Parable of the Lost Coin
The Parable of the Lost Coin is one of the parables of Jesus. It appears in Luke 15:8–10. In it, a woman searches for a lost coin, finds it, rejoices, it is a member of a trilogy on redemption that Jesus tells after the Pharisees and religious leaders accuse Him of welcoming and eating with "sinners." The other two are the Parable of the Lost Sheep, the Parable of the Lost Son or Prodigal Son. As recounted in Luke 15, a woman with ten silver coins loses one, she lights an oil lamp and sweeps her house until she finds it, rejoicing when she does: Or what woman, if she had ten drachma coins, if she lost one drachma coin, wouldn't light a lamp, sweep the house, seek diligently until she found it? When she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying,'Rejoice with me, for I have found the drachma which I had lost.' So, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner repenting." Joel B. Green notes that the woman described is a poor peasant, the ten silver coins, corresponding to ten days' wages, "likely represent the family savings."
The coins may have been the woman's dowry, worn as an ornament. Both theories may be true, either one explains the urgency of the woman's search, the extent of her joy when the missing coin is found. Like the Parable of the Ten Virgins, this is a parable about women which follows, makes the same point as, a preceding parable about men. In Greek, the "friends and neighbors" are female. Green suggests that the invitation to the "friends and neighbors" may reflect a celebratory meal, which recalls the meals Jesus is accused of sharing with "sinners." The woman's diligent activity in searching may symbolise either Jesus' own activity or that of God the Father. The rejoicing of the angels is understood to be rejoicing along with God; this parable has been depicted by several artists, including John Everett Millais, Jan Luyken, Domenico Fetti, James Tissot. Life of Jesus in the New Testament Ministry of Jesus Biblical Art on the WWW: The Lost Coin
Parable of the Prodigal Son
The Parable of the Prodigal Son is one of the parables of Jesus and appears in Luke 15:11–32. Jesus Christ shares it with the Pharisees and others. In the story, a father has a younger and an older; the younger son asks the father for his inheritance, the father grants his son's request. However, the younger son is prodigal and squanders his fortune becoming destitute; the younger son is forced to return home empty-handed and intends to beg his father to accept him back as a servant. To the son's surprise, he is not scorned by his father but is welcomed back with celebration and fanfare. Envious, the older son refuses to participate in the festivities; the father reminds the older son that one day he will inherit everything, that they should still celebrate the return of the younger son because he was lost and is now found. It is the third and final part of a cycle on redemption, following the Parable of the Lost Sheep and the Parable of the Lost Coin. In Revised Common Lectionary and Roman Rite Catholic Lectionary, this parable is read on the fourth Sunday of Lent.
In the Eastern Orthodox Church it is read on the Sunday of the Prodigal Son. The parable begins with a young man, the younger of two sons, who asks his father to give him his share of the estate; the implication is the son could not wait for his father's death for his inheritance, he wanted it immediately. The father divides his estate between both sons. Upon receiving his portion of the inheritance, the younger son travels to a distant country and wastes all his money in extravagant living. Thereafter, a famine strikes the land; when he reaches the point of envying the food of the pigs he is watching, he comes to his senses: But when he came to himself he said, "How many hired servants of my father's have bread enough to spare, I'm dying with hunger! I will get up and go to my father, will tell him,'Father, I have sinned against heaven, in your sight. I am no more worthy to be called your son. Make me as one of your hired servants.'" He arose, came to his father. But while he was still far off, his father saw him, was moved with compassion, ran towards him, fell on his neck, kissed him.
This implies the father was watching for the son's return. The son does not have time to finish his rehearsed speech, since the father calls for his servants to dress him in a fine robe, a ring, sandals, slaughter the "fattened calf" for a celebratory meal; the older son, at work in the fields, hears the sound of celebration, is told about the return of his younger brother. He is not impressed, becomes angry, he has a speech for his father: But he answered his father, "Behold, these many years I have served you, I never disobeyed a commandment of yours, but you never gave me a goat, that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this, your son, who has devoured your living with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him." The parable concludes with the father explaining that because the younger son had returned, in a sense, from the dead, celebration was necessary: "But it was appropriate to celebrate and be glad, for this, your brother, was dead, is alive again. He was lost, is found."
