Matthew25chapter 25

Matthew 25:1-2

ten virgins: Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins continues directly from the readiness charge that closed chapter 24, watch therefore, now cast as a parable of a wedding party. Five of them were wise, and five were foolish divides the company evenly down the middle, the same lamps and the same errand held by both groups, so that the difference the parable will expose is not in profession but in provision. Henry reads the virgins as professing Christians generally, the parable warning that outward readiness to meet the bridegroom is no guarantee of the oil needed to sustain it.

Matthew 25:3-4

They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them names the fault precisely, not the absence of a lamp but the absence of reserve fuel for a wait longer than expected. The wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps, extra supply carried alongside the lamp itself, a detail Gill reads as the parable's turning point since both groups start identically equipped for a short vigil. The commentators commonly read the oil as the Spirit's own presence sustaining a profession that lamps alone, an outward form of faith, cannot keep burning on their own.

Matthew 25:5-7

While the bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept, wise and foolish alike, and the commentators note the sleep itself is not the parable's fault line, since even the prepared virgins nod off waiting. At midnight there was a cry made, Behold, the bridegroom cometh, arriving at the hour least expected, and the wise are proved ready not because they never slept but because they had what sleep could not use up. Then all those virgins arose, and trimmed their lamps shows the moment of testing arriving suddenly for everyone at once.

Matthew 25:8-9

And the foolish said unto the wise, Give us of your oil exposes the fault as irreversible at this late hour, a request the wise cannot grant without endangering their own lamps and the whole procession's welcome. The wise answer, go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves, which Barnes reads not as selfishness but as plain fact, since no man's preparedness before God can be borrowed from another at the last moment. The point presses hard against any confidence that another believer's faith, however near, can substitute for one's own.

Matthew 25:10-12

the door was shut: And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came, and the foolish virgins' errand itself becomes their undoing, absent at the one moment presence was required. They that were ready went in with him to the marriage: and the door was shut closes the opportunity absolutely, a detail the commentators read as final rather than merely delayed. I know you not answers the returning virgins' plea, Lord, Lord, open to us, and Henry reads the double Lord as urgent but too late, since acquaintance claimed after the door is shut carries no weight against a door already closed.

Matthew 25:13

Watch therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of man cometh states the parable's own moral plainly, tying it directly back to chapter 24's repeated command to watchfulness. The lesson is not that the wise never sleep, since the parable has just shown they did, but that they carry what the hour of waiting cannot exhaust. Wesley reads the verse as Christ's own application closing the parable before the next one opens, oil standing for a readiness stored ahead of time rather than assembled in the moment of need.

Matthew 25:14-15

For the kingdom of heaven is as a man travelling into a far country begins the second parable directly from the same watch therefore, moving from waiting to working as the shape readiness must take. He delivered unto them his goods, unto one five talents, to another two, and to another one, according to his several ability, and the commentators note the sums are enormous, a talent worth many years of ordinary wages, so the smallest portion is no trifling gift. Clarke reads according to his several ability as the master's own justice built into the distribution itself, each servant answerable only for what he was actually given.

Matthew 25:16-18

Then he that had received the five talents went and traded with the same, and made them other five talents shows immediate active use of the capital entrusted. He that had received two gained likewise in the same proportion, but he that had received one went and digged in the earth, and hid his lord's money, burying rather than risking it. The commentators read the buried talent as the parable's real subject, not incompetence but a choice against any use at all, safety purchased at the cost of all possible gain.

Matthew 25:19-23

After a long time the lord of those servants cometh, and reckoneth with them, the delay itself testing what the servants did with the interval rather than merely the moment of the master's return. The two servants who traded give an identical account and receive an identical answer word for word, Well done, thou good and faithful servant, thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things, the reward exceeding the assignment in both cases equally. Henry reads the sameness of the commendation as deliberate, since faithfulness with two talents earns the same praise as faithfulness with five, the measure being fidelity rather than the size of the original gift.

Matthew 25:24-25

Then he which had received the one talent came and said, Lord, I knew thee that thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown, offering a description of the master before offering any account of the money. And I was afraid, and went and hid thy talent in the earth: lo, there thou hast that is thine names fear as the servant's own stated motive, presenting the unused talent as if its bare return were itself an achievement. Barnes reads the servant's excuse as self condemning, since a true fear of so demanding a master would have produced effort rather than paralysis.

Matthew 25:26-27

His lord answered and said unto him, Thou wicked and slothful servant turns the servant's own words against him, granting for argument's sake the harsh picture the servant painted and showing it demanded more caution, not less effort. Thou oughtest therefore to have put my money to the exchangers names the plainest minimal duty available, ordinary interest requiring no skill or risk at all, which the servant refused even this. Clarke reads the rebuke as removing every excuse, since the master does not even require trading, only that the money be put where it would grow on its own.

Matthew 25:28-30

Take therefore the talent from him, and give it unto him which hath ten talents states the parable's hard principle, unto every one that hath shall be given, and from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath. The commentators read hath and hath not as measured by use rather than by original possession, since the ten talent servant hath because he used what he was given and the one talent servant hath not in that same sense despite holding the coin in his hand the whole time. Cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness closes the parable on the sixth sounding of weeping and gnashing of teeth in this Gospel, the refrain the brief traces from 8:12 to this verse.

Matthew 25:31-33

When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him opens the third scene of the discourse with the same title and the same glory named at 24:30, the same coming now shown in its consequence rather than its arrival. Then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory names a judgment scene, and before him shall be gathered all nations, every people without exception standing for this reckoning. He shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats draws on a familiar pastoral picture, sheep and goats grazing together by day and sorted only at evening, the shepherd thread the brief tracks from 9:36 arriving here at its final beat.

Matthew 25:34-36

Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world names an inheritance planned before creation itself, not earned in the moment but readied long in advance. The six works named, feeding the hungry, giving drink, taking in the stranger, clothing the naked, visiting the sick, coming to the prisoner, are ordinary and unglamorous acts rather than spectacular ones. Henry reads the list as deliberately plain, since the judgment turns on mercy shown in the smallest and least noticed circumstances of daily life rather than on any grand achievement.

Matthew 25:37-40

Then shall the righteous answer him, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee shows genuine surprise, the righteous unaware that their ordinary acts of mercy carried this weight at all. The King shall answer and say unto them, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me identifies Christ with the overlooked and the needy so completely that mercy shown them is mercy shown him directly. The little ones thread the brief names, running from 10:42's cup of cold water through 18:6's millstone warning, arrives here at its fullest statement, my brethren naming the connection outright.

Matthew 25:41-43

Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels answers the blessing of verse 34 with its exact opposite, a fire the text is careful to say was prepared for the fallen angels rather than for man. The six negations that follow mirror the six mercies exactly, I was an hungred, and ye gave me no meat, sin here named not as active cruelty but as simple neglect, mercy withheld rather than harm inflicted. Gill reads the parallel structure as the passage's own argument, the same ordinary opportunities present to both groups and only the response differing between them.

Matthew 25:44-46

Then shall they also answer him, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, or athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister unto thee repeats the righteous's surprise from verse 37 but from the opposite side, unawareness offered here as a defense rather than reported as simple fact. Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me answers the excuse the same way it answered the question, no ignorance of Christ's presence in the needy excusing neglect of them. These shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into life eternal closes the discourse with a parallel the commentators note carefully, the same Greek word describing both the punishment and the life, so that any argument shortening one term must reckon with shortening the other as well.