• Modern large scale harvesting in the USA
• Photograph by Alfribeiro/istock

What did Jesus mean:

“The harvest is the end of the world”?

The title of this article is taken from some words of Jesus explaining one of his parables to his disciples. Perhaps they were puzzled; for them harvest was a time for joy and celebration, but Jesus' words sounded ominous. What did he mean?

Bible translators have not always helped. The Greek word translated as "world" is "aion", meaning an age or period of existence, not the physical planet. All the main modern versions translate the phrase as "the harvest is the end (or close) of the age". Jesus is not referring to some cataclysmic destruction of the planet and its inhabitants. He is talking about the close of the present age, meaning the end of the kingdoms of men, and the beginning of a new age, the Kingdom of God.

Jesus had been teaching a great crowd of people about this coming kingdom. Matthew's account of the day's work of preaching contains a number of Jesus' parables on this subject of the kingdom of God; this article will focus on just one, the parable of the wheat and the tares.

• The Amish community in America still harvest in the traditional way.
• Photograph from KLiK Photography/shutterstock

At the outset we should note two important elements of Jesus' teaching as follows: It focused on the kingdom; this was the essential message that he taught. The miracles of healing were a means of proving his authority as a teacher sent from God. His moral teaching of the supreme power of love was intended to show us the ways of God. But above and beyond both these elements, was the teaching about the kingdom of God; a kingdom where everyone will know God's laws and obey them, and where sin, disease and death itself will eventually be removed from the earth.

Jesus' method of teaching required his listeners to exercise their minds, to want to seek out and understand this divine teaching. The disciples asked why he spoke in parables. Jesus' reply was that only those who were prepared to seek out the truth would come to appreciate the full meaning of his words (Matthew 13:10-17).

This magazine tries to follow this pattern, to shed light on that new world order which will come when God's Kingdom is established on the earth. We encourage our readers to explore the teaching of the Bible, in order to know and appreciate the promises that God has made to those who listen and respond to His Word.

Parables of the Kingdom

In Matthew chapter 13, there are seven separate parables, each one explaining something about the Kingdom. Most of them start with the phrase "The kingdom of heaven is like ..." The phrases "kingdom of God" and "kingdom of heaven" have the same meaning. The Gospel message taught by Jesus was focused on this coming kingdom. The Bible does not teach that the kingdom of God is in heaven. It is of heaven in the sense that it is of divine origin, but it will be established on the earth when Jesus returns.

Some of these parables are probably familiar; the description of the man sowing his seed is perhaps the best known. It describes how the soil in which the seed is grown has a very great effect on the quality and quantity of the harvest yield. Seed sown on the path, in stony or weedy ground, will not produce as much grain as seed planted in good, well prepared ground (Matthew 13:18-23). Having explained the meaning of this parable, Jesus went on to give another harvest parable.

The wheat and tares

This parable is the one from which our subject is taken (Matthew 13:24-30). It describes a man who planted good quality seed in his field. The impression given is that he was a careful farmer who worked hard to achieve a good crop. But the farmer had an enemy, who came by night and over-sowed the field with tares.

Tares are a weed, also known as darnel. In appearance (see below picture) especially during the early stages of growth, it is almost indistinguishable from wheat. It is only when the plant has grown and the grain is developing that the difference becomes apparent. The darnel is a slate grey colour and is very bitter in taste. If its grain is mixed with the wheat, then the end product will be spoiled.

• Picture of Wheat and Weeds. Yes, they look similar.

As the crop grew, the farm labourers realised that their original planting had been over-sown with the darnel. They asked the farmer what they should do. His instruction was to leave the two crops to grow together until the harvest. The crops were both now grown to the point where they could be distinguished but their root systems would be intertwined. If an attempt was made to pull up the tares, it would also destroy the wheat. When the field was harvested, it would be easy to identify what was the good crop and what was bad. The two could be separated, and the weeds bundled up and burned before the grain was gathered in.

Explanation of the parable

Jesus did not provide an interpretation of the parable in his teaching. After the crowd had been sent home, Jesus was approached by his disciples, who asked him to explain the parable to them. Jesus then went through each element of the story, identifying its meaning (Matthew 13:37-43).

Jesus is the farmer who had spent time and energy preparing the field to receive the good seed. Drawing on the earlier parable of the sower, we can be sure that this ground was well broken up, the stones removed and all the encroaching weeds taken out. The farmer had helpers who assisted in the preparation of the field to receive the seed. The helpers are the apostles who were commissioned to take the gospel to the whole world (the field of the parable) following Jesus' death and resurrection (Mark 16:15).

