Today's Gospel - parable of the talents

[Jack_Bauer]

My view on the Gospel and the parable was that God gives us each talents, some get more than others. We are asked to develop them in some way based on our abilities and situations in life.

I think of the 3 T’s: Time, Talent, Treasure. Time: giving of our spare time in doing good (Example: a cook going for an hour to a soup kitchen once a week to make food). Talent: doing something good for others that involves something we are good at doing (example: a person who plays music for a living playing the organ at Mass for no charge). Treasure: financially and giving of material possessions depending on our individual economic situation in life (giving what we can in the collection, giving a few cans of food to the food drive/pantry) etc.

Mataphorically speaking, YES. But the actual language is what I described. And it does apply to us as well. But I believe he was speaking directly to the leaders of God’s people. In some ways he was also speaking to all mankind… wealthy business owners for example. Have you ever known of a successful company that never took risks? It’s more spiritual though I believe. But Jesus is using language of the Jews, money seemed to be how they communicated best. Greed existed back then too. A businessman, represented by the servant, receives money and rather than expanding to help others, he hoards it and makes up a lame excuse.

 

[EricFilmer]

Here are my thoughts as to how a homily on the Parable of the Talents could have been used to point out the importance of social and economical injustice (according to what the priest in question seemed to have in mind) and still be in keeping (more or less) with a more traditional interpretation of the parable. In other words, had I been the priest in question and really wanted to preach on this topic (and did not want to wait until a more direct Mass reading came up) then this is how I probably would have done it:

1) The Master represents Christ. He gives us talents (in terms of skills, abilities, resources, blessings, etc.) and expects us to use them to do virtuous deeds and promote his kingdom on earth. And when I say “resources” I am including financial resources.

2) One of the things we should use our talents for is to help the poor, which includes working to prevent injustice and exploitation in our economic structures. We can help people along the whole range of stewardship: time, talent & treasure. In terms of treasure, we can commit our resources towards (among other things) generating more resources in order to provide for more people. For example, $100,000 can be used to directly buy food for the poor, but it can also be put into the bank as a CD to generate ongoing interest which can then be used to buy food for the poor.

3) We will all one day be judged by Christ in terms of how well we used our talents. This will include discerning how mindful we were to those in need, and to those who are the most vulnerable in society.

4) The first two servants in the parable utilized their God-given talents to help the poor (among other things). The wicked servant represents those who squander or misuse their God-given talents out of sloth and/or fear, which results in the poor being either exploited (sin of commission) or neglected (sin of omission).

Evidently the priest in question also wanted to work into his homily a warning against the sin of being greedy. This would be a little difficult in light of the outline I just proposed. After all, neither the master nor the first two servants are being greedy, and the profits they rendered represented virtuous deeds for the sake of the poor. In terms of the third servant, his wickedness is described in the parable as resulting from fear and laziness, but not greed. Perhaps, for the sake of the homily, an extrapolation could be made to suggest that in burying the talent, he was hoarding his God-given talents rather than putting them to good use (and therefore some sort of teaching against greed could be made).

 

[Ridgerunner]

Perhaps we shouldn’t take the REAL master’s “greed” in a worldly way.

God, after all, truly is “greedy”. He wants all souls…every last one of them. He concedes none. So, this master in the parable is “greedy” in the way God is “greedy”. He wants all his servants to produce for him. God wants His servants to do the same thing, but with souls. This one might be a missionary who converts thousands, and that’s fine. That one might only provide God with the souls of his children or his spouse, or maybe just one friend, and that’s fine too. But the one who is given the gift of faith and does nothing whatever to assuage God’s “greed” for souls, is condemned.

Anyway, that’s how I see it.

 

[SwissGuard25]

Look at what I posted. A talent of gold or silver is not a coin. It’s a huge amount of bullion… a weight of measurement. A tallent is 130 pounds… that 2080 oz. of gold or silver. There are other substances that could be used as well, but these are common back then. The servant that received one talent received in today’s market, approximately $4 million dollars. So I believe Jesus is talking about the leaders of the Church and possibly the Jewish leaders of the time. They would have known what he was saying and realized it was a slap in the face. Remember, the Pharisees were insanely jealous of Jesus’ following, which produced much fruit, thus multiple talents.

