The Parable of the Talents
Matthew 25:14-30
Introduction
Thank you for reading the Lectionary in Solentiname. I apologize for getting this out a few days late. Before we begin, please let me cross-promote my other project. If you are a comic book fan, or are interested in learning how to read comic books, check out my new blog at spikestonehand.com. You can also subscribe to the newsletter for a weekly recap of the blog here.
If this is your first time here, welcome! Here’s some background on this newsletter. Ernesto Cardenal was a Nicaraguan priest, poet, politician, and liberation theologian. One of his projects was to collaboratively read the gospels with the campesinos of Nicaragua. If the Jesus ministered, taught, healed, and living among the poor people of first century Judea, then perhaps the least of these today can help us better understand Jesus’s message. We participate in this by reading The Gospel in Solentiname, Cardenal’s collection of their discussions. If you would like to learn more about the context of these conversations, there’s nothing better than reading Cardenal’s introduction to the book here.
Last week, we read about the parable of the wise virgins. You can read that here. This week, following the Revised Common Lectionary, lets read about the Parable of the Talents.
Lectionary Reading
Matthew 25:14-30
[Jesus said], “For it is as if a man, going on a journey, summoned his slaves and entrusted his property to them; to one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away. At once the one who had received the five talents went off and traded with them and made five more talents. In the same way, the one who had the two talents made two more talents. But the one who had received the one talent went off and dug a hole in the ground and hid his master’s money. After a long time the master of those slaves came and settled accounts with them. Then the one who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five more talents, saying, ‘Master, you handed over to me five talents; see, I have made five more talents.’ His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and trustworthy slave; you have been trustworthy in a few things; I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.’ And the one with the two talents also came forward, saying, ‘Master, you handed over to me two talents; see, I have made two more talents.’ His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and trustworthy slave; you have been trustworthy in a few things; I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.’ Then the one who had received the one talent also came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew that you were a harsh man, reaping where you did not sow and gathering where you did not scatter, so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours.’ But his master replied, ‘You wicked and lazy slave! You knew, did you, that I reap where I did not sow and gather where I did not scatter? Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and on my return I would have received what was my own with interest. So take the talent from him, and give it to the one with the ten talents. For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance, but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away. As for this worthless slave, throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’”
Solentiname Reading
The kingdom of heaven is like a rich man that took a long trip and left one servant five talents (about 100,000 pesos), another two, and another one, so they could invest them. On his return the one that received five talents gave back ten to him, the one that received two gave back four. But the one that received one talent said to him:
“Sir, I knew you were a hard man who harvests where you didn't sow and gathers where you have scattered no grain. For that reason I was afraid and I hid your money in the ground. But I give you back what is yours.” The master answered him: “Evil and lazy servant, so you knew I harvest where I didn't sow, and I gather where I've scattered no grain? Therefore you should have put my money in the bank, and when I returned you would have given it back with interest.”
WILLIAM: “That's a lousy parable.”
I: “Why is it lousy, William?”
WILLIAM: “Because it's about speculating with money: something we all condemn, like putting money out at interest; giving the money to others so they can work and work with it and hand over the profits to the owner of the money.”
I: “It's really a very ugly example that Jesus gives of exploitation, of speculation with money, of pure capitalism.”
ADAN: “Well, he probably didn't say it. Who knows who said it.”
OSCAR: “He talks of the kingdom of heaven or of God, and he says we must all struggle, and that's why he gives the example of the money. But it's really kind of ugly too.”
WILLIAM: “Maybe it's what those people could understand best.”
FELIPE: “Like here among ourselves we give examples of hens and corn and kidney beans, which are the things we understand best, so it'll be seen clearer, in the people's words. Well that's the way Jesus was talking too. But there he was probably talking to another kind of people, people very stuck on money, and then he talks to them of the kingdom of heaven with the example of a money lender.”
WILLIAM: “Who knows? It doesn't say here who he was talking to.”
OLIVIA: “To the apostles and to us.”
WILLIAM: “In this instance, I mean.”
OLIVIA: “In this instance he's talking to us too. He's talking here about a work that he's left to us, not to one but to many, and we'll all have to account for what we do for others. It's much more to do a thing in common than to make money, because if you work for a community or a country, well then it's capital that's being produced: being conscientious, seeing that the wealth is distributed, that there's medicine for everyone, in short, it's a lot of capital that's being distributed. And that obligation isn't just for one or two or three of us but for every one of us, until we act in accordance with that Gospel, with that very Gospel, all of us.”
OSCAR: “Man, money's what we condemn, but it's only when you earn it by abusing your sister or brother. When you give it, not take it away, you shouldn't be cursed or condemned.”
WILLIAM: “Well, I don't know. Besides, the example is lousier because of what the servant says who hid the money: that he was a hard master, that he gathered where he hadn't put anything, that he harvested and didn't sow.”
TERESITA, his wife: “At that time there were only masters and servants, right? He had to talk like that so they'd understand. At that time all the servants had to be working with the master's talents or money, and that's why he had to give that example.”
