All these things Jesus spoke to the crowds in parables, and without a parable he did not speak to them,
Jesus taught the crowds that day only in stories. Commentators ask two things of this verse: why He would not speak plainly to the people, and what these stories held that no one had said before.
This verse marks a turning point. Right after it the Lord leaves the crowds and teaches a smaller group indoors.
Notice a change now. The Lord stops speaking to the crowds, who had been in view up to this point. As it says, "All these things Jesus said to the crowds in parables; indeed, He said nothing to them without a parable." But now Jesus sends the crowds away and goes into the house. I want you to notice this, because it divides the parables and begins a new set. The parables that follow were not ones the crowds could see or enter into.
This way of speaking began at a set moment. The same words then did two opposite things at once.
The Jewish leaders had just gone as far as blaming His power on Beelzebub. They could go no further in wickedness. Leaders and people were so far from God that the blessings promised to Israel could not be brought in at that time. From that point the Saviour began to use this puzzling way of speaking. It was clear enough to the devout minority, but completely unclear to the godless mass. Like the cloud in Moses' day, which stood between Israel and the Egyptians, the parables were light to the one and darkness to the other.
A national judgment was coming. Even so, the parables did not remove the crowd's responsibility to receive Him.
The Lord of course knew this national judgment and its far-reaching results in advance. He told His disciples about it beforehand, for their instruction. He did not tell the crowds, except in parables only, because He was still presenting Himself to Israel, in both Galilee and Judea, as the promised King... His ministry in parables about the coming change in no way took away their responsibility to receive Him, since they did not understand.
Speaking in stories also sorted the listeners.
By this way of teaching He tested everyone in the vast crowd who heard Him, to see who wanted to learn. For we read: "He said nothing to them without a parable." Yet He spoke, as Mark alone tells us, "as they were able to hear it." His aim was the good of souls, and all who wanted the meaning had it.
Verse 35 backs the method with a psalm of Asaph. One writer notes what it was quoted for — and what it was not.
Verses 34 and 35 again stress the parable form of teaching. But now the quotation is from Psalm 78, written by Asaph — so we know he was a "prophet". It is not quoted for the blinding of the crowd, who rejected plain testimony when He gave it to them. It is quoted as holding things "kept secret" — hidden from the world's foundation. And so it indeed was, for a kingdom to be set up in this way.
These secrets were not buried in the older Scriptures for someone to dig out. No one had spoken them at all.
Verse 35 of this same chapter tells us what the parables contained. Long ago it had been written, "I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter things which have been kept secret from the foundation of the world." These truths about the kingdom of heaven were neither disclosed nor hidden in the Old Testament. They were secrets that God kept back until His Son came into the world. We have the divine nature, and the Spirit of God lives in us. So it is our privilege to understand the divine secrets spoken by the Son.
It also settles what Jesus means by "the kingdom of the heavens" in these parables.
Here the Lord says, "The kingdom of the heavens is like." Suppose He had in view the Old Testament kingdom promised to Israel. Then He could not have said that He uttered things hidden from the world's foundation. For the kingdom in the Old Testament is not a mystery. It is clearly revealed.
- Cause. The parables began after the leaders turned on Him. A national judgment was coming, so He no longer spoke plainly to the crowd.
- Effect. Like the cloud between Israel and Egypt, one and the same word gave light to the willing and darkness to the rest.
- Grace. The method was a test, not a barrier — He spoke as they could hear it, and anyone who wanted the meaning could have it.
- Content. Verse 35 points back to Asaph's psalm. These secrets were never told in the Old Testament. God held them back until the Son came to speak them.
- Consequence. These things were hidden from the world's foundation. So the kingdom in these parables is not the kingdom promised openly in the Old Testament. And the Spirit who lives in believers lets them understand it.
so that that should be fulfilled which was spoken through the prophet, saying, I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter things hidden from [the] world's foundation.
Matthew stops the flow of parables to tell us why Jesus taught this way at all: it was the fulfilment of a line written centuries earlier in Psalm 78. It raises two questions. Why is a psalm called the word of "the prophet"? And what could stay hidden from the world's beginning until now?
The quotations below say "kept secret from the foundation of the world." That is an older wording of the ESV's "hidden since the foundation of the world."
The words come from Psalm 78, written by Asaph, and Matthew introduces them as the speech of a prophet. One writer notes who wrote the psalm, and why Matthew brings it in here:
Verses 34 and 35 again stress the parable form of teaching. This time the quotation is from Psalm 78, written by Asaph, who was therefore known to be a "prophet." It is not quoted for the blinding of the crowd who rejected plain testimony when it was given to them. It is quoted because the parables hold things "kept secret" — hidden from the world's foundation. And so it truly was with a kingdom that was to be set up in this way.
Asaph sang of a past history. One writer sets Asaph and Christ side by side:
The prophet's word was being fulfilled in Him (Ps. 78:2): He was taking the place of another Asaph, to speak of things more deeply hidden than those Asaph spoke of. So the psalmist's words are quoted freely rather than exactly. Asaph's deep things lay in a past history, and it was given to him to tell its meaning. Christ's deep things lie in a history still to come. Its general lesson sadly echoes that older story of another people. Man's history does repeat itself. But now the subject was a state of "things hidden from the foundation of the world" — things the prophets of the Old Testament themselves knew nothing about.
If these things were truly secret, they cannot repeat what earlier Scripture already said:
So we are prepared to expect that in these parables the Lord would bring out things kept secret since the foundation of the world. And so it was. We cannot find anything like them in the Scriptures that came before. Some have fairly called this strange state of things the kingdom of heaven in mystery. The name marks it off from the kingdom of heaven that the prophets foretold.
The same words had two effects at once, and they depended on the hearer:
When the Lord Jesus spoke His parables to the crowd in Matthew 13, the Spirit of God tells us why He spoke in this way. It was the fulfilment of the word of the prophet, "I will utter things which have been kept secret from the foundation of the world" (Matt. 13:35). Here were divine revelations for the disciples of the Lord. But He spoke them in such a way that the very words which revealed God's mind to His own hid it from those who had no divine perception.
Where does that phrase place us in time?
Scripture often mentions the "foundation of the world" as the far edge of the past, the point "from" which human history is counted (Matt. 13:35; Matt. 25:34; Luke 11:50; Heb. 4:3; 9:26; Rev. 13:8; Rev. 17:8).
Until when did the silence last, and Who broke it?
"Kept secret from the foundation of the world" simply means that in the ways of God the secret had not yet been told. It is Christ Who discloses that secret.
When did He start teaching this way, and why then?
He often spoke figuratively. But parables only became prominent in His teaching after Israel refused Him... The group of parables the Lord gives there describes Israel's guilt in rejecting Him. They then show the kingdom of heaven set up in mystery by His ascension to the right hand of God... But from its beginning it held something dear to Him: His own special treasure, the church.
- Secret spoken. Matthew quotes Psalm 78:2 as prophecy. The Lord fulfils it as another Asaph: Asaph told a past history, Christ a history still to come.
- Secret sealed. The parables carry what no earlier Scripture contains. Nothing like them can be found in the writings that came before.
- Secret veiled. One and the same words reveal God's mind to His own and hide it from those without divine perception.
- Secret dated. "The foundation of the world" is the line from which human history is counted. The secret stayed untold until Christ disclosed it.
- Secret prized. These hidden things describe the kingdom of heaven in mystery, set up while the King is rejected. Inside it lies His own special treasure, the church.