The parable about the wheat and the chaff or weeds is a good reminder about how the Gospel of Christ requires us to trust more in the work of God than in our own judgment. The weeds and the wheat do not correspond to different individuals as much as they refer to the mixed nature of our inner life. In the soul of any man or woman you will find both weeds and wheat – both what is obviously good and what is obviously bad. There is a temptation by the disciples of Christ, by those in a position to work the field, to get rid of the weeds. Obviously weeds are the bad thoughts, actions, words, etc., that are discernable at any given time. The question is not whether or not they need to be gotten rid of, but when they need to be gotten rid of. There are some faults – even moral faults – that we may find in ourselves or in others which actually play a role in preventing something worse. These weeds end up protecting the wheat. A great example of this is any humiliating sin. God may indeed allow a humiliating sin so that the wheat of humility will not be removed. Pride is a worse sin than anything we could do that would humiliate us.
Friday of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time
ORIGEN:
Not all the Gospel writers use the same terms in reporting this parable. Matthew wrote of “the evil one,” Mark of “Satan,” and Luke of “the devil.” The phrases “by the wayside” and “in the path” are not quite the same thing. Weigh in the allusion of the statement “I am the way.” Both Matthew and Mark say, most felicitously, that the word was sowed “on stony ground,” not upon a “stone.”
Now to all that which is “by the wayside,” the words “those who do not understand” apply. But to the good ground these words apply: “This is he who hears the word and understands it.” Perhaps then those seeds that fall “on stony ground” and those that fall “among thorns” fall between the people without knowledge and those who understand. This then is an exhortation to meditate diligently upon the faculty of perception. If the seed of the one who is dense is snatched away, the seed of intellect ought to be taken up and covered in the ground of memory, so that it may spread forth roots and may not be found naked or snatched away by the spirits of wickedness.
Saint James, Apostle
AMBROSIASTER:
By treasure, Paul meant the sacrament of God in Christ, which is made manifest to believers but which has been concealed from unbelievers with a veil. Just as a treasure is put in a hidden place, the sacrament of God is hidden within a person, in his heart. The reference to earthen vessels is an allusion to the weakness of human nature, which can do nothing unless empowered by God.
ORIGEN:
For God delivers us from afflictions not when we are no longer in affliction (… Paul says “we are afflicted in every way,” as though there were never a time when we were not afflicted), but when in our affliction we are not crushed because of God’s help. “To be afflicted,” according to a colloquial usage of the Hebrews, has the meaning of a critical circumstance that happens to us without our free choice, while “to be crushed” implies our free choice and that it has been conquered by affliction and given into its power. And so Paul is right when he says, “We are afflicted in every way but not crushed.”