Matthew 25 · Passage · Faithfulness
Well Done, Good and Faithful Servant
In the parable of the talents the master praises two servants as good and faithful and condemns the one who buried his talent.
Jesus told this parable on the Mount of Olives, among His last teachings before the cross.
His master replied, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Enter into the joy of your master!’
- The passage
- Matthew 25:14 to 30, Luke 19:11 to 27
- Books
- Matthew, Luke
- Hold in memory
- Matthew 25:21
Summary
A man going on a journey entrusts his property to three servants. When he returns after a long time he settles accounts with each, rewards two of them and takes the talent from the third. The parable asks what a servant does with what he is given while his master is away, and it names the faithful servant by his work.
- The master gives five, two and one talent, each according to the servant's own ability.
- The third servant blames his fear of the master for burying the talent.
- The parable is the second of three in Matthew 25, between the ten virgins and the sheep and the goats.
The Parable of the Talents
The parable opens with a journey, a trust and three different responses.
The parable of the talents is the passage in which Jesus gives faithfulness its plainest picture. It matters to every reader, because every person holds gifts, time and work that belong to God. The question it answers is what God counts as faithful, and what He does with the faithful and the unfaithful.
Below stand the parable's opening, a table of the three servants side by side and the master's return. Then come the third servant's defence, the parable of the minas, two readings of what the talents stand for and the teachers who read the parable.
Two of the servants go at once and trade, and the third digs a hole and hides his master's money (Matthew 25:16 to 18).
For it is just like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted them with his possessions.The parable opens by making the servants trustees of what belongs to someone else.
Three Servants Side by Side
The master answers each servant by what that servant did with his trust.
The first two servants answer every question alike, and the third answers each one differently.
| The question | The first servant | The second servant | The third servant |
|---|---|---|---|
| What did he receive? | five talents | two talents | one talent |
| What did he do with it? | put them to work and gained five more | gained two more | dug a hole in the ground, and hid his master's money |
| What did he say at the reckoning? | you entrusted me with five talents. See, I have gained five more. | you entrusted me with two talents. See, I have gained two more. | So I was afraid and went out and hid your talent in the ground. |
| What did the master call him? | good and faithful servant | good and faithful servant | wicked, lazy servant |
| What followed? | I will put you in charge of many things. Enter into the joy of your master! | I will put you in charge of many things. Enter into the joy of your master! | take the talent from him and give it to the one who has ten talents |
The Master's Return
Verses 19 to 23 tell of the reckoning with the first two.
After a long time the master of those servants returned to settle accounts with them.The long delay tests what each servant does while the master is away.
The servant with five talents and the servant with two give the same report, and the master answers each in the same words (Matthew 25:21 and 23). The reward is measured by faithfulness "with a few things", so the smaller gain earns as much as the larger.
The Third Servant's Defence
Verses 24 to 30 give the servant's reason for hiding the talent and the master's answer to it.
The third servant says, "Master, I knew that you are a hard man, reaping where you have not sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed" (Matthew 25:24). He hands back the one talent untouched.
The master judges him by his own words. If he believed the master was hard, he "should have deposited my money with the bankers" so that it returned "with interest" (Matthew 25:27). His fault was to do nothing with what he was given.
For everyone who has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. But the one who does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him.The master's rule explains why the talent goes to the servant who has ten.
The Parable of the Ten Minas
The Gospel of Luke gives a second parable of the same shape.
Luke sets his parable near Jerusalem, told because the people "thought the kingdom of God would appear imminently" (Luke 19:11). A man of noble birth gives ten servants ten minas and tells them, "Conduct business with this until I return" (Luke 19:13).
In Luke each servant receives the same sum, and the rewards differ with the gain. In Matthew the sums differ from the start. Both parables end with the same rule, that everyone who has will be given more (Luke 19:26).
His master replied, ‘Well done, good servant! Because you have been faithful in a very small matter, you shall have authority over ten cities.’Luke's servant is praised for the same quality Matthew's master names.
How the Parable Has Been Read
Jerome in the fourth century and Matthew Henry in the eighteenth read the master's praise.
died 420 · Jerome
“He says, Thou wast faithful in a few things, because all that we have at present though they seem great and many, yet in comparison of the things to come are little and few. What greater thing can be given to a faithful servant than to be with his Lord, and to see his Lord's joy? The servant who of five talents had made ten, and he who of two had made four, are received with equal favour by the Master of the household, who looks not to the largeness of their profit, but to the disposition of their will.”
Jerome · Catena Aurea by Aquinas · on Matthew 25:21 to 23Patristic
1662 to 1714 · Matthew Henry
“It is the joy of our Lord, for it is joy in the Lord, who is our exceeding joy. Abraham was not willing that the steward of his house, though faithful, should be his heir ( Gen. xv. 3 ); but Christ admits his faithful stewards into his own joy, to be joint-heirs with him.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible · on Matthew 25:21 to 23Puritan
What the Talents Stand For
Readers differ over what the master's possessions stand for.
Every gift a person has, natural or spiritualJamieson, Fausset and Brown; Albert Barnes
Jamieson, Fausset and Brown wrote that the master's goods "mean all their gifts and endowments, whether original or acquired, natural or spiritual". Albert Barnes wrote that the talents are "designed to refer to the endowments conferred on people", and he added that English keeps the word talent "as referring to the abilities or gifts of men".
The objection is that the parable speaks of money handed over as a trust and names no ability or gift.
The word of God and its understandingOrigen of Alexandria
Origen read the talents as a share in "the oracles of God". He wrote that among those who receive them from Christ "some have more and some less" (Catena Aurea on Matthew 25:15).
The objection is that this reading narrows the trust to teachers of the word, while the parable speaks of every servant.
Faithful to the End
Paul's last letter ends with his own account of his service.
The parable leaves the reader in the time between the master's leaving and his return, with something entrusted and an account to give.
I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.Three verbs sum up a life of service, fought, finished and kept.
Sources
Scripture is the Berean Standard Bible.
- Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset and David Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, on Matthew 25:14.
- Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832 to 1869), on Matthew 25:15.
- Thomas Aquinas, Catena Aurea on Matthew 25, with Origen on verse 15, in the Oxford translation edited by J. H. Newman.
- Thomas Aquinas, Catena Aurea on Matthew 25, with Jerome on verse 21, in the Oxford translation edited by J. H. Newman.
- Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible (1710), on Matthew 25:21.
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