ENACTED PARABLES

In this post I would like to broaden your definition of what constitutes a parable. If a parable is a story told orally in order to compare it to something more significant, then what do we call a story that is presented visually to an audience to do the same thing? Most scholars would call them acted-out, or enacted, parables. There are actually a number of these types of parable in the OT. The most extensive example is probably found in the Book of Hosea where the prophet's whole family life and problems with his wife could be considered an extended parable playing out in real life and picturing the relationship of God with His people. But most of what we would label as enacted parables are associated with two other prophets: Jeremiah and Ezekiel.

In Jeremiah's case, God asked him to do a number of things to get the people's attention with some unusual actions that would get them talking. However, as with spoken parables, the action itself had a deeper meaning. In Chapter 13, Jeremiah was told to put on a new pair of underwear, go to the river and hide it in the cleft of a rock. Then after a number of days he was to dig it up again and show everyone how ruined it was. The word from God to the people was that they would be ruined since they no longer clung to him as closely as the loincloth had, but had gone after other gods.

The next two enacted parables form the bulk of chapters 18 and 19. In the first case, God takes Jeremiah to the potter's shop so he can watch the potter remold a lump of clay into a pot after the first attempt failed. God declares that Israel is like that clay in His hand to fashion into whatever form He chooses. However, the story continues in Chapter 19 with Jeremiah taking a pot that has already been fired and breaking it in the sight of the elders and priests with the accompanying message that God was going to utterly destroy them because of their hardened hearts. It was too late to re-mold them.

The last example I will discuss for Jeremiah is perhaps the most well known. In Chapter 32 the situation is that Jerusalem is under siege by the Babylonians and facing imminent destruction and exile for the people into a foreign land. After predicting all this disaster, Jeremiah, at God's command, does the most foolish and impractical thing possible under the circumstances. He goes to his cousin and pays a large amount of money to buy a plot of land. The message to the people is that they shouldn't give up hope even in exile, because eventually God will bring them back to their land.

If Jeremiah was asked to do some unusual things, God had even more bizarre things in mind for Ezekiel. Since these enacted parables were visible, you may want to look at the pair of collages on this site that I made (see "Ezekiel 4-5") on this site. The first one is entitled “Normally Strange” since that is probably how the prophet appeared to the people around him. It illustrates Ezekiel 4:1-3 in which the prophet is asked to draw a map of the city on a brick and basically set up a Lego type model of the city under siege with toy soldiers and weapons. Then, most significantly, he places an iron plate or griddle between himself and the model of the city to show the people that God will put up a barrier between Himself and the nation and won't help them in their distress during the upcoming siege by Babylon.

I called the second collage “Strangely Normal” since despite Ezekiel's weird actions, they all pointed very logically to the situation the people were going to face soon. This is a rather busy picture since God kept Ezekiel pretty busy at the time. The story in Chapter 4 continues in verses 4-8 with God telling the prophet that he has to lie down for 390 days on his left side to represent the number of years before the Northern Kingdom will be restored and then to lie for forty days on his right side to represent the time of Judah's punishment. It isn't clear if Ezekiel just lies down at night or whether he goes to the center of town and lies down there for a certain period of time each day. Now this acted-out parable/prophecy has driven Bible scholars crazy over the years, actually beginning with the prophets Daniel and Zechariah who pondered over its message, and the controversy continues to the present time. Depending on how these numbers are treated and which starting dates one chooses, this prophecy has been variously understood to predict the date of the defeat of Babylon by the Persians, Cyrus' edict that the Jews could return to Canaan, the rebuilding of the temple, events during the occupation of Israel by the Greeks, or even the founding of the modern state of Israel. Additional details may be found in another post.

Getting back to poor Ezekiel, he is next told that he is to carefully measure out very small quantities of food and water every day for his meals, and to make it worse, he is to bake his bread over a fire made from human dung. This is to point out how severe the siege will be. At that point Ezekiel rebels and objects that he has never eaten unclean food. God compromises and tells him that he can bake it over animal dung instead. Then, starting in Chapter 5, Ezekiel has to shave off his beard and divide the hair into three equal portions by weight. One third is to be burned inside the city, one third struck with the sword, and one third scattered to the wind. This is to represent the fate of the inhabitants of Jerusalem. God says, “One third of you shall die of pestilence or be consumed by famine; one third shall fall by the sword; and one third I will scatter to every wind.” The famine during the siege is predicted to be so bad that people will even resort to eating their own children.

In Ezekiel 12, God asks the prophet to act out two more signs for the people. In the first one, he is told to pack up as if he is leaving in exile, sneak out at night by digging through a wall, and leave the city while covering up his eyes. This is an accurate prophecy of what King Zedekiah and his court will actually do during the Babylonian siege. God says, “I will bring him to Babylon, the land of the Chaldeans, yet he shall not see it.” This cryptic saying happened literally because the king was captured and blinded by the Babylonians before being led off in exile. Following this sign to the people, Ezekiel is told to eat his meals in the sight of the people with trembling and shaking. This represents the emotional turmoil the people will experience during this time.

