the loincloth that you have bought and are wearing round your waist; up! Go to the Euphrates and hide it in a hole in the rock.’ So I went and hid it near the Euphrates as the Lord had ordered me. Many days afterwards the Lord said to me, ‘Get up and go to the Euphrates and fetch the loincloth I ordered you to hide there.’ So I went to the Euphrates, and I searched, and I took the loincloth from the place where I had hidden it. The loincloth was spoilt, good for nothing. Then the word of the Lord was addressed to me, Thus says the Lord: In the same way I will spoil the arrogance of Judah and Jerusalem. This evil people who refuse to listen to my words, who follow the dictates of their own hard hearts, who have followed alien gods, and served them and worshipped them, let them become like this loincloth, good for nothing. For just as a loincloth clings to a man’s waist, so I had intended the whole House of Judah to cling to me – it is the Lord who speaks – to be my people, my glory, my honour and my boast. But they have not listened.’
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Canticle |
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Deuteronomy 32:18-21 © |
You forget the God who fathered you.
You forget the Rock who begot you,
unmindful now of the God who fathered you.
The Lord has seen this, and in his anger
cast off his sons and his daughters.
You forget the God who fathered you.
‘I shall hide my face from them,’ he says
‘and see what becomes of them.
For they are a deceitful brood,
children with no loyalty in them.
You forget the God who fathered you.
‘They have roused me to jealousy with what is no god,
they have angered me with their beings of nothing;
I, then, will rouse them to jealousy with what is no people,
I will anger them with an empty-headed nation.’
You forget the God who fathered you.
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Gospel Acclamation |
cf.2Th2:14 |
Alleluia, alleluia!
Through the Good News God called us
to share the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Alleluia!
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Or |
James1:18 |
Alleluia, alleluia!
By his own choice the Father made us his children
by the message of the truth,
so that we should be a sort of first-fruits
of all that he created.
Alleluia!
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Gospel |
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Matthew 13:31-35 © |
Jesus put another parable before the crowds, ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed which a man took and sowed in his field. It is the smallest of all the seeds, but when it has grown it is the biggest shrub of all and becomes a tree so that the birds of the air come and shelter in its branches.’
He told them another parable, ‘The kingdom of heaven is like the yeast a woman took and mixed in with three measures of flour till it was leavened all through.’
In all this Jesus spoke to the crowds in parables; indeed, he would never speak to them except in parables. This was to fulfil the prophecy:
I will speak to you in parables
and expound things hidden since the foundation of the world.