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Mat 13:23. Ὃς, who) sc. the hearer; cf. Mar 4:20 : otherwise ὃς might also be referred to τὸν λόγον, the word.-καρποφορεῖ, beareth fruit) sc. perfect fruit.-ὅ μὲν-ὃ δὲ-ὃ δὲ, some-some-some) The pronoun ὃ is clearly here in the accusative neuter; for the subject[619] ὃς, which occurs here in the singular number, cannot possibly be divided into three classes of good hearers of the word by Ὁ ΜῈΝ-Ὁ ΔῈ-Ὁ ΔῈ (one-another-a third), which is the common reading.[620] Moreover the protasis has ὃ in Mat 13:8, and the parallel passage in Mar 4:8; Mar 4:20, has ἛΝ also twice over.[621] A single hearer’s plentiful, moderate, and less plentiful progress from three several grains, so to speak, is signified by a hundred, sixty, and thirty.[622] As there are three degrees of hearing without fruit, so there are also three degrees of fruitfulness; which is not, however, restricted precisely to the proportions an hundred, sixty, and thirty fold: for another grain might also produce forty, fifty, seventy, eighty, ninety fold, etc.: since there is a greater distance between the numbers one hundred and sixty, than there is between sixty and thirty. To him that hath shall be given.
[619] The word “Subject” is used here in its logical sense, viz. the Subject of the Proposition, i.e. the person or thing concerning which something else is predicated or asserted.-(I. B.)
[620] Such is the reading of E. M. In his App. Crit. Bengel writes: “ὅ ter) codd. nonulli vetusti apud Stapulensem, vel etiam alii apud Rus T. i., Harm. Evang. p. 1047; Ephrem Syrus f. σ. κ. δ. in vitâ Abrahamii; Isidorus Pelus. l. 2, ep. 144. Lat. Neogrœc. vel plures nee non Syr. (ὁ ter) edd. Aug. 1, Byz., etc., perinde ut versu 8, ὁ pro ὃ, et Marc. Mat 4:8, ἑν pro ἕν, non nulli habent codices.”-(I. B.)
[621] i.e. the ἓν, which occurs three times in Mar 4:8, is repeated as many times in Mat 13:20.-(I. B.)
[622] When such a hearer turns the one and the same doctrine, on the opportunity of hearing it being given him even a hundred times, to his own profit and that of others.-V. g.
Beng. does not seem to me to speak of a different reading, but of the common interpretation, that there are here three classes of good hearers. He plainly understands there to be the one and the same good hearer, who bears fruit from the same seed in different degrees at different times. Hence Luk 8:8 gives the one degree only, viz. the hundredfold, as the normal state of the believer’s fruitfulness. However, in opposition to Beng., the transition from ὃς to ὃ μὲν, ὃ δὲ, neut. nominative, would not be unnatural (whether taken of one and the same good hearer, or of different classes of good hearers), as the individual becomes in a manner identified with the seed in process of time, just as the nutritive elements of the soil become identified with, and taken up into, the young germ: hence σπαρείς, he who is sown (applicable to the seed, but here also to the person), occurs in Mat 13:19, and ἄλλα, Mat 13:8, is nominative neuter, and plural, followed by ὃ μὲν, ὃ δὲ. There is no notable variety of readings in the case.-ED.