An Emmaus Reading of Matthew 25:1-13
On Mercy, Waiting and the Kingdom of the Heavens
Susan Carson
May 6, 2022
for
Dr. Bradley Jersak
Interpretation of Sacred Texts – BIB 5120
Winter 2022
The parable of the ten virgins in Matthew 25:1-13 is given to us by Apostle, tax collector and gospel author Matthew. Written somewhere between 60 and 90 A.D., this is most likely the second gospel written (while Origen holds it as the first), reflecting much of the work of Mark. Matthew gives us a comprehensive gospel intended to help pastor a growing Church still under Roman rule in a time of great turmoil and stress.[1]
Some understand this parable as a portrayal of the final judgment and eternal punishment for all those who lack the oil of grace and/or Holy Spirit. Instead, I propose an Emmaus Road interpretation of the parable of the ten virgins from Matthew 25:1-13. I will address the problem of viewing Christ as punisher and excluder as it relates to the loving, healing nature of Christ. To do that, I will explore the meaning of the passage in the context of the book of Matthew, and in light of scriptures, commentaries and articles, and propose that this parable is an invitation to all followers of Jesus to live watchful lives of mercy rather than a prediction of eternal separation and punishment.
An Emmaus reading opens the parable in light of the person and story of Jesus as the full revelation of God. We read by the light of Spirit to see a story of redemption centered in a loving, self-giving Christ present to heal, serve and save. This is the Christ, the bridegroom, we see in Matthew and in this parable offering compassionate mercy that corrects rather than condemns, seeking to bring all to the wedding feast.
Matthew brings us Jesus in full color, sharing extensively from his teachings in the Sermon on the Mount (Ch 5-7) as well as the Olivet Discourse (Ch 24-25). In Matthew we see Jesus teaching, healing, delivering and fulfilling the Messianic prophecies of the Hebrew scriptures. Concerned with the Kingdom, Matthew helps us see the Kingdom, the rule and reign of God, in Jesus.
The Sermon on the Mount establishes the Kingdom of the heavens as the interpretive rule for the parables to come. The word “Kingdom” and the phrase “The Kingdom of the heavens is like” echo through the book over 50 times. For Matthew and for Jesus, the Kingdom and mercy are inseparable. Consider these Kingdom passages:
“How blissful the destitute, abject in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of the heavens….How blissful the merciful, for they shall receive mercy….” (Matt 5:3-9)[2]. And from Matthew 9, “Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and announcing the good tidings of the Kingdom and healing every disease and infirmity. And seeing the crowds he was moved inwardly with compassion for them, because they were in distress and cast down, like sheep having no shepherd.” (Matt 9:35-36).
Such is the Kingdom of God, the compassionate, merciful, healing lens through which we see the heart of God in the person of Jesus. In sharp contrast to the political and religious powers of the day, this Kingdom is one ruled by the self-giving love of God. Mercy echoes through the book of Matthew. “I desire mercy and not sacrifice” from Hosea 6:6 appears twice (Matt 9:13 and 12:1). Jesus responds to the cry for mercy with mercy (Matt 9:27, 15:22, 17:15, 20:30). And Jesus condemns the Pharisees publicly in the Temple for their lack of mercy: “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint, dill, and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith” (Matt 23:23).
Knowing that judgment is coming on this generation, Jesus says, “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those who have been sent to you, how often I have wished to gather your children, the way a bird gathers chicks under her wings, and you did not wish it” (Matt 23:37). Here we have a picture of the problem–the neglect of judgment, mercy and faith–and Jesus’ compassionate response. Jesus longs to show compassion, but the Pharisees have rejected it.[3]
The parable of the virgins comes to us in this context. As Jesus and his disciples walk away from the Temple and its corruption, Jesus foretells its destruction (Matt 24:2). As they sit together privately on the Mount of Olives, the disciples ask Jesus when these things will happen. They want to know “the sign of your arrival, and of the consummation of the age” (Matt 24:3). Jesus responds with the words that will be echoed in the coming discourse: “Keep watch, so that no one causes you to go astray” (Matt 24:4). The message is clear. To endure to the end (Matt 24:13), his followers must be alert (Matt 24:42), awake (Matt 24:43) and ready (Matt 24:44). This admonition helps us understand the four parables that follow (the prudent and base slave, the ten virgins, the talents, and the sheep and goats).