In today’s application of the Tallents, Jesus is speaking to all of us… Evangelize. But this is particular directed towards the leaders of the Church. But for those of us that are little guys, we have the same burden to evangelize or to use our wealth, tallents, riches, whatever you want to call it, to evangelize… prosper [save souls] for the Church.

Yes, your’s does make more sense than mine.
Thank You.
God Bless.

 

[Barbkw]

I don’t want to discuss the OWS movement, just my priest’s take on the parable. Is this the best or even a valid take on this parable?

Sean

IMO, it’s invalid. Jesus wasn’t commenting on the OWS movement. He was talking about the time, talent and treasures that God has given to us - so that we in turn will give back to His Church and to other people.

What a liberal interpreation of the Gospel.

 

[DCNBILL]

Our pastor made a much simpler point about this Gospel.

The talents represent faith.

If you “use” your faith, share it with others, it will grow in you and you will become richer in it.

If you do not use your faith, bury it, and do not share it with others it will diminish and eventually disappear.

Faith is the only thing when shared with others that will actually increase in the one who shares.

 

[mburn16]

It is a curious parable - I always had trouble understanding it as a child.

However, I gained a better understanding of it when we selected it as the gospel reading for my aunt’s funeral. In the homily, the Priest explained the parable as a lesson in using what God has given us - our gifts, our talents, our responsibilities - to create more for ourselves and others. To build on what we have to expand the pool.

It also relates to growing and exploring our faith, and reaching out to better understand God and not simply being content in saying “I believe”.

…at least that was this Priest’s view on it.

Frankly, I’m inclined to agree with him.

Isn’t there a quote from one of the deutocannonical (spl) books that warns us against acting as misers, and instead tells us to use what we have for our own growth and enjoyment?

 

[MarkThompson]

I skipped that previous 5 posts to give you guys this information I obtained about 2 weeks ago. I did some research on what is a “talent” and determined from my research that during the time of Christ a talent is a unit of measure for “money” or a commodity. A talent of Gold is 130 pounds. I calculated todays value of gold to get an idea of what it was worth back then in today’s standards so that we can better understand. I’ll post what I discovered and sent to my pastor below:

Try fathoming this. If someone gave you this much money, wouldn’t it make you nervous? I think so. The problem is that we need to think in terms of bishops and priests here… leaders of the Church. We know that the Church cost money to run. The value of the gold represents the treasures given by God to bishops, not just the laity. In order to make it grow [make the Church grow] we [the bishops] must take risks. Salvation history is a risky business. The bishops, [leaders of the Church today and then, represented by the Pharisees then] had the choice of growing God’s people or denying them [represented by burying the treasure]. I’ll stop there for now. But I think I’m onto something here. It also could have the modern day twist we often see with the telents being gifts, but I believe it’s more accurately represented by what I’m illuding to so unpolished. I’ll pass this on to my pastor and another friend {priest} from my seminary days… we call each other “brother.”

Unfortunately, the problem with your calculations are that gold is overvalued today, and gold in Biblical times would not have been .999 pure anyway (also, you are confusing troy and avoirdupois measurements).

As far as I’m aware, a talent is generally accepted as being about twenty years’ wages for an average laborer. It’s difficult to translate that into exact terms in modern money, but $4 million is greatly excessive – unless average laborers are pulling down $200,000 a year, in which case you can sign me right up. If we took a year’s wages at a more modest, say, $37,000, then a talent is about three quarters of a million. Then again, if we took the average wage of a laborer in Mexico, we’d have something very different, wouldn’t we.

 

[MKranz]

Regarding the parable of the talents I have a view on its interpretation somewhat different from what I have seen posted. The priest in the parish I attended yesterday spoke about personal talents and compared the use of personal talents to the talents given the servants by the master in the parable. The master being God and the servants being us. First, it is poor translation to say the word for money translates to a word in the English language to describe personal characteristics. I feel the priests who spoke of the talents being symbolic of God’s gift of grace to us were much more on target. My view is that God is love and God gives us love. The love He gives us He expects us to give to others. As he said to the Apostles at the Ascension, ‘love one another as I have loved you’. This interpretation fits the story and its moral. To them who do well with what love God gives them, by showing love to others in return, they will receive more love. Those who do nothing with the love they receive from God will have even what He has given them taken away. Further, remember Jesus said many will call ‘Lord, Lord’ but few will enter the kingdom of heaven. Those who do nothing with the love God has given them will be refused at the gates of heaven. Also, Jesus said to Peter ‘feed my sheep’ after asking Peter 3 times if he loved Him. To me ‘feed my sheep’ means give my love to others. I welcome any comments you all may have on this interpretation of the parable of the talents. Thank you.