Allegory is common in the Old Testament, parables are a typical rabbinical method of teaching. The older son would have the first share in the father's inheritance as his firstborn, unless his younger brother received this share from the father by redemption via presentation in the temple. In addition, the younger son would receive the older son's inheritance upon his brother's death according to the mitzvah yibbum; the younger son demanding his share in his father's inheritance before his father's or his brother's death is illegal, as it is the same as assuming they are both dead. In this parable, Jesus portrays the younger son's life of sin in a typical scriptural way: sexual immorality, like how God describes Israel as a harlot to Hosea. Again, Jesus uses a typical scriptural way of describing the consequences of sin: bondage to wicked gentiles, like the Babylonian captivity; the younger son being joyfully greeted and celebrated by the father is typical of God promising to deliver Israel from exile.
The older son not sharing in his father's joy is typical of scriptural portrayals of unrepentant sinners. The last few verses of the parable summarize the parable in accordance with the Jewish teaching of the two ways of acting: the way of life and the way of death. God, according to Judaism, rejoices over and grants more graces to repentant sinners than righteous souls who don't need repentance. With all this in mind, it is obvious what Jesus is implying with the parable: more than just teaching the Jewish leaders to rejoice as he dose over repentant sinners, he is teaching them how Israel ought to treat the righteous gentiles. In addition, Jesus is teaching them that, if they do not repent of being prodigal sons, they will forfeit their inheritance, so, not share in the world to come like the righteous gentiles; this is the last of three parables about loss and redemption, following the parable of the Lost Sheep and the parable of the Lost Coin, that Jesus tells after the Pharisees and religious leaders accuse him of welcoming and
Good Shepherd
The Good Shepherd is an image used in the pericope of John 10:1-21, in which Jesus Christ is depicted as the Good Shepherd who lays down his life for his sheep. Similar imagery is used in Psalm 23; the Good Shepherd is discussed in the other gospels, the Epistle to the Hebrews, the First Epistle of Peter and the Book of Revelation. In the Gospel of John, Jesus states "I am the good shepherd" in two verses, John 10:11 and 10:14. From John 10:11-18: I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. He, a hired hand, not a shepherd, who doesn't own the sheep, sees the wolf coming, leaves the sheep, flees; the wolf snatches the sheep, scatters them. The hired hand flees because he is a hired hand, doesn't care for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own, I'm known by my own. I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep. I must bring them and they will hear my voice, they will become one flock with one shepherd. Therefore the Father loves me. No one takes it away from me.
I have power to lay it down, I have power to take it again. I received this commandment from my Father; this passage is one of several sections of John's Gospel which generate division among the Jews: "There was a division again among the Jews because of these sayings. Many of them said, ` He is mad. Why do you listen to Him?' Others said,'These are not the words of one who has a demon'. Jesus Christ is compared to a shepherd in Matthew 2:6, Matthew 9:36, Matthew 25:32, Matthew 26:31, Mark 6:34, Mark 14:27, John 10:2, Hebrews 13:20, 1 Peter 2:25, 1 Peter 5:4, Revelation 7:17. Several authors such as Tinto, Barbara Reid, Arland Hultgren or Donald Griggs comment that "parables are noticeably absent from the Gospel of John". According to the Catholic Encyclopedia article on Parables: "There are no parables in St. John's Gospel" and according to the Encyclopædia Britannica article on Gospel of St. John: "Here Jesus' teaching contains no parables and but three allegories, the Synoptists present it as parabolic through and through."
