003:035 "Here are my mother and my brothers. For wherever there
is one who has been obedient to God, there is my brother--
my sister--and my mother."
004:001 Once more He began to teach by the side of the Lake,
and a vast multitude of people came together to listen to Him.
He therefore went on board the boat and sat there, a little
way from the land; and all the people were on the shore close
to the water.
004:002 Then He proceeded to teach them many lessons in figurative language;
and in His teaching He said,
004:003 "Listen: the sower goes out to sow.
004:004 As he sows, some of the seed falls by the way-side, and the birds
come and peck it up.
004:005 Some falls on the rocky ground where it finds but little earth,
and it shoots up quickly because it has no depth of soil;
004:006 but when the sun is risen, it is scorched, and through having
no root it withers away.
004:007 Some, again, falls among the thorns; and the thorns spring up
and stifle it, so that it yields no crop.
004:008 But some of the seed falls into good ground, and gives a return:
it comes up and increases, and yields thirty, sixty,
or a hundred-fold."
004:009 "Listen," He added, "every one who has ears to listen with!"
004:010 When He was alone, the Twelve and the others who were about Him
requested Him to explain His figurative language.
004:011 "To you," He replied, "has been entrusted the secret truth
concerning the Kingdom of God; but to those others outside
your number all this is spoken in figurative language;
004:012 that "`They may look and look but not see, and listen and
listen but not understand, lest perchance they should return