While the ten virgins have been interpreted in various ways through time, in keeping with the words of Jesus and Matthew, likening the Kingdom of God to all ten virgins, it seems most likely that these virgins represent the totality of the Church hearing this parable then, now and in the future. The number ten represents universality.[4] From Augustine, “this parable relates to us all, that is, to the whole church together” and, thus, the bride of Christ. [5] Cyril of Alexander takes it a step further: “In the parable all the virgins go out with their lamps. Jesus indicates by this that all souls have been illuminated by God through innate and natural laws but also indeed by the laws written by Moses. Saint Jerome, as well, tells us the virgins are the whole human race.”[6]
In the parable we find ourselves in the midst of a wedding processional in the dark of the night. All virgins are going to meet the bridegroom with lamps, best understood as the torches (lampas in the Greek[7]) the wedding party would carry to light the way of the bride going to meet her bridegroom. Talmudic authorities held that it was the custom to have ten lamps in a bridal possession.[8]
This bridal metaphor echoes through scripture, from Song of Songs through Isaiah who tells us that the Lord will not rest until Zion’s “righteousness shines like a bright light, her salvation like a blazing torch” and that, no longer forsaken and desolate, the land “will be His bride” (Isaiah 62: 1, 4 NRSV). The same language echoes through Matthew as we see Jesus in another wedding celebration with a similar message (see Matt 22:1-13). More specifically, Jesus identifies himself as the bridegroom directly in Matthew 9:15 as he asks the Pharisees, “Can the sons of the bridal chamber mourn so long as the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast.” Clearly, the bridegroom is Jesus, the center of the wedding feast, the One returning for the Church as a bride (see Revelation 19:7).[9]
Matthew gives us the meaning of the lamps directly in Matthew 5:14-16: “You are the light of the world. A city set upon a hill cannot be hidden; Neither do they light a lamp and place it under the dry-goods basket, but rather they place it upon a lampstand, and it illumines all who are in the house. So let your light shine out before humanity, so that they may see your good works and may glorify your Father in the heavens.”[10]
The ten virgins are divided into wise and foolish exactly in half, possibly to show that we are as likely to be one as the other. Jesus and Matthew define “wise” and “foolish” at the end of the Sermon on the Mount, the frame for the entire book and for our parable. Jesus tells us the ones who will enter the Kingdom of the heavens are those “doing the will of my Father who is in the heavens” (Matt 7:22). The wise are those builders who build on the rock, enacting the teachings of Jesus (Matt 7:24). The foolish who build on the sand, failing to follow his teachings, will fall (Matt 7:27).[11]
In our parable, the wise and foolish virgins are distinguished by their oil, and the understanding of “oil” unfolds through the series of parables and most clearly in the separation of the sheep and goats. Those who are welcomed into the Kingdom are those who have shown mercy to the least of these, not those who (like the Pharisees) have demonstrated spiritual or religious power. In this upside down Kingdom where first are last (Matt 19:30, 20:16), love takes the primary place, demonstrated through acts of mercy (Matt 20:27-28).
From Maldonatus, “The opinion of Origen, S. Hillary, The Author and S. John Damascus is the only true and probable one. They understand by the oil good works, without which faith does not shine, that is, is dead (S. James ii. 26), and by which, if present, faith is kindled, shines, is made to appear, to show (S. James ii. 17).” In their understanding, to take oil in the lamps is to lay up a treasure of good works against the future coming on Christ.[12]
While all the virgins have light and some oil, only the five wise virgins have extra oil. This is all that distinguishes them. All the virgins fall asleep as they wait for the bridegroom, unaware of when he’ll come. All awake to the cry to meet the bridegroom. In the waiting for Christ’s coming, all have died[13] and all have risen in the resurrection (see Ephesians 5:14, “Arise sleeper, and stand up from among the dead”). All trim their lamps, readying themselves for judgment.[14] But in the waiting, the five foolish virgins have run out of oil. They are not ready for the bridegroom.
Even in the delay we find mercy, giving time to respond to the central call of Jesus: “Change your hearts; for the Kingdom of the heavens has drawn near” (Matt 4:17). From Hilary of Poitiers, “The delay has given time for repentance.” [15]
The foolish virgins ask the wise for oil so they can continue in the procession. The wise virgins refuse, sending them to the city to buy oil. Perhaps the city is the place they can “acquire” mercy among poor.[16] From Keener, the wise virgins’ refusal displays their wisdom: “since they only had enough for their own torches, sharing would cause all the torches to be extinguished ruining the whole procession.”[17]
This delay gives the foolish virgins time to go to the city to obtain oil. As they’re away, the bridegroom arrives and the wise virgins go in with him to the wedding celebration. There the door is shut, representing the coming judgment.[18] When the unwise virgins arrive late, they ask the Lord to open for them; and in reply he says, “Amen, I tell you, I do not know you.” (Matt 25:12). Unaware of the day and hour of his coming, they’ve not been ready with the oil of mercy, and they’ve missed this entrance to the wedding celebration.[19] Mounce notes this judgment is immediate for the scribes and Pharisees and predictive for the present and future Church as a warning that the second coming of Christ should find them prepared.[20]
Even the nature of this judgment is merciful for those who’ve lacked mercy. From Jesus and Matthew: “And these will go to the chastening of the Age” (Matt 25:46). The Greek word kolasin is best understood as correction[21], meaning the judgment of those found lacking is intended to correct rather than punish.
