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 25:14-30, Five, two and one talent
A man going abroad entrusts his property to three slaves. Two double what they were given and are rewarded; the third buries his talent and is thrown out.
Matthew 25:14-30, in every translation this tool compares.
Before a long journey a man hands his slaves five talents, two talents and one, each according to his ability. The first two trade with the money and double it, while the third digs a hole and hides his. When the master returns he praises the first two and gives them more; the third says he knew his master was a hard man and was afraid, and the master answers that he should at least have put the money with the bankers to earn interest, takes his talent and has him thrown into the outer darkness.
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- {"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":""}
Keener reckons the five talents at about fifty thousand denarii, the two at twenty thousand and the one at ten thousand, a small matter only to a very rich master; Wilkins values a silver talent at about seventy-five pounds and six thousand denarii, which would make them thirty thousand, twelve thousand and six thousand. Doubling an investment was normal, and the master threw a feast on his return and honored the servants who had helped him (Keener). You have what is yours was the phrase used in Jewish transactions to mean that one was no longer responsible (Keener). Wright reads the story, like other stories of a master and his slaves, as one Jesus' hearers would take as being about God and Israel, and sees the leaders of Matthew 23 in the slave who hid the money. There were no banks in the modern sense: people buried valuables or left them with a neighbor, and the bankers of 25:27 are probably money changers at their tables (Wilkins).
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Matthew 25:15-17, 25:19-23 and 25:24-25
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Matthew 25:14, 25:16, 25:18 and 25:21
- ESV Study Bible, study notes on Matthew 25:18 and 25:27
- Craig L. Blomberg, Interpreting the Parables, 7.1 The Talents
- N. T. Wright, Matthew for Everyone, Part Two, comment on Matthew 25:14-30
- Michael J. Wilkins, Matthew, in Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary, ed. Clinton E. Arnold, on Matthew 25:15 and 25:27
