Texts in Conversation
Mark ends the parable of the growing seed with the farmer sending in the sickle when the grain is ripe. The Gospel of Thomas ends a saying with a ripe crop and a man reaping with his sickle, and both may draw on the harvest in the book of Joel.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Mark 4:29
New Testament
26 He also said, “The kingdom of God is like someone who spreads seed on the ground. 27 He goes to sleep and gets up, night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. 28 By itself the soil produces a crop, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head. 29 And when the grain is ripe, he sends in the sickle because the harvest has come.”
Gospel of Thomas 1:21
Nag Hammadi
20 The disciples said to Jesus, “Tell us what the kingdom of heaven is like.” He said to them, “It is like a mustard seed, the smallest of all seeds; but when it falls on plowed soil it produces a great plant and becomes a shelter for birds of the sky.” 21 Mary said to Jesus, “Whom are your disciples like?” He said, “They are like little children living in a field that is not theirs. When the owners of the field come, they will say, ‘Give our field back to us.’ They take off their clothes in front of them to give it back and return their field to them. For this reason I say, if the owner of a house knows that a thief is coming, he will keep watch before he comes and will not let him break into the house of his kingdom and steal his goods. So you should keep watch against the world; gird your loins with great strength so that the robbers do not find a way to come to you, for the difficulties you expect will arise. Let there be among you a man of understanding. When the crop ripened, he came quickly with his sickle in hand and reaped it. Whoever has ears to hear should hear.” 22 Jesus saw infants being suckled. He said to his disciples, “These little ones being suckled are like those who enter the kingdom.” They said to him, “Then shall we enter the kingdom as little ones?” Jesus said to them, “When you make the two one, and when you make the inside like the outside and the outside like the inside, and the above like the below, and when you make the male and the female one and the same—so that the male will not be male and the female not be female—when you fashion eyes in place of an eye, a hand in place of a hand, a foot in place of a foot, an image in place of an image, then you will enter [the kingdom].”
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Notes and References
“... There is a possible parallel to the end of the Seed Growing by Itself (Mark 4:29) at the end of CGT 21, but (i) the brevity of the statement, which comes out of nowhere and seems to have nothing to do with anything else in logion 21, and (ii) the paucity of significant words shared by Mark 4:29 and this last part of CGT 21 ("fruit," "sickle") make any firm decision about dependence or independence nigh impossible. Both texts could be independently alluding to Joel 4:13 (3:13 in some English translations; cf. Rev 14:15–16). ...”
Meier, John P.
A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus, Volume 5: Probing the Authenticity of the Parables
(pp. 212-213) Yale University Press, 2016
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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