Parable of the workers in the vineyard

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Representation of Heinrich Andreas Lohe (1688/89) in the Hof Hospital Church

The parable of the workers in the vineyard is a parable from the New Testament of the Bible , which is told in Mt 20 : 1–16  EU .

content

The parable compares the kingdom of God with a householder who hires workers in the morning to work his vineyard . He agreed with them a daily wage of one denarius . The vineyard owner goes to the marketplace three more times every three hours and finally after eleven hours to hire workers.

At the end of the working day after twelve hours, he first pays the last employee, who only worked one hour, a denarius. Everyone else receives this reward too. The workers who worked all day complained to the landlord. They are demanding more wages because they have worked more. The landlord rejects the criticism, however, by reminding the angry workers that they had agreed with him beforehand about the payment of a denarius and that he could also handle his money as he pleased.

Interpretation of the parable

The "teaching" of this parable is a paradoxical reversal of common standards; It frames this in two variants, next to Mt 19.30  EU the famous formulation Mt 20.16  EU :

“ So the last will be first and the first will be last. "

Depending on the exegetical method, different aspects of this parable can be highlighted:

Social historical interpretation

The vineyard owner gives all workers exactly the wages that were necessary at that time to be able to support a family for a day. Since the parable ends with addressing the listener in thou form, it should be interpreted in such a way that Jesus wants to encourage his listeners to act in a corresponding way, namely to enable everyone to survive.

Old Testament orientation

In the Old Testament, the vineyard often stands for the people of Israel. Accordingly, in the parable the vineyard would stand for the whole world, which is being worked on for the final coming of the kingdom of God. The church then includes all those who work on it, no matter when they start. Pope Benedict XVI also saw himself in this role as a “humble worker in the Lord's vineyard” . as he emphasized in his first address from the Benediction Loggia.

Allegorical interpretations

The vineyard owner always stands for God.

  1. The workers are God's true children. They come to believe at different times, but they all share the same love of God.
  2. The first workers represent the hypocrites and Pharisees . They have no real faith, they are jealous and unjust towards their fellow human beings, they serve money and not charity, they rise above the agreement with the Lord, they get enough and just as much and are still dissatisfied, they want more justice and are not fair. In particular, this variant of the allegorical interpretation with the clichéd equation of the Pharisees with hypocrites is considered obsolete in modern Christian theology.
  3. God turns to the late, the sinners. Those who came first, the pious, don't need to worry that something will be taken from them, because they get the agreed wages.
Rational-economic interpretation - non-normative ethics

A rational-economic interpretation seems permissible, since the parable does not have any fabulous elements of fantasy: the story could have happened in reality. But what is happening is paradoxical in rational and economic terms. The good deed of the vineyard owner cannot become the rule by any norm or law. The fair payment of the same wages even for workers who came too late is ruinous for the company - and also provokes protests from regular workers. The parable thus shows an important example of non-normative ethics .

Comment on the psychology of religion

According to Fritz Oser and Gmünder, there are five levels of religious judgment . The respective level of religious judgment determines a person's thinking. Level 2 people would literally see the parable and say that God pays an hourly wage. People at level 4 interpreted exactly the opposite: God does not allow himself to be squeezed into categories of achievement and wages; he is concerned with the free development possibilities of all people.

Social psychological note

The theory of social identity ( Henri Tajfel ) examined different reward distributions in small groups. It turned out that profit distributions are not even about allocating the maximum profit to yourself (or your own group) , but rather that the aim is to maximize the difference to other people (or groups). So to a certain extent it doesn't matter how much you get, as long as you get relatively more than the others.

