The "Parable of the Talents"always bothered me-any of you folks have problems with it? [View all]

It's the one that right-wing "Christians" cite to justify their argument that Christians have an obligation to be capitalists.

The one where the lord who has essentially enslaved these people gives them some coins(talents) and tells them to invest them in something.

Some of them do, but one of them assumes it's a trick, is sure that that he'll get in trouble if they make money off the deal, so he just holds on to the talents.

Later, the lord(not "The Lord", a lower-case "lord&quot comes back and mocks the dude who didn't so something with the talents. Jesus takes the side of this "lord" dude on the matter and kind of disses the one who didn't

Well...really, why SHOULD those people have trusted this guy about the investment thing?

And why the heck would Jesus condemn this guy for wanting to be sure he didn't get slapped down by the aristo who basically owned him?

Did this parable ever bother any of the rest of you? Should we really trust that it's something that Jesus himself would actually have believed? And does anybody know of any alternative interpretations for this parable?

I've sometimes wondered if the editors didn't put this in to get the merchant class in the Roman Empire off of the new faith's case.

Just wondering. Have a nice Friday.