Christ As A Teacher

He not only allowed His disciples to ask questions, but provoked them to do so. He deliberately wound His statements in obscurity and paradox, to excite the questioning propensity. He Himself gave this explanation of His habit of speaking in parables. The parable was a veil cast over the face of truth, for the very purpose of tempting the hearers to lift it and see the beauty which it half concealed and half revealed. A teacher has done nothing unless he awakens the mind to independent activity. As long as it is merely passive, receiving what is poured into it but doing nothing more, true education has not commenced. It is only when the mind itself begins to work on a subject, feeling within itself difficulties to which the truth supplies the answer, and wants to which it gives satisfaction, that growth commences and progress is made. What Christ said, set the minds of His disciples in a ferment; it was intended to raise in them all sorts of perplexities, and then they came to Him for their solution. (Dr. Stalker, in Imago Christi)