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Seed (2)

Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament

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SEED.—Excluding the use of this term as equivalent to progeny, offspring, or race (cf. e.g. Mark 12:19-24, Luke 1:55, John 7:42), we find it exclusively employed in the parables of Jesus as an apt symbol for Divine influence, or for the expansion of the moral and religious life in communities or individuals.

1. In Mark 4:26-29, a parable peculiar to Mark, Jesus uses the process of sowing and the subsequent conduct of the farmer to illustrate the certain success of His Kingdom upon earth. What He preached about seemed perhaps to the disciples, as well as to outsiders, as weak as a grain of seed flung upon a field. Yet neither is an isolated or foreign thing in the world. On the side of the gospel were certain mysterious powers which would ensure it success, apart from human aid or interference. All it required was time. The order of things was a ripening order, and at the proper moment these favourable conditions would bring about the fruit and result of what at present seemed a very precarious and unpromising movement among men. Such is the general point of the parable. The seed’s vital energy and its appointed correspondence with the powers of nature symbolize features in the gospel which enable Jesus to await the future with quiet confidence and an easy mind. Neither is just what it seems to the outward eye. Each sets in action a slow but sure process of growth, upon which the sensible person will count. ‘Fruit grows thus,’ said Epictetus; ‘the seed must be buried for some time, hidden, and then grow slowly if it is to reach perfection.’ It is by an extension, or rather a special application, of this usage that the self-sacrifice of man is compared to the burying of the seed in the furrow (John 12:23-25), with special reference to the death of Jesus Himself. The ultimate effects of such self-immolation depend on the thoroughness of the process itself.

The Kingdom is also compared to seed in the parable of the Mustard Seed (Mark 4:30-32 = Matthew 13:31-32 = Luke 13:18-19). A small thing to begin with, it ultimately surpasses all other movements which make a greater show at first to the untrained eye. Here the Kingdom is conceived of, not eschatologically, but historically. When it is likened to ‘seed,’ the thought is mainly of the immense possibilities of growth in it, as compared with its initial size, the correspondence between it and the soul of man, and the pledge, which it contains, of some final and splendid issue.

2. Seed, on the other hand, depends to a certain extent upon soil. While essentially designed to co-operate with the vital forces of nature, it may be rendered wholly or partially barren. And in this further sense it forms a symbol for Jesus of the Divine word and its fortunes in the world of men. Consequently we find that in two other parables the seed represents not the Kingdom, but the word (cf. Matthew 13:19).

The first of these, the parable of the Sower and the Soils (Mark 4:2 f. = Matthew 13:3 f. = Luke 8:5 f.), bears on the difficulties and disappointments encountered in the preaching of the word of God. The latter is compared to the vital germ or grain of the plant, which, through no fault of its own or of the sower, may fail to germinate, owing to the unpromising nature of the ground on which it chances to fall. Nevertheless, the work of the sower must proceed. The partial failure of his efforts is not to render his career or calling void. In the parable itself, which is undoubtedly genuine, the original reference is to the experiences of Jesus Himself as a preacher. ‘Jesus has to preach; the rest is God’s concern’ (Wellhausen). But in the subsequent interpretation of the parable, which, like other interpretations, must be held to contain in whole or part reflexions of the Apostolic age and traces of the editor’s hand, the scope widens to include the general preaching of Christian evangelists, who are counselled not to let themselves be daunted by finding the unsympathetic and the preoccupied among their hearers. The seed must be sown. The word must be trusted to do its work in congenial hearts. The teaching must be imparted. Such is the supreme lesson for evangelists drawn here by Jesus from the vegetable world.

The other parable is that of the Tares, or darnel (Matthew 13:24 f.), which may be an allegorized variation, and in part an expansion, of the ideas contained in Mark 4:26-29. Certainly, whatever be the original nucleus, the editorial reflexions indicate a rather advanced period in the history of the early Church’s mission and discipline. Growth, here too, is a partial feature of the situation. But the seed or word is further exposed to deliberate and widespread corruption and rivalry. Another power of influence is stealthily at work among men. God’s message finds no virgin soil, for the growth of the seed is thwarted; and specious, vigorous rivals abound.

Both of the latter parables, in so far as they emphasize the nature of God’s word or message as seed, thus touch wisely and earnestly on its mysterious power of growth. The spoken word is essentially fruitful. It is the instrument of the Divine mission. ‘We forget too often that language is both a seed-sowing and a revelation,’ says Amiel. ‘Man is a husbandman; his whole work rightly understood is to develop life, to sow it everywhere.’ And the supreme method is the contact of one personality with another, especially through the medium of that spoken intercourse which conveys the truth of God to the soul of man. This, and no external means, is the chosen way of Jesus.

Literature.—In addition to the critical editors on the passages above cited, and writers on the Parables (especially Trench, Bruce, Jülicher, and Godet), cf. T. G. Selby, Ministry of the Lord Jesus, p. 157 f.; Keim, Jesus of Nazara, iv. p. 138 f.; and J. Rendel Harris, Union with God, p. 171 f.

J. Moffatt.