I’m sure most of us have heard a sermon about this parable. I’m pretty sure most of us heard a metaphorical or allegorical interpretation. I’m also pretty sure that most of us heard an interpretation of this parable that challenged us to be a good wheat.
Incidentally, only the rich could afford wheat bread in Ancient Palestine. The poor ate barley.
I want to focus on the weeds. Masamang damo! Or more appropriately, weeds or tares that look so much like wheat that Palestinians to this day call it “bastard wheat.” You can actually call this narrative the parable of the wheat and the bastard wheat!
The parable is akin to the one about sheep and goats. It's about judgment. God’s judgment. Not ours. There will be time to separate the wheat from the bastard wheat. In God’s time.
Why God? Because wheat and bastard wheat are actually sisters and brothers! God created both. So, God will judge. God will separate. Definitely no one else. Only God.
And since God is a God of surprises, God’s judgment will probably surprise both those who self-righteously think they are the good wheat and those whom the good wheat label as bastard wheat.
Reading the Bible inside a Jeepney: Celebrating Colonized and Occupied Peoples' capacity to beat swords into ploughshares; to transform weapons of mass destruction into instruments of mass celebration; mortar shells into church bells, teargas canisters to flowerpots; rifle barrels into flutes; U.S. Military Army Jeeps into Filipino Mass Transport Jeepneys.
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