The sense of injustice from the parable of the workers in the vineyard can be seen as an early example of this theory.

reception

The principle of equal wages for all is taken up in a satirically exaggerated way in the DEFA animated film Nur ein Märchen (1963) with a real socialist adaptation of the Frau Holle motif.

genus

Due to the literary structure, which is approaching a climax in the form of the expression of the vineyard owner, it is a parable .

literature

  • Friedrich Avemarie: The parable of the workers in the vineyard (Mt 20: 1–15) - a social utopia? , in: Evangelische Theologie 62 (2002), pp. 272–287.
  • Friedrich Avemarie: To each his own? All of them! (From the workers in the vineyard) Mt 20: 1–16 , in: Ruben Zimmermann (Ed.): Compendium of the parables of Jesus . Gütersloher Verlagshaus Gütersloh 2007. ISBN 3-579-08020-2 , pp. 461-472. (Cf. http://www.ev.theologie.uni-mainz.de/zimmermann/gleichniskompendium/downloads/manuskripte/Mt%2020,1-16%20Avemarie%20%28Arbeiter%20im%20Weinberg%29.pdf )
  • Jean-Pierre Delville: L'Europe de l'exégèse au XVIe siècle. Interprétations de la parabole des ouvriers à la vigne (Matthieu 20, 1-16) . BETL 174. Peeters Leuven 2004 ISBN 90-429-1441-6 .
  • Catherine Hezser : wage metaphors and the world of work in Mt 20: 1–16. The parable of the workers in the vineyard in the context of rabbinical wage parables . Novum testamentum et orbis antiquus 15. Univ.-Verl., Friborg (CH) u. a. 1990 ISBN 3-525-53916-9 .
  • Hans-Joachim Petsch: To each his own. The parable of the workers in the vineyard . Kösel Munich 1984, ISBN 3-466-36203-2 .
  • Ludger Schenke: "The interpretation of the parable of the 'workers in the vineyard' (Matthew 20: 1-15) by Matthew". In the S. (Ed.): Studies on the Gospel of Matthew. Festschrift for Wilhelm Pesch . Stuttgart Bible Studies. Kath. Bibelwerk Stuttgart 1988, pp. 245–268.
  • Luise Schottroff : “The goodness of God and the solidarity of people. The parable of the workers in the vineyard ”(1979). In: Dies .: experiences of liberation. Studies in the Social History of the New Testament . Theological library. New Testament 82. Kaiser, Munich 1990, pp. 36–56
  • Johannes Seidel: “About the righteousness of God. The parable of the workers in the vineyard (Mt 20: 1–16) ”. In: Herbert Stettberger (Ed.): What the Bible tells me. Current exegetical and religious didactic highlights on selected Bible texts. Festschrift for Prof. Dr. Franz Laub . Bible - School - Life 6. Lit-Verlag Münster 2005, pp. 115–124.
  • Michael Theobald : “The workers in the vineyard (Mt 20: 1–16). Perception of social reality and talk of God ”, in: Dietmar Mieth (ed.): Christian social ethics in the demands of the future. Tübingen contributions to Catholic social teaching . Studies on theological ethics 41. Herder Freiburg 1992, pp. 107–127.
  • Reinhold Zwick : “The parable story as a scenario. Shown using the example of 'work in the vineyard' (Mt 20: 1–15) ”. In: Biblische Notizen 64 (1992), pp. 53-92.

Sermons

  • Eugen Drewermann : “From the workers in the vineyard. Matthew 20: 1-16 ”. In: Ders .: When the sky touches the earth. Sermon on the parables of Jesus . Patmos Düsseldorf 1992, pp. 47-60.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Georg Rainer Hofmann : The vineyard paradox. Can there be good misconduct? An essay on non-normative ethics. wbg, Darmstadt, 2019
  2. ↑ Georg Rainer Hofmann : Impulses of non-normative ethics for the economy - The Gospels on money and ruin, on failure and a new beginning. Nomos-Verlag, Baden-Baden 2018
  3. ^ Oerter and Montada: Developmental Psychology, Beltz Psychologie Verlags Union; Edition: 6th, completely revised edition (February 18, 2008), ISBN 3621276076 , page 945

Web links

Commons : Worker in the Vineyard  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files