Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a net, that was cast into the sea, and gathered of every kind:
All Commentaries on Matthew 13:47 Go To Matthew 13
John Chrysostom
AD 407
After this, that we may not be confident in the gospel merely preached, nor think that faith only suffices us for salvation, He utters also another, an awful parable. Which then is this? That of the net.
And wherein does this differ from the parable of the tares? For there too the one are saved, the other perish; but there, for choosing of wicked doctrines; and those before this again, for not giving heed to His sayings, but these for wickedness of life; who are the most wretched of all, having attained to His knowledge, and being caught, but not even so capable of being saved.
Yet surely He says elsewhere, that the shepherd Himself separates them, but here He says the angels do this; Matthew 25:32 and so with respect to the tares. How then is it? At one time He discourses to them in a way more suited to their dullness, at another time in a higher strain.