 

[EasterJoy]

Today’s gospel was the parable of the talents. In the homily afterward, my priest explained that the master in the parable was not God, but rather a greedy person. The third servant, in good conscience, refused to make his master richer by taking from the poor to expand his fortune. For this display of conscience, he was fired by his master. In leading up to this interpretation, Father noted that the Occupy Wall Street movements are protesting expansion of wealth at the expense of the poor.

I don’t want to discuss the OWS movement, just my priest’s take on the parable. Is this the best or even a valid take on this parable?

Sean

I had heard that take on it in the past, which is different than the more common explanation that we are meant to use those things over which we have stewardship to advance the Kingdom of God. When I heard the Gospel this last Sunday, however, I heard a “clunk” on the “new” theory that the third person was practicing some sort of brave disobedience:

Note the words used by the “servant in good conscience” to explain his failure to turn a profit for the returned “evil king”:

'Master, I knew you were a demanding person,
harvesting where you did not plant
and gathering where you did not scatter;
so out of fear I went off and buried your talent in the ground.
Here it is back"

Now, *either *the 3rd person did not in fact refuse to invest out of good conscience, but rather out of fear of failure (or laziness that he is even more fearful to admit), or else he was trying to make a statement by his non-compliance, but then lied about the motives he had been attempting to state…?!? Does the second explanation even make sense? Who would tell a story about a good principled person who folded up and lied when he actually had to give a verbal account to the evil man he had been defying? In a metaphorical parable, would any reasonably decent storyteller ever have a character do that? Unless the parable is meant to be a very cynical statement about humankind, the metaphor doesn’t even make sense.

Note also that the woman in the first reading (which is chosen specifically to foreshadow the Gospel) is an industrious woman, not a defiant one. If you read the whole of chapter 31 of Proverbs, she is praised because “She picks out a field to purchase; out of her earnings she plants a vineyard.” (Prov. 31:16) This also points to the Church understanding the parable as praising the industriuos servants, rather than ones who do nothing to make a “statement”.

 

[Jack_Bauer]

Unfortunately, the problem with your calculations are that gold is overvalued today, and gold in Biblical times would not have been .999 pure anyway (also, you are confusing troy and avoirdupois measurements).

As far as I’m aware, a talent is generally accepted as being about twenty years’ wages for an average laborer. It’s difficult to translate that into exact terms in modern money, but $4 million is greatly excessive – unless average laborers are pulling down $200,000 a year, in which case you can sign me right up. If we took a year’s wages at a more modest, say, $37,000, then a talent is about three quarters of a million. Then again, if we took the average wage of a laborer in Mexico, we’d have something very different, wouldn’t we.

I appreciate the information. But I hunted down the answer to this and it specifically states the location and the time. Sure, gold may be over valued today, but cut it in half and you still have a small fortune. There are different types of talents as well. We don’t know which one. That was beside the point. If you read my original post you may have seen how many talents of gold and silver were set aside. I watched a video on Netflix on the Tabernacle. Amazing. It’s all contained in scripture. However, there is no replacement for a good visual representation of what it really was like. I always had a very poor image in my mind of what it all looked like and cost.

Besides, even 20 years wages is an enormous amount of money when you think about it. I would argue that the answer is somewhere between yours and mine…thus, still a substantial amount of money at stake. I, as well as many today, have this visual that a talent is a gold coin or similar. The weight, depending on where, varies. But the one I used was the heavier one associated with Rome during the time of Christ. I’ll recheck, but I believe I’m still correct. My analogy, metaphor, still stands. But so do the others.