John Chrysostom is quick to point out that they are “not cursed by the Father but judged by their own actions.” All four parables, he writes, admonish “us about the same things, I mean about diligence in almsgiving, and about helping our neighbor by all means which we are able to use, since it is not possible to be saved in any other way.”[22]
Jesus and Matthew give us the point of the parable clearly: “So be alert, for you do not know the day or the hour” (Matt 25:13). The disciples and we are to live continually alert for signs of the coming of the Son of man,[23] giving mercy to those on the margins, following the way of the wise virgins and the sheep. From Davies and Allison, “Beyond the injustice and disorder of this world is an order and justice of another, which fact guarantees that the actions—even the ordinary actions—of human beings matter and have consequences: people are truly responsible. Moreover, faith that moral order and a happy ending will someday be wrought out of the chaos of human history enables the imagination of Matthew’s reader to see what God has not yet done but will indeed do, and in this way succors those who live the Messiah’s Toran.”[24]
The centrality of the parable and its message is reflected in the Orthodox observation of Holy Tuesday. This prayer from the Services of the Bridegroom during Holy Week guides our response:
“Behold, the Bridegroom cometh in the middle of the night, and blessed is that servant who He shall find watching; And again unworthy is he whom He shall find heedless. Beware, therefore, O my soul, lest thou be overcome with sleep, Lest thou be given up to death, and be shut out from the Kingdom. But rouse thyself and cry: Holy, Joly, Holy are Thou, O God, Through the Mother of God, have mercy on us.”[25]
Through an Emmaus Way reading of Matthew 25:1-13, holding together all of Matthew’s gospel with the character of God clearly visible in Jesus, we see that mercy triumphs over and through judgment, in the end and always. As the bride of Christ in union with him, we are called to embody this same mercy so that mercy becomes who we are. We become the mercy of God to those on the margins, to those in need. And as we become mercy, the Kingdom comes among us now even as it is within us now.
The question for the Church today is, how have we encountered Christ in the faces of others? From a position of power or as a servant? Have we gone higher like the Pharisees or lower like Christ? As we encounter Christ as Christ in others, Christ becomes all in all through love that looks like mercy. This is the way the Kingdom is manifested as we wait, live and die like the wise, storing up treasures in heaven. Judgement means there will be a time in eternity, perhaps painful, but not forever, when we realize the opportunities we’ve missed. We’ll mourn and feel the pain of the loss. And through repentance we’ll receive mercy that heals. In the end, God’s promise to make all things new (Rev 21:1-5) will be fulfilled.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Lexicon. “Bible Hub,” n.d. https://biblehub.com/lexicon/matthew/25-1.htm.
Catena Bible. “Matthew 25.” Catena Bible, n.d. https://catenabible.com/mt/25/1.
Davies, W.D., and Dale C. Allison. Matthew: A Shorter Commetary. New York, NY: T&T Clark International, 2004.
Donfried, Karl Paul. “The Allegory of the Ten Virgins (Matt 25:1-13) as a Summary of Matthean Theology.” Journal of Biblical Literature 93, no. No. 3 (September 1974): 415–28.
Hart, David Bentley. The New Testament. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2017.
Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America. “Holy Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday: Services of the Bridegroom,” n.d. https://www.goarch.org/-/great-monday-tuesday-and-wednesday.
Impact Nations. “Ethics of the Kingdom (Bradley Jersak on Matthew 25).” Accessed March 3, 2022. https://www.impactnations.com/podcasts/teaching.
Keener, Craig S. Matthew: The IVP New Testament Commentary Series. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 1997.
Maldonatus, John. A Commentary on the Holy Gospels, S. Matthew’s Gospel, Chapters XV to the End. 2nd ed. Covent Garden, London: Aberdeen University Press, 1888.
Morris, Leon. The Gospel According to Matthew. Grand Rapids, MI: W. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1992.
Mounce, Robert H. Matthew: New International Biblical Commentary. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, Inc., 1991.
Patte, Daniel. The Gospel According to Matthew. Philadelpia, PA: Fortress Press, 1987.