The good seed are the children of the Kingdom. A comparison with Jesus' final words on this parable shows that the good seed are those who will eventually enter the Kingdom of God. Jesus describes them as the righteous who will

"shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father"

• Matthew 13:43

The meaning of the parable is shown in the table Below. Following the sowing of the good seed, an enemy also sows some seed. The important thing to notice is that the evil planting was not an obvious weed like thistles. It was something which, at first, had every appearance of a good crop. In reality it was not only useless, but positively damaging and poisonous. Jesus explains it as the work of "the devil" (see Matthew 13:39). This article is not the place to explore the Bible teaching about the devil. This is dealt with in detail in other issues of Light on a New World (see for example Light Volume 31.1 page 8). In essence, the Bible reveals the devil to be none other than our own human thinking, which left to its own devices will exalt self importance and try and reduce the authority of divine instruction (Matthew 7:15-20).

Because of the similarity between the good wheat and the evil tares, we must interpret this as an indicator that there would be false religions which pretended to be true but were found to be false – religions based on human thinking and preferences rather than the clear teaching of God's Word.

The development of false religion

This interpretation of the parable is not an isolated example of Scriptural teaching. Other examples abound, both in the teaching of Jesus and of the apostles. In his sermon on the mount, Jesus makes a much more explicit pronouncement: "Beware of false prophets" (Matthew 7:15). He goes on to identify how true teachers and false prophets can be distinguished:

"A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore by their fruits you will know them"

• Matthew 7:18-20

There is a close similarity to the parable of the wheat and tares in these words. The tares were identified once their fruit was revealed; then the tares were cut down and burned.

• After the harvest the weeds and stubble is often burnt.
• Photograph from CoreRock/shutterstock

On another occasion, Jesus was having one of his many arguments with the Scribes and Pharisees, men who professed to worship God but had made their own philosophy and tradition more important than the Word of God (Mark 7:8-13). Jesus condemned these false teachers saying:

"You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do."

• John 8:44

The tares in the parable were "the children of the wicked one", and this link provides further evidence that the tares represent those who pretend to teach true religion, but instead teach ideas based on their own thinking. In a very similar way the Apostle Paul had to withstand a false prophet and condemned him in these words:

"... you son of the devil ... will you not cease from perverting the straight ways of the Lord?"

• Acts 13:10

Paul constantly warned the early churches about the dangers of false religion. To the elders of the church at Ephesus he said:

"Also, from among yourselves men will rise up, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after themselves."

• Acts 20:30

In a letter to the believers at Thessalonica, he warned them about the development of a religion that claimed to be from God, but in reality was a manifestation of sin:

"... the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition, who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God."

• 2 Thessalonians 2:3-4

Similar warnings can be found in the writings of the Apostles Peter, John and Jude.

These warnings were not unfounded pessimism. Church history shows that the original Gospel taught by Christ and the apostles was slowly changed. At the beginning of this article, we showed how the Kingdom of God on earth was the centrepiece of Christ's teaching. The historian Gibbon confirms that in the first century this hope was "the reigning sentiment of orthodox believers", but he goes on to comment that:

"The doctrine of Christ's reign on earth was at first treated as profound allegory, was considered by degrees as a doubtful and useless opinion and was at length rejected as the absurd invention of heresy and fanaticism."

• The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 15, by Edward Gibbon

• The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon
• Photograph from 1stdibs.co.uk

So men rejected the clear teaching of the Son of God.

Lessons for today

The parable of the wheat and the tares has very important lessons for all who wish to be followers of Jesus. He has shown us that true Christianity would be challenged by another form of religion which at first sight looks the same. In reality, this religion is counterfeit, valueless and worthy only of destruction.

Although this religion is opposed to Christ, it will be allowed to co-exist with true religion until the Kingdom of God on earth is established. There will then be a time of judgement, when only those who have genuinely tried to follow the true teaching of Christ will be gathered into the Kingdom. Those represented by the tares will be destroyed, as we read in Matthew:

"... they will gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire ..."

• Matthew 13:41-42

It's easy to be complacent and say that the tares represent the pagan religions of the ancient Middle East. But the tares appeared to be very similar to the wheat, not something totally different. Combined with the warnings which abound in the New Testament, we must accept that the tares represent a corrupt form of Christianity. This sobering lesson must be a real challenge for all Christians today.

This publication can provide stimuli to set the reader thinking, but at the end of the day there is only one source of true understanding about God's Kingdom and the basis of true Edward Gibbon's monumental work "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" religion. The prophet Isaiah spoke out against the corrupt form of religion in his day that eventually led to the downfall of the nation of Israel. His words are just as relevant today:

"To the law and to the testimony! If they do not speak according to this word, it is because there is no light in them."

• Isaiah 8:20

 As he told his parables by the lakeside, Jesus pronounced a blessing on those who would seek to find out the real meaning of his teaching: 

"... blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear"

• Matthew 13.16

This is the main lesson that comes from this study – to determine to seek out from the Bible the true gospel message of salvation, and having found it, to act upon it and prepare for that day when the angels will separate the wheat from the tares! Jesus concluded the parable with an appeal to his hearers:

"He who has ears to hear, let him hear!"

• Matthew 13:43

• Photograph by Alfribeiro/istock