I: “He was seeing the exploitation there was in the society of his time, and that's going on now—much worse with the banks and finances of today.”
WILLIAM: “There's the bank, there's a bank there!”
I: “And it's a condemnation of this system. He says that's the way the kingdom of heaven is, only the opposite: the rich man that devotes himself just to multiply his money is like the man that buried the talent he'd been given and didn't make it produce. Because money is to be given, it's not to be put away; nor is it to be multiplied, because that's not doing anything with it.”
PANCHO: “It seems to me this is clearly spiritual. You always refer every passage of the Gospel to the rich and the exploiters and money, but here Jesus is talking of money only in the form of a parable and he isn't referring to money: these coins or talents are the wisdom that God gives. Some people may have received a lot of it, like the talents of an engineer, a lawyer.”
FELIPE: “That wisdom that you mention and money amount to the same thing: money brings that wisdom, and the wisdom brings money.”
A girl asked Pancho: “Somebody who's received a lot of money, a millionaire, what should he do with his money?”
PANCHO: “Not try to steal, pay fair salaries.”
ELVIS: “That would be to keep the money buried and not multiply it; to multiply it would be to give it to the people, to the people that it's been taken from, for it used to belong to the people. So to return it in his case would be to make good use of the money.”
PANCHO: “That would be a person who maybe has stolen. Many can make money with their work, earning just profits.”
ADAN, his brother: “What happens is that when you've got it, even though you earned it easy, that money's already being used to exploit. Any deal you make is exploitation because it's with somebody else's labor.”
OSCAR: “I see that that man had to go away, and he wanted his money to increase, the way he saw it. And he looked for others who were exploiters like him, and he gave them money so they'd exploit the people and earn more and get double what he was leaving them. So they were all equal as exploiters. They were exploiting the people. But the guy that didn't get much, one talent, he didn't cooperate with them. He was conscientious, because he didn't have the strength to exploit his brothers and sisters. That's the way I understand it. Then the boss got sore when he comes and hands back the same as what he'd been given. We've got to work, we can't goof off, but we're not going to exploit like those were doing.”
LAUREANO: “But it's a parable, man, it's got a different meaning.”
PANCHO: “Well, it's because the word of God is a word of wisdom, and Jesus never made a mistake in giving these examples. And if we begin to think of ‘exploitation,’ ‘the rich man,’ ‘who is robbing the poor man’ and all that (that's all we have on our minds), then we don't understand the example. He wasn't talking about those things. Well, now, there's others that hide behind the Bible to rob all of humanity. And Christ didn't want to tell them that; he wanted to show them what was spiritual, the word of God.”
I: “See, Oscar, here Christ gives the example of an exploiter, and his employees were exploiters too; and he wants them to multiply his money. And Christ says that's the way God acts with us.”
OSCAR: “Oh, well, what God wants us to multiply is love!”
MYRIAM: “Love is what God has given to all of us, in different quantities.”
OSCAR: “I see it now: the ones that have loved humanity a lot have also received a lot of love, and they duplicated it.”
GLORIA: “Some have received more and others less, but everybody ought to double what they have.”
OLIVIA, her mother: “The one who's practiced justice, which is the same as love, is the one who's multiplied. The other one, the one that didn't do anything, is the egotist. The parable doesn't tell that some folks received money to increase money: it's us; the money is us. It tells that you have to give up what you have and work for others.”
DOÑA ADELITA, a little old lady with a very faint voice: “That's the business. The one that has done the most good works has done the most business.”
OSCAR: “That's what this Gospel's saying, but maybe the rich don't understand it, and then what they do is screw you. They start to argue with you, hell, a poor jerk that doesn't understand.”
I: “In Cuba they call workers that have cut a lot of sugarcane for the people millionaire cutters; they're millionaires not in money but in service and work. And that's the kind of capitalists and millionaires that Christ says we must be in the kingdom of heaven. Don't you think that's the way it ought to be interpreted?”
FELIPE: “And those are the accounts he keeps. And he says he's going to be tough in keeping accounts. The guy that didn't produce anything, it seems to me, he can be the religious man who just begins praying and singing junk and he hasn't done anything for the good of the world. And he's afraid to get mixed up in the revolution because he thinks it'll turn out bad, that maybe it's a sin.”
I: “Christ says that just as exploiters multiply money, so we revolutionaries must multiply love.”
WILLIAM: “And love is money; love is also wealth well distributed: the two things are related.”
I: “And money would be good, as Oscar says, then, if we use it as we ought to, distribute it, and then that's the way love is multiplied.”
LAUREANO: “As I see it the kingdom is society and the ones that have received most are the ones that have the most responsibilities. In the case of Cuba, for instance, Fidel is multiplying the talent well. Here it's just the opposite, because here the government may be busy multiplying the talents, but not for the people, so not for the kingdom.”
“The situation here is worse than the man in the parable. That guy was condemned because he didn't use the talent that he'd been given: he didn't do good, he didn't do evil. These guys use all the resources, but they use them for evil.”
FELIPE: “He gives the example of a guy that buried his money, because that's what the capitalists do with capital. They're like that one that didn't use it even for himself or for anybody; he just put it away.”