In Chapter 24, God has Ezekiel enact two final parables just before the siege of Jerusalem. He takes a metal pot filled with water and animal parts and puts in on a roaring fire where he lets it cook to dryness and becomes so hot that even the bones are burned to ashes. One commentator points out that it is sort of like a self-cleaning oven. But after the ashes are removed from the pot, which represents Israel, it is found to still be encrusted with rust inside as a representation of the people's sins. So God at this point indicates that he is tired of trying to cleanse the nation; they will first have to undergo their deserved punishment.

And then comes the final crushing blow for Ezekiel, another enacted parable. He loses his wife and is told to show absolutely no outward signs of grief to those around him. When the people ask him why he isn't in mourning, he explains that when the siege is finished, all of them will be in such shock that they will also be numb with grief when they realize that they deserved all the judgment God has poured down upon them.

Well, so much for OT examples, but if you think that there are no acted-out parables in the NT, you would be mistaken, at least in the minds of many Bible commentators. One example that may come to mind is the story of Jesus withering the fig tree. Years ago I upset a rather rigid elder at our church, who had graduated from Bible seminary, when I suggested that this story was not only a miracle, but also a parable. I was pleased to see years later that many Bible scholars agree with my assessment. This story is also discussed elsewhere in my blog (see "Mark 11").

Actually you could argue that practically everything Jesus did was an enacted parable. For example, his choosing exactly 12 Apostles was a sign that he was forming a new Israel. The various healings of the blind are parables of Jesus' opening people's spiritual eyes. You can especially see that in John 9 where the blind man gradually realizes Jesus' true identity as the story proceeds. “The miracles are not unequivocal heavenly signs, but parabolic...As 'parables', the miracles (especially the exorcisms) represent and are in themselves the destruction and plundering of Satan's kingdom and the realizing of God's kingdom.” (G. H. Twelvetree)

This tradition of enacted parables continues into the early church as we can see in the Book of Acts. In Chapter 9, Saul 's sight is restored just at the point of his conversion to the truth. And as the reverse of this image, Paul on the island of Cyprus finds that the gospel message is being opposed by the magician Elymas. So Paul miraculously makes him blind for a period of time as a picture of his spiritual blindness. And finally, in Acts 21 the prophet Agabus takes Paul's belt off and binds his own hands and feet with it to warn Paul that he will be facing certain captivity if he proceeds with his plans to go to Jerusalem. Interestingly, Paul seems to go against this warning word from God by declaring that he will go there anyway. He states in v. 13, “I am ready not only to be bound but even to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus.”

Well, what if now you said that the time of enacted parables is over? You would be wrong again because all of us perform them today. How? Just look at the ordinances that Jesus instituted. By submitting to baptism, we are picturing the past act of Jesus' death on our behalf, declaring our present close identification with him, and lastly showing the world that we will now be living a brand new life in Him. There is a similar past, present, and future aspect to the ordinance of communion as we remember Christ's death on our behalf and, as Jesus said at the Last Supper, look forward to the Heavenly Wedding Banquet we will share with him eventually. But there are also present aspects to communion. As Paul reminds us in I Corinthians, it is held in a communal setting and anyone who threatens the unity of the church body through his actions will be eating and drinking judgment on himself. In addition, Jesus in Chapter 6 of John's Gospel says in rather graphic terms that totally turn off his audience, “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you...Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them.” Of course, Jesus is talking in symbolic terms but it does point out another implication of the communion service in picturing our unity with Christ as well as with our fellow believers.

This brings up a somewhat controversial subject regarding a possible third ordinance that Jesus instituted. At the Last Supper, Jesus proceeds to wash his disciples' feet. And when Peter objects, Jesus says in words that almost parrot what he said about communion, “Unless I wash you, you have no share with me.” (John 13:8) Jesus then turns to the apostles and says, “you also ought to wash one another's feet. For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you.” (John 13:14-15) And these words are quite close to those Jesus uses to institute the ordinance of communion: “Do this in remembrance of me.”

It is obvious that Jesus is performing a symbolic act that we could easily add to our list of an enacted parables. But what are we to make of him asking his apostles, and each of us by extension, to wash each others feet? Does he mean that we are to have a servant heart toward one another, or is he specifically telling us to literally wash each others feet as part of our worship services. For most of us it is rather a dead issue, but in some Christian denominations it is still practiced. If you are interested in the subject at all I would recommend the book Feet Washing by Thurmon Murphy, who just happens to be John Murphy's father.