Tool Beta
The Ancient World Behind the Text
Pick a passage anywhere in the New Testament. See the customs and ideas a first reader knew without being told.
Matthew 18:21-35, Ten thousand talents and a hundred denarii
Peter asks whether forgiving seven times is enough. Jesus tells of a king who cancels an impossible debt, and of the forgiven servant who then chokes a colleague over a small one.
Matthew 18:21-35, in every translation this tool compares.
Peter offers to forgive a brother up to seven times, and Jesus says seventy-seven times. Then he tells of a king settling accounts with a servant who owes ten thousand talents; when the man begs for time, the king cancels the whole debt. The same servant seizes a fellow servant who owes him a hundred denarii and has him jailed, and the king, hearing of it, hands him over to the torturers until he pays all he owes.
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- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/slavery\/","n":"Slavery and slave managers","s":"Slaves were everywhere in the Roman world, from field hands to stewards who ran whole estates and handled their master's money. A master away and slaves left in charge was a familiar story.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/honor-and-shame\/","n":"Honor before a crowd","s":"Public standing was the currency of the ancient Mediterranean. People competed for honor and dreaded being shamed in front of others.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/parables\/","n":"Parables and riddles","s":"Short stories that compared one thing to another. Jewish teachers used them to make a point plain, and without the point stated they worked as riddles.","r":""}
Some later rabbis limited forgiveness for a deliberate sin to three times, so Peter's seven looked generous (Keener; the cultural backgrounds notes; the ESV Study Bible). The king is a Gentile, perhaps like the Greek rulers of Egypt, and the servants are probably his tax farmers settling accounts; Jesus uses a Gentile court because the selling and torture would not fit a Jewish setting (Keener; the cultural backgrounds notes). Ten thousand talents was more than such a king's yearly income, and ten thousand was the largest number in Greek (Keener; the CSB Study Bible). Sold as a slave, the man would not recover even a thousandth of it (Keener). A king who forgave would at least win a name for kindness, and the servant's harshness spoiled it (the cultural backgrounds notes). Blomberg warns that the king is not a simple picture of God, since God does not torture. Wilkins sets the sum beside Josephus's figures for the yearly revenue of Herod's three heirs, nine hundred talents in all; the debt was more than ten times that.
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Matthew 18:21-22, 18:23, 18:24, 18:25, 18:31-33 and 18:34
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Matthew 18:21, 18:23, 18:24, 18:27 and 18:34
- ESV Study Bible, study note on Matthew 18:21-22
- CSB Study Bible, note on Matthew 18:23-27
- Craig L. Blomberg, Interpreting the Parables, 7.6 The Unforgiving Servant
- Michael J. Wilkins, Matthew, in Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary, ed. Clinton E. Arnold, on Matthew 18:24