“In society there are people who have big jobs, and they multiply, but they don't share it. Maybe they have love just among themselves, but they don't share it with the people. In Cuba, Fidel, hemultiplies and shares it.”
LAUREANO: “It's working for others. He calls him there just a master; a master can be all of society.”
I: “But that master is also God who has given humanity all the riches of the earth to multiply. To multiply for him, for love, which is the same as saying, as Laureano says, for all of society. And he's going to be a hard man when he asks for an accounting.”
WILLIAM: “But the bad servant accuses him of harvesting where he didn't sow. It's a terrible image; he makes him out a monster.”
I: “As the miser is relentless in demanding his money, God is relentless with love.”
WILLIAM: “As a matter of fact, if he asks for an accounting it's because love sowed it. Perhaps that one didn't realize what had been sown, and that's why he says that.”
TERESITA: “That's an excuse by the servant who didn't do anything. People who don't do anything for other people always have that excuse: that love is very hard.”
FELIPE: “Freedom, love, for the exploiter is a monster.”
And he said: “Take away his talent, and give it to the one who has ten. Because the one who has will be given more and will have extra; but the one who has nothing will lose what little he has.”
I: “Isn't that unfair?”
LAUREANO: “If it was money, sure.”
PANCHO: “That's what I'm saying! He wasn't talking in material terms, he was talking in spiritual terms. Because it wouldn't be fair for me to take away from a guy that has only ten pesos and give them to a guy that has ten thousand. That wouldn't be fair; Christ didn't say that. And yet the rich exploiter reasons that way.”
I: “That's what happens with money. Those who have the most earn most and those who have little lose even the little they have. Capitalism makes the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. The bank takes away your lands or forces you to sell when you can't pay the bank. But the same bank loans to the big landowners so they can buy those lands. Just as now many in Solentiname are having to sell their small properties to the great landholding company that's interfering here. Christ says the same thing will happen in the kingdom of heaven, with love.”
OSCAR: “I agree. The guy that's selfish, don't let him have anything, because he's not doing anything, he just lives for himself. There he's talking about the ones that are selfish. The guy that just lives for himself. He doesn't love even himself because he doesn't mind losing his soul.”
I: “Those who have the most love will become richer and those who have very little are going to be left poorer, says Christ.”
OSCAR: “In that sense the thing is fine, because it's okay to take from a guy that only has a little and give it to someone that's deserving. But the truth is that this Gospel is a little involved with the question of money.”
I: “He gives the example of capitalistic exploitation to make us see that the same thing happens with love as with money. But as I say, it's the reverse because the one that has money and keeps it selfishly is the one that has no love.”
TOMAS: “He has love, but it's love for money.”
OSCAR: “See, Ernesto, it's all clear here, all that you're saying, but notice, I find that in lots of people, you know, the Gospel is very fashionable, everybody reads the Bible now; if unfortunately somebody comes along who is quite, let's say, interested in money, and unfortunately he starts to read this Gospel, and understands it in his own way, these words are going to make him worse than before.”
FELIPE: “Well, he couldn't be stupid enough not to notice that it's an example.”
OSCAR: “Well, if they understood it there wouldn't be any rich people.”
FELIPE: “Well, rich people don't even notice things like that.”
OSCAR: “Well, I'm saying then, that if unfortunately they read it there, they think it's a defense of them.”
LAUREANO: “But don't they see that this isn't being said for them but for us? Doesn't it say that you have to give to the one that has? And the rich man, what does he have? Why the money doesn't belong to him, it belongs to all of you.”
ALEJO: “Of course, this example is one of money that's been given and that doesn't belong to them. They're supposed to multiply it and give it back multiplied. It's not for them to sit on it.”
LAUREANO: “Well, in another Gospel it says it's easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle. And if he's making them rich it's so they won't be saved.”
OSCAR: “I think it's clear up to a point, even an ignorant guy can understand it, because he's talking directly. But the other idea is a little more confused so it's difficult for us to solve the problem.”
I: “The command that God gave to man and woman when God created them was: grow and multiply. That's the law of love: be fruitful and multiply. It is proper to life to multiply oneself.”
WILLIAM: “What's unnatural is for money to multiply itself, creating more money all by itself.”
I: “And God doesn't want us to give him back nature just as we've received it; we must give it back to him re-created and transformed. And finally we see that anyone who won't take risks in order to change the world is condemned to solitude, is separated from humanity.”
And that useless servant, throw him into outer darkness, where he will weep and gnash his teeth.
OSCAR: “That's the one who has no love even for himself.”
TOMAS: “The weeping is from fury, and he gnashes his teeth because he's furious.”
OSCAR: “Maybe he's a criminal, a murderer that will kill us all. We've got to get rid of him.”
Next Week
Next week we’re finishing our journey in Matthew 25 to cover the Parable of the Last Judgment. Something tells me our Nicaraguan comrades will have some interesting things to say about this parable.
What was the most interesting part of this week’s discussion? Let me know your opinions in the comments. Thanks for subscribing and sharing. I’ll see you next week.