(11) How is it that ye do not understand?--True to His method of education our Lord does not Himself interpret the parable, but is, as it were, content to suggest the train of thought which led to the interpretation. And the disciples, slow of heart as they were, followed the clue thus given. "Then understood they." Memory did at last quicken faith, and faith imparted the imaginative insight which sees its way through parables and dark sayings.

Verse 11. - That I spake it not to you, etc. The Revised Version, following many modern editors, divides the clause into two, thus: that I spake not to you concerning bread? But beware of the leaven, etc. This is the second ground for the Lord's reproof administered to the apostles. They had taken in a carnal, literal sense a word which he had used in a symbolical or mystical meaning. It is the want of spiritual discernment which he censures. They had had frequent opportunities of hearing and appreciating his mode of teaching: miracles, parables, discourses, had an inner signification, which it was their duty to apprehend. The want of understanding was a moral fault for which they were answerable. We may say it would have been easier for our Lord to have spoken of doctrine without using the misunderstood figure of leaven. But it is in the way of his providence to speak words which need thought and grace to make them fully comprehended. They are thus more impressed upon the heart and memory, and bring forth better fruit. A well instructed Hebrew ought to have no difficulty in understanding metaphorical allusions. His Scriptures were full of them, and could not be intelligently read without the light thus cast upon them.

16:5-12 Christ speaks of spiritual things under a similitude, and the disciples misunderstand him of carnal things. He took it ill that they should think him as thoughtful about bread as they were; that they should be so little acquainted with his way of preaching. Then understood they what he meant. Christ teaches by the Spirit of wisdom in the heart, opening the understanding to the Spirit of revelation in the word.How is it that ye do not understand,.... That you should be so senseless and void of thought, after such instances, as to imagine, that I concerned myself about what bread you brought with you; one would think you could not but know,

that I spake it not to you concerning bread, taken in a literal sense; but must be thought to speak figuratively and mystically, and to have an higher sense and meaning, when I said to you,

that ye should beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, and of the Sadducees; how could you think that I had any regard to the leaven taken in a literal sense, the Pharisees and Sadducees approve or disapprove of?