What is a parable? The range for the Greek term for “parable” in the Gospels roughly translates the sense of the Hebrew term mashal.32 The Septuagint (the standard Greek version of the Old Testament dominant in Jesus’ day) translates mashal in different ways, but in several texts it translates it as parabolē.33 The mashal includes a variety of types of discourse, including stories (e.g., Ezek 24:2-5; cf. fable in Judg 9:7-15), proverbs (e.g., 1 Sam 24:13), taunt-songs (Is 14:4), and riddles (Ezek 17:2).34 Jewish hearers were thus accustomed to a variety of parables, and this range of forms overlaps significantly with those teachings of Jesus designated “parables” in the Gospels. But in rabbinic literature, the mashal specifically includes the kind of story parables told by both Jesus (e.g., Mk 4:3-8; 12:1-9) and later rabbis.35 This suggests that between the Septuagint and the time of the rabbis, a parable of the sort that Jesus told would already be recognized as a mashal (as attested later by the rabbis), which would naturally be rendered into Greek as parabolē (as attested by the Septuagint).36
Although Gentiles also used analogies, metaphor, allegory, and riddles,37 the source of Jesus’ storytelling style is plainly not primarily Greek.38 Story parables are a largely Jewish phenomenon.39 Parables appear in the biblical prophets (2 Sam 12:1-7; Is 5:1-7),40 in some apocalyptic literature41 and some other Jewish texts,42 but were especially common property of the sages.43
The closest formal and linguistic parallels to Jesus’ parables, however, occur in Middle Eastern rabbinic texts, i.e., later records of how Jewish teachers customarily reasoned and taught.44 This close similarity seems the consensus of scholars directly familiar with both sets of parables.45 Although rabbinic parables are midrashic, hence more stereotyped, examination demonstrates considerable formal similarities between rabbinic and Gospel parables, especially morphological but often extending even to stock metaphors and characters.46
Our rabbinic parables are admittedly all later than Jesus, though this could not be otherwise, since all rabbinic literature is later than Jesus, as are most of the sages it cites.47 But because Jesus probably did not influence directly most later rabbis,48 it appears most logical to infer that both Jesus and these rabbis drew on and adapted standard Palestinian Jewish teaching techniques of their day.49 Jesus probably occasionally even developed earlier sages’ parabolic story lines.50
Some differences between the two groups of parables reflect the different sorts of environments addressed by the respective tellers of parables. Whereas the later rabbinic parables often focus on settings such as royal courts, however (as in Matt 18:23; 22:2; 25:34), Jesus most often told stories about agriculture and the daily life of his common hearers,51 a characteristic that supports authenticity in his Galilean context. Another contrast with rabbinic parables is that Jesus’ parables tend to subvert conventional values, whereas those of the rabbis tend to reinforce them.52 This difference may reflect also the contrast between Jesus’ prophetic role and the function of educated legal experts. Jesus’ parables are also far more apt to emphasize eschatology,53 though it is possible that this difference might reflect the situation of Palestinian Jewish thought after the failure of the Bar Kochba revolt more than it reflects a divergence of interests in Jesus’ day.
Except when reporting Jesus’ parables, other New Testament writers, usually addressing urban communities outside Palestine, do not employ such parables. Because later Christians would therefore not have invented Jesus’ parables, most scholars accept their authenticity as genuine teachings of Jesus.54