The image of the Good Shepherd is the most common of the symbolic representations of Christ found in early Christian art in the Catacombs of Rome, before Christian imagery could be made explicit. The form of the image showing a young man carrying a lamb round his neck was directly borrowed from the much older pagan kriophoros and in the case of portable statuettes like the most famous one now in the Pio Cristiano Museum, Vatican City, it is impossible to say whether the image was created with the intention of having a Christian significance; the image continued to be used in the centuries after Christianity was legalized in 313. It was not understood as a portrait of Jesus, but a symbol like others used in Early Christian art, in some cases may have represented the Shepherd of Hermas, a popular Christian literary work of the 2nd century. However, by about the 5th century, the figure more took on the appearance of the conventional depiction of Christ, as it had developed by this time, was given a halo and rich robes, as on the apse mosaic in the church of Santi Cosma e Damiano in Rome, or at Ravenna.
Images of the Good Shepherd include a sheep on his shoulders, as in the Lukan version of the Parable of the Lost Sheep. In ancient Greek cult, kriophoros or criophorus, the "ram-bearer" is a figure that commemorates the solemn sacrifice of a ram, it becomes an epithet of Hermes: Hermes Kriophoros. In two-dimensional art, Hermes Kriophoros transformed into the Christ carrying a lamb and walking among his sheep: "Thus we find philosophers holding scrolls or a Hermes Kriophoros which can be turned into Christ giving the Law and the Good Shepherd respectively"; the Good Shepherd is a common motif from the Catacombs of Rome and in sarcophagus reliefs, where Christian and pagan symbolism are combined, making secure identifications difficult. Media related to Good Shepherd at Wikimedia Commons Holman Bible Dictionary - "Shepherd" for other Biblical references
Religious text
Religious texts are texts which religious traditions consider to be central to their practice or beliefs. Religious texts may be used to provide meaning and purpose, evoke a deeper connection with the divine, convey religious truths, promote religious experience, foster communal identity, guide individual and communal religious practice. Religious texts communicate the practices or values of a religious traditions and can be looked to as a set of guiding principles which dictate physical, spiritual, or historical elements considered important to a specific religion; the terms'sacred' text and'religious' text are not interchangeable in that some religious texts are believed to be sacred because of their nature as divinely or supernaturally revealed or inspired, whereas some religious texts are narratives pertaining to the general themes, practices, or important figures of the specific religion, not considered sacred by itself. A core function of a religious text making it sacred is its ceremonial and liturgical role in relation to sacred time, the liturgical year, the divine efficacy and subsequent holy service.
It is not possible to create an exhaustive list of religious texts, because there is no single definition of which texts are recognized as religious. One of the oldest known religious texts is the Kesh Temple Hymn of Ancient Sumer, a set of inscribed clay tablets which scholars date around 2600 BCE; the Epic of Gilgamesh from Sumer, although only considered by some scholars as a religious text, has origins as early as 2150-2000 BCE, stands as one of the earliest literary works that includes various mythological figures and themes of interaction with the divine. The Rig Veda of ancient Hinduism is estimated to have been composed between 1700–1100 BCE, which not only denotes it as one of the oldest known religious texts, but one of the oldest written religious text, still used in religious practice to this day, though no actual evidence of this text exists prior to the 13th century AD. There are many possible dates given to the first writings which can be connected to Talmudic and Biblical traditions, the earliest of, found in scribal documentation of the 8th century BCE, followed by administrative documentation from temples of the 5th and 6th centuries BCE, with another common date being the 2nd century BCE.
Although a significant text in the history of religious text because of its widespread use among religious denominations and its continued use throughout history, the texts of the Abrahamic traditions are a good example of the lack of certainty surrounding dates and definitions of religious texts. High rates of mass production and distribution of religious texts did not begin until the invention of the printing press in 1440, before which all religious texts were hand written copies, of which there were limited quantities in circulation. A religious canon refers to the accepted and unchanging collection of texts which a religious denomination considers comprehensive in terms of their specific application of texts. For example, the content of a Protestant Bible may differ from the content of a Catholic Bible - insofar as the Protestant Old Testament does not include the Deuterocanonical books while the Roman Catholic canon does. Protestants and Catholics use the same 27 book NT canon, as well as the same 39 book OT protocanon shared by Jews.