 

[Jack_Bauer]

Read the following and note the references on the bottom.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talent_%28measurement%29

The “talent” (Latin: talentum, from Ancient Greek: τάλαντον, talanton ‘scale, balance’) was one of several ancient units of mass, as well as corresponding units of value equivalent to these masses of a precious metal.[1] It was approximately the mass of water required to fill an amphora.[1] A Greek, or Attic talent, was 26 kilograms (57 lb),[2] a Roman talent was 32.3 kilograms (71 lb), an Egyptian talent was 27 kilograms (60 lb),[2] and a Babylonian talent was 30.3 kilograms (67 lb).[3] Ancient Israel, and other Levantine countries, adopted the Babylonian talent, but later revised the mass.[4] The heavy common talent, used in New Testament times, was 58.9 kilograms (130 lb).[4]
The talent of gold was known to Homer, who described how Achilles gave a half-talent of gold to Antilochus as a prize.[5] An Attic talent of silver was the value of nine man-years of skilled work.[6] During the Peloponnesian War, an Attic talent was the amount of silver that would pay a month’s wages of a trireme crew.[7] Hellenistic mercenaries were commonly paid one drachma per day of military service. There were 6,000 drachmae in an Attic talent.
The Babylonians, Sumerians, and Hebrews divided a talent into 60 mina, each of which was subdivided into 60 shekels. The Greek also used the ratio of 60 mina to one talent. A Greek mina was approximately 434 ± 3 grams. A Roman talent was 100 libra. A libra is exactly three quarters of a Greek mina, so a Roman talent is 1.25 Greek talents. An Egyptian talent was 80 libra.[2]
The talent as a unit of value is mentioned in the New Testament in Jesus’s parable of the talents.[8] This parable is the origin of the sense of the word “talent” meaning “gift or skill” as used in English and other languages.[9][10] Luke includes a similar parable with different details involving the mina.[11] The talent is also used elsewhere in the Bible, as when describing the material invested in the dwelling of the commandments.[12] Solomon received 666 gold talents a year.[13]

 

[Incomplete]

Interesting thread!

Note that nowhere in the story did the Master take the talents back. My priest also mentioned the reckless generosity of God.

He had a lot to say, but I’ll just quote his ending because it sums it up well. Oh, and the words “what we do with the dash” refers to that dash on our tombstones between birth and death.

Our little friend is so afraid about doing the wrong thing he simply does nothing. I can relate: at times I am too timid with what I own (one gets so tired of being asked for a gift) … too timid with my time (when crazy busy, my in-servicing with God is often the first thing to go) … too timid with my faith (hiding it from co-workers and friends lest things get uncomfortable). How about you? Are you daring enough to rearrange your priorities …about generosity, prayer, witnessing to what you hold dear? This parable isn’t about capitalism or “being all you can be.” It’s about “what we do with the dash,” and the confidence Jesus has in servants to whom he’s entrusted his whole project … the trust we’re expected to have in Him that he does not call us to failure. How we betray his exuberant, reckless, Good Friday love with our pinched little lives and miserly efforts at religion. Christ does not want us to hedge our bets on him. He told this story on the way to his death after all … his ultimate, reckless, extravagant act. Playing it safe with Jesus (it seems) won’t pay.

 

[FAB]

Today’s gospel was the parable of the talents. In the homily afterward, my priest explained that the master in the parable was not God, but rather a greedy person. The third servant, in good conscience, refused to make his master richer by taking from the poor to expand his fortune. For this display of conscience, he was fired by his master. In leading up to this interpretation, Father noted that the Occupy Wall Street movements are protesting expansion of wealth at the expense of the poor.

I don’t want to discuss the OWS movement, just my priest’s take on the parable. Is this the best or even a valid take on this parable?

Sean

I would strongly disagree with your preist homily.
If you read the Gospel carefully, the master allows the servants not only to keep the initial amount, but also the interest that they had earned.
We are given gifts from God, we are called to use them and develop them to profit the kingdom, those thast do not profit no one not even themselves, and what they have they loose because the don’t use it.

 

[amerrychase]

catecheticsonline.com/CatenaAurea-Matthew25.php (Aquinas’ collection of commentary by Church fathers.)

Thank you for posting this link! I’ve had trouble with this parable since I was young, mostly because nobody ever addresses the conversation between the third servant and his master, and that is the part that sticks out most to me. How nice to see a different spin on the usual talent=gifts.

 

[Jack_Bauer]

Read the following and note the references on the bottom.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talent_%28measurement%29

I meant the reference on the bottom of the original link.

 

[Incomplete]

Another take:

Like others have said, it shows the generosity of the Master, and how much he entrusted to his servants.

It’s about the trust we’re supposed to have in God that he doesn’t call us to failure. How we can betray that trust with our miserly efforts at religion. Remember that this happened on the way to His death, a pretty extravagant act. It’s about what we do with our lives.