How much in a parable is to be interpreted, and how much is incidental? In speaking of the Parable of the Good Samaritan Augustine said: Adam is the man who is attacked; Jerusalem is the city of peace from which he fell; Jericho means the moon, signifying mortality because it waxes and wanes and dies; the thieves are the devil and his angels; the Samaritan is Christ; the oil applied is the comfort of gospel hope; the beast on which the man is placed is the incarnation, the flesh in which Christ came to us. The inn is the church, and innkeeper is the apostle Paul. There are a number of suggestions for the two coins! We wince at that. It is over-applied. It is making every individual element of the parable to have significance; it is going beyond what Christ intended, and introducing an arbitrary meaning to the scaffolding of the parable. We would call that fanciful. Should we have a place for all of these elements? What is general, and what is to be applied? In the period of medieval interpretation, there were four senses to be looked for: the literal – tell it as a story; the allegorical – theological things and spiritual, which were surprisingly often right, but included too much detail; the moral – the implication for conduct, how one should act; the eschatological – the implications for future things, heaven and hell and eternity. They got more out of this absurdly elaborate method than many who use only a literal and technical approach in our day. A parable is not an allegory where every element has significance. They sketch a scene for us and they are interpreted by taking the picture as a whole. The meaning of parables became more apparent with the passing of events. Some refuse to read subsequent revelation back into the meaning of a parable. Their training has been affected by liberalism. Again, think of the Good Samaritan. They insist that this parable should be approached with no presuppositions and that you should ask what was the intent of the original author. If so you would be compelled to say Christ was not speaking of himself. We can go no further than that, they insist. But Christ was asked a question about eternal life that demanded a gracious response, and do we suggest he would give a works answer, destitute of saving truth? That would be absurd! Of course it is gracious, even if not evident then. He spoke about himself. That lawyer when he saw the cross and heard Peter, realised Christ spoke of himself. He was the Samaritan who did a great work. Elapsed time release the meaning of the parable. The sense of that response was concealed until the time.
Benjamin Keach has many things to say about the interpretation of parables in the introduction of his book, ‘Exposition of the Parables of the Bible’. He reminds us that ‘we must always take care to consider the main design and scope of them … or what our Lord chiefly designs therein’. He also warns that ‘it is not always to be expected, that every particular thing, passage, or action, mentioned in a parable, should be answered by something in the explication thereof ‘.