The word "canon" comes from the Sumerian word meaning "standard". The terms "scripture" and variations such as "Holy Writ", "Holy Scripture" or "Sacred Scripture" are defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as terms which apply to Biblical text and the Christian tradition. Hierographology is the study of sacred texts; the following is an in-exhaustive list of links to specific religious texts which may be used for further, more in-depth study. A Course in Miracles The writings of Franklin Albert Jones a.k.a. Adi Da Love-Ananda Samraj Aletheon The Companions of the True Dawn Horse The Dawn Horse Testament Gnosticon The Heart of the Adi Dam Revelation Not-Two IS Peace Pneumaton Transcendental Realism The Nine Freedoms Havamal Eddur Great Hymn to the Aten The Akilathirattu Ammanai The Arul Nool The Borgia Group codices Books by Bahá'u'lláh The Four Valleys The Seven Valleys The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh Gems of Divine Mysteries The Book of Certitude Summons of the Lord of Hosts Tabernacle of Unity Kitáb-i-Aqdas Tablets of Bahá’u’lláh Revealed After the Kitáb-i-Aqdas Epistle to the Son of the Wolf Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá'u'lláh Bon Kangyur and Tengyur Theravada BuddhismThe Tipitaka or Pāli Canon Vinaya Pitaka Sutta Pitaka Digha Nikaya, the "long" discourses.
Majjhima Nikaya, the "middle-length" discourses. Samyutta Nikaya, the "connected" discourses. Anguttara Nikaya, the "numerical" discourses. Khuddaka Nikaya, the "minor collection". Abhidhamma PitakaEast Asian Mahayana The Chinese Buddhist Mahayana sutras, including Diamond Sutra and the Heart Sutra Shurangama Sutra and its Shurangama Mantra Great Compassion Mantra Pure Land Buddhism Infinite Life Sutra Amitabha Sutra Contemplation Sutra other Pure Land Sutras Tiantai and Nichiren Lotus Sutra Shingon Mahavairocana Sutra Vajrasekhara SutraTibeta
Parable of the Friend at Night
The Parable of the Friend at Night is a parable of Jesus which appears in Luke 11:5-8. In it, a friend agrees to help his neighbor due to his persistent demands rather than because they are friends, despite the late hour and the inconvenience of it; this parable demonstrates the need to pray without giving up. It is similar to the Parable of the Unjust Judge and is depicted by several artists, including William Holman Hunt; the parable is as follows: He said to them, "Which of you, if you go to a friend at midnight, tell him,'Friend, lend me three loaves of bread, for a friend of mine has come to me from a journey, I have nothing to set before him,' and he from within will answer and say,'Don't bother me. The door is now shut, my children are with me in bed. I can't get up and give it to you'? I tell you, although he will not rise and give it to him because he is his friend, yet because of his persistence, he will get up and give him as many as he needs." The scene described in this parable suggests a single-roomed peasant house, where the whole family sleeps together on a mat on the floor, a man travelling by night to avoid the heat of the day.
The reason for the friend's request is hospitality, a sacred duty throughout the Mediterranean world in antiquity. This parable appears in the Gospel of Luke after Jesus teaches the Lord's Prayer, can therefore be viewed as a continuation of Jesus teaching his disciples how to pray, while the verses which follow help to explain the meaning of the parable: "I tell you, keep asking, it will be given you. Keep seeking, you will find. Keep knocking, it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, he who seeks finds. To him who knocks it will be opened." Joel B. Green suggests that the question that opens the parable is intended to be answered as an emphatic "No!", since no friend would refuse to help under such circumstances. However, Jesus goes on to point out that if friendship wasn't a big enough motivation, help would still be forthcoming; as with verses Luke 11:9-13, the parable is therefore an incentive to pray. The parable of the Unjust Judge has a similar meaning. There are a number of depictions of this parable, the most famous being The Importunate Neighbour by William Holman Hunt, held in the National Gallery of Victoria, Australia.
