An interesting and difficult question regarding the harmony of the Gospels generally attaches itself to the exposition of this parable. Each of the four Evangelists narrates that a woman anointed Jesus while he sat at table; and it becomes difficult to determine with certainty whether they refer all to the same event, or some to one event, and some to another. In the narratives features of similarity occur; leading to the one conclusion, and features of dissimilarity leading to the other. The prevailing opinion now is that Matthew, Mark, and John, speak all of the same fact, and that Luke speaks of another. I have thought it right to mention, that this question has been often discussed in connection with our parable; but I shall do no more. The decision of it here and now is by no means necessary: the interpretation of the parable does not in any measure depend upon it. It is an inquiry belonging to a different branch of Scripture exposition, and to discuss it here would tend to distract attention from the subject in hand. Assuming then without argument that Luke here records an event which is not mentioned by any of the other Evangelists, I shall proceed at once to examine its substance as the ground from which the parable directly springs. The husbandman at one time operates directly on the tree, and at another time directly on the ground in the neighbourhood; in both cases however, and in both alike, his aim is to increase the fruitfulness of the tree; it is thus that an expositor must in some instances turn his attention in the first place to the surrounding context which suggests and sustains the parable, as the best means of ascertaining the import of the parable itself. A Pharisee invited Jesus to a feast: he accepted the invitation and joined the company at the appointed place and time. A woman who had been of bad character in the town, as soon as she learned that he was there, entered the apartment where the guests reclined at meat, and stood at his feet behind him weeping. Her tears rained down on his feet; she wiped them off with her hair, and then anointed them with precious ointment. Let us endeavour to determine precisely the character of the several actors and the meaning of their acts. The Pharisee, having formed, on the whole, a favourable opinion of Jesus as a prophet in Israel, and being, as he supposed, in a position to act the patron, with benevolent intent, but with a high estimate of his own character and position, invited to his house and table the remarkable Nazarene, whose miracles and doctrines were in every one's mouth. Doubtless he expected, also, that by closer contact, and by means of his own shrewd observation, he should be able definitely to make up his mind on the character of the new prophet, and so to favour or frown on him according to the result.