Sheets, James. “Watch Therefore - The Parable of the Ten Virgins.” Adonai International Christian University, 2015. https://d1wqtxts1xzle7.cloudfront.net/42433346/Watch_Therefore_-_The_Parable_of_the_Ten_Virgins-with-cover-page-v2.pdf?Expires=1651530896&Signature=M6gfU6ni84rE8324PS7lBvDsYeb1qrVpJxKOFCwhCG8Mbvep~ekg551W~VKgBw49gLNhRLa9qr8ARPC6AXTPikRR0lE5RwnNXk9y5gKb6BWeO8z~kB~d9-pe6Rn~ua9BReQActq4B4uBs6vK14maRh4Dm8L7axJFMHkgJJ02PIR0WrRGbr5qmma2LymFFCTay3qxRrkIY2XpxYYWO4MddCEzRi2~FQpCV2fT-X7yiuU-8a~Um32dNL9D4uipTLi6Iul-oiGy1vQh4WcgLi5nQG3ifiDGh5lPaFBmsdf6P2K3DIFfe2iCbmVDdN4IVeRhAMQcUG5edtrVz0XkMB9kUQ__&Key-Pair-Id=APKAJLOHF5GGSLRBV4ZA.
Simonetti, Manlio. Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: Matthew 14-28. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2002.
[1] Leon Morris, The Gospel According to Matthew (Grand Rapids, MI: W. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1992). 4, 8, 12, 15.
[2] David Bentley Hart, The New Testament (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2017). All scriptures are taken from this version unless otherwise noted.
[3] Daniel Patte, The Gospel According to Matthew (Philadelpia, PA: Fortress Press, 1987). 334.
[4] John Maldonatus, A Commentary on the Holy Gospels, S. Matthew’s Gospel, Chapters XV to the End, 2nd ed. (Covent Garden, London: Aberdeen University Press, 1888). 298.
[5] Catena Bible, “Matthew 25,” Catena Bible, n.d., https://catenabible.com/mt/25/1.
[6] Catena Bible.
[7] “Bible Hub,” Lexicon, n.d., https://biblehub.com/lexicon/matthew/25-1.htm.
[8] James Sheets, “Watch Therefore - The Parable of the Ten Virgins” (Adonai International Christian University, 2015), https://d1wqtxts1xzle7.cloudfront.net/42433346/Watch_Therefore_-_The_Parable_of_the_Ten_Virgins-with-cover-page-v2.pdf?Expires=1651530896&Signature=M6gfU6ni84rE8324PS7lBvDsYeb1qrVpJxKOFCwhCG8Mbvep~ekg551W~VKgBw49gLNhRLa9qr8ARPC6AXTPikRR0lE5RwnNXk9y5gKb6BWeO8z~kB~d9-pe6Rn~ua9BReQActq4B4uBs6vK14maRh4Dm8L7axJFMHkgJJ02PIR0WrRGbr5qmma2LymFFCTay3qxRrkIY2XpxYYWO4MddCEzRi2~FQpCV2fT-X7yiuU-8a~Um32dNL9D4uipTLi6Iul-oiGy1vQh4WcgLi5nQG3ifiDGh5lPaFBmsdf6P2K3DIFfe2iCbmVDdN4IVeRhAMQcUG5edtrVz0XkMB9kUQ__&Key-Pair-Id=APKAJLOHF5GGSLRBV4ZA.
[9] Maldonatus, A Commentary on the Holy Gospels, S. Matthew’s Gospel, Chapters XV to the End. 297.
[10] Karl Paul Donfried, “The Allegory of the Ten Virgins (Matt 25:1-13) as a Summary of Matthean Theology,” Journal of Biblical Literature 93, no. No. 3 (September 1974): 415–28.
[11] Donfried.
[12] Maldonatus, A Commentary on the Holy Gospels, S. Matthew’s Gospel, Chapters XV to the End. 299.
[13] Donfried, “The Allegory of the Ten Virgins (Matt 25:1-13) as a Summary of Matthean Theology.”
[14] Manlio Simonetti, Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: Matthew 14-28 (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2002). 217-218.
[15] Simonetti. 218.
[16] Impact Nations, “Ethics of the Kingdom (Bradley Jersak on Matthew 25),” accessed March 3, 2022, https://www.impactnations.com/podcasts/teaching.
[17] Craig S. Keener, Matthew: The IVP New Testament Commentary Series (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 1997). 357.
[18] W.D. Davies and Dale C. Allison, Matthew: A Shorter Commetary (New York, NY: T&T Clark International, 2004). 444..
[19] Maldonatus, A Commentary on the Holy Gospels, S. Matthew’s Gospel, Chapters XV to the End. 302.
[20] Robert H. Mounce, Matthew: New International Biblical Commentary (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, Inc., 1991). 232.
[21] “Bible Hub.”
[22] Catena Bible, “Matthew 25.”
[23] Patte, The Gospel According to Matthew. 344.
[24] Davies and Allison, Matthew: A Shorter Commetary. 460.
[25] “Holy Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday: Services of the Bridegroom.”