Life of Jesus in the New Testament Ministry of Jesus Parable of the Unjust Judge
Parable of the Hidden Treasure
The Parable of the Hidden Treasure is a well known parable of Jesus, which appears in Matthew 13:44, illustrates the great value of the Kingdom of Heaven. It precedes the parable of the Pearl, which has a similar theme; the parable has been depicted by artists such as Rembrandt. The brief parable of the hidden treasure is as follows: "Again, the Kingdom of Heaven is like a treasure hidden in the field, which a man found, hid. In his joy, he goes and sells all that he has, buys that field." The setting here presupposes that someone has buried a treasure and died. The current owner of the field is unaware of its existence; the finder a farm labourer, is entitled to it, but is unable to conveniently extract it unless he buys the field. For a peasant, such a discovery of treasure represented the "ultimate dCSK">Craig S. Keener, A Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew, Eerdmans, 1999, ISBN 0-8028-3821-9, p. 391.</ref> This parable is interpreted as illustrating the great value of the Kingdom of Heaven, thus has a similar theme to the parable of the pearl.
John Nolland comments that the good fortune reflected in the "finding" reflects a "special privilege," and a source of joy, but reflects a challenge, just as the man in the parable gives up all that he has, in order to lay claim to the greater treasure he has found. John Calvin writes of this parable: The first two of these parables are intended to instruct believers to prefer the Kingdom of heaven to the whole world, therefore to deny themselves and all the desires of the flesh, that nothing may prevent them from obtaining so valuable a possession. We are in need of such a warning; the hidden nature of the treasure may indicate that the Kingdom of Heaven "is not yet revealed to everyone."However, other interpretations of the parable exist, in which the treasure represents Israel or the Church. In St. Thomas Aquinas' Catena Aurea, he compiles the comments of some of the Church Fathers on this passage, who point out that like the treasure hidden in the field, the Gospel comes without cost, is open to all - but to possess heavenly riches, one must be willing to give up the world to buy it.
The Fathers identify that the field in which the treasure is hidden is the discipline of Heavenly learning: this, when a man finds, he hides, in order that he may preserve it. For in this present life we are in the war which leads to our country, evil spirits as robbers beset us in our journey; those therefore who carry their treasure they seek to plunder in the way. When I say this; the kingdom of heaven is therefore compared to things of earth, that the mind may rise from things familiar to things unknown, may learn to love the unknown by that which it knows is loved when known It follows, And for joy thereof he goes and sells all that he has, buys that field. He it is that sells all he, has and buys the field, renouncing fleshly delights tramples upon all his worldly desires in his anxiety for the heavenly discipline. In the Gospel of Thomas A similar parable appears in the Gospel of Thomas: Jesus said, "The kingdom is like a person who had a treasure hidden in his field but did not know it.
And he died. The son not know about it either, he sold it. The buyer went plowing, the treasure, began to lend money at interest to whomever he wished." This work's version of the parable of the Pearl appears earlier, rather than following, as in Matthew. However, the mention of a treasure in Saying 76 may reflect a source for the Gospel of Thomas in which the parables were adjacent, so that the original pair of parables has been "broken apart, placed in separate contexts, expanded in a manner characteristic of folklore." The multiple changes of ownership of the field are unique to the Gospel of Thomas, reflect a different theme from the New Testament parable. There have been several depictions of the New Testament parable in art, including works by Rembrandt, Jan Luyken, James Tissot, John Everett Millais. Five Discourses of Matthew Life of Jesus in the New Testament Ministry of Jesus
King James Version
The King James Version known as the King James Bible or the Authorized Version, is an English translation of the Christian Bible for the Church of England, begun in 1604 and completed as well as published in 1611 under the sponsorship of James VI and I. The books of the King James Version include the 39 books of the Old Testament, an intertestamental section containing 14 books of the Apocrypha, the 27 books of the New Testament; the translation is noted for its "majesty of style", has been described as one of the most important books in English culture and a driving force in the shaping of the English-speaking world. It was first printed by Robert Barker, the King's Printer, was the third translation into English approved by the English Church authorities: The first had been the Great Bible, commissioned in the reign of King Henry VIII, the second had been the Bishops' Bible, commissioned in the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. On the European continent, the first generation of Calvinists had produced the Geneva Bible of 1560 from the original Hebrew and Greek Scriptures, influential in the writing of the Authorized King James Version.
