1.02 New Cloth On Old Garment
II. NEW CLOTH ON OLD GARMENT NEW WINE IN OLD WINESKINS.
Matthew 9:10 /.; Mark 2:21 /.; Luke 5:36 - Luke 5:39.
These parables were spoken by Jesus to illustrate His answer to the question concerning the non-observance of fasting by His disciples. The disciples of John and those of the Pharisees happened to be fasting at a time when they saw Jesus and His disciples eating and drinking. They accordingly asked Him: “ Why do we fast [St. Luke adds, and 1 “ Measure for Measure,” Act I, Scene 1, 50 THE PARABLES OF JESUS make supplications ], while Thy disciples fast not?” They do not expressly include Himself in the question, and in His reply He makes no attempt to justify His own personal conduct. He points out to them that it would be unreasonable to expect that the companions of the bridegroom should fast during the marriage festivities, while the bridegroom was still with them; but that a time would come when He would be taken away, and then they would fast. His hearers were well aware that the term “ bridegroom “was a standing designation of the Messiah, and they must have so understood it. He then proceeded to point out how men do not patch an old garment with a piece of undressed cloth (St. Luke: a piece rent from a new garment), nor pour new wine into old skins.
If they did so, the result would be that the piece of unprepared cloth would shrink as soon as it was wetted, and the old garment, incapable by reason of age and wear of resisting the strain, would in consequence be rent; while the new wine would burst the old skins. On the contrary, old garments are patched with pieces of old cloth, and new wine is put into THE PARABLES OF JESUS 51 new skins. Skins of various animals, especially goatskins, were and still are used in the East to hold wine, water, and other fluids, both for preservation and transport. They were particularly well adapted for the latter purpose, as they could be more easily carried by beasts of burden than receptacles of wood or clay. The skins were sewn up and coated with pitch at the seams on the inside.
Both parables teach the same lesson, the impossibility of uniting in agreement the in congruous, the new and the old. There is here no tautology: in the first parable it is a question of a whole and a part; in the second, of the container and the contained. At all times fasting has been a very popular institution in the East. The Pentateuch prescribes only one fast-day, the Day of Atonement, which is still devoutly observed by all Jews who make any profession of religion. As time went on, new fasts were added, besides which voluntary fasts were common. Jesus had, indeed, sanctioned fasting by His own example, but He did not think it necessary to enjoin any particular fast on His followers.
It would be an incongruity if they fasted while 52 THE PARABLES OF JESUS
He was still in their midst, and He foresaw that after His death, even independently of any precept of His, fasting would be observed by them. The separation of Church and Synagogue was a gradual process; and till it was definitely achieved the disciples observed the Jewish fasts. 1 At a later date distinctively Christian fasts were introduced. Theparables in question have, however, more than a temporary significance. The attitude of Jesus towards fasting differed in principle from that of the Jews. With Him it took a secondary, inferior place: the love of God and the love of the neighbour, with all their implications, were what essentially mattered; while the Jews regarded mere external observances as standing on the same plane with those virtues which are at all times indispensable. The Pharisee (Luke 18:12) could think of no positive good works more worthy to boast of than his regular voluntary fasts and his faithfulness in paying tithes. An attempt to improve the old by grafting on it a piece of the new, or by infusing into it a part of the new spirit, would be alike destructive of the old and prejudicial 1 Acts 27:9. THE PARABLES OF JESUS 53 to the new. Time and patience were needed, the older system was already doomed; but Jesus did not wish to hasten its end before the system of which He was the Founder had been sufficiently presented to men in a formal and authoritative manner for their acceptance.
TAGS: [Parables]