Life is a messy affair. Our purpose is often hidden. We have a parable today that originally may have tried to explore these mysteries — the parable of the weeds in the field. But once again the explanation that Mathew provided of this parable is probably not original, not something Jesus himself taught.
No, it is more likely, New Testament scholars increasingly agree, that Jesus' original point in the parable was to affirm the messiness, hiddenness, of life in a context where sectarian sentiments were dominating in the church to be more like the Pharisees and other devout groups of Jews in the era. Like the Pharisees and others, like the community of Jews responsible for the Dead Sea Scrolls and the group of Jews planning a military revolt against the Romans (the Zealots), Christians in …