In January 1604, King James convened the Hampton Court Conference, where a new English version was conceived in response to the problems of the earlier translations perceived by the Puritans, a faction of the Church of England. James gave the translators instructions intended to ensure that the new version would conform to the ecclesiology of, reflect the episcopal structure of, the Church of England and its belief in an ordained clergy; the translation was done by 47 scholars. In common with most other translations of the period, the New Testament was translated from Greek, the Old Testament from Hebrew and Aramaic, the Apocrypha from Greek and Latin. In the Book of Common Prayer, the text of the Authorized Version replaced the text of the Great Bible for Epistle and Gospel readings, as such was authorised by Act of Parliament. By the first half of the 18th century, the Authorized Version had become unchallenged as the English translation used in Anglican and English Protestant churches, except for the Psalms and some short passages in the Book of Common Prayer of the Church of England.
Over the course of the 18th century, the Authorized Version supplanted the Latin Vulgate as the standard version of scripture for English-speaking scholars. With the development of stereotype printing at the beginning of the 19th century, this version of the Bible became the most printed book in history all such printings presenting the standard text of 1769 extensively re-edited by Benjamin Blayney at Oxford, nearly always omitting the books of the Apocrypha. Today the unqualified title "King James Version" indicates this Oxford standard text; the title of the first edition of the translation, in Early Modern English, was "THE HOLY BIBLE, Conteyning the Old Teſtament, AND THE NEW: Newly Tranſlated out of the Originall tongues: & with the former Tranſlations diligently compared and reuiſed, by his Maiesties ſpeciall Comandement". The title page carries the words "Appointed to be read in Churches", F. F. Bruce suggests it was "probably authorised by order in council" but no record of the authorisation survives "because the Privy Council registers from 1600 to 1613 were destroyed by fire in January 1618/19".
For many years it was common not to give the translation any specific name. In his Leviathan of 1651, Thomas Hobbes referred to it as the English Translation made in the beginning of the Reign of King James. A 1761 "Brief Account of the various Translations of the Bible into English" refers to the 1611 version as a new and more accurate Translation, despite referring to the Great Bible by its name, despite using the name "Rhemish Testament" for the Douay-Rheims Bible version. A "History of England", whose fifth edition was published in 1775, writes that new translation of the Bible, viz. that now in Use, was begun in 1607, published in 1611. King James's Bible is used as the name for the 1611 translation in Charles Butler's Horae Biblicae. Other works from the early 19th century confirm the widespread use of this name on both sides of the Atlantic: it is found both in a "Historical sketch of the English translations of the Bible" published in Massachusetts in 1815, in an English publication from 1818, which explicitly states that the 1611 version is "generally known by the name of King James's Bible".
This name was found as King James' Bible: for example in a book review from 1811. The phrase "King James's Bible" is used as far back as 1715, although in this case it is not clear whether this is a name or a description; the use of Authorized Version and used as a name, is found as early as 1814. For some time before this, descriptive phrases such as "our present, only publicly authorised version", "our Authorized version", "the authorized version" are found; the Oxford English Dictionary records a usage in 1824. In Britain, the 1611 translation is known as the "Authorized Version" today; as early as 1814, we find King James' Version, evidently a descriptive phrase, being used. "The King James Version" is found, unequivocally used as a name, in a letter from 1855. The next year King James Bible, with no possessive, appears as a name in a Scottish source. In the United States, the "1611 translation" is generally
