A Prophet Without Honor
53 When Jesus had finished these parables, he departed from there. 54 Coming into his own country, he taught them in their synagogue, so that they were astonished and said, “Where did this man get this wisdom and these mighty works? 55 Isn’t this the carpenter’s son? Isn’t his mother called Mary, and his brothers James, Joses, Simon, and Judas? 56 Aren’t all of his sisters with us? Where then did this man get all of these things?” 57 They were offended by him. But Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor, except in his own country and in his own house.” 58 He didn’t do many mighty works there because of their unbelief.
He goes home, and the people who watched him grow up cannot get past knowing his family.
When Jesus had finished these parables, he departed from there.
The formula marks the end of the third discourse, as it has marked the end of each one Matthew 7:28 Matthew 11:1. What follows the parables is a scene that could serve as a case study in the first of them.
The visit to Nazareth is told in the earlier account Mark 6:1–29. He teaches in the synagogue of the town he grew up in, and the reaction is genuine astonishment: "Where did this man get this wisdom and these mighty works?" Matthew 13:54. They are not disputing that the wisdom and the works are real. That is what makes the scene so strange — the evidence is granted, and then set aside.
55 Isn’t this the carpenter’s son? Isn’t his mother called Mary, and his brothers James, Joses, Simon, and Judas? 56 Aren’t all of his sisters with us? Where then did this man get all of these things?”
The objection is a list of relatives. Four brothers by name, sisters who are still living in the town, a father's trade, a mother everybody could point out. Two of those brothers wrote letters that stand in the New Testament, and neither of them believed him at this stage John 7:5 — which is worth holding beside the last scene of the previous chapter, where the family stood outside and the crowd inside was called mother and brothers Matthew 12:49–50.
The thing standing in their way is familiarity. Not a doctrinal objection, not a rival explanation like the one the Pharisees produced, and not indifference — they were astonished. What they could not do was fit what they were watching into a category built out of thirty years of knowing where he lived. They were offended by him Matthew 13:57, and the word is the same one used of the ground with no root, where the plant came up quickly and fell over when pressure arrived Matthew 13:21.
They were offended by him. But Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor, except in his own country and in his own house.”
The saying is offered as an observation about how prophets are received, and the history behind it is long — Israel's own record of what it did to the men sent to it is the charge he will bring against Jerusalem at the end Matthew 23:37.
He didn’t do many mighty works there because of their unbelief.
The sentence has to be read for what it says. It does not say he could not have; it gives their unbelief as the reason he did not. Throughout this Gospel the works are done for people who came and asked — a centurion, a leper, two blind men, a woman who touched a garment — and in Nazareth nobody came. The mighty works are not a display put on for an audience, and a town that has decided it already knows who he is has removed the occasion for them.
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